Ultranormal

Author: Kevin Lawver

  • I Didn’t Even Know You Could Pronounce Paella!

    So, I made something approacing paella tonight. Jen made this really simple sauce last night with fresh tomatoes, olive oil and onions. It was awesome on pasta, so I figured it might be good with some of the tilapia we had in the freezer. Jen didn’t want pasta again, so we agreed on rice.

    I defrosted the tilapia filets, cut up the last three large cherry tomatoes, the rest of the onion from last night, and grabbed a bunch of spices out of the cabinet. I put two splashes of olive oil in the big sauce pan along with a pat of butter, a bunch of garlic, a dash of cumin, two pinches of cilantro, a buttload of paprika, the chopped up tomatoes and onions, and about half a can of diced tomatoes. I started them on the oven over medium heat, while I put the rice on with some of the chopped up onion and a little butter and salt.

    After the concoction in the sauce pan was boiling pretty good, I put the tilapia filets in and covered the whole thing. I let it simmer on medium-low until the rice was done (it was instant so it was only five minutes). I then dumped the finished rice on top of the tilapia, stirred in some of the juice, and covered it again for about 10 minutes.

    It was really good when I got a bite of something other than rice. I think with twice as many fresh tomatoes, some other veggies like celery, and some more garlic, it would have been perfect. I think we’ll try it later in the week with some shredded chicken.

    This was pretty much a perfect weekend other than my misadventures in home improvement. Max and I played a lot, we had great family time and had a lot of fun. I think I just may be ready for this last week of work before my vacation.

  • We Have A Rebuttal!!

    Nicole from Not Content To Crawl has posted a rebuttal to my Goldmember review. Since seeing the movie, I’ve read some reviews, and maybe I was just in a bad mood. I had just made it through a harrowing day of launching my baby (twice as fast as it was last week, and I did it in two days), and a horrific two months of last-minute changes, humongous projects and well, other unpleasant stuff. So, I may not have been in a scatological humor mood. I’ll give it another shot on DVD.

  • I Ain’t So Handy

    I’m taking a break from putting up shelves. I am not a handy guy to have around. I’ve successfully stripped two screws that are both at varying degrees of in-ness. They are so stripped that I can’t even muscle them in with a big flathead screwdriver. Now, if this were the bottom screw of the bracket, big deal. But, they’re the two top screws of a bracket, and now I’m kind of… well, screwed.

    I hate handyman projects. I suck at them. They make me get angry and sweat. The make me swear, something I’m trying not to do. They make my blood pressure go up, also something I’m supposed to avoid.

    Now the shelves are in a state of disarray. How do I get the stripped screws in all the way? If I can’t get them in, how do I get them out? They’re 2.5″ long, and 3/4’s of the way into the stud. I’m smart enough to know that’s not a good place to be if you’re a stripped screw.

    So, I’m in here, not working on the shelves, trying to come up with a good explanation for myself. “Sweetie, you know, I saw a wonderful set of prefab shelves at Costco this morning. I think those would work much better than… this.” I can follow Swedish directions. Swedish is a lot like Tcl, lots of arrows and numbers and labeled parts.

  • Ok, I Have a Secret

    The first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem. I have a problem. I’m addicted to Crash Team Racing. I’m so bad, I let my son act as my enabler. He likes watching me race, especially on the CTR Token races because the CTR gets really big and he yells out, “CTR! CTR! CTR!!” The game is my crack. It’s almost worse than my Civ3 addiction. It’s much worse than my Final Fantasy jones ever was.

    I have my son now racing around the house making kart noises. Whenever he stops, he makes a cute “Squeeeee” braking noise. He vrooms around the house, a little imaginary steering wheel in his hands, leaning into corners, jumping over things on the floor and doing fantastic donuts.

    What have I done?!

  • Goldmaybe

    I got a free ticket to see a early screening of Austin Powers: Goldmember today. So, if you were planning on plunking down hard earned cash to see it this weekend, hold on a minute. It was hugely disappointing. This is coming from someone who loved the first two and has worked on his Fat Bastard impression since the second one came out.

    It has moments of brilliance, but they’re all rental moments. There’s nothing in it worth seeing in the theaters or that you’ll be talking about the next day at work.

    Goldmember is the worst character Mike Myers has ever attempted. The accent wasn’t done with any attempt at humor, or even accuracy at all. The Goldmember lines were lame at best. Mike Myers couldn’t hold the Dr. Evil voice at times. It varied from scene to scene wildly. Sometimes it was a parody of the original and sometimes he didn’t even try. The same with Austin. He kept dropping the acccent. Beyonce was annoying. She giggled like a 12 year-old through the whole thing and added nothing to the film. Now, if they had gotten Wanda Sykes, THAT would have been funny.

    I won’t spoil the opening sequence, but it was actually entertaining. I can’t believe I’m writing this much on this movie, but here are some things I actually did like in the film. Seth Green was good as Scott. Fat Bastard had a few good lines, and Michael Caine was awesome. He and Seth Green did the only real acting jobs in the whole movie. The rest was almost like everyone slept through making it.

    Go see it only if you’re a die-hard fan, can’t find anything better to do, and neeeeeed to eat popcorn in the dark.

  • It Wasn’t Me! I Was… Dead at the Time!

    Much too tired to say anything of much worth. But, if you want to see what I’ve been working on for the past two months (well, you won’t see most of it, but it’s there), check it out.

    It’s been a hellacious month and a half, with three major projects coming to a head at the same time, 70 frontends (not all done by me, but using stuff I wrote), 12 API’s, and a crapload of last minute fixes happening in the space of one week. I’m not sure how I’ve survived. A few more things in QA that don’t amount to anywhere near the stress of the first 65 and a couple major launches and I’m all done. Then… my vacation. I think I’m going to spend it in a “hospital” recovering from my ever-growing addiction to Code Red, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, Fila Brazillia and Loop Guru.

  • Look, They’re a Pair!

    The Other Side and Whim & Vinegar, another blogging couple to go with Dean and Gail and Kottke and Meg. They’re new to me, having just found them this morning, but it’s always interesting to me when couples blog. Dean and Gail are a lot of fun because they’re excellent writers and sometimes discuss their relationship, which is just fascinating to see from both sides.

    Are there other blogging couples I’ve missed? I’m sure there are… there HAVE to be!

  • Movable Type: Oh How I Love Thee

    If someone really had it together, I mean if someone really had it together, they’d build a message board module for Movable Type. Then, Movable Type would be pretty much the perfect Intranet system. Everyone in the group could have a blog, and you could create message boards where everyone could collaborate, ask questions, etc. Wouldn’t that be cool? Now, if someone would just get off their butts and learn Perl, it could happen. Yeah, sure.

  • Does This Make Kieth a Terrorist, GW?

    I guess the shine is off then, huh? I didn’t vote for him. I voted for Ralph Nader because I couldn’t stomach voting for either Gore or Bush. I’m constantly amazed at the fumblings of this administration. It just gets worse and worse, and I don’t see it getting better. From Bush’s constant manglings of the language to the whole secret Energy Commission to now all of the questions about Business Deals and our constant goofups in international affairs, I’ve just lost hope that the administration can really get it together enough to do anything worthwhile.

    If I really wanted to get into it, it would be really depressing. For all of the bad things you can say about Clinton, he was never this bad. Maybe the healthcare thing at the beginning, but outside of personal problems, and his sexual harrassment (Monica, it wasn’t personal. He was her boss, and he did “favors” for her to keep her quiet about their affair. That’s sexual harrassment and unfair to all the other interns who worked there) stuff, he was a great administrator and leader. When he talked, people on the global stage listened. Now, they snicker.

  • Hi-Ho-Hi-Ho It’s Off to Work I Go

    It’s 8:30pm and I’m still at work. That makes a 12 hour work day for me. Do I get some kind of badge, maybe a cookie?