Tides

Last night I went to dinner at Tides Restaurant with some work people. I've been there a few times now and thoroughly enjoyed each meal.

The whole baby barramundi is sensational.

It's location is relatively obscure so I think it's deserving of a plug.

Balloon Headed Boy

Wow! Funny game!



Help Balloon Headed Boy race through 35 levels of rubberised madness - collect farty flowers to inflate his head and soar between the platforms, thwop those frogs, keep your head above the rising waters, and rescue the balloons so the birthday party can go ahead as intended!

I Love Gadgets!!

I decided over the weekend that my PC needed a little TLC. After all, it was taking me about half an hour to burn a DVD - which is far too long as far as I'm concerned. On top of this the power supply in my beast was intermittently failing, which is a shit at the best of times. So now I'm the proud owner of a brand spanking new DVD burner, as well as a new power supply. The best $166 I've spent in a while.

The main thing I've learned out of this is that there are all sorts of cool (and ridiculous) bits and pieces you can add to your PC. I never realised how many gadgets you can buy which serve to make one's PC run more quietly. Now really, it's not like PCs are that noisy are they? They just hum along in the background, right? You can basically get "silent" replacements for your power supply and just about any fan that sits in your computer. I've never really thought about it, until now. I've got my new power supply installed, and no it's not any quieter or louder than my old one - but now that I know that silent fans are available - I can't help but think of a Cessna aeroplane engine whenever my PC runs. Once the study is properly set up here and I've got a little room to move. I might just pull the beast apart and work out where all this noise is coming from. Let's see how quiet I can get this machine to be.

How times have changed from the days of the standard beige PC case. There is some cool (and once again ridiculous) options - the link shows some of the more "interesting" models available. You realise it's only a matter of time before the "Dalek" case comes out. This will probably make more sense once you've looked at some of the models at the above linked page - they are not that far off.

Now I'm thinking that a new graphics card might not be a bad idea. With technology changing so fast it's hard to work out when the best time to buy is. There's always a far superior and cheaper model just about to come out. I suppose it's like any other computer part - buy what you can afford at the time and deal with it.

Word of the day - Escabeche

At a recent dinner at a fine North Melbourne pub (The Courthouse Hotel), my entree was a sardine escabeche. It was damn tasty. I must admit, I'd never heard of an escabeche before - so I decided to go hunting. Here's what I found. ...they say you learn something new every day.

Spicy?

Last night I went to a cafe/restaurant with some work people. I ordered the Spicy Moroccan beef with rice pilaf etc etc. When the dish came out I had a taste - I thought - "This tastes great, but spicy? I think not." I enjoyed the meal very much. My theory that food tastes better when someone else (ie: your work) is paying for it is still holding true in my mind.

Getting back to the issue of spiciness. I suppose in my mind I associate "spicy" with "hot". If something is listed as being spicy then I would expect more than a mild tang. Now I know that everyone has different tolerances to hot food and comparing peoples' tolerance is like asking "how long is a piece of string?" Especially when I tend to like it when my food fights back a bit.
But all the same if I see the word "spicy" describing a dish on a menu - I think of really strong flavours. Then again, spices can be subtle or mild in flavor so perhaps I'm just full of crap.

www.dictionary.com comes up with the following definitions for spicy. Looking at these I think I'm off the mark in thinking that spicy=hot.

Excuse ME

When I was in Taiwan I tried to learn a few words of Mandarin Chinese. I did okay, by the end I had about 4-5 expressions that I was able to throw into everyday situations.

One of the first things I wanted to learn was the way to say "Excuse Me" if I wanted to, say, get a waiter/waitresses attention in a restaurant. One waitress told me that the relevant expression was pronounced "Boo Hau Ees". So I happily went along, Boo Hau Eesing my way through Taipei. My pronunciation must have been okay as I was always getting the staff's attention. I was quite pleased with myself.

Upon my return to Melbourne, I discovered that "Boo Hau Ees" DOES mean "Excuse Me". But rather than the "Can I please have your attention?" excuse me, it was more the "Sorry I just burped/farted" variant.

I looked back and remembered me, waving my arms at numerous restaurant staff, confidently saying "Boo Hau Ees" as I waved.

I can only imagine what they must have been thinking.

The first visit

Today I went to our new house for the first time since we bought it. Eric and Sophie wanted to have a look.

The "SOLD" sticker had been stuck onto the Real Estate board. It was such a great feeling - seeing that sticker meant quite a lot to me - it kinda made the whole thing real. I took a photo of it for posterity.

Currently there is an ugly Telstra substation directly across the road from our house.. We were horrified when we first saw it and thought "well we're not buying THIS house" It's funny how a lot of houses look great in the ad but some feature external to the house (council rubbish truck depot/huge factory/major highway.. etc) kills the deal in an instant. Fortunately the place is up for sale and has had it's zoning changed from "ugly government industrial building" to "Residential 1" - this is great as it means that we're buying our house while the street still has this huge ugly building in it, and hopefully by the time we get back from Europe - the street will have a few attractive new dwellings in it. You'd think that this can only be good for our property's value in the long run.

A friend of mine works for a property development company which is thinking of buying the land and turn it into houses/villa units..etc. Small world isn't it? I guess if they do buy it I will have all the inside goss as to what is going to be built there.

$821 million: the estimated cost of lost productivity to employees' office chatter about the Super Bowl (assuming that each person talks about it for 10 minutes a day for the week preceding and following the game).

$36,000: The money that I won't get at Ole Miss if I can't finish these essays for the Honors College and Croft Institute tonight. Wish me luck.

Two hydrogen atoms bumped into each other recently.
One said: "Why do you look so sad?"
The other responded: "I lost an electron."
Concerned, One asked "Are you sure?"
The other replied "I'm positive."

Notice something different? No, I didn't get my hair cut again. Is it good? Better or worse than before? Let me know.

And if you know CSS, could you tell me how to (1) make the sidebar a fixed size and (2) increase the space between the body and the sidebar? I hate how they're so close together.

This football game is making me sad. I wanted the Colts to win, even though I knew they couldn't beat the Patriots, and now my head is telling my heart, "I told you so!"

Saw Mona Lisa Smile with my mom today. Yeah, my mom; we decided to have a mother-daughter day today. We both liked it. It was a little depressing for me though, as a feminist.

Funny story: my parents were on our city's website today (Bay Saint Louis yo) and when they clicked on the link to the Hancock County Chamber of Commerce, a porn site popped up. Apparently the guy that made the website didn't realize that the Chamber's website is hancockchamber.org, not .com.

I have to write this essay for the Ole Miss Honors College that asks something about what literary character resembles me the most. My problem is, I rarely read fiction. I always read nonfiction books. So I'm debating whether I should just be like, "Okay I read books about real people" or try to figure out some literary character that I resemble. Any ideas?

OMG: I just saw a commercial for the ESPNZone, and the Boston College Golden Eagle mascot was in it! Look for him in one of the first shots, I think he was with Stuart Scott.

Clay Aiken is going to be the musical guest on SNL next week. I am not looking forward to it. I *hate* that song "Invisible." First off, it's a stalker song. Have you listened to the lyrics? He says, "If I was invisible/ I would just watch you in your room." That is scary! Definitely a turn-off if you ask me. Also a turn-off: the improper usage of the subjunctive mood. Yeah, I'm a language freak. But I cringe every time he sings, "If I was." It's "If I were" dammit!

Wow, I'm watching SNL right now, and Jessica Simpson does a dead-on Britney Spears impression. The episode's been okay so far. The impressions on the American Idol sketch are good. And the two play old people well. It was also funny during the monologue when Nick Lachey's microphone didn't work. They covered well though.

One more thing: Everybody needs to give it up for Michelle Wie. She was excellent during the Sony Open, missing the cut by only one stroke and playing a terrific round on Friday (she shot a 72 and 68 over two days, leaving her at even). What makes this really wild is that she's a 14-year-old girl playing from the boys' tees. Here's a quote from ESPN: "The youngest player in the PGA Tour record books, Wie posted the lowest score ever by a female competing against the men." I think Michelle is going to be a great leader for women in sports, and I wish her all the best. Keep your grades up!

Why can't Sprite make a caffeinated version?

Before I begin, I should explain for those of you whodon't live in the South that Coke is the collective noun for all carbonated beverages. A typical exchange at a home in Mississippi would go like this:

Host: Would you like anything to drink?
Guest: Do you have any Coke?
Host: We have Diet Coke, Sprite, and Orange Soda.
Guest: I'll have a Sprite.

See how it works?

Now anyway, here's what happened to me today. I was really tired today in school, almost fell asleep in class (gasp), so I went searching for some caffeine. Coffee wasn't available at 2:00pm, so I had to settle for a Coke, which I rarely drink. I'm more of a water and juice girl, but that's not much of a pick-me-up. For the record, the only kinds of Coke that I like are either clear or fruit flavored. (Oh and Barq's root beer makes a red creme and vanilla flavor, they are great, but only found on the coast I think.) I really wanted a Sprite, but Sprite doesn't have caffeine, so I went to the Pepsi machine for a 7up. Do 7ups have caffeine? I couldn't remember, and still don't. Well, I click on the 7up button and a freaking Sierra Mist pops out. And guess what. It has no caffeine! I drank it anyway, and promptly almost fell asleep in class again. Why can't Sprite make a caffeinated version? I would stockpile it.

So the Angels got Vlad yesterday. The Astros got Clemens. And the Braves' worst winter ever continues. Cause you know that J.D. Drew is that caliber. Right.