Favorite Thing #14: Amos Lee

One of the great things about ITunes is the suggestion feature. back in December, I had a $15 credit to use up in ITunes and I was kind of lost as to what I wanted to get. At the time, I had been listening to John Mayer's newest album, Continuum, pretty much non-stop. I love the bluesy, relaxed feel to the album and the fact that you could listen to the whole album and every song flowed right into the next until the cd went silent, and you started it over again. So I searched for albums like John Mayer's Continuum and was referred to Amos Lee. I bought the album without listening to any of the clips and fell in love! It has a great folk meets blues meets jazz feel to it. Like the John Mayer album, I can listen to this all the way through without wanting to skip a single song or even noticing how much time has passed. I need to get the rest of his albums, but I have been resisting because his debut album was like magic for me, and I'm afraid of ruining it.

I tried to be technologically savvy and load a music player, but it was too much work, so on the toolbar on the right I loaded a clip thing from Amazon that you can check out. My favorite song has to be Arms of a Woman, but the clip Amazon has isn't the greatest. Hopefully, I can get at least one person to love him as much as me.

Favorite Thing #13: Rust En Vrede Estate Wine, 2003

Rust En Vrede is located in Stellenbosch, South Africa. If I suddenly become a millionaire (perhaps at Bingo tonight?), I would love to own a home here. Vinyards run right up to the base of mountains that appear out of nowhere. The Rust en Vrede estate was the first in South Africa to specialize in red wines, and has been around since 1694. In the past 30 years, they have only had two winemakers: Kevin Arnold and Louis Strydom. Kevin Arnold is a big name in the South African wine venue, and worked at Rust en Vrede for 10 years. During these 10 years, the Estate wine was made for the first time. the sucess of this blend was responsible for the popular "Cape Blend" trend that blends Shiraz, Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot.

Some other interesting facts that I pulled off the Rust en Vrede website:

• President Nelson Mandela selected Rust en Vrede to be served at the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize dinner in Oslo, where he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
• In 1994, Rust en Vrede received the South African Export Achievement award from President Mandela.
• During 1996, Rust en Vrede hosted the King and Queen of Denmark at an official lunch in the manor house on the estate.
• The 1998 Rust en Vrede Estate Wine was named the best blended red wine at the World Wine Championships in the United States.
• In 2000, Rust en Vrede became the first South African winery to be named in the prestigious, “Top 100 Wines of the World” by US wine magazine; Wine Spectator. This was followed up in 2001, 2002 and 2003 where the estate again made appearances on the esteemed list. Thus making it four years in succession that this milestone was achieved.
  

They also have an awesome underground cellar where they store all their wines while they bottle age them. It "was the first of its kind for a privately owned South African estate. Designed by renowned architect Mr Gawie Fagan, the perfectly controlled environment is of invaluable benefit to the production and bottle maturation of our unique wines."

Back to the actual wine itself, it is delicious! I tried it at the estate when I was there and balked at the price (R320, the equivalent of 40-45 dollars). The rest of the wine I purchased at various stops was all under $10 a bottle so I was unwilling to pay 4x the amount for one bottle. But, the wine was so delicious that I regreted not buying it for the rest of the trip. I was extremely excited to find it at Thames River Wine and Spirits one night and recently opened it while on our trip to Martha's Vineyard. I was pleased to find out that it was as delicious as I remembered it. It is composed of 60% Cabernet Sauvignon, 30% Shiraz, and 10% Merlot and aged for 23 months in new American and French Oak Barrels. The bouquet was not as strong as I expected for a predominantly Cabernet Sauvignon blend, but it did have a subtle hint of berries to me. The palate was wonderfully smooth but still full bodied and very slightly fruity. I think that it would probably age really well, so I'm hoping to go back and buy a bottle to store for a few years (if I can resist drinking it).

Favorite Thing #12: Michael Phelps

Picking an athlete as one of my favorite things probably seems weird to anyone who knows me, even remotely, because I am probably the least athletic person in the world. I regularly trip over my own feet, bang my shins and give myself concussions. As a kid, I was always the last person picked for any sport because I was likely to injure not only myself, but anyone around me. (Boy, I sound an awful lot like Bella. Unfortunately, I never had a hot shapeshifter/werewolf and an even hotter vampire fighting over me.) Back to the point - while I am a horrible athlete, the one thing I was good at growing up was swimming. I spent most of my childhood in the water and took competitive swim for 8 years. I never mastered the butterfly (I looked like a fish flopping out of water) because it involved way too much coordination, but I was always one of the best at the breast stroke and back stroke. If my school had a swim team and if I wasn't as lazy as I am, I could have been pretty good. I have a great deal of respect and awe for Olympic swimmers, especially Michael Phelps.

His record breaking ability is amazing.
I remember 2000 when he made the US Olympic team at the age of 15 for the 200m fly and came in 5th overall, which is a huge accomplishment for anyone, let alone a kid who had only been swimming 8 years compared to the decades some of his competitors swam. Just 5 months later, he became the youngest swimmer ever to hold a world record, again in his specialty the 200m fly.

Fast forward to 2004 and his 6 gold medals and 2 bronze which tied him for the most Olympic medals of one type in one Olympics. He raced in 8 events, and was on track to match Mark Spitz's record of 7 gold medals in one Olympics when he was beaten by two other swimming greats, Ian Thorpe (the Thorpedo) and Pieter Van Den Hoogenband. Then the 4*100 freestyle team took bronze and the 4*100 medley team was disqualified due to a false start.

Fast forward again to 2008 where he becomes the greatest Olympic Athlete ever by holding 11 Gold medals (with 3 races still to go). He is once again on track to beat Spitz's record of 7 Golds in one game.

He is built for swimming
Like most good swimmers, he is tall (6'7") but what is even more impressive is that his arm reach is three inches longer than his height, which helps him pull through the water and also gives him the advantage of being able to touch the wall that much sooner. It also helps that his size 14 feet act as flippers...


I'm looking forward to seeing how he does in his remaining three events (100m fly, 200m IM, and 4*100 medley) Hopefully he can fend of his main competition (Ian Crocker, Ryan Lochte, and the Australian team) and get the 8 golds he needs to beat out Spitz's record.

Favorite Thing #11: Vintage Clothing

I have always had a great appreciation for vintage clothing, in particular clothing from the 40's and 50's. For me, this style clothing is so glamorous and sexy, not like the crappy fashions that are popular today. However, being a poor student, I never had any money fo vintage inspired clothing, let alone real vintage. The only piece I had was a swing style dress I purchased for an "Enchantment Under the Sea" dance my senior year (Yes, as in Marty McFly Back to the Future. Are you happy I corrected it Rob?). And while I do love this dress, it didn't really do the era justice.

Retro swing dresses also make excellent clubbing dresses

Old time photos are fun

I recently got into the market of buying vintage inspired dresses when my good friend Kevin Doyle (see entry #9, decided to have a super awesome Great Gatsby themed party on the summer solstice. Through an internet search, Amy and I found a really awesome website called Unique Vintage (http://www.unique-vintage.com/) that sells vintage inspired clothing from the 20's through the 70's. They a wonderful selection of flapper style dresses, from which Amy and I chose the lovely selections below. I complemented the dress with a hat I picked up at the local vintage store Peacock Feathers (13 Golden Street, New London, CT). Amy is much craftier than I and she made her awesome headband, which was by far the best homemade headband I have ever seen, let alone at the party (gluing a piece of sequined ribbon together on the ends is not making a headband).

"What, this old thing?"

Unique vintage has such neat stuff that I used a great 20% off coupon to get a 50's dress, labeled as a "country club dress". Its so comfortable to wear and the skirt is full and tons of fun to twirl in. Amy also got a neat 50's dress with cute little cherries on it. They have so far come in really handy for various summer parties and outdoor movie watching. Since becoming addicted to vintage clothing, we have also become addicted to using any excuse to dress up.

Rob may be handsome but my dress is hot!

I have also added a 40's pinup style bathing suit to my collection from Ester Williams line of bathing suits. This suit (along with the one Amy got) is very flattering to people who aren't built like twigs. Plus, its super fun to wear. I'm really hoping they go on sale so I can order a different print.

This photo could have come out of the 40's

Another great site we have discovered lately is Daddy O's (http://www.daddyos.com/) which specializes in 50's, rockabilly and swing clothes for men, women and children. I ordered a great two piece number today that I am totally stoked to get. My only regret is that I forgot to orderthe awesome cateye sunglasses to go with.

The crowning achievement of my growing collection is the vintage dress I picked up at Aequinox on the Vineyard this weekend (http://www.vintageclothingmv.com/). It is my first actual vintage dress. Although Noe thinks it looks like a Mrs. Cleaver dress, I think it is swell. I haven't gotten a chance to wear it out yet, but I did take a picture of it, which doesn't do it justice. I can't wait to hoodwink Katie and John into inviting us back so I can visit the store again and hopefully find another great piece for my collection.