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ShinyHappy - Thoughts For May 16th - 31st
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05/31/04 More proof of Joss Whedon's genius.
Ring, ring
"Hello?"
"HellothisisensfrslacallingfrombrzzwfsslxcanItellyouaboutourmsbafutzplx?"
"I'm sorry, you're calling from where?"
"ThisisensfrslacallingfrombrzzwfsslxcanItellyouaboutourmsbafutzplx?"
"I'm sorry, but I didn't understand that. Who's calling?"
*Sigh*
"This ... is ... Jawndiece ... calling ... from ... Pretty ... Valley ... Upstream ... Resorts ... Can ... I ... tell ... you ... about ... our ... inexpensive ... packages?"
"No, thanks."
*Sigh*
"Thankshrndackbnfregoodbye."
You know, I answered the call because I knew it was more than likely going to be a telemarketer and I kind of felt like having a reason to bitch at someone. But Jawndiece foiled my plan! I was not prepared for the unintelligible approach. That kind of thing gets you fired from telemarketing jobs, you know. I've never been a telemarketer, but I was in the business of taking customer calls, and speaking clearly is, um ... like, the first rule of telephone work. Obviously. However, she took no personal responsibility for her lack of telephone skills. When I requested clarity, she did that slow-talking thing, as if she were communicating with a young child or someone not too terribly bright. The sighs were of the long-suffering, hard-done-by variety.
Andrew came home from work practically sleepwalking. He got on the sofa and didn't get back up for a few hours, during which time I went on an excursion to Loblaws to get some chicken noodle soup for our dinner. It had been a very rainy day, but the rain had stopped and it was quite foggy by the time I went. From a distance most buildings were no more than four stories high, and I remarked to Andrew later that it was like being back in Kingston again. Although that is perhaps unkind, as Kingston does have some six-story buildings as well.
Later on, after Andrew had awoken and eaten dinner, I decided that I really wanted to get a Coke, but the convenience store next to us was inconveniently closed. Andrew wasn't keen on going out so late, but after realizing that the NDP headquarters for the local candidate were right beside the 7-11 changed his mind and off we went so that he could go peek in the headquarters windows while I bought Cokes. I didn't go and spy inside, but since we also had to pass the liberal candidate's headquarters I decided to join in the spirit of things and see what I could see, which turned out to be not very much at all. I guess it's not about the interior decorating.
Halo has developed quite an obsession with the whole string game. Andrew bought him a catnip fish on a stick and string for Christmas, and while he did enjoy it like the little catnip freak he is, he didn't beg pathetically non-stop for us to pull it out and play with him. But this cheap-ass piece of string tied to the stick (that we took the fish off of) is his most beloved toy ever. Today he nearly drove me out of my mind sitting behind my chair and mewling at me. I hate to be mean and not play with him, but it's not like I want to sit and wave a stick around for hours, either. I guess he needs his excercise, poor little apartment-bound kitty.
Oh, I was happy to see this article and a few others like it while reading Google news today. Apparently Buffy, The Vampire Slayer and Angel, two of my favourite shows, are getting some well-deserved recognition for being the incredible pieces of work that they are. Topics at the conference include things like "slayer slang" and other, more spiritual aspects of the show. Very cool, if you ask me. There's also Slayage: The Online International Journal of Buffy Studies if you want to learn even more
Today's best quote goes to Andrew, regarding his ability to navigate any route known to man and his inability to get up in time to do so: "I get lost in time, never in space." See why I love him?
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05/30/04 As far as I know, this is all true.
So, I had a restless night of not much sleep last night and therefore did not go to the brunch with Andrew at Bea and Dave's place this morning, preferring to spend quality time in bed with sleep. I felt not too terribly bad about this, as I was sure that Bea and Dave weren't counting on me to make the party worthwhile or anything. But then I was talking to terrible, no-good Jerome on the phone and he accused me of lying in my weblog a lot lately! As in, I say I'm going to do something and then the next day I do not do it due to unforeseen complications. That's not called lying, Mr. Black. That's called an inability to foretell the future. So there.
Yeah. I didn't do brunch. I got up and ended up going out for a bit of a walk and shopping excursion during the afternoon as it was a freakishly gorgeous day out. Andrew admonished me yesterday for not going out during the day when I'm home alone and he's right. I should be taking advantage of this beautiful weather while I can. After all, it was one of the reasons I wanted to be in Toronto. I wanted to experience summer here. I remember a couple of days last year when Andrew and I started looking for an apartment in late August (we think now in our elderly and befuddled state of not-exactly remembering) that were swelteringly, meltingly hot. But that's not what I'm looking forward to. I'm looking forward to late summer nights of wandering around downtown doing fun things, or late summer nights hanging out with our friends. It's a late summer nights theme.
So Andrew came home from work and we decided that beef and broccoli would be a tasty supper. I especially like doing that particular dish because it has all the yummy goodness of a stir-fry without the stir-fry hassle that we create, I get to use chopsticks (yay) and it's relatively healthy. He had to go shopping for the ingredients and a few other things, so I got him to pick up some brown sugar and for a late-night snack tonight I made fried bananas. Since the plantains the other night they'd been on my mind, and I think they turned out pretty well. They're something that my dad used to make for us from time to time when I was young and every once in a blue moon I get an enormous craving for them. Andrew tried a few bites and seemed to like them well enough. I should use riper bananas next time, I think.
Oh, I've kept meaning to mention that while we were visiting Jerome he brought out a book for us to look at. I think he thought we'd be as horrified as he was by it, but I was thoroughly amused! It's called "The Waiting Dog" and it's not for the more squeamish among us. It's about a dog who waits every day for the mailman to stick the mail through the slot, and what he'd like to do about it. I think that Alannah's kids (especially Kelton) would appreciate it quite a lot. I'm not usually one for the seeming trend of 'oh, let's make it as gross as we possibly can with lots of references to boogers and guts' that seems to have grown in popularity since I was a kid in kids books and television, but this isn't one of those kinds of books. At all. It's clever, funny, and well-written.
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05/29/04 Bruce Campbell can buy me a red dress.
I have a correction to make regarding last night's Mexican dinner at what turned out to be the El Palenque restaurant. Andrew did not have the burritos, he had the enchiladas. That was his only complaint regarding yesterday's weblog entry.
Today was Andrew's day off. We watched Bubba Ho-tep (I liked the movie enough that I think it warrants a link to the official website) this afternoon and it was really quite good. I'm a huge Bruce Campbell fan. Yes, I will admit that my first exposure to his genius was through watching Xena and Hercules, but I then got to see The Evil Dead stuff and loved him even more. Bubba Ho-tep is a very dark comedy. Andrew says it's part horror as well, but I didn't find it very horrific. The fact that the effects were pretty cheesy took away any fright factor for me. In fact, I actually found it pretty touching and thought-provoking. It wasn't a formulaic, cookie-cutter film. Good, good stuff.
As evening rolled around we started discussing dinner options. I was in what can only be called a grouchy mood today and wasn't in the mood to cook anything at all, so we decided to go for pho. I showered and off we went. For a change this time we sat in the outdoor section. It was a bit cool tonight, so at one point a guy dragged out a portable gas heater and set it down quite near our table. After a few minutes he dragged out yet another one and set it down right between the first one and me, which meant that it was directly beside me. So for the rest of my meal I had one chilly side and one blazing hot side. Weird. There was plenty of room to space the heaters out a bit more and Andrew even suggested that he move the closest one at the beginning when it was flickering like crazy. I said no, though, and the flicker did settle down. Eventually.
When we were done our meal we went wandering around the Kensington Market area, although the only businesses that were open were the bars, most of which were small and interesting looking. We looked at old buildings and houses and eventually made our way back out to College and Spadina. I wanted to get some dessert somewhere, so we decided to check out the new Greg's Ice Cream location and see if it was open that late. Thankfully it was. There were two cute, happy young people working behind the counter and I was thoroughly amused by them as we sat and ate our ice cream. I was disappointed that there wasn't any toasted marshmallow flavour, but they had sweet cream so Andrew and I both got it and it was SO GOOD! I want to get it again and again and again and again! Although next time they should have some toasted marshmallow and I will try that first. Apparently there was a bat mitzvah that it had all been bought up for this time around. At $75.00 a tub, that was some expensive dessert for that lucky girl.
And, then we came home. I feel bad about being such a grump all day long, but Andrew doesn't seem to mind me so much when I'm like this. He was in a huge shinyhappy mood today, actually, which was nice to see, although his mood grew exponentially as mine withered. Hmmm ...
In the end, however, I have to say that we had a good day. We're going to Bea and Dave's place for brunch in the morning, so tomorrow should start off on a great note.
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05/28/04 Plantains can play as hard to get as cold rolls do.
If it's not one thing around here, it's another. Today was Andrew's turn to feel like hell. He did go in to work, but came home feeling like he'd been hit by a truck. As it turned out the show at the Distillery cost a bit more than we were prepared to pay for one show (the ticket price included multiple performances, but we were only going to one) so what with Andrew's ickiness and the cost we opted not to go. Disappointing, as I have not yet seen Marcus perform and was really looking forward to it. Andrew also came home with an invitation from Pez and Skye to go to their place to watch a movie, but again, too much blechiness abounded for socializing.
That left us with the problem of what to do for dinner. We don't have much around the house at the moment, being due for a bit more grocery shopping, so Andrew figured he could handle eating some pho. After we went to the bank machine, however, he changed his tired, weary mind and suggested that we just stay local and go for Mexican. I can't remember the name of the restaurant, but I'll ask Andrew sometime when he's awake, which he is not at the moment. He ordered burritos, which I believe he did the last time we went, and this time I got deep-fried quesadillas instead of the chicken mole. The mole was too spicy last time and even though I enjoyed it I prefer less tongue burning. The quesadillas were awesome, and although there was sour cream on them (because I forgot to tell the waiter I didn't want it) it scraped off well enough that it didn't matter. I just made sure I spread the salsa on top a bit, and mmm mmmm.
Andrew tried my meal and pronounced it even tastier than his. Then came the time for dessert. I'd eyed the flan on the dessert section before we ordered our main course, so when the waiter came back around we asked about dessert and he told us there were only two options available: Deep fried ice cream and fried plantains. I went for the ice cream, a bit disappointed about the flan, and Andrew opted for the plantains, figuring that the coating on the ice cream would likely have eggs. So, off went the waiter. He returned after not too terribly long a time with my ice cream, which was a rather paltry amount of ice cream crusted with some weird-looking stuff. It wasn't exactly batter. At first bite I thought it tasted strongly of coconut, but after a few more chewings realized that there wasn't any coconut. As near as I could tell, it was mostly made of cornflakes. Or maybe Special K. Anyhow, it did taste pretty good so I ate it all up and Andrew waited patiently for his plantains. After a bit the waiter came by and asked if we needed anything else, and Andrew said, "Yes, I ordered the fried plantains."
The waiter paused a second or two, then said something like, "Oh, yeah, I'll go check on them," then hurried off again to the kitchen to tell the chef to make the fried plantains he'd obviously forgotten to tell them to make in the first place. They eventually came to the table, however, looking remarkably like slugs in phlegm sauce. I'm not even kidding. They were plaintain slices in condensed milk, but for me the mental image was immediate and unforgettable. I tried a piece anyhow, though, and it was delicious. I'm ordering that next time if the flan isn't available. Andrew ate up his dessert and when he was finished the pieces I said, "Aren't you going to eat the skin?"
He looked at the grody skin on the plate and said, "Are you supposed to?" while he poked at it a bit, and I couldn't maintain a poker face long enough for him to take a bite. I don't think I would have let him anyhow, but dang, it was funny. It was made funnier by a story he told me later about something he did at work today. He told one of his co-workers that the word 'gullible' isn't actually a word and isn't even included in the dictionary, and the guy believed him for a few seconds. So, Andrew's bad deed swung right back around and bit him in the butt! Creepy karma.
Then we went to rent a movie and came home. As it turns out, neither of us was really in the mood to watch the movie, preferring to just hang out and enjoy each other's company which was a lot of fun and what we both needed, I think. So we'll watch the movie, Bubba Ho-tep, tomorrow. Oh, we also played with Halo a bit. Since the introduction of the highly dangerous string Halo has been constantly begging to play 'catch the string'. He sits on the floor behind our desk chairs and murmurs at us very pathetically. I caved in a bunch of times while Andrew was at work, so he had to take a shift tonight. No flesh wounds resulted, thankfully.
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05/27/04 Fire alarms and headaches are a bad combination!
Today was a bit of an odd day. I developed a nasty headache at around four or so in the afternoon which sucked as I had a headache yesterday at around the same time, too. Yesterday I took a nap to rid myself of it, but today I did not ... dunno why. It just wasn't leaving, either, so when Marcus called at around sixish or so to see if Andrew and I could help him out at a club he was performing at I was hoping that it would leave me in a timely manner. It did not and I kept lying on the sofa with my eyes closed, wishing it away. By the time Andrew got home I still had it, and after a busy, busy day at work he was not feeling up to a night out either, so we had to turn poor Marcus down. That sucked, but since we're going to the Distillery to see Marcus perform tomorrow night it's less of a loss for us than it was for him, as he still had to find someone to help him out. I really hope he did.
So Andrew came home from work, as I mentioned, and made his homemade macaroni and cheese for us. He wasn't pleased with how it turned out this time, but I thought it was delicious as usual. Frank's Red Hot covers a multitude of sins. After this was all done, however, he headed out at around nine-thirty for a quick trip to Loblaws to pick up a few things that we needed, leaving me home to continue trying to recover from my headache.
Mere minutes after he left the house, the building fire alarm started ringing. Just yesterday morning the building management had all the fire alarms in all the units tested, and tested the building alarm for an extended period during the morning (and I mean extended), so I knew exactly what the heck that noise was. It didn't stop right away, so after a minute or so I put on my sandals and jacket and went outside to see what was going on. Earlier I'd mentioned to Andrew that I kept smelling a burning smell, like someone was barbequeing or over-cooking hot dogs or something, and when I went out in the hall I could smell it pretty strongly. As soon as I got outside I thought to myself, "Well, duh, I left Halo inside! What if I'm not allowed back in to get him?" I watched as more and more people started coming out of the building. Then I saw a woman with a cat carrier and I decided that I had to go back inside for him, so I went back to the door and nobody stopped me or yelled at me not to. I ran back into the apartment, grabbed poor Halo (who was nervously lurking beside the bed, wondering what the heck was going on), crammed him into his kitty carrier and hurried back outside.
Most people had gone around to the front of the building at this point, but I sat down on a cement barrier in the parking lot with the carrier on my knees. Halo did what he usually does when he's in his carrier and being carried around, which is to panic and make moaning, yowling noises. Another woman came out of the building with two cat carriers and came over to where I was, sitting down with her cats (who were much more quiet and calm than Halo) beside me. She introduced herself and we made small talk while we waited for the fire trucks to come. It took at least ten or fifteen minutes for them to arrive, and this interval gave me plenty of time to discover that Patty lives on the fourth floor, doesn't have renter's insurance, and is crabby in emergency situations. Also, that she is very mistrustful of the family that live a few doors down the street on the other side of the convenience store and have bonfires in their backyard. She really seemed to be struggling to find a way to blame the current situation on them, although it was obvious that the burnination came from within our building.
As for me, I'm pretty scatterbrained in emergency situations. I didn't even think to bring my purse out with me. Duh.
The firemen opened up the door that leads to the fire escape on the second floor and called down to us that it was O.K. to go back into our apartments, so Patty and I bid each other farewell on my landing and she headed upstairs with her cats. I came inside, let Halo out of his kitty carrier and watched as he scurried directly into his Fortress of Solitude in the bedroom beneath an end table. And five minutes later or so Andrew came in the door, asking if there'd been a fire alarm or something while he'd been gone. Apparently a woman coming in at the same time as he was had mentioned it to him. He missed the entire exciting scene.
The best thing of the entire day just happened a few minutes ago. I was sitting here typing my entry, writing about the fire alarm, and Halo came along asking to get into my lap. He seems to know at this time of night that since I'm typing I can't have a kitty in my lap, so he always uses me as a stepping stone for getting into Andrew's lap. Andrew decided to play with him using a piece of string that was on the desk and dangled it around for a few seconds as Halo tried to catch it. He was still on Andrew's lap, so I suggested (jokingly) that Andrew drag the string up over his own chest for Halo to pounce on. As he informed me that this was a very bad and potentially painful idea, he dragged the string up over his own chest and what do you think happened? Exactly.
Halo pounced on the string and bit himself a mouthful of Andrew's chest, causing Andrew to sharply announce it in a pain-filled, high-pitched tone of voice. I immediately lost all my mental faculties and very nearly lost control of my bladder, helplessly laughing and crying and crossing my legs. I was also nearly undone when Andrew pulled up his shirt to show me the red nip mark on his chest. I eventually regained control, however, and recovered enough to tell you the tale. Woo. That was some funny.
Lastly, although this has already been a wicked long entry for a single day, I must include a little picture that I cropped and modified from a PVP cartoon. You can view the original cartoon here. I'll just post the picture below this paragraph, as it's very small. Andrew was reading the cartoon today and said, "This cat is looking at this guy in the same way that Luna looked at me the other night." And it's true. She sat and stared up at him unblinkingly in a way that clearly stated that she wants him dead.
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I said something unkind about my weblog tonight. I was talking about it and said that since I write it every day, it's almost like it's not worth writing if someone else isn't reading it. As soon as I said that, though, I felt bad, and I felt bad because that's not true. Writing my weblog is one of my favourite parts of the day. No matter the mood I'm in when I sit down to write it, sad, grumpy, or tired, I always end up finding something good and amusing about my day to write about. When I'm finished I read it over and I see that my life is pretty damn good, and I end my day on a positive note every time. That's why I started to write my weblog, first and foremost, and I can't ever forget that. No matter if I get comments or any kind of feedback about anything I write, I write because I enjoy it.
I made that comment at Dan and May's place. We ended up having dinner with Gav at their place instead of going out somewhere to eat. We ended up ordering in food from Jerusalem Restaurant. The food there is unbelievably good. Being the picky me that I am I didn't eat much of what came with it, like the hummus, eggplant, baba ghanouj, or tabouli, but I did fill up on a very tasty tomato dish, lamb, beef and chicken brochettes, rice, and pita bread. Oh, yum. I had a very happy belly when all was said and done.
Gav actually had to catch a plane at some ridiculously late hour, like at 11:55 p.m. or something equally silly, so had to leave before 11:00 p.m., but we got to sit around and have some great chats before Dan took him to the airport. This was the first time that we'd seen Gav since we announced our engagement, so it was nice to hear Andrew tell him the story of how it happened. Andrew somehow makes it a very long story, while when I tell it it somehow seems too brief and anti-climactic. I don't think I romance it up as much as he does, surprisingly. I always thought I was the huge romantic, but apparently not as much as my fiance! I must be getting more prosaic in my old age or something.
Noah was still feeling sick today, with a fairly high fever yet again. He has a thermometer soother (a very nifty little device) and since I was sitting in the back of the car with him I checked for May and he was at 103.1 degrees, poor guy. He was so good when we got to their place, too, eating his food pretty well and once more waving goodnight to us like the sweetheart that he is. I must say that Noah is one of the most good-natured and friendly little babies that I've ever met. Well, friendly with me, anyhow. Apparently Marcus pinches him when we're all not looking, as Noah has taken to crying at the sight of him. I'll be watching you like a hawk from now on, Marcus! (tee hee)
I found a link to something in Orkut the other day and showed it to Andrew today. I'd thought it was kind of neat and interesting, but Andrew reacted with such horror and revulsion that I figured I'd better share it with friends and family, pronto! It's an article about eyeball jewelry. What's eyeball jewelry, you may ask? Well, it's not an eyeball piercing, as Andrew has jokingly talked about in the past. No, it's implanting bits of shiny stuff under the outer membrane of your eyeball in the white area. The picture in the article shows a heart (it looks just like metallic confetti) or you can get a half-moon if you're not into hearts. I really do think it looks kind of cool, even though the model's eyeball looks a little irritated. I dunno. I'm pretty sure that if I got it done someday I'd get it taken out as soon as I got tired of Andrew shuddering in disgust every time I gazed lovingly into his eyes. So, I'll have to stick with tattoos and a navel piercing.
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05/25/04 Man, this one is all over the place.
We had a really nice visit at Dan and May's place tonight. I kind of put off getting ready to go until the last minute, so when Andrew called and asked if I could be ready in twenty minutes I was a bit hard pressed, but I managed it. I'd showered, but hadn't worked any of the other black magic involved in getting myself ready for public consumption. I was actually ready before Andrew even got in the door, though, and I think I was presentable.
With all the rushing and hurry Andrew forgot to bring the Firefly episodes with him, so we ended up watching the first two episodes of Soap, a very, very funny sitcom that ran from 1977-1981. Benson was a spinoff from that series and it's easy to see why, as he steals all the scenes he's in. It's a kind of bizarre show, to say the least, but it was spoofing the daytime soaps of the era. I especially like Billy Crystal as the unabashedly homosexual son of the blue-collar family smiling patiently as his mafioso brother insists he's just a funny guy. I think there were things in the episodes I saw that the networks couldn't get away with today.
Poor Noah was a sick boy tonight, though. He'd been running a fever of at least 104 so wasn't his usual chipper self, but it was sweet to see him trying to do his normal cute and fun things despite feeling crummy. He was crawling on the kitchen floor for a bit during the dinner preparations and played some, but in the end he just wasn't as energetic as he is most of the time, even when his fever subsided a few degrees. We did get our usual goodnight waves from him after his bath, though, with smiles to go with them. Hopefully he's feeling better tomorrow.
Our friend Gav called Andrew's cell phone tonight to see if we want to get together with him for supper tomorrow night, which should be fun. He's in from Ottawa for some reason and since we don't get to see nearly enough of him this is a bit of a treat. I'm not sure where we'll be going for dinner, but I'm looking forward to it, whatever it is. Have I mentioned that I like going out for dinner? Well, I do. Andrew's told me that Salad King is good, but I have yet to go there. Perhaps that will be an option.
Andrew and I have both been feeling kind of poorly on and off for the last little while, and I think that I'm degenerating into yet another cold. In the last couple of hours I've been feeling an ominous tickle/tingle in the throat and sinus area, so I may have to break out the echinacea once more. I think I need to start drinking green tea in copius amounts again too. I don't think I got a single cold when I was drinking pots and pots of that stuff every day. Impending sickness could also account for my crummy mood of late as well, so if so, I want to get it over with and get back to my usual sunshiny self. Ha ha.
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I hope that everyone reading had a happy Victoria day, even if you don't celebrate Victoria day in your land. We didn't to much to celebrate, ourselves. Being able to sleep in as late as he wanted was special enough for Andrew, I believe, and so he slept. Late. As did I. I can't account for Halo's actions, but I think he probably slept a lot, too. Usually when I wake up to roll over or check the time he's curled up against my back or butt or legs or something.
After we got up we spent some time around the apartment goofing off and hanging out until tonight, when we went to Tom and Gillian's place to meet Luna the cat, our possible future foster kitty. I'd briefly met Tom and Gillian last fall at a Retrocity concert (Tom is the bass singer) but it was in passing and we haven't seen them since, so it was nice to spend a little time chatting and getting to know them better.
Luna herself is a great little cat. Although she's not so little, really, being a dedicated and focused eater. She met us at the door and didn't run away, so I could see right off the bat that she's not skittish. I let her smell my hand and didn't push her for anything else at that point, and she didn't follow us into the living room where we sat and talked with T and G like an attention-whoring sort of cat would. It quickly became obvious that she's a confident and independent sort. As Tom was making tea we heard her talking to him (probably telling him he should feed her) and when Tom thought it would be nice to bring her in and set her down beside me on the sofa so we could see a bit more of her, she showed us her butt as she promptly left the room. She felt very strongly that she was not the entertainment for the evening. Tom and Gillian obviously love her to death and find the prospect of giving her up fairly difficult, so Gillian is going to see if allergy shots will help the situation at all. We're more than willing to take her temporarily for a while over the summer while Gillian begins the shots, so it's a wait-and-see proposition. They seem to think we're a good solution to the problem if the shots don't work out, so that's great.
As we were leaving Andrew crouched down to pay a little more attention to Luna and ended up having a bit of a 'catch the hand' game with her where she tried to pin his hand down while he waved it near her front paws. It was pretty cute, but when he stood up Luna sat and stared up at him very, very intently for a long time as if she were memorizing his face. It's my theory that she wants to kill him. Even Gillian seemed a bit surprised by the look she was giving him.
I've totally been slacking off on the No S Diet for weeks and really need to start paying more attention to it again. I determined quite quickly that I'd never be a Shovelglover, but I can be an Urban Ranger and need to start that up pronto now that the weather is gorgeous again. I even have a walking route in mind. The only thing I'll miss is walking at night. I love walking at night, but just can't around here, unfortunately. Well, I could, but shouldn't. I had a great walking route when I lived on Queen Mary road in Kingston that took me exactly 45 minutes with a brief rest in a quiet little park. Even then I'd get a bit of flak from some people for walking at night, but it's really one of the best times of day to do it. Quiet, cool, and great for thinking. Maybe I'll try to get up and take early morning walks, which is the next best time of day for that.
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I am home from my lovely weekend trip to St. Catharines with Andrew.
Besides going to visit Jerome, Andrew's Nana bought tickets for us to see a play in Niagara On The Lake at the Shaw Festival. We saw Ah, Wilderness! and thoroughly enjoyed it. We went into it knowing absolutely nothing about it and it turned out to be very, very funny and entertaining. Nana was worried that our seats wouldn't be great as they were set off to the far right of the stage, but they turned out to be wonderful. The stage was the type that comes out quite far into the audience, so we had as much of a full view as the people set directly in front of it.
Before we saw the play, however, Andrew and I went on a little walk around the waterfront and along the main drag of touristy shops and restaurants. I love to go into little shops that are full of works of local artisans, and immediately saw one called The Shiny Company. I also love shiny things, so had to go in. Andrew and I went in and browsed around and I was checking out the back of the store when I noticed that he was at the counter looking at jewelry. I (of course) went back to where he was looking at rings, trying some on. I tried on a few too and especially liked one of the Claddagh rings, but after a few minutes of this we went back outside. Once we got outside, though, Andrew mentioned that he thought it would be nice to buy me a ring. I told him how much I'd liked the Claddagh ring, so we ran right back inside and bought it! Yay!
I've always loved Claddagh rings. I think they're beautiful, but also appreciate them because of my Irish heratige. So of course I wanted to make absolutely certain once I got home that I was wearing it properly, and according to this page about Claddagh rings and their history, I am. I have it on my left ring finger with the heart faced inward, the crown pointing toward my nail.
I think that Andrew and Jerome did not hate each other, so that part of the weekend was a success too! When Jerome picked us up at the bus station the two of them got a chance to say hello, then we had to go right to the Brock campus and drop Andrew off so he could do a presentation there with his father. After we picked him up again a while later we went out to Perkin's, an eatery that Jerome spends a lot of time at, and they got to chat more so that was good, but the next day we didn't get to see Jerome much until the evening, when we went to the Buttery to see the show. It was great! I had so much fun, even though it's an audience participation sort of thing and I was forced to participate. It ended up being fun despite stage fright, but I have learned that I can't do an imitation of a sheep to save my life, and I really don't want to shake my butt in front of a roomful of strangers. Andrew, however, got picked on quite a bit and seemed to thrive on it. Of course, that could be because he drank a lot of ale, whereas I was stone-cold sober drinking Coke all night. I could have been the best lamb they'd ever seen if I liked beer at all.
Andrew had to stand up front while the Queen sang a mildly dirty song about him and a couple of other guys, he endured a knobby knee contest (which he did not win, surprisingly), and the wench Penelope sang a verse of a ribald ditty to him as well. He was pleased with all of this, of course, and the whole thing was hugely entertaining. One of the rules at these feasts is that the men have to ask permission of the Queen if they need to use 'the moat', and women have to ask the King for the same. I managed to run to the loo before the King and Queen appeared, but did have to ask at a later point. How humiliating. Andrew and I were in trouble, however, when we saw the menu. Nana and Grandpa Bill had taken us and Andrew's parents out for Chinese food not long before the show, which I was not expecting, so the feast of soup, salad, chicken, lamb, pork, veggies, and trifle was overwhelming, to say the least. We did our best and managed to eat some of pretty much everything without splitting at the seams, but it was close.
Jerome plays Sebastian, the King's steward, and does a great job of insulting everyone as often as possible. The people sitting around us managed to discover from us that we were staying with Sebastian for the weekend and were very curious about that. I wonder if they thought he really had a poncy English accent and insulted us every few minutes. Which isn't too terribly far from the truth ...
So this morning Andrew had to get on a bus and come back to Toronto. Jerome and I both slept until noon, then spent the rest of the day puttering around town and generally just relaxing and enjoying each other's company before I got on the bus at around nine to come back to Toronto. We did go to Port Dalhousie and visited a lovely little candy shop where Jerome thoughtfully bought a treat for Andrew. I'd been eyeing it as something funny and mildly horrific, but decided I didn't want to spend so much on a gag gift, but Jerome apparently thought it was worth it. It's a Tequila flavoured sucker with a real worm in it. Ew! The ingredients list is fantastic: Malitol Syrup, Insect Larvae, Natural and Artificial Flavouring.
Insect Larvae is an ingredient. Just think about that.
So anyhow, I'm home. I got to meet Nana and Grandpa Bill who are wonderful people and seemed happy enough to learn that Andrew and I are getting married. And Andrew got to meet Jerome, my oldest and dearest friend in the world. All is good.
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We got a call back from Gillian and Tom, the people who have to give away their cat. Gillian called during the day while I was at home and we chatted a bit about Luna (the cat in question) and what she's like. Apparently she's the type of kitty who will eat herself senseless if left alone with a large bowl of dry food. Halo is the type of kitty that regulates his eating so that he just eats from said bowl of dry food whenever he's hungry and stops when he's not, so we'd basically have to switch him to scheduled eating if we take Luna. That shouldn't be too much of a problem, hopefully.
We have a date to go visit them on Monday night so we can test out Andrew's possible allergic reaction to her. It sounds like she's not as much of a lap cat as Halo, or at least is not as patient about it. Tee hee. So we'll see if things work out. There are other concerns too, so time will tell if it's a good match.
Andrew got home pretty late from work tonight, and by the time he got here didn't feel like having either of us cook anything, so we ordered pizza again. We also once more did the 'two mediums with a free DVD' deal from Pizza Hut and went with Lost In Space this time, a truly terrible movie made in 1998. We opted not to watch it tonight as Andrew had too much to do, so we'll have terrible movie night some other time. Perhaps we'll subject Dan and May to it because we love them so, or save it for a trip to Tam and Dan's (a different Dan altogether). Terrible Movie Night is a thing with them.
I had to call Jerome tonight to iron out some last minute details for our trip to St. Catharines tomorrow. He's being a lovely friend and opening his home to us while we're in the area. Originally we were just going to Niagara On The Lake to see a play that Andrew's Nana bought us tickets for, but since it's near my dear friend we've managed to combine it into an opportunity for Andrew and Jerome to finally meet (and for me to meet Andrew's Nana and Grandpa Bill). We ended up playing a comedy of errors sort of game of phonetag as we usually do, but did get our conversation basically hashed out. The most exciting part was when I finally got him on the phone the final time, promising him that I was in a room with no distractions other than Halo, and I suddenly realized that I'd left the banana boats I was making in the oven for far too long! I shrieked or gasped or something and ordered Jerome to hang on and ran away to the kitchen, expecting clouds of smoke and brittle, dried up bananas with oxidized chocolate filling. What I found was pretty tasty, perfectly done banana boats. Who knew? Apparently they can cook a lot longer than I've been cooking them all along. Huh.
Jerome also thinks I'm rude.
Frankly, I think I'm a bit rude too, but Jerome will have to put up with me for the next few days. I'm really, really looking forward to the opportunity to go to The Buttery, the restaurant where Jerome works nights doing King Henry the VIII theatre when he's not being a teacher of horrible, no-good kids by day. I'll be so happy to see him in tights. Glee! I imagine I won't be able to write my weblog unless Jerome is a very accomodating and patient host, so we shall see.
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05/19/04 There is some talk of poop. Like, twice.
Tonight after Andrew was finished work and we'd had our supper we went out to Dutch Dreams for ice cream. The great thing about it is that there's a little area for eating your ice cream in the back of the parlour. It's up a few stairs and it leads into this bizarrely decorated room with tables and chairs and the weirdest Dutch paraphernalia covering the walls and ceilings. There's a predominantly bovine theme, with wooden cutouts of cows dangling from the ceiling and spinning in the breeze, wooden shoes hanging on the wall with flowers in them, gaudy frames with pictures of ... actually, I don't remember what's in the gaudy frames. They're that gaudy. Basically, it's a neat little place to sit and eat your ice cream. I got Cookies and Cream and Andrew got Pina Coloda yogurt.
The other thing is that no matter what flavour of ice cream you get, they always top it with whipped cream, strawberries, kiwi, pineapple and cantaloupe. I'm sure you can ask not to have it, but the more the merrier! It's slightly odd when placed on top of my usual favourite, rum raisin, and I imagine there are other flavours it wouldn't seem logical to pair that mix with. I think the bubblegum would be pretty nasty. Next time we go I'll have to get the banana ice cream. They also have a flavour called Moose Poop or Moose Manure or Moose Droppings or something, so I'll have to be sure to try that too.
After that we went and rented Planes, Trains, and Automobiles. We browsed for a long, long time trying to figure out what we were in the mood for. I've been in such an unpredictable mood for days now that I didn't really know exactly what I wanted, so when Andrew mentioned it I was surprised to find that I really did want to see it. The last time I watched that one was with John, I know that for a fact (even if he denies it) back in '88 or '89, so bringing it home was a bit chancy after the whole Weekend at Bernie's experience.
Thankfully, it was just as funny as the first time around (if not funnier). Andrew said that it carried very well into the 21st century and I agree. If you don't pay attention to the dated cars and buses, it could have been filmed just a couple of years ago, not seventeen.
I was talking to Alannah briefly tonight and she asked if I was going to make avatars for her kids, so of course I did. Check out Skotia, Kelton and Sehrin. Then I was talking to Mimi and told her I'd do avatars of Luke and July. She asked me to make the Luke one mean, so don't think I'm being unflattering, O.K.? And everyone has been updated on the family page.
Oh, and I forgot to put in a link last night to something that I told May I was going to include. Being a pet owner I know that sometimes there are unfortunate and delicate matters that you have to deal with concerning the health of your animal. I used to have to inject subcutaneous fluids under Halo's skin every day, and fully expect to have to do that again on a daily basis in the future. Well, I came across a link to a page detailing a man's efforts to do what was necessary for the health of his feline. It's a little ... icky, but the illustrations are what make the page worth it, plus the picture of Fred the cat at the very bottom of the page (if nothing else, just look at the photo. It's so worth it). So if you'd like to read about how some guy had to give his cat a home enema, check it out.
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05/18/04 A possible addition to the family!
Kitty! Kitty, kitty, kitty! I'm so excited because there's a chance that Andrew and I will get a new kitty! We learned tonight at Dan and May's that some mutual friends have to find a new home for their kitty because one of them is developing rather severe allergies, with cat at the top of the list. They love their cat and don't want to get rid of her, but since it's not optional they want to find her a very, very good home. I'd like to think we could supply said home.
Since we've been intending to get a cat to keep Halo company anyhow once we get to Ottawa, it's not such a big thing, just an early thing. Talks have not yet even begun with these people yet, however, only a message left on their machine. I guess I won't go on too much about it yet, as we have no idea if this kitty is possibly ours.
So, yeah. We went to Dan and May's place tonight. Dan called Andrew's cell phone while we were on the bus on the way there and asked us to meet him at the Dominion, which was on our way. We met him in the parking lot and since he had Noah with him I offered to stay in the car with Noah while he ran in with Andrew and bought margarine. He said O.K., and I was left alone with the cute baby. This could have gone well or not-so-well, as there have been times in the past when I haven't been Noah's companion of choice in the backseat and he has let this be known. Tonight, however, he was at his most charming. He kept glancing at the rear window as if wondering where the heck his dad had gone, but as I was putting on an energetic 'amuse the Noah' show he was distracted enough to play along and we spent the time giving high fives and playing with the hippo with the mirror mouth. Seeing his own face in the maw of an herbivorous aquatic mammal isn't something that seems to faze him, so all good.
Then it was off to Dan and May's where I pseudo-assisted May in making cookie dough (meaning I didn't really help at all, but I ate a lot of it). We ordered sushi and after dinner we all (me, Andrew, Marcus, Dan and May) sat down to watch the pilot episode of Firefly. When I like a show as much as I like Firefly I desperately want my friends to like it too, so I find it hard not to shout out, "Oh, this is such a good part! Pay attention! Watch the way so-and-so does such-and-such!" I think that I kept myself reined in pretty well tonight, though. It seemed to go over quite well, so hopefully there will be much more Firefly-watching over the summer.
Oh, so I added an avatar picture of my mom and added more friends to the Funky Avatar Friends project. I realize that John is beardless in one and bearded in the other. Deal with it. He's gorgeous both ways.
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05/17/04 I will not win friends and influence people today.
I've had kind of a weird, not-quite-cranky day. I haven't been feeling especially well the last couple of days and was about the same today, so I'm not winning any prizes for congeniality, but I've gotten by, I think, without being overly snippy or unpleasant. That, of course, was a bonus yesterday when we were out with Rosemary and Paul.
Today was a good day for self-involved petulance as we had no plans to see actual people. My only real outing involved the laundry, and lucky for me there was basically no one there while I laundered. While that's preferable for the anti-social, it also makes me nervous to leave my laundry alone in an empty laundromat, for some reason. I don't know if I think that other patrons will babysit my clothes while I come back to the apartment or what, but I felt weird about it, so while they were drying I sat by them with a book and kept them company.
Oh, I went to make more avatars today and the site was gone! I'm going to have to look into it. It's possible it could come back, I guess, but I may have to look into an alternative so that I can funkify everyone I love. I have some South Parks of a few folks that I haven't even posted yet, actually, so I should catch up on that before I make too much work for myself. Hee hee. In the meantime, I'll post the new ones of Mimi and Alannah. I've also posted them on the photo page for my family.
So, I've talked a lot in the past about how I am washing my hair using the conditioner only method, which means (of course) that I wash my hair using only conditioner. It's great stuff and I'm really happy with my hair now that I'm doing that. I came across a great site the other day that might make all my friends and family think I'm a little less weird, though. It's about a guy who decided that he'd try not washing his hair for six weeks! Pretty cool, if you ask me. Look at his site to read his progress from week one to week six. It's written as a series of emails that he updated friends and family with, apparently, and he's a funny guy which makes the reading more interesting than you'd think.
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I feel that I've been neglecting the funny/weird Google searches that bring up my site when people are doing anything but trying to find my site: Firstly, we have 'my-mother "guy gavriel kay "', then '"microsoft office tests" "try it"' (a search in which my weblog was the only search result), and lastly 'calories in packet of Maggie noodles'. I don't know what Maggie noodles are, but I bet they're not low-calorie.
Speaking of noodles, tonight Andrew and I went out to dinner with his aunt Rosemary and her family. We were originally supposed to go to some Chinese restaurant that specializes in fish, which had me stressed out for well over a week. The other night when we went to Pho Hung we took a walk past the Chinese place, though, and I read over their menu to see if there were any dining possibilities for me at all. As it turned out, it had enough non-icthoid fare that I was sure I'd be all right. So by the time this evening rolled around, I was actually looking forward to some very tasty Chinese food and the chance to show off my 133t chopstix skillz.
As it turns out, we didn't end up going for Chinese after all. We went to Il Fornello, a quite nice Italian restaurant. One of Rosemary's daughters had along an exchange student from Nunavut and apparently she was not a great fan of Chinese food. I ended up getting very, very tasty cheese filled tortellini in a spicy tomato cream sauce that was just plain excellent. It might have tasted better if I'd eaten it with chopsticks, but I managed. Somehow. Poor Andrew had a rough time finding something he could actually eat on the menu, as all the pasta and pizza dough appeared to have egg in it except for the rice pasta, and he wasn't into that. He ended up getting a rizzoto dish with a lot of mushrooms, which seemed to satisfy him.
So in the end, all my angst was for naught. The meal was very pleasant in another way, since we also used it as our opportunity to tell Rosemary and her family about our engagement. They were all quite happy and congragulatory. It's funny, but I wasn't quite sure what their reaction would be, so I was slightly relieved. Silly.
After all this we had to go and buy our bus tickets for our trip to St. Catharine's coming up this weekend. I hope that Jerome remembers we're coming to town. So we went to the station, after which we decided to get some dessert somewhere. Andrew had recently mentioned wanting to take me to Greg's, an ice cream parlour that he particularly likes, so we got back on the subway and off we went. We got off the subway and were walking along, happy as clams, almost at our destination, when suddenly Andrew started whimpering. Greg's was gone. The glass doors and windows were covered with kraft paper that said, puzzlingly, "Ice Cream Coming Soon!" Andrew hypothesizes that it's either relocating or renovating, but the point was that it was not there, and it drove another nail into the 'everything that Andrew loves goes away' coffin.
Instead we went to a cafe called 'Coffee, Tea ... Or Me'. It was pretty good. We were the only customers and sat by the giant open windows right at the front. I got cheesecake and Coke, and Andrew got a banana milkshake. He declined dessert, still in the throes of mourning, I think. Poor guy.
I feel like I've said a lot tonight without saying much at all, so I'll end here, except that first I must mention that I've completed my first wave of avatars for friends. Check these out: Funky Avatar Friends. There are more to come!
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