Day Two Hundred and Eighty-Five - Buy Me Some Peanuts And...

Last year we took Adam to his first baseball game and he was very into it - the game lasted around four hours and he was thoroughly engrossed in the whole process. I was beyond delighted - finally another baseball fan! So we decided to go again this year and off we went today. The game was highly mediocre, but Adam still seemed to enjoy himself [and really enjoyed his hot dog - a North American speciality!]. The last time we went I got myself a big bag of popcorn, but Adam was disappointed with it as he only likes sweet popcorn, which we were unable to locate.

In fact, I thought the idea of sweet popcorn + baseball was a bit strange...but then it hit me - "take me out to the ballgame - take me out with the crowd, buy me some peanuts and CRACKERJACK..." and so on. What is Crackerjack but name-brand sweet popcorn? So I set off to find some and I did find some as I was purchasing pizza [this is probably my last kick @ the can for baseball games this year so I needed to make the most of it]. So while it was really for Adam, he's very generous with sharing his food when he thinks it's delicious so I ate Crackerjack while watching a baseball game. It was too sweet to be honest. All stuck in my teeth and such. But - traditions! Baseball! Awesome! I still haven't managed to eat a hot dog [veggie hot dog] while @ a game, but I've got to reserve something for next season.

Day Two Hundred and Eighty-Four - Downbeat

It seems like Joseph's parents have the ability to suggest things that I would normally be totally opposed to and I will go ahead and do these things and sorta [or full-on] enjoy it. Not things like having a big old meat BBQ or going to MarineLand or anything that I'm morally against...but just things that I would normally not do. Today's thing is a minor one of these, but still something I would feel a bit too hipster or something doing. It was late and they were jet lagged, so we kept things kinda low-key for this evening. After dinner they suggested going back to the lounge in their hotel as there would be live music so we did just that - I drank a latte while listening to live jazz music. This is nothing negative towards those who choose to drink caffiene on a Saturday night or those who choose to listen to live jazz. They are just not things I would ever do, especially in combination.

It all sounds very hippie and beatnik and kinda freaky...and yet, if you were there I suspect that you might have a different impression of the evening...please see below for pictoral evidence [yes, that is joseph and littlest brother adam - caffiene and ice cream were consumed - the first of many for the week, i incited a bizarre and angry rant from adam re: the politics of playing rock, paper, scissors and the juzz was just great. wait, i mean - JAZZ. right on.]...

Day Two Hundred and Eighty-Three - Max Power

Joseph's family is arriving tomorrow afternoon for an approximate 10-day stay in our fair city and I totally haven't given any attention to cleaning the house. At all. While creating my epic spaghetti casserole on Tuesday evening I realized that I some of its deliciousness spilled out onto the oven bottom [is that a thing? oven bottom?]. Actually I didn't realize that until I tried to make Joseph a turkey pot pie the other day and the smoke and horrible smell filled the house for like two hours. So, for the first time ever I cleaned an oven. It took a full day to do this and made me really, really appreciate the self-cleaning oven that I grew up with [though I suspect that if you did this with a gas cooker like I have you might surely die].

So, yeah - I attempted to clean the oven yesterday, but in my food-deprived haze and with the cleaner only resting for two hours the gunk did not want to kindly remove itself. So, I put the cleaner on...went to bed...went to work...came home...waited even longer...and then it all came together. I was an extremely crummy environmentalist as it took me about a roll of paper towels to clean off all of the unpleasantness. And really - it was so unpleasant. Before the extreme cleaning power was applied it was just regular foodstuff...post-cleaning spray foam it turned into black slimy sludge and smelled like death. And I still had to scrape things off using our one good flipper [according to Joseph - I think we have two other viable scraper/flipper things]. After I was done I was worried I shouldn't have used that particular product for our gas cooker - I have this big fear of exploding everyone. However, fortunately I didn't explode us all and I made a frakking delicious pizza in the newly clean oven. I really hope Joseph's family checks out the interior of the oven.

Day Two Hundred and Eighty-Two - Hungry Hungry Blogger

This thing sorta happened by accident, however it was on my list of things to do, so once I noticed it was happening I ran with it. Today I did a fast. I have done fasts before - but not for well over ten years [they tended to twig my eating issues, so I stopped doing them]. Anyway, it so happened that I ate my last bit of food yesterday @ 2pm and then I failed to eat dinner. I finally ate something again [just fresh vegetables as I didn't want to upset my stomach with lots of refined foods] around 8pm this evening - so I guess that I fasted for 30 hours. I could have easily gone on longer. I was still drinking calorie-laden drinks [and some non-caloric drinks like water, black coffee and assorted teas - lots of teas/hot drinks] and I find that liquid of any kind fills me up. Especially fizzy drinks like Perrier - must be the bubbles.

I am mixed on fasts in general. They are very en vogue within the proanorexia community [which I find a bit funny as back in my day I would have not termed what I was doing as fasting - it was just not eating - there is a difference]. However, fasts are also supposed to be good for doing a bit of internal housecleaning. I think that must be true, but not really in a pleasant way [the morning after the fast I was abruptly and violently ill so I guess that was my toxins escaping me]. And yet, the thing I like about modifying my diet is that you become acutely aware of everything that you do put into your body. Sometimes less is more.

Day Two Hundred and Eighty-One - By Gelfing Hand Or Else By None

Before I was old enough to go to school full-time I went to a baby-sitter throughout the week. I adored her and even my mum agrees that my baby-sitter, Marg, was like a second mother to me [my mum worked a lot]. Despite [or perhaps because of] the fact that I was the only girl in the baby-sitter's house, I loved being there. They had a swimming pool and lots of board games and I thought she was a great cook - with lots of macaroni and cheese with ketchup smiley faces and tollhouse biscuits. I also liked the other four kids who were there with me - I think I was more of a tomboy than what I remember. However, there was something I did not like - the media selection. These days kids don't have to drive to the corner store without some portable DVD player blasting the latest Disney/Pixar rubbish. Back in my day - we had three films @ the baby-sitter's house and I loathed them all - Annie, Puff the Magic Dragon and - most dreaded of all - The Dark Crystal. The latter would cause me to hide behind the sofa for its entire duration or maybe even go outside [and we all know how much I hate that].

Let's just say that today has been an exceptionally trying day [it really, really has for reasons I won't discuss]. I'm exhausted and my thing du jour got thrwarted by the badness - and what does Teletoon happen to be playing? Oh, that's right - tonight I watched The Dark Crystal. Really. I don't think that anyone will get that this is a huge thing for me - that film scarred and terrified me - I think it's why I don't like birds to this day, even though I didn't remember the Skeksis birdy people. Repressed memories are still memories people. And yet, this film is not scary in the slightest. It's also not a great film so I don't really recommend it - but I have no idea why it terrified me so - like, I couldn't even look near the TV screen when it was on. I also couldn't make it through Labyrinth or Willow - I think for similar reasons - fear of fantasy films - they probably aren't scary either. And just so you don't think I'm a total wuss I watched all sorts of proper horror/thriller films even as a young kid and I was totally fine with them. I guess I should thank my new love of Star Wars for curing me of my fear of Muppets/puppets.

Day Two Hundred and Eighty - Fresh Obsessed

Back in my first apartment I lived very close to a very nice and very huge Dominion grocery store. As it was my first time being on my own, I had no idea how much groceries were supposed to cost...but after moving into a different neighbourhood and dealing with the Price Chopper - I realized that I was saving about 50%. Dominion might not be Whole Foods, but it ain't cheap. However, they did [and possibly still do - it seems they advertise less these days] have this freshness guarantee thing. If you found something past its sell-by date or like a gross piece of produce they would give you that thing for free [not the expired thing, but a new fresh one]. Let's just say that my current food shopping situation is not @ all like that - one is lucky to find any decent produce ever [this is how the man really keeps us poor folks down - malnutrition]. And yet, until today I thought that the dairy case was safe from unplesantness...I was wrong.

This evening I had visions of grandeur - I wanted to create this fabulous-seeming spaghetti casserole thing with homemade tomato sauce and like a million kinds of cheese and all baked into gloriousness. And, I was well on my way and mid-way through creating the mixed cheese component when I realized that the cottage cheese was expired...by like over a week. Sick. So everything had to be shut down - the sauces, the melting, the boiling - all of it - and yes, I was pissed off. It was pouring rain and I was beyond miserable, but I wasn't about to pay more @ Al's across the street - aw hell the the no. What I was going to do was make a statement to the Price Chopper - I returned something to the grocery store. It didn't really make much of a statement. The cashier was super disinterested - I feel like I could have just stolen myself a new cottage cheese [which might have been a more powerful political statement - but I so hate prison] as no one cared. Even more gross was returning to the dairy case and seeing other tubs that were like way, way beyond expired [several weeks] - cottage cheese lasts a long time, too! So I think they have been there since the beginning of time. But yes - if you do plan to return something to the grocery, you would best be advised to clear your schedule - lots of queues.

Day Two Hundred and Seventy-Nine - Callsign Dangergirl

So Joseph has this very neat-o joystick set for computer videogame [in the interest of full disclosure he bought one cheap-o one, but has recently upgraded to the kickass instrumentation you see below - it was too expensive for me to officially declare without some embarassment]. The main reason for the presence of such elaborate-ness is because of this Battlestar Galactica game that allows you to be a Viper pilot. It's pretty cool, but I was getting motion sickness just watching Joseph play it and it looked to be very difficult [because Joseph struggles with it and he is good @ videogames], so I didn't have much interest in trying it out, despite my rabid love for all things BSG. But then Joseph pointed out that it could be a cool new thing so this afternoon I played a videogame with a joystick.


As you can see from the photo, it's more than just a joystick - it has like a secondary component to it [yes, all of that wanting to be an astronaut/pilot training really paid off - so much retained knowledge]. As previously thought - the game is incredibly difficult and frustrating - this little task ended up being a much better test of patience than the origami crane. I feel like it took HOURS, but I finally managed to complete the training course and kill some cylon drone things. I didn't feel as motion sick while playing as opposed to watching, but I really reeked it up out there. It's a bit disappointing, really - that I can't be more like my TV role model, Starbuck. I guess I will just have to be more like her in other ways [yknow - all of those bad ways].

[ps - clearly i found earth - it's right there on the right-hand side of the screen!]

Day Two Hundred and Seventy-Eight - Black Sabbath

It seems like every summer there are more and more and more comic book/superhero films out. I have no actual statistics to support this, but it seems that since Spiderman came out the whole superhero film as actual, semi-serious film [y so srs?] or at least as a replacement for a traditional action film have been blossoming. And yes, I'm clearly part of the problem as I go to see a lot of them. I don't really think that the sheer number of these types of films is necessarily a problem - look @ how many stupid romantic comedies come out every year. Bleh. Well, finally - three months too late to be considered any sort of hip I saw Iron Man. Yes, the Bloor finally decided to not lose the reels or whatever happened back @ the end of June when we were supposed to see it. Maybe the mice ate it.

It was a pretty quality film, although I know that my impression of it has suffered what with seeing The Dark Knight first. Apparently Robert Downey Jr. didn't "get" TDK and, in fact, had some very harsh words for it and Marvel Comics generally. While I don't think that type of criticism is at all justified [I think that TDK - like many other forms of media - is only a "thinking person's film" if you want it to be - that's what makes it great - it's also just a great action film if that's what you want], I forgive him and honestly I'm just happy to see him getting good work, such as Iron Man. Although I wasn't familiar at all with Iron Man/Tony Stark, RDJ was really great in this - fun, glib and very in control - most entertaining. Even The Fishstick and Terrence Howard didn't bug too much. The director's hand was delightfully evident for about 75% of the film [something that's missing from the new Batman films, although Nolan most definitely can set a scene/mood], but then falls away completely @ the finish, which is a shame as it was superfun and very original. Better luck next time!

Day Two Hundred and Seventy-Seven - 999 To Go

I am very proud of today's thing as it required a lot of instruction following and a great deal of patience. Also, a friendly relationship with spatial relationships. To say that I'm not great @ any of these things would be a gigantic understatement. Tonight I folded an origami crane. This is my first successfully completed origami anything so I'm very proud. While everyone else in elementary school was making those jumping frogs or cootie catcher things I was using that same paper to write some sort of emo missive about how unfair the whole activity was. I think it looks pretty nifty, especially considering that I used regular computer/printer paper, not the fancy origami stuff. In the interest of full disclosure I did require a lot of help [A LOT] from Joseph to complete this as I was having a lot of difficulty with the instructions and with not snapping/freaking out and destroying not just that paper, but all paper in the house.


I'm not sure that this is my path to inner peace. In fact, I'm not sure that any path to inner peace is available to someone like me. That's a shame. I'm not sure that I could make 999 more of these - although that's what one is meant to do. If you make 1000 of them then you can make a wish and it will totally come true. Also, 1000 cranes are made for when you have a loved one in the hospital or for weddings. I think they look really impressive all strung together as decoration. Apparently sometimes people do float them down rivers or whatever - although I'm assuming they don't use generic computer paper if one plans to do this.

Day Two Hundred and Seventy-Six - City Wise

Kinda feeling like a crumb bum today with a migraine and stuff so I've got kinda a crumb bum thing for today. However, it is something that my dear readers can participate in so maybe that makes it slightly better/more interesting. Tonight I took a National Geographic quiz on Toronto. Apparently Toronto has been designated as one of National Geographic's Places of a Lifetime...which I find a bit incredulous as this city is dreadfully boring. I ended up getting 80% on the quiz which is much better than I would have predicted as I am dreadful @ geography and I don't really pay much attention to Toronto due to the aforementioned boring-ness.

If you would like to take the Toronto quiz you can do so here. There are many other cities featured. I took a few of the other quizzes - I did terribly on the ones for Tokyo and Venice [I have been to Venice, but not to Tokyo, though I do want to go]. I did really well on the ones for Paris and Rome [have been to Paris, not to Rome]. I'm still not sure why Toronto would be considered interesting enough to actually come some distance to visit...we don't really have anything here that you couldn't find anywhere else. Though tourists certainly do come here - I've always been too timid to ask them why when I encounter them.