Bogieblog

Adults Playing With Legos

Remember playing with Legos as a kid? Well, here is some serious playing with those building blocks, building, er, blocks - as the historic Manchester Millyard used to be. Take a look at the video, it is amazing what they have created (trust Dean Kamen to be in on something like this).

We will definitely have to go check this out (maybe this is the tourist attraction that NH has been looking for since the Old Man fell).

Good News for Rita

Go congratulate Rita on getting a new job (one which does not involve blue vests or saying "paper or plastic?").

Way to go Rita!

Sacrilege

Is this sacrilegious and if so, you think it's something that Cop Car would put up for the Holidays?

Thanks to AMCGLTD for the link!

Talk Back

Ronnie goes on quite a diatribe against Baby Boomers.

To answer Ronnie's Question:

"And did they [baby boomers] really not watch The Sopranos? Or Deadwood? Or 24? Six Feet Under? Studio 60? The West Wing? The Simpsons?"

Here are my answers (and these answers, at least the yes/no part, are good for WS too):

• The Sopranos: No, don't even get that channel, but wouldn't bother watching it if it was on network TV. What I want to do is watch a show about a bunch of gangsters - not.
• Deadwood: I don't even know what channel it is on - Nope, never watched it. Have no clue what it about, so couldn't even speculate on whether I might want to watch it.
• 24: Okay, we have watched this, and even enjoyed one season. It has become obvious though that a person has to suspend all disbelief while watching (or do cell phone batteries really last that long except in our phones? And can one actually fly from LA to Las Vegas and back again in an hour? etc. etc.). We now watch it mainly to make fun of the obvious gaffs in the plot line.
• Six Feet Under: Um, never even heard of it so I guess that means we haven't watched it.
• Studio 60: Ditto - see previous answer
• The West Wing: Nope, never had any interest. I get enough fictional politics from the papers and politicians, why in the hell would I want to watch it in TV?
• The Simpson's: Nope, I hate having to suffer thru ads for the show. I have no interest in watching an imbecile family that has a snot-nosed brat of a kid. I don't think that show was really made for Boomers anyway, but I could be wrong.

Then Crabby gets into the Ipod issue:

There’s hardly a boomer alive who doesn’t own an iPod and they aren’t marketed to anyone over the age of 19 if the music in the commercials is any indication.

She seems to be using this stretch of statement as "proof" that the survey participants must be lying because boomers say that they don't watch (or tune out) commercials that are market for younger people; how can they possibly know about iPods? Ever hear about those things called magazines, websites, catalogs? I get all kinds of catalogs (both paper and email) from electronics suppliers. Even without watching much TV, I have no problem knowing what iPods are or where I can get them. Additionally, I must know every single boomer that doesn't own an iPod because I can't think of anyone that uses one at the present time.

Not sure why Ronnies post seemed to strike such a nerve, maybe because I have read so much lately how everything is, was and ever will be the boomers' fault (including the extinction of the dinosaurs as well as the little ice age and environmental shifting global warming on Mars).

Photo Gallery

I found an awesome photo gallery because The Weekend Pundit (Brent, not Chan) had a link to this (I think his comment was very astute; "A Dean Koontz novel in a photograph."

There are amazing pictures there: This is just cool (not the car, the affect); the landscape is just superb; the wildlife captures are so clear.

I could go on and on, but you can just go see for yourselves.

Updated Security

Nort*n Security (anyone wants to badmouth NS - don't bother. They've been good to me so I use it on my main machine. I use a freebie for the other one, but it doesn't hold anything on it that is valuable) has been bugging me that my yearly subscription is about to run out. Yesterday I went ahead and re-newed my subscription.

If you are getting ready to re-new your subscription, just be aware that ordering contains just a little something extra. There is a line on the ordering page (make sure you read the whole thing) that says: "By placing this order you consent to automatic renewal." [bold is mine - Bogie]

Shortly after is a linked "Learn more". Click on that and you will find an opt-out check box. Then complete the order as usual.

I have nothing against auto-renewal, it's just that the license is tied to a machine. So, if I get another machined, and remove NS from the old one and want to install it on the new one - forget it. So, I could possibly be automatically renewing and paying for someone else to use the product. I am not that generous, so I opted out.

I wonder how many people didn't even bother reading it and will be surprised next year by a renewal bill that they can't remember authorizing?

Service Center and Book Review

I spent 3 exciting hours in the waiting room of a Nissan service center today. I had my truck in for its 60,000 mile sevice (a major service - and yes, my Xterra is only 2.5 years old).

I was the first one to the service center, which includes my beating out everyone who works there. I got my choice of seats. The seats in the waiting room are placed in an L-shape, with a table at the junction of the l and _ portions. One of the seats next to that table is one I picked (there is another table, at the end of one of the arms, just for reference).

Each woman that came in sat as close to me as possible. One lady came in and sat on my right side (the table was on my left). The next woman sat on the left (so our knees were touching. The 3rd woman came in and sat down next to the one I was touching knees with. There were 4-5 other seats available, but they had to cozy up to me.

To make matters worse, the woman on my left was a gum snapper (and she couldn't chew with her mouth closed to save her life). She was also playing some sort of game so there were buzzes and beeps coming from the game and grunts and groans accentuating her every move. Apparently she won a game because then there was a shrill musical interlude that she refused to shut off the sound to.

The lady that sat next to the knee toucher, asked if anyone minded if she turned on the TV. Nope, fine, go ahead. She turned it on loud enough that they could hear it in the sales room (I know, the ladies room is out there) then proceded to pick out some magazines and read. Fortunately, the woman to my right was quiet and fairly non-intrusive.

Those were short-lived interuptions to my reading because they were only in for short services. The rest of the patrons that rotated in and out were men who kept a respectful 1 chair between each person (the waiting room was never so full as to need to sit side by side with anyone). They were also quiet - except the one guy who was a newspaper snapper; each page turned required a snapping of the paper - all in all, much easier on my concentration while I was getting thru the riveting ending to my book!

Which leads me to reccommending a series for anyone who is into fantasy: Steven Erikson's The Malazan Book of the Fallen series. The first Book, Gardens of the Moon, was good enough for me to buy the second book, but it wasn't anything really special (IMO). But, Deadhouse Gates (book 2 - link gives sample pages of the book) and Memories of Ice (book 3, which I completed today) were incredible. This guy can write and can get you to join the family of characters. But, be warned, these are not stories that end "and they lived happily ever after" - many powerful and favorite characters are killed off. There are also a few (very few, after all, this is a very dark series of never-ending war and rebellion) laugh-out-loud moments.

I see by the website that I am woefully behind on the series, but I have book 4, House of Chains, so I will be starting on that this weekend.

Chocolate, Bourbon, Pecan Pie

Yesterday, I made a Chocolate, Bourbon, Pecan pie. We didn't take it with us to the Thanksgiving feast (they had enough food), so we get to enjoy the whole thing ourselves. A co-worker had made it for the company pot-luck lunch on Wednesday, so I Googled and found a few recipes. As usual, I took a bit of this from one recipe, a bit of that from another, and a smidgen of the other thing from yet another, to come up with my own (which, according to my tastebuds, is pretty darned good).

• 3/4 C brown sugar
• 1/2 C light corn syrup
• 6 TBL butter (melted)
• 3 eggs
• 1/4 C bourbon
• 2 TBL corn starch
• 1 C semi-sweet chocolate chips
• 1 C chopped pecans
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 9" deep dish pie shell (uncooked)

Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees

Mix the brown sugar and cornstarch, then add in the eggs, corn syrup, bourbon, vanilla and butter. Mix thouroughly. Stir in the pecans and approximately 1/3 of the chocolate chips.

Sprinkle the remaining chocolate chips (about 2/3 C) into the bottm of the pie shell then pour in the filling mixture. The shell will be full so place it on a non-insulated cookie tray before placing in the oven. (mine did not overflow, but did rise quite a bit during cooking). Bake for 45-60 minutes or until set around the edges. Cool on a wire rack.

I always have trouble getting a pecan pie to set. With the addition of the corn starch, the setting was no-fail!

If you don't want the bourbon taste as strong, most recipes I looked at only called for 1 or TBS not as much as I used.

Next for this weekend, a pumpkin pie with either rum or brandy in it - I haven't decided which yet.

Thanksgiving 2006

We had a grand Thanksgiving spent at a friend's place. They supplied stupefying amounts of food and we supplied the entertainment; taking along the newly acquired DVD of Ice Age: The Meltdown.

The food was divine: turkey, potatoes and gravy, squash, quiche, spinach something (a quiche-type, but not quiche concoction), carrots, beets etc. Then there were 5 desserts (all homemade); pumpkin pie, Swedish apple pie, chocolate cream pie, coconut custard pie and tiramasu.

After dinner (or late lunch, as it were), the leftovers were put away and I volunteered to do the dishes. That allowed everyone who had been busy cooking to converse and gave my stomach time to come to terms with the massive amounts of sugar that had just been dumped into it (I had a helping of 4 of the desserts).

Then, we settled down to watch Ice Age: The Meltdown. Let me tell you, we love the first Ice Age movie. We have watched it 4 or 5 times. Anyone that comes over to our house who hasn't watched it, gets a free viewing because it gives us an excuse to watch it again (and that would be one reason that we rarely get to watch any new movies).

Ice Age: The Meltdown did not disappoint us. It was hilarious and is one of the few movie sequels that is at least as good as the original. The movie was a hit with everyone in the room, so much so, that we had to watch all the extras (including a vignette with Scrat, the beleaguered squirrel).

Yes, we had a grand Thanksgiving; good food, good company, good entertainment - can't ask for much more than that. Hope you had as good a Holiday too!

Thanksgiving Time

Happy Thankgiving Everyone!