I was never an Apple fan to begin with and I do not own (and have never owned) any Apple products. However, I still appreciated them for their creativity and ingenuity when it comes to design and user-intuitiveness. A quick look at the smart phone market will immediately show how everyone is trying to imitate Apples technology and/or design. It’s probably safe to say that Apple revolutionized personal computers, music and smart phones. Steve Job’s vision changed the way people work and play today.

I particularly loved watching Steve Jobs giving his signature keynote speeches. His onstage charisma is incomparable. Apple would have never become what it is today without the lead of Steve Jobs.

Steve, rest in peace. You will be well missed by all.

3 Favorite Catholic Podcasts (SQPN)

• The Break with Father Roderick (website)|(rss)
• Catholic in a Small Town (website)|(rss)
• Catholic Weekend (website)|(rss)

3 Favorite Catholic Podcasts (Catholic Radio)

• Catholic Answers LIVE – This Week (website)|(rss)
• EWTN Audio Library (website)|(rss)
• The Catholics Next Door (website)|(rss)

3 Favorite Catholic Podcasts (Others)

• BustedHalo Cast (website)|(rss)
• pray-as-you-go (website)|(rss)
• Faith & Family Live! Podcast (website)|(rss)

3 Favorite Catholic Blogs

• JIMMY AKIN.ORG (website)|(rss)
• The Integrated Catholic Life (website)|(rss)
• Catholic Cartoon Blog (website)|(rss)

3 Favorite Catholic Apps (Android)

• Catholic One (AppBrain)|(Android Market)
• Evangelizo – Daily Gospel (AppBrain)|(Android Market)
• iBreviary (AppBrain)|(Android Market)

My current project is this blog, of course. I try to review podcasts, blogs, apps, etc, Catholic or otherwise, but I’m a little behind since work has been piling up. Still slowly trying to clean-up broken links and obsolete items.

I made it to Top 50! #18 to be exact. I don’t know how I did it but somehow, I did.

Thanks to all my 13 followers on NetworkedBlogs who made this possible. If you’ve liked whatever you’ve read here so far, do consider following me on NetworkedBlogs to push me further up the list!

Please note that you can only submit the nomination form ONCE. The same show is not to be nominated for multiple categories within the same submission. Get more details at Podcast.Awards.com.

P.S.: If you’re a supporter of SQPN, I suggest you wait for Father Roderick’s “official” suggested nominations list. Meanwhile, let’s work together to try and bring this to Father’s attention. The poor padre is so loaded with work that I think he missed my plurk last night.

ROSWELL, GA – To wrap up a summer of fun and gear up for the fall season of new activities, the Star Quest Production Network proudly announces the addition of three new podcasts to the SQPN family. Each show casts a unique spin on how Catholics live their lives. They serve the growing interest, not only in Catholic living, but in living well.

“In answer to the Church’s call for evangelization via the new media, SQPN is constantly searching for ways to reach out to new audiences,” says Fr. Roderick Vonhogen, founder and CEO of the Star Quest Production Network.

“The three new shows in our line-up do exactly that: Pat Gohn’s ‘Among Women’ reaches out to women, while Nick and Pat Padley cater to young adults with ‘In Between Sundays’, and Jeff Young, ‘the Catholic Foodie’ targets people that love to share faith and good food with friends and family.”

More details here.

And in case you were wondering, yes the Podcasts page has been updated accordingly.

Apart from the usual fasting and abstinence routine that I normally follow during Lent, I wanted to do something different. Something *slightly* more significant. Especially since I’m not *that* fond of meat anyway, so abstinence from meat doesn’t really affect me all that much. I was invited to join a Giving up Facebook for Lent group in Facebook. Although I didn’t join it immediate, it did set me thinking. Am I spending *too* much time on Facebook? Looking back, I realized that the answer was a big fat “YES“! I’ve been logging in religiously, processing requests received, checking on the statuses of my many Facebook friends, playing Lexulous (previously known as Scrabulous) and Bejeweled Blitz. I guess it probably will do me some good to give up Facebooking for the next 40+ days. At the very least, I’ll have more time to catch up on my reading required for the next big project at work. So yes, I’ve joined the group and pledged my determination to rid my attachment to Facebook, and do something productive instead. So if you noticed that I’m kinda quiet over at Facebook, you know it’s all for a good cause.

In addition, I’ll be giving up computer games, particularly PopCap games, for Lent too. I’ve currently got 8 PopCap games installed on my notebook, and I’m beginning to feel that I’m spending too much time on them. Less time on games, means more time to read, means more productivity.

Naturally, I considered whether I should give up Twitter and Plurk as well, but since they’re my primary connection(s) to my friends from across the world, I’ll probably maintain status quo on those, though I most likely *will* reduce the time I spend there. Thank goodness for Ping.fm, I can easily update all my social network sites at one go with the click of a button.

So there. That was my update on what I’m planning for Lent. What are your plans for Lent? Is there anything you’re giving up? Is there anything you’re doing extra? Let me know by leaving your comments. It’ll be interesting to “compare notes”

To all who may be celebrating the occasion, have a prosperous and fulfilling Year of the Ox!

P.S.: The Chinese characters in the picture is not quite appropriate for the occasion, but this is the only background I could find on Meez that’s related to Lunar New Year.

And that was for yesterday’s traffic! Even for today, I managed to hit 65 views! My record so far had only been 40.

I immediately checked the Referrer list, and noticed that the bulk of the new visitors were redirected from Patrick Madrid’s blog. It turned out that Patrick was kind enough to post an entry on his blog, referring his readers to my post on “25 Random Things About Me“. Thanks Patrick! In return, I’m going to ask all of you, my readers to please visit Patrick Madrid’s blog and say “Hi!” for me.

I also noticed that some of the traffic had come in through Google search. Seems that there were many searches for “25 things about me” or “25 random things about me” or something along that gist. It’s always interesting to see what others having been googling, and how they’ve somehow landed on my blog.

To all my readers (old and new), thanks for setting a record in my blog stats and for making history in the life of this wee little blog. I hope you liked what you read and will continue to enjoy reading this blog.