Life is good

Random notes from a ridiculously productive but very pleasant weekend:

• Got the Christmas shopping done. As in, completely. Carrie and I feel very smug about that, thanks.
  
  
• Got a few hours of work put in for the office. Mostly just organizing what has to be accomplished in the next three weeks... I have become a big booster of outlines, lists, and flowcharts, which help me get myself (and others) organized way more than any project management software I've ever used.
  
  
• Took some leftover brisket and a sack of pinto beans and some Pomi tomatoes and so forth and cooked up a big pot of chili, to be portioned out and frozen. Love the thriftiness of cooking with leftovers, but what we really love is the quick, effortless home-cooked midweek meal that just needs thawing and heating.
  
  
• Restaurant notes: Carrie and I had the six-course tasting menu at Fleur de Sel last night, with wine pairings, including (with the cheese course) an aggressively spicy Gewürztraminer that, happily, I will *not* have to go to the ends of the earth to track down... the very fine and friendly Moore Bros. Wine Shop near our neighborhood knows all.
  
  And tonight, I'm meeting some old friends from the dotcom days for dinner at a favorite tapas place. Unlike the old days, there won't be an expense account to cover our bill... but even if we are paying for meals ourselves these days, we are also older and wiser... much.
  
  I hope.
  
  
• Finally, it's time to put an old workhorse out to pasture... our Compaq PC, which has done yeoman's service as our main home machine for four years now, has been boot-and-nuked and reinstalled with Ubuntu Linux.
  
  It is soon to find a good home somewhere as a perfectly serviceable Internet machine.
  
  And later this morning, I'm off to pick up one of these to replace it, adhering to my earlier pledge to eschew all things Vista and replace all the home PCs with Macs as they aged out of usefulness.