Domestic Geek

So Marcus and I spent a good part of this weekend ripping some of our DVD collection to our iTunes Server (with a handy little program called Handbrake so we can view them on our AppleTV. What sucks about the iTunes information palette is it is geared towards songs/music. What to do if you want to add metadata to the movie files so that you can see the rating, synopsis, director, actors, etc? You go download a cool little app called MetaX that I found through the Handbrake forums. It can grab the data from Amazon for you and then embed it into the movie file or you can enter in all that info yourself, if you're so inclined. It's pretty darned cool!

While I was over at Apple's site this morning, I saw the front page had a big announcement that in June you will be able to view YouTube content through your AppleTV. That's pretty cool.

As I mentioned in the last post, we have an Apple TV (tv if you're an Apple Geek) in our household. We've decided that we're going to dump our Dish Network service (unless they have a very cheap basic plan available) and just rely on iTunes and the Internet for our entertainment. I already watch old television and movies through Netflix and most of the shows I watch have episodes on the networks' sites. We could get season passes for our most favorite shows (such as The Office) and still save money by ditching the dish for now. The only problem I foresee is stuff on USA (Psych, The 4400, etc) and a few other shows.

Honestly, though, I'll probably survive just fine not seeing any of them. I'm looking for part time work in the evenings and won't have much free time anymore anyway because getting out of this mobile home is becoming an obsession. We stopped in at PetSmart to get Timothy hay for the bunnies and my heart ached seeing all the dogs and their owners. I want to be a dog owner again so bad. This is the first time in my life that nobody in my family has had a dog and I feel lost.