• 17Aug 08

  Home Improvement Is Not My Friend

  Why is it that every time hubby and I try to do a simple home improvement project it turns into a major production? We thought we would replace the worn out weather stripping on the bottom of the front door and one of the back doors. We have French doors on the back, but we never open one of them so the weather stripping isn't worn on that one. It sounds like it's easy enough to do. You just buy new weather stripping, take the doors off, put the new weather stripping on, and put the doors back. Yeah right!
  
  It took three trips to the store and over two hours to get it done. While we do have new weather stripping, it's not right. Both doors stick now and I can't even open the front door because you have to pull so hard to get it open. That's not even mentioning the fact that we had to turn the air conditioner off during this whole process and it ended up being 85 degrees Fahrenheit in the house. Add 100% humidity to that. It was miserable.
  
  We're going to have to re-hang the front door. Hubby's pretty sure that's the problem with it. We took it down a different way and it wasn't the best way to do it as he couldn't get the screws in tight enough when he put it back. This time, we're going to take the pins out and make sure the screws are tight before we put the door back. It's going to be difficult to get the hinges to line up correctly, though. The door is very heavy because it has a big leaded glass window in the center.
  
  The back door shouldn't be as difficult to fix. We have French doors that open on to back patio, but we never use one of the doors. We're going to try swapping the original piece of weather stripping from the door we don't use with the new piece from the door we use. The original is more flexible, so it shouldn't cause such a problem opening the door.
  
  

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  I watched Spaced and Extras last weekend. I liked them both, but I found that I liked Spaced more. I was surprised by that. I'd seen the finale of Extras and really loved it, so I expected to like the show more than Spaced because I'd also seen a couple of episodes of that. When I looked up the guide for Spaced here, I discovered that they're making a US version of it as well. It won't be the same and I'm not going to bother with it.
  
  Thanks to Newbie and LMH68, I've started watching two other shows; Primeval and Coupling. I know Coupling is older, I missed it the first time around.
  
  I've read some negative opinions about Primeval, but I like it. I wouldn't say it's the best show I've ever seen, but the concept is great and it's fairly well done. The dialogue is a bit wooden, but I can deal with that. I'll keep watching. They did something strange with the advertising here because I thought they were starting series 2, but that wasn't the case. They've just started series 1, so I'm in from the beginning, which is always nice. They also cut bits, but they offer it on BBCA On Demand so I can watch the full length episode there the next day.
  
  I think Coupling is fantastic. It's just so funny. I was watching it with headphones the other night so the sound wouldn't disturb my hubby while he was trying to sleep and I caught myself laughing out loud quite a bit. I hadn't realized it was a Steven Moffat show when I started watching it, so that was a nice surprise. It's also available On Demand, which is great since the episodes are 30 minutes long and they only put it in a 30 minute time slot. The original broadcast is cut to allow ads. I also read that they made a US version of this show which failed miserably. Why doesn't that surprise me?
  
  

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  Have you seen GameSpot's face lift? I like it. I wish we could have that here. It's nice that the entire banner shows. Once you get used to it, it's really easier to find stuff as well. Not that I have enough emblems there to need the feature, but I like that no more than 8 of them show unless you choose to display them. Word has it that they're going to add a feature so you can choose which ones you want to display. That would be nice.
  
  

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  I've been working on adding cast to a guide and I've run into quite a few duplicates. It surprised me to find some for well known people. I'm making progress; although, it's slow, on consolidating all the credits, tagging the guides, and submitting them to be deleted.
  
  

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  That's all for now I suppose. Take care everybody.
  
  

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  • Posted Aug 17, 2008 11:26 pm PT
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• 7Aug 08

  Report Problem Editors and TV Related Stuff

  We now have a way to report problem editors. Staff created a ProblemEditor profile, which is similar to the ReportMIAEditor profile. Obviously, staff would like us to try and resolve any issues before reporting someone, though. Unfortunately, that doesn't always work, so it's nice that there's a way to report it when the issue can't be resolved any other way.
  
  

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  I've been trying to keep up with Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog to see if they found a solution for international viewers. I've heard that it's available on iTunes, but that's the only place I've heard it is so far. I have no idea if it costs anything there for international viewing or not. I know it does/did for US viewing via iTunes, though. It's also on Hulu, but I don't believe that's available internationally. You can keep checking their MySpace page because they do update that frequently. If they find other solutions for international viewing, that's where you'll find the information posted.
  
  

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  The last episode of Doctor Who aired here last Friday. I'll warn anyone who hasn't seen it right now that there are going to be spoilers ahead.
  
  I found it anticlimactic. There were things I loved about it, but as a whole, it was a let down. After giving it some thought, I've come to the conclusion that it was far too ambitious. There was no way to pack as much into it as it seemed to want to contain, so it didn't do enough with most of the story lines. Not that I have anything at all against Russell T Davies as I do like at least some of his work, but I'm looking forward to what Steven Moffat does with the show in 2010. Despite that, I will miss it while it's mostly gone in 2009, though. I'm not even sure if they'll air the specials here or not. If not, hopefully, my friend in the UK will send them to me so I can see them.
  
  Speaking of my friend sending me stuff, I'm glad I was able to see the last two episodes of series 4 before they aired in the US since Sci-Fi decided to ruin them by showing major spoilers in the previews. They showed the huge cliffhanger for The The Stolen Earth. Yup, that's right. They showed The Doctor regenerating at the end of the episode as part of the preview for the episode! Unlike the airing in the UK, they showed a preview for Journey's End, which totally ruined the cliffhanger. To make matters worse, they revealed the major plot point that Donna became part Time Lord in one of the ads for Journey's End. I'd have been so mad if I hadn't seen them yet. Honestly, I have no idea what on earth they were thinking?! Between that and cutting important scenes from most of the episodes, I really wish the BBC could find some other network to buy the rights to the first run of the show here. BBC America airs it, but only several months after it's already aired on Sci-Fi.
  
  

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  I have two shows on DVD to watch. They are Spaced and Extras. I've been wanting to see them for quite awhile now, so I'm really looking forward to watching them. There's not much on television here right now apart from reality shows anyway. Since I'm not much into those, it's nice to have something I like better to watch.
  
  

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  That's it for now. This blog turned out to be a lot longer than I expected. I guess that's what happens when I don't say anything for three weeks.
  
  

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  • Posted Aug 7, 2008 10:49 pm PT
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• 14Jul 08

  Mad Men

  I hadn't heard of this show when someone asked Christina Hendricks about Mad Men at the Starfury convention I attended last year. It did sound interesting to me and I like her, so I was curious to see it, but I didn't think I'd get the chance to see it from the beginning and I didn't really want to start watching with season 2. Fortunately, AMC put it on their On Demand selection in preparation for the second season that begins on July 27, so I decided to give it a shot.
  
  I liked it. I think it's really well done and gives you a good idea of what society was like in the early 1960s. I think they've done an excellent job with regard to authenticity.
  
  It starts out a little slowly and I wasn't hooked immediately, but now I want to know what happens to the characters. I'll keep watching it. I had a curious reaction to the main character, Don Draper played by Jon Hamm. I find that I like him and don't like him at the same time. It's hard to explain. I've never reacted quite this way to a character before. In some ways, he's a real jerk, but he definitely has a good side. It's as if he acts like a jerk sometimes because he thinks that's what he's supposed to do. I love Christina Hendricks' character, though.
  
  I also discovered that there were other actors with whom I am familiar in the show. I hadn't realized that either. I like the story and the character development, but I also like seeing how things were. We've really changed the way we look at the world over the years.
  
  

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  Speaking of On Demand, our cable provider just added a load of channels to the service in our area. This is awesome news! I only wish we'd had BBC America On Demand when they were airing Life On Mars and Torchwood because they showed the uncut episodes on it. There's always a chance they'll offer the Life On Mars episodes when they get ready to air Ashes to Ashes, though. That would be great. At least, I hope they're going to air Ashes to Ashes here. I haven't heard a word about it yet. They also might have the previous Torchwood episodes there before the next series airs.
  
  

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  It seems that Sci-Fi actually listened to all the viewers as they've alloted a one and half hour time slot for the Doctor Who finale. That makes me happy. Let's hope it's long enough so they can get all the ads in without cutting any of the episode. We have 3 more episodes left to air in the US before we have a long break. They don't air the Christmas episode in December here. They air it as the first episode of the new series instead. I'm hoping they actually air everything next year since there aren't going to be regular episodes. If they don't, I'll be mad.
  
  

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  Just in case you forgot, the first act of Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog will be released tomorrow. I don't know what time, though.
  
  

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  • Posted Jul 14, 2008 2:03 pm PT
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