rollin' rollin' rollin'...
Oct. 27th, 2003 07:22 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
scottobearHoly cow.. a new game shop (Twistyland) opened up right across the street from the galleria. (via an ad on cartoon network.) Maybe I can swap out some of my redundant heroclix / mage knight for other goodies..Like the New Sandman series, perhaps.
So... I'm the most googlebotted guy in all of livejournal-land? (at least yesterday) I wonder what factors lead to that sort of thing? I also wonder what being listed on![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
lj_nifty will do to my hits, for that matter. I'm very surprised that I'm more popular than ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
brad. I've already gotten a few friendly hellos as a result.
Thought I'd see my brother yesterday with the Vitas, but it looks like that's not going to happen before I go in tomorrow.
eventual to do - Move the sound card down a slot, see if that helps IRQ-wise, and removes some of the contention there.
In honor of the Nov. 4 release of Robert Plant's Sixty Six to Timbuktu two-CD solo compilation, VH1 Classic will air a Plant special Nov 1 and 4.
Some questions I'd like to see answers to (maybe a new meme?) in comments, or LJs -
Clear Sky Clock's old webhost went weirdly, and as a result, the old bookmarks and links don't work. you can get revised links from the link listed at the front of this sentence.
Florida agribusiness develops a hollow celery you can drink through like a straw. The Bloody Mary has been revolutionized!
A hollow celery stalk you can drink through like a straw?
Well, yes.
And you can eat it after you're done imbibing.
A. Duda & Sons Inc., a leading U.S. vegetable grower with operations in Belle Glade, has spent 15 years developing a variety of celery that grows with hollow stalks. The tube-like celery can then be dropped into your favorite drink to help bring the liquid to your eager throat.
U.S. Department of Agriculture scientists say it's the only plant-breeding instance they know in which food has been grown to be used as a tool.
"The celery straw modernizes an old beverage, the Bloody Mary," said Larry Pierce, a Duda seed research manager in California who led the team that developed the product. "Some of our guys like to drink beer through the straw. The straw actually impacts the flavor of the drink tremendously."
Oviedo-based Duda introduced the celery straw this week at the Produce Marketing Association's Fresh Summit 2003. The trade show, which about 16,000 people attended, ended Tuesday.
Duda employees dispensed drinks of Bloody Mary mix and juices so attendees could try the straws, which they could then eat if they chose. Even the product's marketers were surprised at the response.
"It was overwhelming for us," said Bill Munger, Duda's food service director in Salinas, Calif. "We had not anticipated it to be that strong. The cruise ship industry has shown a lot of interest."
Munger estimates the company's California celery fields have enough of the variety to make 5 million straws this season. Not including shipping costs, the straws will be sold wholesale for 10 cents apiece.
"We will roll it out to the food service trade with an eye on bars and also juice and smoothie locations," Munger said Friday. "We are test-marketing it in California, Denver and Vancouver. We expect to have it out for distribution by the first of December."
Michael Bausher, a USDA plant physiologist at the U.S. Horticultural Research Laboratory in Fort Pierce, pointed out that the celery straw is also completely disposable and biodegradeable.
"They won't float off a ship onto the beaches," Bausher said. "They could even impregnate the straws with food coloring. Kool-Aid would be the one I'd like to try."
Randall Niedz, research leader at the horticultural lab, said Duda's straw breaks new ground.
"It's a nontraditional use for a traditional crop," he said.
Drew Duda, division vice president for the company's Belle Glade operation, one of its celery-growing areas along with California, Texas and Arizona, said the straw was inspired by some "off-types" of celery that were growing wild, and too tall, in their California fields.
The celery was hollow, but bitter.
"We all said, 'Wouldn't it be nice if could drink through this?' " Duda said.
Research manager Pierce's team crossbred the wild celery varieties with Duda's more conventional, sweet strains. Duda's fields produce a total of about 5 million 30-bunch cartons of celery a year.
Celery is a two-year crop from seed to seed, so selecting plants for traits such as hollowness, straightness and taste with an opening large enough to drink through took more than a decade, Pierce said. The variety is a foot taller than the usual 2-foot-high celery plant and has a thick canopy of leaves.
"It has hit like a barnstorm," Pierce said. "But it has been a slow process. We spent a year determining how to process, package and handle the straws."
The celery straw is a small part of the research that Duda scientists, working in the world's largest facility devoted completely to celery, conduct on about 1,200 new lines of celery each year, Pierce said.
Although Duda has spent millions of dollars on celery research over the years, it's not possible to determine how many dollars were poured into the project alone, he said. Much of the research is focused on developing celery that has improved flavor and color, reduced stringiness or is more resistant to disease.
Munger said the company also is working on a way to inject the celery straws with fillings such as cheese or peanut butter.
"In about six months, people can look for it at the supermarkets," Munger said. "There are some hurdles at retail with packaging and proper handling instructions. It's not a replacement for a plastic straw. It has to be refrigerated."
Ray Gilmer, spokesman for the Florida Fruit & Vegetable Association in Orlando, said Friday that the celery straw is the type of value-added product the industry is always striving for. Most often, the innovation is in packaging, pre-slicing or added ingredients.
"This is a way of taking celery and putting a new spin on it," Gilmer said. "They have actually changed the food product. That's what makes it so cool."
A New Dawn of the Dead film
Interesting... but one of those ones I go "uh... why bother?"
I always have room for zombie pictures. But I have to wonder why they chose to remake Dawn of the Dead. I would even go so far as to say that there is room for more than one zombie-in-a-mall film so they could have even created another one. Why remake it? Just for the title, I guess. Though, it has Zombies... I'll probably see it. Plus, Ving Rhames... he's always good at what he does. Hopefully, it won't be stripped of a lot of the subtext that was in the original. (The mall as a comment about the stupidity of consumerism, for example.)
Speaking of commercialism... I'm looking forward to the original's multi-disc deluxe edition DVD early next year, too. I've heard that they are including three cuts of DOTD: The Argento Cut (which is the most popular cut of the film amongst fans), the Canne Workprint Cut (which is often mislabeled as being Romero's "Director's Cut" version of DOTD), and the George Romero/US Theatrical Cut (which Romero considers to be his definitive version of DOTD).
Other Classic Horror Movies that got remade and that I liked quite a lot both times- The Fly, The Thing, Invasion of the Body Snatchers.
Random thought - I wonder if Zombies would prefer hydrocephalic victims?
Other movie thoughts - Jim Carrey as the Bionic Man? Um.. wasn't inspector gadget already made?
Very Nifty set of web-statistics / Hulk- Halloween lights webcam page. Measures local precipitation, outside activity and electrical draw, and you can pan / Zoom the camera around to get a better look at stuff.
It tells you all sorts of crazy statistics, and you can flick off and on the lights around the house.
Well,I'm off... until later, dear journal.
So... I'm the most googlebotted guy in all of livejournal-land? (at least yesterday) I wonder what factors lead to that sort of thing? I also wonder what being listed on
lj_nifty will do to my hits, for that matter. I'm very surprised that I'm more popular than brad. I've already gotten a few friendly hellos as a result. Thought I'd see my brother yesterday with the Vitas, but it looks like that's not going to happen before I go in tomorrow.
eventual to do - Move the sound card down a slot, see if that helps IRQ-wise, and removes some of the contention there.
In honor of the Nov. 4 release of Robert Plant's Sixty Six to Timbuktu two-CD solo compilation, VH1 Classic will air a Plant special Nov 1 and 4.
Some questions I'd like to see answers to (maybe a new meme?) in comments, or LJs -
What was the last time you said something that you later (or immediately) regretted?
What was the last time you regretted *not* saying anything?
Clear Sky Clock's old webhost went weirdly, and as a result, the old bookmarks and links don't work. you can get revised links from the link listed at the front of this sentence.
Florida agribusiness develops a hollow celery you can drink through like a straw. The Bloody Mary has been revolutionized!
A hollow celery stalk you can drink through like a straw?
Well, yes.
And you can eat it after you're done imbibing.
A. Duda & Sons Inc., a leading U.S. vegetable grower with operations in Belle Glade, has spent 15 years developing a variety of celery that grows with hollow stalks. The tube-like celery can then be dropped into your favorite drink to help bring the liquid to your eager throat.
U.S. Department of Agriculture scientists say it's the only plant-breeding instance they know in which food has been grown to be used as a tool.
"The celery straw modernizes an old beverage, the Bloody Mary," said Larry Pierce, a Duda seed research manager in California who led the team that developed the product. "Some of our guys like to drink beer through the straw. The straw actually impacts the flavor of the drink tremendously."
Oviedo-based Duda introduced the celery straw this week at the Produce Marketing Association's Fresh Summit 2003. The trade show, which about 16,000 people attended, ended Tuesday.
Duda employees dispensed drinks of Bloody Mary mix and juices so attendees could try the straws, which they could then eat if they chose. Even the product's marketers were surprised at the response.
"It was overwhelming for us," said Bill Munger, Duda's food service director in Salinas, Calif. "We had not anticipated it to be that strong. The cruise ship industry has shown a lot of interest."
Munger estimates the company's California celery fields have enough of the variety to make 5 million straws this season. Not including shipping costs, the straws will be sold wholesale for 10 cents apiece.
"We will roll it out to the food service trade with an eye on bars and also juice and smoothie locations," Munger said Friday. "We are test-marketing it in California, Denver and Vancouver. We expect to have it out for distribution by the first of December."
Michael Bausher, a USDA plant physiologist at the U.S. Horticultural Research Laboratory in Fort Pierce, pointed out that the celery straw is also completely disposable and biodegradeable.
"They won't float off a ship onto the beaches," Bausher said. "They could even impregnate the straws with food coloring. Kool-Aid would be the one I'd like to try."
Randall Niedz, research leader at the horticultural lab, said Duda's straw breaks new ground.
"It's a nontraditional use for a traditional crop," he said.
Drew Duda, division vice president for the company's Belle Glade operation, one of its celery-growing areas along with California, Texas and Arizona, said the straw was inspired by some "off-types" of celery that were growing wild, and too tall, in their California fields.
The celery was hollow, but bitter.
"We all said, 'Wouldn't it be nice if could drink through this?' " Duda said.
Research manager Pierce's team crossbred the wild celery varieties with Duda's more conventional, sweet strains. Duda's fields produce a total of about 5 million 30-bunch cartons of celery a year.
Celery is a two-year crop from seed to seed, so selecting plants for traits such as hollowness, straightness and taste with an opening large enough to drink through took more than a decade, Pierce said. The variety is a foot taller than the usual 2-foot-high celery plant and has a thick canopy of leaves.
"It has hit like a barnstorm," Pierce said. "But it has been a slow process. We spent a year determining how to process, package and handle the straws."
The celery straw is a small part of the research that Duda scientists, working in the world's largest facility devoted completely to celery, conduct on about 1,200 new lines of celery each year, Pierce said.
Although Duda has spent millions of dollars on celery research over the years, it's not possible to determine how many dollars were poured into the project alone, he said. Much of the research is focused on developing celery that has improved flavor and color, reduced stringiness or is more resistant to disease.
Munger said the company also is working on a way to inject the celery straws with fillings such as cheese or peanut butter.
"In about six months, people can look for it at the supermarkets," Munger said. "There are some hurdles at retail with packaging and proper handling instructions. It's not a replacement for a plastic straw. It has to be refrigerated."
Ray Gilmer, spokesman for the Florida Fruit & Vegetable Association in Orlando, said Friday that the celery straw is the type of value-added product the industry is always striving for. Most often, the innovation is in packaging, pre-slicing or added ingredients.
"This is a way of taking celery and putting a new spin on it," Gilmer said. "They have actually changed the food product. That's what makes it so cool."
A New Dawn of the Dead film
Interesting... but one of those ones I go "uh... why bother?"
I always have room for zombie pictures. But I have to wonder why they chose to remake Dawn of the Dead. I would even go so far as to say that there is room for more than one zombie-in-a-mall film so they could have even created another one. Why remake it? Just for the title, I guess. Though, it has Zombies... I'll probably see it. Plus, Ving Rhames... he's always good at what he does. Hopefully, it won't be stripped of a lot of the subtext that was in the original. (The mall as a comment about the stupidity of consumerism, for example.)
Speaking of commercialism... I'm looking forward to the original's multi-disc deluxe edition DVD early next year, too. I've heard that they are including three cuts of DOTD: The Argento Cut (which is the most popular cut of the film amongst fans), the Canne Workprint Cut (which is often mislabeled as being Romero's "Director's Cut" version of DOTD), and the George Romero/US Theatrical Cut (which Romero considers to be his definitive version of DOTD).
Other Classic Horror Movies that got remade and that I liked quite a lot both times- The Fly, The Thing, Invasion of the Body Snatchers.
Random thought - I wonder if Zombies would prefer hydrocephalic victims?
Other movie thoughts - Jim Carrey as the Bionic Man? Um.. wasn't inspector gadget already made?
Very Nifty set of web-statistics / Hulk- Halloween lights webcam page. Measures local precipitation, outside activity and electrical draw, and you can pan / Zoom the camera around to get a better look at stuff.
It tells you all sorts of crazy statistics, and you can flick off and on the lights around the house.
Well,I'm off... until later, dear journal.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2003-10-27 04:31 am (UTC)Kind of a "google bomb".
Could put some advertising links here, but that would be abusing the commenting feature...
no subject
Date: 2003-10-27 12:18 pm (UTC)I'm not sure how the comments effect the googlebot.. what draws them in.
no subject
Date: 2003-10-27 05:30 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-10-27 12:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-10-27 09:25 am (UTC)I saw this, and thought you might like it: http://www.extremepumpkins.com/detsciencen.html
You talk about such a myriad of things, it's no wonder!
I'm a private-bee with my info...or lack of info. Hee ;)
no subject
Date: 2003-10-27 12:14 pm (UTC)well, I'm glad you pop into public now and again! yours is one of my fave journals to read and look at!
no subject
Date: 2003-11-10 11:46 pm (UTC)Yours is one of mine, too! :0)
no subject
Date: 2003-11-11 06:52 am (UTC)Seriously, I can count on one hand the journals I look most forward to seeing, and yours is there. I don't know how anyone can think your very spiffy observations, animal loving, and fanastic photography could be considered a "boring piece of hooey" at all! I'm really glad that you keep and maintain a journal.
Folks that don't understand journalling probably haven't looked at yours very closely. I think it's a fine example of personal vibe and glimpses.
i wondered the same thing about dawn of the dead
Date: 2003-10-27 10:55 am (UTC)can't ans your questions at the mo. they require too much thought and u know me and thinking. lol