Category: Weblog

I had heard much of a hullabaloo in Twitter about Joss Whedon’s new show, Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along-Blog during the week. Yesterday, I bought the show on iTunes and sat down to watch all three acts. Thanks to the Apple TV, I was able to watch on a nice television set, rather than in front of a computer.
The show was fantastic. I can only hope for a series. I suggest you buy it on iTunes immediately.
Spoiler Warning: If you are a complete spoiler queen and get all worked up about minor plot points that are obvious, then stop reading. Otherwise, I will continue to discuss part of the show that doesn’t impact your enjoyment in any bit.
Of course, the most intriguing moment is the obvious teaser at the end, revealing of the Evil League of Evil about to begin a meeting.

Here is the clearest shot we have of the assembled Evil League of Evil.
From the end credits, we are given the roster:

Professor Normal
Fake Thomas Jefferson
Tie-Die
Dead Bowie
Fury Leika
Snake Bite
Bad Horse
Dr. Horrible
Now, I carefully grabbed screen shots of each character and made my best guess as to match the name with the face. The face of evil! Muah-ha-ha-ha!
First, with the most obvious matches…

Quite clearly, Bad Horse, leader of the Evil League of Evil. I don’t put it past Joss Whedon to not have the actual horse be Bad Horse, but I think this is a safe assumption.

This is Dr. Horrible, now in his red costume and actually wearing his goggles.

Next, another safe assumption that this is Fake Thomas Jefferson. In other shots, he is shown holding a quill, further reinforcing the link to Fake Thomas Jefferson.

Slightly bit riskier is assuming that this is Dead Bowie. The general 70s look and makeup kinda gives this one away.

On the right side, in multi-colored garb, is who I believe to be Tie-Die. There are only a few frames of Tie-Die, but I believe the costume and the peace symbol necklace establish this conclusion firmly.

In this shot, I assume that on the left is Professor Normal. Mainly because he’s the most professorial looking one at the table. To his right is Dead Bowie. Interestingly, the feet on the table are NOT those of Dead Bowie.

In this wide shot, we see entire Evil League of Evil. Between Professor Normal and Dead Bowie, owner of the feet on the table, shown above is Fury Leika. I believe it is Fury Leika due to the Viking-esque look, battle staff, and angry look.

This leaves only one person left, who we can assume to be Snake Bite. Not a lot to go on here. She doesn’t really match up with any other name and she does look like she’s more into nature by virture of holding a bouquet of flowers. Nothing snake or bite like in any shot to confirm this. Maybe she’s got fangs we can’t see.

One more wide shot of the group, with Tie-Die cut off on the right.

With this rationale, I give you my best guess as to who is who in the Evil League of Evil.
What do you think?
Update:
Based on comments by Jeff Donaldson and Eeyore, I think I may have reversed Fury Leika and Snake Bite.

The point being made is that the woman in white with a bouquet, could be a woman scorned at the altar. And we all know that “Hell hath no Fury like a woman scorned.” I can see the idea of a ‘Cobra Cowl’ on the woman with a staff. So she could very well be Snake Bite.
I guess we won’t know for sure, until Joss wants us to know for sure…

Last Friday was my daughter Mira’s birthday, so my wife reserved us a suite at the Disneyland Hotel for the celebration. We got lucky, and they upgraded us to the Pirates Suite. Not the Dream Suite, but pretty damn cool. I was completely blown away by the room.
For a couple years, I’ve been making videos of my hotel rooms, so this was no different. Here’s a short video of the suite.

There are a bunch of pictures of the Suite in this Flickr Set.
Of course, we had a great time inside Disneyland. Here are two videos of us riding the Matterhorn. Do you hear enough little girls squeals for your yearly quota?

Matterhorn Ride 1 at Disneyland from Michael Pusateri on Vimeo.

Matterhorn Ride 2 at Disneyland from Michael Pusateri on Vimeo.

Earlier this year, I wrote about Mint Crisp M&Ms. Now there are Mint Chocolate M&Ms Premium.

Michele and I were at target when I spied this. Obviously, I picked it up.

Inside the curvy box is a bag of the M&M Premiums. The bag is nice because it is reclosable. More bags of candies should have this feature.

The candies themselves have a sparkly exterior. Inside the candy is mainly white mint with a thin layer of chocolate. Unlike a regular M&M, the shell is not crispy candy. The shell is just decoration. If heated, I’m sure that these M&Ms would melt in your hand.
The taste is good. Mainly mint with a little chocolate. The striking thing is the lack of candy shell that you find on the regular M&Ms. It definitely feels like something is missing when the M&Ms is so smooth.
Well worth the money, these Premium M&Ms are tasty. I would like a version with a shell, but it won’t stop me from eating these.

After a few weeks of many meetings, I have drawn this conclusion based on empirical results.

(Obviously inspired by Indexed)

Update: I learned of an amazing site -> https://www.catsthatlooklikehitler.com. I checked and dogsthatlooklikehitler.com is taken, but only used as a placeholder.

In the lobby of building I work in, there is a Starbucks Coffee. Earlier this week, I noticed a new item in the refrigerator.

Yes, it looks like a Doubleshot in a Monster sized can. With a bunch of ‘energy’ ingredients tossed in. Of course, I bought it and brought it home.

The drink is chock full of all kinds of stuff.
2000 mg maltodextrin – Maltodextrin is a type of sugar that digests slowly for a longer release into the bloodstream, meaning providing more energy over time
1800 mg taurine –
450mg of L-Carnitine – L-Carnitine hepls convert food into energy
180mg of Inositol – more commonly know as vitamin B8
325mg of Panax Ginseng – Ginseng is used widely in Asia as an energy booster
90mg of Guarana – the Brazilian seed packed with more caffeine than coffee beans
Also, vitamins B6 and B12 are thrown in as well to round out the B-complex.
The can is the equivalent of roughly 225 mg of caffiene.

I popped the can open and poured it out. The drink had the familiar mocha color. The can I picked up was Vanilla flavored. It was the only flavor they had.
After a big swig, I was happy to find that it didn’t have the bitterness I usually find in energy drinks. But it didn’t actually taste like coffee at all. It tasted like a melted vanilla shake. The sweetness wasn’t overpowering and you got the subtle mouthfeel of some milk, but overall it was fairly watery. It reminded me of the Java Monster I tried a while ago.
I hope the coffee flavor tastes more like coffee.
Realistically, even if I did like the coffee, I probably wouldn’t drink a can of this. There’s just too much caffeine for me. When I drink coffee, I rarely drink more than half a cup, meaning ~30 mg of caffeine. That’s enough to rev me up a bit. If I drank 225 mg of caffeine, I’d probably spend an hour in the bathroom and then not sleep for a couple days. I have friends that could probably drink one of these as a nightcap as they hopped into bed, but my tolerance is nowhere near theirs.

Due to interest, I looked deeper into the Cakesters from Nabisco.
I expected that nutritionally, both Nilla and Oreo flavors would be the same. When I took a look, I found a little difference.

I was surprised to see that the Oreo flavor had more calories than the Nilla flavor. 10 calories more per cake than the Nilla. After reviewing the ingredient, it must be the chocolate that’s in the Oreo Cakesters.

Someone mentioned about remixing the Nilla with the Oreo into a new Cakester. After sharpening my chef’s knife, I started to slice the Cakesters.

Due to my extreme cooking skills I was able to remix the Cakesters as you see. Unfortunately, it do not significantly improve the flavor. They were still soft and sweet, but nothing special.
The Cakesters are still selling 3 packages for $2 at Walgreens, making them exceeding cheap as experimental objects. Any other ideas?

Cakester is not a new social community site for cupcake lovers.
Cakesters is a new kind junk food from Nabisco that tries to combine famous cookies with snack cakes.

Nilla Wafers and Oreo Cookies are some of the most iconic and classic cookies on the market. The Oreo Cookie has been around for almost one hundred years. Nilla Wafers are not quite as old, having originated in the 60s.

The cakesters look like little sandwiches. They are soft to the touch and about the size of a regular Oreo cookie.

The filling is creamy, quite a bit different than the traditional Oreo filling. The filling doesn’t taste bad, it just doesn’t taste like Oreo ‘stuff’.
The cakesters are chocolaty and vanillay and pretty good. But they don’t make the cookies they are based on. They taste like generic cupcakes in a new form. Oreos have a specific slightly sweet flavor instead of the cloyingly sweet flavor of the cakesters. Nilla Wafers have that thin, crisp layer of flavor on the top of the cookie which is completely missing in the cakester.
Overall, the cakesters are pretty good as junk food. They are soft and moist, and you get three good sized cakesters in a package. But if you are a cookie purist, stay away.

Recently I went on a four day rafting trip. Before I went, I made some beef jerky. Here’s how I did it.
My method is based on my father’s method, as I was taught as a boy.
We start with a few pounds of flank steak.

Flank steak is a long cut. I cut with the grain as thin as I can, a little less than 1/4 inch thick. I cut about 3 pounds of beef.

I gathered up all the ingredients.
1 1/2 cup Soy Sauce
1/2 cup Worcestershire Sauce
1 cup light brown sugar
2 teaspoons liquid smoke
1/2 teaspoon garlic salt
1 teaspoon onion powder
I actually smoke the jerky, but if you aren’t going to smoke it, you can add 2 teaspoons of liquid smoke.

Once the marinade is mixed up and the beef is cut, you’ll need a container to soak it in.

I soak the beef at least overnight. The salt in the sauces will cure the meat to help preserve it as well as let the flavor get deep into the meat.

The next day, I set up my smoker and laid out the strips.

After about 6 hours, the jerky was ready. It depends how dry you like your jerky. I tend to like is a little dryer.

When you fully dry out the meat, you have basically preserved for a good long time. It’s interesting to think that preserving meat like this was an essential task our ancestors used before the invention of refrigeration.