::: jeffphillips.org :::

After taking the plunge very recently and buying a new HDTV LCD, we are now disappointed – and not just because cable HD content isn’t really HD. No: we’re disapointed in our TV itself. It seems that we have a defective unit. In fact, it’s the second defective unit in a row that we’ve purchased. You see, we exchanged the first one for the same model and it has the same problem. The TV is a Philips [nice, eh?] 42PFL7403D/27 television and the problem we’ve had in 2 out of 2 TVs is that in the center top of the screen, there appears on occasion a flickering vertical green line. It’s not constant, nor is it the same length each time, but it’s always in the same place.

Has anyone seen anything like this? I’m about to take it back and swear off that brand. But, that will cost us. We’ll have to pay more for a different brand at a different store.

Maybe we’ll just take it back for a refund and move the old 27″ down to the living room…

After over 28,000 miles on the bike, it’s time again for new tires… and new brake pads. So since it was already time for the 28K oil change, I took in the bike for the regular service plus tires and pads. It is ready now for pickup and we’re just about on our way.

The strange thing about bike tires is that with a new pair of tires, the bike handles differently. It’s an enormous and very noticeable difference, not like what you get with a car. With the bike, it drastically changes the way it turns and how responsive it is. I’ve been having to push the bike down into the turns for so long, I’m worried I may turn too fast now… Well, not really, but it will certainly feel like a different bike.

I’m also replacing my old torn up jacket. This is the jacket that I had the wreck in 3 years ago and the sleeves are still torn up. So, I’ve ordered a new one that will hopefully be more noticeable: bright white with black trim.

Next on the agenda: new helmet!

For some reason, the comment feature has been broken on the web site… until now, that is. I have set it back to an old default [not one I care for – ugly permalinks…] and it is working now.

So if you have something good to say….

No, no the movie of the same name, but our very own office space… Finally! After about a month or so of being without a space for my office in the new place [I’ve been working on the kitchen table…], we finally set up my desks last night. No more cluttered table… at least, no more cluttered table caused by my laptop and accoutrements.

So, now the basement is about half done, but of course the second half is always the hardest. Maybe finishing time can be represented on an asymptotic scale with time stretching to infinity as room approaches completion. The closer it gets to done, the longer it takes to actually finish…

Maybe now with the basement well started, we can work on some of the other things we’ve been putting off.

I don’t really know that that holiday is, but the name seems fairly appropriate. Well, more like “un-boxing” day. We’re now living in the midst of many, many boxes. We’ve made some significant progress, though. The master is fully unpacked except for some closet rearranging and the books are even alphabetized: something we never even got around to at the last house. The guest room is done, too – we had to have a place where the parents could sleep.

Our next big project is the main living floor – kitchen, living room, dining room. This seems to be the most difficult of spaces to fit everything in. After that, I hope to knock out the office area. This is not to say that we haven’t done some there already. We have. It’s just more of a focus area for us in the living area.

I suppose we’ll be done unpacking in a month or so. That would be MUCH faster than the last time, and even faster than the time before. We’re getting too good at this. I hope to settle here for a little bit and not move.

I hate moving.

It’s been a long time since I’ve updated this site, but that’s because I’ve been busy. Any of you who have moved [and that should be most of you] know what this is like. We are living in and among boxes and most of our things are packed away. We have to search for things daily.

My parents were also here, so there was even less time to blog. That’s quite all right, though. Now that I’m back at work, I have a few spare minutes to give you all an update.

We have finally washed our hands of our old place [not that we disliked it, mind you – we loved it and the beautiful hardwood floor, but we mainly are glad to not be dealing with the management company. They were not very friendly or helpful]. Now, we are fully installed in our new house. Today, I made my first commute from the new place to work. I have to say that I saved 15 minutes in drive time. That’s not bad. Of course, traffic was lighter today anyway due to the upcoming holiday, but I still saved 15 minutes. That’s awesome!

Our new master bedroom is much more roomy and we will not know what to do with all the extra floor space. What that also means, though, is that the rest of the bedrooms are smaller to accomodate the larger master. That’s okay. I don’t sleep in those…

The easiest floor to complete unpacking on will be the top floor where all the bedrooms are. We have already made a good start with the guest room being mostly done and the master is about half-way there. The third bedroom will be saved for later since we have to plan out that room as a craft room and decide where we want to put things. The office will be the next easiest to unpack, but probably the most dificult to arrange. We’re still not sure where we want the desks.

The main living floor is already arranged [we reserve the right to rearrange, though!] but the unpacking here will take the longest. This is because of the kitchen stuff which makes up the majority of the boxes [with the possible exception of the book boxes, but those are very easy to unpack and I know where they all go].

But, I’m back at work now… to which I should probably return.

More will follow… it always does…

Packing Day is over with a minimum of fuss. I have to say, this moving/packing company we’ve chosen is doing a great job so far. They packed our whole house in 4 hours. It took us 2 months last time…

So, we collapsed for several hours…

Then, today, the move. It was LONG. 10 hours long. We have so much stuff that they had to make two trips. We celebrated the night with Mexican food and margaritas. I’m so tired now…

At least I know I’ll sleep well on our first night in the new house.

It has arrived. I sit now in the office while the packers do their thing. We have transported much of our stuff so it should go much faster for the packers. [By faster, we mean cheaper, too, since they charge by the hour…]

As you can tell, the web site is active again after an outage yesterday. This was the “data center move”. In other words, I’ve already moved the servers to the new place. The only computer that’s not there is my work laptop. And after tomorrow, I will cancel the Internet service here.

Of course, I need to sign up for cable TV at the new place…

I’m such a slacker.

And did I tell you that I’m tremendously sore since we had a VERY hard softball night last night? We played from 8:30 to 10:30PM in the rain most of the time and the team was the toughest we’ve played yet. We played hard and won one and lost one.

One more game series and the season is done… finally… maybe it won’t get rained out…

Soon it begins. Soon, very soon, Laura and I will begin the long 13-mile trek from our old place to our new place in the Promised Land of Herndon. We clean, sort, prep the old place while at the same time preparing the new place for our extended presence.

New knobs adorn the doors of the new house [a good precaution every time one moves into a new place – at the very least, change the locks]. I haven’t finished with them all, but a good start has been made. New smoke detectors/carbon monoxide detectors are in place in the new house.

And my most favorite of all: a brand new programmable thermostat. The best thing about it is that it’s an auto-switching heat/cool unit with a backlight that changes color depending on if it’s cooling [blue] or heating [red]. It ROCKS. It also works better than the last one. Which is very important.

Yesterday, the bike left the old abode and took up residence in the new place. Soon to follow are the computers [once the new data connection is fully active]. Then the main packing and moving. Wednesday, we will sleep in the new house for the first time.

We’ve gone and closed on the new house today! All the paperwork is done and we’re ready to begin the move in. That’s where the real stress will happen. Luckily for me, my parents are coming up to visit and help us unpack and clean up the old place before we have to vacate it.

Now that we spent years paying off credit cards and a car loan to be debt free, we’re jumping head first into the largest loan I have ever had… Ouch…

I’m really excited, though. We just bought some new smoke alarms/CO detectors and will also be replacing some door knobs with prettier ones and sturdier locks.

I’m sure there will be more later…