Televisions and Pianos

14 July, 2006. 384 words.

As you can probably tell, I’ve renamed the Genealogy News to Household News. I figure I can combine both topics into one category, and perhaps have enough material to post something once a month or so.

To inaugurate this newly-named category, I’d like to announce that we got a new TV! On July 4, we bought a Sony 32″ high-definition LCD television. It’s uber-cool. Unfortunately, since most broadcasts in America aren’t in high-definition yet, and DVDs are not high-definition yet, our television sort of over-achieves until the content world catches up. At least we can see movies in widescreen format without squinting. (We can actually read movie credits now!)

I picked up the $5/month “high-definition” option from Comcast cable, which we needed in order to watch Stephen King’s Nightmares and Dreamscapes in high-definition. (I wouldn’t have bothered since we could pick up the “Big 4” HD stations on the TV already, but N&D was on TNT-HD.) It required an “HD converter box.” It turned out the “converter” box was actually a complete dual-tuner DVR (digital video recorder)… so now we not only have a cool picture, but we can also pause and rewind live TV, record shows easily, and we don’t have to use those icky analog VHS tapes anymore! I finally feel like a participant in the 21st century. :)

In other news, Cynthia picked out a nifty Yamaha digital piano for use at church. (We celebrated July 4 by pouring money into the economy.) It sounds pretty dern good, and Cynthia reports that it “feels” pretty good, too. Sadly, it stays at church so I don’t get to hear her playing it very much. :(

But even more exciting than the digital piano, remember that 1926 Steinway we bought, oh, about a lifetime ago? The one that needed restoration? Well, it’s finally restored! Or at least, fixed. I hesitate to get too excited about it, since it technically isn’t in the house yet, but piano movers are scheduled to bring it to us next Tuesday! To make a long story short, the saga of this piano is rather long and complicated: The restorer has been suffering all manner of life-altering illnesses and setbacks lo these many years. But we saw the piano last weekend and he’s finally delivering it next week. Yay!

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