Wednesday, November 28, 2007

where's my next fix?

I just finished the last of the turkey and stuffing. For seven straight days my diet has included at least one turkey sandwich. Tomorrow's lunch, no matter how large, will leave a feeling of emptiness, I fear.

Is it just me?

I could eat turkey sandwiches on toasted bread with mayonnaise, cranberry sauce and heated stuffing for two meals a day. How long could I do that before I got sick of it? Let's just say my supplies have never outlasted my taste. Seeing the end of my current supply dwindle has made me think of stopping at the store to buy another bird...just for sandwiches.

To me, the holy trinity is this: pizza, Chinese food and turkey sandwiches.

The pizza would preferably be pepperoni, but most other traditional favorites will suffice. Cold pizza? Yes, yes, a thousand times yes. Cold pizza especially for breakfasts is an excellent reason why you can never order too much pizza.

The Chinese food is also an excellent cold treat, even for breakfast. Pupu platters work best. The boneless spare ribs, teriyaki, egg rolls and crab rangoon are all top notch after a night in the refrigerator. Chicken fingers aren't perfect cold, but they're still better than broccoli.

Forget chasing the dragon; I'm chasing the turkey.

Monday, November 26, 2007

A Season of Faith

'Tis the season to think about all that you know and believe about our world.

Now is the time to search for truth.

Friday, November 16, 2007

good happy hopeful positive

I love learning about this kind of stuff.

CSP; concentrated solar power. It's a "green" technology that sounds great. Fuel to generate power? The sun. But these aren't solar panels on the roof of your neighbors house.

Look out of this worldly? The BBC guy thought so, too.



A concrete tower - 40 storeys high - stood bathed in intense white light, a totally bizarre image in the depths of the Andalusian countryside.

The tower looked like it was being hosed with giant sprays of water or was somehow being squirted with jets of pale gas. I had trouble working it out.

In fact, as we found out when we got closer, the rays of sunlight reflected by a field of 600 huge mirrors are so intense they illuminate the water vapour and dust hanging in the air.

The effect is to give the whole place a glow - even an aura - and if you're concerned about climate change that may well be deserved.

I found this when I went to this website, even though I meant to go to this one.

And from the first site, I found this cnn article. Here are some pretty fun things from that article:


One of the byproducts of CSP, waste heat, can be used to desalinate seawater(conversely, it can produce thermal cooling, otherwise known as air conditioning). And this is what TREC believes will make it more appealing for the MENA region, as its CSP project will effectively enable the countries there to avert the kind of crises in the future that people now commonly refer to as the Water Wars. (noternie note: MENA is Middle East, North Africa)

Serving the Yemeni city of Sana'a for example, "which is facing the exhaustion of its ground water reserves in about 15 years", CSP-treated water will save the international community billions of dollars in the future, when millions leave their homes for lack of water, it argues. Moving 2 million of Sana'a's citizens to new homes will cost around $44 billion. But it would cost $7 billion to build the CSP plants, which would prevent them leaving in the first place, TREC argues.


Exciting, nonpartisan, plausible, forseable, positive, clean, lasting solution.

More in-depth information can be found by reading and following links from the article on wikipedia. Read one of the above linked articles and see if you don't get excited by the possibilities here.

Wednesday, November 7, 2007

Preparing sour grapes for harvest

Don Shula was a great coach. But I think he needs to stick to running his restaurants.

His comparing the Patriots spygate to Bond's steroid use is way off and clearly only meant to preserve his 1972 team's claims to greatest team ever.

The Patriots have not done anything since week 1 and there is doubt they did anything in that game to benefit them in that game. Credible speculation is that the filming was scouting for future games. And if they win out, they'll go 19-0. Miami only went 17-0.

If the Patriots or any team ever goes undefeated, their achievement will be more significant than the Dolphins because they will have won more games. The talk I've heard has always been that if a team goes undefeated, the only way the '72 Dolphins stay in the conversation is with an asterisk and note indicating they played fewer games. So maybe Shula is trying a preemptive strike.

Shula is probably still sore there was talk of the Patriots having outdone the '72 Dolphins by winning 21 straight NFL contests in 2003-04. "They weren't all in one season" they whined.

The claim that the '72 Dolphin team is the best ever is not even a lock. Great accomplishment, but many put them behind the '85 Bears, one of the Patriot teams or entries from San Francisco, Pittsburgh or Dallas.

Tuesday, November 6, 2007

Candy confirmation

A Milky Way bar is just a 3 Musketeers with caramel added, no?

I'm not a huge fan of either. Do they have a loyal following? Is a Milky Way or 3 Musketeers anyone's first choice?

I think Snickers is tops in candy bar sales. But it would be interesting to see who falls in line behind them: Hershey? M&Ms? Reese's Peanut Butter Cups? Almond Joy? Mr. Goodbar? Baby Ruth? Or are these just my favorites?

Obama = fuddy duddy

Yeah, someone's got to be an adult. And yes, a mockery was being made of the process. Still, Obama goes down a few points in my book for putting in effort to keep Stephen Colbert off the South Carolina ballot. Why couldn't he trust the entire thing to die of natural causes? A cnn story gives a hint ;-)
But the calls raise questions about the Obama supporters' motives, given their close ties to the campaign and the fact that Colbert and Obama both draw support from a similar demographic.

Monday, November 5, 2007

Global warming

Saw that Matt Lauer is at the North Pole, someone else from the Today show is at the South Pole and they've got someone in a jungle somewhere? All are supposed to be highlighting issues of global warming and environmental issues.

Wouldn't it be better if they all stayed home instead of flying stars, makeup people and technical staff all over the place? Surely there is stock footage available or local folks that can send stuff back? How much extra power do they use getting there and running remotes from there?

Maybe it's me.

Friday, November 2, 2007

Hello Hub Bloggers

Welcome to my corner of the universe. Despite what you see on this front page, I do post on more than sports. Check the archives if you wish.

This is a personal blog. It's not a political blog or a sports blog or a media blog, etc. To me being a personal blog means it will contain whatever strikes my fancy at any given time, regardless of topic. I've already posted on the Red Sox, Patriots, journalism, fires in my kitchen, microfinance and technological singularity.

Thanks for the plug, Jay.

And if you're one of "my people," check out Hub Blog, using the link over there on the right.

Thursday, November 1, 2007

Just in case...

I don't want A-Rod.

I’m just preparing myself for the possibility, not inevitability. I’m perfectly happy to continue hating him and wishing career ending injuries on him.

In addition to Randy Moss, I also put forward for your consideration David Wells. Heck, look at Manny Ramirez. Have we not had to get over a few things with him?

And since someone played the dreaded “curse” card, why not hypothesize that really “reversing the curse” requires taking a premier player from the MFY? Ask one of the doomsayers about that, then step back and enjoy the logical gymnastics. I’m guessing the end result is doom for the Red Sox, somehow.

Consider: how delicious would it be if A-Rod came here, turned out to be a decent guy and a clutch performer in the middle of a Red Sox dynasty?

I still haven’t convinced myself, so don’t think I’m trying to convince anyone else.