Socco-politics

I've been watching a lot of World Cup soccer. It's pretty exciting stuff (once you get over the vuvuzelas). But I was thinking about a way to make the World Cup even MORE exciting.

I think that teams should get an advantage based on geo-politics and their histories. Let's take a look at how this would pan out for the round of 16:

Uruguay vs. South Korea. Ok, bad example... moving on.

Mexico vs. Argentina - another bad example - even if you go back to the Incas

USA vs. Ghana - Well, this was tough, but it looks like the CIA tried to assasinate the Ghanan president at one time. They also destabilized the county's economy. This isn't all that great, but I think the US team should get an extra man for 20 minutes of the game.

England vs. Germany - Ok, this is a tough one to sort out. England beat Germany in two wars - that should warrant a two-goal head start. But, Germany bombed the snot out of London - maybe they get to start the game with a penalty kick to try and even out the score. But, what's this? The royal family are Germans! That bit of sneakery earns them a goal. So - the game starts 2-1, with a German penalty.

Netherlands vs. Slovakia - Another one with not much excitement. The Netherlands are members of NATO while Czechoslovakia were Warsaw Pacters. I guess since NATO won the cold-war "ish" - they might be given a bit of an advantage. Of course, since The Hague is in the Netherlands, they have the right to dispute any referee's call and pass judgement on it.

Japan vs. Paraguay - Seriously? Why couldn't it have been Spain or one of those old-school colonials.

Brazil vs. Chile - again, for countries so close, there isn't that much political history (at least according to Wikipedia). Maybe Chile gets an advantage because the food that sounds like their country (chili) is way better than the Brazillian one (brazil nuts). But then again, maybe Brazil gets an advantage because of Brazillians. But I digress...

Portugal vs. Spain - this is the most epic of all group of 16 matches. Portugal's throne was claimed by a Spaniard in the 1500s. Something like that definitely deserves a 1-goal advantage. But, the Portugese successfully overthrew the Iberian Union in a war, which nullifies the goal advantage.

In summation:
If your country colonized, invaded, seized the throne or bombed the ess out of another country +1 goal.

If your country successfully overthrew tyranny by another country in a violent fashion (none of this constitutional monarchy like Canada) +1 goal.

If your country dumped is prisoners on another country (England-Australia) - +1 goal (author's note: I know this isn't true, but it's fun to make fun of Australians?)

If your country dropped an atomic bomb on another country (applies to US only) - +2 goals. (Japan will NEVER want to face the US in the World Cup)

If your country successfully beat off a much stronger country when they tried to invade - +1 goal (if Vietnam ever plays the US.)

I'm sure there are more rules, but I'll let FIFA sort them out.

Oh - and even better - I think that World Cup results should translate into tangible political advantages. Like, if you beat a nuclear-capable country by more than 3 goals, they have to give you a uranium enricher - think how hard the Iranian team would play.

And just think about the south of France and the Tuscan region in Italy. Due to their terrible performance, they should expect some Kiwi or South African land-owners soon.

Chudway

Last weekend, we went to our friend's (Dani and Greg - shout out!) house for a practice day for our trip to Mexico.  (which means, eat Mexican food).  We received a call in transit from Dani that there were no ripe avocados at their Safeway - so we had to make a pit-stop to grab some.

The closest Safeway was Millbourne Market Mall, deep in the heart of Millwoods.  If you have never been there, I really don't suggest it - it has to be one of the chuddiest Safeways I've been to in a while.  (and don't get me started on the rest of the mall - it's like a worse version of Capilano mall, if you can believe that!)

Anyway - going to that Safeway is like a trip back in time.  It's like this store was passed over when Safeway did their store upgrades a few years ago.  Instead of fancy flooring, organized isles, self-checkouts, etc... you get:

1. Wide lanes.  I think it's because they have this huge store, but not much stock.  It's like that Seinfeld episode:
   
   
   
2. Old-school style round checkouts:  You know the ones - instead of a conveyer belt, it's a turn-table kind of dealy that endlessly rotates.  It's not like they needed to save the space in the store that those conveyer belts take up (see #1).  Maybe their clerks are erstwhile DJs or something.
3. Old-school style freezers.  Yes - instead of the stand-up freezers with doors that hold a ton of food, you get the floor-level, top-loading big bulk bins of coldness.  These take up a lot of room (see #1).
4. A whole lot of dead space.  The front of the store has no Starbucks, no video renting machine (and P.S. who buys DVDs from a vending machine at Safeway)?  Just a bunch of old linoleum in that 1970s Safeway style.  The store kindof looks like a 10-page report that you wrote, but did it treble-spaced with huge margins, so there's really only 2 pages of content.
5. A produce selection that rivals communist Russia.  I almost wanted to put on a big furry hat and line up with some vouchers for my monthly lettuce allotment.

So, the next time you're sipping your java-chip frappucino whilst checking out your own groceries, remember the early 80s and how much of a nasty chore grocery shopping used to be.

Or still is, if you have to take your kids along - right Kathryn?

Best of Edmonton?

This week, SEE Magazine released their annual results for "Best of Edmonton".  For the list, you can go here.

I just had to comment on this - while most categories seem OK, there really are some that I think they just copy from year to year - or, people just vote stupidly.

Favourite Edmontonian - Michael Phair.  Ok, I agree that people liked him a lot when he was on city council, and I have to agree that he could be favourite Edmontonian for 2007...  But come on, that was 3 years ago... unless you are involved in community relations for the UofA, do you really see him doing much?  (as an aside, I think he's stalking me - I do actually see him everywhere - but he is hard to miss in his wild shirt choices).

Best local professional athlete - third place was Ricky Ray.  Srsly?

Best donair - third place - Charles Smart.  Ok, just you try and go get a donair from Charles Smart.  Woops - it's a big pile of gravel.  This place has been closed for over a year AND TORN DOWN!

Best fine dining - Packrat Louie - ummmm?

Best brunch - Culina - granted, the food there was really good - but not what I would consider the best.  (hello, Smitty's anyone?) - I guess good ol' Smitts doesn't really count as brunch though.

Best everything else - to win, your store / business / brothel MUST be located on Whyte Ave.  If not, don't even think that you're ever going to win in any category.

Except if you're Ikea.

Mother's Day Gluttony

For mother's day, Greg and I decided that we would cook a gourmet meal for our wives (read our baby mammas).  Here's what was on the menu:

For an amuse bouche, we had tuna tartare - (recipe here) - this was amazing!  Some diced ahi tuna in a soy / lime / wasabi sauce.  I decided to serve it on a spoon, like this:

This was so good, that we broke the amuse bouche rule and had to have a second helping.

For the appetizer, I wanted to make a pan-seared foie gras with caramelized apples (recipe here).  So, at Sobey's Urban Fresh, across the street from where I work, they used to sell foie gras.  (at least, they did in March).  Turns out that they don't anymore.  Woops.  So, with some scrambling (and phone calls by Kathryn, because I hate the phone), we found mousse de foie gras.  I thought that we'd give it a try.

Served with this dish was a home-made brioche.  This recipe is from the French Laundry cookbook.  I was really impressed that I could cook something from that book.  The brioche and apples were amazing, the mousse, not so much.  But, live and learn.  The brioche recipe is here.  And here's a link to a really funny blog of someone who cooked her way through the French Laundry book.

By the way, making the brioche dough with a hand mixer was a bit troublesome... I had to keep re-attaching the dough hooks after they got bogged down in the buttery dough.

A picture of the brioche (before / after).

And the finished appetizer:

Next, a palate cleanser of cranberry sorbet (recipe here).  This was helped by Donvier, my good friend and ice-cream maker.

For the main course, we had Beef Wellington.  Note to anyone wanting to make this - please be sure to buy/make puff pastry - Phyllo pastry is NOT the same thing.... (requiring a second trip to the grocery store).  With this, we served creamed spinach and a Gorgonzolla and pear risotto.  The risotto was absolutely amazing (and probably the only thing on the menu that a vegetarian could eat).

The Wellington recipe is here, and the risotto recipe is here - from an interesting cooking blog.

Finally, for dessert, we had lime panna cotta with mint and tequila.  This was like an amazing creamy lime-y jello.  We had to eat it out of the ramekins, because we couldn't tease it out (despite calling it names).  It was a nice, light, awesome end to a wonderful meal.

Side note - the meal was even better because Greg and I served it all wearing chip-n-dale outfits, I mean just aprons, no wait, shirts and ties.

Bus driver hierarchy

As I waited for my bus at Millgate the other day, I started to wonder if there's a hierarchy of bus drivers.  In my world, here's how it works:

The best bus drivers get to drive the LRT (how cool would that be???!!!) - this is reserved for those extra-special people - or maybe a birthday treat.

Or maybe the best ones get to drive the hybrid bus on loan from BC.

The second step down gets to drive the bendy-busses like the #9.  Just because they get to be extra-awesome around corners.

Then comes the regular busses - not for over- or under-achievers - just achievers.

If you show up late for work, you have to drive one of the old-school busses - not as much fun, but still OK.

If you have a pretty bad record at the bus garage, then you're demoted to the little busses - not really a bus, but not really a van.  These are the second class citizens in the bus world.

And finally - School Special.  Yeah, 'nuff said.

Bracket busting

In honour of March Madness, I'd like to talk about a little bracket-busting of my own.

When I was little, our family used to take long road-trip vacations in our van, towing a trailer. Since my dad was a teacher, he had two months off in the summer, so we could take our time and drive to California or Florida. These trips were generally 6-8 hour days spent in the van, puncuated with quick stops at tourist attractions and KOAs. And, to get off topic, there's nothing like pulling up to a KOA when you're little and seeing both a swimming pool AND an arcade - HEAVEN!

ANYWAY, we had the full-sized dodge van - none of these puny little mini-vans for our family. In the 80s, long before the advent of car seats, baby helmets and the like, we were allowed to be out of our seats and lying down on the giant carpeted floor space between the middle seats and the back of the van. I think that my dad carpeted this himself - so it was an awesomly comfortable shag from time to time (depending on the van, and on what was cheap at the carpet store I guess).

One of my favourite passtimes whist relegated to the back of the van was to have smash-up derbies with my Hot Wheels cars. I usually had about 16-20 cars with me. The rules are pretty easy - take two cars, one in each hand - point them at eachother, then smash them together. If one car remains on its wheels while the other turns over, that car wins. The cars faced off in a best of 3 match.

So, off I would go, setting up the initial bracket for my derby championship. The cars would face off, and half would be eliminated. This would continue until there was one car left. The champion, you say? Not even close!

That would only waste about half an hour. When you're driving through Montana, you need to kill a lot more time than that. The winning car would be put aside, and the remaining cars would then face off in a renewed bracket. The losing finalist from the previous round would get a bye to future smash-up rounds. It was all very complicated.

Eventually, I'd be down to 2 cars left that hadn't managed to win. These were generally the ugly Motorhome, the Bubble Gunner (both pictured below), or the tractor part of a semi that had lost its trailer. This one lost all the time because it was so light and top-heavy. Also, I didn't like it all that much.

There were actually two motorhomes, but one of them had all the paint chipped off, so I repainted it in red - the tires, windows, body, etc and called it he Devil Mobile.  It fared a lot better - it must have been heavier due to all that extra paint - because I'm not really all that good at being light with a paintbrush.  Especially with my sausage fingers.

Back to the competition... it would go on and on for hours, until there was one definite winner - the champion of champions.  It was usually this awesome Ferrari Key Car.  I think it was a combination of the car's wedge shape and the fact that I always wanted it to win.  I think that I would press down on the car really hard in an effort to get that wedge-shaped hood under the wheels of the other cars.  In the 80s, the Ferrari Testarossa was the ultimate in coolness, especially if you like Magnum PI.  My dad still has the car at his house - I should maybe steal it and re-enact the derby championship.

Of course, if my kids tried to do that, I'm sure that I would yell at them to keep the noise down and go do something else.

Lonely shoe

On two different occasions yesterday, I saw a stranded, lonely shoe left by the side of the road. Then I thought about the many times in the past where I've seen stranded shoes forlornly discarded at the side of the road.

Which got me wondering - how does one go about losing just one shoe? Granted, half of the shoes you see on the road can be accounted for: somebody throws them away because they already lost the first one.

But how does one go about losing just one shoe? Are you in such a hurry that as your walking and your shoe falls off, that you just don't have the time to go back and get it and put it on again? Did it fall out of your gym bag? If so, how do you not notice the weight difference? (p.s., you don't often see light-weight expensive sneakers lying around).

Did the mother shoe have too many shoe puppies and you had to toss one away, tied in a bag and thrown into the river. (author's note: I have never gotten rid of excess puppies this way).

Did you fall asleep while riding shotgun, with your foot out the window, and the driver of the car played a funny trick on you?

Really, I have no explanations.