Author Archive

May 14th, 2007 by alephnaught

Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly

Title: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly Author: Anthony Bourdain Paperback: 352 pages Publisher: Harper Perennial; Updated edition (January 9, 2007) ISBN-10: 0060899220 ISBN-13: 978-0060899226 Aviva and I got turned on to Anthony Bourdain from his Travel Channel television show, “No Reservations.” He’s irreverent and willing to try almost anything. This book is very […]

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Rome

May 13th, 2007 by alephnaught

Rome

Its Mothers Day in Rome; more importantly, its Aviva’s birthday (her second birthday celebrated overseas I might add). Aviva almost slept through the alarm clock. We’re waiting a bit to have breakfast because, well, things just don’t run on time in Italy generally. So we went down and ate – one of the proprietors came […]

Rome

May 12th, 2007 by alephnaught

Rome

Aviva woke up early, really early (like 4AM), so I woke up early too. We got organized, which is always a nice thing. I realized I forgot the special cable for my new camera (I knew I’d do that), and I couldn’t get the zip USB cable to work with Aviva’s camera (funny, it powers […]

Departure for Rome

May 11th, 2007 by alephnaught

Departure for Rome

We bought the tickets and used miles for upgrades back when I had Platinum status with Northwest Airlines. Unfortunately, we had to fly through Detroit and Paris to reach Rome, but at least we have business class seats except for the jog between Paris and Rome. Our flight from Chicago left on time, we got […]

May 6th, 2007 by alephnaught

A History of Orgies (Prion Lost Treasures)

Title: A History of Orgies (Prion Lost Treasures) Author: Burgo Partridge Paperback: 256 pages Publisher: Prion; New Ed edition (August2002) ISBN-10: 1853754919 ISBN-13: 978-1853754913 This book was a fun read. I read it over a couple of months. A History of Orgies discusses the history of orgies including a number of descriptive examples. Unfortunately, there’s […]

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May 5th, 2007 by alephnaught

An interesting article on bicycles

An article from the Wall Street Journal on how The Netherlands and Denmark (and others) are using bicycles to reduce polution.

Posted in The Netherlands,

April 15th, 2007 by alephnaught

Hiding in the Mirror: The Quest for Alternate Realities, from Plato to String

Title: Hiding in the Mirror: The Quest for Alternate Realities, from Plato to String Theory and Beyond Author: Lawrence M. Krauss Paperback: 288 pages Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics) (November 28, 2006) ISBN-10: 0143038028 ISBN-13: 978-0143038023 I wanted to catch up on the latest theories in quantum mechanics without the detail (I haven’t looked at math like […]

April 8th, 2007 by alephnaught

Dinner at Mitsuwa Market

We saw Mitsuwa Marketplace, 100 W, AlgonquinRoad, on the TV show Check, Please! This is an oriental market, selling a lot of Japanese and some Chinese and Korean food and, well, stuff, especiailly books. We got food at the dim sum shop, but there are 5 different food preparation stores, including one that’s Korean. The […]

Posted in Personal, Tags: ,

March 30th, 2007 by alephnaught

The Song of Hannah : A Novel

Title: The Song of Hannah : A Novel Author: Eva Etzioni-Halevy Paperback: 304 pages Publisher: Amazon Remainders Account (August 30, 2005) ISBN-10: 0452286727 ASIN: B000F5FQZO I liked this book. It was well written and the story was gripping. Its loosely based on the story of Hannah and her son, the prophet Samuel. There are some […]

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March 30th, 2007 by alephnaught

Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything

Title: Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything Author: Don Tapscott, Anthony D. Williams Hardcover: 320 pages Publisher: Portfolio Hardcover (December 28, 2006) ISBN-10: 1591841380 ISBN-13: 978-1591841388 This was a good book and worth the cost and time to read. The book begins with seven aspects of what Tapscott and Williams call “the collaboration economy”: Peer […]