xsamplex

The weather has been overly mild since January started. Yesterday, we once again had plenty of rain, this time accompanied by gusty winds. This led to different power outages across the province. As per the last remark: I personally believe the NS Power crews bungled this one. Power was out around 5:00 PM and came back up around 8 PM after (not 1, not 2, not 3) 4 intermittent ‘power-ups’ some of them lasting shorter than a minute. I bet a lot of electronics have been wasted.

On a more optimistic note, I see that the country of Russia is dealing with a bitterly cold Winter. -32 degrees Celsius. That’s pretty cold. Compare that with Whitehorse, NW: it’s only -23 degrees over there. I’ll stick to my Warm Canada, I guess.

Earlier, I decided to look for information about the World Cup Soccer, which is to be held in Germany later this Summer (earlier on xsamplex). The Dutch play against countries like Argentinia, Montenegro and Ivorycoast (For French Canadians, that is Republique de Cote d’Ivoire). Important dates to remember are June 16th (vs Republique de Cote d’Ivoire), June 26th (vs. Argentina) and June 6th (vs. Montenegro).

Group C’s stadiums includes the Munich stadium. It was finished in 2005, 3 years after a municipal referendum supported to construction of this football stadium. Designed by Swiss architects (Herzog and De Meuron) , it features a ‘smooth facade formed from translucent, lozenge-shaped cushions glows in a variety of colours to imbue the structure with a shimmering, magical poetry’.

That sounds like my type of donut.

Statement: You know you’re Canadian if you watch Canadian Air Farce and you think it’s actually funny.

Rationale: Humour expressed during this show is either dry or not even funny. Apparently, you need to be Canadian to actually understand what the fun about the show is.

Confession: Last night’s show was amazingly funny: well, it wasn’t, but at least I heard myself laugh.

Conclusion: This is good

I was going to add a quick drawing of the three pillars of democracy and end up with a rant about politics, but, for that, I should point you to the more politically gifted. I prefer to have strict separation of powers: that’s what I was taught in school. Democracy is the least of all evils, for sure. John Locke wrote:

Again, there is no liberty, if the judicial power were not separated from the legislative and executive. Were it joined with the legislative, the life and liberty of the subject would be exposed to arbitrary control; for the judge would then be the legislator. Were it joined to the executive however, the judge might behave with violence and oppression

Notice that the weather is warmer than normal. Around this time last year we probably had centimeters of snow. Today, the temps are floating around the 10 degrees and the ground is soggy. I prefer some colder weather: at least it guarantees it kills the bugs. I mean, not all bugs are supposed to survive the Winter. Mark my words: we’re going to have a summer with loads of bugs.

After a heated discussion with Alfons, I ended up craving these classical examples of genuine Dutch cuisine.

1. Frikandellen: a long shaped snack, made out of mix of meat (minced and ground). Urban myths tell stories that frikandellen contain ‘left over’ meat, i.e., pieces of animals that can’t be sold to the general public, like eyes, entrails and that. This snack is ever-popular with kids and adults alike. Yummy stuff, really. Eat with ‘patat’ (Flemish Fries).

2. Kroketten: gravy-like elastic substance breaded with a thick layer of crumbs. Dutch call the substance ‘ragout’, which is actually made out of minced horsemeat, flour, butter and ‘jus’ (juice of meat).Hmmm, horsemeat!

Dutch food: It’s like watching the Temple of Doom over and over again!