Jake Sprouse

I’ve been thinking a lot about how I love Pittsburgh lately. After moving to Seattle two years ago, I’ve reconnected with a bunch of friends via Facebook, and the Steelers have rescued football for me. But this… this really sums up my feelings for the place. Really. I shed a single tear.

Dear Lazyweb,

When running in the foreground, my iPhone app occasionally uses an alert to get the user’s attention. If the Ring/Silent switch is set to silent mode, the phone will vibrate (kSystemSoundID_Vibrate); otherwise a sound is played.

It appears as though the iPhone SDK limits me to playing audio supplied by my application only:

I was unable to find any explanation for this limitation of the AudioToolbox Framework on the google. Does anyone out there know what the justification might be? Note that Apple’s applications seem to be able to use system sounds (presumably using the same AudioServicesPlaySystemSound or AudioServicesPlayAlertSound API calls exposed to us), as shown in this screenshot of the Alarm Clock application.

Update:

It looks like I’m able to use an NSDirectoryEnumerator to get the contents of /Library/Ringtones/ on the phone, but if I try to load one of these files using AudioServicesCreateSystemSoundID() it fails with OSErr -1500 (Operation could not be completed). Sandboxing… Thanks to Steve Makofsky for his help.

You shouldn’t have to register to leave comments now. I think I’ve got it figured out so that the comment spam isn’t a problem for me.

1. At my follow-up appointment this morning, Doc said my vision is 20/25 and he expects me to be down to 20/20 within two weeks.
2. While walking to work from the appointment, I saw a chalkboard marquee outside of Bank of America advertising a 5.25% MORTGAGE, NO FEE’S. So I wet my thumb and fixed it. I blame my mother for the self-righteousness I felt.
3. It took me eight minutes to donate a pint of blood. That’s a record for me!

Or, the LASIK seems to be working.

Yesterday, I had LASIK surgery at the Swedish Hospital Eye Center from Dr. Brian McKillop.

I was on Valium for the procedure, but I clearly recall hearing the doctor say, just before the procedure was to begin: “Gentlemen, we can rebuild him. We have the technology. We have the capability to build the world’s first bionic man. John Sprouse will be that man. Better than he was before. Better, stronger, faster.”

Well, better eyesight, anyway. Plus, if you can believe it I’m even more good looking than I was before (see recent photo, left)!

Highlights:

• They make you wear a hairnet and shoe-cover booties. But no gown. I get the hair thing, but are shoes really that much of a contaminant?
• They dope you up and then smear iodine all around your eyes.
• Then you sit and wait until the dope kicks in.
• Eric and Andrea, the assistants, are super nice.
• They take you into the operating room and put you in a Lay-Z-Boy and give you a teddy bear. Between the Valium and the teddy bear, how could you not be relaxed?
• They tape one eye closed and then tape the other eye open. Then they put anesthetic drops in your eye.
• The laser machine swings into place and you’re instructed to stare at the little flashing dot.
• Some sort of circular metal device is inserted in your eye, which you can’t feel at this point. It expands to stretch your eye out.
• Doc uses a paintbrush to wipe more anesthetic onto your eye.
• A suction-majiggy is attached to your eye. When Eric turns the suction on, everything goes black.
• A slicer-majiggy is attached to the suction-majiggy.
• The slicer majiggy saws through the front of your cornea, stopping before slicing it completely off. You can feel your eye vibrating when this is happening, but it’s not painful, just creepy/totally awesome.
• Majiggers are removed, and you briefly can see the flashy dot again. Then doc uses a pick to lift the flap up, and the flashy dot gets really blurry.
• Doc makes the dot a little less blurry and tells you to stare into the middle of it. Meanwhile, Andrea is counting backwards from twenty.
• The machine starts clicking loudly. You don’t feel anything. Doc tells you you’re doing really well.
• You’re trying your best to stare at the middle of the dot. It smells like hair burning. Things are starting to feel a little intense but there’s still no pain, and then…
• Andrea gets to zero and the clicking stops.
• A bunch of water is flushed into your eye. It feels wet.
• Doc uses his little pick to put the flap back. Then he uses another little paintbrush to smooth it down.
• They put a bunch of drops into your eye.
• They tape is closed, and start in on the other eye.
• Five minutes later, you’re up and doc does a quick eye exam to make sure everything looks good.
• Things look a little fuzzy and milky as your buddy drives you home, but you can already see way better than you would be without your glasses.
• When you wake up from your nap, you look out the window and realize you can make out the numbers on the bus stop sign a block away. You’re kinda psyched.
• Your eyes itch. You have to wear stupid-looking protective goggles until the next morning.

I woke up this morning and things seemed even more clear. My eyes are still a bit itchy, but I can work at the computer just fine. I have my follow-up appointment in an hour, and then I’m off to work.

Also, Dylan is funny: