Organic vs Local

It's been in the news a lot lately.

Now that "organic" groceries have become "mainstream", more and more companies are busy slapping the organic label on their products. A lot of the time, those same products come in conveniently pre-portioned pre-wrapped pre-packaged portions; let's also not forget that they come from thousands of kilometers away too.

As much as I disdain the "100 mile diet", the authors have a good point, one that I still think Nabhan is better at making, that you should know where your food comes from.

It makes no sense to buy "organic" strawberries from Mexico, when conventionally grown local ones are available.

Here's something the pro-organics movement doesn't want you to know - farmers hate using pesticides. You know why? Because it's expensive. Even when they do spray, they use as little as possible to keep expenses down.

My local farmer's market had a survey last summer and people overwhelmingly said they wanted to see more organic produce at the market. I don't. I want to see stuff I can't get at Safeway, and stuff that's fresh. Organic doesn't really matter to me.

So here's a radical idea - buy local produce. Don't worry about the organic label (but hey, if you prefer and can afford "organic", great - go for it).

The truth is that if it's local fresh and seasonal, it'll taste better than that imported from Mexico organic stuff.

Facebook

I recently was invited to join Facebook by a friend of mine, and I decided I'd give it a try.

Like most new users, I quickly invited everyone I knew, checked to see if some old lost friends and acquaintances were "out there" and experienced some of the obsessive-compulsive feelings I had when I was a kid collecting hockey cards. Look at how many friends I have! Collect them all!

But Facebook has a bit of a darker side too. I scoffed when my friend quipped that he refused to sign up because he didn't want to be on it when the stalkers came, but now I'm reconsidering that. My boss joined a work related group, and quickly jumped off because he didn't want to read all the rants and negative comments some people were leaving. (Making comments about your workplace online in a public medium is naive at best). I've had colleagues who I don't really know, except that they're on the employee roster, add me as friends.

My wife is on Facebook and she told me to make sure to check my privacy settings. I've pretty much locked my profile down, and I've even limited a bunch of people to only have access to my limited profile. I think though that what will ultimately happen is I'll be dropping people - the acid test will be, "would I invite this person over for dinner?"

If my answer is no... poof!

A Random Haiku

My poppies are in bloom in my garden (and I saw fields of them at van Dusen Gardens last weekend), and while I was at home today, this popped into my head.

Orchid's only rival
Poppy's red origami
Blooms make me happy

Phases of a Thesis

Tell me why I want to do thesis papers again?

My darling wife, who's been through both a MS and a PhD, told me that by asking that question I was at the "it looks like an insurmountable peak" stage.

I asked what the other stages were.

Apparently, next comes the "work like a demon" stage, followed by the "I don't care anymore" stage.

The weirdest one is the "I can't believe I got away with that" stage. That's the one that happens after convocation.

In between the "I don't care anymore" and the "I can't believe I got away with that" stages comes the "I'm too blotto to form sentences stage"...

... that's the one that happens after a successful defense.

I have lots of good wine in my cellar for that!

Fencing

No, not the fancy footwork kind with epee or rapier, the more banal kind with posts and cedar panels with latticework.

When we bought our place in 2003, the fence was given "a couple more years" by our realtor. Our neighbours to the north who own several properties in the neighborhood concurred.

Over the winter, our fence finally showed its age and one of the board kept popping out of its panel. I finally did some makeshift repairs to hold that in, which prompted the stress on the fence to show in another place and soon the side was sagging and looking disorderly.

We conveniently had a Home Depot flyer in our newspaper back in April that said they would come and give us a free quote, remove the old fence and dispose of it and then install the new one.

A brief digression - we have debated many a time to push the fence out closer to the sidewalk, but several things made us decide to replace the fence exactly in place:

• the Telus box that was in front of our fence was nice and small, but in February Telus came and replaced it with a huge box (for Telus TV among other things) about three times the size, which meant any previous plans for fencing around it would have to be redone.
• we would have had to move the garden over.
• any space we'd gain would not really be a net benefit. Notwithstanding that we have essentially a postage stamp sized back yard, we have several parks and playgrounds close to us, including one literally half a dozen houses down the alley, so any theory that the back yard would be a good play space for our daughter would not be fulfilled.
  

So we had AIM Cedar Works come out and give us a quote. We were technically too small a project (they wanted a minimum 60' of fence, ours was 54'), but they said they would do it anyways, and gave us a quote. 10% off if we booked by the end of April.

Well, we thought about doing it ourselves, but the price was very reasonable (much lower than we expected) so we booked it.

Yesterday, they came and installed the fence. It took them all day, as they hit a snag. The owner before the one we bought the place from had poured concrete in the back yard (torn out by the previous owner, and further reclaimed with a grass installation last year by us), which meant they had to jackhammer out and dig a trench to remove the gate posts. Lesson learned, aside from relief that we'd hired professionals, was that it's easier to install a new fence from scratch than to replace an old one.

The new fence is a thing of beauty. The old one was 4' tall and had a bracework of crossed bamboo poles for the Japanese hops we had to create privacy in our back yard. However, the hops are aggressive plants that in the spring grow as much as 6" a day or more, and further go to seed in the fall and die off until the spring, so there's always a mess to fix.

The new fence is 5' tall, and it's just the right balance between giving us more back yard privacy and less maintenance. I expect more back yard time this summer.

As a final comment - AIM Cedar Works rocks - they came when they said they were going to, did a great job of removal of the old fence, installing the new one, and cleaning up before they left. On time, professionally done, and on budget. I would happily recommend them to anyone.

$1.234

I bought my fuel efficient Tercel in 1998. At the time gas was $0.399/litre for regular gas.

Yesterday, I filled up and the price was $1.234/litre. It cost $42 to fill up, the most I've paid for a fill up on my car since I've owned it.

I'm glad I have a gas sipper rather than a gas guzzler!

Missing the Point - Incandescent Bulbs

The minister did not reply to me, but my MP did. Her reply was:

Thanks for your message about the proposed phase-out of incandescent lightbulbs.

The most common replacement for incandescent bulbs currently is the use of Compact Fluorescent Light bulbs (CFLs). I recognize this is not always the perfect replacement for the phasing out of incandescents though.

I also want you to know that Paul Dewar’s Bill to phase out incandescent lightbulbs, as it is being drafted, does not specifically recommend the replacement of incandescents with CFLs. We recognize the new technology is being developed all the time, and hopefully we will soon have a solution that addresses all our concerns.

The phasing out of incandescent light bulbs is one of many alternatives that can help place Canada on the path towards ensuring environmental security and sustainability.

Thanks again for taking the time to write and share your concerns.

Sincerely,

Libby Davies

I did send a reply:

Dear Libby,

With all due respect, the point I was making, and which bears repeating, is that banning incandescent bulbs does not generate a desired result.

If the desired result is to reduce the power consumption of light bulbs, then the answer is NOT "let's ban incandescents", but rather "light bulbs must not consume more than x watts per y lumens".

To once again use the example of California, they did not ban internal combustion engines, instead they set emission standards.

THAT is what I am advocating our government do.

So don't ban incandescent bulbs, set power consumption standards. THAT will achieve the stated goal.

Thank you.

Will keep all y'all posted...

Risty's Redux

When I first moved to Vancouver back in 1998, I took a lovely one bedroom apartment in Marpole. It's a great neighborhood and between 64th and say 72nd on Granville, you can find pretty much everything you need - doctors, dentists, banks, grocery and produce stores, and last but surely not least, restaurants.

One of my first pleasant discoveries was a classic family diner called Risty's. It became one of my regular haunts and I'd go there at least once a week. Even after I moved near the Drive, since I worked in Richmond, a former colleague and I would go there regularly for lunch.

A couple of years ago, the family who'd owned it when I first moved into town sold it. The new owners were very nice, and the food was every bit as good. They even kept the original menu.

However, and this is not meant in an unkind way, the new owners had, for the kind of restaurant it was, poor English. I have countless times been in eateries in Richmond like at the food court Yaohan Centre where I've pointed at what I want, or been to a hole-in-the wall place where I've had the opportunity use what few phrases of Cantonese I know to order dim sum.

But for a classic diner, a burger and fries place with endless coffee, where the regulars are as white as the Wonder bread they make toast with, having to point to the menu to order a club sandwich is bad for business.

For me, having been a regular since 1998, loving the food, and being a little more flexible about language barriers, I was willing to put up with the minor inconveniences. However, as time went on, I did see fewer regulars, and for that matter, business seemed to be slow.

Just recently, someone else bought the restaurant, and they've now been open for a couple of weeks. Today was the first chance I'd had of going there.

The new owners, as with the previous two sets, are also Asian, but speak flawless English. Hopefully word gets around and business builds back up quickly.

Little seems to have changed at Risty's in terms of decor, which probably hasn't changed since the ... 60's? 70's? Certainly unchanged since 1998!

The menu has changed though. Gone are the salads, which were always a weak spot in the line up, and sadly, gone are many of the breakfast options (like the Denver hash and the famous Risty's omelette!). However, they have streamlined the menu and played to their strengths. A strong lineup of sandwiches and burgers, including the new "super burger" that has cheese, mushrooms, bacon, and... a fried egg. The soups are still home made and delicious.

The service was diner efficient - never did my coffee cup see its bottom, and the food was fabulous - hot, fresh, well prepared.

Risty's still strongly recommended by me!

Ratings:
Service: 4/5
Ambiance: 3/5
Food: 8/10
Price: $

Score: 15/20

Kal Tire

I take my car for routine service to the Toyota dealership, and I have nothing but nice things to say about how well my car runs and the service I've had there.

But for little things, the Kal Tire near my office is ideal.

Last fall, I managed to get a flat tire, and the Kal Tire folks fixed it for free (under the Michelin warranty), even though they didn't sell me the tires.

Today, I drove in to replace the dead headlight bulb, and again, no charge for the installation, only the bulb.

They'll definitely be getting my business when I finally get around to replacing my shocks and struts...

On the Stupidity of Banning Incandescent Bulbs

This morning's Globe & Mail (online) had the following headline - "Ottawa Moves to Ban Incandescent Lights"

I will spare you the diatribe, and instead share the letter I wrote to the right honorable John Baird, minister of the environment. Please write him too!

Dear Mr. Baird,

I am writing to you about the government's announcement that it intends to ban incandescent light bulbs by 2012.

While I am all for conserving energy, the specifics of the ban are highly problematic.

It would be far more reasonable and progressive to instead require that light bulbs, regardless of type, produce a certain level of light per watt. While this won't get you the same spectacular headlines as "Ottawa Moves to Ban Incandescent Lights", it will solve the problem.

As a convenient example, GE recently introduced something they call a high-efficiency incandescent bulb, and according to their press release "[t]he target for these bulbs at initial production is to be nearly twice as efficient, at 30 lumens-per-Watt, as current incandescent bulbs. Ultimately the high efficiency lamp (HEI) technology is expected to be about four times as efficient as current incandescent bulbs and comparable to CFL bulbs." GE has set their target to be 2010 for these bulbs. I'm sure other companies are working on similar ideas.

It seems that it should be possible in the forseeable future to have incandescent bulbs that are, for the purposes of reducing energy consumption, on even par with the current crop of compact fluorescent bulbs.

The government's role is not to ban certain kinds of goods, but to set the standards by which manufacturers will compete. Just as California has demonstrated that stringent emissions standards will cause manufacturers to innovate and create more fuel efficient vehicles, hybrids, and electric cars, this is an opportunity for your government to show environmental leadership and encourage technological innovation.

Thank you.

I'll let you know if I hear back...

Tosca!

If ever one were to say to oneself, "I'd like to see a good opera, one that would definitely let me decide if it's something I might like", then one need do little more than to go see the current staging of Tosca put on by the Vancouver Opera.

Even the usually critical reviewer from the Vancouver Sun called it a "tour de force".

In its splendid season-closing production, Vancouver Opera gives us the goods with this nasty thriller, set in a stunning stage design from the Milan-based Scenographie Sormani-Cardaropoli, which is spacious but feels close with dread.

Cynthia Lawrence, a soprano praised for her work in this role at the Met, is the real deal. She is fiery in a plot that is fueled by Tosca's jealousy, yet in her one great aria, Vissi d'arte, raptly removed and soliloquy-like with a feeling of being intensely caught up in a world not of her making.

This is tremendously difficult to sing, holding the high notes dramatically and for a long time, as Puccini wanted, then making a proper diminuendo -- also observing most of the grace notes, showing a firm cleanness on the marcato notes and a focus in the lower half of the voice. It was all there and thrilling to hear.

Singing actors is what Tosca must have or it's just a recital. There isn't a less than fine voice in the cast or one singer who doesn't act persuasively and naturally.

The Italian tenor Renzo Zulian as Cavaradozzi was impressive just minutes into the opera with an effortless Recondita armonia, though he didn't start it softly. He much later gave an even finer E Lucevan le stelle with fine control, power and resonance at the climax and the image of a man lost in reflection.

That's two of the three leads, which we saw early, inviting speculation as to what Scarpia would be like. And he, baritone Yalun Zhang, was wonderful too, applying extra weight to his voice to suggest bestial authority. He was very firm and consistent, though he might have changed his tone at key places to show that Scarpia can also be mellifluous and oily to get what he wants. This would only have enhanced the sense of his loathsomeness once the gloves come off.

But what a production. The minor parts were cut from the same cloth as the leads: Nicolae Raiciu as the sacristan, John Arsenault's Spoletta and John Conlon's Sciarrone.

Act II, where Scarpia interrogates Tosca, was a killer: suspenseful, dire with atmosphere and top lighting that made Scarpia look very sinister. Director Stanley Garner spares nothing and it's just what it should be. For once there's no hokiness to the moment when Tosca hurls herself from the parapets. She falls backwards, letting gravity do its work.

The chorus is terrific too, and conductor Robert Tweten gets nothing but beautiful playing from the Vancouver Opera Orchestra.

This is a dream closing for an opera company, something that should get the subscriptions going for next year.

My New Macbook

My new Macbook arrived yesterday, and I have a few first impressions I thought I'd share.

First, for the propeller heads, I got the white Macbook with the 2.0GHz Core 2 Duo Intel processor, 1GB of RAM, 80GB hard drive - in other words, I took all the default options. ALso comes with built in iSight camera, Bluetooth, wireless, firewire, USB, and a DVD burner. Full specs at the Apple site.

Second, I bought a Macbook both to complement my iMac and to have available to take with me wherever I go so I can work on my thesis papers. It will also allow me to surf the internet when my wife is using the iMac.

I would have bought a refurbished one because they're cheaper, but since none were available when I ordered, I used my student discount (there are some perks to being a grad student).

In strictly aesthetic terms, the laptop is very attractive. The white housing is made of a slightly opalescent hard plastic that looks like it will be quite durable. The unit is very light (a bonus for carrying around), and small - less than an inch thick! The 13.3" screen doesn't feel small and looks great.

One of the things Apple does well is think about what their end users need and therefore they put a lot of effort into design. The keyboard has a really nice tactile feel to it, and the touchpad is pretty nice although I prefer using an external mouse. Speaking of mice, Apple still uses the single button mouse concept in its design, so the touchpad only has a single button. Since I use a two button scroll-wheel mouse on the iMac, I'll be using one with the laptop whenever reasonable.

A cute and useful design feature is that the power cord connects with a magnetic clip - if the power cord is tripped over, it'll merely pull off without either destroying the power connection or hauling the laptop to the floor. Another nice touch is that there's an AC extension cord for the power adapter, although it requires pulling out the flip down power plug, which I could see losing.

The pleasant surprise came when I turned the laptop on. During the inital "welcome to your new Mac" process, it asked me if I had and existing Mac and if so if I wanted to synch it up with my current one. Well, yeah!

A few minutes later, after borrowing my existing iSight's firewire cable, my Macbook was busily transferring everything over from my iMac - applications, user accounts, music, photos, etc. This is the point where I discovered that I should have spent the extra money on a slightly larger hard drive. Once the initial transfer was complete about two hours later, I had to do some judicious file editing and another synch to get the rest of my applications over. On the other hand, there was a lot of data transferred over that I just don't need on my laptop! In the end, I have about 10G usable left on my 80G drive.

However, since the laptop was now synched and everything was transferred over, it behaves exactly like my desktop does and I didn't have to set up any preferences since that work was done a long time ago on the iMac.

On the whole, I'm very pleased with my purchase, and I think I'll be getting a lot of mileage out of the new laptop. All I need now is for the iSkin laptop case to arrive (UPS says tomorrow).

Feeling Great

I mentioned about a month ago that I was going to work on my fitness goals, and I'm pleased to report that things are going well. Down 11lbs so far in about six weeks, only 24 more to go to where I was two years ago, and then a lot more to where I was nine years ago. Go me!

I decided not to do MetSyn and instead leveraged my membership at the YWCA since it's a first class facility and more importantly, easy for me to get to and from home given the other constraints that real life has for me, like the commute to work, day care, etc. So now in addition to my two spin classes, I've added two mornings of weights. This might become three times a week, although once the weather improves and more importantly, the sun rises early enough, I'll be cycling on weekends again.

I've been working with the absolutely brilliant, talented, and fabulous Lisa Wagner and she has put together a cracking workout for me. This morning while I we were chatting she was talking about her long term plan for my fitness goals and said she would start me on a program where, I would do "100 pushups, 100 crunches, 100 rows, and 100 step-ups, in an hour, and we'll start on that in about, hmmm... 4... 5..." and in the pause I inserted "months?"

"Weeks," was her reply.

Fantastic.

Luther Wright & the Wrongs

I like a wide variety of music, and what's in vogue on my iPod varies on my mood.

Recently, I was over playing board games at a buddy's place and he puts on an album called Rebuild The Wall by Luther Wright & the Wrongs.

If you liked Pink Floyd's The Wall, imagine it done by a very talented bunch of country & bluegrass folks.

It's both really good and really funny at the same time. Y'all.

Playing With Numbers

It's tax time, or will be soon, and so I've been collecting my stack of information slips.

One of the benefits I have at my company is an employee stock purchase plan. Similar to many companies, the company I work for allows employees to contribute some chunk of their base salary into a fund that is then spent quarterly buying stock for us at a 15% discount.

Unlike some of my colleagues, I sell my shares pretty much as soon as I can. It's usually 5-10 business days from the date of the stock purchase to the time it's in my stock account and accessible to me, so in the interim, the price has fluctuated somewhat.

Now, as everybody knows, when you sell a stock, you're taxed on the capital gains; but here's where the fun with numbers begins.

To contrive the example with nice round numbers, I bought something worth $100 for only $85, but paid income tax on the $15 difference, so the asset, from the tax man's point of view, is $100.

Thanks to this little peculiarity, on paper, for tax purposes, I almost lost money in 2006 on the stock market.

Financial math really appears like voodoo sometimes.

Free is a Very Good Price

I have a KitchenAid stand mixer, one of the tilt-head kinds. I bought it about seven or maybe even eight years ago, and love it. Mostly I use it to knead bread dough, but I've also used it for:

• making pasta (with the pasta roller attachment)
• applesauce (with the fruit/veg strainer - no more peeling or coring apples required!)
• cakes
• whipping cream
• cookie dough
• grinding meat (with the grinder attachment)

It's a great kitchen appliance and while they're expensive, they're incredibly durable and well built.

If I've had a kvetch about mine, it's that the bowl is perhaps a little small for my usual bread dough batch. More often than not, it's fine, but sometimes the dough creeps up the dough hook and I have to stop and scrape.

For years I've been collecting Air Miles. Every once in a while I check to see if there are any rewards I'm willing to be parted from my points for, but a lot of the rewards haven't interested me, and despite the opportunity for "free flights" using points, you're still on the hook for all the taxes and surcharges and booking flights on points is a PITA (pain in the (_(_)).

However, just recently, they had the KitchenAid Professional 600 on in pearl grey. I thought about it and by the time I decided to act, they were gone. DOH! However, I've been keeping my eye out and lo, they now have them in white.

I've ordered one. 4600 air miles well spent! I'm looking forward to using it.

Marcello's on Commercial Drive

Marcello's is an Italian restaurant on Commercial Drive. My wife was working late and so I thought a nice way to spend the evening would be to take my daughter, who's almost three, out to dinner after work. I thought of taking her to White Spot, which is a place she likes, but she wanted pizza (I did offer her the choice - pasta, sausages, or pizza), so I thought I'd try out Marcello's.

Marcello's offers a nice well laid out place, with plain but elegant tables. Along the wall of the open kitchen is an astounding wood oven where they bake the pizzas. It looks like a giant stylized face of the sun, with the mouth being where the pizzas go.

Once we were shown a table, we were given menus and left to deliberate. The menu has a nice selection of pizza and pasta as well as salads and some other main courses. It's obviously meant to cater to family style dining, where orders are shared amongst those at the table.

We ordered a mushroom pizza for her and a gnocchi for me. I also ordered a glass of the sangiovese ($8 was pricey for what I got), and a steamed milk for my sweet pea.

The steamed milk came way too hot and with no spoon. When I asked the hostess for a spoon, none came, and by the time toddler agitation was setting in, my waiter finally came by once more. I waved him over and he said "your dinner's coming!"

I expected dinner to take some time, after all this wasn't Domino's, but all I wanted was a spoon. What we got was one of those long handled dessert spoons. Argh.

Cardinal restaurant sin number one was committed next. My gnocchi arrived, but the pizza did not. Generally speaking, dinner time's pretty easy going, but now the promised dinner was not on the table and there was no way she was going to even try the pasta. By the time pizza finally came, she was past wanting to eat so we pretty much had to pack up and go home (although the leftovers will be delicious).

The food was fabulous though. I'd go back in a group any time. Alone with kid in tow on a week night would be a different story.

Ratings:
Service: 2/5
Ambiance: 3/5
Food: 7/10
Price: $$

Score: 12/20

Restaurant Reviews

I think a lot about restaurants - I like to eat out, and when I do, I like to have a pleasant experience. While it's always about the food, ultimately, service and ambiance are also important.

I've decided that I'm going to have ratings with my reviews. They're completely subjective of course, since they ultimately reflect my likes and dislikes. However, the same rating for two places does not mean they're equivalent. For instance, if I were served a Risty's burger at Bishop's, it would still be a great burger, but for Bishop's it would probably be a 4 or 5 instead of an 8 or 9.

So on to the ratings...

Service: rated from 0 to 5.
Ambiance: rated from 0 to 5.
Food: rated from 0-10.
Price: rated from $ to $$$$.

What I'm looking for when I rate:

• Service - essentially I want the staff to acknowledge my presence, make sure my food gets delivered on time, and if I'm dining with others, that we all get our food at the same time. Relatively speaking, my expectations for a diner are different than for an haute cuisine establishment.
• Ambiance - this spans the gamut: cleanliness; decor; comfort.
  
• Food - this one gets the most points since it's really the most important thing. My expectations depend on the kind of restaurant it is; the chicken noodle soup at a diner is not the same as of the consommé de volaille at a fancy French restaurant, but both could score an "8".
• Price
  
• $ means inexpensive. Most diners fit here.
  
• $$ means about $20-25 per person. Most family restaurants like White Spot fit here.
• $$$ means we're getting expensive. Ironically, most places I end up disappointed in fit in this price range.
  
• $$$$ means bring your gold card. If it's got four $'s next to it, it had better earn a 16 or better.

A rating under 10 means I'm unlikely to eat there again.
10-12 means it's a decent place worth visiting.
13-15 means it's good and I'll go there happily.
15-17 means the place is great and I'll recommend it to others. I'm probably a regular.
18-20 is the creme de la creme. Highly recommended.

Timing is Everything

Late last week, China had a stock market "correction" and took down most of the North American markets with it. This week the markets are still down.

I could have predicted this - after all, I had just invested in an index fund (XIU on the TSX). However, I'm only down 5% so far! I wish I had more cash in my stock account to buy more actually. Market overreactions are always a good time to buy.

Ariadne auf Naxos

Last night we went to see the third production of the Vancouver Opera's 2006/07 season, Richard Strauss' Ariadne auf Naxos.

It was a lovely production. The story follows the play within a play model. Two groups have been hired to perform for a duke at his estate - one is for the opera "Ariadne auf Naxos", a tragic tale taken from Greek myth, the other a comedia del arte farce, involving Zerbinetta and her four suitors.

Hilarity ensues as the duke, concerned that the entertainment be complete for the 9pm fireworks, orders that the two groups combine their performance. Surely, his majordomo contents, such a "minor" change should be easily accomplished.

Of the operas I've seen, this is probably my favorite production to date.

Speaking of which, I've seen...

Nabucco (Vienna, 2001)
Die Fledermaus (Vancouver, 2001)
Turandot (Vancouver, dress rehearsal, 2005)
Dialogues of the Carmelites (Vancouver, dress rehearsal, 2005)
Macbeth (Vancouver, 2006)
The Magic Flute (Vancouver, 2007)
Ariadne auf Naxos (Vancouver, 2007)