Wednesday, July 21, 2010

The Adventures of Pam & Frank

5:04 AM

The Adventures of Pam & Frank

Posted: 20 Jul 2010 10:14 AM PDT

I'm kind of a weirdo.

One of my happiest moments is when I'm driving down the road, either an unfamiliar highway or one packed with traffic zooming along just above the posted speed limit.

Blasting from the radio (or the 14-year-old's iPod) is a collection of really great music that I have never heard before. No matter what my mood before, this always makes me happy.

Lately I have been streaming music from various websites and blasting music into my kitchen while I cook or bake. Our current kitchen has a swinging door that I can close to confine most of the sound to that part of the house.

Sometimes it's hard finding new music, but over time I have collected a nice list of websites that help introduce new stuff, indie bands, unheard-of labels, and emerging artists hoping to make it big. No matter what genre you like, you'll probably find some great new stuff here, too. All legal, of course.

Here's my list:

last.fm - my current favorite. Type in a song or artist you like and get a radio station with a playlist based on that artist or song. You can also "scrobble" which means last.fm will look at what you have stored in your computer and make a playlist based on what you already have. Lately I've been playing "Groove Armada radio," "Bela Fleck and the Flecktones radio" and sometimes I'll crank up the bass and listen to "the Gorillaz radio." (I need bigger woofers, though.)

pandora - same concept as last.fm but I just prefer the radio station that last.fm creates better.

ilike - listen to 30 second samples of stuff and get free downloads of stuff you've probably never heard of (because they're new emerging artists). Shows you what's popular on their site or you can explore based on what you like.

emusic - monthly subscription for bargain downloads. We discovered a lot of good stuff here, including Pam getting hooked on Of Montreal.

Amazon - Start by looking up an artist or album you love. Then scroll down to see other music purchased by customers who bought your favorite album... browse from there. This is where I nearly wet my pants upon the discovery of Mrs. Miller, Florence Foster Jenkins, and Jonathan and Darlene Edwards.
Holy crap.
(I think this subject is a blog post all by itself.)

iTunes - I'm sure you've heard of iTunes. Honestly, this is probably the last place I go for music.

MySpace - I'm personally not a fan of MS, but this is where Rachel discovered so much fantastic music like Hot Hot Heat, The Fratellis, Hard Fi, Say Hi To Your Mom, Does It Offend You Yeah?, and a buttload of other fantastic artists. We have discovered many more artists here than at Facebook.

1227.com - You're going to hate me for this, but I love this site.

The Adventures of Pam & Frank

5:20 AM

The Adventures of Pam & Frank

stopmotioness uncut & remasterd

Posted: 17 Jul 2010 08:21 PM PDT

Yesterday Rachel performed in an orchestra concert at her (old) middle school. It was excellent; probably the best one I've been to yet.

After the concert, one of the kids ran through the hall yelling, "It's on YouTube!" During the concert, the guy next to me on the top bleacher had a tripod set up and he filmed the entire concert, so I wasn't surprised it was posted.

Today while searching for the performance (I couldn't find it!?) I stumbled across this vid that some of her classmates made. The school offers a film class and Rachel thinks they made it for class. Pretty neat.

The Adventures of Pam & Frank

5:09 AM

The Adventures of Pam & Frank

Mother Nature reads my blog

Posted: 08 Jul 2010 05:45 PM PDT

Three days ago, in a previous blog post, I complained about the cold weather.

I guess Mother Nature reads this blog and decided to show me who's boss:

It's ok. I love the heat.

You Oregonians might not appreciate my next comment, but I have to say it:

It's a dry heat...

The Adventures of Pam & Frank

5:12 AM

The Adventures of Pam & Frank

Pass It On Plates has a new website!

Posted: 06 Jul 2010 11:27 AM PDT

If you are looking for our plate diaries at www.passitonplates.com, don't worry if you don't find them. Your plate diaries still exist and everything written in them is still there.

You can now find your plate diaries at our new website address: www.pass-it-on-plates.com

For more details on this change, please check out our Pass It On Plates blog post about the upgrade.
(If you want your plate to have the new website address written on the back, there is information about that as well in our Pass It On Plates blog.)

Thank you!

The Adventures of Pam & Frank

5:14 AM

The Adventures of Pam & Frank

Summer Rant

Posted: 05 Jul 2010 04:09 PM PDT

It is July and I am cold.

Actually, I am freezing my butt off. Oh yes I'm here in Oregon, not Antarctica, where it should at least be 80 degrees by now. The windows are open and the thermostat in my house reads 64.

I reluctantly shut off the furnace for the season a couple weeks ago. If I had firewood, I'd build a fire in the fireplace because I'm so dang cold. My nose is icy and my nostrils feel frosted when I inhale. Doesn't that just sound wrong to want to build a fire or turn on the heat in July? I'm just tired of being so cold all the time.

It's just not right.

Our weather here in Oregon is usually so wonderful that I keep some weather widgets on my computer wallpaper just so I can be accurate when bragging about our weather. Hmph. It's depressing to realize that compared to Salem, Oregon: it's a little warmer on the coast, toasty warm in my Wisconsin hometown, and delightfully HOT in Rancho Mirage, CA (near Palm Springs.)
Gee, I'd like to be there right now...

Yesterday Rachel asked if we could go up the mountain to our favorite bend in the river at North Fork.

"Uh, that's a mountain stream fed by snow melt. I'm gonna have to say no."

"But mommmmmm..."

"How many days have we had over 80 degrees this year?"

"Ummm, 2? Maybe 3?"

Yah, No. Maybe by the end of August it will have warmed up enough.

Is it warm where you are? Has June delivered its June-like weather to you and your garden? Does July look like it's going to be everything you hoped it would be - as far as weather goes?

Comment here with your weather bragging and gloating. At least I can warm myself up by imagining your weather!

The Adventures of Pam & Frank

5:09 AM

The Adventures of Pam & Frank

"Welcome Home!"

Posted: 02 Jul 2010 03:47 PM PDT

Phở = Vietnamese Beef Noodle Soup

aka my family's favorite comfort food.

No, we're not Vietnamese, or even Asian for that matter, but we certainly know a good thing when we see it. Or in this case, when we smell and taste it.

We're regulars at a local Salem Phở restaurant, where we basically fill up on soup and salad. Frank orders Phở (the soup), which always comes with bean sprouts, sliced limes, sliced jalapenos, and lots of fresh basil on the side.Rachel and I usually order Bún. Bún is a salad - with noodles under the lettuce. Sometimes the lettuce is blended with chopped fresh herbs such as cilantro, basil, or mint. The Bún is usually topped with grilled meat, egg rolls, pickled carrot/daikon radish, bean sprouts, and served with Nước mắm (a sweet fish sauce, used as salad dressing) on the side.

Yesterday we had an appointment up in Portland, and afterwards we zig-zagged across downtown looking for a place to have lunch. We argued over burgers, Greek gyros, Indian food, shopping mall food courts and Voodoo Doughnuts, then backtracked to our starting point to eat at a place called "Toast and Phở."

Weird name, but it turns out Phở is a traditional Vietnamese breakfast (can you imagine a big steaming bowl of beef soup for breakfast every morning? I love it, but no. I couldn't do that for breakfast.) In the mornings they serve traditional American breakfast, Bún and some rice dishes for lunch, and Phở all day long.

We walk in and inhale. Smells like Phở: rich beef broth, star anise, basil, grilled meat... Yum.

The lady (one of the owners?) walks up to us and asks, "Family of three?"
"Yes."
"Welcome home! Right this way..."

Welcome home? I've never heard of that greeting at a restaurant before.

Welcome home.

A departing customer smiled at us and chuckled. He must have been surprised when he was welcomed home, too.

Welcome home. It stuck in my mind.
We looked at the menu out of habit, but were ready to order before we even parked the car.
"One Phở and two Bún please. Also two salad rolls and a pot of green tea please."

(Don't even get me started with the salad rolls. I don't have enough time to tell you how much we love them. Especially from Toast and Pho - where they lace the rolls with fresh basil AND fresh mint leaves. Holy moley. I will tell you about these amazing things another time - for now I'll just say that they're addicting. Rachel and I dream about them at night.)

She was absolutely right. As we dug into our favorite comfort foods, we were at home... in this new restaurant.

Pam's Inbox

5:06 AM

Pam's Inbox

HOW DO THESE FOLKS SURVIVE ???

Posted: 01 Jul 2010 05:15 AM PDT

ONE
Recently, when I went to McDonald's I saw on the menu that you could have an order of 6, 9 or 12 Chicken McNuggets. I asked for a half dozen nuggets.
'We don't have half dozen nuggets,' said the teenager at the counter.
'You don't?' I replied. 'We only have six, nine, or twelve,' was the reply..
'So I can't order a half dozen nuggets, but I can order six?'
'That's right.' So I shook my head and ordered six McNuggets
(Unbelievable but sadly true...)

TWO
I was checking out at the local Walmart with just a few items and the lady behind me put her things on the belt close to mine. I picked up one of those 'dividers' that they keep by the cash register and placed it between our things so they wouldn't get mixed. After the girl had scanned all of my items, she picked up the 'divider', looking it all over for the bar code so she could scan it.
Not finding the bar code, she said to me, 'Do you know how much this is?'
I said to her 'I've changed my mind; I don't think I'll buy that today..'
She said 'OK,' and I paid her for the things and left.
She had no clue to what had just happened.

THREE
A woman at work was seen putting a credit card into her floppy drive and pulling it out very quickly. When I inquired as to what she was doing, she said she was shopping on the Internet and they kept asking for a
credit card number, so she was using the ATM 'thingy.'
(keep shuddering!!)

FOUR
I recently saw a distraught young lady weeping beside her car.
'Do you need some help?' I asked. She replied, 'I knew I should have replaced the battery to this remote door unlocker. Now I can't get into my car.'
Do you think they (pointing to a distant convenience store) would have a battery to fit this?'
'Hmmm, I don't know. Do you have an alarm, too?'
I asked. 'No, just this remote thingy,' she answered, handing it and the car keys to me.
As I took the key and manually unlocked the door, I replied, 'Why don't you drive over there and check about the batteries. It's a long walk....'

FIVE
Several years ago, we had an Intern who was none too swift. One day she was typing and turned to a secretary and said, 'I'm almost out of typing paper. What do I do?'
'Just use paper from the photocopier', the secretary told her.
With that, the intern took her last remaining blank piece of paper, put it on the photocopier and proceeded to make five 'blank' copies.
Brunette, by the way!!

SIX
A mother calls 911 very worried asking the dispatcher if she needs to take her kid to the emergency room, the kid had eaten ants.
The dispatcher tells her to give the kid some Benadryl and he should be fine, the mother says,
'I just gave him some ant killer......'
Dispatcher: 'Rush him in to emergency!'

Life is tough. It's even tougher if you're stupid!!!!

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Sunday, July 18, 2010

Friday, July 9, 2010

Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Saturday, July 3, 2010

Friday, July 2, 2010

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