trip

Phew. I'm back. That was one serious week down in the Bay. The hotel had leopard print bath robes and tiger-striped carpet. Uh, yeah.... They also had a hosted wine hour each and every evening. The international people I was with the whole time all jokingly scheduled 5:00pm meetings each and every night. Yikes! The business portion of my trip went well, a sort of total immersion into the regional end of things. I even spotted Mr. CEO while in the main HQ building. It was from a distance, so he didn't see me. If he had, he would have immediately recognized my genius and offered me his position. Such is life.

The fun side of the trip was fantastic. Not only did I get to meet a whole bunch of people that I ostensibly work with, I got to see C., B., and A.! Marvelous. A. was in fine form. She and J. provided soooooo much gooooooooood food I thought I might burst. Luckily the Hug Attaaaaaaacks took place before the main Feast.

I don't know how they did it, but they managed to BBQ cheese! Straight ON the grill! It was so delicious. Oooh, I also received word from A. that there would be updates to her blog once her big-time-smarty-pants test was over and done with.

Big thanks to C. and J. for picking me up from the airport last night!

where the Cool Kids are

Today I make why way down the coast to where the cool kids are. Apart from the meetings and presentations (including one comprised entirely cuddly kittens and bunnies from yours truly), I'll be able to see Chris, Becky, and Ana. Huzzah! The amount I've been able to see these 3 in the 9 or 10 months they've been away is a little astounding, certainly unexpected, and much appreciated.

This should be a great trip down to the Bay. An interesting aspect of my work is that the people I work with the most, talk to on a daily and weekly basis, I've never met. Strange, but true. This trip down I'll be able to meet some of these people and finally put a face to the name. That, and I finally booked a nice hotel to stay at.

One thing that won't be fun... while I'm gone, some other cool kids are leaving town. Boo. To Austin and Nina, I want to see a blog and a Flickr account. To Jeff, I expect some serious rants since you'll be down in the real Thunderdome soon enough. To all three of you, happy travels.

Nice!

Big thanks to KungFuKitten for finding this particularly entertaining web site. Anyone who even moderately enjoys the Simpson's should check it out.




Me, in Springfield.

The Bandit's Altercations

Attention blogging world! My sister finally created her very own blog, aptly titled The Bandit's Altercations. Fantastic.

In other news, I said I'd dig this up for my disbelieving german friend leaving town shortly. The Hoff, in all his glory. Believe it.

Mini Post for a Mini Day

Yesterday I had the distinct pleasure of feasting on a basket of sliders. "What is a slider?" you may very well inquire. A slider is a miniature hamburger. Or, in the case of yesterday, cheeseburgers. Given my love of things in miniature, this was a most glorious way to spend the dinner hour. Upon settling up my tab, Mr. Steel noticed that miniature Moon-Pies were also sold for a mere 4 bits. That put the miniature day over the top. I have no idea when I had my last Moon Pie, but the miniature version was fantastic! Just enough moon, just enough pie.

Miniature! Huzzah!

For KFR

I think I should apologize to the rest of my readers....

word

dope
rad
totally!
awesome
meow! (that's for you, Sara)
wicked
???

One good turn....

Deserves more muppets.

Beth Orton- Conceived... you must watch until you see the mole that has a little Stevie Wonder swagger to him. Or the bunnie that plays the drums.

Scene from a Walk: Poop 'n Trebuchet

While out for stroll this noon hour I met some very interesting scenes. I'm using "interesting" quite loosely here, so please lower your expectations. Almost immediately after I embarked on my journey I came across the remnants of what had to have been a sick dog. Poor thing must have been constipated as the excrement resemble deer poop, only on a much larger scale... and it carried on for about 15 feet. The walk 'n poop. Needless to say (well, perhaps not needless as I'm writing about it) I didn't really ponder the situation much. I went about the business of walkin'.
.... walk.... walk ...... walk...... walk
On my return home I saw another interesting sight. This one actually was interesting. I beheld a homemade trebuchet. It stood about 5 feet high and looked a bit delicate, so nothing terribly heavy when launching... no watermelons or anything. It appeared highly useful, nonetheless. I was so enthralled with the trebuchet I totally kicked a little poop ball from the constipated dog. And then it hit me. Maybe the dog wasn't, in fact, constipated. Maybe there's another explanation here. Maybe, just maybe, the little poop balls were flung to their current position by the trebuchet which is now in the shop (garage) for repairs.

It could happen.

Melitta Style Coffee

Coffee in the morning. What could be better? Just to clear the air of what the wonderful Melitta filter is and how it works, some instruction and explanation. My indoctrination in the joys of coffee created in this manner originated with my old boss in the Cave. Ahem, "You gotta try this. You only need one cup. One really strong cup of coffee is all you need. One cup at breakfast and one after lunch. It's brilliant."

I haven't actually moved into the "one after lunch" realm yet. That would require me to purchase another filter and take the necessary bits into work, as my old boss did. Anyway, the necessary bits... what are the necessary bits?

• melitta cone + filters
• finely ground coffee- the grind is crucial, the closer to espresso grind the better
• coffee cup
• hot water... let it cool down a bit from boiling

Now that you've gathered the necessary ingredients, it's time to start brewing. First and foremost, you want to bloom the grounds. I've heard varying statements on the amount of blooming needed (from once to three times), but essentially you just need to get the grounds ready to contribute their full coffee goodness. To bloom: pour in a small amount of water to wet the dried grounds. Theoretically, no water should drip into the cup as it is all soaked up by the beans. If successful, the ground coffee will expand (almost like bread rising) and little air bubbles will appear. Once you've gone through the blooming process, up to three times, you simply add the rest of the water and coffee then filters into your cup. Voilà! Coffee!

When all is said and done, you have a marvelous cup of really strong coffee that has a really complex taste. And as a matter of preference, I add half 'n half.

allow me to add

a few more suggestions or addendum to KFR's list,

1. Sports Night - Only on for about 2 seasons (I'm sensing a theme here), this show packed much more social commentary (in unexpected ways!) than a show called "Sports Night" might suggest. Don't need to be a fan of sports to watch. But do watch if you enjoy Felicity Huffman, Peter Krause, Robert Guillaume, and Josh Melina. Created by Aaron Sorkin, this show is packed with walk-n-talk witty (and intelligent!) banter.
2. Humboldt Fog cheese made by Cypress Grove. Let it warm to room temperature and watch the gooey creamy goodness go. Pair it with a crusty bread and some wine and you've got a party in your mouth.
   
3. DO NOT pair Humboldt Fog with Two Buck Chuck. I'm sorry Chris, but sometimes you just need to stand up for what's right. I very much appreciate the cost of Charles, even that there are more expensive wines out there that taste worse... All this is to say that I think there are other good inexpensive wines out there. Not that at wouldn't drink the Two Buck Chuck if offered.
4. Melitta Filter: As a side on coffee creation, you should really explore the option of a Melitta Filter. Many filter sizes are available for your differing coffee consumption needs. All I'll say is that I used to drink around a half a pot in the morning. I'm now down to a cup a day as this coffee packs sooooo much coffee goodness. It's like Pirate Coffee on 'roids. Pirate Coffee + half 'n half. I'll happily drink my coffee black, but I do think that half 'n half has the ability to draw out other delicious coffee flavors.
   
5. Mini-Tourist trips in your own backyard.
6. Redoing your blog's color scheme. Open your heart? I'm not so sure about this one. We'll give it a little time to see how it goes.
   

Executive Decisions

It's time for executive decisions. I'm all about the executive decisions these days. Unfortunately, many of these executive decisions are not mine to make nor do they necessarily match up with my own expectations.

• Executive Decision #1 - imposing my will: Camping destination determined.
• Executive Decision #2 - my body imposing its will: While visiting such prettiness as these pictures demonstrate, my digestive system decided to go cuckoo. Yes, the 24 hour flu (or some such bit of sickness)struck Saturday afternoon and held on through Sunday. Let's just say I finally ate some rice and drank Gatorade yesterday evening (thanks BCC!)
• Executive Decision #3 - this one is literally an executive decision to do with employment. Keep your fingers crossed. I'll have more to report soon enough.

new bed and a good night's sleep

Rushing through a blog post is never a fun thing. It's not as bad as rushing through a cup of coffee, but the two together really suck. I find myself in this position as I overslept this morning in my GIANT new princess-and-the-pea-esque bed. Let's just say the bed in total is a bit larger than I had anticipated (please see the above image). I immediately called the store to exchange the box-spring for a low profile one to (hopefully) lower the height by about 4 inches or so.

But I think the larger point here is that I overslept. I overslept and I feel fantastic. No matter that my coffee and blog post are slightly rushed. I slept well, I read the comics, watered my herbs (which are moving along swimmingly), and now I shall head off to work. Huzzah!

I mean, I know I'm not tall, but this is madness!