Bryan's Blog

Durham

The next stop on our tour was Durham, North Carolina. From the land of horses to the land of tobacco. A pit stop along the way led us to Corbin, Kentucky; site of the first Kentucky Fried Chicken. Really it's called Sanders Cafe but also carries the corporate logo. It was an interesting little place with a modern KFC kitchen to the left, and the old cafe to the right. Almost like taking chicken home to eat.

We drove through Knoxville, TN but didn't see the sun sphere. I suppose that's because Nelson knocked it down (Ha ha!) We arrived at the destination around 11:00 PM eastern time.

Most of the vacation was spent in Durham and we did a lot of eating. People must eat after all, and why not try the local cuisine? We hit up a couple barbeque places and found out that it's quite different then the stuff we get around here. Barbeque there is clear, with the primary ingredient vinegar. Definitely a change from the Kansas City style which sometimes requires a change of clothes when done.

A lot of time was also spent touring colleges. We saw Duke, North Carolina (UNC-Chapel Hill) and Wake Forest. Wake Forest was my choice, all I really wanted was a souvenir. Those Demon Deacons don't sell a lot of stuff outside their campus. I could not see myself going to Duke or Wake Forest, perhaps UNC, but nothing beats MSU,M.

On December 4, it was off to our nation's capital.

Road Trip Part One

Prior to earlier this month I had only seen the states of Minnesota, Iowa, South Dakota, Wisconsin, Nevada, Illinois, and Florida in person. I'd flown over others, but it's always a unique experience to see the sights from the ground. So when my friend Michael Piotter asked if I wanted to go to North Carolina to visit his sister Lynnea I said I would. After all, my Tahoe needed some miles put on it. So off we went on December 1. First destination Bowling Green, Kentucky.

Mr. Piotter is a Corvette buff. Corvettes are made in Bowling Green, so we went to see them roll off the assembly line. I've never been a huge sports car person, although if I were given a 'vette I certainly wouldn't turn it down. Along with the Chevy flagship, Bowling Green Assembly Plant makes the Cadillac XLR, which would be more my style. Except for the 60K base price. We looked for an XLR on the road during our trip, but couldn't find any.

Personally I liked the National Corvette Museum in Bowling Green better than watching them being assembled. The new models are cool, but seeing Corvettes from the '50s and '60s isn't something you can generally do in Minnesota.

Other than eating at a place called Jerry's Restaurant, quite possibly the worst food I've had at a restaurant, we didn't do much else in Bowling Green. Except get lost trying to find our destinations at night. A tip for people thinking about going, there are no giant signs that say "Corvettes this way." We did mistakenly drive through Western Kentucky University looking for the assembly plant, the first campus we would visit on the trip. Although that one wasn't exactly planned.

Next stop, Durham, North Carolina.

"Phonebooth" on My Cellphone

Back in May I bought a new cellphone with many bells and whistles. It does all the cool things a modern cellphone should do, plays MP3s, takes pictures and video, has bluetooth, has the power to annoy people in theaters (I think)... All the good stuff. But the ability to play movies? Actual feature length films? Who would think it, and perhaps more importantly, why?

Today I found out that it will be possible thanks to my MultiMediaCard slot and the good folk at Sony. Gizmodo told me the story. I would never actually buy a movie on a MMC card, but it is fascinating what the "nerds" come up with.

Do you suppose they're going to have "please refrain from watching movies on you cellphones" commercials in theaters now? That would be something.

Monkey Shows

I've had it with game shows. They should be replaced with monkeys playing chess. At least the monkeys have an excuse for not knowing what's going on. I'm pretty sure the game show was designed to make the people watching feel like they belong to Mensa.

While the monkeys are at it, they can also host a show about paternity tests. That's a hot topic these days according to Maury. Sometimes it's just hard to know which one of the 20 guys is the father, and the public audience needs to know you've been sleeping around. Just imagine how little Jamaal Rasheif Abdul Smith Jones is going to feel when he gets old enough to know he was on this monkey show. He'll have to find another show to talk about what it's like. Genius!

So that's what happens when you watch daytime TV, you go nuts and need to let the world know it. I'll be back in 2 and 2.

More Toys

I've had a couple days off of work now, and if I keep going through money at the rate I am it's going to wipe me out. That's what happens when you're loyal to brands that don't believe in sales.

My computer monitor decided it didn't want to deal with the punishment I was giving it and fizzled out. It works at low resolutions, but that is subpar for a Mac user like myself. Even the menu bar is pretty to look at so it needs to be shown off. So now I'm the proud owner of a 20" Apple Cinema Display. It looks so much better than anything else, I might have to sell all of my DVD players and watch movies on the computer. I'm sure the back of this looks better than the front of yours..

Your House Needs Shingles

Does anyone remember webcrawler? How about Lycos? No? It must be true, Google is taking over the world. My Oxford dictionary defines "google" as a web search, but I'm getting the feeling that it will mean "Internet" in a few years. Why have I come to this conclusion you ask? Google Maps is the answer.

Google has already gotten into email, now their treading on Mapquest territory. And it kicks the pants off of anything they have to offer. Go on, play with it yourself. There are even color satellite images of certain parts of the United States. If it were to get any closer, sunbathers would have to run for cover. I have seen this before, Microsoft has black and white images, but not quite as close.

I need to get back to spying on the neighbors...

BBQ Pork Strawberry Shortcake

Today I tried my first Cherry Vanilla Dr. Pepper and tasted neither cherry, nor vanilla. It tastes just like Dr. Pepper to me. They like to claim that their Diet Dr. Pepper tastes just like the original, apparently that applies to anything they do. This smells like a "New Coke" ploy to me. With Pepsi trying to eliminate Dr. Pepper/7 UP in the Mankato area (and possibly other markets) this could just be a trick to sell more regular D.P. But Mountain Dew will always be the champ anyway.

Low Fidelity (Not that kind)

I own an outstanding pair of headphones. I bought them at Target several years ago for around thirty dollars. They have served me well, I can't count the number of hours I used them while mowing the lawn. Unfortunately, they are now useless in all devices except my stereo receiver. After tripping over them while plugged in, I broke the plug in half. It shouldn't have been a big deal, they were showing their age anyway. Time for a new pair.

So I hit the headphone aisle and look for a comparable set, find one and purchase. They sound terrible. They're no better than the free set I got with my CD player which they certainly should be. But of course I can't take them back, afterall they work. I just have to listen to crappy sound on rainy days like this when I have nothing better to do than complain about bad headphones.

Next time I'm going to watch where I walk.

I heart Macs

My new Mac mini is awesome. OS X is totally awesome. And the 80's rocked!

Several months ago, I had contemplated buying a Windows machine for the price, being a true Mac user though I stuck to my guns and kept using my old machine. Which is still a great machine, it's just showing its age. Thank God I'm not using XP right now, because I've been having fun this past month just playing with the operating system. It's literally amazing what it can do. My mini has been running nonstop since I took it out of the box, nearly a month ago. (Not actually, it's had to reboot for updates, but I'm not going to count that.)

Of course I can't convert anyone, it's probably time to concede that, but at least I didn't convert myself.

mini Blog

I finally got a new computer, and it only took a year. It certainly isn't the dual G5 Power Mac I was drooling over last year. Instead I bought a Mac mini. It's an eight inch square of computing power. After using the same Mac for close to 7 years, it's like the fastest thing in the world. And, it's really nice to surf the web without running into sites that can't be displayed without a modern browser.

I also got an iPod to go with it. Having 2994 songs on a device smaller than a walkman is great, the only problem is that it took me 4 days to get it all loaded. 240 CDs is more than you think. It turns out that is 8 days of music. With iTunes running in the background, I'm listening to some songs I've never heard before, or at least forgotten about. I love toys!

This might mean that I keep this blog at least a little more up to date. Then again, I haven't even played with GarageBand yet... I should get on that.

Speed

The Minnesota Department of Transportation just came up with a brilliant idea to slow down drivers in the Twin Cities metro area... Increase the speed limit. A stretch of interstate that was previously 55 miles an hour is going to change to 60. I can't tell you which part, as the argument at the table overpowered the volume of the television. The method to this madness is that the slower drivers will speed up, and the fast drivers won't speed up as much.

This is a very good idea. In fact, all highways should get a 5 mile an hour bump since it seems that speed limits are just recommendations anyway. And then I say put a minimum on all highways, the idiots driving 10 miles under the limit are just as dangerous as the ones going 10 miles over. I'm sure there's a study out there somewhere.

Bored on a Sunday

I don't really like watching TV anymore. Except for a handful of shows, nothing good ever seems to be on. Or at least anything that I think is good, and isn't that what's important; what I think? Today for instance, I could be watching cars turn left for 500 miles, or maybe an infomercial about Oreck vacuums. Oh I know, I'll flip to the ever popular movie of the day. Problem with that is, I probably own the movie.

As a kid I could watch anything. Something about the glowing screen is addicting to kids under 12. I'm sure the FDA has studies on it, look it up. How I long for a story about an alien dad who communicates with his daughter through a giant crystal clam. Now that was must see.

Jigsaw Mania

I've been working on a jigsaw puzzle for about a week now, I bought it to pass the time. These past few months I've had a lot of time to pass. Of course the first thing that gets put together is the border. In the history of jigsaw puzzles I would venture to say that none has ever been put together any other way. Would it be the sign of a serial killer if their finishing touch was a corner piece? I think it would.

This got me to thinking... do they make puzzles with no border? If they do, I don't think I'd ever want to see it. With no obvious place to start, I probably wouldn't. It would just sit there in the box.

That's a little more insight into my world. Hope you enjoyed it.

It's a dry heat

Here's what I hate about winter... the heat! I can't stand how everyone needs to be in 75 degree houses when they would be bitching about 70s in the summer. But then I am one of those people. Have you ever checked your body temperature when you're well? I have, 98.1. Maybe that half of a degree makes me need colder temperatures, it could explain it.

Spam used to come in cans

This weblog is entirely new.. sort of. I just discovered 1032 comments that don't belong. They should be gone for good now, but it was nice to know that there are so many casinos on the Internet. Along with some other products found in Vegas and the like.

I believe I have fixed the problem, all my commenters will now have to be registered to join the fun. I can't see this being to big of a problem, my fan base is not that large.

And I have been thinking of some new crazy topics lately, so I might be able to get this thing going again. Until then you can ask me for the address of an online casino.