I Ain't Afraid of No Daleks

During the hot weather, or when I'm working a split shift and must have a late lunch, my slow cooker is a real blessing. Also, if it's not hot out, I will sometimes make a quick casserole in the morning, to re-heat for later.

Here's some favourite slow cooker and casserole recipes:

Roast Pork with Apricot sauce and Raisin Pilaf

1 small boneless pork shoulder roast, approx. 2 1/2 to 3 1/2 pounds.
1 18 oz jar apricot preserves
1/4 cup chicken broth
2 Tablespoons Dijon mustard (can sub. spicy brown mustard, for a bit more "kick")
1 large sweet or yellow onion, chopped
1 box rice pilaf
1/2 cup seedless raisins (optional)

Place meat in bottom of slow cooker. In a bowl, combine preserves with mustard, broth and onion. Pour over meat, and set cooker to low. Cover and cook for 8 to 12 hours. Remove meat to platter. Skim off any fat and pour desired amount of remaining sauce in cooker over meat. Before serving, prepare rice according to package directions, adding raisins when you stir in the pilaf seasoning packet, if desired, and cook as usual. Serve meat with rice and cooked young green peas or a tossed green salad. Serves 4 to 8 people.

As a kid, this was my #2 favourtie dish for mum to make me (next only to her New England pot roast), she got this casserole from an old Campbell's Soup cookbook from the mid-1960's, and added to it, over the years:

Yankee Noodle-Frankfurter Bake

1 package hot dogs, sliced 1/2 inch
1/2 package medium egg noodles
1 can Campbell's tomato soup
1 sm. can baby or regular peas, drained
1 Tablespoon onion powder
2 1/2 teaspoons prepared yellow mustard

Cook noodles according to package directions, drain. Grease a large casserole dish, and pre-heat oven to 350 degrees (moderate oven). In a bowl, combine all ingredients, until well-blended. Pour into casserole and seal top with aluminum foil. Bake for 30 minutes, removing foil last 10 minutes. Serves 4 to 6.

Shown below are publicity photos from BBC One's most recent bid for viewers: Celebrity Co-ed Naked Bowling.

Here we see actor David Tennant (Dr Who/Casanova/Learners) trying to knock down ten pins, in a bid to win 50p for his favourtie charity:

David was playing against American heiress, celebrity and jailbird, Paris Hilton, shown below:

Ms. Hilton was playing for one dollar, to be used to purchase a packet of nail files from the Dollar Store, to give to her fellow convicts--tho' Paris says she might use the money to buy herself some new fingernail polish.

Just minutes ago, I was out on the balcony, watering my flowers, when I saw this woman on the side porch below me. She flagged me down, said she was with national security something, something (I'm partly deaf in my right ear, and someone was using a grass trimmer nearby, so I couldn't hear her clearly at first) doing some kind of personnel investigation and asked it I knew someone named "William" something or other.

Hmmm--reminds me of the time we had an international hit man, wanted by Interpol, hiding out in an apartment complex near our village school, when I was a teenager. You just never know, do you?

I don't know what Flame has against poor Charlie, all of the sudden. She keeps going after him, for seemingly no reason.

I mean, poor Bonnie Prince Charlie will be laying down, snoring away, and Flame will walk up to him, spit at him, and slap him upside the head with her paw. No reason. Poor Charlie.

After, if I don't pay attention to his plight, he'll get up and wander around, mewling like a little baby--"She hit me!" So, now, I make it a point to give him sympathy right off--and yell at Flame.

I mean, she never liked him much, but she never went out of her way to hurt him before, either.

Sometimes, I think it's because he's lying on her blanket--it was supposed to be their blanket, to be shared by the three cats--but Flame somewhere decided that it was exclusively hers.

Now, last night--just got to bed and was having the oddest dream--I was in some board room, there was this long table with chairs, and they were filled with Dr Who fans--all dressed up like the Master(s)--except that it was some kind of game they were playing, and one person dressed like the Master was really the Doctor, impersonating the Master--and people had to guess which fan was really playing the Doctor. Confused yet? Said it was an odd dream....

Anyway, how I woke up---grrrrr! Rowrrr! Hisssss! Spat! Flame was attacking Charlie underneath my bed. Oh yeah, I was lovin' that. I shooed Flame away and had to bend over and sooth Charlie's feelings, before going back to sleep. Stupid cats--sometimes I really have to remind myself, how much I love them.

POOR CHARLIE!

BAD FLAMEY!

By the way, for certain of my friends whom may be reading this, SUPPOSEDLY, the CD containing my personal photos will be ready on Saturday---maybe. For obvious reasons, I didn't put in a lot of family photos, but there's several of my late mum, and I found one of my nephew and me, at one of the local beaches, where it's taken from a bit of a distance, and you can't really see his face too clearly, so decided that would be okay--tho' I have reservations about publishing a pic of me in a swimsuit.

Mostly, there's some pics of me, past and present, and pics of the area around where I grew up, and some of Egypt, and some local photos of fall foliage and stuff.

12th July, 2007

Playwrite27 (N.)

It was reported today, in northeastern New York state, that the state of New York is considering slapping National Grid with a large fine.

This all stems from a massive power outage earlier this week, which National Grid is blaming on severe thunderstorms that blew through the area, knocking out power lines in several key locations.

According to a National Grid spokeswoman, the company did a planned shut down of the power to a local city, to avoid having an overload to their system. The problem though, lies with the fact that no one at National Grid said a word to anyone about the planned outage.

And that left leaders of the city of Troy, New York--the city directly effected by this power cut--both angry and concerned. Troy, located on the eastern banks of the Hudson River, just north of the capital city of Albany, has a population of 50,000--many of whom are elderly. The city has two hospitals and a large number of senior housing complexes. This occurred during a sweltering heat wave, with temperatures hovering around 90 F (32 C) accompanied with steamy tropical-like humidity.

Despite not knowing about the planned outage, city leaders acted quickly, setting up cooling centres and working with local grocery store chain, Price Chopper, to provide ice and bottled water to those who needed it. Even so, the city's fire department and ambulance crews were kept busy, responding to medical emergencies at several of the senior complexes.

The New York State Public Service Commission, which oversees utilities in the state, will be investigating the planned outage, and has not ruled out levying fines on National Grid, for not notifying city leaders of their intent. Local and state lawmakers are also looking into National Grid's policies, and promise to see that changes are made in regards to how planned power outages are handled by New York state power companies.

Other parts of the area were shut down as well. On Tuesday, in the north country, a thunderstorm took out 13 power lines at the Spier Falls Dam on the Hudson River, in Moreau, NY, causing a low voltage situation, which can cause damage to home appliances and computer systems. National Grid reacted by shutting down power to parts of three counties: Saratoga, Washington and Warren. Power was cut to much of New York's north country, including parts of the cities of Saratoga Springs--a popular resort city of 26,000, in Saratoga County, and the City of Glens Falls-which has a population of 15,000, in Warren County, and the small city of Hudson Falls, in Washington County. Power was restored to most parts of this area fairly quickly.

National Grid is defending these planned outages as a necessary evil, to prevent even worse outages. However, state and local authorities are taking a dim view of National Grid's procedures, saying there was a massive communications failure on the utility's part. National Grid took over operations in many parts of the state recently, buying out the former "local" power company, Niagara-Mohawk, which had served statewide customers for over 50 years. National Grid is based in the U.K.

THE CITY OF TROY, NY

Doctor Who: Time Lords Don't Cry

Chapter 17: Invasion

The Doctor kept turning the key but the engine refused to turn over. The thing in the metal suit slowly clanked towards them. “Where’s my sonic screwdriver when I really need it?” The Doctor murmured sarcastically, “Oh, I know, back in the Tardis. Lovely.” Uncle Tobias slowly clanked over to the truck, and reached out a steel gloved hand, towards the driver’s side door.

The Doctor looked through the glass, staring out into the blustery night. He said quietly, "First, the sovereign--that's the leader, finds a host, in this case your uncle. It takes on the appearance of the species it decides to invade. Then, it uses the bodies of other life forms as either a source of energy--food, or, they they become slave-corpses for the Droom invaders, like your Mrs. McHenry. The remaining population is absorbed by the Droom, and used as host bodies." “How many of them are there?” Marie asked. Shutting off the truck's headlights, the Doctor looked at her, his eyes darkly somber, and said, “Billions.”

Well, I was toying with going back to the ER again, tonight. Was bad late this afternoon and into the evening again--but feeling mysteriously better, now.

It's strange, I felt very tired today, yes--but the surgeon told me it might take weeks for me to recover completely, possibly months. And, of course, there was that tropical steamy hot weather of the last week, that only just broke last night. That kind of heat just saps the strength from you, if you're not used to it--and I'm not. I'm a cold-weather person, always have been. I can handle minus 15, 20 or 35 F (sub-zero), better than 90 F.

And a lovely day it was, out there today, such a relief to have the humidity gone--wish it could be like this all summer, a perfect 10 of a day. But the horrid muggy weather yesterday and before, really didn't help my condition, any.

I almost fell today, getting up from my chair. Just couldn't get my balance. I've been feeling a bit--odd, on and off all night, very mildly light-headed, rapid heartbeat, and a a headache, as well. So, I still have a few of the symptoms of a low blood count/anemia. I have been taking the iron and vitamins daily, so...no idea. I'll make a couple of appointments tomorrow, see what's what.

I nearly got creamed by some jerk in a compact car, while legally crossing the street tonight--an idiot who had the nerve to yell at me...I wrote a letter to the Post-Star editor again--pulling no punches this time. I really am truly beginning to loathe modern America--we really are a bunch of hypocritical maroons.

In all seriousness, if I win the lottery, gonna' do two things--pay off my debts, and move the hell out of America--Canada, England, Scotland, Wales, Netherlands, Iceland...don't care. Just anywhere away from these people who can't spell, read, talk proper English, or walk through a car park safely. Arrrgh!

I REST MY CASE: