A little life update
02 Jun 06 | Life
Over at the New Yorker, Rebecca Mead revisits You've Got Blog and our lives since then.
My article at Lifehacker
25 May 06 | Science & Technology
An article I wrote entitled How to mouse goofy is up over at Lifehacker. Enjoy!
Welcome whoever wants non-food
19 May 06 | Happenings
Welcome to the new old megnut.com, now located at meg.hourihan.com. Some day I'll update the design so it looks like the new site that it is. For now I've just lopped the "nut" off the banner and started to remove the cooking posts. More to come eventually.
For those that want it, the feed for this is http://meg.hourihan.com/index.xml
Happy birthday dear megnut!
02 May 06 | Happenings
Today megnut.com is seven years old. It's hard to believe, actually impossible almost to believe it's been going for so long. This site has seen me through singledom, coupledom, engageddom and now marrieddom. It's seen me through tech start-up entreprenuer times, unemployed times, working as an independent consultant, more entreprenuer times, more unemployed times, and then a shift to restaurant and kitchen work, and now a more food-focused life. When it started, it was one blog among maybe a hundred. Now it's one in a sea of millions of blogs. Nearly every friend I have, including my husband, can be traced in some way to this site.
For a long time, it was just something this site was just something I had or did. I didn't put too much thought into what it was supposed to be or what it meant to me. But you can't do something for seven years and not realize, "Wait! This is really meaningful to me, and special, and I'd be really sad if it went away." As you may have noticed by the recent volume of postings, it's not going away anytime soon. In fact, I'm feeling a new-found excitement about blogging and this site and its potential. Seven blog years is like twenty dog years, which is like 80 human years, but don't worry, this old blog has a little life in her yet. Happy birthday megnut.com, old girl!
The best running shoe shop in NYC
30 Apr 06 | Sports
Now for something not food related! Yesterday I went to Jack Rabbit Sports, a sport store that recently opened near Union Square in Manhattan. (They've also got a Brooklyn location that's been open for a while.) It was far and away the best shoe store experience I've ever had, and I don't think I'll ever buy a pair of sneakers anyplace else again.
First step: evaluating your foot and watching you run. They put you on a treadmill in the shop and watch the way you run and how your foot strikes. Then they start bringing out shoes for you to try, and each time you get back the treadmill and test out the shoe. The guy we worked with was knowledgeable and very helpful, and sent me out the door with the first pair of non-Asics running shoes I've owned in twenty years!
They also offer classes, custom bike fitting, and 10% everything you purchase after your first purchase. They had clothes too, but I was so excited about the sneakers that I didn't even look at anything else. I [heart] Jack Rabbit Sports!
Driving in Mexico
19 Apr 06 | Travel
Everyone tells you (by which I mean "everyone" who is writing guidebooks and "telling" me by my reading of their guidebooks) how hairy it is to drive in Mexico. But in general the Yucatán isn't as bad as some other areas I've driven around in the country. Everywhere you drive you need to be on the lookout for a tope (pronounced "tow-pay"), or speed bump. In general you find them on the outskirts of towns and on the main drags through them. They come in various shapes and sizes, some consisting of little round metal dots, others raised platforms of concrete. Some times they're quite wide if they're doubling as a sort of pedestrian walk-way. But my favorite were some homemade-looking ones we spotted, especially along the Boca Paila Road south of Tulum. They were just several thick pieces of rope laying across the road in a clump. Whenever we spotted one, I could not resist referring to them as ropes ("row-pay") because, see, they were topes made of rope. Ha ha, get it? Good times like these were numerous on our honeymoon.
Investigating the Bush presidency
18 Apr 06 | Political
Carl Bernstein (who forever is linked to Dustin Hoffman in my mind) has an essay on the Vanity Fair site calling for, Senate Hearings on Bush, Now.
After Nixon's resignation, it was often said that the system had worked. Confronted by an aberrant president, the checks and balances on the executive by the legislative and judicial branches of government, and by a free press, had functioned as the founders had envisioned.
The system has thus far failed during the presidency of George W. Bush—at incalculable cost in human lives, to the American political system, to undertaking an intelligent and effective war against terror, and to the standing of the United States in parts of the world where it previously had been held in the highest regard.
There was understandable reluctance in the Congress to begin a serious investigation of the Nixon presidency. Then there came a time when it was unavoidable. That time in the Bush presidency has arrived.
He makes a pretty compelling case, and I hope Congress wakes up one of these days and decides to take some action.
Some photos from Mexico
18 Apr 06 | Life
Unlike other trips (e.g. Ireland and Asia) I have stopped obsessing over my photos and decided to just go ahead and throw some up on Flickr so that others can actually see them! Honeymoon photo set on Flickr is now available for your viewing pleasure. I don't feel like the photos turned out as well as I'd hoped, and I also didn't take as many as I wanted to. One thing that's missing is some sense of the small town of Tulum, near where we stayed. But every time we were there it was either a) night or b) too hot to walk around and take pictures. So the collection is lacking a lot of what our daily experience was, and a sense of that general Mexican town. Perhaps with another trip, I'll be able to capture more of that.
Back to reality
14 Apr 06 | Life
We're back from our honeymoon in Mexico and it was totally excellent. Though this photo is a bit weird, I kind of like it so it's the first one I've posted from the trip. I took a bunch of long exposure night shots, just for fun. This is a portrait I took of us on the deck of our cabaña. Those specks of white are stars. More details about the picture at Flickr, just click on it to see. Now that I'm back, there's lots to do. Mostly though I just feel like looking through my photos and remembering the great time we had.
A bit of Maya history
04 Apr 06 | Travel
While in Mexico, I'm hoping to do some traveling around to various historic sites. The Yucatan peninsula is filled with ruins and temples of the Maya civilization. When I lived near Mexico City I visited some Aztec/Toltec/Olmec ruins, but I've never been to this area of Mexico before, so I'm looking foward to it. The Wikipedia link above has a ton of information about the Maya, including this section about their Pyramids and temples. Between visiting such sites, some colonial cities, hanging on the beach, and sleeping, it should be a pretty busy visit.
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