Guilty Pleasures

August. The slow news month. Makes February look interesting – well, almost.

There’s Huricane Katrina, sure. But other than writing a couple checks and sending off some dry goods, there wasn’t much to do from sunny Colorado Springs.

And the blog? Well, this is (was, nearly) the slow news month, so I’ve been catching up on reading. David McCullough’s 1776, the new one from Ralph Peters and Tom Friedman (and don’t they make a pair).

Just when I thought it was safe to blog again, I broke down and ordered a little something else from Amazon.

I’d seen Lileks rave about HBO’s Carnivale for a year or two, but missed it when it first aired. And that’s the problem with Appointment TV. Miss the first one, and you’re pretty much screwed until the DVDs come out. Oh, I could have TiVo’d the re-runs, but it’s not the same. Not the way HBO does drama. Until I get a TiVo that can record in Hi-Def, I’ll either watch HBO’s shows live, or buy the DVDs.

Long story (kind of) short: I’m hooked. Carnivale is all that and a bag of bearded ladies. Watched four episodes today, and I’m hoping to get in a fifth before bed.

NOTE: Kudos to HBO for packaging just two one-hour episodes per disc. It costs them a few pennies more to make and package, but allows 50-100% more bandwidth for enhanced picture quality. And it shows. Not even The Sopranos got that kind of royal treatment.