Posts from February 2010

@jacob, this IS the best period Emma-Knightley dance I have ever seen.



I will admit, Emma is probably one of my least favourite works by Austen, but this 2009 adaptation does as much justice to the novel as the 1995 version of Pride and Prejudice. In fact, it makes it so picturesque that I am almost ready to overlook the fact that I am always uncomfortable with Emma's character in the real book.

Romola Garai is SO not the Emma that Austen wrote about. She has absolutely no pretension, is much too earnest and can't pull off the insularity that is the trademark of Austen's Emma! For a change, I loved the fact that they miscast so far from the truth that I actually liked this Emma.

Oh, the soundtrack is GORGEOUS and I have been listening to it non-stop for days on end!! It has a bunch of lively innovative waltzes
and some heart-breaking cello and flute pieces

and really everything in-between.


@jacob, you MUST see this (especially if you don't like the real Emma too much. heheh)

Hee Hee...

It was not about badges.
It is never about badges.
It will never be about badges.

That Coconut oil is 92% saturated fat - around 30% more than butter. It has 6% monounsaturated fat and just 2% polyunsaturated fat. In the US, it is consumed in large amounts in nondairy coffee creamers on a regular basis by most of the population.

Anyone who thought that they were cutting out the risk of fattening substances by using non-dairy coffee creamers and didn't know this fact are in for a shock.

Coconut oil can be heated to 177 degree C (that is 77 degree C more than the boiling point of water) before it starts to smoke - this is very convenient for mass scale cooking industry use. You would be hard-pressed to find commercial mass-produced baked goods or confectionary here that doesn't have coconut oil used as a shortening agent.

It is however, one of the best skin moisturisers on the planet.

If you answered popcorn (or nothing), you would be wrong. Utterly, absolutely, WRONG.

It's Kale Chips! The recipe is so ridiculously simple that even I could have made it 4 years back, but didn't.



To make up for that lamentable lapse, I just made and devoured a kilo of kale chips in addition to the kale salad I had earlier. If you see a greenish looking person scuttling about tomorrow, its probably a safe bet to assume that they are not from Ireland.

If you don't put on your coats and boots, rush to the nearest kale selling-store (or your fridge, if you are already a kale-eating monster), make these chips RIGHT NOW, you will have a sad potato-chip-filled or popcorn-filled Friday evening, suckers.

Assuming you now have that kale in hand, wash it, strip the leaves from the stalks, tear the leaves into BIG chip sized pieces, dry it, spin it down, toss in some olive oil, juice from a quarter lemon and a liberal sprinkle of salt. Dry the leaves at around 90 Degree C (yeah, yeah, F it -> ) for 20 minutes or till the leaves are a dessicated dark earthy green.

DO NOT burn them. Do not raise the temperature. The idea is to dry them, not roast them. They taste THAT much better when dried (than roasted). Watch carefully around the 20-30 minute mark. Just drag a chair in front of your oven door and keep staring at the kale. They will transform into junk food craving gold.

I can't quite explain how they taste, they are bizarrely awesome and extremely addictive. If I keep going at this rate, I might just beat out Pizza Hut in Kale consumption.

Me: (to very happy-looking matronly but slightly intimidating tall Latino (HLMSITL) woman picking out the last piece of odd-looking squash that I wanted to try) Ah, so you like that squash?

HLMSITL woman: (waving the rather sizeable squash about as if it were made of sponge) I do. VERY much.

Me: How, would you say, is it different from Acorn squash or Butternut squash?

HLMSITL woman: Hmm... its firm.

Me: You mean firmer than butternut?

HLMSITL woman: Yes, and also (pointing to the acorn squash) this one.

Me: (persisting in the hope that she may realize that I have never tried it and maybe, just maybe give it away) Firm in what way? More fibrous?

HLMSITL woman: No, firm as in even after cooking you feel like it could get caught in your throat and choke you to death while eating it. (Makes a choking gesture at her neck with both hands and rolls eyes around, manages to look rather alarmingly like she is actually choking.) Like THAT. And I LOVE that, you know?

Me (to myself): Nopes, I definitely don't know.

Me (to HLMSITL woman): Wow. How fascinating! *Smile Smile. Edge away*

You just can't deny it [1-5].

---

References:
1. @theecarey #50736
2. @theecarey #50766
3. @theecarey #49743
4. @theecarey #45899
5. @theecarey #35925

My laptop battery goes from 96% "discharging" to 5% "Critical Battery Level, Shutting down NOW" in 20 minutes flat. This is with the monitor off and on lowest power consumption settings. It never reaches 100% charge, according to the battery monitor. I always see it hovering around 95%. Worse, it takes just 20 minutes to charge to 95% .The laptop and battery are just around 1.5 years old. :/

I guess I am partially to blame for this poor battery performance because I really should have run the battery through the charge-discharge cycle all this time, instead of running it from the AC outlet power most of the time.

Maybe Sanyo makes trash batteries. Who knows... Mine is a
LION NS2P3SZNJ5WR

I have learnt my bitter battery lesson in time for my next Chrome OS powered netbook - which hopefully is just round the corner.

@himay, "Ack!"? Really? Think again! ;-)

Who knows what miracles you can achieve...
When you believe, somehow you will!
You will, when you believe!



I love this song. I could listen to it on a loop for a solid 1 hour or more. I know, because I have done it. The lyrics are so irrationally and completely positive and that, I think is part of its magic. Of course, the other part is Whitney Houston's smashing powerful voice. Anything she sang turned into an impressive crashing waterfall of sonic gold, back in the day.