Neteller Disbursing
Just got the official word that Neteller is finally releasing the money that has been stuck there since they drew the scrutiny of the US authorities. Here's the email:
Dear Brian,
The NETELLER Plc Group has announced that the distribution of funds to its US members will begin on July 30, 2007.
You are receiving this e-mail because our records reflect that you are a US member who may request funds from NETELLER. As of July 30, you will be able to make a request for funds on NETELLER’s website by signing in to your account. In the meantime, you should visit our online FAQs for more information about the distribution plan.
Please note that US members will not be able to request funds from the NETELLER website after January 26, 2008.
NETELLER Plc Group
If you didn't do it already, go get your money.
RIP Ingmar Bergman
Ingmar Bergman died Monday at the age of 89. He was a wonderful filmmaker who made movies that were art, not crap.
Night Shift
Night Shift by Stephen King
My review
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
The audiobook version of Stephen King's collection of short stories doesn't have all the same stories, but enough of them for me to do the review. King has some good stories in here that kept me captivated, like Jerusalem's Lot (prequel to the later novel Salem's Lot), Strawberry Spring, Quitters, Inc and The Ledge. But there are some real clunkers too, especially the Lawnmower Man (NOTHING like the Pierce Brosnan/Jeff Fahey movie) and Graveyard Shift. Luckily though, with good or bad, short stories are over quickly and you can move on to the next one, unlike the recently reviewed Saturday (yeah, I really didn't like that one very much).
Saturday
Saturday by Ian McEwan
My review
My rating: 2 of 5 stars
I listened to this book on CD on the way back from Michigan. I have to say, if I had been reading it myself, I doubt that I would have finished it. Ian McEwan definitely has a way with words, his writing is exquisite. But for the vast majority of the book, which covers one Saturday in the life of a neurosurgeon, I felt like he was being wordy for the sake of being wordy. Everything was a fifteen minute exercise in dragging out a simple thought or situation. The book's "climax" occurred on CD 7 (of 9) and the remaining two hours were just an extremely long and boring denouement. I know there are some people who like that kind of writing, but that's the difference between me and the literati.
I Miss The Comfort In Being Sad
Making its way around the intertubes is a funny "Thriller" video. For you kids, that was a big hit for Michael Jackson before he went all crazy. If I'm ever incarcerated, I want to go to the Cebu Provincial Detention and Rehabilitation Center in the Philippines.
And here they are doing "Radio Gaga" by Queen. Not as awesome, but funny when they do the clap-clap part of the chorus.
On an only vaguely related (by music) note, I got Nirvana's "In Utero" from LaLa a while back, after reading "Life is a Mixtape." I'm not going to go by a shotgun like Kurt, but even if you couldn't understand everything he sang, he wrote some pretty good songs. And as "Life is a Mixtape" suggested, I really do relate, at times, to the songs on this album. Worth revisiting if you're all groweds up now and last listened to it in college.
World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War
World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by Max Brooks
My review
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
I was originally amused by the fact that someone at the Fairfax County Library decided that this book should be filed under the Dewey Decimal 817. I figured that they mistakenly believed it was non-fiction. As it turns out, 817 is Humor & Satire. The book should still be just a regular fiction classification, but at least they didn't think it was a non-fictional war book.
Max Brooks does a fabulous job of positing the events leading up to and following the war against the zombies. The book takes the form of a series of interviews with participants, intended as a reminder to the world of what happened, where they went wrong, and how to keep it from happening again. He really goes in depth, covering every corner of the world, every possible battlefield (including the tunnels under Paris, underwater, and urban settings), every angle. It was a fun escape from my "vacation" to Michigan, very creative and original. Highly recommended for the geeks out there.
I'm still reading the Murakami short story collection, which I left at home while on vacation, but I also have two audiobook reviews upcoming, as soon as I finish them up.
Phone Update
SunRocket finally acknowledged that they are going out of business on their home page. At least they stopped taking new orders! They also finally sent an email to customers about the situation, offering two companies who are taking on SunRocket refugees: Packet8 and TeleBlend. Packet8 has been around for a while, and they are offering the $199/year plan. I've never heard of Teleblend before, and it looks like they are brand new, and possibly are some of the same people that were behind SunRocket (they magically appeared right after SunRocket went under), so no thanks. While we were gone, we got our equipment from Verizon VoiceWing, but I haven't had the chance to hook it up yet. Our SunRocket stuff still seems to be working, which is good, but who knows how long it'll last. So for now, at least, we'll be moving it over to VoiceWing. I will let everyone know when and if they need to use a new number.
I also got a Verizon flyer for the FIOS triple play: $99/month for TV, phone and internet. When we got home yesterday, one of the DirecTivos was on the fritz, but easily revived. Unfortunately, it has been doing that more frequently, and I worry that it may go kaput soon. It would be an excuse to switch services, so I am going to look into how much it would realistically cost to move everything to Verizon. The Verizon flyer is so poor that it doesn't even tell you when the $99/month rate expires, just that it requires a two-year internet commitment. It also doesn't say how many boxes it includes, since you have to have a cable box to use it. Technically, it could be cheaper than our current services, but maybe not, once you figure in taxes, extra boxes, etc. I did notice that Tivo has a new lower priced HD unit, and selling off the DirecTivos on eBay could help fund that. Hmmm...
So there you have it. Keep trying the old phone number for now, until we tell you otherwise. And if you don't get through, let me know!
Off The Grid
We're back from Michigan now. Not a bad trip, except for me getting stuck in traffic on the Pennsylvania Turnpike driving home yesterday. At least I got to see the wreckage of the semi that hit the guardrail and ended up on its side. Still ticked that it took an extra 45 minutes to get through there though. As they say, "I was making good time!"
I stayed off the Internet all weekend, and felt a little out of touch, but not too bad. I did a lot of reading, traditional and recorded, so many reviews upcoming. I've got a SunRocket update too, which will get its own post, but for now, it seems that our phone is still working, but who knows for how long. And the Yankees are now 6 games over .500 after pounding the D-Rays and Royals the past few days.
In the meantime, I have over 60 emails and 1400 RSS items to read, plus lots of work to catch up on. Back soon.
Time for Something New
Well, there seems to be no hope for SunRocket, so I reluctantly signed up for Verizon's version of VOIP today. Their landline service just costs way too much. For $20 I get everything I would get for $45 on their landline service. What the hell? Stupid phone companies... At any rate, I will be trying over the next couple of weeks to port our old phone number to VoiceWing, and we'll see how that goes.
In the meantime though, I've managed to snag an invite to GrandCentral, Google's latest acquisition. Their pitch is that you give out one phone number, and it stays with you wherever you go. It basically just forwards calls to the number to any other phone numbers you would like: your cell, home, work, whatever. It's very flexible too, as you can designate which numbers will ring which phones. So, for example, our neighbor around the corner probably wants to talk to Lisa at home, not me at work, so I can set it to only ring the home phone when they call. Vice versa, if I'm waiting for a window company to call me back, I can have it ring me no matter if I'm at work, or on the way home. And if no one answers, Grand Central is the one place to check your voicemail, which you can do online, or have it sent to you in an email. You can also designate certain numbers as "spam" so that they don't get through to you. I used this feature a lot in SunRocket.
My GrandCentral number is 703-539-5150, if you want to try it out.
Oh, and I do have invites to share, if you are interested in trying it out. I got my invite from an anonymous stranger at InviteShare.com. Now if only someone would invite me to Mint.com!
Fuuuuuuuuuudge!
Un-frickin-believable. SunRocket, aka our phone provider, is going under, according to the New York Times. I heard rumors on Friday, but didn't really buy into them until just now. I'm still stunned, and I don't know what to do. Obviously, I'm a bit wary at this point of signing up for another cheapo VOIP service, but we'll have to figure out something. Unfortunately, we are also going on vacation to Michigan for the next few days, so I probably won't be able to take care of anything until I get back. For now, if you can't reach us on our regular phone number, try my cell, or Lisa's (yes, we are aware that is a California number. Deal.).
You know what really pisses me off is that they didn't tell anyone about anything, all the way up to the bitter end. If I had known even a week ago, I could have made plans to switch to someone else. But now, it looks like we are stuck in limbo, and we may even end up losing the phone number we've had for the past 6 years. Dammit this pisses me off!
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