Time Flies

...when you're hustling like a mofo.  Which I am, all the time.  It is exhausting and leaves little time for other stuff.

Lots of irons in the fire and I'm seeing some payoff for my preparation and drive, which is good, but it might lead to some hard choices, which is not bad, per se, but fraught.

WAS THAT VAGUE ENOUGH FOR ALL Y'ALL???

The past few weeks and the next few weeks until the end of June are pretty much bananas.  But it's okay, I've made my peace with it.

We spent the May 2/4 weekend in Cleveland with H & A and their kid, Danger.  We managed a 5+ hour drive there and back without having to resort to screens in the car, but we almost broke down (and by "we" I mean, obviously, "the Dotytron" who is ready to unleash the screens-in-the-car-kraken at the slightest provocation) on the way home.  The kids were cranky and overtired and I was driving and it was a bad combination.  I just gotta say: when I'm riding shotgun, I KILL the kid distraction game.  The Dotytron's methodology is very strange.  It involves near-instant capitulation, turning up his own music in the car VERY LOUD, playing one half-hearted game of "Eye Spy" and then asking why we can't turn on Eddie VAN Halen's DVD player.  At the end of the day, the point is: we made it.  My tips for longish car rides with kids success:

1) PACK SNACKS.  SO MANY SNACKS.  I have an emergency stash of snacks in the car, and before we go, I pack a snack container of a mix of goodies for each kid.  Each kid also has their own bottle of water

2) Try to do the driving around bedtime, if at all possible.  We'v gotten burned before thinking that if we leave the city at 3 or 3:30pm, then we'll "beat" rush hour traffic heading out of the city.  THAT IS A G-D LIE!  All you do is pick up rush hour traffic.  Basically, you leave the city by 2pm, or not until 6:30 or 7pm.  So, we eat dinner at home, get the kids into their jammies, and then pack up and roll out with the aforementioned snacks.

3) Depending on your kids' interests, pack some appropriate, portable, no small pieces entertainment gear.  The Big Yam gets some crayons and markers and a big pad of paper.  The twins get to hold a foam sword, conducting baton, or one of those magna doodle boards.

4) Bring music your kids like.  We have a Spotify playlist of all their favorite tunes, so when they get tired of being quiet, we play that for an hour until they invariably pass out.

And that's it.  We've never driven for longer than 6 hours.

We basically just chilled out, ate some food, hung out with their friends.  Went to some playgrounds and their Museum of Natural History.  It was very low-key.  Some snaps from our time there:

LOL at my cautious Big Yam struggling on this thing.

Three amigos

I made that toffee bundt cake from Baked Occasions but this time put a brown butter glaze on it.  It was MURDERATION

They took us to Eddie's Grill, which is this cute, old-timey place that serves chili dogs and fries and hamburgers along lake Erie.  I have to say though, Americans have no idea how to cottage.  They're clueless.

We tried Michael Symon's new BBQ joint, Mabels.  The brisket was delicious.  The lamb ribs were way too fatty.  The pig's tail was in this super-spicy, vinegary, buffalo-type sauce which was super-addiction.  Baked beans and slaw were good.  As was the spaetzle side and the beet salad.  It was tasty, but kind of expensive.  Not sure if I would go back.  Portion sizes were kind of weak.


Whenever we travel, we always come back and get Vietnamese takeout from our local.  It's a tradition.  We came back late on Sunday of the long weekend, which meant we had all of Monday to relax.  We spent the morning doing chores/laundry, and then grabbed takeout and spent the afternoon at Cherry Beach.  It was the perfect long weekend day.

This past weekend was lovely.  On Saturday, the Dotytron was at the Discening Coyote's bachelor party, and our caregiver invited my kids to her son's 12th birthday party at her house, I was on my own on Saturday night which was SO NICE.  I went shopping for a dress (in a REAL. LIVE. STORE.) for my brother's wedding, and then met up with Lolly and we had dinner at Lamesa, which is a modern Filipino restaurant on Queen West.  The irony is not lost on me that my kids were chowing down on home-cooked Filipino food and I was eating an upscale version.  The food was delicious, though.

Our appetizers, a crispy pork belly with papaya slaw and sawsawan reduction, and a tuna/avocado poke-type thing with shrimp chips for scooping.

Our mains: octopus and crispy polenta; chicken adobo with garlic rice (so good!); a charred eggplanta caponata thing with creme fraiche; and this DELICIOUS grilled zucchini with coconut zabaglione, and foam and housemade ricotta.

I really loved the vegetable dishes in particular.  There's nothing bad about a super-charred eggplant dish and the zucchini was delectable.  The coconut was so rich and light and the lightly grilled zucchini played so well with the ricotta.  I would definitely go back and it was a fantastic choice for gluten intolerant people.  We lucked out because it was a walk-by situation.

Then I came home and had my buddy M over to watch a movie as part of this half-assed Marxist film.

Sunday the Dotytron was pretty wrecked so we took it easy and kept it local.  We went to the farmer's market and hung with people we saw there, then came home and had dinner with Momma D, freshly returned from Iceland.  I made pizzas on the grill, which were good, but not great.  I need to get my grill hotter!  I don't know how to do it. They were still tasty, but the pizzas need a minute or two under the broiler to get the top browned (the bottom cooks before the top crust can get really burnished).

In other news, this actually happened to me the other week at lunch with my homies KD and G.  We were at Burrito Bandidos and because I'm really making a concerted effort to shape up, I got a "wrapperless" burito bowl.  I ate half of it and the rest was in my styrofoam container that I had closed up because I was planning on saving the rest for lunch the next day.  While we were sitting there, an indigent man had come into the restaurant, and rifled through the garbage next to our table, looking for something to eat.  He came to our table and asked if he could have my container of food.  I hesitated, probably longer than was decent (because I really wanted to eat the rest!), but after a pause, I said he could have it.  He opened up the container, looked at the mess that was inside (a wrapperless shrimp burrito bowl will never win any plating awards), and then shook his head and handed it back to me.  LOL!  It was kind of hilarious that he was hungry but not THAT hungry.  But also sad.  But also good that people maintain their humanity and always have standards?

I've been on this pretty disciplined weight loss regimen for the past two months and I've actually seen results.  I'm about 4 lbs off from my pre-twins pregnancy weight.  I run about 5km 3 or 4 times a week, getting up buttf**k early in the morning to do so (I'm up and around before 6am, ideally).  And I do gross things like start my day with a green smoothie and exercise portion control and log everything I eat.  I feel like I do this every summer, but this is the first time I've seen marked results, and I think I can chalk the success down to this: being kind to yourself.  That was the breakthrough for me.  So, if I have a bad day where I go off the rails on what I eat?  It's no biggie.  I try again the next day.  I don't sweat, or stress, or beat myself up over it.  Which means that the shame/guilt spiral of excessive overeating that used to accompany previous lapses doesn't happen.  Same with the exercise.  If I feel like not doing the full run, I don't do it.  I don't beat myself up over it.  It's working for me, this whole being kind thing, and I kind of like it.  If I know I want to eat ice cream for dessert (which for me, is I KNOW IT), then I just dial back on dinner a bit.  Not hating myself for enjoying myself makes a big difference, I've found.  It's just easier to dust yourself off and try again (try again).

I can't believe the twins are almost 3!  THIS IS UNREAL.  They're such little people now.  So much talking and being ridiculous between the two of them.  I love their little butts so much.  This week, Quincess woke up and barfed a few times.  He wasn't feeling well.  When Lindsay (Twin B) heard, he scuttled down to the basement to get their toy doctor's kit, and was talking to himself the whole time about how he knew what to do.  He then struggled to get the doctor's kit up the basement stairs.  He was so determined!  I was in the kitchen futzing around and Twin A (Quincess) was in his high chair and all I could hear was him screaming, "LEAVE ME ALONE!!! LEAVE!!! ME!!! ALONE!!!" as Twin B advanced on him with a plastic syringe.  So cute.

This video shows the cute little gasps that Lindsay does when he's excited about something.  He's such an enthusiastic little dervish.  He's been all over his "ice lollies" lately (that's a Peppa Pig reference).

Lindsay talking about his "snow cones."

This guy's morning hair

 

At one of our new favorite playgrounds

Outside all day, erryday.

Twin A is so funny.  He has this belly-laugh chortle which is so adorable coming out of his wee little body.  He also gives major teenage-style attitude.  "Line up your shoes on the mat!" Response: "I diiiiiiiiiid" and then he throws his head back and drags his body around like Paul Rudd in Wet Hot American Summer:

He also gets very teenager-y when he wants something and drags all the words into one moany-sentence.  I'm trying to capture it on video.  It's so good:

So. Much. 'Tude.

For all my friends who still have the option of avoiding this fate: don't drop off your kids/pick them up at school.  I don't have the stomach to watch schoolyard dynamics play out.  The other day, I went back to watch the Big Yam surreptitiously from the side after dropping him off.  He ran up to a friend of his, and playfully grabbed his friend's baseball cap off his head.  His friend whipped around, annoyed, and ripped the hat out of the Big Yam's hands and hit the Big Yam with it.  Then the kid turned around and continued talking to this other kid.  I watched the Big Yam stand there, kind of chastened, his arms akimbo, all awkward-like, and then you could see him trying to recover, so he asked his friend, "Are you Iron Man?" and his friend ignored him.  The Big Yam stood there for a bit more, before running off to play with other kids, and my heart hurt for the rest of the day.  I could barely stand it.  

WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY

I know that I can't protect him.  I just don't have the heart to watch this stuff happen.  He is a very sweet, gentle, weird kid.  He's not great at reading social cues.  I mean, he's okay at it, and he likes other kids, but he's also very content to play in his own interior world.  Like, if all the other kids are doing a game of hide and go seek, the Big Yam will frequently just go off and do his own thing...he's not the one to succumb to the group propulsion to do what everyone else is doing.  These are all beautiful, lovely attributes.  I just want him to be safe in who he is.

This sweet little butt.

I also know that a lot of the time the view from outside is way worse.  That I'm likely projecting a lot of my adult psychological baggage and nuances onto his social interactions...it doesn't make it easier.  Can I just like, never drop him off and pick him up?  

I've been gently probing during our dinner time conversations, because I want to know about other stuff happening that might be bothering him.  I feel like we don't know very much about what happens during his day.  The other night, I asked, "Did anything happen that made you sad, or mad today?" He thought for a moment, and then his whole sweet face brightened up and he said, "Something made me so happy! Our butterflies hatched!" And then he went on a long, rambling description of the butterflies hatching.  Never change, Big Yam, you sweet little soul.

Dinners around here lately:

Oven roasted kalbi and bi bim bap rice with fried egg

Leftover almond toffee from making the bundt cake with maple bacon ice cream and mercury espresso ice cream (I have a bit of an ice cream problem at the moment)

Stew oxtail, squash, and spinach with a double

Quickie weeknight meal - brisket in the freezer, King's Hawaiian rolls, and broccoli

Soft shell season!  Breaded soft-shell po' boys with bacon and homemade remoulade

A veggie-heavy meal - tater tots (fried, of course), roasted aspargus, poached eggs, proscuitto and hollandaise.

Fin.

Charles in charge.

It's very non chill being misrepresented in a professional capacity because, in part, I suspect that guys have the tendency to focus all their aggression on a woman, even if a woman and a man are saying the EXACT SAME THING.  

Am I loud?  Yes.  Am I outspoken?  Yes.  Have I been that way since pretty much birth?  Yes.  Am I confident in my brains and my professional judgment?  Yes.  Do I feel this is something I should apologize for, or curb?  AW HELL NO.  

I've had a very trying time, the past week and a half.  But there have been bright spots.  

Like: Dr. Rei and I hatching a plan for an awesome project together, and by extension, me being continuously nourished and sustained by this beautiful, strong, funny, smart woman's counsel, commiseration, and support.

 Like: we had my mum over for a birthday celebration for her and ate Sukho Thai takeout and I presented her with a coconut bundt cake that she didn't care for.  

Like: we took the kids to the Zoo on Friday.  We had a really fun time and it was all around splendid. At the gorilla enclosure one of the male gorillas, Sadiki, was standing right at the glass and I met his eyes for a solid 30 seconds, and I don't know what happened...but I started welling up.  He just held my gaze and the meaning behind his eyes was so primordial, still, and all-knowing...it triggered the Romantic sublime in me, and I just felt overcome.  It's like that scene in Mulholland Drive where the women are are sitting in the theatre and listening to a woman singing a Spanish (?) version of Roy Orbison's "Crying" and one of the women watching just starts to cry and cry, tears spilling silently down her face.  It was such a deep moment, and after, I felt so calm, and centred.  

The other night we were watching Broad City and I had one of my mortality moments and I felt my blood pressure skyrocket and that panicky, IDON'TWANTTODIEEVER feeling in the pit of my chest, which is usually how it goes when I think about dying.  After staring into the eyes of the gorilla though, I was acutely aware that the feeling I had when he assessed my soul, were I to think about my own mortality and death (which I did, immediately thereafter - Romantic sublime again), would carry over and I would feel peace and that maybe this is what people feel like when they're about to die.  Maybe if the conditions are right, you're not filled with panic and dread, but you tap into the ancient gorilla-gaze that lies dormant in the deepest recesses of your brain and soul.

Carrying on.

Like: we went to Barque for brunch with the kids on Sunday morning and hit the Jamie Bell adventure playground to burn off some kid steam right before.  It was such a nice morning and Barque is so kid friendly.  Like, I knew they were kid friendly because we had gone there when the Big Yam was young, but kid-friendly enough to handle a table of 5 featuring three kids to two adults is like, next level kid friendly.  They have little mini packs of play-doh for each kid!    Anyway, the kid's menu had scrambled eggs or pancakes (and some other stuff that were non-options for my guys).  I ordered pancakes for the Twins, and I asked the Big Yam what he wanted.  "Scrambled eggs."  "Are you sure?  You don't usually like scrambled eggs when I make them at home."  "Scrambled eggs."  "You're sure you don't want pancakes?" "Yes, I want scrambled eggs."  

Scrambled eggs are placed in front of him.  He glances at his brothers' pancake plates and his face crumples in abject dejection and he wails, "Awww...I should've ordered pancakes!" and then he buries his face in the Dotytron's chest and cries, "Now I wish I didn't order scrambled eggs!" and maybe there's something wrong with me, but the crushing realization of his own error in judgment was very hilarious.

Like: Twin A's new deep-throated belly laugh.

Like: Twin A's singing along to his auntie's song in his little wispy voice.

Like: Twin B's standard greeting of "Hell-lo" when you enter the room.  As well as his new thing of saying, "aww" in this funny, aggressive kind of way.  And also saying, "alright" to agree with you.

Like: the Dotytron and I getting a night out for ourselves, midweek, thanks to the babysitting services of one Momma D.  We went to Imanishi Japanese Kitchen, a new Japanese izakaya-type place.  The space is really pretty - kind of serene Japanese-rustic...like we were in a tavern in the Japanese countryside.  I think it's run by ex Kinka (née Guu) dudes.  The food was good, but not great, and while I liked eating izakaya-type food in a quiet, adult space, I thought the execution at Kinka is much better - the fish carpaccios are more inventive and the flavours make more sense at Kinka.  The standout dish at Imanishi was the corn tempura, and everything else was okay, but not as satisfying as the Kinka experience.

This was grilled sting ray fin with a dipping sauce.  This dish was a flop.  It was chewy and lightly charred but the texture was off and the flavour was vaguely funky, but not in a good way.  

You can't go wrong with fried oysters.

I didn't take a picture of every dish, but we got the beef carpaccio, and the whitefish crudo, the aforementioned corn tempura (so lacy and salty and addictive), and perfectly cooked octopus balanced against the crunchy brightness of celery.  

That's a good summary of my bright spots.  Friends, family, and food.  Pretty on-brand, I'd say.

Fin.

Things That Have Made Me Laugh, Lately.

NEW BLOGGING SCHEDULE SAY WHAT WHAT WHAT.

The Big Yam saying, "If you put a bag that says 'popcorn' in the microwave, you get magic."

The Dotytron threatening to take all the gimmicky board books away from the Wonder Twins, (gimmicks are stuff like, lift-the-flaps, really simple, non-narrative driven books) because they're too "indulgent" and "hedonistic" (!)  At one point, he pointed over at Quincess and said, "See!  Look at how gratuitous and hedonistic this is!" - cut to this scene:

Yup. So indulgent.

The Big Yam saying, "Yowza" while watching Jurassic World.  Apparently Jurassic Park franchise movies turn him into a member of Our Gang (you'll remember how he said "Goll-lee" watching the first film.)  When the Jurassic Park theme came on during the new film, ever so faintly, he said, "They have my favorite song!  How did they know it's my favorite song?" 

The Big Yam asking the other kids from the neighbourhood during our camping trip, "DOES ANYONE LIKE JOHN WILLIAMS???"

The Big Yam explaining the birds and the bees to me on the way to the grocery store: "If a woman who is a girl wants to be a mummy, she has to find a boy, tell him her name, and have birth."  [Since I straight-up never refer to mysel as "mummy" I at first he was talking about a preserved human.]

We went camping a couple of weekends ago (more on that later), and Lindsay learned a new skill - climbing out of his crib.  This lead to our return Sunday night's sleep being pretty brutal.  We were up and down all night picking him up, putting him back in the crib and telling him: "It's bedtime.  Lindsay sleeps here." Last night, as I was putting him to bed, I put a few layers of thick blankets on the ground so that if he fell, he wouldn't get hurt.  I checked in on the twins later and walked into the room to find Lindsay lying face down, head turned away from the door, one arm up over his head.  As I opened the door, he said, (without turning his head): "sleep here?"  It was so slovenly it was gold.  I was like, fine, whatever buddy...if you want to sleep on the floor you can until we sort out converting the crib to a toddler bed. 

This video of the kids slow-motion running towards some giant bubbles:

Slo-mo video in your pocket is the best thing to happen to life.  I can't wait to get it when I upgrade my phone in T-minus 8 years.

Camping, camping, camping.  Is it a surprise to anyone that I took to camping like a fiend?  We did a big car camp with our neighbours (five families - 24 people total) to the Warsaw Caves conservation area.  One of the main pros of car camping is that you can be as hedonistic (not in the Quincess quietly reading himself a book sense, in the "you can bring as much s**t as your car can take" sense) as you like.  Space and weight aren't an issue.  So we had blowup mattresses and I brought my cast-iron pan and I bought us a giant, 8 person tent which is about the same size as our living room in Lil' Ugmo, and we ate like kings.

It was a really nice long weekend.  The site was large so we weren't on top of each other, the fire pit was huge.  The good thing about our street crew is that the kids know each other so well that they can all entertain themselves and the adults can chill.  The other good thing is that we're all so used to being around each other's kids that we are all at ease with parenting (read: disciplining) each other's children.  We see each other's kids alot, in a "home from work, bra off" kind of setting, which means that a lot of the social barriers and "fear of imposing" have long gone out the window.  When you're outside after dinner as much as my street is, you rapidly get to the point where people are getting testy with their spouses and screaming at their kids with impunity.  It's easy for me to ask one of my neighbours to take the Big Yam to brush his teeth and not worry that they're going to be put out or worry about not taking his s**t.  We're also all used to monitoring a herd of small children, so whereas some of my friends are still in their "entirely focused on my one child" phase, and adding another kid into the mix would be adding to their plate unduly, with the neighbours it's effortless.

Like cottaging, camping is an extreme form of grown-up sleepovers.  Once the kids had FINALLY gone to bed we could sit around the fire and chat.  I mean, it would have been EVEN BETTER with some of my real homies.  Don't get me wrong, I'm relatively unfiltered around the neighbs but it's still gonna be different than hanging with people who've known me for 20 years.  I came home fired up with plans to do it again with our Markham crew, or maybe the Roomie et al.  This inaugural trip was all it took to open the floodgates.  I'm up for a canoe-in site.  I up for driving to Kilarney to see Ontario in all its wild, untamed, pump-up-the-volume glory.

Do I think I'm going to become one of those gear-heads who goes on a epic portages deep into the bush and dehydrates food?  Uh, no.  I don't ever want to be so constrained with having to "pack light" that I don't get to eat deliciousness and I'm eating astronaut pouches for dinner.  Part of the whole fun is setting up camp, and then cooking, because really, what else is there to do?  Food tastes better when you're outside.  We were lucky in that we had no rain...I can imagine that it sucks pretty hard when it rains the whole time, but it's still something you'll remember and that brings a family together.

So yeah, I went away a camping neophyte and came back a Griswold.

Scenes like this certainly helped:

Look, I like nature.  That's a legacy from my deadbeat dad (remember how I have a DAD?!  WHO HAS NEVER MET HIS TWIN GRANDSONS BECAUSE HE'S A GIANT REPRESSED WEIRDO PSYCHO WHO CHOSE HIS WIFE OVER HIS OWN BLOOD?!).  My dad taught me how to fish, and took us cottaging, and took us to cottage resorts when I was a kid.  I have really good memories of those experiences with my sister and Bruce Wayne.  Anyway, I like nature.  I'm a Romantic at heart - I dig my sublime, okay?

We took the kids to Bluffer's beach last Friday.  A little piece of urban paradise, a 15 minute drive from my house, deep in Scarborough.  Fine sand framed by towering rugged cliffs and warm, idyllic lake Ontario water rock-free, and knee high for a good 30 feet out.  We didn't go prepared but you better believe we will next time - set up our umbrella and laze the day away while the kids bank their sand-drenched sun sleep.  I dumped a metric tonne of sand out of water shoes on my way home (solo!  Imagine packing up 3 little ones from the beach, solo - the Dotytron broke off and went to school to set up for the year ahead), and it was one of those drives where I was frantically looking in the rearview mirror and entreating the Wonder Twins to stay with me, please please please, just stay awake and answer my inane questions about what noises animals make, until we get home so that you can serve your full nap in your own beds.

We also went on a hike through the Don Valley on Saturday, post-Evergreen Brickworks Farmers' Market.  All this was in lieu of visiting our friends S & P.  We went to our local farmer's market on Sunday, smoked 3 racks of ribs and had a feast with our friends B & G, and had a Micelli Monday on Saturday, so it was still a full, active weekend, but one where there were lulls during nap time when I could lie on my own couch and read a book and drift in and out of sleep to the sound of cicadas in the trees and the smoke from my neighbour's brush-burning fire drifting in.  It was perfect really.  I can't remember when we've had that kind of weekend in town...not since early July?

That lazy, drifty, frowsy kind of  Sunday is the exact opposite of my day today - when I took the kids to the CNE and there but for the grace of the neighbours who came with me, would probably have ended up buried under the sand sculpture, my face frozen in mid-disciplinarian "that crazy mom" shouting mode.  I made it out, but just barely.  CNE with kids is the perfect example of Einstein's theory of relativity.  TIME SLOWS DOWN THERE, AND THERE'S NO WAY YOU CAN TELL ME DIFFERENT.  I lived about 10 lifetimes today.

My work hosted a "kids day" which was an employee engagement initiative spearheaded by my lovely colleague.  I would prefer my employee engagement in the form of a respectful, not-stifling work culture fostered by senior management, but maybe that's not always possible?  Heh.  The Dotytron brought the kids and it was pretty stressful because I have such a low tolerance for unacceptable behaviour and of course the kids were going buck.  Anyway, we ended up at A3 Napoli for dinner - which is a Naples-influenced street food spot brought to you by two of my Toronto favorites: Porchetta and Co and Pizzeria Libretto.  I thought it was going to be a gong show - Yelp said unequivocally "good for kids: NO" and the dining space was all those super-high bar-height tables that always have me inelegantly clambering stools like a bullrider being helped aboard an especially ungainly bull.  However!  We got there and they had two extra-tall high chairs and some colouring and the food was delicious.  We had a pizza, their gran fritto misto (which is a mixed bag of stuff from the fryer, served with pesto, mayo, and marinara).  Our fritto consisted of: fried zucchini (bliss!), fried scallions (like verdant onion rings!), fried meatballs (bogarted by Quincess!), fried arancini (oozing with cheese inside that was more cream than cheese!), calamari (as you would expect!), and frittatini (their version of macaroni and cheese, fried! Think: macaroni carbonara - then fried !!!!!).  We also had their batt, which is half a pizza fritta (touted as for one, but if you're ordering other stuff, totally enough food), which made me go in paroxysms of ecstasy.  Imagine if you will, the most perfectly thin-crisped fried, ungreasy dough edge, giving way to a Naples style pizza chew, the perfect bread-to-filling ratio giving way to the most creamy, unctuous, pure tasting essence of dairy (it's stuffed with buffalo ricotta, provola [I'm assuming provolone?] and cicciola [I had to look it up - pressed cakes of fatty pork.  OH YES].  The service was quick, they had decent beers on tap, and feeding our family of five cost about $60, which all combines to a win for me.

We went to visit my sister a few weekends ago and had a good time, (Dotytron found a bottle of rarer bourbon, we went to an indoor trampoline place, we avoided buying things because of our s**ty dollar, I taught my niece how to style her hair a la 50s rockabilly), and on our last day we hit the local veterans' food truck rodeo fundraiser thingy (they were raffling guns!).  Our crew is mostly pictured above.  As we were walking back to the car, I turned to the Dotytron, who had Quincess in his arms and the Big Yam by his side, "That was fun, do you want me to drive home?" at which point he turned to answer me, and then said, "UMMMM...WHERE'S LINDSAY?!????!!!"  S**t sons, I almost home-aloned my kid, in some village in New York State!  Thankfully the rodeo was tiny and I found the little miscreant standing under an adjacent tent to where we had been eating, shaking an open water bottle and cackling with glee.  I got lucky.  

The other night I made Marc Vetri's pappardelle with corn crema and charred scallions and it was deeeelicious.  Like the best creamed corn you've ever had.  I doubled the corn in the recipe because my kids are cornholios.  I served it with my go-to late summer salad of baby arugula, grilled peaches, and fried haloumi.  

I made Smitten Kitchen's sesame noodles (with Chinese thick wheat noodles) and served it with seared salmon (which my kids gobble up) and smashed cucumbers with tahini dressing.  Honestly, smashed cucumbers are all the rage, but I didn't think the smashing really did anything here, other than add time and effort.  

Back to school means that there's more Scarborough goodness back in my life.  Last week's takeout night was Babu.  Mutton rolls are my life.  

I made Smitten's hazlenut crumb plum tart for our dinner with B & G.  I doubled the hazlenuts because I love toasted hazlenuts, but should have upped the flour accordingly to absorb the extra fat.  My crust edges were crisp but the bottom got soggy from being too buttery (didn't know there was such a thing!).  I also would omit the custard next time and just throw in lightly sweetened plums, and perhaps more of them with a bit of something to bind the juices.  The custard got lost and the plums (I used Italian prune plums) didn't shine through against the toasty nutty strength of the hazlenuts.  I would make this again, but would tinker with it.  Hazlenuts should go in all crisps and crumbs though, as far as I'm concerned.  

Finally, the Big Yam has been OBSESSED with the concept of Taco Tuesday, so I've been trying to make that happen for him because it makes him so happy.  We had a taco salad tonight - lettuce, cabbage, leftover slaw topped with taco beef and black beans, guac, pickled onions, shredded cheddar (this is kind of a key component), sliced olives, sour cream, and salsa with some crunched up tostadas for added texture.  A very satisfying dinner salad.

Fin.

Pro Tips

#1 It undermines your ability to complain about how busy you are, when you willingly take on joining Parent Council at your kid's school (despite the fact that forced to give a Gladiator review of the school's performance thus far, it would get a resounding thumbs-down), and you sign up for the fundraising committee for a local community service provider.

#2 Deciding to be a general contractor for the finishing of your basement reno ALSO undermines your ability to complain about how busy you are (BUT I LOVE DOING THIS SO G-D MUCH!)  Why couldn't I just be a GC?!

#3 When you're doing a massive job, like underpinning your basement, it makes the job infinitely better when you hire amazing contractors to do the job and they have the good sense to hire a team of 20-25 year old hunks to do the work.

Further to Pro Tip #3, guys, this team is SO HOT.  They are tall (at least 6'2").  They are tattoo'd and hunky (think slightly scruffier Abercrombie models) and polite and respectful.  I can't recommend our underpinners enough.  I wish I could hire them AGAIN, and that's saying something, because generally we burn through a trade (like, to the point of me withholding a significant percentage of cash, no longer on speaking terms, salt-the-earth style of burning through) with each reno.  The main dudes are cautious, respectful, very conscientious and they don't pass on extra costs to us.  The team is a bunch of sweethearts - they come in every morning, prep the area, say good morning to everyone, remember the kids' names - I'm so impressed so far.

They are also BLOWING through the job.  They started November 11th, and by Friday, my basement looked like this:

The electrical panel on the top left of this photo (next to the conveyor belt they use to get the dirt out of the house and into the bin), used to be at my HEAD HEIGHT.  And now I can't even reach it.  Unbelievable.

The white pipe is our drain, being supported by strapping.

The job is done in stages.  You can see the spray-painted areas of the wall marked 1, 2, and 3 in the pictures above.  They dig out all the section 1s, then pour, then start on the section 2s, and so on, so that your house is never at any point more than 1/3 unsupported.  They let the concrete cure for the full 48 hours.  Then they start the next stage.  They will likely be done by the first week of December. WHAAAAAAT.

Then I've got to figure out a way to get my furnace reconnected (it's supported right now, but the last thing they'll do is hang the furnace while they dig underneath it and pour the slab) and my laundry reconnected.  A WHOLE NEW FLOOR OF THE HOUSE, GUYS!

This job hasn't been without its headaches.  THE JOYS OF LIVING IN A SEMI, PEOPLE!


At the end of this though, I will have an 8'2" basement.  EEEKS!!!  When the Dotytron and I stand down there now, it's amazing how spacious it feels.  It's not a tonne of space, granted, not by normal, non-downtown dwellers standards.  We are going to try to maximize it too, by getting an office/bedroom, a laundry/bathroom and a living room (in addition to the furnace room) under there, but still!  A WHOLE OTHER USABLE FLOOR OF THE HOUSE?  Nothing to sneeze at, basement haters (i.e. all those people who told us that it wasn't worth it).

My reaction to the Underpinners team of hotties put me in mind of that Hollaback video that made the rounds on the internet in late October.

I watched the video, but then questioned myself as a feminist.  While the majority of the exchanges were gross and would definitely make me feel uncomfortable (hate being told to "smile" like a trained dog), some of them seemed benign (to me), which is what sent me spiralling.  When is it okay to say hi to a stranger?  Is there any context?  Commentary on the video seemed to indicate no.  That a woman has the inherent right to walk around without being encroached upon by men who only see her as an object.  I get that, I do.  But then, how are you supposed to meet people?  Is it okay in a bar/club setting?  When I see someone that I find "interesting" and approach them in a public space, am I similarly objectifying them?  It was really hard for me to wrap my head around.  Saying hi isn't okay?  I was confused by that as a general mode of practice.  That being said, there is a house around the corner from us, on the main street, that's clearly a rooming house and the dudes there (who don't work and when the weather is nice seemingly sit outside drinking all day) have verbally harassed my nanny, the neighbour's nanny, and when I walk by them, they don't dare say anything, but you can feel the predatory colour to their gaze.  It was gross and discomfiting and enraged me before I knew they said stuff to our nanny, and now that I know, if they so much as do it again, I'm going to tear a strip off of them.

This leads me to another issue that had me very confused in the month of October.  The hashtag #rapedneverreported started appearing, as a (very positive) offshoot of the Jian Ghomeshi thing.  Someone I know was sharing her story on Twitter and as part of that conversation, she tweeted that a thing we could do is to model consensual behaviour when we tickle our kids.  The whole POINT of tickling is that the kid is laughing and saying no!  I was so conflicted about that!  I brought it up at Academic Book Club and they reminded me of that experience most of us have had, where we've been tickled by a weird uncle until we almost barfed.  THAT'S the kind of tickling we're supposed to stay away from.  The tickling "game" where the kid is obviously enjoying it is okay (I think.)  Just trying to avoid irrevocably contributing to rape culture, thanks!  UGH.  I know I sometimes purposefully push past the line of the Big Yam's comfort zone for the sake of my own sadistic pleasure.  Not with tickling, but sometimes I'll be fake-scary and then verge into real scary and I can tell that he's wavering and I'll put it justthatlittlebit past the point where he's okay and into starting to feel real fear.  I'm a monster.

We've had ourselves some proper good weekends.  We were in our favorite USA small town last weekend, eating copious amounts of food and lying around until we atrophied and lining up the cousins on a couch for cute photos like this:

The weekend before was a doozy - my mum came over and was being super-cute with the babies and SMckay was over and I had my eyelashes filled (oh, I didn't mention that I'm an eyelash extension ADDICT?!  Cuz I am), and we went with my mum to T&T and I made dinner and then SMckay took the Big Yam out for his birthday present excursion (a TTC ride and hot dogs) and then my mum went home and SMckay and I went to see Gone Girl while the Dotytron hosted record club.

The following day involved some weird March Break trip investigation that suddenly through Disneyworld into the mix (?!) and then dinner at our friend's JJ & S's house.  Busy!  But I love all the people I saw so it's a good kind of busy.  The kind of busy that means you never get around to raking leaves or tarping up the outdoor furniture and then all of a sudden you have to do it when it's premature polar vortex winter and there's snow and then the job is a million times worse.  That kind of busy.  That's what's on our agenda this weekend.  Tarping and raking and bagging, etc., etc.

There was also a 13 (!!!!!) year anniversary dinner at Bar Isabel for me and the Dotytron.  He did the math: apparently when we're 43 we will have been together longer than we were apart.  There's nothing to say about that, other than the obvious: I like the guy.

We were advised to order 5 dishes but ended up closer to 10.  Even at that, this left us satisfied, but not hating ourselves.  If we wanted to hate ourselves we could have ordered 5 more plates of the croquettas alone.  My pics are dark but I'm an Asian girl so will take pics of my food until I die, bae:

Raw bay scallop with honey crisp apple, cucumber and dill.  I  enjoyed eating this dish (because I love raw scallops like nothing else) and understood the textural inclusion of the apple and cucumber, but the cucumber fell flat for me.  The watery vague bitterness of the rind didn't match with the cool, crisp sweetness of the other elements.  Also, the cucumber wasn't chilled enough, which I think was a problem with the palatability.

Pintxos!  Who doesn't love pintxos?  Not me!  On the left we have bacalao (salt cod spread), a pickled egg and a little wee sausage and on the right we have sobrassada, shaved foie (must have been frozen and shaved) and honey.  I would have taken about 10 more each of these two bites.  SO GOOD.  So balanced between smooth, rich, sweet, briny.  

These croquettas ruined my life.  All I want is more of them in my mouth all the time.  Gooey and molted on the inside with a sobrassada spiked mayo for dipping.  

Obligatory bone marrow with salsa verde.  Why don't I just make bone marrow all the time?  Good Q.  I should do that and sweetbreads and foie more.  YOLO.

Patatas bravas is something I really miss having.  Those Spaniards (Catalans?) are really good at getting a chunk of potato blisteringly crisp on the outside, only to have your teeth then meet a puffball explosion of fluffy starchy innards.  We got the supreme version, which came with boquerones, blood sausage, slices of jalepeno, and some other stuff.  On the left you have crispy fried sweetbreads served with tuna.  

I have parent council stories to regale you with, but those are tales for another day.  In the meantime, here's a photo of Lenny as an environmental activist, and the Quincess as a tiny, shrunken, old man:

Fin.