Aladdin

[Abbot Hamilton]

Wonderful creation Sylvia

"Crucial question

Does anyone have a favorite wine they like to drink during the holidays?

I'd really like to try a dry mead, but the only mead around here (from Augusta, Missouri) is super sweet.

-Tim "

Tim, i like Scottish wines myself. The single malt type.

[Gustavo]

This year I didn't make anything special,
but I'm waiting the orders ... Unfortunately, they'll come after the date ... I didn't intend to ask them for the date, but, when the seller mailed (automatically) saying "it'll arrive after Dec 24th", I thought with myself ... Oh, pity ... It could have been on the date ... But this coincidence already happened this year, on my birthday, so, a lightning to hit the same place twice? Don't think so.

Just for Klicks is amazing, Sylvia! I'm always inspired by it. Now I'll have a bit more of work with light effects, I hope, for I'll have windows ... 


Hope to show you ... Internet hasn't been much friendly, here. But, well, there's going to be a bunch of free days ahead (not to mention that I'm changing jobs ...), so, I hope to have chance to make the new episodes, either for Fletcher & Elmo as well as for the Pirates' Chronicles & The Map Story.

Lets see how it goes.


Thanks for the Aladin!
 


Gus

[Timotheos]

Maybe mead isn't exactly wine...  

but, seriously, Gordon, there are semi-dry meads!  

I like trying Spanish wines.  I guess because I liked my first Spanish wine, a Caceres de Rioja, so much; the reds at least are spicier without being as heavy as the Australian lineup...  Argentine wines are hitting our shores at a decent price with different tasting grapes than the usual suspects.

My pet peeve, somewhat, is Napa Valley.  My dad took a three day tour of Napa Valley a few years back, and though he never touches a drop, he's a super-fan of Napa.  There will be a bottle of Napa wine on the table this Christmas of which I will be the sole drinker.  I'm uncertain whether his tongue isn't firmly in cheek when he extolls the virtues of Napa, plants a bottle in front of me, and refuses to touch it....

To Gordon:
It's difficult to find good port around here without looking hard.  There is a "generic" American brand that dominates the store shelves here which tastes very mediciney.  What price range does decent port fall into?    

I enjoy good Sake but that is also hard to find in the US outside of a major port city.  Gekkeiken, which is bland is everywhere, unless you go to Chicago, San Fran, or LA.  I mean, even the Japanese restaurants in St Louis stock nothing but Gekkekken...

[Rasputin]

Well thank you for the Picture of Aladdin and the story behind it .

As for the Alcohol topic, I live in Sonoma County and wine flows in our ditches, so i I will just stay out of that topic

[playmofire]

To Gordon:
It's difficult to find good port around here without looking hard.  There is a "generic" American brand that dominates the store shelves here which tastes very mediciney.  What price range does decent port fall into?    

The supermarkets all carry a range of brands of port as well as their own brands.  All the supermarket chains have own brand wines which are rated very highly by the experts.  In a recent "50 best" in The Independent newspaper, 7 of the 50 were supermarket own brands and another 2 were a chain stores own brand.

A good, branded LBV port will be in the range of  £9-£11 at the moment, though there is probably a bit of extra discounting now to boost Christmas sales.  The port I mentioned in my earlier post, the Nierpoort 2004 LBV is £13.95 a bottle at a specialist wine shop and is much better than the usual branded port I buy from the supermarket for about £3 less.  The quantity produced of this is too small for a supermarket to be interested in stocking it.

[Richard]

Sylvia ... Your creations are always magnificent. However, Aladdin is definitely one of your best!

Thanks for letting us in on your background secret ...
(but IMHO, your finished result is much better than the original) ...   

Happy Holidays, Sylvia!    Too bad that we're all so far apart.
It would be very nice to sit down and sip some port with you, Gordon and our Playmofriends.

All the best to you and your family this holiday season and throughout the coming year,
Richard

[Timotheos]

The supermarkets all carry a range of brands of port as well as their own brands.  All the supermarket chains have own brand wines which are rated very highly by the experts.  In a recent "50 best" in The Independent newspaper, 7 of the 50 were supermarket own brands and another 2 were a chain stores own brand.

A good, branded LBV port will be in the range of  £9-£11 at the moment, though there is probably a bit of extra discounting now to boost Christmas sales.  The port I mentioned in my earlier post, the Nierpoort 2004 LBV is £13.95 a bottle at a specialist wine shop and is much better than the usual branded port I buy from the supermarket for about £3 less.  The quantity produced of this is too small for a supermarket to be interested in stocking it.

Thanks Gordon for the information.  Sounds like I need to find a specialist liquor store.

I'm feeling "Victorian Theme" this weekend.  On the way home from work, I stopped by St Charles' brewpub (Trailhead Brewery) and bought half-a-gallon of their Christmas ale straight from the tap in a take-home glass jug like people had to do before refrigeration.*

* Actually maybe you Brits still do this more than us.  Anheiser-Busch in St Louis introduced refrigerated train cars to the US back in the early 1900s and became the country's first "national" beer.  Thanks a large part to their clever marketing, we Americans are hooked on nearly-frozen beer that's been sitting on the shelves for a few seasons...

But as for so-called draft beer from a can--has anyone tried that "Guinness Draft" with the dumb plastic ball inside?  That has got to be the most flavorless beer in the world.  Judging by how rich Trailhead's day-old ale tastes, I can only imagine how Britain's famous stuff must taste fresh from the barrel.*

* Maybe I shouldn't include Guinness anymore in this list.  Considering our Guinness was brewed in Canada...  maybe I should go to Ontario for that true Irish flavor.

[Timotheos]

Sylvia ... Your creations are always magnificent. However, Aladdin is definitely one of your best!

Sylvia has set a precedent for a rather high bar for herself.

But Aladdin definitely ranks at least a rock-solid B+ on the Sylvia scale.

-Tim

[Gepetto]

But as for so-called draft beer from a can--has anyone tried that "Guinness Draft" with the dumb plastic ball inside?  That has got to be the most flavorless beer in the world.  Judging by how rich Trailhead's day-old ale tastes, I can only imagine how Britain's famous stuff must taste fresh from the barrel.*

-Well Tim, even then it would be a twist since Guinness has several 'varieties' of their stout depending on the country it is going to (alcohol level especially). Portland, Oregon is blessed with many fine breweries and several distilleries and like most things, once you have had it fresh at its point of origin there is no going back, sorry for the digression.

Sylvia, I agree with Richard in that your use of the book background was a vast improvement on the original.




Gepetto

[Timotheos]

I think I rather strayed from my original topic, didn't I?

sorry for the digression.

Does anyone truly prefer that threads cling monomaniacally, like nervous nannies, to the introductory topic?   

I guess we could remain faithful and discuss Aladdin's role in the original Arabian knights.

Here goes:
While Disney portrays Aladdin as Mughal Indian or Persian, in the Arabian Knights, he is Chinese, from Chang-An (an old Chinese capital)(though there is nothing Chinese about the narrative's names or settings and Disney can't really be faulted for moving the location!    )

The Arabic breakdown of "Aladdin" is "Allah ad-Din" and means something like "Allah is Noble" (or "Nobility of the Faith", according to Dickapedia).   

Pretty exciting stuff, eh!  Glad I stayed on topic, everybody??   

-Tim