Mythbusters has a lot to answer for. They really should append “don’t try this at home” to anything to do with soft drink and mentos.
From bits and pieces…
Science hurts
Pop tart
Oh Pepsi, you’re so cheap. You’ve always tried so hard to impress us. But you’re a floozy. We can see right through you… you and your cheap tricks…
Here’s a diagramatic representation of the evolution of two popular cola’s logos over their history…
Death becomes you
I probably don’t write enough about death. Mostly because it’s one of those topics you don’t talk about in polite company.
But I can’t let these advances in post mortem technology go by without comment.
Finding the right, dignified, treatment for your loved ones is an important choice…
Firstly, you could turn your loved one’s ashes into a rather smart casual diamond… from LifeGem. Here’s a testimonial…
“Dear Mr. VandenBiesen,
Thank you, Thank you, Thank you. The Archie Life Gem is so beautiful. I received it on Wednesday last week, had it mounted into a ring the same day, and have been wearing it ever since. The color is so amazing.(so is the size-Thank you) I am thrilled. What a wonderful service your company performs. Thank you for making my heart smile again.
Angie McKinnon”
If that’s not your thing, you could always choose to keep your loved one’s ashes in a purpose built urn – reproduced in the image of the recently departed. From PersonalUrns.
Doctored emails
I know I said I was going to stop putting my conversations with Dr Paul on the main page. They’re getting too long.
But I have an excuse – there’s this cool new “text to video” platform – xtranormal – that is worth mentioning all by itself. The fact that I’ve used it to animate our current email conversations is neither here nor there… the German accent I gave him makes him just as hard to understand as he is in real life. I’ve updated the video to give him a nice clear British accent…
Dialogue with Atheists
I love my atheist friends. Not only do they brighten up my work days with interesting emails, the also get me thinking quite a bit about what we do right and wrong as Christians.
The Internet Monk has entered into his own little dialogue with an atheist – it’s interesting reading.
That old “morality” chestnut comes up. One of the things atheists seem to find profoundly annoying (apart from being generalised and slandered as a bunch, and references to Hitler) is the idea that you can’t be a moral person without God.
This is a communication breakdown. When I say “you can’t be good without God” it’s because I believe in God, believe humanity to be totally and naturally sinful, and believe that God graciously allows sinful people to act morally. Other people mean something different – they mean that you can’t be moral without “believing” in God. They’re different. And I think we need to be careful to express the difference in meaning. Non-theists are capable of moral behaviour. Theists believe that’s because God lets them, atheists don’t feel that compulsion because they don’t believe God is there to do it.
The internetmonk article also brings up the question of indoctrinating children and whether or not this constitutes “child abuse” – which it can’t possibly, if God is there. And I believe he is.
Butter Chicken
I’ve been a bit inspired by my mum’s cooking blog (that doesn’t get updated very often) to put some of my recipes online occasionally.
It saves trying to write them down in a book somewhere to keep track of them.
Today’s recipe is for Butter Chicken – my Butter Chicken Recipe is deceptive – it contains no butter.
Ingredients
- 2 tins of Tomato Soup
- 1 medium size tub of natural yoghurt
- 1 dollop of cream
- 2 tablespoons almond meal
- 2 tablespoons garam masala
- 1 tablespoon turmeric
- 2 tablespoons Hungarian sweet paprika
- 1 tablespoon cumin
- Curry powder (to taste – I used about a table spoon)
- 2 teaspoons of coriander
- Chicken (I used about 4 thighs – but this could probably be safely increased)
- Onions
Method
- Combine tomato soup and yoghurt in a pot on low heat, add almond meal and spices, stir.
- Brown the onions in a separate saucepan/wok, add the chicken (cut into chunks) on medium heat.
- Once the chicken has started to seal add the sauce.
- As the sauce starts to bubble add the cream, stir in. Cover.
- Simmer on medium heat with a lid for 30-40 minutes.
Serve with rice and naan/roti/flat bread of some description/pappadams.
Leave any suggested improvements in the comments…
Wind break
Three nights of Chamber Music done and dusted. I’m feeling as cultured as one of those Yakult yoghurt drinks…
I can tell my bassoons from my oboes… So I thought I’d share that culture with you.
Meet Bruce
This is Bruce. He is my new scambaiting alterego. I have decided that rather than boring all those not interested in my scambaiting exploits I will set up a category that is excluded from the main page and the RSS feed – but available from a nice, easy to find, link. Which I will add when I’ve set it up. For now, this is Bruce. He’s pleased to meet you. And to help you with any foreign banking dramas you might have…
An Apple a Day…
Recently I purchased my first Mac. I quickly discovered that the Mac vs PC discussion is a touchy subject for some people and found it very ironic when a heated debate arose on my facebook wall.
I purchased a Mac because they have the reputation of working. Everytime. I don’t care that you can’t play games on a Mac as well as you can on a PC. I don’t care that you can’t watch movies to a high standard. I don’t even like playing computer games or watching movies. I don’t even care that you can’t customise it. I don’t even know how to customise computers, and, after watching my husband “improve” his PC, I wouldn’t want him to even try and customise my Mac. All I want to do is turn on my computer, use the internet, word process and then get on with my merry life without having to spend half of the day encountering problems. If I have to pay a little more for this reliability, then it’s money well spent in my opinion.
I should say here that the intention of this post is not to highlight the validity of my purchase. Neither is it weigh into the debate on Mac vs PC. If you want to have that debate at the end of this post go ahead, just don’t expect me to join in. I actually just want to relay this morning’s computer related events that I found vaguely amusing.
Having awoken to a beautiful winter Townsville morning, I decided to try and chat to my parents via Google chat. Unfortunately they were having technology issues at their end (they’re PC people) so the conversation didn’t take place. Throughout this time, Nathan had been on the upstairs desktop (PC) for well over three hours, trying to get a sermon written and some other pieces of work done. Every 3-4 minutes he popped down to see me while his computer restarted. Apparently he was having some troubles. What can I say, he has a PC. Lunchtime rolled by and he joined me for some Indian curry before returning to the computer to try and get some work done. It was about this time that I stared to hear banging coming from upstairs. Things were not going so well. Graciously I offered to let him use my Mac so he could get the work done. He told me that he’d been intending to do this all morning, if only he could retrieve the work he’d started on the PC. I don’t know about you, but spending roughly four hours trying to open a document seems a little unproductive.
It’s now about an hour after the banging stopped and I haven’t seen or heard from him in awhile. I don’t know if this means the computer is working or if he’s found a book to read. Most likely the latter.
Trying new things
I’ve been tweaking my design a bit in my allocated blog time today – rather than posting. Check out the funky new drop down menu in the top right of the design, and first time (and regulars coming back for the first time) visitors will get a nice little welcome message from now on.
Try it and tell me what you think.
Off to opening night of the Australian Festival of Chamber Music now. I’ll come back more cultured, but don’t worry, I’ve got a heap of trivial things to post tomorrow to get you through your weekend.
NASCHART
NASCAR is the world’s dumbest motor sport. Here’s a flowchart guide to success.
Tequila Mockingbird
For those not interested in US race politics here’s a quick snapshot of a story going on in the US now that will make this post make sense…
An African American professor was arrested in his own home recently for breaking into his own home. The police were called by a neighbour, who didn’t recognise the guy as the home owner. The guy told the police that he was the homeowner, established this fact, and was still taken to the police station – Barack Obama commented on the situation, which is inappropriate given the separation of powers between executive and judicial arms of government. Everybody got mad. Then Obama invited the professor and the police man around to his house for a beer so they could have some laughs and move on with life…
Pretty cool hey. It’s a bit like To Kill A Mockingbird – because it’s about Racism, and a guy who knows the law really well doing his bit for reconciliation and to bring equality to the legal system.
Anyway, XKCD has produced this comic strip – which was funny.
Biblical suspicion
Why is it that as a Christian I am suspicious of anybody who forms their entire worldview – scientific, political and eschatological – on the basis of Genesis, Daniel, and Revelation?
They seem perfectly natural places to go for such issues…