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The wife and I finally ran our first half marathon yesterday. It was the Semi-Paris. Of course neither one of us feels like moving today but we both toughed out the race and finished the course. I didn't do that great because I had to walk a good amount of the race. 

I was doing good for about half the race. Then after the second water/food table at the halfway mark my groin started hurting. By the time I hit kilometer 15 my groin had enough. It was about this time I could have gave up and got a ride to the finish. Instead I opted to push through it and walk the remainder of the race. Which this in turn allowed me to feel how swollen my feet had become. I didn't get an official time as they already started tearing the race equipment down when I crossed the finish line. Shortly after the finish I remembered to stop the Nike+ app and it recorded 13.5 miles at 3:52:39. I was also wearing my Garmin HR620 but managed to accidentally stop it about 10 miles in. So its' time did me no good. 

Today is a new recipe that I decided to mix together on a whim. I wasn't too sure how it would end up tasting especially since there wasn't a lot of seasoning added. To my surprise it was a hit. In fact we both loved it so much that I didn't get any left overs for work the next day. The wife was even thinking of seconds without being halfway done with her first bowl. If you get time to make it I hope you enjoy it as much as we did.

Ingredients

6 Red potatoes

1lb Sausage

1 red pepper

1 Onion

1/4 stick butter

250g of mushrooms

2 cups cheddar cheese

Dash of cayenne pepper

Directions

Peel and cut potatoes into cubes

Cut pepper into small slices

Chop up onion

Cut up mushrooms

Brown Sausage on medium heat

Reduce heat to low

Add potatoes and cover pan

Add butter, onions, and peppers

Mix well

Add mushrooms once potatoes start getting soft

Add cayenne pepper

Top with cheese

Let sit for 5 minutes

This is one of my favorite comfort foods. Good for your taste buds but not so good for you. The best part is It doesn't take long to make either. Unless you make your own biscuits. I have never tried making my own biscuits before. One of these days I will have to give it a try. Always seem to love food from scratch much better than store bought food.

Ingredients

1lb Sausage

1 package of pre-made biscuits

1/4 cup flour

2 cups milk

1 tbsp maple syrup

Salt and Pepper to taste

Directions

Brown sausage in pan over medium heat

Place biscuits in oven

Turn heat down to low

Mix flour into sausage

Add 1 cup milk and maple syrup

Mix and continue to add 1/4 milk until desired thickness is achieved (about 2 cups total)

Gravy will thicken over time. If too much milk is used and gravy refuses to thicken up then add a teaspoon of flour.

Salt and Pepper to taste

Remove biscuits from oven

Break apart biscuits and cover with sausage gravy

When you don't want a frozen smoothie after your workout this is one delicious milkshake. It isn't all that cold unless you add in a couple ice cubes. But sometimes the brisk air outside cooled you off enough to not want a cold drink. 

Ingredients

2 cups cocunut milk

500g of Strawberries

2 bananas

4 scoops whey protein

Directions

Place all ingredients in blender

Mix until smooth

We all know that Monday's can be the worst day to keep your exercise routine going. Even if you are feeling it work on Monday's never fails to ruin your drive to workout. If you do manage to get through work still pumped to workout, it always seems like something else comes up. This was of course the case yesterday. I was all excited with the nice sunny weather that occurred and ready to go out for a run in the evening after work ended. Then in the short drive home and getting changed the weather turned to utter crap. It got all windy and started to rain. This of course caused me to put another layer on and the wife to start questioning whether we should even go out for a run. 

Decided to watch a movie on Netflix for a relaxing Sunday night. We opted for watching Earth to Echo as it was new on Netflix. Probably the most exiting part of this movie for me was when they entered the pawn shop. For everyone else this was just another boring part of the movie. However, right off the bat I noticed that the pawn shop had a Citizen watch that I own on display. It made it more interesting because the watch didn't seem to be that popular compared to Citizens other watches. At least I could never find it anywhere when I purchased the watch. I had searched quite a while to find a blue square face watch that I liked. Otherwise the movie was okay but reminded me of a kids version of the Blair Witch Project. I pretty much attribute all of the handheld movies with the Blair Witch Project. 

The night didn't get a whole lot better from the TV perspective. Next up we decided to watch Expelled as it was also popular on Netflix. At least with this movie there was a couple of laughs and no handheld shaking cameras. 

After being let down by two movies we opted to turn back to TV shows again. As we finished off the Doctor Who that was available on Netflix we decided to try out Torchwood based around the character Captain Jack Harkness from Doctor Who. I won't do a rating on Torchwood until we get further along in the series.

Coming soon to a monitor near you ... a post on Doctor Who.

Earth to Echo rating 2/5 

Being that it is Friday, and our new pitcher for our blender showed up yesterday I decided to try out an idea for a Protein Shake. I figured that the wife likes Banana-weizen and I wanted to try out beer in my protein shake so why not put them together. 

The shake didn't turn out how I thought it would. At first it was very bitter and tart when I mixed it up. So of course I then had to do something to sweeten up the shake a bit. So to the cupboard I went to pull out the honey. After adding a little bit of honey it took away the edge on the shake but I recommend not drinking this shake through a straw. It tastes more potent through the straw.

Ingredients

1 Banana

2 scoops vanilla whey protein

1/2 liter hefeweizen

1 cup ice

2 tbsp honey

Directions

Put all ingredients into blender

Being that it is Friday, and our new pitcher for our blender showed up yesterday I decided to try out an idea for a Protein Shake. I figured that the wife likes Banana-weizen and I wanted to try out beer in my protein shake so why not put them together. 

The shake didn't turn out how I thought it would. At first it was very bitter and tart when I mixed it up. So of course I then had to do something to sweeten up the shake a bit. So to the cupboard I went to pull out the honey. After adding a little bit of honey it took away the edge on the shake but I recommend not drinking this shake through a straw. It tastes more potent through the straw.

Ingredients

1 Banana

2 scoops vanilla whey protein

1/2 liter hefeweizen

1 cup ice

2 tbsp honey

Directions

Put all ingredients into blender

Being that it is Friday, and our new pitcher for our blender showed up yesterday I decided to try out an idea for a Protein Shake. I figured that the wife likes Banana-weizen and I wanted to try out beer in my protein shake so why not put them together. 

The shake didn't turn out how I thought it would. At first it was very bitter and tart when I mixed it up. So of course I then had to do something to sweeten up the shake a bit. So to the cupboard I went to pull out the honey. After adding a little bit of honey it took away the edge on the shake but I recommend not drinking this shake through a straw. It tastes more potent through the straw.

Ingredients

1 Banana

2 scoops vanilla whey protein

1/2 liter hefeweizen

1 cup ice

2 tbsp honey

Directions

Put all ingredients into blender

Ever wish you could go from this

to this

The Fujitsu ScanSnap iX500 is a wonderful scanner that will help you rid yourself of those pesky filing cabinets and make everything digital. What better way to have all of those documents actually at your fingertips. No more dealing with the hassle of sorting through files in a folder when you could have a search field. 

The large feeder tray allows you to scan entire document sets together into a single pdf file. The beauty of this scanner is that the pages don't have to all be the same size even. This comes in handy when dealing with invoices with tiny receipts needing to be together

The scanner allows you to save documents to cloud services. My personal choice is to use Evernote to store all of my scans. This allows for quick and easy organization of your documents. There is a difference between using this scanner on a MAC and a PC with Evernote. While utilizing  the scanner with a PC you can have a specific notebook open and the new document will be delivered to that notebook. However, on the MAC it will always go to the same preconfigured notebook. 

When I first started converting my filing cabinet I preferred to utilize the scanner on the PC to drop files into their proper notebook. After a while I found it much easier to just scan everything to my Inbox notebook and move everything into their final notebooks afterward.

I don't get rid of everything myself. There are still things that you have to retain a physical copy of. Like a Title, Deed, Birth Certificate, etc. Though, there is tons of junk that we all horde that we really don't need to. Whether it be from a delivery ad, bank statement, or even a receipt. Keeping these type of documents electronically will allow you to have access to the information when needed without taking up the physical space in your house. 

Hope this brief review helps you out with consolidating your physical paper requirements. I know this scanner has freed up loads of space in my house and allowed me to have information at my fingertips whenever I need it. 

Specs

50 page feeder tray

25ppm colored Duplex scanning

Wireless connectivity to PC, Mac, Android, and iOS

One of our favorite restaurants, Scotch and Soda, serves a Spicy Cottage Pie that the wife and I love to eat. We decided to try making our own for once. It wasn't to bad but we both recommend using less peas.

Ingredients

1lb Ground Sirloin

1/2 bottle Cholula Hot Sauce

1/2 bag of frozen peas

1 tsp Ground Nutmeg

1 tsp Italian seasoning

2 tsp Minced Garlic

1 onion

6 Red potatoes

1 stick of butter

Directions

Peel and cut up potatoes

Boil potatoes until soft

Brown ground sirloin

Mix in nutmeg, hot sauce, and Italian seasoning to ground sirloin

Strain potatoes

Add half a stick of butter, salt, pepper, and garlic to potatoes

Mash potatoes

Layer peas on top of ground sirloin

Cover peas with mashed potatoes

Slice remaining butter and place on top of mashed potatoes

Bake in oven at 175C (350F) for 15-20 minutes until potatoes lightly brown

Now that the sickness passed it was time to get back to the gym. So the wife and I hopped on the treadmill for a 2 mile run to finish clearing out our lungs. When we got home it was time to make our post workout protein shake. I gathered all the ingredients up and decided I might as well take some pictures for the blog. 

As soon as I started blending our shakes up today a small piece of the blender broke. Luckily I was able to finish our shakes before the blender started leaking too much. I have been debating over getting a single serving blender for a while now but the wife has talked me out of it each time I go to purchase one. Now I get to do some research to figure out if I should order a replacement part for the current blender or go ahead and order a single serve blender. If anyone has any experience with single serving blenders vs large blenders feel free to leave your opinion in the comments section.

  Ingredients

Serves 2

2 cups coconut milk

4 scoops whey protein powder

1 bag frozen peaches

1 tbsp Honey

1 cup water

Directions

Place all ingredients in blender

Mix until smooth

Pour in cup

Look I made it back before the end of the week. So after being sick all week last week and the wife still a little under the weather. It was finally time to cook some real food again. Not having any clue on what to make I turned to Allrecipes.com to get a dinner idea. After a few minutes browsing I decided I would make Chicken Fettuccine Alfredo after seeing a recipe for Fettuccine Alfredo. Of course I didn't use the exact recipe but got a good idea for what I needed.

Having nothing in the house really I made a quick trip to the grocery store after work to pick up some things. I had always wanted to make my own cream sauce but never remembered to buy the cream. So I made sure to pick some up this time.

There are a few things to keep in mind while cooking this dish. One do not strain noodles over your sink. Instead just lightly strain them over the pot and add them directly to the sauce. When you get to the last bit of noodles don't strain them. This allows a little bit of the starchy water to be added to the cream. Second add the fresh basil as a last ingredient to the sauce. This ensures that it does not burn. Lastly do not cook anything on high. Medium heat is the hottest you need to put anything on.

I was able to make this meal in under an hour from start to the first savory bite. This included all the time to take the photos. Both the wife and I usually eat about 2 normal servings for dinner though it all ends up on only 1 plate or bowl. So of course we always love when dinner is so yummy and there is enough left over for lunch the next day. Hope you all enjoy the recipe. It was a pleasant change to microwaved food from the past week. 

Ingredients

2 cups heavy cream

2 sticks of butter

45g of Ramona cheese

59g of Parmesan cheese

1 tsp of minced garlic

1 box of Fettuccine noodles

Salt and Pepper to taste

450g of Chicken breasts

 Directions

Cook chicken on stove using your favorite cooking oil

Cook noodles 8-10 minutes

When the chicken is done start melting butter in cream

Mix in garlic, salt, pepper and both cheeses

Mix in basil to sauce when noodles have finished

Add noodles to sauce

Add Chicken

Stir real good

Hello world. My wife has blogged for years now and I figured it would be a good idea to start my own. I stood up this site a while back thinking I would write all of these reviews for different technology products that I own. Needless to say life has gotten in the way of writing those reviews. I now decided that I would try to do at least a weekly post with what is going on in my life. This might spark a new idea for this site. 

This past week started out horrible. I was sick all week long and of course ended up getting the wife sick. So the beginning of the week ended up being tons of TV. We finally decided to start watching Doctor Who on Netflix. We have now made it halfway through Season 6 in about a week. So it's a good thing that our ISP doesn't limit our bandwidth. 

Before I went and got the wife sick we did manage to get through a few new board games. Ticket To Ride Europe with 1912 expansion, Castles of Mad King Ludwig, and King of Tokyo. We both had played the original Ticket To Ride so we knew we would enjoy the Europe version. Castles of Mad King Ludwig was okay with 2 players but would be much better with 4. Out of the 3 games I think King of Tokyo was the favorite for both of us. It plays pretty quick with 2 people but can take a little longer if you like. It can be played with up to 6 people and we both can't wait to play it with our friends. 

Only thing productive really to happen this week was I switched my computer case out and added a new custom water loop to replace the Thermaltake Bigwater 760. The main reason to change out my case was I had it for the past 6.5 years and was wanting a case that provided better cable management. So I decided on the NZXT H630 since my motherboard is classified as E-ATX board. However, I think it would fit in a standard ATX case. After modding the Bigwater 760 it was much better than stock. The mod was relatively simple as I just changed the fan direction from top to bottom to bottom to top. I then added an additional 120mm fan underneath to create a push/pull radiator.  I would have kept using the Bigwater however, the new case only had two 5.25 drive bays and the modification requires three 5.25 drive bays. 

I picked up a Monsoon M2 reservoir and a full GPU block. I purchased a used Swifttech kit that included a water block, pump, and 240mm radiator that I am using. There were some additional parts that I am not using as they wouldn't work in my case. The new custom loop that I installed now also includes my video card in the loop. Including the video card in the loop has increased my CPU temps a few degrees. However, it has drastically decreased my GPU temps over the stock cooler. In addition, I don't have to worry about the GPU fan sounding like a turbine jet engine when the GPU starts being used. 

I almost wasn't able to finish transferring the computer to the new case. I had to make a quick run to Conrad's to get 2 power extender cables. This was due to this being my first case with the power supply mounting on the bottom. Another unexpected event was having to order a new wireless NIC. My motherboard included a mPCIe wireless N card but of course one of the cooling tubes needed to run right through it so I decided it was time to upgrade from N to AC. I am not a fan of running cables all over the house anymore. So of course I had to order a new ASUS Wireless NIC. It won't arrive till at least Monday though. So I will be sticking with the Macbook till then. Though, I can always run a quick CAT5e through the hallway if I must use my desktop. 

Hopefully I will find time to get some more posts up during the week. If you don't see any before next Saturday, you can at least expect a new post next Saturday.