Podcasts For Fun
I registered for PodCamp Toronto 2012 today, an unconference that has grown to include more than just podcasting: all varieties of social media are welcome as topics for discussion. I’ve attended in the past, really enjoyed the sessions. Coincidentally, when I started iTunes, it downloaded an interesting podcast on 3D printers as disruptive technology, and [...]
Special for Earth Hour: Solar PV at Tower Power Toronto
Tonight at 8:30pm we’ll celebrate Earth Hour, when we all turn out the lights for an hour. Although mostly symbolic, this should actually translate to reduced power consumption; in Ontario, you can track this on the IESO Earth Hour site which will show a graph of actual consumption against that of a typical Saturday night. [...]
More HD experiments
Living with an electrical engineer is always…interesting. I’m also an engineer, but my desire to tinker is more software-oriented than hardware, whereas Damir likes to build things. After our initial experiments with the HD TV antenna that we bought for $35, he started researching on the web, and ended up building three other HD antennae. [...]
HD OTA experiments
An online conversation with a few friends last week got me thinking harder about something that’s been on my mind lately: is it possible to get rid of my Rogers cable subscription, and get TV signals the old-fashioned way: with an antenna? This is now referred to as “OTA” (over the air) for those in [...]
Up and flying
Parts arrived today, and the remote-controlled helicopter is up and flying again, this time in the building gym where there’s high ceilings and no furniture:
Adventures in R/C land
Damir’s birthday was a couple of weeks ago, and I gave him a gift that I felt reflected the gravity of turning 46: a remote-controlled helicopter. Thanks to some advice from the swarm (thanks, Jeff!), I found Hobby Hobby, a store that specializes in remote-controlled everything: planes, helis, cars, and parts for anything that you [...]
Lazy Sunday
With us both coming off head colds, it was a lazy Sunday (except for the pancake outing and some grocery shopping). Afternoon naps, then home-cooked chili with fresh baguette followed by a bit of TV. I, Robot was on, and Damir watched it while I drifted around between kitchen and living room and office. I [...]
Jerry has (had) a friend
After last week’s mousecapades, we figured that the entry hole was blocked from our side and we were free of mice, although there were still some odd scramblings inside walls at times. For good measure, we picked up a couple of traps, and set out two of the glue type and one of the old-fashioned [...]
A mouse in the house
Sometimes it just doesn’t pay to go away somewhere nice and warm in the middle of winter. I’m off in Jacksonville, Florida this week, so ended up having a Skype text chat with Damir earlier today while I was between conference sessions: [10:24:29 AM] Damir says: caught a mouse last night[10:24:39 AM] Sandy says: a [...]
Chairs!
With the rearranging of the furniture caused by Damir moving in and having to have a bit of office space, my dining table and chairs have gone into storage and we’re currently eating our meals off the coffee table — not my favourite arrangement since it leads to a lot of crumbs on the carpet. [...]
