The Digital Cliff
That's a term used to describe the abrupt decay to unusable of a digital signal at a certain distance from the transmitter. The point at which this occurs depends on the height of the transmitting and receiving antennas, the terrain between them, the frequency of the signal, and various other factors. I got around this evening to looking at coverage maps for the new digital signals of the broadcast television stations we used to receive here. As I expected, we are in the dark blue (probably not usable) zone on all of them. Only violet or no signal at all would be worse.
Terrain and distance to the transmitters are the factors in play. The nearest transmitters are in Chicago, Rockford, and Milwaukee. Even with analog, our Milwaukee reception was very poor. So I looked at WREX (formerly channel 13 in Rockford, ABC affiliate,) WTTW (formerly channel 11 in Chicago, PBS affiliate,) and WGN (formerly channel 9 in Chicago, independent.) None of them look to be worth the bother of even redeeming the "coupons" for a converter box. The problem is that we are in the Kishwaukee River Valley, a shallow depression between two long glacial moraines that separate the Fox River and the Rock River. Rockford is on the Rock River, so there's a pile of gravel and iron 50 to 100 feet high between us and them. Chicago is on the shore of Lake Michigan, about 150 feet lower than we are but divided from us by the other moraine which rises 50 to 80 feet above our level. Not that we watched much broadcast television anyway. News and weather occasionally was about it. The last time we actually watched any significant amount was probably during the 9/11 attacks. Still, it's irritating that the government and the broadcast industry have written us off as "irrelevant" along with all the other people living in similar areas. The only remaining alternative here would be a satellite dish, requiring special installation at a distance from the house, which is quite costly. (There is no cable TV here at all.)
Today was a zoo at work. Summer Reading always generates a lot of requests for new library cards. But there was also a Spanish class in the library this morning, which seemed to bring a flood of people with little or no English who wanted cards. Then in mid-afternoon a group of Red Hat Club ladies arrived for a tour. They kept my boss busy for nearly an hour. Many of their questions were surprisingly detailed. It was amusing to hear her trying to explain ebooks and ebook readers (the Kindle was named in the question) to a group who were not even computer users and had difficulty grasping the concept. It didn't help that we had no actual reader on hand to show them.
Today is also Gary's birthday. Took him to dinner at Donley's, a Western themed steakhouse south of Union. They are a bit pricey but not too bad. The food is high quality and the servings are huge. We always bring home leftovers. The decor is fun, consisting of lots of real antiques from the gold rush era and the western states, mixed with western film posters and pulp magazine covers from the heyday of the western story. There are also Civil War relics and some old hunting trophies: moose, elk, buffalo. It was not busy or noisy, which is a plus from our point of view but probably not good news for the restaurant.
Farrier pronounced Tess better, and even trimmed more off her feet. No blood, no limp, so that's good news.
Oh, and it's raining again.
Terrain and distance to the transmitters are the factors in play. The nearest transmitters are in Chicago, Rockford, and Milwaukee. Even with analog, our Milwaukee reception was very poor. So I looked at WREX (formerly channel 13 in Rockford, ABC affiliate,) WTTW (formerly channel 11 in Chicago, PBS affiliate,) and WGN (formerly channel 9 in Chicago, independent.) None of them look to be worth the bother of even redeeming the "coupons" for a converter box. The problem is that we are in the Kishwaukee River Valley, a shallow depression between two long glacial moraines that separate the Fox River and the Rock River. Rockford is on the Rock River, so there's a pile of gravel and iron 50 to 100 feet high between us and them. Chicago is on the shore of Lake Michigan, about 150 feet lower than we are but divided from us by the other moraine which rises 50 to 80 feet above our level. Not that we watched much broadcast television anyway. News and weather occasionally was about it. The last time we actually watched any significant amount was probably during the 9/11 attacks. Still, it's irritating that the government and the broadcast industry have written us off as "irrelevant" along with all the other people living in similar areas. The only remaining alternative here would be a satellite dish, requiring special installation at a distance from the house, which is quite costly. (There is no cable TV here at all.)
Today was a zoo at work. Summer Reading always generates a lot of requests for new library cards. But there was also a Spanish class in the library this morning, which seemed to bring a flood of people with little or no English who wanted cards. Then in mid-afternoon a group of Red Hat Club ladies arrived for a tour. They kept my boss busy for nearly an hour. Many of their questions were surprisingly detailed. It was amusing to hear her trying to explain ebooks and ebook readers (the Kindle was named in the question) to a group who were not even computer users and had difficulty grasping the concept. It didn't help that we had no actual reader on hand to show them.
Today is also Gary's birthday. Took him to dinner at Donley's, a Western themed steakhouse south of Union. They are a bit pricey but not too bad. The food is high quality and the servings are huge. We always bring home leftovers. The decor is fun, consisting of lots of real antiques from the gold rush era and the western states, mixed with western film posters and pulp magazine covers from the heyday of the western story. There are also Civil War relics and some old hunting trophies: moose, elk, buffalo. It was not busy or noisy, which is a plus from our point of view but probably not good news for the restaurant.
Farrier pronounced Tess better, and even trimmed more off her feet. No blood, no limp, so that's good news.
Oh, and it's raining again.