If you’re curious about how oysters can be made safe for even at risk groups like those with diabetes, cancer or liver disease, check out BeOysterAware.com. They have information on how Gulf oysters can be processed to be virtually free of the bacteria vibrio vulnificus which is the main culprit behind illnesses in at-risk people who have consumed raw oysters.
Archive for March 21st, 2008
Ode to Oysters
Friday, March 21st, 2008Not Your Typical Playdate
Friday, March 21st, 2008A friend of mine just came up with a brilliant idea. For a long time we’ve been having playdates where our children get together and we talk while they play. Nice for socializing the kids. Often my oldest isn’t there because he goes to school so there are 5 kids and 2 adults.
She mentioned today that we might add another playdate during the week but with a twist. One of the adults would leave. I think this is sometimes called babysitting but babysitting and babysitters are hard to come by nowadays so we’re calling it a playdate. With my oldest at school I would end up handling only one more child overall (5 instead of 4) but I think I’ll feel a little guilty dumping 3 extra kids on her since she will go from 2 to 5.
That doesn’t mean I won’t do it (evil laugh here).
An Oyster for Your Thoughts
Friday, March 21st, 2008Oysters produce pearls when they get irritated. Wouldn’t it be great if they produced other, perhaps more useful items? What if you could put a piece of dirt in an oyster, wait a couple months and then open it to find a car? Or your anniversary is coming up, you put a piece of dirt in your pet oyster and on your anniversary open it up to find flowers, chocolates and a romantic sunset? I suppose in this case finding a pearl would work out just as well but it would be more amazing if she’s expecting a pearl and gets the other stuff instead.
But then what are you supposed to do with the Gulf oysters that produced the romantic sunset? You could get a recipe from BeOysterAware.com site and not have to worry that you might wreck the night by mispreparing this delicacy. You can make oyster cakes, oyster pizza or oyster alfredo and win your sweet over for at least one night. I will go ahead and caution you to save the recipes that contain garlic for another occasion.
Here’s my idea of how a sunset would look if an oyster could actually pull it off.
Tell Me What You Want Me to Feel
Friday, March 21st, 2008CNN is interesting. They’ve had three different takes on what is ruffly the same story today. First the news that Obama’s passport info had been breached – just a regular story but the one that gets the biggest picture on the home page. Later they put n their red stripe across the top that there is BREAKING NEWS – Clinton’s passport info has been breached. Now they have decided the story isn’t all that important but not quite as unimportant as it originally was so we have a yellow stripe DEVELOPING STORY – all three presidential candidates’ passport files have been breached.
Now I’m not one to form my own opinions, I need someone to do that for me and CNN is the source I have chosen. Exactly how am I supposed to feel about this? Is this just another day at the beach, horrifying or something I might want to be concerned about later? I hope they figure out how I’m supposed to feel about this soon, because all I’ve got to go on right now is anxiety.
Education with a Side of Experience
Friday, March 21st, 2008When I was student teaching, my mentor teacher told me that when she was working on her undergraduate Mathematics degree in Canada, they had an interesting program where the school would place her in an internship for 3 months and then she would take classes for 3 months. It alternated this way for her entire time there, giving her experience as she earned her degree. Everyone who has ever applied for a job knows that unless you have some experience, you’re going to start at the absolute bottom or more likely not be qualified for the job at all. You can’t get a job without having experience but there seems to be no way to get that experience so the program she was in helped her overcome that hiccup in life.
Up until this point, I thought that was a Canadian thing and not possible here in the US, but now I’ve heard about Kettering and their engineering co-op programs that are very similar. Kettering is only one of 14 universities in the entire country to offer this so it’s no wonder I hadn’t heard about it before. Students are placed with companies starting their freshman year.
Whether you’re interested in industrial engineering, biochemistry of computer science, Kettering can be the place for you since they are ranked #11 overall on the US News & World Report ‘America’s Best Colleges 2008′ list (#1 in the Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering category). Apparently, their innovative approach to education works.
Tips Time
Friday, March 21st, 2008I just read an article about Starbucks not paying tips out properly and it made me think about the nature of tips in general. everyone knows you are supposed to tip your waitress – they don’t even make minimum wage. Some say 15%, some say 20% or more; some say don’t tip if service is bad and others say that you tip no matter what.
The debate continues with who you tip other than waitresses. There’s the pizza guy but do you tip per pizza or do they also get a percentage? I know at least one person who does it the percentage way but the idea was completely alien to me because I can’t quite figure out what that could be for. A waitress works for as long as you are sitting at her table but the pizza guy just finds your address.
I tipped a masseuse once. Even though I paid through the nose for the massage, I was told it’s proper to tip. I was happy to because it was a really good massage, but exactly where does the fee I paid go?
My parents used to give tips to the paperboy but there aren’t any paperboys anymore so we don’t have to worry about that one. We do have to worry about the barista, the hairdresser and the ice cream store scooper.
I’ve seen tip jars at the cookie store and just about any food service counter you walk up to. These people make minimum wage (which ain’t much) but I don’t interact with them for more than a few seconds.