Privacy & Me

I suspect everybody who ventures online wonders the same thing: just how connected do I want to be, anyway?

There are news stories about colleges using Facebook to investigate parties with underage drinking (oh, the horror!). There are news stories about employees getting fired when they blog inappropriately (try to get six people to agree on a definition of "inappropriate." Just try.). And I work for a search engine, so I'm fundamentally aware that if it's out there & it's a public page, it might get, well, found. That's what search engines do.

So what does that mean for my little collection of blogs, for linking to my friends' blogs, for creating a profile for myself? I'm not exactly paranoid, and no, I don't expect "the Government" to show up at my house because I'm interested in cooking and tech and travel. I don't expect any concrete negative consequences at all, in fact. But some vague & nameless concern nags at me anyway. Once the info's out there, I don't control where it goes or how it's interpreted, even though I created it. If you find my friends & my interests, you find me. . . .

Then again, I'm writing a cooking blog - and there's really not much point if no one finds it, or if I anonymize it so far that it puts everyone to sleep.

Oh well. In the short term, I'm just grateful that there's some grad student in Arizona who's got the same name I do. She's a geologist, and she's published so many articles that if you search for me, you find nothing but pages & pages of her. Clearly, rocks rock. (Yes, Mom, the pun is for you).

Cooking

In the interests of blogging about something I'm passionate about, I just started a second blog: Impatient Cook.

Grin. It's an experiment. Recipe for pear muffins, anyone?

I was sort of amazed at how easy it was. Domain registration of www.impatientcook.com thru Yahoo: ~$11/year. Blog itself: free. Time to set whole thing up: under 10 minutes. And now I have a website. I also have grandiose dreams of putting ads on it and making enough money to. . . Do Something With. I'm not sure how much money that might be. I'm not sure how feasible putting ads on my blog is, anyway.

But isn't "Impatient Cook" a great phrase? How is it that no one else snapped it up during the '90s boom of "I'm going to get rich off of registering domain names that people will want later on"?

And what will I do with this blog? Leave it as a welter of random chatter? Why, yes, that is exactly what I'll do. . . .

Re-start

I originally started this blog as list of bookmarks for myself - but in the couple of years since then, I haven't needed any of that info I so carefully saved (life metaphor, anyone?).

More recently, I find myself writing long, ranting emails about a variety of (mostly political) topics. I also find myself wishing I lived in the age of the Traditional Christmas Letter, when it was socially acceptable to write a multi-page "this is my life" document and send it around to everyone you knew. The people I care about are scattered across several US states & several European countries - if I don't do a Traditional Christmas Letter, am I reduced to really, really, repetitive emails?

Sigh. So I'm joining the information age (yes, yes, this is ironic, considering the whole I-live-in-Silicon-Valley thing) & restarting the *?!~* blog.

The greatest bed ever

. . . is in the art collection at the Getty: http://www.getty.edu/art/collections/objects/o6778.html

Moving to the city

Something we've been talking about for a long, long time. This is just a list of resources.

The basics: housing. Links to local real estate companies (probably a better technical term for that somewhere, but I don't know it) include Bpm.com, Murphy Apartments, and

The basics: decor. I love Illico Design, which very conveniently just opened a store in Santana Row. I also love The Apartment. Actually, I don't love what they sell - I love the interiors they show under 'Interiors'. Gorgeous. Inspiration to go and repaint a wall or build myself a desk. El Paso Import Company is great for classic Southwestern type stuff, which one can inappropriately mix with Eames' work if desired. Eames was a modern architectural pioneer - which means that I think he's a mixed grab-bag. Some cool stuff, some uncomfy stuff, some good ideas, and some good ideas that could use updating. Unrelated: I recently bought a slate fountain as a present; these are really gorgeous.

The basics: utilities. A bunch of people have recommended Sonic as a DSL provider. And TheBlueBook.com is recommended as a source for all kinds of building contractors.

Living in the South Bay

Recreation: I keep meaning to try out the San Jose Repertory Theatre, but haven't yet. I do make it to the very cool Stanford Theatre on a pretty regular basis, however. The local discount theater seems to be the Cinema Saver 10 in Milpitas.

Yoga: recently had a great class with Kim of Yoga Center of Palo Alto.

Transport: Caltrain now runs high-speed trains from SF to SJ. In-between stops are Millbrae, Hillsdale, Palo Alto, and Mountain View. Total time SF to Mountain View: 46 minutes. Not bad. There's also the Silicon Valley Light Rail. To take light rail to SJ airport - start at the Mountain View stop, transfer at Baypointe, get off at Metro. Trip would run about an hour, based on leaving Mountain View around 3pm. From the Metro stop, there's another shuttle to the actual airport (yet another thing I haven't tried yet, having found that randomly begging rides from people at work is pretty successful).

Food: Restaurant Reviews from a local blogger whose taste seems to match mine.

Travel

Travel is key.
Useful links include SideStep for plane flights (I don't think it includes JetBlue, but it's great for everything else) and Carrentals.com for car rentals (okay, haven't tried this one myself, but I hear good things).

Specific places:
Newport, RI: Newport is full of B&Bs. Stay Newport is run by a very nice woman named Elizabeth, who found me a place to stay during a weekend in the height of "the season" (aka July). Other places include Brattle House, Admiral Fitzroy, The Chestnut, Fair Street B&B, and Cooney Cottage. For rate ranges, see this page.