Barbecue at Jamey's; Barbecue at Jamie's

As I noted in the DVD post, Saturday night had us going to two barbecues. And — well, first, let me apologize for that post. There's a perhaps moderately amusing story buried in there somewhere, but I think it fell victim to that "I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to make it shorter" principle.

Anyway.

 

So the rains tapered off in the afternoon and we headed to Jamey's for a barbecue with the fencing crowd. Cool outside, nice for sitting and surveying the new little lawn (it's a long, sad, sod sob story), visiting, and meeting their dog Tanner. When they got him as a puppy, they knew he was part Heeler, but they didn't know what the other part was, and figured on a 40-or-so-pound dog. The other half is Rottweiler, apparently. So he's a big, but a total sweetie, and there's the possibility we'll be sitting for him.

A couple hours there, and we were off to Monica's co-worker Jamie's for their cookout. It was primarily for fellow museum folks, and the invitation read (links added):

For all those who have been Franked, Fluxed, Chaired, Needled, and almost sent around Gee's Bend or down the Old Spanish Trail in the process, it's time for a bit of Indigenous Comic relief from all the Tuff Stuff and Art on the Edge. Please leave the museums behind and join us to share a bit of your Native Couture amidst the Flower Power of our summer gardens...

Like last time, there was paella made in the outdoor fireplace.

the roofers are here right now

There are six guys walking around our roof right now. Sounds like people upstairs, only we don't have an upstairs. If the wind dies down enough, they'll finish the tear-off and do the foam. The view out our front door:



Okay, time to go to work.

Seems that …

the interior design firm up the street has a fruit orchard in over by its parking lot. Apples, pears, and plums.

final music on the hill

This past Wednesday was the last Music on the Hill concert of the summer at St. John's. Biggest crowd ever, and a lot of swirly dancing for Wagogo, the Reggae/World Music-type band that played. We met up with Stacey, her co-worker Andrew, her mother Bernice (who is an absolute stitch), and her friend Tracy who is back in town for a second summer of Big Fiber/Human Tools. I got there first (my office is closest), and staked out a spot with some blankets. Bram came next and brought some chairs and the roll-up table — which hasn't seen nearly as much use here in SFe as it did back in Arlington. Stacy scored some food from the Walter Burke catering tent, I brought some Trader Joe's drinks and snax and we set up real nice. It was a lovely evening with a gorgeous sunset, fun music, and no threat of rain.

Clockwise: me, Stacy, Bernice, Andrew, and Tracy


Andrew, Tracy, and Bram


Bernice wished someone knew how to Merengue or Mambo so she could dance.


Stacy and her Mom


So much swirly dancing!


Sunset

DVD Player

Since we bought the Graphite iBook in 2000, that's functioned as our DVD player. It even came with the cables to plug it into the VCR (which runs through the stereo), so we were good to go out of the box. Sure, it was a little clunky at times, and it meant that we had to put the laptop on the floor by the TV when we wanted to watch, but, hey, it worked for us. OK, it was awfully sensitive to any scratches on the disc's surface, and some newer DVDs just freaked it out. But still. Why buy a DVD player when you've already got one?

When we upgraded to a new iBook last year, it didn't use the same cables (and didn't come with new ones), but that just meant the old one moved permanently into the living room, which worked pretty well because we could use it for streaming radio, accessing the iTunes library, and playing DVDs, as well as the occasional (slow) Web browsing. Never quite got around to getting a third length of cable so it could go on the tables we have out there and never worked out how to integrate it into the shelves, so it just sat on the floor in the corner.

As noted last week, the DVD drive seems to have finally died. Last year, the power source went, and I was willing to pay to get that fixed, but this just didn't seem worth it. So, before fencing Thursday, a quick stop at the local electronics store for the lowest-price, brand-name-I-recognized player they had.

Unpacking and looking through the manual, that's when we (and by "we," I mean "Monica") discovered that this wasn't going to just be a plug-and-play operation. To connect to the TV (ca. 1994, when Monica moved to Arlington), we needed to get an RF modulator and some more coaxial cable. Picked up those last night and got it all connected, with not a huge amount of grief — all so we could get our Mad Men fix.

However, it seems that we can't run the DVD playback through the stereo, at least with the current configuration. So the audio just comes from the built-in speakers on the TV. On the other hand, maybe now we can watch the rest of the (banged-up) Weeds DVD we have out on loan, and future downloaded Cinematic Titanic movies will play properly.

We'd picked up an Airport Express a while back with a gift certificate from M+D, but had to wait a few months to get it up and running until we upgraded the desktop system. The intent was to buy some little bookshelf speakers and set that up in the fireplace room, but it now uses the connection vacated by the iBook. The streaming can be inexplicably spotty, but thanks to PandoraJam, I can indulge in my new favorite geekery in the living room as well.

The old iBook now lives in the fireplace room, still good for some simple Web browsing. And it's the only machine capable of connecting to and configuring the old Airport base station.

Next week, the insulation guys come to work on the roof, and hopefully after that, we can get around finally installing the TV aerial up there. If we can find someone to hook it up. And then we get to revisit this whole thing again in a few months with the conversion to digital TV.

To summarize: technology — two steps forward, one-and-a-half steps backward.

-=-=-=-=-=

So, it's actually raining right now, with the promise of occasional showers all day. We've got two cookouts to go to tonight.

Also, Jason's account of Santa Fe is posted.