• flashforward
• the office
• community
• 30 rock
• supernatural
• survivor

I am behind watching Supernatural – mainly because it tends to get bumped off the dvr in favor of some silly medical drama (not my choice). flashforward is slow, but I want to see how it turns out.

Community is on NBC and last night’s Halloween episode was their best yet. Watch it on Hulu… and be sure to google Mexican Halloween sex position

And then I gave up because I really don’t have anywhere “adult” to go for halloween night. Maybe I will still do it last minute, but probably not.

Picture credit: Rob / cockeyed / Geico Money Sculpture

Of course, the climatic final scenes are the highlight (including this funny ambiguously intentional / unintentional dance move / butt flash).

Even if you have not watched the series in the past, spend 42 minutes on Hulu laughing with the Dunder Mifflin staff.

• The Ofice: Niagra, Part 1
• The Ofice: Niagra, Part 2

Once the notifications are sent down to the app, you get the familiar notification on your screen. Another great feature of Prowl is you can setup redirections. If you use Tweetie for Mac, but like Echofon on your iPhone – Prowl can redirect the notification for you and automatically launch your preferred Twitter client.

My Growl/Prowl notification list so far:

• Tweetie (select Twitter posts, replies and direct messages)
• Firefox (download completions, forecast fox severe weather alerts)
• Mail (Growlmail push notifications for my non-push email accounts)
• Adium (Instant message notifications if I do not happen to be using BeeJive)
• NewsFire (RSS reader that can refresh feeds every minute – for Facebook notifications & updates)
• Transmission (download completions)
• Dropbox (file syncs)
• Evernote (sync completions)

Pros:

• You can push just about any alert you can think of to your iPhone.
• Open API so cloud based service can push as well.
• Customizable quiet time to silence push notification

Con

• Your computer needs to be on for nearly all notifications.
• Battery life can drain if you get too many push notifications
• Your computer needs to be on for nearly all notifications.

UPDATE: After using for a day or so, I’ve stumbled upon a great convergence of cloud services. Here is what you need:

1. gmail – register a new dedicated account
2. mail2prowl.de (your prowl API key @mail2prowl.de)
3. notify.me

Set your new “notification” gmail account automatically forward (and then delete) messages to your APIKEY@mail2prowl.de email address. Signup for an account with notify.me using your new gmail address. Add any RSS feed you want to monitor. You can even use the twitter search API to search for public @ replies to your timeline. (if you were @ev, you could put in the following RSS feed for notifications). Facebook has lots of RSS feeds you can put into notify.me as well – such as a notifications feed.

Now – any messages sent to your notification gmail account will automatically push to prowl. You can also set specific filters on any other email account to maybe push messages to your prowl. All without relying on having a computer running all the time.

Possible improvements:

• The most significant improvement (not directly in the app itself) will be once more cloud based services can send information to Prowl via API.
• A “clear all” button would be nice to have in the bottom right corner of the main notifications screen. Just so there were less clicks to clear out your entire notifications window.

There is promise of multiple account notifications coming soon.

Works great if you are activesyncing work email, but still want push notification of new mail to your personal gmail account.

Verdict: must buy

Amazing that youtube is now available to enjoy via your TV – the quality that is being sent down is AWFUL. It is barely passable while watching a music video or kid at disney video.

So, while I appreciate the feature update, I am hopeful that the quality that youtube sends down will improve as more and more people upload from their HD sources.

Kudos to Peter Jackson for championing this project. An excellent piece of writing & directing by Neill Blomkamp. And a masterpiece of acting by the virtually unknown Sharlto Copley.

Hard to imagine that most of Sharlto’s dialogue was improvised, but the way in which he emotes makes it all the more believable. I don’t want to say much else other than he was fookin great.

Verdict: Worth the ticket price. Rent/buy on Blu-Ray when released.

Note: There is a great interview with Neill Blomkamp (to read after you have seen the movie) on avclub.

The first two episodes have been a bit of a let down compared to the first season’s finale.

I liked the character motivational changes, but am disappointed by the slow moving arc. Pacey/Peter’s new take charge attitude is refreshing compared to his season 1 mopey-ness. Maybe he missed Dawson.

Anna Torv (Olivia) has so far sported her black bra once and taken a bubble bath once. I have never seen a bubble bath with more bubbles before.

Creepy after effects of parallel universe traveling seem to be the next drawn out theme, while I am more interested in the “message” that Spock may have relayed. Charlie doppelgänger needs to shit or get off the pot too. He doesn’t look like he is doing well.

I will continue to watch, if even to just enjoy another bubble bath.

This chick flick of a movie was terrible.

pro:

• tweetie starts up 64-bit automatically; kudos. my only non-apple app that actually launched 64-bit immediately.
• I like minimizing application windows behind the main app icon on the dock. very windows 7, and keeps the dock tidier
• safari starts fast, but it always was kind of speedy.
• ichat pops up 64-bit

con:

• my logitech cordless optical trackman does not work correctly due to logitech’s old 32-bit control center not being available for 64-bit snow leopard.
• vmware fusion is still 32-bit, and I suspect that is the one app that could really use some more horsepower. although it works fine
• istat menus are not snow leopard compatible yet and that left my menu bar very sparse… will not even run in 32-bit

runs, but runs in 32-bit:

• itunes is still 32-bit (what the fuck?)
• firefox is still 32-bit (is there a 64-bit compiled somewhere?)
• evernote is still 32-bit
• logmein helper is still 32-bit
• adium is still 32-bit
• netnewswire is still 32-bit (even the new google reader beta)
• ecto is still 32-bit (I can live with this one, I don’t see much room for performance improvement anyway)

verdict: I am going to hold off putting snow leopard anywhere else until some of this 32-bit nonsense is cleared up.

I watched Punisher: War Zone last night. I had got it from Netflix about a week ago and never got around to watching. I felt compelled to watch and get it over with.

I had marginal hopes for this movie. I liked Thomas Jane in the first one, and was unsure about the recasting.

Things I liked:

• this was no marvel pg-13. it was brutal
• sound design was all bone-cracking and face-squishing
• most of the supporting cast worked well (wayne knight, the guy from x-files & lost)

Things I did not like:

• kids in peril
• this new frank castle is OK, but not thomas jane
• dominic west was great in the wire – but I could not stand his character
• long
• slow
• started to put me to sleep (it was also after 11pm)
• the punisher does not need absolution. that is why he is the punisher and not the punishee. I could have done without that final scene.
• the script could have been better. I know there were a lot of people involved with it, but the final result just did not do it for me.

verdict: worth a netflix or redbox if you are a marvel or punisher fan – otherwise, skip it.

Costco started carrying a model that had Netflix Instant Watch streaming built in, and I decided now was the time to make the leap. I fully expected to pay over $200 for one, but the price dropped considerably last week. Even comes with a free HDMI cable.

As soon as it gets hooked up to a working Internet connection, it checks the firmware version and will prompt you to upgrade. The upgrade takes 20 minutes or so and is a little annoying to have to do as soon as your take it out of the box.

On Sunday, I had to take one back. It would not boot up correctly. Sometimes it would just hang and not send anything to the screen via HDMI. Just brought it back and bought a new one with another coupon. Fired the new one up and had Ghostbusters streaming (after the 20-minute firmware update).

So far, well worth it. Blu-ray even at 1080i is amazing.

When there is nothing worth watching on the dish before bed, I have been watching 30 Rock from the beginning of season 1 (I think it is coming down at 480i – but still looks good).

The fast forward and reverse is awkward. It seems to advance too fast and then not “stop” exactly where you want even if you are pushing the remote.

It has Pandora streaming radio too, but I have not checked it out yet. I’m already spoiled with SiriusXM radio in my car, iPhone and Dish – so not sure if I will end up using Pandora at all.

First Blu-ray purchases (while at Costco):

• The Fifth Element Remastered
• Cars

Things I liked:

• Writing was reminiscent of Old School and Anchorman
• Great casting
• Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly were great together
• Will Ferrell’s sister-in-law (Kathryn Hahn) stole every scene she was in
• Dale & Alice scenes. every single one
• John Woo reference in epilogue
• “What the fucking fuck?”

Things I did not like:

• Some parts felt a little long
• Sleepwalking didn’t do it for me (see previous)

Worth netflix or redbox. Maybe even buying on dvd or blu-ray if you find it on sale.

• Apple unibody 17″ MacBook Pro
• 32″ 1080P HDTV (or bigger)
• Apple Mac Mini (to connect DVI to TV)
• 10.2″ Netbook (Samsung or Acer w/ RAM upgrade)
• HD distribution over ethernet device (to hook up 1080P TV)