ain't technology grand?

this weekend i bought me a new TV. it's been in my budget for a while now and on saturday afternoon, i bit and bought a nice little 46" sony LCD. now i'm in the midst of trying to figure it out.

upgraded my cable service and swapped my cable box for an HD cable box (there was a difference) and i can say that the channels that are in HD, look pretty good. but i've discovered that it really depends on what is airing at any given moment in time varies in what i see. with the HD channels, i get a full 16:9 picture. some commercials are in 4:3 ratio (standard non-widescreen tv) so i'll see the black bars on the left/right sides. then some commercials (watchmen trailer just aired and did this) and it is widescreen, but scaled to fit within the 4:3 ratio, not my full 16:9.

now, my new cable box will switch between various settings depending on the channel (480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i) but my tv doesn't seem to understand when to use what scaling. typically, both 720p & 1080i (tv supports 1080p, so i'm good there) will display in widescreen. but if i goto a SD (480i/480p) channel, the tv will stretch the 4:3 screen to 16:9. so, with a few quick flips of a button on the TV remote, i can put it back into 4:3, but i haven't figured out yet how to tell the TV to use the proper aspect ratio depending on the channel.

ooo...lobotomies

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tv shows

right now my two favorite tv shows are:

Battlestar Galactica
Burn Notice

thankfully, new episodes are on tv right now.

w00t!

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very funny

Little Britain USA

and i had to laugh when i discovered that the 4th Doctor was the narrator (of this and the original British series.)

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about time. i saw that Red Dwarf was coming back (albeit a very limited resurrection) the other week, but here is the official confirmation.

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boo.

there isn't much on tv these days, at least not on sunday nights so i've been lazy and not changed the channel from fox (where i had been watching football) and they have this game show called Hole In The Wall.

it is awful.

and i'm trying to figure out how to make a 'glory hole in the wall' joke, but can't. where's lil' jimmy norton when i need him?

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heh.

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the tv saga continues...

good news bad news.

the good news is i have tv. the bad news is it's piggybacking on KO's for the moment which means i have to get cable. *sigh*

so i'll try and call on monday to see when i can get it installed. oh well. it's been a little while since i've had to pay a cable bill so i can't complain too loudly.

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that was lucky

all was not lost. fortunately for me, i have some really cool landlords who offered to let me watch BSG on their tv in the basement. KO is gonna look at things tomorrow, and LO said that comcast has been up and down the street all week, so who knows what kind of games they are playing. we did laugh at how stinky still had her cable as KO lamented that he wished it was hers that was a problem and not mine - they aren't fond of her leaving her tv on all the time with the volume up a levels it shouldn't be. he's talked with her several times about the volume and she still doesn't seem to do anything to their annoyance.

hopefully we'll be able to figure out what is wrong and i'll have tv back, but worst case scenario, i'll get my own. i haven't had to pay for it since moving here (split the bill at the last place) so if that's what it means, oh well.

tivo does attempt to record the channel, but then it doesn't bother to keep whatever isn't broadcast. i went to watch something that i knew had recorded only to discover that it hadn't and that's when i discovered the blank screen. of course it didn't help that i started watching something else i had recorded so i didn't realize quite what had happened until it was too late. but thankfully the kindness of landlords shined their light and allowed me to keep up with the happenings of BSG.

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grrrr...

fucking cable is out. wonder if it's related to that whole fustercluck KO was telling me about last weekend...

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Pebble the Vote!

Vote for TK!

Help him get a new front lawn.

Won't someone please think of the children?




hint: fewer shovels = better

additional hint: click 1 (one) shovel

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game shows

i was just talking with M and i came to the realization (surprise) that i absolutely despise game shows on TV. the only ones i can even remotely stand are Jeopardy and reruns of Press Your Luck (not Whammy).

but M was telling me how she fell into some new one on CBS with Drew Carey and i could feel my temper just go flying out the window. i know i prolly sounded annoyed, so i do apologize for that, but as she is describing this abomination to me, i was growing more and more disgusted with how fucking lazy the networks are.

i know i've reached a saturation point when it comes to television, and i know that the bulk of it is absolute dreck, yet i still watch it (no wonder it's called an idiot box). with minor exceptions, i hate pretty much all reality (that really isn't) TV. (i'll admit to watching Top Chef and Project Runway, altho i think Runway is a challenge away from jumping the shark)

but fucking survivor, or american idol. jesus fucking christ...we are a really fucking pathetic society if more people are casting votes to boot a tone deaf singer off idol than there are voting in a presidential election. (if we haven't yet, give it time, it will happen)

i realize it's cheap and if it catches on, the ROI is pretty high. no writers (or fewer as people are discovering some "reality" shows are partially scripted to make them interesting *cough*hulkhogan*cough*), small crews following a group of attention whores act like a group of fucking idiots, what can be better than that?

fark is fucking right - hollywood is out of ideas. how long before they decide to start putting 2 hour episodes of the price is right into theaters for us blind sheep to go rushing to see. and let's not forget the director's cut DVD that comes out afterwards that includes a deleted scene where drew "accidentally" cops a feel.

fucking reality TV. and motherfucking game shows.

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i semi-watched the season end of 24.

all i can say is 'eh'

actually, it was pretty bad. i remember thinking that last season was pushing it, but this season it completely jumped the shark. and then made some yummy shark fin soup.

i actually missed chunks of episodes and you know what? for a show that if you miss something, you're pretty much screwed, it pretty much sucked.

so, season 6 of 24 was pretty bad. and we get a 7th season in january. i wonder if i'll watch it. or find something else...like watching the paint drying channel.

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wow...i've never really cared for Geraldo Rivera, but fox here just showed a clip with an interview they held with him regarding the murder diary of OJ and he said it was "disgusting" and that OJ was "a pig". he also said that he was ashamed of fox (his employer) for actually showing this 2 part interview.

so for a brief moment, i have a tiny shred of respect for him.







aaaaaaaaaand it's gone.

NOW with linky goodness

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hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha....

every once in a while, something will pop up on tv that catches you by suprise, and tonights Prison Break provided the suprise.

after beating bellick and stealing the money, geary gets a penthouse suite where he hires some 'escorts'. when they cut back to him talking with the escorts, one of them says "you want a cleveland WHAT?"

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the things you see sometimes

i'll see if i can't find a shot of the ad, but i was just watching House, and Dockers has a commercial that ends with a shot of a road, and a pier extending out onto (what should presumably be) San Francisco Bay, with a nice shot of the Golden Gate bridge.

the only problem with the shot is this:

i walked that stretch of road when M&i were in San Francisco. i recognize the palm trees, and that stretch of road with the trolley car (not one that goes up and down the hills). it's actually along the piers between Pier 39 (w/all the famous seals) and the Embarcadero. (~1/3 of the way up from Embarcadero. actually, thinking about it, i may have actually stepped on some of those stone blocks...)

and to make things worse, when you are looking out that way, you don't see the Golden Gate bridge. you see the Bay Bridge going towards Oakland.

plus, there isn't a pier that juts out into San Francisco Bay like the one in the ad. at least not from the shot that they are using.

i thought commercials were supposed to be truthful. how disappointing.

all hail the home of the mighty eyeballed ones

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late night funny

i haven't watched letterman much but last night i saw a little bit that he did that was titled "Great Moments in Presidential Speeches". it showed 3 from 3 presidents.

in order:

1. Franklin D. Roosevelt: "All we have to fear, is fear itself"
   
2. John F. Kennedy: "Ask not, what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country."
   
3. George W. Bush: "I think I saw a guy spittin' in a can"

and some video humor for you.
Daily Show: President Bush debates Governor Bush

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and so it begins...

GA just came out and asked if it was ok to start migrating data from old servers to our new ones in preparation of the active directory upgrade that is just about to happen. i just saluted and off he went back to the server room to kick things off. and so begins a new chapter in the IS department here.

the last 30 mins or so were kind of restful. things are quiet enuff at this time of day that i semi-dozed off. heeheehee.

and in preparation for tomorrow, i have a nice 19" dell LCD monitor on my desk. it's purty. and i can't keep it says DH. but i can use it this weekend to watch Pinky and The Brain which was supplied to me by my younger westward sibling. (anyone interested in getting me Animaniacs is welcome to)

but basically all i need to do is be here. DH wants an IS presence while GA & co. do their voodoo so i get to sit here for most of the day tomorrow, so i'll watch Pinky, read more of Chapterhouse: Dune. and i also need to start sifting thru the 400+ pictures M&i took on our left coast adventure the other week. so that is my plan for tomorrow. i'm hopeful that we'll be able to get everything done tomorrow, but as they didn't touch the new exchange box today (GA said they might be able to start building it during downtime this afternoon), i have the feeling that won't be done until tomorrow with the full upgrade done until sunday. that sucks as it kills my entire weekend. oh well. the price i have to pay to get the title. at least they are doing all the work, so if something gets fucked up (they swear it won't), it's their fault and not mine. i'm kinda glad that i'm not doing the hands on migration. it's a lot of work. fortunately they have done this a few times, so they have some sense of what to look out for. it's really only a few servers that are going to be truly affected, and the rest should just fall into place.

i'll try and put together some sort of summary of our west coast adventures as well, but we had a really good time in both PDX and SFO, so as trips go, it was really good. never been to either place, and we liked both. flights between BOS and LAS sucked, but the shorter flights were a little better, well, flying into PDX from LAS was rough, but more because we were tired of flying by that point.

anyways, i'll try to write something up, and maybe a few pictures as well. more later, maybe.

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no no no no no....

edit: turns out this was a hoax
what the FUCK are they thinking?

new coke anybody?

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hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha...

one of my favorite foods is the simple avocado. unfortunately, i don't know many uses for it outside of guacamole, salads, sandwiches and sushi (a little toro, some avocado, spicy mayo, make it maki and roll in tobiko and you have one of my all time favorite sushi rolls, but i digress).

so i'm watching Good Eats and they are doing a show on avocados and did you know, that the word 'avocado' is a bastardized pronounciation of the Aztec word 'ahuacatl'?

and guess what that means.

TESTICLE!

hahahahahahahahaha...

it's fun being childish sometimes.

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