Pinnacle DVD creation

Peggy's Pages
Keith set up the Pinnacle so I could begin editing our home movies--again. When he was here, the program worked beautifully, so last night I left the machine on all night recording the same video I’ve been trying to record onto DVD for a year now. I did mute the computer, so we wouldn’t have to listen to the audio all night. When I started editing it today, the machine had not recorded the audio. The same frustration I felt so often last year is back.
I want to fling the machine across the world We purposely bought this new expensive Dell computer so I could make movies. I’m not going to get Joel involved. He’s already upset that I am actually getting rid of the videos we’ve held on to for twenty years and don’t watch. I’m not going to call Keith, because he’s got his own family and problems. He doesn’t need this.
I think the solution is to start again fresh in the morning. I’ll set the machine while I’m at exercise and not mute it. Perhaps, the muting of the computer caused it not to record the audio. If that doesn’t work, I’ll call Dell—we paid for customer service although this is probably the program not the machine. Then I’ll call Pinnacle again and pay for their customer service. I will get these DVDs done this year. I will…I will…I will…

The Penelopiad

Just finished reading Margaret Atwood's new book titled The Penelopiad. The author retells the tragedy of Penelope, cousin of Helen of Troy, and wife of Odysseus from Homer's Books of the Odyssey. I read about Ms Atwood's book in the reading section of the newspaper. I reread part of the original Odyssey just to refresh my memory from college reading nearly forty years ago. The Odyssey is so engrained in our culture through cartoons and movies, that I remembered most of the story but none of the symbolism. I didn't remember anything about Penelope and her twelve maids who were hung by Odysseus.

This modern book, written in the language of today, is a parady of the myths of that time. Penelope is in Hades--the afterworld retelling her story from her point of view as it happened three thousand years before. The book kept my attention throughout the telling. Most interesting was the small, what I'll call commercials, the author interspersed in various rhyme, different poetic forms, a court case, dream or drama. As I read the book, I felt like Penelope was actually beside me telling her story.

I think this book is an interesting one for someone who has read Greek myths and enjoys that sort of scholarship. It is a tongue in cheek parady of sections of Homer's Odyssey. The main character is not Odysseus, but his wife Penelope. The book cost $18.00 at Border's but I suggest a reader wait and buy it used or get it at the library. Although, I never like to wait when I think I may like to read a book. For me, it was worth the cost. I'll loan it to my friends. Don't know if my daughter would enjoy it. I wonder if she read the Odyssey in college. Are they still doing that?