monitorhead

Today, the whole family is loading up in the new party van and heading toward Abilene, TX. I am attending the Math and Science Centennial Conference at ACU, a part of their celebration of 100 years for the institution. It should be fun revisiting old professors and friends. I will also be delivering a short talk covering my thesis research. I think that the thing I am anticipating the most is attending Chapel on Friday.

I always had mixed feelings about Chapel. On one hand, it is great for the whole student body to assemble everyday to pause for reflection and praise. On the other hand, too many people acted disrepectfully and disruptively raising a black cloud over the affair. I recall several instances when Wayne Barnard (at that time, dean of students who presided over Chapel) had to reprimand the entire assembly while the speaker struggled to address us over the noise. What a shameful way for a group of college "adults" to behave. Despite those distasteful attributes, most of my memories of Chapel are fond and I look forward to returning. I remember one time we had bats loose in the stadium. They kept flying around and freaking out the people who sat in the upper seats near the ceiling (generally, where the loudest people sat). Mostly, I remember singing. It is always amazing to hear 3000 people sing "The Lord Bless You and Keep You" in perfect harmony.

Do you have any particularly strong memories of Chapel? Good or bad, leave a comment.

Moving from Los Angeles to Houston has introduced a series of technology related difficulties at our house. Of course, there were the expected service outages– no telephone (thank God for mobile phones), no internet connection, no satellite TV, no video game console. Telephone and DSL were restored relatively quickly after we moved in but required about a week from the order date. The game console was unpacked within a few days but unused prior to establishing my internet lifeline. Our DirecTV install is the most surprising delay. In LA, I never waited more than 3 days for an installer to arrive. Our inital call to DirecTV in Houston gained us a 9 day wait prior to install. To make it worse, the installer never showed up. A few calls later and I received the next available install date–another 5 days of waiting. The install is scheduled for tomorrow. I’m keeping my fingers crossed.

We have also seen a rash of hardware failures in our computers. The first I noticed was the DVD-R drive in our desktop computer has failed and no longer reads disks. It had been acting up prior to the move but seems to have failed completely now. Likewise, our computer monitor which has been problematic for more than a year is showing serious screen distortions. It has now been replaced with a new LCD flat panel monitor, a Samsung Multisync 730B for those who care. The desktop system is due for a complete upgrade but these things seem to hasten the process. Luckily, Megan and I both have laptops to rely on. Finally, and worst of all, the primary hard drive of our media/PVR PC has failed requiring a new drive and complete software and OS reinstall.

These issues have prompted at least two major conclusions: 1) life with no internet connection, PVR, or gaming was not as bad as I anticipated since my work-a-holic schedule prior to my thesis defense essentially weened me off the technology milk. I even enjoyed reading more and going to sleep earlier. 2) The convenience and enjoyment of an internet connection, PVR and other electronic doo-dads is worth paying for.

Life can be enjoyed with or without toys.

By popular request (16% of regular readers), I am announcing the purchase of a new television set in our household.  It is the most glorious thing to grace my living room (besides Megan). I don’t yet have photos of it in place but you can find product info and images here. I chose to go with a Samsung DLP, the HL-R4677W. It is actually a discontinued model as of August 2005 and I bought it at a reduced price. This was not the model I was researching but I think that it is actually has a better picture quality than the one I had been considering.  It also fits perfectly in my TV cabinet with about a half inch on either side of the bezel which is better than the other unit would have fit (that one was actually a little wider and might have been a problem). I’ll try to post some actual photos in the near future when we have our internet connection up at home.

We have been watching OTA (over-the-air) HD broadcasts–like the premier of 24 last night–and DVD’s which both look superb.  DirecTV won’t be installed until next weekend but then we’ll be in full-blown middle-class American mode with all TV options at our fingertips. I haven’t hooked up my Xbox yet but imagine Halo 2 will be stunning on the display over my HD connector kit.

We are home owners and we have successfully moved ourselves and our belongs inside the walls of our new home.  Most of the boxes are unpacked but we are hardly settled.  We have the necessities: a roof, food, water; and the modern necessities: electricity, heat (and A/C since it is Houston); but lack the amenities we’ve become accustomed to: telephone, internet connection, satellite TV.  Of course, those are scheduled for installation and should be up in a week or so.

At work, I have been rigorously going through my new hire training regimen–two full days of classroom training and countless computer based training modules.  Maybe next week I’ll be prepared for actual work.  I guess I can’t complain too much since they do pay me for this stuff.

Hopefully, I can start making more regular blog entries once we get our home internet connection up.  By the way, who is going to confess to the the classic gaming engrish on the magnetic poetry? You know who you are.