Anti complaint – Page 19

Im back, the cat is back, the wife is gone

Well, she’s gone temporarily. We got in on Friday (A day late because we missed our flight. If you’re flying from Dublin to Philadelphia on US Airways, do yourself a favor and get there early.), and she flew out yesterday for work. She’ll be back Thursday.

Unfortunately, as usual when she’s not here, I didn’t sleep well last night. I haven’t figured out why I sleep better when she’s here, but I do. And the stupid cat didn’t help. She was loud and irritating pretty much all night. I don’t think I got more than an hour straight of sleep all night.

Anyway, hopefully tonight I’ll sleep better.

The trip, by the way, was fantastic. I’ll write more at some point, but we had a great time. Dublin is very expensive, however. But I sure do love Guinness.

A suggesting for writing

Why I Won’t Read Your Unpublished Work (Whatever)

For God’s sake, if you’re going to hand your work over for critique, finish the damn thing first. Even if it’s broke, you can fix it. But you can’t fix a fragment. All you can do is fiddle with it, and in fiddling avoid finishing it. I don’t encourage this; even with friends, I don’t read things that aren’t finished.

The whole post linked above is pretty amusing, as Scalzi generally is. But this part caught my eye. I’d never thought of that. And it makes a lot of sense. Not that I’ve ever finished any story I’ve started, but often asking for feedback has actually been the last thing I ever did. I joined a Sci-Fi writers feedback web site, got some pretty positive feedback on the first chapter of something that I had started, and promptly never picked the thing up again. It was a strange feeling. The person who offered the feedback did what I thought was a good job. He mentioned some good things, gave some constructive criticism, and did it in a polite, supportive manner. Not much more you can ask for.

And still, I got that “OMG my writing is terrible” feeling. And it’s not that my self-worth is tied up in how someone I’ve never met feels about the first draft of the first chapter of a novel I was working on. Honestly, if he’d ripped it apart, I would have just assumed that he was incapable of understanding what I wrote, and pretty soon I would actually believe that.

Anyway, not that I want to use “I let people read it” as an excuse for why I didn’t finish any of the writing projects that I started. But maybe I should keep stuff to myself until I’m finished. My wife will kill me, probably. But if I explain to her I’m doing it so I can finally finish a novel, become a bestseller, and support us both into our old age, I think she’ll understand.

My wife, my accountant

And I thought I was just getting a lawyer when I got married. Turns out my wife is an accountant, too. When we were (Well, she was) doing our taxes, she discovered that I had failed to report some mortgage interest paid on my 2005 return. So, she insisted that I re-file. Or, rather, she re-filed, and made me sign it.

Today, I get a check from the IRS for $328.46. $300 in taxes I paid and didn’t owe, and $28.46 in interest.

So, what should I do with it? I figure it should be something nice for both of us.

Nice job, Apple store

Yesterday, my wife fried the power supply to her month-old MacBook. I think it happened when she unplugged it to move from the living room to the dining room. Today, I went in to the Pentagon City Apple store, where we bought the computer last month, and talked with a salesman there. He checked the power supply on a store computer, checked our computer on a store power supply, determined that our power supply was, indeed, dead, and promptly gave me a new one. No questions, no nothing. Just gave me a new one.

Then he walked me through the process for transferring files from the old computer to the new, which we tried once unsuccessfully. I’m going to try it again tonight.

So, I may not like Apple and their over-priced proprietary hardware and their snooty commercials and the f’ing iPhone. But I’m quite impressed with the service at this Apple store. They were busy, too. It’s not like I caught a guy, bored in an empty store, and got a lot of attention. And this will certainly be the first time an Apple has ever worked better after I touched it.

Opening night at The Heights

Last night was the grand opening of The Heights, a new restaurant a few blocks from us. The wife and I went with a friend of hers visiting for the weekend.

First of all, it was packed. We waited probably half an hour. It wasn’t too bad – we found a spot at the bar to wait. The staff all seemed a little nervous, but very friendly and attentive. The food was very good. The buffalo shrimp appetizer was very good, and my tilapia with rice was also very good. The wife tried their frozen mojito, which she liked. We had a caramel banana cake thing for dessert, which was quite nice.

The staff was a little overwhelming. We had at least 5 people bring us things or take things from our table. But the service was good, and everyone who did come to the table was very pleasant. It was a little warm in the restaurant.

I really liked the bathroom – nice stone tiles and funky orange walls. The finish on the construction left a little to be desired. However, they plainly aren’t quite finished with the construction. The floor of the entire restaurant is still bare concrete. So maybe they’ll polish off the bathroom soon.

Anyway, I’m glad to have them here in the neighborhood. And it will be really cool when they open up the outdoor patio, which I think will just about double the capacity.

Afterwards, we went up to the Marx Cafe in Mount Pleasant. That just might be my new favorite low-key bar. The place looks like a barn or something. Lots of exposed wood, as if it’s still being built. The wife’s friend said it looked kind of like a wine cellar – they have bottles over the bar on some kind of strange shelves.

The beer selection is odd but good. They serve beers I’ve never heard of in glasses with the name of the beer on it. The service was great. The waitress even laughed at a marginally funny comment I made, which is always nice. There was a slightly obnoxious group next to us, but not too terrible. And the music was fantastic. Apparently the DJ for most of the night is only there once a month or so, but he played nothing I’d ever heard before, and nothing I didn’t like. Not that I would go out and buy everything he played or anything like that. But you know how the bar always plays some really horrific stuff at some point, like some Jane’s Addiction or some other intolerable crap? This bar played none of that. And they have a really interesting menu, although we didn’t try anything. Maybe next time.

Anyway, I heartily recommend both.

A strange but compelling book

I hereby demand that all people who are good at math make the world free of illness. The rest of us will write you epic poems and staple them together into a booklet.

I tried out the Mount Pleasant branch of the DC public library the other day, and one of the books I picked up was Adverbs by Daniel Handler. I picked it up because, seriously, it had a very colorful cover. That’s how I often pick books at the library. It has worked surprisingly well so far. I didn’t realize this was the Lemony Snicket guy. I didn’t see that movie, and I don’t really know anything about the books. I’m not sure if knowing would have influenced my decision to read the book.

Anyway, I like it so far. It reminds me of Chuck Palahniuk, the guy who wrote Fight Club, except with a softer edge. Palahniuk likes to lead you in circles and then punch you in the gut. Handler leads you in circles and then kind of jabs you in the ribs, hard enough so you rub them, but it doesn’t really hurt.

It’s a little strange – each chapter is not exactly connected to the previous chapter, and he uses first-person narration that is not always the same person. But it often seems as if it could be the same person. Except the gender changes.

I’m only about 65 pages in, though, so I can’t give a full review. But I will when I finish it.

I knew it was a good beer

Above And Beyond: Sierra Nevada’s Cool, Refreshing Customer Service – Consumerist

Total Wine said they’d exchange the beer for different cases — (hopefully they’ll have Sierra Nevada from this year) and Sierra Nevada said that they would send a check to reimburse the full cost of the cases if Total Wine didn’t exchange the old beer!

Story from Consumerist of a couple who bought three cases of Sierra Nevada for their wedding (The wife and I had Sierra Nevada at our wedding, too – certainly it follows that the couple in this story are just good people.) that turned out to be quite old.

Now, I’m not sure why they went straight to the brewer, but they did, and Sierra Nevada made sure they had fresh, delicious beer for their wedding. Well done, Sierra Nevada. To be fair, Total Wine, the place they bought the beer, did exchange the old cases. But you can never have too much good service. I don’t think.

Our new neighborhood bar/restaurant

Logan @ the Heights

The Heights is the quintessential neighborhood restaurant: perfect for a quick weekday bite, a night out with friends, or a lazy weekend Brunch.

The Heights is opening this Friday, according to signs in the window. I’m excited. I know it’s not the neighborhood bar/restaurant that they’d like you to think it is. I mean, this is their fourth one, which is approaching chain-status. But Merkado is pretty good, and I’ve heard good things about the others, and this one is ours. Now we can tell those snooty Mount Pleasant jerks that they can keep their crappy bars.

I’m just kidding, really. The only Mount Pleasant bar I’ve been to is The Raven, and it’s a cool place. And aside from the occasional “your neighborhood has more crime than our neighborhood” potshots, which are probably deserved, I like the people I know in Mount Pleasant. To be fair, that’s really only one couple, but still.

Anyway, the wife has a friend in town Friday, so maybe we’ll stop by the opening. Or maybe they have other plans. I don’t really know. But you can be sure I’ll try out The Heights eventually. And no, I don’t plan on calling it Logan @ The Heights unless they call the one down there The Heights @ Logan.

Weekend in Philly

The wife and I spent the weekend in Philadelphia. I’ve been there a few times, but not recently, and not for long. Philly has kind of a bad reputation, but it doesn’t seem deserved. The city is clean, there’s lots to do, and we had a good time. Maybe if we stayed longer, we’d find some reason to hate the city, but I have no complaints.

As you can see from the photo, the Latham Hotel has a bottle opener in the bathroom. How many times have you been in a hotel, and had to open a beer by banging it on the door hinge? I mean, that happens to me ALL THE TIME. And it’s not a really good way to open a beer. The Latham takes care of that.

Anyway, we got to see a lot of the city. We met up with some friends, had a really great dinner at Amici Noi on Market Street, and walked around a lot. It was a really nice weekend.

Mmm, wine.

Finding Gems in the “Off” Vintages

Reading this site always makes me want to go buy wine. And I do need to fill up our wine racks – currently we just have a few special bottles that we’re saving (Actually, that we’re scared to drink). One of them is for our anniversary in August, and one of them is my favorite wine, a 2004 Gibson Wilfreda, that we bought on the honeymoon. I think I’m afraid to drink it because I worry that it won’t be as good as I remember.

Anyway, one of these days reading Vinfolio might actually make me buy the wine, rather than just think about it. I’m sure that would make them happy. Maybe they can get me a deal on a case of Wilfreda . . .

I also have to give Mr. Moore credit for correctly using both “its” and “it’s” in the span of three words. I’m always surprised at how often I see people get this wrong, and often in publications that should really know better.