Nite-nite: Gary Coleman 1968-2010

...and the Diff'rent Strokes curse continues. First, Dana Plato dies in a trailor in Vegas, now Arnold.

Gary Coleman, who played Arnold on Diff'rent Stokes in the 80's, died today in Utah at 42. He suffered a brain hemorrhage on Wednesday at his home.

His shortlived success, led to years of money and legal problems. It all started in 1989 when he sued his parents for inappropriately handling his money. He then filed bankruptcy in 1999. He's also been arrested for assault, disorderly conduct, and domestic violence.

The poor guy never really seemed to find happiness. At least now he's found peace.

So that's two of the three kids from Diff'rent Strokes. Todd Bridges, you should count your blessings.

...meanwhile Conrad Bain (who played Philip Drummond) is goin' strong at 87.

Watch this movie!

One of the things I enjoy about my morning commute (ok, the only thing I enjoy about my morning commute) is flipping between my 90's country and Rosie Radio on XM/Sirius satellite radio. Yes, Rosie Radio as in Rosie O'Donnell. Love her or hate her, she has a lot of thought provoking guests on her show.

This morning she had the makers of the documentary Food, Inc. It is a movie about the food industry, the governments involvement, and the damage we are doing to our bodies with the over processed meats and vegetables that we eat.

I haven't watched it yet. We plan to watch it tomorrow night (it's on Netflix Watch Instantly!) but I'm sure it will disturb me and make my already complicated relationship with food, pretty much impossible. Oh well.

Here's the trailer:

Giants Brewfest next weekend

Do you like beer? Do you love the Giants? Actually, if you like the Giants and love beer, check out:

(click on the picture for the link)

Play Pac-Man on Google.com homepage!

If you go to the google homepage today (which I rarely do as my best friend works for Yahoo!), you will find their logo in the Pac-man game screen!

Clever, cute, fun, and addicting. So, if you want to kill some time on your Friday, hit up google.com and play a little. Then, go back to Yahoo! cause it's better. :)

PS - Thanks Dyann for the heads up!

New software

It occurred to me when watching some of the SeaWorld video from last month, that a lot of that could have been sliced up and put into one, much more interesting, video package. So, I decided to buy some video editing software. It's pretty cool. I have no idea what I'm doing but, my best friend, Christian says he can give me a tutorial.

This is my first attempt at using the software...I can use all the help I can get.

A new place to spend SF summer nights

For the last few months, we have been obsessed with frozen yogurt. It started when we were visiting the fam in LA. Although late to the game, we discovered the concept of self-serve yogurt and fell in love. Now that we're eating healthy, it is our reward for a good run, or an intense spin class.

We have found a few in the city that we like. TuttiMelon is really good. They have shops in the Marina, North Beach, SOMA, Sunset, and a few others I think. Most of them are self-serve, which is definitely a requirement for us. They all have anywhere from four to six flavors and an abundance of toppings.

This month, the Safeway shopping center at 16th and Potrero opened a new froyo shop: Nubi Yogurt. This is now the place to get froyo in the city (in my opinion). They have over fourteen flavors to choose from including cheesecake, several fruit flavors, and my favorite: Red Velvet Cake. They always have tons of fresh toppings and are situated right above 24 Hour fitness. How perfect is that? Now our reward is instant :)

So, if you are in the area, check them out. You might see Tommy and I shoveling a spoonful of Red Velvet Cake in our faces. Don't judge us, we earned it, remember? ;)

4 & 1/2 Rebas. They just need to add Cookies'N'Cream to their flavors and Pink&White animal cookies to their topping selections and they will earn the other half of Mrs. McEntire.

Review: Village California Bistro

Every year for my mom's birthday and Mother's Day, I try to find somewhere different to take her. Something other than our usual Chevy's, Elephant Bar, Stacks, etc that we go to through the year. For the past couple of years that I've been living in San Francisco, I've brought her up to SF since there are about four hundred more quality restaurants in the city vs the south bay.

This year, I decided to give San Jose another shot. Why make mom drive two hours on Mother's Day, right? Now, if you are used to San Francisco restaurants, bars, shops, etc and must eat and shop in San Jose, where is the one place you would go? Yup, Santana Row.

My first choice was to have brunch at Citrus, the restaurant on the 3rd floor of the Hotel Valencia (...which is actually the 1st floor? Weird) but they told me they weren't having any kind of brunch. They said we could order room service and sit outside with it if we wanted. What?? No.

So I called the Village California Bistro. They were fairly booked (I of course waited until the Monday before Mother's Day...in my defense I was on vacation) but were able to grant us a reservation for three (my mom, Tommy, and myself) at 2pm. A little later than I'd have liked, but ok.

We got there at about 1:45p and it was bustling. The entrance is a little awkward because you walk into the back of the host station. So, you are greeted by the backs of the host staff...strange. Anyway, they are no doubt used to this as they quickly turned around, greeted us, and asked if we had a reservation. We were concerned that there would be a delay since they had cleared some of the patio seating due to the weather (thanks "mother" nature) but we were seated right away.

Within one minute, our waiter appeared, greeted us, and wished my mother a happy Mother's Day. Points right off the bat. We wasted no time hitting the buffet. Anything and everything you could imagine. Pasta, breakfast items, seafood, dessert, everything! We filled our plates with such great items as chicken piccata, salmon, bacon, ham and cheese croissant sandwiches, oysters, prime rib...I could go on...but it's making me hungry. The food was delicious.

It has been my experience that we subconsciously lower our expectations when it comes to buffet food. For instance, Tommy and I just got back from a cruise. The food was good, not great, but good. We seem to cut the cooks some slack when they are cooking the same items for that many people. I have to say, each item that I tasted could have been presented as a menu item and I would have been thoroughly impressed. The quality was excellent.

We made quite a few trips back up to the buffet, and each time our dirty plates were cleared promptly. I had to ask for refills a couple of times but the staff was quick to return with one. The desserts were also delicious. A little more on the "mass produced" side than the main course items but that didn't stop me from shoving them in my face.

The buffet ended at 3pm and they started to casually, slowly, break things down a little early. They never made us feel rushed, but when I got up to get yet another desert, I heard them turning people away at 2:30pm.

The buffet was just under $40 per person. Not a bad price for a Mother's Day buffet and, when you consider the quality of food, it's a pretty good deal. What bugged me is that they charged us for coffee and soda. Soda, I understand a little more, but coffee?!?! You are going to charge nearly $40 and include oysters in your buffet but charge me $2 for coffee? That was a little petty in my opinion. It didn't tarnish the experience though. A good time had by all. Most importantly, my Ma.

A well deserved 4 Rebas for Village California Bistro. We just may add it to the Chevy's, Elephant Bar, Stacks rotation.

SeaWorld San Diego!

After our 5 day cruise to Mexico, we spent a few days in beatiful San Diego. We spent one full day at SeaWorld. I had never been! It's a great park. We went on a couple of fun rides and saw some fun shows.

Although I've never been to SeaWorld, I used to love going to the original Marine World Africa, USA in Redwood City (NOT to be confused with the new mega-amusement park in Vallejo). I always loved the Killer Whale and Dolphin show. Below are a couple of videos that Tommy took at the Killer Whale show. They are pretty amazing animals!

0:15, 0:34, and 0:58 are nice shots in this vid:



Check out 0:12 and 0:36 on this one


You can check out more vids from the Killer Whale show on my YouTube page

Another anti-gay "Christian" leader caught with gay hooker

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