Unless you have a reasonably tuned palate, a very large number of Starbucks coffees taste pretty much the same. It’s not the fault of the beans, no sir. It’s all about the Starbucks roasting process, which, in the traditional Starbucks […]
Tag: nostalgia
Recipe: Simple Spiced Apple Cider
Near as our calendar app can tell us, it’s Christmas Eve. That means it’s time to hunker down in front of the fireplace, snuggle up with your special someone, and enjoy a warm mug of spiced apple cider. This recipe, […]
Review: San Pellegrino drinks
Is it just me, or did San Pellegrino’s near ubiquity come out of nowhere? It wasn’t long ago that you’d typically only find San Pellegrino fruit beverages at coffee shops and Italian restaurants, stocked either to please clients who remember […]
NEAROF!’s 3rd Annual Christmas Gift General Ideas
It’s that time of year again, isn’t it? It’s hard to believe this is the third annual NEAROF! gift guide. Every year, it’s getting harder to write this thing, probably because I’ve included all sorts of great stuff in prior […]
Review: Planters Old Fashioned Peanut Brittle
Goodie! It’s that time of year again when a few hundred square feet of every grocery store becomes a temporary enclave of Christmas snacks, full of icy squares, Turtles and Toblerone bars the size of fence posts. I can’t say […]
Arbitrary: Why I love my balcony garden
Until moving to Calgary, the closest I came to balcony gardening was the flower bed in front of our old apartment in Edmonton’s Belgravia neighbourhood, which the owners actively encouraged us to plant with veggies and herbs. Try as we […]
Review: Nerds! candy
It’s back to school time again, and you know what that means! Nerds! Not my intellectually curious brethren (copy editor pride, yo), but the Willy Wonka candy staple. I’ve been hooked since I bought my first box at a convenience […]
Review: Pop Rocks
What’s that Simpsons quote? “It’s like there’s a party in my mouth, and everyone’s invited!”? That just about sums up Pop Rocks. You never forget your first experience with this exploding confection. You tear open the package, throw some Pop […]

