Apple — What An OS Upgrade Is Supposed To Be

Leopard Debut Line

This past Friday afternoon the boy and I hopped in the car and we drove down to the brand new Apple Store in Deer Park so that I could pick up the latest version of the Macintosh operating system dubbed Mac OS X Leopard (that would be “oh es ten Leopard” for the uninitiated).

The debut was set for 6 PM and we arrived at about 5:45 at which point the line was I’d say about 100 people long stretching all the way south from the store and just ready to curve around the corner. What was strange for me was the collection of different types of people that were there for the debut. Most of the time you would think that people waiting in line for the debut of a computer operating system would be mostly a collection of geeks like me. This was simply surreal. You had everything from Yuppies with their mochas to some kids from Stevenson High School. You had families as well, I had my son and the man behind me had a couple of his young kids with him. The folks in the line were as random a cross-section of people as you would expect just about anywhere else.

The doors opened up at 6 and the line moved really fast. We snagged our free Leopard t-shirts at the door and I got in line to pick up a copy while Aidan went and picked out his game as a reward for being good at school this week (Zoo Tycoon 2 by the way). The line at the counter went pretty fast and while waiting it was real tough to decide which version to get. No, this isn’t like Microsoft with 10 different versions with different features crippled in the OS. The decision for me was whether to get a single edition or a family pack (since we now have 3 Macs in the house) which allows you to install Leopard on up to 5 Macs in your home (what a novel concept).

At this point I was bitten by some of my old Windows habits. Before getting my first iPod and then shortly thereafter becoming a Mac enthusiast I was a major Windows geek and had hand-built my previous 5 PCs. Every Windows user knows, it was trumpeted from the heights when Vista came out, an upgrade to Windows usually means you have to upgrade your PC otherwise it will likely run slower before because that much more as been added to the OS. This has been the case for every Windows upgrade I’ve ever done. So although I did the Tiger upgrade before on my Mac that was just my Mac. Now I have to worry about my mom’s iMac and my son’s iBook. I was concerned it would run slower than Tiger and whether they really needed the upgrade or not. So, I got the single version and I get an education discount from Apple since I’m on the school board (one of the few forms of “compensation” I get for the many hours I put in there!).

Aidan entertains dad and the line.

So with Leopard and Zoo Tycoon 2 in hand we returned home and I immediately cracked open the package to start the installation on my year and a half old MacBook Pro — the first Mac to transition to Intel. Then the shockers began. First, the upgrade took about 45 minutes. In that time Leopard backed up my Tiger system so I could revert if need be and did the Leopard install, all behind the scenes since I just went with the express installation route. Then I fired it up and the true shocker ensued, everything runs faster. I mean it, I’m no sucker for these upgrades where your mind tricks you into thinking things run faster. I’m telling you everything from boot to opening Safari or Mail or any other task I’ve done thousands of times on Tiger runs faster. The system just pops, it is definitely noticeable. The final shocker — everything worked. I had a program or two that had to be updated but no searching for drivers or changing this or that to get it to work everything worked perfectly and I was doing one of my online singing gigs within an hour after doing the install.

There has been all of two snags that I have hit, the first being Apple has changed how the system accesses the hard drive that is connected to my Airport Extreme Base Station router. It’s no longer using the Airport Disk utility which is a good idea. What’s not a good idea is it doesn’t automatically mount the drive anymore, a few folks have complained about this in the Apple forums so I know it’s not just me. I’m sure they will come out with a fix for that shortly.

The other is with my M-Audio Firewire 410 audio interface and yet another case of it needing retirement. I’ve been getting some audio bugs and I’m sure they haven’t put out a driver for Leopard yet although M-Audio has announced they will. To be honest this is M-Audio’s problem as this driver has always been buggy and a pain. I like its features but I’m at wit’s end with it, I see a Presonus device replacing it in the near future.

So my decision in the line to just get a single version ended up costing me about $60 or so since it’s clear to me I can immediately put Leopard on my other Macs with no worries. I’ll try to purge the Windows habits for good when the next version of OS X comes out. Kudos to Apple for another great release, I love many of the new features (hooray for Stacks!!!) and am looking forward to discovering them all.

Cubs — What, me worry?

Yes, it’s time to worry now and no, I’m not happy with how Lilly pitched last night. Our pitchers are pressing though because we aren’t getting any offense.

This series is very simple — if Lee and Ramirez do not hit, we will not win. We’ve paid these guys a boatload of money, Lee butchered us in 2003 so we know he can hit in the post-season. Where is it? Some have mentioned Soriano but I see Soriano getting on base at least which is a far cry more than Lee and Ramirez right now. If healthy he would have made that catch against the wall but he’s clearly toughing his injury out and smashing into a wall to play a ball is not going to happen rought now. We’re not getting any offense anyway so maybe Pie in center wouldn’t have been a bad idea right now.

The Cubs can still win this series, I know they can. But it will take Lee and Ramirez showing up to do it. If our big guns can’t outduel the great Augie Ojeda and Stephen Drew we don’t deserve to advance anyway. Both of them seem to have no timing at all with Lee not looking at all comfortable and Ramirez trying to swing out of his shoes every time up.

Soriano has been aggressive on silly pitches though, he could have jumped on first pitch fastballs (Valverde gave him one two nights in a row) in the zone but has waited. Then he’s been chasing curve balls later in the count.

One ray of hope out of all this — Kerry Wood was truly impressive. That, and the play of Soto was good to see. The rest of these guys need to step it up or it’s going to be a long winter.

Cubs Loss, More Stupid Cubs Columns

You know, if there’s one overriding reason I would like for the Cubs to win besides the one from my last post, it’s to shut stupid sports writers up. I’m serious, I’ve had it with these boneheads. You know what really stinks? In the playoffs they add even more boneheads to cover and offer commentary on the game.

I knew I would see this junk though when I went to bed last night, just knew it in my bones. So let me clear up some facts here for everyone.

FACT: No matter what decision Piniella made with Zambrano the Cubs only scored one run. The way these nonsense columns were written you would think the Cubs had a lead and he pulled Zambrano and the bullpen blew it. That wasn’t the case.

FACT: Carlos Marmol has been the Cubs’ best reliever all year, has a miniscule ERA and an insane strikeout ratio. He’s young though, this was a great situation to put him in and if he’s going to blow something it’s a great time for him to blow it — Game 1 where there’s plenty of time left to play. It should steady his nerves, he was clearly trying to overthrow.

FACT: Zambrano has had his cramping issues past the point he was pulled last night. There is no guarnatee he was going to continue to pitch that way, it was a great performance. Pulling him with the game tied preserves his strength and his psyche. He’ll be back in Game 4 and it wouldn’t surprise me if that’s the game the Cubs close out the series. There is no doubt in my mind they can take the next three in a row.

Now that I’ve thrown those to facts out there I’ll put out some opinions.

For the D’backs this was a must win game, for the Cubs it was not. Webb is not slated to come back to pitch until Game 5, the Cubs can win this series without ever seeing him again. There is a precipitous dropoff of starting pitching talent after Webb. In fact, the remaining 3 guys are barely .500 if they are that and have high ERAs. The Cubs can bomb these kids now and it starts tonight with Ted Lilly who has playoff experience with Oakland. The Cubs put up a good showing against the stud (I should know, Webb is a keeper I’ve had for two years on my fantasy team). That was a good showing against Webb, I was disappointed they didn’t get more out of the 6th inning with the bases loaded. In fact, I was thinking to myself that Lou should have pulled Zambrano there. I would have much rather seen Daryle Ward coming up then with the bases still juiced and the Cubs ready to put Webb and the D’backs to bed. Webb was losing it in that inning, Zambrano couldn’t connect despite Webb still getting the ball up and not getting much bite on his sinker.

So despite the Cubs top of the lineup being unable to drive in Zambrano after a lead-off double in the 3rd inning this is somehow Lou’s fault according to a vast assortment of boneheads.

Mike Downey said today, “A decision that Lou Piniella made in the pressure cooker of the playoffs blew up in the manager’s face Wednesday night and cost his guys Game 1.” Horse manure. Did the Cubs have a lead when Zambrano was pulled? No they did not. Did Piniella fail to drive in runners in scoring position for three consecutive innings? No he did not. Let’s follow the great Mike Downey’s absurd logic here, the Cubs should have left Zambrano in. For how long? Another inning? The rest of the game? Let’s assume Zambrano pitches the rest of the game, doesn’t give up anything. Guess what Mike, the Cubs didn’t score another run the rest of the game. So I guess Lou should have just burned up his best pitcher in the first game when the offense clearly wasn’t clicking. Great idea Mike!

Next up we have Rick Morrissey who in the same paragraph acknowledges the Cubs had no offense going but this is Piniella’s fault for not leaving Zambrano in. Huh? Rick, again, the game was 1-1, the Cubs did not have a lead, they didn’t score another run, having Zambrano continue would have done what essentially other than assure he will not come back ready on 3 days rest for Game 4? “There might not be a Game 4″ Morrissey chirps. You’re right Rick, if the Cubs continue to face Brandon Webb the next two games and can’t put any offense against him there might not be one. Oh wait, Brandon Webb isn’t coming back until Game 5 though is he Rick? I can’t fathom the stupidity of this column, it makes no sense whatsoever. Piniella saw his offense sputtering against Webb and not cashing in its chances. Maybe if the Cubs get more than one run in the 6th he pushes Zambrano more and tries to take Game 1 and deal a near death blow to the D’backs. They didn’t though and he knew he would be taking a huge risk pushing Zambrano in a game they weren’t winning and weren’t generating much offense in. That’s why he’s in the dugout and you’re behind a computer Rick.

Next up, Phil Rogers writes a column about going with a three-man rotation being dumb. I normally like Phil and agree with his columns but this one is dumb as well. The Cubs don’t have a reliable fourth starter, period. Who are the D’backs going to throw against the Cubs in Game 4 at Wrigley? The vaunted Micah Owings who pitched two good games his last two starts against two very bad teams but only lasted 2 1/3 against the mighty St. Louis Cardinals the start before that and gave up five runs in three innings against the Padres before that one. The Cubs put up three runs on seven hits in six innings on August 24th the second time seeing him. He started out 4-1 but ended up 8-8, has a 4.303 ERA and a 1.284 WHIP, I’m not scared. Rogers makes a reference to the 2003 Cubs starting a rested Kerry Wood in Game 4 against the Braves in the NLDS. The Cubs had four solid starters in 2003, they do not in 2007. I knew Kerry Wood, Phil, Jason Marquis is no Kerry Wood. Wrap fish with that column.

Let’s stop picking on the Tribune now, over at CBS Sportsline Scott Miller wrote a pretty even handed article about the move. Despite cracking some jokes about the Cubs, perpetual losers, looking ahead he covered the reasons Piniella made the move, how solid Marmol has been, etc. Good column.

Over at the Daily Herald something weird was going on. Even handed columns were being written while being tainted with stupid headlines. You can only see these in the print edition, the web headlines are different. So I encourage you to pick up today’s edition of the Daily Herald and look at the goofy blatantly stupid “No really good reason to lift Big Z” a sentiment not found anywhere in Mike Imrem’s column. I like Mike very much, I think he always writes a great column. So does Barry Rozner who I think jumped the gun as are many Cubs fans. We won’t know if Piniella came up short on the move last night until Game 5.

Even if the Cubs lose this series, it doesn’t change the fact they only scored a single run. Soriano came up in the bottom of the 9th and got the fastball he should have been looking for right over the heart of the plate — he looked at it. That pretty much sums up the Cubs offensive performance last night, guessing wrong. That is why they lost last night, not anything Piniella did.

Cub Hope Springs Eternal In Heaven

It’s here, the day is upon us when the beloved Chicago Cubs will take to the field in the National League Divisional Series. It’s been four years since they were last there but it seems like a lifetime ago when you look at all the changes to the Cubs roster. It’s even more staggering when you consider how long it has been since the Cubs have been in a World Series let alone won one.

I come from a long line of die-hards on both sides of the family and die many of them have. I even have a relative who died at Wrigley Field. For decades my family has watched the Cubs try and fail and try and fail again. So here we are, in the playoffs again and every Cub fan asks himself “is this finally the year” or “will it finally be different this time”? All I can tell you is hope springs eternal in heaven.

My father has been gone for 8 years now and in his 55 years he never saw the Cubs play in the World Series, that he could have remembered anyway. When I think of it now the suffering he endured during his life at the hands of one Cubs team after another it’s quite unimaginable. Add to that his parents, his brother and sister, virtually an entire side of my family that has risen and fallen in the time since the Cubs last won a World Series. That’s the perspective it needs to be put in. To many this just may be sport, not anything to get all caught up in, but those of us who have lived the life of a Cubs fan know that it is far more than that, it’s about hopes and dreams you’ve held since you were a child. Now it’s gotten to the point where the hopes and dreams of generations are being pinned on the Cubs.

I can honestly say though this team has given me a lot of hope but I am giving them the high expectations they should be riding on. This team was bought and paid for to win and win it should. The Cubs definitely have as good a shot as any other team. The regular season is over and the real season starts today. What happened before today means nothing now. We finally have a manager who cares about one thing and that’s winning. Lou Piniella doesn’t care about what the reporters say, what his players say, or what anyone has to say about how he runs the ballclub. He manages to win and that’s all there is to it.

So when I heard Lou speak about getting teary-eyed to the strains of “Go Cubs Go” piped from the Wrigley rafters when the Cubs win I think I realized that Lou really does get it here. The Cubs have been a franchise of hope surrounded by a century of misery, every Cub fan knows that. We also know the ones who have their seats in heaven now including Steve Goodman who wrote and sang “Go Cubs Go”. There are many that have come and gone over the years and many more who are trying to hold on so that they can see the day. That day would be when the Cubs win the World Series and all the nonsense of curses and goats and Bartman generated by lazy sports writers will be dead and buried – exorcised from our favorite franchise forever. Then again, as it should be today and as it should always be, it will be about winning.

I demand a World Series victory for myself, for my family and for all those who have come and gone who won’t be living to see it. The Cubs owe us that much and we should demand it from them. World Championship and anything short of that is a disappointment. Hope does spring eternal, but hope is not a method. The Cubs need to get it done. Go Cubs Go!!