I took it upon myself to revamp my search for the finest fish & chips in the land with a trip to my local Fins fish market on Fair Oaks Blvd. My previous visit to Fins had been delightful. I had, therefore, been looking forward to this meal for quite a while based on nothing more than a hunch that Fins would do something wonderful with the traditional fish & chips plate. Unfortunately, my hunch turned out to be more of a misplaced wish than an intuitive guess and my visions of otherworldly fishy and chippy experiences fell apart more quickly than a flaky piece of halibut.
Continue reading “Fish & Chips, Fins Style”
Merry Christmas, Matt Chicken
County’s new mapping tool goes live
Sac County rolled out a new online mapping application “that provides maps and information about services and facilities available to or near a specific property.” It’s called e-Map-It, and it’s available on their page of online services, which is actually a really nice list. As far as e-Map-It goes, it seems pretty useful. If you were looking at houses you could get all sorts of info on utilities and services. I suppose the main reason they can’t just rely on a Google maps for all the map info is because this particular one is tied to parcel number and overlaying parcel number data on GMap would probably be as time consuming as building and deploying a .NET application.
UPDATE: Thanks to Bill G. pointing out that the tool doesn’t even support Firefox, I can take back my wishy-washy approval and give this thing a big fat thumbs down.
Santa getting busy early on CBS13
On last night’s 10 p.m. broadcast, CBS13 ran a story by Mike Dello Stritto on a deaf family’s collection of over 4,000 Santa decorations. Their cameras panned silently through the house, showing Santas covering every surface, including the bathroom vanity, which was adorned with a windup novelty item depicting Santa and Mrs. Claus having a very merry Christmas in the bathtub, if you know what I mean. It was absolute genius, check out a screenshot or check out the video online. Stay classy, Sacramento!
TIME to get Smoshed
Via Rachel Leibrock Time magazine will mention local YouTube stars Smosh next week. “The SNL of YouTube?” If that’s anything like being the SNL of TV shows, is that even a compliment?
Lucca for Lunch: Food, Folks and Frozen Ass Cheeks
(NOTE: Before I sat down to write this little blurb, I did a quick peek at what some other folks had to say about Lucca online. To my amazement, my eating experience turned out to be eerily similar to the experience of the News and Review’s Liz Kellar some three years ago.) Having recommended Lucca to my coworkers as a festive and rewarding eatery at which to have our Christmas luncheon, I was sorely embarrassed by the poor accommodations, suspect service and lackluster food. (To be truthful, I wasn’t that embarrassed, at least not nearly as embarrassed as I was when that tape recorder fell out of my jacket at that Doobie Brothers concert exposing me as an illegal bootlegger. Man, was my face red, almost as red as my beret.)
Continue reading “Lucca for Lunch: Food, Folks and Frozen Ass Cheeks”
Feed the homeless (governor)
Homelessness is a problem of most metropoliseses, and especially those such as ours where housing prices skyrocketed in a short time, making affordable housing difficult to obtain by those who need it most. Many times, people have to make do with whatever they can get their hands on. Some people deal with such adversity better than others.
Just ask Gov. Arnold. According to SFGate.com’s Lynda Gledhill:
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Wednesday that he’s “very happy in my little hotel room.”
That in response to a published report in the Sacramento Bee that he and First Lady Maria Shriver have toured a new 15-floor hotel and condominium project being built a few blocks from the Capitol.
Schwarzenegger has been living in a the penthouse in the Hyatt hotel across from the Capitol since taking office. The state has no official governor’s residence and he and Maria found no suitable house when he was first elected. The constraints of security, wanting to be close to the Capitol and necessary space for a governor with four children left almost no options.
Just one more day
Tower Records is open for just one more day, at least at the Watt & El Camino location.
I stopped in earlier and bought a handful of CDs for a grand total of $9.19, including works by Dada, Sia, Ringside, Red Flag (a serious flash in the pan ’80s synth-pop,not even a one hit wonder, group I once saw at Maxim, an 18-and-over “club” on Auburn & Garfield when I was 17), and “The Sounds of Kwanzaa” (it was $1, how could I pass it up?)
Of course, as I was quickly scanning what was left of their merchandise, a young girl was chatting on her cell phone next to me, complaining to whoever was on the other end of the phone, “This store sucks! They don’t have anything!”
If anything, Tower can provide you with an inexpensive option for your last minute shopping.
“So much for world peace” or “Who wants to talk Project Runway?”
This was the punchline delivered by one of the news anchors on the Good Morning Today it’s Early show yesterday after running a story about, ahem, current Miss USA Tara Conner. Of course, no one got it and he had to explain that she’s being scrutinized for her underage drinking, drug use, and same sex lip locking (not that there’s anything wrong with that! well, she was Miss Teen USA, but she was 18! we think, not sure if she was at the time, but let’s not split hairs here) and that typically that’s the answer contestants give when asked…just as I will do now, he let it go and moved on…but I laughed, talking head, dude, I laughed!
Today, cbs13.com ran a story (lucky for me as I’ve been itching to rant on the subject and needed the “local angle” to pitch to my editor at headquarters) about a local beauty queen’s reaction to Donald Trump’s decision to let Miss USA keep her title as long as she agreed to enter rehab. Continue reading ““So much for world peace” or “Who wants to talk Project Runway?””
Office XMas party reviews: R15 and Melting Pot
Young and old mix at R15, if by mix you mostly mean the old hitting on the young
We widget factory workers were “blessed” this year with two holiday parties, and as usual this gave me an opportunity to check out some local hot spots I normally wouldn’t frequent.
First up was Café Bernardo/R15, the latest venture in the Paragary empire. Our luncheon was served in an upstairs room, one of the areas set up with XBOX 360s with wireless remotes. The fare was fusion, which if you have ever read this blog before you can probably guess is not one of my favorite styles.
Continue reading “Office XMas party reviews: R15 and Melting Pot”
The Sac Rag 
