According to a survey by Men’s Health, Sacramento is the 18th most socially networked city in the States, beating such larger areas as San Jose and New York City (??). Since this blog is basically my only connection to the social network, as it were, I’m not sure what to make of it. But I guess we’re pretty savvy!
Twitter Towns (Men’s Health)
Guy Fieri continues his tour of Sacramento when Diners, Drive-ins and Dives visits Dad’s Kitchen. Bought by Julio Peix from some juggalos scant more than a year ago, Dad’s has quickly become a local favorite on Freeport with a tasty mix of comfort food, craft beer and great music. Poke your head in tonight, it will probably be a fun party. DDD is on the Food Network at 9:00pm.
As with being told to vote (I can’t find where I talked about that), I’m not entirely sure how I feel about being told to try my hand at balancing the budget. I assume the Bee’s interactive feature was not done in cahoots with the powers that bee in the state house. But I was also asked by the Natomas School District to participate in an “interactive budget workshop” (tonight at 6pm at Inderkum High School) to collaborate with Assemblyman Dr. Richard Pan on balancing the state’s books. For some reason this just doesn’t sit right with me.
Sure, we voters bear some responsibility for the mess as many of the strings tying the hands of the legislators were put there by voters. But making sense of it is part of a politician’s job. They seek our input when we vote, so pretending that they are taking our input in the line items of the budget seems like a preemptive excuse for when the final result doesn’t please anyone. “Well, we certainly did solicit your input, but as you see there are as many budget solutions as there are Californians, so our options were limited, etc.” So when the actual budget consists of a bunch of backroom temporary and no permanent solutions, we won’t have anyone to blame but ourselves.
I know my feelings on these things are seldom relatable but there you have it. What do you think? Do you enjoy fiddling with the knobs? Do you think they actually care what we’d do if we called the shots?
I am usually skeptical about weather warnings and today was shaping up as validation of that, since it cleared up nicely despite forecasts for rain through the evening. But that was before I saw this outside the window here at work just now. Technically this is a funnel cloud, I believe:
Now if I could just find my grandparent aged aunt and uncle and my little terrier dog and get into the cellar, I’ll be all set.
While ordering at what I assume it’s appropriate to call “Camellia McDonald’s” (Folsom and 56th in East Sac) I realized that almost every time I visit that establishment I am struck by the way the young staff is, to put it delicately, unburdened by the pressures of intelligence. I recited my order and this young lady looked up at me for such a long moment that I actually questioned whether I was in the right place.
I am happy to say that while I get older and grayer and worry more and more about retirement and kids driving too fast down my street, I can still giggle when I see something like this…
My Butthead reaction was supported by this page I found while researching this particular parlor.
Let us indulge you with the elements of relaxation…Free table shower every visit!!
Uh, huh, uh, table shower? I’m getting, like, old and stuff.
There’s a fair amount of buzz around LA’s Dawes, a mellow country rock band appearing Tuesday at Odd Fellows Hall in Davis. After the band was recommended to me a few weeks ago by a coworker who discovered them at a live show, I have had their new album, “North Hills,” in steady rotation and it has endeared itself to me very much. It’s not the straight ahead country or the jangly country-psych I usually go for (if that makes any sense). It’s an earnest and seriously beautiful album, and the word on the street is they put on a great show.
The album, North Hills, is available in the MP3 format on Amazon for $5. Take a listen to “When My Time Comes” and you’ll be sold.
Dawes, Jonny Corndawg, Shannon Harney & Friends
Tues., Feb 1, 8:00 PM
Odd Fellows Hall, all ages
Tickets: $10 on TicketLeap or $12 at the door
I took the family a-walking on the American River Parkway in the Sunrise Blvd/Jim’s Bridge area on Christmas Eve and noticed this weird structure on the north side of the river. It looked like it would be pretty tricky to get there from any of the houses on the cliff. My photos don’t have geotagging but AFAICR it was midway between Sunrise and Jim’s Bridge on the north bank. I’m assuming it is either a duck blind or some sort of ecological outpost? Does anybody know what this would be?
Continue reading “Weird structure on Amer. River Parkway (PHOTOS)”
Spent some time in Lodi over the holidays with a family member who just moved there. My family on my father’s side is from Merced, so the Central Valley always feels very homey to me. We were close to downtown Lodi so on Boxing Day we took a nice walk down to visit the shops, since there was no rain. It seems like a pretty neat little downtown, with some nice local restaurants and lots of quirky shops. Tom’s Used Books in particular could just open up my wallet and take everything I’ve got, plus they have cats. Pictures after the jump.
Continue reading “Stuck in a-Lodi again”
You know, most days my bike-light rail-bike commute is uneventful. (Most days.) When I have complained about the variable length of trains being an inconvenience that I have been complaining somewhat, though not completely, facetiously. If anything it is a compliment to RT that as a daily LRT commuter this is my chief frustration. (At least, if we don’t get started on the fact that I keep buying monthly passes and yet I haven’t been asked for proof of fare payment in over a year.)
So today I was actually thrilled to have been slightly inconvenienced by the light rail train fire at the Starfire station. I had to disembark Watt/Manlove and catch a shuttle to my usual stop. RT was able to scramble shuttles to meet us there instantaneously.
The Sac Rag 