Tonight I did battle with the frozen crust that's been covering the sidewalk and driveway for the past couple of weeks. The base layer came as rain/snow/sleet and pretty much coated everything with a 1 inch crust of frozen gunk. Then it's snowed on top of that. I think I'd been hoping for a thaw to get rid of that base layer, since it's stuck so solidly to the ground. However, with people coming tomorrow night, just leaving it on everything wasn't an option.

So, I scraped and scraped and scraped, getting down to about a 1/2 inch and then dumped something like 25 pounds of salt on the remaining layer. We'll see what happens to the ice, but I'm pretty sure my back is toast.

OK. Given my age, the number of grey hairs I found in my beard this morning is starting to disturb me. 1 and maybe 2 can be flukes, but we're getting pretty far past that level. Maybe I'm just stressed out, but it looks like age is starting to catch up to me. I will take grey over bald though and I'm still doing OK in that area.

I also recently bought (with Christmas money, it's not like I do nothing but buy stuff) a
Amazon.com: Lite-On AllWrite LVW-5005 DVD/CD Recorder to be able to record from the dish onto DVD just like a VCR. So far, I've got 2 Carnivale episodes and they look and sound great. I'd prefer to be able to capture 5.1 sound from the dish, but it's not like I bought a $1000 DVD recorder.

After yet another person reported that my phone spent hours dialing and redialing their number (sorry Trish), I decided I need a phone that can't come unlocked and dial on its own from my pocket. So, I ordered a Amazon.com: Sony Ericsson Z600(Unlocked). I hate trying to deal with the cellphone companies as an existing customer, so I just bought one unlocked that I can swap out. I like the bluetooth capability of my existing T610, and since the Z600 is based on the same platform, I'm hoping that my Palm and headset, etc. will work just as well. The clamshell design should address my 2 biggest complaints about the T610: scratched screen and exposed keypad. Supposedly this screen is easier to read in the sun, which would be a pretty good deal too.

I've been watching my newly purchased set of:
Amazon.com: DVD: Carnivale - The Complete First Season and rediscovering why I fell in love with this show last year when it was on. I've been ramping up to the season premiere on Sunday (which I probably won't get to watch until Monday or Tuesday.

This series is just chock full of texture, subtlety and breaking out of TV and movie cliches. I kept finding myself expecting a very predictable line or action in a given situation only to be pleasantly surprised by the fact that they chose a better path.

Anyone local who wants to get together to watch, let me know.