Wednesday, January 03, 2007

The Quiz

As promised, a quiz on what you have learned. The answers are at the bottom but try and see what you can do without peaking. Let me know how you scored.
1. This one should be pretty easy...you tell me
2. This little guy is white but look carefully.
3. This one might be a little tricky because you can't see the head very well but you can do it.
4. Look at this face. She's all about eating the camera you can tell.
5. Don't think too hard.











Answers:
1. Sheep!
2. A cow
3. Black Sheep!
4. One happy goat
5. A Moose. Mr. Moose, my former basketball coach in fact.

Monday, January 01, 2007

Amendments

I was recently informed that a friend has...trouble distinguishing sheep and goats. I figured it would be nice to help her and anyone else with similar difficulties as best I can. What follows are a series of pictures comparing the beasties with a few extras. Tomorrow...or when I get around to it...I will post a pictures quiz and we will see what you learned.

First some Sheep.

Note that they are a uniform color and have curly hair. When they are shorn the hair is very short but is still very curly as it grows back in. They also lack horns and generally look pretty dumb.

Next, Goats. They come in a host of colors and even when their hair grows it remains more or less straight. Both males and females have horns though the males' horns can get much longer and spirally.

Here is a wee goat and its father. The male goat has whiskers on his chin. You can't see his horns but trust me they are pretty impressive. Also note the curiosity in the younge goats face...he thinks...most of the time.

This would be an alpaca. It is a close relative of the llama. In general alpacas are a solid color while llamas can be many different colors (this one is atypical) Llamas are much bigger much more misanthropic- they will spit at you for no real reason. Like sheep, they can both be shorn. Unlike sheep they have some inborn intelegence and a long neck. Neither llamas nor alpacas grow horns. (Bonus- they are related to camels)

One large beef cow with her friends. I'm not sure what to tell you...it's a cow.

A cow moose, aka a female moose. They share a reseblance but your mama moose is much larger and has a bigger nose and stick up ears (not stick out ears). Plus moose don't live in fenced fields...they go through the fences as they pass by.

There you go....Someday soon I will update with a little quiz. Hopefully this helps.

Oh look....A Recipe

Apple Cranberry Pie That Even My Mom Likes
2 Pillsbury Pie Crusts (If you want to make your own, more power to you. It would taste a whole lot better…provided you make good pie crusts in the first place. Maybe you should stick to the dough boy.)
¼ C White sugar
2 T flour
¼ t Salt
¼ t Allspice
1/8 t Nutmeg
½ t Cinnamon (5L you can skip this and not miss too much)
½ t Lemon Zest
1 T Lemon Juice
2 T Honey
1 ½ T Brandy Jim Beam Bourbon
1 t Vanilla
½ C Dried Cranberries
A quantity of Apples (I think I used about 6 Empire apples, which are smallish, and a pair of Granny Smiths)

Pre-heat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Use the nifty apple slicer to core and slice apples for you. Peel the skin off and cut into smaller chunks. Toss in to a microwave safe Corning ware dish that you find in the clean dishes side of the sink. Microwave the apples for 7 minutes and drain off the juices in a colander that you also find on the clean dishes side of the sink. Put the apples back into their very warm Corning ware and add the dry ingredients and cranberries. Go on a search for brandy in the liquor cabinet and finding none use bourbon instead. Mix all of the ingredients together and take your time figuring out how to zest a lemon. Do it wrong anyways. Roll out an oval shaped pie crust into a glass pie dish and dump in your mixture of apple-y goodness. Roll the second pie crust on and crimp the edges. Make sure you cut off the extra crust so that you can re-roll it. Cut a shape or two out of the crust to make a fun design and add some slits so that the steam can vent. Pop your baby pie into the oven for 35 minutes or until the crust is crispy and brown. Don’t eat it with freezer burned ice-cream that your father finds in the freezer. Avoid the temptation.


-Jn