The Odyssey.  Why…?  I’m not sure, but something about the story of a man who ends up spending ten years trying to get back home kinda’ strikes a chord or something with me I guess…  

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Hi everybody.  Guess what today’s recipe is?  Okay, okay, it’s not so much a traditional “recipe”, it’s more of a guide line that you can use for …umm… “experimental” purposes.

The most commonly used recipe in Bangladesh for cooking rice involves boiling it in a buttload of water.  A lot of checking is involved, if you’re a n00b.  (Boil the rice for too long and you end up with mush.)  Once the rice has been properly cooked, the water is drained.

A less common boiling method involves cooking the rice with a set amount of water (usually in a ratio of 2:1, i.e. two units of water for every single unit of rice).  This method is generally used when cooking some of the fancier local dishes.

For fried rice, oil can be added to the water when the rice is being boiled.  The boiled rice can also be fried during post-production.  (If you fry dry uncooked rice, you’ll end up with popped rice, which is sort of like popcorn, but made from rice. XD)

These are more or less the basis for all rice based dishes.  Simple ne?

Now, keep in mind, what I posted above is more of a guideline, and you’re more than welcome to experiment by adding your own set of ingredients.  Case in point: Hotdog Fried Rice & Rice Pudding.

I used to make Hotdog Fried Rice back when I was living in New York, and beef hotdogs was readily available; and Rice Pudding is a traditional Bangladeshi desert.

For Hotdog Fried Rice, you’ll need:
    – roughly five to six Beef hotdogs.  Or a similar quantity of sausages.  (If you opt for healthier chicken/turkey franks, you’ll also need some cooking spray/oil of your choice.)
    – two to three cups of boiled rice.
    – Cooking spray/oil to your liking.
    – half a chopped onion
    – a couple of finely chopped green chillies  (Or not, if you don’t like spicy food.)

Now, Chop the hotdogs up to thin slices.  They should look like little meat colord dimes.  Pre-heat a frying pan in high-ish heat, and throw in the hotdog bits.  Now, the heat should melt the fat in the hotdog and in about a minute or so, your hotdog bits should be frying in their own grease.  Once they’re fried, drain the grease. Whatever’s stuck in the pan should suffice to fry the onion & rice.  (Unless you’re using chicken/turkey hotdogs, in which case you should add a bit of cooking spray/oil to begin with.)  Add the onions.  Stir until they smell cooked.  Add the rice.  Stir.  Add the chillies.  Stir for a while.  And that, as they say, is the end of that.

Traditional Bangladeshi Rice Pudding is a lot easier to make.  You’ll need:
    – around half a galon of milk.
    – one and a half to two cups of white rice.
    – sugar, according to taste.

In a saucepan, heat the milk over l-o-w heat (otherwise it’ll boil over) for around two hours, or until the milk has become denser.  Add the rice.  Add the sugar.  Stir, so the rice doesn’t stick to the bottom of the pan.  Once the rice is cooked, let the whole thing cool.  Garnish with chopped almonds, nuts, raisins… whatever tickles your fancy.  Serve.

=^^=

Montana Max, Tiny Toons.

Those of you who may be too young to remember, back before the advent of Internet Explorer and it’s ilk, web browsing was done on a purely text based …er… basis.  Which was a good thing, because if you’ve ever tried to browse with a 14.4 K modem… ugh.

Computer geeks felt the need for speed and they satisfied that need by keeping things as simple as they could.  To that extent, Lynx is faster than anything that’s out there right now.  ANYTHING.  It doesn’t load graphics, it doesn’t load CSS and it doesn’t support any fancy scripts.  It shows texts & links.  Primarily because back it the heyday of text based browsing there wasn’t anything else to show.  Aside from some fancy asciii art.

Bob knows why, I’m still on a masochistic kick, one that involves “returning” to archaic command based days of PC-yesteryear.  Anywho, in the screenshot you see, I am trying to make my way through my own Xanga page…  Now if only I could use it to update my blog … :

Err… that’s all. =^^=

I’m in the process of shifting to a new Operating System. Linux Mint.

Why? Because it’s a learning experience. Learning how to download and properly burn a bootable ISO, reconfigure the BIOS to boot from the CD, partition available Hard Disk space and set up the proper disk loading utilities involve doing a lot of homework.

Also, because, Mint (and it’s ilk) manage to deliver a swift, powerful kick to Microsoft where it hurts the most. Integrity. To begin with, it’s stable. Really, REALLY stable. Linux prides itself on being stable. There are computer (servers & stuff) that has been running non-stop, on Linux for years on end. So important is stability to the Linux people, that the software does not need rebooting for anything. ANYTHING. Worst case scenarios involve restarting individual services. That’s it.

Then there’s the software suite. It comes with a decent assortment of software. An office suite, an image editor, a buttload of internet related stuff like browser, mail & chat software. Nothing excessively fancy, mind you, but you’re getting productivity & multimedia bundles straight out of the box. Plus the media players are up do date in terms of compatibility & codec. Getting Windows up to working condition involves installing third party media players & codecs. Then you’ll need to download OpenOffice (which comes with Mint), or pay some more money to legally install a commercial Office Suite. And if you don’t want to be held hostage by the Big M, you’ll probably need to download and install browsers like Firefox or Opera, and Email software like Firefox.

Add to that, the overall Hard Disk efficiency. Windows Vista needs a minimum of 10 GiB of space. If you’re in the mood for some decent visual effects (windows swishing into view & all that) be ready to lose about 40 GiB free space. Mint, on the other hand, comes with an assortment of Visual Effects & what not, the aforementioned software suite, and STILL manages to take up roughly 2 GiB space. Hell, the CD is Live, i.e. It loads the Operating System straight off the CD. It doesn’t touch a thing in your Hard Disk, so if you don’t like it, or if something goes wrong, restart your computer without the CD and your PC is back to the way it was.

Last, although definitely not the least, it’s free. You can download the ISO from http://www.linuxmint.com/download.php and burn a CD for yourself, your friends, your friends’ friends, etc. No legal hassles. No guilt.

Yeah, I know I’m gushing about my new toy. Admittedly the learning curve is steep. Having an internet connection, or an IT Guy/Girl nearby comes in pretty handy.  However there’s the satisfaction of knowing I learned something new and achieved something on my own; rather than being force fed a dolled-up bloat ware whose sole reason for existence is to force people to keep spending.

=^^=

Yes.  Would anyone want the organs, I’m not so sure…  

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ABSOLUTELY NO ONE.

Why?  Because despite what popular science fiction would have us believe, the process of cloning only duplicates genetic material.  Whether for better or for worse, who and what that person is affected more by their environment and experiences.  And despite common beliefs, the output from the cloning process is more likely to be a baby, rather than a full grown adult.

There are high chances that you clone Arnold Schwarzenegger, only to have the clone eventually grow up to be an unemployed  middle-aged couch potato.  Not only would there be no point in cloning a person, living or deceased, the expectations put upon the clone  would more or less ensure that existence is not very pleasant for the clone.  Imagine if you will, if someone cloned Elvis.  From the beginning of his life, the clone would be pleagued by hordes of fans expecting the second coming of the king of rock’n'roll.

So while that makes cloning potential candidate for potential situations like growing a spare orgran or three, or streamlining food production; it might even go as far as pet “replacement”… given the comparatively limited life span of household cats, dogs & whatnot… the process doesn’t work as well with human beings.

While it might be fun to imagine Led Zeppelin reuniting on account of a cloned John Bonham, or a cloned Shaolin ass-kicking Buddha, or a movie where Bruce Lee actually gets to fight the likes of Jackie Chan, Jet Lee, etc; the reality of the matter would be that you’d end up with with a baby, who, over a period of a few decades, may or may not follow in the footsteps of the person they were cloned from.  That and a lot of religious/philosophical people picketing outside your house.

So why bother?

I just answered this Featured Question, you can answer it too!

(Re)introducing Led Zeppelin, one of the greatest rock bands of all time…
Enjoy.

=^^=

Me. XD
   

I just answered this Featured Question, you can answer it too!

The original video was posted at http://bryn-dis.blog.is/blog/bryn-dis/video/2062/ by someone called “Bryndís” … I think.  Anyways, enjoy… =^^=