Ellipsis Weekend Cooking... Ice Cream!

 

One-Ingredient Banana Ice Cream NYT - Recipe

"Never ask a woman, eating ice cream straight out of the carton, how she's doing."
~Unknown'

We are quickly approaching the midpoint of summer. This year it falls on August 6th. So, it's time to brush up on some ice cream recipes. I have a wonderful Cuisinart Ice Cream and yogurt maker, that I bought in the mid 90's, and it's still going strong! We have made some unique, and really delicious flavors. I have a Ben and Jerry's ice cream cookbook, and the cantaloup and chocolate mint flavors always come out perfect! I have tried most of their recipes, so I want to movie on to recipes I haven't thought of trying, and of course, New York Times Cooking does provide! Here is a link to a model similar to mine. I am fairly sure my 30 year old one has been retired. If you don't have your own ice cream machine, I recommend Cuisinart. But full disclosure, Cuisinart is my go to for most of my small product machines.

Don't these recipes for ice cream and sorbet sound delicious?

Mango Soft Serve - NYT - Recipe

Melon-Mint Sorbet - NYT - Recipe

Peach Ice Cream - NYT - Recipe

Summer Berry Ice Cream - NYT - Recipe

Mmmmmmmmm!

The Lies They Told Us

 

The Monkees

Season: 1 Episode: 19

Find The Monkees

🎵 "I have no more than I did before, but now I've got all that I need,

 for I love you I know that you love me." 🎵

Papa Gene's Blues

Written by, Michael Nesmith

The Monkees

Now there's a disease called, Cyclospora, which is making it's way around. It's a parasite found in fresh vegetables. The main symptom is "exploding diarrhea." And what did Trump do? Well, just like in 2016, earlier this year Trump cut surveillance for this specific parasite! It looks like we may have the makings of another Corvid-19 situation, but I sure hope not. I am going to do a deep dive on this, and see what I can find. God, we are the richest country in the world, and we can't even keep our own people safe, and able to eat fresh fruits and vegetables. This just didn't happen when I was a kid, at least not that I can remember. The first major outbreak of something like this was, Legionnaires Disease, in the mid-1970's. There were mistakes made then as well, but at least the lessons learned helped to keep us safe going forward. So, what will we have learned from this? That remains to be seen, but without the proper people to monitor it, things feel quite dark. Sometimes I wish I could go back to my childhood, spend a day happy, believing I had my whole like ahead of me, and everything would live up to the lies they all told us. You can't go home again, but you can spend a little time living in the daydream that made you happy. My happy place, when I was very little, was watching, The Monkees, with my sister. Star Trek, too, as well as the, Wild, Wild, and That Girl! Gosh, there was so much to look forward to.

That Girl

Season 1, Episode 5

Anatomy Of A Blunder

Iceberg Lettuce From Taylor Farms, Sold at Taco Bell Linked to Cyclospora Outbreak - CNN

Trump Baby Whine Crying... IT'S NOT FAIR!

"There is nothing so unattractive as a whiny person. We can have empathy for a person in deep emotional pain. But a whiny person who gets overwhelmed with perceived unfairness and like a two-year-old child who did not get his or her way, well, it can be difficult to relate to that person."

~Gary Rohrmayer

21 Dangerous: 21 Day Transformational Pray Guide

Okay, Trump will deliver his big fancy speech tonight, and I am not ready for his stupidity, but whether or not I like it, it's coming. Putting all things in perspective, he can say he's going to do something, but that doesn't mean he will be able to do it. Like declaring California primaries null and void, or imposing restrictions on the use of mail=in ballots. The law is quite clear that the Federal government can't stick it's nose into how the states run their elections, if he tries, there will more than likely be lawsuits. Also, Gavin Newsome has prepared for this that kind of nonsense. When it comes to Trump possibly declaring that the 2020 election was rigged, it wasn't, Joe Biden won, it's simply a continuation of his usual boring whine. IT'S NOT FAIR! Of course, there is the possibility that all he will just come to say that he is backing, Mike Lindell, the pillow guy, for governor of Minnesota. See, he did that yesterday, but Trump does seem to prattle on when he thinks he's been clever! Nah, Trump won't share the limelight with anyone, he's the big boy! I mean, he's the man who couldn't even allow America to be the star of the 250th year of signing of the Declaration of Independence! What a sad child he is.

Well, we will see what happens next.

Going Off Script

Senator Raphael Warnock and Senator Jon Ossoff

"Democrats care about what's fair and true.

 Republicans care only about winning,

 no matter how much the have to lie and cheat."

~Oliver Marcus Malloy

Inside The Mind Of An Introvert: Comics, Deep Thoughts and Quotable Quotes

Ugh. Blech. On Thursday night, Trump will deliver a primetime speech, which has all the possibilities of being one of his most terrifying moments our country has faced. I am already stressed out. Will he end free and fair elections in his speech? Will he declare Martial Law? Will he unseat the two senators from, Georgia? Is he panicking? Will he simply deliver his usual long string of  unhinged, repetitive, whiny nonsense? Or has his Acting Attorney General, Todd Blanche, provided him with fake evidence that brings all of their favorite election interference conspiracy theories to life? Who knows what he will say, he almost always goes off script.

What do we do if he declares the 2020 Georgia election results invalid?

 What happens then?

I am terrified about so many things. Todd Blanche has a confirmation hearing later today and I have a little hope that he won't be confirmed, but at this point I hate dealing in hope. I will be watching it. It starts in a little 3 hours from now. At least I hope I will be awake. It's my plan to be awake. Sigh. I mean who can sleep? I still have so many questions just ruminating through my mind. Trump needs to be impeached and removed from office for obvious reasons. The only hope we have of that is the upcoming election, when we can take the house and senate.

Growing up I didn't have any idea that this would be what my life would be at 64. I knew physical pain came with growing older, but I never knew that I would be facing the stress of my own country becoming an authoritarian nation, led by puny tin pot dictator. On my wedding day, when hubby and I looked into the future, all we could see was incredible happiness. We were blind on love and hope. Life was shiny and happy for a long time. Then we lived through our share of tragedies, as most folks do in the course of a lifetime, but the last 10 years, better know as the era of Trump, has been among the worst of our life, for so many reasons. 

So yes, I am stressed.

But his speech isn't until tomorrow night. Let's get through today, shall we?

I hope Todd Blanche isn't confirmed.

Ellipsis Movie Of The Week... The Beanie Bubble

 

"Ty would tell you he did it all.

 Which is as crazy as believing stuffed animals are gold."

~Robbie (Elizabeth Banks)

The Beanie Bubble

Did you collect Beanie Babies? I did, kinda. How can one "kinda" collect something? Well, here's the thing, I bought them mostly for my niece, and for my mother. In my niece's case, it was an incentive to keep getting those A's, but with my mother, well, she was in the early stages of Alzheimer's, and she liked having the little animals around. Her cats enjoyed them too. Now, about me, I have always loved stuffed animals, my insane collection goes all the way back to a stuffed turtle my brother sent me from Viet Nam. It was a green and lite blue turtle about 14 inches wide, and it remained on my bed until I got married. I eventually placed my friend, Timmy, in my cedar chest where he remains to this day.

But this movie isn't about sentimental collecting of adorable stuffed animals. This movie isn't really about the toys or the crazed customers who bought them, The movie is about the business of building a company, which sold fairly cheap little toys to mostly crazy ladies, and which carried a corporate crazy all it's own.  Inspired by true events, we get to see the manipulations and backstabbing that built the brand, Ty. So, pop some popcorn, sit back, cuddle your favorite Beanie Baby, and enjoy the ride.

Personally, my favorite Beanie Baby was the Princess Diana bear, sigh, which I haven't seen in years. If you were lucky enough to find the bear with the misspellings, well, there's one going for $50,000 on eBay. I wasn't that lucky, I got the reissued one, but I loved her all the same.

A little music from the era...

If It Makes You Happy

Sheryl Crow - 1996

Could It Be, Satan? Nah, It's Just AI Tyler

 

AI should be judged not by what it replaces, but by the new human capabilities it enables."

~Tom Golway

Amplifying Human Experience Enabling Gain-Of-Function via AI

As I have mentioned before, my new phone is a lot of fun, and it is actually inspiring me to do more with my photographs, even if it's with some of my older photos! Yesterday, I was pretty much in bed all day with a migraine, and photography was not an option, but by the evening I was feeling better, so I did a few new photos of Tyler, and played around with converting some July 4th photos into AI beauties. AI photoshopping will never replace taking and editing my own digital photos, but it's kinda nice to see my photos in a new light. And that cute image above is definitely an accurate depiction of my beautiful pink eared cat, my gorgeous sweet Tyler! I am not sure how I feel about AI in general, I mean I know it will do some damage, and these data centers certainly border on evil. I just know that those centers were born of a musing of Satan, but playing with AI for fun, or to find information quickly is a good thing, I think. I love my cats, and imagining them in a new light is one way I try to help myself out of this depression I have been feeling. And it was fun to ask Alexa the other day, if Simon can have Brussels sprouts. He loves them so much. So, in that respect, thank you AI, now behave yourself!

And The Mighty Simon

Weird, Right?

 

"Don't think of it as dying, said Death.

 Just think of it as leaving early to avoid the rush."

~Terry Pratchett

Weird, right? It wasn't on my bingo card, but okay. I guess more details will come to light in the next few days, but for right now, 1:51 am PST, weird, right?