Christmas website scam

So this guy, Alex Komarnitsky, started a website two years ago purporting to let people turn his Christams lights on and off over the internet. But he really wanted to see if he could use computer tricks to make it look as if the thousands of Christmas lights adorning his house were blinking on command. This year he went even further - when a local news channel did a story about his site and had a news copter hovering over the house, he had is wife in the house turning the lights on and off manually. He has now come forward and admitted it's a hoax. And here is the link to the site itself - if you are interested. Sounds like a pretty shifty thing to do, if you ask me.

The great iPod debacle

That's what I've decided to call it. It's been all taken care of for over a week now, so I believe I have enough perspective on the whole situation to be diplomatic when I write this - so here goes...

It all started on December 8th. The iPod I've had since February started acting up a lot - it would skip a song, play the next and maybe one more, and then it would freeze. Totally locked up and it would just sit there till you reset it. Very annoying, and it got worse on Sunday the 12th. I was at the gym, and it did the same thing - skipped a song, played the next, froze up. It wouldn't reset, though. It just sat there, then turned itself off after a few minutes. But it wouldn't power back on. So, I made a trip out to the Apple Store at Easton Towne Center, and figured they could look at it for me. If you haven't been in an Apple Store, they have this thing called the "Genius Bar". If you are having problems with an Apple product you can take it there and get assistance. So I go to the Genius Bar and consult the "Genius". He was able to get it started, and says "Looks like the battery is dead - it'll need to be charged, but it works OK." I pointed out to him that the battery had just been recently charged, and was in fact half charged when it quit. He didn't seem to think anything of this, and said again "The battery is dead. Just give it a good charge."

So I took it home, recharged the battery fully and tried again. And it still did it, no different than before. So I took it back to the Apple Store again on Sunday the 19th. And when I talked to the next "Genius", he said it was probably software corruption, and suggested we return the iPod to factory default. So he offered to do that for me, and we did it. It also deleted all the songs off the iPod - but I could reload them from my PC. He got it to load a couple songs off the test Mac they use, and they played back OK. So he gives it back to me, "There you go. When you take it home, it'll need to reset again and reload the system software since you use a Windows PC." All well and good, I said - but I was still worried. And with good reason.

I get home, and later that night I try to reload my songs on the iPod. It detects that it's connected to a Windows PC, and wants to reformat again - good so far. After it's done, it loads the system software. So far it's doing exactly what it's supposed to do. The firmware update works fine, and it seems to be OK - so I try to upload songs to it. It starts OK, tells me it's loaded 900 songs - then it freezes. Locks up totally - and locks up my computer too. I disconnect the USB cable to the computer, and the computer is OK again. I had to restart the iPod though. But it did restart, and I tried again. It didn't work - again. I tried several times, and even tried the iPod restore and firmware download again. Nothing worked, and I was getting rather pissed off at it. It seemed to always stop on a certain song - so I deleted it. And then it would stop on other songs, so I deleted them too. I got rid of about 200 songs and it still wouldn't download correctly. Now I was really mad.

So I make ANOTHER trip to the Apple Store on December 21st, and went directly to the front desk and asked for the manager. Suffice to say, that was absolutely no help, as she didn't even express concern over the problem and just directed me to go to the Genius Bar. Lovely customer service skills. I went to the Genius bar, and met the ONLY person who actually cared enough to help. And he quickly diagnosed the problem - a faulty hard drive in my iPod. You know what he did? He LISTENED to it - because it made an odd noise when he started it up and tried to look at the system settings. No one else had even though of this, but I guess I should not have been surprised. He went to the stockroom, and returned with another iPod to give me in exchange for the faulty one. I left the store and went home, tried the whole procedure again - and it worked. Flawlessly. Because this time, it WAS FIXED.

So, I've written letters to the manager of the Apple Store, the Senior Vice President in charge of Retail for Apple, the Senior Vice President in charge of the iPod Division, and to Steve Jobs himself. I've expressed my concerns to them, and hopefully something will happen. We'll see, I suppose. I'll keep you informed if anything comes of it.

Merry day after Christmas

It's been a very interesting last few days. Wednesday afternoon a huge snowstorm started and it covered the area with quite a lot of snow by the time it finished the next day. Around Delaware (where I live) we had at least a foot of snow. And since part of the storm included freezing rain, the snow had a nice ice coating over it. We couldn't get out of our driveway Thursday or Friday, so I didn't go to work either day. In fact, I spent a large portion of time both days shoveling snow with my wife - loads of fun. The city finally got out our way Friday evening and plowed our streets. It was a good thing too, because we needed to be able to get out of the house for Christmas - we'd already committed ourselves to be at my mother's house Christmas morning and at my wife's parents house for Christmas evening. We made it out to my mother's house OK, got there about 7am (my 3 nieces get up VERY early even when it's not Christmas), and had a great time opening presents and having breakfast all together. We left around noon, went back home to get the things we needed to take down to Cincinnati (where my wife's parents live) and get the dog ready to go. We loaded up the car and got on the road, had a decent drive into Cincinnati and had a second present opening extravaganza - no kids this time, but 3 dogs. Because we have Lucas (our golden retriever), her parents have Molly (a chocolate Lab), and her sister has Tanner (a beagle). Having 3 dogs also makes for an interesting Christmas time. The dogs get presents, of course - but also seem to monopolize picture taking in the same way children do. Although, with the scenes straight out of Sodom and Gomorrah our dogs got into, these pictures aren't quite as family friendly. Molly is female, Tanner and Lucas are male, and even though Tanner and Lucas are fixed, they were all trying to go at it. It was actually pretty funny! Anyway, just wanted to post a bit about what's been going on recently. I really need to post an entry about the huge problem I had recently with my iPod - but I'll need to compose my thoughts and come up with a way to write about it without just typing expletives constantly. Hope you all had a Merry Christmas (or whichever celebration you subscribe too)!!

A match made in the Islands of Fire

Survivor host Jeff Probst has announced he is dating Survivor:Vanuatu - Islands of Fire contestant Julie Berry (read the article here). Probst is 43 and Berry is 24. As recently as a week ago, he had been denying rumor that they were dating, rumors that had emerged earlier in the season and were strengthened after the broadcast of an episode in which Julie was shown at a challenge wearing a hand painted tattoo of a heart with the word "Jeff" in it. Hee. Maybe he fell in love with her after seeing her sun bathing naked in front of the rest of her tribe. True love, yo - you can't knock it.

Pictures (but not of Julie's naked ass - thankfully)

Trailer for the Tim Burton remake of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

You can watch it here - Charlie and the Chocolate Factory Teaser Trailer. Hmm, could be very cool.
You can also check out the newest trailer for Batman Begins here. That looks like it will be really great! It better be, to make up for that horrible Batman & Robin piece of crap.

Picture of my nieces

I didn't take this one, but it's a great picture of my nieces -



Very cute, aren't they?

Finally...

I'm finally back to doing my real job (for what it's worth), and hopefully this means more regular blog updating. I still haven't had a chance to play with the pictures with my new camera, so I've definitely got to get off my ass and do that - cause Christmas is coming, and I'll just have more pictures to go through. Yup, gotta do that. BTW - buy a iTunes Gift Certificate through the link above (If you want), and I get a little bit in return. Works out good for all, no?

[Sarcasm] Oh, OK Barry - whatever you say [/Sarcasm]

Hot on the heels of the leak of Jason Giambi's grand jury testimony (revealing that he used steroids), Barry Bonds testimony has also been leaked. He stated that he "used a clear substance and a cream given to him by a trainer who was indicted in a steroid-distribution ring, but said he didn't know they were steroids". Right. The article further reports "Bonds told the federal grand jury last year that Greg Anderson, his personal trainer, told him the substances he used in 2003 were the nutritional supplement flaxseed oil and a rubbing balm for arthritis". Does this revelation really surprise anyone?

Bah

Not really "Bah, Christmas" more a "Bah, work sucks". I haven't had any time to do much other than work recently, and for that reason have not posted very often in the last few weeks. Hopefully (fingers crossed), my work situation will get better soon and I'll be able to post more. I haven't even had time to play with my new camera - I know I promised I'd post up some of the pictures I took with it, but I just haven't had a chance. I'm thinking I'll be able to do it soon, this weekend at the latest. Wish me luck!

Say Cheese!!

My lovely wife got me a new digital camera for an anniversary present - the Kodak EasyShare DX7590. I got a chance to use it for the first time yesterday at Thanksgiving dinner at my Mom's house, and it was really easy to use. Had to get up early today for work or I would have a few pictures to put in the post - I'll definitely get a chance to post some after the weekend.

Happy day after Thanksgiving!

It's the busiest shopping day of the year, so I'm sure you're out there now fighting traffic and long lines at the register - but if you get a chance, go check out the Virtual Bartender. Ask Tammy to do something, and she'll do it - maybe. Some commands I've had work are "kiss", "flirt", "gymnastics", "jiggle", and "pillow fight". Just an FYI, this is a bit racy (no nudity though), so it might not be safe for work.

Busy, busy, busy

I know, I know - it's been a week since my last post. But in my defense it's been a fairly busy week. Getting back into the swing of things after vacation really took a toll on me, I'm still not 100% back up to speed. And tomorrow is Thanksgiving, and I have it off but have to work Friday - but then I took Saturday off. So I work a day, am off a day, work a day, am off till Wednesday. Could be worse.

Vacation was great - I didn't write a lot about it cause I never seemed to get a chance to. We went to Las Vegas, stayed at my Dad's timeshare at the Hilton Grand Vacations Club. Decent room (and it was free!!) and located right behind the Flamingo - so the location was great, right in the middle of the Strip. And we were really busy - went to the Tournament of Kings at Excalibur the first night we were in Vegas, and since we walk EVERYWHERE we go in Vegas we had to walk there through a rainstorm. A rainstorm that generated a RECORD SETTING AMOUNT OF RAINFALL for Las Vegas. You wanna know how much? 0.25 inches. I know, it seems like not a lot, but in the desert? That's A LOT. Trust me. So we were wet, and cold, and it is really tough to walk around the Strip when the sidewalks are wet (since all the casinos have fancy sidewalks of marble or polished granite or whatnot). Suffice to say, once we got to the show, we were really glad to be inside. They started our "feast" (it's a dinner show) with tomato soup, and it was so good!! A great way to recover from the weather outside. We had fun at the show, but took a taxi back to the room - no WAY were we walking through that rain again!!

Gotta stop here for now - I'll try to post more about the trip soon. I'll also try to get back to posting more regularly - hopefully my cruddy work situation will get better soon.

The Amazing Race 6 premiere

So I think it's no secret I love The Amazing Race, I've posted a few times before about it and how terrific it is. The 2 hour premiere episode for the sixth season was last night, and it was so great! My wife and I already have a team to hate (Jonathan and Victoria, mostly because Jonathan is an ass), but who knows about the other teams ? Some of them seem like they could be OK, and a lot of them need to pay closer attention to their clues and road signs and maps and... well, pretty much EVERYTHING. I can't wait to see what happens!

Vacation never seems to last long enough...

Greetings! I've not posted in a long while because I was on vacation. My wife and I went to Las Vegas (with a short side trip to California) and we just got back on Monday. So, I'm still trying to get back in the swing of things - and just started back to work today. Since I've still got a lot of catching up to do this will be brief, but hopefully I'll have time for a longer post tomorrow or Friday. I am glad to be home, but truth be told I would much rather still be on vacation. I guess that's pretty true for anybody though, isn't it?

OK, now that's just cruel

You've had a rough week. You ended a hard fought campaign hopeful that you and your running mate would win - only to lose to a retarded Texan. Your running mate conceded the election Wednesday, and you figure you'll decide what to do next since you gave up your seat in the Senate to run. But wait - it's not over! Your wife has breast cancer! Seriously, what's next?

Election 2004 (or as I like to call it, Wait - WTF?!?!)

So yeah, John Kerry conceded the election and George W got a second term. He's also declared his win 'historic'. Not the word I would choose, but whatever. But I hate how all the Republicans are now all about bridging the partisan gap, and Bush himself said he wanted to "earn the support" of those who voted for Kerry. They say this after running one of the most devisive campaigns in history, and basically convincing the Republican faithful that 'Moral Values' are more important than any other issue facing this country. What a crock. We'll see just how bad the next four years can get - with the dollar losing value across the globe, huge domestic deficits, and ever eroding lack of respect for the US in the eyes of the world. Oh well - there's always 2008, right?

Kerry Concedes

According to a story on CNN, John Kerry will officially concede the 2004 election to George W. Bush. Not a whole lot else to say about this, it's certainly not the way I wanted the election to go. Guess it's time to move to Canada, eh?

An important message brought to you by... EMINEM?!?!

No really. I case you've forgotten just how important the presidential election is, watch this video for Eminem's song "Mosh" off his new album Encore. Very cool video, and a very cool message. Word to your mother.

In a more humorous election-related vein, check this little Flash animation out -
Political Bohemian Rhapsody. Pretty funny!

New Photo iPod

Sorry about the lack of posts recently - work has been seriously kicking my ass. Once I get home I don't really want to even look at a computer, much less use one. So here's a second post for today - hopefully this helps make up for the recent dearth of new posts :)

OOH - I want the new Photo iPod! Who wants to buy me one of the 60 GB ones? C'mon - it'll make you feel good!

The Amazing Race 6!

The next season of The Amazing Race is set to premiere on CBS November 16th - check out the website for racer profiles!! I love this show so much - it's so awesome to have another season so soon after the last one ended. I just wish they would release the earlier Races on DVD, since I never got to see the first one. It'd be a great thing if CBS ever did release them on DVD - I know it'd sell really well!