Adventures in Bread Making

I watched a video on break making.
Cover a table with flower, kneed for 8 minutes, let sit for an hour , need again , sit again 40 min ... very messy , very long , looks like hard work too. Why would I possibly want that ?

I've had my eye on a Bread Maker for a while now, and I finally scraped together the cash to buy one. The fact that "Black Friday" , traditionally an american only sales event , has migrated north and this 80 $ bread maker only cost me 50$ was a big help as well.

Apparently , you just pour the ingredients in , push the button , and walk away. An hour later, you come back to a nice freshly baked loaf of bread.

And the current price of a loaf of bread is $2.50 Canadian.  But baking it yourself is considerably cheaper. I estimate the 2.5kg of flour I bought will do me for at least 5 loaves of bread , and it cost $2.99 . The rest will last considerably longer than 5 loafs.

What the heck is that duck taped to the front of the bread maker you ask ? Funny thing about the recipie book that comes with this bread maker. It has 10 really complex recipies for really strange and bizarre loaves of bread. But it doesn't seem to have a "simple loaf of bread" recipie.  I had to go find one on the internet and tape it to the front so I wouldn't lose it.

And because I eventually plan on moving into public housing , and I seriously don't trust neibours on public housing vis a vis cock roaches , I put all the ingredients in a nice sealed plastic container.

I love sealed containers. Especially air tight ones. If I could , I'd put all my worldly possessions in them.
Note to self : Blow 10$ and get another one, there's still room on my shelves. And even if there isn't , they stack ok.

So ..inventory all the ingredients, check the recipie ...
ouch. Forgot the yeast.
Back to the grocery store. Luckily it's only a block or so away. Wait in line ...buy my one single item ...

Put ingredients in the "bucket" inside. Heed the warning in the instruction manual that the yeast always goes last.

Interesting thing about the bucket. There's a paddle in it that goes round and round and round ... is that going to leave a hole in the back of the bread? Hmmm....
Plus ... there's a heating wire ....you know, you look in your oven and there's this big wire that when you apply power heats up and turns red and gives off heat like crazy , there's one of those circling the bucket that I put all the ingredients in. I guess it automagically kneeds and cooks.   Cool.

Hmm...one hour and still not done.  Note to self. Get a pic when it's done.


Cost Per Loaf

 Total cost of start up ingredients (salt,surgar , vegetable oil , flour , yeast)  was 15$ (yeah I cheaped out and bought only the smallest packages of each. Cost efficiency is terrible for the first experimental batch ).

But at 3 cups per loaf, Flour is the one controlling the cost , really. The rest of the stuff I just took a little tiny bit out of each , they'll obviously last 50 loaves or something ridiculous. So 10$ divide by 50 is 20 cents a loaf for all of that. And the flour is 3 dollars for 5 loaves (at a guess, I'll likely get six or seven , but we'll say five) is 60 cents , so the total is 80 cents a loaf.

80 cents a loaf , compared to 2.50$.

And thats using the most cost inefficent bag of flour (you get discounts for buying larger bags). If this works , I can see that 80 cents becoming 40 cents , and me carrying home 8kg bags of flour once a month...or larger.  :)

Edit : Cost per loaf

The loaf this thing produces is freaking huge. Worth about two store bought loaves. So that 80 cents a loaf is really 40 cents for store bought sized loaf equiviliant. 

One Loaf of Bread (3 hours later)

Back of Loaf

Yes , as you can see , the paddle does leave a little hole in the back of the loaf.

Side View

Top View

That is a standard sized dinner plate , to give you an example of how big a 1 1/2 pound loaf of bread is.
It tastes ... like a store bought loaf of bread. Nothing special , nothing terrible , nothing wonderful. Perfectly edible.

Note to self : Get a proper bread cutting knife. The pruning knife you see in the pic just mangles it , and trying to eat peanut butter of a huge thick slice of fresh bread , still warm , that would put a slice of texas toast to shame , is a messy business.

Also , stand it up and cut it horizontally , seperating top from bottom . The loaf is freaking huge and you'll never be able to hold on to a full slice unless you chop it down to size.

A day for a retired techie

A stunning day of adventure in the life of a retired techie....

So I'm playing wow , and I get this quest to go rescue a goblin,
but when I open the flight point map , it's just blank ..for a bit,
and then it loads.

Girlfriend , are you running anything heavy ? No , how about the
room mates ?

Oh right , I can check that on my router.  so I close the game,
go to the router's control page, and what do I see ? Seven
devices. Two named android (probably phones) , one named playbook
(Probably a black berry playbook) and a couple or three computers.

Do you know your room mates have hooked up two phones and a
black berry hooked up , and you're only charging them 15$ a
month ? I could ban the mac addresses.

No , don't do anything tonight. She doesn't feel like fighting with them.

Back to the game. I'm in Northrend , in that quest where
you get transformed into a female Vylkul giant, evil creatures
because THEY'RE FULLY CLOTHED ! I mean like , even a priest has
less clothing than they do ! What kind of game is this where
you can't stop and look down the shirt of your own charactar
and admire her breasts ?

Oh , and they enslaved all their males and have them working
in a mine, and I get a quest to go kill the rebels who don't
like being slaves to women. But thats just par for the course
in a video game.

*Sigh* Now girlfriend is pissed. What do you mean two phones
and a play book ? what the heck is a playbook (it's the
blackberry version of an iPad) . Ok ok , I'll ban the mac's
after midnight when they're all asleep. Sheesh .

Back to the game. Kill the male rebels , become best friends
with the cruel dominatrix who's running the mine , sent off
to kill a female Vylkul this time. I'm supposed to "do it
gently, she is a female after all " .

Playbook is 600$ - 1000$ . Android phones start at 200$ and go
up. And room mate complains at the 15$ / month she's supposed
to pay for her share of the internet. And she's using so much
that my game is lagging.  Invasion of privacy knowing all this ?
Well...she's cheating us and interfering in our enjoyment of
our internet. She's lucky we don't just lock her out entirely.
We'll leave her lap top connected , that's all we agreed to.

Now where is that stupid goblin I'm supposed to rescue ?

The List of Evil Companies

I'm going to keep a list of Evil Companies. Companies that lie , or do nasty things that a large number of their customers would find offensive.  In order to make the list , a company has to go above and beyond the call of profiteering. Screwing you over with cheap flimsy products isn't enough.


LG , a Division of Samsung
Why : News Reports , nov 2013 , of their Smart TV not only tracking the viewing habits of it's users (despite having internal controls that could be set to "off" , they tracked you anyways) , but they were also tracking anything else on the local network the TV was connected too (file names from USB sticks , from any disks put into the cd / blue ray players, etc)

Google , Microsoft  , AOL , most USA Corperations
Why :  Homeland Security in the United States Requires them not only to turn over all information they have on every user who uses their services, they are legally forbidden to tell anyone just how much information they're turning over. President Obama publically admitted to this in the summer of 2013 . In the face of their restriction of telling just how much they're reveiling to the NSA via the infamous PRISM program , declarations that they're not listening in on your phone calls , reading your emails , listening to your skype calls , etc (for anyone in the world) are non-credible.

Google Corperation (Again !) 
Why :  I have an android phone. Anytime I try to use anything from Google it demands I activate Google tracking and let them track my exact location all day long. I tried to download and use a program to learn french , and they want to know my exact location. I see no reason for this. Deleted the App.

Microsoft , re: XBox :
Why :  The XBox has a camera on it (the kinect device to detect hand / arm motions) and Microsoft is legally requried , like all USA Corperations, to spy for the US Government. Ergo : Pictures of you in your home while many people are likely partially or completely unclad are being submitted to NSA whether you like it or not.

Microsoft , re: Windows Updates :
Why :   The combination of automated Windows Updates and US Government requiresments for any US corperation to spy for them mean that they can include a trojen to spy on  you at any time through an automated update.  The fact that there wasn't one there yesterday doesn't mean there isn't one there today. Also , given the history of companies like LG for including opt out features that don't actually opt you out of anything , the fact that you've disabled updates doesn't mean a thing. 

Apple iPhone re: Fingerprint scanner
Why :   Because Apple is a USA Company , and is legally required to hand over all information it gathers to NSA . And it's getting the fingerprint of anyone who buys one of their fancy new finger print secured iPhones, and thus passing it on to the USGovernment. Yes, they totally deny it. Yes, they are forbidden to tell you just how much information they are giving to NSA by US Law , no their denials are not credible.


This list will continue to be updated as new evidence and news articles come to light.

Spy TV

Yep. TV that spies on you.

LG promises update for 'spying' smart TV

 

LG has admitted it continued collecting data on viewing habits even after users had activated a privacy setting designed to prevent it.

The television maker has apologised to its customers and told the BBC it would issue an update to correct the problem.
UK-based IT consultant Jason Huntley, who raised the issue in a blog, welcomed the "positive step".




The point here is the TV was spying on you in the first place.  Tracking your habits , and adjusting what commercials it shows you , in other words, targetted advertising.
The fact that it had controls  hidden away somewhere to turn off spying is irrelevant because they usually hide them so well most users can't find them.  The fact that those controls didn't work is just gravy on top of it all.

Why is targetted advertising evil ? Why is showing you stuff you might be interested in a bad thing ?
Because they tack a little extra onto the price if they know you're interested.  Because you can't do research for a friend on something anymore because the prices they quote you will be different than the prices they would quote him.

And because you're no longer dealing with a reputable company.  Providing controls that they know don't work is the same thing as lying.  LG and Samsung are no longer reputable companies.  And the problem is , everyone does this kind of thing , and demands the consumer accept being lied to on a regular basis.

Everyone wants you to join their social website , so they can spam you with targetted ads.
Everyone wants you to watch their internet TV , so they can spam you with targetted ads.
Everyone wants to track your computer across all sorts of web sites and see what you're interestd in , build a profile on you , so they can spam you.

They are predators , and you are the prey . And their intentions are hostile. (At least financially) 

How would you like your boss to get a list of all the TV shows you've been watching , cheap , for just a few dollars ? Every post you made on face book , every news article you read . How about a lawyer ? Did you get into a car accident recdently ? Going through a nasty divorce and there's mud slinging all over the place ? How would you like to lose custody of the children because some lawyer supena'd your TV company and sold the judge on the notion that the TV you watch is innappropriate for children ? Or that you watch waaaay too many beer commercials you must be an alchoholic ?

Letting them build a profile on you , be it TV you watch , websits you visit , etc , screws you for hunting for jobs , screws you if you ever try and make an insurance claim , screws you in any divorce , just generally screws you whenever someone gets to go rooting through it looking for dirt and making no attempt at a fair assessment of your charactar.  They'll point out the bad and totally ignore the good and thats all anyone will see.

Letting them make a profile of you will get you in a lot of trouble , and is to be fought at every turn.

Or you can just get a job at walmart for the minimum wage and give up on every winning a court case against any insurance company. Heck , don't bother with insurance they'll never pay out anyways , not with your profile.