./janella.com

Today would have been my father’s 95th birthday. I know if he lived this long it would have been quite a feat. Nonetheless I do miss him still.

I saw these images below posted on some messageboard regarding the new [Fantastic Four] movie being made.  From the looks of the these images I’m not too impressed.  Then again I wasn’t too impressed with the Thing’s costume or Jessica Alba as Sue Storm.  I’m thinking their going to have to CGI the Thing or he’ll just look like a ‘guy in a costume’.

I’m watching tv right now, seeing how the Presidential race is going. It’s interesting to see the color coded map on the screen, and how divided the country is on who should be PODUS (President of the United States - something I learned from watching [The West Wing]) I’m not sure how the country comes out of being so divided on a leader, especially with a war going on and the economy the way it is. Only time will tell if the Country is going to be moving in the right direction.

Yeah, it took me an hour in line to cast my vote, but GO VOTE!

Today we went up to the City to Lotte’s place to (1) celebrate Matthew’s birthday - which was last week, (2) a house-warming for Lotte, and (3) celebrate Halloween.  Now that’s a lot of celebrating!  Photos are posted on the website.  I had to head back early to hand out candy at the house.  Right now I’m typing this weblog entry from the laptop near the front door.  The kid flow is somewhat steady.  I’d say about 40+ kids at this point.  There are still those older kids who don’t dress up and expect candy.  Ugh.

Well, it looks like its dying dying down.  Of course as I wrote that three kids came up to both greet with a “trick or treat” and a “Merry Christmas”.  Nice.  Oh well, closing shop at 8pm no matter what.  Better go man the door.

I get worried about my computer. Actually, the data stored on the computer, such as email and the family digital photos. Computing, as some of you may have experienced, can be frustrating. Errors in Windows seem to happen daily if your system is askew. The Internet is not a safe place as well. Viruses are everywhere, even in images viewed on websites! Also, hard drives can crash - even though only one has crashed on me ever. In an effort to avoid total disaster should my computer go haywire, I decided to back everything up. I was going to back everything up to another internal hard drive - but what if my computer overheated blowing up both hard drives? I needed an external solution. I decided on finally getting a DVD burner.

Why a DVD burner? Well, if I stayed with my trusty old CD burner to back up the information I desired, it would probably take 10-15 discs. If I backed it up to DVD it might only take 2 or 3 disks. This is because CDs hold about 650MB of information. Compare this to 4.3 GB of information a DVD can hold and you see why DVD is the answer for now. Also, the price of DVD media (the blank stuff) is coming down. I think CDs are about .20 to .25 cents per disc while DVDs are about .50 to .80 cents per (at least the stuff I get). Dual-layer DVDs (the ones movies come on) are still a bit pricey, but that doesn’t matter for now.

I did some quick research on [cnet.com], [tom’s hardware guide] and [videohelp.com]. I then chose my burner: the Pioneer DVD A08XL - in black to match my system. I chose this particular burner because (1) it could burn at a high speed, (2) it had a rebate offer, and (3) it was black to match my computer.

Installation of the drive was straightforward. I was able to burn a DVD once I installed the included software. I was also able to burn DVDs using Nero, which I find better than the included software. I like this drive, and burning with DVDs. The only downside I see with this specific drive so far: it seems slower at burning CDs than my old CD burner.

Are you registered to vote? Hope so because it’s too late to register for this year’s election - at least in California. For a comedic look (or a comedian’s pov of politics) check out the following:

• [the borowitz report] I heard him on the KGO radio. Pretty funny guy.
• [Jon Stewart's appearance on Crossfire] steaming video on someone's blog. Enjoyable.

Wow, today was a busy day.  I helped celebrate my sister and friend’s birthdays.

First off was Susana’s birthday in Santa Cruz.  My mom and I drove up to Riva’s on the wharf to meet Susana, Kayla and Rex for lunch.  I had my ususal Fisherman’s Platter (calamari, fish, and chips).  There was some slight detour-ing going and leaving the pier as a marching band competition was occurring by the Boardwalk.  Luckily Kayla was able to guide us back to her house for cake.  We even beat Susana and Rex back to the house! (pics posted on the photos page)

Later on that night I was invited to my friend David’s 40th birthday celebration at El Burro’s.  There must have been a lot of people celebrating their 40th birthday there as I almost ended up with the wrong party for dinner!  It was the first time i met most of David’s family (mom, dad, and his sisters).  It was a large celebration that lasted several hours.  Good food, good cake, and good conversation.  Oh, and afterward we went to go catch a showing of [Team America] at Century 21.  My review on that later.

"So you wanna breakdance instead?
-- Purported mumbled word by me.

Ok, I know I talk in my sleep. But I can’t imagine any situation where I might mumble the above phrase. Farrah said I did and she’s not one to make this up. I don’t think I can even make this up!

our favorite new television show this season has to be [lost] wednesay @ 8pm on abc.

quick shot: plane crashes on a deserted island.  survivors try to figure out where they are, how to contact someone for help, and who they can trust amongst their group.  it’s a dramatic gilligan’s island!

what we like (so far): the story has many mysterious elements surrounding the island as well as passengers on the plane.  when i say ‘so far’, you just never know if the show’s storyline will tank as it moves forward.  the characters not only ‘purtee’ but have some depth.  the writing is strong (again, so far).  this is a show brought to you by the makers of felicity and alias.

what we didn’t like: that it’s only on once a week.  ugh!