So, in showing that I obviously don’t know my Monday night TV schedule as well as I thought I did, Castle returned tonight, and the only reason I knew about it was the fact that I saw something on Hulu about 10 minutes before it was supposed to begin. Wouldn’t have been a big oops, but with the few number of shows I want to watch that are actually coming back from their break in January, you’d think I’d be more on top of when each one premiered. At least I know for a fact that Glee, White Collar, V, and Survivor aren’t premiering any time later this week, so the schedule surprises should be minimal for the next 7 days.
I’ve had a feature which exists in Windows that I’ve been trying to find the equivalent of in OS X, but I don’t think the functionality is built into the base OS (and Alexander agrees with my analysis that it isn’t there). As it turns out, what is ironically the easiest way to replicate this functionality is through free Microsoft software that has both a PC and Mac version available, plus it solves the issue that all of the other considered solutions had. Namely, I want to sync video files from my WHS to my Macbook for when I take it on trips, but I didn’t want the slowdown of having to use an internet file storage solution. Fortunately, Windows Live Sync does exactly what I need it to do (theoretically, I haven’t actually tried it yet). So, Microsoft 1, Apple 0, but do we really need to keep score? Yeah, I think we do :)
Personal - Seattle
To finish off the weekend of TV, the season premiere of Chuck tonight was just as entertaining as it should have been, and now it gets to share Monday nights with 24 (starting next week, also with a Sunday two hour premiere) as my go to shows for the first day of the week. Fortunately no other shows that I really like to watch are on Monday night (aside from Two and a Half Men, but I never watch that when it initially airs anyway), so when everything else sees fit to return, I won’t have to worry about Hulu quite as much. Andrew will be quite happy that Chuck has premiered since it means an end to the barrage of ads he’s been seeing and apparently getting quite annoyed with since he isn’t that big of a fan.
Tomorrow is a not completely boring but still nothing major to do day for me. In fact, my schedule is like that through Wednesday (with the latter two days being even more open than tomorrow), but then fortunately Thursday and Friday get slightly more interesting. At least my calendar is at the point now where I have at least one item on it every day, a great improvement over my first couple months where I enjoyed having something to do on a single one.
Personal - Seattle
Being over at Andrew’s last week for the Cowboys-Eagles game was fun, especially since it was a shutout and some small bit of revenge for the end of last season. As planned, there was a repeat again tonight (although without me), but if I had been in Dallas, I would have been over there again. Fortunately, the outcome was even sweeter this time because we did to the Eagles what they did last year (ended their season) and at the same time, Dallas finally got a playoff victory. I guess my consolation prize for being in Seattle was that it was in the 50s here today, not sub-freezing.
Tomorrow there are a couple more playoff games, but since none have any impact on Dallas’s situation (next weekend, noon on Sunday, at Minnesota), I probably won’t dedicate a whole lot of time to exclusively watching them. Instead, I can be doing awesome things like playing/finishing Mass Effect, honing my Civilization IV skills before my multiplayer game with Alexander starts, or possibly just watching TV shows off Netflix. Notice how all three of those things and a common theme: me sitting in my apartment, doing virtually nothing productive with my time. Aren’t weekends the best?
Personal - Seattle
On DVD, I now have both the second season of Chuck and the first season of Fringe that I can entertain myself with this weekend if I so desire. In addition, the Cowboys play the Eagles tomorrow night. In addition to that, I have numerous seasons of shows available to stream from Netflix, including Dexter which I started tonight. In even more addition to that, Sunday night is the two hour season premiere of Chuck. Could TV possibly be any better this weekend? No, I don’t think so.
On my plane trip home Wednesday evening, I watched Equilibrium on DVD which I had from Netflix since before I even left. It was one of those movies I had never heard of before, but Netflix recommended it to be, and I bet it was because I had rated both The Matrix and Wanted highly because it was effectively a cross between those two movies. Sure, Equilibrium came out in 2003 and Wanted was in 2008, but trust me, it was a cross of the two. My score: 7.5/10.
Personal - Seattle
Sure, I worked from home the first few days this week answering emails and everything, but it never really felt like “work”. Between today and tomorrow, however, this might as well just be a two day work week for me. Today was just sort of that depressing “first day back” syndrome, and then tomorrow gets to be all upbeat and cheerful since it’s time for the weekend! Also, since I just realized my title could be read differently than I intended, it’s supposed to just be “The Monday Friday Situation”, not “The Monday Through Friday Situation”. You know, things like that can be really important in the long run when I’m rereading this post and can’t even decode my own titles.
CES news keeps me quite entertained during the more boring parts of my day and just underscores exactly why I want to go so badly next year. As if the AT&T phone announcements weren’t enough (but they were), companies are showing off new laptops, e-readers, and TV connected media streaming devices that just taunt me to choose between them if I ever want one. In fact, the one of media streamers I’ll likely get for my parents, and I’m still in the market for a netbook. Overall, there’s just way too much stuff to see and I get the feeling that even the best websites that cover CES don’t do it justice.
Personal - Seattle
In what is by far the best news of 2010 up to this point, it appears that my days with my iPhone will soon be coming to a close. At CES today, AT&T announced that “in the first half of 2010”, both Android and WebOS-based phones would be making their debut. Considering that I become eligible for an upgrade on April 20th, apparently the cell phone gods are on my side (at least the ones who dislike Apple). Sure, I won’t be terribly shocked if that date slips, and there’s no guarantee that any of the phones that come I’ll like, but with the Nexus One and Pre being two extremely likely candidates, you can probably put me down for a move away from Apple. Of course, this means that I wouldn’t be able to upgrade to a Windows Mobile 7 phone until next year, but I’m willing to postpone hopping on Microsoft’s bandwagon for just a tad longer.
As you can see from the lack of a bold indicator at the start of this post, I am finally back in Seattle. The entire trip process from DFW to SeaTac to my apartment went extremely smooth, and my body thinks it’s almost 1:00 which means I’m about ready to go to sleep. My day tomorrow isn’t completely packed, but it’s definitely going to be a busier day (as will Friday) than the past couple have been with just answering emails.
Personal - Seattle
Dallas, 12:50 AM (1/6): I bet that if I didn’t point it out, no one would notice. However, by not pointing it out, then I can’t reference it in my title and make up witty comments concerning it. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, then obviously you don’t read my posts closely enough because this post should have come 8-12 hours ago. As it turns out, I am on a flight tomorrow, I got paid $400 to be on said flight, and all is well with the world since I’m able to make this post just fine.
So, tomorrow will be just like today, but with everything shifted a tiny bit earlier. Instead of a 6:45 flight I’m on a 4:30 flight, so that means that I actually get into Seattle at a more reasonable time. All that really does is allow me to have more time at my apartment unpacking before I feel the urge to fall asleep, but I’ll gladly take more over less.
Dallas, Personal - Seattle
Dallas, 1:45 AM (1/5): Two things are for sure tomorrow: 1) I’ll be making a post in the afternoon before I go to the airport just to stay on the total safe side as far as schedules go, and 2) I’ll be going to DFW tomorrow with a slight uncertainty as to whether my destination will be Seattle, Dallas, or some other location. Ok, so let me explain exactly how I could go to DFW and have Dallas as my destination. I promise that I’m not going insane from lack of sleep or being on drugs or anything.
Apparently my flight tomorrow is yet again overbooked, and when I checked in online earlier, I was asked if I wanted to volunteer to possibly take a later flight (as was the case in Vegas). I went ahead and said sure, and then I decided to go ahead and check what the alternatives would be. There is a Dallas-Portland flight that would take off after my current Seattle flight, but I would be left in Oregon overnight with no way to get to Seattle until Wednesday morning. I would think they would rather have me stay overnight here rather than in Portland, so that’s how I could conceivably see myself going to DFW but staying in Dallas an additional night. Of course, if I were to stay in Dallas, I’d get my parents to bring me back home instead of staying at a hotel at/near the airport.
Dallas, Personal - Seattle
Dallas, 1:50 AM (1/4): The BBQ at Andrew’s was fun (helped quite a bit by a 24-0 Cowboys victory), and then we watched movies and DVDs once it was over. When I’m back in Seattle next weekend in hopefully somewhat nice weather, apparently there will be a repeat since the Eagles and Cowboys play again next Saturday, again in Dallas, for the wild card round. Fortunately since all games now are playoff games I can see them all in Seattle, but if I was going to be around, I would definitely join everyone for another version of today.
Tomorrow I’m officially back at work, but at the same time I’m still on vacation. Confusing? Think of it as a vacation + having to respond to emails, but as long as those emails get responded to in a timely manner, I can do as many vacation-like activities as I want. Granted, I have no such activities planned for tomorrow (or Tuesday) at the present time, but if my schedule was that planned out in advance, it would border on not being a vacation at all.
Dallas, Personal - Seattle
Dallas, 1:45 AM (1/3): Ok, so tonight wasn’t really a “party” in the sense that Andrew’s BBQ tomorrow could be considered one, but I’s say going over to Jess’s house, having about 10 people there at it’s most populated point, and watching Star Trek counts as at least an informal one. I’ve also become addicted to a Scrabble-esque iPhone game that can be played multiplayer against someone else, so I have games going on with Jess and Crayton in that (apparently I’m a little late to this party). As a result of that, I’ve finally found a use for notifications on the iPhone even though I wish there were some way to say “don’t notify me in the middle of the night when the noise/light will inevitably wake me up”.
I’m curious to see what Monday will be like as far as “working from home” goes since people will actually be around the office for a change. Granted, I still won’t have much to do beyond answer emails, but I’m anticipating the volume to be slightly higher than it was when I got here right before (or just as) everyone was going on vacation in December. While emails are fun and all, one nice thing about getting back to Seattle will be the fact that I at least will have more to do during the day.
Dallas, Personal - Seattle