Useless Conversation

[MuffinMan]

It's not just the restaurants.  I guarantee you that you could go to any one suburban area in the country and compare it to a similar suburban area in another state and 90% of the stores would be the same:  Lowes, Home Depot, Office Max, Office Depot, Chipotle, Starbucks, Target, etc.  

Sounds like you should move NE to Austin. Even though the suburbs and exurbs are like that here there is definitely an anti-chain vibe that I quite enjoy.

[ghost]

It's not just the restaurants.  I guarantee you that you could go to any one suburban area in the country and compare it to a similar suburban area in another state and 90% of the stores would be the same:  Lowes, Home Depot, Office Max, Office Depot, Chipotle, Starbucks, Target, etc.  

Sounds like you should move NE to Austin. Even though the suburbs and exurbs are like that here there is definitely an anti-chain vibe that I quite enjoy.

I am absolutely all for that, except that Austin is full of orthodontists.  They're like cockroaches.  If you lift up a rock you'll probably find 50 of them under there all screaming, "send me some patients, please!!!!"  No, I'm stuck in San Antonio for the foreseeable future. 

[Sand]

When it's a Monday and between a seedy red lobster and the olive garden, I'll pick the olive garden.

And their salads are delicious... And their salad dressing is gluten free.

Im genuinely curious. In what place would you find yourself that those two are your only two choices?
My wife travels for work, yet still manages to find wonderful local restaurants in most cities she works in or at least slightly better chains like Panera Bread.

[Nebu]

And their salads are delicious... And their salad dressing is gluten free.

What salad dressing isn't gluten free? 

[Lantyssa]

You'd be surprised.  The stuff is everywhere if you don't make everything yourself from scratch.

[Selby]

Im genuinely curious. In what place would you find yourself that those two are your only two choices?

Most suburbs or places along major freeways are very much like that.  Granted, those wouldn't be your ONLY two choices, but they would be the highest rated out of what is available.

[ghost]

And their salads are delicious... And their salad dressing is gluten free.

What salad dressing isn't gluten free?  

Many kinds of ranch and other creamy dressings are things to watch for in restaurants.  

That's why gluten free is such a bitch.  You never really know what's in stuff if it's processed or a sauce.  I hate eating out unless it's at a nice restaurant where they do things from scratch. About the only thing I can eat fast food is the salad from Chick Fila and Chipotle. 

[Nebu]

You'd be surprised.  The stuff is everywhere if you don't make everything yourself from scratch.

My biochem must be rusty.  I was under the impression that glutens were proteoglycans created by the overmixing of processed grain flour in the presence of a protein binder.  Are they using processed grain flours as thickening agents in ranch and the like?  Damn, it's a good thing I've never liked anything but salt & pepper on my salads.

[MuffinMan]

I was under the impression that glutens were proteoglycans created by the overmixing of processed grain flour in the presence of a protein binder. 

[Lantyssa]

My biochem must be rusty.  I was under the impression that glutens were proteoglycans created by the overmixing of processed grain flour in the presence of a protein binder.  Are they using processed grain flours as thickening agents in ranch and the like?  Damn, it's a good thing I've never liked anything but salt & pepper on my salads.

Flour and gluten are often used as thickeners and binders.  Also they're present in some processed food just because both lines happened at the same processing planet.  Labeling has gotten a lot better in recent years, but you don't have that luxury if eating out.

I'm lucky in that I'm only slightly intolerant.  I can usually handle a little gluten, maybe even do a burger every now and then, but I never know if it'll give me trouble so I try not to indulge too much.

[Nebu]

I'm guessing they're using flour in the low cal and corn starch as a thickener in the normal... that makes sense.  Thanks Lanty!

[IainC]

Got home after ~24 hours of solid travelling to find that my fridge freezer had died at some point in the last two weeks. All the food in it has liquefied so, when all I wanted to do was fall over and sleep, I had to clean it out and take the manky, mouldy food down to the bio bin outside. And now I need to find a new fridge freezer that will fit in the built-in kitchen.

[Strazos]

Can you remind the 'mericans what a "fridge freezer" is?

[IainC]

Can you remind the 'mericans what a "fridge freezer" is?

It's a fridge and a freezer in one unit. Separate compartments and doors for each function rather than a fridge with a small freezer shelf in it.

[Strazos]

Oh, those are just Fridges over here.

[JWIV]

Okay, I am now a serious convert to Barefoot Wine.  $12 for a 2 liter bottle here, and their Pinot Noir, Reisling, and Moscato are all amazingly not only drinkable, but actually enjoyable.

[MisterNoisy]

Okay, I am now a serious convert to Barefoot Wine.  $12 for a 2 liter bottle here, and their Pinot Noir, Reisling, and Moscato are all amazingly not only drinkable, but actually enjoyable.

I like them for cooking.  Drinkable but cheap enough to make a coq au vin with and not feel bad about it.

[ghost]

You'd be surprised.  The stuff is everywhere if you don't make everything yourself from scratch.

My biochem must be rusty.  I was under the impression that glutens were proteoglycans created by the overmixing of processed grain flour in the presence of a protein binder.  Are they using processed grain flours as thickening agents in ranch and the like?  Damn, it's a good thing I've never liked anything but salt & pepper on my salads.

Wikipedia is probably a decent explanation.  Gluten is a nice binder, as you mention.  So many foods need to have that added in not necessarily as a thickening agent but to keep things sticking together.  An alternative is xanthan gum, but it doesn't work as well. 

[Lantyssa]

Two days in a row this strange substance has fallen from the sky.  My cat became coated in it.  Whatever it was she did not enjoy it, and some of it transferred to my hands upon trying to comfort her.

I'm concerned for our safety.  Do you think I should take her to the vet and see a doctor myself?  I'd consider calling the poison control center, but I am a loss for describing the stuff, it appears to be clear and odorless (I didn't try tasting it), so I'm not sure they would be able to help us.

Your thoughts?

[MuffinMan]

I had to take a few moments yesterday to figure out how to turn on my windshield wipers. First time I've turned them on since I bought the car a few months ago.

I find it amusing it waited to rain until ACL weekend.

[Sky]

Two days in a row this strange substance has fallen from the sky.  My cat became coated in it.  Whatever it was she did not enjoy it, and some of it transferred to my hands upon trying to comfort her.

I'm concerned for our safety.  Do you think I should take her to the vet and see a doctor myself?  I'd consider calling the poison control center, but I am a loss for describing the stuff, it appears to be clear and odorless (I didn't try tasting it), so I'm not sure they would be able to help us.

Your thoughts?

Sometimes we get that, too. In the winter, it hardens and covers everything!

[Merusk]

Lant, stop tasting that and get help immediately.  That stuff is dangerous and you shouldn't be messing with it.  Don't you know it causes thousands of deaths and millions in property damage every year?! 

Get educated!
http://www.dhmo.org/facts.html

[Lantyssa]

Heh.  That's one of my favorite sites.  Been a while since I visited.

[Sand]

Im genuinely curious. In what place would you find yourself that those two are your only two choices?

Most suburbs or places along major freeways are very much like that.  Granted, those wouldn't be your ONLY two choices, but they would be the highest rated out of what is available.

Im not going to continuing arguing this but will simply say I vehemently disagree.
I travel at least once a month for work or more. My wife, who is pregnant with our child and trying to eat extremely healthy travels every single week for work.
Neither of us eat at these crappy chains. Or anything like them.

You may have to put five minutes of thought into where you are eating each meal, but in almost any decently size city or suburb there are numerous other locally owned options and even if its still a chain there are better chains.

[NowhereMan]

So if you were reading the Space Marine thread you'll have already seen me bitching about not being able to purchase the game over Steam. It turns out that it's just the UK and the reason for it is our only high street gaming retailer threatened to boycott it if it got a Steam release since that would compete with their own on-line service. Ordinarily I'd just say fuck 'em because I prefer Valve but not be too bothered and eventually just pick it up anyway. Due to work and friends visiting I haven't been able to get out to any of their shops to actually buy a physical copy this week and being bored decided to just buy the fucking thing through their digital distribution. Their system is delightfully awful and they really seem not to want people to use it at all since they've got the game available for £30 with free shipping or £35 as a download. Being an idiot and wanting to play the game I still got the digital download, went through the exact same purchase process as a normal physical copy apart from the fact that it wouldn't let me pay via paypal and they then sent me an email confirmation of my purchase.

That's it.

There's no fucking explanation of how I'm meant to download the game, the confirmation page in the order process was completely blank so I don't know if there were meant to be any instructions there or not. It looks like the system requires a human being to log in and actually 'ship' the product, although my order tracking page (seriously, they do not distinguish at all between physical and digital purchases) says it's shipped. I could deal with them being monopolistic cockfucks if they could at least put up a product that fucking worked but it seems like they're determined to make US companies tearing Steam vouchers out of game boxes look accommodating.

Edit: Oh I should add that there's nothing but complaints about physical pre-orders from them either since they shipped something like half the pre-orders on the day of release and the rest were delayed by a week or more. They also stocked a number of their shops with 1 copy of the Collector's edition and far fewer copies of the main game than they had pre-orders. I really can't wait for stuff to move on enough that publishers can tell bricks and mortar chains like this to go fuck themselves when they start making demands.

[Lantyssa]

Sounds like they would have been better off letting them boycott.

[Ironwood]

Sorry, which retailer is this mate ?  I can't tell from the Space Marine thread for all the fucking stupid pics of female people dressed up in polystyrene.

[NowhereMan]

Game, although moaning about it elsewheres apparently they denied having anything to do with Steam not carrying Space Marine. Service wise I wouldn't really bother with their download thing though, jesus I paid an extra fiver to not be able to actually download anything.

[Ironwood]

Yeah, reason I ask is because I used Game to Download War For Cybertron, since I was in the same position as you.

I don't remember it being that bad in terms of 'where you go and what to do' but I do remember installing their own downloader which was a pain in the fucking tits and it still taking Days on the dedicated 10mb line that I used for work.  It was truly painful.


So, to conclude, um, Good luck ?

Edited to add : Despite being pished, I just remembered that I've had to keep the 8Gb or so downloaded installer in case I ever want to uninstall and put it on again.  Also, I only get 5 attempts for this.  I don't know what happens then.  Possibly Game repossess my scrotum.

[Furiously]

Two days in a row this strange substance has fallen from the sky.  My cat became coated in it.  Whatever it was she did not enjoy it, and some of it transferred to my hands upon trying to comfort her.

I'm concerned for our safety.  Do you think I should take her to the vet and see a doctor myself?  I'd consider calling the poison control center, but I am a loss for describing the stuff, it appears to be clear and odorless (I didn't try tasting it), so I'm not sure they would be able to help us.

Your thoughts?

Sounds like you might have gotten some universal solvent on your cat. That stuff dissolves a ton of ionic solids... Watch out.

[Ironwood]

Good God, the Domain Name Business is a cesspool.

[Cyrrex]

I wonder what people in the cesspool business use to compare stuff against other stuff.

[IainC]

I wonder what people in the cesspool business use to compare stuff against other stuff.

Patent law.

[Merusk]

Good God, the Domain Name Business is a cesspool.

You and Schild should swap stories sometime.

[NowhereMan]

Yeah, reason I ask is because I used Game to Download War For Cybertron, since I was in the same position as you.

It's looking like possibly something didn't load properly when I completed the purchase and it's not registered properly. I say this to give them as much benefit of the doubt as I can since so far all I've gotten from them is an email telling me they've charged £35 and they'll let me know when my order is dispatched. Ringing them today to ask for a refund since I was able to buy it from shopto.net and use their code to download it through Steam anyway. In the future I'll probably need to spend more than 5 minutes just being annoyed and actually put some research into my options with these sort of things but Game still suck balls.