Flag Day 2009
Long may she fly over the land of the free.
And happy birthday to the United States Army!
Saturday Burger Feast
Damsel and I decided to have hamburgers and roasted potato spears today. We didn’t just buy ground beef patties and throw them on the grill, but rather ground up some brisket and put in the seasonings ourselves. Damsel prepared four half-pound patties from a two pound brisket we bought on sale and had in the freezer until yesterday.
I started the patio grill and preheated to 400°F with the lid closed. A low flame setting does the job. Meanwhile, Damsel sliced up the potatoes into spears and anointed them with seasonings and some EVOO.
She then puts the potato slices on a baking sheet and I slip them onto the shelf in the preheated grill. There they sit for 20-25 minutes when I take the tongs out and turn them over on the baking sheet. After another 25 minutes, they’re done. Moved them to a warm place on the grill and turned up the heat on the other side for the burger patties.
Grilled the patties until medium. For the last minute or so, I topped the patties with Havarti cheese slices. We like Havarti better than cheddar or American slices.
When the burgers were done, we brought them in and fixed up paper plates with the cheeseburgers on buns with onion, tomato and lettuce. Today, we added some green goddess dressing. Served with the ‘taters, this was sure a good meal!
Another Two-tone Gerbera Daisy
This one is shades of pink. These two-tone hybrid Gerberas have just started showing up in the garden shop this spring. We think they are very pretty and love them in the patio. Click for full size.
Hollyhocks
Taken during a recent visit to the Botanic Garden – a red Hollyhock, a.k.a. Alcea.
From Wikipedia – Alcea:
Hollyhocks are popular garden ornamental plants. The flowers have been selected for variations in color, with dark purple, red and white-flowered plants available in addition to the colors found in wild plants.
Hollyhocks are very drought resistant, and do well in full sun locations that might be too hot or dry for other plants. They produce large, flat coin-shaped seeds (1/2″ diameter) that seem to grow easily wherever they drop. While an individual plant might only live a handful of years, by that time chances are good it will leave plenty of descendants. They have very long taproots which make transplanting difficult.
Have a Nice Nuke
The Democrats and the Obamadministration think it’s OK for Iran to enrich nuclear fuel for that country’s energy needs, yet the moratorium on new nuclear facilities for the US continues. Why is it OK for them and not OK for us?
At least some members of the U.S. House and Senate are trying to get some traction for nuclear energy by leveraging the Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) myth.
Via Planet Gore
We Need 100 Nukes by 2030 [Carl Shockley]
After fumbling over the Waxman-Markey initiative for several months, Republicans have finally hit their stride. Both House and Senate members are quickly falling behind the rallying cry, “100 New Reactors by 2030.”
“I think global warming is a real problem but I don’t think the solutions the Democrats are coming up with are going to accomplish anything,” said Sen. Lamar Alexander (R., Tenn.), head of the Senate GOP caucus. “The only thing that’s going to allow us to cut carbon emissions is clean nuclear energy. We built 100 reactors between 1970 and 1990. We can do the same thing now. If global warming is the inconvenient problem, then nuclear power is the inconvenient answer.”
Alexander and three other Tennessee legislators were on hand Wednesday morning as Babcock & Wilcox introduced its new “mPower” 125-megawatt modular reactor that it will submit to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in 2011. The $750 million reactor will be built in a factor and shipped to the site by rail, where it would be completely buried underground and refuel only once every five years. “Everything in this reactor would be made in America,” said Republican Bob Corker, Tennessee’s other senator.
Congressman Zach Wamp (R., Tenn.) warned that the United States is falling behind other countries in nuclear technology. “What we’re talking about here isn’t just a revival of the nuclear industry,” he said. “We’re talking about an American industrial renaissance.
Power generation using conventional coal technology has been mathematically proven to have little effect on AGW. We should continue to use coal powerplants. In addition, we should resume nuclear generation, as it is clearly a better and more efficient method of producing the energy our nation needs, regardless of whether it actually does anything to improve the environment.
Beavertail Blossom
Sounds weird, but this is the bloom on a beavertail cactus. The cactus is similar to the prickly pear cactus whose growth is similar to the flat oval structure of a beaver’s tail. These hot pink springtime flowers are seen in various locations in Joshua Tree National Park.
