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This smelled amazing brewing so I was a bit sad when it was incredibly tart. Very, very tart. Tart raspberry but tart is the operative word. It’s not bad. It’s just a lot. Goes nice enough with my avocado toast though.

Western has a January intensive period. You may recall me complaining about it last year. I hate it. However, as a second year, I got to pick what course I took for the intensive period at least. I went with Gender and the Law of Work because (a) as a woman who is well aware of pay discrepancy and other gendered issues in the workplace, I thought it would be interesting and informative and (b) I have heard great things about the prof. The downside of the course was the grading: 20% participation, 30% presentation and 50% paper. As someone with social anxiety, participation and presentations scare the crap out of me. I also believe that my more than $20k of tuition money is participation enough. That’s just me.

With that said, the prof mistakenly believed yesterday was the first day of class and sent an email stating that she would just be doing a course overview and anyone who did not intend on dropping did not need to attend. My friend attended yesterday and informed me that the entire class was all of 15 minutes and the prof elaborated that the presentations were to be super informal and that participation simply required attending half of our peers’ presentations. No need to talk or contribute but just be present for the presentations…and not even all of them. So that’s a load off and means that I likely won’t have to present to the whole class which takes pressure off for that as well. Now to just strategically plan when to present so it is likely fewer people will show – at the start will people be too busy to show up or will they want to see an example? At the end, will people have already put in their time and decide to take a longer break? Got to figure that out. Thankfully, when the prof realized that today is actually supposed to be the first day of classes, she decided to just do the overview again which means I am getting yet another day before having to return to classes and that is awesome.

Yesterday I had my groceries delivered. When I got hungry this morning, I made a bagel with cream cheese and when I was still a bit hungry, I decided to make a smoothie. Last time I made a smoothie with this matcha, I just put in a tablespoon and it was not nearly enough. This time I just sorta dumped a bunch of it in and hoped for the best. It is perhaps a bit chalky, which often comes with too much matcha powder but its got a whole lot of honey flavor. So overall, I am quite happy – watching Shameless on my couch while sipping my matcha smoothie on my last day of freedom before class.

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Still not my favorite. It’s not bad. It’s just not really that flavorful or distinct. It’s semi-fruity but nothing that is clearly peach or blueberry. It really is just ok and now that it’s gone, I likely won’t really remember it much.

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It’s January in London and there is a lot of snow on the ground but it is above freezing outside and sunny and apparently I am channeling Summer since I have been thinking of iced tea and tea pops and am currently cooking mango salsa chicken in the Instant Pot.

This tea definitely says Summer, especially with its cute flamingo sprinkles. My preference would have been to make a teapop but I only had a single serving pouch and thought it would be too diluted so instead I went with a plain iced tea.

This is quite nice. No artificial or waxy note that DAVIDsTEA’s fruitier teas sometimes get. It is strawberry and some passion fruit/tropical. It is nothing earth shattering but it is making for a nice and refreshing iced tea which is what I wanted. Personally, I would probably pick up more of this in the future. Is it even on the tea wall still?

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I helped myself to a bit of this and am passing the rest on to Sil. For me, I am having a super weird experience because this tastes like a sweet honeybush. I am getting nothing from it’s namesake and it’s not even a honeybush tea. No maple and definitely no cookie. Maybe nut. Plus, I ended up with a couple of cardamom pods in my filter and yet I don’t even get cardamom.

I followed the package directions of 1 tsp/8 oz and steeping for 5 mins at boiling and I am not getting what I think I’m supposed to. Hopefully Sil has more luck.

Oh no. Very no. Hibiscus overload. Maybe 10 minutes was way too much and maybe I knew that in my heart. Regardless, it’s cinnamon and hibiscus fruity and I picked it because it’s best before date was the last day in November. With that said, I don’t think that factored into the hibiscus overload that made the cup not that enjoyable. Thanks for sharing Roswell Strange but this was not for me.

Roswell Strange gave me a bunch of this to pass on to Sil so I may have snagged a delivery fee of one cup. Thanks to you both!

It’s a little more apple-y than I remember it being but still very lime centric and creamy. It is a nice tea and I’m sad it was on DAVIDsTEA retired. With that said, I don’t think it quite stands at a 95 for me anymore so I’m dropping the rating a bit.

Sipdown (343)

This tastes like strawberry. Strawberry and maybe some meringue if I use my imagination but if I didn’t have the name to guide me to that, it likely wouldn’t be the first thing that comes to mind. It’s strawberry + but not Eton Mess.

Used this for my daily eggnog latte. It’s a nice latte and the ginger flavour is prominent which gives this a lot of depth. It’s also maple-y tbh which brings out pancake even in latte form. It’s a good tea, it really is and works well for a latte but I still find myself not loving it due to my feelings about pancake teas.