Thanksgiving 2011 - so much to be thankful for · Monday October 10, 2011 by colin newell
Just spent a wonderful 3 day weekend at Point no Point cabins – Andrea’s and my primary get-away.
Timely escape as it is Thanksgiving weekend – and true to form, we never do anything within the realm of ordinary. This is Canadian Thanksgiving weekend – yes, I think it is earlier than our American counterpart… all about seasons and all. We harvest earlier.
Anyway – this weekend we had our favorite cabin (it is a secret…) – packed in some wine, some food and some radio equipment (to keep station VA7WWV on the air – kind of a civil defense priority!)
Dinner on Friday night was a quickie of gourmet kosher all beef hot dogs, beer and potato chips – the beer was Blue Buck. We arrive around 4 or 5 normally on one of these weekends and the sooner that we get into the outdoor hot-tub the better!
Saturday morning included a road trip into Sooke, B.C. for lunch at “The EdGe” – I had the kitchen sink bowl and Andrea had their classic burger served on an in-house triangle shaped bun. The Kitchen sink includes a bit of beef, white fish, shell fish, some pasta in a spicy Thai style broth.
Afterward we had a quick coffee at “The Stick” in Sooke.
On our way back through Otter Point, we stopped at the Tugwell Creek meadery – for those unfamiliar with mead, look it up. Oddly, I have around 8 bottles of Tugwell mead in my wine rack that are untouched – good thing some of them will last upwards of 1000 years! Yes, we bought two more bottles!
Saturday evening dinner was at “The Point” restaurant – and for a change we ordered all appetizers; Frisee salad featuring pork belly and soft boiled egg on frisee lettuce, seared scallops on a marmalade biscuit, a duck confit treatment, and an in house “tortilla chip” salsa thing… cannot remember what the protein on it was.
We had a bottle of an Argentinian Malbec with this collection.
We tend to avoid the mains at the Point no Point restaurant because they tend to be somewhat over the top, not so much with the quality (which is great) but the quantity – I avoid mains that have too much on the plate.
Dessert. For a change, we ordered two: the Creme Brulee and their awesome chocolate mousse.
Getting away from the grid gives us a great opportunity to count all of our blessings – and there are lots of them; great health, wonderful marriage (15+ years and every day is part of a remarkable honeymoon!), steady work, awesome friends and on and on and on. I am sure my readers have their own stories – love to hear them in the comment field of course!
The Sun was out the entire weekend – which is a little odd for this time of the year. The Sunday was spectacular – and we sat at the Beach House at Point no point, completely alone and undisturbed while a brilliant Sun blazed down – we imagine the temperature rose to around 20 degrees © for a while.
As I mentioned on my twitter and facebook feeds, I am kind of off the grid for a while I study for my Apple Technician certification (and it is a lot of study…) – I will be blogging and posting the blog URLs on twitter and facebook — just no random musing on the social network sites – at least for the time being.
Hoping you all have your own version of a great Canadian (and coming up… American thanksgiving!)
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Project in development - Women in Coffee - the audio series · Friday September 2, 2011 by colin newell
Just time stamping this for my own sanity and motivation.
After doing a fairly successful podcast at the WCCCS “For the Love of Coffee” – chatting with the industry movers, brewers and shakers (only men talking…) I realized that I need to approach this again – this time for the gals…
Because there are as many (or more) hard working ladies in the coffee business as there are guys – and I probably will not be surprised to find that the ladies have to work harder to cover as much ground(s) as the guys.
Some of the questions I will put forward: Does gender matter in coffee world? What, if any, pay equity issues exist? Promotional issues? Safety? Yes, I have to ask that as well – Do women feel safe working and traveling in the coffee industry.
I may, obviously, touch a few nerves…
but that is what I do.
So stay tuned as I flesh this out!
Credit where credit is due – I thought of this but Julia Barber of The Western Canada Coffee Collective is giving it legs by throwing her support behind this project. Hey, at this point, Julia Barber is, quite arguably, the hardest working person in the business!
WCCCS 2011 Audio Podcast roughcut · Sunday August 28, 2011 by colin newell
We interviewed a variety of great people at the 2011 WCCCS in Victoria at the beautiful Crystal Gardens Event Center. Have a listen to our near-30 minute chat with some of coffees movers, brewers and shakers! – if you cannot see the audio thingie below, click here for the mp3.
Talking Western Canadian Specialty Coffee in Victoria – 2011
Good bye to Jack Layton · Monday August 22, 2011 by colin newell
All our prayers and thoughts go out to Jack Layton’s wife, family and extended family.
