Saturday, April 21, 2012

Perfect For Little Errands


Max and I hadn't been doing a lot of traveling together. Part of the reason was the last few weeks of tax season. Part of it was a piece of shit battery. Part of it was the new battery wasn't properly charged like they told me it was. But Saturday came, the weather was stupendous, magnificent and any other adjective you can think of to describe it. And I had some errands to run.

We are making some changes to our home entertainment and technology setup. First is that we shitcanned the local cable TV provider. Just didn't think the value was there anymore. Second, we are getting a wireless home Internet connection from the phone company.

I know it may seem strange, but we have never had a high speed Internet connection at home. We have a digital TV antenna in our attic, so we can get HD television over the air for free. We are all about "stuff" for free. We thought that home Internet vs cable TV was a good trade off.

We needed a wi fi Internet adaptor for a Blu Ray player, an HDMI switch and a few other electronic goodies. Also we needed to hook up our attic television antenna to another television. That will entail some cutting and splicing of coax cable and I needed some tools and fittings and doo-dads for that. And if you're like me, then you're a little bit unsure of exactly what you need.

First stop, Home Depot. Found most of what I needed for cutting and splicing coax cable. It's not exactly splicing because you end up just cutting it and affixing an end that can be screwed onto your TV or some other connector. There's a particular type of trimmer that works pretty slick. There's also a crimping device that was a little harder to figure out, but with a little trial and error we figured out how it worked.

Next stop was Radio Shack. The hope was to find inexpensive wi fi adaptors. I knew I was in trouble when the store person gave me one of those deer in a headlight looks. I knew that I needed a couple of questions answered so I didn't stick around.

Next stop was Best Buy. Here I knew that what I was looking for would be well overpriced. You can get some good deals on equipment here, but they kick your ass on the accessories and cables. But I did talk to a dude that answered a couple of my questions. Amazing to me though was that they didn't have any adaptors in stock.

Last stop, Target. This trip was a gamble, because I was not real confident that they would have what I was looking for, but I seemed to remember seeing what I wanted at a Target store before a year or so ago. And luck would have it, they had both items at about half the Best Buy price.

Now by this time I had numerous small items I had purchased and Max continues to amaze me because I was able to get all the items into either the top case of the seat storage area. Didn't even need the "man bag hook"!

The only bad thing about the trip was the usual Saturday traffic, a real pain. But the weather couldn't be beat. Max is running like a champ.

It turns out I forgot to get one small HDMI cable.

Oh well, another excuse to run an errand on Max.

10 comments:

  1. Glad you got out. Weather here is pretty great as well. Today was filled with stuff, but tomorrow after I get done preaching I think a ride will be in order...or a skate...or a....

    Oh well, it is good to have a full life :)

    Ride on! and go get that cable.
    ~Keith
    Circle Blue

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    Replies
    1. Hey Keith, after you do your preachy thing tomorrow, have a nice ride or skate or whatever for me and I'll do the same for you.

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  2. Netflix streaming with a disc or five is the way to go. That and an iPad gives you a huge range of stuff with zero advertising.

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  3. Conch, Jayna and I actually watch a lot less TV. We still get Netflix movies mailed to us and find it amazing when there is 65 channels that you can't find anything worth watching. We will stream a few shows and maybe even blog from home. How scary is that?!
    Good to hear from you. I still dream about riding that highway down to see you someday. Say hello to Layne for us.

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  4. **Chuckles** I gave up my TV about 3 years ago and don't miss it. Nearly everything I want to see is either on the PC or on Netflix. You won't miss much.

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  5. Cpa3485:

    I need to do something about our HD and cable options. We are paying big $$ for nothing, no HD signals, nothing. We have had our 1080pHD TV for a year now using it as a 480p

    bob
    Riding the Wet Coast
    My Flickr // My YouTube

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  6. Hi Jim,

    I am glad to hear that normal service has been resumed and you and Max are able to spend more time together. Keep healthy and don't sit in front of that TV for too long!

    Best wishes from across the pond.

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  7. Hey Robert,
    Thanks for stoppin' by. The TV setup is almost ready to go, just waiting for the internet hookup that should be this weekend. We Netflix a lot (the wife picks them out), and looking forward to the changes.
    I'll need to explore your site some more, it looks good!
    Jim

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  8. Bobskoot,
    Some of the entertainment options around here are ridiculous in price. I am so cheap, it makes me angry when I see what some people spend. Do you have a blu-ray player. Ours will be hooked to the internet and we should be able to get a a lot of HD "stuff".
    Take Care,
    Jim

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  9. Gary,
    Rest assured that I will not spend that much time in front of the TV. Max and I have some plans for the summer. Just got through our busy season at work, have some home projects to get done this year, but Max and I will be cavorting a fair amount this summer. He deserves to have a lot more miles under his belt than he got last year.
    Thanks for visiting, I was recalling my little trip to Nebraska recently.
    Take Care,
    Jim

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