Daily Horoscope for All: Today you should relax, hug your loved ones, and, if vicinity allows, partake in Ben & Jerry’s Free Cone Day. Their store locator includes info on participating locations.

When Rick & Billie Broome added a sunroom to their house they had to hire a crane to lift in the primary component of the decor. Measuring 15,800 pounds, 50 feet long, 12.5 feet wide and 27.5 feet tall, this wasn’t a fancy hot tub or mahogany bar. The Broomes built their sunroom around the front section of a United Boeing 727. The idea came to Rick Broome, a plane nut (needless to say), in a dream when he was 16. An artist, his nearby studio work table, resembles a United Airline ticket counter. He’s hooked up the first-class lavatory, heat & A/C, and has plans to paint the floor of the room and ceiling of the cockpit so he can pretend he is in flight.

“I’m in the time warp of vinyl, and it works for me” says Jim Goff, owner of JNS Phonograph Needles. He repairs record players, sells needles and other phonograph supplies at his Seattle store. There are records for sale too, left over from the stock of Standard Records which occupied the space until 1987. Goff discovered his skill for phonograph repair while working for the owners of Standard Records and he and his wife ended up buying them out. Now vinyl fans bring and send in their turntables for his expert care and flat $45 fee (plus parts). But don’t expect to find JNS on the Internet. Goff’s “time warp of vinyl” remark is strictly true. No computers, no fax, and no credit cards either.

Eating out with Food Allergies
We don’t go out to eat very much because of our son’s food allergies. Eating out doesn’t need to be a part of our lives, but it’s certainly a convenience for us working parents and it’s a social activity with friends. We prefer Asian foods but there’s usually a language barrier that reduces my confidence that our restrictions will be understood. I’ve searched chain restaurant websites for ingredient lists or allergy information. The dominant fast food places (e.g. McDonald’s, Burger King) are very open about listing their ingredients and you can trust that their robotic food assembly lines won’t stray from set procedures. But fast food isn’t really what I want.

Each chain handles allergy information differently, many inadequately. Chili’s, for example, has a PDF with an exhaustive list of what items are safe for each common allergen. But the structure makes it difficult to determine what is safe if you have multiple allergies. Outback Steakhouse has a “General Guidelines for Allergies” that is specific to nuts and dairy (gee thanks). The best method for a place that doesn’t want to list its ingredients is a chart with the menu list down the leftmost column and then a list of allergens across top (BK has this and ingredients lists). Each item gets marked if it’s got the allergen so it’s easy to spot the clear winners. Many places don’t bother with allergen info and I understand it’s a hassle and also a liability to put out a guarantee that something is safe when cross-contamination and substitutions can easily occur.

In Massachusetts, celeb chef Ming Tsai has been campaigning for legislation to raise awareness of common allergens in restaurant kitchens. His son used to have seven of the common eight food allergies. Restaurant associations are of course against any laws since they’ll come with the burden of potential lawsuits. Some places do train their staff and are very accommodating. It can’t hurt to ask when you eat out, but of course the best solution is to bring your own food and explain why. The more awareness there is for this growing problem the more restaurants will want to help out voluntarily.

It’s hockey playoff season. For the small handful of you who aren’t aware of how Canadians feel about hockey, remember: Canadians love hockey and Canadians love Hockey Night, the Saturday CBC broadcast with a 50 year history. This playoff season, the National Hockey League has screwed over CBC’s Hockey Night (yes, I said screwed, sorry mom). CBC was expecting to get Saturday’s Ottawa Senators & Pittsburgh Penguins game. The Penguins’ Sidney Crosby is Canada’s new Wayne Gretzy (or Mario Lemieux if you prefer) adding Canadian appeal for CBC and marketing appeal for America’s NBC. Guess who the NHL decided to make happy? NBC. The game will be played in the afternoon on NBC and CBC gets the Tampa Bay Lightning & New Jersey Devils instead (yawn). CBC will see at most one Canadian team for Hockey Night playoffs. They paid the NHL $500+ million for six year broadcast rights. NBC only pays the NHL if their ads make money (ah ha, incentive!). The Nova Scotia House of Assembly actually passed a resolution protesting the NHL decision. “Screwed” pretty much sums it up. Sorry Canada!

When it’s time to retire, the equine members of the San Francisco Police Department go out in style. Chub, Ernie, and AAA Andy were given a fancy retirement ceremony at the Police Stables in Golden Gate Park on Tuesday. They then headed to Rocking B Ranch in Sonoma County under the care of the San Francisco SPCA. Their shoes will be removed and they will be free to frolic with the five other retirees kicking back in the fields. Two youngsters, Rusty and Seattle, both 8 years old, were sworn into the police force at the same ceremony.

Mary Allen Hood decided recently that she wanted to buy her high school class ring. The fact that she is 97 and graduated in 1928 did not deter her from calling up Washington-Lee High School in Virginia and asking if they could help her fulfill this little dream. School officials managed to find a 1937 model on which the ring company based a design and Hood happily ponied over $513.04 to pay for it. After her story made the news, the management at Hess Construction Company decided they wanted to pay for her ring. The reason? They’re about to demolish Washington-Lee High School, home of the memories her ring will hold, and build a completely new facility.

As a follow-up to the Washington Post story on Joshua Bell’s busking efforts, writer Gene Weingarten had an online discussion which reveals further background information to the story. Weingarten was unable to convince the D.C. Metro officials to allow Bell (or any musician) to play in a station, so he turned to the property management for the arcade area adjoining a Metro elevator. They agreed in a jiffy. Also, in a deal with Bell’s publicist, the story, which took place in January, was held until April 8th to coincide with the April 10th awarding of the Avery Fisher Prize to Bell. There are other backstory tidbits and musings from Weingarten in the session, and of course plenty of differing opinions from readers. What Weingarten wanted to understand was what exactly made so many readers cry when they read the article?

Fans of the Powerpuff Girls will be amused by the Japanese anime “Demashita! Powerpuff Girls Z” based on the series. Cartoon Network took the Powerpuffs to Japan and reworked the premise (which was itself inspired somewhat by anime) with anime producers. The girls are not exactly the same Powerpuffs, as they are regular girls who’ve been exposed to Chemical Z, but there are many characters and plot aspects retained from the original series. Now teenagers, Hyper Blossom, Rolling Bubbles, and Powered Buttercup fight crime (of course) and have special weapons. Bubbles’ weapon is a bubble wand. The show premiered last summer and escaped my radar until the recent announcement of a Powerpuff Girls Z Nintendo DS game.

A long stay at Alcatraz wouldn’t appeal to many, and the 18 hour solitary night watchman shift barely appeals to any. Gregory Johnson plays upbeat music on his iPod as he walks the deserted prison buildings, trying not to think about the long-gone occupants, the murders and suicides. Previous holders of his post report a few mysterious goings on, but they all know the creepy surroundings plays tricks on your mind.