I’m back from a 2 week vacation in New York, Philadelphia, Hershey, Cape Code and Boston.

Of all the places we ate at, one place really stood out and I’d go back again: Wood’s Seafood in Plymouth, MA. The fish was incredibly fresh, the portions were ginormous, and the prices were down right cheap (but then again my Bay Area-tized perspective skews things. Heck, even apartments on Newbury St seemed reasonably priced!).

I learned about this restaurant through Live Search QnA. Good thing I asked there!

Law and Disorder – WSJ.com
Mr. Wolf and the Universal executives had better luck at NBC, which premiered “Law and Order” in the fall of 1990. Before it aired, Mr. Wolf made one change. Compared to everything else on television, “Law and Order” moved at a lightning pace, with no scene lasting more than two pages. This was giving test viewers whiplash. Mr. Wolf added a “chung chung” chime and inserted a location card between scenes to let viewers take a breath.

Otherwise, the show has remained almost exactly as Mr. Wolf envisioned. A former advertising copywriter, he sees “Law and Order” as a brand. He tells his writers that the series should be like Campbell’s Soup: many different flavors, all of which are of consistent quality and predictable taste. “Episodic television is the triumph of the familiar,” he is known to say. One way Mr. Wolf maintains this consistency is by making most of the victims wealthy white people, which he believes viewers are more interested in watching. He limits the number of shows containing minority victims, including blacks and Muslims, to four or five episodes a season out of 22 to 24.

This isn’t particularly surprising. People like a certain amount of predictability, especially when they’re just relaxing watching TV.

Mortgage Giants Take Beating On Fears Over Loan Defaults – WSJ.com
Congress and the White House are counting on Fannie, Freddie and the Federal Housing Administration to prop up the mortgage market as other financial institutions shun what they see as a treacherous business. Fannie and Freddie “are critical to keeping the economy going,” said Frederick Cannon, chief equity strategist at Keefe, Bruyette & Woods in San Francisco.

Fascinating – so apparently if people stopped borrowing money to buy used homes from each other, our economy will implode. This doesn’t strike me as our nation’s finest moment.

Bloomberg.com: Bonds
Obama May Produce $1 Trillion Deficit, Gross Says Update3

By Candice Zachariahs

June 30 Bloomberg — Bill Gross, manager of the worlds biggest bond fund at Pacific Investment Management Co., said a Barack Obama administration may have no other choice than to produce the first $1 trillion U.S. budget deficit.

“You have inherited a mess, Gross, co-chief investment officer of Pimco, said in an open letter to Obama, the likely Democratic presidential nominee, published on the Newport Beach, California-based companys Web site today. “What do I think you should do as the new president to rectify this mess? All I know is that any solution will come with a high price tag.

…

Republicans “will blame you for years and label you `Trillion-Dollar Obama,”’ said Gross, in his analysis that assumes Obama will defeat his presumptive Republican adversary, John McCain. . “There is, in fact, not much that you or any other President can do.”

Yipes. Best of luck to either McCain or Obama! Talk about seeking a challenge…