I love their concern but maybe I’ll just take them Those being my two sentient parents who PAY $7500 a month for the privilege of residing at blah blah fu not you RP but I’ll take them out to dinner since FeDantis has opened up the hospitality industry.
I don’t understand assisted living facilities (or nursing homes, or whatever they’re called these days). The government here recently announced new guidelines whereby residents can leave the facility for visits with family, but only during the day and must be back at night, and I believe whoever they’re visiting must have been COVID tested. At least that’s my recollection of what I heard. There seem to be some aspects of the system, as well-intentioned as they may be, that really do sound like a fucking jail.
Ba fucking humbug.
I love watching the Great British Baking Show. I love that there isn’t all the fake crap in our US reality TV - the screw ups are in the cooking, not because someone just saboutaged someone elses bake.
That being said …
Holy fucking shit. You have had to audition, and beat out something like 10 000 other people to be one of the 13 people to be on the show.
How the fucking hell do you not know how long to bake a cake or muffin or bread for? If I knew I was going to attempt to get on the damned show, you can bet your ass I would buy all the cookbooks of Hollywood and Berry and work my way through everything at least a couple times to familiarize myself with rough puff pastry, full on real puff pastry, pate sucree, hot and cold water pastries, various sorts of rolls and breads … cookies, tarts, pies … How the hell can you get on the show and not know the average genoise cake takes x time at y temperature? or ginger nuts take 12 minutes at 210C …
pant pant pant
I can see not knowing what a kough aman is [a really funky bretonne pastry, very yummy with tea while watching the boats in the port of St Malo bob around] I can see not knowing what a sfiagliotelli is [a really annoying Italian version of flaky pastry that is not folded like puff, but you can soort of fake it with puff in an emergency] but really, the bog standard British classic sweets?
It sounds like you’d be a good candidate for that show!
I’m not a baker but I can understand your annoyance. If people want to go pro at something, they need to put in the work.
That’s sort of what happened to one of my mom’s cousins. A few years ago, a combination of her own medical issues and her husband’s recent stroke caused her kids to place both in “assisted living.” This particular facility noted that both qualified for placement in “skilled care” – the cousin for her diabetes complications, and her husband because of paralysis from the stroke. Unfortunately, the only “skilled care” unit available at this facility is the one where they place dementia patients. Yep, this cousin and her husband ended up locked away (yes, the doors have security codes on them) because of their complicated medical needs.
I agree with you, completely.
Granted, some contestants come from small towns and may not have had access to some of the more offbeat bakes, but wouldn’t you have poured over every Paul or Pru book ever written?
My grr are the “trying to be unique” recipes.
From this week’s episode:
bubble gum and cream soda together in a cake?
I do feel bad for the contestants this season- quarantined, not the same ability to practice and test as if they were at home, and little family support (although I read they could have one family member in lockdown with them).
Well, that was clearly an experiment that didn’t work out at all… and I called it: I said the “show stoppers” would turn out horrendous when they assigned them.
By the way, is that Matt Lucas from Little Britain?
I’m not used to seeing him being a guy…
Yes, it’s Matt Lucas.
I adored Mel and Sue. Sue is like your slightly batty aunt, Mel like your rebel aunt. Noel and Sandi worked well. Sandi balanced Noel’s goofiness with her air of exasperation.
Noel and Matt? Both very genial goofballs? I’m hoping it’ll work.
That’s the other jar-opening gadget I inherited from my elderly mother. Does indeed work very well!
That Matt Lucas guy reminds me of someone’s creepy uncle. Not a fan so far, which is a shame because I love the show. I miss Mary, Mel, and Sue, but I’m learning to tolerate Noel.
Really don’t know where to put this, don’t want to start a thread, so here y’all go! Goddammit.
Explain like I’m five? I don’t even know what a “derivative” is.
One end of our porch is covered by climbing roses which are always full of birds.
A pair of Desert Thrashers nest there every winter, raise a chick in the spring and then will move away while lil Johnny or Jill is out and about. Johnny or Jill will hang around for a couple more weeks, then will move out as well. Come early fall, the adults will come back to their winter home and start fixing it up for the winter.
Their other name is “poopy birds”. They poop all over the porch which is made even worse because they also eat the cat kibble which gives them runny poops.
They use their curved beaks to sweep the ground and flick clumps of dirt around in their search for bugs and worms. Cute when they are in the yard, not so cute when they are in the pots of posies I have on the porch.
So, that was a long way of saying that the poopy birds are back and I’ll need to scrub the entire porch before I have company out there again.
Mmmm… they had to audition, yes, but… well… they’re selecting contestants to make a show, not to actually find the best bakers. Those people who spent months poring over every baking book they could find, that could bake a gateau blindfolded, I reckon a lot of them are sat there yelling something along the lines of ‘How the hell did that muppet get on there when I didn’t?!’ at the screen from home.
This could have come anytime in the past year, but screw you The Hartford, and your BS LTD process. Come hang out with my wife for a week, and then determine if a Stage IV cancer patient on daily chemo can effectively perform a nursing job. It’s awfully damn convenient that you get to make the decision whether or not to pay the claim that you are insuring. But our insurance system is perfectly fine, right?
I have a thing called a jar key, it is available on Amazon. looks sort of like a larger “church key”. it releases the pressure of the vacuum seal making the jars much easier to open.
Derivatives are unregulated financial contracts (thanks, Phil and Wendy Gramm!) which allow third-party speculation on real assets - mortgages, cars, more. Derivatives are not primary financing instruments- you can’t finance your mortgage with one, they don’t support assets… what they are are legal bets on the value of assets owned by other people.
In the Great Recession, it was the derivatives markets which were frozen the worst of all, especially after the collapse of Lehman, who was a signer on many derivative contracts.
Derivatives are extremely complex and their inability to be priced in 2008 is what directly lead to TARP. To give an example, see the picture below:
Don’t worry about what a ‘CDO deal’ is or any of the other jargon, just understand that the entire eye is but ONE contract, and each of the nodes are other contracts, these contracts themselves derivatives on underlying mortgage bonds (cannot be displayed at this scale), which are bonds formed by grouping mortgages. So, this picture represents (bottom up):
- Tens of thousands of mortgages (unseen), wrapped into…
- Hundreds of mortgage bonds (unseen), wrapped into…
- Dozens of derivative contracts, wrapped into…
- The Eye of Satan, above. (The name given this chart when presented in Congressional testimony).
- Each dot on the outside of the eye is a separate contract which uses this contract for part of its valuations.
See? Any problems anywhere along that chain has repercussions on hundreds, thousands of other contracts. The market freezes up, and voila! Another 2008!
And now, there’s $1.2 quadrillon dollars wrapped into fake financial assets like the above.
What could go wrong? 
I have a plastic box shelter on my porch where the neighborhood kitties I feed can stay in cold weather. In the winter I fill it with straw. Right now it’s empty but it’s going to get cool tonight so I thought I’d put a small blanket in it in case one wants to sleep there. So I put the blanket down and was straightening it out when I felt a soft lump. WTH oh shit. Ewww! I lifted the corner of the blanket and saw a tail. Yep, rat. Ewww! I picked it up in the blanket and threw the body in the flower bed around my oak tree and the blanket in the garbage can. The body wasn’t stiff so it was apparently a fresh kill. I’m so thankful that I found now instead of days later when… ewwww!
The rant part is that I’m pretty sure where it came from. One of the cats left me another one on the doorstep a few weeks ago so I know there’s a colony. The neighbor behind me has let his backyard get overgrown and he has junk piled up by his house. Perfect place for them. I just hope nobody puts out poison. The cats are probably doing a pretty good job (and there are several outdoor cats around besides the 3 I take care of). I don’t want any of them to get hurt.
I’m not really worried about my house. I had roof rats around 10 years ago and had any outside entrances sealed off. But I’ll still be listening for any pitter patter in the attic.
When there’s a Presidential debate in town, why is it necessary to close streets and businesses and disrupt traffic for up to a week? Not to mention increased police presence in case of protests and rioting?