Does anyone actually know what hummus is? I do!

August 6, 2003

There’s an old expression, “Try something new every day.” Well, I don’t know if it’s actually an expression, but it’s at least a SAYING that I’ve heard before. Anyhow, today I decided to try both something new and something new to eat: hummus. As someone put it, “Are you planning on cutting ALL meat out of your diet?” Heck no. I just wanted something new to put in a sandwich since cheese is pretty fatty. I’m not trying to cut all the fat out of my diet, but I figure, less fat is pretty good, as long as I supplement it with plenty of other nutrients.

So I went back to my trusty AllRecipes that I use for most of my recipe needs and I found a good, low-fat hummus recipe. Actually, I didn’t even know what hummus was before I looked. I figured there was something exotic about it, but geez, it’s basically just beans and spices. Just like lots of other dips. I went down to the store and picked up a couple of cans of garbanzo beans (chick peas!) and some extra ingredients. I ended up making it with the beans, garlic, a red pepper, paprika, cumin, parsely flakes, cilantro, and lemon juice. It turned out…well..I think. You know, since I’d never had hummus before, I wasn’t exactly sure how it was supposed to taste, but it was a bit spicy. I knew that it would be, and I was OK with it, but again, I wasn’t really sure how it would taste. I also bought some pita bread to use to eat some of it to see if I liked it, and frankly, I did. I ended up using the hummus for dinner in a sandwich, and boy, it was one of the best sandwiches I’ve had in awhile. I don’t know if it was necessarily the hummus or the other new things I did to the sandwich (salad dressing on the lettuce, oregano, salt and pepper), but it sure was good. I sure write a lot about food here, don’t I?

Yeah, so the biggest point in my day was making hummus. I need a hobby. A different hobby than computers, that is. I went and mailed a package and a couple of letters and saw my friend Mike who I used to work at Papa Murphy’s with, and we decided to go get a pitcher of beer next week. I also talked to my friend Hannah that I had coffee with a few weeks ago and WE arranged to have coffee early next week, so I guess I won’t be quite as solo.

Ooo, another neat thing I wanted to tell everyone about but had to wait is a cool DVD I bought online. Many years ago (like about ten), groups of people used to get together and make computer presentations, called “demos,” where they would demonstrate their programming skills in computer graphics and music composition, and then publlish them on the Internet, show them off at computer and demo shows, etc. Anyhow, there was one in particular, widely hailed as one of if not the best of all time that my sister and I really liked, and so in my searches for it on the Internet, I came across a place SELLING it. Now, I was looking to download it because as I mentioned, I’m thinking about building a new/old computer to play old games on, and being able to play this old demo would have been fantastic since I can’t get it to run on my computer now since, well, my PC is too good for it. Anyhow, while looking for a download site (you’d be surprised how hard it is to find something ten years old on the Internet without being in a chat room), I came across a company who had complied several dozen of these demos, approximately four hours worth, to be exact, and was selling them on DVD. I had to buy it. So not only do I now own a permanent copy of the demo I’ve loved for ten years that I can play without having to build an old computer to run it on, I have three hours a fifty-five minutes of ones I’ve never seen before–including a few more from the same group. I’m looking forward to watching all the ones I haven’t seen before, but even watching a couple of the others on it besides the one I bought it for proved that they just weren’t as good as the one I like. Well, maybe some of the others will be good.

I’ve often wondered what happened to the guys who made that demo. I know where a few of them are, working for various companies (a bunch of them went on to found Remedy Entertainment who made the game Max Payne that I probably haven’t mentioned before, but I love), doing their own thing, but not really together anymore. I always loved the music to the demo in particular, and I’ve kept tabs on the guy who composed the music for it, even going as far as downloading the music when I couldn’t watch the demo. Great stuff, classic techno.

Well OK, in any case, that was my excitement for yesterday, getting that DVD. I don’t think I have much else to look forward to this week, but hey, that just means I have the week open, right? Night everyone.

Posted in Geekery, General, Movies