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The U.S. Food and Drug Administration today launched its pet health and safety widget for consumers as part of an ongoing effort to provide timely, user-friendly, public health information.

We recently switched to iPhones and I have used it long enough now to offer up a review in comparison to what I looked at for alternatives in getting a new cell phone and our experience with our previous cell phones. And now I have purchased a MAC for her and for my father as replacement computers. My workstation at home is "adequate" for now, so I have not gotten one for myself yet, though when I do replace it, it will be a MAC. In this first part I will cover the conversion to the iPhone.

Now here is the thing, it has nothing to do with the operating system. It is the hardware platform. Starting out at the phones, Erica had a Motorola Krazr with a proprietary carrier OS, and I had a Windows mobile Pantech duo. My wife began to have problems with her phone over time, and trying to keep her contacts and calendar synced with Motorola's proprietary software was just horrendous. My phone running Windows mobile just worked. It synced w/o issue using Active Sync. The only issue I had over time was that the phone would reboot itself. Which was tied to a design flaw in the hardware of the Pantech Duo. Basically the sliding of the keyboard would cause it to reboot. It really became annoying. The other downside was I had a proprietary connector, so if I was out somewhere and needed a charge, I was SOL since it didn't have a standard USB mini adapter. Motorola at least had a standard USB mini so chances were always good you could bum a charge off someone.

Over time we have had various iPod incarnations and I had a 1st gen iTouch. I had seen and played with the iPhone a bit from colleagues.

So when we were due for new phones. I looked into all the phone available with our carrier and narrowed it down to either the iPhone or a Windows mobile device. Additionally for the Windows mobile it needed to use a standard USB mini connector, non of that proprietary connector crap. Given our travel, the phone needed to support international travel. If it had Wi-fi, that was a bonus but not a requirement. The iPhone is a proprietary connector, it has enough share such in the music player and phone market, that it really is a "standard".

I was very happy with Windows Mobile software, in that it just worked. My big concern with the iPhone was that Apple's delivery system for it, iTunes, is a piece of crap. It bricked my iTouch on many occasions. And I was not eager to see my phone get bricked and leave me high and dry before a trip the way my iTouch bricked itself just prior to us leaving for our two week road trip. Windows mobile never did that, it synced contacts, calendar and music w/o a issue. The applications on the iPhone/iTouch were compelling, but I could live without it.

In looking at all the phones given the criteria, the iPhone really stood out. I went and checked out all of the Windows mobile devices that fit into the criteria: HTC Fuze, Samsung Propel, LG INCITE and the Nokia E71x. The last device in the list, the Nokia wasn't windows mobile, but the design intrigued me. I went to an AT&T store to try out all the devices. Basically, all the devices, except the iPhone failed. Why? Simple, they were "clunky" and very difficult to use. It felt almost painful with some to use it. And not just in non-phone applications, but the phone applications as well. They were not simple, elegant or easy to use. The best of the pack was the Nokia, however I could not bring myself to like it because it was proprietary operating system. The foremost the feature after usability as a phone, is that had to be dead simple syncing of contacts and calendar items to the phone. Of those phones, the ones that had "touch-screen" capability felt wrong. They felt cheap and like they were not solid devices. Given that all of them were around the same price as an iPhone 3GS 16GB phone, that was not acceptable.

I brought Erica in later in the week to have her try out phones from the list of candidates I put together so we could make sure she got a phone that works for her. Hands down without blinking she picked the iPhone after looking at them all.

We have had the phones for several weeks now and they have been working great. We both love the over the air connectivity of the applications - maps, weather and web browsing mostly. It really makes it easy when you are somewhere without Wi-Fi and can still look something up. The ability to be able to check traffic as you are walking out the door, or look up something is tremendous. My concerns about using it as a phone and music player have been appeased. Despite my issues with the iTunes software, the device itself has worked great. The reason it works, and the iPod works, is that it is just a very natural and intuitive to interact with the device. Anyone can pick it up and within a few minutes get where things are and how to use them. Even as a technologist I struggled to figure out how to use the other phones. Their interfaces were severely lacking in ease of use when stood up next to an iPhone. And these were phones that are supposed to be in the same class and price range as an iPhone.

- Stephen

Address:
     901 West Butler Pike
     Ambler PA 19002
     (215) 643-6300
Web: http://broadaxetavern.com/
Cuisine: American/Modern
Service:
Food: 
Atmosphere:
Cost:
Overall rating:

We went to the newly opened and renovated Broad Axe tavern Friday night for dinner. The outside and the inside have been completely renovated. The interior is nothing like it used to look, it has been completely re-done. The cuisine is what I would call "American modern", it has a slightly upscale bar/restaurant fare with some international influence.

They have a tremendous beer selection, on draft and bottled. They have the standards on tap such as Guinness and Yuengling, part of their "Starting Eight", but they also have a rotation of other beers that called the "Changing Eight". They not only have a selection of wine, and other cocktails (quite a nice list of custom martini's and mojitos), but their focus on beer selection is great. Too few restaurants treat their beer selection as an after thought.

Erica and I split an appetizer of fried calamari which was good. Nothing over the top about it, a pretty standard dish. I had the Grilled Ahi tun and baby bok choy in a dashi broth. Erica had one of the specials, a scallop noodle bowl. For desert Erica had the Tripple chocolate brownie (OK, I had some too :).

The meal was pretty good. The seared tuna I had was well done, and had a nice flavor to it. The bok choy it sat on top of in the dashi broth was a bit bland. There just needed to be something more in the broth to stand out more in comparison to the tuna. I really like bok choy and it can have a great flavor to it. Unfortunately the dashi broth seemed to wash it out.

The service was great from when you walk in, through the entire meal. Our waitress made sure to check up on us regularly, and Eric the host even came by at the end of the meal to see how things went. It was a really nice experience and we look forward to going back there again.

- Stephen

Last night while sitting on my back porch enjoying the thunderstorm, I had a visitor join me. This frog came along on the porch heading towards the back door, or just wanting to get out of the wet weather. I have never seen a frog anywhere near our yard before.

 

You can see more pics on my Facebook album, or my Picasa album.

- Stephen

We spent the 4th of July at my Uncle Jerry's for his birthday and 4th of July party. Quite a lot of family came out from all over on both sides for the festivities. It was a lot of fun meeting some new friends and re-connecting with some family we had not seen in a while.

   
We were introduced to the game of Stump. I can't believe that I have gone this long in my life and not come across this game before! Basically you stand around a stump and take turns attempting to hammer another persons nail into the stump fully. What makes the game hard is that you have to flip the hammer first and catch it before taking your turn and in one fluid motion, without readjusting your grip, you take a swing at one of the nails. (Preferably not your own.) It is actually quite a lot of fun. And of course I managed to find a site dedicated to the game: http://www.worldstump.com/china/chinapics.html.

Pictures from the party can be found in this Picasa album, or on my Facebook album. I kept the sizes large so that they would be printable.

- Stephen

Address:
         237 Saint James Place
         Philadelphia, PA 19106
         (215) 625.8800
Web: http://www.zahavrestaurant.com/
Cuisine:  Israeli/Middle eastern
Service:
Food:
Atmosphere:
Cost:
Overall rating:

Last night we we out to dinner with Wayne and Katherine. This place is the top rated places to eat in Philly and for good reason. Outside the building is pretty non-descript. Inside it is a completely different atmosphere. Everything is open, pretty much in two rooms. From anywhere in the place you have a view of the kitchen working on orders. It is warm and inviting.

Service is tapas style, basically small plates which are meant to be shared and should be. The recomended starter and speciality for the table is the Salatim & Hummus with Laffa. The Salatim is a selection of different dishes from chick peas to beats enjoyed with or without the laffa. Their hummus was some of the best I have ever had. As we went through and placed our orders, our waiter Eric asked us if we were sure we had not been there before. He said we were hitting all the best plates in our ordering.

I spotted the Jerusalem Grill, which was a mixed offal - "all the good stuff". I wasn't sure what it waas, but I from the vague description, I had a pretty good guess. Eric confirmed that it was heart, liver and testes from different animals. Mainly duck and lamb. I rouned my order out with Kibbe Naya (raw ground lamb) and The Jaffa (Branzino - a whitefish). Fried cauliflower, stuffed baby peppers, The Read Sea (seared tuna) The Turk (ground beef), The Farsi (lamb), The Galil (eggplant) and Fried Kibbe.

Nothing I had disappointed. The Jerusalem Grill was tremendous. It came with a side of a mustard like sauce, more sweet then spicy and laffa. The spice was only needed as an accent as the heart, liver and testes were extremely tasty on their own. I had not had raw lamb before, but it had a great flavor and texture to it, again the spices not overwhelming and letting the food stand on its own. Everyone really enjoyed their food and a good bit of sharing. The only off-note was in the Turk which Erica ordered. It was just too much spice for here and she felt was overwhelming. Not from a heat perspective, but just being too much seasoning.

For a drink, I tried their "Tel Aviv Black & Tan" which was a half and half of Goldstar Larger and Malt. I followed it up with just the Goldstar Malt as the meal progressed. Overall both were OK. There were good beers, but didn't really blow me away. They just seemed to be good middle of the road beer.

We finished up the meal with desrt. Erica and Wayne got the Roasted peach which was a cashew baklava, a peach and white chocolate panna cotta. Katherine tried their drink "The new milk and honey", which I had a taste of. It was really good, not overly sweet and I am sure could knock you back without realizing it. I had the Konafi which has a shredded, crunchy phyllo dough on top of ricotta, rose water and pstachios. It was deliciously sweet.

It was a great night overall and I look forward to going back there.

- Stephen

Today we started off by visiting Erica's grandfather in the morning. And then we  met up with my parents, Thomas, Veronica, Miquel and Nina at Oreland Pizza for lunch. From there we headed down to the Philly zoo for the afternoon.


The morning was overcast and rainy, but by the time we hit the zoo it was warm and sunny. As it turns out, they were also taping an episode of "Dinner Impossible" with Robert Irvine at the zoo. They were doing a dinner for local armed forces, police and fireman at the zoo.


We came across where they were filming and hung out for a while watching what they were doing. It was pretty interesting to see that what you see from Chef Irvine on the show was actually going on in person. We managed to get some good shots of him in action.

The menu apparently was inspired by different animal groups - reptiles, primates, big cats, and birds. And apparently on the menu under reptiles were chocolate covered crickets!

Everyone had a great time at the zoo. Afterwards we headed up to Giuseppi's near Oreland for dinner before everyone headed home.

More pictures can be found on Facebook, or my Picasa page.

- Stephen

This site is wonderful! http://awkwardfamilyphotos.com

It has a lot of gems like this:

The garage renovation, making our garage and basement one large room is really moving along. The new support beam is in and the walls are down. They have started digging to pour the footer where the garage door is.

It is really amazing the difference in the space, compare then:



To now:





 - Stephen

I was updating my AFI Top 100 movie checklist which Erica and I have been slowly working through, and I only have 3 more movies left in the list! I only have "The African Queen", "The Apartment", and "Swing Time" left to watch. I have seen bits and pieces of African Queen, but not the whole thing all the way through. Unfortunately, African Queen is not out on DVD - at least Netflix doesn't have it. So finishing off the complete list may take a while.

Working through the Top 100 list has been interesting and has broadened my horizons a bit. I have learned that I just don't get the Marx Brothers. I tried, with no less then 3 of their movies, and I just don't find them funny. Sure they have a few funny zingers - but not worth sitting through an entire movie. Usually I can at least find bad comedy's somewhat funny, but through the majorit of their movies I did not even crack a smile.

The list has put me in front of a lot of movies I would not have considered, mainly a lot of the older movies from the 20's, 30's, 40's and 50's. We like to think of the 1950's and before as simpler times, or as times of innocence and not having to deal with quite frankly adult topics. Such as in "On the Waterfront", "The Best Years of our Lives" or "Sunrise". "Sunrise" is dealing with a husband unfaithful to his wife and planning the murder of his wife to go away back to the city with his mistress. There were a lot of movies through all of the decades up to the present that I found I really enjoyed.

Even though movie technology is not what it is today, a number of the very early movies like "Modern Times" and "Sunrise" hold up from a cinematic perspective today. They beat out most of the "B" movies made today. I did not consider all of the movies on the list 5 out of 5 stars. There were a number that were, and most were either 3 1/2, or 4 stars. But a few such as "Nashville" and the Marx Brothers movies which I don't think should be on the list. I could understand one of the Marx Brothers movies being on the list, as these movies are not all on the list because of story and acting, but also because of cinemetography, technology or just as a representative piece of the period or commentary on the time period.

I would say that if you regularly avoid differnt movies because of what you think they are, stop and give them a second look. The AFI Top 100 list is a really good list to start with. You will be suprised at what you find may be your new favorite movie!

- Stephen