I still *want* to love you, but you're losing me

Dear TiVo,

I read two articles recently that spurred me to write you this letter.  The first article described how at the end of July 2009 you had 3.05 million subscribers, but at the end of July 2010 you were down to 2.38 million.  Five years ago this would have surprised me, but not any more.

The second article was from your site, describing the spiffy new QWERTY TiVo remote with a sliding face and a full keyboard.  I was overjoyed by the news, as I’ve been waiting for a remote like this since I bought and activated my first TiVo back in 2002.  I read the article in great anticipation, wondering how pricey the remote would be.  Hm, $90.  Not unreachable, but seemingly a little steep, which would make it in keeping with everything else you sell.

But then I got to the last paragraph, where the last sentence read:

“The new remote will work with TiVo Premiere, Premiere XL, TiVo Series3, TiVo HD, and TiVo HD XL boxes.”

No Series 1?  No Series 2 or Dual-Tuner?  Leaving us faithful early adopters behind again, are we?

Typical.  This is typical of everything I have come to expect from you over the years.  I still love TiVo-the-technical-solution, but with TiVo-the-company I have gone from love to like to not caring to being annoyed and, finally, to loathing, where I am today.

I now own and use 5 (count ‘em) TiVos, but they are all Series 2.  My disillusionment began in earnest when you released the Series3 boxes, and included things like YouTube browsing that were not made available to Series2 owners.  Now, you had a story for why this was so, which was something about Flash, I think, but I didn’t (and still don’t) buy it.  If you had wanted to make it work, you could have.   But, you chose to have those features and functions be differentiators to try and get Series2 owners to upgrade.

So close, and yet so far away

And it’s continued to be that way over the years, up through the latest insult of not letting us have the new remote (pictured at left).  You continue to add new and improved features and functions, very few of which are made available to your existing base of owners, unless they have the latest and greatest.  Now, I understand this from a business perspective, as I work in technology, so I know that it’s hard to keep the installed base happy.  It’s very easy to add new features and functions to totally new and redesigned devices, and your bean-counters are happy to see the R&D and other expenses that go into anything that will grab new customers and dollars.

I can visualize the meetings where you discussed the strategy of what to do with the installed base.  Spending money on something that will make the installed base happier is not a strategy that reaps short-term benefits, so it’s difficult for people to get behind it and make those investments.  Conversely, it’s much easier to talk about investing in the new model with the new features that will open up new markets and bring in new customers and new revenues.  *Everybody* can get behind that, and nobody gets fired for trying to grow the business.

But people do get fired for spending money on things that are difficult to quantify, like the care and feeding of existing customers.  However, the sign of a truly successful company is that they do exactly that.  It’s like flossing your teeth.  If I don’t floss today, nothing bad really happens.  If I don’t floss this month, or even this year, there may be no noticeable negative impact from my perspective. 

But if I never floss?  Eventually I’ll start losing my teeth.  And teeth, like customers, are things that, once you’ve neglected them to the point that you lose them, you never get them back.  Well TiVo, you haven’t been flossing, and you have decayed my loyalty as a customer to the point where now I hope that some viable alternative presents itself, so that I can leave you behind.

The good news, for you, is that the technology of the TiVo is awesome.  Usability is great, and you have features and functions that far outstrip anything that the cable companies offer.  However, from my cable company I can get an HD DVR for $5/month with no other out-of-pocket expense.  With you I’d have to spend $300-$500 to get the new TiVo Premiere, and then cough up another $300 for lifetime service, or $11/month for the monthly services.  Your DVR is far better than the one my cable company offers, but the three year cost for a TiVo Premiere for me would be $800, while the three year cost for my cable company’s DVR would be $180.

Not only are you more than four times more expensive, but you only have a one-year warranty, so if my TiVo has a problem in year 2 or 3 it falls to me to fix it out of my own pocket.  My cable company will send me a replacement box at no cost if their DVR has problems.

So, with TiVo I get a slicker product but at over 4 times the cost, and I also have to assume the risk of repair costs after the first year.  You’re good, but you’re not that good.  So, for the first time in eight years I am open to an alternative.  I don’t think it’s out there, yet, but if I’m ready and willing to move away from TiVo that means there are others like me who are, too.

I do hope that you figure out how to survive, and how to offer your products at a far more reasonable cost.  I know that cable companies are licensing your software to put on their set-top boxes, and I can see this being a way for you to survive.  My hope is that you are able to maintain the full feature set when provided by a cable company, because I can see them wanting you to disable or degrade certain functions so that they maintain control of their user base.  Don’t do that, please?

And I think one thing that has become clear over time is that your subscription fees are poisoning your business model.  Either make me buy the device with a huge up-front cash outlay *or* charge me a monthly fee, but don’t do both.  For a $500 up-front purchase price you should be able to provide the programming information at no additional charge.  If you don’t want to do that, then let me get the box for $10-$15/month and no up-front fee, and back it with an ongoing warranty just like my cable company does.  I’d do that in a heartbeat – get a TiVo Premiere for nothing up front and $15/month?  Sweet.  How about doing that?

But, after 8 years I feel that I know you well enough to know that you won’t do either of those things, because it appears that your corporate culture is too hide-bound to consider those alternatives.  Somebody, somewhere has decided that a monthly subscription fee needs to apply, and the huge up-front purchase price needs to apply, and that’s that.  If you have to have a monthly fee, how about making it something reasonable, like $5/month/household, and it doesn’t matter how many TiVo’s I have?

I’m rooting for you, but only a little bit.  I used to care about you, but now I don’t, because you’ve spent 8 years not caring about me.  I wish you good luck, and I hope you figure out a way to survive.  But, if you don’t, I will no longer be among those who mourn your passing, because while you had great engineering, your business side sucks.  How about listening to your engineers, who I’m sure have been trying to tell your business folks all of this all along?

But, no, conventional wisdom says that engineers don’t know what they’re talking about when it comes to business.  Er, except for Google, that is.  And Microsoft.  Oh, and HP, too. 

But, what do they know?

Sincerely,

EngineerBoy

Related posts:

1. Review of Amazon Unbox for TiVo
2. Review of the Westinghouse 47″ LCD HDTV (TX-47F430S)
3. EngineerBoy’s Review of the Litter-Robot

Typical US Airline Flight

I loathe and despise coach business air travel.  When I travel personally, it’s usually with Marie, and we usually plan to make sure we can travel in comfort.  You see, I’m 6’5″ and not svelte, and coach seating is not designed for me to fit in comfortably, and when we travel for pleasure we either wait until we can splurge on first class, buy a third seat so we have room, or make the best of sitting side-by-side.

However, when one’s company is footing the bill and you don’t have the flexibility that you do with personal travel, you get the seat you get and you have to make the best of it.  You can try for exit row or bulkhead, but those seats are in demand and sometimes hard to get.

Lucky for me, on my most recent business flight I was able to get the exit row aisle seat both outbound and inbound.  The flight out progressed without incident (thankfully), but as I boarded my flight home and approached my row, I noticed that the two inside seats were occupied by a couple, with the man by the window and the woman in the middle seat, meaning that my aisle seat would place me next to the wife.

Now, although I am a big guy, I can sit in such a way that I stay completely in my own air/leg/shoulder/butt space, particularly in an exit row where I can fully extend my legs.  So, I resolved myself to spend 3.5 hours in my polite, curled up, as-motionless-as-possible seating pose, so that the lady next to me would not feel infringed upon.

As I sat down I could sense the woman was not happy about the situation…I mean, who would be?  Even three normal-sized humans sitting side-by-side-by-side in a coach cabin is oppressively claustrophobic, and when one of the three is a big guy like me it just makes it worse.  So, I understood her pained look at her husband as I sat down, and also understood his reassuring patting of her leg as if to say, “It’s okay, honey, I won’t let the traveling ogre squash you!”

So, I sat down, belted up, stuck my legs up under the seat in front of me, crossed at the ankles to keep my knees clearly in my own airspace and not in any way crossing over into her leg space.  I folded my arms tightly, with the arm closest to the woman specifically tucked up as far as possible, so that I was clearly not infringing on her shoulder room, either.

I had also brought a couple of magazines to read, and when I pulled them out I held them with my arms almost fully extended in my lap, and when I turned the pages I did it with my arms fully extended so that my elbows didn’t bend and momentarily reduce her personal airspace.  I also fully ceded the armrest to the wife so that she wasn’t too squeezed-feeling.  Note that this is what I always do when I travel seated next to anybody but Marie, as I know that my large-tallness could be a burden to other fliers.

So, there I am, a big guy squeezed into a seat that isn’t designed for me, but contorted in such a way that I did not in any way cross over into the seating space of the woman next to me.  On most flights similar to this, that would be the story – me contorted and uncomfortable, but otherwise flying without incident.

Well, not this flight.  At first, everything was fine, or as fine as it can be in a coach sardine can.  However, I then noticed that the woman, who was 5’5″ at best (and slender), had not only taken to sitting with her legs crossed, but crossed in such a way that they were crossed *towards* me, and not only that, crossed at an angle so that her foot was clearly extending over into *my* airspace.  Really?!

I mean, she could have either a) easily not crossed her legs in such a manner that they floated into the legroom of the person next to her, or b) if she had to cross her legs in such a manner, at least do it in the direction of her husband.  He, presumably, would mind a lot less than me, and he was maybe 5’8″ himself, so had plenty of leg room.

So her border aggression was pretty irritating, but I again took the stance that although she was being rude, I was still partially to blame for the uncomfortableness of the situation, given my height/size.  In fact, I realized there might be a chance that she didn’t even realize what she was doing, and might have been subconsciously making sure to command her space, or something.  So, I tried to let go of the irritation.

Then she picked up her book to read.  And with almost every page flip, she elbowed me in the ribs.  Only a little but clearly enough that she knew she was doing it.  I’ll again state that I was very clearly completely on my side of the seat divider, and had ceded the armrest.  But, this wasn’t enough for her, so she had to come past the armrest with each page turn and elbow me, even though she could easily have turned the page in a much less elbowic manner.

So, that’s how the flight progressed.  Me sitting in such a way that I was contorted and remaining 100% on my side of the leg/air space of the seats, and her dangling her foot into my space and elbowing me when she turned her book pages.

W…T…F?

I resolved to just accept that I was flying next to a selfish, thoughtless human being, and although I found her behavior to be quite rude I still realized that me being a big guy contributed to the situation.  I’m already stressed out enough when I travel for business, so I didn’t need to also marinate in a stew of bilious resentment towards the high-riding b*tch sitting next to me.

So, to the extent possible, I let it go and tried to relax…relax…relax…(rib poke)……relax…let it go…deep breaths…(leg kick)……………relax, dammit!!

And I did, I kept my cool and tried to get along as part of a society.  Eventually I fell asleep.  Note that this was done by fully extending my legs under the set in front of me, tightly crossing my arms in front of me, and lolling my head to the side away from Ms. Prissy Pants.  And so I dozed off a couple of times like that, as comfortably as possible, but I’d nod off for a few minutes, wake back up (still fully balled up and not infringing her in any way), read some more, then go back to sleep.

During one of my bouts of sleeping, I was startled awake by the husband, let’s call him Mr. Prissy Pants, full-on kicking me in the legs as he tripped over me trying to climb over me to get out and go to the restroom.  He not only kicked me, he kicked his wife, and half-fell into the aisle, clumsily grabbing the back of somebody else’s seat across the aisle and startling them awake, too.  Now, through this flight I hadn’t slept for more than 10 minutes at a stretch, so it’s not like he had been blocked in by my long sleep cycle or anything.  I’m also not deaf so they could have easily asked me to move, and the wife obviously had no social compunctions about elbowing me already, so she could have elbowed me awake and asked me to move.

But no, he decided to try to climb over me, a sleeping, 6’5″ guy wedged into his seat as tightly as possible, and then clumsily tripping and kicking me, and waking me up and also waking up the guy across the aisle.

His polite response to this?  “Goddam it…fucking…shit…”

That’s it.  Then he stomped off down the aisle to the restroom.  No apology for a) kicking me and waking me up, b) waking up the guy across the aisle, or c) being stupid/rude enough to try to climb over me in the first place.  I assume there was no apology for kicking the wife because she was already used to his rudeness, or something.

At this point I did get sort of a pained smile from the wife, which I took to be contrite, but nothing more than that.  Also, she then immediately started shifting and squirming in her seat, like a 2 year old that has to go potty but doesn’t say so.  I finally asked her, very politely, “Would you also like to get out?”.  She said no, but she *clearly* needed to get up and go to the bathroom, too.  So I said, “Well, I was going to stretch my legs anyway, so feel free…”, and with that I got up and moved forward in the aisle to clear a path.  She immediately shot out of there and down the aisle.

I stood stretching my legs until they were both back in their seats.  I got nothing from the husband, no ‘thank you’, no ‘sorry’, not even eye contact.  Punk.

When the wife came back, she at least said a quiet little “thanks” with a pained smile.  But that was it, and sullen silence the rest of the flight.  The only good news was no more rib poking or leg kicking occurred.

I also noticed that, other than a logistical conversation as we were leaving (something like “where are the headphones?”, or something), the couple barely spoke a word to each other, although both were awake the whole flight, as far as I could tell.

So, maybe this couple was having some other problems, unrelated to air travel, that exacerbated the situation and/or their behaviors.  Maybe.  However, my gut feeling is that they were just a couple of rude, self-centered assholes who saw me as nothing more than an inconvenient lump that was further harshing their stonily silent travel.

At this point, I’d also like to make sure that the airlines get their fair share of the blame here.  You see, they already know what size seats are comfortable for the cross-section of normal travelers – just look at the chairs in the gate area.  The seats at the gate are by no means over-sized, but they are pretty much normal-sized, meaning that all of us waiting around for our flights can do so in relative comfort.

Now, I understand that I’m way over on the right-hand side of the bell curve when it comes to human sizing, and I don’t expect that airlines are going to make every seat large enough for me to be comfortable in.  But, what I would like, and what they could do with minimal effort in my opinion, is to offer slightly larger seats for slightly more money.  I, and I assume many, many, many other travelers, would happily pay an extra 25% for a seat that was 25% larger. 

However, today the only option is to pay anywhere from 4 to 10 times the ticket price to get a First Class seat, which by my reckoning is about 25% larger than Coach.  That’s ludicrous.  The airlines have scrunched and scrunched coach seating until it’s finally at the point where even normal-sized humans can barely travel without extraordinary discomfort.

Another option is to retrofit airplanes with offset seating.  Today, seats are configured side by side in a line, so that the part of most humans that is widest (shoulders) are lined up, creating the least amount of room between passengers.  However, it’s possible to slightly change the arrangement of seats so that each seat is slightly offset from the other, meaning that each passengers shoulder goes behind (or in front of) the shoulder of the person sitting next to them.

More seats, more room, more comfort, more privacy. Come on, airlines!

Although it would be hard to prove, and I doubt there is such a thing as a retroactive patent, I have conjured this seating arrangement up on my own in my head over the years as I have spent countless hours contemplating the horror of US coach air travel (whilst traveling, of course).  When I started writing this rant, I did some web research and found that this type of seating arrangement is already commercially available.  The picture to the left is from the website of Thompson Solutions, for example.

First, I have to say that I love Thompson Solutions for creating these seat prototypes.  Second, why the hell isn’t this type of seating being immediately adopted?!?  Yes, I know there is an expense to retrofitting planes, but how about on new planes that are added to the fleets?  How about starting to add offset seating to those?

The truth is that I really don’t need more room.  I can be happy in a cramped space, as long as it’s not inhumane and doesn’t involve ongoing incidental contact with strangers.  Offset seating provides exactly that.  In fact, I’d rather slide into a human-sized tube, get it sealed up, and be stacked like logs when I take a flight, rather than have to deal with the current cattle-car arrangement. 

One might respond that, in a free market, the customers decide what happens, and that if airplane travel were so horrible the airlines would be out of business.  Or, a competing airline would spring up and use smart new ideas to steal market share.  The problem is that, even though the airline industry has been ‘deregulated’, it’s not really a bunch of independent companies vying for market share on a level playing field.

Have you ever priced airline tickets?  Isn’t it an amazing coincidence how so many independent airline companies manage to offer the exact same fares on the same routes?  I mean, down to the penny – exactly the same.  This means, of course, that the airlines communicate in some way on fare structure.  Some might call that collusion, but I don’t want to get sued so I won’t.

Also, the major airlines have enormous control of gates at major airports.  Just ask Southwest Airlines.  They are probably the only real maverick airline, and they have been locked out of many major airports for a long time, because it’s impossible (or prohibitively expensive) to break the stranglehold that the larger airlines have on gates and flight times.  However, slowly but surely Southwest expands their routes over time.

They are actually my one hope for the return of sanity to air travel.  They’ve always gone their own way, and I could see them stepping up and doing something (like offset seating) to differentiate themselves further from the cattle-car airlines.

And to the prissy couple from above, and to all other fellow travelers, let’s please try to get along.  Air travel is a necessary evil in today’s world, and we are all just trying to get from Point A to Point B with our luggage and sanity intact.  I know there are rude people of all sizes, but let’s let them remain the minority.  Let’s all keep our wits about us and remember that we’re all human beings, and that if we could afford First Class we would, and if we could avoid cramped coach travel, we would do that, too.

But the reality is that most of end up traveling from time to time.  As a requirement of our professions.  To visit family.  To seek medical help.  To unwind on a vacation.  To attend a funeral.  And, as hard as it is to believe, very few people travel for the sole purpose of annoying their fellow passengers.  We’re all on board for a reason, and if we have any anger or ire let’s direct it at the airlines for not offering us any realistic options, rather than sniping at each other.

Related posts:

1. Can We Stop Airline Terrorism?
2. Esther’s Follies (***½)
3. Desperate Housewives (***)

Don't lose your cool...

We recently replaced two of our old, crappy window unit air-conditioners with newer models.  The new units were from Home Depot and the installation was do-it-yourself, and when I was done I realized that I had two undisposable hunks of junk to deal with.  You can’t just throw away a system loaded with refrigerant, so I figured all I had to do was figure out how everybody else did it, then do that.

My first strategy was to ask at the local recycling center here in Brenham.  They said I could probably take them to the collection station (dump), so the next time I went to the dump I asked at the office if they would take window unit air-conditioners.  They said they would, as long as all the coolant had been recovered by an authorized contractor, and the units were officially tagged as being empty.

That sounded good, so I started calling the local AC contractors around town, and found that 90% of them responded with “we don’t work on window units”, 5% took a message and called me back looking to schedule a coolant recharge, and 5% had no idea what I was talking about (and/or feigned ignorance because they didn’t want to do it).

At this point I’ll clarify that I clearly expressed that I was willing to pay a fee for this service, I wasn’t looking for it to be done for free, or anything, and still no takers.  I finally started doing some serious web searching and found this site:

http://www.texaspowerfulsmart.org/rebate/recycling_partners.php

Which bills itself as “Official Texas Trade Up Appliance Rebate Program”, and that link goes to their list of recycling partners.  That list looked very promising, especially when I saw that all Best Buy locations were drop-off locations that take room air-conditioners, as shown here:

Problem solved?! Nope...

With a song in my heart and a ‘green’ aura, I figured my problems were solved, so I loaded up the air conditioners (one of which was a 25,000 BTU model weighing 200+ pounds) and prepared to get rid of my albatrosses…albatrossi?…albatri?  Before heading out I figured I’d make a quick call to my local Best Best buy to confirm, and that’s when I got the bad news – they didn’t take air conditioners.  They didn’t really care too much about the fact that they were listed on the Texas site as being an authorized recycling center that took window units, it was no dice.

I figured I’d double-check on the Best Buy website, where I found this:

Confirmation of misinformation, frustration

I figured, oh well, just some miscommunication and/or old information, no worries, and I’ll just work my way down the list of nearby listed recycling centers.  Unfortunately, each one I contacted had variations of the same story, they either didn’t deal in window units, or they only recycled old units when they were selling you a new unit.

My strike-outs continued and my frustration mounted, until I got to ‘Barker’s Heating & Cooling Inc’ in College Station.  They knew what I was talking about, told me the fee ($75), said I could drop them off, and that they were open until 5pm.  I headed out as fast as I could, overjoyed at finally being able to finally get rid of these units in an ethical way.  Dealing with Barker’s could not have been any easier, they knew what they were doing, offloaded the units quickly, I paid the invoice, and I was on my way within 15 minutes.  Whew.  Here’s their website:

http://www.barkerservices.com/company.shtml

We’re planning on eventually installing central AC, and when we’re ready Barker’s will be getting the first shot at it due to their efficiency and friendliness in dealing with the recycling/disposal of these two window units.

I’m posting this in case it might prove helpful to somebody else in the same dilemma.  Those of you Texans in bigger  cities and/or in towns that already have a straightforward way to recycle air conditioners, be thankful.  For the rest of you, I hope this saga includes information that may prove helpful to you if you happen to be finding it frustrating to figure out how to get rid of your old window units ethically and legally.

Related posts:

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2. Asian Cajun Bar and Grill (***½)
3. Review of the BT Longhorn Saloon & Steakhouse (***½)

"If you could make God bleed, people will cease to believe in Him."

Iron Man 2 is a not-disappointing sequel, however it’s also not as entertaining as the original.  But, there have been only a very few sequels that equaled or surpassed their predescessors, so that’s not surprising. 

What was surprising, for me, was the understated performance by Mickey Roarke as Ivan Vanko (right), Iron Man’s nemesis with a family grudge in this installment.  Calling his performance “understated” is an…well…understatement, because Vanko is of course a larger-than-life comic book villain.  However, within that context, Roarke’s performance is carefully restrained and excellently realized.

Also well cast and well characterized are Sam Rockwell as Justin Hammer, head of a competing defense contracting firm, and Garry Shandling (Garry Shandling?!??!?) as Senator Stern, Iron Man’s foe in the Senate who is looking to have the government own (and exploit) the underlying Stark technology.  Scarlett Johansson also does a good job as Natalie Rushman, Tony Stark’s new assistant who is “from legal”.

The story…well…the story gets us from Point A to Point B very effectively, but it felt like a transition piece instead of a complete story.  That may be the way it has to be for movies based on comic books, since the comics have been around for decades and have much more story material than can be compressed into a movie (or two, or three).  However, it seems like a movie of this caliber should at least strive to end at a more momentous and climactic juncture.

The film-making is also sloppier than in the first one.  As an example, there is a sequence where Tony Stark appears as Iron Man at his own Expo (about the size of a World’s Fair) and is attacked by an army of drone robots.  These drone robots are similar to Iron Man, can fly, and are packed with advanced weaponry.  Iron Man takes off with the fleet of drones in hot pursuit, launching a continuous stream of weapon fire at him.  Does Iron Man fly as far away from the gathered expo-attendees?  No, he spends five minutes swooping and diving around the Expo, causing the drone-fire to strafe the crowds of innocent bystanders below, over and over and over and over again. 

He has no reason to hang around the Expo, there’s nobody he needs to rescue, nothing he needs to disarm or defeat, and if he had simply headed as far and as fast away from the Expo as he could he would have saved many, many lives.  In fact, after his 5 minutes of induced-strafing-of-the-innocents, he finally wises up and says something like, “Holy crap, I better get away from the Expo!”, and then zooms off.  Narcissistic personality disorder, indeed.

But, overall, it doesn’t disappoint, which is a bit of faint praise, but also a bit of a relief.  I really liked the first film, and was very worried that the sequel would go off the rails.  It didn’t.  It also didn’t blaze any new trails, but that’s okay.  This is one of the few sequels that left me wanting to see the third installment, and was definitely worth the price of a non-matinee, first-run movie theater ticket price.

Related posts:

1. Iron Man (***½)
2. Iron Mountain Lodge and Marina – DeGray Lake, Arkansas
3. The Dark Knight (***½)

Dogs eat it, flies swarm to it

I thought I’d try to be a little more gentle on the environment and use an ‘organic’ fertilizer for our yard.  I found Scotts® Organic Choice® Lawn Food at the local Home Depot and decided to give it a try.  I just spread it this weekend so I can’t speak to its greening or healthifying effects on the lawn, but I can state, unequivocally, that my three dogs and every fly in the general area *love* it.

I first spread it on the front lawn, without any drama, and the only slight warning sign was the very…er…’organic’ smell of the stuff.  However, it smelled like it could be a rich source of nutrients, if you know what I mean and I think you do.

Then I spread it in the back yard, where our dogs have access to the fenced yard.  I locked them in the house while I spread it, and as soon as I finished and let them back out all three of them started snuffling around the entire yard like prized truffle pigs.  Things took a turn for the worse when I noticed that all three of them were also licking the grass and ground and ingesting the fertilizer grains.

I also noticed that there were flies all over the yard, landing randomly all over the grass, apparently drawn in by the organic lawn food.  Note that I’m pretty meticulous about keeping our yard clean of doggie bombs, so the appearance of swarms of flies is not normal.  Also, the flies weren’t hanging around any dog piles, they were all over the yard.

I locked the dogs back in the house and figured I’d try watering the Scotts into the yard and see if that would help.  It didn’t, it only seemed to add an irresistable ‘gravy’ to the granules and made even more attractive to my dogs and the flies.

So, now, here I sit with my dogs locked in the house, waiting for the time when (I hope) the Scotts has lost its mojo enough that my dogs won’t continually graze on it.  The stuff claims to be safe for kids and pets, and there’s even a picture of a kid and a pet laying in a grassy yard on the label, but I bet this stuff isn’t designed to be a dietary supplement. 

I checked the Scotts site here, but they don’t have any helpful information, and as of the time of this posting the “View Label” button on that page returns:

“We apologize for the inconvenience, but this information is no longer current and accessible.”

Similarly, the ‘FAQ & Help’ tab says:

“Sorry, no F.A.Q. material for this product is available.  If you have product questions Scotts experts are available by email and phone in our Help Center.”

Which neither answers my questions nor is helpful.

So, if you’re like me and you’re exploring more natural ways to keep your lawn green, and you’re wondering about Scotts® Organic Choice® Lawn Food and your dogs, I can tell you that I won’t be using it again.  My dogs haven’t seemed to suffer in ill effects, but still, I don’t want them eating this stuff.  Also, the flies were just the icing on the cake and completed my disappointment in this product.  I mean, even if I didn’t have dogs, who wants to have a fly-infested green lawn?

Not me.

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The preparation and the finished product

I’ve always been partial to McDonald’s Sausage McMuffin with Egg, but I prefer to avoid fast food whenever possible, and I prefer to eat healthy ingredients.  For the sake of this article, “healthy” refers to the ingredients being as natural and pure as possible, and as free of chemicals, hormones, pesticides, preservatives, cruelty, and “modified” ingredients as possible (and not necessarily “food pyramid” healthy).

So, over the years I have learned to make breakfast muffins at home, and have refined the recipe to the point where I can barely eat fast-food muffins any longer, since they pale by comparison (if I do say so myself).

The recipe below is for three muffins, the ingredients are:

• 3 farm eggs
• 1/3 lb of natural pork breakfast sausage
• 3 tbs butter
• 3 slices Kraft Deli Deluxe American cheese, 3/4 ounce per slice
• 3 Bays sourdough English muffins
• 2 tbs of pure maple syrup (not Log Cabin or Butterworth type, but actual pure maple syrup)
• Salt and pepper to taste
• Tabasco to taste (optional)

A few words about the ingredients – we get our eggs and pork from Yonder Way Farm, which we are lucky enough to live a 10 minute drive from.  If you live in or around the Houston area we highly recommend either driving out to the farm (just outside of Brenham), or getting your order from one of their many delivery locations in the area. See more about Yonder Way Farm at the bottom of this article.

Also, if you’ve never had farm eggs (or if it’s been a while), they are amazingly better tasting than store bought eggs.  The yolks are almost orange, instead of yellow, and the eggs are naturally a variety of shapes and colors (see picture above).

One other ingredient note – the cheese we use is specifically and only Kraft Deli Deluxe American.  Don’t confuse this with the individually-wrapped “cheese food” versions of American cheese, the Deli Deluxe American is actually cheese, not a chemical concoction, and is significantly better tasting than the disgusting “cheese food” versions.

The gear is as follows: 

• 12″ Emeril Pro-Clad Stainless frying pan (which we *love* and use almost daily), for the eggs
• Cast iron frying pan, for the sausage (if you don’t have one, ask your mama about them)
• One Non-stick egg ring, for forming the sausage patties (but NOT for the eggs)
• Three stainless-steel egg rings, for the eggs
• Nylon spatula
• Scissor tongs
• Coffee cup or small bowl
• Butter knife and fork

First, leave the cast iron skillet cold for now, but put the stainless steel skillet on medium-low heat (setting 3 out of 10 on our electric stove) with the three stainless steel egg rings in it, to pre-heat.

Now, in the COLD cast iron frying pan, we need to create the sausage patties in place in the pan.  Lay the larger, non-stick egg ring where the first patty will go, then take enough of the breakfast sausage to roll into a ball about 1.5″ in diameter.  Put the ball in the ring, then gently work it flat until if forms a thin layer at the bottom of the ring, all the way to the edges.  We like our patties as thin as possible without falling apart, which means starting with about 3/8″ thickness of the raw sausage.  When finished, lift the ring off the sausage, leaving the patty, and move the ring to the next position, and so forth until you have three patties.

Now, put the cast iron skillet with the three patties in it on a burner on medium heat (5 on a scale of 10 on our electric stove).  Now reach over and turn down the heat under the stainless steel skillet to low (2 out of 10 on our stove).  Crack the three eggs into the coffee cup (or small bowl), salt and pepper to taste (and add Tabasco if so inclined), then use the fork to lightly stir to break up the egg yolks and even out the seasonings.

Put a pat of butter in each stainless egg ring to melt, use the tongs to move the rings around to spread the butter evently.  Pour an equal amount of egg into each egg ring.  Let everything cook for a minute or two here.

Now, about the English muffins.  Unless you have a six slice toaster you’ll have to do multiple batches to get all three toasted.  Now would be a good time to start dropping the muffins to toast – you’ll probably have to experiment to get the timing correct for toasting the muffins, depending on the number of slices your toaster holds, how fast it toasts, how brown you like it toasted, etc.

Now, flip the sausages, they should be pretty browned up on the cooked side by now.  Watch the eggs, you’ll be able to see the cooked part solidify in the bottom and along the sides, when it looks cooked about halfway through (bottom half solid cooked, top half still runny), use the scissor tongs to hold the tongue of the egg ring in place, use a butter knife to run around the inside edge of the ring to loosen the egg, then use the butter knife to lever up under the cooked part of the egg, letting the runny part run back down into the bottom of the ring, then flip the cooked part of the egg over and set it back down inside the ring, covering the runny part that just ran into the bottom.  That’ll put what was the cooked bottom of the egg on top, and allow the rest of the egg cook below it.

It’s a bit tricky to do the egg flip maneuver, but with practice you should get it.  I sometimes have egg run out under the bottom edge of the ring, or slide out over the top edge of the ring – if that happens, let the escaped egg cook for a few seconds to get slightly solid, then scoop it up and put it on top of the source egg to maintain egg volume.

After a few more minutes the sausage should be done, flip to be sure, it should be browned on the other side, too.  Remove the sausage to a plate, and pour a small portion of maple syrup onto each patty, and spread it around a little to cover the top.  You’ll probably want to add the syrup to taste, but my recommendation is not to put to much on, or it’ll drip on you while you eat it.

You should also be able to remove the egg rings from the eggs now, again using the tongs to grab the tongue of the ring and using the butter knife to run around the inside of the ring to loosen the egg.  If you do this too early, you’ll get some runny egg leaking out from the middle, and you’ll have to learn the timings for your stove, tools, and methods.

Flip the eggs again, and then at this point I use the spatula to flatten them out a bit, which spreads them out and makes them “English-muffin sized” and a better fit when put together.  At this point I also turn the heat under the eggs up to 5, to prepare it for grilling the muffins and to finish the eggs.  I also cut the corners off the cheese slices to make them octoganal and a better fit for the sandwich…if you leave the corners they tend to droop and “over-cheese” the taste.

Remove the cooked eggs to a plate, and put a cheese-octogan on each one – the cheese will melt slightly during the rest of the process.  Add a bit more butter to the pan, then grill the English muffins (insides only, not the outsides) in the pan – this crisps them up and makes a nice grilled taste.

Now assemble the muffins – muffin bottom, egg with cheese on top, sausage patty with a hint of maple syrup, and muffin top.  Voila, ready to eat…enjoy!

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Bound by Logic

We walked into Sherlock Holmes with the baseline hope of being entertained, and we were not disappointed.  Director Guy Ritchie has created a period/action/mystery film, starring Robert Downey Jr. as Holmes and Jude Law as Watson.  We could not recall a single other Guy Ritchie film that we’ve actually watched all the way through, as we typically find ourselves overwhelmed by the style but underwhelmed by the story, however in this case the film delivers on both counts.

The story revolves around a plot to return England to her glory days as the Empire, including re-absorbing the United States, weakened by the Civil War.  A secret society uses advanced (for the times) technologies in an attempt to give the appearance of supernatural powers, and to then rule by fear.  In a parallel thread, Watson is engaged to be married and is in the process of moving out of 221B Baker Street, much to the dismay of Holmes, who conspires to delay the passing of their close partnership.

Holmes and Watson, of course, work together to uncover the plot and foil the plotters, and the film ends with an obvious setup of the sequel, which will, of course, include matching wits with the infamous Professor Moriarty.

The style is a mash-up of authentic-looking old London combined with modern slow-mo, blow-up, near-super-hero-ish sensibilities.  This could have been a horrific combination, but Guy Ritchie keeps it all just enough in check so that things don’t spin into forehead-slapping territory.

Put it together and it was a solidly entertaining film, and I am looking forward to the sequel.  It wasn’t great or classic cinema by any stretch of the imagination, but you’ll feel like you got your money’s worth, unlike with many (many, many) other big-budget, action-oriented movies.

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2. Unleashed (***)
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Three's A Crowd

First, about the hype.  This is one creepy and disturbing movie.  It may not be the scariest movie I’ve ever seen, but it’s in the top ten.  The fact that it delivers such a wild ride but was made for less than $20,000 borders on amazing.

The plot is simple – Katie has been sporadically plagued with things going bump in the night her whole life.  She now lives with her boyfriend Micah, and recently she has started noticing strange happenings once again.  Micah, being the typical male, figures that the best way to respond is to buy some new electronics, and so as the film begins he as just come home with a brand-new, high-def video camera and sound recorder which he proudly explains (multiple times) he has connected via firewire to his laptop to document the events.  Then, if they are actually happening they will have proof, but if the tapes show nothing, it will serve to help Katie understand that nothing is actually happening.

That seems reasonable, except for the fact that Micah’s meddling and problem solving only serve to piss “it” off, and so matters begin to escalate.  They consult a ghost expert, who is helpful and friendly, sort of like Tim Gunn if he were on Project RunAway!  However, once the expert figures out that the malevolent entity is a demon instead of a ghost, he gets the hell out of there, leaving Micah and Katie phoning for help from what appears to be the only practicing demonologist in Southern California (ha!), who conveniently happens to be out of town until after the movie is over.

The entire film takes place on their property, from the opening shots of Micah filming Katie pulling into their driveway, to random handheld shots around the house, typical family films from the backyard pool, and most disturbingly, tapes of them sleeping, filmed with the camera completely stationary on a tripod in the corner of the bedroom, in night vision.  Yes, that’s where the fun begins.

The film does a great job of ratcheting up the tension, night after night after night.  We learn from the film that since this is a demon who is fixated on Katie, it wouldn’t help for them to leave, because the issue doesn’t have to do with the house, but with Katie, and the demon would simply follow them.  So, they surf the web and read books and try to figure out what to do.  How successful they turn out to be I will leave as an exercise for the viewer.

The actors who play Micah and Katie do a great job of seeming like a typical, young, upwardly-mobile couple.  Their house looks freshly decorated, and doesn’t have a “lived in” look.  He’s a day trader, she’s a student, he plays guitar, she does bead-work and knitting.  They seem perfectly natural on-screen, just the way all of us look and act when self-consciously filming ourselves with home video equipment. 

When they wake up, they look groggy and puffy.  When the camera pans the interior of the house, we see awkwardly exposed power cords and clutter, intermingled with furnishings from the upper-price ranges at IKEA.  They have a HUGE television and a pool, she drives a Miata, and they live in what appears to be higher-end-but-still-somewhat-cookie-cutter neighborhood.  It’s all pitch perfect.

The story behind the film is pretty interesting, too.  The director (Oren Peli, also the writer) filmed it in his own house and a very low budget.  He showed the film around festivals and shopped it around, and Paramount ended up buying the rights to the film, but apparently they did so only to get the rights to remake it.  Paramount started showing it to big-name directors trying to entice them into making a bigger-budget version, but Steven Spielberg told them they were crazy and they should just release the original film, albeit maybe with a different ending.

Also, reportedly, Spielberg took the screening DVD home with him to view, and after watching it started having his own paranormal problems, including doors closing and locking from the inside.  Things got to the point where he finally brought the DVD back to Paramount in a garbage bag, as he didn’t even want to touch it.  This could all have been cooked-up nonsense to add to the film’s mystique, but it would seem to me that Spielberg has more than enough money to waste his time playing make-believe in order to sell somebody else’s film.

After all that, I do have one big, BIG problem with the film, that almost caused me to shout at the screen, and which caused me to quietly whisper several times to Marie.  If you look at the picture included in this post, you will see that Katie sleeps on the side of the bed closest to the door.  And all through the movie, even when malevolent happenings are happening, even when they see ON TAPE with their own eyes that these happenings pass through their door, she continues to sleep on that side of the bed.  Although it certainly makes us feel more fear for Katie, it was ridiculous to think that any boyfriend/husband would allow his wife to continue to be the first one exposed to known danger by being closest to the door that way.  Hmph.

Other than that, this movie is pitch perfect.  I’ve seen a *lot* of scary movies in my day and am pretty jaded, but I can tell you that I’ll be very happy going to bed tonight knowing that we have three big, fierce dogs in the bedroom with us.

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Jesus Christ, it's the 14th Earl of Gurney!

I am amazed that I had never heard of this film until very recently.  We watched it last night (via Netflix Watch Instantly), and it was one of the most profoundly absurd, amusing, and disturbing films I’ve ever seen.  If you think you may one day have any plans to see it, my advice is to stop reading reviews right now, and come back after you’ve seen it.

Part of the power of this film is that it starts out as what feels like a quirky little comedy, then evolves into a sort of absurdist satire of the English class system, takes a turn into the blackest of black comedy, and then…well…let’s just say that the longer you watch the stranger it gets, until the end when it will elicit from the viewer an involuntary “WTF?!?”, whether one likes the film or not.

And we liked it, very much.  Well, as much as a disturbing move can be liked, that is.  However, I wouldn’t give it a blanket recommendation to every potential viewer, because it’s just so…bizarre.  I’ll put it this way, if you think that a film that is sort of a combination of Eraserhead, Monty Python, A Clockwork Orange, Murder by Death, and Jesus Christ: Superstar sounds intriguing, then this might be a film for you.

The key ingredient that allows this film’s radical elements to coalesce into a near-masterpiece is the transcendent performance of Peter O’Toole, for which he received an Oscar nomination for Best Actor (losing to Marlon Brando in The Godfather).  He enters the film sporting both the appearance of, and belief that he is, Jesus Christ.  When asked how he knows that he is God, he responds, “Simple. When I pray to Him, I find I am talking to myself.”

If you find that quote witty and sublime, you might enjoy this film.  If you find it blasphemous and/or offensive then you may want to skip this movie altogether, because it only gets worse (or better, depending on one’s perspective) from there.  In another example, while reciting his marriage vows he promises to love his bride “…from the bottom of my soul to the tip of my penis.”  Again, if you think you could find that line funny in the proper context, this might be a film you would enjoy.

The basic storyline is that, after his father’s (jaw dropping) death, Jack (Peter O’Toole) returns to inherit his vast estate and title as the 14th Earl of Gurney.  Jack has spent the last few years in and out of asylums, as he is quite mad, but his powerful father would never allow him to be committed, as that would bring shame and disgrace on the family name.  Jack’s surviving relatives begrudge him the inheritance, and so plot and scheme to take control away from him.

That could be the synopsis for a benign and forgettable English parlor dramedy, but it merely provides the framework around which a surreal story unfolds.  If the description of the film thus far hasn’t given you a clear idea of what to expect, I’ll add that, at any moment, in any context, and in any combination, the characters of this film are prone to breaking out into song and dance numbers, which is normally one of my least favorite things in a film, but here it serves to ratchet up the lunacy to ever more scarifying heights.

I won’t share any more of the plot, but I will reiterate that this film will most definitely *not* be for everyone, and I don’t mean that in the “some of you aren’t cool/hip enough to get this film” sort of way, I mean it in the truest sense of the words.  I believe that most viewers will either love the film or hate it, with very little middle ground – think of an exotic dish prepared with unfamiliar spices and ingredients, with a distinctive and powerfully unique taste and texture.  Some will love it, others will hate it, and neither are “right” or “wrong”, it’s just a matter of taste and preference.

But, if you are intrigued by the prospect of a film that is absurd, engaging, dark, surreal, funny, musical, and tragic, then you may want to put The Ruling Class on your Halloween movie list.

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Lies Scene

The Informant is a *real* movie, made the way movies should be made.  First of all, the script is amazing.  Second, the acting is phenomenal.  Third, the score is perfect.  Fourth, the costumes, locations, and make-up are flawless.  And fifth, the directing and cinematography are beautiful.

And sixth of all, it’s funny as hell!

The story is loosely based on the events surrounding the Archers Daniels Midland price-fixing scandal of the 1990′s, primarily involving lysine, a food additive.  Matt Damon plays a fictionalized version of real-life whistle-blower Mark Whitacre, a high-level ADM executive who turned informant for the FBI.

As imagined in The Informant!, Mark Whitacre is a mildly sociopathic, self-deluding, compulsive-lying, white-collar criminal.  When Whitacre blames his own failures on sabotage by competitors, the FBI is called in to investigate.  Lead agent Brian Shepard (Scott Bakula) develops a rapport with Whitacre, and eventually hears about much bigger malfeasance being perpetrated by ADM themselves.  Whitacre’s wife guilts him into revealing the sordid details to the FBI, seemingly because it is the right thing to do.

And over the course of the next few years, Whitacre is run as an undercover agent by the FBI, wearing wires, eliciting damning statements from competitors and co-workers who are being secretly videotaped, and providing substantiating documentation of the global price-fixing being organized by ADM.  And, when they finally have enough evidence to convince the Attorney General’s office that the case is solid, they swoop in and make a bunch of arrests.

And then the fun really begins.  I won’t divulge any of the rest of the story, but suffice it to say that The Informant is an engaging and laugh-out-loud black comedy, made with near-perfect craftsmanship.  Matt Damon added 30+ pounds to meet director Steven Soderbergh’s one-word description of the look we wanted for the character – doughy.  Add the 80′s styled hair and porn-star-ish moustache, and Damon is transformed into a grifter extraordinaire.

And if there was an Oscar category for Best Stream-of-Consciousness-Narration, this film should win, hand’s down.  As played by Damon, Whitacre is placed into many stressful, dangerous, and scary situations, but his running mental commentary is…sublimely detached and egocentric, as if he was having an out of body experience, and while his body and voice stay engaged with the real world, his thoughts wander to trying to figure out how polar bears realized their black noses made them stand out against the snow, and so cover them with a paw while lying in wait for prey.  Did they see their reflection in the ice or the water?  Did they notice other polar bears were conspicuous with their black noses?  That seems like a lot of thinking for a polar bear.

It certainly does.  And this movie will cause a lot of thinking from the audience, because the story moves fast, the plot is serpentine, and there are no dramatic zooms or musical flourishes to alert the audience that Something Important Is Being Conveyed Right Now.  In this film, the plot twists and turns based on casually uttered phrases, and you end up asking yourself, did I just hear that?  But doesn’t that mean the exact opposite of what we already know?  Now what?!?

And I have to admit, it felt really, really good to be engaged both by the humor and also by the complex story.  Too many movies today are either Serious or Funny, but this movie is both.  It’s like a bizarre clone that combines the DNA of Michael Clayton and A Fish Called Wanda, but in a good way.  I mean, the plot revolves around a bunch of execs from a global conglomerate who conspire with their international competitors to fix the price of a food additive.  That’s not exactly a gold mine of possibility, but Soderbergh and company have taken it and crafted one of the most unique and enjoyable movies I’ve seen in years.

To put it in perspective, this is the kind of film where you’re watching a scene where the biggest, baddest, silver-haired ADM exec has come down to face-off with and intimidate his conniving underling, and as the scene unfolds you ask yourself…do I recognize that actor…no…wait…can it be…is that…is that Tommy Smothers playing the executive?!  Yup.  And later on, is that Dick Smothers as the judge?!?  Yup again.

So, directed by Soderbergh, exec produced by George Clooney, starring Matt Damon, story about boring food additives and price fixing, main character is a compulsive liar, there’s a guy from 30 Rock, a guy from Quantum Leap, The Smothers Brothers, and there’s even a gratuitous Cusack in this film (I didn’t know there was a third!).  Put it all together and this is a film.  A Hollywood film.  A piece of cinema.  Not a packaged deal.  Not a marketing campaign.  Not a merchandising machine.

A film.  By film makers.  For film watchers.  Go and enjoy.

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