I took the day off today. "Took off from what?" you are asking. I know I'm retired so it gets difficult to define just what a day off means. This day off means that I decided not to shovel snow or do any physical labor. I didn't really decide, my body decided. Wednesday I shoveled and horsed the snow blower around to get the area in front of our garages cleared and yesterday I shoveled some more to clear up the front sidewalk to make an opening to the street. Anne shoveled too, but she's more sensible and stops when she feels tired. I have no such sense and just keep on going. Anyway, today my body was telling me that it was time to take a rest. So I did, until a little while ago when I got the shovel and cleared up some ice on the walks.
I always like to clear a path to the street, but it is difficult when the plows leave three feet of the edge of the street unplowed until hours after the snow stops and then come by once again. This is, of course, after everyone has cleared their walks.
We were without telephone, Internet and TV all day yesterday because our cable wire came loose from the house and was dangling low over the street when a snow plow hit it and took it out all the way. Cablevision showed up after dark and was ready to fix it, but the police wouldn't let them do it in the dark. They were here before 9:30 this morning and got it all back up running. I was impressed by the service. Last March, when we had another major snow storm, the cable wire came down and they got here the next day and fixed it.
So, while we were in the dark ages, Anne and I had to actually talk to each other and listen to radio to stay informed. For you younger folks, radio is like television, but it doesn't have any pictures. All you get is the sound. I know, primitive. It got me to thinking about what people did before Internet and television. My parents had neither. We got a television when I was in the third grade and I remember that there wasn't all day programming, but mostly a few shows on in the evening and only in black and white, if you can believe.We had a phone, but only one in the house and we had a private line. Many other people we knew had party lines. That was where one, or two, or even three families shared one phone line. These were people you didn't know and the idea was that if you were on the phone and you heard a click meaning that one of the other parties was trying to make a call, the custom was for you to hang up and let the other person do so. If you were the one trying to make the call and you picked up two or more times and the line was still busy, you could say that you needed to make a call and the other party usually hung up. You could also eavesdrop on another party's call but, in polite society, that wasn't done. We didn't have any of these problems because we had our very own private line. I remember playing with toys, building things with Lincoln logs and blocks and something resembling Lego. I played outside a lot with friends or went to various friends house to play there. My mother liked to sew, make delicious meals and putter around the yard in the summer. My father liked to work in his shop and kept busy with house maintenance in nice weather.
Yesterday we listened to the radio some and I read. I find that I don't watch television all that much and I use the computer mainly for reading emails and finding out what's going on. That doesn't take much time at all. Most of the emails I get are ads for something. But, it feels like without the Internet and television we are somehow not properly connected to the world. We didn't have our regular phone either, of course, but we were able to communicate with a cell phone. We have become so reliant on being able to connect with the whole world. Why, you can even take classes on the Internet and get legitimate credit at a scholastic institution. I understand that some of the teachers of these classes are quite good. You only realize how connected we have become when you become unconnected. Anne was trying to find a particular radio station, but wasn't sure of the frequency. We couldn't look on the Internet. The newspaper no longer lists radio stations and the phone book only lists two radio stations, neither of which were local.
So, how do we stay connected when a storm disrupts our communications? In this instance it was only for one day, but what if it were for a longer period? Do we all really need to be that connected? Do we all need cell phones and wi-fi hot spots in addition to our home based links? When we go off on vacation we are usually happy to be without these facilities. Has the Internet become an essential tool in our modern society? I think it is becoming more so every day. There are more and more links to things that are only available over the Internet. Messages, coupons, notices of this and that, emails and on and on. It was not that long ago that the Internet was unknown to most people who are now thoroughly ensnared in its web. I don't have an answer and I don't even know if there is a question, but these are some of the things I have been thinking about. I need to get back to my book.
Friday, January 28, 2011
Saturday, January 22, 2011
Music, Music, Music and some Wolves
I am still hard at it. Sorting, disassembling my train layout and trying to figure out whether or not to convert my LPs. My neighbor, who was helping me to try to figure out how to get photos to sync to my iPod (still no answer to that yet, but I've moved on), let me borrow a portable hard drive that he has with 100 GB of music on it from a DJ that gave it to him. It has all sorts of music from the 40s through the 90s, the kind that would be played at weddings, parties, etc. I copied a whole lot of it, but not all. I'm really not into hip-hop or rap or some of the other genres of today. I copied in batches and it took probably a total of nine or ten hours to do that. It's amazing; I just clicked "copy" and then "paste" and the computer did the rest.
I have a lot of classical LPs also that I have been agonizing over whether or not to convert them. Today I decided to look over our CD collection. I was surprised that we have about a foot's worth of CDs of classical music. Where it all came from, I am not sure, but I went straight to the cellar and, no longer feeling guilty, removed about six boxed sets of Beethoven LPs from the shelves. It was hard because I realized that quite a few of these records had probably never been played. Why did I feel guilty? If I hadn't played them in thirty years, well, duh!
I seem to have things that most people don't have and maybe don't want to have. As I was sorting through LPs, I came across one titled "The Language and Music of the Wolves." On one side, Robert Redford narrates about wolves. On the other side there are tracks of wolf sounds. Here is the list:
Band 1 - Opening Howl
Band 2 - First Growls of Wolf Pups Inside the Den
Band 3 - Pup Howls - Spring and Fall - Contrasted with Adult
Band 4 - Barking
Band 5 - Series of 3 Adjacent Single Howls
Band 6 - Comparative Difference in Howls
Band 7 - Single Howls Joined to Give Illusion of Pack Howl
Band 8 - Combined Sounds of the Wolf
Band 9 - Distant and Close-up Howling Ending in Group Howl
Band 10 - Series of Group Howls
Band 11 - Joint Group Howl
I'm not making any of this up. Who could make such stuff up? Okay, maybe Stephen King. But this is the truth. Do you think I have to be more aggressive in throwing out records? I bet you can't imagine how many happy and relaxing hours I have spent through the years sitting in a comfy chair with a glass of Scotch and a good book (Jack London, probably) listening to my wolf howls. Actually, I may end up converting this one. I can see a great deal of entertainment value if, by chance, we buy the house next to my brother-in-law. Ah, I see it now. A cold winter night; a loud speaker set in our yard facing his house, but the volume not set too loud. We go over to visit and sit by the fire. Everyone is relaxed. Suddenly, a bone chilling howl fills the air outside, followed by Distant and Close-up Howling Ending in a Group Howl. I think I will hang onto this LP. It most assuredly has possibilities.
I have a lot of classical LPs also that I have been agonizing over whether or not to convert them. Today I decided to look over our CD collection. I was surprised that we have about a foot's worth of CDs of classical music. Where it all came from, I am not sure, but I went straight to the cellar and, no longer feeling guilty, removed about six boxed sets of Beethoven LPs from the shelves. It was hard because I realized that quite a few of these records had probably never been played. Why did I feel guilty? If I hadn't played them in thirty years, well, duh!
I seem to have things that most people don't have and maybe don't want to have. As I was sorting through LPs, I came across one titled "The Language and Music of the Wolves." On one side, Robert Redford narrates about wolves. On the other side there are tracks of wolf sounds. Here is the list:
Band 1 - Opening Howl
Band 2 - First Growls of Wolf Pups Inside the Den
Band 3 - Pup Howls - Spring and Fall - Contrasted with Adult
Band 4 - Barking
Band 5 - Series of 3 Adjacent Single Howls
Band 6 - Comparative Difference in Howls
Band 7 - Single Howls Joined to Give Illusion of Pack Howl
Band 8 - Combined Sounds of the Wolf
Band 9 - Distant and Close-up Howling Ending in Group Howl
Band 10 - Series of Group Howls
Band 11 - Joint Group Howl
I'm not making any of this up. Who could make such stuff up? Okay, maybe Stephen King. But this is the truth. Do you think I have to be more aggressive in throwing out records? I bet you can't imagine how many happy and relaxing hours I have spent through the years sitting in a comfy chair with a glass of Scotch and a good book (Jack London, probably) listening to my wolf howls. Actually, I may end up converting this one. I can see a great deal of entertainment value if, by chance, we buy the house next to my brother-in-law. Ah, I see it now. A cold winter night; a loud speaker set in our yard facing his house, but the volume not set too loud. We go over to visit and sit by the fire. Everyone is relaxed. Suddenly, a bone chilling howl fills the air outside, followed by Distant and Close-up Howling Ending in a Group Howl. I think I will hang onto this LP. It most assuredly has possibilities.
Monday, January 17, 2011
Busy Days
I've been busy, which is good because I like to be busy. I have been disassembling my train layout for one thing. I am amazed by how much work this involves. I guess I shouldn't be surprised when I think about how long it took to get it together. Did I really put all those wires under there? Did I really wire all those control units under the layout? How did I manage to crawl around under there? Well, I guess it was me because I don't remember seeing anyone else under there. So, I now have all the trains, cars, people, vehicles, buildings, track, switches and landscaping packed away. I have pulled out all of the wiring and need to decide what to do with the control boxes attached to a panel under the layout. I was thinking of leaving them attached and just removing the panel, but it would save a lot of space to pack the controls separately. Besides, I don't know where they might go on an entirely new layout. I have to figure that out.
While I'm doing all of this demolition I am multi-tasking. I am listening to old LPs (phonograph records). The idea is to decide on which ones to keep and record onto my computer with the idea of discarding the LP once it is digitized. I am finding that the discard pile is growing bigger than I thought it would. It seems that my tastes have changed over the years. I hope that they haven't just changed for the day that I'm listening. I would hate to make a mistake and throw out music that I want to listen to again someday. Some of these records are old, but not as old as the 78 rpm records I still have somewhere. This is what it says on the back of one LP. The tile is "The Fabulous Four Hands of Frankie Carle." Frankie Carle was a piano player and the album features some blues on a grand piano and some old time songs on an upright honky-tonk piano, hence the album title. This is what it says:
This is a "New Orthophonic" High Fidelity recording,
designed for the phonograph of today or tomorrow. Played
on your present machine, it gives you the finest quality of
reproduction. Played on a "Stereophonic" machine, it gives
even more brilliant true-to-life fidelity. You can buy today
without fear of obsolescence in the future.
The LP is copyrighted by Radio Corporation of America in 1961. I wonder if any of the engineers of that time had any idea of how we would listen to music fifty years later. And I'm thinking, "WHAT, I remember this record. I used to listen to it, but IT'S FIFTY YEARS OLD!!! You can see how this is traumatizing me.
So, I am choosing the records that I enjoy listening to and that have superior sound quality for processing. There is so much music available to us today. Back in 1961, I'm told (it's a little before my time), you had records, tapes and radio. Radio was very local, except at night when you could pick up signals from all across the country. Now we have Internet radio, satellite and the ability to download any kind of music from anywhere, anytime. With cable TV, we also have music of any type available 24 hours a day. How much time do I want to spend recording old LPs when it takes about 45 minutes, give or take a few, to get each record digitized including typing in the names of all the tracks?
In the meantime, I am still trying to get my iPod Touch to sync photos from my computer. I called in my neighbor who knows almost anything to do with computers. He spent over a half hour here yesterday and about an hour or more today and he is baffled by it. He has been searching the Internet for some kind of answer and while some folks have similar problems, none of them has found a solution. We will eventually figure it out, but at least I don't feel so bad that I couldn't figure it out myself. By the way, speaking of music, my neighbor lent me a hard drive with 100 GB of music on it and told me to copy whatever I want. The hard drive has all kinds of music, the kind a DJ would use for a wedding or party.
When I get done with all of this multi-tasking I will have to post some new pictures on this blog. Also, I have not forgotten about my novel that I am writing. I'll get to these things. I should probably listen to some music, but there is so much to choose from. Decisions, decisions.
While I'm doing all of this demolition I am multi-tasking. I am listening to old LPs (phonograph records). The idea is to decide on which ones to keep and record onto my computer with the idea of discarding the LP once it is digitized. I am finding that the discard pile is growing bigger than I thought it would. It seems that my tastes have changed over the years. I hope that they haven't just changed for the day that I'm listening. I would hate to make a mistake and throw out music that I want to listen to again someday. Some of these records are old, but not as old as the 78 rpm records I still have somewhere. This is what it says on the back of one LP. The tile is "The Fabulous Four Hands of Frankie Carle." Frankie Carle was a piano player and the album features some blues on a grand piano and some old time songs on an upright honky-tonk piano, hence the album title. This is what it says:
This is a "New Orthophonic" High Fidelity recording,
designed for the phonograph of today or tomorrow. Played
on your present machine, it gives you the finest quality of
reproduction. Played on a "Stereophonic" machine, it gives
even more brilliant true-to-life fidelity. You can buy today
without fear of obsolescence in the future.
The LP is copyrighted by Radio Corporation of America in 1961. I wonder if any of the engineers of that time had any idea of how we would listen to music fifty years later. And I'm thinking, "WHAT, I remember this record. I used to listen to it, but IT'S FIFTY YEARS OLD!!! You can see how this is traumatizing me.
So, I am choosing the records that I enjoy listening to and that have superior sound quality for processing. There is so much music available to us today. Back in 1961, I'm told (it's a little before my time), you had records, tapes and radio. Radio was very local, except at night when you could pick up signals from all across the country. Now we have Internet radio, satellite and the ability to download any kind of music from anywhere, anytime. With cable TV, we also have music of any type available 24 hours a day. How much time do I want to spend recording old LPs when it takes about 45 minutes, give or take a few, to get each record digitized including typing in the names of all the tracks?
In the meantime, I am still trying to get my iPod Touch to sync photos from my computer. I called in my neighbor who knows almost anything to do with computers. He spent over a half hour here yesterday and about an hour or more today and he is baffled by it. He has been searching the Internet for some kind of answer and while some folks have similar problems, none of them has found a solution. We will eventually figure it out, but at least I don't feel so bad that I couldn't figure it out myself. By the way, speaking of music, my neighbor lent me a hard drive with 100 GB of music on it and told me to copy whatever I want. The hard drive has all kinds of music, the kind a DJ would use for a wedding or party.
When I get done with all of this multi-tasking I will have to post some new pictures on this blog. Also, I have not forgotten about my novel that I am writing. I'll get to these things. I should probably listen to some music, but there is so much to choose from. Decisions, decisions.
Saturday, January 8, 2011
Crossing Over
I bet you think I'm going to write something about dying and going to the Great Train Layout in the sky, but that's not what I mean with the title. I'll explain.
This may be long and drawn out, but I want to write it and you can stop reading if it gets boring. I have a 3rd generation iPod Nano which I use for my music. It is only 8GB and it is just about filled . I mentioned this to Anne who has an iPod Nano and an iPod touch, the last generation. She said she doesn't really use it and that I could have it. I said, being generous and kind, that, if she wanted, I would get her a new iPod touch that has a camera in it and can wash the dishes and set the table. She thought that would be nice. Anyway, I took her iPod touch and proceeded to sync my music onto it. I thought that since it is an iPod touch, I would also sync some photos and my contacts and calendar. I did that on my old Nano before it got too crowded. Previously I had used a Mac computer to do that. We're getting to the "crossing over" part. Now I am using a PC (a Windows based machine). I cannot get it to sync my photos from Windows Live Photo Gallery to the iPod Touch, nor will it sync my contacts or calendar. It's supposed to be easy, but there is some funny language in the online instruction manual (they don't give you one with the product anymore) that seems to imply that you should use Adobe Photoshop Elements 8 or later, but it should work using folders on your computer, so it says. Once again, I have learned that, despite what they all tell you and how easy all the commercials make it seem, it is never easy crossing over from one platform (Mac) to another (Windows) or the other way around. Mac stuff all works very well if you stick to Mac stuff, but as soon as you start mucking around with Windows and Mac, things get sticky.
I have been using Steve Jobs' (CEO of Apple) philosophy of technology, or my version of it, which says that before long, everything will be internet based and we won't be using CDs or DVDs. All music, photos, video, etc. will be on a hard drive or on the internet. I believe that he is correct and that this is already happening in Europe, Asia and the Middle East. We are far behind, but we are going in that direction. But, if machines don't talk to each other, how can any of this be accomplished?
I did find a work around. I discovered that when on the iPod Touch, I could go to my pictures on Flickr, click on a picture and it would give me the option to save it. I found this out by accident. I didn't know where it would be saved or why I would want to since the picture is already on Flickr. I clicked save and didn't think anything else of it until I realized that the "saved" pictures were now on my iPod Touch without having to sync anything. You can view all of my Flickr photos by going to the clink (my word for a link that you click) on the right side of this blog. Somewhere there it says "Bill's pictures" or something. If you have any trouble with that, please let me know so I can spend another three or four hours trying to figure it out. I realized that I am almost a year behind in posting pictures to Flickr, so please forgive me. I am trying to get caught up. By the way, Windows makes it very easy to get pictures from Windows Live Photo Gallery to Flickr. I think it's easier than from Apple's iPhoto. I am also in the midst of disassembling and packing my train layout in anticipation of a move to somewhere, sometime in the future. There I am also far behind SOME people who have managed to make a move to a nice warm place just in time to avoid the thirty inches of snow at Christmas time. Sigh!
This may be long and drawn out, but I want to write it and you can stop reading if it gets boring. I have a 3rd generation iPod Nano which I use for my music. It is only 8GB and it is just about filled . I mentioned this to Anne who has an iPod Nano and an iPod touch, the last generation. She said she doesn't really use it and that I could have it. I said, being generous and kind, that, if she wanted, I would get her a new iPod touch that has a camera in it and can wash the dishes and set the table. She thought that would be nice. Anyway, I took her iPod touch and proceeded to sync my music onto it. I thought that since it is an iPod touch, I would also sync some photos and my contacts and calendar. I did that on my old Nano before it got too crowded. Previously I had used a Mac computer to do that. We're getting to the "crossing over" part. Now I am using a PC (a Windows based machine). I cannot get it to sync my photos from Windows Live Photo Gallery to the iPod Touch, nor will it sync my contacts or calendar. It's supposed to be easy, but there is some funny language in the online instruction manual (they don't give you one with the product anymore) that seems to imply that you should use Adobe Photoshop Elements 8 or later, but it should work using folders on your computer, so it says. Once again, I have learned that, despite what they all tell you and how easy all the commercials make it seem, it is never easy crossing over from one platform (Mac) to another (Windows) or the other way around. Mac stuff all works very well if you stick to Mac stuff, but as soon as you start mucking around with Windows and Mac, things get sticky.
I have been using Steve Jobs' (CEO of Apple) philosophy of technology, or my version of it, which says that before long, everything will be internet based and we won't be using CDs or DVDs. All music, photos, video, etc. will be on a hard drive or on the internet. I believe that he is correct and that this is already happening in Europe, Asia and the Middle East. We are far behind, but we are going in that direction. But, if machines don't talk to each other, how can any of this be accomplished?
I did find a work around. I discovered that when on the iPod Touch, I could go to my pictures on Flickr, click on a picture and it would give me the option to save it. I found this out by accident. I didn't know where it would be saved or why I would want to since the picture is already on Flickr. I clicked save and didn't think anything else of it until I realized that the "saved" pictures were now on my iPod Touch without having to sync anything. You can view all of my Flickr photos by going to the clink (my word for a link that you click) on the right side of this blog. Somewhere there it says "Bill's pictures" or something. If you have any trouble with that, please let me know so I can spend another three or four hours trying to figure it out. I realized that I am almost a year behind in posting pictures to Flickr, so please forgive me. I am trying to get caught up. By the way, Windows makes it very easy to get pictures from Windows Live Photo Gallery to Flickr. I think it's easier than from Apple's iPhoto. I am also in the midst of disassembling and packing my train layout in anticipation of a move to somewhere, sometime in the future. There I am also far behind SOME people who have managed to make a move to a nice warm place just in time to avoid the thirty inches of snow at Christmas time. Sigh!
Sunday, January 2, 2011
The Year 2011
As you all know by now the new year has come. I had nothing to do with it as I proved by sleeping through its birth. On New Years Day we had our traditional party with two other families of friends. I think we started this almost thirty years ago and now the number of attendees has increased substantially. We all (well, most of us) gathered and had a great time.
Roxana and the boys had to be at LaGuardia at 5:00 p.m. for their flight back to Florida. Had she known what was going to happen, she could have come to the party. They boarded their American Airlines flight and it took off on time, but after about one-half hour of flight the pilot announced that they were diverting to Kennedy Airport for an emergency landing because of engine problems. When they got on the ground they were directed to a nearby gate. After a while the were boarded on a second plane, but after being on there for about one-half hour they were told that they couldn't fly because the flight crew had exceeded its hours. They had to stand in line to get vouchers for a hotel where they stayed overnight.
They were told that the flight was at 8:00 a.m. the next morning, so they got up to get a 5:30 a.m. shuttle to the airport. It got to be 8:00 o'clock and no one was at the counter at the boarding gate. Finally someone showed up and Alex, yes Alex, went up and asked why their plane was delayed and when they were going to leave. The people were nice to him and they found out that the flight was at 10:00 a.m. and not 8:00.
When they boarded the plane, Anthony and Alex were invited into the cockpit and allowed to sit in the pilot's and copilot's seats. Roxana cautioned Alex not to touch anything fearing that he might decide that he had waited long enough and try to fly the plane.
Pete and his family had a nice hotel room and choice seats in Times Square for the ball drop on New Years Eve courtesy of NYPD. As they were escorted through the crowds, people cheered them and tried to give high fives. Pete said the people didn't have anything to do and probably thought they were celebrities. I guess they were in a way. Commissioner Kelly came over to talk to them and shook hands with Anthony and Alex. This was all the result of some courtesies Peter had extended to the Commissioner when he visited Haiti.
So, I started to dismantle my train layout today. I realize that this will take some time as I survey the mass of stuff that has been accumulated through the years. While I'm at it, I'm trying out some of the engines to make sure they still work and I'm trying to organize things because I know that the minute I put a cover on a box I will forget what's in it. I want to pack things carefully so that nothing gets damaged when we move. I'm not sure how I will transport these trains, but I can decide that once we have a place to move them to.
Roxana and the boys had to be at LaGuardia at 5:00 p.m. for their flight back to Florida. Had she known what was going to happen, she could have come to the party. They boarded their American Airlines flight and it took off on time, but after about one-half hour of flight the pilot announced that they were diverting to Kennedy Airport for an emergency landing because of engine problems. When they got on the ground they were directed to a nearby gate. After a while the were boarded on a second plane, but after being on there for about one-half hour they were told that they couldn't fly because the flight crew had exceeded its hours. They had to stand in line to get vouchers for a hotel where they stayed overnight.
They were told that the flight was at 8:00 a.m. the next morning, so they got up to get a 5:30 a.m. shuttle to the airport. It got to be 8:00 o'clock and no one was at the counter at the boarding gate. Finally someone showed up and Alex, yes Alex, went up and asked why their plane was delayed and when they were going to leave. The people were nice to him and they found out that the flight was at 10:00 a.m. and not 8:00.
When they boarded the plane, Anthony and Alex were invited into the cockpit and allowed to sit in the pilot's and copilot's seats. Roxana cautioned Alex not to touch anything fearing that he might decide that he had waited long enough and try to fly the plane.
Pete and his family had a nice hotel room and choice seats in Times Square for the ball drop on New Years Eve courtesy of NYPD. As they were escorted through the crowds, people cheered them and tried to give high fives. Pete said the people didn't have anything to do and probably thought they were celebrities. I guess they were in a way. Commissioner Kelly came over to talk to them and shook hands with Anthony and Alex. This was all the result of some courtesies Peter had extended to the Commissioner when he visited Haiti.
So, I started to dismantle my train layout today. I realize that this will take some time as I survey the mass of stuff that has been accumulated through the years. While I'm at it, I'm trying out some of the engines to make sure they still work and I'm trying to organize things because I know that the minute I put a cover on a box I will forget what's in it. I want to pack things carefully so that nothing gets damaged when we move. I'm not sure how I will transport these trains, but I can decide that once we have a place to move them to.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)