Al's Blog-o-Sphere

The return of the Lockport Molson Canal Concert Series is about a month away and the promoters released the schedule and lineup of entertainers on Wednesday.

As usual, there is a lot of fuss about the headliners, and has brought in a bunch of top-name acts that will undoubtedly have the square behind Ulrich City Center packed again. You’ve probably already heard the names and most of them were no surprise; they were almost all leaked/announced on the individual bands websites and show schedules.

But, unlike most of the local free summer concert series, they have also released the local or regional performers who will be opening for the headline acts. I think this is great as it gives the fans of the local bands some notice, give the bands themselves time to promote their appearance and in the end, brings even more people to the shows. Since the openers play first, this means more people get there early and probably stay longer which translates to more business for the vendors and surrounding businesses. It’s such a no-brainer, that I don’t understand why venues like Artpark and Thursday at the Square don’t put more emphasis on this.

So, let’s look at a few of the local bands: Continue Reading…

Well, it’s spring and a young man’s thoughts turn to…

building a PC, of course. Well, I’m not that young, but since I bought a new LCD TV and mounted it on my living room wall, it was the next logical step.

I’ve had a sound system tied into my TV watching since before “Home Theater” was a common term. My first DVR came in 1999, when I got a ReplayTV 2000. I only retired it a year ago when it’s power supply failed. I still have it, in case I want to repair it, but about that time, I got a satellite dish and got the DVR option along with that.

But, I haven’t been totally happy with that, plus with the switchover to DTV, and no way to record over-the-air, I’ve been seriously looking at HTPCs. Home Theater PCs are a computer with a tuner card to collect video and then display it, in real-time, or later via recording, on your TV. It’s a different breed of PC in some ways, with some special needs in the areas of cooling, sound levels and I/O devices. Continue Reading…

Actually said by a weatherman tonight on a local TV station:

If you are going to be out driving tonight, be careful because we haven’t seen rain like this in a couple of days and it could get slick.

Wait a minute. We should be extra careful because of the possibility of RAIN?!?! Because we haven’t seen rain in the looooong time of a couple days? How condescending and patronizing can the TV talking heads get? They must think we are like stupid Turkeys, standing in our front yards, looking upwards at this strange phenomenon, rain. We must have forgotten all about it because our short attention spans don’t go back a mere couple of days. They must warn us to close our mouths so that we don’t drown!

I don’t really think it’s a matter of some contempt for their viewers IQ. I think mostly, when you’re getting paid to fill time talking about something, sometimes they say anything as long as it sounds sort of related to the topic at hand.

I mean, come on, this is Western New York. We drive through blizzards before breakfast here. (And weathermen have a canary about it.) A little rain shouldn’t even be worth mentioning.

…since my last post here.

Since our trip to Atlanta, I’ve been under the weather. I wouldn’t say it’s the Swine Flu, but I did meet some people from Mexico in Atlanta…

But I haven’t felt like sitting in front of a computer. Or thinking. Actually, sitting is the easy part. Concentrating with my sinuses plugged up and coughing up a lung is hard.

So, I’m finally feeling better and finished up the DTV post right below this.