Go Nuts Donuts just sent me 2 dozen donuts to my office to try out. I am now waiting for the rest of the team to come in so we can dig into them. So far I have my eye on the chocolate donut with marshmallows.
Category: Kuwait
The Donuts are here!
My Escalade Experience
After I posted the picture of the new Escalade earlier in the month I got a phone call from Alghanim Automotive marketing people telling me I could take the car out for a ride. So yesterday I took it for a ride and wow what a ride.
The first thing I noticed once I got into the car was how beautiful the interior was. As I mentioned before, unlike the old Escalade who’s interior I found extremely boring and “American”, the new Escalade is much more cleaner and very European. The interior detailing is extraordinary and extremely comforting on the eye. It’s really a huge leap over the old one. The drivers seat was also extremely comfortable and I was quickly able to adjust it and the mirrors before I left the dealership.
I took the car out to the Gulf Road and went cruising. The engine is unbelievable, with over 400HP it just wants to go faster and faster. I had a hard time keeping it at 80KM/h, there is just soo much power in it that a slight tap on the gas and you’re already at the speed limit. Of course speed limits are meant to be broken when no radar cameras are around so as soon as I passed one I slammed on the gas for an earth-shattering kick down. The engine (which comes from the Corvette) just suddenly took on a new life and turned the classy quiet Escalade into a scary loud hotrod.. it was incredible.
After driving for a while I decided to park the car and take some pictures plus explore the various features of the car. The coolest thing I found was the trunk since its fully automated. Basically the old trunk was very heavy to open and close especially for woman so the new trunk is motorized. You press a button on the handle and step back while the door opens up. You press another button and the trunk closes down. I even recorded a video of it, which you can watch [Here]. The car currently doesn’t come with a Navigation system but by the end of the year they will not only be coming with a built in Navigation system but also 3 screens in the back (it currently has 1) and the ability to play a different movie on every screen, plus 3 other people in the car could also listen to 3 different CDs all at the same time using wireless headphones. So in total 6 people could be watching or listening to 6 different things all at the same time.
The exterior of the car has also changed a lot although it still closely resembles the older model. You still have the over sized headlights for example which allows you to spot an Escalade from a mile away. The new Escalades also come with 22inch rims as standard and soon official body kits will be made available by Cadillac so anyone will be able to pimp their ride at the dealer. When driving around on the Gulf Road the car is an eye catcher. It can’t not be since the car is huge and I was driving the Pearl White version so I was sparkling under the sun.
I had a lot of fun driving the car around and when I brought it back to the dealer, the manager gave me a detailed tour of the cars features. If I had the money I would have bought the car right on the spot which brings me to the final point, the price. The new Cadillac Escalade starts from KD20,900 which is cheaper then a Range Rover but more expensive then the Lexus. It’s in a pretty nice position at the moment and I am sure once the car is more widely available the price will come down a bit more. If I had to choose between a Range Rover and the new Escalade it would be a really tough decision, luckily it’s not a decision I am likely to make anytime soon.
Here are some pictures and videos I shot:
Picture of Escalade’s interior
Picture of Escalade’s Exterior
Another picture of the Escalade’s Exterior
Video of trunk opening and closing
Video of a tour around the car
Where have you been
Hmmmm I just got a jar of Choowy Goowy cookies. Its been like forever since I last had some. Yummmyyy…
Free iTunes Song
I was at Sultan Center and I spotted the new packages of Lucky Charms. The new packages have a cool promotion where they now come with codes inside that let you get a free song of your choice from iTunes. Now thats cool..
The cheapest Big Mac is in China, where it costs $1.30, compared with $4.93 in Switzerland which is the most expensive. Kuwait is not on the chart but a Big Mac here costs $2.76. [Link]
12-inch Apple PowerBook
G4 867mhz
640MB Ram
40GB Hard Disk
Combo Drive (CDwriter + DVD Reader)
Builtin Bluetooth and Airport Express (wifi)
Brand new battery
Extras included: Fire engine red foof case, old battery (holds over an hour charge), original cds, regular mouse, external display adapter
Laptop condition is very good except for minor issue with screen, there is a dark shadow on the bottom left corner of the screen. Here is a picture of it.
Asking price: KD250
Update: Its been sold
Its Fiber Optics
The past week I have been driving to work using the Gulf Road. On my way I kept spotting this group of American looking people on the side of the road (on the side going towards Salmiya) with their GMC’s parked up on the side walk and a little shade setup. I thought maybe they were shooting a TV commercial but then I noticed that everyday they would move a bit. First time I saw them they were in front of Burj al Hamam restaurant, then I saw them near Fridays and just now on my way back from the beach I saw them near Marina Mall. So, I decided to u-turn and stop and ask them what they were doing.
I park the car and open my window and a guy comes towards me, I ask him if he minds telling me what they are doing since I keep seeing them in a different spot every day. The guy replies back to me with an Australian accent that they are installing fiber optic cables. I thank him and drive off.
So mystery solved, now if you see the SUVs parked on the side of the road you know why they are there.
update: a reader mentioned the following article related to fiber optics in Kuwait. Looks like we might be getting some good stuff. [Link]
Fire in the Shuwaikh Port
There seems to be a large fire at the Shuwaikh port. According to Stallion, a storage warehouse inside the port compound between the ugly blue building and the free trade zone caught fire.
Click here to view the picture above in big
Note: Picture taken by Stallion
Whale Shark caught in Kuwait
Someone emailed me these pictures of a huge Whale Shark that was caught in Kuwait. I don’t know when these pictures were taken but since I haven’t heard about this before it could be very recent. Seems the pictures are old but you still check them out below..
Fire in Hawalli
Mr. Bo9agr has pictures of a fire that happened in Hawalli. I can’t read the Arabic but the building looks like the one I park in front of when I go to get my computer stuff. Its near Walla’a Complex. [Link]
My MacBook is here!! Its soooooooooooooo white (like me!!!). As with all my electronic devices I name them after characters from the Transformers cartoon. My MacBook is going to be called Ratchet who was the white doctor transformer. Everyone say hi…
update: Here are my first impressions…
– The edge of the MacBook below the trackpad where my wrists rest is sharp and so is causing red horizontal lines to appear
– The screen is fucking bright, brighter then my Lacie CRT which is right next to me
– The battery life is amazing, I got the MacBook at 12:30 and it had a 75% charge. I played with it a bit and then played it with through out most of my lunch (1-2) then came back to work and I have had my MacBook open ever since installing software and stuff and it still tells me I have 1 hour of juice left and its currently 4:06PM.
– It feels a lot bigger then the 12″ PowerBook
– No overheating issue so far and I haven’t even heard the fan come on
– I need more RAM, haven’t had any problems yet but I imagine everything would be moving a lot faster once I install 2GB of RAM
– Wifi reception is amazing, suddenly I see 5 networks where with the PowerBooks in the office I usually only see 1
– They keyboard feels normal, nothing weird at all
– The trackpad button feels a little soft
– I have absolutly no use for iSight
– I hate FrontRow and Dashboard, just disabled both
– I love how the MacBook closes.. no more latch, just like the old clamshell ibooks
And thats all for now…
…but I can’t touch it! Its held in customs and will be cleared only by tomorrow morning. I mentally prepared myself to get it today and now I am left hanging with no MacBook. Urgh I can’t wait till tomorrow!
International Optics
One of the best customer service in Kuwait can be found at International Optics. The employees there are always extremely friendly and professional.
The other day we passed by them because Geo had chewed up Nats glasses after she accidentally left them on the table and they were completely destroyed. The frames plastic was bent, the metal thing on the side was scratched like crazy and he had chewed one of the glasses. She was about to throw them away when I told her they might be saved. So we went to the International Optics branch in Central Plaza and showed it to this one guy. He asked what had happened to it and I told him my dog chewed it. He of course found that funny and shared it with his fellow employees. He told me to come back the next day at the same time and we left.
Next day we went back and I realized I should have taken a before and after shot because what they did was incredible. They actually bent the frame (plastic and all) back to the right shape, they polished the front to remove all the scratches and the side metal was repainted. It was hard to believe this was the same glasses. If they had come and told me we threw your glasses away because they were unfixable I would have said ok but instead they fixed the glasses and they only charged us KD10 to replace the one scratched glass.
This is not the first time they were this helpful, I have had problems with my other shades and they always took care it. Anyway I figured I would talk about a company would good service since I mentioned Showtime’s bad service in the previous post.
The Kuwait Cinemagic & The Royal Film Commission invite everyone to attend a Jordanian Short Film Screening event which will take place at Al Sha’ab Theatre on the evening of June 22nd, at 7:30 p.m.
They will be screening around 10 short films made by young Jordanian filmmakers, some of whom will be attending the event and discussing their work.
It promises to be a fun evening, and you can bring as many people as you like just as long as you come early, as the seating is free and will be on a first come first served basis. Here is the flyer for the event.