Category: Personal Thoughts

Eggplants!


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Kiddo and I had a couple of pork chops and eggplants last night, all cooked on the Webber Q.  I also threw in a couple of sweet peppers. Tress didnt want any dinner as she had a biggish lunch at Little Nyonya again.

We have been having eggplants a lot – everytime we do a barbie, which has been a little frequent in recent weeks. Apparently eggplants are great for you, so I guess we’re ok. Look at this write up re eggplants:

Nutritional Value of Eggplant

Eggplants are rich sources of dietary fiber, vitamins and minerals and contain very less calories. This makes it an ideal component of the low fat diets and the diets of those working on weight loss. Other essential minerals contained in eggplant include potassium, manganese, magnesium and copper. Eggplants are very important sources of phytonutrients, which is obtained from their deep purple color.

Dietary Fiber
Eggplants provide dietary fiber in abundance which is essential for regulating and facilitating smooth bowel movements. The dietary fiber in eggplant also helps, lower blood cholesterol and blood sugar levels. One cup serving of eggplant would contain approximately 10% of the recommended dietary fiber.

Vitamins
Eggplants contain vitamins like vitamin C and b-vitamins, but they are not very high in content. One cup cooked serving of eggplant would contain approximately 2-5% of the recommended vitamin B1, vitamin B-3, vitamin B-6 and vitamin C.

Nicotine
A very interesting nutritional fact about eggplants are that they contain trace amounts of nicotine, which is absolutely harmless to the body. The nicotine levels in eggplants are way less than that in cigarettes.

Potassium
One cup serving of eggplant contains around 3% of the recommended potassium intake. The potassium in the eggplants is beneficial for those suffering from low blood pressure levels and it also regulates the beating of the heart.

Calories
Calories and fats are something, that the eggplant contains the least and this is what makes it a healthy component of daily diet.

Phytonutrients
This is the most important nutrients that eggplants contain. They contain phytonutrients like flavonoids, caffeic acid and chlorogenic acid. The flavonoid Nasunin in eggplants, has high levels of antioxidant properties and is known to be a scavenger of free radicals, thus protecting the cells of the body. Nasunin is also known for its ability to protect the fats surrounding the cell membrane of the brain. The chlorogenic acid it contains is known to be the most potent antioxidant that displays antimicrobial, antiviral and antitumor abilities and plays an important role in the prevention of many diseases.

Eggplant Nutritional Facts

The table below has some detailed information on the eggplant nutritional facts.

Nutrient Content
Dietary Fiber 10%
Vitamin C 3%
Calcium 1%
Iron 1%
Thiamin 2%
Riboflavin 2%
Niacin 3%
Pantothenic Acid 2%
Vitamin B6 3%
Potassium 5%
Phosphorus 2%
Magnesium 3%
Zinc 1%
Copper 3%
Cholesterol 0%
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Father Bob and the Witch Hijacker


If a Christian minister goes into an occult proceeding and starts to maybe pray and proclaim the gospel, my guess is that Christian minister is likely to be labeled a evangelical fanatic, behaving stupidly and unreasonably. There would likely be outrage from some quarters, or at least some “tsk, tsk” hissing around.

Yet when a witch doctor takes over a wedding ceremony in a church, it hardly makes the news. Is there bias reporting against Christianity? You bet.

See here:

 

———————————————————-

Father Bob Maguire angry over witch hijacking wedding ceremony

• by: Aleks Devic

• From: Herald Sun

• January 17, 2012 12:00AM

A WITCH who went to jail for dragging a policeman 190m with her car has hijacked a wedding ceremony being performed by the reverend Father Bob Maguire.

Father Maguire said he felt like the “devil took over me” when Eilish De Avalon conducted a Pagan Handfasting Ceremony at a Brighton Catholic church.

Father Maguire said he had warned the woman to tone back her scripts for the January 7 wedding but was “taken for a ride” on the day.

Ms Avalon, who was jailed for two months last June after pleading guilty to recklessly causing serious injury, dangerous driving, driving while suspended and using a mobile phone while driving, yesterday confirmed to the Herald Sun it was the first time she had performed the ceremony in a church, but declined to speak further.

Handfasting ceremonies are performed for same-sex couples, opposite gender couples and for multiple partners.

The bride and groom’s hands are tied during the ceremony and vows are usually taken for a year and a day.

At the end of some services, the couple jump over a broomstick.

Father Maguire said he was fuming about the ceremony conducted after his official religious ceremony at St James Church Brighton.

He was also further angered that Ms De Avalon, 40, posted on Facebook: “History in the making this morning in when I conduct a Pagan Handfasting Ceremony in a Catholic church with the support of Fr Bob.”

Fr Maguire said: “She is using me as an endorsement to blow her own trumpet. She took an opportunistic advantage of the parish.

“I was taken for a ride and blindsided. Once in the saddle she took over the place. It was like the devil got a hold of me.

“I’ve never had an experience like that in my 50 years (with the church).”

Bishop Les Tomlinson, Vicar-General of the Archdiocese of Melbourne, said the matter would be looked into and described the service as “peculiar” and regrettable.

“Such a person is not welcomed in the Catholic Church to interfere with liturgy,” he said.

Ms De Avalon was pulled over by police in Geelong in February 2010 after police saw her talking on a mobile phone. She drove off with a policeman’s arm pinned in her car window.

The car came to a stop only when the badly injured policeman was able to pull the keys from the ignition.

devica@heraldsun.com.au

 

 

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Scruff chilling out


image

Scruff at the end of a stinking hot day at Mahoneys Reserve.

Weekends, soon to be different


English: Category:Images of Canberra Burton an...
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The VTAC offers are scheduled to be released today. Any hopes of Kiddo opting for a BA/LLB course in Monash have been reduced to a mere theoretical possibility, as she has been really excited about doing the PhB course in ANU in Canberra instead. I have in fact, paid a deposit for her residential college in the Burton and Garran Hall (“B&G”). Tress had also set Kiddo up with a supplementary credit card and got it activated and ready to go. We’re likely to be taking that long hike to Canberra again, around the second week of Feb.

On Saturday, we made a vegetable soup together. It’s a continuation of Kiddo’s cooking lessons. The class took place in between two hefty sessions of cleaning. After the usual vacuuming, Tress, Kiddo and I settled down for some soup, after which I went out and continued hacking down our overgrown Silver Stirling hedges. Well not exactly hacking down but bringing them down from a monstrous 3+ meters to a more manageable 2 meters or so. Earlier that morning Tress and I had gotten up early to get to Tullamarine again – this time taking a young lady doctor from Mulgrave who was going back to Malaysia for a short holiday. We got to her home just before 7, dropped her off at Tulla just before 8am and got to the Vic Market to get stuff for a barbeque we did last night. So all in it was a long and busy day and after prepping the communion spiel and other bits I had to do in church the next day, the 3 of us settled down to a game of cards for a bit.

On Friday we had gone to the Knox for a movie – a very ordinary Sherlock Homes sequel (“Game of Shadows“). It was a disjointed and messy fare and loads of bomb blasts and slow-mo running, jumping and fist fights… sigh.

Last night we had 3 families over for a barbeque dinner. Sort of 3 families – one still has her hubby and kids in Singapore for their holidays, and she had returned to Melbourne early to go back to work. We again finished up late – it was about 12am when we got to bed, and gym this morning was sort of tough.

If it sounds like we’re trying to cramp our weekend, I guess I am. 3 weekends from now, our weekends will be very different. I just want to keep the good thing firing on all cylinders while we can.

Food Handrers


See this story about dodgy food outlets.

Sushiman is an outlet in Box Hill Centro and unfortunately I have bought my sushi from that outlet a number of times before.

This does nothing to my disdain for Chinese migrants who bought up food businesses simply as a means to maintain their residence status. For may of them there is little interest in the food business overall, let alone safe food handling issues. In the case of Sushiman apparently a fine of $145,000 was levied. Again, this is of little consequence to Chinese migrant business owners. Sure, such a fine hurts and it may make them take more notice but I suspect it would have little impact on the malaise of Chinese businessmen buying up food outlets with little or no interest in food service. Many of these business persons are wealthy and what drives them is not the relatively puny fines but maintenance of their residence status. The way to deal with this effectively is to disqualify them from owning, operating or investing in food business. Some form of risk assessment which takes into account what can better act as deterrence or incentives, ought to be in place to deal with this. Just my untutored observations…

If you want a bit more info, see here.

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Wintery Summer’s Day


It was 11 degrees at 5.40 this morning. At the gym people were in trackies and when I got in to the office it was still only 13 deg. As far as the weather goes in Melbourne, the only constant is change. It no longer feels strange to see, in the middle of January, people walking about on the streets with a jumper or coat. At the office this morning I had a meeting with a couple of external IT guys and one came in a jumper and the other, a sports coat.

When we first came here in 2004, the “spread” of temperature through the course of a day was a feature I marveled at. It could be 8 deg in the morning and 30 deg at 3pm. At least today it would remain cool throughout, hitting a top of 19 deg. We were often reminded to keep jackets in the car because you could almost be certain that the weather will change at some point.

We were out at the Tullamarine airport again last night, dropping a mate off with his daughter to resume his holiday and it was cool. It was our fourth trip to Tulla since New Year’s Eve and there will be at least one more this weekend. The first one on NYE was a sweltering night and last night, it was cool – all within a 10 day period.

It has been a mild summer but today feels anything but summery…

See this story on The Age

Winds deliver a dose of winter

Adam Cooper

January 11, 2012 – 9:48AM

 

Parts of Victoria have been buffeted by winds of more than 100km/h as Melbourne’s hot summer conditions give way to an unseasonal wintry blast.

Just a week after Victoria began the new year with a heatwave, high winds were recorded around the city this morning, with gusts of 95km/h felt in Frankston, 83km/h in Fawkner and 74km/h at Melbourne Airport.

The strongest winds were felt at South Channel Fort, in Port Phillip Bay near Sorrento, where a gust of 107km/h was recorded at 8.14am.

The State Emergency Service is monitoring the winds, but says there has been no major damage caused by falling trees.

However commuters on the Pakenham and Cranbourne train lines, in Melbourne’s south-east, will experience a longer trip to work after a tree fell on an overhead power line.

Metro has tweeted that services are suspended on the two lines between Oakleigh and Dandenong stations, with buses ferrying passengers between them.

Metro says outbound trains on the two lines will terminate at Oakleigh until further notice.

Bureau of Meteorology forecaster Terry Ryan said the high winds were felt around 8am today.

“We’ve had very windy weather this morning but conditions will be easing this afternoon as the front moves away and the high slowly moves towards us,” he said.

“The morning will be windy but the wind will back off this afternoon … we’ll have strong winds on the bay, but the real gales will be gone by 10 or 11am.”

Mr Ryan said snow had fallen at Mount Hotham, although it was not settling because the ground was too warm.

He said snow could fall at any time, but it was fairly unusual to record falls in the first two months of the year.

“We’re still recovering from spring, you might say. It’s more a spring event before we launch into the depths of summer,” he said.

A top temperature of 19 degrees has been forecast in Melbourne today, but it will be colder in other parts of Victoria.

Rain and high winds are expected in Ballarat, across Gippsland and on parts of the west coast.
Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/environment/weather/winds-deliver-a-dose-of-winter-20120111-1pu6s.html#ixzz1j6LIPFyn

 

 

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Devi Shetty


We were watching TV last night (before nipping off to Tullamarine again) and caught BBC’s Hard Talk. An Indian doctor was talking about affordable healthcare and it was wonderful to see this India doctor obviously thrashing Stephen Sackur, the BBC presenter.

That Indian doctor is Dr Devi Shetty and here was a refreshing guest on Hard Talk. He was obviously very smart and articulate and offered no apology for making hospitals as big as possible using all the technology available to him, in order to deliver affordable health care, in this case to Indian farmers who only had to shell out 10-20 cents a month for health cover. He thinks healthcare will be the next big driver of economies but does not think this will compromise healthcare delivery – it would in fact enhance the reach and quality of healthcare.

Dr Devi Shetty will be one to watch.

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Much ado …


I have been watching a bit more television than before, and it is particularly bad given it’s the height of the silly season.

This recent malady means I become more slathered with atrocious ads like Coles’ “No Added Hormones” commercials featuring Curtis Stone and Normie Rowe.

I like Curtis Stone’s shows. His “Take Home Chef” is a bit of a hit in our home. I don’t listen to Normie Rowe much but he doesn’t bug me too much either.

I don’t care for Coles’ current ads but I just shrug it off and let it be. It would appear however that these ads have riled enough Aussies to make it to the papers as a story. Does the TV silly season extend to the print media or are Aussies’ lives so affected by TV. Whatever happened to laid back Aussies… why can’t it be left alone and just let it run its course…

The over-reaction here:

COLES’ latest cringe-worthy ad has prompted a wave of scorn from consumers and marketing experts.

The ad features celebrity chef Curtis Stone and singer Normie Rowe with a re-working of his hit Shakin’ All Over.

The ear-splitting tune lauds Coles’ range of no added-hormone beef.

But one expert said the singing was so bad, “you miss the main point”.

Another marketing expert said he believed Coles was purposefully heading downmarket to compete with Aldi.

The ad, the latest in the supermarket chain’s sing-and-dance commercials, was released last week.

But an expletive-laden hashtag directed at the supermarket giant was already trending on Twitter on Sunday.

Consumers have threatened to boycott Coles over the advertisements.

On Coles’ YouTube page, one subscriber said: “Suddenly I want to stuff my face with hundreds of thousands of hormones, just to make it stop.”

The backlash was just as vicious on Twitter, where radio broadcaster Derryn Hinch also weighed in saying: “Normie. Look what you’ve done to your own song. Hope Coles has better quality control on meat than on ads.”

Marketing consultant for QBrand Stephen Downes said the chain was dragging its image downmarket in a bid to win back market share from Aldi.

“It’s all very deliberately daggy,” he said.

Dr Downes said Coles had probably designed their ads on the assumption most of us were not going to change where we shop.

“They are talking to a particular group of people, like the swinging voter,” he said.

“Where Coles and Woolies have had their share eaten into is in the outer suburbs and lower socio-economic areas.

“Maybe they’ve chosen Normie Rowe because he presents quite well to a white, older and lower-socio economic demographic who shop at Aldi.”

Branding expert Simon Rowell said it was time for Coles to switch tack.

“They’ve gone down a direction with the advertising style and it is really running out of legs. It looks desperate,” he said.

“The no-added hormone message is getting lost in Normie’s terrible singing. You’re so distracted by the execution of the ad, you miss the main point.”

A Coles spokeswoman said the company had “heard a wide range of opinions about our latest commercial”.

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Anwar Ibrahim’s fate in his hands


He’s the judge in the sodomy trial of Anwar Ibrahim.

Mohamad Zabidin Mohd Diah was only made a judge in 2006. He did his law in University Malaya. He’ll (ostensibly) affect the outcome of Malaysian politics.

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Telling moments


A mate of mine in church was back in Melbourne after his holidays in Malaysia and we caught up yesterday. He’s a politics buff so we spoke about it a bit.

Today’s an important day for Malaysian politics. The absolute farce that has been Anwar Ibrahim’s sodomy trial (Mark II) has turned me off Malaysian politics completely and I have not been following it for a while now. The verdict is due out today and although his defence lawyer Karpal Singh remains confident of an acquittal many in Malaysia are expecting him to go to jail, again.

Najib Razak and his regime has been a putrid joke on Malaysia and the tragedy is that there is nothing in sight that would suggest Malaysia will be able to crawl out of this Aegean’s stable, anytime soon.

Anwar Ibrahim unfortunately, was part of the problem and his current mob was also from the old fold. Even is the next general elections in Malaysia brings about a new government, there is no real prospect for change for the better.

On the home front…

Tress took part of the arvo off on Friday to be at Docklands for her parents’ farewell dinner, on time. So when I got home she was already home. She was sitting on the couch with Kiddo.

I walked in and realised a bit of a momentous occasion was unfolding. I saw a letter from the UAC with an early offer for Kiddo to do the Philosophy Bachelor (PhB) course at the Australian National University. I was very happy for her but knew instantly that it would mean she would indeed leave home very soon.

Chances are she would also secure an offer to do the Arts/Law (BA/LLB) course in Monash University but it is very unlikely she would prefer this course to the ANU PhB one.
We have about 4 – 5 weeks to plan whatever she needs and then it would be just Tress and I here in Melbourne. I need to think about what I want to do with my time here…

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