The local TV news had a short video about an Indian company called Nadir Ali and Co. (NAC). The company is currently run by Managing Director Aftab Ahmad, who is over 70. It is based in Meerut, Utar Pradesh, where it has been operating since 1885.

The company makes musical equipment including horns, trumpets, and drums for many armies around the world as well as famous jazz performers.

According to the Daily Mail, one in three Britons dreams of emigrating to ease financial worries.

They quote a YouGov poll citing cost of housing and tax burden on the middle class. People between 25 and 34 are the most likely to leave.

If that is the case for Britian, I wonder what the ratio in Egypt would be?

I saw this a while back, and thought that it raises a good point: the cost of experience! 

A furnace repairman coming to a home and after looking at the furnace for about a minute and a half, listening to the rumbles and gurgles. He takes his hammer out and at once precise place he hits the furnace. The furnace starts up and runs fine as if it was brand new.

The bill was $200.

The homeowner asks why so much when all he did was hit it once with a hammer?

The repairman takes back the bill, and itemizes the bill still totaling $200.

When studying history, we often look for literature, archeology, events, and the like. Seldom do we consider food and recipes to be a topic of history.

However, there are several sites that have recipes from olden days. Some of them have a nice collection of recipes from Islamic countries, most notably Iraq and Andalusia.

These recipes go back all the way to the 10th century, when Baghdad was the seat of the Islamic Caliphate, in the Golden Age of Islam in the East. The Andalusian recipes go further into the 15th century, just before the fall of Granada.

An article in yesterday's newspaper interested me enough to open an old topic that I planned to write about.

It is about Massimo Francesco Marcone, an assistant professor at the University of Guelph. He traveled the world in search of some bizarre delicacies.