This is just one plate of many hors d'oeuvres my mom conjurs for New Year's Eve.
The clam puffs on the left are my favorite of all time.
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Friday, December 31, 2010
Thursday, December 30, 2010
A couple pics of my new dumbphone, the perfectly acceptable Samsung a107.
While I wait for my new, unlocked, red Dell Streak to arrive I still wanted to use AT&T's crazy good prepaid plan of $2/day unlimited calling and texting when you use it. So, I found the most simple phone I could, the Samsung a107 for $20 at Best Buy. Then I bought a $15 refill card and got it for half off. Then I used a $5 coupon I had as a Best Buy Reward Zone member. So, yep, I paid just $5 for the phone and paid just $15 for $30 on my account since the phone came with $15 included.
TXTING & DRIVING, IT CAN WAIT
Y R U YLLNG?
What's really amazing to me, as a dedicated and passionate gadget guy, is how little this phone does. This phone doesn't have a camera but can go online. Of course, the $2/day plan does NOT include data but does allow you to access the web at the cost of 0.01/kb, which is absolutely absurd. Luckily, I was able to find backdoor codes for the Samsung a107 online that allowed me to turn off 3G access entirely. So, no paying $5 to download a 500kb ringtone.
Once my new Streak does arrive (Dell.com says it'll happen on January 15) I'll stick with my T-Mobile sim for it's $1.50/day unlimited Internet. I use it all the time on my old-as-dirt iPhone 3G and love it. Sure, it's only on T-Mo's Edge network (which means it's be crazy slow) but hey, show me another data plan that is as flexible as a $1.50 daypass and runs on 3G and I'll switch! I'd rather have slow convenience than be forced to pay on days I just don't need it. I may just pick up a MiFi once their battery life gets a bit longer. Speaking of battery life, the BEST thing about the a107 is that the battery seems endless. As I type this I've been traveling for six days and I have yet to plug it in. Meanwhile, I plug my iPhone in twice a day. Can't wait to get my Streak and retire this old guy!iPhone pics from over Utah... part 2 (of 3)
Something about views like this makes me keep taking pics--even if they end up kinda identical. :P
This is not as bad a thing now as it was back in the dark ages before the days of digital photography. When I traveled to Italy and Greece in the 80s I spent a LOT of money processing too many nearly identical shots of gorgeous views.
Gah--I want to sleep on the cotton sky in these pics...
It's like a sky-high zen garden for an atmospheric groundskeeper.
And I love how mountains can look like islands.
iPhone pics from over Utah... part 1
Delta had no cheap, direct flights to NoCal so we had a stop over in SLC, UT. The views from the plane were spectacular.
I kept making stupida Quantum Leap opening titles jokes.
Back in 2004 Siskita was in Utah for a gig but, flying to visit her I don't remember looking out the window of the plane.
I talked to a local after we landed and he said they had gotten some snow earlier in the winter but that only the snow in the mountains didn't melt.
The clouds looked like an ocean of cotton.
iPhone pics from over Utah... part 3 (of 3)
Here are a few more shots taken over Utah.
Imagine if you could sail on those clouds....
Sorry for getting all poetic and stuff, but I'm typing all this on next to no sleep as I and @Siskita fly into JFK where we will wait a few hours and hop on another plane to Charlotte to visit my east coast fam.
Two layers of clouds is pretty neat to see, I think.
The dinal pic is of us over Utah!
Bleh... forgot how much I hate flying. The views are great but everything else suuuuucks.
A few random pics from our (ongoing) holiday trip to visit family in NoCal and South Carolina
First up: Christmas dinner!
There was plenty of food but I tryyy to eat light. Salmon was what we had instead of the more predictable turkey or ham.
Pic #2 features Siskita holding her dad's cat, Tiger, who is taking a swat at me.
Saw this in a GNC we went into for some Flaxseed oil pills and Vitamin D--I think this dude is trying waaaay too hard.
Saturday, December 25, 2010
About to land for a stopover in SLC, UT--here are some Lego-Related Pics! Ice and Papercraftish
Lego Ice Minifigs melting in OJ!
Lego papercraft now available at Muji
Closer shot...
Thursday, December 16, 2010
Tuesday, December 07, 2010
@SierraRein wins a contest and will be singing live at Birdland, here in NYC on 12/
Sierra just posted this over on her blog at http://sierrainnewyork.blogspot.com but I thought it was great news so I'd post it here:
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Birdland. December 12th. James Barbour. I Sing Music.
Those who read my blog recently saw this entry about my submission for ForTalent.com's online contest to sing at James Barbour's Holiday Concert.
Well...I WON!!!!
I am their #1 contest winner and will be singing live on December 12th. I also won the $150 cash prize. James was kind enough to extend an offer to fellow contestant Jovani McCleary, who is the runner up contest winner and will be singing live at the December 13th show (with a previously unannounced $100 cash prize). I will sing one song of James' choosing (it may be the same "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" that I submitted with, or another) in his 90-minute set. And I just read from James' blog that special guests that evening will be fellow Broadway alums Robert Cuccioli and Merwin Foard!
For those in the NYC area...short notice, I know...but here are the details:
Sunday, December 12th at 6pm, runtime: approx 90 minutes
Purchase tickets online here.$35 or $45 price
Location: BIRDLAND NYC
315 West 44th Street
New York, NY 10036
(212) 581-3080Now...what the **** do I wear?!?
Cheers,
Sierra Rein
"I don't sing because I'm happy, I'm happy because I sing" - William James
YAY, SIERRA!! CONGRATULATIONS!!! I'M SO PROUD OF YOU (but not at all surprised you won!)
What approximately $20 got me at Book Off this weekend
That book on the left is called ペロリちゃん or Perori-chan. It's a compilation of simply drawn comic strips. Then there's a book about the Peanuts comic strip which I think is called "All of Snoopy's something something". OK, the "somethings" are just where I couldn't translate. But literally it says "スヌーピーたちの(kanji)(kanji)はなし" or "Sunupitachino(kanji)(kanji)hanashi" I think "hanashi" is talk. So maybe it's "All of my talks with Snoopy"? Then there's a manga starring ドラえもん or "Doraemon". I'm puzzled as to why the first two characters are in katakana but the rest are in hiragana. The big magazine in the middle is called "Weekly Shonen" (shonen=boy) and is about an INCH thick with comics--insanely great price at $1.00 used and only a couple of months old. Then, volume 1 of "Moonlight Mile" which was recommended to me by @tomzer1 because he said it was similar to "Planetes" which is an AWESOME anime that I HIGHLY recommend. However, in this manga, there's a group sex scene almost at the very beginning of the book! Maybe Tomzer was referring to the anime adaption of "Moonlight Mile"? O_O And finally we have "Black Jack: The Best 12 stories by Osamu Tezuka". If you're not familiar with Black Jack, he is an outlaw surgeon who can basically do almost anything with a scalpel but charges you a million every time no matter how hard the procedure is. He's a classic anime/manga character in Japan.
So, why did I spend $20 on books I can't yet read? I'm using these books as a reason to study more. I have them on a shelf, right next to my desk, so I'll see them always and (hopefully) feel inspired to study hard so I can one day read them.
From a few nights ago: Proof that I am not good at Scattergories
Though I've discovered that I enjoy the games Curses and Apples to Apples quite a bit. I'm not that great at either of them, either, but hey, board games can be fun, who knew? ;P
Friday, December 03, 2010
Here is @SierraRein singing "Have Yourself a Merry Little Chrismas" Holy CATS she's good!
I don't even like Christmas music, generally, but this is incredible.
Oh and if you happen to have a fortalent.com account, I'd really appreciate it if you would go vote for this song in a contest. The winner gets to sing at a major NYC cabaret.
Wednesday, December 01, 2010
EFFYOU.ORG: EFFYOU to anyone who thinks WikiLeaks should be stopped
EFFYOU to anyone who thinks WikiLeaks should be stopped
The whole problem with absolute power is that there can’t possibly be a check or balance placed on it. In case you haven’t noticed, America has no check or balance on it currently and hasn’t had one in quite a while. No military is stronger than America’s and only a few economic powers could ever hope to compete with the US economy (despite it’s recent and huge collapse).
So, why all the tough talk regarding WikiLeaks? WikiLeaks has no military, no national economy, very few ways to defend itself and it’s only power or influence in the world is through words.
Why are so many world leaders afraid of what words might end up on WikiLeaks.org? Perhaps it’s because those words draw attention to behavior that would normally not be acceptable if it were done in public?
If that’s the case, then why is it being done?
If your government is doing things in private that it couldn’t get away with in public, your government is doing bad things and should be stopped.
Who is more to blame for a child’s death when he or she is shot in combat? The soldier who pulled the trigger, thinking he was facing an enemy, or the commanding officer who ordered the soldier into the position in the first place?
via effyou.org
Please read the rest at http://effyou.org. Thanks.
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Monday, November 29, 2010
The latest from http://thepete.com/ics Cancer doesn't understand our priorities!
Please visit http://thepete.com/ics for more Ballpoint Adventures!
RIP Irvin Kershner, director of the best Star Wars film of all time!
Not only did Kershner make the best Star Wars film, he proved you CAN make a sequel that is better than it's original. RIP KERSH! YOU WILL BE MISSED BUT ALWAYS REMEMBERED!
Read more about his passing.
I'm 90% sure that, back when I was working as a projectionist in LA, Kershner attended a press screening I ran. I saw him exit the theater and thought "Holy crap! That's Irvin Kershner! I should say something!"
But I didn't. The same thing happened to me when I found myself in line for popcorn in front of John Phillip Law at the Egyptian Theater and now he's passed on, as well. So fearful. I've got to start being that obnoxious guy who just starts jabbering to famous people. I did do that once to Mike Nelson. He's famous, right? O_O
Regardless, I was very saddened to read of Kershner's passing this morning. He seemed like he might still have something to offer cinema. Not like ESB wasn't enough. Ah well... I hope my screening was in focus for you, sir! RIP.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Working on my #NaNoWriMo novel and happened to look down at the wordcount to see... 50000!
On the nose!
And, not surprisingly, the novel isn't finished yet. But I think I can get 'er done by Tuesday night... I hope!
Friday, November 26, 2010
Thursday, November 25, 2010
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
Cracked 41k on my #NaNoWriMo novel tonight! Er, morning. But it was a GREAT night of writing!!!
It was one of those nights where I couldn't "put the book down" even though I was writing it. :) The last words I wrote tonight are visible in the pic. Pretty cool, huh?
It's all science-fictionish and bloody!
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
We rarely eat red meat so I had to take before and after shots...mmmm delicious!
These were taken a few weeks back.
We may have to do this more often since it wasn't that pricey and was quite tastey! Yay, Trader Joe's!
Forgot to post this the other day--@siskita picked up Tron Legacy tickets for us and here's mine!
Looking forward to it! Will haven't watch the original again beforehand. It's been a couple years.
Psyched to get Android running on my old eee pc 701 (4g surf). Now I just need a text editor that can edit HUGE text files.
The whole reason for the netbook is to have a way to work on my novels on-the-go but a full OS on the eee is either too clunky (XP), too slow (XP also), too big (Vista) or I run into compatibility issues with the apps I want to run (Linux). But Android (FroYo!) is really light on the eee's tiny resources and can do what I need it to. And doesn't that Android logo look good on the eee?
The lockscreen is just one example of quite a few points at which I wish I had a touchscreen. It's really hard to swipe with just a track pad! But it's WAY easier to type with a REAL keyboard, so it's a trade off.
I even got this build running on my Mac via Parallels.
The build I used, btw, is froyo-eeepc-20101015.iso and was found at http://code.google.com/p/android-x86
I found that via http://android-x86.org. (be sure to use that dash!) It was a breeze to get it up and running, too! I used Parallels to boot the ISO and then installed it onto a 16GB SD card I had pre- partitioned with two FAT32 partitions--1 was 2GB and the other 14. I formatted the 2GB partition to ext2 for the OS and the system sees the other partition as the external SD card. Pretty sweet! Sadly there is no access to the official Android Market though it does have another market (AndMarket it's called). Also it's pretty easy to install from apk files manually. One minor drawback is that the wifi doesn't reconnect after you close the display. Not a huge deal but still not perfect. Also the camera app keeps crashing and mp4 playback is choppy. Still, if I can find a good text editor I'll have all my bases covered. I'm actually kind of astounded that I got FroYo on my old eee 701 so easily!
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