Nashville - Bluebird Cafe

We just got back from Nashville visiting our daughter and her sorority's parents' weekend. It was a great weekend even with the rain. A lot of good food, nice people, bigs, littles, great music, art and cowboy boots. Saturday Susan took us to the most fun place - it's called The Bluebird Cafe. You wouldn't believe this place. It's a storefront in a retail strip of stores. You make reservations online Monday at 8am or come and stand in line to see if you get lucky. The venue is referred to as In The Round which means there are 4 to 6 chairs in a small circle in the center of the floor and then small tables around the rest of the floor. The entire place probably seats 100 people or less. The entertainers are song writers that play and sing their songs. Many of the singers have songs that have been recorded by big names and become hits. The music was FANTASTIC! The night we were there was being conducted as a fund raiser for the area YMCA organization. People were buying CD's for $100+ to support the cause. I got in the spirit when one of the keyboard players asked if anyone had a piano in their home. I raised my hand out and said you got it. Before I knew it I had made a donation to the YMCA and we have arranged a summer party in Cincinnati with a fantastic Nashville song writer and recording artist to play for us. You can see a short video and also see some pictures from the Bluebird Cafe

De Lorean Double Take

I was driving on Columbia Parkway (Cincinnati) this morning and saw two De Lorean automobiles coming side by side from the other direction. It's not often to see one of these, pretty unusual to see two. These cars were orginally manufactured for the American market from 1981 to 1983 in Ireland. There were about 9k of these built.

The De Lorean Motor Company went bankrupt in late 1982 following John De Lorean's arrest in October of that year on drug trafficking charges. He was later found not guilty, but it was too late for the DMC-12. Approximately 100 partially assembled DMC's on the production line were completed by Consolidated International (now known as Big Lots).

Probably most known for it's role in Back to the Future.

Ikea - Bigger than the white death?

The first Ikea in Ohio opened today in Cincinnati. This may have been a bigger event than the white death (snow) we received this past weekend. I had business in the general area so just happened to drive by the new store. They had police at all entrances turning people away! There was no room in the parking lot for more cars. It's just hard for me to get too excited about this - but a lot of people sure are.

My Cholesterol

Check this out - I'm pretty proud of these cholesterol results. Thanks much to my new physician.

Oh yeah, what did it take? The usual - diet, exercise and drugs.

The White Death

It's March 8, 2008, and it happened - the WHITE DEATH - was visited upon us. We had SNOW! Having grown up in Cleveland this is not too big a deal for me but for most of the other people in Cincinnati - it's a classic Chicken Little - The Sky is Falling . This picture is from Paxton Avenue in Hyde Park where a cross country skier passed along be for the dogs and I got there. I caught up with the skier when I got closer to home and got his picture - which you can see at Google's Picasaweb

Replacing Kitchen Disposal

This weekend I went to the big box hardware store and bought a replacement garbage disposal. What a great invention. What else can take 10 lbs. of food waste and turn it into rat food so quickly? I'm not incredibly handy but can tackle some simple around the house jobs and I thought changing the disposal couldn't be too bad. I was told that the various fittings were pretty standard - I expected that I would just disconnect the old one - then connect the new one and voila (or as some say wallah)! I should have remembered that plumbing tasks just never work for me. First of all, the housing of the old unit was bigger in diameter than then new unit so the old pipes didn't reach. This just meant another trip to the hardware store. I found Ralph, who was very helpful, at our hardware store and he got me what I needed. I used my hacksaw to shorten one pipe, used my one or two replacement components and got everything hooked back together. I ran the water in the sink - no leaks. I switched on the grinder and it purred. Everything was fine - or so I thought. Only problem was - I omitted reading the instructions. Later the next evening I was working in my home office and my wife came in and asked 'have you been in the kitchen?' This was a loaded question - we now had water all over the floor. The fine point that I had missed was that - not everyone has a dishwasher. This means that the black hose that goes in the the upper part of the unit, which is the dishwasher drain pipe, is not something that everyone has. For those that don't have a dishwasher - the port that this hose connects to is blocked. If I had read the instructions I would have learned that those of us that do have a dishwasher need to take a screwdriver and a hammer and knock out the plug that blocks off this port!

Now I have rerun the dishwasher and when it finished - the bottom of the dishwasher was no longer filled with water and - I did not have a small lake in my kitchen.

Perhaps next time I will remember not to do any plumbing jobs.

Microsoft TS2 Event Survey

Dear Microsoft,

Hi, Is this for real?????

> Thank you for attending the Microsoft TS2 Event from August 1, 2007 - December 20, 2007.

I would think that if I were at an event that lasted that long I would remember it. Wait, let me ask my wife if she remembers me being gone that long. I'll get back to you.

Thanks.

Regards,
Allen
================================================

From: Feedback@MicrosoftTS2.com [mailto:Feedback@MicrosoftTS2.com]
Sent: Wed 2/20/2008 12:05 PM
To: Allen Miller
Subject: Reminder - Microsoft TS2 needs your feedback

Dear Allen Miller,

Thank you for attending the Microsoft TS2 Event from August 1, 2007 - December 20, 2007. You have been invited to complete the TS2 Event Satisfaction Survey. The goal of this survey is to measure the effectiveness of our events and help us gain deeper insight on how we can improve your relationship with the Microsoft Partner Program. By completing the survey and sharing your feedback, you will help us gain additional insight on your interaction with the Microsoft Partner Program tools and resources while helping us to improve your overall experience with TS2 Events.