Ok, so I’m sure by the headline a bunch of you think I’m crazy (of course you may have thought that before you read this). Yeah I’m against Amendment 36 (this is the amendment that would split the Colorado Electoral votes for this election) and here’s why. It isn’t right. Let me explain.

Honestly I don’t know how I feel about the Electoral College, although I did read a good bit about it after the 2000 election and from what I remember reading I do think it serves a purpose. Now I don’t like to debate issues that I don’t know a good deal about so let me get to why I’m against amendment 36. Why should Colorado be able to do against the entire country and have our votes be counted differently than everyone else’s? I don’t know much about election law so maybe I’m just totally wrong here, but it seems that the argument for this amendment is that now “my vote will count” since it’s no longer a winner take all system. While that sounds good (to me too) what doesn’t seem right to me is that would mean my vote counts more votes from other states (like Florida). If this were a national ballot item I think I would probably vote for it (or at least have to read a lot about it). Since this is a national election, not a state election, changes should be on the national scale.

End soap box speak 17-B.

Last night we watched Ghandi. Somehow I’d never seen this movie and in some ways I wasn’t looking forward to it. I’m like that, even though I know it’s going to be great, a 3 hour drama isn’t something that gets me excited. Well like all Melanie’s choices it should have. It was amazing. Now that’s nothing new, you’ve probably seen it as it came out in 1982 so it’s not exactly a new release.

The film is wonderfully done, Richard Attenborough (the crazy old coot in Jurasic Park does a wonderful job directing the movie (the lighting is especially dramatic at times). Ben Kingsley does a simply amazing job in his Oscar winning role (for best actor) as Gandhi (the film won 8 awards, Best Actor, Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Best Cinematography, Best Costume Design, Best Director ,Best Film Editing, Best Picture, Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen).

Ok, so you know Gandhi is, but I’m guess (unless you’ve seen the film or from some other way) you don’t realize how incredible he truly was. There are some truly amazing quotes in the file (which I couldn’t find online). It’s also amazing the change the Gandhi was able to impose on India, while never holding any office, rank, title, religious position, elected position, nothing. He was simply a man. But he was so much more than that that an entire nation followed him. The film is truly amazing and honestly the 3 hours just fly right by. If you haven’t seen it I HIGHLY recommend it, it’s definitely one of the best films I’ve ever seen.

So last night for our dinner guests we made Crawfish Monica. However since we are in Colorado and finding good crawfish is almost impossible we used crab (of course I made mine with mushrooms instead). We merged 2 different recipes, one we got from the New Orleans Jazz Festival (where we had it the first time – it’s amazing there) and one we got from Emerils site. It’s basically a cream-tomato based sauce with some Creole seasoning, a ton of cream and butter, and crab (or if you can it crawfish). It’s REALLY bad for you, but hey, you don’t eat it everyday right? So here’s the recipe:

1 lb crawfish tails (or shrimp, crab, lobster, or mushrooms)
3 Tbsp butter (DO NOT use margarine)
1 pint heavy whipping cream
1 bunch of green onions, finely chopped
3 – 10 cloves of garlic finely chopped (we go heavy on this)
1 lb cooked pasta (we use Rotelli)
14 oz of diced tomatoes (the canned kind) blended until smooth
Creole seasoning
3 ounces Parmigiano Reggiano Cheese grated

Cook the pasta in a large pan. Have it read in about 15 minutes.

In a large skillet melt the butter and sauté the onions and garlic for about 3 minutes. Add in the crawfish (or the substitute) and sauté for about 3 more minutes. Add cream and a few pinches of the Creole seasoning (be careful it can get hot fast, taste it after you add then add more to taste) and the tomatoes (make sure they aren’t chunky unless you want them that way). Cook for about 10 minutes over medium low heat until the sauce thickens some. Stir in the cheese for about 1 minute then add the pasta in to the sauce. Let it sit for a few minutes before serving. Serve it with a good white wine and French bread. Bon Appetite!

Last night we had some friends over for dinner and watched Dinner Rush. It’s by director Bob Giraldi who is best know for directing the Michael Jackson video Beat It. It stars Danny Aiello (who I thought was great in Moonstruck) as an aging pseudo-mobster who’s a bookie and a restaurant owner. The restaurant is the focus of the movie, where his son, played by Edoardo Ballerini is the star chef, and one of the best in TriBeCa. The other star of the movie is the food, and boy does it look great!

Although the story line is a bit slow (our dinner guests thought it was too slow) the characters are great and include a slew of people you’ll recognize (like Mike McGlone from The Brothers McMullen and John Corbett from My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Sex and the City, and Northern Exposure). All in all I thought it was very well done, with a smooth story line, great acting, and great direction. It was listed as a dark comedy, which I don’t think it was, it’s more of a dark dramedy (but it’s definitely more of a drama). I would completely recommend it (especially if you’re a foodie at all).

Last night we watched The Day After Tomorrow. It was what you’d expect, a big loud action movie. Even still it really wasn’t all that bad. The underlying story is decent and the acting isn’t that bad either (although not great). Dennis Quaid (who I actually like) wasn’t bad as a climatologist that is predicting a coming ice age. When it turns out he is right he sets out to get to his son, Jake Gyllenhaal (who was just awesome in one of my all time favorite movies October Sky) who is trapped in New York by the impending doom.

That’s the basic story and while it’s not bad it’s very predictable. The movie is by Ronald Emmerich, the same director from another big, loud movie Independence Day. Basically if you like Independence Day you’ll like The Day After Tomorrow. Hard to recommend, but if you want to see it it’s basically what you’d expect.

Well I finally did it, I finally released Jinzora 1.1 today. Rather than rehash everything here you can read the release announcement for yourself. Along with this release I’ve released a new design for the website that I think is much cleaner and more professional looking.

It’s been a long road for this release, and I have to admit I did get into a mode of feature creep where I just kept getting ideas and kept adding things in. I guess that’s how software goes, huh? Please check out the release and let us know in our forums about any issues you find. Enjoy!!!