Last night (meaning Wednesday), I went to Best Buy. I decided it was way past time to acquire a new cell phone. (Attentive readers may remember that Bitscape's old cell phone has utterly sucky coverage in and around the Castle Lair. Since since the land line was cancelled due to excessive annoyance, this effectively elimiated direct voice communication from inside the Lair.)

I pondered the provideres, and the choices available, knowing only one thing for certain: No Verizon. I decided to try the AT&T service, and found a Panasonic phone that looked most suitable. Unfortunately, there was only 1 sales guy in the cell phone section, and he was taking such a ridiculously long time to wait on other customers, I finally gave up and left. To the other Best Buy.

There, I was waited on promptly by a sales person. Unfortunately, the cell phone I wanted was out of stock. Doh. But he said it would be more in on Thursday.

While in The Temptation Zone, I was lured by the Queensryche Live Evolution concert DVD, and purchased it. More on that in a bit.

On Thursday, I returned to Best Buy during lunch, and went through the process of purchasing the phone. This time, I did opt to purchase the 2 year service plan, since 2 other cellphone people I know (those being my mom and brother) have said they were glad they got it for the free battery replacements.

I charged my phone at the office, called ATT to get it activated, and service came on virtually instantaniously. Excellent. A much spiffier phone than my last one, with much spiffier features, such as a hands-free earpiece, longer battery life, a speaker phone, memo recording, and capacity for more phone numbers (though I ever used more than a dozen of the slots anyway). I am pleased to report it also works perfectly from the Castle Lair. Mission accomplished.

The only downside is that I can no longer brag about how my cell phone only 1 penny to purchase. Well, that, plus the fact that I did have to pay more than a penny to get it.

It could be considered a mildly disturbing trend that 3 of my monthly bills will now be paid different divisions of the AT&T corporation. Sigh. All hail consolidation. At least their service doesn't suck compared to the alternatives, in areas where such a thing exists (i.e. Qwest, Verizon; I guess I haven't actually tried satellite tv, although I don't think my apartment faces the required direction anyway). Or I could have just been brainwashed by the AT&T commericals that appear in almost every commercial break on virtually all the channels.

Another slightly spooky thing to note: AT&T and Verizon appear to have exactly the same voice mail interface, right down to the automated operator voice and menu options. Might they actually be dialing into the same system? Interesting...

Another random idea: The phone system really ought to have something like dns, so that when you change your number, you don't have to go and tell everyone the new number. I know I'm far from the first person to muse about this, but it really would be a good idea.

Moving on...

Queensryche. Live Evolution. This DVD is really great. (Surprise, surprise!) The concert, performed in a tiny little theater in the band's hometown of Seattle, takes a tour through the history of their music in semi-not-quite-chronological order.

I had the privilige of seeing this band in person when they played at Red Rocks in July of 1997. I quote the late Chris Farley. "That was awesome!"

This audio on this DVD, while not the hyper-engineered surround extravaganza of the NIN disc I got a couple weeks ago (that one totally spoiled my ears), is solid and powerful. Last night, I listened to the 5.1 mix on the speakers. Tonight, I listened to (much of) the 2 channel mix in my headphones. The 5.1 mix is pretty much all in the front. So much so, that I'm not certain why they even bothered putting it in a 5.1 track, because it doesn't sound like it uses much of the rear at all. The sound is sharp though.

That said, the 2 channel mix has a distinctly different flavor. I confirmed this tonight by switching between the downmixed 5.1 and 2.0 in my headphones several times. Initially, the 2.0 mix sounds kind of wacky because of the extreme separation, but I got to like it after listening a few minutes. While the (downmixed by my receiver) 5.1 mix puts everything in a "conventional" sounding stereo space with, the 2 channel mix puts Michael's guitar all in the left ear (or nearly so), except when he's doing solos, and Kelly's guitar all in the right. The drum, bass, and Geoff's voice are centered. The sound matches their positions on the stage. This is way cool for listening to how the different instrument parts come together to form the music. (When those two lead guitars get into a duet, like they do on Eyes of a Stranger, look out!)

In a move somewhat rare for concert dvds (at least the ones I've seen), the video is presented in 16:9 aspect ratio. This goes nicely for the width of a stage which has 5 people playing on it. I like.

The content. Well, it's Queensryche. That serves as a guarantee that the show Doesn't Suck. Geoff has an amazing voice. The performance is excellent. He sings with power and passion. Hit those high notes, Geoff. (On some songs, he does opt for using a lower pitch than was recorded on the studio versions. Perhaps to avoid straining vocal chords within the first 5 minutes? He can hit the high ones when he wants to, although you can see on his face that he's pushing.)

The show starts with the old classics. NM156, Road to Madness (awesome stuff), a bring-down-the-house performance of The Lady Wore Black, London, Screaming in Digital. Then jump forward in time to the Empire/Promised Land stuff. I Am I, Damaged, Empire (high energy), Silent Lucidity, Jet City Woman. Then a few of the newer stuff from Hear in the Now Frontier and Q2K. Rewind to everyone's favorite: Operation Mindcrime. My only complaint here is that I wish they had done more songs from this, the sacred narrative. The stuff they did was great (especially the guest vocal by Pamela Moore on Suite Sister Mary), but I wanted to here more than just 3 songs from it.

The show wraps up with a couple more of the old classics: Take Hold of the Flame, and Queen of the Reich.

Then there's the DVD interviews with band members. I liked the content. I do wish they had filled the whole screen with the interview video, instead of having a static background and a little window with the person talking, especially on my not-HDTV display. Oh well. Still good stuff.

I seem to be just going on and on tonight. One of those times, I guess. Sometimes, I sit down to type a rambling, and nothing pops into my head except, "Gee, it seems like it must be time to type something, but nothing comes to mind right now." Not so this time.

Yes, it is after 2am, and I do have work tomorrow. Fortuanetly, I did get a lengthy nap earlier this evening. I was thinking about going to BLUG, but Zan Lynx opted out due to the snow, and I decided that on this nite (vanentine, of all times), I wasn't feeling terrible sociable, nor was I terribly enthralled by the topic to be discussed, so I came home and slept.

CmdrTaco's post has been making waves. I find it funny that so many people get all excited about this from someone they've never met. The reverberations of Jaeger's announcement in Content Solutions are understandable, since pretty much everyone in this "circle" knows each other. But then again, this is CmdrTaco. He may as well be one of the family. lol.

Alrighty. I need to go back to bed. I did get some sleep, but I need more, or I'll be sorry by morning. Over and out.