Be Lambic or Green

We won the grand final of the McKibbin’s pub quiz last night with 27 out of a possible 50 points. Second place only had 24, I guess it was a tough quiz. Go us!

Some sample questions for you:

• What date was the day the music died?
• Which creature has the longest recorded life span of 220 years?
• Which plant has the largest seed?
• What was Toto’s real name?
• Which Broadway play begins with “Sold! Your number please? Thankyou sir.”?

We got all but one of those wrong. Of course, it’s much easier with Google at your fingertips…

Our last night in PA was spent in Intercourse (snigger) where we saw authentic and not so authentic Amish folk, bought jam, and ate traditional Amish fare (ham and reconstituted dried apples with potato dumplings and chow-chow).

I arrived back in Montreal on Saturday morning to be greeted by my lovely wife who I missed terribly while I was away. We went home and spent the weekend gardening, mowing lawns, pulling up dandelions and using C&T’s super-duper jet washer to wash the deck. We finished the weekend with chicken on a beer can (shove a half empty can of beer up a chickens bum and stand it on the bbq for an hour or so) and a trip to Rockaberry’s for pie.

Now I’m back at work and trying to figure out if I actually learned anything last week.

On Wednesday night we visited Philly. We spent a long time trying to decipher the parking signs (and I thought the Montreal ones were bad). We saw the Liberty Bell Centre (or Center as they like to call it) and Washington Square and all that patriotic stuff. We ate at a fancy contemporary Italian restaurant where everything was delicious.

Last night we went on a scenic drive through the PA countryside, visited the Chadds Ford Winery and picked up a couple of bottles then went back to the hotel for an evening of wine, pizza and a good movie (The Station Agent).

Tonight we’re going to visit the Amish and try some shoo-fly pie.

We went to the King Of Prussia mall last night. Depending on who you talk to it’s either the biggest or the 2nd biggest mall on the East Coast side of the USA. It’s big, but it’s not really exciting for the likes of me. I drooled over everything in the Mac store then wandered around aimlessly for an hour before eating an oversized meal at the Cheesecake Factory. I still have half a slice of cheesecake in my hotel fridge.

I’m in Malvern, PA, population 3000. It is not very exciting.

My Mum is currently in Portugal, probably drinking “screaming orgasms” with “the girls”. I think it’s a second childhood thing.

My Dad just had an operation on his wrist. I’ve yet to find out why.

My Brother is a policemen in the Met, and just passed his response driver test. So if you’re in London and see a police car hurtle past with lights and siren going and a skinny lad grinning in the driver’s seat, it’s probably him.

My Sister is in the middle of a paramedic training course, currently inflicting her bedside manner on patients in various departments of her local hospital. I guess all those visits to A&E in her youth had an effect.

My Mother-in-law just spent the weekend practicing sleeping with her friends. Best not to ask.

So now I have to ask, in a terribly transparent attempt at getting more comments, what are your family up to?

Whether you think Belinda Stronach was right or wrong to defect from the Conservative party to the Liberals, surely she deserves the same amount of respect as any male politician?

With her ex-fellow conservatives calling her an attractive dipstick, a whore and a prostitute and the National Post referring to her decision as a Blonde Bombshell I start to wonder if it’s possible for women to be taken seriously in Canadian politics.

Sunday was my birthday.

I got an early birthday present from Paolo who managed to get me the episode of Doctor Who that I missed last week. Thank you Paolo!

On Saturday we were joined by Kim, Cara & Tyler, Paul & Jen, and Eddie & Manon for a day of over-eating, over-drinking and playing silly games (the girls beat the boys at Cranium by some fluke). We finished the day with a viewing of the extended edition of The Fellowship of the Ring, and Shawn turned up fresh from Ottawa just as Boromir was keeling over full of arrows.

I have to thank Jen and all of the above for my lovely gifts and cards and for the good company. I also have to thank Cara for the delicious birthday cake she made. I only had nine candles, which was a relief, I was sure I was older.

A couple of items from the blogosphere:

First, what would you say if someone asked you to switch to a less gay phone company? Eugene Mirman handled those sales people perfectly.

And secondly, is this amazing satire or unbelievable reality? What do you think?

Something bizarre and freaky happened to the DVR last night. American Idol (which I don’t watch) recorded ok. Amazing Race (which I watched while it was on) recorded ok. Doctor Who (which was on while I was out) did not record!! This is terrible and horrible news (yes Shawn, there is such a thing as must-see-TV, and Dr Who is it).

If anyone (John? You listening John?) happened to record last night’s episode and can lend me the tape I will be forever grateful.

If anyone happened to record it in high definition, I will prostrate myself at their feet, proclaim my unworthiness and then have myself flagellated in their honour.

Back in February I sent off my application for Canadian Citizenship. I’ve been bitching and complaining (mostly inwardly but occasionally to Jen) about the lack of response from them. Today I was going to call them up to ask what was going on, but I decided to do a bit of research first.

According to the immigration website, the first stage, which involves someone looking over my application and making sure everything is there before sending me a confirmation letter, takes approximately three months. This means I should wait at least until the end of May before calling.

Three months? That seems like a long time just to take a brief look at my application and fire off a form letter. There can’t be that many people applying for citizenship can there? I went looking. Apparently there are. Every year about 160,000 people apply for Canadian Citizenship. That means those poor immigration people have to look at around 700 applications every working day. That’s 100 applications every working hour. And that’s just for the first step of the process.

About 5% of those applications get rejected, which still leaves 150,000 applications for the more detailed second step, and probably more than 100,000 for the even more detailed third step.

It looks like the CIC employ about 4000 people, and I would guess that less than a tenth of them spend time processing citizenship applications. Putting all these numbers together, it’s not really surprising that the processing takes so long.

So I’m going to stop complaining, sit back, relax, and wait patiently for my application to be processed. My Father-in-law has been here for over 25 years and he’s still not a citizen so it’s not like I’m in a hurry. I don’t envy the job those immigration people have to do, so they can take their time, and I’ll be very nice to them if they call.

This article about a rubella outbreak, says:

Health authorities believe the outbreak started at Rehoboth Christian School in Norwich, where about 60 per cent of students are not vaccinated, most for religious reasons.

If only there was a religion vaccine…

The race was a bit on the boring side, but I laughed at Michael’s misfortune. I now have visions of him grabbing the nearest Bridgestone mechanic by the throat and yelling into his face. Congratulations to Kimi on a dominant victory.

We tidied up the garden over the weekend ready for planting season and went to Reno Depot to buy seeds and a hoe (not a dirty hoe though).

I made banana bread: quarter cup of butter, half a cup of sugar, 2 eggs, 2 cups of flour, some baking soda, some baking powder, mushed up overripe bananas, all mixed up, poured into a loaf tin and baked for an hour.

It was Mother’s Day here in Canada yesterday so I sent Mum a box of champagne truffles, even though British Mother’s Day was about 2 months ago.

In skeptical news, the Kansas science trials are nearly over, and it sounds like the intelligent design community have been made to look, well, stupid. The real scientists boycotted the whole thing, leaving the lawyer on the side of science to cross-examine the ID people and make them look silly and lazy (apparently most of them didn’t bother to read the document the trials were based on).

Everything you need to know

Gardening season is upon us and I look on it with a mixture of excitement and trepidation. We have a huge garden, which is great until you realise how much work is involved to maintain it. Jen and I are quickly coming to the conclusion that we can’t manage it alone.

If anyone is feeling incredibly altruistic and wants to come by and help out with our gardening efforts, they are more than welcome. There might even be some bbq chicken in it for you. Here’s a list of what we plan to do this year:

• Mow the lawn every two weeks
• Plant the vegetable garden
• Weed the vegetable garden and the other beds regularly
• Put some kind of fence around the vegetable garden
• Find other innovative and humane ways to keep the squirrels off the vegetable garden
• Tidy up all the existing flower beds
• Create a new flower bed along one side of the vegetable garden
• Plant more pretty things
• Look after the existing pretty things
• Paint the garage
• Paint the potting shed thingy
• Wash and reseal the deck

If we can manage half of that lot I’ll be happy.

They can’t fool me, I know what they were alluding to.

The judgement is in. Jenson Button and Takuma Sato are banned from racing in the next two grand prix. It’s better than the team being thrown out of the championship but it’s still a bitter blow to a team who had good hopes of being up there with the top teams.

Did they cheat or was it a misunderstanding? It’s hard to say; the FIA say one thing, BAR say another. I’m tempted to believe the FIA but I still disagree with the penalty. Barring a team from racing is not only punishing the team, it punishes the fans. We want to see good competitive racing, and losing a competitive team, even for only two races, reduces the excitement level of a sport already suffering from lack of excitement.

Remove their points from the last race, give them a heavy fine, make them start from the back of the grid for the rest of the season, but let them race.

This article reports on a 14 year old BC girl who was refusing blood transfusions on religious grounds. She’s a Jehovah’s Witness. Two judges have ruled that she is too young to make that decision so she must have the transfusions.

I’m in two minds about the decision. I’m a firm believer in individual rights and individual choice. If she really doesn’t want transfusions then she should be able to choose that option. It has to be an educated choice though, so I hope that someone other than her fellow JWs has sat her down and explained everything to her. Sadly, JWs aren’t allowed to associate with non-JWs, so even talking to a doctor about her options is against the rules and could have her disfellowed.

This article spurred me into examining some of the JW beliefs. They may seem harmless enough, but they are actually quite an insidious organisation. They control their members through guilt and fear. Members are actively encouraged to turn each other in for rule violations. Violations can be anything from smoking to reading religious material not published by JW. An unrepentant follower can be shunned and disowned by his fellow JWs.

That kind of environment can only result in massive indoctrination for anyone growing up in it. That 14 year old girl, and others like her, have effectively been completely brainwashed. They are under complete control by their cult and that control must be incredibly difficult to break.

So what about the blood thing? The JWs most controversial rule is based on a few lines from the bible which state that we should not eat blood. Back in the ’60s the JW ruling based on these scriptural references was that blood transfusions, organ transplants and vaccinations were not allowed. Since then the rule has been relaxed to the point now where everything up to partial plasma blood transfusions is allowed. Nobody has managed to explain why it’s ok to receive partial plasma but it’s not ok to receive full plasma.

Science tells us that a blood transfusion provides no nourishment. The blood is not digested by the body. So how does a blood transfusion break the scriptural rule that we may not eat blood? That’s another question the governing body of JW has failed to answer. This site has all the information you need on the blood transfusion controversy.

Featured on the cover of an Awake! magazine from 1994 are the photos of 26 children, ages varying up to 17 years, with the caption: “Youths Who Put God First.” Inside the magazine proclaims: “In former times thousands of youths died for putting God first. They are still doing it, only today the drama is played out in hospitals and courtrooms, with blood transfusions the issue.”. The main article, ‘Youths Who Have “Power Beyond What Is Normal”‘ tells the stories of three of these children who died after refusing blood treatment. This to me is a callous disregard for human life. The magazine is treating these children as martyrs when in fact they are innocent victims of a cult of guilt and fear.

Should religious freedom stretch this far? Should an organised religion be allowed to endanger the lives of it’s followers? Barbaric practices like the hindu sutee (widows being burned alive on their husband’s funeral pyre) have been outlawed for many years, so banning a dangerous religious practice would not be setting any precedents. Telling people to refuse blood transfusions is life threatening. It should not be allowed.

After over a year, yesterday was finally the day to get a haircut. I went to Mutt and Jeff, a hair salon on Crescent Street where a very friendly staff treated me well and my hairdresser did an impressive job with my difficult hair. During my cut, the three hair dressers and two other customers were having a detailed conversation about sex toys, which enriched the experience even more.

Here are the before and after pictures:

UPDATE: My head has been freezing all day.

Yesterday I had a bit of a cooking extravaganza. It started with a bacon and mushroom sandwich. Not exactly high faluting gastronomy, but important to get right. The bacon has to have just the right amount of crispiness; the mushrooms have to be cooked but not mushy; the bread must be heavily buttered and spread with brown sauce.

Later on I started work on a Merseyside Meat Pie: Brown a pound of ground beef and fry in some onion. Add a couple of handfuls of diced potatoes and another couple of handfuls of diced carrots. Add some beef bouillon, some worcestershire sauce and enough liquid to just cover everything. Simmer for 45 minutes. Meanwhile make enough pastry for a 9 inch pie crust, with top. After 45 minutes, add some flour/water mixture to the filling and boil to thicken. Leave to cool. Line your pie plate with the pastry, pile in the cooled filling, put the lid on. Decorate it as you see fit, and do a better job of crimping than I did. Bake in the oven for 45 minutes, brushing with egg wash after 30.

While I was doing that I also threw together a batch of spag bol sauce for freezing: browned beef and onion, mushrooms, garlic, canned tomatoes, red wine, oregano, marjoram, thyme, a bay leaf, salt and pepper. Cooked at lowest temperature until it becomes a rich dark sauce (at least 2 hours).

Oh and I had some leftover pastry, and half a jar of mincemeat in the fridge so I made mince pies for dessert. Very Xmassy.

Tonight is the McKibbin’s pub quiz. Starts at 8pm. Hosted by Shaun.

Tomorrow night is the Hurley’s pub quiz. Starts at 8pm. Hosted by John.

Jen has been on the winning team for the last two quizzes. Come along, see if you can beat her.