Still no Wii. Everyone is out of them. And I refuse to pay more than retail, or seek the assistance of the underbelly of society. So what to do while waiting?

My plan was to load up with a ton of great DS games:

• Mario & Luigi Partners In Time (almost done)
• Yoshi's Island DS (barely started)
• Mario vs. Donkey Kong 2 March of the Minis (yet to start)
• Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin (done once, almost a 2nd time, playing as alternate characters as well, can't get enough)
• The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass (delayed - preordered)

And even a PSP or PS2 game:

• Ratchet & Clank: Size Matters (not out yet - in the GameFly Queue)
• Final Fantasy XII (in the GameFly Queue)

But what I didn't expect was that I'd get in a Castlevania groove that I just didn't want to end. Then, I think it was Nate who mentioned, I find out that XBox 360 is getting Castlevania: Symphony of the Night in it's arcade section. Now which one was that, oh yeah the PlayStation one that I never played because I didn't have a PlayStation. What's this? Everyone says it could be the best ever? And it's selling for $50-$100 on eBay even 10 years later! Oh how I have to play this one.

Enter serendipity. Stopped at the GameStop and asked if they had it. They are all like "dude, we just stopped carrying PlayStation games" but then "wait, what title? I think I saw that in the back, dude" and "I'll go see if I can find it, hang out at Trader Joe's it may be a while" quickly followed by "dude, you got a dell game!". Only $25, not bad. And he didn't actually say dude once, I don't think.

So is it the best ever?

I'm partial to Aria of Sorrow and now Portrait of Ruin. But to be honest, I didn't realize that much of what I liked, that is so different than say Simon's Quest, was all introduced in Symphony of the Night. AoS has the cool soul stealing, and the new co-op play in PoR is cool, but otherwise SotN is totally it. The question should be, though, why didn't Sony push Konami to do a conversion to PSP? That is the sort of thing that is pushing DS out the door, and the only title that I even care about for PSP is Ratchet and Clank, otherwise most games have been mediocre (Untold Legends) to disappointing (Loco Roco, Me and My Katamari, Tokobot) with very few exceptions (Mega Man: Powered Up, Ultimate Ghosts 'N Goblins) and those all seem to be remakes anyway.

So I guess I have even more to keep me occupied before I can get my Wii, but it better not be too long, spoilers for Twilight Princess abound!

Working from home has some great advantages. No longer am I stuck in rush hour traffic, less stress, more time for me. If I sleep in? Work starts in my PJs. However, this means no Starbucks or Caribou between home and the office. For me it's about 10 minutes to the closest Starbucks and a little less to the Cafe Mayorga. So that Krups espresso machine I had that I hadn't used in a while 'cause steaming (and buying) milk is a pain for me, comes out and is back on the counter. I was drinking drip for a while, but my machine works best with 1/2 a pot or so, and I just don't drink that much any more.

So now I'm on a double espresso with 3 sugar cubes bent. I had been buying Starbucks ESE Pods for my machine, as that's what I had always bought in the way of pre-measured packets of coffee. They require no griding, no measuring, no tamping, and therefore are little trouble.

Enter Dad. He also has a Krups machine that takes ESE pods, but he uses Illy pods and ridicules my Starbucks pods. And lately it's been hard to find those pods. So I figured I look around and see if I could score some of these Illy pods. No dice. Then I remembered that I worked on the Interweb, and did a search or two, and found some great pod sources:

• Pod Merchant
• amazon.com
• ebay (you can search them yourself, I'm no fan)

I also found out that Illy is responsible for this invention, though it seems like everyone is doing a similar thing these days.

Anyway, the ridicule and the lack of Starbucks pods, and clear abundance online made me order some up, I settled on a 50 Lavazza Gran Crema Espresso Pods pack off of Amazon fulfilled by "Espressotiamo" mostly because of the free shipping and my knowing the Lavazza brand. Placed the order on the 5th, and it just arrived today (which isn't bad at all).

Made a cup and it's not bad. I think Starbucks roasts theirs a bit longer and packs it a bit tighter, but this is just the beginning, next up I will have to try ordering the Pod Merchant Super Sampler and a tin of Illy's, perhaps 2 (one medium roast and one dark roast).

So do I miss that cup from Starbucks? Not at all. Even the worst of these pods are going to be better than 90% or more of the espresso that I've had from Starbucks. Any espresso drinker will tell you that they just don't have the machines or the talent to pull a proper shot. I stick to the frou-frou drinks at Starbucks that are over laden with milk and flavor syrups, 'cause their espresso just isn't good enough. Of course that means for my current double shot I am paying around $1-$1.25, at Starbucks, after loading it up with crap I didn't really want just to make the coffee palatable, I'd pay around $3.75-$4. And that is an expense I certainly won't miss.

And we're not talking about the size of the universe, the other great debate:

Over the last 20 years a great debate has raged over the issue of which diaper system has the least impact on the environment. Cloth or disposable. While it seems obvious that 18-20 billion disposables made with plastic sitting in landfill creates by far the most impact, in fact, the results of the studies comparing diapers you wash and reuse, and ones you throw away, vary depending on the study and who funded it. Into the fray comes a third player. gDiapers. The flushable option. Minimal washing and no garbage.

[ gDiapers - The Great Debate ]

Yaty and I were planning on doing the proper green thing and using cloth, low and behold there is another option, and according to the website's propaganda, it's better than cloth! Of course that's if you choose your cloth option poorly. I've ordered the starter kit and 160 more inserts, so we should have enough experience by the time we get to medium sized diapers to see if we'll switch to cloth at that point, or continue with flushables.

Just finished this:

Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin Nintendo DS Konami Teen

Best game I've played in a long spell. Okami took me longer, and was very nice, but the new Castlevania is downright addictive. I've finished the game the first time, I'm doing a 2nd play through, and then I'll try some of the alternate ways to play (different characters and such). So enjoyable that it's keeping me from finishing this:

Mario & Luigi Partners In Time Nintendo DS Nintendo of America Everyone

And keeping me from starting this:

Yoshi's Island DS Nintendo DS Nintendo Everyone

Both of which I'm looking forward to. M&L PiT is not as complicated as I first thought, even with 4 characters playing at once. It's still not quite as good as Paper Mario IMHO, but I like it.

Yoshi is just good ol' fashioned platforming fun, and I never played the original so it's been enjoyable the few levels I did play.

So do I miss the Wii that I don't have yet? Not quite. Nintendo has truly delivered for the DS, and I assume will be taking over the world any day now.

Update: List has grown...

They tell me that babies like the music. Since I expect to have a baby back in my life shortly, I plan to put together some CDs for the baby. I don't particularly like the sort of Barney or Raffi type stuff that is pushed as music for children, but I do understand that small humans prefer simple music to more complicated stuff.

I just started this yesterday, so I don't have much yet, but I have a deadline looming so I'm asking the world at large for assistance. I figure I need 2 discs, one for waking up/car time/play time and one for nap/bed time. So far I have only 4 17 items that I am sure I want:

1. Big Rock Candy Mountain - Burl Ives
2. Goober Peas - Burl Ives
3. 500 Miles - Peter, Paul and Mary
4. Whistling Gypsy - The Clancy Brothers
5. Cotton-Eyed Joe - The Chieftains feat. Ricky Scaggs
6. Que Sera Sera - Dorris Day
7. Tacos, Enchiladas and Beans - Dorris Day
8. Scarborough Fair - Simon & Garfunkel
9. Good Vibrations - The Beach Boys
10. California Dreamin' - The Mamas & The Papas
11. Hotel California - The Eagles
12. For What It's Worth - Buffalo Springfield
13. Purple People Eater - Sheb Wolley
14. Mother Goose Medley - Spike Jones
15. Istanbul - They Might Be Giants
16. Take Me Home, Country Roads - John Denver
17. Rainy Days and Mondays - The Carpenters

Yes, so far it's all folk music, but I like folk music so nyah.

I'm hoping I can find some acceptable tunes in some other languages too, no need to limit baby so early.

What would you put on a CD for babies?

XML Notepad 2007 provides a simple intuitive user interface for browsing and editing XML documents.

[ Download details: XML Notepad 2007 ]

Windows only, but it appears to be a free add on to any validatable copy of Windows.

I have a large number of family coming in next week and I need some recomendations on places in the greater Columbia area that have good food and can handle a party of 16-20 including small children.

Anyone?

I live on the Internets, many of my friends do as well. Some of my friends and family don't. And sometimes I brings things back from the Internets and have to explain them to the people in meatspace.

Exhibit A

How do I explain this one? I ordered a lovely onesie with the baby "Trogdor the Burninator" on it for my future baby (to arrive in early Febuary), but I'm certain I will get questioned about what on earth this is. I think I can explain it here to those who visit the Internets, but don't necessarily live here, or live here but haven't yet experienced some of the odder corners of cyberworld.

Clearly you can find the Wikipedia and look up the entry on Trogdor, but let me sum it up for you:

1. The US government wants to make sure that it can wage war even after a nuclear strike, so they invent the first of many Internets called ARPANET.
2. Some brainy scientific types in Swizertucky who do the Nuclear thing wanted to read each others papers
3. A guy or two in Chicago decided that pictures were nicer than just words
4. Macrodobe used to be more than one company, and one of them decided that we needed their interactive CD product on the Internets, but it was big so they acquired another company and it became Flash
5. Flash is kinda dumb for most everything except Homestar Runner
6. The Homestar Runner is kinda dumb, but his friend/nemisis Strongbad is clever
7. Did I say clever? Perhaps I meant he's kinda Jaka Sembung
8. But funny (funny peculiar that is)
9. He likes to doodle, and doodle, and doodle
10. Geeks like his doodles and go way too far
11. I'm a geek
12. I bought a onesie

And now you are caught up on how it all happened, and what I've gotten myself into.

Oh, and HSR has a wiki dedicated to it (the HSR that is).

Frequent readers may remember my stupid plan to make a CD of music about coffee. One of the comments suggested a few more that I didn't have, and although I don't remember using this list to add more songs to the mix, about 1/2 of these ended up on the CD:

I am just finishing up a CD of coffee songs I am compiling for the people I work with (I work in a coffee shop, heh). I opted for Ella Fitzgerald's version of Black Coffee, and the Ink Spots on Java Jive, but have some of the same ones you do. I notice this post is about a year old, and I use Napster, not Rhapsody, but how about these:

• Coffee Song - Adam Hood
• Coffee Man - Calvin Owens
• Cowboy Coffee - The Mighty Mighty Bosstones
• Don't Forget The Coffee Billy Joe - Tom T. Hall
• Cigarettes and Coffee - Otis Redding
• What I Want is a Proper Cup of Coffee - Trout Fishing in America

[ david kearns dot com - Inane Pet Project ]

Yes, you heard correct, on the CD. I officially purchased my CD and it's in the car now. What made the cut?

All of these are available on Rhapsody as a playlist. The list ended up having a lot more "country" than I would have expected, but all in all I like what this ended up becoming. Next up: find around 20 tracks about video games...

The "Trivalley Herald" which I assume resides somewhere "inside the bay area" had a piece summarizing what Muslim Prayer is like in a basic sense. This is a good thing. Whenever I travel I am nervous about where and when to pray. It's not something most people are familiar with, and people seem to freak out at the sight of it. I am in the habit of finding the airport chapel, meditation room, or reflection area and praying there. Usually I will find the direction toward Mecca marked, some copies of the Quran, and a prayer rug for the weary traveler. Detroit has one of the finer areas for prayer in the US that I've seen.

In summary, this is how we do what we do:

Major steps of prayers include recitation of phrases and verses, holding hands at one's chest, reciting the opening chapter of the Quran, which translates:

"Praise be to [God], Lord of the worlds.

"The most gracious, the most merciful, master of the day of judgment.

"You (alone) we worship. You alone we ask for help. Show us the straight path, the path of those whom you have favored, not (the path) of those who earn your anger nor of those who stray. Amen."

This is followed by other verses from the Quran.

Putting hands on knees, in bowing posture, and praising more.

Bowing down all the way to the ground, with the forehead, nose, hands and knees touching the ground, the worshiper continues with more praises. At the end of the last unit of prayer, sitting down, resting hands on the thighs, the worshiper recites:

"All glorifications are for [God]. All acts of good deeds and worship are for him. Peace and the mercy and blessings of [God] be upon you, O prophet. Peace be upon us and all of [God]'s righteous servants. I bear witness that there is no god but [God], and I bear witness that Muhammad is his servant and messenger."

The second part of recitation in this position means:

"O' [God], exalt Muhammad and the family of Muhammad as you exalted Abraham and the family of Abraham. Verily, you are full of praise and majesty. O [God], bless Muhammad and the family of Muhammad as you blessed Abraham and the family of Abraham. Verily, you are full of praise and majesty."

[ Inside Bay Area - Understanding Muslim prayers will ease fear ]

I've taken the liberty of replacing the word Allah with God in the above piece. If you don't know what Muslim prayer looks like, you couldn't possibly have a good grasp of the word Allah. For those concerned about this crazy other god that Muslims worship, you should know that God has many, many names across the languages and faiths of the followers of Abraham, and that in Arabic bibles they use the word "Allah" for "God", so it's clearly the exact same concept.

Did I mention I love where I live?

Yalda and about 50 other Wootton students were on an unusual field trip that took them to Washington National Cathedral, the Islamic Mosque and Cultural Center and the synagogue. They marveled at stained glass and gothic arches, watched Muslim men perform noon prayers and heard about the history of the Jewish community in Washington, all in an effort become familiar with religious traditions many had never seen up close.

[ A Window On Religion And Tolerance - washingtonpost.com ]

Not just every school system would allow for a field trip like this. Seriously cool, IMHO.

I loves me some Indian food, but it can be expensive to eat out all of the time. My latest food find is well on it's way to fixing that for me. Sure I could get cookbooks, and learn how to make Indian food, but then who work all of my jobs for me? Enter easy-prep, mostly ready to eat, Indian cuisine from Deep:

Deep Foods is one of the leading manufacturers of Indian foods. Since 1977, it has been tantalizing the taste buds of Indian food lovers. Using authentic recipes, Deep Foods offers delicious snacks, frozen meals, ice creams and other specialities. These delicious, all- natural products are prepared to satisfy the most dedicated culinary aficionados of Indian cuisine.

[ Deep Foods ]

I've tried their Naan, Samosas, and Mutter Paneer and all are tops. They are rather affordable, and soooo many varieties are available at my local hindimart Shah & Patel Grocery, but if there isn't a Hindustani Purveyor of Fine Goods near you, you can get this stuff online as well.