Twenty Nine

Happy leap year 2008!

Cold

It's cold outside.  Wind chill of 17.  Yet, I chose today to go to the outdoor cart.  Some random thoughts:

 

1.  I feel terrible for all those street cart vendors that have to stand out in the cold on the bitterly cold days.  It's already a hard enough job and on a cold day, I want to give them business, but it's hard to want to stand outside in the cold myself!  But today I braved the cold because I am having serious Europa rebellion and it's the next closest place.

 

2.  I really like that we now have a woodwind trio playing in our building at lunchtime.  We used to have a piano player.  I wonder if the piano is broken.

 

3.  I would love for a full sized piano keyboard in our apartment.  Sigh, space issues.

 

4.  We are behind on watching Lost again.  "Up to date" lasted a whole 2 weeks.

 

5.  Did you hear that American Idol is getting Beatles songs for top 12?  I hope they don't butcher it.  Speaking of Idol, sometimes I wonder if the judges are listening to the same show with some of their comments.  I am still having issues with the ringers being there, not necessarily the ones with previous exposure but the ones with recording contracts.

 

6.  I like genmai cha.

 

7.  I need to clean my office (or at least have everything in manageable order so people can find things) by March 12.  That's way too soon...

 

8.  So I got the chicken biryani from the street cart vendor and they warned me that it would be spicy, and it is but I didn't realize it was like spicy to the point where it could make me sweat.  But my tongue hasn't burned off yet.  That's good.  But it's also good because it warmed me up (and I guess is toxin releasing).  When I was waiting on line, 30 more seconds and I would have started shaking from the cold.  But I'm glad I went.  These guys are soooo nice.  I don't think I need this blanket on anymore!  Haha.

 

9.  Picking Rami over Chris on Project Runway... I don't agree with their choice.  I had a feeling that was how it was going to go, because could they really put someone in the final 3 who previously got kicked off the show?  Doubtful.  Besides, the show from the beginning made it seem like Rami would be in the finals.  I really wish it was Chris, Jillian and Christian though.

 

10.  I'm going to air out my office from the biryani and then it's back to closed door, back to work.  Hope you're staying warm!

Ice Follow-up

If you're wondering - the sedan spinning was in St. Louis.

Ice

That was scary to watch.

The Weather Channel just showed a blue sedan driving on a very icy road. It spun out of control, slid diagonally across three lanes, spun around, slid in reverse (in the direction of traffic), spun around again and seemed to stabilize. It is amazing that there was no crash (at least they didn't show one). But it was absolutely frightening to watch.

It reminds me of the time when Alvin drove us from Champaign to Pittsburgh. We were in Ohio, it was torrential downpours (and we were still on the road). An SUV not far in front of us literally spun off the road in a circle. It was like watching in slow motion and quite scary.

To everyone in this wintry mix, snow and ice - drive carefully!

Snow

Wow, it's snowing like crazy outside.

When they show the snow and icy mix colors on the Weather Channel map, it reminds me of ice cream for some reason.

From ice cream, I get to yogurt. From yogurt, I get to Red Mango. (Since Pinkberry's not really yogurt, and we don't really know what it is, right?)

The new Red Mango opened on 8th today. They gave out free yogurt from 3-10 pm. Free yogurt! Yet when I got there around 8:30, it was fairly empty. There was no line. I wonder if it was busier earlier and it just got slow. I worry though, since the location is hidden under this scaffolding that has been up for like over a year (without much visible purpose) and I don't think anyone knew it was opening and giving out free yogurt until today.

So... as much as I hate lines ... I love Red Mango yogurt (especially topped with fruit and mochi, yum). For that reason, I am telling everyone that they are open and you should all go. It's healthy and delicious. Yum.

I wish they were open for breakfast. Although maybe I should be glad they're not. It could get really expensive stopping there every morning.

Tuesdays

It's so hard to get work done on Tuesday nights. Once I start watching election returns, I can't turn it off. And I could listen to Obama give the same speech over, and over, and over again.

Yum

I wish lunch at Dishes were cheaper.  The "market table" (buffet) is 9.90/lb and, although I want to go there every day for lunch, that could get a little painful for my wallet.  But I guess if it were any cheaper, it would be even more crowded than it already is and that would be (more of) a nightmare.  I'm trying to think of what my favorite part of today's lunch was, but I can't decide.  I took pictures of the little yummy food-filled box.  At least when it warms up a little more (although it was actually quite nice at lunchtime today - 45 degrees?) it won't be such a hard walk to get to the other less expensive places that also have good food.  I can't go to Europa every day.  It's starting to get really boring.

Ads Roundup

The commercials this year were just ok. Rather than blog after every commercial break, here's a summary of what I liked and didn't like (skipping over most Fox promos and also the United Way/Parents are the anti-drug ones, because the latter are fine whatever they say). The list of "don't care" and "don't like" is much longer than the ones I liked. No surprise there, I suppose. I can't believe it took me half an hour to type this out.

Favorites

-- FedEx with the pigeons and birds carrying packages - I thought this was funny, unlike so many others.

-- Pepsi with Justin Timberlake - Funny watching JT get tossed around.

-- Trailer for the Pixar movie, Wall-e - I was laughing out loud at this one. I love Pixar movies. I love seeing Buzz and Woody talking about the movie. I loved what they had in the ad. Excited!

-- Bud Light with the cavemen - much better than the Geico cavemen. "Wheel suck!"

-- NFL Superad - is that a true story? Regardless it was fantastic.

Liked

-- Diet Pepsi Max with the sleeping people - I liked this one because we have all been one of those sleeping people at some point (at least I know I have!).

-- Trailer for Wanted - looked interesting.

-- Clydesdale with dalmatian trainer - I like Clydesdales. I like dogs. And the commercial was really sweet.

-- TMobile fave 5 with Charles Barkley - amusing. Those phone calls seemed like they were getting annoying :)

-- Doritos mousetrap - the giant mouse was funny.

-- Trailer for Jumper (and all the other ones that have been playing already)

-- American Airlines escape from company training

-- Coke - fighting between the balloons for the Coke bottle - amusing and cute.

-- American Idol with Ben Roethlisberger - that was really amusing. Looking forward to getting past the mass auditions on AI.

Somewhat Liked (maybe)

-- Bud Light fire breathing - it was just ok. The beginning wasn't very good, but the ending got a little better. For the first commercial, I was expecting something better! Made me think about that article from the paper about how the commercials this year would be sweeter and gentler.

-- Bud Light cheese run - amusing, but nothing really special.

-- Underarmour - it was fine, but I wasn't really paying close attention because I was just thinking about how Alvin really likes Underarmour.

-- G2 with Derek Jeter - would have gone into the "boring" category except the ending was nice.

-- Tide to go with the talking stain - it was ok. At least it gets across the message about the product.

-- Cars.com, 2nd ad - my ads just say "with Bones guy - amusing" and I'm not sure I remember why.

-- Sales Genie with the pandas - I liked the pandas but the accents bugged.

-- eTrade with the talking baby - the spit-up was amusing.

-- Coke with the Democrats/Republicans - cute but I think it will take more than Coke to bridge this gap.

-- Taco Bell fiesta platters - why aren't there real Taco Bells in the city?

-- Bud Light Will Ferrell.

Didn't Care/Boring

-- Bridgestone with the screaming animals - *shrug*

-- Doritos and the girl singing - did she win a contest or something? Didn't really care. Nice for her that she got a big audience though.

-- Prudential - my notes said that I didn't really care, and I couldn't tell you what was in this ad if I tried.

-- Dell - didn't care for the ad, but I liked the saving lives part.

-- Trailer for Iron Man - seemed fine, but I didn't even remember they had this on until I checked my notes. The only trailer I really remember is Pixar.

-- Garmin GPS - the only thing the ad did was make me want to go on vacation.

-- Sobe Life Water - I think this was the dancing? I just wrote "boring."

-- Yukon hybrid with the sketched ball - I'm glad they make it, but *shrug*

-- Bud Light accents - Continuing from last year? Didn't really care.

-- Trailer for Prince Caspian - started thinking about how I hadn't read the book in like 20 years and have no memory of what happens.

-- Vitamin Water - *shrug* What's with all the water advertising this year?

-- Bridgestone with people in the road - better than the other one, but still didn't really care.

-- Hyundai something or other. Boring.

-- Ford Edge with Derek Jeter - my only real thought was that Derek Jeter was now shilling for 2 products!

-- Dunkin Donuts - nice but seen before

-- Sequoia - commercial was boring but the activity would be fun.

-- eTrade talking baby again - I was not a big fan of clowns either.

-- Hyundai Genesis - maybe I just find car commercials boring?

Didn't Like

-- Audi - I think I was missing the pop culture reference at the time for whatever this was, and just didn't really like it. The sunset in Arizona after the commercial was nice, though!

-- Sales Genie, the first ad -- I wrote "meh" in my notes but I don't even remember what this was about.

-- Godaddy - of course it goes in this category. Were they really going for "go online and watch someone take their clothes off"?

-- Cars.com with that stone circle fight.

-- Corolla with the badgers in the car.

-- Leatherheads - I thought it was amusing and was waiting for the product it was advertising, but a movie? Really?

-- Careerbuilder with the bouncing heart - I think I zoned out.

-- Planters peanuts - I didn't like this one at all. I found it unpleasant overall, but the message that an "unattractive" girl would have no one paying attention to her but if people smelled peanuts, they'd be falling all over her, I didn't like at all. As if someone had nothing good or attractive about them because of how they look. Anyway.

-- Carmen Electra and the ice cubes gum - kind of lame.

-- Careerbuilder with the singing and the giant spider - yuck. Some of us do not like spiders. And that was a giant one! Why can't you bring back the chimps??

-- Bud Light with the ability to fly - it was obvious that there was going to be a plane involved.

-- Sunsilk hair - kind of boring, and I was doubtful that the featured celebs used the products.

-- Zohan movie trailer - don't even remember what this is about. Is this Adam Sandler?

-- Gatorade with the dog drinking water - I sat there, thinking aloud, "I can't believe millions of people are sitting here watching a dog drink water."

-- Victoria's Secret - I rolled my eyes. Because obviously women can't like football games.

-- Amp drink and charging the car with his body - eww, gross. And no, don't try it at home!

Congrats

I'm uploading some old pictures to Picasa, and came across this old one from the 9th Ave Food Fair last May. It seemed to fit for tonight's special occasion!

Superbowl

Yay Giants!!!!!!

So happy!!!!!

Noise

They have been trying to fix my neighbor's windowshade for like 40 minutes, and the drilling, hammering and constant banging are really giving me a headache.  Sigh.  I keep waiting for my windowshade to fall off and crash onto the heater.