Today in 1969, Apollo 11 landed on the moon. In honor of that, Google's gone and put moon images into the maps interface and created Google Moon.

Be sure to click on the various landing site, and zoom all the way in to see the truth about the moon. Oh, and read their FAQ, too.

In July of 1998 I moved from working in the Television group to the Online Desk. It has been six of the best years in my professional life. I got to do everything from editing content to creating graphics to writing software and designing entire systems for the creation and delivery of content. I've worked with big and small clients, I've helped other groups within the company, and all the while doing this with a fun group of people.

Tomorrow is their last day in this job.

I am certain of one thing, and only one thing: these people, these coworkers, these friends of mine, they are starting a new journey that will take them places they have been wanting to go. None of them will be left wanting, none of them will find it too difficult to find a job. I'm also starting a new job, in another division. But I'm still left saddened and a little morose.

I couldn't have done it all these years without them. Some, I'd never seen before my stint on the desk. Others I'd worked with across jobs and companies. A dozen years here, eight there, and five here... It adds up to real time. Real friendships.

At work, we always had a fun atmosphere. They made the bad days bearable and the good days great. They helped guide me professionally and they were there when I needed someone to guide me personally.

The hardest part is not that they will be without jobs -- I don't think they will be for long. The hardest part is knowing that most of them are leaving. To be sure, we'll stay in touch, but it's not the same.

It saddens me to see this happen. It saddens me to know the laughter and the poke-poke-poking won't be there. But, to each and every one of you, I salute you, my friends.

Thanks for the many great years, and here's to many more.

The technologies behind the new operating system are, simply stated, big moves. Apple has essentially identified really granular things that the OS should be doing and moved them where they belonged. They've finally made APIs available to developers that won't be broken in the next OS release. They've opened up major technologies for easier access by developers. And they have laid the ground work for even more innovative programs and features in future releases.

Apple could spend the next two or three OS release cycles leveraging everything that Tiger is introducing under the hood. And that's why I will spend the money, and recommend anyone else spend the money, on an upgrade. This isn't a small performance boost and it isn't improvements meant to make the OS more stable and more usable (though those are there). This is, conceptually, as big a leap under the skin as was OS 9 to OS 10.

I could go on and on about the changes but, lucky for me, John Siracusa over at Ars Technica already has. In an impressive dissection of Tiger, Siracusa takes you into the guts of the new OS, as well as showing you the new applications and user interfaces. He digs under the hood and provides the reasons for speed improvements and shows all the building blocks that have to go together to make those new technologies work.

I know it is very long, sometimes rather technical and often preachy, but it is worth every minute you spend reading it. The future is there, it has to be harnessed.

It sucks, but I will get to them. Just not in the next couple of weeks. I'm off to Toronto for a couple of days, mid-week.

I've got a few posts and a bunch of pictures to put up, so I will try to get to those over the next week and weekend.

The reason we went was to see an "old fashioned" burlesque show. The show itself was not too bad, but four sets over a three hour period was just not what I would call value for money. But the people who came out, well, they were the stars of the show.

There was "Bondage Pants" Man. He was wearing a nice pair of black pants with red accents to them. Oh, and they had buckles and belts between each of the legs, making it hard to move. He was dancing like your typical white male: flailing arms and legs going to different beats.

Then there was "Pseudo Army" Man. This guy was dressed in leather pants, an Iraq themed T-shirt and an Australian/desert-type leather hat. And he was dancing like a man possessed. Just not with the music we were listening to.

Of course, no techno party would be complete without a geek boy. Geek Boy was just that: geeky, tall and wearing jeans and a T-shirt. The T-shirt read "Foo" on the front and "Bar" (in big huge letters on the back). Go look it up, but suffice it to say, I'm not geeky enough to wear that.

Lastly, well, there was "Cane Man". Cane Man was walking around looking to all the world like a late 1800's dandy. Longish hair, tapestry for clothing, long coat, and, of course, a cane. He was walking around the entire time having a very long and involved conversation. With himself. It was hysterical, except that he kept swinging the cane and I was worried we'd get hit.

Fun night.

I'm at Hartsfield airport and I hear the following announcement:

"For those of you on Delta Flight 271 to Columbus, OH, I'm sure you are aware that we should be boarding right now. Unfortunately we don't have any flight attendants. As soon as we can locate some flight attendants and get them on the plane, we will begin boarding."

Just the thing you want hear when you've got an hour and half to catch your connecting flight.

A few minutes later: "The flight attendants are in the building. They are in concourse B and should be here [concourse A] in a few minutes."

It'll be my first trip to Hotlanta, and hopefully it won't be all that hot. And while I've been to Iceland a few times, this will be my first visit in the spring.

Should be a fun time.

The descriptions of the dishes are wonderful, but the commentary is hysterical. Standouts include: Slender quenchers, snappy mackerel casserole, mousse of salmon, and Frankfurter spectacular should tide you over!

Very disturbing.

To see the full roster of entries, head on over to Domestic Goddess and check out the list.

The best part is the cost: just over $1.50 for many many minutes of talking. Their rates are pretty damn good. I think the service is great, and I'm going to use it a bit more. And calls from one Skype user to another cost nothing.

So this month's Paper Chef has some odd ingredients. Odd in that they don't immediately jump to mind as something I'd want to eat together. Eggplant, pomegranate, stale bread and chocolate. Yeah, I wasn't quite sure what I was going to do with that.

My first thought involved a baba ghanouj-like spread. Eggplant, chocolate and tahini (trust me, the two of those go as well as chocolate and peanut butter) spread on a stale bread crostini with pomegranate seeds for garnish. I considered a mole casserole with eggplant and chicken. But in the end, I wanted to try making a dessert with eggplant. Mostly because it's such a silly idea.

I decided I'd make a quasi-bread pudding with eggplant and a pomegranate chocolate sauce to top it off. I also wanted some pomegranate seeds for garnish, but after hitting four different markets, I found out that pomegranates are not in season, which makes them more of an odd choice.

For the pudding:

• 4 oz bittersweet chocolate
• 1.5 tablespoons butter
• 1 medium eggplant
• 1/4 loaf sourdough bread, stale
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1/2 teaspoon grated nutmeg
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 tablespoon dark rum (optional)
• pinch of salt
• butter and sugar for pan

Heat the oven to 350° F. Melt the chocolate and butter in a microwave safe container (~ 1 min at 50% power), then mix thoroughly. Slice the raw eggplant lengthwise and scoop out the meat leaving the skin behind. Pull the crust off the bread and roughly tear or chop the bread into smaller pieces. Add the eggplant, bread and sugar into a food processor and pulse for about a minute or until everything is well mixed. Add the egg and pulse until incorporated. Add chocolate/butter mix, nutmeg, vanilla, salt and rum (if using) and pulse until the liquid is a nicely homogenous.

Butter two individual serving bundt cake pans and sprinkle sugar inside. Fill to just over 3/4 way up with the batter. Place the cake pans on a cookie sheet and place in the oven for 45 mins. Rotate once during baking. Once finished, place pans on a cooling rack and let sit for 15 mins. Overturn and allow to cool to room temperature.

For the sauce:

• 1/2 cup pomegranate juice
• 4 oz bittersweet chocolate
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 tablespoon heavy cream
• pinch salt

Put the juice, chocolate, butter, sugar and salt in a pot and bring to a simmer, constantly stirring. Be careful to watch the pot lest it boil over. Reduce the liquid by half. Take off heat and stir in vanilla and heavy cream. Let cool, then place in dispensing bottle and refrigerate.

For candied eggplant:

• Six thin sliced rounds of eggplant
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup water

Bring water and sugar to a rollicking boil and add eggplant rounds leaving them in for a minute or so. Pull eggplant out and place in a shallow container, pour the syrup over them. Let sit for an hour, then drain the eggplant and place on parchment paper. Sprinkle with sugar and place in a 250° F oven until dry and crunchy.

Plate up the cakes, pour some sauce over cake and into bundt hole. Garnish with candied eggplant, whipped cream and mint. Sprinkle a little confectioner's sugar on top.

Enjoy the Inquisition.

Tasting notes are after the jump.

It could have used a little less time in the oven. The bottom of it, which was open and on top in the oven, is drier than it should be. I love the crumbly nature of it though. The best way to describe this is like a zucchini bread, only more sweet.

The candied eggplant is surprisingly good. The caramel flavors dominate the eggplant, and the crisp exterior give just slightly to a chewy interior.

Would I make this again? Well, to be honest, eggplant is not my thing at all. I'd probably not go out of my way to make this, unless it was to impress or scare someone. But it is very tasty, nonetheless.