2010 — 30 December: Thursday
A fresh cuppa at hand, some lovely Beethoven violin music,1 a non-subzero temperature. I seem to have the morning under control, so far. Unlike a certain large studio:
Warner Brothers has been slightly less pro-active than Toyota was earlier this year with my accelerator pedal. My recent DVD copy of "Inception" is going to be replaced, but only because I complained. Since my DVDO Edge scaler generally did such a good repair job "on-the-fly" I was largely unaware of the mastering problem until my video picture quality consultant Mike2 decided the quality was intolerable on his system and started digging. The Warners web site in the UK has now just owned up (sort of) to the problem3 and started offering free replacement copies.
The speed with which they are able to do so suggests they had already spotted the problem and knew they would have to fix it. Ho hum. It's 08:58 and I think I shall venture out into cyberspace to see what else is cooking.
30 years!
There's plenty to ponder here, of course. Though it's also a bit late to change anything. [Pause] That's breakfast sorted. Now I'd better nip out to start my Xmas shopping :-)
I guess I won't be buying any Kodachrome.
Phase 1 complete
There's not much to this Xmas shopping lark, really. Matalan: three pairs new boxers? Check. Six pairs new socks? Check. Comet: Another little external hard drive as commissioned by another relative? Check.
Brief pit-stop, then I'm off to dear Mama's choccie shop to restock. She hasn't stated a preference, yet, but then I've yet to find a chocolate she doesn't like. I shall keep trying, just for fun :-)
It's 11:26 and dull and grey out there. +5C seems mild these days. I gather we have the North Atlantic Oscillation to thank for relatively static weather patterns hereabouts.
It was either some bearded...
... religious bloke, or maybe it was Mickey Spillane, who said "Vengeance is mine", wasn't it? Well, if my reader has the patience of Job, I can now reveal that, while I was out, Mr Postie dropped off five further credit notes from Staples.
So what? Well, it brings my collection up to nine of the things, and they add up to £418-21 — an amount that contrasts nicely with the original invoice (back in mid-August, which I paid promptly, of course) for £360-58. I appear to be trembling on the brink of making a profit. [Pause] Maybe not. Looking closely at the damned things (for the first time, I admit) it looks as if I'm supposed to have been sending each one back having written on it the number of the invoice it's to be applied to. I think I shall defer to the great goddess Procrastination for a while and see what happens. If their accounts department is organised along the same lines as their customer service department, urgenticity-wise, I should be OK until about Easter.
What's that, propping up my front door?
Having dropped a power supply back with its original owner, and snaffled a couple of mince pies over the road, a spot of scanning reveals another small batch of filmic goodies. Good-oh.
- Smart People
excellent cast - Quo Vadis, baby?
another from the "I'm not scared" chap - Thirteen
I live in hope of seeing Holly Hunter match her performance in "Broadcast News" — this is directed by the lady who made "Twilight" (and co-written by "Rosalie"!) - The Witnesses
A look back at the 1980s - Histoire de Marie et Julien
Love story plus supernatural thriller - La Belle Noiseuse
A seriously-reworked (and far shorter) version
The three French films were packaged as "French collection Vol. 4 — Emmanuelle Béart" for less than a tenner. Amazing.
Somewhat later
I've just finished re-watching "Letters to Juliet" — its emotional impact has been greatly heightened for me after hearing the sensitive interview with Vanessa Redgrave earlier this week (on "Woman's Hour", naturally). She made the film while coping with the loss of her daughter Natasha, her sister Lynn, and her brother Corin. And having got back together with Franco Nero (the guy who played "Lorenzo" in the film) with whom she had had a son two years after they'd met in 1967 while filming Camelot. What a tangled web, heh?
And now — just to show my credentials as a true child of the New Millennium — I've successfully bought, downloaded on to BlackBeast, and almost painlessly transferred over to my giant iPod (aka the iMac), three MP3 music files for a total cost of 37p since Amazon had been kind enough to offer me £2-00 off "my next download". Nice quality, too:
- One of these Nights, by Jackson Heights, from an Eagles tribute album I didn't even know existed
- Self Control,4 by Laura Branigan, replacing the lower bitrate version Junior downloaded for me several years ago from a Russian site of not entirely convincing legality (they were undercutting everybody else)
- A Lady of a Certain Age,5 by Divine Comedy (a group that needs a great deal more study than I have so far given them)
It's 22:12, which is cuppa time in my book.