It’s Not The Cold, It’s The Humidity

We did it! It appears that we’ve survived ICE Storm ’07.

Have You Been On The Edge Of Your Seat?
Here are my February Goals…

1) Lose two pounds. (starting weight ~205 lbs)
2) Run no fewer than fifty miles. (hey, this time I also have two fewer days!)
3) Do twenty push-ups and fifty sit-ups at least three times a week.
4) Read no fewer than two books.
5) Go to the Center For Puppetry Arts.
6) Use Marta for commuting at least one day per week.
7) Get all my 2007 information into Google Calendar.

I realize that four of those are carryovers from January but they are the types of goals that should carryover. Besides, with the exception of the book reading, I failed with the others.

So It’s Spelled “Ilan?”
My bad. Now that Ilan has won Top Chef I should give him his due and spell his name correctly. Honestly I really thought it was spelled “Elan.”

I managed to resist the urge to read the article which contained the spoiler, and I am glad that I did. I did read the article after watching the show, however. For those of you who didn’t, it clearly stated that Ilan had won. Apparently some one at Food & Wine magazine erroneously posted the article to their website.

The finale was just “okay” in my opinion. I still don’t understand why Marcel would pick Mike who, at least by the show’s editing, looked to be the least trustworthy of the sous chef candidates.

Hmm, I wonder what Gail Simmons is doing these days…

ITP Flickr Pic
The genius behind this blog

I only wish that I was able to get better focus on the little guy. He works so hard…

I’d Buy That For $1, But Not $1.99
While I think it is great that avenues now exist for legally downloading tv shows (even though it may eventually lead to the demise of my industry) I have to balk at the price charged for an episode.

Let’s take iTunes for an example…

Let’s say that someone named, oh I don’t know, let’s say Betsy, was unable to watch one of her favorite programs, we’ll choose The Office as a for instance.

Now let’s say that even though Betsy has a really great friend who has a Dish Network DVR and will be recording the show because he too will be unable to watch it on NBC’s schedule. Let’s also say that Paulie, I mean Betsy’s great friend, has offered to have Betsy come over and watch The Office at a later date (have I mention how great Betsy’s friend is lately?) and she has agreed.

If for some bizarre reason Betsy decided to watch the show via iTunes instead of with Paulie her great friend she could do so at a cost of $1.99. On the surface this seems fair, but let’s do some math.

Assume that a cable / satellite user gets a channel lineup of fifty channels for $50 per month (keeping it really simple here). Therefore this person is paying $1 per month for each of these channels.

Assume that each of these channels broadcasts twenty shows a day on average. Since you are paying $1 per channel you are therefore paying five cents per show!

$1.99 >> 5c

See how I can make the statement that you are getting screwed by paying $1.99 per episode? Hell, I’ll even concede that there is a cost of storage and transmission in addition to the desire for Apple (in this case) to make a profit, but does this comprise of 95% of the cost of the product?

Just my two cents — which in my world should get me 40% of an episode of The Office.

Let The Only Ice Tonight Be Inside Philips Arena
Tonight I’ll be back down at the Arena rooting for my favorite hockey team, the New York Islanders. I was bummed when the Isles came to town and took an overtime loss home with them last Friday night.

If you are not into the hockey, but are into the big ass beers at Gorin’s in CNN Center then you can also find me there before the puck drops.

And now for some ideas stolen from LiveJournal…
Current Mood – renewed, although still not ready for Sunday
Current Music – Sirius Satellite Radio, Channel 26 playing Grizzly Bear — “On A Neck, On A Spit”
Website Of The Day – Somebody tried a social experiment by leaving a wallet with $2.10 on the ground and then recording what happened when a person picked it up. They repeated this experiment one hundred times. If this interests you, you can find the results at Wallet Test. What would you do?
Exercise (b)Log – none

February Goals
1) Lose two pounds. (starting weight ~205 lbs)
2) Run no fewer than fifty miles.
3) Do twenty push-ups and fifty sit-ups at least three times a week.
4) Read two books.
5) Go to the Center For Puppetry Arts.
6) Use Marta for commuting at least one day per week.
7) Get all 2007 information into Google Calendar.

Cheers,
Paulie [eatl/ga]