so the weekend. elvis bossa nova was fun, even though we could only stay to hear one of their numbers. they've come a LONG way since the last time we saw them, in their early days at the dakota. it's a much more polished, full, swinging sound now - they're well deserving of all the accolades they're getting. bwong met up with us there and we caught the opening band together - they were kind of a folksy, rootsy, twangy thing. the best part was that the lead singer/guitar player broke the string on his guitar, played out the tune, and then asked the audience if there was anyone there who knew how to change a guitar string. so i naturally looked over at the dotytron, who firmly shook his head and said, "no way. i do that all day for kids in band." the dude up on stage continued his banter for a bit but then went, "seriously folks, if anyone know hows to change a guitar string out there..." at which point bwong and i started hooting and hollering and pointing at the dotytron and shouting: "IAN! IAN! IAN!" and causing such a ruckus that basically the dotytron HAD to slink up to the front of the stage and grab the guitar and change the strings off to the side. it was kind of the best (for me and bwong, not so much for the dotytron.)
of course i took a photo to commemorate:
then we saw some of our high school peeps (sadly, no appearance by the dotytron's ex-gf) and then tried to make it out to evil dee but me and the dotytron got into a bit of a tiff and dr. rei wasn't itching to go and so it all fell apart. we kept lingering at elvis bossa nova so that we could hear 1 song, but by the time that happened, we were too late for the $5 cover at the drake underground AND there would have been a massive line. the good news is: the dotytron and i are no longer in a fight. we technically resolved it that night.yesterday we did our errands and then went over to nany and poppa's for dinner. what a FEAST! nany is the best old-skool, kind of 70s hip, mom-cook i know. this is what she made us. we started off with one of the weirdest, unironic salads i've ever eaten. it consisted of canned pear halves, with mayonnaise in their little cores, and iceberg lettuce chunks, sprinkled with grated cheddar cheese:
totally weird, right? strangely tasty, though! kind of crunchy and sweet and slippery with a bit of sharp salt from the cheddar. awesome.then we had pot roast, with green beans mixed with cream of mushroom soup, bob evans' mashed potatoes (which i was raving about, thinking they were homemade, and then started raving even MORE when i found out they were bob evans' mashed potatoes AND they were NINETY NINE CENTS), and carrots and onions. this was served with these things that nany off-handedly referred to as little "jiggers" - which is basically buttered white bread with the crusts cut off that's been baked until crispy:
the star ingredient in the pot roast? lipton's onion soup mix, natch. i contributed dessert, which was a sour cream apple pie with cinnamon streusel and vanilla ice cream:
nany sets a mean table...you can kind of get a glimpse of it here, beyond the dotytron and em's head:
it was a lot of fun. we came home and basically passed out.i had a strike of inspiration last night to make a breakfast of biscuits, sausage gravy and eggs. the very THOUGHT of this breakfast had me hankering for sunday morning from about 10pm saturday night on. sunday morning could NOT come fast enough. can you blame me? check out the goods:
this was a FREAKING KILLER breakfast of champions. zomg. i can't believe it's taken me this long to realize i could make this. i gotta say, if i ever open a brunch place, i would probably be a zillionaire. nobody ever gets it just right. like, they serve you 10 different kinds of benny (which i find excessive), but then you have to go someplace else for corned beef hash. and the corned beef hash place ONLY has corned beef hash and no huevos. and NO ONE in toronto serves biscuits with sausage gravy and eggs, i'll tell you that much.i tried a new technique for the biscuits - almost like a quick puff pastry...you smear the biscuit dough with butter, fold it like puff in thirds and then turn it and pat it out again. you do that three times. the recipe is from by way of blackberry farms by way of gourmet magazine. the recipe is here: buttermilk biscuits
on the way to pick up our water filters for our hippie dippy terra cotta water filtration system...i came up with a new me-ism. this is AFTER i spent a good chunk of time laughing at my own responses to the "things in a box" game we played at the farm. yes, you read that right. i was remembering my OWN answers to the "things in a box" game and laughing out loud about them - almost a week and a half after the fact. but c'maaan...they were pretty gold.
category: places you would feel comfortable taking a stranger
my response: loblaws and/or shoppers
category: things that don't live up to the hype
my response: apple versus pc
category: things you do on your break from work (this was from 2 years ago at the farm
my response: research native american history
LOL! it was during this little laughing fit (did i mention that i was driving?) that the dotytron decided that he doesn't find me 1/8 as funny as i apparently find myself. for those of you who don't know the game, a category is pulled and read out loud. players then write their responses to the question/category prompt. all the answers are collected and read out loud to the active "player" in that round. the player has to match the response with the person they think wrote it and they get a point for each correct guess. all incorrect guesses go to the person reading the categories (there's variations on this part.) it's pretty darned fun.
anyway, the new lagerfeld saying was instigated by some a**hole honking at me while i was trying to decide which lane to go in. at which point, i said, "look. sometimes you just gotta suck the tit, and go." which makes NO SENSE but is so freakin' funny that i'm laughing out loud just typing it out. this will be added to the long list of me-isms...the most notable one being: "stick a gun in me - i'm done."
we went skating today for about a half hour...by the end i was definitely cruising with a bit more confidence and getting a bit more a rhythm going, plus my ankles were stronger and not as hurty, so i'm gradually improving. that or my skating muscles are wakening from their torpor and harnessing some long-forgotten vestigial memory of my grade 6 skating lessons.
tonight for dinner i made us tourtiere - ground pork cooked up with onion, garlic, potatoes, frozen peas, seasonings (plenty of thyme, sage, a bit of rosemary) and stuffed between two flaky crusts. served with my apple-pear-cranberry relish and a wintery salad of romaine, radicchio, sliced pear, and toasted chopped hazelnuts in a maple balsamic vinaigrette.fin.
