A Bit Eclectic

The other day I was complaining about the terrible commercials on TV.  Apparently we haven’t made much progress in recent  years.  Check out this Nutri-Grain commercial from 2005.

via Blake

I realized something when watching this weeks episode of Heroes (Season 3 Episode 5). I get really frustrated that the characters never ask what powers someone has. It will get mentioned in a conversation that (insert character name) had powers and everyone just kind of leaves it at that. If I were in the room, I would want to know what the powers were before I let the conversation continue.

I understand that discovering the powers is part of the suspense and I wouldn’t expect the writers to reveal it at that time. It just feels like it is the elephant in the room that no one addresses. I think it would be just as effective to have someone ask and then cut to the others face, which could possibly have a look of horror, and then cut to another scene.

This is just one of the things that frustrates me about the storytelling in this show. There is a bag full of others, but that is for another time.

Here is a great example of excellent filming.  This ad says more than some of the movies I have seen this year.  It can almost make me forget about those Microsoft ads.

[via Daring Fireball]

A couple months ago I bought a new 26″ Westinghouse LCD TV. My main reason for the purchase was the size. Its sleek form made it easier to transport back and forth between school.

The TV had a great picture and overall I loved it. That was until I noticed the audio started becoming out of sync. At first I thought I was crazy and it wasn’t really going on, but it got progressively worse the longer the TV was on. The audio would happen half a second after the video.

I then started doing some research to fix the problem and came up with nothing. I started to make up excuses for the problem, like it was the power source or the DVD I was playing. So I learned to live with it, until last night. After watching 30 minutes of Silverado I got fed up with the issue and decided to look up a solution yet again.

This time I had a ton more luck. I found my solution in a review at Buy.com. Apparently, some Westinghouse TVs had a firmware issue that would cause this problem. Lucky for me, the firmware on my TV is user upgradeable. All I had to do was download the newest firmware from the manufacturer’s site and load it onto a portable USB drive*. That then plugged into the side of my TV and the update started. It was really easy and the whole process has renewed my faith in the company. The audio/video sync issue is completely fixed.

The whole process was so simple that I wish it was on more devices. This is the first TV that I have owned that allows the user to update the firmware with minimal frustration. Although it was a pain to deal with the audio issues, now that it is fixed I can easily recommend this TV.

*There are more detailed instructions with a few more easy steps located on the firmware page.

In our increasingly busy lives, there is less time to do everything that enters our life. This forces us to make choices. One of these choices deal with entertainment.

I am having an internal struggle over the decision to choose a form of entertainment. Currently I’m a total TV junkie. I love TV shows and have 23 season passes set up in my TiVo. I have intense loyalty to my TV shows, I mean I am still watching Lost after the numerous let downs and frustrations.

At the same time, I love to read books. Books are one of the greatest sources of entertainment. It is great to be able to picture the story in my own way and be immersed in the world. The problem is my stack of books that need to be read is large and growing.

I have a limited amount of time to devote to entertainment, and currently TV is the winner. TV isn’t as rewarding as a book, but is much easier to absorb. You can have TV on while doing something else and still enjoy your show. TV is the low hanging fruit that is easy to grasp but contains the occasional worm.

TV can be extremely entertaining, but can leave you with endless unanswered questions (LOST). This helps the networks boost future ratings, but is very frustrating. You can also get involved with a show that ends up being cancelled due to low ratings. Now you are stuck with a story that was never finished properly. Also, TV shows are developed to run on for a long time, this can lead so a series finale that is unsatisfying. It can feel unfinished, like it should go on.

Books on the other hand are high up in the tree. They are difficult to obtain, but twice as large and extremely juicy. Books entertain you for a longer period of time and feel more rewarding. After a book, you feel a great sense of accomplishment.

Although books are more rewarding, they require a lot more energy and devotion. When reading a book, you need to devote all your attention to the book. Unlike TV, you cannot read a book and do homework at the same time. Also, it is hard to determine whether a books is going to be good off the bat. Sometimes you will be one third of the way through before it really turns good.

With so much of my time already invested in TV, I am having a hard time giving more of it to books. I need to find a way to get off of TV and onto books and feel good about it.

TV is the low hanging fruit that has the occasional worms. Books are the hard to reach, yet plump and rewarding fruit at the top. This is my battle through the tree to get the good stuff on top.

With the season premier of Lost Season 3 a few days ago, my interest in all the secrets of the island have been rekindled. Last year after the season finale I stumbled upon a really good and interesting site called Lostpedia. Lostpedia is a wiki that is dedicated to everything Lost. You can literally spend hours looking around it and find tons of interesting things that various viewers have picked out of the show. So for all you hardcore Lost fanatics that can’t get enough of Jack, Sawyer, Kate and the gang this is your one stop shopping for all things Lost. Link.

Ok so the season premier of lost was on today and man was it crazy. This is going to be a great season, I can tell just from watching the first episode and seeing the previews for next weeks. I am not going to say anything about what happened so that I don’t ruin it for anyone else that is still planning on watching it. I have heard that the producers have said that they are trying to avoid the breaks in mid season like they have done in the past. This way we can have a continuous season instead of like 2 months then take a 3 week break then start up again. Also I hope none of this seasons episodes drag on like they did in the second half of last season. The last 4 or 5 episodes were good but there were some before then where it seemed like they didn’t have enough of a plot line to fill episodes until the season finale so they decided to do boring stories about the characters. I hope that some of you know what I meant in the past few sentences because I’m not sure how to phrase it any better. Anyways, I hope everyone enjoyed the season premier as much as I did. This is going to be a great season for TV shows. House, Lost, Heroes and Smallville all look very promising so far.