Archive for January, 2007
January 25, 2007 at 6:42 am · Filed under Culinary Experimentation
Almost immediately after posting my last entry, I got an email from the writers of two of the books I was ordering. They recommended that I also purchase - “What to Drink with What You Eat”. I agree with them - beverages are a really important part of the meal because they can enhance the flavor or detract from it. So, I went ahead and ordered that book as well. Hopefully I will be able to write a glowing review of all three of their books in the near future. My expertise in cooking is fairly limited right now, but with the right foundation and a lot of practice, I am confident that I will be preparing some amazing meals for my friends and family within the next few years. I may take a few classes in order to learn some basic techniques and improve my knife skills, but I actually have a lot of fun just experimenting with ingredients and recipies even if they do not turn out right!
I found an interesting recipe for tea sandwiches - ingredients are wheat bread, smoked salmon, avocado, cucumber, mayo, lemon juice, and pepper. Going to see how it works out tonight!
Here are the wines I bought:
- Folie a Deux - Menage a Trois - 2005 (California red table wine)
- Antonio Sanguineti - Nobile di Montepulciano - 2002 (Italian - Red)
- Shepherd’s Ridge - 2005 Sauvignon Blanc (New Zealand)
- Allan Scott - 2002 Chardonnay (New Zealand)
- Four Emus - 2005 (Austrailian Chardonnay) - I bought it because the name/bottle made me laugh and it was $7 - not expecting much, but at the very least it is an interesting conversational piece
I am not looking to build an amazing collection or anything, but I think it is always good to have the right wine on hand. Going to actually read reviews online - not sure why I didn’t think of that before I went to the liquor outlet - I actually picked my recent scotch and vodka (chopin) purchases that way.
I have four bottles of scotch right now:
- Glenfiddich 15 year Solara reserve
- Glenmorangie 12 year port finish
- Macallan 15 year Fine Oak (my favorite)
- Aberlour 15 year
January 22, 2007 at 6:50 am · Filed under Meaningless Drivel
Since the weather has somewhat killed my desire to do anything outside out my home, I was saving tons of money! I did finally get out this past weekend and buy some stuff. Well, some is somewhat of an understatement. More like a sizable amount.
Highlights of the stuff I bought:
- Large 5′x8′ rug for my family room. Fits perfectly and goes well with the theme. It is mostly brown/beige with some red highlights.
- Three 48″x30″ rugs… really colorful and fun.
- Black Console Table with frosted glass inlay
- Black End Table with frosted glass inlay
- A large poster that is a really cool color of blue, which says ORANGINA. It looks a lot like the one here, but the one I got is a much more vibrant shade of blue. It made me laugh, so I bought it.
- Five bottles of wine. I had no wine, so I picked up some decent stuff. I am actually pretty good at picking wines… I know nothing about wines, but I generally pick excellent ones almost all of the time! I do know a good wine when I taste it, but I am deer in the headlights when I look at wines in the liquor store. The last housewarming I went to, the person I went with and I both picked out a bottle on the way. It was funny because she acted like she knew what was good, yet the bottle I picked was excellent and the bottle she picked was awful!
- Finally made it to Sam’s Club - had no tissues left, so stocked up on paper products and a random assortment of other stuff.
I need to get my place somewhat organized, then I’ll post some pics. I still need to print out some pictures to put in my picture frames, but going to try to get that all of that accomplished this evening! I am ready to get all of it finished, so I can start entertaining more.
I am ordering some books from amazon this week. I buy about 3-5 books a month. The internet is a great resource for information, but I still love reading. Found some good books that are highly recommended, so ordering these:
- A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
- Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World - Jack Weatherford
- The 33 Strategies of War - Robert Greene
- Becoming a Chef - Andrew Dornenburg
- Culinary Artistry - Andrew Dornenburg
- No One Cares What You Had for Lunch: 100 Ideas for Your Blog - Margaret Mason
- Wall and Piece - Banksy
January 19, 2007 at 7:16 am · Filed under Activism
I love activism.
I love when people are passionate about an issue even if I do not agree with their viewpoint.
Ideas change the world and I love it when people use their time and talents to make statements about their beliefs. Obviously, I am against any activism which promotes hatred, removal of civil liberties, or violations of human rights.
I am a big fan of Banksy: 
Banksy is the pseudonym of a well-known English graffiti artist from Bristol. His artwork is often political and/or humorous in nature. His street art, which combines graffiti with a distinctive stencilling technique, has appeared in London and in cities around the world. […] Banksy’s stencils feature striking and humorous images occasionally combined with slogans. The message is usually anti-war, anti-capitalist, anti-establishment or pro-freedom.
I am not opposed to a lot of things that I ramble on about, I just feel like the mainstream media and people in general usually ignore the less popular stances on an issue. They do this for the sake of blending in, but blind belief in anything leads to bad things. Awareness about something requires understanding all facets.
January 18, 2007 at 9:54 pm · Filed under Pointless Rants
The true.com ads on myspace are beginning to really piss me off. They are big and obnoxious… Most of the girls in their ads are not even remotely attractive despite the fact that most of them are about three square inches of fabric away from complete nudity. As far as true.com goes, they apparently have the worst customer service of any online dating service and are the most expensive. People who have subscribed, have found it frustrating to cancel.
It did have some cool features, but for the most part it was lame and match.com seems to have copied all of the good ones. I never bothered subscribing. I technically still have an free account because apparently you need to send them a copy of your birth certificate and your right pinkie toe in order to delete an account. Since it is almost impossible to delete your account, true.com has a very realistic claim that they have 11 million members!
I think every woman who winked at me on True.com had a high school education or less, a minimum wage job, and multiple kids… and enough incredibly obvious baggage to cover the deck of an aircraft carrier. I know I am not gorgeous or rich (yet) or whatever, but I can do a lot better than that.
Every time I send a myspace message, I see those awful advertisements and they just irk me. They bother me even more than the flash ads with the annoying buzzing noises, the epileptic seizure inducing ads or those annoying free ring tone ads that require participation (aka $4.95 per day program).
All of this preying on people by major corporations pisses me off… It is like when I bought a cell phone, I sat there and read the entire contract. The sales person had the nerve to get annoyed with me when I asked questions. I told him that I am not going to agree to anything that I haven’t read. I would have gone into some big long rant about how the high priced lawyers that represent their corporation are not looking out for my best interests… but I saved my breath as the guy probably had lots of kids to feed at home and just wanted his 5% commission. Salespeople in general really piss me off because they can flat out lie to your face and get away with it. If what you are signing says the opposite of the salesperson, what you are signing holds up in a court of law. I’ll rant later about how little I like the salespeople of the modern era, but a quick thesis for that rant: “Most salespeople could be replaced by Roombas or primates and sales would probably increase.” I also need to ramble about how our civil court system is a travesty as it only rewards lawyers for their greed, but those are both rants for another day…
I will never put annoying ads on this site. I will eventually do the affiliate marketing thing for a little more disposable income, but the main goal of this site is to post rants about meaningless crap that will hopefully elicit a chuckle from some of you out there. I will take any and all suggestions for things to ramble about. I could probably ramble on about the merits of cheddar cheese flavored goldfish crackers and end up with enough content for a doctoral thesis.
January 16, 2007 at 7:28 am · Filed under Pointless Rants, General Stuff
Top Gear is returning in less than two weeks! As most of you probably do not know, Richard Hammond, one of the hosts, was in an awful rocket car crash and nearly died. He survived and is apparently getting back to 100%. Top Gear is a really badass show that airs on the BBC. They do reviews of the latest and greatest high end vehicles. Most of the reviews are of European cars, which for the most part are vastly superior to their American counterparts. I found Top Gear because they put an “Americanized” version on discovery or TLC - which is funny because the BBC originals have no commercials and a lot more of the British humour.
I love British humour - It is sarcastic, dry, and dirty. American television really pales in comparison to what the BBC has to offer. Our stuff is all tugging at the heartstrings human interest bullcrap. Which is great in small doses, but it has infected everything on American TV - from sporting events to sitcoms to news to etc. The only show that I am actually excited to watch on American TV is Top Chef.
On the topic of human interest bullcrap, I do not care that Linebacker #2’s mom died when he was 13 and he had to walk 46 miles to college every day and work 87 hours a week to support his family. I do care that he goes out on the field and gives 100%. Sports used to be pure. Athletes were gods. They were legends. Now all of this “making people on TV more human” stuff just irks me. Part of the allure of the famous is the mystery… when you take away the mystery, you kill the illusion. Sad when the news consists of 0-2 actual news stories and 6-8 human interest stories masquerading as news. The latest abducted white sexy coed is not front page news. Then again, with the patriot act and the “war”, I guess that any critical remarks about the government would be immediately censored… First Amendment, I miss you! Come home soon! I am tired of the vapid and tiresome filler that characterizes 99% of the content in the mainstream media.
On the car front, I think I am going to start saving for my M5 now. I love my 2000 Maxima GLE, but I really want a manual and more horsepower. I am young, unattached, and may as well indulge myself. Nothing compares to the adrenaline rush of a roaring engine, screeching tires, and the G forces of acceleration.
January 14, 2007 at 7:51 pm · Filed under General Stuff
I am going to dig up some of my old academic papers to post here. I really enjoy writing about philosophy, sociology, psychology, economics, etc. I need to write something everyday, but I am going to try to limit the publicly viewable version of this blog to somewhat interesting and entertaining writings. Besides the stress relief that comes with putting my thoughts into writing, I am trying to develop my story telling skills. Unfortunately, my long-term memory is somewhat fried because I tend to be an “out of sight, out of mind” sort of person… so it is going to be somewhat of an uphill battle for me to get this stuff out of my head.
I am going to integrate a flickr account too. I bought my camera last June and have only taken a few hundred photos…
January 8, 2007 at 6:05 pm · Filed under General Stuff
Fun stuff. Still need to fiddle with the themes a bit to get a design together… then it’s onwards to greatness.
