Monthly Archives: February 2008

random thoughts, Technology

New HDTV!

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i bought the pioneer 50″ plasma i wanted – pdp-5080hd. there was a price drop, and i’ve been wanting to buy it, but was kinda waiting for S. to look at furniture for it.

on wednesday i went to j&r’s site, which has had the lowest price on it, and it was no longer listed.

fuuuuuuuuck.

so after work yesterday, i trudged up there (it’s only a few blocks from here), saw the TV (again), then went to the sales guy. there’s one left in the warehouse. price was $500 more expensive than on the web site. he didn’t know why the price went back up. but, he could talk to his manager…

comes back with a price that was $100 more than the price i saw on their site. i’m still not sure, but i tell him it was a no-brainer at the web site price. so he matches the price. delivery’s like $150, and no tax on the sale.

i looked at the comparably rated samsung and panasonics while i was waiting for the guy to work his deal, and they just weren’t the same. plus, the samsung was more expensive. they had america’s test kitchen on when i was there, which is most likely what we’ll be watching most of the time…
so i’m going to have this huge freakin’ tv delivered next saturday. it’s going to look really out of place in our apartment, but once we upgrade it will be awesome. or so i’m hoping.

it’s only a 720p set (768p, actually), but as i was waiting at the cashier with the sales guy, i asked him about the 1080p vs 720p thing. he told me that he and a colleague actually set up two blu-ray DVDs next to each other – one on a 720p and one on a 1080p. said that unless you were like 6 inches from the tv, you’d never notice a difference.

Food

Today (and tomorrow’s) lunch

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it’s farking cold here in NYC. we’re supposed to get snow tomorrow; today it’s just… cold. it’s days like these where you don’t want to travel too far to get lunch. while the past few days’ lunch consisted of an excellent roast beef, made with a recipe from your friends at Cook’s Illustrated, with garlic mashed potatoes, i needed something different.

the “farmer’s market” still runs on tuesdays and thursdays. well, one of the apple vendors, and two bakeries still make a presence in the cold outside . long story short, one of the bakers had a ‘pizzette’ – essentially a little pizza with various toppings. for three bucks, i bought a particularly awesome-looking one covered with blue cheese and caramelized onions.

to supplement, i finally splurged for The Soup Man. previously, i walked over there to find their selection isn’t as varied as Hale and Hearty, and is quite a bit pricier. however, their New England Clam Chowder (my favorite!) was vibrant and delicious, with nice color added from red bell pepper and carrot. and for your $9.70 (tax included), you get a piece of bread and a banana!

overall, a hearty and delicious meal for a damn cold day.

random thoughts, Technology

edmarsh… .com?

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so edmarsh.com was up less than an hour and a half after i changed the nameservers.

i played with wordpress all day (and now looking at drupal again). i’m surprised the ease with which everything is configured; although i have uninstalled and reinstalled both wordpress and drupal a few times already, and broke the themes folder in WP once. i modified the template, and had a little fun. and the cpanel is a whole lot nicer than the windows-based helm.

i find it amazing that a few years ago, i would’ve hand-coded a whole new site. now i simply don’t have the time or inclination. getting this new site up has given me an interest in mysql, so that’s something i’ll learn enough of to just get me in trouble. or disinterested.

my problem, as always, is that i’m diving right in. i need to plan this site out and figure out just what i need it to do. i’m sure i’ll fuck up wordpress again, and i will never be completely satisified of the outcome. and then, after awhile, i’ll lose interest, and move on to something else.