New TV on Order

Our old bedroom TV gave out the other day, and I have been researching new TVs online. I talked with my brother-in-law, who is the family expert on HDTV, and he gave me some tips. He bought a DLP HDTV, and has regretted his choice since it comes with a cooling fan that gives out a lot of ambient noise. He has tried to change out the fan on his TV, but the replacement fan is just as loud. The picture is great, but the noise is really irritating.

I was thinking of either a plasma or an LCD TV, and was swayed to the LCD version because it does not have burn in problems. The store salesperson I talked with told me how the newer plasmas have minimized the burn in problem, and I should not have to worry about it. However, he does not suffer from the screen displays that pop up on my TVs at home, reminding us that scheduled programs are available for selection. The pop up has a bright red bar, which would glow for a long time on a plasma in our house. So we have ordered a 40" Samsung LCD HDTV. Since this is for the bedroom, and needs to go against a particular wall, we were limited to no greater than 42".

The TV will be delivered next Wednesday. I know, you are thinking "why didn't he just pay for it and cart it home." "The new LCDs are not that heavy." Right. But by getting them to deliver this new TV, I can also get them to haul away the old cabinet based 35" CRT monster which is now dead. The donating agencies, like Goodwill, only accept TVs that are in working condition.

I also bought a new cabinet, which will be used to carry the new HDTV. The cabinet was built by Bush, which has done an amazing job with their pre-drilled holes and alignment. I brought that home and assembled it over a few days time. I think it took something like 4 dozen screws and wood glue. The store would have charged $50 to assemble any cabinet, and now I know why. It takes so much time and effort.

I will see what the TV is like next Wednesday.

Busy Week

This has been a busy week. Monday was our anniversary, and I had planned on taking out my wife for dinner. I called the best restaurant in the area for reservations, and was told that they are closed for supper on Sunday and Monday nights. I told the receptionist that next time I would schedule our anniversary for another day. But we went to a fine Italian restaurant, and totally stuffed ourselves. My wife has been on a diet, and so both of us have been downsizing our meal portions. The dinner Monday was humongous. We had a large take-home bag after the meal. Incidently, the food tasted great.

I took in the SUV yesterday morning and had the oil changed, and the tires rotated and balanced. While they were working on the SUV I took a rental car and ran to my doctor's office and picked up my allergy drops. Cool stuff. You don't have to get shots. Just put a few drops in your mouth twice a week.

Yesterday afternoon the cable tech guy came and helped set up my new cable modem. He also gave us a new control and got it working for a second TV. We had to change out the TV the other day when the old TV went kaput.

This morning the air conditioning guy is suppose to come and fix the drain on one of our air conditioning air handlers. It is humid now, during the monsoon season, and we get a lot of moisture dripping off the condensers. There are plastic pipes that are suppose to take the water outside and drip on the ground. But one of the pipes is stopped up and the water is running out of the base of the air handler and down into the air chamber where the unit picks up the air to circulate through the house. So the AC guy will have to cut into the dry wall and replumb the tubing. How do I know? Well, he had to do the same thing last year. I think the remodeling we did this last fall caused enough dust to make the problem happen again. Ugh....

Tomorrow morning the Termite inspector comes for his yearly walk-around. If he sees any signs of termites on the exterior of the house, he will spray again. It is a sweet deal for the bug company. Then the regular monthly bug spray guy will come at noon and spray the house inside and the stones outside (I can't say grass, since this is the Phoenix area and we don't do grass except on golf courses.)

Tomorrow afternoon the Sears guy is scheduled to come and fix our icemaker on the new refrigerator. It keeps getting stuck on the cubes and won't pop them out of the tray.

Friday is scheduled as a day of rest. Thank goodness we are retired, because this is too much to handle if we were working. LOL.....

Cable Modem Problem Resolved

The Tech from our cable company came out yesterday, and fixed my cable modem problem. He hooked up my new Linksys Cable Modem with my Linksys Wireless Router, and got everything running again. He even helped to be sure my notebook connected wirelessly with the router. It took a little adjustment, and now things are fine.

I use to have the cable modem hookup drop out on me at least sometime during the day for the last few weeks. But since my new modem was installed I haven't had (knock on wood) any drop outs. Frankly, I think the problem was that the firmware in my old Motorola modem was not up to date. (I have had that modem for at least 4 years.) The Tech showed me how to update the firmware on my router using the linksys.com site. I did that last night. Here's hoping the connection lasts.