Bah Humbug on Twinings Earl Grey! 40% of the Flavor?

We love tea.  Earl Grey has always been a favorite, so one year I was thrilled to see a whole big tin of it at Costco.  Bad idea.  By the second year, there was no flavor left in the tea.  Lesson learned.
But I was willing to buy a box of 50 tea bags.  These were oddly weak from the get-go, barely enough to brew one cup, let alone a pot.
Perhaps you will see the problem more quickly than I did.  But eventually I did notice that these were marked as weak tea bags.  Not my imagination.  The very clever part, unless you like pissing off your loyal customers, is that the tea bags aren't 60% smaller, they are full size tea bags with 40% of the flavor.

Full Length Mirror Search Ends at Etsy

When buying an item, I always like it to be the greenest it can be, but I couldn't figure out how to apply that to mirrors.  Really, all we wanted was a plain old vanilla full-length mirror, slightly nicer than the inexpensive ones at Home Depot.  Searching online, it became clear this was no simple quest. It turned into visiting dozens of mirror vendors, gaudy and gaudier, as well as pricey and pricier.

Eventually I found a site that would fabricate a mirror to our specs.  Not cheap, but at least we'd get the damn mirror up on the wall, after a year in our new house.  Then the light bulb went off - it we were doing a mirror from scratch, why not check Etsy and see if we could hire a craftsperson rather than a factory to create the piece?

Score!!

A quick Etsy search turned up Inspired by Nature, a couple in Tennessee who works with reclaimed wood, designing and creating all kinds of cool things.  It was great fun to design the mirror with them, emailing back and forth, until the order was placed.  About two weeks later, just as promised, a monster sized box arrived with our beautiful new full-length mirror made of reclaimed barn wood painted white.  For the same price as buying from a factory!  No kidding.  Kent was a delight to work with, and how great is it to help people support themselves by doing beautiful work reclaiming old wood, and getting a piece yourself?

Moral of the story.  Check out Etsy when you need something made to order.  It may be cheaper, since you're paying the craftspeople directly, than going through a store or site.  Such are the wonders of the internet - from a wood-shop in Tennessee to my bedroom in Philly.

(Tree not included.)

Support Shining Hope for Community!

Here's a shameless plug for a terrific upstart school in Kibera, the slums of Nairobi.  I'm on the board and blown away by what a bunch of young 20-somethings are helping to make happen, for little girls whose prospects were so bleak.  Invest a minute to watch this very happy video.