Fail.

1st try getting to Cleveland - fail. We're on the Gardiner, in Mississauga, lunch packed (Italian cold cut sandwiches with lots of butter, cherries, butter tarts, ice cold water, chips), tunes blasting, when the Dotytron feels the Captain shift into a higher gear and suddenly we're running at 4000 RPMs. So he pulls off at the Erin Mills Parkway exit and slows down to get it to shift down, and then the car dies. Just stops dead. He tries to turn on the hazards and it makes a weird grinding noise and then everything kaks out. Can't turn the key in the ignition, can't change gears, nothing. We're stuck in the middle lane of the off ramp on a bleeping hot day. We call CAA, he stops traffic so that me and the Big Yam can climb out of the car and wait in an Eggsmart, and then the Dotytron proceeds to deal with shadesball tow truck drivers.

Why are tow truck drivers such lowlifes? Tow Truck Driver #1 (TTD1) shows up, pulls in front of our car, gets into position, and tells the Dotytron that the OPP are going to show up any minute now and will consider the car stopped in the middle lane a safety hazard and will make him get pulled to the shoulder. TTD1 says that he'll cut the Dotytron a special rate to pull him to the shoulder now, but that if he waits until OPP makes him pull over, then he's going to have to charge him full price. Dotytron reports this back to me 'pon the celly and I tell him, "Tell him to go F**K himself." Then, Tow Truck Driver #2 (TTD2) shows up and says to the Dotytron, "Listen, I know TTD1 and he's a crackhead. An actual crackhead. He just sits in his house all day, listening the scanner, waiting for the call. Then he'll take your money, immediately go buy a rock, and then sit doing crack all day. I'll tow you to the side of the road FOR FREE just so TTD1 doesn't get your money." LOL!!!!!!!!! How hilarious is THAT?!??? Then OPP does show up and is saying that TTD1 is already in position and Dotytron's explaining the situation about how TTD1 wants to charge him and TTD2 will do it for free and OPP says that he's aware of the long standing feud between these two and the problem is that TTD2 isn't licensed to tow on the highway (even though we were stopped about 6 feet from Erin Mills Parkway - gah!) and just when things are about to come to a head, CAA shows up and tows our car to our mechanic.

What a shizshow. Meanwhile - Bruce Wayne shows up and gives us all a lift back home. So we stayed home and hung out with the neighbours and I drowned my sorrows by eating 4 (FOUR!!!) hot dogs and half a box of KD. And then we walked to Ed's for ice cream. Needless to say, I watched the final episode of season 2 of Treme feeling VERY thirsty. Haha.

We're hoping our mechanic can have us back on the road (apparently our alternator is blown) and then we'll stay an extra day so that this entire weekend isn't a write off. I just really didn't want to be in Toronto this weekend and moreover, was REALLY looking forward to hanging with H & A.

Fingers crossed.

Tempting the fates cautionary tale - because I'm a novice driver and fear cars, I'm always freaking out whenever I hear the slightest rumble/creak/whathaveyou in the Captain. The Dotytron is always saying that I'm "irrational" and "if something's wrong with a car, you'd know - it appears gradually, it doesn't just die in the middle of road while you're driving." After yesterday, I'm all like, "SEE! SEE!!!!!!!!!" *a million fingers stabbing in his direction*

Ai ya.

Fin.

zoinks!

i know, it's been a while. that's cuz sunday was such an epic whirlwind of a day that the thought of typing it out seemed a little daunting. on top of that, yesterday was dodgeball finals and work has been insane. i pulled TWO HOURS of overtime last night (waiting to go to dodgeball, but still, i actually WORKED instead of my usual futzing around on the intarwebs routine.) the good news is, i found out today that my earned day off (EDO) is being reinstated. i scarcely dare believe it. i've been on such an emotional roller coaster with this thing, but i met with hr, and they signed off on it, so my third fridays are back in my beloved arms. maybe we had to be separated to realize just how much we appreciated each other (this is a patent lie. i appreciated it plenty. do a search of past rhapsodic blurg posts to that effect.)

so. sunday. we slept in a little bit, having fobbed off our meeting with our agent (we just didn't feel like schlepping around looking at houses and being business on a sunday. worst house hunters EVER.) so i came up with a hair brained scheme to accomplish 10 billion things at once. the plan was thus: we would go for a run along the danny, stopping at the westernmost outpost of our grocery shopping ports of call, walk the groceries back, then job down to this place called 'okay okay' diner for breakfast, then walk back. nice and leisurely. the first part went swimmingly. we jogged briskly and amiably, got groceries, walked them back. the second part of our mission involved us leaving the house, carrying only our bank cards, and $30 (we were going to get more money at the bank machine to top up the $30 for breakkie.)

we jogged down to queen, the air was brisk, we worked up an appetite that could only be sated by eggs and carbs and fat. the dotytron went to our branch in leslieville while i nosed around a value village. i met up with him at the branch only to find him lacking cash and locked out of his card. apparently he had entered his pin, the machine told him it was wrong, he tried two more times and he got locked out. weird. so then i tried. i entered my pin in once and the machine gave me a "your card is disabled" line and wouldn't give me the time of day on subsequent tries. very strange. we warned the people waiting in line after us to use the machine that it might very well be possessed and stood aside to see how they fared. NO PROBLEMS AT ALL. okay. me and the dotytron's accounts with the bank aren't linked in ANY fashion. it's pretty freakin' odd that two separate cards would arbitrarily be subject to erroneous and false accusations of pin-entering-malfeasance, right?

so then we were kind of spooked because we (naturally) assumed that someone had stolen either my identity, his identity, or (worst yet) some monstrous amalgam of BOTH our identities. we were also FAMISHED. so we walked over to okay okay on queen east and peered at the menu and counted our monies and realized that we had *just* enough to cover what we wanted to order, tax, and a barebones tip. the place was small and there was a couple waiting ahead of us. there was also a lady who looked up at us and brusquely demanded, "you waiting for a table. how many." i said two, and she said, she'd take my name down for a table. so i gave her my given name, and she snarkily said, "how about your REAL name?" and i said, "uhhh, that IS my real name," and she said, "oh, i thought it would be something shorter, so i wouldn't have to write so much." at which point i was so blinded by rage at her crappy service and the fact that my bank card was all shambles that i didn't think to respond with the reply that came to me later, "how's about C**T? how's THAT for a short first name, lady?"

so we both walked out and were HOPPIN' mad and we mad-walked all the way home and called the bank and tried to get our cards sorted out. mystery of mysteries, the bank had the dotytron down as having entered his pin correctly, once (even though he tried 3 times) and had me down as entering my pin incorrectly SEVEN times (even though i only tried once.) so his was unlocked and mine was locked. then i called 'okay okay' and complained to that same terrible server who seemed kind of taken aback that her transferral of her own ambivalence and dissatisfaction with having made the exceedingly poor decision to work in the service industry, doing a brunch shift at an extremely busy restaurant with a clientele of mostly annoying young urbanites (i don't blame her, but you chose this path, lady) was commented upon by a dissatisfied customer. she assured me that i would be receiving a phone call from the actual proprietors (i haven't, to date.) anyway, we were both hungry and achey and tired and most of all, still deprived of that thing we wanted most of all: eggs and carbs and fat.

so i figured we should pilfer from the grocery jar (and repay later) and bike back down to queen and go to one of our tried and true brunch spots, joy bistro. we got our bikes out, still mad and testy enough to be peevish and snappish with each other, which necessitated me initiating a "let's start all over." a "let's start all over" means that i put the breaks on a rapidly deteriorating situation and "start over" in the persona of the dotytron, by sticking out my hand and saying, "hi, i'm ***" it's a good way of regrouping before things escalate too far and someone gets locked out of the house and has to smash the door in to get back in. errrrr...that may or may not have happened. lol!

anyway, we were still mad when we started biking and still a little flush from our previous physical exertions. however, as we started coasting downhill on our bikes in the brisk, sunday, sunny-but-only-really-10-degrees weather, we rapidly realized that we hadn't dressed appropriately and we were both FREEZING. freezing cold, miserable, hungry, and steadfastly fixated on a goal of eggs and carbs and fat.

at this point, we were so far gone the only thing we could do is laugh the maniacal, empty laugh of the damned. no sooner had we reached THAT state of being then we came upon the most MAGICAL HOUSE IN ALL OF TORONTO. on a wee side street winding up from queen east, was a little semi-detached house, pretty standard east side fare, except for the fact that the ENTIRE FACADE WAS COVERED WITH STUFFED ANIMALS AND DOLLS. seriously. the entire front of the house featured row upon row of stuffed animals and dolls, and the low fence encircling the property was similarly festooned.

naturally, we stopped and gawked. "this is the best thing ever" we announced. i noticed that an oldish lady was watching us appreciate the gong show that was this house. i kind of assumed it was a neighbour marveling along with us at the decrease in her property values. then she asked us if she liked it. she wasn't dressed super-odd. she was missing a few front teeth. she kind of looked like the kind of person you'd see shopping at knob hill farms a little too late on a saturday night (an elite group of oddities with whom i was aligned, thanks to big d.) anyway, we politely replied that it was "something else" and she said that it wasn't often seen by very many people because not many people walk down this particular street. then, she asked, in a faltering, wizened, old lady voice, "would you like to have tea in my garden?" at which point we decided to abort! i thanked her but told her that we had brunch plans and we biked off. THAT'S WEIRD, RIGHT?!? needless to say, the line of the week so far has been "would you like to have tea in my garden?" in old lady voice. lol!

then i biked to dodgeball and played like a maniac. so on sunday, i: ran, biked to dodgeball and back (about 20 km) and played dodgeball. i was so done by the time i came home.

i managed however, to throw together this tasty repast. it was kind of passover themed. i made roasted salmon with a tasty herbed mayonnaise sauce, pan fried rosemary "smashed" potatoes (little red potatoes boiled until tender, smashed roughly with a potato masher, and fried until crusty in a pan with oil and chopped rosemary) and roasted white asparagus with bagna cauda. the salmon was superb. i seared it skin side down first in a cast iron pan (season the salmon skin generously with salt and pepper, place skin side down in a medium-hot pan, cook slowly until the skin is crispy and then finish in a 400F oven, approx. 10 minutes for each 1" of thickness of salmon.) i'll post the recipe for the mayonnaise sauce after.

for dessert, we had orange creamsicle floats, inspired by something i saw that suzanne goin had done in one of her restaurants (except she subs tangerine juice for the blood oranges). it's so easy! you juice one or two blood oranges or tangerines into a glass, add a few scoops of vanilla ice cream, and top off with club soda. i think if i wanted to gussy it up a bit more, to add an herbaceous element i would stir it with a sprig of rosemary...i think those flavours would be lovely. it was DIVINE. so good we had one last night when i came home from monday night dodgeball.

tonight we had a simple, quick pasta of whole wheat penne tossed with T's chilies, chili oil, garlic, rapini, sliced salami, and some grated pecorino.

i still have book reviews to do...hopefully i can catch up tomorrow. but P is coming up to visit for easter weekend from new york and you know how much we love our pingy around here so we'll probably be occupied hanging with her before we head to chicago on friday.

fin.


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herbed mayonnaise sauce for salmon
makes enough for 6-8 portions up to 2.5lbs of salmon fillets

2/3 c. of mayonnaise (i used that super raw-garlickly anchovy-less caesar dressing i had made a while ago)
1/4 c. of spicy brown mustard (or grainy, or dijon)
2 T. of brown sugar
1/4 c. chopped fresh tarragon
1/4 c. chopped fresh dill
1/4 c. chopped fresh chives
1/4 c. chopped fresh parsley
2 T. lemon juice

- mix all together in a bowl. season generously with pepper and carefully with salt. spread on top of salmon and roast as per directions above. extra sauce can be serve alongside.