I hit my peak weight of 208 pounds last fall. Between us, Rochelle and I have gained more than 60 pounds since we met each other. At the end of last year, we resolved to do something about it.
I hit my peak weight of 208 pounds last fall. The photos of me from our trip to Tequila are painful to look at. Between us, Rochelle and I have gained more than 60 pounds since we met each other. At the end of last year, we resolved to do something about it.
Today, after about six weeks of more moderate and healthy eating, I weigh 188. I’ve lost 20 pounds! (However, looking in the mirror, I either need to hit the weight machines at the gym really hard, or lose another 10 pounds.)
I’ve been fairly successful by concentrating on only a few things:
Eat far less processed food (and we’ve cooked a lot at home to achieve this).
Minimal carb intake (but not Atkins-style meat/fat gluttony).
Don’t drink alcohol during the week (and beer is right out, at all times).
I came to these by combining advice from David, our friend who has lost over 100 pounds, on his own plan that is basically “No Processed Foods!”, and the Phase 1 and Phase 2 food guidance from the South Beach Diet (which is a lot more healthy than Atkins, and not bad at all for a fad diet).
All things considered, my “diet” hasn’t been that painful. I’ve gorged myself on pizza twice (once for the Super Bowl, once for the Duke-North Carolina game), eaten well most of the time, and certainly gone drinking plenty often. A little more exercise wouldn’t be a bad thing, though…
Last week we had a reunion of our group that went to Tequila. (Actually, it wasn’t so much a reunion as a reenactment; five people passed out at the host’s house, two of them were Rochelle and I.) A couple of days before the party, I put together a terrific DVD of the trip, using photos from all the participants, and iPhoto and iDVD for Mac OS X.
Last week we had a reunion of our group that went to Tequila, to tour the region and visit the fabricas that make the distilled spirit we love so much. Actually, as Martha described it the next day, it wasn’t so much a reunion as a reenactment. Five people passed out at the host’s house, and only one of them was the host. (Two of them were Rochelle and I.)
But the point of this posting is the DVD I brought to the party. I collected 1,400 photos from the folks who went on the trip, and organized them down to about 750 photos broken into 10 slide shows, using iPhoto for Mac OS X. Then, using iDVD, I was able to build a kick-ass DVD of the slides, which we spent an hour watching and laughing hysterically at during the party.
There are definitely some defects in iPhoto and iDVD, that made the task harder than it should have been. But given the amount of material I started with, and the quality of the finished product, it’s amazing that I was able to put it together in just a couple days. Especially since I had never used iDVD before this project. iDVD is an amazing piece of software.
There were a couple bugs in the disc I burned for the party, that I’ll fix some time next week for a 1.0.1 release. But then I get to add iMovie into the equation, and really put on a show, with better transitions, better control of timing to the music, and most importantly, captions for all the crazy photos. Should be a blast.
Last week I signed up for a new ADSL account with Speakeasy, a top-rated ISP providing service in the Bay Area. Over the last five days, just about everything that needed to happen has happened, except for receiving the new DSL hardware, which is “out for delivery” according to UPS’s package tracker. I will probably have it up and running later today — at nearly 8x the speed of my current SDSL connection!
Last week I signed up for a new ADSL account with Speakeasy, a top-rated ISP providing service in the Bay Area. Over the last five days, just about everything that needed to happen has happened, except for receiving the new DSL hardware, which is “out for delivery” according to UPS’s package tracker.
The reason for the change is simple: we signed up for DSL after I moved in with Rochelle, at the end of 1998, when it became clear that our needs for internet access could not be met by a single phone line. “When are you going to be done with the internet?”
Back then, only one provider covered our neighborhood, and even then, only with their more expensive business-class SDSL service. With no other options, we signed up for it. We’ve had the 192/192Kbps service for about five years now, and neither the price nor the speed has changed.
Even once other DSL options came to our neighborhood, they initially weren’t much better, or cheaper, than what we had, and were a whole lot less reliable. I can count the number of times our DSL service went out on one hand — in five years! And of those, two occurred when the service was sold and transferred from one ISP to another, two outages that could have been planned for and minimized if the new ISP had been communicating better.
Today Moore’s Law and other developments have improved reliability tremendously, and left our 192Kbps service in the dust. We can get way more speed for half the price, and with reliability and quality of service that’s certainly good enough.
It took a little searching to find a DSL provider who explicitly allows running servers, who doesn’t block ports, and generally meets our slightly different needs (since we run our own network at home, including servers and custom domains, etc.). And then I needed to set up a more powerful firewall, that would make the migration smoother, etc.
That’s all mostly done, so I’m sure as soon as the new hardware gets here I will be tearing into the box, setting it up, and switching over — even though I should be doing other things. The concept of surfing 800% faster is intoxicating!
Our servers will migrate a little more slowly, since I’ll need to do things like update the DNS records, and other tricky technical stuff. There will be some disruption when I start those, probably this coming weekend, but using the new connection for our desktop systems should be a piece of cake.
I don’t know what to make of this USB-powered beverage warmer. On the one hand, it’s a weird use of a computer to power something distinctly non-computer related. On the other hand, my coffee cup is currently sitting three inches from a USB port, with the remainder of my morning coffee, too cool to drink…
I don’t know what to make of this USB-powered beverage warmer. On the one hand, it’s a weird use of a computer to power something distinctly non-computer related. And god knows I seem to get low-power warnings whenever I plug in anything but a mouse and keyboard into my computer via USB.
On the other hand, my coffee cup is currently sitting three inches from a USB port, with the remainder of my morning coffee, too cool to drink…
A year or so ago, Rochelle and I went to one of the Fancy Food shows held in San Francisco. All kinds of luxury foods, just waiting to be sampled. If you go only for one day, it’s impossible to sample all of them, or even half. Our experience doesn’t even begin to compare with what Joe Bob Briggs went through at a Fancy Food show in New York.
A year or so ago, Rochelle and I went to one of the Fancy Food shows held in San Francisco. All kinds of luxury foods, just waiting to be sampled. If you go only for one day, it’s impossible to sample all of them, or even half. We tried anyway.
Rochelle and I recently tested the early waters on mobile phone number portability, by switching our mobile phones from AT&T Wireless to Verizon Wireless while keeping our existing mobile numbers, in the third week that it was possible to port the numbers.
Rochelle and I recently tested the early waters on mobile phone number portability, by switching our mobile phones from AT&T Wireless to Verizon Wireless while keeping our existing mobile numbers, in the third week that it was possible to port the numbers.
We wanted to switch for a variety of reasons:
My phone (using AT&T’s GSM service) works well everywhere except in our house. According to the research I did, for a variety of reasons Verizon has the best coverage in the Bay Area and nationwide.
Rochelle’s old (and free) “stick-style” phone keeps dialing me from her purse. A new clamshell design should fix that.
Rochelle’s plan was killing us when she overflowed her minutes or roamed, which happened every other month.
Our old plans were old, and not getting us the features or minutes that were available today.
Rochelle’s company switched their preferred wireless provider to Verizon, and Verizon was offering killer discounts on plans and new phones.
OK, we admit it, we just wanted to get polyphonic ringtones.
I did almost a week of research, inputting our old bills into a spreadsheet to review our historical usage patterns, comparing different carriers’ available service plans, learning more about mobile phone technologies (e.g., TDMA vs. CDMA, 800MHz vs. 1900MHz, etc.), finding the right phone, finding software for the right phone that would connect it with my Mac, etc.
In the end, Verizon having an arrangement with Gap, plus the ringing endorsements and explanations of technical superiority, made it impossible not to go with Verizon. Picking phones was a little harder, but after narrowing the options to three phones and Googling around for reviews and other info, it became clear that the LG VX4400 was the way to go for us. I’ll write more about our phone selection in another post.
Once the decisions were made, Verizon’s corporate rep made it incredibly easy to place the order and get the ball rolling. During the order process he was very careful to caution us that, because of the very early nature of number portability, it could take between 2 hours and a week for our numbers to completely transfer from our old carrier.
It turned out that AT&T wasn’t happy with our decision to switch, and our phones were deactivated immediately after they were notified we were transferring to Verizon. Since this was a few days before we got our new phones, let alone activated them and the number transfer, it seemed a little harsh, but making do without mobile phones for a couple days wasn’t a big deal.
In the end, the number transfers were anti-climactic. When the phones arrived I charged them for a few hours, and then followed the two-step procedure to activate them. Instead of it taking 2 hours or a week, the phones immediately came up with our old numbers. Yay Verizon!
So far we’re pretty happy with the new service and phones. I still don’t get perfect reception in the house, especially not in the computer room, but the phone is definitely usable in what is apparently a very tough environment for mobile service. After hours of “dicking around” (Rochelle’s term for it) with BitPim, the phone sync software, I managed to get our contacts copied from my computer to my phone, along with a bunch of custom ringtones and wallpapers.
I just got a card in the mail, from Symantec’s rebate center. I am due a $30 rebate on updated anti-virus and personal firewall software we just bought for Rochelle’s computer, and their rebate center rejected the rebate claim for completely bogus reasons.
I just got a card in the mail, from Symantec’s rebate center. I am due a $30 rebate on updated anti-virus and personal firewall software we just bought for Rochelle’s computer, and their rebate center rejected the rebate claim. The supposed reasons are:
Invalid Postmark Date
Missing Purchase Date
The first reason is completely bogus, because (a) it’s not my fault, it’s the USPS; and (b) they don’t need a postmark; the rebate claim was submitted well within the required period, and even the rejection card itself got here within the mandated period. Postmarks are only necessary if an item is received past an expiration date, which isn’t the case.
The second claim is, in a way, even worse. The claim submission included a copy of my Costco receipt. I know Costco receipts, and they always have the date. Just because some minimum wage processing drone in Florida can’t find it in the 60 seconds they’re allowed to spend handling each claim doesn’t mean the purchase date isn’t there.
This is yet another example of the false savings that “rebates” represent. I can’t tell you the number of rebates we have failed to get, due to denied claims, or just laziness in submitting. One of these days I may actually wake up and realize that rebates are not savings, they are a bet, and sometimes you win, sometimes you lose.
I should note that this rebate is offered — and processed — by Symantec themselves. I’ve always had good luck with the rebates that get processed by Costco (which are the ones where they print the rebate form directly onto your receipt, extremely convenient).
What’s really ironic is that I dithered in the store, with both the McAfee and Symantec packages in my hands. About the same price, equivalent features. I eventually went with the brand I’ve purchased in the past. But if Symantec doesn’t come across with my $30, they’re going to lose a customer forever.
In preparation for the coming year, a progress report on last year’s resolutions, which Rochelle recently found on her computer.
Rochelle found the following snippet on her computer, dated at the end of last year:
“Crap Reduction and Abatement Program — While we have remained committed to the idea of having less stuff, we still have way too much crap. Michael has promised to get rid of his BeBox collection by January 17th (the one year anniversary of their arrival). I have promised to throw any remaining BeBoxes out the front window on January 18th. I have vowed that since Spring semester doesn’t start until February, I would dedicate a couple of weekends in January to weeding through the dressing room which, despite our good intentions, has reverted once again to the Island of Lost Crap.”
For the record, all three of these things will be on our resolutions list at the end of this year, too.
About a year ago, I was sitting in a bar, and listened to one fellow trying to impress his table companions by making a sophisticated tequila order. He was having more than a little trouble, because he couldn’t remember the brand of any quality tequila except Patron. The waiter was trying to help, but he was using tequila terms correctly, and the customer just had no clue. He eventually managed to order “Patron Gold” (there is no such thing), and as the server walked away, he said to his companions “that guy doesn’t know shit about tequila.”
About a year ago, I was sitting in a bar waiting for a friend to arrive, eavesdropping on the conversation at a nearby table. Mostly I listened to one fellow trying to impress his table companions by making a sophisticated tequila order. He was having more than a little trouble, because he couldn’t remember the brand of any quality tequila except Patrón. The waiter was trying to help, but he was using tequila terms correctly, and the customer just had no clue. I thought about stepping in, flashing my Ph.D. card, and trying to help, but decided the guy was beyond saving. He eventually managed to order “Patron Gold” (there is no such thing; presumably the waiter brought him Patrón Reposado or Añejo), and as the server walked away, he said to his companions “that guy doesn’t know shit about tequila.”
Sadly, his level of knowledge is pretty common, even in states like California where a lot of tequila is imported and consumed. It’s not hard to learn enough to always get a quality drink, but it requires a bit more effort to impress your companions, or the waitstaff.
Before posting more about our trip to the tequila region of Mexico, I thought I would describe a few of the basics of tequila. This is by no means an exhaustive list of what you might want to know about tequila; if you want to learn more, you need to start visiting Tommy’s Mexican Restaurant on a regular basis. Sit in the bar, and talk with Julio Bermejo, one of the world’s “tequila ambassadors.” But this will get you started.
First of all, tequila is a denomination of origin spirit, one of two in North America (the other is mescal). This means that to be legally labeled as tequila, the spirit must be produced in a particular geographic region, primarily the state of Jalisco in Mexico, but also including a few smaller areas nearby. Other denomination of origin spirits you might be familiar with are Scotch (the denomination of origin version of whiskey) and Cognac (known as brandy if not made in the right part of France).
Tequila is made from a particular plant, agave tequilana weber, blue variety. While many people mistakenly think the agave is a form of cactus, it’s actually closely related to the lily. It looks something like a large aloe vera plant.
Quality tequila is made from 100% agave, and will say so on the label (it’s a mark of pride and quality), but the law allows products labeled tequila to be made from as little as 51% agave, with the rest coming from unspecified sugars (usually sugar cane).
Tequila production, like other well-known denomination of origin spirits, is heavily regulated, with government oversight to ensure adherence to the rules. This is A Good Thing. A few years ago there was a severe agave shortage, and many less reputable distilleries were not using 100% agave to make their tequila. The CRT inspectors, who make daily visits to the distillerias, actually measure the volume of agave delivered to the plant, and when production significantly exceeds the expected amount for that volume they know something’s fishy.
The process of making tequila goes something like this:
Harvest agave plants. Quality producers harvest individual plants at the height of their maturity, i.e., when they are 8-10 years old. Harvesting kills the plant. (Tequila is the only spirit where the raw materials do not renew easily and grow every year, year after year.)
Cook the agave. Almost all of the highest quality tequila is cooked in traditional stone ovens called hornos; the more commerically-oriented technique is to use a giant steam pressure cooker called an autoclave. The cooking process converts the agave starches to sugars. This can be done in as little as 12 hours in autoclaves, but generally is a 36 hour or longer process in a traditional hornos.
Extract the agave juice, called aguamiel. The traditional approach uses a giant stone milling wheel; it’s roughly 30% less efficient than more modern techniques that use motors, gears, steel rollers, etc. Quality tequila can be made using either technique, but the difference is a lot like “first press” olive oil or “first crush” wine. All other things being equal, the higher quality result will be achieved by being a little more gentle, and accepting some loss in efficiency.
Ferment the sugars. Yeast is added to large vats or tanks of extracted agave juice, and it ferments, converting the sugars to alcohol. Eventually the increasing alcohol level kills the yeast, and fermentation ends. Fermentation produces an alcohol level of 5-7%, about the same as beer.
Distillation. In the traditional batch-oriented process, pot stills are used to purify and raise the alcohol level of the product. The fermented juice is distilled once to become ordinario, which is around 20% alcohol (40 proof), and tastes pretty foul raw. It’s distilled a second time to become tequila, at 45% alcohol (90 proof) or greater. High-volume production is done with something called a column still, which isn’t a proper still at all. Tequila produced with a column still is always inferior to product coming from traditional stills; no quality tequila is made with column stills. Note that what comes out of the still is higher in alcohol content than what you’ll find in the bottle. Most products are dilluted with water to adjust the alcohol percentage as necessary, down to 40% (80 proof).
Aging (optional). Some tequilas are aged in oak tanks or barrels, to add color and complexity to the flavor of the spirit. More on aging further down.
The next thing to know is that there are four major categories of tequila, which generally correspond to increasing levels of quality:
Joven abogado, which means “young and adulterated”. This is never good tequila. It’s not 100% agave (the “abogado” part), and it’s not aged (“joven”). This is stuff like Cuervo Gold/Especial/1800. This kind of tequila is often called mixto, meaning it’s a mixture of agave and other sugars (mixto says nothing about the aging, however). Just Say No.
Blanco, or unaged tequila. Blanco means white, and a true blanco is crystal clear, with no color at all. It is tequila straight out of the still (cut with water if necessary to bring the alcohol down to 80 proof). Many tequila connoisseurs drink only blanco tequilas, because they are closest to the “pure” flavors of the agave plant. A very few blancos, mostly Herradura Silver, actually see a little time in oak. This gives them a bit of color, adds some flavor and complexity, and can cut the harshness that is common with blancos. Blancos are sometimes called plata as well.
Reposado, or “rested” tequila. Reposado tequilas have been aged in oak containers for a minimum of 60 days, up to nearly a year. There is no limit on the size of the oak container, and for some volume products like Sauza Hornitos, they are aged in giant oak vats. Better tequila is aged in smaller 55 gallon barrels, the same size used for aging wine, and for longer than the minimum, usually 6-9 months. The oak can be new, or more commonly, used bourbon barrels from the US or Canada. Aging mellows the tequila a bit, and adds color and complexity.
Añejo or aged tequila. Añejo tequilas must be aged for a minimum of 12 months (but 18 months or more for the better quality tequilas), and the oak containers may not be too giagantic (not over 600 gallons, but again, 55 gallon barrels are best). The extra time and contact with wood imparts a stronger oak flaver to the tequila, deepens its color, and smooths it out considerably. Añejo tequilas are almost always the most expensive, but this is a factor of the time and storage space it takes to make añejo as much as it is a factor of quality. Still, all of the super-premium tequilas, like Cuervo’s Reserva de Familia, Herradura’s Seleccion Suprema, or San Matias’ Rey Sol, are añejos. (I am extremely partial to Rey Sol in particular.) Even these products are aged only to 5-6 years (compared to many times longer for some other spirits).
The most important thing about this list is that, while these categories generally correlate with increasing quality as you move down the list, it’s not guaranteed. You must still look for the “100% Agave” on the label, even on añejo tequilas!
Another important thing about this list is that you don’t see any of the marketing terms that people confuse with descriptive terms. I.e., you don’t see “gold”, “silver”, or (these days) “platinum”. Those are marketing terms; they mean nothing about the quality of the tequila, and tell you only what the manufacturer wants you to think about their product. Non-100% agave tequilas can contain other sugars, so often caramel coloring is added to make the product look like it was aged for longer than it was; this is where the “Gold” almost always comes from.
I’ll stop here, and save some more information, recommendations, and margarita tips for another post. And then, maybe, I’ll write more about our trip to Mexico, and the psychopath tequila fiends we went with.
It might be hard to believe that in a food city like San Francisco it can be hard to find good pizza. Indeed, it’s not hard to find good pizza — if you’re willing to drive to it. Tommaso’s on Kearny, Vicolo on Ivy, and Arizmendi, on 9th Avenue are all good. None are close, none deliver. My kingdom for good pizza delivery!
It might be hard to believe that in a food city like San Francisco it can be hard to find good pizza. Indeed, it’s not hard to find good pizza — if you’re willing to drive to it. Tommaso’s, on Kearny at Broadway, is probably our favorite. Vicolo, on Ivy, is also outstanding (but not open on Sundays). Arizmendi Bakery, on 9th Avenue between Irving and Judah, changes their pizza every day; most days the combinations are both unique and tasty.
None of them deliver. And none are in walking distance.
We have a couple pizza places on our block, but I have come to the conclusion that you can tell if a pizza place is good or not just by looking at their sausage. If they use the little Sysco sausage pellets, the ones that look like rabbit droppings, it’s mediocre-at-best pizza. That’s our block.
North Beach Pizza makes pretty good pizza, if you get it from the right location, and they deliver. The problem is, you can only get delivery from the location closest to you, and the North Beach Pizza on Haight delivers crappy pizza (it inevitably arrives soggy and warm, not hot and crispy).
As you might imagine, this makes football and, especially, college basketball far less enjoyable than they might be. What’s a sportsfan to do? (Don’t get me started on the food in sports bars in SF.)
But, glory be, I have been delivered. We finally found excellent pizza delivery, from Bambino’s Ristorante on Cole Street. Pizza arrives fresh and hot, with a crisp crust, and outstanding ingredients. I especially recommend the Number 10, the “Tre Fromaggi”, which is a thin crust pizza without sauce, three cheeses, garlic and fresh basil. Out of this world good. Rochelle and I had to stop ourselves from eating an entire Extra Large in one sitting…
