Melanie's Page

I always mean to take video with our camcorder. We have a nice JVC with a 20GB hard drive (kind of like these) that we’ve struggled to… Continue

I would not classify myself as an iPod person. I own one only because I won it in a contest at work along with a Bose Soundock. We loaded music on the iPod two years ago and haven’t changed anything since. We just don’t do a lot of activities where the iPod seems essential, but I find it creeping into our daily lives more and more.

For instance, last summer we bought a new car, a Scion xB. Kind of ugly, and a little flashy, Scion is Toyota’s low end line made for a younger crowd.… Continue

If you work or have ever worked in an office, you have probably dealt with the break room mess that builds up frequently. The dishes with unidentifiable crusties that stack up near the sink (if you have a sink) and linger for weeks at a time. The refrigerator full of science experiments, some from as far back as 1973. Coffee mugs that can be dated by examining the rings around the inside.

We have that phenomenon here at Vann’s, too. Only, because the dishwasher is located on one floor and the b… Continue

Anymore, most people buy individual songs off iTunes or use services like Rhapsody and Pandora, which all offer unlimited access to music. But I’m currently fascinated by another type of music access—in fact, I’d call the 80GB hard drive on my audio/video receiver a downright obsession. My mission in life for the last couple of weeks has been transferring all of our music CDs onto the hard drive. We have about 200 CDs in a rack in the basement. Admittedly, I can’t remember the last time we liste… Continue

It was a bit of a ghost town around the Vann’s offices last week. Some of it was extended holiday vacation, but there was also a contingent of Vann’s employees who went to the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas. This annual sojourn to the conference capital of the world takes place over a period of four days in January. All the major players in the electronics industry show up to show off their latest technological accomplishments. Although I wasn’t there, I followed updates on Twitter… Continue