Weekend Roundup
Friday sucked. The less said about that, the better.The sole positive about Friday was that after I finally left the office about 9ish pm, I went by and bought a Kinect for my Xbox 360. I promptly worked out some stress playing a weird human Breakout-style game ("you are the paddle!") and playing around with the Dance Central preview.
Saturday was a decent amount of cleaning. I'd basically realized that it was That Time Again and set about dusting and vaccuuming. I'd had my Usual Movie Buddy turn down catching either RED or Megamind, so I ended up finally seeing RED alone. (I'd been holding it a bit because it was UMB's kind of movie, but ... his loss.) I had to go out to grab some Cleaning Stuff, so I also grabbed Dance Central while I was out, and some 3M Command Strips to hold the Kinect to the top of the LCD flatscreen. (Worked like a charm, and about 1/5 the price of the apparently-unstable shelf that PDP sells.) I also played around watching college football on ESPN3, now that Xbox has that after this week's update. (Pardon me while I channel a tween here and squee. Streaming live/semi-live ESPN? Awesome. Streaming live/semi-live ESPN that I can control by talking to the television? Coolest thing evar.) Saturday night I went out to a former Mick's (now Thirsty Dog Tavern), which was pretty damn tasty--definite foodie bar.
Saturday night was more Kinect games, while I continued ignoring the files I'd brought home from work. I overthought Kinect Adventures a bit, because I was a touch disappointed that there were some games that could be done with just a regular controller, and might have even been somewhat better. (Rafting, I'm looking at you here.) Rallyball, however, which is the aforementioned human Breakout-like game, has quickly become my new favorite Xbox casual game. Better, I found my younger brother playing Adventures on Saturday night, so we networked up and ran some co-op games. The microphones on the Kinect picked out voices well while filtering out the game noise, so we could chat while playing (with occasional interjections from his wife) and it was almost like he was right there, especially with the outline of his avatar right next to mine on the screen.
Dance Central was both fun and a good workout; I'm glad I picked it up. It's rapidly getting addictive. I'm sure it's no coincidence that the song you start on is pretty recognizable to much of anyone these days (Lady Gaga's "Poker Face").
Sunday late morning, I went up to historic Roswell to check out some of the eating establishments there. (Yeah, I ate out too much this weekend.) I parked at one end and walked to the other, then back down to figure out where to eat. Sadly, a number of places were closed. I ended up at the Street Kitchen, which was ... interesting. The pimento cheese was good. The white chicken chili was ... well, the base was stock and cream, and it had tons of droplets of what looked like chili oil, and a few small strips (just in a cup) of what looked for all the word like Boar's Head sliced chicken. It was spicy, and not bad, but ... not really white chili.
So I watched part of the Falcons game (damn fine game!) and worked a little on the aforementioned files before a traditional Sunday afternoon nap. I headed down to Pizzeria Vesuvius, my traditional Sunday evening spot, a little earlier than usual, hoping to find the owner/chef, who hadn't been there the past couple of weeks. Instead, I found a bit of a conundrum. There were lots of people there, and a good number there for the Sunday night buffet, but the pizza quality wasn't quite what I was used to, maybe because Richard still wasn't there. It was still good, and certainly better than most commercial pizza joints, but it wasn't what it had been. I noticed that the namesake pizza (my favorite!) wasn't even on the menu anymore, though John, the manager, had one fixed for the buffet when I asked. (Though he wasn't sure if they had the ot sauce--thankfully, they did.) I'm ... getting curious about what's happened with Richard, if he was bought out by partners or something, between not seeing him there for 3 Sundays running and some of the changes (poorer quality on the buffet, and not the range that he usually did). Really, I saw him as the Naples-trained pizza-maker he was, and a chef to boot, so his pizzas had flair, which was one of the things that kept me coming. Now ... it's wood-fired pizza still, and good, but without that extra Something. I'd wager I could tell the difference between one of their old pizzas and a newer one, and likely with my eyes closed. (The size of the sliced pepperoni would be a giveaway.)
I've missed 3 weeks there myself, when I went for my cruise, so Richard may just be off on a deserved vacation. Still, I'll probably ask if he's not there again next week. Pizza aside, it was always fun talking SEC football with him.
Saturday was a decent amount of cleaning. I'd basically realized that it was That Time Again and set about dusting and vaccuuming. I'd had my Usual Movie Buddy turn down catching either RED or Megamind, so I ended up finally seeing RED alone. (I'd been holding it a bit because it was UMB's kind of movie, but ... his loss.) I had to go out to grab some Cleaning Stuff, so I also grabbed Dance Central while I was out, and some 3M Command Strips to hold the Kinect to the top of the LCD flatscreen. (Worked like a charm, and about 1/5 the price of the apparently-unstable shelf that PDP sells.) I also played around watching college football on ESPN3, now that Xbox has that after this week's update. (Pardon me while I channel a tween here and squee. Streaming live/semi-live ESPN? Awesome. Streaming live/semi-live ESPN that I can control by talking to the television? Coolest thing evar.) Saturday night I went out to a former Mick's (now Thirsty Dog Tavern), which was pretty damn tasty--definite foodie bar.
Saturday night was more Kinect games, while I continued ignoring the files I'd brought home from work. I overthought Kinect Adventures a bit, because I was a touch disappointed that there were some games that could be done with just a regular controller, and might have even been somewhat better. (Rafting, I'm looking at you here.) Rallyball, however, which is the aforementioned human Breakout-like game, has quickly become my new favorite Xbox casual game. Better, I found my younger brother playing Adventures on Saturday night, so we networked up and ran some co-op games. The microphones on the Kinect picked out voices well while filtering out the game noise, so we could chat while playing (with occasional interjections from his wife) and it was almost like he was right there, especially with the outline of his avatar right next to mine on the screen.
Dance Central was both fun and a good workout; I'm glad I picked it up. It's rapidly getting addictive. I'm sure it's no coincidence that the song you start on is pretty recognizable to much of anyone these days (Lady Gaga's "Poker Face").
Sunday late morning, I went up to historic Roswell to check out some of the eating establishments there. (Yeah, I ate out too much this weekend.) I parked at one end and walked to the other, then back down to figure out where to eat. Sadly, a number of places were closed. I ended up at the Street Kitchen, which was ... interesting. The pimento cheese was good. The white chicken chili was ... well, the base was stock and cream, and it had tons of droplets of what looked like chili oil, and a few small strips (just in a cup) of what looked for all the word like Boar's Head sliced chicken. It was spicy, and not bad, but ... not really white chili.
So I watched part of the Falcons game (damn fine game!) and worked a little on the aforementioned files before a traditional Sunday afternoon nap. I headed down to Pizzeria Vesuvius, my traditional Sunday evening spot, a little earlier than usual, hoping to find the owner/chef, who hadn't been there the past couple of weeks. Instead, I found a bit of a conundrum. There were lots of people there, and a good number there for the Sunday night buffet, but the pizza quality wasn't quite what I was used to, maybe because Richard still wasn't there. It was still good, and certainly better than most commercial pizza joints, but it wasn't what it had been. I noticed that the namesake pizza (my favorite!) wasn't even on the menu anymore, though John, the manager, had one fixed for the buffet when I asked. (Though he wasn't sure if they had the ot sauce--thankfully, they did.) I'm ... getting curious about what's happened with Richard, if he was bought out by partners or something, between not seeing him there for 3 Sundays running and some of the changes (poorer quality on the buffet, and not the range that he usually did). Really, I saw him as the Naples-trained pizza-maker he was, and a chef to boot, so his pizzas had flair, which was one of the things that kept me coming. Now ... it's wood-fired pizza still, and good, but without that extra Something. I'd wager I could tell the difference between one of their old pizzas and a newer one, and likely with my eyes closed. (The size of the sliced pepperoni would be a giveaway.)
I've missed 3 weeks there myself, when I went for my cruise, so Richard may just be off on a deserved vacation. Still, I'll probably ask if he's not there again next week. Pizza aside, it was always fun talking SEC football with him.