Looking for a good way to season your cast-iron pan or skillet?
I came across this a while back and thought it was the best set of instructions/info I'd seen on this topic:
Saturday, November 12, 2011
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
Smoking at Bellevue Place and Lincoln Square
I recently sent a letter to the company that owns Bellevue Square and Lincoln Square in Bellevue, WA, complaining about smoking around the elevator and stairway in the parking garage that links the two malls. If anyone else has run into this and been annoyed by it, send them a note at:
Kemper Development Company
575 Bellevue Square
Bellevue, WA 98004
I am writing to complain about the smoking that takes place at Bellevue Place and Lincoln Square, especially on the sky bridge linking the two malls, and outside the Piano Bar in Bellevue Place. The smoking occurs at all times of the day, but gets worse in the evening, and is a real problem during the family dinner hours (roughly between 5pm and 8pm).
This is especially noticeable to me now that I have a young child and need to use the elevator and sky bridge as I move around the mall with my 1 year-old in her stroller. As you know, the Bellevue Collection is a very popular destination for families with young children, and most of them that park in the Bellevue Place parking structure will need to use the elevator to get to the third level which provides the main access to the three malls.
A large number of smokers tend to congregate right outside the Piano Bar entrance, which is directly in front of the elevator and not more than ten feet from the stairway. Even families with older children that use the stairway are thus exposed to unacceptable levels of second-hand smoke.
A similar problem occurs on the sky bridge between the malls in the evening, when smokers from the various bars and restaurants congregate on the bridge. Crossing here is like running the gauntlet through a smoker’s den.
I doubt the Washington State and King County smoking regulations are being followed in the above scenarios. At the very least, there should be no smoking within 25 feet of elevators and stairways that are commonly used.
I hope you can find a way to encourage smokers to find a place to go that is not directly in the path of the majority of the non-smoking public, and does not expose children to second-hand smoke.
Kemper Development Company
575 Bellevue Square
Bellevue, WA 98004
I am writing to complain about the smoking that takes place at Bellevue Place and Lincoln Square, especially on the sky bridge linking the two malls, and outside the Piano Bar in Bellevue Place. The smoking occurs at all times of the day, but gets worse in the evening, and is a real problem during the family dinner hours (roughly between 5pm and 8pm).
This is especially noticeable to me now that I have a young child and need to use the elevator and sky bridge as I move around the mall with my 1 year-old in her stroller. As you know, the Bellevue Collection is a very popular destination for families with young children, and most of them that park in the Bellevue Place parking structure will need to use the elevator to get to the third level which provides the main access to the three malls.
A large number of smokers tend to congregate right outside the Piano Bar entrance, which is directly in front of the elevator and not more than ten feet from the stairway. Even families with older children that use the stairway are thus exposed to unacceptable levels of second-hand smoke.
A similar problem occurs on the sky bridge between the malls in the evening, when smokers from the various bars and restaurants congregate on the bridge. Crossing here is like running the gauntlet through a smoker’s den.
I doubt the Washington State and King County smoking regulations are being followed in the above scenarios. At the very least, there should be no smoking within 25 feet of elevators and stairways that are commonly used.
I hope you can find a way to encourage smokers to find a place to go that is not directly in the path of the majority of the non-smoking public, and does not expose children to second-hand smoke.
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
Sims Medieval Fails To Start, or Why I Love Electronic Arts
I got my wife a copy of "Sims Medieval" for her birthday a few weeks ago (DVD from Amazon), and she was really pleased and looking forward to playing it. Sadly, we've run into nothing but problems, and EA's support (both email and phone) has been useless.
So, allow me to vent a little here and perhaps share a fix or workaround that search engines will be able to find, assuming someone comes up with a tip :)
Some info on my wife's machine: It's running Windows 7 64-bit, and is a beefy laptop with a decent video card. Sims 3 ran fine on it.
Issues #1: DVD fails to be read
Right out the gate, we hit a snag since the DVD wouldn't be recognized by the drive in my wife's "gamer" laptop. After hunting around for a while I found other people had run into this, and the suggestion was to download the game from EA's Origin site (basically a Steam knock-off). The product key in the DVD case works to get the digital download for free. So, I downloaded it (takes ages) and installed it without errors. Yay! Not quite...
Issue #2: The game fails to launch/start
The game creates a desktop icon which runs a little launcher application. Clicking on the "Play" icon in the launcher is supposed to start the game, but nothing (visible) happened. Research online showed this was not something other people had run into, and several tips were provided on forums:
So, allow me to vent a little here and perhaps share a fix or workaround that search engines will be able to find, assuming someone comes up with a tip :)
Some info on my wife's machine: It's running Windows 7 64-bit, and is a beefy laptop with a decent video card. Sims 3 ran fine on it.
Issues #1: DVD fails to be read
Right out the gate, we hit a snag since the DVD wouldn't be recognized by the drive in my wife's "gamer" laptop. After hunting around for a while I found other people had run into this, and the suggestion was to download the game from EA's Origin site (basically a Steam knock-off). The product key in the DVD case works to get the digital download for free. So, I downloaded it (takes ages) and installed it without errors. Yay! Not quite...
Issue #2: The game fails to launch/start
The game creates a desktop icon which runs a little launcher application. Clicking on the "Play" icon in the launcher is supposed to start the game, but nothing (visible) happened. Research online showed this was not something other people had run into, and several tips were provided on forums:
- Try downloading the game again and re-installing - Made no difference
- Disable your anti-virus (!) - I checked any the AV product had not blocked any of the apps related to the game, and disabling real-time scanning made no difference
- Disable UAC (!!) - made no difference
Note: I really don't recommend doing the last two things - you're opening yourself up to compromise by malware
Looking into the Windows Event Viewer, I noticed there were entries for each time I had tried to launch the game, indicating that the executable had crashed. The information indicates that the app (TSM.exe) is hitting in invalid instruction exception which is not handled... Looks like a bug to me...
Fault bucket 2466582291, type 1
Event Name: APPCRASH
Response: Not available
Cab Id: 0
Problem signature:
P1: TSM.exe
P2: 0.0.0.8065
P3: 00000000
P4: TSM.exe
P5: 0.0.0.8065
P6: 00000000
P7: c000001d
P8: 00c6fdfd
P9:
P10:
Since I'm a geek (or perhaps just a masochist), I decided to take a closer look at the crash dump. For some reason the code is executing an invalid instruction deliberately - after setting up an exception handler. I am guessing this is part of the DRM solution (SecuROM, which is from Sony, ahem! :). I would guess this is aimed at making debugging and reverse-engineering harder, but if it makes the games unplayable then you wonder how they can stay in business?
Here's a disassembly dump of the code in question:
0:000> u 0106fe0b
TSM+0xc6fe0b:
0106fe0b 683efc0601 push offset TSM+0xc6fc3e (0106fc3e)
0106fe10 64ff3500000000 push dword ptr fs:[0]
0106fe17 64892500000000 mov dword ptr fs:[0],esp
0106fe1e 0f0b ud2 <-- The app crashes here
0106fe20 03648f05 add esp,dword ptr [edi+ecx*4+5]
0106fe24 0000 add byte ptr [eax],al
0106fe26 0000 add byte ptr [eax],al
0106fe28 83c404 add esp,4
0:000> lmvm tsm
start end module name
00400000 01e71000 TSM T (no symbols)
Loaded symbol image file: TSM.exe
Image path: C:\Program Files (x86)\Electronic Arts\The Sims Medieval(TM)\Game\Bin\TSM.exe
Image name: TSM.exe
Timestamp: Wed Apr 27 12:58:42 2011 (4DB87572)
CheckSum: 012BE735
ImageSize: 01A71000
File version: 0.0.0.8065
Product version: 0.0.0.8065
File flags: 0 (Mask 17)
File OS: 4 Unknown Win32
File type: 1.0 App
File date: 00000000.00000000
Translations: 0000.04b0 0000.04e4 0409.04b0 0409.04e4
The UD2 instruction is an special instruction used to generate un unsupported instruction exception (see here and here). It's been supported for ages, so it's not an issue with the processor in my wife's laptop (Intel Core 2 Duo) being too old.
EA Customer Support:
In one of EA's forums, it was mentioned that you could email them with bug reports. Perhaps this was during the Beta only? I emailed them but have yet to hear back...
In a fit of insanity I thought I might get something useful out of calling EA Customer Support. After some scripted steps (collecting DXDiag information) the call turned tragi-comical as the rep told me that my wife's video card and then processor were not supported. (The CPU is .2 GHz slower than the recommended Windows 7 specs, and her video card is not on the "blessed" list).
I mentioned I got the DVD from Amazon, and he told me off, saying buying games from Amazon was a bad idea and you "never know what you are going to get". (WTF? I didn't but it from some reseller on Amazon, it's the same product sold in all other stores!) He then suggested I download the game from Origin (despite me saying I had done this already), and then said I could install the game "on the Internet" so it wouldn't matter what video card or CPU my wife had.
Friday, December 10, 2010
The joys of flying Delta
This is a rather long-winded and complicated story, but I hope that by sharing it I will help people avoid the same nasty experience. Or perhaps if you do encounter the same problems, you will be motivated to complain and get some compensation...
Here is a letter of complaint I sent Delta recently:
---
I recently flew on Delta/KLM from Seattle to Cape Town with my wife and 6 month-old daughter, as well as my mother-in-law. While I have only positive things to say about KLM, I am disgusted at the way I was treated by Delta.
In mid-May this year, I purchased tickets from KLM.com for travel in October, and included information about the infant in the reservation. Her full name and date of birth were provided, and in the breakdown of the total price the infant ticket charges are shown separately from the adult ticket charges. After getting the confirmation email, I called KLM (and eventually got re-routed to Delta, since they are their US partner) to make sure the baby’s ticket was OK and to reserve a sky cot – this was done without any problem and I thought I was all set... At no point did anyone mention that I needed a paper ticket for the infant, and I did not receive anything in the mail prior to our October departure.
Come October, on check-in at Seattle, I was told I needed paper tickets for the baby and that I needed to pay an extra 10% for the baby. When I asked why this wasn’t factored into the original price of the tickets I got no satisfactory answer and the agent accused me of not booking for the infant. The check-in agent was initially very aggressive and made it sound like I was at fault. I repeatedly told her I had booked with KLM, mentioned the baby and even showed her the printout of my confirmation that listed the baby’s name. She would not budge on the 10% fee, so I ended up paying it grudgingly.
We then waited for an hour and a half as they struggled to get paper tickets issued for the baby. There was some problem up with the reservation and the printers at SEA would not issue paper tickets. (They tried 3 separate physical printers and got the manager on duty to try fixing it without any luck.) During this process the agent also ran my credit card twice (the first attempt at getting the paper tickets issued failed due to the issues mentioned above, so she had to do it again). I mentioned I was worried about being charged twice and she assured me the first charge would be cancelled.
The check-in agent had to spend over an hour on hold with someone elsewhere who “rebuilt” the tickets in such a way as to allow them to be printed by the agent at SEA. I was in jeopardy of missing my flight by this stage (30 minutes or so until the flight would have closed, and we still had to clear security…) Needless to say, neither my wife nor I needed this extra stress and aggravation on our first international flight with a 6 month baby!
This ticketing nightmare repeated on every Delta leg of our trip. In contrast, the KLM staff in Schipol (AMS) airport were very friendly and efficient and got us boarding passes for our flight to South Africa, and on return from South Africa to Schipol we experienced the same fast and friendly service. However, our Delta connecting flight from Minneapolis St. Paul (MSP) to Seattle was another nightmare with us almost missing the flight as I waited for a Delta agent to get boarding passes issued – again there was some problem with our reservation that prevented them from simply printing boarding passes. (When we departed Cape Town for our return leg, I was only given boarding passes for the KLM flights, not the MSP to SEA final hop.)
Remember the double credit card swipe mentioned above? To add insult to injury, now that I am back home and I have time to look at my credit card statement, I see that Delta has indeed charged my credit card twice for the 10% fee. So, it appeared I had now paid this charge three times! (Once during my initial reservation on KLM.com, and twice on check-in in Seattle.)
---
After we came home, I checked my original credit card statement from back in May when I bought the tickets, and realized that KLM had not billed me for the 10% fee (even though it was shown on the receipt and included in the total...) So, in the end I only ended up paying the 10% fee twice...
I contacted Delta to complain and initially heard back pretty quickly, but soon ran into dead silence. Over a month passed without any response and in the meantime I disputed the duplicate charge with my credit card company. As luck would have it, I was in the final phase of wrapping this up when Delta finally got back in touch with me. (Perhaps as a result of the credit card company talking to them?) Delta finally apologized for the poor service I'd experienced and send some travel vouchers to compensate myself and my wife. (Yay, we get to fly Delta again! :P )
All in all, it was a draining experience, but I guess persistence pays off!
Here is a letter of complaint I sent Delta recently:
---
I recently flew on Delta/KLM from Seattle to Cape Town with my wife and 6 month-old daughter, as well as my mother-in-law. While I have only positive things to say about KLM, I am disgusted at the way I was treated by Delta.
In mid-May this year, I purchased tickets from KLM.com for travel in October, and included information about the infant in the reservation. Her full name and date of birth were provided, and in the breakdown of the total price the infant ticket charges are shown separately from the adult ticket charges. After getting the confirmation email, I called KLM (and eventually got re-routed to Delta, since they are their US partner) to make sure the baby’s ticket was OK and to reserve a sky cot – this was done without any problem and I thought I was all set... At no point did anyone mention that I needed a paper ticket for the infant, and I did not receive anything in the mail prior to our October departure.
Come October, on check-in at Seattle, I was told I needed paper tickets for the baby and that I needed to pay an extra 10% for the baby. When I asked why this wasn’t factored into the original price of the tickets I got no satisfactory answer and the agent accused me of not booking for the infant. The check-in agent was initially very aggressive and made it sound like I was at fault. I repeatedly told her I had booked with KLM, mentioned the baby and even showed her the printout of my confirmation that listed the baby’s name. She would not budge on the 10% fee, so I ended up paying it grudgingly.
We then waited for an hour and a half as they struggled to get paper tickets issued for the baby. There was some problem up with the reservation and the printers at SEA would not issue paper tickets. (They tried 3 separate physical printers and got the manager on duty to try fixing it without any luck.) During this process the agent also ran my credit card twice (the first attempt at getting the paper tickets issued failed due to the issues mentioned above, so she had to do it again). I mentioned I was worried about being charged twice and she assured me the first charge would be cancelled.
The check-in agent had to spend over an hour on hold with someone elsewhere who “rebuilt” the tickets in such a way as to allow them to be printed by the agent at SEA. I was in jeopardy of missing my flight by this stage (30 minutes or so until the flight would have closed, and we still had to clear security…) Needless to say, neither my wife nor I needed this extra stress and aggravation on our first international flight with a 6 month baby!
This ticketing nightmare repeated on every Delta leg of our trip. In contrast, the KLM staff in Schipol (AMS) airport were very friendly and efficient and got us boarding passes for our flight to South Africa, and on return from South Africa to Schipol we experienced the same fast and friendly service. However, our Delta connecting flight from Minneapolis St. Paul (MSP) to Seattle was another nightmare with us almost missing the flight as I waited for a Delta agent to get boarding passes issued – again there was some problem with our reservation that prevented them from simply printing boarding passes. (When we departed Cape Town for our return leg, I was only given boarding passes for the KLM flights, not the MSP to SEA final hop.)
Remember the double credit card swipe mentioned above? To add insult to injury, now that I am back home and I have time to look at my credit card statement, I see that Delta has indeed charged my credit card twice for the 10% fee. So, it appeared I had now paid this charge three times! (Once during my initial reservation on KLM.com, and twice on check-in in Seattle.)
---
After we came home, I checked my original credit card statement from back in May when I bought the tickets, and realized that KLM had not billed me for the 10% fee (even though it was shown on the receipt and included in the total...) So, in the end I only ended up paying the 10% fee twice...
I contacted Delta to complain and initially heard back pretty quickly, but soon ran into dead silence. Over a month passed without any response and in the meantime I disputed the duplicate charge with my credit card company. As luck would have it, I was in the final phase of wrapping this up when Delta finally got back in touch with me. (Perhaps as a result of the credit card company talking to them?) Delta finally apologized for the poor service I'd experienced and send some travel vouchers to compensate myself and my wife. (Yay, we get to fly Delta again! :P )
All in all, it was a draining experience, but I guess persistence pays off!
Wednesday, December 01, 2010
Think twice about recycling
There was an interesting segment on NPR recently, featuring Annie Leonard, the creator of "The Story of Stuff" project. The latest video in the series is "The Story of Electronics"
It turns out a lot of things that are collected to be recycled in the USA are in fact sent overseas to be processed. Even things like plastic drinking bottles. Things like old electronics are especially bad since the people harvesting metals and other valuable bits from the electronics are exposed to a stew of toxic gases and chemicals.
Before recycling your next electronic gizmo, you might want to check whether your local recycler is has an e-Steward certification. I wonder whether PC Recycle and other local recyclers used by companies like Microsoft are e-Stewards?
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Almost time to drink my eggnog!
I mentioned aged eggnog a while back, and have some made and aging in the fridge right now.
By the end of November it will have been 3 weeks, and time to sample it for the first time... I'm keeping my fingers crossed!
I will let you know how it is :)
Thursday, November 25, 2010
Winter Ales
Happy Thanksgiving!
When winter comes I am always happy to see the return of the seasonal winter ales and beers. This is a pretty unique thing that beer-drinkers get to enjoy - when last did you see a special winter wine or winter vodka? (Yes, of course there is mulled wine and alcoholic eggnog, but you get my point.)
I like to buy at least one pack of each of the winter ales, and maybe even try some new ones. Ones I've tried over the years are:
- 2 Degrees Below from New Belgium (Colorado)
- Winterhook from Red Hook (Seattle-based)
- Ebenezer from Bridgeport (Oregon)
- Celebration Ale from Sierra Nevada (California)
- Auld Acquaintance from Pike Brewing (Seattle-based)
- Bifrost from Elysian (Seattle-based)
- Delirium Christmas (Belgium)
Of these, I think my favorite has to be the Ebenezer - it's nice and dark without being too strong.
As you can see, we are spoiled for choice up here in the PNW! :)
What's your favorite winter ale?
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
Mint.com and Fidelity login errors
I recently signed up with Mint.com to aggregate all my different financial info. The experience for adding accounts is pretty simple and intuitive, until I tried adding my Fidelity accounts. Even after entering the correct username and password, I kept getting an error saying the info was incorrect.
After trying multiple times, and looking around for help online. One suggestion was to select Fidelity NetBenefits instead of the Fidelity Investments account when adding. (I have both a brokerage account and a 401(k) so both could have worked. However, using the Fidelity NetBenefits approach didn't work for me.
So, on to plan B... I found another suggestion that long passwords on Fidelity cause problems for Mint.com. (Lame, but not unheard of - why websites put an upper limit on password length is beyond me. What's really lame in this case is that Mint.com don't warn you that they have an upper limit on passwords they support!)
The remedy was to log in to Fidelity directly (and reset my password, since Mint.com had tried unsuccessfully enough times to lock me out - grr!). My new password is less than 13 characters long (and randomly generated using this webpage :) )
Once I had set the new, shorter, password I went back to Mint.com and added the Fidelity account. Hey presto, it works!
Now come on Mint.com and allow us to use longer passwords!
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
Sachertorte
I recently celebrated my birthday, and decided to splurge and order a cake from a local catering company. I had heard about one from the wife of the chef/owner, who works at the same company as I do and is a member of our "foodies" mailing list.
She mentioned that her husband made a good sachertorte (and had done extensive research in Vienna, so he knew what he was talking about...) Having some fond memories of sachertorte I had eaten as a child in South Africa (we had several German bakeries in Cape Town), I decided to order one from him.
I'm pleased to report that the cake was delicious - props to Matt at Starry Nights Catering! A little dry (as it should be), but very tasty and with an amazing chocolate "icing" (couverture). As is customary, I had my slice of cake with whipped cream and a good cup of coffee. The leftovers made an extra-decadent breakfast the next morning too! :)
Looking at the recipe for the cake here, I realized that the icing is incredibly tricky to make properly - not somethnig I'm likely to try at home any time soon :)
Photo credit: LuceCreativa.it
She mentioned that her husband made a good sachertorte (and had done extensive research in Vienna, so he knew what he was talking about...) Having some fond memories of sachertorte I had eaten as a child in South Africa (we had several German bakeries in Cape Town), I decided to order one from him.
I'm pleased to report that the cake was delicious - props to Matt at Starry Nights Catering! A little dry (as it should be), but very tasty and with an amazing chocolate "icing" (couverture). As is customary, I had my slice of cake with whipped cream and a good cup of coffee. The leftovers made an extra-decadent breakfast the next morning too! :)
Looking at the recipe for the cake here, I realized that the icing is incredibly tricky to make properly - not somethnig I'm likely to try at home any time soon :)
Photo credit: LuceCreativa.it
Sunday, November 21, 2010
Some Garagiste and Jon Rimmerman info
Hi all! First of all, I'm back and hope to be blogging here more often - stay tuned!
I came across two items online recently, both related to the Seattle wine retailer Garagiste, which is run by Jon Rimmerman. I've been a mostly happy Garagiste customer for several years, and have discovered many good wines (and gotten some good deals) along the way.
Every now and then I get irked by his flowery prose and over-the-top description of wines or wineries, but hey, that is part of the fun. (Apparently many wine makers and wine distributors subscribe to his mailing list just to read his mini-essays, not to buy anything.)
Jon Rimmerman spoke a while back at a local mini-conference on small business about the founding of Garagiste and how it has grown. It's worth a look, considering he started with $500 and no marketing budget, and now sells millions of dollars of wine a year.
Here's the link: http://www.wellesleywinepress.com/2010/07/recommended-viewing-jon-rimmerman-from.html
I came across two items online recently, both related to the Seattle wine retailer Garagiste, which is run by Jon Rimmerman. I've been a mostly happy Garagiste customer for several years, and have discovered many good wines (and gotten some good deals) along the way.
Every now and then I get irked by his flowery prose and over-the-top description of wines or wineries, but hey, that is part of the fun. (Apparently many wine makers and wine distributors subscribe to his mailing list just to read his mini-essays, not to buy anything.)
Jon Rimmerman spoke a while back at a local mini-conference on small business about the founding of Garagiste and how it has grown. It's worth a look, considering he started with $500 and no marketing budget, and now sells millions of dollars of wine a year.
Here's the link: http://www.wellesleywinepress.com/2010/07/recommended-viewing-jon-rimmerman-from.html
The second item is an article in the New York Times, looking at HR 5034 and how it would prevent people like Jon from shipping wine to their customers in other states. A nice quote from him is: "It's easier to deal in guns that in wine [in the US]"
The link: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/20/dining/20pour.html
And finally, how about some feedback from readers...
If you're a wine drinker, where do you buy yours from? How do you discover new wines, or do you stick to the ones you know?
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Food that should not have artificial sweeteners in it
Yesterday my wife and I went to Costco to get some supplies and noticed that they had a read product we've recently discovered and really like: Orowheat whole-wheat sandwich thins. (These are like burger buns but about he thickness of a thick pita bread).
The really sad thing is that they contain sucralose - artifical sweetener.
I should have checked the label before, but this time we did and we realized they contain sucralose and a few other odd ingredients (like cellulose - not something I would use in my kitchen, but probably not too bad since it is a plant-based fibre).
The really sad thing is that they contain sucralose - artifical sweetener.
I should have checked the label before, but this time we did and we realized they contain sucralose and a few other odd ingredients (like cellulose - not something I would use in my kitchen, but probably not too bad since it is a plant-based fibre).
Saturday, February 27, 2010
Trip to Maui
I recently visited Maui for the first time and had a wonderful time. I can certainly see why so many people rave about it, and why people tend to go back every year (or as often as possible)! The weather (even in winter), humpback whales, amazing beaches, beautiful landscape, laid-back atmosphere, friendly people - there is so much to like.
In the next few blog posts I will recap some of ther highlights and "pimp" some of the good places we went to (both to make sure I remember them and to help other people plan their trips...)
But before I get to that, I need to spend some time talking about a flat tire. Stay tuned...
In the next few blog posts I will recap some of ther highlights and "pimp" some of the good places we went to (both to make sure I remember them and to help other people plan their trips...)
But before I get to that, I need to spend some time talking about a flat tire. Stay tuned...
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Basler Läckerli
One of the special Christmas treats when I was growing up were cookies my gran used to make called Basler Läckerli (also spelled Leckerli). These are named after the Swiss town of Basel, and I guess my gran was exposed to them as she grew up in Alsace, France.
They are quite unusual , containing no eggs or butter. Instead, the dough is made from honey, sugar, candied citrus peel, almonds and spices. They last forever (in an airtight container), but if they do start to get a bit dry you can soften them by putting a few slices of apple in the container with them.
I had great success making some myself this past Christmas, and have shared out my gran's recipe on Google docs here: http://docs.google.com/View?id=dgt27mxq_5fnz9rfxn
If you're not up to making them, and are feeling flush, you can also order some from a shop in Switzerland: Läckerli Huus
They are quite unusual , containing no eggs or butter. Instead, the dough is made from honey, sugar, candied citrus peel, almonds and spices. They last forever (in an airtight container), but if they do start to get a bit dry you can soften them by putting a few slices of apple in the container with them.
I had great success making some myself this past Christmas, and have shared out my gran's recipe on Google docs here: http://docs.google.com/View?id=dgt27mxq_5fnz9rfxn
If you're not up to making them, and are feeling flush, you can also order some from a shop in Switzerland: Läckerli Huus
Thursday, December 24, 2009
Friday, December 18, 2009
Aged Eggnog
I noticed an article in the current Seattle Magazine that mentioned ageing eggnog. I'd never heard of this before, being a somewhat recent transplant to the Northern reaches of the world. For some reason, in South Africa, we never really got into eggnog, what with the 36+ degree C summer weather over Christmas!
The basic idea presented in the article was to put the eggnog (with alcohol) in a cool location - the author used her unheated garage. Now, my garage seems to stay around 45 degrees F in winter (at the coolest), so this seems like a dangerous thing to do. Surely the eggs will grow some funky bacteria?
Not so, according to this article on Chow.com: Old but not lethal
They do recommend using the fridge, not the garage, though!
The basic idea presented in the article was to put the eggnog (with alcohol) in a cool location - the author used her unheated garage. Now, my garage seems to stay around 45 degrees F in winter (at the coolest), so this seems like a dangerous thing to do. Surely the eggs will grow some funky bacteria?
Not so, according to this article on Chow.com: Old but not lethal
They do recommend using the fridge, not the garage, though!
Tuesday, December 01, 2009
Doing what Heifer.org says they do...
(Originally posted 1/18/2007)
I spotted this story on Metafilter, the video here is worth checking out.
It turns out Heifer.org (recent darlings of the media for some reason) have fine print on this page on their website that says the money donated to them is "symbolic" and will not actually go to buying a water buffalo for a needy family. Some of it will, but the way the website is worded you'd think all (or amlost all) would go towards the buffalo, and that you might get some feedback (a picture or info of the recipient family):
It looks like the small print may have been changed since this post . It now reads:
What does Chariy Navigator say about Heifer? They give them a 3-star rating, and only 75% of the funds they raise go towards the program costs. The president's salary of $183,000 doesn't help much...
Update: 04/24/2008:
This post still gets a lot of views... To clarify a bit - I have not volunteered with or donated to Heifer.org. (Some readers seem to think I have).
Checking the Charity Navigator page a little of a year after I originally posted this, it's interesting to see the increase in the president's salary. From $183,000 to $213,490. That's a 16% increase!
Update: 12/01/2009:
I am amazed to see that this post still gets a lot of hits and generates a lot of comments - I had no idea it would be such a lightning rod when I posted it! Kimberline recently commented and I think it's worth responding to some of the points raised.
Firstly, the title of the blog post is in reference to the short film by Robert Thompson titled "4 Generations" (linked to at the top of the blog post). This is the person that "is doing what Heifer.org says they do".
I should be clear that I don't hate Heifer.org. Originally I was motivated to post something because I enjoyed the short film, found it opened my eyes, and provided some food for thought. Before seeing the film and reading the story, the only information I had seen about Heifer.org was what they showed in their advertising - turns out that was a bit misleading. (Shocking!)
At the time I posted this blog, Heifer.org had what I think was misleading advertising, which they since corrected to make it clear the donations they receive may not result in actual animals being purchased for the poor. So, while the title of the blog post is a little outdated nowadays, I presume folks can read beyond the title of the blog post and form their own opinion of how applicable (or not) it is today.
Kimberline says that he/she doesn't see any mention of donations to charity on my blog, and therefore I am not qualified to criticize a charitable organization. I've never felt the need to blog about my donations to charity, but I will say that I do give each year and have volunteered my time as well.
Kimberline makes it sound like we should be happy with any charity that gives money to the needy, and not worry too much about the efficiency. I disagree - while 75% may seem like a good ratio, it is not that great. If you want to make a difference, you should want to make the biggest difference you can per dollar, so efficiency is vital.
If you are really interested in addressing world hunger as efficiently as possible, I would recommend looking at the Friends of the World Food Program. They spend 94.5% of their income on program expenses and have a four-star rating on Charity Navigator (see here). The CEO does earn a large salary ($300,000 in 2007), which some may take issue with, but given that so little money is "wasted" by this organisation, the CEO must be worth the money! :)
In closing, I don't expect people to read my blog post and make a decision based solely on the information here. Hopefully people take the time to do a bit more research and reading, go to Charity Navigator or even ask the charities they like for more information on their overhead.
I'm not going to pull this post down simple because some people think Heifer.org should not have a spotlight shone on them.
* Photo from CharlesFred (Flickr)
I spotted this story on Metafilter, the video here is worth checking out.It turns out Heifer.org (recent darlings of the media for some reason) have fine print on this page on their website that says the money donated to them is "symbolic" and will not actually go to buying a water buffalo for a needy family. Some of it will, but the way the website is worded you'd think all (or amlost all) would go towards the buffalo, and that you might get some feedback (a picture or info of the recipient family):
Nothing's more satisfying than finding exactly the right solution to a problem. That's the good feeling you get when you give an Asian subsistence farmer a water buffalo.
It looks like the small print may have been changed since this post . It now reads:
The prices in this catalog represent the complete livestock gift of a quality animal, technical assistance and training. Each purchase is symbolic and represents a contribution to the entire mission of Heifer International. Donations will be used where needed most to help struggling people.
What does Chariy Navigator say about Heifer? They give them a 3-star rating, and only 75% of the funds they raise go towards the program costs. The president's salary of $183,000 doesn't help much...
Update: 04/24/2008:
This post still gets a lot of views... To clarify a bit - I have not volunteered with or donated to Heifer.org. (Some readers seem to think I have).
Checking the Charity Navigator page a little of a year after I originally posted this, it's interesting to see the increase in the president's salary. From $183,000 to $213,490. That's a 16% increase!
Update: 12/01/2009:
I am amazed to see that this post still gets a lot of hits and generates a lot of comments - I had no idea it would be such a lightning rod when I posted it! Kimberline recently commented and I think it's worth responding to some of the points raised.
Firstly, the title of the blog post is in reference to the short film by Robert Thompson titled "4 Generations" (linked to at the top of the blog post). This is the person that "is doing what Heifer.org says they do".
I should be clear that I don't hate Heifer.org. Originally I was motivated to post something because I enjoyed the short film, found it opened my eyes, and provided some food for thought. Before seeing the film and reading the story, the only information I had seen about Heifer.org was what they showed in their advertising - turns out that was a bit misleading. (Shocking!)
At the time I posted this blog, Heifer.org had what I think was misleading advertising, which they since corrected to make it clear the donations they receive may not result in actual animals being purchased for the poor. So, while the title of the blog post is a little outdated nowadays, I presume folks can read beyond the title of the blog post and form their own opinion of how applicable (or not) it is today.
Kimberline says that he/she doesn't see any mention of donations to charity on my blog, and therefore I am not qualified to criticize a charitable organization. I've never felt the need to blog about my donations to charity, but I will say that I do give each year and have volunteered my time as well.
Kimberline makes it sound like we should be happy with any charity that gives money to the needy, and not worry too much about the efficiency. I disagree - while 75% may seem like a good ratio, it is not that great. If you want to make a difference, you should want to make the biggest difference you can per dollar, so efficiency is vital.
If you are really interested in addressing world hunger as efficiently as possible, I would recommend looking at the Friends of the World Food Program. They spend 94.5% of their income on program expenses and have a four-star rating on Charity Navigator (see here). The CEO does earn a large salary ($300,000 in 2007), which some may take issue with, but given that so little money is "wasted" by this organisation, the CEO must be worth the money! :)
In closing, I don't expect people to read my blog post and make a decision based solely on the information here. Hopefully people take the time to do a bit more research and reading, go to Charity Navigator or even ask the charities they like for more information on their overhead.
I'm not going to pull this post down simple because some people think Heifer.org should not have a spotlight shone on them.
* Photo from CharlesFred (Flickr)
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Can tap beer make you sick?
The Seattle Weekly had an interesting column a few weeks ago, talking about beer on tap, and how it's really important for the beer lines to be changed regularly.
See http://blogs.seattleweekly.com/voracious/2008/10/ask_the_bartender_can_tap_beer.php
This is not something I've thought about much before, but it makes perfect sense. Perhaps it's worth finding out how often your favourite pub or restaurant change their lines? Or if you get some "off" beer, this may be the reason why... (Previously I used to think it was all to do with the age of the keg...)
See http://blogs.seattleweekly.com/voracious/2008/10/ask_the_bartender_can_tap_beer.php
This is not something I've thought about much before, but it makes perfect sense. Perhaps it's worth finding out how often your favourite pub or restaurant change their lines? Or if you get some "off" beer, this may be the reason why... (Previously I used to think it was all to do with the age of the keg...)
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Syrah versus Shiraz
The Splendid Table (a food and wine show on NPR) had an interesting segment featuring Randall Graham (of Bonny Doon Vineyards). He talks about Syrah versus Shiraz, and the difference in style between French (or Old World) syrah and Australian (or New World) Shiraz.
He certainly has some valid points. I did find that I got bored with the very ripe, over-extract, Australian Shiraz that I was buying a few years ago, and tend to prefer the more complex stuff now. However, I think there is a place for both Old World and New World wine, and I have had some truly memorable Shiraz from Aussie (2002 Larrikin, 2004 Losy Highway Stella's Garden, 2005 Mitolo G.A.M. for example). South Africa also makes some great Shiraz wines, somewhat in-between old and new world in style...
So, for me, it's less about the country the wine comes from, or whether it says Syrah or Shiraz on the label - it's about what is inside the bottle.
You can listen to the audio segment here and find more info on the show's webpage here.
You can also read an excerpt from Randall Graham's book.
He certainly has some valid points. I did find that I got bored with the very ripe, over-extract, Australian Shiraz that I was buying a few years ago, and tend to prefer the more complex stuff now. However, I think there is a place for both Old World and New World wine, and I have had some truly memorable Shiraz from Aussie (2002 Larrikin, 2004 Losy Highway Stella's Garden, 2005 Mitolo G.A.M. for example). South Africa also makes some great Shiraz wines, somewhat in-between old and new world in style...
So, for me, it's less about the country the wine comes from, or whether it says Syrah or Shiraz on the label - it's about what is inside the bottle.
You can listen to the audio segment here and find more info on the show's webpage here.
You can also read an excerpt from Randall Graham's book.
Thursday, November 05, 2009
A fix for the Win7 / ReadyNAS Duo problem
A while back I posted about an error I was hitting when copying files from Windows 7 to my new ReadyNAS Duo (see here).
Thanks to commenter Bill Kirchhoff I found a way to get things working:
Under the settings for Streaming Services/ReadyDLNA, uncheck the "Automatically Update" option:
The downside to this is you need to manually rescan your media files.
Thanks to commenter Bill Kirchhoff I found a way to get things working:
Under the settings for Streaming Services/ReadyDLNA, uncheck the "Automatically Update" option:
The downside to this is you need to manually rescan your media files.
Wednesday, November 04, 2009
Invictus
In September I blogged the 1995 Rugby World Cup match and the book "Playing The Enemy" (see here). I missed that they are making a film based on the book - "Invictus" directed by Clint Eastwood and starring Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela and Matt Damon as Francois Pienaar.
It looks like it will released in the USA around December 11. Looking forward to it!
It looks like it will released in the USA around December 11. Looking forward to it!
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