Orientation

So here are the highlights of MY Sunday.

1. Farmer's Market in Long Beach - bought a couple of Bacon Avocados and a bison steak.

2. Helped my girlfriend escape from the onorous yoke of Comcast by fixin' up her roof antenna.

3. Not watching the Superbowl, except to test reception.

LH (said girlfriend) has been on Comcast since she moved in to her place last year, and she got one of those bundles where they provide cable and internet service for a low introductory rate. And since she doesn't watch a lot of TV she got the absolute minium of cable possible - local channels, public access, weather, the Learning Channel and Classic Arts Showcase. And even though she has a 32 inch 1080i TV, her cable box was only providing standard def. She'd come over to my place and see glorious Hi-Def images pulled out of the ether for nothin' and she decided it worth the cost of 3 months of service to buy a good roof antenna and get it installed. However, the guy who put it up there just basically stuck it in a hole and left.

The thing is, lugging the thing up a ladder and putting it a hole nowadays is the hardest part. My job was easy as hell, even easier because I have what those guys in the sixties didn't; an iphone. (I also needed a monkey wrench and screwdriver, but that's details). But the most important thing you need when you're setting up an antenna is which way to point it, and putting this into your browser is almost the whole battle. You tell it where you are, it tells you where the signals are. As it happens, in Los Angeles County almost all the TV worth seeing comes from Mount Wilson, so you don't have to choose which stations you'd rather see. The whole package is right there.

From my apartment, Mount Wilson is 76-78 degrees off magnetic north. If I were setting up the antenna there, I'd take the iPhone up to the roof, use the compass, and point the antenna that way. And I'm thinking of trying to get permission to do that, because now my girlfriend gets better reception than I do. In fact, terrestrial HD is a better quality than cable or satellite HD because those guys take the terrestrial signal and recompress it before they send it to you. If you have multiple inputs on your HDTV (you do, trust me) consider hooking up an antenna for the local channels.

Tonight I think I'll enjoy House in pristeen HD while eating my bison steak. By the way, who won?