Pilot lights, bad design, etc.

Had to use the heat today (it got down to around 40 last night), and discovered that the pilot light on the furnace was out. This required that the pilot light be re-lit, a task that was complicated by the fact that the access to the pilot light was on the side of the furnace closest (about a foot and a half) to the wall. To be fair, another side of the furnace is cheek by jowl with the other furnace, but that leaves two sides that have 12 or so feet of clearance. So, among the great questions of our time is, why on earth wouldn't you install the furnace so that it was easy to access the pilot light?

University of Illinois engineering alum Henry Petroski's got a number of books about design, and engineering and similar questions.

Lawyers among us...

Included herewith is a (partial) list of lawyers/former lawyers/recovering lawyers in the children's/YA lit biz. I'm sure there are other obvious ones I'm blanking on:

Franny Billingsley
Sara Jane Boyers
Alex Flinn
D.L. Garfinkle
Ruth Pennebaker
Sean Petrie
Louis Sachar
Greg Leitich Smith
Cynthia Leitich Smith
Cheryl Aylward Whitesel
Janet Wong

Happy Presidents' Day!

Okay, back in the mists of time, there were these two holidays: Lincoln's Birthday and Washington's Birthday. For reasons not entirely clear to me, these were apparently combined into one when Martin Luther King Day became a national holiday. Since it's generically "Presidents' Day" I'm not sure if it's supposed to honor all our presidents, including say, whatshisname who died from eating cherries, or just Lincoln and Washington.

Regardless, here are a couple links to things L and W.

NIU's Lincoln Net
Abe Lincoln Presidential Library

George Washington at the White House
Mount Vernon

Catcher in the Rye

I have a confession to make. I can't stand this book. I think Holden Caulfield is a spoiled, whiny baby.

Austin Restaurant Guide for TLAers

The Texas Library Association conference is here in Austin this year for the first time since Johnson was president (Lyndon, not Andrew) and I've been getting requests for restaurant advice. So, here's a quick and dirty guide to Austin restaurants. All are within walking distance or a quick cab ride of the Convention Center and convention hotels (in no particular order):

Best Places to go on an Expense Account:

Driskill Grill (One of Austin's best, in the recently restored Driskill Hotel)
Cafe at Four Seasons (Very good, best place to rub shoulders with celebrities [Lovett, Bullock, etc.])
(Note: The Driskill Grill and the Cafe are typically Austin's highest rated restaurants)
Bitter End Bistro and Brewery (Good beer, good food, recommended for carnivores)
Vespaio (High end Italian. I don't know if they take reservations, though, so you should be there at 5:30 or be prepared to wait)
Louie's 106 (Mediterranean, in the historic Littlefield Building)
Truluck's (seafood, in the heart of the Warehouse District)
Jeffrey's (the Bushes' favorite; tables are a little close together, though)
Zoot (high end American)
Fonda San Miguel (Interior Mexican, a bit of a hike from downtown)

Japanese/Sushi:

Uchi (Sushi, but with a twist)
Kyoto (on Congress Avenue, with a tatami room)
Musashino (also a bit of a hike, but worth it)

Vegetarian:

Mother's
West Lynn Cafe

High End Chains:

Roy's (Asian fusion)
Sullivan's (steak)

Other Downtown/Near Downtown Restaurants:

Roaring Fork (New, in the Stephen F. Austin Hotel, a little loud)
Restaurant at the Mansion on Judge's Hill(in boutique hotel in newly restored mansion)
Manuel's (Mexican upscale)
La Traviata (Italian)
Z Tejas (new Southwestern)
East Side Cafe (they grow their own vegetables)

Funky Austin Places (inexpensive):

Magnolia Cafe
Kerbey Lane Cafe
Hyde Park Bar and Grill (look for the fork in the road)
Guero's (Tex Mex)
Katz's New York Deli
County Line (barbecue, but a little outlying)
Iron Works (barbecue)
Stubb's (barbecue)
Hoover's (southern home cooking. And barbecue)

Happy Days and the late 70s

The other night ABC had a 30 year retrospective/reunion show on HAPPY DAYS. Very nice show; they even had a segment on the "jumping the shark" episode, although they were a bit, hmmm, nuanced on the exact definition.

Of course, this also got me thinking about other things going on circa 25-30 years ago:

Cell phones were the size of bricks (A "brick" is something that used to be employed more often in the building of houses.).

Music came on vinyl disks the size of dinner plates.

Beta vs. VHS

8-track vs. cassette.

There were only three television networks. Most of the country received them via a piece of wire called an "antenna."

64K was considered a lot of memory for a computer.

There was only one long distance telephone company.

Saturday morning cartoons were actually cool and an entire generation learned the words of the Preamble to the Constitution during the commercial breaks.

Chrysler was still an American company (although the recipient of a government bailout) and its most prominent product was the K car.

Chicago had a mayor who was not named Richard Daley.

Jimmy Carter, a former peanut farmer and submariner, was president of the United States. (On February 19, the Navy will commission the U.S.S. Jimmy Carter, a Seawolf-class attack submarine, in his honor).

Ellen Raskin won the 1979 Newbery Award for The Westing Game.

Lobsters feels no pain...

when dropped into boiling water. At least according to this study by the University of Oslo.

Freddie would disagree.

Old news, but still bizarre...or who was Antonio Meucci?

According to House Resolution 269 (June 11, 2002), he was the inventor of the telephone. As for Alexander Graham Bell, he was a fraud. And worse, a Scotsman.

According to a poster (postee?) "[t]he question of whether Bell was the true inventor of the telephone is perhaps the single most litigated fact in U.S. history, and the Bell patents were defended in some 600 cases. Bell never lost a case. HR 269 directly contradicts findings of courts in New York, Massachusetts, Louisiana, Ohio, Maryland, and numerous others states. (See among others American Bell Telephone Co. v. Dolbear, 15 Fed. Rep. 448; American Bell Telephone Co. v. Spencer, 8 Fed. Rep. 509, and American Bell Telephone Co. v. Molecular Telephone, 32 Fed. Rep. 214.)." HR 269 also apparently directly contradicts the findings of the Congressional Committee of 1886, set up in response to the Pan-Electric Telephone scandal.

Hmmm. Almost makes you remember the good old days when the Indiana House decided pi was equal to 3.2.

Valentine's Day

So tonight I'm trying to recreate something Cyn and I had a few years' back at Le Cinq, a restaurant in Paris: (whole) lobster and (whole) chicken, steamed together, with a sauce (I don't know what the sauce was, but I'm shooting for something like a remoulade). I'll probably just use a couple lobster tails and some chicken leg/thighs, though. Also, steamed asparagus and heart of palm salad. Chocolate covered strawberries for dessert. And a Petit Syrah (I know it's a red, but Cyn doesn't drink white, and besides, it's a fairly light red and the lobster and remoulade are rich, anyway).

Things I am not doing today...

The Austin Marathon. I've done it a few times before - it's got a pretty good route. The first few miles are up in the northwest part of town (lots of concrete and strip malls), then it meanders downtown in front of the state Capitol and Congress Avenue, and then around Town Lake and Zilker Park. Twenty-six point two miles, but it's all downhill.

Yeah, I feel like a slug.