i think i'm starting to feel the ill effects of too many activities/hosting a billion people all the time. my mondays now go from leaving the house at 7:30am to arriving home at 9:40pm, thanks to my classification, taxonomies, and metadata course - which i left NOT UNDERSTANDING A SINGLE FREAKING WORD THE INSTRUCTOR WAS SAYING, much less the assignment that's due in two weeks and is supposed to be "challenging." so my week right now is (was):
monday - night class
tuesday - john carpenter film club (10 people at my house for vegan dinner and the movie)
wednesday - baking for the weekend
thursday - 1/2 game of dodgeball and then professor's book club
friday - dinner at dr. rei and hanbo's
saturday - hosting a heap of kdubsguelph tdot crew for dinner (we're totally getting takeout) and hot tub time machine
sunday - having nany, poppa, momma d, poppa d, and ehmdo over for dinner
THAT'S CRAZYGONUTS UNIVERSITY (where i'm getting a phd.) it's not sustainable. last night after class i called H in a panic freaking out about the film club. more importantly, the person who SUGGESTED the film club has NEVER hosted. NOT ONCE. don't you find that weird? anyway, H and that guy were amazing and offered to host. since i've already made a heap of tofu dumplings and have all the ingredients for the long bean and tofu stirfry, i'm going to come home, make that stuff up, and cart it over to their place so they're not totally inconvenienced by me being a flakebot and don't have to conjure up a dinner for 10 out of thin air. all they have to do is make the rice. i also made coconut tapioca pudding. i can drive myself over there...BECAUSE I PASSED MY DRIVING TEST. did i mention that already? who knows. the point is - no more mogwai driving rules. and i can start driving on the highway, even though i'm NEVER, EVER, EVER going to do that. this way, i don't even have to stay for the movie bit and can hang out and socialize and get my little keister home to do the billions of things i have to do at home (like be home.)
for the next 4 mondays or so i have night class, so i've started making the monday night dinner on sunday night. this means i have to pick stuff that's going to pack and reheat well. last night i had quite the spread - leftover salad from the night before (somehow, the chunks of avocado stayed miraculously green and didn't oxidize) and a roasted shallot, grape tomato, and orange pepper farfalle pasta. after the vegetables were roasted i tossed them with the cooked pasta and added some sliced black olives, a sliced bunch of basil, some grate parm, olive oil, and a little additional seasoning. it was pretty tasty. you could also eat it cold if you wanted to, i guess.all i want to eat lately are burgers, burgers, and more burgers (and poutine or just regular fries and gravy.) not sure what's up with that - and i'm totally indiscriminate about it, too - well, not in the sense that i'd eat a BAD burger - but i want everything from a five guys burger and fries number to a johnny's to a wendy's to a burger king. ground meat on a bun - yum.
so tonight we're having the vegan dumplings and the stirfry with brown rice over at H and that guy's. i don't think i'll stay for the movie. 
we recently watched "the young victoria." i quite liked it. i'd seen the director's other feature, the québec-made film, "C.R.A.Z.Y." and thought that while the story was a trifle long and meandering - it was a uniquely canadian coming-of-age story. the direction in "the young victoria" is sumptuous - the fabrics are rich and rustling, emily blunt's hair is glistening, candles flicker by the hundreds, and the mincing, courtly dances are executed with the swanning precision of expertly-controlled marionettes. i don't usually like emily blunt - i find her a little cold and forced - but she made a splendid victoria - regal, and by various turns capricious, willful, and obstinate - yet still maintaining the girlishness of her youth and inexperience. the political intrigue was less interesting to me than the development of the story of her love with albert - which was sweetly told and albert was played with a touching shyness by rupert friend. you really believe in the growth and development of their love for each other and i learned some historical tidbits too - i didn't know that albert died 20 years into their relationship (not a spoiler alert, really) and i found it so moving when the film revealed that in honor of her husband, victoria had his clothes laid out every day for the rest of her life. it was an entertaining trifle - not something you think about but a visual, period-piece treat.
we also watched "the private lives of pippa lee" which was pretty bad. it's about pippa lee, played by robin wright penn, reflecting on her life and the variations iterations of herself that she's embodied - always in relation and reaction to someone else in her life (her mother, her much older husband) - and how she only comes into her own and gets to know herself for herself, in the late middle stages of her life. which COULD be interesting if the film was done with any sophistication or character development or attempt to make you give a rat's a**. unfortunately, it's an epic fail on that front. you just don't care. and it's poorly done and trades on well-worn clichés that it doesn't bother freshening up. it was a bit of a chore and trial to get through. i just found it a waste. a waste of some pretty decent talent (notably, robin wright penn who tends to be underused) and money and my time.fin.
