I wish I knew how to play the accordion. Also, I wish that I flew model planes. Really, I wish I did anything that people might find interesting.

• 06:05 Not surprised at all here. RT @urbanophile: Most dangerous large metro areas for pedestrians - is.gd/4RGBM
• 07:37 I wish the Strida was a fixie. Great fun to ride around the shop, but you can't back up. gdzl.la/7eG1Qy

• 12:18 You can buy "creamy" fruit flavors of Halls cough drops in Latin America. They are SO much tastier than the too-minty ones sold in the U.S. #
• 12:27 @mrswatermelon "Halls Creamy" looks just like LifeSaver rolls-type cough drops, not in a candy bag. Refresh is fancy, comes in bags. #
• 13:02 Lunch: Mediterranean platter with grilled veg, chicken skewers, hummus, cous cous, flat bread. Heavenly! just missing some yogurt sauce. #
• 13:07 @davidrperry Looks like a typical copy edit mark-up. Copy editing is a truly thankless (but essential) job. F' collaborating an edit pass! #
• 13:33 @davidrperry AC is not bad. You should just wear Speedos everyday. btw that copy edit thing -- I meant "F Outsourcing" #
• 14:39 I know I was on vacation when it happened, but my thoughts goes out to the people in Ft. Hood. #

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In the oven:

2 lbs dried pinto beans
3 carrots, in big chunks
3 stalks celery, in big chunks
1 medium onion, diced big
2 heads worth of garlic cloves
2 bay leaves
1 ham shank

It smells really good in here. I like it when the whether turns cool enough that I want to find a reason to leave the oven on low all day. 

Some more photos and write-up from our trip. Figured I'd better do something immediately to avoid doing absolutely nothing.

First, one set from the Disney cruise.

This is what it looks like to view the front landing gear of a 747 from about 30 feet directly beneath it.




This is from the boat's stop at St. Martin. There isn't much room for an airport and the landing strip for it starts literally 100 off a public beach. Most of the planes that come in are smaller but they get a couple 747's a day from Europe and we were well timed in our 15 minute stop on a cabbed round-the-island tour.

Here's a shot of that same plane a little bit farther out.



Now from Costa Rica.

A very large beetle used as a prop by a guy selling young coconuts outside a Del Monte banana processing plant on the way to our boat for getting to Tortugeuro (boat or plane is the only way to get there).



Our main reason for going to Tortuguero was to see the sea turtles (a surprise bonus was had on the cruise when a sea turtle surfaces for air just a couple feet from me while snorkeling during our St. Thomas stop). They're significant to Lani and me for several reasons so we were really looking forward to seeing them. Unfortunately, the nesting season is pretty much over by the end of October so instead we had to settle for trying to catch a nest hatching (much lower certainty of successful timing). So it was a huge bonus to go out on that quest and come across a turtle laying her eggs a couple weeks late.



We escorted her back to the sea and then it was on to find the baby turtles.

Fortunately we were successful here as well. Here, the 150 or so eggs have all hatched but the turtles are still lethargic in the nest. They'll slowly get more active and finish breaking down the walls (the hole here is there doing, not ours) and make their break for the sea (much assisted by our presence keeping birds and other hunters away).





After about 45 minutes of observation they were on their way.



I escorted this one all the way to his successful entry into the ocean. I'll assume he is one of the very few that survived more than a little while in the ocean without falling prey to some aquatic predator.



Enough of turtles (though I could have happily spent all day walking them to from nest to ocean).

Also in the Torteguero area we saw (among many things I didn't get even mediocre photos of)

1. Enough red poison tree frogs to arm an ancient Indiana Jones treasure booby trap.



2. Leafcutter ants



3. A troop of howler monkeys (not the best photo I took of them but used because of baby presence).



4. Tree-climbing iguanas (these last two photos show how much trouble I had with lens fogging due to rain and humidity).




5. A surprisingly human looking three-toed sloth



6. And, of course, lots of jungle



We then hopped over to the Pacific coast on this, our new personal best for smallest airplane used. Soon we'll have to fly our own to get any smaller. When you're flying through clouds in one of these, you do find yourself wondering just how well the pilot knows where Costa Rica's 100+ volcanic peaks are.



On that coast we saw

1. A tiger-face crab while out in the mangrove swamp. Saw hundreds of land crabs out there but this species really stuck out.



2. A juvenile boa constrictor resting in a tree. I was really hoping for some good snake sightings but this turned out to be the only one we saw all week. Closest thing to a disappointment on the trip.



3. Lots of "regular beach, not land" crabs at the beach.



4. Essentially our own private beach since we seemed to be the only guests in our section of the hotel (Hotel Arenas del Mar) where we were staying. Unfortunately, neither Lani nor I are the type get much use out of our own private beach.



5. Impressively large crocodiles. They are protected in Costa Rica and their population has rebounded on this river to around 200 per mile.



Of course, you saw one of the friendly troop of adolescent capuchins above, here are others:

A. Bob



B. George



C. Steve



D. Achmed



So those are some of the highlights from our time in Costa Rica.

• 18:55 Eating gingerbread and drinking a Belgian blonde. Yeah, life's pretty okay! (And by "Belgian blonde" I mean beer.) #fb

We're back from our Caribbean cruise with friends and just-us trip to Costa Rica.

The monkey on the right is me:



The monkey on the left is a wild (though unfortunately not wild enough because of less than reputable tour companies feeding them) capuchin in the mangrove swamp outside Quepos, Costa Rica.

A very fun trip that I'll probably never get around to writing down.

Feeling nerdalicious tonight.  John Hodgman is the nerd king, and 90 minutes of him talking about fake trivia, book publishing, and D&D was just what I needed tonight.  If your NPR station carries City Arts and Lectures, look for it.  I doubt the persimmon bit will make the radio cut, but it should. 

( You are about to view content that may not be appropriate for minors. )

• 19:05 At the DeYoung for the Mission Murals party. Oh the irony of going to a museum to see photos of street murals 3 miles away. #fb
• 11:17 Spidey sleeps about 22 hours per day. That's completely understandable: it's exhausting work, being Spidey.

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• 22:28 Today's Woot shirt is pretty darn hysterical. shirt.woot.com #fb

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• 16:51 Finally got on Yelp! I guess now I really have to make a decent website. bit.ly/vtuL8 #fb
• 12:21 Trying out the Tweetie/Flickr workaround. gdzl.la/7dmYd4

The empire strikes back

In recent weeks, we've taken huge steps towards blocking spam accounts on LiveJournal. In fact, we've suspended as many as 30,000 accounts in a single day! We've implemented several pre-emptive measures to prevent the creation of spam accounts, and we've honed our detection of suspicious content. Spam bots are a crafty lot, so we'll continue to refine our tactics and keep up the good fight to keep you safe from spam attacks on LiveJournal.

RSS feeds again

If you're addicted to xkcd_rss, icanhaschzbrgr, or other syndicated feeds, we're pleased to report that we've resolved the update error that was mucking up your RSS feeds. While content was being pulled correctly, it wasn't being posted to the feeds themselves. Late last week, we finally nailed down what we hope was the root problem, so content should post properly. We thank you for your patience.

Wii have killer CSI Deadly Intent contests!

c_s_i

If you're a gamer who loves CSI, have Wii got news for you! c_s_i is sponsoring killer contests. Simply post a question to a member of the CSI crew. The winner will get a free copy of CSI: Deadly Intent for Nintendo Wii (with a retail value of $39.99) and get their question answered by a member of the CSI writing team! There's also a fantastic monthly contest. To enter, join c_s_i, play the online version of CSI: Deadly Intent, and respond to a two-part query for a chance to win a Wii! Entries will be judged on composition and originality. Sorry, but you must be a U.S. resident and over 18 years old to participate. Check out the rules here.

Enveloped in postcards

Last week, we asked you to send in postcards to help us decorate our drab concrete walls. Here's a photo of the results so far! Thank you so much and please keep them coming! You can mail them to Frank the Goat, Esq., c/o LiveJournal, Inc., 539 Bryant Street, Suite 210, San Francisco, CA 94107. Be sure to include your username, since we'll be giving ten random users paid account credits.

Photos of the week

If you haven't visited our new LiveJournal photo community, you're in for an amazing visual trip. LiveJournal users from around the world will take you on a scenic journey to everywhere. Post your own pictures or kick back and enjoy at lj_photophile. You can view some of this week's awesome photos after the jump. Please start tagging with geographic location, since we'd like to track all the places around the world represented in this community. Keep on commenting too!
( Read more... )

Tags: csi, photos of the week, postcards, rss, spam, writer's block

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So, I've finished the Discworld books about the Ankh-Morpork City Watch (according to this reading guide). I listened to them all on audiobook over the last few months. I liked them quite a lot, but I don't know if I want to start on another series or not. I chose the Watch series because a long time ago my friend Chris told me that was the best series, so that's what I read. So now what? Do I start a new series? And if so, which do I go with next?

• 05:37 It seems my body hasn't yet accepted the time change, so I'm now waking at 4 instead of 5. The good news is I'm now caught up on Twitter.
• 10:59 I think coworker's shirt sums it up best: bit.ly/1q8W8p #fb
• 11:02 And if anyone was wondering, the Karmic Koala upgrade was incredibly smooth, and fixed all the problems I'd had before.
• 12:07 Another great shirt just spotted: "The sports team in my area is superior to the sports team in your area."

I'm coming around to the idea that I should get my asthmatic 10-year-old vaccinated against H1N1 but holy christ I am not fucking interested in pulling him out of school and taking a day off work and driving to some farflung place in the county where there is a huge traffic backup and nonexistent parking to wait five hours in line to do it.

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• 06:03 While I have no love for advertising, I really have no problem with some company shelling out to stick its name on a ballpark.
• 07:27 I'm consistently amazed at just how good people are at wasting my time. #fb

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Exactly what it sounds like: https://www.freshballs.com/ (has auto-playing audio/video)

Just bought tickets to see John Hodgman interviewed by Merlin Mann on Saturday at City Arts and Lectures.  SQUEE. 

• 06:07 thankful to be biking to work by sunlight, however fleeting it may be. #fb

One of my all-time favorite bands was the local Chicago band The Ghettobillies. They stopped performing a few years ago, unfortunately. Three of them have formed a new band for you to love and/or hate just as much. The new band with the awesomely bad name is Katastrofist and has two songs for your enjoyment/hatred at their myspace page. This is about the only thing that can get me to go to myspace.

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• 21:51 A few winks in MCO before security gate opens @ 4am. Then snooze @ our gate & hope for seat assignments. Ugh. Obfus continues to sniffle. #
• 04:26 Finally on plane to Miami. Crawling into middle seat is hard when the geriatric woman in the aisle seat refuses to move to let you in. #

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• 21:25 Halloween: either make it for the kids or make it creepy. The whole sexy Halloween or dance party Halloween just doesn't work for me.
• 10:36 Making backups and sticking them online before upgrading to Karmic Koala. A real bundle of joy, I am! #fb

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1. Saw Where The Wild Things Are today.  After reading so many negative reviews about how depressing it was I was surprised by how much I liked it.  It's not a kids movie by any stretch of the imagination, and the kid in it is a bit of a shit, but that's what I liked about it.  It's totally pop-psych 101, but an interesting portrayal of the inner struggles and frustrations that go with being a kid and not having any control over your life.  
2. Went for a walk tonight in the Gold Coast.  it's the neighborhood in my town with huge spooky mansions and people go nuts with the decorations, and is a very popular place for trick or treating around here.  I just wandered around, watching the kids and checking out the houses.  The weather was perfect, not too cold, and I had a nice evening.  

3. Tomorrow is make-up day for me.  Up until this week I've been very good about working on stuff for each of my classes for an hour per day during the week, and I've been totally on top of things.  But Bob threw me completely off.  I didn't do anything Monday or Tuesday and now I pay the price.  Ooops.  Only one more visit from him before the end of the quarter, and that's over Thanksgiving, so I should have most of my coursework done by then anyway. 

4. Book club tomorrow night.  I feel like I just hosted it last weekend.  Time flies. 

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• 09:11 finally feeling something close to 100%. It's only been a week! #fb

I had never tried Pandora Radio until today. I like it a lot! I wish there was something between a thumbs up and thumbs down, though, as if to say "I like it, but let's not get carried away with it".

ABC's Modern Family is hilarious. Probably my favorite comedy since Arrested Development.

My new Blackberry has shocking low battery life. I'm hoping it's a configuration thing. I'm going to stop by Target to get some more chargers, though. I like to have one at work, one downstairs at home, and one upstairs at home (plus a new tip for my iGo system, for travel).

I'm going to lose 15 pounds in November. Yes, I choose the month that has Thanksgiving to lose a lot of weight. It seems like a lot, but since it's the start of the diet, it's easier to lose a lot. I just really want to see some sort or results. I don't have a scale that can handle m girth, so I won't really be able to check anyway. It's just the trying I need to work on.

Games and pumpkins tonight. I like games and pumpkins.

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What I am about to say will make several of you green with envy:

Tonight I took a cooking class with Olivier Said, former owner and bartender at Cesar in Berkeley, and co-author of the Cesar cookbook. 

This is a man who knows his tapas.  Here is the menu we cooked tonight:

Tuna & Spice Stuffed Fried Peppers

Roasted Mussels with Parsley & Parmesan Crust

Pinchos Morunos (Spice Grilled Pork)

Mushrooms in Escabeche (Mushrooms with Tangy Sherry Sauce)

Baked Mediterranean Seasonal Vegetable Cake

In the course of the class we actually did three different versions of the mussels and some lamb skewers along with the pork.  I manned the fryer for the stuffed peppers (I had never deep fried anything before tonight) and I have to say, they were amazing - basically roasted bell peppers cut into strips and rolled around a stuffing of tuna and some herbs in a bechemel sauce, breaded in panko with smoked paprika and deep fried.  Oh, they were good.  

Also, the vegetable cake was amazing.  I wasn't expecting much (that name is accurate, if not particularly appetizing), but it might have been my favorite thing and it's certainly the thing I'm most likely to do again at home, and probably on a regular basis.  We roasted a bunch of veggies (zucchini, yellow squash, red onions, eggplant) with olive oil and salt and then mixed up a quick-bread batter with a ton of fresh thyme and poured it over the veggies and stuck it back in the oven to finish.  It was amazingly simple and very very good.  It will make an awesome side dish with meatloaf or stews in the fall, and I bet it would be a great brunch dish with poached eggs as well. 

I've never actually taken a cooking class before, and I really liked how he ran this one.  There were 16 people there and he had five assistants in the kitchen as well.  We snacked on bread and cheese for the first hour while he ran through each of the recipes and techniques, and then set up each dish at a station attended by  one of the assistants.  I'm not sure it would be as useful to me if I were really green in the kitchen, but we got to float around and work on whatever we wanted.  I skipped the mussels station entirely because I can't eat them and won't cook them, and once I got the ingredients down for the mushrooms I skipped that too, since I make a very similar dish already and while the combination of ingredients were new to me, the technique was not.  That left me able to pay attention to the things that were new to me, and show off a little for the people who really haven't done much cooking.  (I am amazed at how many people are afraid of a roux.)  

He offers a twelve week basic skills class that I would LOVE to take. I'm completely self-taught and while I'm pretty good at the things I know there are huge holes in my experience - my knife skills are fairly non-existent and there are a lot of things I've just never tried because I mostly cook for myself.  Unfortunately, the series is really expensive so it's going to have to wait a while. 

When I was home I saw our next-door neighbor and asked what her daughters were up to. She said her oldest, Wendy, got sick of being a chemist and was now running a sock-yarn business out of her house.

http://www.knittersbrewing.com/

Cool that she's doing it, and cool that it's a good enough business that she could quit her regular job. I guess she does a lot of the dying herself--so that chemistry still comes in handy.

In response to user comments from last week, we want to let you know that we'll remain LJ cut-free for the next month in order to get more eyeballs on our evolving newsletter. As for product coverage, that continues to be our top priority. For more granular detail, however, we recommend you join lj_releases.

Super-tweak for Yandex search

Some of our beta testers expressed privacy concerns using the Yandex search engine. Here's why: Last week, when you ran a search, you could see the usernames (and only the usernames) of everyone who commented on an entry, even if that entry was switched to Private or Friends Only after it was originally indexed. You could NOT see the actual comments from Friends Only or Private posts. In response to your input, we've implemented a fix to keep all user activity currently marked Friends Only or Private completely hidden. If you'd prefer your public content not to be indexed by Yandex, click here and use the settings labeled Search Inclusion (this covers your entire journal) and/or Comment Search Inclusion (which covers comments only). To test drive Yandex search now, click here.

Postcards from the edge

Several years ago, we asked LiveJournal users to send postcards to help us decorate our dull, white-washed offices. Since a good idea warrants repetition, we're at it again (same issue, new address). We hope you'll surround us with LiveJournal love by sending your postcards to Frank the Goat, Esq., c/o LiveJournal, Inc., 539 Bryant Street, Suite 210, San Francisco, CA 94107. We'll post snapshots right here. Be sure to include your username, since we'll randomly pick 10 lucky recipients to win free paid account time.

Conquer Writer's Block

Here are some excerpts from this week's most popular question of the day:

If a friend or relative makes a racist or homophobic remark, do you tend to confront them or let it slide? Are you more likely to confront them if it offends you directly or someone else who seems reluctant to speak up?

1. I find it easier to stand up for other people, and i wouldn't let it slide if they made a rude or hurtful comment.
2. Usually if a friend makes a racist or homophobic remark, I tend to let it slide. I think that while i would not say such things myself, I have no right to censor those around me.
3. This happens all of the time. I confront some relatives, but I refuse to if they are drunk or watch Fox News.
4. I'd let it slide if it was just a private remark... As much as I despise bigotry and intolerance, I know that you can't change people-they have to change themselves ...
5. Confront! confront! confront! Politely, but without equivocation.
6. SPEAK UP. Always, always, always speak up. Letting something slide lets ignorance win. No matter if it offends me directly, or someone else, I will confront the speaker and let them know that's not ok.
7. I don't get offended personally. As an immigrant, woman, gay and person of color if I took every single potentially offensive remark seriously I wouldn't get anything done.
8. I punch them in the balls. With my mind.
9. I do speak up, but often very timidly because I feel that I'm white and therefore I don't really have any authority to lecture someone on what's racist and what isn't...
10. Generally speaking, I do not let this shit fly, because it reduces me as a person, to this non-person and it replicates the destructive discourse that makes sure that sexual minorities, racial minorities, women, people with disabilities, trans people and every intersection thereof into something other than human... And sometimes... I'm just too tired to deal with it, so I roll my eyes, make a sarcastic remark and hope the conversation moves on quickly.

For more daily questions and user comments, join writersblock. FYI, we don't want to invade your privacy, so we haven't credited individual users for their responses. We'd appreciate your feedback on this!

Spotlight community of the week

We can't resist making one last midnight trip to the ol' pumpkin patch. If you adore crazy costumes, fiendish festivities, and bottomless candy consumption as much as we do, this community has just what it takes to light up your jack-o-lantern.


halloween_fan

Photos of the week

We received so many incredible photos, we had to close our eyes and point. We uploaded a selection of awesome images at our new lj_photophile community. Please join and start posting (try to keep the width at around 625 for the sake of consistency)! We'd love for you to tell us more about your photos! You can help us select spotlight photos by commenting on your favorites. Once again, we thank you for making our online world more beautiful!

shutter	pancetta	ilya_gorokhov

Curtains

Thanks, again, for tuning in. We look forward to seeing you next week.

Tags: lj_photophile, photos, postcards, qotd, spotlight, writer's block, yandex

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A Bourdain cartoon?