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Post by kerouac2 on Aug 21, 2018 10:40:35 GMT
Today I received a (small) dental bill that had been mailed to me in January. The post office put the envelope in a protective plastic pouch so that I could see that it had been half eaten by rats. But where?
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Post by bixaorellana on Aug 21, 2018 15:16:29 GMT
Bjd, let's hope that Lugg's former m.i.l's son doesn't read your post! Kerouac! Did the PO tell you it was eaten by rats, or have you been hiding a talent in identifying rodent dentition?
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Post by kerouac2 on Aug 24, 2018 18:38:31 GMT
I don't think they did a DNA test on it, but something had sure the fuck been chewing on it.
Meanwhile, there was a heartwarming report on the evening news about neo-hippie families driving all over Europe in vintage VW vans. Most of them lead totally normal lives but had hippie parents and it is a total joy for them to take their children on trips in the same rustic camping conditions with which they grew up. And the kids seem to love it, too.
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Post by kerouac2 on Aug 25, 2018 14:00:02 GMT
Why oh why do I keep forgetting to buy a new jar of pickled ginger every time I go to the Chinese supermarket? I need it desperately, not only for my 100-year eggs but also for my sushi and sashimi. Maybe tomorrow.
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Post by bixaorellana on Aug 25, 2018 15:54:07 GMT
You should go get it now, partly as punishment for having forgotten so many times and mainly because then you'd have it. Get more than one jar.
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Post by kerouac2 on Aug 25, 2018 16:34:29 GMT
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Post by bixaorellana on Aug 25, 2018 17:44:25 GMT
You can push that candied ginger right over here right now! What I have always done to manioc is to boil it and serve it with a side sauce of well-crushed garlic, olive oile, salt, pepper, & lime or lemon juice. Either that, or cook the rounds with something fairly soupy and flavorful like stewed chicken. Even then, the side sauce would not go amiss. Yucca on its own doesn't have much flavor.
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Post by tod2 on Aug 26, 2018 12:58:08 GMT
I had manioc for lunch this week. We call it Madumbi. Simply boiled and then the skin taken off while just warm. Sliced up and totally covered in butter and a sprinkling of sea salt. Just to die for. (And, very very African meal).
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Post by Kimby on Aug 26, 2018 13:07:35 GMT
I googled “manioc”, and found it’s the same as “cassava” which I also don’t know.
cas·sa·va kəˈsävə/ noun noun: cassava; plural noun: cassavas 1. the starchy tuberous root of a tropical tree, used as food in tropical countries but requiring careful preparation to remove traces of cyanide from the flesh. a starch or flour obtained from the cassava root. 2. the shrubby tree from which cassava is obtained, native to tropical America and cultivated throughout the tropics.
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Post by kerouac2 on Aug 26, 2018 14:28:48 GMT
God, that stuff is a bitch to peel, but I think it's pretty obvious from the photo. My cooking websites have told me to make manioc fries. I think there will be a risk of slicing off my fingers when I try to split the damned thing with a knife, but I'll be careful.
Okay, I will confess why I bought the manioc. I found myself watching one of those adventure reality shows yesterday. In this one they take just two celebrities and drop each one on opposite sides of an island with a few tools and some water but absolutely no food. They have to survive 5 days while doing the same sort of challenges as in 'Survivor' to get money for the charity that they have designated. In this particular episode, there was a talk show person (think 'Ellen DeGeneres') and a pop star from The Voice, one of the rare ones who actually ended up with a real career. He is actually Israeli, but his success came in France, so that is where he is these days -- luckily for him, he was actually born in France, so there were no documentation problems. Anyway, after a first night of horror, they manage to meet up at the designated place, both of them starving to death after having just nibbled on a coconut or two, but him much more than her ("I'm 34 and I am used to eating 3 full meals a day as well as anything else whenever I feel hungry."). Poor Amir. Well, Christine has been living on and off in Mexico during her life and she says "I'm sure there must be manioc on this island. It is fantastic -- even better than potatoes!" Well, they finally find some and Amir loved it, cooked with the pathetic little fish that they caught. (Wouldn't any of us love just about anything in such circumstances?) Since I went to the Chinese supermarket only about an hour or two later and saw the Brazilian manioc for one euro a kilo, I was compelled to buy it. So there.
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Post by bixaorellana on Aug 26, 2018 15:20:03 GMT
Now all you have to do is go hide in a park with only a fish hook, a piece of string, and a jackknife for twenty-four hours before you have your manioc. That way you'll really appreciate it.
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Post by bixaorellana on Aug 26, 2018 22:52:46 GMT
Got this from a genealogy site:
Do you look like your relatives? Use our facial recognition software to find out. Upload a Selfie Upload a Family Portrait Compare
Um. I already use facial recognition hardware. It's called a "mirror".
Edited to brag that I wouldn't even need the mirror hardware for comparing, since I already know what I look like.
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Post by kerouac2 on Aug 27, 2018 16:08:42 GMT
France is going to stop installing land lines for telephones as of November 15th. After that date, all home phones will have to routed through internet boxes. As for existing land lines, they will be eliminated starting in 2023, zone by zone. Anyway, the original technology lasted for 130 years, not bad when you think of it.
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Post by bixaorellana on Aug 27, 2018 16:24:17 GMT
So I use this info to get a divorce ? Absolutely. Of course you should believe some software online rather than the evidence of your own senses. After that date, all home phones will have to routed through internet boxes. As for existing land lines, they will be eliminated starting in 2023, zone by zone. That is interesting. For some years now, my phone has been tied to my internet. But sometimes, when I can't get online, the phone still works. Why is that?
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Post by Kimby on Aug 27, 2018 16:35:17 GMT
Phone service may require less bandwidth, if that’s the right word, than internet service.
Cell phones don’t work well in my neighborhood, but I can send and receive texts, which requires even less bandwidth, or signal strength.
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Post by kerouac2 on Aug 28, 2018 14:59:20 GMT
I can think of 3 separate occasions where smokers have given me health warnings:
-- Salad in a bag is packed with noxious gas; I shouldn't eat it. -- I use the same plastic water bottle for too long to keep water in my refrigerator and am contaminating myself with microscopic plastic particles. -- I should stop eating meat. Meat is bad.
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Post by kerouac2 on Aug 29, 2018 10:06:05 GMT
Short nights are the best kind!
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Post by mickthecactus on Aug 29, 2018 10:41:06 GMT
How depressing.
Garden centres are already gearing up for Christmas.
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Post by mickthecactus on Aug 29, 2018 12:02:22 GMT
Scallop wars between the frogs and the rosbifs!
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Post by Deleted on Aug 29, 2018 12:55:04 GMT
How depressing. Garden centres are already gearing up for Christmas. OH GAWD!!!! I always loathe when that happens here which I'm not quite sure it has yet as our growing season is very, very long and more than likely (let's hope anyway!!) this won't happen until the end or maybe mid-October.
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Post by mickthecactus on Aug 29, 2018 15:57:17 GMT
We still have a good month to go here but that doesn’t put them off.
I hate it.
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Post by mich64 on Aug 30, 2018 1:27:09 GMT
We went for a walk around the mall today and stopped at the card/gift store, filling the front corner was a very large Christmas display of ornaments and decorations. I was surprised, I have never seen this so early and then at another gift shop there were Christmas decorations as well and they were right next to the Halloween section.
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Post by bixaorellana on Aug 30, 2018 2:09:36 GMT
This is the time of year when there used to be displays of big paper autumn leaves and giant fake pencils along with sweaters and stuff advertising back-to-school. It's even way too early for Halloween stuff!
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Post by Deleted on Aug 30, 2018 12:12:03 GMT
Not here!!!! Halloween costumes and decorations have been on display in every Walgreens, Walmart, Rite Aid's etc. for a few weeks now.
Statistics have shown that it is the biggest commercial enterprise in the U.S. Most all of it geared toward adults.
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Post by kerouac2 on Sept 1, 2018 14:02:14 GMT
Maybe the shops will be inspired by summer Mardi Gras and start doing Summer Christmas.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 1, 2018 14:35:01 GMT
There already are specialty shops that are geared to selling Christmas crap stuff year round. I think there's still one in the French Quarter on Decauter Street that's been there for about 40 years. At least Midsummer Mardi Gras gives a much needed jolt to the evening businesses along our little commercial corridor that suffer through the summer hanging on by a thread. I saw some folks I know that work in the service industry on Oak Street and they reported that it was the busiest night of the whole summer and people have fun!!! (I was irked however, that the little grocery despite my forewarnings, did not stock enough beer and wine for the week and I was not able to purchase my wine until later this week and had to go out of the neighborhood to get what I needed )
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Post by bixaorellana on Sept 1, 2018 20:16:13 GMT
... there's still one in the French Quarter on Decauter Street that's been there for about 40 years. That used to be LaNasa Hardware. It's where my grandfather's oyster knife came from. And you're right that it got turned into something grotesque 40-some years ago. I will never forgive them.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 1, 2018 20:34:42 GMT
Wow, that most certainly is unforgivable.
I had a feeling that you would know what place I was referring to as it is just a hop skip and a stumble jump from The Abbey but never would have guessed that you would make reference to it's previous tenants.
How is it that you remember that Bixa? What I mean is were you with him when he bought the knife or just happen to remember from him telling you?
That is a fond memory I must say.
There is just a handful of the old time neighborhood hardware stores left here in NOLA. We make a point of patronizing them whenever possible.
In Bridgehampton there is still the same family run hardware store. I make a point of going there every time I visit. Sometimes just for the sake of nostalgia.
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Post by bixaorellana on Sept 1, 2018 20:43:49 GMT
I don't know how I know that the knife came from there, except that obviously someone told me. It had a longer knife portion that the modern ones and no slippage guard. The handle was wood, rather slender & with a burn mark from who-knows-what on one side. I think it's in one of my mother's rather frightening kitchen drawers, so I probably saw it in the fairly recent past.
I remember LaNasa Hardware & I think it was one of the places in the Quarter that sold seeds. It also seems to me that there was an "adult" movie theatre nearby in the era shortly after it was turned into an Xmas store. I hope so, anyway.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 2, 2018 12:57:05 GMT
I have a faint recall of purchasing seeds from a store in the French Quarter. It makes me wonder if maybe the Reuter Seed Company had a store there.
There was of course the giant Reuters on Carrollton Ave. in Mid-City and I was heartbroken when they closed.
At least they preserved the original building.
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