2009 Mar 21 | Benjy's, Ovations


And onto new new camera number two, which is a newer version of the same brand I currently have. Unfortunately, this one also isn't that great. It has a little better zoom and takes slightly better pictures in a darker room with a flash, but my current one is actually better in basically every other situation.

Sigh, you'd think newer stuff would be better than older stuff, especially with electronics, but I returned this one, too. Thankfully, my old camera has for now stopped having problems (it wasn't reading the memory card and the shutter button wasn't working), so I'm just sticking with it for now. I'd really like to get a cell phone that has a good camera, but almost none of them take good pictures, and the ones that do annoy me in others ways.



A vendor selling goodies at the park.



There are starting to be a lot more people at the park now that the weather is nicer. Mainly people playing basketball, kicking a soccer ball around, kids on the playground, and a fair number of runners.

The demographics are kind of interesting, other than the fact that almost everyone here is Hispanic, with a few black people scattered in. When I lived in the Medical Center, most people ran around Rice, and the runners were generally college-aged people in pretty good shape. Most of the runners here, though, are middle-aged and fairly out of shape, so it's nice to see them trying to get healthy. Most of them run a fairly long ways, too, rather than just going around the track once and calling it a day.



While the optometry school was on spring break, the university converted a whole row of student parking into faculty parking. Nobody noticed until people started getting tickets for parking there, and it sounded like even the administrators at the optometry school hadn't been warned about it. Parking has been really bad recently, so this just set everyone off more.



I've never particularly liked delis, but I decided to eat at McAlister's. They have a chili bowl, and I absolutely loved the ones from Boudin Bakery in San Francisco, but this one wasn't nearly as good.



They really should have made the mileage 88,888.



I really, really hate it when people pull into an intersection they can't get through because of other cars backed up in front of them and then block traffic coming from the opposite way. It doesn't happen too often, thankfully.



It was really foggy for a few mornings.



I like how the writing on the California license plate is light, airy, and fun...



...while the Texas one is heavy, stiff, and means business. I prefer Cali.



Both the Free Press Houston and the Houston Press are free newspapers that I read to find out about any interesting events that might be going on. I prefer the Free Press, but it's harder to find than the Press.



I've been wanting to try out Benjy's restaurant for a while now, and Fran and I went there on Thursday. Jeremy used to work there but doesn't any more, which was unfortunate because he's really good at telling us what's tasty.



Our server at Benjy's was helpful and seemed to be fairly knowledgeable. He recommended beers we thought were pretty good, so that worked well.



Right next door is Kelvin Arms, a Scottish Pub.



The unique aspect is that there's an old bank vault you can sit inside.



After dinner we went to Ovations, a jazz club. It was a nice, cozy little place and the music was good.



I took Kirby home, which usually is a pretty fast road. However, I forgot that the rodeo is still going on, so that made it slower.



Argh, every time I take this local road it seems there's a train sitting there.



Well, the other drivers almost left enough space for people to get through the intersection, but the semi driver pulled up a bit too far. If only people would pay a little more attention and be a little more curteous.



Hmm, I wonder if taking the smaller roads home would be worth not getting tar and all the other goop on my truck.



I've always thought it's interesting how heat messes up LCD watches. Then again, I love this watch, a Wal-Mart special. It has everything I want (time, date, and stopwatch), I don't care if I scratch it up, and if it breaks, I can just buy a new one for a couple of bucks.



Time to switch from computer vision therapy to something else. This is much more of a pain, though. I have to line it up correctly, move it correctly, keep reminding myself to stay at the correct distance because doing all of that makes me want to lean in, time it myself, and measure it myself, whereas the computer did all of that on its own.