I used to pick up Maui Gold pineapples at Trader Joe's every winter. The pineapple display often had the Maui Golds placed amongst the ones from Thailand or elsewhere and I'd carefully check for the Hawaii tag. I was trying to reclaim the amazing flavor of the freshly sweet pineapple I had in Maui years ago. Sadly, Maui Land & Pineapple, Inc., who retailed as Maui Gold, shut down their pineapple production at the end of 2009. Maui Land & Pineapple was the largest grower of the fruit in Hawaii. Dole Food still has some pineapple acreage in Oahu, but has most of its production elsewhere. Del Monte harvested its last Hawaii pineapple crop in 2008. However, not all is lost as Haliimaile Pineapple Co. Ltd has stepped in and purchased or leased the Maui Pineapple assets and fields, including the Maui Gold pineapple and brand. They plan to export a small percentage to mainland retailers where Maui Gold can command a premium price (I'm thinking that might not be Trader Joe's).
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Those wanting to pop the question in an unusual fashion may consider a trip to Chicago's Field Museum where, for a $350 fee, the staff will place your engagement ring inside a case in the Grainger Hall of Gems. The service is proving popular. The Field is currently hosting The Nature of Diamonds, an exhibit that explores the history and beauty of the popular gem. The 128.54 carat Tiffany Diamond and the 407.48 carat Incomparable Diamond are on display.
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Monday, February 01, 2010

Ten Years, Two Months

This weblog began as a means for me to write regularly and share interesting finds from the scattered pages of the World Wide Web. Something happened along the way that in hindsight seems obvious but was never a goal for me, never even a side thought.

The weblog community when I started in 1999 was small. Blogger.com had a “recently updated” list on the home page with weblogs separated by hours, then as months passed, minutes, and eventually the timestamps were irrelevant as the phenomenon boomed. Now every media outlet of any worth is on the Internet and weblogs are more common than personal home pages (remember those?). My source material for blog posts has changed. Back then, it was about fortuitously clicking into a guy’s website devoted to his personal tea bag collection. Now it’s also about finding an article in a local paper about a museum’s tea bag exhibit, searching to see who else wrote about tea bags, and also killing the idea if too many people have written about it and I have nothing to add. Behind all the visible growth and changes, there were people. People sharing and, more importantly, people connecting.

Along the way, readers sent me emails with interesting links and thoughts on my posts. I emailed other bloggers links and opinions. I sent several people to a new place called Metafilter that I visited often. Fast forward ten years and that circle of people is my online community, one that is as vital as the friends I see in person. And because of the convenience of the Internet, the people are actually more accessible and available than friends I need to plan to get together with or call or even email.

One vital member of the early weblog community was Brad L. Graham who passed away unexpectedly a few weeks ago. Brad brought many bloggers together in those early days and continued to do so. He knew from the beginning that it was about the people because that’s the kind of person he was. “Sense of community” was a key point in his “Why I Weblog” essay back in June of 1999. And, this being the Internet, “people together” didn’t have to mean people physically in one place (though his regular “Break Bread with Brad” events did that too). It meant online forums, sites like MetaFilter, comments on weblogs, email discussions. I touched base with Brad and several other friends regularly in one of these communities. His was an energizing and funny voice. We shared a love of Buffy and Broadway; I watched every video, visited every link he shared because I knew it would be funny or thought-provoking and it was usually both. Each day he’s been gone from our lives has made it all the more clear that even a virtual presence can create defining, bonding moments in people’s lives and friendships.

When I thought about how to approach my “ten year anniversary” post I knew I wanted to write about the community and I wanted to, as usual, thank the people who helped me along the way. I also knew I wanted to get off the daily posting treadmill. Getting that all into a form I felt worthy of capping off ten years was daunting enough that I delayed for weeks. Then Brad died, throwing me off balance entirely. And as I spent my time reconnecting with friends of Brad instead of writing, it became even clearer that while the point of this exercise may have been about the writing, it ended up being about the people.

I’m still here, not producing as much, but thinking about what to do next both with the weblog and my ever-present goal of writing. I have a backlog of post ideas that have accumulated, waiting for my usual research. Ten years of weblogging as a discipline has been valuable, but ten years of friendships and community altered my life. Thank you Brad, thank you to his friends, you all know who you are, thank you, and here’s to keeping the World Wide Web a welcoming place to visit.
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Tuesday, December 22, 2009

Toni Keene, executive chef at Macy's downtown Seattle store, has been dishing out Christmas treats for 20 years on the sixth floor (the Home department of course). She survived the Bon Marché transition to Macy's and continues to give cooking demonstrations, hand out recipes, and advise shoppers on cookware purchases. On a recent Frango Friday (all recipes used the Macy's signature Frango chocolates, which originated in Seattle in 1918) she baked over 800 cookies for shoppers, which they enjoyed with peppermint coffee.
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A Day in the Life of NYTimes.com, video visualizations of traffic to NYTimes.com on June 25, 2009 (the day Michael Jackson died). There's a map of the U.S. and map of the world. Mobile site users are identified with orange circles, the rest are yellow. There's a huge glow at 5:20pm right after TMZ broke the news of Jackson's death.
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Tuesday, December 15, 2009

My annual quest to find the original location of the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree on Live/Bing maps' birds-eye view turned up a neat little coincidence. The tree's owner, Maria Corti, is a fifth grade teacher at Cider Mill School in my hometown of Wilton, Connecticut. Corti lives in Easton, CT and the 76-foot-tall Norway Spruce used to stand 10 feet from her bedroom window. She had been told that she may have to remove the tree in 5-10 years, which alleviated some of the guilt she felt at chopping it down. This year the tree's Swarovski crystal star topper has been made over with 720 LEDs, 44 circuit boards, and 3,000 feet of wire for crowd-pleasing lighting tricks.
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Monday, December 14, 2009

Elliott Bay Book Company is moving from Pioneer Square to Capitol Hill. Owner Peter Aaron promises "a warm, comfortable and cozy environment" in the vintage 1918 building, which was the original Ford truck service center for Seattle. A creaky fir floor, high wood ceiling with wood beams and skylights will contribute to the charm, and the vibrant Cap Hill surroundings will hopefully contribute to the coffers.
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Flight testing of Boeing's 787 Dreamliner begins this week. Test pilots will put the new plane through nine months of extreme conditions, from a cold start after an overnight at 55 degrees below zero to one-engine operation, in-flight stalls, and braking on the runway at top speed with brake pads ground down to maximum allowed wear. Chief project engineer Mike Delaney is hoping for several lightning strikes to quell concerns that the plastic airframe won't dissipate lightning as well as aluminum. The outside of the 787 is composed of carbon-fiber-reinforced plastic. Boeing sent a 6x3 foot panel of the composite plastic to All Nippon Airways to convince their engineers that the material was durable and repairable. They banged on it with hammers, barely scratching it, and Boeing demonstrated how to repair the damage. Barring any additional slips in the schedule, ANA will receive the first 787 in late 2010.
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Friday, December 11, 2009

Hook's Cheese Company (in Wisconsin, of course) has had the patience to age a 15-year-old cheddar. They started in 1994 with 5,200 pounds of cheddar that they sold chunks of at 10 and 12 years. 1,200 pounds were kept for the 15 year mark as they found the flavor to be developing well. Limited quantities are still available -- at the steep price of $50 per pound. But another batch is not far behind and will be ready in March 2010.
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It's so cold in the Seattle area that a Port Orchard family sent in a photo of their cat's water bowl to a local news station. It had frozen overnight with a strange spike of ice sticking out of the top. Ice spikes are created when the surface of the water freezes first. The water underneath causes a crack to form in the top as it also freezes and expands. As that water dribbles out and freezes, an upwards spike is formed. Neat!
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Tuesday, December 01, 2009

Lady Washington is a replica of an 18th century merchant sloop, also called Lady Washington. Built in Aberdeen, Washington, she's appeared in "Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl" and "Star Trek Generations." Her crew is accustomed to wintering over in Sacramento, California's sunny weather, but her diesel engine (yup, they don't sail everywhere) no longer meets California's emission standards. So they're stuck in Washington's cold, wet winter hoping to raise money for the $100,000 replacement engine. An anonymous benefactor has already provided 78% of the funds.
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Microsoft spelled out "bing" with their Bellevue City Center building windows over the weekend.
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Monday, November 23, 2009

Can peanuts be grown in Washington state? CB's Nuts is endeavoring to find local sources for Pacific Northwest peanut lovers. The salmonella outbreak and resulting peanut recall made several small food producers realize they were several steps removed from the original source of their peanut ingredients. Some suppliers even refused to reveal where their peanuts were from, citing competitive issues. CB's is working with local researchers and farmers to see if peanuts can become a successful crop here.
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The Obamas' first state dinner takes place on Tuesday and honors India's Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. The secrecy surrounding the event planning can go only so far when a gigantic tent can be seen on the South Lawn of the White House, a guest chef has been brought in, and an estimated 400 guests have received engraved invitations. The Prime Minister's vegetarian diet will certainly inform the menu and Chef Marcus Samuelsson of New York's Aquavit has been invited to join the line led by White House Executive Chef Cristeta Comerford. Details about the china selection, flower arrangements, and other pertinent trappings will be revealed by the First Lady to both the press and twenty girls from her high school mentoring program on Tuesday afternoon. The Obama Foodorama blog has continuing coverage (and the press credentials to help keep it first-hand and accurate).
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Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Kerry Taylor Auctions' next sale on December 8th will include a collection of clothes that belonged to Audrey Hepburn. They are, strictly speaking, hand-me-downs that she gave to her longtime friend Tanja Star Busmann after she was done with them. Also included is the wedding dress made for Hepburn's planned nuptials to James Hanson which she called off. At her request, the dress, created by the Fontana sisters, was given to a "beautiful, poor Italian girl." The bride kept it in a box for her happily married life and it was recently recovered for a Fontana retrospective.
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Take (insane) rally car racer Ken Block's tricked out Subaru WRX STI, replace the tires with snow cat tracks, crank it up to 400 horsepower, and you've got the "ultimate backcountry shred car." It's called the TRAK STI and it was supposedly outed in a YouTube video earlier this year, then was officially announced this month along with the requisite official YouTube video of Block going nuts in the snow.
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Monday, November 09, 2009

Connecticut has reduced the marketing budget for its Commission on Culture and Tourism to $1, down from $4.3 million. Local tourist spots such as the Mark Twain House and the Goodspeed Opera House are looking at increasing their own marketing. The casinos (I still can't believe my home state has 3 huge casinos) have been hit hard as gamblers are putting down less. At the tourism office they'll be depending a lot more on Visit Connecticut! website updates. Maybe they should put that $1 in the nickel slots.
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Chinese mycologist Shu Chun Teng studied at Cornell in the 1920s and, after returning to his native country, "spent the next decade traveling on horseback gathering molds, lichens, yeasts, rusts and morels in the forests, fields and marshes of his homeland." During the Japanese invasion he had his collection smuggled to the United States. He was punished during the Cultural Revolution for his dealings with foreign countries and died in 1970. Last week Teng was honored at a ceremony at the Chinese Academy of Sciences where the President of Cornell University returned the vast collection of fungi to China. Teng's daughter is certain that her father would be happy that it was back home.
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Monday, November 02, 2009

Royal Carribean's The Oasis of the Seas barely fit underneath the Great Belt Fixed Link (a Danish bridge) on its maiden voyage. The ship is five times larger than the Titanic and features telescopic smokestacks that can be lowered for tight situations. As the world's largest cruise ship it has the superlative amenities to match its title for 6,300 passengers. One of the four pools has high-dive platforms. There's a skating rink and a small golf course. A bar in its "Central Park" neighborhood moves between three decks. Built in Finland, it cleared the Great Belt bridge with a half-meter to spare.
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When the Boston Globe set out to expose the splendor of college presidents' homes this past summer, only Wellesley College president Kim Bottomly allowed them access to her house. An often historic campus residence is a perk for many private college presidents. The Globe sought to juxtapose their luxurious accommodations against staff salary freezes, program cuts, and layoffs. They were left to glean what information they could from online real estate sites on house values and observations from staff and students, mostly on the homes' exteriors. President Bottomly was careful to point out that she was merely a custodian of the 1854 house which is frequently used for college events.
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Thursday, October 29, 2009

When I visited the L.A. Times site a few days ago, the Connecticut highway of my childhood was up on the front page. The Merritt Parkway was recently added to the World Monument Fund's watch list and the L.A. Times article discusses the balance between preservation and safety for this beautiful and, yes, old-fashioned highway. It's a charming countryside thoroughfare that doesn't exist in L.A., which I guess is what makes it of interest in a place where you can spend several hours of your day in a smoggy eight-lane freeway.
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A bit of news on Peter Gabriel's next album has surfaced, but it is mostly the same details revealed by John Metcalfe in a blog posting last month. "Scratch My Back" will contain covers, or "reinterpretations" of other artists' songs and those artists will in turn cover Gabriel's songs. Gabriel's covers are acoustic with orchestral and chamber music arrangements.
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Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Coca-Cola is introducing 7.5-fluid ounce mini cans at the end of this year. They're designed to put the calorie count, 90 calories for Coke, front and center on the label. The cans will be sold in eight packs. There will also be mini cans of Sprite, Fanta Orange, Cherry Coca-Cola and Barq’s. Presumably a Diet mini can would be besides the point.
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The Philadelphia Phillies chartered an Amtrak train for their trip to New York to face the Yankees in the World Series. Usually they take a bus up, though they do ride the rails to D.C. for Nationals games.
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Monday, October 26, 2009

U2's 360° Tour set was designed so big as to be invisible. It's not invisible (people have been calling it "the claw"), but it is constructed cleverly to allow for more seating and new attendance records. The L.A. Times has several interactive graphics that demonstrate the stage's conception and construction. Three skeletons of the set were created to allow U2 to play in one city while set up begins in the next. 95,000 people were expected at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, CA last night (the show was streamed on YouTube).
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In a rare interview with the Seattle Times, Stephen Sondheim warms up for his Monday conversation with Frank Rich to be held at Benaroya Hall. Sondheim doesn't mind, in fact he likes, the more recent scaled-down versions of his musicals, including John Doyle's take on 'Sweeney Todd' which had Patti Lupone doubling on tuba. He reveals that 'Sweeney' was intended to be more intimate until Hal Prince insisted on it being a big production. And what about the Tim Burton movie? Sondheim likes it "because Tim made it a film, not a recording of a stage musical."
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