My parents came over; I've been spending a lot more time with them since the accident, and this is definitely a positive thing. I think that was one of the key changes I wanted to make in my post-accident life. But just as we were getting some good work done on the leaky main service pipe (a T had been used to tap into the main, and a pipe extending from it was then nailed onto a rickety wooden fence. The torquing of the fence caused a small leak at the joint of the T. Poor planning all around), they received word that an uncle of mine had just died of cancer.

While I was in the middle of my very sombering thought, I sat here in sweltering 75 degree heat. Tomorrow it's supposed to be 89 degrees. Me being a Californian, I had to turn on the A/C so that it brought it back down to a more manageable 70 degrees. Thank goodness I had that new HVAC system installed last November.

It's odd; this uncle married into my family, so I'm not related by blood. Still, the death of anyone dimishes us, and I'm just as much related to my brother's roommate as I am to this uncle. Still, I don't feel a connection at all. I think remorse and grief come from reflecting on the happiness one shares with the deceased. Because I never really spent a lot of time with him, I feel a little empty inside, simply because I feel like I should have some deeper emotional connection with him, but I don't. It's odd to place into words.

I've been distracting myself lately by attacking two of my favorite hobbies: putting together computers, and being an audiophile. In the first case, I've been trying to revive Pandora, a machine I put together four years ago with the intent of being a TiVo before TiVo became a verb. Well, my experience in attempting (and failing) to put together that computer allowed me to succesfully put together Poseidon, which is currently sitting in the living room recording Good Eats and Simpsons and Queer Eye and World's Best, and then encoding them into WMVs so that they can be streamed over the network using Internet Explorer. I've even sold a few co-workers into using BeyondTV3 for their PVR needs, simply because they, like me, want file-level control over the recordings.

But since Poseidon was built from scratch with the intent of building a PVR with updated technology, I decided to relegate the hardware originally in Pandora to turn her into a full-fledge warez computer. I've had to make a few tweaks, though, to compensate for the fact that she's on all the time. First, I used a Vantec Stealth 80mm case fan, with only 20db noise. Next, I had to find a low-profile DVI card to fit in the Antec Minuet microATX case. Doing a simple search online led me to the PowerColor system integrator-edition, based on a mature ATI Radeon 9200 chipset. I don't care much for 3d gaming graphics, so it didn't bother me. Next, I'm replacing the Intel PIII CPU Fan with one from QuietPC, which rates at a whopping 12 db. Pandora is going to be some quiet. Currently, she's loudly downloading a massive amount of torrents. I can't wait until that PowerColor card comes in so I can stop using the D-sub input on my Dell 2000FP LCD monitor; everything looks so grainy and hazy.

As you can see, I like hot-rodding my computers. Let's get to the audiophile setup...

I spent the evening watching the new episodes of Six Feet Under and The Sopranos on HBO. They played this great promo with the song "Algebra" by Soul Hooligans. If you can find it, go get it. And then give it to me. I managed to get my MX-700 remote finally programmed. I'm missing a few discretes, but fortunately Lawrence over at GNP can help me out in that regard. I decided to stop using the Tara Labs 55i interconnects as my composite and digital coaxial outs, opting for some cables (also from Tara Labs, in Ashland, Oregon) that were actually meant to do those jobs (namely the 200d and 200sv series). I'm going to need 3 more S-video cables and one $99 composite-S-video converter from Monster, which seems really excessive considering that it's merely for my inferior cable box (supplied by Adelphia).

My 55i's are currently not used, but I think I'm going to reattach them to the Arcam DV88+ as standard audio outputs, figuring that the stereo decoding on the Arcam was superior to the DAC in the Rotel RSX-1055. I'll still use the Rotel's surround processor, but for straight stereo, I'll route them through the 55i's. I'm also in the market for a sub right now, but that can certainly wait.

I'm on a roll, so I'm going to continue...

I also saw my dream TV at GNP today. It's the Loewe Articos 55, a 55" Digital Light Processor TV using the next-generation DLP chip from Texas Instruments (known as The Mustang). All the hot DLPs are using it, and because the inferior technology plasma is actually more popular, the DLP is cheaper. So if anyone has $7000 they can loan me, they can come and watch TV at my house. Eventually I'll be using component (and if I've got an HD-signal, I'll also use DVI) inputs, so the whole S-video migration thing was just because I didn't like the idea of the 55i's being misused. Still, I want to hold off on getting an HD tuner until there's one that I can plug into a PCI slot and use with Beyond TV 3. $300 for a myHD MDP-120 card seems rather cumbersome given that I'd have to use two different interfaces.

But the Loewe looks seriously awesome. My only problem is what I'll do with my cheap-ass RCA if I get it. Wow, this air conditioner works really well. I'd rather be bundling up than lying here sweltering in a 76 degree sauna. Tough life.