34C

that's my current bra size. A THIRTY FOUR C. so in the space of less than a year, i've gone from wearing nothing but american apparel cotton bras (which are basically one level down from training bras) convinced that i'm barely an a-cup, to the realization, courtesy of team kdubsguelph crew ladies, that i'm actually a 34B and that my boobs didn't have to be wall-eyed all this time and that i didn't have to live in fear of a cold day at the office making me look extremely unprofessional in a thin sweater, to being a 34C. it boggles my mind - they still look so wee. and i'm used to a C cup seeming like ginormous globulus enforcers or something. but i guess i'm not as flat-chested as i thought i was.

this weekend was a non-stop orgy of family and friends fatburger lovin'. friday i went buck and did a billion things and subsequently exhausted myself - but really, would i have had it any other way? no. then the outlaw bro and my sis showed up and we took them for rico's long-delayed birthday dinner of oysters and beers and other irish pub food at the ceili cottage. i think we totally won him over - he was loving the cask-conditioned ale and the bangers'n'mash, mac'n'cheese, and the soup of the day (eggplant and roasted garlic).

saturday morning was the ladies-only family shower - consisting of mostly the dotyron's aunts from momma and poppa d's sides of the family. my mum showed up wearing the most RIDICULOUS beyoncé heels and this flashy purple dress and a giant black patent prada bag and somehow managing to pull it off. instead of looking age-inappropriate, she just looked kind of fabulous. her shoes kind of looked like this:

that's my mum, alright. it was a brunch affair - i made my sis' ham and veggie strata, a caramelised onion-bacon-cheddar quiche, a spinach-mushroom-blue cheese quiche, a mixed green salad, a fruit salad, and my sis made a delicious sour cream coffee cake. we also had plain, chocolate, and almond croissants from bonjour brioche as well as a gorgeous lemon poppyseed cake from this place in leslieville called (stupidly) lpk's culinary groove:






nany gave us a bunch of knitted sweaters with matching caps - in graduated sizes as well as these two knitted dolls. i'm pretty sure the one on the right is supposed to be me. evidence in favour: the swarthy complexion, the slanty eyes, the angry eyebrows/side swept bangs. lol! amazing! everyone was insanely generous and i pretty much never have to buy the fatburger a single piece of clothing for the first year. we're just crossing our fingers that the ultrasound tech didn't make a mistake and that spumante is actually a boy.

for dinner that night my mum used her xmas gift certificate the kids gave her and took me and my sis out to the harbord room. it was okay. they're big on the "local" thing and i'm getting kind of tired of it, to be honest. like, i'm okay with the politics behind it, but i'm not okay with a restaurant not really having an angle - it's like, here's your meat, starch, vegetables, all simply prepared, minimal saucing. boring! i can do that...sheesh.

we started off with their charcuterie board, which featured soppresata and capicollo from pingue. a house made pig's head terrine, a deep fried poached egg (that they were inordinately chuffed about - dude, i've done that), and a chicken liver terrine that was a little lacking in liver-y flavour.

we also had the merguez sausage with polenta. this was another okay dish - nothing that knocked my socks off. the sausage was tasty (but i don't think it's made in-house) and sat on a bed of nice, soft polenta strewn with an eggplant mixture. the thing that ruined this dish for me was the crumbling of feta on top. the feta was far too sharp and gamy for the relatively restrained nature of the dish.

we also shared the braised rabbit pappardelle, which tasted like chinese food, strangely. like some brothy, braised chinese pork dish with egg noodles - i wasn't feeling this dish. the pappardelle was lovely - very chewy and al dente, but the rabbit and shitake mushrooms never coalesced into a worthy sauce companion for the noodles.

for our mains - sorry, from the "large plates" section of the menu, we had the milk fed veal chop (delicious) served with mustard mashed potatoes (a little gummy) and sautéed spinach with raisins (ho hum)

we also split the halibut with chorizo and chickpeas. the halibut had been aggressively over-cooked...it flaked off in big, dry chunks and the dish lacked panache. the chorizo and chickpeas tasted like you would expect them to taste, but overall, it was a fairly uninspired showing.

for dessert, we had the doughnut filled with lime curd and served with tapioca. this was very, very nice. the doughnut could have been a touch more tender (it was hard to cut into it) but the lime curd was rich and light at the same time and i have a colossal soft spot for tapioca pudd in all its forms.

we also shared the chocolate tart with peanut butter mousse which tasted like moon cake - the combo of the peanut butter & chocolate created a pastiness reminiscent of lotus paste - again, the unexpected chinese-ness of it was a little unexpected and disconcerting.

overall, i'm not sure that we'd go back. the menu and execution lacked cohesion - there was no clear vision from the chef and the actual dishes were inconsistent - nothing ever transcended the sum of its parts. for 3 medium sized plates, the 2 large ones and the 2 desserts (plenty of food for 3 people - 2 of whom are preggos), and no booze the total came out to $140 or so.

i then spent the rest of the evening churning out vellum mobiles for the friend's shower on sunday. because i'm CRAZY. i stole the idea for the vellum mobiles from jordan ferney's blog, oh happy day. there were a not insignificant amount of work, but in the end, they went a long way to gussying up the bain co-op community centre:

we had red pepper hummous dip (costco), green pea & pecorino dip (homemade), roasted garlic eggplant dip (homemade), chips (costco), flatbreads & bagel chips (costco), samosas (sultan of samosas), toni's goat cheese baguettes (toni), deviled eggs (homemade), tomato, artichoke, salami & olive skewers w/ balsamic vinaigrette (homemade), mini devil's food cupcakes with brown sugar buttercream (homemade), red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting (homemade), blueberry crumb bars (homemade), banana-walnut bars (homemade), vegan cupcakes (made by H and that guy), and dominion slab cake (dominion). it was quite the spread and we all collectively made a significant dent in the food.

our friends were overwhelmingly generous and kind-hearted and it made us feel so good about the extended network of aunties and uncles that are going to be loving up on the fatburger. it was really a lovely time overall - it's always hard mixing your various groupings of friends and making sure you get time to talk to everyone in equal measure - but i think (hope) that people had fun.

yesterday was a crazy day. at work, then my conference presentation (FINALLY OVER WITH) and then homebirth information night. homebirth info night resulted in me being the jerk in the class who's obviously texting. i r bored cat. i left the house at 7:30am yesterday and then didn't come home until 10pm. we stayed out after to get some dinner in me at a congee restaurant. i haven't really given any thought to who i want at the birth. i guess i always kind of figured that it'd just be me and the dotytron and my midwives. if my sister could travel, i know i'd want her there as well...i'm not sure who else i would want to burden with seeing me naked and rubbing my feet and massaging my back and listening to me curse and grunt and moan and poo myself. that's a tall order and a lot to ask of anyone.

at homebirth info night they bring in two women to talk about their stories - one who planned a homebirth and then had to be transferred to hospital and another one who's homebirth went well. one of the speakers brought her kid with her - the kid is crawling, so like, 6 months or so. is it weird that i'm going to have a child but am simultaneously disgusted/repulsed by most other children not related to me by blood or friendship? this kid was a snotty mess and everyone was cooing and picking him up and doting on him and i was inwardly praying (while feigning an interest in my cell phone so that i wouldn't make eye contact with him) that he wouldn't come up to me so i wouldn't have to publicly look like an a**hole for wincing when he got slobber on me. i'm not good with sticky or gritty. i'm a little worried about it, to be honest.


tonight for dinner we had CSA minestrone - chock full of kale, zucchini, carrots, pancetta, onions, garlic, tomatoes and various shelling beans. alongside we had paninis of crispy pancetta, figs, and fresh mozzarella.

i also went a little buck and prepped cabbage rolls with tomato sauce. the cabbage rolls are stuffed with beef and brown rice...i haven't tasted one yet but i'm cautiously optimistic. i'm on a huge stocking-up-the-freezer kick. right now, the best gift anyone could give me would be use of their freezer for all the meals/soups/etc. that i'm trying to stock up on for when i won't have time to think straight - let alone contemplate making dinner.

fin.

catching up

so i've been m.i.a. for the last little bit. here's a capsule review of what i've been up to.

- york orientation was THE BIGGEST BUST OF ALL TIME. seriously. i had to sit through introductions of the professors and then the graduate research coordinator for my program gave a 30 minute speech about how "research is valuable" (who is saying it ISN'T?) and how you can find all sorts of wonderful ideas for research projects from reading the newspaper. i walked out after 20 minutes and was so pissed at them for wasting my time that i made the dotytron pick me up at the subway station and ferry me to dairy queen where i took out my frustrations on a oreo brownie explosion, a hot dog, and an order of onion rings.

- friday i had planned on cooking a duck to make space in our freezer and then managed to turn the whole enterprise into a rosh hashanah dinner party with our buds B, G, S, & P where we had noodle kugel (basically, an egg noodle casserole with cottage cheese, sour cream, poppy seeds, etc.), ginger-maple carrots, cucumber-dill vinegar salad:

the duck was really tasty.

i topped it all off with a pillowy, tall, fluffy, apple cake that i served with bourbon toffee sauce and whipped cream. delicious.

- saturday morning we had our first private prenatal class. we basically whittled down the entire curriculum to: labour (what IS it?), relaxation techniques, and breast feeding, meaning we got the whole thing done over 4.5 hours on saturday and sunday morning. guys, labour is kind of crazy. also, there are NO VIDEOS of labour (maybe the one i posted from the "pacing the panic room blog") that don't feature people who are giant dorklingers/possible LARPers. it's like they're diametrically opposed or something. i don't know if my immediate, gross-out visceral reaction is because of the fact that you're pushing a baby out of something the size of a quarter, or if the videos all feature people i don't want to be associated with or have anything in common with AT ALL, even the universal experience of bringing life into the world.

- we followed this up with the interment of poppa's ashes at a cemetery in oakville, where there are other dotys buried, like pharris doty (awesome name, pharris, good job). i know, prenatal class followed by ashes burial is all very:

like, the first minute of it, anyhow. i don't know WHY i wasn't expecting it to be an emotional experience...i guess i kind of thought that i'd had my crying over and done with? but then poppa d had to go and get an IRISH PIPER to play and it was the most winsome, mournful soundtrack ever (think: deck of the titanic), and i was totally blindsided by the fact that there were OLD PEOPLE from the royal canadian legion there who were SO OLD that i basically started bawling as soon as i saw them come marching up in their uniforms. they were adorable. like, hard-of-hearing, frail, adorable.

i've been looking for an outlet for some kind of volunteer work and more and more i'm coming to the realization that i should really work with old people - i'm not really sure in what capacity, or how, but i think that's where my heart lies. watch this space here for updates.

- we were SUPPOSED to spend saturday night at our friend L's housewarming/birthday party but we had a late lunch with the dotytron's family after the interment (not to be confused, by the way, with INTERNMENT, which is what we do to japanese people in the united states and canada during WWII), and it had been an emotionally draining morning so i sent along some fig frangipane bars with our friends B & G and we tendered our regrets, instead opting to try to put up the shelving in the fatburger's room and pass out at 9pm after watching 1/8th of a streaming version of "the expendables" on our tv via my laptop. streaming tv/movies technology really hasn't progressed to the point where it can satisfy my desire of size and clarity. i mean, when you blow it up so that you're watching it on your tv (and keep in mind, our tv is modest by most people's standards), you're basically looking at things the way like, robocop sees them (best case scenario, maybe the way cyberdyne systems model 101 - that's, the terminator to you - sees things).

- sunday we ate challah french toast and bacon and nectarines, bananas, and wild blueberries for breakfast:

- we followed that up with our second prenatal class whereupon i received failing marks for stating that i deal with stress/tension by yelling expletives at my partner. overall, it was pretty informative, but i am glad we skipped all the n00b icebreaker stuff from the group classes. some of the relaxation/massage techniques will probably come in handy and our instructor brought over an epidural kit so i could see the size of the needle as well as a vacuum and this portable pelvis thing with a life-size baby so you could see all the crazy behind-the-scenes stuff that goes into getting the little succubus out of you.

- then it was more errands and futzing and napping (i've been so so so tired lately) and prepping for the shower and then for dinner i raided our CSA produce and fridge leftovers and made us pan-seared steaks with chimichurri, boiled purple potatoes tossed with butter and salt, corn pudding, and sautéed mushrooms:

- speaking of shower prep, i kind of missed this whole process because we didn't register when we got hitched...but why do people go off-list and then ask me what i need for the fatburger? i don't get it. like, either you don't register at all and accept what people get you, which is totally fine, but do people think that you set up a registry as a joke? like, that there's big, fat, quotation marks around the items there? "playmat" "bassinet sheets" "bathtub"??? i dunno. when people get married and shiz i either go cash money or i get something off the registry. i don't presume to know better. and i get it, i really do. buying baby clothes and stuff is super fun and super cute and i know you probably know baby x, y, z that loved items a, b, c, but at the same time, we REALLY NEED those crib sheets and the washcloths and stuff. and it's not like we did the cray-cray thing i've seen on some wedding registries where people register for like, a $200 salt shaker. i felt i was really reasonable. like you can get us the binkies AND the outfit of your choosing and not spend more than $25. and realistically, kids don't NEED that many clothes! that's why we specified on the invites sizes greater than 6 months. like, if the kid has 15 onesies for 0-3 months, that means they're going to wear each thing a maximum of 6 times. it's insane. ultimately, i don't care if we have to buy the stuff ourselves, but i've been asked a few times if we really want the stuff on the registry, and i'm like, YES! don't you know me?!? don't you know the stock i put into list-making and researching? i think having a baby is the one time when you ACTUALLY NEED STUFF...forget getting married...especially with couples living together for years and years. anyway, the point is: i don't know who goes about making sarcastic or joke registries, but i don't get it. or at the very least, don't ask me what i want, because i've already provided you with the list!

- today we went with dr. rei to pick up food and stuff for the shower from costco. dr. rei has hilariously threatened to start packing up food and snatching hors d'oeuvres out of people's hands if she deems the gift table not up to snuff. i love that little llama - she's always looking out for me and her heart is so big. one of her biggest anxieties is having me inviting random people over for dinner and "giving all my love away" on people who don't deserve it (aka, anyone but her). i couldn't ask for a more loyal, trustworthy, and decent friend.

- for dinner i made us paninis of grilled eggplant, heirloom tomato, genoa salami, and scallion mayonnaise on ace focaccia, with leftover corn pudding:

now i'm going to try very very hard to stay up past 9pm whilst simultaneously doing kegels AND practicing my relaxation breathing. i look like i've swallowed a basketball lately. it's crazy.

wish me luck!

fin.