MORE ABOUT THE IPOD.....
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Recently I wrote a quick blog post about how you could connect your IPOD to your TV via some cables, and with the the help of some inexpensive software, rip your DVDs onto the IPOD and play it back on the IPOD or TV.
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Well, the TV turned out to be kinda inconvenient, especially if you wanted to pause, fast-forward, or change to another show, and, while it was kinda cool to be able to watch this on the IPOD itself, there was a little eye strain after two or three hours. Then I remembered our portable DVD player!! it gets little to no use and I thought "Gosh, it would be great if I could plug it into this".
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So, once I asked Robin where it was (she is very organized - and GOD how I love it compared to my previous situation of living with a "Hoarder") and sure enough, there was a switch for DVD or INPUT. A quick run to Fry's for 3 RCA adapters ($1.09 ea.) and I plugged it all in to find that it worked just great! Now we can watch IPOD shows on a 7" screen, with much better stereo speakers and all it cost me was the price of the adapters. So how many of you have portable DVD players just gathering dust?? If you have an IPOD and get those $3 cables, you'll be happy as a pig'n mud being able to watch TV shows, or whatever via you IPOD while lying in bed (and with at least a 7" screen or larger). Don't let that portable player waste away (if you have an IPOD), because you can store seasons of your favorite shows on da 'Pod and that sure beats changing out a DVD frequently.

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73

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WOODY

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OH! I almost forgot a quick one from an e-mail I got this afternoon:

"Woody, Divorce may be a pain in the ass...but it isn't half as bad as the one you were married too - CONGRATULATIONS!!"

DEAL OF THE DAY

For anyone poor soul trying to learn how to bake, skip that high-end school and buy this downloaded game off AMAZON for only .98 cents!! What-a-deal, but, that price is only good today.

KEEP THOSE CARDS AND E-MAILS COMING IN!!!

You never know who reads these blogs, usually you expect they are read right here on Earth, but I received an e-mail that say "CONGRATULATIONS WOODY". There was a card/picture of sorts attached to it and I found it kinda funny so I'd thought I'd share it with you.....

73

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WOODY

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THE DAY AFTER.....

This one came in via email overnight! I think I have a pretty good challenger to my own photoshop skills!!

"I ESCAPED......."

THE VULTROLL'S GRIP FINALLY LET LOOSE, THUS, "DRAG-ME-TO-DIVORCE-COURT" IS FINALLY OVER, AND SHE HAS BEEN DEFEATED!! LONG LIVE "ASH".

09-28-09

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[Has begun]

"BIG THINGS - LITTLE THINGS - THINGS THAT MATTER"

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It's not the big victories that keeps us going, or, rooting for the little guy, it's those small victories you often don't even hear about. Sure, we've all heard about the BIG ONE - "David vs. Goliath", but usually that gets relegated to those bedtimes stories that the kids love to hear, while one parent gives a short wink to the other.

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Today we still have giants roaming the world, trying to squash each little David that comes along but they just can't seem to be able to do it. Take Microsoft for example - all they were was an OS (Operating System) software company they make computers work. Yet, high above the Earth, Darth Gater was busy building his "Death Star" on the dark side of the moon, working on plans to make their own versions of a programs which users wanted, and they ran on windows, only MS wanted people to run his program's (i.e. - Windows Media Player), plans of entering the hardware side of things and generally making it a software world.

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But there were many little Davids out there that planned to make better programs (and make them they did). One of my favorites was MP3 - we're all familiar with that format now, but if the Dark Lord had been able to smash it, MP3 would be a mere footnote in history. And let's not forget our champions of little fighters - APPLE. You know that APPLE is getting into Microsoft's turf when they (Microsoft) have to run commercials with excited people picking out their dream PC (for a certain price range) and jumping up and down when, after picking a PC which is made by anyone, but runs Microsoft as their OS - get it FREE.

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Let me digress for a moment when I ask, "Just what is a Microsoft PC??". I know of Dell, HP, ASUS and many others, but I've never seen a hardware pc that sez "MADE BY MICROSOFT". Any ways, my digression is over and so I say "THANK YOU APPLE", for being a thorn in Microsoft's side. You keep them on their toes with the IPODS, Smart looking hardware (Oh, that's right, Microsoft doesn't build PC's), and being relatively virus free. If Microsoft had devoted as much money as they did to losing projects like "Microsoft TV", and spent that money making smarter, tighter, more bulletproof code, then we wouldn't have had to suffer through ME, 2000 (eh), and (ugh!!) VISTA. Kudos go to Mozilla for their excellent, fast and reliable browser, and GOOGLE'S great search engine (Which i still prefer to the "non-cool" sounding "BING"). They are current under attack as I type. Microsoft couldn't do it alone, so they've made a deal with Yahoo (or in Yahoo's case "Made a deal with the Devil") to use BING.

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I know that there are dozens (maybe more) examples of how Darth Gater probably killed great ideas that would have made computing much better but I hate to think so hard on a Saturday - so, write me and let me know which ones you liked that got squashed, AND, what's worse than "squashed"? It's called "Bought-out-and-bloated". My prime example here was a neat program called VISIO. It was great, the engineers loved it!! It would even run over a network (how cool is that?).

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And then, one sad day, I sat down at my former desk to order the latest version and my link went nowhere. I called my salesman Sam (Great guy if you ever have the pleasure of buying stuff from him) and he looked under the companies name which was still on their database system, but all zeroes down the column. Sam said, "Okay, let me try just searching under VISIO", and we only had to wait a few seconds when he replied "I found it!" he exclaimed, "ummm...only it's now listed under Microsoft". Hence, they were bought out. I ordered a couple upgrades and waited for them to come in.

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Well as you would expect, they arrived with that Microsoft label and by golly the code had been bloated big-time. On some machines it would install - and ran very, very, slow. On other machines, it wouldn't install at all. Being as large as it was now, of course it would not run across the network, but I found a place with some of the older Visio (from the former company) and ordered it to appease the native (engineering) God's and that was when i found out that it would not install on an XP box ("Thank You, MS"). And as before, they've bought and bloated software for many years. Man, I didn't expect multiple paragraphs about this, as it was just an intro into my subject, but if you've made it this far, you either dislike Microsoft or, like reading my postings...

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I guess I'll cut out my other examples and move along to what was to be a divorce analogy. which follows a similar vein I suppose, but for those that care, I'll be free (after almost 2 years of legal hell) on Monday.

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Let's hope for some DX out there that day and look for me on 38 LSB - Woody

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TICK-TICK-TICK...

Yep, time is moving along to where I'll be officially unleashed!!! "Time waits for no one, and it won't wait for me...."
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WOODY
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IT"S CRAZY, IT"S WEIRD

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IT"S TUESDAY

IT SEEMS SO LONG AGO...

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Yes, it's "WEIRDER-THAN-WOODY" day in honor of an upcoming final decree which sets my own favorite guest (me) F-R-E-E!! So in the appropriate sense of dignity I've dug up a few jewels from the past and plopped 'em on this posting! Oh...and this old commercial kills me everytime I run across it -

Ya gotta love that cow!

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A & C MEET THE M_ _ _ _Y

AND

WITH HALLOWEEN JUST AROUND THE CORNER...

(POOR LARRY)

"DON'T WORRY..."

For those who sent me a couple short e-mails - NO, the 'ex hasn't run out radio gear to sell. It's true that there have been no postings for a couple weeks, but I suspect she is not doing anything now per advice of her lawyer (I could be wrong) so that she'll appear indigent, and unable to fend for herself in court. After that, she'll be back to her auctions, so no emails to me are necessary - please.

iTUNES VERSION 9 UPDATE

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Just an update regarding iTunes9: Robin called me and said that after she installed it on her notebook it would not import songs off a CD anymore. She'd get an error and then iTunes would shut down. I talked her through a System Restore, and guess what? it wouldn't restore (where previously it had). So I asked her to bring it over when she came by on Saturday and I looked at it and tried un-installing/re-installing and getting the same result. Sure enough, System Restore would not work.

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Finally I found version 8, and after un-installing 9, installed it with success. The problem she had with version 9 was solved, but her system will not Restore any longer. My first thought was that iTunes9 somehow corrupted the Restore function, but my pc (where Restore once worked) has the same Restore problem, and that began about six months ago. I'm wondering if one of the many Microsoft "Updates" somehow broke System Restore? Anyways, she's happy to have version 8 back on her notebook, while the loss of XP's System Restore still remains a mystery...

THIS WEEKS SUNSPOT REPORT

CLICK ON THE SUNSPOTLESS IMAGE FOR THE REPORT

TUNE REVIEWS

My gripe about software fixes/updates is (temporarily) out of my system, and I thought that this would make a perfect time for two reviews which might make an impact on iTune/IPOD owners!
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First is the recently revealed iTunes 9. I usually hate upgrading to new versions of iTunes as it seems like it always screws sometime up which then I have to fix. But I read a bit about Ver.9 and two of the new features attracted me enough to cross my fingers and click on the download button. The biggest advantage (for me anyways) is group sharing within your household network! I have a fairly beefy PC in one room and a Netbook that Robin bought me in the living room. Knowing how poorly iTunes runs on a PC (it runs on top of Quicktime player), I figured it wouldn't make sense to have it on the Netbook as it would have a hard enough time playing music off it's hard drive while coping with iTunes.

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Now, with the new "Sharing" feature, all I have to do is put iTunes on my Netbook, Authorize it, and then pull up my library on the other PC and stream the music to the Netbook! Step one was upgrading my other unit to Ver.9, Step two was installing Ver.9 on the Netbook. After enabling "SHARING" on both units I went into the living room and could see my main PC in the column on the left. Clicking on it gave me the message "Copying Library From Test". This took only a minute or two and then there it was - the library from the other computer displayed on my Netbook! Now the true test: Would the Netbook play the songs without glitches, over my wireless network? Short answer: "YES". I was happy. Now I could be in the living room, doing other things and still play music from my iTunes on my other PC.

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The second feature I liked was the iTunes Album - you can buy a CD from iTunes and have the experience you used to have with records: Front/Back cover, inside with pictures, liner notes and lyrics. Just like the "Olden Days", only digital. I've yet to try this, but I'll let ya know whether it lives up to it's hype of not.

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CUCUSOFT

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With a name like that, you have to wonder if it's a joke or not, but I can truthfully say that, name aside, Cucusoft has a great product! So I bet you're wondering "What the Hell is it?"

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Cucusoft is a great software package that allows you to convert DVD's to IPOD format, thus allowing you to take advantage of your DVD collection and put some of your favorite movies and/or TV shows onto your IPOD. I Like it for TV shows the best, and like with music, you can create your own playlist of your favorite TV shows and cartoons. Granted, the IPOD screen is small, but it's not THAT bad to watch, and, if you buy one of those inexpensive video cables off AMAZON ($3 and up), it's easy to plug it into your TV - at home, or, on the road. I'd suggest getting the deluxe version which combines their audio and video conversion suites, and it's only $39.95.

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LAST BUT NOT LEAST

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You never know what or who you'll run into when your out and about. Just the other night we popped into a favorite place and this is what we saw!

ONE COOL LOOKING BIRD, AND HE HAD A LOT TO SAY

COMING SOON:

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"I ONCE LIVED WITH A HOARDER"

FUZZY....

If I appear to be a little fuzzy, it's all the fault of the Software companies! To begin with, in the "OLDEN" days of computers (not even going too far back, just 1990) you got your PC, it had it's OS and you used a few programs - and all was well with the world!

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Today it's a totally different matter and I'm no "Mad Hatter" when I say this. Just this week I spent a huge amount of hours updating, rebooting, updating, and rebooting again! First, there's the Death Star of software, MICROSOFT. My GOD!! I can't even begin to add up the total numbers of upgrades and updates. This week, like most others, I had to download and apply upgrades from the "BEAST". But wait - there's more! I also had to update Java, Firefox, iTunes, ADOBE Flash and Reader, and even Maxtor nabbed me to upgrade my external drive software!

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I know that I'm missing several others, but if you're like me, you are sick and tired of endless updates (that often come at a time where you don't want to wait many minutes for the update, and lengthy reboot time). It will only get worse, and I suspect it will only fire the flames within the user as well. For once, I would like to open iTunes and not see "A new version (update) is available"...

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WOODY

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LABOR DAY WEEKEND REPORT

Labor Day weekend was great, and I hope you had the same, but before I get into our little excursion, let's open the "MAILBAG" -

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PHIL WRITES:

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Hello Mr Brian,
The happier days of my life were lived through CB. All the friends I met, the CB Breaks,
the Benefits. Ratchet Jawing through the night, copying the mail, Friends like Snuff & Buzzy. My question is now that the fad of CB has died down I would imagine its more like the ole days. Do people still use CB and are there any CB clubs in the New Orleans Area,
and is the new equipment good.

Thanks
Phil

KDW-8458 AKA Green Goblin
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Hi Phil,

To a certain extent the band has gone back to the old days. It certainly is quiet without Sunspots which are great for local-long distance QSO’s. When the band is dead, it will seem like there is no one except truckers on the airwaves, and they tend to use channels all over the band, so if you live near a freeway, bleedover would be an issue. Finding someone to talk to during a no-sunspot cycle can be challenging, but there are folks out there every day. Where I’m at, there’s a group of guys who use AM, but mainly in the early morning (4a.m. – 9a.m.), and another group on SSB that operates the same morning hours, but usually can be heard every night, but later (10-12a.m.), However, when some Tropospheric ducting occurs, opening up some short range skip (500-1500 miles), it’s like they come out of the woodwork and every channel is packed.

In you area, the last time I passed through it was late at night and I heard a local crowd talking (if memory serves me right) on channel 40 LSB. There may be some on AM but I didn’t hear anything at that time. Old CBer’s never die – they pack up their stuff and every 5-10 years or so pull it out when they get nostalgic. If you have some nostalgic buddies w/o equipment I’ll bet that it wouldn’t be hard to talk them into getting back on the air. CB clubs still exist, and I’ve heard of CB Breaks and Jamboree’s happening but there aren’t many across the U.S.

Your last question can cause quite a stir whether it be over-the-air, or on an Internet CB message site, but I’ll give you the answer I’ve been saying for over 15 years now – Most of the new rigs (Chinese junk) aren’t very reliable. I usually use older gear, purchased locally or off EBay. I have two mobile rigs, an E.F. Johnson 4740 AM/SSB rig; the other being a Cobra 138XLR Am/SSB transceiver. Other rigs that have stood the test of time and are (in my opinion) better are:

Realistic Navaho TRC-457/458 AM/SSB Base
Courier Centurion 40D AM/SSB Base
Most early Uniden/President or Cobra rigs

And you’ll find some nice AM Tube rigs that are either restored or close-to-new from the sixties (but expect to pay a hefty price) as well.

You’ll probably remember which ones were good back in those days, and which ones to stay away from. On one of my Blog posts this week, I’ll post your question and see if anyone knows where the activity is in your area. And when that ‘ducting occurs, who knows, I might hear ya on their as New Orleans comes in quite frequently.

Thanks for writing, hope your Labor Day weekend went well!

Regards,
Woody

P.S. - IF ANYONE IS FAMILIAR WITH ANY CB GROUPS OR FREQUENCIES USED IN THE NEW ORLEANS AREA, EMAIL ME AND I'LL GET THE WORD BACK TO PHIL...

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ALAIN WRITES-

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Hello I have a question for you !

Who or what manufacturer's made the CB's for JC Penney's

Thanks you.

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Hi Alain,

They had a couple different Mfg’s that made equipment for them, one of them being Cybernet. They made similar transceivers for Sears and Radio Shack to name a few. All three of them have similar 23 channel mobiles with a built-in power supply as well.

Regards,
Woody

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AND NOW, THE REST OF THE STORY

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While driving around, in between looking for a job, I'd spotted some interesting spots where I wanted to go back and take some pictures of them. I was hoping, and waiting for an overcast day so that the light would be evenly distributed, but it was not to be. Sunday, it rained cats'n dogs and then suddenly quit. Within 30 minutes the sky was fairly clear and as you can imagine, humidity was off-the-scale!
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I could have easily blown it off and waited for optimum conditions but thanks to Robin, I got pumped up again and it wasn't very long before we were on the road - our destination was only a few miles away. My subjects were my favorite to take - curious buildings (see photo at right), landscape, etc. with Robin being the one exception (after all, who wouldn't want to photograph this beautiful woman?)

YEP, SHE'S BEAUTIFUL ALRIGHT!!

Today's photography allows you to do things easily that 15 years ago took a lot of time. For instance this picture on the right. It's nothing special, and frankly, most people would have either deleted it or not taken it at all - but I had a feeling that there was more than met the eye. So I snapped it the way I wanted it to look and didn't give it another thought until I brought it into ADOBE Photoshop Elements.

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I could see that it looked just like I shot it - an old building (The old Imperial Sugar building in Sugar Land) with a bicycle lane sign posted at the side of the road. The windows were dark, with the slightest reflection of the sky (Photo, above/right). I went to work....

Here is the same picture, after a multitude of filtering and adjustments. My first step was to convert it to black and white (the easy part), next, I wanted some color in the foreground, and finally, I wanted to bring that reflection of the sky out as best as possible. It won't be long before I print and frame it, but this is just one example why you shouldn't delete your photo's because you never know what you can get out of a plain shot! CAMERA: Olympus LENS: 500mm f2.8

PLANNED PHOTOS ARE GREAT, BUT THOSE SPUR-OF-THE-MOMENT SHOTS ARE TOO

So ends my report on our Labor Day weekend. We're now into September and by the end of the month - yes, the end will finally come
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73

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WOODY

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THERE ARE SOME GOOD LOOKING
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"EXECUTIVES"
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OUT THERE

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[YOU JUST HAVE TO LOOK FOR THEM]

73

WOODY

I WASN'T FINISHED...



Well, nothing like posting an un-finished post! What you read just before was my rough draft, but mistakes happen and I hit the PUBLISH key instead of the DRAFT key. In "LAND OF THE GIANTS", the crew of the "Spindrift" (a name suggested by Kurt Kasznar / "Alexander B. Fitzhugh") is travelling to London from another location on Earth via space when they run into some turbulence, which seems pretty funny now as the turbulence begins as thunder and lightning - in space. Very soon after they are pulled into a white hole, the controls of the ship return, and they make their landing (thinking it's London). But no, it's a world filled with giant everything - as if they had shrunk. The character Fitzhugh plays a poor version of "Dr.Smith" from Lost-In-Space (another Irwin Allen Production), with a young, smart, older-than-his-years boy version of "Will Robinson".
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It worked to a certain extent, plus the show started out in color when shows like "Lost In Space" began life in black & white. If you were lucky enough to have a color TV - it was great!! (The only oddity to the color television was my Dad's attempt at achieving perfect color. He had a color bar chart and there was one station that would display the same exact chart and my Dad would fervently adjust the colors to get as close to an exact match as possible).
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So we never knew what happened to the Spindrift, it's crew, and passengers, just like we never found out if the "JUPITER ONE" from Lost-In-Space either made it to their destination - or back to Earth. And what about the "INVADERS"??? Did the Aliens win? Did the "Seaview" (Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea) ever complete THEIR mission? And finally....did the "Prisoner" ever escape that Island?
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These are questions that will never be answered. So, what was your favorite show?


NOW, my post is finished - WOODY

NO CLOSURE....


How many T.V. series have we watched, only to have the series cancelled, thus left hanging....wondering - "What happened". One such show was "LAND OF THE GIANTS", which, if you're reading this, and you grew up with CB and TV in the '60's, you know what I mean! I thought it was a great show (like most Irwin Allen Productions) and even though the plot was kinda "Out There", I was hooked. Imagine my horror when the show was cancelled!
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"Did they make it back to their own Earth?"
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"Did the Giants Win?"
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So many questions, and no answers to be found. I'm sure there's at least one series that you watched where it was cancelled with no conclusion, and that really sucks. So, what shows do you wish they had an ending to? Shoot me an email - Woody

NOTHING LIKE A GIANT CAT TO SCARE THE CRAP OUTTA YOU


Or, the headlights of a giant car...

But this had to be a wake-up call

Does anyone know what brand walkie-talkie he was using??

ANOTHER P.O.C. OVERPRICED AUCTION

(P.O.C.= PIECE OF CRAP)
{oh, but it's VERY rare}

CLICK ON P.O.C. FOR FULL DETAILS
(Should read: FREE, YOU PAY SHIPPING)

THIS WEEKS SOLAR UPDATE

CLICK ON SUN FOR ARTICLE

ANOTHER GREAT (FUNNY/SAD) AUCTION....

CLICK ON PICTURE

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WOODY

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