Digital Soda Jerk

I stopped off at 5 Guys Burgers for an infusion of artery hardening bacon topped goodness. The drink machine was something I've not seen before -- a kind of futuristic-yet-slightly-retro-looking soda fountain from Coca-Cola.

I am enraptured. It's got a touch screen interface with pop-top symbols of each flavor of soda. Touch Coca-Cola, for example, and the screen changes to show all the different kinds of Coke: Diet, Cherry, Zero, Classic, etc.

Apparently, these machines have up to 100 drink choices by using concentrated flavor cartridges (similar to printer ink cartridges) and carbonated water. How cool is that?

It reminds me of when I was in third grade; we lived in an American hotel for a couple of weeks in Turkey while we waited to move into our apartment.  The dining room had a real-life soda jerk fountain against one wall -- the kind where you pumped syrup into a glass and then fizzed it up with the carbonated water gun.

It was also where the ice cream sundaes got made. It was completely self-serve. We spent all our available free time at the soda fountain making up drinks and eating ice cream. Heaven!

Ever since then, I've always had a fondness for real soda fountains. The chance to be a modern soda jerk is just too much to pass up. I'm going back to play with the machine.

Below is my cell phone camera close up:

Senomyx Redux

Looks like Semonyx is back in the news regarding their testing of artificial flavors on cells from aborted fetuses.

I wrote about Senomyx three weeks ago: the world yawned; Children of God for Life wrote about it, and something happened: Campbell Soup has ended its relationship with Senomyx.

Within hours of our press release, Children of God for Life received notice from Campbell Soup that they have severed their ties with Senomyx.

Stated Juli Mandel Sloves, Senior Manager of Nutrition & Wellness Communications at Campbell Soup Company, "We are no longer in partnership with Senomyx. This fact was discussed during the Senomyx conference call with its investors earlier this month." 

“Every effort is made to use the finest ingredients and develop the greatest selection of products, all at a great value. With this in mind, it must be said that the trust we have cultivated and developed over the years with our consumers is not worth compromising to cut costs or increase profit margins."

From the CGL press release:

“What they do not tell the public is that [Senomyx] are using HEK 293 – human embryonic kidney cells taken from an electively aborted baby to produce those [taste] receptors,” stated Debi Vinnedge, Executive Director for CGL, the watch dog group that has been monitoring the use of aborted fetal material in medical products and cosmetics for years.

“They could have easily chosen COS (monkey) cells, Chinese Hamster Ovary cells, insect cells or other morally obtained human cells expressing the G protein for taste receptors,” Vinnedge added.

After three letters, Nestlé finally admitted the truth about their relationship with Senomyx, noting the cell line was “well established in scientific research”.

Pepsico wrote: “We hope you are reassured to learn that our collaboration with Senomyx is strictly limited to creating lower-calorie, great-tasting beverages for consumers. This will help us achieve our commitment to reduce added sugar per serving by 25% in key brands in key markets over the next decade and ultimately help people live healthier lives.”

“If enough people voice their outrage and intent to boycott these consumer products, it can be highly effective in convincing Senomyx to change their methods”, Vinnedge noted. “Otherwise, we will be buying Coca-Cola, Lipton soups and Hershey products!”

So you see that we CAN change the way these Big Pharma and Biotechs operate if we speak our consciences.

Smoking Scotch

I recently had the opportunity to broaden my palate in the wonderful world of Scotch whiskey. (Thanks, Shoe!)

I had a wee dram of a number of Scotches, ranging in price and quality, from the delicate to the bold.  The most unusual was Ardbeg 10. The website describes it as:

The Ultimate Single Islay Malt Scotch Whisky. It is, perhaps, the most peaty malt whisky in the world - certainly of all the Islay malts. Ardbeg is the PEATIEST and SMOKIEST of all the Islay malts, yet has a fruity floral sweetness and complexity to the spirit.

I'd have to say that's probably the most accurate description I've ever read. The flavor of Ardbeg is a wonderful, delicate floral sweetness that is really top shelf.  Truly excellent. The only caveat here is: you must NOT breathe.

If you do, Someone (there's that guy again!) will pour a gallon of liquid smoke into your nostrils. They are not kidding when they claim the peatiest and smokiest Scotch in all the Islay. This is potent stuff that lingers on in your nostrils long after the swallow.

If smoke is your bag, then this is your Scotch. Long life! As for me, I'm reminded of why I like bourbon instead (or at least non-smoky Scotch). I'm grateful for having had the experience, but between Ardbeg and the Rauchbier, I'm smoked out.

Rituals Of The Season

Today was Wynken's first soccer practice of the season. 

He's got the same coach and almost all of the same boys as last season, which is a bonus. They're generally a good lot.

Unfortunately, it is unseasonably cold with temperatures in the 35F degree range. I stood around with a couple of the other dads making chit chat though clenched teeth. Meanwhile, I'm thinking: why do we do this crazy social ritual when every one of us would rather be waiting in the car with the heat on full?

Eventually, one of the dads who was in thin cotton slacks bolted for the comfort of his car. I'm wondering now: how come I wasn't smart enough to do that? Ah, the pressure of social graces.

The boys were fine since they were running around.

Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival #101

This week on Sunday Snippets, WBN presents: Decisions, Decisions.

• World Down Syndrome Day
• 24:15 The Genuine Article 
• What if she had said No?
• Humor: The God Gene

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival is a weekly opportunity to share your best posts with the wider Catholic blogging community.
To participate, create a post highlighting posts that would be of interest to Catholics and link to the host blog at http://rannthisthat.blogspot.com/. Go to the host blog and leave a comment giving a link to your post

Beer Madness 2011

I don't have much use for basketball, it doesn't hold my interest -- too much scoring dulls the senses.  Speaking of dulling the senses, the sensible brackets to watch are that of the annual Washington Post's suds showdown -- BEER Madness.

This year an epic 64 American microbrews go head-to-head. Brackets include: Malt, Fruit & Spice, Hops, and Roast.

Already in Round 3! Someday, I'm going to be on that panel ...

The Annunciation of the Lord - Solemnity

The following is a shameless reprint of the reflection found in the "Catholic Calendar" application found in the App Store (author unknown).  I don't claim any authorship at all, I just found it cool and thought you might too.

The Annunciation of the Lord - Solemnity

What if she had said No?

The question may strike you as irreverent.  How dare I suggest that the Blessed Virgin Mary, Queen of Heaven, Co-Redemptrix of mankind, could have left us in the lurch like that? 

But what if she had?

Could she have said No?  You might say that of course she couldn’t, she was far too holy — but you would be guilty of demeaning and dangerous sentimentality.  It is demeaning because it turns Our Lady from a free human being into a sanctified automaton.  The whole glory of the Annunciation is that Mary, the second Eve, could have said No to God but she said Yes instead.  That is what we celebrate, that is what we praise her for; and rightly so.

This sentimental view is dangerous too.  If we believe that the most important decision in the history of the world was in fact inevitable, that it couldn’t have been otherwise, then that means it was effortless.  Now we have a marvellous excuse for laziness.  Next time we’re faced with a tough moral decision, we needn’t worry about doing what is right.  Just drift, and God will make sure that whatever choice we make is the right one.  If God really wants us to do something he’ll sweep us off his feet the way he did Mary, and if he chooses not to, it’s hardly our fault, is it?

So Mary could have said No to Gabriel.  What if she had?  He couldn’t just go and ask someone else, like some sort of charity collector.  With all the genealogies and prophecies in the Bible, there was only one candidate.  It’s an alarming thought.  Ultimately, of course, God would have done something: the history of salvation is the history of him never abandoning his people however pig-headed they were.  But God has chosen to work through human history.  If the first attempt at redemption took four thousand years to prepare, from the Fall to the Annunciation, how many tens of thousands of years would the next attempt have taken?

Even if the world sometimes makes us feel like cogs in a machine, each of us is unique and each of us is here for a purpose: just because it isn’t as spectacular a purpose as Mary’s, it doesn’t mean that it doesn’t exist.  When we fail to seek our vocation, or put off fulfilling some part of it, we try to justify ourselves by saying that someone else will do it better, that God will provide, that it doesn’t really matter.  But we are lying.  However small a part I have to play, the story of the Annunciation tells me it is my part and no-one else can do it.

Faced with the enormity of her choice, how was Mary able to decide?  If she said No, unredeemed generations would toil on under the burden of sin.  If she said Yes, she herself would suffer, and so would her Son; but both would be glorified.  Millions of people not yet born would have Heaven open to them; but millions of others would suffer oppression and death in her son’s name.  The stakes were almost infinite.

You might say that Mary didn’t worry about all this, just obeyed God; but I don’t believe it.  What God wanted was not Mary’s unthinking obedience but her full and informed consent as the representative of the entire human race.  The two greatest miracles of the Annunciation are these: that God gave Mary the wisdom to know the consequences of her decision, and that he gave her the grace not to be overwhelmed by that knowledge.

When we come to an important decision in our lives, we can easily find our minds clouded by the possible consequences, or, even more, by partial knowledge of them.  How can we ever move, when there is so much good and evil whichever way we go?  The Annunciation gives us the answer.  God’s grace will give us the strength to move, even if the fate of the whole world is hanging in the balance.  After all, God does not demand that our decisions should be the correct ones (assuming that there even is such a thing), only that they should be rightly made.

There is one more truth that the Annunciation teaches us, and it is so appalling that I can think of nothing uplifting to say about it that will take the sting away: perhaps it is best forgotten, because it tells us more about God than we are able to understand.  The Almighty Father creates heaven and earth, the sun and all the stars; but when he really wants something done, he comes, the Omnipotent and Omniscient, to one of his poor, weak creatures — and he asks.

And, day by day, he keeps on asking us.

The Great Catholic Steak Out

Lest you think I suffer from a grammar deficit, I don't mean stake out, I mean steak out.  As in, get the steak out, it's time to eat!

Friday, March 25 is the Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord. That ain't no minor thing, that's a Big Deal (tm).  The Church wants us to Celebrate -- not celebrate, I said Celebrate.

Can.  1251 Abstinence from meat, or from some other food as determined by the Episcopal Conference, is to be observed on all Fridays, unless a solemnity should fall on a Friday. Abstinence and fasting are to be observed on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday.

Being obedient sons and daughters of the Church, the same filial duty that makes us fast and abstain from meat impels us not to fast and abstain on a Solemnity even during Lent.  This has nothing to do with being weak, not being able to "tough it out", being legalistic, trying to be more Catholic than the Pope, or any such nonsense. This is about love -- love is obedient.

So we do what we're supposed to do when we're supposed to do it. Kneel when we kneel, stand when we stand, fast when we fast, abstain when we abstain, and don't when we don't.

So fire up the barbecue, roast the brats, smother the chicken, fry the burger or whatever you like and raise a glass to the Queen of Heaven -- she said yes! -- and her glorious Son, Our Lord.

24:15 The Genuine Article

We’ve heard it before in many forms. It’s the little things that count. Good things come in small packages. It’s the attention to detail. He who is faithful in small things will be faithful in greater. St. Therese of Lisieux became a saint by the little way. Blessed Mother Theresa said “[D]o small things with great love”. 

One of my favorite Lenten meditations is the guy at the home improvement store who said, “We’ve got some great fertilizer for less over here”.  Wait -- what??
 
Continue reading >>>

Subscribe to As For Me And My House (Jos 24:15), Thursdays at Catholic Dads Online! 

Thank You Steve Jobs

Today I upgraded my iPad to undo the upgrade which took away one of the most useful features: the side switch orientation lock. This is not so important on an iPhone, but this is waaaayyy important on an iPad.

I don't care a fig about the other updates, and I don't care that you don't care -- I care!!

John Cleese: The Scientists

Go ahead. Laugh.

World Down Syndrome Day

My boy Nub has Down Syndrome. Read The Nub of the Story for my conversion on this topic. I've got some pretty strong feelings on the matter.

I won't give a dime to the National Down Syndrome Society because they refuse to affirm the dignity and worth of DS children prior to birth. Their attitude is symptomatic of the public at large.

Mark W. Leach at Public Discourse uncovers some of the reasons why.

Each year, March 21^st is World Down Syndrome Day (WDSD). The date 3/21 was chosen as a representation of the genetic cause of the condition, a triplicate of the 21^st chromosome. WDSD seeks to raise awareness of a genetic condition that may very well diminish to the point of disappearing. This is due to the prenatal testing sham.

Read the whole thing here.

Intertubes A Toilet Sometimes

Last week the Intertubes lit up with intense reaction to 13 year old Rebecca Black's song "Friday", dubbed by overzealous editors as "the worst song ever".

"Friday," sung by 13-year-old Rebecca Black, was uploaded to YouTube last month by Ark Music Factory, a Los Angeles-based company that was hired by the girl's parents to produce the song for their daughter. (AFP)

The "worst song ever"? Really? The song has 30 million hits on YouTube. Million.  I heard it -- I thought it was pretty forgettable; typical tween song. But it wasn't horrible. If you don't like it, don't listen to it.

Some Netizens representing the lowest rungs of the culture went so far as to post comments saying "I hope you cut yourself and die or get an eating disorder so you can be pretty."

Seriously? The girl is only 13 years old and her parents paid a company to produce a song for her as a gift. The reactions are so intensely over-the-top as to be unbelievable. The anonymity the Internet affords sometimes brings out the worst in people. (Probably another jealous 13 year old.)

Being a 13 year old is traumatic enough all by itself, no need to pile on.  At least this girl produced something to look at; most of these parasites never will.

Quote Of The Day

"Women. Let's face it -- they're insane ... and we can't live without them." -- Anonymous

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Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival #100

This week on Sunday Snippets, WBN presents: Lunchroom Barbarians.

• 24:15 Lunchroom Barbarians
• The Light Is On 
• The Best Blogging Buddies Evah!

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival is a weekly opportunity to share your best posts with the wider Catholic blogging community.
To participate, create a post highlighting posts that would be of interest to Catholics and link to the host blog at http://rannthisthat.blogspot.com/. Go to the host blog and leave a comment giving a link to your post

The Best Blogging Buddies Evah!

Recently we at the Nod household received baby shower gifts for our latest Nodling, Dab. The fact that it was unexpected, unmerited, and a complete act of kindness only serves to accentuate its worth.

Check out these onesies -- they're awesome! Dab is gonna wear them with pride as he says his rosary and learns about the saints.

Mrs. Nod and I are extremely grateful to Rebecca (aka the Mom), LarryD, and anyone else who may have had a hand in it (you know who you are!). Somehow you made an obscure guy with a little blog and a big family feel very special.

Thanks!

24:15 Lunchroom Barbarians

They pour over the rise in a ragged line, eyes glazed and staring off into the middle distance. As they advance, various articles fall from their hands and backs; shoes, packs, jackets, papers, and unidentifiable plastic bits clog up the pathway, only to be trampled unseen by those following close behind.

A low and insistent moan issues from their mouths and the atmosphere becomes dangerously charged.  Half a dozen of them break off from the horde and fling open the door of a small unassuming dwelling, trammeling the stairs, and swarming the inhabitants. 

The Lunchroom Barbarians are home and they are hungry.

Continue reading >>>

Subscribe to As For Me And My House (Jos 24:15), Thursdays at Catholic Dads Online! 
 

The Light Is On

He is waiting for you.

Stout Observation

Just in time for St. Patrick's Day.

Brilliant article over at The Economist on how bubbles form in Stout beer (how can I get that job??). As anyone knows who has enjoyed a Guinness from the pressurized can, it takes a special widget containing nitrogen to make all those awesome creamy bubbles instead of the regular CO2 used in ales and lagers.

Now it turns out that you may be able to do the same thing using a coffee filter instead. Read the whole article here.

[Dr. Lee] wondered why the normal mechanism of bubbling in beers and sparkling wines does not appear to work in stouts.

Conventional wisdom used to hold that once the pressure inside a bottle or can has been released by opening it, the bubbles in a fizzy drink, whether alcoholic or not, are seeded by pockets of air trapped in scratches and imperfections on the surface of the glass being drunk from. Over the past decade, however, scientific scrutiny has revealed that most bubbles actually form on fibres of cellulose that have either fallen into the glass from the air or been left behind when it was dried with a towel. These fibres, which are generally hollow, trap a small amount of air in their interiors.

To see what is going on in stouts, Dr Lee and his team wrote down the equations governing the physics of the dissolved gases and fibres. They found that molecules of nitrogen and carbon dioxide are able to diffuse from the liquid through the walls of the fibres into the air pockets trapped inside them, causing those pockets of air to expand. If a pocket reaches the end of a fibre, it breaks off as a bubble.

The problem, as far as stouts are concerned, is that the low concentration of dissolved nitrogen means the process works at only a 15th of the rate seen in ales and lagers. But Dr Lee has an answer to that: more cellulose. He and his team spiked their beer with extra fibres from a cut-up coffee filter and watched the bubbles form under a microscope.

Rule 42

After I told her for the 42nd time to eat her oatmeal, 3 year-old Nib responded, "I want to get big, Daddy. But not in the ceiling."

Reminds me of this from Alice In Wonderland.

The King then read from his book: "Rule forty-two. All persons more than a mile high to leave the court."

"I'm not a mile high," said Alice.

"Nearly two miles high," said the Queen.

"Well, I sha'n't go, at any rate," said Alice.

Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival #99

This week on Sunday Snippets, WBN presents: What's In That?

• 24:15 Senomyx Green
• Pray A Priestess Home
• King's Cake

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival is a weekly opportunity to share your best posts with the wider Catholic blogging community.
To participate, create a post highlighting posts that would be of interest to Catholics and link to the host blog at http://rannthisthat.blogspot.com/. Go to the host blog and leave a comment giving a link to your post

Overheard In My House

Overheard in my house:

The Greek god Uranus had his gentiles cut out, so Aphrodite sprang from his forehead instead.

24:15 Senomyx Green

For those of you who will remember, the iconic film Soylent Green depicted a dystopian future in which all the food supplies have been exhausted by overpopulation and people are dependent on protein bars handed out by the government in order to stay alive. The secret origins of Soylent Green are revealed at the climax to be made from the only remaining source: It’s people! — in a word, cannibalism.


Ever since then, Soylent Green has become a byword to describe the unthinkable thrust upon the unsuspecting.

One of the biggest driving forces behind the abortion business is money. Abortion is big business. Body parts can and are being sold to medical researchers, pharmaceutical companies, cosmetics companies, IVF labs, and a growing list of customers that may surprise you (there’s gotta be some kind of regulations, right?).

Anyone who has ever researched how vaccines are made may have wrestled with the notion of “remote material cooperation” with evil. Is it morally licit to use a vaccine made from aborted fetal cell lines? Some say yes, some say no. The Church has no official position on extant shots that I know of, and is generally pro-vaccine. It seems to come down to making a decision with a properly informed conscience. (Don’t flame me — I take it on a case-by-case basis.)

So when I became aware of the current controversy regarding a food flavoring biotech company called Senomyx using cells from aborted fetuses, I began to get that sinking feeling. Are they putting Soylent Green in our food as “artificial flavors” ?

Continue reading >>>

Subscribe to As For Me And My House (Jos 24:15), Thursdays at Catholic Dads Online! 


UPDATE: Campbell Soup has dropped their partnership with Senomyx over negative publicity regarding using aborted fetal cells.

Ash Wednesday

Remember, O man, thou art dust

And to dust thou shalt return

King's Cake

I'm pretty ignorant when it comes to Mardi Gras traditions, being fairly content to celebrate the actual holiday or holy day instead.

But people get pretty excited about it, so I accepted a slice of King's Cake at work.

A king cake (sometimes rendered as kingcake, kings' cake, king's cake, or three kings cake) is a type of cake associated with the festival of Epiphany in the Christmas season in a number of countries, and in other places with the pre-Lenten celebrations of Mardi Gras / Carnival. It is popular in the Christmas season (Christmas Eve to Epiphany) in France, Belgium and Switzerland (''galette'' or gâteau des Rois), Portugal (bolo rei), Spain and Spanish America (roscón or rosca de reyes and ''tortell'' in Catalonia), Greece and Cyprus (''vasilopita'') and Bulgaria (banitsa). In the United States, which celebrates Carnival mainly in the Southeastern region (Louisiana and New Orleans in particular), it is associated with Mardi Gras traditions.

The cake has a small trinket (often a small plastic baby, sometimes said to represent Baby Jesus) inside, and the person who gets the piece of cake with the trinket has various privileges and obligations (such as buying the cake for the next celebration). -- Wikipedia

I remembered just enough of this before I bit into it to avoid swallowing the Baby Jesus trinket that I found inside.  I heard people asking around who found it, but as the only "benefit" I knew of was the responsibility to buy the cake next year, I haven't mentioned it yet.

Pray A Priestess Home

Our pal LarryD at Acts of the Apostasy has just had a brilliant idea. True, most of his ideas are super-snarky (which keeps us laughing) but this one's for realz.

Inspired by the true life return to full communion with the Catholic Church by a woman who attempted to be ordained, LarryD is organizing a prayer campaign for those associated with RCWP.

Last week's story of Norma Jean Coon publicly renouncing her association with RCWP and attempt at ordination to the diaconate really moved me. It was a bright light of hope in a week of dark, despairing news. Perhaps it's the initial sign that the womynpreest movement is beginning to crack. Thus, we should all help it along.

That's why I've decided to launch the "Adopt-A-Priestess Project", which is not all that dissimilar from "Adopt A Seminarian" initiatives some dioceses have, or the Spiritual Adoption of Unborn Human Life that had been encouraged by Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen.

Document of Renunciation of Ordination to Diaconate by Norma Jean Coon.

Wondering what to do for Lent? Why not help someone return home to the Catholic Church? Click on over and give LarryD your support. Pray on! 

Pray for the conversion of: Chava Redonnet

Shake It Up

We have all been staring at the same four walls for about 3 weeks now due to illness. On Saturday, I threw everybody outside whether they wanted to go or not. Everybody.

Mrs. Nod confided to me: "I'm mad at you". Join the club, signups are over there. (But then she took a nap and felt much better.) In fact, everybody felt better just to be soaking up some Vitamin D and running and playing. One thing is for certain: nobody in this family will be signing up for a 5-year trip to Mars in a tiny capsule.

Dab made his long awaited debut at Mass this weekend, despite the rain. It always amuses me to see the people that we barely know or don't know at all come out of the woodwork to congratulate us on the baby. Not that I'm complaining about it -- I'm pleasantly flattered.  I guess we're just that visible, even when we're doing nothing and sitting quietly in the back.

I decided to shake things up a little more on Sunday afternoon by declaring that we would be making our own pizza from scratch. My mom used to do this when I was growing up, and it's not that hard especially if you own a pizza stone -- which I do.

Now the Nodlings are that kind of crew that historically turn their noses up at anything but cheese pizza. I don't listen to those mewlings and force them to eat all kinds of crazy dishes that I make up -- and they love.  I won't force Blynken to eat mushrooms unless they're really well mixed into something, because she looks like a cat horking on a furball, but other than that I generally don't make exceptions.

But today was Pizza Day. We made French bread style for lunch as a warm-up, and then we got out the rolling pin and made pizza dough for dinner.

I asked them to pick pizza-like toppings and they could put in on the pie themselves.  Well! This cheese-only crowd put on pepperoni, black olives, green pepper, garlic, minced onions, mushrooms, and oregano.

Nib was hilarious! Every time I'd shift the pie to the left or right to work on the next part, she would jump down, move her step stool to my other side, and clamber back up so that her nose was level with the pizza. "Daddy, I help you?"

For our second pie we made deep dish which included ham, pineapple, green and red bell pepper on half. My half was more exotic: pepperoni, olives, feta cheese, mushroom, diced tomatoes, garlic.

They ate it all up with relish! Um, no, not relish-relish, they just liked it a lot. I had five kids hovering around my elbow as we mixed and rolled pizza dough and clamoring to be allowed to put on the next topping.

Hmmm, I wonder if that would work for other kinds of dinners? Hmmm.

Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival #98 & Saturday Evening Post

This week on Sunday Snippets, WBN presents: Sick of It. Because we're alternately amused, alarmed, and "over it".

• Dr. Suess Does Star Wars
• Coming Attractions 
• Sick Of It

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival is a weekly opportunity to share your best posts with the wider Catholic blogging community.

To participate, create a post highlighting posts that would be of interest to Catholics and link to the host blog at http://rannthisthat.blogspot.com. Go to the host blog and leave a comment giving a link to your post

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Saturday Evening Blog Post

 

Welcome to the SATURDAY EVENING BLOG POST!
This is where bloggers gather on the first Saturday of each month to share
their favorite post from the past month.

This month, we’re sharing our favorite post from FEBRUARY 2011!

Sick Of It

This post contains graphic descriptions of body fluids and other unpleasantness. If you are easily offended you might want to skip this. Just saying.

Someone in this house has been continually sick for the last three weeks running. After baby Dab was born, the girls immediately spiked fevers with the flu and were banished to their rooms to watch movies ad nauseum (pun intended).  Mrs. Nod and I have been stuffed up with a bad cold and I've had a crushing sinus headache for the last three days. Nub has been a river of snot.

I've seen more body fluids in the last few weeks than most people see in a year, and I'm, well ... sick of it.

Today Nib decided to take off her diaper and poop on the floor, and to add insult to injury she then wiped her butt on the carpet. Eww. Yuck! This was after she climbed up on a chair in Blynken's closet and played with the fish food and spread it all over the room. Smells like 3-day old shrimp.  Ever try to vacuum up nasty fish smell when you feel your head is in a vise and your stomach is threatening to turn on you? Not pleasant, I assure you.

Perhaps there is a little jealousy over the new baby?  Grrr. I'm not overly fond of 3 year-olds to begin with.

I keep going to bed, knowing that tomorrow the sun will rise and shine on the bad and the good alike.  Eventually, this will pass. Grump. Grump. Grump.

Thanks for noticing.

Better By Half

So the boys took me out to the Dogfish Head Alehouse to celebrate the arrival of Dab, the newest Nodling. The tagline for this brewhouse is "Off centered ales for off centered people".

This translates to interesting beer that you can't get anywhere else. I'm an ale fan, so this is right up my alley. Since I couldn't decide on just one, I got two -- the Black & Tan to be precise. This is a fun drink if you've never seen it. It's made from two beers: one dark, the other tan. The dark beer sits on top of the light colored beer without mixing, giving it a striped appearance.

The Dogfish Head Black & Tan is made with a 90-minute IPA on the bottom (very hoppy/bitter) and a sweeter Chicory Stout on top.  

"The 90 Minute IPA was our first continually-hopped beer, which is a method of hopping that allows for a pungent, but not crushing hop flavor."

"Chicory Stout: A dark beer made with a touch of roasted chicory, organic Mexican coffee, St. John's Wort, and licorice root. Brewed with whole-leaf Cascade and Fuggles hops, the grains include pale, roasted & oatmeal."

I recommend giving your taste buds a treat!