Finished the table this morning; did touch-ups and let it dry while we went on errands. Once we got home I placed some rub-on gold leaves on the top and on top of the shelf below, and then clear-coated both these flat surfaces. While I was out there I spray-painted a stool that's been sitting unpainted for over a year; it's for getting to the top books on the media bookshelves.

It's getting to be time to put up the Christmas tree in the living room, but part of what was sitting there at the moment was the box with our new stereo receiver and speakers. James 20+ year old receiver had blown a left speaker months ago; we used the one working speaker only when we watched DVDs, although previously we'd had the television shunted through there as well.

Well, there was no way to get the box out of the living room except by assembling and hitching up the new receiver, so that's what James did. He pulled the old unit and speakers out and re-attached the wires, and in about an hour we had the television and the DVD again working. The radio still isn't working properly, but we've played the radio maybe once in the past year anyway.

Well, the smaller speakers need something to sit on. And that meant James needed to also assemble the DVD towers we bought on sale several months ago. These are 60" inch high, 12-inch wide towers from Office Max (or Office Depot or Staples; how can one remember after all these months?). But first, with Willow perched between us wearing her new red bandanna with the holly applique, we carted the receiver, which was still good, with the speakers and a note about the left one, to Goodwill, then treated ourselves to Bruster's ice cream and Willow to a doggie sundae.

When we got home it was back to work. James assembled the main part of the DVD towers and then I got to hammer the backs on and fix up the shelves. One on either side of the entertainment center, and we were done. Well, James was done with that--he still had to go upstairs and cook himself breakfast burritos. I got to load the shelves and tidy up the leftover papers.

By then we were both beat. I had James make me some canned soup, whereupon I sat down with my supper to watch the The Waltons Pearl Harbor episode, "Day of Infamy." The hair still raises on my arms when I hear the news bulletins. It's a wonderful episode that still makes me cry.

Despite being dog tired, I did put up a few decorations.

The den will need a lot more work, but this is just the next step in whipping it into shape. James was disappointed that we did not connect all the speakers today (it has six; we put in left, right and center leaving the two rear speakers and the subwoofer for another time)--he says it's a guy thing. :-)

BTW, we got to test a theory of mine today and it turned out I was right. When we bought the DVD player two years ago, one of the perks of the Apex 600A we purchased was that it was supposed to play .mp3s. Imagine my disappointment when it didn't. The book said it was "capable" of playing .mp3s, but referenced having a receiver that could play Dolby Digital 5.1. James' receiver, as I said, was 20+ years old--no Dolby 5.1 back then. This receiver was a cheap one from Sam's, but it did have the requisite Dolby.

So I popped a burned .mp3 CD into the player and to our surprise a menu appeared! It will play .mp3s now, but there's a little catch: the sampling rate on the files has to be 64 kbps or more, which most of mine aren't. However, it's good to know for future reference. We listened to "Gracie's Christmas Carol," 1936 outing on the Burns and Allen Show, and President Roosevelt making a Christmas address to the nation, those being the only two shows that were sampled over 64 kbps.

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 9:01:00 PM

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