Birthday Gifts

I recently got a package in the mail from my Brother and Sister down in Georgia. Inside this magic package was a big "Mug of Tea" (shown thusly).

Bleh..

It's depressing when you want to be yourself around someone, but you used to not completely act like yourself around them; and you want to be friends, but are afraid that acting exactly like yourself will ruin your friendship.. Sigh*

blah blah blah..

Edit: Because I like to think that I try to be nice so everyone will like me.. But me, myself without acting so people will "like" me is kind of a jerk sometimes. Not all the time, just about certain things..

Edit: I'm feeling particularly open, at the moment. I'll probably delete this post later.. Except now that I've said that I've got to prove to myself that.. although.. I did just say the other thing, and now maybe.. but because I've made such a big deal.. but maybe.. er.. blah

Stash - Peppermint Herbal Tea

I'm sick. And therefore...

This is the latest tea that I shall be reviewing: Stash's Peppermint Herbal Tea.

Water Type: Hard Tap (Lots of Minerals)
Steeping Time: Still in (10+ Minutes)
Steeping Heat: Reg. Boiling - Scalding
Additives: Nothing.. the tea bag is still in, if incredibly overused, bitter tea leaves count as additives..

Initial Taste = ?.?

After-Taste = ?.?
Aroma = 8.5
Originality = 5.0
Taste Throughout = ?.?

Average = 6.75

Initial Taste = I actually have not tasted this. I'm only using it to huff so it can clear my sinuses out.

After-Taste = Huffing, not stuffing.

Aroma = Smells like peppermint herbal tea.. legit. Exactly what you would expect.

Originality = Common, it's peppermint. herbal. tea. Original is about as far removed from this as Santa's belt buckle is from his butt.

Taste Throughout = Still just for huffing.

This tea gets a B+ for giving me something to write about while clearing my sinuses and making it easier to get to sleep (when I try again) at the same time.

Top Ten Things To Hate About Team Fortress 2

Top Ten Things To Hate About Team Fortress 2:

Team Fortress 2 is a great game. I'm sure most of us who have played more than ten minutes will agree. However, if someone tells me they hate the game I find that completely understandable because there are several things about Team Fortress 2 that will make you despise the game if you encounter too many of them during your first time playing. Here are the Top 10 I could think of:

• 10. If you capture the first cap point and cannot capture the second within the same minute, half the defending team just goes engineer and spams sentry guns until the time runs out.
• 9. Pyro spam (Unless I'm the one doing it. ;p).
• 8. "Performance Regression"... seriously, VALVe?
• 7. People who name themselves stupid names, or have stupid avatars that make you want to punch someone's face when they kill you.
• 6. People who join a server and screw around because they're legit trying to be obnoxious.
• 5. When a Pyro camps at your spawn point and kills everyone as they spawn.
• 4. When your stupid team cannot work together and just kill that Pyro because IT ISN'T THAT HARD if you play right!
• 3. Arena Maps
• 2. More than two scouts on a single team (This includes engineers playing like scouts!).
• 1. People who play like the game is called "Solo Fortress 2" not "TEAM Fortress 2"!

There are many other obnoxious things about this game, these are the ones that I run into most often/find most annoying.

Samurai Chai Mate

Samurai Chai Mate - My older brother Jared, and his wife, April, sent me my favorite Christmas present. As I held the package in my hand I could smell what was inside and was very curious what they had gotten me. Loose tea never crossed my mind, but that's what it was. A bag of Teavana - Samurai Chai Mate, and a stainless steel tea infuser.

Tea comes with all you see here! Mate tea and Rooibos tea mixed together with pineapple, cinnamon, nuts.. those little, blue flower things (Any more, of course).

The infuser shown here is not exactly the same one that I received, but it is extremely close. The infuser (like the Mate tea) is also Teavana brand and is perfect for brewing loose tea.

Water Type: Hard Tap (Lots of Minerals)
Steeping Time: 00.04.00
Steeping Heat: Reg. Boiling
Additives: 2 Teaspoons of sugar.

Initial Taste = 9.0
After-Taste = 9.0
Aroma = 9.0
Originality = 9.5
Taste Throughout = 8.5

Average = 9.0

Initial Taste: This tea has an interesting flavor. It's a tangy, fruity, slightly nutty taste with a bit of spice. A sort of mix between the fruity herbal teas you buy can buy and real tea; but those those herbal teas tend to have an overpowering fruit flavor, whereas this tea mixes tea and herb perfectly, each complimenting the other. It is very good by itself at any hour of the day.

After-Taste = The after taste did not differ noticeably from the Initial Taste.

Aroma = It smells exactly the way it tastes, which is extremely good.

Originality = I have not tasted a tea this flavorful without being cluttered before (Although, bear in mind I have not been trying teas for very long). The taste was full of everything I mentioned before, fruit, tea, spice, etc but each flavor perfectly compliments the others. This tea does not need sugar at all to be enjoyed, but a little sugar actually adds to the flavor. As always with sugar, though: Moderation.

Taste Throughout = I wish I could give this a 9.0 as well, because the taste stays just as good all the way down. Except that (since it is brewed loose tea, and because of the contents of the tea) there are a few tiny leaves and specks of loose Mate that probably will inevitably get through any infuser's mesh. This may not be a problem for some people I know who never drink the last inch of whatever they're drinking, but I always enjoy sipping the last tea from the bottom of my cup. Something which is difficult when the last three sips are full of loose tea particles.

Other Notes: I really enjoy this tea and will try always have some around for use. Plus, brewing your own cup of tea from an infuser makes you feel awesome, ancient, like a master, and a little snobby.

Bottom Line: This is a very interesting tea that is full of flavor which never overpowers itself. Highly recommended for fans of fruity flavored teas.

Thank you, Jared and April! I love it!

                                                 

"Strange how a teapot can represent, at the same time, the comforts of solitude, and the pleasures of company."  ~Author Unknown

Sleeping With Socks on in the Winter

I rarely sleep with socks on. For some reason it makes me feel like I have not completely undressed and re-dressed into pajamas (unless fuzzy socks are involved [which I {unfortunately} do not wear]). However, as the first two sentences of my post have implied, though not out-rightly said, I am wearing socks to bed tonight.


... I just sat here for 20 minutes trying to figure out what to write. I have nothing more to write about.

I am wearing socks--The End.

Sorry. ;p

*Sings* "My Dad is rich.. And your Dad is /dead/" -Draco and the Malfoys

In College Comp I am supposed to keep a journal. Now, I don't keep it as a legit journal. I keep my legit journal next to my bed and will probably legit journal about how annoying it is that I have to keep a [fake] journal for College Comp. Well anyway, this is a passage from my [fake] journal, which is why it has spelling and grammar errors all throughout. But Karena found this slightly amusing. Mostly the end part, but you need the beginning in order for the end to make sense. ;p So if you are bored and have enough time, enjoy!

I think Betta fish are sort of cool. Not completely cool, because completely cool would be kind of weird. But they are sort of cool. They are also able to swim around in a glass cup with absolutely NOTHING to do and still have fun. Or maybe they don’t have fun. I guess we’ll never know because we cannot read their minds. So I suppose if we were ever able to read their minds then we would know. But until then we won’t know squat. My sister killed a Betta fish that she had once. She was told that she only should feed it two pellets a day and every once and a while she could give it a bloodworm treat. But she thought that since the dog eats food during the day and can have many treats if people give it to her (although they shouldn’t) that she could give her fish that many treats. But the problem with that is the treats are the size of the full meal pellet itself, so giving the fish one treat is like a full meal. She has given the dog up to 7 treats a day before without it having any problems because the treats are MUCH smaller than a full meal. However, the bloodworm treats for her Betta fish are the size of a meal, so giving the Betta fish 7 treats would be over feeding it. Which she did, and it died. Now she knows better.

She got another fish a few days later and it has been completely fine since then, and it is even a lot more animated than the other one, so either it’s just taking steroids and can handle all the bloodworm treats, or she learned to feed her fish correctly. I’m guessing it’s probably the latter, although I really think it would be epic awesome if it was the former. I want to know what a fish on heroin would be like. It would probably be bashing against the side of the fish tank going: “Bella, Bella! I need you!” But I think that it would be very disappointed to find out that she was nowhere to be found.. or more likely, she probably fell over on her way to the fish tank by tripping over her own knees and then smashed her head against the side of the fish bowl, effectively gashing her brain in with a large shard of wet, slimy, covered-in-bacteria-y glass. Then the fish would fall out as the water poured out like that much grog down the hatch of a Russian sailor, and it would fall to her side and die beside its own, personal brand of heroin.

That’s another thing, WHY HEROIN? Can’t Edward be more romantic and use something more archaic? Like: “You are my own brand of Chinese grown opium!” Or maybe more realistic, like: “You are my own personal brand of acid, which makes me hallucinate that you are not a complete klutz with a brainwave of roughly half the activity of a flatline.”