The source of all of my problems: Comcast & Al Davis

My relationship with the DVR has had its ups and downs, and for a while there, we were getting along just fine. It played all my shows without any disruption, and I was beginning to think to myself, "Oh no! I'm not going to have anything to write in my blog! Everything's perfect!" But sure enough, the SOB strikes again.

It's kind of the way I'm feeling about the Raiders right now, more specifically, that dinosaur, Al Davis. Last year, it felt like everything was going well. We were headed in the right direction with leadership under a new head coach, and I wasn't getting pissed off at the team for not trying because they were.

But then Al wants to step into the picture this year and disrupt the team with his crazy shennanigans, thereby ruining whatever chance the Raiders had of being successful this season. The Raiders' organization is a dictatorship - free speech is stifled (Al has final word), the media has limited access to the inner workings of the team, and coaches and personnel have restrictions on what they can and cannot do. I mean, does he realize it's 2008, not 1978, and the game has changed? Does he realize he's the reason his beloved baby is in shambles? Does he realize that the fans of the Nation are sick and tired of this bullshit, and we want to be a f*in winning team for once? Stop being a control freak and trying to monopolize the franchise! Ugh! GO AWAY, AL! You need to be fired. You should fire yourself...

Hey, Raider fans, join the fight against TPTB: KeepKiffin.com.

*update as of Tuesday 9/30: Al Davis is a hack. Sorry, Kiff. Good luck, though, and I wish you future success.

What was I talking about again? Oh yeah, the DVR - back to the topic at hand.

So ignore the whole comparison of Al Davis to my DVR. That's just my crazy "other" frustation that I had to let out. Plus, I don't want the DVR to go away (like Al Davis). I just want a miracle to fix it. And by miracle, I mean Comcast. And by Comcast, I mean enemy number one on the list of things I hate.

For some reason, right now, the DVR does this weird thing when I reach the end of my show. Let's say, I'm watching an hour long episode. It shows up as 1:00 (1 hour) on the DVR duration timer. As I approach the end of the show, around :55 (minutes), I fast forward, usually, to see the previews for next week. During the fast forward, the DVR pauses (not freezes) at :59. I try to rewind because it's gone a little too far (usually, you'd want to stop the fast forward at around :57, or so, for the previews). But instead of rewinding, the DVR just goes back to the beginning of the show (0:00).

Ok, that's not so bad. I figured I possibly hit the rewind button one too many times, and it accidentally went to the start of the show. Fine.

So I fast forward again to get to :57. and the stupid machine does it again. It takes me to the beginning of the show. I did it about 3 times, and every single time it did the same thing. It irritated the heck out of me. Seeing previews for the next episode always gets me excited, and I love to know what I'm looking forward to. But apparently, the DVR doesn't want me to know. What a piece of --

I'm not that mad. It's just this device is supposed to work. Mine doesn't seem to want to.

And you know who I blame it on? Comcast.

Instead of trying to get in good with Google or Yahoo or whatever search engine you're trying to create an agreement with so you can screw your Internet customers, how about you fix your DVR! There are more important things to worry about than making a buck - oh, like, making sure your customers are satisfied with your products. I know the economy is a disaster, and I know everyone is trying to find a way to survive the horrors that our country may possibly face in the next few years, but come on. Sorry, that the $700 billion dollar bailout won't help you some, but you know who it is going to affect? We, the consumers, who pay for your services and products. If we're going to pay the monthly bill, while we are already strapped for cash, for a service and a product that you provide, it should, at the very least, perform at the level you claim it to.

"Now TiVo’s legendary ease of use and unique search features make searching for, recording and watching your favorite shows and movies simple. And finding HD content is easier than ever" - taken from the Comcast website.

You mention the keywords "ease" and "simple" when in reality, nothing is simple or easy about the DVR. Your product makes it difficult to watch a television show interruption-free. There are almost always problems with the DVR, and this is a just another one to add to the long list of annoyances I have with it.

On that note, you greedy, money hungry, execs at Comcast better not be thinking of more ways to screw their customers by making it harder for us to access certain websites on the Internet. The Internet should remain neutral and not owned or controlled by any specific entity. SAVE THE INTERNET!

Kind of like the Raiders. Maybe the Raiders should not be owned or controlled by any one, specific person who has all the power to put restrictions and limitations on the team. Maybe, we, the city, the fans, should step in, and own them like they do in Green Bay. Take a stand! I'm sure we can make better decisions about the team than the old, washed-up cryptkeeper. For my sake, and the sake of the loyal fans of the team and around the league, please: SAVE THE RAIDERS!

Ah, to hell with it. Forget everything I said earlier. The only thing that needs saving is my sanity unlike Al Davis, who lost his 20 years ago.

Life without the Macbook

(Actually only 2 days, but it felt like a lifetime).

I'm still at odds with the DVR. Don't think I'm gonna let it off the hook that easily. It still freezes, drops audio, cuts off, yada yada yada, and does all the things it's so adept at doing. I just have another device to bitch about:

My MacBook.

Wait? What's that? The almighty Apple creation is causing problems? The laptop that is supposedly immune to viruses, spyware, and adware? How could I possibly have an issue with it?

Well, it's me. Technology and I don't mix (well).

I've had my MacBook for a little over a year, and up until last Thursday, I've had no problems, whatsoever. I was in love with it. I had been a loyal PC user for 20 years, but had to suffer through problems and issues almost monthly. But with Apple? Nah...it was, dare I say, perfect.

The only "problem" I had with my laptop was that I didn't have a lot of music in my iTunes library. I refused to download Limewire or BitTorrent, not because I think it's wrong to share copy written files through the Internet, but because of my previous experiences with it (namely, crashing my computer due to viruses). I always wondered why artists and musicians had such an issue with their songs being leaked and downloaded on the Internet. It's more publicity for them, which means more money, right? At least, that's the way I see it. Maybe I'm just a cheap ass. Whatever the case, good music should be shared and not hidden.

Anyway, most of my songs came from either direct purchases on iTunes, which started to get expensive, CDs that I had uploaded, or blogs on the Internet that offered a free download. In total, I had a whopping 150 songs, or so, in my music library. Being the music enthusiast that I am, I needed to do something about that.

I had a video iPod, which had been giving me problems i.e. blasting the volume on its own causing my eardrums to bleed, but it had nearly 4,500 songs on it. I hated that I had to plug my iPod into my laptop just to hear all of those songs. I wished there was someway I could just put all the songs from my iPod onto my MacBook.

Alas, there is a way. It's called Senuti (iTunes backwards). It allows users to transfer songs from their mp3 player to their music library.

This was an even greater application for me because I had just purchased the new iPod Touch to replace the devil video iPod, and I didn't have songs to put into it because I didn't have any (in today's terms, the phrase "not having any songs" translates to "I have less than 1,000"). However, the iPod Touch requires one thing: download iTunes 8. (Why is this post sounding like one whole big Apple plug?)

So, there I was last Thursday - on my perfect Mac, downloading the perfect application, with an upgrade of the perfect music library...what could possibly go wrong?

Senuti downloaded just fine. I connected my iPod to start transferring all 4,500 songs. That process seemed, to me, well, like a long process. So I stepped away from the computer to do other things. I came back in about an hour, and I saw that little rainbow spinwheel (the equivalent of the hourglass on the PC, meaning it's trying to process something). I figured, "Oh, OK. It's just a lot of information. That thing should go away soon." So, I walked away again. I came back in another hour, and the spinwheel was still there. On top of that, the computer started making this clicking sound, as if it was going to explode or something. WTF? From now on, bear with me, as I get into some MacBook terminology.

I tried to close out of the application windows - nothing.
I tried to Force Quit all programs - nothing.
I tried control, apple, option, shift, [insert any other button] - nothing.

So, I turned off my computer. I turned it back on...and all I saw was a gray screen. I didn't see the Apple logo, nor did I see this little guy:



I repeated these steps about 20,000 times, but still nothing. It was just gray oblivion.

I couldn't believe it. After a year of bliss, the stupid computer wanted to do this to me? I logged onto our other computer (a PC! Gasp!), and I read some of the discussion forums to see if other people were having the same problems, too. And as it turned out, some of them were. And yanno what they say the problem was? iTunes 8. According to the Apple Forums, iTunes 8 apparently had been eating up people's hard drives and frying them. It did the same to mine. Stupid Apple!

I took it to the Apple store at 1:00pm Friday, and he said my hard drive was kaput. Well, no shit Sherlock, the operating system won't even run. He said it would take two days to fix. Fine. The worst part about losing my laptop for two days wasn't the fact that I would lose all my files. I had a flash drive with a lot of my documents, most of my pictures are on MySpace (ha!), and well, you know the whole music deal. The worst part was that I live in the East Bay, and I drove about 30 minutes away to San Francisco because that was the only Apple store that had an appointment for me. I figured, in two days, I'd be at work (Sunday) in San Francisco, and I'd just pick it up then. I drove home, and around 3:00pm, I got a phone call.

"Hello?"
"Hi, Jenna? This is Miriam from the Apple store. Your computer is done."

Are you frickin' kidding me? The inane part was that I contemplated going back to SF the second they called me, but my rational side kicked in telling me, "Gas is 3.83, and you're broke." So, I called them and told them I'd pick it up on Sunday like I had originally planned. Ironically, they said, "No problem." Easy for them to say; I've had plenty the past day and a half.

After this crazy debacle, there's an even sadder part that causes me to question if Apple is in cahoots with some secret brainwashing organization (let's just call them their marketing team, for now). Because Apple has a genius marketing team, I'm only one paycheck away from purchasing their newest operating system, Leopard.





Doesn't it look cool? And plus there's Time Machine on it, which is basically a System Restore (for you, PC heads). I'm such a sucker.

This whole adventure happened because all I wanted to do was take the music from my iPod and put it on my computer. That's it. A lot of my songs on my iPod came from my friends' libraries and earlier downloads from Limewire (on the PC). It was shared, and it was free. I like free stuff. I got to listen to music I wouldn't have otherwise heard, due to the eclectic range of all my friends. But, of course, because I have such bad luck with technology, it prevented me from doing it. Is this the digital rights management gods trying to send me a sign? Lars Ulrich, are you monitoring my computer habits?

Well, if it (he) is, I'm ignoring it because once I got my computer back, I downloaded iTunes 8 again, as well as Senuti.

Strangely enough, after analyzing all the things that caused my laptop to crash, I've deduced that it wasn't iTunes 8 or Senuti, especially since they're running perfectly now. It was trying to transfer 4,500+ files to a computer that was already trying to handle two new humongous applications at once.

My bad.

OK, Steve Jobs and Apple, you're off my sh*t list - for now.

My DVR still sucks. So does the GOP.

Usually, after a long day (either of school or work or both), I look forward to coming home to catch what's on my DVR. I see the usual -- Days of Our Lives, Jon and Kate Plus 8, Man vs Wild -- but I notice something else. It was listed just simply as: The Republican National Convention.

Oh, great! Why must you (my parents) fill up the memory on this machine with such nonsense?

But before I get to the mighty GOP, let me just vent at the fact that for some reason Comcast decided to do something called an "EAS" at 3:15pm. It stands for Emergency Alert System, but that's besides the point. When they do this, it turns off the DVR entirely, meaning it cuts off the show it was recording. And what was taping during this time? My guiltiest pleasure on television (besides the horrible, fake, phony, stupid, scripted-reality show The Hills): Days of Our Lives. So, while I was watching Sami plead to her lover, EJ, to help her get her daughter back from her ex-husband, Lucas, who had just gotten out of jail, and is now getting cozy with Sami's step-brother's ex-wife, Chloe...the DVR shuts off. Usually, these things only last 2-3 minutes, but for some reason, I missed about 20 minutes of the show. So irritating.

Question: what's an EAS supposed to be anyways? I understand what it means, but what exactly is it supposed to do? I've been alive for 22 years and have been watching television for about 20 of them, and I have yet to see that EAS/EBS put to good use. I'm a television major. I really should know. Whatever. I missed what could have quite possibly been the most important scene EVER on Days. Thanks for nothing, Comcast!

Look, the EAS being put to good use:


So, back to the GOP. I watched Sarah Palin's acceptance speech, and whaddya know? Part of it was cut off by the DVR, but I got a majority of it. Aside from the speech itself, I found myself paying attention to the commentary from television stations after the fact. The one we recorded was from MSNBC, so I believe it was during Hardball with Chris Matthews. There was a little panel discussing her "performance." I was curious to see what Fox was saying about their newest "Superstar Politician" as well, so I heard some of that commentary. I was disgusted...from both stations. Not necessarily because they both were praising Palin, but because of what they were praising her for.

Both were annoyingly particular about the fact that Palin has a way with words and presented herself very well...basically all the intangibles that have created this "buzz" about the new VP nominee. This frustrated me because the primary responsibility of television news is to inform the public. Additional commentary is welcome, but their first responsibility is to reiterate her positions on certain topics that most of the audience would want to know. So, I'm going to do my part. Here's a good link that provides Palin's position on ALL issues.

While I can certainly say she's a very good public speaker, my criticism was her lack of content regarding the issues in focus during this election i.e. Roe v. Wade, Global Warming, Social Security, the War, etc. Three things I can remember from her speech: attacks on Barack Obama, her family, and lipstick. It's unfortunate that I had to look online for all this information. I guess SF State deserves a big Thank You for engraving in me to distrust television news and the importance of using different sources to help find my answers.

I thought Tina Fey's impression was on point, and we even got to hear some of Palin's positions. Albeit, in a humorous way.


Those are just the few of the things I found wrong with the DVR and the GOP/Palin. Gosh, I hope we can fix it soon (oh, and the DVR as well).

This blog will R.I.P. in 2 days (brought over from LiveJournal)

I created another blog. Wow! What a surprise!

I need to learn how to keep these things updated. I guess my life isn’t interesting enough to write about (or should I say “consistently interesting” enough…yeah, that sounds better).

Thankfully, I actually have a reason to create a blog now. And it’s for school – yet another surprise! Whooo! SURPRISES GALORE! I haven’t quite figured out what I want to write about yet. I was thinking something along the lines of “My DVR sucks,” and I just write about how my DVR messes up (i.e. freezes, audio drops, etc.) on me all the time while I’m in the middle of my television show. With that as the main topic, I was hoping to expand it to all technology, like how my cell phone never has service or how my Ipod won’t let me import other people’s libraries anymore. Or how I wish my boss would just follow the masses and purchase a Mac at work so I don’t have to deal with the horrible PC anymore. It’s basically a rant blog, but I feel like it’s the kind of thing that everyone can relate to. Writing is also my release whenever I want to vent, and I think rather than throwing the remote at the television to release my frustration with the DVR (which I have never done, but have contemplated many times before), I can just write in my blog. Think of it as a public anger management/therapy session with the Internet community. Sound good?

something like this...

Other ideas I had revolved around role play. One of the characters I wanted to play was one (or all) of the Gosselin kids from Jon and Kate plus 8; a hypothetical “If one of the sextuplets or twins created a blog, what would they say?” I would base each post off of an episode, assume the role of one of the kids, and type.

this is cute

The URL for this blog is movinlikewhoa basically saying I’m constantly on the move and annoyingly indecisive. Hopefully the new blog will be interesting, pending my decision of the topic – that is, assuming I make a decision.