The Ultimate Sandwich?

I just finished what may be the single best sandwich I've ever had in my life.  I haven't the faintest idea how I could improve upon it.  Here's how I made it:

• Bread:  Two slices of Dudley's rosemary-olive oil bread, toasted until it just began to brown.  If you're from the San Diego area and you don't know Dudley's bakery, then you're unnecessarily missing out on a simple pleasure.  If you do know about Dudley's, well, then, you know what I'm talking about!
• Mayonnaise: A freshly opened jar of real mayonnaise (not that “salad dressing” garbage) – not homemade, true, but still very good.
• Avocado: A Californa Haas avocado, perfectly ripe, blemish free, sliced.
• Tomato: An Imperial Valley tomato, ripened in our window until it smelled wonderful, sliced thickly.
• Lettuce: A few leaves of crisp, dark green iceberg lettuce – for the crunch and the burst of moisture as you chew.
• Salami: A half-dozen slices of top-notch genoa salami.  There's a huge variation in quality of Italian cold cuts at our local stores.  Albertson's carries several that are particularly good, and this was one of them.

I ate it with a tall glass of cold milk.  As we like to say: “It was so good that it made my brains fall out.”.

Never thought I'd say this, but I'm going back to work on the taxes with a smile upon my face.  Nothing to do with the taxes, of course...

One Happy Dog...

As I made my lunch a few minutes ago (more on that in the next post), the two dogs who are home with me (Mo'i and Lea) were watching my every move.  They acted as if they hadn't been fed in months, but since I had personally fed them just last night, I knew this wasn't true.  But Lea got to me anyway, because while she's still in great health, she's old enough now that her main joys in life are (a) sleeping, and (b) eating.

So she gets extra “treats” from me frequently.  I've tried to be creative in what I get her, to give her a little extra enjoyment.  I may have hit an all-time high today.  I took a couple of pieces of genoa salami (which she was acting very interested in) and blended them with a few ounces of milk (a well-known favorite).  Then I warmed that slightly in the microwave, and broke up a piece of potato bread crust into it.  I let the bread soak, then gave her the bowl.

When you know a dog as well as we know Lea, it's easy to tell when she's happy.  Lea was happy as she ate that bowl of doggie joy.  Her tail was wagging, and she came over to see me every few laps – just to say “thanks” so far as I could tell.  When she was all done, I was treated to five minutes or so of a very affectionate old dog acting like she was a puppy again.

Glorious.  And an absolutely wonderful antidote for the chore I'm working on today.

Thanks, old girl...

Satellite Temperature Data...

Here's something interesting: satellite temperature data, publicly available.  The graph below has ticks for each year.  The AGW folks sure are reading a lot into these data!  Of course, they're not using the satellite data – they're using surface measurements instead.  I will note that surface temperature data from hundreds of organizations and thousands of instruments is much easier to manipulate than the satellite data...

Good Career Advice...

Scott Adams (creator of Dilbert) isn't just a cartoonist, he's a first-class observer of modern humanity.  In this article at the Wall Street Journal, he's got some of the best advice I've ever seen for young people preparing for a career.  Much of his advice is applicable during a career as well, so there's something for everyone in the article.  Some elements of his advice one can see in my own career.  For example, I'd say that learning to write reasonably well, and learning how to be unafraid of public speaking, have both done more for my career than any particular piece of techncial learning.

But the strongest resonance for me was his advice that most people should emphasize acquiring multiple skills rather than trying to be world-class in any particular skill.  Oh, yes – for me this advice has the strong ring of truth.  Over the years, I've acquired a strange collection of knowledge and skills – designing concrete mixes, writing software, corporate accounting, back-end stock trading processing, designing electronic hardware, some civil engineering, slide rules, optics (especially as it applies to photography), cryptography, and a bunch more.  I'm no world-class expert in any of these areas, but the fact that I have a smattering of them all has been incredibly useful in my career.  It also has done something else that Scott doesn't mention: by practice and example, it gives me great confidence that I can learn how to do just about anything – and even that is very useful in a career.

So go read it, and pass it along to anyone you know who might be able to use some good career advice.

Quote of the Day...

And as a special added bonus, it's in a Kirk cartoon:

Discovering the government's been shut down is like finding out your Yugo has been stolen … you feel bad, but it's no big loss.

Exactly, Kirk.  Exactly!

It Could Have Been Worse...

This is why I can't get too excited by last night's budget deal.  It's crumbs, folks, and not very tasty crumbs at that.  I'm pleasantly surprised by Boehner's ability to negotiate, and completely unsurprised that the Democratic leadership couldn't get it's intellectually bankrupt people together.  All I'm saying, though, is that this could have been much worse.  That's not at all the same thing as saying it was good...

If You Hear Yelling and Cussing...

...from the general direction of Southern California today, that's probably me.  I'm doing my taxes today, toting up all the money that the federal government is going to steal from me.  As I watch the dollars add up, I'll be thinking about how the likes of Reid, Pelosi, Obama, Schumer, etc. will find wasteful ways to spend it.

If I have a good day, a liter or two of vodka should get my blood pressure under control this evening...