Ploafmaster General

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

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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.

(image via Adam Currell on Flickr)


Tonight Valerie wanted to try something new for dinner, so we skipped our usual haunts and drove to Dot's Back Inn on MacArthur Ave., in the Bellevue area.

This place typifies the neighborhood hangout restaurant with its low roar of patrons, low lighting, and low prices for food. The requisite tin ceiling so prevalent in Richmond eateries was there, too, along with a well chosen and balanced selection of kitschy decorations. Since Dot's seemed to be a "regular place" I decided to try some "regular food": the steak and cheese sub plus an extra fifty cents to eat fries instead of potato chips.

I was well rewarded.

The steak was indeed steak - sirloin pounded thin and tender with real cheese melted over it on a lightly toasted sub roll. It was one of the tastiest steak sandwiches I've eaten in ages. And the fries! They were a fine surprise. These were no sticks-o-starch. No, these were thin slices of potato cut in half before deep frying. Crispy, tasty, and clearly made today. I finished off my dining with a slice of homemade (from a nearby bakery, I'm guessing) chocolate pie. Capital!

This is just the sort of restaurant that makes me happy to live and eat in Richmond.

Ever since I got Dave into Flickr he's been digging through all the pictures he can find. Several days ago he discovered Sean Wood, an Aussie living in Tokyo, Japan. This guy is incredible.

The earliest of his posted work on Flickr comes from his DSLR, but the vast majority of his work lately is made up of film shots taken with medium format, rangefinder, and panoramic cameras. I've never been so inspired by what's possible with film as I have after looking at these. Additionally, with both film and digital, Wood has exceptional talent for capturing candid moments of genuine human expression.

He's highlighted a subset of his work on his beautifully simple (yet unfortunately slow) website, 50mm, where you can see the images much larger than allowed on Flickr.

Wow...you'd think I've never done this before...

My earlier attempt at farting out a post for the sake of it backfired. It turns out I created a "page" rather than a post. And only just now realized it. So it's gone.

Good riddance, too, since I finally got my act together so late at night to deliver a real post (the one prior to this) anyway.

I can't recall for the life of me where I originally saw this, but this gentleman built his own Mellotron from the carcasses of old Sony Walkmen. He has sound samples, and a link to a "making of" page as well.

That most excellent website, The A.V. Club, has an interview with original MythBusters Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage. It's interesting to see how little they expected of the show at the time the the filmed the pilots. The whole thing is well worth the read.