Vacation Day One: Hershey

We spent a lovely sunny day in Hershey Park, Hershey Chocolate Works, and the Hershey Story museum downtown.

At the museum, we got to attend a "chocolate lab" where we learned about the Mayans, and about a chocolate drink they made. We then made it ourselves.

Ben and Daniel got to be factory workers at Hershey Chocolate World:

We found a "ficus benjamina":

Daniel rode this with about 20 Amish girls (not pictured) who squealed the whole time in German:

A really, really good day, and a great start to our vacation!

Honors Day (and Night)

School wrapped up this week, and Ben and Daniel were both recognized at their schools for being the sup-a-stahs they are.

Ben's school had 6th Grade Honors Night on Tuesday Night. Ben was recognized for making the honor roll every nine weeks this year. We had crap seats, so I didn't get any decent pictures during the program (unless you count the numerous shots of the heads of the people sitting in front of us.) And Ben was late for a ball game, so he wasn't interested in sticking around after for me to get pictures of him and his teachers, him and his locker, him and the water fountain, etc. So the only picture I got was very much after the fact:

Daniel's 4th Grade Honors program was Thursday morning. Daniel racked up the awards: Perfect Attendance, Academic Excellence (Straight A's), Accelerated Reader (335 points) and Creative Writing. He was also chosen by his classmates as the Outstanding Male Student of the Year (based on conduct and character). AND....we got pictures:

DP and Mrs. C - the greatest 4th grade teacher of all time.

DP and Dad - the greatest dad of all time.

Field Day!

Even though everyone else in the country was off today, Daniel had school. He had to make up a snow day, and the school opted to come in on Memorial Day rather than a Saturday. Knowing that most of the student population wouldn't show up, they decided to have Field Day today (pretty smart thinking, if you ask me). Since I was off today, I decided to help out and spend the day with my favorite fourth grader.

Another Lost Post (Sorry, I can't let it go)

I know, I know. Most of you don't watch Lost. But if you did, you'd know why I'm compelled to talk about it all the time.

And for them that do.....

Mark and I re-watched the pilot last night for the umpteenth time. We noticed something that didn't really register before, but was way cool in light of the revelations made in the season five finale.

Locke is on the beach talking to Walt about backgammon. He says "it's the oldest game in the world." He explains how they found backgammon sets when they excavated ancient Mesopotamia, some five thousand years old.

Then he says: "There are two sides. One is light, one is dark."

Oooooohhhhhhh.

What I'm Reading Now

Mindless Eating, by Brian Wansink.

Mark got me this for Mother's Day. It reminded us both of a book we read a few years back called Why We Buy by Paco Underhill. WWB shares the findings of a consulting firm that is hired to come into stores, study the shoppers, and make recommendations that will increase sales. It was fascinating.

Mindless Eating is very similar and equally fascinating. The author studies the eating habits of Americans in many, many different scenarios. They do things like go into movie theaters and give all ticket holders a free tub of popcorn just to see if they will eat it, and how much of it they eat. The catch? The popcorn is five days old and about as tasty as cardboard. But guess what? Everyone ate it. They acknowledged that it sucked, but they still ate it.

Most interesting to me is the studies done in a place called The Spice Box. Billed as a prix fix restaurant that is used for recipe testing, this place is actually an extension of the University of Illinois's food science department. They bring people in twice a week and feed them meals. The diners think they are tasting new recipes, but the powers that be are actually studying their eating habits.

On one evening, they give everyone the same brand of cheap, two-dollar wine. Half of the restaurant is told that it is a new label from California. The other half is told that it is a new label from North Dakota. Same wine, but the California people enjoyed their meal much more than the North Dakota people did, and the North Dakota people left early. On another evening, they have waiters describe the specials to half of the diners, and the other half simply reads the specials from their own menus. Then they determine who ate more and why. Stuff like this fascinates me.

The basic finding of the author is that people, by and large, can eat 20% more than they need to, or even want to, without even knowing it (hence the name, Mindless Eating). If people can eat 20% more without noticing, it stands to reason that they can eat 20% less without noticing. They key is figuring out why we eat more than we need to, and using that knowledge to our advantage.

So far, very, VERY interesting read.

The Rice Cooker Cometh

The Incident

It’s taken me a few days to come down from the Lost season finale. It was all I hoped it would be and more. I have no idea what is actually going on, but I have some thoughts….

I think Jacob and Anti-Jacob (for lack of a better name for the guy in the black shirt who found the loophole) are mythological brothers/enemies/forces/gods/something who are somehow experimenting with humanity on the island. They obviously have some sort of Yin-Yang thing going, and Jacob is obviously trying to make something happen by bringing people to the island.

I think the Anti-Jacob is controlled by Jacob or by the island, and was confined to the cabin somehow. I think when Ben took Locke to the cabin in season four, the voice Locke heard saying “help me” was not Jacob but the Anti-Jacob and he has somehow used Ben and Locke to carry out his evil doing. The cabin was surrounded by the ashes each time we saw it before, and Illana seemed really surprised that the ash line was broken and that whoever she was looking for was not there. The ash line might also tie the Anti-Jacob to the smoke monster, who knows.

I now think all of my earlier season five theories are wrong. BUT…..I do still think the spiders will come into play somehow and I think Daniel is really Charlotte’s father. Of course, these theories may well turn out to be wrong too. I suspect next season will begin with our survivors boarding flight 815 again and we won’t know if it’s a flashback, or if it’s happening now, or….well, you know what I mean.

And don’t forget that Ben is a big fat liar and could very possibly be playing the players.

Some other highlights –

The Juliet scene at the end – Sun got the great acting-chops scene at the end of last season and Juliet got it this time around. Very well done. (Although I do find it hard to swallow that a bomb could drop all that way and not detonate, but some half-dead woman can hit it a few times and make it explode.)

Rose saying “It’s always something with you people.”

Miles and his “Have you stopped to think that maybe doing this will cause the incident and not prevent it? Oh – glad to know you’ve thought this through.”

The scene where Jacob was on the park bench and Locke’s body splattered behind him.

And my favorite scene of all….. my favorite scene from all five seasons….the happiest I’ve been watching this show….Jack getting kicked in the balls. Man I hate Jack.

Juliet was the perfect woman. Smart, pretty, zingy one-liners - she kept the house, delivered babies, and lubed up the van down at the motor pool. What a shame.

When this guy first appeared, I thought it was House. Then I thought "oh, he'll have this whole thing figured out in a half hour."

Help me out here - does this guy have four - and only four - toes?

Applesauce

Tonight I took the new food mill out for a spin and made homemade applesauce. I started with seven pink lady (Cripp's Pink) apples, the greatest apples known to man.



I chopped five and realized the pot was getting pretty full, so I left two back. I added the juice of one lemon, enough water to cover the bottom of the pan, and three tablespoons of sugar.



I brought that to a boil, then let it simmer for twenty minutes with the pot covered. Then I removed the lid and let it simmer for another twenty (when the water was gone). Then I dumped the apples in my brand-spankin' new food mill.



I milled and milled and milled, and ended up with this:

Since Daniel is the chief applesauce eater in our house, I let him choose the spices. We added a quarter teaspoon of cinnamon and a vanilla bean.

I have to say, I have never had applesauce this good. I probably could have left out the sugar altogether. It is delicious. Delicious! And after my work out with the food mill, I'll be putting on a gun show later. It's a win-win!