Category: -cat

Who knew that Eagan had Internet access, eh? It turns out that I’m huge there, according to a recent comment:

“You are indeed huge in South Minneapolis. However, you are just as huge in Eagan. At least in my mind.”

It’s great to hear that the Internet works south of the Minnesota River. Keep on truckin’.

I went to a Malaysian restaurant called Banana Leaf for dinner tonight in Milpitas, CA, based on a recommendation from a new friend, Anand Iyer. Great eats. Thanks, Anand. This is a place I never would have picked without a recommendation since it’s stuck in the middle of chain store hell next to Applebee’s and every other chain you find in every suburb in America.

I went with the Rendang Beef based on our waitress’ recommendation with a side of coconut milk rice. I believe this is the second time I’ve had coconut milk with the first time being paired with shrimp tempura in Belize at the Banyan Bay Resort. Basically, if you haven’t tried coconut rice, find a way to make it happen.

I bought a can of Mendota Sparking Water when I got to work today to wet my whistle (I’m off soda through Christmas). However, the can was warm. How disappointing! I figure the Coke machine must have just been refilled before I purchased it.

In other news, before leaving work last night I purchased a can of Mendota Sparking Water from the Coke machine. I remember buying it, but don’t remember drinking it.

Coincidence?

We had less trick-or-treaters than expected this year, and I think I know at least one reason why: our doorbell’s battery is dead . . . I think. At least, it doesn’t work when we press it, as we found out when some friends stopped by, used the doorbell, then waited and waited before switching to knocking.

They thought our doorbell issue may be causing us to inadvertently snub the youth of America on their sugar quests. I removed the ringer from the front of the house, forcing future trick-or-treaters to knock for their sugar.

So what happens? The doorbell rings 5 minutes later! With no ringer! What’s up with that? did a ghost ring it?

Time for a new doorbell.

Carly and I drove to Mora, Minneaota this morning so Carly could run the Mora 1/2 Marathon as part of her Twin Cities Marathon training. Around Forest Lake, the low fuel light came on, but we were running a bit late after a slow start to the day, so we pushed on. There was a gas station at the Hwy 70 exit from I-35 we had to take (British Polluters), but with less than 30 to race start, we pushed on. By the time we turned North on Hwy 65 for the last few miles to Mora the needle was below empty. A gas station sat on the edge of town, but Carly made me keep friving so she would?lt miss her start. I reminded her that her bike was in the car, should we run out of gas. Luckily, we made it, but not without some stress. I put 15.8 gallons in the 16 gallon tank. In the past, I’ve joked with Carly about being low on fuel, saying that we have enpugh gas to get to Hinckley when the gas light comes in. Well, it turns out that’s true.

I just watched Chemlawn dump a bunch of chemicals on my neighbor’s lawn. How long will it be before they let their one-year-old crawl all over their newly chemicalized lawn?

Developing . . .

Here’s my take on Britney Spears getting pregnant again:

Providing a fertile landscape for Kevin Federline does not seem like a smart move. Once is bad enough. I hope this isn’t some kind of “save the marriage” by having another kid trick.

Firing the Nanny: Britney made a smart move firing the nanny who dropped her son Sean on his head, creacking his skull. That gains her some parenting cred, although taking a week or so to take the child to the doctor was about as irresponsible as it comes.

I wrote this for an Al Franken loving friend who couldn’t make it to the movie last Thursday, but thought I’d repost it here:

First, get yourself to his movie, “When God Spoke.” It’s playing at the TC Film Fest, but doesn’t have a national deal yet. At least, that’s what Al told me at Sea Salt.

Al spoke after the movie at the Riverview, then there was a “Gala” at Sea Salt. I was ordering a Grain Belt Premo at the bar when Al plopped down right next to me. He was pretty tired after a long day, and apparently a long day the day before at St. John’s. I had a platter of Oysters in front of me that he was eying, so I hooked him up.

I tried to figure out what to ask the guy given such a unique opportunity. At first, I drew a blank, then came up with something like, “Have you thought about how you could be an influential senator if elected?” to which he responded, “I hear it helps to be in the majority.” I asked him if Walter Mondale gave him that advice (Mondale was in the movie giving him advice) which got a chuckle out of him. I was pretty proud to make a hardened commedian like Franken laugh.

My friend Jeff told Franken that his mom thinks I look like him (Franken). He studied me for a bit, then said he sees some similarities.

He confirmed that he does live in Grant Park, and said he likes it there.

And the whole time, he was POUNDING through oysters. My friend Jeff had the quote of the night with, “The man likes his oysters.”

He was very nice to everyone. Especially to the people working at Sea Salt. Meeting him and seeing him interact with the public made me like the guy even more.

I had my first modeling gig last night. Seriously.

Our friend Katie called Carly saying she needed some people for a photo shoot for Minneapolis / St. Paul Magazine at the Walker Art Center. Apparently, they’re doing a story on . . . you’ll have to wait to find out.

We had to dress up, drink wine, and act candid for an hour an a half.

I have a new found respect for Cindy Crawford and Tyra Banks.

The view from the Walker is pretty darn impressive. We were there at sunset and watched the color of the skyline change at the sun lowered in the sky. Very cool.

Happy new year everyone! In the spirit of the new year, Technology Evangelist has ten predictions for 2006:
1 A new super-virus will be released on the Internet that will wreak havoc on Windows based systems. This virus will be bad enough to bring entire legs of the Internet to a crawl. We’re not talking about your average every-day virus, we’re talking about a massive virus the likes of which we have never seen and will cost corporate America billions.
2 BluRay and HD DVDs will finally hit the market with much fanfare, but at a very steep price. While the early adopters will all grab on to a format, most consumers will ignore this until there is more HD content available.
3 Windows Vista will actually be released.
4 Apple will release a HDTV living room solution. Maybe based on iTunes, maybe not, this system will allow users to download HDTV shows and movies legally and play them on their Macintosh via their Front Row application. Just plug your Intel based Mac Mini into a HDTV, and download away. While iTunes allows you to download videos today, they are only 320×240, we’re talking 1080i or 720p+ quality here.
5 Free WiFi hotspots will start cropping up everywhere as retail owners find this is an easy way to get repeat business.
6 To compete with Windows Mobile 5, Palm will release an all new Treo, above and beyond the Treo 700w, based on a Linux version of the Palm OS. This will be a completely new system that will give Windows Mobile a run for its money; however, the momentum behind Windows Mobile 5 will continue to climb.
7 Intel will produce a 64 bit chip that actually beats the x86 AMD systems in price, performance and power (as in lower power consumption). I know, it’s a long shot, but you never know.
8 A VoIP war will be raged between Microsoft, eBay/Skype, Google/AOL, and the traditional VoIP providers such as Vonage. We will see a lot of innovative features, the least of which is video. Expect to start getting WebEx type functionality in these applications.
9 Applications will continue to move to the web, try Writely, Bloglines and Yahoo Mail and they will become more integrated – think OnlineOffice – so that users can access their data from their Handhelds, Tabnotes, and Media Center PC’s: The web will fundamentally disrupt every industry, while we have heard this before, it will truly happen in Web 2.0.
10 After Technology Evangelist offers HDTV coverage of CES, the traffic to this site will become so large that we will be forced to upgrade to a new pimped out XServe from Apple. Maybe even two clustered together.
What are your predictions for 2006?