What Obsession Hath Wrought
Posted on | July 14, 2008 at 9:37 pm | 7 Comments
In the comments to a recent post on DMR’s “stuff reduction” blog detailing his CD storage solution, a discussion ensued about how I store my 4000+ compact discs. Always on the lookout for posts for my own blog, I thought I’d go into more detail here and post some pictures on Flickr. It’s so much easier to talk about it when there is visual reference material.
A number of years ago, I went through my entire CD collection (probably more than 3500 CDs at that point) and replaced all the jewel boxes with double pocket plastic (poly) CD sleeves (Prod Code SCDDPJ) from Bags Unlimited. The price per sleeve is reasonable when you buy them in massive amounts, which is what I had to do. The replacement job took several months, but it was worth it. I was able to sell the jewel boxes for a nickel a piece to a guy who ran a music transcription service and apparently had a lot of CDs of data to send out. I doubt I could find a deal like that again any time soon. A mutual friend who was in the media storage business hooked us up. Anyway, here is how the CDs go into the sleeves (click on the photo to go to the Flickr page, where you can view it in larger sizes):
The sleeves have a resealable flap, which initially has a white plastic strip over the sticky part that you peel off and throw away. I put the CD booklet and the CD in the front part of the sleeve and the tray card in the back. The sleeve is not quite wide enough to fit the tray card with both spines spread out, so I have to fold one of the spines over. It’s nice to have one spine showing, since it makes the CD easier to find on the CD shelves – I usually don’t have to pull out the CD to identify it. Some of the bags, especially in the early days, varied in width and some of them were too narrow to have even one spine not folded over. I think quality control wasn’t too good. The last few batches I’ve bought have been better though. So, some of the CDs don’t have any spines showing, which does make them hard to identify. Whenever I run across those in my listening or ripping, I’ll replace them with a newer, wider sleeve. I’m thinking it’s been maybe 10 years since I did that replacement task, and the CDs don’t seem to have suffered any degradation from being stored in the poly bags.
Once I replaced all the jewel boxes, that reduced the shelf space required to something like one fourth or one fifth of what it was. Before the replacement project, my father had made me a series of wall units for storing the CDs, which eventually got up to four and covered my entire dining room wall. Once I converted to the plastic sleeves, I was able to keep it down to one unit. I still have the other three sitting in my basement unused. Here’s what the collection looks like these days (again, click on it to get to the original larger photo on Flickr):
The CDs are in order by artist, and in chronological order within the artist. In order to facilitate identifying the CDs, I cut up some comic book storage backing boards, pasted some A-Z labels on them, and stuck them into the wall units in the appropriate places. Even though it looks pretty full, the CDs are not packed very tightly and there’s lots of room for more. Plus there’s some empty space at the end where I store mix CD-Rs people have sent me, spare jewel boxes, and other music-related paraphernalia. I don’t anticipate ever filling up the one wall unit and needing to bring one of the other ones back up. I’m focusing more on (legal) downloads these days (mostly from eMusic) and trying not to buy many CDs. And I’m also trying to get rid of the ones I never listen to. The collection grows very slowly, if at all, these days.
Somehow, I think this is a problem very few people have. Don’t let your kids grow up to be collectors!
Latre.
Poignant Search Term Of The Day That Led To This Blog: “frozen vending machine has no buttons”.
Toll Story
Posted on | July 13, 2008 at 10:40 pm | 1 Comment
Movie Review Sunday!
I don’t have any movies to review today. Haven’t seen any this week, at home or in the theater. I do have a backlog of flicks I’ve been meaning to mention, but I don’t feel like getting into any of those now. They are fading from memory.
So… hmmm… what else to talk about?
Pet Peeve of the Day: The State of Colorado. Well, remember back in this post, I talked about how I applied for a permit to allow me to travel in an HOV lane in my single occupancy Prius Hybrid? Well, I got a letter from the State of Colorado on Friday telling me that I’ve been granted the permit. Hooray!
The only problem is that apparently in order to get the permit, I have to apply for an ExpressToll transponder. This is supposedly because the single-occupancy Hybrids are going to be allowed in the HOT (High Occupancy Toll) lanes of I-25 and not the HOV (High Occupancy Vehicle) lanes. The transponder is supposed to tell the toll machines that I have the permit and am exempt from the toll. But you still have to give them your credit card and put the $35 on the transponder and all that. This is sure a lot of trouble to go to. I am especially miffed because I anticipate like never wanting to use the HOV/HOT lanes on I-25. I never drive on the Valley Highway during rush hour. I only wanted the permit so that I could drive in the Santa Fe HOV lane when I go to visit my dad in his nursing home after work. Santa Fe Drive is like a parking lot during the rush hour, but a parking lot with very large trucks every third vehicle. Being able to go in the HOV lane would speed the drive immensely and allow me to spend more time with my dad.
But I don’t want to have to get the frickin’ transponder. Gad, I wonder how many other Hybrid owners this will discourage from actually going through with obtaining the permit? (Hopefully all of the Hybrid SUV owner.)
This is just another typical example of the way the Colorado state government runs things. And it’s far from the worst. As a taxpayer, I’m very frustrated. Here it took them three years to actually get this Hybrid HOV thing off the ground (it’s been conceptually legal that long, they just didn’t have the permits thing worked out), and then they make it more complicated than it needs to be.
Latre.
Bonus Pet Peeve of the Day: I haven’t had much time to download third-party apps to my iPhone yet, though I have tried out a few free ones. One of the apps I installed is actually an Apple app called “Remote” that allows you to control the iTunes library on your computer through the WiFi connection on the iPhone/computer. This is very cool because I can pipe iTunes into my living room stereo via this wireless Logitech dongle thing I have. I hate to have to go running to the computer to switch songs or albums or playlists, so having the iPhone act as a remote would be fantastic. Unfortunately I can’t get the thing to work. The iPhone and the application pairs with iTunes and the PC okay over the WiFi network, but when I go to actually choose the library on the iPhone, it times out and says it can’t locate it. And yet it was able to locate it enough to pair with it in the first place.
According to the Apple discussions forum, it appears that other people are having this same problem, and the only commonality is that their iTunes libraries are stored on external hard drives like mine. Since my library is so huge, I don’t feel like moving it temporarily to the internal hard drive to test this theory. Guess I’ll just watch the webs and see what other people come up with or what Apple says.
Update: Wouldn’t you know it? Right after I posted this entry, I tried the Remote application again, and it worked. Must’ve been because I rebooted the computer or rebooted iTunes or something. Anyway, it’s totally awesome!!
Poignant Search Term Of The Day That Led To This Blog: “i’m becoming a hermit and i like it”.
Someone Left The Cake Out In My Brain
Posted on | July 12, 2008 at 11:54 pm | Comments Off
I’m on a roll! I actually finished another video game!
Not only did I finish God of War: Chains of Olympus on the PSP a few weeks ago, I also just completed Portal (one of the games in The Orange Box compilation) on the PS3. I first mentioned Portal way back in this post about the Jonathan Coulton song “Still Alive”, and now I’ve finally fulfilled my promise and played and finished the game.
Portal is not your typical computer/video game. It’s kind of a like a first-person shooter in that you’re looking through the eyes of a character holding a gun, but the gun is actually a “Portal Gun” that opens up teleportation doorways. It’s more of a puzzle game. Although there is some pretty intense action in the later stages, it’s all about figuring out how to get out of each room (or “testchamber”) by placing the portals properly and using them to redirect things or to go through them. There is some very dark humor, as the computer-voice antagonist GLaDOS who initially acts like she is trying to help you eventually taunts you and then tries to kill you. The dialog she spouts is very, very funny and filled with double meanings. She keeps promising you “cake” as a reward, though as the game goes on, the prospect of actually getting any cake seems dubious. (As the graffiti on the walls says “The cake is a lie”.)
Some have complained that the game is too short, but I thought it was the perfect length. There are 20 testchambers (0-19) and you can get through the first 15 or so pretty quickly, but then it gets really, really hard. And then the last testchamber is very long. It seems almost as long as the whole rest of the game put together. Eventually you have to match wits directly with GLaDOS while the clock is ticking down, and it gets very intense. Took me awhile to get through that final battle, but I finally did it today. I was very happy. I finally got to see the final scene and the end credits and to hear “Still Alive” in context as it was meant to be heard. My girlfriend is just happy she no longer has to hear the annoying computer voice, although she has memorized some of the dialog and hits me with it from time to time.
It’s been a long time since I’ve completed two video games within a year, much less within a month. I’ve also been getting back into Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin and have started playing Ninja Gaiden: Dragon Sword on the DS, and now I’ll finally get back to Grand Theft Auto IV and Heavenly Sword on the PS3. Although I have a really strong desire to go back and play Portal again with the added challenges that got unlocked when I completed the game. There’s no better high than figuring out how to complete a level and outwitting GLaDOS!
Latre.
Poignant Search Term Of The Day That Led To This Blog: “someone stole my wd mybook”.
Barely made this post under the wire!
Brickin’ Zee iPhone?
Posted on | July 11, 2008 at 12:57 pm | 3 Comments
You’d think I’d learn.
Remember a week or so ago? When Sony released the big new 2.40 firmware update for the PS3, I downloaded and installed it on the first day. Only after I installed it did I learn that the update caused many PS3s to stop working and Sony pulled the update from its servers the same day. Luckily, I was not one of the ones affected and the update went smoothly. Sony says the problem was caused by a conflict with some particular set of “administration data” on the PS3’s hard disk. I guess I didn’t have that data configuration. Sony quickly released a 2.41 update that didn’t have the problem, which I also installed. But apparently the people who encountered a bricked PS3 from the 2.40 update have no recourse but to send their unit back to Sony for replacement. Ow! Imagine being without a PS3 for a few weeks!
Everyone kept asking me this week if I was going to upgrade to the iPhone 3G on the first day, today. I decided awhile ago I wasn’t going to do that. I was going to get along with my old iPhone and the new 2.0 firmware update and see what happens. I was really looking forward to that update, since one of the things it does is allow the installation of third-party applications through Apple’s iTunes Store. That’s what I’ve been waiting for ever since I got the iPhone. Sure, the 3G networks speed, the GPS, and the flush headphone jack are all good enticements to upgrade the hardware, but I couldn’t really justify it at this point. My main goal is to use the iPhone to replace my PDA eventually, so the PDA functions that third-party apps could potentially enable are a big step toward that goal. The sooner I could get those apps on there, the better.
So when Apple updated iTunes last night to the 7.7 version, which allows access to the iPhone Apps Store and which is probably also necessary for the iPhone 2.0 firmware update, I installed that right away and had no problem. I browsed the Apps Store a bit and it looks like there’s some interesting stuff available, although not everything I need yet. I also kept checking to see if the firmware update was available. I was hoping it would happen after midnight Eastern time, but it didn’t. I checked it the first thing when I got up this morning – still no update. Then, after I ate breakfast, I checked again and there it was! I set it to “download and install”. The download was like 232MB and was going very slowly, so I hit the showers to get ready for work.
When I got back to the PC, it had finished the download and it was starting the install. It had to backup the iPhone’s data to the computer because the new firmware requires a completely clean iPhone to install. It took it awhile, but it appeared to do the backup and the install okay. It looked like it got to the part where it was going to restore the data and re-activate the phone, and then suddenly I got an error message about being unable to access the iTunes Store and “The network connection has been reset”. The display on the iPhone was telling me to connect it to iTunes. The iPhone showed up as connected in iTunes, but with just the name “iPhone” instead of the one I gave it, and the configuration screens were blank. I could go to the iTunes Store and navigate through that okay, but every time I clicked back to the iPhone icon, I got the same error message. Aaargh! The iPhone was a brick – it could only make “emergency” calls. I couldn’t understand why it said it couldn’t connect to the iTunes Store when I could connect to it for browsing. Or was it complaining about the network connection between the phone and the PC? But the phone was registering inside of iTunes and would appear and disappear in there when I would connect and disconnect it.
I tried rebooting iTunes – didn’t help. I tried rebooting the PC – didn’t help. I tried rebooting the phone – nothing. Panic set in. I was late for work and my phone wasn’t working. I tried calling Apple Support, but trying to get someone to talk to was a pointless task. I finally found the discussion forums on Apple’s website and it looked like many other people were having the same or similar issues. It appears that the Apple servers just got slammed from all the new 3G activations and from people like myself upgrading the firmware on the old phones. One poster said an Apple CSR told her to just keep trying – click away from the iPhone icon in iTunes and then back to it. That’s what I’d been doing for the last half an hour anyway, but I kept getting the error message. Finally, right after I read that, I tried again and got “Accessing iTunes Store” without the error message. And lo and behold, after a minute of that, it started the restore process, and a few minutes later I had a fully functional iPhone again, with the new firmware installed. I didn’t have time to reinstall the music on the phone, which I had wiped out before the install so it didn’t have to back it all up. Nor did I have time to check out the new 2.0 features. I just grabbed the phone and scooted out of the house.
So, what have we learned from this? The first lesson is not to update on the first day of release. Check the Internets and see how things are going with the update first. The second lesson is hopefully learned by Apple. Assuming it really is a demand problem, they should’ve staggered the release of the software and the new hardware, and released the software early (if it was ready). I know firsthand the problems of anticipating user load and how hard it is to test for that sort of thing beforehand, but they should’ve been better prepared.
Okay, time to check out those third-party apps!
Latre.
Posted from my iPhone.
Tanks A Lot, Safeway
Posted on | July 10, 2008 at 7:01 am | 2 Comments
Another way in which I’m trying to be more green is by driving less. I think I’m not alone there. The price of gas might have a little something to do with that. I am so thankful that I was able to buy my Dad’s Prius and ditch the Acura RSX, even though its gas mileage wasn’t that bad compared to most of what’s out on the road these days. Still, it costs me around $15-$20 a week to keep the Prius gassed up. I can’t imagine how people with gas-guzzling SUVs survive, although some of my co-workers who own them are taking the bus whenever they can.
Pet Peeve of the Day: I’ve been buying my gas at Safeway because Club members get a 3 cent discount per gallon when they use their card. And for a long time, if you bought $50 worth of groceries in a single transaction, you would get a 10 cent per gallon discount on your next fuel stop. But now they’ve changed all that. It appears that you have to now spend $100 to get the discount, although that can be spread over multiple transactions. And the gas rewards expire and reset at the end of the calendar quarter. Here’s the rules according to the sign on the pump (click to enlarge):
The wording is very confusing. It’s even confusing on the pamphlets they hand out at the store that contain a FAQ and everything. It almost makes it look like you only get 10 cents off per single gallon for every $100 you spend. That can’t be right, since it means spending $100 saves you only 10 cents total (well, 7 cents actually). They really should put something in the explanation about how the discount applies to the entire fuel transaction. Maybe I’m just easily confused. I couldn’t test it just yet because I only spent $50 at Safeway this week, so I only got the standard 3 cents off per gallon when I filled up yesterday.
I can’t really get too mad at Safeway, since the $50/10 cent thing was a pretty good deal and I knew it wouldn’t last forever. Their gas prices are usually pretty reasonable even before the discount. But I do hate change! And I always complain.
Latre.
Poignant Search Term Of The Day That Led To This Blog: “narnia spanking stories”.
Bin There, Doing That
Posted on | July 9, 2008 at 6:52 pm | 7 Comments
Another way in which N has changed my lifestyle, besides all the food things I mentioned earlier, is that I am now more green than I used to be. Oh, I think I was always pretty good with conserving and recycling, but she is more dedicated than I am.
For a long time, I paid the trash company extra to pick up my recycling as well as the trash. (Here in the suburbs we have to pay for our trash removal, unlike in the city of Denver.) Then when I switched to a new company for trash pickup, the new company didn’t do recycling. So instead I would drop off my recyclables (mostly just newspaper and aluminum cans at that point) at the big recycling bin in the parking lot at work. Then that new company went bankrupt (keeping the money I paid in advance) and I switched back to the old company. But by then, I was used to dropping off my own recycling and didn’t want to pay for it. So I didn’t re-sign up for that part of it. It’s a bit more of a hassle to load the stuff in the car and take it somewhere, but I don’t mind.
Then the recycling bins went to single-stream recycling and started accepting a lot more items, like plastic bottles and cardboard boxes and such. And then the bins multiplied across the city, appearing in many church and retail location parking lots. So there’s really no reason to pay for recycling anymore. Even though the new office doesn’t have a bin nearby, there are plenty on the drive to work. N showed me how I could recycle a lot more than I used to, like all the cereal boxes and stuff like that. She’s also got me using a lot less paper towels, napkins, tissues, etc. So now I have to dump stuff off at the recycling bins more often, but my trash is down to practically nothing. In fact, most weeks I’ve only got three-quarters of a 13-gal kitchen trash bag to put out for pickup, whereas I used to have 2 or 3 full ones a week. Sometimes I even wonder why I still pay for trash pickup, but it does come in handy on those weeks where I have a lot of extra stuff, like tree trimmings and weeds, or the debris leftover from a party.
I’ve noticed that more and more restaurants are getting away from plastic containers for leftovers and are going back to cardboard boxes and other more environmentally-friendly take-away packaging. And now comes word that the local recyclers are starting to accept the dreaded plastics #3 through #7, which previously they stayed away from. We end up saving a lot of cottage cheese and yogurt and butter containers to store leftovers and such in, partly because they can’t be recycled. But if that’s changing, then to the bins they go.
But now and again my mind flashes back to that Penn & Teller episode from a few years ago where they declare that most recycling, with the exception of newspapers and cans, costs more in time, money and resources than it would to just throw the stuff in a landfill (and much of it ends up there anyway). And that we’re never going to run out of landfill space. But I don’t know how much of that still applies, if it ever did, and recycling is one of those things that can make me feel good about myself no matter what my inner skeptic says. How can it be bad for the earth to reuse trash, even if it costs more to do it?
Latre.
Poignant Search Term Of The Day That Led To This Blog: “do i have the right way if i am at the stop sign earlier and i turn left at the two way stops”. (Good question, actually. I alway assume the answer is “no”. I think the person going straight has the right of way no matter what.)