andersonfam.org

This email was just sent out to everyone in our office at work. Looks like I’m going to have to find another means of releasing my pent-up angst :-)

To All,
During discussions with building management today I was notified that the building has recently suffered a rash of broken toilet handles in the men’s bathrooms. This has occurred on all floors. In addition to leaving an already limited resource even more scarce, these handles cost time and money to replace.
Flushing the toilet is a socially encouraged behavior; but please do so without damaging the toilet.

That last sentence is pure gold.

As some of you know, I’ve been on the planning committee for the Minneathlon v2.0 race that takes place today at Logic. In a nutshell, the Minneathlon is an adventure race/scavenger hunt type event. This year’s theme is “Brains vs. Brawn”, a nod to the fact that the race will include both physical challenges as well as a healthy dose of challenges to work the teams’ thinkers.

We’ve been planning this race for about a month now, and I’m quite excited that race day is here. Start time is at 8:30. If you’re interested in following along, we’ve set up real-time GPS tracking of all the teams. All of the race clues will also be posted as the race progresses (only after each team has successfully solved the clue, though). We’ll be out taking pictures along the race route, and I’ll be sure to post those after the race.

For several weeks now, I’ve been hearing reports (firsthand and otherwise) of people sighting Google’s street view fleet around the area. I just discovered this afternoon that the “Street View” button now shows up when viewing google maps of the Minneapols/St. Paul area:

Unfortunately no blue-highlighted roads are showing up yet, though, so they evidently have a bit more work to do before Street View for our area goes live.

I just have to post a few “I’m a proud Cook” photos. I hope you don’t mind.

Meghan found some sashimi-grade Tuna on sale today at the supermarket and snatched it up. Now, I don’t know how many of you have had the pleasure of consuming real, high-quality tuna. For those who haven’t, you ought to – it’s *nothing* like the fishy, salty stuff you get out of the can. When cooked correctly (rare), in my opinion, tuna steaks far surpass any cut of beef, pork, or otherwise you may have. Take a look:

Cooking these over the chimney starter was, sadly, not my idea originally. Alton Brown, of Good Eats fame turned me on to the idea. Cooking over the charcoal chimney is really perfect for Tuna – you need incredibly intense heat to cook it correctly – 30 seconds on each side was all it took. Here are the final results:

Lemme tell you – the tuna was amazing. We’ll surely be doing this again in the near future.

Here’s the full picture set.

An excerpt from a conversation I had today with my boss over IM:

(3:39:21 PM) Erik: you’d be glad to hear that I fabricated a few gonkulators today.
(3:39:58 PM) Dan: for Boston?
(3:40:05 PM) Erik: yes
(3:40:10 PM) Erik: the T1 loopback plug.
(3:40:18 PM) Erik: …I think would classify as a gonkulator.
(3:42:09 PM) Dan: yes gonkulator, specie [sic] Toneloopicus
(3:42:20 PM) Erik: ooh – very nice.
(3:42:38 PM) Dan: thanks

You heard it here first, folks. A new species of gonkulator was coined today.