I’m considering getting an entirely new home theatre set-up, and this is where I’m saving my research/exploration findings.
Television
I’m thinking of a 42″ Panasonic Plasma (at JR.com): TH-42PX60U. It’s extremely high-rated, great looking, and fits in the space I have.
Price: $1299 US, $1500 CAD
Receiver
Panasonic SA-XR57S (also at JR). I’ll be able to run everything into here […]

In case you didn’t realize it, having to work two jobs in order to pay the rent is now referred to as “portfolio diversification:”

Firefighters who want to live in high-priced cities can work two jobs, said W. Michael Cox, chief economist for the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. “I think it’s great,” he said. “It […]

H2O

Originally uploaded by johnkoetsier.

Teresa and I were out shopping this afternoon … our main floor bathroom is about to get blown up and redone.
High time, too …
We saw this sand-blasted glass sink and faucet - beautiful. Unfortunately, due to irritating facets of reality (namely, pipes, […]

I’m finally home from traveling 3 out of the last 4 weeks.
I remember seeing an interesting tutorial a couple of months ago on multiplying people in photographs, and we had a bit of time for fun, so I thought I’d celebrate being home by increasing the number of kids in our home.
Here are Gabrielle and […]

Houston police chief Harold Hurrt wants to put surveillance cameras in all kinds of private spaces … including homes.

“I know a lot of people are concerned about Big Brother, but my response to that is, if you are not doing anything wrong, why should you worry about it?” Chief Harold Hurtt told reporters Wednesday at […]

For over a decade, Teresa and I (mostly Teresa) survived life dryer-less. That sounds shocking to a lot of people, but we just never bought a dryer.
When we were just starting out, we spent $800 on a Maytag washer, and there wasn’t any cash left over - or at least none that we really wanted […]

I keep hearing more about marmoleum as a cool new flooring option.

Looks like a very neat eco-friendly option other than hardwood or tile. Feet-friendly, too.

I’m sort of in the market for a design tool that will let me have some fun with home design and architecture, and there are two tools that appear interesting right now.
One is Microspot Interiors. Looks very cool - you see it in action via a demo movie. A bit pricy, perhaps, at about 120 […]

Last summer, I spent a day helping my dad refinish his basement. It’s in the house I grew up in; my parents have owned it for almost 40 years.
The house itself is well over a hundred years old. I was born and raised in New Westminster - the oldest city (and former capital city) […]

Cornelia Rinsche Hartog was born January 2, 1924, in Holland. More than that, I don’t know. Somehow, the city of Rotterdam rings a bell, but I honestly don’t know.
I always knew her as Corrie. Not that I ever called her that, of course. She was my then-girlfriend’s Oma, grandmother. But that’s the name that Rienk, […]

Teresa and I took our sons Ethan and Aidan to Science World yesterday after some furniture shopping in Yaletown.
One thing that caught my eye was an amazing plasma display. I’ve been looking a little at large flatscreen TVs lately. I almost certainly won’t get one this year, but it’s always fun to look.
But I haven’t […]

I need a backup solution for my home computer (an iMac G5), and I’m considering these products:
- Deja Vu, for backup and cloning software
- Iomega 250 GB USB 2.0 external drive, for actual disk space
(That’s a pretty cheap 250 gigs, btw … about $100 USD, after rebates.)

One of the problems in our house is an enormous wall in our living room for which we have never yet found a suitable piece of art.
It’s about 20′ high, and perhaps 12′ wide … a standard-sized painting would look puny and insignificant, not to mention re-emphasizing the sheer size of the space.
The solution might […]

In this post, I talked about the travails of installing defective laminate flooring.
I am feeling a LOT better about it now. We ripped up all the old new flooring - Swiss Lock laminate - returned it, and came home with the new new flooring: Formica laminate. Much better!

In my last post, I talked about feeling like a handyman … since we’re installing laminate flooring.
Well, that was shortlived.

Wow. I feel like a handyman.
We’re installing new flooring - laminate hardwood - on our main floor. Don’t let anyone fool you - it’s a lot of work. And we haven’t even started laying the floor yet.