It’s The Taste Stupid

First we added bread sticks. Then it was stuffed crust pizza. Then two crusts with one on top. We’ve had Thin, thick and deep dish. Square shapes. Four separate pizzas in the same box. Two for Two. Three for three. Five for five. They keep inventing new gimmicks to get you to keep ordering their pizzas. The latest, unveiled using a Super Bowl commercial is break free cheese stuffed bits of bread around the edge.

They just don’t get it, make a good tasting pizza and people will come back without having to resort to trickery.

Started up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/06: 35

Two For Tuesday

Tonight Donna and I went out for a scoop of ice cream. We went to a place on the south side of town, J. Flanagan’s, that used to be somebody’s home, but has been converted into a business like 90% of the places along this former residential street that has become a byway between two major commercial roads.

I got a cup of my usual, some sort of coffee flavored treat while Donna picked something slightly different than her normal. While waiting to be served I was magically transported back to high school by the music playing in the background. Tuned to one of the several local “classic rock” stations, the radio was playing the stoner national anthem, Led Zeppelin’s “Stairway To Heaven.”

When we got our ice cream and sat down I heard “Stairway To Heaven” end and “Misty Morning Hop” start. I usually don’t pay attention to which day of the week I’m on at any given moment (except for Friday afternoon), but right away I knew it was Tuesday.

Started up, stil up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/06: 35

Win a 2006 MX-5

The Kidney & Urology Foundation of America, Inc is raffling off a new MX-5. The drawing will be at the New York Auto Show on April 23rd. (Winners need not be present) Buy your tickets on line, a book of 6 tickets is $25.

I’ve bought 6 hoping to shorten my lead time to a new Miata by 4 years or so.

Started up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/06: 35

TDTVS

That Damn TV Show Thursday we watched 2 0f the 4 episodes on disc 5. Friday night from 6 until 11:30 we watched the last 2 on #5 and all 4 episodes on disc #6. Last night we watched nearly every tidbit crammed onto disc 7.

Now that we have finished mainlining Season 1, what? They are about halfway through Season 2, should we jump in now and wait until summer to see the first 11 shows to catch up on the back story? Wait until summer and hope they run the repeats in original order? Or wait until September to rent the Season 2 DVDs and watch them forgoing Season 3 until it’s DVDs in September 2007 and so on? Or download the torrents and watch the earlier Season 2 episodes on the PC?

I can’t just join the show mid stream. We did the one season behind thing with the Sopranos, but that was easy because there was no temptation because we didn’t HBO. With Lost on ABC there will be that allure on Wednesday night to check how things are going on the island. I tried to use a couple of Bittorrent clients, but even with my high-speed connection it was going to take more than a day, then what if what you got wasn’t playable?

My vote is to wait. Donna will probably want to start watching episode 12 of season2 this Wednesday. Family crisis in the making. This may be more of a marriage stability test than doing a Time/Speed/Distance Rally in the Miata.

Started down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/06: 35

4 8 15 16 23 42

4 8 15 16 23 42The Powerball Lottery is worth like a hundred eighty million bucks. I think I could quit my job with that kind of money.

Donna and I have our ticket, we bought a quick pick a couple weeks ago with 10 plays, so it is good until the 25th of this month. For the three draws we have been through since we bought the ticket, we have not had a single number match anywhere. Maybe tonight’s the night. If I stop posting here after tonight, check the Powerball site to see if the winning numbers were 1 39 40 42 47 17, that’ll explain it.

Once the jackpot climbs over a 120 million or so there is a guy at work that goes around and collects from a group of us so we can increase our odds slightly. It started out with about a half dozen folks playing, but the number has grown to nearly 30. After all, once you have played once, you can’t get back out, how would you feel if 25 of your co-workers walked in and told the boss to take his job and shove it while you had to stay behind because you wouldn’t cough up a measly buck? So I have about 30 more chances on those tickets for tonight.

Because of my current obscension with the TV show “Lost” I gave a brief thought to playing the numbers 4 8 15 16 23 42, but decided against it after what happens to Hurley when he won over a $150 million using them.

Started down, went up, back down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/06: 34

Non Conforming Material Report

Donna and I work in a manufacturing plant and our Quality Assurance department uses what they call an NCMR to flag parts that are bad. NCMR stands for Non Conforming Material Report which is the politically correct term for crap parts. Like the parts that aren’t up to spec would have it’s feelings hurt if we called them scrap or something.

Today at work the Activities Committee had a bake sale to raise money for projects they do during the year (and perhaps to help defray the cost of psychiatric help for the fragile egos of non conforming parts.) Donna volunteered to bake some of her renown chocolate chip cookies for them to sell. Last night we made around 10 dozen cookies. As always there are a few that get baked a little too long or crack and break when they are removed from the cookie sheet. Wanting to put only her best cookies on sale we took a paper plate full of the rejects to work to give away on my side of the plant.

To be cute I placed a little sign over the cookies that read:
Non Conforming Cookie Report.
Failed inspection for the following reasons:
1) Heat treated to long
2) Rough edges
3) General workmanship

Within a half an hour the cookies were all gone, but some one had placed a sign over the top of mine:
Second sample of 24 required to make final determination. Submit to Engineering Department. Day shift only.

Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/06: 32

What?

Something changed with my web host. All of a sudden the fancy post titles stopped working. When I try and go to the configuration page for the plugin I get this evil looking message:

FATAL: Your PHP installation does not support some key functions that this plugin requires. Talk to your hosting administrator about upgrading your PHP installation with GD and FreeType support.

I checked what the web host was running through cPanel and it seems like both those items are already running. I guess I should complain, but I just don’t have the motivation to try.

Is it just me or the reason Ford Motor Company is in trouble is because the head honcho, the guy in the commercials and on the cover of Newsweek, Bill Ford looks a lot like Al Gore.

Bill Ford Al Gore

As regular readers know, my wife and I are recent inductees in the cult that is “Lost” and while searching for an episode guide to see where last night’s ABC rerun fit into the scheme of things I found ABC’s official merchandise store for the show. Why, oh why, do they insist on putting the show’s logo on every item they sell (well that is a somewhat rethorical question) when it would be so much cooler if they just let the item stand by itself. Those in the know would immediately get it and those that didn’t and asked would get an impassioned sales pitch from an insider. And it they didn’t ask, they just aren’t hip enough to matter. I know that I would buy the Oceanic Bag as my laptop carry bag in a minute if it didn’t have the show’s logo on the front.

Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/06: 32