This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Author: Ex-PH2

  • Thursdays Are For Cooking….

    Baby red potatoes

    It is cold, rainy and dull and boring, so I thought that you would all like some soup this time.

    This comes from Genius Kitchen, potato soup made with leftover (or boxed) mashed potatoes.

    Smashed Potato Soup from Genius Kitchen

    2 tablespoons butter or 2 tablespoons bacon drippings

    1?2 cup chopped onion

    1 cup chopped fresh mushrooms

    14 1?2 ounces chicken broth (boxed is okay)

    1?2 teaspoon kosher salt

    1?4 teaspoon black pepper

    1?2 teaspoon sweet paprika (I consider this to be optional)

    2 cups prepared mashed potatoes (leftover is great, or the boxed mix, too)

    1?2 cup cheddar cheese

    2 scallions, finely chopped (Green onions are fine, too.)

    3 slices bacon, cooked and crumbled

    2 tablespoons sour cream

    2 tablespoons cream or 2 tablespoons half-and-half

    Instructions:

    Cook bacon, and set aside to crumble.

    In a large saucepan, cook onion in butter or dripping until softened.

    Add chopped mushrooms and cook until tender and onion is golden.

    Add chicken broth, salt, pepper, and paprika, stirring to mix.

    Blend in mashed potatoes, stirring until lumps are gone.

    Bring soup to a boil, then lower heat and add cheddar cheese, stirring until it is melted and smooth.

    Mix in scallions, crumbled bacon, sour cream, and cream/half and half, stirring to heated through but not to boiling point.

    When you serve this, top it with some of the crumbled bacon, some cutup green onion tails, and some of the shredded cheddar.

    Put a sandwich with it and enjoy it. On a cold, rainy, obnoxiously stubborn gray day, this and a good book fill the void of boredom.

    Bears won their division title against the Packers last week. Yes, I did rub my sister’s nose in it. She says it only happened because she went to Italy.  Okay, sure. (Snort!)  Heh.

  • The Russians Now Have a Hypersonic Missile

    Vladimir Putin

    I’m only posting this now, because Vlad Putin is Russian Orthodox and the Orthodox Church doesn’t celebrate Christmas until January. And that’s getting close. Vlad is pawing the ground and snorting. He can now claim a successful launch of a hypersonic missile (a/k/a  a glide vehicle, per the story) as his ultimate answer to the US’s aggressive warmongering. Full story is at the link: https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2018/12/26/putin-oversees-hypersonic-weapon-test-says-its-invulnerable/

    These days, I can’t figure out if he’s whistling Dixie in Russian or just yankin’ us because it’s fun for him to do so.

    From the article:  Speaking to Russia’s top military brass after watching the live feed of the launch of the Avangard vehicle from the Defense Ministry’s control room, Putin said the successful test was a “great success” and an “excellent New Year’s gift to the nation.”

    The test comes amid bitter tensions in Russia-U.S. relations, which have sunk to their lowest level since the Cold War times over the conflict in Ukraine, the war in Syria and the allegations of Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

    Note the linkie thingie to another article in the middle of the missile test news, in which he says we’re threatening him with war. Here it is:  https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2018/12/20/putins-ominous-warning-us-is-raising-threat-of-nuclear-war/

    Oh, puh-lease!  Yes, Vlad, I do know about Tsar Bomba, what it was like and its range. But that was the 1960s and this is a lot later. I lived through that. So did a lot of other people I know.

    We are not the ones who want nuclear war. We have always seen nukes, et al., as deterrents, not weapons. We won’t start it, but by God, we will end it.  We were glad the Cold War ended. You should have learned something from that.

    Be careful what you wish for, Vlad. You might not like it.

    Anyway,  Schastlivogo Rozhdestva.

    (My Cyrillic  script didn’t work here, so it’s phonetic.)

  • 104 years ago, on Christmas Eve….

     

    In 1914, the Pope issued a statement suggesting that all sides in conflict in the Great War should observe a Christmas truce.

    In Europe, along the front lines between British and German troops, an unofficial truce began on Christmas Eve.

    The story is recorded here:

    https://www.iwm.org.uk/history/voices-of-the-first-world-war-the-christmas-truce

    Guns went silent. German soldiers were out of their trenches and hidey-holes. Some were playing soccer or just goofing off. The Brits joined them in No Mans Land. They shared cigarettes, drinks, chocolate and stories.

    For a brief moment, there was no war.

     

  • Volcano Alert

    A major volcanic eruption has generated a lethal, destructive tidal wave (tsunami) in the Sunda Strait of Indonesia.

    https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-46663158

    Anak Kratatau has erupted twice in the last 24 hours. After the first eruption, a tsunami swept across the Sunda Strait, toward Sumatra and toward Java. This was followed by a second eruption. Anka Krakatau’s most recent prior eruption was in July.

    In the town of Pangdelang, a concert was underway on the beach, with over 200 concert goers and a band named “Seventeen”. They are now missing and presumed dead.

    It is daylight by now in Indonesia. Vulcanologists are trying to determine if the tsunami was caused by a slide of part of Anak Krakatau’s cone to the sea floor, displacing seawater and generating the tidal wave. The Sunda Strait is narrow, which channels these giant, destructive waves into focused trains.

    As you may recall, in 2004, the 12/26/2004 Boxing Day earthquake at Banda Aceh on the west coast of Sumatra was a 9.2 quake that created a massive tidal wave which rolled across that area as if it did not exist, pulled back and rebounded across the Indian Ocean, and rebounded again toward Sumatra. The possibility that the tsunami might reach the west coast of the US was very real. Hawaii did get a flood that was up to 1 meter deep and the wave rolled further east toward California. Over 288,000 people lost their lies to that earthquake-generated wave of destruction.

    Anak Krakatau is the successor volcano to Krakatoa’s massively self-destructive eruption for two days in August, 1883, which sent a tidal wave in all directions before the caldera collapsed inward. That massive eruption not only caused damage everywhere the tsunami that it created went, but also dropped the temperature worldwide by 1 degree Celsius.

    A plinian eruption, which is what Anak Krakatau engaged in, is very similar in its shape to a nuke explosion. Same shape, same shock wave, same rebound.

    Anak Krakatau is the result of filling a new magma chamber to revive Krakatoa’s extinct caldera. This has been going on since 1927.

    There is no such thing as a truly extinct volcano. They tend to move with the Earth’s plate movements. Mount Damavand  a potentially active volcano, is a stratovolcano which is the highest peak in Iran and the highest volcano in Asia. Erta Ale in Ethiopia’s Danakil Depression is the most dangerous volcano in the world. It sits on three plate boundaries, and the caldera has finally filled to the brim and is spilling over.  The Earth’s crust there is less than a half mile thick, whereas it is normally 18 to 20 miles thick on land, and at the bottom of the oceans, barely 3 miles thick.

    The US Navy has a base at Sigonella, Sicily, below the very active volcano Etna. While there has been recent speculation about a revival of activity in the Alban Hills volcano complex south of Rome, it is more likely that the magma is moving under the sea bed to Etna’s magma chamber.

    Why do these things matter? Because they affect everything that we take for granted if they are severe enough events.  If you will recall, Iceland’s Eyafyalajokull shut down all air traffic in Europe and between Europe and the US/Canada until it simmered down. Pinatubo forced the evacuation of Clark Air Force Base in the Phillippines.

    Keep the missing people from this disaster in mind when you’re having Christmas.

     

  • Something For Breakfast or Supper

    Frittata are the easiest thing in the world to fix.

    You need cooked fillings, your choice, anything from bacon, potatoes,.onions, cheese, and ham to veggies and mushrooms and other fine comestibles.

    One 10-inch cast iron skillet (with a lid, if you have it) If you don’t have a lid, improvise with one of those splatter shields.

    If you are cooking this for more than one or two people, use a larger skillet.

    Cook the fillings first and leave them in the skillet.

    Leave the lid on the skillet to keep the heat in the pan.

    For a frittata, the proportion is one to two eggs per person, so if you are making two helpings of this, use 4 eggs.

    Beat the eggs severely about the head and shoulders. (Make them cry.)

    Season the eggs with your personal preference in scrambled egg seasonings.

    Pour the beaten eggs over the cooked fillings.

    Cook over a low flame and keep an eye on this while it cooks. No, you do not have to turn it over. Keep an eye on it. It will cook quickly, and you can put the lid on the skillet, turn off the stove and let the skillet finish the cooking for you, with the lid on.

    As an alternative, you can put the skillet into a slow oven (about 325F) to keep it warm while you make toast and cook bacon. Otherwise, turn off the heat and leave it on the stovetop with the lid on it for a few minutes. The heat of the skillet should finish cooking the eggs. And you should have made toast and cooked bacon ahead of time.

    When the frittata is done, if it’s for more than one person, cut it into portions and put some cherry or grape tomatoes with it on the plate.

    If you want to do this as sheet pan eggs for a large group of people, use a 10×13 glass baking dish, (coated with a fat like butter to prevent sticking) 2 eggs per person, cook the fillings first, add cream or whole milk to the eggs when beating them, and pour the seasoned eggs into the greased baking pan.

    Bake at 350F for 12 to 15 minutes. Keep an eye on the baking dish, to make sure they are cooking completely, and top them with shredded cheese in the last 2 to 3 minutes.

    If you are going to bake these eggs, make sure you grease the baking dish first, or the eggs will stick. Butter works well for this.

    The alternate breakfast is fried eggs, sunnyside up on toasted shredded wheat biscuits (the BIG ones), surrounded by nice crispy bacon as a defense against bacon-picking predators.

    The title of that book is “One Night of Scandal”.  You guys need to read more romance novels.

  • Flu and You

    This is the latest CDC report on influenza cases as of 12/21/2018:

    https://www.cdc.gov/flu/spotlights/flu-activity-elevated.htm

    From the article: “CDC monitors and analyzes key flu activity indicators every week. After sustained elevated activity is observed across key indicators for a number of weeks, flu season is said to have started. Flu activity met those criteria for the week ending December 15 (Week 50).

    Influenza-like-illness (ILI) activity, which had hovered at or slightly above the national baseline of 2.2% for the previous three weeks, jumped to 2.7% nationally, with 8 out of 10 regions of the country at or above their regional ILI baselines. [Over the past 5 seasons, the peak of ILI has ranged from 3.6% (2015-2016) to 7.5% (2017-2018)].

    New York City and 11 states are experiencing high or moderate ILI activity.

    24 states and Guam are reporting regional or widespread activity.

    The percent of respiratory specimens testing positive for flu at clinical laboratories increased from 6.5% during week 49 to 11.0% during week 50.

    To date, influenza A(H1N1)pdm09 viruses have predominated nationally; however, over the last three weeks influenza A(H3N2) viruses  have been most common in the southeastern United States (HHS Region 4: Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee).”

    The remainder of the report is at the link above. If you didn’t get your flu shot, you should. They are free at VA clinics and FHCCs. Even so, the Corpsman who gave me mine told me that this time, the flu shot is effective against only 26% of the flu viruses available.

    And of course, now, I have a cold that comes and goes and I spilled hot tea on my keyboard last night and had to get out an old one, so between coughing and sneezing and feeling like someone  stomped on my head, my life is just crap right now.  And it’s all YOUR fault.

  • Why Am I Not Surprised?

    Planned Parenthood – the nonprofit organization that really cares about women.

    This is supposed to be such a caring organization, right? Sure, as long as you can pay for what you want.

    But for their employees? Not so much.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/20/business/planned-parenthood-pregnant-employee-discrimination-women.html

    Planned Parenthood: biggest hypocrites on the planet; they do not care about their employees at all. As described in the article at the link, their employees seem to have no real rights under labor laws at all.

    There used to be rules about work-day breaks for non-exempt employees, but that has changed. But then, the PPs probably don’t bother to follow state regulations about it, and things have changed since I retired. Breaks are not required by the FLSA regulations. Glad I don’t have to work any more unless I want to.

    However, this form of abuse seems to be a pattern with the PPs, if it is accurately reported in the article They don’t really care at all about women, no matter what their self-labeling is. They only care about getting cash in the cash drawer.

    The woman who wrote the article was a part-time employee, which she says did not qualify her for the FMLA protection, which is outlined at the link below.

    https://smallbusiness.chron.com/circumstance-can-deny-fmla-55704.html

    The Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 (FMLA) is a United States labor law requiring covered employers to provide employees with job-protected and unpaid leave for qualified medical and family reasons.

    Pregnancy was covered by that at the time if the firm had 50+ employees. And the PPs have far more than 50+ employees, nationwide.

    FMLA rules state that private-sector employers are not required to provide federal FMLA benefits if they have fewer than 50 employees. An employee who would otherwise qualify for FMLA can be denied if the company itself is not required to offer the benefits. This is something that employers should consider when making staffing decisions.

    However, Planned Parenthood is a nationwide organization with a LOT of employees – many more than 50. And as a nationwide employer with a large number of employees, you’d think that the PPs would at least accommodate their female employees. The author of the NYT article indicates that no such consideration was given to her. Just the opposite, in fact.

    While I find PP’s treatment of this employee abusive as reported, current federal labor law says that employers are no longer required to even give employees lunch breaks any more. There was a poster on the wall in the break room where I worked that informed us of the minimum hourly wage, and what we could expect in the way of work breaks: two 15-minute breaks plus a ½ hour lunch break, which could be combined into a 1-hour lunch period. But that was when things made sense. Now it seems that changes have been made and they are not for the better, and are exacerbated by companies that only have what is termed part-time employees,  even if those employees actually work full time and sometimes overtime.

    Essentially, what this woman has described is the equivalent of a sweatshop work environment.

    I’m glad I’m out of the work world now, if that’s the case. On the other hand, why am I not surprised by the way this woman was treated?

  • Update on ISIS

    EA-6B stern aspect

    The following is the latest news on ISIS, as of this morning.

    ISIS has been stuck in one small area on the Iraq-Syria border for over a year. It’s something CNN and the other, more blighted newsfeeds don’t relay to the public.

    They were in a pocket around Hajin, being faced by Iraqi and Syrian and Kurdish troops.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/09/world/middleeast/isis-territory-syria-iraq.html

    They aren’t completely obliterated, no. Per that NYT article, they may or may not have about 20,000 to 30,000 in Iraq and Syria, as the CIA estimated in 2014. Some self-identified IS supporter says there are more in hidden places. That’s entirely possible, but both of those are hearsay, not hard evidence.

    In fact, Kurdish forces on Dec.14 seized control of Hajin, along with Syrian Democratic Forces:

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/12/14/syrian-forces-backed-us-airstrikes-take-last-big-islamic-state/

    Many were killed in US-led airstrikes, which have not stopped. The successful efforts of local ground forces (Kurds, Iraqi and Syrian) should relieve the 2,000 US special operatives on the ground of the necessity of staying in locus, allowing them to return to the USA.

    Nothing was said about ending US airstrikes.

    While there may be isolated jihadi groups here and there, such as those who claimed responsibility for the Christmas attacks in Paris a year ago, the evidence provided indicates that ISIS has been effectively choked as a mass force. No doubt, the guerrilla tactics of blindsiding people with bomb attacks in subway stations or going into soccer stadia and shooting groups of people, or murdering two Scandinavian girls who were backpacking this past week in Morocco , a relatively safe tourist area, will continue. That is how they operate.

    But Hajin is/was their last stronghold and it is gone.

    The Middle East has a history of warfare that dates as far back as 15,000 yeras, further back than when Sennacherib stole the statue of Marmuk from a temple and died of drinking plague-contaminated water. It has never been anything other than a battlefield.

    The war with ISIS is a continuation of what started long, long ago and has never stopped. If they are reduced to a few hate-filled crowd bombers and manage to wipe out whatever is left of them, something else will rise to take their place.