By Amaryllis Holloway -Turman
The other day I was eating an orange. Normally, I would not have thought that would initiate any spark of inspiration. It seemed that this orange had a copious amount of seeds in each segment. I began to wonder how many trees I would have, if I took the time to plant these seeds. I could have the makings of an orchard.
Restaurant.com claims that you can get the best deals on the web by using their website. Having used their website, sometimes I got good deals and other times, it was a different story.
The normal cost of the certificates I have seen range from $5 – $40. The value may be $15 – $200. The way it works is that you pay a price for value at that restaurant. For example, I saw a "$25 off of $35 purchase" certificate that cost $10. At first glance this is a great deal. But you have to read the small print to see what is not included from the menu. Also, tax and 18% gratuity is added before deducting the certificate value.
Even if you only purchase $35 worth of food, your out of pocket costs at the restaurant will still be about $20. Add that to what you paid for the certificate, and your total out of pocket cost is $30. In essence, you only saved $5 by going through Restaurant.com. It is true that you still saved some money, but what the time and effort worth it? It depends on what you wanted.
When I went to San Francisco, I planned my dinners around what certificates I had. Since I did not know where I wanted to eat, I checked Restaurant.com, looked over the restaurant menus, and other websites for restaurant reviews. When I go to Atlanta, I check to see what is available also. If I have a taste for a certain cuisine, I might check to see what restaurants they have. Since I am not saving an extreme amount of money, I look at the certificate value also.
The bottom line is that if I am going to a restaurant with a coupon (which is what this essentially is), I want to feel as if I am getting some savings. If I have to pay a lot (yes, this is arbitrary and can mean different things to different people) in my opinion, the whole certificate purchasing process is not worth it. The way that I try to maximize my deal is to buy the certificates on sale. They regularly have 70% and 80% off certificates prices. Instead of paying $10, I would pay $2 or $3 for a certificate with $25 value. However, for many of the fancier restaurants, the promo codes do not apply.
I recommend using Restaurant.com but do the math first to make sure you are mentally prepared for what you will have to pay at the restaurant. Using their certificates does not slash your restaurant cost drastically, but it will reduce them.
Farmer’s Shed is another triple D (Diners Drive-Ins and Dives) pick located in Lexington, SC
This is a Southern food joint with different meats and sides for each day Monday through Friday. The allure of this place is that it is located next to their farm where a lot of the vegetables are grown. I was fortunate to have a vacation day on a Wednesday and was able to visit. The food was so good!!!!
I ordered the cranberry pork chop because I like all things pork. I was served a thick cut pork chop with cranberry/meat broth drippings. I do not even think that is the proper way to describe it. The cranberries were not too sweet or too tart. In any case, the pork-cranberry flavors worked very well together. After I finished my plate, I wanted more. The collard greens were some of the best that I have tasted in a restaurant. I think they might even have rivaled Daddy Dz (Atlanta, GA) and that is saying a lot. Their cornbread has a little sugar on top before they bake it and so there is a little crunch on the top. It went very well with the collards. The hint of salt from the collards paired with the hint of sweet from the cornbread had my taste buds performing gymnastic flips of
joy in my mouth. At one point, I had to close my eyes to fully enjoy the experience.
If you have read any of my other posts featuring restaurants that have been featured on TV, you know that I hold the restaurants to a higher standard than normal. If a place is rumored to be so good that it is on TV, the food quality has to be perfect. Sometimes Southern food restaurants fall short because the food is not as flavorful as it appears to be on TV. I can say that is NOT the case with Farmer’s Shed. This restaurant is worth all the accolades they have received. I wished that I lived closer so that I could go there every day. I am already trying to figure out how I can get there on a Friday. There Friday menu
looks really good too.
Overall: Farmer’s Shed is definitely worth a trip! Check out their menu beforehand so that you can decide what you want to eat. Otherwise, you
might to order one of everything 
I only bought my Xbox because of the Kinect. I was intrigued by the next level of advancement of motion sensor gaming. In contrast to the Wii, with the Kinect there are no batteries are needed because your body is the controller. I was able to buy Xbox 4GB console and Kinect on sale for around $250. There are several memory options of the Xbox console, but if you are not a real serious gamer like me, the 4GB is fine. However if, you want to play games like Halo, Call of Duty, or Far Cry, you might be better off splurging for the 250GB console (which is going to be about $100 more expensive). If you don’t, you might end up running out of memory and have to buying the larger memory console later. Save yourself the time and money and buy what you need the first time around.
When using the Kinect, you need a lot of room. A good playing area is about 6-8 feet away from the sensor. They recommend at least 10 feet if there are 2 players. I play in an area less than 6 feet, so my head is a little cut off on the projection image. This means that on some games I am lose points because the sensor does not full recognize my movements. But for the most part, the sensor does a pretty good job of knowing where I am and what movements I am trying to make.
If you buy the Kinect new, you will probably have the Kinect Adventures game to come with it. Since the Kinect is fairly new, most of the Kinect games are going to be the most expensive. From what I have seen, the average prices start at about $40. Most of the games that I want are $50, so I am waiting for sales and specials. During the Christmas holidays, there were Amazon specials and I was able to get Dance Central 2 for $30 (regular price $50) and The Biggest Loser: Ultimate Workout for $20 (regular price $40).
I can rent games from Blockbuster, but since the Kinect games are newer, it cost $2-3 a day unless I buy the gaming subscription. I have Blockbuster Online which allows me to put games in my queue. As of yet, I have not received any games because there is a long wait for all the Kinect games.
Overall, I love my Xbox with Kinect. It is worth the money spent. I am able to exercise without feeling like I am doing a workout. So far, I have lost 5 pounds. I am motivated to keep on playing my games and burning off the pounds.
If you are fascinated by the human body, YOU have to check out this exhibit. If you are studying to be in the medical field, YOU need to see
this exhibit.
You will have a whole new appreciation for bodily functions and motions that you took for granted. Examine the body from the inside out-circulatory, digestive, muscular, and all the other systems. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience. Although, it was difficult to go through the section about unborn bodies. It is sad to know that a life ended before it really got a chance to start.
I was inspired to exercise after seeing this. I heart my body and I want to take care of myself the best way I know how.
And in other thoughts, I do not know how someone can study the body in detail and not be convinced there is a Creator. The intelligence that was needed to make our body is definitely out of this world!
I did not know about water ice until I was in Philadelphia, PA (maybe I knew but didn’t pay attention). On this particular summer day, I was hot and wanted something sweet and cold to eat. I took a chance by going to John’s Water Ice. I think in the backof my mind I thought that I might have heard of water ice before from one of the many travelling food show that I watch (but I could not be sure). I was so glad that I tried it.
This is the ultimate icee. I love this shaved ice that has the texture of ice cream even though it is small ice pieces. I chose Cherry because
that is my favorite summertime flavor. The flavor was sweet like fruit punch or HiC without the syrupy aftertaste.
It was so good, I am hesitant to try any other water ice. I don’t know how anyone could make a water ice any better. I would rather revel in
this memory instead of spoiling it by eating a mediocre water ice. And the next time I am in Philly, I know where to go for a delicious cool treat.
This is the typical story of a young girl from the mid-west that is determined to make it in the big city. And as always, she finds a boyfriend who respects her mind too. The story is the same, but the names are different.
I thought that this would be a movie for my and hubby to watch- chick story for me and eye candy for him. Well I was wrong. There were not enough skimpy outfits and eye candy to amuse him and distract from the fact there was not a lot of quality acting or mediocre script writing. And Cher’s face was so taut, I could not pay attention to her acting. Half way through the movie, even I was getting bored and starting playing Farmville (I can only take so much).
All in all, it was a major CHICK FLICK. Girls, keep that in mind if you were thinking this would be a good date movie. I suggest saving it for Ladies’ Night. Straight men will probably not be impressed with this movie since there is not enough scantily clad women to compensate for the film’s shortcomings.
If you like to hear Christina Aguilera wailing (or as some would say “hitting those high notes”), you will probably love this movie.
I have been thinking about dental health today since I had a dentist visit yesterday afternoon. In the past I have hung my head in shame when the dental hygienist asked if I was flossing regularly. Ummmm. I could lie but you know my gums tell the real story. So I fess up and admit it. I brush my teeth vigorously, use mouthwash, but it seems that flossing has always been one of those activities that was hit or miss for me.
That was before GUM Eez-Thru
These little floss picks are easy to carry in my purse and I can floss with one hand. I like this brand because the floss pick is made of “special floss that resists shredding”. You may not think that is a big deal, but I have used other floss picks and ended up with more thread between my teeth than when I started.
Have you ever had a piece of popcorn kernel between your teeth and gums? Having bits of floss between your teeth feels like that but more annoying. So for all you people out there that know you need to floss but don’t want it to be a chore, choose GUM Eez-Thru
Now when I go to the dentist, my hygienist knows that I floss <insert bright smile here>
Café at the Corner in Hapeville GA is a small French bistro that is open for lunch only. Hapeville is a little town near the Atlanta airport. You know that the food must be good when a small town restaurant on Main street is only open for a few hours each day. When I arrived at the restaurant with my lunch group, the line was snaked around in front of the food counter. There were so many delicious choices that the 10 minutes waiting time was almost not enough for me to make up my mind. And most of that time was spent trying to decide what dessert I wanted.
I decided to order the tomato bisque, spinach quiche, and cheesecake topped with cherries. This was some of the best tomato soup I have ever had. It was creamy. The coarse cracked pepper on top added a little crunch and explosion of pepper flavor that goes well with the tomatoes. The spinach quiche was well put together and the crust was flakey with the right amount of cheese sauce.
All of the meal was leading up to my favorite part: dessert <insert applause and cheers here>. The cheesecake was rich, smooth, with perfect texture. It was not too sweet. There were more cherries than the cherry filling, which was a plus in my favor.
One of my lunch companions ordered the cake topped with frosting and almonds (seen in the picture at the top). I wish I could have tasted her cake because it looked so scrumptious when she was eating it. And it did not help that she was making sound effects like "Mmmmm this is so good". I thought about asking to taste her cake, but I did not want to offer a taste of my cheesecake. I decided to leave that alone and the next visit here I will try the Almond cake (don’t know the name of it but that is what I am calling it).
Overall: I really enjoyed eating at Café at the Corner. I did not expect such delicious food in this small town next to the airport. But now that I know about it, I am glad it exists!
Last night, we had a movie themed night: After the End of the World (post-apocalyptic genre)
First movie: Book of Eli
All I knew of this movie before watching it was the trailers of Denzel Washington fighting bad guys using his machete. I knew that he was protecting a book, but I did not know for what or why. The movie starts slowly, but you find out that Eli (Denzel Washington) has been walking for 30 years after the war that caused major devastation to the earth to find a place for the book he is protecting. He does have very impressive fighting skills. Case in point: A guy pushed him and Eli told him that if he did it again, he would not get his hand back. The guy did it again and Eli cut off his hand in a matter of fact way.
His nemesis Carnegie (Gary Oldman) is looking for a book that he believes contains great power and with it he can extend his influence and authority over others. To that end, he sends his hooligans out over the wasteland to ravage and pillage to find this special book. He is frustrated because they come back with books, but not the one he was seeking.
Then he meets Eli, impressed with his fighting skills, and hopes that Eli will help him find the book for which he is searching. Eli declines and Carnegie locks him up for the night hoping to change his mind. He even send in a young bar maid named Solara (Mila Kunis) to use her feminine wiles to convince him. Eli does not fall for the bait because he is focused and on a mission. She begs to stay the night so that Carnegie will at least think they slept together (she worries that Carnegie will hurt her mother). Eli allows her to stay and while in the room, she sees that he has a book. She is excited about this even though she does not know how to read.
The next day, when she goes to see her mother, she prays for their food like Eli did the night before. Carnegie is suspicious about Eli. In the end, Solara tells Carnegie that Eli has a book so that he will stop hurting her mother. Carnegie goes to find Eli because he wants that book. Again Eli declines, a shootout ensues, and the chase is on.
I will not tell you any more of the story or what the book is because I want you to see the movie. The ending was okay. I was not totally disappointed. I felt that was probably the best way it could have ended. Eli was determined to carry out his appointed task. And for the most part things seem to work out for him, that you believe that he might have some higher power watching over him.
From the movie, there is an underlying message of hope and religion/spirituality being the answer to combat despair.
Second movie: I am Legend
Robert Neville (Will Smith) is a scientist that is trying to find a cure for a virus that was caused by scientists who created it when trying to use the molecular structure from measles virus to cure cancer. The viral infection is transmitted through the air and from bites from infected individuals. Neville is immune to the virus and becomes the last healthy human survivor in New York. His one companion, a dog named Sam, cannot be infected from the airborne virus but can be infected if bitten. Neville is methodical about keeping his whereabouts hidden from the Darkseekers, infected individuals that have super human strength, angry attackers like rabid dogs, but have an extreme sensitivity to sunlight and UV light.
It would seem that Neville had nothing to live for since he saw his wife and child die in a helicopter accident when they were leaving NY. But he is determined to find a cure for the human race since he is the only possible hope as a person immune to the virus. For years without success, he does trial after trial with different chemical compounds in efforts to combat the virus’ effects. Meanwhile, he is constantly looking for survivors, although he is not sure there are any. Although, he thinks that the Darkseekers are devolving and losing all traits of humanity, there are instances in the movie that show the viewer that they still have intelligence, logic, planning abilities. This is probably the undoing of Neville because he begins to underestimate his opponent.
This movie ended okay also. I probably would have been in the minority choosing the alternate ending if I had a choice. Through it all, Neville becomes, more than a man, a legend.
The movie seems to be a cautionary tale of what can happen when scientists try to outsmart and control nature. There is still so much about nature that they do not know and creating mutations might have the unintended consequences of creating viral infections that have 90% infection and/or kill rate of the human race.
