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June 27, 2004
I Will Sleep Easier Tonight Knowing These things.
The Thermochemical Joy of Cooking
Myth: Storing coffee in the freezer keeps it fresh.
Truth: The daily removal of java beans from the freezer causes their temperature to change. This encourages condensation which, like prolonged exposure to air, degrades the flavor of the beans.
Myth: Putting oil in pasta water prevents the noodles from sticking together.
Truth: Starch released by the noodles as they cook causes them to stick together. Using ample water will help dilute the starch. Oil floats to the surface of the denser water and has little effect on the noodles.
Myth: Washing mushrooms causes them to soak up excess water.
Truth: Even when soaked for 5 minutes, standard button mushrooms retain less than 3 percent of their weight in water. Washing affects them even less.
Myth: Leaving the avocado pit in the bowl will prevent guacamole from turning brown.
Truth: Enzymes in an avocado's flesh become discolored when exposed to oxygen. Leaving the pit in your guacamole keeps only the portion under it green.
Posted by tbartels at 01:14 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
June 26, 2004
2,468 miles of Pure Bliss.
Ever since I was about 16 years old I have wanted to take a 6 month hiatus from life, and do a thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail, I used to hike a lot more and have recently replaced hiking with biking. I still dream about doing the Appalachian Trail someday, but maybe just not as soon as I had hoped. I never really thought of an alternative, but I came across an article about taking a mtn. bike trip along the Great Divide. Advantages? Well, it is about 300 miles longer, but it is done on a montain bike, so it only takes about 3 months instead of 6 and it goes through Canada and the U.S. to the border of Mexico, whereas the Appalachian only covers the east-coast of the U.S. Hmmm...this sounds promising.
Posted by tbartels at 03:46 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
June 24, 2004
I Found that Next Level...
Okay I have found the next level above want, it is lust, I Lust for these knives. Yes it is sick...gimme.
Posted by tbartels at 12:52 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
June 23, 2004
What Percentage of Our Lives Are "Want" and what Percentage are "Need."
I really don't need any German Goggles but for some reason I want some German Goggles. Damn those are cool. It's not like I would wear them around the street or anything, maybe I would talk myself into actually dressing up for Halloween this year if I had those German Goggles, and they are on sale for only $9.99. But really, how much of my life is filled with 'Want' rather than 'Need', once all of your needs have been met, does everything after that become a "wanted" item? I luckily can't remember ever feeling like I have gone beyond need and want to whatever comes next, something that is surely not a need, and really passed up a want a few times over and has just become some form of abundance or gluttony. Are these goggles in that same rung?
Posted by tbartels at 11:50 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
I Want to Build a Teardrop Trailer.
;)
I was reading an article about an entirely unrelated subject and visited a site that lead to a fascination. Now I have only been fascinated by these things for about five minutes, but I am enamored. I love to travel, and have always been fascinated by my mom's stories of traveling around the country with her father and siblings when she was a kid, camping everywhere they went, driving on all of the old highways, what fun! Well now I can build my own ultra cool, aerodynamic Teardrop Trailer.
Posted by tbartels at 01:19 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
June 21, 2004
The New Dangers of Flight.
Pretty soon you will be unable to bring a deck of cards on an airplane for fear of killing a watermelon, well...Cards as Weapons is an out-of-print book by a magician that was fascinated by crimes based on wit rather then brute force.
Posted by tbartels at 10:07 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
June 17, 2004
Purposely forgetting your passwords.
Instead of remembering a string of characters to access your e-mail, it is possible you would only have to know a concept that you chose from. As far as I can tell, you would be shown a series of pictures or patterns and asked to identify which images fit with the concept and upon accuratley selecting the images you would be granted access. By use of our natural instinctive imprinting process -- this is how we remember things -- a group of researchers from Hebrew University in Israel have successfully eliminated the need for conventional passwords, well okay they are about 4/5's of the way there.
Posted by tbartels at 09:38 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
June 15, 2004
Gmail puts it's neck on the line.
There has been a lot of criticism of the new Gmail system from Google mostly having to do with privacy issues, many people belive that Google will have too much power over too many peoples e-mail and that with each user agreeing to allow Google to scan their e-mail in order to advertise relevant products will open new doors to government scanning and monitoring. There is a good article on Security Focus about exactly this, the author brings up a good point about state level "all-party consent" laws. Basically he points out that Google looking through your mail from someone that doesn't know about Gmail is illegal in many states, especially in CA, where Google is based. After reading the article I realized that from another angle this could cause a problem for courts when fighting spammers, many e-mail services filter mail for Spam and will delete it before you even see it in many cases, technically this is a violation of the same laws, essentially this could render any spam prevention implemented prior to mail delivery illegal. The spam filters installed on my mail server as well as many others around the world not to mention all of AOL's spam prevention would fall under this category.
Posted by tbartels at 12:57 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
June 14, 2004
Your head asplode!
I recently saw the movie Supersize Me with Olga, in it there is a man that talks about observing a smoking person being ridiculed for the bad habit and he goes on to speculate that it is along the same lines of confrontation that might as well be applied to persons of excess weight or consumption disorders. We -- Olga and I -- have since been trying to figure out if it is possible for us on a daily basis to take it to that next level. If the fat farmers of america have a say in it we may never get our chance, there is a new lobby in Washington that is prompting "...the words "height and weight" [to be] added as a protected category [in the constitution] (with race, religion, gender and sexual orientation)..."
Posted by tbartels at 01:15 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
So many pictures not being taken.
Recently I have been craving a day-to-day camera solution, I used to carry my old Pentax everywhere I went, taking pictures of everything I could, just to learn how to use a camera. Eventually that was stolen and I ended up replacing it with a digital camera, but I managed to break that with little effort. I have been looking at the LOMO LC-A as a rugged, high quality photo point-and-shoot camera, I am alsto attracted to the simplicity and vintage feel of the camera itself. I have also been looking at the posability of getting an ultra-lite/really-small digital camera that most-likely won't break if I sit on it or drop it a few feet. Something like the JB1 that fits in a Zippo shell but doesn't have the greatest picture quality(yes I tend to be a stickler for high-res, and nice optics), and then today I discover the Rolleiflex MiniDigi, this is by far the coolest digital camera in the world.
Posted by tbartels at 11:37 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Bicycle as dot-matrix printer
Bikes Against Bush has put together a neat little contraption that uses chalk-paint to write messages on the ground as a bicycle rides by. The intent of the system is for activists hoping to speak out against the Republican National Convention in NYC. The just put up a video of the system in operation so you can see the dot-matrix bike in action, I want one mounted sideways so I can drive by a car and let them know how I feel about them almost running me over on my way to work.
Posted by tbartels at 11:17 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
June 10, 2004
Could the French be any more anit-american?
Paris has bid to ban the SUV...how wonderful.
Posted by tbartels at 07:18 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
June 08, 2004
Shake Things Up - Soycessful Campaign.
Sorry about the cheesy title. Isn't it ironic that with all of the new advertising from the dairy industry that Silk(R) Chocolate Soymilk is now the best-selling drink in the chocolate milk category....mmmmm.
Posted by tbartels at 09:42 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Lowes has got your CC secured.
It's not often that I see Gainesville in the news, but there is a story about a couple of twenty-something guys that were recently caught hacking into a wireless network at Lowes in several South-Eastern cities, Gainesville being one of them. They mention that the guys were all members of the "local 2600 scene" and at least mention it in a respecable light, saying it is an "informal collection of technology aficionados." Which is probably one of the best descriptions I have heard, but it doesn't do much to make the case against the case that everybody involved with 2600 isn't malicious.
Posted by tbartels at 09:19 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
June 04, 2004
New Seattle Public Library Building
I can remember being in classes four years ago when people started talking about the Seattle Public Library Building by Rem Kookhaas OMA. The original concept for the building was a stack of books, the result is pretty nice, and I have a feeling it looks better in person that it does in the pictures.
Posted by tbartels at 02:43 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
June 01, 2004
Cooking up a Storm
I alwasy figured I would be a better cook if I really understood why different processes were necessary at different moments, now there is a show just for me. And if you were ever looking for a new purpose for all those ecess legos you have sitting around you can always make some Mathematical Sculptures.
It was a good 3-day weekend I spent most of it reading about Fermat's Last Theorem, it is a really interesting story and I am facinated by the idea of a book/story that follows the life of an object or idea rather then the life of a person, in the vein of 'if these walls could talk' i guess. On Monday I took Jason Mtn. Biking for his first time on an actual mtn with a bike, I think he is hooked. ;)
The host of the cooking show has a website of his own...very cool.
Posted by tbartels at 09:28 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack