New Fall Network TV Line-Up is a Complete Bust

It's Fall and that means that new shows are here & old shows are returning. Here's some highlights...

The Good:

Castle - Castle picks up where it left off. It's good. The characters are well-developed. The mysteries are always interesting. The actors have chemistry. Nathan Fillion is quickly becoming my favorite actor.

House - I hate that I like this show. It's well-written, well-acted and it's just good TV. The premier was yet further proof why House is a great anti-hero.

The Bad:

Heroes - This season's villains are Carnie freaks? Really? Sigh. I keep wanting desperately to love this show. On one hand, we have House (which I should hate but love) and on the other we have Heroes (which I should love but hate.) Can't win.

Flash Forward - Epic fail! The pilot completely failed to capture the grand scope of events. The lead actors have the emotional depth of paper bags. They clearly wanted to rush forward to the broad plot of the series. In doing so, the show misses everything. The first episode should have played out like a disaster film. ER's should have looked like MASH centers. Lights should have failed to work. Cell networks should have been down for weeks. National Guard troops should have been everywhere. And really, some lowly FBI field agents are in charge? Pass...

The Ugly:

The Forgotten - Huh? Really? Regular citizens solving the unsolvable in no-time flat. Wow. That sounds really, um... Concept good. Holland Tunnel-sized holes. Pass...

NCIS LA - I love NCIS. It's almost a guilty pleasure. I laugh every time the shows tries to pretend that NCIS is some "other-spy" organization, but I accept it because the character acting is great, the plot moves along nicely and it establishes rules that conform with the Hollywood version of reality. NCIS behaves like a law-enforcement arm of the US Military. Domestic Spying was never the focus of the show's makeup. It's more of a byproduct. The spin-off, on the other hand, is all about domestic spying. The intro/cross-over episodes of NCIS last season were the worst episodes of the season. The changes for the season premier actually made things worse. The fact that the first episode started with a dead navy officer is irrelevant. It's a spy show. The premise sucks. The show sucks. The chain of command makes no sense. Their place in the grand scope of things is confusing. They have no place even in the NCIS version of reality. Don't just pass, RUN AWAY!

Play Ball

We're home from Turner Field. It was a wet, but fun time. Our first "real" trip to Atlanta and I never even really saw the skyline. It was too foggy and rainy whenever I looked that way. In fact, I never really saw anything aside from Turner Field & our hotel. We did drive through the Olympic torch site. Maybe if we go back next season, we'll actually spend time seeing Hotlanta.

Anyway, here are some highlights...

Turner Field

Turner Field attempts to merge that throw-back feel with the modern. It does it very well. The entire exterior is the same brick with green metal-works that give you that old-school feel.

Entertainment

The real gem of the park is the entrance area with live entertainment, the best food at the park and the big shops. The BBQ sandwich was really good. Unfortunately, this area has no sight-lines to the ball-field due to the position of the main scoreboard.

Breast Cancer Awareness Night

Saturday night was breast cancer awareness night. Hundreds of survivors took the field and released pink balloons. YES, it made me think of Karen.

The other thing to notice on the above photo is the giant Coke Bottle and Cow. In Philly, we have the Bell. At Turner Field, they have a Cow that does "the Chop" and a really amazing Coke Bottle that lights up, changes colors, displays all sorts of messages & shoots fireworks. I'll still take the Bell.

The turnout Saturday was great. This helped us to experience the full force of "the Chop." When something big happens, the Cow chops, every screen has giant chopping tomahawks, and ever fan chops and chants in unison. It's something to experience. I felt like General Custer.

Of course, the "stranger in a strange land" feeling we got from the Chop was nothing in comparison to when the entire crowd launches into "Thank God I'm a Country Boy" during the 7th-inning stretch.

First Pitch from Our Seats on Sunday

Saturday was fun, but the Phillies lost. Thank goodness for Sunday. The Phillies were aggressive from the get-go. Victorino got himself ejected when he was called out at 2nd. His outburst was in response to a bunch of questionable calls (I checked with iDad, who triple checked the play(s) from home.) The guys were fired up from there.

There was a long rain delay during the 5th inning. Knowing we had a 4-hour drive ahead of us, we were really worried that we would have to leave before the game ended. But, the game resumed just in time for us to get home at 11PM.

Will we go back? Absolutely. I can see us going to a weekend match-up next season. I doubt we'll splurge for the really expensive seats, splurge on dinner at the Chop House or buy Tomahawk beer next time.

Note: This trip was our "It goes up to 11" anniversary present to each other. It's hard to go see a baseball game in November.

Weekend @ Turner Field

Joel, you wanna know something? Every now and then say, "What the fuck." "What the fuck" gives you freedom. Freedom brings opportunity. Opportunity makes your future. - Miles, Risky Business

Miserable 2-weeks here at our house. It started with my feet being a mess, making it hard to walk. (Yes, it's all related to my Fibro.) Then Slick got utterly hammered at work. She even brought the dreaded black bag (the one with the laptop in it) home last weekend. She worked all-day Sunday then followed that up with multiple days of getting up at 5AM to get to work early.

This morning, while looking over the Phillies boxscore from last night, I noticed that they would be at Turner Field all weekend. Miles pops into my head. Before I noticed, the wife and I have hotel reservations across the street from the stadium and really good seats for Saturday & Sunday's games.

Happy early anniversary to us.

I Still Won't Buy Norton, But A Great Ad Campaign

Cover Art

or Why Google Should Go Ahead And Organize The World...

One of the most hyped parts of an iPod Touch is the "Cover Flow" view. This is supposed to allow me to visually skim through my music library. There's only one problem. Huge portions of my library is missing cover art. And not just because I have "free" music. Most of my music collection is still from CD's the wife and I accumulated over the years. No, iTunes hates collections, movie soundtracks, greatest hits and all sorts of random songs. And of my music with cover art, some of it isn't even the right cover. For the longest time, one of my Green Day albums didn't have cover art. Why do I mention this? Because, Mindy Smith had the missing Green Day art.

So, I started my cover art project. Sometimes, it was as simple as deleting the current wrong cover and having iTunes search again. Sometimes, I had to fix the album title or artist name. Slowly, I found myself with three categories of music still missing covers. 1) Old MP3s missing tons of info. 2) the dreaded "collection" and 3) all my Beatles music.

Today, I made my big leap forward by downloading art from other places and manually matching it with my music. This may seem like a pain, but I wish I had just done this from the begining. It's easy. Go to to a place like Amazon, search for the song/album, save the cover art and then copy it to your album/song info page.

This is the part where Google gets my vote for organizing the world....

Time and time again, Amazon would give me a "can not find" message. I would then google the item in question, only for the top choice to come up as...you've guessed it...Amazon. How can Google index and track info on Amazon's website better than Amazon? That's not a question for Google, but one for Amazon.

Of course, none of this is surprising or important.

No, what's important is that I finally have cover art for Abby Road when I decide to listen to the Beatles.

Which is quite often because Abby Road is - as my niece would say - awesomely awesome!

Week One: Eagles vs Panthers - Sigh

The Eagles won. It's what I wanted. So, why am I so miserable?

My "home town" team vs my "home" team was great...

Until it wasn't.

Having lived in Charlotte for 5 years, I've earned the right to pull for the Panthers in all things except when they play against the Eagles. So, what I wanted yesterday was a hard-fought, exciting matchup where the Eagles won late in the 4th quarter. Instead, I got uncertainty.

Delhomme was horrid. Sure, the Eagles defense had a lot to do with it, but he was horrid. I was excited and worried when I saw a clock-draining opening drive from Delhomme and the Panthers. The Eagles responded with some great play on defense & special teams. In the first quarter, the Panthers took over 8 minutes to score 7 points. In the second quarter, the Eagles took less than 5 minutes to pour on 28.

If I could have stopped the game there, I would have been happy. But NOOOOO... We had to play a 2nd half. Delhomme had to stink it up even more. The Panthers were just horrid. But that wasn't the worst of it.

Donovan's got a cracked #@%@ing rib. It was like a movie drama. The "hero-king" gets hurt and the screen flashes to the once exiled friend who's next in line. Is that concern on his face or is he coldly calculating his position? The audience is spell-bound. This is money in the bank for the NFL. It's painful for the fans.

So, now I get to watch and wait as both teams figure out what to do with their quarterbacks before week 2. Sigh!

Oh Happy Dog

Friday was beautiful. I spent most of the week with my feet up because they hurt. But on Friday, they felt better and I couldn't resist the weather. It was a comfortable 82 degrees, sunny with a pleasant breeze. It was perfect. Nothing to do but take the dog to Cane Creek for some hiking and rolling in the grass.

Letting Go of World of Warcraft Blogs

The following is a repost of my post from today on OrdoSerp, the Lord of the Rings Online blog I participate in.

Funny thing about giving up World of Warcraft...

It's life-altering.

I "forgot" to cancel my subscription last month. Part of me kept thinking I would hop back on and play. But, then I saw that I hadn't logged on since early July and I realized that my wife & I had wasted a combined $90 for July, August and September. It got easier to hit the cancel button after that.

My RSS feed contains a lot of WoW blog. It's hard to let go. But it's time to say goodbye to them too. Here is a list of the blogs & podcasts I will miss the most. (Yes, there are more. Yes, I'm pathetic.)

Goodbye Daily Druid, druid-news aggrigate extreme. I even appeared in your listings once or twice. I haven't glanced at the feed in months, so it's not a hard break for me.

Goodbye Flyv. You were a guild-mate and a teacher when I started to learn to feral tank. You've also moved on from WoW. But, your direction and my interests have drifted apart. It's time for me to accept that and move on.

For months, I really hoped Phaelia would return and provide us with more Resto4Life. Now, I'm glad you didn't. You helped make my wife an amazingly awesome tree and amused her endlessly. She had so much fun reading your blog that I started reading it and eventually tried to learn to Boomkin & Tree when the dual-spec option happened.

Goodbye Pike, reluctant leader of the hunter community. Most hunter-blogs flare bright for a while then burn out. Yet, Aspect of the Hare goes strong. Elitist Jerks may have taught me how to raid, you taught me how to enjoy it. After I swapped to full-time feral druid to off-tank for my little 10-man guild, I kept reading your blog. Now, sadly, we have no place in each other's lives. I may miss you most of all.

Goodbye Kalon and your blog ThinkTank. Think tank is the ultimate tanking (mostly feral) blog around. Yours may be the hardest break. How is it that 2 months have gone by since I last played Rhus, yet I'm still reading your theory craft? Why do I care about the Feral loot-tables in the Coliseum? Why would I care if I should keep T8 cat gear or not? (Especially since I slowed and then stopped my progression before getting any T8 gear for my cat.) Your blog is like catnip rolled in honey. What feral off-tank (current or retired) can resist you?

Goodbye Randydelux & Scott. Last week when I caught myself loading your latest podcast on my iPod before a hike, I knew it was time to stop. There are no LotRO podcasts that can even hold a candle to the Instance. I've seriously considered listening to your show just for the fun of it. It's not going to happen. ExtraLife will continue to be part of my day and I'll be tryingExtraLifeRadio.

I continue to follow and support Andrew over at Of Teeth and Claws in his game-blogging endeavors. I'm glad that he's branched out from WoW to write about all things gaming. I think his latest crusade against subscription MMO's is thought-provoking. I have a lot to say about subscription MMO's and why they work, but that's a different post.

Goodbye World of Warcraft, I've canceled my subscription, deleted all the theory-craft sites from my bookmarks and now, I'm not even going to read blogs about you.

My gaming time is now taken up by Lord of the Rings Online, Mario Kart & Rock Band 2.

A Funny Thing Happened...

...on my way to write new posts this June. I started having the best summer I've had in years. I felt good, the weather was great, my wife had a lot of vacation time and I just didn't give a rats-ass about blogging. Sure there were a lot of times when I considered posting about our Summer adventures. Our multiple bear run-ins while hiking in the Shenandoah National Park nearly got me posting. My 10-year-old niece singing a near perfect "Eye of the Tiger" on Rock Band 2 also ranked up there. And let's not forget getting to see Tiger Woods roar back LIVE at the Bridgestone Invitational. But all that's in the past.

Now, with Labor Day upon us and remaining vacation time limited to Thanksgiving and Christmas, I'm thinking about getting back to my normal routine. So, what about this blog? Good question. Do I even have any readership anymore? Some folks probably neglected to delete me from their RSS feeds. But then, this blog has never been about "readership."

When I stopped posting this spring, I joined Facebook at the behest of some friends. I found it a mixed bag. On one hand, it's a virus-laden, time sink. On the other, I reconnected with dozens of high school friends. Unfortunately, it made me realize that highschool was 20 years ago. Yet, instead of reminding me of all my highschool horor, Facebook has helped me rediscover the good times. For that, I'm glad to have joined. Just don't expect me to do anything on Farm Town or Mafia Wars. I've got a lot better games to play.

My Facebook experiment can't/won't replace blogging or other online-networking in my life. Facebook isn't about close friends or deep thoughts. It's about broad, social networking. I don't have 80+ close friends. I have 80+ "friends" from multiple phases of my life.

Oddly, the biggest news in my life since starting my blog-break is probably our exit from World of Warcraft. After over 3 years, WoW stopped being the best MMO for us. So, the wife, our friends and I all moved over to Lord of the Rings Online. The gameplay is similar enough to make the transition fairly painless, but different enough to breath fresh life into online gaming nights.

Now, before you worry that we simply replaced wow-addiction for LotRO-addiction, rest assured that Slick and I have moved past the 7 nights a week MMO insanity. Our group officially tries to meet 2 nights a week. I expect that we'll have some weeks where that number will be more like 3-4, but gone are the marathon Warcrack days.

Our main recreation source is still online videogames. But instead of just playing the MMO de jur, we're doing more stuff on the Wii. We've got an online Rock Band 2 group and I've been trying to organize weekly Mario Kart Online night with my college friends and hope to start a weekly session this month.

We've also been getting together with our neighbors for dinner, trying to make friends with other couples on the block & even make friends with some of Slick's work friends.

So, that's my quick recap.

Let me finish this post with a shout out to my friend, Pobble over at Pobble Thoughts. She's been going through a blog-writing crisis much like the one that lead to my taking a break from blogging. Her plight was a major reason why I decided to finally get this first post back out of the way. I've been close to starting back up for weeks, but avoiding it. This is my lame attempt at solidarity with her. Good luck Pobble!

and now to hit publish without spellchecking or proofreading. Why? Because I'm tired and I feel like it. Night all! And welcome back me.

Miss Me

Don't make a big deal about it, but...

Urge to post rising...

Dun dun dun...

Exercising My Demons

I've not been posting a lot lately. There's a lot to say about "why." It started with writer's block. I would find a subject to write about and become completely inarticulate. Posts, even bad ones, would not flow. Then in turned into a disinterest in posting about anything.

This blog, first and foremost, has been a place for me to channel my frustrations about my health. Even posts having nothing to do with my fibromyalgia often flow from it. The blog is my outlet. It's been a purpose in a purposeless existence.

No, I'm not trying to depress you.

My mother-in-law, the wise woman that she is, suggested something profound to me recently. The writer's block is a good thing. I forget her exact words, but it boils down to this...

I needed to talk and now I don't.

What does that mean? This blog has been like a therapist in my life. It was my "keep a journal" project. I had finally found the right job, our lives were headed exactly where we wanted to go, things were great and then my health made it all go away. I gave up "everything" to get healthy and focus on the things that matter. It was a very painful decision, but continues to look like the right one.

And so it happened. I stopped having to talk about "it."

Unfortunately, that's also meant that I don't need to vent about the economy, comment on the new "first dog," or share my sadness on the passing Harry Kalas. I see this writer's block as a good thing, but it's also created new concerns.

This blog has always served three purposes.

1) A place for me to work through things, "exercise my demons."
2) A place for my family & friends to check up on us.
3) A place to write.

I'm done exercising my demons through this blog. I can find other ways of writing. But what about my readership?

My plan is to go silent from blogging for a month or so. There are other things I've been devoting my blogging & feed-reading to - mostly exercise.

Exercise - daily - focused - even when I'm in a lot of pain or suffering from fatigue - but careful exercise has become the next major step in managing my health. It's the one post I still have left in me, but doesn't need to be written.

Simply put: the Wii Fit is an amazing piece of technology.

When/if I return, this blog will probably undergo a face lift and become focused on things like "vacation photos" and blurbs about home-improvement projects. I may even look for another online home.

This is not goodbye from blogging. This is shalom.

OMG WTF AIG part 2

So, this AIG exec has turned in his resignation in the NYT. He's giving his $742M bonus to charity. He feels "unfairly persecuted by elected officials."

Read his letter in the NYT-OpEd section here.

You can decide for yourself.

OMG WTF AIG

A.I.G. Chief Asks Bonus Recipients to Give Back Half

Ever gotten a "bonus" at your job? Maybe it was enough to to cover a down payment on a new car or pay off a credit card. Did it feel good to be rewarded for your efforts? Maybe your department or even whole company had an "off year" but you performed well and were encouraged to work harder because of it.

When I heard about the A.I.G. bonuses, I wanted to believe that most of the $165M in bonuses were to folks like you or me. Hard-working middle-class people who got a little extra in these hard economic times. Yeah...not so much.

Of the 418 employees who received bonuses, 298 got more than $100,000, according to the New York attorney general, Andrew M. Cuomo. The highest bonus was $6.4 million, and 6 other employees received more than $4 million. Fifteen other people received bonuses of more than $2 million and 51 received $1 million to $2 million.

It baffles me. It knocks the wind out of me. It was shocking that the company gave out bonuses. Harder still to believe that these "bonuses" were clearly not tied to actual performance, but instead contractual. And still, none of that bothered me, angered me, as much as the actual per-person pay outs.

How is this shit not criminal?

I don't have a problem with people being rich. But good grief.

I could go on, at length, with an even more curse-laden diatribe but you get the idea...

.

Who Will Save Us?

Funny story here. Just a few days ago I was in an email chain describing my relationship with my friend "Cainam." It went like this...

Don Quixote had Sancho Panza! Shrek had Donkey. I can't go chasing windmills without Cainam.


Note: For some reason, I can't seem to adjust this picture to fit in my blog. Just click the image to read the whole thing. Also, if you don't already, read XKCD!

The New Symbol of America's Troubles

This from MSNBC...

Eagle survives crash through windshield

It may not be a Bald Eagle & that truck might not be the mortgage crisis, but it's the perfect symbol of this entire debacle. The truck windshild is fucked up. The bird's face is messed up too. But both are getting patched up.

So, remember as you watch Citi fall below a $1 a share, watch in awe as unsubstantiated fear rips health GE stock prices down the toilet & GM's living on a respirator and waiting for someone to pull the plug on bankruptcy.

The Eagle Lives! It lives in spite of all those moronic talkers on CNBC & Fox. It has been hit by the runaway truck of American excess & greed, and it's going to live to fight another day!

And never forget this isn't your daddy's Bald Eagle. He's the jackass driving the buss taking America to Hell. No this bird is our Golden Eagle. For we too feel like we've been hit by a truck. And if that golden can recover to fly someday, then so can we.

P.S. Dear Political Talking Heads! Fuck you too! Instead of being rabble inducers who talk out of your asses, try helping the President save the Eagle (that's us) from the truck!

Always make posts like this...on sleep meds...teatering on the edge of passing out...unable to think clearly...It's how Wallstreet's been managing our money all these years, and look how well their doing. The've gotten bonuses for screwing up all our lives. I wondered what their soul cost them?

Power

That storm system that swept across the eastern seaboard dumped about 4-5 inches of snow on us. That's saying a lot for the southern tip of North Carolina. There are just enough salt trucks in the region to hit the major interstates, but our town's snow plan is to wait for it to melt.

Around 9AM, just as the sun came out, the whole town of Waxhaw lost power. It stayed off until about 4PM. The house got down to about 55 Deg. Just as I was about to "free" my car (garage door opener didn't work) & drive to a mall or the library, the power came back on. It stayed on until about 5:30 then dropped for another hour. Hopefully, that'll be it for the night. But, we are taking some precautions.

I've gotten out the flashlights. Since the temperature outside is predicted to be in the teens tonight, we're cranking the heat for the rest of the evening.

It totally makes you think about people who lose power in ice-storms for days on end. I mean, no coffee, no computer, no heat is frustrating, but I didn't really suffer. I spent the day in a sunny room reading. I could "escape" anytime I wanted. Some folks aren't so lucky.

Wall Street? What About Pro Sports Pay?

Let's see...

Redskins land Haynesworth for 7 years, $100 Million

The Dodgers and Manny are fighting over $25 Million (for 1 year)

Jayson Werth's winter contract is worth $10 Million for 2 years.

$20 Million here, $10 Million there. Where's the outrage when sports stars ask for such money? Sure, they aren't responsible for the economy. But the players & the people who employ them are just as guilty of milking us. We can't watch most of their games without paid television services. The tickets, parking & food is too expensive for a family of one. We're forced to fund their new stadiums with local tax dollars under the threat that they'll move somewhere else.

When the owner of Lowes Motor Speedway wanted to build a drag strip, the town of Concord, NC didn't want it. So, he just threatened to move. Next thing you know, not only did he get to build his drag strip, the town helped.

We're so enthralled with and dependent on our sports that they have a strangle-hold on us. Yet, as we sink players like Manny Ramirez can demand millions. A-Rod, Bonds, Big-Mac. They cheated, but A-Rod is still playing. And you can bet that Bonds & Big-Mac would be too if they were still young enough.

Marbury acts like a complete jackass in New York and what does he get? He gets to join the world champion Celtics for a $20 Million contract buyout & a minimum veteran's salary of $1.3 Million.

The players aren't the only ones I blame here. They are just one part of the great sports machine that's milking us for all we're worth. Will the economy get bad enough that fans stop paying for their fancy channels & cramped seats? What then? Will the NFL be asking for a bail-out? Will NASCAR be begging for fuel-subsidies?

I've grown weary of it. Maybe I should start following my local little-league teams.

Squirrel Chasing Injury

My dog is limping. Seems he hurt his left-front paw or the dog-equivalent of a wrist. As best I can tell, it happened Saturday when we were cleaning the kitchen floor. The dog saw a squirrel out by the bird feeders, raced to the back door, and lost traction. It definitely hurt because he stopped chasing the squirrel for a moment...but just for a moment.

And then he seemed fine. My in-laws arrived - why else would we be cleaning - with their dog. Max & Stewie played. Everything seemed fine. Sometime between Sunday & Monday we noticed that he was limping a bit. Otherwise, he seemed great. By Tuesday, the limp would come and go. Once he started moving around, it would disappear. If he sat for a while, it came back. Sprain right?

And now, suddenly today, he's really limping. Except of course when there's something to do. Every time Stewie barks at kids, Max runs over to help. Every time Max sees a squirrel in the yard, he runs after it. Then, when it's all over, he's pathetic again. If he couldn't use it at all or if he wouldn't let me touch it, I would have taken him to the vet days ago. Instead, I'm in limbo with it. My gut tells me that all this extra activity is aggravating it. How long do I hold out? If it's "just" a sprain, then dealing with a vet trip will only make it worse. If it's not just a sprain...

For now, I'm making him hang out in the computer room with me and not letting him run around barking at stuff. It sucks for him. It kind of sucks for me.

Stupid squirrels...

Mm...Fail He Does

Muppet Fail Theory & Star Wars from PvP. It's funny because it's true.

“Wait, I was just thinking that Yoda is a muppet. As with all muppets, everything he does fails. He talks about how Anakin is troubled, but still lets him become a padawan and a Jedi. He works closely with Palpatine AKA Darth Sideous without ever so much as thinking twice. He’s the general of the so-called Clone Army, which kills all of his Jedi but Obi-Wan. He effs up the fight against Sideous.

He doesn’t want to train Luke. Then, when he does want to train Luke, he doesn’t want Luke to leave. If Luke hadn’t left, the whole rebellion could have fallen.

Not until Yoda dies do things go right for the rebellion against the Empire. Yoda’s rise is the rise of the Empire.

Dude is a muppet through and through.”

When $300 Doesn't Seem Like a Lot of Money

There are a lot of good things about being a home-owner. It's been nearly 7 years since my wife dragged me kicking & screaming into our first home & I don't regret it. Having a home means having a dog, a garage with tools & room for all my crap. I like being handy even if my health has curtailed my projects a bit. Still, there's one thing about home-ownership that's not fun: The ever-present fear of that major repair. Today, was one of those days.

Our downstairs toilet & the dishwasher have been backing up. I finally had someone come in and snake the sewer line to the tune of $300. The line is right next to a tree. The guy had a really hard time snaking the line. Yipe! He told me to call the county because the problem spot is where the line meets the street and that it was probably tree roots. If the county won't fix it, the price will start at $1,000 because his boss would have to come out with a team & a camera. Visions of heavy machinery, trenches in my yard, a felled tree filled my head. So much for our savings.

Except, everything is "fine" now. They came out. The blockage is clear. It's all good. Well, it might not be great. It's possible that the snaking is only a temporary fix. It's likely that I'll have to have work done in the future. For now, however, I'll pay my $300 & know that I got off easy.