Warning: This post in not about programing. It’s about an Apple ID security breach.

Updated: 07.02.09
Updated: 06.28.2009
Updated: 06.26.2009

I have always had a fascination with the idea of developing for the Mac. I guess those seeds were planted “… way back in the days of old” when I was creating custom stacks in Apple’s HyperCard, or creating custom databases in Filemaker. Developing for the Mac, or now for the iPhone, is one of those dreams many Apple Fan Boys and Girls have had. To build that one illusive application that everyone wants. Needs. Must have! Cha ching! Hey … I didn’t say my motives were altruistic.

It was with these thoughts in mind that I went out the other day and bought “Programming in Objective-C 2.0” by Stephen G Kochan and Erica Sadun’s “The iPhone Developer’s Cookbook“. Yesterday I started reading Programming in Objective-C 2.0. To get started I needed to log into my Apple Developer Connection account and download the latest version of the Apple developer tools which includes Xcode, Apple’s programing environment.

While I was there I also registered for the iPhone Dev Center. To do so I had to register with my current Apple ID. I then needed to fill out an iPhone developer questionnaire. With that done I could then download the latest version of the 2.08GB Apple iPhone SDK.

Sometimes things don’t always go as planned …

There have been a whole host of things that have gone on in the past few weeks.

On the health front … went to see Dr Raghu as a follow up for my Sarcoid. He didn’t put me on any drugs at all and told me he didn’t want to see me for another 6 months. Unless of course something “pops up’. The chemo drug he put me on really “messed” with my system, especially my thyroid & my testosterone levels. My Thyroid is coming back on it’s own, and my testosterone levels are getting back to normal with injections every 10 days. When they reach normal & stay … no more injections either. Woo hoo!

On the communication front … I did something I said I would NEVER do … I joined the Twitter Nation. As can be evidenced by the Twitter Widget on the right side of this here blog. The scary thing is I’m liking it better than Facebook. At least with Twitter there are no Fave 5’s and no other extraneous noise. I can “follow”

Life is dichotomy. Life is duality. The Yin & Yang of light & dark, virtue & evil, up & down … uh … you get the idea. Existential at best. Detached at worst. Round and round goes the world, as does life.

The Good News:

Went to see my pulmonologist today, after a four month hiatus from him or any Sarcoid drugs. He says though active, my Sarcoid is still mild. Like some milk-toast cheddar from Wisconsin. He doesn’t see any link with any of my current symptoms. And let me tell you … there still are plenty.

The Bad News:

In looking at the EKG that Dr Rosenfield did on me a few weeks ago in his office, Dr Raghu says it shows an abnormality. Okay … that’s a scary statement. And looking at my blood test results, my thyroid function is low. Not catastrophic, but this could also add to why I’m still feeling tired.

The kids are alright. They just celebrated their 3rd birthday. Okay. Shoot me. It’s a fluff piece about our cats. No pun intended.

Now we can never be sure when exactly they were born, it’s just an approximation using higher math functions. Or just counting backwards. Though for some … that is is higher math … these days. But I digress. We got them when they were approximately six weeks old … give or take.

Rocky and Rose were rescued cats born in a manger barn somewhere in the farmlands of Washington state. Their Manx mother was a barn cat, but I guess her owner thought more than one was a crowd. Luckily they were rescued. We, or I should say Chris found them on PetFinder.com.

The New go2jo.com …

When I lived out on Long Island while going to CW Post Center, I use to work for a company called “Crazy Eddie’s“. It was a NY based electronics and music store. You could buy anything from component stereo equipment, car stereos, to records. Remember vinyl? At Crazy Eddie’s there would always be a Christmas In August sale. Why? Because Eddie was crazy! Well …I’m feeling a bit like that now. Crazy. As you can see I’ve grown weary too. In less than a year, though it does seem longer … it was time for me to abandon my last WordPress theme and opt for a newer one. Though I liked my last theme, for its graphics heavy front page. I also didn’t like it because

I feel the need to shower. It’s time to come clean. Not in a drench me with lukewarm  water in an enclosed box kind of thing. I think this is more a metaphoric shower. In my posts talking about my autoimmune disease Sarcoidosis, I’ve always disguised my doctors’ names. It’s time to come clean.

I realized that those folks who do read my posts about Sarcoidosis may be looking for doctors to be their advocates. I know that the process of diagnosis, and just having this disease is emotionally draining. Not knowing where to start, or what doctors to turn to, or ones that even know what the disease is … that’s the hardest part. Not knowing. Feeling alone. Feeling helpless & hopeless.

I guess if I go back an list the characters in this long running play “Living The Sarcoid Life”  I could clear things up. Maybe a list of the ‘advocates’ and the ‘clueless’ might work. But then I also need to think of the liability of talking about the ‘clueless’ … can they sue me for libel? It is only my opinion. For now … just the advocates.

Let me tell you about a place, somewhere up NJ way … Cherry Hill to be exact. The home of the legendary Emerald City. I had been there quite a few times to see shows, with and without my then girlfriend Dorothy. This particular evening my friend Geoff Hoover and I were there to see John Eddie & The Front Street Runners. They were opening for Gary US Bonds.

Gary was having a comeback of sorts. He had a new album out that Bruce Springsteen had written three songs for, played and sung on, Miami Steve Van Zant, played, sung, and wrote “Daddy’s Come Home” for this LP, and the Asbury Jukes horn section got in on the action too. It was truly the “Asbury Park Mafia” helping out one of their heroes.

“Police On My Back”

Well I’m running, police on my back
I’ve been hiding, police on my back
There was a shooting, police on my back
And the victim well he wont come back

I been running Monday Tuesday Wednesday
Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday
Runnin Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday
Saturday Sunday
What have I done?
What have I done?

Eddy Grant

These are the moments legends are made ….

As some of you may have noticed … there’s a new page added to my blog. If you look at the menus above you will see a new button named “joMusic“. This is the place I am going to be posting my own music. As I explain on the new joMusic page, I’ve been a musician for a good part of my life. You may have read my previous post about my old band “The Human Element“. In that article I said I’d eventually post some of my own music. And now I have. I will continue to post more music as I record it, and post older music as I digitize it.

Most of the things I will post will be demos of things I’ve worked on or am currently working on or finished. They may not be the best mixes in the world … but I just thought it was time to put some of this stuff out there in some form or another.

So come back often and check for new music, photos, and news about what’s going on in my life.

In 1980 I was attending school at  CW Post Center of Long Island University. I was also sharing an apartment in Oyster Bay Long Island with 3 women: Cande Roth, Ellyn Solis, and Dorothy (Orant) Morrison. The night I moved into this insane asylum I ended three years of being a non-smoker. I purchased that pack of Newports … and torched up the first smoke, and didn’t quit again until the early 90’s.

In my years at Post I was a communications major and later film major. I also did radio shows on the college station WCWP 88.1 on the FM dial. I also was a photographer for an NYC club magazine called Non-LP B-Side. Those were some exciting times. Musicly there was the whole UK & US punk explosion that brought so much amazing and exciting music. I use to spend a lot of my extra cash either at Bleaker Bob’s in NYC or a few of the independent music stores on Long Island that specialized in British imports. Buying the latest import singles & LPs my radio shows were something to hear. I loved bands like The Clash, The Jam, The Sex Pistols, XTC, Elvis Costello, Ian Dury And The Blockheads, Fashion, Richard Hell And The Voidoids, Tom Verlaine with or without  Television, Graham Parker, The Undertones, Ultravox, The Ramones, Talking Heads, all the assorted Stiff and Two-Tone bands and so much more. And what money I didn’t spend there I was spending on photographing some of these bands and paying to have the film processed at professional color labs, in NYC or on “Lonkisland”.

Dorothy was also an avid musicologist and fan girl of so many of those bands. That was one of our many connections. She also turned me onto a lot of stuff that she loved too. We influenced each other. Hell … when I met this girl she was “sittin’ on the hood of a Dodge” in the parking lot at the Spectrum in Philadelphia. A friend of mine and I were waiting to buy Springsteen tickets. We drove in from southern NJ the night before and slept in  my car. Early the next morning, before “the line formed”, I was wandering around the parking lot and here was this beautiful blond wild child, sitting on the hood of that car (but no soft summer rain) and asking me … “hey you like Costello too?” I was wearing an Elvis Costello t-shirt at the time. And that was that. We talked and that started the long slow process of friendship … and years later … a bit more.

Dorothy and I were in L. O. V. E. with the Clash. There was always something about their music, attitude and politics that resonated with us, and the world. They were so much less nihilistic than the Pistols. Plus they had huge hearts. You could see it in the passion they showed onstage and off.