The phone rang at 7:30am; it was Best Buy, telling me that they’d be here to install the new TV by 1pm and asking if it would be OK if they came earlier, maybe 11am. I said “yes”, and we went out for a walk in the rain.

The phone rang again at 10:30am; it was Best Buy, asking if they could come in 10 minutes. I said “yes”.

They had a little trouble removing the old TV – it had been sitting in one place for years, and the weight of the TV made the rubber feet on the stand adhere VERY firmly to the glass table. But they got the stand to loosen its death grip and took the old TV away, giving me just enough time to clean the glass thoroughly (Bosch cooktop cleaner does a great job!) before they assembled the new TV to its stand and put it on the table.

The picture was spectacular, as I’d expected; it was set to full brightness and contrast, so it almost popped out of the screen; I’ve toned it down a little bit, and I’ll try Consumer Reports’ recommended settings tomorrow.

I don’t particularly like the Samsung remote – it is VERY minimal (it doesn’t even have a mute button – you have to press down on the volume switch), so I expect to stick with the Harmony as the main remote.

I hooked up the Apple TV, Mac mini, and Raspberry Pi directly to the TV, since they’re all 4K-capable; I left the TiVo and Blu-Ray player attached to the A/V receiver. It’s awkward, though I was able to program my Harmony remote to handle everything. I’m looking forward to getting a new 4K-capable A/V receiver soon – Best Buy will have the one I want (Denon AVR-X1700H) in stock locally again next weekend, and I have built up some credit in the Best Buy rewards program in the last few months.

Shabbat Shalom!

My cousin Darryl offered some advice after I posted about making frozen latkes: “Get a real mixer instead of the crappy one you have now!” He even sent a link to a discounted KitchenAid 5-quart bowl-lift mixer at Best Buy so I wouldn’t have to do my own research.

So I did some research and decided that I didn’t want to get that mixer. Instead, I got a discounted KitchenAid 5-quart tilt-head mixer at Best Buy. It’s a little smaller than the mixer Darryl recommended and can only knead 4 pounds of bread dough instead of 7, but I think I can live with that limitation.

We used it for the first time today to make pretzels, and I was impressed. I didn’t have to hold on to the mixer to keep it from wandering; I didn’t have to scrape dough off the walls of the bowl to get it into the dough ball; I didn’t have to add more water to get all of the flour incorporated into the dough after the initial three-minute mix; it took less time to get the dough completely developed.

Thanks for the advice, Darryl!

I spent a long time today thinking about upgrading my A/V receiver to go along with the new TV (I have a Denon AVR-2112CI which works fine, but it doesn’t support 4K video or eARC). The Denon AVR-X1700H has the features I need (it doesn’t have analog video input in case I want to play an old laserdisc, but I should be able to live without that), but it’s not available locally at Best Buy, which seems to be the only remaining store in the area which sells decent but not insanely priced audio gear. There are still some high-end audio shops nearby, but I’m not interested in buying a receiver with a five-digit price tag!

Since I can’t get a new receiver before the TV arrives on Friday, I may as well wait to order a replacement until I see how the new TV works with the old receiver (or if the new TV’s audio is sufficient). Should I order from Denon, Amazon, or Crutchfield? :-)

It’s Tuesday, so we went to the chiropractor as usual this morning. It was raining off and on during our drive, but nothing particularly serious, so we expected to take our usual after-adjustment walk on the Los Gatos Creek Trail – we were wearing raingear, and I’d even brought along my Makanyi hat to keep me warm.

But when we got to the parking lot, we couldn’t park in our usual space.

The chiropractor told us that people come and hang out in the parking lot in the evenings and party in their vehicles; his best guess was that whoever was in the truck heard the tree crack and tried to back away, but couldn’t get far enough before the tree fell on their truck. He also mentioned that he’d been awakened about 2:10am by lighting, thunder, and strong winds (he lives about a mile from us); we hadn’t noticed anything.

While we were chatting, a notification popped up on my phone about strong thunderstorms in the area. Diane and I decided that this was a perfect opportunity to fulfill my resolution to visit Valley Fair and walk inside.

There were quite a few traffic lights out along our way. And when we got to the mall, the power was out to about half of the stores, including the new section that had opened in early 2020. We were still able to walk through that part of the mall, but actually visiting Eataly or Bloomingdales or even Macy’s will have to wait – they were all locked down tight.

Our next stop was Lunardi’s; they were operating on generator power and had been since about 2:10am. We picked up our food and went home; we still had power, but much of Los Gatos had lost power in the storm, as had a lot of people in the mountains.

We stayed home the rest of the day. Maybe more of Valley Fair will be open on our next visit.

One of the high points of our trip to Africa earlier this year was the time we spent at [Makanyi Private Game Lodge] near Kruger National Park. The animals were amazing, the guides were excellent and informative, the food was tasty, the accommodations were comfortable, and the sundowners were a wonderful way to wind down from a day of game drives.

I liked the place so much that I bought a scarf and a knit cap with their logo as souvenirs. I put them away when we got home, planning to wear them when the weather got cold; I didn’t want them to get lost in the closet, so I put them in a Good Safe Place.

Months passed, and winter arrived. I knew where the scarf was, but I couldn’t find the cap. I pulled out all the luggage we’d taken to Africa – no cap. I cleaned out the closet where I stash my headgear – no cap. I was beginning to think that I’d only thought about buying the cap and hadn’t. I was even considering calling or emailing them to see how much it would cost to get a cap shipped to the US.

Tonight, while I was in a Toastmasters meeting, Diane found the missing cap. It was in the same chest of drawers as the scarf, just two drawers lower. I had not one, but two Good Safe Places; it’s a shame I didn’t remember to look in both of them!

Thanks, Diane!