My Husband Betty
Helen Boyd is the author of one of the best books on dealing with living with someone with who is transgendered from the spouse’s (most particularly the wife’s) perspective. If your married, I can’t emphasize enough how important it is to understand your spouse’s point of view, it goes a long way to helping you both communicate on your very real transgender (GID) issues. Whether your male-to-female or female-to-male I’d suggest you take a look at her book. This book was very important to me in understanding my wife’s point of view. For my wife, she was able to at last read something from another genetic woman who’s husband is transgendered and who did not necessarily think their situation was all "wonderful" nor all "terrible". It’s well researched, well written, and well worth reading.
Helen’s journal, (en)gender, is at this link here.
You can buy the book from Amazon at this link here.
64-bit slap down
64-bit desktop computing (for the rest of us, not the tech weenies) is starting to really make a surge. I had posted here about 64-bit computing asking the question if any of us really needed it, and how we might get some bargains in the meantime on older 32-bit computers. Back then, I had the opinion that most of us won’t need 64-bit computing, however, the times are changing, and for the Frugal Tech, you dollar can go further on your tech purchases.
What we are talking about of course is the seemingly epic struggle between Intel and AMD for control (or at least a reasonable split) of the computing desktops and compute server racks of the IT World. On one side, we’ve got Intel with it’s approach to the market and on the other AMD with it’s approach. They are both driving everyone to 64-bit (even if the software applications are not quite available yet).
For the technically inclined, please note benchmarks at C/net at this link here
Our friends in Russia (and now also the U.S.) at X-Bit labs have run some benchmarks as well and you can see those at this link here.
First, the punch line – AMD Athlon64 based computers at 64-bit are hands down better than their Intel counterparts. On price, performance, and on the lesser considered but equally important issues of power consumption and thermal dissipation (how much heat the chips give off) AMD’s Athlon64 processors are just a better bargain.
So let’s talk about why you should care, what you might do about it, and, most importantly for the Frugal Tech, how it effects your purse.
Snarflats and Thingamabobs – review of The Little Mermaid
I make no bones about the fact I love older movies. I have nothing against newer ones, I just like to find the fun niches in the older ones. The buried treasure if you will 
When you have sick children, one of the nicest things you can do for them is just be with them. This is no small feat at times! The to do list is on your mind, that project needs to get done…
Well, I got a chance this weekend to do both of the above nice things, revisit an old movie and make sure one my sick children felt better while watching Disney’s “The Little Mermaid”, based on the story by Hans Christian Andersen (see link here). If you haven’t seen this one in a while you should! If you’ve never seen it you really have to. The animation is the older two dimensional approach that Disney built it’s reputation on and it’s done very well. However, what sets the story apart is the story line. It’s amazing how good it is – even today.
Some of my favorite parts are:
- The heroine, Ariel’s, spunky character and her deep need to be someone decidedly different from who she is currently
- Sebastian, the crab, as sidekick and babysitter
- The theme of sacrifice for the one you love
- The great music!!
- The fact it’s just plain fun and romantic
So grab that cocoa, blanket and the one you snug with and have a look, you’ll be happy you did
Chicken Ragout with Potatoes & Olives – Tasty Chicken Heaven
When I made this I thought, "they will hate it". I have no idea why I thought that, I think it was the odd mixture of onions, garlic and olives and how those simply do not mix with children. Then, as I was making this dish, and the wonderful aromas were wafting from my kitchen kingdom through the rest of our house, I heard the peep every chef loves to hear, "hey what’s that smell, it smells sooo good". Well, my confidence shored up, I drove ahead in making this dish. The recipe is courtesy of "Make it in Minutes" a Weight Watchers cookbook (you can check out the cookbook at this link here). A ragout, for your general cooking trivia knowledge, is French for "A well-seasoned meat or fish stew, usually with vegetables". This one uses chicken and it is heavenly (especially on a cold night).
Click on for the fabulous taste treat!
