Beaver Tales

Moving day!

2008-01-30T16:16:00.000-05:00

To anyone who still checks this blog for updates,

I originally began this blog as a way of journaling my year living in England. It was a great year and a fun blog, but for some reason it didn't seem to carry over very well once I was home. I never felt the urge to write in it and when I did, I would feel too guilty about how much time had passed and that would keep me away. I've decided that I need a whole new blog to journal my life in Toronto. Please come over and visit me at Broccoli in Toronto where I will be writing about the chaos of trying to plan 2 simultaneous weddings!

I hope to see you there!

Everyday super powers

2007-02-23T14:27:00.000-05:00

A lot of people have mini-super powers; above average abilities at things that are kind of mundane and everyday, but no less useful for their banality. My darling Nyron is one such. Unlike Brent Butt's Shirt Powers, Nyron's super power is more pratical and less self-centred; he has Concert Ticket Powers. Whenever we decide we would like to go to a show, no matter how hard it is to get tickets, Nyron somehow manages to do everything right and at exactly the right time. The Ticketmaster gods smiled upon him when he got Radiohead tickets that sold out almost immediately. They smiled upon him again this afternoon when he got Arcade Fire tickets for their concert this May. Life is good. :)

o( )__

Science according to George Strombolopolous

2007-02-21T21:16:00.000-05:00

On The Hour tonight George talked about a study done in London that shows that using email decreases a person's IQ by 10%. The funny thing about that is that scientific studies have also shown that using pot only decreases your IQ by 5%. Makes you think. So stay off the email and rock the gange instead! Makes me wonder why I quit...

o( )__

Setting up shop

2007-02-11T10:40:00.000-05:00

Last weekend was spent almost entirely working on my studio. The paint colours look great and Nyron assembled a great big corner shelving unit that we got from Ikea. The wood is untreated softwood, so I had to spend some time sanding the splinters off the boards. I've decided to leave it unpated for now, since I like to look of the raw wood with the earthy green tones of the walls.

I got most of the larger items and things already in boxes or cases on the shelves, but I need some storage systems for all the loose items that got piled into the closet through all this. I'm trying to be as cost-effective as possible and since my business is about upcycling I thought it would be best to try and make my own storage containers. I've sent Nyron around his store in search of books on basketweaving and I'm going to try and make storage boxes by weaving rolled-up lengths of newspaper. I don't subscribe to any newspapers, since I never bother reading them, but every neighbourhood in Toronto has a local paper that gets delivered to every door, whether you subscribe to it or not. I'd been using them for my vermicomposter, but that's on hold while I make some necessary adjustments to the composter, so they'll do nicely. If anyone knows of any websites with good beginner instructions for basketweaving, please let me know.

Once I get my studio set up all I need to do is start producing product. I've found a website, Etsy.com, that provides online stores to people who make and sell hand-made products. Online stores provided by servers like Yahoo!, where you get a cookie-cutter webpage, are expensive and buying a .com means having to hire a web-developer, two options that I don't have the money for right now. Etsy is great because there is no cost to set up the store and no monthly fee, you just have to pay per item listed and purchased, which is excellent for someone just starting out.

Now all I need is a name. Nyron has suggested Dam That Beaver Designs and my dad has thought of Second Chance. If any of you can think of anything, let me know. I'll keep you updated as I work this out and you can be sure there will be a prominent link once it's up and running.

o( )__

Who says Americans live in a culture of fear?

2007-02-02T18:28:00.000-05:00

Since I don't watch the news, this lovely bit of mass hysteria didn't catch up with me until today. A few weeks ago two artists were hired to make and distribute advertisements for the upcoming Aqua Teen Hunger Force movie. For those of you who don't obsessively watch Teletoon at 10:00 every night, Aqua Teen Hunger Force is a 15 minute cartoon show created by the wonderfully subversive minds at Adult Swim. The cartoon consist of human-sized fast-food creatures: a milk shake, a round ball of ground meat (which is something that probably hasn't existed in a fast food place since the 40s, since all fast food hamburgers arrive already shaped and frozen), and an order of fries that sports a goatee and shoots lazers out of his eyes. The show follows these three as they hang around thier run-down house, torment their white-trash neighbour, Carl, and ocassionally get pestered themselves by a litany of strange side-characters.

The advertisements took the form of throwies (think Light Brite) of the Mooninites, a pair of popular side characters. The throwies were magnetic and were displayed around the cities of Boston, New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Atlanta, Seattle, Portland, Austin, San Francisco, and Philadelphia for weeks, apparently without much notice. Almost made it a bust as an advertising campaing, until Thursday morning when a woman on a bus noticed one of the throwies on a bridge in boston and called the police to report a "suspicious deivce".

"An army of emergency vehicles responded to the scene with lights flashing, including police cruisers, fire trucks, ambulances, and the Boston Police Department bomb squad.

Police inspected the package using a truck-mounted work platform. Transit police officer Joseph Mathews from the explosive detection unit donned the thick green armor of the bomb squad an approached the object.

Matthews attached cables to the device and officials later fired the small water explosive to render the object safe. " - Boston Globe

Shortly after this made the news, Turner Broadcasting, parent company to Adult Swim, called the Boston police to assure them that they were responsible, that it was an advertising campaign and nothing threatening. They even gave them the exact locations of the other throwies. The police didn't beleive them and only treated it as "a possible lead".

After all the dust settled the police and government of Boston were very angry. Not because anything had done wrong, but because they were very embarrassed and embarassment often turns to anger: anger and the search for a scapegoat. The two artists were arrested on charges of placing a hoax device to incite panic, a felony charge that carries a five year maximum sentence, and one count of disorderly conduct, a misdemeanor. Even the judge seemed sceptical and the two were released on bail. They will be faced with a judicial hearing at a time that hasn't been disclosed. Turner Broadcasting has offered to pay for the inconvenience caused by the campaign, which has been estimated may cost a third of a million dollars.

The obvious question, of course, is: What the fuck? How bad has Bush got these poor people that small (no more than a foot square) magnetic Light Brites can cause such panic? The fact that this has been taken so seriously is both mind-boggling and a source of tremendous amusement to me. And many others. Here is Stephen Colbert's report, YouTube-based comedy group Zebro favoured us with their take on the situation. I'm still looking for others: there's rumour that Jimmy Kimmel did a skit and Penn Jillette discussed it on his radio show, but I'm still trying to find the links.

The final word: chill the fuck out, America!

Green Canada?

2007-02-02T16:01:00.000-05:00

I'm glad I'm not the only one who was worried about the slow appearance of snow this winter. Check this out. It's beautiful.

2007-02-01T13:50:00.000-05:00

I'm not into New Year's Resolutions, they're usually the best way to set yourself up for disappointment and add to the January Blues. However, I have made one resolution that is simple and immediate enough to keep. I've resolved to finally get my spare room turned into a creative and usable studio space.

Nyron, as usual, is being a big help in this. He has a few weekdays off this week, so he is spending that time painting the walls in two lovely shades of mossy green that I picked out. We got the paint at an independent Behr Paints dealer down the street from my home who special ordered Behr's EcoSpec low VOC paint. After all, this is supposed to be my serene, creative space; I don't want it to give me headaches and cancer!

On the weekend we're getting a set of Ikea shelves so that I can keep all my materials organized and accessible. As my birthday present, Nyron is buying me a sewing table so I can finally take my sewing machine out of the lonely box I stored it in when I went to England. I can hardly wait to be re-united with my beloved sewing machine! Oh, how I miss it! Oh, how my pants have gone sorrowfully unhemmed! I'll update with photos as soon as everything's done. I might even invite some of my crafty friends over for a studio-warming.

o( )__

I am a master chef!

2006-11-11T18:30:00.000-05:00

OK, not really. But I did cook dinner from scratch today, which is a rare and special occasion. Usually Nyron is the cook in the house and if it's up to me, we dine on fish stick and fries. But today I was idly watching Food Network which is where I get my vicarious chef fix, when I actually saw a recipe that looked simple enough for me to do well. It's a ground beef and macaroni and cheese oven baked pasta and I was able to do it with stuff I either already had in the kitchen or could get at the little grocery on the corner. The best part? I managed to do it without making an unholy mess of the kitchen, a feat Nyron has yet to accomplish. :)

o( )__

Web surf for a cure

2006-11-08T16:06:00.000-05:00

Do people even call it "surfing the web" anymore? Anyway, I discovered this new search engine on TreeHugger calld GoodTree. It's a search engine that generates money for charities. How? Companies pay good money for their websites to be part of the thousnds of hits you receive whenever you type something in to your search engine. Goodtree takes $0.01 for each search page you visit and gives this to charities of your choice. $0.01 doesn't sound like much, but it builds up, especially for people who do a lot of reaserch online or are just bored sitting in front of a computer in their office all day - ahem. There's even a place on the website to keep track of how much you've raised. The "tree" part comes from your friend tree. If you refer the website to your friends and they use it, the running total of money earned represents everyone on your friend tree.

It's not as colourful of fancy as other search engines: very bear-bones. But it's a great idea. My favourite feature is the bookmark links. Instead of having to access the favourites drop-down in the toolbar, you can put links to your most commonly used websites right on the front page. I've made GoodTree my homepage at work and set up the links so that I can quickly access the Bank of Canada Currency Converter, which I use constantly to take Canadian dollar payments from students who were invoiced in Us dollars.

0( )__

High in the sky

2006-10-25T11:11:00.000-04:00

Christmas is far too few knitting days away and my mom has already bought my plane ticket home for the holidays. I'm not a fan of plane travel in general; it's small and cramped, the food is awful, and I always forget to buy gum and have to sit through 2 hours of ear popping. But the thing that concerns me most, of course, is the carbon emmissions. While I only take 1 or 2 return flights a year, it worries me that I'm basically counter-acting all the carbon saving I do by spending 2 hours on various means of public transportation each day.

Luckily, I'm not the only one concerned about this, as indicated in a recent article on Treehugger. They list 5 instances of environmentally conscious aviation, including a plane that runs on AA batteries! Check it out!

o( )__

Girlie time!

2006-10-22T22:05:00.000-04:00

This afternoon my friend Ana Kay, her cousin Kate, their friend Karen, and I all went for Edwardian Tea at the Spadina Museum. We got gussied up and arrived at the gorgeously restored Edwardian home of the Austin family, one of Toronto's upper-elite in the late 1800s and early 1900s. We had a table in a cozy corner of the sunroom, set with individual tea settings and a platter of assorted tea sandwiches, followed by another platter of cookies. We were offered 3 varieties of custom blends of tea named after memebers of the Austin family. I tried all three and ended up buying a little package of "Mary's Concert Blend" to take home.

After the tea, during which we mainly discussed who we thought were the hunkiest male actors in BBC adaptations of Romatic and Victorian era novels, there was a tour of the house itself. The house was donated to the city by the last member of the Austin family to live there. Although it needed a fair amount of restoration (one of the rooms required all the damask wallfabric to be remade to exactly match the original) all the furniture was donated along with the home. Some of it had to be restored, but it was wonderful to see the actual furniture instead of recreations. The furniture was all made by local furniture makers at the time, so it's good to see the Austin family being so economically and environmentally conscious. :)

My favourite part was the kitchen. I'm fascinated by antique kitchen equipment and this kitchen had it all. It had the original gas oven and the newer oven that the family bought in the 1930s, the ice cabinet that had to be filled with huge ice cubes in the summer to keep the meat from spoiling, and all the little kitchen gadgets that I love to look at at antique stores, including a wall-mounted hand-crank coffee grinder that has become one of my watch-for items when Nyron and I go antique shopping. I could have spent all day in there! I wish they taught cooking classes.

In short, I highly recomend the event, which they have a few times every fall. I wish they had it in the summer, since it would have been lovely to see the grounds, but it was worth the walk in the rain from the subway station.

o( )__

Check this out!

2006-10-03T20:33:00.000-04:00

Hey all you kids trapped in the 70s. Check out who Nyron and I got to hob nob with as part of his incredibly glamourous job of merchandising manager at Chapters.

It's Tommy Chong! He was really cool. As you can see, the camera guy caught us mid laugh. And, no; he didn't smell of patchouli. :)

o( )__

Fashion tip of the day

2006-09-26T08:32:00.000-04:00

When wearing a classic black shirt to work, don't wear a white fleese hoodie over top to keep you warm on your way to work. No matter how comfy it is.

o( )__

Covet of the Week: SolarStyle Portable Solar Charger

2006-09-22T17:50:00.000-04:00

This is definitely the next wave in personal electronics. SolarStyle has created a solar charger that's about the size of a cell phone or wallet that you can use to charge portable devises: cell phones, iPods, digital cameras. The battery holds a charge, so you can charge it during the day and use it at night. And it can be charged by indoor light as well as direct sunlight. What this means is that I can plug my iPod into it at work in my tiny, windowless office and listen to music all day long. Groovin' through the stress, oh yeah!

I'm really glad that this kind of technology is being made so readily available to people. I remember when solar electricity was only available by installing extremely large, inflexible panels that cost thousands of dollars and you had to trim the tall trees around your house to get them to work. They were basically considered experimental and impractical by most home-owners. Now, you can keep a solar panel in your purse (or on your backpack) and whip it out whenever you realize that you forgot to charge your cell phone yet again and it's on its last bar. Hey! Maybe I should get one of these for Nyron. He's always letting the batteries die down on his phone...

Thanks to Yorkshire Soul for reminding me that my readers await. Sorry for the hiatus.

o( )__

Turn, turn, turn

2006-08-27T09:56:00.000-04:00

Fall is coming. I can tell not just from the way I stand shivering at the bus stop every morning, but also in the way that my undeniable urge to knit has resurfaced. Although I usually mourn the passing of summer, I'm quite glad to see the change of seasons. This summer has been stressful and less than kind to me and I'm rather glad to see it go.

The knitting this season started when we heard that friends of ours in Amsterdam just had a baby boy. As with most knitters, there are few things I like to knit more than baby things. They're so soft and small! So I've designed a baby blanket in ivory and light green with musical instruments in some of the green patches. The parents are both musicians so I thought it would be fitting.

o( )__

Update: we are open afterall.

2006-05-29T08:50:00.000-04:00

Working on the assumption that people would probably be late, I called work again and was rather surprised to get a response. We're open and a smattering of students have done whatever they needed to to get to school. If only there was this much dedication in high school! But then, students didn't have to fly around the world and pay hundreds of dollars to attend high school.

I was told that even the Director doesn't think she'll be able to come in today and it's really my choice. I love the idea of another day off, but a nice quiet school day is excellent for getting work done, so I decided to at least attempt to make my way downtown. I called Nyron and woke him up, but I really didn't want to force him to drive me in if he didn't feel up to it. He went out with his friends to play basketball last night and doesn't have to be into work until 2pm, so I wasn't expecting him to jump out of bed and run to my rescue. Especially since I might have an equally hard time getting home. So here I stay until I hear that the strike has been stopped or some other plans are made.

0( )__

TTC + strike = long weekend (but how long?)

2006-05-29T07:27:00.000-04:00

This morning started like any other morning. I grumbled and groaned out of bed at 6am, got dressed, fed Spirit, watered my plants, and put some of last night's leftovers into a tupperware container for lunch. I peeked out the balcony doors in the direction of the bus stop and was relieved to see it still empty. I spent a few minutes picking a new book (I've decided to give up on my current read; life's too short for books that suck) and went outside to wait for the bus. At first I thought it a little odd that the bus stop was empty - there's usually at least one or two people waiting for the 7am bus - but I figured I must have just missed it and the next one would be along in 10 minutes. I sat down on the bench and before I'd even got a sentence into my new book I heard someone honking their horn. When I looked up I saw the driver rolling down his window as if to talk to me and figured he just wanted directions. Boy, was I surprised when he informed me that the TTC was on strike as of this morning and the bus wouldn't be running today! How the hell was I supposed to get to work?!

Luckily for me, it seems that work is closed today, like many of the city's schools I would imagine. I've called three times and got no answer, so I figured it was safe to change into jeans and a t-shirt. I wish I was the kind of person who could just crawl into bed and get back to sleep at this point, but I've been awake for too long and there's too much light seeping through the window blinds.

Right now things are fine. Nyron will probably still have to work today, since retail stores tend to stay open on days like this just in case some locals want to buy anything, but at least I'll get to see him this morning. I, however, worry about how long this strike will go on. Schools can't stay open with only a handful of students and staff. For everyday this strike goes on it's another day of classes the student's miss. Some of the students are only here for a few weeks and every class really counts. Once they've reached their last day they go home, whether they've been able to attend every class or not.

o( )__

Somebody stop the madness!

2006-05-27T15:48:00.000-04:00

I've begun reading Metro on the way to work in the mornings, largely because I'm not enjoying the novel I'm currently reading but I hate to give up on a book halfway through. After the 20 minute bus ride to the nearest subway station, I've usually had enough and grab a Metro from the news stand inside the station. I was hugely dismayed yesterday to read a tiny blurb in the international section that the US House of Representatives (that's the branch just below the Senate, right?) have voted successfully to put a bill before the Senate that will allow oil drilling in the Alaskan wildlife reserve! They've been trying this since 2005 and they don't seem to ever want to stop. So far, each time it's come before the Senate they've done right by voting it out.

What worries me, though, is that in some ways it doesn't matter how many times it gets voted out. It only needs to be passed once for the bulldozers to head north. The article said that they expect greater support this time around because Americans are so upset about the price of gas ($3 in some places, apparently). However, with typical lack of foresight, no one seems to clue into the fact that the amount of oil they'll get will only last a few years, while the damage caused will last decades and possibly be irreparable.

Please! Any Americans who are reading this, do anything you can to let your government know that you are against killing animals and destroying unique natural habitat just so that you don't have to bus it to work. You have a huge amount of power to influence the decisions your government makes; remember, they work for you, not the other way around. Make this an issue worth getting involved for and please, get involved!

After reading such depressing - if brief - news, I need to blog about some success in life. So I thought I'd photograph an update on my table-top greenhouses.

Here's the whole lot, with tops up so you can see all the budding green life:

OK, so you can't really see all the budding green life. That's why I've taken some close-ups of the little darlings.

*sniff* They're getting so big! Now that I look at them, I'm starting to think that these are the snow peas and that the peppers haven't started sprouting yet. I really should have labeled things. : )

Oh well. It'll be ad adventure as things grow to see what everything turns into.

There won't be a lot of guessing about this one, though. Two of these cups are chives, two are green onions, and two are chamomile. True, I can't necessarily tell which are which right now, but they'll distinguish themselves soon enough.

I feel like a mom! I'm so proud of how all my little babies are growing!

0( )__

What's this I see?

2006-05-25T21:23:00.000-04:00

Why, it's a little baby pepper plant!

Isn't he cute? I'm not sure if he's a green pepper or a red pepper, but why get hung up on colour, I say. : ) It's all part of my fledgling little table-top greenhouse community.

I put this together on the weekend with some plastic pastry containers I've saved over the last few months. The pepper plants are in the upside down muffin tray. There's also snow peas, chives, green onions, chamomile and maybe some other things. I have to admit, I don't quite remember what we planted.

And here's Nyron looking tired after a long day at work:

Doesn't he have such a cute hang-dog face? He works so hard.

o( )__

I need a rest from my long weekend : )

2006-05-22T13:38:00.000-04:00

For those of you who aren't yourself Canadians but read my blog, I assume, because you wish you were, you probably don't know about May 2-4. May 2-4 is actually Victoria Day weekend and is the first long weekend of the summer. It's coloquially called May 2-4 because it falls close to May 24th and people often celebrate the long weekend by drinking a 24 case of beer (or two, or three), often at the cottage if you are lucky enough to have one. Unfortunately, most cottage folks weren't too lucky this year, as the weekend has seen mostly rain, heavy winds and even some snow in - you guessed it - cottage country. So it seems a lot of people have decided to use the long weekend and bad weather to get spring housework done. And Nyron and I are no acception.

We've spent most of the weekend painting and now the living room matches the library downstairs. It's an entirely different process painting an oft-used room compared to a room that's mainly used as a way to get from the front door to the stairs. Our lives were disrupted for more than 24 hours as we had to unplug the computer and tv and push all the furniture into the centre of the room. You don't think it's possible to crave a couch until yours is filled with boxes and covered in plastic sheeting.

I also managed to get a bit more gardening done and the patio is looking just that much more green. A woman on freecycle offered up some strawberry plants since her's were taking over her garden. I was quick to reply and was gifted with 7 individual plants, which gave me the perfect excuse to buy some beautiful deep blue strawberry pots. It took some doing to get all the plants in and still keep the earth from falling out of the various holes, but they look great. The plan is to put them on a multi-teired stand of some kind so that they don't strangle the other plants (Strawberries: sweet but ruthless).

Here's my garden so far:

Pretty sparse, I know, but I'm working on it. The strawberries are in their lovely pots, the green pot is peppermint (I'll be moving it to a proper pot once I find one suitable), and the wooden box contains oregano and parsely.

Happy May 2-4 everyone!

0( )__

Kanye would be proud

2006-05-18T21:45:00.000-04:00

Nyron, the king of finding great stuff on the internet, came across this jewelry website by way of comic writer/artist Brian Wood's blog. It's for a company called Leber Jeweler Inc. and they make their pieces from reclaimed and recycled metals and gems that are environmentally mined and conflict free (the diamonds are Canadian). They are also really beautiful. I find a lot of jewelry I see in stores is quite gaudy, and I hate the way most engagement rings set the gem really high up, which is a surefire way for me to get it caught on everything and cut into my finger, but these rings of a subtle uniqueness that really appeals to me. Not to mention that it provides a way for Nyron and I to satisfy our need for wedding rings without having to support the unethical and earth-injuring practices of the large-market jewelry industry. I very much like the "Emma" ring for an engagement ring and Nyron and I both like "Linus" for wedding bands. Now you can "spend all you life trying to get that ice" without it costing the earth. : )

o( )__

Thinking too big

2006-05-17T22:11:00.000-04:00

This May 2-4 weekend Nyron and I plan to spend working on the house. As well as clearing out the garage in preparation for turning it into a workshop and finishing the painting (we've found a lovely hazlenut colour that already adorns our library walls) I'm hoping to find time to work on the balcony garden. Always being one for thinking ahead, I started wondering what I could do for the winter. I came up with the idea of turning my balcony into a greenhouse and started mentally designing a frame system that I could set up with metal pipes and cover with plastic sheeting that would be relatively simple to put up in the fall and take back down in the spring. That way, I'd have a year-round garden and a year-round supply of fresh vegetables.

Then, as usual, reality set in. I live in a condo-townhouse, which means I have to abide by the building management's rules. There are very strict rules about what we are allowed to make visible in the "public areas" of which the balconies are an example. We're not even allowed to hang clothes-lines. So I really can't imagine that turning my balcony into a large plastic greenhouse would go unchallenged by the powers that be. I can't wait until we win the lottery and move into a self-sustainable homestead outside of Toronto - such is the dream.

I guess I should just start thinking smaller. Like, a whole series of little greenhouses, the ones with the adjustable shelves just like the balcony-sized one in my head, but about 2 feet high. I had one of those once, years ago, which gave me the idea in the first place. How many do you think I could fit on my balcony before it's deamed "unsightly"? : )

o( )__

Even the best of intentions...

2006-05-04T12:59:00.000-04:00

I'm home sick today and watching Daily Planet to pass the time (sick days are always so boring!). They did a piece on the new collection of new wind terbines that England has built in the Irish Sea to help combat greenhouse gasses. Sounds like good news, right? Well, the piece was immediately followed by a bit about scientists in California noticing that their wind turbines have had an effect on the behaviour of the local ground squirrels. It seems that the squirrels near wind turnbines are more edgy, stressed, and more prone to diving for cover in their holes. Speculation is that the noise, or possibly the vibration, makes it difficult for the ground squirrels to hear each other's warning cries - basically, it cuts off the communication system of these very social animals.

It seems a bit of a catch-22 for us humans. Even when we try and fix some of the damage we've been doing for hundreds of years, we end up just causing other problems. As anyone who studied the chain of life in elementary school knows, this doesn't just effect ground squirrels; this also effects the animals that rely on them. For example, golden eagles.

It's hard enough, even in an age that is ever enlightening to the necessity of dealing with these environmental problems while we still can, to get support and funding for the reaserch and implimentation of "earth-friendly" forms of energy production, without finding out that they create further complications. And of course, we have no idea how far such complications could reach when the ripples stop.

Now, I'm not saying we should just stop trying. That would be ridiculous. It's an unfortunate fact of the matter that the things we do to help can also be the same things we do that hinder (just look at World Bank's dealings in the Third World). It's true that everything in this world effects its environment in some way. We've just got to find some way of striking a balance, so that we can make a positive change that isn't also tied to a negative one.

o( )__

For anyone who thinks you would only get worthless stuff on Freecycle...

2006-04-08T14:29:00.000-04:00

...I got a bike! I'd been keeping my eye out for offers of bicycles on Freecycle for a while, since I live so close to a lovely park and would like to be able to bike around my community (not to mention, to nearby Port Credit which is lovely and has some great shops!). After responding to a number of offers, I finally got picked to receive a bike that the man who posted it had found on the curb on garbage day. It's a lovely 1960s bike painted, as it happens, in my favourite shade of green. It just needs it's breaks fixed. And a carry basket. And I need a helmet. I'm currently trying to find a bike repair place close enough so that we don't have to try getting it in the back of Nyron's car again. When we picked it up it turned out to be too big for the Camry and we had to take the front wheel off just so we could close the doors. But not before getting bike grease on the upholstery. What with my cousin's cats peeing on the back seats and now this bike I fear I've done more damage to Nyron's beloved car in the last two years than all time he's had it!

Oh well. My bike is cool! I'm thinking of calling her Madeline, after "The Apology Song" by The Decemberists. If you see me cruising around South Etobicoke someday soon, give a wave!

0( )__

Climb a little higher...

2006-04-01T14:50:00.000-05:00

This April 29, I will be volunteering for the CN Tower Climb in support of WWF. That's World Wildlife Fund, by the way, not the World Wrestling Federation. : )

To participate in the climb, all you have to do is register online, then raise a minimum of $50. There is also a team climb on Thursday, April 27 for those of you who like to do it in groups. All the money raised will help WWF fight Global Warming and man-made climate change. Just think of all those smog alert days in Toronto last summer (48 - the highest on record!) if you need another eason to sign up for this great cause! Hope to see you there!

o( )__

Sometimes this city makes me shake my head in wonder

2006-03-22T17:02:00.000-05:00

As often happens on my lunch break, this afternoon I found myself walking through the labyrinth that is the Toronto PATH system in search of food-court food. Up ahead of me, I noticed a woman's scarf gain freedom from the coat slung under her arm and fall to the floor. There was a group of three women between myself and her and I expected that one of them would pick up the wayward scarf, but instead all three stepped over it an continued on, although they certainly must have seen it fall. When I reached it I picked it up and sprinted up to the woman just as she was rounding a corner. When I said, "excuse me, you dropped your scarf" she seemed positively surprised. Her two friends looked at me with wide, almost fearful eyes until they realized that I wasn't trying to mug them, but was in fact just returning their friend's scarf. I left them to their exclamations of surprise and wonder that someone would actually be nice to a stranger.

It's times like this that make me wonder at the city I live in. I love Toronto, and I recognize that as a large city its citizens run on anonymity and individualism. But the look of shock and surprise on those women's faces made me think that they'd all lost more scarves than have had returned to them.

o( )__

Weapons of Mass Dissemination: The Propoganda of War

2006-03-21T17:50:00.000-05:00

That is the title of the Canadian War Museum's latest exhibit. It is a collection of toys, posters and advertising from the first half of the 20th Century. It's not often that I wished I lived closer to Ottawa (in fact, I'll go right ahead and say that this is a first) but I do wish I could see this exhibit. I've always been fascinated with war propoganda. I have a copy of the training film-turned propaganda documentary Why We Fight from WWII on DVD and am always on the look out for prints of the knitting posters (with such rousing slogans as"Knit Your Bit!" and "Our Boys Need Sox"). And if anyone ever sees an authentic Red Cross War Sock Knitting kit, even if it's just the empty tin box, please let me know!

The way that war is presented to the people left behind is, I must admit, a wonderful example of creativity in advertising. How else could you convince thousands of people that sending their friends, family, and lovers off to die in a country they may not have heard of before and for reasons they aren't necessarily really told, is a good thing? Of course, I don't beleive that war propoganda is a good thing, the way it insites hatred in the "enemy" and glorifies the soldiers (as if the other side aren't doing the exact same thing and suffering in the exact same ways) but it is a fascinating and insightful look into the power of advertising and human susceptability.

If anyone who reads this lives in or is planning to visit Ottawa while this event is still running, please post a comment and let me know what you thought of it. I can't be there myself (Toronto is about a 6 hour drive away) but I'd love to hear about it from other people.

Peace,

o( )__

Moving up in the world

2006-03-18T12:54:00.000-05:00

I haven't written in a long time, but I have a very good excuse: I got a promotion! I'm now going to be a registrar at work, which means I get my own office but I won't be making the ordering decisions for the school anymore. So now, any time I find a environmental product to replace something we;re using I have to go through the woman taking over my old position and hope she follows through on it. Hopefully, she will.

I got a response from the people who make the Worn Again shoes and they say there's at least one outlet in New York. Luckily, that's just where Nyron and I have been considering going for our next vacation. Unfortunately, with this new position and the summer rush coming, I'm not sure how soon we'll be able to go anywhere. Well, whenever it is, I'll be sure to look for them.

o( )__

Oh, how I want these!

2006-03-01T17:40:00.000-05:00

OK, I know that a major part of living environmentally is to cut down on consumption (shopping) so as to reduce the energy, transportation , and packaging costs of new items, but considering the state of my year + old Converse All Stars, I think I can get away with coveting these:

These shoes, by Worn Again in the UK, are made of old prison blankets, jeans, army uniforms, silk parashutes, recycled plastic and all kinds of other "trash". And aren't they just beautiful? Sigh. I think I'm in love. To bad they don't have any distribution in Canada, but I've emailed them to find out where in the States they are sold. Anyone up for some border shopping?

o( )__

Rx Cuteness

2006-02-23T17:18:00.000-05:00

If you've never seen the website Cuteoverload.com go to it. Go now! It's better than Prozak, really.

There's even a write-up in the Alt Health section of Now Magazine that suggests that looking at images of cuteness should have a beneficial effect on your mental health. So when your boss catches you looking at pictures of hedgehogs and kittens instead of the boring spreadsheets you're supposed to be working on, just smile and say it's a doctor-perscribed health treatment. You all believe I'm a doctor, right?

o( )__

It gets worse before it gets better

2006-02-21T15:47:00.000-05:00

I'm in even more pain today than I was yesterday. It's such a cruel paradox that muscle pain is the worst two days after the offending exercise has taken place. I feel like I've been beaten about the chest and shoulders with a wooden cane. I walk like I left the hanger in the front of my shirt. Who knew I had muscles around my collar bone? Who knew they had the power to freeze my entire upper body. Curse whoever invented barbells!

On the bright side, I bet if someone proposed a robot dance contest, I'd win hands down. Come on, everybody! Get down like it's 1984!

o( )__

Ow, ow, ow, ow!

2006-02-20T08:33:00.000-05:00

I let my friend K talk me into accompanying her to her workout class at the gym yesterday. It was arobics with bar bell weight lifting. I hurt in places I didn't even know had muscle!

o( )__

Is it too early to start thinking about spring?

2006-02-19T18:15:00.000-05:00

The amount of glorious sunlight that wakes me up through my south-facing bedroom windows every morning makes it hard to remember that it's not quite spring yet. Nevertheless, it hasn't stopped me from starting to plan my balcony garden. I've never done a lot of container gardening before, so I went to the library (just a few blocks from my place) to get some books on container gardening on balconies. Call me a geek, but I always feel better if I thoroughly research a project before I start it.

While out shopping with Nyron yesterday (for much-needed tall Billy bookshelves from Ikea) we decided to take a trip to Canadian Tire as well and I picked up some seeds. I got some clear plastic egg cartons from a nice freecycler and I'd like to try growing at least some of my kitchen garden from seed. Why?, because then I get to start the whole gardening process much earlier in the year! Of course, I haven't really managed to get a seed to grow into anything since we all planted bean seeds in 3rd grade, so we'll see if the fruits of my labour...well, fruit. In an attempt to get Nyron excited about my little wilderness of edible flora in the making, I let him pick most of the seeds - snow peas, green and red peppers, basil, camomile (for tea), carrots, cucumber, green onions, chives, parsley, peas, and tomatoes. Neither of us really likes tomatoes, but I've never had a tomatoe plant die on me yet, even in drought conditions where everything else withered away. This way, even if my green thumb turns out to be more brown than I'm hoping, I'll have at least one vegetable to show for my efforts. Anyone up for salsa?

As for my vermicompost, it seems to be going well. The only thing that sometimes worries me is the amount of moisture that keeps building up. Every once in a while I find white mold accumulating in the bin. I emailed the question address on Mary Appelhof's website and it was suggested that I take the lid off for a day or two. I've had to do this twice, so far. I'm not adding any water, it's all a biproduct of the worms doing their thing. I wonder if I should be adding more bedding or just keep leaving the lid off once a week. I think I'll go do a search of Yahoo! Groups to see if there's a vermicomposting group I can join to ask questions and get support. I'll come back and update my findings later.

o( )__

Happy Valentine's Day!

2006-02-14T15:49:00.000-05:00

My Velentine's treat to you are two poems. The first is a poem by Stanley J. Sharpless. I don't know if he's a "poet" but this poem won a magazine contest in England for the best poem about the aphrodisiac effects of chocolate. I found it republished in Len Fisher's How to Dunk a Doughnut:

Cupid's Nightcap

Half-pat nine - high time for supper

"Cocoa, love?", "Of course, my dear."

Helen thinks it quite delicious,

John prefers it now to beer.

Knocking back the sepia potion,

Hubby winks, says, "Who's for bed?"

"Shan't be long", says Helen softly,

Cheeks faintly flushing red.

For the've stumbled on the secret

Of a love that never wanes.

Rapt beneath the tumbled bedclothes,

Cocoa coursing through their veins.

Just goes to show the 1950s weren't as puritan as they seem looking back, eh?

The second is one that I wrote a few years ago and that just today won the Valentine's Day Writing Contest that my work put on for the staff (there was also a contest for the students). It's a parody of The Passionate Shepherd to his Love by Christopher Marlowe:

The Passionate Hipster to his Love

Come out with me and be my love
And we’ll the weekend pleasures prove
Of bar and club and Indie show
To look like we are in the know.

After we have seen the band
We’ll sit the patio, beer in hand
And to prove we’re intellectuals,
We’ll wax existential.

We’ll lounge the grass of Philosopher’s Walk
Being a hip enough place to sit and talk.
Languishing, discussing out classes
While you gaze at my Elvis Costello glasses.

And I will buy you beaded rings
Made of Fimo and hemp-woven string
A T-shirt screened with an ironic slogan,
A courier bag all covered with buttons
And because it’s deck (and I’m low in pocket)
It’ll all come fresh from Kensington Market.

As I expound just what my heart meant
We’ll spend alternate nights at each other’s apartment.
My undying love I to you avow,
Well, anyway, at least for now.

My winnings include a hardcover copy of Brick Lane by Monica Ali and a bottle of Henkel champainge.

o( )__

A slight miscalculation

2006-02-10T13:18:00.000-05:00

Last week I ordered a half order of biodegradable cups (4 boxes of 1000) to try out in our lounge. When the invoice arrived, we had a bit of a shock - we had completely miscaculated the price difference. When we looked at the invoice for the styrofoam cups we took the price to be the price per box, when in fact it was the cost of the entire order of 8 boxes. So instead of the biodegradable cups being $30 less per box there were actually over $100 more and instead of saving the company $300/month we accidentally spent $400 extra. Oops.

It's really too bad. I still believe that we should try and find a way to use biodegradable cup sin the lounge. The woman I spoke to a Green Shift expressed interest in the price difference between their paper cups and styrofoam cups, so I think I'll send her an email to let her know what kind of pricing comparison they're up against.

0( )__

Wining and dining

2006-02-07T08:29:00.000-05:00

On Thursday I got to represent my company at the Green Tourism Association's 10th Anniversay Wine and Cheese evening (we're not a tourism company, we're a school, but I'm the event planner for the students so I qualified). It wasn't quite as glamorous as it sounds, since it took place at 5:30 at the TD Centre and was entirely populated by people who had just gotten off work and were drinking to take the edge off. It was mainly an opportunity to mix and mingle, but it seemed to me that most of the people there already knew each other and it took me until my second glass of wine to be able to just walk up to someone and start a conversation (I'm a little shy). That person happened to be a tour guide with a tour company that recently sent us promo material in the hopes that we would use them for our student trips. I'm sure our conversation was very informative but, in a distinct downside to the concept of an after-work wine and cheese gathering, I can't remember much of it.

The lovely wine was provided by a local winery, Henry of Pelham Family Estate which is located in St. Catherines. I wish I was enough of a wine connoisseur to be able to talk about it's bouquet and undertones and such (if my friend Yorkshire Soul were here, he'd be able to write a whole review on just the wine) but all I can say was that it was tasty. There was also chocolate by Chocoland Eco-Choco-Art which is a local, family-owned company that produces organic, fair trade, hand-made chocolate "inspired by nature and poetry". Does it get any better? I even got to meet one of the owners, Radmila, who was presiding over her chocolate table and making sure people knew it was there to be eaten, not just looked at - and the chocolates did look beautiful. Of course, the most important part was whether or not they were delicious and they most certainly were. I could have wished she'd brought more varieties for me to try, though. : )

o( )__

New year, new look

2006-01-30T20:45:00.000-05:00

By now, I think my readership is probably down to my boyfriend and a few close friends who only read this blog because I read their blogs. Even I've started getting bored with it. Let's be honest, my day-to-day life just isn't all that interesting to write about, especially since I refuse to write about work (I rather like my job and don't fancy getting fired). So, I've decided to give this blog a new focus, an underlying theme that can string the posts together and give me an incentive to write. I'm going to focus more on my ongoing attempts to be more conscious of the way my lifestyle and choices affects the world around me.

Environmental awareness is something I've been interested in since I was a child growing up in the 80s and trying to make compost in an icecream container under the sink and nagging my parents to seperate their recyclebles. Now that I'm all grown up and have 100% control over my buying and household habbits I'm trying to be decidedly aware of how everything I do changes the environment around me. I've started using biodegradable cleaning products and wheat-based cat litter. Unfortunately, I don't live in the Annex, so there are no organic grocery stores nearby, but there is a halal butcher so it's a start.

My major eco-achievement today, however, took place at work. In the lounges we provide for the students we offer coffee and tea and filtered water. This cornucopia of beverage options causes thousands of polystyrene cups to be thrown out every month. Luckily, my boss is very environmentally conscious, she simply hasn't had time to do the research necessary to make the office more green, a task I have jumped at the chance to do. So this afternoon, I finally managed to find a local company, called Greenshift, that sells biodegradable hot drink cups. The best part is, they are actually LESS expensive than the polystyrene cups we've been buying, by about $30 a box! Since we go through close to 10 boxes a month, this is no slight savings. Don't you just love it when being good to the world is good to you budget?

0( )__

Welcome, worms!

2006-01-19T08:46:00.000-05:00

A few weeks ago a lovely couple on Freecycle heeded my request for vermicomposter worms and gave me some. For those of you who don't know, vermicomposting is composting using worms. It's a great way to keep a composter in your kitchen, because it doesn't smell (thanks to the worms and the air holes drilled into the container) and it can be made small enough to fit under your kitchen sink (which is where mine lives). It's also really easy to set up and maintain - this is my first time trying one and the worms have already started breeding! That's a very good sign, because creatures only breed when they feel secure in their environment.

I have to admit I've always liked worms - I don't think twice about rescuing a worm from the sidewalk on a rainy day - and I'm loving that I can use them as little workers in my home. The soil they produce is so rich that it has to be mixed with potting soil for gardening because otherwise it would overload the plants. The excess water produced by the worms can be used as also a highly concentrated fertilizer spray and the worms themselves make excellent fishing worms (Nyron's father loves to fish).

So welcome, worms! I hope you like living under my sink.

0( )__

Where have all the snowflakes gone?

2006-01-12T17:50:00.000-05:00

Is anyone else as bothered as I am about the weather? Probably not. The teachers at my school are thrilled that it's so "nice and warm". I find it rather forboding. It's January. It should be snowing. Full stop.

I've been actively working on my New Year's Resolutions the last few weeks. So far I'm off to a good start, at a good pace (don't want to burn myself out before March). I have two resolutions I'm working on;

1) Start my home business that I've been dreaming about for years now. Spirit Eyes Designs (let me know what you think of the name) will sell hand-made home decor products made with reclaimed materials. I plan to set up a website and sell them in some local stores as well.

2) Slow down. It's amazing how quickly I've fallen into the "must get everthing done right now Oh My God I'm so behind!!!" mentality at work. I rush around like my belt is on fire and return home to tired to even cook dinner. This was rather inevitable since I was the only one working front desk for about a month and literally did have to do everything single-handedly. But now we have a new girl with me at the desk and it's taking a lot of the load off. I'm also making a decided effort not to freak out and rush to get everything done. After all, the students can wait! If it takes me a little extra time to do one thing or the other, it's not the end of the world. If I have to be strict about rules like "Only sign up for events during the break periods" in order to get work done, then that's what I have to do. It's not the end of their world or mine to make them wait a little or to take my time and do things calmly. It's certailny worth my sanity!

o( )__

Warning: the following entry includes pictures that some viewers may find too cute to tolerate. Viewer discretion is advized.

2006-01-02T15:29:00.000-05:00

My mom just sent me these pictures of the Christmas Puppies. Get ready for some extreme cuteness:

First we have the proud mother, Belle, in the maternity ward (the padded cardboard box we put together for her). She's so beautiful, I'm sure the puppies will be beautiful just like her. Well, you can see for yourselves...

One,

two,

three times the puppies!

It's hard to tell since there's nothing for comparison, but Mom says they're about 6" long now. Their eyes are still closed, or course, since they're only about a week old. In another week or so their eyes should be open and the puppies will be even bigger and start to become chewers of socks and messers of the kitchen floor. But for right now they're just sweet as sugar.

o( )__

Happy 2006

2006-01-01T15:27:00.000-05:00

So how was everyone's New Years? Our's was great. Nice and relaxing, and we even managed to leave the house.

First we went to Canadian Tire and Ikea for some house stuff. Well, actaully, we went to Canadian Tire for house stuff, Ikea was for browsing - we can't really afford furniture right now. But we did really well at the CT. It's amazing how I ever got along without little things like baking sheets and a cutlery drawer sorter - you try making chicken fingers in an aluminum roasting pan. Then we came home and relaxed on the couch and watched some Black Adder and a Hitchcock film from the boxed-set I got Nyron for Chrismtas. Nyron went to a fine food store downtown before coming over the other day and we still had some deli turkey and roast beef and some really nice french bread left for dinner. Mmmmm, good! You can put whatever gourmet ingredients you like on a sandwich but if it's smooshed between to pieces of preservative-laden Dempsters your sandwich will still taste like shit. At least, that's my humble opinion.

After a few hours of that I started feeling a little restless, so we caught up with some friend who were drinking in the Red Room downtown. That was fun. It's mostly people I don't get to see often because they're initially Nyron's friends, but I'd certianly like to see more of them. And there were new people that neither of us had met, which is alway exciting. We had our own little Idea City conference at the table, discussing various ways to save the world in the new year. It was a blast.

Today is more pratical. I've been getting a lot of house work done and watching the almost complete lack of entertainment on TV. I even discovered that I get the SexTV channel, but I have yet to see any sex. I'd say, "What a rip off" if I wasn't getting the channel for free. You get what you pay for, I guess.

o( )__

The longest/shortest week I've ever worked

2005-12-31T11:22:00.000-05:00

Last week was only 3 days long; well, the work week, anyway. It was lovely to have a week and a half off for Christmas. It meant that I got a day to relax and regroup after my trip home, but it also meant I had more catch-up to deal with when I did get to work. This is something I'd never experienced working in retail; when you come back from vacation, you don't have to do anything but exactly what you were doing before you left.

3 days was not nearly enough to do everything that I wanted to get done. My boss and I had planned on spending the bulk of our time organizing the supply room. Needless to day, none of that got done. Oh well.We'll just have to go back to trying to do it bit by bit while people come in every few minutes and mess it up again. One thing I did finally get around to doing was reorganize my new desk the way I like it. The woman who worked on the front desk with me is moving to Switzerland, so I became the lead Front Desk person. Sure, it sounds like a promotion, but it's really just more work for the same pay. But, I got to move over to her side of the desk, which is about twice as big. Mmmmm, space!

So what is everyone doing for New Year's Eve tonight? I have no idea what Nyron and I are doing. He's not exactly the "plan ahead" type. He'd rather be spontaneous. I'd rather have reservations. We're both rather broke after Christmas, so we'll most likely stay home, order pizza and watch the British countdown on BBC, which I get for the next month for free with my cable package.

I currently have roughly 400 channels. My free preview endes early February, and I don't think I'll bother to renew. There are a few channels We might purchase individually, like the BBC channels and maybe Book TV (it has another month to impress me), but most of the channels are the exact same as the regular 60 that we get. I mean, the exact same! Showing the same shows, sometimes even at the exact same time. Why would I pay an extra 20 bucks for that?

I hear a garage door opening. It's either Nyron or the neighbours (in a townhouse, it can be hard to tell). Hope everyone has a great New Year!

0( )__

Certainly a one of a kind Christmas

2005-12-26T14:49:00.000-05:00

I went east this past week to spend the holidays with my family in Nova Scotia. Soon after I arrived, my mom told me that their female pomeranian, Belle, was pregnant (courtesy of their male pomeranian, Baux). Using calculations based on the last time my parents saw the two getting busy, my mom figured that the puppies would be born in late January or early February. Belle, of course, was incredibly pampored as is befitting expectant motherhood. We rubbed her belly and could feel the little things moving around inside (almost as cool as when my friend Amy let me feel her stomach when she was pregnant with her son).

On Christmas morning my brother, grandmother and I walked over from my grandmother's house (where my brother lives in the basement and where I stay when I'm in town), next door to my parents' house. They were still in bed when we arrived, so they asked if we would let the dogs out the front door so they could do their business. When we pushed back the gate that keeps them in the kitchen (they're still being trained) Baux went shooting out like a rocket and out the front door. Belle, however, only went as far as the foyer before returning to the kitchen, which was very strange. After doing this a second time, I volunteered to corall her outside. When I went into the kitchen I heard a strange mewing sound and there she was, she was lying on a blanket, curled around three tiny, damp, brown newborn puppies! I'd never seen anything like it. They were tiny, about 4 inches long, their eyes still closed and, although a little nervous at first, Belle took to motherhood right away. She'd already dealt with the placenta and cut their umbilical chords and was cleaning them and letting them feed. By the end of the day, all her nervousness seemed gone and she was in complete control, only acting agitated when one of the male dogs came into the room.

So that is my incredible Christmas story. The puppies are now roughly 6 inches long - they grow so fast! - and momma is still donig well (so I'm told, I've since returned to Toronto). I just wish I could have one of the puppies, but I'm not in a position in my life to take care of dogs, especially poms which are so high-maintanence. I hope everyone had a great Christmas or whatever holiday you celebrate (or don't, whatever). I'm off to do some more unpacking; how much stuff do I have, anyway?!

o( )__

Always make sure you have all your ingredients: A cautionary tale

2005-12-13T08:44:00.000-05:00

My friend Kathryn is having a turducken dinner (that's a chicken stuffed inside a duck stuffed inside a turkey) tonight and she's asked that the side dishes be pot luck. So I offered to make my grandmother's traditional mushroom stuffing - which, to be honest, is about the only holiday side dish I know how to make. It's really simple; just fry chopped onion and sliced mushroom in a pan, add chuncks of white bread (about a loaf), a bit of water to make it moist, lots of sage, a small can of mushrooms and, when I can get away with it, some corn (my dad doesn't like corn, so I'm not allowed to add it when we make it at home). Easy, peasy, lemon squeazy, right? Except that when I went to the neareset grocery store, they didn't have any sage. None. I spent about 5 minutes staring at the spice section willing it to appear, but unfortunately I was reminded once again that my will is not strong enough to change the physical material around me. Not yet, anyway.

So I went home to frop everything off (after having a conversation with the cashier about why I always bring my own shopping bag) and headed back out the door. The solution was to take the street car to the Queensway loop where there is a great big Sobeys. On the way, however, I noticed the Red and White grocery store which is closer, so I make a quick amendment to my plans and got off the streetcar...only to be reminded that some grocery stores are not open at 8:30 at night. A 10 minute wait and back on the street car, where I did get off at the Sobeys.

I got what I came for, as well as stuff to make tacos for dinner, and came home. But oh! Once I got cooking, it was like a ballet. Chopping onions while hadnling two pans at once, stiring one pan with a taco in my hand while pouring a glass of iced tea. Spinning around to avoid the bits of taco meat I spilled on the floor. Glorious. And now I have a huge bowl of stuffing to bring to the party. I just hope I added enough sage.

o( )__

There's no place like home

2005-12-12T08:38:00.000-05:00

Sorry. I'm sure you've all been waiting anxiously for an account of my new place and I, the negligent blogger, have been, well, neglegent. So here I am now to fill you all in to the sound of a collective exhale.

We moved in on Thursday. It took us two trips but with the help of one of my uncles we managed to get everything in the house before the snow hit. We put everything in the garage (and there a fair bit of it remains) until we can get everything sorted and in its proper place. It doesn't help that my great-greadmother moved into a home while I was in England and I somehow became currator of most of her stuff. Some of it we're managing to incorporate into the decor, but a lot of it will simply remain in the garage until further notice.

On Friday I had one of the worst days at work I've had yet. The woman who works at the front desk with me was supposed to spend that week training me on the things I hadn't learned yet, which were making the diplomas for the leaving students and getting things ready for the incoming students. So none of that got done and everyone had to pretty much drop what they would otherwise have been doing that day to make diplomas and prepare ninders and nametags. By the end of the day I was exhausted and upset, so much so that I started going home without realizing that Nyron and I had tickets to the Sarah Harmer concert at the Harbourfront Centre that night. Luckily, Nyron called while I was still on the streetcar to ask what time it started and I was able to get off and go back to Union Station before it was too late. We ended up missing the first song, but those things happen. Once we sat down, though, and she started singing I immediately became more relaxed. She's such a great performer. When we got home there was a graduation gift from my parents waiting for me: a new TV with a DVD player and VCR built in. They even sent a TV stand for it that matches perfectly! They'd wanted it to be a surprise, so they sent it to Nyron's house and he set it up while I was at work.

The rest of the week has been spent alternately unpacking and lazing around on the couch. I'm not used to the house yet and something keeps waking me up 2 or 3 times throughout the night. This leaves me exhausted at work and by the time I get home i'm pretty useless. Still, we've managed to get the place starting to look homey. We've set up the library in the front room and the living room has all my DVDs. The kitchen is set up and there's a culinary school down the street where I can finally learn to cook. We even set up this little plastic Christmas tree we found among my great-grandmother's things. We've already exchanged one gift: we agreed to buy each other iPods. Nyron's already put together a playlist for me to listen to on the way to work. Which is where I have to go now.

o( )__

Just a few more hours...

2005-11-30T16:39:00.000-05:00

...and I'll be in my new place. After much back and forth the property company finally agreed to let me have the keys as long as I faxed them a copy of my passport within 2 weeks. It's all so ridiculous, but it's sorted so that's what matters.

Apparently my mom is sending some big surprise to me via Nyron and it's set to arrive on Friday. Nyron's being admirably tight-lipped about the whole thing; my mom would be proud.

o( )__

Is this the end for our hero?

2005-11-29T16:57:00.000-05:00

It seems there may be a snag in my much anticipated move to the glorious West End. The property company wants to see my passport which, not having been informed of this ahead of time, I packed away in an anonymous box in the storage facility that currently contains the bulk of my worldly possessions. We tried to placate them with my birth certificate and a copy of one of my credit cards, but it seems they're still giving us problems. Enough problems that it may interfere with me getting the keys on Thursday.

It's rather sad that I'm only marginally outraged at this. It's gotten to the point where I'm no longer surprised when something goes wrong; I've almost come to expect it now. After all the preperations I've made - setting my check-out time at the Shoebox to Thursday morning, taking Thursday off work, packing up my room and putting it safely in the trunk of Nyron's car - why shouldn't something go wrong? I'll know tomorrow, hopefully, what's going on.

In happier news, I helped a student get appartment insurance today so he can move into a new place. It's very difficult to comminicate in another language over the telephone and his English level is pretty basic so I made a series of calls on his behalf so that he could pay for an insurance policy and get it faxed to his property company. The whole thing took almost an hour and at the end of it he left, assuring me he'd return so to get his copy of the policy which I'd requested to be faxed to the school. I thought he was going to get a coffee, but when he came back (moments after the MSN conversation with my mom informing me of the travesty mentioned above) he handed me something square in a Shoppers Drugmart bag. It was a box of Ferrero Rocher chocolates! I couldn't believe it! This kind of thing is just part of my job; I've made phone calls on students' behalfs before, it was no biggie. It was just so sweet and at a moment when I was feeling a bit pissed off and upset that I felt a little teary and went out from behind the dest to give him a hug. What a sweety.

o( )__

One Week! (and not the Barenaked Ladies song)

2005-11-24T17:10:00.000-05:00

One week from today I move into my new place! I'm more excited for this than Christmas! After all, what's Christmas but a day to spend with family and get gifts? We're talking about a home here! A home where I can unpack my stuff and not have to pack it all up again in a few months. A home where I can have fabulous parties with fabulous people. A home where I can actually get to know more than two of my neighbours. I just can't wait.

I have to start packing up my stuff in the Shoebox tonight so that I can move most of it out on the weekend. Ultimately, by Wednesday I should have nothing in that room but my overnight bag so that I can check out in the morning and take the streetcar straight out. "Out" will have to be to the storage facility at first, rather than the townhouse because it seems I won't be getting the keys until after 2:30 in the afternoon. For some reason there's only so much preperation that the lawyers can do beforehand, everything - all the payments and forms - don't go through until the day of, which slows things down considerably. But even such beurocracy can't spoil my mood about moving in!

As soon as I get settled we'll have to immediately start planning our Christmas party. Stay tuned for details!

o( )__

A reminder about the effects of harsh chemicals

2005-11-21T18:00:00.000-05:00

The day before my convocation I treated myself to a manicure. I love manicures. My figures get quite sore from constantly knitting and a manicure is professional nail colouring and a hand massage all in one! I hadn't had one in about 7 years and really enjoyed it. Afterwards, I bought some nail hardener to use because my nails split along the edges (very annoying!). I used it as directed, applying one coat every day for a week. By the end of the week, there was so much laquer on my nails that it was begining to peel in large chunks, so I decided it was time to just return my nails to their usual au naturel state. I don't have any nail polish remover so when I was at Nyron's place in Brampton yesterday I used some of his mom's.

After using this stuff, I seriously marvel at the resiliance of Mrs. Ali's hands. Maybe it was the fact that for each nail I had to rub through close to 10 layers of polish and hardener, or maybe that nail polish remover is industrial strenght, but whatever the reason it did some damage to the skin on my hands. The fingers that manipulated the acetone-soaked paper towel are so dry it feels like they're perminently covered in wax; I can barely feel them. The chemicals seem to have actually likked the top few layers of skin and the tips of my fingers now look like the landscape of an Arazona desert. I've been applying moisturizer to my fingers constantly all day to no avail. It's really quite gross.

This is why I prefer to use as many natural products as possible and why I've always had a slight fear of household cleaning products. I've never had vinnegar kill off layers of skin from my finger tips.

o( )__

You know you're an adult when...

2005-11-20T22:35:00.000-05:00

you find yourself filling out an application for financing at Leon's. Today, Nyron and I went out to pick out two sofa beds for the new place (just over a week now!). We found two very scooshy green couches that are both sofa beds. One of them is slightly smaller than the other, because I'm only willing to condesend to the barest amount of guest space in my studio (aka the spare bedroom).

It was a little strange having to fill out all kinds of information about my credit history and employment. Luckily, my parents are buying one of the couches as a gift for us so it's not going to set us back too much. But with all that's been going on, I definitely want a comfy couch to relax in after a long weekend of moving furniture.

o( )__

Oops! Clumsy me!

2005-11-17T17:31:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I had a clumsy day. Have you ever had one of those? Where the conncetion between your brain and the rest of your body feels faulty and everything you pick up drops? Yesterday was one of those days.

It started out with spilling Tim Horton's tea on my shirt. Twice. Then, I spilled it all over the desk and onto my keyboard. All this within the first half hour of being at work. It took 15 minutes to soak up all the tea in the keyboard by poking the corners of sheets of Kleenex between the keys. Then, I hit the side of my calf with my ankle and made a hole in my nylons with the zipper of my lovely tan-coloured boots. I asked my boss for some clear nail polish, but luckily she had a set of emergency nylons in her desk.

All these little acts of failed dexterity culminated in one final act of clumsiness. We received a large Grocery Gateway order of coffee creamer and sugar for the lounges exactly 2 minutes before the student break started. I hate when they do this (although they really have no way of knowing what our schedule is) because it means that all these boxes are cluttering up the lounge right in front of the counter and blocking the students' way. So I was in a bit of a rush to try and put it all away before they decended on the lounge like coffee-starved locusts. I put together a box of a dozen bottles of creamer and 4 large bags of sugar - in retrospect, way too heavy for one load - and lifted it to take it downstairs. I didn't lifet with my legs, nor did I lift with my back; I lifted, instead, with my shoulders. I don't recomend it as an alternative. I had a previous injury in the main muscle of my left shoulder (the trapezial muscle, I believe it's called) and so it immediately protested to this undue abuse, especially since I continued to take all the boxes downstairs in spite of it all. Needless to say, that was the last clumsy act of the day, owing to the fact that I had to move too gingerly to give myself the opportunity. Nyron came over that night with some muscle rub and kisses and made me feel better.

Today, through a mixture of muscle rub and pain killers, I feel much better. In fact, much better than I thought I would. Nyron has the whole weekend off starting tomorrow and I was heartbroken to think I'd be an invalid the whole time. My mood has been further improved by the fact the one of the students made me an entire family of paper cranes for my desk: Mother, Father, Big Sister and Baby.

o( )__

I am officially gradumacated!

2005-11-15T17:25:00.000-05:00

Last night was the convocation. As to be expected, it was a lot of innitial running around and being confused just to sit still for an hour and a half and spend 5 seconds on stage. Nyron bought be a bouquet of flowers on behalf of my family who couldn't be there. The the ceremony was really just the precurser to the celebration meal.

As a graduation gift, my mother offered to pay for Nyron and I to eat out anywhere we wanted. Anywhere. So, of course, I asked Nyron to pick as ritzy and expensive a restraunt as he could find. : ) We ended up at Susur, a wonderful restraunt on King E that blends Asian and Western dishes. Nyron had mentioned when he made the reservation that it was to celebrate my convocation, so the first thing the maitre de said when he welcomed us was "congratulations". That was very thoughtful.

The restraunt does a taster menu, where you choose the number of courses you want (5 or 7) and each person at the table gets something different, but we weren't feeling that adventurous so we opted for the a la carte menu. First we got a complimentary appetizer taster. We each had three different little dishes on different decorative plates (mine was beach pebbles embedded in clear sealer with little circular indents for the tiny dishes to go). For the first course, Nyron and I both ordered this dish containing two kinds of fois gras (one was chocolate) and roast breast of squag (which I think means pigeon). Please, no one tell me what fois gras is made of, because I liked one of them and I'd really rather not know. I think it's one of those French "use every part of the animal" foods.

Afterwards came a pineapple jelly in a soup, which was really refreshing and made a great in-between course to clear the palet. We each had a different main course; mine was coffe and vanilla maranaded ostrach and Nyron's was bison. I think Nyron ordered it just so he could make jokes using the Street Fighter character M. Bison. For dessert we had another taster plate, which included a pineapple torte, peach mouse between filo waffers, pear mouse on a dark chocoalte base, lemon-chilli sorbet on candied orange wedges and lemon pate on a little cookie. The maitre de must have mentioned my convocation in the kitchen, because someone wrote "congratulations" in semi-sweet chocolate on my plate. I also had one of the best glasses of red wine I've ever tasted (I don't usually like red wine, but this I liked).

o( )___

Life in the Shoebox continues

2005-11-12T13:01:00.000-05:00

Just 18 more days in what will hopefully be my last time spent living in residence ever. Things are pretty much all set for me to move into my new townhouse - the utilities are switched over in my name, I've transfered my Rogers account and made an appointment for a hook up on the 3rd and most of my bills are updated to my new address. Now all I have to do is wait.

Well, wait and graduate. My convocation is this Monday. Somehow, I'm not as excited about it as I thought I'd be. It's being rather anti-climactic, really. For one thing, my parents can't come see it. That's kind of the whole point of convocation, isn't it? For your parents who raised you and sent you to school and supported you to see all their (and your) hard work pay off? But they've very recently been inundated with business and can't leave the province, so Nyron will come and be my spectator, with an empty seat next to him. I may not even buy a dress. It just seems like a waste of money that I should be saving for the inevitable expenses of moving to a new place. Expecially since I'd have to buy shoes and make-up as well, since everything is in storage.

It seems, as I write this, that I'm more dissapointed than I've been letting on, even to myself. To be honest, the fact that my parents can't come is really no surprise; this kind of thing has been part of our lives for as long as I can remember. No plans are ever certain. Even family vacations have had to be cut short (sometimes, even before we even arrive) because business becons and you can't tell a grieving family, "I'm sorry, we can't hold a funeral for you mother this weekend. We'll be in Disneyworld". Even the fact that I'm the only person in my family to even go to university, let alone graduate, isn't enough to change this inescapable fact. Work comes first, it always has. Without it, I wouldn't have been able to go to university anyway, so it's kind of appropriate, I guess, that it is taking its price in this way.

Anyhoo, when next I write (and who knows when that will be!) I will have Hon.BA after my name. But it just doesn't seem that big a deal.

o( )___

When beavers get the flu...

2005-10-29T16:09:00.000-04:00

I've had the flu since Wednesday. Despite throwing up that morning (in the sink, because the bathroom in the residence is too far away for me to have made it) I still dragged my ass down to work and worked most of the day before my boss made me go home. Why risk making myself worse just to go to work? you might ask. Because it beat the hell out of staring at the same 4 walls of the Shoebox (which is what I've been calling my residence room) for hours on end. That is, in fact, exactly what I ended up doing on Thursday and it nearly drove me crazy. The worst was when I finished knitting Nyron's mom's scarf, because then I really had nothing to do.

I'm better now, although the evil being that lives in my lungs and gives me bronchitis every year has gleefully taken this bout of the flu as an opportunity to bring back my cough with a vengence. This particular cough is one that I have had since last spring when I was still in England and had just managed to get rid of a few weeks ago. Damn. Oh well. This lovely sunny Saturday and the two Matt B comics that I found at The Beguiling should do well to cheer me up.

0( )__

Happy Turkey Day Everyone!

2005-10-10T18:20:00.000-04:00

Unfortunately, my posts are going to be few and far between until I get settled in the townhouse. I don't feel right about blogging at work (especially since the IT guys constantly look in on my computer through remote connection) and I don't have internet at the hotel. This weekend I'm at Nyron's for Thanksgiving.

I'm still enjoying work. I've officially become the event planner for the school. It was originally part of my job description when I got hired, but my boss has thankfully given me a month to get used to the school before putting such a large extra job in my lap. It was previously done by two teachers but they're both teaching 3 out of the 4 periods and don't have time. Unfortunately, they didn't seem to have had time to organize the events they'd scheduled for the second half of this month, so now I have to pick up their slack while at the same time organizing next month. It kind of pisses me off that it was handed to me so disorganized, but whatever. I'll fix it this week.

This weekend marked the end of week 2 of living in the residence hotel. I could be there for 6 weeks or a full two months, I still don't know yet. The worst of it is, the new owner of my old house hasn't even moved in yet. There is absolutely no reason for me to be in that freezing cold, tiny room eating take out and TV dinners. I'd say I'm pissed off at the guy, but I think I'm just beyond. A few weeks ago I was pissed off, now I'm somewhere past that, into a kind of hyper-pissed state. Hopefully this will be enough to convince Dad to actually take action against him, even if it is after the fact. I'd really like him to file a formal complaint against our real estate agents, too, for allowing all this to happen. It was part of their job to be on our side about this and they haven't been from day 1.That's all for this week. Hopefully it won't be too long before I get a chance to blog again.

0( )__

I have a fan!

2005-09-27T15:38:00.000-04:00

I recently discovered the following comment on my blog:

Now, I may be making some assumptions here, but I was under the impression that in order to get into University, one had to complete elementary, middle and high school with a satisfactory degree of success. After reading your blog, in which you have explained you are in your fifth year of an English degree, I am truely astounded as to how you could have completed all of these educational requirements, because it is quite obvious that you CANNOT spell. it logically follows that your claim of being an English Student is a fallacy, therefore your blog is not true and your whole life is a lie. Good day.

At first, Sarah and I thought, "Who is this guy? What kind of petty asshole belittles a person's entire existence based on a small and extremely common trait?". But then I read his blog and realized that he's not an asshole: he's a fan! What else would you call someone who starts a blog just to write about me?! I'm really flattered! You know, you start these things and you wonder if anyone ever reads them. Maybe you get a comment that isn't spam for someone's porn site and you feel good, like what you have to say is interesting to someone. But to have someone start an entire blog just for me! I feel like a celebrity!

Another great thing about Joe (which is apparently his name, or at least the name he's given to his URL) is that he is the perfect example of a sociological theory I learned about in SOC 100 that I've always found fascinating. The theory goes that a person will always attribute another person's actions to internal motives and their own actions to external forces. In this case he is attributing my lack of proper spelling to my own lack of education (although the fact that he also uses it to question my entire existence is beyond the scope of this theory). He is basing this on an assumption about me, personally, without taking external factors into account. However, I would answer that it is not my spelling or my education that is at fault, but the fact that I tend to quickly write posts between tasks while at work and am often too rushed to read them over before clicking "Publish". This is, of course, very unprofessional and I thank you, Joe, for reminding me of it. I will certainly try to remember to re-read before submitting my writing.

The reason I've always found this theory so fascinating is that I see its truth in countless instances every day. This theory has far reaching implications. Just think of the number of problems and misunderstandings, some of which end in tragedy, that occur everyday because people assume the cause of others' actions without really stopping to think about them. If you think about it globally, entering cultural misunderstandings under this category, it becomes obvious how important a theory this really is. If everyone took the time to realize that they can't possible make accurate assumptions about the people around them, imagine what a better world it would be.

So Joe, welcome to my blog and to the world of blogging in general. I hope you enjoy reading it and I look forward to reading yours. I appreciate all your comments and shall comment on your blog in return. It's always nice to get comments. Also, you may be interested to know that you don't need to have a blogger account to comment on peoples' blogs, provided that the author has specified that they allow anonymous comments.

(By the way, you spelt "truely" wrong)

o( )__

Just what I needed!

2005-09-26T18:25:00.000-04:00

Nyron and I just got back from a week-long trip to Nova Scotia to visit my family. More importantly than just a visit, this trip was also to introduce Nyron to my father who hadn't met him yet. Ooooh, pressure! But all went well and my dad seems to actually like Nyron! Like any true father, he's never liked any of my boyfriends. This is especially meaningful given that Joe the real estate agent actually had the complete lack of diplomacy and understanding as to mention directly to my father that we are planning to get married! Even knowing that, my dad still seems to approve.

Our trip was the most relaxing trip home I've had since I moved (not including the strained and exhausting 22 hour drive each way, of course! We only had 3 days in Nova Scotia so we tried to make the most of it. My parents took us out to Peggy's Cove and I took Nyron shopping on Spring Garden Rd and for a walk up Citadel Hill and to the Maritime Museum. It was so wonderful not to have to worry about where I'm going to live or packing my entire house into one little room.

Tonight I'm moving into a residence hotel downtown. It's a hotel that operates at a reduced rate and caters to students. It's much cheaper than staying in a proper hotel, although it lacks some of the amenities like an en suite bathroom and a tv. It does, however, have an excersize room, so I'll get at least a few months of regular excersize in before the winter slows my metabolism.

=^_^=

Once again, things have changed

2005-09-13T17:23:00.000-04:00

Joe the realestate guy and my dad apparently got into it again this morning and out of spite Joe has declined to let me rent his basement until my townhouse becomes available. This is getting rediculous. I don't know how these guys can still think they are in the right and treat us like this. If the tables were turned and I gave the guy who sold us the townhouse less than a two weeks' notice that I planned to move in whether he was ready to leave or not, I would most certainly not get away with it. Yet, that is exactly what the new owner of my house has done and they continue to stand by him while he ignores the stipilations of the contract that they drafted and he signed? What the hell is a contract for, anyway? The most important thing I've learned about this whole experience is to never trust a real estate agent. Anyone know of anyplace being sub-letted or anyone who wants a roomate until Dec. 1?

As for the cats Nyron almost had a home for them but it fell through. We've decided sooner would be better than later to take them to a shelter so we'll probably do it tonight or tomorrow. Everything has just suddenly piled up on me and it's making me feel burried. Things that I was supposed to have weeks to take care of suddenly have to be done before Monday and I only have a few hours a night to do it all now that I have a full time job. It's gotten so that my job is my escape from everything going on in the rest of my life (although I still spend my time at work looking for a new place to live, so it's not a complete escape). I guess I'd better get used to this since this is what my life is going to be like for the next few months.

o( )__

Wednesday is D-day

2005-09-12T17:49:00.000-04:00

We've decided to wait until Wednesday to try and find homes for the cats. If no one takes them by then, we'll have to take them to the Toronto Humane Society. We've checked to make sure that they are a no-kill shelter. The last thing I want is for them to get put down after all I've gone through to prevent just that.

This is really hard, but it's getting easier for both of us the more we get used to the idea. We have to be adult about this and if we're given a choice between a new home and two cats there's not a lot of practicality in choosing the cats. I just wish I had a little more time to find homes for them, but we've been given the deadline of this weekend and since I have to have everything packed and gone into storage before Nyron and I leave for Nova Scotia the sooner the better. Nyron's been taking this quite hard as well and has declared that he won't want another pet for quite a while. I completely understand.

0( )__

Good news and bad news.

2005-09-11T13:16:00.000-04:00

Good news:

I got the job I wanted. I started on Friday and seem to be settling in fine. Everyone there is really nice and the woman I'm replacing doesn't leave unti lJanuary so I'll have plenty of time to get used to things. The best part is that my boss has given me leave to go on Nyron's and my trip to Nova Scotia next week! She really didn't have to do that and could have easily insisted that I work straight through like I'm supposed to, but she also has family scattered all over Canada and knows what it's like to miss them. I'm also well on my way to getting the townhouse I wanted. They've acepted our offer and we're just waiting on the close.

This brings me to the bad news:

Because my dad is spending so much money on this townhouse for me and I certainly don't have anywhere else to go, he's demanding that I get rid of Sebastian and Hyde. At first he was going to give me until I move into the new house to find them homes, but as of today he's demanding that I get rid of them before we leave for Nova Scotia. Nyron's well pissed and will have a hard time being nice to my dad when he meets him, which could cause problems as well. If anyone knows of someone who can take one or both of the cats by the 18th, please, Please, PLEASE get in touch with me asap. I've set up websites for each of them which are linked from my knitting blog (see sidebar).

0( )__

Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster

2005-09-07T23:14:00.000-04:00

Have you guys seen this? This site cracks me up. It was created this past June by a guy named Bobby Henderson in Oregon who was pissed at the Kansas School Board for deciding to allow Intelligent Design to be given teaching time equal to the theory of evolution in their schools' Science classes. It proports that Flying Speghetti Monsterism is as valid a form of science as Intelligent Design, which is, of course, not at all. And since this guy is a university graduate with a degree in Physics, he manages to make his arguments sound logical and educated (i.e., not a crack-pot). He even includes a very helpful graph that "proves" that Global Warming is caused by the decline in pirate population since the 1800s.

0( )__

Back in this old house

2005-09-07T16:29:00.000-04:00

Wow. Staying at Nyron's really brought to life just how much this house isn't a home. In fact, I don't think it's ever really been a home, just a place I've stayed in intermittenly for the last 4 years. Especially now that the house has sold and my residency is subject to the whim of the new owner, I'm really yearning for a place I can settle in. Mom and Dad are dragging their feet, though, bound and determined not to let a single possible property go uninvestigated. I've found one that I quite like at Lakeshore and 12th St (so anyone who thought my current place was too far away to visit me, I'll definitely never see again) but it has a closing date of early December so I'll still need to find a place for the time in between. Even though I'm supposed to have residency of this house until November, the new owner is planning to move his family in here at the end of the month. Anyone know a pet-friendly place I can sub-let for a few months?

On the job front I might be getting close to having full-time employment. I aplied for a receptionist/event planner position at an international language school and I was chosen as one of the Final Three. I went into the office yesterday for a final interview and the candidate will be chosen sometime today or tomorrow. Of course, I really want this job - it seems like a really fun, relaxed environment and I'd get to plan day trips and events as well as do all the regular office stuff - but at the same time part of me hopes I don't get it, or better, that the decision is further delayed. Nyron and I have had a road-trip to Nova Scotia planned for months. If I get this job, I'll probably have to start right away. I don't get any vacation time until I've been working there for 6 months, so I'll not get to see my family until March. Also, I've been really hoping that Dad and Nyron can meet soon so that Dad can get used to him and stop resisting our relationship. It'll be much harder for my dad to see Nyron as a stereotype once he's recognized him as a human being. Mostly, I've just been really looking forward to the road trip part and to also hopefully seeing my friend Sarah in New Brunswick who I haven't seen in years.

0( )__

If you need me, I'm in Brampton

2005-09-02T09:45:00.000-04:00

On Monday morning the new owner informed me that he wanted to sand and re-stain the floors in the house and I had to be out, with my cats, by that night and come back Friday. It took me a while to find all three cats since one of them had found a new hiding spot that I was too short to discover on my own (I thought he'd escaped through a window the owner had left open that morning and spent the whole day worried sick about him. Damn cat). After traumatizing the kittens with a half hour drive up to Mississauga (and they traumatized us by peeing on the back seat of Nyron's car) we dropped them off at a cat hotel and Nyron brought me home to stay with him for a while.

I'm actually quite enjoying myself here. Nyron's place is much nicer and cozier than mine. They have full cable where I only have basic and there's a koi pond in the backyard where I usually spend the afternoons reading - my prefered literature at the moment is chick lit, especially Madeleine Wikham (aka Sophie Kinsella). Most importantly his parents don't seem to mind having me here and I certainly do my best to clean up after myself and stay out of their way. Especially since I'll be staying here longer than expected. I got a call from the new owner last night saying he just now got the first of three coats of stain down and that I have to stay away until at least Monday.

This whole house situation is getting ridiculous. Ridonculous, even! First of all, it says nowhere in the contract that he can kick me out for a week to do renovations and had I been kept up-to-date on the particulars of the contract I would have informed him of such at the time. Secondly, he also mentioned last night that he's planning on moving his family into the house in the second week of September: a whole month before he's supposed to. I'm not even close to having a place to live yet, but they've already rented out their old house. He even told the real estate agent that I could live in the basement and babysit his kids! What a jerk!

Right now that's neither here nor there as I sit in the sun next to a bubbling koi pond and read girly novels. I'm dealing with everything as it comes the best I can and trying not to worry about where I'm going to live two weeks from now.

0( )__

Farewell My Concubine by Lilian Lee ***

2005-08-28T16:50:00.000-04:00

Set in China in the first half of the last century, Farewell My Concubine follows the lives and careers of two Peking Opera stars. Moving from their childhood together under the skillful but brutal tutalage of their opera teacher, to national stardom, vilification under the Cultural Revolution, and finally to their reconciliation at old age, this novel travels through an incredible path of cultural change in China's history. The story acts as an exploration of the changing and often contradictory cultural response to the arts in China.

The novel is written in the trademark simplicity and beauty of Chinese literature, but it seems to fall short in some ways. The characters are often quite unlikable, which undermines the effectiveness of the drama. The simplicity of the narrative style works well to highlight the sometimes complex changes that happen to the characters and the country as a whole, but I found I would have been interested in reading more detail about the cultural changes that took place in that period of China (the rise of communism and China's Cultural Revolution has always been an interest of mine).

Farewell My Concubine was made into a film staring the lovely Gong Li (Raise the Red Lantern).

Where will I live?

2005-08-28T11:07:00.000-04:00

The real estate agents have finally turned their attention to me and have sent me a list of listings (that sounds redundant, but it isn't) of properties on the market. I've been pretty much talked into giving up on a townhouse and going for a condo instead. The pros: It's smaller, so easier to clean; There's a possibility that I'll find one with an exercise room/pool; I can think of myself as one of those "hip young professionals" that condos seems to be marketed towards; There's a good chance that it'll be less than 50 years old (unlike many of the townhouses in this city). The cons: It's smaller, so I won't have as much room and will have to be more organized; No backyard and very likely no balcony or even kitchen window; Many condominiums don't allow pets, so that severely narrows my search (not to mention eliminates a lot of the really nice ones downtown); No front porch on which to sit with a glass of lemonade and my knitting, serenely waving at my neighbours (not that I do that now, but I'd like to).

The way I think of it, it's only for a few years. After that Nyron and I will probably be moving to England or getting ready to buy our own house or something equally adult like that.

I've asked the agent to set me up with appointments to see 4 of them on Tuesday so Nyron can come too. My cousin Sharon also drove me around yesterday and we discovered some condos that weren't on the list for me to inquire about. I'll let you know how it turns out as this blog becomes The Great Condo Hunt.

o( )__

Who would steal a recycle bin, honestly?!

2005-08-20T13:07:00.000-04:00

I am a very organized person. I like there to be an easily recognized place for everything to live in. This is why I am very particular about having 3 recycle bins on my front porch: one for paper, one for glass/plastic, one for aluminum. I know they probably all get mixed up in the truck anyway, but what if they don't? Anyway, I'm an eighties child; I was taught to seperate my recyclables.

Which is part of the reason why I'm so ticked off. I mean, who steals a recycle bin?! A full recycle bin at that! In order to take it they had to dump all the glass and plastic out of it into the aluminum bin. It's not like these are hard to get, the city wants everyone to have them, so why do people have to steal mine? I knew the last time this happened (oh yes, this isn't the first time) that I should have written my address on it in big black marker. ARGH!

Oh well, what it really comes down to is that this isn't my house anymore, so it really doens't matter. I'm going to go eat some left-over Chinese take-away with Nyron. Yum.

o( )__

And now the construction has moved to my house

2005-08-20T11:10:00.000-04:00

I haven't heard construction sounds from next door in a while now. It's been nice to be able to sleep past 7am without having to ignore the sounds of machismo-increasing power tools coming in my bedroom window.

That doesn't mean that Im enjoying peace and quiet, however. The sale on the house closed yesterday and at this very moment the buyer is downstairs with a friend starting his remodling of the basement. Spirit is the only one of the cats who seems unconcerned by the steccato bangs and crashes that vibrate the floor. The other two our hiding valiantly under the armchair (although Sebastian spends most of his time there, anyway). Oh well. I'm moving as soon as I can find a place which hopefully won't be too long. Come to think of it, the 3 straight summers of noise pollution coming from next door has made this seem almost like a series of soft whispers drifting up from the basement. Maybe if I get tired the vibrations will lull me to sleep.

o( )__

All rain and no chores makes Brooke a lazy beaver

2005-08-19T17:18:00.000-04:00

One of the things I love about Toronto are the frequent summer thunder storms we get. I've always loved the energy and noise of a storm, especially when I'm warm and cozy indoors. The sound of the rain is so soothing to me that for as long as I can remember my dad would leave my bedroom window open on rainy nights to help me sleep.

Today we are having one of those stormy days, only it's proving a bit of a nuisance. The cats are terrified and won't come out from behind the armchair in the corner of the livingroom. In fact, this morning Nyron and I had a tiny panic when we couldn't find Hyde at all! Turns out he'd actually hidden underneath the armchair! I was hoping to be able to work on socializing them some more today, especially Hyde who still won't let us pick him up, but it seems that it's a no go. Hyde won't let me near him and even Sebastian hissed when I tried to pet him earlier. It's become clear to us that these cats are not at all used to being picked up or handled. I often wonder if they've had any direct interaction with humans at all before I got them. (For a complete recount of our attempts to socialize these psycho-kittens, read my other blog.)

The other thing that makes this rain a nuisance instead of soothing is that I'd planned to get some laundry done today. Normally the rain wouldn't affect that, but since there's no door to the basement and we need to keep the cats on the main floor because they keep getting into the walls, we've had to barracade the doorway to the basement. Which means that in order to do tha laundry I actually have to go outside and re-enter the house via the backdoor which leads down to the laundry room. I put a load in a few minutes ago, just before another huge downpour started. Ask me how thrilled I am about the prospect of getting soaked just to change over the wash. Go ahead, ask me.

Oh well. This is a fine excuse to not get anything at all done today. It's always good to look on the bright side of a situation. : )

o( )__

I can't wait to move

2005-08-16T13:12:00.000-04:00

On occation I have made jokes about how my house is making me sick. "I'm allergice to my house" was my MSN Messenger sign-in name for a week after I got back home. It turns out, I may have been closer to the truth than I realized.

I'd always known about the mold in the house and the fact that it was very likely one of the "bad kinds" that make people sick. This has since been confirmed by the appraiser who was in last week. Now it turns out that some of the insulation in the attic is asbestos-based, one of the most contagious kinds. All last week my house has been a revolving door of inspectors and contractors making estimates. I just got a call today from one of the real estate agents who called to warned me not to go into the room with the attack hole and to keep the door closed.

The good news is, he's anxious to find me a new place to move into asap, which is perfectly fine by me! The sale closes on the 19th and soon after the buyer will be in to start doing renos. Another good thing is that we're trying to find a way to block off the basement so that he can work, which means forcing my 2 new adopted cats to get used to living on the main floor and I can stop worrying about them getting stuck somewhere downstairs or getting sick from all the mold.

o( )__

The Unintensional Assistant Director

2005-08-10T16:01:00.000-04:00

That's me. I'm the Unintensional Assistant Director.

With the copious free time that a life as an unemployed lay-about affords me, I decided to apply to do continuity/art department on a few local short films. I sent out about half a dozen resumes to various prouductions and it wasn't long before I started getting calls. I took the first one that came along (not knowing that within 2 days I'd be contacted by three more productions!). The director asked me if I'd be AD and since I'd only put continuity and art department on my resume, my mind equated AD to Art Director. Sure, fine; it's a bit of a responsibility jump, but I can handle it.

This afternoon was the first rehersal. When I arrived the director sat down with me and started handing me release forms and all kinds of other stuff that I've never really had to deal with before. And that's when it clicked in: AD = Assistant Director. Oh my.

But not to worry. The super bull shit powers that my BA in English has granted me helped keep the slight look of panic out of my eyes as I scanned for anything in the sheets and forms that looked familier. But as the afternoon wore on, things started to settle down. I mean, she has my resume, she knows I have no experience in this, so she doesn't look surprised or put off when I don't seem to know what I'm doing. And by the end of the rehersal, I was discussing shots with the DOP and giving the actors direction.

This will be good experience for me. I'm being forced to work outside of my frame of knowledge and still keep afloat. Plus, as AD, I get to make sure that all the things I need done for continuity and set design are done the way I want them. Mmmm, control.

o( )__

Free books!

2005-08-09T15:33:00.000-04:00

This morning Nyron attended the Random House preview. Not only does this give him information about the hot new books that haven't hit the shelves yet, he also gets to take heaps of free books home with him; and the home to which he chose to deliver them, was mine. : )

He brought over 12 books, including the only copy of Salman Rushdie's new book, Shalimar the Clown, that was offered. I have a bookcrossing bookring book that I have a month to read before I have to mail it off again and the Diana Wynne Jones Chrestomanci series that Nyron is insisting I read so that we can chat about it, but once I've done those I can't wait to dig in to these advanced copies.

o( )__

Visited Countries Map

2005-08-07T10:33:00.000-04:00

This is a map of all the coutries I've been to in the world. It's not much, but I'll be adding to the list in years to come.

create your own visited countries map
or vertaling Duits Nederlands

On the road again

2005-08-06T09:49:00.000-04:00

The waiting and suspence is over. I am moving once again. My parents accepted an offer on the house and I will be out of here as soon as I can find a town house in my price range. I'm not sure if my parents are planning on buying it and renting it to me or if they'll just cough up the rent until I get a job. I still have to call Joe the Real Estate Guy and figure it all out.

I had a job interview the other day and it didn't go so well. I didn't get the job because of my results on a spelling test! Can you believe it? I'm sure at that moment one of my old English teachers smiled and suddenly thought, 'I told you so' without really knowing why. I think the reason I did so poorly is because I'm not used to having to spell check a list of words and say which ones are wrong. I'm used to seeing words in prose and in that context it makes much more sense to me. The words that I didn't pick up on are words I know and would have caught if they were in context and not standing alone. Oh well, no use playing a game of shoulda-coulda-woulda, it's done. Moving on.

Tim's still here, although my mom went home on Monday. My grandmother's also still here but she's staying at my cousin's so we haven't seen her much. Tim and I have spent most of our time watching movies, playing PS2 and getting stoned. I've had to stop smoking pot, though, because my lungs are bad enough as it is. Sorry everyone, but looks like I'll be a second-hand smoker from now on.

o( )__

When you turn 95 the Prime Minister sends you a birthday card

2005-08-04T10:42:00.000-04:00

My great-grandmother turned 95 last weekend. We had a big party for her and some of my family from in Nova Scotia came (my mom, brother, and grandmother). The party was held in the recreation room of her elder-care residence and on one of the table was a signed certificate from Paul Martin congradulating her on living so long. I'm told that if she reaches 100 the queen will give her a watch.

o( )__

Mom's home!

2005-07-28T11:37:00.000-04:00

My family arrived last night. My brother, mother and grandmother come to visit for my great-grandmother's 95 birthday this weekend. Nanny's staying with a cousin while my mom and Bro are crashing here. I've been looking forward to this trip for a long time, not just because they brought my cat back to me, but also because this is the first time my mom has come to visit me since I moved to Ontario.

Nyron got the weekend off work so that he can do family stuff with us (I love that man!) but he had to go home last night because he is working today. Tim wasn't in the house an hour before he was on the phone to his friend Dylan making plans for the night, so Mom and I ended up alone to entertain ourselves. We decided that the bottle of wine we'd already had upon returning from the airport was just the beginning and walked up to my local Firkin for some more drinks. Hmmm, getting drunk with Mommy! That was never mentioned in any of those "My Day" preschool books I read as a child, for some reason. It's always fun to hang out with my mom. : )

o( )__

I'm very sore, but at least I got a lot done.

2005-07-24T12:02:00.000-04:00

Wow, what a busy day we had yesterday. Nyron hoarded the HMV promo fliers from the Toronto Star so that we each had a "Buy one regular priced DVD get one free" coupon. Off to spurge on expensive DVDs! It's funny how willing one becomes to drop $50 on on DVD when they know that they're getting another expensive one for free. We tried to make it worth it by not getting either of the DVDs at under $30. The salesguy mentioned that people were lined up outside the door at opening and they took all the Criterion boxsets they could. We still managed to do farily well, though. Nyron got a season of Batman:The animated series and the Criterion edition of Kurasawa's Stray Dogs. I got the special edition of The City of Lost Children by Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Fushigi Yugi Eikoden which is 4 epilogue-ish episodes to the Fushigi Yugi series. Someday, when I have $300 to spare, I'll buy the series box set.

Afterwards we went to the Books and Coffe bookcrossing meeting. The "official" bookcrossing meeting day is the second Tuesday of every month. I've become the moderater for the Tuesday meetings, but I wanted to attend one of the Saturday ones (moderated by another bookcrossing in the group) to get a feel of how this particular group operates and see if Steve has any advice/suggestions for organizing my own meeting. There were 5 people including Nyron and I. We left behind the books we'd brought and pciked a few for us to read. Then Nyron friend Christa arrived and we left with her so I took a few more to bring to the Tuesday group. That's one of the great things about belonging to more than one group: it's a great way to circulate the books that don't get picked up after a meeting.

With a backpack crammed full of books, Nyron and I played tour guide to his friends Christa and her husband Julian. I love playing tour guide, I often do so for out of town friends whoe come to visit. It was a rather short tour, however, and limited to the waling route between the Future Bakery where the bookcrossing meeting was to Nyron's work. We made sure to go through campus, though, to show off how beautiful it is.

With Nyron safely at his managerial post I went to do some errands. Unfortunately, I chekced my balance and realized how broke I am, so that severely limited what I could get done. I managed to take my cell phone in to get fixed (it heats up when I talk on it or leave it to charge) and mail a book off to a bookcrosser in Texas who requested it from my Availables page before meeting up with Nyron again for dinner. We had some pretty good sushi at this restraunt by his work. I can't remember what it was called. It was good, except the vegetable tempura was a little too crispy.

When we were at HMV earlier we ran into my friend Anna Kay who works there. She told me that her shift ended at 7 and that we should meet up and hang out. she's currently house-sitting for a friend who has one of those really cool "country cottage" style decorating schemes. I just love it there! There are always so many cool things in that space. For example, her kitchen table is the stand for an old Singer pedal sewing machine! To get there, however, we had to walk since Anna Kay didn't have money for the subway (she'd just had to pay her right arm to get her bike fixed). On the way we bought a bottle of Wild Vines Strawberry White Zinfendel to enjoy. It was a nice relaxing evening, just us girls, although the walk there almost killed me. : ) Darlong Anna Kay did everything she could to help, including taking most of the books into the bike basket and carrying the backpack on the bike handle, but on top of all the walking I'd already done that day the damage was already done. My feet still hurt, but that's life.

Today, I'm not going anywhere! I'm going to sit on the couch and watch DVDs all day!

o( )__

Impromtu job interview

2005-07-21T12:08:00.000-04:00

This morning I received a call asking me if I had a few minutes for a phone interview. Don't worry, it was all legit; it was for a job I actually applied for. It was just a little strange to be one minute sitting watching tv, the next answering questions about my job experience. But I kept my cool and hopefully I'll get a call-back (I feel like an actress!) to come in for an interview.

I got asked the two questions I hate to get at interviews: What makes you stand out among the other applicants and, How much do you want this position to pay you. I hate those questions. I can't very well say "nothing makes me stand out" but I çan never think of anything to say, so I usually give some trite answer about my relevant experience or positive attitude or something like that. As for the wage question, how the hell am I supposed to know what they're willing to pay me? Especially since the last admin position I've worked was for my parents and I wasn't exactly getting minimum wage since it was just for spending money.

Oh well. I hope I get this job. It's for an IT company that does web design and customer support. It would be a great way to learn a bit about web design.

o( )__

Madness and Mayhem: the midnight selling of Harry Potter 6

2005-07-16T13:15:00.000-04:00

Actually, it wasn't all that chaotic, just packed. There were a number of people dressed up, which is to be expected. The security was really tight. On top of the store's own security there were two uniformed police officers. When the box was mistakenly brought down an hour early (not to be opened, mind you, just to have it ready) it caused enough of an issue for "They" to demand it to be returned to the storeroom until 5 minutes to midnight. A little anal if you ask me, but then, those are the rules.

At midnight the box, a huge single cardboard container covered in black plastic to conceal it's true identity that had to be transported on a skip, was opened to a jubilant count-down and news coverage. My very own darling Nyron got to be the one to lift off the lid and therefore may be on the news tonight (CTV, I think). By this time the line, which started along the front windows of the store, had winded a serpentine path around the giftware and into magazines, back out along the travel section and actually intercepted its own beginning and then passed it. People had to be let through 5 at a time until the end of the line moved forward enough to stop blocking the path. As the people came through they were handed their books directly out of the giant crate.

The only customer altercation experienced on the sales floor (although there were apparently a few upstairs where the preorders were being distributed), was by a man who took great personal offense that the two policemen were allowed to queue jump to get their books. He said, "just because they're civil servants doesn't mean they should get to jump the line. I have been here since 11". Of course, the cops had been there working security for much longer than that and they didn't get to sit at the Starbucks and have coffee. But what it really comes down to is - Come on! It's just a book! Yes, it is an highly anticipated, overly securitied book with the largest first edition print run of any book in publishing history (so I've heard), but it's still just a book. If the guys who've been working to keep you safe from the highly excitable populace around you want to buy their own copies of the books, it's not big deal! Get a life! He actually argued his point for a full 5 minutes before Nyron was finally able to induce him to move along so that the rest of the people who had been there since 11 could move forward.

We also had to explain, with decreasing patience, to the people just "hanging out" or browsing for other books that they had to leave. The whole staying open until 1am thing is strictly for Harry Potter only. No, you can't buy one of the 5 dollar bargain books. No, you can't use the washroom. And no, you especially can't stand in the middle of the store getting in everyone's way while you do so. Buy Harry Potter, or get out.

Since Nyron and I were handing out books to people in line, we got the pick of the whole crate for ourselves, so we put aside some that were unscathed by their incarceration in a cramped cardboard box (which took a crippling toll on some dust jackets) and went up to buy them on Nyron's discount when the chaos had calmed down. I stayed up until 2am reading before succumbing to sleep, only to be awaken this morning by the very loud construction machines next door at 8am. Last year I read the 5th book in 12 1/2 straight hours with hardly a break. This year, I think I'll let it last a bit longer.

o( )__

A night for geekin' out!

2005-07-16T00:06:00.000-04:00

Tonight at midnight the security will be relieved. The chains will be cut and the boxes opened to reveal their highly anticipated contents. I am, of course, talking about the midnight launch of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince! Nyron's been working at the Star Treck event that his Chapters has sent books too, but he's going strait from there to pick me up and take me to his store to be there for the launch and, naturally, buy our own copy. Each. I don't share. : )

In other lit-geek news, Nyron has bought the knit dolls of Arthur Dent and Ford Prefect made as part of the marketing for the movie. That's a triple dose of geekiness for me: literature, film and knitting. I just about lost it when I saw that knitting scene they did for that movie. Oh, to have been working art department that day!...*drool*

Ahem, ok, I'm back to earth now.

So here are the dolls:

Arthur Dent. In his house coat.

Ford Prefect. With a towel. Love the attention to detail!

o( )__

Let the rain come down!

2005-07-14T23:19:00.000-04:00

It's rained! Thank god! Something to break the heat, if only for a little while.

o( )__

Why do my parents think I'm a mind-reader?

2005-07-14T20:17:00.000-04:00

When I arrived back home from England I wasn't told that my house was still being sold, I had to find out from a Real Estate agent knocking on my door. Now, a discussion with my mom after another rogue agent has shown my house had lead to me finally being informed that the listing is only temporary and will be up soon. Why wasn't i told this before? When asked, my mother responded with: you didn't ask. That's almost funny.

So now it seems that my position isn't as transient as I believed, which I have to admit is a good thing. I can actually unpack and settle in. I don't have to feel like I could have to move at any moment. I don't have to feel so free-floating. Of course, now I'll be expected to have this place looking nice for when family visits. But at least I'll feel secure enough to buy a new sewing table.

o( )__

The Making of Jurasic Park: The Musical

2005-07-14T03:43:00.000-04:00

Scott's play is fantastic! It's a three-man play and the actors all play various roles. The set design is very sparse, but don't let that fool you; the play itself is full of humour. In fact, it's hilarious. It's set up to mimik a Making Of documentary with great use of spotlighting for the individual interviews and fuller lighting for the rehersal scenes and sneak preview. The whole production is put together very well considering a cast of three and crew of one.

The best part is that it's still playing! Go see it! Seriously, I mean it. It's great.

It's playing today at 4:00
Tomorrow at 7:00
And Saturday at 2:15 all at the Tarragon Theatre Mainspace, 30 Bridgman Ave. The Fringe Festival website has a map to the theatre.

o( )__

Lethargy of the Toronto summer

2005-07-13T21:28:00.000-04:00

I feel so listless lately. I can't settle my focus on anything, even tv requires too much mental commitment for me right now. I have so much stuff to do, yet I can never find anything to occupy me.

I blame the heat. As you can tell by my Weater Pixie it's ungodly hot! 34C and that's not including the humidity which usually, like a movie camera, adds 5 or 10 degrees. And no amount of verticle stripes will help. It's even too hot to sleep the last two nights with the only ac in my house the 5 year old oscillating fan propped up on an end table in my bedroom. It's actually hotter inside my house than outside. Sitting on the couch causes me to work up a sweat.

OK, I should stop complaining. I think maybe I'll go to the park across the street. They have a swingset there and swings have a decidedly calming effect on me. And tonight Nyron and I are making homemade fish and chips and then going to see our friend's Fringe show: The Making of Jurasic Park: The Musical. I'm very excited.

o( )__

Kitty foster home

2005-07-09T19:08:00.000-04:00

A woman on freecycle sent out a request for cat stuff. It seems that she and her boyfriend have decided to become foster cat parents. They are going to house cats (along with keeping their own) so that they don't have to live in horrid little cages while awaiting adoption.

I think this is such a wonderful idea and curse the various circumstances that keep me from following her lead. I'm not so much worried about Spirit - she's become quite used to other cats coming in and out of her life - but I can't very well start taking in foster cats when I don't know how much longer I'll be living here. WhenI mentioned it to Nyron as a possiblilty for when we're more settled he says he doesn't want me to become a crazy cat lady. Silly Nyron. Cat lady's are only "crazy cat lady's" when they live alone. clearly we'd be the "crazy cat couple". : )

I've decided that since I can't foster cats myself I'm going to help out this crazy cat couple. In a book in the Pets section of the bookstore where I used to work I once saw a project for turning odd socks into pet beds by filling them with fibrefill and sewing them together in a circle. I have quite a few odd socks lying around, so I think I'll give it a shot. If it works I may send out an APB for odd socks.

o( )__

How long does it take to build a bloody house?!

2005-07-07T12:00:00.000-04:00

The house next door to me has been under construction for over 2 years. 2 summers ago they tore the existing house down and poured the foundation. Last summer they worked on the house and were still working on it when I left for England. It never occured to me that they'd still be working on it when I cam back, but they are. That 3 summers in a row that I've been woken up at 7:30 in the morning by powertools on the other side of my bedroom wall. When will it end?

To put in puspective just how slow this is, a lot down the street from me which was completely vacant and untouched since its previous occupants (a convenience store and a pub) were domolished has now become a dozen finished townhouses, a dozen almost finished townhouses, and 2 or 3 dozen townhouses in various stages of completion. I miss waking up to sounds other than buzz saws.

o( )__

Shakespeare and Stratford

2005-07-04T01:13:00.000-04:00

No, I didn't spend the weekend with the great bard. For those of you who don't live in Canada, it may surprise you to learn that we have a town in Southern Ontario called Stratford. Next to Stratford, is the town of Shakespeare. Why do I care? Because every year, Stratford puts on a theatre festival called, with typical Canadian originality, The Stratford Festival. It is also where Nyron and I make our annual (2 hour) pilgrimage for some fine theatre. This year it was for Stephen Sondheim's Into the Woods and Noel Coward's Fallen Angels. Into the Woods I really enjoyed. The set was imaginative and there was a great use of light, colour and video projection. The play itself held its own and, of course, Sondheim is a great composer and lyricist. I would recommend it to anyone. Fallen angels didn't impress me as much. The humour was there, but there wasn't much else to speak for it.

Shakespeare is a very small town and the only reason one wouldn't just drive through on their way to the Stratford Festival is because it has some great little antique shops and other such quaint temptations. One particular stop we wanted to make was the Antique Warehouse which we had missed last year because of it's 6:oo close time. It was most definitely worth the wait. The place is a huge labyrinthine collaboration of shelves and display cases holding copious amounts of miscellany. Heaven. I walked away with a really cute S&P shaker set of little mice popping out of melons and 10 vintage Nursery Rhyme Wade figures. Nyron was probably the big winner here, as he bought (discovered by me!) a signed hardcover first edition of Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman.

Culture and consumerism was had by all. : )

o( )__

Happy Canada Day!/Bonne Fete du Canada!

2005-07-02T02:59:00.000-04:00

What a lovely Canada Day. It was actually less scorchingly hot than usual which was very considerate of the weather because that meant that my friends and I could fly a kite at the park without melting into little puddles on the grass.

After the outdoor merriness we went back to Kathryn's for a nutrituous lunch of KFC and the plans of a bbq later that night. Dave and Emerson had things to do before then, so Kathryn and I were left to our own devices: those devices being to pop popcorn and watch 28 Days Later, which I didn't find scary at all but still rather enjoyed. At this point, the boys all started calling to say that they couldn't come for the bbq, so it was just the two of us drinking sangrias until our respective boyfriends arrived.

Here's how MY boyfriend arrived. When he got to Kathryn's he called me on my cell phone to say he was just outside so I went to go open the door for him. But the doorstep was empty. I ventured out onto the driveway and finally the sidewalk, trying to figure out where he was. It was pitch black out, with only a few suburban streetlamps to show me the way. After a few minutes of asking him where he was, Nyron ran at me from the side of the house. He was wearing dark coloured clothes and has black hair and brown skin, so he just looked like a blur - just how the Infected people look in the movie. No one has ever made me scream that loudly and that genuinely since I was a little girl. I will get him back for that someday.

I hope everyone else had as fun a Canada Day as I did. And if you're not Canadian, too bad you missed it. : )

o( )__

Reception photos

2005-06-29T13:01:00.000-04:00

Here are some photos of the reception. Well, actually, they were all taken outside the mosque after the reception. But you know what I mean. : )

Here are Alana and Ismail looking smashing. The cool thing about splitting the wedding up into three parts is that the bride gets to wear three different gorgeous dresses!

Here is Nyron and I, looking mighty spiffy ourselves:

Nyron and Alana's parents look like the dignified in-laws they now are:

o( )__

Alana's Wedding part 3: the reception

2005-06-27T14:23:00.000-04:00

Yesterday was the final stage of Alana's wedding. Since the wedding ceremony was organized and set up by Alana's family, Ismail's family took care of the reception. It took place at a different mosque than the wedding, too, one with a bigger central area to accomidate the tables and large numbers of people. Again, it was segregated.

Everyone was dressed to the nines, including me in my sari which I eventually got together after about 4 tries. I still wasn't entirely convinced it looked right, some pieces still need to be tailored so that next time it'll fit perfectly. I think I was the only person there who wrapped my sari myself, most of the young women who wore them got them wrapped by an aunt or had them wrapped and sewn together so they just have to be pulled on like a skirt. I think that's a mighty good idea. : )

The reception was just a big banquet at the mosque, with samosas, curries and rice for dinner and lots of yummy desserts. Alana and Ismail posed for some pictures at the beginning and then seperated to their own special tables on wither side of the dividing wall. (One of Nyron's cousins sitting at my table actually caught her mother peeking through the curtain into the men's side).

I'd meant to include a picture of Nyron and I all dressed up, but I just realized I left my camera in Nyron's car, so it will have to wait unti lhe gets here.

o( )__

Pre-reception blues

2005-06-26T03:47:00.000-04:00

I'm sitting here in a sari that I'm pretty sure isn't put on right, my hair half curled and a rather timid attampe at make-up. Sometimes, I really suck at being a girl.

o( )__

Alana's Wedding part 2: The wedding

2005-06-25T03:02:00.000-04:00

Last night was Alana's wedding. She looked absolutely beautiful, as you can see here:

Here is Alana with her proud mother:

Alana and her groom, Ismail, are very traditional Muslims and wanted a very traditional wedding. This meant that the ceremony was segregated, with the women upstairs in the women's prayer room...

...and them men all the way downstairs:

The tradition is that the bride is asked and must accept three times. The first is the initial engagement. Later, the bride's father and the Imam ask her again if she thinks that marrying this man is a good life decision for her. The third happens at the wedding, when the fathers of the bride and groom bring her a gift from the groom. This gift is hers to keep forever; no matter what happens in the future the gift is hers to keep and she can do with it whatever she likes.

Of course, she accepted and the men returned downstairs for the remainder of the ceremony. The Imam spent some time talking about marriage and it should come as no surprise that the sentiments were pretty universal. He spoke about the important aspects of a successful marriage: respect, love, affection, loyalty, unity, compromise. Then, Ismail signed the wedding certificate and Alana's father brought it upstairs for her to sign. And there were married.

We all went downstairs for the immediate reception (there will be another larger reception tomorrow). The bride and groom cut the cake...

...and fed it to each other:

Pictures were taken with Ismail's family...

...and Alana's family:

The couple sat on special chairs at the head of the room like a king and queen presiding over the festivites:

Rings, of course, were exchanged:

Here's the happy couple:

o( )__

My inner European

2005-06-24T02:41:00.000-04:00

Your Inner European is Irish!

Sprited and boisterous!
You drink everyone under the table.

Who's" Your Inner European?

Irish. This is actually pretty accurate, since I am part Irish. My last name even has an Irish crest. Love that sexy highland dancer skirt, too. ; )

o( )__

My henna

2005-06-23T14:15:00.000-04:00

I totally want to get this done at my wedding!

The woman who did this does it professionaly (we all had to pay her) and she does a really good job. She just freestyled everyone's designs. It was amazing to watch her work. Even the little kids who got it done sat perfectly still for her and were very careful not to smudge the work afterwards.

The henna was stored in long, thin triangular pyramids like the kind used to decorate with icing. She held the thin end a few inches away from the tip as if she was simply drawing with a pencil.

Alana's Wedding part 1: Mhendi Party

2005-06-23T14:14:00.000-04:00

Last night I went to Alana's Mhendi party (am I spelling that right, Nyron?). Nyron picked me up after work and we first went to buy bangles to wear with my sari for the reception, then he dropped me off at his place and left, because the Mhendi party is for women only! It's like a bachelorette party, except there are no strippers.

Before we left, I asked Nyron if what I was wearing was ok or if I should change. I've been relying quite heavily on Nyron's advice for this sort of thing lately because I don't know the customs for a Muslim wedding or the extent to his parents' conservativeness, so when he said "you might get henna on it, so just put on a t-shirt" I had no reason to doubt his judgement. However, when we arrived and his mother opened the door in a lovely creamy yellow pants suit I started to wonder. When I saw his sister in a gorgeous green dress talking about how she just got her hair professionaly styled, I knew I was officially under dressed. As soon as the door shut behind Nyron his mom turned to me and said, "let's get you something to wear". Luckily we're about the same size and this is what I ended up in:

These suits are really very comfortable.

All of his aunts said how lovely I looked, even though most of them wore Western dresses.

I was a little akward at first since I didn't know many people there, but soon there were so many people that it didn't matter. So many people! The house was full of women and a few children. The groom, Ismail's, family soon showed up and I was no longer the only person who didn't know anyone, so I got to mingle, see some of the women dance, and watch henna being done. Of course, I got henna done, too (see above picture, I'm having a hard time getting this uploading software to work).

The party was fun, and a small sneak preview of what the reception will be like (the reception will be segregated, so it'll be me and all the women-folk once more).

o( )__

Some possible good news

2005-06-22T19:10:00.000-04:00

Joe (my parents' real estate agent) just called to say that the people he showed the house to less than a week ago want to come and see it again today. Apparently they were quite happy with the house and even gave Joe their own address so that he could look it up and see if they're likely to get enough for it to buy this one. They'll be coming by today - in an hour in fact. Hopefully, I'll know in a few days time what my future living situation will be. I don't really care at this point, I just want something stable.

I had a job interview yesterday for a tele-promotions job. Basically I'll be calling people up and telling them what vacation option they are eligible for. It's all people who have specifically given the company information for the purposes of receiving exactly this call (not phone numbers from a raffle draw or anything like that) so it's not like telemarketing. It doesn't really sound like a lot of phone, but I could stand to make more money than I ever have at a job before. Although it's still a pitifully small amount of money, it would actually be enough to pay my pills. I'm supposed to hear from them sometime today.

Yesterday was Nyron's and my anniversary. We got dressed up and went out to the same restraunt we went to on our first date, The Senator. Unfortunately, it's under new management and they changed the menu around so they didn't have what we got last time. What we did get was a little too salty. Now we have to find a new restraunt. Then we went to the movies and saw Mr. and Mrs. Smith, which was really fun but I think it's the kind of movie that I'll like more the second time I watch it.

So that's the news in the world of me.

o( )__

Mmmm, convertable red...

2005-06-18T01:59:00.000-04:00

I got a new cell phone today (that's a mobile for my friends across the pond). It's a flip phone and the cover is this really cool chade of red that you can imagine being on a convertable or nail polish or something really glossy and fashionable like that. I've been having fun the last few hours trying to get it to do all the things that the user's manual claims it to be capable of. Ostensibly, I can even check my email from it (I'd love to set it up so that it tells me every time I receive a release alert from bookcrossing!). Someday I might splurge on call display so that I can assign ringtones to specific incoming phone numbers. Feel free to start making requests now. : )

Unpacking is going very slowly. It's hard to stay motivated when all I keep wondering is how long before all this stuff has to go back in boxes. Oh well. I managed to get all my books unpacked and organized into a semblance of categories on my floor. Somehow, I think I'm going to need more bookshelves.

o( )__

Tales of living in an open house.

2005-06-15T04:24:00.000-04:00

I arrived home from England on Sunday, thoroughly looking forward to putting my house together, determined to make it feel more like a home than last time I lived here. Which is why I was so shocked when, within hours of arriving at my house, a real estate agent came knocking on my door to inform me that he had an appointment to show my house that afternoon. Wha-wha-whaaat?! I informed him that I was living here now and that I believe the house is no longer going to be for sale. When I called my mom, however, I was proven wrong. Apparently they still plan on showing the house and selling it to the highest interested party, with or without me living in it. I hoped this wouldn't effect my life much, but I was proven wrong again yesterday morning when a couple knocked on the door at a rather...ahem...inconvenient time, causing me to run downstairs in my house coat and tell them that, no, they can't see the house today. I'm having my parents\ agent put a "by appointment only"sticker on the for sale sign.

So what it all comes down to is this: at any time this house could be sold right out from underneath me and I'll have to move again, likely this time to a condo which will be way too small for all of my stuff (especially since I recently inherited some pieces of my great grandmother's furniture upon her recent move into an old age home). I'm trying to unpak and I really don't know how to go about it. Do I go through all the trouble of unpacking my salt and pepper collection, just to maybe have to pack it all up again?

Oh, and we had a kitchen fire this morning trying to make tea for breakfast. Welcome home.

o( )__

Hard hats must be worn in this area.

2005-06-08T09:27:00.000-04:00

Sorry folks, this blog is still under construction. It will be open for your reading pleasure later this month (once I get back to Canada and get internet set up in my house).

The management and staff thank you for your patience and hope this does not cause any inconvenience.

o( )__