Lemons..

Ok.. My one nit that really annoys me w/ Windoze.. Why the $#$#!L does it take 2-4 minutes to connect to a frickin wifi network.. I can never find the dumb utility that will give you the list of available networks.. I generally have to wait for Windows to finally display it for me.. With OSX, I could be on the network in seconds.. Sheesh.. Anyway, I see this frequently with any windows based laptop when roaming to a new area....

Heelllooo.. You guys are missing the main point here-- What the heck did this guy do to get stuck underneath a LAWN MOWER! I guess I just don't know how you get stuck underneath a 6" mower unless you're REALLY hairy and thought a good mow might be easier than a full-body shave???

I'll stick with my current homebrew system consisting of a outdated (e.g. cheap!) Compaq Proliant 6400R with dual redundant power supplies, 4 hot swappable RAID array (w/battery backed cache) expandable to many more drives, quad processors (550Mhz Pentium II Xeons) and up to 4GB RAM -- all running Linux (FC3 currently) keeping a nice low cpu load.. I've had this machine running for almost 4 months without ANY powerdown or reboot (it would be longer but I needed to reconfigure my power cords).. It's running Exim, MySQL, Postgres, PHP, Apache, SSH, etc. The great thing is that IF one of my drives fails, I can plop in a new one and the raid system automagically rebuilds without any help.. I picked this machine up off of e*bay for $75 and it works GREAT!

MikeH --

Not sure if it is of interest, but you might checkout Kamado's Extruded Coconut Charcoal (reviewed on the TNW's website I posted above) which goes for about $8/box current + shipping. It's all natural and 100% carbon which means it burns great, but can be a bit hard to start -- however, it produces little ash (compared to other brands) and can run for hours in a temperature controlled environment. More info can be found on the Kamado site linked from TNW's review if I recall. I completely agree that the quality of your lump is mandatory to ensure a good cook of whatever you're cooking. Why take a chance on cooking an expensive piece of meat to some crappy coals!

After I upgraded recently to my Kamado ceramic grill, I found that some companies that make "lump" do so using some sort of process that involves the use of diesel fuel -- one of those companies is Kingsford for their Charwood product (not the briquette -- I didn't have any to try this with) and IF (and only if) you get that stuff going REALLY smoking hot (like you can easily do with one of those charcoal chimneys so that flames are coming out the top and all of the coals are bright red) and with it sitting on the ground, stick your nose (while standing preferably!!) over the rising heat cone from it and I think you'll smell what appears to smell of a diesel truck idling nearby.. This is also the case with one variety of Best Of the West that I had purchased at my local Smart-n-Final.. Try that test IF you have one of these products and for me, both emitted a strong diesel truck odor.. I pinged Kingsford support about this and they denied this was an issue with their product and when I called them on it and how to reproduce the nasty odor in their charwood product, they decided to no longer reply. I should mention that my testing methodology indicated above did NOT use any sort of charcoal lighter -- only paper in the chimney was used to start the fires. If you haven't read the reviews, TNG's site is great for charcoal reviews -- see :

http://www.nakedwhiz.com/lump.htm

Ok -- I guess I forgot that minor detail (8->

Anyway -- here's a link with photos.. On the top of that page is a link to the mfg's website if you're interested.

http://www.pbase.com/nrflower/kamado

Oops.. I forgot to mention that my ceramic grill runs on charcoal lump (not that kingsford crud) and only needs to be cleaned out about once every few months (for ashes that is) -- otherwise it's no different than loading up any other BBQ and getting it going.. I use a weed flame thrower that I got from Harbor Frieght Tools to start my coals going -- it usually only takes about 2 minutes tops -- no need for a charcoal chimney, etc.. Not much different that your gas variety here. Just my $0.02 worth..

Hmm.. I've been grilling for several months now (here in So-Cal). I recently purchased a new grill that is completely different that any other I've had in the past and I believe that with a little TLC, this grill will be around and cooking for the next 25 years instead of the average 2-5 years for those metal/wood models that everyone pays big $$ for every summer only to rust and otherwise decay into a rusting heap. In case you're wondering, my grill is mostly ceramic and can keep a nice oven like temperature going for literally hours on end -- this allows you to grill steaks with sear marks on them like you see some people able to do (temps >600-700 degrees), but also allows you to do the low-n-slow thing to roast your ribs or pork butts for >24 hours if you want -- all with that great smoke flavor that you can add if you wish (e.g. apple wood, hickory, etc).

Maybe those particular lemon bars were really nasty! We've got two people that make home-made lemon bars on occasion here and they get wolfed down fairly fast -- they're definately gone by the end of the day.. Of course, there is no competion from brownies, cookies or other food..