Archive for August, 2006
August 31, 2006 at 11:47 am · Filed under General
As I mentioned recently, this week is back to school week. I’ve been seeing lots of greetings between old friends on the train as kids get together after a summer apart. This has highlighted a significant difference between the sexes.
The girls employ the “squeal-hug” technique: they see each other, they squeal at each other, and they run into a warm embrace which lasts several seconds. They then talk at high speed about everything that happened to them over the summer.
The boys on the other hand use the “grunt-slap-bump” technique: they grunt at each other in a manly way, they perform some variety of hand slap, optionally involving extra twiddly bits if they’re trying to look really cool, then they bump opposing shoulders, as if they are trying to hug but miss.
These are the things I notice while travelling to work.
August 30, 2006 at 7:34 am · Filed under Food
My Sister-in-law-in-law asked me for my rhubarb crumble recipe. I figure if I’m sharing I may as well share it with everyone. If you’ve seen any of my other recipes you’ll know I’m not very precise with quantities. This one will be even worse, as crumble is very forgiving so I usually don’t even bother measuring.
For the filling, chop your rhubarb into inch long pieces and throw into a saucepan with some brown sugar (how much depends on how tart you like your filling), cinnamon, and ginger if you’re feeling in a gingery mood.
If your rhubarb plant is small and pathetic like ours you might need to add some other fruit to make enough filling for your dish. I’ve tried it with apples and blueberries, both work well. Cook the mixture on medium for about 15 minutes or until the rhubarb is starting to go soft but not disintegrating. Pour it into your crumble dish.
For the topping, take some self-raising flour (about 2 cups?) and cut in enough butter to make a moist biscuit crumb texture. Add more butter if you’re feeling decadent. Stir in some brown sugar. The ratio of flour-sugar-butter is probably about 3-1-1. Add some oats if you’re into that kind of thing (I usually don’t). Spread the topping out over the filling, being careful not to push it down.
Cook in a 325F oven for about 30-40 minutes or until the topping goes golden brown. Serve with custard or ice cream.
August 29, 2006 at 7:28 am · Filed under Games
It’s Tuesday again, which means Montreal Scavenger Hunt time.
The rules: Figure out where the photo was taken and tell me in a comment or take your own photo at the same location and post it on your blog for the added bonus of getting added to my blogroll (exciting eh?).
So here it is.. where is it?
August 28, 2006 at 8:31 am · Filed under F1
After the excitement of Hungary, I thought Turkey would disappoint, but I was wrong. It was in danger of becoming boring about midway through, but the second round of pit stops brought Fernando and Michael together for a fantastic fight to the finish. You know it’s been a good race when the two championship contenders cross the finish line side by side.
Alonso was lucky to get in front of Schumacher when everyone pitted during the safety car, but that was lucky for us too; The race would’ve been a lot less interesting if both Ferraris had stayed up front. The big question is what would’ve happened if Michael had got past Alonso? Would Massa have slammed on the brakes? Would we have seen a farcical finish like we did with Rubens a few years ago? We’ll never know.
August 24, 2006 at 7:57 am · Filed under Movies + TV
Little girls need to stop listening to their hormones and start listening to the singing.
August 23, 2006 at 12:36 pm · Filed under Travel, Work
For most schools around here, this is the last week of summer. For the past few weeks I’ve had peaceful journeys to work, sitting reading my book in a quiet carriage, sometimes with empty seats around me. All that is about to change.
It started today with the Dawson students who thankfully are old enough to be reasonably restrained, but on Monday it will be bedlam. The train will be full of screaming 12 year olds with their cell phones and ipods and all the souvenirs of a summer spent having way too much fun. They will be in a frenzy of excitement at least for the first few days until school has drilled all the fun out of them, then they’ll just be mildly hysterical. They’ll be running up and down the aisle, throwing stuff at each other, flirting, fighting, gossiping, screeching and generally being teenagers.
Oh well, maybe I’ll be more awake when I get to work now.
August 22, 2006 at 8:09 am · Filed under Games
Last week’s scavenger hunt went unanswered. The photo was taken between Burger King and Future Shop on St Catherine Street.
This week I have a slightly easier one for you, but first the rules. Examine the photo below and figure out where it was taken. Tell me where it is in a comment or go take your own photo of the location and post it on your blog.
This photo was taken east of Peel, West of University, North of St Antoine and South of de Masionneuve. So where is it?
August 21, 2006 at 10:45 am · Filed under Movies + TV
I don’t sit in front of the TV all night any more, I sit in front of it all morning instead. I have an hour before work each day to be a couch potato, and two hours before feeding time at the weekends. There’s nothing good on at that time in the morning, but that’s OK, I have a DVR. Some of the things I’ve been watching lately:
- Re-runs of The Good Life on PBS, even though they insist on calling it Good Neighbours
- Brotherhood on TMN; a Showtime drama about two Irish brothers, one a politician and the other a gangster. Sometimes I’m not entirely sure which is which.
- Northern Town on CBC; a quirky comedy about, well, a northern town. It has that slightly amateurish Canadian feel about it but it’s still entertaining.
- Hustle on CBC; a BBC drama about a group of con-men (and one con-woman for the sex appeal) in London and their wacky antics.
- Carnivale on TMN; I know it’s been cancelled but I still can’t pull myself away.
- Rough Science on TVO; Geeky show about a group of geeky British (and one American) scientists in New Zealand solving geeky scientific tasks. Yes, I’m a geek.
- Time Team on TVO; I just love watching Tony Robinson trying to make archeology sound as exciting as possible.
- Doctor Who on CBC; OK, season two hasn’t started yet, but it’s coming!
Talking of Dr Who, someone has been leaving comments on one of my old Dr Who posts today. They are strangely formatted and difficult to decipher but still interesting, thanks “K9 MK78″.
August 17, 2006 at 7:43 am · Filed under Travel
The joys of becoming a parent are immeasurable, but it does have a few small downsides. One of those is that we haven’t been on any trips for a couple of years. I have to admit that I’ve travelled more than my wife, but only because of a business trip to Florida and a trip to France which was not a happy one.
So until we can travel again (hopefully next year), I’m doing my travelling vicariously by reading travel books. I started with Bill Bryson’s Notes From a Small Island, documenting in hilarious fashion his travels around Britain, followed by Notes From a Big Country, The Lost Continent and A Walk in the Woods, also by Mr Bryson.
Having exhausted my Bryson collection (apart from the Australia one, I wasn’t in the mood for Australia), I’ve now started re-reading The Kingdom by the Sea by Paul Theroux, another amusing trip around the coast of Britain. Theroux’s writing pulls one along at such a speed that I expect to finish the book very quickly, which exhausts my travel book collection.
So my fair readers, can you recommend some travel books that I can feed to my travel bug?
August 15, 2006 at 7:35 am · Filed under Canada, Games
It’s time for the second Montreal Scavenger Hunt. You might actually have to go out and look around for this one, but it’s a nice day so go take a stroll.
The rules: Find the location of the picture below, and either leave a comment here telling me where it is or go take a picture of the location and post it on your own blog for extra kudos and the honour of being added to my blogroll.
This photo was taken below de Maisoneuvve, above Rene Levesque, east of Peel and west of Berri. So where is it? (oh and if you’re Fred, nice sentiment but work on your grammar).
August 14, 2006 at 7:50 am · Filed under Skepticism
Those who believe in alternative medicines often claim that science is somehow fighting against them, that science will never validate the therapies they believe in. Reasons given are many: the therapy won’t work under controlled conditions; science doesn’t consider the emotions of the patient; big pharma are conspiring to ridicule alternative medicine to increase their own profits; the studies are flawed; and the old favourite, well it works for me.
Sometimes though, science surprises the alties by validating one of these therapies. Take this recent study for example which shows that berberine, a substance used in ancient chinese medicine, may actually be useful against diabetes and obesity:
The researchers found that a dose of the compound, given orally, caused blood sugar levels to go down, led to fewer fats circulating in the bloodstream, made insulin work better and lowered the animals’ body weights.
Unlike the alternative medicide purveyors though, who will no doubt be marketing this stuff much more vigorously based on this study, scientists are cautious:
We would not recommend that anyone attempts to use this as a treatment in its current form as this research only focuses on animals. We will wait to see the results of further research with interest.
So what will happen if these findings are replicated and berberine is found to be safe and effective? If it works, it will be used in the treatment of diabetes and obesity and it will be medicine without any need for the “alternative” qualifier.
August 10, 2006 at 9:52 am · Filed under Canada, Home
Here are some of Montreal’s best:
- Best Sushi - The Sushi Shop (various locations)
- Best Indian Food - Ganges (NDG)
- Best Carrot Cake and Bread - Homestyle Bakery (Beaurepaire Village)
- Best “Family Dining” Restaurant - Baton Rouge (various locations)
- Best Steakhouse - The Keg (Old Montreal)
- Best Irish Pub - Hurley’s (Crescent) especially when Dusty is on duty, the Best Waitress
- Best Pain Au Chocolat - Veggirama (tunnel from 688 Sherbrooke to McGill Metro)
- Best General Tao Chicken - Hot and Spicy (the Faubourg)
- Best Breakfast - Eggspectation (various locations)
- Best Fine Dining - Le Trois Soeurs (Beaurepaire Village)
- Best Smoothies - Jus Booster (Sherbrooke and McGill)
August 9, 2006 at 7:06 am · Filed under Blogging
Looking at my logs, it seems that 51.5% of my visitors are still using IE to do their browsing. 3% of you are still using a version below 6.0. Why are you doing that to yourselves?? My advice to you is:
Or if you want to be on the leading edge, why not give Firefox 2.0 Beta 1 a try? I’m using it now and I’m very impressed so far.
23% of my visitors are already using Firefox. Very sensible people.
August 8, 2006 at 8:02 am · Filed under Games
Welcome to my first ever Montreal Scavenger Hunt Photo Quiz Thingy. Here are the rules:
I will post a photo of somewhere in downtown Montreal (to be more precise, within the area bordered by De La Montagne, St Antoine, Berri and Sherbrooke). You have to figure out where it was taken and tell me in a comment.
For extra bonus points, gold stars, and the honour of being added to my blogroll, you can also go to the location, take your own similar photo (not the same; you can’t just copy my photo and pretend you went there) and post it on your own blog with a trackback/link to this post.
I hope to post a new scavenger hunt every week until I run out of photos.
We will start with a nice easy one, but they will get more difficult, trust me. Where is this piece of ugly corporate art?
August 7, 2006 at 9:33 am · Filed under F1
What a race, what a result! I’m starting to think it might actually be a good idea to have randomized sprinkler systems on F1 circuits; wet races are always the most exciting.
The race was exciting from the very start, watching Alonso gain 10 places in the first lap and Schumi also racing through the field as Kimi took off in the lead. Jenson took a little more time, overtaking one car every lap until he was up to 4th place. Kimi’s amazing run of bad luck continued when he slammed his car into the back of a slowing Luizzi. His retirement was followed by Alonso going out with a driveshaft failure, leaving Schumaker to romp away with some free World Championship points. But it wasn’t to be; struggling on bald tyres he was quickly overtaken by De La Rosa, despite cutting a chicane to try to avoid it, followed by Nick Heidfeld who made contact with the Ferrari causing Michael to retire.
With Alonso and Schumi both out of the race it was all up to Jenson to bring it home, and he did it in style. Even before the retirements he was already way ahead of Michael, and getting busy catching Fernando. While the rest of the field struggled with grip in the treacherous conditions, Button drove smoothly and consistently, aided by an inspired tyre and fuel strategy. Well done JB, it took 113 races to get there but everyone knew you could do it.
So good news for Britain, but bad news for Canada. After Villeneuve was unable to race in Hungary, he and BMW Sauber have parted company for good. Is this the end for Jacques?
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