Musical Friday -- The Imperial March

It's pretty dark and raining outside, and I just got a paycheck deposited in my checking account that's half it's usual amount because of the unpaid time off we had to take. So I'm choosing a Musical Friday theme to suit. One of my favorite all-time classical-music / movie-music style songs, The Imperial March (Darth vader's theme) from Star Wars, by John Williams:

Thoughts from the Masters last week

Man, I was really disappointed at how the Masters turned out this year. Tiger never really could get it going in any of the first 3 rounds.

See highlights below. At the beginning of the final round on Sunday, it seemed like it might be one of the greatest final rounds in history. Phil Mickelson shot a 6-under 30 on the front nine and came back from -4, 7 shots back, to within one of the lead. His front nine included a wonderful shot on #7 where he had to hook his approach and almost holed out for eagle (about 4:20 on the video).



But it came apart for Phil when he splashed his tee shot on #12. After Tiger and Phil were out of it, I was then rooting for Keny Perry to win and become the oldest major champion ever. But, holding a two shot lead after his birdie on 16, he bogeyed 17 and 18 to fall into the playoff with Cabrera and Campbell. So Cabrera ended up surviving, sucking less than the others to win. He was probably the one guy I was least rooting for to win. Wasn't as bad as Phil and Monty's collapse at the '06 US Open, but a similar let-down.

Musical (Good) Friday

A really awesome web site (link here) I found with mashups of Youtube clips into a complete song. Below is a song called "The Mother of All Funk Chords"!

Champagne Cosmopolitan, Proud Mary

I've made a couple of new drinks lately that are pretty good. The first is simply my standard bloody mary recipe (see recipe in previous post for 20th Hole Bloody Mary), but simply reducing the amount of Red Eye bloody mary mix to just a couple of ounces, essentially making a smaller but stronger drink (ratio of vodka to mix is higher). I call it the "Proud Mary". A couple of those will certainly get you "rollin' on a river"!

The second drink is a new one that I really like, and plan to make for the next party I host. It's simply a mixture of a standard cosmopolitan and Champagne or sparkling wine. I thought about calling it a "Cham Wow", but I think that violates a copyright of something else! 8^) I think I'll stick with a Champagne Cosmo.

Note that real Champagne is from the Champagne region of France. While there are a few brands of real Champagne you can sometimes find for < $20, most real Champagne is > $40 a bottle and probably a little too nice to use for a mixed drink. So you can certainly use a good-tasting California sparkling wine or Italian Prosecco for this.

20th Hole Champagne Cosmopolitan (makes 2 drinks)
-- 4 oz vodka [I like Stolichnaya Citro (citrus-flavored vodka) for this, but any other good-quality unflavored vodka will also work well]
-- 2 oz Cointreau or Paula's Texas Orange
-- juice of 1 large lime, freeshly squeezed
-- Champagne, sparkling wine, or Italian Prosecco
-- 1-2 oz cranberry (or cran-raspberry) juice cocktail
-- 1-2 tbsp simple syrup, to taste
-- shaker filled with crushed ice
-- 2 large chilled martini glasses or champagne flutes

Add vodka, orange liqueur, lime juice, syrup, cranberry juice, and ice to shaker. Shake thoroughly to mix and chill. Strain into martini glasses or flutes, filling glass about halfway. Pour into glass the Champagne / sparkling wine to fill glass (you want about 1:1 ratio of cosmo to sparkling wine). Garnish with orange or lemon peel if desired.

Better check your Ozarka bottle before you leave for the day

Sigh. With the hard, poor-tasting water we have in Kyle, we use an Ozarka water delivery service where you flip over those 5-gallon bottles onto the dispenser. I put on a new bottle last Sunday morning, then we all left for the day. When we got back home after lunch at about 2 or 3pm, the bottle had emptied all over the floor. While it initially appeared that the water remained only in the kitchen area with the hard tile floor, we later noticed the laminate flooring in the living room starting to swell and bubble up in a few areas near the transition.

We ended up having to rip out a pretty large area of the flooring. The pad underneath was soaking wet over a pretty big area. Fortunately, Ozarka has a subcon insurance they keep for situations like this. So I don't think I'll end up with any out-of-pocket expense. I've got an appointment next week with a flooring installer to get a quote on the repair. Home Depot is checking to see if they still make this color of Pergo -- if they don't, the whole living room flooring will have to be replaced. See photos below. In first photo, note position of Ozarka bottle in upper left.

I guess Tiger's knee is feeling OK

In a post a couple of months ago (link here), I included an imbedded clip (second clip) showing Tiger Woods making a long birdie on the last hole of the Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill to win over Bart Bryant by a single shot. It was a dramatic shot, complete with full on Tiger hat-slamming celebration mode.

Well, last night Tiger showed he has fully returned and is ready to once again pwn the rest of the golf world. At Bay Hill to defend his title, he started the final round trailing Shawn O'Hair by 5 shots. He did not finish that way.

Tied with O'Hair at -4 coming the the last hole, in fading light due to an earlier rain delay, he needed to make a 15-16 ft putt to avoid having to come back the next day for a playoff. See below for the results. Click on the little "HD" in lower right to see it in HD.

Paula's Texas Orange

After quite a bit of searching (most of it quite tasty), I feel I have finally found a worthy "economic recession" replacement for my favorite orange liqueur, Cointreau. Cointreau is outstanding in my favorite mixed drinks like margaritas and comsopolitans, but tends to run $37-$40 for a 750ml bottle. And it never seems to be on special in my local store, Twin Liquors.

With the cutback actions taken at my company (mentioned in a previous post here), I needed to save some money, so I began trying cheaper substitutes. I tried Patron Citronge, Gran Gala, and Bauchant to only marginally acceptable results (the Citronge isn't that bad). But when I tried Paula's Texas Orange, my search was over.

Paula's is made in Austin, TX, and is unfortunately only available in Texas right now. As good as it is, though, I hope they'll expand and make it available to the rest of the country. It has a very fresh, light orange flavor that does not taste artificial at all. It makes great margaritas and cosmos. Heck, you can even make an All-Austin Cosmopolitan by using Paula's and your choice of three different Austin-made vodkas: Tito's, Dripping Springs, or Savvy.

While I still think Cointreau is the best, Paula's Texas Orange allows me to make margaritas and Cosmos that taste almost as good as those made with Cointreau, but for much lower cost. That's certainly something to be appreciated these days. Cheers!

Additional side note: "What about Grand Marnier?", you may ask. While I agree that Grand Marnier may be one of the best orange liqueurs out there, I prefer G-M for straight sipping in a cognac / brandy snifter. I think it's a bit heavy and overpowering for my margaritas and other mixed drinks. But this is simply my personal preference. Arguing about whether Cointreau or G-M is a better orange liqueur is like debating whether an Aston-Martin DBS or a Porsche 911 Turbo is a better car.