What a load...

What benefit does the sign provide for library patrons? And do they even care?

Had a cow, man!

Kim and I took a trip to the Orange County Fair today. For 2007, the theme is Cowabunga! - the Year of Herefords, Surfers & Sand.

This year's signature fair food: The deep fried peanut butter and banana sandwich (the ingredients here are pretty self explanatory), and the Hucowamongous burger. It's big. I mean, BIG. The biggest burger I've ever seen.

I wasn't even planning on eating one until Friday, when Carl at work questioned whether a person could even eat such a thing. Well, I took that as a challenge, and was determined to give it a try. I'm no champion eater, but I'm no stranger to large amounts of food, either.

We spent a good amount of time wandering the fairgrounds, looking for this beast of a burger, but couldn't find it anywhere amongst the deep-fried desserts, and various meats on sticks. My strategy to prepare was to avoid any fair food I'd normally eat; instead I drank a couple beers (Sierra Nevada Summerfest).

We gave up hope finding this burger on our own, and visited an information booth. The helpful staff told us they were somewhat hidden away, inside the Carnival of Products building, at the California Grill. The lady told us she shared one such burger with her 6'5" husband and 5'11" daughter, and between them, they managed to finish it.We thanked them, and headed over.

When I went to order it, the man behind the counter at the California Grill asked me if I was sure I wanted it. Of course I was sure! Within minutes, it was ready.

As we carried it outside, there was lots of pointing and staring. At the burger. It has a commanding presence. I'm not sure anyone saw the man behind the burger. We found a table and I settled down.

How did I do? Was I up to the challenge? Have a look!

My Membership in the Multiple Kwik-E-Mart Club

When you think about it, it's rare enough the person who gets to visit a Kwik-E-Mart. Only just more than a handful of 7-11's across the country have been converted.

It's even more rare (rare-er?) the person who gets to visit more than one. Here's a couple people besides me and Kim who have reported visits to multiple Kwik-E-Marts:

RumorsDaily.com: Simpsons 7-Elevens Still Packed, Sold Out -- Los Angeles and Burbank locations

P & C: Burbank and Henderson (Las Vegas) locations

Two Weekends, Two Kwik-E-Marts

Last weekend, Kim and I went up to her grandparents' house for a birthday barbeque pool party for Ryan's birthday. On the way, we stopped by the 7-11 turned Kwik-E-Mart in Burbank. Our timing was good -- we got there when there was no line. By the time we left, the line had grown. We couldn't spend a lot of time in the store, because Molly was waiting in the car.

Today we had a beach day with Kim's friend Stephanie and her boyfriend Justin. We spent a few hours soaking up the sun (through some SPF-30) at Playa Del Rey. The beach was nice -- lots of sand, not too crowded. A little noisy -- it's just north of LAX, so there's lots of air traffic, and the crashing waves contributed to hearing difficulties. Afterwards, Kim and I decided to go to the Kwik-E-Mart in Los Angeles on Venice Boulevard. It was almost on the way home.

But when we got there, there was no parking left, and a long line. I drove up the street a ways, but all the street parking was taken. A little disappointed, I headed back to the freeway.

But traffic on the freeway was awful! So bad, that the exit to Venice Boulevard was looking pretty nice...so we gave the Kwik-E-Mart one more chance. It didn't let us down! There was a spot on the street sitting open, just feet from the end of the line of people. We actually parked closer to the end of the line than people who managed to find spots in the Kwik-E-Mart parking lot.

Sitting in line made for good people-watching, and when we finally got in, we had more time to browse around and see all the merchandise.



The next nearest Kwik-E-Mart is in Las Vegas (well, Henderson). I'm not sure how many other people can say they've been to two Kwik-E-Marts...what about three? Hmm...

Need for Speed

I went for a short bike ride this evening, over the hill on Cannon, to Santiago Oaks Regional Park, biked some of the trails and found a new (to me) path that takes you out the side door of the park, so to speak.

On the way down the hill on Cannon, my speedometer hit 51.7mph. I knew I was going faster than I had gone the last couple times...but I also had a feeling that I wasn't really going 51.7mph.

Just before heading out, I tried to reset the tripmeter, max speed, etc on my speedometer. Unfortunately, I don't know the button commands well enough, and completely reset the whole thing -- it prompted me to input a wheel factor.

I couldn't remember what I'd used before, and the garage door had shut already, so I wasn't going to waste time going back through the house. I took a stab at the number, and headed out on my ride.

I'd guessed too high. So I ran the numbers, fought the math, and came up with a new top speed of 46.4mph. Not too shabby! I think I can probably get at least a couple mph faster on that hill. Can I top 50mph? I'm not sure, but I want to find out. I may have to qualify my previous top speeds as "unofficial".

I'm also going to carve the wheel factor digits into the back of the speedometer, so next time I inadvertently reset the thing, I can know what to set it back to.

Bike ride to Peters Canyon

This morning I took a bike ride to and through Peters Canyon in Orange.

Ride stats: 10.9 miles
Time: 1 hour, 12 minutes
Avg speed: 9.1 mph
Top Speed: 43.8 mph

The panoramic image above is compiled from a set of photos I took at the highest point on Canyon View Ave, on the way to Peters Canyon. I hit my 43.8 mph top speed going down that hill (past the stop sign on the right side).

It only took about 15 minutes to get from home to Peters Canyon. I did the usual loop (after the hill on Canyon View, the hills were especially unfun, at least the upside), and then headed back home.

Windows XP bug

I've seen this particular bug dozens of times, but this is the first time I've documented it. Why on earth is Windows XP Explorer showing five icons labeled "Desktop" in the explorer bar?