With the honor of being chosen the best man, comes the duty of giving a good wedding day toast. This is no easy task. Standing before your closest friends and family members to give a toast can be daunting, intimidating and down right nerve-wracking. Here are a few tips that you can use the next time you are called on to give your next toast.

1. Don’t Drink Beforehand. This might be difficult for a few of you, especially at festive occasions like a wedding party. However, the toast is your nod of appreciation for being selected the best man. The least you can do is be as coherent as humanely possible. This means lay off the booze. Syllables will flow and you’ll be able to articulate your words better than you would under the influence.

2. Prepare, Practice and Rehearse. This means have your toast written out. Practice saying the toast for at least a few days prior to the wedding. Once you think you’ve got it down, practice it in front of another person. Rehearse, rehearse, rehearse. Have a copy of your toast on hand with you on the wedding day … just in case.

3. Emphasize Key Parts. Emphasize as in be sure to slow down or speed up your toast accordingly. Make eye contact with the groom, bride and audience accordingly. If you’re going to tell a funny story about the groom, be sure to give the audience time to digest it and then laugh a little. Embarrassing moments are best left avoided. If you’re going to tell a heartfelt story, then you might want to slow down the speed of your speech a bit. Know the key parts of your toast and emphasize those parts.

4. Individualize The Audience. People usually are afraid when they have to speak in front of a large crowd. To minimize this anxiety, pick out a single person and devote 10 seconds of eye contact time during your speech to that one person and then move on to another person. Keep rotating. Individualize your audience. You’ll forget you’re speaking in front of a large crowd.

5. Keep It Brief and Concise. No one likes to sit through a long winded speech. Keep your toast brief and concise. A best man/maid of honor speech should take you no longer than 3-4 minutes max. If you’re not the best man/maid of honor then keep your toast at a minute max.

Hopefully, you’ll be able to use these tips the next time you’re asked to give a toast. Remember, it’s an honor to give a toast. A good toast will always leave a positive and lasting impression on those that you are toasting.

What tips do you have when it comes to giving a toast? Any memorable experiences?

The Water Bobble is one beautiful piece of water bottle engineering. Each “bobble” comes with its own patented carbon filter which has a slight electro-positive charge, which allows it to attract chemical and impurities in the water. It is suggested that the filters be changed every 2 months or every 40 gallons.

Each bobble holds 18.5 oz. of water, is BPA free, and made in the USA out of recycled materials.

By the Water Bobble from the Water Bobble Online Store for $9.99.

Now here’s a neat idea for your next custom mug! These silhouette mugs come to you courtesy of Etsy’s houseware designer, BrooklynRehab, and vector artist Miss Crowland. For a pricetag of $65 you get:

• 2 digital portraits (emailed to you), which you can choose to print in whatever way you see fit
  2 mugs (1 of each portrait)

All you need to do is send in a full sided portrait and Miss Crowland will do the rest. The digital image will be ready within 10 days and the mug no more than 7 days after that.

Buy the Custom Silhouette Mugs from BrooklynRehab for $65.

To the chagrin of the traditional coffee house, Starbucks has become a mainstay in cities across America and the world. As we know, coffee can have many health benefits including benefits to cardiovascular health. Starbucks, however, serves up some of the most unhealthy and calorie filled “coffee” drinks on the market. Here we take a look at 10 of the worst drinks that you can order up at your local Starbucks. If maximizing your total calories and fat intake is on your list of priorities then this is the definitive beverage list for you.

*Note that the chart reflects the venti with whole milk and whipped cream options. Please see below for 2% and nonfat milk options.

[View with PicLens]

1. Peppermint White Hot Chocolate with whole milk and whipped cream. Damage: 730 (690 with 2% milk) calories venti, 27 (22 with 2% milk) grams total fat in venti.

2. Iced Peppermint White Chocolate Mocha with whole milk and whipped cream. Damage: 700 (680 with 2% milk) calories venti, 26 (23 with 2% milk) grams total fat.

3. Mint Chocolaty Chip Frappuccino Blended Creme with chocolate whipped cream. Damage: 680 calories, 21 grams total fat (same calorie and total fat count for the venti whole milk, 2% milk and nonfat options according to Starbucks.com).

4. Peppermint Mocha Frappuccino Blended Coffee  with whipped cream. Damage: 660 calories, 19 grams total fat (same calorie and total fat count for the venti whole milk, 2% milk and nonfat options according to Starbucks.com).

5. Tazo Green Tea Frappuccino Blended Crème with whipped cream. Damage: 650 calories, 15 grams total fat (same calorie and total fat count for the venti whole milk, 2% milk and nonfat options according to Starbucks.com).

6. Eggnog Latte. Damage: 630 calories (610 with 2% milk), 30  (27 with 2% milk) grams total fat.

7. Iced White Chocolate Mocha with whole milk and whipped cream. Damage: 630 (610 with 2% milk) calories, 27 (24 with 2% milk) grams total fat.

8. Java Chip Frappuccino Blended Coffee with whipped cream. Damage: 600 calories, 23 grams total fat (same calorie and total fat count for the venti whole milk and 2% milk options according to Starbucks.com).

9. Caramel Brulee Crème with whole milk and whipped cream. Damage: 600 (560 with 2% milk) calories, 22 (16 with 2% milk) grams total fat.

10. Espresso Truffle with whole milk and whipped cream. Damage: 560 calories, 21 grams total fat (whole and 2% milk options not available).

Some things to note: all of the items here are the venti counterparts. You can definitely knock down a few calories if you:

• Drop the size of your drink to a grande or a small.
• Choose 2% or nonfat milk over the very fattening whole milk option.
• If you want to drastically reduce the total fat count then pass on the whipped cream option.
• Just say no to anything Peppermint from Starbucks.
• Stay away from their Frappucinno menu but I quickly found out that simple drinks like hot chocolate can be just as dangerous.
• If you just have to have a Frappucinno then get one of their light blended options.

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Photos provided by Flickr users: danielparece, AK37, PowerBookTrance, iiraa, KenobiWanX, Katherine Ridgely, and raspberryteacup.

Check out this excellent video from the guys at The Department of the 4th Dimension, a design and production studio. They examine what goes into making a cup of espresso by interviewing Kyle Glanville, a barista at Intelligentsia Coffee in Venice, California.

Some take home points:

• Every variable in espresso making is very critical.
• Any misstep will manifest itself in the cup.
• Feel the grind and then adjust accordingly.
• Preheat cup with hot water while you prepare the espresso.
• Make sure your filter basket is nice and dry so that the oil released from the coffee can do its job.
• Redistribute coffee in basket so that the water can extract the coffee evenly.
• Proper espresso extraction will take about 20-30 seconds.
• Adjust grind depending on the look and taste of your espresso.
• If your espresso shot looks pale, tastes a little thin then you might have to adjust grind a little finer.
• If your espresso shot looks black, too short and tastes super bitter and compact then adjust grind a little coarser.

Espresso, Intelligentsia from Department of the 4th Dimension on Vimeo.

Here’s an interesting collection of influential and controversial figures throughout history on milk bottles. The bottles were designed by a graphic designer based out of Montevideo, Uruguay who goes under the pseudonym Luliexperiment. You can check out more of his artwork at his blog. In this instance, milk is the canvas for the artwork.

This unique jug thermos from designer Jörg Boner falls under the I Want That category.

“Thermos is a coffee pot for people on the move. It carries two cups and is no bigger than fits comfortably into a bag. The elastic band that fixes the cups into place can be transformed into a handle in just one move, turning the thermos bottle into a coffee pot. The way in which it plays with both archetypes is characteristic of the product.”

It’s not unusual for a thermos to incorporate a cup into the cover but this one comes with two, making it the perfect companion to a rooftop coffee session with your significant other.

The product was designed for Nescafé. No word yet on availability or price.

YouTube star, MysterGuitarMan, takes music to the next level with his rendition of the overture of “Die Zauberflöte” by Mozart. Now I’m thirsty for some root beer!

These lovely bottles were spotted by the Notcot staff while shopping at Mitsuwa Marketplace. The bottles were so uniquely shaped and colored that I just had to share them here with you. They’ve indeed got sex appeal. Mitsuwa Marketplace, by the way, is a great place to shop for Japanese goods in the good ol’ United States. It probably is the next best thing to actually flying to Japan to do your grocery shopping. You can find a Mitsuwa Marketplace in California, Chicago and New Jersey. And if you decide to stop by at one of their location, maybe you can seek out one of these sake bottles and let me know what it tastes like!

Via Notcot.

Beer is typically packaged in one of three different bottle colors: brown, green and clear. Now, selection of the bottle colors usually boils down to a marketing decision – what looks good with the corresponding label and logo. From a beer protection standpoint, brown bottles offer the most bang for the buck.

The brown tint of the glass protects (but not completely) the beer from wave-lengths of blue light that cause beer to become skunked. Green and clear bottle offer virtually no protection from damaging light and therefore make the beer much more susceptible to becoming skunked.

Beer bottles that use completely opaque bottles and therefore keeping light away from the beer offer the best protection. Think of opaque bottles as the ultimate Trojan equivalent for beers.

In short, light exposure is bad, bad, bad when it comes to beer. Even beers that are sitting in the grocery store under flourescent light is susceptible to damage, especially those in lighter colored bottles.

A Few Commercial Beers and the Color of their Bottles:

Brown Bottles: Bass, Brooklyn Lager, Dos Equis, Negro Modelo, Pacifico, Quilmes, and Red Stripe.

Green Bottles: Becks, Heineken, and Molson.

Clear Bottles: Corona, Sol, Tesoro

What does skunky beer taste/smell like?

Here’s an experiment that you can do: Take two fresh non-skunked bottles of a hoppy beer such as Sierra Nevada Pale Ale and pour one bottle into a drinking glass and keep the other bottle away from direct sunlight. Let the one in the glass sit in the sun for 5-10 minutes an then smell and taste both the glass of beer that was exposed to sunlight and the beer that was not exposed. You should get an idea of what skunked beer tastes like from the sun exposed glass of beer.

So How Does A Beer Become Skunked?

Ultraviolet light is the uber enemy when it comes to beer. Hop-derived molecules known as isohumulones (they contribute to the bitter taste of beer) are torn from each other when exposed to UV light causing them to bind to sulfur atoms and in effect producing the skunked aroma.

Why is it called “skunk”, “skunky”, “skunked”?

It’s because the odor is reminiscent of the smell that skunks release when they are in defensive mode. In other words, skunked beer is unappealing to the taste buds.