A few years ago, HBO produced a miniseries about John Adams based on David McCullough’s biography. I remember Andrew watching a little of this when we were staying in Williamsburg. I asked him why he was watching it and he said it was interesting. Go figure. It turns out it was a perfect movie to watch in Williamsburg (though really he didn’t watch more than 30 minutes of it, I don’t think; we stayed pretty busy) not least of all because they filmed some of the movie there. It also won 13 Emmy awards, though this is a little misleading since the miniseries category isn’t nearly as competitive as, say, comedy or drama series. It stars Paul Giamatti who has played a lot of different kinds of roles, but most famously starred in Sideways where he was a whiny loser (or maybe “winey” loser, hee hee). The miniseries is on 3 disks, spanning 8 hours. It covers Adams from the Boston Massacre up until his death which took place on the country’s 50th birthday, the same day that Thomas Jefferson died.
Year: 2010
Black Cat HM-01 Warm
Summary:
| Battery: | AAA/10440 |
| Switch: | Reverse clicky |
| Modes: | 1 |
| LED Type: | Osram warm |
| Lens: | Glass |
| Tailstands: | Yes* |
| Price Paid: | $7.82 |
| From: | KaiDomain |
| Date Ordered: | 31 Oct 2010 |
Pros:
- Warm tint is rare among budget lights
- Pretty bright for this tint
- Cheap
Cons:
- Ringy beam
- Only 1 mode
Win 7 Antispyware
Tonight Mom called and said she thought she had gotten some kind of virus disguising itself as anti-virus software. She kept getting a window popping up telling her to download some software. She knew that she wasn’t supposed to do this and that McAfee was supposed to protect her from viruses. But McAfee had let this one through. [In fairness to McAfee, it turns out her subscription had expired several months earlier.]
This isn’t a virus so much as it is a trojan and like so many of them, once it gets on your computer it is very hard to get rid of. By manipulating the Windows registry it prevents executables from running so that you can’t install anything or run programs, and it stops you from getting to websites where you might find help or download fixes. Even if you can find the virus’ executable files, they will reinstall themselves the next time you open your web browser or any other executable. Awful.
Review: Mr.Lite BLF AA-4YE
Summary:
| Battery: | AA/14500 |
| Switch: | Reverse clicky |
| Modes: | 4 |
| LED Type: | Cree XR-E Q5 |
| Lens: | Collimator (plastic) |
| Tailstands: | Yes |
| Price Paid: | $16.99 |
| From: | Manafont |
| Date Ordered: | 25 Oct 2010 |
Pros:
- Well made
- Smooth threads
- Very good throw
- No flashy modes
- Nice holster and lanyard
Cons:
- Needed some repairs to work
- No mode memory
- Two low modes are too close together
- Without lanyard it will roll
Uniquefire AA-S1 Osram
Summary:
| Battery: | AA/14500 li-ion |
| Switch: | Reverse clicky |
| Modes: | 1 |
| LED Type: | Osram |
| Lens: | Glass |
| Tailstands: | Yes |
| Price Paid: | $9.93 |
| From: | DealExtreme |
| Date Ordered: | 22 Aug 2010 |
Pros:
- Very bright
- Well made
- Looks good
- Cheap
Cons:
- Only 1 mode
- Spindly clip