2.26.2007

Birthday weekend extravaganza

birthday

The lemon poppy seed pound cake that Val made for my birthday.


vodka

The vodka used to make the white russians we had whilst watching Big Lebowski.


Olympia Diner

The Olympia Diner where we had dinner.


Clam Roll @ Olympia

The Clam Roll I had for dinner at the Olympia.


The bowling birthday crew

The bowling birthday crew.


Bowl O Rama

The Newington Bowl-O-Rama (OPEN 24 HOURS!!!) where we bowled.


A chair from my elementary school

The bowling alley chairs that I went to elementary school with.


Fanta Grape

The Fanta™ grape soda I enjoyed at the bowl-o-rama.


Bowling beers

The beer I enjoyed even more than the Fanta.


D is for Drinks

The "D is for Drinks" button.


Bowl O Rama

The Bowl-O-Rama when we arrived.


flashlight

The flashlight tht I got from my brother. It has one switch that turns it on, and another button that changes the light from white to green to blue to orange to light green to purple to yellow to light blue to pink. The best part, though, are the instructions. And I quote...

"White light is the highest brightness. It can be applied to any illumination situations.

Red light is the most obvious and noticeable. It can be used as an warning color or signal.

Green light is the healthiest. It is good for eyesight and can be used to check map.

Blue light is the coolest and bright in the night. It can be used to relax the fidgety mood.

Orange light is the warmest. It is part of warm color. It can be used to make peace mood.

Light green is mysterious. It can be used to make strange mood such as Halloween.

Purple light is glitter. It can be used to make romantic mood or environment.

Yellow light is glaring and with good penetration. It can be used as a fog lamp.

Light blue light is the tranquilest for composing the emotion. Also can be used in camping.

Pink light is romantic. It can be used to increase the temperament and interest of life."


So there.

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Wha?

I just saw a Cadillac commercial soundtracked with a Pogues song.

What is the world coming to?

2.25.2007

34


34, originally uploaded by doctorhectic.

So it came and went. And with it came and went my 3,500th photo on flickr. BOWLING!

So proud I am of all of them.

2.23.2007

DAY OFF

AdventureWagon!

Mrs. Cupcakes and I took the day off and headed east to Brooklyn, CT. What was there, you ask? Not much this time of year, but it was a nice day for a drive.

It's on the scenic CT-169, which is nice for spring, summer, and especially fall, but there weren't many things open to visit (museums, cafes, restaurants, etc.). We took notes on things to revisit. All of the above, but also, orchards.

OrchardWagon!

We ended up heading south from Brooklyn on 169, and then taking I-95 over to Madison, CT, recommended by various locals as a destination. We ended up visiting a coffee shop, a bookstore, and a really great wine store, the Madison Wine Shop, where Rick Lewis was (and usually is) conducting a blind tasting in the back of the store. He had 6 different wines in brown paper bags, and honestly wanted us taste each one and have a discussion about what you were tasting and how you were tasting it. It was very educational. Mr. Lewis, the proprietor, has a different take on tasting/purchasing, basing his store inventory mostly on wines he has tasted and enjoyed, disregarding rating numbers and for the most part, price tags. He does factor taste and price into his consideration of value, but he truly understands that wine price shouldn't dictate quality. I highly recommend you check out the website, just for his comments, reviews, and explanations of terminology he uses to talk about wines. We bought 4 different bottles, and we've added the store to our new but ever growing list of CT wine stores, including TOAST (where things are arranged by taste) and Mt. Carmel Wine & Spirits, which has a great selection and is right by work.

We had a great day, finishing our Madison visit at Madison Chocolates, selecting a half-dozen truffles to try tomorrow, FOR MY BIRTHDAY. We got almond, lemon, Bailey's, hazelnut, dark chocolate, and semisweet chocolate for our 6 selections.

Tomorrow, I will turn 34. Also, I will go bowling.

Looking good!

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2.18.2007

Engine

I washed my car today (not pictured above) after a week of slush/melt cycle, and in order to prevent it from freezing shut, I drove it down CT-9 to Essex, home of the steam train museum. Things were pretty quiet there, but they do keep quite a few of the collection pieces outside where you can see them.

Engine

Engine

Engine

leaf springs

Engine

They also had a very fine plow.

Trainplow

This is but a tiny sampling of what they have to offer, so sometime this spring I'll have to return. They also do an honesttogod dinner train that you can ride from there, or ride the train north and then take a riverboat back south.

On my meandering way back home I came across about a dozen wild turkeys, out and about, wandering through the woods in a very expensive looking neighborhood.

Turkeys

Not a great picture, but you can see a few of them.

Now the car is relatively clean, and I'm ready for more snow, like the dusting we got this very morning.

Snow-mobiles

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2.17.2007

Episode 435, or flickr kickr

Picture 7.png

This morning, on flickr, I noticed some of my preview images were replaced with some not my images.

Picture 27.png

When clicked on, they were linked to the right images, but the previews at all different levels had a random rogue image every 20 images or so.

Picture 20.png

Some hi-res, some low-res, but extremely random.

Picture 2.png

This was the first image in my cue, which tipped me off. I also checked other accounts, and I think David had the best rogue images, including this...

Picture 33.png

...this...

Picture 34.png

...and this.

Picture 36.png

My favorites in my cue were the swedecakes racecar above, this...

Picture 11.png

...and this.

Picture 10.png

The problem had been posted to some flickr forum discussions this morning, and they seem to have figured out it was a server gone bad somehow, not a malicious hack.

Exciting!

2.11.2007

A little pot

tiny pots

We went to find the second location of Sit 'n' Knit up in Wethersfield on Saturday. Turns out they moved into an upstairs location at the Comstock, Ferre & Co., which is the oldest continuously operating seed company in the United States. The tiny pots above are from there little greenhouse room on the back of the building.

cactacular

There were also quite a few cacti and various succulents, and these cool collapsible bamboo trelli.

collapsed and expanded bamboo

Wethersfield just keeps getting better and better.

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2.05.2007

relaxing time

Friday night we saw Borat over on campus. Saturday I watched a Looney Tunes Bugs Bunny DVD by myself whilst Val was up north visiting Rebecca. Sunday we "watched" the Super Bowl, but really the tv was just on and we kept switching to Animal Planet in order to watch Puppy Bowl III.

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