Dudzinski & Frohoff: Dolphin Mysteries: Unlocking the Secrets of Communication

I was really looking forward to this book, but after reading it, I feel I really haven't learned much about dolphin cognition and communication. First, the book is extremely repetitive. For example, in the first two chapters, the authors says that dolphins are "egregious" animals, again and again and again. And then in the middle of the book they say how they touch with pectoral fins and how this can mean different things in different contexts, again and again and again. And in the last chapter they say how loud noises can adversely affect dolphins, again and again and again. The book could have been shortened by a factor of a few without any loss of information. Second, the style is really annoying: the book was obviously written by two people as it is a bit incoherent at times and they often say things like "I (Toni) observed this and that" and then Kathleen thinks this and that and then we are served a thick dose of emotional stuff about how they love dolphins and oceans. I bought this book to learn about dolphins and not about Toni and Kathleen, so passive voice with some information might be more helpful. Finally, when they come to the really interesting stuff, they don't go into any detail. For example, they explain the false belief task challenge and then they say that there is some reason to believe that dolphins have passed this task, without any elaboration whatsoever. Sure, I could go and find the source paper, but I bought the book precisely because I don't have time to do things like that...

Magic Hat: Feast of Fools Winter Variety Pack

This is a nice selection of beers from Magic Hat. For some reason I had a bad prejudice about Magic Hat, but already the very first beer from them that I drank, I liked. Well, at the moment, Magic Hat from Vermont is what Lagunitas from California used to mean for me, while I was still at the West Coast. Apart from the usual collection of the winter beers, Number 9 is still here and I still like it a lot. More importantly, they have a selection of beers that go under label "Odd Notion". These beers are experimental beers and they truly bring some new flavours to the established styles. Unfortunately, I've drunk all of them, so can't be more specific than that... Haha. :)

Brooklyn Brewery Variety Pack

Brookly lager was the first beer I wrote about here. This time I bought the Brooklyn Brewery Variety pack, which contains 4x Brooklyn Lager, 4x Brooklyn Pennant Ale '55, 2x Brooklyn East IPA, 2x Brooklyn Brown Ale. Well, what to say: I still really like Brookly Lager, the rest is so so, nothing to really write home about... Let's stick to Brooklyn Lager from this brewery, the only one really worth a mention.

André Gide: Ponarejevalci denarja

Ponarejevalci denarja so knjiga, ki sem jo žvečil celo večnost. Par mesecev, čeprav je relativno kratka. Zgolj, da ne bom čez tri mesece pozabil, da sem jo bral, so tukaj ključni podatki: izjemno kompleksna zgodba z malim miljonom karakterjev, umetniki, ki "ne mogu da gledaju ljude", vsi heteroseksualni odnosi so napisani pavšalno, res se dogaja zgolj homoseksualcem in te dogodivščine so napisane s takim žarom, da se človeku kar milo stori pri srcu. Naslov izhaja iz dvojnosti, original in kopija originala, tako na ravni umetnosti, kot na ravni medosebnih odnošajev.

Apollo Olive Oil: Mistral Olive Oil

I tend not to rave about things like oil, but this olive oil really deserves attention. We bough it in the local whole foods and when I saw Maya speaking to the dude I was immediately suspicious since in California people usually put more emphasis on bullshit and organic credentials of ingredients rather than the quality itself. But this guy was different, he was spelling out the various varieties of olives that went into different versions of their oil (I didn't recognise any) rather than go on about tradition, environment, etc. And indeed, these dudes use an advanced vacuum milling technology (allegedly only one of five in the world) and the results are worth talking about. For the first time I am looking forward to taste olive oil in salad rather than just assume it is going to provide some neutral background to the salad itself. Warmly recommended.

Fantôme de Noel

I've decided to splurge on beer this Thursday and spent $15 on Fantôme de Noel. Fantôme makes expensive beers in a small craft brewery in the French speaking area of Belgium. Well, I got home, opened the beer and it exploded, making a small fountain in my living room and kitchen that took 20 mins to clean up. Now, I was paying $15 for half a bottle of beer. Huh.
But it was good, real good. With wines, price never correlates with taste that much, at least not to my buds, but with beer you can never do wrong with buying an expensive one...

Deschutes: Red Chair IPA

I am simply too busy at the moment to write much about cool beers I am drinking. However, this one is really quite interesting. Inidian pale ale (IPA) is one of my favourite styles and American microbreweries created their own stream of IPAs characterised by excessive hoppines, bitternes and high alcohol content. This one keeps the hoppines and high alcohol content, but manages to remove bitterness. The result is quite intruiging and novel in addition to be a very drinkable, citrusy beer. Well done, Deschutes!