Cable TV (or, Why can't I get ESPN without paying $60?)

I'm not one to watch TV with much regularity - in fact I went several years without a television at all. I do enjoy a good movie, but regular television programming just annoys me. Its too full of reality tv shows that in fact have absolutely nothing to do with reality. When was the last time you ever had to vote people off an island in real life? That's what I thought. It also has tons of mind-numbing commercials with wardrobe malfunctions or rich dumb girls strutting around fast cars and rubbing soapy water on themselves......well, okay, maybe i could make an exception. You get my drift though. It's generally just crap.

There are, however, one or two channels I do enjoy. Believe it or not, FOX ranks up on this list. Why? Because for some reason it tends to have good shows. I usually have one a season that I'll watch: most recently it was 24.....solid. FOX news is also up there for the amusement factor -- I find it entertaining to watch them pretend to be unbiased. "Fair and balanced", oh that's great. I was watching an interview the other day with an Amnesty official, and when it became clear that the host could not get around the legitimate point the official was making in criticizing the Bush administration he paused, and asked: "Isn't it true you contributed to the Kerry campaign?". As if that has anything to do with the facts that were being presented!

But I digress.

The other two channels which I would like to receive are ESPN and Comedy Central. Comedy central just cuz it's damn funny, and ESPN because I like my sports. And except for football (Redskins rule!!), the sports I like are not mainstream enought to get playtime on the non-cable channels (which is all i get). Wimbledon is a great example. Often considered the first among equals when it comes to the tennis grand slams, Wimbledon is always a treat to watch. It started today, and of course it's being broadcast on ESPN, but not the regular channels. No -- they'd rather show the Spurs and the Pistons, which until last night's game ranked among the most un-interesting finals in basketball history. I also like to watch soccer, along with the rest of the known world outside this wierd country. Most Americans just can't seem to get into it, which is inexplicable to me. It's an amazing sport, and it's captivated the rest of the world. And guess where they show it? That's right - ESPN.

Now, it's not that I'm averse to paying for the luxury of receiving these channels. I can deal with that. What annoys me is that in order to get ESPN and Comedy Central, I have to buy a package that has 120 channels of crap for $60/month. And when I ask why it's so expensive, they tell me cuz I'm getting 120 channels! I don't want them! All I want is to watch Wimbledon and The Daily Show. Is that too much to ask? Apparently so.

Here's a free idea to anyone who wants it: a self service, pick your channel, tv service. Have several packages, or just charge a flat fee per channel. You'll make money, people will be happy, and several infomercial-only channels will die much deserved deaths.

Redeye Flights

I'm in our nation's capital right now, visiting some family and eating home cooked food. I took the redeye flight out here last night, despite lots of people asking my why I would do that to myself. Actually, I find the redeye flights to be the perfect way to travel.

I flew JetBlue, which leaves out of Oakland airport. I have nothing against Oakland, but their airport is like a Greyhound bus station compared to SFO. I would not take flights from there, but JetBlue is a pretty damn good deal and so far (based on two trips) a good airline as well. There was a lot of traffic getting into Oakland, which is odd because normally there is not much traffic at airports at that time of night.

Which brings me to the first reason I like redeye flights. Easy getting into the airport, no long check-in lines, short security lines, and empty restaurants where service is quick if you want something to eat. Those hassles alone are enough to make many frequent travellers annoyed enough to want to strangle someone. The second reason that I like these flights is sleep. I have lots of difficulty sleeping on planes unless I'm really really tired -- the problem is that if I'm not sleeping, boredom sets in rather quickly. There's a limit to the amount of reading/music that I can take all at once in tightly confined quarters. Thus, if I don't get much sleep the night before, by the time of the redeye I'm so tired that sleep comes readily and the flight goes quickly. Excellent.

Of course, by sleeping on the plane I don't waste an entire day on the airplane. During the day I can go out and do things, spending it on an airplane seems a waste of time. However, if I can spend the night on the plane and sleep while I'm there, then it's not a waste at all. In fact it's a pretty efficient use of time, as I wake up at my destination. Now, it is true that I usually need to take a nap of a few hours when I get to my destination to catch up on some missing sleep, but I still don't waste the whole day. It's pretty damn cool.

I think however that these flights are catching on. This past one was full to capacity, and amazingly, for the first time, these were not the cheapest times available for flights (close, but not quite.) Ah well, for now I still think that its' the best deal going.

Another Saturday?

A week passes so quickly -- I am surprised and dismayed at how little I sometimes accomplish in the span of a week. Ah well.

Currently I am drinking "apple tea", a curiosity I found in Turkey when I was there about a year ago. It was offered in most tea places, and sold in the spice markets. Although I still don't really know if that's because it's a popular drink or that it's considered exotic and expensive, and thus good for foisting upon unsuspecting tourists. Regardless of the origins, it's pretty damn good and I recommend it.

Istanbul is certainly one of my favorite cities. It straddles the crossroads between Asia and Europe, and was of huge strategic value to pretty much every empire to have existed in that area since before the time of Christ. As such, the number of wars, treaties, religions, cultures, and peoples that have claimed the city at one point or another is astounding. And they have all left their mark. I suppose that's what fascinates me so much -- you can actually feel the history closing in around you, the confluence of beliefs and cultures is apparent in a million different ways, all straining against each other and yet in a strange sort of harmony.

Point in case, when I was there I received a tour of one of the old palaces that housed the sultans of the Ottoman Empire. It was beautiful, and absolutely enormous. My tour guide was a pretty young Armenian girl. I found it amazing that after what the Ottomans did during WW1 there is still vibrant Armenian community in Istanbul. Not only that, but it was ironic that one of them was showing me the fallen majesty of the Ottoman sultans, who were the symbols of the wealth and degenerative excess that ultimately brought it down. Although I kind of wished I had, I did not ask her about it. It would have been, I thought, a little rude.

Turkey is struggling to get into the Eurpean Union, and yet still considered by many to be part of the Arab world. It's a country that lies at the heart of what is to be the main force of change over the next hundred years -- the emergence of what has formerly been known as the "third world", and how they integrate (or don't) with existing power structures. Istanbul is at the heart of Turkey, and as such exemplifies a lot of this struggle. Modern malls exist on top of (literally) underground markets that have existed for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. What's more, they are both thriving as they specialize in different products and sell to different clientele. How this is all going to play out I don't know, but it's great to watch and think, especially as you sip some apple tea.

That's another thing I like about teas. They generally make me reminisce about other times, although to be honest I probably do that far too often than is healthy. Speaking of which, I should go and see about getting some food.

Lazy Saturday Thoughts

Right now I'm listening to Nine Inch Nails. Downward Spiral. On SuperAudio, courtesy of my roomate. Damn that's good stuff -- if you have not tried it, I highly recommend it.

The days have been really gorgeous lately, the miracle of late-spring/early-summer that hits San Francsico every year for about a month, before the fog descends and the sweaters make a return. However, for now my sweaters are in the back of my closet, and the t-shirts have taken center stage. Of course, it's nothing compared to the middle east where some family is, or even France where other friends are currently vacationing. But hey, it's home.

I've been getting out bouldering lately, trying to get myself to a place where I can legitimately call myself a boulderer without shaming the rest of the community. Castle Rock State Park is where I normally go -- filled with great big sandstone boulders. Lots of slopers, which are my weakest point, so it's great to get practice on that stuff. Typically I've been a gym rat up until now, but I really cannot justify that nowadays with Apollo shining down on us the way he has been lately. My goal is to be a decent boulderer by return of the harvest. Let's see how well I can hold to that.

As soon as I figure out how to post photos on this thing, I'll start doing that more. I'm sure it's very simple, but I'm also quite technically incompetent......although I do want to learn HTML so I can create my own website. But when I know how to do all that, I'll post photos of climbing and our great little garden in the back, courtesy of my other roomate, which we just finished putting sod down on this morning. (Come to think of it, this house doesn't owe anything to me except a lot of books, and a periodic supply of fresh baked chocolate chip cookies.)

I know I've said this before, but tomorrow I really do plan on buying a phone. The Motorola "Razr", which of course also means switching to Cingular. Wish me luck.