Violin in C Sharp

 Back in 2016 the family and I went to Chicago for a vacation and while there we had afternoon tea at this marvelous place we found called Russian Tea Time.  My Dad, who is a coffee drinker and NOT a tea drinker simply LOVED the tea we had there - and has since, measured every other cup of tea he's had against his memory of the tea from Russian Tea Time.  So, for Father's Day, I managed to track down a tin of the house blend that we had at the restaurant.  This is the tin that came in the mail. Honestly, I don't remember there being a Black Currant taste to the tea back then - I thought of it more as a Russian Caravan type of blend but..... this is the House Blend, and that's what we had.... so I brewed us up a few cups to try. Ok... wow, in the mug it could be masquerading as coffee with that color! This stuff is BOLD and STRONG.  I tend to be heavy with the leaf when I brew my tea, but I think for this blend I don't need to be.  The black currant is much ...

  My friend Jess and I got into a music swap today.  She was sending me Russian ska and I threatened to retaliate in K-Pop but I realized there were so many more songs that I wanted to share with her that I was just going to have to sit down and dedicate a block of time to fully getting into it without interrupting her work day too much.  So.... here we go. Mayfly  - Playing with Paints Lyric video:  https://youtu.be/PCKVCAIbh20 Performance video:  https://youtu.be/yTJiKjZy5Xo This one I actually already shared with her - but since it's what started the sharing trend in my head, it's where I have to start again.  This is from the recently ended South Korean idol competition show Kingdom: Legendary War.  It was part of the combo team challenge and was the "rap team" entry.  It's rappers from BTOB, Stray Kids, & ATEEZ coming together - and it is glorious. BTS - MAP OF THE SOUL:7 'Interlude: Shadow' MV:  https://youtu.be/PV1gCvzpSy0 Thi...

I absolutely love a good thai tea - but supporting my habit of how often I crave one is not realistic considering how much they cost to buy.  When I found this at Cost Plus World Market I was excited... yet dubious.  Having watched so many tea baristas at bubble tea joints build my thai teas in front of me, I knew that there was more to it than just a tea bag - but my understanding of tea also made me realize that the most important building block of the drink HAD to be the tea itself.  I was right. This stuff is like no other tea I've reviewed before in that I won't even CONSIDER drinking this stuff straight off the steep.  It's dark but instead of getting coffee black dark, it gets dark orange.  It gets bitter if you oversteep, but the bitter doesn't taste like the tannin overload of an oversteeped black tea... but I don't have the words to describe what it DOES taste like oversteeped.  It's just... nasty. So, the box has instructions on how to take the b...