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Wednesday - September 26, 2007
DirecTV's new HD channels are live today
Today, DirecTV turned up 21 new national HD channels. They've promised another 79 before years end. Unfortunately, you need an MPEG4 receiver, which excludes my HDTiVo (HR10-250). I'm waiting for some truly compelling stations to hit before I jump over to their current DVR. Either way, it's still a good start.
# A&E (Channel 265)
# Animal Planet (Channel 282)
# Big Ten Network (Channel 220)
# CNN (Channel 202)
# The Discovery Channel (Channel 278)
# The History Channel (Channel 269)
# The Movie Channel East (Channel 544)
# NFL Network (Channel 212)
# Showtime West (Channel 540)
# Showtime too (Channel 538)
# The Smithsonian Channel (Channel 267)
# The Science Channel (Channel 284)
# Starz Comedy (Channel 519)
# Starz East (Channel 522)
# Starz West (Channel 540)
# Starz Edge (Channel 520)
# Starz Kids and Family (Channel 518)
# TBS (Channel 247)
# TLC (Channel 280)
# Versus / The Golf Channel (Channel 604)
# The Weather Channel (Channel 362)
Posted by jcraven at 2:57 PM | Comments (1) | Television
Halo 3 first impressions
After completing the first two levels, here's my initial thoughts.
1. It's very, very pretty.
2. The AI is much more intelligent, and can be quite tough even on Normal mode.
3. The Gravity Hammer is awesome, by far my favorite weapon so far.
The only problem I ran into, was that there was an 360 Dashboard update released a couple weeks ago, that I hadn't logged in to download. It kept trying to update itself last night, but due to server side issues it kept failing. This prevented me from any online play in Halo 3 or any other game. This morning I logged in just long enough to get the update, and it installed fine. Now I'm ready for some online play.
Posted by jcraven at 11:00 AM | Video Games
Tuesday - September 25, 2007
Finish the Fight
Unless you're living under a rock, you already know that Halo 3 is being released today. I'll be picking up my pre-order around lunchtime. I'll post a review as soon as I get through it.
Posted by jcraven at 8:49 AM | Video Games
Monday - September 24, 2007
Wedding #432 for the year
This weekend we went to Jodi and Daniel's wedding. Lara took some really good shots, which can be found here. Be sure to check out page 3 for some awesome dancing pictures.
UPDATE: Shutterfly link for those wanting hard copies.
Posted by jcraven at 2:51 PM | Comments (1) | Misc
Monday - September 17, 2007
Weekend Trip
This weekend we went to visit Sarah and Daniel in Athens, GA. We had a good time, except for driving through Humberto on the way down.
We went to the UGA game on Saturday. It was so hot though, we retreated to indoors before halftime. They beat Western Carolina 45-16, so we didn't miss a whole lot. We caught the game at an awesome wing place called WOW Cafe & Wingery.
For the most part we just chilled and toured around Athens since this was my first visit. Overall it's a nice town, and sometime I'll go back when I have more time to stay and visit. On the way out we had brunch at Five Star Daily Cafe, where I had an "Elvis Breakfast". Yep, I had a fried peanut butter and banana sandwich.
A big thanks to Sarah and Daniel for hosting us. We'll see you soon.
Posted by jcraven at 2:03 PM | Misc
Tuesday - September 11, 2007
What's wrong with kids today?
Lara and I watched the first half of the MTV Video Music Awards mostly in fast forward mode. Of course we had a morbid curiosity to see Britney's performance, and it was terrible as expected. But what the heck was wrong with the rest of the show? Is it just me, or is most of the stuff that passes as 'music' on MTV just absolute crap? Maybe I'm just getting old.
I will give credit to the two exceptions in the first half of the broadcast. First on the list was Sarah Silverman's show opener, since It was pretty funny, and did a nice job of poking fun at Britney. Second was Chris Brown's dancing, and although he did lip-sync the entire thing, his performance was entertaining.
The Washington Post has a nice summary here that highlights all the same points. I'm hoping that the majority of youth today thought the show was terrible, but if they didn't, I think we're all doomed.
Posted by jcraven at 2:16 PM | Movies & Music
Friday - September 7, 2007
New Fans
Looks like we have some new fans from Michigan State and Ohio State.
Tomorrow's game is sold out, and they expect to pack in over 25,000 people into the 16,000 seat stadium.
Posted by jcraven at 7:51 AM | Sports
Thursday - September 6, 2007
Zombie War
I don't know why, but I'm still laughing at this.
Posted by jcraven at 2:58 PM | Misc
Wednesday - September 5, 2007
Cover of SI
So Appalachian made the cover of Sports Illustrated this week. Nice.
Appalachian is the first institution in Southern Conference history and the first college football team from the state of North Carolina to grace the cover of SI.
Posted by jcraven at 9:53 AM | Sports
Tuesday - September 4, 2007
Down they go
So Michigan went from #5 to out of the top 25 altogether. Ouch.
Also, according to the USAToday Sagarin ranking, Appalachian moved up to number 38 in the country among all Div 1 teams. Check it out here. Poor Duke comes in at 152.
Posted by jcraven at 4:35 PM | Sports
More ASU news
Here's a nice write-up in the NYTimes. Also here's a great YouTube video of some Ohio State fans watching the game.
If you want to watch the game again, it is being reaired a couple more times on the Big Ten Network, Wed @ noon and Friday @ 4AM.
I can't wait to go to the next game on Saturday.
Posted by jcraven at 10:48 AM | Sports
Saturday - September 1, 2007
Upset time!
After leading most of the game, App comes from behind with 30 seconds to go and pulled a huge upset over #5 Michigan. Final Score 34-32. Front page story on ESPN.com.
Be sure to check out the pole on ESPN to vote if this was the biggest upset of all time. Vote here at the bottom right corner.
Random links as I find them:
Fark.com (always amusing, but not for the light-hearted)
GoASU.com
Detroit Free Press
GoBlueWolverine
Yahoo
Fox Sports
WRAL
Associated Press
Posted by jcraven at 3:53 PM | Comments (2) | Sports