h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

from clzoomer's link:

"The Historica-Dominion Institute has developed a superb teaching guide with a historical timeline that incorporates material from Hill's novel. Available in both official languages, it was distributed to more than 4,500 schools across the country last year and early this year."

I hope departments of education, school boards, and teachers vigorously take advantage of these materials. I've noticed that the CBC has developed a First Nations History teaching package involving the 8th Fire project. I hope it is also taken up.

I have a bad feeling that our collective history continues to be sadly neglected in our schools. I hope my suspicion is wrong.

and, on a totally different subject . . .


For the beer people: http://albertaventure.com/2012/03/the-hangover/

and, for the milk people:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/story/2012/03/02/edmonton-last-milkman-last-day.html?cmp=rss

Good Venture article, or at least another set of persspectives.

About Barry Svederus...sign of the times I suppose. To rather paraphrase the old adage, no spilt so I ain't cryin'...

Supply and demand:

http://www.avalondairy.com/delivery.html

And in glass bottles, yet!
I suppose if enough people want it, it will continue.

http://www.avalondairy.com/history.html

Scroll to the bottom and see what happened to the milk on a cold day!

(Yes, every now and then we have those here.)

When anyone mentions milk delivery I smell horse products. We used to hop aboard the wagon while the milkman with a dozen bottles would deliver to several houses in a row while his horse plodded on.

Anyway, I understand that vitamin D destroyed the milk delivery business. The dairy doesn't add it as a dietary supplement, it's toxic to the bacteria that spoils milk. Used to be, milk only lasted a day or so in your fridge so you had to have a milkman.

What reasons do the dairies have for not adding vitamin D? Surely they could do it if they wanted to, couldn't they?

"Canada currently has mandatory fortification of foods, through the Canadian Food and Drug Regulations (28). When a nutritional public health need is identified, the solution is to ensure that all people can benefit, and staple foods are fortified. In the case of vitamin D, the foods that require fortification with vitamin D are milk and margarine. In the case of milk, fluid milk "shall contain added vitamin D in such an amount that a reasonable daily intake of the milk contains not less than 300 IU and not more than 400 IU of vitamin D" (29)."

http://www.ajcn.org/content/80/6/1710S.long

Recently there has been an upsurge of interest in 'raw' milk, with a backlash from regulatory agencies.


"Raw milk advocates say that pasteurizing milk destroys enzymes and reduces milk’s nutritional value. Health authorities maintain that raw milk may cause illness due to microbial contamination, especially E. coli and campylobacter."

http://blogs.vancouversun.com/2011/12/19/raw-milk-activist-hits-back-launches-lawsuit-against-fraser-health/

I would assume this would mean no Vitamin D added as well.

Okay, point taken.

I'm glad you raised the topic of raw milk. Gourmets in many countries swear by cheese made from raw milk. Does Canada allow people to buy raw-milk cheese?

Yup, as long as it has been aged 60 days or more. I imagine trying to tell a Quebecois they couldn't have their cheese would start another separatist movement. Moodzy tabarnac!

I'm glad to hear that.

AFAIK the bacteria that make the tasty cheese also either eat or outcompete the bad bugs so no pasteurization is necessary.

The cases of food poisoning from eating bad cheese have mostly involved pasteurized cheese . In any event, the biggest plus for arw-milk cheese is the taste. Pasteurization is said to kill some of the taste.

has anyone mentioned vitamin D in cheese? Here (Alberta), the vitamin D gets added to the drinking milk *after* the stream has been diverted to the cheesemakers (blessed be they). I had always assumed that it was added shortly after the cow, but in the medical discussions when my daughter became a bone loss concern I learned that her Herculean cheese consumption did little for her bones in our northern latitude without supplemental vitamin D.

I've just posted this as a new thread on the Edited Entry on The Edmonton Grads A3506861 , but I thought I'd add it here:


It's International Women's Day today and . . .


. . . after a long shipping delay I finally have my copy of "The Grads Are Playing Tonight!" http://t.co/53QiHkW3

After a quick leaf through, it looks really exciting: individual biographies of every player ever on the team as well as the overall history and lots of pictures. The forward by Edmonton Journal sports columnist Terry Jones (he's been at the post as long as I can remember) sets an important tone: the Grads should be -- must be -- celebrated by Edmontonians, by basketball fans, by sports fans and by all who think -- and who doesn't ? -- that excellence is something truly most excellent.


I'm not much of a basketball fan or even a sports fan, but I've lived in Edmonton most of my life and I certainly think that excellence is most excellent, so, I'm `planning to start driving to the basket with "The Grads are Playing Tonight!" tonight!

Apparently, Darth Vadar is afraid of Canada. [Dick Cheney was scheduled to make some sort of appearance in Toronto, but apparently he had some kind of flashback to a political protest there and decided that he and his daughter's lives would be in jeopardy (and so cancelled).]

j_z_d, I had a tweet this evening indicating that your favourite chocolate place had closed. Is it so?

Let'shope the rumors were false. Chocolate fanciers have so little they can count on as it is.

If true, I must with shame: although both my usual gallery and my accountant ate only a block away from Kerstin's, I've never gone in.