This was another episode that I was looking forward to, after viewing the previews.

Regarding the indecent with Tim, Lil' Charles and Miss Robbie's grandson from Texas, Andre,  I think that Tim could have handled the situation with Andre without hitting him in the chest.  I do understand his frustration, though.

Both Charles and Andre know that they can't be fired, and they  take working at Sweetie Pie's for granted.  When Tim was trying to talk to them about being more responsible, both of them were disinterested and disrespectful.

On a side note, I noticed that Tiim called the server, Paula, over to illustrate a point about responsibility to Charles and Andre.  I mention that because I believe he also tried to call on her to back him up when he was talking to Miss Robbie about the new manager in a previous episode, but Miss Robbie didn't want to hear it. Paula comes across as a no nonsense type of person, and I get the impression that Tim respects her and her work ethic.

Even after Tim used Paula as an example, Andre and Charles still kept making excuses, and thats when things first start to go sideways.  When Tim asked them to go sit at the bar with him, all they did was mostly clown and make smart comments.

Then, when Tim got Andre sitting alone at the table, Andre was still clowning, and Tim hit him in the chest.  After that, Andre leaves.  It appears that Tim got physical with Charles and Andre again off camera, and the next thing you know Charles comes running in crying to Miss Robbie, followed by Andre, talking about what Tim did to them.

Miss Robbie's response is to believe their account, go to the restaurant, yell at Tim and then fire him.  I know Miss Robbie has to have a strong business accumen to run  two sucessful restaurants, but I don't see how you fire the conscientious person who works the hardest, and keep the two who don't care. I don't know what has transpired between Miss Robbie and Tim prior to the show, but it seems that, on the show, more often than not, Miss Robbie takes the side opposite of Tim in a dispute.

Skipping over all the drama that occurred afterward, I'm glad things appeared to have worked out in the end.  It was nice to see  Andre recognize that he played a major part in creating all the discord,  and that he tried to facilitate getting the family back together. Still, I think that he and Charles need to go; at least as far as the restaurant is concerned.  Let them come back after they have proven that they can take their work seriously. I also hope Miss Robbie reconsiders her decision to surprise Tim with the news that he has to share an office with Lil Charles at The Upper Crust.

As far as restaurant matters, I wasn't paying too much attention to the roof situation with the Upper Crust Restaurant, until they said that it would cost $50,000 to replace it, and that Miss Robbie didn't have any money left in the budget to cover it.

Fifty thousand is also the amount the wedding planners told Janae that her wedding would cost, so I  think Janae is going to end up having to scale back her dream wedding plans!

Oprah and Gayle Visit Sweetie Pie's

Oprah is in St. Louis filming Oprah's Lifeclass: the Tour, and she can't wait to stop by Sweetie Pie's, a local soul food restaurant. Neither could Gayle, who flew all the way from New York City for lunch. Watch as Oprah and Gayle meet the Montgomery family, who run Sweetie Pie's and are the subjects of an OWN reality show, and then feast on chicken, cobbler and more.

I was looking forward to this episode since last week, when I saw that Tim and Miss Robbie were going to have a cookoff.

Usually, I'm either on one side of a debate or the other, but, in this case, I can see both sides.

People come to Sweetie Pie's for the great soul food, created from the recipes that were handed down to Miss Robbie from her mother. The restaurants have been very successful with the food on their current menu, and I can understand why Miss Robbie would want to continue what has proven to be successful at the new Upper Crust location.

On the other hand, I can see Tim's point as well. The new Upper Crust restaurant will give them the opportunity to expand on what people already love about Sweetie Pie's, by offering new menu items to go along with their already tried and true menu.

What I also like about Tim is that he is motivated. He not only wants to add his soul food creations to the menu because he feels he can cook, but also because he wants to help take the Upper Crust restaurant to a new level by trying things that have not been done at the Sweetie Pie's Mangrove location.

What surprised me about the cookoff was that Tim actually won, though Miss Robbie, who had the head chef, D'Angelo, fill in for her because she was not feeling well, said that Tim won because the tasters were intimidated because he was big and ugly, rather then because they liked his food better.

The tasters were not supposed to know who cooked what dishes, but Tim didn't like the way Lil Charles was serving some of his dishes, so he brought some of them out himself, so the tasters at least knew some of his dishes. Some of Tim's dishes included deep fried soft shell crab, beef pasta shells, chicken alfredo stuffed pasta shells, lobster claws, clam claws, deep fried georgia peaches and peach donuts.

I am glad that it looks like some of Tim's soul food creations will be included on the Uppper Crust menu now.

I also like Miss Robbie's idea to include a culinary school in the new Upper Crust restaurant to keep the art of cooking soul food alive.

It reminds me of the way Gates Bar-B-Q, in Kansas City, created the Gates College of Bar-B-Que, better known as Rib Tech, to train their cooks and other personnel to uphold the Gates Bar-B-Que tradition.

On another front, I don't want to touch on the wedding and wedding planning situation with Tim and Jenae, until I see more of the upcoming episodes. From the preview of next week's episode, it looks like there may be a non-wedding related intense incident involving Tim and one of the other family members.

For anyone that is a fan of the TV show,  Welcome to Sweetie Pie's, all new episodes return to the OWN  network this Saturday, March 31, 2012, at 8:00 pm central! Sweetie Pie's Website

Leaders of The Mayors Bistate Innovation Team, Mike Burke and Ray Daniels, discuss Google Fiber on KCPT's The Local Show, on February 6, 2012.  The show also featured segments on depression, a meeting at the Kauffman Foundation discussing how Kansas City can become one of America's most entrepreneurial cities, and other subjects.  The video clip above jumps to the segment on Google Fiber.

Being a guy, I didn't know how often I would tune into Oprah's new OWN Network, but I wanted to at least watch it occasionally when it first debuted, out of curiosity.

At first, I tuned into some of the shows, like Master Class, and Oprah's All Stars, but they really didn't hold my attention for very long, and I gradually started watching less and less, and then finally hardly at all.

Then, recently, as I was channel surfing one evening, I saw an advertisement for a show named "Welcome to Sweetie Pie's", and it sounded interesting enough for me to check it out, and I'm glad I did.

Welcome to Sweetie Pie's is a reality show about Robbie Montgomery, a former Ikette, of the 1960's Ike and Tina Turner Revue, who had to stop singing, when she suffered a collapsed lung.

No longer able to sing professionally, she then decided to turn to something else she could do well - cooking, and poured her talents into opening a soul food restaurant named Sweetie Pie's.

Sweetie Pie's is located down I-70 from Kansas City, in St. Louis, MO, and the show follows, Robbie Montgomery, who is now 70 and known affectionally as Miss Robbie, and her family, as they juggle the challenges of running a successful, busy restaurant and family life.

Along with Miss Robbie, the show features  her son Tim, my favorite cast member, who helps her run the restaurant, his girlfriend Jenae, who can be irritating at times, Miss Robbie's lazy young nephew, Lil' Charles, and other family, friends and restaurant staff.

I have the show set to record and I usually watch a couple of episodes at a time, so I am not sure when new episodes air. You can read more details about Welcome to Sweetie Pie's on the OWN network website: Welcome To Sweetie Pie's. Sweetie Pie's restaurant website

I bought the Lacie 1TB External USB Hard Disk to serve as an external hard disk for my MacBook Pro 13 inch laptop, mainly to use as a scratch disk for Final Cut Express.  My main concern before buying the drive was if the USB connection would be fast enough to serve that purpose.

The first thing I noticed after unpacking the drive is that the power cord and USB cable were not as long as I had hoped.  I had to place the drive a  very short distance from my MacBook Pro, and also move the power strip closer to the laptop.

The drive itself is shiny black, and light and sleek.  After connecting it to my laptop, the drive free disk space first read approx. 650 gb, but   after formatting the drive for the Mac, using the pre-installed software, the free disk space increased to a little over 930 gb.

Next, I updated Final Cut Express to use the Lacie external drive for the scratch disk.  I am fairly new to FCE, so I don't currently have a very heavy video editing requirement.  With that said, after a day of rendering several 3-4 minute video clips, I am happy to report that the drive has worked without incident, and, so far,  I am happy with its performance. If anything notable  happens with this drive in the future, I will report it on this site.