Recipes: Peanut Biscuit - Impossible Pie - Sour Cream Cake

Peanut Biscuits (remember tell people in case if allergy)
1/4 lb butter
1 cup s/r flour
half cup chopped peanuts
3/4 cup brown sugar
mix dry ingredients
melt butter mix all together
place in a flat tray & cut when you take out the oven. Leave in tray to
harden.
Cook in a moderate oven until light golden brown, a little darker than
when raw.
----------
Impossible Pie
3 eggs
1 cup milk
half cup s/r flour
1/4 cup melted butter.
Mix with fork and pour into pie dish.
dice any of the following -
bacon, mushrooms,salami, fish or salmon, corn, tomato etc,. throw into
pie dish. sprinkle 1 cup grated cheese on top. bake in moderately hot
oven till cooked.

----------------------------
Sour Cream Cake
6 oz melted & cooled butter.
1 1/2 cups s/r flour
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
1 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
3 eggs
mix with spoon
300 mls sour cream
dob sour cream on top
place in lined tin 160 Celsius 1 hour.
sprinkle with icing sugar
Also nice in winter served hot as a dessert or cooled as cake.

Farewell: Jean Simmons aged 80

British actress Jean Simmons dies aged 80 - Telegraph
One of the truly greats. And one of those who helped make the Great British films of the post WW2 time.

Full list of films see Jean Simmons (IMDB)

I'll focus on just some from the wonderful early ones

Great Expectations (1946) the young Estella and then years later Miss Havisham "Great Expectations" (1989)

Black Narcissus (1947) the cheeky village girl - a film so full of life and light and colour - one of my favourite films. And amazingly it was all filmed in a English studio - no visits to mountains at all. Only last week I saw Kathleen Byron who played the "mad" nun in a Midsomer Murders of course she did it - Kathleen died January 2009

and a minor role Caesar and Cleopatra (1945) but a film of light and colour too - was it then she met Stewart Granger whom she married in 1950

Hamlet (1948) Ophelia to Laurence Olivier - ah what a dark brooding story

and of course The Robe (1953) and Spartacus (1960)

a film I always like for whimsical humour The Grass Is Greener (1960) and with Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr who of course was the star of Black Narcissus

This with Dirk Bogarde where her brother and his hotel room disappear So Long at the Fair (1950)








Bless you Jean for giving so much enjoyment

Farewell: Donald Pickering

Donald Pickering 76 - Telegraph

Donald had this wonderful upper crust voice. He could so easily put down a pushy yob. I always enjoyed his polished performances  

Lockerbie bomber

If it was mistake for Blair to considering releasing him then why did Salmond eventually release him??


Lockerbie deal a mistake - Scottish leader | The Daily Telegraph

SCOTTISH leader Alex Salmond attacked the UK Government for having tried to include the Lockerbie bomber in a prisoner-transfer deal with Libya before his eventual release.

Mr Salmond - whose administration drew fierce criticism for releasing Abdelbaset Ali Mohmet al-Megrahi on humanitarian grounds last year - said the attempted deal by then-prime minister Tony Blair's Government was a "mistake" during a Parliamentary hearing in London.

"It was a mistake because it raised an expectation by the Libyan government that Megrahi would be included in such a prisoner transfer," Salmond said, referring to negotiations on a deal which was eventually sealed in 2008.

"It was a mistake because it cut across the due process of Scots law, because one of the provisions of prisoner transfer is that legal proceedings would have to come to an end.

Farewell: Richard Todd aged 90

Richard Todd - Telegraph

Richard was one of my favourite actors from way back. I remember his touching performance in "The Hasty Heart", a sad but warm film. He was so good. In most of his films he was an action man. Of course Guy Gibson in "the Dam Busters".


And so many other roles - Robin Hood and Rob Roy were him at his dashing best.
The Telegraph article is a good tribute and the comments also.
They mention how he really was an action man, one of the paratroopers landing on D-Day and in the film he played his own commanding officer and in one scene is talking to another actor playing Richard himself.

Strange Day 23 Sep 2009

Dust Turns Sydney Sky Red | Blankets City| Sydneysiders| Weather | Warning | Never seen before

I woke up and could not believe the colour of the sky.
I have been in Seoul with sand clouds from China came across
Only thing I've seen like it Sydney was the Blue Mountain bush fire decades again and burnt leaves etc fell out of the sky
2 days later Aussie dust lands in New Zealand | The Daily Telegraph



Has Bill Clinton lost the plot
Rudd smartest guy in room, says Clinton | The Daily Telegraph

Mr Clinton said."He then proceeded to describe in excruciating detail George Washington's strategy to hold New York in the revolutionary war."
Really Bill!! Kevin knowing in detail how George help NY - I can talk on Custers last stand and other historical events

Bill of Rights - not needed in Australia

Death knell for democracy if wigs get the gig: Howard

A BILL of rights would erode Australia's democracy, diminish the reputation and accountability of Parliament, politicise the judiciary and represent the ''final triumph of elitism in Australian politics'', the former prime minister John Howard said last night.

Delivering the annual Menzies Lecture at the University of Western Australia, Mr Howard campaigned against ceding power from elected individuals to the non-elected judiciary.

The Rudd Government is exploring whether to introduce a bill of rights. In December, it commissioned a committee chaired by Father Frank Brennan to gauge public opinion on how best to achieve greater protection of rights. It is due to report to the Government on September 30.

-----------

My study of law and history convinces me that our Common Law provides our freedoms. Why do we need new laws and why would we put it under control of non elected officials.

PM's Blog | Prime Minister of Australia - Not a Joke this is real

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I have done it too as ronlankshear

I am trying to understand what is going with China.
I thought Kevin "knew" how to talk to the Chinese
China | Beijing | Stern Hu | Kevin Rudd and China diplomacy

At least the article gives some idea of Why

"The Shanghai State Security Bureau has accused Mr Hu of causing economic losses to China by bribing steel executives and stealing state secrets.

Chinese media have raised an array of allegations, including that Rio Tinto may have bribed all of China's top 16 steel mills, but analysts are wary about the veracity of any of the reports.

No evidence has been presented, and the Australian Government, Rio Tinto and Mr Hu's family have been given no information beyond the scant details given at a Ministry of Foreign Ministry news conference a week ago and a brief statement on a Chinese website.

Australian officials speculate that the Chinese action is an attempt to unify iron ore buyers and maximise China's bargaining strength in contract negotiations with the iron ore miners, Rio Tinto, BHP Billiton and Vale.

Mr Qin said that foreign firms should display business ethics when operating in China. "A man with noble characteristics who loves money should make it by honourable means."

Stringybark Creek - Ned Kelly - robber or terrorist or was he really a heroic freedom fighter

Last week ABC TV aired Tony Robinson's archaeology visit to Glenrowan and his amusing review of Ned Kelly.
One over the top enthusiast persisted that Ned was some kind of Irish freedom fighter and that a whole army of "revolutioners" were in the other pub at Glen Rowan waiting for the declaration of independence.  When the police arrived Ned went off we were told to tell them to stand down. A very strange revolution.

We were told the old story of Ned being brutalised by the system and that was why he took to robbery and he was only defending himself against the brutal police.
That he was a Robin Hood character - (Tony did tell us that he robbed the poor as well as rich).
It was sad in the show to watch the policemen who was interviewed at the Stringybark Creek memorial having to listen to this nonsense of an heroic Ned

An article today reveals some police documents for the time
The Kelly hunters: dispatch challenges bushranger myth
including the brutal slaying of the police at Stringybark Creek. That 82% of police were Irish anyway.

Windows: File Search Engine - absolutely FAST

Everything Search Engine

Farewell: Natasha Richardson

So sad Natasha Richardson has died after a skiing accident.
What a loss to British acting.

My heart goes out to one of my really favourite actors her husband Liam Neeson
her father the brilliant director Tony Richardson  and her mother the absolutely great Vanessa Redgrave
whom I saw only recently in a very beautiful film Atonement (2007)

Natasha was born 1963 and I learnt from imdb that I first saw her as  flower girl
in her father's The Charge of the Light Brigade (1968)

Strange as the first time I remember seeing Vanessa was just 2 years before in the incredibly brilliant
A Man for All Seasons in (1966) and also the very cool Blowup (1966)

Restaurants in Epping and Sydney

Eatability web site has customer reviews on restaurants around the country

also with maps and you can add a review

Link is for Epping cafes

Rustys coffee at the station is top

and the Thai in North Epping is next

Epping Restaurants

Cornerstone was at Eastwood but both Friday and Sunday are at George/Ryde Streets Epping

So Friday night and Sunday 10am are at Cornerstone corner Ryde and George Streets Epping we were at Eastwood for some time

Danger! Robot of Lost in Space dies: Farewell Bob May

Danger! Robot of Lost in Space dies - World - smh.com.au

LOS ANGELES: Bob May, who won a cult following as the Robot in the hit 1960s television show Lost In Space, has died of heart failure. He was 69.

May died at a hospital in Lancaster, California, said his daughter, Deborah.

May's entertainment career spanned more than 65 years. He was already a show business veteran who had worked as an actor and stuntman in movies, TV shows and on the vaudeville stage when he was tapped by Lost In Space creator Irwin Allen to play the Robinson family's loyal metal sidekick in the hit series that debuted in 1965.

"He always said he got the job because he fitted in the robot suit," said June Lockhart, who played the family matriarch Maureen Robinson.

Although May didn't provide the robot's distinctive voice (that was done by announcer Dick Tufeld), he had a devoted following of fans.

Lost In Space was a space-age retelling of the Swiss Family Robinson story.

Survivors include his wife of 48 years, Judith, two children and four grandchildren.

Brilliant ideas - Hearing Aids etc

Well I love my hearing aids and just this week I went and had new inserts
Inserts are the plastic tube from ear mould to the actual behind the ear aid. The plastic gets hard and dirty and you start to say "WHAT". new inserts and all is clear again. Around $40 and I am hearing well again.

Mine are Savia from Phonak hearing systems - Products
I purchased mine from Beth and Greg and the others at M.A.C. Audiology Service are fantastic. Park in Eastwood medical centre and they are first building on left

Then from a brochure MAC had - I tripped to Printacall Doig Avenue Eastwood
and for $124 Geemarc CL iLoop

It has phono plug which fits iPod - headset sockets etc etc. But the loop around my nect. Press buttons on my Hearing Aid for T Loop and wow the sound goes straight into my ears and LOUD. I can hear old movies and the rest of them can carry on chatting. If I turn on T Loop in both ears I cannot hear anything else

Funny sticky label on packing says contact
Oricom - Cordless & Corded Phone, VoIP Internet IP USB Phone, Motorola, Conference Phones, Two Way Radio
but not shown in their products - but it is at Geemarc Telecom I suppose repairs and it is Oricom

I bought the one which needs a phono cable from headphone socket to headset - this needs long cables so I can sit on lounge. I think there is a wireless version

Brilliant Ideas

Lifehacker has some good stuff not just technical but lifestyle

see this one - when we lost a bag in NZ it was hard to describe and they give you a form with shapes.
being able to show a photo on phone of camera will be a great help.


Use Your Camera Phone To Document Suitcase and Contents - Lifehacker Australia


and don't forget when parking at shopping centres take a photo of floor sign just in case

This is site Lifehacker was linking to

Cell Phone Camera Tip: Snap Your Suitcase Contents Pre-Flight | cell phone

I also like this - photo appointment cards
Geek Tip: Keep Track of Appointments With Your Cell Phone's Camera

And David likes Videojug for "How to Do's" here is their luggage Luggage (Travel: Luggage)

A Film called Australia

We have just seen the Nicole Kidman epic Australia (2008)

Warning you are in the cinema over 3 hours - watch the parking hours - due to be 3 hours soon at Macquarie

This has an interesting opening paragraph

WHO WE ARE: Does accuracy matter? | Who We Are | Sun Herald Blogs

You'll feel like walking out of the cinema several times during the first 40 minutes of Australia, but try to stick it out. At first you suspect Baz Luhrmann and Nicole Kidman are having a huge lend of us, but as it proceeds, Australia becomes less like a parody. There are plenty of moments when you cringe in embarrassment at the clunky script, the hammy acting and the cheesy effects, but they are eventually outnumbered by moments that are quite engaging.

All That is so true. Especially within 10 minutes or so I was feeling like walking out. It seems like an animated film with real people. Funny camera angles - distorted features - very loud noises - very quirky camera tracking - camera seems to be hand held - ghastly. (Right through the film I thought the colours used were strange. It all seems so artificial. )

Then suddenly it slows down and actors can act and we see scenes instead of flashing around all over the place.

Best "joke" in this part of film: Lady Ashley looking out of side of truck sees Kangaroos bouncing along. "oh how lovely". BANG and blood running down windscreen. Shot Roo on roof of cab. You've got to be quick. The world i.e. England thinks Roo's are romantic - in Australia they are meat - a lot for sale in butchers nowadays not just pet shops.

Second best "joke": The film implies it is in tribute to "the Stolen Generations" - is it? - well just because it centres around a boy that the NT police want to take into care it might appear to be but the essence is the romance between Lady Ashley and Drover. Rabbit-Proof Fence (2002) was much more into the Stolen generation. "Australia" seems to imply that the Stolen generation was only up in the Northern Territory. End of film has text that acknowledges some law change in NT in 1973 and Kevin saying Sorry in early 2008. What about the Australian referendum, 1967 (Aboriginals) that changed all Australia. I came here in 1966 and I was amazed that such a law change was needed. Most Australians were also appalled and the referendum was easily passed. It was good to see people celebrating the WIN on the 40th anniversary in 2007. "Australia" the movie did not mention 1967.

Much has been said about Nicole in the film. I thought she did well - the English lady coming to like the outback was well done. Her accent has been described as over the top - I thought it was hardly enough - a 1939 Lady Ashley would have had a much more upper crust accent. This film is most more entertaining than Cold Mountain (2003) in which I thought Nicole was mundane and Renée Zellweger was brilliant.

Jackman well he handles the part of Drover ok - just playing himself. Sort of part Bryan Brown would have played but I suppose 2o years too old. Instead Bryan is King Carney the cattle King I was never sure if he was really bad or was it just David Wenham who plays the ultimate villain Neil Fletcher very well. Did Northern Territorians strut around with big bottles of beer clamped to their lips. I thought they drank seven ounce glasses. Plot to me was confusing about whether King Carney had ordered the murders that Fletcher performed.

The aborigine actors were very good. King George was excellent ( David Gulpilil was also in Rabbit-Proof Fence. )

The climax is the Japanese bombing of Darwin. The film did show the panic afterwards with the military grabbing every vehicle so they could get out. Read about the Adelaide River stampede here The Battle for Australia - Australia under attack
and the damage shown in Darwin appears to be what happened

The strange thing was the gun fight with Japanese who land on "Mission Island" which WHO WE ARE blog says refers to Japanes Air Raid on Bathurst Island on 19 February 1942.
So the Japanese soldiers on the Island was a film invention - why lie about history. Reading about Bathurst and Melville I think the movie has invented their Mission Island just for the climatic finale.

Our friend Janene remarked on how fake the ships are in Darwin harbour. They sure do look strange -like distorted "paintings". Is everything digital nowadays. Models might have been better. What was all the money spent on?

Some good scenery - the cattle stampede is dramatic - was the gorge "real" or another digital creation.
I think you see the North better in Crocodile Dundee

The film is really bringing in the cash
Baz Luhrmann cashes in on epic movie Australia | The Daily Telegraph
inference seems to be that is in Australia but overseas hmmmmmmmmm


Now for a long read on how bad this film really is try Germaine Greer: Strictly fanciful
Germaine has major concerns about the future child who plays the young boy

A Partridge in a pear tree and Christmas Trees

One of the stories that emerges in email every Christmas is 

"From 1558 until 1829, Roman Catholics in England were not permitted to practice their faith openly. Someone during that era wrote this carol as a catechism song for young Catholics.  It has two levels of meaning: the surface meaning plus a hidden meaning known only to members of their church. Each element in the carol has a code word for a religious reality which the children could remember.  -The partridge in a pear tree was Jesus Christ."  

Whilst I think is that there is some truth in that story regarding the Christian meaning behind the song but the implication that it emerged as a tool for the Roman Catholic "underground" church is nonsense. They may well have sung the song but I think Protestants would have as well.  These two sites discuss some aspects of the song in detail  

The Twelve Days of Christmas

On the First Day of Christmas

The French for partridge is "perdrix" which is pronounced "pear dree". So the song is French or even comes from Greek. So it appears to have been around for a long time and in transferring between languages to have been become slightly confused.

I learnt the song when I was a kid and it was/is very popular at Christmas in England.

Now why would the English have so much love for a song that was used by Catholics in secret.

Nothing about it is particularly Catholic - I do not see the Pope or Mary mentioned - the principles it expounds appear to be Protestant beliefs. Perhaps it is really a Protestant song enforcing their Faith.

------------------

Also I am amazed at the "veneration" Christians give to the Christmas Tree.
Here is Wiki on possible pagan origins for the European usage of the Tree
Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Now I like Christmas Trees but are they really anything to do with Jesus. Just part of our cultural traditions. Of course now they mean Christmas and so it brings people around to thoughts of the Lord so that is good.

I do like Christmas. Total strangers will say "Merry Christmas". My brain tells me that 25 December is not when Jesus was born BUT my heart says He would love the Love that appears at this time of the year. The reason for the season.

BOILED CHOCOLATE CAKE with CHOCOLATE BUTTER ICING

BOILED CHOCOLATE CAKE
2 Cups water
2.5 Cups sugar
1 Cup butter
4 Tablespoons cocoa
1 Level teaspoon bicarb/soda

Boil all the above for 5 minutes in large saucepan.
Allow to cool, then:-

ADD
3 Cups self raising flour
4 Beaten eggs
Mix well, pour into 31 x 25 cm. baking dish lined
with alfoil.
Bake 350 - 400 degrees fahrenheit for
35 - 40 minutes or until cooked.
Ice with chocolate icing

CHOCOLATE BUTTER ICING
4.5 oz. icing sugar
1 tbsp. melted butter
1 tbsp. cocoa
2 tbsps. milk
1/2 tsp. vanilla essence

Put the icing sugar, cocoa, vanilla, and butter in a
mixing bowl.
Gradually add the milk, and stir
until the mixture is smooth and creamy.

Sweeney Todd: The Real Story of the Demon Barber of Fleet Street

I just read
Peter Haining - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
book on Sweeney

I just do not know when I first heard of Sweeney Todd. There was also Maria Marten and the Red Barn. Melodramas from Victorian times that were supposed to be fact!
I am sure my parents would have understood Sweeney to be real. The famous police force the Scotland Yard Flying Squad is known as the Sweeney. Todd rhymes with Squad. In London rhyming slang you drop the rhyming word. Aussies says Captain Cook for a "look" Londoners say Butcher's (hook assumed).

I was never sure when Sweeney was supposed to have been running his barber shop - I supposed early 19th century. Well Peter tells me 1785. And that he was born 1756 and has a complete life story leading up to the murders and how the Bow Street runners responding to complaints about foul smells from St Dunstan's investigate and find out it is due to all the all the bodies.
Peter has a number killed like 160 - due to all the clothes found. But Sweeney is only charged with killing someone called Thornhill. And in the trial a doctor identifies Thornhill's bone - due to some breakage that the doctor treated and the way it has healed. The whole case against Sweeney in Peter's "research" sounds very vague and it sounds like a good defence would have squashed it.

Trouble is Peter never gives sources for his findings. Except he quotes a paragraph or so found in material from a Broadway play in 1940s. Hardly an actual source.

Peter starts the book with a coverage of legends from Middle Ages time frame about "demon barbers" and human flesh eating murderers - some in France and one called Swaney Bane in Scotland. How strange that Peter tells us the story is a legend and then treats the 1785 events as genuine history.

Wiki article is quite clear Sweeney was fiction

Sweeney Todd - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia  I just checked the 17/19th century newspapers at Australia National Library eResources - List item and not hit on Sweeney until 1852 when Llyod's weekly has the "string of pearls" story as a serial. Which Peter tells about in his book. He has an excellent coverage of Penny Dreadful writers and all the books and plays about Sweeney.  Peter Haining - Wikipedia whilst disparaging his work on Sweeney does acknowledge his research into literature and Sherlock Holmes.   Very strange that he should produce a book with so much research and resource quotes. without any resources for the his main story the actual existence of Sweeney  Todd.