champagne

yesterday was the dotytron's champagne birthday (29 on the 29th.) i neglected to mention it because i was too busy going INSANE trying to prepare for the farm trip. basically, the kdubsguelph toronto crew are all heading up to this place called markdale, ontario (close to owen sound) to celebrate new year's and J's birthday up at L's farm/cottage that's not on a lake. i'm super-excited...this is probably the most ambitious thing we've done for new year's in about 4-5 years...lol! the best is that it's going to be all people we love in the same place. the usual problem with new year's is that people are doofuses, and don't commit, and want it to be an epic night and totally over-plan it. this is just going to be a fun getaway weekend, although i have a hard time thinking that it could possibly rival last year's jack astor's love in with me, bwong, and the dotytron, during a huge snowstorm, when the dotytron botched mr. big's "to be with you" and kiboshed playing "come on eileen." lol!

anyway, last night most of the goosetang clan (minus dr. rei and hanbo...who seem to be missing all the epic goosetang hangs lately!) and the roomie, and l'army, and montreal I went to harlem restaurant for dinner. the dotytron had a hankering for soul food and the best i can say about it is that i suppose it's as good as you're going to get for american soul food in toronto (damning with faint praise?) essentially, we don't really have that type of black culture in toronto...most of the black culture is from recent (relatively) immigrants from the caribbean (which is why we get such awesome rotis and doubles and jerk goat, and soca [i don't like soca]) but not so much from the candied yams/banana pudding/fried chicken and waffles school of awesomeness...which i think is where my true heart lies. overall, the food was fairly generously portioned and reasonably priced (there was some dissension about this, but the most expensive entree ordered was $20 and the most expensive appetizer [the ribs] was $12, which i think is fair).

bwong, dotytron and i went splitsies on stuff...we shared:

catfish lafayette, which the menu describes as "seasoned, deep fried catfish or chicken morsels in a hot sauce" the sauce wasn't hot in a chili-sense...it could have been a lot more incendiary, instead, it was more of a sweet'n'sour concoction (truthfully, i was expecting a creamy remoulade-y type of smothering sauce - like chicken gravy or something...i don't know why.) as you can see, it's a pretty big portion and it was still pretty tasty.

i had the bourbon baby back ribs...which were nicely cooked (not smoked). tender, with the right amount of grip at the bone so you could tear off the gristle that connects bone to meat in one satisfying strip...the sauce was a sweet-based barbecue sauce with a good amount of depth...again, it was billed as a "hot" sauce but there was little discernible heat.

the dotytron ordered the jerk chicken quesadilla, which was nice (although not very soul food), which came topped with a sweet chili sauce.

for our mains we went splitsies again. we shared the fried chicken which was all dark meat (bliss!) coated in a semi-shaggy crumb topped with another sweet-hot sauce and served with an indiscriminate afterthought "salad" of mixed mesclun greens, a blackberry, some sliced plum, and some kind of dressing (i generally refuse to eat afterthought salads on principle.) the fried chicken was pretty darn tasty, i thought. extra points for our plate consisting of all thighs.

i ordered the beef short ribs, which were really tender, very meaty, and sauced with a "brown" (both in flavour and appearance) sauce that had a good mix of vaguely caribbean influenced spices (thyme, allspice, etc.) it was served with rice (which tasted like uncle ben's parboiled, to be honest) and sauteed swiss chard. it was really good though, and a very generous short rib serving (considering i've paid double that for half the amount of meat before.)

the dotytron got the ham hock, which by the end of it's obvious long-braise seemed to have lost all it's porkiness...the ham hock was right up my alley but not so much anyone else's - mostly bone encased in flabby skin, again sauced with the "brown"ish sauce and served with rice and greens. the ham wasn't very ham-like though, and i think that was a bit disappointing...it didn't have enough of that salty ham flavour you're looking for. it was probably the weakest main.

a meal for 6 people, with 3 cocktails and 4 beers, 5 apps, 6 mains, came to $215 before tip which i thought was a pretty fair price, considering that INCLUDED the alcohol. i'd go back, but stick to the ribs and the fried chicken.

it was a HI-LARIOUS night though. bwong, dotytron, and i were in fine form and were pwning right, left, and centre. we got into some pretty heady conversations on sexual proclivities, definitions of deviance, art and aesthetics, homosexuality, the intarw3bs (oh hai!), and other random ridiculousness which culminated in a visit at home from our buddy S whom we then had the pleasure of ribbing for a while. it was a near-perfect night. i love my friends. fam-up!

now we're off to the farm...have a safe and happy new year everyone!

see you in '09!

fin.

xmas chez the ho-lee-shi-do's

epic. that's all i can say. it's a good thing we're going to L's farm for 4 days because we totally need a break from our break so far. my bro S-dawg bought rock band so i spent a good chunk of the weekend banging away on the drums. here's the problem with that game - there aren't enough songs you actually know/want to play. seriously dudes? rise against?!? against me!?? no one actually cares about THEM! it should be non stop 70s and 80s arena rock. he also bought this trivia game called "buzz" which comes with 4 buzzers that you use to select your responses and buzz in with the answers.

incidentally, S-dawg was the only one home when we arrived at the family manor and i span style="font-style:italic;">was going to see through my campaign of not being extra nice to him and ignoring him...but i could see in his eyes that he was sorry and embarrassed. so i went up and gave him a hug and we started laughing and i said, "you apologize" and he said, "no, YOU apologize" and i said, "i DID apologize. i CLEARLY sent you an email saying that i was SORRY that you're such a D**K." lol! which is a textbook karl lagerfeld, esquire apology.

somehow the gift theme ended up being stripy stuff...kick-started by my mum giving my two brothers matching gap sweaters. "matching gap sweaters! matching gap sweaters!" ended up being the default catchphrase that we yelled near-constantly while we opened prezzies.

this is a HORRID pic of us in all our striped swag. lol!

here is our eggs benny breakfast...with the monkey bread that looks like it has a smiley face in there - weeeiiiirrrd.

this is my nephew being cute...wearing a charlie brown christmas chair tie-in around his neck.

this is the roast beef dinner (prime rib of beef, gravy, roasted garlic mashed potatoes, buttered peas, spinach gruyere casserole, pillsbury crescent rolls)(it was hella tasty):

trifle (lemon curd, pound cake, raspberries, mountains of whipped cream):

the next night's dinner we had a slow-roasted pork shoulder (with crackling!) that had been rubbed with oregano, garlic, salt, pepper, vinegar and lemon juice and roasted for 5 hours. my sister made a b***hin' sweet potato casserole topped with marshmallows, and i made braised green beans with bacon:

this is my niece wearing the striped dress i bought her (from the gap!):

finally, when we went to see "the curious case of benjamin button" (hereinafter referred to as "the movie"), we came across one of those movie billboard things with the cutout for you to put your face in...my family has never met a cardboard cut-out insert-your-face-here thing that we've never loved/exploited/made tasteless, so this is the end result:

note: the boobs.

i'll do a review of "the movie" and "slumdog millionaire" when i return on friday. in the meantime, have a safe and happy new year, all!

fin.

p.s. these two are best buds.

p.p.s. i did a lot of driving this weekend...this is my second first time backing into a parking spot - i wanted to document my near-perfect form. the dotytron was remarkably unsupportive.

xmas chez the doty's

too many presents? check. (look at how the presents extend BEHIND the tree. also note that the gift bags sometimes contained MULTIPLE presents)

stocking filled with wondrous and random stuff (plastic dinosaurs, anyone?) and candy? check.

random isotoner/bowring stuff from nany and poppa? check.

lots of laughing and love? check.

breakfast? check.

post-breakfast movie watching in our pajamas ("disturbia" some of "the heartbreak kid")? check.

turkey dinner? check.

over-long conversation with uncle J about enlightenment and how i'm enlightened and don't need silent retreats? check.

lots of family time with loved ones? check.

turkey-and-too-many-carbs fueled dream about living on a cruise ship (you accessed my room via the staircase from the teen section of the bookstore on the ship!) with rihanna and chris brown, the centrepiece of which was me trying desperately to have high tea in the formal dining room? check.

i got some super-cute presents this year. i got my ANTIQUE GLOBE FEATURING THE USSR! you guys should see how effed up africa is. there's like 50% less countries! lol! and vietnam is "indochina"!!! i got some of those animal prints that i loved (the raccoon one, the barn owl one, and the gorilla one), a cute hostess cupcake change purse, the "anti-bride wedding planner," a new toaster, this bbc chef series, and all kinds of lovely lovely things. it's way too much (as always) but always super-appreciated and thoughtful.

now we're getting ourselves sorted to head up to markham for xmas part two: ho-lee-shi-do edition (that's what we've taken to calling our clan...it's an amalgam of all the last names of the parties represented.) i haven't spoken to my broski since he kicked me out of his car. i've vowed not to be EXTRA-nice to him.

we always spend too much money eating out so we're trying to cook more at home. tonight for dinner i'm making cauliflower and pancetta pasta with a romaine salad with roasted pears and walnuts. for dessert, me and my sis are hauling up extra cookies and fudges and sweets from the our respective cookie tins this year. tomorrow i'm making eggs benny for breakfast and then we're going to loaf and then we're doing the present opening and having the big prime rib dinner, with spinach casserole (my sis'), peas, garlic mashed potatoes (mine), pillsbury crescent rolls (pillsbury's), gravy (mine), and a lemon curd raspberry trifle for dessert (mine). sunday we're going for cantonese dim sum with my mum's friends and for dinner i'm doing a slow-roasted pork shoulder with potato-thyme gratin (mine), sweet potato casserole (my sis'), green beans (mine), and no dessert.

check out what H gave me for xmas!!! isn't it the cutest??? i have such talented friends:

adorable, huh?

happy boxing day everyone!

fin.

merry xmas everyone!

1 more day!

'til christmas eve! tomorrow is a half day at work...kind of sucky, but i know we're very lucky and fortunate to get a week and a half off paid, so i'm not complaining about working a 1/2 day on christmas eve...especially since i'm not traveling anywhere far...we only have to go about two blocks over to momma and poppa d's house.

more leftovers tonight - boring! i also have to make a pound cake for my family's trifle and bake off the last batches of cookies for the xmas cookie tins, and make the dotytron's family's xmas dinner dessert - it's the caramel pecan upside down banana cake that i've made before. there's only going to be 9 of us, so one cake will still manage to feed us well with some big, fat slices (topped with a drift of whipped cream - but of course.) for xmas morning breakfast me and the dotytron are making huevos rancheros - i'm going to fry off the corn chips tomorrow so they're nice and fresh for xmas morning.

our christmas eve movie is going to be "slumdog millionaire" - i'm pumped! some of the other xmas eve movie choices i've been less than thrilled about - i think i fell asleep during "sideways" (one of the best lines from 30 rock EVER - liz lemon: "i don't see race! remember when i asked that black guy if he had seen sideways?" lol!!!), "volver" was a little too campy for me, i was only semi into "the chronicles of narnia" and its under-handed christian brainwashing, and "the golden compass" was disappointing. i really really really want to see "revolutionary road," and "the curious case of benjamin button," but they're not opening until christmas day. i wouldn't mind seeing "milk" either (franco making out with a guy! hot!) - but i've heard it's pretty hollywood and kind of pedestrian (courtesy of my film friend D at work - we agree about 90% of the time. michel gondry's oeuvre creates some hard core divisiveness, with me falling on the side of con and D falling on the side of pro.) i also really really really want to see "jcvd" and "the wrestler" although i know "the wrestler" is going to tear my heart into a million pieces - just reading the review in entertainment weekly almost broke me - the story of a decent, good man, whose glory has long passed him by, trying to eke out a living in circumstances far beneath the heights and adulation he experienced at the top of his game - TRAGIC. CUE TEARS.

funny things: last night we finally got around to eating this foie gras torchon that was gifted to us by bwong (thanks, bwong!) i warmed up my faux-poilane loaf of bread in the oven and sliced off thin slices and laid it out with the foie, some salted butter, and some fleur de sel. the dotytron was hitting the foie hard, cutting off huge chunks of it and smearing it haphazardly on his toast, so i reprimanded him with a, "DOTYTRON! it's NOT BUTTER!" followed up promptly with, "the butter on the other hand, IS BUTTER" *insert me topping my toast with 1/2 a stick of butter* lol! also, a few weeks back when we were watching "gossip girl" the dotytron unveiled this AMAZ0RZ chuck bass impression. it was hilarious - all squinty eyes and over-enunciated drawl.

"gossip girl" ended winter break on a high note - chuck and blair! chuck and blair! that show totally consumes me. i effin' love it to the stars.

edit: continued posting at 10:00pm tonight the roomie ended up being responsible for dinner. a few months back we were talking about the dotytron and how i gently hen-peck him into doing stuff and kind of run his life for him and how (roomie's opinion) he would probably cook more meals or remember to do stuff (ie. taking out the trash) more if i wasn't around to remind him all the time...basically, that he doesn't bother remembering to do this stuff because i'm so crazy i remember FOR him. the example the roomie used was how she used to cook for herself but now that she lives with us, when we go away, her cooking skills have regressed and she just orders out. so i suggested that once a month, SHE should be responsible for a meal - win-win, right? the roomie resisted MIGHTILY so now, roughly once a month or so, she pays for our takeout and calls it her "cooking." tonight she "cooked" some mamma's pizza for us. i also had wendy's for lunch with c64 (of C&C music factory fame.) my gut! my poor gut!

only 2 more sleeps til xmas!

fin.

rebranding

the weekend ended up going out with a whimper - family stuff during the day and then at night maximum schluffiness on the couch with the dotytron. i'm doggedly trying to finish my now-horrifically backlogged xmas knitting, with no hope for resolution in sight. since i'm sure my nephew doesn't read my blurg, i can spoiler-alert and say that i'm knitting him a sweater that he BETTER LOVE AND CHERISH WITH EVERY ATOM IN HIS WEE LITTLE DOOSIER BODY. it's probably the biggest garment i've ever knit - mind you: i've been working in baby scale for my whole knitting career (2 years?) so moving up to small child scale is daunting. i also have something in mind for my niece but no hope in hell of having it done in time.

anyway, we ended up putting the kibosh on the dotytron's birthday dinner out for the time being, to be rescheduled at a later date. there was a storm coming in and we didn't feel like trekking out in the snow and we were super-full and stuffed from our 3 plates of food (or maybe that was just me) at the annual doty family christmas brunch thing, this year held at the weston golf and country club. the food was pretty awesome...big juicy breakfast sausages, a succulent ham, eggs benny, pancakes, waffles, scrambled eggs. probably one of the best doty family christmas brunch showings in a couple of years.  this is a pic of us at the brunch:

this is us with (from the left): beryl (pronounced - inexplicably - "burl"), nany and poppa. they're kind of the best. even if poppa is a staunch conservative. whatever i say or do, nany is unremittingly positive and supportive and thinks it's great.

this is us with (from left): uncle mert (short for merlin) aunt debbie, and mert's wife pat. mert and pat and nany and poppa are thick as thieves. mert and poppa are brothers but those four do everything together. they've traveled together, dine together frequently, and finish each other's sentences. uncle mert is very stylin' in a hep cat kind of way. he's a graphic designer who came up with inspector smartie. i've never actually seen inspector smartie, but he purportedly exists. however, a thorough search (read: google) does not retrieve any evidence. so inspector smartie's internet footprint is pretty minuscule (read: non existent, seemingly.) beryl has lead a crazy life too...she's sang on records and she's a fire cracker...i think she's 90? check out that outfit! she's sharp as a tack and really picante.

so we had a faux-celebratory dinner of popeye's - which is rapidly becoming the preferred caterer for all of me and the dotytron's major life moments. lol! but popeye's is rebranding! it's weird! now they're called popeye's louisiana kitchen - i was a bit disturbed, but it seems they've kept the core menu that we know and love (deep fried apple pie, spicy fried chicken, mashed po' with cajun gravy) and supplemented it with a knock-off of the kfc bowl (can't wait to try it!) and some wraps and stuff. as long as they don't mess with the chicken recipe, i'm perfectly happy.

so "the house bunny" was pretty decent, but i have this weird affinity for anna faris (the same way i have a weird affinity for james franco) - i find her so cute! and that movie poster cracks me up, as do lines such as: "the eyes...are the nipples of the face" lol! it was very insubstantial and formulaic but i find her very endearing.

now we're slogging through season 2 of "dexter." we don't love it, but we don't hate it, and we obviously like it enough to see it through. the addition of lila (pictured below) has done a lot to keep us interested as we both find her ferociously sexy and she adds a welcome note of raciness (especially when compared to dexter's primary love interest - the boring rita and her shrill kids.)

the dotytron also took it upon himself to download THE ENTIRE SERIES OF "HOUSE" which he tried to make me watch. we sat through one episode with me shooting daggers out of my eyes and the dotytron getting increasingly nervous and mouthing "sorry" to me as we sat through one of the BORINGEST shows of ALL TIME. it's SO SO SO boring! the worst! i kind of hate procedurals...so maybe dr. house and i aren't meant to get along, but even at that, i found it mind-numbing.

tonight is a pretty low-key night...i have to do some baking and some prep for my family's xmas trifle dessert. we're eating our way through the leftovers in the fridge slowly but surely (there's no point in cooking anything new!) i made two loaves of olive-thyme bread yesterday, the dotytron baked them off. here is how they turned out - no shots of the mie as they've been ear-marked for the farm next week and for the dotytron's family as part of their annual xmas food basket. tonight i'm also going to start two new loaves of the rosemary olive oil bread for the dotytron to bake off tomorrow. the dotytron make a booboo and didn't score the olive loaves. lest you think that such forgetfulness goes unpunished, i filled his shoes with sourdough starter. he's gotta learn!

anyway, i'm getting pretty amped for the holidays. 1.5 days to go!

fin.

bailed!

so we're bailing on our friends' housewarming party tonight. these are friends we see once a year, maybe? we've already seen them once (had them over for dinner, even!) it would have been a good chance to see the dotytron's former jazz/music crew but really, we (and by "we" i mean: the dotytron, since i can't take responsibility for ALL his socializing) don't make a consistent and concerted effort to keep in touch with those guys. plus, it's already started storming and we're beat from this week of mayhem...and we have the dotytron's pater's family brunch tomorrow AND the dotytron's birthday dinnie.

so i think we're in the clear for bailing.

last night was so much fun! it ended up being a very small group...basically just 8 of us or so (i think the blizzard dissuaded a lot of people) but i much preferred it that way cuz we got a chance to really all talk and catch up instead of splintering off into small groups and mingling. i really really really hate that T-pat & J-mar live in b.c. and i hate that i've just gotten to know L and she's moving to the 'tooner to be with N. bogus. here are some shots from the evening...me and my girl:

this is a shot of the group...we call it our indie rock album cover:

so tonight i'm going to prep some stuff for the big trip to the farm (making garlic butter for garlic bread) and maybe prep some stuff for my family's christmas dinner trifle and then kick back in my pjs, do some knitting and watch "the house bunny" which FINALLY came out on dvd (yesssss!!!!) shouts out to the dotytron for indulging me on this one. i owe him, bigtime.

fin.

in the words of the esteemed dotytron...

"DUDE, IT'S FUXXORED OUTSIDE!"

it's been non-stop snowfall since i left the house this morning...with no end in sight! this is a day for knitting if ever there was one. i've been digging around in my ravelry queue...trying to figure out what i'm going to do next (never-mind that i'm horrifically backlogged and that progress on my nephew's sweater has slowed to a crawl.) hopefully i can drag out the yarn and needles to my various social commitments this weekend and get some work done while i visit.

edit: they closed my work down 2 hours early! i'm writing the remainder of this post from home!

what a nice little treat! now i get to wax my 'stache, make deviled eggs for the dotytron's mater's side of the family's gathering and watch oprah and knit before i have to leave the house again! score! the dotytron's mater's side of the family's gathering, if you recall, is the one where grandpa mistook me for one of the nannies (or vice versa) and was hosted by his aunt and uncle...who are straight out of the 50s - not in the reappropriated, kitschy, pastiche kind of way, but in the ACTUAL nancy and ronald regan/model train set in the basement kind of way. it's pretty awesome. i have a special affinity for that kind of conservativism - a simpler time, when people were a little more erudite and literate, women engaged in the womanly domestic arts, and visible minorities knew their place (JUST KIDDING!) really, i relate to his aunt because she likes to label things and is kind of tightly wound in a similar way to me. plus she seems super-organized - i admire foresight and organization like few other things. she totally looks like nancy regan though. it's a hoot.

so tonight is the party in T & J's honour. last night's dinner was fun but made me sad (which naturally came out as resentment) that T doesn't live in toronto. J and the dotytron gabbed about jazz and they're both such awesome people...i'm mad! add to that that T's best friend, L is moving out to saskatoon to be with her man N, who we also met for the first time last night (we = me and dotytron, the rest of the gang spent a chunk of time out west together.) either way...it's BOGUS that not everyone i love can live within a one hour radius of me. BOGUS!

i made those ever-popular devil's food cupcakes with brown sugar whipped buttercream as my contribution for tonight. tomorrow i'm contributing deviled eggs, white chocolate hazelnut cranberry bars and some peanut butter rice krispie treats. tomorrow morning i'm getting up super early to go out and do some grocery shopping before we head out to the party. we also have our friend's housewarming party tomorrow night. crikey. to that end, i don't think we're going to stay super-late tonight.

fin.

feeling faint

so, i did it to myself AGAIN. spent my lunch surfing realtor.ca and simultaneously casting myself into fits of ecstasy/losing my mind in a reverie of unrealistic fantasy wish-fulfillment/anxiety over not striking while the iron is hot and having the market correction in housing prices slip through my fingers. this ALWAYS happens whenever i spend any small amount of time on realtor.ca...it's like the sweetest home-heroin kiss you can't deny. also, because i've been bad lately and have racked up my line of credit - i won't be back on the saving track until march (when my contract ends, how fortuitous!)

the point is...i'm hoping and crossing my fingers that somehow, somewhere, the dotytron will stumble into a job in this dire market for educational professionals, that my contract gets renewed, that we don't lose our shirts entirely on this performance thing, and that the predictions that things won't start looking up until at least early 2010 are TRUE. please please please let them be true! so many houses on the market right now - most of them are calling my name!

yesterday was so much fun! the hart house buffet makes up in ambiance what it might lack in dizzying cornucopia of selection...you basically had 4-5 salads and cold things (cold cuts, etc), a turkey and stuffing entree (a cute little boob of stuffing draped fetchingly with dark and white meat, pre-sauced), roast beef, a fried fish thing, roasted potatoes, and root vegetables. and there were desserts of the bought variety. the great hall is a lovely venue though and it was gorgeous with the mid-afternoon light streaming in through the windows...it was a very very very poor wizard's version of hogwarts, but enough of a fascimile for a boarding school-fetishist like myself.

then i went shopping with T which was highly enjoyable. she gives honest opinions and we both have clearly defined personal styles.  i accidentally sabotaged my savings attempts by buying 2 sweaters and a dress (all on sale!!!) but from here on in - it's dedicated paying off debt/socking coin away time. seriously, when did the gap become the best?  i know they're an ailing brand...but i really like what head designer patrick robinson has done.  the clothes are great for work and every day...gone are the cartoony colours and in their stead you have nice, flattering, muted tones and figure flattering cuts.  the problem is the price point, which is why the sales rack beckons me with its preponderance of lovely bits marked down to ameloirate my recession guilt.  i love the sales rack at the gap and i love the fact that because they're an ENORMOUS corporate chain their customer support is exemplary (90s days for a full refund on unworn merchandise!!!  be still my heart!)

after wreaking havoc on the queen west strip T and i headed home with our ghandi's rotis in tow for some couch surfing and gabbing.  she bought me the loveliest, thoughtfulest, completely unexpected xmas presents that made my offering of the xmas cookie tin seem downright scroogelike in comparison.  

i got a pair of cute underwear with a robot printed on them (i wore them today so you'll have to go without a picture), i got this t-shirt, printed with day of the dead type skeletons causing a ruckus:

and i got two lovely balls of b.c. yarn:



so i signed up for twitter two weeks ago - i kind of hate it and don't see the point. K gave me obviouseyes when i told her i wasn't keen on it, accompanied with the dripping-with-sarcasm, "really? really? you don't like twitter? you're not 140 characters...you need 3 paragraphs." she's an astute one, that K is. OKAY FINE, IT'S TRUE. 140 CHARACTER IS PALTRY! the stingiest character allowance ever! plus, NOT BEING ABLE TO SEARCH FOR PEOPLE IS SO COUNTERINTUITIVE! like, apparently there are some writers of interest that i'd like to follow who don't happen to be in my email contact list (quelle surprise.) but there's no easy way of finding them unless you know their handle. otherwise, i have to wade through who my friend's friend's friend's are following in the hopes of finding a nugget of gold in a sea of banality. not worth the time investment, in my humble opinion. no no, in the end, i feel like macroblogging of the k. lagerfeld, esquire variety is > than microblogging.

tonight we had dinner with T, her man J, her bff L and L's man N at lil' baci.  

spent the rest of the night wrapping my xmas presents (the ones i've gotten in the mail so far, anyway). i wanted to be more environmentally friendly this year so i went with korean/chinese newspaper with one piece of wrapping paper that i cut up to use for accenting. i d/l an "asian" type font that was cute and printed that on label paper for gift tags. i think they turned out really nice, actually!



in other news: they're calling for 10 centimetres of snow tomorrow!  TEN CM! HAPPINESS!!!!!!!!!!!!  

fin.

why the dotytron and i need a palatial estate

as dr. rei astutely observed last night (as we discussed her rapid acclimatization to condo living and how the dotytron and i are very much NOT suited to it): "its cuz you guys have a BILLION hobbies EACH."  it's so true!  we DO have a zillion hobbies each and we're constantly in the process of acquiring new ones.  

last night's dinner was so much fun!  dr. rei came by and looked at my bevy of performance gowns and we hatched a plan to go visit a bridal boutique to find something for her along her specifications.  unbeknownst to the both of us...we had each bookmarked the same wedding we came across in our travels through the blogosphere...so random!  

tonight's dinner was lovely...G had to work late (she's a high powered lawyer in the midst of her articling year) and so it was just B and us...we had a grand grand grand time talking and eating and it was so nice - the rabbit was AMAZING.  absolutely, deliciously, amazing.  you couldn't ask for better (lagerfeld says, humbly).  i browned off some diced pancetta, set that aside and browned (not very diligently) the rabbit pieces in the pancetta fat.  set those aside, sauteed some chopped onion, garlic, and carrot in the fat, and then added diced tomatoes with their juice, some chicken stock (would have deglazed with wine if i had it), thyme, rosemary, and a little bit of salt and pepper.  tossed the rabbit, the pancetta, and a bunch of PITTED (bwong made me pit them!!!) olives, and some balsamic vinegar brought to a boil with an equal amount of sugar.  the dotytron threw the dutch oven in the oven with the lid on for an hour, and then i came home, checked it, and left it in for another hour with the lid off.  it was juicy and so so flavourful.  i topped the rabbit with a gremolata and a sprinkling of sea salt, and served it with the braising liquid on top of pappardelle, with that radicchio fennel salad on the side.  we also served some of the poilane-ish bread on the side.

for dessert we had the sweet potato pecan pie i made last night (which caused dr. rei and bwong no small amount of anguish - they claim that B & G are always getting "their" food.)  B is a great conversationalist - he asks good questions and is smart and very curious...factors which conspire to invite stimulating talk on a wide range of topics.  me and the dotytron had a number of mind melds tonight, where we said the same thing and then high-fived about it - one of our commonalities tonight was talking about how much we hate anarchists and how anarchists are children who know nothing of economics, politics, human nature, infrastructure, physics.  lol!

tomorrow is a big day. i'm going with my colleagues to this buffet that hart house does every year leading up to the holidays. it sounds AMAZING. like, true english style classic buffet with a roast, turkey, trimmings, salads, and plum pudding! with hard sauce! i had my first taste of plum pudding today...apparently it was a rather poor specimen...i'm excited to see what hart house has to offer in the pp department, although i've been warned by one of my one-generation-removed-from-fair-britannia colleagues that it still pales in comparison to a proper, steamed, moist plum pud made (properly) with suet. i love GRAND buffets in the tradition of a british boarding school or like, oxford or something. basically i yearn for the type of spread you'd get at a country estate after a day of hunting, like something out of pride an prejudice (the exciting parts with mr. darcy...not the boring bits with mr. wickham) or the dining room at hogwarts - the annual holiday meal in the harry potter movies is the stuff that dreams are made of. as i've mentioned before, i have a certain anachronistic fondness for a culture that refers to sundry desserts of all persuasions as "pudding."

then shopping with T! i'm going to try to be very very very good and not buy anything. i don't want much. i feel like my fall/winter non-work wardrobe is somewhat wanting but it's not something i feel so keenly that it has to be rectified with spurious spending. at least, i don't feel it as keenly as i feel the missed opportunity at buying those gorgeous vintage riding boots from last month. le sigh. i contacted the seller to get a measurement of the sole (it's so hard to tell with vintage sizing - ESPECIALLY with shoes!) but she never responded because they had been bought out under my nose. i still think of them...one of the ones that i'm sure i'll regret for getting away. anyway, my fall/winter wardrobe leaves a little to be desired in the casual/weekend department...but that's something i'm going to work on over time...my look is in a bit of a flux lately. i love my wide leg jeans but don't have proper, winter-appropriate footwear to pair them with. i love my long, fitted jeans but again, no nice leather (or leather-esque) boots with which to sheath them. a lot of tshirts and some nice sweatshirt-y jackets...but not enough variety and layering pieces...i feel like i'm making the weekend transition from t-shirts and shlubbiness to something a little more put together...i just don't know where it's taking me as of yet.

anyway, enough of that. tomorrow is shopping and rotis with my girl. yay!

i leave you with this roll call of awesome:

what's that you say? oh, no big deal. just a charming little lightbox featuring new york, london, moscow, and medina skylines made out of vintage chandelier parts. the work of maxim velcovsky from studio qubus.  

socket antlers to store and hold charging cell phones and batteries. very cute and surprisingly practical, although this whole woodland animal theme that's taken the affordable design school by storm is getting tired for me. no more owls or deer or birds, please!

fin.

the weekend that was...

the hell/fun week to come!

saturday was nice...a big group of us went to the craft fair thing...the crafts were cute (some), a little too hipster/indie for me (most) and expensive (all). lots of moustache things and silhouettes (silhouettes are big in the urban craft arena for '08) and red-capped naive drawings of mushrooms (big in '09!) and random tchotchkes (i spelled that right on the first try - YESSSSSSSSSSSSSS!) the things i liked the most were these felted mobiles that had various themes - the breakfast one was cute with felted sunny-side-up eggs and waffles and toast and bacon...it'd be cute in a kid's room. otherwise, the second runner-up where these 70s crocheted afghans and throws, but i don't think those were for sale - they were just put on benches so that people could sit and not get dusty...but i loved them - great, bold, color combos like orange and yellow and brown.

yesterday was oodles of fun!

we got up and ate oatmeal and laid down the vocals for our much-requested duet on the annual xmas cd. we lost the dball finals because we were missing two key guy players on the team, but it was a very narrow loss (13-11) and i feel good about it because the other team is good hearted and fun to play and the calls were fairly distributed.

after dball we went to my friend H's place for her birthday party. it was fun! she created a new game where we had to draw stuff based on cards we received. cards would say something like: "draw a really ugly building" "draw the best present ever" "draw your best friend from grade 5" "draw a toad, eating a fly, watching over us" "draw someone using the word 'irregardless'" lol!!! it was hilarious. hopefully H posts the pictures of our pictures and i can display them for you. this is the sushi she made and the peanut butter rice krispie treats that i made...which were vegan-friendly thanks to the magic of high fructose corn syrup:

i'm also uber-excited about the duet this year on this year's xmas cd. it's pretty hilarious. we usually make a tonne of cds but it seems not many people appreciate the work that goes into them. our biggest fans are: nany and poppa, the dotytron's parents, and my sister and outlaw bro. i think this year we're going to be more selective.

if i can get my act together (or the dotytron can) i'll post a lil' present for all my faithful fans and readers on xmas day!

so tonight dr. rei is coming over for dinner sans hanbo and bwong invited himself along. i bought ANOTHER performance dress...but this one is going to be the REAL DEAL one. it's a 1960s silk chiffon number that fits like a dream (read: i can't breathe!) and is really feminine and sweet. it cost about 10x my other dresses cost (but my other dresses were like, $20 so that's not a big deal, as far as performance dresses go, right?) and i anticipate that i'll be able to get a lot of wear out of it for years to come (provided i get some ribs removed, of course). i got it at cabaret vintage on queen west. it was totally random...we popped in with some of the crew i went to the craft fair with to help our friend L find a dress for her sister's wedding. we were all sitting on this chaise lounge talking and being rambunctious and making L try stuff on. i saw the dress and off-handedly thought i'd try it on for a lark. it had a 26" waist so i didn't think i had a shot in hell...luckily my lack of a rack came in handy and it zipped up and it looked really cute! even if i end up finding a MORE fabulous $35 dress, this one is still nice to have in my collection. it's quite sweet...but it might change the colour scheme slightly and i might need to rethink the headpiece. fun!!!

dr. rei and i are going to hang out and gossip and talk and look online for wedding (her) and performance (me) stuff. it's going to be absolutely delightful.

tonight for dinner i'm making tuna noodle casserole with a buttered challah topping. remember when i used to cook??? i'm baaaack! for dessert i'm going to make us that salted caramel chocolate banana tart thing - but with a streamlined graham cracker crust instead. i need to use up the extra pastry cream and salted caramel.

tuna noodle casserole:

banana salted caramel chocolate tart:


roll call of awesome:

check out these stunning paper cut illustrations by yulia brodskya (a russian graphic designer/artist)...brilliant and so so so beautiful.



fin.

*stage whisper*

that went well. last night's dinner with my prof J, her husband S, and her brother L and his fiance S went really well! it was very natural and fun and chatty and laughy. L and S made us pakoras with a mint chutney and we had dhal makhani (hers was way better than mine) and a beef and coconut curry with rice and a poilane-ish loaf that my prof made with some starter i gave her. the chocolate, salted caramel, banana tarts were DIVINE. sooooo tasty! i'm going to make them for dr. rei and hanbo when they come over for dinner on monday.

so all my going buck on weekends and after work during the week has paid off and i'm looking at a saturday (relatively) free of responsibilities and chores. it's awesome!!!!!! i've got all my xmas baking pretty much done (all that's left is the desserts for the dotytron's family's xmas and my family's xmas) and i'm at the point where i can just bake off frozen cookie dough as i need it and assemble tins with the cookies and pre-baked and frozen bars and candies. LOVE IT.

today i'm heading to this city of craft thing with H and baby D and our friend M. then i'm meeting up with my dear friend from uni T, who's visiting from B.C. and her bestie L - we might go see a movie (i think "milk"). then i'm coming home to sharpen my knives, mail and address xmas cards, work on the annual xmas cd (the dotytron wasn't going to do one this year but they're in much demand amongst a certain demographic - especially our duets. lol!) knit, and hang out.

we still have a vat of that cassoulet stuff leftover so we're going to be eating leftovers for dinner. it'll be nice to have a night off and in because this week coming up is FULL TO THE TITS with social engagements and commitments. peep this schedule (welcome to bucktown, population lagerfeld and dotytron):

monday: dr. rei and hanbo over for dinner

tuesday: lunch with the other staff at work, have B & G over for dinner at night

wednesday: holiday brunch at hart house with my colleagues, 1/2 day vacation to continue the tradition that we have when T visits of going shopping, getting rotis from ghandi's and have her come over

thursday: dinner at lil' baci with T, her boyfriend J, her bestie L, and L's boyfriend N

friday: party at L's for T and J

saturday: reid (the dotytron's mom's side of the family) xmas social in the afternoon, housewarming party in the evening, our friend I is coming in from montreal

sunday: dotytron family xmas brunch, still hanging out with I...maybe the dotytron's birthday dinner?

INSANE-O! i'm excited/terrified. i'm glad all my xmas shopping is done. tonight i'm going to wrap presents and tie up all the loose ends and knit like a maniac.

i'm including a recipe for sugar plums that i got from my old supervisor T. they're spiced dried fruit and nut balls that are proving to be an unusual and popular addition to the holiday cookie tin.

fin.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

sugar plums
makes approximately 40-50 truffle sized treats

1/4 c. honey (i used liquid, but apparently creamed is better)
1 t. cinnamon
1 t. allspice
1/2 t. ground nutmeg
2 c. of almonds, toasted and finely chopped (food processor is your friend!)
1 c. of dried apricots (hand chop smaller and then finish in the food processor with the almonds)
1 c. of dried dates (ditto)

- in this recipe, the food processor is your friend...but i made a big mistake in thinking that i could just dump the whole dried apricots and dates in there and the food processor would do all the work - INCORRECT!!! the blade gets all jammed up because the fruit is too big and sticky.
- so i rough-chopped them into smaller pieces and then ground up the nuts and added the dried fruits to the nuts to finish chopping super small...this worked beautifully because the nuts absorbed some of the stickiness and made the mix a little drier and gave the blade some traction. my old supervisor T is crazy and just hand-chops everything super-small.
- combine all the ingredients
- roll approximately 1 T. sized portions into balls, chill.
- the original recipe tells you to roll them in cinnamon sugar...i dip them in melted dark or white chocolate and refrigerate them.

resistance, as they say...

is futile. i gave myself over to mcdonald's for lunch and will be giving myself over to a massage after work and then takeout for dinner as we're going over to momma and poppa d's to decorate the xmas tree tonight and they're grabbing takeout for us.

we haven't seen them in forever, i hope i don't say anything weird in my post-massage haze.

then i have to come home and make labels and address a billion xmas cards and make the dotytron sign them and finish the individual tarts for the dinner at J & S's (my profs) house tomorrow. they're making indian food, which tends to be kind of warm and thick and round and heavy flavoured from long-simmering times so i decided to make something light and sweet and cloud-like. i found a recipe on tartelette's blog for a banana cream pie with chocolate and caramel but i made some alterations. in the original recipe there's a layer of bittersweet chocolate ganache on the bottom of the tart shell, then caramel, then pastry cream, then sliced bananas. i'm going to do the ganache, then i'm mixing the salted caramel WITH the pastry cream (and possibly lightening further with whipped cream folded in) and topping with bananas that i may brulee (i gotta test the torch tonight). it should be a sweet-salty combo that should provide a nice counterpoint to indian food (i hope!)

roll call of awesome (a new blog installment):

a roland 808 pillow. totally amazing, but not 99 EUROS amazing (how can you justify that when we're in the grips of a WORLDWIDE recession?

right now i'm totally crushing hard on paul volcker (i've been subsisting on a steady diet of financial blogs and volcker seems like THE MAN):

joseph stiglitz also deserves pride of place here (for now...i have to brush up on my keynes i guess - shudder).

this, this, and this from my favorite diversion from everyday life, the best week ever blog.

this comic:

and finally, this:



fin.

can't talk

exhausted, and freaking out over being a fat little weirdo and getting diabetes and having high blood pressure and clogged arteries.

i went INSANE after work today and went all santa's-workshop-blitzkrieg on my holiday baking, enlisting the help of the ever-amiable dotytron (don't ever underestimate the power of coming home from work to be greeted by the dotytron, scatting, in a louis-armstrong voice - it's effin' aces.) i made 5 sets of cookie tins - baked off the pecan shortbread, the espresso shortbread, gingersnaps, and over-baked the chocolate crackles which was upsetting because now my cookie tin is overwhelmingly short-bread/buttery cookie heavy and it's not balanced (as balanced as holiday cookie tins can get); i made dulce de leche bars; i made these things called "sugarplums" which i picked up from my old supervisor T - they're basically dried apricots, dates, almonds, orange zest and spices, chopped fine and bound with some honey and rolled into balls and then dipped in chocolate...i was an idiot and bought white chocolate chips instead of proper white chocolate, which don't melt down properly (they become this super gummy, tacky mass, completely unsuitable for dipping) so i had to junk it and dip them in dark chocolate; i made butter pecan fudge; i rolled and pre-baked 7 mini tart shells; made pastry cream; made a salted caramel; and FINALLY ate dinner.


we had this for dinner. it was delicious. it's my faux-cassoulet...farmers sausage braised with white beans, kale, tomato paste, grape tomatoes, rosemary, thyme, chicken stock, sauteed onions and garlic, and a few duck breasts (thanks, bwong!)

anyway, i ate entirely too many trimmings from the sweets and now my tummy hurts and i can't believe i have to get up and go to work tomorrow.

the light at the end of the tunnel is the fact that i'm going to see my massage therapist. i feel like my back is DESTROYED from being hunched over staring at my computer screen all day. and my butt and legs are sore from dodgeball. and from being a fat little weirdo.

in other news...i said the words "genital love hewitt" tonight and i've basically been laughing myself silly ever since.

in other other news...it's unclear whether my dball team is going to play dball twice a week this coming winter season...so we're trying to think of other sports we can play. right now i'm actively campaigning for the "all sorts of sports" one, which is where you show up and play a different sport every week (volleyball, ultimate, floor hockey, basketball, soccer, dodgeball, rugby-basketball, etc). some of the other teammates are campaigning to play basketball. something (read: "logic") tells me that if dodgeball gets competitive, then basketball will get INSANELY competitive...and if it's self-refereed it's going to be REDONKULOUS. like, you NEED a ref to call fouls! otherwise, you'd have peeps (read: me) calling fouls every .0156 seconds! i'm also crippled by my complete inability to jump. seriously. i got on a trampoline once with the dotytron at his family's friend's farm and i don't think i ever cleared more than 1/2 a foot.

now i'm going to bed. tomorrow i have a lunch date at mcdonald's with K. further adding to the fat little weirdo in me. sigh. i just can't seem to shake the fat little weirdo!

fin.

i never said i wasn't crass

you know what had me laughing to myself last night after dodgeball, spicy pho, and an epsom salt bath, spewing cookie crumbs all over my keyboard and into my mug of cold milk? me asking ian about a "va-POO-rizer" (vaporizer). i basically laughed (at my own) (terrible) joke for about an hour. the kind of laughter where you think you have it in check only to explode in a big pooffft as the laugh comes gurgling from inside your belly all the way up and out past your cheeks, puffy from attempts to suppress borne out of shame (at how weak the joke is/was.) the other "joke" (i use the term liberally) that i always find funny is when i get to ask if anyone has seen a C**Tainer for *insert leftover here* i basically lose my s**t, which has the dotytron shaking his head, incredulous that i can find such juvenile humour so endlessly entertaining.

having the dotytron accompany me to pho hung resulted in me getting tainted with his gweilo (chinese for white person - "ghost man")-ness. we got a fork and a western spoon with our pho instead of the chinese (vietnamese?) spoon and my bowl was suspiciously missing some of the gristle and tendon and fat that i had specifically ordered. bogus! i got the special satay add-in for 0.75, which means that my pho was festooned with an incendiary shower of dried chili flakes and chili oil, creating a near impenetrable spicy slick on top that made my lips burn for a couple of hours after. it was perfect for a cold, wintery night, especially coming on the heels of my team's crushing defeat in the finals.

our opponents kind of hated us...for reasons legitimate (we were unbeaten going into the finals) and imagined (they were of the d**k persuasion). they pulled the kind of stuff where they would call us on our outs, but would NEVER walk off the court unless it was the most OBVIOUS hit ever. so there were people getting grazed with balls and deflecting balls onto their own body and sometimes BLATANTLY getting hit with balls that would just stay on the court. it made everything sour because they wouldn't give an inch when we called them on it, but our team totally walked off in every case where there was a dispute, rather than get into an endless shouting match. they were also the kind of team that would call you on technical stuff (holding the ball for longer than 10 minutes), stuff that you usually let slide unless it becomes obscene, but then, would do the same thing, and when you called them on it, would act like giant babies and get all petulant and mock you for doing it. it was very frustrating and super annoying and it sucked to lose in the finals, but mostly it sucked to lose to that team. like, i'm fine if you're going to be a stickler and make us walk off all the time...but you have to give me SOMETHING sometimes and be willing to do the same when we call you on it.

in other news...financial blogs are running my life right now. entertainment, library, technology, miscellaneous, craft, design, home decor, celebrity, food, and knitting blogs are totally getting the shaft in my daily blogroll.

in other other news - i think the presentation went well today. it felt like it was over before i even started. people said i seemed poised and relaxed and not too nervous, which is the desired goal.

tonight, in a nod to nany dotytron, we had rigatoni with rose sauce, topped with the nany-preferred topping of a shower of scallions. we had this with a salad of romaine, nuts, and roasted caramelized pears and a red wine vinaigrette. i also made sugar cookies for the kids in the dotytron's after school program and for him to drop off at the school that he WAS on placement for, before YORK DECIDED TO GO ON THE LONGEST STRIKE OF ALL TIME. i don't even KNOW how this is effing things up for him. i don't know if he's going to be able to apply and qualify for the ontario teachers federation or whatever, i don't know how it's going to affect his job prospects in an increasingly dire job market, i don't know how the summer is going to shape up in light of the fact that this is week 5, they're heading into week 6, with no end in sight.

so i'm officially done all my xmas shopping. i have to get a few small things for the dotytron and that's it. i also have to wrap the presents and mail the holiday cards and then the rest of it is baking and putting together tins for gifts. the problem when you're making candies and stuff though, is figuring out how to time the more volatile ones (like the english toffee). humidity will do a number on it and you can't hold it for very long...maybe i'll just ax that one from the roster this year.

tonight i made the sugar cookies and made a double batch of pie crust and baked off some sweet potatoes for a sweet potato pecan pie. we're having dinner at my former prof's house on friday and i offered to bring dessert...i hope the sweet potato pecan pie is a hit! it's either that or the hazelnut brown butter cake.

fin.