Maybe if the US government had not banned photographs of flag-draped coffins back in 1991, there wouldn't be all the furor there is today over Tami Silicio's photograph of flag-draped coffins, published in the Seattle Times (and now elsewhere), and the collection of flag-draped coffin photos gathered through the Freedom of Information Act efforts of www.thememoryhole.org.
We get the Merc delivered every day to Dale and Fri-Sun the Chronicle is delivered as well. I often read the papers side-by-side and compare the news coverage.
Today both papers ran Silicio's photograph on Page One, both with a bit of the photo above the fold. The Chronicle coverage was strikingly similar to the Merc's.
(Feh. The Merc is now requesting a free registration to read its articles online. I'm OK with that but I know many people aren't.)
Quirky, I know, but I always check to see how the two newspapers edit articles obtained from other sources. Today both papers ran non-identical edits of a Bill Carter article from the NYTimes. The NYT itself wasn't running the photograph, though: "The Chronicle purchased rights to publish the photograph on today's front page from ZUMA Press, a photo agency, which is handling distribution. In addition, rights to it have been purchased by a weekly news magazine, according to ZUMA. Until it appears in that magazine, the deal specifically prohibits it from appearing in the Washington Post, USA Today or the New York Times. Proceeds from the sale of the photo will go to a charity selected by Silicio, according to ZUMA."
Or, as the Mercury puts it, "Zuma Press, a photo agency, is handling distribution of the photo. Rights to publish it have been purchased by a weekly news magazine, according to Zuma. Until it appears in that magazine, the deal specifically prohibits it from appearing in the Washington Post, USA Today or the New York Times. Proceeds from the sale of the photo will go to a charity selected by Silicio, according to Zuma."
Any bets that that photo will be on the cover of the next issue of Time Magazine? OK. Maybe Newsweek. Probably not People.
Would there be all this hoorah if photos had been published off and on, numbing the juiciness of this story?
www.thememoryhole.org seems to be overwhelmed with action this morning. I get an "operation timed out" when I try to pull up the site. Ah, the bane and heaven of getting great publicity.
Friday, April 23, 2004
Thursday, April 22, 2004
California SB 1520
California SB 1520 : Senate Bill This bill is idiocy. New York has pending legislation along similar lines. Customs rules were recently changed to disallow fresh, frozen and canned meat from France. Where's a girl to get her seared foie gras if these bills pass? Who the heck does Senator Burton think he is?
BLOGGER - Knowledge Base - How To Get A Book Deal With Your Blog -- an entertaining review of folks who have actually snagged a book deal with a blog. You can do it too! Meet Julie Powell, who decided to spend a year cooking up Julia Child's recipes ... and blog about it. Her book from Little, Brown will be out in 2005.
Wednesday, April 21, 2004
[FOOD] www.chocolateandzucchini.com
Chocolate and Zucchini is a French foodie blog brought to us by 24-year-old Clotilde Dusoulier of Montmartre. The blog is entertaining in and of itself, but it also has a swarm of links to other foodie blogs, an index to the recipes she shares, archives sorted by subject as well as date, a bloxicon (in case you don't know what an amuse-bouche is and want to), book recommendations, &c.
Turns out there was an article on foodie blogs in Gourmet's April 2004 issue. Behind on my reading I be.
Turns out there was an article on foodie blogs in Gourmet's April 2004 issue. Behind on my reading I be.
[FOOD] El Raigon -- Argentine asado
El Raigon -- Argentine asado
510 Union St, San Francisco
I mentioned that we'd gone to El Raigón, a new Argentine restaurant on Union, a week ago. I've made copies of their menu to drop off with friends who might be interested. Hope this restaurant has much success. Unfortunately, one set of friends who would be very interested in a restaurant close to Coit Tower are low-fat vegetarians. El Raigón is not for them.
We'd noticed last Tuesday that El Raigón was open as we walked down to Iluna Basque. We'd walked a half-block farther past and decided to turn back and eat there instead. The door was locked! There were people inside eating! We realized that the staff was probably having an open house/dress rehearsal for friends. We stopped off again on our way home from Iluna Basque when we noticed the door open and a woman standing in the doorway.
"When are you opening?" we asked.
"Tomorrow," she answered. "Here, take a menu."
We thanked her and trundled home, already making plans to eat there the next night, even though eating dinner out three times in four days is far from our norm.
El Raigón -- Argentine asado
510 Union St. [between Grant and Stockton, North Beach]
San Francisco, CA 94133
415-291-0927
The restaurant design is simple-- exposed wood beams, concrete floor. You can't miss the "art" on the walls -- framed cow hides. The frames are about 3'x3' and the cow hides are stretched over the frames. Spot lighting picks up the swirls and variations in the hides. The hides were all of a piece: reddish brown with white patterning, almost a Rorschach. Don't know what cattle breed. Maybe Guernsey? An array of bolos hung against the wall at the far end of the room. Some framed photographs of Argentinians hung on the wall as you came in.
The woman we'd talked to the night before appears to be one of the partners. She was running the front room and recognized us. There were a good dozen people having dinner. A group of five and another couple of couples came in while we ate. Seemed a good turnout for a first night for a restaurant that doesn't have a flashy exterior. Word of mouth from friends of the restaurant, Telegraph Hill neighbors and noticing the place while you were walking by are the only ways the first-night diners could've known the restaurant was open.
We started dinner by nibbling on bread dipped in chimichurri sauce as we decided what to eat. The bread came in a metal bucket, continuing the cattleman motif. Excellent chimichurri sauce.
Both of us had mollejas (grilled sweetbreads) for appetizer. My first experience of sweetbreads was when his nibs wooed me with home-cooked sweetbreads in a sour cream, shallots and port sauce. My first experience. Since then, sweetbreads have always been a favorite. Recently I've been lamenting the fact you can't find sweetbreads in the meat cases at the grocery stores these days and very few restaurants have sweetbreads on their menus. The prime reason we first stopped at Isa was because Luke's menu featured both sweetbreads and seared foie gras.
El Raigón's sweetbreads were delicious, simply prepared, grilled and served with a lemon wedge. Also good dipped in chimichurri. Excellent.
We continued on with beef for the main course. The restaurant is proud of its grass-fed Montana beef and plans to be able to serve Argentinian beef some day. I had Bife de Chorizo (similar to NY strip) and his nibs had Ojo de Bife (rib eye). My mental translation of "Ojo de Bife" is cow eyeball, which is why I didn't order it. Of course, Bife de Chorizo sounds like beef sausage ...
Both pieces of beef were ordered medium-rare and both arrived perfectly done. yay! I opted for a side of Espinaca Saltada (sauteed spinach) and his nibs had Calabaza Pisada (mashed squash). Both good. The spinach was sauteed with garlic. Both vegetables were prepared with no extraneous fuss.
Also on the menu are shortribs, lamb loin, grilled chicken, and halibut. For the vegetarians, main dishes include fettucini with marinara sauce and steamed vegetables. The restaurant also serves salads, other sides, empanadas, blood sausage, Argentine sausage, prawns, &c. Plenty of choices, just not very much choice if you're vegetarian. If you're on the Atkins diet, however, this place is for you.
I saved half of my beef to leave room for dessert. My Panqueques con Dulce de Leche (crepe-like pancakes rolled around rich, golden brown dulce de leche) were yummy. Exceedingly rich. His nibs had Flan Casero, which was an excellent excellent yummy flan.
What with wine and coffee, dinner was in the $$$ range even before tip. The pieces of beef were $24 and $28. The sweetbreads were $9 each. Sides were $3 each. Desserts were $7 each. Yummy stuff, though, and just a few blocks from home. El Raigón is definitely a place to return to when we are entertaining beef-eating friends or just hankering after a simple slab of beef.
510 Union St, San Francisco
I mentioned that we'd gone to El Raigón, a new Argentine restaurant on Union, a week ago. I've made copies of their menu to drop off with friends who might be interested. Hope this restaurant has much success. Unfortunately, one set of friends who would be very interested in a restaurant close to Coit Tower are low-fat vegetarians. El Raigón is not for them.
We'd noticed last Tuesday that El Raigón was open as we walked down to Iluna Basque. We'd walked a half-block farther past and decided to turn back and eat there instead. The door was locked! There were people inside eating! We realized that the staff was probably having an open house/dress rehearsal for friends. We stopped off again on our way home from Iluna Basque when we noticed the door open and a woman standing in the doorway.
"When are you opening?" we asked.
"Tomorrow," she answered. "Here, take a menu."
We thanked her and trundled home, already making plans to eat there the next night, even though eating dinner out three times in four days is far from our norm.
El Raigón -- Argentine asado
510 Union St. [between Grant and Stockton, North Beach]
San Francisco, CA 94133
415-291-0927
The restaurant design is simple-- exposed wood beams, concrete floor. You can't miss the "art" on the walls -- framed cow hides. The frames are about 3'x3' and the cow hides are stretched over the frames. Spot lighting picks up the swirls and variations in the hides. The hides were all of a piece: reddish brown with white patterning, almost a Rorschach. Don't know what cattle breed. Maybe Guernsey? An array of bolos hung against the wall at the far end of the room. Some framed photographs of Argentinians hung on the wall as you came in.
The woman we'd talked to the night before appears to be one of the partners. She was running the front room and recognized us. There were a good dozen people having dinner. A group of five and another couple of couples came in while we ate. Seemed a good turnout for a first night for a restaurant that doesn't have a flashy exterior. Word of mouth from friends of the restaurant, Telegraph Hill neighbors and noticing the place while you were walking by are the only ways the first-night diners could've known the restaurant was open.
We started dinner by nibbling on bread dipped in chimichurri sauce as we decided what to eat. The bread came in a metal bucket, continuing the cattleman motif. Excellent chimichurri sauce.
Both of us had mollejas (grilled sweetbreads) for appetizer. My first experience of sweetbreads was when his nibs wooed me with home-cooked sweetbreads in a sour cream, shallots and port sauce. My first experience. Since then, sweetbreads have always been a favorite. Recently I've been lamenting the fact you can't find sweetbreads in the meat cases at the grocery stores these days and very few restaurants have sweetbreads on their menus. The prime reason we first stopped at Isa was because Luke's menu featured both sweetbreads and seared foie gras.
El Raigón's sweetbreads were delicious, simply prepared, grilled and served with a lemon wedge. Also good dipped in chimichurri. Excellent.
We continued on with beef for the main course. The restaurant is proud of its grass-fed Montana beef and plans to be able to serve Argentinian beef some day. I had Bife de Chorizo (similar to NY strip) and his nibs had Ojo de Bife (rib eye). My mental translation of "Ojo de Bife" is cow eyeball, which is why I didn't order it. Of course, Bife de Chorizo sounds like beef sausage ...
Both pieces of beef were ordered medium-rare and both arrived perfectly done. yay! I opted for a side of Espinaca Saltada (sauteed spinach) and his nibs had Calabaza Pisada (mashed squash). Both good. The spinach was sauteed with garlic. Both vegetables were prepared with no extraneous fuss.
Also on the menu are shortribs, lamb loin, grilled chicken, and halibut. For the vegetarians, main dishes include fettucini with marinara sauce and steamed vegetables. The restaurant also serves salads, other sides, empanadas, blood sausage, Argentine sausage, prawns, &c. Plenty of choices, just not very much choice if you're vegetarian. If you're on the Atkins diet, however, this place is for you.
I saved half of my beef to leave room for dessert. My Panqueques con Dulce de Leche (crepe-like pancakes rolled around rich, golden brown dulce de leche) were yummy. Exceedingly rich. His nibs had Flan Casero, which was an excellent excellent yummy flan.
What with wine and coffee, dinner was in the $$$ range even before tip. The pieces of beef were $24 and $28. The sweetbreads were $9 each. Sides were $3 each. Desserts were $7 each. Yummy stuff, though, and just a few blocks from home. El Raigón is definitely a place to return to when we are entertaining beef-eating friends or just hankering after a simple slab of beef.
The day has turned blue and sunny both here and there.
My little bird family was squeaking and squawking when I took a break to fix lunch and move some more boxes.
"Mom, I want a worm!"
"Waaaah! She got a bigger piece than I did!"
And all the while the mother bird saying, "Hush. Can't you see that giant human down there checking out all the squawking you're making? Hush, missy! Hush! Or that mean ol' human is going to fry you up for lunch!"
For the second year in a row, a small Oregon junco has made its nest in the window sill of the small window at the top of the kitchen wall, just above the stove. The window (a clerestory window) opens in on chains, and there's a three-inch deep space between the window and the screen outside. I seldom open the window even on the hottest days. Last year, the bird pecked and ripped a hole in the screen and built a nest in the protected space, out of sight of any of her common predators. Her family duties were so successful she's back again. This year she doesn't have to rip the screen because we didn't mend it after her caretaking duties were done last year.
You can't see the bird-lets too well, because of the angle of sight to the window, but you can always tell when mom arrives with something to eat. Peep. Squawk. Waaaah! PeepPeepPeep.
My little bird family was squeaking and squawking when I took a break to fix lunch and move some more boxes.
"Mom, I want a worm!"
"Waaaah! She got a bigger piece than I did!"
And all the while the mother bird saying, "Hush. Can't you see that giant human down there checking out all the squawking you're making? Hush, missy! Hush! Or that mean ol' human is going to fry you up for lunch!"
For the second year in a row, a small Oregon junco has made its nest in the window sill of the small window at the top of the kitchen wall, just above the stove. The window (a clerestory window) opens in on chains, and there's a three-inch deep space between the window and the screen outside. I seldom open the window even on the hottest days. Last year, the bird pecked and ripped a hole in the screen and built a nest in the protected space, out of sight of any of her common predators. Her family duties were so successful she's back again. This year she doesn't have to rip the screen because we didn't mend it after her caretaking duties were done last year.
You can't see the bird-lets too well, because of the angle of sight to the window, but you can always tell when mom arrives with something to eat. Peep. Squawk. Waaaah! PeepPeepPeep.
Was up for a Board meeting of the Broadway Towers HOA last night. KS has finally sold the last of the condos left from the condo conversion which began in the 80's: 1981? 1986? Something like that, but I'm not interested in searching through old paperwork to find the date. I suppose I could ask KS: she'd know right off the top of her head. Part of the conversion deal was that the developers had to allow a life-lease to tenants over a certain age who didn't want to buy their unit.
KS'd attended practically every Board meeting since she took over from her father back when. Last night was to be the last Board meeting she'd attend (x'd fingers that escrow closes smoothly). So I made some chocolate chip-macadamia nut brownies to celebrate the end of what seemed to be a never-ending connection to the building, with all the ups and downs. We bought our place from the eeeeeeevil condo developers in summer 1991, never thinking they'd still own units in 2004. (They probably never expected it either.)
Back in Dale today and the skies are a semi-sunny gray. Checked out the cam and luckily it's just as gray in the city or I'd be even more gloomy about the columns that pend and the chores that nag.
KS'd attended practically every Board meeting since she took over from her father back when. Last night was to be the last Board meeting she'd attend (x'd fingers that escrow closes smoothly). So I made some chocolate chip-macadamia nut brownies to celebrate the end of what seemed to be a never-ending connection to the building, with all the ups and downs. We bought our place from the eeeeeeevil condo developers in summer 1991, never thinking they'd still own units in 2004. (They probably never expected it either.)
Back in Dale today and the skies are a semi-sunny gray. Checked out the cam and luckily it's just as gray in the city or I'd be even more gloomy about the columns that pend and the chores that nag.
Monday, April 19, 2004
[FOOD] Yet another exciting weekend
Spent time over the weekend moving boxes full of contents from the house that sold, contents that I can't give up yet. The boxes are cluttering the family room and need to be moved to a spare room upstairs. Finally moved the cheap OfficeMax desk that had been in that room since the soon-to-be-twenty-three-year-old left for college. Set the desk pieces outside by the side gate, under the overhang: it is going to make a lovely potting bench. [snerch] ... at least until the rains make the particle board swell and it crumbles.
With the desk out, I had space to rearrange that room's bureaus and then moved up a fourth bureau that had been in the middle of the family room with boxes stacked around it.
Moved a variety of items out of the bureaus, sorted through them for Goodwill candidates and then reshuffled the remaining back into the drawers. Next up the boxes: moved six on Saturday but what with the work on the bureau contents, the Goodwill sort, &c. decided that was as much as my back could take.
On tap for this week: continue on with the box moves and then move up the three bookcases that are also cluttering the family room area and reshelve their contents. Don't I live an exciting life?
We took one major load to the Goodwill on Saturday, and another is already in queue.
We are getting somewhere. I just hope that years and years hence I won't regret giving up some of this stuff. My problem is that I haven't really moved for almost twenty-seven years. We've acquired additional places to live and stash stuff, so the amount of stuff we have has expanded without really being noticeable or cramping our space. I've never had to really seriously go through stuff and decide "Your Conestoga wagon is only so big. The heavier you load it, the sooner the horses will die of exhaustion and if they die of exhaustion before you reach your destination, you will likely die as well. You MUST DECIDE what stays and what goes before you leave Missouri." Now that our space is shrinking, the overabundance of stuff is starting to cause problems.
Decisions. Decisions.
The twenty-fifth anniversary FUTS Spring Fling is scheduled for early June, which is later than normal, but I have all these boxes in the family room -- see? -- and the room must be clear so people can roam around. The plan is to have the house contents resettled far before it's time for the Fling, but we've built some slush time in there. If I can get everything resettled ahead of time, maybe we'll have time to do some of the painting and what-not I'd been hoping to get done. We'll see.
I can hear a voice saying, "Work on the book, missy. Finish the book. What about the book?" Is this just a huge cat-vacuuming exercise?
We finally got up to San Francisco on Sunday in time for a couple open houses and the tale end of the SinC/NC spring fest at A Clean Well-Lighted Place for Books, 601 Van Ness Avenue.
OPEN HOUSES
Only went to a couple open houses because tours opened at 2PM and the spring fest started at 3PM and the two we really wanted to see were a-ways apart. We walked over to Green Street to check out 363-365 Green St and then came back for the car and drove to 1800 Gough, a full floor (well, two floors really) penthouse condominium on the "city" side of Pacific Heights.
363-365 Green St Two units (currently being used for a single family) at $1.495m is reasonably priced and the views of Coit Tower and the city are better than most.
1800 Gough at $5.5m just wasn't worth the money, even if I won the lottery. The space was great: it even had a small ballroom on the second level, but the price was way out of line for the space and the view.
We left the car on Gough, a few blocks N from 1800, and walked down to the spring fest. Introduced myself to Mark Coggins, who'd I'd exchanged e-mails about the fest a week or so ago. Heard Rhys Bowen read from a current work, Camille Minichino read from a WIP, other folks read, including Cara Black. Rhys' set was my favorite. I was sorry I'd missed the folks I had missed. Didn't win one of the raffle prizes. Stayed for a few nibbles afterwards then we walked back to where we'd parked the car. Parking is that awful in SF that it was easier to walk fifteen or so blocks down and the same back on a drizzly day than to go looking for a parking space closer to ACWPfB.
The Art Store
The walk back and forth was worth it, though: on the way back I was able to stop off in The Art Store at 1414 Van Ness and lust over their hand-made papers and 50% canvas sale and their oils and watercolors and ... but a little voice was saying, "Get the book done, missy. Don't lose focus." I decided the hand-made papers and papyrus and the blank canvases would be my reward when the thing is finally done.
Last night, we went out to dinner early, around seven or so. We'd had no lunch, what with chores and open houses, except for a single shrimp and a couple of cookies at the SinC/NC event. The day was drizzly. I wanted to go to Piperade, but they aren't open on Sundays. His nibs wanted to go to Estia, I wanted to go to The House. The two restaurants are, literally, two doors apart, so we bargained. I know that The House is open Sundays -- good, our walk in the rain won't be for naught -- but if Estia is also open on Sunday, we'll stop at Estia because we've never eaten there before.
Estia ~ 1224 Grant Ave
Estia [no Web site that I could find]
1224 Grant Ave (just north of Columbus)
San Francisco, CA 94133-3910
415-433-1433
Estia opened last November (2003) and friends who had been there liked the food and said they were served prodigious quantities. Sunday was a gray day, with intermittent drizzle. We'd made up our mind not to walk far for dinner and decided, finally, to head down Union, turn on Grant and walk a-ways, maybe eat at The House, or Estia, if it was open on a Sunday.
It was.
The owners decorated Estia beautifully, although I probably would've used actual photos rather than the watercolor prints of Mykonos and Santorini I could see from our table. The walls are a warm cream with a contrasting carved molding about a foot from the ceiling. A dark warm blue paint covers the remainder of the walls and the ceiling. Small lights hidden behind the top of the molding, take the blue from very light near the molding to a dark royal blue.
The ceiling of the bar area in the back corner is painted white to break the space away from the rest of the restaurant. Greek taverna music plays in the background. The setting put his nibs in a reminiscent mood. He said he'd like to return to Greece again, maybe this time skipping the more touristy places and instead hanging out, eating and soaking up the sun on Hydra or some other small island.
Our service was excellent. Our server told us what she thought were the best items on the menu and helped us select a Greek red to accompany dinner. We told her that although we'd been to Greece a couple times, we didn't know the wines at all -- we usually just drank whatever red came to the table. We wound up with a Goumenissa Boutari (2000 - a blend of Xynomavro and Negoska) to accompany the meal -- a perfect choice.
We took some of her food item suggestions, skipped others. She came by frequently to check on the dinner's progress and whether we were enjoying the plates. She was friendly, pouring wine, talking about the foods we'd chosen. She seemed to enjoy showing off their food and wines.
We started with fried calamari served with a lemon wedge and thick garlicky sauce. Yummy. We also had the grilled octupus. Yummier. Both small plates were substantial and we were starting to fill up before the dinner entrees arrived. Dinner entrees were moussaka topped with grated cheese and lamb fricassee with an avoglemono sauce, served over rice with vegetables.
I preferred the lamb to the moussaka. Both entrees were HUGE servings. His nibs, who also preferred the lamb, said the moussaka was the best he'd ever had. We wound up packing half of each entree home so we could leave room for dessert -- and have something to eat for dinner the next day.
Our desserts were rice pudding and, of course, baklava. I had a Greek coffee as well. Our server offered the coffee in the traditional Greek variants: bitter, semi-sweet or sweet. I chose semi-sweet. A Greek coffee contraption in the bar puts out dark, thick coffee that goes well with dessert. Finely ground coffee and water (and whatever sweetener you've chosen) are mixed in a briki, a small copper pot with a long handle, and set to "cook" until done. When done, the briki contents are swirled, poured into a demitasse cup and served. Caution: You'll wind up with a thick coffee sediment as you finish your cup. The sludge isn't meant to be drunk.
The baklava was not too intense -- as it sometimes can be -- and was served with a bit of sour cherry sauce, a perfect complement. The rice pudding was served piping hot with a large dollop of rose petal jam in the bottom of the dish. The result was amazing, one of the most memorable rice puddings in a long history of rice puddings.
Dinner tab was $103 before tip. I liked the dinner, liked the food, service was terrific, but I had no immediate desire to come back for a further taste in the menu (there are thousands of restaurants in the city, do you want to go back or go on?), but looks like we will be returning soon. His nibs was taken with the food and the echoes of sunny days in Greece.
Or it might've been that rice pudding.
We wandered back home, uphill as always, and sat on the deck watching the lights on the Bay Bridge and across the Bay to Berkeley and Oakland, drinking cognac and talking about what we wanted to be when we grew up.
This morning it took us a while to say good-bye to the boats on the Bay and head back to Dale again, but the delay was balanced by the improvement in traffic: one hour garage door to garage door. Zip zip zip.
Back to my boxes of stuff and exciting life.
With the desk out, I had space to rearrange that room's bureaus and then moved up a fourth bureau that had been in the middle of the family room with boxes stacked around it.
Moved a variety of items out of the bureaus, sorted through them for Goodwill candidates and then reshuffled the remaining back into the drawers. Next up the boxes: moved six on Saturday but what with the work on the bureau contents, the Goodwill sort, &c. decided that was as much as my back could take.
On tap for this week: continue on with the box moves and then move up the three bookcases that are also cluttering the family room area and reshelve their contents. Don't I live an exciting life?
We took one major load to the Goodwill on Saturday, and another is already in queue.
We are getting somewhere. I just hope that years and years hence I won't regret giving up some of this stuff. My problem is that I haven't really moved for almost twenty-seven years. We've acquired additional places to live and stash stuff, so the amount of stuff we have has expanded without really being noticeable or cramping our space. I've never had to really seriously go through stuff and decide "Your Conestoga wagon is only so big. The heavier you load it, the sooner the horses will die of exhaustion and if they die of exhaustion before you reach your destination, you will likely die as well. You MUST DECIDE what stays and what goes before you leave Missouri." Now that our space is shrinking, the overabundance of stuff is starting to cause problems.
Decisions. Decisions.
The twenty-fifth anniversary FUTS Spring Fling is scheduled for early June, which is later than normal, but I have all these boxes in the family room -- see? -- and the room must be clear so people can roam around. The plan is to have the house contents resettled far before it's time for the Fling, but we've built some slush time in there. If I can get everything resettled ahead of time, maybe we'll have time to do some of the painting and what-not I'd been hoping to get done. We'll see.
I can hear a voice saying, "Work on the book, missy. Finish the book. What about the book?" Is this just a huge cat-vacuuming exercise?
We finally got up to San Francisco on Sunday in time for a couple open houses and the tale end of the SinC/NC spring fest at A Clean Well-Lighted Place for Books, 601 Van Ness Avenue.
OPEN HOUSES
Only went to a couple open houses because tours opened at 2PM and the spring fest started at 3PM and the two we really wanted to see were a-ways apart. We walked over to Green Street to check out 363-365 Green St and then came back for the car and drove to 1800 Gough, a full floor (well, two floors really) penthouse condominium on the "city" side of Pacific Heights.
363-365 Green St Two units (currently being used for a single family) at $1.495m is reasonably priced and the views of Coit Tower and the city are better than most.
1800 Gough at $5.5m just wasn't worth the money, even if I won the lottery. The space was great: it even had a small ballroom on the second level, but the price was way out of line for the space and the view.
We left the car on Gough, a few blocks N from 1800, and walked down to the spring fest. Introduced myself to Mark Coggins, who'd I'd exchanged e-mails about the fest a week or so ago. Heard Rhys Bowen read from a current work, Camille Minichino read from a WIP, other folks read, including Cara Black. Rhys' set was my favorite. I was sorry I'd missed the folks I had missed. Didn't win one of the raffle prizes. Stayed for a few nibbles afterwards then we walked back to where we'd parked the car. Parking is that awful in SF that it was easier to walk fifteen or so blocks down and the same back on a drizzly day than to go looking for a parking space closer to ACWPfB.
The Art Store
The walk back and forth was worth it, though: on the way back I was able to stop off in The Art Store at 1414 Van Ness and lust over their hand-made papers and 50% canvas sale and their oils and watercolors and ... but a little voice was saying, "Get the book done, missy. Don't lose focus." I decided the hand-made papers and papyrus and the blank canvases would be my reward when the thing is finally done.
Last night, we went out to dinner early, around seven or so. We'd had no lunch, what with chores and open houses, except for a single shrimp and a couple of cookies at the SinC/NC event. The day was drizzly. I wanted to go to Piperade, but they aren't open on Sundays. His nibs wanted to go to Estia, I wanted to go to The House. The two restaurants are, literally, two doors apart, so we bargained. I know that The House is open Sundays -- good, our walk in the rain won't be for naught -- but if Estia is also open on Sunday, we'll stop at Estia because we've never eaten there before.
Estia ~ 1224 Grant Ave
Estia [no Web site that I could find]
1224 Grant Ave (just north of Columbus)
San Francisco, CA 94133-3910
415-433-1433
Estia opened last November (2003) and friends who had been there liked the food and said they were served prodigious quantities. Sunday was a gray day, with intermittent drizzle. We'd made up our mind not to walk far for dinner and decided, finally, to head down Union, turn on Grant and walk a-ways, maybe eat at The House, or Estia, if it was open on a Sunday.
It was.
The owners decorated Estia beautifully, although I probably would've used actual photos rather than the watercolor prints of Mykonos and Santorini I could see from our table. The walls are a warm cream with a contrasting carved molding about a foot from the ceiling. A dark warm blue paint covers the remainder of the walls and the ceiling. Small lights hidden behind the top of the molding, take the blue from very light near the molding to a dark royal blue.
The ceiling of the bar area in the back corner is painted white to break the space away from the rest of the restaurant. Greek taverna music plays in the background. The setting put his nibs in a reminiscent mood. He said he'd like to return to Greece again, maybe this time skipping the more touristy places and instead hanging out, eating and soaking up the sun on Hydra or some other small island.
Our service was excellent. Our server told us what she thought were the best items on the menu and helped us select a Greek red to accompany dinner. We told her that although we'd been to Greece a couple times, we didn't know the wines at all -- we usually just drank whatever red came to the table. We wound up with a Goumenissa Boutari (2000 - a blend of Xynomavro and Negoska) to accompany the meal -- a perfect choice.
We took some of her food item suggestions, skipped others. She came by frequently to check on the dinner's progress and whether we were enjoying the plates. She was friendly, pouring wine, talking about the foods we'd chosen. She seemed to enjoy showing off their food and wines.
We started with fried calamari served with a lemon wedge and thick garlicky sauce. Yummy. We also had the grilled octupus. Yummier. Both small plates were substantial and we were starting to fill up before the dinner entrees arrived. Dinner entrees were moussaka topped with grated cheese and lamb fricassee with an avoglemono sauce, served over rice with vegetables.
I preferred the lamb to the moussaka. Both entrees were HUGE servings. His nibs, who also preferred the lamb, said the moussaka was the best he'd ever had. We wound up packing half of each entree home so we could leave room for dessert -- and have something to eat for dinner the next day.
Our desserts were rice pudding and, of course, baklava. I had a Greek coffee as well. Our server offered the coffee in the traditional Greek variants: bitter, semi-sweet or sweet. I chose semi-sweet. A Greek coffee contraption in the bar puts out dark, thick coffee that goes well with dessert. Finely ground coffee and water (and whatever sweetener you've chosen) are mixed in a briki, a small copper pot with a long handle, and set to "cook" until done. When done, the briki contents are swirled, poured into a demitasse cup and served. Caution: You'll wind up with a thick coffee sediment as you finish your cup. The sludge isn't meant to be drunk.
The baklava was not too intense -- as it sometimes can be -- and was served with a bit of sour cherry sauce, a perfect complement. The rice pudding was served piping hot with a large dollop of rose petal jam in the bottom of the dish. The result was amazing, one of the most memorable rice puddings in a long history of rice puddings.
Dinner tab was $103 before tip. I liked the dinner, liked the food, service was terrific, but I had no immediate desire to come back for a further taste in the menu (there are thousands of restaurants in the city, do you want to go back or go on?), but looks like we will be returning soon. His nibs was taken with the food and the echoes of sunny days in Greece.
Or it might've been that rice pudding.
We wandered back home, uphill as always, and sat on the deck watching the lights on the Bay Bridge and across the Bay to Berkeley and Oakland, drinking cognac and talking about what we wanted to be when we grew up.
This morning it took us a while to say good-bye to the boats on the Bay and head back to Dale again, but the delay was balanced by the improvement in traffic: one hour garage door to garage door. Zip zip zip.
Back to my boxes of stuff and exciting life.
Thursday, April 15, 2004
[FOOD] Iluna Basque and more
We're splitting time between Hill (Telegraph) and Dale (South Bay) these days as we slowly make the mental mind shift from thinking of Dale as home to thinking of Hill as home. Dale is a giant mess what with all that came out of the house we just sold near Monterey plus the stuff from my brother's place, which sold two and a half years back but which still hasn't been settled and sorted.
Dale is cluttered and claustrophic and stacked and boxed and have I mentioned cluttered? ... and we haven't even talked about my office. I'm spending time sorting through and settling two house-worth's of stuff into Dale while we consider maybe -- just maybe -- selling Dale while the market is hot and interest rates are low.
"... and doing what with the contents from Dale? plus Customs? plus Casey's?" is the question. We talk of buying a warehouse someplace near the Hill to stash the books and the furniture and what-not I haven't yet let go of and maybe buying some place someplace else. Most of the tens of thousands of books (mine and Casey's and those I still keep buying) are in a tilt-up space next to a guy who sells skylights to contractors, who is next to the gutter guru.
The books are in the book-space: the furniture and knickknacks and dishes and punchbowls are here, at Dale, which is where my cable connection and office are -- proof positive that the Hill isn't quite "home" yet...
We go up to the Hill with greater and greater frequency these days as we consider what-next? and watch the boats and walk ... and walk ... and walk and take in dinner and walk ... and walk ... and walk and fall asleep and drive back to the South Bay, where the lucre is made, in the morning. What had been weekend days became Friday night through Monday morning and now is becoming the weekend and maybe Monday or Tuesday night and maybe Wednesday night and soon it's Friday again.
This past Sunday night we ate at Fior d'Italia, Tuesday night at Iluna Basque, and last night (Wednesday) at El Raigón, an Argentine restaurant (excellent grass-fed beef and chimichurri) on Union which opened ... last night.
Amazing how many restaurants are within walking distance, if you don't mind walking. The farthest we've walked from the Hill is to our still-fave Isa which we discovered when we were still dossing at the condo in Pacific Heights, before we bought and settled in at the quite different space we now call home.
Some day when we can't make it up the stairs inside our space and back down again, when we can't make it up and down the Filbert Steps to our little alley-way, when we find it difficult if not impossible to walk uphill and down and over and up from leased parking a couple blocks away, when we need an elevator and someone to open the door, we'll go back to the condo, but please ... not for another two or three decades. The view just isn't the same. Sure you can see the Bay, but the boats are further away, 1940 Vallejo blocks our view of Alcatraz and ... well, it's just not the same. ... at all.
From the Hill, Isa (Luke and Kitty don't have an "Isa" Web site? Why not?) is a fifty-minute walk each way and worth it. We've walked to First Crush, forty minutes maybe. Gary Danko, thirty-five? The conglomerate of tasty places at Belden Place [Plouf, Cafe Tiramisu, B44, &c. ] or Jeanty at Jack's, twenty minutes. Piperade, another of our favorite restaurants, is located down the Filbert Steps and around the corner from us on Battery (1015 Battery). Dinner there involves something more than five minutes less than ten minutes walking "to" -- more walking "fro" because you're stuffed with good food and you have to hike up the Filbert Steps to get home. The walking uphill (always uphill .. from wherever we eat) is a way to work off maybe 100 calories of an excellent dinner.
We stayed closed to home for this week's dinner explorations, though. Iluna Basque (at five blocks) was the farthest we walked to dinner.
Iluna Basque ~ 701 Union St.
Iluna Basque http://www.ilunabasque.com/
701 Union St.
San Francisco, CA 94133
415-402-0011
Iluna Basque (a Basque tapas place in North Beach, on the south-west corner of Union and Powell) opened in late February 2004. The restaurant dining room is wood and stainless-steel with an upscale bar on the west side and windows that look out over Union Street and Powell. Inside, if the outside view doesn't interest you, you can catch a peek at the action in the kitchen or just people-watch the wide variety of fellow diners.
Mattin Noblia serves excellent food for someone so young (23). Noblia, as I said, is young and self-deprecating as well, for someone who had been chef at Piperade and now is probably the youngest chef to own a restaurant the likes of his. When we complimented him on his food, he shrugged and smiled, then gestured toward the view of Coit Tower. "But the view, isn't it wonderful?"
Views, schmiews. We have a view of the Bay and the boats from our humble abode, a view of Coit Tower too, if we're facing that direction. We hadn't gone to Iluna Basque for the view from our table. What we don't have at home (but now can have with a five-block walk) are "Txangurro" crab croquettes that melt in our mouths, "Amatxi" style duck rilette served in a small casserole dish with garlic toast, Basque garlic soup with shrimp and sun-dried tomatoes, and salmon tartare with capers.
I had the pineapple "carpaccio" for dessert. Ymmm. Noblia's concoction is a thin slice of pineapple topped with sugar, thrown under a broiler to carmelize the sugar. The pineapple with a now-crusty caramel topping is served warm, drizzled with berry sauce.
We had probably five or six tapas, a bottle of wine, a glass of wine each at the bar while we waited for our table, two desserts, a glass of manzanilla to accompany the pineapple carpaccio, coffee and a bill that topped $120 with tip, if memory serves.
The food though not-cheap was consistently excellent. Yahoo. North Beach and Chinatown don't lack for restaurants, but Iluna Basque is that good -- a perfect spot to take adventurous guests.
Dale is cluttered and claustrophic and stacked and boxed and have I mentioned cluttered? ... and we haven't even talked about my office. I'm spending time sorting through and settling two house-worth's of stuff into Dale while we consider maybe -- just maybe -- selling Dale while the market is hot and interest rates are low.
"... and doing what with the contents from Dale? plus Customs? plus Casey's?" is the question. We talk of buying a warehouse someplace near the Hill to stash the books and the furniture and what-not I haven't yet let go of and maybe buying some place someplace else. Most of the tens of thousands of books (mine and Casey's and those I still keep buying) are in a tilt-up space next to a guy who sells skylights to contractors, who is next to the gutter guru.
The books are in the book-space: the furniture and knickknacks and dishes and punchbowls are here, at Dale, which is where my cable connection and office are -- proof positive that the Hill isn't quite "home" yet...
We go up to the Hill with greater and greater frequency these days as we consider what-next? and watch the boats and walk ... and walk ... and walk and take in dinner and walk ... and walk ... and walk and fall asleep and drive back to the South Bay, where the lucre is made, in the morning. What had been weekend days became Friday night through Monday morning and now is becoming the weekend and maybe Monday or Tuesday night and maybe Wednesday night and soon it's Friday again.
This past Sunday night we ate at Fior d'Italia, Tuesday night at Iluna Basque, and last night (Wednesday) at El Raigón, an Argentine restaurant (excellent grass-fed beef and chimichurri) on Union which opened ... last night.
Amazing how many restaurants are within walking distance, if you don't mind walking. The farthest we've walked from the Hill is to our still-fave Isa which we discovered when we were still dossing at the condo in Pacific Heights, before we bought and settled in at the quite different space we now call home.
Some day when we can't make it up the stairs inside our space and back down again, when we can't make it up and down the Filbert Steps to our little alley-way, when we find it difficult if not impossible to walk uphill and down and over and up from leased parking a couple blocks away, when we need an elevator and someone to open the door, we'll go back to the condo, but please ... not for another two or three decades. The view just isn't the same. Sure you can see the Bay, but the boats are further away, 1940 Vallejo blocks our view of Alcatraz and ... well, it's just not the same. ... at all.
From the Hill, Isa (Luke and Kitty don't have an "Isa" Web site? Why not?) is a fifty-minute walk each way and worth it. We've walked to First Crush, forty minutes maybe. Gary Danko, thirty-five? The conglomerate of tasty places at Belden Place [Plouf, Cafe Tiramisu, B44, &c. ] or Jeanty at Jack's, twenty minutes. Piperade, another of our favorite restaurants, is located down the Filbert Steps and around the corner from us on Battery (1015 Battery). Dinner there involves something more than five minutes less than ten minutes walking "to" -- more walking "fro" because you're stuffed with good food and you have to hike up the Filbert Steps to get home. The walking uphill (always uphill .. from wherever we eat) is a way to work off maybe 100 calories of an excellent dinner.
We stayed closed to home for this week's dinner explorations, though. Iluna Basque (at five blocks) was the farthest we walked to dinner.
Iluna Basque ~ 701 Union St.
Iluna Basque http://www.ilunabasque.com/
701 Union St.
San Francisco, CA 94133
415-402-0011
Iluna Basque (a Basque tapas place in North Beach, on the south-west corner of Union and Powell) opened in late February 2004. The restaurant dining room is wood and stainless-steel with an upscale bar on the west side and windows that look out over Union Street and Powell. Inside, if the outside view doesn't interest you, you can catch a peek at the action in the kitchen or just people-watch the wide variety of fellow diners.
Mattin Noblia serves excellent food for someone so young (23). Noblia, as I said, is young and self-deprecating as well, for someone who had been chef at Piperade and now is probably the youngest chef to own a restaurant the likes of his. When we complimented him on his food, he shrugged and smiled, then gestured toward the view of Coit Tower. "But the view, isn't it wonderful?"
Views, schmiews. We have a view of the Bay and the boats from our humble abode, a view of Coit Tower too, if we're facing that direction. We hadn't gone to Iluna Basque for the view from our table. What we don't have at home (but now can have with a five-block walk) are "Txangurro" crab croquettes that melt in our mouths, "Amatxi" style duck rilette served in a small casserole dish with garlic toast, Basque garlic soup with shrimp and sun-dried tomatoes, and salmon tartare with capers.
I had the pineapple "carpaccio" for dessert. Ymmm. Noblia's concoction is a thin slice of pineapple topped with sugar, thrown under a broiler to carmelize the sugar. The pineapple with a now-crusty caramel topping is served warm, drizzled with berry sauce.
We had probably five or six tapas, a bottle of wine, a glass of wine each at the bar while we waited for our table, two desserts, a glass of manzanilla to accompany the pineapple carpaccio, coffee and a bill that topped $120 with tip, if memory serves.
The food though not-cheap was consistently excellent. Yahoo. North Beach and Chinatown don't lack for restaurants, but Iluna Basque is that good -- a perfect spot to take adventurous guests.
Friday, March 05, 2004
BookOfAges.com
This is a crafty site: http://www.bookofages.com/.
The site revolves around the Book of Ages, a series, the first of which (the age 30) is out. Need to know any factoids about thirty year olds? This book's for you. The site's crafty because it's an excellent marketing tool. The site provides enough meaty info that you can knowledgeably decide whether you are or are not interested in what the book might offer. Interesting factoids. Did you know that at age 30 both Harrison Ford and Jesus were carpenters?
The site revolves around the Book of Ages, a series, the first of which (the age 30) is out. Need to know any factoids about thirty year olds? This book's for you. The site's crafty because it's an excellent marketing tool. The site provides enough meaty info that you can knowledgeably decide whether you are or are not interested in what the book might offer. Interesting factoids. Did you know that at age 30 both Harrison Ford and Jesus were carpenters?
Wednesday, March 03, 2004
Computer Bits April 2004 -- Web sites from AAAS in Seattle
Just sent off the April 2004 column for Computer Bits which goes into long and gory (but less long and gory than it had been) detail on kewl-ish Web sites I came across at AAAS in Seattle over the Presidents' Day weekend.
Amazing stuff out there.
OSTI, the Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Scientific and Technical Information: http://www.osti.gov -- deep Web stuff
Science.gov: http://www.science.gov - access to over 1,700 government information resources
National Academies: http://www.nationalacademies.org) - publications and Web pages produced by the academies
National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST): http://www.nist.gov
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory at Hanford: http://www.pnl.gov
EurekAlert: http://www.eurekalert.org - cutting edge science news
SCIRUS: http://www.scirus.com/srsapp/ a science-specific search engine
Public Library of Science: http://plos.org - an interesting concept. Hope it works.
the Sheffield Chemdex: http://www.chemdex.org - over 7K chemistry links
ChemWeb.com: http://www.chemweb.com - "the largest online chemical community in the world"
US Geological Survey (USGS)' "Status and Trends of the Nation's Biological Resources": http://biology.usgs.gov/s+t/SNT/index.htm - used to be available as two thick volumes of data. Now? ... it's all there on the Web. Download as PDF files.
USGS: http://www.usgs.gov/ - all hail the USGS
USGS' publications warehouse: http://infotrek.er.usgs.gov/pubs/ - to buy or download for free
USGS' national map: http://nationalmap.usgs.gov - more cool technology
USGS' earthquake info: http://earthquake.usgs.gov - real time earthshaking info
USGS' Advanced National Seismic Survey: http://www.anss.org/
Earthquakes in Oregon: http://neic.usgs.gov/neis/states/oregon/
National Library of Medicine: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/gquery/gquery.fcgi - awash with useful information
PubMedCentral: http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/ - an archive of life sciences journal articles provided free online
MedLinePlus's drug information online: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/druginformation.html
UC's BioTech programs: http://ucbiotech.org
Genome information: http://www.ornl.gov/sci/techresources/Human_Genome/posters/chromosome
DOE's Genome programs: http://doegenomes.org
Human Gene Therapy, the magazine: http://www.liebertpub.com/hum/default1.asp
Biosecurity and Bioterrorism, the magazine: http://www.biosecurityjournal.com/
Annals of Improbable Research: http://improbable.com
More info available when the April column goes up at the Computer Bits site, sometime after the beginning of April.
Amazing stuff out there.
OSTI, the Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Scientific and Technical Information: http://www.osti.gov -- deep Web stuff
Science.gov: http://www.science.gov - access to over 1,700 government information resources
National Academies: http://www.nationalacademies.org) - publications and Web pages produced by the academies
National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST): http://www.nist.gov
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory at Hanford: http://www.pnl.gov
EurekAlert: http://www.eurekalert.org - cutting edge science news
SCIRUS: http://www.scirus.com/srsapp/ a science-specific search engine
Public Library of Science: http://plos.org - an interesting concept. Hope it works.
the Sheffield Chemdex: http://www.chemdex.org - over 7K chemistry links
ChemWeb.com: http://www.chemweb.com - "the largest online chemical community in the world"
US Geological Survey (USGS)' "Status and Trends of the Nation's Biological Resources": http://biology.usgs.gov/s+t/SNT/index.htm - used to be available as two thick volumes of data. Now? ... it's all there on the Web. Download as PDF files.
USGS: http://www.usgs.gov/ - all hail the USGS
USGS' publications warehouse: http://infotrek.er.usgs.gov/pubs/ - to buy or download for free
USGS' national map: http://nationalmap.usgs.gov - more cool technology
USGS' earthquake info: http://earthquake.usgs.gov - real time earthshaking info
USGS' Advanced National Seismic Survey: http://www.anss.org/
Earthquakes in Oregon: http://neic.usgs.gov/neis/states/oregon/
National Library of Medicine: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/gquery/gquery.fcgi - awash with useful information
PubMedCentral: http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/ - an archive of life sciences journal articles provided free online
MedLinePlus's drug information online: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/druginformation.html
UC's BioTech programs: http://ucbiotech.org
Genome information: http://www.ornl.gov/sci/techresources/Human_Genome/posters/chromosome
DOE's Genome programs: http://doegenomes.org
Human Gene Therapy, the magazine: http://www.liebertpub.com/hum/default1.asp
Biosecurity and Bioterrorism, the magazine: http://www.biosecurityjournal.com/
Annals of Improbable Research: http://improbable.com
More info available when the April column goes up at the Computer Bits site, sometime after the beginning of April.
Monday, August 18, 2003
Computer Bits October 2003 covers the weather
The October 2003 column for Computer Bits covers the weather. When we were up in SF talking with Chris Larsen, he asked about the column. I told him October was a weather-related column and he said to be sure to include iWindsurf.com . Great site. The miracles of modern science.
More ...
The Weather Network is Canada’s only weather-devoted specialty channel. The French sister-station is MétéoMédia. The Web site offers
# detailed city forecast pages for more than 3,000 cities in Canada, the U.S. and internationally
# WeatherDirect - get daily local forecasts directly to your e-mbx (worldwide)
# Weather and radar maps (worldwide)
# Highway and road construction updates (Canadian)
# Traffic cameras (Canadian)
# Golf reports for more than 2,000 courses (Canadian)
# Monthly and seasonal forecasts (Canadian, US and international)
... and more.
International coverage is not deep: e.g. Italy consists of Rome, Milan, Venice and Naples, but not Florence. Interested in Palermo, Taormina or Mount Etna, anywhere on Sicily in fact? Tough luck.
The Weather Channel provides similar information for an American audience. The site provides current weather and forecasts for sixty-five Portland OR area golf courses!
NOAA (the national Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration)'s National Weather Service provides local forecasts by ZIP, city or state as well as satellite images, hazardous weather warnings, radar imagery, surf forecasts, fire weather, river conditions, small craft advisories and more.
Pickup your local forecast. e.g. Portland, OR . Or go to the Website for the Portland region and get information about various hazards and storm reports. Check out the local satellite and radar scans. The site also links to the Oregon Department of Transportation cams: see what the weather's like at I-84 and Lloyd Blvd.
NOAA's Climate Prediction center offers expert assessments. Every Tuesday the CPC issues a hazard assessment for the United States for the upcoming three days to two weeks. The Center also offers drought assessments, heat assessments, climate assessments and more.
Useful information NOAA has on tap, and they also have pretty piccies!
The following restrictions apply to use of NOAA images. "Most NOAA photos and slides are in the public domain and CANNOT be copyrighted. Although at present no fee is charged for using the photos, credit MUST be given to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration/Department of Commerce unless otherwise instructed to give credit to the photographer or other source."
More weather links:
http://www.iwindsurf.com iWindsurf
http://www.wpotd.com Weather picture of the day
http://zebu.uoregon.edu/weather.html Portland OR current weather conditions
http://www.wunderground.com Weather Underground
http://www.wunderground.com/US/OR/Portland.html Weather Underground Portland OR forecast
http://www.ucar.edu/ucar University Corporation for Atmospheric Research
http://www.cnn.com/WEATHER/index.html CNN Weather
http://polar.gsfc.nasa.gov/VLM WWW Virtual Library - meteorology
More ...
The Weather Network is Canada’s only weather-devoted specialty channel. The French sister-station is MétéoMédia. The Web site offers
# detailed city forecast pages for more than 3,000 cities in Canada, the U.S. and internationally
# WeatherDirect - get daily local forecasts directly to your e-mbx (worldwide)
# Weather and radar maps (worldwide)
# Highway and road construction updates (Canadian)
# Traffic cameras (Canadian)
# Golf reports for more than 2,000 courses (Canadian)
# Monthly and seasonal forecasts (Canadian, US and international)
... and more.
International coverage is not deep: e.g. Italy consists of Rome, Milan, Venice and Naples, but not Florence. Interested in Palermo, Taormina or Mount Etna, anywhere on Sicily in fact? Tough luck.
The Weather Channel provides similar information for an American audience. The site provides current weather and forecasts for sixty-five Portland OR area golf courses!
NOAA (the national Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration)'s National Weather Service provides local forecasts by ZIP, city or state as well as satellite images, hazardous weather warnings, radar imagery, surf forecasts, fire weather, river conditions, small craft advisories and more.
Pickup your local forecast. e.g. Portland, OR . Or go to the Website for the Portland region and get information about various hazards and storm reports. Check out the local satellite and radar scans. The site also links to the Oregon Department of Transportation cams: see what the weather's like at I-84 and Lloyd Blvd.
NOAA's Climate Prediction center offers expert assessments. Every Tuesday the CPC issues a hazard assessment for the United States for the upcoming three days to two weeks. The Center also offers drought assessments, heat assessments, climate assessments and more.
Useful information NOAA has on tap, and they also have pretty piccies!
The following restrictions apply to use of NOAA images. "Most NOAA photos and slides are in the public domain and CANNOT be copyrighted. Although at present no fee is charged for using the photos, credit MUST be given to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration/Department of Commerce unless otherwise instructed to give credit to the photographer or other source."
More weather links:
http://www.iwindsurf.com iWindsurf
http://www.wpotd.com Weather picture of the day
http://zebu.uoregon.edu/weather.html Portland OR current weather conditions
http://www.wunderground.com Weather Underground
http://www.wunderground.com/US/OR/Portland.html Weather Underground Portland OR forecast
http://www.ucar.edu/ucar University Corporation for Atmospheric Research
http://www.cnn.com/WEATHER/index.html CNN Weather
http://polar.gsfc.nasa.gov/VLM WWW Virtual Library - meteorology
Tuesday, January 21, 2003
Computer Bits March 2003 - trivia sites and facts that aren't
The March 2003 column for Computer Bits is for the most part done. The subject is trivia sites on the Web and e-mails and virus warnings and how their facts aren't always -- a caveat lector sort of look at things. So, I pulled all the "trivia" bookmarks out of my bookmark file. Turned out I only used a few, but as long as I had them in a separate spot, I decided to put them here.
TIME LINES AND CALENDARS
American Society of Clinical Pathology - Timeline
Camelot International - On This Day - April
Daily Globe: "J" World Dates Archive - SEPTEMBER
Dr. Mac's Cultural Calendar
MendelWeb: During Mendel's Lifetime (1822-1859) (not complete 1860-1884)
Minnesota Public Radio's The Writer's Almanac
PBS History: On This Day In History
pre-WWI trivia
Daily Dose of History
Dave's Date Books and Celebrity Birthdays
Special Events for the Year 1949
Michael J Maggio's Daily Almanacs
"inQuiry Almanack" - Thisday - November, 1997
"inQuiry Almanack" - Thisday - October, 1997
1997 Trivia
I have more date trivia links here (http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/wrlinks-history-ref.htm#dates)
FACTOIDS AND TRIVIA
Joey Green - weird
The Straight Dope: Home Page
Urban Legends Reference Pages
Urban Legends Reference Pages: Toxin du jour (Kiss My Aspartame)
FunTrivia.com - The Archive of Fun Facts and Trivia
The Archive of Useless Facts and Trivia
Bubble gum trivia
Buckknives.com
Michael H. Burchett's Notes on the 20th Century
Caligraph 3
Chicago - Trivia
A Collection of Word Oddities and Trivia
Cornerstone Trivia Game
Did you know?
FCS News - Trivia Page 3
Erin Barrett & Jack Mingo - Fun Facts
FunTrivia.com - Trivia Search Engine
Past Mailings: Gagler Trivia
Geography Trivia
LIST: MOVIE TRIVIA: in-jokes, cameos, signatures
Mind Uploading: Past Developments
The Miscellanea Digest
m i s s p e l l i n g s
MONEY, WEALTH, SUPERSTITIONS, FOLKLORE AND MORE
physicians doctors who were writers poets
Santa Clara Valley trivia
"skosh" "kamikaze"
Snap:Entertainment:Fun Pages:Trivia
Tox Trivia
toy trivia
trivia
Trivia Ink Old Questions
Trivia Questions
Trivial Trivia
The Useless Information Home Page
Weird Factoids
TYPEWRITER HISTORY
Typewriter invented by newspaper editor
Myths about QWERTY
I have some other miscellaneous trivia information here (http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/wrlinks-ref.htm#research) and here (http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/wrlinks-wordstuff.htm#wordstuff).
I'm sure there are more than these in my bookmark file, but these will have to do for now. I'll take out those links that are 404s when I get around to checking and add the others ditto.
TIME LINES AND CALENDARS
American Society of Clinical Pathology - Timeline
Camelot International - On This Day - April
Daily Globe: "J" World Dates Archive - SEPTEMBER
Dr. Mac's Cultural Calendar
MendelWeb: During Mendel's Lifetime (1822-1859) (not complete 1860-1884)
Minnesota Public Radio's The Writer's Almanac
PBS History: On This Day In History
pre-WWI trivia
Daily Dose of History
Dave's Date Books and Celebrity Birthdays
Special Events for the Year 1949
Michael J Maggio's Daily Almanacs
"inQuiry Almanack" - Thisday - November, 1997
"inQuiry Almanack" - Thisday - October, 1997
1997 Trivia
I have more date trivia links here (http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/wrlinks-history-ref.htm#dates)
FACTOIDS AND TRIVIA
Joey Green - weird
The Straight Dope: Home Page
Urban Legends Reference Pages
Urban Legends Reference Pages: Toxin du jour (Kiss My Aspartame)
FunTrivia.com - The Archive of Fun Facts and Trivia
The Archive of Useless Facts and Trivia
Bubble gum trivia
Buckknives.com
Michael H. Burchett's Notes on the 20th Century
Caligraph 3
Chicago - Trivia
A Collection of Word Oddities and Trivia
Cornerstone Trivia Game
Did you know?
FCS News - Trivia Page 3
Erin Barrett & Jack Mingo - Fun Facts
FunTrivia.com - Trivia Search Engine
Past Mailings: Gagler Trivia
Geography Trivia
LIST: MOVIE TRIVIA: in-jokes, cameos, signatures
Mind Uploading: Past Developments
The Miscellanea Digest
m i s s p e l l i n g s
MONEY, WEALTH, SUPERSTITIONS, FOLKLORE AND MORE
physicians doctors who were writers poets
Santa Clara Valley trivia
"skosh" "kamikaze"
Snap:Entertainment:Fun Pages:Trivia
Tox Trivia
toy trivia
trivia
Trivia Ink Old Questions
Trivia Questions
Trivial Trivia
The Useless Information Home Page
Weird Factoids
TYPEWRITER HISTORY
Typewriter invented by newspaper editor
Myths about QWERTY
I have some other miscellaneous trivia information here (http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/wrlinks-ref.htm#research) and here (http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/wrlinks-wordstuff.htm#wordstuff).
I'm sure there are more than these in my bookmark file, but these will have to do for now. I'll take out those links that are 404s when I get around to checking and add the others ditto.
A potpourri of blogs
We were discussing blogging on alt.writing recently and I gave a list of some, to me, interesting Web logs.
There are a zillion blogs out there and, like the Web, the quality is sometimes questionable.
http://www.mamohanraj.com/journal/ - Mary Anne Mohanraj
http://boingboing.net/ - eclectic mix from Cory Doctorow and others
http://scalzi.com/whatever.htm - John Scalzi
http://www.joannejacobs.com/ - Joanne Jacobs
http://www.williamgibsonbooks.com/blog/blog.asp - William Gibson
http://www.infinitematrix.net/columns/sterling/index.html - Bruce Sterling
http://www.jessamyn.com/journal - Jessamyn West
and I pointed off to the article I wrote for Computer Bits a while back on blogging.
Blogging takes time. If the blog is tracking your progress somewhere else and, like the blog for http://www.internet-resources.com/writers tracks changes to the site (although that blog doesn't track all changes), that means I add a link to the site, sometimes post to misc.writing and misc.writing.moderated about the link and then sometimes add information to the blog. I am a bit compulsive, but boy, does all that tip tap and duplication take time I'd rather spend elsewhere.
So, it's not that I haven't been collecting links for my columns or that I haven't written a column since August or that there's nothing knew at http://www.internet-resources.com/writers, it's just that there is no time for everything. This blog and that one over there will be attended to on an occasional basis.
There are a zillion blogs out there and, like the Web, the quality is sometimes questionable.
http://www.mamohanraj.com/journal/ - Mary Anne Mohanraj
http://boingboing.net/ - eclectic mix from Cory Doctorow and others
http://scalzi.com/whatever.htm - John Scalzi
http://www.joannejacobs.com/ - Joanne Jacobs
http://www.williamgibsonbooks.com/blog/blog.asp - William Gibson
http://www.infinitematrix.net/columns/sterling/index.html - Bruce Sterling
http://www.jessamyn.com/journal - Jessamyn West
and I pointed off to the article I wrote for Computer Bits a while back on blogging.
Blogging takes time. If the blog is tracking your progress somewhere else and, like the blog for http://www.internet-resources.com/writers tracks changes to the site (although that blog doesn't track all changes), that means I add a link to the site, sometimes post to misc.writing and misc.writing.moderated about the link and then sometimes add information to the blog. I am a bit compulsive, but boy, does all that tip tap and duplication take time I'd rather spend elsewhere.
So, it's not that I haven't been collecting links for my columns or that I haven't written a column since August or that there's nothing knew at http://www.internet-resources.com/writers, it's just that there is no time for everything. This blog and that one over there will be attended to on an occasional basis.
Tuesday, July 02, 2002
Computer Bits August 2002 - SETI and Art Bell and UFOCity
The August column will include some selection from the following: [still collecting]
New Frontiers in Science
http://www.newfrontiersinscience.com/
Art Bell
http://www.artbell.com/index.html
SETI Institute
http://www.seti.org/
SETI Search for Life at space.com
http://www.space.com/searchforlife/
SETI@home
http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/
X-files
http://www.thexfiles.com/main_flash.html
UFOCity - Peter Robbins, meister
http://www.ufocity.com/index.cfm
Robbins' links
http://www.UFOcity.com/links/index.cfm
UFOlogy - with a UK focus
http://www.ufology.org.uk/
UFO Magazine
http://www.ufomag.com/
Robbins' Webwatch column for UFO Magazine
http://www.ufomag.com/webwatch.html
UFO World
http://www.ufoworld.co.uk
UFO World Links
http://www.ufoworld.co.uk/links.htm
Institute for UFO Research
http://www.frii.com/~iufor/index.htm
Institute for UFO Research - Links
http://www.frii.com/~iufor/links.htm
John Greenwalde's Black Vault
http://blackvault.com/
David Sereda - NASA UFOs
http://www.ufonasa.com/
Bruce Maccabee - UFO research
http://www.brumac.8k.com/
/WIG'D/
WAPIT UFO GROUP
http://www.wapit-ufo-group.org.uk/
/INFO/
UFOSeek - the paranormal and UFO search engine
http://www.ufoseek.com/
Create your own alien Web site
http://www.aliengifcentre.web.com/
Occultopedia
http://www.occultopedia.com/index1.htm
/NEWSGROUPS/
alt.alien.visitors
alt.ufo.reports
alt.paranet.abduct
alt.paranet.ufo
alt.alien.research
/RINGS/
BUFOD UFO
http://A.webring.com/hub?ring=bufod
Area 51
http://H.webring.com/hub?ring=area51ring
UFO
http://N.webring.com/hub?ring=ufos
UFO Alliance
http://D.webring.com/hub?ring=ufoalliance
Alien Abduction
http://K.webring.com/hub?ring=alienabduction
Skeptic
http://L.webring.com/hub?ring=skeptic
Paranormal Place
http://www.ringsurf.com/netring?ring=ppwebring;action=list
New Frontiers in Science
http://www.newfrontiersinscience.com/
Art Bell
http://www.artbell.com/index.html
SETI Institute
http://www.seti.org/
SETI Search for Life at space.com
http://www.space.com/searchforlife/
SETI@home
http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/
X-files
http://www.thexfiles.com/main_flash.html
UFOCity - Peter Robbins, meister
http://www.ufocity.com/index.cfm
Robbins' links
http://www.UFOcity.com/links/index.cfm
UFOlogy - with a UK focus
http://www.ufology.org.uk/
UFO Magazine
http://www.ufomag.com/
Robbins' Webwatch column for UFO Magazine
http://www.ufomag.com/webwatch.html
UFO World
http://www.ufoworld.co.uk
UFO World Links
http://www.ufoworld.co.uk/links.htm
Institute for UFO Research
http://www.frii.com/~iufor/index.htm
Institute for UFO Research - Links
http://www.frii.com/~iufor/links.htm
John Greenwalde's Black Vault
http://blackvault.com/
David Sereda - NASA UFOs
http://www.ufonasa.com/
Bruce Maccabee - UFO research
http://www.brumac.8k.com/
/WIG'D/
WAPIT UFO GROUP
http://www.wapit-ufo-group.org.uk/
/INFO/
UFOSeek - the paranormal and UFO search engine
http://www.ufoseek.com/
Create your own alien Web site
http://www.aliengifcentre.web.com/
Occultopedia
http://www.occultopedia.com/index1.htm
/NEWSGROUPS/
alt.alien.visitors
alt.ufo.reports
alt.paranet.abduct
alt.paranet.ufo
alt.alien.research
/RINGS/
BUFOD UFO
http://A.webring.com/hub?ring=bufod
Area 51
http://H.webring.com/hub?ring=area51ring
UFO
http://N.webring.com/hub?ring=ufos
UFO Alliance
http://D.webring.com/hub?ring=ufoalliance
Alien Abduction
http://K.webring.com/hub?ring=alienabduction
Skeptic
http://L.webring.com/hub?ring=skeptic
Paranormal Place
http://www.ringsurf.com/netring?ring=ppwebring;action=list
Friday, May 31, 2002
[FOOD] Computer Bits July 2002 - days of wine and more wine
Guess what the July column covers.
/INTRO/
Wine Bork
http://www.winebork.com
ZAP - Zin Advocates and Producers
http://www.zinfandel.org/
/ADVOCACY/
The Wine Institute is "the voice for California wine" -- a public policy advocacy.
http://www.wineinstitute.org/
National Wine Centre of Australia - provides similar function
http://www.wineaustralia.com/
PASSIONS &. INFO
The Zin Zealot
http://home.earthlink.net/~nagyv/index.html
Robin Garr's Wine Lovers Page
http://www.wineloverspage.com/
Wine and Winemaking from Lisa Shea at About.com
http://wine.about.com/
Tom Cannavan's Wine Pages - updated daily. UK base
http://www.wine-pages.com/
How to taste and serve wine
http://www.tasting-wine.com/
MAGAZINES
Wine Spectator online bills itself as "the most comprehensive wine Web site in the world" and it well may be.
http://www.winespectator.com/Wine/Home
Food and Wine magazine online
http://www.foodandwine.com/
winebusiness.com - for industry professionals
http://winebusiness.com/
Wine Access - Canada's Essential Guide to Good Wine & Spirits
http://www.wineaccessmag.com/
Wine Enthusiast magazine (and more!)
http://www.wineenthusiast.com/
The Wine Advocate - "The only really INDEPENDENT guide to fine wine." in either French or English
http://www.wine-advocate.com/
Wine & Dine - the electronic magazine == Food and Wine
http://www.winedine.co.uk/
Wine Press Northwest - our passion is Pacific Northwest wines
http://www.winepressnw.com/
Wine Press Northwest covers the Oregon wine country
http://winepressnw.com/oregon/
Wine on the Web - the TALIKING wine magazine
http://www.wineontheweb.com/
Wine Enthusiast magazine
http://www.wineenthusiastmag.com/
WINE STUFF & STORES
Winestuff.com - when you need decanters, glassware or corkscrews.
http://www.winestuff.com/
Wine Searcher.com is "a gateway to specialist wines"
http://www.wine-searcher.com/
WineBase - the Ultimate Cellar Management and Wine Reference Software
http://www.winebase.com.au/
/INTRO/
Wine Bork
http://www.winebork.com
ZAP - Zin Advocates and Producers
http://www.zinfandel.org/
/ADVOCACY/
The Wine Institute is "the voice for California wine" -- a public policy advocacy.
http://www.wineinstitute.org/
National Wine Centre of Australia - provides similar function
http://www.wineaustralia.com/
PASSIONS &. INFO
The Zin Zealot
http://home.earthlink.net/~nagyv/index.html
Robin Garr's Wine Lovers Page
http://www.wineloverspage.com/
Wine and Winemaking from Lisa Shea at About.com
http://wine.about.com/
Tom Cannavan's Wine Pages - updated daily. UK base
http://www.wine-pages.com/
How to taste and serve wine
http://www.tasting-wine.com/
MAGAZINES
Wine Spectator online bills itself as "the most comprehensive wine Web site in the world" and it well may be.
http://www.winespectator.com/Wine/Home
Food and Wine magazine online
http://www.foodandwine.com/
winebusiness.com - for industry professionals
http://winebusiness.com/
Wine Access - Canada's Essential Guide to Good Wine & Spirits
http://www.wineaccessmag.com/
Wine Enthusiast magazine (and more!)
http://www.wineenthusiast.com/
The Wine Advocate - "The only really INDEPENDENT guide to fine wine." in either French or English
http://www.wine-advocate.com/
Wine & Dine - the electronic magazine == Food and Wine
http://www.winedine.co.uk/
Wine Press Northwest - our passion is Pacific Northwest wines
http://www.winepressnw.com/
Wine Press Northwest covers the Oregon wine country
http://winepressnw.com/oregon/
Wine on the Web - the TALIKING wine magazine
http://www.wineontheweb.com/
Wine Enthusiast magazine
http://www.wineenthusiastmag.com/
WINE STUFF & STORES
Winestuff.com - when you need decanters, glassware or corkscrews.
http://www.winestuff.com/
Wine Searcher.com is "a gateway to specialist wines"
http://www.wine-searcher.com/
WineBase - the Ultimate Cellar Management and Wine Reference Software
http://www.winebase.com.au/
Tuesday, April 23, 2002
Computer Bits June 2002 - passions on the Web
Guess what the June column covers.
Jerome's soft drink can collection
http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/7670/
Eric Harshbarger's LEGO® website
http://www.ericharshbarger.org/lego/
Other LEGO® pages
http://www.google.com/search?as_rq=www.ericharshbarger.org%2Flego%2F
LEGO® builders
http://directory.google.com/Top/Recreation/Collecting/Toys/Lego/Builders/
Silly Putty pages
http://directory.google.com/Top/Recreation/Collecting/Toys/Silly_Putty/
More Silly Putty
http://vern.com/putty/creations/
Castles of the World - Jaime Fernandez Jr & al.
http://www.castles.org/
Phil and Becky Vacara's photographs of medieval sites
http://www.homeusers.prestel.co.uk/magor/photographs_of_medieval_sites.htm
Hamish Reid's California Driving - a Survival Guide
http://www.caldrive.com/
Someone LOVES his Miata
http://www.pacificsites.net/~hakuna/miata.html
Someone likes to collect um. unusual names
http://mabear.freeservers.com/index.html
Art Makosinski's passion for Henry Burr
http://www.me.uvic.ca/~art/hb.html
Jason Scott has a passion for text files
http://www.textfiles.com/
Who would buy that?
http://www.whowouldbuythat.com/
Michael Thyen collects 555 numbers from movies, television and radio
http://home.earthlink.net/~mthyen/
Rob Cockerham cares about "how much is inside?"
http://www.cockeyed.com/inside/howmuchinside.html
Sarah's origami
http://sarah.fredart.com/sarahs.html
Clay Randall's money origami
http://www.umva.com/~clay/money/
a collection of links to folks with a passion for antique radios
http://www.antiqueradio.com/radiolinks.html
The DeadLetter Office - write your own "farewell" letter
http://www.thedeadletter.com/read.html
This to That - glue advice and more
http://www.thistothat.com/
Enrico Tedeschi has a passion for old radios
http://www.etedeschi.ndirect.co.uk/
Paul Robert's Virtual Typewriter Museum
http://www.mmworks.nl/typewritermuseum/
The Jell-o Museum
http://www.jellomuseum.com/
The Ancient AOL Disk and Memorabilia Museum
http://www.aolmemorabilia.com/
The Brick Testament
http://www.thereverend.com/brick_testament/
Airline Meals
http://www.m4rco.net/airlinemeals/
Geekbabe likes Peeps!
http://geekbabe.com/peeps/
Pen Spinning
http://pentix.modenstudios.com/
Rubber Band Balls on the Web
http://www.geocities.com/elvis9227/
Scott Bartlett's Rubber Band Ball
http://bigrubberball.tripod.com/index.htm
World's Largest Masking Tape Ball
http://monsterball0.tripod.com/id8.htm
Gladys Dwindlebimmers Ralston Gallery of the Unidentifiable
http://www.dearauntnettie.com/gallery/index.htm
The Burlingame Museum of Pez Memorabilia
http://www.spectrumnet.com/pez/pezexhibit.html
Crackerpacks - collecting firecracker labels
http://www.crackerpacks.com/
Jerome's soft drink can collection
http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/7670/
Eric Harshbarger's LEGO® website
http://www.ericharshbarger.org/lego/
Other LEGO® pages
http://www.google.com/search?as_rq=www.ericharshbarger.org%2Flego%2F
LEGO® builders
http://directory.google.com/Top/Recreation/Collecting/Toys/Lego/Builders/
Silly Putty pages
http://directory.google.com/Top/Recreation/Collecting/Toys/Silly_Putty/
More Silly Putty
http://vern.com/putty/creations/
Castles of the World - Jaime Fernandez Jr & al.
http://www.castles.org/
Phil and Becky Vacara's photographs of medieval sites
http://www.homeusers.prestel.co.uk/magor/photographs_of_medieval_sites.htm
Hamish Reid's California Driving - a Survival Guide
http://www.caldrive.com/
Someone LOVES his Miata
http://www.pacificsites.net/~hakuna/miata.html
Someone likes to collect um. unusual names
http://mabear.freeservers.com/index.html
Art Makosinski's passion for Henry Burr
http://www.me.uvic.ca/~art/hb.html
Jason Scott has a passion for text files
http://www.textfiles.com/
Who would buy that?
http://www.whowouldbuythat.com/
Michael Thyen collects 555 numbers from movies, television and radio
http://home.earthlink.net/~mthyen/
Rob Cockerham cares about "how much is inside?"
http://www.cockeyed.com/inside/howmuchinside.html
Sarah's origami
http://sarah.fredart.com/sarahs.html
Clay Randall's money origami
http://www.umva.com/~clay/money/
a collection of links to folks with a passion for antique radios
http://www.antiqueradio.com/radiolinks.html
The DeadLetter Office - write your own "farewell" letter
http://www.thedeadletter.com/read.html
This to That - glue advice and more
http://www.thistothat.com/
Enrico Tedeschi has a passion for old radios
http://www.etedeschi.ndirect.co.uk/
Paul Robert's Virtual Typewriter Museum
http://www.mmworks.nl/typewritermuseum/
The Jell-o Museum
http://www.jellomuseum.com/
The Ancient AOL Disk and Memorabilia Museum
http://www.aolmemorabilia.com/
The Brick Testament
http://www.thereverend.com/brick_testament/
Airline Meals
http://www.m4rco.net/airlinemeals/
Geekbabe likes Peeps!
http://geekbabe.com/peeps/
Pen Spinning
http://pentix.modenstudios.com/
Rubber Band Balls on the Web
http://www.geocities.com/elvis9227/
Scott Bartlett's Rubber Band Ball
http://bigrubberball.tripod.com/index.htm
World's Largest Masking Tape Ball
http://monsterball0.tripod.com/id8.htm
Gladys Dwindlebimmers Ralston Gallery of the Unidentifiable
http://www.dearauntnettie.com/gallery/index.htm
The Burlingame Museum of Pez Memorabilia
http://www.spectrumnet.com/pez/pezexhibit.html
Crackerpacks - collecting firecracker labels
http://www.crackerpacks.com/
Computer Bits May 2002 - art museums and more
The May Computer Bits column is titled "Surfing the Internet: Magritte, Monet, Matisse and Munch" and should be out in print and up on the Web at the beginning of May. The column covers art search engines and image searching on the Web. Also included are links to some of the online art galleries and museums:
http://www.tate.org.uk The Tate has put almost its entire collection on its site - 50,000 works. Each work is described in detail, including title, date and media.
http://www.npg.org.uk/live/index.asp - The National Portrait Gallery in London
http://www.vam.ac.uk/ The Victoria & Albert
http://www.louvre.fr/louvrea.htm The Louvre
http://www.musee-orsay.fr:8081/ - The Musee d'Orsay
http://www.nga.gov/search/search.htm The USAn National Gallery
Great stuff.
http://www.tate.org.uk The Tate has put almost its entire collection on its site - 50,000 works. Each work is described in detail, including title, date and media.
http://www.npg.org.uk/live/index.asp - The National Portrait Gallery in London
http://www.vam.ac.uk/ The Victoria & Albert
http://www.louvre.fr/louvrea.htm The Louvre
http://www.musee-orsay.fr:8081/ - The Musee d'Orsay
http://www.nga.gov/search/search.htm The USAn National Gallery
Great stuff.
Wednesday, April 17, 2002
Another blog - this one for internet-resources.com/writers
Decided to setup another blog -- one dedicated to writerly links.
http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/blog/writers-blog.htm
http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/ has over 1500 links that are checked for deadwood regularly. The links are sorted into nine major groups and almost one hundred subgroups. The site has been mentioned favorably in writers newsletters, on writers' sites, on mailing lists and in newsgroups and is visited by writers from all corners of the world.
I plan to use this new blog to pop up descriptions of some of the links I'm adding to http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/ and descriptions of some of the links that are already there.
This blog will be a means of getting a look at what's new at http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/ and a tour of what's there.
At the bottom of each item that has a link from http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/, I'll add a reference to where on the site you can find that link and others like it. The reference will be xxx|yyy, meaning you can find the link in yyy subgroup of the xxx group.
http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/blog/writers-blog.htm
http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/ has over 1500 links that are checked for deadwood regularly. The links are sorted into nine major groups and almost one hundred subgroups. The site has been mentioned favorably in writers newsletters, on writers' sites, on mailing lists and in newsgroups and is visited by writers from all corners of the world.
I plan to use this new blog to pop up descriptions of some of the links I'm adding to http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/ and descriptions of some of the links that are already there.
This blog will be a means of getting a look at what's new at http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/ and a tour of what's there.
At the bottom of each item that has a link from http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/, I'll add a reference to where on the site you can find that link and others like it. The reference will be xxx|yyy, meaning you can find the link in yyy subgroup of the xxx group.
Thursday, February 28, 2002
Computer Bits April 2002 - digital photos
The April column for Computer Bits flew off this morning a day ahead of deadline. I finally settled on a focus for the "digital photo" issue -- wrote a column covering photo "album" sites on the Web. I also snuck in mention of Dick Harper's photo/art gallery and Kathy Vincent's gallery of watercolors. Beautiful stuff.
Monday, February 25, 2002
Computer Bits Feb 2002 - updates to links
URL Updates - 'twixt then and now, the following URLs referenced in the Feb 2002 Blog article for Computer Bits have changed, disappeared, taken a hike. It's too late for the print edition and the magazine doesn't update the Web version either, so here's a list of things that have changed:
Four links out of thirty-two and it's less than two months since I sent the article in. Ouch!
- The Mercury News, wouldn't you know, revamped their whole site after I submitted my article. The new link for Dan Gillmor's blog is http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/business/columnists/dan_gillmor/ejournal/
- I sent a note John Paczkowski at the Merc to find a link to the 9-11 blog that was also referenced in the article. John sez they're moving the archival stuff over to the new Web location and it should be available in a few days.
- Dave Winer's http://www.weblogs.com has been re-vamped for speed and currently hangs Netscape 4.7+ If you'd like to check out the link, use IE.
- Ev's blog at http://www.evhead.com/ doesn't show all content with Netscape. It did at the beginning of January, honest! If you'd like to check the site out, use IE.
Four links out of thirty-two and it's less than two months since I sent the article in. Ouch!
Saturday, February 23, 2002
More URLs with digital photos and albums
More URLs with the photo theme.
My friend Ravi just sent me a link to some photo sets at Yahoo! of his lovely daughter and his two-month-old son. When we got back from Nepal-Bhutan-Tibet, one of my fellow travelers sent a link to her sets of photos from the trip. Resources available for photo sharing and/or printing, storage on the Web
My friend Ravi just sent me a link to some photo sets at Yahoo! of his lovely daughter and his two-month-old son. When we got back from Nepal-Bhutan-Tibet, one of my fellow travelers sent a link to her sets of photos from the trip. Resources available for photo sharing and/or printing, storage on the Web
- http://www.activeshare.com/ - Adobe ActiveShare. Free download (like Adobe Acrobat). Photo correction (red-eye, cropping, "instant" fix). Direct connection to Shutterfly.com for sharing &c.
- http://www.cartogra.com/home/home.asp - Cartogra from HP Photo: set up albums, order photos, fiddle with photos (make ePostcards, greeting cards, &c.). HP Photo Manager lets you setup thumbnails for easy browsing, upload large numbers of photos at once, &c.
- http://www.ClubPhoto.com - ClubPhoto.com lets you send in your film or upload digital pictures. Albums. Order photos. Order gift merchandise.
- http://www.digitalfridge.com/ - Digital Fridge "a place to create and share online collections of your favorite photos and videos." Free. File size limits.
- http://www.dotphoto.com/ - dotPhoto. Upload, build albums, share, print, sell your photos. No "adult" content.
- http://ezprints.mye-pix.com/ - EZPrints.com - view, order, print photos.
- http://www.fototime.com/ - FotoTime. Software to download. Fee-based after 30d free trial. $23.95 -> 250MB of storage. Each additional 250MB costs $23.95.
- http://picturecenter.kodak.com/ - Kodak Picture Center Online. View, enhance, albums, share, print. Cannot download high resolution pictures. Must order Photo CD from Picture Center. Max 200 orginal pictures included in free storage. Account is kept active if a roll of film has been developed or pictures ordered in last 30d.
- http://www.ofoto.com - Ofoto "a Kodak company". Get your photos online, share, "enhance" and print.
- http://www.photoaccess.com/ - PhotoAccess.com - like EZPrints - upload images, click to order, photos sent. Also photo gifts. Permanent unlimited online storage FREE. Friends have access with "key" and can order too.
- http://www.photoloft.com/default_new.asp? - PhotoLoft.com. Fee-based. Online photo album. Creative photo greetings. Share photos.
- http://www.photopoint.com - PhotoPoint.com - "is currently offline"
- http://www.Printroom.com/ - Printroom.com. Online photo-finishing services. Upload. Share. Print. Free 200MB of storage. Professionals can sell photography over the Web.
- http://www.Shutterfly.com/index.jsp - Shutterfly.com. Web-based photo service. Storage. Photo correction (red-eye, cropping *c.) Free, unlimited storage. Share. Film developing, too.
- http://photos.yahoo.com/ - Yahoo! Photos. Upload, enhance (crop, rotate, &c), share, order, photo gifts & cards.
Monday, February 11, 2002
Image searching on the Web
Photographs online - resources to track them down
- http://images.google.com/ - Google's image search
- http://gallery.yahoo.com/ Yahoo! online picture search or select "Corbis only" or "NBA only"
- http://www.altavista.com/sites/search/simage - AltaVista multimedia search. Search photos/graphics/buttons/banners. Get color/B&W. Choose from Web and/or Rolling Stone magazine (the partner site)
- http://www.ditto.com/ - Ditto.com visual search - court case re thumbnails
- http://multimedia.lycos.com/ - Lycos Multimedia has a parental filter that can be turned on/off
- http://www.picsearch.com/ - PicSearch. Filters on all the time. Search images and/or animations, color and/or B&W
- http://search.news.yahoo.com/search/news/options?p= - Yahoo! search news photo archives
http://www.lapl.org/elec_neigh/index.html - the LAPL digitized photo archives w/ search engine
- http://www.nga.gov/search/search.htm - Search the National Gallery (USAn)
- http://gallery.euroweb.hu/welcome.html - Search the Web Gallery of Art: > 9,200 "digital reproductions of European paintings and sculptures created between the years 1150 and 1800" includes commentary and artists' bios. Fourteen "guided tours" present collections of paintings with commentary. e.g. "Tour #13: English art in the 15th-18th centuries Description: This tour presents English painting and sculpture from the 15th to the 18th century, i.e. the Gothic, Renaissance, Mannerist, Baroque, and Rococo periods. After a long period of dominance by a series of foreign-born artists, English art produced in the 18th century some great artists like Hogarth, Reynolds and Gainsborough." Some tours require browsers using frames. You can add period-specific background music from the Classical Archives
- http://www.artcyclopedia.com/ - Art Cyclopedia - the fine art search engine. Designed by John Malyon. As of a year ago indexes "700 leading arts sites, and offer more than 24,000 links directly to an estimated 80,000 works by 7,000 different artists."
Friday, February 08, 2002
Links to blog articles
Must be in the air:
The Fortune and PCMagazine references courtesy of Jason Shellen in a note to blogger.com's blog on 08Feb. The Time reference courtesy of Ev in a note to blogger.com's blog on 03Feb. The Business 2.0 and Wired references also courtesy of Ev. The remaining article references courtesy of http://blogdex.media.mit.edu/ -- BlogDex -- from MIT, which strives to track pop culture by ranking sites by the number of references to those sites found in the blogging community.
The info page http://blogdex.media.mit.edu/info.asp provides links to yet more information on the blogging phenomenon, including some links I didn't provide in the article.
- [Business 2.0 14Feb2002] Weblogs Make the Web Work for You by Dylan Tweney
- [Wired 18Feb2002] Blah, Blah, Blah and Blog by Farhad Manjoo
- [Fortune 01Feb2002] Web journals by pros are a font of insight. by Carlye Adler
- [BBCNews 04Feb2002] I blog therefore I am by Giles Turnbull
- [PCMagazine 05Feb2002] The Blog Phenomenon by John C Dvorak
- [Time 11Feb2002] Pssst. Wanna See My Blog? by Chris Taylor
The Fortune and PCMagazine references courtesy of Jason Shellen in a note to blogger.com's blog on 08Feb. The Time reference courtesy of Ev in a note to blogger.com's blog on 03Feb. The Business 2.0 and Wired references also courtesy of Ev. The remaining article references courtesy of http://blogdex.media.mit.edu/ -- BlogDex -- from MIT, which strives to track pop culture by ranking sites by the number of references to those sites found in the blogging community.
The info page http://blogdex.media.mit.edu/info.asp provides links to yet more information on the blogging phenomenon, including some links I didn't provide in the article.
Blogs and blogs and blogs
The February Computer Bits went up yesterday. I've already received a handful of nice notes. One of the bloggers I mentioned in the article wants a hard copy for her scrapbook: I put in a request to the Big Kahuna on her behalf.
I added a zillion links to the http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/ site this past day or two. Most additions were to the [reference] and [business] sections.
The http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/ counter spilled over the two thousand count yesterday.
I was doing a little happy-dance until Joanne Jacobs mentioned to me that her http://www.readjacobs.com/ -- Read Jacobs -- blog (mentioned in the Computer Bits article) is getting a thousand hits A DAY, over twenty times my hit rate. At least she's given me a goal to shoot for.
Wonder how many of those hits are from fans who miss her column in the San Jose Mercury News?
Maybe if I wrote about more interesting things?
I added a zillion links to the http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/ site this past day or two. Most additions were to the [reference] and [business] sections.
The http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/ counter spilled over the two thousand count yesterday.
I was doing a little happy-dance until Joanne Jacobs mentioned to me that her http://www.readjacobs.com/ -- Read Jacobs -- blog (mentioned in the Computer Bits article) is getting a thousand hits A DAY, over twenty times my hit rate. At least she's given me a goal to shoot for.
Wonder how many of those hits are from fans who miss her column in the San Jose Mercury News?
Maybe if I wrote about more interesting things?
Monday, February 04, 2002
Tracking those hits and tweaking the sites
Finished up the March column on RPGamers on the 'net yesterday and sent it along to the powers-that-be at Computer Bits .
Noticed that someone had clicked through to this blog from my February Computer Bits article on blogs and hustled over to see if the February issue was up yet. Nope. Must've been someone on staff checking the link I had in the article. Should be up soon, though.
The transfer of towse.com from ciHost to the new host completed during the last couple days of January. February 1 I get a note from ciHost that they'd charged my account for $240 for the next year's service. Fired back a note saying, in effect, um. no. You aren't hosting me anymore, or hadn't you noticed?
I've finally got all of my Web sites registered with the same registrar ( http://www.godaddy.com), which means I can keep better track of when things expire. GoDaddy is also a cheap registrar. Check it out.
The FREE Bravenet visit counters have been working out fabulously. Nice to see http://www.internet-resources.com/writers get the attention it has been. Yesterday, a Sunday, it got ninety hits, mainly because someone who saw it liked it and posted about it to a handful of writing groups. I can also see when people come through from searches in Google News archives and check out what article of mine they'd clicked through from. Fun. Bravenet lets me choose whether to use the counter as a hit counter or a visit counter (only one count if the person pokes around throughout the site) and also lets me explicitly say "here's my IP address -- don't count any hits I make myself" because, of course, I'm using the links page as my home page and could drive up the stats like nobody's business. Looking for a page counter? Check out http://www.bravenet.com - Bravenet.
Noticed that someone had clicked through to this blog from my February Computer Bits article on blogs and hustled over to see if the February issue was up yet. Nope. Must've been someone on staff checking the link I had in the article. Should be up soon, though.
The transfer of towse.com from ciHost to the new host completed during the last couple days of January. February 1 I get a note from ciHost that they'd charged my account for $240 for the next year's service. Fired back a note saying, in effect, um. no. You aren't hosting me anymore, or hadn't you noticed?
I've finally got all of my Web sites registered with the same registrar ( http://www.godaddy.com), which means I can keep better track of when things expire. GoDaddy is also a cheap registrar. Check it out.
The FREE Bravenet visit counters have been working out fabulously. Nice to see http://www.internet-resources.com/writers get the attention it has been. Yesterday, a Sunday, it got ninety hits, mainly because someone who saw it liked it and posted about it to a handful of writing groups. I can also see when people come through from searches in Google News archives and check out what article of mine they'd clicked through from. Fun. Bravenet lets me choose whether to use the counter as a hit counter or a visit counter (only one count if the person pokes around throughout the site) and also lets me explicitly say "here's my IP address -- don't count any hits I make myself" because, of course, I'm using the links page as my home page and could drive up the stats like nobody's business. Looking for a page counter? Check out http://www.bravenet.com - Bravenet.
Thursday, January 31, 2002
Tuesday, January 22, 2002
More RPG links: caustic commentary courtesy of James Kendall
More RPG links: notes courtesy of James Kendall [jameskendall@mindspring.com]
- RPG Archive ~ http://www.rpgarchive.com/: a *huge* archive of pre-written adventures, along with links, reviews, and a few other tidbits.
- BlueTroll ~ http://www.fortunecity.com/victorian/byzantium/55/ : This is -the- premier DnD Netbook site online. Had dozens of them the last time I checked over a year ago, and is always being updated. Also had a number of general purpose books like 'Book of Herbs' 'Book of Poisons' ' Historical Weapons' 'Creation of Thieves Guilds' and so forth, as well as hundreds of fan-created DnD stuff. Spells, classes, races, so forth. Don't know if WotC cracked down on that aspect of it or not, but the rest should still be there.
- Google's list of roleplaying magazines and ezines ~ http://directory.google.com/Top/Games/Roleplaying/Magazines_and_E-zines/ : A nice concise list of online Ezines and RPG mags.
- Google's roleplaying links ~ http://directory.google.com/Top/Games/Roleplaying : Is where I'm getting a number of these links. Might want to go through it in greater detail on your own. Under the 200+ links for 'World Building', Patricia's page is second on the list.
- Roleplaying Tips Newsletter ~ http://www.roleplayingtips.com/ : Just found this one and haven't had time to look through it indepth. Looks like a weekly email fanzine that's made up a a couple of "how to GM/Roleplay' articles sent in by subscribers and emailed out to everyone on the list. All the old ones are in archives, and there seems to be some really good advice amidst it all. (After a bit of further reading, it seems that a number of the articles come complete with links to other websites that explore the topic in further detail. Very nice indeed.)
- GamerJargon.com ~ http://www.gamerjargon.com/ : Admittedly, I don't recognise about half this jargon, but it's a simple primer on most of the gamer/geek terms that've cropped up in the last 10 years from OOC to 'all your base'. Not sure all of them are real, though.
- Uncle Figgy's Realm ~ http://members.aol.com/dwcope/home.htm Uncle Figgy! The Dear Ann Landers of RPGing. Though the site has sadly gone un-updated since June, it's still a wonderful RPG (and writing) resource. The FAQ section where reader questions on how to deal with powergamers, properly describe scenes, and create believable NPCs are covered and also a small 'so you want to be a writer, eh?' section that talks about what exactly those slushpiles are. The guides, however, are where it's at. There are five of them, written over the course of a few years, each one very indepth and must reads. 'How to GM', 'How to RolePlay', "Roleplaying for Non-roleplayers' (sort of an intro piece to show to your friends when they want to know what it is you do), and my personal favorite 'The Fantasy Guide.' To paraphrase his intro to it: "In bookstores you'll find dozens of books on how to create belivable weapons and armour, but not one on how to create a believable magic system, which is what all of fantasy writing is inherently based on." So he goes into his own ways to create your own homebrew. A *very* nice site.
- S John Ross' BIG LIST of RPG plots ~ http://www.io.com/~sjohn/plots.htm : An interesting page, even from a writing standpoint. A quick summary of the 34 basic RPG plots. Almost every single adventure ever published falls under one of these groupings. Also features common twists to each plot type, and a few links to pages that cover the topic in a more scholarly fashion.
- RPGNet http://www.rpg.net/ : More a 'what's new in the world of gaming' page then anything else, but a good place to hook into the rumor mill of what's upcoming. Also features pages on 'how to' for game creation, game publishing, as well as job offerings for playtesters and similar sorts.
- The Malkavian Web page ~ http://www.freeshell.org/~alik/malkavian/ : Malkavians are the 'insane' vampires from the WoD, and this is a page set up with some very good articles about how to realistically portray an insane character beyond the 'walks around in teddybear slippers and wacks people with a fish' (fishmalks) stereotype that seem to crop up. The page also has some miscellaneous vampire stuff, as well as a fair crop of WoD humor. The page (Malchavian Insanity, one of the first links there) where they talk about roleplaying madness is what I nominate this page for, though.
Monday, January 21, 2002
ATTBI.COM redux
Arguing now with attbi.com over why I deserve my promised billing credit of "two-days-credit-for-every-day-without-service after the changeover from @Home" for the twenty-seven days in December that my cable modem was non-functioning.
attbi.com says my problems had naught to do with the switchover, that the problems appearing when they did was just an amazing coincidence of timing and I don't deserve the credit.
I argue. They repeat their stance. I argue.
If they're selling "good will" along with their assets, their buyer is paying too much.
attbi.com says my problems had naught to do with the switchover, that the problems appearing when they did was just an amazing coincidence of timing and I don't deserve the credit.
I argue. They repeat their stance. I argue.
If they're selling "good will" along with their assets, their buyer is paying too much.
In honor of the one-hundredth bday of Barnum's Animals [Crackers]
[http://www.nabiscoworld.com/Barnums/], Nabisco will be adding another animal to the menage detroit.
Will it be the penguin, walrus, cobra, or koala bear?
RPG links galore
Collecting together links for role-players on the Web as well as newsgroups and such for the new role-playing sub-section in the Fiction section of the writing links site : http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/
- RPGHost.com ~ http://www.rpghost.com/
- RPGNews.com ~ http://www.rpgnews.com/
- Google - Roleplaying/Online Communities ~ http://directory.google.com/Top/Games/Roleplaying/Online_Communities/
- White Wolf Online ~ http://www.white-wolf.com/
- The Camarilla: LARPs &c for White Wolf's World of Darkness ~ http://vampire.tamu.edu/camarilla
- Steve Jackson Games ~ http://www.sjgames.com
- Steve Jackson Games - GURPS ~ http://www.sjgames.com/gurps
- Steve Jackson Games - Roleplayer: GURPS newsletter ~ http://www.sjgames.com/gurps/Roleplayer/Roleplayer21/
- Steve Jackson Games - Pyramid Magazine ~ http://www.sjgames.com/pyramid/
- Steve Jackson Games - Pyramid Magazine [Guidelines. Pays $0.03/wd] ~ http://www.sjgames.com/pyramid/writing.html
- Wizards of the Coast ~ http://www.wizards.com/
- RPGA Network ~ http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=rpga
- Chaz Boston Baden - Role-Playing and other SF-related Games ~ http://www.myth.net/sfrg/sfrgv.htm
- Johan Danforth - The Cave / The Workshop: generators & al. ~ http://spitfire.ausys.se/johan/
- LARPs & resources: White Wolf, Changeling, Hunter, Mage, Vampire, Werewolf, Wraith, &c. ~ http://www.bloodshadows.org/bslinks.html
- BJ Zanzibar's World of Darkness ~ http://ezinfo.ucs.indiana.edu/~adashiel/wod/wod.html
- Juha Vesanto's RPG links ~ http://www.hut.fi/~vesanto/roleplay.html
- Ring of Darkness Webring ~ http://K.webring.com/hub?ring=ringdark
- WORLD BUILDING
- Juha Vesanto's World Building page ~ http://www.hut.fi/~vesanto/world.build.html
- World-Building Email List homepage! ~ http://www.nocturne.org/world/main/main.html
- World-Building Email List's World Building FAQs (including references) ~ http://www.nocturne.org/world/faqs/w-b.html
- World-Building Email List's archives incl. World Summaries ~ http://www.nocturne.org/world/archive/archives.html
- Paul T. Riddell - on the problems of introducing plants and animals to alien worlds ~ http://www.eventhorizon.com/sfzine/commentary/riddell/1299.html
- Victoria Strauss - An Impatient Writer's Guide to World Building ~ http://www.sff.net/people/victoriastrauss/impatient.html
- Patricia C. Wrede - World Building ~ http://www.sfwa.org/writing/worldbuilding1.htm
- Elizabeth Anne Viau's World Builders course site ~ http://www.world-builders.org/
- Winchell Chung's Starmapping and World Building Links ~ http://www.projectrho.com/smap11.html
- SPECIFIC GAMES
- Wizards - d20 (including official licenses and system reference docs) ~ http://www.wizards.com/D20/
- Wizards - d20 Wheel of Time ~ http://www.wizards.com/wheeloftime
- NEWSGROUPS
- alt.games.whitewolf
- rec.games.frp.dnd
- rec.games.frp.gurps
- rec.games.frp.misc
- rec.games.frp.storyteller
Thursday, January 10, 2002
FindArticles.com is a LookSmart engine attached to a Gale Group archive of articles from more than 300 magazines/journals dating back to 1998.
The magazines available range from Academy of Management Review and Accent on Living to Worldwide Biotech and Wrestling Digest.
The collection includes Sunset Magazine, but knowing that things come and go and disappear without a moment's notice, I think I'll keep the decades of paper Sunset archives I have stashed away for the nonce.
The magazines available range from Academy of Management Review and Accent on Living to Worldwide Biotech and Wrestling Digest.
The collection includes Sunset Magazine, but knowing that things come and go and disappear without a moment's notice, I think I'll keep the decades of paper Sunset archives I have stashed away for the nonce.
Wednesday, January 09, 2002
Northern Light is getting out of the search engine biz "in order to focus on the enterprise market" says a story in Internet Week yesterday. David Seuss says "The business model for free, advertising-supported, public Web search has not been developing for us." Question is, though, do they have any idea how many of their enterprise customers came their way because they'd tried that free public Web search and liked it?
Friday, January 04, 2002
I've decided the ATTBI e-mail support is run by a 'bot. There is no other explanation for the lame cut n' paste "answers" I get to serious concerns, like (a) my mail.attbi.com mail service isn't working and (b) the Web-based mail doesn't know my account exists.
I get back a generic "this is how Web-based mail works" note from the friendly, helpful support staff.
I know how Web-based mail works. I used it while my cable modem connection was unusable through December 27th. This afternoon, sometime between 12:30P when I went down to the main house for a cold lamb sandwich and 1:15P when I returned, their mail got screwed.
Luckily, my e-mail to most towse.com addresses in existence redirects to both attbi.com and mindspring.com, so I spent the afternoon using mindspring.com's Web mail to access my VERY IMPORTANT EMAIL ON VERY IMPORTANT SUBJECTS.
After I sent back a "did you even read what I said?" note and then sent another note explaining the problem in different terms, I got a mail back the following day (05 Jan) telling me (in response to my "did you even read" note) that I should try their online support chat for help using my mail.
Next mail in from attbi in response to my second note, following closely on the heels of the "use chat" mail said, "On 01/04/2002 there was an issue on the mail servers preventing most users from logging onto the mail server to retrieve their email, Please try again, and if you are still getting an error reply to this message."
"Preventing most users?" Oh, please.
You have to wonder how much support time was spent sending 'bot messages and using staff time to answer a question that could've been easily handled by putting something on their support Web site saying, "We're having problems with our mail servers. We hope to have them functioning again soon. Please be patient."
I get back a generic "this is how Web-based mail works" note from the friendly, helpful support staff.
I know how Web-based mail works. I used it while my cable modem connection was unusable through December 27th. This afternoon, sometime between 12:30P when I went down to the main house for a cold lamb sandwich and 1:15P when I returned, their mail got screwed.
Luckily, my e-mail to most towse.com addresses in existence redirects to both attbi.com and mindspring.com, so I spent the afternoon using mindspring.com's Web mail to access my VERY IMPORTANT EMAIL ON VERY IMPORTANT SUBJECTS.
After I sent back a "did you even read what I said?" note and then sent another note explaining the problem in different terms, I got a mail back the following day (05 Jan) telling me (in response to my "did you even read" note) that I should try their online support chat for help using my mail.
Next mail in from attbi in response to my second note, following closely on the heels of the "use chat" mail said, "On 01/04/2002 there was an issue on the mail servers preventing most users from logging onto the mail server to retrieve their email, Please try again, and if you are still getting an error reply to this message."
"Preventing most users?" Oh, please.
You have to wonder how much support time was spent sending 'bot messages and using staff time to answer a question that could've been easily handled by putting something on their support Web site saying, "We're having problems with our mail servers. We hope to have them functioning again soon. Please be patient."
Revised the blogger article for Computer Bits today. Boy howdy, did I ever.
I was confabbing with the Computer Bits editor about what to do in March (something on photography on the Web, maybe to include Ray Rasmussen's photos. ???)
During the midst of this, while we were discussing some blogs I hadn't put into the article, the editor said she'd been planning on getting to editing my article this weekend and if there were changes I wanted to make I was allowed as long as (1) I didn't make the article any longer than it had been and (2) I got it back to her before the day ended.
Then, of course, I had to revamp my hyperlink lists here of what was and was not included.
I was confabbing with the Computer Bits editor about what to do in March (something on photography on the Web, maybe to include Ray Rasmussen's photos. ???)
During the midst of this, while we were discussing some blogs I hadn't put into the article, the editor said she'd been planning on getting to editing my article this weekend and if there were changes I wanted to make I was allowed as long as (1) I didn't make the article any longer than it had been and (2) I got it back to her before the day ended.
Then, of course, I had to revamp my hyperlink lists here of what was and was not included.
Thursday, January 03, 2002
Uploaded the 200201 revised edition of the misc.writing Book Turners Club List to http://www.towse.com/misc-writing/mwbtcl.htm
Added a counter to the blog and also moved a counter from the soon-to-be *poof* writing links set on towse.com to the writing links subset on internet-resources.com. http://www.internet-resources.com/writers/
Put a checkbox on the blog so users can toggle whether to pop up a new window for a hyperlink click.
Some links stashed away today:
- http://hotwired.lycos.com/webmonkey/reference/color_codes/ - WebMonkey's hex color references
- http://html-color-codes.com/ - VisiBone's hex color reference set
- http://www.bravenet.com/ - BraveNet's site. These fine folks take care of the aforementioned hit counter(s)
Wednesday, January 02, 2002
Some other sites of interest
Some other sites of interest
- http://www.idea-a-day.com/ Idea A Day "will publish an original idea every day for the rest of time. The ideas published will be free of copyright, however valuable they may be. They are there to be read, to be enjoyed, to be exploited. Whatever." ... and boy-howdy are some of these ideas "original." Need a whack 'longside of the head, creativity-wise? Here's your site. [seen in BoingBoing]
- http://www.umva.com/~clay/money/index.html Money Origami [seen in BoingBoing]
Computer Bits Feb 2002 article - links to blogs/bloggers
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