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ShinyHappy - Thoughts for September 1st - 14th
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09/14/04 Love is in the air ...
Yes, Andrew has once again gone back to Ottawa and left me to my own devices. Not that I'm hard up for stuff to do. There's plenty of packing left to be done, although he did take a carload of stuff with him when he left today. I also have masks to make and twice as much affection to spread around for the cats.
Speaking of cats, things are definitely improving slowly but surely with Luna. She has been hiding out in the hall closet a bit, but when she comes out (which she does) she's not acting overly depressed. I know what it's like to want some quiet and privacy, too, so I can hardly blame her. Anyhow, she and Halo are noticeably less hostile with each other. Today Luna was eating out of the food bowl and Halo got right up to her and sniffed her ear. She growled a tiny bit, but nothing else. Also, they've been chasing each other around but not attacking each other. I'm tempted to call it playing, actually. They have their tails straight up a lot of the time and do the kind of rearing play posture when they stop (which you'll only understand if you have cats, probably). There is still a bit of growling, and some obvious lines in the sand when it comes to certain areas of the apartment, but all in all I'm very pleased. Here's a picture of them hanging out pretty close to each other on the floor. I've also updated Luna's Page with a couple more pictures of her relaxing in the windowsill.
Best of all, Luna is wanting affection from me. She lets me know right away if she doesn't want to be petted, but a few times now she's rubbed against my legs, and she's been greeting us at the door and talking to us. Sometimes it's about food, yeah, but she also just seems glad that we've come home.
My only concern is the eating situation, since Halo and Luna are proving that their eating habits do not mesh well at all. Luna isn't used to sharing, period, and Halo doesn't seem to grasp the concept of timed feeding. Patience will eventually win out, I know, but it would be less worrisome if he wasn't such a skinny little guy to begin with.
So anyhow, I'm pleased out of proportion with the mask I'm currently working on, but since it's a gift for someone who reads this weblog I can't show pictures of it yet. Argh. Ah, well. Once it's given I'll be updating the Mask Pages asap. I'm also really interested in any unique and funky ideas for masks if anyone has any. I obviously like to do things a bit different from what you'd normally think of when you picture masks in your head, so if anyone has an idea they think would be along those lines, please share!
I also thought I'd mention that my hair is still rinsing blue every time I wash it. This stuff is worse than henna! And I'm afraid that the bathtub is pretty badly stained (although the sink was not, for some reason), so I'm going to have to get some bleach on there, I suppose. It's a good thing the apartment did get rented out before I went on this little hair adventure!
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09/13/04 At least it wasn't nostril cream.
Why am I so tired lately? Seriously, it's all I've been able to do to keep awake the last few days. Not that my schedule has changed much, I just feel bone tired all the time. Blah.
I had a pretty quiet day today. Andrew and his dad were out of here fairly early this morning. Andrew had to go to City Hall to give a deputation before a joint committee meeting for the St. Clair streetcar right of way kerfuffle. There were well over a hundred people signed up to do the same thing, though, so he kind of had to be there all day to wait his turn, and he also wanted to hear what other people had to say. He got to make his speech at around eight o'clock this evening and it went very well, apparently.
So I stuck around the apartment and did my usual around-the-apartment things including working on my current mask a bit more. Since we weren't sure about Andrew's schedule and we were planning to go to Dan and May's place tonight Dan and I worked out that we'd meet at a bus stop on Bathurst when he got off the subway at the Heath street exit. Dan wasn't in sight at all when I got to the bus stop so I went down to the station exit and sat on a bench while I waited for him and watched people for a while. A guy walked past with a german shepherd sort of puppyish dog, except it had a strange half-tail instead of a normal tail. I was curious about it but was a bit too shy to ask. Then the puppy decided she'd had enough of this walking business and laid down on the ground very near me, refusing to get up. The guy tried to convince her to and the whole scene had me laughing. She saw me looking and started lunging in my direction, so he let her come to me for some petting and I asked about the tail thing. Apparently she was just born that way, and her littermates weren't. Weird. She was pretty cute, though.
Dan came along eventually and we caught a bus. While we rode we talked blog stuff, and I managed to worry him about his new comments function which hadn't worked for me when I'd tried it (although it turned out to be just fine when he checked it later). Also, I watched a woman absolutely disgust the man she was sitting beside as she sprayed some kind of nostril spray in her nose. Both sides. And she massaged it in after. Ick.
So May fed us her incredible fabulous delicious chicken soup with dumplings which stuffed me so full I thought I might die. Then when Andrew arrived he brought Waiting For Guffman with him, which is another wonderful Christopher Guest film that I hadn't seen. I really like all his movies, although as I commented afterward I really do think that Christopher Guest thinks that Christopher Guest is hilarious.
Andrew is leaving in the morning so I'm revving up to be sad and blue about that. This weekend I'm supposed to be going to Ottawa with Dan and May and Noah, so I'll see him soon. It still sucks, though.
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09/12/04 More kitty tales, of course.
Guess what today was, boys and girls? That's right! It was Jerome's 30th birthday! Happy Birthday, Jerome! Can you believe we've been friends for twenty of those years? Unreal.
Things are slowly improving with Halo and Luna. They can be nearer and nearer each other before the growling starts. Now it's a matter of a few feet. Halo is seemingly very territorial about the bedroom, however, and gets really pissed if Luna goes in there. Unsurprising, as it's his favourite place in the entire apartment. Luna is getting much friendlier with me, too, and I'm looking forward to the time when she deigns to sit in my lap. That'll be nice.
We had a very quiet day today (apart from kitty growling). I wasn't feeling great so ended up napping again today for a large chunk of the afternoon. I don't know what's up with the sudden napping in the daytime stuff. I'm usually the type to hate naps. I often feel weird and kind of unwell when I get up from them. Today's was not so bad, though, and Halo joined me for a lot of it. We're very glad that Halo's affection for us hasn't been affected by the presence of a new kitty. I was a bit nervous that he'd withdraw and just kind of lurk around not seeking us out any more, but it doesn't seem to be that way, thankfully.
So, then tonight we went to Clinton's to see May perform with her quartet. They were great, of course. Because Bea has gone off to Harvard they added a new member to replace her and she is also a wonderful singer. Hisani was awesome tonight, though. She sang this sassy song about shoes. When in the song she is propositioned to do various things, she kept repeating, "Not in these shoes!" It was a fabulous song, and she pulled it off fantastically. She has the right attitude for lyrics like that. :)
We came back home during the middle of the next group's set because Andrew's dad is in town and staying with us, so we had to be here to let him in. Luna seemed very interested in him, actually, coming to see him at the door and sniffing him and his belongings thoroughly. She was very intense about one of his bags, but it turned out he had some muffins in there and Gillian did warn us that Luna is a carb-addict and will eat anything breadlike. So, the muffins are safe in the fridge away from her hungry little paws.
After Mr. Jeanes arrived we went out with Marcus to The Big Slice for some fine Italian food and chat (although the chat wasn't in Italian), then came back home for the night. I did a bit of work on a mask today, actually, that I hope to have finished within the next couple of days, but it's a bit different from the style of mask I have been doing. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it'll turn out the way I want it to.
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09/11/04 Will work for rent money.
So my darling Andrew arrived in Toronto today. He was really tired, having not rested well on the train. He hadn't had nearly enough sleep last night, so we both napped a bit during the day. Which was nice. It just doesn't feel right around here without Andrew.
After we got up we were just hanging out when I realized that I was having a major craving for sloppy joes. Why, I don't know. I don't remember the last time I had them, and it was just the sudden knowledge that they were the only thing I wanted. Luckily, Andrew was open to the idea so he went out to get the stuff and we had sloppy joes for our supper. I found that they didn't taste quite like I remembered. Weird. Still good, though. I hope this isn't a recurring craving, like mine so often are.
Halo and Luna are still full of mutual resentment. Andrew and I are both surprised by Halo's hostility especially. He's seemed to really come out of his shell in the last year, actually, so maybe this attitude is an extension of it (to put a good spin on it, anyhow). Luna has been a bit warmer with me today, letting me stroke her a few times and seeming to enjoy some tickles under her chin. She's also very vocal, which I love. They've had some loud encounters but nothing overly violent, so I'm sure that it's going to work itself out soon enough and they'll get a lot more comfortable with each other. I'll be surprised if they don't.
We went for a late visit to Dan and May's tonight after they got home from the wedding they went to today. Andrew and May compared school notes and we had tea and lovely conversation. May said that she is really looking forward to our wedding, and I have to say that I am too! I also shared with them that I have a couple of exciting job prospects on the horizon, a few not so hot money-wise but that sound enjoyable, one very awesome but a bit intimidating and not a sure thing at this point. I won't say much more than that regarding them as I don't want to get too excited myself. We shall see!
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We are now a two-cat family. Luna arrived today. Tom and Gillian brought her over this afternoon with all her stuff and hung out for a bit while she wandered around and sniffed things. I had assured them time and again that Halo would be a wimp about the whole thing. Yeah, he might hiss a bit at Luna eventually, but he'd probably just hide in the bedroom and they wouldn't even know he was there. So we were talking away, when suddenly a huge screaming ruckus exploded out of the bedroom. I guess what happened was that Luna approached Halo in his hiding spot in the closet and he felt cornered, so he attacked her. It figures that after all my assurances that he's a gentle little lamb he goes and makes a complete asshole of himself.
Since then they've been much better. They're keeping a constant eye on each other, swearing at each other a lot and generally being as tense as possible, but there's no indication that a physical fight is going to happen. Quite soon after Tom and Gillian left Halo seemed to realize that Luna was staying and that he'd better watch out for what was his, so he went and sat down on his catnip fish. Here and here you can see it peeking out from under his little kitty elbow. Poor guy.
Anyhow, I've changed the Cat Page to reflect both of them now. Check it out for lots of pictures. Halo's page has a bunch of stupidly adorable new ones, and there's a Luna page showing off how pretty she is.
I forgot to mention the other night that I tried C2 to see what it's like. If you don't know, it's Coca Cola's new low-carb soft drink. It's stupid. It's not just stupid, it's dumb. It has aspartame and sugar! Duh! There's a zero-carb Coke product out there, folks. It's called Diet Coke! If you're low-carbing you're not supposed to have caffeine anyhow, man. So, I tried it and it goes down tasting like Coke, until you've finished your sip. Then it suddenly becomes a diet drink. With sugar. So there's no point in having the aspartame in the first place. Argh! I shouldn't have tried it, but the curiosity was too much for me.
So today I was happy because Andrew was supposed to arrive tonight, but he called a bit after five to tell me that he can't come until tomorrow morning. His day had gotten more complicated than he'd expected it to and he couldn't get the last train in time. He's getting up at six in the morning to catch the train here, though, so I'll see him soon.
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09/09/04 I'm not a blue-haired freak.
Today I have a new addition to my mask making page. I finished the snake mask I'd been working on. Finally. It gave me a bit of grief during the painting stage, but it's finished and I can relax about it. I'm very pleased with how it turned out in the end and will probably make a few more like it.
Otherwise, I had a generally quiet day, I guess. I didn't mention last night that when I went to Greg's I also stopped in at the Shopper's Drug Mart nearby it and bought some Manic Panic hair dye in Shocking Blue. I've been toying with the idea of a blue streak in my hair, as I may have mentioned before, but I've also been curious to see what would happen if I did an overall blue dye job on my hair. I'm not about to bleach my hair so I have been quite aware that I wouldn't end up with actual blue hair. Since I've been hennaing it has been a dark reddish brown colour for quite a while now, and even though I like it I have been kind of ready for a change. So, I figured I'd end up with dark purplish hair, or possibly no change at all.
So, today I washed my hair and used half the container of dye on it, getting blue all over myself and the bathroom. It washed off my skin very well, thankfully, and it came off the sink no problem too. After I rinsed it out and my hair had dried I was very surprised by the results. No blue worth mentioning, but it had toned down the red of the henna and pretty much taken my hair back to a dark brown/almost black shade. I decided to go for broke and used the other half of the jar, and it made a bit more of a difference, but still not in any blue sense. Maybe in a certain light there's a bit of a blue sheen, but nothing appreciable. Here's a pic of the results (as I promised Jerome there would be), such as they are, and another one of the ends. See, no blue. But nowhere near as much red either, which I had lots of.
That was very exciting. In order to document it and the snake mask, though, I had to go out to buy batteries for the digital camera. It really does eat batteries like a pig. I went to Loblaw's so I could also buy stuff to make a stir-fry with, and ended up forgetting to get the batteries. So I had to make another trip tonight, this time to the drugstore, which caused me to miss calls from both Andrew and Jerome. I managed to talk to both of them eventually, so all is well. I really, really, really miss my Andrew.
It appears that Luna will be arriving tomorrow, as I haven't heard otherwise. It's going to be so weird to have two cats around! We're greatly hoping that she doesn't hate Halo. He's been around other cats before and his philosophy has always been to live and let live. Luna, as far as we know, hasn't lived with other cats before, so who knows what her reaction is going to be? I'll give it the rest of the month, of course, to see what happens. In the end it's all about whether or not she's happy, but most importantly whether or not Halo is happy.
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Today was a bad day. I wish I could say it wasn't, but ... it pretty much was. Ugh.
To begin with the phone woke me up. This isn't terribly bad, except waking up to the phone is never optimal because the person on the other end can usually tell they woke you up. Anyhow, it was (to my shock) a temp agency calling to see if I was still living in Toronto. I said I was until the end of the month and the lady on the line said that was great, as the job she was calling about was only for two weeks starting Monday anyhow and seemed perfect for me. It was a data entry position. I said I was definitely interested and she asked if I could come in today to do a data entry test for the company that was looking for agents. She said it was hardly an issue, seeing as how I'd done so well on their tests, but that it was required. I said sure and got myself ready and out the door, heading for their office.
When I walked in and talked to the lady who'd called, I knew. She had this lip-biting sort of expression and said, "We tried to call you ..." As it turns out, while I was on my way there (it takes about 45 minutes to get there) they'd found out that the positions were now all filled. I took the test anyhow, as she said that there could be dropouts, and kicked its butt. Sigh.
I had a full-blown migraine by the time I got home and went to bed to wait it out. I was feeling rotten, though, because today was the day that Luna the cat was supposed to move in with us. Tom called last week and we arranged that today would be when, but after I got the call about the job I left them a message asking if we could do the whole thing over the weekend. I felt really guilty about that, and Tom's nice message on the machine saying it was O.K. made me feel even worse, for some reason. I'm really looking forward to having Luna with us, and they've been trying so hard to work things out for her.
The phone rang a couple of times while I slept. I didn't answer it, still feeling like hell, and when I woke up I found that there was a message from Marcus wanting to see if I was interested in going for ice cream with him. I liked the idea and was considering showering and stuff when I heard a knock at the door. I went and looked through the peephole and saw a man standing out in the hall that I didn't recognize. I felt uneasy about answering what with Andrew not being home and me still in my pajamas. The guy then banged on the door really hard, so I figured I'd better see what he wanted.
The guy told me that he was the property manager and he needed to come in and look at the apartment. We hadn't received any notice that anyone was going to be coming to do this so I said, "What for?" He said, "To see what repairs I need to make." His attitude was really irritated and condescending as if I was being stupid and I really didn't want him to come in. I said, "Now?" and he said, "Yes, now. I have to look at the floors and stuff." I didn't quite know if I could refuse him entry if he was the property manager, so I let him in. As soon as he stepped in the door, though, I started kicking myself, thinking that there was no way I should have done that. Anyone can say they're the property manager, right?
Anyhow, he came in and walked all over the apartment, looking in every corner and crack. He even opened the refrigerator and looked inside. I kind of walked behind him to see what he was doing, very nervous and weirded out. Then he started suggesting that Andrew and I should try to move out early as he'd want to be making repairs to the place and if we waited until the last day of the month he'd only have a few hours to do things in before the new tenants moved in. I was pissed about that, but just mumbled something about us having to be gone a bit before the end of the month anyhow. I just wanted him out of the apartment as soon as possible. Then he said that he was coming back in half an hour with a man who wanted to look at the place.
So he left and I thought to myself that I did not want to be there when he came back with some other guy. I started getting ready to go out for a walk and the phone rang. It was Andrew and I immediately launched into my story about this guy barging into our place. Andrew didn't like the sound of it and said he'd call the property manager. In the meantime I hightailed it out of there, leaving a note on the door saying to go ahead and show the place. I ended up going to Greg's by myself and eating some Grape Nut ice cream to soothe my nerves, which it did. When I got to the subway station I realized that I don't know Marcus' number off the top of my head so couldn't invite him to go with me, so I ate lonely ice cream.
I talked to Andrew later and he told me that he had talked to the property manager and the guy had made it sound like he'd been perfectly polite, reasonable and pleasant. Luckily, Andrew's dealt with him before and knows just what his attitude is like.
I don't have a problem with the super showing up at the door with people to look at the place. Legally, they're allowed to do that. What I have a problem with is a strange man showing up at my door unannounced looking to come inside without giving me time to even change out of my pajamas, or just have a third party there so I'll feel a bit more comfortable. Maybe I'm not legally entitled to that kind of courtesy after giving notice to vacate (although I'm going to find out), but it sure would have been nice.
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09/07/04 Pho Hung has gone too far this time!
This was a happy hair birthday for me! I came away with four new very special combs and two gorgeous new hairsticks! Looky:
The top comb is the Creative 8 seamless comb that Andrew bought me, and the one below it that looks very similar but smaller is the Creative 5 seamless. Next to the smaller one is the sunfish shaped oxhorn comb that May got me, and below those is the wooden comb that my dad got for me. Then there's the absolutely beautiful hairstick that Alannah bought me. It has two little bells dangling from the top. And then below that is the second Kingwood Ketylo hairstick that Andrew bought me to go with the other one I have.
I must be hairtoy satiated now, right? We shall see.
I got other wonderful things for my birthday too, of course. A wooden cat ornament, a gorgeous bracelet, some cashmoney, a pretty chopstick set, et cetera. Andrew and I also took a trip to Michael's craft store while we were in Kingston and I very excitingly got a huge tub of white glue to use for my masks instead of flour and water paper mache. I'm positively giddy about that one, as I found that the flour and water mix went bad on me way too fast. The point is, however, that my birthday was fan-freaking-tastic and I'm thrilled that I got to spend it with my family. My birthday cake was a White Chocolate Raspberry monstrosity from Loblaw's bakery that is possibly the sweetest thing I've ever eaten in my life. I chose it, being the birthday girl, but didn't expect that over half of it would be making the trip back to Toronto with Andrew and me. Ack.
When we got back into town on Monday night we went straight to Dan and May's place where they were winding up a barbeque with some couples they know that have babies all Noah's age. So we got to see other adorable babies and see Noah interacting with them, which was all kinds of cute. There was also a couple there with an eight week old baby as well. The cuteness factor was overwhelming. After all the baby people had left we cleaned up and eventually settled in to watch Logan's Run, which Andrew managed to actually buy a copy of for us to keep rather than rent it. I was so excited.
Have you seen Logan's Run? I hadn't. I knew it would be cheesy. I knew not to expect great things from it. What I didn't know was that it was so very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very bad. Everyone in it ought to be ashamed. It was enjoyable to poke fun at the horrible effects, predictable plotline, formulaic exchanges between men and women and ... well, just everything. However, there were some wonderful things about this movie that rescued it for me. One part of the movie involves a lot of cats. Really cute cats that are obviously underpaid, as they're the best actors in the whole thing.
And there was an unexpected blessing that came out of this experience. At one point there was a scene where some gas was sprayed over a dead body and it kind of melted into a puddle and disappeared. May was very icked by the scene (bad as the effects were) and said something about not having needed to see that. I tried to comfort her by saying, "He didn't even leave a stain." To which May responded, "But I'd want to leave a stain!"
That struck me as the funniest and somehow wisest thing I'd heard in a long time. We should all want to leave a stain when we're gone! Our lives should all be about leaving the biggest, most permanent stain we can. Believe me, May, you will leave a major stain. No one could forget you. :)
So today was the day that Andrew was supposed to be leaving Toronto to go to Ottawa for his first week of school. I'd suggested we go to Pho Hung for a nice meal. He was eager to go as well so off we went at suppertime, happy as clams. When we got there we placed our order and things went nice and smoothly. Our pho came, our rolls came, and then our drinks came. We always order bubble tea and I always order a Coke as well. Andrew sometimes orders a Coke, and this time he had. When the tray reached us, however, the waitress set down two bubble teas and two ... Pepsis!
Andrew asked if they'd made a mistake. We were then informed that Pho Hung has switched to Pepsi from Coke. We were aghast. So we sent back the evil cans and contented ourselves (as best we could) with bubble tea and green tea. I feel like Pho Hung was saving this colossal indignity for the last somehow, teasing us for a year with haphazard service, always just good enough to keep us coming back. And then, just before we leave town, making what will probably be our last visit as Toronto citizens a heartbreaking experience. The sub-par cola company claims another favourite restaurant. When will the madness end?
Sigh. So then we went grocery shopping and came home. Andrew decided that he'd leave tonight even if it meant getting into Ottawa at a ridiculously early hour in the morning, so I fussed and nagged him to leave as soon as possible so I wouldn't be up all night worrying about him. Even though I tend to go to sleep stupidly late all the time anyhow, I definitely won't be able to sleep until he calls to let me know he got in safely. Today I finished the third book in the trilogy that Jerome sent me so I don't even have anything to read to take my mind off it. Argh. Ah, well. I'll survive.
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09/05/04 Happy Birthday to me!
Ooh, I'm doing an unprecedented early day entry! Andrew and I are leaving town for Kingston in about half an hour and while I wait for him to shower I thought I'd quickly mention the fact that I won't be doing a weblog entry tonight, and leave you all with this little picture I took this morning. Halo loves being in bed with us. It's pretty much his favourite thing in the whole world, and he often does all he can to convince us to go in there. And once he's on the bed, he strikes this pose, which I deem his 'baby bunny' pose.
Aren't they sweet? And no, Halo's not missing an ear. He, in order to maximise cuteness to its fullest extent, has it tucked under his head. Oh holy crap so cute!
Ahem. After reading last night's weblog entry Andrew asked me if my mom really does prefer her whipped cream without sugar in it. I said yes. Andrew said, "That's butter!" I nearly fell on the floor laughing. Hee hee.
Also, Andrew has lost one of my birthday gifts. After giving me the smaller of my seamless combs when they arrived, he hid the other larger one to give me on my birthday (today) and he hid it so well that he can't find it now. I know it'll be found eventually, but it's driving me mad, I tell you! He did give me my second Ketylo hairstick, which I'm very pleased about, and the best birthday card ever. He's the very best.
O.K.. Off to Kingston we go!
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09/04/04 In that moment, I wished I was blind.
Andrew and I woke up to a call this morning from the superintendent asking if we minded someone coming to look at the apartment in ten minutes. Not really having much choice in the matter we got out of bed and hung around while a very young looking woman traipsed through with the super. That happened twice more during the day. Thankfully our super isn't terribly enthusiastic about her job so the visits are very short, involving her going, "This is the kitchen this is the bathroom this is the living room this is the bedroom O.K. that's it." And then they're gone.
She actually had someone in to look at the place last night too while we were at Dan and May's, and she asked me today about my masks, which are spread out on the kitchen table where I've been doing most of my work lately. She then mentioned that she went to see Cirque De Soleil the other day and that my masks reminded her of that. I took it as a compliment. I'm nearly finished the current one. I think. The paint job is tentatively finished, but if I decide I don't like it I'm slapping on another coat of gesso and starting over again.
Andrew's sister Jenny is in town this weekend and she came by this evening for a bit, then we three went out to Salad King for supper. I got the same meal I had last time (hot chicken with cashews) and asked to have it mild this time rather than medium. I think I like it better with a bit more spiciness, though, so next time I'll get medium again, I guess. It's great, though, because they're not stingy with the cashews at all. Andrew decided to get mango sticky rice for dessert and when it came I was a bit icked by the sight of it. It was a flattened clump of sticky rice covered with coconut milk, a sliced-up mango sitting alongside it. He eventually admitted that it wasn't really a great dessert, unsurprisingly.
We went to Greg's for real dessert. I was terribly happy to see that they had Grape Nut ice cream this time, and decided to also get the hot fudge sauce, which I've been informed is absolutely orgasmic. It's wonderful as hot fudge sauces go, but it got in the way of the Grape Nutty goodness of my ice cream. Next time I'll get it on Sweet Cream. Now, the whole point of going to Greg's (apart from it being so ridiculously good) is that it's egg-free, or so we've been led to believe. However, tonight the guys behind the counter were neither able to confirm nor deny the presence of eggs in any of the ice cream flavours. Jenny had to ask, as her egg allergy is even more severe than Andrew's, and when they couldn't give any sort of definitive answer she reluctantly concluded that it was better to be safe than sorry. She did try a wee bit of the Sweet Cream with no ill effects, but since she didn't really care that much for the flavour it wasn't something she wanted an entire cone of. I felt bad, as Andrew and I sat there eating our ice cream very happily and she had none.
Jenny did point out that the Sweet Cream tastes exactly like frozen whipped cream, which is the best description I've heard of it yet. So, I'd be willing to bet my sisters would like it very much. Maybe not my mom, though, as it does taste like whipped cream with sugar in it. Tee hee.
And then Andrew and I came home after bidding Jenny and Colm (who joined us outside Greg's for a while) goodnight. We had a little quality time with Halo on the bed when we got in, as he had a very stressful day what with strangers coming in and out so much and he needed a little positive affirmation. While we were chatting and lounging and relaxing I happened to mention that Andrew had in the very beginning lured me because he'd known my (metaphorical) mating song and dance. Now, saying things like this can be dangerous because more often than not, Andrew will take a phrase and (for want of a better term) make it a reality.
Frankly, if he'd danced like that when we first met I'd have called a cab right away, and I don't think that 'She Blinded Me With Science' is anyone's mating song. If it is, they're probably pretty lonely.
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09/03/04 My hair is happy now.
Today was a day of wonderful wonderfulness for me! We got a notice yesterday that there was a package waiting for me at the post office, so today we went and got it and it turned out to be my birthday gift from Jerome! Yeehaw! Yes, I opened it today. There was no way it was waiting two whole days until Sunday. Sorry if that's not what you intended, Jerome.
Anyhow, what he sent me was the Wind on Fire trilogy by William Nicholson. I'd never even heard of it before, but started reading the first one while we were waiting at the subway station for Dan tonight, and I've hardly been able to put it down since cracking it open. To quote Noah (and the Teen Girl Squad, I guess), it's SO good! I'm thinking I'm probably going to be finished these in no time flat, and they'll hold a very special spot on my bookshelf from now on beside the Guy Gavriel Kay collection.
Then when we got to Dan and May's place tonight May presented me with my birthday gift from them. I opened it up to find a lovely little purple suede purse with something hard inside it. May said that the tiny purse was not the main gift, but that it had come with the item she'd actually ordered for me. So I unzipped it to find ... dah dah dah! A horn comb! I posted about horn combs and my desire for one a long while back, and May stored that away and remembered it for my birthday! So I now have a lovely little black oxhorn comb in the shape of a sunfish. It's great. It even has a distinctive and kind of funky smell ... like oxhorn, I suppose. May also assured us that the horn used by this company is harvested humanely with no trauma to the animals, probably meaning shed horn, not clipped horn.
Now to complete my comb collection I need to get a wooden comb and a metal comb, then perhaps I'll be satisfied. Perhaps.
We were going to watch Logan's Run tonight as I'd wanted to watch it for my 30th birthday, but when Andrew went to rent it tonight neither of the places he went to had it. Sigh. So we rented Kill Bill II, which is a good movie so I wasn't terribly disappointed. We're going to get together on Monday night and will attempt to rent Logan's Run then. Here's hoping!
I want to say that I really, really, really love and appreciate my friends. However, I'm an awfully tired weblogger tonight as I only got a very few hours of sleep last night, so I'm going to cut it off right about here. Good night!
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09/02/04 I've learned my ice cream lesson.
Yay for digital cameras! I've updated my mask pages with a mask that I finished today. I didn't exactly give it a glowing review, I realize, but what can I do? It's not my favourite piece. It's not the one I was gushing about yesterday. That one is going to turn out well if I can just get the paint job done to my satisfaction.
I didn't mention yesterday that Andrew and I went to Ikea to mull over what kind of bed frame and dressers we want to buy when we get to Ottawa. I love going to Ikea, but this is only the second time we've gone since we moved to Toronto. We're going to buy the stuff with some money we received as an engagement gift, so it was nice to be there actually looking with purpose. I hate window shopping 'just for fun'. Bleah. Anyhow, the bed frame we chose is a nice iron one, and the dressers we're getting will do perfectly. We also wrote down the name and numbers of a cool bench like one that Gundel and Julie have, and also some chairs to go with our dining room table. Ikea rocks.
Then tonight Andrew and I went out with Rayna to see Festival Express. I wasn't overly excited about seeing it myself, but knew I wouldn't hate it. And for the most part I was right. It was pretty funny in places and it was roll-your-eyes amusing to see the hippies having their little entitlement tantrums over the ticket prices. (They insisted that it was their right to see the shows for free. Uh ... O.K..) Now, I wasn't sitting there because I was bent on seeing the bands that had played, or to look at CN trains, but I did come away with a brand new and somewhat exciting appreciation for Janis Joplin. The documentary showed the Grateful Dead, Sha Na Na, The Band and more and it was not bad. Then Janis Joplin came on and sang Cry Baby and by the end of the song I was absolutely blown away. It was the only time during the movie that the theatre audience clapped, and you could tell that she was the 'something special' about that tour. It's so sad to think that just a couple of months after that footage was filmed she was dead.
After this we decided to go to Demetre's for dessert. Andrew and Rayna were all excited about going and I was a bit skeptical. I already know where to get the best ice cream in Toronto. However, instead of eating Greg's I went whoring around with this newcomer and was disappointed in the end. I think after Grape Nut ice cream there's just no going back. I got a crepe filled with ice cream and topped with strawberries and strawberry sauce, but the ice cream just didn't do it for me. It was supposed to be all special, made with honey and other fabulous things. In the end, though, it just wasn't Greg's ice cream and I knew it. Live and learn. I may go back to try the Cookeo ice cream at some point, though. Oreo Cookie ice cream is always good. No matter what.
Archives / Search The Site / Friend Blogs
09/01/04 May's been teasing me a lot lately, so maybe it's her bad karma.
I was very excited today to realize that Google offers a site search capability. I've been agonizing about the silly way I'd been organizing (or rather failing to organize) the links that I use in my entries and had been wanting to provide a way for people to search the site when they wanted to find something rather than combing through pages and pages of links. So notice, if you will, in the links above what you're now reading the new handy-dandy Site Search that I've added thanks to Google!
I am very fond of Google. Have I mentioned that before? And I also have a buttload of Gmail invites on offer if anyone at all is interested. Just email me and let me know. It'll be first come, first served, I guess.
So I threatened to talk more about things that happened over the weekend while we were in Ottawa, but whatever I was thinking of seems to have fled my head. Although actually there was something that I found funny (in an evil way). For the entire weekend while Dan and May were in Ottawa the weather was hot. It was hot and humid and sticky and unpleasant, and sweat was everyone's very close companion. So sleeping was a mite uncomfortable. Couple that with the fact that on Friday, Saturday and Sunday mornings there was loud construction going on at the church across the street. Quite early. Early enough to be very annoying. I recall May saying in exasperation, "It's Sunday!"
So, Dan and May headed back to Toronto on Sunday and left the futon bed for me and Andrew to share that night. And wouldn't you know it, the weather cooled down considerably. We didn't just use the blanket, we required the blanket. And I completely expected to be stirred from my sleep by the sound of banging, hammering and drilling, but no, on Monday morning there was blissful silence from the construction area over at the church. Strange, no?
We did end up getting our fair share of the bad luck, though, on the road home. (See yesterday's entry in the archives.)
I realized today that my mask making link is now buried in the archives, so I have to mention it again. So far everyone seems to love the gecko best, which is no surprise to me as I fully agree that it's the most appealing of the bunch. However, I'm working on one right now that I really and truly love and I think could perhaps be my new favourite. We won't tell Gordon that, though. I bought some brown craft paper while I was in Ottawa over the weekend and I'm so glad I did. It makes all the difference when it comes to paper mache. It's stronger and creates a much, much nicer finish to the final layer. And once Andrew gets a haircut I may take some pictures of him modeling the masks for us.
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