More complaining apparently in order:

DirecTV, I like you THIS MUCH:


















Unfortunately, you have me by the shorties. Two times in the last week, I've set the Tivo to record stuff while I was out of the house doing other things. I like Tivo a lot, and up til now it has been rock solid. We like to watch a certain group of shows, and we almost NEVER watch them in real time, always recorded. We can watch an hour long show in 40 minutes that way. And when we want, too.

Anyway, I missed a major chunk of the Masters on Sunday, as well as the first half of one of the last Jazz games. This makes me cranky, to say the least. Part of the problem is setting the recorder to record HD signals that are put out from the local broadcasters here. All the networks have an HD signal that can be captured by an antenna. That's the THEORY anyway.

Some time ago, we upgraded the Tivo receiver and our DirecTV package to include the "HD Package" - but that didn't include the "local HD's". They didn't offer that at that time. Two years ago, we missed most of the 7th game of the Stanley Cup Finals, due to the fact that we set the recorder to record the NBC HD signal. NBC's HD signal here (over the air) absolutely sucks. You can never watch an NBC broadcast in HD here, because the signal is weak, and even a good antenna doesn't grab it all. ABC's HD signal is almost as bad. CBS's is about 90% dependable.

Now, in order to get the locals on HD through DirecTV instead of over the air through an antenna, one must upgrade receivers AGAIN. And incur a new charge for the Local HD package. DirecTV, I wish I could quit you.

Anyway, on to other things. There are all kinds of bloggers - those who blog about life in their evenings, those who stay at home during the day, and blog at that time, and those who run blogs as a business, and then there are the ones like me - I don't take this all too seriously, and I write when I have time during the day. Therefore, busy work time = not much time to write on the blog. And that's why posts have been thin here lately. When I get busy, my free time pursuits get dropped off the table for a while. My feed reader piles up with an almost insurmountable level of stuff too, so I end up being totally overwhelmed with stuff.

A lot of the stuff I get dropped onto my machine is design related, and some of it is stuff from blogs I like to keep tabs on, some is finance and business related, and still others are music related. Either way, it's a ton of stuff. Like fireplaces.














I don't know why I post pictures of fireplaces. It's just a thing. Some of the feeds I get are from design and photography related sites, and the fireplace photos are a part of that. One site in particular, Desire to Inspire, is great, because they post several photos at a time of the interior design work of one particular firm or individual. Some of it is totally not my style, while some most definitely IS my style, and I tend to collect photos of things I see that I find inspiring.

Here is something I found charming and half-funny when I saw it:

If you can name five or more of these, you might be a design geek. Just a little chair porn for you this afternoon.

And from there, we move to some more mundane randomness: Did you watch the Democratic "debate" last night on ABC? What a dismal performance. And I'm not talking about the candidates. It took a full 50 minutes before either candidate was asked a question about policy, position, or program. It was a pathetic showing for Charlie Gibson, whom I don't consider a real news-man anyway. I would have expected a LITTLE more from George Staphylococcus though. Not much, mind you, but a little.
And one last thing - you would think that if you consider yourself enough of a photoshop wizard to be able to land yourself a job at a national level agency, you would pay a little closer attention to detail.

I'll have a black and tan, please.

For now, that is all. But I shall return. Look forward to that.