pieces

http://fukung.net/v/5494/randomness_023_2.jpg

Yeah.

I love this town. Last night, a great friend came into town for one night only (right before her move from Dallas to Tempe), and we, of course, went to Trudy’s, as it is my favorite restaurant, maybe ever, followed by the Spiderhouse, becuase we wanted to sit and talk. But even though Trudy’s is amazing, I really did, for a brief fleeting moment, consider taking her somewhere else, but really, the choices were overwhelming. There is so much fun stuff to do in this town (it refuses to consider itself a decently-sized city, which is definitely part of its charm until you’re sitting in traffic), and so many neat places to eat and just hang out. It most of the other places I’ve lived (San Antonio being the only exception), I would really only have about a night’s worth of stuff that I’d want to show someone when they came to visit.

Take Baltimore as an example. Is it between Labor Day and Memorial Day? Then lunch at Golden West, with a fantastic bowl of green chili stew and a chorizo burrito smothered in green chili sauce is in order. Summer time? Then it’s off to Trinacria, a little Italian deli with cheap wine and fantastic prosciutto, mozarella, and basil sandwiches. And for dinner? Well, my choice was always to go to Annapolis for crab, but of course, that’s kind of a hike. The next best seafood can be found in Fell’s Point. And dessert? Well, that’s easy, and is easily the highlight of the entire day. Head over to Little Italy, preferably by water taxi - it’s definitely not somewhere you want to walk to. And find Vacarro’s. Hopefully it’s Monday night, where you can have all you can eat for $12.95. But really, a third of one dessert will more than fill you up for days. And these are amazing desserts. Tiramisu, Cannoli (these they ship, and they would make a fantastic gift, if anyone is in the market to get me one), the world’s best Gelati. They have something called Colosseos, which are massive waffles topped with gelato, fudge, nuts, and whipped cream. They come in 1/4 size. This is a good idea. My favorite thing is the Vesuvius. Here’s their description:

A chocolate brownie cake layered with caremel, fluffy cheesecake, chocolate mousse, served with two plain cream puffs, hot fudge, wet nuts, and whipped topping

Yeah.

Oh, and did I mention the coffee? Of course there’s the usual cappuccino and espresso, but the one I couldn’t resirt was the Heavenly Chocolate, which is basically an ice cream float, only it’s made with chocolate ice and espresso. Yum.

So, if you can stumble out, you want to head down the street and check out the bocce game. But no laughing - these people are serious. And no playing. This game is for the locals. And they are passionate. It is incredible to watch.

One of the best nights I ever had in that city involved the bocce court. Jack and I had gone on a date and I was dressed in heels. We stopped by and happened upon a game of only two people. They actually asked us to join them, and as this never happens, we of course couldn’t refuse. Four or five games later, my feet were bloody and my hands were black (I, too, get into my sports), but I’d had an amazing time.

So there’s your day in Charm City. And the next day? Go home, or down to DC, because you’ve seen all there is to see in The Greatest City in America (and yes, that really was their slogan for awhile, pasted on the boarded up row homes that would catch on fire and force the neighboring tenants to find a new overpriced shack).

Best quote I heard all day:

“His ignorance makes me feel dumb.”

That was the most amazing, cool, wonderful spring ever. And it lasted until June.

I already miss it.

You know, I like having a brain. I like being able to talk about, well, stuff. To reason things out. To have a half-way intelligent conversation, even if I can’t always remember the word I’m looking for.

I wonder what life would be like without it.

I spent time with someone yesterday (not the friend I will blog about later), and the only word that comes to mind is vacuous. Just nothing there. I would ask a simple question, and receive a blank stare in return for several seconds, followed by something that in no way related to what I had asked, and in some cases wasn’t even a sentence.

A friend told me recently that she has realized that she doesn’t want to marry anyone without a college degree. While I’m not sure that I would have that standard as an absolute, I do understand what she’s saying. I mean, you should be able to converse with your life partner, and it is nice when your ambition coincides.

I can’t imagine anyone even going to dinner with this person, much less proposing marriage.

This was originally posted on livejournal’s tech support community (also linked on the left under “Sites I Enjoy”), and it was taken down by the original poster when he got fed up with getting flamed (simply because someone thought the temperature listed was way too low - I mean, come on people, it’s a really funny story, leave it be). So I can’t link to it, but fortunately for everyone, google still had it cached:

Give me a gun, and a bottle of Tequila…

I check my work email from home before I make my morning commute, so I can see what sort of maelstrom I’m about to walk into…

If you can guess by the subject of the post, this one is a doozy.

From: $user who for whatever reason came in on Monday when no one else was in the building.
To: IT Dept.
Re: A/C constantly running.

Hi Guys,

I came in today (Monday) to finish up a project I was working on before our big meeting with a potential client tomorrow, and I noticed that there were three or four large air conditioners running the entire time I was here. Since it’s a three day weekend, no one is around, why do we need to have the A/C running 24/7? With all the power that all those big computers in that room use, I doubt it is really eco-friendly to run those big units at the same time. And all computers have cooling fans anyway, so why put the A/C for the building in that room? I got a keycard from $facilitiesmanager’s desk and shut off the A/C units. I’m sure you guys can deal with it being warm for an hour or two when you come in tomorrow morning. In the future, let’s try to be a little more conscientious of our energy usage. Thanks.

RESULT:

Fatalities: Exchange Server, Domain Controllers, a few Sun boxes that I’m not sure of the usage.

Near-Fatalities: Phone Switch, Apps Servers.

Temperature of server room 7AM Tuesday Morning: 90 Degrees Fahrenheit.

Status of Employee who sent the above e-mail: Terminated.