The Duc Pond

We took in a cat with feline leukemia. Amber got a notice from Hugs for Puppies and dying cats need homes too. I’m not sure how long it’ll be around. Could be 6 months. Could be 2 years. For now, though, it’s ours!

Uh oh. What Apple product did Duc waste his money on now? Actually it’s a T-shirt from the grand opening of the Apple store at the Cherry Hill Mall. Unfortunately it’s an XL so it’ll be pretty useless to me unless I can it to shrink in the dryer.

I got there about 10 minutes after they opened and the line to get in was huge. Just as it was with the iPhone launch, a gauntlet of Apple store employees lined the entrance to clap and cheer as people entered.  They sure know how to make you feel good about being in the Apple cult. One older woman had a shirt from the opening of the Apple store in Marlton (Sagemore). Anyway, here are the crowds:

Below you’ll find a photo album showing what I did to convert my 2007 Honda Civic Hybrid from the factory XM satellite radio to Sirius satellite radio. Start at the first picture and keep moving to the next photo to read each part. The captions explain the parts used and what was done.

Honda Civic XM to Sirius conversion

I know I’m late to the party, but today I decided it was time to join the commodities bandwagon and put 2.2% of my IRA assets into DBC, an ETF that has holdings in crude oil, corn, gold, aluminum and other futures. Back in 2005 I purchases shares of a mutual fund that held many energy companies, and that has done very well. But with the dollar continuing to be weak and global demand for commodities high, I wanted more direct investment in the actual stuff that developing nations are so hungry for.

Today I went to an event at the local AMC theater that showed all 5 Academy Award Best Picture nominees. I’m not sure why these were the Academy’s top 5, but it’s always a mystery. I judged them on their entertainment value to me, and not necessarily their worthiness for being nominated.

Michael Clayton - Some people thought this was boring, but I really enjoyed it. Sure it’s predictable and other corporate-takedown movies are like it, but it’s still well done.
There Will Be Blood - Daniel Day Lewis is freakin’ incredible in this. He needs to win Best Actor. Some people find it too long to hold their interest the entire time, but I personally was riveted. Paul Dano was great too, in that he really made want to punch him in the face.
Atonement - I was pretty disappointed given all the hype. I found it rather boring, and the timeline jumps were more annoying than they were clever IMO.
Juno - It’s a great, clever, charming movie. This was easily the most entertaining. The dialogue is witty, but not hard to follow, so you don’t have to pay the kind of close attention you do to all these other movies.
No Country For Old Men - Also really gripping and well done. A lot of people hate the ending. I’m fine with it, and I certainly don’t consider it open-ended. Enjoy the ride and don’t worry about the ending.

Amber got me an iPhone for Christmas. It’s so awesome and I love her. I mean, I’d love her regardless, but the iPhone was a great surprise (I had asked for clothes). I used to browse the web on my old Motorola E815. Needless to say, having a full browser is a breath of fresh air. I’m still disappointed you can’t send MMS messages, and I can’t wait for the SDK in February so we can see some third-party applications.

For the love of all that is holy, go see Superbad. Pure. Hilarity.

A friend of mine has opened a video game and comic book store in Egg Harbor Township. This will seem shocking when you compare their store to Gamestop, but get this: They know stuff about video games. They’ve also got a great setup, with beautiful HDTVs that are set up properly and large racks of comic books.

Check it out! They’re on Tilton Road, in the same shopping center as Pep Boys and Wawa:

Level Up Entertainment
www.levelupentertainment.com
6814 Tilton Road
Tilton Times Plaza Space A
Egg Harbor Township, NJ 08234

On Monday, August 13, 2007 I was on my way to work when a car cut in front of another car that was in front of me. The car that was cut off (Car 1) slams on his brakes. Car 2 hits him and comes to a complete stop. I hit Car 2. I’m not going to absolve myself of any guilt. The accident was avoidable. However, I will say the merge from Route 38 to Route 30 sucks (which is why Car 1 got cut off in the first place) and the nature of commuting in that area means a lot of people are driving closely to each other.

Here’s what the car looked like afterward (declared totaled):

But those days are over for me. I’ve bought a new Honda Civic Hybrid to replace my Camry, and owning a hybrid opens you up to the world of hypermiling, which really forces you to drive a lot more safely. To keep a steady speed, for example, you’ll want to open up a lot of room between you and the car in front of you. You accelerate much more slowly, and drive more slowly in general. I visited my parents yesterday, and on the trip home averaged 57 miles per gallon. It didn’t take any longer than normal to get home either.

Of course, you piss off a lot of people behind you driving like this. People expect hard acceleration as soon as the light turns green, and driving well over the speed limit. There always seems to be some old guy or huge truck driving slowly in the right lane, though, so thus far I’ve been able to use someone else as a scapegoat for my econo-driving.

Here’s the new vehicle:

I’ve been looking into eco-friendly phosphate-free laundry detergents. The most well known is probably the Seventh Generation line of products, available at Whole Foods but also online too. They work with normal and high efficiency (e.g., front load) washing machines. Phoshates, as you may know, promote algae growth, and as you may also know, large algae blooms in oceans and lakes kill aquatic life. The eco-friendly detergents are also petroleum free, and free of other wacky chemicals.

Consumer Reports rates Seventh Generation in the middle of the pack, but considering most of us don’t have kids and work in clean offices, it’s probably not a big deal. You can always keep that bottle of Tide around for the heavy duty cleaning. Any reduction helps. I used to use Purex because it was always on sale, and it cleaned fine despite being among the worst in Consumer Reports. Seventh Generation beats that handily, so I’m sure it works fine.

Same goes for dishwasher detergent. In this category, Consumer Reports rates an eco option, Ecover Ecological (powder or tablet form, also available at Whole Foods or online), pretty damn high. Third best in fact, above names like Cascade and such. Also high is Trader Joe’s powder (not so much the gel), which is cheaper. Effective AND non-evil.

Amazon.com and Drugstore.com have great prices on some of these products.

I started looking into this because I recently got a Whirlpool Duet WFW9200SQ front load washer (and the matching gas dryer). Besides cleaning better and being more gentle on clothes, front loaders use far, far less water than traditional top loaders (there are high efficiency top loaders out there, like the Whirlpool Cabrio). It was actually disconcerting at first, since there’s no standing water at all. Only enough water is injected to get the clothes wet and no more. Everything came out clean, though, so I can attest to their efficacy.

Front loaders don’t just save water, they also save the natural gas (or electricity) used to heat that water. It’s the eco-sensitive way to go!