We’re number 4 in the nation according to Business Insider.
I can imagine most of it stems from having so many poor drivers on the road, as well as the Buffalo Bills being the local favorite.
Of course 4th place is the 3rd loser. Let’s do better next year.
Rochester is the 4th most affordable city to live in.
Thanks to my buddy Rob for sharing this, and since I haven’t written anything in awhile (new job, busy!), this is a good place to try to pick it back up.
Since our manufacturing outfits screwed us in the 80′s, we’ve had a jump on the rest of the country who’s only recently gotten screwed. We’ve diversified our economy. We have new industries. We have great academic opportunities. It will only keep getting better.
I bought my house 5 years ago. I’ve made numerous improvements, and since I live in an up and coming area, I’ve built up a lot of equity. The city itself hosts a lot of great opportunities, and a renaissance is coming. Slowly, but it is coming.
Having some server problems. I go into specifics in my other blogs, but I’m hoping to limp along and replace this machine eventually.
Some of the restaurants on my list for checking out next are Lento and Edibles. I have friends who work at both places, and I’ve neglected visiting them for too long.
Also it’s that time of the year for Halloween festivities. One of my childhood favorites was Powers Farm Market in East Rochester. They have these sweet Teepees and all this other cool stuff. I take my god-daughter there now, and it has been fun reliving the experience with her.
They don’t have their own website, but you can get the address details at RocWiki.
Finally! I made it!
I remember eating at that location when it was The Atomic Eggplant (RIP), so I was even more thrilled knowing that a new restaurant will be utilizing that space.
The layout of the restaurant has changed since then, with a bar greeting you as you walk in. On most nights, you’ll find Luc, an old friend of mine, behind the bar working at a furious pace to create some of the fancy concoctions you will find on their cocktail menu. The downstairs is minimal, with the upstairs space housing most of their tables. There’s also a rear patio too, but I believe the days of chilling out on the patio are quickly coming to a close for this season.
We were seated upstairs, and ordered drinks and an appetizer while we perused the menu. The upstairs has great hardwood floors and high ceilings. Very comfortable if you’re tall. We started off with the cigarillos, which are rolls of buffalo chicken and cheddar cheese in a tortilla, served with a delicate bleu cheese sauce. They were quite good, and I was pretty psyched for my main entree, The Big Licky, which is essentially a pulled pork sandwich, with a fantastic mustard BBQ sauce, with a side of home made potato chips as a side. I was pretty full at the end, so I opted out of dessert.
Over all it was a great experience. There was a technical issue with the printer, which delayed our dinner a bit, but it’s a growing pain of a new restaurant and I’m confident they’ll work through the bugs by the time I go back. And I am going back. It’s definitely a menu with a lot of interesting things on it, and I look forward to trying some of their vegan options as well. I’m not a vegan, but I appreciate all kinds of food, and honestly I like to see how vegan ingenuity recreates “normal” food.
The Owl House is at 75 Marshall Street, and their website is http://www.owlhouserochester.com/. I would recommend calling for reservations a few days in advance for a weekend evening. The word is definitely getting out there, and the amount of people they’ve been getting through the doors has been reaching new highs every week. Their hours are 11 to 11 Tuesday through Sunday. I only wish I worked in the city, because their sandwich menu would be totally kick ass for lunch.
Cross posted from Greenovation
As more and more people become technologically savvy, they eventually acquire more and more computer equipment. That old 386, 486 and early Pentium may still be sitting in your basement or your garage. You know you can’t throw it out, but what can you do with it? It’s too old for anyone to find a reasonable use for it, or perhaps one of the components is burned out and it’s just not worth it to fix. You can’t throw it out. PC’s, especially older ones, are filled with all sorts of unfriendly metals and components with mercury being one of the more poisonous. Odds are there’s also quite a bit of metal components in the machine, and metals are some of things more easily recyclable. The question that remains is where and how?
The good news is that if you live in a major metropolitan area there are probably several organizations that will take that old stuff off your hands. Most of them for free (they sell it for scrap), and some will charge you for certain items (older tube TV’s). If a machine is still viable, check with your local school board to see if they accept donations. A lot of inner city schools would love to add more computers to their classrooms.
Here in Rochester, we have our own recycling giant. They’re called Regional Computer Recycling and Recovery (RCR&R for short). They have drops all over the area, and most local computer retailers will accept your junk on their behalf. Anything under 5 lbs is free, and for anything over there are reasonable fees. If security is your concern regarding you old hard drives, most are either destroyed or sanitized. They can guarantee your drive has been sanitized in writing for an additional fee as well, which should help you sleep better at night knowing that any residual personal data won’t fall into inappropriate hands.
I work in the financial services industry (in IT), and once or twice a year we offer our customers a unique experience. We team up with RCR&R and our local shredding company to provide recycling of our clients old hardware (and shredding of their old documents). An RCR&R truck and a shred truck (unrelated to RCR&R) will be parked outside and our clients will filter in throughout the afternoon dropping off old stuff to be recycled. We foot the bill for this, and it allows us to put our clients at ease by offering this unique service and making sure their old hardware doesn’t end up in the wrong hands or in a landfill.
If you want to learn more about the corporate and residential services that RCR&R offers for the Greater Rochester region, check out their website at eWaste.com.
If you want to check out other options for recycling in your area, check out your local municipal web pages for information. If you’re a Monroe County resident, you can find a list of possible alternatives here.
A restaurant I’m eagerly awaiting to eat at should be opening in the next week or so, according to my inside sources… and their Twitter feed (@theowlhouse). I’ve followed The Owl House’s progress on Twitter and Facebook for several months now, and mentioned it several times. I’m really excited, and their menu looks great. You can check it out at http://www.owlhouserochester.com/. I will definitely share my experience with everyone after I’ve had a chance to visit.
I’ve been out of town a lot this summer. Been to a lot of big cities and all over America. I’m still happy to come home to Rochester though.
Anyways, I just wanted to get in a quick update so people don’t think I’ve given up or died. I’m here. I’m just REALLY busy.
I also want to plug another web project I’ll be part of. Greenovation at http://imagecitygreen.com/ is a new project started by my good friend Jason Rowe. While the site’s idea is globally focused, all the talent is local (so far). This is also a business venture for Jay, as he does consulting work to bring green concepts and technology to the homes and businesses of his clients. The site will also be selling a lot of great items to help you lower your environmental foot print and save money on your utility bills. The site is still in its infancy, but I have a good feeling about it.
Stop on over and let your presence be known in the comments section.
Have a good night, and stay cool. Although I’m really psyched that we’ve had an actual hot summer after the a few duds in a row.
Tonight is the first of many of the the East End Festival in the city. Lots of live music and plenty to drink. Check out the details at the official website. The chief sponsor is also The Downtown Fitness Club, which I’ve talked about and recommended in the past.
In other site news, I was out of town last week. Specifically I was deep in the heart of Southern Kansas, just north of Oklahoma. If you’ve ever questioned your choice of living in Rochester, I’d have to say you haven’t seen enough of the rest of the world. Not to knock the mid west, as it definitely has its own special small town charm, but I was certainly glad to be back home in my mid size Rochester.
I’ll be heading out to to explore the Big Apple next weekend, which will offer a totally different contrasting situation to my last outing. The more I see of America, the more I appreciate where I call home. Not that anywhere else is “worse” or “better”, but it is different, and hell, I’m comfortable here. If I found a place I liked better, I’ll move there, until then I’ll keep exploring, but Rochester will always be OK in my book.
The rest of June should slow down, and there’s still some new restaurants I’m dying to try. I’m still looking for help too. Until later, enjoy the weather!
I hope everyone has had a chance to make it up there this week. I haven’t had a chance yet, but I live in the neighborhood and traffic was pretty consistent all weekend. The weather looks like it will continue to hold out this week, so attendance should be pretty high. Hopefully there are still some flowers left, but there’s plenty of other things going on as well.
I should be getting back to posting more regularly. I’ve been pretty busy lately with my other two sites and life in general, so it’s been tougher to check out new places to eat.
I’m looking forward to The Owl House opening up on Marshall street, off Monroe Ave. Check out their Twitter and Facebook feeds for more information. I’m pretty excited. They have a good crew on board and have been pretty transparent about what they’re doing to the place, and what they will be doing when the place opens. They casually mention some of the food they’ll be serving, and my interest is definitely piqued.
Also in the next few weeks is the Roc City Rib Fest! It’ll be up at Ontario Beach Park again and there are even more people competing this year, including a couple of good friends of mine (Go GCI!). There will be plenty of vendors, plenty of smoked food, and a lot of folks competing for a multitude of titles. It’s sure to be a blast.
I’m still looking for other people who want to help with the site’s momentum. It’s not a paying gig, but if you’re a foodie or a festival head with a positive attitude, I would love to have you write for the site.
