Summer fun food and drink - Breastfeeding in the upside down Universe · Thursday August 7, 2008 by colin newell
If you watch as much TV as I do (and it isn’t really that much…), what do you see?
Murder, mayhem, carnage, chaos, sadness, hunger, and death…
And that’s just what’s on Food TV’s popular, Chef Ramsay.
Tune around ABC, NBC, CBS or Fox… and CNN and you are assured of seeing a never ending body-count; kidnapping, gun shot fatalities, homicide, serial killers… all in mind boggling detail.
And yet when a woman feeds her baby, in public no less, the reaction from the surrounding public can vary from casual indifference to self-righteous indignation and utter contempt.
I mean, I would understand someone reacting with unbridled horror and revulsion if I pulled a Canada goose out of a giant paper bag and slit its throat with a K-Bar knife, tossing it onto a Hibachi on a busy street corner and serving it up with a tossed salad. That I would understand. A Canada goose, after all, is a sacred creature.
Breastfeeding, next to stopping at Starbuck’s for a double-tall decaf latte, is one of natures original methods of infant nourishment. So what is the big deal? Sure, breasts are sexualized on women – so what? It takes a deeply disturbed psyche to be perturbed by a new mom and her un-weaned young’in taking in a few dozen sips of Planet Earth’s first beverage.
So. It is with no surprise to me whatsoever that protests are popping up (or out) all over the place – At the H&M Store in Vancouver for example, where a young Mom was hustled into the back of the store by a brace of apoplectic staffers – shortly thereafter a coven of lactating mom’s showed up for a protest or circle squirt of sorts. God bless ‘em!
And Hey – Having worked at a University for over 20 years seeing virtually every square inch of male or female flesh exposed (especially this time of year…) all I can say (or feel) now when I see a mom and baby feeding is: “There is a happy baby and at least it isn’t crying…”
Maybe these weird folk suffering from breast aversion need to spend some flying from here to there on a jumbo jet filled with implacable babies screaming their heads off – if only to appreciate the simple joy, simplicity and honesty of that one moment – One mom, one breast, one baby… in perfect harmony and silence.
Summer fun food and drink - vacation from sunspots · Saturday August 2, 2008 by colin newell
I am starting a 3 week vacation today and we are pretty much playing it by ear. We are, quite literally, in the dark about what we are doing… where we are going exactly.
I would tell you if I knew. But I don’t. So I cannot.
What did cross my mind today (am I am talking quite extemporaneously now…) was that people who do things at the last minute are the bane of security hawks very existence. What do I mean by that you ask?
Well. Did you know that there are cruises line in the U.S. that (choose to) report every single guest they are going to have on their cruise to the F.B.I. and/or homeland security. Not every cruise line does this. It means that before you hit the lido deck on Day one of your Caribbean cruise, the men in black are aware of your location – right down to the GPS location of the ship.
Not me though. And it got me thinking again: What if I dropped into WestJet.ca or AirCanada.ca and picked up a flight… for say… tomorrow morning? I mean, there have to be empty seats on planes all over the place. Or what if I decide to fly to London, England… like… tomorrow? Would that not upset some security suit somewhere. I mean, that whole not knowing where I am at any given moment can quite literally drive someone out there… mad. Mad I tell you… Mad.
Next item. Sun spots. No, not age spots. Sun spots.
I have been a radio guy since 1971… when I was young. Very young. I will keep it simple and say Ham radio – which for the purposes of this entry is the suitable term. Most people know what Ham radio is… so I can skip the long definition.
Anyway. I have been observing all the neat science things that are needed to make this hobby work… for 38 years. And the primary thing that makes Ham radio work… and the ability to talk to and listen to radio signals from around the globe (without the internet folks!) are sunspots. Sunspots. Not age spots. Sun spots.
Sun spots come and go. They generate some of the forms of solar radiation that energize the Earth’s ionosphere – that allow radio signals to bounce around – like at night time when you listen to San Francisco from your cabin in Anchorage Alaska. Most people have noticed that AM radio signals carry a lot further at night then it does during the day. Conversely, FM radio rarely skips. It does more often than people realize… but that is another medium.
Photo above – a recent picture of the Sun which should be festooned with at least one big Sun spot. Instead, nothing.
Long story short: Sun spots go through cycles of intensity that last 11 years. And these Cycles have been going on without interruption for hundreds and hundreds of years… thousands of years… since the beginning.
Uhm. With some exceptions. Like the 17th and 18th century. When there were, how can I put this… mini ice-ages. Doldrums. Periods when there were no Sun spots for several decades at a time. Triggering brief global Ice-ages. Albeit Small ones. It effected the whole planet. Normally moderate climates like the one they have in London, England — In the 1700’s, the Thames River would freeze up solid 3 weeks of the year… year after year… for about 20 years.
Like I said: I have been observing solar cycles for 38 years. And something is amiss. But there is no immediate cause for alarm… like not in the next week or so anyway.
To a geophysicist or a radio science guy like me, being told that a Solar cycle is not starting is kind of like being 21 again and having your girlfriend tell you she’s late.
If you get my drift. It is a scenario that has long term consequences. That are almost immediate – once it’s confirmed.
We have just concluded Solar Cycle 23 and Solar Cycle 24 was supposed to start… a year ago.
So listen up. The term Solar Cycle 24 could very well become a household phrase over the next 6 months. In some ways, it could be coming at a good time… and at a very bad time.
Do yourself: Google Solar Cycle 24 right now. And strap yourself in for an interesting ride. More scholarly reading here
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Summer fun food and drink - Starbucks in decline chapter three · Tuesday July 29, 2008 by colin newell
In the race to win a large slice of the Australian coffee market, Starbucks acknowledged experiencing the business equivalent of a blown head gasket. 61 “under-performing” stores to be shuttered out of its total Aussie portfolio of 84.
Starbucks ambitions to be Aussie’s caffeinated Billabong of choice and its subsequent yewey have left investors and speculators saying hooroo to share value.
Buggah. Explanation of some of the words above? Aussie Slang
With 15,000 coffee shops globally and 600 stores in the US heading to the long paddock one has to ask: Where does it all end? 12,000 employees in the U.S. could be flipping pages in the help wanted section – so what’s next?
In my opinion, I see this more as a stage of healthy weight loss – kind of like Marlon Brando shedding a few pounds… at least… while he was alive.
Ok. Maybe not a really good example.
Starbucks can afford to shrink a little when you think about it for a moment. What other business can you name, that when you look down your main street in your town… you see a Starbucks… and when you move your head ever so slightly to the left or right… you see another Starbucks. I dare say you would not find that with a McDonalds… or a Subway… or… whatever. You get the point.
Heck. Starbucks is more ubiquitous than Vitreous Floaters – and more common than the Head Cold – There is so much Starbucks coffee consumed in Seattle, Washington alone that the caffeine levels in Puget Sound spike measurably at 10:20 AM and 3:20 PM every weekday.
So they can shrink a little. Sure their share price is falling faster than a gray squirrel base jumping from the penthouse level of my apartment building. This will be a golden opportunity at some point in the near future. After all, we are talking about coffee here – a infinitely renewable resource – with a captive audience… hopelessly addicted… I mean dependent on a healthful beverage rich in… antioxidants… yea.
One other thing – Starbucks would be well served to abort the gut-bomb breakfast items – The TurboChef, a malfunctioning Star-Trek replicator type device that reconstitutes breakfast sandwiches made several light years from here is not a great addition to a place that is supposed to smell like coffee. If I want a Sausage McMuffin (made fresh and on the spot…) you know where I am going to get it from!
And the squirrel. He is fine. Terminal velocity for a squirrel is about 3 miles an hour. He dusted himself off, threw back a quad espresso and got back to the serious task of getting his nuts together.
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Summer fun food and drink - Pemberton Music Festival afterglow · Monday July 28, 2008 by colin newell
How is (was) the day after Pemberton Music Festival like Beijing (a mere 2 weeks before the Olympics)?
Answer: Pollution. Garbage. Clutter. Rubbish. Discards.
There are a handful of things that really get my goat… and one of them are the people that get all Enviro on the World, all Hippied out in their split-window VW’s (one of the most polluting vehicles on the planet) along with virtually anything else made by Volkswagen… girls who eschew shaving their armpits and dudes who eschew personal hygiene for a weekend… who espouse Groovy, Peace and Love all over the place…
And then litter the f*cking crap out of our pristine countryside.
What is wrong with you people?
A news clip showed the absolutely astounding detritus, flotsam and jetsam; $300 dollar tents used once. Camp stoves, still warm. Coffee percolators, still warm. Clothing. Sleeping bags. Un-opened bags of food. Discarded without a thought.
Begs the question: What is wrong with you people?
I am no saint, but these huge music festivals are quite literally the last places I would want to be on Earth – and one of the reasons has been illustrated above.
Yea. If I want to hang out with pigs, I will go to the farm for an afternoon…
And pick up after myself.
So. You do the same please.
Peace out.
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