Museum

Today we went to the museum! I haven't been to one in a very long time and I was really looking forward to this trip. The museum we went to had a variety of galleries - ancient objects from the Roman Empire, Africa and Asia, Victorian style objects and furniture, an early 90s gallery, various paintings and an exclusive collection of Napoleon Bonaparte's belongings.




Roman coffin








... what I make my boyfrind do =P.








That orange thing is a TV. Can you believe that?




The most compact vanity table (with chair!) I have ever seen.




An acrylic chair with fake roses embedded in it. Very tacky but sorta cute =).





I know this picture doesn't say much but the stairs were the most annoying stairs I have climbed in my life... ever! The steps were long and short - the opposite of what regular steps are. It may seem a breeze to walk up but as ridiculous as this may sound, it was a workout for both the body and the mind!



Napolen's clothes and accessories.




Face mold that was taken on Napoleon after his death.








...and here is one of my dogs, Napoleon =P. He loves to be in pictures.



They always want to play!

Bidz.com

One day I was browsing the net for some jewelery. I think it was a necklace I was looking for. I found this site Bidz.com and the concept of it seemed quite appealing. It is similar to eBay except you don't deal with individual sellers but rather with one company that sells jewelery, watches, sunglasses and other miscellaneous stuff. They post items and people bid for them. Some items run rather cheap, others start at quite high price tags.

Pros:
- variety of items
- new items introduced all the time
- easy to make an account
- easy to bid
- don't lose much if you decide not to buy an item you've won; at most you'll lose the account but you can always make a new one with a different e-mail address
- items are well described and pictured
- items are authentic; they come with a certificate
- good prices
- sometimes they have special offeres such as free shipping or $ off

Cons:
- shipping may take a while; for some items it took over a month to arrive however, my watch came within a couple of days
- sometimes you may pay customs; I don't know what this depends on because it's definitely not based on the value of the item (from what I've realized)
- quoted retail prices may not be accurate


I bought quite a few things from them. Some I've kept and some I've given to my mom. Here are the things I've kept:

The prices below are in US currency.

1. Tiny two tone gold butterfly pendant with genuine diamonds on a gold chain for $15; retail price: $140



2. KREMENTZ bracelet in 925 sterling silver for $58; retail price:$600 ( I found it for $84 on eBay)

3. Lucien Piccard Swiss watch with genuine diamonds, ceramic bracelet and mother of pearl dial for $96; retail price: $675 (I found it on other sites for $200)
I didn't keep its bracelet not because I didn't like it but because it has a limit to how many links you can take out and unfortunately, even with the maximum of links that came off, the watch was still too big on me. I bought a leather strap and now I'm super happy with it.

By the way, I know genuine diamonds sound nice but mine are not top quality. What makes a diamond expensive is the precision with which it is cut. The most expensive diamonds will reflect a lot of light; that's what makes them super brilliant and super expensive.

Have you bough anything from this site and if so, what was your experience like?

Making Pizza

I don't think there are many those who don't enjoy a fresh slice of pizza. I have been trying for ages to make the pizza crust of my dreams - that is a fluffy crust - but it never turned out quite right. A couple of days ago I have run over this bread recipe in one of my cooking books. I think it's a really good recipe and it is super easy to make. It takes a long time to make because... well... bread takes a long time to make. Luckily, you'll probably spend 10 minutes preparing the dough; the rest of the 2 hours involves leaving the dough to rise and baking it. Overall it's not too bad and it's definitely worth it. On top of it, I'm sure your family will be impressed.

Ingredients:
2 tsp instant yeast
1 tsp sugar
374 g white strong flour/bread flour
50 ml olive oil
extra flour to sprinkle
ice




1. Warm up 80 ml of water. (the water has to be warm not hot)
2. Mix yeast and sugar and add to the warm water.
3. Let the mixture stand for about 10 minutes until bubbles appear.

4. Put 250 g of the flour in a large bowl with two teaspoons salt and make a well in the center.
5. In the well add the yeast mixture, the oil and 230 ml of water.
6. Knead for 5 minutes; the mixture will be quite wet at this stage.
7. Lighly grease a bowl with oil (I just wet a napkin with a bit of oil and wipe it around the inside of the bowl) and put the dough in that bowl; cover the bowl with plastic foil

Tip: It's ideal to place the bowl in a warm place. What I do is turn on the over and leave it on for about 1 minute. After, I turn it off and place the bowl inside. Make sure it's not too hot in the oven; you don't want to bake the dough just yet.

8. After 30 minutes or more your dough will have doubled in size.

9. At this point take it out and knead in the remaining flour. Your dough will deflate back to its original size. Cover the bowl again and place it in the warm place for a second time.
10. The dough will rise again and finito; the process is done!

11. Now it's the fun part! Wipe a large baking tray with oil, sprinkle with flour and slap the dough on. Make sure you don't punch the dough down. You want to keep it as fluffy as possible. Preheat the oven at 415F or 210C. Add the pizza sauce, the toppings and voila! It's ready for the oven.

My pizza is a medium size but I should have spread out the dough a bit more. Keep in mind that the dough will rise a bit a baking. This recipe will make a large pizza.

12. Place the pizza in the middle of the oven. Underneath it place an oven safe bowl filled with ice. Bake for 20 minutes without opening the oven. After the 20 minutes remove the water bowl and bake the pizza for another 10 minutes.



That's it! Bon appetit!