Inside The Perimeter

I’m in a mood — one of those moods which makes me question my existence.

Is There A Doctor In The House?
I think that I should go see a doctor about my allergic reaction that started last Saturday. The only problem is that I don’t have a doctor.

The last time I went to see a physician was around November 2002 (or was it 2001?) for a similar malady. The doctor I saw at that time was “new to me” because the “my” doctor had left the practice (without letting his patients know, apparently). I really didn’t care for the “new” doc, so I vowed not to go back. It’s not that I have been exactly 100% healty since, but I’m part of the Sub-Species Stubbornus under Genus Homo Species Sapien therefore I tend to avoid medical practitioners.

I wonder if I can combine this trip with a about-to-turn-40-finger-up-my-arse physical?

Smoke Now, For Tomorrow You May Not Be Able To
As of tomorrow bars and restaurants in Georgia have to choose between on of the following

• Admit patrons younder than 18 and ban smoking
• Ban patrons younger than 18 and allow smoking

I’m looking forward to this change. I only hope that it doesn’t destroy the business of some of my favorite places to eat.

We Interrupt This Blog Entry To Install More Memory
This pc has been sluggish of late, so I’m packing it with more ram. Be back shortly….
.
.
.
I’m back!

How Do You Ruin An Already Bad Run?
Mother Nature spewed gallons of water on me during my Wednesday night “run.” Blech. The only joy I found in my own private Idaho last night was when I jumped feet first into a puddle at the corner of Briarcliff Road and North Decatur Road. Oh, it was like being a child again!.

It never rained in the Highlands so as I sauntered back toward George’s Bar looking like a drowned rat people gave me the strangest looks.

Living In A Fantasy World
Yesterday I found out that the people over at the Performance Bicycle website have set up a fantasy league for the 2005 Tour de France. Cool. I’m just nerdy enough to be interested.

And now for some ideas stolen from LiveJournal…
Current Mood - far from 100%
Current Music - Coverville Podcast #104
Website Of The Day - Those crazy kids and their Flickr Tags. Devious Gelatin has an application called Montager which makes a montage of a photo using Flickr photos which have tags matching the ones you entered into the form. Try it, but please read the warning on the page first.

Cheers!
Paulie [eatl/ga]

City Of Atlanta, Welcome To The 90’s!
I was able to pay my water bill online yesterday. Since regaining control of the billing rights to water and sewer services from United Water I have had to pay my (now monthly) bill with this crazy thing called a check. Oh, how quaint! Check out City of Atlanta’s website for more deets if you think you can pay via the Internet Superhighway as well.

Dear Paul Armstrong
I will never make fun of Lance Armstrong. His ability to overcome cancer, and follow that up by winning six Tours de France (hopefully he’ll wrap up his career with a seventh) are major achievements.

The web designers (or their email spamming drones) at the Lance Armstrong Foundation are fair targets, however. Perhaps they should have paid a little more attention to detail before sending out the email I received yesterday which referred to me as “Lance” instead of “Paul” in the salutation. Being a slightly-more-than-casual bike rider I am certainly flattered, but don’t worry, I have no plans in pursuing the real Lance’s lurv, Sheryl Crow.

iTunes Version 4.9 Contains Podcast Functionality
This can’t be good for me. I spent about two hours last night subscribing to podcasts and then listening to a couple that I had never subscribed to before. I’ve had podcasting aggregators in the past, but I have to give credit to Apple for their ability to make things easy to use and sexy. The brilliance of their podcast directory page made it really easy for me to find podcasts that I never would have found any other way. Now if I could only figure out how to enter a URL directly into iTunes so that I can subscribe to My’Lanta. Command line entry is one thing that Apple has never really warmed up to in the past.

Start Spreading The News
I’m planning a trip to New Amsterdam, aka New York in August. As if I needed reasons other than New York fuckin’ rocks and that I was born and spent nearly thirteen years there, I am planning to see my favorite movie “Glengarry Glen Ross” which came out in 1992, on Broadway at the Jacobs Theater. Never heard of “Glenngary Glen Ross?” Check this out then

It’s a no holds barred, cutthroat competition in David Mamet’s Pulitzer Prize-winning suspense comedy GLENGARRY GLEN ROSS, directed by two-time Tony® Award winner Joe Mantello (Take Me Out, Wicked) and featuring an all-star cast led by Alan Alda, Tony® Award winner Liev Schreiber (The Manchurian Candidate), Jeffrey Tambor (Arrested Development), Gordon Clapp (NYPD Blue), Frederick Weller (Take Me Out) and Tom Wopat (Dukes of Hazzard).

No a bad cast either, eh?

Oh no! It looks like my favorite website for tv information, TV Tome, has been gobbled up by TV.com which seems to be owned by CNET. I’m not so sure that I like this! Maybe it is the 1990’s again and the City of Atlanta is on the cutting edge of technology afterall…

While in the Big Apple I can also help the New York City Subway celebrate its 150th anniversary. They are touting it as “150 Years of Rabid Transit in New York City.” Oh I’m sorry, that’s “150 Years of Rapid Transit in New York City.”

Will Marta be around for their sesquicentennial? Who are we kidding?! They will have long since gone bankrupt and the tracks will have been turned into Segway trails by then.

All joking aside, the NYC subway site has a few cool links embedded within it. Check out their Rail Map (my home hood was near the end of the 7 in Queens), and the fascinating (at least to me) Abandoned Station List.

Have I ever mentioned my fascination with urban abandonment? Ah, I’ll save that for a later date.

And now for some ideas stolen from LiveJournal…
Current Mood - doing the time warp
Current Music - Sirius Satellite Radio, Channel 26 playing Gomez — “78 Stone Wobble”
Website Of The Day - Okay, I was going to make that NYC Subway website the Site of the day, that was until I saw a link to Men Who Look Like Kenny Rogers. Too Fucking Funny!!!

Cheers!
Paulie [eatl/ga]

Fuckity, Fuck, Fuck, Fuck! How did I miss this?!?!

Happy Birthday, Alter Ego!!!
Today is John Cusack’s 39th birthday. JC call me next year and I’ll give you all the 411 on turning 40.

I’ll be at home celebrating be watching “Eight Men Out”, or “High Fidelity”, or “Being John Malkovich”, or …..

Cheers,
Paulie [eatl/ga]

And Here Is Why I Hate Chastain
If I had my Metro Blogging privileges turned on I would have busted this out as my first entry.

I am a fan of “A Prairie Home Companion”, the weekly Olde Time Radio show that has been on NPR for years. Usually this show is broadcast live on Saturday nights. When I found out that they were doing a show in Atlanta I was excited and wanted to get a ticket. When I found out that it was a Friday night show I was so confused that I didn’t follow through on the ticket idea. I was certain that this was to be a “special” show, and not the normal “A Prairie Home Companion” show. Then, I found out that the show was going to be done at Chastain, and I decided that I definitely did not want to attend.

I hate Chastain Park Amphitheater! The venue is not that great, the people are usually loud/rude, and its nestled in a community that dictates that shows end by a certain time so that they can go beddy-bye in their super-overvalued houses.

It came as no surprise to me when I read the following passage “A Prairie Home Companion’s” host Garrison Keillor on the Prairie Home Companion website.

AN APOLOGY TO OUR AUDIENCE IN ATLANTA
Saturday’s broadcast from Chastain Park amphitheater was not the show it might have been, and I am awfully sorry. The show (which was taped on Friday evening) was troubled by a large number of loud drunks sitting in the expensive corporate seats down close to the stage. This is an odd experience for me, to be standing on the lip of the stage and telling the news from Lake Wobegon and hearing people yell at me, “Tell the one about the dog” and “How’s the fishing this year?” and so forth. You could hear the wine bottles clanking for two hours. There were six-thousand other folks in the audience who seemed to be fans of the show, but all I could hear were the drunks snarfling and bellowing down below. And so the show was a joyless affair on stage, and when it was over, I walked off and didn’t return for a bow. I have never felt so miserable on stage as I did Saturday. If Chastain Park were par for the course, I would’ve quit years ago. I apologize to the six thousand.

btw - I have a really hard time typing the word “prairie.” I don’t know why, I just do.

Now That’s Alarming!
I accidently set off my car alarm when I returned home from trivia last night. I am here to tell you that it scared the living shit out of me! The alarm’s blaring quickly brought me back to the carjacking last year and all of the thinking that I did in its aftermath. I came to the conclusion that I am very glad that I didn’t attempt to set the alarm off during the carjacking because I seriously think that I would have been shot on the spot — either out of anger, or by a knee-jerk reaction due to the noise.

Tuesday’s CD Release Of The Day
There is not much to my liking today. I’m going to have to go old school country and give George Strait and his release of “Somewhere Down In Texas” my nod.

Seriously, I don’t recognize most of the artists listed on today’s list of releases. And, mark my word, I will most likely never pick a movie soundtrack as my pick of the day.

And now for some ideas stolen from LiveJournal…
Current Mood - fair to midland
Current Music - This Week in Tech Podcast #11
Website Of The Day - Generate a music family tree at Live Plasma.

Cheers!
Paulie [eatl/ga]

I figured that this being Pride Weekend and all I’d rather get fucked outside the perimeter rather than hanging around midtown and getting fucked inside the perimeter.

OTP, Part 1
Cartersville, Georgia — The weather was beautiful, the ride was shorter than adverstised by about three miles (I rode 52 miles), the aid stations were well stocked, and the post-ride beer brought by my friend Harold was cold. What more could a person ask for?

Plum Loco
I rarely eat plums. It’s not because I don’t like them, I just never think about buying plums. One of the aid stations had plums and I took one for the end of the ride. It was ripe, juicy and delicious, the perfect snack for a warm day’s ride. However, I think that I might have discovered that I am allergic to plums. The plum I ate was one of the few things out of “the norm” that I consumed on Saturday morning. Dammit, another one of life’s pleasures taken away from me.

Corndogarama, Fun, But Not Fantastic
I gave up on the Corndogarama at The EARL pretty early Saturday night. Maybe it was because I was tired after riding my bike that morning. It was fun to do some people watching and scarf down some corndogs and Miller High Lifes, but I just wasn’t into the scene.

OTP, Part 2
Woodstock, Georgia — The weather was lousy, the hash was muddy thanks to the rain yesterday morning, but at least the beer at the end was cold. What more could a person ask for?

Not Pork Loco
Last night I think that I ate the best plate of carnitas I have ever eaten! Mind you, I doubt that I will ever drive all the way to Woodstock to eat it again, but damn it was good! I wish that I could tell you exactly where I ate this dish, but the name of the restaurant escapes me. It was La Pa…. north of I575 off of Exit 8. Did I mention that it is way the fuck OTP?

Catching Up On My Stories
Not really, just some podcasts. This weekend I “tuned in” to a podcast being delivered over at My-Lanta. The podcasts I listened to fell into two categories, the reading of Lisa Baron’s column from The Sunday Paper, and reading “the best of” Craig’s List Atlanta. Both styles were well done and will keep me coming back.

I am hoping that My-Lanta does well and continues to produce new podcasts, I just hope that they don’t do so well as to get a “cease and desist” letter from that other Mylanta.

They’re #2! They’re #2!
Southeastern Conference fans can breath a sigh of relief knowing that my beloved Florida Gators failed to win the baseball college world series. Argh!

And now for some ideas stolen from LiveJournal…
Current Mood - glad to be itp, hoping not to be itching
Current Music - Coverville Podcast #103
Website Of The Day - Have Monkey Butt you say? Try some Anti-Monkey Butt Powder!

Cheers!
Paulie [eatl/ga]

Look Who’s Volunteered For Metroblogging Atlanta!
ME! Yesterday I bit the bullet and sent in a request to become an author over at Metroblogging, Atlanta style. It seems fitting that the person with www.InsideThePerimeter.com should be an author there, no? I’ve been accepted, pending the submission of a short bio. This will sound odd, but I hate writing about myself.

My Friend Flickr
Today I am becoming a paid member of Flickr. I was skeptical about becoming a member so soon after they got gobbled up by Yahoo, but then I remembered Blogger was once gobbled up by Google as well.

Look for more photos in this space now that I have a half-decent camera and a convient space to dump pictures. Oh, and if you want to become one of my Flickr friends/contacts, my account is InsideThePerimeter. How original…

I Can Ride 55
And I shall tomorrow in a far, far away place known as Cartersville, Georgia. I have to give the folks up in that area credit for their honesty in real estate advertising; their website name is Not Atlanta — truer words never written.

If you happen to be in the area, I’ll be the one doing 55 miles of the Cartersville Century on the red Trek, wearing a Yoo Hoo bike jersey, looking like I am about to puke my guts out thanks to my current lack of exercise.

Good Times. Good Times.

Show Me Your Pride. But Keep Your Penis In Your Pants, Please
This weekend is Gay Pride weekend in the ATL. While I don’t subscribe to that lifestyle, I hear that Piedmont Park is the place to be this weekend. As I said I’ll be in Not Atlanta.

A few years ago I went to Eddie’s Attic over in Decatur on the Friday night of Gay Pride weekend. The place was packed with lesbians (imagine that — lesians in Dick-Hater). It was great people watching until I came to the sad realization that it was like most nights for me in a bar — surrounded by women who have absolutely no desire to go home with me.

Go Gators!
Woo Hoo! My alma mater is making a trip to the championship round of the College World Series. It’s been somewhat lean times for Gators fans of late. Shit, the Gators even managed to lose a football game to Georgia last year.

Good luck lads! I hope you bring home the University’s first baseball championship.

And now for some ideas stolen from LiveJournal…
Current Mood - living life on the straight and narrow
Current Music - Coverville Podcast #102
Website Of The Day - The Condiment Museum. That’s C-O-N-D-I-M-E-N-T, and not C-O-N-D-O-M M-I-N-T.

Cheers!
Paulie [eatl/ga]

This week my content, much like my life, has been on the lackluster side. I need to shake things up a bit.

Unreal Estate, aka What’s In A Name?
The other day I saw a sign near the Edgewood Shopping District for a new housing community. You may remember the hubub about stores in this shopping center calling themselves “of Midtown” raising the blood pressures of some intowners.

The sign caught my eye because it said “The Preserve at East Atlanta” and touted itself as “DeKalb’s first Conservation-Zoned neighborhood”.

Using the currently-popular-nearby-neighborhood in your name is nothing new. I have heard of many apartments/houses being wrongly-touted as “in” or “near” Buckhead, Brookhaven, Decatur, Vinings, etc. during my ten years in Atlanta. But “of East Atlanta”? Where the heck is this thing going to be built?

First, let me say that the website for “The Preserve at East Atlanta” is no help. I could not find a single map or directions to the community using their site. The only clue I gathered was from their statement

Enjoy hiking along Sugar Creek to discover a new species of wildlife in the afternoon, and still meet your friends for an evening on the town.

From my best determination Sugar Creek is down on I285 near I675, hardly what I would call East Atlanta, thankyouverylittle.

Jeepers The Cops!
I decided to run the Full Moon Hash last night. Knowing that the hash wouldn’t be off the scale for difficulty and would provide me with a smidgeon of exercise, it seemed like the thing to do.

This hash had the added bonus of a beer stop midway through the course. The beer stop was a welcome sight as I meandered down the old railroad bed which runs behind the Home Depot on Ponce because I knew that I could rest a spell and perhaps drink a frosty beverage. I am glad I didn’t.

We all stood around the bed of a pickup truck enjoying the beautiful evening, joking, and what do you know, the police arrived. That’s right, some fucking assclown called the cops on us!

Okay, I know it’s illegal to drink alcohol in public. Got it! But there were no more than fifteen adults, standing around a truck, not creating much commotion (especially compared to our endings), in the early evening. Jesus H Christ, lighten up people!

Luckily we saw the police in time to hide the few open containers that were present.

And now for some ideas stolen from LiveJournal…
Current Mood - bored
Current Music - Coverville Podcast for 22-Jun-05
Website Of The Day - Everyone says that I need to get a dog. I think that I’ll just keep on pretending that I have one by visiting Dogster.

Cheers!
Paulie [eatl/ga]

It Wasn’t A Firebird, It Was Just On Fire
My current office location has been a source of oddities over the last few years. Therefore, there was little disbelief when I was leaving the building for lunch yesterday to hear “Hey, there’s a car on fire in the parking deck!” When I walked through the building doors the story was confirmed when I saw a stream of grey some coming from the other end of the lot (luckily, no where near the Jackmobile).

How does a parked car catch on fire? This is what I’d like to know…

Now Warming Up In The Bull Pen
For years I’ve travelled up and down the connector past Fulton County Stadium / Turner Field and have seen the bar (currently) known as The Bull Pen. In theory this business should be a gold mine during baseball season, at least for the 81+ home games played by the Braves. However, the fact that it is nestled between Turner Field and the Interstate seems to make it off the beaten path for the majority of the fans.

Last night I made my first trip to The Bull Pen since that was the pre-determined meeting location for the group of my friends who attended last night’s game. While it was a somewhat surreal experience for me, it was an enjoyable one as well.

The place is HUGE, with rather high ceilings for bar. I guess the place is really more of a restaurant that sells beer. While I didn’t eat there last night, since I had scarfed down a few slices of pizza at Grant Central East prior to walking to the stadium, the food that I saw my friends eating looked rather appetizing. The beer was “bar prices” as opposed to “stadium prices” — the Sierra Nevada I had was $4, but there was a 5 for $15 offering for those willing to swill Budweiser products.

I dare say that I would be interested in making a return visit. Does anyone know if they are only open during baseball season? Are they open when there is no home game scheduled?

Hard Decisions About Hardware
Some of my aging home computer hardware is about to pass into the Great Beyond. About a month or so ago I pondered jumping to “the other side” by buying an Apple 12″ iBook. I’ve been in the computer game for a long time and I’ve blogged my history with Apple in the past so I know the dangers of introducing another operating system into my network. I not exactly sure what is possessing my to think about adding an iBook, maybe it’s the desire to have another platform available to see how this site acts, or maybe I got caught in the swell of interest in Apple’s release of OS X Tiger.

And then the news that Apple is moving to Intel chips next year hit the streets.

What to do? What to do?

And now for some ideas stolen from LiveJournal…
Current Mood - conflicted
Current Music - MacCast Podcast for 21-Jun-05
Website Of The Day - Celebs have to eat too, why not take pictures of them doing so. Go here to see some.

Cheers!
Paulie [eatl/ga]

The Number Of The Count Was Three
Meet the Hashers was a skeleton crew last night at Taco Mac. The team consisted of me, Glenn, and Angela. The number of team members was one more than the number of questions we missed. Did I mention that we won? Did I mention that we won BIG? MUHAHA!

Last night’s victory was a little more pleasing than it normally is. We usually have a large constituency and most of the other (losing) teams gripe “They should win, they have so many people.” Take that you whiners!

I can only remember one of the questions we missed, probably because it was a sports question.
Q: Long before becoming an NBA coach at which college was Pat Riley a basketball star?
A: Kentucky (damn, I guessed UCLA)

A Walk Is A Good As A Hit
And hopefully tonight it will be better than a drive.

I’m going to the Braves game tonight. For the first time since moving to my hood I am going to walk to Turner Field. Fear not, I shan’t be alone as it was really Glenn’s idea to walk and I just volunteered to join him.

East Atlanta Streetscaping
Driving up and down Flat Shoals Avenue in the East Atlanta Village is a little prettier these days. Thankfully the streetscaping project is starting to wind up and trees have been planted in the curb bulbouts.

Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for Glenwood Avenue in the East Atlanta Village. Glenwood could use some trees to hide the number of emptied storefronts which have surfaced. Gone are Good News Cafe, some antique store, Kinky Pinky boutique, and Dollar Days.

I really want to tout how great my neighborhood is. On days like today that is really hard to do.

You Would Think It Would Be Cheap To Go To Vegas!
Thanks to Delta I’m already losing money on my birthday trip to Las Vegas. Yesterday I booked my flight (for late July) and it came to $518 round-trip. Fuck, you would think that Las Vegas would subsidize airlines to bring people to them.

New Music Tuesday
I see twenty-three new releases on the cd front; I have no idea who half of the people releasing cds today are. Crazy.

I guess I’ll give my not to Billy Corgan and his release of “The Future Embrace”. Don’t know the name? Billy was the lead man of The Smashing Pumpkins and Zwan.

And now for some ideas stolen from LiveJournal…
Current Mood - smart
Current Music - Geek News Central Podcast for 21-Jun-05
Website Of The Day - Turner’s got a new offer for gaming. It’s called GameTap. Psst, I like to game (for free)….

Cheers!
Paulie [eatl/ga]

It Was A Meal, It Was A Wonderful Meal
On Friday night I was finally able to eat at Rathbun’s. I love a good meal. I don’t even mind paying for a good meal. On Friday I had a great meal, and then found out that I didn’t have to pay! Woo Hoo! Oh, I tried pay, but my friends wouldn’t let me. Silly Kids.

My meal consisted of an appetizer of Ahi Tuna (yum!), an entree of a Pork Porter House with brilliant macaroni & cheese (yum!), and a shared dessert plate that was to die for!

I Snooze, I Lose — Part 1
On Saturday yours truly was the hare (trail layer) for the Atlanta Hash. My trail, laid with the help of my buddy Gentrif*ckation, took our victims up to the top of an old, closed landfill (which gives you a great view of downtown), down the backside of the hill into the Entrenchment Creek. A good time was had by most.

I should know better than to buy a concert ticket for the same night as I lay trail. After a few extra beers at Gravity Pub I went home to take a power nap before going back out to The EARL to see the Shout Out Louds and The Dears. When my power nap turned into a power sleep I realized that I was not going to make it out again.

I Snooze, I Lose — Part 2
Sunday morning brought an attempt at running — that didn’t go so well. The “running” was followed by a rousing day of drinking, eating, drinking, croquet, drinking, badminton, drinking, eating.

Want to take a guess at what I did when I got home?

Yeah, when I finally woke up again I managed to watch Family Guy before going back to sleep for the evening.

Today Was A Great Day To Ride My Bike To Work
I wish I had….

Your Student Is Not An Honor Student At The University Of Kansas
Apparently, somebody at the University of Kansas goofed.

Due to an e-mail mistake by the University of Kansas, 119 students who failed all their classes during the last semester found out who shared their misfortune.

Man, I’m glad the internet didn’t exist when I was in school.

Happy Birthday, Pac-Man
I’m not sure if Inky, Blinky, Pinky, or Clyde are happy that Pac-Man is celebrating his twenty-fifth birthday this month, but I think that Ms. Pac-Man is probably fairly pleased.

And now for some ideas stolen from LiveJournal…
Current Mood - not bad
Current Music - This Week In Tech Podcast #9
Website Of The Day - Before you run one of my trails you might want to brush up on your travel health knowledge. Ok, this site is really to help you get ready to travel abroad.

Cheers!
Paulie [eatl/ga]