This is not a man with a blog.

Was for sale: 1976 BMW R60/6 (this bike has been sold)

By Shabbir | January 7, 2007 | Comments Off on Was for sale: 1976 BMW R60/6 (this bike has been sold)

[I sold this bike already.  I’m just leaving this here for archival purposes.   -Shabbir] So I’m selling my beloved first motorcycle, a 1976 BMW R60/6.  When I bought my Harley a couple of years ago I stopped riding it.  I put it in my shed, covered it, and that’s the last time I spent any…

Back from Pakistan! Poker results for 2006!

By Shabbir | January 2, 2007 | Comments Off on Back from Pakistan! Poker results for 2006!

So I’m back from Pakistan.  Can you believe that I traveled for two weeks through a region at risk for tuberculosis, hepatitis, and food poisoning, but that I was done in by a cold I caught in California upon my return? The trip was amazing, and I have both video and photos to share with…

No access to e-mail or web.

By Shabbir | December 11, 2006 | Comments Off on No access to e-mail or web.

see you in two weeks.

The gear manifest.

By Shabbir | December 9, 2006 | Comments Off on The gear manifest.

"Moishe’s going to miss you.  He’s going to ask for you constantly", said Sarah in the car on the way to the airport. "Tell him daddy’s on safari to get him pictures of buses and trucks", was my response. As you probably know my last trip to Pakistan two years ago was a photo bonanza. …

Ah, this is the life.

By Shabbir | December 9, 2006 | Comments Off on Ah, this is the life.

26 hours.  From start to finish, I’ll be traveling 26 hours.  It was this thinking, among others, that led me to buy a first tier ticket from PIA (Pakistan International Airlines).  Traveling business class (there is no first class on PIA) is like hanging around a lot of people with disposable income who aren’t rich…

I’m almost gone.

By Shabbir | December 9, 2006 | Comments Off on I’m almost gone.

I love you, but I think I need to see other people. Brown people, specifically.  In just about 6 hours I’ll be sitting on a plane beginning my 26 hour journey to Karachi, Pakistan.  Don’t feel too sorry for me though, I’m not flying coach.  And I’m flying alone for the trip there.  Upon arrival…

And this is why I don’t run my own blog server…

By Shabbir | December 5, 2006 | Comments Off on And this is why I don’t run my own blog server…

..the maintenance is a killer.  Every piece of technology I own requires some amount of sysadmin time.  It’s not that I’m not a competent sysadmin, it’s that there isn’t time to deal with it all and do it well. Case in point: My Chef’n pepper grinder and Pakistani diaries entries.  The photo links for those…

A new personal best!

By Shabbir | December 5, 2006 | Comments Off on A new personal best!

Although December is almost over, I think I played my last live poker in DC this past Friday night.  After the company holiday party at Local16, one of the company’s directors had us over to his house and we played a $.25/$.50 game of no limit hold’em.  The maximum stack you could buy was $50,…

Peking Roast Duck

By Shabbir | December 4, 2006 |

Over Thanksgiving I really wanted to roast a duck, so I dug up a recipe and did it.  The result was pretty good, and not greasy at all like you’d expect a duck to be. I’ve placed the photos up on flickr, please take a look. Peking Roast Duck, by Chef Shabbir

Don’t provoke the civilization, it bites.

By Shabbir | December 1, 2006 | Comments Off on Don’t provoke the civilization, it bites.

I actually read my spam.

No, that’s not exactly right.  Because of my past life, I get a sizable percentage of e-mail from people who would otherwise be putting up fliers at the local monthly UFO watchers Meet Up.

I have a kindred spirit with these people who range in lucidity from giving me a call periodically to see if I’ll help get attention for their injustice to just sending me crazy e-mail about their ongoing litigation with the US gov’t.  There are a surprising number of veterans among them, which I find very sad.  At the end of the day they are so much like me, with a cause they champion and the megaphone of the Internet.  They just seem to be missing that internal compass that tells the rest of us that we’re really overlooking a key point.  Or that perhaps we aren’t right.

Perhaps I possess a modicum of self-doubt that they lack, or perhaps the chemicals in my brain are in better proportion.  Either way, I feel that if Alzheimer’s ever hits me, I’ll be on the other end of this transaction.

Today’s is a first for me.  I’ve never had an Asian crazy spam before.  So here it is for all you’re viewing pleasure.  Here’s my favorite quote, by the way:

"If everyone can tramp down on
law and publicly provoke the civilization of the world, like Du Pon and its CEO
Holliday have done, what the world will be? "