Taiping Hou Kui

The last time we went to Seattle I brought home a bunch of teas from The Perennial Tea Room. Most of them made their way to my office, and I worked my way through them over the months. Unfortunately, it didn't occur to me to record my experiences.

So this time, I'm going to talk about the two teas I bought during our trip for Renee's 14th birthday. I'll keep it short, as I'm at work, but I can always come back and add new notes later (yeah, right).

The first tea was recommended by a lean, grey-haired woman who obviously loved her product. I suspect that she was fully infused when I asked her about the Chinese green teas, as she charged in and opened about six different jars. I ended up purchasing her favorite, the Taiping Hou Kui. The envelope contains the additional caption: Great Green Monkey King - Anhui China Green. At $6.25/oz., it seems rather dear (try this one at $11/oz.!), but you can make a cup with a single teaspoon, so it should go a long way. The website says you can resteep leaves up to three times, but I only have the one steeper, and I like to alternate flavors, so I'll take the wasteful route and steep once.

The leaves themselves are long and thin, and have the expected green tea aroma, but with a flowery accent. The taste is very mild. Could I distinguish it from any other green tea? I think so. Would I buy it again? At the rate that I drink tea, and with all the varieties that are out there, I think I might get to it again when I hit 80. But it is definitely as good a green tea as any I've had.

First Netflix Failure

Jean and I watched the first disc of Extras: Season One with great pleasure last week. This week we were all wiggly with anticipation when the second disc arrived. Unfortunately, midway into the first episode, the DVD player froze. No amount of skipping or fiddling worked. I'm going to try the recommended cleaning procedure tomorrow. If it doesn't work, we'll send it back, and have our first experience with Netflix's problem response system. Fingers crossed!

Update

We sent back the bad disc, and got a replacement yesterday. Jean and I watched it last night, and had a much better viewing experience. The Patrick Stewart episode is hilarious (at least the part with Patrick Stewart). I'll be sending back this disc, and waiting to see how they handle the 'duplicate'.

New Music

• Heaven or Las Vegas - Cocteau Twins


• American Don - Don Caballero


• It's a Beautiful Day - It's a Beautiful Day

Now Exiting the Tweens

Renee turned 14 this weekend! To celebrate, we took our selves up to Seattle, sticking to our favorite stomping grounds, like Pike's Place Market and the International District. Pictured in the banner is the kitchen of one of Jean's favorite stores, Piroshky, Piroshky. A small sample of photos from the weekend can be viewed in this set.

Running Woman

Jean ran the Helvetia Half Marathon this weekend! Hurrah!

The banner image was taken after she had finished. It's one of only two that I snapped, so I will apologize for the foreshortening caused by the wide angle. Jean feels it makes her legs look short. But since she had just finished a half-marathon, they couldn't be that short!

Passel o' New Music

I'm getting lazier every month. Here's the list of recent eMusic:

• Soundtrack for Amadeus


• Abwoon - Lisa Gerrard


• Blame It On My Youth - Art Farmer


• Assassin Reverie - Terry Riley (The ARTE Quartett)


• In C - Terry Riley (Bang On A Can)


• Music in Fifths - Philip Glass (Bang On A Can)


• The Greatest - Cat Power

Recent Netflix Movies

Jean and I watched Pi: Faith in Chaos, by Darren Aronofsky. It is a bit heavy-handed and overwrought, but fun in a soapy, art-house way.

More recently, we watched the Pedro Amodovar movie Live Flesh. We've really enjoyed a lot of his films over the years, and expect to catch up on a number of his works through Netflix. But this one was kinda dark and pessimistic, somewhat off the path from what we've come to expect from him. As a result, we rated it a little lower than others of his.