Ravings of an Intermittent Fool

This Ask Metafilter post really lays it out on how you can assign a keyboard shortcut to a bookmark in Firefox. This is really great because I have a few bookmarklets that I use all the time and quicker access to them is great. I should add that you should only edit your prefs.js file while Firefox is closed because the browser overwrites the file when it exits, thus clobbering ths change that you make. Otherwise its a pretty easy to implement change.

OK, here is a little, horriblly geeky joke in a form of a picture. I took this photo at Microsoft SharePoint 2007 conference a few months ago. This was at the bird of a father luncheon. Isn't it apropos that a tool like Groove that supports disconnected, asynchronous collaboration would have a table that had no people at it?

OK, yeah that was pretty geeky but I get a few people out there laughed.

Priapic - Phallic or relating to or preoccupied with virility or male sexual excitement

The Double Down Saloon, how did I miss this place when I was in Vegas. Not only are they the home of the Bacon Martini, they also have Ass Juice!?!?!?!

Looks like I need to make another trip to Sin City.

It was good to see that awful hole in the ground on Cincinnati's riverfront finally filled in with something. Granted it is only temporary but it is better than nothing. If you haven't heard, Cirque du Soleil's Quidam is coming to Cincinnati. Like all their shows, it is a bit pricey but from what I hear, they always put on a good show.

More photos of the tents and their trailers are in my gallery.

29-Aug-2006 Update: I now have a review of the Cincinnati performance of Quidam.

Although this car is from Virginia, it seems apropos that I spotted this license plate in Surfside Beach, SC.

Its very cool to see that a company Monolith MC is offering pre-built, pre-configured DVR machines that are based off of MythTV. One wonders how much support and maintence is required to keep a machine like this running. If my ReplayTV ever dies completely this might be a good solution.

( via PVRBlog )

Decolletage - the low-cut neckline of a dress

Cognomen - A name, especially a descriptive nickname or epithet acquired through usage over a period of time.

Not sure when the last time my gutters were cleaned out but yesterday, I swore I was pulling out Peat Moss. Crazy amounts of it. I am completely not looking forward to Fall when all the leaves come flying down. This is going to be a serious undertaking.

Angela and I recently tried out Nectar, one of the newer resturants to open in Mt. Lookout Square. The resturant is located on the same side of the street as Zip's but much closer to where MLT's is located. The resturant is organized as a simple rectangle with a small hostess section in front of the doors that had a very neat alcove covered in broken ceramic tile mosaic. Sadly, this is the most distinctive decoration that I remember and its not visible when you are dining. The tables are arranged in three columns with wooden benches lining the walls. This is laid out much like Cumin in Hyde Park except that Nectar is about twice as large.

Next, I'll describe the food which in a way seems kind of silly since the menu seems to change quite frequently. Case in point, the menu described in the CityBeat review is different than the menu that is posted in the resturant widnow and is furthermore different than the menu that we received when we sat down. Dinner service started off with some delicious bread, butter and a selection of olives which was a nice change of pace. My only complaint is that Nectar chooses the fancy bread guy approach in terms of service (he comes around with a basket of bread and serves you a piece with ridiculously large tongs). The bread guy was inattentive and didn't reappear for the rest of the evening. That's a shame because the bread had great flavor and hugged the line between soft and chewey.

Angela had a hanger steak with mashed potatoes, crimini mushrooms and a nice sauce. It was prepared very perfectly and presented on a long white rectangular plate. It looked very chic. I very much wished that we had some extra bread at the table because the leftover sauce on the plate would have been phenomenal with the bread.

I had a duck breast that was served on top of a lentil cake with a blackberry compote and some shaved fennel. Unfortunately in my mind the blackberry, while sweet and different, overwhelmed the duck. This was a shame because the duck was expertly prepared and absolutely delicious on its own. Likewise, the lentil cake was delicious enough for me to eat by itself.

We were too stuffed to have desert but we did see the couple next to us order a few and they appeared to be of the "architectually grand and complicated" school of deserts rather than simple concotations that pack much taste and texture. I'll just leave it at that since I didn't get to try them.

As for atsmophere, the place felt very plain and the noise levels bordered on excessive. The one open room really amplified all the comversations of the diners. It was hard to have a conversation without resorting to raising your voice. In addition to this, I felt the service was a bit stuffy (along with the aforementioned inattentiveness). I'd like to see the place lighten up a bit (both in decor and in tone of service). This I think would help keep people's attention on the food which was quite good over all.

Bollard - One of a series of posts preventing vehicles from entering an area.

What a clever idea, crushable concrete. Basicly it is a concrete mixture that supports the weight of normal people but collapses under the heavy mass of an airplane. This acts an invisible barrier to stop runaway airplanes from doing serious damage to surronding areas of airports. This seems like a great idea.

What is the deal with this? What mainstream Internet retailer decides to take their site down in the middle of the day on a Saturday? This is the bricks and mortal equivilent of doing construction on all of your stores in the middle of a shopping day. Arrrggh.

As I mentioned a few weeks backs, Cirque du Soleil's Quidam has come to town. I had the good fortune to see them over the weekend so this is my review of the show.

The first thing that you will notice about the circus site is the large purple and yellow tents. These things are works of art by themselves. Its pretty amazing that they can take an empty field and turn it into a highly sophsticated stage to perform circus acts. As you get up close you can see the massive bolts and pilings that are sunk into ground to keep the tent from blowing away. Once you are in the tent you will notice that the seating arrangements are about 280 degrees around a circular stage. Behind the section of the stage that has no seats is a roughly rectangular stage. From what I can tell, all seats have a good view of the circle but a more limited view of the rectangle. What this means in terms of the show is that you will get to see the circus and clown acts completely from everywhere but perhaps miss out on some the "performance art". This is because all of the circus acts occur on the circle (which is a rotating turntable by the way) or above the circle. On ocassion, the rectangle will be occupied by what can be best called people during performance art. There are lots of costumes and people walking around but I frankly don't think you are missing out on a whole lot because while these people are supposed to be advancing the plot line of the story, the story is pretty incomprehenible. So sit back and watch the amazing visuals and gawk at what your fellow humans have been able to train their bodies to do.

As for the actual show, it is broken into two sections roughly an hour la piece with a 30 minute intermission. You will be pleased to know the the tent is air conditioned which for August in Cincinnati is an absolute must. Generally speaking, the high intensity or amazing circus acts are alternated with more whimsical "performance art" segments or some modern clowning. It was good to see that you can take the essence of what it means to be a clown and ditch the cliched hats, makeup and shoes and actually do some good physical comedy with the audience members. Also, most of the crazy awesome circus acts like twirling on suspended ropes or rings or performing what amounts to a pommel horse routine on a small stakes in the ground, while the platform rotates were all spectacular. The strength and grace that these performers have is other worldly.

Speaking of the suspended performers, I should mention that the biggest, most striking thing that you see when you enter the tent is five tracks set in a large arch over the stage. On these tracks is an ingenious set of trams and pullies that the circus uses to have performers enter and exit the stage as well as lower them to the floor. It was pretty amazing just watching that piece of aparatus work.

No review should be complete without saying what I didn't like. I was a bit disappointed that the theme/story of Quidam wasn't very evident and it didn't provide any sense of why I was seeing what I was seeing. At a normal circus, this isn't a problem because you are just seeing strength and grace on display. But Cirque du Soleil presents itself as more than just a circus act and its that more that I found a bit lacking. Perhaps if I just treated it as surreal experience and left it at that I might be happier. Also, while I didn't get anything to eat or drink, I was a bit disappointed the food selection was pretty low brow a la standard movie theater fare. Somehow I expected the sophisticated french circus would offer more choices. Perhaps some pate with my popcorn. Lastly, I was told by my wife who has seen La Nouba in Florida that a lot of the technical acts that are on display aren't exactly unique to this show. What is unique is the styling and performance art pieces. Also, this is on a much smaller scale than what is offered at their permenant theaters.

All in all, I can recommend this experience eventhough I pointed out the caveats. Perhaps if you have seen other Cirque performances in Florida and Las Vegas this will underwelm you but for those who haven't this is certainly cheaper to see the show locally then to travel to the other side of country.