Eli over at the aadl uncovered this gem of a recipe from the Ann Arbor Cookbook, 1904:  ”The following is all I know about cooking squirrels. First catch your squirrel. Skin him, etc. Parboil in a little water in a kettle, add salt, pepper, and enough butter to fry it brown. Then eat. If the animal is tough parboil a little more till he is tender”  -Contributed by: F. A. LYMAN

I’m totally inspired and looking forward to our next IT Dinner, 1904 style.  You can view the scanned original of this recipe and other historic Ann Arbor cookbooks at the Ann Arbor District Library’s Cookbook Collection.

Available with 3.06GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 4GB RAM. Sweet.

There are a couple electronics/computer recycling events coming up in the Ann Arbor area. The first is Saturday, April 26 at Best Buy. Best Buy is teaming up with Great Lakes Electronics to recycle used electronics at no charge. Drop off will be in the Best Buy Parking lot on Lohr Road. They ARE accepting computers, monitors, printers, fax machines, TVs, audio equipment, VCRs, DVD players (items up to 100 lbs each).

The next event begins Thursday, May 8. Ann Arbor Public Schools and Climate Savers Computing Initiative at U-M are working together to recycle electronics. Schools and businesses can drop off items Thursday and Friday, the general public can drop off on Saturday, May 10 at the Pioneer High School Parking lot. (Thanks to Nicole & Diddy for the tip!)

photo from IT NYC 2006

Just in time for the Ann Arbor Commuter Challenge, Google has enhanced their maps of Ann Arbor to now integrate the AATA bus schedules and routes.  I’ve had mixed results with it so far–plugging in the Deli to Bakehouse yields a pretty interesting route, but I see a huge potential, especially if the UM buses and proposed commuter rail and AMTRAK train schedules were also integrated.  Give it a whirl:  Google Transit Ann Arbor.

Winston’s Lego Computer is one geek’s log of creating a Lego case for a functioning computer. The specs on the machine aren’t bad: 933MHz processor, a DVD drive, 1GB RAM, wireless network adapter, and a ton of input/output choices. Not sure what the OS is, but I bet it’s Linux.

Non-nerd Lego enthusiasts (that’s an oxymoron, right?) might enjoy these 32 other things built from Legos, like this giraffe:

Overdue post…

I’ve been using 10.5 since it came out in November. In that time there have been 2 major (10.5.x) updates and handfuls of software, firmware, and security updates, all of which have steadied the ship (sorry to mix metaphors). Some have criticized, some are still complaining. But guess what? *ding!* It’s ready. Serve it up! For the masses, consume!

Joel on Software lays out his company’s recipe for customer service that parallels our own Zing approach. How very uplifting to read about other IT groups focusing on the user!

#2 is hilarious yet practical, giving customers a graceful exit out of a user-error problem.

Of all his steps, this one really caught my eye:
#8 Give customer service people a career path

Here at Fog Creek, customer support is just the first year of a three-year management training program that includes a master’s degree in technology management at Columbia University.

Now that’s commitment to customer service!

Dell’s IdeaStorm takes feedback and suggestions from the Dell user community and allows them to promote the ones they like and demote the ones they don’t.

Ultra wide, ultra mail-able, and ultra unlike any envelope you’ve used before.

At just 11×17 inches this envelope this is truly a breakthrough design.

Are you a huge nerd with a sharp sense of style? Then these ASCII art curtains by Dutch designer Nienke Sybrandy would the perfect addition to your abode. ASCII art is like geek impressionist painting: from afar you see a complete image, but up close you see all the tiny strokes (in this case printable characters) that make up the image. If the term hasn’t been coined already, I’d like to call this “geek chic.”