Miscellaneous Shellfish...

...or, Did I Miss Something?

I replaced the tempermental household diety that was our DVD/VCR player/recorder, purchasing a new one that has the most inscrutable user's guide I've ever read. I don't understand the different kinds of DVD formats, and recording modes, and whatever the heck "progressive scanning" is. Why would you assume we all know these things like we know the difference between cheddar and swiss cheese, or PC versus Mac? Is it so hard to provide a little explanation? Especially since the nice man who sold me the unit pointed out that this particular manufacturer invented the DVD player, so you'd think they'd have figured out how to explain it by now.

For the past two days, the weather people have issued a "freezing fog warning." I don't recall having ever heard this term before. What is freezing fog? Why do we need to be warned about it?