Food
Friday night, we went to Europa Bistro on Elmwood and I had pheasant, it was totally delicerific. I would suggest anyone who loves European food head on over. (e:matthew) had polish Golabki which looked pretty good too.


Garbage Pile
I called the city to pick up the "garbage" left over from our bathroom demolition. It costs $82 for 12x3x3ft.


I thought that was reasonable as the wood was going to just mold in our garage and a lot of it was just garbage (broken glass, old plastic doll house, etc). I put it out and the city guy said he would come by in the morning to assess the cost, we would then have till 1PM to bring the money down to city hall and they would take it away.

The thing is I put it out on Thursday night and Friday morning at 9:20 I got a call from the city saying I forgot to put my garbage out and need to reschedule. The thing is I did not forgot, someone must have taken it all. I find it hard to believe because a lot fo it was no reusable in any way. Like I could see someone taking the wood, but every scrap of everything? Well, it was free so I can't complain. I would have put out more stuff from the attic.

Air Pollution
According to this article I was reading, air pollution increases the risk of Blood Clots. The really surprising part was the picture of pollution in Beijing. I had no idea it was so bad. It seems so far removed. Apparently, they are going to reduce pollution just before the olympics by shutting down factories, stopping construction for two months and reducing traffic



Imagine what it feels like during the "clean" time if you live there. Imagine the impending doom feeling of it coming back after it is gone.

I guess it was bad in riverside when I lived there one summer - but not like that photo. Someone, recently wrote or told me about some chinese friend driving down the way to Niagara Falls and saying how it smelled like home - was it one of you guys?

Work
Is so freakin' crazy. I am back to loving it but its just crazy how much there is to do! I launched one of the apps I was working on today and the the department that uses it seemed to really love it. I think tomorrow is going to be a really dramatic, life changing day. Hopefully, in a good way.

I also saw this cancer fighting robot surgeon in a conference room the other day. It looks like the future.


The Fireplace
I keep working on the fireplace in the side parlour/office. It is starting to look really nice.



I am so glad I stripped it, even though I am painting it because the detail stands out so much now. I think I am never oil painting again though.

(e:mike) and I went to Wegmans to get everything for our Mother's Day dinner. We managed to top my mothers multi meat meal maximum with 6 of our own meat options. (e:terry) and (e:matthew) also played crucial roles in cooking and decorating. Actually, they were really tiny portions of meet because they were just part of the wraps. I think we ate more veggies than meat per person.

We had:
Calamari, crab legs, chicken, sirloin, shrimp, sea bass

Along side:
bean sprouts, carrots, pickles, olives, chopped ginger, chopped garlic, orange peppers, hungarian peppers, wakame salad, sweet potato

On:
Rice noodles and Romain lettuce leaves

It was a Korean style inspired meal but had no real Korean flavors. My parents really seemed to love it and it was fun watching everyone create their lettuce leaves.



For dessert we had watermelon with strawberries and whip cream along side chocolate cookies.

My mom drank tea made with one of the pretty tea balls we bought in San Francisco.



Before anyone reams me about eating Sea Bass, we bought it because at wegman's it was the only fish labeled sustainable.

It was so delicious and the perfect texture.



We got my mom a digital camera. The same one as (e:mike)'s but in pink. At first we weren't sure if she would like but then she took to it right away.



Wegmans has so much good food int he prepared lunch section. That is where (e:mike) and I ate lunh to get ready to prepare dinner.
They even had polenta


And they also sold mini fresh herbs for around $1 which I think it s great idea.


This, however, was a horrible idea? Who thought that blueberries were so awesome but just lacked a convenient carry case? Worst of all it still says you have to wash them?

Getting a virus at a conference is one thing. Getting the norovirus is yet another. I am so glad this was not me.

For most techies, it's generally not good to be associated with a virus of any sort. But folks at Sun Microsystems and organizers of this week's JavaOne software conference in San Francisco may have felt especially queasy when they heard that local health authorities were tracking an outbreak of stomach flu at the Moscone Center in recent days.

With up to 70 cases reported, the city health department said it suspects the culprit may be the highly contagious norovirus - a real virus, not the computer kind.

Symptoms usually last only one or two days, according to a bulletin that city officials issued this week. But they can include vomiting, diarrhea, cramps, aches and even low-grade fever. And the virus can spread easily from contact with someone who hasn't washed his or her hands, or from touching a contaminated surface.

Does anyone want this vintage solid wood Art Deco hutch and chairs? The hutch is probably worth money but I don't want to bring it anywhere because its heavy. If we still had the table I would have tried to sell the set. They are on our porch destined for the garbage if no one wants them. I am going to try craigslist too.

Fun
I cut my hair and left a little stripe on the top for the weekend. I thought it would be fun. I think it is a little crooked.





I wish I had friends to go out dancing with or something to do but I don't so i will probably just stay home and watch television, ya fun! I wanted to go to Cleveland for May Daze 3

This year May Daze 3 has 4 rooms of sound and lights, 5 international headliners, 21 supporting artists from Ohio and the 5 surrounding states. Electro, Live PA, DNB, Breaks, House, Dubstep, Techno, Hardcore, you asked for it, you begged for it, and we are bringing it.

The large size flyer is here


At Home
Today I painted this fireplace in the side parlour. Well, I finished sanding it and priming it. I had tried staining it but the wood just couldn't handle the stripping. It looks a lot better painted after being stripped though because now you can see the details. I will post pictures tomorrow after I finish the top coat. The smell of oil paint is the same as the smell of stain, varnish, polyurethane. I would just avoid it at all costs. The only reason I went with it was because I was told it was what I want to use for a mantel and because I don't want to have to paint lots of coats on in the future as it obfuscate the details.

What are you supposed to do with the brushes afterwards? They don't clean with water, which means they probably only clean with paint thinner. I refused to pour a pint of paint thinner down the drain in order to clean the brush. Instead, I just threw the $10 brush out. That seems like a waste - I will never use oil paint again.

(e:terry) and (e:matthew) worked on the yard. It looks amazing.

At work
Today, was a terrible day at work that undid the good feeling I had about yesterday.

a. New auditing regulations that sounds like serious drama and I believe will add more red tape to the extreme red tape slowness of everything and really only adding a perception of security. I hope I can at least be part of the implementation plan.
b. Still no official confirmation of the new position, although I have now done months of work as if I was in the position.
c. The new project we were taking inhouse to make our lives way easier and to encourage integration between systems, offer more control, promote a standard way development, pass the bus test and save money - got scratched because frankly - I believe someone is friends with the vendor.
d. The to top it off, I got taken off my regularly scheduled development to spend the last two weeks building an application to replace the one (e:jim) never finished. Then today, after staying late the last two nights to finish and test it in all 5 browsers, the 5 people who needed the application ASAP, didn't even bother to show up for the introduction, argh.

estrip
I got my 2 millionth view over the last day!

I seriously can't imagine dealing with this public relations nightmare. It dwarfs my estrip.org /estrip.com drama. This one hospital our vendor is working with has an angry patient that bought their .com

Check out overlakehospital.org - seems like a nice hospital site.



Hopefully, you get their before you see overlakehospital.com They even cite cases of employees having sex with patients.



They are so screwed. That is what I love about the web - although this is pretty extreme, it shows how one individual can get their perspective out without an entrie publishing company. Think about the devastating effect of this on that hospital. They seriously, could not throw enough million dollar ad campaigns at this problem to make it go away.

Today I have to go to a meeting about social networking. Its yet another vendor educating our executives about what they need in order to make a socially networked site work. I offered them much of this information for a long time now but it has to come from someone else in order for the marketing people to believe anything. It is the only thing I hate about working at Roswell, the way that the marketing team approaches problem solving.

I remember having to fight them in order to host their videos on youtube and then display them on the site so that more people would be able to see them when not at our site or when just searching youtube. They gave me this whole drama about how they don't want to be associated with the youtube brand identitiy. Clearly, that is like saying I don't want to be associated with the whole television thing at this point, lol. Finally, they agreed and we hosted the videos for yroswell on youtube which I think was a much better solution for their end goals of getting the word out - than our inhouse video player.



Now we get to go to a meeting where they are going to tell us the same kind of thing about how we should be integrating social networking sites. I find it so frustrating that it takes an outside force for them to believe stuff. Thankfully, I have had to deal less and less with marketing in the last few months and more and more with internal development needs. It makes my job so much more enjoyable to take out the marketing aspect. I hope it stays that way.

UPDATE: The meeting is actually pretty great. It seems like we are going to start everything from scratch which is what we needed, seriously. I hope this means less vendors, more in house devel. Its the first time I feel like everyone is on the same page.

Seriously, I have almost completely lost the ability to write stuff down by hand. Here is an example of my notes from a meeting. It is so strange because if you could see how meticulous and amazing my school notes were before computers you would be astounded. I will post some later. They were borderline book quality. Now I can barely read my own handwriting and just kind of remember where stuff was on the page to trigger my memory. Also, I started this bigger size means more important thing which really doesn't translate so well to paper. The notes I typed out of this look a million times better and makes sense.

First, I made pickles today. I wanted to do this for a while. I didn't have exactly the right stuff but I think they came out. I used red wine vinegar instead of the white kind, because it is the only kind I had at home besides apple cider and that kind was too strong.

So the recipe that I totally made up was:

10 cukes (the pickles themselves)

2 cups of red wine vinegar
5 garlic cloves
crushed black peppercorns
some fresh thyme
some mustard seeds
A tablespoon salt
a bit of red onion
a tablespoon brown sugar
2 bay leaves
I HAD NO DILL :( but I bet it would be good

I boiled everything together except the cukes which I cut up into spear. Then I put the spears in the jars and ladled the hot vinegar broth into the jars. They already taste good 5 hours later. I imagine in the next day or two they will be great.



Then (e:terry) and I made a whole Korean style dinner, in which I used the pickles.



Afterwards, we also made fiddleheads. It was the first time I ever made them. I did not use this recipe because (e:matthew) and (e:terry) don't like procuitto but it sounds really good. On a side note do you think it is bad that I have eaten one piece of procuitto almost every day for about 5 months.

Holy crap, i am getting so ripped off on it. Looks like a whole leg of San Danielle Proscuitto is only $224.99 and that is 15 pounds. I pay like $10 for 3 ounces. I seriously am getting that as soon as we get our new fridge when Dave moves out in June. It will last like a year.

FIDDLEHEAD FERN WITH PROSCUITTO

Serves 6

Kosher salt
2 pounds fiddle head ferns, tripped and washed
24 paper-thin slices prosciutto
6 tablespoons brown butter
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1. In a large pot bring 2 quarts water and 1 tablespoon salt to a boil. Fill a medium bowl halfway with ice water. Drop the fiddleheads into the pot and cook for 1 minute. Drain the fiddleheads in a colander, then submerge in the ice water until completely cool. Let the fiddleheads drain well in a colander and wrap them in a clean kitchen towel to dry.

2. Arrange 2 slices of prosciutto on each of 6 room temperature plates.

3. Put the brown butter in a large saute pan over medium heat. Add the fiddleheads and toss gently, adding 1/2 teaspoon salt and the pepper. Heat for a minute or two until they are warm, then divide the fiddleheads among the 6 plates. Serve at once.

There were all these pretty flowers on the tree in the backyard.


Check out how big Basra has gotten.

Today, we went to go work on the front yard at the rental property. The house next store is cleaning out something. I am glad they are cleaning, but the mess looks unreal. Why can't they put he junk in actual bags.



So someone stole our trash bin and to make it even crazier, I think the tenant that moved out, just stole my grandmother's hutch from the attic. There is no one else that could have really gotten into the attic to take it. The downstairs tenants, the only other people with access were home and they did not have it. His apartment is empty since he moved out and the hutch is gone. Really, no one could have taken it but him.

So I called him and he said he didn't know what a hutch was. I described it and he said he didn't take it. Most definately someone did, as it was there the last time I looked in the attic and it was quite large. It makes me really angry. I am not giving him any security deposit now. I guess what that is for, but still its not the same as my grandmother's hutch.

These are some pics of the rooms. It is not too bad and is for rent if anyone is looking for a second floor apartment right next to D'youville Every tenant has a different idea with how the inside should be painted so I am leaving it up to them. I will pay for the paint. The last time I painted all the trim brown with really expensive oil paint and two weeks after they moved in, they painted it gray with cheap flat latex.

The dining room is cute and opens to the living room




3 bedrooms




A kitchen that needs a new floor, I think we are probably doing that before someone else moves in. The floor is very 50s.




The bathroom has the old style tub like in the back bathroom at my house but we added a shower head.