Adventure in the 21st century is not like hobbits going to dispose of a ring

With this being the long weekend, and my birthday coming up soon, hubby and I decided that we would attempt going away for a few days.  The parameters were something along the lines of driving distance and relatively cheap.

I sort of got set on the idea of Maine, just because I was kind of digging the idea of seaside and clam chowder, and it's about twice a year that I get to have lobster.  Well, now that I can cook them myself, I'm thinking that number will up itself a bit.

Anyway, Hurricane Earl dashed any sort of plans for Maine, and while I could probably do the travel search thing in a heartbeat, for someone else, professionally, on my own, I'm really quite useless when it comes to booking any sort of vacation.  Business trips seem to be a different story, because then you have a starting point of reference, like location of the conference, hotels and restaurants in close proximity, things to do according to the given schedule.


When we were planning our honeymoon, I was set on the idea of learning to surf somewhere.  I scoured for days, looking at places like Costa Rica, Hawaii ... all for nought, because we ended up going to the Bahamas on the great and fabulous recommendations of two of our best friends.  But also, hubby is generally quite good at planning travel stuff, and on other occasions, while I have been searching for days, he finds something in 15 minutes.

This, however, was not the case.  For various reasons, hubby was being all defeatist in his travel searching.  We have been thoroughly put off bed and breakfasts, and availability of "nice hotels" seemed to be dwindling as the hours went by.  Eventually, hubby called it quits on the search and declared that we would just be spontaneous.

Yikes.  I really don't enjoy being spontaneous.  I like knowing where we're going, I like knowing what to pack, and I like having a plan of action for stuff like nearby restaurants that I'd like to try.

ANYWAY ... we woke up late, and hubby says, "So, let's just get in the car and drive."
Me:  "Uhh ... okay.  We'll leave in two hours."

So I scurry around the house like some headless chicken on crack, flailing about trying to get snacks and grab things that I think we'll need.  I packed spinach dip (to use up the expired-but-still-good sour cream), tortilla chips, water, watermelon (1 pound eaten, 14 to go) and two apples which are sort of nearing their last legs.  (Yes, you do sense a theme here.)  I scurry around some more, grabbing things that I think we'll need, and what hubby should take but doesn't think he'll need.  Then the hallway looks like we are leaving for two weeks of camping.

We get in the car and drive west.  Armed with iPhones and a sat nav (GPS), we briefly enjoy the sites of small towns along the way.  There's a lovely beach near Turkey Point, there's a majestic lighthouse in Long Point, there's a cute little dock somewhere close by.  We stop in Point Stanley, and hubby gets completely turned off of the post-50s bed and breakfast crowd yapping about ponchos.

"We are not staying here," he says gruffly.

So we get on our iPhones and use a combination of the HotelPal, TripAdvisor and Priceline apps to find somewhere close by.  I tell him that the closest available and cheapest hotel is the Howard Johnson (Ho Jo) in London at $90 for the night.  He later tells me that his experiences with the Ho Jo have never been stellar, and which is why we were rushing off to find a Staybridge Suites in London.  We actually really like that brand of hotel - usually the suites come with a kitchenette, and the rooms are quite large.

While hubby drives, I get online to see if the Staybridge Suites have a vacancy.  Nope.  Determined, hubby plows on to London, where he decides that there has to be something available.  We get there, drive through, hubby saying all the while that he's looking for the nice downtown historic part.  We drive down what appears to be a main street, find "town", and decide that it looks too much like Hamilton.  A LOT like Hamilton.  Nevermind.

We keep driving through, and suddenly, London looks like it's finished.  There are just houses and side streets, then more and more farm land.  Oh, guess we went through it.

Eventually, having this wretched cold and blowing my nose every five minutes, I pass in and out of consciousness as the medication weakly kicks in.  When I wake up, we're still in farmland like area, and hey, it looks a lot like 10 minutes from where we actually live.

It starts to rain, and hubby sees a blue provincial sign for two inns.  We drive by the one, call and find out that there's no vacancy.  Boy, I can imagine a pregnant Mary swearing Joseph up and down on that donkey for not having called ahead.

Somewhere along the way, striking out on GOOD hotel availabilities, I did actually say, "This is what happens when you don't call ahead."  I don't think the Bible does justice for Mary in censoring what she probably said.

Eventually, we drove past the Stone Willow Inn.  I looked online quickly and found out that they had ONE room left with two queen beds.  $150 minus $5 for a CAA discount ... sold.  We were tired of roaming around southwestern Ontario.

It turned out to be alright ... no Hilton NYC, but decent enough.  The restaurant wasn't really stellar.  The beds were alright, they had free wireless.  They had a little fridge in the room stocked with bottles of water.  Umbrellas in the lobby for guests to use.  The toiletries were okay, but there was a big set-in stain of some sort on my bath towel.  THAT freaked me out.  And I wrote so on my comment card.

So we won't be visiting St. Mary's again.  It didn't really help that people were staring us down at the diner where we had breakfast.  (And the food was terrible.)  Usually, if you're a "foreigner" to the town, people will be friendly and greet you, or kind of stare until you engage them in some sort of conversation.  If they keep staring with the frowny face after that, well, then you sort of chalk it up to old-school racism.  Surprisingly, living where I do, it happens frequently enough that I'm fairly familiar with the drill.

Our "weekend getaway" wasn't great, but it wasn't disastrous.  Hubby agrees that we're relatively done with small town tourism, but that next time, we'll just have to do a proper vacation and go somewhere city-like.  And book ahead.

A pretty rad thing ...

Yup ... life in a small town is just a little more manageable when you hear that the project for which you were the only writer/researcher for seasons 2 and 3 got a GEMINI NOMINATION!!!

Yes indeed, ladies and gentlemen, www.TasteBudsTV.com got a GEMINI NOMINATION for Best Cross-Platform Project - Children's and Youth!!

And even though my name is not on the billing (it's all the producers' names), I am totally riding the coattails even for the nomination.  Spent time updating my LinkedIn profile, resume and Facebook status ... because my claim to fame by association on that is being THE writer/researcher for seasons 2 and 3.  CONTENT, baby, CONTENT ... is king.  So let's be clear now though that I'm not claiming ownership for all things word-related, but at least I can say that there's enough of a contribution there that I'm going to toot this horn until the if/when of a next award.

I know we'd all be jazzed about nominations for the actual show, but the website is (albeit cross-platform because of the brand but) a separate entity, and my absolute FAVOURITE gig in the whole wide world.  I love the team, I love how straightforward the tasks were, I love the positive responses I got for my work (which didn't feel like work because it was mostly fun); I love that I got to work from home; and I love how promptly I got paid compared to some other companies that take a MONTH or MORE.  (Can you tell that I'm waiting for a cheque?)  And I love that I got to speak on a panel.  [Thanks again Sasha!]

Worked on the stop-mo short today and had a fabulous day.  More on that later.

Coffee Protocol

Okay, so I'm putting this out there.

I admit that I'm a little petty about etiquette.  (Like on the train: when seats are empty, people should sit diagonally from you as opposed to next to you.)  But I also think that if there's a standard etiquette-related protocol, people should know about it.

The big thing about this [media] industry is that everyone takes people out for coffee, whether it be for networking, or meetings, or when you're in that awkward stage of just starting your career, and you want to pick someone's brain for their "tips and secrets to making it big."

I've had a few instances now of being invited to coffee for specific industry reasons (by people I didn't really know), and then I have to pay for my own, or in the more unusual case, I'm COMPLETELY left without a beverage.  This happened the other day, and then I realized that it happens to me too frequently.


Here's where I think you're in charge of picking up the entire tab for coffee, especially for someone you don't know that well:

• you're the one who invited the other person out for a specific reason
• you used a phrase somewhere in the initial correspondence (leading to the coffee meeting) such as:
• "I'd like to pick your brain about .... xyz"
• "I wanted to know what you thought about ..."
• "I have this show idea and I wanted to run it by you, seeing how you're a development executive, could you comment?"
• "I'm new to the business and am looking for some advice ..."
• "I was hoping you could walk me through how to ..."
• "I wanted to run something by you ..."
• "I have a show idea and wanted to see if you'd like to work on it with me"

• you're pitching someone on the idea of working on something for free

It's not the cost of the coffee, it's the principle of protocol.  A coffee is a small courtesy for to "repay" someone for their time. 

Summer 2010

Well ...  yes, shame on me for having a blog and then failing to update it.

Truth is, there hasn't been a whole lot of interesting stuff to tell you about.  I suppose I'm keeping up the blog because it's a nice outlet on which to vent (and write things like "Coffee Protocol", see next entry), and people tell me that it's hilarious.  Thank you.  I'm steadily losing followers on Twitter, but I'm wondering if maybe that's because I had a bunch of animal rights' lovers.  Motorcycle Man has been replaced with "Neighbours-Who-Do-Not-Control-Their-Yappy-Dog", and I tweeted the other day that if it didn't stop, that dog might soon become a muff.

Well now, it's hard to pick up sarcasm in 140 characters sometimes.

So if you really want to know what's been going on, I'll tell you.

The Short

My friend Animal (not his real name but close) and I have been working on the neverending stop-motion short that seems to be taking us years.  Lately, we've been getting help from skilled friends who can make tiny prop magic.  It's rather inspiring for being able to work on my own shows later on in life, because there's this truly gratifying feeling of working all day toward something that *I* wrote/created.  Amazing.

Starcraft 2
Yup ... who knew that I would have nerded out and gone gaga over Starcraft 2?  Well ... it's like reliving high school, even though I caught onto the wave a bit late.  The game's slightly varying variables somehow really appeal to my organizational sense and need for order.  Of course, my desk is in chaos most of the time, but I like that SC2 units have certain jobs and functions.  And they do what you tell them to do.

Weight loss
Turns out that Starcraft 2 is a fabulous distraction, pain reliever (I sprained my ankle) and appetite suppressant, which was a great help in the initial weight loss regiment.  I went to the doctor for a physical, and while I think that perhaps the nurse may have overestimated my weight, I pretty much freaked out when the doctor told me what my current weight was.  YIKES!  So I've been using this iPhone/iTouch app called Lose It!, which basically acts like a calorie counter.  You log the foods that you eat and the "exercise" that you do, and you have a handy way to see what your calorie budget is for the day.  Of course, I've been sort of cheating on this thing by programming in regular type activities for which there actually is a calorie loss count, like cooking, typing, loading/unloading the car, shopping, driving, washing dishes, etc.  I suppose the kicker is that I added "playing board games" and while there is no actual moving of physical pieces or picking up anything while playing Starcraft 2, I figure that it raises the heart rate a little, so I think it counts.  Plus, you sort of forget about food while in battle sometimes.


My friend Syd thinks that there's no way I could have lost 8 pounds in 2 weeks (since it's too rapid a period), but overall, I'm sticking to the story that I've lost 11 pounds in 4 weeks.

Cooking
As usual, hubby has been enjoying meals around here.  While it hasn't been anything too exciting, (I usually save that for Facebook updates), here are some of the things I've tried in the past few weeks:

• cornbread muffins
• oven "fried" fish
• chicken korma (using the VH Sauce)
• spaghetti with homemade meatballs (I described it as "spaghetti with homemade meatballs, a thick tomato sauce peppered with fresh tomatoes, sauteed sweet vidalia onions and roasted yellow zucchini; garnished with Parmesan and fresh basil from our front-step 'garden.'"
• homemade herb chicken burgers and homemade fries (which even enticed our friend Mike to drive all the way out here for dinner)
• Chinese beef stir-fry with rice and Chinese broccoli (hubby went for THIRDS!)

Ah, and the culinary highlight of summer was cooking live lobsters for the first time!  Our friends were absolutely delighted, and I was pleasantly surprised that I can get three grocery store lobsters for the price of one in a restaurant.

New laptop ... I miss my old one, but I guess it was time for a change

So I had to buy a new laptop (the one in the Amazon ad is close, but not quite it) because while working on Taste Buds on the TV side, my old laptop started eating files.  Eating files in a really disastrous way.  I would be working on files, save them, then not be able to open them again.  When it happened the third time, I was just about ready to cry.  I was house-sitting that week, and boy, would it have been a way less stressful week had I just been able to use the one laptop and that's it.  It was a Friday, so I drove across town to come home, work until 2:30 in the morning to finish what I had to do so it was ready for Monday.  But then it wasn't that it had to be ready for Monday, we had actually PLANNED to work that weekend because of late script deliveries and whatever else.

Just a note that next job, I am charging double time for working weekends and evenings past 7 p.m.  Even if that just means it's greater incentive not to have my plans cancelled left, right and centre.  If you want to be a time vampire, it's going to cost you.

I've been able to get away with just using my desktop, using other people's computers (thank you Sean J and Mark), but unfortunately, unless it's your own computer, it's kind of like driving someone else's car.  You're really afraid to do stuff in it, just in case you trash it.  On Monday, I had a punch-up room with some hilarious folks (3 of whom I really quite adore from previous gigs), but I'm thinking now that I looked like a boob because I wasn't typing as fast as I normally do, and since there were no delete or home/pg up/pg down/end keys, navigation was a little spotty.  That, and the wireless mouse with a delay ... cripes.  I must have looked slightly inebriated.  Which sucks especially, because I was a little excited after hearing my typing test results (more on that later), that I type at 103 wpm with 99% accuracy.  Apparently, the average is about 40.

ANYWAY ... so now I'm all geared up.  It's just a matter of getting used to this keyboard, where the shift key is a little too far to the left, and the return is a little too far to the right.  I keep hitting the keys adjacent to those, but I think with things like blogging, which help me type straight on, I'll get used to the keyboard soon enough.  I miss my old laptop, I really do, but when you're only keeping a half hour of battery power, it's time to go.  I miss that keyboard; I miss the functionality of the keyboard, because you could press the blue function key and get certain parts of the keyboard to act like a number pad.  I also remember getting used to the shift key, but that's not to say that I can't do the same with this one.  Maybe it'll just mean that my pinkies will be a bit stronger than the usual nothing that they are.

I'm also getting used to Office 2010.  I was sporting a real dilemma for about 24 hours there, because I couldn't decide whether I wanted one registration ($120) or the full package which comes with 3 ($160).  In the end, I thought that there's no way I'd be able to sell off two registrations, and plus, who knows what would happen to those two in the land of Ebay or Kijjiji.  I might find myself with some subpoena for piracy that wasn't my fault.  So I bought one, which makes me feel a little ripped off, but I didn't have much choice.  That's another thing - I totally would have gone Mac for this laptop, but didn't feel like paying $1500 for something that's not going to be my main computer.  It might become my main computer until my next writing room so that I get used to the keyboard, but really, I love my Mac too much.

Actually, getting MS Office 2010 was a bit of an adventure in itself.  I opened the box for the registration key, then realized that whoops, it was not 2010 pre-intalled on my machine but 2007.  Luckily, they let you convert the trial version, but crap, the Canada-based link wasn't available.  And then the Microsoft customer service chat representative really wasn't helpful, giving me US (geo-blocked in Canada) links.

Now that MS Office 2010 is installed, I'm slightly intrigued as to what new features it holds, although quite irritated by this Ribbon nonsense.  Instead of having shortcuts and drop-down menus so that you have more page space and nice little toolbars, you have tons of options which you're sort of forced to keep on the screen.  But like a big nerd, I've been going through the keyboard shortcuts list from the Help Section, and learning what I can to make things easier for myself.  Like splitting the screen with Alt+Ctrl+S.  Oooooooh.  And now I realize what I have to add to my Auto-Correct list in Word.  See?  Customization.  Love it.  That's also the difference between Office 2007 and 2010 - you can customize that damn Ribbon too.

I've also been doing quite well at Ribbon Hero.  Find it in the Help section.  It's not a bad way to learn the program.

Shocking, rocking headlines from the town Post - July 2010

I've noticed lately that nothing much goes on here.  Lots of pictures of sunshine, rainbows and clueless looking babies.

Hubby gets the credit for first making me laugh when looking at the headlines.  We get this free paper delivered three times a week, and usually I just take the flyers and recycle the rest.  One day, he said, "When are they ever gonna have some real news?  Enough with the girl guides and the sunshine and rainbows."

So to give you an idea of what headlines are gripping the town, I'll be posting a few more as they come.

1.  Is city hall too white?  (July 2010)

The characters around here - Motorcycle Man Theories

Originally posted July 4, 2010

Over the week, hubby was home because of lieu time from work.  We spent a LOT of time together.

And in that time, we theorized why Motorcycle Man has to idle for so long when he goes off.

1.  Motorcycle Man has a small penis.  The loud vroom vroom sounds make him feel better about himself.
2.  Motorcycle Man is also short.  Double whammy.
3.  Motorcycle Man seems to be avoiding Gramma's nagging whenever he goes off.  Already, he puts his iPod earbuds in, then vroom vrooms around for a bit.  We're not sure if he actually hears her.  Probably not, because he probably doesn't hear our yelling (from inside the house), "Just get on with it already and leave!"
4.  It's some kind of mating call.
5.  It's some kind of celebratory thing.  (Hooray!  It's not raining and I don't have to drive the car that says "Gramma"!)
6.  Motorcycle Man is poor (because he lives with Gramma) and buys his gas from some shady dude who makes his own brand.  Saturday mornings is when it really craps up the bike.

Things hubby is now trained to do - I'm so impressed

1. Tile a fireplace
2. Renovate a bathroom (sink, toilet, wainscotting, painting)
3. Save "good" takeout containers
4. Look around for any food that has to be put away before leaving the kitchen

Dinner success: mussels in cream sauce

Dinner success!

Menu:  mussels in a cream sauce with garlic and shallots, fresh French bread and grilled veggies

(bread bought, grilled veggies reheated from previous night)

MUSSELS

Prep:

- peel garlic, get ready to press directly into saucepan

- dice shallots

- measure cream

- measure chicken stock

- scrub mussels, throw out any that are anything other than tightly closed

1.  Use a big saucepan, coat bottom with butter

2.  Sweat 2 cloves garlic, 2 diced shallots

3.  Add 1/4 cup cream, 1/2 cup chicken stock

4.  Add pre-scrubbed mussels (2 lbs)

5.  Turn up heat, put on lid

6.  Watch mussels steam, open and turn orange. 

7.  Dish up mussels, pour sauce on top.

Recipe based on the basic one and chart of substitutions from How to Cook Everything.

Happy July! Watching paint dry can actually be stressful

Here are the things I learnt this weekend (and in list form because I love lists):

• We should have asked our friend Amine to help us paint, because he loves to paint and has tons of days off to use up
• When painting, daylight is better
• When painting, a power roller is an excellent tool
• When painting, you should wipe up those paint drips, because latex paint can dry in 3D
• Curtains scrunch up, so our measurements were just slightly off
• Always put painting tape around stuff you don't want to become blue (or the colour you're painting), because then it means you have to sand it down later
• Have the vacuum handy when painting, because you can vacuum up the dust on the baseboards before washing them
• Flip flops double as an excellent fly swatter (killed 3 today!)

Things I'm Looking For

1. A potter for my basil plant that looks like a giant coffee cup.  Plain white, no designs, looks sleek and chic for the kitchen.  Not girly.
2. Splatter guard for pans when I've put in too much oil.
3. Fly swatters.
4. Cool-looking plungers x 3.
5. A luxury RV that uses rain water to replenish the water supply, runs on solar power, electricity (from braking) and methane.

Today's (June 30 2010) Globe and Mail Social Studies column says this:

Your powerhouse

“The human body may be a biological powerhouse, but how much of its energy do we flush down the toilet – literally?” Duncan Graham-Rowe writes for Wired magazine (British edition). “According to Virginia Gardiner, 32, an engineer at Imperial College London, it makes more sense to recycle our dark matter than dispose of it. To prove her point she has created a flushless toilet designed to harness this energy.” The LooWatt system produces methane, which is burned for electricity. “Your annual deposits could produce enough energy to light a 60-watt bulb for 10 hours,” she says.

So it's only a matter of time before I have an RV that can run on anything but gasoline.

The characters around here

Bryan and Elisa, mid-30s, Deb's hubby's best friend and wife.  Which makes them couple friends.

While Bryan and Elisa are the best thing to have come from the same small town suburban purgatory which Deb now finds herself in, the ironic thing is that Bryan and Elisa escaped months after Deb and Hubby's initial move-in, and now live in Toronto.  In this sitcom, they're the perfect secondary characters, because they truly do "give explanations of the hero, the hero's world, and have scenes where the hero is allowed to express thoughts, desires, goals, plans and values."

Bryan has been Hubby's best friend since age 11, and married  Elisa several years ago.  Deb and Hubby remember when Bryan was single, and think that Elisa is a perfect match for him. Bryan sometimes provides history, context, and background for Deb, which is immensely helpful in figuring out the World of Hubby.


Of all the characters on the show, Deb and Hubby prefer to travel with Bryan and Elisa the most, which makes for great episodes* since Deb is so admittedly weird.  B and E are well-traveled, adventurous, food and wine lovers, university-educated professionals, and good conversationalists, but most of all, easygoing, which is a stark contrast to Deb's uptightness and creative type/professional writer-explained OCD tendencies.  Deb appreciates that B and E (E especially) are really supportive of her career and never make her feel bad for her quirks (like frequent visits to the bathroom and late night crankiness).  They also act as culinary guinea pigs, and Deb is occasionally unsure if they're just being super polite about ugly food.


* in the case where these characters are used in a sitcom
__________________



In this past weekend's episode: 

Deb and Hubby met up with B and E at Bryan's parents' cottage which has been in the family for a number of years.  This is Hubby's favourite northern location, and looks forward to visiting whenever invited.  This is probably his twelfth time, and Deb's second.  Hubby is so excited about visiting the cottage, that last year, he (and Deb) drove 3 hours to the cottage, back 3 hours to attend an inflexible appointment, and 3 hours to drive back to the cottage.  (Then 3 hours back home.)

It's a beautiful location, backed by the lake, with two bunkhouses, gorgeous deck and an outdoor hot tub.  If push came to shove, the cottage could accommodate 11 with an RV parked in front.


This episode (Season 2, episode 16) is lighthearted with a playful tone.  Deb is on a quest to replace a missing earring from a set bought from a beachfront jewelry shop.  Hubby debates whether a dog is in their future while he plays with Bryan's family's dogs.  Deb reveals a little more detail as to why she hates her 10-minutes-from-farm-land purgatory, and figures out why she loves, not hates, cottage country, since cottage country is quite similar to her town which she despises.  Hubby inadvertently gloats about getting one bug bite, while Deb deals with her fear of bug bites (because on her, they flatten out and form shapes like Germany).  Deb enjoys the time with B and E, Bryan's parents, uncle and aunt, and tries to figure out the factors which make Bryan's family dynamics an ideal in-law situation.

New Experience: Being a Panelist

I'd love to put credits in here with actual full names, but because I'd like to avoid Google picking up links to names in my blog (where I tell you all sorts of inside information about being a kooky freelancer), I'm unfortunately only going to use first names. 

So I got to be a panelist on Monday night for the very first time!

I must say that the whole experience of being a panelist was quite exciting from start to finish.  A few weeks ago, I received a well-timed email from WIFT-T (Women in Film and Television - Toronto).  Heather was writing to invite me to be part of a panel that my good friend Sasha was moderating and for which she had recommended me.  Sasha is the Supervising Producer at marble, and technically, my boss' boss (?) for the online/interactive side of Taste Buds (that kids' cooking show I've been working on).  It was extra exciting because there were members of so many different cool industry organizations in the audience, and I counted six people who I already knew.  (I totally remember when I wouldn't have known anybody.)

Basically, my role on the panel was to highlight the differences between writing for TV and writing for online (of the same brand).  

Overall, it was a great experience and I had a lot of fun, and if there's a next time, I totally learnt what I should and shouldn't do.  Unfortunately, I can't help my voice squeaking at points because when I do any sort of public speaking, my mouth usually goes dry.  And then I'm always afraid of drinking the big glass of water in front of me because I'll look like I'm shaking for nervousness, when it's really that I'm more nervous about knocking it over by accident.  I know, priorities, really.

Truthfully, I was hoping to be more funny than (just) informative, and luckily, it appears as if I was both.  Lots of people came up to me afterward, to ask questions, introduce themselves, and to thank me for being part of the panel.  A lady who I might make another professional best friend said that I was eloquent; my friend John said that it was good, and that everyone had the same "huh?" reaction when this one lady asked her question in a rather bitchy way.  I had a really nice but brief conversation with Tom the Animation Executive Producer afterwards too!

Tom:  You were very good.

Deb:  Thanks!  You're very funny!

Tom:  YOU'RE very funny!  You nailed all your jokes.

Deb:  Thanks!

I actually pitched him a show when I first got out of school.  So in total, I think I've spent about 3.5 minutes ever talking to Tom.

My Facebook status update that night was:

had a good run with tonight's panel.  People laughed at my jokes ... hope I did marble proud?

and Sasha wrote back with:

judging by all the creatives in the room hunting you down at the end of the session, i'd say you did good :) you rep'd marble and your sheep 'interstitial' (fussy crowd) well :)

I love my sheep sketch.  Check it out at www.tastebudstv.com in the Video/Food Hints section.  In fact, while you're there, check out the rest of the site which got me a spot as a panelist!

And guess what?  Hubby came to the event too, even though he usually hates these networking things.  He had a great time and said he had fun because of the conversations he got to have (because convergent media was actually relevant for him).  So I took him out for a sushi dinner afterward.  :-)  A good night for both of us.

Whoa .... earthquake!

Here's the dilemma: it's almost an hour after the mini-earthquake, and I still haven't quite gotten back to work.  I think it's because part of me is still freaking out that I'm working from home by myself and had no idea what that was.  It sort of makes me want to work in an office.  Sort of.  In an office, other people can assure you that you're not crazy when something like an earthquake happens.  Luckily for me, all the social networking outlets (MSN, Facebook, Twitter) did that virtually for me.  And boy am I kind of glad I know that it was an earthquake, otherwise I'd be shaking my fists at the neighbours and at places where I thought there were poltergeists.


While there are cons of working at home, such as ... 
1) regular interaction with people is usually limited to persons who are 2-dimensional and scripted and/or reading from teleprompters
2) you could die by yourself and nobody will find you until 10 hours later
3)  you don't leave the house for days at a time if you don't go running or something, or you know, have kids
 
... the pros are as follows:


- nobody knows how often you really go to the bathroom (people in one writers' room must know I have a small bladder by now because I was drinking all this water before the wedding to lose weight)


- nobody knows how much you really snack (although I think I also may have given myself away at the last two writers' rooms)

- there is no getting stuck in subway crises, traffic, or having to smell people on public transit every day

- you save a bundle on laundry because you don't sweat into normal clothing unless you wear workout clothing and go straight to working out at the end of your day


- you choose your own hours ... for the most part

- the likelihood of your house getting robbed is significantly lower because you can call 911 while wielding a bat and staring down a robber as s/he is in the process of breaking and entering

- you can take a nap when you feel like it (I always like saying this one because I identify with preschoolers.  Yeah ... naps make the world go round.)


- you can like people a whole lot more when you don't see them every day because certain people have gross habits like flossing their teeth in front of you, leaving you souvenirs (both tangible and intangible) in the unisex bathroom, slurping coffee and chewing gum really loudly


Oh hey, I don't have it so bad.  And if nobody found me until 10 hours later ... well, you just chalk that up to fate.

Forrest Gump: I just felt like running

Okay, well, I felt like walking, not running.

After not having left the house in two days, I decided that I needed a little fresh air, and just didn't feel like doing any ab crunches, since I'm a little dubious about the cleanliness of the basement carpet.  And I wasn't really keen on vacuuming.

People out here usually say hello when they cross paths while walking, but I just wasn't in the mood, especially when people seem to stare before the opportunity presents itself.  Even the cats, raccoons and skunks seem to stare.


So I walked, and walked, and walked ... for 7 kilometres.   It was about an hour and half with the scenery consisting of factories, car dealerships, houses, banks, a tiny strip plaza, and giant mansions.   I landed up at this little park that has big rocks to sit on that overlooks the lake.  Across the way, you see the glimmering, shiny, glamorous lights of ... factories.

The park itself is somewhat idyllic, except for the idiot couple who came along with their annoying laughs.  The nice thing about Toronto is that people speak so many different languages, you can tune out what they say.  In this case, it was inane drunken chatter.  I miss you, diversity.


Exhausted, mosquito-bitten and grumpy, I didn't walk home and I called hubby to come and get me.  The nice thing about the iPhone is that you can pinpoint your location and email it.

Commuting - a walk in my shoes

While the last post was a little more rambly, here is COMMUTING from my point of view.  

I tried doing a flow chart just to illustrate what I think about when making the trek to Toronto, but I'm not good at those.  So here goes.

Getting to Toronto ...

• What time do you have to be there?
• What will traffic be like?
• Which stop do you have to get off at?  
• Will the train stop there at that time of day?
• Will you be at a convenient enough location to walk to the next destination?
• Will the train be convenient when coming home?
• Circumstances that equal an automatic decision to drive:  uptown, late night return home, running late 
• Where will you park?  
• What route will you take?
• What will hubby have for dinner if I'm not here to cook?
• How many people/friends am I seeing that day?
• Can I see more than two?
• What kind of shoes do I wear that will be appropriate for walking a short/medium/long distance since I'll be walking quite far away from the car?
• What am I taking with me?  Is it heavy that I need the car?
• Should I stay over at my parents' place?
• What am I doing the next day?
• Should I schedule things back to back so I cut down on the commuting altogether?

Yeah.  Lame.

I used to just hop on the TTC and go.  It's not a big deal getting to Toronto, but this is just to show that it's comparably more arduous than when I actually lived there.  I used to hate when it took an hour, hour plus, to get anywhere significant, but now it kind of takes an equal amount of time when I'm the car.

On the plus side, I'm becoming a much better driver with so much practice.

This whole post centres around my adventures of commuting

Wow, I hadn't realized it's been almost a week since my last post.  Lots of things have actually been going on.  I just skimmed this whole post, and it's a lot of rambling diary-type stuff, so you know, you don't have to read this one.



Okay, well, thanks for reading.

Wednesday
Wednesday was my sister's birthday, so I took her out for lunch.  After that, my good friend Nat treated me to the AGO where we walked around and dreamed of having offices with a solarium-like design.

I found a new parking lot that I really like, despite it smelling like pee.  It's the type where you put in your credit card and only pay for the time that you're there, rather than worrying about what time you might possibly leave, and then overpaying.  If it's one of those lots where you have to predict the time you'll stay, I always overpay for parking, just because I worry about walking too far away and then not making it back in time to prevent a ticket.

So Wednesday night was the first time where I can say that traffic actually caused a good result.  I looked up my route home (Google maps app) and saw that it would take me three times as long to get there with traffic.  Booooooooooooo.  So I called my friend Sasha for a Foodie Call for dinner and luckily, she didn't have plans because I hate eating by myself.  I highly recommend the CN rolls at Sushi Time because I think avocado and salmon make the perfect sushi.  I really dislike cucumbers.  I've tried to get along with them, but we're still on the outs.

After dinner, I took Sasha home and got to my own home in record time.  Hooray - that was a very smart choice on my part, and plus, hubby finished the cabbage rolls so there was no more of having to suffer through that.

Friday
I decided to take the train in so I could make my morning meeting at 9:30 a.m.  Rather than sitting through traffic, I thought I'd be smart, and luckily, my best friend Cris had the day off, and we went for an Indian lunch buffet at Little India on Queen Street.  I'd say it was good, but I still much prefer dinner at Kama on King across from Roy Thompson Hall.  MuchMusic was setting up for the MuchMusic Video Awards and you could see the pandemonium of blocking off streets.

Saturday
Hubby and I had a wonderful SaturDATE, to which I'd been looking forward ALL WEEK.  He made brunch for us, I packed snacks, then we took the train in.  We realized that is the first time that we've ever taken the train together in four years.  So we can honestly say that we were glad not to have driven in, since there are multiple streets blocked off with cement blocks and tall fences because of the G20.  And that is why I'm playing hermit this week and getting lots of work done on www.TasteBudsTV.com Season 3.  Check it out here.  Traffic was TERRIBLE, all backed up, streets closed ... hubby said he honestly would have turned around and that would have been the end of the SaturDATE.

The first stop on SaturDATE was the Design Exchange, a centre dedicated to industrial and contemporary design.  With $10 admission each, it was about a dollar a minute to see what was perhaps the tiniest exhibits I've ever seen where you had to pay for admission.  ANYWAY ... we'll chalk it up to making a donation.  But hubby enjoyed it because he likes industrial design, and we'll go see the next exhibit I'm sure.

Next stop on SaturDATE was St. Lawrence Market.  Unfortunately, I had allotted about an hour and a half for the Design Exchange, so everything moved up.  We bought some lovely Camembert, a hunk of turkey kolbasa and a baguette which, in addition to pear, made wonderful sandwiches for our picnic at Harbourfront.  Full and happy, we walked along the lake to watch the boats and peruse the outdoor market.  Hubby now knows about the once hourly trains because we missed two and thus killed two hours by walking around and around.  But SaturDATE was great overall.  The rain started just as we got back to the car, and neither of us were hungry until about 9 p.m.  That happens when you have that much cheese.  I'm kind of surprised that I didn't have nightmares, but I think mostly happens to me when I eat cheese JUST before going to bed.  Weird.  Dairy-induced nightmares ... well, I am partially lactose-intolerant.

Sunday
Sunday was spent doing lots of driving.  I met up with some friends on the way to see my parents.  Short and sweet visit.   Also had a lovely time with my parents, sister and brother-in-law since my mom went all out and made ribs, lasagna, and Chinese noodle stir-fry for my sister.  My salad was a big hit with my sister and mom wanting the leftovers.  Spinach, blueberries, goat cheese, toasted almond slivers and blueberry balsamic vinegar.  I ended up leaving late, and unfortunately, the highway was closed down to ONLY the left lane for a big chunk of my drive home.  Boooooooooo.  Hubby and I both hate it when there are lane closures but nobody's working.  At least I saw people with hard hats and trucks.  If there hadn't been any, I would have been ultra pissed.

Monday
Land of the Hermit.  Yup.  Hearing the neighbours' air conditioner every 30 minutes, hearing Motorcycle Man idling.

Popular phrases out here

Does grammar and cultural awareness die when you hit a certain border?

1. "Can I help yous?"  ("You" is not a word meant to be pluralized.)
2. "All's I gotta do ...." ('cause all's you need is love?  Sigh.)
3. "You guys' stuff."  (You could just simplify and say "your.")
4. "I fixed it real good." (I fixed it.  'nuff said.) 
5. "I think I like it more better."  (You don't need "more" if the word ends with -er.)
6. "Don't got."
7. "Ain't."
8. "Ain't got."
9. "Them people."
10. "Chinaman."
11. Iraq pronounced as "eye-rack"
12. Iran pronounced as "eye-ran"

I'll keep adding to this list.

The characters around here

The Hillbilly Porch Dwellers, late 40s-early 50s

At the entrance to the townhouse complex, both houses are home to what Deb and her husband refer to as the "Hillbilly Porch Dwellers."  These women are often found sitting on their front porches, chain-smoking and staring down the oncoming traffic, both vehicular and pedestrian.  While such neighbours might be useful as a members of the Neighbourhood Watch, "watch" in this case is used simply as a verb and not a noun.

Generally, activities such as reading, use of a laptop, actively watching one's own children playing or meaningful social interaction with others might be considered a good use of time while front porch dwelling.  Inactivity renders one as creepy and without better things to do with one's time.  Conversation with the Hillbilly Porch Dwellers has been kept to a bare minimum as the staring and chain-smoking often serves as a force field-like perimeter for avoidance.

One might guess that these women (in two separate houses) are perhaps in their early 50s, but could very well be in their late 30s.  Smoking has definitely taken its toll on what could perhaps have been beautiful, tooth-filled smiles and facial skin that now bears a striking semblance to raisins.

We will eat out for cabbage rolls from now on

Cabbage rolls turned out to be a fail.  Booooooooooo.

Nearly two hours of my life that I'll never get back for such an unattractive and bland thing to eat. This is where low fat can bite me.

I dunno ... I was pretty jazzed by the sound of the recipe because after all, the recipe comes from a restaurant in New York. But then again, restaurants in New York are a dime a dozen.

Here's the link to this terrible recipe:  http://homecooking.about.com/od/turkeyrecipes/r/blturkey3.htm

When I think about it, this recipe required way too many dishes, steps, ingredients and timing issues.  Plus, steps required mini steps, like carefully separating and washing cabbage leaves so they didn't rip; and getting the rind of the lemons (I just zested).

PLUS, I learnt that I should wear closed shoes or slippers when cooking, because a sizzling hot piece of onion flew out of the pan on to my foot.  Boooooooooooo.

DINNER FAIL.  Luckily, we still have some of the delicious apple-pear crumble in the fridge.  With whipped cream on top ... mmmmmmm.

On another positive note, I got the deal memo for my next gig and I am SO excited to start work!

The latkes are no more

I had this genius plan to make turkey stuffed cabbage rolls tonight, but I unfortunately ran out of time while working on dessert.  So when I called hubby to ask when he was coming home, he actually answered that it was about a half hour.  Then I looked at the recipe and saw 65 minutes but the steps suddenly seemed overwhelmingly onerous (i.e. boil water, blanch cabbage leaves).  [I can see somebody saying "wun-russ"?]

So in my haste, I decided that the butternut squash mix was going to become quiche in a hurry.  I added two strips of bacon (could have used more), and egg-washed the frozen pastry, then egg washed the top with the rest of the egg, dumping it in.  Baked it for about 45 minutes at 400 F and served it with frozen peas.

Tonight's dinner + hubby's lunch tomorrow = 3 meals

$0.20 = peas (I know that the big itself was $1.99)
$0.10 = onion (it was around half from the butternut squash mix)
$0.49 = eggs (there was some in the mix already and then I used 1 more)
$0.00 = butternut squash (rescued from parents' house as it was getting old)
$0.10 = bacon?  I dunno ... there was only a little bit
$1.25 = one pie crust (I know this because I make a fabulous beef and vegetable pie and always wait for the pie crusts to go on sale for $2.50 each)

______

$2.14 / 3 = $0.71 per meal

Wow, it's really exhausting keeping this giant grocery database in my head.
Please don't think I calculate every meal that we eat.  I only do it if I'm really proud of myself and can actually figure it out.  And it's sort of my campaign to prove that you can eat healthily on a tight budget.

Friends of ours came over for dinner this one time, and I calculated it then, only because we usually go out and spend quite a bit with them.  It turned out that I'd spent about $16 for the four of us to eat at our house.  And then hubby played along and guesstimated (all by himself!) how much we probably would have spent had we ordered the same things at a restaurant.

It's so funny - he's becoming more and more Chinese as the months go by.  He knows to save the "good takeout containers."

I was actually quite proud of hubby tonight.  I was all in a huff when he got home because of my dinner cooking plans going off schedule (and off the week's menu schedule too).   And just when I was about to freak out about how this isn't supposed to be my life for where we live, he became Super Duper Husband.

He:
1) did the dishes
2) set up the laundry
3) cleaned our master bathroom 
4) didn't complain at all about having to wait for dinner to be ready
5) walked with me to the library
6) enthusiastically complimented the apple and pear crumble with real whipped cream that I made  AND asked for it as a snack with lunch tomorrow
7) gave me cash so I don't have to go to the bank tomorrow
8) answered all my semi-leading questions with the right answers i.e. do you like not having to worry about food and meals?  Do you like the surprise of finding out what's for dinner when you get home?

Sigh.  Yes, what a keeper.   




This is a get-out-of-me-being-mad-at-you-in-future-card, Husband.

The characters around here

Motorcycle Man, age unknown, 5'3", stocky but not fat

Motorcycle Man lives across the street with an elderly lady who, for various valid reasons, we call "Gramma."  Gramma herself seems to be an elusive character, wary of strangers (maybe more so minorities*), venturing outside very little but leaving her garage and front door open quite often.  There are a lot of non-business-oriented pickup trucks that come to visit her.**  With her magnetized car ribbons, Gramma supports the troops, and to my delight, has now changed the magnetized car ribbon to promote organ donation.

I theorize that Motorcycle Man is either 

1a) unemployed, or

1b) works shifts of some sort

since he keeps rather irregular hours. 

There is absolutely nothing wrong with Motorcycle Man's motorcycle since he just  revved up and took off.  What Motorcycle Man likes to do is idle for about 3 minutes or longer every time he goes off.  Coming back, it's not as bad as it used to be.  Since Motorcycle Man doesn't keep a remote control for the garage door, he has to park in the driveway, open the front door, open the garage door, get on the bike, park the park, open the front door, close the garage door.  I can see the process it takes in that.  

When he leaves, though, Motorcycle Man likes to rev the engine a few times, stand around while the bike runs for about 5 minutes, sometimes even up to 15, and then if he feels like it, does a couple of laps around the neighbourhood, revs some more, lets the engine run, and goes into the house for something, leaving the bike on. 

One day, lawnmowers were out in full force while Motorcycle Man was idling, and we could still hear the bike.  Inconsiderate fucker.

Every time it rains, I think it's great, because it means that Motorcycle Man probably has to take the bus, or drive the car that says "GRAMMA."

* A florist once gave me Gramma's poinsettias to deliver to her when she got home from wherever because it was too cold to leave them outside.  When she got home, I rang her doorbell, carrying this gigantic flower package, and she took FOREVER to open the door, even when she got right to the window.  I don't remember a very audible thank you.

** My friend Jeannette puts it really succinctly when describing these pick up trucks as "the kind that should have a gun rack" because that's an excellent way of describing them.

The characters around here

UGHGHGHGHG.

I think because preschool projects are relatively short term, this screenplay is kind of killing me.  It's not because it's the first draft, it's the SECOND draft.  So it's reworking and rewriting ... which I kind of dread.  Long form dread.

So in an exercise to get into characters, I've decided to use my neighbours around here and describe them to you as I would if I were pitching a sitcom.  Actually, not really.  Pitching a sitcom is a very different ball game.

____________

Names have been changed.  Sort of.


James and Agatha, late 50s, Scottish, generally quiet except between 9 and 10 pm.
James and Agatha keep to themselves but make polite small talk when asked questions.  Potential to be quite sweet and generous but have never been taken up on such offers (i.e. borrow tools, give a ride somewhere).  They make rare appearances but are frequently heard through their home fixtures, which are of industrial strength.  

Deb and her hubby have devised several theories about James and Agatha.

1:  James and Agatha's house must be like an igloo.  Their industrial-strength air conditioner goes off approximately every 30 minutes and is somehow attached to the brick wall, which heightens the reverberation and thus makes Deb feel dizzy when lying down in the master bedroom and can feel the whir drummed into her brain.

2:   James and Agatha like routine.  They tend to follow similar patterns of coming and going.  James takes a shower when he gets home, because Deb can hear the pipes.
2a)  James and Agatha like routine, so they do it between 9 and 10 p.m. every night.  There's a lot of banging in the basement.

3:  James and Agatha like a clean house.  They vacuum quite often.

4:  Deb has sent over baked goods and once, stuffed meatloaf with roasted broccoli and herbed potatoes in a takeout container for James when Agatha was in Scotland.  They've never returned such a gesture, which brings Deb to these theories:
4a)  James and Agatha do not like our food.
4b)  James and Agatha just don't reciprocate.   
4c)  James and Agatha have dietary restrictions. 

_______________________


"You have an overactive imagination."

Yes, yes, I do.  And people pay me for it.

Oh, I forgot to squash them down

Latkes Attempt #4

I think this is it.  I'm sorry, but from here on out, we're turning the remains of this into quiche.

Accidentally sort of put too much oil in the frying and deep fried the latkes, but unfortunately, they aren't really cooked on the inside.  Blegh.

Decided to try different condiments.

Ketchup = meh.

Sour cream = bland.

Sour cream + peach/apple sauce = not bad but not really worth a repeat visit.

Kozlik's horseradish mustard = I was already regretting putting that much on - but actually quite delightful.

This other Dijon mustard = meh.

This other Dijon mustard with sour cream = slightly better.

Apricot jam = promising

Sour cream + apricot jam = winner

Yes, I know have a lot of time on my hands.  But today's plan is working on the second draft of my screenplay, and it's a lot more agonizing than the first draft.

If only I could manifest winning the lottery

I have no idea how people manifest winning the lottery, but I'm still figuring out how to control what's in my dreams.

Last night, hubby and I were talking about how my matron of honour and her husband are going away to this spa in Northern Ontario at some point.  Lo and behold, I dreamt that hubby and I had taken a trip to a Norweigan spa.  All I remember is having to do work at a computer terminal with other people, searching for shells on the beach, and finding large chocolate Easter eggs in blue foil. 

I'm surprised that I didn't dream about being incredibly obese.  After last night's post, hubby and I sat down to watch TV, and by chance, World's Fattest Man was season premiering on TLC.  This man is 760 pounds!  His fat has become so large, that it makes his belly button slope to the side.  And he has to wear diapers.  

I dunno ... I still wonder: at what point do you kind of look at yourself and say, "Hey, I'm getting really wicked fat.  When somebody calls me in a panic, I can't muster up any kind of speed or urgency.  I should do something about that."

Just so that it doesn't sound like I'm generally discriminating against big people

I should clarify here that when you read the previous post, it is NOT that I have a dislike of big/overweight people in general. 

But food-related obesity in people other than chefs FREAKS ME OUT.  

With chefs, you can't always trust a skinny one.  With medically-related obesity, patients can't help that.  With food-related obesity, I just want to tell people to walk the fucking 10 minutes to work instead of driving for 1 minute.  Seen it, true story.


(I actually am trying to prevent obesity in this household.  My workout today was substituted with cleaning.  It made me sweat, and I called it a day.)

Totally redeemed myself for disaster breakfast. All in a day's work.

I don't know why poor people go vegetarian or eat such crap food.

Dinner tonight for 2 people:  $4.35

$3.00 = Delicious, tender, fall-of-the-bone pork ribs for 2 people ($9/3 since we only ate a third of it; also used slow cooker on high for 5 hours because they were still kind of frozen)

$0.50 = Half a bottle of Kraft Chick'n Rib BBQ sauce used to marinate ribs

$0.10 = Russet potatoes with butter ($0.88/20)

$0.75 = half broccoli bunch

_____

I say suck it, Swiss Chalet, because that same meal would have cost me something like $15 + tax + tip.

I get really annoyed when "baked potato" is a side option at restaurants.  I'll take the fries because at least I know more labour went into making that than wrapping the potato in foil and flinging it the oven, only for me to dress it up by myself.  I also get annoyed with restaurants that serve ordinary, every day pasta.  It's like art: if I can do it myself, I'm not impressed.  

 

I was going to put a list of really cheap foods that fill you up here, but really, it only boiled down to how I get SUPER ANNOYED at seeing TV shows about obese people in trailer parks.  I just don't understand it.  If you're that big, and eating that much food, then I think you've got way too much disposable income to live in a trailer.  

If you don't have a job, first thing you cut is car and TV cable. So you should spent a lot of time outdoors and walking to wherever you want to go. 

If there's very little space in the trailer, you'd probably have to do a daily grocery run to replenish your supplies.  Even if you drove there, you'd have to at least walk in the grocery store!

You'd probably also want to make your clothing last longer, so if you knew that you could fit two of you into a shirt and make that shirt into two, or use that obese shirt as a towel, that's sort of motivation to lose weight there.

And if you don't have a job, and have bills to pay, then you're probably pretty stressed out, and then the combination of drinking, nervous fidgeting, chain smoking and stress would make you lose weight.  Right?

Yeah ... I just don't get it.  Maybe obese people are just shipped in for those particular episodes.  Unless you say, "You've literally eaten us out of house and home."  Hmm ...

I get all this because I watched one episode of Wife Swap. It just happened to be on ABC when I'd finished watching something on the PVR, and it was like a mesmerizing train wreck.  I couldn't look away.  This obese woman lived with her family in a trailer park with her husband and two sons.  She swapped with this perky family of entrepreneurs where the mom was really into self-affirmations and positive thinking.  The whole family was into salads and exercise, and lived in quite a large house.  So in one challenge, the moms had to prepare the other mom's recipe for a typical dinner.  Obese Mom had a recipe using a whole stick of butter and some pretty super fatty stuff.  And for that segment, I just thought, "Hunh.  Butter's kind of expensive when you use that kind of quantity all the time."

OH ... I almost forgot to tell you that Butternut Squash Latkes Attempt #3 went alright.  Made smaller patties, squashed them down in a smaller frying pan, and letting them set in the fridge helps to maintain the shape until cooking.

___________

In case you're reading this as a separate page and got separated from the post two minutes afterwards:

I should clarify here that when you read the previous post, it is NOT that I have a dislike of big/overweight people in general. 

But food-related obesity in people other than chefs FREAKS ME OUT.  

With chefs, you can't always trust a skinny one.  With medically-related obesity, patients can't help that.  With food-related obesity, I just want to tell people to walk the fucking 10 minutes to work instead of driving for 1 minute.  Seen it, true story.


(I actually am trying to prevent obesity in this household.  My workout today was substituted with cleaning.  It made me sweat, and I called it a day.)

Ugh, disastrous breakfast

I've sent hubby on a play date with a friend of mine, thinking that he needs more male friends, and this would be good bonding.  I shouldn't say "play date", but they've gone to play video games for a solid three hours at Playdium so that takes care of "play" and it's Sunday, June 13, so that takes care of "date."  First person shooters make me dizzy, so it was best that they take the three-hour play cards and go crazy.

Thinking that I'd give him a good breakfast before he went off, I decided to fry up some bacon and butternut squash latkes, to be served with a dollop of sour cream.  (I know, bacon, how un-Jewish.)

Anyway ... breakfast culminated in disaster.

Hubby is actually quite polite when it comes to terrible food that I've made.  I think it's because he knows that if I get discouraged with it, I'll just keep making boring stuff, and then the culinary adventures will cease altogether.  So unfortunately, I used this recipe, and then bungled it, and then when I fixed it, I just found that the recipe itself was bunk.  

So it called for 4 cups butternut squash (peeled and grated), 3 eggs (whisked), and a small onion (peeled and grated), then grapeseed oil for frying.  You basically had to mix the first three ingredients together, make patties from the batter, and then fry them up.

Ugh, disgusting.

Granted, I put WAY too much butternut squash into this giant mix, so there wasn't enough egg mixture the first time around.  The patties just wouldn't stay together, but hubby was starving last night and wanted to start dinner, so I quickly made a butternut squash hash, which didn't get crispy, and was kind of just ... mush.  BLEGH.

So this morning, I thought that I'd be brilliant and add panko (Japanese bread crumbs), which would give the egg something to stick to.  I learnt this from my chef friend Miriam while working as a Writer/Researcher on Taste Buds (http://www.TasteBudsTV.com).

After adding what seemed like 2 cups of panko to this horrible mixture (of which the aftermath now sits uncomfortably in my stomach), it seemed to work.  The patties kept some sort of form, and so, in a rush, I decide to make the "patties" large-meatball-sized.  As you probably guessed, or may not have, the butternut squash didn't cook all the way through, and we were left eating some pretty crunchy centres.  GROSS.

And of course, like a good little Asian in not wasting food, I'm still fighting through the mix, having made smaller patties around the size of a Toonie (the $2 coin), I plan to fry them up maybe for tomorrow's breakfast, with better results.  

Not ready to throw in the towel just yet.

On another day, I'll tell you all about the difference in food perspectives in this house and how they can spiral into cultural crises.  Sigh.

Interesting things from the Thursday Globe and Mail's Social Studies section

Listen to your clothes

“High-tech clothing with embedded biosensors and an Internet connection could respond to your mood and help you get through the day,” Michelle Bryner reports for LiveScience. “The new ‘smart’ clothing contains wireless biosensors that measure heart rate and temperature (among other physiological indicators), small speakers and other electronics that wirelessly connect to a handheld smartphone or PDA. Data from the sensors [are] sent to the handheld where it is converted into one of 16 emotional states, which cues a previously set-up database to send the wearer some inspirational message. … The sounds, photos and videos sent to the wearer aren’t arbitrary. Instead, the messages are spoken by a friend or loved one. ‘When you first wear the garment, you turn on the device and you tell it what person you want to channel that day,’ said Barbara Layne, professor at Concordia University and co-developer of the garments. ‘That could be your lover who’s away, it could be your deceased parent, your best friend, whoever you want to be with that day.’ ”

Heartbroken guys

“Contrary to popular belief, the ups and downs of romantic relationships have a greater effect on the mental health of young men than women, according to a new study by a Wake Forest University sociology professor,” ScienceDaily.com reports. Even though men sometimes try to present a tough face, unhappy romances take a greater emotional toll on them, says Robin Simon, co-author of the study, which is published in the June issue of the Journal of Health and Social Behavior. “The researchers also found that men get greater emotional benefits from the positive aspects of an ongoing romantic relationship. … [Dr.] Simon suggests a possible explanation for the findings: For young men, their romantic partners are often their primary source of intimacy – in contrast to young women, who are more likely to have close relationships with family and friends. … She also explains how men and women express emotional distress in different ways. ‘Women express emotional distress with depression while men express emotional distress with substance problems,’ [Dr.] Simon says.”

Off-season bargains

Some U.S. schools are taking measures to stay competitive during a recession, United Press International reports. “At least a dozen private and public colleges are bringing in extra revenue by offering summer school classes with lower tuition than during the regular school year, USA Today reports. … Jenna LaPlace of Bainbridge, Ohio, says she’s saving $1,560 [U.S.] by taking animal physiology at Hiram College this summer rather than during the regular school term when it costs 40 per cent more. … For the second summer in a row, St. Peter’s College in New Jersey is offering a ‘buy-one-and-get-the-second-for-half-price’ deal on summer school courses.”

Don’t dwell on the present

The weeklong celebration of the Facts & Arguments page, cultural landmark though it is, may strike some readers as excessive and unhealthy. Not so. Back in 2006 – those were the good old days – Marina Krakovsky had this to say in Psychology Today: “Despite nostalgia’s bittersweet rap and the oft-heard advice to live in the moment, recent studies suggest that the occasional detour down memory lane can give your spirits a significant lift. Thinking of good memories for just 20 minutes a day can make people more cheerful than they were the week before and happier than if they think of their current lives, report researchers from Loyola University in Chicago.”

Feeling grumpy 'is good for you'

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8339647.stm

For Better: The Science of a Good Marriage

For Better: The Science of a Good Marriage by Tara Parker-Pope is the book I just raced through.  I'm not very good at reading non-fiction since I don't retain the information as well as I do with something fluffy that I read in just one go.


I would recommend this book for newlyweds, pregnant couples and people who have a rocky marriage.  I think it caters to people who would question aspects of their marriage, rather than those who have settled into one and seem fine.  Then again, I know a couple that seems to just co-exist, and that's how they work things out between themselves.  


I was first attracted to this book because when I can, I like reading the New York Times, and Tara Parker-Pope is a regular columnist.  She had written something in an article that struck a chord, and so I hunted down her book.


So here are some of the interesting things I learnt and want to share with you before I race it back to the library (see earlier post).  Note that I'm just sharing my notes with you, but I've read the book.  If you read these notes and then quote them to someone else, you're probably taking things out of context.

• Divorce rates aren't going up, they're actually going down, for a variety of reasons.
• One doctor is quoted as saying: "What I find so disturbing about this 50% divorce rate idea is that people aren't forming the right expectations about marriage.  The 50% number makes people think, 'Will my kids be raised in a divorced household?  Will I end up a single mom?' I think in terms of planning for the future, it's useful to understand what really happens in your peer group."
• Phoebe's lobster story in Friends isn't true.  Lobsters don't mate for life, it's more like two weeks.  The writers should have used the prairie vole as the example.
• Birth control pills might actually lead a woman to choose a mate that's genetically unsuitable for her.  The idea is that you're a better match with someone who has different major histocompatibility complex (MHC) genes from you.  Birth control pills trick your body into thinking you're pregnant, so your instinct for different MHC genes goes dormant. [It's an interesting chapter on tests that required smelling sweaty t-shirts.]
• A man's olfactory senses appear to guide him toward a woman who is primed to conceive.  [Interesting section on how strippers make more money when ovulating.]
• There's no excuse for not having time for sex because if you were having an affair, you'd make time for that.
• Women don't need sex when breastfeeding because they're tired and getting all the cuddly hormones from the contact with the baby.
• Holding hands with your wife can relieve tension and stress, particularly through traumatic experiences.
• How you tell your "how we met" story says a lot about your marriage.
• Jazz lovers are 30% more sexually active than other people.
• Obesity in a marriage can be contagious.
• Wives are like "gatekeepers" of family health.
• There's a good chapter about how sleep and snoring and separate bedrooms have an effect on marriage.
• You need friends.  Heterosexual men tend to say that their wife is their best friend or their only friend.
• Husbands should take a long parenting class with their wives.

I'm still not happy with this layout, but I'm doing other stuff in the meantime

I actually got several things checked off my to-do list today, which is rather phenomenal since I've spent the last few days as an uncreative slug.  I shouldn't admit that ... but here's the truth: when you work from home as a freelancer (not as a person who just happens to work from home), you have waves of creativity.  I pumped out two spec scripts* and then got pooped out.  I'm waiting for my next contract to be lined up, and there's a meeting this week for another potential project.

(* spec scripts are original scripts written by writers to provide a sample of their work using existing shows.  For example, if you wanted to work for a preschool series, you could provide a spec script of a Sesame Street episode that you wrote.)

Two of my main goals today were to 

a) digitize recipes from a cookbook that I intend to buy anyway.  I just didn't feel like spending the full $39+ it takes to get free shipping today.

b) finish reading this book that's due today at the library.  I'm ultra frugal and was so wanting to say that I managed to use the library out here without ever getting a library fine, but alas, that resolution has been broken already.  $4 later ... and now I'm racing through a non-fiction book laden with facts.  (See the review that's probably above.)

On a delightfully culinary note: I made a delicious dinner last night for about $6 that makes about 4 meals, or serves 4, since hubby had to work late again last night.

$2 - half jar of pesto

$1 - half 900 g bag of pasta (shells)

$0.75 - bunches of fresh spinach

$2 - two frozen salmon portions

$0.15 - sprinkling of Parmesan cheese - I'm guessing $0.15 since it's a big bottle

_____

$5.90 (approximately ... when you account for taxes, etc.)