My Mind Is As Sharp As A Butter Knife
The Mind, He’s No Good At Remembering Things
I have a lot of passwords. I mean a lot. Recently two things have happened which have changed my life.
Last night I realized that I have no idea about the password I use to connect to my DSL provider. This is normally not problematic, unless of course you are changing routers, which I will be doing in the near future. I made every effort to remember the password and never did. Today I’ll be calling technical support to have them reset my password.
Once I’ve successfully changed my password I will be storing it in a way that will help me never forget it. I’ve started using 1Password and loving it. 1Password allows me to remember one password (hence the product’s name) and store all of my other passwords encrypted within it. If you are a Mac user (1Password is Mac only) I suggest you check it out.
Making Tough Decisions, Part 1
I have a ticket for tonight’s performance of “Smart Cookie” at the Hertz Stage of the Alliance Theatre. I will not be using it. For weeks I’ve known that my ticket conflicted with the monthly social gathering of the Atlanta Photography Exposure and have been too distracted to exchange the ticket.
What to do? There is not enough time in the night to do both, so I’ve chosen to skip the play. Sure, I’ll wind up eating the cost of the ticket and will probably wind up purchasing a ticket to a future performance, but I’ve decided that I’d rather spend the night amongst photogs instead of non-interacting theater goers.
ITP Flickr Pic
Yep, another shot from last Sunday’s Chinese New Year.
I haven’t shot since. Such is the life I lead these days.
Top Chef : Another Dream Shattered
At the beginning of the past few Top Chef chefs seasons a bunch of EAV Buzz users have randomly been assigned Top Chef cheftestants. This season I am Jamie.
For this week’s episode we are treated to an hour of Eric Ripert, which the female bloggeratti seem to think is the bee’s knees. Ripert is a real Top Chef (and one of the best moments of the night was seeing Padma call him so).
For the QuickFire Challenge the cheftestants have to show their knife chops be filleting fish. They are first challenged with sardines where a few of the cheftestants do a fine job while others bludgeoned them. Next up was a fish whose name I cannot remember. It’s a much larger fish than the sardine, but has enough pin bones to cause grief. At the end of two rounds the competition was up to the hairless — Hosea and Stefan. For those who’ve not been watching this season let me tell you a few things about Stefan
- he’s skilled
- he’s German
- he’s arrogant (is that redundant?)
- with the exception of last week’s Elimination Challenge he’s been kicking everyone’s ass six ways to Sunday
The third round is all about eel. Guess what Stefan has been doing since he was a young lad? Preparing eel. It doesn’t help Hosea’s case that he’s also never seen an Iron Chef where ell was the secret ingredient because his doesn’t have a clue how to skin an eel. As if I need to tell you, Stefan was declared the winner.
Here’s a helpful tip if you’ve attended the Top Chef tryouts in Atlanta and get chosen for the show. Watch the past seasons, People! They repeat contests constantly!
Case and point: The cheftestants are taken to one of Ripert’s restaurant and served a six-course meal. Hmmm… Six cheftestants; six courses. Coincidence?
For the night’s Elimination Challenge the cheftestants have to recreate one of the courses, randomly assigned with the exception of Stefan, they have just eaten. It’s time to find out who’s been paying attention to their meal. Fortunately for them they are supplied with all of the raw materials, but they still have to figure out how to use them. Much to my surprise most of the cheftestants do a good job. One of the worst however was my girl Jamie, who gets unceremoniously asked to pack up her knives and leave. Oh, and guess who won the Elimination Challenge…. Stefan. I’m thinking we already know who is going to win this competition.
Stats & Goals
Daily
Current Mood – okay
Current Music – listening to Leo Laporte’s “The Tech Guy” podcast
Website Of The Day – I have an assignment for you today. Figure out what Atlanta’s Half Off Depot sells, and let me know if it’s worth investigating.
Mode Of Transportation To Work – my car
Exercise (b)Log – nothing
Monthly
Foot Mileage – 0 miles, Wheel Mileage – 0 miles
Consecutive Days Of Bed-Making (Longest Streak) – 5 (5)
Vegetarian Days – 1, Carnivorous Days – 3
Marta Rides – 0
February Goals
- Complete all necessary work on my bed room
- Lose no fewer than one pound
- Run no fewer than 30 miles
- Completely read Softbox Lighting Techniques for Professional Photographers, and Conceptual Blockbusting: A Guide to Better Ideas
2009 Goals
- Reduce my weight to 190 pounds (today’s weight was 199.5 pounds)
- Completely read the book 1001 Paintings You Must See Before You Die
- Earn at least $150 through photography sales in order to cover the cost for the renewal of the Jalapeño Beach SmugMug account I opened the other day.
- Save $500 for the sole purpose of donating to charitable organizations of my choice
- Attend at least one professional photography workshop
The Unmeasurable
- Continue backing up all data, including the off-site storage
- Become a proficient programmer in Objective-C (iPhone development) and Ruby on Rails (Black Sheep web page concept)
- Do not create a solution for something which is not a problem
Cheers,
Paulie [eatl/ga]
The Alliance box office might just swap the ticket for you or give you a credit towards another show. Stranger things have happened.
-FP
Had I called before today I know I could have exchanged (I’m a season ticket holder). I’ll try calling them this afternoon, but it may be too late.
Darn me for not taking care of business!!!
If I can say anything about the German educational system, it is that it doesn’t fool around… he’s probably been trained since he hit the 8/9th grade towards becoming a chef. Germany makes kids decide much earlier what they want to “be” when they grow up, than the US does, and they then provide educational pathways to get there. It may not be perfect, but folks who get through it know their stuff….
Good point Gentri. I was taught that many years ago in German language classes, but hadn’t thought of it.
From what I see Stefan is an excellent chef with a chef’s ego to match.
Okay I checked out the website, it looks like it is mostly a place to buy 1/2 off gift cards to local resturants, with a few other services thrown in…GA Aquarium, Bright Smile, Lasik. Fine print at the bottom of each pages gives details and restrictions.
I don’t eat out as much as you do, or at least when I do I don’t pay for it
If they have place you would eat at it might be worth it,
If you want to eat out more all you have to do is destroy your plumbing.
Mmm, not a big fan of gift cards but if they are for establishments I already frequent it might be worth looking into.
Dude, I don’t have time to eat out, plus it isn’t generally all that good for the waist line.
I did splurge on a jalapeno burger and half a beer at George’s last night (how crazy is that), after my solo run, only 3 showed up for the 6 pm run and two of them left at 5:45.
No time? Cut out all of that running and you’ll have plenty of time. Our time is all we own, and all we really get to prioritize.
Well, since it’s been almost a week since Allan said it…… If you would fix your plumbing, you could start cooking at home again!
Love ya, mean it!
And – pick a night, we will cook you a home cooked meal, you just have to come to Marietta.
Martha – half a beer? What is wrong with you?????
Just call the box office. Season ticket holders are few and far between these days, so they like to hang on to the ones that they’ve still got. You should see the show. It’s a scenic and prop wonderland!
Sweet, I’ve exchanged my ticket over the phone. Bully for you, Alliance Theatre!
Glad it worked out! We can’t afford to lose any more subscribers. Just remember, the price you pay for your season ticket helps me do things like eat food and drive cars
Me too Holly, although I was going to pay double until you convinced me to try and exchange.
As for losing a subscriber, the only way you’ll lose me is by my moving. I really like the plays put on at the Hertz Stage. And, although it possibly help you eat or drive cars directly, I just received my tickets for my Horizon Theatre subscription. 
(btw- best of luck with your house purchase)
Oh yeah, it’s actually “Smart Cookie”.
I told you all my mind was going.
Thanks for catching my error Holly, I’ll fix that later.
Woah! I just caught myself in time yesterday as I dropped by and almost read the Top Chef recap without thinking. Managed to catch up on that episode last night. Paulie, you was robbed! Leah is lame and needs to go. The bunch of them must be pretty dense not to realise what the challenge was, as soon as they were told they were going to have a meal we knew exactly what was coming.