Travels and Images
WEEK 47 2003
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Picture of the Week
Lancaster
Weather
A Year
Ago, This
Week
Saturday 22
November 2003
Saturday - we all went to see 'Cat in the Hat'. I don't think I've ever fallen asleep in a theater before - it wasn't a terrible movie, just sort of uninteresting for me. YMMV (Your Mileage May Vary). I wore my hat, and was happy for it - it was cold this morning!
I did a bit of rescue work on a computer - somehow the 'program files'
directory had been dragged to the desktop - and the machine still ran
but many of the add on applications failed, since they expected to find
files in the directory in its usual place under c:\windows. The fix was
to drag and drop it in it's correct spot.
Friday 21 November
2003
Friday - dinner at a friends. It was a birthday dinner, with a 'Cat in the Hat' theme. There were hats, gloves, even face masks created from the family pet! Amazing - I could never think of these things. ( What about the open running sores of yesterday? you might ask. All I can say is: free food and birthday cake! ) We are all going to the movie tomorrow - with hats.
It does sort of capture my 'suave man of the world' look...
There is a commercial on teevee for something...razor blades I
think...anyway it is extolling titanium as "the sharpest metal". There
is a scene where a giant blade cuts through a car. Hmmm. I think they
meant "hardest" metal - which is untrue, or that it can make the
sharpest blade - also untrue (probably). It bothers me.
In other news, Judge Rejects Plea to Return Power to Americans. Heh. It's a parody of course - for now.
Thursday 20 November 2003
Thursday
- no dining out tonight, most of the usual gang are sick. Oh they claim to be well now - "Come and visit" they say, but I know better! Huge open running sores or something like that. Plague. Ugh.
Wednesday
19 November 2003
Wednesday
- I took the day off. I hadn't intended any such thing, but listening
to the weather report in the morning I heard something startling: "...highs for today are predicted to be in the low seventies..."
Well, I had been kicking myself for not finishing the house painting
before the cold weather set in, so this seemed a heaven sent
opportunity.
So, I spent the day, from noon until dark, painting. The front is about
85% complete now - and I finished (mostly) that horrible little ledge
area.
All day long people were stopping to ask: what is that? "That"
being the home made and quite sturdy scaffold for painting under the
high eaves. Obelisk shaped, shoulder high, it has been up on my roof
since before Halloween, puzzling a great many people I have discovered!
Tuesday 18
November 2003
Tuesday
- not a lot to say about work, and since I spent most of the day there...not a lot to say.
Lets see, an amusing Stargate-1 this weekend. Our captured hero,
responding to the evil villains gloating over an anticipated future
torture "...and furthermore, you ended that sentence with a preposition." Not to mention the geeky guy, crawling through ventilators, referring to Star Trek and muttering "We may as well all be wearing red shirts." And the alien team member, responding to a question about the Stanley Cup: "The Canuck's are the better warriors."
Monday
17 November 2003
Monday - back to work. Still sunny, more
or less. Fog on the southern hills in the morning, very picturesque. If
I were less lazy in general or more of a photo buff in particular I'd
get up early and catch a photograph of the sunrise on it. Don't hold your breath.
In other photo news someone has come up with a $11 disposable digital camera
that you return to the store to get the pictures from. Heh. All the
disadvantages of film, none of the advantages of digital. Who thinks of
these things? And, it has already been hacked! Someone has figured out how it works, and how to solder your own USB cable to it for downloads.
But really, my advice is to get a decent camera - this one has no lcd
viewfinder, only holds a limited number of pics, uses a CMOS sensor
insteady of a good CCD, and the lens is glued in.
The 49er's crushed the poor old Steelers this evening. Heh. We're back to 5:5 for the season now. Rattay looked good. More importantly, the kicker could actually kick. Their lousy kicking has been a thorn in the 49er's side for years.
Sunday 16
November 2003
Sunday
- sunny, bright, warmer than the last couple of days.
Master & Commander was great.
It had, without a doubt, some of the best sailing and fighting scenes
I've even seen for the big screen. I think the characters were true to
those in the books as well - and not just Aubrey and Maturin, but
Killick and the rest. Remarkable. I need to see it again....
In fact, it's interesting. It seems that in the last few years we have
amazing things coming out of Hollywood, movies like this, movies like
Star Wars with it's own fabulous effects, movies like Pirates of the
Caribbean which has such amazing effects that you forget that they are
effects.
Sometimes they are cgi, sometimes as in this movie, they sail a square rigger down to Cape Horn to get shots.
The Golden Age of Hollywood - we're living it.
In other news, I didn't do
much. I did get down to Best Buy and bought the best buy in a DVD
player that I could get - $55, because they were sold out of the $37
units. I own an expensive unit that failed after a few hours of
playing, admittedly over a couple of years, and isn't worth getting
fixed. Bah. But the new one is far more capable than the old - plays
MP3's, video CD's, picture Cds, and so on. Hopefully it will play
something besides Princess Monoke.
Picture of the Week
Photo Notes: The
modern airliners have little teevee screens that they play movies on,
and also plot the route and such. Here is a shot of a flight coming
back from England, at the tip of Greenland. It's probably the closest
I'll ever get to Godthab!
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