The last week of my life has been devoted to studying for my bio tests that are over as of 10:40 this morning. It has been trying reading the same chapters and reviewing the same dissections over and over. So tonight I am rewarding myself with some delicious home cooked well somewhat cooked food. Tonights menu was Steak Tartar and Frites. I have never tried to make this before but it was pretty fun. Really the single most important part is to use fresh sirloin and fresh eggs considering they are both raw. I know, I know it's dangerous to eat this. But I love this dish so much that it is worth the risk. There are a lot of ingredients but they are all pretty cheap except for the Cognac. So in no particular order you will need beef, egg yolks, parsley, dijon mustard, ketchup, cornichons, capers, onions, worcestershire, hot sauce, cognac, black pepper, and anchovies. You could if you were so inclined to read a recipe and measure all of it. But I just mixed the wet ingredients with the chopped beef and added everything else till it tasted good. I served it with some Samuel Smiths Oatmeal Stout. Making fries at home is a terrible mess but they taste so freaking good. I guess there is a bit of irony that I cooked the one thing that wouldn't harm me if eaten raw. But who the hell wants to eat raw potatoes? There is something very attractive to me about eating something that could potentially have me in the fetal position for a week. It's time I step it up though, I really need to visit a licensed Fugu chef one of these days!

This is really starting to piss me off. I can't find one bit of information on the subject that pertains to the actual theory. I seriously doubt that there is a real theory behind it. Everything I seem to find on the subject of ID is supporters trying to debunk Evolution. How is this the basis for a scientific theory? I think my favorite things to read are the Irreducible complexity and the watchmaker arguments. The creationists that are trying to get this crap taught in public school are either disturbingly misinformed or blissfully ignorant. I have watched two documentaries this week on this so it has really been on my mind. This semester I have been taking an Evolutionary Biology class and to be honest it wasn't my favorite subject from the start. But in the last month it has really become much more interesting. To study something that is amazingly still controversial is strange. I love to watch people walk forward to the professor to argue at the end of lecture. It seems odd, I have never witnessed someone question a physics professor on the validity of the theory of gravity, yet there they are arguing against Evolution because "it's just a theory". I guess I don't understand why some people of faith want so badly to insert hypotheses that are unable to be tested into the public school science curriculum. It is a dangerous thing to teach bad science to students. As an agnostic it actually wouldn't bother me to teach some sort of religion class in schools as long as it were and option and not mandatory. But keep it out of my science class!

So browsing through some airline forums yesterday I stumbled upon this little gem. . If you don't feel like reading I will sum it up. Apparently there is an airline called Metis Transpacific and is based in Macau. They allegedly offer three flights a week from Vancouver to Macau. The only problem is they don't actually exist. Their website is complete with photoshopped pictures of their aircraft and incorrect data about them. . You can purchase tickets through their website, however after you have made arrangements you can't pay by credit card, they want you to wire money to them. I can't believe there would be a rube dumb enough to fall for that. I guess wikipedia was initially fooled however. .

Have I mentioned I can't wait for this semester to be over? I'm starting to get nervous about getting into this Nuke Med Tech program. Last year they had 44 applicants for 14 spots. Hopefully my enthusiasm and grades in everything else will make up for my bad grade in physics. I do think physics is interesting but I just don't think in mathematical equations.

So I should be more concerned with finals but really all I can think about is where the hell I'm going to go on vacation this spring. It's really a shame the dollar sucks right now, that has pretty much ruled out a big potion of Europe this year. The thing that really sucks is all the cheap flights are to places that are really expensive. Sure a flight to London can be found for under $500 if you look real hard, But I would be limited to a week considering the cost of getting around and sleeping and such. Anyway so far my travel destination hopefuls are down to Vietnam, India, Iran, Dominican Republic, Northern Spain, Mozambique, Seychelles, and Mexico. In all likelihood Spain and Seychelles will not happen unless I hit a massive windfall this spring. Also cost of flights to Iran and Mozambique may rule those out. Does anyone have any suggestions to really awesome places that are off the beaten path, that are relatively cheap to travel in/too?? Preferably they will have cheap beer as well.

Ok so I know (e:paul) was interested and (e:drew) said he could be dragged out if it was planned. So I'm thinking of going out for sushi on Monday if anyone else is interested. I would like to try Wasabi because I have heard its really good. Does anyone have an opinion of that place? But I would definitely return to Kibirashi again. O is definitely out, I think their food sucks. Let me know, because I am definitely going but I figured it would be fun with more people than just myself.

"That Tenderloin was so juicy I could have sworn it was Filet Mignon!" He tipped so well that I didn't have the heart to tell him.

Well not really my hometown, or my relatives for that matter. I just bought my tickets to go to Florida to see my family for Christmas. I was so excited to find nonstop tickets at decent travel times for $213. I am the self-proclaimed king of finding good airfare. But this is way cheaper than the usual jacked up rates around holidays. Let me tell you how excited I am to be flying my 10th airline and my 6th Boeing jet. Most people get on the plane and ignore it, but I love flying on different aircraft. After this I only have three Boeing jets left before I have flown all of their commercial production models. I have never flown Airtran before so I'm hoping it's a good airline. Has anyone ever flown them? Also on the subject when did Jetblue become so freaking expensive? They used to be the first place I looked because they were so cheap. Now they same flight dates would cost me over $500! I have no loyalty to airlines whatsoever, those frequent flyer programs are so lame anyway. Everything is restricted and sometimes you have to fly standby just to redeem your miles. I really hope Virgin US comes to Buffalo so we can have some nice price wars between them Southwest and Jetblue.

Although I will not divulge the pathetic number of women I have slept with, I will divulge how pathetic the first time was. I was 19 years old and needed to beat the 20 mark. I think I did by maybe a couple of months. The moment was really ruined by my lack of preparedness. Stopping to walk to the quickie mart 1/2 a mile in freezing cold rain tends to do that. Anyway it was on my friends apartment floor in potsdam, and I believe it may have lasted all of 2 minutes, give or take a minute. What can I say? I was excited. I can imagine she was largely disappointed.

So yesterday right before Bio Lecture I really had to blow my nose. So I went into the bathroom next to the lecture hall, even though there was a disturbing odor permeating into the lobby. As I was washing my hands, out from the stall stumbled my bio professor looking disheveled with his shirt untucked, I thought wow he is either sick or hungover. Anyway he made a beeline straight for the door bypassing the handwashing process. I couldn't help but snicker during lecture everytime his hand came anywhere near his face. Remind me to never shake that dudes hand.

As a new Buffalo transplant its nice to be able to have a multitude of new restaurants to try. Tonight was my first dinner at Saigon Café. Overall a pretty good experience, the food was by far the highlight.

The Good:

I ordered Pla Jean, which is whole fried red snapper with red and green peppers in a ginger curry sauce, allegedly garnished with scallions but there were none to be found on mine. A few minutes after I ordered I heard the unmistakable sound of cold flesh hitting hot oil stream out from the kitchen. I could hardly wait to try it, this is the first time in several months I have had whole fried fish. It was by far the best dinner I have had since moving to Buffalo. They certainly know how to fry snapper well. The curry tasted vaguely familiar, like I had eaten it many times before. It had a little bit of Thai basil in it and a hint of coconut milk as well, slightly sweet and medium spice. It was a massive portion but I was determined to eat the whole thing. I avoided most of the rice because it was an ungodly amount. I had the urge to try the eyeball and it was really anticlimactic, just extremely chewy.

The Bad:

The service wasn't terrible; it just wasn't all that great. They do that team serving crappola, which I normally despise. There are a few exceptions when a place has captains and back servers with a system that works that I find it to be really efficient. This was more of a "whoever isn't busy" can take care of you sort of system that led to me not being greeted very promptly. They were pleasant however and I did get an excellent recommendation for dinner. I noticed that their reservation system is lacking as well. There were two parties that had a res for 7:30 and the entire dining room was sat. So maybe there are a few front of the house issues there.

The Indifferent:

As I was getting up to leave I peered into the kitchen window and to my shock they were using the same brand of canned curry paste that I buy. I was surprised they don't make it themselves, but honestly I really don't care. That dish was freaking delicious.