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Watching time, the only true currency // A journal from John B. Roberts

Year: 2003

  • TiVo sends an upgrade

    (I’d like to put down more than these mundanities, but wanted to close the door on this topic, for now.) Earlier this week, I learned from the TiVo Community Forum that the lack of support for the 2.8 version of the Linksys USB wireless adapter in the TiVo software was the problem. TiVo wouldn’t recognize…

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  • atrabilious (\\at-ruh-BIL-yuhs\\, adjective)

    On Tuesday, September 30, 2003, atrabilious was the word of the day from Dictionary.com. I’ve been saving that email ever since. The email gives two definitions. Melancholic; gloomy. Irritable; ill-natured; peevish. I’m rarely melancholic, but a lack of sleep/time sure makes me peevish. Peevish is a good word to say, sort of like moussaka… just…

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  • BOOK: I Don’t Know How…

    I stayed up late last night polishing off the final pages of Allison Pearson’s I Don’t Know How She Does It. I didn’t read Bridget Jones’ Diary, but I wonder if it was similar. Very real, very up-to-date, but still fictional… this book felt very timely to me, as a parent of two kids. Basic…

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  • One more way to fight…

    Since the California law that goes into effect on January 1, 2004 won’t slow down the international spammers, I was glad to find another low-tech way to slow the harvesting of email addresses. Vin Crosbie pointed out this handy tip for encoding an email address in a way that web browsers will work, but the…

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  • No buyer’s remorse here

    Ever since the announcement of the new G4 iBooks, I’ve been curious about whether the new 12″ iBook was comparable to the 12″ PowerBook I purchased in July. Seems I’m not alone, and a few other have actually written down their thoughts. Here’s a grid which basically concludes that it’s almost a wash, and then…

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  • I’m here… it just feels…

    Spent the weekend at Ed’s bachelor party in South Lake Tahoe, got a stack of bills to pay and accounting to do for some family stuff, and the girl must have a tooth coming in because she’s cranky as all hell. And I cannot get the &*%&^% TiVo to recognize the wireless network, despite some…

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  • Imitation = flattery

    I spent much of today writing down requirements, in preparation for a kickoff meeting at work tomorrow afternoon. We’re going to re-introduce a feature from the past, but this time we’re going to do it ourselves, rather than outsourcing the service. Despite problems with the outsourcer which led to our discontinuing the offering, readers (tens…

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  • How old are you?

    I woke my son up this morning, and… well, OK, he woke me up this morning, per usual. After a few pleasantries, I told him it was October 21st. And then I asked him how old he was. He started: “I’m…(hesitation)…THREE!” Yes, today was the third birthday. Pretty easy to forget the level of anticipation…

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  • Joining the Tivolution

    I hope TiVo lives up to the hype. Ours arrived today, and after some struggling with the various inputs (no, the VCR isn’t hooked up yet, but I think the DVD still is), I saw the Welcome screen and the rest was easy enough. I appreciated the coincidence (?) of the New York Times running…

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  • BBC’s Big Read

    Everyone loves lists sometimes. The BBC polled the UK in April to find out the country’s favorite 100 books. Now it’s down to a list of the top 21. Apparently, they are going to winnow them down further still. I’ve heard of almost all 21, but two didn’t ring a bell: Birdsong (Sebastian Faulks) and…

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