Confessions of a Chilihead

Melody Reading Price list

2012-02-23T11:38:00.005-05:00

About Tarot

Life is a cycle. Within each person's life are a series of cycles, each one with a beginning, a middle and an end. Many cycles overlap during a person's lifetime, others begin when others end. It can be said that the Tarot represents these cycles. Tarot allows us to truly examine these cycles, making life and love easier.

Advantages of hiring a Tarot practitioner:
* Personal exploration and growth.
* Awaken yourself to the choices available to you.
* Find a focus for your problem solving.
* Help you clarify goals.
* Help you understand the past, present and future.
* Help you make decisions about the future
* Fortune telling, in its most basic form

What Tarot can do for you and your business:
* Provide dialogue and personal insight.
* Annual business planning.
* Mission and Vision Statements with real meaning.

Tarot History

Many believe that Tarot began in Italy in the early 14th century although the basis for modern-day tarot was created in the 19th century by a Catholic Priest named Eliphas Levi. A learned scholar, Levi was schooled not only in Catholicism, but Judaism, Hinduism, Cabalism and Masonic religions. He also studied astronomy, astrology and metaphysics. When he created his first deck, he incorporated his knowledge (and understanding) of these religions, the elements of nature (fire, water, earth and air) as well as astrological symbols. Some cards even refer to Biblical scripture. By the late 19th century, the cards were being used to predict the future.

There is nothing more mystical and magic to Tarot than there is magic and mystery to the Universe. Tarot unlocks these mysteries, when you know how to read the cards.

About Melody

Melody is the name that I have chosen to give to my Source Spirit. I believe that within each of us resides an energy, a guidance system, if you will, that uses emotion to show us the best way to meander through this existence we call human life. That existence is at its very core, if you think about it, designed for one sole purpose... the experience. It is the very journey between birth and death that is of import and in order to navigate that path we have built in energy systems. It's rather tricky to explain given the fact that no two people can ever possible 100% agree on all of the icons that must be used to describe what I'm talking about, but know that deep inside you, you can FEEL that energy. It is what makes you feel good when you win something. It is what drives you when you're on the path of something you truly desire and it is the wondrous emotion of love and power that you feel when you exchange spiritual connections with someone or something else.

That energy, which I call my Source Spirit, speaks to me, and the "voice" I hear, I have named Melody.

Interestingly, it is through the tarot cards that Melody speaks and as such, my readings are, as my husband likes to call them, eerily accurate.

I do not pull punches, I do not play games. I am not one of those readers who is all hung up on the "ethics" of tarot that they cannot tell you what they actually SEE in the cards. I believe that IF I can see it, it is because it is meant to be told. I won't sugar coat what I see, although, I always strive to deliver what I see with love.

Some people call it channeling, I simply call it being completely in touch with the higher self within me that is able to connect to the higher self within you. Melody is not a separate entity that exists outside of me, consider she is more like an imaginary friend, or more appropriately, my burning bush ala Moses of the Bible fame.

Prices:

Personal Consultations: $100.

Corporate consultations:
$250 plus $75 per additional employee Includes a Mission Statement reading (3-6 cards), an Annual Business plan reading (24 cards) and two key employee readings: Double Horseshoe reading (14 cards each).

Gift consultations:
Birthday Readings:
Double Horseshoe (14 cards) or Celtic cross reading (10 cards) $100
Wedding Gift: $150 includes one Relationship reading (8 cards) and one Double Horseshoe reading (14 cards) for each of the bride and groom.

Tarot Parties $450. Includes a Double Horseshoe reading (14 cards) for the host/hostess and one Simple Horseshoe or Life Strategy reading (7 cards) for each of a maximum of 8 guests. (Time frame: 5 hours).

Readings are done in person, on the phone, skype, internet messenger or by email; by appointment only.

Referrals are welcome.

If you are interested in learning how to read tarot cards or how to improve your relationship with yourself and your own Source Spirit, request an invitation to join the Facebook group: http://www.facebook.com/groups/222715774453593/

A healing meditation for Sally.

2011-04-10T12:01:00.002-04:00

Sally is my helpmeet and one of my best friends. We have some important plans together to save Haiti or at least part of it, and the whole world by spiritually overly-optimistic intention. She and I met on twitter and became fast friends during the Haitian Earthquake crisis. Sally is very dear to me is an absolute angel to everyone whose life she touches. And I need her. So, I'm asking for your help to save her. Melody is sitting with her now and holding her hand, except she looks like a little old woman, who Sally will recognize instantly as her mother. (There are literally tears streaming down my face as I describe this vision I have just been blessed to feel.)

Anyway, I'm already late, so let's get this out there!

Sally is currently in a battle for her life with pancreatic cancer. The doctors have given her two months. We want to call their bluff and go all in. So, we're calling on lightworkers everywhere to participate in a global healing. The more people we can get praying, the more effective the efforts will be, so please, pass it on.

You can use your own healing meditation/prayer if you are more familiar with one, but this is the Meditation I will be doing. I welcome you to follow it.

Please, share this prayer/meditation request with anyone and everyone you know who might comply and ask them to pass it along as well. The power of prayer is the most powerful tool we have.

In light and love,

Tina (and Melody).

Full credit for my meditation must be given to Copyright © 2003 - Guru Rattana, Ph.D. Learn more, by clicking here: http://www.kundaliniyoga.org/kyt23.html

Here it is:

Healing Meditation Instructions

Yogi Bhajan has said that the mantra RA MA DA SA SA SAY SO HUNG is one of the most powerful healing mantras on the planet. The power of this mantra comes from its ability to connect earth and ether. This mantra is used in many meditations taught by Yogi Bhajan. Below I explain one of the most popular meditations.

RA MA DA SA is the earth mantra.

This part of the mantra pulls the healing vibration into the physical plane.

SA SAY SO HUNG is the ether mantra.

This part of the mantra resonates with the universal healing frequency.

RA - Sun
MA - Moon
DA - Earth
SA - Infinity
SAY - totality of infinity
SO HUNG - I am Thou

Activating the Chakras
The mantra can be vibrated up the spine, chakra by chakra. Slightly pull on the energy centers as you chant each sound. This internal stimulation helps activate and align the chakras.

RA - base of spine
MA - belly (ma aa)
DA - navel center
SA - heart
Pause - hold at heart
SA - heart
SAY - throat ( say ay)
SO - third eye
HUNG - out the top of the head

To Begin
Set your intentions and ask for healing for yourself, others you wish to include, the Earth and Yogi Bhajan. Then release these prayers to the universe. During the meditation concentrate only on doing the meditation, the mantra and the effects you are experiencing. Get into the sensory experience and awareness. The more you are present to your experience, the more effective you are in creating a sacred healing space. You will use the space that you have created at the end to share healing energy.

Position - Mudra
Sit in Easy Pose (or full lotus) with your upper arms resting against your ribs, slightly in from the sides. The elbows are bent, and your forearms
positioned upward and slightly angled out from the upper arms. Your palms are flat, facing upward and pointed out from your body at a 45-degree angle.
(to form a 45% angle point the hands are over the legs toward the knees.)
The fingers are together with the thumbs stretched out towards the side away from the fingers.

It is very important to stretch the thumb away from the fingers. The stretch in the webbing keeps the hands flat and helps maintain a stretch at the wrist. You can use one hand to push down the other hand in order to get a feel of the correct stretch in the wrist. It is this stretch that helps balance the brain. When the thumb is not stretched, the wrist relaxes, the hands move upward and the mudra and its effects are compromised. When the mudra is accurately done, you will feel energy or a pull in the center of the palms. This creates the power to heal with your hands.

Your eyes are focused at the tip of your nose and the eyelids are nine-tenths closed. The focus at the tip of the nose, creates the pressure to cross the optic nerves at the third eye. You should be able to feel an awareness at the third eye and be able to hold your attention there.

Chanting
The mantra is to be chanted in either of the following two versions:

Inhale deeply and chant the mantra all in one breath. Ra Ma DA SA SA Say So Hung. There is a pause between the two SAs, but NO breath. Adjust the speed so that you can chant the full mantra on one breath, without a cheat breath on the pause.

MA and SAY are slurred making two notes each, "MA AA", "SAY AY". The first SA is short. HUNG is forcefully vibrated in the skull and out the top of the head.

Chant for 11, 15, 22 or 31 minutes.

Effects and Powers
This meditation gives one the power to heal long distance and to heal with the hands.

To End:
Now is the time to use the healing space that you have created.

* Inhale deeply and hold the breath. While the breath is held, concentrate on yourself and feel the sensations in your body. Feel or allow the vibration of the mantra to penetrate every cell of your body. Feel the mantra continue to resonate in your body. Become the healing vibration. Allow yourself to be healed.

Repeat the above process 3 or more times with the following variations.

* Inhale deeply and hold the breath. Feel the healing love pulse in your heart. Invite in friends, members of your family and situations and allow them to be bathed in the healing vibration. Hold them in your body, in your heart and in the healing vibration that you now resonate with and embody.

* Inhale deeply and hold the breath again. Feel that your heart is so big and the love so infinite that you can hold the whole earth in your heart. Let the earth pulse with the mantra and be healed with this love.

* Inhale deeply and hold the breath for a last time. Invite Yogi Bhajan into your heart to be healed. Be very attentive. I personally find that my heart space increases dramatically when I invite Yogi Bhajan in. I feel he is also healing me.

The above sequence can vary according to what you are intuitively directed to do

Another thing to do is to feel the Sun or a golden light in you heart:

* Chanting RA creates this energy.
* Expand it to fill every cell of your body. Then merge with the group's light if you are doing this with in a group.
* Feel the light expanding to radiate through the room, the vicinity, the area, country and then the whole earth.
* See/feel the earth healed.
* See/feel the hearts of every person penetrated with love and peace.
* Merge everything into Universal Light.
* As you come back, i.e. focus only on yourself, know that you can maintain this healing energy and light in your being.
* Intend that simply by smiling and greeting others, you share this love and light with the world.

End with the prayer "God bless this Earth with peace." Repeat five times.

2011-04-08T17:55:00.004-04:00

If you don't know Elyse Bruce or Thomas Taylor of Midnight in Chicago, reading this blog is a waste of time. But you're welcome to read along.

Elyse Bruce, the musician is a very old friend of mine. She and I go way back. In fact, she would have been the maid of honour at my wedding to my current husband had her son not gotten ill. Well, she used to read tarot cards with me regularly. In fact, it was her tarot cards that predicted that I would be getting married to a "magician". Click here to see a tarot "magician" card. But later, she met this guy Thomas D. Taylor and things changed, a lot.

Because of Thomas, Elyse put away her tarot cards. Said she had to hide them from Thomas because he didn't like them. So, MIC's suggestion that they know nothing about my "magic" is an outright lie.

Eventually Elyse broke up with Thomas, or rather she told me that she had, but she kept him as her business partner.

I haven't had reason to think of Elyse since last July, the week before my step-daughter's wedding. And I'm looking forward to having no further thoughts of her once this blog is written.

See, what Elyse knows is that last July, she took it upon herself to write a letter to a fruit company with whom I was helping negoticate a win win situation for a Haitian farmer. That result was published in the Montreal Gazette, and Chenail Fruits, helped out someone they didn't have to help out. A little paperwork error, one might say. But the win was negotiated contrary to what Elyse tried to do; which I might add, could have her charged in a criminal court. I decided at the time that I would not press charges BECAUSE she had been my friend for so long and also because I believed, and mostly still believe that she is under some form of control of Thomas D. Taylor. But trust me on this, if ever the question comes up in a court of law, Elyse, whether it be me or someone else, I've still got your email in hand and Libel is a pretty easy thing to prove when untruths are written in emails. I've also got the email you sent me telling me to stay away from Ari Ne'eman of ASAN because he was bad news. Maybe Ari can use that in his lawsuit if you two don't knock it off?

For the record, this is the wonderful hot sauce project that should have been: http://www.thehotzoneonline.com/2007/12/14/raising-the-heat-for-autism/

Yes, it ended up selecting Autism Speaks, but Thomas tells the story just a little differently from the truth, we call that obfuscation and Thomas is really good at it. I had no clue that AS was supporting eugenics, and through what strikes me as creative ostracization now, then struck me as a really good reason to NOT work with AS. And we cancelled the project, but that wasn't good enough for Thomas. Thomas and Elyse believe in guilt by association. See, people aren't allowed to be ignorant of things like Eugenics as pertains to AS because well, you should know that they're into eugenics, EVEN THOUGH, it is written NOWHERE on the AS website or in any of their documents. But you know, that's enough for Thomas to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Now I bet you're wondering... What do they think of YOUR friends and family? Do any of your friends or family support AS? You best disown them because if not, you're in Thomas' target sights.

Interestingly, in the last 24 hours, since I became the target of the attacks, I have learned of a frightening history of MIC going after people, as is repeatedly seen in her blog, like a dog after a bone. Elyse believes that if you do something, like allow your autistic son to go somewhere, and he somehow ends up murdered, its YOUR fault for letting him go.

I should mention that although it's pretty easy to guess which one of the two of them is writing because I know Elyse so well, for someone else, it's hard to tell which of the two of them is posting on the Midnight in Chicago blog, because neither of them sign their posts other than as "Midnight in Chicago". So, it's not really Elyse or Thomas that is doing this, it is Midnight in Chicago. Odd to not separate THAT from your "company". At least what I'm posting is personal, on a personal page in Facebook and here on what is clearly labeled as my PRIVATE blog.

But then, they've done this to how many people?

So, now we come full circle and the possible reason you've landed on this blog... What you want to see is my response to her last post with all her acknowledgements about my company, because, it seems, although she'll allow posts that say I'm a devil worshipper, she won't allow this one... Well, here is that response:

I really appreciate the publicity, Elyse. We’re very proud of our company. It makes great products and is actually changing things for people which is more than I can say for MIC.

You see, if someone wants to do business with me, it will be because Brooks Pepperfire Foods makes amazing gluten free hot sauces and other food products. And frankly if the only reason for not doing business with me is because I have friends who DO support Autism Speaks, then by all means, go find another gluten-free hot sauce. I’ll help. :)

So, I’m curious, how many people do you think will read this? Should I be concerned that my sales will drop off? You’re awfully full of yourself.

I could take the time to rebut your BS and obfuscation, but I’m not going to bother, my Daddy taught me long ago that when you roll around in the mud with pigs, you get dirty and the pigs like it. I prefer not to roll around in the mud with you, I have a business to run and I’m going back into that little forum that you and your bully friends are so not welcome in and I’m going to continue to find support and succor and share it with the other people who are in there. And I’m going to do a lot of other things that are way more important than what you think you have to say.

And if you’d like to report the group to Facebook, by all means do so, but the reason the lock is on the door is so that people can post in security. Self-help groups require that as a key to their effective operation. But you knew that.

Which reminds me… I have to wonder now if maybe the reason that Brady White, DDS got so angry at Sympatico because you were doing exactly THIS to him back then? Maybe I owe him an apology for defending you to him? Say did you save any of THOSE screen shots?

You make your own bed in life and you choose your path, Elyse. Try to choose a better one. This one is just ugly.

Now, I've had about enough this, Elyse Bruce and Thomas D. Taylor of Midnight in Chicago. So, it seems has pretty much anyone and everyone in the autism community that you have previously targeted.

Regardless of what anyone thinks of Autism Speaks or any other autistic support/advocacy group, we as aspies, Dx'd or not, with friends, family, and connections on the spectrum, owe it to each other to work together to make autism awareness, support and advocacy number one.

If Elyse and Thomas think that this goal is best served by going after and attacking everyone in the autism community, by being nasty and divisive, then, that is their path. We each get to choose our own. If they think that calling in the troops to attack me, make fun of my company using lies and obfuscation is going to knock me off my game for more than a short while, then, they think far too much of themselves.

Finally, since I've logged onto your blog no less than 20 times in the past 24 hours just to see what shite you've been posting, the calculated repeated activity by someone else you've targeted for ostracization, means that nobody but those posting here are actually reading your blog.

And guess what? Given the ridiculously low number of hits THIS blog has gotten. You're stirring this stuff up amongst basically nobody.

So...

Stick a fork in this issue, it's done.

For those of you who are more interested in awareness, support and succor of each other, well, just keep doing the work required, because this divide and conquer the autism community ridiculousness isn't doing anyone any good and sadly, as a result, neither is Midnight in Chicago.

Elyse and Thomas, I have one suggestion... Start figuring out why you feel the need to ostracize all these people and maybe then you'll realize that you've both got far better things in life to do than this and if you don't, go find something!

Maybe plan your wedding... Happy things make life much more pleasant, don't you think?

Bless you both.

Welcome to my blog!

2011-04-08T17:24:00.005-04:00

So nice to have you.

I hope you find your visit here most pleasant.

Why stop here? My home website is http://www.pepperfire.ca my flagship brand, is http://www.peppermaster.com and finally our latest Pepperfire Initiative project: http://www.haitianfire.com

I hope you're having a wonderful day!

Let me know if you'd like a Tarot Twreading. They're free.

Of course, it helps if you're on twitter, so feel welcome to follow even more of my insanity there!

Thanks for stopping by.

Yours,

Tina Brooks

Tea and little boys and why stories are meant to last forever

2011-03-15T21:33:00.005-04:00

One of my best friends in the whole world, one Ms. Ali, aka, All in One on Aeclectic Tarot and one of my Soul Sistas, has at the ripe old age of, well, slightly older than me, learned how to drink tea. Snicker says the newfie.

Well, I told her to get a brown betty. There is nothing else in the world that one should, could or would make tea in, so that is what I recommended.

Well, I was at a tradeshow last week and in the booth next to me was Al Cadenas' tea company. These guys were pretty cool, they must have had a hundred different teas. In the booth they had a whole bunch of teapots and I thought of getting Ali a teapot, except that, Greg and I haven't had a bodum since the fire, and they had one... so we traded. I got my bodum and Ali is on her own for a Brown Betty.

So, then, here we are.

The whole point of this post is not my new bodum. It is in fact a showcase for a cute little story for cute little Nico (Ali's boy, who I suggested should have been a dog, although, she turns out to have been 100% absolutely suited to being a mother... lovely thing. But, ahem, I digress.)

So, here goes...

Once upon a time there were a pair of Peking ducklings. Their parents had been killed in a natural disaster and they were all they had left to the other in the whole world.

These ducklings were loved and coddled by Tina who lived in Montreal. Montreal is a city in Canada, the land of true freedom, way up north where the entire country freezes over in the winter and so much snow falls that everyone has to move into an igloo built on top of the snow until the snow melts in the spring.

Well one morning, the ever so slightly older Peking duckling heard that Alison had learned to like tea. So he shook his slightly younger brother awake and quacked, "I have to go to California! Alison MUST learn to LOVE tea!".

At first the slightly younger brother Peking duckling was surprised but he came to accept the idea quite readily when he realized that the two beloveds could stay in contact, as often as they wanted, daily, several times a day even and all they had to do, as a team, was to have both Tina and Alison turn on their PCs every so often enough that they could say a quick hello and how-goes-the-duck-race, if you will. So it was decided. Slightly older brother Peking duckling would go to California.

So, Tina put Slightly older brother Peking duckling into a little box, along with a little surprise for Alison to enjoy with her tea and sent it off via Canada Post.

Btw, you can track the voyage of Slightly older brother Peking duckling by going to http://www.canadapost.ca and track this package: (insert CP tracking number here).

When Alison receives slightly older brother Peking duckling, she is most graciously asked to Meme in kind by completing the tale of Tea.

On the Topic of Ferrets as Pets; not to be Confused with the Topic of "Familiars".

2011-02-26T12:23:00.003-05:00

Before my first child was born, I had two ferrets. They make great pets. I like running a dog, so I hestitate to say they are the best, nothing beats a dog.

Things you should know about Ferrets:

They are explorers and are able to get into the oddest places. You won't be able to figure out HOW they got into them, so you need to ferret-proof the rooms where they are going to be released. They also like chewing on things, like wires, so you have to keep those away from the ferrets as part of your ferret proofing. Interestingly, they use ferrets to wire airplanes because their natural inclination is to go into tunnels. When you see a ferret running into a pipe in a movie, it is not because anyone trained them to go in there, it is because they LIKE to go into tubes, so your cage or room in which the ferret will live needs to be a mini jungle gym for ferrets. Your daughter will really enjoy "building" this space because the funkier it is, the better the ferret will like it. I'll explain why... Ferrets have two speeds... asleep and whirling dervish. There is nooooo middle ground. When they are awake, if there is no-one around, they will play with their environment. Kinda like giant gerbils or mice. Probably why people think they are rodents, but they aren't.

Ferrets, like cats or dogs, need to have shots and be spayed or neutered. The male is much larger than the female of the species and because they are pack animals, are better happier pets if they are part of a pack. In other words, get two ferrets or become an alpha ferret. You can get a ferret manual at the local library or on Amazon. I recommend DD read a couple before becoming the mama ferret. But, it sounds like this is right up her alley if she really likes animals.

Ferrets eat like cats, so feeding a cat is the same as feeding a ferret, EXCEPT, you have to feed it ferret food or ASH-FREE cat food, because the ash in dried cat food is bad for ferrets; it's probably bad for cats too, but it expressly causes respiratory problems in ferrets. You can purchase the food directly through your vet, they get good discounts. If you buy the food in bulk, it's cheaper. Btw, there is a small-animal vet that will have better knowledge of ferrets than other vets, so choose carefully. Ferrets are like cats in that they like to poop in the same place all the time. So they will tell you where to put the litter box once they've explored the room. Btw, the bigger the area, the more litter boxes you will need. They don't like to travel very far when they want to poop. Like cats they like to cuddle and need to wear a harness if you're going to walk them outdoors on a leash. Like cats, who also like to explore on a leash, they are freaking lazy, so don't expect long walks... but more on that in the "like a dog section".

Ferrets are like dogs, so you can train them to do things, like come when they are called and they are fun to play with. Please know though that you do not need to train them to do what they do in the movies, because those things are just things that the ferret will do naturally, they are highly inquisitive and really intelligent little buggers. They're FUN! Now, as lazy as ferrets are, they "tunnel" when they do not want to be awake anymore too, so they will cozy up inside your jacket or wrap themselves around your neck like a fur stole or even curl up in the inside pocket of the carrying purse you bought for just such purposes and it will hang out of the back content to let you do the walking while its nose explores the environment where you take it. Then, when you stop, they love to sniff around the ground exploring wherever you've stopped until you're ready to go again, so they're fun to putter around with. Much better animals for talking for walks and chillaxin the way teens do than cats who mostly don't like to be carried for long.

Ferrets need to have their talons clipped (or sanded down) regularly, (I walked my ferrets on pavement, we lived in the city, so that took care of a lot of the talons, but I still had to clip them once a month. That is like one would do with a dog. You can use one of those teeny buzz sanders made for manicures to do it yourself.

Ferrets are blind as bats like moles but not quite so bad because they are diurnal (I think that's the right word) -- they are mostly day creatures, when they're awake. Because they don't see very well, you never want to move really quickly near their faces, they will bite out of instinct.

Ferrets sleep 17-20 hours a day, so they need a nice safe dark place to go to during the day, that's where their cage comes in. My ferrets had their own room, rather than a cage, and that room had shelves and ramps and ladders that the ferrets could climb and play on. They love to jump and play.

The hammock is just another playplace for the ferret, they might even sleep in it. They are community-oriented, social animals who like to sleep in a lump, so they are accustomed to sleeping in a pile. The hammocks are simply unnecessary, but make for a comfy place for the ferret to nap. (Did I mention, they sleep a lot!).

Ferrets are great pets for high school kids because they'll curl up in your lap while you study or play video games, and when you want to be interested in them, they're totally ready to play.

Ferrets are mustilidae (sp?) like skunks or weasels, they are NOT rodents, so they have to be de-scented. You get the ferret de-scented BEFORE its first heat, which is also when you will get the ferret fixed. You have to fix them. I recommend getting all domesticated pets fixed though. It's hard to be natural and wild when you are a pet so hormones are not good for it.

If you've ever got into any video game for any reason, you are going to LOVE your daughter's ferrets. They really do make great family pets, and they will make a point of sleeping when there is no-one around to play with.

Oh, and did I mention, they make GREAT pets!

A little background.

2011-01-30T18:08:00.001-05:00

My course began when I was really little. I didn't know it then, but with 20/20 hindsight I can see it clear as day.

When I was about 18, I had my first vision. I was walking along the beach with Jesus. And he was telling me that I was here to do something important, although he didn't say what. But he basically told me to trust that no matter what happens, he would be with me all the time and that in the times that I felt most alone, he'd be carrying me, even if I didn't know it.

About 17 years ago, I had another vision. My husband was killing himself on drugs and there was nothing I could do to stop him. I had been attending al-anon and had shared that night that every time I shared my anxieties, I felt better. In the vision I saw myself reciting those same words to the women in the group and stood up and looked behind me and each time I saw that when I had made good choices, those choices had been guided by the hand of God. So, then and there I made a commitment to God to look for those pathways that would lead me to the good choices and so long as God made it clear to me, I would follow.

So far so good, or so I thought.

Then my husband committed suicide, leaving me destitute with two small children and about $120K in debts that could not be written off.

And there I was thinking... But, I'm doing what you said, I'm going where you say, why arent, things getting better... But I couldn't see what was good and right and coming for me in the future.

I was so taken up with my husband's death, and the way that even my own family behaved because of it, that I moved out into the middle of nowhere to be alone with my kids.

Then about a year later, I met my current husband. I wanted nothing to do with him, but my heart had other ideas.

When he asked me to marry him, I thought, "what are you nuts, you have nothing, I have less than nothing, what good is this going to do?" but my heart thought "yes, yes, yes, yes, yes"...

We were married five months later.

Everything doesn't go exactly according to plan. Things are not always bright and rosy, but I actively look for the good in things. Doing the exercises in the ACIM helped me to realize the lack of real value to things and the real value to my emotions.

I think, although, even for me, it would take a lot of work, that I could handle just about any strife that God chose to throw at me. I swear to God, I say to my husband regularly, I am Job. I truly am.

But, I have to trust in God's plan anyway.

In the meantime, what happens is that I have come to grips with the knowledge that I am not my credit rating. That any morning, no matter how bad yesterday was, today has the potential to be better and so, my first thought is, today will be a better day.

Sometimes, when I'm slogging through a hell of a day, it's all I can do to find the good in what is going on, because I want to pull my hair out, I ran out of gas, filled up, forgot the fill the windshield washer reservoir, got turned around, was a half hour late for my appointment, ran into traffic that would make me an hour late for another appointment, then get home after a really stressful day to learn that I have a choice of tea or tea to calm my nerves because my beloved drank the last glass of rum.

Life isn't easy, it isn't meant to be.

Melody has taught me that we are here to experience these things because WE CAN. God cannot step into this illusion and do any of what we are doing, because God knows that at the wave of a hand, his riches would be right there on the table in front of him. He does not fear, he does not feel pain, he does not desire riches or even comfort, for he HAS all these things.

What we as humans fail to EMBRACE is the knowledge that WE are God and as such, We do not fear, we do not feel pain, we do not desire riches or comfort for we HAVE all these things...

EXCEPT

That in order for us to EXPERIENCE the richness that life has to offer, we CANNOT know who we are, so we have this curtain that draws down that keeps us from knowing the truth. Even when it is right in front of us, our ego refuses absolutely to accept it for if it did... WE would cease to exist, for as Gary Renard described it, the Universe would just disappear.

Now, when Melody started introducing me to the Law of Attraction, things got interesting.

But that's another lesson plan altogether.

Both of these "Grand Designs" work because at the end of the day, WE are who we are.

BUT, if we allow our Ego to fight the good fight, we will not believe it and no manner of desire or wishing for the peace will allow it to be.

We must convince our Ego that in following the lesson plan, the ego will become all that it can be and life will be wonderful... even when it is horrible.

New Year's inspiration

2011-01-01T14:17:00.003-05:00

I've been reading my pals' posts on Facebook about their New Years' resolutions and what they are planning for the coming year and I figure it's a good idea to share what I'm going to do with the coming year.

Perhaps you can help?

First let me tell you how I got here and why I am going to do what I am planning, it'll make more sense.

When I first met Melody I had no clue about the Law of Attraction or the Course in Miracles or even about where she was leading me. All I knew was that she had been leading me quite well on a pathway that I was quite willing to follow.

I have gone from being a stressed out, overworked lunatic with very odd idiosynchracies to being a calm, happy, loving person. At least most of the time. As I say when I have the few moments I still do, be patient, Melody isn't finished with me yet.

Well, about the time, I had begun planning my career as a professional Tarot Reader, but Melody had different plans. Or I, at least, had a different pathway to walk before that could happen.

Well, things have happened, I have grown and changed. I have stepped through the aperture of a black hole and seen beyond the event horizon, or, in the words of my friend Gary Renard, I have seen the universe disappear.

And then I have willed it back into existence, because I'm just frankly not ready to step on over and stay there. I rather like it here.

AND, I might add, given the number of people who have come to rely on Melody for guidance, she isn't quite done over here yet either.

This year, I will be launching a spiritual guidance club. Said club will be open to all comers, and will provide them with unlimited access to Melody. I am planning on writing a newsletter and daily blogs that will come straight from Melody through me... I don't know how that is going to go, so I'll be finding a couple of "guinea pigs" for the project. I've already asked a couple of people, who know who they are, and they have accepted. There are a few people to whom I have yet to make the invitation but they will receive that soon enough.

The goal is to make it so that I can afford to bring Melody's wisdom to people without putting me into a position where I am doing more tarot readings for free that are encroaching on my income making time. Those who find value in Melody's guidance will, I believe, agree that this is the right way for me to go.

The project will involve the receipt of an email message specifically for the reader direct from Melody. I haven't figured out exactly how this is going to happen, especially if the mailing list gets too big, but that is the general gyst of it. This message will be free for all those who want them, but for those who need more, they will be able to subscribe to a paid system where they can have all the immediate access to Melody they need. Subscribers will be able to request a message from Melody on any given day, and have access to full personalized readings.

Anyway, there will be way more to it than that, but that's the gyst of what I'm working on right now.

Any thoughts on which way I should go? Feel free to comment.

Profile of a Tarot Reader

2010-03-28T12:39:00.003-04:00

Tina Brooks comes from a long line of gypsy Tarot Card readers. Her Grandmother was Madame Laurette. A well-known professional reader and psychic who passed away in 2008.

Tina began reading cards at the age of 14, under the Tutelage of Madame Laurette and began with the very difficult task of memorizing the meanings and imagery of 52 regular playing cards. It was not until many years later when Tina saw her first Tarot deck, a Crowley Thoth, that card reading began to have real meaning. The painted pictures in the Thoth deck gave way to images, thought patterns and ideas that the regular playing cards could never invoke.

In 2004, Tina's much read and much beloved Thoth deck was lost in a house fire. For a year, Tina didn't even think to pick up her cards. But one day, she found herself searching for her cards, to no avail and realized she would have to purchase a new deck of cards.

That was when Tina discovered the Revelations' deck, the cards she currently reads with.

They say all things happen for a reason, this discovery was no accident. Tina could suddenly see and hear the thoughts, images and ideas displayed in the tarot quite clearly and with great emotion. Shortly thereafter, Tina discovered that these cards were a window to the essence of the universe and she began to discourse, through the cards with the spirit known as Melody.

Melody has explained to Tina that although she can be described as many things, a spirit guide, an angel, perhaps even a demon by some, she is none of these things. Melody is, purely and simply, Tina's direct connection to Source. Source can be described as the energy that is life.

With the help of the Revelations Tarot deck, Melody whispers messages to Tina that she can translate into English or French, giving new insights and meaning to the people who sit for her readings.

Whether it be about love, work, money or health, Tina's readings hit uncannily close to home.

Tina can be found reading and teaching tarot on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum, a haven for many of the world's best tarot readers as well as on Twitter, where under the Twittername "Pepperfire", Tina and Melody offer 140 character Tarot Twreadings.

We invite you to open your heart and your mind to the messages that Tina and Melody have to offer and hope that you walk away with insight and love in your heart. Failing that, we hope you find the readings entertaining, for life is meant to be fun.

On Shifting your Vibration

2009-12-31T20:07:00.003-05:00

On shifting your vibration...

Why do you want or need to shift your vibration?

Well, without getting too weird, "vibration" is what we all do. That is how we manage to "exist", mostly because we don't really -- I'll explain that in a later blog, though. The more in tune you are with the Source energy, the more strongly or "louder" you can vibrate. Surprisingly, very much like the Force in the Star Wars Saga.

Vibrations dictate what is. Our intent alters those vibrations to how we want things to be, but Vibrations take time to shift. One does not vibrate "I am fat" every day of their lives suddenly to "I am thin and vivacious" and physically become so immediately. It takes time for the lifetime of fat to dissolve itself from your body. And according to Deepak Chopra, every single cell in your body recreates itself once every two years. So, with that as a rule of thumb for something known and something physical, I contend that it could take up to two years for a particular intention to materialize.

Ultimately, One needs only to set an intention into motion and it will come to be. Adding more vibration to the idea will alter and change how the idea can or will come into being. The more focused your intention is on the outcome, the more focused the ability of the intention to manifest.

Esther Hicks' Abraham in describing this truth, likened it to setting your vibration to; "I want to be in San Diego": And so you begin travelling to San Diego. You have set your mind on going to San Diego and are on your way. But suddenly, about halfway along the road, you've stopped to realize that you aren't in San Diego yet. Unfortunately, now you've set the vibration to become: I am not in San Diego. And until you reset your vibration to I want to be in San Diego, you cannot BE in San Diego. Some people become so focused on the idea that they are still not in San Diego, that they end up going back to where they started from.

Being in vibrational alignment, one needs to keep the faith. When you speak about what you want, focus on what you have towards that goal, rather than on what you are missing. If you feel good, it is good. If you do not feel good; something has gone wrong and you are not in vibrational alignment.

Example. Hey, my clothes fit better than ever! I really am a skinny-ass bitch, is a positive affirmation that you are on your way to becoming the skinny-ass bitch you so desire becoming -- ie vibrational alignment. "Damn, my favourite jeans still don't fit.", is a one-way ticket to them never fitting - vibrational misalignment. Ooh, I look good -- vibrational alignment. "I still look a little jowly" -- vibrational misalignment. Are we getting the picture?

The trick is to notice when you are saying things that are vibrationally misaligned with where you want to go. A little game I heard about on a mid-afternoon talk show; Put a rubber-band, bracelet or watch on your wrist. Everytime you notice that you've said something negative. Switch the "bracelet" to your other wrist. Consciously recognize that the thought is not in keeping with what you desire and spend the next 17 second creating a We Good statement about your body shape and size; this will get you back into alignment; and as hard as that sounds, it only takes 17 seconds of focus in order to activate a new vibration.

The idea is to recognize thoughts that make you feel good and thoughts that make you feel bad. It is the thoughts that make you feel bad that keep you from your goals.

Your intention is to truly get to the point where you can say "We GOOD" and understand what I mean. Although, hopefully by that point, my "WE GOOD" will be some other sound or expression that is altoghether your own. Rather like the concept of the now mistakenly commonly-used meditation tone; OM, you use WE GOOD until your own feeling sound becomes more apparent to you. Then use THAT. That is YOUR vibrational tone. Use mine until you find yours.

How will you know when you've found it? You'll know, because you'll feel-hear it.

Oh wait a minute; I'm getting ahead of myself here. Can you even feel-hear the vibration? No?

Here's how you can feel it:

You're going to spend 17 seconds finding a vibration. First I'll show you a good vibration.

I want you to remember one of the happiest moments of your life. One where you felt loved, all-important, totally taken care of, well-fed, etc. Remember if you've ever felt "bliss".

That is a good vibration. And in order to counter any negative vibration (this is easier with practice), all you have to do is focus for 17 seconds on a positive vibration and you can shift vibration.

Now, because it is actually "contrast" that you are looking for, you need to know and understand what a bad vibration is, all you have to do is think of something that gives you any emotion other than bliss. Bliss is where you want to go. Easy.

All good and well while you're sitting here unannoyed reading what I have to write for you, but what do you do when someone really ticks you off?

Well, here is the law in action: Set an affirmation that says: "I will reach for the best feeling thought I have access to right now. And I'll be proud of myself when I find even the slightest relief." Then do it and keep doing it until you find your way back to bliss.

When you try to feel better, you will. And here is where the greatest words ever spoken by a character in a science fiction movie come into play; There is no "try". There is do, or don't do. So, FEEL better. When you feel better, you release resistance. When you release resistance, you are in vibration, to stay in vibration, be appreciative of everything that you have, and everything you want will come to be. THAT IS THE LAW.

You don't have to actually DO anything at all. You simply have to vibrate. I vibrate WE GOOD and it's bloody well working! When you are fully completely utterly and totally vibrating and in the moment, and one with everyone and everything that you perceive, then you are in WE GOOD.

Our true self is a state of pure bliss. Love, Peace, Fulfilled. In being in that state, we live in that state and the Universe disappears. In desiring to become one with that state, we set our life focus to maintaining our level of bliss the more we feel bliss, the stronger our vibration. The better everything becomes.

21st Century Tarot

2009-05-31T14:51:00.004-04:00

For some of you, it may come as a shocker to learn that I read tarot cards professionally. For others of you, it's a given. It's just something I do, something I've always done and it's not a big deal.

I started posting on twitter a little while ago, using the tweetname Pepperfire. When I created my profile I posted that I read tarot cards professionally. Someone asked if I was any good, so I tweeted a couple of cards I pulled for them. It's snowballed since then.

That's when I got the idea to use Twitter as the medium for practicing my craft. I created the concept called Tarot Twreading. Essentially, a Tarot Twreading is a tweet that in and of itself is a tarot reading. I began with three cards, read them, then reduce the reading to a tweet.

A tweet? Well, for those of you living in the dark ages, a tweet is a 140 character statement made through the Twitter.com website. For ordinary tweeters, it's a way to have conversations with each other, to share relevant and sometimes irrelevant information and sometimes it's just a way for people to advertise (read spam) their particular business, whatever that may be.

The beauty of twitter, for me, is that I am required to reduce my thoughts into the tightest most concise space possible. That's not easy for someone as verbose as I, but being pedantic has always been one of my things, so it's a glorious place for me to spend time. Reduce, rewrite, retweet.

Add me on twitter and request a Tarot Twreading. I'll add you to my queue. Don't worry, I'll tweet you just before your twreading comes up in the tweetstream so you will know it when you finally receive it.

Blogging...

2008-10-17T10:10:00.001-04:00

It seems it's almost a year since I last posted a blog... I've been so busy, that my writing seems to have simply fallen by the wayside.

Called to my attention by a friend, I shall make an effort to find my way back to the blogboard... I have so many words rattling around in my head, they must somehow find a way out.

In the meantime...

I have to run, I have a meeting.

Me out.

Why I no longer post at Ryze.

2007-10-29T20:17:00.000-04:00

If you actually read my blog... and why would you? You'd know that I use it to draft stories and articles and sometimes just to write about stuff.

I don't require commentary, but I like it when my friends do. I don't solicit commentary, but I like it when people point out things I may have missed or give me new information that didn't exist when I originally wrote the blog, I even like it when people point out that I made an error in calculations.

Those are the great sorts of commentary that one expects to receive as a blog-writer.

What one doesn't typically receive and I wonder why people feel inclined to write them are commentaries that are deliberately insulting. Recently I received a comment, signed "anonymous", of course, telling me that the reason I was having a hard time with ex-employees was because I wasn't a kind person. Right on the heels of another comment suggesting that they didn't like the colour of my blog and therefore it wasn't worth returning.

Well, for starters, my ex-employee didn't leave because I wasn't kind and I really couldn't care less whether or not the person commenting, likes the look of my blog. I didn't create it for them.

That said.

The commenter hails from California; Fountain Valley, in fact. And the even more interesting thing is that I actually know someone from Fountain Valley... Isn't that weird? And to add insult to injury, something happened shortly before these two posts that would lead me to believe that this person was mad enough at me to want to get back at me.

But for some unknown reason, that person isn't wise enough or savvy enough to know that NOTHING you post on the internet is anonymous, even if you make a point of not signing your name.

So, I bet you're wondering what happened to cause this woman to hate me so much that she'd post hateful things to my blog?

Well, I'm not proud and since libel is only libel if it is untrue... here's the story, because frankly, the whole incident was childish, insulting and never should have been given the light of day.

Back in August, a woman by the name of Althea Garner got into a flame war with a couple of fellows on Ryze. Althea claimed to Ryze Administration that they were harassing her, and both of them got suspended; no questions asked.

Well a horrific, uproar ensued and Ryzers began a write-in campaign asking for either the reinstatement of the two men or the equal suspension of Althea, since she had given as good as she got in the flame war.

Well, the suspension was granted by Ryze Admin.

Shortly thereafter, I came up on the receiving end of Althea's radar and she sent a misplaced email to Ryze Admin, calling for my suspension. Without question or explanation. I found myself on the receiving end of a suspension.

Two months later, I was lurking, still waiting for my "suspension" to be lifted or even acknowledged by Ryze Administration, when Althea went into a network and posted the outright lie to everyone and sundry who could read it that she had no idea who had complained about me to Ryze Admin, but that she had nothing to do with it and she went so far as to suggest that I had upset someone else on another network.

I lost it.

Me losing it isn't pretty.

Well, I decided that since Ryze Admin was blatantly ignoring me anyway, and that at this point, I really didn't care whether or not I ever got back into Ryze because anyone that ran a network like that didn't deserve any hit generation that I might be party to. So, I created a persona and I named it: Althea Garner is a bold-faced liar. And then I posted this story and included a copy of the email that Althea was stupid enough to have forgotten that she'd cc'd me on, when she complained to Ryze Admin calling for my suspension. Duh!

Well, before I knew what had happened, Althea had finally shown her true colours publicly, had insulted the owner of that network and everyone who posted there, gone into her own, now no longer existent network, and posted how outraged she was over the indignity she was being made to suffer at my hand. She made nasty hateful PMs to the owner of the network, threatened her children with horrible diseases, etc. And ultimately came in here and posted those two hateful posts.

Well, suffice it to say, I was right about never being allowed back into Ryze. I apologized for losing it, and asked to be let back in.

Well, I've more pride than that... So, here I sit, receiving hateful posts to my blog, that will never see the light of day and the only thing Althea Garner can do about it is pout.

So now, Ryze Admin is in the unwelcome position of having been used to further Ms. Garner's ends, of having acted on her lies and made to look foolish and of losing my business, although truth be told, they hadn't received any yet, because I'd made my decision to become a paying member at the beginning of the tight cash flow period and as such, hadn't given them any money yet.

But I'll be damned if I'll do so now. Well, truth be told, and all humility aside (I did write the admin and apologize for my "you're a liar" post. I also asked if he could let me know when this suspension (which was based on a liar's lie and uncalled for to begin with), would end...

I was told to come back in a year or two.

Guess what...

Ryze Admin... You can feel free to share this with Althea Garner: THIS is for you:

In Search of Fair Trade

2007-02-07T13:48:00.001-05:00

I’ve been using fair trade coffee and fair trade for many years in my home kitchen, but had never thought of actually using these products on an industrial level until one evening watching George Stromboulopolous on CBC tv’s The Hour talked about Fair Trade chocolate. The two most important things that caught my attention were that FT cocoa beans are not picked by children nor sprayed with pesticides.

In passing, I asked my husband why we weren’t using FT ingredients in our business, he replied that sometimes we did, but he hadn’t really thought about it. Discussions ensued and we realized that we were going to an awful lot of trouble to find great quality chillies in countries where Fair Trade was probably already working and we could save ourselves a lot of trouble by letting them do the work.

We were wrong.

When I contacted the Fair Trade Certification board in Germany I learned that there are currently no standards set and no market for Fair Trade chili peppers and in fact the reason for this is because nobody with the expertise required was involved in Fair Trade. Well, we use several thousand pounds of chillies a year, so in my eyes, there certainly is a market for them and we’ve already established standards for the peppers we use, so I took the leap. I volunteered Brooks Pepperfire Foods Inc. to source peppers for Fair Trade. Well, I quickly learned that every country has a regional board called TransFair. Here, in Canada, it’s TransFair Canada, in the US, it’s TransFair US, well, you get the idea. I also learned that the reason that each country has it’s own regional board is because of regional government import rules differing. I also learned that in order for someone to sign on to Fair Trade as an importer, they need to be sponsored by their regional board. So, I contacted Rob Clarke, the Executive Director of TransFair Canada and told him I wanted Fair Trade peppers. Some discussions ensued and lots of learning began, and several months later, here we are, well on our way to creating Fair Trade standards for chili peppers, registering farmers and creating a market.

Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve spent a great deal of time studying the prices at which other vendors are selling peppers. I’ve learned more about pesticides than any woman has a right to know and learned that there is a serious need for fresh clean peppers year round. It’s a daunting task infiltrating a well-established market with produce that surprisingly has never been available, even though there is a huge demand for it.

So far, I think the most exciting part of the entire project is discussing the opportunity for certification with the farmers. Explaining to them what is possible for their future and how Fair Trade is going to benefit not only them, but their families and employees as well. We’ve run into some pretty scary situations already in sourcing our peppers. In some countries political unrest becomes an issue when we’re trying to get peppers out of the country, we’ve actually been told that armed guards are required to get the peppers to the airport.

What is so moving about the entire project is what can happen with the social premium that the fair trade farmers will receive for their peppers. As buyers, we are expected to work directly with the farmers to develop commercial relationships, trust and mutual support. We are expected to adhere to what seems to be an extensive list of criteria established by the Fair Trade Labeling Organization, aka FLO-Cert.

We buy a lot of peppers for our own needs over the course of a year and because we have to source fresh peppers all over the world it isn’t much of a leap for us to source the same peppers for FLO. After all, the questions we need to ask for ourselves seem to be the same questions we need to ask for FLO. We are expected to give the farmer a fair price for their commodity and that price point provides a living wage for the farmer. In addition to the price, we offer a commitment to developing a long term business for the farmers so they will be capable of future development and investment in their farms.

They in turn agree to provide good working conditions for their employees, and ensure safety procedures and adequate health standards for all workers. In addition, farmer/producers must employ democratic working processes. The democratic standard ensures that democratic decisions are made concerning how the fair trade premium will be spent. Who better to decide how to improve their living standards, than those living them. Finally, the farmer agrees to use environmentally sound production methods.

Fair Trade generally helps promote human rights, especially those of women, children and people with disabilities and as the local situations improve, they are expected to continuously improve upon these standards.

As we have announced our intent regarding Fair Trade, many people have asked us how this impacts local farmers. Fortunately, it’s not just about where we buy our peppers (or other ingredients), it’s a way of life. Originally, when we first started buying peppers, rather than growing our own, we gave priority to local farmers. We make a point of buying peppers of great quality, with few to no pesticides at a fair price - fair, not just to the farmer but to ourselves as well. We’ll buy local peppers, when they’re ripe, and that’s a huge benefit to our community. It defends our sovereignty, saves us the costs of fuel and energy, helping us lower our environmental footprint and provides us with the freshest peppers we can possibly get. Unfortunately, our community can only give us five weeks worth of peppers in the October, if we’re lucky. The rest of the year, we have to go where the peppers are ripe.

So for us there was only one question left to answer. Does Fair Trade really do anything or is it simply a way for us to feel good about what we would like to think our pepper dollars are doing?

Activists who are against globalization criticize huge companies for not being altruistic enough, because they can probably afford to be even more altruistic than they are. One example of this is Starbucks who, although they are the largest roaster and retailer of fair trade coffee, by far, is heavily criticized, because less than 10% of their bottom line is in Fair Trade coffee.

Visiting Fair Trade plantations, one finds better housing, better facilities and better schooling than in neighbouring plantations. Critics feel this is unfair because neighbouring plantations aren’t benefiting directly from the social premium that the Fair Trade plantation receives.

Critics of Fair Trade suggest that fair trade products are going to cost the consumer more than the non-fair trade equivalent commodity. Generally, this is untrue because the Fair Trade purchaser in going directly to the farmer succeeds in cutting out, occasionally, several levels of middlemen who add a premium to the price of the commodity every step of the way. Fair Trade often succeeds in increasing the price the farmer receives while still leaving ample room for the Fair Trade premium and a decreased cost to the purchaser. Of course this point, in and of itself feeds yet another criticism of Fair Trade. If you had taken economics 101, you would have learned that increased prices tend to stimulate production. Increased supply will decrease prices in the receiving market, thus, an increase in supply will lead to a disproportionate drop in price for North American farmers. So, for our local farmers, it is suggested that Fair Trade isn’t fair at all. What these critics neglect to realize is that our local farmers have no difficulty getting a fair price for their commodity. Where an american farmer might receive $7 lb for orange habanero, farmers in Haiti, India or Africa may only receive .45 cents.

Fair Trade isn’t about giving farmers something to which they are not entitled. It is about justice. It is about giving second and third world farmers the same price they would receive if there were a level playing field. It is about treating farmers on the other side of the world exactly the way local farmers demand to be treated. Fair Trade farmers are often on the receiving end of an unfair trade system. One where their competition is given tax subidies that allows them to flood the market with below cost commodities. Such subsidies make it very hard for second and third world farmers to compete and is truly, for them, an unfree-market system. Fair Trade helps level that playing field.

We’re going to buy peppers to make our sauces and in helping get these commodities fair trade certified we can empower farmers and farm workers to lift themselves out of poverty. It is our goal to help these farmers develop the business skills necessary to compete in the global marketplace. We’re hoping that the peppers that we bring to market for these farmers will be competitively priced with other gourmet, specialty peppers. We do expect though, that they will be more expensive than mass-produced general quality peppers. It is possible, depending on the farms’ locations that the peppers could be more expensive. Many of these farms lack the extensive shipping and logistical capabilities of the vertically-integrated, multi-national fruit companies from whom North Americans traditionally buy peppers. Also, we expect to see variances in the price at market of peppers depending on the demand the markets put on the various breeds of peppers we manage to get certified.

In the end, though, regardless of TransFair or FLO, it is Brooks Pepperfire foods who will set the price at which we make these peppers available and our pricing won’t be controlled or influenced by either of these organizations. We do expect, though, that the more purchasers we find for these peppers, the larger the market we can create for these peppers, and the more companies, retailers and consumers who support us by joining us in bringing these peppers to market, the more ability we will have to lower prices.

I expect it’s going to be a wild ride and we look forward to sharing the project with you.

Sourcing Peppers, another adjunt to the Naga Saga

2007-02-05T14:05:00.000-05:00

We found a supplier in India for the local variety of this pepper. In this area, the pepper is known as the Raja Mirchi, or king chilli.

We sent an agent into the neighbourhood to procure the peppers for us. He tells us that he camped out for three days and found the climate to be freezing, people untrustworthy and a very insecure life for residents. Our agent bribed some people and managed to arrange a meeting with the agricultural minister who shared with us the following information about the product, its quality, the people and transportation issues.

I thought we’d share that with you.

The normal growing season for raja mirchi is between April and October both in plains and hilly areas. During this season the chilli is of good size, weight and has the required pungency and aroma. He also noted that in Northeastern India the chilli is consumed for its flavour rather than for it’s heat. Which is what our friends in England, the Michauds’ had told us.

The chillis grow better in the valleys and hilly areas than on the plains and is mainly found in amongst the bamboo. The first peppers take 6-8 weeks time and the first peppers are never eaten because the locals feel that their colour and flavour is lacking. These first peppers are used as compost. Interestingly enough, our agent tells us that the plants grow to a height of 9 feet! He also tells us that after a couple of fruitings, the plants are cut down and fully renewed. The natives feel that any longer than 18 months and the peppers deterioriate very quickly. The natives then plant new peppers.

At market this chilli is more expensive than other chillies for various reasons. Picking the chilli is difficult because of where it grows, it is difficult to get to and thus is a herculean task. The aroma and pungency of the pepper is so intense that few people can stand it enough to pick them.
Local transport is a major problem so the peppers are transported to the bus terminal, where the public transit system is used to bring the chillies to the marketplace, picture the dreaded Mexican schoolbus, albeit Indian style. At market, the peppers are graded between good ones and ordinary ones based on the size and texture of the chilli. At this point, there is an average 30-45% rejection rate. It is at this point that the peppers are packed for export to us. The entire process from plant to us, takes about 10 days.

The peppers are purely organic and no fertilizers are used. Hence the peppers are SKAL certified organic.

Our agent informs us quite readily that the area is full of thugs and that because of insurgency in the area, it is difficult to move the produce at will.

The email was signed as follows:

“Overall an experience I won’t forget”.

And, I might add, overall an experience we won’t soon forget either.

As you can well imagine, buying something that Americans find mysterious is a source of great amusement to Indians and Bangladeshis who are quite familiar with these peppers.

This quip from a subcontinet forum: credit a poster named “vAtraT”: I recall reading about habanero (pronounced haabaanyero) peppers, which are among the hottest around, that they’re 40 to 50 times as hot as jalapeno peppers, and jalapeno (pronounced haalaapenyo) peppers are not tame. In that article they mentioned a northeast Indian pepper as being the hottest ever. This must be the Naga pepper.

I had wondered how they go about ascertaining the hotness. Turns out they dilute the juice N times and then apply it to a certain part of the anatomy. Then the average distance of the first hop made by the subjects (multiplied by N, of course) determines the strength of the pepper. It’s all very scientific.

Me out.

Dorset Naga update...

2006-10-23T14:07:00.000-04:00

I just received word that a show has aired on the BBC in England that announced the results of an HPLC test done on Dorset Naga peppers grown by BBC “Gardeners’ World”. The group took to the airwaves on Friday to announce the results live.

According to Joy and Michael's Website, the peppers grown by Gardeners' World scored a whopping 1,598,227.

The results of the test as published on the BBC Gardeners' World website read as follows:

Gardeners' World's hottest chillies

Over the course of this year, Gardeners' World has grown a variety of chillies to find the fieriest fruits. The chillies were all tested at Warwick Horticulture Research International (HRI) and the results are shown below.

The hottest chillies

1. Chilli 'Dorset Naga'
2. Chilli 'Caribbean Red Hot'
3. Chilli 'Orange Habanero'
4. Chilli 'Fiesta' (grown outdoors)
5. Chilli 'Scotch Bonnet'
6. Chilli 'Fiesta' (grown indoors)
7. Chilli 'Apache'
8. Chilli 'Paper Lantern'
9. Chilli 'Etna'
10. Chilli 'Adorno'

I have to say that at this point, it's relatively easy to state that the World's Hottest available chili peppers is still a C. Chinense, but I think until someone comes up with something close to this incredible heat level, the Dorset Naga is going to be competing for the Guinness Book of World Records' title very soon.

For those interested in growing these chilies, you can contact Peppers by Post. According to their website, the seeds will be available for sale beginning in 2007. And yes, you can get them shipped to the US.

There and Back Canada...

2006-10-19T17:40:00.000-04:00

I drove out to Cornwall this morning to set up our Christmas show taking place this weekend and on the way back we saw the oddest looking thing. A man was trudging along the highway dragging a cart behind him. He looked for all intents and purposes like he'd been walking for a while, and indeed he had.

We didn't initially stop as I was in a hurry to get home and we still had to pick up Mike's dog. Needless to say, after picking up Pepper, we turned out onto the highway and I spotted the odd looking man and his cart, and I told Mike were going to take a bit of a detour.

I figure if God puts such things in your path once, it's for a glimpse, if it's twice it's for a more important reason and should be investigated... So, investigate we did.

It turns out that the man's name is Trevor. That's how he introduced himself. He didn't give me his last name. He did post his name, almost as an after-thought on his website. Trevor Redmond is taking steps for cancer prevention and boy is he stepping.

This is Trevor:

He started on his journey in British Columbia, back in March, 2006 and has been walking now for seven months. He expects to end the "there" part of his journey in Halifax when he will stop and plan the "back" part.

I asked him how he was doing the trip and he said that he was using a combination of camping, in a tent, staying in motels and taking advantage of some of that good old Canadian hospitality that we are all so proud of up here. He choked me up. Mike gave him our business card and suggested he look us up on his way by. I'll gladly cook him a meal or give him a bed depending on the time of day he goes by.

On October 9, Trevor passed through Kingston. He wrote on his website:

"In challenging myself, I have now taken 6,586,353 steps as of Kingston.

In challenging Canadians, I have received over 11,000 dollars towards my efforts.

This works out to about $2.20 per kilometer over the 5000 Km stretch I have already walked.

I am looking for a dollar a step. Help us to take those steps.

Catch me!

I would also ask that you get your friends involved in this effort. The more we step, the further we will come.

The more we move...the more we move others.

To all... I'm still pulling for you."

I read Trevor's website after returning home and it choked me up. I had asked Trevor if he was taking donations and all I had in the car was $1. So I gave it to him. I felt really good coming home to discover that I had taken one of Trevor's steps. I challenge you to take one as well, he's got a lot of them available.

Tellicherry Black Pepper

2006-10-18T16:33:00.000-04:00

Every time we introduce a new customer to our
Tellicherry Black sauce, we inevitably get asked the
same question: "What's a Tellicherry".

Tellicherry is not a "what", it's a "where". Located
on the South-Western coast of the tip of India, near
Cochin, Tellicherry is in the heart of pepper
country.

Both Tellicherry pepper and Malabar pepper come from
the same plant and are harvested at the same time.
Tellicherry pepper are the larger of the two and
will have matured further before the harvest,
benefiting from a better location on the vine and
thereby receiving more sunlight. Only the largest
10% of these peppercorns are good enough to bear the
name Tellicherry, making these peppercorns very,
very special, indeed.

In India, pepper is part of the cultural heritage of
the people. Growing pepper is seen more as an art or
a craft than as a metier. Even though it is a
cash crop, pepper growing and grading is taken very
seriously in this part of the world. Farmers take
advantage of centuries of skill handed down from
generation to generation to grow and harvest these
tiny black seeds of flavour.

Once picked, it takes about a week for the
peppercorns to dry in the sun. During this time,
they will lose a share of their flavour in the
process. Until recent years, all pepper drying was
done this way. Although, nowadays it is not uncommon
for pepper to be rapidly air-dried indoors.
Interestingly enough, this new technology brings
with it the benefit of less flavour loss. Thus,
today's peppers are fresher, cleaner and more
full-bodied than ever before and allow the farmers
to fetch a higher price.

Although the size of the peppercorn is very
important to garnering the name, "Tellicherry", the
maturity of the peppercorn is the ultimately
all-deciding factor. It is the extra-ripening time
that the Tellicherry peppercorn receives that
increases the percentage of essential oils in the
fruit and makes it taste so aromatic and why the
Peppermaster chose these peppercorns for our black
pepper sauce.

Peppercorns although not chillies, are often a
chiliheads first foray into the world of pepperfire.
As children growing up in North America, what would
setting the table be without a shaker of pepper?
Well, it wouldn't be rightly set, now would it? As
we grow up and our tastes become more cosmopolitan,
we are introduced to the splendours of the
peppermill. Once having experienced the glory of
fresh ground pepper, who would return to the dusty
dryness of the pepper shaker? From the peppermill
with ordinary Madagascar black peppercorns, (sold
most commonly as "whole black pepper"), one
eventually discovers the perfume and wonder that is
Malabar and hopefully as well, Tellicherry.

I had opportunity to read of the adventures of one
who visited India to research the true art of
peppercorn manufacture, as I researched this article
and he tells of his visit to Mount Tellicherry
India.

Picture sweeping mountain slopes gazing down on a
lush untouched jungle. Imagine the perfumes and
odours of the world famous outdoor markets and all
the spices wafting on the air. He describes a
landscape very different and exotic, than ours, one
ripe with cardamom and cinnamon, their perfumes
carrying on the breezes and fields and fields of
wild pepper bushes.

Pepper bushes grow to about 3-5 feet in height. They
dangle their berries much like tiny bunches of
grapes and although they have been known to grow
well in other climates, the soil and climate of this
region of India produces the best peppercorns in the
world.

Interestingly enough, it is in the drying of the
peppercorns that they get their distinctive colours
ranging from green-yellow through red and brown to
jet black. The long bunches of berries are picked
almost ripe and allowed to dry to their familiar
shape and colour as we know them. Even more
interesting is that what we know as "white
peppercorns" are not another species of pepper at
all, but instead they are the de-husked center of
the ripe peppercorn.

I learned in my research, too, that the varieties of
peppers that we know as "pink, long and Szechuan"
peppercorns are all different species of plant and
indeed are not true peppercorns at all.

As the Peppermaster already knew and I learned,
Tellicherry is synonymous with the absolute best
grade of peppercorns. They are of better quality,
the flavour is richer, and more varied and you'll
discover that this black pepper is well worth the
time it takes for us to use it in our sauces.

Here at Peppermaster, we get our Tellicherry in
airtight light proof pouches which we only open
right before we will use the peppercorns. We grind
them fresh and only process what we will use
immediately. Although hand mills and mortars and
pestles are recommended for the average kitchen, we
use a high speed blender to crush the corns for our
sauces. It is this last minute grinding that gives
our Tellicherry Black sauce its distinct flavour.

If you haven't had the opportunity to fill your
peppermill with Tellicherry black peppercorns, we
suggest you do. And in the meantime, pick up a jar
of our Tellicherry Black sauce and introduce
yourself to the rich intense flavour of Tellicherry
pepper. We've married the Tellicherry to three of
the richest flavours we know; fresh roasted garlic,
rich dark Guatemalan espresso and to bring into full
bloom the flavours of all of these ingredients,
French Cognac that completes the bouquet.

Peppermaster Pepper Steak

Easy Salt & Pepper Shrimp
Ingredients:
1 Tbsp Butter or Cooking oil
1 Tbsp Tellicherry Black Sauce
1 lb peeled, veined Shrimp (with or without tails)

Directions:
Heat butter (until melted) or oil in saute pan. Mix
in Tellicherry sauce. Saute shrimp until just
cooked.

Serve with steamed vegetables and wild rice.

Easy Pepper Steak
Ingredients:
2-3 Tbsp Tellicherry Black Sauce
1/4 Cup heavy cream
2 New York strip loins (or your preferred cut)

Directions:
Combine cream and pepper sauce with a whisk. Bring
to a simmer over low heat, keep warm.

Grill steaks to desired doneness and spoon on the
pepper sauce or serve it on the side in a gravy
boat.

Serve with baked potato and grilled vegetables.

About kicking puppies.

2006-10-01T18:12:00.000-04:00

If you've started following this blog, it's possible that you got here because I left one of my comments on your blog. I suppose it's a hobby of mine, but I like bouncing through blogs when I want to blog but can't focus on a topic worth blogging about and all I want to write is something cheesy and personal -- which absolutely goes against my very idea of blogging and begs me to go buy a journal.

Something always motivates me to blog... I have something cool that I found that I want to share or I'm walking around emotionally struck looking for an outlet and frankly don't think it's any of your business why I feel like kicking a puppy. Of course it's days when I feel like this, that I blog bounce looking for someone to rip a strip off. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.

Today, I learned two new words... Political Terrorism and White Privilege and decided that the puppy I want to kick is a privileged white Republican who likes to practice political terrorism.

Political Terrorism ran chills through my spine and flipped my stomach over a few times as I came to understand what the bloggers were talking about. White Privilige had my stomach flipping over, but running fewer and fewer chills down my spine as I came to understand what those bloggers were talking about.

Political Terrorism is the fear forced down our throats over and over again by those who want us to swallow their politics no matter how incredulous the basis for that political stance might be. One such stance is the one that we're unpatriotic if we aren't 100% behind the war in Afghanistan (The American equivalent of this is that you're unpatriotic if you're not 100% behind the war in Iraq -- or the ahem... war on terrorism).

White Privilege is the privilege that I as a white woman enjoy and that no person of colour anywhere will ever be able to enjoy because they aren't white. And that although, it's not something for me to have to feel guilty about, it is something that I have and any pretense that I am not privileged in this way is short-sighted and ignorant to the extreme.

Being a slightly facist feminist pacifist humanist like me isn't easy when blogging. I see commentary by people that I just want to take and shake. And then of course good sense kicks in and I either post something, that only I could ever possibly think is witty, in their comments or bounce away from their blog, shaking my head instead. Fortunately the latter happens far more often than the former, but the former, more than likely caused YOU to be here reading my gibberish.

What I discovered while bouncing today is that there is an awful lot of political terrorism being practiced by the white privileged who are calling for the blood of some faceless Islamic terrorists on the other side of the planet and who at the same time are in abject disgust with those of us who would like a face put on our aggressors before we are willing to give up our rights and freedoms for the sake of being protected from their aggressions.

The thought that comes to my mind... Who are you calling a terrorist, you freaking terrorist??? I just happened to notice as I was blog bouncing that the worst political terrorists are, more often than not, privileged white republican men.

So, really the two words, today anyway, go hand in hand.

What is interesting to me is the thought in my mind now, is what the heck am I going to do about these new words?? I can't really go around smacking all the privileged white republican men who are practicing political terrorism, can I?

Oh wait! I can blog.

So, here's a personal message to all you fat cat privileged white republicans with your brains stuffed so far up your bums that you are willing to give up your freedom for the sake of security.

It is not in support of terrorism that I am unwilling to have my luggage searched by the TSA. It is in protection of my rights and freedoms, which are not up for grabs simply because someone blew up the World Trade Center.

Jesus loves me, homosexuals and Belinda Stronach regardless of whether you do or not -- He said so himself.

Protecting Darfur from their Government is JUST as important as protecting Afghanistan from the ~~druglords~~, I mean, the Taliban.

There is nothing wrong with trade with Cuba or trade with China and Vietnam they are all EQUALLY vital to a spirit of international harmony.

The United States should simply get out of the United Nations. That way, their highest national priority; enforcing U.N. resolutions against Iraq; won't be in direct contradiction to everything that the UN stands for.

If multi-national corporations can make decisions affecting all mankind without regulation then a woman can be trusted with decisions about her own body.

The best way to improve military morale is to improve veterans' benefits, equip our men better and give them better combat pay.

Condoms won't keep adolescents from having sex, but it will help stop the spread of STDs and lower the incidence of teen pregnancy.

Belittling your allies and then demanding our cooperation is no way to make friends.

Making fun of Canadians for providing health care to all citizens, while providing it to Iraqis but not Americans really is hypocritical, not to mention mind-boggling.

Global warming is not junk science. And "Creationism" like all other religious theologies, should only be taught in schools with the consent of the children's parents.

Who a Government official is sleeping with should be NONE of OUR BUSINESS and lying to enlist support for a war in which thousands die should be a criminal offense.

Government should get out of people's bedrooms most especially their own.

White men are privileged individuals, whether or not you want to accept that fact and someone countering that privilege with equality is not now nor will it ever be "reverse discrimination".

And last but not least, women are not second class citizens. We are better socialized than men are, think faster on our feet and are able to empathize better with our fellow man in order to find solutions that will protect and heal the entire planet and not just the bit run by privileged white men.

So there it is.

If you're a privileged white republican, consider yourself my kicked puppy.

And if you're not... forgive me for kicking puppies, they are after all only puppies.

Some people just don't understand "courtesy".

2006-09-29T11:19:00.000-04:00

Have you ever been so unhappy in a job that you felt you had to quit? Have you ever hated it so much that you simply went home from work one day and never went back? Did your boss have any inkling whatsoever that you were unhappy???

My assistant quit on Tuesday morning; no warning and no notice. She's left me in the position of having to figure out what she's done and what she hasn't. Worse, she's left right before the three busiest months of the year, when I haven't the time to train someone new.

She never complained nor gave me any idea that she was unhappy. In fact, she'd gone all over town (I live in a small town) telling people how much she loved the job.

She quit in an email. She said the job was too physical for her.

If I'd been in the frame of mind to fire her, I would have had to give her a week's notice, BY LAW. The Labour Board says I can sue her in civil court for the "reasonable amount of notice" that she is required to give me.

I wonder if she'll be so foolish as to give my name as a reference?

Terrorists hell, I'm more afraid of the local psychos!

2006-09-14T00:05:00.000-04:00

It must have felt like Baghdad central in downtown Montreal today.

A man walked into Dawson College with three guns, one a semi-automatic, and simply opened fire. Two people, one of them the gunman, thankfully, are dead and reports vary on how many were injured or treated at hospital.

Offhand, I don't know anyone involved (I don't think). Although, I do have an acquaintance who works there; I have a dear friend who passed away earlier this year who was a much beloved counselor there for a long-time and I've attended classes in those hallowed halls. Heck, I wrote my Jeopardy! application in one of those classrooms!

Dawson is a beautiful old campus on the corner between Westmount and Downtown Montreal and is a beautiful Cegep not a University, as the US press is calling it. This is essentially the equivalent of Grade 12 and 13 here in Quebec. So these kids are all 17 and 18 years old. Watching the newsclips of Montreal's babies running in fear from the building hit so close to home.

Here we are the day after the anniversary of 9/11 thinking about all the people who died in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania that day, some of whom I knew personally. I was wondering about the insensibility of the disaster that occurred that infamous day and about all of the things that have happened since then, when this occurs. What a mindf*ck! Pardon the expression.

My nephew (Father of my Great-Niece) is a Captain in the Air Force and because of his position, has a slim chance of going to Afghanistan and yesterday, because of his job, he was in my thoughts, repeatedly. But today, after hearing the news, I thought of his sister, she's a member of the RCMP, off on maternity leave (new Mother of my Great-Nephew) and she could have easily been one of those cops who had to deal with that gunman today.

Apparently, two cops on a routine call just happened to be nearby when the gunman started shooting. They acted very quickly and in a very short period of time, had him cornered and "neutralized" so he could do no more harm.

It's funny, for the last few years, when I'd see stories about Afghanistan on the news, I'd fear that my Nephew would get called up and sent overseas to kill potentially innocent Afghanis in the guise of protecting us from Osama Bin Laden and the Axis of Evil. But everyday my Niece and her co-workers are out there on the front line dealing with all manner of psychos right here at home. And those psychos could far more easily kill you or I than every single one of Bin Laden's creepy friends.

All I can think today is thank God for people like my Niece. Those are the front-line members we need to have protecting us. Policemen.

And before 9/11 that's what our military were; policemen... Peacekeepers.

Today I saw the new recruitment commercials for the Canadian Military and it looked like an advertisement for one of those video games that I don't let my son play.

It's like they're trying to recruit people who will enjoy killing. People who will do what we have never wanted our military to do.

It breaks my heart and makes me wonder... Do we need more killers or more policemen?

The 12 steps of Chiliheads Anonymous

2006-07-18T10:33:00.000-04:00

These are the Twelve Steps of Chiliheads Anonymous.

1. We admitted we were powerless over chili peppers — and that our lives had become unmanageable.

2. Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity; or at least make it stop burning!

3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of Dave DeWitt as we understood Him.

4. Made a searching and fearless inventory of our hot sauce fridge.

5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being that we really did like the taste of scotch bonnets.

6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all the Tobasco from restaurant tables everywhere and replace it with REAL hot sauce.

7. Humbly asked Him to not remove our seeds.

8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to try even harder in the future to turn them all into chiliheads.

9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would keep them from really enjoying the burn.

10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were deficient promptly bought another bottle of hot sauce.

11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with capsaicin, as we understood it, praying only for knowledge of the fact that there are only 15,000,000 SHUS in pure cap and the power to carry that message to the rest of the world.

12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of eating peppers, we tried to carry this message to chiliheads, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

The Dorset Naga

2006-05-20T12:29:00.000-04:00

It's every chilihead's dream to find the world's hottest pepper. We go through phases of seeking all the heat we can handle, delving into extracts and maybe even cap-surfing until we either tire of it, hurt ourselves or settle into simply eating fresh peppers regularly.

April fool’s Day 2006 will go down in history as the day that Joy and Michael Michaud, pictured here, announced to the world that they had hazarded upon the world's hottest pepper. From there, the story began its whirlwind tour of misinformation, mistrust and hoaxism. The April Fool's Day joke is that this story didn't break on April Fool's Day. The story was published on March 31st, in the Bridport News a newspaper local to the area of Dorset where the Michauds reside. The media then picked it up and ran with it... on April fool’s Day.

Joy and Michael Michaud live in West Bexington, a small rural village in the county of Dorset, England. They both hold a Doctorate in grassland agronomy. Joy's is from Aberystwyth University of Wales and Michael's is from Texas A&M. Michael is American. Michael is co-author of the book; Cool Green Leaves and Red Hot Peppers. Michael contributes articles on his work with immigrants and the vegetables they grow. One such article appeared in a Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) magazine, The Garden, entitled: The World in an Allotment - Gardeners from Different Communities.

For their part-time chili business, the Michauds grow 8 other chilies and tomatillos. All the chilies, with the exception of the Thai hot are grown in the soil in polytunnels, a UK version of a plastic sheet hot house. The Thai hot and some other chilies sold at shows as decorative, edible house plants are grown in pots where they thrive. Joy and Michael spent the last weekend planting out this year's crops.

For the past several years, Joy and Michael have been selecting the best and the brightest of the offspring from a Bangladeshi pepper, the naga morich. The pepper, which ripens to a rich red colour, is preferred by Bangladeshis to be picked and used green. Their intention for selecting these plants was to get larger, heartier fruit, with stronger, larger plants. They are aware that culling the way they did is really going the long way around, but they are quite satisfied with the resulting plant. The line for which they have applied for Plant Variety Protection (PVP) (Plant Cultivar Protection in North America) has been given the name ‘Dorset Naga’.

In a personal interview, Joy said, "We don't know whether our chilli is the hottest in the world or not, probably not, it is just that we had it measured." The truth is that based on two independent HPLC tests of the Michaud's Dorset Naga, their cultivar, planned or accidental, currently holds the highest HPLC count for anything other than an extract, or does it? Interestingly enough, there is yet another chili from Assam, India, called the bhut jalakai or raja mirchi (ghost or poison chili) and it supposedly registers a reading of 1,041,427 SHU. The Michauds believe that the Dorset Naga, the naga morich, the bhut jalakai, the raja mirchi, and other landrace naga varieties, (all C. chinense peppers) from that region, North Bangladesh/North East India, may all be related. During the interview, Joy expressed surprise that there was so much excitement generated over their peppers. After all, such hot peppers are common in the ethnic shops catering to immigrant Bangladeshis where they found their naga morich peppers. With a laugh, Joy writes, "Michael's favourite quote is that these chillies are the world's best kept secret. Only him, me (sic) and a million Bangladeshis know about it!"

Joy tells us that this year's Naga crop is about 1-2 feet high already and they expect the fruit to be ready to be picked by late July. Once grown, the Dorset Naga is easier to tell from the naga morich, mostly because the plants themselves grow twice as tall and the fruit are much larger.

Shown here, side by side, the naga morich is on the left, the Dorset Naga, on the right.

Regardless of when the fruit are ripe, don't expect to be able to buy any fresh Dorset Naga unless you live in Britain. The Michaud's will only ship to a British address.

The Michauds also sell to a few selected sauce makers, their main buyer being a Bangladeshi family. A few years ago the Michauds’ regular buyer had let them down and they had masses of naga laden with fruit and no one to buy them. Joy contacted the Bangladeshi sauce makers, who weren't really sure they wanted the peppers. Joy sent them a sample anyway. Once they had the pepper in their hands, they changed their minds and suddenly, Joy and Michael couldn't grow enough! Last year the Michauds had to limit their hot sauce maker to only 10 kilograms of fruit a week. The majority of the chilies the sauce maker needs are imported from Bangladesh.

The Dorset Naga, although large for their size, are very thin skinned with a large cavity, so the Michauds get about 200 fruit per kilo. The plants are so bushy, that Joy actually has to search for the chilies. Perhaps she should call it the Hide and Seek Naga! Joy picks all of the peppers herself. They are so hot; she won't let anyone else do it. Interestingly, the peppers are not always bush-ripened. The Bangladeshis who eat the naga prefer the peppers green.

Michael and Joy joked that they should set up a competition to see who can come up with a hotter pepper. Michael figures it would be a great way to get more people intermingling with the Bangladeshi communities; they would go into their shops, where meeting the people and talking with them will help break down barriers.

If you are going to go around to the shops that Bangladeshi immigrants frequent, you might find these little green chili pods that don't look special, but there they will be. The Bangladeshi pepper is always sold green, so it is hard to extract viable seed, but the Michauds managed it, so it is possible.

At the moment the Michauds are not selling seed of Dorset Naga. They have applied for plant variety protection and the seed is likely to be available after this year’s season. There has been a sudden flurry of naga seeds being sold on the internet, but this is not Dorset Naga, and may be the seed collected from the unripe fruit sold in the ethnic shops. It is also rumoured that some of the seeds might actually be the PCP Red Savina.

We had a customer of ours bring us a plant he called a Mr. Naga. After showing the pictures of Mr. Naga to Joy, she concurs, Mr. Naga was most definitely a naga morich. So, indeed, we have had the honour of tasting the now famous pepper. What's sad, is that last fall Mr. Naga lost all of his leaves and one of our employees thinking him dead, tossed the plant. In case you are wondering, the fruit on Mr. Naga was the hottest pepper I have ever tasted and it actually left our Peppermaster feeling like he'd been punched in the chest. It took his breath away and he had to sit down.

The fruit of the now defunct Peppermaster Mr. Naga plant.

I asked Joy if she and Michael eat the peppers they grow, and if so, what their favourite way to eat them was. She told me that they do eat the peppers, just not the Dorset Naga, it is too hot for them. She made the point that they both love the habanero and its wonderful flavour, asking if I had ever tried using it for tomato ketchup or for a fruit-based pasta sauce. Then she commented that they used a habanero specially bred for its mildness. Lover of the habanero that I am, I would love to taste this mild-bred habanero, even if I would end up adding heat afterwards.

Over the years, Joy and Michael have come to specialize more and more in chilies, but they continue to grow other crops. The Michauds sell a lot of Mexican chilies and as such they grow the vegetables that would go best with those chilies, hence the growing of tomatillos. In a chili business like theirs, the Michauds need to offer a variety of peppers, covering the full range of heat, so, they have always included a hot habanero pepper. To be able to supply all the chilies in their catalogue right from the beginning of the season they aim to synchronize the first harvest of their chilies. This was difficult with the habanero as these peppers tend to ripen later than other types and normally should be picked ripe. But when, a Pakistani friend mentioned a fruity flavoured Bangladeshi chili eaten green. A little checking and it turned out that the chili was a habanero and because it is traditionally eaten in its green stage, could be picked several weeks earlier than usual. That was the beginning.

Joy and Michael would like everyone to know that they aren't fraudsters. They aren't about to claim that their peppers are the hottest anyone could get. The only claim the Michauds have made is that these two HPLC tests were carried out on a pure sample of their peppers. The tests, both conducted by reputable American HPLC testing facilities, recommended, Joy adds, by people in the US chili industry, gave their pepper sample an average score of over 900,000 SHU. They have sent their results to Guinness to apply for the World Record, and in the event that Guinness, and indeed the rest of the world would like more proof, wait a while, the Michauds intend to retest this summer.

It's funny that two agronomists who prefer the milder peppers should develop something so hot they can't eat it. In fact, both Joy and Michael downplay the macho chili eating, lovers of peppers, they prefer to enjoy their flavours whether, mild or hot.

Drugs don't Kill Kids, Lack of Parental Responsibility Kills Kids!

2006-04-21T12:32:00.000-04:00

If you've been following my blog for a while, then you'll know about the teen who died from a drug overdose. Said death touching way too close for me. Well, the saga continues.

Last week, my eleven year old son came home from elementary school with a letter in his hand that confused him. The letter was from the school, they were planning on April 21 to hold a pajama day and each child would donate at least $1 to have the privilege of wearing said pajamas and the monies collected would be used to plant a tree in honour of this young girl who had "passed away".

"Mommy," my bright little boy asked, "why are they planting a tree for her, didn't she overdose on drugs?".

He showed me the letter. It gave no mention of "drug awareness", it gave no mention of the lesson to be taught from planting this tree, and indeed, left ME wondering why a tree was being planted.

I phoned the school.

I was told that the children of the school had decided to erect the tree to remember a classmate who'd died. I was left with the impression that regardless of what insensibility this project might have, it was closed to discussion and there would be no further discussion on the matter, it was set. I requested the Principal call me.

That was last Thursday.

Yesterday, after no response from the Principal, I wrote a letter and rather than write several letters, I decided to write one open letter.

This is the letter:

(The young girl's name has been removed to protect her family).

========================================================

I am writing this open letter to tell you how irresponsible I find the to-date shoddy planning of "Pajama Day", this Friday at Mount Pleasant. Allowing the children to memorialize the death of this girl in this manner is an affront to any parent hoping to teach their children not to go where this girl went.

It makes sense to me that these children want to do something to remember the fact that one of their ex-school mates has died. But I find it insensible that the guiding adults at this school are allowing the desires of the children to proceed, seemingly, without wise adult guidance.

This girl died using illegal drugs. Sending a letter home to parents asking them to donate money to purchase a tree to memorialize a child who "passed away" puts this girl's death on par with that of our recently deceased teacher, Mr. Nagy or someone who might have passed away due to leukemia or some other malady. Furthermore, simply planting a tree in her honour without surrounding the function with an opportunity to teach our children not to do drugs, is thoughtless, irresponsible and misguided.

Stevie was a bright child, with a bright future and her life was snuffed out because she voluntarily did Ecstasy.

Aside from planting a tree, there are many ways that the children of Mount Pleasant can remember this girl without turning her into a bizarre cult figure who simply "passed away".

The RCMP, across Canada offers the DARE program to elementary schools. This program sends trained police officers into the schools to teach children how to avoid using and misuing tobacco, alcohol, marijuana and other drugs, such as ecstasy.

The D.A.R.E. curriculum includes both the K-4 Visitation Program, and the Elementary (5th/6th grade) curriculum. These programs are specifically designed for the children of Mount Pleasant and the workbooks are available in both French and English.

DARE is a comprehensive prevention program designed to equip school children with the skills to recognize and resist social and peer pressures to experiment with tobacco, alcohol, other drugs and violence.

The D.A.R.E. workbooks cost .89 per student, and I believe that instigating an annual D.A.R.E. day program, designed to raise money to help pay for this program, is a better memorial to this girl than simply planting a tree.

I would further hope that the plaque that accompanies this "memorial" tree will state clearly the mistake that Stevie made in doing the illegal drugs that took her short life, so as to not give undue honour to Stevie's death.

It seems highly plausible to me that had Mount Pleasant had such a program in place on an annual basis, this girl's death might have been avoided.

I would suggest that taking the adult upper hand and guiding the children to do something to memorialize Stevie, by instigating a program such as D.A.R.E. within the walls of Mount Pleasant will have far more future value to our children than simply planting a tree.

In protest of this lack of thought, I will be keeping my son home from "pajama day".

I do hope that you and the other teachers involved will put a little more thought into this project.

==========================================

I guess someone (or several someones) that I sent the letter to decided to forward it. Perhaps they agreed, perhaps they didn't, but the letter ended up in the hands of someone who for whatever reason didn't think this is any of my business. They called to tell me so, and the conversation ended with them threatening me.

I understand, all too well, how painful such a situation can be for people, but that's no excuse to threaten someone's life. I called the police and filed a report, but didn't press charges. I might have empathy, but I don't take chances with folks I don't know very well.

Later that afternoon, I received a phone call finally from the Principal. He was a little annoyed that I wrote the letter. He said he'd been given the impression that the "problem" was taken care of. I guess it wasn't, surprise, surprise.

I spoke to him for about an hour and he left me with the words; "You raise some very valid points", resonating in my ears. Unfortunately, I have nothing in my head, nor my heart that leads me to believe that the letter or the phone conversation changed anything. We'll see.

I told him that I believed that several parents had already dropped the ball when it came to this girl's death and that I couldn't simply sit idle and watch it get dropped again. And I mean it. Wednesday night, the town community center is holding a drug awareness meeting. I will be there. I wonder if the tree planting will come up as a topic of conversation? I hope it does. If we're to leave a legacy for our children, it should be one of truth. And the truth is, this girl died from lack of parental supervision.

She was at a friend's home for a sleepover. There was no parent. The two girls went to the house of a third kid, slightly older and again, there was no parent. The kids did ecstasy, and one of them is now dead. Where were these kids' parents? I don't know where these kids' parents were or what they were thinking.

What I do know is that three families, already in crisis, have been destroyed by this incident and I've taken it upon myself to make sure that someone who has the time to do so, picks up the ball, and runs with it. And I really hope I find someone, because if I don't, I feel I will have to be the one to run with the ball, and I really don't have the time for it.

In the event that I don't find someone to run with the ball, I've been doing some research. I've learned several things.

Teaching kids to "Just say "NO"!", and programs like "Scared Straight" and "D.A.R.E." may only work on little kids. By the time these kids are teens and are into fully experiencing life, wanting to be adults before their time, these programs aren't enough. So the next questions are: What is enough?; What works?; and, Why don't these programs work?

Unfortunately the answers to these questions are a little elusive. Mostly because not everything works for everyone. So is there a bandaid, one size fits all solution? or is there a lot of work to do?

A woman named Dr. Marsha Rosenbaum started the Safety First program, a Reality-Based Approach to Teens, Drugs, and Drug Education in 1999. The program came about after the San Francisco Chronicle published a letter that Rosenbaum had written to her teenage son, as he started high school. Rosenbaum's idea was to put in place realistic strategies that her son could use as he wended his way through this new path in his life.

Dr. Rosenbaum earned a PhD in Medical Sociology at the University of California at San Francisco in 1979, and was a recipient of study grants from the National Institute on Drug Abuse for eighteen years. Dr. Rosenbaum has completed studies on Crack and Heroin addiction as well as ECSTASY and drug treatment.

I printed Dr. Rosenbaum's brochure: Safety First: Teens and Drugs. and will offer free copies to anyone who wants one, at Wednesday's meeting. And I hope to find someone enough in support of something like this to really want to run with it. And ultimately, please, cross your fingers that I'm not really alone in this; that would kill me.

Me out.

Are You Trying to Kill Yourself or Your Dinner Guests???

2006-03-19T18:34:00.000-05:00

While blog browsing today, I came upon a recipe for hot pepper oils for home growers written by John Laumer of Philadelphia for Treehugger.com a site for organicophiles. Being the capiscumophile I am I found the blog by blogsearching "hot peppers". Why am I blogging about it??? Because homemade hot pepper oils are dangerously friendly to the clostridium botunlinum bacteria; better known to the rest of us as botulism.

Botulism is a disease caused by the flourishing of the clostridium botulinum bacteria. There are numerous outbreaks of foodborne botulism occuring almost every year and more often than not, they are caused by eating contaminated home-canned foods. An average of 110 cases are reported every year.

Symptoms of botulism include double vision, blurred vision, drooping eyelids, slurred speech, difficulty swallowing, dry mouth, and muscle weakness. Untreated, these early symptoms can progress to paralysis, which ultimately is why you want to be very careful not to get botulism to begin with. Paralysis, when it gets into your lungs is a one way ticket to death. If you know what I mean.

Botulism symptoms, according to the CDC, occur between 18 and 36 hours of eating contaminated foodstuffs. BUT, they warn that they can occur as early as 6 hours after eating something tainted or as late as 10 days later.

Botulism treatment requires injection of an antitoxin and although the antitoxin can slow the effects of the botulism, reversing it fully can take up to several weeks. The good news is that whereas botulism induced paralysis can be fatal, over the last 50 years, deaths from it have been reduced from 50% to less than 8%. Oh, the miracles of modern medicine. Cases of severe botulism can put you on a breathing machine for as long as it takes for the antitoxin to allow your system to return to normal. That can take several months. Someone who survives botulism poisoning can have fatigue and shortness of breath for years and require long-term therapy in order to completely recover.

In other words, botulism is a bad thing.

The good news is that botulism is easily prevented.

More often than not, when one is talking about home-canning procedures, one needs worry about botulism for low-acid content foods. I, being a hot pepper afficianado need not worry about such things, I'm not about to home-can anything low-acid. Indeed, if I'm to home-can anything it will be hot peppers. Well, now technically, in my case, I suppose "home-canning" is actually "professional processing", but, well, you get the idea. At any rate, although our "professional processing" is just that, my company uses "home-canning" methods, only on a more commercial scale.

Peppermaster hot sauces, to-date, doesn't have any peppers packed in oil, yet. And, truth be told, the reason we don't is primarily because of botulism.

Strict hygienic procedures are required to avoid contamination of foods and even so, once processed, oils infused with garlic, herbs or hot peppers should be refrigerated. Fortunately, botulism is destroyed by high temperatures, so, persons who eat such foods should consider boiling the food for 10 minutes before eating it to ensure safety. As reticent as I am to get involved in hot peppered oils, the Peppermaster assures me that when we do so, this won't be a concern of ours.

My fear, if you will, is that our customers will take our lovely peppered oils and then have to boil them for ten minutes in order to be sure that they won't get botulism. And of course, after reading the CDC website, one might come to this conclusion.

After much research, I've come to the conclusion that in order to properly put peppers into oil, one must be very concerned about moisture levels. Avoiding at all costs, following the FDA's recommendation that one add microbial inhibitors or acidifying agents. We will NOT be using citric acid; or microbial chemical anythings.

If you are going to home-can your peppers and pack them in oil, do yourself a favour and add citric acid. Then, when you boil the product, do so for no less than 10 minutes and add five minutes for every 5000 feet of elevation you live above sea level.

If you want to be really safe, simply blanch your peppers, cover them with water and then boil the jar for 15 minutes. Then, you can safely add the oil right before cooking... Bye bye botulism risk.

Me out.