2022 Budget TV Choices for Black Friday

Whoa! Lots of russian women playing today at the Australian Open. & more besides that! & many champions, to boot!

 

Whoa! Lots of russian & communist chinese(always small letters) women in the 3rd round of Australian Tennis Open eliminations. Yeah, they are all ready to carry a bunch of Western civilization dollars to their respective totalitarian dictatorships, so they can make more weapons.

& before Edwin talks about me talking about politics, dictators already killed off the politicians in their countries & replaced them with yes-people.

 

Watching some of the old Northern Exposure TV programs. The TV series wasn't filmed in Alaska but in one of the small towns near I-90 in the high foothills of eastern Washington. So they were able to show lots of snow....like in Alaska. TV fakery at its best. With the big 43inch TV, I'm watching a lot closer, because I wasn't hooked on the Series when it first was aired. Janine Turner was cute enough, but so far I don't like the "Battle of the Sexes" between her & the doctor. Its far too artificial & made up. A doctor & a pilot is an outstanding necessary team in Alaska, able to respond quickly to emergencies a hundred+ miles away in any direction. So far, the supposed quirky Northern Exposure is a waste of footage, when it could have been a very exciting Series. But, then they would have had to add lots of true Alaskan footage for a trace of authenticity. They could have filmed some of the Washington state Alpine Lakes Wilderness area, Enchantment Lakes & also some lower altitude footage of Mt. Rainier & said it was terrain of Mt. McKinley & foisted it off as Alaska. But, the outdoors people who really knew Washington state would have complained about the fakery. So that's probably why they didn't have many wide landscape vistas.
The TV series Twin Peaks also suffered from the lack a lot of wide-angle mountain footage, that would have made west & central Cascade mtn. of Washington state so identifiable. Only had opening & static shots of Mount Si (Twin Peaks). Twin Peaks was supposed terrain in the northeastern portion of the state.

Well, back to Northern Exposure, trying to find the hoopla in Janine Turner. Yeah, the 43 inch TV makes her look better than my old TVs from the time. Put the ONN TV on the zoom setting.

 

Watched a compilation of Mars rover photographs gathered over the years. Some I had seen, but many were new to me.. The 43in ONN TV gave the best presentation I had seen of Mars surface & I had seen a lot of Mars pictures. It was almost like a Travelogue! Some were wide landscapes, but others, altho showing "wideness", seemed intimate & restful....almost Earth-like. I think some of the images showing evidences of "water carving" the grounds of Mars, gave that "Earth-like" feel, the most strongly.
Watched an 8K scenic Earth video. Of course, the ONN isn't 8K, but for a $100, the 8K videos were sweet. I often moved closer, to see as much of the rich detail that 2K can render. Keep going ONN. You'll be worth your price with just a few years viewing. After that, ONN will be a free extravaganza.

 

Hmmm.....While in the hospital after my attack, the little 30-32inch hospital TV was blatantly sub-standard to the 43inch ONN. The double distance(more?) to the smaller TV, gave it a postage stamp feel. Of course, the hospital TV didn't have good color adjustments. & the poor TV coverage was despicable. Getting back to the ONN really buoyed me. What a pleasure $100 can give. Again, watching the Landscape Artist of the Year competition.

Also determined that if I was watching the ONN TV at the distance of the hospital TV....yeah, I see why people want 65-85 inch & 4K & 8K TVs.

 

From Dec 14, 2023:

Just got a free book, Arthur C. Clark's 2061, Odyssey Three. I didn't know he made the Odyssey into a trilogy.

 

From 11-28-23:

PS, 2-2-24.....Turning down the terrible music, I just turn my I-phone on King-FM classical music. The greater depths of music by Schubert, Chopin, Liszt, Mozart, Debussy, Schumann(both Robert & Clara), & Ravel really give increased strength to the videos, specially the mountainscapes.

 

Just watched "Valerian & the City of a Thousand Planets". Have tried to watch it in the past on the 32 inch TV. But, I lost interest fairly soon. This time, the 43 inch ONN TV sweetly showed the special effects & held my interest, until the characters developed interesting personalities...or not.
Lots of sci-fi has tried to "correct" the World Wide berserker genocidal western civilization total destruction of Native Tribes. Yes, sci-fi Star Trek, Star Wars, Avatar, & VCTP writers have story ending "alternative histories" saving "future" Native Tribes. & yes, historians can name many Native Tribes (& even individual Native Tribe warriors). But MORE YES, is that over half of all Native Tribes were squashed out of existence, without ever being named or known by any historian.

 

Jan. 21,2024:

Intermittently, I still watch Northern Exposure. Glutten for punishment, I guess. So far, the best part was when Marilyn Whirlwind was learning to drive a vehicle. Several characters were "helping" her, with mostly failing efforts. One character came to her to continue her driving lessons. Marilyn decided to stop her lessons. This is the best of Northern Exposure as she said, "Driving will just get in the way of my walking".

Yeah, I agree with that....until I can get an Electric Car.

 

I think I'll watch Northern Exposure,too.
I really used to enjoy that back in the day.
Felt like I should be in Alaska.

 

Oh , and I watched part of that Valerian movie.

Wild graphics !

 

The plot completion (the idea of saving of Native Tribes) was delayed & got mauled till the end. It was all movie magic & had nothing to do with any form of reality (yeah, yeah, I know.....sci-fi reality). Reviewers' & viewers' final assessment of VCTP, were that both didn't care.

 

I do like the Gilded Age, for the same reasons.

 

I liked the PBS series, the Flambards from 1979. A broken turn-of-the-century family without the money or skills to keep up the degrading estate, still pretended they could function in "high society" with their decreasing numbers of horses for "riding to the hounds" events. William, the youngest son didn't like horses, & was crippled in a horse "accident" in the first episode. But, he loved the newly born technology of aviation. What was cool is wonderful flying models of many turn-of-the-century airplanes were shown. With very short clips, it was amazing how realistic the flying models were, as the models were presented as actual people carrying aircraft, telling the story of William progressing into an aviation engineer. A cousin Christina went to live with them as a last resort, when other parts of the family couldn't help her anymore. Eventually, the despicable & crippled old man(also permanently injured in a horse accident) died, leaving the estate to the two sons. As time progressed, William & Christina fell in love & married. A new operation healed Williams bad leg &......

I won't say anymore, if anyone wants to watch the series. Hmmm....I had the series on some disk, but no longer have a machine to play it on. I wonder if there is some PBS program to watch it on the very nice 43 inch ONN. Maybe I can look around.

PS....Flambards is on YouTube! Excellent. However as I'm able to do on other series, Flambards doesn't fill the 43 inch ONN format. Between the different 1979 color balance(that helps present the decaying land, house & family) & the format, it will not be to my liking. But, other people may like the quaint presentation.
One highlite is William flying a Bleriot from England back to France to return the plane back to Louis Bleriot. Christina flies with him & as they cross the English Channel, the "Song of Christina" is playing, a marvelous & upbeat song of courage & love between William & Christina.

 

Watching Martin Clune's (Doc Martin) "Islands of America" on the 43" ONN TV. Started with the Hawaiian Islands, then a few islands of Alaska, including Kodiak Island, with a Kodiak Bear population of 1 bear per square mile. Then, Clune's documentary moved to the Channel Islands, off the coast of California. Then, they moved 2000 miles east to Avery Island, in Louisiana, home of the family owned Tabasco sauce company. At one point they showed thousands of barrels(not bottles) filled with aging Tabasco sauce, worth $1 billion! Tabasco is sold in 117(?) countries around the World.
At 12AM, I had some leftovers of vegetable mix that I added some Tabasco sauce to. Oh, boy.

 

2-28-24:

Was TV surfing with the 43" ONN TV & came across a TV video on bush pilots. I clicked on it, & listened to a bush pilot tell of an early piloting mistake, who, as the weather closed in, had to land on one of the many mountains in Alaska. He landed safely & almost got the plane to a stop, when the plane began sliding to the right, downhill. The good news was the nose of the plane did rotate into the slide, the plane did stop & everybody survived, including a baby. The bad news was the propeller & engine were destroyed & the pilot had his face battered as the plane's nose ran into big boulders. They were eventually rescued by a helicopter. The mountain on which they landed......was on Kodiak Island. Small world.

 

With the 43" ONN TV, I continue to watch the landscape videos. As is my norm now, I turn down the terrible "musical" accompaniment, & turn the classical music station, KING-FM on. Tonight was a very fine landscape video(with animals & birds). The best fitted music was again, Debussy's Petite Suite. But the Chopin really gave depth to the videos that the sappy music misses entirely.

 

Haven't seen a brand new movie in 15 years.....Lord of the Rings? I'm TV hopping after the Oscars with the 43" ONN. Stopped at a free showing of Poor Things. Not knowing movies, I was surprised to see the beginning, that I thought looked like a Frankenstein movie, which I never saw full length in any previous version. Because I could "fast forward", I still haven't seen a complete version of Frankenstein. William DeFoe & Emma Stone are weird, as were all the commentary depictions of "scenic Earth existence". One funny scene was of a small shot of a "London" sector, which looked more like a small Spanish or Mexican community. Again, weird.

As other reviewers state in similar words, "Punkish" & "That's it". Did I say it was FREE, thank goodness.

 

4:14AM.....Hey, the 43inch ONN TV is approaching 4 months & its still functioning. Delightful!
Utube has a fairly recent rendering of a relaxing tour of Harry Potter's Hogwarts Castle. Its kind of interesting if one is a Harry Potter fan.
One of the worst presentations was of the Astronomy Wing. There WERE telescopes, but no one looking through them. Old corroded refractor telescopes were exposed to the weather with optics you couldn't see through. Maybe you could....with magic. Didn't matter tho, since no continuous viewing could be done, because surrounding bulwarks & castle turrets blocked viewing. Maybe you could see vertically, but none of the refractors had 90 degree diagonals for viewing vertically. High tech reflector telescopes & necessary high resolution cameras were nowhere to be seen, so you could really determine the Universe. Again, that there magic.
Graphically presented students walked around the halls, ascended stairs as easily & quickly as they descended stairs, showing no effects of gravity. Also, feet on the stair steps were mis-matched.
Another poor rendition was an open meadow outside of the Castle, with wind supposedly rustling the grasses. Instead of wind tho, it most appeared to me that the ground was moving underneath the grasses like an earthquake.
The video was cool tho, despite the mentioned shortcomings. To whatever degree of acceptance the video gains, 159,000 viewings have occurred in 3 weeks. Other "Hogwarts" videos have had over half a million views over a period of half(?) a year.