Dave Garrett

Apparently Savvis (one of the larger US hosting providers) had a major network outage affecting a couple of its data centers, which knocked Lycos and Tripod offline. More details in this Computerworld article.

This was going around my wife's office here in Houston a couple of weeks ago, but fortunately she managed to avoid catching it. Not so fortunately, my mom wound up with a marginally milder version...on Christmas day. Needless to say, she wasn't up to eating much of a Christmas dinner. Must be a Texas thing, as I haven't heard much about it going on anywhere else yet.

I don't have it yet, but the 4-disc version is on its way to me - I didn't preorder and was waiting for a full tracklisting to become available to make a decision as to which one to get (tracklisting for both the 2- and 4-disc versions is here). So far, I haven't seen anything but rapturous reviews of either set (you may want to take a look at the zappa.com forums). Both sets contain the original vinyl stereo mix of the album, and everyone seems to agree that it's indisputably the best this title has ever sounded on CD. I think which one you get depends on how much you're into FO - serious fans will probably want the 4-disc one. Unfortunately, there are several tracks on the 2-disc one that are not on the 4-disc one, so if you're a completist, you'll want both; as much as I love FO, I'm only getting the 4-disc version unless I eventually run across a deal too good to turn down on the 2-disc one - I'm simply not going to pay $32 for a handful of unique tracks. One other thing to consider is that the 4-disc set is a limited edition, and I'm guessing there were a lot of other people who didn't preorder but were waiting until it was released and more details were available as to the actual contents to order a copy, so if you think you want one, I'd recommend not waiting too long.

Yeah? Then what the hell does it mean to a woman? Depends on which side of the plate she's swinging from.

My wife isn't a collector at all, and gets irritated with the amount of crap I have around the house - unfortunately, in addition to music, I have large book and video collections as well. I still have the vinyl I acquired in high school and college, but there ain't no way I'm going to be able to set up a vinyl rig again until I downsize something else. Before we were married, she used to work for a local nonprofit that put on classical concerts; they eventually branched out into jazz shows as well, a move which proved extremely popular. Thanks to her position there, I got to see (off the top of my head) Jaki Byard, Pharoah Sanders, Sonny Rollins, Wayne Shorter, Jacky Terrasson, Cyrus Chestnut, and Roy Hargrove, among others. But she's much more of a casual music fan than I am, and, as others have mentioned in regard to their spouses, she doesn't have a lot of tolerance for the more "out" stuff - let's just say that I don't often play Cecil Taylor when she's around.

You'll never find a TV that's been properly set up on display in a big box store. Almost without fail, they all will have the brightness and contrast jacked way, way up so they will stand out under the bright fluorescent lighting. It's almost impossible to tell under such conditions how a TV will really look once it's installed in your living room and the settings cranked down to something approaching reality. And if you're really intent on tweaking a set so it'll perform to its maximum ability, you'll want to have it professionally calibrated by an ISF-certified technician - these guys have special tools and intimate knowledge of TV service menus so that they can make setup changes that aren't accessible via the standard controls.

How many CDs do you have? 160GB isn't much space when it comes to storing uncompressed WAV files, and even if you use one of the lossless compression formats like FLAC, you're only going to gain probably a 30-40% reduction in file sizes. You don't even want to think about a lossy compression format like MP3, which you could conceivably cram a medium-sized CD collection onto a 160GB drive with, unless you're prepared to sacrifice a lot of sound quality. The bigger issue is this: hard drives have a finite lifespan, and it's typically only a few years. You'd need to have two copies of everything backed up onto separate drives to be reasonably safe against failure. CDs don't degrade or wear out if they're handled properly. Hard drives eventually fail even if they're properly cared for. Of course, it sounds like you've got a bigger issue on your hands - if my wife were to bring this up, my counterargument would be "but that's what the shelf space is for".

My parents are both in their 70s. A couple of years ago, their old Chrysler econobox had far outlived its usefulness, and it was time to buy a new car. With the exception of a Beetle in the mid-60s, they had never owned a non-American car. I, on the other hand, have been a loyal Honda owner for close to 20 years, and recommended to my dad that he test-drive an Accord. But they headed off to the Mercury dealer, hell-bent on getting a new Sable. Long story short, the salesman at the Mercury dealer pissed my dad off so bad that he swore he'd never again set foot in their dealership, and the next thing I knew, he was emailing me to let me know that a new Accord was sitting in their garage. The way he takes care of cars, it should easily last them for 15 years. But Hondas aren't always an easy switch for someone accustomed to softly-suspended American sedans - their suspension is tuned stiffer for better handling, more like Euro sedans.

Mouse Gestures - Firefox add-on

Both of those are now available at BMG, so they should be showing up at YourMusic soon. I just ordered them from BMG yesterday, along with several other new arrivals: Johnny Griffin - The Congregation Lee Morgan - The Cooker Ike Quebec - It Might As Well Be Spring

They actually did, before having an as-yet-unexplained last-minute change of heart (rumored to be a rights issue, but you'd think those kinds of things would be cleared up well in advance). Some copies actually made it to retailers' shelves; I was lucky enough to find one at Borders the week it was released. There was a plentiful secondary market on eBay for a while, as many people that also found copies cashed in on their luck, but those sources seem to have largely dried up. Newbury Comics is offering several, however, at not too much of a premium: BOOMERANG on eBay

The sandwich part may be new, but doggie ice cream's been around for a while. Frosty Paws

CD Universe has this on sale now for $45.49 - that's the second-best price I've seen on this so far. The best was Wherehouse.com, but that was using a coupon that expired over a week ago - I got it from them for just over $39 shipped. I was planning to use a 30% off Borders coupon before I ran across that deal, but I'd have probably paid full price for it if nothing better turned up - it's that good.

Crap! I forgot about the Bear Family Cole set when I was running through my mental list of box sets I'd been waiting for a good deal on. Probably just as well, given the number of unexpected expenses I've had to deal with lately. I did wind up getting this new Rhino set for $39 and change shipped:

LA COMMUNE is due out on DVD in the US on October 24.

EAT THE DOCUMENT isn't as compelling as DON'T LOOK BACK, IMO. I think its notoriety largely stems from its continuing unavailability, but it is certainly worth seeking out for the dedicated Dylan (or Pennebaker) fan. DVD-Rs aren't too hard to come by on eBay, and there was also a bootleg pressing of several hundred copies released in Germany several years ago - more details here.

The Sony Japan CD (SRCS 6843):

eBay listing Looks like it was on the Groove Merchant label.

This is what's known as "fullcoat mag" - 35mm film that has had magnetic oxide applied to it across the entire width of the film, as opposed to "mag-striped", where thin stripes of magnetic oxide are applied on the outside edges of film prints for a multichannel soundtrack. Mag-striped 35mm film was what was used for films boasting 4-track stereo in the 1950s; later on, 6-track 70mm film prints became commonplace for big-budget roadshow presentations. A good mag-striped multichannel audio track flat stomps all over any digital film sound system I've ever heard; unfortunately, the number of venues that can still run mag-striped film is fairly small, and new mag-striped prints are rarely struck now, as mag-striping has essentially been banned due to environmental concerns regarding the process used to apply it. Anyway, getting back onto the topic of fullcoat mag for audio recording, this site has the following brief comments:

As a shrink...you should see it in the "flying V" as well. yeah, but i was a guitar player way before i became a shrink. i even played a flying v for a short while. damn, they're heavy! I don't think my back could take a Les Paul or a Flying V. The original Flying Vs were made of korina, a very lightweight wood - you'd almost swear it was balsa wood, it's that light. I got to play one once in the late 70s at a music store I used to hang out at - IIRC, it was for sale for $4500, a lot of money back then. Judging from this site, however, they've appreciated a bit since then.

A couple of years ago was before I'd discovered Zweitausendeins, but I got one from them in March (albeit for $60 rather than $30).

There are many download managers available that will allow you to grab multiple files using http instead of ftp. If you use Firefox, check out FlashGot used in conjunction with one of the download managers linked on the FlashGot page. I've used Free Download Manager with FlashGot, and they work like a charm. After 20 minutes or so after I had posted this,I found solution at shnflac.net's discussion board.I downloaded a plugin called DownThemAll for Mozilla Firefox.Now I just need to click on directory and select the folder where I want to save the files and it works like charm! I've already downloaded 3 1966 shows and two 1967 shows.I definitely need to buy 300-400 empty cdrs... External hard drives have gotten so cheap now that it's become very tempting to just forget about recordable media entirely as an archival solution, and just move your SHN/FLAC/audio format of choice files to one or more hard drives that can be swapped out as quickly as plugging in a new USB device. Western Digital has 250-500GB external drives available for roughly $175-250, and with hard drives you don't have to worry about a scratched or otherwise suddenly unplayable CD-R so long as you do regular backups of all your data. I have to admit I used to be skeptical about hard drives as a primary method of music file storage, but after seeing a friend's simple setup with 3 of these WD external drives, and the absolute ease of use compared to swapping out CD-Rs, I was convinced. Now I just need to get a sufficiently large drive - could've probably bought one with what I spent on the Concord sale...

There are many download managers available that will allow you to grab multiple files using http instead of ftp. If you use Firefox, check out FlashGot used in conjunction with one of the download managers linked on the FlashGot page. I've used Free Download Manager with FlashGot, and they work like a charm.

The US and UK editions have identical content, but the covers are different. The one you have is the US edition, and the one in Claude's link is the UK edition. I was lucky enough to pick up remaindered copies of volume 1, California Cool, and New York Hot some years ago, but I never got volume 2 until recently, when I found a reasonably-priced copy of the US edition online at a bookseller in the Netherlands. The shipping costs were almost as much as the price of the book itself, but even so it was still a lot cheaper than most of the other copies I've run across.

Mockingbirds and blue jays can be VERY aggressive toward anything that gets too near their nests, regardless of size. I've seen them dive-bomb neighborhood cats as well as my German Shepherd, and I've had a close encounter with them on a couple of occasions myself.