Friday, November 7, 2008

Vacation Day!


Home Made Whole Wheat sandwich loaf., originally uploaded by Thomas Lester.

Life has become very busy. I haven't had time to blog much lately. I need to find time to blog more. It does my soul good. I have the day off today, so I'm going to write a personal "catch up" entry.

Being back at Sun Microsystems has been great. It feels like home. I have a lot on my plate, which is good. I'm the tools lead and architect for change and release management tools. I love it. Now, if the economy can just get out of the crapper, we'll be good to go.

On another note, Joe Stupp - CEO of Chipotle has appointed me and my good friend Jonathan the official "Master Burrito Ambassadors" for Jacksonville, FL. Ha! Jonathan also won a year of free Chipotle Burritos. He's one of the luckiest people I know. He's always winning stuff.

So, what's up with the sandwich. I'm learning how to make home made bread. This was my first successful whole wheat sandwich loaf. Looks pretty yummy, eh? It was! Actually... it was as good as any bread you can find in the store. I was impressed. All natural, too. And no.... there were no "bread machines" used. This was all from scratch and by hand (it was kneaded in my stand mixer, though). The chicken was leftover from a whole chicken that i grilled. We are trying to cook more from scratch. We want our kids to know how to cook. We want them to understand that good food doesn't have to come from a box or can! I think cooking from scratch is becoming a lost art.

Speaking of cooking... inspired by Jonathan, I got an electric smoker for my birthday. Looks like a small mini-refrigerator. So, I'm learning how to smoke food. So far I've done spare ribs, and last night did some chicken. The ribs were a learning experience. The rub was less than desirable and kind of messed up the taste. The chicken that I did last night was very good. This weekend, I'm either going to do a pork shoulder roast or a brisket.

There... I forced myself to make a blog entry. Now, maybe I'll start posting regularly again.