| SundayBetsy got dreads put in. I'll let her post about the experience (and perhaps show pictures?), but suffice to say, they are awesome. The cost of the work was partially covered through trade - in exchange for work, we offered to cook dinner for ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) lishd and gorthok. I went a bit overboard, but the meal was totally awesome: Course 1: Proscuitto-wrapped melon with cilantro and lime glaze
Course 2: Soupa Avgolemeno (lemon-rice soup) with fresh oregano from our garden
Course 3: Pan-seared scallops with mint pesto, served on watercress (mint also from our garden)
Course 4: Leg of lamb with green garlic and rosemary crust, roasted zucchini, bread and romesco sauce
Course 5: (Betsy's dish) Gingered summer fruit bread pudding with vanilla ice cream Maybe the best meal I've ever made? I was quite proud of it, and everyone seemed really happy with it. It's rare that I get to go all-out on a meal like that - anyone else have something they want to barter services for food on? SaturdayParticipated in a Microsoft user experience trial for a new game coming out. Can't say any more about it than that. Overall, though, it was a fun experience, and if you have some free time (and want some MS software/products as compensation), keep your eyes open for things like that. The group was Betsy, Hillary, Matthew and I. Afterwards, the four of us joined Cory back at their house for some pizza, Wii Fit and Rock Band. Good times. FridayFourth of July! Sausages, bocce tournament, beers, fireworks, friends, sunshine, good times. ThursdayThe plan was to get some pizza and go to the drive-in movies with Corey, Melinda and a friend who is currently living in Poland (and her Polish fiancee). However, the Poles got stuck down in Seattle while we were all up in Mill Creek, and since Melinda was sleepy and Betsy had to work early in the morning, the plans changed to tacos and renting a movie. Still a lot of fun, but we need to find a time to go to the drive-in before the end of the summer. | |
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| Yeah, this pretty much sums it up. It could have been a lot worse, though. The door is at least open to get a new NBA team in Seattle, and the fans are what makes a team special. I hate the precedent this sets, and it's tough to lose such a promising young group of players, but a glimmer of hope is worth holding on to. | |
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| Man, I love looking at my "choose a shipping address" page in Amazon, because it's like a minor history of my life over the last 8+ years.
- Parents' house (before college / college summers)
- Stevens Court (college apartment)
- Zombie house (post-college house)
- Elliott Point (bachelor pad w/ Aaron)
- Capitol Hill apt (first apartment w/ Betsy)
- Speakeasy, Belltown (2 years there)
- Speakeasy, waterfront (2+ years there)
- West Seattle (current home)
I'm just missing the Asylum, my miserable little Capitol Hill room, and my new job - otherwise, that's a pretty good history of my life since 2000. And for many of those houses, Amazon is the only place where I still "keep" the address. | |
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| Lazyweb Questions!!!
1. I'm in the market for a portable music device. My requirements are:
- Able to jog with the device (i.e. no hard-drives)
- Very easy to add/remove music from multiple computers
- Cheap
- Not a shuffle
Any suggestions?
2. I have a friend who, despite working in the tech industry for several years, doesn't really have a good sense of hardware components. He wants to buy some more RAM, and doesn't know what he's looking at. He's smart enough to open up his machine and install things like sound cards or hard drives, but when he pulls up an Amazon listing for something like "2GB 667MHz DDR2 Non-ECC CL5 DIMM", his eyes glaze over.
What does he need? Does he need to open up his computer to see what he has already, and if so, what should he be looking for? And will the install be "plug and play"?
3. Was the first half of 2008 better than 2006 and 2007 combined, as far as great music? Portishead's Third and Why?'s Alopecia are both "top 5 of the decade" candidates, and Erykah Badu's New Amerykah would be near the top of any year's list. Subtle and Spiritualized both put out albums that, while not career-best, were solid efforts from two of my all-time favorite bands. Combine those with NIN's interesting experiment of Ghosts, a solid effort from The Roots, and the ridiculously fun album from Girl Talk, and this has been a crazy good past 6 months, making up for a pair of sub-par years that we've recently gone through. | |
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| I was kinda grumpy this morning because the VP of my organization was still putting the pancake batter together when I got to work, and I didn't get served breakfast until 8:45. And on top of that, the espresso machine was taking FOREVER to steam milk for my latte.
Meanwhile, at the old company, friends are getting laid off, customer service is declining rapidly, and all of their energy and resources are devoted to a product that I'm extremely skeptical about.
I think I made the right choice in moving on. | |
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| I was trying to remember whether something happened in 1st grade or 2nd grade, and I thought to myself "oh! I'll just go check livejournal, and see when I wrote about it."
Note to self: While it seems like forever, it's only been 8 years (2000-05-21), and your childhood wasn't online.
P.S. I've survived my first few days at work. I don't know what I'm doing yet. But at least I get free soda. | |
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| Hey,
Anyone have a suggestion for a good pediatrician / family doctor? We're looking for someone in the West Seattle area.
Thanks! | |
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| Betsy and I were discussing our top 5 picks for the hottest celebrities of both genders. Our lists tended to overlap quite a bit - I think both of us have similar criteria (extra points for being a musician, personality is as important as look, nerdy = good, etc). I'm interested in what your top 5 would be for the genders - post your list in the comments, with links to pictures if available. And no, this wasn't just an excuse to look up pictures of hot girls while serving out the remainder of my work time with some serious short-timer's syndrome. That's what Facebook poker is for. FemaleNeko CaseZooey Deschanel (if we were to ever hook-up, our kids would have some serious bug-eyes)Joanna NewsomNatalie PortmanMaggie GyllenhaalMale(I feel lame, because I could only come up with three names. And I'm not trying to play the "oh, i have no idea when men are attractive" card - I just couldn't think of many guys who are both good-looking and don't seem like buttholes.)Sufjan StevensBill CallahanMos Def (Because, well, you know...)Your list(s)? | |
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| I got the job!
Friday, June 6th will be my last day at Speakeasy, after nearly 5 full years here. On Tuesday, June 10th, I'll be starting at my new gig.
Hooray!
(two Qs: anyone have a really cheap laptop (<$200) they want to sell me for the long bus rides? and anyone know how to reserve the grotto or the upstairs at the Rendezvous?) | |
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| Last night was interesting. Long story short, Betsy and I finally ended up eating dinner at 11pm in the parking lot of the Burien Jack-in-the-Box1 in the front seat of our new car.
1 - A mistake I am paying for this morning. | |
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| You know, I really enjoy the music of Chan Marshall, but I gotta say, I'm not that crazy about the new album cover.  link | |
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| Pastries at Lola's and wandering around Kubota Garden = awesome Smelling the pot smoke from 200m away and hearing the shrieks and giggles of stoned teenagers running around an otherwise tranquil Japanese garden = not so awesome Dinner at Tilth = holy crap awesome Watching Aurelia's Oratorio = super awesome - if it comes to your town, you should go watch it Missing the Subtle concert that was last night = unawesome, but I've seen them perform 6 or 7 times already, so it's okay Listening to Jake's new band = awesome++ - I'm excited for their upcoming show at Trabant (June 21st) Thinking about work in the shower and getting myself stressed out on a Sunday morning = insufficient awesomeness levels Beautiful sunny day outside = emosewa in a mirror | |
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| I <3 John Moe's "Pop-Song Correspondences". Dear Mr. Prince,
It's been three days since you delivered your keynote address, "When Doves Cry," to our organization, the American Ornithological Society. As president of the AOS, I wanted to wait a little while before contacting you to express my displeasure with what took place. Frankly, it took three days for my bewilderment and fear to begin to ebb. As you know, we paid you a hefty honorarium to deliver what we thought would be a scholarly presentation. We want our money back.
(continued...) | |
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| LJ recommendation of the morning: ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/syndicated.gif) freakangelsfeedSyndicated comic, coming out with 6 new pages a week. The setting is steampunk/future-fantasy, and I've been really enjoying it so far.  | |
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|  Seems like the world is finally all abuzz about Why?. From very solid reviews all-around, to feature articles in the local paper, to name-dropping from former Top Models, it's been really exciting to watch my favorite little band finally get their moment in the sun. I'm super excited about the concert tonight - I've listened through every album in his back catalog today (including the EPs) to get ready. It took me a few listens to warm to Alopecia, but now I've been unable to take it out of my CD player. It's completely awesome.
 On the other end of the spectrum, Subtle seems to be digging themselves further and further into their own esoteric little hole. They're about to release the third album in an increasingly surreal concept album trilogy. Dose "summarizes" the storyline as: And then the idea behind this is, Hour Hero Yes is a slave for these Ungods of this world that he falls into-- which is our world, of course, slightly metaphorized. In this world, he is kept by these two Ungods, the Revered Pitman and Dr. MoonorGun, and he is forced to dispose of all things beautiful, or [that have] meaning. They are more concerned with nervousness, apathy, you know, than ushering in a new era for mankind.
So he's their gimp, and he has to take all these things, turn it into prose, turn it into song, and he has to make these pop songs that they never turn off, basically. They have to be perfect pop songs. That's all they want. So the record itself is inside the almanac. The record is a spool of his perfect songs that he cuts for these gods. And they have to be these pop songs that they never want to turn off. At the same time, all of the words are from his almanac that he keeps, that's telling the truth about these gods. So, uh, yeah... probably shouldn't start writing up that feature article in The Stranger yet. The laser show on Friday was a lot of fun. 99% of the laser "art" was just generic screensaver stuff, with a few custom images tossed in occassionally, but Doseone was there to introduce the album and he did a signing session after it was all done. The new album sounds really good, although my first impression is that they buried Dose's voice too low in the mix (although it might pop out more when I get to listen on headphones). I'm excited for that album to come out next month, and to see them in concert around the same time.
As of right now, my top 5 albums for the decade look something like this: 1. Sufjan, Illinois 2. Why?, Alopecia 3. Why?, Elephant Eyelash 4. Subtle, For Hero: For Fool 5. Radiohead, Kid A With the new Subtle album still to drop, and new Portishead and Spiritualized due as well, 2008 is shaping up to be a great year for music. | |
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| I went to The Boredoms concert last Friday. I've been wanting to see them since I first heard their music, about 8 years ago, and this was their first major tour in the U.S. since then. It was well-worth the wait. Here are a few pictures from their Chicago show, via Pitchfork.  I <3 you, eYe.  I <3 you too, Yoshimi.  I extra <3 you, 7-neck guitar that was played with drumsticks. | |
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| I've found that I've recently been way more interested in using my journal to do surveys, ask questions, or otherwise get information from my friends, than I am writing about my own experiences. I guess it goes in cycles.
On that theme, What is your desktop image? Post it in a comment.Here's mine:  I took it from a webpage of old sci-fi novel cover scans. It was featured on Boingboing a few months ago, but I can't seem to find it today. I tend to choose colorful, interesting pictures, rather than any friends/family/etc. If you set your image from a browser in Windows, and can't find the original website anymore, open the Display Properties menu by right-clicking on the desktop. From there, go to the desktop tab, and highlight the "Desktop Background" background. Click the "browse" button, and it should load the directory where the image was auto-saved. From there, you can copy/paste/upload. I had to convert my image from bmp to jpg, but I'm not sure if that was because of the original source or not.
My new goal for the next few weeks is to check out all of the albums suggested for the IDGABTT Club. Thanks to everyone who suggested something. | |
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| A few months ago, one of the participants in my Mix CD club mentioned that he wanted to send out a copy of The Downward Spiral with a note attached saying "Here - it doesn't get any better than this." It seems like that would be a really interesting idea of a CD trade - the "It Doesn't Get Any Better Than This Club". Rather than doing mixes, just send copies of a full album that you think everyone should listen to. There's all sorts of legal/ethical/logistical reasons why I'm not going to sponsor a club like that, but it's an interesting exercise to think about what you would send. I've come up with two main rules: 1) It has to be sufficiently awesome that you can honestly say that it doesn't get any better than this. 2) It has to be something that a significant majority of the other members of the club haven't heard before. So, based on that... What would be your submission to the "IDGABTT Club"?( my submission ) | |
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| True or False:
St. Patrick's Day is the tackiest holiday. | |
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| Man, it's been a while since an ironmaus LJ Scattergories, hasn't it? Time for my turn in the gamemaster's chair! I encourage everyone to play. Honestly, put down any answer at all, even simple ones but make sure they're real. For categories like "politician" or "beverage," don't think I won't Google them and disqualify those I can't find. ( Rules (as ganked from Matthew's post) )I'll cut it off at 8am Wednesday morning and post winners as soon as possible (Wednesday night?). Today's Scattergories are brought to you by the letter T. This means that all of your answers must start with that letter to receive any points. Poll #1152497
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: NoneCartoon/Comic Character Album Title U.S. City (w/state, ex. Seattle, WA) Sports Player Beverage U.S. Politician Toy/Game Term of Endearment Poll #1152498
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: NoneOccupation Things That Smell Good Actor/Actress Animal Visual Artist Feeling Clothing Crude Word/Phrase | |
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|  Oh man. I think I'm going to need this someday. There's also a version written by Doug E. Fresh, which would also be awesome, and one by Shaggy, which would be considerably less awesome. Now I just have to wait until they sign up Too $hort for his turn at a kid's book. | |
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| I know that few people on my friends list care about sports, and fewer still about the Sonics and the NBA. But I have to link to the "Save Our Sonics" Mailbag article anyway - the letters and comments perfectly sum up how frustrated and angry I am about the situation. And if you'll excuse me, I'm going to now watch Kemp/Payton highlights on YouTube and fight off the clouds of dust that seem to be getting in my eyes. | |
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| 96 seconds. I made my first ever political donation today, and it only took me 96 seconds, including page loading time and the time it took to pull my wallet out. Obama is getting extremely close to the 1,000,000 mark for donors. The American public tends to be very impressed by large round numbers, and while 1,000,000 is not significantly different from 987,355 (or whatever the number below currently indicates), an even million would be a good talking point and get some buzz going. If you've been sporting an Obama icon and friended him on Facebook and whatever, but haven't yet made a contribution, please do so now. Even if it is just $5 - right now, hitting that "magical" 1 million mark is the more important figure as far as having talking points for the Ohio/Texas contest.  | |
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|  Replace the word "Lincoln" with the word "DSLAM", and that's a pretty accurate picture of the training classes I lead. | |
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| Man, what a weekend. I caucused for the first time ever, and cooked celeraic (celery root) for the first time ever. MY LIFE IS A NON-STOP ROLLERCOASTER OF THRILLS AND/OR CHILLS. Caucus: We all met at the local elementary school, and crowded into the cafeteria. The crowd was probably 300-400 people - it was truly a monster caucus. When the organizer asked who was here for the first time, 90% of the people raised their hands. Hooray for the first non-symbolic caucus of my lifetime! Each precinct went off to their own separate room. Our precinct has 12 people turn out, and the vote went 8 Obama, 3 Clinton, and 1 uncommitted. Our precinct represented 4 delegates, so a bit of math showed that 2 or 3 people (depending on the scenario) would have to change their minds to affect the delegate count in any way. With everyone (but the uncommitted person) feeling very strongly about their candidate already, it wasn't worth lengthy deliberations or lobbying. We went around the room anyway to just casually talk about what we liked about each candidate, and it felt more like a group of neighbors on a Saturday afternoon chatting about politics than a heated debate. It was a lot of fun. Celeraic Celeraic tastes halfway between really mellow celery and a parsnip. I cooked it with some lobster mushrooms, a quick bechamel sauce with various cheeses melted in, a touch of mustard and shallots, and tossed it with pasta, covered with breadcrumbs and baked it like mac&cheese. It ended up being very tasty!
Betsy knitted me a sweater for Christmas! I've been meaning to post this picture for a while, but I keep on forgetting.  It is completely awesome, and Betsy is completely awesome for having knitted it. | |
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