Neil Young

  • Neil Young knows this: beware the Christmas ham, says insurer

    Posted: December 20th, 2011 - 3:52pm by Doug Powell

    Neil Young once had to cancel some tour dates because he sliced a guitar finger while making a ham sandwich.

    New Zealand's state-run Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC), which offers universal insurance cover for accidents, released figures today showing the cost of treatment, rehabilitation and compensation for accidents recorded last Christmas Day have topped $NZ1.9 million ($1.45 million).

    That includes several claims for ham-related injuries - including carving mishaps and burns, neck and knee strains from carrying heavy hams, and even a crushed finger after a ham toppled from a stand.

    Most of the 3,040 Christmas Day injuries accepted by ACC resulted from outdoor activities - including frisbee, fishing, slippery sliding, trampolining and poolside antics.

    One person laughed so hard they fainted, hitting their head in the garden, another broke their tooth on a dislodged gem that ended up on the menu, and someone taking their post-lunch nap was injured when a drunk person stood on their face.

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    Wacky and Weird  |  0 Comments
    Christmas, ham, insurance, Neil Young, New Zealand
  • There is a town in Northern Ontario that posts inspection results online

    Posted: December 14th, 2009 - 5:12pm by Katie Filion

    You can take the girl out of Northern Ontario, but you can’t take the Northern Ontario out of the girl. Since moving to New Zealand I’ve picked up a few Kiwi-isms, but I’ve managed to keep my awful hick accent, and still occasionally read the news for happenings near my hometown.

    Sudbury, home of the OHL (that’s ice hockey) team Sudbury Wolves, has begun posting the results of restaurant inspections online, reports Northern Life Online. The website, www.sdhu.com, launched today, and reports go back to November 1, 2009.

    Stacey Laforest, a manager in the Health Unit’s Environmental Health division, said,

    “Before we had the technology to go online, the public could call us for inspection and enforcement information for restaurants and other food premises. Posting the information on our website makes it more accessible to the public.”

    [F]ood premises in the Sudbury and Manitoulin districts are listed alphabetically by name. Information includes food premises inspection reports, food safety convictions reports, food safety closures reports, an explanation of commonly used terms, and a link to the applicable legislation.

    I took a gander at the website, curious what East Side Mario’s received on its most recent inspection – it hasn’t been inspected since November. Neither have the majority of restaurants in the database, with every one I clicked on returning a blank screen. I’d rather see a card at the door.

    For the Neil Young fans, Helpless (below), because There is a town in Northern Ontario…

     

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    Restaurant Inspection  |  0 Comments
    Hockey, Neil Young, Northern Ontario, Sudbury
  • Websites on stickers so consumers know where their food is from: a cool idea 10 years later

    Posted: December 30th, 2008 - 9:51pm by Doug Powell

    About every 10 years I, briefly, become cool, at least in my own mind.

    In high school in the late 1970s, I played air bass in an air band called Tone Deaf for one memorable performance. I should have stuck with it; 30 years later, kids are shelling out millions to play air whatever in Guitar Hero.

    In 1991, Nirvana came out with grunge, Canadian Neil Young was the godfather and my closet of plaid shirts otherwise known as Kenora dinner jackets was all the rage.

    Today, Canadian Press predicted that in 2009, products from apples to chicken will carry codes purchasers can enter into a website for sourcing details. When I started working on the on-farm food safety program with the Ontario Greenhouse Vegetable Growers back in 1998, I said, hey, you growers are doing this great food safety stuff, you should at least put a url on those stickers so those shoppers who want to know can find out all about your great food safety program.

    Guess it wasn’t cool enough.

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    Food Safety Policy  |  0 Comments
    Air Guitar, Canada, Cool, Neil Young, Outsource, Sticker
  • Neil Young, Blu-Ray and norovirus

    Posted: May 9th, 2008 - 2:52pm by Doug Powell

    Earlier this week, Neil Young unveiled his long-awaited Archive project on Blu-Ray Disc at the Sun Microsystems JavaOne conference in San Francisco.

    Yesterday, San Francisco public health officials warned of an outbreak of norovirus that has sickened several people who were attending or working at conferences at the Moscone Center between April 30 and May 8, 2008.

    As Caroline McCarthy noted in her story,

    "To clarify, this is a virus that makes you barf and gives you diarrhea. It's not the kind of virus that sends Viagra-pitching e-mails to all your friends or treats you to a Rick Astley sing-along every time you turn on your computer."

    Further information on noroviruses can be found at the Department of Public Health Web site at http://sfcdcp.org/norovirus.cfm.


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    Norovirus  |  0 Comments
    Blu-ray, Neil Young