Kaizen Media Blog

Innovation through creativity and passion

Entries for November, 2007

Pinot Grigio

White WineOur Pinot Grigio, a medium bodied white wine, was bottled on September 10, 2007 and although it was drinkable right away we found it to be like sour grapes for the first few months. 

In early November we rediscovered this wine and a fantastic transition had taken place.

Our First Red – Pinot Noir

Red WineWe bottled our Pinot Noir on June 20, 2007 & we didn’t realize how long it would feel until it’s maturity date: November 20, 2007! 

It was a very long 5 months but now we’re in love with it.  It is a velvety smooth red wine and we can easily finish a bottle over any meal, conversation or just enjoying a snow storm.

Our First White – Reisling

White WineWe bottled our first white wine, a light bodied Reilsing on June 1st, 2007. 

We were able to drink it as soon as it was home chilled of course and it was very sweet. 

As it matured the flavour mellowed out considerably and as time goes on it continues to have a lighter taste.

Yarmouth Desktop Wallpaper

Foggy Lighthouse

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Golf Desktop Wallpaper

Golf

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Advantage Relocation Systems

Kaizen Web Design Logo SampleDawson Creek, BC

Advantage Relocation is a member of United Van Lines that has been moving Canadian families in Western Canada since 1949.

We also designed a website, stationery and business cards for Advantage Relocation Systems.

Click here to enlarge logo.

Advantage Relocation Systems Ltd.

Kaizen Web Design Website SampleDawson Creek, BC

A member of United Van Lines that has been moving Canadian families in Western Canada since 1949.

We modernized their branding with a new logo, stationery and refreshed their existing website. We helped to implement the new branding by working with their painter and printer to assist with getting the new logo on their fleet of trucks and business documents.

Click here to visit www.letusmoveyou.com.

World’s priciest cocktails

Sometimes, drinking away your sorrows doesn’t mend a broken heart. And these days, it can break the bank.

Dazzle CocktailTake the US$51,200 Dazzle cocktail, available at the Second Floor Bar at Harvey Nichols in Manchester, U.K. It’s got rose Champagne and strawberry and lychee liqueur. But the real buzz comes from the 18-karat white-gold ring with pink tourmaline and diamond stones nestled below all that booze.

Other cocktails don’t need gems to be ultra-pricey. Consider the Bar at the Merchant Hotel in Belfast’s US$1,400 Mai Tai.

A Mai Tai, the token tipple of tiki bars–for the price of a trip to Bora Bora?

“It’s all about the rum,” says Sean Muldoon, the “potation” manager at the opulent hotel bar in northern Ireland. “The presentation may seem like nothing,” says Muldoon, referring to the bottle’s plain-Jane, hand-written label. “But I believe what we have here is something very, very special … This is history in a bottle.”

Indeed. The J. Wray Nephew 17-year-old rum from Kingston, Jamaica, is the very same golden, pungent, full-bodied rum that inspired “Trader” Vic Bergeron to create the original Mai Tai at his Oakland bar in 1944. It’s unclear if this bottle of 17-year is an actual remnant from the sugar estate or a ridiculously limited replica made some time later. Either way, there are only six bottles of the stuff floating around, and the Merchant’s bottle, which sleeps in the hotel safe at night, is the only one that’s available to the public.

Crafty cocktailing
There have always been people with money to burn, but rarely have there been so many exorbitantly priced cocktails at their disposal.

Modern day “mixologists” like Muldoon are constantly seeking ways to elevate the art of cocktail-making by conjuring their own cordials, syrups and tinctures. They are driven by a public that has become increasingly savvy and discriminating about what passes their lips, and distillers who keep giving them better and better spirits to work with.

Donovan Bar at Rocco Forte's Brown's HotelAntonio Dandrea, bar manager at the Donovan Bar at Rocco Forte’s Brown’s Hotel in London, says this puts a lot of pressure on mixologists to constantly push the cocktail envelope.

“People are always looking for something different,” he says, “something they can’t find anywhere else.”

Hence his lavish US$100 truffle martini, which begins with a nubby black truffle from Alba enjoying a 48-hour soak in super-premium vodka.

For US$20 more, he’ll mix in some chocolate liqueur, float some double cream across the top and add two slices of fresh truffle.

Top of the tops
Not one for sweet drinks? We scoured bars, casinos, restaurants and lounges around the world to find other decadent libations and discovered they fall into distinct categories.

Some, like the famous Ritz sidecar at the Hotel Ritz in Paris, also deliver gravitas in a glass. This former most-expensive Guinness record holder features a coveted 1865 Ritz Reserve cognac from Napoleonic times.

Other lavish cocktails contain pricey, top-notch–though not necessarily historic–ingredients. The margarita at Isla Restaurant at the Mirage Hotel in Las Vegas is made with smooth Herradura Seleccion Suprema tequila, Grand Marnier 100-Year Anniversary, Cointreau and fresh citrus syrup. An added bonus? It’s prepared table-side at the restaurant by Isla’s very own “tequila goddess.”

Sometimes, it’s the garnish–not the pour–that sends the price soaring, as in rubies parading as maraschino cherries or a solid-gold swizzle stick. The most famous in that category is the Algonquin Hotel’s US$10,000 martini-on-the-rock–the “rock” being a 1.52-carat diamond from the hotel jeweler.

Serious spirits aficionados, however, dismiss these as choking hazards dreamed up by marketing types.

“I may as well serve a cocktail on top of a mink coat and call it my US$20,000 sidecar,” says Duncan Halden, bar manager at Gordon Ramsey at the London in New York.

Though it’s not on the menu, he serves a US$550 sidecar to connoisseurs upon request that, he says, “out-luxes” the famous version at the Paris Ritz. It features Hennessey Ellipse super-premium cognac–poured from a decanter that was specially designed by Tomas Bastide, a designer at Baccarat–and Grand Marnier 150.

World’s priciest cocktails
Pascale Le Draoulec and Lauren Sherman

Go to Forbes.com to view the slideshow

In Pictures: World’s Priciest Cocktails

Video: Liquid Luxuries: Thousand-Dollar Cocktails

American Gangster

American GangsterAbsolutely amazing movie, best movie ever!  Denzel Washington nails his character as usual with his classic style.  I was hanging on every moment of the saga and at times felt shocked at the heinous crimes.  It is a movie that encourages us to reflect on the history of law and order and many things.  All the cultures that make our history, how everything is connected.  Really inspiring movie.

I heard an interview on Flow 93.5 with Jay Z and he ended up in studio to express his flow of emotions after watching this movie.  Although I don’t think I could sit through an entire Jay Z album maybe I could read through the lyrics and see what he felt and how the movie inspired him too.

I am sure that anyone that watched this movie would take enormous value from it and be able to apply it to their own lives highs and lows and the nature of the universe uncovering new avenues for all of us every day.

Nobody’s Perfect

Artist: Miley Cyrus
Album: Hannah Montana 2: Meet Miley Cyrus
Year: 2007
Title: Nobody’s Perfect

Everybody makes mistakes… Everybody has those days… 1 2 3 4!
Everybody makes mistakes… Everybody has those days… Everybody knows what what I’m talkin’ ’bout… Everybody gets that way… [x2]

Sometimes I’m in a jam
I’ve gotta make a plan
It might be crazy
I do it anyway
No way to know for sure
I’ll figure out a cure
I’m patchin’ up the holes
But then it overflows
If I’m not doin’ to well
Why be so hard on my self?

[Chorus]
Nobody’s Perfect!
I gotta work it!
Again and again ’til I get it right
Nobody’s Perfect!
You live and you learn it!
And if I mess it up sometimes…
Nobody’s perfect

Sometimes I work a scheme
But then it flips on me
Doesn’t turn out how I planned
get stuck in quick sand
No problem, can be solved
Once I get involved
I try to be delicate
Then crash right into it
My intentions are good
Sometimes just misunderstood

[Chorus]

Nobody’s perfect!
I gotta work it!
I know in time I’ll find a way
Nobody’s perfect!

Sometimes I fix things up
And they fall apart again
Nobody’s perfect

I might mix things up
But I always get it right in the end

[Talking]
Next time you feel like… it’s just one of those days…
when you just can’t seem to win
If things don’t turn out the way you plan,
FIGURE SOMETHING ELSE OUT!
Don’t stay down! Try again! YEAH!

[Singing (x2)]
Everybody makes mistakes…..
everybody has those days…..
everybody knows what, what I’m talkin’ ’bout…….
everybody gets that way

Nobody’s Perfect!
I gotta work it!
Again and again ’til I get it right!
Nobody’s Perfect!
Ya live and ya learn it!
And if I mess it up sometimes…
Nobody’s Perfect!
I gotta work it!
I know in time I’ll find a way
Nobody’s Perfect.
Ya live and ya learn it!
‘Cause everybody makes mistakes

Nobody’s Perfect! No no! Nobody’s Perfect!

Nobody’s Perfect Lyrics from lyricsmania.com.