Categories
Apple Personal

Video Capture Time

While in New York I picked up the Elgato video capture device for my Mac. Basically it allows me to connect regular RCA and S-Video cables to my Mac which I can then use to convert analogue video like old VHS and Betamax tapes to digital. I have a ton of old videos from the 80’s I want to start converting to digital and sharing on this blog. My issue is the Betamax tapes, does anyone know where I can get a hold of a Betamax player here in Kuwait?




Categories
Food & Drinks News

New world’s biggest burger record

Probably the only burger that should be eaten with a fork and knife. [Article]

Thanks FYI




Categories
Food & Drinks Healthier Lifestyle Kuwait Personal

My Burger Rampage Diet

As most of you might have noticed, while in New York I ate a lot of burgers. Many people thought I was actually posting too many food posts but they would have been a lot more if I posted about all the burger places I went to. Before going to New York I had a list of around 60 burger places I wanted to try out which I got from the blog A Hamburger Today and even though I didn’t even get close to trying out 60 burger places I did have on average two burgers a day while in New York. And guess what? I lost weight!

Before I went on vacation I spoke to Fahad and I told him that there was no way I could eat healthy on my trip. It was New York and I wasn’t going to spend my time looking for something healthy to eat. He told me as long as I was going to do a lot of walking than I could eat whatever I wanted as long as the proportions weren’t too big. He told me I also had to have a meal every 3 hours. I could also have dessert if I wanted but it couldn’t be part of my main meal, it would have to be counted as a meal on its own. So if I had a burger at 12PM I could have an ice cream at 3PM. I thought that was fair and took his advice.

My morning started off either with a big breakfast from a cozy diner near my hotel or a McGriddle from McDonalds. I stuck to places near my hotel since I needed to have breakfast an hour after waking up. That would happen around 9 or 10am. Then, 3 hours later I would have a burger, 3 hours after that dessert (usually a chocolate cone from Pinkberry or a cookie from a bakery), 3 hours after that another burger and finally my last meal at night would be dinner at one of the trendy restaurants near my hotel.

I rarely had fries with my burger, I think I only had fries 3 times on my trip. I would also always order only 1 burger but sometimes it would be a double patty. One great thing (or it could be a bad thing) about New York is the fact I think by law they need to display the calorie count of everything on the menu. So one time I was at Wendy’s for example and I felt like a double bacon and cheese but then noticed the calorie count and decided to go with a regular double cheese burger instead. I think the calorie count helped me save a ton of calories. It was also one major reason I didn’t have french fries with my burgers since if I did the calorie count of my meal would double. I also went with Coke Zero over regular Coke since that was another easy 200-300 calorie saving.

I walked a lot, around 12 hours and the only time I took a cab was to and from the airport. I was using the subway mostly and it was mostly from Brooklyn where I was staying to Manhattan which is where everything was located. While there I walked everywhere and only took the subway if I was in a rush like to catch a store before they closed. One night I walked back to my hotel even which was around a 8-9KM walk according to Google Maps.

The result? I left Kuwait weighing 77KG and I came back weighing 76KG. I thought I had lost more weight but I am not disappointed losing only a KG with the food I was eating. Now that the vacation is over and I’ve returned to Kuwait I’m eating healthy again and today was my first time back at the gym since I left. Until my next burger rampage…




Categories
Food & Drinks Travel

Curry in a Hurry

This has to be the best name for an Indian restaurant ever. Period.




Categories
Food & Drinks Travel

Soho Park Burger

This photo is dedicated to Man from the moon since he recommended this place. I took it today while having one of my burgers. This one was taken at Soho Park. The burger looked good but taste wise was just ok. Here is a larger version of the [Picture]




Categories
Food & Drinks Personal Travel

Burger Joint at Le Parker Meridien

After a million people recommended I try Burger Joint I decided to pass by Le Parker Meridien hotel and try it out. I got there around 11:10PM, 20 minutes before closing and stood in line (of course) waiting to order. The place was packed mostly with business men in suites who looked like they were staying at the lux hotel, some group of friends and a family or two. While waiting in line a table cleared up and Nat quickly took it over while I waited to order.

They had simple instructions up on the wall which were:

Step 1: Hamburger or Cheeseburger

Step 2: How d’ya want it cooked?
(rare, med-rare, medium, med-well, well)

Step 3: What d’ya want on it?
(Lettuce, tomato, onion, pickles, ketchup, mayo, mustard)
With everything, call it “The works”

Be ready to order or else you go to the end of the line.

I decided to have a cheese burger, medium with just ketchup and mustard, plus fries, a beer and a diet coke. Total came out to $20 and I sat down and waited for my name to be called out. The hotel is very posh but Burger Joint is designed to look like some small dodgy burger place. It’s very small and I can imagine that must frustrate a lot of people who come in for a quick bite and not find anywhere to sit.

I got my burger and took my first bite, and then second and then third until there was no burger left. Honestly I wasn’t impressed. The burger was good of course, but it was missing an oomph. I know many people will shoot me down for this but I prefer Shake Shack over Burger Joint and as you know I prefer Five Guys over Shake Shack. Cute little place though.

Update: Comments now open, not sure why they were closed




Categories
Food & Drinks Personal Travel

The Five Guys Burger

I was walking around shopping when suddenly I spotted a Five Guys restaurant. I was caught by surprise since someone had told me there was no Five Guys in New York before I got here. Without hesitation I quickly rushed in and ordered my burger.

The way it works at Five Guys is all the burgers come plain and you tell them what you want inside (all the toppings are for free). I ordered a cheese burger which comes with 2 meat patties and cheese, I added three toppings, ketchup, mustard and grilled onions plus a small coke. Since they cook everything fresh to order it takes a bit of time to prepare your food so you go sit down until they call out your number. My number was 47 and when they called my number out I picked it up and came back to my table.

The packaging is very basic. They use brown paper bags with no branding and aluminium foil to wrap the burger with. Only the cup had Five Guys written on it. I unwrapped the foil to find a messy burger that looked very unappealing. BUT, the burger tasted AMAZING so it didn’t matter if the interior of the place was uninteresting or the fact the burger looked messy and came wrapped in foil. It was just like a wow! People THIS was as pretty close to a 5 out of 5 I’ve ever been!

The Shake Shack burger was good but the Five Guys burger was incredible and there was no line! Nat was just starring at me wondering why I was getting orgasmic over a burger since I was just munching and going amazing I love this non stop. When I left the place I was like I’ve got to go back and I sooo am going to!

Update: Below are pictures I took of another Five Guys branch in New York




Categories
News Photography

Thailand Protest Pictures

Great photos from the Boston Globe. [Link]




Categories
Automotive Kuwait Photography

Pictures from Red Bull car drift

Blogger Mathai was at the Red Bull car park drift and took some cool pictures. You can check them out [Here]




Categories
Funny Movies Videos

Four Lions Trailer

This is a comedy I can’t wait to watch.

Four Lions tells the story of a group of British jihadists who push their abstract dreams of glory to the breaking point. As the wheels fly off, and their competing ideologies clash, what emerges is an emotionally engaging (and entirely plausible) farce. In a storm of razor-sharp verbal jousting and large-scale set pieces, Four Lions is a comic tour de force; it shows that-while terrorism is about ideology-it can also be about idiots.

[YouTube]




Categories
News Videos

The capturing of Somali pirates

Amazing first-person shooter view footage of Dutch marines boarding and capturing a hijacked container ship. [YouTube]

via




Categories
Videos

96 hours in Sharm el-Sheikh

Some guy goes from Kuwait to Sharm el-Sheikh and records the whole thing on video and uploads it onto YouTube. I’ve never been to Sharm el-Sheikh so I was curious to watch this video but just a warning up front before you watch the video, the guy wears a speedo and has bad taste in music. [YouTube]

Thanks Ahmad

Update: Video has been removed by the user.




Categories
50s to 90s Kuwait Photography

Old pictures of Kuwait from LIFE archive

Fereej found pictures of Kuwait taken from old issues of LIFE magazine. The pictures are of very good quality, I love them. [Link]

Update: Check out all the pictures and more [Here] There are tons!




Categories
50s to 90s Kuwait Photography

Great vintage picture

I saw this picture on my friends facebook page and I thought it was worth sharing with everyone. It’s an amazing shot taken I’m guessing in the early 70s when they were still constructing the Kuwait Towers. Can anyone tell me what car that is?

Thanks Farah!

Update: Turns out its a 1977 Nissan Skyline. Beautiful car.

Update2: Turns out the photo was originally taken from KuwaitStar on [Flickr]




Categories
Food & Drinks Guest Bloggers Healthier Lifestyle Information

You’re not fat, but your butt’s too big

Posted by Fahad AlYehya | Core Fitness – Kuwait

“Dude, I’m really skinny up top, but down below I’m a MESS!”

“I’ve been doing ab work for ages! I literally spend hours in the gym everyday crunching and leg raising my butt off! Why do I still have this belly!? Where’s my six pack!?”

“I might as well paste that muffin I just ate on my thighs, because eventually that’s where it’s going to end up.”

“I’m a 27 year old guy that has better breast development than Pamela Anderson!”

“I’ve been on Lipo-6 for 3 months! Nothing happened!” Me: what’s your diet like? “I pretty much eat whatever I want.”

These pretty much sum up what I am about to tackle today (and obviously the title). Before I do, I’d like to point the finger of blame:

1) Training is 20-30%; it only refines a physique.
Nutrition is the other 70-80%.
2) Abs are made in the kitchen.
3) Why are you crunching with no weights when you clearly don’t have any abdominal muscles?
4) The abdominals are a muscle. If you work a muscle everyday it’ll shrink and never grow.
5) If you eat like a pig and train like a horse, you’ll lose overall weight; except for those stubborn fat stores you want to get rid off.

Too many of you quit too early to see any significant results. You tend to give it all up once results start to slow down. It took you years to gain all that fat, so why do you expect to lose it in such a short time?

It’s hard to make your first million, but once you do, you’ll know exactly what kind of work ethic you’d have to give in order to get it. Same thing goes with a set of abs or shapely thighs; you’re pretty vague about how long or hard your journey will be, but once you give into the commitment then it’ll be all worth it.

I’m here to serve as a guide to that journey, where simple bouts of information may prove useful for that much needed push you’ve been looking for.