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02.23.05 do you see this? the entries below? it's my food phase. or rather, the era of prosaic* in which i finally take heed of those friends who keep telling me i look at your website, but i usually don't understand what you're talking about. which is equally attributable to both my rambling and my nerdiness. speaking of which, is it spelled with an i or a y? # it's a very exciting time to live on post, between jones and levenworth. our quaint, quiet (once you get used to the sirens; oh, and now that the bar is closed) little block of mixed income folk (art school students, working class families, corporate print buyers), muttering middle eastern men, young foreigner travels and low-mid priced hotel guests is just buzzing with the anticipation. we have not one, but two new businesses recently opened on our street, with a third space papered over and clearly undergoing some kind of transformation. the useless sushi hut has been replaced by an interesting (and pretty good) greek hut. they're still serving their "startup menu" which is lamentable, because after three years living here, jessie and i are aching for something to eat besides thai food. but the real star is the eura cafe, a tea house that offers a shockingly broad menu and an adorable interior that appears to have been ripped from the pages of a west elm catalog (i've been staring at that catalog for the past two weeks, so trust me on that). sadly, it replaced the juice-bar (why doe jamba hate downtown so?) that was staffed by a pair of cute, friendly young girls who clearly had a crush on my boyfriend. at least one of the girls appears to have some part in this new venture; the woman who's in charge (an achingly pretty asian woman who's clearly in the midst of some very graceful years, which might be the receding side of her 20s or the ascending front of her 30s) is welcoming to a fault. and the tea, the tea is wonderful. # 02.21.05 i'm easy to spot in a restaurant, this time of the year. that's me, the totally godless one, sitting on the other side of the restaurant eating a BLT, on a friday, during lent. i'm officially kicked out of the Big Three religions. oh, and the mormons wont have me either. i'm drinking a coke. it's because of that pesky BLT that i wasn't able to fully enjoy my dinner with evan at fresca. the cuisine is peruvian, and evan (having recently visited peru) seemed to agree to it's at least marginal authenticity. i always enjoy latin american cuisines, because i'm wholly unprepared for the variety, the combinations and the preparations. but fresca specializes in ceviche, so i gave theirs a try. again, had i not enjoyed a very large and very late salmon BTL just a few hours earlier, i think i would have taken greater pleasure in the food. the ceviche was quite good; excellent fish, fresh, sweet avocado, served with a sharp but solid bite of spice. the wine our waitress recommended to me (if i was better at this, i would remember) was perfectly paired, dry and slightly sweet, it melted together with the ceviche and made me oh, oh so happy. i had hoped we would go on that friday to the nearby elite cafe instead, but their policy of not taking reservations and our designs to see a movie after enjoying dinner just weren't going to mix. on top of that, the foodie i work with made a point to wrinkle her nose when i suggested it; i guess the heyday has passed. still, i enjoyed the food when jessie took me, and the high-walled booths are a treat for privacy within the bustling ambiance. # sunday night: gay's broadcast home? who knew? queer subject matter on both Simpsons and Desperate Housewives was an excellent little surprise, but did Fox really need to advise parental discretion? # 02.17.05 want to read a really fascinating, in depth interview with win butler of the arcade fire? then start on the second page, after pitchfork get's over themselves and stops lamenting their own pitchfork-ness. oh yeah, and the current state of cool. jeez, someone should mention how crazy this kind of thing makes people. i mean, it's a pretty great interview; shame to drop readers before the end of the first page. # 02.15.05 you know, there are two really simple things that i wish my ipod could do that would really really make me happy. if only someone would hack the ipod, or apple would open the ipod OS up to plug-ins or apps. i'd love to have the option to set an incremental audio timer. kind of a digital metronome, with a beep or 1 second pause played in-ear over whatever i'm listening to, at regular intervals (1 minute, 5 minutes, 10 minutes) that i select. this would be totally useful when i'n running or working out; i'd never have to look at the clock to know how long i'd been running for, or when i should rest or for how long. simple and totally unobtrusive. the other feature i'd like is a little more obscure. the ipod supports viewing small text notes, and i know there are some applications or scripts that will write RSS headlines out to your ipod -- i think this is a killer idea, but the machine isn't quite ready for it. i'd like to be able to set a flag of some kind on note files; i would download and read RSS on my ipod on my way to work if there was some way to flag articles or links that i wanted to follow up on later. the only question is, how would the ipod mark a text file? add a prefix to the file, perhaps? does anyone know if the ipod OS can even write files? an on-the-go playlist for notes would be hot, but seems overly complicated to become an actual reality. # 02.14.05 hey cool hacker, thanks for making this to unlock two-finger trackpad scrolling on older apple laptops. there's a script to check if your machine will be compatible, and the author was kind enough to make a temporary installation script (for trying it out, to make sure nothing's going to get stuck or screwed up) as well as a revert-to-original-drivers script. # 02.11.05 my friend ellyn started going to a kitting group. they call themselves the knit-wits. really, it would be cleve, if it wasn't the same name as every other group of knitting women between about 25 and 55. i think that knitting is the new yoga in 2005. all the hipsters are doing it. but what will happen in 2006, when they're all stuck with a stack of sweaters that are a lot less DIY than they intended, and a lot more Grandma's Epileptic Seizure? me, i'm holding out for bikram knitting. actually though, i'm thinking that i need a new hobbie for this fine new year of ours. last year i tried creative writing classes (look where that went!). right after the elections, i was considering volunteering with a political cause, some kind of action committee or something. but i think i need to be better aligned with my 2005 moto ("less you, more me"). i've honestly been considering joining a kyaking club. i mean, in the spring, that is. even so, it'll be cold on the bay. maybe you'll knit me a scarf? # 02.10.05 ok, a moment of desperate geekism: does anyone know where i can find some sample applescripts that iteract with excel 2004? i'm going out of my mind looking. # this is going to be the best issue of details, ever. # seriously, 50 gmail invitations. please, someone take some. # trying to catch up with my recent pop culture consumption:
#  my powerbook is a turtle. this is it's shell. a perfect, nondescript, glove-tight slipcover, handmade by my fabulous, crafty coworker Ann. if you can't find what you want the way you want it, ask someone to make it for you. yeah. # 02.09.05 i'm sure you've already seen this by now. why did it take so long for someone to put together a really good map system? and why is anyone surprised it was google that finally did it? i mean, click and drag maps? interactive maps? nearly-instant, mapped local search? totally. and once it lets you find intersections, everything else will be worthless. # 02.05.05 i've just finished the long-delayed but surprisingly unchallenging task of converting my movabletype categories into something that will be slightly more useful to technorati's semantic web. previously, i was using categories for my own obscure internal classification system. but since i've started to fall in with the cult of productivity (don't worry, i'm not talking about the kind my employer would appreciate), i've seen the light on tagging, categorizing and sharing. i'll spare you the typical righteous flailing of the semantic web obsessive (lord knows i've done it to you before). i have some del.icio.us bookmarks to post. and some mp3s to rank. and some photos to organize. we're building a better life out of shoe boxes and index cards! # any mac users out there use NewsFire? i use netnewswire exclusively, but i'm fickle by nature and this new program looks really pretty. i downloaded it to see how it handles and it seems nice enough, but i'd like to know if anyone's taken to using it full time? there's not a lot of buzz online, it seems. # 02.04.05 everyone take a moment out of their day to wish byron a happy birthday. he's 16 today! our sweet little prodigy. # 02.01.05 bill clinton for secretary-general of the united nations? very, very cool. well, not quite as cool as the whole repeal-the-22nd-amendment/clinton's third term gag that's going around. but still cool. # « January 2005 | archive index | March 2005 » built with movabletype |
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