Daily Deals, Blogging, Books, Movie Animation.

I must confess that although I carry Amazon.com ads, I don’t often read them, however, there was a Daily Deal on Wednesday, a 32 gig flash drive for $22 and change. What a deal. I wish I hadn’t just bought one for $32. I was tempted to get another just because it was such a good price, but I resisted. The Daily Deals appear just above the header on this post. I am going to keep a better eye on the banner in future. Amazon.com sell such a lot of things, not just books and music. I wish Amazon.ca carried such a variety but maybe they are not allowed to by law or something.

Been sorting out a few things in my computer room come office come library and was looking at the folders in which I keep the printed versions of my blogs. The amount of stuff I have written over the years absolutely staggers me. Who knew I would have so much to say. Admittedly my print outs are single sided because I cannot guarantee that the printer won’t pull more than one sheet of paper through at a time which would make a right mess of double sided printing, but even so, that’s one hell of a lot of verbiage. One of the folders isn’t labelled yet as it isn’t completely full, but the others carry between 7-800 pages each. Thanks to those of you who have been reading my yap ever since I started, and thanks to those who have joined me through the years. I always knew I wanted to write, I just thought I wanted to write a book, but I am not sure I had the discipline to do the research and I sure never came up with a brilliant idea for a story.

Somewhere I saw a request (I think from Amazon.com) asking for photos of books in the bedroom. I never, but never read in bed. I hate it. When I am reading I am either sitting at the table eating lunch, or sitting in my armchair with a coffee at my side. Lately I have been doing a lot of Kindle reading. Before that I was reading some loaners which carried a lot of sex. I get tired of reading sex, its all the same, rarely anything different although having said that, I recently read one that was different and I was rather surprised, to say the least, to read what was written. I enjoy romance, but I really don’t want to read all this hot and steamy stuff. It doesn’t titillate me – does it you? I just think “Oh Gawd, not again”. I read one story recently where a couple were on a stakeout and had to hide, they are in a small closet and start making out, really!! For me, a good story doesn’t need all the intimate details, the best writers I know don’t add all this explicit stuff, they just tell a good story and if the characters fall in love, their sex life isn’t detailed right down to the last nubbin. I’ve had two good marriages and once upon a time lots of boyfriends, I don’t need this stuff. As for what I am now reading, I have been downloading lots of freebies from Amazon.com for my Kindle and enjoying them. A couple turned out to have detailed sex, guess what, I deleted them.

Matt tells me we are supposed to get 2 inches of snow this afternoon. Considering the whole of Europe is plastered with the stuff, I guess its about time we got some.

Last night I watched The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian, and wondered once again how they achieved the character of Aslan the lion. To me, he looks just like a real lion, but obviously you can’t have young humans hugging real lions. I finally got round to Googling about it and it turns out it was all done with computer animation. I am very impressed. I didn’t know they could do that much these days. It never occurred to me, I thought somehow they had taken film of a lion and interwoven it with the characters, but I guess that wouldn’t be possible anyway. The mouse, Reepicheep, was done the same way, as were all the talking animals. I don’t usually want to know how these things are done, but I was particularly interested in how they did Aslan. The Guardian had a video showing some detail about how it was all done.

I am still not totally decided if I am going to try and bowl today, will let you know tomorrow how it goes.

It would be hard to say which I would choose if offered a chocolate cake or a carrot cake, ideally I would like a piece of each, even though obviously it wouldn’t be good for me. Today I got a carrot cake recipe in my mail and as it claims to be simple, I thought I would share it.

Simple Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

Source: America's Test Kitchen
Cooking.com

Makes one 13 by 9-inch cake

If you like nuts in your cake, stir 1 1/2 cups toasted chopped pecans or walnuts into the batter along with the carrots. Raisins are also a good addition; 1 cup can be added along with the carrots. If you add both nuts and raisins, the cake will need an additional 10 to 12 minutes in the oven.

INGREDIENTS
For the Carrot Cake:
2 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour (12 1/2 ounces)
1 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/4 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon table salt
1 pound medium carrots (6 to 7 carrots), peeled
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar (10 1/2 ounces)
1/2 cup light brown sugar packed
4 large eggs
1 1/2 cups vegetable oil or safflower, or canola oil

For the Cream Cheese Frosting:
8 ounces cream cheese softerend but still cool
5 tablespoons unsalted butter softened, but still cool
1 tablespoon sour cream
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups confectioners' sugar (4 1/2 ounces)

DIRECTIONS
FOR THE CAKE:
Adjust oven rack to middle position; heat oven to 350 degrees. Spray 13 by 9-inch baking pan with nonstick cooking spray. Line bottom of pan with parchment and spray parchment.
Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, and salt in large bowl; set aside.

In food processor fitted with large shredding disk, shred carrots (you should have about 3 cups); transfer carrots to bowl and set aside. Wipe out food processor workbowl and fit with metal blade. Process granulated and brown sugars and eggs until frothy and thoroughly combined, about 20 seconds. With machine running, add oil through feed tube in steady stream. Process until mixture is light in color and well emulsified, about 20 seconds longer. Scrape mixture into medium bowl. Stir in carrots and dry ingredients until incorporated and no streaks of flour remain. Pour into prepared pan and bake until toothpick or skewer inserted into center of cake comes out clean, 35 to 40 minutes, rotating pan halfway through baking time. Cool cake to room temperature in pan on wire rack, about 2 hours.

FOR THE CREAM CHEESE FROSTING:
When cake is cool, process cream cheese, butter, sour cream, and vanilla in clean food processor workbowl until combined, about 5 seconds, scraping down bowl with rubber spatula as needed. Add confectioners' sugar and process until smooth, about 10 seconds.
Run paring knife around edge of cake to loosen from pan. Invert cake onto wire rack, peel off parchment, then invert again onto serving platter. Using icing spatula, spread frosting evenly over surface of cake. Cut into squares and serve. (Cover leftovers and refrigerate for up to 3 days.)

Have a great day

Prince Caspian, Kung Fu Panda and Rhubarb Soup

I loved it, it was very well done. It is long enough ago that I don't remember where Prince Caspian differed from the book although I had been told it did. Maybe I will read the book again so I can see. My friend also loved it, so I wasn't alone in my impression. It was running in two theatres, I am not sure how busy the other one was, but there were only a handful in ours. I would have thought running it in two at once was not very sensible, except at weekends when the kids are around I suppose. The theatre was also showing Indiana Jones and I suspect that was pretty busy, there were a lot of cars in the parking lot. The four Pevensie kids are beautifully portrayed and Reepicheep, the fighting mouse, was wonderful. I could be wrong, but I do not remember Minotaurs in the book, however, they worked OK in the movie. If you like this kind of movie at all, I can thoroughly recommend it. I wonder if they are going to make films of all of the books, I do hope so. I will certainly be in the front of the line to see them.

There were previews of some of the upcoming movies and I would love to see Kungfu Panda, it looks pretty funny. I will have to watch out for it, I will probably have to find another friend to go with as last night's companion is off to visit family for a while and it will be in theatres on June 6. There were several other previews of movies which are upcoming and which looked as though they would be worth seeing. Don't remember them all now, but if I can find someone to go with me, it is great to see them shown on the big screen. The surround sound is quite impressive too. Matt won't go to the movies because he says the sound is too loud. He is right, but I find you get used to it very quickly.

Here's an unusual rhubarb recipe which I got through Recitopia UK.

Rhubarb Soup
Serves: 4

4 stalks rhubarbs
1 qt water
3 cooked beets
1 cucumber
3 hard boiled eggs
1 cup sour cream
1 Tbsp dill
salt for taste

Cut up rhubarb and boil in water for about half an hour. Put through sieve and add finely cut beets, finely cut cucumber and hard boiled eggs. Add salt and dill. Put in the refrigerator. Serve cold.

We are off grocery shopping now, this afternoon Matt has another appointment with Let It Heal. Have a great day.

Fantastic Machine, Cost of Food, Herbs, Prince Caspian

This is quite an incredible piece of musical apparatus all built from farm machinery and which took 13,029 hours to set up. The pictures come from a company called Animusic and you can see more of their animations here. A friend sent me this today and I was very impressed. I just got Matt to look at this and he figured it was boring. Amazing the difference between us.

This morning GMA were talking about the rising costs of food and what people are doing about it. Some are going to considerable lengths to decrease their grocery bills. A lot of people are growing their own food so they don't have to go to the store at all. There was one couple who had filled in their swimming pool with dirt in order to grow food instead. I thought this was rather extreme, it must have cost a fortune for all that dirt anyway. If you are an apartment dweller, it isn't possible to grow very much, at least we have a balcony which a lot of apartments don't. We haven't yet been to get our herbs for the summer, we like to have basil, thyme, sage and rosemary. I particularly need to make some basil pesto to put in the freezer. I ran out a couple of months ago. Plus I like basil for my homemade tomato soup. It is so nice to have fresh herbs available when you are cooking. I would also like to grow cilantro, but for some reason we have never had any success with it. We tried several times when we lived in North Carolina. We could grow all kinds of herbs, but the cilantro went to seed almost immediately.

Talking of food costs, we popped into our local store yesterday for a rotisserie chicken for supper as we hadn't done anything about supper earlier. They were selling local asaparagus quite cheaply, but when we looked at it, it had stems which needed the ends removed - if it's local, why is that do you suppose? The asparagus I buy, every bit can be used. Tough ends are supposed to indicate how long the asparagus has been picked, but if its local, it can't have been that long surely? We will be heading out to Barrie's Asparagus today, I still had some asparagus left on Sunday and no time yesterday because of bowling. I will be suffering from withdrawal symptoms soon *g*. Can you imagine what I go through once the season has ended? I live til next Mother's Day when the season begins once more.

Tomorrow night I am going to see Prince Caspian with a friend. I have heard some good reports of the movie so am looking forward to it. I will probably end up buying the DVD. I want to get the Spiderwyck Chronicles too, haven't seen that movie, but will rent it when the DVD comes out. I have somewhat forgotten the story of Prince Caspian, but I understand there are bits in it which didn't happen in the book, so I had better not re-read it before I see the movie. I see its rated PG as well which, considering its a children's story, seems a bit stupid.

Having talked about Basil Pesto, here is an original Italian recipe that I use. There are hundreds of versions out there, but I like this one very much.

Pesto

Source: Great Italian Cooking

1 Cup fresh basil leaves, washed and thoroughly dried
6 sprigs parsley
3 sprigs marjoram
1/2 cup pine nuts
3 cloves garlic, crushed in the press
1/3 cup Parmesan, grated
1/3 cup Romano
3 tbs olive oil
2 tbs softened butter
1/4 tsp salt

Blend everything in blender briefly. Makes 1 cup. By leaving out cheese and adding another 1/4 cup pignole makes a good sauce for hot boiled fish. Use the regular recipe and add to hot consommé or tomato soup.

Have a great day.