Black-eyed peas

Black-eyed peas
Originally uploaded by gopherpl.

This is a recipe I fooled around with till coming up with something basic but tasty. It's fresh-tasting and hearty and cheap and simple but still high-quality.

It takes:
One bag black-eyed peas
One onion
One pack bacon
One arbitrary amount of oil
Salt.

1. Chop up an onion and cook it in oil. After a couple of minutes add the bacon, already chopped up. Cook until the bacon could be safely eaten, but nothing beyond that (don't make it crispy).
2.In the meantime, put the peas in a pot of water, completely submerged, and boil. After boiling point is reached, let them boil for 10 minutes. Then drain thoroughly.
3. After taking them out of the water, put the peas in the pan that you've cooked the onion and bacon in, assuming the pan is large enough. Did anyone else notice how awful the referee was in the US-Italy game? That was bullshit. Anyway, pour new water on top until water covers the peas by about 1 cm.
4. Cover and cook on medium for about 1.5 hours. Salt to taste.

You can get about four good meals out of this.

Who Says Smoking Isn't Classy?

Who Says Smoking Isn't Classy?
Originally uploaded by gopherpl.

Seeing this woman probably isn't a good health idea. Last month I took a train to Göteburg to visit some friends and in the course of the visit drank coffee on the top floor of Gothenburg's tallest building, a good vantage point from which to view Norway's National Day parade. The coffee place had the typical Scandinavian style of architecture and general classiness, and this lady topped it off. Previously I'd slowly been disabused of the notion that smoking was cool. And then this harlet in a bun decides to look out a window in dim light while she has her cigarette.

A Glorious Collection of Statesman

Picture 180 (Small)
Originally uploaded by gopherpl.

One night in the depths of winters a friend, Nils (furthest one sitting to the left), graciously invited me to a party, or a meeting, of several of his friends. I went out of boredom and the meeting started inauspiciously. I did not know the subject of the meeting nor the passion that it would arouse, and I certainly did not know that I would be witnessing history unfolding. But soon the scales fell from my eyes and I realized I was party to the most glorious collection of statesmen assembled since the Founding Fathers, possibly the Greeks. Indeed, a new World of Warcraft guild was being formed, and I would be privy to the eloquent debates that would mold the framework of this guild. Though no artist's masterpiece could do justice to such a meeting, I realized history would damm me to internal infamy if I merely sat there without lifting my meager fingers to record something. So with my pencil and paper I have recorded the great convention of 2006 which formed the GnomeGrinders World of Warcraft guild.

Glorious Sweden triumphs

Sweden wins 1-0 against Paraguay, scoring only two minutes before regulation ends. Their last game was a 0-0 tie, so the goal was a nice tension reliever. Johnny blogged about the Bóltyzĉhyhlzvaka conversation earlier so as revenge here is the Sweden game conversation.

J: are you all going to overturn cars and set them on fire now?

P: Oh yeah! that was such a rush though for us when they scored.
i really love how in soccer there's just one big payoff in a 1-0 score
something like basketball is way too gradual.
before this i thought soccer was way too much to the other extreme, and then football as the perfect medium.
but this is good too

Today I ate 5 pieces of french toast and a pack of bacon. I'm a hero.


I liked this rant that I saw:

"'No instant gratification . . . I think that's why so many Americans have a problem with soccer."

So once again the fact that soccer isn't that popular in America is attributed to an alleged character defect. Couldn't possibly be a simple disinterest in the sport.

I rather like soccer. It's the holier-than-thou soccer fans that I find I don't care for.

Enjoy the game. But stop with the holier-than-thou crap already. Soccer is no more or less virtuous than any other athletic competition. Stop pretending like it is."

World Cup

A couple of quick observations on the World Cup...

It seems like half of the teams have German or Dutch coaches who look like mad scientists (white hair, white jacket, slight but intense scowl)
Even without knowing anything about football, you can get by on analysis fairly decently by assuming that many of the team's playing style and strategy comform to national or ethnic stereotypes.
The American fans actually seemed to know the lyrics to the American national anthem.
And the World Cup brings out some of the best commercials in Sweden. My favorite is for a Swedish television company that shows Germans in feather caps and short green shorts (basically an Ooter uniform from the Simpsons) dancing to a polka band. The narrator then says "There's many reasons not to visit Germany. Instead buy a Telia tv and enjoy the World Cup at home."