I’ve watched one too many commercials with Dick Vitale (or impersonators, which are even worse). I can’t tell you how annoying and worn out his shtick is. That’s one part of March Madness I won’t miss when its over. Man, I’d never think I’d prefer Billy Packer over Dickie V, but its come down to that. Just shut up!

I don’t have a fancy green skin to lay on you like some blogs, but the thought’s all the same: Happy St. Patrick’s Day.

May the luck of the Irish be with you!

I got my Hauppauge Nexus DVB-S card a few days ago, which explains why I haven’t been more active here! It has lived up to my expectations.

Having this card in North America is like being a fish out of water. DVB is the European standard for direct-to-home (DTH) satellite broadcasts. The American market is dominated by packaged providers like DirecTV and Dish Network. Still, there is a world of Free-To-Air channels to be had. I would love to see many more!

The card needed a little tweaking to be happy here, as it came set up for PAL format. A registry tweak here and a obscure checkbox in the software there and I was all set. The only issue now is getting Linux TV to run the card.

FTA channels are scattered all across the sky, a fact which would ordinarily require a garden of satellite dishes. Fortunately, an innovative dish exists to solve this problem. Called a toroidal dish, it can focus simultaneously on a 40 degree arc of sky, allowing reception of up to sixteen satellites! This amazing dish measures just 90cm, allowing for installation everywhere (the FCC rules trump any zoning or neighborhood covenants).

I’m just testing things out now, but I forsee DTH satellite services to be the ticket to information freedom. Now more than ever, there are compelling reasons for alternative media channels. One day, you could kill off the bloated packages cable and satellite companies force you to buy and get only the channels you care about. Each would be beamed to your home directly from the programmer’s satellite transponder. No middleman!

The industry doesn’t much like that idea, since padding its numbers helps boost advertising revenue. I’m hoping that DVB gets disruptive enough in this country that change becomes inevitable. I’m taking the first step.

(P.S., if anyone knows anyone at Microspace, I’d love to take a tour of their facilities.)

For a while now, MT.Net has been home to a page about the old Raleigh Municipal Airport between Garner and Raleigh. I became interested in the old airport when I first read about it in the paper. Who knew that the scrub pines and empty shopping mall on the corner of U.S. 70 and Tryon road once was the site of Raleigh’s original airport?

I took pictures around the property five years ago this month. It was surreal walking through the woods and seeing a runway in front of you. Fire hydrants sprouted in the midst of trees, built to service a commercial park plan that then fizzled. At the time I was unaware of the large population of homeless (and sometimes surly) people who lived in the woods there. Fortunately for me, I didn’t see a soul.

Pretty soon there will be homes on that property, but not for the homeless. The Wakefield developers are putting in a multi-use development there, with homes ranging from $100,000 to $400,000.

While it will be a bit sad to see the last remnants of the airport turned into cul-de-sacs, it is still a good thing that someone finally decided to tame that property. The Frankenstein combination of the lame strip mall and the wild woods just doesn’t work. Here’s hoping this third time developing this property is the charm.

This really warms my heart. Close to a million Lebanese demonstrated yesterday in support of ousting Syria from their country. It was the largest demonstration ever in Lebanon, if not the whole Arab world.

I’ve always felt an attraction to Lebanon. Perhaps I lived a former life there. Before the country’s devastating civil war, Beirut was a bustling center of commerce, a crossroads where East meets West. Now with the citizens demanding change, Lebanon once again leads the way.

I’m proud to see the people of Lebanon taking charge of their destiny. I wish I was there!

Today’s Q section of the News and Observer has a wonderful section on how to hold your governments accountable. This week is National Sunshine Week, a week focusing on freedom of information and open records. The N&O details how to request public records from federal, state, and local governments and details on public meetings laws.

Here are tools that not only traditional media like television and newspapers can use, but bloggers as well. Find out how your tax dollars are being spent! Keep our leaders honest! Make sure the government that serves you is doing your bidding and not its own. Democracy depends on the people keeping a close eye on those in power.

(Ironically, the N&Os section celebrating open records is itself locked behind a Register Wall. Thank goodness for Bug Me Not.)

I read today that Greenshields is closing. It’s been closed since last August, when a fire broke out. Seven months without an insurance settlement process has put the cap on any chance of reopening.

Greenshields was one of the first bars I went to when I was new to Raleigh. My first week at Pioneer Software, a group invited me out and we went to Greenshields. It was before most of the brewing tanks were installed. We sat at fold-up tables in a large, white room.

As the brewery expanded and jazzed up its furnishings, it became a choice spot for watching basketball games. There was a always good chance of getting a good seat in front of the big-screen TV on game day.

The beer Greenshields served was good, but never great. And the food wasn’t the best, either. Still, Greenshields provided a nice, comfortable place to meet friends downtown.

I’m sorry to see it go.

As you are all aware, US troops opened fire on the car of recently-rescued Italian journalist Giuliana Sgrena, killing Italian secret service agent Nicola Calipari. The claim from Washington is that the car was traveling at a high rate of speed and refused to stop.

Sgrena maintains the car was traveling slowly and no signals were to be seen. In fact, she says there was no checkpoint. Now the U.S. side is calling the checkpoint “temporary”.

Uh-huh.

There are two sides to every story, and the truth is often somewhere in between. Everybody knows that Sgrena has an axe to grind, so you have to take what she says witha grain of salt. Still, I’m curious now after seeing photos of Sgrena’s car. That car doesn’t look like a hail of bullets hit it. It looks like very precisely-aimed shots were fired at it. Note the one shot at the edge of the rear window. Was this simply an errant shot, or were the rear passengers targeted? You don’t stop a car by shooting into the back of it.

I look forward to full, thorough investigation. I’m not holding my breath, though.

I went to the doctor earlier this week to address a persistent sinus issue I’ve had since New Year’s. After asking a bunch of questions regarding my symptoms, the doctor declared it to be allergies.

Uh, no. Thanks, Doc, for not listening. My parting gift is a bottle of Flonase to go with my still-lingering sinus issue.

I swear some doctors don’t want to be bothered by patients. Write a prescription and move on to the next one. I should have insisted on seeing my usual doctor instead of taking whomever was available.

But hey, we’ve got the greatest healthcare system in the world, right?
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