Ploafmaster General

Dave comes through again with another stellar recommendation. Rui Palha's black and white photography is impossibly good from start to finish. His ability to capture a sense of isolation or transition is impeccable. It's hard to choose a favorite, but if I had to, I'm sure I could come up with a short list.

Our current model of space shuttle has ben in service almost 7 months longer than I've been alive. Don' you think it's time for some alternatives?

Dinner tonight was magical. I went by the butcher shop for a special trip because I knew they'd have freshly made hot dogs.

Let me repeat that. FRESHLY MADE HOT DOGS.

The Belmont Butchery makes their own links from (I believe) beef shoulder, presumably garlic, salt, some fat, and whatever other seasonings they choose. They handle the stuffing and smoking, and I was delighted to see them trussed up with string when I arrived. They're a quarter-pound each, so I grabbed two for dinner.

I decided that I'd try my hand at deep frying, so there was a reprise of my potato chips - only this time cooked in peanut oil. MUCH better. They cooked considerably faster, were more evenly crispy, and delightfully browned. I toasted up some nice rolls while the hot dogs cooked up...

I felt as if I'd never eaten a real hot dog until tonight.

I'm finding that I'm consistently delighted (but not surprised) by the extreme difference in quality and flavor between what I'm buying from the butcher and what I've previously eaten in its industrial format. The snap of the casing, the juiciness, the texture, the taste! You can't begin at one without the others. I'd have a hard time getting these for a cookout (they're not cheap), but I think my every-two-or-three months hot dog habit is about to change to once-a-month.

I washed down this perfect warm weather meal with some lemonade, and now I wish I had some gelato to cap off my evening's meal :-)

It must be Nostalgia Day here at the 'General, because I can't help but run in to little blasts from my past. BEHOLD, Garbage Pail Kids:



This came from Flickr user Mauricio Montoya, who has an entire set dedicated to the fabulously disgusting trading cards.

Oh childhood, where did you go?

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Br9K8qnD5E0&hl=en&w=580&h=485]

Last year I received a notice from a collection agency regarding unpaid personal property taxes on my old 1991 Toyota Camry. It was about $25, I think, including the interest for paying late. The problem is, I'd traded in the car in 2004 when I purchased my Jetta. I basically had to contact the dealership and have them send me a copy of the sales information from their records so I could fax it to the city as proof that I really had sold it. Phew...that was settled.

Until this year.

I received THREE tax bills this year - one each for Valerie's and my Jetta, and one for a 1991 Toyota Camry. That I still didn't own.

Today I called the city offices and pressed "3" for the Department of Finance or whatever. When I told the customer service gal that I had a problem with my personal property tax, I was informed that that department was currently unavailable because of high demand. That is, the very group with which I had a problem during tax season wasn't taking calls during tax season since IT WAS BUSY BECAUSE OF TAX SEASON!

So I left a freaking message. I may be too generous in assuming they keep records of what people paid in years past, but if they did, they should be able to see that I clearly paid only for two Volkswagens, and didn't do a thing about a Toyota. We'll see.

READ. LAUGH. Unless...you don't hate Montana, do you?

Check out my fresh uploadz.

Yeah, I know, it's Earth Day, but I wasn't actually searching for something related to the environment. I was researching the design and manufacture of beer kegs when I came across the ecoKEG, developed by an Australian named Warwick Field.

This keg is made from fully recyclable plastics, weighs about 30 pounds less than a standard keg, and has the potential for keeping beer fresh for longer than metal. It's still a standard size and shape so it's supposed to work with existing beer logistics. There are financial incentives to beer distributors, too, since it's a lower cost of materials and lower risk for lost or damaged kegs.

I'd like to keep an eye on this, because it'd be interesting to see how well they work in practice and whether they make their way to the United States. I'd also be interested to research the comparative polluting effects of manufacturing and recycling polyethylene terephthalate vs. steel or aluminum.

For some additional history on Fritos, and the man who turned them from a Mexican beach snack into a major American munchie, check out NPR's piece on the corn product.

MacNN is reporting that Paypal claims they won't block any modern browser, including Safari. Woohoo!

I made my own potato chips for the first time tonight.

I used the mandoline to slice up a large Yukon Gold potato which I then tossed in a drizzle of extra virgin live oil and some Kosher salt. I roasted the slices (I didn't feel like deep frying for the first time when I was cooking other things), flipping once after about ten minutes. Once finished, I dressed the crisp slices with another sprinkle of Kosher salt (though perhaps it should have been the only salt), fresh ground black pepper, fresh thyme, and freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano.

They are pretty much my new favorite potato chip.

I've known for a little while now that Paypal is planning to block browsers that don't have anti-phishing measures built in.

I've given this some though, and I think this is a stupid idea. I understand phishing is a legitimate security threat, but it's one which requires user interaction at a higher level than most exploits. To prevent me from intentionally going to the Paypal website directly or from eBay is off-putting. It's not a crisis for me to open Firefox when I want to use eBay, but it's pretty crappy user experience if I have to remember to open one browser for one use case when I'd otherwise rather use Safari. I think this really boils down to me not liking a website/company telling me which browser to use.

I guess there's naught that I can do but hope Apple includes support for Extended Validation certs in a (near) future version.

Jack Donaghy: Don't you watch the news?

Liz Lemon: The Food Network doesn't have a news show.

30 Rock, 4/17/2008

Tonight I'm heading to Delicious Designs with Valerie - an annual event hosted by her trade organization, the American Society of Interior Designers.

At this event folks construct architectural, interior, or furniture elements out of edible materials. I've seen copies of famous buildings, a sagging toilet made out of rice crispy treats, and the totally-not-fair-but-somehow-won-anyway pirate ship made almost entirely out of pickles. Lots of this stuff is super kitschy, some of it's downright stupid, but some of it is quite clever and creative. Valerie is working with some others to construct a sample board, and her part included some "wood" made from chocolate, and "cork flooring" made from two kinds of graham crackers. I'm hoping to get loads of pictures from the event, but considering the low indoor lighting, that may be wishful thinking...

Last night I actually managed to get to bed before 7:30 and - Miracle of Miracles!!! - fall asleep before 8:00.

I did this because I semi-voluntarily came into the office this morning at 4:15 to oversee my portion of a production database release. I woke up once at about 11:40 to hit the head, and then only woke up again at 3:25 this morning, five minutes before my alarm was to go off anyway! So now I'm sitting here in the office at 4:45 AM typing a blog post.

If there's any advantage to being up SO early, it's that I'm leaving the office around 2 PM this afternoon. I plan to take a nice full hour-long lunch at noon - anyone care to join me? - and then finish up my day before heading out to FINALLY shoot that roll of B&W film in what's supposed to be a glorious afternoon. Heck, if today is as sunny as it's supposed to be, maybe I'll even fire off that roll of slide film in my bag...

Oh my...this is rather big news, I think.

RoughlyDrafted is reporting that IBM has created a Mac-switching pilot program internally.

That's huge. Really huge. I remember when I was younger arguing with my Mac friends when the major alternative was IBM. Now that Big Blue is out of the hardware business, it seems they're looking to move away from Windows. Image the increase in Mac adoption if this expands! Work users looking for Macs to use as personal computers, more enterprises deciding it's actually okay to use OS X instead of Windows...I can't emphasize enough how significant this will be if it takes off.
(via MacNN)

According to the BBC News, the skeleton of a freakin' triceratops will be auctioned off in Paris, France.

Now where can I find a half million Euros and a larger living room?

Attacking a Hardee's commercial is a little too easy these days. Whether it's for chauvinistic portrayals of women or the seeming attempts to make their burgers look as sloppy and disgusting as possible, the fast food chain's TV ads don't seem to find much praise outside the frat boy set. I usually just ignore the commercials, but this one finally ticked me off:

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOJdsOCRaxU&hl=en&w=580&h=485]

Besides the obvious offense to me as a guy who DOES bake (and cook all sorts of other things), there's a really stupid element to this commercial that I can't get over.

Can you honestly tell me that if a dude walks into a room with fresh-baked biscuits that the other fellas are going to look at him funny instead of greedily snatching the food right off the tray? I can't think of a guy who'd rather stare at a baking man than eat the freely offered baked goods. Now I love me some Hardee's breakfast, and their biscuits ARE tasty, but come on. This is ridiculous.

Holy crap, Richmond has a new spice store!

Penzeys is a chain based Wisconsin that's just opened their 26th location in Carytown, and the store is full of a spectacular selection of whole and ground spices as well as herbs and spice mixes. There are at least three different curry powders, for example, and at least as many chili powders!

I purchased a tube of three whole Mexican vanilla beans, and I look forward to exploring the shelves at Penzeys in the future.
(via Brandon Eats)

According to Jon Baliles on River City Rapids, the Ukrop's grocery store at Grace and Harrison by VCU is shutting down. I have mixed feelings about this.

On one hand, students and nearby residents are losing access to a Richmond business and now have to either shop at Kroger (blech) or drive (if they can) to Carytown to shop Ukrop's. On the other hand, while the Grace Street location was a dramatic improvement over Community Pride, the store was never quite up to snuff compared to other Ukrop's stores. In fact, even though I live on the south end of Seminary Ave., I typically drive to the Carytown location because of the better selection (especially produce).

Ah well, it was a grand experiment while it lasted, and an alternative to the cold confines of Kroger.

Photography class: confirmed.

Booyah.

The Almighty Network Administrative Overreactors for my company have seen fit to block the chat portion of Gmail. Now I feel like I'm missing a life line to the outside world.

That's right, Corporate America. Keep showing your employees that you don't trust them to simply get their work done, and cover it up with the weak blanket response of "it's in the name of security."

http://widgets.nbc.com/o/4727a250e66f9723/48020f0410eb0313

I guess Ashton Kutcher CAN be funny...when he keeps his mouth shut.

The New York Times has a rather interesting slideshow featuring clever re-imaginings of the Olympic symbol for the sake of protest.