A literal description of my state of mind
A literal description of my state of mind
An awesome resource for hockey fans, it's like having an entire sports page dedicated entirely to NHL Hockey and delivered to your email inbox every day.
Thanks to Off Wing Opinion for pointing this one out.
It's been a long time since I've posted anything from kitchen, but it's been quite a while since I've been able to do any serious cooking. Liz is out of town for a week visiting our oldest daughter, so I'm taking full advantage of the culinary freedom to try some new recipes.
Last night's dinner:
Sweet & Sour Country Ribs
Ingredients*
2-3 lbs country pork ribs
4 Tbsp soy sauce
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 can (20oz) chunk pineapple in juice
1 tsp crushed coriander
1/2 lb snow peas
2 tsp chopped candied ginger
Directions
Start the oven going to 325 degrees.
Put the ribs into a shallow casserole dish (9x13 works well).
Pour pineapple juice over ribs. Save the pineapple chunks for later.
Drizzle the soy sauce over the ribs, then sprinkle with the garlic and coriander.
Bake for an hour and a half to two hours, basting with the juices every half hour or so. The ribs should be very tender.
Put the ribs onto a heated platter and pour the juices from the pan into a large measuring cup or bowl. Let it settle for a few minutes and then skim the grease from the top.
Heat a medium frying pan on the stove.
Add the pan juices and bring to a boil. Let it cook, stirring frequently, until it begins to cook down.
Add the snow peas and stir, let them cook for a couple of minutes, until they turn bright green and are just tender crisp.
Add the pineapple chunks and stir in to heat through.
Pour it all over the ribs and sprinkle with candied ginger.
We served rice on the side, with the pan juices over the rice. Mmmmmmm. This one is going into my recipe book.
*That's what the recipe called for, but here's what I did different.
First, I forgot the garlic. Just flat out forgot it. Didn't have any coriander or candied ginger either. Instead I sprinkled about a tsp of ground ginger over the ribs before going into the oven, and at the table a dash of soy sauce on the ribs really woke up the flavor.
My Video is on google videos! Woo. Let me know what you think about it.
The people in it are my friends: Molly, Shannen, Diedre, Renee, and Shae.
In 1942, shortly after the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, the U.S. Coast Guard Cutters hockey club was born.
Brainstorm of Lieutenant Commander C. R. MacLean, a former player from Michigan and personnel officer at Curtis Bay Yards in Maryland, the Cutters played through the 1942-43 and 1943-44 seasons in the Eastern Amateur Hockey League, considered to be one of the most competitive leagues of its time.
They also played a number of exhibition games and once, at Carlin's Iceland in Baltimore, their home ice, the Cutters went head-on against the Stanley Cup champion Detroit Red Wings.
The Cutters took two league championships in their brief history, and the team was broken up when the Coast Guard came under pressure because the guys were playing hockey when so many others were in combat.
Go read, and learn about a little-known bit of frozen history.
From Dustbury:
And if you thought HD in radio meant the same thing as HD in television, think again:
"Quite honestly, it doesn't stand for anything," said Peter Ferrera, president and CEO of the HD Digital Radio Alliance. "The concept was somewhat of a steal from HD television, where viewers know it means better quality."
Courtesy of Hockey Recap, a link to a list of the greatest players to ever wear each uniform number.
Why now? Well, it seems that a rookie made the Montreal Canadiens club this season and is sporting number 84, which was the last number from double-zero to 99 not to be worn regularly during a season.
For the record, I heartily approve of #21, Stan Mikita (my all-time favorite), and Caps fans will be pleased to see Dale Hunter at #32 and Olaf Kolzig at #39. Good list, and sure to start some serious arguments.
I'm talking hockey, of course. It even has its own subject category here on Rocket Jones.
And this link, Hockey Recap, is an amazing resource for you hockey fans. I signed up from almost day 1, and have it delivered to my inbox every morning.
Go ahead and click on that link above, because every referral gets counted and the top dogs for the day get a prominent link on the top of their page. Make Rocket Jones shine.
Also, thanks to Off Wing Opinion for the original pointer.
You've all seen the "face" on Mars. You may have heard about the recent debunking, where higher resolution photographs showed that it was, indeed, a natural physical feature. You probably didn't hear about the barking mad conspiracy theorists who're convinced that NASA is satan and they want to hide the evidence of extraterrestrial life (ignoring the fact that finding ET would mean a huge expansion of space exploration funding).
So, here's a nifty 3D animation from ESA (European Space Agency) showing the "face" and what it really looks like from various angles.
Thanks to Transterrestrial Musings for the pointer.
The youngest dog got a haircut today. Desperately needed, he was starting to look like the love child of a rastafarian dust mop and a gordian knot. So Liz sat down, shortened up his leash, and had at it with the scissors, electric trimmer and shop vac.
At some point the goofy mutt took a snap at the scissors as Liz worked, and got his tongue cut. Bled like hell for a while, and he drove Liz crazy as he wanted to give himself a bath, leaving himself a bloody mess.
That was all done and over with by the time I got home, or so we thought. As I cooked dinner, I looked down at the dogs and saw Trix sitting there in a puddle of smeared blood, one paw looking half chewed off. Once again, his "bath" opened the wound and he recreated the "bucket at the prom" scene from Carrie.
We've got brand new carpet in the house, remember?
I snatched him up like a football and scrubbed like hell with a dishrag to clean him up as best I could. Then I took him upstairs into Liz's sewing room where he doesn't mind hanging out, is gated to keep the rabbit in, and has old carpet on the floor.
When he kisses you, he smells like blood.
On Sunday morning I "winterized" the front yard, which included the season's last mow and edging and cleaning up the flowerbeds. I also harvested the last of the veggies that we grew this year as an experiment.
Folks, this is the last harvest from *one* tomato plant, *one* cherry tomato plant (grown in a flowerpot), and *one* jalepeno pepper plant. We probably got close to 200 tomatoes from that one plant, and I did nothing more than water it fairly regularly. No fertilizer, no insecticide, nada. As such, I estimate the loss rate to hungry bugs and stuff to be around 40%, and when I picked a tomato and found it to be unsuitable for the table, I dropped it on the ground as bait/decoy and eventual fertilizer.
Figure a hundred each from the cherry tomato and jalepeno plants, and it was a bountiful year around here, and the neighbors enjoyed it too.
Still, come Spring I'm planting boxwoods. The HOA was on my case about the veggies in the front yard, and the garden was a whole lot more work than a few small shrubs. Oh well, it was fun (and tasty) while it lasted.
Unlike here. The title refers, of course, to whatever universe Tom Cruise is living in.
Tom Cruise has filed a $50-million lawsuit against Holesome Fun Incorporated, the world's largest manufacturer of sex toys, over the company's alleged unauthorized use of his image on its new Mission Insertable butt plug.
No, really!
That's the difference between "stars" and us little people. Me, I'd be rather honored to think that people would pay money to stuff my likeness up their ol' wazoo. I'd hope to be smart enough not to raise a big fuss too, thereby opening myself up to reporting like this:
Mr. Cruise is also demanding "the immediate and complete withdrawal" of the Mission Insertable butt plug...
Immediate? Selfish bastard, at least wait until I'm finished.
(almost forgot, found this thanks to the crew over at Babble-on).
On the way to our monthly rocket launches, we would pass an old stone building just off the interstate (I-66, west of Manassas). Set back into some woods, the building was multi-storied but just a shell, lacking even a roof. We always wondered about it, but never took the time to take the next exit and backtrack to try to learn more.
Recently, we noticed some work being done on the old building, and there is now a sign posted that included a website address.
The building is known as Chapman's Mill. There's some fascinating history about the people and building itself, and here's a teaser:
Some other interesting facts about Nathaniel Chapman: He was the executor of both Augustine and Lawrence Washington's estates. His wife's mother was the half sister of Mary Ball Washington--Augustine Washington's second wife. His daughter Lucy, married Samuel Washington the brother of George Washington.
Head on over and get edjumacated.
Yeah, that word is used too often, but in this case it correctly applies.
Check out this video.
Thanks to Ian for the pointer.
The countdown towards National Novel Writing Month, 2006 continues. On November 1st, the following people will begin writing the anthology that history has been waiting for.
annika
Victor
Ian
Buckethead
JohnL
Paul
Blue
Mookie
Molly (blogless)
Ted
Read details here.
Like that picture up above? I'd like to give special thanks to artist Webster Colcord for granting permission to use his awesome robot graphic for our group effort. If y'all want to snag the picture to post on your own pages, please feel free, as long as you post a link to webstercolcord.com and don't alter the image itself. I'll be putting a smaller version up on the sidebar tomorrow.
I'm sure I've forgotten someone, so please let me know if you'd like to join the fun.
Funny and oh, so true.
President Bush said that if illegal immigrants want citizenship they'd have to do three things: pay taxes, hold meaningful jobs, and learn English. Bush doesn't meet those qualifications. -- PJ O'Rourke
Read the rest at Q&O, neither party is spared.
Unobtrusive, yet not quite grasping the concept.
Getting into a hockey goalie's head. Here's a snippet:
I sat in 101, Row D, seat 11...right next to the [Carolina Hurricanes] Canes entry, behind their bench.1st period: Semin unloads a wicked slapshot that Ward can't handle. End of the 1st period, as the Canes come off the ice, I tell Ward, "Semin's gonna light you up in the 2nd."
2nd period: Semin scores again. Ward comes off the ice. "I told you what was going to happen..."
Read the rest, it's priceless.
Meanwhile, over at the Parkway Rest Stop, Jim has been reading Hillary Clinton's letter to Nancy Pelosi:
Right off the bat, I�m going to appoint Barbara Walters as the White House Chief of Staff. Can you imagine anything funnier than hearing her say, �Madam Pwesident� and �Madam Vice-Pwesident� every day? ROTFLMAO!
I'll second that. ROTFLMAO!
It has been a whirlwind of life around here lately.
Liz has had to take a leave of absence from work. She still cannot drive, let alone work, so we have become a one-income family again. We've been seeing many specialists, and they've ruled out a lot of really scary things that might have happened. We still don't have an answer - which is frustrating - but they've been introducing new medications (slowly, always slowly) and adjusting current ones, looking for that magic combination that will bring her back to normal. Or as close as possible anyway.
At work, we've had the fiscal year thing happening. Working in a finance-related field, you can imagine that it's been chock-full o' adventure and happenstance.
The home remodel is 95% complete. It's down to details, details, details. On Monday the floor people come out to figure out how they're going to fix the kitchen floor, because they botched the job. It's going to have to be redone, and they accept that, but unless better prep-work is done correctly, it'll just happen again.
Some touchup painting needs to be redone, some finishing trim installed, and of course lots of putting stuff away. I've been cooking like crazy this weekend (yay! finally!!!), and it's all harder because I don't know where anything is. As I get used to the new layout I won't have to hunt down the stuff I need, I'll just instinctively turn to it. We like it very very muchly though.
The new carpet and furniture is beautiful. The living room has looked like a cemetary all weekend because it's Fall Break at Rachael's school, so she brought some friends home with her (hence the cooking spree), and they're sleeping en masse in the living room. Yes, I'm living "Standard Male Fantasy #11 - House Full of College Girls".
I'm about three weeks away from being able to slow down, but I've gotten into a nice groove about things, so instead of being hectic and frantic I just stay steadily occupied from 4am (when I wake up for work) until 8pm or so (when I decide the day is done and unwind for a bit before bed).
Pictures of the house to come.
Origami Underground (Not really Work Safe), as a friend said "funny, yes, but I'm midly horrified".
I can at least link to something.
The Misadventures of Hello Cthulu.
Thanks to Random Nuclear Strikes for the pointer.
After yesterday's accomplishments, today I fixed a leaky drain in the upstairs bathroom sink, put half the basement back together and removed the old toilet in the downstairs bath so the floor guys could do their thing.
Mike, the friend that helped with the laundry sink yesterday, bought a new pickup.
Talk about cool stuff right there.
I'm too lazy to actually write much more then this at the moment, so have fun. I'm gonna go burn my eyes out by playing with the link some more.
The suspect shot and killed a deputy, shot and killed a police dog, and shot and wounded another deputy before being surrounded by 10 SWAT officers. Then he raised a gun...
"I suspect the only reason 110 rounds was all that was fired was that's all the ammunition they had," [Polk County Sheriff Grady] Judd said. "We were not going to take any chance of him shooting back."
Burn in hell you swiss-cheesed cop killer.
No dreams this time. I got up to close windows because it's raining and damn near tore a toe off kicking a box sitting along the upstairs hallway. That's way exagerated of course, because nothing is broken and no blood is leaking, but it's still throbbing and I'm pissed off.
What's with the freaking rain, anyway? All week long we heard about how beautiful the weekend was going to be. It drizzled much of yesterday and now rain overnight. Stupid weatherman.
Look at me, I'm a whiny little bitch.