AllGuinness

You would be surprised at how few things change around here. So little in fact, that I have little inspiration to write much. I suppose I should get over that and create my own inspiration. I could claim that I am too busy with the new child and all, but it would be a lie. While it does occupy some of my time, there is still plenty left over to do as much writing as I could want.

We are getting a new air conditioner put in here, and while that may not be all that interesting to you, it is something that is sure to change my life substantially. Luckily, we are getting financing from SMUD at a rather attractive rate, otherwise I have no idea how I would come up with all that money at one time. It could be done, I suppose, but it would mean at least another hot summer without, so I’m happy it exists. We are putting in a high-end Lennox system, so I hope that turns out well. I imagine there will be rather regular maintenance issues to correct to augment the out of pocket expense to me, but it must be done. We got four estimates before deciding, but now I don’t really know why since we picked one that was far from the cheapest. I have a hard time picking something when I know there is a better attainable option out there. Did somebody just say iPhone?

For my upcoming trip, and for general use, I wanted a new, relatively inexpensive, camera. This way wife and I will each have our own. I want mine for taking hundreds of pictures of mundane things like bathrooms and building facades, while wife will want to take better pictures of family and friends. We have the Cannon SD500 which is pretty good for the point and click crowd. It has 7.2 MP while my new Kodak EasyShare has 10. The thing is, the Cannon takes far better pictures. There is clearly much more going on than mere mega-pixels. The Kodak’s images come out much grainier. Still it was cheaper by far, and should work fine for my purposes. I’m planning to step the resolution back to about 6 MP anyway as I only need my images for the web, and don’t plan on cropping or printing.

Our free cable finally gave up the ghost, so we were forced to come up with another option. After looking at my options (sadly SureWest doesn’t offer service in the downtown area with their fiber-opticness) I decided to go with DirectTV. I would rather have cable, but for the features I wanted the price difference was rather steep. There are a couple of problems with DirectTV though. Their DVRs require a land line to work, though I can’t tell why they would need it. My existing TiVo won’t work well with the new system and will only record one show at a time. So all that kinda sucks. There are also some features about the user interface that I am not a fan of, but I suppose I will get used to it shortly, as with anything else. Their much touted HD capacity still lacks any real punch, though that will probably get better over time. I got the HD package anyway to play on the big TV, but it offers only a limited number of extra stations.

I got my first iPod for father’s day. It is a Nano, and it is pretty cool. I am only using about half of the 8GB capacity though. I marvel at people who routinely fill a 20 or 40 gig drive.

In other sound news, I have added a Sony home theater in a box to my big TV. It is alright for an entry level system, and certainly trumps just listening through the television speakers. This dingus also has an iPod dock so I can plop my device there and listen to all of the music through the system, and control the iPod from the TV screen.

From this post it seems like all I ever do is buy things. Perhaps it is true. Not all of it is high-tech though. I recently purchased an old-fashioned push lawn mower and a manual edger. I also got a broom and rake instead of a blower or something. My lawn in pretty micro-sized so using any other kind of mower seems like overkill, and also less time efficient. I have yet to use it though. I will probably have to go over the lawn one more time with the electric equipment to get it to a place where manual mowing is less than a deathwish. Then I plan on doing it every four days or so to keep it well managed. I’m sure the neighbors will appreciate that as well.

Speaking of exteriors, the carpenters we hired are finishing up on the front of the house soon. They are sheathing the brick pillars on the porch with wood, thus bringing it back in line with how it might have looked at its origin. Or at least kinda close. We will then get on the schedule for exterior paint for later this summer, and the house will start to look like a real place fit for real people.

This post has been brought to you by the treasury department which urges you to keep the economy strong by buying everything you can think of.