Blogger's Block

It's been a really long time since I've blogged, in relation to how often I normally blog.  If I were Nuke, this would be a really short time between blogs.

Anyway, the reason I haven't been blogging is because I've had blogger's block...I just haven't had any topics pop into my head.  I've been in sort of a reading and movie watching desert for the past few weeks, so I haven't even had any of those to fall back on.  Well, I do have one, but it's the 5th book in a series, so I really need to combine that one with another book review.  Frankly, it's been frustrating.  On Tuesday night, I sat down to blog and had nothing...I just stared at my computer screen.

Some ideas have been slowly filtering back into my brain.  Hopefully I'll have some real topics soon.  Please hang in there with me.

Ranking the Commanding Officers

An interesting topic came up amongst 2 engineers today...who were the best Star Trek Captains?  Well, I've changed the title to Commanding Officers because I'm not sure Benjamin Sisko was actually a Captain in the early seasons of "Deep Space Nine".  We really have 6 commanding officers to choose from...Captain Kirk (William Shatner), Captain Picard (Patrick Stewart), Cmdr/Capt. Sisko (Avery Brooks), Captain Janeway (Kate Mulgrew), Captain Archer (Scott Bakula) and New Captain Kirk (Chris Pine).  I'm excluding Captain Spok because he never really commanded the Enterprise.  I'm also excluding Mr. Sulu, who was Captain of Excelsior in "Star Trek 6".  Finally, I'm excluding the bearded one, Cmdr. Riker, who was Captain of the Enterprise while Picard was a Borg.

Without further adieu, here's my list:

1 - Cmdr/Capt. Sisko (Avery Brooks) - Sisko was the Commanding Officer of "Deep Space Nine" and is my favorite of the group.  He just had presence, and you really believed he could kick anybody's butt if he needed to.  The show was not my favorite of the group, but I really liked Sisko.  He provided a reason to watch a subpar show.

2 - New Captain Kirk (Chris Pine) - I loved the J.J. Abrams reboot of "Star Trek" and I love Chris Pine as Captain Kirk.  Pine was perfect for the role and easily stepped out of Shatner's shadow.  He could eventually be #1 on this list, but he has to show a little more first.

3 - Captain Archer (Scott Bakula) - "Enterprise" was my favorite of the TV shows, and Capt. Archer was a big reason why, but not the only reason.  That was a really great cast, and I think Archer's coolness suffers because of it.

4 - Captain Picard (Patrick Stewart) - I just couldn't put a French guy with a British accent higher on this list.  Yes, he is a fine actor, but he was often overshadowed by Data's brilliance/quirkiness and Riker's beard.

5 - Original Captian Kirk (William Shatner) - To some, this will be blasphemy, but when compared to the younger, and better Chris Pine, Shatner seems old, slow and frankly, his overacting seems campy.  I do love him in the Priceline.com commercials though.

6 - Captain Janeway - She really struggled with a subpar show..."Voyager" was terrible.

Match Play, Round 2

This will be the final update from my club match play tournament, because I lost my 2nd round match.  We played last Thursday.  I was carrying a 5 handicap and my opponent was a 6.  I'm actually a 6 now...had I waited one day we would have been playing straight up.  Yeah, I'm not proud of that 6 handicap...I'm just not making enough putts to shoot low scores.  But...I digress.  Playing straight up wouldn't have mattered much anyway, because I played terrible and my opponent played ok...ok beats terrible every time.

Last Thursday was the first of the super hot days here in eastern Iowa.  The heat index was well over 100 degrees when we tee'd off at 4:15 pm.  I quickly yanked my opening tee shot behind a tree and proceeded to make bogey, going 1 down.  I made a lot of bogeys on the front nine, shooting 7 over par and falling 4 down.  On the 2nd nine, I made a little charge, making birdie at 10 and parring the difficult 11th to get back to 2 down.  But, on the next 2 holes, I lipped out putts that would have closed the match to 1 down, instead, I was 3 down with 5 to play.  We halved 14 and 15, so I was dormie, meaning I was 3 down with 3 to play.  I won 16, but then we pushed at 17, so I lost 2 and 1. 

The gentlemen I lost to was a great guy, and I'm now rooting for him to win the whole thing.  If I had to lose, I'm glad it was to him...I just wish I would have played better.  It was my worst round of the year.  But, I guess that's why I don't play golf for a living.

A Super Movie

"Super 8" is THE must see film of the summer.  Yeah, I really liked "Thor" and I think the finale to "Harry Potter" is going to be great, but even I'll admit that those movies aren't for everybody.  "Super 8" is for everyone over the age of 15...I say 15 because there is some language. 

Directed by J.J. Abrams and produced by Steven Spielberg, "Super 8" is a nod to Spielberg's sci-fi films of the late 70's and early 80's, but made relevant to today's audience by J.J. Abrams.  This movie is really a combination of "E.T.", "Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind", "Goonies" and "Star Trek" (the new one).

The first thing you have to realize is that "Super 8" isn't about the alien that escapes during a train crash.  "Super 8" is a story about the 6 kids who witness the train crash and film the alien escape on their Super 8 brand film.  It's sort of a coming of age story about friendship and moving on after tragedy.  The 2 main kids are Joe Lamb (played by Joel Courtney) and Alice Dainard (played by Elle Fanning).  The other kids are important to the story, but the movie really focuses on Joe and Alice, who we find out are somewhat bonded by the tragedy that killed Joe's mother.  Both of these actors do a great job, especially Elle Fanning.  The Fanning kids can act.

After the alien escape, mysterious things start happening around town, and the Air Force shows up to "help".  The 6 kids continue to try to make their movie, despite the mysterious happenings, while Joe's father, Deputy Jack Lamb (played by Kyle Chandler), tries to get a handle on the things going on in their small town.  Meanwhile, Jack and Joe struggle without Joe's mother, and their relationship is a secondary story line throughout.  Everything builds to a great crescendo and really cool final scene.  Oh, and the credits are worth sticking around for too.

I laughed a lot, jumped a few times, and was reminded of how good a movie can be by "Super 8".  This is a 5 star movie and definitely worth the $9.25 I paid to see it.  I'm so glad the coworker told me that this movie was worth seeing, and I hope you'll get out there and see it too.

Now That Was Tasty

Living in Iowa, our grocery store is HyVee.  Back in April, HyVee announced a partnership with Celebrity Chef Curtis Stone, which I thought was really exciting because I've seen Chef Stone on the Food Network before.  Chef Stone is providing recipe ideas for HyVee shoppers, and a few weeks ago, we saw the recipe for Seared Steak with Caramelized Onions and Gorgonzola.  I followed the recipe exactly, so I won't rewrite it here.  Follow the link if you want to make it.

Here's what I would suggest if you decide to make this.  Make a lot of the onions...they are soooooooo good!  Also, the Gorgonzola is really powerful, so I would recommend going easy on the cheese.  I made this recipe using New York Strip steaks, but I got less expensive steaks because I was dressing them up.  I just tenderized them a little bit by pounding, seasoned with salt and pepper and grilled them.  I cooked them for 4 minutes over high heat, and then moved them to the cool side of the grill for 7 minutes.  This got the steaks to medium well.  These were 5 star steaks.

For a side dish, I made one of our favorite grilled sides...roasted potatoes with red peppers.  Here's the recipe:

Ingredients:
3 russet potatoes diced, skin on
1 red bell pepper, seeded and diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 cup olive oil
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper

Directions:
Combine olive oil, garlic, salt and pepper and whisk together.  Toss the potatoes and peppers in the olive oil mixture.  Wrap the potatoes and peppers in non-stick aluminum foil, sealed tightly. 

Preheat grill to 400 degrees.  Cook potatoes and pepper packet on the grill with the lid closed for 45 minutes.  Serve immediately.

This was a magical combination, and was pretty easy to make.  Try it some evening at your house and let me know what you think.

Movie Review: "Space Cowboys"

In keeping my promise to go back and watch more Clint Eastwood directed films, I watched "Space Cowboys" last night on Netflix Instant Watch.  Another solid Eastwood movie.

Frank Corvin (Eastwood) is a retired engineer.  Corvin was a test pilot and engineer in the late 1950s, right before the formation of NASA.  When NASA was formed, Corvin and his team were shut out of the space program by James Cromwell.  Now, forty years later, an aging Russian satellite is about to fall back to earth, and the only team that has the knowledge to fix it is Corvin's team, that includes Tommy Lee Jones, Donald Sutherland and James Garvin.  But, can they handle what the find when they intercept the satellite?

This is a solid 4 star movie that is really focused on the relationship between Eastwood's character and Tommie Lee Jones' character, with Garner and Sutherland providing solid support.  The relationship between these 2 characters is complicated, but both have to learn to get over their past if they want to get to space.  It makes for a really compelling story.

If you skipped "Space Cowboys" when it came out in 2000, go back and give it a shot now...it's better than a lot of the stuff that is coming out lately.

Rick Riordan Is At It Again

All the man does is write entertaining, high quality books for kids, young adults and 30 somethings who are recapturing their childhood.  In The Throne of Fire we are once again reading the transcript of a recording made by Carter and Sadie Kane.  Carter and Sadie are descendants of the Egyptian Pharaohs, in fact, 2 of the most powerful Pharaohs, and they are also magicians.  The problem is, other magicians think they are outlaws because their father released trapped Egyptian gods back into the world.  He did this to save the world from the return of Apophis, the most evil of all the ancient gods.  Carter and Sadie believe that their father is right, that the old gods of Egypt are the solution to stopping the rise of Apophis, and they are bent on seeing this mission through.  This time they have the help of a few other junior magicians who answered the call they put out with their first message in The Red Pyramid.

The Throne of Fire is another masterfully crafted story from Rick Riordan, who is my favorite author.  As this is the 2nd book in The Kane Chronicles series, we have already met our narrators, Carter and Sadie.  Each character tells about 2 chapters before "switching" with the other narrator.  Riordan varies the storytelling style enough that you really believe you are reading 2 different views of the events.  It's a really cool way to read a story.

At first, I wasn't thrilled with this book.  It took me a while to remember what I read in The Red Pyramid, which is the problem with only releasing 1 book per year.  Once it all came back to me though, I thoroughly enjoyed the 450ish pages of this book and really look forward to the final book, due out next year.  If you haven't picked up The Kane Chronicles, by Rick Riordan yet, give these books a shot.  I think you'll really enjoy them.