scott

Supercharging My TivoHD

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When I moved into my new apartment last August I got digital cable but I opted to not get a cable box. Instead I got a TivoHD and two CableCARD’s. The TivoHD and CableCARD combo has been fantastic. I got two CableCARD’s to use in the Tivo. I figured it could handle two, and two cards was still cheaper than renting one cable box. The issue was when the cable guy came to setup the cards I didn’t have the Tivo so he configured on in my TV and it worked great, but after the initial test the second one didn’t seem to work. I tried several tests with one and two configurations of the cards in my Tivo and always got no luck with one of the cards (always the same card). I wasn’t in a rush to call in the issue since I would have to either pay to have a service visit or go into their office to swap the card.

I finally broke down and wanted to fix the issue with the second card so I can record two shows at once with the Tivo. After over a year of procrastinating I finally called to figure out what was wrong with the second CableCARD. The rep I spoke to didn’t really have much of a clue so I wasn’t confident she would figure out the issue, but I got lucky. She sent some sort of signal boost to my TV and then after two hours both cards were working normally. I was very happy. Now I can record two shows in HD at once! Mmmm HD. I don’t even know how often I will need this function but it was a problem that I finally wanted to have resolved!

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Black Friday

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Yesterday I was really stupid and did what everyone else did the day after Thanksgiving. I went shopping. I know, I always say I avoid all stores between Thanksgiving & New Years. Especially on Black Friday, but I wanted a deal on a computer monitor. Since I have been working remotely from home periodically I wanted a nicer monitor for my work laptop. Going from my 23″ Cinema Display on my mac to a 19″ boxy monitor on my Thinkpad just wasn’t cutting it. I went to Best Buy to look at a 22″ or 24″ HP LCD. Turned out I thought the 22″ was too small, and the 24″ was too expensive. After some quick price comparison on my iPhone I realized that I could get a better deal online so I passed on buying anything.

After my failed attempt at shopping I meet up with Danny and we headed over to Stout for a few drinks and dinner. It was cold walking to Stout but it was a nice to get out!

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Went to take part in Black Friday @ Best Buy. Didn’t buy anything. Ended up at Stout for drinks and dinner with Danny, then home for some TV.

The Holiday’s

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For Thanksgiving I went out to my sisters for a few days. I ended up taking off Wednesday and Friday. I headed out Wednesday morning with my parents. We got to spend most of the day hanging out and my mom helped a little with getting the cooking finished. Thanksgiving day was relatively low key. It was only about 8 adults and my niece and nephew. Dinner took longer than anticipated to be ready to eat but when it was it was good! Desert was even better. The homemade brownies were really good. Zach seemed to love them, but anything with chocolate and sugar impresses him.

2008 Thanksgiving - 20

The funniest point of the day was when Zachary said he was thankful for Dinosaurs. Morgan was more practical and was thankful for food and oxygen. How a 5 1/2 year old can know to be thankful for oxygen I will never know!

It looks like I was able to avoid getting a cold from everyone. I was happy about that! I got a ride back to Manhattan Thursday night from Michael’s dad. We got a little lost but thankfully there was no traffic.

Short Week

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Today I worked from home. That is part of my typical routine I have gotten into over the past 6 weeks. Tomorrow I am off to the office for about 6 hours of back to back meetings. That is the downside. The upside is that I have the rest of the week off. Even though my company gives me a half day (1pm we can go home!) on Friday, I decided that I wanted the full day off to make it a nice long weekend. I am going to my sisters Wednesday morning and wont come home until Friday morning. Then I get a normal weekend to hang out. Hopefully I don’t get the cold that has been going around that I have been semi avoiding for the past week.

Today was relatively uneventful at work. Lots of planning meetings, and following up from a release we had over the weekend. Nothing I can discuss here. I was battling a Migraine most of the day. The Aleve didn’t work, so I ended up having to take something stronger towards the end of the day. I was trying to avoid it but if I didn’t I would ruin the entire evening.

After work I ran out to the grocery store and grabbed a fresh filet for dinner. The new “fancy” grocery store virtually across the street from my house is spoiling me. I check out what I want for food and then get it fresh and cook it up. It beats thinking ahead several days and buy from Fresh Direct. I still use Fresh Direct and love it but the fresh stuff is too difficult to predict when I will eat it. I would rather go to the store right before I want something vs buying it and hope I will be in the mood for it. The filet was really good, and the peacan bars I got for desert will hopefully be really good when I eat one later.

So, Who Am I?

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I have hinted at this for ages, but I never publicized who I am on this site. Well, way back when I started writing this blog it was trivial to figure out who I was. Then there was a period of time where I went out of my way to mask who I was. In recent history I haven’t come out and said my name or where I work, but you don’t have to be Sherlock Holmes to figure it out. To me, because of an scare at work a few years ago right around the time I read about people being fired for blogging I have been very shy about saying my name on this site. It is probably an over reaction especially now since I put anything detailed I write about work on a private site. I have still been a bit gun shy. Gus, pointed out to me that hiding who I am might actually be a bad thing. He might be right. More and more people look to someone’s online presence when looking up someone. I have heard of people getting job offers or not from their writings online. So why shouldn’t I say who I am? I have seen my postings commented or quoted in an online magazine here or there, or vmware blog once or twice.

So hi, my name is Scott Weinstein. I live and work in NYC. Please don’t confuse me with the 36 other Scott Weinstein’s in the US according to a census website I found a few months ago.

Now the disclaimer, the postings on this site are my own and do not represent the views of my employer. That is verbatim from my current companies policy regarding personal blogs. It goes without saying but I will follow their rules and say it anyway. My views are just that, mine. I haven’t stated who I was until now specifically because I was concerned about employers not approving. Now that I work for a company that has clear guidelines, and are open to personal blogs as long as these guidelines are followed I wont do anything to violate those policies. The topic of blogging isn’t so new anymore that I need to be so paranoid.

In the end, no one really cares about this topic but me. As I always have said I write this for me, so talking out loud about this is good (for me).

James Bond

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Tonight I saw the latest James Bond movie, Quantum of Solace last night with Danny. It had some good action sequences but otherwise was simply an OK movie. It didn’t suck, but it wasn’t so memorable. Casino Royale was a much better movie in my opinion. After the movie Danny and I hit the Heartland Brewery for dinner. I only had one drink because I think I am fighting a cold. Otherwise a relatively uneventful day.

A Release in Progress

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I am eagerly waiting for one of the guys on my team to finish a software release on one of the applications my team supports. They have been working on it almost all day. I don’t have anything really to do with the release again until tomorrow morning but I know I won’t sleep right until I hear that everything went OK. I am hoping I get that nice all OK email in the next 90 minutes! Fingers crossed.