Reponse to e-mail probably produced by "Artificial Stupidity"

Subject: Re: Ironside TV sales
Date: Tue, 2 Sep 2025 08:28:00 -0700
From: Mike Quigley
To: Luca Rivera

On 2025-09-02 4:19 a.m., Luca Rivera wrote:
> Hi
>
> I came across your website and read about your tv shows.
>
> I work at SalesCloser, the first AI agent capable of handling any phone calls, zoom chats, scheduling shows, and more, without any code needed.
>
> You can use our AI agents to handle viewer call-ins, book interviews or premieres, and make reminder calls for upcoming shows without missing any on-air opportunities.
>
> Would you be open to a quick call to learn more?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Luca
> 422 Richards St, Suite 170. Vancouver, BC V6B 2Z4
> P.S. Please let me know if you don't want to hear from me again

Hi, "Luca Rivera," are you a real person, or just some AI bot?

The Ironside "tv shows" are not *my* shows. If you took the time to read the page [see www.ironsidetv.com], you would see that I am just reviewing the shows (mostly the first season, which were broadcast almost 60 years ago and I had nothing to do with them). I did not like the majority of these shows I watched at all.

Obviously, I am not interested in discussing anything like you suggest.

Poo to Shampoo!

I bought this fancy anti-dandruff shampoo some time ago, this is an e-mail I sent to the company, which is called Vichy:

I purchased your Dercos anti-dandruff treatment shampoo yesterday from London Drugs in Vancouver. This is the stuff in a white bottle with a green label. I really don't understand how you are supposed to use the "pump" at the top of the bottle. This is in 3 parts, the bottom is a normal "cap," above this is a thing like a "collar" which prevents you from pushing down the pump, and the top is this thing that looks like a bird's beak which is the actual pump. There are no instructions about how you are supposed to use all this. It's totally stupid. I finally figured out to take off the "collar," but then is the pump at the top of supposed to pop up or what? I can't push it up or down. I don't want to use too much force on this thing, this shampoo is VERY EXPENSIVE and I don't want to break the bottle. I've tried turning the "beak" part of the pump, you can rotate this 360 degrees. There is some "writing" on the top of this beak which suggests you have to turn it right or left. I really don't get it. To use some shampoo I took the whole top off and just poured some shampoo into my hand.

(Soon after sending this complaint, I was able to figure out how to use the pump myself; it was not easy.)

A Shocking Response

I wanted to ask Google search if iPhones had a certain kind of email program and instead of saying "email" I said the word "eel":

No, iPhones do not have any eel-related features. The question is likely referring to the electric eel, a fish that can produce powerful electric shocks, and not a part of any iPhone functionality. Electric eels are known for their ability to stun prey or defend themselves, and are not connected to any iPhone capabilities.

Comparing Bread Machine Times

This is a comparison between times in Hamilton-Beach Homebaker Breadmaker, model 29882C (my old machine) and new machine, model 29982, just called "2 lb. Bread Maker." Both machines have three levels of crust: light, medium and dark. Choosing any of these does not affect the baking time.

HOMEBAKER BREADMAKER, MODEL #29882C
2 loaf sizes available, 1.5 lb. and 2 lb.
1. Basic 2:53, 3:00
2. French 3:40, 3:50
3. Gluten-Free 3:32, 3:40
4. Quick 1:40 (no choice of size)
5. Sweet 2:50, 2:55
6. 1.5 Express 0:58 (size as indicated)
7. 2.0 Express 0:58 (size as indicated)
8. Dough 1:30 (no choice of size)
9. Jam 1:20 (no choice of size)
0. Cake 2:50 (no choice of size)
11. Whole Grain 2:55. 3:00
12. Bake 1:00 (maximum time)

REPLACEMENT MODEL #29982
3 loaf sizes available, 1 lb., 1.5 lb. and 2 lb.
1. Basic 2:55, 3:00, 3:02
2. French 3:54, 4:01, 4:09
3. Gluten-Free, 2 lb. only, 3:09
4. Quick 1:24 (no choice of size)
5. Sweet 2:47, 2:52, 2:57
6. 1.5 Express 1:25 (size as indicated)
7. 2.0 Express 1:35 (size as indicated)
8. Dough 1:32 (no choice of size)
9. Jam 1:20 (no choice of size)
10. Roast Nut 0:45 (no choice of size)
11. Whole Grain 2:54, 3:09, 3:22
12. Bake 1:00 (maximum time)

---

WHOLE GRAIN (WHOLE WHEAT) CYCLE, MODEL #29982

The length of this cycle for a two pound loaf is 3:22. Times are "counting down" in reverse.

3:22 - Starts with this "jerky" sounding movement of the mixing blade.

3:21– Switches to a different mixing noise, still not full-fledged mixing.

3:20 – The sound made by the mixing blade from now is continuous, additional flour or water may be necessary, sides of the bread pan should be scraped down with a plastic scraper if there is anything there; also flour in the corners should be encouraged with the scraper to come to the middle. 3

3:10 – The full-fledged mixing stops, a ball should be formed by this point. (This machine forms balls of dough better than any other bread maker I have ever used, by the way.)

2:45 – Machine has been quiet until now, there is a beep noise which means "add raisins, nuts or whatever," but the machine does not start up until…

2:43 – Machine resumes mixing, this is unusual, every other machine I have had has you dump the additional ingredients in the bread pan when the blade is moving. From this point, the machine keeps mixing (if there are additional ingredients) or just forming a ball. Sometimes the mixing is non-stop, other times it continues for 29 seconds, then stops for 1 second while the ball is tossed around to another location in the bread pan by the blade. This continues until…

2:10 – Machine finally stops the second mixing (I felt like this is a very long time).

1:50 – The machine moves the bread around slightly for two or three rotations of the blade.

Soon after this point before I figured out how to make the machine make bread successfully, the bread started to rise too much, so I had to abandon following what was going on. The baking would have begun shortly after this.

I got a new bread machine...

---

Despite the following rant, the bottom line of which is that this most recent bread machine I got is incapable of making a 2 pound loaf without big issues, I actually found a way to have it make bread successfully ... so read on ... and see the update at the very bottom...

---

I finally broke down and got a new Hamilton Beach bread maker. The previous one I had (model 29882C) was falling apart, the pole which holds the blade started dropping out of the bottom of the machine. There were ways to still make bread but this was kind of hairy, because even if the pole was in the machine, there was a small gap where liquids, typically put in the machine first, could leak through the bottom and cause a short circuit or a fire or something.

I had purchased the "Artisan" Hamilton Beach machine, model 29985F, in October 2024 from Amazon.ca to replace 29882C, but 29985F had serious problems (see my review) and it was returned to Amazon. Model 29982 was recommended by the company as the one I should have gotten to replace 29882C. But 29982 was also BAD. Its major problem was it was incapable of making a two pound loaf without a big mess.

You can look up this new model by searching for B0BLXGJ27V at Amazon.ca (Canada) or Amazon.com (USA). (In the URL, Amazon.com says it is a "Programmable Dishwasher.") Amazon.ca currently has it for sale only from Marketplace sellers, the price is over $200 Canadian. Amazon.com has it as "Amazon's choice" for $74.99 US on special, but to order this from Canada costs around $143 Canadian including shipping; I ordered mine from Walmart Canada and the cost was around $145 Canadian.

I made several tests with 29982.

The first one was a 2 pound whole wheat bread using an old recipe from a Black & Decker manual/recipe book which I have used many times without a problem. (NOTE: Instead of water and powdered milk, I used 3% milk from Safeway; instead of honey I used maple syrup, which I use interchangeably with honey all the time.) The bread hit the viewing window of the machine during the baking cycle, but it only touched it a little bit (about the size of a quarter) and I tapped it down gently with a spoon, it turned out OK and was tasty. I was optimistic.

The second test, a white bread, was using the 2 pound loaf recipe in the manual for the new machine, 29982. The bread hit the viewing window big time and I punched it down, but the top of the bread looked bad; the rest of the loaf was OK. The ingredients were exactly as listed; I was using Robin Hood white flour.

The third test was another two pound loaf of the whole wheat bread mentioned above, again using the old recipe from the Black & Decker manual. It started to almost hit the viewing window of the bread machine with a huge bulge and over an hour still to go and if I hadn't stopped things, the mess would have been much worse. The ingredients were exactly as specified, with milk powder and honey this time. I took the dough out of the machine, and put it in a bread pan and cooked it in the oven.

The next test was a one-pound loaf, using the new machine's white bread recipe from the manual. One pound loaf recipes are often found in really old bread machine books, though they are usually not identified as such. This turned out perfectly. How could it be otherwise, it was the smallest one -- unlike the two pound loaf above with the same recipe which was a disaster. This test used white flour which was not Robin Hood flour.

The final test (so far) was the 1½ pound loaf from the default white bread recipe again. This one also hit the roof, though not as serious as other examples, with about 32 minutes to go during the final baking sequence. The rest of the bread looked OK. This test used white flour which again was not Robin Hood flour.

It doesn't make sense to me that I have used the whole wheat bread recipe from the old Black & Decker book for years and the loaves all turned out OK, but now the results are inconsistent. I think I was lucky that my old Hamilton Beach machines were compatible with those recipes.

BUT ... there are some other issues, maybe. I notice that the ingredients for Robin Hood flour (a Canadian flour which is more expensive than typical "no name" flour) that I used to make a 2 lb default white loaf (above) from the HB manual (which was a flop) are kind of weird. There might even be other grains included in this white flour along with other additives. And when I used to make bread with an HB machine, I usually first heated up the water for 30 seconds in my microwave ... but I think the rising/baking would override that ... it's not like "cold" water at the beginning could have such a huge effect on the loaves. And it's not like I live in La Paz, Bolivia, I am only a few hundred feet above sea level.

Here are some other interesting facts about this new Hamilton Beach machine, 29982:

• First of all, THERE ARE ONLY TWO RECIPES IN THE MANUAL. One is for white bread (which I have used twice above, one was a huge flop). The second is for something using the "Roast Nut" cycle which replaces the "Cake" cycle in my previous HB machine. You are supposed to take some nuts like almonds, soak them in salty water, drain them and then cook them in the machine for 45 minutes, producing a snack treat. If you want other bread recipes, you have to go the Hamilton-Beach web site! There are around 40 such recipes on the page at the Hamilton Beach site (choose "Breads" on the left side), but if you don't own a computer you are stuck with only the recipe for white bread, unless you own some recipe books or consult the Internet. Some of these recipes at the HB web site are for the same bread, so you get two recipes, one each for 1½ and 2 pound loaves.
• The mixing blade in the new machine is not compatible with the shaft in my now-broken machine's baking pan ... this could be a problem if you are ordering some replacement blade from a place like Amazon where lots of generic blades are available, which don't specify which machine they are for.
• The overall dimensions of the bread pan are similar to my earlier machine, but the thing on the bottom of the pan where it connects to the motor is NOT the same, so you cannot use the pan in an old machine or vice versa. This again could cause issues if you are ordering a generic bread pan from Amazon which does not specify which machine it is for.
• The machine beeps at various times (when you add raisins, nuts, etc.) but the volume of the beeps varies. The beeps when everything is finished are barely audible. As well, when I was making whole wheat bread, it started beeping at 1:35 of the cycle, which made no sense, because there was nothing happening at that point.

See also another posting on my blog which compares the times for various breads on the old and new Hamilton Beach machines as well as a sample time breakdown for one cycle on the new machine. The old machine's manual had a time chart which was much more detailed than the one for the recent machine, which is disappointing.

---

UPDATE, JANUARY 12, 2025

I was just about ready to return this new Hamilton Beach machine to Walmart, when I suddenly had a brainstorm.

This new HB machine is unusual, because it has 3 different weight settings: 1 lb., 1½ lb. and 2 lb. One pound loaves were popular when bread machines were first introduced many years ago; these days typical weights are 1½ lb., 2 lb., and even 3 lb.

Since a 1 lb. loaf of white bread using the one and only default recipe in the machine's manual turned out OK (because it was the smallest one with the shortest baking cycle) I decided to try and make a 1½ lb. loaf without any change in the ingredients, but using the 1 lb. baking cycle. The results were perfect, not only for a white bread loaf (which had blown up using the 1½ lb. recipe with 1½ lb baking cycle as well as a 2 lb. loaf which was a huge disaster), but also for my "kitchen sink" bread which is full of seeds based on 7 grain bread recipe from the Black & Decker manual, plus a pumpernickel loaf.

In my old Black & Decker manual/recipe book, I found there are several 1½ lb recipes, and I found a really old bread machine cookbook written by Donna Rathmell German from 1991 which has recipes for all 3 weights. She wrote several bread machine books judging by what is available at Amazon. I used this book for the pumpernickel bread mentioned in the previous paragraph, using the 1½ lb. recipe/1 lb. baking cycle combo as well as another recipe for 1½ lb. cinnamon raisin bread from the Black & Decker book, and they all turned out fine.

---

My conversation with Rufus, Amazon AI

(I was looking at some soundtrack CD on amazon.com, suddenly there was this pop up on the screen:)

Hi, I'm Rufus!

You can ask me all your shopping questions. My answers are powered by AI, so I may not always get things right. Learn more.

Does it contain any dialog or narration?

(This was not a question which I was asking.)

Unfortunately, the product information does not specify whether the soundtrack contains any dialog or narration. Soundtrack albums can include a variety of audio content beyond just musical scores. Without further details from the product description or customer reviews, I can't provide a definitive answer.

(I should have looked a little closer to see this was gonna be a conversation with AI, which was introduced on Amazon in February 2024, almost a year ago.)

Where is this pop up coming from?

I'm afraid I don't have enough context to determine what pop-up you're referring to. Could you please provide some more details about the situation?

I mean this pop up where you are telling me stuff RIGHT NOW.

I do not actually see any pop-up appearing on my end. As an AI technology without a visual interface, I can only respond based on the conversational prompts you provide. Could you please describe the pop-up you're referring to in more detail? I'd be happy to try my best to address any concerns once I understand the situation better.

(All this shit with pictures, stuff I might want to buy, suddenly appears:)

IrriFix Box Set - Rain Bird Popup Riser Extensions 1800EXT | RainBird Universal Sprinkler Extenders 1800-EXT | Set of 6 with Instruction Card & RotorTool Screwdriver

F FORITO 2-Pack Anti Blue Light Screen Protector Compatible with MacBook Air 15.3-inch 2024 2023 Release M3 A3114 M2 A2941 - Eye Protection Blue Light Blocking & Anti Glare Screen Filter

Ailun Privacy Screen Protector for iPhone 14 / iPhone 13 / iPhone 13 Pro [6.1 Inch] 2 Pack Anti Spy Private Tempered Glass Anti-Scratch Case Friendly [Not for iPhone 13 Pro Max] [2 Pack]

Gogoonike Adjustable Laptop Stand for Desk, Metal Foldable Laptop Riser, Portable Laptop Holder Mount, Ventilated Cooling Computer Notebook Stand Compatible with 10-15.6” Laptops

MNN Portable Monitor 15.6inch FHD 1080P USB C HDMI Gaming Ultra-Slim IPS Display w/Smart Cover & Speakers,HDR Plug&Play, External Monitor for Laptop PC Phone Mac

(Back to the discussion with "Rufus"...)

Stupid, everything you are telling me is in a pop up which seems to be connected with some item I am looking at on amazon.com.

I don't have an answer for that. Do you want to try another shopping question? You can also head over to the Customer Service Home page for more information.

The customer service home page for what?

The customer service home page provides assistance with orders, subscriptions, refunds, returns, missing packages, tracking deliveries, identifying unknown charges, and other common help topics related to Amazon's services and products.

To get help, select Customer Service.

Stupid, what is this "customer service home page" connected with, is this Amazon or some seller on Amazon?

The customer service home page refers to Amazon's official support resources. It provides assistance for Amazon's own services like orders, deliveries, payments, refunds and other common issues customers may face while shopping on Amazon. The page allows you to select the topic you need help with and guides you through resolving your query or concern.

To get help, select Customer Service.

(That is enough.)

According to one WWW page, the name "Rufus" is associated with black people:

The Decennial U.S. Census data also provides insights into the ethnic identity associated with the Rufus surname. From 2000 to 2010, there were shifts in the percentages across different ethnicities. The largest ethnic group identifying with the Rufus surname is Black, which increased from 73.52% in 2000 to 76.10% in 2010. The second largest ethnicity, White, decreased from 19.29% to 14.52% during the same period.

If you watch Hawaii Five-O, you would know that this name, at least at the time of the show, was stereotypically connected with black people: http://fiveohomepage.com/season11/distantthunder.htm.

Facebook annoyances (again)

I was a member of a Facebook group which focuses on bread machines. A while ago, I got kicked out of the group. I couldn't access it or the administrator from any level. Any connection I had with this group totally disappeared. And I was one of the "Top Contributors" to this group!

I managed to contact the admin, and he said I had been kicked out because I made a posting which contained the word "money" (seriously) so Facebook must have thought I was a spammer. What a joke. Anyway, the admin reinstated me and I posted more for a few more weeks.

But then there were more problems. I posted a message about this particular bread machine, that a new model had been released, and once I did this, I was again kicked out of the group and any connection with it disappeared, just like before. No idea what happened, there was no mention of money in this posting.

However, I think possibly Facebook has it in for me because elsewhere in my Facebook feed, I had posted a couple of links to news and opinion articles about what jerks they are. I had left Facebook after my initial fascination with the place several years ago, and took great pains when I went back on recently to not use any of the information connected with my previous account, though I'm sure they can make the connection.

Perhaps there is another issue, though. Recently Facebook is having a fight with the Canadian government, and they are cutting off all reference to news from Canadian newspapers because the government wants them to compensate the places where they "steal" this news from. Maybe I, being Canadian, am tarnished with this brush, though my recent posting responsible for my banishment was hardly a "news" item in the sense of current events.

I managed again to get in touch with the administrator from the group to investigate my second "disappearance," but I am not encouraged to resume my postings in this group even if I will be allowed back.

Facebook seems to be a horribly paranoid place. I have asked people to contact me via my e-mail outside of Facebook (I have only been on the internet since 1991 and had my own WWW site since 1997) but it is unusual they will do this.

Recently I wanted to send someone a PDF file of this school newspaper that she was involved with many years ago with via the Facebook Messenger. She gave me the usual paranoia, i.e., "I don't feel comfortable when clicking on things in Messenger." But she finally DID reply to me -- not to my e-mail but in Messenger -- and botched up her reply in a spectacular way, ending up in some other message in my Facebook feed which revealed everything she wished to tell me confidentially in a very public way!

If this kind of nonsense persists, I think I am going to abandon Facebook again soon. Every second posting there seems like a commercial, much like the Internet itself these days. Why I am hanging out on Facebook -- mostly in groups which reflect my interests, i.e., film and other music, film technology, my home town, and so forth -- doesn't make sense, since I cut off cut cable TV over 20 years ago because I hated the commercials there so much. The last time I got off Facebook I got fed up with their insidous monetizing everything you are connected with as well as their crappy attitudes reinforcing bourgeois morality (no pictures of nudity, even of famous statues, or breastfeeding women, the picture of the little girl who was bombed with napalm in the Vietnam war and so forth).

Stupid Amazon survey

I was selected to take a survey connected with Amazon. I think this was Amazon.com based on some of the response questions.

Normally I can't stand surveys which has input ranging from bad to good like this:

○ I hate it ○ I sort of hate it ○ I have no opinion ○ I sort of like it ○ I love it.

Seriously, people don't think like this! But I figured, what the heck...

This was one of the first screens, which led to this, a more detailed explanation.

The only one of these tools on Amazon I use with my cell phone is the barcode scanner, which will tell you if the item is available at Amazon ... sometimes. My experience is it doesn't work most of the time, though if you type the actual number under the bar code into the Amazon search engine, it will find the item (if it's in the system) right away.

Of course, when you complain about something in one of these surveys, you get sent off on a tangent with specific questions about what you are complaining about. For example, this screen, this one, and this one.

All of this ended up here. The issue here is not whether I want to use the barcode scanner again or not, but the fact that it doesn't work correctly most of the time, and there is no place to leave specific information about what I find wrong with it aside from a couple of generic text entry boxes in other areas of the survey which I doubt anyone will ever read.

Many of the responses in this survey ranged from annoying to idiotic, like "How often have you had difficulties finding products on Amazon that represent you?" (WHAT?!?!?)

Who comes up with this crap? Do normal people really think about their Amazon experience this way? I finally just chose the most negative response to each question, trying to get to the end of the survey.

I have to wonder if this survey was prepared in some country where English is not the first language after reading "Amazon acknowledges, and correctly interpets your asks."

It ended with ("for statistical purposes only") "Are you of Hispanic or Latino/a descent?" followed by this! Can you believe it? I filled in the blank with "CANADIAN."

Hassles of Everyday Life

If you do a Google search for my cell phone number you will get a few results -- creepy web sites in countries like Turkey, Russia, etc. which compile various phone numbers. If you try and go to these web pages you will get stern warnings from your browser, "don't do this," because they are extremely unsafe.

===

Because I have an Android cell phone, the other day I got some message from Google maps which told me all these places I have been recently over a period of several days. For example, the museum in the town where I grew up near Vancouver (I donated a bunch of stuff to them), two Value Village stores, and a restaurant where I had brunch with this old friend of mine. Because I have "location" on with the phone, it knew all these things. If I don't have location on and I lose my phone, it cannot find it.

===

I got warnings in both text message and email yesterday that I hadn't paid one of my credit card bills and the amount is due on March 30, hardly enough time to pay it off, because banks don't seem to work on the weekends as far as receiving payments are concerned. The only problem is, I already paid the bill when I got the statement 10 days before and in my account at the bank which issued the card it shows that the payment was received shortly after this.

===

Yesterday I got a text from some person in Ohio which looked like it was a wrong number. I said to them, who are you, the person then started to get chatty when I said I was in Vancouver, saying "Oh Canada is a wonderful country, blah blah blah." They sort of apologized for bothering me, but then seemed to be starting a conversation with "what should I call you?" At this point, I blocked the number. I felt like saying, "Oh, I guess you are one of those Internet prostitutes," but they did seem sincere, obviously part of their persona to insinuate their way into my good books. I should have replied, "I am Officer Mike with the Vancouver City Police."

Another example of why Facebook is dumb

On January 17th, 2023, I posted the following on Facebook. It said "Shared with Public," this means "anyone on or off Facebook" can see this posting. Probably not a good idea considering what happened. I only have about 5 dozen friends on FB, these people that I have known in the past, have worked with, etc. I thought only these people would see my posting, which was like this:

"I received e-mail from one of my investment companies that my statement is ready. I don't recall ever receiving something from these people before (this was not a scam). I tried to track down the password, but there was nothing. So I tried the usual "forgot your password" link. When I did this, it says what is your e-mail address, so I entered the address that this document was sent to. Just below this, it asks for your "login name." Now, if I can't remember the password or where it is, why would I know where my "user name" is? DUH!!"

I actually resolved this problem myself. But shortly after posting this, I received a message from some attractive looking woman in SYRIA (seriously, no pun intended for "syria-sly") with advice on contacting a guy called bunyan_assist on Instagram. (Facebook owns Instagram.)

The bunyan_assist person supposedly can help people if you are having trouble connecting to accounts because of login/password issues. But I wondered, how is this relevant to me, because I didn't provide a lot of details about the problem I was having including specific information about the web site I was having the problem with.

In addition to this Instagram account name, a phone number which was in Wisconsin was provided. This Syrian woman had several hundred friends, making me think that her account was hacked. The whole thing was creepy, I just deleted her message.

However, I wanted to post about this experience later. It took a while to find a reference to this bunyan_assist in my Google search history from a couple of weeks prior. When you do the subsequent Google search for this "fixer," the resulting information which you can see on the search results page is very sketchy:

(#1) More I messaged @BUNYAN_ASSIST on Instagram, his a cyber security expert who helped me recovered my account successfully, kindly message or text him on +1...

(#2) But I know you can still get back into your account by direct message (Bunyan_assist) on Instagram now and ask for his help to recover your account text or..

(This what you see when you get the search results, if you go to the place where these results are supposedly located, the above information is not seen.)

So I posted about my experience on FB with much of the same info as above (again, not just to my friends), and almost immediately got multiple responses similar to what I had received before. This was all very weird. Is some scammer scraping every account on Facebook with keywords like "password," "login," "problem(s)," etc.? The whole thing was creepy, I just deleted all of it (again). These are the second batch of responses I got over this issue...

5 comments

Kelly Andrews -- Kindly inbox me immediately for assistance

Brenda Tullock -- I forgot my Facebook password too but got help from meta_generat_cyber on instagram he helped recover my account he can recover your account...

Brenda Tullock -- Just try and message him on Instagram now I'm sure he can help

Evelyn Smith -- You just invoked more of them lol (this woman wanted to become my friend on FB, I declined her request)

Mhiz Golden -- You can get your account back contact mirac Recovery on Instagram

Bread Machine Banana Bread

I have used this recipe many times. For the best bananas, I get bananas which are very ripe, then I put them in the freezer for a while, until they turn BLACK. You take them out of the freezer and then let them come to room temperature and cut the ends off with scissors and squeeze the contents into the mixture as per the instructions in the link below. The recipe asks for 2 bananas, but sometimes I have used three.

If you follow the instructions in the recipe, it's a good idea to take a plastic scraper and, during the initial mixing cycle, make sure there isn't any of the mix on the inner walls of the bread pan. Use the scraper to make sure that the stuff which is being mixed is truly mixed by pushing it from the outer edges of the pan toward the center. If you don't do this, you might end up with a "crust" on the bottom of the bread.

In order to overcome this problem a couple of times, I didn't put the liquid mix into the bread pan and kept it until the "dry" stuff was finished, mixed them together, and then put ALL of that together into the bread pan to be mixed.

https://www.thespruceeats.com/banana-bread-machine-recipe-304378

No Love for Park Royal

I wanted to get a new laptop for my wife, since her old one was as slow as snails having sex in a bowl of molasses on top of a glacier, an expression I once used to described this BBS where I hung out in the 1990s that really pissed off one of the co-owners there.

There were laptop deals at Best Buy on Boxing Day, but I dragged my ass, and the computer I wanted was sold out almost immediately. But just before the sale ended (Dec. 31st), I tried again and there was ONE of these at the West Vancouver Best Buy, which is in the Park Royal Shopping Center, about 15 miles away from my place.

You are probably wondering, "Mike, why didn't you just have this shipped to the Best Buy on Marine Drive near your house [a mere 3 miles away] instead of driving to West Vancouver?" and I would answer "Because my attitude was: Don't ask any questions, they might screw up such a transfer or maybe the order will be cancelled or whatever."

Anyway, a couple of days later, I went to Park Royal South where this Best Buy was supposedly located. I went over the Lions Gate Bridge, and at the first left going south, which is Taylor Way, an extension of the street that goes to the highway up the hill, I turned.

There was a big BEST BUY written on one of the buildings in front of me, but no other information. I pulled into a parking lot for a Dollarama nearby to get my non-existent bearings, and then I mindlessly turned down some street which was like an alley between buildings, going west. This went on for a few blocks, then I saw a Home Depot, which interested me, because I wanted to get some stuff there anyway, and I could kill two birds with one stone.

After I got out of my car, I saw some guy, who was a bus driver, and I asked him if he knew where the Best Buy was. He didn't, but he pulled out his cell phone and looked in Google Maps, and said it was "at the east of the mall" (which is where I started my journey).

Anyway, I wanted to go in to Home Depot, which was not some huge warehouse, but this kind of "cute" brick building. But I was at the back of Home Depot where there was a Starbucks, so I walked about half way there, and then decided to move my car to the parking lot in front of the Home Depot. I backed up carefully, avoiding this McLaren sports car. In the Home Depot parking lot, I asked some other guy who had a wispy beard like the truckers in the protest a year ago if he knew where Best Buy was, and he said words to the effect: "It is over there by the movie theatres," pointing east.

After I got my stuff at Home Depot (where the cashier didn't know where Best Buy was either), I started east on this road which runs south of the mall. There was soon a ramp up to a parking lot, so I went up there. I kept driving and came to the furniture store called The Brick which didn't seem to be open. No luck, so I backtracked and went into a parking lot at the lower level which led to the Osaka Supermarket.

I went up some stairs and when inside the building asked this woman who was cleaning stuff if she knew where Best Buy was. She pointed and said "Around the corner." So I went that way. I eventually ended up at Best Buy, where some guy wanted to help me. I asked him where do I pick up this laptop and he pointed to the other side of the store, which looked like it was about half a mile away. I asked him if there was a parking lot outside the doors over there, and he said yes.

Because I wanted to drive to this parking lot, I went through a nearby Staples, which had an entrance on the outside of the building when I had come in earlier. As I went down stairs to my car, I totally misjudged the last step on the stairway and fell down on my hands and knees. There was no one around, and I picked myself up. This fall resulted in some very nasty bruises on my leg which appeared later. It didn't endear me to Park Royal at all.

I left this parking lot, breaking several rules as to where I shouldn't go and went back to the east of the mall via the south road where it still was not obvious where I should go to get to Best Buy. I drove into this other parking lot which was totally outside of the mall and around in circles, trying to figure out where Best Buy was, annoyed.

I then went back down the alley which took me to the area of Home Depot again. I pitifully asked a couple of people while driving in the alley if they knew where Best Buy was, and they said no. Then I started back eastwards again. I found a parking lot which I figured was below Best Buy, and there was sort of an alcove in this parking lot. At this point, I wanted to just phone the store and ask how the hell do I get to the far-away place I had seen earlier next to the pick-up area from the entrance to the store inside the mall.

Unfortunately, there are no direct phone numbers for any Best Buy stores in Vancouver if you look them up on Google. There is only some 1-800 number where you have to listen to numerous idiotic prompts ... then it said "your waiting time is 8 minutes." By this point, I was getting really fed up, so I went into the mall through some entrance which mentioned the movie theatres.

I wandered around for a while and eventually realized I was totally lost! There were NO MAPS with the usual "YOU ARE HERE" on them anywhere in Park Royal that I had seen. I went up some escalator which brought me beside Osaka Supermarket, but I couldn't remember if this was the same area I was in before. I couldn't figure out where my car was or the door with directions to the movie theatres, but I remembered beside this door was a lot of Sportchek logos, so I went into the Sportchek store and asked if there was an exit on the outside of the building, which there was. I went there and quickly found my car.

I went back to the south road and kept driving to the east of the mall and parked in the parking lot outside the Dollarama again which I figured MUST be below the Best Buy since their sign was up above. I went inside the Dollarama where some tall blonde Russian babe was stocking shelves and asked her where Best Buy was. She said in a Rocky-and-Bullwinkle's Natasha voice: "Up stairs." So I went through the door at the back of the store and up an escalator to the entrance of Best Buy where I had already been, where the guy pointed out the entrance a half a mile away.

I trudged across the store and went out the doors there and noticed there was not only a parking lot in front of me, but a STAIRWAY down to the Dollarama parking lot, duh! So I picked up the laptop and went back to my car down the stairs. Then I noticed this maintenance truck which I had seen earlier when I was in the Dollarama parking lot. There were two lanes, one for up and one for down, both connected with the Best Buy lot upstairs. When I was there before, this maintenance truck was parked in the "up" lane, as if to say "there is some maintenance going on, you can't come up here." Now the maintenance truck was in the "down" lane, where some guy (who I hadn't seen before) was fixing the sign above which says something like the maximum height allowed for cars going up the ramp.

What a huge hassle!!! Of course I got a survey regarding my "Best Buy shopping experience" later which I filled out with a totally hate-filled response.

But the problem isn't just Best Buy, it's the way Park Royal (which is north AND south of the main drag) is laid out. I told a friend of mine who lives in the area of the north part of the mall, "Park Royal is totally crazy. It looks like they made it up as they kept building things without any plan in advance." She replied, "I'm sure that’s the best assessment I’ve heard. It’s a disaster.”

Kitchen Sink Bread

This recipe is for “Kitchen Sink” bread. I have a Hamilton-Beach bread machine now; I wanted to make this bread from my old Black & Decker manual/recipe book which requires Seven Grain Cereal, but I didn’t have any of that. Instead, I had a cupboard full of bags of stuff where I would buy something to use a tablespoon or two of in some bread, but I would never finish the bag.

This recipe is the cousin of another recipe uploaded recently (November 2022) to a Facebook bread machine group which is based on one of Killer Dave’s breads which contains a lot of seeds.

Here is the recipe:

1⅔ cups of water – I heat this up in the microwave using a Pyrex measuring cup for around 30 seconds and dump this into the bread pan. If you think the temperature is too hot, by the time all the ingredients are in the pan, it will be OK, trust me. If your bread machine warms up the liquid at the beginning, you don’t need to do this business with the microwave.

3 TBSP of powdered milk

2 TBSP of shortening (I use vegetable or olive oil)

2 TBSP of honey

2 tsp of salt

1¼ cup of whole wheat flour in Canada; in the USA, use 1 cup of whole wheat flour

2½ cups of bread flour in USA; in Canada, use 2½ cups of all-purpose or bread flour

At this point you are supposed to add ¾ cups of Seven Grain Cereal, but ¾ cups is equivalent to 12 TBSP, so add 12 TBSP of different things. For example: cracked wheat, corn meal, poppy seeds, pumpkin seeds (unsalted), sunflower seeds (unsalted), white sesame seeds, black sesame seeds, triticale flakes, hemp hearts, oats, “healthy” cereal (in Canada, Red River), different types of flour (spelt, triticale, tapioca, rye, etc.). If you don’t have 12 different things, then double up some items so you would have 2 TBSP of some things out of the total 12.

1¼ tsp of yeast (I use bread machine yeast)

Use the Whole Grain or Whole Wheat setting, this recipe is for a 2 lb. loaf. On my machine, there is no option to choose the crust, you may be able to select something here.

On my machine, the bread is first mixed with a chunka-chunka sound (about 2 minutes), and then it is mixed really well, with the blade going non-stop for about 13 minutes. After the non-stop action starts, I open up the machine, and using a plastic scraper, make sure there isn’t any of the mixture on the sides of the pan. I also flick the bread from the corners of the pan into the center using this scraper (there is a certain technique to doing this). Don’t just dump ingredients in the machine and come back 3 hours later, you have to be proactive.

If the mixing bread starts to climb up the wall of the bread pan, I drop a heaping TBSP of some “thickening” flour (I use rye flour, but others would do) right on top of it. This should help the bread to form a nice ball which is bounced around in the bread pan. I wouldn’t recommend doing this for more than two TBSP of the “thickening” flour.

I have made this bread many times, never had a flop!

Cheezies Bread

I’ve had a bread machine for years. I use it all the time.

Recently, I wondered if you could use Cheezies, the Canadian snack food, to make bread using this machine. So I experimented with a recipe for cheese and onion bread from an old Black & Decker machine recipe book, which I use with my newer machine, which is made by Hamilton-Beach and has a single mixing blade in the middle of the bread pan.

Cheezies are made out of corn meal, cheese and other stuff and are horribly addictive. They are a legendary Canadian snack food. I think the equivalent in the USA would be Cheetos which are crunchy (not cheese snacks which are puffy and full of air).

I foolishly bought a large package of Cheezies at Costco in Canada which contained all these 36g Hallowe’en-size bags of the snack. It comes in other sizes as well, as you can see from the Cheezies home page, http://www.cheezies.com

In order to prepare for making the bread (below), I took two of these 36g bags, which weighed approximately 80g (just a bit less than 3 oz.), dumped them into a bowl and using a mortar-and-pestle style method, crushed them up into a powder. You can do the same thing using a blender. This produces about ¾ cup of crushed Cheezies, well-packed.

Anyway, here is the bread recipe:

1½ cups of water – I heat these up in the microwave using a Pyrex measuring cup for around 30 seconds and dump this into the bread pan. If you think the temperature is too hot, by the time all the ingredients are in the pan, it will be OK, trust me.

3 tbsp of powdered milk – I also used just 1½ cups of skim milk, also warmed up, that worked OK too.

2 tbsp of white sugar

2 tsp of salt (original recipe calls for 1½ tsp)

3¾ cups of bread flour or all-purpose flour in Canada; in the USA, **use 4 cups of bread flour** (that’s what the recipe says)

¾ cup of powdered Cheezies (as created above)

1½ tsp of bread machine yeast

Use the Sweet Bread Setting, this recipe is for a 2 lb. loaf. The second kneading for this bread type on my machine is VERY long. Choose the crust you want if there is a selection.

I have also added 2 tbsp of dried onion flakes or 1 tsp of lemon zest or 1 tsp of some mixture of spices (dill and other stuff) to this bread, it turned out fine. On my machine, the bread is first mixed, and then it is mixed really well, with the blade going non-stop. After the non-stop action starts, I open up the machine, and using a plastic scraper, make sure there isn’t any of the mixture on the sides of the pan. I also flick the bread from the corners of the pan into the center using this scraper (there is a certain technique to doing this). If the mixed bread starts to climb up the wall of the bread pan, looking like a giant slug from the movie Dune as directed by David Lynch, I drop a heaping tablespoon of some “thickening” flour (I use rye flour, but others would do) right on top of the “slug.” This should help the bread to form a nice ball which is bounced around in the bread pan. I wouldn’t recommend doing this for more than two tbsp of the thickening flour.

I'm back on Facebook, and it's still annoying

 Why is Facebook so annoying?

If a posting has a lot of responses, it says "49 Comments" at the top, for example. If you click on this, it then says, "View 10 previous comments" and "All Comments."

If you click on "All Comments," it breaks this down into "Most recent" and "All Comments." But when you then start to read what are "all comments" (which is what I wanted to see in the first place), on some of the comments, after what is seemingly some default number of characters, it cuts off and you have to click on "See More" to read the rest of what is posted.

Is there something you can configure so you can see all of the comments (like REALLY >all< of them all of the time) without all this extra clicking?

It's like Facebook wants to intentionally discourage communication between people so they have more time to watch dashcam views of cars flipping over, lame "Just for Laughs" style videos, excerpts from movies about bullies, home movies of people acting like morons and ads which litter the place -- not to mention pictures of women with big breasts.

New Chips from Lay's

 Just announced, new varieties of chips from Lay's:

Rainforest - Using herbs harvested near old growth trees, these chips have a light scent of pine. The bags are specially sealed with biodegradable crazy glue to ensure freshness.

Pemmican - First in a line of indigenous-flavored chips, these tasty morsels will be sold in northern Canadian stores by special arrangement with Lay's to keep costs down, unlike typical other offerings in those stores like Cheerios ($20 a box) or a pound of fresh blueberries ($30).

Brazilian Beef - These chips with a South American tang feature the smell of smoke from burning Amazon rain forests nearby which were cleared to make room for more pasture land.

Sushi Boat - This variety features "Ocean Wise" fish, a fancy way of saying we are kind to the fish before we slaughter them. This variety is personally endorsed by David Suzuki.

Saltspring Salsa - These ones feature pieces of organically grown tomatoes which have been dried in the sunshine as well as other vegetables. There is also goat cheese from goats which have been been raised by the Saltspring Island Ladies' Co-op. These chips are slightly more expensive because of the ferry fuel surcharge connected with transporting the chips to the mainland.

Cell Ding A Ling

I think it's very funny the way in TV shows and movies that when characters get a call on their cell phone the ringtone is usually the default one for that phone.

COVID-19 Humor

 I thought I was getting a cold yesterday and, of course, I was anxious about whether I could still smell anything. I reached around in my room for something to check out my sense of smell and it was some deodorant but guess what? It was UNSCENTED!

I saw some ad on the Internet that says if you have erectile dysfunction that's a possible symptom of having COVID-19. So I guess I have COVID-19.

Annoying CKWX Commercials

 Jerry Brar Mortgages - I look up "Gerry Brar" (at least I got the "Brar" right), which produces "Did you mean: jerry brar mortgage"

Ensign Pacific Chrysler - name of the company sounds like "Enzyme Pacific."

BMO - most of some commercial was this crappy pop song, I couldn't understand a single word which was said. I don't think this commercial lasted a long time.

Ziprecruiter, an employer-based employee search company. They say the same things over and over, including "Ziprecruiter.com -- slash -- Canada ... that's Ziprecruiter.com -- slash -- C-A-N-A-D-A." Huh? Do they think people in Canada are so stupid they can't spell the name of their own country? I think this ad campaign has ended.

[Update from 2023:] Pacific Blue Cross, a medical insurance company, has a commercial saying that kids are covered free when they are included in a family travel plan. This annoying "child" in the commercial wonders if their cat named "Gizmo" would qualify, followed by some chuckles. As someone who, as CKWX's own commercial says, listens to the station "four, five times a day" (if not more), I hear this Blue Cross commercial a lot and I HATE IT.

Many CKWX commercials would benefit by having the name of their companies or websites spelled out, especially if there is no other mention of how you can contact them like with a phone number or whatever.

Someone in the CKWX advertising department recently (2023) thinks it would be a good idea to have a musical jingle at the end of some ads, many of which are unbelievably lame!

Back from the dead (again?)

Time to dust off this old blog so I can post the stuff that I send to friends and just tell them to check the blog periodically so I can avoid sending the same things to the same people.

Should be stiff competition from mistermike.blogspot.com (one posting), mistermikes.blogspot.com (one posting) and mister-mike.blogspot.com (no postings).

BTW, am I the only guy who types blogspost.com whenever looking up an address here?