Windows on the way!

A few days ago, I called the company who had installed the other windows in my house last year. He came over and gave me an updated quote for the large picture window at the front of the house.

A bit more than last year, but still a great deal, the whole window replaced and installed for about $2000. Happily, this is the last window to be replaced upstairs. The basement windows are smaller, and when I get around to doing them, It will be a lot cheaper.

In about six weeks, the window will be be built, and the installer will come and pull out the old one. I can't wait! My new window will have two side panels that will open. The front of the house doesn't have any way to ventilate at all except for the front door. While there's not a lot to worry about in this neighborhood usually, I don't want to leave the front door open while I'm sleeping.

After this window is done, I have only a few large projects left. One of the smaller ones I want to complete is the eaves troughs. Stupid things always get clogged with leaves, so I'm going to have them all replaced with new stuff that has the leaf guard on it. And maybe have them re-route the one on the front, so that it doesn't pour water onto the driveway. Not so big a deal in the summer, but spring and fall it makes the front walk like a skating rink.

Today is one of the few days it hasn't rained. I'm going to wait until later in the day (so it can dry a bit more) and try to cut down the jungle in the back.

Carrot and the stick...

I was watching a video this morning that made an awful lot of sense. Typically, I try to stay away from the deep mind bending stuff within an hour of waking up, but this one struck me in the first few minutes as something I should watch.



Needless to say, I haven't made it to the disconnection of monetary rewards vs. mastery, but we can all dream, right?

New Look!

I got kind of sick of looking at the same old layout.

Blogger has added a layout and template design widget that I used to give the blog a make over. I believe the new look is a bit more striking, and easier to look at. It doesn't mix together quite as much.

That said, there's not much else to post. It's raining, yet again. I have about a million things to do in the yard. However, I'm looking at it this way: a cool summer means less use of the air conditioner, thus cheaper electricity bills. Yay!

I've been tossing around an idea to build a small media player. Basically, I would use a mini-ITX motherboard and case, throw in a couple gigabytes of memory and a smallish hard drive (anywhere from 80 - 250 GB). There's a few free to use software packages out there. Notably XBMC and Boxee. I'm pretty sure that with a bit of testing, I could even make it work with a universal remote control. Run it with an invisible Linux operating system behind it, and there we go! Instant home network enabled media player!

Should play any type of computer media except digital rights managed content. (For the uninformed, that would be copyrighted material you download from iTunes and such.) The only thing keeping me from really doing it is the cost. I've been trying to find a more local vendor than the UK for the mini-itx parts, but there seems to be a somewhat small demand for the parts. Sadly, I'm looking at a $450 price tag at this point, and that's not worth it. For some reason the site in the UK is raping people overseas on shipping. If I could bring it down a hundred and fifty bucks, I would do it. I'll have to think about it. I'm really trying to save money for another vacation next year also.

Just curious, would there be anyone interested in having a media player like this if I could get the pricing down to a reasonable level? Overall size would be 62 x 192 x 210mm, or about the size of a small DVD player.

Anyway.. that's all there is right now. I'm going to go and send a grumpy email to that website about their shipping costs...

Amazing Talent!

Now, I'll be the first to admit I'm a bit biased, but the guys in the following video are really good. They are a group of Grade 8 boys who put together a band, and have been practicing for a few months. They performed this song in front of the whole school, and then later than night in front of parents. Shortly, they will be going to another city as a part of their band trip to perform there also.

They chose to perform "Know Your Enemy" by Greenday, but have a pretty good list of songs they have perfected, including "Highway to Hell" by AC/DC.

Enjoy!