Thursday, October 14, 2004
Oatmeal with brown sugar and pumpkin pie spice. Shopped for new servers, prepared for server migration. Lunch: leftovers from yesterday, tortilla chips. Met with Cindy. Computer Support Committee meeting where they covered a lot of security issues. Made adjustments to a PowerPoint presentation. Got the filesize down from 47 MB to 1.5 MB by removing all the images, saving them as JPEG, and replacing them back into the presentation. Met with Rodney briefly to see about some student data he needed. Handed off account info for Linda C. Created an account for Rodney in the student database. Dinner at Four Season (415-861-2682, 708 14th Street). We had The Mandarin meal for 2: fried shimp, sizzling rice soup, Mongolian beef, garlic chicken, steamed rice, hot tea. The beef dish didn't taste right—the flavor of the sauce wasn't quite right. The shrimp chips that came on the beef plate tasted awful—as though they were fried in rancid oil. We were too lazy to complain and just ate the rest of the food. Throughout the meal we had to swat away or kill fruit flies that hovered in the dining area. We were the only people in the dining room, and I guess our waiter overheard my complaints to Patrick about the meal because when the meal ended he told us next time we could ask for a dish to be exchanged if we didn't like it. You know, they just shouldn't've served us bad food in the first place. You know someone in the kitchen didn't want to pour out a large batch of oil that had been in use for awhile. The rest of the food we ate was good, but it will be a long time before Patrick convinces me to eat here again. Patrick likes that they all spoke Mandarin. They don't take Amex. Patrick's fortune: Don't let unexpected situations "throw" you. My fortune: He likes to flirt, but toward you his intentions are honorable.