In this post I highlight three iPad apps, Photoshop (PS) Express, PhotoPad, and Sketchbook Pro. All of the apps above seem to hone in on different areas for photo editing and they each do what they do on the iPad really well. Read more…

Yesterday, we had whole wheat pasta with an Alfredo sauce over broccoli, carrots and red peppers. It was so good. Another favorite was Zucchini Parmesan.

After staying away from meat for a few weeks, tonight we thought we’d try just some grilled salmon. It sounded good, and looked good with a nice glaze. My husband liked it. But as for me, I think I may put off eating meat for a while.

I’ve been feeling really good physically only eating veggies (will eat eggs and cheese). And I’ve been careful about getting protein from legumes, seeds and nuts, as well as having the occasional protein shake with almond milk. But today after eating some of the fish, I just didn’t feel like my body needed the meat. It’s not because it was salmon, as I have liked salmon in the past. It’s just that my body is telling me I don’t need meat, or I’m telling my body this. Either way, I’m looking forward to getting the fish smell out of the house and keeping fish, or any meat, off of my plate—for now.

So, here I go into veggie land.

In this post, inspired by Nic Marks, I want to expand on what he has referred to as the Five Ways to Well Being, “What positive actions can you do to improve well being in your life?”

Five Ways to Well Being

But why don’t all of the car makers in the auto industry create web sites that are mobile friendly? It would make sense to build mobile-friendly auto web sites since I’m thinking they may target similar demographics as mobile telecommunication and tablet manufacturers.

Additionally, if I was able to use a fully functional auto web site on my mobile device, I could build a car or two (for comparative purposes), save it on my iPad, walk into the car dealerships that I’ve narrowed in on with my car choices including specifications and options, and proceed with purchasing my chosen vehicle. Why not, right?

So, I went to a number of car web sites in the last 24 hours and this is what I found:

Ford.com: The main page looks good and the menu is functional which is also good. However, once I click on “Cars” and choose a model to “Build and Price” I’m stuck because the site goes to flash. Not good for anyone using iOS.

GM.com: Clicking on”Vehicles & Innovations” and “Vehicles Home” I get the choice of “Get Flash Now” or “Non-Flash Version” where I choose the latter. The difference between the two site versions is huge.  I can look at a bunch of little thumbnails of cars that’s sorted by class, but the site could be much better. They could have made it so there’s a nice image at the top of the page (for visual appeal) and then when you click an image, the top image is replaced with the model chosen before clicking through for the details of the auto; it would just work better visually. I felt cheated after seeing the Flash version on my laptop. Having said that, after I clicked into the details of a vehicle, it got better visually.

Chrysler.com: The best mobile auto site. Good functionality and look on the home page, can build own vehicle, and view the complete specs of the built car. The only thing I would have appreciated was the ability to save the car with specs as a pdf. Visually appealing site with fully functional menu and interactive. The Chrysler.com site offered the best iPad browsing experience. Well done.

Toyota.com: On the home page, the mobile button on upper right is cut off on the ipad. There’s no functionality to build a vehicle or really get any of specs. All I can view are some very brief and general descriptions of the model, but I’ve not yet found any details on models or options. I also downloaded the iPad app and it was even more limited. I can view photos and demos, but nothing that would be useful in my car buying and decision-making process. Their non-mobile web site has plenty of details, features and specs. The Toyota.com web site seemed better suited for an iPod or iPhone; the look and feel of the interior pages was better than the home page.

Honda.com: I can build a vehicle, but when I was actually building a car, I couldn’t see all of the accessories that were listed and available. However, when I went to the site on my laptop, I could see that there was a scroll bar in a frame that was not usable on the iPad. If not for the poor functionality because of the frame issues, this was a good site. Lot’s of information and details that would be useful toward making a purchase. The Honda.com web site was really good visually.

Mazdausa.com: The main page has “Wireless Home” in the title, and a ton of white space on the page to the right of the menu which made this the worst main page display. I clicked in to interior web site pages, and no change.  All of the text and images only used about a third of the display. Text was tiny and images were tiny thumbnails. I could see specs, but again, every page occupied a third of the available space.  Even the gallery had images too small that didn’t take advantage of the screen. This was a huge disappointment considering two car purchases I’ve made have been Mazdas. Not a good iOS experience at all.

HyundaiUSA.com: I can build my own car which was great, but I was only given a very small popup window with general information—no details or specifications on the car I had just built. I could have taken advantage of the “save” option but I would have had to give my email and personal info. Thanks, but no thanks. I would have liked a printable/pdf page with a summary of all specs and options. The look and feel of the HyundaiUSA.com site was good.

Kia.com: This mobile site seemed like it would be fine for an iPhone, but not so much for the iPad. There wasn’t any build a vehicle feature, so no real help in building the car I might want to buy. Having said that, the Kia.com site did give more details, specifications and features and options than competitor sites, although without visual impact. Also, while the options, features and specifications were available, the list was long and very basic in it’s web presentation.

Well, there you have it.  I hope this has been helpful. At the very least, it’s been helpful for my own car-buying process.

Then when Pew released another report on January 11 indicating some mismatches between mainstream press coverage and public interest on some topics (not including the economy), it seemed to give a reason as to why we tend to go to the internet for the news.

In general, the public tended to maintain its interest in major breaking news stories considerably longer than the press did. And the press tended to maintain substantially more interest in Washington Beltway controversies than did its audience.

So, I decided to write a quick article on some good sources I’ve found for trending news and what tools I tend to use the most to get the news I want.

• Twitter.  I admit, I love Twitter.  I don’t sit and stare at it all day, but I do follow several news Twitter feeds.  I found it helpful to create topic lists (like news and tech) and put those I follow in these lists. This is helpful when I’ve been away from Twitter for a while because I can take a look at a particular list as a filtered topic without seeing all of the other updates.
• Google Trends.  With this, I get a quick look of trending topics and searches. Often I’ll dig a bit deeper into the topics and searches to get a better idea as to why something is trending.
• Google Timeline. I used this tool in my search for happy news.  You can enter a term in the search field (like “economy”) and find articles that mention the term.  Filtering can be used in a number of ways to get as specific, or general, as needed.
• Favorite news sites. Of course, you can go to your favorite news sites to get the latest news.

iPad apps great for getting the news online

News resources and apps I use on the iPad:

• Pulse. This is one my favorite news apps and the first place I go for the news.  I can add a whole host of web sites under 5 different topic tabs.  Pulse has featured sources, but you can add any site’s rss feed to the reader.  I like this app because of the amount of information I have easily available without having to go to different web sites. When viewing an article, you have the choice of text or web pages and then there’s some share buttons to easily send it to to social sites or email. There’s also the ability to open up any article in Safari.
• SkyGrid.  This app is another “one stop shop” for news.  It has Featured, Most Viewed and Team Favorites sections in addition to giving you the ability to view the latest news by categories and you can search and follow any topic or interest.
• Flipboard. Another nice app because it’s really visual. You can also search for and add “people, lists and blogs” on Twitter as well as Facebook. The display is a fun magazine format that’s just nice to read.

So where do you get your news from? If you have any great ideas that I missed, let me know. Thanks!

• Disposable dusters to microfiber duster.  I am one of those people that’s pretty allergic to dust. It really causes problems for me. While my husband can use a washable dust cloth, I can’t and only used the dusters with handles because of my allergies. We did find that we could wash them a couple of times before they fell apart, but this was hardly a good solution. At Ikea, we found a long-handled microfiber duster for just $2.99 that’s really awesome.  It’s bendable and when it’s dirty, it just goes in the washer and comes out just perfect (like when we bought it) and ready for another round of dusting.
• Quilts to Duvets (Comforters). I love the really nice patchwork quilts.  But I found that just after a couple of years, regardless how much I spent on the quilt or how careful I was, the stitching started coming apart and I’d find myself spending almost as much time mending the quilt as using it. So, I replaced our quilt with a duvet (comforter) and cover.  Again, Ikea has some comforters as low as $9.99 along with a good selection of duvet covers with matching pillow cases.  I can wash the duvet cover and when the cover wears out or I want to change the look in my room, I can keep the duvet and get another cover.
• Throw pillows with removable covers. I don’t know why I didn’t make this move before, but we’ve covered all of our accent and throw pillows with zippered removable covers.  They’re easy to keep clean, nice looking, and easy to coordinate in whatever room I want to use them in. I’ve purchased covers in a variety of fabrics and styles so you can go as casual or fancy as you want. Best of all, the covers really extend the life of the pillows.
• Furniture with removable cushion covers. We recently replaced our living room furniture because it was getting hard to maintain.  After donating the old furniture to a local charity, we purchased an L-shaped sofa with removable cushion covers. While it was a larger purchase, I’m so glad we did this.  We recently realized how much of a good move this was when we had a spill, removed the covers, took them to the earth-friendly dry cleaners and got them back as good as new. The other cool thing is that not only are the cushion covers removable, but the entire sofa can sport a new look with a new sofa cover (yes, from Ikea) if we wanted.
• Use natural or Shaklee cleaning products. To take care of water lime scale, we use lemon juice and as an abrasive cleaner or deodorizer, we use baking soda. For a multipurpose cleaner, we use  Shaklee’s chemical free Basic H2 (organic cleaning concentrate is a non-toxic biodegradable, all-purpose cleaner). In different concentrations, this multipurpose cleaner can be used on everything from glass, to countertops, to our car. (Disclaimer: I am not a Shaklee distributor.)

If you’re looking to update or replace electronic gadgets, Lifehacker.com has a great article highlighting Five Easy Places to Recycle Your Old Gadgets and Computers that’s a must read.

I found out about E-Books for Troops while reading an article by James Fallows of The Atlantic.  This program takes gently used Kindles to fulfill their mission

“To provide U.S. military personnel with free e-book readers and quality reading material in order to enhance their opportunities for recreation and renewal while defending our nation at home and around the world.”

With my husband having served in the USAF, we talked about what a great initiative this is and how useful this would be for military members during deployments. Deployments can be anywhere from 3-12 months and with limited resources and storage, having a Kindle would enable military members to have their personal (and even professional) libraries with them.

If you don’t have a Kindle to donate, don’t worry. Ebooksfortroops.org has a PayPal button where you can make a monetary donation.  They’re also participating in the Amazon.com affiliate program so if you go to their site and then click through to buy from Amazon, Ebooksfortroops.org gets the referral.

1. Multitasking: With iOS 4.2 came multitasking.  To check the latest apps that have been used on the iPad, just hit your iPad button twice (in the image, the button by the yellow arrow). Once the mutitasking menu is visible, you should see the apps you’ve recently used.  If you scroll to the left, you’ll get the option to adjust the screen brightness, lock the screen to keep it from rotating, or play music from the iPod app. If you scroll to the right, you’ll see more of the apps that were recently used.  I really appreciate the easy access to my favorite apps and the ability to easily change my screen’s brightness without having to go into settings.
2. Web Browsing.  Browsing in Safari gives you quick access to nine screens.  Just don’t forget to use and access bookmarks for quick access to more web pages.  I also use the Read It Later app so that I can add pages to my Read it Later library (easily synched online) and then quickly remove them after reading.  I use the app for less permanent reading such specific articles versus using the bookmarking feature in Safari for web sites.
3. Images. Also when it comes to browsing, keep in mind that if you want an image that is worth a thousand words, just ‘touch’ the image and hold your finger or stylus on the image, a menu will appear that will let you either copy the image, or save it to your “saved photos” folder in your Photos app.
4. Screen Shots. If a screen shot was what you had in mind, you can do that, too.  Just press and hold the power button (green arrow in top image) and click the  iPad button (yellow arrow in top image) until you see the screen flash.  The flash means that the screen shot has been taken and saved to the Saved Photos folder in the Photos app.  And when you sync the iPad with your computer, the screenshots will go in the folder you’ve designated for synching on the computer. If you want to, you can email the screen shot in the Photos app by going to the Saved Photos folder, touching the thumbnail of the screen shot and then touching the square with the arrow on the top right of the screen.  This will open a menu that will allow you to email the image.
5. The Touch Screen.  If you’re like me and fingerprints on the screen bug you ever so slightly, you may want to get yourself a microfiber cloth.  I have one that I keep with my iPad and it works great on those tell-tale finger prints and stylus marks. I don’t really use the cleaner that came with the cloth because the microfiber cloth works great on the touch screen with just an easy wipe.

Hope this helps.  Have fun!

Since it’s just my husband and I (both working), we had Greens & Grille roasted potatoes with a California Cobb salad.  Their food is so, so good. I feel a bit spoiled after going there.

On Tuesday I caved and had a chicken salad with rice and black beans and taco.  It was good, but I realized after eating that I probably didn’t need the meat.  I felt way too full.

Wednesday and Thursday we had soup for lunch and salads with rice for dinner.  Now I know that I wasn’t just going to have salads on meatless days, but that’s just what I’ve been craving. I just absolutely love raw vegetables.  In the salad we had avocado, apples, red and green peppers, and corn with romaine lettuce.  It was so good; filling but light.

Friday we had baked potatoes with (you guessed it) salad.  I’m really serious about loving the raw vegetables–it’s my favorite meal.  In last night’s salad we had red and green peppers, apple, avocado, and broccoli with a baked potato (skins rubbed with sea salt). Super yummy.

On top of all of this, we made the switch to almond milk. I have to admit I had to get used to the consistency because it seems richer than the skim milk I had grown accustomed to, but it’s really good. The first time we got just plain almond milk and this time we got vanilla flavored. The thing is that the almond milk actually feels like a treat. Oh, and the best part is that when it comes to milk, we are lactose and cholesterol free, as well as without all of the other “extras” that come with dairy milk.

What a great week, right? Now, let’s see how we do next week.

• In order to get access to the Mac App Store, you need to update Mac OSX on your computer.  When you update OSX, an app will install on your dock to access the Mac App Store—and no, the Mac App Store is not included in iTunes.  Yeah, I thought it would be in the iTunes store, too. The update will require you to restart your computer so be sure to save all of your open files before you restart. Once the Mac App Store is downloaded and installed, you can click on the icon on the dock and start browsing (or buying) the apps.
• The terms and conditions must be accepted.  If not, you’ll probably get an error.  I didn’t get the error, but there was quite a bit of buzz online about getting an Error 100.
• Apps that are purchased or downloaded are automatically added to the dock.  This is probably so that you can see the apps easily after they’re downloaded and installed.  I don’t know about you, but my dock was packed as it was, so the additional apps on my dock made my icons pretty small. If you plan on really trying some apps from the Mac App Store, you may want to combine apps in the docs into stacks.
  • You can go to the Apple site to find out how to work your dock a bit.
  • I found that creating aliases (two-finger or right click any program to make an alias) for the programs I wanted on the dock, and then putting the program aliases in a folder, and finally clicking and dragging the folder to the dock worked really well for me. Once on the dock, click to reveal your options menu (for me it’s a two-finger click) to choose whether the folder displays as a “stack” of icons or as the folder icon.