It's raining here

I thought I'd jump on the rain bandwagon. I felt very left out with all my friends from AZ and SoCal complaining about all the rain and I thought, "Gee, why am I not getting any rain. For goodness sakes I'm in Orlando, where in the course of just a few days we get more rain than AZ in a year." Well today it's been raining all day, as expected. So much expected that today's baseball game was preemptively played yesterday to make a double header. UCF dominated by sweeping Monmouth 6-4, and 8-3. I'm enjoying these free baseball games and I plan on going to a lot of them. Unfortunately I'm not at Arizona where their ball team is playing great and is ranked top ten in the nation. That's awesome and I expect more.

News of the Weird: TENACIOUS D
Farmington Hills, Mich., elementary school teacher Nancy Seaman, 52, on trial for murdering her husband, said it was self-defense, even though a reported autopsy said he had been stabbed 21 times and struck with a hatchet 15 times. (She was convicted in December.) And University of Virginia student Andrew Alston, on trial for fatally stabbing a firefighter after a night of bar-hopping, said the victim had actually inadvertently stabbed himself during aikido horseplay, even though there were 18 stab wounds, spread among the heart, arms, back, shoulder and face. (Alston was convicted of manslaughter in November.)

Free dinner is my reward

These past few days I've been absolutely spent trying to study for a couple of midterms. One was yesterday where the professor purposely gives way too much problems to work in the allotted time and threw several curveballs. The other was today, where the test wasn't too difficult, gave plenty of time yet I think I still managed to screw up several of the problems. After today's exam I immediately went home and promptly took a nap. Very nice. The best part is, there are two visitors in Orlando that are prospective grad students for CREOL. That means tonight there is a recruiting dinner of sorts and I get to be a recruiter. Free dinner, woo hoo. I remember my own visit out here and how I got a lot of free food out of it and basically a free three day trip. Even though I'm now on the opposite end, I'll still be able to get free meals out of it. Last Friday I went to a really nice, small, quaint, neighborhood Italian place and this week I get free Mexican. So I've been starving myself today to be plenty hungry for my food and I can't wait for the rest of the weekend to come as I have lots of baseball games to attend, TV shows to catch up on, and a little homework and lab work to do. Midterms are over.

News of the Weird: KNUCKLEHEAD DEATH WISH or SOON TO BE DARWIN AWARD WINNERS
In January, a 23-year-old woman, attempting a handstand on a hotel balcony railing in North Fort Myers, Fla., fell to her death but only after shouting to friends to "watch to see what I can still do." And a 21-year-old student at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln was killed when, not belted in, he was ejected from the back seat of an SUV in a crash; the student was prominent for his libertarian political views, including a defiant stand in the student newspaper against mandatory seatbelt laws. (He described himself as one of "a die-hard group of non-wearers out there who simply do not wish to buckle up.")

The Grad School Beast: Part 2

As I mentioned before, Grad school is kind of split in two parts. On one hand you have the classes and course work, the other half is devoted to research. Now it's this second part where all the fun is, and/or stress. The course work is all fine and dandy but it is really important just for passing the qualifier. The work you do for your advisor is the important stuff. This work, can be treated like real work, just like a job. I'm getting paid for it so I guess it is a job.

The professor I work for is pretty cool. A little hard to read at times but overall he's a good guy. He doesn't loom over your shoulder all the time, but he also keeps tabs to make sure the work is getting done. As a first year grad school it can be kind of hard to get homework and studying done while also juggling the tasks at work. Most professors are understanding when you need to catch up on homework because if you don't pass the qualifier then you're no good to them. My advisor seems to be understanding when I haven't quite finished the task but because of his nature he really doesn't say much and leaves wondering whether or not it really was okay.

It's this kind of unknowing that really bothers me. At times I'm unclear what really needs to be done, yet if he comes and something isn't done it weighs on me. It's mostly a communication issue that I'm sure will work out in time, I have been working for only a month. My two main tasks in the group are to assist another grad student on one experiment and to maintain the website. That second task really sucks but I don't think it will be too bad. Right now it hasn't changed in a long time so there's a lot to do. But after I'm caught up there will only be a few changes here and there. The other task is taking polarization readings from a random media. Ever since last years senior capstone project I've been intrigued by polarization so this is right down my alley. I'm still feeling my way around what exactly we are doing with this experiment and its purpose but is pretty neat. That's why work can be a blessing and bane. My advisor is mostly cool but can be hard to read. Sometimes I have very little to do and other times I have to come in at off peak times just to get the work done. Sometimes I hate taking the same readings over and over again just to do them again with a few adjustments to fine tune data. Other times, like this past Sunday, I like coming in and fiddling with the setup and seeing what the universe has to offer.

In grad school you can't expect too much cause with each coming week the situation changes. It's an altering environment. Each new discovery leads to more questions. There will always be classes, there will always be work. I just hope that soon I can figure out exactly what I want my thesis to be and get working on it. That's the ultimate goal.

Sweep,... sort of

But it was still a night the Suns dominated. Nobody really watches the NBA all-star weekend festivities, but those who did are sure to recognize the power in Phoenix. The night was set to belong to Phoenix and they nearly, completely owned it. All five starters for the Suns were there competing in four different events. The first event, shooting stars is comprised of a current player, WNBA counter-part, and a 'legend' from the team where they shoot from six varying points on the floor and best time wins. Since Phoenix had Shawn Marion, Diana Taurasi, and Dan Majerle they were a shoo in to win and they did by over 10 seconds. The next event was the skills event consisting of various running, dribbling, passing, and shooting drills. Steve Nash put the other competitors in there place after this event. Next up was the always thrilling three-point shootout. It can be fun to watch a dominate shooter struggle and another get hot. The Suns had both Joe Johnson and Quentin Richardson competing here. Joe struggled a bit but Q slipped into the final round where he caught fire to hit his last nine shots and win by one with a score of nineteen, very good. SO the night was set for the Suns to dominate and sweep the contests if Amaré Stoudemire could close out the slam dunk contest. But while his creativity was the best, with the help of the well-rounded soccer skilled Steve Nash, Amaré couldn't get over the hump and outshine the electrifying Josh Smith who won the crowd and judges over with a jersey homage to Dominique Wilkins.

A beautiful day for baseball

The plan was to work in the lab. The result was a day at the ballpark. I knew I had to attend the UCF baseball game because they were playing Notre Dame. my best friend Brian goes there so I had to watch for bragging rights. Weather was perfect. Low 70's, a few puffy clouds in the sky, and a soft cool breeze. The game turned out to be great as well. Great pitching and defense. There were a few errors but mostly from aggressive hardnose play and stupid things. UCF had a relatively early one run lead but in the 7th ND tied it. But right back in the bottom of the inning UCF scored the go-ahead run. The top of the ninth also featured som great defence including a hard liner and the final out was on a bobbled one-hand play where the third baseman had to throw on the run and while the throw was wide, the first baseman sacrificed his arm to make the stretch for the ball. There was also another great play where there was a hard pop fly that the runner from first thought wasn't caught because the second baseman was deking him to second, but this gave plenty of time for the center fielder who really had the ball to throw him out back at first. I'm excited about this team, they are aggresive and run a lot. They force the action and I can't wait to see the rematch tomorrow. Great game.

Linkity: Kind of a fun little link. I'm not sure how serious it is but I found it to be a little funny.

Grad school is a whole different beast

Ever since I've been attending, and even with one semester behind me, I've been struggling to classify what grad school is really like. At least in my field, part of it is class and studying, with another part work. The reason it seems weird is that although I have less time and work commitment, I end up working more and spending more time at school. Maybe I've just had an attitude adjustment and value my education more or perhaps there's a hidden force that holds me here.

Classes on one hand are just like a class for any other college undergraduate experience. I attend, mostly on a voluntary effort, I complete almost weekly homework, study for midterms and ultimately take the final exam. The difference is the structure of the class. Instead of explaining the topics and gearing the direction so that the homework problems and questions can be solved, the professor is likely to present the information, give a little direction and then move on. Rather than tell you what you need to know and how to do it, it's more like, "here's what you should know, plus more. Now go learn."

It's because of this that the classes are tougher. Even though I only have three classes, it seems like more than enough. Last semester, for what seems like the real first time in my life, I thoroughly stressed out over finals. As I said before, classtime and homework is not spent on making sure you can grasp and understand the concepts, that's up to you. Rather, classtime normally overviews the topics, at times just grazing the surface. Reading the text is an absolute must. Unfortunately most classes don't have a designated text and there is no instruction on what to read or what is really helpful. Most professors often give a list of recommended reading but only bits and pieces from each book are ever very helpful. At the end the shear volume of the topics and consumed information is just overwhelming.

Last semester I didn't know how I could learn everything for the final, and it was a complete mystery as to what would show up. Although some grades suffered, I really did learn a lot. With a semester behind me I starting to appreciate this new routine of reading a lot, struggling through homework and stressing over tests. But in the end it's an educational experience and grad school proves and lives by the adage, "You get out what you put in."

It's because of this hard work and heavy study and reading that this class I have right now really pisses me off. In class the professor is very deliberate, and makes the topics pretty straight forward but with no depth. The little he tries is of no help. Due to a friend's advice I read deep into Joseph Goodman's, Introduction to Fourier Optics. First it seems that the professor has just been following along the beginning of the book, and Goodman has done a much better job at teaching me than me teacher has. My first midterm for the class and this semester was yesterday morning. I was a bit worried, he had never taught the class before so no one could prepare me for what it would be like so I just studied and prepared for it all. Bam,yup, I over prepared. It turns out that all I needed to do was memorize the homework. Each homework for the class is only three problems. We only had three homeworks before the test. The test had only three problems. Yep, each question was from different homework. Now I'm not mad that I studied, learned and was well prepared, but I've been getting used to this new experience and I'm just hoping the class will start to push me and stop being a nuisance that I have to get up early in the morning to attend.

Sometimes I wonder though how much of my learning is by my own will and from reading and how much is actually being given to me by the institution. I guess the real benefit of attending a school is the structure, being surrounded by great minds who, for the most part, are willing to help you, and the opportunities that are continually opening up.

Since this has become a rather lengthy post I shall resume the second part later.

Blogging, my escape

I've started to cherish blogging. Every since I was given my own desk with my own computer in my office I've been a lot happier. The first thing I did with this computer was of course download Firefox with the essential extensions and Winamp. I'm fully prepared to tackle any obstacle ahead with my headphones on and grooving to streams from Digitally Imported. But whether I'm pounding out problems for the homework, reading the latest publications or text for class, or coding and updating the group website I'm eventually going to need/want a distraction. Normally surfing the web is fun, but I can only revisit the same sites so many times and I don't have the patience to weed through a lot of the other stuff, so now I blog. Because I spend a lot of the day behind a computer I've been very good about posting. I'm at least at and average of six posts per week. I wish I had little more returning readers, but it's not important. So to all the faithful readers, you'll have to visit more often because the updates will keep coming. And now onto some of my ongoing ever popular features that sit at the bottom of my posts.

News of the Weird: SMOOTH CRIMINAL
Jeffrey "Roofman" Manchester, 33, was finally recaptured after six months of inspired police-dodging in Charlotte, N.C., after having smuggled himself out of a previously escape-proof prison nearby. According to a January profile in the San Francisco Chronicle, Manchester (a handsome, athletic, personable man who got his nickname from a multistate series of ceiling-entry burglaries) built an ingenious home behind a cubbyhole at a Toys-R-Us, then at an abandoned Circuit City next door, outfitting both digs with various conveniences, such as a protective surveillance camera. The dashing Manchester volunteered at a church, befriending the pastor and dating a parishioner, who eventually helped police capture him. Said a police sergeant, "(W)e can learn a lot from him."

Linkity: I'm pretty big movie lover so I found this website to be a little entertaining. If you ever wondered what are the/how many specific instances of all the bad stuff, violence, and language there are in a movie, this site tells all, of course from the Christian perspective. Some of it is just plain hilarious on how anal they can be.

Wilco and WebComics

First off, Wilco last night was a blast, but there are a few things that bothered me. First, I haven't attended many concerts so the continual standing for 4-5 hours straight while bumping into and standing sideways for a bunch of smelly people isn't really my idea of fun. Wilco's a great group that just doesn't play the type of music you normally hear. Unfortunately they can be pretty mellow at times, so sometimes the stage presence was a little lacking and they played a lot of slower softer songs that didn't quite work for the venue. But I totally respect them, because to them it's all about the music, and not just pleasing, so they just played what they felt. None of the songs were like what they are on the albums. To some they may not like this unexpected turn of notes, but I relish the chance to hear a unique version of the song. I could also tell that it's their more current work that I find more attractive while their older stuff is more standard common fun tunes. My overall impression is that although they can put on a pretty unique concert experience, I think I may prefer to listen to their unique brand of music on my own.

Now on to part two of my webcomics review. It's been about a week since I last reviewed, which has given me some time to check out the others. First I'd like to thank Carol for pointing out her husband's comic at drink at work.com. The comic is known as mediumlarge and although I've only seen a bit, it's hilarious. It's definitely right up my alley. Most of it seems to parody current day pop culture especially revolving around the television. Definitely click on the links from her comment posts from Thursday, February 10, "Left Handed Tidbit for the Day."

Staccato
I actually haven't seen much of this other than a few archives here and there because it seems as though the author was away for awhile. It also looks as though a publisher has stopped carrying Staccato. I don't know if this will affect the online version or not. Basically the premise is that the main character is a recent grad, semi-looking for a job. He still hangs out with his old friends, some of which are still in college. Oh, and all the characters are animals. Since the subject matter is somewhat correlated to my actual life (grad school is very different from normal college, and sometimes I feel like a recent grad) I've enjoyed what little I've seen. So if the comic doesn't have anymore updates, dip into the archives.

Megatokyo
Now if you're not looking for a daily comic or a simple funny strip, check this one out. It's actually and online manga updated M,W,F. I've enjoyed the art greatly and the story as well. Since it is a manga the story is ongoing and it can be kind of hard to pick it up as it is without starting at the beginning. But starting at the beginning is no chore since I actually think the funniest parts are at the beginning. The main audience for this is Japanese pop culture, anime/manga, and gaming, especially from the Japanese geniuses.

The next two are kind of fun, but the art/drawings aren't quite that great. They also haven't been updated much and one them seems to be on hiatus for a long while. Nuklear Power has some strong wit and will be very popular with any Final Fantasy fans. The author uses blown up sprites from the original Final Fantasy graphics and uses them as characters. Not quite sure what the overall theme is but there is plenty of satire, cliché, stereotypes, and pretty much anything you can find in a comic that occasionally offends at least one social group. The other is Spelling the Vacuum Cleaner. This hasn't been updated at all for the past couple weeks. I hear this is also an ongoing story and that catching up is more of a delight than a chore. I haven't seen it yet but perhaps putting it out there for others with more time to read can enjoy.

I hope some have checked out Sinfest. It's great and I'm really loving it now. One thing that's uncommon to webcomics is that this one is updated daily, not just M-F or periodically.

News of the Weird:TECHNICOLOR YAW
NASA announced in October it was retiring the KC-135 plane it had long been using to train astronauts for weightlessness in flight; an official told reporters that the air crews had kept track of the amount of astronaut vomit cleaned up over the years and that the total was at least 285 gallons.

I get to see Wilco

So I'm pretty excited about seeing Wilco in concert tomorrow night. They're performing at the House of Blues and I'm going with Troy. Now Wilco is a relatively new group to me and Troy is responsible for introducing me. A while ago I gave him a project to compile a bunch of songs from groups I should be listening to. Apparently I wasn't listening to the right stuff and was too in the dark about a lot of musical artists. Anyway he put two songs from the album A Ghost is Born onto his compilation and I must say I enjoyed them a lot. He then gave me the entire album to check and I must say it was great, and totally different from what you normally hear. In fact that album won Wilco two Grammys including bust alternative album (category 22). They seem to have been greatly influenced by the Beatles or perhaps I'm stretching, but some of the instrumental flavor and instruments they add has a very strong Beatles vibe and I love the Beatles. Hopefully they put on a great live performance and it should be a great experience.

Where did the night owl go?
So I've been going to bed at ten for the past two nights. I'm normally up past midnight but for the entire week I've been exhausted and it usually hits me right around six or seven. Luckily I've been able to finish my homework at the office and not have to actually bring it home with me. The other big factor is that there's no reason for me to stay up and watch the television. None of my sports teams are on television. I can watch any of my normal primetime television later for recordings. And Daily Show has been reruns all week.

It's actually really been quite nice getting in a good nine hours of sleep. I don't plan on making this regular but it has been nice to catch up on my sleep. See I'm not able to sleep in on the weekends. I now have a cat and at times he's just like a baby. I mean I have to feed him, take care of him, and he'll cry in the night and wake me up. He just doesn't understand that weekends are special and to him it's just any other day. He'll wake me up at the normal 7:00 AM time and think nothing of it. Sometimes he's nice and he'll just curl up next to me and allow another couple of hours but he's normally pretty ornery. Still I love him just the same and he can be quite the entertainer at times.

Linkity: Some of you may have heard of dailyconfession.com and this site is similar. People just post little comments all the time to tell the world what they've done or the situation their in. The interface is as easy as just reading and most of the posts are crazy and amusing and other stuff is just extreme.

Linkity part two: This site is just comic relief. It's old and it's not even American. Apparently it's some sort of marriage counseling for all sorts of deficiencies like communication and sex. Basically stupid questions about sex from really stupid people. But the translations are awful which means Engrish-licious.

Left Handed Tidbit for the Day
According to a US study, blonds are twice as likely to be left-handed as brunets and redheads.

Web Comics
Who even reads the funnies these days? I used to always just open the paper and turn to the sports section and ignore the rest. Well, since I've been in college I haven't really seen the paper and who even needs to in this digital age with all the news online. Well a couple of years ago my roommate and I chipped in to get the Arizona Daily Star, the newspaper in Tucson. I still do prefer the paper copy so I said sure. Every morning I turn right to sports and he heads straight for the comics. Well because they were always sitting out I started to read them and he pointed some of the good ones beyond those I already knew about. I've always loved Dilbert and Foxtrot is always good but I also enjoys Get Fuzzy. Well since we were only roommates for a year, that's all that the paper lasted.

Jump forward two years and I'm once again able to get the paper every weekday. Let me just say that the comics for the Orlando Sentinel suck. They suck hard. They don't have any of the great standbys. They don't have Foxtrot and they don't even have the occasionally funny but normally cute Baby Blues. I don't get to see the Sunday paper much but from my memory they don't bump up the quality by much. In fact they normally print all their comics in color so there is no benefit to the Sunday paper. Maybe that's why they don't print the others, because there isn't a color version but I think that's phooey. I did happen to discover that Dilbert is tucked in with business just like in the Daily Star but that's it. Here's a list of the crap they show:
Peanuts Classics (come on)
Blondie
Hi & Lois
Hagar the Horrible
Beetle Baily
Sally Forth
Dennis the Menace
and the every present horrible Family Circus

For some reason I thought a lot of these comics had ended but nope they're there, every day, stinking each day. I avoid them at all costs because if I read them I just get angry. The only saving grace is looking at the funny drawings for the rather unfunny Mutts and laughing at Garfield, I mean that's one fat lazy pussy, right?

The remedy? I now turn to web comics. They often aren't updated daily but they are normally pretty funny, especially someone in my age group. Because of the fact that they don't appeal to a broad audience is why they stick to the web but they all have some success. Some are ongoing stories while others are just satirical funny strips. Some appeal to gamers only while others are meant for the college folk. So every day I start up the computer I check these out to see the latest misadventures of the characters of the super information highway.

F Minus
The first plug goes to F Minus. Not really a web comic but rather an online archive of a strip that ran for the State Press, the ASU student paper. It's also authored by an old good highschool friend of mine. He recently one a MTV sponsored contest that won him a publishing deal with United Feature Syndicate, responsible for Dilbert, Peanuts, and Get Fuzzy. So while no new comics are posted definitely hit the archived comics and I'll guarantee laughter.

Sinfest
I stumbled across this last year. I haven't kept up with it too well but it normally brings good laughs. Definitely dip into the early comics. They set up the story a little and may be some of the funnier comics. The drawings are great and I love the wit.

Penny-Arcade
I'm sure a lot have heard about this. It's basically for gamers and only will the true gamers find each comic funny. But if you follow along you'll get most of it. They also keep a blog of gaming news, so that tends to be interesting as well.

There are a few more but I've only seen them recently so I'll give a few days to make sure they're any good.

News of the Weird: ISN'T IT IRONIC?
On Dec. 20, a United Parcel Service driver was involved in a crash on an icy road near Keene, N.H., suffered a head injury, and was taken to Cheshire Medical Center, where tests were to be performed, except that the required machine for them was broken (though parts were on order). After checking the status of the order, hospital personnel discovered that the parts had been shipped and were in fact in the crashed UPS truck, and someone was dispatched to the scene of the accident to retrieve them.

In December, the British parents' organization Bullywatch, which issued blue wristbands to students to publicize the campaign against school bullying, reported that any kid wearing the wristbands was immediately targeted for attack by bullies.

Oops, that's not what I was supposed to do
The plan last night was to go down to the Enzian for the 9:30 showing of Vera Drake. Well I got there pretty early and found out that they were showing a different movie at 9:30, not Vera Drake. So I called up Troy and told him the bad news and that he could stay home and rest up. Well I should have gone as well, I'm kind of behind on an assignment but the film they were showing was free to film society members. Since I was planning on signing up anyway, I stuck around and watched for 'free'. It was a Sundance feature from some years ago that showed that a quality film can be made with a home camera. The Same River Twice was basically a documentary of a group of friends that lived a very free nature loving life as they rafted down the Colorado river. Then the guy who filmed their last ride in 76 decided to meet back up with them around 20 years later and see how they've lived out their lives. It was really interesting and I never thought I would enjoy watching a complete stranger's home movies. Plus it was also beautiful since half of it was filmed at the bottom of the Grand Canyon.

Linkity: Pimp Your Grill. My teeth were looking a little dull so I decided to glitz them up. No I didn't just get them whitened, I went a step further and went golden! Too much bling?

Highlight from the History of Left-Handedness
On this day in 1964, The Beatles arrive in the United States for the first time. Half of the members of the Fab Four are lefties--Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr. Interestingly the only remaining living members as well.

A day of John Turturro, of sorts
As I was making a very late breakfast yesterday I had an urge to watch Rounders. Not all of it, just the cool card game parts and definitely the finale against KGB. Well the movie stars John Turturro as Knish. Later that night on TCM, they were showing Quiz Show which I hadn't seen and decided to watch. It just so happens that John Turturro stars in that as well. Let me just say he played to completely different rolls and he's a pretty good actor. Now if only I'd capped the night off with another completely different movie, O Brother, Where Art Thou?to go for the triple crown.

News of the Weird:LOVERS, NOT FIGHTERS
Nonlethal war tactics suggested by an Air Force research team in the 1990s were made public in December by the military watchdog organization Sunshine Project. Tactics included a recommendation to expose enemy troops to powerful aphrodisiacs in order to distract them into lustful hookups with each other (irrespective of gender). The Pentagon said the idea was dropped almost immediately, but the Sunshine Project said it was discussed as recently as 2001. Other ideas: giving the enemy severe halitosis (so they could be detected within a civilian population), overrunning enemy positions with rats or wasps, and creating waves of fecal gas.

Black Bean Deli
So just as soon as I said a found a new place for good subs and sandwiches I find that I have a new favorite. My new favorite sandwich is the Cuban, and no one makes a better Cuban than Black Bean Deli. Not something you find at all in the southwest. It's the perfect combination of ham, pork, swiss, and a pickle grilled flat with a press. Black Bean Deli also serves up other Cuban sandwiches that sound pretty damn good. One is pulled pork with a garlic sauce drizzled over it, yummy. Plus they also had common Cuban sides like rice and beans and plantains. I went to the Black Bean to grab a bite just before the Popcorn Flick at Winter Park. Last night they were showing Grease. It was good fun but the best part was the sandwich. I gobbled it right up and then washed it down with a Havana Cola, based on the grand Cuba Libre.

Linkity: Eyes don't look the way you want them to? Now your eyes can look more American just like you want them to. Then just stab a pink fork into them and don't forget the glue. Watch with an open mind.

The Toasters @ The Social
Last night I went downtown to see The Toasters. They're a ska band and were pretty good. I can't say the same for the two groups leading in. They were also both ska but I think only one of them really qualified. The Corks were decent, considering they were just the local central Florida group. The Supervillians had been touring with The Toasters and I didn't care for them at all. They were just a wall of sound. No balance. This may just be because of poor sound engineering but it certainly was not music. But the Toasters jammed and other than the fact that The Social was a very smoky bar/club, I had a great night.

Papa Joe's Pizza & Pasta
It's no East Coast Super Subs but I think I've found my new favorite sandwich/sub place. It doesn't compare to East Coast in sheer taste, fixings and value but overall suffices as a replacement. The size is right around eight inches and under six dollars. But the sesame roll they use is way better than the bread at East Coast. The sub rolls they used were hit and miss a lot and sometimes came out real chewy and sometimes hard. The rolls at Papa Joe's are toasted to perfection. They come out crispy and flakey. It can create an enormous mess but I found myself rounding up the errant flakes from my plate and gobbling them up. The cheese steak was simple; steak, onions and provolone, but was melted to perfection and sated my appetite. Next time I'll see if I can add a little hot sauce, I really miss that special peppersauce from East Coast.