Keeping your car in great shape is one of those things that sounds like a lot of work, but is actually just a series of small, easy-to-manage jobs that don’t take up much time at all. Basic maintenance will help you keep your car on the road longer and will mean fewer repair bills due to parts failing or breaking down. Here are a few ways you can keep your car in better shape without breaking a sweat.
On average, Americans have four alcoholic drinks a week, a Gallup poll revealed. At the end of a long day at work, when the sun is setting and the day is done, the most natural thing in the world appears to be a beer, although wine comes in a close second, and liquor last because it favored by only 22% of the population.
Though I’ve written about 007-related matters quite a few times on this here site, including the matter of Bond and booze, I actually haven’t seen “Spectre” yet.
Nevertheless, amid all the Internet back-and-forth about the latest entry in this most mammoth of all film franchises, it seemed apt that I stumbled upon a drink apparently named after the slim but exciting pulp novel that started it all…and then restarted the whole thing when it was finally turned into a canonical James Bond movie called “Casino Royale.” (At least on paper, Ian Fleming’s novel was actually adapted twice before that, but it’s a very long story why neither of those two productions, one a live TV broadcast and the other a lavishly misbegotten 1960s cinema curio, actually “count.”)
However, the drink itself turned out to be a little too serious, perhaps — a charge that’s also been leveled against some of the more recent Bond films as well, though not necessarily by me. Still, I took it upon myself to lighten things up. In the movies, maintaining the balance between light and dark elements in something like a Bond film can be pretty difficult to pull off. In an over-tart/under-sweetened drink, however, it’s really just a matter of boosting up one of the sweeter ingredients and maybe doing a Mary Poppins and adding just a spoonful of sugar. To wit…
The Casino Royale (Rebooted)
2 ounces gin
1/2 ounce fresh lemon juice
1/4 ounce maraschino liqueur
1 egg yolk
1 teaspoon superfine sugar
1 dash orange bitters
1 orange slice (optional garnish)
Combine the gin, juice, liqueur, egg yolk and sugar into a cocktail shaker. Dry shake (shake without ice) to emulsify the yolk. Add ice and shake again very vigorously. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass. If the oranges from your supermarket are sufficiently sweet, consider adding a slice for a garnish. If not, don’t sweat it. There’s enough going on in this drink.
*****
For the record, the original version of the Casino Royale, which I found on various web sites, contains only one teaspoon of maraschino and no other sweetener of any sort. That version is not for everyone and I’m not even sure it’s for me. On the other hand, it’s definitely less fattening and great for people who don’t mind very tart drinks softened by an almost yogurt-like softness, courtesy of the egg yolk.
Still, though it might be less kind to my waistline and my A1C, I like my sweetened up version. It worked very well with a few different gins. Bombay Dry, Plymouth, and value-priced Gordon’s all produced dandy results, lending the drink the right floral/boozy backdrop. I also had good results with both Maraska and Luxardo maraschino. The latter was more sweetly inviting, with a vaguely vanilla-esque back-taste. Luxardo added more overtly complex flavors in ways I simply don’t have the vocabulary to fully describe right at this moment, other than to say it was kind of interesting.
Now, it’s time for an appropriate musical interlude from one of the worst spy movies with one of the best scores not composed by Sir John Barry.
The story of the Chilean miners who were trapped over 200 stories underground, and their subsequent rescue after a whopping 69 days, is one of humanity’s finest. It is a story of hope, courage, faith and determination, and it had ‘major motion picture’ written all over it. Unfortunately, the word ‘major’ proves to be the biggest problem with the eventual motion picture. “The 33” had an intimate, claustrophobic film within its grasp, but chose to paint by numbers instead. They even recorded all of the dialogue in English. Ninety-nine percent of the characters are Chilean; this movie has no business being in English.
On August 5, 2010, a group of men working for the San Jose Mining Company went to work in a mine in the Atacama Desert, despite concerns from staffers – and clear signs from the mine itself – that the mine was becoming unstable. While the men were in the mine, the rock shifted above them, cutting off their access to the surface. The men retreated to a shelter 2,300 feet below ground, where there was to be a radio, rations, medical supplies and a way out. The initial plan was to climb the escape ladders in the shelter, only to discover that their employers never finished building them. To add insult to injury, the radio was disconnected, and there were no medical supplies.
Faced with limited rations, Mario Sepulveda (Antonio Banderas) takes the lead to make sure everyone gets a fair share, even though that means one very small amount of food per day. On the surface, Laurence Golborne (Rodrigo Santoro), head of the Ministry of Mining, convinces Chilean President Pinera (Bob Gunton, of all people) that it is their moral imperative to rescue those miners, and Golborne brings drills to dig for the miners, and shelter for the miners’ loved ones, whose homes are almost 30 miles away but refused to leave the site out of fear that San Jose will abandon the miners if no one’s watching them and keeping them honest. Before long, the United States, Australia and Canada are all lending a hand in the effort to rescue “Los 33.”
Every little thing that you do leading up to your competition impacts the way your body looks, from the food that you put in your body to the products that you put on it. Even drinking too much water at the wrong time can make your body look softer and cost you definition.
After working so hard building your muscle definition, you need to do everything you can to highlight that work. Smooth, beautiful skin can make your muscles pop. You’ll look stronger and more cut with the right skin work.
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