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I like this guy more and more.

Measles up 38% last year! People, get an education! Or a clue!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7872541.stm

I used to quite like Jeni Barnett when she did the cookery program on Chef Porn TV. Turns out she’s a complete idiot.
And now her employer LBC radio – which I have to admit I always thought of as Loud Mouthed Ill-Informed Idiot Radio when I lived in London – is siccing its lawyers onto Dr Ben Goldacre for daring to call her out on her ill-informed rantings about MMR and not vaccinating your children.
Look. This is quite easy. Vaccinations will probably save your child’s life. Not vaccinating your children will increase their chances of them dying, and will also increase the chances that others will die. it’s that simple, really. There’s plenty of evidence that vaccination is good and none that it is bad. Sure, there are plenty of anecdotes from uninformed (wilfully uninformed, even) parents saying that ‘My child fell ill after vaccination’ but the plural of ‘anecdote; is not ‘facts’.
And if, like the nutter on the Jeni Barnett page above, you believe that you can treat measles with vitamin C – stay the hell away from me and keep your superstitions and infectious children to yourself.
When we visited the UK over Christmas, we felt obliged to consult our pediatrician about whether or not to vaccinate Scarlett against TB. This is no longer done routinely in France because it simply doesn’t exist here any more. However, it’s become quite popular in the UK due to people NOT vaccinating their children, with herd immunity against it descending in places to 60%. So, visiting the UK is becoming like visiting the third world – get your vaccinations before you go or you risk catching medieval diseases.
And yes, I am angry, very angry about this. Wilfully, ignorantly putting your children and, above all, my children at risk through stupidity should be illegal. Parents who refuse to have their offspring vaccinated should be prosecuted as if they were beating them with lead pipes.

I thought about going out to hit 18 holes or so with my golf bat or perhaps playing some tennis with the local politians but they won’t let my dog on the golf course so in the end decided that I’d rather have a takeaway curry. But you can’t find any here because the place is full of crappy drivers and cheese shops and bloody English people who write about how delightful the cheese is and how you can’t get an effin’ plumber for cash. So I ended up ordering some instant curry powder on the internet which I gave to my wife to cook instead. She’s a great cook, nearly as good as my mother who’s Italian. I prefer Italy, the food is great and my auntie knows what I like to eat.

* Normal service will be resumed eventually

With apologies to Bob and Alex who are both a bit more interesting than that.

http://www.thesundayleader.lk/20090111/editorial-.htm

Sri Lankan journalist Lasantha Wickrematunge wrote this piece in advance, to be published should he ever be killed. He was murdered by the bad guys in Sri Lanka. I’m grateful there are still journalists who do this sort of work, and I’m sorry we still need them.

” People often ask me why I take such risks and tell me it is a matter of time before I am bumped off. Of course I know that: it is inevitable. But if we do not speak out now, there will be no one left to speak for those who cannot, whether they be ethnic minorities, the disadvantaged or the persecuted. An example that has inspired me throughout my career in journalism has been that of the German theologian, Martin Niem”ller. In his youth he was an anti-Semite and an admirer of Hitler. As Nazism took hold in Germany, however, he saw Nazism for what it was: it was not just the Jews Hitler sought to extirpate, it was just about anyone with an alternate point of view. Niem”ller spoke out, and for his trouble was incarcerated in the Sachsenhausen and Dachau concentration camps from 1937 to 1945, and very nearly executed. While incarcerated, Niem”ller wrote a poem that, from the first time I read it in my teenage years, stuck hauntingly in my mind:

First they came for the Jews

and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for the Communists

and I did not speak out because I was not a Communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists

and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for me

and there was no one left to speak out for me.

If you remember nothing else, remember this: The Leader is there for you, be you Sinhalese, Tamil, Muslim, low-caste, homosexual, dissident or disabled. Its staff will fight on, unbowed and unafraid, with the courage to which you have become accustomed. Do not take that commitment for granted. Let there be no doubt that whatever sacrifices we journalists make, they are not made for our own glory or enrichment: they are made for you. Whether you deserve their sacrifice is another matter. As for me, God knows I tried.”

http://www.blueservo.net/

Texas border patrol puts up webcams watching for Mexicans trying to sneak in. If we see anything suspicious we should let them know. Will someone please write me a perl script that does this every 8 nanoseconds or so?

I laughed so much tears are still running down my face now.

Oh, I registered on the site: they think I’m 5-year-old Joe Jackson from Tanzania, and that I’m qualified to guard their border.

Bwahahahaha!

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Apple collars:
Use medium-sized tasty apples, Granny Smiths are the only ones I can get here. Core them with an apple corer (lemme know when I’m getting too technical) and then slice thinly with a mandoline (the kitchen kind, not the play-when-drunk kind). If you don’t have a mandoline you could try a sharp knife but you may fail to get the slices thin enough – you want them to be about 1 milimetre thick. Make a sugar syrup by dissolving 600g sugar in 500ml of water, warm it over a low heat until the sugar is all dissolved. When it’s cool, slip the apple slices in (they can break so for two people I’d do about 10 – they’re delicious anyway) and let them soak for a few hours. Then cook them for two or three hours in an oven at 80 C, turning once. Best to cook them on a silicone cooking mat, a Silpat, or greaseproof/silicone paper if you don’t have that. They should be crystalised when you take them out but not browned. If you’re doing this for lunch tomorrow, start today.

OK, time planner for soup/chicken/pears.

Assuming you want to eat at 1pm, adjust for other dining times.
1100: Choose pears that are still firm, one per person. Peal pears really carefully, leaving the stalks. Cut a slice off the bottom so they’ll stand up. Put into a saucepan, cover with red wine, add four tablespoons of sugar, one teaspoon of ground cinnamon, two cloves, heat gently. You don’t want this to boil, you want the pears to poach gently so don’t have the heat too high. When it’s steaming/simmering, taste the mulled wine and correct the sugar/spice mix if you don’t like it. If it’s too sweet, add more wine. How long it takes depends on how ripe the pears are. You can cook them for too long and they’ll disintegrate, then you have pear and mulled wine soup which you strain and serve like you meant it to happen. In all, they’ll be done in an half an hour to an hour or less. Poke a sharp knife into them to see if they’re done – when it slides in easily, they’re done. Remove the pears at this point and keep them on one side and allow the wine to go on simmering until it’s reduced at least by half. You can reduce it more if you like, but don’t go too far or it’ll turn to toffee. When it’s reduced enough for you – keep tasting it – turn off the heat and allow it to cool on its own. You’re going to warm it up just before serving so just leave it in the saucepan.
1115: When the pears are simmering, cut the tops off the carrots so you don’t see any more green centre, cut off the very tips, then scrub them thoroughly under running cold water with a nail/vegetable brush. Cut into equal-sized pieces about 2 cms long/wide and put them into a saucepan of cold water. You’ll need about 250g per person. Use just enough water so all the carrot is covered. Add salt, a four-fingered pinch per litre of water. When the salt is dissolved, taste it – it should taste as salty as the sea.
1130 Cover the carrot pan, bring to boil, reduce heat to simmer gently. 15 – 20 minutes. Peel potatoes, cut into equal-sized pieces, leave in pan of water.
1145: Prepare green veg if you’re using fresh, or use frozen and have a beer instead of preparing green veg. When you can stick a knife into carrots, remove from heat and liquidise with stick blender or liquidiser, cuisinart, whatever. Cover pan, leave on one side.
1200: Prepare chicken. Use chicken breasts. You want them to be of equal thickness all the way around so they cook evenly, so put into a plastic bag and gently pound the thick end with a meat mallet or your empty beer bottle. If you’re using rabbit there’s no pounding to be done.
1215: Put potatoes on to boil. Add salt as above. Peel thumb-sized piece of ginger for two people.
1230: Put butter to melt in e.g. bowl in microwave. Use 25% weight of spuds. Put frying pan on heat to warm up, then add veg cooking oil, then salt chicken/rabbit lightly, then put in frying pan. Give it five minutes on one side without touching it, then turn. When done remove chicken, keep warm. If rabbit, leave long enough to brown outside all over then put in oven for 15 minutes.
1245: Drain spuds, leave in colander on top of saucepan while you drain green veg. Put veg in serving dish, cover in warm place. Spoon mustard into chicken frying pan after pouring off oil, stir well with wooden scraper to get bits up, when bubbling pour on cream, stir well. When bubbling, turn off heat.
1250: Put carrot soup on heat to warm, add one third volume cream reserving a little, grate ginger directly into soup. Mash potatoes, then pour in melted butter, mix well with masher or whisk. Cover, keep warm. Warm serving plates.
1300: Put green veg on to cook, serve soup. Pour swirl of remaining cream onto soup, add sprig of herb e.g. parsley if that floats your boat.
1315-ish: Turn up heat on mustard sauce to make bubble, stir well. Plate chicken chevauché, pour on sauce leaving half meat exposed, add potatoes and veg to plates, herb if need be.
1345-ish: Warm sauce for pears, put pears in dish, cover with sauce, add apple collars if you did them, serve.

Ingredients for two:
500g carrots
Salt
250ml thick cream
Two chicken breasts/two rabbit thighs
Mustard
250ml cream
500g potatoes
125g butter
Green veg to taste
2 pears
Bottle red wine
Sugar
Cinnamon
Cloves
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Getting in touch with my feminine side!

Large video file follows.

Scarlett playing on the sofa