What whale tastes like.

th8 What whale tastes like. Just spent a couple of days in Fairbanks with my friend Linda B. Today I came home to freshly waxed floors, freshly baked bread and freshly boiled whale. I am not making that up. Yes, DF really did wax the floors.

And yes, he really did boil a piece of Balaena mysticetus.


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th 150x150 Another TSA friendly toiletries bag up for grabs.Had enough of winter? Maybe it’s time to go somewhere — and this week’s giveaway is a great travel companion.

The prize is another bag of travel-sized toiletries because (a) spring break is almost here and (b) it’s always a popular giveaway. Maybe that’s because you, like me, resent the hell out of paying $1.44 an ounce for toothpaste.

“Sized right for flight,” my left hind foot: It’s another way to gouge the consumer because manufacturers know how many of us want to go carry-on only.

What’s in the bag? So glad you asked.


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th3 Busting cheap airfare myths.Planning to hit the beaches on spring break or take your kids to a theme park during school vacation? Better buy those tickets soon. A new study from CheapAir.com indicates that the lowest prices can be found about seven weeks out.

The study also addresses questions like “When’s the best time to buy a ticket for Thanksgiving?” and “Is Tuesday night really the best time of the week to buy a ticket?”

The answer to the second question, by the way, is “no.”


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th Some things are worth the cost.Apparently I was out of my mind when I booked my recent trip to the East Coast. My return schedule last Friday was Philly-Chicago and then Chicago-Anchorage. The option of flying directly to Anchorage vs. a stopover in Seattle or Salt Lake City felt like a grand piece of luck.

And it would have been, if the flight had left on the same day. However, it left at 9:30 a.m. on Saturday.

I wanted to do a series of forehead-plants into the drywall. Instead I sighed, shrugged and started looking for a semi-affordable hotel near O’Hare.

The old me would have done those forehead-plants.


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th1 The Molly Pitcher workout.When I was in elementary school we heard the story of a brave Revolutionary War-era woman who carried water to the troops during the Battle of Monmouth. “Molly, Molly, bring us your pitcher,” the men would call on that hot July day. That’s how she became known as “Molly Pitcher,” we were told.

Mary Ludwig Hays McCauley did follow her husband, a barber who enlisted in the Revolutionary Army, and apparently helped him load cannons. But “Molly Pitcher” seems to have been just a generic nickname for women who carried water to the colonial troops.

The truth is so limiting. I like the legend better, especially after what happened to me yesterday.


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