Netflix Recommends:

Apparently that DVD includes the controversial "Raven & friends go on a killing spree" episode. Or, maybe the "Violent TV Shows" factors in the show's ability to incite violence in the viewer.

I cooked something: Swiss Chard

So, farmer's market season is in full swing. I've been visiting my favourite market since it opened back in May, and the plants and spinach are giving way to a greater variety of produce. Two weeks ago I randomly grabbed a huge bunch of Swiss Chard (which might actually be Rainbow Chard) for just $2 from one of my favourite vendors.

When I buy greens like kale or chard, I usually chop it up and sautee it with a little garlic and finish it off with some sesame oil. With almost two pounds of chard to use I decided to do something different. Some internet searching turned up this recipe at Allrecipes.com. I tweaked it a bit and came up with:

Swiss Chard with White Beans and Goat Cheese

Ingredients:

1.5 tablespoons olive oil
2 cloves of garlic minced
1 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 large bunch Swiss Chard (with the stems, damnit!)
1 16oz. can of Cannellini beans, drained and rinsed (or, you know prepared dried beans if that's what you're in to)
1 16oz. can of fire roasted tomatoes with green chiles

Soft goat cheese (chavre)

You'd really want to throw this away?

Instructions:

Slice the chard leaves in about 1" strips. Chop the stems separately in 1" pieces.

Heat the oil in a skillet over medium heat. Add the garlic and red pepper flakes; cook and stir about a minute, until fragrant.

Add the chopped stems and cook for about 2 minutes, until they start to get soft. Add the leaves and cook for an additional 2 minutes. Add tomatoes and beans, and cook until the chard is wilted and the mixture has reduced slightly.

Check this shit out

Serve hot and garnish with goat cheese (or don't if you're vegan).

You know you want me.

It's kind of spicy, kind of savory, and totally easy.

I would watch this program

If only it wasn't a Nike ad.

Verisimilitude

I found the story about villagers blocking the Google Street View car mildly amusing, but mostly sort of moronic. It read like a lot of "Boo hoo, people on the internets might see our rich-people houses. Oh, the humanity!"

This, however, fucking rules.


View Larger Map

When the Street View car rolled through a Pittsburgh neighborhood in 2008, residents and people from around the city were ready. Organized by artists Robin Hewlett and Ben Kinsley, several blocks of a residential street were set up with tableaux to create a sort of human-populated Busy World of Richard Scarry. This has been on the internet since November 2008, and I can't believe I'm just seeing it now.

The Street View above shows the route. Follow Sampsonia Way eastbound to Arch St. Click the southbound arrow on Arch once, then get back on eastbound Sampsonia to Federal St. I highly recommend visiting the project website at http://www.streetwithaview.com/. There's information on the project, a full scene breakdown (in case you missed something), and videos.

[Found via John Hodgman's Twitter]

I think I smell a rat...

Thanks to WTF_Nature, I just learned about the Hero Rat program in Africa. Since 1996, the APOPO has been training giant pouch rats to detect landmines; and in 2004 they started training them to detect diseases like TB.



Apparently, I'm the type of person who finds giant rodents adorable; and after clicking over to the Adopt a Rat page, found myself donating to TB-sniffer rat, Kim. Sure, Chosen One was tempting and Allan had the cutest pictures, but all of the other rats had pages of effusive comments. All Kim had was:

Dear Kim,

i wisch I could fondle you someday!

Truly
Britta

Um... I'm guessing that's some sort of translational quirk. But what if it's not? I can't sit idly by and watch while a rat with my same name is subjected to sleazy come-ons.

It's bad enough that her job involves interaction with "sputum".

That's oddly specific

"Violent Documentaries" and "Suspenseful Sci-Fi & Fantasy from the 1980's"?


The new taste preferences on Netflix are weird. The intro page only gave me about 8 "tastes" to rate (Violent, Suspenseful, Romantic, Goofy), but the actual "Taste Preferences"-setting page has 24 different ones to rate. These things seem too weird and objective to really produce useable results. The provided examples are a clear indication that Netflix and I have wildly different definities of these things.

Ugh, I just can't... Patch Adams? Fuck you, Netflix, for reminding me that this abomination exists.

Yep, nothing says romance like hillbillies, dead guys, nautical disaster, whores, the mentally retarded, and Tom Hanks.

I wasn't going to say anything about this one, but Van Helsing? Really? I saw that piece of shit, and I must've gouged my eyes out too early to see the deep emotional subplot.
Also, how the hell is Top Gun listed under "romance", but not Eternal Sunshine? Oh, right, because these listings are nonsensical and useless.

This is where I'm calling total bullshit on these categories. They had the decency to stop listing Crash on every goddamn category, but three Nicholas Cage movies? Now I know they're just fucking around.

It was bad enough when I had to contend with their inexplicable genre-based recommendations, now when I log in I'm met with stuff like this:

Edit to add: I just noticed that in addition to the "tastes" and genres, you can set preferences for an endless number of other things, like "qualities" (which, inexplicably includes Bollywood), storylines, release dates, and all of the Netflix subgenres. One of these days, I'll try and manipulate it so it appears that I'm only interested in Gritty Zombie Blacksploitation Bollywood Tearjerkers that were released in the 1910's or 1980's about Post Apocalyptic Kung-Fu Whistleblowers and are based on Children's Books.
In all honesty, if that was a movie I'd watch the hell out of it.

Experience Aromatherapy as I stitch?

Hell no.

1. "Secret Perfume" sounds like some sort of scented douche. And, if you take away the embroidered towel, the promo pic looks like it's selling some sort of "feminine deodorant".

2. It seems like the scents would intermingle, and you'd have to pick colours based on what fragrances would compliment each other rather than what would be aesthetically pleasing.

3. My cross-stitch projects should have scents that reflect their nature. I don't think I've ever made anything that would be properly represented by synthetic strawberry or honeysuckle. E-mail me again when you start making thread that smells like cigarettes and scotch, DMC.

What would be the right scent for this bookmark?