Author: Eugene Glover

I’d like to think they guy ahead of me at lunch today learned his lesson, but I know he didn’t.

He wanted 4 6″ sandwiches, three of them identical, he also wanted them to be “specials” – that is, sandwich, cookie, chips.

Pretty simple, eh? Yeah, you’d think.

Instead, our protagonist decided he was going to make things “simple” for the sandwich artists. Here’s how it goes:

Artist: What can I get for you, sir?
Knucklehead: I need four 6″ sandwich specials, one a tuna on wheat, the other three BMT’s on Italian. You can just make one of them a 12″ sandwich.

What do you think the artisan made? 4 sandwiches, 1 6″ tuna, 2 6″ BMTs and a 12″ BMT. Exactly as ordered. But of course, knucklehead was trying to get both the 6″ sandwich deal special and pay the price for a single 12″ sub instead of the price of 2 6″ subs. (To be fair, there’s no reason that a 12″ sub shouldn’t be exactly the cost of 2 6″ subs, but thoes are the breaks. I suppose there’s lower overhead on only topping one sandwich instead of two.)

The practical upstart is that I waited 5 minutes while they all tried to wrap their heads around Knucklehead’s poor language skills and their inability to comprehend beyond their script. Meantime, my toasted sandwich got cold.

I wish there’s been a giant octopus handy.

I wonder if this lends any more credence to stories of giant octopi attacking ships in the old days? Perhaps old sailing vessels looked like tasty sharks or whales passing by? Follow the digg story link back to a video of an octopus killing a shark at an aquarium in Seattle. Impressive!

From DIGG:

A giant octopus takes on a shark in a video like something from a horror movie, Octopuses are remarkable creatures, and are much more intelligent than you may think.

read more | digg story

DSC00270.JPG

Originally uploaded by Gridman.

Chu-Wan and I had our first christmas tree in 1999. It was a live tree that was about 3 feet tall when we planted it.

Now it is about 12 feet tall and I noticed today while cleaning the pool that it is forming pine cones for the first time!

08-06-05_1210

Originally uploaded by Gridman.

This is not a review. This is a promise!

Manhattan Pizza & Subs has been on 7th Street in Phoenix since 1984. I’ve been eating there since 1987. In all that time, only once, in 1987, did I eat a pizza there, at lunch time on a work day. It took them so long to cook it that I got in trouble at work – I had to take it to go, and still I got back to the office late and had to hear about it. (They didn’t actually care that I worked 70 hours a week on unpaid overtime, all they cared was that I was back from lunch before 1:01.)

I didn’t get to enjoy the pizza and I’ve just not tried again. In the intervening 18 years, I’ve eaten hundreds of sandwiches there. I love ’em. Especially the #10, pictured here.

This is my promise to you. I will eat a pizza there in the month of August and review it.

Now that I’ve committed to it, I can’t back out. It’s a done deal.

I was just checking the statistics on my web site and I’m always surprised at what people are looking for: Here are the top search phrases that lead people to my page.

• kung fu I must have mentioned this somewhere but cannot remember where or why
• lee’s sandwich OK, fair enough, I like to eat there.
• rude costco employeeI don’t think I’ve ever met a rude Costco employee
• locust This one makes sense
• costco arizona Perhaps they’re looking to find that same rude Costco employee
• taipei Again, this makes sense – I’ve written enough about Taipei at The Lone Locust Travel Page
• singapore post Someone looking for a post office?
• taiwan underground shopping street Been there, done that
• toilet restaurant Been there, done that, too, but I’m not bragging about it

I guess it just goes to show… come to think of it, I’m not sure what it shows.

Magnetic distortion due to lightning strike

Originally uploaded by JohnKit.

Tuesday night my office building was struck by lightning. Most of the monitors in the building were left on, but in power saving mode. This was the result!

Wednesday morning, many of the older CRT type monitors looked like this when we turned them on.

That background should be solid blue. This photo was taken by a co-worker and better than the ones I took with my cameraphone.

If anyone was in the building when this one struck, I’ll bet their hair was standing on end!

07-30-05_0809

Originally uploaded by Gridman.

I don’t generally write entries commenting on news articles, but this one is too much of a hoot to pass up.

Some pretentious wanker filled a bottle of water with melted ice from the Antarctic, placed it on a plinth and had the audacity to call it “art.” More than just plain audacity, he’s valued it at £42,500!

That in itself would be a funny story, but the kicker is that someone apparently drank it in the middle of the exhibition!

While I would never advocate theft, this is just too poetic for words, in fact, there’s the art in this whole situation. It’s beautiful, thought-provoking and it moves me emotionally.