Department of redundancy department

You guys, it's been forever since I was able to claim that posting on DW was in service of my job! Which is probably partly why it's been forever since I've updated here. The rest of the story falls to the usual subjects: actually working at work, avoiding computer use at home (seriously, I went online twice this weekend, and was up past 2am both nights; coincidence, this is not), and an intense distaste for typing long entries/responses on my phone. Shit like this never helps, but I think smartphones have done more to kill casual blogging as a communication tool than the boneheaded moves of any individual company. (Disclaimer: I am a curmudgeonly old touch-typist and do not have fun interacting with keyboards where both my hands will not rest comfortably in home position.)

With that said, this is one of a whopping three posts I'm making today -- there's already a frivolous locked post you may have missed, there's this post, and there will be a serious/thoughtful locked post on the intersection of research ethics and data that I'll start working on right afterward. That one's probably much more of interest to me than any of you, but I'll leave it up for anyone who might want to read and/or comment. (ETA: And given the late hour, the third post may not be finished today at all; as long as I get it done before 2:30pm tomorrow, though, it'll work out.) Anyway: those of you whose RSS readers only pull public posts, consider yourselves notified to log in and check for the others. ♥

(If I may interrupt myself for one second, though: damn these days where I don't eat lunch until 3pm are difficult. And after everything else, I still have choir rehearsal tonight too...wargle.)

Enough about that...on with the show! Where by "show" I mean "2011 in review," and by "2011 in review" I mean "food trucks OM NOM NOM."

New Food Trucks At Which I Have Eaten, 2011 Edition:
- Auntie's Fry Bread
- Big Red Tuna
- Boba Truck
- Bowers Gourmet Sausages
- Breezy Freeze
- The Bun Truck
- Caridad Cuisine
- CambalaCHE's
- Chasing Paradise
- Chef Che's Argentine Cuisine
- Coolhaus
- Da Burger Boss
- Danky's Doners
- Dolce Burgee
- Feast
- Germany's Famous Bratwurst
- Get Toasted
- Glowfish
- Gourmet Genie
- Grilled Cheese Patrol
- Grindhaus
- Gringo's Tacos
- Jersey Grub
- Jogasaki Sushi Burrito
- Kabob Express
- Kiyoko's Teriyaki
- Krazy BBQ
- Let's Roll It
- Lidia's Dominican Kitchen
- Lomo Arigato
- Mambo Juice
- Miski Gourmet
- Morock'n'Roll
- My Delight Cupcakery
- N'Awlins Gourmet Food Truck
- Neri's Curbside Cravings
- New Delhi Express
- No Tomatoes!
- OG Tempura
- Onolicious Hawaiian BBQ
- Pokey Truck
- Pranzo
- Rebel Bite
- Rockin' Roll by Sushi Dan
- Rokyo Ramen
- Serendoggity
- Shrimp Dancer
- Smokin' Willie's
- South Philly Experience
- Stackers Burgers
- Sura
- Surfer Taco
- Temaki Truck
- TwistBurgers
- Vesuvio
- Waffles de Liege
- The Wien
- Wrap Me Silly
- The Yummy One

You read that right -- those are only the new trucks I had not tried prior to 1/1/11. I maintain a separate Twitter feed containing the complete list of trucks that at least sometimes appear in the vicinity of my workplace. However, the list will likely never be this impressive again; having moved nearly two miles down the street last July (see: division change), I find myself in a veritable food desert. When the best option is walking the 3 blocks to partake in the hospital's cafeteria, you know you have (first-world) problems. :Þ

Best food truck of 2011: Jogasaki Sushi Burrito, hands down. Sushi burrito. Do I really need to say any more?

Best song of 2011: Florence + the Machine, "All This and Heaven Too." Runner-up, and winner if you insist on songs that get radio airplay: Florence + the Machine, "Shake It Out." Ceremonials is the good stuff, man.

Whew! Check G+ if you want pictures from Hawaii and elsewhere, witty quips and commentary, and my good old-fashioned takedowns of those who are doin' it wrong. Plus, y'know, whatever other random shit springs to the top of my mind. :) And hey -- happy new year!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Holy crap that is a lot of food trucks.

Yeah. ♥ It's about the only thing I'm going to miss about working out of CNN, but it will leave a noticeable hole in my ~~heart~~ stomach. Clearly I will just need to start checking up on my assistant around lunchtime.

(And just think, this is how many food trucks I was able to eat at after I picked up dietary restrictions and had to start ruling some trucks out!)

Haha! So many of those trucks sound so good!

So many of them were! :D Come to think of it, none of them were outright bad, although some could have been priced better, and a few did take longer than I think is really appropriate for a truck operating in the middle of a workday.

Oh man, I could go for some Belgian waffles now. ;_;

I've listened to "All This and Heaven Too" a number of times. It's very good, though my preference is for instrument led music and this sounds more like Andrew Lloyd Webber than anything else I've heard. I tend to enjoy the valleys more than the peaks when I listen to pop music so this operatic style takes a lot of getting used to.

I'm actually thinking about buying a smartphone, since mobile internet seems like a neat thing to have. At the moment, my two biggest concerns are the conditions for workers assembling the phones and the potential health risks of long-term exposure to low-level microwave radiation. Do you have any information that might address those concerns?

*laughs* That is definitely a comparison I had not heard before, although with that particular song I can see it -- the melody is very major-chord, musical theater style. Huh. Well, you know me; I'm partial to vocals and lyrics first, harmonies second, and everything else a distant third. :)

Offhand I can advise you (1) to stay far, far away from the iPhone if you care about worker's rights, and (2) although cell phones haven't been around long enough to produce trustworthy cohort studies about their associated health risks, the few reputable large cross-sectional studies I've seen haven't shown any elevated associations for cancer among adults with heavy cell phone usage. I'm leaving this message here as a placeholder while I go work on my talk for this afternoon, but both of these questions merit actual research and citations, and I'll see what I can turn up when I'm less under-the-gun. :)

It definitely sounds like a vocalist's song! I could tell from the first 15 seconds that the production was excellent, though; I'm still working out all the layers of string and voice.

I'm envious of your relationship to music, TBQH; at some point when you have a chunk of time I'd like to get critical feedback from your more harmony-based perspective. I don't know keys, so I'm flying blind when I mix. :)

Thanks for confirming my fears about the iPhone... I'm leery of iProducts as it is, so this only encourages me to eschew them. If it helps, I hate talking on the phone and would be largely using it to check email and maps, so my direct exposure to radiation would be lower than average... I try to get back to messages quickly, but the cultural push towards last-minute finagling over the phone, versus forethought and planning, is something I've been swimming against.

Anyway, many thanks! Given the solar radiation we're in for this year and the next, phones may be the least of everyone's worries, but it never hurts to ask :p

I'm partial to Seven Devils. (My sister was playing a bunch of it while we were driving to & from Madison.)

Coming back from choir rehearsal last night I developed a new affinity for "Breaking Down"...really, the whole album is just magical. :D

Totally agreed. I am loving the hell out of it. I think "Spectrum" is probably my favourite, heh.

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