It doesn't snow in the Pacific Northwest

Honestly, this isn't snow:



This is just cotton candy that is falling from the sky:



Maybe it was the pillow factory down the street that exploded?

It was a good Thanksgiving Day

For that I am thankful. What is better than getting together with friends and eating almost to pain :)

Work perks

I don't normally reference where I work, but I got to experience one of the quirky perks on Wednesday and just had to share. At Amazon, they will bring in 1 or 2 authors, artists, speakers, etc to talk to or perform for Amazon employees. This last Wednesday, they brought in Battlefield Band, who I have not seen since 1997 when they performed at Michigan Tech.

Basically they are back in the states, touring for they latest CD release, Road of Tears. For those that like traditional Scottish music, I do recommend this band.

Recipe: U.P. Stuffing

Rather than type it out again, here is a page on how to make a very meaty stuffing.

Recipe: Sausage Thingie's

Ok, first off I didn't name them, but at least the name is somewhat fitting for this misfit recipe. Althought I have heard that they might go by the name Polish Mistakes but I cannot say here nor there.

Ingredients 1 lb. ground beef 1 lb. sausage (spicy) 1 lb. velveeta 1 loaf cocktail rye 1 whole onion diced (optional) Instructions Pre-heat oven to 350 degree F In a dutch oven, sautee the optional onion Brown up the ground beef and sausage in the same dutch oven Drain grease off Dice up the velveeta Add the velveeta to the dutch oven and reduce to medium low stirring occasionally until thoroughly melted On a cookie sheet place the cocktail rye slices Place one Tablespoon of meat/cheese mixture onto each rye Place cookie sheet in the oven for 12 minutes Serve

Listen closely

Was listening to NPR on the way home and what do you know, there is Tom Waits giving an interview about making movie soundtracks and playing from his latest CD, Orphans.

Sunday, sunday, sunday

Coming out of the weekend today, although I am sure that I shouldn't look at my weekends as over till Monday morning, and looking at another day of football and Miranda watch. Also probably going to take a look at Michelle's dresser and see what I will need to do to install some drawer slides to make it easier for her to use.

Today also marks the official release date of the Nintendo Wii gaming system. Not sure how that is going to play out, but I will probably get one once there is a good set of releases that tickle my fancy. The price point is pretty good and the new controller setup is definitely intriguing.

Football wise, it seems to be a very depressing day for the Lions. They may beat the Cardinals, but I hold little faith going into that. Good thing is that I get to watch an NFC north team in the Green Bay Packers, where I can watch Western Michigan alumnus in Greg Jennings.

Miranda is doing well and getting more and more active. She is able to crawl to the laundry basket we have her toys in and pull some out now. Most of time, though she crawls around chasing Tigger.

ESPN, what have you done?

Mike mentioned in one of his earlier posts how annoying it is to have guests in booth during Monday night football and I think I have to reiterate on that thought. During tonight's game between Tampa Bay and Carolina, Jeff Gordon was on to help promote ESPN soon picking up NASCAR and ? To congratulate his second marriage?

Sigh...

If you are going to sell me something, do something football related or more related to the programming I am watching. Don't push Desperate Housewives, Dancing with the stars or NASCAR on me. Aren't the commercials enough??!! Maybe it isn't, but given that this is on a paid channel (i.e. cable or dish) then why am I paying more?

Iron Chef America: Battle Cranberry

So it looks like the Food Network is doing another cross show gimmick was by pitting two of hosts against each other in kitchen stadium. Tonight it is Rachel Ray and Giada De Laurentiis and they are teamed up with Mario Batali and Bobby Flay respectively. Generally I am not a big fan of these gimmicks and this is not any different.

Of note though, both of these hosts would have difficulty without the Iron Chefs to help as they don't seem to have the time management needed. Also it seems like the Batali/Ray side is not terribly friendly whereas the De Laurentiis/Flay side is smiling and a little more organized.

Not sure who will win... not sure if I will even bother to watch the end. All I know is my Lions lost... again. Sigh.

Got an opinion on restaurants?

I know that everyone is a critic so why not help one of my friends by reviewing some restaurants you have been to on his site, Foodry. He even created a nifty blog widget so you can keep the consumers of your reviews up to date.

I spent some time reviewing alot of my old haunts from when I lived in St. Joe, and have reviewed a couple of the restaurants I visited in the PacNorWest. I probably won't be adding the blog widget though since my blog is cluttered enough as is.

My profile on Foodry

Office Pranks

Have you ever wanted to prank an officemate while they are on vacation? Do you love Gummi Bears?

Buy Haribo Gummi Bears!

Images of the prank: Haribo Gummi Bears Prank

Discuss amongst yourselves: Haribo Gummi Bears Discussion

Personalized Search results

John Battelle's Searchblog recently posted about the launch of a new search company, Collarity, that tailors your results to your preferences in a hope of better sifting through the cesspool that is our lovely schminternet.

By tracking the search terms, url choices, and selections of users and visitors, Collarity responds to a user's 'hot spot of interest' (i.e. query) with sites visited by expert-users in that area.

Review: The Long Tail

The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More by Chris Anderson is a book that explores how people shop and purchase and compares it to how they did this over the last 40 years to come up with a new theory of niches and individual tastes. Chris shows how the age of mega blockbuster is coming to a close. As part of that statement he shows that the numbers as a whole are going up as general consumption is going up, but as a percentage of the population and of the purchases dollars spent, it is steadily decreasing. Mr. Anderson utilizes Rhapsody, iTunes, and Amazon.com are leading the way in offering huge selections to feed our very individualistic tastes. We no longer have to be satisfied by the stock of the local record store, or by what the small B. Dalton located in the mall to drive what we could buy. If I have a taste for Industrial Alternative Carnival music, then now I can truly buy music that fits that genre.

The problem that Chris points at though is how can consumers find these items. How can I find the Surf Green KitchenAid StandMixer? (Did you know there are 24 colors of KitchenAid StandMixers?) How do I find new music to fit my taste or a new author or work that fits my need to read? It was possible for the old time record store clerk to handle their catalog, but can any one person handle 300,000+ albums in their head and Amazon carries many, many more than that...

I enjoyed the book as a sort of mental exercise where I utilized his problem space (even though I sit in it at work) and tried to think of ways to surface those things that are not commonly shown since they aren't mainstream. The problem is really surfacing those to the right people. I recommend this book as a look at marketing to niches and the smaller, avid consumers within.

Review: On Intelligence

On Intelligence by Jeff Hawkins, is a book that rethinks the way we think in an attempt to further define why computer scientist and mathematicians have had trouble creating artificial intelligence. But the book goes further than that, by explorer the human consciousness that defines our intelligence. One of the primary proofs that Jeff puts forth is that our computers today run at nearly 3 GHz and yet cannot produce the same results as a computer at image recognition, sound recognition, or any other form of pattern analysis, and yet the human brain can run about 100 MHz (as defined by mathematical computation).

Jeff postulates that our mind is wired for patterns partly because we are always predicting what stimulus will come next. We see lightening, so our brain anticipates hearing thunder. We hear a siren so we anticipate seeing an ambulance or fire truck. Many of his ideas have a good deal of merit from my non-expert level opinion because it gives us another way to attack the problem of pattern analysis, which could lead to better disease analysis, weather prediction, or other problem solving activities. I highly recommend this to dabblers in expert systems and like as well to those that are interested in neocortex of the brain.

Sunday

Sunday was a pretty good day. We went out to eat in the morning to Salty's at Redondo Beach with our friends Ali, Steph, and Darius. Was a lot of fun and Miranda was great. Never cried once and we were there for 2 hours (it is a huge buffet of seafoody goodness and you really have to pace yourself).

Otherwise, the Lions won (although I had to content myself with the highlight reel) and the I bought two old "new" games for the gamecube which have both proven interesting.

John M Knight's Fort Knight Dispatch: The real space for innovation is in remote diagnostics

My friend John, has a link to an interesting article about where the Maytag/Whirlpool merger is at. Maypool. Whirltag. Appliance conglom.

John M Knight's Fort Knight Dispatch: The real space for innovation is in remote diagnostics

What I have an accent?

It tells me I have an inland North accent. I thought I spoke true engrish...english.

What American accent do you have? Your Result: The Inland North You may think you speak "Standard English straight out of the dictionary" but when you step away from the Great Lakes you get asked annoying questions like "Are you from Wisconsin?" or "Are you from Chicago?" Chances are you call carbonated drinks "pop."
The Midland
The Northeast
Philadelphia
North Central
The South
The West
Boston
What American accent do you have? Take More Quizzes

Rememberance and a shout out

It is funny that as one gets involved in all the aspects of one's life, it is easy to get totally absorbed in it, so much so that you forget about many things that are not directly in your path of vision. For one, I am a gamer and musician as hobbies, but those has fallen to the wayside to my new job as Dad. For the most part, I don't miss them all the time, but there are events that bring those things to the forefront and then I truly begin to miss them. Maybe someday I will have time? More likely I will have to make time and reduce my sleep :)

As for the shout out, it is directly related to what led me to miss writing, playing, and performing music. My friend Ish just posted about how he has now got some time scheduled to do some recording. Thankfully he gave some links to his music that he recorded in the past and I got to enjoy those this morning as I came into work. Ish, if you read this, I have always been in complete and utter awe at your talents and abilities. The songs I downloaded were incredible. I remember hanging out and jamming once, and most of the time I forgot to play because I was enamored of what you could create. Thank you.

And because I feel obligated to post pictures of my daughter when I do post...