Onions are god’s gift to mankind. Well, for me anyway.

Everyday I encounter onions in my plate. Red onions, sweet onions, white onions, giant onions, baby onions…the list goes on. But even then, I can not claim that I am an onion expert. My love for these bulbs far outweigh the knowledge I have for them. Nor my skills for preparing them into good food.

Onions are one of Texas’ leading crops bringing in more than $100 million each year to the Lone Star state. With the income and other industries dependent on this prized crop, the onion industry is expected to rake in more than $400 million this year. That is how big the onions are in this state. Onions are a force to be reckoned with. A running urban legend is that Texans eat onions like how we eat apples. A very, very weird thought.

Probably the most famous of sweet onions (and also one of my favorites) is the Texan Sweet Onion ‘Grano 502′. Housewives don’t know the name, but they sure as heck would recognize the bulb immediately when they see it. Grano 502 is large, sweet and very meaty in onion standards. It’s very appealing to its patrons and to the untrained eye.

The onion industry is naught of its strife, however. The unstable market for these bulbs often leave its producers in a confusing state. Most newbies destroyed the industry with their untimely introduction to the market. If one dares to venture the onion market, one must learn the ropes and tricks of the industry of the market.

Unless you’re highly interested in growing onions than eating them, good luck. I would rather have myself a plate of steak topped with onions, chowder with onions, and onion chips by the side. Just kidding. But onions do have a very high medicinal value, and is quite good for the body.

Just keep it away from the eyes.

The very word ‘barbeque’ commands awesome respect and effect that it leaves most stomachs growling, and mouths watering when their thoughts fly off to a sight of hot, steamy, juicy, and sauce-laden, meaty goodness…broiled perfectly in slow-charcoal heat and browned to perfection. Texas has complex knowledge with barbeques, after all, the Lone Star state is known for its love of anything meat.

Barbeque has a big differencefrom grilling or broiling. It is the unique way of cooking over fire by indirect heat (either coal or wood). Because it is indirectly cooked, the flavor and aroma tends to develop and contributes to the overall taste of the meat.

Texas barbeques are unique from other barbeques, and can be easily recognized by several of its traits. Firstly, meat often used wouldn’t be chicken or pork, but beef; since the state is less hostile to the growth of cows. That and beef is a manly meat. Although there’s not much of the sexual discrimination there, the tougher the meat is, the more exciting it is for the Texan eater.

Meat used in Texan barbeque is heavily spicy and heavily flavored. No herb, rub, marinade and juice is spared to help contribute to the deep and smoky taste of Texan barbequeing. You could just imagine the very herbs popping and sizzling on top of the oils of the thick slab of beef.

Barbeque sauce is the pride of Texan grilling. There’s the Texan barbeque sauce, a unique blend of herbs and oils, something hinting to a tomato scent (ketchup maybe?); all sweet, spicy, thick and filling. Heavily scented and finger-licking goodness. Be careful not to eat your finger.

Barbeque is without a doubt, the most popular in Texas, and every family, every clan, every restaurant has a secret recipe of their own. Barbeque is a legacy, most tasty, in the Lone Star state.

Mead is an alcoholic drink that is made from honey and water, fermented and left to develop using yeast. The content may rise from that of slightly alcoholic, to one that could knock out a heavy drinker. More often than not, it is confused with the name ‘honey wine’ but it’s still mead. Nothing special but honey and wine.

A type of mead that has herbs and spices (common favorites are ginger, vanilla, clove, cinnamon, nutmeg, oregano and even lavender) is called metheglin. Metheglin comes from the word meddyglyn which roughly means ‘healing liquor’ suggesting to its earlier use as a type of therapeutic or immediate drug.

Nowadays, metheglin is commercialized, produced, and sold in bottles across the state, more for its taste and appeal rather than its medicinal effects (if it did have any). Spicing and the combination of amount and type is key. As of this time, there are at least a hundred different types of metheglin, a handful being popular, and some trying out on the exotic or esoteric.

Metheglin makes for good business, especially in several parts of Texas who still have the appetite for this pioneer drink. It’s simple, and not complicated like beer or most of the modern wines that we have. The health bit is a bonus, it’s the taste that matters. After all, we’ve been smoking and drinking with disregard for our health. Well, metheglin may actually be good for your body. Moderation, again, is key to this. After all, too much of a good thing would still bring illness to you.

To make metheglin, mix rational parts of water and honey, bring to a boil, mix in your herbs or flowers/spices and yeast. Allow to ferment for a week in an airtight container. Drain out and strain for impurities and ferment once more. Let it reach at least a year for good and sweet taste that’s deep, like the history of mead.

The city of Houston is the fourth largest city in the United States, located in Texas.

Being a large city, it is quite easy to find good things to buy, good food to eat, and good places to visit. Texans would claim Houston is a good city, and the number of tourist spots in the area would keep anyone entertained for as long as their visit would allow them to.

For the naturally curious, their is the Houston Museum of Natural Science, an altar for the different branches of science. The museum has a butterfly center, a planetarium with stars and the usual revolving satellites, models of dinosaurs and much more.

There’s also the Museum of Fine Arts, which houses a very large and expensive collection of art pieces, most from around the world. Renaissance, tribal art, expressionist, abstract and even the pre-Dark ages. It also hosts art from its visitors, students from the surrounding art schools or rising artists, whose works may one day take the art world by storm.

We also have the Houston Downtown aquarium, a 7-something acre complex that has renditions of famous waterways like the Amazon River, Louisiana swamp and others. There’s also a Ferris wheel inside, a helipad (makes me wonder what this is for) and a train tunnel that passes underneath a shark tank. Feel the thrill having a shark swim above you in menacing circles!

The Houston Zoo is a huge crowd drawer that boasts a collection of 4,500 animals, ranging from mammals, birds, felines, reptiles (alligators, anyone?). The zoo is also well known for having reared the largest elephant calf in all of the recognized zoos around the country. It is also probably the only zoo that hosts the Giant Eland, a rare specie of savanna antelopes. Believe me, being near this great-horned being is a wonderful experience that cannot be emulated by anything else.

I really did not understand what had gotten my friend hyped up when I told her to go to Fort Worth Botanical Gardens to relax. Apparently, the effect she got was somewhat reversed for her.

The Fort Worth Botanical Gardens is a collection of different themed gardens, just west of central downtown. It’s a highly relaxing sanctuary of plants, water, birds and beasts. An aria of different plants, all from different biomes around the world are collected and grown, planted and displayed for everyone to see.

The best part? Free parking! I don’t know about you, but parking had always been one of the bigger hassles when it came to trying to relax to some ‘spa’ or some ‘nature park’. Having your parking worries solved is one way to stifle problems when it comes to relaxing.

The gardens they boast are NUMEROUS. They have rose gardens, fuller gardens, Japanese gardens, perennial gardens, fragrance gardens, trial gardens, four seasons, the Texas Native boardwalk, the Conservatory, the Water Conservation Garden and the Water Wise Garden. Of note is the Rose garden, which was inspired by Italy’s Villa Lante and has a lot of vista views. The garden is pock-marked with bushes of rosy goodness everywhere. The Japanese garden is also of note, as it is a few of the places you actually have to pay to get in. But it’s worth seeing the friendly koi amble with your finger as you dip it in the pond.

The park has a slew of events like volunteer workshops, festivals, children’s gardens and more. It’s a community effort, one that connects people together as they hoe the fields, plant the seedlings and enjoy the time together under the shade of a tree.

Perhaps, there is more to it than just staying at Fort Worth Botanical Gardens.

I woke up this morning and checked out my favorite forums for new directories to submit my site to. Specifically, I was looking for free directories as I do not have a big budget to promote this site. I did manage to find one free link directory that was launched in the last day:

A Free Directory

Now what got me with this site is that you could either get a free listing or get some massive exposure with a paid link that was only $4.99. Like I said though, I don’t really have much of a budget, so I took a free one.

If you have a website, I would definitely suggest submitting to this site. Mine was approved in less than one day.

I was looking online today to find some free places to promote my blog.  This is mostly a daily thing I do, the more I promote, the more traffic my site receives.  I found these three free websites that allow you to list a backlink from your site for free.

Tower Promote Free Link Directory is a free link directory on an older domain.  Links on older domains tend to have more value associated with them.  You can list your site free or pay to get a featured link.

4169 – Free Link Directory  is an SEO friendly link directory.  This one was started earlier this year, and shows much promise.  Again they offer free listings and very reasonably priced paid listings.

The Best Damn Links Page is another human edited link directory.  This one is fresh, but built on an established domain.  You can get a free listing or pay to feature your link and get more exposure.

That is all the sites for today.  If I find any other sites that will help you to promote your site or blog, I will let you all know.

If you ever search for anything online, you may be familiar with search engines.  In fact, you should be.  To be honest, how else would you be able to find anything?

Try a web directory.  Web directories work very much like a search engine, but instead of being a list of sites that have been scooped up while travelling the internet, a directory is a collection of sites, edited by a human being, that have been submitted by webmasters to promote their sites.  The advantage of a web directory is that the human editors filter out a lot of poor and spammy sites.  So, in theory, you should be looking at the best of the best.

Today I came across a web directory that I thought I should mention: Mitefind .  What sets this site out from the competition is that it is an old search engine that turned into a directory.  Why?  Well, talking to the owner, he pointed out that most third party search engines just show search results from other search engines such as Google, Yahoo, etc.  By changing into a directory, he could show custom results without depending on the big boys.  The result:  a paid link directory .

Again, I had to ask, why make the site a paid directory?  Again, the answer related to content and time:  With so many free directories, the owners get backlogged with the number of free submissions that they have to approve.  In fact, I have another free directory that gets between 100 and 200 submissions per day.  I honestly do not have the time to keep up while approving sites for nothing.  This way, when someone submits their site and they pay for it, I know that they are serious – and I get their site approved right away.  

Is it worth it?  You bet.  I have promoted some sites on free directories that have taken up to a year to be approved – that really does not help me when I need traffic now.  So, check it out, pay for a link and I promise you will have no regrets.  My site was listed quick and even now, my search engine ranking has improved because of it.