Ploafmaster General

My brother Mugs just received his first job offer today!

The crazy guy just graduated with a BA in English from Longwood University and after months of applications and interviews, has received a formal offer for an IT position!

I'm totally proud of him, and whether he takes this job or a different one, I'm glad he finally has a chance to get his foot in the door.

UPDATE:
Mugs took the offer. Way to go bro! Welcome to the inescapable world of the nerds!

Check it.

Here are some movies that are out or releasing this year that I'm planning to see, in no particular order:

Hot Fuzz (I loved Shaun of the Dead)
Fantastic 4: Rise of the Silver Surfer (Yes, really...I never saw the first one, but the Silver Surfer looks incredible)
Ocean's 13
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End
Ratatouille (Read Jason Kottke's insight)
Live Free of Die Hard (Sometimes you've just gotta see a souless action flick!)
Transformers
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (This one is a given. Holy CRAP I can't wait)
The Simpsons Movie
The Bourne Ultimatum
The Kingdom
Across the Universe (Yeah, it's a musical, I think...Yeah, I really want to see it)
I Am Legend
Be Kind Rewind (A new Gondry flick - with Jack Black!?!?)
American Gangster

Not exactly a short list :-)

I'm sure most of these will be relegated to Netflix, but I hope to catch at least a few of them on the big screen.

I'm a HUGE fan of the band Genesis.

Well, sort of. I'm a huge fan of the band Genesis when Peter Gabriel was the lead singer. I don't hate Phil Collins - I actually like his singing, and his drumming is incredible. I simply prefer the more "prog rock" style when Gabriel was singing lead (and Steve Hackett was still playing guitar).

I was obviously excited, then, when Mugs called me on the phone a short time ago to inform me about a Genesis reunion tour that's in progress - until I researched it a little bit. It turns out that Peter Gabriel couldn't join them because he's finishing up a new album (!)...but there's still hope, as there have been talks recently between the former band mates of touring with a full performance of 1974's The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway. HOLY CRAP. I think I'd pay $100 for a ticket to that show.

But until that materializes, I think I'll just have to listen to "Dancing With the Moonlight Knight" to satiate my need for that sweet classic (really classic) Genesis sound.

Oi - today for the first time (I think) I ate Thai food.

I met my buddy Patrick and many of his cohorts at Thai Diner in the West End of Richmond. I don't know if it's really authentic Thai food or some Americanized approximation, but I do know that I enjoyed item R14 on the menu - "Amazing Thai" (that's really what it's called!) with Pork, peanut sauce, vegetables (all of which I like, except for the mini corn), and white rice. I opted for "American Hot" as far as the spice level was concerned, and boy was it intense. The zing of those chilis lingered in my mouth long after I returned to the office. Perhaps next time I'll be daring enough to try the "Thai Hot."

Yesterday Steve Jobs made a HUGE announcement for Apple Inc. at his WWDC '07 keynote address: Apple's web browser, Safari, is now available for Windows. Well, a public beta version is, at least.

Apple is finishing up an upgrade to version 3.0, and decided to add a Windows version. Several people have expressed different potential reasons for such a move, but I ultimately think it's pretty sweet. One more browser available to the rest of the world should shake up the market quite a bit.

An interesting side note...Apple's website (and Jobs' keynote) indicated that the software would be available on Windows XP and Vista. At work, however, I'm stuck on Windows 2000, so it was with nervous excitement this morning that I attempted to install the beta on my workstation. Thank heavens - it works!

It's a little surreal seeing the Safari shortcut on my Windows desktop, and the UI looks so foreign on my computer that I'm a bit distracted. Of course, I typically use Firefox at work, and even on my Mac at home, so this is more to play around.

Here's hoping that another taste of Apple flavor on Windows machines will convince more folks to give Macs a second look.

Sufjan Stevens has the honor of opening up a tribute album to Joni Mitchell with her song "Free Man in Paris." I purchased this song on iTunes because it not only pays suitable homage to the original, but captures both the best of Sufjan's past musical efforts and a taste of what his future recordings have in store.

Tight orchestration (without quite going overboard), changing rhythms, and snappy vocal lines make for an entertaining and aurally enjoyable piece of music to complement the cranky lyrics.

Sufjan explained his understanding of the song and his ideas behind the remake on a page dedicated to the tribute album. There you can also listen to a healthy length clip of both Joni's original and Sufjan's version.

Man, I hate mowing the lawn. I always have - since I started at the age of ten on a yard in Bayville NJ that was more gravel than grass. Imagine being marginally taller than the mower handle itself while round pebbles and debris shoot from the back of the mower. You're trying to avoid damage to more than shins at that height.

It's somewhat ironic, then, that I purchased a house with such a monumentally large yard (for a city lot). I love having a plot of land big enough to run around, play horse shoes, or have a large get-together, but it certainly creates a conundrum; I have to mow this huge freakin' pile o' grass.

Up until recently, I've had to do this with a push mower. I've loathed this, of course, but what I've loathed more was my (otherwise wonderful) wife's reluctance to see why I wanted a ride-on. Every time friends and family came over for the first time, I had to endure the question, "Do you have a ride-on?" Well finally I do. Thanks to Mugs' move to a place without a yard, he's gifted me his lazy mower, and I aim to use it. The problem is, I think I need to get a new spark plug and battery. And removing that spark plug is going to take removing some other parts first...ugh...

So here's hoping I don't contract West Nile virus from the mosquitos which inhabit my currently over-grown yard, as I lie on my back beneath the front end of my newly acquired lawn-chopper trying desperately to extract a spark plug using my Leatherman.

Tonight I dined at Akida in the Fan district of Richmond. Some awesome sushi indeed.

This place was TINY. Maybe 20 people could comfortably eat here, but it'd be cramped and noisy if that happened. Luckily, showing up at 6 pm on a Thursday night meant we were finishing up just as business started to pick up. But you don't care about the crowd, I suppose.

The food...wow. I supped with my hombres Dave and Nate. Dave had ordered an appetizer of steamed dumplings which appeared to be filled with a mixture of chicken and at least scallions, I believe. They were surprisingly light, and while I wasn't a fan of the accompanying dipping sauce, the fellas seemed to enjoy it. Nate ordered the seafood udon which turned out to be a gigantic bowl filled with a colorful and appetizing mixture of broth, noodles, vegetables and sundry types of seafood ranging from clams to salmon. I believe there was even a whole egg that'd been dropped in, poached by the soup itself.

Dave and I each ordered two rolls. We both ordered one of the specials off the board called a Dragon Phoenix Roll which consisted of a California-roll style (rice on the outside) maki roll with spicy salmon inside, spicy tuna on top, and crispy tempura flake on top of it all. This roll had that delightful sort of spiciness that I enjoy so much where it builds slowly on your tongue without overwhelming the taste buds, and was easily my favorite roll of the evening. My second roll was the spider roll - a traditional maki roll containing tempura-fried soft shell crab and a little cucumber, topped with some eel sauce. Each piece actually had a note of sweetness at first, balanced by the saline eel sauce. Quite good. Dave's second roll was the eel roll, containing eel, cucumber, and topped of course with eel sauce. This was also good and quite mild.

I finished off my meal with a piece of tuna nigiri. The fish was delicious and fresh - perhaps a bit too thickly-sliced, and a little too much rice, but still quite tasty.

The restaurant itself, while small, was just my kind of place. A bit dive-ish on the outside, but cozy inside with high ceilings and the expected Japanese decor. The table service was quite nice, actually, consisting of more substantial chopsticks instead of the cheap bamboo snap-apart variety. Pretty dishes for the soy sauce, appetizers, and sushi complemented the excellently presented food.

Ultimately I was glad to find a good sushi place so close to my house. This location is the original of two Akida restaurants in Richmond, and is situated on Robinson between Grace and Broad Streets.

Okay, so this commercial that my boss just sent out is really funny and lifted my spirits (no pun intended) quite a bit at the end of the day.

It's kinda rough (but totally bleeped out), just a warning.

[youtube [www.youtube.com/watch](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJJL5dxgVaM&w=425&h=350])

"Too soon," thought the beleaguered gentleman, as he dismounted his horse and...

After watching these three ads, I had to renew my efforts to resist. I just keep telling myself, "Wait 'till it has a higher storage capacity."

I can't believe it's freakin' JUNE FIRST today.

I feel like the year has flown by so far. I guess that's really the big change when you "grow up" and don some semblance of a responsible adult life; time speeds on by. It's as if now that childhood is over, the rest of your life rushes past on it's way to the end.

That may sound terribly fatalistic or depressing, but I don't mean it that way. Just an observation :-)

So Twitter finally worked with the Facebook folks on some integration. Sort of.

There's a new Twitter app for Facebook, and while I was hoping this would mean I could use Twitter to update my Facebook status. Unfortunately all it seems to do is display a little Twitter module on my Facebook profile with my latest Twitter status.

Here's hoping for more real integration rather than a little tack-on widgety thing.

As if my angst wasn't excuse enough to write less frequently, yesterday I purchased a Nintendo Wii. I think I'll be sufficiently distracted for the next who knows how long.

But don't worry, you two or three regulars (semi-regulars?) - I'm not abandoning this space for a long term hiatus. I'll probably have plenty more to say about my new video game system as I use it more and play new games.

Oh yeah, and I'll still write about other stuff, too :-)

So I just finished working on a secret document last night.

It's secret because I don't want certain people to know about it yet.

In due time. In due time, indeed.

Yesterday Val and I watched each of our two Netflix rentals...well, she mostly talked on the phone to her sister and organized the documents folder on our computer during my movie. I thought both movies were very good, yet each disappointing enough in their own ways that I couldn't go higher than four-out-of-five stars for the flicks.

My selection was Ryan Fleck's Half Nelson, starring Ryan Gosling. I have to agree with several of the film critics here - it's an excellent performance for Gosling, and one which I hope propels him into more high-caliber roles. The abundance of expert hand-held photography right to my taste as well, particularly since it's used during many essentially still shots. Two of my favorite parts, however, are the scenery (I have to find out where in NYC this is located just for my curiosity) and the music which both serve to drive the point home that Gosling's character is barely floating along in his depressed world when he isn't in class making a difference to middle school students.

Unfortunately for me, the ending is really rather abrupt - we have seriously a two minute scene to close out the barely-existent story. And speaking of that near-non-story - I felt through much of the film that I was simply watching events happen rather than a narrative. Call me old-school in that sense, I suppose. Overall, though, as my 4/5 suggests, I did enjoy the movie a great deal.

Valerie's movie was Stranger Than Fiction, a story about a story, where the main character really exists and finds that the author is writing his life and imminent death. Will Ferrell plays quite well in this movie, as do Dustin Hoffman and Emma Thompson. The movie is filmed quite a bit better than I've come to expect of comedies, including a rather creative shot inside an articulated bus, and an excellent use of info-graphics to punctuate the lead character's obsession with numbers.

This, too, disappointed largely because of the ending. There is such build-up and significance placed around the ending by the movie itself that when it finally arrives, it feels more like slowly letting the air out of a balloon rather than popping it. I found this unfortunate as the build-up was handled quite well. Again, however, I enjoyed this movie enough to give it 4/5. I hope this indicates a better direction for Will Ferrell in the future, though we can't be too sure with Blades of Glory and Semi-Pro in the future.

HOLY CRAP ON TOAST!

Blizzard Entertainment is FINALLY working on a sequel to Starcraft! Check it out, and peep the screenshots!

I'm so excited, I think I need to to box my ears.

Today Val and I are heading to the Lebanese Food Festival at a Maronite Catholic Church in the West End.

I hope to have more details afterwards, and I sure as heck hope the food is good :-)

UPDATE:
Meh. It was alright - if you're a big fan of Mediterranean food other than the Italian variety, you'd probably really dig the food. Standard fare like shwarma, kabob, falafel, etc. was present, and the desserts as well. Those tasty pastries were pretty good, though - especially the macaroon and baklava.

I'm feelin' pretty blah lately, so writing here will probably be a bit more sparse than usual.

Recovering from his fall after slipping on the viscous substance on the cement floor, Juan stared hard at the deep red fluid before exclaiming, "That's, not blood -- that's..."

So today was excellent, and the full weight of it just struck me: Brian Warshaw, my brother, just graduated from Longwood University with his Bachelor of Arts in English. Magna Cum Laude, 3.7 GPA, rocked the house. Oh yeah, and he did it in 2.5 years. With a little baby to care for this past year, and a wife to care for.

Congratulations, man, you deserve the recognition, and I'm really proud of you as your brother.

Q: Hey ask dan! Here’s my question: How would YOU make crapplejuice as a cocktail and what would it taste like? Please give me your most detailed and goriest explaination. (Holy crapplejuice Batman!)

A: Well it seems that my sister-in-law still likes to see her weirdest questions answered for all to see, and this time, it's a rather disgusting one :-)

First I want to suggest, Elizabeth, that you probably meant "grossest explanation" rather than "goriest" since I doubt you're talking about a bloody crapplejuice cocktail here!

That being said, here's my ancient family recipe for just such a libation:

1.5 oz. Crapple Jack
1.5 oz. Patron Anejo Tequila
4-5 dingle berries - reserve one for garnish
Crapple Juice to taste

To mix: Fill a Boston shaker with ice and add the Crapple Jack and tequila. Shake vigorously. In a rocks glass, muddle all but one of the dingle berries with some crushed ice. When thoroughly pulverized, add more crushed ice to fill the glass halfway. Pour out the contents of the shaker into the glass and top off with Crapple Juice. Garnish with the remaining dingle berry on the rim of the drinking vessel.

There you have it! If you're not dry-heaving after all that, post questions for next time (if there is one) in the comments of this or any future post.

"How many times," moaned Kirk, "do I have to tell you to keep your grubby hands..."

Slate has a nice slide show essay on their site about American painter Edward Hopper, best known for the excellent Nighthawks.