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Monday January 15, 2007

Self improvement

"Oh dear," said Graham. "The living room telly has just gone kaput."

"How do you mean, kaput?"

"It's fine if you like magenta. If not, it's kaput."

"Oh dear. What shall we do about it?"

"We shall have to buy a new one."

"When?"

"Are you just about to go to Sainsbury's?"

"Yes. I need stuff for our lunch and dinner."

"How's about now, then?"

And that's how it was we bought a new TV today. A rather splendid TV with a Bush label on it. 28 inch, wide screen, Nicam Stereo, built in digital receiver, and substantially less in cash terms than the old Grundig model with a propensity for magenta that it replaced. I forgot to ask where it was made. 'Bush' is a good old British make but I bet that it's only the label that's British. All the rest is doubtless manufactured in some far away place with an unpronounceable name.

Not that I mind getting more for less. A few years back I'd have said that the phenomenon probably had something to do with quantum. Now I know that it's all about globalization. The good side of globalization. Not the bad side, where you pay a pound for a one-dollar burger at MacDonalds, or a similarly disadvantageous amount for an Apple computer. No, this is the good side, and I'm not arguing.

It has a splendid picture, too, and nice, crisp sound. I offered to go halves on the cost but Graham would hear nothing of it. I shall find a way to make it up to him.

It hasn't been at all bad today in other regards. Not quite sunny, but almost. Still impossibly mild, which is ridiculous. I understand there are ice storms raging in the central USA, heading east and north. Places like Arizona and Southern California are experiencing frosts and frozen water pipes for the first time in several living memories. Here, where we are supposed to be hardened to it, we're nipping out into the garden and round to the garage in nothing but a t-shirt and lounge pants, and wearing shorts indoors of an evening.

When we were having dinner this evening there came a buzz and a chitter-chatter, and some decidedly stingy-looking insect hit the lamp and fell on to the table. I inverted my (empty) glass over it quick as quick and, with the utmost care, deposited it out in the garden. At which point two moths fluttered in to dance around the lamp before I could close the door.

Moths! In January!

That should never happen.

I turned my face away from blogging today, needing to think about and do other things. Checking in this evening I discovered with great amusement that some YouTube user has rated yesterday's video as 'poor', along with the New Year greetings one. I'm inclined to agree with him/her but I do wish s/he had left a comment giving me some pointers towards improvement. No matter. I have a fair idea of the way to learn good videography and to improve my results. And I'm certainly not daft enough to think that a video clip that gets something in the region of 200 viewings in the first 24 hours is necessarily a good one.

Readers' note:  The Haloscan comments are still acting up so I've dropped 'em. The comments feature on the mirror blog works fine.

You may also wish to note that I have decided to cut-over to the blog version somewhere around the end of January. I'll let you know if there will be a need to change your bookmarks; maybe there will, maybe there won't.