This week we have been mostly looking at pretty water art from the great Heinz Maier.
If you're currently being affected by late afternoon boredom, Heinz's website might be your remedy. You can find it here http://500px.com/cymaii
This week we have been mostly looking at pretty water art from the great Heinz Maier.
If you're currently being affected by late afternoon boredom, Heinz's website might be your remedy. You can find it here http://500px.com/cymaii
Exciting news. Our friends at the Department of Time are offering an unlimited number of our lucky drinkers the chance to win a free day next week*. That's right — one whole day, absolutely free.
All you have to do to take us up on this once-in-every-4-years offer is let us know what you plan to do with it. So don't delay, tell us what you'll be getting up to below and extend your year by one whole day. We'll pick the best, then to claim your prize just wake up as normal on Wednesday 29th February and go out and do something you wouldn't normally do. Something fun and a little bit reckless like eating breakfast at the nice organic cafe down the road, or having a full body massage and a mani-pedi. Your working week will move seamlessly from Tuesday to Thursday, without anyone noticing you didn’t show up on Wednesday.
It may sound too good to be true but there's no catch. Promise.
*Caribbean holiday not included. Only one prize per person. The free day must be claimed on Wednesday 29th of February. Prize is not transferable and no cash alternative will be offered. No household chores or criminal activity are to be undertaken on the free day. innocent accept no responsibility for employees failing to turn up for work.
We're giving up pictures.
The Scale of the Universe - zoom from the far reaches of outter space down to some Quantom foam.
The butter in our kitchen can sometimes be a bit hard, but over the years we've all found our own way of getting around the issue.
Some of us are in no rush, and come back later. Others hold it over the hot toaster to warm it up a bit.
There's always one though, who simply can't wait.
But then who are we to judge? They probably just prefer it that way.
If you're wondering why the shop down the road's out of lemons and panicking about what to put on your pancakes tonight, then you'd better hot foot it over to Menton, in the South of France, where if you're very careful and exceptionally good at Jenga, you'll be able to pluck a couple from one of these constructions.
Noone seems to talk about Pancake Day anymore. Maybe it's not cool to pan fry batter, chuck it about a bit then coat it with lemon and sugar. Maybe noone knows how to make batter these days. Or maybe, despite all the hype, they just don't taste very nice.
Who cares? Pancake Day is the one night in the whole year when you don't have to have a proper tea. There are no greens to plough through, no food groups to tick off, just eggs, flour, butter and milk all mixed together on a plate with your topping of choice. We can't think of anything we'd rather be eating tomorrow night.
Friday is day of mixed emotion. There's relief and excitement that the weekend is within sight, but often disappointment at how little you've managed to achieve during the week.
But Friday is not a day to be glum, so let go of that end of week lack of achievement angst, pour yourself a nice chilled drink and put everything that was left on today's to-do list straight onto Monday's. Obviously there's no way you'll get all of it done on Monday, but that doesn't matter. For Monday is a day of promise, a day when anything seems possible, yet nothing seems to actually happen. Mondays pass in a blur of tea, weekend confessionals and moaning. It's Tuesday when reality kicks in again, and by then it's almost Friday anyway. Welcome to the hamster wheel of modern life.
For when only a refreshing mix of clam juice and tomatoes will do.
Well played sir.
A few enterprising souls are doing cake deliveries in Fruit Towers today to raise money for Body and Soul, a charity supporting children, young people and families affected by HIV. The idea is that those of us who didn't spend the whole night baking wonky-looking offerings can pay to have them delivered to someone we like in the office. Or, in the case of the heart shaped lemony biscuits, someone whose teeth we'd quite like to break.
...to be eating cauliflower, parsnips, potatoes, celeriac and purple sprouting broccoli. Fruit fans should wrap their chops around British apples and pears.
A tasty veg curry and some baked fruit sound pretty good to us.
You can find more recipes and tips for reducing food waste at Love Food Hate Waste, and up to date information on what's in season at Eat The Seasons.
...make sure you wear something decent for that special lady in your life.
Happy Valentine's Day.
Valentine's Day. You either love it, hate it, really hate it, or barely acknowledge it. There's no denying though that it causes many of us to reflect on one of two things: your relationship, or your lack of a relationship.
With this in mind we'd like you to send us a picture (tweeted to @innocentdrinks with the hashtag #loveduplonewolf, or uploaded to our Facebook page). In this picture, you must either show us:
1. How deliriously happy you and your other half are (a la loved up Claire and Jeremy)
2. How deliriously happy you are without an other half (a la lone wolf Lilly. Note the framed Hoff pic).
We'll post our favourites throughout the day on Twitter and no doubt send a load of drinks to those pictures that have truly nailed the concept of 'delirious happiness'.
Remember, tweet @innocentdrinks with #loveduplonewolf or upload to our Facebook page, and never, EVER, take yourself too seriously (we couldn't give a monkey's whether your 'other half' is actually your real other half or not - staggeringly, Claire and Jeremy are just friends - we'd just love some funny pictures).
It's Valentine's Day tomorrow. And if you haven't already made plans for the one you love/lust/like, there's still time to pull something special out the bag. Here are a few ideas to get the romance section of your brain fired up:
1. Make a personalised smoothie label.
Just click here to unleash your inner Casanova and pen your declarations of love (or pinch one of the ones we've already written). Then, print it out and stick it onto a smoothie bottle, hand it over and wait patiently for them to succumb to your charms.
2.Make a 3D chalk creation that your loved one will see on their way to work.
Something love inspired would be nice. You'd better get started now.
3. Write them a hug note on a post-it.
4. Have a carpet picnic complete with Malteser tiffin and homemade tortilla chips and salsa dip.
5. Send an e-card of a loved up pair of animals via Friends of the Earth. Another environmentally friendly option is to reuse a card from a previous year.
7. Make a mix CD.
Vickers got this for her birthday and we're all pretty jealous. It's got the 32 songs that have been number one on her birthday each year.
8. Embrace your inner cynic, hop on board the "Valentine's Day was invented by the card companies" bus and let it pass unnoticed. If your beloved complains, question why you loving them every other day of the year isn't enough.
Some of Fruit Towers' fittest are cycling from London to Brighton soon to raise money for Body and Soul, a charity supporting children, young people and families affected by HIV. Today they've donned their lycra to raise awareness and collect our loose change by keeping an exercise bike going for the whole day.
We think that's a brave effort for a Monday.
Here's Philippa W doing her shift.
Fancy having a Daal curry this lunch? There's a musical treat if you do.
On the inside of the new Daal veg pots there's a record player with a list of songs, all of which are related to food. So tune in, pop your veg pot in the microwave and have a sing-a-long whilst you eat.
Here is the link as well for those not having a Daal curry but who still want the tunes: www.innocentdrinks.co.uk/lunchmusic
Meet Fruit Towers' latest resident, Gary Goyle. Our office superhero, Conor, came across young Gary at the local garden centre and couldn't resist bringing him back with him. Gary hasn't been welcomed by everyone though, as Neil the gnome, who might have been called Gary in a previous life, has taken to turning him round each night to face the flower trough. Spooky stuff.
Today is our juice carafe's first birthday. To celebrate we sang happy birthday, we played pass the parcel and Dave F's wife made this rather lovely orange sponge cake. Being an inanimate object our carafe wasn't able to enjoy the cake, so we did the decent thing and helped it out. It was delicious.
You may also remember that last week we set you the challenge of writing an ode to our juice carafe. We had some cracking entries but there could only be 3 winners, so a big well done to Lydia, Paulme and Becky whose tales of hullabaloo, marching bands and vodka made us smile a lot.
Its our juice carafe's first birthday,
We are planning to have a great laugh,
All our staff will be singing hip hip hip hooray,
For the success of our posh jug, the carafe.
The apples and oranges, all of our fruits,
The staff, and Richard Reed too,
Are going to strip down to their birthday suits,
And cause quite a hullabaloo.
It's our juice carafe's first birthday
A Juice of high repute
Twelve months of loving labour
Devoted to the fruit
The finest natural product
From Innocent to you
Add a drop of Vodka
And make it naughty too
It's our juice carafe's first birthday,
Bring on the marching band,
Bursting with fruit and here to stay,
They're the zest-iest in the land.
So let's dance for joy and celebrate,
Gather round all your friends,
'Cos they're never made from concentrate,
And there's even some exciting new blends.
Thanks to everyone who entered and congratulations to Lydia, Paulme and Becky. A case of our juice will be on its way to you shortly.
Ryan sent us an email earlier this week. We like it. A lot. Ryan is a man that knows what he likes.
"im ryan im 5 and i lik yor jooce lodsi luv bananana strorberie and greapesi asked mumee to buy me mor cos i luv them so mutchi just wantd to sey fankyou for macking nise drinks for meeeeeeei dru you a pikture of me and my drink
fankyooooooooou
ryan"
Here is Ryan's picture.
We asked if Ryan would mind us posting his email and picture on our blog and, according to his mum, he was over the moon. 'The world needs to see my beautiful picture,' he said.
Imagine coming across this on a park stroll.
An unexpected side effect of the 2010 flooding in parts of Sindh, Pakistan, was that millions of spiders climbed up into the trees to escape the rising flood waters; because of the scale of the flooding and the fact that the water took so long to recede, many trees became cocooned in spiderwebs.
We like fruit and we like sitting down, so really it was only a matter of time before we got ourselves a bench modelled on a banana.
It wasn't something we could create ourselves though, so luckily help came in the form of builder and wood carver extraordinaire Neil Melville Rae.
The banana is one of a number of fruit sculptures that Neil's been working on which were submitted to last year's Arundel Gallery Trail as an exhibition called "The Temple of the Strange Fruit".
The wood used for the sculptures came from a 200 year old oak tree which was sourced locally to Neil in West Sussex. The tree had been dead for some time and was in a dangerous condition, so it was carefully felled and put to good use.
Here's the model for the banana sculpture.
And here it is being made.
It took a few strapping men to carry it in.
And now it sits pride of place in the chill out.
At a loss as to what to get your beloved this Valentine's Day? Need to atone for last year's diamond ring keyring stunt? Maybe we can help, as we've got 3 luxury Valentine's Day breakfast in bed hampers from Forman & Field to give away. Stuffed full of bubbles (of the drinking variety not the blowing kind), smoked salmon, coffee, jam, crispbreads and lots of innocent smoothies, we'll even arrange the hamper to be delivered straight to whoever it is you want to spoil.
To be in with a chance of winning, all you have to do is tell us about the worst romantic gift/gesture you've ever been on the receiving end of below by 9am on Monday February 13th. The 3 that we feel most sorry for will be rewarded with a delicious hamper and our deepest sympathies.
This competition is now closed. Thanks to everyone who entered, and well done to Linda Guest, Stana Magnusova and Alison Blencowe who won the hampers.