Yesterday, we decided to upgrade our 9 yr old standard definition TV to a new fancy rear projection set. I'd been researching models for a bit, and had decided the newly released Samsung HL61A750A was the one to get (rear projection for refresh rate and price/screen size; this samsung for LED -- no lamps to replace, and the new dark chip to increase contrast). Ann's new job includes some responsibilities with the Apple stores within Best Buy, so we went to see what one looks like stopped by the TV section to show Ann the model. A salesperson saw us, and I mentioned that I had seen the same set online for ~$450 cheaper online. He went to his manager, and came back with a new price, but still about a bit above the total online price. I also wanted the TV calibrated, and had seen an in store promotion discounting the service. My counter was thus to ask for a bigger discount on calibration. He went back to his manager, and dropped the TV price another $100. It hadn't occured to me that the big box retailers are willing to negotiate prices.

Buying the set means a cascade of changes... Our current TV's home, a pine armoire won't fit the new set... so it has to go, and I need a new TV stand. With the armoire disappearing, Ann wants to change out the matching coffee table. A new HD also needs a HD signal, so need to change the Comcast service. Our series 1 Tivo doesn't accept HD, so that needs swapping out. It looks like I'm going to be a frequent ebay/craigslist poster for a while.

Update: I guess I'm not the first to figure this out.

We keep hearing that the winner of the tournament is the only team that will end its season with a win. Well, the Ivy League does not have a conference tournament - so some other teams can end on a winning note. This year Penn and Yale won their last game of the season.

This holiday season Ann and I asked ourselves "Do you remember what x and y's kids names are?" more times than we can remember. So, we realized that our address books should have a kid's name field. Turns out that address.yahoo.com supports this:

1. Go to the contact you want to add a kid's name.
2. At the bottom, there is a button, "Add a Custom Field". Click it
3. Enter in the new title (like Kid's Names)
4. Choose that field in the drop down. And fill it in.

From then on, the new field name will be present in the drop down. Now, if we could only remember how to fill it out :)

Over the last 6 weeks or so, I've used gmail exclusively as my email client. I forwarded my yahoo address to my gmail address.
Pros:
- threading. It's very nice to have a conversation wrapped into 1 screen. Most communication is better when there is a conversation -- threading helps keep a conversation together. Yahoo has no way to do this.
- spam protection. Gmail catches a bit more than Yahoo. They'd miss about a message per day (mostly 419 scams). Yahoo misses 1-2 messages a day (mostly 419 scams with a few "normal" spam every once in a while. I should note that there were a few senders that gmail refused to put in my spam folder, even after reporting 3 times.
- Better image blocking options. Gmail allows you to indicate which senders should have their images shown. There are a few newsletters I get that need images. Yahoo's new mail has an option not to block images from Address Book entries, but that is a bit broad/overkill. The classic version doesn't have the option at all. I suppose I'm to blame for this since I "PM'ed" the feature 6 years ago. Of course, it was conceived of and launched in a *single* day, so I'm not too bothered.


Cons:
- search. Gmail's search is horrid. They only do exact match. Before my trip a week ago, I asked some folks for restaurant recommendations. I searched for 'restaurant.' No luck finding the message. Turns out that the messages only had 'restaurants' in them. Yahoo not only does partial match, but also lets you filter results by sender, folder, date, attachments, and other message attributes.
- interaction. Gmail has a very strong point of view that the user should not delete messages. After all, they give you a ton of space, and their search is terrible (oh, wait), so, why delete. Well, why would I want to keep newsletters, ads, and mailing list digests? After delete, gmail forces you to go the inbox/folder view. In a given session, the only time I want to do that is after I've read all new messages. The interaction forces a ton of extra clicks. Similarly, I use the unread status of a message to indicate some action needs to occur. Gmail's mark as unread is hidden in a menu... lots more clicks.
- disposable addresses (addressguard). I'm addicted to them. Gmail's hidden plus addressing should remain hidden.

Whatever:
- I can't seem to train myself to use keyboard commands in a web application.
- I didn't use any of gmail's free capabilities to read messages in other applications (imap/pop...)
- filters. both yahoo and gmail's are terrible, though gmail gets kudos for a)test search b) using a sample message to create one. Gmail has a undocumented feature that allows some "special headers" (like mailing list's list-id) to be used in filters.
- I never really put tagging through its paces.