I thought I’d make a french onion soup for lunch while taking a break from the website stuff. Now, I know french onion soup is more of a winter dish, but hey, have you looked at the temperature lately? The soup turned out really nice, so I took a picture and decided to give you the recipe, should you be interested.

The main ingredient in this soup is not onions, it’s time: it takes about two hours to make two bowls of soup, so don’t start this as a last minute what-the-hell-are-we-making-for-lunch type of meal. It’s a lot of standing and stirring.

Remember, this makes TWO bowls, multiply all ingredients according to your number of guests:

• 3 medium onions, thinly sliced (makes about 4 cups worth)
• 3 tbs margarine/butter
• 1 tbs flour
• 1/2 tsp sugar
• 4 cups of beef broth
• 2 tbs Sherry
• 2 slices of bread
• 2 slices of cheese (swiss is best, but any will do, except cheddar)

Here we go:

In a large pot, melt margarine/butter, and add onions. Cook on LOW heat for about 45 minutes, stirring frequently.

After about 45 minutes, when the onions are starting get a bit pasty, add suger and flour, stir and cook for 3 minutes.

Add the beef broth, stir, and simmer uncovered for about 50 minutes, or until liquid has halved in volume. Add the Sherry about 10 minutes before it’s done.

Spoon the soup into oven-ready bowls, toast the bread slices and float on top of the soup. Cover the bread with cheese slices and broil in the oven until the cheese is bubbling and golden brown.

Enjoy (and apologize to your partner/family/co-workers for the rest of the day)

I will be working this weekend (weather permitting: wireless is no fun in a thunder storm) to upgrade my webpage to WP 2.8.1 and install a new theme. This Blue Zinfandel theme has served me well, but is beginning to show its age…

So over the course of this weekend, widgets may stop working, disappear, reappear, and screw up the layout–no worries: I’m on the case!

See you all on the other side!

I know this has been a busy news week, with such utterly important subjects as Michael Jackson’s Memorial Extravaganza, Shannon Tweed Day (yes? no? ye.. no? no!), and Did He or Didn’t He (also titled: Damned if you do, Damned if you don’t), and a nearly missed photo op (would you want to be in the picture with people who think they can influence the weather? I wouldn’t either) but I’d like to point your attention to another pressing issue: the City of Ottawa Weed Team.

Upon getting a complaint from a neighbour, the City of Ottawa Weed Team was sent out to a suburban back-yard to take note of the unruly collection of grasses and weeds protruding through their fence and peeking into their neighbours’ yards, and to subsequently deliver a bylaw notice that the home owners should mow their weed-yard down, or else… [the City of Ottawa would do it for them, and send them the bill]

Now, I am not one to go for the eco-nut back-yard let-it-grow-wild meadow-experiment, however, I do believe in property rights, and as such a homeowner has the right to grow any plant he or she wants to, even if it does invite an infestation of aphids and bees.

The irony is, ever since the City of Ottawa banned pesticides (and herbicides) on their own property (long before Dalton banned it for everybody else), and they cut the budget for city property grass mowing in half, coincidentally around the same time, the city is one big collection of tall grasses, weeds and other unsightly growths and are in effect in constant violation of their own bylaw. Take a drive down Merivale Road, Baseline Road, St. Josef, Carling Ave. The weeds are three foot high! 

I think the City of Ottawa has better things to do than to lecture ordinary citizens about keeping their lawn neatly trimmed and bickering on whether we should have a Shannon Tweed day or not: the latest property tax increase is currently set at 28%, to be wiggled down to, say, 26.3 by the time the budget gets approved.

Get to work, you bums!

Mr. Carr, an inmate in Millhaven, had his award upheld by the Federal Court Justice James Russell on June 2. Mr. Carr was stabbed in the bum with a plastic device in 2005 and has since been suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

The taxpayers of Canada eased his suffering to the tune of $12,000.

Mr. Carr, who was serving a three-year term for robbery-related offences when he was attacked, is now living in the Hamilton, Ont.-area, awaiting his money.

You’re welcome.

It seems that Michael Jackson was about 1/2 Billion dollars in debt when he died. This mean that my net-worth is more than the King of Pop, who sold over 750 million records world-wide, and is the world’s most famous person.

I, Erwin Gerrits, am worth more money than Michael Jackson. How’s that for an ego booster?

Ol’ Tom got me all riled up here. Pensioners in this country, who worked hard all their lives, make $519 a month. And that’s TAXED. And we’re gonna give this crook $317,000 severance? In the seven months she worked for us, she made about $100,000 a month. $100,000 A MONTH. She defrauds the Ontario taxpayer to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars, and our “esteemed” health minister Caplan doesn’t even have the guts to fire her. They came to a “mutual decison” to “resign”. Give me a break.

People with MS can’t pay for their meds and are being  cut off. Kids with autism can’t go to their therapy. Going to emergency in this province takes 5-13 hours. Waiting for an MRI takes 8 months. We all pay up to $1000/year EXTRA taxes to make our health care better, and they turn around and give it to crooks and bastards, who would rather bill $2700/day AND charge for a cup of tea, than hand over that money to one MS patient so she can afford to get her shots for another month.

If you have any scruples, all of you, you surrender your “bonuses” and severances so these people can buy their meds.

What’s wrong with this country? We’re bailing out private companies, give 3.5 billion dollars to retired workers so they can live better than all the rest of us who don’t have pensions, and now we’re payign $2700/day to consultants who INTERVIEW THEMSELVES?!?

I’m so pissed off, it’s unbelievable.

In a report published by the Global Humanitarian Forum on May 29th, Kofi Annan (yes, him) warns the world that hundreds of thousands of people are currently dying from Climate Change, and by 2030 that could be 500,000.

Highlights of the report:

Report projects that by 2030, worldwide deaths will reach almost 500,000 per year; people affected by climate change annually expected to rise to over 600 million and the total annual economic cost increase to around $300 billion

To avert worst possible outcomes, climate change adaptation efforts need to be scaled up by a factor of 100 in developing countries, which account for 99% of casualties due to climate change

Of course, the report is short on facts, long on fear-mongering:

The report estimates that climate change today accounts for over 300,000 deaths throughout the world each year, the equivalent of an Indian Ocean Tsunami every single year.

And this is my favourite quote from Kofi:

We need an international agreement to contain climate change

Good luck with that.

My five random questions to which I need answers:

1. Why do BBQ chips no longer taste like BBQ, but are just plain sweet?
2. Why is a hot day proof of Global Warming, and yet a cold day is “just weather”?
3. Why do the tax dollars of someone who does not have a pension plan (me) go to pay the pensions of retired GM (a private company) workers?
4. Does Dalton like the look of weeds all over the city?
5. Does ANYBODY watch “I’m a celebrity–get me out of here!” ?

Discuss.

Ever wonder why the girl in the Baileys commercial (”Gotta Have Coffee…”) doesn’t show her whole face? You know which one I am talking about:

Here it is:

We have the guys on video.  They brought a gun and a sword. They eviscerated the victim, live on video, cut off his fingers and then killed the guy. Five guys got off (I suppose hanging around a guy with a gun and sword who ends up killing someone just isn’t a crime in this country), the sixth, Mr. Man (Wahab Dadshani), who defended HIMSELF against the full might of the Canadian prosecution, got convicted for MANSLAUGHTER. Murder just wasn’t proven. We’ve got a dead guy. A murder weapon. The act on video. (Lenny would say: I love it when they make our job so easy). But murder wasn’t proven. Bringing a gun and sword and someone ends up dead at the end, just isn’t premeditated. For manslaughter, Mr. Man will get up to six years, with time served he’ll probably be out next week.

What a joke.