Here's an article on the possibility of micropayments (the ability to charge a very small amount for web content.) This idea has been around for a long time, but hasn't ever caught on (for some technical, and maybe other reasons.) Now it looks like it might be almost ready for real use. Would this be a good thing? Or is it better for the web that people write things just because they want to? (from hack the planet, but now I see that Kottke is talking about this, and I guess it's hot on metafilter too. What comes around...)

I don't usually like to get cc's of joke mail, but I did get a funny one relating to the latest virus (which I've already received about twenty copies of, at work).
It's the Voluntary Compliance Virus: "please erase your hard drive, then send this message to everyone you know. Thank you for your cooperation."

foreward from gore vidals 1991 book about hl mencken.

How about this new sport (?): geocache. Thanks to the improved Global Positioning System (GPS) information now available to people without security clearances, all sorts of new opportunities have been opened up. Like this crazy sport (again: ?) where people hide caches of "stuff" around the planet (often in pretty out of the way, hard to get to places) and then players try to find the stuff. Not really a sport I guess, but sort of interesting. Somebody stop me if you hear I'm getting into this. From the site

"Geocaches are already located in many locations around the world. Many thanks go out to the geocachers that have placed geocaches. It's just as challenging to create a good geocache as it is to find one. If you find a good geocache and you enjoyed the adventure of the journey to find it, be sure to thank the geocacher by writing your comments in the logbook or sending them an email. Geocaching can be a fun and rewarding new sport that welcomes us to the 21st century with many new adventures."

Welcome to Mark, new author of roll your own one lap (although possibly that's not really the title.) I'm not exactly sure what this is going to be, but he comes with high recommendations. Not sure if he is reading this page, but feel free to introduce yourself Mark, if you want. Or not. Either way we'll check out what you are doing, which isn't too clear to me at this point, but I believe it involves some love of auto racing, combined with a (chronical of a?) sabbatical from the wild world of information technology. This may or may not become the future home of his page, so make real nice, and maybe we can add another to our strange little world.

this is kind of interesting, the presidential aircraft gallery at the usaf museum.

6/18/00 We had dinner at Surya a high-end Indian and Indian influenced cuisine. I think the group of seven all found it very tasty and some dishes were super yummy (a sprouted lentil salad!!). They are at 302 Bleeker St. near 7th Ave South. But for me the best Indian food (in NYC) is the vegetarian Vatan 409 3rd Ave near 29th, set like a small South Indian village. Great food but terrible wine list and will not allow you to bring w/ corkage fee:<( I would love to eat there one day with a bunch of German and Alsacian wines...

strawberries are all over the Green Market!! w/o even tasting just look at the difference between the organic ones and the inorganic--the organic look like the rarer French fraise!!--do you know that strawberry is a great absorber(sp?) and it hold all those pesticides etc very very well--so buy organic strawberries or dont care!! also according to Andrew Weil next to strawberry is bell pepper and cantalope w/ major pesticide levels--most cantalopes come from the big mexican farms mass produced and very untasty (to me) and full of....eat less / eat better!!

for the good doctor DRW

More trouble with names and fancy language.
Owing to priority rules in paleontological nomenclature, Tyrannosaurus rex is in danger of losing its name. Say it ain’t so, Manospondylus! (via Ancient World Web)

found this listing of vineyards while searching for stagecoach vineyards. my father has some stake in it. i dont think they are bottling wines,just harvesting. he mentioned that they grow for cabernet and one of the buyers was kendall jackson. thats about all i know.

Yes, the site was down for some time yesterday afternoon/evening. I'm not sure of the exact length of the outage. When I got home from a late dinner everything was back up. I know some of you are getting really slow connection speeds (although for others it seems O.K.) I'm trying to understand this problem, and while I'm not near any sort of solution, I have learned a bit more about internet topology. Hopefully we'll be able to get everyone up to speed soon.

6/10/00 Chez Polaner--learned a simple Sardenia dish--will cook it soon--tuna steak that you wash than dry in a towel and do as the French Laundry chef does run a knife over the it and scrape any water off the surface (it help's sear better)--grill or pan cook than slice up add salt pepper herbs olive oil, cover with arugala and chill--later serve by scooping the tuna holding the arugala and flip on plate--great w/ french red burgundy or cab franc from the loire valley both slighty chilled too!!

Siamese Twin Cat

reports are that Blue Hill is awesome--lots of buzz in the food / wine bizz--chef came from???...El Bulli!!!

6/8/00 dinner at 71 Clinton Fresh Foods--fab again--i didnt taste but he did a Foie Gras(sp?) soup that freaked the table--new desserts were twisted and expanded presentations of the dishes rocked--we all brought the best wines we could get and mine were the top two (not only to me)--1978 Bartelo Moscarello Barolo & 1995 Weinbach Tokay Quintessence de Grains Noble "Cuvee 100th Year" (best dessert wine i ever tasted) other yummy's were 90 Echezeaux DRC, 92 Weil Spatlese Trocken, 92 Grivolet Meursault Clos de Perriere...SPOKE TO WYLIE ABOUT THE "GREAT CHEFS AND SHAMANS" DINNER BY AMAZON CONSERVATION TEAM AND SUSAN SARANDON....

coincidence?? i was on my way to 71 Clinton St for dinner and in the cab was a book full of #'s and personal photos and Huichol photos--there was a card for Chicama (see below) and it turns out he did the glass wear for them--just tracked him down through Chicama's manager at a friends house and he is on the way over to pick it up (p.s he hadnt even realized he lost this--maybe that means he didnt)

6/7/00 Rhone Restaurant new spot with 99% Rhone list (champagne)--we liked the food, chef ex Gramercy Tavern, wine list is of course interesting and will be even better when the more 98's roll in this year. and if they start to rock hopefully lots of older and rarer juice will show up...they got 16 bottle's of Raymond Trollat Saint Joseph 1996 (now 15 and list saz 97) @ $44--it is really worth a trip to the bar or a cheese plate!! VERY RARE JUICE

roadside attraction

moshi moshi

behold! the chomskybot!

im not sure. does this belong in sustenance? i guess that depends on who you are asking.

the owners of Babbo, Lupa etc have opened a fish restaurant called Ekra?? 43 and 9th--i am going week of June 18th anyone want to come w/ me and the lovely Linda (hope shes coming)--Suyra also that week too so lets pick some dates--i'm on liver detox next week all 7 days!!

I put some navigation links on the discussion pages. Is that what was wanted? Also, I don't think anyone we don't know is reading the site, but if this isn't true it must have been a pretty frustrating read. I just saw this morning that if you weren't signed in, the system would print out all comments in a section all the way back to the beginning. This made the group page many hundreds of K, and basically unusable. Fixed that, so while everything is still slow, it is much more reasonable now. I must remember to keep testing things without being signed in.

6/6/00 first nyc mojito (very expensive) excellente but we will try to do better on the roof of 135R one night??:>) than to Meigas was very taste E--my favs was salmon served in a cream gaspacho(sp?), the seafood risotto with seared scallop's on top, pepper's stuffed w/tuna, everything was good to excellent one dish was weak due to overcooking, all reports on the suckling pig were top notch--dessert super super fun, bread very very weak (but the same in spain / its very rare to find good bread)--wine list lacked something but we had some tasty older wines for fair prices--expensive night over all--MB has put Suyra as next stop on the World Pro Sustenance Tour