Bumper charity weekend ahead

The guys and I have a hectic weekend ahead of us as we take on our most ambitious charity project in the 12 or so years we’ve been doing this.

We’ve invited some of the poorest families from an economically depressed residential area South West of Johannesburg to join us for a lunch the guys will be cooking, and we’ll also be distributing food hampers to each family. We’ve secured the assistance of a local school which has kindly allowed us use of the premises, and a few classrooms and the ablution facilities.

The classrooms are for the use of a general practitioner, a dentist and an optometrist who have magnanimously donated their time and services to conduct basic medical screening and checks on all the invited folks who are in such need. The SA Blood Services (SANBS) will also be at hand to perhaps carry out some tests, present a talk, and hopefully collect some much-needed blood from willing donors.

Tomorrow, we’ll finish up some last-minute shopping and spend the day putting together the food hampers which will consist of basic dry provisions, vegetables and fruits. The guys will then spend the rest of the afternoon preparing the meat, vegetables etcetera for the traditional Indian chicken briyani, we will be cooking in two huge pots over an open fire at the school.

The cooking will start very early Sunday morning. Tables and chairs will be set up for the few hundred people who are expected, and some classrooms will be prepared for the health professionals to do their thing.

I’m expecting to be exhausted by Sunday afternoon, but gratified at pulling off this mammoth [for a handful of guys] task.

And in this corner, George’s Grill & Griddle…

During the week I spotted a George Foreman Grill & Griddle (hereafter referred to as GGG) on display in a store that I frequent, and being a bachelor, I thought it looked like the perfect appliance for those quick dinners after a hard day at the office.

However, the store was temporarily out of stock, except for the one on display. The sales lady offered to put in back in the box for me to purchase, but I declined and opted to return on another occasion to check if stock was available. On Saturday, I returned to find two GGG’s in stock in somewhat battered-looking boxes, although the contents appeared untouched in their original wrappings.

I was rather eager to give this appliance a try, so I made the purchase and picked up a fairly big rump steak at a supermarket, on my way home.

After the obligatory reading of the instruction manual and recommended cleaning with a  damp cloth, I got GGG’s grill section set up and ready for cooking.

Fifteen minutes later (including standing time), I tucked into a steak that was disappointingly  tasteless. I had followed all the instructions explicitly. What the hell happened?

My initial thought was that the steak was overdone. But it certainly looked medium-to-well as I normally like it. Then it dawned on me that maybe a steak needs to be cooked in its own fat. This appliance has a fat-free system that allows the fats and oils to drain away. I may be wrong, but the lack of taste pointed to a lack of fat. This afternoon, I did some digging on the Interwebs and found the following hilarious Customer Review by Sam Gregory on Amazon which sort off confirms my suspicion:

A ring at the door abruptly disturbs my sleep. My dream? I don’t remember the exact details but it was something involving two fillet steaks, a tub of goose fat and a scantily clad Britney Spears singing into a newspaper cone filled with chips.
After performing my ‘one-two-three’ side-roll out of bed and onto the floor I dragged myself to the staircase instead of getting straight to my feet, then used my elbows to slide up and into the stair lift.
I had the man from the stair lift company come round and fit an extension to the rail last month meaning that I can get anywhere downstairs without having to flop out of the chair, because walking is just SO outdated.
The doorbell rang a second time and I scrabbled to open it, refusing to drop the half eaten Mars bar in my left hand from last night which was by now, coated in a mixture of carpet fluff and hair. I just hate waste.
A cheery young fellow passed a huge box to me which I rested on my stomach-shelf and asked me to sign his notebook which I did, smudging melted chocolate and caramel across the sheet by accident, much to his dismay.

Hugging my new present and closing the door I put my chair into gear and made my way to the living room to unpack it. Seeing Georges over-enthusiastic, smiling little face filled me with excitement as I removed the outer packaging. I noticed that this thing was indeed a healthy size, possibly big enough to cook half of a breakfast on at any one time.
After sitting it down I plugged it in next to my computer to let it warm up whilst I logged into World of Warcraft, but to my amazement, by the time I had reached the character selection screen I could feel the heat beaming up at me from the fully machine washable griddle plates. Wow, what a machine!

I whipped my chair into warp-speed and flew to the kitchen to grab a couple of sirloins, a handful of pork chops and a dozen sausages just to give my Foreman a little mid-morning test.

That was where I hit my only real problem with this little beauty.
I didn’t take much notice when I first slapped my meat-feast across the grill but the whole machine is actually on a slant. The front kind of dips downward, meaning that all the fat and grease (the good stuff) seeps out of your food and runs onto the floor.
I have found a few solutions to this design flaw and they are as follows:

1. Cut a long French baguette in half and place it beneath the front of the grill allowing it to soak up the wasted fat. This tastes great with a couple of sausages crammed inside.

2. Take two fairly thick books (I use my Linux For Dummies 8th Edition and a couple of computer game walk-through guides, I don’t use them anymore, I am too elite) and stack them underneath the front feet of the George Foreman. This keeps the fat on the grill and allows your meat selection to cook in its own juices wonderfully.

3. Last but by no means least… I noticed whilst unpacking the box there was an extra bit of packaging which at first I thought was a little excessive but now have come to think of as a real godsend. It is almost like a long plastic dish that fits perfectly to the size of the grill!
I place this underneath to catch the fat, then before it cools down to a solid state, quickly pour it into a blender with some ice cream, a tablespoon or two of sugar and a knob of butter then leave mixing whilst I remove my meat from the grill. Pour the frothy delight into a chilled glass and enjoy through a straw.
This is a real treat and highly recommended!

So what more can I say?
A superb invention I would highly recommend to anyone who like me, strives to be nothing but the best.

Thank you George you lovely little man you.

Pros:
Warms up quicker than World of Warcraft
Great picture of George Foreman on the outer packaging I feel, which I have now had framed and put beside my bed

Cons:
Could be bigger really. Say 3 or 4 times bigger?
The slanted grill is a minor issue which can be rectified by following my above instruction

I’m not about to give up though. Perhaps I was doing something wrong after all. Either that, or I have lost my sense of taste. So before I retire my GGG for life, I’m going to try a few other items like vegetables, fish, sausages and bacon, on the grill first. I also still need to try out the griddle section.

Well George, seems like you’re going to get another shot at the title…

Abaya urrrrgghhh!

It was pretty hot today. The climate control in my car was at full tilt.  It was therefore a little disconcerting, gazing in my rear-view mirror at two women in those black tent-like outfits, riding in an older-model car that obviously did not have the same comforts.

I could not tell if they were comfortable or happy; all I could see were their eyes through a rectangular slit cut in the headdress which formed part of the ensemble known as an abaya, traditionally worn by Moslem women.

I resisted thinking about what they had on underneath and failed. I hope it was nothing because perhaps that would have made them slightly less hot. I really don’t know; I have never tried wearing a shapeless tent-like outfit before.

At this point, I know there will be those who will accuse me of being disrespectful towards the Islamic religion. Well…. I’m being no more insolent towards Islam, than I’m towards every other religion; I have the same loathing for all religions. Don’t take it personally.

This is not about your religion; well not entirely. It’s about the women who are affected by it. Maybe I’m presumptuous, but I can’t imagine any women willingly dressing up in tent-like outfits on a hot day. I’m not saying it does not have practical applications in some parts of the world; it just seems so impractical and silly on a hot day in this part of the world.

Women would have to be absolutely terrified of the maker of such a dehumanizing religious law, not to mention the cruel earthly guardians self-appointed to enforce it. That would be about the only reason for dressing up like that, apart from dementia and a bad case of self-loathing.

Women’s beauty is meant to be shown off and celebrated. It’s meant to be enjoyed by both men and women alike. I just can’t abide any archaic law that prevents me from savouring the beauty and form that makes up a women.

Women have a right to live with freedom and dignity. She should not tolerate any god or man who would take that away from her, lest she be prepared to live in mental and physical slavery for the rest of her life.

Listen up, you oriental berks, rhino horn does not cure cancer

Just over a year ago I wrote about how poachers were decimating South Africa’s rhino population, driving another species towards extinction.

At that time around 210 had been killed already, but the latest figures indicate that the total for 2010 reached a record 333. However, the figures for this year thus far is an alarming 341 animals killed, which works out at almost one a day.

Image via Wikipedia

And it’s all for feeding the ignorant oriental belief that rhino horn cures cancer among other diseases.

The biggest culprits driving the killing of rhinos for their horns remain Vietnam and China. It appears that their respective governments could not be bothered in the least to implement measures to curb the trade in rhino horn. One wonders if the ageing Commie despots running these countries, are not indulging in rhino shavings themselves, to prolong their tenure in office, dealing more misery to their people.

It’s a scandal that a magnificent beast is giving up its life, not to sustain human life as livestock do, but to sustain a delusional belief system.

So listen up! Stop being yellow monkeys! If you’ve got cancer, go to a fucking doctor for treatment, or die with dignity. Don’t be grasping at horns. Let the beasts be…

Bend over, there’s more to come after the highway robbery

Image via Wikipedia

Toll roads! If there’s any motorist who likes the idea, you’re on the wrong side of the fence of a mental institution.

We pay taxes so that roads, among other essential infrastructure can be built. When the roads are tolled, after being built with taxpayers hard-earned cash, that’s highway robbery.

But don’t expect politicians to pay heed or understand that; they’re really useless at generating wealth; just spectacular at expropriating it.

The initial toll proposals for the Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project (GFIP) up here on the Reef in South Africa, were greeted with derision and indeed howls of laughter. Did these morons in government actually think we the citizens were going to pay those absurd tolls for a road we had already paid, many times over?

After the citizens demanded a rethink by government, the new toll structure announced over the weekend are really no better. One government spokesperson had the audacity to speculate that the new proposal was fair to everyone.

That is everyone who stands to benefit from the tenders involved in the project, not to mention the grubby self-serving politicians themselves who are without doubt involved somehow.

Bastards!

This comes fresh on the heels of the announcement that government intends to tax us even further to sustain their latest hair-brained scheme known as National Health Insurance (NHI).

Yes folks, prepare to bend over after being robbed at a tollbooth, so that the swines’ in  government can reach up your ass and wrench out whatever is left, to pay for the health insurance you’re going to need after becoming destitute.

Public health is currently a cesspool of corruption and incompetence. We don’t need to feed this monster with any additional taxation so that it becomes bigger and more uncontrollable.

Taxpayers who are already overburdened by government extortion to fund their lavish lifestyles, feed those hungry tender machines, keep their cronies happy, and sustain those extravagant post-apartheid pipe dreams, should refuse to be treated as cash cows, and fight this tyranny with all they’ve got.

No more, please! Or we’re going to take this to the street…

Rant Alert: But it’s juicy!!!

Image by _dorothy_ via Flickr

I do love mixing the odd cocktail and invariably the recipe calls for fresh fruit juice.

But I’ll be damned if fresh fruit juice can be found in a hurry anywhere in South Africa. Unless you buy fruit and extract the juices yourself, the gunk passing for fruit juice on all major retailers’ shelves, including the over-hyped major supermarket chains, is absolute rubbish.

What the fuck is 100% blended fruit juice or pure blended fruit juice? Since when is blended, 100% or even pure?

Why can I not get pure 100% orange juice or cranberry juice that is NOT MIXED with a blend of apples or other berries? None of my cocktail recipes call for a mixture of apple and orange and whatever the fuck else the manufacturers decide to throw in to create their concoctions. Why can’t I get just plain orange juice or plain apple juice or plain cranberry juice?

If I wanted orange juice with apples and other fruits, I’d mix the fucking thing myself. I mean who the hell would prefer a blend, rather than the pure unadulterated thing? Am I the only person who thinks that these blends are a scam by the manufacturers who use terms like “pure” and “100%” to mislead customers? Are customers even aware that they’re being scammed?

Perhaps I’ve got it all totally wrong and the manufacturers have conducted market research that indicates that people like the mixed up shit. Am I?

And while we’re still discussing the issue, why, oh why are all the bottles of 100% blended juice always so fucking sticky? I remember a dairy company that delivered pure 100% orange juice [only] to my door when I was a kid, and the bottles were never sticky. Is it that the manufacturers these days not only care so little about quality, they couldn’t bother to package the crap they’re selling in a presentable manner too?

Oh, the disdain…

What Freedom of Speech Means to Christopher Hitchens

From Vanity Fair article

Whatever your feelings about the robust atheist beliefs of Christopher Hitchens, you will eventually admit that he was a marvellous orator, and an incredibly good writer too.

So it’s rather sad that he is currently fighting cancer, which is now laying claim to his vocal chords as well. However his mind is as strong as ever and it’s unlikely that the dastardly disease will make any inroads there.

It’s therefore a pleasure to be able to continue reading his work, the most recent of which is an article in Vanity Fair where he shares some thoughts on the loss of his voice and what it means to him. It begins so:

Like so many of life’s varieties of experience, the novelty of a diagnosis of malignant cancer has a tendency to wear off. The thing begins to pall, even to become banal. One can become quite used to the specter of the eternal Footman, like some lethal old bore lurking in the hallway at the end of the evening, hoping for the chance to have a word. And I don’t so much object to his holding my coat in that marked manner, as if mutely reminding me that it’s time to be on my way. No, it’s the snickering that gets me down.

Catch the rest of his thoughts here:

Christopher Hitchens: Unspoken Truths Culture: vanityfair.com.

It’s arrogant and reckless to think that prayer will cure cancer…or anything else for that matter

I received another one of those deceptively cute e-mails today from someone who I don’t think is a Christian. The contents are what you’d expect from a fundie.

However, I know this person and she’s definitely no fundie; maybe just another innocent believer who is a tad lazy to employ some reasoning skills. And also becoming an unwitting spammer.

So here’s the contents of the mail:

Friday is world cancer day – I’d appreciate it if you will forward this request 

♥ 93% won’t forward 

A small request.. Just one line. 

Dear God, I pray for a cure for cancer.  Amen

[Image of candle removed]

All you are asked to do is keep this circulating, even if it’s only to one more person. 
In memory of anyone you know who has been struck down by cancer or is still living with it.

A Candle Loses Nothing by Lighting Another Candle.. 

Please Keep This Candle Going

Okay, the first obvious problem with this mail is that World Cancer Day is on the 4th of February 2011, more than two weeks away; not this coming Friday as the impression is being created. I however don’t have any problem with that; it’s actually laudable to create awareness about this important day. What I do have a problem with is the call to prayer and the conceited suggestion that you will be only one of the mere 7% of people who are “good” and “give a shit about cancer.”

My second problem with this mail has to do with reasoning. Let’s assume that there is a god. Cancer has been around since the dawn of man. It’s just that its only been relatively recently diagnosed, not through divine revelation mind you, but through the hard work of scientists. Let’s also assume that god is responsible for creating everything and he [or she] has a divine plan, just like scripture [or the priesthood] tells us. Now wouldn’t it then also be logical to conclude that cancer was created by god and it’s part of his divine plan?

Wouldn’t it also then be arrogant, not to mention futile of man to pray for its eradication, seeing as it is a constituent of a bigger divine plan? Isn’t it reasonable to make these conclusions? And isn’t a divine plan supposed to be incontestable? As the late great George Carlin so eloquently reminded us:

What’s the use of being God if every run-down shmuck with a two-dollar prayerbook can come along and fuck up Your Plan?

Coming back to reality, the plain and honest truth is that prayer is not going to do any good in curing cancer; there is no evidence whatsoever that it does anything apart from making you feel like you can sit on your ass and magically command things to happen. Cancer is treatable when detected early and the chances are good that cancerous cells can be treated into remission. Ongoing research, however may one day lead scientists to discover how to switch cancerous cells off, so that they don’t divide and replicate.

This e-mail is dangerous in that it encourages both fundies and the ignorant to pray rather than seek medical help. Let’s be part of that ♥93% that employs our reasoning faculties.

Things looking slightly better on this World Aids Day

I heard on the radio this morning that SA’s abysmal AIDS statistics show an improvement from previous years. Apparently there has been an almost 500% improvement in people voluntarily taking the HIV tests since last year. And, according to statistics released by our Deputy President, 200 000 new people have been placed on ARV treatment, which includes about 20 000 pregnant women.

I know that these figures are anything but acceptable and we need much more improvement, but these figures point to the success of organizations who persistently fought our government’s blinkered policy of denialism.

Had a certain beetroot brandishing bitch still been our Health Minister, appallingly abetted by our former President, AIDS would have claimed much more victims in South Africa, than it has. Thankfully that useless Minister of Health ruined her liver and is now resident in the whisky section of that big Liquor Warehouse in the sky, and our former pontificating President has been booted out, perhaps to join her soon in the tobacco section.

Hopefully, our incumbent President will spare some time off from making an ass of himself, to support further efforts to eradicate this dreadful pandemic.

Some thoughts on the death of my father

Its been just over a week since my father passed away after a protracted illness. Now that the business of laying him to rest, and the memorial service has been concluded, I finally have a chance to pen some thoughts about the experience, which I admit does not make for particularly pleasant reading.

During my years at school, I read a wonderful quip by someone, which goes something like “Death is a dreary, dull affair, and my advice to you is to have nothing whatsoever to do with it.” Brilliant, isn’t it? Until it comes calling at your door, off course! And now it was my turn to deal with it.

My father had been quite ill for many years. In the last year or so, his dialysis sessions were increased to three times a week, but his condition steadily declined. His death was not unexpected; however it was delayed by his tenacious will to live, quite evidently through a lot of pain. The painful expression that was almost permanently etched on his face, still dog my mind. Amazingly however, he insisted on functioning normally and doing the things that were of quintessence right to the end.

This situation posed a few questions which I tried to analyze for a time, even just prior to his death, but I could come to no real conclusions. The natural evolutionary tendency for humans is to try to survive, even if the body is in revolt. But is it desirable for a person to endure pain and suffering , especially when afflicted with a terminal illness, as in the case of my father? And while its natural for family and friends to hope for someone who is ill, to hang on for as long as possible, is it not somewhat selfish in the case of terminal illness. Is it not possible that our wish for longevity, could place pressure on terminally ill people to force themselves to live a little longer, usually under tremendous pain? And off course, watching someone waste away in pain, is extremely distressing for family and friends; not to mention the burden that care-giving places on them. A vicious cycle indeed!

I received news of him being admitted to hospital about a week before his actual passing on. With the above thoughts playing out in my mind, I delayed traveling down to Durban from Johannesburg, secretly, irrationally hoping that he would pull out of this latest setback, like he had done so many times before. On the advice from my brother that the prognosis did not look very good this time, I finally decided to make the 600 kilometer trip. Again, with irrational hope, I packed just a few jeans and t-shirts, thinking that somehow he would surprise us once again, and I would be happily back on my way to Johannesburg in a few days.

I didn’t get to see him alive one last time. He passed away while I was in transit…

I remember arriving in Durban to the smell of fireworks, and receiving the news from my tearful mother. Strangely I felt no immediate grief. I was actually relieved. Is that wrong? Does being relieved when death ends pain and suffering, constitute immoral behaviour? I should certainly think not. Yes, I’m sad, but I’m happy too, for the end of my father’s pain, and just as importantly, the end of the anguish endured by his family.

The funeral did pose a moral dilemma for me, being the eldest child. I agonized for a little while over participating in the elaborate Hindu funeral rituals, but realized that supporting the family in a time of bereavement was more important than my secular principles. Although I did not participate fully in all the prayer rituals, I did ensure that I gave them my full support and was present throughout. And, the arrival of my father’s only surviving brother from Canada, did relieve some of pressure off me. At times my rational self did get the better of me when I questioned the logic of some of the religious practices, but I relented soon enough.

I volunteered to pay tribute to my father at a memorial service held yesterday, and I managed to write down a few thoughts, but quickly had to scupper that when my sister, suspecting that I would use the opportunity to speak about my religious and political beliefs, asked me politely to refrain from turning the eulogy into a lecture. I had to resort to winging it, and I suppose I did a fairly decent job, since no one in the largely conservative, religious audience, had a heart attack.

For me, life goes on. I just hope that the rest of the family can put this tragic episode behind them fairly quickly and live their lives normally again.