I got invited to a trial-run for a new restaurant called Sardine in Machinary Row. It’s owned by the two guys that own Marigold Kitchen, so I was pretty excited to go.

More or less, everything was free. They had a house red and white wine, and a house beer, Stella Artois. I had to try them all, and all were excellent. I pretty much stuck to the Stella, which I hadn’t had before.

First of all, the wait staff was great. Very friendly, not overbearing, and very informative of all of the dishes, including the different wines. The kitchen had made sure they sampled a little bit of everything.

For an appetizer, we ordered the Parmesan polenta with grilled pork sausage piperade and pork demi. Wow it was good. Each bite amazed me with the amount of flavor. I was also very impressed with the presentation.

For dinner I had the pan-seared skatewing with sautéed broccoli rabe, fingerling potatoes with a lemon caper butter sauce. This dish seemed to be the “star” of the evening. Everyone I talked to that tried it, couldn’t stop talking about. For those who don’t know, skatewing is like a the wing of a stingray. The texture was great, and the capers added a nice touch. The potatoes had this red flake pepper on it, similar to the potatoes at Marigold’s, which was a good thing. When I return to Sardines, I will have a hard time not ordering the skatewing again.

My girlfriend got the roasted bone-in pork loin with a fava bean, black currant, tomato and cumin
pan sauce and potato purée. This was also excellent, and another favorite of many of the patrons last night.

I talked to the owner Phil when we were leaving and he apologized for the wait. It did take quite some time to get our food, but it didn’t matter. This was trial run, which gives them time to fine tune before they open on July 6th.

It was a phenomenal evening, and I very much look forward to eating their again.

I’ve been working on computers in some capacity for years now. I first became a Dell fan when I was fresh out of college and working at the University of Wisconsin Athletic Department’s Help Desk. I had to fix many a Dell, but loved them due to their great support.

It’s been a few years since I’ve called Dell support, but I figured I’d do so for a friend of mine’s computer. The BIOS wasn’t recognizing it’s hard drive anymore, and it was making an awful clicking noise. It was clear the hard drive was fried. I called tech support, and I was actually surprised how quickly I got a human on the phone. Once I got someone on the phone, I notice he had a VERY, VERY thick Indian accent. He says, “Hi, my name is Sam, can I have your service tag number?” It was actually one of the few things I actually understood, but that’s because I already knew what he was going to say, aside from his phoney name. I could be wrong, but I’m guessing Sam isn’t a popular name in India.

I probably spent an hour on the phone with Sam. He had me doing all of these checks, which is the norm, except I had to wait a few minutes between each check. Eventually, I had to tell him that I wasn’t doing anymore checks on the system and he was going to send me a hard drive. I thought that did the trick, but he than started asking me questions about the system, and ultimately suckered me into trying a few more things. Finally, he asked me to take the battery out of the motherboard. I said, “what does that have to do with the hard drive clicking?” He said he needed to put me on hold for a few minutes. FINE!

The conversation with this guy was priceless….

Sam: Are there any lights on the front of the computer?

Me: Yes. There are three green lights labeled 1, 2, and 3.

Sam: So there are lights?

Me: Yes.

Sam: What do they say?

Me: 1, 2, and 3.

Sam: What color are they?

Me: Green.

Sam: Let’s try rebooting the computer and see if the lights change.

Me: (after reboot) They’re the same.

Sam: What color are they?

Me: I’m not repeating myself anymore!(blood pressure rising)

This guy knew less about computers than my 5 year old niece that just graduated kindergarten. I grew to love Dell because of their support, not necessarily because their hardware was better than any other company. I’ve dealt with companies like Quark who have awful support. In fact, Quark still has the worst phone support on the planet. Anyway, if Dell doesn’t do something quick, they’ll lose customers, and I mean A LOT of them….including myself.

10. Improve Keyboard and Mouse Technology - My issue with Apple, and just about every other hardware company, is the keyboard and mouse technology has been stagnant. Apple needs to quit being so damn stubborn and offer a three-button mouse. Why do I say three? Well, I need to be able to right-click and I like to use a top button for Expose’.

I didn’t realize how bad their keyboard is until I tried to switch from my G4 PowerBook keyboard to the Apple keyboard. It looks cool, but it might the klunkiest keyboard I’ve ever used. I want less action on my keyboard so there is less between the point of pushing a key, and the key issuing the command. Kensington has keyboard that uses scissor switch technology that feels like laptop keyboard, but has better spacing. Apple should follow their lead and come out with one of their own, and ditch their embarassingly awful keyboard.

9. iTunes for Linux - I understand they probably don’t want to give people another reason to choose Linux over OSX, but the Linux community is clammoring for iTunes. Apple dominates the mp3 player market, yet they’ve shut out an entire community of Linux users. Let’s not forget, the Linux community will have their way, one way or another, so resistance IS futile.

8. Port OpenOffice - I think Apple should partner with OpenOffice and help them develop the software and port a version for OSX. I’m not a big fan of pre-installed software, but I think they should also consider pre-installing, or at least make it easy for users to install it themselves.

7. Open Source Bundled Applications - Apple bundles some nice software on their computers, so why not make them open source? I say open up these applications to the community, and watch the them get better.

6. Servers - Apple has failed miserably at the server market, and the cost of their servers is a big reason not to even give them a chance. Why spend all of that money on a Apple server when you can run a Linux on a Dell for half the price? I think Apple is putting too much effort into making their servers look cool. Who cares? The server is probably going to spend it’s life in closet anyhow.

5. Gaming Console - Apple is in the hardware business, right? Apple should come out with gaming console where games can not only be played on their console, but also played on their computer. Over time, Nintendo and Apple would end up being the top two consoles, easily beating out Playstation and XBOX.

4. Wireless iPod - I’m tired of hooking up a cable to my iPod to transfer music. Also, if I could ditch this FM transmitter, I’d be a happy man. Apple should have incorporated Bluetooth into their iPod a long time ago so users can transfer music and play music on their Bluetooth compatible home/car stereos.

3. Games - They need to get back into the gaming market. I have a ton of friends that wish they could switch to a Mac, but are stuck with Windows due to their love to play games. They should try and partner with some of these gaming companies and start creating some of their own games. Gamers also want like their hardware, so Apple will also need to put out a powerful machine that gamers can easily upgrade.

2. Affordable Hardware - I love Apple hardware, but I don’t care what anyone says, their hardware is too expensive. If Apple wants a bigger piece of the pie, they must lower their prices. If I were to buy a Mac-mini, by the time I upgraded it so it has at least a gig of ram and a 120 gigabyte harddrive, I’m over $1,000; and I still don’t have a keyboard, mouse, or monitor. Enough said.

1. Run Microsoft Applications - I say, “Forget bootcamp!” I want to be able to stick a Microsoft Office installation cd into my cd-rom and install office. Apple has the Windows API, so I say, “make it happen”, and watch Microsoft’s stock dip down to 15. If Windows games could be installed and run flawlessly, GAME OVER! I, and many others, would never use Windows ever again.

I’ve been a fan of the band “Live” ever since their “Mental Jewelry” album, so I’m always excited when they come out with a new album. Unfortunately, Live has jumped on the pop music train; thus, I must get off the Live train. I listened to each song off the new album, and I was dissapointed with over-produced pop songs. What gives? I honestly wonder if this was the band’s decision.

I saw Live about 5-6 years ago at the Riverside Theater in Milwaukee, and although it was a great show, I had a bad feeling they were headed down a road I wouldn’t like. Why did I have this feeling? First of all, they added a keyboardist and a second guitarist; neither were necessary. The sound of the band was the guitarists unique sounds, dark vocals, and great drums. Now, the guitarist sounds like any other guitarist you’d hear on a pop album.

I just hope they can bounce back from their worst album to date. This is the type of an album that gets a band dropped by their label.

How many times have you seen this error when compiling PHP? It absolutely drives me insane! I don’t know why, but when I stumble upon this error, I fix it, and then never document it. And, I’ve found little information on Google about this error message:

configure: error: libjpeg.(a|so) not found

The problem I run into is I forget two steps of the installation after “make install”. So, here’s what I do, and it seems to clear up the problem….