renee and elliott

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Val shaves her head to celebrate the Big 6-oh.

Our dear friend Val is celebrating her 60th birthday. To mark this milestone, she decided to have her head shaved. Val invited all of us over to watch the shearing of her color-treated locks. Now she can start fresh and let the natural beauty of her hair come through, no matter what color it may be.

Val has always been a remarkable lady, but in the past few years, she has embraced change and transformation, all of it for the better.

The yoga bug bit her hard a few years ago, and now she is a registered yoga teacher with her own yoga studio.

We wish you many more happy birthdays Val. You are a woman of exceptional character. Our lives are enriched by your friendship.

I love a good all-beef hot dog with all the fixings. It’s another reason I’m only a part-time vegetarian.

I took my bike on the bus to run an errand yesterday, so I had a chance to do some exploration. I found a little hot dog stand on the side of the road. This isn’t just any hot dog stand. It’s a real New York hot dog stand. I am not kidding.

There are many ex-New Yorkers here in South Florida. It seems like New Yorkers know more people here from New York than they knew when they lived in New York.

The Rangers Suck!

I hate going to Panthers-Rangers games. Half the crowd is cheering for the wrong team! I’ve seen the Panthers play against the Devils, Islanders, and Sabres, but the Rangers seem to draw the most and the worst from the Empire State. I have nothing against New York or its inhabitants, but I paid money to see a PANTHERS game!

Real New York Food?

Ever watch two New Yorkers meet for the first time? They start talking about that deli on 72nd and Broadway. Then they reminisce about the pizza and the Chinese takeout. “The pizza sucks down here. I don’t eat pizza anymore. That place Mauro’s on the corner? They suck!” If you miss the food so damn much, then go back!

You can go back to New York just by heading over to 6401 Sheridan Street in Hollywood Florida. That’s where New York transplant Elliot has set up his hot dog stand and tent. He serves up real all-beef New York hot dogs, pastrami, brisket, and knishes! Is it authentic New York food? Yes it is. Elliot has all the stuff shipped from New York. The all-beef hot dogs with the natural casings are hand-made. You get that satisfying crunch when you bite into them.

I stayed and chatted with Elliot for a while. He saw the Nikon D80 around my neck, so we chatted it up for a while. He’s a photography buff too.

During the time we chatted, 3 ex-New Yorkers came by to order some dogs. One woman was vocally skeptical until she took the first bite. “Give me another one!” she exclaimed. “This is it! This is the real deal!”

It’s the Water

Elliot went on to explain that it isn’t the water. The word on the street is that New York’s water supply is the magic ingredient that’s missing here in South Florida. Most restaurants use reverse osmosis filtration systems to cook with and to provide water for the soda machines. It’s part of the insane overhead a restaurant has. Go ahead and order the “tap” water when you go out to eat. It’s essentially the same as that bottle of Dasani you pay $2.25 for!

Elliot insists that it’s the quality of the ingredients and the level of service that distinguishes New York food from the South Florida wannabes. He further explained that the food in New York is so good because, if it wasn’t, the people would riot. New Yorkers demand the best.

New York Pizza in Florida?

Before I left, Elliot endorsed another South Florida restaurant. “I went to Angelo’s Corner down in Hollywood. I took one bite and I was like, ‘where am I?!?!’ I live by Sawgrass Mills. At $4.25 a gallon, I drove all the way to Hollywood Beach just to have a slice. The gas costs more than the pizza!”

I’m not an expert on New York pizza, but I do know Angelo’s makes a good pie. Renee and I order the large pie with fresh basil, fresh garlic, and black olives. We save on gas because there’s another Angelo’s within walking distance.

The next time you have friends visiting from New York, take them down to Coney Island Joe’s.

Coney Island Joe’s is open daily from 11am - 7pm and accessible by BCT Routes 12 and 18.

My name is Elliott Kim and I approve this message. I was not compensated for this review.

Gas prices have caused many people to consider public transit. I started riding the bus long before gas was even $3.00 a gallon. I detailed my experiences here a few months ago and wrote about teaching teens how to use public transit on 21st Century Dad. These articles were intended for a general audience, but now I have some specific tips to share for people here in Broward County.

Read the rest of this entry »

Gladiators enjoy modern luxuries like cigarettes and cell phones.

I have no clue who these people are.

One of the most recognizable buildings ever.

A view from the Ponte Vecchio (Old Bridge) in Firenze, Italia.

I have no clue who these people are either. If you haven’t tried taking photos of strangers, it’s a lot of fun.

I don’t even remember how I found this site. I was sure to Stumble it, so others can waste time online just like me!

To offset that time wasted, you can become more productive in another area of your life. Why not use the PocketMod to get more organized and stay on top of things? Any product with a calendar and to-do list built in will surely make your life so much easier.

Basically, you fold and cut a sheet of letter size paper to make a handy booklet you can customize and keep in your pocket.

The Flash player application allows you to make your own Pocket Mod booklet. There are several useful pages that you can drag and drop like to do lists, calendars, conversion tables, and tipping calculators.

A savvy graphic designer can surely reverse engineer this and create totally custom booklets this way.

Renee and Elliott are tech-savvy, but they recognize when low-tech still gets the job done.

Reason number 437 Renee and I use Macs.

In the early days of the web, we had hit counters. Today, we have Google Analytics. The depth of the data is incredible. You can see the number of visitors to your site, how many pages they looked at, and if you have a webcam hooked up, we get to watch you. I want to address the guy with the tacky wallpaper in the den:

Please! Call an interior designer ASAP and get that taken care of!

You can see what keywords people queried into search engines to land on your site. One visitor from Scotland queried “Are Elliott and Renee in love?”

The only correct answer is YES!

~e

This video, “Web 2.0… The Machine is Us/ing Us,” about How Web 2.0 connects people, was created by Michael Wesch, an anthropology professor at Kansas State.

I know many of you are curious about blogging. How are we making money doing this? If we’re making money at it, it must be difficult and complicated, right? We all know the real reason Renee and Elliott rock is because Elliott is Asian and Asians are good on the computer. Actually, in the process of becoming “whitewashed,” his computer skills are handicapped. He needs a no-hassle user-friendly computer like a Mac to do anything.

Yaro Starak just launched a new site aimed at beginners and those who are not tech-savvy. The new site is called “Become a Blogger.”

Like almost every blog out there, this site is completely free. You don’t even have to sign up for an email newsletter. The video tutorials are professionally produced, easy to understand and very informative. Here’s a sneak-peek at what you’ll learn:

1. Why You Should Use WordPress
2. How To Get Your Own Domain Name
3. How To Get A Web Host
4. How To Install WordPress With One Click
5. How To Upload Files To Your Webhost Using FTP
6. Choosing A WordPress Theme For Your New Blog
7. How To Install And Use WordPress Plugins
8. How To Create Your First Blog Post And Blog Page
9. What RSS Is And Why You Need It
10. How To Use Feedburner For Supercharging Your RSS Capabilities

We’ve been doing this for a little while now, but the External Resources page still has a few gems for us. Our friends ask us about blogging all the time. Take a peek at Become a Blogger sometime soon.

Further Reading and Related Posts:

1. What is a Blog and How To Make Money Blogging
2. A Few Good Bloggers
3. Essential Skills for Blogging
4. A Digital Literacy Guide (free ebook)