Valentine's Day is quickly approaching and if you forgot to get something for your significant other (or yourself), I don't blame you. With everything going on these days, it is tough to remember a holiday that was made to capitalize on something as priceless as love. But I think we can all agree that if you are going to spend money telling somebody you love them, you'll want to spend that money locally. From bakeries to candy stores to charcuterie boards, there is something in Regina for that special person in your life.

In December I bought a $50 chocolate box from Dessart Sweets with every intention of unboxing it and make a video about it. However, the chocolate temptation got the best of me and I ate the entire box in a single sitting. The box has a wide variety of chocolates in it, ranging from specialty-flavoured KitKat bars to European specialities to unique chocolate bars like the Charleston Chew.

If chocolate is not your thing, Dessart Sweets also has miscellaneous candy boxes for the same price. They also have imported chocolate and candy boxes for the broken-hearted globetrotter in your life.

As of last week, I am officially in the final year of my 20s. That has me a little worried because they say it is the 30s when you are forced to finally grow-up... and I really do not want to do that. So, with that sense of impending doom in mind, I decided to embrace my inner child and find some birthday "freebies" around Regina.

There was just a pesky little pandemic in the way.

Because of this, I didn't feel it was right (or safe) to visit a dozen stores around the city, many of them restaurants, asking for free things. A lot of small businesses are hurting right now and asking for free things "just because" doesn't help them at all.

To say 2020 was a different kind of year is an understatement. On one hand, I want to celebrate my accomplishments and the success of my blog this past year, but on the other hand, I want to mourn those who passed, the businesses that closed, and the livelihoods that were ruined. We all saw some very new and very terrifying things this year. We saw a once in a century pandemic, global lockdowns, silent streets, empty skies, and still oceans. We saw dolphins in canals, elephants sleeping in fields, goats trotting around streets, and monkeys jumping on empty highways. We witnessed the comet Neowise, the Great Conjunction, the evolution of Starlink and some even saw a lunar eclipse.

This past year we saw the best, and the worst, and it changed us. With nearly two million people dead in less than a year, this global pandemic made us question a lot. It made us question why pandemics happen, how we can prevent them, how we handled them in the past, and how we can move forward with them. COVID-19 was a wake-up call. Previous pandemics like SARS, MERS, and Swine Flu all showed us we had flaws, but COVID-19 blew those flaws wide open. We are fortunate that COVID-19s main threat is mass hospitalization, not mass fatalities. We are overdue for the next deadly pandemic, and this showed us that we are not at all ready.  

Because of the pandemic, my travels this year were limited. Instead, I did more local articles, did some unboxings on my YouTube channel, became a licensed drone operator, and focused more on my brand than on my travels. I also worked on building my YouTube channel. I had hoped at the end of 2020 I could launch a new website with a new logo, but it didn't work out that way. I think we can all say that about 2020: "It didn't work out that way".

There are not many positives that have come out of 2020, but one thing that has is the urge to support local businesses. Although many people were shopping locally before the pandemic, the past few months have shown just how fragile many of these businesses are. Local businesses are what make cities flourish. They are the flavour that makes each city different than the next.

From the Prairies acknowledges this and decided to use the current crisis to showcase some of Saskatchewan's homegrown talent. They offer a wide variety of different boxes, each that showcase different products all either made in Saskatchewan or supplied by a Saskatchewan producer. The products are thoughtfully curated by Brandi to engage all five of your senses -- touch, smell, sight, sound, and taste.

The box I got from From the Prairies was their "Prairie Goddess" box. This box is full of things for the goddess in you or the goddess in your life. Although many of the items in this box are items I would not use, there are people in my life who would use them.

If you're reading this, you probably already know what kimchi is. However, prior to my trying it, I did not know what it was.

For those unfamiliar like me, "kimchi" is a Korean dish made of fermented vegetables. Although you can buy kimchi at any grocery store, they are often packed full of preservatives and other little nasties. The kimchi I tried was made in Saskatoon by Baechu Kimchi. It was jarred, packed, and hand-delivered right to my door.

So, now that we know what "kimchi" is, what is "baechu"? Because kimchi has been around for centuries, it has a lot of variations. However, the most common and most popular is made out of Napa cabbage, which is simply "beachu" in Korean.

To start with, there was no Spanish Influenza vaccine.

Or at least, not one that was of any use.

In 1918, scientists didn't have the capability to see viruses, similar to how we don't have the capability to see dark matter today. They knew something was there but it was an enigma. In fact, they thought it was a poisonous chemical, which is why they coined it a "virus", which means a "slimy liquid or poison" in Latin.

In 1935, the National Socialist German Workers' Party – better known as the Nazi Party – forbid Jewish physicians from practicing medicine. Could this be the reason why Dr. Hermann Ernst Hinderks moved to South Africa from Germany that same year? Many believe so, especially after finding Dr. Hinderks' name in Adolf Hitler's infamous "Black Book".

Although the events of 1935 are not exactly where our story of Wilcox's Nuremberg Chronicles begins, it is as good a place as any to start.

Why Dr. Hinderks had a copy of the Nuremberg Chronicles isn't known. The last owner of it, Robert Barclay, died over a century prior. It also isn't known when, or why Dr. Hinderks sold the book to Kenneth Gardner either. The transaction occurred after 1936 but before 1940. One idea was that Dr. Hinderks needed the money, and the book was his sole possession after fleeing Germany. But if that was the case, why did it take him over a year to sell it? We may never know. Nevertheless, Dr. Hinderks sold the book to Kenneth Gardner for $600 – or about $7,500 in today's money.

For a moment it seemed like how it used to be.

I was invited to The Lancaster Taphouse's new downtown location for a pre-opening last weekend. The restaurant is in the old Capitol restaurant, one of my favourite places to eat in Regina. I liked the Capitol not only for the food and atmosphere but for the décor. I especially liked the mural on the back wall of the restaurant that showed how the old Capitol theatre used to look.

I was a little worried that when The Lancaster opened, they would replace this mural, but thankfully they kept it. They also added much more too.