Posts by Peter Ashby
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@ Eddie Clark
Keep your eyes peeled for the unpeated Caol Isla and Ardbegs then. I have the Caol Isla and my tasting notes simply say 'Honeyed green melon', it is delicious. As a peat/smoke/seaweed freak who tends to drink them as digestives I used to use Scapa as a winter apperitif whisky, but it is boring compared to the unpeated Caol. Seek it out, it's cask strength and worth every penny. -
@ Russell re Talisker
16 yo that I got duty-free in Singapore last year, which is smooth but shows the way some of these whiskies can lose their zest with age.
Hmm I have the distillery bottling of the 18yo Talisker and I don't recognise that comment. Sure the fire in the tail has been banked a bit, but it's still there. However the rest of the taste is if anything more interesting with more depth at the start (not just quick SWEET, but gradations and different flavours) but also in the peat and smoke of the middle. The Hart bros must have got a seriously inferior cask.
The big powerful whiskies like Talisker, Lagavulin, the other Islays can stand up to both wood and what the wood contained. I have two sherried Taliskers that you wouldn't know were anywhere near a sherry butt, they are just different. However I have tasted some sherried Speysiders and lighter Highlanders that just taste of sherry, no thanks. I'd rather just drink the sherry.
There is also no hint of the wood in an 18yo Talisker, you can't say the same for a similar age Glenfiddich.
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@Mark you have to be willing to go online for good whisky if you live in Dunedin. Is Meenan's still there? they used to be willing to order bottles for you.
@ Islander As for Lagavulin, yes, yes, yes. It is my 2nd favourite after the inimitable Talisker but the price is a problem. When your standard offering is a 16yo you need good stock control and a working clairvoyant on staff, unfortunately they got it wrong and 4 or so years ago stocks of the 16yo pretty much disappeared everywhere but here in Scotland, where the price went stratospheric. I am getting by on the 12yo cask strength they rushed out to fill the void. It's nice but lacks the punch of the 16yo.
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Cultivating connoisseurship beyond what you already like is making a rod for your own back.
Wise words. As a connoisseur of fine single malt whisky the only Speysiders I have are for culinary purposes. It is isn't that I don't like them, just that they don't do anything for me. Also I am not a price/age snob. One of my all time favourites is Bowmore Legend, no age statement, cheap, but seriously smoky.
I know people who refuse to drink anything other than silly money old Speysiders which taste of nothing more than the wood they have lain too long in. Know what you like, revel in it and hang what the next guy thinks. For the record I'll drink anything else especially if it's peaty, briny, seaweedy and of course smoky. Unless its a Bruichladdich or a Laphroaig (though I haven't tasted 'new' Laddie yet, so am reserving judgement).
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The comparison with road death reporting is interesting. Here in the UK we just get obsessive reporting of young, usually black, urbanites knifing each other and there is a panic over it (despite stabbing deaths overall falling, us Scots being nicer). Howver road death reporting over here is largely left to local, often free, newspapers. The national media only report road deaths if there is a large amount of carnage or people involved (tourist bus for eg) or emotional (all but one of a family, couple on honeymoon etc).
However a glance at the first Google hit:
http://www.driveandstayalive.com/info%20section/statistics/stats-multicountry-percapita-2004.htmShows that the roads here are safer than in NZ. Which on the surface would suggest that the constant and national reporting of EVERY road death in NZ does not make people drive more safely. Perhaps what is happening is an example of familiarity breeding contempt and it is only particularly bad holiday weekend tolls that people pay attention to.
Or that road conditions are very different. Your average Brit never drives over 50km/h except on multilaned highways. Roads between places are at least dual carriageway and often motorway. You see it up here in Scotland where you get stuck behind someone crawling along what often passes for SH1 in the more geographically interesting parts of the country. And the appalling overtaking behaviour.
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Wouldn't it be cool if we could get an old passenger liner, The QE2, or sum such Icon into space. It could orbit the moon, as an amateur astronomers attraction.
Traditionally it is a teapot in orbit around Mars...
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The war *in * Lebanon in 2006 was not between the democracies of Israel and Lebanon, it was between Israel and Hizbullah, which is not a democracy. The state of Lebanon was not involved, even though it's nominal territory was invaded. The Lebanese National Army, the armed forces of the democratic state of Lebanon sat it out.
So as others have said the war of 1812 between Britain and the US would seem to count as would Britain's involvement in the wars with Revolutionary France prior to Bonaparte crowning himself Emperor.
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The chilling thing is the possibility that the author, as a 21st century Republican, has, through the Bush White House, the US prosecutors scandal and any number of appointments and contracts in the Iraq project, simply become acclimatised to the idea of a culture of governance that values political loyalty over competence and integrity.
There does seem to have been a deliberate move by the Republicans, especially the fundies to replace a politics where the idea was to win an argument based on who has the better arguments to one where 'you arguing with me? you fired!' is the order of the day.
Remember the dictum that fascism will come to America carrying the cross and wrapped in the flag? Does Palin look like any sort of democratically inclined person to you?
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Yes, there is a Wizards DVD (Region 1, NTSC) NOW, but there wasn't when I got my torrent. And yes, I had signed the petition. I am undecided whether to purchase it, I note there are quite a few for sale second hand on amazon.co.uk...
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I used to love Wizards, especially the monks, and the ending. I found a torrent of it a while ago (there is no DVD), and was, well disappointed. A work of its time perhaps and things have moved on and it has stayed static.
I can see how it would freak out a youngster though, I was at least 16 when I first saw it.