3.28.2010

Bye bye cable, hello pretty yarn.



We decided the other day to get rid of cable again. Ryan was working on our monthly budget, and I pointed out that he forgot the Shaw bill, and that made me realize that we should just get rid of it. We had only meant to have cable for a few months anyways, and then forgot to cancel it. Ryan had recently called Shaw to see if they would match MTS' current promotion by giving us a free PVR and some extra channels, which they did in order to keep us as customers. I was so excited to have a PVR again. Seriously. When I was in university, we drove down to Grand Forks just because Ryan decided that he wanted a TiVo. And me and that thing became BFFs. I always had something to watch (I'm one of those people who need the TV on when they do things), and not only did it record all of my favorite shows, but it recorded shows it thought I would like. And it made the cutest noises when I deleted things or skipped commercials. And the remote! With its thumbs up/down buttons! It was amazing. But then we got rid of cable, and with that TiVo. So when Shaw gave us a Pace Tahoe, to say I was excited would be an understatement (I am a TV addict!). And it sucks. And has really bad user architecture and seems fairly unintuitive.
(Sidenote: I heard the Mozilla guy on Spark today talking about how software should grow with the user, teaching it the skills needed to use it as they go along like a video game does and opening up as the user gains more skill. He went on to talk about how you don't need to read a manual for a video game, because you learn all the basics by playing the first level. I had never thought about it this way, but it's so true. More designers need to think like that.)
It just erases files or stops their recording for no good reason. It was really disappointing. Probably even more so after having a TiVo. Our first one was broken with the deleting problem so we returned it two days after getting it, only to get another one with the same problem. I called Shaw again, and they told me it's just an issue with the box that I'll have to deal with until a firmware upgrade happens. LAME. Not to mention our cable blips all the time which is just annoying. So instead of using something that just frustrates me a lot, I'll just go back to watching stuff online which works really well. Except that B's favorite shows, Team Umizoomi, and Fresh Beat Band are not really around yet as they are newer Nickelodeon shows, but he probably watches too much TV anyways.


I went grocery shopping yesterday. $108.96. Not bad! Especially since I spent 10 of that at Organza on blueberry perogies(!!!) and Veggie Booty for B. The greenness of them threw him off at first, but once I convinced him it was something tasty, he went nuts. They're like a healthier more natural corn puff coated in veggie powder. There is spinach and kale in the ingredients and he will eat it. It's a start. It's my goal to make O less of a picky eater than his big brother. See, I started out making all of B's baby food, with lentils and beans and real veggies and fruit of all kind, and applicable spices here and there. I bought Baby Cubes (which are really awesome) to put all the food in. But then our food processor broke, and I got lazy, and jarred mush it was. In my opinion, there are two kinds of mush: sweet mush and savory mush. It all just tastes like jars. But B loved it. And then came crackers and toast, and then when I was pregnant with O it was a lot of convenience stuff. It's not like he eats horrible though, he does get all his food groups in a day, but getting him to eat veggies is rough. Ryan even made these DELICIOUS Parmesan butternut squash noodles from Deceptively Delicious, but even that did not work. He is a smart cookie and fairly picky. I want to try making the pea mint popsicles in Toddler Cafe sometime soon, as he did like the pea pancakes a lot and loves popsicles. We have since gotten new parts for the processor, and little O is going to eat well when his time comes. And maybe if I try real hard, it will look this pretty.


After shopping, I went to Ram Wools. I got some beautiful yarn! I got a ball of Noro Silk Garden (my favorite!), and some black Lett Lopi to contrast it with to make some pretty mittens with. Well, I think all the yarns I got today are destined to be mittens. I also got a colourful skein of Mirasol Hacho, which is a beautiful hand dyed merino, as well as aubergine and pale blue balls of Sandnes Alpakka. So soft! I haven't been to Ram Wools since I lived with my mom. It was the only good place the 88 bus went other than to the 18 North Main. The new location is a lot brighter. It was so hard deciding which yarns to buy. They all felt so nice and were such pretty colours (although I did not find the perfect green I was looking for - I might have to make a Knitpicks order). And now between yarn for three pairs of mittens that I bought yesterday, and the yarn for the hoodie I bought last week, and the project I am currently working on, I'll be busy for a while.

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