2006 — Day 42 - what passes for normal service around here
To my other Mac-using reader, any sign of my missing chevrons or has Safari gone walkabout in this respect? Signal via Tom-Tom, Tom.
The BBC hi-def transmission of Code 46 and the upscaled DVD playback were, as far as I could tell, almost too close to call. There was a scene with a simulated video phone with a small text item in the bottom right that was readable on the satellite transmission. I was prepared to believe that would be a tiny font too far for the DVD player but, not so — read on.
Improved PLUGE-hole department
Mr Parcelforce delivered an enigma wrapped in a mystery yesterday morning. Well, a new Pioneer DVD recorder that does (as hoped) give me greater control over DVD black levels on playback. And the alphabet soup here, too:
But a 150-page user manual? Please! Gimme a break. It was bad enough having to write the damned things; last thing I want to do now is read them. So that's the A/V system re-plumbed; again.
Lighter news
Mr Amazon meanwhile delivered the two Amy Winehouse CDs, complete with parental guidance13 an' all, and the 1980 BBC Oppenheimer DVD set. In the meantime, we've now watched the complete Alan Plater "Get Lost!" prequel to the Beiderbecke trilogy. Possibly a mistake to squish it all into a single evening, but you're only young once. Oh, and Lidl have a special coming up on cheap USB memory sticks, so I'll be joining the other grey panthers, bright and early (8 a.m.!) next Monday morning... It's important for us retirees to set little targets, don't you think, to stave off the boredom?
In between the raindrops (and the cold whose symptoms appear temporarily worse) I picked up Send in the Idiots by Kamran Nazeer. I heard an interview with him on NPR some months ago, and his book (which I stumbled across in WH Smith, beautifully mis-shelved) looks like an interesting description of the lives of some autistic men and women. It has not been universally well-received. Nice to see it is set in Bembo, incidentally. (I trust that remark doesn't make me too un-NT. Perhaps I should screen myself at this useful parody site?)