<?xml version='1.0' encoding='UTF-8'?><?xml-stylesheet href="http://www.blogger.com/styles/atom.css" type="text/css"?><feed xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom' xmlns:openSearch='http://a9.com/-/spec/opensearchrss/1.0/' xmlns:georss='http://www.georss.org/georss' xmlns:gd='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005' xmlns:thr='http://purl.org/syndication/thread/1.0'><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001</id><updated>2011-11-27T15:50:33.753-08:00</updated><category term='tech'/><category term='metablogging'/><category term='apple'/><category term='politics'/><category term='comics'/><category term='bars'/><category term='holiday'/><category term='pork'/><category term='video game'/><category term='music'/><category term='pretty'/><category term='achewood'/><category term='cigs'/><category term='blog'/><category term='meta'/><category term='metal'/><category term='words'/><category term='food'/><category term='internet'/><category term='coffee'/><category term='asshole'/><category term='love'/><category term='candy'/><category term='boogers'/><category term='notes'/><title type='text'>The Baehr Essentials</title><subtitle type='html'></subtitle><link rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#feed' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default?max-results=100'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/'/><link rel='hub' href='http://pubsubhubbub.appspot.com/'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><generator version='7.00' uri='http://www.blogger.com'>Blogger</generator><openSearch:totalResults>29</openSearch:totalResults><openSearch:startIndex>1</openSearch:startIndex><openSearch:itemsPerPage>100</openSearch:itemsPerPage><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-7777331052519863040</id><published>2008-12-18T06:57:00.000-08:00</published><updated>2008-12-18T08:05:44.699-08:00</updated><title type='text'>Whoa, nelly.</title><content type='html'>Been off this pony for a while.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I'll get back on eventually, but the next two weeks are going to involve some seriously hectic changes, including:&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;1) moving most/all of my worldly possessions about 220 miles SW to Brooklyn&lt;br /&gt;2) flipping my job from working at home in my pajamas and talking to stuffed lobsters to working in an office in pants and talking to real people.&lt;br /&gt;3) ceasing my Krav training up here (for more information, visit &lt;a href="https://curt-krav-maga.blogspot.com"&gt;Curt's Krav Maga Blog&lt;/a&gt;) and picking it back up in Manhattan.&lt;br /&gt;4) oh by the way xmas/new years&lt;br /&gt;5) oh god, oh no, this can't be happening, selling my car?!  We'll see about that.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Not much else happening at present.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Crazy times a'brewin though, good gravy.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-7777331052519863040?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/7777331052519863040/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=7777331052519863040' title='0 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/7777331052519863040'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/7777331052519863040'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/12/whoa-nelly.html' title='Whoa, nelly.'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>0</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-6201571338377525259</id><published>2008-10-09T08:50:00.000-07:00</published><updated>2008-10-09T08:58:36.734-07:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='video game'/><title type='text'>AnaChrono Trigger</title><content type='html'>It is the year 12,000 BC. Dalton has stolen your time machine/airship, the Epoch, and is about to make his maiden launch.  As a video game villain, he clearly needs to say something both proud and menacing to herald this, his greatest coup to date...&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/SO4pcJWtKiI/AAAAAAAAACg/9xm5W0_i2ds/s1600-h/anachrono.png"&gt;&lt;img style="cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/SO4pcJWtKiI/AAAAAAAAACg/9xm5W0_i2ds/s320/anachrono.png" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5255183378712177186" /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Excuse me?&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-6201571338377525259?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/6201571338377525259/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=6201571338377525259' title='1 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/6201571338377525259'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/6201571338377525259'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/10/anachrono-trigger.html' title='AnaChrono Trigger'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><media:thumbnail xmlns:media='http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/' url='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/SO4pcJWtKiI/AAAAAAAAACg/9xm5W0_i2ds/s72-c/anachrono.png' height='72' width='72'/><thr:total>1</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-7069811628455726869</id><published>2008-07-03T16:59:00.000-07:00</published><updated>2008-07-03T17:02:57.228-07:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='cigs'/><title type='text'>Just dawned on me...</title><content type='html'>I've been a non-smoker, uninterrupted, for 6 months now.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Feels like both a laughably short and impossibly long time.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-7069811628455726869?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/7069811628455726869/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=7069811628455726869' title='2 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/7069811628455726869'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/7069811628455726869'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/07/just-dawned-on-me.html' title='Just dawned on me...'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>2</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-3590423502678140958</id><published>2008-06-13T08:29:00.000-07:00</published><updated>2008-06-13T08:37:58.278-07:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='tech'/><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='apple'/><title type='text'>Dear Apple: reprising the reprise</title><content type='html'>I always forget in the heat of hardware fury how easy it is to be nice to tech support people, and how far being nice will get you as a customer.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Interject: unless you're dealing with the Bender Ball people, who from my experiences are all trained like sheep to be as unhelpful as possible AND to try and sell you DVDs over the phone while you're furiously trying to cancel shipping of shit that you never ordered.  I have never balled out a phone service person quite like the time when I called the Bender folk to dispute an unauthorized charge on my credit card and the dude on the phone -- who sounded like the Dog Whisperer -- followed my comment of "Please cancel shipping immediately and remove all of my information from your system" with, "And while you're on the phone, would you like to buy...?"  &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;But yeah, Apple's always pretty decent on the phone, and I have a new mouse in the mail. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;That was fast.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-3590423502678140958?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/3590423502678140958/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=3590423502678140958' title='2 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/3590423502678140958'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/3590423502678140958'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/06/dear-apple-reprising-reprise.html' title='Dear Apple: reprising the reprise'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>2</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-1238966065811430584</id><published>2008-06-13T08:05:00.000-07:00</published><updated>2009-03-12T05:59:34.610-07:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='tech'/><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='apple'/><title type='text'>Dear Apple: reprise</title><content type='html'>Dear Apple,&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Once again, shame on your Mighty Mouse.  The scroll ball is such an intolerable piece of shit that it requires almost-daily maintenance -- in fact, run a google search for &lt;a href="http://www.google.com/search?ie=utf8&amp;oe=utf8&amp;q=mighty+mouse+scroll+ball" target="blank"&gt;mighty mouse scroll ball&lt;/a&gt; and all you get is forum after forum of people saying, "I can't believe I keep buying this shitty piece of shit because it's the only thing that scrolls the way I need -- briefly."  &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;So one of the common solutions for a jammed/dysfunctional scroll ball is to flip yer mouse upside down and roll it around vigorously on a sheet of white paper. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Apparently if you do that too many times, however, it will jam the scroll ball in, and then BAM, every click is a center click and your mouse is toast.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;And can you unjam the ball?  NO!  Why? Because Apple doesn't give you a way to OPEN THE F'ING MOUSE.  You also can't get under the ball and pull it up because, well, it's a slippery little bugger.  Basically, in the process of my daily make-my-stupid-mouse-work routine, I managed to break it in some new, unrecoverable way.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Screw you guys, but bless your 12 month warranty, and failing that, bless your store clerk who will, whether he likes it or not, give me a new one for free under the duress of Furiously Disappointed Customer.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-1238966065811430584?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/1238966065811430584/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=1238966065811430584' title='0 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/1238966065811430584'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/1238966065811430584'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/06/dear-apple-reprise.html' title='Dear Apple: reprise'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>0</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-3901841481887861495</id><published>2008-05-22T09:49:00.000-07:00</published><updated>2008-05-22T10:01:09.810-07:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='blog'/><title type='text'>Monetize me</title><content type='html'>Well, minimal traffic coming through ye olde bloge these days...&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;So I fired up a possible monetizer at &lt;a href="http://www.bostonredsoxfansite.com/baehr/"&gt;a silly Red Sox fansite&lt;/a&gt; in hopes of pulling some special-interest readership and better utilizing AdSense.  Will it work?  Doesn't really matter.  I'll have fun doing it.  &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Of course, it was foolish of me to try and start a Sox-topic blog in the middle of the NBA playoffs, but there you have it.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-3901841481887861495?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/3901841481887861495/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=3901841481887861495' title='1 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/3901841481887861495'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/3901841481887861495'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/05/monetize-me.html' title='Monetize me'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>1</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-3296893587906939606</id><published>2008-05-21T07:45:00.000-07:00</published><updated>2008-05-21T08:07:44.943-07:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='notes'/><title type='text'>Notes to self</title><content type='html'>Upcoming topics that probably deserve some airplay:&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;(1) I care about basketball for the second (?) time in my life.  Thank you, Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce, et al.&lt;br /&gt;(2) &lt;a href="http://www.alchemistlounge.com"&gt;The Alchemist&lt;/a&gt; has terrible food, and after briefly trying really, really hard to like it, I am back to the opinion that it is bad for JP and should be re-replaced by a sports bar.&lt;br /&gt;(3) &lt;a href="http://www.milkywayjp.com"&gt;The Milky Way&lt;/a&gt;, in addition to being a phenomenal name for a bar, is moving down to the Sam Adams Brewery lofts.  This may herald the dawn of gentrification on JP's proverbial Wrong Side of the Tracks, and I'm not so sure I like it.  Also, that dawn might have already been heralded.&lt;br /&gt;(4) In non-bar news...I've been having a really hard time getting burgers to cook a consistent medium rare for me lately.  Advice would be appreciated.&lt;br /&gt;(5) There is no number 5.&lt;br /&gt;(6) Actually, there are a lot of restaurants and recipes that deserve some attention.  &lt;a href="http://citysquares.com/boston/mission-hill/restaurants-food-beverages/bars-taverns-cocktail-lounges/mission-bar-grill"&gt;The Mission&lt;/a&gt;, for example, is really friggin tasty and has never disappointed me.  &lt;br /&gt;(7) Stump.&lt;br /&gt;(8) Adventures in &lt;a href="http://www.shockwave.com/gamelanding/texttwist.jsp"&gt;Text Twist&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Ok, cool.  At my current pace of output, that should keep me busy for about two years.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-3296893587906939606?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/3296893587906939606/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=3296893587906939606' title='0 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/3296893587906939606'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/3296893587906939606'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/05/notes-to-self.html' title='Notes to self'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>0</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-8776065733614497795</id><published>2008-05-06T11:07:00.000-07:00</published><updated>2009-03-12T05:58:22.709-07:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='tech'/><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='apple'/><title type='text'>Dear Apple</title><content type='html'>Ok, real quickie here --&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Shame, shame on you, Apple, for creating, marketing, and continuing to produce the Mighty Mouse.  This mouse is the weakest piece of shit excuse for consumer hardware I've seen since those retarded track-ball stationary mice (you know who you are).  Seriously, for $50 I'd like something that I can open and clean, or that will at least retain all of its advertised functionality for more than two days at a time before I have to go digging at that stupid little rubber ball with a toothpick and an alcohol-soaked q-tip.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I don't think I've ever held such a sustained fury at any single object in my life.  I'm actually astonished that I haven't broken this thing yet given my lifetime track record of defective-hardware-as-projectile.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I love Apple.  I really do.  They (tend to) make excellent hardware, pretty, user-friendly software -- but for $50, if using this mouse doesn't make me shit rainbows out of my palm, I must say I find it to be a huge disappointment.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-8776065733614497795?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/8776065733614497795/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=8776065733614497795' title='0 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/8776065733614497795'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/8776065733614497795'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/05/dear-apple.html' title='Dear Apple'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>0</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-1428450758154822739</id><published>2008-03-23T10:08:00.001-07:00</published><updated>2008-03-23T10:09:25.618-07:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='metal'/><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='holiday'/><title type='text'>Happy Easter!</title><content type='html'>100 points to Julia for the following, as we sat down in the car to go grab eggs and candy:&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Me: Hmm... maybe we should put on some Easter music?&lt;br /&gt;Julia: What, like Lamb of God?&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-1428450758154822739?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/1428450758154822739/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=1428450758154822739' title='1 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/1428450758154822739'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/1428450758154822739'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/03/happy-easter.html' title='Happy Easter!'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>1</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-8755600851677083721</id><published>2008-03-18T07:26:00.000-07:00</published><updated>2008-03-19T09:01:51.199-07:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='holiday'/><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='food'/><title type='text'>Lucky Lucky</title><content type='html'>First of all, St. Patrick's Day, oh, how mixed my feelings are for you... it's like, ok, sure, I'll start drinking at 5 or whatever, and I do think that with all the people we celebrate on our annual, federal holiday schedule -- MLK, George Washington, Veterans, Dead Veterans, The Working Man, Columbus (mmm...genocide), Jesus -- we might as well add Drunks.  After all, drunk people are (at any given time) a substantial societal constituency.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;And really, I know it sounds like a joke, but I'm dead serious -- drinking is pivotal to this society and much of the rest of the world.  Booze is what human beings, as a species, have chosen as an acceptable, leisure-time drug, and we use the hell out of it, so we might as well celebrate it.  &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;On the other hand, St. Patrick's day is truly celebrating the bringing of Christianity to Ireland and the clover represents the holy trinity, so really... it's just a 250-year old Americanized bastardization of a holiday celebrating something that happened 1700 years ago, far away, with a church.  Which makes getting hammered and celebrating the City of Boston a pretty hilarious way to celebrate it.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Or in my case, drinking like, 4 beers and watching a basketball game.  At home.  In my sweatpants.  It was awesome.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;***&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Topic 2: Lucky Charms. Bought a box, had a bowl, and I swear to St. Patrick they've tipped the marshmallow ratio.  It's like...it's like the box was assembled by that same fat kid who always sniped the M&amp;M's out of your trailmix.  I'm talking multiple marshmallows per spoonful.  Almost too sweet, but really just kind of great.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-8755600851677083721?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/8755600851677083721/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=8755600851677083721' title='2 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/8755600851677083721'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/8755600851677083721'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/03/lucky-lucky.html' title='Lucky Lucky'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>2</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-999212880191418538</id><published>2008-03-06T12:09:00.000-08:00</published><updated>2008-03-06T12:10:58.424-08:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='meta'/><title type='text'>technorati(ca)</title><content type='html'>Ok, so I've set up a &lt;a href="http://technorati.com/claim/xf2dbmcew" rel="me"&gt;Technorati Profile&lt;/a&gt;...c'mon, visibility...&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-999212880191418538?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/999212880191418538/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=999212880191418538' title='3 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/999212880191418538'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/999212880191418538'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/03/technoratica.html' title='technorati(ca)'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>3</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-1753504867539414277</id><published>2008-03-06T08:21:00.000-08:00</published><updated>2008-03-06T08:37:59.425-08:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='pork'/><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='food'/><title type='text'>On a lighter note, a pork chop recipe!</title><content type='html'>Spice Rub:&lt;br /&gt;Minced garlic&lt;br /&gt;Salt&lt;br /&gt;Pepper&lt;br /&gt;Paprika&lt;br /&gt;Cayenne&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Breading materials:&lt;br /&gt;Flour&lt;br /&gt;Egg (2?)&lt;br /&gt;Bread crumbs&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Pork chops&lt;br /&gt;Sweet potatoes&lt;br /&gt;Bacon (thicker and smokier = better)&lt;br /&gt;Mascarpone (optional)&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Whatchu gon' do:&lt;br /&gt;1) Chop and fry some bacon (the start of all great recipes)&lt;br /&gt;2) Your potatoes -- cut 'em, boil 'em, mash 'em.  During the mashing process, add the chopped bacon, some butter (to taste), and optionally the mascarpone.  Be light on the fatty stuff -- you don't want to lose the taste of the bacon.&lt;br /&gt;3) The chops -- Give the chops a couple whacks to tenderize them and rub them w/ the spice rub.&lt;br /&gt;Bread them (flour -&gt; egg -&gt; bread, make sure you keep one of your hands dry!)&lt;br /&gt;Heat up some olive oil (or butter or both) in a pan and sear them bitches on both sides.  Reduce heat, cover.  They're cooked when they resist a push from your thumb and the meat inside is all white.  Because they're pork.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Serve w/ barbeque sauce (I use &lt;a href="http://www.sweetbabyrays.com/" target="_blank"&gt;Sweet Baby Ray's&lt;/a&gt;.  I also advise setting the BBQ out ahead of time so it's at room temperature.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Eat with like, 14 glasses of water and at least two helpings of salad.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-1753504867539414277?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/1753504867539414277/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=1753504867539414277' title='0 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/1753504867539414277'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/1753504867539414277'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/03/on-lighter-note-pork-chop-recipe.html' title='On a lighter note, a pork chop recipe!'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>0</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-1899843920539723467</id><published>2008-03-06T06:52:00.000-08:00</published><updated>2008-03-06T13:50:40.150-08:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='asshole'/><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='politics'/><title type='text'>Recaps and Variouses</title><content type='html'>Ok, so I've been off the blogowagon for a couple weeks.  Why?  Because I'm extraordinarily absent-minded.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Accordingly, here's a little brain-vomit:&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I'm going to go ahead and echo &lt;a href="http://www.mentalmasturbator.com/" target="_blank"&gt;Andrew&lt;/a&gt; on this one -- screw you, Ohio, for keeping that crazy lady's campaign alive.  Had Hillary been swept out of the midwest once and for all, Obama could do what any incumbent-hopeful would do -- focus on a campaign going forward for the general election.  Not today, Barackadoo, not today.  Instead, both senators get to waste a shitload of time and money campaigning against each other for 2 months while John &lt;a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1Y73sPHKxw" target="_blank"&gt;"Dramatic Hamster"&lt;/a&gt; McCain sits tight with his terrible opinions and stupid face.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Interjection -- McCain has in the past week garnered endorsements from two of Texas's great cult leaders: John "Crayzee" Hagee and George "Retard" Bush.  Now Bush is an easy target and an obvious endorser.  Yes, he might be the figurehead for the fall of Constitutional democracy, yes, he might be the herald of a global moral apocalypse, and yes, he might look and act like a confused child...but he has a political obligation to endorse whatever else comes out of the GOP's infected womb, so there it is.  John Hagee, on the other hand, is a real piece of shit.  Discussions of his piece-of-shit-atude can easily start and end with his profession -- evangelist, crackpot -- but what fun is it if we don't ping &lt;a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/politicsNews/idUSN2749859920080228" target="_blank"&gt;Reuters&lt;/a&gt; for some quotes?  Apparently Hagee "envisions a blood-soaked clash between East and West leading to the return of Jesus Christ."  And you know what, with McCain's stubby little finger on the button, it's not bloody unlikely.  Except for the second coming of Christ part.  That's just silly.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Let's not forget, boys and girls, what happened &lt;a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waco_Siege" target="_blank"&gt;last time&lt;/a&gt; we let Texas cult leaders get too far ahead of themselves.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Ok, so coming back to the top: thanks, Ohio, asshole, for giving Hilldog and The Obaminator (&amp;#174;) two months to dig away at each other and give Stumpy McShitfucker all the quotational fodder he'll need to bury the DNC in mud come November.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Remember 4 years ago when one self-contradicting John Kerry quote got taken out of context and spun into a national ad campaign that sunk him?  Flip flops?  Bush riding a campaign of "I may be completely unqualified to run the country, but at least you know where I stand"? &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;We are a nation of short attention spans, fleeting patience, and extremely shallow judgement.  God help us if one of the democratic hopefuls drops a soundbite worthy of muckraking -- if either does, the general election will be over before it starts.  People in this country are like screaming toddlers -- all they need is one phrase to repeat, one hitch they can grab and run with so they can express themselves loudly and without thought.  Republicans understand this, and that is why they keep winning elections.  The American populace is really goddamn stupid, so get on their level.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;All I can ask, is please, please -- Hill-o-vision, Obaminator (&amp;#174;), please don't say anything stupid in the next 7 weeks, because you will be slaughtered for it, and we will all suffer.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-1899843920539723467?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/1899843920539723467/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=1899843920539723467' title='1 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/1899843920539723467'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/1899843920539723467'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/03/recaps-and-variouses.html' title='Recaps and Variouses'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>1</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-1129481007122630746</id><published>2008-02-28T18:51:00.000-08:00</published><updated>2008-02-29T10:05:44.604-08:00</updated><title type='text'>sicktastic.</title><content type='html'>&lt;div style="text-align:left;background-color:#f16b12;padding:5px;width:210px;height:100px;"&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.candystand.com/play.do?id=18189" style="font-family:Verdana,sans-serif;color:#FFFFFF;line-height:9pt;font-size:9pt;font-weight:bold;text-decoration:none;" target="blank"&gt;Jetboost&lt;img src="http://candystand-local/assets/images/space.gif" width="10" height="3" style="border:0px"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;img src="http://www.candystand.com/assets/images/game/thumbs/jetboost.gif" align="left" style="border:0px"&gt;&lt;span style="font-weight:normal;font-size:8pt"&gt;We are clear for take off. Collect the boosts to reach for the stars!&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-1129481007122630746?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/1129481007122630746/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=1129481007122630746' title='0 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/1129481007122630746'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/1129481007122630746'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/02/sicktastic.html' title='sicktastic.'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>0</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-6985601148763377757</id><published>2008-02-08T07:40:00.000-08:00</published><updated>2008-02-08T07:48:41.028-08:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='pretty'/><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='tech'/><title type='text'>This is pretty.</title><content type='html'>Found while trolling some message board about AJAX/prototype.  It's made with &lt;a href="http://www.processing.org" target="_blank"&gt;Processing&lt;/a&gt;, the same toolkit I used for that weird drawing project I did at the end of senior year.  That reminds me, I think that's documented somewhere...&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;In any case, this is pretty:&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;object type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="400" height="225" data="http://www.vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=658158&amp;amp;server=www.vimeo.com&amp;amp;fullscreen=1&amp;amp;show_title=1&amp;amp;show_byline=1&amp;amp;show_portrait=0&amp;amp;color="&gt; &lt;param name="quality" value="best" /&gt; &lt;param name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /&gt; &lt;param name="scale" value="showAll" /&gt; &lt;param name="movie" value="http://www.vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=658158&amp;amp;server=www.vimeo.com&amp;amp;fullscreen=1&amp;amp;show_title=1&amp;amp;show_byline=1&amp;amp;show_portrait=0&amp;amp;color=" /&gt;&lt;/object&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.vimeo.com/658158/l:embed_658158"&gt;Solar, with lyrics.&lt;/a&gt; from &lt;a href="http://www.vimeo.com/flight404/l:embed_658158"&gt;flight404&lt;/a&gt; on &lt;a href="http://vimeo.com/l:embed_658158"&gt;Vimeo&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-6985601148763377757?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/6985601148763377757/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=6985601148763377757' title='0 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/6985601148763377757'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/6985601148763377757'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/02/this-is-pretty.html' title='This is pretty.'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>0</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-7795879482020608897</id><published>2008-02-07T12:31:00.000-08:00</published><updated>2008-02-07T13:32:41.390-08:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='politics'/><title type='text'>Beep beep!  Here comes old crazypants!</title><content type='html'>So Romney pulled out, all but handing his votes to John McCain...&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;...which is scary, because McCain will appeal to moderates in big, wishy-washy purple states like, I dunno, Florida.  This will be especially true if Obama is nominated, as that gigantic chunk of voters who say experience is ever so important may default to the old kook.  Of course the lack of hindsight it takes for any dem to say that experience is a top priority is staggering.  After all, we just watched &lt;a href="http://www.tailored.com.au/uploaded_images/horse-laugh-721137.jpg" target="_blank"&gt;a man&lt;/a&gt; get four years of practice presidency and then immediately screw up four more.  Bush has been like the Miami Dolphins of politics.  Take a 6-10 season, get psyched because you have nowhere to go but up, and then promptly go 1-15.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Sadly, hindsight is hazardous to American politics.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;McCain, despite being a &lt;a href="http://punchup.files.wordpress.com/2007/06/john_mccain.jpg" target="_blank"&gt;psychotic little troll of a man&lt;/a&gt;, is kind of friendly-seeming.  And kind of electable-seeming.  On the other hand, just about the worst thing you can have when you're balls-deep in a politically and economically destructive war is an ex-POW with an anger management problem.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I really don't know how to feel about this one, but I know it makes me nervous.  McCain is just the kind of gun-slinging retard that a country full of gun-slinging retards could get behind.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-7795879482020608897?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/7795879482020608897/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=7795879482020608897' title='0 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/7795879482020608897'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/7795879482020608897'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/02/beep-beep-here-comes-old-crazypants.html' title='Beep beep!  Here comes old crazypants!'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>0</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-454861972412516724</id><published>2008-02-05T13:46:00.000-08:00</published><updated>2008-02-07T13:34:41.513-08:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='politics'/><title type='text'>John Edwards doin' it wrong and here's how</title><content type='html'>In short, I appreciate the championing for the middle class.  I really do.  Here's why it doesn't work --&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;1) A speech that's all sob-stories about individual, lame-ass people makes for a &lt;i&gt;lame-ass speaker.&lt;/i&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;2) Any dem is going to fight for the middle class, the individual, the little guy.  It's part of the party agenda.  If you make it your main running point against two people declaring eras of "change" it gives the impression that you have &lt;i&gt;nothing original to say.&lt;/i&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;3) We have a federal government, we have state and local governments, and we have constituents.  There is a food chain.  Perhaps as the president it would be best to focus on improving state and local governments so they can take care of individuals.  If you worry primarily about the individual on the presidential scale, you are &lt;i&gt;applying for the wrong job.&lt;/i&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Good guy, good ideas, just the wrong focus for a national leader.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-454861972412516724?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/454861972412516724/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=454861972412516724' title='0 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/454861972412516724'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/454861972412516724'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/02/john-edwards-was-toolbag-and-heres-why.html' title='John Edwards doin&apos; it wrong and here&apos;s how'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>0</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-8963846710939905215</id><published>2008-02-05T09:04:00.003-08:00</published><updated>2008-02-05T19:12:07.242-08:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='asshole'/><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='politics'/><title type='text'>Romney Update</title><content type='html'>For some reason, the most interesting part of this year's elections for me is consistent development of a long-forgone conclusion:&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Mitt Romney is a complete and total ass.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;CNN ran earlier this morning a little bit of a speech he gave contrasting himself favorably with John McCain.  It amounted to a 15-second-ish laundry list of disparate votes they each took, each entry of which was like a virtual tick on the checklist of Why Mitt Romney is an Offensively Backwards Chump-ass Fool.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The top 5 that Romney was really proud of, complete with snippy remarks:&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;1) McCain opposed drilling for oil.  (Romney did not!)&lt;br /&gt;* Yes, screw McCain and screw finite resources, too!  Drill the shit out of those fossil fuels before they (gasp!) run out forever.  Clearly more effective than researching alternatives.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;2) McCain opposed tax cuts for the wealthy.  (Romeny supported them!)&lt;br /&gt;* Come on, this is America.  If the rich, white guy who's never once looked prejudice in the face can't get richer, then who can?!&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;3) McCain opposed the amendment that would define marriage as a union between a man and a woman.  (Can it, Mormon.)&lt;br /&gt;* Welcome to 21st century America, where in addition to socially persecuting you for being gay, we'll make extra-special certain that you get to feel the cold, hard dick of legal injustice, too!&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Really, marriage is a joke.  It's just as easy to get out of as it is to get into, and its main purpose in current society is a fat tax break.   Amending the Constitution to ban homarriage (you heard it here first) is nothing more than bigotry.  It's an absolute abuse of the Constitution's dynamics, and just the kind of bullshit moral parading that people in high office should be shamed for doing.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Moving on.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;4) McCain supported embryonic stem cell research.&lt;br /&gt;* This one is a little touchier, so I'll be gentle about it.  Fuck Romney, fuck Bush, fuck this entire debate.  If you can eat eggs, you can harvest precious cells from the unborn, and if you can mass-murder civilians on a political Jihad, then playing god is already fair game.  Oh look, no issue anymore!&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;5) McCain supported amnesty for illegal aliens.&lt;br /&gt;* Ok, so there are fair points to be made from both sides of this one, and I offer the following in bullet-form so as to avoid the stylistic choice of overly verbose diction that has at times in the past become not uncommon for me to use while writing.  In no particular order:&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;- Immigration has vastly different effects from state to state.&lt;br /&gt;- If you can get someone to trim your petunias for $3/hour, go nuts.  Same goes for vineyards and vinyl siding.&lt;br /&gt;- Land of promise, my ass.&lt;br /&gt;- Only in this country can denying amnesty for anyone regarding anything be politically beneficial.&lt;br /&gt;- Ok, that's probably a lie, but I still find it pretty abhorrent.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;My advice: grant federal amnesty, then let the states decide what to do for themselves.  That is why we have a multi-tiered form of government, no?&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Oh, that reminds me, John Edwards doin' it wrong, and here's how --&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-8963846710939905215?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/8963846710939905215/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=8963846710939905215' title='0 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/8963846710939905215'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/8963846710939905215'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/02/romney-update.html' title='Romney Update'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>0</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-577094599982348325</id><published>2008-01-26T11:44:00.000-08:00</published><updated>2008-12-10T14:01:24.273-08:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='achewood'/><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='food'/><title type='text'>Food Update</title><content type='html'>A couple of cooking novelties pulled from a recent camera-dump:&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;1) Bear egg&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;This is not super complicated to pull off.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;1 egg&lt;br /&gt;1 cookie cutter&lt;br /&gt;salt &amp;amp; pepper&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;All you do is crack an egg into a cookie cutter.  The smaller your shape's area, the trickier it is to cook the egg through without turning the yolk into a crumbly little piece of crap, but the metal frame makes it really easy to flip the egg early and cook it evenly.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/R5uXNlXr_QI/AAAAAAAAAAw/vNOaeatK6Fk/s1600-h/DSCN0636.JPG"&gt;&lt;img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/R5uXNlXr_QI/AAAAAAAAAAw/vNOaeatK6Fk/s320/DSCN0636.JPG" alt="bear egg" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5159884057708592386"  border="0" /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;2) Beer can chicken&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;This one was lifted from &lt;a href="http://achewood.com/index.php?date=08272004" target="_blank" style="text-decoration: none;"&gt;Achewood&lt;/a&gt; pretty much verbatim.  Basic procedure is drink a few beers, then another half beer.  Throw some spices and taste into the halfie, shove it up the chicken's bum, cut up some vegetables, get it all really oily and bake it.  Simple and delicious and crispy and really, it's just a &lt;a href="http://achewood.com/index.php?date=08272004" target="_blank" style="text-decoration: none;"&gt;great recipe&lt;/a&gt;.  Excellent as-is or as a template for repeated experimentation.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/R5uXOFXr_RI/AAAAAAAAAA4/rlE8-EF24j8/s1600-h/DSCN0616.JPG"&gt;&lt;img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/R5uXOFXr_RI/AAAAAAAAAA4/rlE8-EF24j8/s320/DSCN0616.JPG" alt="beer can chicken" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5159884066298526994" border="0" /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;3) Meat cake&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Oh, that meat cake.  Meat cake, meat cake, meat cake.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;This was my birthday cake this year, courtesy of X and Julia.  Truly stunning.  Three layers of extremely good meatloaf iced with mashed potatoes and decorated with ketchup and, yes, bacon.  Mmmm, bacon.  Original concept, &lt;a href="http://www.blackwidowbakery.com/demo/meatcake/" target="_blank" style="text-decoration:none"&gt;Black Widow Bakery&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Seriously, check out that bacon work.  That's some professional quality bacon lettering right there.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/R5uUflXr_MI/AAAAAAAAAAQ/pJ7LFKiJVCw/s1600-h/DSCN0640.JPG"&gt;&lt;img style="cursor: pointer; width: 321px; height: 212px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/R5uUflXr_MI/AAAAAAAAAAQ/pJ7LFKiJVCw/s320/DSCN0640.JPG" alt="meeeeat caaaaaaake" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5159881068411354306" border="0" /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;And a very convincing cake.  Just look at that slice action.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/R5uXOlXr_SI/AAAAAAAAABA/-jve1mD7ntw/s1600-h/DSCN0642.JPG"&gt;&lt;img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/R5uXOlXr_SI/AAAAAAAAABA/-jve1mD7ntw/s320/DSCN0642.JPG" alt="slice-o-meat-cake" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5159884074888461602" border="0" /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-577094599982348325?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/577094599982348325/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=577094599982348325' title='0 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/577094599982348325'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/577094599982348325'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/01/food-update.html' title='Food Update'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><media:thumbnail xmlns:media='http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/' url='http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/R5uXNlXr_QI/AAAAAAAAAAw/vNOaeatK6Fk/s72-c/DSCN0636.JPG' height='72' width='72'/><thr:total>0</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-7202163740398174485</id><published>2008-01-23T07:51:00.000-08:00</published><updated>2008-01-23T08:22:14.665-08:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='music'/><title type='text'>Alive: wow this album is tight.</title><content type='html'>If you have ever listened to Daft Punk and thought "Hey, this is pretty cool, but I wish it were a little cooler," um... &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Look, point here is that Alive, Daft Punk's 2007 venture into recording live techno, is really, really goddamn sick.  Truly, it has been kicking my ass on repeat since I got it.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;So get it.  And on the one hand, if you're largely unfamiliar with Daft Punk, using this album as a starting point is really unfair to both listener and band.  It's much more open-ended and creative than most of their studio work, and quite frankly it's more interesting to listen to.  It's not that the studio catalogue is particularly uninteresting, but rather that this album is kind of a curve-breaker in terms of overall quality and creativity. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;...and on the other hand, if you are largely familiar with Daft Punk, Alive will it will make you go batshit raving bananas.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-7202163740398174485?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/7202163740398174485/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=7202163740398174485' title='1 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/7202163740398174485'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/7202163740398174485'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/01/alive-wow-this-album-is-tight.html' title='Alive: wow this album is tight.'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>1</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-6463331059443837156</id><published>2008-01-15T08:10:00.000-08:00</published><updated>2008-01-15T08:14:21.479-08:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='coffee'/><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='love'/><title type='text'>Love is...</title><content type='html'>...walking to the kitchen to get some more coffee only to find that your girlfriend left her travel cup on the mail table on the way out the door and then being like cool i'm gonna drink it and then tasting it and realizing it has nasty-ass splenda in it and then being like nah it's cool i'll drink it anyway.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;oh wait, that's not love.  that's just plain old lazy.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-6463331059443837156?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/6463331059443837156/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=6463331059443837156' title='3 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/6463331059443837156'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/6463331059443837156'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/01/love-is.html' title='Love is...'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>3</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-1552219198360744771</id><published>2008-01-15T08:01:00.001-08:00</published><updated>2008-01-15T08:08:52.526-08:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='words'/><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='candy'/><title type='text'>Gummies</title><content type='html'>It is roughly 11:00 in the morning, I have been awake since easily 6:30, and I have not yet eaten breakfast...&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Unless you count scarfing oneself into a sugar coma on a half-pound sack of LifeSavers Gummies as "breakfast".&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Seriously, if you get one of the big bags and just start going at it, you can cover the full cycle of excitation to sugar crash in about 30 minutes... and then you're just sitting there, twitching, sweating, wondering, "Damn, how do they get them so gummi?"&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Ah, more coffee, then back to the grind.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Also, there had to have been a way to better connect "coffee" and "grind" in that last sentence.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Has to have been?  Had to have been?  Is was?  Whazza?  Blaaaaaaarrrggggg.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Guh.  Being able to edit as you write out an internal monologue really does a number on verb tenses.  Or maybe that's just the Gummies talking.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-1552219198360744771?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/1552219198360744771/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=1552219198360744771' title='0 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/1552219198360744771'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/1552219198360744771'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/01/gummies.html' title='Gummies'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>0</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-6417458746151097438</id><published>2008-01-10T04:48:00.000-08:00</published><updated>2008-01-15T09:09:58.927-08:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='metablogging'/><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='internet'/><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='bars'/><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='food'/><title type='text'>Today is Thursday</title><content type='html'>So are these things supposed to convey a sense of continuity -- "Dear reader, it's Thursday, and wow it's been a busy two weeks since the holidays and hey, happy New Year!" -- or is it cool to just pop in and scratch out some notes like marker on a public bathroom wall?&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Were the Internet indeed a public bathroom, the "blogosphere" would certainly be the handicapped stall at the end of the row.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Meanwhile, it's Thursday, and it's been a busy two weeks, and Thursdays are really early days on the ol' Wrigley front, and I'm sleepy.  I've been writing actual code lately (as opposed to doing my much-beloved secretarial and monkey work), which feels pretty good in an academic-justify-your-existence kind of way.  I've also been eating candy like it's my job, which it kind of is, so I guess that's ok, too.  &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Seriously, though, I got some boxes of candy from Wrigley right around when I got back from Maine, including several boxes of Orbit.  This is important, because I decided to quit smoking on New Years and now chew approximately 20 sticks of gum a day, at about 2 minutes per stick.  Coincidence?  Highly doubtful.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Also, I don't know what the etymology of "cold turkey" is, but...oh, wait -- &lt;a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_turkey" target="_blank"&gt;wiki: Cold Turkey&lt;/a&gt;.  Also, it is damn sweet that wikipedia exists, and that Google exists, and that both are such pervasive tools as to have become verbs, and that if you use Google for a phrase you need a definition on, it will more than likely point you at wikipedia.  Only by the grace on the Internet is it completely legitimate to say, "Well I Googled it, but Google just pointed me at wiki, so I guess I could have just wikied it in the first place."&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;***&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Went to Faneuil Hall with some heads for bar trivia the other night; nice bar, outskirts of the plaza.  Too bad the start times listed on the &lt;a href="http://www.stumptrivia.com/stump.asp" target="_blank"&gt;trivia site&lt;/a&gt; and the bar itself showed a two-hour discrepancy, and too bad we showed up on the late side of it.  So too bad we were in Faneuil with no reason to be there and ended up going to this empty wanna-be sports bar called The Tap.  Why do I mention this?  Because The Tap is in a long row of bars where someday, someone (maybe you!) might be walking and thinking, "Wow, so many bars, and which one should I patronize?"  In the event of such a query, I advise skipping The Tap.  Decent food, decent service, but horribly overpriced for the quality on both counts.  Looks like a place where you should be able to snag a $10 pitcher.  Not so much.  Also the fries were soggy and the onion rings verily burst with room-temperature fryer grease.  Note: if you are getting people drunk and you have a kitchen where 50% of your output is fried, do everyone a favor and make sure your fryer is hot and that you don't plate the fried stuff 10 minutes before you plop a crappy $9 club sandwich on the plate and trot it out to the table.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Really though, the nail in the coffin (checkpleasethankyougoodnight-style) came from a two-man band with which the bar was trying to attract patrons through the open door.  We left halfway through their first song, a cover of Otis Redding's (Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay, handled exclusively in the way-out-of-tune register and quite possibly transposed into an extremely depressing minor key.  As we departed, the singer (who looked like an ugly rendition on something stupid) was whistling his way through the bridge and the bar was almost completely empty.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-6417458746151097438?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/6417458746151097438/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=6417458746151097438' title='1 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/6417458746151097438'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/6417458746151097438'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2008/01/today-is-thursday.html' title='Today is Thursday'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>1</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-2622764304075244798</id><published>2007-12-25T15:24:00.000-08:00</published><updated>2007-12-28T12:24:33.572-08:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='comics'/><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='boogers'/><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='holiday'/><title type='text'>Ruminatin'</title><content type='html'>First off, wee-haw, it's nice to be in Maine for a winter holiday -- the entire world could be smoldering under its disintigrating gas-blanket, and come December 25th, it will always look like Chrismas up here.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Been readin'.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Picked up the latest Hellboy trade paperback compilation yesterday; read it before breakfast this morning.  So, so good.  The only catch with a book like Hellboy is that with such a short-spoken, quippy protagonist, there's a not a whole lot to read.  Mignola's art is so stunning in its simplicity that while its quality demands a slow read, a single-sitting push leaves me in the world of, "Oh yes, look, another page of black ink and... oh wait, yep, a monster... next page--", and when the dialog/action sequences are mostly of a big, red goofball telling a Hydra to "Shut up" while clocking it in the face, again -- makes for a quick read.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;But oh man, so good.  Also, a nice side-effect of such heavy-handed-but-somehow-intricate art is that it has immense replay value.  Maybe 2008 will bring me a re-reading of the whole series.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Good, that'll kill about two hours.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Also finished Watchmen today.  As I've been gushing about to, oh, anyone within earshot of me for the last week, Watchmen is a really, truly, good novel.  The pictures help, too, but really, wow.  Alan Moore runs so many concurrent story arcs over so many timelines, carrying so many motifs so successfully in both the text and artwork that it really takes time between sittings to digest the whole scope.  Seriously.  If you ever read Watchmen, take your time. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Wait, no.  Rephrase:&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Read Watchmen, and when you do, take your time.  The graphic novel is a versitile form -- you can do things with dialog-over-pictures that would fall absolutely flat with text alone; allowing the art to narrate setting and mood opens up a vast space for characters to develop subtlely, for actions and locations to not lose their meaning in cumbersome description; you can show or hide anything and everything, leaving clues for the reader's brain to crunch between the delicious cookies of overt plot advancement. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Oh look, it's a stupid sentence!&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Really though, reading a good book should feel like eating a good meal, and Watchmen delivers for hours and hours.  Every possible advantage of the graphic novel's form is reaped and presented beautifully over a compelling, accessible, and very human plot.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Restate: read Watchmen, and when you do, take your time.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Now, of course, this leaves me one more holiday-season comic acquisition to digest -- Jhonen Vasquez's Jellyfist.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Then again, it's Christmas, I'm up in Maine with family, there's a big roast in the oven and almonds and prosciutto in my belly, and I don't want Vasquez's brain invading mine and leaving horrible little creatures to gestate in there just yet.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;***&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Meanwhile, my brother got a new digital camera just prior to joining us up in Portland, and for the past two days has been experimenting with its myriad, futuristic features.  I've been pretty much stationary with my face in a comic book since Saturday, making me an excellent test subject for a new camera... so now there are probably two dozen test photos of me reading and picking my nose.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;What, you don't pick your nose while you read?&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Or blog, for that matter?&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Bullshit.  I don't believe you for even the scarcest fraction of a second.  Every blogger's keyboard and every reader's pages are stained with the boogers of deep rumination and nasal spelunking.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Thinkin' and pickin'.  Like peanut butter and jelly, baby, and don't you forget it.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-2622764304075244798?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/2622764304075244798/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=2622764304075244798' title='0 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/2622764304075244798'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/2622764304075244798'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2007/12/ruminatin.html' title='Ruminatin&apos;'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>0</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-7815692711649267101</id><published>2007-12-20T08:17:00.000-08:00</published><updated>2007-12-28T12:24:07.108-08:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='metablogging'/><title type='text'>Is this thing on?</title><content type='html'>Just remembered I have a blog.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Hmm...&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Restaurant reviews?  Inane ramblings?  The hell is this thing for...?&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Oh, meta-blogging, how lame you are.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Also, anybody out there have any advice for tweaking the graphics behavior in Parallels to behave non-retardedly with active windows in coherence mode?&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Anybody?&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Is this thing on?&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-7815692711649267101?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/7815692711649267101/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=7815692711649267101' title='1 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/7815692711649267101'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/7815692711649267101'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2007/12/is-this-thing-on.html' title='Is this thing on?'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>1</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-1526331500594205482</id><published>2007-11-07T14:12:00.000-08:00</published><updated>2008-01-02T11:47:22.045-08:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='politics'/><title type='text'>Flawless Tactics</title><content type='html'>Mitt Romney, asshole that he is, is now campaigning to run our fine, disintigrating country.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Sweet!&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I'll keep this short.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The man, a chiseled movie-star-looking windbag of a politician, is up against some tall odds.  For starters, he's a conservative coming out of deep hibernation in the grungy leftist cave that is Massachusetts.  But ah, the man is so publically digestible, he's a publicist's dream: a friendly, smiling, family-man caught in the grips of complete political reinvention.  Also, he's a Mormon, although I'm not entirely sure how that will play into all of this, except for liklihood of right-wing-friendly religio-politics.  That certainly doesn't present a problem when your campaign base is in...&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;...South Carolina.  So Mitt's in the ol' SC, and I imagine his plunge into right-wing national politics as sort of a supreme-dickwad-vision-quest.  In the end I suppose he'll come out looking like a "compassionate conservative" -- not too dumb, not too smart, and the kind of guy you'd like to have a beer with.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;There's a reason that a guy you'd like to have a beer with (Governator excluded) should probably not be elected to high office: he's probably drunk.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Anyway, Mitt's in SC, and his reinvention would scream insincerity and horse poo if it were not for the brilliant political reporting of Fox News:  "Mitt Romney was in South Carolina campaigning this week for the important Southern vote, blah blah, vapid story, pause; his reason for being in town?  A chili cook-off!"&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Sounds like the kind of guy you'd like to have a beer with, eh?  Damn, chili cook-offs are sweet.  What a great parting thought...&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;...also, his campaign and publicists are stationed right down the street running their famous, annual Bullshit Cook-off.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I swear, if you dug up Joseph Goebbels and jammed his rotting corpse into a particle accelerator or something and set all the dials just right, out would pop Fox News, the many-headed propaganda monster disguised as a friendly news station for thrill-seeking, retard Americans.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-1526331500594205482?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/1526331500594205482/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=1526331500594205482' title='0 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/1526331500594205482'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/1526331500594205482'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2007/11/flawless-tactics.html' title='Flawless Tactics'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>0</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-7871841290832697031</id><published>2007-11-07T08:40:00.000-08:00</published><updated>2007-12-28T12:25:06.390-08:00</updated><category scheme='http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#' term='candy'/><title type='text'>Moromoromoro</title><content type='html'>Cadbury has this thing called the Moro Bar.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I don't know what's in it, but it tastes like crack.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-7871841290832697031?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/7871841290832697031/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=7871841290832697031' title='1 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/7871841290832697031'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/7871841290832697031'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2007/11/moromoromoro.html' title='Moromoromoro'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>1</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-3247639021669272598</id><published>2007-11-01T08:58:00.000-07:00</published><updated>2007-11-01T09:59:01.481-07:00</updated><title type='text'></title><content type='html'>&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-3247639021669272598?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/3247639021669272598/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=3247639021669272598' title='0 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/3247639021669272598'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/3247639021669272598'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2007/11/blog-post.html' title=''/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>0</thr:total></entry><entry><id>tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2922703860716151001.post-1014947466796396273</id><published>2007-11-01T08:43:00.000-07:00</published><updated>2007-11-01T09:06:39.892-07:00</updated><title type='text'>new(s)</title><content type='html'>Holler at your new blog.&lt;div class="blogger-post-footer"&gt;&lt;img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2922703860716151001-1014947466796396273?l=baehressentials.blogspot.com' alt='' /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;</content><link rel='replies' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/feeds/1014947466796396273/comments/default' title='Post Comments'/><link rel='replies' type='text/html' href='http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=2922703860716151001&amp;postID=1014947466796396273' title='0 Comments'/><link rel='edit' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/1014947466796396273'/><link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://www.blogger.com/feeds/2922703860716151001/posts/default/1014947466796396273'/><link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://baehressentials.blogspot.com/2007/11/holy-crap.html' title='new(s)'/><author><name>baehr</name><email>noreply@blogger.com</email><gd:image rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail' width='24' height='32' src='http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_YaK5bxqtX0o/TK4tnK9dXdI/AAAAAAAAAKI/tLPfk4td814/S220/Tanooki-Mario.jpg'/></author><thr:total>0</thr:total></entry></feed>
