Bev's Blender Brain Blog

Corn Sushi just isn't right

Greg and I LOVE sushi. We eat at Sushi Boat Kazoo in Campbell way too often - especially in the warm summer months when we just don't want anything heavy.

The sushi chefs at Kazoo must have gone through some new classes lately, because they are coming up with some crazy options that stretch way beyond the boundaries of traditional sushi. The first sign was when the happy bag had a smiley face on it, made of radish and green onion.

But CORN sushi? Its just not right.

Corn is a wonderful food. The gold of the Aztec Gods. The crown of America's heartland. It bears no resemblance to raw fish.

Songwriter Brad Colerick pays appropriate tribute to corn in his song Sweet Corn and even dares us to try it with a "drop o' Tapatio" - which turns out to be pretty good. And so is the song. You can download it from iTunes. The chorus reminds how corn is supposed to be enjoyed:

I want sweet corn for dinner
Sweet corn to feed my soul
Sweet corn, been waiting all summer
LIttle bit o' butter and a pinch of salt and pepper
and a drop o' Tapatio on my sweet corn

And that, my dear sushi lovers, is what corn is REALLY about.

Tapatio is a registered trademark of the Tapatio Hot Sauce company.

How to scam out of property taxes: learn from Larry Ellison

Property taxes in California are a nightmare. Believe me, I know. We live in a 2,200 square foot house on a 10,000 square foot lot. That adds up to more in annual property taxes than my first car was worth.

But Oracle founder Larry Ellison has come up with an ingenious solution: convince the county assessor that your property is worth less because of the design of your house.

Chris O'Brien recapped these events in his San Jose Mercury News opinion piece:

Ellison spent years building a Japanese-style estate on 23 acres in Woodside. And for several years, Ellison has been appealing the county's assessment of his property.

In a nutshell, Ellison argued that because of the estate's distinct architectural style, it's worth far less because it would be far less appealing to any potential buyer. The San Mateo County Assessment Appeals Board agreed.

The board lowered the property's assessed value from $173 million in 2007 to $69.7 million in 2008. That is expected to cut Ellison's estimated tax bill from $1.86 million in 2007 to $751,041. And as icing on the cake, the board also ruled that the county owed Ellison a $3 million refund for taxes paid since 2004.

Well, I have weeds in my yard. Who would want that? We painted the inside walls dark red and dark green - definitely a distinct style. The stucco repair on the back of my house would NOT be appealing to a new buyer. And the noisy kids next door? That should knock off a good chunk of perceived value. How about we reduce my property taxes by more than half?

At issue here is the effect on the Portola Valley School District budget. The district is facing a million dollar shortfall due to the overall loss of property tax revenue due to sagging home values, and $300,000 of that can be directly attributed to the reduction in Ellison's taxes. O'Brien calls for Ellison to fork over twice that, $600,000, to help out his local school district.

Those who've been in the valley awhile have heard the Larry Ellison stories. He doesn't exactly stand out as a man of the people, so my advice to the Portola Valley School District is don't hold your breath.

But I just might check with the Santa Clara County Tax Assessor to see if I can claim that no one will want my house because of the weeds and the noisy kids next door.

How important is spelling?

I just received a link from @JustinKownacki via Twitter to a Time Magazine online article called Making an Argument for Misspelling. It seems a criminology professor in the UK is tired of correcting the spelling in his student's papers:

"Good spellers, Smith says, should be able to go on writing as usual; those who find the current rules of English too hard to learn should have their spelling labeled variant, not wrong."

Am I the only one who is appalled?

This harkens back to my May 2008 post The Millennials: everybody gets a goody bag. We wouldn't want anyone to feel bad about their inability to spell.

I must admit that I've gotten lazy from the past few years of using spell checkers and I'm guilty of more than one typo on this blog. Unfortunately TypePad doesn't incorporate a spell checker, and I haven't taken the time to proofread my work. That's a reason, not an excuse, by the way. There is no excuse.

Proper spelling is crucial to credibility. Years ago, I worked with a colleague who was attending night classes to finish his degree. He complained that the professor shouldn't concern herself with typos in his papers - he thought she should just grade on content alone. That statement hit me like a ton of bricks. But then again, I studied journalism and public relations under Dennis Wilcox. There are no typos in the SJSU college of Journalism and Mass Communications.

And don't get me started on the grammar and spelling - not to mention the accuracy - of today's news reports.

What do you thin? 

Hi, my name is Veb

Its funny how some names remain common throughout eternity - John comes to mind - and some go out of style after a generation or two.

While I think the name Bev is pretty normal, I'm having to admit that its going the way of Gertrude and Maybelle.

Most of my friends know that I lie about my name at Starbucks because they NEVER get my name right. I used to play a game where I'd go through the alphabet choosing a different name with the next letter each time I went. I'd forget where I was by the time I got to "Linda."

We've been going to the same Starbucks for over a year now and they all know us, so I'd forgotten about this little problem - until this morning when we went to the Safeway kinda-sorta but not really Starbucks.

Who would name their kid Veb? What would that be short for? Veborah?

A million to one

Today is my first day back in my office in my backyard since last October when we cut power to the outbuilding, so the pool could be dug. After 9 months of remodeling stories both inside and out, we're finally at the point where we can put the house back together and I can once again work in my office.

Not that its entirely done, don't get me wrong. The original door now opens up to within 2 feet of the pool, and the window was re-purposed for my step-son's bedroom so there is plastic covering the opening where it used to be. But I was sooo looking forward to having my space back, so here I am, making do.

But the start of my day was delayed by a duck who'd decided to take a swim. Greg and I spent almost an hour trying to chase it toward the side gate to the street where it could get back to the pond behind our house. Greg was on one side of the pool with the net and I was on the other with the broom. Wish I'd had someone on video duty for THAT one.

It finally got so tired and scared that it hid in the skimmer, so we trapped it with a laundry basket and set it free outside our fence.

So I'm finally settled down, working on some editing, and the impossible happens.

The pool sweep occasionally shoots water up out of the pool, as they all do. This one has perfect aim. It shot water THROUGH the 20 inches that I had the door propped open, and made a DIRECT HIT on my computer screen. No where else is wet, only my screen - 15 feet from the pool, inside a building.

What are the chances of that happening, a million to one?

Baked potatoes made more convenient

I'm all for convenience foods. I've been especially appreciative of break-apart cookie dough over the past couple months that we've been without the full use of our kitchen.

I don't go to the grocery store much any more since Greg has taken over the shopping and cooking for our family, but when I tagged along with him recently I did a double take in the produce section.

Yes this is real. Right there in the middle of the bin of bulk potatoes were several shrink wrapped russet potatoes with microwave instructions. The shrink wrap even had a convenient pull-tab to unwrap the potatoe.

I'm tempted to stop right here, under the assumption that those of you reading this will join me in the realization of just how absurd this is. However, I have to admit that I'm impressed with the sheer moxy of marketing a potatoe as a convenience food.

This breakthrough is brought to you by Progressive Produce of Los Angeles, Calif:

"Today’s busy, time-challenged meal providers are searching for answers to the “what’s for dinner” question that doesn’t involve burgers and fries from the local take-out. Now they can choose to prepare hot, fresh, nutritious meals in minutes with Progressive’s new microwaveable products. Currently on the menu are baked potatoes and yams, with more items coming soon."

They've registered the name  MicroBaker, and they have a patent pending for the easy open shrink wrapper. So as ridiculous as this is, my hat is off to the folks at Progressive Produce - especially now that they've gone one step further by marketing Potatoes for Two. That's right, TWO potatoes, packaged together for the microwave.

Maybe these are the guys who can solve the gas crisis.