Technical Problems...

I am doing all the posting today from Surenna's mac mini. I cannot seem to get internet connectivity from the PC today and so I reloaded all the pictures back into the camera and then connected the camera to her computer. There are some little differences in how the computers work, like I cannot get a thumbnail preview of picture files, so it is a little tricky to photoblog. dbp

The End Of The First Day At Disney.

At the end of the first day, we had scheduled a dinner with Cinderella and friends. We decided to drive to the Grand Floridian, where the dinner was, and we got there early. So we hung-out for a while in the lobby. Surenna seemed bored by all the elegant opulance. We sat at the round table on the right hand side of the above picture by the elevator. There was a band playing jazz on the 2nd floor balcony. dbp

Excuses for not getting-on with the disney blogging...

So, I expected that I would get a lot of Disney posting done this weekend; maybe even the rest of it. No such luck. Saturday, I took Dahlia to her learn to skate program--she needs to learn to glide. Then, I needed to bake in preperation for a late lunch at our in-laws. First, I got a huckleberry pie going: Vaishali made the crust dough (which is always very easy to handle and comes out tasty), which I rolled-out and filled: 1 Quart of frozen huckleberries 1 Cup of white granulated sugar 1/2 Cup all purpose flour 2 Tablespoons cornstarch I toss all of the above together in a bowl and as the berries melt, the various powders and granuals stick to the huckleberries. Bake at 400F until it looks done. Once the pie was in the oven I started in on the pizzellies: Cream 1 Cup of butter (two sticks) with 1 1/2 Cup of Granulated sugar, add 6 eggs and 3 1/2 cups of all purpose flour and 4 teaspoons of baking powder and 2 tablespoons of anise extract. Cook iaw pizzelli maker instructions. I also roasted 1/2 pound of coffee before all the baking: --Pre-heat oven on convection bake to 466F. --Put in the beans on a baking sheet (with raised edge) which is large enough for the coffee to be in a single layer. --I roast for around 12 minutes. I look for the beans to be just starting to get glossy and be the color of mahogany. It smokes-up the house, but is well worth it if you like really good coffee. The coffee crackles and throws-off a papery skin, so you will need to sort of thresh this off before storage. It is a mess, so do this step outside. Just pour the coffee back and forth between two bowls and blow at the pouring stream. The papery parts will blow away leaving clean beans. If you do this step inside, your wife will kill you, and you have no excuse since you were warned. dbp ps Why didn't I do the Disney posting on Sunday? I have good reasons, but if I post about them, the question will come up: Why spend all that time on the excuses post, when in the same amout of time, you could have just done the real posting? pps. Belated happy birthday to my sister Mary: It is on the first day of the month, right after the shortest month--I always remember too it late to send a card.

A Brilliant and Funny NYT Article

February 25, 2007 Modern Love The Hunter-Gatherer, Parking Division By ANDY RASKIN I read this and thought it was great about a week ago. It has taken me since then to find it again. Enjoy dbp

Why MGM-Disney "Works"

All theme parks rely to one extent or another on sets and I think that a good deal of the charm of visiting these places is the scenery. The thing about MGM-Disney is that the theme is movie-making and so you get all of the scenery but they also let you see that it is not real. Since they don't have to hide the fact that what you see isn't real, (in fact, they don't want to hide it) it frees them up to do really impressive stuff. The above is a scene from the grandstand at Lights, Motors, Action!™ Extreme Stunt Show What I like about the view is that from this vantage point you can see the Hollywood Tower Hotel, the top of Mann's Chinese Theater, Mickey's Sorcerer Hat and a Mediterranean village. There were a couple of sets where (from the right position) it looked like you were in Manhattan or San Francisco: The effect is pretty convincing, but there are flaws: You can see the shadow of scaffolding from the back-side of some of the set on the face of a couple of "buildings" The SF set is really good. The girls are standing next to and even touching this painted wall and it still looks like they are on a street in San Francisco.

Misc. Pictures from MGM

Surenna and I were off on our own for a while because she was our only child over 48" tall and so the only one who could ride on the Rock-N-Roller coaster with me. While we were waiting to hook back up with the others, we took a break, had some popcorn and snapped a picture outside of the Hollywood Brown Derby. Meanwhile, Vaishali was introducing the other two girls to some Disney characters. Here is Jemma with Jojo and Goliath. (L to R: Goliath, Jemma, Jojo) Dahlia and Jemma with a character you might recognize.. dbp

Quick update and then back to Disney Blogging...

Last week was a 4-day week due to President's Day. On these short weeks I don't need to be to work until 10:30, so there was time to blog a little every day. Now I am back to a normal week and so I really only have time to post on Wednesdays (when I am off) and weekends. This morning after coffee and a visit to my favorite blogs: The Bleat and Althouse, I can continue with my own postings. Stay tuned. dbp

MGM-Disney Back-lot Tour.

One the the many things we did on our day at MGM was to go on the back-lot tour. I, along with 3 other dads got "volunteered" to participate. I am not normally good with names, but I think I still recall my "costar's" names: L to R. Jim, Brian, me and Chris. We put on blue waterproof outfits which looked navyish and ran around on a PT-boat set while being filmed. Then technicians spliced together all the film with some stock footage and the result is the clip shown below: Jim was the guy who got flooded in the engine room, Brian was at the con and Chris & I were the comic-relief deck hands. As an aside: As a former Marine, I did feel a little uncomfortable all got-up in Navy uniform.

Beauty And The Beast

After the Tower of Terror, we fastpassed the Rock 'n' Roller Coaster and then went to the stage show for BATB. The costumes were bright colors: Belle, was pretty: There were lots of dance numbers: The show was a nice break from running around and the girls loved it. dbp

MGM-Disney: Our First Park

My wife & I came to Disney World once before. 10 years ago, before we had any children, we came and just stayed overnight. The same day we drove over from my parent's house (on the West coast of Florida) we went to MGM and then the next day to the Magic Kingdom and Epcot. Maybe this is why it just seemed natural to go to MGM first. When we first came in to the park, the High School Musical float was just starting out. It really set the mood for the day. (Our girls are huge fans of it and the music is really catchy) We went straight to the Tower of Terror and did that first--even 5 year old Jemma! Poor Jemma had her head buried in my side even before the elevator began plunging down and rocketing up. dbp

We tell the girls that they will be staying at Disney for a few days

We wanted to avoid the endless questions which would result from our children if they knew that the main part of our trip would be at Disney World. We just told them that we were going to Florida to visit grandparents, they were sufficiently thrilled by that, so we did not elaborate. Now we are in Orlando, the kids still don't know what is up and we are rapidly approaching the Wilderness Lodge. We didn't want to tell them while driving since we needed to take some reaction shots, so we truthfully told them that we should have lunch before continuing on. Once we got to the hotel I had all the girls get a table at the restaurant there while I checked-in. I must say that the lobby is a bit imposing... Here: Surenna does not believe I am serious when I ask if they would like to stay in this place for a couple of days. Not all the girls were so hard to convince as the cynical Surenna. Happy Dahlia! Jemma is delighted!

We depart cold MA for sunny FL

We took this trip one week before the school vacation in order to avoid crowds. The long line at the AirTran counter gave us less than 30 minutes to clear security and board our plane. A nice result of the delay was that we got bumped up to business class! I think what happened is that the airline didn't have adjacent seats in tourist class and all of our children are young, so they gave us the only seats left which were by each other. After we got through security, we rushed to the gate and were the last ones on-board the plane. We took-off and flew through sunny skies direct to Orlando.

High School Musical

Before the show, such anticipation... The girls all danced--Jemma ignores the crowd and dances with # 23.

The Flooring is finally done!

Bamboo planks for the bulk of the room. and Slate by the entrance We had originally been going to put cork flooring where the bamboo now is. My wife and I were in Home Depot and saw the bamboo, which was very attractive and quite inexpensive--about half the cost of cork. The instructions, which were with the display, pushed the use of polyurethane glue. The 60 lb buckets of glue were right there, so we picked one up along with the wood. Just to play it safe, we also got a box of 2" finishing nails. When I opened up the planks I saw that the instructions called for glue OR nails. Well, I had both, so I used both. The glue was very messy and is (barely) soluable in denatured alcohol, but does not dissolve in water, oil, paint thinner or acetone. The only solvent I have, but didn't try, is gasoline. I guess I will be wearing glue on my hands for a week or so. The bamboo is a very hard material and splits easily. I predrilled each of the nails that I put in. This floor is going nowhere. dbp

Standard Pot Roast using 7-bone Chuck Roast.

In a large dutch oven, brown the meat in a tablespoon of olive oil. If the roast is too big to lay flat, then cut it into pieces and brown them one at a time. Set aside the meat once browned. Peel one medium potato per serving and slice it length-wise. Place the potatoes in the dutch oven so that the rounded side is facing down. Place the meat on top of the potatoes and arrange it so that, as far as you can, it is in a single layer. Bake, covered in a 350F oven. Around 1 & ½ hours before serving add the rest of the vegetables and spices: • Put fresh black pepper on the meat, as well as salt, crushed garlic and crushed red peppers(if desired)and bay leaves. • Place onion halves, flat-side-down on top of seasoned meat. • Put carrots and parsnips in. They should be cut into 2-3 inch length and halved if they are thicker than the diameter of a quarter. Recover the dutch oven and return to the oven for around 1 & ½ hours or until the onions are done. When you add the vegetables, you may also add mushrooms, whole if small or halved if large. Bell pepper, in large chunks is an option some like. Some folks insist on adding tomatoes—this is fine, but you may want to blanch them and pull the skin off first, or use a can of whole stewed tomatoes. The roast should let out plenty of liquid, but add some water, wine or beer if it looks too dry on the bottom of the pan.

Travel Documents...

Observent viewers may have noticed that various official looking documents were posted here a couple of weeks ago. Here is why. I had to travel to Canada (which I have done probably a dozen times) and it never occured to me to bring any kind of proof of citizenship. I had my wife fedex the documents to me in Vancouver, but just in case they didn't make it on time, I had her post the documents to this blog. A week after I returned, sure enough, my passport finaly came to me in the mail. dbp

Travel Update...and the unspoken comment.

Outside of the passenger screening area there was a woman with a pet carrier and a few other bags. I overheard her asking an official if her carry-on needed to be checked. My unspoken comment: If it is still alive, then it isn't carrion. My wife and I totally get, and like this kind of humor. It is the knowledge of how idosyncratic we are that made me hold my tongue. dbp

Waiting on Hertz...

I am here in Lynnwood WA with my nephew waiting for Hertz to come to my rescue. We had to jump-start the rental since it is so cold here, but when I went to scrape the windows, the car locked itself when I shut the door. What kind of car does that? Hertz said it was a "Safety" feature. Okay, seems to me more like an inconvenience feature. They say they will be here in 20-30 minutes. It is 9:12 now. The clock is ticking...

Random Bumper Sticker...

I know that making fun of bumper stickers is mostly a little too easy, but I can't resist doing it at least once. I should note that this is not the first time I have seen this sticker, it is just that it stimulated the following chain of thought.

WAR IS NOT THE ANSWER!

First thought: This is probably a left-over from the run-up to the Iraq war, or possibly Afghanistan or maybe even the prospect of one with Iran.

Second thought: If war is not the answer, then this implies that there is a question out there which has an answer, but that answer is something other than war. What if the question is, what do we call an armed conflict between two nation states? War may not be the only correct answer, but it is certainly a member of the correct answer set.

Third thought: In any situation, one could rule-out one course of action without suggesting any alternatives and end up being able to defend any outcome.

Let us use the Iran scenario: If we do not go to war then whatever does happen can be explained-away as: "Well, war would have resulted in an even worse disaster, or the non-war option taken was not the correct non-war option. That is to say, "The crater located where Tel Aviv once was could have been averted in some other way than by warfare." The answer is even more simple if we do go to war: "It could have been solved peacefully". I am always suspicious of folks who play such games.

The fact of the matter is that any country which spends money on having a military must implicitly believe that war is indeed the answer, sometimes.

dbp

Random statement by Jemma as she sips her hot cocoa

"Mermaids love salt. I am a scientist of mermaids. I know everything about mermaids."