Interesting Glycemic Facts

While browsing through some of the worst offenders in the Glycemic Index Database, I came across the expected muffins, breads & grains, However, there were a few entries which really surprised me:

Cranberry Juice: 56-68 GI
Cheerios: 74 GI

Granted both of these have other health benefits, but clearly my Cheerios & Cranberry juice diet idea isn't gonna fly. There's also these quite interesting comparisons:

Ice Cream: 56-80 GI vs. "Tofu-based frozen dessert": 115 GI
Mars Bar: 62-68 GI versus Fruit Roll-ups: 99 GI

Truly, we live in a topsy-turvy world when a candy bar is healthier than a fruit roll-up!

*goes off to cross-references grocery list for any surprise offenders*

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Overheard At Work, pt15

[When informed a friend couldn't attend their weekly role-playing game because he cut off part of his finger]
Engineer: But he can still roll with his other hand!

I'm 98% certain he was joking.....Well, 95%.

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The Dark Knight

I'm not going to equivocate or explain my opinion. It's very simple really.

WOW.

If you don't see this movie you are depriving yourself of an absolutely stunning piece of film.

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Summer YA Reading Spree

Recently, I’ve been on a young-adult reading frenzy. It’s a bit strange, when I was a kid I preferred adult science fiction. But now that I’m an adult, I like young adult novels. Maybe it is because the YA books are a lot better than they used to be.

“The Princess Academy” by Shannon Hale. A really interesting modernized sorta fairy tale. When the royal priests degree the future princess will be from a frontier mountain known for its quarries, officials build an academy to train the local young ladies in proper princess behavior. Only the point of the story isn’t really marrying the prince, but how education broadens the minds and perspectives of these girls so that even if they aren’t the future princess, their homes and families are greatly improved because of their greater understanding of the world. When you combine this with a likable heroine, some good adventure and complex adult characters, well, it makes for an excellent read.

“The Lightening Thief” by Rick Riordan. What is it about Greek gods? 2000 years after their worship fell out of favor, numerous fictional works make use of the mythology. Perhaps the reason is that with twelve main gods and armies of various supernatural creatures, the Greek Pantheon makes for good drama. That’s just as true for young adults as is it for grown-ups. What if you discovered that your missing father was a Greek god? What if this turned out to be a really dangerous fact? That’s the premise of the “Percy Jackson & The Olympians” novels. This first book in the series is a very fun, well-paced read with a trio of pre-teen demigods trying to prevent a war. Good fun, humorous plot twists revolving around various points of Greek myth and some interesting hints about Western civilization in general. I look forward to reading the rest of these books.

“His Dark Materials” Trilogy by Phillip Pullman. Ah yes, the controversial trilogy that advocates the death of “God”. Honestly, the subject matter is less disturbing than the extreme unlikability of most of the major characters, heroes and villains alike. I’m actually impressed that Mr. Pullman wrote three novels involving people I don’t particularly like but he somehow managed to make them suspenseful. This was mainly a credit to his plotting skills. My main gripe is that the conclusion of the series is woefully anticlimactic. The story continues for a couple of chapters beyond what it really should in order to deliver a gut-punch of a twist that frankly seems entirely too convenient. These are good books in the sense of being well-written and plotted, don’t get me wrong. Unfortunately, the last book was the least enjoyable for me.

On a sidenote, I'll be travelling for work this week so it's unlikely there will be any posts until Saturday.

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Thoughts From The Drive Home...

Superman and all those other superheroes are creations of another age. I mean, who cares about supervillians on the rampage anymore. This is 2008 and we have 2008 super-problems that need solving. In a time when the price of oil is skyrocketing, who will be the superhero for our age?

It appears our cries for help at the gas pump are being answered.....Never fear, guess who is here!

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Pajamas from the Mall

While at the mall today, I generally refrained from taking pictures of patterns. I find that retail personnel for clothes in particular don't like it when you're photographing their stuff. However, in the pajama department of Dillard's I came across some patterns that demanded my camera's attention.

See full post for sleepwear designed to give you psychedelic nightmares. The sheer loudness of these prints would keep me awake for hours.

Teaser: The tamest pattern of the bunch.
No really.


When acid-dropping ferns attack! (in your sleep)


I do not care how many times they say it, Brown + Pink DOES NOT equal pretty.
See?

If you stare at the following pattern for move than twenty seconds, it will appear to move.

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Movies from My Weekend

Spent my holiday weekend reading, shopping and watching some movies....

"The Spiderwick Chronicles" is just a good, fast-paced romp through a fantasy world. I'd never read the book(s?) this movie is based on but it was pretty enjoyable. Also, Freddie Highmore impressed me by being able to play twin boys in such a way that I never once confused who was who. A nice family movie.

"Hancock" was great but, man, this wasn't the super-hero movie I thought I was going to see! And I mean that in the best possible way. After the big reveal, I had no idea where the plot was going. Charlize Theron's character especially pleasantly surprised me. It was pretty interesting to see a superhero film where the superhero is such total jerk. Also even though Hancock cannot be injured (for the most part), the film did a really good job of conveying the destruction and peril that would result from these powers. There's a good bit of language but overall, this is really enjoyable action movie.

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CD Baby Strikes Again!!

Aka - How I spent my Stimulus check, part the first

Once again, I wandered into the online music store CD Baby and have now purchased an insanely eclectic bunch of music. Also, I discovered their $5 sale (buy any 3 CDs on the sale list and they are all $5 instead of their list price). Reasons for my depleted bank account:

Vibeke "The World Famous Hat Trick" - Described as "Norway's answer to early Blondie", this is rousing album of jamming music. I particularly like track 6, "Meant To Be With You".

The Frolics "The Frolics" - Like kinda dirty punk-country with a wonderful sense of humor. I can easily imagine myself humming "Crackhead Fred". Besides, you've got to admire a even tangentially country band who includes "A Ballad to Eazy-E" on their CD.

Devotchka "How It Ends" - "European influenced sad bastard music"....And what music! Although only four tracks are available for previewing, they are a varied and interesting group of songs. If I had to pick a favorite, I'd got with "The Enemy Guns" for being the coolest song I've heard in months. I really can't wait to listen to the rest.

Kagero "Kagero" & "Red & Black" - A Half-Japanese Gypsy-Punk Group whose lead singer channels Simon Le Bon. The self-titled album is more punk with songs like "Samba Au Lait". The second album, "Red & Black", with only three songs makes a surprisingly huge impression based on pure gypsy awesomeness, especially the title song.

Devil Doll "The Return of Eve" - HOLY MOLY. A rockabilly/jazz/punk singer with an out-of-this-world fantastic voice. Just absolutely blew me away with every single track. Not to mention, there's a huge variety in the song styling, from the punky "The Curse" to the more contemplative "Tortured".

Next up, buying CDs that I actually have planned to buy for a while but put off for reasons that escape me now.

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The State of Engineering, Sorta

Thanks to a coworker, today I read this article in “Design News” magazine which discusses the results of a survey of 2000 engineers on the state of engineering careers. I had a great deal of trouble taking this article seriously when, in one of the graphics, it lists the average engineer’s salary as $86,194(!). Um, maybe in the computing industry.....

Another amusing part of the article was when they asked engineers in their survey what would they change if they were CEOs of their companies? While some of the items listed are worthwhile goals, several were wildly infeasible. Here is my favorite suggestion of the bunch:

“Get rid of bureaucracy”

I think pretty much every corporate employee in the history of mankind has had this recommendation. Bureaucracy is very, very frustrating. However, how many bad ideas are (thankfully) prevented from being implemented because of bureaucracy? Imagine how much worse things would be if red tape didn’t hold back the “shoot from the hip without thinking” ideas that needed to be held back. Good bureaucracy acts as a filter without overwhelming or swamping its participants in paperwork. Whether your company has good or bad bureaucracy is a different question, but guys, entirely “getting rid of bureaucracy” is like wishing for the sky to be purple...and on fire.

The article did have one absolutely brilliant quote about working in engineering:

“In general, engineering is a very demanding and relentless pursuit, mixed with periods of chaos and panic and brief moments of satisfaction. After months of hard work and finally pulling the proverbial rabbit out of a hat, there is a brief moment of satisfaction and accomplishment. Then, your boss hands you your next assignment – and this one involves two rabbits and a smaller hat.”

Very well said.

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