I don’t know if I’m alone here but I have 5 email addresses that I care to admit to and probably 3 others that I check from time to time also.
This for me is a problem but how do I let go of them all?
I could keep all the addresses alive and just feed them all into one main address but this issue isn’t about filling up my inbox, it’s about having just one contact gateway.
Can it be done? Continue reading
This blog wouldn’t be the same if it weren’t for the plugins, themes and the programmers behind them. I think it’s time that I give credit to the authors of plugins that I use on this blog. All the plugins and themes I use are absolutely free and I recommend every one of them. It makes blogging easier for the publisher and readers. So thank you to the programmers that submit their projects to the wordpress plugin library. It’s the free software/open source software movement that has allowed for ordinary people to publish on the internet without too much money or IT expertise required. Continue reading
Obelisco
I was lucky enough to visit Buenos Aires in 2005 and there are many great memories to look back on. Here is my experience.
Great things about the city
The city of Buenos Aires is old, elegant, big and entertaining. The biggest feature for me was that the city literally doesn’t sleep! I still talk about how I was able to eat a steak in a restaurant at 2:30am and how I bought a soccer shirt from a shop at 1:30 in the morning!
The people in Buenos Aires are very friendly to tourists and also helpful. They treat foreigners with a lot of respect and you always feel welcome. This came as a surprise to me as I was warned to receive a hostile reception for being Chilean. This myth was debunked early on in my trip! Continue reading
If you’ve ever lived in Canberra, ACT, Australia for a substantial period of time, you’d be familiar with the Canberra Centre. It’s Canberra’s biggest shopping mall. Today, I will rant about how I got overpriced at the Canberra Centre carpark on Boxing Day, December 26, 2009.
Upon entering the Canberra Centre car park today, Saturday 26 of December 2009, I paid close attention to the Centre’s rates. It shows the prices for normal shopping days and then at the bottom, prices for non-normal shopping days.
It clearly states that for Sundays or Public Holidays, there is flate rate of $2.
I was surprised and disappointed when upon paying for my stay today, the machine charged $5.60 for about 3 hours of parking. Now I know today is not Sunday but I’m pretty sure the 26th of December – otherwise known as Boxing Day – is a public holiday! Continue reading
Traditional Margherita pizza
Once upon a time I thought that the more toppings a pizza had, the better it was. I still enjoy most of the toppings that go in a supreme pizza but now I’d rather have a good simple pizza than an all-you-can-eat meal on an average quality dough.
I used to pack a pizza with mushrooms, capsicum, tomato, ham, salami, cheese, tomato pizza sauce, onion, olives, and pineapple (if available). Since then I’ve learned that in Italy (Naples specifically), authentic pizzas can only have dough, tomato sauce, cheese and basil leaves.
I think many of us in the Western countries have been side-tracked about what’s important in a pizza. I think it’s the dough. The Naples regulations require the dough to be cooked in a woodfire oven for 60-90 seconds. While the toppings are very important also, the make-or-brake aspect of the pizza is definitely in the dough. Many consumers of average grade pizzas will probably make the mistake of thinking that more toppings equals more value for money and that quantity of ingredients adds to the taste.
A similar thing happens to Italy’s espresso style coffee. While we should be more concerned with the espresso shot, we get distracted by all the things we can disguise the taste of the espresso with. The short black, ristretto, double ristretto is the essence of what coffee is however, we add milk to this, sugar, and some people go as far as creating a peppermint mocha (heaven knows what goes into that).
In summary, we should go back to basics with cooking and hot beverages. Find out where they came from, how they evolved and try to capture the integrity with which these meals first came into creation. If there’s no appreciation for the food’s history, preparation and original authenticity then how can you really enjoy it?