Tin Foil Soldier

stir fry with a twist

food on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

Last week I made a ham and bean soup (sorry, no pics), and then with the leftover ham I made Ham and Potato Stir Fry 2 nights ago.

Ham and Bean Soup:

• 1 bag Cannellini beans
• 1 bag Great Northern beans
• —Soak beans over night
• 1 onion, diced
• 1/2 lb shoe string carrots, cut into 1/4-1/2″ pieces
• 2 cubes of vegetable bouillon (we use organic stuff that’s awesome)
• 2 lb ham, cut into 1/2 - 3/4″ cubes
• Salt
• Pepper
• bay leaves, 2x
• garlic
• cloves

I forgot to put the soup together in the morning, so Kev and I went home @ lunch and speed preped it instead of letting it sit all day in the slow cooker.  I replaced the bean water and brought them to a boil to get things warmed up and started.  I put everything else into the bottom of the crock pot and put it on high.  Once the beans were boiling I poured them in with the ham and onions.

Let that cook for ~4-5 hours, your house will smell awesome, ours did when I got home from work.

Don’t forget to take the bay leaves out, their flavor will get too strong, plus no one wants to bite into a bay leaf.

When making the soup I decided that I had way too much ham and that I would save some for a stir fry.  The other day I bought leeks because they always use them on Food Network and I have never cooked with them so I wanted to give it a shot, supposedly they are like a mild combination of onion and garlic.

Brown Basmati Rice:

• 1 1/2 cup brown basmati rice
• 1 tb butter
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 1/2 cups boiling water

combine all of the ingredients in a 8×8″ pyrex baking dish and cover with aluminum foil.  Bake in a preheated oven for 45 minutes at 425 degrees.

My recipe is different from Alton Brown’s because I only wrote down his ingredients, not the baking instructions, and I found that I like my rice better, it seems fluffier cooked at a higher temp, plus basmati cooks faster than regular brown rice. (long and thin vs short and wide)

Ham, Potato, and Leek Stir Fry:

• ~1 lb ham, cubed into 1/2-3/4″ pieces
• 2 leeks
• 3 potatoes (I used Yukon Gold)
• 1 - 1 1/2 cups tomato sauce
• 1/8 cup half and half
• 1 tb butter
• cumin
• ginger
• poppy seeds
• salt
• garlic

Boil the potatoes first, just to get them out of the way.  Cube the potatoes into 3/4-1″ cubes and boil in water with salt and a generous dosing of garlic powder to flavor them.

Cut the leeks however you want, I cut off the bottom and top, then halved them lengthwise.  Apparently you are supposed to remove the outer layer as it is chewy.  I did not know this, now you do.  I cut them on a bias, creating 1/2-1″ wide strips on an angle.

At this point the potatoes were done so I put them in a strainer in the sink and then melted the butter in the pan I had the potatoes in.  Add the leeks and cook until it starts to turn transparent.

Add the ham cubes, 1/2 tsp ginger, 1/2 tsp cumin, 1 tsp poppy seeds, the tomato sauce and the half and half.

I decided that I was making this to kinda be like indian food, where there is plentiful amount of thick sauce, and it seems like tomato sauce and half and half created a sauce kinda like Indian curry.

After the sauce was stirred together I added the potatoes and folded them in so I didn’t mash them too much.

Serve over rice

I think this came out really well, and if I had removed the outer layer of the leeks it would have been a touch better but it was still delicious.

Movie Showtimes - Google Search
The Dark Knight
2hr 30min - Rated PG-13 - Action/Adventure
1:00 1:30 4:15 4:45 7:30 9:25pm

I still haven’t seen The Dark Knight, I’m trying to get together a trip to the dollar theater.  Or it might just be a date, I’m not sure; but either way I wanna see it in the theater, soon.

Anyway, I don’t even use other sites to look for movie showtimes, just type “movies 14623″ or whatever your ZIP is into google and poof, the work is done.

Joe. My. God.: Top Ten Most Irritating Phrases
Oxford University has issued a list of what they consider to be the top ten most irritating phrases.

1 - At the end of the day
2 - Fairly unique
3 - I personally
4 - At this moment in time
5 - With all due respect
6 - Absolutely
7 - It’s a nightmare
8 - Shouldn’t of
9 - 24/7
10 - It’s not rocket science

Finally something on the Internets that isn’t depressing news about gay rights!

I think the following probably have a place on the list of most irritating phrases:

• Like So
• so on and so forth
• carry on

There is another phrase that I say often that is stupid and probably irritating, but I don’t remember what it is right now.  Kevin, do you remember?

Keith Olbermann’s Special Comment on Proposition 8 - Towleroad, More than gay news for more gay men
…

If you voted for this Proposition or support those who did or the sentiment they expressed, I have some questions, because, truly, I do not… understand. Why does this matter to you? What is it to you? In a time of impermanence and fly-by-night relationships, these people over here want the same chance at permanence and happiness that is your option. They don’t want to deny you yours. They don’t want to take anything away from you. They want what you want — a chance to be a little less alone in the world.

Olbermann’s Special Comment kinda made me well up.  I don’t know what else to say, but you really should watch the video.

Direct link to Keith Olbermann on Prop 8

NoFo: Proposition Hate

…
In addition to “every child deserves a mother and a father,” these self-professed “Christians” use meaningless, grotesquely misleading catchphrases like “sacred institution” and “threat” and “protect” and “redefine” and, when they don’t get their way, “activist judges” to further their loathsome agenda to vilify gay people and teach the nation to hate and fear us. The fact remains that nobody—“Christian” or otherwise—has yet to articulate a plausible or even fact-based justification for denying us marriage equality. “Sacred institution,” “threat,” “redefine” and their ilk are nothing but a lazy, artless code for “religious extremists are consumed by a pathological loathing for gay people.” And whether or not they choose to own up to it, they know in their cold, black hearts that it’s the truth.

Here is another reason that we need gay marriage, because a civil union is usually worthless in the eyes of the law.

Lollypop Farm

Kevin and I went to lollypop farm to look at the dogs.  We all want a dog around the house, we just aren’t sure how ready the house is for a dog.

My stomach feels like shit and my left shoudler hurts.  I am going home sick and will probably end up at the ER eventually.

The fun never ends.

Strip the Mormon Church of its Tax Exempt Status - Towleroad, More than gay news for more gay men
“Section 501(c)(3) describes corporations, and any community chest, fund, or foundation, organized and operated exclusively for religious, charitable, scientific, testing for public safety, literacy, or educational purposes, or to foster national or international amateur sports competition (but only if no part of its activities involve the provision of athletic facilities or equipment), or for the prevention of cruelty to children or animals, no part of the net earnings of which inures to the benefit of any private shareholder or individual, no substantial part of the activities of which is carrying on propaganda, or otherwise attempting, to influence legislation (except as otherwise provided in section (h)), and which does not participate in, or intervene in (including the publishing or distribution of statements), any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for public office.”

Well that sure is interesting.  I would love it if the Mormon church could be stripped of its tax exempt status, especially after all of the money they gave to support Prop 8.  I don’t know what to think from reading some of the comments on towleroad, but it is probably an unobtainable goal, similar to the fight against Scientology.

Anyway, I found a good quote on the “Mormons Stole Our Rights” page:

To the rest of those silent Mormon protesters, one can offer the words of Elie Wiesel:

“I swore to never be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must always take sides, Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim, silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.”

Anyway, the LDS Church has never treated gays as human beings, and their support of Prop 8 has been pretty evil.

It is great the Obama won, but civil rights took a big hit yesterday and today as all of the ballot initiatives seem to point to taking away the rights of humans who are apparently viewed as less than human by lots of people.

In photos: ‘Barack Obama casts his vote’
Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama arrives with his family to vote at Shoesmith Elementry School in Chicago, Illinois, USA, on US Election Day, 04 November 2008. Obama is running against Republican Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama for the office of the 44th President of the United States

Since he is apparently running against the republican version of himself, I wonder who he voted for.

Don’t worry, I have my sticker.

We had a halloween party for my roommate’s birthday and because its fun!

We mostly finished the bar in time, but the 2 part epoxy glaze coat for the bar top wasn’t completly set yet so we had to use coasters and be careful with the bar.

This is from Thursday night when we tapped the keg.

We even bought him a Labatt Blue tap handle for his birthday

I thoroughly enjoyed being the internet for halloween.  I converted the series of tubes sound clip from the Series of Tubes wikipedia article to mp3 and e-mailed it to myself on my phone so I could play the clip for people.

I also duct taped some stick figure porn to myself, because thats what the internet is obviously for.

Lots of candy left over, gotta bring some to work so I don’t eat all the chocolate.

I still jump when I walk down the stairs if i am not paying attention because I put a 3ft tall werewolf statue in the corner that comes into view as you turn at the bottom of the stairs.  I went to get socks from the dryer this morning and jumped a little.

Desktop Network Share Aliases on OS X 10.5 (Leopard) « Missing Monkey Head

1. Open Finder preferences, General, check the “Connected servers” box, which is unchecked by default.
2. Mount network share; it should appear on the Desktop.
3. Right-click to create alias.
4. Click the alias whenever you want to use the network share

Don’t worry, I don’t have a mac, its for work

calkins road and 15A, rochester ny - Google Maps

Calkins road is 2 lanes in each direction, so I was pulling onto it and into the left lane because I had a green turn arrow to turn left onto Calkins.  A lady was on 15A, turning right.  This is fine, she gets the right lane, the left is for me.  I saw her pulling out as I was going through the intersection, so I was in a state of heightened awareness due to my driving mantra about other drivers (”it might be a woman”).

As I suspected she might, she pulled into my lane directly in front of me with no sort of warning.  I blared the horn at her and she just kept coming into my lane.  I stayed back enough that she never got too close to me, but she had no idea I was there.  So as I am observing my surroundings as this is happening, I notice that a cop is sitting on Calkins road at the red light in the leftmost lane.  He probably saw all of this happen because I was beeping my horn for a while, but he must have just completely ignored it because no one got hurt it doesn’t matter that an old lady has no idea about her surroundings.

Anyway, I changed lanes and pulled up beside her, where I finally got her attention, I doubt she even knew what was happening until she finally looked over at me beeping at her and gesturing my arm as to say “what was that back there!?!” (I didn’t flip her off).

The whole point of this rant is two fold.  One, old people shouldn’t be allowed to drive; the crazy broad had a plastic hair bonnet on and everything.  That basically means she is too old to be driving.

Secondly, when using an intersection that has 2 lanes in the road you are turning onto, USE THE PROPER LANE, and when you want to change lanes after you are on the new road, SIGNAL.  This is a pet peeve of mine that I have been noticing alot lately, changing lanes in intersections or immediately after you get onto the road just because you feel like it.  Traffic flows because one person makes a right on red into the right lane and other person makes a left on green arrow because they have the right of way.

Shouts & Murmurs: Undecided: Humor: The New Yorker
“Well, Charlie,” they say, “I’ve gone back and forth on the issues and whatnot, but I just can’t seem to make up my mind!” Some insist that there’s very little difference between candidate A and candidate B. Others claim that they’re with A on defense and health care but are leaning toward B when it comes to the economy.

I look at these people and can’t quite believe that they exist. Are they professional actors? I wonder. Or are they simply laymen who want a lot of attention?

To put them in perspective, I think of being on an airplane. The flight attendant comes down the aisle with her food cart and, eventually, parks it beside my seat. “Can I interest you in the chicken?” she asks. “Or would you prefer the platter of shit with bits of broken glass in it?”

To be undecided in this election is to pause for a moment and then ask how the chicken is cooked.

Via Dooce, but I could swear I read it before today.

I also recommend going to dooce and watching the video of David Sedaris’s clip on Letterman.

Joe. My. God.: Hackers Attack Gay Marriage Sites
the denial-of-service attack (DoS) on the NO on Prop 8 website occurred before 11:30pm, Wednesday, October 29th and coincides with a similar attack on Florida’s NO on 2 campaign, the Constitutional Amendment Against Marriage Equality.

When your right wing crazy religious conservative views are being overtaken by people who think everyone should be equal, what is the best thing to do?  A childish attempt to DOS the opposition’s websites is apparently what some zealots thought might help.