Tuesday Kitchen Blogging: meatballs

I made meatballs for the first time tonight (woo-hoo!). Overall, they were a success: they tasted great, and I did set off the smoke alarm. I used Half Circle Ranch Organic Piedmontese Beef - very tasty, and it's from Montana.

Advice to bachelors

Here's my advice to bachelors (i.e., never-married men over 30 living alone): if you are earning a good living, then (for goodness sake) hire a cleaning service. Yes, even if you have to cut back on pay-per-view, beer, and chicken wings. My life is so much smoother now that I have a maid service come in every other week.

Soup & Salad

I had lunch today at the Bozeman Community Food Co-op (on Main, across from Safeway). It's a great place for soup, salad, and sandwiches.

The process: you make your salad (etc.) at the deli on the main floor, pay at the regular checkout, and eat upstairs.

Ski: Day 6

A great day for tree-skiing at Bridger Bowl. I fell down a bunch in the moguls, though.

@ the movies

I saw Underworld: Evolution last night. If you think you might enjoy watching a leather-clad lady vampire kick werewolf butt, go see this movie. (trailer)

Two new Bozeman blogs

I created a couple of blogs recently for organizations I'm active in:

Cascade Association of Neighbors is Bozeman's newest officially organized neighborhood.

Bozeman Engineers is the local chapter of the Montana Society of Engineers.

Woo-hoo

I saw a woman with a pierced tragus today...

City engineer to speak at 2/9 meeting

Everyone is welcome to attend the 2/9 meeting of the Bozeman chapter of the Montana Society of Engineers.

Rick Hixson, City Engineer, will speak on: "Bozeman Engineering Projects: the next five years."

For info on venue and cost, see the PDF flyer.

NPR (National Public Radio)

Stories about Montana

Stories about Bozeman

More pallets

These pallets reside in an industrial park in Belgrade, just west of Bozeman, Montana.

Pallets in the snow

Part of NE Bozeman is zoned "Industrial."

A chance to help a Bozeman coffeehouse entrepreneur

Interested in Coffee and Art? Here's your chance to provide input to Cafe Evoke, a soon-to-be Bozeman coffeehouse:

[begin forwarded message]

My name is Jason Duncan and my wife and I are hoping to opening Cafe Evoke, an art and coffee house, in the North East Neighborhood. Our art and coffee house is dedicated to building community on both a local and global scale. We are planning to serve Fair Trade and organic coffees and teas and organic foods whenever possible.

Our goal is to provide a place for people to come, sip, and talk. A place to build relationships with each other and also learn about issues that are affecting our friends in coffee producing countries including Ethiopia, Kenya, and Guatemala. We plan to display the work of local artist, bring in singer songwriters, writers, poets, play writes, videographers and others to share their passions.

We have been in contact with One.org who wants to host Bozeman meetings at Cafe Evoke. We plan to host Fair Trade seminars and do our best to not only serve great coffee but to educate on the passionate journey this product takes from the bean to the cup.

In an effort to be a community coffee and art house from the beginning, we want to know what the people in this community think about our ideas. We have dreams of providing a place for people to just be from 6:00 am to Midnight. We desire Cafe Evoke to be an alternative to the bar scene and think it will be a great place to "work together to create community."

It seems that we all agree: by working together, we can make a difference.

We are looking for a location in the building on Wallace and Peach and also in the new Freight Building that is going up in March. I would love to get your feedback, ideas, concerns, and suggestions. We feel the values of this community are a great match for Cafe Evoke and we want to be a voice and meeting place for all.

Please feel free to email us at info@cafeevoke.com with your thoughts, suggestions, questions, and concerns. We want to make sure all have a voice in what goes on at Cafe Evoke. You may also call me at 406.599.1628. We want to know how you feel about our hours (6:00 am to Midnight) and what things you would like to see in a community art and coffee house that is dedicated to serving the best organic and fair coffee.

Thank you for taking the time to help.

Jason Duncan
Cafe Evoke
jason@cafeevoke.com
*******
[end forwarded message]

Wiki photograph

I'm almost famous - the newly revised Wikipedia entry on Bozeman, Montana uses one of my photos. Better check it out quickly, before someone repalces it with a different photo, though ;-)

Ski: Day 4

Powderiffic. My legs are so sore I can barely move...

Ski: Day 3

Another great day at Bridger Bowl. I'm whipped - a hot shower awaits in the very near future. (Kinda unusual for me, as my showers are usually ice cold.... Hey, don't knock it until you've tried it ;-)

Anonymity: Four folks from town recogized me on the slopes.

Books I read over vacation

Besides overdosing on cable TV over Christmas break (I don't watch TV in MT - only when I'm traveling), I also read some interesting books. I can recommend any of the following:

What Went Wrong? : The Clash Between Islam and Modernity in the Middle East

Salt: A World History

The Physics of Superheroes

Fuel Cells

Dr. Max Deibert (Dept of Chemical & Biological Engineering at MSU) will give a presentation on Fuel Cells this Thursday. See the information flyer for details.

Anyone can attend this luncheon meeting (as long as they pay the $10 fee). Email me if you want more details or would like to RSVP.

In upcoming months, I will announce presentations by Bozeman's City Engineer and the City Manager.

Airport art

After spending 10+ days in Texas, I went to South Carolina for a couple of days. I'm finally back home.

I liked a piece of sculpture in the Greenville-Spartanburg airport, so I read the plaque...the sculpture (of flying geese) was done by Jim Dolan of Belgrade, Montana.