Dave Mancuso dot Com

Robert Atkins died today in New York. Rumors will probably start that he died of his diet, but he actually slipped on ice outside his clinic two weeks ago. He hit his head and never recovered.

I can honestly say that I’ve never felt as good as when I’m on the Atkins diet. Contrary to popular belief, I eat more salad and vegetables on the low carb diet in two weeks than I eat on a normal diet in six months. You never know what’s going to happen to you tomorrow, though. I hope I’ll have at least as long a life as Atkins did, accidents notwithstanding.

Yep, Brad was right. The Moody Blues is the group who put out Octave. Their most famous album was probably Days of Future Passed (because of the song “Nights in White Satin”), but I think their best album was In Search of the Lost Chord.

By the way, The Moody Blues is one of Drew’s favorite bands, although his favorite song at the moment is “The American Pie Song.” Alyssa likes Sheryl Crow and the “Car Wash song” (yes, that “Car Wash”).

Here’s another trivia question, maybe easy, maybe not. Which Beatles song was titled “Scrambled Eggs” when it was being written?

And another, because I feel bad about not including (late) ’80s music: which band had a great hit called “Break Out” (their only hit ever)?

I changed the item body text. I didn’t like the serif I tried, so I changed it back to sans-serif, but a little smaller. It look small in Safari, not so small in Camino, not so small in IE. The top bar and side bar are next. Maybe over the weekend…

No one guessed, but that’s likely because the band Steel Breeze was too obscure to note. I’ve heard of the band, but I’ve never heard their hit song “You Don’t Want Me Anymore.”

And the lyric from the Pink Floyd song? It’s from “Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Parts 1-5)” (“Blown on the steel breeze”).

This one may be a bit less obscure: which longtime rock band released their eighth album with the name Octave in 1978?

Brad Rhine introduced a new application today: Frequency. Frequency is a clean and simple app that lets you easily post writing to an online weblog site on the Internet. I tested the beta version and was impressed by its fluidity and directness. I will probably move over to it in time. I would definitely recommend it to a computer non-power user. They could update a website daily by just writing a few words and clicking one button. Hey, maybe Brad could use that for a tagline: “Frequency is one-button Internet publishing.”

I’ve been digging into my web templates and stylesheets to alter the look of my site. I’m not sure how it will end up, but it may look radically different. Feedback is welcome (at this point, you may not even notice what I’ve changed so far).

The “Tokyo Drew” post a few weeks ago engendered a few comments, one of which was my sister Lisa’s comment about the time the drapes were nearly ruined when we were children. Food was involved, children were involved, drapes were caught in the crossfire, and my parents made us write 500 times that we wouldn’t throw food, or play with food, or whatever each of our parts of the transgression was. I was of course completely blameless in what I remember as the “Spaghetti Incident,” but Lisa has a more precise memory of this traumatic event:

“Looking back, you are right about who did the throwing. It was not spaghetti, but instead a wretched stew of some sort that was likely a kitchen experiment gone wrong.

Lesson #1: A cook must be prepared to admit he/she has bungled… it is not acceptable to smile “convincingly” and serve it anyway… the mouth under the age of
10 can not be fooled.

Lesson #2: After serving such a “meal” do not leave said children under 10 unsupervised to eat alone while you check on your wallpapering project upstairs.

Lesson #3: The eldest Brother may not require the youngest brother to consume an additional portion of the “stew” or a serving spoon full may be thrown in his direction. [Editor’s Note: Lisa must certainly be remembering this part incorrectly–as you recall, I am of course blameless. –eldest brother Dave]

Lesson #4: “Stew” stains custom-made Italian draperies.

Lesson #5: After a food fight, check for damage before taking off… you can run, but you can’t hide.

Now that you’ve made me look back… I don’t remember having a role in the event yet was also required to complete the writing assignment. Sigh, I must be off to polish my halo now. :)”

Hmmmm. As I recall, I was the only one who had to write 500 times since I had just learned cursive and could actually finish the assignment. I don’t think Lisa or Joey could write much, since they were in 1st or 2nd grade at the time. I was ripped, man. But I don’t carry a grudge. Oh no. Not at all.

She’s right about the 10 year old mouths, too. Drew tells the day care folks that “Daddy’s diet food tastes like dog food.” Tell us how you really feel, Drew–don’t hold back. 🙂

Oh, and the drapes? The went to the dry cleaners and came back unstained. They lived to grace the windows for several more years and moved with us to our next house at 14 South Swarthmore Ave. in Ridley Park.

You know, I like HGTV as much as the next guy, but why do the makeovers in Design on a Dime always cost $1,000.00? That’s not really a dime to me–are there new economic rules I’m not aware of?

I was listening to Pink Floyd and a good trivia question occurred to me. Can you tell me which band named themselves after a line in a Pink Floyd song? I’ll give you a hint–it’s a line in the album Wish You Were Here.