tesalia springs co.

According to Wikipedia, Machachi is located in Ecuador. That's basically all you get.

What you don't learn is that Machachi, in Ecuador, also has a spring water bottling company called The Tesalia Springs Co (which, strangely on their website, is also called The Thessaly Springs Co. Did something get lost in translation?)

Tesalia Springs Co--AKA Machichi Ecuador bottle cap with a cool polar bear on it--was found in a very dark and dingy deli in Corona. This is a revelation for me as a bottle cap collector. It meets the requirements: Name of company: check. Cool animal: check. Place where it's from: check! Does it matter that their website isn't in English? NO!

Hop on a subway and go a few stops and there is a whole new world. The woman behind the counter spoke absolutely no English. The water tasted like agua con gas. Nothing special. Yet. Imported, Ecuadorian Spring Water can be had in NYC for less than $2. Brilliant.

The only question is: why is there a polar bear on the bottle cap? The last I checked, polar bears didn't live in Ecuador.

lion brewery, alaskan brewing co

Another day, another blog post about animals! Are we sensing a theme here? Actually, I don't have that many animal bottle caps, but the ones I do have seem to be begging for their 15 minutes of fame.

As you can tell, Crownvention was an amazing opportunity to find all sorts of bottle caps from all over the world. One crown I kept seeing over and over again was the Alaskan Brewing Co.'s "Made in Alaska" crown. Two polar bears -- a momma bear and a baby bear.  Same design for all crowns, but lots of different colors. Another great starting point for you beginner crown collectors. The one I got at Crownvention is purple with pink highlights. Who doesn't love a polar bear?

While at a local deli with a large selection of beers, I find myself choosing beers based entirely on what their bottle cap looks like.  New criteria for Lauren purchasing a beer: Do I have the bottle cap already? Is it unusual or visually striking? Does it have a lion on it? If these questions are answered correctly, the beer is mine. Recently I found Lion Brewery, a beer purveyor in Pennsylvania and their brew Lion's Head. Upon researching this brewery, I also noticed that they make soda! Which now makes me wonder: Is their soda crown different than their beer? I will certainly be keeping my eyes out for their soda as well.

The beer was delicious -- and the crown is awesome  A lion's claw mid-swipe, with a "claw off" instruction. Why twist when you can claw? It might be my new motto.