Marilyn's Photos - Sep 27 2026 - Can McDonald's Have a Chef?

 

The headline on Bing starts with this unlikely sentence:  Why one former McDonald's chef... That's falls into the category of "jumbo shrimp" or "deafening silence" - don't you think? So it must be time to head on over to find out what McDonald's chef might do and how would they attract a chef. That second question is easy - I would guess a lot of money would do it.  First of all, we're told that McDonald's does not have a single chef, instead it has a culinary team and Chef Chad Schafer is the Senior Director of Culinary Innovation.  He works on core recipes like burgers and sauces.  Chef Mike Lingo is a senior culinary manager who works on menu items and mentors newer chefs.  Chef Janae Havis is a culinary innovation chef focused on food science and new flavour trends.   McDonald's most famous chef was Dan Coudreaut - he was with them from 2004 t0 2018.  He is known for tweaking  their recipe for the special sauce of the Bic Mac.  Here is the magic moment:  Mayonnaise Sweet pickle relish Yellow mustard White vinegar Garlic powder Onion powder Paprika Wow!  Can you imagine giving your culinary talents over to this?  This is the stuff of cooking that my brother and I did when we were 10 years old.  We loved adding ketchup to mayonnaise and spreading it on big Romaine or Iceberg lettuce chunks. Crunch, crunch. (You can buy it today as Heinz Mayochup). On the other hand, I guess if there's a pot of gold involved, a person might do great things.  What things would the current chef Chad Schafer be involved in?  Changing the timing of when to toss the dehydrated onions onto the grill, or altering griddle batch sizes from eight patties to six, or switching to a brioche-style bun. It is brioche-style as there are no dairy, eggs or butter in a brioche-style bun.  These just don't seem life-altering chef moments.  Hop over to the McDonald's website and see hat the current head chef - Chef Chad - aanswers to questions like: I love being a chef because..."of the people I get to work with. Being a chef at McDonald's..."is a privilege.   "We can make a difference in how the globe looks at food and the people that create it."  In closing, it is worth taking a moment to look at the contrasts  we have in the world -  we go from McDonald's juniour hamburgers starting at $1.50 U.S. to the most expensive single-portion burger on the planet is "The Golden Boy" - costing almost $6,000 U.S. Its onion rings are champagne-battered with Dom Perignon. Wake up!  It is time for a McDonald's McMuffin. Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.com

Marilyn's Photos - Sep 26 2026 - Names Trending

 

Favourite names.  There are all those headlines about baby names trending...we can add to that AI agent names trending.  Well the AI Mode in Google doesn't want to provide a list...it wants me to "get aquainted" with them and their purpose. Coding and Software Devin AI OpenHands Replit Agent OpenCode SWE-agent Workflow and Automation Manus AI Zapier Ajelix Moxo n8n Research and general assistants Gemini Deep Research OpenClaw Agent Zero Core Agent Frameworks and infrastructure Claude managed agents Amazon bedrock agents Dify Mem0 They seem ominous sorts of names - not like Jiminy Cricket and Johnny.  I wonder how many there are now - I see a huge list of AI software when I ask HIVE if a picture is AI generated.   You can go to the aigentslist.com to find an AI agent that works for you.  It's here.  Of course you have to enter your email to subscribe... This is an abstract view of the Walt Disney Music Hall in Los Angeles.   Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.com

Marilyn's Photos - Sep 25 2026 - Latest AI News

 

Did you know about the big controversy in September in the mathematics field?  OpenAI claimed its AI agents solved part of the million-dollar Millennium Prize math problem - the Navier-Stokes problem.  There were rumours of an imminent human breakthrough by Tristan Buckmaster and Levent Alpogue.  They were actively working on a solution to the problem and considered themselves months away from a solution. All of a sudden OpenAI puts 10,000 AI agents onto the problem and comes up with a solution in 88 hours. Buckmaster "accused" OpenAI of focusing attention and speeding up activity on the problem. What he also worried about was that they could have stolen from the human researchers who had been using OpenAI as an aid in the research and storing results there.  While OpenAI denies it would have stolen research directly, the researchers realized that they didn't opt out of OpenAI having access to their prompts as training input.   There's a frustration with AI companies treating important fundamental mathematical research as a media tool.  This is the sort of thing that increases share value.  Attention is distracted from the hacking, run-amok stories that make the headlines.  Supposedly OpenAI wasn't going to claim the million dollars.  I wonder why not?  Why bother when they are about to hit the trillion dollar mark in corporate value and preparing for a "flotation" that could get it to the trillion dollar level.  The Mathematics community was very upset. An Open Letter was published by 25 Fields Medal winners who worry that the genuine pursuit of understanding is getting brushed aside in the pursuit of corporate victories.  Having "the answer" isn't the same as showing how the answer is figured out.  And to what else can be learned by studying it.  Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.com

Marilyn's Photos - Sep 24 2026 - Harvest Moon This Weekend

 

The NASA website tells me that the Moon will guide you to a few celestial landmarks.  One of them is the Teapot, a group of stars in Sagittarius that resembles a teapot, complete with a handle, lid, and spout.  "If you are under an especially dark sky...you may see hazy steam rising from the Teapot's spout.  Follow the steam to its thickest part, and you'll be looking toward the centre of our Milky Way galaxy. " Here's the diagram and then the picture. I know you are really supposed to see a teapot, but like most of the constellation shapes, I find it notional at best.  And all the rest?  Orion, the hunter, Cassiopeia, The Queen/W Shape, Scorpius, Cygnus, the Swan/Norther Cross and the Big Dipper Ursa Major.  The articles all say they are easily recognizable due to their distinctive shapes.   In comparison, we really can see a Harvest Moon.  Its peak time will be on Saturday at 12:49pm - that doesn't sound like we'll see it at its peak.  It will be viewable both Saturday and Sunday evenings.  The moon will rise in the eastern sky.  Where would we stargaze to see the moon on Saturday? Definitely Niagara Falls.  Here's a picture below of the Harvest Moon over the Falls in 2019.  It comes from a Facebook site called Geographical Features so I hope it is a real photo.  It does look wonderful, though.   Here's one of my grunge collages - it looks like a moon up there on the horizon. Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.com

Marilyn's PHotos - Sep 22 2026 - Autumn Late

 

This was a late astronomical start to Fall, and late in the day yesterday as well.  And all of a sudden here we are with temperatures that definitely say Autumn.  What do we expect in Autumn?  The word is "crisp" with mornings and evenings being and feeling colder.  With that, we end up in sweater weather. And we get some of the best foods in Autumn - not only delicious but fragrant - apple and pumpkin pies, roasting potatoes, squash and chicken or turkey.    These are great times.  But they are short, and definitely shorter than the best days of summer.  The Meteorologists say each season is getting shorter except summer.  Summer is 30 days longer compared to the 1960s.  That is six to eight days per decade change.  It starts earlier and ends later. That's the temperatures.  Add to that the placement of Victoria Day and Labour Day which expanded our "idea" of summer this year.  It is always educational to read the Weather Network - each province is given a "personality" and Ontario's Autumn this year is "unhurried" - the extended version of fall.  It also says to watch for a "fall fake-out"  - that an early season chill doesn't spell the beginning of winter.  That was accurate for today's morning temperature. Compare Ontario's personality with Quebec's - it says it will be "reluctant" - summer left early, but winter is in no hurry.  It is as if there are now meteorological poets out and about.  It is only September and this is still a flower season - lots of flowers blooming,  This is Sweet Autumn Clematis.   Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.com