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Do people still repair TVs? and is it worth doing? I came home today to find my Samsung HDTV had bit the dust, despite being well taken care of, plugged into a UPS and all of that..
When trying to get it to start, it clicks a few times and there is a moment of sound but it is never able to successfully activate the picture tube. After trying unsuccessfully to start, it clicks off. Fully removing it from power and plugging it back in hasn't done anything.
In any case, the TV is out of warranty, but it wasn't a really cheap TV when I brought it in 2002, ao I'm disinclined to replace it. It's a 27 in. flat CRT HDTV with two component inputs and a slew of regular composite inputs on the back, and I'm using all of them, so I imagine it won't be cheap to replace if I were to buy new.
Worth getting repaired? How much can I expect to spend?
Keep in mind that me looking at it myself is completely out of the question.. I deal in software, folks. Design an enterprise identity management system? Configure some servers? No problem.. but, my legally-blind self isn’t about to start poking around inside a TV with all of its capacitors and what not.. :)
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Tonight I came home to find that the entire hallway area and my third floor apartment had been consumed by a particularly noxious odor. Turns out that the landlord had made the monumentally stupid decision to apply a new wood stain to all of the floors in the restaurant on the ground floor of the building in the dead of winter. Now, mind you, I've certainly dealt with wood stain before, but this stuff was ridiculous. I am three floors above the restaurant, and the odor was so strong that it induced an almost instant splitting headache, among other things. (One of the problems with my building is that the wet walls, particularly the open area behind the washer/dryer unit, are extremely efficient at carrying whatever is going on in the restaurant right up to my apartment. Ordinarily, the odor from the kitchen of a good Italian restaurant is quite alright with me.. but this was clearly unacceptable). One of the other side effects of this noxious odor is that it seemed to propel me to produce some particularly pungent prose (and apparently induces temporary fits of alliteration as well) in the form of a rather blunt letter to my landlord. Now, I may perhaps be sending a mixed message by including this letter in the same envelope as my rent check, but no matter. Especially considering that those postal bastards are going to be kicking it up a notch next week, I have got to conserve.. :) Here's the letter in PDF format. I was particularly pleased with the last sentence, which I think (slightly modified), might be useful as a general disclaimer in a number of situations.. :) Please do understand that my fair, but not charitable, criticism is an objective assessment made in the context of a customer in a business relationship, and does not constitute a personal attack. Tags: apartment, bad customer service, landlord
Current Mood: splitting headache
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That would be Iron Chef Masaharu Morimoto, of course... A bi-annual indulgence that a few of us take part in (which corresponds with the two times a year that Joy and Mike visit the east coast),  celaeno, nemo_wistar, redvector, and leprechaung and I went to Morimoto in Philly this past Wednesday. Most of us (except Joy) had the Omakase, which roughly translates into "I'm in your hands." Basically, you order the Omakase at a particular price point, and you get an eight course chef's choice menu. This is the best way to experience everything that the restaurant has to offer. Seems a bit much, perhaps.. but I have to say it's entirely worth it. I didn't know that food could be this good. redvector and leprechaung experienced it for the first time, and I'm sure they'll be along for subsequent trips. celaeno did an excellent writeup in her journal. redvector posted about it as well. Looks like Joy's entry is protected though, so I will have to do my own writeup. In the meantime, have a look at the pictures. Tags: food morimoto
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blackbytes, kingfox, jenniever and I will be all over California next week.. We'll be attending the SIGUCCS Fall 2005 Conference in Monterey but will be taking advantage of the opportunity to use some vacation time too. Here's the schedule (tentative) in case anyone will be around: - Saturday 11/5 - San Francisco (arrive at SFO early afternoon), spend the evening in SF.
- Sunday 11/6 - Depart for Monterey in the afternoon.
- Sunday evening 11/6 - Wednesday morning 11/9 - Conference in Monterey. I will be giving a talk on
 drewuniversity's Identity Management projects. kingfox is giving a talk on change management and desktop imaging.
- Wednesday 11/9 - Drive down the coast from Monterey to Los Angeles.
- Wednesday evening 11/9 - Friday afternoon 11/11 - Los Angeles
- Friday evening 11/11 - San Diego
- Saturday morning 11/12 - Morning departure from LAX. Arrive later that afternoon. kingfox and I will see if we can arrange to get them to park the plane right at redvector's place...
Tags: california, conferences, coworkers, friends, identity management, talks, trips, work
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At one point during Peter's party an unidentified female, who will henceforth be referred to as "mystery camera person" asked to borrow my camera. She snapped the picture at right, thanked me, returned the camera, and walked into the next room. At no point during this was there a discussion of where I was going to be posting the pictures, or even if the pics were going to show up on the internet at all... Of course, I immediately consulted shmivejournal who had witnessed what was happening and was wondering the same thing I was.. No doubt Jay's powers of over analysis would lead us to possibilities I would never have considered... We figured there were three possibilities: - She would merely ask Peter who I was and where I would be posting the pics.. This is the most mundane possibility.
- She didn't care if she got the picture, merely that it was taken.. That.. somewhere, on the internet or elsewhere this image existed was enough for her.
- She had Google superpowers that would make mere mortals and geeks alike quiver with fear... Being plugged into The Matrix, she would immediately become aware when the image was posted online, if not having used her mental powers to pull the image off the camera's memory card directly..
Well, whoever you are, whereever you are, Mystery Camera Person, here is your picture.. Submitted via the "I borrowed your camera and don't know who you are" lost and found... We only ask that you use the image for good and not for... well.. Perhaps stick to the lighter side of the varying shades of evil... Tags: friends, halloween, parties, photography
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Figure I should post a little about celaeno and nemo_wistar's wedding.. daylami and I drove in from Seattle Friday afternoon and took the ferry across to Victoria. We arrived around 7 or so and after spending a sizable amount of time looking for a petrol station so we could put a few liters in the Neon, we arrived at the Laurel Point Inn a bit before 9. Picked up our room keys and about halfway up the elevator I realize.. hmmm... Room 652? Aren't Mike and Joy in 650?... As it turns out our suite was, in fact, next door to Mike and Joy's, and beyond that, they were adjoining rooms. Even though they weren't to arrive until tomorrow, this knowledge was a source of much amusement that evening. We decided to wait by the door when they were due to arrive and as soon as we heard them unpacking, we cued up That song by That British guy, which of course could only mean one thing.... Sadly, that was the same day that daylami received some terrible news about her apartment in NY having burned down. Everyone should keep her in your thoughts and send best wishes. I know that if anyone can get through this, Charlotte can. The wedding was held on Sunday at 3. The rain kept back sufficiently that the ceremony could be held on Mike and Joy's balcony, which is fortunate, since the Victoria backdrop is beautiful. There are some pics of the ceremony in my Flickr account that you can look at. It was a civil service (God optional), small, very well done, just like they wanted it. Dinner was at Japaneese Village. There were some amusing toasts given.. Fun and good food was had by all. These are some of my best friends in the world, and I'm very happy for them. Those two are made for each other more so than anyone else I know! Tags: friends, trips, vacation, victoria, weddings
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OK.. I do promise to post more about Mike and Joy's wedding soon, perhaps even an explanation for why I'm wearing a Japanese Kimono over my suit, but for now I must digress... My crappy Kodak decided it was time to die while I was in Canada. I was planning to replace it eventually, but will need to do some sooner than I expected, since I'd like to have a camera for when I'm in California next month. Basically, I'd just like a simple digital point & shoot that's at least as good as the one I'm replacing (at least 4 megapixels, 3x optical zoom). Keep in mind that I'm not a good photographer, so I don't need anything fancy. My Kodak used SD cards, and I have a number of devices with built in or external SD readers (tablet PC, desktop, Treo phone, etc.) so I'd like something that works with SD if possible. Any good suggestions? Tags: gadgets, geek, photography
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