(e:libertad), I know you have told me many time in fragments how hard it was but could you please share, in a consolidated post, how you quit smoking finally?

• How long had you been smoking?
• How much were you smoking?
• When did you start?
• What brands were you smoking?
• How long did it take for you to quit?
• When did you start trying to quit?
• What all did you try?
• What worked?
• What didn't work?
• What do you feel was the most helpful and the least helpful?
• Who helped you?
• Who didn't help you?
• What factors dangerously pushed you into relapse?

This is a LOT to ask of you, I know, but I am honestly VERY VERY interested in success stories like yours who have fought single-handedly against a whole CORPORATION of evil. It's amazing really that your individual will power fought and defeated commercial interests who are pushing out this drug to the masses and encouraging addiction with a sole purpose of financial gain and complete disregard for the financial, health and emotional burden of communities across the planet. I think people who quit smoking are perhaps the strongest people anywhere.

Has anyone ever tried getting tickets at this station? I just booked some "pick up at station" tickets and am now nervous if this station has anyone there for giving me the tickets! All the times that I have traveled from this station, I have never seen the "office" open, ever.

EDIT: I went to the Buffalo Exchange Street Station yesterday and got my tickets. I didn't even need a print out of my confirmation email - which was great because I didn't have it anyway. The lady at the counter just asked for my photo ID and confirmation number and handed me my ticket. Their hours are from 6:30 AM to 4:00 PM Monday through Friday and yes, they mainly deal with handing out tickets to people who have booked tickets online.

After some more snooping around in the Amtrak website, I found two more information pages:

1. Station Hours for Amtrak Buffalo Exchange Street Station:
2. Station building with waiting room details for Amtrak Buffalo Exchange Street Station:

It says ticketing hours are from 6:15 am to 4:00 pm, Monday through Friday. Its closed on Saturday and Sunday.

I checked out google maps to see if anyone has ever had a successful ticketing experience at this station and found TWO place pages!!!

Place page one:
Amtrak: For Station Information Only Call
75 Exchange Street, Buffalo, NY 14203-2918
(716) 856-2075

• Vague reviews. The latest one is mine - that I definitely intend on updating soon.)

Place page two:
Buffalo Exchange Street Station
United States
amtrak.com

• No reviews or phone numbers but it has train schedules!
• However the two measly train timings on that page are dated and most uninformative.
• What the hell? I am going to post my review on this page as well.

I wonder how many other place pages exist for this one tiny joke of a station. Such a disorganized mess!

TERRIBLE choice. Didn't bring me any joy. Had more sugar than almonds. Should have got the Klondike...

I though this was a swell idea of (e:matthew)'s (but I can't see his post anymore). So the concept is to post a simple screenshot of the favourite scene from your favourite movie.

Here is mine:


I love the music, the dance the whole concept, the flowing tattoo map that forms out of nowhere, the drums, the drama and the breathtaking awesomeness of this scene. From "The Fall".

My brother is moving out of his big and happy 1 bedroom flat to move closer to his workplace in Manhattan. But his landlord won't let him out of the 2 year lease he signed. :(

Would any of you happen to know of anyone who wants to live in a nice 1 bedroom in Forest Hills, Queens for a year on a sublet?

Here is his ad on Craigslist:

According to Google, its the 160th Anniversary of the First World's Fair.

I love this really cool illustration on the Google homepage with the gold ornamented magnifying glass and several random fun animations as the magnifying glass hovers over details.







I had to look up what it was all about. According to wikipedia:

The first Expo was held in The Crystal Palace in Hyde Park, London, United Kingdom in 1851 under the title "Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations".

And then I realized that the Pan American Exposition in Buffalo in 1901 was a World's Fair! Those were the glory days for our city. Look at all the pomp and circumstance...

I was craving pizza yesterday night so I made my own for lunch today. 10X tastier and awesome and I bet, around 14X cheaper.

A cute breakfast for once...



Cals...............251
Fat................12g (39%)
Cholesterol.....205 mg (143%)
Sodium..........532 mg (38%)
Carbs.............21g (15%)
Fiber..............6g (50%)
Protein...........18g (75%)
Sugars...........1g

I was looking at the Best of Buffalo food lists and...

Best Salad
Poppyseed Cafe
Cole’s
Pano’s
Globe Market
Kosta’s

EH??

The only poppyseed cafe I could find online was this and that is in Fircrest, Washington. Is this in one of the burbs or something?

Other thoughts about the list:

Best New Restaurant
The Delaware
Blue Monk
The Eights Bistro
Mezza
Lloyd’s Taco Truck

No Blue Fin? Is it not that new, maybe? I voted for Blue Fin. (e:Paul), Blue Fin doesn't even make the best sushi list. Didn't you vote early and often?!! :-)

Best Dessert
Chocolate Bar
Delish
Dessert Deli
Butterwood
Sweet Tooth

This makes me think the list is rigged. I know for a fact tons of people voted for Chow Chocolat - including me.

Restaurants Buffalo Needs
Authentic/traditional Mexican
Ethiopian
More vegan/vegetarian options
More food trucks
A vegan bakery

I think I agree with this one the most. Well... as in 4/5. I am definitely not agreeing with the idea of a vegan bakery...

Best Thai / Vietnamese
Saigon Cafe
Taste of Thai
Papaya
Pho 99
Jasmine

WHAT? No Blue Fin, in this list as well? Did voting for one place in 4 categories disqualify my vote or something?!

Best Soul Food
Gigi’s
Soul Fabulous
Aunt Mattie’s
Lagniappes
Musician’s Big 6

I haven't been to any of these places except old Lagniappes... Come to think of it, I have no idea what soul food is.

Best Vegetarian
Amy’s
The Eights
Merge
Betty’s
Falafel Bar

Merge is an over-rated disappointment. I can confidently say that people who have been vegetarians for more than a few months and for the right reasons (read: not substituting the hell out of every meal with meat "substitutes" and craving meat all the time) won't like this place. The food is just bland and made without any soul. I am not sure any of the people who actually run the place are real vegetarians - hence the lack of connection and soul.

WHOA. THE EIGHTS BISTRO! How did I miss this restaurant right down the street? Maybe I should go there for dinner tonight after I am done at the office. It's open till 2 AM today apparently.

If not today... SOMEDAY, I really want to try these from their menu:

• Brussels Sprouts w/hot smoked caramelized onions,

gruyere cheese and a touch of mozzarella (white) $13.50

• Mushroom and Caramelized onion served with a rosemary infused honey drizzled over melted blue cheese and mozzarella. topped with roasted walnuts (white) $12.75

(I hope I am not kicked out if I ask them to omit the blue cheese. Blue Cheese = ick)

• Vegan - housemade basil chili tofu cashew cream and marinara sauce. Topped with plenty of broccoli, mushroom, yellow peppers and red onion $14.50

And good riddance, Campieri's. You were a rude, snobby, intolerant, racist and an awful person. I hope you have nothing to do with this new Bistro. If this is just a reincarnation, I don't think I am going anywhere near it.

Best Middle Eastern
Amy’s
Byblos
Mezza
Falafel Bar
Natalie’s

Hmm.... Haven't eaten at 3/5 of those places. I wonder if any of these are in the downtown/Allentown/(E:strip) areas.

Best Indian
Star of India
Taste of India
Kebab and Curry
Tandoori
India Gate

No palace of dosas? Maybe it has really gone down the hill since I last went there.

Okay, this list is tooooo long already. I am out of break-time. Let me wrap this up by saying..

Best dining out
- Everything else

I haven't heard of half the places on there. And places in Amherst and the burbs shouldn't really be nominated for something that is called "Best of Buffalo". It's unfair to the people who have actually set up businesses and cater to people IN the city of Buffalo.

And OH.

Best Pilates / Yoga
Evolation Yoga
East Meets West
Sjakti Yoga
Bikram Yoga
BAC

No Hand to Heart. Clearly, my vote was disregarded. The Artvoice ballot is SO rigged.

---

PS: I really like the fact that the quote box is hidden against the white background. I wish the quote box were transparent in other backgrounds as well (when the theme changes). Nudge Nudge *hint* *hint* (e:paul). :)

So I decided to have my own Natty Party, went and bought a kilo of 85%++ dark chocolate (they have an excellent lindt sale at walgreens), brewed a couple litres of tea and took 11.04 for a test spin.

Very fancy, I admit. But not utilitarian fancy... For example, the menu is a combination of a magnified gnome-do and the linux-mint menu. Everything hovers in 3D glory. But I am not quite sure if I like this sort of menu. Maybe with a few keyboard shortcuts but not on its own...

I can't easily find a way to shuffle things around in the main panel at the top. I also can't figure out how to move that application-dock-panel to the right. I like to have everything on the right. I am not a left-hander and I resent things that force me to clumsily switch to my left hand.


And there is too much Mac-iness that I don't like. All the program-related menus appear in the top panel. I absolutely loathe this behaviour in Mac - one of the many reasons why the Mac interface is not so "intuitive" or appealing to me.


I tried to do some simple image manipulating and resizing. In typical Ubuntu contrariness, everything already installed was definitely not what I wanted/liked. Sometime natty eye-candy is just not enough.

Currently, I am on madbox on my oldest laptop (Ubuntu 10.10 kernel + Openbox +SLiM, WinXP on my daily laptop and a stripped down Ubuntu 10.10 64bit on my analyses laptop. I don't see the nattily-dressed Ubuntu making a grand entry on any one of them for now. Seems to me that most of the nattiness has been adopted at the cost of flexibility.