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April 22, 2007

Saying Goodbye to Cable

... and hello to television!

I've had a great time blogging here this month! Thanks to the Literary Chicks for inviting me.

And in keeping with the Internet blogging thing, my farewell blog is about computers. (How's that for a smooth segue?)

Well, actually, it's about television. Or television AND computers. Because I've suddenly realized that the two go together like, oh, peanut butter and jelly.
This is because I've recently become an iTunes fanatic. (Let us count the ways that Julie can procrastinate writing her current book, shall we?)

Seriously, I didn't realize all the cool stuff one could do with iTunes ("one" being me). Did you know that you can buy episodes of Time Tunnel and Battlestar Galactica? Not to mention The Shield?

This is incredibly exciting news to me because my husband and I decided to cancel everything except basic cable. So now we have network television (and the TV Guide station. Which I watched this morning. How scary is that?). Just network television. That's it. No The Soup. No FX channel. No late night HBO. No –

{ahem. I'm not really mourning the loss of cable. Truly}

We did it because a) we have two kids and who has time to watch TV, and b) because most of our TV watching (because, hey, you really can make the time if you try hard enough) was DVDs. Like all 7 seasons of Buffy. You know. The Essentials.

So bye bye channels. And it felt so liberating. And, no, I'm not falling into a rut by ordering MORE television on iTunes. Truly. I'm "expressing by newfound liberation." Truly.

Here's the trouble with iTunes, though: I have a 13 inch (I think) iBook. You really need to be looking at it straight on to watch a show. And our living room TV is a big, honking flat screen. Not that I don't love my husband, but I really don't need to watch television with him with our ears pressed together. But (as I learned) you can't burn your iTunes shows to DVD and watch them on your television. Which means we share the screen on my laptop, or we don't watch at all.

Bummer, man.

Fortunately, Apple has invented Apple TV. It basically broadcasts your iTunes content to your TV. All for the low, low price of $299.

I can handle that, I think. I will buy that, and our life will be golden. Cherubs will dance on our ceiling. Life will be good. (Even more, my husband can catch up on Heroes so that he can watch with me when the show comes off hiatus on Monday without having to watch the webcast, and we can both catch up on this season's The Shield, which I miss desperately.)

Off I go to the Applestore (cyber-ly, anyway) and am about to order when I decide I should ask exactly why something that only broadcasts needs a hard drive. I still don't understand the answer, but the guy at the Apple Store did tell me the thingie won't work without one of the Intel Macs (or a PC).

Major bummer, man.

But, hey, I've been meaning to buy a new Mac anyway. I bought this one on a whim when I was on a book tour and my PC crashed for the 875 thousandth time. In desperation I went to the mall between a tv appearance and a booksigning and begged the clerk to help me with this impulse purchase. Not surprisingly, he was very cooperative. I ended up with an iBook because I swore I only wanted to write books and answer email and light websurfing.

Of course, I LOVE my Mac, and now wish I'd bought the biggest, baddest machine they had. So the idea of buying the MacBook isn't foreign to me. And my husband wants my old Mac. So, hey. Maybe it's a sign.

I manage to convince myself of this to the point that we are actually planning to drive to the Apple Store to buy the thing. Then I realize that I'm actually contemplating spending about two grand so that I can watch television. Honestly, it would be more economical to just re-order cable.

We mentally apply the brakes. This is no big deal. We do not need to see my iTunes content on our television.

Except ....

Except now the idea is in my head. And I'm like a dog with a bone. I will figure this out, gosh-darn it!

And you know what? About two in the morning, I do. Two words: External Monitor.

Yes, it turns out that our television has a PC port. It's all set to be an external monitor. So I take the monitor cord from the desktop computer (who really needs to see the screen there anyway?) and basically hang upside down and backwards to plug it in. Then I plug in the travel speakers I have (brand: Creative. And they ROCK). I turn it on and ... am I a friggin' genius, or what? Houston, we have liftoff! Beautiful picture, great sound. And the husband unit is most impressed (not with how late I've stayed up dealing with this non-problem, but the solution definitely impresses him).

Only one problem: the cord is only about 4 feet long. So the computer has to sit right next to the television. Which means we have no way to start and pause without (gasp) standing up and walking to the television.

I have that problem under control, though, too: tomorrow – first thing – I'm buying a wireless mouse!

Hey, by the time I'm done, I may be writing novels in the recliner with my words spread out over the flat screen on the far side of the room! Stranger things have happened ...

What's not strange is that we have four winners! (Yet another cool segue, eh?) Yup, here are the winners of my book give-away:

Receiving THE GIVENCHY CODE and THE MANOLO MATRIX (the two books leading up to this month's release, THE PRADA PARADOX):

O.A.

Joan Roberts

And receiving GOOD GHOULS' DO (the sequel to THE GOOD GHOUL'S GUIDE TO GETTING EVEN):

Tara Kennedy

Kathy McGuire

Congrats, y'all!

And thanks again for hosting me! I've had such fun!

Posted by Julie Kenner at 1:15 AM | Comments (9)

Comments

Posted by: Sheri at April 22, 2007 11:13 AM

Posted by: Julie at April 22, 2007 11:37 AM

Posted by: Lani at April 23, 2007 10:18 AM

Posted by: katkin at April 23, 2007 10:45 AM

Posted by: Kimberly Linder at April 23, 2007 11:29 AM

Posted by: Julie at April 23, 2007 11:41 AM

Posted by: RandomRanter at April 23, 2007 6:20 PM

Posted by: laurenjharwood at April 24, 2007 3:05 PM

Posted by: Time for change at May 9, 2007 4:51 AM