go scorsese

finally scorsese gets his well deserved oscar.
i was glad crash didn't win this time.
i was glad the oscars weren't as political, although one wonders about inconvenient truth. perhaps having al gore on there was the sufficient dose of politiquing that the oscars afforded themselves... thus no long sentimental anti-bush anti-iraq speaches this time around? i hate bush and iraq just as much as the next bleeding heart liberal but it was getting a bit repetitive when the oscars were putting their mandatory plugs on these issues, over and over again...

coca-cola ad: gta meets coke

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7wt5FiZQrgM

do wine drinkers dream of mechanical rabbits?

borrowing (and butchering slightly) the title of a very entertaining cyberpunk novel by philip k. dick, "do androids dream of electric sheep?", i post about a very pleasurable moment that i experienced when i finally figured out how to operate my rabbit wine opener properly.

the rabbit is something every serious wino has in her arsenal. unfortunately my rabbit is not of the metrokane line. it always suffered from some sort of a mechanical flaw which i could never figure out for the life of me. many a wine bottle was opened with the cork being forced into the bottle by the cork-screw piece of the rabbit which resulted in either the wine being squirted out at high velocity or with creating a pressure inside the bottle where the cork would get stuck inside the neck of the bottle. the only way that i could get to the precious liquid was by carefully applying a hammer to the neck of the wine bottle. needless to say, neither of these archaic alternative uncorking methods were pretty or enjoyable.

today, i finally figured out the flaw in the mechanics of the rabbit. due to a particular flaw in the design of my rabbit, one of the metallic rings that was supposed to come down and rest against the cork would actually remain jammed with the top ring. by wiggling the bottom ring free of the top one and bringing it towards the cork, i can now properly push on the handle and drive the cork-screw into the cork and then lift the lever to uncork the bottle. moreover, before i thought that i had to manually separate the cork from the cork-screw by twisting it counterclockwise, which never seemed to make any sense to me. that was the wrong way of going about it as well.. instead one must push the lever down once again, squeeze the handle and push it back up and the cork will seamlessly detach from the rabbit, placing the bottom ring back in the proper position.

when i realized the innerworkings of the rabbit i was very pleased with myself. the wine tasted even better afterwards. perhaps tonight i'll finally dream about mechanical rabbits...?

snow flakes

it is already snowing. i have not really seen much snow this winter so it's exciting to see snow. notwithstanding, with the storm coming, i will need much strength, being the MFIC and all..