Monday, May 25, 2009

I am my mother's daughter

So, the Mom is visiting at the end of the week. I am very excited, and I have a lot to do - stocking up on groceries, doing several loads of laundry, cleaning everything, yadda yadda yadda. So, the minute I get out of work today, I rush off to (of course)...go shopping.
Whatever.
So I'm in Winners and I find sheets for a very reasonable price. And since I've needed new bed linens for some time, and especially since I'm soon to have a house guest, I consider this a fortunate find.
However, I also find shoes.
They are the same price as the linens. And they're great. And I can't splurge on both.



Sorry, Mom.

Thursday, May 14, 2009

Call it Vitamin P

Summer hours at my office started this week; that means working an extra 45 minutes every day until Friday, when we get to leave in the early afternoon. And while I'm very much looking forward to Friday, right now, all I'm feeling is a full week of extra-long days piling up. This, together with the stressingly difficult Pilates class I just went thorough (I'm pretty sure this damn class is supposed to be getting easier, not harder as I go along) has left me decidedly drained; I didn't even have the mental fortitude to steer myself away from temptation tonight and so am having a dinner that is very much anti-diet. I bought something I've never purchased for myself before, ever: one box of Lucky Charms. I justified that if I was craving it so badly, then maybe it contained something my body needs that I was lacking (you know how sometimes you out-of-the-blue want a steak if you're low on iron?)
However, looking down at the remains of my 'dinner', I find it doubtful that my body was lacking in vaguely purple-tinted milk.

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

Spring things

So, it's officially Spring, and the weather has become acceptibly spring-like, even if 'April's showers' seem to be spilling into May.  I've cleaned my house (to a degree, anyway), I've started my garden, I'm cooking with vegetables from Canada (as opposed to South Africa) once again!
This year, I've planted sugar snap peas (these didn't work last year, but I like them too much not to try again), red peppers, tomatoes, and spring onions.  Good luck to me, though I already have sprouted things poking out of soil, so I'm off to a good start!
 
I also went back to the Farmer's Market with a friend last weekend.  It's been a while since I've been there- winter doesn't make me want to get up early on a Saturday to trek across town to a large cold building that's probably mostly filled with withered carrots anyway- but now that there is sunshine in the mornings, it's great to go.  Which, for the record, everyone else seems to be thinking as well, cause it was friggin packed.
But I'm glad we went.  It always feels good to go to the market.  I feel very grown-up and sophisticated to buy things like fiddleheads and smoked paprika.  I also bought a large pink chunk of Himalayan rock salt, which I currently think makes me very cool in the kitchen.
I made fiddleheads with shrimp over cauliflower mash- and damn I'm good!
 
And I'm buried in the extra-curricular projects right now.  I'm knitting two things at once (scarf for the brother and messenger-style bag for me), I just loaded up with new beads at the Toronto Bead Show, it's finally warm enough for me to start stonecarving again, and I even picked up new sketching pens...and then went home and sketched...and then remembered why I don't sketch things...I suck at sketching.
 
In my down time (of which I have little left, after all that), I'm reading a book that has no real story; no character development, no antagonist to speak of, no rise or fall of action...believe it or not, it's not even fiction, it's NON-ficition (which I never, ever read), and it doesn't even have a plot, unless you consider the alphabet a plot, and even if you did, I doubt you'd find it a very compelling one.
And I tell you now, this is one of the most ticklingly wonderful reads I've ever read.
Ironically, it's a book published by Penguin that's all about an Oxford publication, but what can I say, sometimes the publishing lines get blurred.
It's called Reading the OED, and that's all it is, a book about a guy reading a dictionary- and its GREAT!  Seriously, people, go out and get this book.
I freaking love words.  Favourite new word so far: Cellarhood (n.) The state of being a cellar.  WHY DOES ENGLISH HAVE A WORD FOR THIS?!


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