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Joolwe is actually a website, Joolwe.com, with a very clever marketing strategy. And some attractive silver earrings. Like the Athena Citrine earrings shown here.
Joolwe recently interviewed a number of bloggers about their approach to buying and wearing jewelry. I was one of the folks they talked with; you’ll find the interview here.
Tagged earrings, jewelry, Joolwe, marketing strategy
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Some of you know I’ve been having a wonderful time playing around with Steampunk fashion and am looking forward to attending Steamcon in Seattle this fall.
I found myself fascinated by this accessory from Muddy Mountain Pottery — a Raku pottery ray gun with a glass element and clockwork innards.
“Menacing, with delicate precision,” is what the artists call it. It’s intended for display, but wouldn’t it be great with a Firefly-esque Desert Nomad Steampunk costume?
The artists think they got the name Heinlein Hand Howitzer from Denvention Fan Guest of Honor Tom Whitmore, who visited their booth at the WorldCon.
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Kinesiology professor Robert Motl, a former competitive bicyclist, is studying the effect of caffeine on people doing vigorous physical exercise.
His results indicate that “caffeine reduces pain reliably, consistently during cycling, across different intensities, across different people, different characteristics.”
Does this reduction in pain result in improved performance? I, personally, don’t care. Reduction in pain, for me, would increase my enjoyment of exercise and my willingness to do it for 90-minute periods three times a week. I’m going to grab a shot of espresso before my Trailer Park Yoga class tonight and will report the results. Something tells me I’ll be wide awake!
(Yes, the Trailer Park Yoga classes with Susan are starting up again, and will be available for the next few months on a drop-in basis. The location is in Fremont. Please contact me for details if you’d like to attend, or check out one class as a guest.)
Tagged caffeine, exercise, pain, Trailer Park Yoga
>Pacific Northwest Seasons has a review of the tea house on NW 85th St., Zendog Studio. It’s a “photography studio-art gallery-frame shop-teahouse” that does tea ceremonies.
Posted in Uncategorized
>Tea Time Chatter reviews a new tea house at Crossroads Mall in Bellevue. Has anyone tried the tea house in Crown Hill on NW 85th St.?
Posted in Uncategorized
>The super-sweet chai (made from a syrup mix) served at most coffee houses is a real disappointment for me — so much sugar and cream that it’s more like warm ice cream than a refreshing drink. On the other hand, most spiced chais sold in tea bag form are boring.
Of course, there’s a complex, spicy chai made right here in Ballard: Morning Glory chai. If you have the time to deal with the complicated and time-consuming brewing, you’ll find it’s delicious. But I don’t always have time to boil a bag of spices for several minutes, strain that mixture, and then add the loose-leaf tea to brew.
Last week, at an Asian grocery in Naples, Florida, I came across a peppery, complex chai in easy-to-use tea bag form. Even with plain white sugar and skim milk it was fabulous. It’s Mighty Leaf‘s “Bombay Chai Black Tea,” Indian black tea leaves blended with pepper, orange, cinnamon, caradmom, and clove.
The Mighty Leaf chai was so good that my mother asked me to leave the box with her in Florida. Fortunately, I’m pretty sure I’ve spotted Mighty Leaf boxes at some of the grocery stores in Seattle (QFC? The Ballard Market?).
Tagged chai, Mighty Leaf chai, tea
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When I was a child, breakfast was pretty predictable: On weekdays, Cheerios or cornflakes with fruit ands skim milk (summer) and oatmeal, cream of wheat, or grits with butter (winter). Saturdays it was eggs, bacon, and toast. Sundays it was blueberry pancakes with maple syrup (at my father’s request).
When I went off to college, of course, this all changed. Dining hall scrambled eggs were so tasteless that often leftover Chinese food was the better choice. When I lived in New York and then in Italy, breakfast was usually a croissant or brioche. There was a long phase of bagels with cream cheese when I worked at newspapers. When I moved to Seattle, cinnamon rolls were the big thing. Along the way I encountered people who ate donuts and sugary cereals (ugh) for breakfast. And spent one year in a household where we often had firm tofu, topped with shaved bonito and soy sauce.
Now I notice that I have defaulted to the breakfast routine of my childhood, with cold cereal/hot cereal most days, and eggs or maybe even pancakes if I go out to breakfast with friends on the weekends.
I wonder if, when they teach us what to eat for breakfast, our parents realize that decades years later, we’ll find ourselves reverting to that menu. No matter what weird stuff we’ve eaten for 20 or 30 years in between.
Of course, by that time many of our parents will be long gone and never know that their teachings eventually took hold. My mother, however, is still around and able to see (and comment on) what I eat for breakfast when I go to visit her.
She’s 90; I wonder if oatmeal is the reason why?
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At the renowned Berkeley Bowl whole foods grocery store last week I encountered the Jazz apple. A cross between the Gale and the Braeburn that has out-scored both in tastings, it’s a rich, crispy apple bursting with flavor. It was grown Washington state, but I had to go to California to find it. Go figure.
According got the jazzapple.com website, (yes, this is an apple with it’s own website) it’s available in Washington state November through April and New Zealand (where it was developed) June through August.
>It’s been my custom for the past several years to write on the holiday cards I send out “Best wishes for a happy and healthy New Year.” Why the addition of “healthy” to the usual holiday greeting? Not sure. Perhaps it’s because I had a mysterious, debilitating illness that trashed my life for five years in my 30s. (It turned out to be interstitial cystitis, and treatable, once diagnosed.) Or perhaps because on the East Coast I sometimes bought coats from Jewish manufacturers with labels that said “Wear in good health.”
Anyway, I don’t make New Year’s resolutions, but I do write down a few priorities. This year, the whiteboard outside my office says:
1. Eat healthy food.
2. Exercise three times a week.
3. Earn $$$.
4. Do creative things.
5. Have fun with people.
They’re in that order for a reason. It’s hard for me to work long hours, sustain creative projects, or truly enjoy myself, if I’m not healthy. I know people who manage it, but I’m not one of them.
And, yes, I know that simply eating healthy food and exercising won’t guarantee good health; it’ll just tip the odds in my favor. Genetics, and fate, are also important factors.
Those if you who know me can guess why I’m thinking and writing about health this week, can’t you?
Tagged health, healthy eating
>I discovered that if you steam cauliflower (with some sliced leeks, if you like) you can then treat it like a baked potato, sprinkling it with grated cheddar, chopped scallions, and bacon bits. Yum!
Tagged cauliflower
Fitness, Food and Fashion 