July has been a busy month here at Club Josh!
First up, can we talk earthquakes?? We had another mild to moderate quake on July 7 that registered M5.4. It is the third M5+ quake in So Cal this year, and the second 5+ aftershock to the M7.2 Easter Sunday Sierra El Mayor Quake. I have to admit, I was disappointed I missed the majority of the shaking of the 7.2 since I was in my Dad’s Chevy Tahoe at the time, but I have not missed the other two. I am fascinated how the Sierra El Mayor quake broke north and has now triggered quakes in the LA region. Of particular interest is the Elsinore/Whitter complex as well as the San Jacinto faults. I think it is just a matter of time before we have a large-ish quake either on the Ft. Tejon section of the San Andreas or on the other two faults. I am glad I am in a 2009 constructed apartment complex! Now is the time to get those quake survival kits up to speed and refreshed!
Next up, let’s talk about AT&T UVerse. When I moved into the new complex, I was bummed that I could not get DirecTV due to the fact we face North. It seemed like the best option was AT&T UVerse and after getting a package deal it actually was quite reasonable. For the most part, the service has been good. I am enjoying the HD on Daniel’s new TV, but the DVR functionality leaves a bit to be desired, especially after so many years using TiVo. Note to TiVo, please get your service to work with UVerse!!
This month, we have suffered through two major outages. First up, our DVR died while watching the 25th Anniversary special of Dollywood. One moment she is singing “My Country, My Home” and the next it freezes. After rebooting, it comes up with a big Red X on the screen. We had to wait a few days to get it swapped out. Sadly, all the recordings were gone, but since the settings and scheduled recordings are stored on the modem, all was not lost.
A week later, I was in the middle of working on a web site for the Adriatic Vascular Summit, and right after I pushed a first version live, everything went out. No Internet, No Cable, and no Phone service!! It was a frustrating three days full of repeated calls to Customer Service and tech support. The worst part was that no one really knew what was happening and they had no ETA. After several tweets, I was contacted by one of the AT&T service reps who forwarded my contact info and concerns “to the highest levels”.
After someone from corporate contacted me, the service finally came back online the next day (although I am sure it was just coincidence). I was able to get a service credit for it being offline as well as super-slow for a few days after the outage. To my delight and surprise, someone followed up with me a few days after and offered to increase my service credit and gave me his contact info should things go horribly wrong again. He also told me that it was a software glitch and that is why no one knew where the problem was.
In the end, I was happy with the resolution, but it still set me way back on my projects, not to mention I almost started reading books again!
Things are now back to normal, and I once again started to unpack and get situated. This past few off days, I unpacked most of my books (some who made the move might end up being donated after all). I am still struggling to find an elegant media storage solution. I really want to unpack all my DVDs and CDs to clear up closet space and make my room a bit more, well, roomy! Perhaps I should just digitize all of them and go the virtual route. Of course, this still begs the question what to do with all the physical discs?? Maybe underbed storage??
Don’t know, but part of the problem I have is deciding what to do!