Sonic Drive-in

We went to the new Sonic restaurant that went up on the East side of Appleton today.  Generally, we’re excited when new businesses come to the area – having more selection is never a bad thing.  However, we weren’t impressed with our inaugural trip to the restaurant.  Our experience:

The place was busy when we got there.  Upon pulling in (we were on our bikes), we weren’t immediately sure where to order.  We pulled our bikes up to one of the drive-in stalls, but then Wanda noticed that they had outdoor seating and a place to order for those eating outside.  No problem so far – it was our unfamiliarity with the store.

We were disappointed, however, that there was no indoor seating.  We were on our bikes, so eating outside wasn’t a big deal, but generally we would go there in one of our vehicles.  I don’t really want to eat my meal in the car in general, but I can’t imagine eating in the car during the winter!  Who wants to lick chili dog drippings off of their steering wheel?

There were also no bike racks.  Since we were outside, we just parked our bikes near our table.  However, since it was busy, our bikes frequently got in the way of others.  Oh well.

We were ready to order.  They had two order stations outside, though one of them was out of order, which was odd for a new store.  Wanda got in the rather short line for the functional unit (I watched the bikes).  There were only two couples in front of her, but it seemed like it took a long time to cycle through the orders.

Once Wanda ordered for us, she joined me at the picnic table (which was clean).  Our order came relatively quickly, which I suppose is expected of fast food.  The order was also accurate, which is good.  Sadly, ketchup (or any other condiments/supplies) seemed to be in short supply, requiring the carhops to ration them.  We asked for ketchup for our fries, and was initially given 3 packets.  We asked for more right away, and was given an additional 3.  Would it be so hard to have a condiments bar?  I hate the packets.  By the way, what do the carhops do in the winter?  Rollerboots and snowmobile suits?

We were ready to dig in.  Lacking a tray, I emptied the ketchup packets onto the paper bag for the fries.  Wanda got a grilled chicken sandwich on a wheat bun, and I got a SuperSONIC Cheeseburger.  Wanda’s sandwich was bland and dry, much like the Premium Grilled Chicken sandwiches at McDonalds.  My cheeseburger was very decent, however, it tasted very much like a Whopper.

We were finishing up, and I wanted a refill on my soda (I always get a refill).  DENIED! They don’t do soda refills.  Epic fail!  $1.89 for a large, non-refillable fountain soda that I could have gotten at the gas station for $0.99.  At least the syrup and seltzer ratio tasted correct.

We left with the feeling that Sonic offers a similar menu to McDonalds and Burger King, but at a higher price, no indoor seating, no soda refills, and no convenient condiment access.  Where’s the value compared to other chains??

PS, Wanda’s Java Mocha Chiller was decent, but Wendy’s Frosty-chino is better.

September 4th, 2009  Food, Reviews   Tags: fail, fastfood, restaurant, sonic, sucks, more...

Bathroom Remodel Advice

My parents are redoing their master bathroom, and we’re trying to figure out what to go with on a few things:

1. Color – They have decided to go with tan and earth tone colors for the tile and counter tops.  The granite is a mix of tan colors.  What looks better – off-white or white for the toilet, sink, and bathtub?  The white looks very clean and sterile, but the “biscuit” color matches the tan somewhat elegantly.  Some primitive examples: white, biscuit.
2. Bathtub – Drop-in or alcove style? Water jets, air jets, or a standard soaker tub?  The drop-in cast iron is more rugged, but with tile on the walls, there is more cleaning.  Water jets and air jets are nice, but what about cleaning (especially if you have hard water)?  Anyone have experience with these?  The soaker tub is also nice and easier to clean, but lacks the Jacuzzi feel.  The alcove tub is easier to clean, but is it durable?  Will it be more susceptible to hard water stains and/or cracking?
3. Bathtub walls – If you don’t go with the alcove, would you go with tiles or granite walls? Tiles look nice, but are more effort to clean and maintain.  Granite also looks nice and is easier to clean.

Does anyone out there have experience with anything mentioned about?  Anything you want to share, pros and cons?  Thank you.

July 31st, 2009  Projects   Tags: advice, bathroom, granite, remodel, tub, more...

Aptana Studio

I’ve been looking for a decent PHP editor for my Macbook Pro – something like Dreamweaver, but free.  I finally found it in Aptana Studio.  It’s available for Mac, Windows and Linux.  It has built-in support for PHP, Ruby on Rails, Python and Java, live FTP/FTPS editing, Subversion connectivity, and a lot more.  Check it out!

July 4th, 2009  Uncategorized   Tags: aptana, editor, php, Software, source code, more...

Digg Dialogg: Brüno

Digg recently asked readers to submit questions for their interview with Sacha Baron Cohen.  If you’re a fan, you may think this is funny:

• Digg Dialogg: Brüno

June 30th, 2009  Humor   Tags: bruno, comedy, digg, interview, sacha baron cohen, more...

Addicted to Power

Rush Limbaugh had some interesting commentary on the Democratic party on Thursday:

CALLER: “[W]hat do the Democrats want? They own the car industry. They don’t want us to go to college. What do they want? At the end of this, what do they want? They’re going to have all the power, and what do they want?”

Rush made an insightful comparison of the Democrats’ irrational policies with that of the chemically dependent:

LIMBAUGH: “Have you ever had a genuine addiction to anything? … Well, I have. I have. I have, and let me tell you about it. It makes you entirely unreasonable and irrational. It is all you care about. Nothing else matters. No matter how important to you otherwise, it doesn’t matter as much as the addiction. Feeding it, the fear of not being able to, is what animates your existence every day. These people are addicted to power, because they think it is their birthright. And I’m not just talking about the people in Washington, elected officials. I’m talking about some of — not all, but some of — the rank-and-file, madcap, insane liberals that you will find blogging, that you will find e-mailing, that you will find on the protest march. Their lives are basically meaningless. The addiction to power and dominance and control is what drives them. And the thing about an addiction is, it can never be satisfied.

Well, I have. I have. I have, and let me tell you about it. It makes you entirely unreasonable and irrational. It is all you care about. Nothing else matters. No matter how important to you otherwise, it doesn’t matter as much as the addiction. Feeding it, the fear of not being able to, is what animates your existence every day. These people are addicted to power, because they think it is their birthright. And I’m not just talking about the people in Washington, elected officials. I’m talking about some of — not all, but some of — the rank-and-file, madcap, insane liberals that you will find blogging, that you will find e-mailing, that you will find on the protest march. Their lives are basically meaningless. The addiction to power and dominance and control is what drives them. And the thing about an addiction is, it can never be satisfied.”

The caller followed-up with:

CALLER: “But after they destroy our country, where’s their power?”

Rush’s reply:

LIMBAUGH: “What do addicts do? They destroy themselves. They do. They destroy themselves, and they destroy the things that are most important to them.”

I couldn’t help but think of Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle when I was listening to this segment.   You can find the original transcript here:

• Transcript: http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_051409/content/01125112.guest.html

Of course, this attitude isn’t limited to just the left – I think it is common among most politicians today.

May 18th, 2009  Politics   Tags: 2009, addiction, Politics, Radio, rushlimbaugh, more...

Twig – WordPress Twitter Integrator

I just put together my first release of Twig, a plugin for WordPress that will pull your tweets from Twitter, cache them in a database, and display them chronologically intermingled with your WordPress posts.  It the first version, so there are bound to be bugs with it.  I hope to add more features soon, but I wanted to get an initial version out the door before the scope creeps into oblivion.

If you’re brave enough to try this initial release, please let me know if you encounter any bugs, as well as ideas for feature enhancements you might have.  Cheers!

• Download Twig 0.1
• Documentation
• Plugin Page @ WordPress.org
  

April 21st, 2009  Software   Tags: plugin, Software, twitter, Wordpress Links, more...

Vodka Pasta

I made an interesting vodka pasta dish using some of the leftover the remaining leftover ham from Easter.  It was delicious, so I thought I would share it with you.  You can view the recipe here:

• Quick & Easy Vodka Pasta

April 18th, 2009  Food   Tags: Food, pasta, recipe, more...

Web Site

I’m working on a project, and I’m using my web site to test its functionality. For the few people that actually visit my blog, you may notice some bugs over the next 2 weeks with my site. I should have it wrapped up by then.

April 17th, 2009  Uncategorized   

Web site changes

I’ve made a couple of changes to my site.  As you can probably see, I have added my twitter feed to my front page.  I’ve done this because I don’t post to my main blog as much as I used to – I post my thoughts to Twitter (which then automatically get copied to my main web site and Facebook).  I will probably reserve my traditional posts for longer posts.  It was not a simple tasks to intermingle Twitter posts within the WordPress loop, but I eventually got it to work with some sloppy code.   The posts are cached and updated every 30 minutes.

I also am trialing my web site back on a Windows server (previously it was on Linux).  I’m doing this to consolidate web hosts, and hosting on Windows gives me most stuff on Linux as well as ASP.NET.  I generally prefer Linux hosting when .NET isn’t needed, however, this will save me time and money.

There will be bugs with the new setup, but I’ll take care of them as I see them.  I see my Flickr feed isn’t updating, which is probably a permission issue (curse Windows permissions!).  I’ll work on that.

April 9th, 2009  Web Site   Tags: blog, hosting, twitter, update, website, more...

American Idol 8.11

Alexis Grace got screwed on Idol last night.  Michael “Roughneck” Sarver should have gone, and I’m shocked that Allison Iraheta was in the bottom three – she rocks.  Alexis was clearly disappointed during her second run of the song, but that’s understandable.

It’s going to be a tough year – lots of talent, there is.

March 19th, 2009  Television   Tags: 2009, americanidol, music, tv, more...