In Maine

I'm on a not-quite-a-vacation trip to Maine this week. I flew up for a Halloween party at a friend's place near Portland and I'm staying the week at my parents' house before flying back on Saturday. Since they FINALLY got high-speed Internet earlier this year, I can work from their house. The weather (except for the rain storm when I flew in) was gorgeous on Sunday and Monday. Sunny, cloudless skies and temps near 60. It's overcast today and 36 deg at this moment.

Unfortunately Tara had to stay back in Phoenix. She has her college courses, work, and is dealing with pneumonia or worse. Hopefully her doctor will be able to give her some antibiotics that work today. She was taking a Z-pak but they didn't help at all.

I played some disc golf in Sabattus yesterday. Given that I was using all disc that I literally found along courses in Dallas over 5 years ago and hadn't played in heavily forested areas in 2 years, I did pretty good. I only played 9 holes since I was running late and had to be home for our 6pm dinner reservations at Solo Bistro in Bath.

Solo Bistro was excellent. I'd read about it a couple years ago but hadn't been back to try it. In the meantime, my sister started working there and has raved about it. I was going to go with her and her husband, but child care proved elusive, so I went with Mom and Dad. We had a great time. Everything we ordered was outstanding.

Beet and cabbage soup

Organic greens salad with balsamic vinegarette

Tomato and cheese tart


Grilled crevaille, ocotupus, and shrimp with carrots and sweet potato/yukon gold potato puree

Grilled flat iron steak with homemade steak sauce, steak fries, and salad

Corn-crusted halibut, cabbage slaw, carrots, and the same potato puree

Warm Maine apple dumpling

Molten mocha cake with candied pecans and caramel

Rustic Cafe - North Phoenix

Tara didn't finish her bacon.

That should be a clue about how much we enjoyed our first visit to Rustic Cafe, a new restaurant just north of the 101 on Cave Creek Road. A friend let us know about a 90% off sale at Restaurant.Com and I noticed that Rustic Cafe was on there, so I grabbed one so we could give them a try.

Mistake. Big mistake.

It's actually a cute little spot, with around 20 tables or so. Service was very friendly and helpful. The menu is quite extensive. In addition to typical breakfast and lunch items, they also have Lebanese, Italian, and Mexican sections on the menu.

Since we had to order at least $20 to get $10 off, we ordered quite a bit. Tara got biscuits and gravy and a double order of bacon. I ordered corned beef hash, sausage, and a cinnamon roll for us to split. We each got a Coke. Shortly after ordering, our waitress came back and said someone had ordered five cinnamon rolls earlier and they were out. We ended up getting a chocolate muffin instead.

The chocolate muffin seemed pre-fab, like they'd run across the street to the nearby Costco's pastry section. It was exceedingly generic.

Tara's biscuits and gravy was a large serving that looked like it had waited a few minutes before it was brought out. The gravy had already cooled enough to have a skin over it. It had large chunks of sausage in the gravy which Tara liked. The gravy lacked any real flavor, however. Even after liberal seasoning with salt and pepper, it was still very bland. Her double side of bacon was a generous amount, but again, it was flavorless. She didn't finish it and this is a person who plots to steal any leftover bacon she sees restaurants, regardless of whose table it is on.

My "hash" wasn't. I've had corned beef hash all over the country. Generally it's actual hash: corned beef and vegetables that have been run through a meat grinder or chopped up finely and mixed together. Rustic Cafe's "hash" was slices of thin, fatty, and rubbery corned beef, slices of pepper, and slices of onion on top of horrendous home fried potatoes. I even asked the waitress to verify that this was the corned beef hash that I'd ordered. She said it was. It was awful. The potatoes ranged from over-cooked potato chip-like slices to pieces I couldn't get my fork through but still tasted slightly raw. There was no consistency. The corned beef was chewy to the point if being inedible. I eventually just gave up. The two eggs I'd asked for over-medium were just not good. And nothing had any flavor. I'd smelled a t0-go order of the hash as it went by me and it smelled great. The dish I got? It completely lacked any seasoning. The toasted english muffin on the side wasn't bad. The sausage? It had the uniform size and unnaturally smooth edges like it came directly out of a Jimmy Dean package. It also has no flavor and a slightly odd texture.

So yeah, we were thoroughly unimpressed with the food. Which is a shame, as we love Mom and Pop local joints, especially ones this close to home. Tara said that the sandwiches we saw other diners eating all looked really good, and said maybe she'd try those sometime.

That is, until both our stomachs started to feel queasy within 10 minutes of us leaving the restaurant. Mine was unsettled for the rest of the afternoon and Tara's is still not quite kosher. She said she felt like she was going to throw up all afternoon. I wasn't that bad, but I definitely was under the weather.

We still have another $10 gift coupon, due to a snafu when I was ordering them. Luckily it was only $.40.

Expanding the Collection

I've since added to my Goodwill collection after this past weekend. I had some pretty good luck for the most part. I found a battery for my laptop that gives me more disconnected time than either of my current batteries. I got an Dish network DVR-equipped receiver that I scavenged the 160GB hard drive out of. I did get a very recent DirecTV DVR, but unfortunately it's 320GB drive was DOA, so I returned it. I also grabbed another AS-IS original Xbox for cheap. It's DVD drive didn't work, but swapped it out with the drive from my flaky Xbox and it works great. Very quiet as well. Since I was still within the 14-day return period for the second Xbox I got (after the flaky one died), I returned that for a nice store credit for future visits.

The major bummer of the weekend was when I bought was was supposed to be a wireless network card for a PC, but inside the box was just a crappy modem. That was returned as well. I was very unhappy about that pig-in-a-poke.

As Tara says, I probably have a Goodwill addiction. I'm not sure I can really argue. It's like a Valley-wide treasure hunt. :)

The Goodwill Collection

I have sort of become a Goodwill addict. Tara I think just humors me on the 1/2 off weekends that the Phoenix stores have. I figured I'd try to go from memory (failing though it be as I approach my fourth decade in a few months) and compile a greatest hits of what we've found there.

Summer of 2000 Indigo iMac (works great)
Memory chips for said iMac
(2) Original Xboxes (I got the second one on Thursday after my other one crapped out. I couldn't leave my Halo game in the middle.)
PS2 video console
Older, but unused, barebones mini-tower with a 2.0 GHz Celeron and 128MB RAM
(2) roller computer bags
HP 6840 Wireless printer
HP 2500 Color Laserjet printer (status unknown, but it was only $5. need a yellow toner cartridge)
4-cup KitchenAid coffee maker
KitchenAid Coffee Grinder
Brother Intellifax 770 fax machine
PS2 controller
Xbox controller
New-in-box waffle iron
Tons of beading supplies for Tara
Lots of clothes (shorts, shirts, jeans, skirts, blouses)
External FireWire drive case
External USB/FireWire DVD burner
Large black Epicurean composite wood cutting board
Hand mixer
Purse for Tara (her old purse actually broke just outside a Goodwill as we were entering)
60 GB laptop hard drive ($5. Awesome deal. I just wish the other two I got with it hadn't been DOA)
Delonghi hot water pot
Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurty
Several loaf pans, both non-stick metal and glass

I'm sure I'm missing some stuff. None if it is really cutting edge, but most is quite useful. For instance, the external DVD burner can be used with my ThinkPad to burn DVD images. The standard optical drive only burns CDs. Previously, I had to use one of my desktops (the last of which died months ago due to a bad BIOS upgrade) or Tara's laptop. Now that I found the old/new barebones, I once again have a desktop. I've upgraded the processor to a slightly newer Celeron D CPU (courtesy of Bookman's, my second favorite used computer parts source) and installed more memory (some also from Bookman's. Turns out I had compatible memory but didn't know it.) I just now was able to install Mac OS X 10.5.2 on it, so I've got a working Hackintosh as well. That leaves the status of the iMac in limbo, as the Hackintosh is MUCH faster. It's not as pretty, though. :)

The kitchen stuff has been very helpful. The cutting board is great. The coffee maker doesn't give the coffee a strange taste like our other one . Tara drinks coffee, so I took her word on it. The Delonghi hot pot is awesome. Boils water in 2 minutes. It looked nearly new when I got it. The coffee grinder is perfect for grinding spices.

I've had a few misses, as well. The two SATA laptop drives were toast, which sucked. They were a huge steal at $10. Some clothes didn't fit right. Luckily Goodwill has a great return policy. You get your refund on a Goodwill gift card (at least that's how it is done for the Central AZ Goodwill stores) that is good at any of the Central AZ stores.

I've also seen some deals that I had to pass on for one reason or another. I saw a great little Dell laser printer, but since we already had four printers in the house, not much need for it. I saw three TiVos this weekend that would have fed my TiVo addiction nicely, but I've got nowhere to put them. And I'd be single again if I'd bought them.

Hell, I was already on THIN ice for the Xbox on Thursday...

Highly-recommended Sci-Fi: Torchwood: Children of Earth

I'm a huge fan of science fiction and growing up in rural coastal Maine in the 70s/80s, it was scarce on TV. The various New England PBS stations did air Doctor Who, and I got hooked on it's cheezy effects and charms.

Fast-forward to 2005 and the BBC re-launches Doctor Who with vastly improved, but still somewhat hokey, effects and some stellar writing and acting. After his great guest shot starting in "The Empty Child"/"The Doctor Dances", Capt. Jack Harkness (John Barrowman) was given his own more adult spin-off, Torchwood (an anagram of Doctor Who). With far less happy endings and much more moral ambiguity, it had a distinctly different vibe and tone than the generally more fun-loving Doctor Who.

After two seasons, Torchwood was moved to BBC1 ( I guess the more prestigious BBC channel) and given a short, five episode third season. It was aired as a "Five Night Event!" miniseries last week here in the States. And it was amazing. If you are new to Doctor Who and Torchwood, I'd recommend watching at least the DW eps involving Capt. Jack and Torchwood itself prior to watching. Otherwise, given the dense mythology of essentially TWO series, you'll be lost. Once you are up to speed and dive in, you'll be hooked. It's better than the previous two Torchwood series and even most Doctor Who episodes. It grabs you and just doesn't let up. And unlike me, you can watch it all at once on the just-released DVD sets: http://www.amazon.com/Torchwood-Children-Earth-John-Barrowman/dp/B002BVYBJW/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1248801656&sr=8-1

You'll be better off not reading any reviews or recaps of Children of Earth. It's best to see it unspoiled. Suffice it to say, it's probably something that could never have been made for American TV. And that's a very good thing.

Here is the minimum you need to watch for Capt. Jack background. Series 2 of Doctor Who features tons of Torchwood bits, including how it's founded, it's FAR future, and other background that is more or less covered in early Torchwood episodes. I'd recommend watching all the Doctor Who just because it's excellent, although it does have some dud episodes like all shows do.

Doctor Who Series 1 (w/Christopher Ecclestone): "The Empty Child" through "The Parting of the Ways"
Torchwood Season 1
Doctor Who Series 3 (w/David Tennant): "Utopia"/"The Sound of Drums"/"Last of the Time Lords"
Torchwood Season 2
Doctor Who Series 4 (w/David Tennant): "The Stolen Earth"/"Journey's End"

"We can't sell computers anymore"

That is a quote from a worker at a Goodwill we went to this past weekend. It seemed like it was for anti-identity theft purposes. I thought it funny because I bought the iMac a couple months ago and it still had the original owner's fully-functional hard drive with data and I see hard drives all the time at the various GW stores we frequent.

It was even more ironic because at the next store we went to after that one, there was what looked like a brand-new computer tower case. Upon further inspection, I saw that it had a motherboard inside as well. I couldn't figure out how to open the case easily, so I couldn't look inside. This was also the first GW store that had no computer monitors at all, so I couldn't plug it in and see what happened visually. Luckily, I'm a stubborn cuss. I plugged the case in over at the electronics testing bench and heard a successful boot beep. No glaring sounds indicating missing or no memory or anything. Since it was marked at only $17.99, I snagged it. Hell, the case and power supply alone were worth more than that.

Once I got home and plugged it into my monitor and booted it, it came up as a Celeron 2.0GHz with 128MB RAM. Not exactly a powerhouse box, but it did indeed work. I figured out how to pop open the case and it looked pristine. I'm guessing it's about 5 years old judging by the motherboard and BIOS on it. As far I can tell, it's never been used. There's no dust inside, all the metal covers for the drive bays were still in place, and the power supply's cables were still wire-tied together. It just needed drives (which I have in abundance) and more memory. A trip to Bookman's in Mesa later and I had 1GB of RAM for $20. Of course later that night I was grabbing one of my old video cards to install and found that I already had memory that would have worked. D'Oh! So I installed as much memory as I could and started installing operating systems. So far, it runs Windows 7 RC1 and Ubuntu 9.04 "Jaunty Jackelope" fine. It's got a small wind turbine of a case cooling fan that is quite loud, but otherwise it's a great little box.

They might not sell computers (whatever, dude) but I've had some pretty good luck there. Granted none of it's cutting edge, but it's fine to mess around with for fun.

Project iMac

My first computer was a brand new Apple Mac SE with a whopping 20MB hard drive for my birthday my senior year of high school. At the time, that hard drive seemed HUGE. Not so much today.

Through most of my college years, I had the trusty SE with it's 9" B&W monitor and massive Imagewriter II printer. I eventually got an accelerator card for it and maxed out it's RAM at 1MB. During one of my "extra" senior years at WPI, I upgraded to a Centris 610 with a huge 13" Sony Trinitron monitor. Many a game of Hellcats over the Pacific with my Gravis mousestick were played.

Soon after graduation, I got a job at a small local computer store in Maine and learned the art of building an IBM-compatible PC. At some point I sold the Centris went fully to the Dark Side as PC user. Since '94 or '95, I haven't had a Mac.

A few weeks ago, I was poking around a Goodwill in Gilbert, AZ, and came across an Indigo iMac. I grabbed a power cord from a nearby rack and plugged it in in the testing area. I booted immediately and everything seemed to work fine. I'd been looking for a project to amuse myself during my spare time, and for $25, I couldn't pass up the little guy.

I found a Mac-compatible keyboard at another Goodwill near home and with one of my old USB mice, I had myself a fully-functioning, Summer of 2000 iMac G3 350Mhz in all it's glory. Mac OS 9.0.4 on it's 7GB hard drive with 192MB of RAM. I researched the latest compatible OS the little G3 could support and it turned out to be OS X 10.3.9. I was able to round up the install discs and after installing a larger hard drive I had hanging around, I got it installed no problem. I found a faster system board on eBay located in Queen Creek, and after verifying it was a compatible board, I bought it. The part number said it was a 450MHz board, but it turned out to be a newer 500Mhz board. The board also added FireWire and had double the onboard video memory. I swapped it out and it runs 10.3.9 pretty well.

I'm still trying to track down some compatible memory to max it out at 1GB of RAM, but it's turning out to be quite an ordeal. The first place I tried to order from "lost" my order, but I later found it wouldn't have worked in any case. A couple days ago, I got a call from my credit card company and the card that I tried to use had a ton of suspicious charges. Go figure. Luckily they rejected most of them and have filed fraud claims on the remaining ones.

The second company I tried to order from (the memory was explicitly listed as Mac-compatible) never charged my card or shipped memory. I tried calling and emailing, but they cancelled the order with no explanation. Great company, huh?

I found some that seemed to fit the bill, but when it arrived, the iMac didn't recognize it. I found a stack of memory chips at a nearby Goodwill yesterday, and was able to marinally increase my memory. I've loaded OS X 10.4 on it, but it runs pretty slow, as it is using all the available physical memory. I'm going to keep looking once I get paid again.

I did get a kick today when I was looking around a nearby pawn shop and found a much older Tangerine iMac marked at $100. Mine is way faster and I haven't spent nearly that much.