My Recommendations

The Byward Market in Ottawa is the obvious tourist hot spot in the city, boasting the latest and arguably, greatest restaurants. Stella Osteria has been around for a few years, affiliated with Luxe Bistro and the Blue Cactus. Rated highly by the local paper and magazines, we had high hopes. The hostess at the front was wonderful and attentive - if she was the standard for their service, the evening would have been wonderful. Sadly, she wasn't. From Wikipedia, "Osteria" in Italian literally means a place where the owner "hosts" people. Food is generally regional and prepared with local recipes, and often served at shared tables. We've been to Mozza Osteria in Los Angeles - that felt exactly as described above. I'm not sure if the owners of Stella truly have that in mind, because the experience didn't hit that tone at all. Food First off, the portions are very large. It would be enough to only have three appetizers for a table of four. It was i...

While the main fan site is on RKOP , Common Pleasure is a great site for Jason Mraz audiophiles, wanting to go through his entire discography and perhaps better, all of the songs he has ever performed. The site host (Jon, I believe) has amassed one of the most complete listing of Mraz's work (he also records some of his shows with amazing quality). The forums don't have a lot but the information contained within the site (which is remarkably well updated - details from shows from April 2010 are all there). This is really the kind of site for those fans who want to catch up on older tunes but also any fan who wants to find the latest shows and what was played. Highly recommended.

Mozza Osteria is a restaurant co-owned by celebrity chef Mario Batali and Nancy Silverton. Our experience was amazing. Expectations were high - and they did not disappoint - in fact exceeded. We were 5 mins late for our 5:45 reservation - and they got us in (lineup after 7pm ) and made my wife's birthday dinner a meal to remember. Our daughter said "most amazing meal experience in her life". Every bite was an amazing set of layers - and the service was phenomenal. Not rushed - amazingly helpful and the price was actually lower than expected. We could not have asked for a better evening. Served by a group of professionals all of whom were exceptional, the experience felt like a tour. If you had been there before, you felt they would have let you do your own thing - but as first timers, they didn't push all of the food, making simple but amazing recommendations ("you don't need four dishes, only take three and mix them"). Including dessert, wine a...

Always recommend Jason Mraz (an amazing song-writer and great guitarist) - but even more so with his final performance of the Gratitude Cafe tour in San Diego, CA, singing the following: ( In My Life, the Beatles ) - although some lyrics were missed, this was beautiful. But it also reminds me of one of his original songs, 1000 things. A slightly different sentiment but somehow quite similar, about how after all , there is one thing you remember: "But I stopped my counting when I saw your face Erasing memory, well I feel as though I've never seen a face before Until I saw your eyes And they're smiling back at me through my tears I've been counting all these years, oh Suddenly the thousand things I've seen were nothing more than dreams of Of you and me" --- Jason Mraz Mraz is often considered fairly egotistical in his writing - but with the renditions of these songs, I think he shows what a wonderful guitarist and lyricist he is. ...

Company: Wine Garden (West) - RECOMMENDED The Wine Garden is a wine-making company, similar yet different to make-your-own-wine businesses but with a twist. Most wine making companies offer juices or concentrates, where you have to purchase large quantities of juice and then wait (usually longer than 2 months) to receive your wine. The end result? It's up in the air. The Wine Garden is different. Yes, you still have to pre-order the wine but what is available is a wide variety of taste and price. Most of the juices offered all come from the Maipo valley in Chile, where their provider provides grapes directly from a first-press vineyard. While there are third-press juices like many companies, the treat is in the Wine Garden's first-press grapes, frozen grapes brought up right from various regions. Matt and Kevin, the owners, take special attention in the pressing and fermentation process. These first-press grapes can take upwards of six months but are stored in beautiful Hungar...

Company: WestJet Airlines - RECOMMENDED There are effectively two major airlines in Canada: Air Canada and WestJet. Air Canada has gone from being a government subsidized airline to a private company, gobbling up other private airlines. WestJet is the latest of airline companies who provide competition with Air Canada for across the country, as well as some international flights. We recently flew to Vancouver from Ottawa. This was the first time we have flown on WestJet and based on our experience, we would definitely fly them again. On the way out, we had a brief stop-over in Calgary. The flight attendants on both flights were friendly, attentive and in the case of Michael, hilarious. Michael made a "show" of the emergency announcements and both times, got the attention of most passengers, to the point of making the other flight attendant laugh during her announcements. Only downside was on the flight back where the pilots did not welcome the passengers on-board (a small thi...

Company: Around the Home Handyman - Norm (Norman) Richter - NOT RECOMMENDED This company is NOT Recommended. Here is a link to their BBB listing. Note that the Around the Home BBB rating is not an "A" as noted on other sites. (something I don't usually do here is comment on individual businesses or go on non-technical tirades. This is an exception to the rule - so if you're looking for tech comments, please ignore). On a personal note, I can appreciate people can't work for free these days. It's tough - but any company who offers a one-year guarantee for their work should not be charging for problems with existing work (new work, yes - but work that they originally did? Absolutely not). We have used Around the Home handyman services, owned by Norm Richter (also listed as Norman Richter) for two separate pieces of work: roofing and flooring. The roofing job was done extremely well and on budget. After the flooring work, we will never use them again. T...