Havenbasin Road

After picking up my new phone I have to admit I did play a little bit. I had to, it was part of setting it up on my computer and updating it. I kind of got lost for a while in the app store. Lots of fun looking stuff! Much of it free! Which is very cool. There are also, of course, a lot of apps that require payment but some of them really seem to be worth it. I already picked up a couple, mainly because they were currently like eighty percent off, figured if I was interested in them, now would be the time to get the app instead of waiting until it goes back to full price. I saw a few others that I want, but need to check into before getting as they are a bit more expensive. Ok, going to go try and finish stuff so I can go play just a bit.

Going to talk about phones again, and this time not a complaint. A little bit of fun news. I finally got my own iPhone! Yay! I waited awhile but needed to get a business line, which is different news, and I went ahead and upgraded my phone. The old phone was really at the point of falling apart. I had about three buttons on it that were cracked completely through the button and it was having some issues dealing with some of the stuff I was trying to do. Texting was a serious pain, though I did a lot of it. However, texting on my new iPhone is a really easy. Quick, fast to type and easy to cut, copy and paste if I want. I am really enjoying it so far and I have only had it for like a day. I am very anxious to play with it for a bit but I have a few things I have to get done so playing with it is having to go on hold until I finish those things, afterwards I can play with it some.

I did a fast search and you can find several places online that will let you watch UK and states TV. Could save some money. I also know that the local stations tend to offer many of their shows online for watching as well. Actually, one of the things I like about the local stations online is the way they handle their advertising there. The advertising online for the local channels is much more focused. Each show normally has only one or two sponsors so that is all you get as far as commercials, plus the amount of commercials you get is cut down a lot. It makes for a much more pleasant viewing experience to be honest, don’t forget, you can pause online as well.

It is still really frustrating sometimes to try and watch TV with an antenna. I talked about that yesterday but I didn’t really discuss IPTV, and I am sure many of you were thinking about that while reading my complaint post on antenna TV. Just getting TV over the internet would actually meet both of my requests, having more stability and being able to pretty much watch when I want to watch instead of being restricted to a schedule around TV.  I like the idea but you have to have your computer connected to the TV or a big enough screen that you can use it as both a monitor and a TV. I bet, though, that they have other things out that are all in one items, where you can surf through your TV. The only ones I can think of in that regard, though, require you to have cable television as well as the internet. I will take a quick look. I am sure there are other options besides having to have SDSL.

I really miss cable, but  HDTV is a beautiful thing! The antenna works and receives HD signals over the air but it really drives me nuts that the signal is so weak. It goes in and out, depending on the channel. What is worse is the one channel I watch daily has real, actually most of the channels, have real problems when the microwave is being used. If I run the microwave then I lose the signal to the TV, it gets weaker and is a big pain to try and watch. I have thought about trying to tune it with a baseball bat but figure I would really regret it later when I couldn’t watch anything. I was thinking maybe I should try and find some sort of technology forums to get some better ideas than the baseball bat fix. I haven’t tried that yet, mainly because, honestly, I just thought of it. Feel kind of stupid as I use the internet most all day and that should have been one of the first things I thought of doing.

I will still probably hold off for a bit before getting the cable or satellite, though it is very irritating! Holding off, cause of course, I want the more expensive options. A DVR. Have to have that, makes watching TV so much more convenient! Being able to record the shows and watch them later is very nice. You get used to it after a bit, then you get spoiled with it and really miss it when you move. At least I did. Ah, well sooner or later I’ll break down and get it again. Then I can start watching more TV. Right now so much to do I don’t get much chance to watch a lot but if I could record things and watch them when I wanted to, like at lunch, that would definitely fit my schedule!

Here is an update on the business card story I talked about before. Nope, I didn’t choose an offshore financial service but I also have not gone with any other banking institution yet. It was pretty irritating to have, but it makes sense as I am just starting my business and don’t yet have all that much income to show but still, it is irritating. And of course dealing with a new institution probably didn’t help as they have zero history with me. Ah well, maybe just get one later after I have been established as a business for a bit. Once the business finance stuff is in order and going well, and then I can probably get one with a lot less hassle at a new place. If not, then I will stick with my current institution. Dragging things out for a month or so was really unnecessary. I could have told them to stuff it earlier and gone somewhere else if they hadn’t just dragged me along for so long. It does also seem to have an effect on my having opened accounts with them. At this point I am thinking about closing them up and going somewhere else for business services. It’s definitely a bit irritating. Best if I just forget it and move on though. Not getting the card won’t hold me back, mainly wanted it to keep everything business related together for tax purposes. I figured it would be easier that way.

The people I have dealt with at the banking institution are very nice and were extremely helpful . It was just the person doing their business accounts that seems to be a complete twit.  I am sure that person is not, but it was certainly the impression I got, and one I will be sure to warn my friends about.

Boredom makes it even harder to focus on required class stuff.  Learning, I usually find fun, especially if you are learning something you are interested in, but having to learn stuff only  because it is required for your degree is a bit of a pain sometimes. Don’t you hate studying? I mean the school required class type studying. Especially when you have other stuff you want to do, but you know you have to get this done. What really sucks is that if you don’t do it and study for the stuff you could care less about, you will be stuck with it again. If it’s required for your major you have to have it. The  Clep tests and other college test out things have saved me some pain, but sometimes you just have to bite the bullet and deal with the agony of college class requirement induced boredom.  Speaking of agony I am kind of down to the wire here, so time to go put something together fast.

I usually find myself getting over boredom about the last day of the semester when I can dump all the crap I had to learn that I will never use again, but still some stuffy fellow or lady somewhere decided it was good stuff for the program, people needed to know it to be successful. Yay, right. Most of the times it is only in their dreams and in their pasts where what they are requiring to be a part of a given degree path is really relevant. Seriously drives me nuts. And yes, you guessed it by sitting here typing to you about how annoying it is I am procrastinating, putting it off and basically trying to ignore it as long as I can. I know that is a pain when I am rushing at the last minute to finish things, but, heck, I still do it. Only for so long though, cause I really don’t want to be stuck doing it again next semester.

Thinking again on homes and insurance, but,  now just thinking about them together. I paid all of the insurance; if you read before I was talking about all the bills coming due at once. That is not fun. I have also mentioned wanting to get a house, well it occurred to me, while having to pay the other things that something I need to keep in mind is the additional costs of a house, which I hadn’t really thought of. The first obvious one, is of course, insurance. Home insurance, is somewhat important, at least it makes sense to have it to me. I haven’t read a lot of home insurance news but I know there have been issues just like with any other type of insurance so you have to be careful who you trust for your insurance.  After insurance, I thought about taxes. Those can take a large amount, yearly. That really depends on where you live and what kind of tax stuff they have going.

Home ownership has many extra costs associated with it. I was thinking of insurance and taxes and then that just led me on down the road to consider other things I am going to have to account for after buying a home. Maintenance is a big one. Living in an apartment a lot of times maintenance is taking care of for you by management so you don’t have to worry much. That includes appliances. Your fridge breaks, dryer on the fritz? No problem. Call the management and they will send somebody out to take a look at it and if needed, replace it. Can’t beat that! But when owning a home, the only management you can call is yourself. There is also the security system as well, you will have to take that into account. How much, if any, you want to spend or what type you want to go with. Makes me sit back a moment; definitely have to do more thinking about this as there is a lot to consider with a new house. I still feel that it is worth it, long as you are aware of what you are doing.

Regular season football is a blast, even without a favorite team. I do have teams I prefer over others, but nobody I am following regularly. I have thought of the fantasy football league things, as I know a few people who do that but I think it probably would be a waste of my time to set up as I really doubt that I would pay attention to it every week. Watching the games, though is easy and fun because all I have to do is turn them on and sit back and enjoy. They make great white noise as well, when I am working on things I can just turn them on and half way watch the games. That, of course, only works when the game is not very exciting or it is not one of the teams that I do enjoy watching. I used to like Green Bay, due mostly to Brett Favre but he has been such a disappointment in his actions and attitude recently that I don’t think he is worth the effort to watch anymore. He  will do fine as white noise.

I am happy that American football is getting ready to begin. I enjoy watching it, just not so much pre-season football. Pre-season football is usually quite boring to watch. I never really get into it as all it is, is the announcers running their mouths, kind of like me with my keyboard at the moment. They talk about whatever really strikes their fancy, although they do tend to keep the talk generally around the idea of football, it just seems like one monologue most of the time. Since I am not really a diehard fan of American football it just tends to bore the heck out of me, puts me to sleep. Plus the games tend to be a bit boring as well, so I normally don’t bother with pre-season games. I find the regular season games great fun to watch, though! They are really enjoyable to plan a small party around.

I talked about business bank accounts and my current issues with one last week, well I am still having issues with them . I originally went with the bank because they were friendly and had decent savings rates, but the rest of their services are leaving a whole lot to be desired. So, guess I take my business somewhere else. Small issues, irritating issues none the less. Seems  to be complaint week again. At least they are minor complaints, which is one point I am not going to be complaining about. Alright, enough with the digressions, back to your regularly scheduled complaint. Banks and business accounts. So, think I complained a bit about how long and what they are doing in regards to my business card. I have, at this point decided to forego the card and just use one of my own personal ones for business stuff only. It is just to much of a pain dealing with them and it has taken entirely much too long to even get the card. They did apologize a lot, saying the delay was really not acceptable, which it wasn’t, but it is somewhat to little to late at this point. I still think it would be less painful to make use of a foreign currency bank account. Actually, I know it is less troublesome

Banks, especially credit unions should be consumer friendly as it is our money they are using, but they seem to lose sight of that fact. Most of the ones I have been to, if you go inside the bank they are fairly nice but if you call them you might as was have well not bothered, although that is really a lot less so with the credit unions. The big banks, though, are often good at wasting your time on the phone.

There really don’t seem to be that many quality insurance companies available. Many of them seem to focus on their profit not on their customers, which makes the idea of switching a bit scary as well because you really don’t know what you might end up with.  I forgot to mention car insurance last week when I was talking about my insurance stuff being due. Well, no real surprise here, but it will be due in about a month. I attempted to shop around last time it was due, but there really wasn’t much difference. It seemed like an average of thirty or forty dollars either way. Which is really not enough to switch for. Switching entails more paperwork which of course is usually a pain in the butt. So unless I can find a difference of one to two hundred I don’t think it’s worth the trouble. At least not right now. 

A car insurance quote is often quick to get, long as you are willing to part with all of your private information. Up to and including the names you have chosen or are going to choose for your children or future children. And, yes, that is a complaint. One of the big problems with choosing car insurance, and a big deterrent to changing it just based on price is quality. I have read through a lot of the reviews and it appears that several of the current insurance companies are wonderful, but then the next place I check has them as worse than in-laws. That makes it somewhat challenging to decide on who to pick for insurance. General car news is a lot easier to find, and easier to trust. But we still need to have car insurance, which unless there is a huge price difference, means it is easier just to stick with your current insurer.

I am figuring that about the time I am ready to purchase a house rates will have already dropped. That is my hope anyway. I have been watching mortgage news and how its changing; they are really fluctuating at the moment. They were lower a bit ago but they have gone up. I have hope that they will drop again soon! I was also wondering about all of you who are ready for remortgages, does the rate drop help you guys or not? I am still keeping an eye on a property that is close by, but have yet to contact the owner. The property keeps dropping in price, which is good because even with its past price drops it is still too highly priced. Thinking about it though, it would be a good starter, but it is not my dream house. That is kind of a surprise. I thought it was pretty nice but after sitting here thinking about how I want to describe it and its location I find my mind wandering to some other houses that I know of that I really like. Maybe I will not worry about that one house, although if it dropped to a halfway reasonable price I might be interested in it.

I loved being out at sea and the idea of living on a boat has always appealed to me. Although the house boat concept hasn’t every really grabbed me. Many of them look neat but I get the feeling like you are living on a static block over liquid land. If I had a houseboat it would need to be moveable, otherwise I don’t see the point. One type of house that I would be really interested in is a yacht. You don’t get all the land like you do when you buy property but with a nice yacht you can certainly see more land. Of course I would need a crew with the yacht, I am not interested in trying to run everything myself. I would want some people to take care of that. They probably wouldn’t be too hard to find.