(NOTE: Energy drink reviews have been moved to http://www.fizzywakeup.com)
It has arrived! Thanks to the combined efforts of Uncle Paddy, Auntie Lorna and Thai I now have a can of Kratingdaeng, aka Red Bull. It is the original Red Bull energy drink originally made in Thailand (although this can says made in Vietnam I’m assured it is the exact same recipe). The can has travelled across the world to be with me, stopping in Ireland along the way before making a brief detour around South Wales because of an airport baggage mix-up. Anyway I have finished drinking it now and can confirm it was worth the wait! The first big difference I notice about Kratingdaeng is that it isn’t carbonated. It’s flat. Still. Sans bubbles… which gives it a weird texture. I’m not sure whether it’s because of that or not, but it seems to have a much more syrup-like feeling to it and is sweeter tasting than UK Red Bull, certainly couldn’t ever be considered sour like my usual cheap alternative Tesco Kick. I’m not sure the caffeine content because the ingredients just say ‘caffeine’, but the other ingredients (like Taurine, B vitamins, etc…) are all mentioned in similar quantities to what I’m used. It’s faster acting than the UK version and I felt the effects within about 10 minutes of drinking it… after just half the can had gone. Right, next drink to try and find is the Japanese ‘Lipovitan’ which apparantly inspired Kratingdaeung.
Snowdon x15
June 28th, 2009 1 Comment »I’ve just got back from my 15th (I think) trip up Snowdon. The trip started yesterday morning when I jumped in the (lightened by way of back seat removal) car and travelled around 4 and a half hours from South to North Wales. When I got there I set up the tent at the camp site and waited for my sister-in-law and co. After an evening of curry and Plop Trumps we retired for the nights. Getting up early this morning was easy cuz we didn’t sleep much (camp site was noisy.. booo), and we managed to get to the Pen-y-Pass car park for 6:45am. Good job we got there early because we ended up with two of the last 5 or so parking spaces – that car park is getting more ridiculously busy each time I visit it. We took it nice and slow to the summit as the weather was so hot, but the summit was covered in people wearing flip flops and trainers because the train service has started to run again. Looking around a gift shop at the top of a mountain is a strange experience but it has been done a lot nicer than the tasteless glass dome mockup I saw a few years ago. Anyway I’m back home now and covered in midge bites. Photos will follow once I get them off Helena (photos of the walk, not the bites).
Poppy's First Sports Day
June 23rd, 2009 No Comments »Getting this up on the web for you all to see was trickier than it looks I can assure you, mainly due to Mr Vangelis and his flaming chariot based score. Of course the rights are held by UMG and I’m just taking advantage of creative re-use loopholes, but facebook’s video hosting just doesn’t want to know. Luckily, good old YouTube and their Google backed negotiating skills with the big record labels mean that they will allow me to host Vangelis based home made videos there (even if it does mean that the video is unavailable in certain un-named countries, sorry if that includes you). Right, on with the show:
That was the week that was
June 22nd, 2009 No Comments »What a good week… I did pretty much nothing and it was quite relaxing. Okay so I did manage a walk at the beginning, and then an exam. Oh and there was Poppy’s school sports day mid-week too. And the cinema visit. And I did spend a couple of days designing a new web site for the village community association which is a story for another blog post at some point in the future. But other than that it was nice. Father’s day was nice too, with Poppy and Joseph getting me a Dad themed Toblerone and a box of Cadbury Heroes. Now the Heroes are worthy of discussion. It’s a sad day when they remove the much loved Crunchie and the white chocolate Dream. I was never really a fan of the Picnic and Whole Nut items so they are no loss, and I could take or leave the Time Out. But a box of Heroes is now a fully evened out variety of niceness with the new Bourneville, Twisted and Chocolate Eclair additions. Mmmm. Shame there are less varieties overall though, can’t have everything.
Right, I did also manage to get chance to do a bit of video editing. I’m working my way through the footage of the last few months and have completed ‘A Visit to Margam Park – April 2009′:
Still to go is Poppy’s birthday video, and of course the video footage taken at her school sports day. There is also some footage of Joseph but I’m saving that up do one big video spanning a few months – makes for better watching.
And my recipe of the week is: The Pizza Burger. Inspired by the delights of Buzz Lightyear’s Pizza Parlour at DisneyLand Paris, I attempted to recreate their nourishing Pizza Burger. For this meal you need:
- 2 x small pizzas.. ideally about 4-5 inches
- 1 x beef burger
- 1 x slice of processed cheese
- Some tomato ketchup
Cook pizzas and burgers separately - making sure the cheese hasn’t browned on the pizzas. Assemble in layers starting with a pizza, face up, some ketchup, the burger, slice of processed cheese, and finally top with the remaining pizza face down. Enjoy as a nice light and healthy snack. Sorry, I didn’t get a photo of this gourmet delight but if I do make another one I’ll try to remember.
Star Trekkin' across the Odeon
June 15th, 2009 3 Comments »I took myself to the cinema this evening to see the new Star Trek movie. Those Sith were as scary as ever, but I was a tad disappointed with the Jedi ditching their light sabres in favour of the less sophisticated phaser gun. And there were no Ewoks. All that aside I still expected Spock to point his finger at his enemies and slice the top of their heads off, but he didn’t. It was a brilliant film though and cleverly done so well worth seeing. Ooh yes and the exam I took earlier today – it went well I think and I actually enjoyed doing it which was very different to the last exam I took – hopefully I’ll get the result by the end of August.
Now cue the Trekkies’ offensive….
