"Matt's Sisters Birthday" written by Paul on estrip.org

07/05/08 10:52 - 70ºF - ID#44874

Matt's Sisters Birthday

We headed down to the Lake Chautauqua area for (e:matthew)'s sister's birthday party at (e:matthew)'s parents cabin. Happy Birthday Mary! For the first time I had AT&T coverage everywhere. Not just sort of service but like full bar connection. Even way out at the end of this country road.

On the way there we stopped at the Depew Wegman's to get some supplies and some food. The food was such a freakin' ripoff. It was like $23 for the three of us to eat cafeteria quality crap. I would never eat there again. The dining area was seriously sub par compared to the Wegman's on Amherst St. I had some cold turkey and Italian wedding soup. I think in the end there was more garbage than food.

Here is (e:matthew)'s family's dog chillin in the sun.

Here is everyone sitting around

And here is (e:matthew) getting a close up of some forget me nots.

Permalink: Matt_s_Sisters_Birthday.html
Words: 169
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: buffalo

07/05/08 11:14 - 69ºF - ID#44867

Fourth Of July At the Harbor

We went to see the fireworks at the harbor front/ new canal area with (e:jim) and (e:james). (e:jim) got good pics of the fireworks with his phone I think. (e:matthew) tried taking some with mine. I can't believe none of us brought a real camera.

Here is a blurry pic of the crowd. I wish I had brought a real camera. I am going to regret this later when I look back at the iphone years.

It was interesting to see a part of downtown so populated with so many people. I heard multiple people taking about how they were amazed at the progress and to all the people who said they would never see a revitalized waterfront downtown - the time has come - at least for the Fourth of July. I actually heard one woman say she loved the fact that now she can take visitors downtown to see the waterfront and not be embarrassed. I have to question if she has ever been down there before though, because the Marina area itself has been pretty nice for a while.

Floating War Junk
I know I will get some slack for this but the floating war junk cemetery looks so ridiculous to me. Is it really an attraction. I mean I know it has always been there, but really put yourself in some other country visiting on the waterfront and imagine the impression you would have. Like imagine a trip to China and they had those warships on the riverfront. And if we are trying to give a mighty powerful image, then those are the wrong ships. They look ancient.

What I really did not understand was the really bad irish musi. THey played almost no American music andwhile I am not a big americana fan, serioulsy - isn't that what the fourth is about. I think they really need to reconsider the music next year - almost no one clapped.

metalpeter writes at 01:14:58 07/06/08 - Comment #36776: The reason the war ships look old is because they are from the last real war we fought in WWII (The Korean war doesn't count because it is the forgotten war and I don't even think I knew anything about it until I saw someone who had a hat from the ship they where on in that war). They are not junk and people can go on them, and I did when I was a kid. On a side note have you ever looked at an of the Memorials down there? There is a pretty interesting Irish one if you know where to find it, and the polish one is so Pretty it is solid black and the eagle is white and cut into it.

Music wise the only band I saw was Jackdaw and they are great, if it isn't what you like then I guess you don't like them. The thing with Jackdaw is they are pretty well known and a big name band. But if you don't know there music or there type of music it is kinda a whats going on here and even when they do a cover it is done in their way so it doesn't sound like the original. I think they where a pretty good choice.

tinypliny writes at 08:25:05 07/05/08 - Comment #36755: HEY! No picking on the sexy moustache! It's smokin' HOT!

iriesara writes at 03:44:16 07/05/08 - Comment #36748: Paul, what is up with that mustache?!? I can't tell if you look like a gay porn star from the 70s or a corrupt South Buffalo cop. Either way its terrible. I mean that in the nicest possible way, of course.

tinypliny writes at 11:31:36 07/05/08 - Comment #36726: I was there as well!!!!! I can't believe I missed you all!! I missed another chance to make amends and introduce (e:james) as the ruler of the land of the dead. The fireworks were very pretty but somewhat shorter than I expected. I saw that they had better and longer fireworks day before yesterday when BPO played at Dunn Tire Park (saw them from my window).

I think the war junk museum is pretty impressive. The warships bristling with surveillance devices and weaponry give off plenty of aggression! To a certain extent, all military museum around the world exist to serve the same purpose. I am not sure you need modern warships to make an impact on civilians who casually visit to gawk at all the arsenal majesty. But then, I am from India and we used to buy second-hand military equipment from Russia, back in the day. I think when we outgrew a certain age, our parents stopped taking us to military parades, shows and museum. I now wonder how they thought it was okay for us as kids but not as adolescents... Hmmm.. interesting.

Permalink: Fourth_Of_July_At_the_Harbor.html
Words: 337
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: food

07/05/08 11:13 - 69ºF - ID#44866

Yummy Squid at Kunis To Go

Kuni's to go really has the best sushi around. I just can't believe how fresh and yummy everything always is.

Mackarel is still my favorite

(e:Terry) and I got the squid rings as an appetizer. They are the absolutely most perfect consistency. It makes me wonder if he has a tank of fresh ones swimming around in the back.

Speaking of squid. Here is a picture of my and squiddy in the pear tree which incidentally has a lot of pears growing again, yeah!

Behind Cole's there is this giant pile of boxes. How big does it grow before they take it away.

Permalink: Yummy_Squid_at_Kunis_To_Go.html
Words: 112
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: programming

07/04/08 03:33 - 74ºF - ID#44862

Learning Iphone

I started programming my first iphone app that lets you take a pic and send it to your journal. So far I got the take a pic or select from your library and send it to the site. I am able to capture on the site and save the photo. The next step is like some sort of loading feedback and adding username password protection.

The real issue is then I can't just post it on the site for everyone to use once it's done. You are going to need some sort of itunes acct and get it from apple "if" they approve my app. Its all really annoying. Maybe I will just get sick of it and quit, lol.

Seems really lame to me that you can't just distribute your own apps to your own audience.

Permalink: Learning_Iphone.html
Words: 137
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: mustache

07/04/08 01:24 - 57ºF - ID#44852

Angry

I am a petty, angry person right now. I went out to the bars tonight and someone had the same freakin mustache as me. This made me really angry. Not like I expect to have a monopoly on the mustache but seriously who has this kind of mustache anymore and how did they have to be like two feet away from me.

Permalink: Angry.html
Words: 64
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: life

07/02/08 07:01 - 80ºF - ID#44841

The Cat and the gym

So, today I petted a cat for the first time in my life. It even sat on my lap. I am very allergic now - we were outside - it was cute. Right now I feel like I might die of allergies.

work
Great day web programming at work - it feels like I don't get to do that much anymore. I have upgraded to Zend studio Neon which is built on top of eclipse like all my other IDEs (flex and aptana) I think I am happy with this accept for the fact that eclipse does not have word wrap - what the fuck!

estrip
Tommorow is the big day to move the server to (e:fing)'s house. I wish it could be at my house instead as it costs $99/month - at least that way I could kill two birds with one stone but alas - FIOS is still no where near my part of the city.

Gym
I have been going the gym evry day, I am looking buffer already. I think by the end of summer I should be pretty buff if I keep up with it and I don't get some horrible crohn's drama death thing - so far the Lialda seems to be working great.

Permalink: The_Cat_and_the_gym.html
Words: 213
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: work

06/30/08 11:21 - 65ºF - ID#44832

Worst most awesome day

Squiddy The Kitty
Just sits at the door crying for us all day. I threw him some squid. It was the nicest thing I ever did for a cat.

Work
At work today I had to work with a person that someone refered to as the "obstructionist." It was really irritating experience. To start off they just forgot about our scheduled meeting to get the task done that I have waited since January for and lots of people depend on. After showing up 15 minutes late, they then spent like 15 minutes huffing and puffing and berating everything non-windows - calling Unix based server amateur operating systems. Eventually, I just left their cube as it was not worth my time arguing with them as it was getting nowhere.

I am so sick of hearing it from this small group of fundamentalist microsoftees - we made the decision to use PHP and CentOS Linux with MySQL for internal web dev - its over. We bought the hardware, the developers have bought into it - its saving us a ton of time - its rebust, speedy and secure and its making everything auditable, its basically working out awsome and we are expanding it.

Its really funny that some people are so Microsoft but they don't even use the latest stuff or get under the hood much. I mean they use Windows server 2003. Doesn't that sound pre-fuc%ing-historic at this point. I am not syaing that everythign microsft sucks. I am just saying it is totally unprofessional to pretend there is nothing outside of it and not to look into more feature filled, more secure, cheaper and more robust alternative when they exist and were created for 2008. We are talking an operating system made 5 years ago vs one made this year.

Luckily, my linux hero co-worker was there and everything worked out. We basically just computed around him and now the same goal is reached.

I never even ended up eating lunch today which I am sure is not a good thing. Instead I ate two dinners, one before and one after the gym.

Permalink: Worst_most_awesome_day.html
Words: 351
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: pets

06/29/08 08:45 - 69ºF - ID#44825

Someone take this cat

I wanted to make a funny terrorist video where I dressed up like a terrorist and threated to kill the cat in 30 hours if noone met my demands, which by the way were to take the cat, but I am too lazy so this is what you get. Here is the cat chasing me around. It wants to be petted constantly.

::Download Flash Video::

Permalink: Someone_take_this_cat.html
Words: 63
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: food

06/29/08 08:45 - 69ºF - ID#44824

Dinner With Jim and James at Aroma

Gym
Went to the gym again with (e:terry) and saw (e:james). That makes 6 days of the gym this week. Hit the sauna again - I really want one at home - next year.

Aroma
Then we went to dinner at Aroma on Bryant with (e:jim) and (e:james) for dinner. I had the rack of lamb with pistachio mint pesto for $26 which tasted really good but was such a ripoff in terms of portion. Same with (e:matthew)'s chicken and (e:jim)'s steak. I would probably never eat there again. Serioulsy, my lamb rack was three ribs and the "with fingerling potatoes" meant actually just two mini potatoes.

It actually looks bigger in the pic than it was. I was starving afterwards.

paul writes at 10:35:26 06/30/08 - Comment #36630: You can't promise proscuito and not deliver, its cruel and unusual.

james writes at 10:16:23 06/30/08 - Comment #36629: The menu was pretty pretentious too. They put the grade of Brandy in the description of every dish they used. If I am paying that kind of cash for that tiny speck of food they damn well better use quality ingredients. Ya, they drizzle truffle oil on their chicken. ZOMG! Trufflz are SO Xpensive!

But, I doubt they actually use the ingredients listed in the description, as my pizza was missing the single meat ingredient. Not something that goes unnoticed.

matthew writes at 05:56:28 06/30/08 - Comment #36628: It was pretty awful. If the food was amazing the tiny portions they served would be okay, but it wasn't good. and WAY overpriced! Noodles and bread are the cheapest food ever, so it's no wonder that the pizza and pasta dishes are huge. I've had much better food out of a box.

and you are so right ,(e:tinypliny), about the pretension. I'll never go back.

jenks writes at 05:23:20 06/30/08 - Comment #36626: omg, I LOVE that place. sorry you had a bad experience, but it's seriously one of my fave restaurants in town. I could eat there every day. The pizzas are awesome, and the pasta dishes are huge.
yummmmm.

tinypliny writes at 12:14:56 06/30/08 - Comment #36622: I hate that place because:
a) The waitresses are not only pretentious, they have a discriminatory attitude towards people who may not be upto their snooty levels of "sophistication".
b) There were flies all over the place INSIDE when I ate there.
c) The ladies room had two stalls, one had a broken door, and the other had no toilet paper. There ran out of soap on the counter for washing hands.
d) With all the above they STILL charged like we were eating at a gourmet restaurant in Paris or something.
e) Our waitress' attitude was revolting, disrespectful and made our evening an eating hell.

Trattoria Aroma, YOU ARE BOYCOTTED.

joshua writes at 12:01:00 06/30/08 - Comment #36620: Haha - rule #1. Small portions in Buffalo doesn't play too well. Even if the food was very good, pretentiousness like that in our city is way out of place.

james writes at 09:45:10 06/30/08 - Comment #36614: Perhaps it will be more reasonable during their going out of business party.

Permalink: Dinner_With_Jim_and_James_at_Aroma.html
Words: 129
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: party

06/29/08 05:47 - 69ºF - ID#44821

Dave's Daughters Party

Saturday, after the photoshooot we went to Dave Daughter Errin's graduation and birthday party. Conratulations Errin. It was one of thsoe surpise parties where she really had no idea and we all jumped out to surprise her at her house. Her girlfriend had taken her to the aquarium for the day.

The party was lesbiantastic, accept that (e:fellyconnelly) and (e:lauren) were missing. Seriously, maybe you guys should all meet. Anyhow, I got this great pic of (e:Terry) and Dave oggling one of the cutest lesbians I ever saw.

I wish I had gotten her picture.

Pat and Terri, our hiking buddies, were there as well. I can't get over how much Terri looks like (e:iriesara) - I think they must be related. The other half of the picture is (e:matthew) but he made me cut it out because he looked crazy.