reasons why i love my job

1) my supervisor is bringing me a piece of osso bucco that she made for lunch today
2) see reason #1

me and my supervisor are kindred spirits...we love tripe, bone marrow, zucchini blossoms, baking...the list goes on and on (in case you haven't noticed, the theme of the list is "things karl lagerfeld likes to yam").

in other news, while in the states, i bought a set of jersey sheets (t-shirt material). holy effin eff! how did i live so long without their loving embrace?!?

short post today...celebrity gossip came and bit me in the ass and left me with no time. i register for courses on thursday...eek! and i took on some extra work from that prof i was doing research with before. it's piecework, so i can do it at home on my own time. sweet!

tonight for dinner, if the boy can find zucchini blossoms at the farmer's market, we're having tempura battered, mozzarella, ricotta and basil stuffed zucchini blossoms with squid, chorizo and arugala penne. if there isn't any, i'm making fried rice with pork-stuffed, tempura battered eggplant pockets with sweet chili dipping sauce.

fin.

sometimes, a picture just says it all...

harbord fish'n'chips was as reliably, earth-shatteringly awesome as ever (my abuse of adverbs knows no bounds!). the batter is so crispy and light that i end up eating more than any mere mortal should. i also can't get enough of "planet earth". it's KILLING ME. how can the earth be so cool? how does earth run t'ings so hard? je ne sais pas.
across from harbord fish and chips there's this wall of kid's graffiti featuring the standard line up of trees, houses, the peace sign, and of course, "wu-tang forever !!" hi-larious. i've been eating there for ages and only noticed it last night. i kept getting the giggles over it.


in other news, i've done a lot of reading lately but haven't had a chance to post my reviews. i'm currently reading edward tufte's "the cognitive style of powerpoint" and it's making me SO SO SO happy, as it's basically a reinforcement of everything i've been saying about powerpoint (albeit in a less vitriolic, more eloquent and persuasive way, minus the liberal dose of slang). i LOATHE powerpoint. i hate it when people reiterate the headings on the screen and i find it makes for (generally) hopelessly banal and uncreative presentations. well, edward tufte agrees! i'm going to quote from it whenever i can this year in school (faculty of information studies professors by and large worship at the altar of powerpoint). there's nothing i love more than being able to to turn to established authorities as backup for my s**t disturbances.

today is my long day. i prepped ahead and made a sri lankan beef curry with rice (which is what the house family is eating). alongside salad and lots of fruits.

fin.

that be the stuff, yeah...right there

i got to dance my ass off last night and it felt gooooood...two nights this week (it's a record!) we showed up at around 11:30, the place was EMPTY. i was freaking out and apologising, figuring it was going to be a dud night, what with aaron la crate playing at footwork and all. so we chilled for a bit, and then dougie boom came on. he plays really bad techno. like, REALLY bad. i mean, i don't really go for the seriousness of techno under the best of circumstances, but what dougie boom plays is the WORST. so we went for a brief little walk outside, come back and the place is ram-jiggedy-jammed.

sixtoo came on and laid down some nice stuff - dancey, hard, large bass. then came "the jokers of the scene". i HATE those guys. they place the worst-sounding, clowny s**t ever. but people EAT it up. it's SO BAD. they're lame. so we went for another walk, at this point, the boy went home cuz he wanted to catch the subway and me and the roomie were contemplating it, because we had no idea when tittsworth was going to come on (note to promoters...the headliner should come on BEFORE last call). finally, i was like, you know what? i paid $10 to come out and i've had a few too many lackluster attempts at dancing lately...i'm STAYING, dammit!

and boy, did it pay off. tittsworth was awesome! so many tunes i wanted to hear got played. it was very similar to the two most recent mixes of his that i heard (his mixing skills are insane though...seamless...which is a nice surprise considering other peeps - flosstradamus for one - get bigged up and their skills are novice at best), i'm not sure if tittsworth always plays the same set, or if that's just what he's doing nowadays. either way, me and the roomie were lovin' life...we pretty much stayed to the almost-bitter end and i worked up a good sweat. SCORE!

came home, got a good night's sleep, ate a big breakkie (peameal, over easy eggs, toast, standard sunday morning juice) and now i'm doing some futzing around the house, puttering, prepping dinnie for tomorrow, running errands, then relaxing. we're having dinner with our buddy aaron tonight at harbord fish'n'chips. mmmmmmmmmm. then strawberry mousse pie for dessert. it could've used just a touch more gelatin, but it comes our super light and packs a bright strawberry punch. the recipe is a keeper fo' sho'.

fin.

twilight zone theme

the stars have aligned in mysterious ways this weekend. not only is it my female doppelganger's birthday on sunday, it's my male doppelganger's birthday today (happy birthday lindsay and attila!!!) not to mention, that i've finally had a few pics taken of me recently where i DON'T look like complete ass. dun dun duuuuuuuuuuuuuun. weeeeiiirrrrrdddd.

i didn't go out last night instead opting to do a long yoga session and watch some heavy nature s**t (snow leopards galore!) on my beloved "planet earth" (the brits have received a temporary reprieve from my de rigeur vitriolic disdain based on the strength of this one documentary) in combination with qt with the boy.

i'm still trying to rally troops to come see tittsworth. the mixes are so.much.fun!

peep this mix: tittsworth june 2007

if that doesn't make you want to shoop, then i'm sorry, you're suffering from some kind of nervous condition that has severed the connection between your ears and extremities.

today i'm working a shift at the library, then going to meet my friend d for some shopping and ice cream in her hood (yonge and eglinton). we're going to go to la paloma for gelato and en route hopefully hit this store that my supervisor at my other job tipped me to. apparently they reliably have zucchini blossoms. i LOVE zucchini blossoms and they're very hard to find. i'm crossing my fingies.

if all goes well, dinner tonight will be ricotta-mozzarella and basil stuffed, battered, and deep-fried zucchini blossoms with a pasta of bucatini tossed in an italian sausage tomato-cream sauce. for dessert a strawberry mousse pie in a graham cracker crust.

fin.

cruising the myspace strip

sorry folks, i got caught up listening to tunes 'pon de myspace so i ran out of time. i'm doing some research on the opening acts for daft punk...to say i'm hype for this night might be the understatement of the millenium. it's going to be le bonkers. it's going to be a proper RAVE.

i'm feeling much better after the haggardness of yesterday...it was ROUGH. i got super-tired right after lunch but then i picked up steam...good thing too, as the public library was a right gong show. i spent the whole night practically on the circ desk. insane in the membrane.

tonight i'm going to try to catch some of the dusk dances at withrow park. basically, for a week during the summer there's a group that organizes groups of dance performances in parks throughout the city, there's several in each park and there's a tour leader that walks you from site to site. it's all FREE! then i'm going to possibly go to the el mocambo to check out this dude named arun branch and the halfway tree. he does reggae. it sounds okay to me...but not that hype. according to the boy, anthony braxton once said something along the lines of, there's people who do stuff that's "fresh", and they're the ones who are restructuring music, and then you got your good traditionalists who are doing stuff within an established idiom. people who are traditionalists who are AMAZING would be sharon jones and the dap kings. this dude isn't a very good traditionalist. he produces what sounds to me like very mediocre, well-trodden reggae. but it's for my doppelganger's birthday...so i'm probably going to go at least for a little bit.

i REALLY want to go dance to tittsworth tomorrow night, but i don't know if i can find anyone to go with me.

that's a shot of me and dr. rei from the chromeo show!

for dinner tonight we're having a spice-rubbed grilled salmon with curried vegetable couscous.

fin.

hurrrrrting...

got home just after 2 last night, asleep by 2:30, up at 7:00 to start work. ugh. midweek shows are the worst! don't let anyone tell you different.

however...last night's show was also THE BEST! the place was packed to the tits. i'm so glad we had our tickets in advance because they only released like, 70 at the door, and it was for $25 or something crazy. the party took place at spin gallery, which is usually used as a gallery space and gets special licenses to serve alcohol when they use it as a venue. i paid FIVE DOLLARS for water, little mini bottles of evian. what a RIP! we came in to some weirdly minimal fake-ironic band that were totally annoying. when flosstradamus came on, they kept stuff mostly housey, but when they played daft punk and randomed it up a bit (ie. dropping "groove is in the heart" !!!!! and "push it" !!!!!!!) it was beyond hype and i brucked out largetime. they turned the crowd into a seething, sweaty, hype mass for chromeo who blew the place apart. they're such a FUN band. i'm in love with dave 1 (pictured above...he's even hotter in person)...they're both total charisma. pee thug works the vocoder, synths and talk box, while dave 1 plays guitar and sings...they've been best friends for forever and bill themselves as the most successful arab (pee thug)/jew (dave 1) collaboration in history. dave 1 is also doing his phd at columbia university in french literature (!!!!!). swoon.

i've had a thing for middle-eastern dark-haired boys lately. and by "thing" i mean: "ravenous desire for"

the party was so hot and steamy that the sweat was collecting on the overhead pipes and dripping back down onto the dancefloor. also: hipster kids stink like the douches they are. like seriously folks, if you're a stinkbot (i am not, thankfully *knocks wood*) then PUT ON SOME ANTIPERSPIRANT BEFORE YOU LEAVE THE HOUSE, wanksters! sheesh! most of them look like they've stepped out of the same american apparel ad...le boring. the point is: me and dr. rei danced our butts off and had a fabulous time and we needed a grand slam of a night like that cuz we hadn't had one in a while.

today i'm an idiot and i signed up for extra hours at my branch...which means i'm going on 4 hours sleep and undertaking a TWELVE HOUR WORK DAY. and i'm having LUNCH WITH MY DEADBEAT DAD. i'm a masochist. i think i'm going to cancel lunch with my dad...a girl can only take so much.

last night's dinnie was tasty as all f**k. i dunno what i'm eating tonight...probably a plate of hurt with a side of whiny petulance and mad dog tired grumpiness.

fin.

on the run...

busy busy busy! non-stop action around these parts, although the roomie forced me to do some yoga on monday when i came home frazzled and irate and set the stage with candles, mint-essence air spray, and non-vocal music and it actually kinda worked. so i did it myself last night and it does help me to unwind a bit (i have a total tendency to get VERY wound). it's very mother earth (aka sarah mclachlan)-y which i have an innate tendency to associate with flakebotness but if it works, it works, i guess.

in other news, we over here have discovered bbc's "planet earth" series and i'm officially obsessed. it's a documentary of footage of the earth with state-of-the-art technology and unprecedented camera techniques. amazing! we saw this leopard that lives in eastern russia, of which there are only FORTY left in the world. and there's this crazy scene of a great white shark chomping on a seal that's depicted in all its slow motion, thrashing, water-droplets-raining down glory. there's also all this fantastic time-lapse business, and if there's one thing i love, it's a well-executed time-lapse. one drawback: it's narrated by david attenborough, who makes it a little stodgier and fussbudgety in that classic british documentary narration way than the footage calls for. he also anthropomorphizes the subjects and infers human qualities into a lot of behaviour that's not necessarily substantiated - making it seem like he's taking narrative liberties.

tonight i'm going to see chromeo with dr. rei. they're a fun, 80s revival-esque kind of band that really commit to their personas. it's going to be douchebag central in there, but what can you do. 

we're having bucatini with pancetta, caramelized onions, black pepper and parm with a big salad tonight for dinnie.

fin.

professional navel-gazing

here is a new york times article entitled "a hipper crowd of shushers" that was featured this past weekend - yet another mass media rumination on how librarians are cool and don't wear buns and cardigans and glasses, etc. etc.

i mean, REALLY. it's beyond annoying. what other profession is so preoccupied with fretting and analyzing themselves? just DO YOUR JOBS, already! the resulting denials and attempts to show how "cool" and "hip" librarians are is even worse. just read the article, i mean, tattoos = cool, does it? and djing = cool? is the whole world in the throes of 9th grade-dictated social organization or something? the back and forth on this issue: "librarians are cool!" "but articles that talk about how we're cool still seem to suggest we're dowdy and repressed!" and the defensiveness on the part of the profession is as bad as discussions on canadian national self-identity. quit navel-gazing and just go out and DO IT! the more you endlessly yammer, the more you come off as whiny, defensive weirdos, in my opinion.

i would like to draw your attention to the one pearl i gleaned from the muckish dreck passing for journalism, and this is: ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY HAS LIBRARIANS!!!!! can you say dream job? i've been joking for ages that i'd love to be a pop culture librarian - imagine working for the magazine bible of popular culture?!? *swoon*

i think my supervisor at the public library made a passive-aggressive comment about me not doing my job properly last night. i could have misheard her, but i'm not sure (i had asked to leave two minutes early to try to beat the storm home - i rode my bike). it was something to the effect that yes, i could go, but now SHE would have to be left doing the final closing tidying up of the branch (which i had already done, to the best of my abilities). it was a little weird if she did make the comment for a few reasons: a) she could have just told me to not to leave early, b) she knows we're under-staffed. there are supposed to be two pages at night to tidy up the branch. now that it's summer, the library is busier than ever, and filled mostly with kids, who are notorious mess-hounds. furthermore, i have a 3 hour shift on mondays, 1 hour of which they had me on desk, half an hour they had me scheduled doing another public service assistant job, so that leaves me with an hour and a half for shelving and doing a clean up at the beginning and end of my shift.

meh.

tonight for dinner we're having falafels.

fin.

hilarious run-ins with the bluehairs

dinner last night was the bomb. the boy's nany and papa live in a condo complex with a bunch of other seniors. their apartment features nany's needle-pointed pillow with the endearing slogan "screw the golden years" lovingly festooned upon it.

as we're sitting down chatting before dinner is served, we hear a knock on the door. nany goes to answer it and the resulting exchange goes something like this:

elderly neighbour-man (enm): "hey __ do you have any alcohol?"
nany: "sure! what would you like? gin, vodka, whiskey..."
enm: "well, what do you think would be good to give to a vomiting dog?"
nany: "i'm not sure, but i think 4 ounces should do it"
- at this point, there are interjections from us sitting in the living room listening to this and everyone starts piping in with suggestions (most of them to the effect that the dog should be taken to a vet, and not given alcohol)
somebody asks, "does the dog vomit often?"
enm: "well, no other than the time it ate some crack in the barbados" (!!!!!!!!!!)

i almost died laughing.

another choice moment is when the boy is pouring wine at dinner. he goes around and pours a standard pour, the glass is about half full. nany looks him square in the eye and says, "__, i asked for a GLASS of wine" at which point he obediently tops her up.

hilarious.

today is my long day so i'm packing an egg salad sandwich and that cumin-dressed cucumber, celery and red pepper salad with the fresh mint.

fin.

cooperation, makes it happen

cooperation, working together! (that's a line from a song from an old sesame street skit). team danforth really pulled it together this morning and we cleaned up the house like crazy. moved some junk that we'd been holding for my buddy up to his apartment, rearranged some furniture, positioned this new antique refrigerator chest the boy's parents gave us (i love it!) and generally tidied up like a team. it was awesome! the organization and mobilization made my organization and mobilization-loving soul very happy indeed.

last night's concert was very pretty and nice, but i wasn't keen on the venue. it's in a converted courthouse (and is called, somewhat non-creatively, the "court house") with soaring ceilings and kinda stuffy, aspirations-of-grandeur decor. when we showed up, there were two lines. upon inquiring, i was asked if i had a reservation. "no," sez i, "i have a ticket". well apparently, people who reserve a table (with a $15/person minimum!!!) get seats and the rest of us poor schlubs who have already shelled out $35/ticket have to go up to the mezzanine or stand at the back of the room like the lowly plebes we are. i was a little irate to say the least. YOU KNOW WHY JAZZ IS A DYING SOUND? because of that faux-elitist bulls**t. how 'bout we try to make a VIBE happen first? ugh. i abhor places that try to mix dinner and entertainment. either the DINNER should be the entertainment, or the ENTERTAINMENT should be the entertainment, not both. unless you're serving nachos and fries and wings. but places like the court house don't have the good sense to do that. instead they serve a poutine with "duck confit, maple syrup jus and goat's cheese". good lord, man! that sounds AWFUL!

last night's dinner was so simple and easy and tasty and good. buying mussels at a restaurant is probably one of the biggest ripoffs imaginable. we got 3 lbs of mussels and 2 lbs of clams for $15. that's usually what you end up paying for ONE pound of mussels, and seriously, mussels are one of the easiest things in the world to prepare. it's a crying shame.

in other news: ESPRESSO MASCARPONE ICE BOX CAKE IS THE BOOM BOOM. it took me 15 minutes to make and probably about as much time to demolish the whole thing if common sense hadn't taken over. delicious!

this morning for breakfast i made fried peameal, over easy eggs, toast, and the infamous carrot-beet-apple juice. for dinner we're going to the boy's nany's house. i'm hoping for a roast but as usual, i'll be happy scarfing down anything an old lady cooks for me.

fin.

cinematic orchestra

was more cinematic than i would've liked. i can't imagine that i used to willingly PAY to hear that kind of stuff. it was hopelessly generic and unmemorable. it's "cinematic" alright, but not very evocative, it sounds like a lot of sub-par jazz rip-off noodling. but i do love the harbourfront bandshell as a setting for shows...i wish the city would let it be used more, and later! dancing outside late at night would be lovely.

on fourth of july eve, my sis and her fam took us to her friend's house on the shores of one of the finger lakes for the annual "ring of fire". it's awesome. the lake association gives everyone with frontage on the lake 2 red flares (and then people buy more) and at 10pm on fourth of july eve (aka july 3rd) everyone lights their flares so the whole rim of the lake is softly glowing and outlined in red. at the same time, people are pulling up deck chairs and having bonfires and doing fireworks. and when i say "doing fireworks" i mean: spending tens of thousands of dollars on REAL fireworks, NOT the rinkydinky burning schoolhouses that you get from the convenience stores in toronto. like, symphony of fire fireworks, disneyworld fireworks. it was buckshot. i LOVE fireworks! and i LOVE sitting by lakes and watching fireworks with people i like in deck chairs. it even made MY cold, blackened heart stir with furtive, nascent nationalist sentiments, and i LOATHE nationalism. it's just nice when people come together to do something (barring genocide and fascism).

it wasn't all sunshine and roses though. our ride down there was marred by a tactical error on my part that raised the simmering-beneath-the-surface ire of my outlaw brother. we took two cars down to the lake. i had made my award-winning potato salad and a spinach salad and dessert (which i carried in my lap). i packed up the food and put the salads on the backseat of my outlaw bro's car. well, apparently it sloshed around and got potato salad "all over" his car. then he flipped out and then he gave me the finger as he drove by. it was ugly. in my defense, i NEVER put food on the floor of the car. it's gross! especially if it's in tupperware! how was **i** to know that tupperware didn't form a tight seal? and my outlaw bro, incidentally, LOVES my potato salad, so you'd think he'd be glad that the essence of something he loves would be soaked into the cushions of his car. right? right?

tonight i'm going to see bill frisell at a new venue, the courthouse. i lurve bill frisell. most of his later stuff has been meandering, porch guitar music in the country-style. love!

i switched last night's dinner. we ended up having steak sandwiches on toasted baguette with arugala, sliced tomatoes and st. agur cheese. with grilled asparagus. delicious!

tonight we're having the steamed clams with toasted baguette and salad. i also made a surprise dessert for the boy, who's been pestering me for this "caterpillar" dessert his mum used to make him as a kid, consisting of nabisco chocolate wafer cookies, sandwiched with cool whip and then frosted with more cool whip and frozen, so the cookies get kinda soft and squishy. my variation features espresso, whipped cream and mascarpone, and the cookies, layered into a dessert. i have high hopes.

fin.

look at that form!

well, i played my first-ever 18 holes of golf over the weekend at a course in the town my sister lives in. it was hella cheap! $55 US for two people AND a cart rental! i'd love to be able to say that i played awesome and that i'm a natural, but that would sadly not be the case. i shot 190 on a par 4. however, i AM good at driving a golf cart. my short game sucks balls. and, as you can see, my follow through needs a bit of work. i was feeling rushed and nervous from having people playing behind us and the pressure to play more quickly than at the driving range, where time is on your side. it was still really fun and i'd like to definitely play some more. maybe sniff around on craigslist for some used clubs or sumpin'.

this is a picture from my dinnie at "cracker barrel" which is supposed to be an ye olde tyme country store-style franchise. so you walk in through the "general store" where they sell rockers and miscellaneous americana from the ages (ie. saltwater taffy standing cheek by jowl alongside pez dispensers and the like). the offerings are mostly down-home cooking. i had country fried steak. GENIUS. it's a piece of "steak" (more akin to hamburger or a thinly pounded and tenderized steak cutlet) that's been breaded and deep-fried and is served with a gravy that's so thick and globby, you can stand a spoon up in it. it comes with three sides so i had fried okra, hashbrown casserole (!!!!!!) and mac'n'cheese (!!!!!!!). you'll notice an appealing beige-y palette to the plate with a noticeable lack of items deriving from a fresh, unfried, or vegetal nature (save the okra, which has been aggressively cooked into submission). cracker barrel is AWESOME. but you have to have a deep-seated love for the craptacularly salty, ultra-large-sized and carb-loaded to appreciate it (and if you don't have such a love, even buried deep down in your health-loving soul, you and i are probably not very good friends).

that's a pic of my niece in a rare moment of quiet good humour, and my nephew, whom i dressed up in a spare tutu (thereby breaking my poor outlaw bro's heart). my 3 year old niece is making me question my desire to ever have children. she's a handful. a willful, stubborn, talkative, opinionated little person who can be really funny, but who can also at times be a real whiner. i love her, but i also love being able to give her back.

tonight i'm headed to harbourfront for the "beats, breaks, and culture" festival to see the cinematic orchestra for free! i LOVE free ish! this is what we had for dinner last night. it cooked up pretty quick and was tasty and summery and light. for dinner tonight we're having either shrimp scampi with lots of garlic and chilies, or steamed clams/mussels in white wine and garlic. either way, alongside we're having toasted baguette and salad.

fin.

mini vacay, hey hey

the vacation recap is going to be spread out over a few posts as my 5 days spent in sleepy, small town, upstate new york left me with too many observations to mull and stories with which to regale. i will say this: i LOVE small towns and i have a very large soft spot in my heart for americana. i don't know why, but canadiana has much less of an effect on me (in my weaker moments, i suspect that this might be related to the relative strengths of the respective nations' regional cuisines, and if that is the adjudicating factor, then i regret to say that i pledge my allegiance to the flag and amber waves of grain).

in related news, this post is a shout out to bob evans, bulk sausage maker and restaurateur, who passed away recently and who is responsible for a product that i hold near and dear to my heart. i have no idea why canadians don't see fit to carry bulk sausage in their grocery stores, but i will say this: american grocery stores (even in teeny tiny little small towns with populations under 10 000) have got us BEAT. the selection! the grandeur! the regional specialities! for a city that's as multi-culti as toronto, why can't i find dulce de leche in my iga? so while i'm busy half-masting my personal flag to great bulk sausage makers recently departed, i will also take a moment to pledge allegiance to wegmann's grocery stores and the exhaustive glory they contain within their brick walls.

finally, here is a picture of a baby wearing freakishly oversized senior citizen sunglasses that's pretty self explanatory.

tonight for dinner, i'm giving my gut a rest by making angel hair pasta with chopped tomatoes, basil, balsamic and olive oil and a large salad.

fin.

daftcakes!

yesterday we had a going-away party for a coworker. it featured some baked goods (little butterfly cupcakes, italian orange and chocolate-iced biscotti, my pecan shortbread and norwegian cardamom spice cookes with espresso glaze, coffee cakes), fruit, but most notable of all: dominion grocery store slab cake. which i ate two pieces of. corner pieces - with double the frosting! it was fairly disgusting. one of my apocalyptic skills is my uncanny ability to eat massive amounts of slab cake and to at times, favour it over home-baked pastries. i don't know what it is, but lately, grocery stores have really NAILED the slab cake genre. it's all in the frosting. gone is the hard, overly sweet, teeth-aching frosting of yore and in its' place is a lightly sweetened, softly airy, whipped-cream-esque substitute. divine!

after that i met up with dr. rei and we did some shopping for my nephew, little ze's birthday. we also hit the new "forever 21" store at the corner of dundas and yonge. it's an american chain that offers cheap(er) clothes that are still stylee. i went in and almost died and went to heaven. the clothes are so me!!!!!! they've got this flowy, vaguely hippie-esque vibe with nice patterns and colours. j'adore! it's a lot more me than the offerings at h&m, which are a bit too euro-urban-trendy-electro for me. however, i was thinking that the price point would be a little lower...it's not that much of a deal (especially for the quality), but it's still fun to check out. i love shopping with dr. rei because she's very sensible about things and keeps me from going buck on generic, mass-produced pieces, by asking me the hard questions like, "do you really need this?" or "why don't you save your money for something really special?" and in the end, i need to be asked such things, because i've inherited my mother's ability to be a shopping addict. and my wardrobe is already bursting at the seams. i have a pretty good eye for clothes, so things i buy rarely go "out of style" per se, which means that at the rate that i'm collecting, it's bad news for the amount of space i have.

the point is: you're right dr. rei...i'm better off spending my hard-earned dollars on one of a kind pieces.

also, i'm going to visit my sis for a mini-vacay (me and the boy took a few extra days off work), so i should REALLY be saving my money for the hole i'm going to tear into the libertine collection at target. i'm also hoping to check out steve and barrys, which sells ultra-cheap clothes that are the end result of my people being paid in grains of rice. eeeks.

in other news...my birthday weekend is going to be OFF THE CHAINS. i've decided that i want to go see daft punk at arrow hall on august 5th. check out this footage:



holy s**t. if that's not the hypest thing i've seen in a while, i don't know what is. all the dancing i haven't been doing all year is going to be made up in one glorious show. the greatest thing about my birthday is that the provincial government saw fit to mark the auspicious occasion of my birth with a civic holiday, which means that there's always a 3 day weekend lurking around the vicinity of my bday. BOOOOOOYASHAKA. that means the rave is ON, motherf**kers!

ahhhhhhhhhhhh!!! i'm so hype already it's making me want to shoop like whoa!

have a great long weekend, peeps! i'm going to be chilling out maxing relaxing all cool in the land of super-sized portions of bob evans bulk sausage, biscuits and gravy, and modern imperialism-derived slack.

fin.

mmw + s = <3 <3 <3 !!!

last night's show was so good! it was funky and skanky and jammy and dancey and all the upbeat medeski martin and wood hits that i love. although i've said it before and i'll say it again: JAZZ FANS ARE THE WORST. the most unhype, unenthusiastic crowds i've ever seen. it's like buddies: you know why you're listening to a dieing sound??? because you do it a disservice and make live shows NOT LIVE.

mmw is as close as i get to listening to a "jam" band (ie. i loathe dave matthews with a vehemence i usually reserve for...well...i guess i loathe a lot of things with vehemence). i've seen them four times now, and each time, people are up outta their seats and dancing. so why would the td canada trust toronto jazz peeps see fit to pack a bunch of CHAIRS into the tent where the concert took place??? so lame! the most rousing reaction most toronto jazz people can muster is polite clapping. there wasn't much of a vibe inside the room which is so odd to me, as jazz is something that's dependent on LIVE performance. and sometimes that s**t get's COOKIN' but you wouldn't know it from the crowd reaction.

i have to say i think this is a toronto thing. in nyc, peeps get riled and rowdy, and this is the 50+ crowd. we saw ron carter (for free!) at the museum of natural history and the peeps were feelin' it. blech. it's just depressing how lamely mediocre and genially bland toronto is sometimes.

scofield adds an extra layer of dopeness to the group and my only complaint is that the show was a little short.

tonight for dinner i was thinking of going out to eat, but i'm going to do the frugal thing and make a pancetta, caramelized onion, cracked black pepper and parm bucatini with a salad.

fin.

is this normal???

that's a question that gets asked a lot around these parts, usually late on a friday evening, as the roomie, the boy, and i are deep in conversation, as we happen to glance at the clock and realize that by all rights, we should be capitalizing on our youthful vigor and painting the town red, not 2 hours into a psychoanalysis of what makes oprah indicative of the problems with society (the boy and me), or the last bastion of hope for our damaged world (the roomie).

our closeness and contentment with each other as company always makes us wonder aloud if it's "normal" - but then we realize the question is a wash, because as usual, we're only asking each other creating a circular trajectory to our self-analysis.

this was thrown into relief at my friend's shindig on saturday. it was the roomie's long island friend (hereafter known as "p"), the roomie, myself and someone we hadn't yet met sitting on the couch in that order. it was pretty hot in there and we were sweating up a storm, until that became a topic of conversation. "i'm sweating like a pig," says i. "it doesn't matter cuz you don't have hair under your pits so it wouldn't stink," responds the roomie. "sure i stink," is my retort. "no, you don't," is the roomie's rejoinder. to which, i take the "logical" next step, and swipe a hand under my armpit, lubing it up with the pheromones-laced secretions of my glands, and take a sniff. i then offer said hand to my roomie to take a sniff, which she obligingly does, with the comment, "i don't smell anything". at which point, the kindly girl sitting on my right decides (justifiably so) to get up and move to a chair across the room.

yikes. maybe this whole family thing has gone too far? although the thing that reassures me is that every time we have someone over, they want to move in with us. something tells me i'm into something good.

concert tonight! medeski, martin, wood and scofield. you know what i love more than a hammond organ??? a rhodes! and you know what i love more than a hammond and a rhodes? a wurlitzer!!! and you know what i love best of all??? when someone can play ALL THREE at a time, alongside bass and drums. it's my ideal combo. none of that saxamaphone and trumpet biz...all meat, no fat. it also means i get to dance outside. joy!

for dinnie tonight we're having seared scallops on a bed of creamy egg noodles with garlic scapes and peas. and a radicchio, parsley, fennel and romano bean salad with lemon and olive oil and fleur de sel, the original incarnation of which is pictured above.

fin.

this is a throwdown...

behold my boy foucault showing chomsky who's bawss in this debate. imo, he mops the floor with chomsky, especially in the second part. i LOVE this kind of stuff.





in other news, the parental complaint about teenage boys eating you out of house and home is a truism like CRAZY. my little bro is INSANE. he drinks like a litre of milk at a time and i watched him polish off the remainder of my (rather expensive) organic breakfast cereal (there was HALF A BOX LEFT) yesterday as he dumped it into the largest bowl i have. basically, i'm going to buy him a jumbo box of vector and hope that does the trick. i don't know if i can keep up.

for dinner tonight we're having grilled bacon wrapped mackerel with boiled blue potatoes in dilled sour cream and asparagus.

fin.

three's company

actually, technically we have five people in this house right now. so far so good...nobody's had any freak outs yet and the house doesn't feel super-full. we'll see how long this bonheur lasts. my little bro is very respectful thus far, so i think it's going to work out. i'm kind of still reeling from the fact that he's SO OLD now.

the driving range went well again yesterday. according to the boy, i was doing way better than bunny summerington the fourth a couple of spots down, who had the whole rig: a shiny set of graphite clubs, collared polo, walking shorts, golf shoes, the glove, etc. and while my shots were (for the most part) landing straight and true, hers were all over the place. i'm HOOKED. we're going on a mini-vacay this weekend but when we get back, we're going to try to get a round in. i'm totally hyped.

finally, we watched the final two episodes of veronica mars, the series. wow. that was COMPLETELY UNFULFILLING. it blew chunks. the story was actually starting to pick up and they left the door open for future episodes and then BLAM. that's it, show's over. laaame! the writer/executive producer knew what was up though, as he dissed himself in the second last episode. still...laaame!!! it just made me mad more than anything else.
we ended up at this place called "the burger shoppe" for dinner last night. they ONLY do burgers, fries, onion rings and shakes and they market themselves as "specialists" in that particular idiom. dinner was on the pricey side: 2 "shoppe" burgers (with caramelized shallots and horseradish) combos, 1 with fries, 1 with rings, a side gravy, an upgrade to boylan's soda (instead of canned coke) and a vanilla shake cost $30. it's getting a shade high for me. the fries were outstanding, the onion rings needed a touch of seasoning, the shake was a good shake (if i had my own milkshake machine, i would exercise the masochistic need to be gouged every time i want blended ice cream and milk), and the burgers were quite good, although what i really enjoyed was the shallots and the horseradish. it was a beefy little number, but it wasn't the kind of burger that makes me want to shoop, if you know what i mean. i had what i thought (on a tastebud satiation level) was an equally good banquet burger, made with a quantifiable amount of less care and cheaper ingredients, for $3 at square boy. so burger for burger, i don't know if it's worth the drive to acton. the fries were just the way i like them though. top fries in the city (in no particular order): the burger shoppe, duff's wings, and oyster boy.

today is my long day, so i cooked my dinnie for tonight, yesterday. we're having a fried eggplant, roasted pepper, grape tomato, basil, and oven-dried chili pepper penne pasta, with a big salad with my carrot-miso vinaigrette.

fin.

the bad boyfriend pays off (finally!)

our relationship to supermarket has finally taken a turn for the better. it's basically our abusive boyfriend. most of the times it's pretty bad, but then the odd time, the place is full, the music is good, and it's hard to forget all the bad times we've had. after a fun and sociable time at my friend's place for pre-drinks, we meandered over there, and the place was actually busy! and the tunes were aight (aight meaning they played "bonita applebaum - AT THE APPROPRIATE TIME - *cough* dr. rei *cough* and "o.p.p." and "push it"). that's an overexposed pic of me in our friend's car on the way over. there's nothing i love more (as i'm exceptionally unphotogenic) than blurry or overexposed pics of me.

you know what else is a ginormous ego-stroke? on saturday night some pretty cute dude tried to pick me up off the street and told me i looked like i was 21 (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!). best thing to happen on saturday night fo sho.

last night's dinnie was the boom boom. although i spoiled my supper by eating a square boy banquet burger at 2pm for a late lunch. but it tasted so goooood going down. the star of the show was definitely strawberry pie. it was fantastic! the crust was flaky and light and tender and had good flavour and the strawberry filling set up nicely, wasn't too watery, and wasn't too sweet. it was the essence of strawberries bound in my award-winning (self-adjudicated, not peer-reviewed) crust.

today the plan is to hit the driving range with the boy, although he's still not up yet, so i'm not sure how feasible this plan is, then come back and eat a sunday breakkie of blueberry buttermilk pancakes and bacon. then i'm going to a yoga class, coming home, and making dinnie for my mum and bro while my little bro moves in.

dinner tonight, if i end up cooking and we don't go out, is supposed to be a pasta with fried eggplant, tomatoes, olives and parm with bucatini and a side salad. strawberry pie for dessert, obvs.

fin.

mr. belvedere, m.d.

last night's dinnie with dr. rei and the roomie inside the ride was hi-larious and featured, amongst other things: an ongoing mr. belvedere gag, dr. rei's bumbled fumbling of a 1 month old baby, dr. rei's subsequent unsuccessful hamming attempts at winning said baby over, only to be met with rolleyesdotbarfdotgif from the baby, and a mildly embarrassing conversation on the streetcar to the bar where us three girls hashed over (quite loudly) people we knew who were "ugly" "average" or "pretty".

the bar was a bust. i was expecting old skool hip hop dj sets and what i got instead was an all-white reenactment of 8 mile. seriously. it was like bad mc after bad mc, although the notable line of the night was: "or else i'll f**k you over like a french seal". yikes is right, folks, yikes IS right.

today i'm lazing and futzing around the house with the roomie and her visiting friend from long island. then we're going to my friend's place for a birthday pre-drink and then seeing where the night takes us. i've given up on finding a live place to go dancing. it's like, never going to happen.

tonight for dinner we're having ginger-pear glazed grilled pork chops a panzanella salad and grilled asparagus. for dessert we're having a warm strawberry pie with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

fin.