Fried Rice With Peas, Carrots, and Eggs

Our most recent cooking class at the Dorothy Lane Market Culinary Center included Fried Rice with the ingredients you see below which begins with stir-frying the green onions, celery, peas, and carrots.  That gets pushed to the outside of the pan and the eggs get scrambled and cooked in the middle and lastly, the peas are added.  Cold, cooked rice is added and it's all stirred together with low-sodium soy sauce.  

In the class, it all goes so quickly, but that's easy when all the ingredients have been chopped, sliced, and shredded ahead of time.  But while it will take longer, I can't wait to try this out at home.

Remembering Shadow

Shadow passed away in 2010 and it's hard to believe she left that long ago.  I was recently thinking about her more memorable antics and decided that it was a great topic for a Life Experiences blog (link below).  I wrote about bisquits, bunnies, bedroom doors, and booms; things she liked and those she didn't.  

https://lifeexperiences.paulishing.com/2025/02/remembering-shadow.html

Electronic Travel Authorization

The United Kingdom has erected a virtual tool booth under the guise of a travel authorization.  For £10 (12.45 USD), it gives you permission to travel to the UK.  They even have an app for iOS and Android that makes their collection so convenient (mainly for them).  A European Travel Information and Authorization System (ETIAS) is required for most mainland Europe countries and costs £7.  The United States has the Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA) which costs $21.  Other countries have similar ways to collect more of your money.

Taxes are necessary, and the clever ones mostly tax other people, not their direct citizens.  For example, Dayton, Ohio has a combined tax rate for hotel stays of 13.5%.  Not many citizens of Dayton are likely to stay in hotel rooms, so the vast majority of this does not impact them.  When renting a car in Austin, Texas, 40% of the cost is for taxes and fees.  And of course, a favorite of state and federal governments is "taxing the rich", which is never going to apply to me.  

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/apply-for-an-electronic-travel-authorisation-eta

Property Maintenance Code

The city of Kettering, as most localities do, has a documented Property Maintenance Code that details rules about your house, mostly on the outside, including grass, weeds, firewood, landscaping, garbage, motor vehicles, boats, lighting, and animals.  Most of it reads like a "Good Housekeeping" book, but there are a few where I learned something.  For example, you can only have five household animals over four months old at most.  Firewood has to be stacked to "prohibit the creation of a rodent or insect harborage area". I don't know how one would stack firewood to prohibit and of course, the regulations don't say how to either.  The whole code can be read at the link below.

https://www.ketteringoh.org/exterior-property-maintenance-standards

Elle

For the last several months I've received Elle magazine.  I didn't subscribe to it (duh) but it's specifically addressed to me.  How this happened is a mystery but if this happened because some Internet marketer pieced together my browsing and purchasing habits, they not only think I'm a woman but that I'm very liberal and like high-end (expensive) apparel.  That marketer needs to find a new career asap.

https://www.elle.com

Carmine's

Carmine's is an Italian family-style restaurant located in The Forum Shops at Caesars Palace on the Las Vegas Strip.  Family-style means each dish is super-sized and served like you would at home.  We had Caesar Salad to start and our entrees were Shrimp Scampi, Bolognese Meat Sauce on Penne, and Chicken Parmigiana, plenty of food to feed our nine family members.  What was very unexpected was that our food was absolutely delicious, the kind that makes you close your eyes to fully enjoy the tastes and aromas. 

https://www.thelasvegastravelguide.com/restaurant/carmines-italian-restaurant

Thicker Cap

I wrote back in November 2024 that I had to use a pair of pliers to open a carton of Land O'Lakes half-and-half (the one pictured on the right below).  I would like to believe that my blog was the inspiration for the redesigned cap on the left carton.  They increased the height of the cap from 3/8" to 1/2" and that little difference makes it so much easier to open.  Halleluja!

Mastered Spaghetti

Been about ten years since I posted "On Becoming Left-Handed" (link below).  Back then I still ate spaghetti and sushi right-handed.  I am pleased to share that I can now eat spaghetti left-handed, as shown below.  The twirling is opposite (i.e. counter-clockwise) while I'm being lefty, but the action is smooth and not at all awkward.  I can eat sushi left-handed, but it's not smooth and certainly awkward.  I just don't get a chance to use chopsticks that often, so it might be a while before I conquer that one.

https://lifeexperiences.paulishing.com/2015/12/on-becoming-left-handed.html

Ohio Rest Areas

I applaud the State of Ohio for its multi-year project to rebuild or refresh thirty-six of the highway's ninety-three Rest Areas by the end of 2026.  I've been to the one around exit 27 on northbound I-75 and it's very cool.  But what's not cool is that three of the four Rest Areas on eastbound I-70 from Dayton on the route to Pittsburgh are currently closed.  Only the Rest Area near mile marker 129 is open at the moment.  It's not a big problem to figure out alternatives, but nothing worse when you gotta go than coming up to a Rest Area only to find it closed.

The map below shows all the currently closed locations and you can use the link below to explore the entire Ohio Rest area system.

https://www.transportation.ohio.gov/traveling/rest-areas

Stretch The Legs

My son owns Absolute Fitness, a personal training gym, and recently showed me a new stretch he developed for himself to help relieve back issues.  As shown below, a wrap around my ankle is connected to a pulley that's attached to a weight stack.  The leg is supported by a foam cylinder and the other leg is tucked up to keep the back flat on the mat.  I just scootch myself back far enough to get some separation of the weight plates and lay down and relax.  A few minutes and I stretch my other leg.  The relief on my lower back as my leg is gently extended is remarkable.  This is now part of my routine after my other exercises.

https://absolutefitnessohio.com

Skillet Chicken Thighs with White Wine–Butter Sauce

Gourmet Chef Elaine made this decadent dish that includes two sticks of butter and a half-cup of heavy cream.  She opted for boneless chicken thighs to make eating easier and subbed chopped scallions for the chives on top.  The star of the show is the sauce, a reduction of vinegar, dry white wine, shallots, lemon juice, bay leaves, and the aforementioned butter and cream.  This is not a quick, mid-week meal.  Save this recipe for a special Sunday when you have plenty of time and nothing else to do.  

https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/food-network-kitchen/skillet-chicken-thighs-with-white-winebutter-sauce-11585712

 

Mashup Drinks

I like making my own mashup drinks to reduce calories and get the exact flavor I want.  I start with a small can of zero-calorie soda like 7-Up Zero Sugar then doctor it up with watermelon puree, strawberry daiquiri mix, or the Reàl Peach puree in the picture below.  The Reàl brand has a large selection of infused syrups including blackberry, raspberry, banana, and black cherry.  You can find their entire selection at the link below which includes a long list of delicious drink recipes.

https://www.realingredients.com/products

Quantum Computing For Dummies

I used the multiple four-hour flights back and forth to Las Vegas to learn more about Quantum Computing, one of the current "big things" in the technology world.  Borrowing a "for Dummies" book from the Dayton Metro Library was a fitting choice, as so much of this might make sense to a physicist or a mathematician, a lot of it was so far over my head it was spinning.  I boil it down to using some strange behavior that happens in the subatomic world (e.g. superposition, entanglement) to create a massively parallel system that speeds up certain types of problems (e.g. cracking encryption, route optimization) so solutions can be found in a usable timeframe.

Google recently announced that their new Willow quantum computer solved a standard benchmark computation in under five minutes which would take today's fastest traditional computer 10 septillion years (that is, 10 to the 25th power) years.  

The book also postulates that what happens in this subatomic world just might mean there exists a multiverse.  Woah!

https://www.dummies.com/article/technology/computers/what-is-quantum-computing-300551

Cirque Du Soleil

Cirque Du Soleil has five permanent residencies in Las Vegas including "O", the water-themed performance we attended in January 2025 at The Bellagio.  An hour-and-a-half full of synchronized swimming, high-driving, and gymnastic performances with some comedy during set changes.  The stage can be lowered in sections creating anything from a solid floor to a seventeen-foot-deep pool with 1.5 million gallons of water.  We opted for the VIP experience which included meeting three of the cast members, including the clown who gets set on fire.  

https://bellagio.mgmresorts.com/book-show/o-by-cirque-du-soleil

Las Vegas Sphere

We stayed at the Horseshoe Hotel during our last trip to Las Vegas and paid a little extra for a room with a view of the Sphere.  It was fun to look out our window and watch the ever-changing visuals on its massive dome.  Its exterior contains 580,000 square feet of LED displays and measures 366 feet high and 516 feet wide.  It cost 2.3 billion dollars and opened in September 2023 featuring a 40-show residency by the Irish rock band U2.  So cool.

https://www.thesphere.com

Rack Of Lamb

Lamb is not a meat we have all that often but while perusing the meat counter at Costco we spotted the small rack shown below and we thought to give a new recipe a try.  Gourmet Chef Elaine lined a baking sheet with aluminum foil, drizzled on some olive oil, placed the ribs bone side down, and cracked come salt and pepper on top.  She topped that with a spread made of garlic, rosemary, dijon mustard, honey, and olive oil.  Done in about thirty minutes in a 450-degree oven followed by resting for ten more.  

https://www.thepioneerwoman.com/food-cooking/recipes/a39026720/rack-of-lamb-recipe

No TSA PreCheck

Sunday morning at the Las Vegas airport is a really bad time to have closed the TSA PreCheck line, relegating us to the cattle call chute shown below.  The line consisted of ten, 80-foot lanes that snaked back and forth painfully slowly.  It took a little over thirty minutes to get through that 800-foot line and then we had to have our carry-on bags scanned twice because we had our iPads in them, which we don't have to remove when using PreCheck.  Fortunately, we gave ourselves extra time to get to our gate, but the whole process was such a pain.

OK, enough bitching...

Silence Unknown Callers

If your iPhone rings and it's from an unknown caller, you probably won't answer it.  But you can simply have your phone ignore them completely by going to Settings, then Phone, and tapping "Silence Unknown Callers" as shown in the screenshot below.  I was surprised to find it turned off by default, but I guess some people actually answer these calls.  This option has been around since iOS 13 (2019), so if you have an iPhone, you likely have it.  Some additional tips can be found at the Apple Support link below.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/111106

Laptop Bag Strap

I've used the laptop bag seen below for probably ten years and never could figure out the purpose of the horizontal strap on the back.  Maybe it's good for something else, but I recently found it's a great way to secure the bag to the extended handle on a piece of luggage, making it easier to haul through an airport.  Better late than never I suppose.

iPad On A Plane

On our flight back home I noticed the lady in the window seat was watching a show on her iPad.  I never thought to suspend my iPad by shoving the cover in the pocket of the seat back in front of me.  I either held it or placed it on the tray table, but that will now be a thing of the past.  When I asked her how she came up with such a brilliant hack, she replied "Tik Tok".  That explains why I never knew about it.