Week before last I only made it to workout once, due to some schedule conflicts, so made up for it this week with 3 visits. At official weigh-in, I’m at 226. Would have been more if had been weightlifting; next week will do better.
Oh well, another week or so goes by, how the hell did that happen? We’re working off a bit of a meat hangover here at Chez Geeque, because we met some good friends for dinner at the nearby Texas de Brazil in Schaumburg and ate a large quantity of delicious slow-roasted meat. We groaned contentedly when offered dessert, came home, watched Stargate: Universe and Numb3rs, and fell into bed.
This morning we both moved very, very slowly and tonight for dinner – vegetarian! But it was a wonderful meal, and the setting and serving style lent a great sense of occasion and even drama.
Our friend Jim from Utah was visiting with a friend nearby, and we thought this was a good excuse to get together with our local friends Jon and Amy, who are big fans of this Texas de Brazil and eat there pretty frequently. They recommended the place and we made our way there from several different directions.
Jim and his friend Michelle were coming from Madison and had the longest distance to travel, so we greeted them with a glad “Hurray! Let’s eat!” and got settled. Our servier was Fabiola, a favorite of Jon and Amy’s – she’s the greatest – and she told us how it works. There are little cards at each place, along with sets of tongs in addition to the usual table setting (including steak knives). Keep the red-bordered side of the card up, get salad and soup from one of the most impressive buffet bars I’ve ever seen, and when read for the meat, turn the card over.
Immediately, servers bearing charred flesh converge on the table. You can get something cooked to order, but everything is normally medium rare. They come over, offer some generous but not overwhelmingly large portion of tasty meat, and either they push it directly onto your plate from a sword-sized skewer, or they slice off a nice piece, which you grab with your tongs as they slice and place on your plate.
Oh. My. God.
This was some serious meat action. I was of course reminded of the infamous “Meatblock” task on Amazing Race years ago, which consisted of four pounds of meat, handed to you on a tray, that you had to eat. All of it. Or you took a penalty, which was light enough that most people calculated that they’d still get to the pitstop and check in early enough to beat people who decided to stick it out chewing on 4 pounds of meat and meatlike gristle.
However, our meat was all delicious and varied. I think my favorite was the garlic top sirloin, which had incredible flavor. However, the bacon-wrapped filet mignon was also very good, as was the leg of lamb, the flank steak, the parmesan chicken, the Brazilian sausage, and whatever that rolled-roast house special was. I’m sure the pork ribs and lamb chops were good too…
Thing was, I forgot to flip my card over, so these handsome fellows bearing swordsfull of roast meat kept coming over, and David would take an occasional slice because it was right next to him.
Fortunately, I managed not to disgrace myself by eating EVERYTHING offered to me. Just most of it.
We laughed and talked, and Jim and Michelle seemed to be enjoying themselves in spite of the decor, which looks pretty Satanic what with the blood red walls, flames, and skewered flesh now that I think of it. Fabiola was delightful and charming, and so I’m sure we’ll go back again and ask for her. Just not as often as Jon and Amy, because it’s more of an “occasion” type restaurant for us rather than a weekly or twice-monthly snap decision.
But oh yeah; handsome Brazilian men bringing me hot meat on sharp sticks: bring ’em on!
Some disturbing facts in this article about an unlicensed adult group home. Meanwhile, the waiting list for a bed in a state-licensed home is 18,000 names long.
Parents decry care at Deicke Home in Lombard for disabled adults — chicagotribune.com
Disabled care advocates say the Deicke case provides an inside look at the risks of Illinois’ problematic and woefully underfunded adult-care system, where countless small, unlicensed homes provide much-needed housing but offer little relief to worried families.
“They exist because the system in Illinois is inadequate and broken,” said Zena Naiditch, president and chief executive of Equip For Equality, a nonprofit disabled care advocacy group. “You’re talking about people who are very poor and are looking for a place to live. So you have this secret, behind-the-scenes provider system that, if you shut it all down, would create a crisis. Because there’s not enough beds for everybody.”
The vast majority of group homes for disabled adults are licensed with the Department of Public Health, which provides a set of rules to ensure resident safety: on-site inspections when complaints are filed; background checks for employees; education and training for nurses; and CPR certification and other basic levels of competency.
A family member is lucky to be in one of the better-run, licensed homes. There are activities, but also paid work, and life skills like budgeting are taught to the capable residents too. It’s clean and organized when we visit (if a little noisy), and it could be a lot worse, I guess.
Parish meeting – lunch first, then business
Via: Flickr
Title: Breaking Bread
By: GinnyRED57
Originally uploaded: 11 Oct ’09, 12.43pm CDT PST
Enjoyed Friday’s episode of #SGU, not just because I’m a fangirl. Plenty of nuance, a lot of trudging across White Sands, but they’re in survival mode, people! And what about that shuttle?
Edgier and younger in tone, SGU takes the franchise in a dynamic new direction, appealing to longtime Stargate fans and first-time viewers alike. The two-part premiere of Universe was directed by Andy Mikita (Stargate Atlantis, Stargate SG-1) and lensed by Rohn Schmidt (The Shield, The Mist). The series also stars Alaina Huffman, Louis Ferreira, Elyse Levesque, David Blue, Jamil Walker Smith and Brian J. Smith.
SGU follows a band of soldiers, scientists and civilians, who must fend for themselves as they are forced through a Stargate when their hidden base comes under attack. The desperate survivors emerge aboard an ancient ship, which is locked on an unknown course and unable to return to Earth. Faced with meeting the most basic needs of food, water and air, the group must unlock the secrets of the ship’s Stargate to survive. The danger, adventure and hope they find on board the Destiny will reveal the heroes and villains among them.
My husband David and I were, like a lot of Stargate: SG1 fans, kind of late to the party. The original TV series, itself a spinoff from a movie staring Kurt Russell, started out life on Showtime but we were not subscribers to that cable service. Fortunately, it started showing reruns after about the first season or two on the SciFi network, and then they started running several episodes at a time on “Stargate Mondays.” Eventually, the show moved to SciFi itself, and we were soon caught up on all the old seasons and waiting impatiently for new episodes to air.
When Stargate: Atlantis premiered, we liked it a lot, and thus when first SG1 and then Atlantis were eventually canceled, we were saddened and perplexed. Sure, we could see why after a lengthy and very successful run, it was time to wrap up SG1 so that the cast could move on to new projects. But we couldn’t see why Atlantis was being cancelled when it was only a few seasons into what could have been just as long a run, and felt kind of resentful that a whole new series, Stargate: Universe, was immediately announced. What? No more Dr. McCrankypants and his amusing fear of citrus products?
However, in spite of our reluctance to get sucked in to yet another SciFi/SyFy show that inevitably gets canceled by beancounters, we watched last week’s premiere of “Universe.” I’m glad to see that the ratings were good, because I think it has a lot of potential – not just as “a sci-fi show” but as “a drama set in space with character-driven plots and lots of potential conflict/problem resolution stories.”
It was quite interesting to me to see how in the 3rd part of “Air,” (the first two parts were the 2-hour premiere last week) there was a lot of fragmentation, lack of group cohesion, and out-and-out dislike between characters. Not only that, but there’s likely to be a lot more shades of grey as far as individual versions of the truth and the current situation is at any one moment. As in, Rush orders Sgt. Greer to do something drastic, and immediately afterward, declares that Greer did this horrible thing (before it was clear that Greer would actually be around to explain his actions). When Greer showed up, that sets up a bit of an awkward moment later for Dr. Rush if questions are asked. It’ll be interesting to see if that bit of business shows up later as an example of the untrustworthiness of Dr. Rush, who continues to present an almost mystical, supremely confident public face, with a side of “how dare you!” when challenged. Yet when he’s alone, that’s when his defenses are down… and you wonder if he’s really a megalo-maniac, or just a garden-variety suicidal maniac.
It’s hard to write ambiguity, and shifting loyalties, and group dynamics that lack clear focus or strong leadership. That’s why it will be interesting to see how things develop in the weeks to come. Clearly, their first priority for survival was Air; next week seems to be about power reserves, light, and the lack of it.
Also, there is that matter of the shuttle that took off shortly after the ship went back into FTL (faster than light) drive; there were 2 people that went through the desert planet’s gate to some other planet that they thought offered a better chance of survival. Are they lost forever? Did someone (most likely Eli, who tried desperately to herd cats on the planet) go back to try to find the others?
Yes, it looks and feels a little like Battlestar Galactica (a show I never watched, although David hung in there with it). It doesn’t SOUND like BSG though, thank God; I couldn’t get past the whammity-bammity wardrumming on Galactica and the soundtrack for SGU sounds much more orchestral, yet without the synthesizers favored in the previous shows. To my ear, the music is more sonorous, melodic, and a little more melancholy than either Stargate series ever was, and the cinematography up to now has been either claustrophobia-inducing, or opened wide up, emphasising the hugeness of, yes, the universe compared to the puny humans now marooned on a derelict ship. As in – the opening shot shows empty space, and the ship materializes (slows from faster-than-light speed) far, far away from the camera’s point of view. How lonely, and how beautiful, and how mysterious. We remarked at the time that we thought the ship was coming alive, attempting to prepare for its long-awaited guests, as the interior lights were coming on as the Icarus ring was connecting. Also, it was a little like “light the lights, show’s about to begin.”
It doesn’t look or feel like either of the previous Stargate series, which isn’t necessarily bad or wrong; just different. Maybe I should make a quick list of attributes for each series as I currently see them, to illustrate the differences…
It’s a tug-of-war between the “bean counters” and the “been counted (unworthy of an upgrade)”. If you’re not on your company’s VIP list, good luck with getting business class to Singapore…
Cheaper business airfares still a tough sell in today’s economy – USATODAY.com
Trying to lure business travelers back into more expensive seats, airlines have slashed business-class fares to foreign cities. Many business-class airfares to Europe this fall are 33% to 66% cheaper than a year ago, an analysis by FareCompare.com finds.
While the cheaper fares are more attractive to cost-conscious companies, they are still a tough sell in this economy. In fact, some companies are requiring employees to buy only coach tickets, which traditionally are one-fourth to one-eighth the price of business class.
Delta Air Lines’ cheapest round trip, a non-stop New York-London coach ticket on Oct. 7, for example, was $716 for an Oct. 23 departure and an Oct. 30 return. The least-expensive business-class fare for the same flight was $4,634.
“The real question is: Will business travelers pay substantially more for a more comfy ride as companies move toward increased austerity?” asks FareCompare.com CEO Rick Seaney.
From what I can see, booking a lot of international travel for one major multinational client, the old days of expecting to fly business class are over unless you’re either a Vice President or other VIP with your corporation, or you luck into a free upgrade. It’s true that in some markets there are now heavily discounted, nonrefundable round-trip business class fares in the most competitive markets, but even then, they’re 4 or 8 times the cost of a discount, nonrefundable coach fare. AND they have bigger change penalties, in some cases approaching $300.00-$400.00 plus difference in fares. In the case of the company I’m currently “tied” to, there are now directives in place that state that a manager or higher must approve the purchase of a business class fare, via email in most cases. However, it’s a lot easier to get a “yes” if it’s a nonrefundable fare of, say, $3500 versus a refundable fare of $7,000-$8,500.
That said, the upgrade certificates that many corporate agencies administer on behalf of their accounts are now worth their weight in gold. They’re often given out in packs to companies that have corporate discount deals with international carriers, as a way to sweeten the deal.
As for domestic travel, some airlines are really good about offering either “free upgrade” coach fares that automatically get rebooked into the forward cabin when priced (typically they are booked in the last 2 or 3 pricing categories to sell out). Others are really good about upgrading frequent flyers as soon as they detect a new booking by a high-mileage traveler has been ticketed. Yet others don’t give out a lot of upgrades unless your mileage is stratospheric… but they do hand out a fair number of tightly controlled “free” tickets. As you might think, profitability is a problem for a couple of the examples I have in mind.
Still other airlines are operated like airborne cattle cars, yet continue to be profitable without any forward cabin at all. Why? Because they provide reliable, reasonably priced, friendly service (well, Southwest/WN, anyway).
Hmm… ironically, they’re getting the business without bothering about the class.
Especially don’t mess with me on my own blog with a bunch of religio-cranky delusionist crap. Also.