Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Finally it has come! Merry Christmas to everyone! Take care in your travels this holiday season and may you all enjoy your time with your loved ones.

Smoothest Chef around!

People know that I love to cook and the few people that have experienced my cooking know that I can. Well I have been wanting to step up my cooking skills and I've been going to some classes at Mrs McGarrigle's in Merrickville. I've tried a few new things and slowly been stepping up my cooking skills, but my Idol in the cooking world is Curtis Stone of TLC's Take Home Chef. Hello, go up to a strange woman in a shopping market, with 20 other people. Ask her she would let him cook a meal for her and her significant other at her place. Buy the food when she accepts then asks her to drive him in her car!

Some of the best episodes are when the women don't have a significant other and it is an all ladies show, you dog Curtis! I've noticed that he only picks women!

The best part of the website is that it has all the recipes from the show and they are not that hard to make(Crepes with berries and Chocolate sauce, to die for)!

Watch the show, take some notes and cook for someone who will enjoy it!

Weekend Report

Ah, This weekend I combined two things that I love to do. Drive on Ottawa's busiest streets and shopping. Yes, that is sarcasm! Christmas shopping was the name of the game. Keeping cool the key to winning it.

Don't get me wrong I love Christmas and being with family and giving presents, but this time of year is a pain in the butt getting to the shopping centers Then once you get there it is like a scene out of Mad Max, a battle for the one parking spot that 30 other cars are looking for! Get into the store to find out that the item you are looking for just sold out! Argh!!!!!!! Repeat at the next shopping center! So here are a few tips to keep the stress down and have more Christmas spirit.

1. Take a day off work to do your shopping. The roads have less cars, more parking spots at the stores and the shops have less people in them.

2. Get there early. If the weekend is the only time you have. Early is the game! I try to have my shopping done by noon. Hey, people like to sleep in and it gives the same reasons as No. 1.

3. Shop online, can't beat UPS/Purolator/DHL bringing it to you! The shipping charge is always worth my sanity!

I found a site www.tv-links.co.uk that had all the episodes of Heroes and decided to watch the pilot while Tara was out shopping. Well 11 hours later I finished all 11 episodes and now I'm hooked. Yes, I'm behind the times Ryan, but wow I love this show! An x-men feel with an x-files twist. The website is pretty cool, but when I started to witch Stargate Atlantis season two it will not upload part 4 of episode 1. boo, hiss. It looks like the person who owns the site fixes broken link and will notify you that the link has been fixed. I like this site do to the fact that I'm busy and I do not like to have to sit at a certain time to watch the show on TV. When I have time I go to the site and then watch at my convenience, pause when I have to and come back when I'm ready. The way of the future, just go to NBC.com and watch your show,Hint, Hint NBC!

NikoVideo

A new age of movie rentals has surfaced here in Brockville. It is called NikoVideo. What is this, you ask? It is a new way to rent videos. It is like going to a bank machine, you pop your membership card into the machine scroll through the titles and then select what you want. The best part, it is only $2.27 if you return the video back within 6 hours! If you forget to bring it back then it is is only $3.97 for the 24 hour period.

Sounds pretty good, well it gets better. The search for a video at the machine is a bit of a pain, a neat feature that they have is you can access the movie selection from your computer at home, reserve the title that you want, and within 3 hours all you have to do is go to the location , pop your card in and out comes the selection! The web page even tells you what movies are at the machine, so no wasted trips to the store to find out that they're all out.

Here is the catch, yes always a catch, you have to load your card with money, min $20, to be able to reserve at the website. The machine will tell you what your balance is and of course you will be able to deposit more money on your card at the machine.

Overall, I like that it is much cheaper to rent a video, half the price of Blockbuster or Rogers. once it catches on they can always raise the price. They have current titles and they claim to have new titles every week. The machine is easy to use, but awkward to navigate through. I will continue to use NikoVideo till they come up with a Internet video service, but with HD DVD coming out soon I don't think the DVD format will exit soon and I'll be getting my DVDs from somewhere.

UPDATE: All the prices for the Brockville store!

New Release less than 6hours 2.27 taxes in

24 hours 3.97 "

Old movie less than 6hours 1.14 "

24 hours 2.56 "

It Has Been A While

It has been a couple of weeks since I posted something on here. I was on a seminar in Mississauga the week before for Comprod, the filter and antenna systems that the coast guard has purchased for the new radios that we will be putting in this winter. A course in Ottawa last week at Learning tree for networking. Lets just say that I will never complain about the traffic in Brockville again!

The Bengals played the Ravens last Thursday night and my Nephew and I took an opportunity to take some pictures with my Brother's Bengals gear. Well it came back to bite us as the Bengals beat my Ravens, my Brother wasn't like this when the Raven beat his beloved Bengals at Baltimore, but the Begals will have to settle for the wild card!

Played some ball hockey with Matt and Duncan last week. 1. I'm out of shape and 2. it takes a while to stop hurting. I hate getting older, the brain still wants to play the body is starting to complain!

You tube, I love this website! I have a video on there that has been viewed 1500 times! the other 9 videos have to split the other 510 views. You can find me at Pollcrazy

Well I will have more to report on soon!

The force is strong with these potatos!

Well Christmas shopping this weekend I scored with the Darth Tater and Spudtrooper in one package, Score! This Darth Tater has an exclusive chest plate! You can find this at your local Wal-Mart for $15!!!!!!!!

When I was looking for a picture of this treasure I found this! A new Mr potato head "Artoo Potatoo!