November 18, 2007

Fall Colors

The fall colors are in full effect right now, so yesterday I took my new (used) bike for a ride, and brought my new camera along with me. I had good excuses for buying both, but yes, I am now broke for a while.

I live right next to Rock Creek, so I rode along the creek and took all of these shots within ten minutes bike ride of my house. It's such an amazing part of D.C., squarely in the District, a ten-minute walk up to the Cleveland Park metro stop (and all the Cleveland Park commercial stuff), and yet right next to a beautiful, lush park that is even quiet. Well, when people aren't being murdered there, anyway.

Posted by Barzelay at 11:27 PM | Comments (1)

November 17, 2007

New Camera Is Cuter, Cuddlier, And 50% More Sanitary Than Old Camera

For a long time before we started our summer jobs this past summer, Jeanette and I knew we were going to be making way too much money. We both had summer associateships at law firms in San Francisco, and they pay young attorneys (and the law students who will soon be young attorneys) way more than they are even close to worth, in the hopes that you'll stick around once you've learned the ropes. Along with all the other similarly situated law students in our class, we played this game where we planned out what we were going to buy with the small fortunes we anticipated earning. We allotted certain amounts to clothing, or travel, or electronics, or hobbies, and we even committed to saving large sums, even knowing we'd spend more than we had planned.

I decided well in advance that I was going to 1) buy a digital SLR camera, 2) fly my family out to San Francisco for a vacation, and 3) buy some sweet new kitchen gadgets. And I faithfully fulfilled numbers 2 and 3. But I decided, over the course of the summer, that I just didn't need the expensive new camera, in a large part because I was rarely blogging, and certainly wasn't posting extensive photo sets. So I felt like I was being "good" by not giving in to the covetous urge for pixel-y deliciousness. I was resisting temptation, and being frugal. I was a real trooper, living my deprived, 3 megapixel life.

It worked out nicely until, two weeks ago, I knocked my one decent camera off the kitchen counter. I was photographing the process of butchering a rabbit (yes, I do that sort of thing, and I have about a whole year's worth of cooking exploits awaiting posting to EatFoo or here, if I ever get back on the wagon). I reached for it and, instead of my fingers grasping the camera, they just kinda slapped it. It went sailing.

Durable as my camera always was, it flew down, lens-first. There was a sickening crack as it hit the hardwood floor. Before I even looked at the LCD, I just knew the camera wasn't going to work. Sure enough, the screen will only show all-white, and it won't store any pictures, despite the shutter opening and closing when I press the take-the-goddamned-picture button.

As soon as I realized that my beloved old camera was finished, I started to let out little whimpers. Big wet drops ran down from my eyes and found their ways to my lips. What else could I do but turn to my only companion for support? And so I buried my face in the loving embrace of the half-butchered rabbit, snuggling up to the cuddly little guy for comfort. He was with me in my time of need. There was only one set of footprints in the sand that day. And they weren't footprints. They were paw prints. From lucky, delicious paws.

Oh, and in a twist ending of which Rod Serling would have been proud, the dropped camera turned out to be powered by what kind of batteries? You guessed it. Energizer.

Anyway, with nothing left but my point-and-shoot, pocket-sized, good-for-parties, bad-if-you-want-decent-looking-shots camera, I had no choice but to make the stupid purchase that I'd wanted to over the summer. There went $600. If I'd have just bought the stupid thing five months ago, I would have avoided all that pain and suffering--from the loss of the camera, as well as from the bacterial infection I got from snuggling up to the raw meat.

Now I have a Canon Digital Rebel XT. It's 8 megapixels, with much better lens and features. It's also sturdier, so I will feel free to slap it around a bit. It ain't one of them sensitive broads what can't take a hit. The best thing to come out of this ordeal is that the new camera has given me a renewed interest in taking crappy pictures of things. That means you can expect more photos, just like old times. But I'm happy. This camera is really, really awesome, and I love it. And I'm constantly worried that someone is going to steal it.

Posted by Barzelay at 1:33 AM | Comments (1)

July 19, 2007

Kwik-E-Mart

Of all the places they could've put the Kwik-E-Marts for The Simpsons movie promotion, they put one in Mountain View, CA. It's an hour South of San Francisco, and happens to be where one of my law firm's offices is located (the headquarters, in fact). The only reason this makes sense is that they put it in basically right next to Google's campus.

Anyway, it's a lot of fun. We ate disgusting-looking pink-frosted doughnuts, and slurped up electric blue squishees. The signs are all pretty funny. Definitely one of the coolest promotions any of us has ever seen.

Posted by Barzelay at 6:14 AM | Comments (7)

August 19, 2006

St. Louis Arch

My first time seeing the St. Louis arch. All photos were taken while driving.

Posted by Barzelay at 12:00 AM | Comments (3)

August 18, 2006

Photos While Driving Through Colorado

Random views while traveling through Colorado.

Posted by Barzelay at 12:00 PM | Comments (1)

Arches National Park

What an amazing place! Go here before you die.

Posted by Barzelay at 12:00 AM | Comments (0)

August 17, 2006

Photos While Driving Through Utah

Random views while driving through Utah.

Posted by Barzelay at 12:00 PM | Comments (0)

Bryce Canyon National Park

Very cool views, but extremely crowded. The scenery wasn't mind-blowing, but it got really cool when I snuck down into the area called "Wall Street" (you've seen a zillion pictures of it before without knowing it), which has been closed for a while due to a rock fall. Down there it got pretty amazing, with huge, red rock faces and an impossibly long and narrow pathway between them. If you go, take the trails. Don't bother with the million different overlooks unless you have to kill a day.

Posted by Barzelay at 12:00 AM | Comments (0)

August 16, 2006

Death Valley National Park

In Death Valley, I watched my car's information center as the temperature climbed. Had I been driving through later in the day, it would have gotten much hotter, but rest assured that it was still quite toasty.

The funniest thing I saw was in the lowest, hottest, nastiest part of Death Valley, I saw a man standing outside, a cigarette in one hand and a coffee in the other. At that point, it was 114 degrees out, and he was purposely standing out in the sun, rather than under the shade of the awning right next to him. Ridiculous.

Posted by Barzelay at 12:00 PM | Comments (0)

Devil's Postpile National Monument

Posted by Barzelay at 7:00 AM | Comments (0)

Cedar Breaks National Monument

Posted by Barzelay at 6:00 AM | Comments (1)

Kolob Canyon at Zion National Park

Posted by Barzelay at 3:00 AM | Comments (3)

August 15, 2006

Yosemite National Park

Posted by Barzelay at 4:00 PM | Comments (0)

August 13, 2006

EFF Bike Ride at Moss Beach

Posted by Barzelay at 10:00 AM | Comments (0)

August 7, 2006

Oakland A's Game

I went to an A's game.

»» Continue reading "Oakland A's Game"

Posted by Barzelay at 3:13 AM | Comments (7)

Muir Woods National Monument

I saw some huge redwoods at Muir Woods National Monument.

»» Continue reading "Muir Woods National Monument"

Posted by Barzelay at 3:12 AM | Comments (0)

Alcatraz

I went to Alcatraz.

»» Continue reading "Alcatraz"

Posted by Barzelay at 3:11 AM | Comments (2)

Scharffen Berger Chocolate Factory Tour

I toured the Scharffen Berger Chocolate factory in Berkeley.

»» Continue reading "Scharffen Berger Chocolate Factory Tour"

Posted by Barzelay at 3:10 AM | Comments (0)

July 25, 2006

Sonoma County wine tasting

Intern outing to wine country! Brief wine write-up at EatFoo.

Seghesio

Ridge

Teldeschi

Passalacqua

Unti

Fritz

Posted by Barzelay at 8:12 AM | Comments (2)

July 4, 2006

Creme Brulee

Note: This post is also posted at the brand-new food blog I started at EatFoo, to which I and many of my friends will be contributing, as promised. For now, I'll still be cross-posting *some* of my entries. At least the ones where I include pretty pictures. Comment over there.

I first had creme brulee at a Ruth's Chris during high school and instantly fell in love. I had the good fortune to date a wealthy girl with generous parents. I ate a ton of great food that I could not otherwise have afforded (at least not until I have that law firm job). And I've never gone back. Since then, I've had a lot better taste in food, and have developed my culinary techniques in a large part to be able to eat the way I was occasionally able to, but without paying for it. But I'm not so poor--I managed to purchase a kitchen torch at an outlet mall ($20). I'd had my eyes on them for a while, having made several decent attempts at making creme brulee and pining for a handheld propane caramelizing device. This was the first time I had a chance to try it out.

Creme brulee is such a simple dessert, but is so delicious, and seems to occupy a sort of mystical place within American culture. Unlike for the French, this is no everyday dessert for us. We view the sugar crust with wary interest, wondering what sort of culture would create something so delicate and restrained. "But... where's the chocolate?" we ask. We're all the more bewildered by the dessert's size. Which American among us is willing to sacrifice his elephantine hunk of chocolate wall layer cake with ganache in favor of this tiny yellow dish? So many Americans have yet to try creme brulee, but awareness of it trickles into our culture from French movies and our more cultured or well-off friends, and so its reputation grows without actually ever inundating us to the point that we cease seeing it as something special. Which makes it all the more easy to impress with it.

Having since eaten at perhaps five or six other Ruth's Chris locations, I can say that the Ruth's Chris in Tampa was a shining star of Ruth's sky. They made delicate spun sugar toppings for their creme brulee, while other locations were content to serve theirs without (not that there's anything wrong with that). I'm positive that my jaw dropped the first time I saw one of those sugar toppings (and I'm positive that it looked at least 3.7 bajillion times better than mine does). For all the years since, I wondered (constantly--that's all I've done for the last eight years) about this spun sugar, not knowing what it was called or how to google for it, but finally I figured it out. I finally happened upon it unexpectedly while reading some wholly unrelated recipe. And so it trickled into my consciousness accidentally and gracefully, just as creme brulee is finally doing into the American consciousness.

For the recipe and the how-to, head over to the post on EatFoo.

Posted by Barzelay at 5:34 AM

June 12, 2006

Walking The West Coast

On Saturday I went hiking at Point Reyes National Seashore with a few other EFF people. It was my first time on Highway 1, my first time on the actual coast of the West coast, my first time seeing elk and seals (or sea lions, we aren't sure which) in the wild (or at least in a nature preserve), and afterward, my first time eating at In-N-Out Burger.

We hiked a trail out to Tomales Point, which was maybe nine miles round trip. We also went off the trail on a crazy hike/climb down (and later back up) a not-so-sheer cliff to the seashore. Near there we stopped for lunch. All told, it took us about six hours, but was very beautiful and California-ey. It looked just like all those Pacific Northwest coast images one sees. Probably because it is the Pacific Northwest coast. So... now I've seen this. On to Redwood, Yosemite, etc.

Posted by Barzelay at 7:54 AM | Comments (1)

June 4, 2006

Days 3 Through 12

Cross-country trips, new cities, and new jobs present quite a problem for a blogger. They give him tons and tons of material about which to write, hijinks and shenanigans occur, crazy people are met, and pictures are taken, but there is never any time left to write about them. And blog material has a way of piling up that discourages one to blog at all if one can't make a significant dent in the backlog. So this is my attempt to do that. Two weeks of living in one post of blogging. I'd love to be more detailed; there is so much more to tell. But then again, it would be quite silly to lament one's life being so full that there isn't time in which to comment on it. If living were to become a lower priority than meta-living, one's real-life adventures would probably not be the sort worth reading about.

Day 3 of the trip saw me traversing Wyoming. The scenery finally got interesting after the long and boring Nebraska void.

I took a few scenic loops on the recommendation of a shaggy old cowboy at the Wyoming welcome center. He didn't let me down. The first was through Medicine Bow National Forest. It was supposed to add an hour to my travel time, but it ended up adding about two and a half because I stopped so often to take pictures, get a closer look at rivers and trees and snow, and admire the views.

A few more hours and I arrived at the Flaming Gorge National Recreation Area loop. The sun was going to go down soon, and I thought strongly about skipping it, but I'm glad I didn't. Some of the views were spectacular, and were made all the more so by the stark golden glow of the sunset.

Then I decided to take some long exposure pictures on the road while there was still some light, and just see what happened. Pretty cool, I think.

I drove and drove and drove and finally made it to Salt Lake City. Thinking I could find some place on the Southwestern side of Salt Lake City, I pressed on. But no lodgings were to be had. I ended up having to go another hour and a half or so, across the Great Salt Flats. This pissed me off a bit because it meant I couldn't see them (it was pitch black in the middle of nowhere, Utah. I spent the night in Wendover, Utah, right across from the Nevada border.

The next morning, I left my pillow in the hotel room, and didn't realize it until the next night. But I decided to backtrack for a bit to see a little of the salt flats. They were very flat, white, shimmering, and eerie. I didn't go too far back, so I guess I didn't even get the full salt flats experience.

Nevada was weird. Everyone I saw there at all stops was either a trucker or a biker. I ate lunch at a pizza hut and literally everyone there (maybe fifteen or twenty people in unrelated parties) were wearing some item of Harley Davidson couture. And there I saw the man with the largest head I've ever seen. He was native American, maybe 6'2" and about 300 massive, powerful pounds. And atop his humongous frame was a head like a ponytailed, lumpy basketball, and only slightly less orange. I could not stop staring at him, and I could not shake the thought that he was the inspiration for the goblins in the animated version of The Hobbit. He even had the same humpback.

I resisted stopping for the all-you-can-eat lobster buffet in Boomtown, Nevada, and finally made it into California.

A few more hours, and I reached Berkeley. With bitter longing, I walked a bit around UC-Berkeley's gorgeous campus. I had no idea it was so beautiful and lush. It stirred up some regrets about not ever studying in undergrad and therefore having to "settle" for not-Berkeley-but-still-wonderful-Georgetown. And then that reminded me of how I'm doing the same thing in law school. Will I finally be forced to settle for a not-high-paying-but-still-exhausting firm job? It was a sobering reminder not to waste my summer, and to really put all I can into the EFF job. Oh, and for the record, I love Georgetown. But Berkeley was my first choice.

I drove across the Bay Bridge into the city, and was pretty shocked. San Francisco is a big city. Much of it is not quaint or charming. There is no parking to be had, and any hotels I was likely to find would have been much more than I'd like to pay. So, having been thoroughly intimidated by my dusk entrance into San Francisco, I promptly drove back across the Bay Bridge, and got a motel room in Berkeley for cheap.

The next morning I went to look at an apartment. The guy answered the door shirtless, wearing sweatpants. His name was Avi, and he was a short and skinny Jew who obviously worked out a lot to make up for the fact that he was a short and skinny Jew. After criticizing me for being Jewish and mispronouncing his name, he took me inside the apartment and started frying up some bacon for himself.

After spending a good fifteen minutes telling me about all the other people that wanted to move into the place, and how this was really an interview and I needed to impress him, he finally explained that in truth, he didn't really care who lived there. Why?

"Because I'm hardly ever here, anyway." At this point the bacon was completely burned and smoking like crazy. He continued. "I'm almost always gone. I get a big-bootied bitch, we hop on that sport bike you see out the window, and we just ride somewhere."

And yes, that's an accurate quote.

In my desperately homeless state, I almost decided to take the place. Thank God I had the sense not to put myself in such a ridiculous home, no matter how much blog fodder it would have produced. Instead, I decided to go by my summer workplace and see if anyone would be there on a Saturday morning who might take mercy on me and give me a place to stay. EFF to the rescue! A staff attorney and one of the other interns were there. The staff attorney got Jason on the phone, who said I could stay at his home. The intern, Nick, and I went to lunch and I stored some of my more valuable stuff in his apartment temporarily until I found my own. And I emailed some more people from Craigslist.

Shortly thereafter, I got a call from one of them, who was familiar with EFF and wanted me to come see the place. Such a huge difference from that other shithole. This apartment was in the Mission, was huge, had a backyard, a loft with a really nice little roof area, and best of all, the people living there didn't discuss the big-bootied bitches they drove around on their sport bikes. We got along very well, and an hour or so later, with a little help from Cara, I was handing over my rent check.

That night, I stayed with Jason. That was somewhat surreal. I'd been reading his blog for several years, and was, shall we say, a big fan of his work. So I was geeking out over being around him, while he was barbecuing me steak and otherwise being a gracious host. His roommate, George, was awesome. She (George) is an Australian programmer who was one of the original people who worked on Flickr. She moved to San Francisco when it was bought by Yahoo. We all watched the last twenty minutes or so of Carrie, as she paused every few seconds to take photos of the screen. Then Jason started taking photos of her taking photos of the screen, and it all culminated in us watching a full episode of Star Trek Voyager. Law geeks indeed.

Every night since then, I've been in my apartment. More on that to come. In the between time, I've started my job at EFF. It turns out that a lot of what I do there is confidential, and I can't really talk about it--kind of ironic for an organization so into free speech. But attorney-client privilege is no joke. Ah, well.

Now you're all caught up, and I can get back to real blogging. Also note that I added pictures to the Day 2 post as well. I'll post about San Francisco, work, my apartment, etc. later. For now, suffice to say, I'm in a great apartment with cool roommates, and I have an awesome job.

Posted by Barzelay at 9:10 AM | Comments (3)

May 25, 2006

Day 2

I am in a motel room in Kearney, Nebraska. Today involved lots of driving through flat, featureless farmland in very wide states. I stopped into a Best Buy outside Chicago this morning, bought new RAM, then promptly returned said RAM when it failed to address my laptop's problem. Other stuff:

• Detours taken: 3
• Temperature range encountered: 43 F - 93 F
• Outlet malls shopped: 2
  • Clothing items purchased: 2
  • Cooking items purchased: 4
• Former Presidents' boyhood homes passed by: 2
• Tornadoes encountered: 0
• Boring states passed through: 3
• Total cost of road tolls so far: >$40
• Underwhelming regional theme parks passed: 3
• I also saw the International Wrestling Institute & Museum
• Music:
  • The National - Alligator
  • Paul Simon - Rhythm Of The Saints
  • Self - Subliminal Plastic Motives
  • Rush - Permanent Waves
  • Sunset Rubdown - Snake's Got A Leg
  • Mates Of State - Bring It Back
  • Radiohead - Kid A
  • plus crazy Mexican radio for a while and very cool Omaha radio for a while

Posted by Barzelay at 12:20 AM | Comments (9)

May 23, 2006

Day 1 Of The Trip

DC to Chicago leg:

• Anti-choice billboards: 5
• Jesus fish: 2
• Support The Troops/God Bless The Troops magnetic ribbons: stopped counting after forty
• Dollars spent on fast food/gas station food: $21
• States traveled: 5
• Distance traveled: ~650mi
• McDonald's Asian Chicken Salad is surprisingly very, very good
• I prefer single-ply toilet paper
• My laptop no longer works. Need new RAM? Will stop by first Circuit City I find.
• CDs listened to:
  • The Editors - The Back Room
  • Band Of Horses - Everything All The Time
  • Burden Brothers - self-titled
  • Built To Spill - You In Reverse
  • Red Hot Chili Peppers - Stadium Arcadium
  • Queen - Innuendo
  • The Toadies - Rubbernecker
  • The Islands - Return To The Sea
  • Mozart's Requiem
  • The National - Alligator
  • Sufjan Stevens - Illinoise

Posted by Barzelay at 11:08 PM | Comments (6)

April 4, 2006

Storms approaching

I love the weather right before storms. The smell of the air before the rain, the gathering clouds, and most of all, the wind! It's my favorite kind of weather. It really energizes me, and clears my head. It makes me self-reflective and philosophical, but frisky and playful. It makes me happy and brings out creativity, and erodes a good bit of cynicism.

Anyway, this evening, Sarah pointed out to me an impending storm taking over the NW DC sky. I popped my head out the window, and it was quite cool to see. Here's a picture of the storm coming, taken out the window of my apartment. The colors were absurdly vivid, and it was at the perfect time in between sunset and darkness.

And then the rain hit, and it rained hard. The rumbling patter of the drops was relaxing, and I ended up going for a brief walk outside in the rain, until I realized that, unlike the Florida rains I'm used to, DC rain is pretty damn cold. But anyway, good job storm; you were pleasant and beautiful.

Posted by Barzelay at 2:34 AM | Comments (3)

March 12, 2006

Idiotarod 2006 and a nice day at Tryst

This was a very DC day. After auditioning this morning to be an SAT/LSAT teacher for Kaplan (pays well, though infrequently, and perhaps I can teach classes in San Fran if I get the unpaid EFF internship), Jeanette and I went to lunch at Chinatown Express on 6th and H NW. That's the place where a guy is always putting on a show in the window making lai mein noodles by stretching and folding dough over and over again. I'd been craving some Chinese food, and that place is very good, and cheap.

After that, we decided to head out to Adams-Morgan to study at Tryst and then get Ethiopian for dinner since I'd never had Ethiopian before (post on Ethiopian food to come). Tryst is not usually the quietest place , with a hip soundtrack (Sufjan Stevens, the new Belle And Sebastian, The Arcade Fire, etc.), baristi steaming milk, waiters running about, and chatter. But on this occasion we experienced a very peculiar and enjoyable interruption: Idiotarod 2006.

Basically, we were sitting there reading cases for our moot court competition, and every minute or so, a group of five or six drunken idiots would run by, cheering and yelling, dressed in absurd outfits and costumes, while pushing a decorated shopping cart. Very conducive to concentration. With a bit of googling we found this posting on Craigslist [edited for brevity]:

Get SMASHED at the 2006 Idiotarod, D.C.

What the Hell is the Idiotarod Anyway? It's a day of racing, making an ass of yourself, meeting new people, stopping and having chats with some local bartenders, potentially dressing up, and generally having one of the best days of your life.... The race starts with registration and Check-in at the Front Page in Dupont Circle, three checkpoint bars in between and a large party at Tom Tom in Adam's Morgan. Plan to make a fool of yourself, or come and mock your friends. And all in the name of giving back to the community...

A team is comprised of 5 Pullers/Runners, 1 Musher, and one cart. The same 6 team members must start and complete the race, and be present at each checkpoint. You should come up with a catchy team name...there might even be a prize... We will award First, Second, Third, Best Costumes, Best Fundraising and Best Sabotage prizes... For the 2006 D.C. Idiotarod, we have decided to donate funds earned to the Arlington Food Assistance Center (http://www.afacinfo.org/). They don't know they are getting this money yet, so you can't blame them for anything stupid we might do...

I love this idea, and I'm not surprised to hear that it originated in San Francisco, the land of flash mobs, giant pillow fights, the EFF, and more. I so wish that I'd have known about the Idiotarod 2006 in advance. It definitely would have been up my alley. Oh well. In any case, I got some good photos of the event in progress, and some good distraction.

The rest of the day was spent quietly at Tryst, my favorite DC hangout. I used their free wifi, edited my spring appellate brief, read some moot court, and played some Text Twist (so addictive). It was beautiful out, and so they had the whole side facing the sidewalk opened up. A breeze was blowing in, and the natural light from the front as well as from the skylight really made it a nice place to study. This was my first time there during the day. I got some iced coffee, we split a fruit tart, and then I had some more serious coffee drink later in the day. A very pleasurable time. I highly recommend you check Tryst out if you have not yet done so.

Posted by Barzelay at 1:55 AM

March 10, 2006

Skiing at Snowshoe, WV

Ah, skiing, how I missed you. I'm on spring break, and as a brief reprieve between rewriting my s