Donnie’s Blog

Some friends of mine recently received a food processor as a gift, and they were wondering what to make with it. I suggested mayonnaise, since homemade mayo is always tasty, but they weren’t so excited about that. Another good suggestion is cashew-nut butter or almond butter; the texture is just like peanut butter, but the flavor is amazingly rich.

Every time I think of peanut butter, I remember this one episode of Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood where he made peanut butter. Or, at least, he tried to make peanut butter. His operating premise was that the name “peanut butter” was based on the actual ingredients for peanut butter. So, he threw a bunch of peanuts into a bag, added a stick of butter, and then proceeded to bash the crap out of it. The result wasn’t exactly peanut butter. I distinctly remember the scene - that big traffic light and the aquarium… I seem to recall him saying, “Well that didn’t work very well…”

I am glad that Mr. Rogers never tried to make butterflies.

I’m officially sick of Battlestar Galactica, mainly because it has officially turned into a soap opera.

No CG is worth enduring a soap opera for.

Yay, another season of Battlestar Galactica has started! I almost missed the first episode (being in another country at the time…), but fortunately I was able to catch the last airing. At least I hope I did. I had to set up the VCR to record it, and hopefully I figured that out correctly. (Yeah yeah, even programming teachers have trouble with VCRs sometimes.)

I’ll find out in a couple of hours whether my efforts were successful or not.

By the way, check out the ten “webisodes” that were posted on the BSG website leading up to the season premiere. I don’t think they’re really critical to the plot, but they were good filler while we waited for October to get here…

There’s a new show on the Discovery Channel that I’m becoming pretty addicted to, called Survivorman. The whole premise is that this guy gets dropped into the wilderness somewhere and has to live for seven days without any supplies or help. He has a couple video cameras that he uses to record everything he does, and then they put that together into a half-hour show.

I’m sure the guy probably pitched the show to Discovery, but it’s fun to think about what that job-description would look like. You’re surfing through monster.com and you find:

Required Skills

• Must be able to start fires without any matches
• Must be able to identify, catch, cook, and eat non-poisonous snails, frogs, and lizards
• Must be able to go several days without any human contact

Preferred candidates will also know how to spend the night in the wilderness without freezing to death, and how to avoid causing raging multi-state forest-fires.

Then there’s the folks who have to blur out all the scenes where Mr. Survivorman is “au natural.” That’s a job I’m really glad I don’t have…

I don’t know why the History Channel insists on producing these documentaries about major airline accidents, but they sure aren’t helping my fear of flying. Part of me thinks, “I shouldn’t watch - it’ll just disturb me.” Another part says, “Hey, this could be important!” And then there is the visceral response to seeing a catastrophe unfold.

What I do know is that there’s a whole lot more that could go wrong than whatever I can dream up!