Sephy’s Platzish

If I’m going to give alternate titles to this, it’d be the “back on track” edition.

Without further ado, back on Sundays now

Sunday, 4th May

Look carefully! There’s a duck in the middle of the puddle-cum-lake. It was just paddling through as it was probably resting in a trip further north. However, we don’t know that.

Distance - 6257 steps, 5.00km

Monday, 5th May

Alright, this is something that most people don’t see on their commutes - it’s a play area for kids that is situated a ways off of the road. Fortunately, it is right where two roads intersect at a 4-way stop, so it’s relatively safe

Distance - 4434 steps, 3.54km (including walking around a parking lot investigating a haircut deal for $8.95)

Tuesday, 6th May

I did take a couple of pictures, but really, they’re nothing to write home about since they’re pictures of a drive-thru Starbucks in the distance…

Distance - 2359 steps, 1.88km

Wednesday, 7th May

This is a picture that almost could be considered for inclusion on a gas sign website. This is the Citgo station that I’ve filled at a couple of times because they’ve had cheaper prices for gas than other stations in the area. From what I had heard on this day, I saved anywhere from 7-10 cents per gallon by filling up there.

Distance - 2457 steps, 1.96km

Thursday, 8th May

This is the lesser photographed, but more often scene of a train - passing by when you and some of your closest commuting compadres are sitting patiently in line for it to get through so that we can continue on our merry ways.

Distance - 2000 steps, 1.60km

Friday, 9th May

Some people take their devotion seriously by putting a simple bumper sticker on their vehicle. Others fly a flag. For some, not only do they have a whole bunch of lips on their vehicle, they put up three separate phone numbers on the vehicle to drum up her business in the Avon trade…wonder if she’ll be seeing people interested in her products with the van than without…

Distance - 6132 steps, 4.90km

Saturday, 10th May

The tulips in one of the outdoor beds have decided to come to life. Now, after having a bit of a break from flowers, we have this specimen. For some reason, I like taking pictures of flowers - I think it’s the color myself.

Distance - 6918 steps, 5.53km

In other news… I’ve been feeling a bit discombobulated lately. I’m not totally sure why, but I kinda feel like I’m complacent with where I am now. Truth be told, I am happy with where I am now - I still want to find a second job on the weekend possibly. Also, I’ve heard some success stories about products being sold on Craigslist and about some things that I should have the knowledge of how to go about doing it.

Speaking of my talents at work, I hinted at it earlier, but I’ve had the fortune to help a couple of people out with their sites. To be honest, I’ve enjoyed the process, even though in one case, it was something that I would have not have thought of for a long time.

About a week ago or so, I finally got my hands on one of the digital converter boxes I’d talked about not being available at Wal-Mart at all. It turns out that Best Buy has literally scads of them for sale. So, they’re $10 more than the Wal-Mart ones, but you’re getting a much better box.

Interestingly, the box that is sold at Best Buy (under their Insignia name) is manufactured by LG Electronics for Zenith. As we all probably know, LG make some darn good products, and they haven’t gotten this one wrong either.

Now that we’re finally getting towards the cutoff of analog TV and we finally have the digital converter boxes (set top box, STB for short) available in stores, and to be honest, I’d be prepared to buy another one at full price even for my room, or for the computer.

As it stands, with analog TV, using rabbit ears, we’d get 11 channels over the air, and the signals on those channels went all the way from fairly clear to barely watchable. Of course, since it is digital, now all the channels come in crystal clear, and there’s 28 of them. That’s just from Milwaukee!

The only problem is that this number goes down to around 8 when something happens. This happens when the noisy neighbor comes through. Its presence interferes with the UHF signals (I think the term for that is “multipath” - where the signals bounce off of something causing confusion), so I’m only left with the 8 channels of public TV, including one which shows Mr. Rogers Neighborhood at midnight…

However, the greatest thing is that I can get all the programs in HD now. Well, not purely HD, but it’s widescreen and just as clear as HD pictures, just downscaled to the proper resolution for an analog TV. Seriously, if you haven’t gotten a coupon for the digital boxes, you can do it at dtv2009.gov - the program should still be available for a little bit of time from now.

I’ll have some shots of the digital channels soon, because there is something annoying about some of them.

…or the way too late edition

I’ve been slack in working on this blog because I’ve been involved in a couple of other projects, so let’s just get this darn thing done, eh?

Sunday, 27th April

The first buds of the season are starting to appear on the trees this spring, making some green finally appear.

In the horse paddock, we have a bird sitting on the wire fence meant to hold the horses in, but definitely not the water

Again, I have some good luck with the camera, snapping this great shot of an airplane flying overhead while I was walking.

This is another shot of the red tree at the far end of the paddock, but with a slightly different angle, showing off more of trees surrounding the paddock-cum-lake

Distance - 5038 steps, 4.03km

Monday, 28th April

More with the trees again, this time with another tree just getting some buds on it. As you can see, some of the trees here can get quite tall here.

Distance - 1990 steps, 1.59km

Tuesday, 29th April

Looking exciting, eh? Well, this is now the closest I’ve gotten to $1.00 per litre for fuel - $3.759 per gallon. Thankfully, I don’t have to fill up with Diesel, at $4.229 per gallon…but I fear that the price of fuel will be getting there. I hope I’m wrong…

Distance - 2869 steps, 2.29km

Wednesday, 30th April

A little hard to see, I know, but there are two dots which is where two deer are located. They had crossed the road in front of me.

Distance - 2069 steps, 1.65km

Thursday, 1st May

Apparently too embarrassed to display the costs of their food, one of the local supermarkets have decided to only say that they have a sale. That’s not unusual because they have a sale every week, from Thursday to Wednesday. Either that, or they just were too lazy to set out the actual sale prices (for example, avocados for 88¢ each).

Distance - 2433 steps, 1.94km

Friday, 2nd May

A few weeks ago, I showed a shot of this looking the other way, up the ramp in the foreground. Here’s an opportunity to see things from the other side. The grass is getting greener and greener by the day, and folks are now going out to mow their lawns and do some yardwork which needs to get done…

Distance - 4487 steps, 3.58km

Saturday, 3rd May

I didn’t put the pedometer on, or take any pictures, but I did do a bit of walking around some stores both in the morning and then in the afternoon when I went to get one of the converter boxes that I’m going to get for the digital TV

In other news… As I’ve mentioned, I’ve picked up a couple of projects that I’ve been working on around the net, including a first customer for my WordPress upgrades, though that appears to be more of a troubleshooting call now, as the upgrade seems to have gone well. One good thing about having this stuff to do is that I am finally getting my sleeping patterns straightened out, and I’ve been getting to bed around 1AM, which is definitely an improvement over the past few weeks. I’ve also been getting up at 8 or 9 now, compared to 10 or 11, which really sucked, I gotta say…

So, on Monday, I mentioned that I’d have something about a toy that I’d be getting this week. So far, I’ve gotten nothing. Well, that’s actually a lie because I did get the thing that I wanted to get so that I could save on this thing.

What is it, you ask? A digital to analog TV converter box of which there is a program underwritten by the US Government to subsidize the cost of the boxes to the effect of upwards of $80 (2 $40 coupons per household).

What had spurred me on to applying for the coupons in the first place was the appearance of the boxes in the local Wal-Mart store. I had noticed them at the beginning of March, on the day when I was doing the test drive to and from work, and we stopped at the store which I pass every day to check it out.

When I first saw them, they literally had stacks and stacks of the boxes. At the time, I thought that they would be in plentiful supply for quite some time. Since seeing them at first, and seeing them in a whole bunch of other stores, I didn’t think anything about it until I received my coupons on Tuesday (I knew that they were coming because the site said that they were sent out on Friday or so), and I had an item on my list that said I’d look at getting the box after work.

So, I stop at Wal-Mart on my way home from work. I had an inkling (from other stores disappearing the boxes in recent days) that they might not have any out, but I checked anyway, expecting to just walk in and walk out with a box for $10 after the coupon.

I get to the electronics section, and there’s nothing. Zip, zilch, nada. Even the display unit has disappeared. I go to ask the clerk in the area, and they make a comment that they’re sold out, but might have some on Thursday or early next week.

Just a side note here - you can tell I want something when I have this unending desire to get it. Do you want an example of this? Well, at midnight, I called up the store which had just opened up in the area.

Lesson 1: Don’t call Wal-Mart at midnight.

Why? Well, you tend to get some of the densest folks in the store. I call them and ask if they have the digital converter boxes. I get put on hold, and after a minute or so, the person comes back and asks if I’m meaning for an audio system. In the end, as far as I can tell, they don’t sell them there. I’d just guess they’re out as well.

We get to Thursday, and I need to go over to another city to pick up some medicine from my clinic, so I decide to make a pit stop at the Wal-Mart there (they’re like viruses, in just about any city now [but not as bad as Walgreen’s, which appear on every street corner {I pass 2 on my way to work every day}]). I head over to the electronics department, and they actually have a box there. Well, not exactly. It is just a display model with a clock ticking down to February 19th, the switch off date for analog TV. Any boxes? Nope. Any in the back? Nope.

So, I go back to the first store which said they might have one Thursday night. They don’t have any, but fortunately, the gal remembers me from Tuesday night, and mentions one important thing - they are backordered. They don’t have any at the store, and even the distribution centre is having a backlog of orders as well, and the next time they might have some available is unknown.

Lesson 2: Do stop at a Wal-Mart early in the morning.

This brings us to Friday morning, and since I have an hour or so between when I arrive and when I start to volunteer, I decided to head down to the Wal-Mart that is about 3 miles south of where I was to see if they had any. The setup was the same as the second store I went to - display unit with countdown clock. No other display, no boxes. I decided to skip over the folks at the electronics counter because I was listening to the reason for stopping at Wal-Mart at 7AM: the Wal-Mart Radio network. They were reading out a list of employees who had worked for them for 20 plus years. It was a simple format - Employee name at store number in city name, x years. It was such a fascinating thing to listen to  because of all the numbers they just roll off in such a short succession. Plus, it was completely content-free radio. Just names read out by some guy, along with some music (which he claimed was requested music).

I get to the door, and strike up a chat with the greeter (because frankly, there ain’t much going on at 7am in a Wal-Mart which has just opened), and I mentioned the converter boxes. She said that they didn’t have any, but I should try the store I had tried (I explained what I was told), along with one that was, well, just too far out of the way

She then mentioned that she had cable and was OK with the conversion to digital, which is completely true. I’m safe with it as well, but the biggest reason that I want the box is all the channels that you don’t get on cable (luckily she has the same cable company as I do so she can appreciate it ). She also made a comment along the lines that I observed - in March, they had stacks and stacks with no clue what to do with them. Now, you can’t find them.

It’s like they’re disappearing like they’re going out of style!

An idea that’s been floating through my head after thinking about the kinds of shows I watch (and realizing that I don’t watch all that much American TV, and a lot of foreign TV) is one of what channels would you have if you could have any channels available in the world.

For me personally, it would be a heavy focus on two areas - news and sports. Before I get to my channel list, let me set out the challenge to you: What if you had your own TV service? What channels would you want to have if money, time and satellite coverage were not issues?

So, without further ado, here’s my channel list.

Local Channels

A note about local channels: There will be multiple listings for some channels and networks because of the fact some stations in my area carry multiple signals, plus the local channels would all be brought in by antenna, so the actual list would vary from day to day

• WISC (TV3, Madison - CBS; no subchannels)
• WTMJ (Channel 4, Milwaukee - NBC, 1 subchannel - 4.2, Weather Plus)
• WITI (Channel 6, Milwaukee - Fox, no subchannels)
• WGN (Channel 9, Chicago - CW, no subchannels; for sport in HD)
• WMVS (Channels 10-1 through 10-7, Milwaukee -  various PBS networks)
• WISN (Channel 12, Milwaukee - ABC, no subchannels)
• WMTV (Channel 15, Madison - NBC, 1 subchannel, weather)
• WVTV (Channel 18, Milwaukee - CW, no subchannels)
• WHA (Channel 21, Madison - PBS, varying subchannels)
• WCGV (Channel 24, Milwaukee - My Network, possibly 1 subchannel)
• WKOW (Channel 27, Madison - ABC; no subchannels, NO logo over all pictures!)
• WMVT (Channel 36, Milwaukee - PBS HD)
• WMSN (Channel 47, Madison - Fox, unknown subchannels)
• WDJT (Channel 58, Milwaukee, 2 subchannels - WMLW & Me TV)
• WYTU (Channel 63, Milwaukee, analog only, Telemundo)
• And some religious channels that I can’t be stuffed listing

Entertainment channels

Now, all of these channels would be in HD or Widescreen, when possible. Note that this is definitely not an exhaustive list as I’m probably not aware of all the channels in the world.

• A&E
• Discovery Channel
• Discovery Home & Living
• TLC
• Animal Planet
• Cartoon Network
• Boomerang
• Nickelodeon (the channel that airs the good shows)
• TV Land
• HDNet
• TBS
• TNT (not so much for the programming, but for the six races in summer)
• UKTV (Aust.)
• Other UKTV Networks (UK)
• G4TechTV (Canada)
• How-to Channel (Aust.)
• Discovery RealTime (UK)
• BBC America (before it went to pot)
• Travel Channel
• Comedy Central
• Fox8 (Aust.)
• Lifestyle (Aust. - probably just a sample for a while)
• National Geographic (US)
• GSN

News Channels

• CNN (US)
• CNN International
• CNN Headline News
• CNBC (US)
• CNBC World
• MSNBC
• BBC World News
• BBC News Channel (formerly News 24)
• Sky News UK
• Sky News Aust.
• Fox Business Channel
• Fox News Channel
• Sky Business Channel (Aust.)
• Euronews
• CBC Newsworld (does that even exist anymore?)
• Bloomberg
• Times Now (India/US)
• Al-Jazeera English
• Weather Channel (US)
• Weather Channel (Aust.)

Sports Channels

• All Regional Channels (i.e. the Fox Sports Net channels, Comcast Sports Network, etc.)
• Setanta US
• Cricket Channel
• ESPN
• ESPN2
• ESPNews
• ESPN Classic (US)
• ESPN Classic (UK)
• ESPNU
• ESPN360 (internet service)
• ESPN Deportes
• Speed
• Versus
• NASCAR Hot Pass
• Motors TV (UK or mainland Europe)
• Fox Sports 1, 2, 3 (Aust.)
• ESPN (Asia/Pacific)
• Zee Sports (South Asia/India)
• Sky Sports 1, 2, 3, Xtra (UK)
• Sky Sports News (UK)
• Fox Sports News (Aust.)
• Fox Soccer Channel
• Eurosport News
• Eurosport 1, 2
• Fox College Sports
• Rogers SportsNet (or whatever the main Canadian regional sports net is)
• GolTV

Spanish Channels

• Univision
• mun2 (if that’s still on the air…)
• Telefutura
• Galavisión
• Azteca América
• Fox Sports en Español

Movie Channels

For the most part, the Movie channels are for the shows aired on there, such as Dexter and Flight of the Conchords (and apparently Summer Heights High is coming to HBO this year)

• I think I’d have all of them available in the US, just because there might be a time when I find a movie that I haven’t watched (not that there are many of those out there, eh? )
• Turner Classic Movies
• Fox Movie Channel
• Sundance Channel
• Independent Movie Channels

Music Channels

• VH1
• VH1 MegaHits (though that ain’t coming back )

Yeah, that’s about it…I’ve never been one for watching music videos; if I want to listen to music, I’ll listen to it on the computer or the radio.

So, there you go. 25-plus local channels, 24 general entertainment channels, about 60 sports channels, 20 news channels, dozens of movie channels, at least 6 Spanish Channels, so a total of about 150 channels, plus the obligatory Video-On-Demand probably.

Also, I’d have to have about a 3-terabyte DVR to record all the stuff I’d never watch anyway, but think I had time to watch.

What do you think? Am I just crazy for wanting to have all of these channels? How much do you think this would cost? For some reason I don’t want to think about it because I know it would probably be in the hundreds of dollars a month, just for the various equipment, such as PAL-> NTSC converters (or just a PAL TV )…