I'm a big geek:

New Lappy, originally uploaded by cafechimp.

It was time to upgrade, and Dell and the folks at SkinIt suckered me in. I'm not 100% sure how Samus got past their "copyright censors", 'cause I was fully expecting this to be denied, but it arrived, and looks just as great as I expected.

I love the new featured item, Steak Grilled Taquitos:

Please make this a permanent addition to the menu!

Project 51 Productions Ltd. is proud to announce that it has acquired the worldwide animation and related rights to the classic video game series “Castlevania” from Konami Digital Entertainment.

[ Project 51 Productions Ltd. ]

I hope for something with the feel of Vampire Hunter D, but much better updated animation and the Castlevania world plot. Hopefully they aren't too tied to just the Castlevania III story, and can work in elements from the entire timeline.

And that problem is Grocery Stores. How many do you visit on a weekly basis, here's my list:

• Giant - close by, self checkout, has basic traditional American products
• Safeway - sometimes we're in that neighborhood, much like Giant but more Organic selections
• Whole Foods - lots of Organic cruelty free type stuff, and great cheese selection
• Trader Joe's - just has things no one else seems to carry
• Kam Sam - Chinese Grocery right around the corner for basic Asian products
• Asian Market - Farther away but with better Indonesian selection
• Grand Mart - Korean supermarket way up in Gaithertucky, but really great produce
• Shah & Patel - Indopak groceries that no one else carries
• Lezzet - Turkish dry goods, only they have the super awesome sour cherry juice that I'm growing to love
• Rockville Gourmet Halal Meat Market - super butcher even if you aren't Islamic in your leanings

And those are just the regular spots, then sometimes we'll stop into a specialty market like

• Yekta - Persian grocery
• The Italian Store - just found out they carry Illy pods

Where do you shop?

Can I pay to keep more of my photos on Flickr?

Absolutely! Upgrade to a Pro Account for just US$24.95 a year. Here's what you'll get with a Pro Account:

• Unlimited uploads (10MB per photo)
• Unlimited storage
• Unlimited bandwidth
• Unlimited photosets
• Permanent archiving of high-resolution original images
• The ability to replace a photo
• Ad-free browsing and sharing

Compare that to what you get with a Free Account:

• 100 MB monthly upload limit (5MB per photo)
• 3 photosets
• Photostream views limited to the 200 most recent images
• Only smaller (resized) images accessible (though the originals saved in case you upgrade later)

[ Flickr: Help: Free Accounts, Upgrading and Gifts ]

This site used to have a gallery, but those photos only just made it up on my flickr. They are pics of my daughter so I restricted it to family and friends, so if you are family or friend but a lurker, it's time to tell me your flickr info so I can add you as family or friend.

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?