Aw, BUGGER!

[annathepiper]

-0: Cruel, cruel irony that lets me find out about the sneak preview of Serenity in the last half hour or so, a sneak preview which includes a screening in Seattle, only to then discover that it's ALREADY SOLD OUT. Sniffle. No Captain Tightpants for me until September. Foo!

+/-1: My second replacement iPod battery arrived yesterday from Laptops for Less--the replacement I ordered for the first replacement, since the first replacement rather sucked. Installation went easy; it was very promising that the connector on the new battery was not in fact broken and I was able to snap it into place without any of the wires popping loose. I'm test-playing the new battery as we speak, though I am dubious that I'll make it to the full eight hours of promised playtime. I'm closing in on 2.5 hours right now and the meter's showing only about a quarter power left. This vexes me, as the whole point of ordering a new battery in the first place was to get a battery that actually performs as close to new as possible. I'm waffling now as to whether I feel like going to the trouble to make them send me a third one, or whether I should just live with it as long as this battery performs better than the original--and to go look for a different site that sells batteries for iPods, in the hopes of finding a better source for them.

+2: I did indeed finish Dragon and Phoenix on the way home from work last night, finally. I was a bit surprised that the character I most wanted to hit upside the head did not in fact do the Stupid Thing I thought he was inevitably going to do--but on the other hand, I'm not sure if I approve of him being relegated to a bystander in the final action anyway, especially since his whole driving force of angst was never actually resolved.

+/-3: Microsoft is coming under heavy, heavy fire for backing out of supporting the Washington State gay rights bill that just got shot down in our legislature. Jon Stewart let 'em have it with both barrels on The Daily Show last night in his usual inimitable fashion--and solarbird, risu, and I all died laughing. Boy, am I glad Mr. Stewart's on our team. THANK YOU, JON!

Tuesday miles: 1.0
Miles out of Hobbiton: 90.21
Miles to Rivendell: 367.79

Comments

[sarekofvulcan.livejournal.com]

Sorry -- I was desperately trying to find a phone number for you at midnight. :-)

There's always eBay... :-)

[annathepiper]

*snicker* I'm not THAT desperate. ;) For the price of one of these tickets off eBay, I'm sure I could probably go see the actual released flick four or five times in September!

[kieri.livejournal.com]

Apparently it sold out within 10 minutes. :) Rach, aka seattlesparks plans to dress-up as a Browncoat and stand around with a sign looking cute hoping someone will sell her an extra ticket. If not, hey, line parties are fun anyway. :)

And I, unfortunately, will not likely get to see it in the theater at all, due to the fact that it isn't coming out in Japan AFAIK. Unless I fly to Australia in November or something. O:)

[annathepiper]

TEN MINUTES?! Wow, the Browncoats must be one hell of a rabid fan group! I wonder if anyone else outside the Browncoats circles actually got any tickets.

And why do I get the feeling somebody's planning a holiday? ;)

[kieri.livejournal.com]

Well, I'll certainly be watching the airfares...The issue will be getting the vacation time more than anything else. We shall see. :)

[annathepiper]

Good luck! I'd like to see Oz myself someday but I don't know if I'll be able to make it down there. Much may depend on whether Oz gets the 2010 Worldcon AND whether Dara and I can afford it if they do!

[darthhellokitty.livejournal.com]

Oooh, I hope that Daily Show's online someplace...

Daily show repeats... frequently.

[kokyu.livejournal.com]

On my system last nights episode is scheduled to go again at 7 PM tonight. Your mileage may vary.

Re: Daily show repeats... frequently.

[annathepiper]

We see ads all the time for the Daily Show repeats, but our Tivo doesn't pick them up--usually since we only have it record first run stuff. :)

[annathepiper]

Haven't looked, but as kokyu posted, the show does frequently repeat episodes. Do you have the channel at home?

[starfallz.livejournal.com]

Yay Jon!

[annathepiper]

Totally. The more I watch that man's show, the more I admire him. :)

[emmacrew.livejournal.com]

I saw a guy who looked remarkably like Jon Stewart eating by himself in the Crossroads food court today. I guess it's pretty unlikely that it was actually him, though.

[annathepiper]

*giggle* Yeah, we're a bit out of his way. ;)

Ipod batteries..

[(Anonymous)]

IIRC, you said Ipods used a rechargeable lithium-ion battery..do they need to be "exercised" a few times like NiCads or Nimh ones do? The first few times you use them, Nicad/nimh might not run long, but after a few charge/run down cycles, the running life between charges goes up.Is it possible connect a milliammeter is series with the battery while it's running,(or to use an outside power supply..easier to use a meter with) to see if its current consumption is within what's normal for it?just a couple possibilities..Scott

Re: Ipod batteries..

[annathepiper]

Yes, the iPod batteries are lithium-ion. I don't know if they need to be warmed up in such a way as you describe; I am not familiar enough with the behavior of these batteries to really make an accurate guess. Off the top of my head I do not remember any such thing mentioned in the documentation that came with the iPod when I bought it, and the info sheet that came with the new battery I purchased said only that I should charge it for no less than three hours before playing it the first time. Which I did.

Nor do I know what its normal power consumption measurements are, unfortunately. So even if I did connect a meter up to it to take a reading, that would tell me nothing, since I don't know what the baseline against which I should compare would be.

Also, it'd require me to take it apart to do such a reading anyway. The iPod's battery is not externally accessible, as I've mentioned before. Taking it apart is easy, but I don't know enough about the motherboard inside the iPod to know where I'd need to touch with the meter's probes. You have to lift out the hard drive to get to the battery, a flat, squarish thing that rests in a little pocket beneath. Three wires come out of that to a white connector which is then snapped into place on the corner of the motherboard. I don't know for sure but I would expect that the proper place to stick any probes might be under that connector, and I'd have to lift out the motherboard to do that--and I'm not sure how to take the iPod apart to THAT degree. I don't want to break it. :)