Le sigh...

...we have crawling! Kind of. It's weird...I feel like when you watch him go, it doesn't actually look like he's moving (the motions aren't fluid in the least - he does these weird Frankenstein arms), but then you notice that he's somehow maneuvered his way across the floor. Happyface! Sadface! The following video also features a Smudgie cameo AND an extended self-examination of the diaper fastenings interlude. Scintillating stuff.

The Big Yam mastered the art of self-locomotion in tandem with the ability to pull himself up to standing. Ai-Ya. He's not consistent at it yet, but all the foundations are there. Time to get baby gates and resign ourselves to everything at knee height being pulled onto the floor.

I ran intervals yesterday. Which is a HUGE leap up from my usual slow-jog-canter-barely-breaking-a-sweat action. Ummmmm...intervals are HARD. On the plus side, I've already met my boot camp quota for the week with three days left to go! Huzzah! I'm also thinking of taking up skipping as a cardio activity. Aaaand...we have my beloved softball tonight. Aaaand...I've had the opportunity to have myself a catch several times this week. Love playing catch. Loooooooooves it.

What a busy week! Wednesday hangs with Hanbo was good times. Strolled the Roncey strip, picked up an awesome takeout lunch of breaded pork and coleslaw, nosed around the antique stores on Queen West, felt grateful that I don't live out there, had a catch - all in all, a successful mission. Yesterday I took the Boobla into City Hall to have lunch with my friend A from my book club. She's my successful, down-to-earth, and really engaged friend. She has 2 boys and is about 6 years older than me, but I still sometimes feel like a kid around her for some reason...or like a little sister.

I'm feeling pretty good about my portion of the research paper. If the nap gods line up, I should have it done by this evening, hopefully, leaving my weekend free for fun and games. The agenda this weekend is as follows: take Poh Poh out to lunch tomorrow, then head to Scarborough to see the final "gala" for the Dotytron's after school program kids (where they do a showcase of all the stuff they've been working on), then head over to B & G's house to help them with their deck if the boys are still working on it, then hanging with Dr. Rei and Hanbo.

Is it totally weird that I love helping people with decks? That to me is a good time. Mainly because I like social activities that combine some hands-on work and learning opportunities. Our friend Gaz used to be a contractor and B is a great, hands-on learner/project tackler, and our friend Fox is always willing to help out. I like having those kinds of dudes in my life. The kind who like doing dude things and don't think that spending an afternoon drinking beer in the sun and building something is work. The kind that will offer to help you demo your deck and garage and are actually looking FORWARD to it. The kind that will get me over my fear of building my own deck. The kind that keep me from being the kind of person (like some of my neighbours) who have their fathers come downtown to install a wireless doorbell.

Sunday is Father's Day - I'm making the Dotytron brunch and then maybe taking him out for a quick dinner if the timing works out...we're supposed to go up to Markham because Bruce Wayne and CHova want to take Big D out to Red Lobster, but I'm pretty sure Red Lobster doesn't take reservations and I feel like that's going to be a shiz-show. So it might just be our family together on Baba's day. No complaints here, really. I always wonder when your family unit gets to claim holidays as your own.

Last night's Polski Ogorki meal - 2 kinds of kolbassa, pickled herring & raw onions on heavily buttered rye bread, a cucumber-sour cream-dill salad on my CSA lettuce.

Tonight we're having another cool, no-cook meal - roasted peppers and tomatoes topped with burrata, some cured meats, and some baguette.

Fin.

insert annual rant re: spring forward

it's kicking my a** this year. AND futzing everything up. to wit:

- i was doing quite well with a 6:30am run every morning in the breaking light of day. this meant that i still had time to do my morning stuff AND was jazzed enough to get into work early (and thus be able to leave a bit early)
- NOW, at 6:30am it's unbearably dark and it's nigh impossible to run without fear of getting mugged
- ergo, i have to fit in running on my lunch at work, which is okay, but kind of sucky because i have a lot of work commitments (read: lunching with dr. rei)
- i've been going to sleep at 10pm every night. which robs me OF AN HOUR of potential productivity. bogus!

so today i had my book club at lunch but i had to split my time between running AND doing the book club. it was kind of a s**tshow.

last night for dinner i made us a very very very good one. it was a pan-seared, oven-roasted hunk of salmon (seriously, i think my portion was a 1/2 lb-er) topped with a spoonful of sour cream mixed with chopped parsley, dill, and maple syrup. then i made a cold soba noodle salad with scallions, broccoli, and carrots in a chili-kicked sesame-soy dressing. so good!

i've been making a concerted effort to up my fiber intake every day. my goal is about 20 grams of dietary fibre. i'm doing pretty good! i've been starting my day with either a whole wheat bagel, 3 homemade bran muffins, or a bowl of frosted mini-wheats. then during the day i snack on almonds, at least 3 clementines, 2 grapefruits, and a fuji apple with a piece of cheddar cheese. come home to the fairly healthy and vegetable-infused meals we've been eating lately. true facts: dietary fiber is easier to come by if you cook the vegetable. so if you eat cooked broccoli instead of raw, you're like, doubling the amount of fiber.

note: i realize all this talk of dietary fiber makes me sound like a senior citizen. i am what i am. convergence: this fiber kick of mine totally coincided with the GIANT colon at my work! we walked through it today. it's kind of awesome. a 40 ft. colon you can walk through. a 40 ft. colon you can walk through that costs $12,000 to set up for 2 days. amazing.

i felt like all my good work lately was undone by the fact that i had a bowl of mangled mini-devil's food cake cupcakes with bourbon toffee sauce and whipped cream last night for dessert. AND 2 small pieces of leftover mama's pizza. SOBA NOODLE SALAD ISN'T VERY FILLING, AIGHT?

i baked the mini-cupcakes to bring to work tomorrow for a belated st. paddy's thing. i'm participating in a talk tomorrow evening after work with my executive director's class, so i thought i'd bring the cupcakes to that, too. and i'm bringing them again to my non-work book club meeting at my friend J's house next week. mini-cupcakes are the gift that keeps on giving. seriously. at 96 to a batch - you can't beat that yield!


tonight i had a massage after work and then came home and made chova and my mum's joint birthday cake (chilled hazelnut mousse cake with chocolate ganache). for dinner we had homemade ramen (i didn't actually make the ramen). purchased ramen, boiled, and then added to homemade pork stock with boiled watercress (note: I LOVE BOILED WATERCRESS - i can seriously eat like, 10 lbs of the stuff, easy) and boiled pork and leek wontons (also not homemade) with a boiled egg and chopped scallions.

have i ever mentioned that i hate spring cleaning? i do. but it's that time of year. we've kind of started. i've started switching out my summer clothes with my winter clothes and washing and sorting. we're going to do a massive re-org of the basement and install some shelving in the bathroom. we defo gotta clean out our enclosed porch. the dotytron was a prince of new england and raked up all the leaves and detritus outside with a broken, hobbit, half sized rake. you know how tall the dotytron is? it was hell. YOU KNOW WHY HE HAD TO USE THAT RAKE? BECAUSE SOMEONE STOLE OURS. OUT OF OUR BACKYARD. what a c**t thing to do. if i ever catch someone doing it i'm going to go berserker on them and rake the shiz outta their faces. nothing like poetic vigilante justice. AND we've got to start thinking about the giant litter box that was our formerly sodded front yard. and the plumbing. and the roof. and the back deck. ugh ugh ugh.

ugh. i've just spring-cleaning-talked myself out of giving you a movie and book reviews.

sorry for being boring.

fin.

nothing to see here

boringtown! not much to report - played dball last night...a crrrrrap game on my part. i think housing a giant plate of fish'n'chips (haddock) from parkside fish'n'chips did me in. parkside has been around since 1928 and the asian couple who run the shop have had it for the past 24 years. it's pretty grimey and dingy in there, but the first rule of fish'n'chips is NEVER, EVER judge a fish'n'chippy by its environs. that's a fatal mistake. parkside is all fluroescent lights buzzing atop a long, thin room dominated by an ancient battleship of a fryer facing 3 worn and stained chairs for waiting patrons (i stand). it's a takeout operation only. when you open the door, the old man emerges from the back of the shop with a dirty apron on and creakily moves towards you, taking your order with an affable smile.

news alert that should surprise no one: HE BREAKS MY HEART. your choices are cod or halibut or crab cakes all served in a crisp, industrial batter with a heap of fries (soggy, hand-cut, limply exemplifying the essence of potato) wrapped in the de rigeur newspaper and paper. all for the pauper's sum of $8 flat. packaged tartar sauce (the way it's supposed to be). i'm a fan. it's never going to usurp harbord fish'n'chips for value and glassine batter, but it's miles ahead of my hated fish'n'chips nemesis, chippy's. so close, too!

did i tell you they're opening a gourmet burger shop in lil' ugmo's hood? it's going to be called great burger kitchen...they're touting local, organic beef and claiming to be a purveyor of poutines. yessssss!!! AND the new neapolitan-style pizza place seems to be legit enough - wood burning oven, ingredients shipped in from ital-towns - enough so that i will never line up for pizzeria libretto again. seriously, the pizza at libretto was good...but not NOTICEABLY different from the satisfaction derived from a terroni's pie or a piping hot massimo's slice on the enjoyment scale. certainly not enough to warrant lining up for, at any rate.

anyway, i played a listless game of dodgeball cuz i was weighed down with a pound of grease and fries soused in reconstituted swiss chalet dipping sauce to make up for the meagreness with which parkside dispenses tartar sauce packets (at places that have packaged tartar sauce, i understand and commisserate with the miserly distribution of the tartar sauce...THESE ARE OLD CHINESE CHIPPY PROPRIETORS, WE'RE TALKING ABOUT HERE, PEOPLE!!!) and their lack of any gravy whatsoever. as s-dawg said when he walked in the room and espied our pre-game dinner, "now i know why you guys are always so loagey at dodgeball" - CAUGHT!

tonight we're hosting one of the dotytron's oldest friends for dinner. they reconnected on FB. apparently S was the dotytron's first partner on all imaginative, kid-creative fueled journeys of the sonic kind. i'm going to let them reminisce and talk shop and stay out of their hair. i'll sit downstairs and try to fast-forward through precious or work on my quilt and watch mad men while they reminisce and music nerd out together.

for dinner i made us a "mexican" lasagne of corn tortillas layered with a chorizo, kidney, black bean, dried chile chipotle sauce (aka my chilaquiles base), roasted, peeled canned poblanoes, and shredded jack cheese. served with a tomatillo salsa and avocadoes chunked up with lime, red onion and sour cream. it was a pretty tasty variation of my favorite ingredients.

fin.

so boring!

is my life boring? i feel like my posts lately have been boring. but guys, this is my schedule this week (fill in the 9-5 hours with work):

wednesday: knit club meeting at H's
thursday: ikea then dodgeball
friday: lunch with dr. rei, then dinner and "twilight: new moon" with the hamcamp klik and s-dawg
saturday: errands, house stuff, xmas prep then saturday night supper club meeting at L's house
sunday: brunch with A & C and then mebbe a haircut or MORE house stuff

THAT'S SOMETHING EVERY NIGHT/DAY. that's insane! i was SUPPOSED to do something last night too (have dinner at the ex roomie and l'army's pad) but i pushed back on account of the fact that yesterday wiped me the eff out with playing catchup at work AND coming back so late on monday evening. that didn't stop s-dawg from coming over late last night unexpectedly to a) clamor for leftover halloween candy and b) try to show me links on his facebook while i was studiously attempting to write heartfelt paeans to wedding presents.

p.s. DID I MENTION THAT THE MONTH OF DECEMBER IS ALREADY SHOT FOR ME?!??? seriously! why are the holidays so stressful?

in other news, on sunday morning, i woke up after having had blast-from-the-past dreams of my undergrad/raving years. sleepily, the first words i uttered to the dotytron were, "did you ever go to industry?" and he said, "no - what is it?" and i said, "it was a club - ed rush dj'd there, i guess you weren't o.g. enough" to which he replied, "WOW. you're starting off the day with an o.g. potshot?" lol! it still makes me laugh, because really, i am PRECISELY the kind of person to start my day with an o.g. potshot.

in other news - years of fiscal responsibility have gone crumbling in the wake of winter tires, home ownership, and generally trying to maintain a middle class standard of living. i am debt ridden. riddled with debt! swimming in debt! parading on a flotilla of debt! there's no point trying to buckle down in december - the new year will bring about a spartan, monastic existence of at home time and simple, homey pleasures that don't require conspicuous consumption. all in the bid to pay down our copious debt so that we can in good conscience go with hat in hands to the bank for more - to revamp the kitchen (and more!).

i'm surprisingly okay with this - if only because i'm not really paying attention? that must be it. i just blindly make payments and praise the powers that be for the invention of overdraft.

roll call of awesome:

these are things i'm loving, lately...

how ridiculously attractive is this family? seriously? are you for real? gabriel aubry is the tallest, coolest drink of water that the parched sahara of humanity has ever known. holy cats! i'm not usually big on celebrity babies, but nahla is adorable! is this weird? i just find the whole lot of them so aesthetically pleasing.

i recently bought this print for our hallway, because really - HOW MUCH DOES THIS LOOK LIKE ME WITH MY HAIR DOWN? lol! it's hilarious! the likeness is uncanny!

this print is going in our front hall. isn't it the cutest? i got it from tad carpenter, a graphic artist who does posters for musicians i loathe like conor oberst and block party. his art prints are adorable though and i love the colourful, vaguely retro, blocky style.

we got this print for the dotytron's room in blue and red, from brainstorm print and design.

fin.