Fall TV extravaganza!

Well, fall is officially here. You know what that means? Time to lose yourself in all of the new TV shows and waste away your evenings. There are quite a large number of new shows this season, and me and my wife are trying to figure out which ones we want to stick with. We already watch "Survivor", "The Amazing Race", "LOST", "Numb3rs", "The Office" and "House". Well, "The Office" and "House" we don't watch as much because it is recorded upstairs, and we really don't seem to be up there all that often except to sleep. We have quite a bit of "The Office" to catch up on (still have some of last season to watch.) Looking at our current list of shows, we have our reality, drama and one comedy. So I am looking into more comedy relief. Now that "Friends" and "Joey" are gone, we haven't found anything worth while.

I decided to record "The Class" last night to see if that would fit the bill. I downloaded the first episode... No wait, did I say download? I meant recorded last week. We watched it last night, and we aren't quite sure about it yet. It had it's moments, but there are a number of characters to adjust to, it's difficult to really accept it from a single episode. I will keep recording it and see how it pans out.

Another show that I recorded is "Studio 60". I don't know if we are even going to get into this one. I haven't heard too much about it, but I enjoy Matthew Perry so it may be worth it.

Oh! We also caught the premiere of "Heroes" last night. Very interesting. That is definitely one that we will keep watching, hopefully something that will continue for seasons to come.

Speaking of seasons to come, I got into 2 other shows last year that were canned: "Surface" and... Darnit. I can't remember the name. It's the one about the alien presense that is taking over people. It started out on a battleship or something like that and it is spreading. Carla Gugina (I think that is how you spell it) is in it, as well as 'Data' from Star Trek. Anyways, I guess the name isn't that important since that one got canned halfway through the season. "Surface" had some potential, especially during the beginning and middle of the season. Unfortunately, it kind of tailed off, and was kind of anti-climactic in the end of the season.

There was one pilot that I watched on You Tube, and I found it very refreshing, funny and entertaining. For some reason, the pilot was rejected and the show didn't see the light of day. I am trying to think of the name of it, but it isn't coming to me. I am going to have to search through You Tube to find it. It was based on a couple of guys that were hired to make a TV show and basically live on the set.

Since I am talking about You Tube, I admit it. I watched all of the 'lonelygirl15' video blogs. If you haven't heard about it, there were a number of video blogs supposedly published by some girl chronicling her life with 'Daniel' and her struggles with her parents. It got quite a following until it was learned that it's all fake and they are just actors. http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=lonelygirl15 Still entertaining.

It's been almost 2 weeks???

Sometimes, time really does fly by. These past couple of weeks have been pretty busy. The main thing that has happened is that my daughter had to have her appendix removed. She is doing much better 1 week after the surgery, and is well enough to go to the Cheetah Girl Concert... This past week has been filled with stress, frustration, pain, etc. This brings up the question of the appendix. WTF is it really for? If you can live your live just the same with our without it in your body, why even have it? Another thing, if it becomes inflamed and even possibly burst, it would lead even more complications and possibly even death. Now why in the heck would we have an organ in our body that isn't really needed, but if things go wrong can cause us to die? Unbelievable. I know I could go on and do research about the darned thing, but I'm too lazy.

The never-ending upgrade cycle

In a previous post, I wrote about the tendencies that I have to accumulate 'stuff'. Part of this problem that I have stems from the never-ending upgrade cycle that the technological innovations have presented to us. I know that my wife just LOVES the fact that I'm a geek when it comes to technology and that things are ever progressing.

Case in point is my recent television upgrade. It all started over 10 years ago when I bought my first big screen television. It was a 32" Sony Trinitron TV that was one of my first big purchases after I moved out to Santa Clara with my first job out of college. I was able to hold on to it for almost 10 years, so I would say that the investment was well worth it. The picture on this TV was great, but then came HDTV. Even though there weren't many stations broadcast in HD (and availability is still kinda limited) I just had to get one. I picked up a 57" CRT based RPTV from Sony. It was great to have the HD picture and I thought I would be happy for years and years to come. Oh, how I was wrong. Upstairs, I moved the 32" to the bedroom (what a PITA that was). Being that the bedroom is quite large, 32" isn't very sufficient. Needless to say, that TV was upgraded to a 50" 720P Samsung DLP television. Sure, I was happy, but the technology just keeps improving, and now they have 1080P sets. So what do I now have sitting in the living room? A 61" Samsung 1080P DLP HDTV. Is it going to stop there? Do I dare say, "yes?". I would probably be lying if I did.

Along with the TV upgrades, you also need to get all of the supporting hardware, like the upconverting DVD players, HDTV Cable set top DVR boxes, etc, etc, etc. The buyers are our next garage sale are going to love us.

The $200.00 store

Over the years, and many visits to this particular store, it has acquired the endearing title of "The $200.00 Store". What store may this be? Here's a hint:

Yes, the bulk item membership store we have all grown to love. No matter how much we realize that we don't really need to purchase items in such HUGE quantities, we always go back. The thought of just going to the store and getting these great deals on these items makes it hard not to go back. But every time the trip is made, that reminder of it's impact on our pocketbook shows up at checkout. ka-ching!

"But I only needed to get some bread." If only it were that easy.

The electronics area of Costco is very nice, even if the selection is limited. No bulk items to worry about, the pricing is right and warranties on larger items is very good. Wine is another great 'smaller' item that can be picked up. These items and the 'you can only purchase these items during this window of time' coupons keep us going back. Oh! Not to mention the numerous samples of food that always seem to taste better coming from the electric pot/toaster oven/microwave than they do when you take them home. So sneaky.

A new store just opened up down the road from my house, and soon, yet again, I will be off spending another $200.

The accumulation of 'stuff'

I have always been a pack rat. Once I acquire something, I find it hard to get rid of it. I always have some reason why not to get rid of it. One of the worst things is clothes. I have had clothes in my closet that I haven't worn in almost a decade. Not only are they out of style, but they no longer fit. My excuse? Oh, I will fit into them again eventually. Is that realistic? No friggin way. I like my food too much. My wife has gotten me to give quite a bit to Goodwill, so I guess I am getting better.

Another thing that I am bad with when it comes to saving, is computer gadgets and other electronic gismos. I must have 4 computer cases sitting in the guest room closet. All have a couple of pieces here and there that are either not working or obsolete. I basically only use my current computer for the internet and the occasional game. Why do I need to keep old hardware that I will never use? I was cleaning up in the game room this morning and found an old Hi-Fi VCR. I haven't used a VHS tape in quite a while, so will I get rid of it? Probably not. I also have 3 DVD players that are in perfect working condition that do not have a TV friend to go with it.

This brings me to another topic of discussion, the ever consistent urge to 'upgrade' to the lastest and greatest gadget. But I will save that for another day.

Why can't everything just work?

I recently purchased an external HD from zipzoomfly.com (great site for your computer hardward needs) for a great price. I figured it was a necesity so I could backup the increasing number of digital photographs and MP3s that are on my system. One crash and all would be lost. I don't mind losing the MP3s, but losing the pictures is something quite different. We typically take pictures with a digital camera, so there aren't many hard copies of these memories sitting around.

The HD that I bought is a Western Digital Dual-Option 250GB drive. It comes with both USB 2.0 and IEEE 1394 connections. Transfer via firewire is much faster than the USB connection, but you can also use the USB connection to enable the external USB hub. So I have both connected. I figured this would be an easy task of installing the drive and the software, a few clicks here and there and I would be backing up my files. Oh, how wrong I was.

The software that comes with the HD is a dumbed down version of the Dantz Recover software. When I tried to do an automatic backup session, everything seemed to work fine, until I kicked it off and left it overnight to backup. The next morning my system was in standby mode, and would not 'wake up' properly. The system would startup just fine, the monitor fails to turn on. So a hard reset was needed. After the reset, I looked at the backup logs and it was claiming lack of space on the backup drive. WHAT?!? It's a 250 GB drive and I am backing up a 120 GB drive. You do the math. So I try a manual backup, and when it is querying all of the devices, it freezes on device 3:1. Of course, I haven't gone looking around trying to figure out which device that was as the program is frozen. I can't even kill it through the task manager.

After a few tries and reboots, I have completely given up on the software. I decided to install MS backup (available on your Windows XP disk) and use it. I am able to backup just fine now using this software, but I am still having problems with the system standby and recover. Everything recovers except for the monitor. Bah. I have tried to update my graphics drivers and any other drivers on the system and will see if that helps any, but I have a feeling it has something to do with the new HD. I may just have to turn off the drive unless I am performing a backup.