I should not be allowed into Wegman's, like, ever

I just got my inner geek on with that Doctor Who thing. Now my inner bitch wants some time, too.

Wegman's is wonderful - absolutely wonderful. Except during the week of Thanksgiving. Then it's a zoo. I was reminded of that the hard way when I went there Sunday to buy the last few things I needed for Thanksgiving. Some cilantro here, some oranges there, a bit of lemon juice (Emeril's Funky Turkey again - the family loves it, only I double the recipe and replace Emeril's Essence with Old Bay). And no, I found out there are no Jellybabies at Wegman's (hat tip Meg).

My GOD, those people are so SLOW to move! There seems to be two types of people who go shopping at Wegman's the fourth week of November: the ones who cannot be bothered to move very fast, and the ones who cannot be bothered to move at all. Perhaps many of those in the former category (as I found myself in) would move were it not for those people in the latter category who just stand there deciding whether or not they really need the $4 a pound navel oranges, or the $3.19 a pound navel oranges (really, what's the difference?). JESUS, PEOPLE, MOVE!!!

Coincidentally, this is also why I should not be allowed to drive, as I find myself cutting people off in the aisles at Wegman's, muttering under my breath about how some people don't know that I cannot walk through them! Actually, you would be surprised that I'm not an aggressive driver, despite my six years and seven months in California and my propensity to speed up when those people who race toward the end of merge lanes in order to cut everybody off try to get in front of me. (Only one has gotten over in the last year, ha!, and I've been around the Beltway a lot this year, as you've read.)

Now I am mindful when I'm shopping. I try my best to move my cart and my butt out of everybody's way when I'm shopping. If I have to stop in a high-traffic area, I pull over so others can get by me. I don't just stand there blocking everybody. Just imagine if someone did that on 695. "Uh, dude, stop the car right here in the middle of the lane. I need to look at the map again. Dude, is this Parkville or Pikesville?" AAAAAAAAAARGH! Just f*cking pull over or move, people! Gawd, this isn't rocket science!!!

Shopping really does bring out the worst in me. I guess the recession is good in that it has forced me to limit my supermarket visits to once a week. Otherwise I'd have a stroke right there in the produce section. Really, I need to take up yoga or something.

End of rant :)

Again with the delay in posts...

Sorry about the delay in posts. Not only have I been very busy with work and grad school, I still have yet to establish an internet connection at home, leaving me dependent upon the wireless of others. I have finally dispensed with Verizon after waiting for two fucking weeks for their repair technicians to come out and make my dryloop/standalone DSL work. I know what I'm doing, but there's only so much you can do when Verizon's "automated technician" finally accesses your fully plugged-in and turned-on modem whose DSL light is blinking and whose internet light is completely off, and cancels your technician call because to them, it's apparently "working" (I wish nothing but the worst of worldly horrors upon the man or woman who thought up the idea of that computer voice that you have to talk to because a real person cannot be bothered to do so - the same computer voice that misunderstands about 62% of what you say because you're either not speaking clearly enough because you're frothing at the mouth or are sarcastically overenunciating because you're pissed off).

So I'm back with Cavalier, my original provider. I have to pay a $35 connect fee, even though I chose to disconnect my service (long story - cell phone is all I use so why pay $30 a month for a phone I've touched about once a month?). At least they understand that, since I cancelled my service and they did not, that I don't owe an extra $70 deposit to them because I'm bad pay.

I should be posting more semi-regularly in about a week or two, by my best estimation.

I. Hate. Verizon.

I fondly remember the conversation I had with the DirecTV lady about signing up for Verizon's stand-alone wireless internet that doesn't require an active phone line to use (I just use my cell phone). She told me it would only take 48 hours for Verizon to get back to me to confirm that my connection was active.

That was 288 hours ago.

One of those most recent hours (I think it was #287) I spent talking to a very apologetic woman from India who referred to herself as "Beverly" trying to get in touch with the tech support people, only to keep me on hold for 20 minutes, have to hang up, and call me back 10 minutes later just to tell me that they closed at 5. But she couldn't give me their direct number because - and these were her own words, y'all - "They are really 'customer unfriendly **GIGGLE GIGGLE**'." I'm glad I'm not a violent person, or these tech support people would know what "customer unfriendly" really means.

So that's why, at hour #288, I'm sitting in my car in the parking lot at Towson University, hoping that all the rain-soaked people running to and from the gym don't think I'm a pervert just because I'm on my laptop, in my car in the parking lot at Towson University.

Too bad I didn't have internet access in my place (The neighbor's unsecured wireless connection? "Limited Connectivity"). I was reading Adam Roberts' summary of his demo at the Book Festival and I saw that he gave a quick review of his pasta sauce recipe. I tried it out tonight. It didn't go the way I had planned (I'll write about it tomorrow, when I can find a proper internet connection that doesn't require sitting in my car). He also has his review of Obrycki's, which Elizabeth, Julie and I all recommended that he try out on Saturday. Plus, you'll get to find out which he liked better: blue or Dungeness (he liked both, but I'll let you find out for yourself).

Frills? What frills?

Why don't they just get a big catapult and fling people across the country? Although to be fair, it's the sodas I'm more annoyed about, less so those craptastic movies. I just read an Entertainment Weekly or a Discover Magazine and never watch them anyway.

Opera is great - for most stuff

A few years ago I became an early convert to the Mozilla Firefox browser. It was light years ahead of Internet Explorer, which I still think is a particularly useless browser. It's good for one thing: checking your work email, but that's only if your workplace uses an Outlook-based email interface. Ironically, IE has now taken on a more Firefox-like appearance, with tabs and everything (the lats browser to pick up on the trend).

As of late, Firefox has been getting buggier and buggier, slower and slower - in short, more IE-like. SO I find myself going back to an IE-alternative that I used before I had even heard of Firefox. That would be the Opera browser. Currently at Opera 9 status, I found just by accidentally clicking on it that it's, in fact, much faster on the load and open than Firefox or (especially) IE.

There is one problem with Opera, though, and it's a big pain-in-the-ass if you use Blogger with any frequency. I just corrected a spelling error in one of yesterday's posts (that's me, always going back and correcting things - I just did it now to add a link), and I used Opera. Then I hit "Publish" and my post wound up looking, well, like this:



Mind you, all the photos and video and the text attached to them were centered before I hit the "Publish Post" button. This is what it is supposed to look like:

That is after I went back and fiddled around with it some more in Firefox. Thankfully, the post looks normal now. But I do highly recommend Opera over even Firefox now. But please don't use Opera with Blogger. It just ain't workin' right.

Spike in the Beltway

This news, via Kit, bugs me: Spike from TC4 is opening his own restaurant near Capitol Hill in DC. Y'all know I don't like the guy too much (just look at my live-blogs for TC4, which I'm not doing tomorrow by the way). But really, I don't like any of them too much. Richard was kind of alright but he's starting to annoy me now. But (and Kit I only thought of this after commenting on your site) this might actually mean he had to pack those knives and go before the finale. Why else would he be announcing plans to open a restaurant now? Just makes sense to me.

I wanted to find a funny video on YouTube to express my sentiments, but alas, nothing. But I did find this funny spoof on Rachael Ray. And since every day is open season on Rachael Ray, well, just watch.

From the "Duuuuuh" Files

It's a good way to save money when you bring your lunch to work with you. It's not a good way to save money when you leave said lunch sitting on top of your car for three hours before you realize it's not in the fridge.

And it was sour beef, too. With a big dumpling.

No, I didn't eat it!

From the "Color Me Unsurprised" Files

I came to this realization a few weeks ago, and now with today's results against the Rays it is official: if the Red Sox are the new Yankees, then Dem O's are the new Red Sox. You know, the ones that could always be relied on to suck? Yep, those Red Sox. Any bets on when their season officially becomes "unsalvageable"? I vote May.

The vacation starts tomorrow...

Well it's finally here. The passport is xeroxed - twice, the clothes are packed, the dishes are cleaned up and the mail is... uhhhm, oh shit, I forgot to stop the mail.

Anyway, in 24 hours I will be in Boston, roaming around the city while I wait for my connecting to Reykjavik, which then takes me to Amsterdam around 11AM Thursday morning, Nederlander time. A few things I'm hoping to see and try:

1. My first lobster roll in Boston or, barring that, some "wicked" New England seafood. Certainly it's not as good as the Chesapeake's, but whose is? :) But I'm still looking forward to it.
2. Will anyone in Reykjavik's Keflavik Airport be able to talk to me in English?
3. Trying real Dutch foods like pannekoeken with some other stuff (bacon? raisins? cheese? Apparently these are heel Nederlands things to put in your pancakes).
4. The supermarkets, where I will be getting most of my food, due to the continued slide of the dollar into the proverbial gutter.
5. Some good Indonesian food (again, easy to find in the supermarkets). It's as easy to find as Chinese is here. Nasi goreng, anyone?
   
6. Surinamese cuisine - I have little clue what it is, except the word roti keeps popping in my head.

That's it for now, except that I am going to start copyrighting these posts, just as any of you who writes a blog (hopefully) may be doing already. I thought it was understood, but since the previous one (I still have no idea how to contact the bastards) I have to threaten legal action (direct quotes that give credit to me are A-OK). Malnurtured Snay also gave me the suggestion that I go to Wordpress, which apparently will allow me to choose who links back to me or not, but that still only solves part of the problem.

Who the F*#k is Tom Courtney?

If you are Tom Courtney, could you please tell me why you're passing off my blog posts as your own, and then cease and desist from passing off what I take the trouble to write as your own?

I haven't been on Technorati in many months. I found out that I have four people who have favorited my blog (thanks, Jeff Quinton, Harmony Lameche, Teambenya and to Foodette at Restaurant Review World out in the City of Angels).

Now I found my antepenultimate blog post, Exit 27A-B from my Beltway Snackin' series. I also noticed 470 blog reactions to me, accumulated over perhaps the last year or so.

Among them I found this. Click on it to read what it says:


This is what it says (all links have been deactivated and boldfaced):

Exits 27A and B: MD-146 (Dulaney Valley Road, to Towson)

by @ 2:24 pm. Filed under Uncategorized

Tom Courtney wrote an interesting post today on
Here’s a quick excerpt
I would’ve taken a photo just to remember all the varieties and ingredients, but I felt self-conscious even whipping out my cell phone, the guys behind the counter were that close. Each slice had delicious cheeses. …

Read the rest of this great post here

It can be found here, on a website that is apparently about cell phones. I am not hotlinking it, so as not to give free publicity to somebody that may not merit it: http://www.cellamigo.com/blog/exits-27a-and-b-md-146-dulaney-valley-road-to-towson/

Perhaps I am misunderstanding. I mean if anyone who clicks on this will get to me. But I'm puzzled as to who exactly "Tom Courtney" is, or if he even exists. I don't know if this is a bot or just a stream or someone trying to plagiarize off of me. Or it may just be streaming for me, but I never asked anyone to do that, seeing as how it's on a "blog" about cell phones, getting both me and them an extra link. I think it might be some kind of spam thing, since there is no way to contact anyone on that page - there is no contact info. And the only way I can leave comments is if I register. Of course, I'm afraid if I do that I'll get a ton and a half of spam in my inbox. But I will continue to figure out what the hell is going on.

So if this is legit, contact me and discuss this at your earliest convenience. And if it truly isn't on the up and up who or whatever you are, stop fucking plagiarizing what I write!!!

Is this on the up and up? YOU decide

Various food bloggers have gotten this exact same post. I know because I've seen it elsewhere and I myself got it the other day. Being naturally mistrustful, I deleted it because I didn't know if it was spam or not. Rachel just the exact same message in her comments, so I investigated from there. It doesn't really look like spam to me. So not to be uncharitable, here it is. You decide.

UPDATE - baed on Rachel's experiences with this type of message several times a week, I'm removing the links to "Jeena"'s website. If there really is a Jeena. I've replaced the links with bold face, so as not to give her any linkage.

Hi there my name is Jeena and I have started a food recipe forum that I thought you would like to join here Click here for food recipe forum

I would love to see you on there to chat about food and cooking and you can talk about anything you like and start your very own topics. :-)
or see my main food recipe website Jeenas food recipe site

You have an excellent food website yourself and your just the right person to take part on our cooking forum, your going to love it!

Hope to see you soon- your most welcome to come and join us foodies, we are a friendly group and you will have lots of fun. :-)

Thanks

Jeena x
jeenaskitchen.com/forum

I was probably just being paranoid and silly. But Jeena has four different blogs. It's probably fine.

UPDATE 2 - With that attitude, you might be surprised that I don't give out my credit card number or click on spam messages in my mailbox or anything like that.

This spring vacation is already exhausting me...

Well my schedule seems to finally be confirmed for my March trip to Amsterdam. And my four hour layover at Boston Logan has just been turned into an eight-hour one.

And wouldn't you know it: after things are finally set in stone and it's too late to just throw my hands in the air and ask for a refund from Icelandair (which they offered to give me), I find a great deal on Kayak.com through Lufthansa for about $50 less than I originally paid. And it's a direct flight.

Okay, I think I get to say this:

RRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!!!!!

On the bright side, things could be worse. Plus, I guess that means I can go into Boston for a few hours after all. I can try some of that good New England cuisine after all. So, lobstah roll anyone?

Flying out of BWI? No problem! Flying to Iceland? No...

AAAAARGH! I can't believe it! After being cautious and buying my tickets months in advance, to fly from BWI to Reykjavik to Amsterdam in March at a great price, I find out this (right from the hestur's mouth):

Icelandair will terminate the Baltimore/Washington service effective January 13, 2008

You can imagine how I felt after that little tidbit of information. Fortunately I talked to a helpful lady from Icelandair's North America offices (located in Columbia, strangely enough - for now). They booked me a flight from BWI to Boston Logan, where I will THEN transfer to Icelandair and complete my journey to Reykjavik and Amsterdam - and viceversa. Of course, it's TWO connections each way, which will leave me very exhausted. But at least they are footing all the extra expenses. At least I can't argue with that. And I can finally mark Massachusetts off as a state I have visited, if only for a few hours.

Yes, Wednesday, they are made with real Girl Scouts

Someone didn't tell me it was Girl Scout Cookie time already. But I guess that explains why one co-worker has a sign-up sheet on her office door with the words "Yes! I have Girl Scout Cookies!" emblazoned above it. Now I have to figure out how to deftly dodge the little vultures when they inevitably start popping up at the supermarket.

Personally, I think it's great to teach girls and young women these important entrepreneurial skills - they need to know they can do anything they damn well want to (look at Hillary, whatever one thinks about her). But I still don't want to buy the goddamned cookies!

On a related note, I saw the strangest thing today at a gas station on the way to visit the folks: three little girls - or it might have been two little girls and a little boy - dressed as Girl Scout Cookies. Perhaps it was just for Halloween. But not at any time in my 30+ years on this earth have I ever seen a child dressed as a Girl Scout Cookie (the photo above, of the scary little girl being consumed by a Lemonades cookie, is directly linked from the Girl Scout Cookie Program website - I don't think I can ever bring myself to eat another Girl Scout Cookie again after seeing that). Strange. But at least it gives me an excuse to post this:

From The Addams Family Movie (1991):

Girl Scout: Is this made from real lemons?
Wednesday: Yes.
Girl Scout: I only like all-natural foods and beverages, organically grown, with no preservatives. Are you sure they're real lemons?
Pugsley: Yes.
Girl Scout: Well, I'll tell you what. I'll buy a cup if you buy a box of my delicious Girl Scout cookies. Do we have a deal?
Wednesday: Are they made from real Girl Scouts?

Further proof that Sandra Lee has lost her mind

Sandra Lee is going all goofy! And I mean more so than usual. After all, it's her Halloween episode! The woman should not be allowed near a television studio during the month of October. Otherwise, Mike and the bots would have a field day. Apparently this isn't her only attempt at holiday cookin' - check out her Kwanzaa Cake - no, I am not in any way making this up (thanks to Adam "Amateur Gourmet" Roberts for the link - I cracked up). Yep, only a matter of time before we go and commercialize Kwanzaa.

I really can't stand the woman, and she seems second only to Rachael Ray in volumes of people who dislike her. Here's Leslie's take at the Southern Social, and a particularly cruel if not hilarous post from the food network addict (and just look at all the sites that pop up when you Google the phrase "I hate Sandra Lee"). But unlike many of her other detractors, I get a sick, Mystery Science Theater 3000 sort of sick pleasure from her show - especially when it's martini time!

Anyway, her strange Halloween episode. Here she's in Scarlett O'Hara drag. Poor Scarlett has suffered many an indignity, but making eyeball meatballs?

Poor Scarlett is bent over a hot electric skillet.

Here's a closeup. Do I hear a "Fiddle-dee-dee" coming on? Oh sweet Jesus, please no.

Here they are, the eyeball meatballs - just meatballs with a pimiento-stuffed green olive sticking out of the middle. It sounds worse than it probably is, but still, if someone tells me they are serving this, to bastardize a quote from the heroine of Tara, I'd rather go hungry again.

It's Liz Taylor as Cleopatra in the Sandra Lee Show! She's plating those confounded meatballs.

You will kneel - on your knees - as I make chocolate spiders!


Wouldn't chocolate scarabs have been more appropriate? Hey wait a minute: spiders have eight eyes!

Oooooooooooh and
I said what about
Spiked Punch at Tiffany's
she said I think I
don't remember that in the film!
(kudos to whomever remembers that song)

I Despise Earthlink

Here's an exercise in futility: for the new apartment, I recently ordered Earthlink's freestanding DSL service. It clearly gives you the impression that you do not need a phone line for it to work. So I thought, "Great! I can save money by just using my cell phone instead of paying for a land line!"

So I get the package. But by the time I get home it's not on my porch. So of course, I assume it is stolen. I report it stolen to UPS and Earthlink and they send another one out.

Fast forward to the following day: it's sitting inside my apartment! Turns out my neighbor received it accidentally and safeguarded it so it wouldn't get stolen (which was very nice of her). She gave it to my landlord who put it in my apartment.

So now I call up Earthlink to cancel the shipment of the second package. And I get their aggravating automated "talk-to-the-fucking-computer" system. Why are all of these agencies using these now? They never are able to answer my nuanced questions, and worse yet, I don't want to talk to a fucking computer! And they've gotten smarter than in the past. Usually I would just say nothing and after 5 minutes of sounding frustrated that I wasn't talking, the computer would just patch me through to a human. Not anymore. They basically give you the automated version of a "Fuck you" and hang up. These telemarketers are desperate to not talk to anyone, ever.

So I frustratedly talk to the stupid computer, and after about 10 minutes get funneled to one of Earthlink's offshore help centers. Another bugaboo. Now I truly have nothing against the nice folks in general on the other end. I feel sorry for those folks in the outsource shops - Earthlink didn't hire operators in India and Pakistan because they wanted to pay them more, after all. But over the course of two or three hours I managed to talk to three different people who understood more than enough English to understand the basic questions I asked, but not enough to understand the more complex questions: "I was under the impression that I needed no phone line but now it turns out I do!" "That is right, sir, you always need a phone line for DSL." "But your website specifically says I don't!" "That is right, you always need a telephone line for your DSL service." "Could I talk to a supervisor?" (This is where I was put on hold for half an hour - I'm not kidding - hung up, and tried again.)

These folks may speak better English than I ever will speak of Hindi, or Bengali, or Punjabi, or whatever other languages they might know. And sure, it'd be fun to learn any of those languages. But if they are going to use underpaid laborers (which hurts them as well as American workers), I wish they would find folks that understand the most complex nuances of the languages being spoken. O tal vez debo hablar con la operadora española. Aunque mi español es en nivel similar con el inglés de los operadores indianos y paquistanis. ¡Ay caray!

I finally get to talk to somebody about canceling my service, and am told that I will not be charged once I send back my modem. Of course, since they sent no return shipping label with the modem they have to send one of those to me, too. But now I am having my packages sent to my parents' house, which is secluded enough that packages are never swiped off the porch (there's actually a little too much junk on the porch for a would-be thief to even think something worth taking was there, but I digress).

Fast forward to today, when I get an invoice for my Earthlink service! AAAAAAAAAUGH!

At least I don't have to work this morning (I teach a morning college class; unlike most Saturday mornings, I gave my students off today), otherwise I would be late. And, at least I'm meeting a friend from out of town at the Timonium Oktoberfest! I can drown my frustrations in some beer that actually has flavor, unlike the stuff the most popular American beers. Oops, did I say that? (I'm talkin' bout you, Coors!)