Stupidfool.org

Back in time

Google Search (2001), a search interface against a Google index from January, 2001 (FAQ)--and in honor of Google's 10th birthday--is really fascinating.

Doing a search against it for things that are common now--Movable Type, for instance; or, even, blog, which returns only 76,000 results!--yield such different results that it's truly like traveling in time, almost, which, I guess, says something for Google's ubiquity and the expectation--or, at least, my expectation--that search results presented in Google's interface actually reflect the current reality. It's disturbing, slightly.

Janelle Monae's "Many Moons"

A brilliant, manic video (via Idolator), also available on Janelle Monae's official site (with better audio quality).

Cocktails on the iPhone

Cocktails, on the phone: the future is truly here!

Photo from spiritsandcocktails.com

Cocktails--my absolute favorite iPhone app, both for reference (while at the store, looking to buy everything I need to make a cocktail) and for browsing fun--just got a recent upgrade. Along with the usual bug fixes, speed improvements, &c., they've added a new collection of recipes, which they're calling the Contemporary Masters series:

Our inaugural release includes a generous 78 recipes from Seattle mixologist Jamie Boudreau. We’re confident you will find in his recipes a rich trove of fresh ideas and techniques. In another first, we’re implementing in this release our first real batch of ingredient recipes: formulations for extraordinary ingredients you make yourself, ahead of time.

The drink I'm most excited to try is the Twelve Five Cocktail, a mixture of scotch, absinthe, Punt e Mes, and Benedictine.

"It's Muzak now."

Jon Stewart on 24-hour news networks, from this Entertainment Weekly cover story:

On CNBC I saw a guy talking to eight people in [eight different onscreen] boxes, and they were all like, "I don't know!" It'd be like if Hurricane Ike hit, and you put on the Weather Channel, and they were yelling, "I don't know what the fuck is going on! I'm getting wet and it's windy and I don't know why and it's making me sad! Maybe the president could come down and put up some sort of windscreen?"

Bailout

My favorite explanation of the financial conditions that led to the bailout, from Choire Sicha:

So like, if you loaned a bunch of people money, under the mistaken impression that Michael Jackson's back catalogue would always get more expensive, and then Michael Jackson got some weird face surgery again and no one wanted his albums any more, well then they won't get more expensive and all those loans are pretty worthless—and plus you loaned people money for mp3s who really didn't have the money to pay it back anyhow!

Warm Kabocha Squash Salad

Another weekend, and yet another winner from the Lucques cookbook! This was a warm kabocha squash salad with bacon, roncal (I substituted manchego), and pecans.

This recipe from a 2004 issue of Sunset (penned by Suzanne Goin) approximates the recipe from the cookbook, as you'd expect, with a couple of slight changes.

I love kabocha squash, especially roasted as it was here, with olive oil, thyme, and some salt and pepper: it's sweet and delicious, and paired with bacon, a sherry-based vinaigrette, toasted pecans, shaved manchego, arugula... I'm hungry again, just thinking about it.

On Qualifications

George Saunders, in "My Gal", from last week's New Yorker:

Where was I? Ah, yes: I hate Élites. Which is why, whenever I am having brain surgery, or eye surgery, which is sometimes necessary due to all my non-blinking, I always hire some random Regular guy, with shaking hands if possible, who is also a drunk, scared of the sight of blood, and harbors a secret dislike for me.

Microsoft's Seinfeld campaign

On the shuttering of Microsoft's Gates-Seinfeld ad campaign: for my part, I actually liked the ads (one and two).

Well, okay--"liked" is a strong word, and it doesn't really describe how I felt about them. "Appreciated" might be more accurate, because it was a complicated feeling.

Or, maybe: they didn't feel like your typical Microsoft ads, which, at least, was something.

John Gruber sort of nails it in "There's Nothing There", when he writes:

But they "worked" only insofar as they said nothing and dropped the pretense of saying something. The spots said nothing and reveled in the nothingness.

And I suppose that, in the end, what the ads made me feel most was sad. Sad that Bill Gates, who, after all these years, and despite being (once again) the richest man in the world, apparently doesn't feel like he understands "regular people" or why they use his company's products; and sad that Microsoft who, despite their being (still!) so dominant, still feel like they're losing--and by what they seem to be measuring, they're right.

That just seems like the worst kind of torture.

Bucatini all'Amatriciana

One of the major benefits of having made a batch of basic tomato sauce a couple of weeks ago is that I can now make one of my favorite pasta recipes, bucatini all'Amatriciana, using Mario Batali's recipe.

I've been making this dish for a couple of years, after we ate it at local Italian restaurant and loved it. It's a simple dish, at heart, and it can withstand a lot of experimentation & tweaking: I've made it with bacon, as well as with pancetta; I've made it with a basic 28oz can of San Marzano tomatoes, as well as with the aforementioned basic tomato sauce; I've even made it, once or twice, with a pasta other than bucatini.

But I've never been as happy with the Bucatini all'Amatriciana as I was the other night, when I made it with lovely chunks of pancetta and the basic tomato sauce. It was simple, hearty, and delicious.

Not Boring

A gigantic tunnel boring machine, as featured in "The Long Dig" (abstract only, sorry) in last week's New Yorker: