Sunday, September 30, 2007  |  

- exile in guyville -

First off: I. Fucking. Hate. Los. Angeles. For reals. Traffic is insane, they all drive like maniacs, and everything is scattered all over the place. I mean, was the city designed by someone with ADD?

That said, it was still a super fun trip. And people are definitely prettier over there.

Now, the culinary review:

1. Red Mango: Do believe the hype! It's fairly similar to Pinkberry (which was everywhere in LA), but slightly less tangy, which works much better with the green tea flavor. Let the frozen-yogurt war begin!
   
   
2. Irv's: Burgers were pretty good but it was Sonia the super friendly owner who really made the place stand out. Dave White readers may know that she writes personalized notes on every plate, and she wrote "Just for you, Sugardaddy!" on mine. On Matt's? "Just for you, Sugardaddy's friend!"
   
   
3. Pink's: Martha Stewart Dog seemed to be the most popular item. Now, I'm a firm believer of the "bacon makes everything better" school of thought, but 3 strips of bacon on a hot dog? Like, gross. I went with the original chilli dog and it was just aight for me, dawg.
   
   
4. Roscoe's: Again, good but nothing to rave about. Gimme Ezell's any day.
   
   
5. The Secret Ice Cream Place That Shall Remain Nameless: Sadly, the infamous bacon-caramel favor was nowhere to be found, but their signature brown-bread ice cream was to die for. Still undecided about green tea/almond/banana flavor, which totally confused my mouth.
   
   
6. Milk: Best green tea milkshake I have ever had. I wasn't so crazy about the green goddess dressing in their cobb salad though. Also, I was too full to try out the blue velvet cake ("excellent cake and will make you forget your disappointments," according to Dave White) which made me sad.

Wednesday, September 26, 2007  |  

- family affair -

A lot of people thought I was crazy to fly down to LA just to see a concert, but it was so worth it. Random notes about the show:

1. From the get-go, it was clear that Rufus just didn't have it that evening. His voice cracked on several occasions and he struggled with the high notes throughout the set. He still managed to keep the show very entertaining though, and I couldn't care less about the mistakes.
   
   
2. Little known fact #1: Judy Garland was my very first crush, celebrity or otherwise. I remember watching The Wizard of Oz for the very first time (I was like 5 or 6) and thinking, "wow, she's the most beautiful girl, ever!"
   
   
3. The Hollywood Bowl allows outside food and beverage, including booze! We had a nice picnic with a bottle of Oregon pinot noir and lots of goodies from Trader Joe's.
   
   
4. Little known fact #2: I had never listened to Judy Garland (not counting The Wizard of Oz stuff) until about 2 months ago.
   
   
5. My favorite part in Judy At Carnegie Hall is when she tells the story about the British press. Rufus told a very funny story involving Betty Buckley.
   
   
6. Overheard during intermission (courtesy of some guy exiting the men's room, talking on his cell): "Oh my god, there are so many poorly dressed men here!"
   
   
7. Rufus loves to designer name-drop. He talked about the Alexander McQueen jacket at the last concert; this time, he gushed about the "amazing Tom Ford shirt which is bordering on the ridiculous." He's apparently a big Viktor & Rolf fan also.
   
   
8. Surprise guest #1: Martha Wainwright (Rufus's sister) who stole the show with an incredible rendition of Stormy Weather. Upstaging Rufus at his own show is no easy task, but that's exactly what she did.
   
   
9. Surprise guest #2: Kate McGarrigle (Rufus's mother) who accompanied Rufus on the piano for Over the Rainbow.
   
   
10. Surprise guest #3: Lorna Luft (Judy's other daughter). "I was kinda hoping for Liza," quipped Matt, but we figured Rufus probably wanted to be the only diva at the show.
    
    
11. The next day, I found Judy Garland's star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and decided to lie down on the filthy sidewalk to have a picture taken. Then Matt lost the camera. D'oh.

Tuesday, September 18, 2007  |  

- stay classy, washington -

Mt. Vernon may have the SKAT, but Seattle's got the SLUT.

Current music: Amy Winehouse vs. Eric Clapton - The World Changes On Its Own

Monday, September 17, 2007  |  

- leave oj alone! -

Am I the only one who finds the Goldmans infinitely more despicable than OJ Simpson? Every time I see Fred Goldman and his hideous moustache, I just wanna hurl something at the TV.

Current music: Judy Garland - Judy At Carnegie Hall

Tuesday, September 11, 2007  |  

- the take over, the break's over -

After being a loyal Blogliner for years, I finally made the jump to Google Reader.

The biggest thing that had held me back until now was that Google Reader has no easy way to jump from feed to feed. In Bloglines, you just hit "s" to cycle through the unread feeds; in Google Reader, you need to do Shift+n, Shift+o, which is a total pain in the ass. It's also not smart enough to cycle back to top when you get to the bottom of your list, at which point you have to start doing Shift+p, Shift+o to traverse back up the list. Ugh.

And no, using the mouse is not an option.

Other gripes with Google Reader so far:

1. Feeds are listed alphabetically by default and you can't rearrange them. WTF? What if I want Lifehacker listed before Dave White Knows?
   
   
2. Ditto for tags. I realize Gmail is the same way, but it's more of a pain here.
   
   
3. Ability to read multiple feeds as one? Not a fan. At least not yet.
   
   
4. Why does it show already-read entries? I can see how this could be useful, but at least give me an option to turn it off?
   
   
5. Am I the only one who thinks that when a new feed is selected, the first entry should automatically be marked as "read"? To be fair, Bloglines Beta also does this.
   
   
6. Much has been made of Bloglines' aesthetics (or the lack thereof), but it's got nothing on Google Reader. It's like a constant assault on my visual senses.

Monday, September 10, 2007  |  

- selenese for beginners -

Douglas Sellers' Using DSL for Automated AJAX Testing was easily my favorite presentation at GTAC '07, and people seem to agree -- it's got over 6000 views on YouTube, far more than any other GTAC videos.

His company, CustomInk, also has a newish blog that's worth checking out.

Current music: Stereo Total - Paris-Berlin