Uncle Walter's Rants

Guess what! I made dinner and it was good!

So I got home and thought to myself, self you're hungry what can you do about it?  Well, I thought a while and decided that food would be a good option, but I didn't want to ruin my dinner. Then I thought what about dinner, I need food for that as well and The Wife wouldn't get back to the home with the munchkins until later. I felt it was my job, no my duty to provide for my family!

Of course there are requirements that must be met in making the food. The kids had to each it, the food should be tasty, it should at least pretend to be healthy. So, I ruled out the cake mix away and kept looking. Hmm, frozen tilapia, egg rolls, kid cuisine, Chef Boyardee. What to make. I checked and the clean dish availability and determined that the fish could be fried. I found a stash of potatoes and mashed potatoes joined the mix. A bread product was called for so I figured quick biscuits would fit the bill.

So, I washed the potatoes, cut them up and threw them into boiling water. Next I turned to the awesome power that is Google and found a recipe for batter to fry the fish in. Luckily I found one that was beer based, the best kind of fish batter. I tweaked the recipe slightly and soon had some fish frying. The potatoes finished boiling and I whipped them up in the Kitchen Aid.  Soon potatoey goodness was complete (after adding milk, salt, pepper, and butter). The Wife arrived  just as the last fish came out of the oil. Suddenly panic struck me to my core... no biscuits!  I tracked down a recipe for quick biscuits and pumped them out in record time.  A good meal was had by all!

For your dining pleasure, here are the recipes for what I made!.. well, except for the potatoes I didn't measure any of that.

Quick Biscuits    

2 Cups Flour
1 Tablespoon Baking Powder
1/2 Teaspoon Cream of Tartar
1/4 Teaspoon Salt
1/2 Cup Melted Butter
1 Cup Milk

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Milk all the ingredients then drop in dollops onto greased cookie sheet. Bake 8 to 12 minutes or until golden brown.

Beer Battered Fish

Fillets of fish (about 8 or so)
1 Cup Flour
2 Tablespoons Garlic Powder
1 Tablespoon Paprika
2 Teaspoons Salt
2 Teaspoons Ground Black Pepper
1 Beaten Egg
1 Bottle of Beer (Wheat brew works best)

Heat up some oil (about 1/2 inch). Beat all the ingredients together. Dip the fish and gently put in the oil. When one side is done flip and do the other side. Take out and put on paper towels so the oil will drain. Fish should be golden brown.

Oh Superman, what did they do to you?

Superman: At Earth's End

I am speechless... just speechless.  How can we go on without Santa Superman?

What is wrong with you Tivo???

I am a long time Tivo fan. I love fast forwarding and rewinding, watching what I want when I want, on-line scheduling and all that. Tivo is the best of the best in doing that and I like to use what is the best. Since 2002 I have been a Tivo evangelist eager to spread the word of this DVR magician. Today my Tivo Premiere still does all those things better than my original Tivo. It does them flawlessly, the problem is that it isn't enough anymore. There is a world of on-line media out there and Tivo is the right product to deliver that content to me. And they did add Netflix and Hulu Plus. The problem is that they did is poorly.

The Hulu Plus implementation is acceptable, but it is the Netflix one that is a disaster. You can only view items already in the queue, words get out of sync with the mouths regularly and things don't always play when you click play. Sometimes you have to go back and hit play again. Before you ask, no it isn't my internet, that works fine and the Tivo is hard wired directly to my Fios. But I could deal with all these problems because it would work with enough patience and start/restart of playing. Then a new problem popped up involving shows with more than 100 episodes like Law & Order. When you go to play them, only 100 are available. And it isn't like the first 100 episodes play. Instead it is a mix of episodes from every season. That was the final straw, and I went out hunting for another streaming solution.

So I went out reading reviews, looking at prices, checking out what is out there and decided to pick up a Roku (starting at only $49). A little streaming only device that does Netflix, Hulu, HBO Go, Hulu Plus, Amazon Prime and a host of other services. It took ten minutes to setup and configure. It worked wirelessly and streamed flawlessly. Every problem the Tivo had was gone on this device. It made The Wife happy and made me a bit sad inside.

Tivo should have been the device to do this, it was the one that should have, it was the one that failed miserably. What should have been the center to my home TV setup is sharing it with a little box that is only slightly bigger than a hockey puck. The Tivo is a real computer, running a modified Linux OS, while the Roku is a tiny flash based device that does only one thing really well. Tivo should be able to do this streaming and more yet it fails. It makes me sad.

I hate to see a company with a good product screw up so badly. They have (or had) a great opportunity to be the center of a home entertainment system, but instead they are settling for a could have been. I hope that Tivo can get their act together, but I am losing hope fast. The Roku does everything that the Tivo should do and more while the Tivo seems content to accept its place as a basic DVR.

-UW

Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio, a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy.

He hath bore me on his back a thousand times,

and now how abhorr'd in my imagination it is!

My gorge rises at it.

Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know not how oft. 

Experts warm that millions of rings may be "romantically defective"!

This is an URGENT bulletin! Apparently real diamonds are "romantically defective" when compared to... a fake diamond? A perfectly formed man-made fake diamond. Which, I have to say as a partially color-blind guy, looks completely fake to me. There are colors that should not be here and without the natural defects found in say, real diamonds. You know the things that come out of the dirt and are cut to look nice. This thing came out of a lab, which is OK, but doesn't look real at all. Yet, it somehow has the power to make real diamonds "romantically defective".

So, just what is "romantically defective"? Does the presentation of a "real" diamond fail to excite your lady? Is that even a defect in the diamond or the lady? And, who are these experts? Was this a scientifically chosen panel or a batch of kids at a Chuck E. Cheese birthday party? And another thing, 4 carats? How big is four carats? Well, I looked it up, its 10.2 mm which is freakishly large for a normal ring. It's as big as this circle. 

Now I am a fan of giving your lady the right things for them and if they want a large fake gem then get them this, but I seriously doubt it will instantly transform all her diamonds into "romantically challenged" goods.

-UW

 

Why I want to win 100 million in the lottery

I don't ever expect to win, but I do like to think of what I would do if I did.  Beyond paying off all my debts and repairing the exhaust on my Volvo, I think I know what I would like to do.  I would like to create an American Micro-Finance organization. In case you haven't heard, micro-financers are lenders who makes small loans to those who would not otherwise qualify for, or need, large loans. These loans are for as little as $50 and they have a very high payback rate. I would love to setup a small micro-loan firm to help those who are struggling to get out of debt by granting low interest loans to replace high-interest debt. I also want to help small start-ups with seed money. You know, enough to allow the entrepreneur to begin to realize a dream. Help that kid ready to change the world by giving him or her the chance to grow an idea big enough to attract funding by venture capitalists. I would just want to retain a small portion of the company in a silent role. 

It's just, as I think about the challenges in life and the unexpected surprises that pop up, I think there is an opportunity to be the person who can make a difference for those in need - and those ready to change the world. I think it would be good for me, for those I can help, and the country as a whole. 

Not that I ever expect it to happen, but it would be nice.

-UW

What we need is a shuttle rescue mission for the Phobos-Grunt probe

Yes I know that the shuttle has been retired and is no longer flight ready, but Russia's 18th failed attempt to reach Mars is still salvageable. I am amazed that we don't have the capability to fly up there and retrieve or repair the probe and send it on its way. This groundbreaking device was going to bring back material from Phobos, a Mars moon, and now it drifts aimlessly in low Earth orbit while engineers try in vain to reach it. A shuttle could save it, so could a private vehicle.

Instead it will blow up when it hits the atmosphere (with luck) and not rain radioactive material on people. Actually the risk to us is very low, but there is sadness in the fact that this probe could have been so easily saved. Hard to believe that we walked on the moon in 1972 and haven't done all that much up there since. We can't even rescue a crippled probe in low-earth orbit.

-UW

 

We're going on a trip in our magic rocket... 'Scort

Ok, ladies and gentlemen the time has come for the pilgrimage to the land down under (commonly referred to as Florida) to visit the dum dum duuuuumm... in-laws.  Or as The Wife knows them the "family". Yes we will make the trek from our undisclosed location to the foreign land where it is hot and wet to see people that came out of the same uterus as The Wife, as well as their offspring. We will be driving in The Wife's PT Cruiser with a little friend behind. Yep, the $350 1985 Ford 'Scort.  I hear it was once an Escort, but it doesn't "start with Ease" anymore. (Say it outloud it makes sense ;) So it's the 'Scort. We will use it as a trailer to get down there and then use we will have two vehicles so that dear Uncle Walter may flee the dum dum dummmm... in-laws if necessary leaving The Wife to fend for herself. Or the other way around and The Wife can flee her dum dum dummm... "family" for her sanity, leaving Uncle Walter to fight them off with his floppy shillelagh (if you have to ask you are not qualified to know).

We shall camp in the land of gators, tourists, and gray hair. The kids will have fun, The Wife will push through and UW will try to get some sleep (first kinda vacation in many many years). The blogs will continue for the duration (with one or two possible delays in posting) and we will keep responding to comments as best we can.  And... I will try to do a bit of travel journalling here so I can log our adventure and misadventures.  May be an interesting read after the fact, we'll see.

-UW

The Frozen Vegetable Duck* says keep reading Uncle Walter!

He doesn't just promote Birds Eye frozen vegetables, he also knows good blogs when he sees them. The Uncle Walter family of sites has been buzzing the past few days with GeriADtric posts finally coming up to one a day, the Professor dropping to three a week (they take a lot of work so don't get upset), and the Professor's recipe blog posting recipes as old as the 1700's. But I won't forget our roots so the Romance Quote site will keep churning out implausible references and names for parts that I am not sure exist. The covers site has a treat coming up with our first "theme" week. If it goes well we may have some more after that. So, stay tuned more frozen goodness to come!

-Uncle Walter

*Birds Eye does not endorse, approve, not recommend Uncle Walter. In fact I doubt they have ever heard of me, but I am sure that I have the support of most of ducks frozen or otherwise.

1950 Life Magazine -- Birds Eye Frozen Vegetables -- Courtesy of www.geriadtric.com

A tasty treat for the inner cannibal in all of us

Popeyes, masters of chicken for when you aren't in the mood for KFC, has decided to appease the little Jeffrey Dahmer in all of us. That's right, Popeyes new Rip'n Chick'n is a chicken breast, sliced partially through, and then fried. And it looks like a human hand. Now you can indulge your man-eating desires without the taboo of human flesh! Don't belive it is supposed to look like battered and fried human digits? Then why do you think they call the parts you rip off "fingers"?

The concept and execution are bad enough. But then they take this mangled hand-breast and serve it with fries (OK), biscuit (OK)... and ranch dressing... WTF??? Why does everything on the face of the earth have to come with ranch dressing? I mean, it looks like peppered "man-juice" and tastes like... Well, you don't want to know.

Seriously, I can go just about anywhere and they are like, "would you like ranch with that," and I'm like "Hell no, you bastard, don't deface my food with your speckled dressing!" Why would I want that??? Blue cheese, honey mustard, even ketchup, and I'm good. But ranch? That stuff is awful.

Now all I can think about is ranch. What was I talking about?  Oh well. Never mind.

-UW