Wedding Update, New Toys, Fun at Work, and More!

Well, a lot has been going on in the month since my last post. It is getting closer and closer to my wedding. Over the weekend, Stephanie and I went down to the Cook County Clerk's Office and picked up our Marriage Certificate. We have been trying to get a grip on all of the little last minute things we need for the wedding: favors, bridal party gifts, cake topper, etc. We have also had our two wedding showers (one in Minnesota, one in Illinois) and received a lot of great stuff, so Thanks! again to everyone who came. All-in-all, it has been a very stressful time =)

We found some time to unwind this weekend. On Sunday, we went down to the Taste of Chicago for the afternoon to walk around to different food vendors and sample some of what Chicago has to offer. Last Friday, my new toy came in, the Canon Digital Rebel XT (with starter kit), so I am now trying to find my way around all the cool new features that separate the Digital SLR cameras from the Point-and-Shoot cameras. Hopefully I can get some good fireworks shots with this camera when I am in Minnesota over the 4th of July holiday =)

As of Today, I am no longer a Web Developer at Leapfrog, but a full-fledged Software Engineer =) This comes after a three month migration period where I have had to do both jobs. As a part of the job transition, I have been learning Ruby on Rails development, which will be my primary focus as a Software Engineer at Leapfrog. So far, the world of Ruby and Rails seems like a good direction in which to go and I have a fine mentor at Leapfrog, Jeff Cohen (from Softies on Rails), in which to follow.

Recipe: Beef Taco Skillet

I love finding new recipes, this one I got from my mom, who found it in a magazine. Really tasty and easy to make.

Serves: 4 - Cook Time: 20 Minutes

Ingredients

• 1 pound Ground Beef
• 1 can (10 3/4 oz.) Campbell's Tomato Soup (Regular or 25% Less Sodium)
• 1/2 cup Salsa
• 1/2 cup Water
• 6 Flour Tortillas (6"), Cut into 1" pieces
• 1/2 cup Shredded Cheddar Cheese

Directions

1. Cook beef in 10" skillet until well browned, stirring to break up meat. Pour off fat.
2. Stir in soup, salsa, water, tortillas. Heat to a boil. Reduce heat to low and cook for 5 minutes. Top with cheese.

Recipe from the Campbell's Kitchen.

Back-to-Back Concerts

It's been a while since I've got the chance to go see a concert, but this week I had two concerts to go to:

Three Days Grace, Breaking Benjamin, Puddle of Mudd, and Red

On Tuesday (May 22nd), I went to the Congress Theater to see Three Days Grace, Breaking Benjamin, Puddle of Mudd, and Red. Overall, a good show, the only band that I didn't like, was Puddle of Mudd. I'm not saying that I don't like the band, I own Come Clean and Life on Display, I think they are good albums with catchy songs, but they just had no stage presence. Everyone in the band pretty much just stood on their mark the whole night playing longer, dragged out versions of their songs (they even had an interlude with a song off the Grease soundtrack). This was probably the first show I have been to where the number of females in the audience approached the number of males. The vast majority of the females in attendance were there for Puddle of Mudd, which was disappointing because the opening act, Red, would have had a much more livelier crowd if Puddle of Mudd was not on the bill. By the time Breaking Benjamin played their first song, the attitude of the crowd had changed completely; from standing around singing along to Puddle of Mudd (which I would have rather done in my car), to starting up pits and crowd surfing with Breaking Benjamin. The metal-heads finally took over the floor and Breaking Benjamin and Three Days Grace put on a good rock concert.

Static-X, Otep, and Invitro

The following night (May 23rd), I went to the House of Blues to see Static-X, Otep, and Invitro. For the first time hearing Invitro, they were pretty good. The band features former SNOT/SOULFLY guitarist Mikey Doling, and they opened the night up by coming on stage wearing white lab coats and masks made from aluminum foil. Their debut CD comes out on August 7th, 2007, but they had copies on sale at the House of Blues for only ONE DOLLAR. Otep was a little disappointing, not because of their choice of songs, but the transition between songs was to long and politically motivated. I don't care what a band's political point of views are, just stop the preaching already, we get it. Static-X headlined, pushing their new CD, Cannibal, by playing about 5 new tracks intermixed with the classics. They put on a great show, like always, and the crowd that night was much more active than it was the previous night with Three Days Grace and Breaking Benjamin, making it very enjoyable.

Wedding Bands

On May 4th, 2007, Stephanie and I went back to Wedding Bands and Company to sit down with Koorosh Daneshgar and start designing our wedding bands (back story: I'm Getting Married!, Engagement Ring). Last night, we received an email from Koorosh with pictures of the two designs:

Michael's Wedding Band Design

Stephanie's Wedding band Design

Note: the engagement ring pictured in the above design is not quite the engagement ring that Stephanie has. The one pictured above has a prong setting, while Stephanie's ring has a bezel setting.

Book Review: Jason Beaird's "The Principles of Beautiful Web Design"

Rating: 4 out of 5

I consider myself knowledgeable in generating the CSS and xHTML code needed to get a design from paper to the web. What this book does is attack the area of development in which I need help with: creating the design. This book teaches the basics of design principle in Layout and Composition, Color, Texture, Typography, and Imagery. Like all SitePoint books, The Principles of Beautiful Web Design walks you through a project from beginning (talking to a client) to end (polished web design) in order to provide a real world example of the material being taught.

The most informative chapters, for me, in this book were: Color and Typography. The chapter on Color goes over the basics of color psychology, color theory, and creating a color palette. There were a few good resources identified in this chapter including: the Color Scheme Generator from WellStyled and Jonathan Snook's Colour Contrast Checker. The chapter on Typography goes over the anatomy of a letterform, typeface distinctions, and choosing the right fonts. One of the most helpful bits in this chapter was a web resource: Marko Dugonji's Typetester, which allows you to compare a variety of text options side-by-side to help you choose the right font and styling for your web site.

This is a good resource for developers, like myself, who want to learn more about the design world (at least how it applies to the web). What this book does not do, and is not intended to do, is teach you about xHTML, CSS, or PhotoShop. So, if you are a designer and want to learn how developers work, this book is not for you. I am looking forward to applying what I have learned throughout the book to my next web project (you might just see some changes on this site as well).