You Bet Your Life

For you young folks, that was a TV show Groucho Marx was still doing back when I was a kid.

I found some episodes I could download. I forget what made me think of them. But they were small and I was correct in assuming that Fay would like them.

We watched a couple episodes tonight. Also watched "Special Bulletin" (a way creepy made-for-TV movie from 1983), and a tape of Superman cartoons.

Someone else at the apartments had dumped a set of VHS cartoon tapes. They are each several episodes totaling around 30 min per tape. So there will be one of those per TV night as well until we run out.

The Superman tape was a bit worn, but I may try using the vid cap setup to get it on disk and we can try burning it to DVD later. Actually, come to think out it, at 30 min, it would likely burn ok to VCD and I've got a *lot* of blank CDs.

Oh yeah, some had tossed one of those combo VCR/DVD units on the "grab it if you want it" table. It had "works" written in felt pen on the VCR part and "doesn't work" written on the DVD part. Since it'd been sitting there for over a week, I grabbed it last night and checked it out. It had a *lot* of connections on the back. The DVD only connections included separate stereo sound output and both coax (RCA jack) and fiber optic digital audio. And S-Video and component video (switch selected between them).

I noted that the way the coax digital audio was placed, even I who am moderately familiar with such stuff almost thought it was the composite video jack for the DVD side (the yellow connector on the usual red/white/yellow triplet).

So I hooked it up and stuck in a DVD. Which promptly started playing.

Until she can scrounge a TV of her own, I've loaned Fay an old TV to VGA monitor box I had, and given her the VCR/DVD unit. Now she won't have to deal with her computer getting draggy trying to play the DVDs she borrows from the library. And he can also watch old tapes I' have kicking around. :-)

Next time we'll play at least one more You Bet Your Life (I've got 8 or so), another cartoon tape, A movie (I think I know which one I want to show her, it's been sitting on the server for a long time) and some more galactica episodes. We're about a quarter of the way thru season 3 (3x07 is the next episode to watch)

I may have a few other surprises in store for her in upcoming selections. One that we are both interested in, there wasn't time for tonight. Maybe next time. But I've got that old(er) movie to show too. We'll see.

History

Tomorrow, Friday April 24th, is the 500th anniversary of the coronation of King Henry VIII.

This why we need same sex marriage

Gay man says he was forced out of partner's room at OHSU
Why the word "marriage" matters

(short version of the above. A nurse in ICU made a man leave his domestic partner's side at a time the partner wasn't expected to live. Fortunately, he was able to get hold of a lawyer fast and was able to get back "only" two and a half hours later)

Yeah, "domestic partnerships" are *supposed* to be equal. This shows the reality. As noted in the second item, if OHSU is making this sort of goof, what are other places doing.


Basic Rights Oregon item looking for reports of other instances where domestic partnerships proved to be separate and unequal.

tech advice

Got a friend asking me to come over and look at the roomie's computer which has crashed *several* times with the BSOD.

On getting the crash info, I find that said roommate has been just rebooting with a *file system* error. And when I asked when the last backup was the response was "huh?"

*Shudder*

As I've warned them, that response may mean that my response after checking things may well be "bend over and kiss your files goodbye"

So, I'm setting out a first draft of a "help" file that may eventually go up on the web site.
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