Key Lime Pie

In early December I was visiting with a customer and when it was suggested that we might have lunch Ted's Montana Grill was the place to go. Once we were seated I leaned over to the guy at the end of the table whos' firstname was Sherman (yes like the famous Union Army General that burned the city of Atlanta) and asked him what he was having to eat since he seemed excited to be there. He told me "Something and Key Lime Pie". Then I asked him what he recommends I try and he told me " you better have the Key Lime Pie or you will be sorry" even though I was more interested in something for a main dish. So much of the lunch conversation was about Key Lime pie and why I should eat it and love it. The scoop I received from Sherman is that the Key Lime Pie is not made at Ted's but at Kenny's Famous Key Lime Pies which is located in Smyrna Georgia. Sherman convinced everyone at the table that we all MUST have dessert and it MUST be Key Lime Pie. It was good in fact better then I ever remember since Key Lime Pie is not something I would actually order. So on small piece of paper Sherman drafted up a detailed map so I could stop by the factory to pick up a Key Lime Pie after leaving the resturant. Sherman not only knew the directions, he knew the actual address and he knew the phone number as he is certainly a Key Lime Pie connoseir. So I just felt compelled to stop by Kenny's to pick up a pie since I was actually in Symrna Georgia. When I arrived home I told Loraine that I had picked up a Key Lime Pie for dessert as my parents were arriving that evening and she said "Oh that's too bad since I do not like Key Lime Pie!". (that was news to me) Well we all had Key Lime Pie for dessert and yes I forced Loraine to have some before she went out to do some church business. Loraine returned quite late and I was working on the computer and she came in and asked if she could have another piece of Key Lime pie. My look let her know that I remembered she does not like Key Lime pie and she said " well I like Kenny's Key Lime Pie". So if you try Kenny's Key Lime Pie you will like it instantly. I went back two days later and that time I bought 4 pies. Today I went back again and this time I bought 7 pies.

Broken Identity

I broke my Georgia drivers license into 2 pieces in April 2006 when I tried to straighten it for a security guard in Memphis. I quickly asked for some tape and after joining the pieces I had a bendable license which has lasted for a very long time. Until November '07 I have used it for identification each time I board a plane or enter a secure facility which is really a lot of use. Most of the time the person that checks the bendable license says something like "I don't think this is valid" and/or "you need to get this replaced". My plan was to replace it when it expired in January '08 but in October the TSA implemented a new program for bendable licenses that meant a ticket flagged with the infamous " SSSS" that means this is somebody that needs to be checked throughly. At first it was just a more in depth check of my carry-on, then every time they checked for any bomb materials, next they added the blow test (where you stand in a phonebooth-like device and it blows air all over at the same time) and sensors check the exhaust for evidence of any foreign material and finally after two thorough pat-downs I have have been using my passport for identification.

Animal, Mineral or Vegetable?

Years ago we used to play a game while we traveled called "20 Questions" where the person with the clue would tell us if an object was a(n) Animal, Mineral or Vegetable and then we would see how few questions could be used in guessing the actual object. Good guessers can almost always determine what the object is without using all 20 questions. Now the reason why I thought of this was we have a weird thing happening in our kitchen and the object is Mineral or that is what one would think at first but since it seems alive it wants to be in the Animal camp. What takes place in our kitchen is the formica counter top has come alive or so it seems. About 6 months ago we woke up in the morning and the counter top had separated from the wooden surface and was all curled up on all edges. Loraine told me that it was just asking to be replaced by a granite surface but after a few weeks it was flat again and stuck to the wooden surface in the morning. We figured it has something to do with temperature and humidity but since it goes through this process continually we have no idea what the actual combination is to make it "curl" or to "lay down" but we do know granite is in our future sooner rather than later.

Oh so that's what it does!

After being frustrated with an electric hedge clipper for a few years (and cutting the cord at least once) because it is under powered and stalled on so many twigs we decided to invest in a gas powered model. I did some research and then we purchased an Echo (this is sounding like a Consumer Report again :-) for its reliability and power. When I attempted to assemble the clipper it mentioned installing the blade straightener but after looking at the component I thought since it was very thin like sheet metal it would do very little to actually straighten the blades which were made of much thicker material - so I left it in the box. Once the gas was mixed and loaded I fired up the new tool and began to trim all the little bushes that occupy our front yard and it worked like a dream. Gas trimmers are heavier then electric so quickly my arms began to get tired from the extra weight. I ended up swinging the blades to my left and as I did so I cut my pants in the middle of my left thigh, and what was underneath was cut cleanly as well and even though it is snug fitting my skin was not even pinched let alone cut which I find very interesting. After studying the blade straightener more closely I determined that it should have been called the leg protector as it protrudes about a 1/2 inch farther out then the actual blades. I now have installed the leg protector and have used the tool several more times without cutting any clothes or body parts.

Boy Oh Boy Oh Boy!!!

We recently had a third grandson born on September 13th to Lisa and Matt. His name is Ryan Matthew Calloway and he joins our two other grandsons Dahl Thomas and Ty Aaron Salmon. Lisa told Loraine that if we lived in a different city, or country, Loraine would be coming to spend a week or so at her home to help her out as a new mother, so that is basically what happened. Loraine enjoyed herself immensely, she especially liked how her memory seemed to come back and was able to recall many things that happened during her labours and deliveries and our children's first few months of life. Lisa hopefully you did not get to bored listening to Mom's rambles. Loraine was able to be in the delivery room and of the experience she said " It was just like watching The Discovery Channel - it was Awesome!"

Do you want everything on that?

For my Birthday in January Lisa bought me a Mandoline. My Sister Diane called me and she asked what I got for my birthday and when I told her I got a Mandoline – she said “ I didn’t know you played the Mandolin” and I told her that I use it for cooking and we both had a good laugh. I had a Mandoline (the cooking kind) for many years (bright Orange) that I bought from some guy in the basement of the Big-4 during the Calgary Stampede - on a special of course. You know the routine - some guy has a large microphone hiding his lips, he shreds a horde of vegetables while he tells a bunch of bad jokes, adds a little sauce, then everyone tastes it and a few suckers buy the shredder at the special Stampede price. It lasted a long time and it was always my favorite kitchen tool but it met an untimely death when someone put it in the dishwasher and it was not dishwasher safe. The new Mandoline was black with the option to make several thicknesses of condiments but in the initial testing of the new kitchen tool it failed miserably - on the TOMATO no less. It would not cut a firm tomato and we all wondered if it was made in China and we figured it probably had lead paint - it was made in China if you were wondering. I did not even attempt to cut carrots as that would have been impossible and probably would have involved a trip to the ER. So it was disposed of and we did not have a Mandoline for a while but after some research Lisa gave me a new Mandoline, the Zyliss. The Zyliss is Swiss made and works very well shredding both fruit and vegetables in several thicknesses - from .7 mm (1/32) to 7 mm (1/4). We have experimented long enough to know that the perfect onion is 1.5 mm as is the pickle and the perfect tomato is 3.0 mm.

VOIP (VoiceOverIP or VariousOpportunitiesforIllogicalProblems)

A little more then a year ago I decided that we were spending entirely too much money on communication costs each month. With a cell bill close to $300 and a land line at $75 I felt that it was time to venture into VOIP. Getting rid of the land line and going VOIP would be good since the main reason for the land line was long distance to Canada. After some research we decided to go with Sunrocket - not the biggest player but one that had a growing market share. The cost was less then $17 a month with unlimited calling within North America - I could even call all my friends in Mexico City whenever I wanted. Well Sunrocket sent us the Gizmo and within a few minutes we were up and running. Some times it was good, some times it was bad but never was it great. After a month we had the company fine tune the Gizmo for better performance and it was better but it was never great. I talked with other people that had VOIP service and asked if they had some of the same issues I was complaining about. Most said they did but for the price the pain was worth it. With that theory I would expect a lot more people to be driving Yugo's or Lada's. Since we changed our phone number and never told anybody our call volume went way down and telemarketers have left us alone which has been a great thing. Long distance to Canada was good one day and bad the next and some times the call just dropped for no apparent reason. Over the last year it gradually got better and was more and more reliable. Since they had my credit card on file they just charged another $200 about three weeks ago for the next year of service. Just a week later Loraine read in the online news that Sunrocket was going out of business. I called them and there was no answer but I did get an email a week later confirming that they were indeed going out of business. Well the phone continued to work and then we lost the ability to call Canada in the middle of week two and on week three inbound local calls would not work making that the most expensive month in my VOIP experience. We could still call out but it was time to do something. Well have we gone back to a land line? - of course not we are true VOIP users and have migrated to Vonage just in the last few days. Is the service great only time will tell? - well lets just say the Yugo is polished up and ready to go.

Flowers?

Loraine wanted me to take some pictures of the day lilies in our yard as this summer they are lasting more than a day (usually they last about 10 days). Well first I need to say we have become quite accustomed to Georgia with all the plant life, the claustrophobias of being surrounded by trees everywhere you go and the extreme green pollen dump every few years does not freak us out anymore. I always thought I enjoyed gardening but that was when we lived in Calgary where hardly anything grows plus there are about 90 days between the last day of spring frost and the next frost cycle. In Georgia everything grows so well the maintenance on a yard cannot be done adequately on one day a week. Most people have a mow & blow service (we have Nathan) and there are many additional services for trees, pruning and lawn weeding. Every seven years there is a drought cycle and this year happens to be it, so it feels a lot more like the West - much drier no muggy mornings from the rain at night, summer this year has been very pleasant even when we reach the 90's. The drought is bad and thus even-numbered addresses are permitted to use water for outdoor purposes only on Saturday from midnight to 10 a.m.

Throw another Squirrel off the Barbie

I have really tried to avoid getting into this blog thing but this "Canned Salmon" blog has been created for quite some time and there are several links pointing to it making us look uninvolved or computer illiterate or both. For a while my excuse was " we do not have a digital camera" - I know that is totally lame as digital cameras are so cheap they practically give them away when you fill your gas tank. So I finally bought a DC and even though it is not a nice SLR it still works and takes reasonable quality pictures - good or bad pictures are determined by the person using the camera. I have looked at the events in our lives for a month or so pondering on what I would "report on" and it seems that our lives are much like a ongoing Seinfeld episode - nothing really is happening.
This is the first post - you know the worst thing about making the first post is that suddenly you are obligated to create another and another and so on otherwise it is like your life has been canceled (US spelling) or nothing is happening. But since we told you that nothing "is" happening we have nothing to lose...
A few weeks ago we came home from the grocery store and as we got out of the car I said to Loraine "Wow - somebody is losing a lot of propane - hopefully they don't blow up their house". After we brought in the food and put it away I went out on the deck to fire up the grill. (You do not BBQ in the south - you buy BBQ at a BBQ place and you grill in your backyard) I could not smell propane at all assuming it was a neighbor having a bad day so I fired up the grill and since the igniter does not work I had my trusty portable igniter thrust deep into the heart of the ole' grill (I wanted to say BBQ) when suddenly the whole grill was engulfed in flames coming from below the unit - right near the propane bottle. My mind quickly thought that I did not want to be remembered as the guy that died lighting his grill in Georgia from the shrapnel of a 20lb propane bottle so I bravely reached through the flames and turned off the propane. Hair loss was contained to mostly my right arm but there was a bad smell in my nose indicating something else had fried. After a minute of getting my senses I needed to investigate as to what really happened and poked my head close to where the bonfire seemed to originate. There was a large hole in the rubber hose that delivers the propane to the grill and because it had teeth marks that looked similar to the teeth marks on the sides of the grill I knew it was the handiwork of a squirrel. You would think that squirrels are just furry, cute little mammals that hide nuts and have a lot of free time on their hands (paws). The ones in Georgia are busy all day and all night chewing grills, chewing plastic deck chairs (I wondered why we were the only people that thought plastic deck chairs are cool), throwing nuts, making noise and trying to get into someones attic so they can chew the wiring after they play in the insulation. A few months ago we had noticed that locally they still sell grills with plastic sides in Georgia but nobody has them - not even us anymore. A few weeks before the latest squirrel incident we had purchased a new grill (BBQ) that is all metal construction, with doors on the bottom which now we know are to protect the rubber hose from sabotaging squirrels. There was not a really compelling reason to put the new grill into service, before the incident, although the squirrel teeth marks on the plastic side shelves dulled my appetite slightly but now the ole' grill was dead - killed by a squirrel. I wonder if propane has the same effect on squirrels as helium does on humans?