Thursday, August 21, 2008

Bolt, Steel Magnolias

I am pleased to report, if you didn't hear, that Usain Bolt did it. He broke the world record in the 200 metre by 2/100 of a second. He is absolutely fantastic. Did what no-one has done before by winning the 100 and 200 metre races in record times in the same meet. He was 22 yesterday so the crowd sang Happy Birthday to him. Matt says he has to compete in a relay yet. I wonder if he will have "enough" for the same races in four years time? Picture taken from CBC's Olympics Page. Steel Magnolias was very well done. I saw the film years ago, but for some reason, I hadn't remembered what a powerful story it was. The Drayton Festival players did a wonderful job. The whole play takes place in a beauty salon although I recall in the movie they moved to other scenes. When the final moment came with the mother being so angry about her daughter's death, you could have heard a pin drop. Then the relief came with gales of laughter. It was most impressive. Beautifully acted. One criticism was the hairdresser, Truvy, was trying to do a Dolly Parton and Dolly Parton she ain't. Why she didn't just interpret the part her own way I don't know. Also, not her fault, there were a couple of lines which referred to Dolly's endowments, which were somewhat misplaced with this actress, in fact with most other actresses. I am surprised the producer didn't cut them out. Picture taken from IMDB I was somewhat surprised to read in an ezine I take that people were actually donating money to the writer to help him buy a new computer. I can't figure out in my mind if this is being generous or stupid. Admittedly he has been writing for a number of years and has become a great favourite with his readers, but..... Hey guys, I need a new computer, are you going to send me money to buy one? As usual I watched Nova Science Now, nearly didn't but it was chucking it down in Beijing so there wasn't a lot to watch. They are having a typhoon (hurricane) over there too and it is dropping lots of rain everywhere rather like Fay is over here. Theirs is called Nuri. They postponed several events, but I read today that the equestrian events in Hong Kong are going to go ahead. I appear to have missed the new stuff on the Nova programme and just watched some segments I had already seen. They were still interesting. There was one segment on retrieving tissue samples from T-Rex bones. If you want to check the segments out click here you can also see the segments I missed earlier. Shopping day today, I haven't been for a couple of weeks, so need to get cracking. I was just reminded of the following recipe so thought I would share it with you. This is for different kinds of crèpes which can be filled with different foods. Tomorrow I will post suggested fillings. I particularly love the wholewheat crèpes, they taste so different. Crèpes Serves: 12 Source: Cooking Light - May 1994 1-1/4 cups flour 1-1/2 cups skim milk 1 tbs margarine or butter melted 1 egg Herb Crepes - add 1 tbs each of minced fresh parsley, oregano and basil to the milk. Parmesan - add 1/4 cup grated Parmesan to the flour Cornmeal: - replace 1/4 cup flour with 1/4 cup cornmeal. Wholewheat - replace 1/2 cup flour with 1/2 cup wholewheat flour and use 2 tbs margarine. Dessert Crepes: add 1 tbs sugar to the flour grated lemon rind (optional) Instructions: Place flour in a medium bowl. Combine milk, margarine and egg and add mixture to flour, stirring with a wire whisk until almost smooth. Cover batter and chil for 1 hour. Coat a non stick pan with spray and when hot pour in a scant 1/4 cup of the mixture. Tilt pan to spread. When the underside is done turn over and cook the other side. Place on a towel to cool. Can be layered in wax paper and frozen til needed.

11 comments:

  1. Jo -- Crepes! There is nothing nicer than sitting in a bistro in Paris on a cold rainy winter afternoon eating crepe! And watching the Parisians rushing by.

    You must have a very large shopping bag if you shop only once a week. Or do you load up the boot of the car?

    Marilyn

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  2. Jo -- Forgot to tell you. Other people ski. I skie. By this I mean when there's snow out I am flying through the sky most of the time...

    Marilyn

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  3. Yes Marilyn, we do fill up the "trunk" of the car LOL. We go to a local supermarket and get most of the groceries and vegetables we need which generally last us for a week. We do however occasionally shop for special items in other stores. As for shopping bags, we use recyclable ones these days which we bought from the store for almost $1 a piece but have had for ages. Saves on the plastic bags and I do so wish more people would get into the habit of using them.

    Ah well, never heard of skieing before.

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  4. Jo -

    There are very strict rules about changing the dialogue in a play. It's in the rights agreements so they couldn't drop those lines. They, should have dealt with it in the delivery.

    jan

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  5. Didn't know that Jan, thanks for telling me.

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  6. I know most writers don't make an awful lot of money, but with a few realy successful movie scripts under his belt and not yet being retired, it surprises me too that Harling would need help in getting a simple computer ... unless those people want to get him a special computer, or he now requires a pc designed for people with special needs because of health problems or something. Maybe it's a more a tribute of apprecation - and yes, we'd probably all like one of those. :)

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  7. Crepes, yes. More please:-)Another different in terminolgy here in Oz. Here crepes are more usually called pancakes. The first time I was asked to make "pancakes" in America I tried to do it with a commercially prepared mix and couldn't understand why they were coming out like pikelets (aka drop scones or griddle cakes).

    Oh well, you live and learn:-)

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  8. Who's Harling?

    But I am still waiting for my donations *G*.

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  9. Yes, Satima, it took me a while to learn the difference too. We call them pancakes in England as well.

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  10. Sorry ... Robert Harling is the author of Steel Magnolias (he also did the screenplay for the film). I thought you meant that the ezine people were wanting to raise funds for a computer for him, but maybe I got that wrong. :3

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  11. Nope Ru, I was referring to something or someone quite different.

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