coalcracker.net

Vote for Pat Burrell in the Final Vote for the All Star Game!

Anyone who has talked to me about food or cooking for even a minute has probably heard me go on and on about how great Mark Bittman and his How to Cook Everything cookbook are.  Bittman publishes a weekly article called ‘The Minimalist’, as well as a blog, both on the New York Times site.  Whatever recipe he comes up with each week, I usually make for myself the next week.  So it’s safe to say that I am an avid follower of his work. 

That also means I respect his opinions on food.  So when I saw this article and watched the related video over at TED, I thought he made a lot of sense.  He suggests that Americans in general eat way more meat than is necessary — or even sustainable.  He points out that nutritionists recommend we eat a half pound of meat a week…  most Americans, including myself until recently, eat that in a day. 

As a result of all this, he makes a very reasonable request – that we all try to be conscious of how much meat we do eat, and to try our best to cut back.  He’s not saying that we should all become vegetarians, or some other ludicrous thing…  he admits that even he likes a steak once in a while.  But still, until he pointed all this out, I never even thought about it.  Meat was the “center of the plate,” as he says.  That’s how I thought because that’s how I was raised.  When I would figure out my grocery list for the week, I would start by thinking “Hmm, chicken, beef, or pork?”  It’s very confining and pretty damn boring, too.

Now that I’m freed from that “obligation”, I have really been enjoying it.  Of course, Bittman’s recipes have helped a lot – I’ve made all the recipes attached to that article above (all great).  But even beyond that, I am finding myself making meals that I would have never considered a month ago.  This week I had Spaghetti Carbonara with Zucchini, with just a salad.  That was my whole dinner, no meat at all, and I didn’t miss it one bit.  Helping me along down this road are the weekly farmer’s market here in town, as well as my own vegetable garden pictured to the left.  It’s so easy to do this with all the cheap, tasty, fresh produce I can get my hands on right now.  I love taking vegetables straight from the garden to the kitchen… be it the salad of mixed greens and tomatoes I had with that carbonara the other night, or the bowl of garden peas I had for lunch over the weekend.

I’m not sure what I’m going to do when summer ends and takes the good produce with it, but at least now I’m thinking about what I eat.  Thanks, Mark.  Whether you’re skeptical or interested, please be sure to check out that article and video above.  Great stuff.

Following up on my last post from way back in March, I continue this highly original theme with this offering:

3.  Songs with police sirens in them — Man, this one is especially bad in songs that you haven’t heard before.  Talk about having your heart just drop out of your chest as you look up expecting to see flashing lights in your rear view.  The most recent offender for this would be Weezer’s confused epic “The Greatest Man Who Ever Lived (Variations on a Shaker Hymn)“.  But there’s tons of songs that have them - Thin Lizzy’s Jailbreak comes to mind.

I guess one benefit is that it makes me stop speeding for a while until my heart rate goes back to normal…

In my last post I mentioned I made a list of all the software I would need to reinstall with my fresh Windows install.  Well, here it is.  Remember that this is my work computer…  so I have a lot of programming tools and what not.  But of course I have way more “fun” stuff than “work” stuff…

Opera - My favorite web browser
Digsby - My new favorite IM client — connect to every network you can think of
DisplayFusion - For managing my wallpaper on dual monitors… awesome app
Simplify Media - To connect to my 25 GB of MP3s on my computer at home
iTunes - To play those MP3s!
Last.fm - As a music junkie I can’t go without it
xAmp Studio - For listening to XM Radio, especially Ron and Fez
uTorrent - Hmm, why would I need this at work?

Google Pack
Firefox - As a development tool more than an everyday browser
Google Photos Screensaver - Beats the flying XP logo
Acrobat Reader

Development
Editpad - Because Notepad sucks
TortoiseSVN - The best way to connect to my Subversion version control system
Visual Studio 2005 - For .NET development
Eclipse - For Java development
Beyond Compare 2 - Awesome diff tool for Windows
RealVNC Client

Other Stuff
RingCentral - Our VoIP software, very cool
MS Office 2007
AVG Free AntiVirus - The latest version 8.0 is really nice
Mozy - Essential remote backup software
Tea Timer - A dumb little timer app I use so I don’t forget about my coffee brewing

I reformatted my work computer and reinstalled Windows XP this week since it was really running like a dog.  It’s one of those things I really dread because I’m always worried I’ll forget to back something up and it will be gone forever.  But I guess I’ve done it enough times now that I have a good handle on it, because it was pretty painless this time.  I thought I’d share a few things I do to prepare for reformatting that really make things easier.

You should already have a backup. Before you even reach the point of having to reformat, you should already have some sort of backup in place.  It should be easy enough, but so few people do it.  For a long time I was one of those people…  I just never felt like it was worth the effort.  But think of it as an insurance policy… you need to invest something for your own peace of mind.  I’ve become a big fan of remote backup over the past year or two, and I definitely suggest it.  I use Mozy at home and work… it’s $5/month for unlimited storage, or FREE up to 2 GB.  Once you set it up, it’s automatic… you don’t have to worry about it at all.  I also push all my pictures to Flickr ($25/year) so they are safe as well.

Make lists. The best way to make sure you don’t forget anything during the reformatting process is to make lists.  Make a list of all the files you will need to save —  bookmarks, e-mail, address book, calendar, music, videos, podcasts, your iTunes library file, documents, pictures — the list will be a lot longer than you thought.   Once you have this list, make sure you know where to find everything on it.  Some things, like your Outlook PST file, are buried away in hidden folders.  Another thing I did was to make a list of all the software I would have to install on the new system.  Web browsers, IM clients, etc. Don’t forget things like AntiVirus or other passive programs — check your system tray icons for essential apps you may have forgotten.  Good preperation here will make the rest of this much easier.

Go download your drivers now! Although Windows supports a lot of hardware, I found on my latest reformat that it doesn’t have drivers for most of the hardware in my Dell.  The last thing you want is to reformat your only computer and then find out you don’t have the network driver — you won’t be able to go download it!  Go to your manufacturer’s website to get the latest video, audio, and network drivers, plus anything else relevant.  Back these up with the rest of your files before you reformat.

Be ready to patch. If you have access to it, get a copy of Windows with the latest service packs rolled into the installation (this is called slipstreaming in nerd speak).  Windows XP is on Service Pack 3…  if you install from an old Windows disk, you will have to download and install each and every service pack.  Windows will do this for you during installation, but it will probably triple your installation time, since those packs are pretty big downloads.  If you don’t have a “slipstreamed” version, prepare yourself for lots of downloading, installing, and rebooting.

Backup your “file list”. Even though you already have your files backed up somewhere, you should get a copy of them right before you begin the reformat to make sure you have the latest.  Copy them to another computer over the network, or to an external drive or USB thumbdrive, or burn them to a CD.  It will be much faster to retrieve them this way than to download several gigabytes of data from a remote backup.  From here you just pop in the Windows CD, reboot, and follow the instructions.  Reinstalling Windows is much easier than it used to be.  If you prepared correctly, you have nothing to worry about.  If anything happens during the install, you can always start over, because your files are safe.  I was able to get my PC back to normal in less than a day…  and it runs like new!