I love New Orleans.

And I am very sad today because of what is headed their way again... just 3 years after Katrina devastated my favorite city.

Hurricane Gustav is expected to make landfall near New Orleans tomorrow morning. The city is being evacuated, and I really hope more people leave this time.

I don't want them on their rooftops begging to be rescued.. I don't want them lying dead in the streets...

I have a ticket to New Orleans on October 10th. I want everyone to be OK... I want New Orleans to be OK... I want to see her again soon...

I love New Orleans.

A new toy for my laptop...

Today I bought a mouse for my laptop.



A Logitech V220 Cordless Optical Mouse for Notebooks

It's red. It's pretty. And now I can play Sims 2 on my laptop!

I'm also going to be getting Microsoft Streets and Trips 2008 soon... so we can use the laptop as a GPS. It's gonna be awesome on roadtrips...

Beef!

It's what's for dinner...

Today I smoked a chuck roast and it was awesome.

I combined a few recipes I found online, made a few substitutions for ingredients I didn't have in the kitchen and gave it a shot... literally!

I started by making a dry rub.

1 T pepper
1 T kosher salt
1 t garlic powder
1 t paprika
1 T Chef Paul's Barbecue Magic

I coated the outside with that mixture and then got started on the marinade...

I injected the roast with a 50/50 mix of Dale's Steak Seasoning and apple juice.

Next I recreated a fat cap for the roast, since it didn't have one of it's own... I covered the top of the roast with bacon.

Here is how it looked before going into the smoker:


And here is how it looked 3 1/2 hours later:


We're going to play around a bit with the cooking time when we do it again. It was probably done 30 minutes before we took it out, but it wasn't dried out at all...

and that was the most awesome bacon I've ever tasted...

Fall vacation countdown...

In 61 days I'll be on my way...

My vacation will begin in New Orleans, LA. I'm meeting Vera and Steven... and maybe Steven's girlfriend Lauren... and maybe Steven's friend Matt... we've got a couple of rooms at the Hotel Villa Convento. One loft, and one single...

We plan to go to the Preservation Hall, and maybe do another ghost or vampire tour. I've also made a list of some daytime activities... French Quarter tour, cemetery tour, and maybe a buggy ride... stuff like that.

After spending the weekend there I'll be riding back to Alabama with them. I'll spend a couple nights at their house. Since they'll both be working or in school during the week I decided not to stay the whole week.

On Wednesday evening I'll be flying to Orlando. I'm going to Halloween Horror Nights on Thursday night. Thursday, Friday and part of Saturday I'll be doing my favorite thing... Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure! Saturday night I fly back to Ft. Lauderdale... head back here to Miami and have Sunday to recover from the trip before I go back to work on Monday.

Then I start the countdown to the next trip!