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I'm reading the book Trading Up right now. It was $1 at Borders and for that little I figured I couldn't go wrong.

The book talks about the "New Luxury" consumer - the guy or gal willing to spend a little more in certain areas of their life that they deem important (usually on a personal, emotional level) while making up for it by saving money in areas where they don't care quite so much.

The classic example is the Mercedes-Benz in the parking lot at Costco.

It's an interesting book, even if it does kind of keep saying the same things over and over again. If nothing else, it brings some of the decisions I've made since leaving home (when I started attending college) into a clearer focus.

The timer in our dishwasher seems to have gone bad. A cycle that is supposed to take 98 minutes takes over four hours. Later, I checked and the timer said 40 minutes. I called someone and, after a three-minute conversation, still said 40. Heck, it's said 28 minutes for the past 10+ minutes (I switched it to "Quick Wash" mode as a test after it stuck at 40 for several minutes).

It's a 24" built-in Bosch that came with the house, so it's probably 15 years old or so.

We're also likely going to look for a new gas range as well. Ours is flaky and one or two of the burners constantly click the igniter.

I thought dishwashers cost a bit more than they did (and that ranges cost a bit less), but we'll probably look into getting a new one VERY soon. If anyone has any recommendations, let me know what you think.

Huh? Why?

I'll just keep on keepin' on with Adium.

Complete with tracking!

Just today I became frustrated with editing my cookies (I don't know why I bothered to look at the list) and just deleted them all en masse. I wish browser cookies were easier to manage (in Safari at least).

Dear AFC Team Looking to Hire a New Coach,

Hire Bill Cowher. He's great. Plus, as a Steelers fan, I'll have one less team to worry about.

Win-Win!

Signed,
Happy with Tomlin

Today is the last day to pick up, at a savings of over 20% off, the Mac News Junkie Bundle I wrote about a few days ago.

Follow your favorite news feeds using Cyndicate from Cynical Peak Software and then archive your favorite articles using EagleFiler from C-Command Software.

Cyndicate and EagleFiler normally retail for $29.95 and $40, respectively, but for a few more hours you can buy both for just $55. Full-featured demos of both applications are also available.

Bruce Arians had a very bad gameplan (very little play action, too much of the old "run-run-pass" offense). The offensive line had a horrible game. And key penalties (one leading to the TD return) and mistakes (Ben's INT from the two yard line) cost the Steelers the game.

Even still, I like everything both Ben Roethlisberger and Mike Tomlin had to say after the game. Tomlin said something to the effect of "The 11 guys we have on the field represent the Pittsburgh Steelers, we have full confidence in the 45 guys we put in hats each week, and we'll never use injuries as an excuse." Good stuff and definitely an upgrade over Bill Cowher.

I expect the Steelers to take it out on the Seahawks next week.

Today I played golf at the Bedford Springs. I'll have a review of it online at The Sand Trap within about a month.

So Apple has this pretty awesome way to create your own little jingles and things. It's called Garage Band.

And Apple has this nifty little phone that can play little jingles and things. It's called the iPhone.

But there's no way to get something from the first thing onto the second thing.

None at all.

• The iPhone 1.1.1 update apparently modifies your IMEI number to a standard testing number, which means unlocked iPhones won't recognize even the original AT&T SIM card.
• Unlocking an iPhone is not like putting an after-market stereo in your car or painting it, then having the brakes fail. It's more like adding a NOS system, then having your engine explode while you drag race. I think what Apple's done is perfectly legal… but still a bit tacky, especially since goPhone accounts appear to be broken as well.
• I'll be sticking with 1.0.2 for awhile.
• I believe the "Dev Team" will eventually come out with a re-lock. I'm one of the few people who seems to be using my SIM card with Cellular One ((Most everyone else is on T-Mobile or is in a foreign country.)) - a company AT&T will own very soon.
• With the iPhone now "jailed" like the un-jailbroken iPod Touch, I suspect efforts there will be redoubled (or "retripled").

And here I thought I was just about done with MP3.

Then, along comes Amazon MP3, written up by John Gruber not once but twice.

I will certainly be checking Amazon before the iTMS store now. 256 kpbs MP3s probably sound about the same as 192 kpbs AAC, but the prices seem better and the selection of DRM-free music wider than is available from Apple.

Finally, some competition, and DRM-free competition at that. Yippee!!!

Two great applications - EagleFiler and Cyndicate - are being offered this week for a combined "bundle" price of $55.

Cyndicate, of course, I've written about before. I continue to believe it's the best feed reader/aggregator on the market today and one of its killer features - ratings - was developed with help from EagleFiler's developer, Michael Tsai.

EagleFiler integrates with Cyndicate to provide one-key access to store the permalinked web archives. Once in EagleFiler, you can file it into a folder, tag it, search it, add notes, and otherwise get to your data much more quickly.

Whether you're a student, a researcher, or just someone doing your job or following your hobbies, Cyndicate and EagleFiler make a great duo.

More information on the bundle is available here. Remember, this is only available for one week at $55, a savings of over 20%.

What shows - new or old - will you be tuning in to this fall?

I plan to give Chuck, Journeyman, and a few others a shot. I don't know if I'll bother to watch Heroes - I may record it and watch it if I have the time, but not otherwise.

And I will say this: without the DVR, I probably wouldn't watch much TV at all. Being able to watch three one-hour shows in less than two hours has its appeal, as I tend to watch from about 10pm or later after my day's work is done and the rest of the family is asleep.

This blog is now running WordPress 2.3. So far, everything seems to be running smoothly, even with the massive number of plugins I use.

My two plugins also seem to work.

There are still two hacks I still have to make to the code: one adjusts the kses properties and the other "fixes" the uploading of files, though lately I've been using an AppleScript for the latter instead.