Well I'm thinking of giving up coffee. Margaret might remember me saying this..oooh, sometime during our History of English class back in 2006 (! that long ago!) and her reply was, "Why?". Good question. I don't know why I say these things, but I just feel it's time. And I don't even drink that much, one measely little stove top espresso each morning. And I mean TINY. But still, I'm addicted.

In the past when I've tried to give it up, I ended up having to take a 3 hour nap in the middle of the day so I this time I'm going to wait until my summer vacation which starts July 1st.

What I would like to know (and I can't find a straight answer on the internet) is if an infection can be treated with antibiotics, does that mean that that's the only way to get rid of it?

I'm pretty sure I'm suffering through a second sinus infection! The first one was about 2 months ago. I went to the doctor who prescribed antibiotics and the infection gone in 3 days. But now it seems it's back. I can't explain exactly how I know it's a sinus infection and not a regular cold; I can just feel it. But I don't want to go back on antibiotics, so I've started doing sinus rinses! And I've got Mark (who suffers from seasonal allergies) hooked on them too! 

But I just need to know: can you get rid of a bacterial sinus infection without antibiotics? Can other infections that are usually treated with antibiotics be gotten rid of without drugs?

Too cute! After Willow eats her breakfast, she likes to jump on my lap and fall asleep (sometimes I rub her big belly). Here she is chilling out, half on my lap, half on the table and looking up at me, waiting for me to flip her onto her back for a belly scratch!

Speaking of Willow...Mark and I have mentioned her so many times in emails to each other that Little Willow appeared in Mark's Google ads!

I thought I'd search my Gmail and find instances of Willow:

Can you believe you left the balcony door open?!?! Willow must have been so happy!

last night Willow spent every minute staring at the radiator in the living room.

willow says 'hi!'

googled "lump after spay" and it's normal, willow's ok

Well! The week of Kath is over! I'm pretty late in updating, but here goes...

Let's see...oh yes, I posted about my Korean lunch. Well that night I had dinner at my brother's house with my parents and we had fish (I can't remember what kind), roasted potatoes, roasted red peppers, wine and for desert coffee and a rhubarb crisp. I didn't have any of the last two, I was too full! I got home around 10pm and ended up having a few cookies though!

So that's the end of that! What did I learn during my week of Kath week?

1. The importance of presentation - even arranging food on the plate in a cute way made it more fun to eat and I'm pretty sure I'm going to buy some cute bowls to eat my oatmeal out of. It made eating it much more fun.

2. I have a new appreciation for variety. While I'm adventurous when eating out, I definitely am not when it comes to cooking at home. I think I'll try harder to cook more interesting things.

Did YOU learn anything new from Kath?

My mom and I hit up Man-na on Bishop downtown, my favourite Korean restaurant. They always give you little dishes of kimchi, Korean radish, potato and miso soup to start. 

Then I had the seafood bibimbap, my favourite! Unfortunately, I only remembered to take a picture after I mixed the egg in.

And my mom had the lunch box special, so beautiful!

Yesterday, I got home, did a 30 minute meditation, then had a snack of yogurt, honey, poppy seeds and a few almonds. Here's Willow checking it out...

Then I went downtown for an appointment but was hungry for dinner so I stopped by Sac-Wich. I'd never been there before. I always thought it was such a weird place when I'd see it on Beaver Hall but a new one just opened at Alexis Nihon so I stopped in to check it out and get a quick bite. I got the Mediterranean Veggie sandwich and it was delicious! Wow! Inside the place looks like a Quiznos, but the sandwiches are fantastic! And they have lots of great little cakes and cookies, biscotti and tiramisu, it all looked really yummy!

Then I headed over to my brother's house and had a beer, but I don't remember what kind, though it was delicious. I had one of my mother's cookies and then a few wasabi beans. My mom sent me home with more cookies and I had two more at home and that was it for the night!

This morning I had oatmeal.

The mix:

1/3 cup water

1/3 cup milk (2% this time)

1/3 cup oats

1 tbsp ground flax

1/2 banana

1/3 mixed frozen blueberries and raspberries on the bottom

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 dash cinnamon on top

1 tbsp peanut butter

6 sour cherries on top

1 triangle of dark chocolate

Plus a cup of french press coffee and a glass of water. I'm currently enjoying my second cup of coffee. I always go for extra coffee on the weekend, though on week days I limit myself to 1 small stove top espresso in the morning and that's it.

Today, to honour the last day of my Kath week, I will bring my camera with me and take more pictures!

Greetings from work! I just had a lunch of a Tim Horton's sandwich called a "Club a la Tim" and a small "ice capuccino" - no pictures!!

I did bring some sliced grapefruit for a snack and just had a piece. Kath seems to do this all the time and I noticed Dana did it too, but I have to say, it's not for me. I'm not a big grapefruit fan to begin with, though I'll eat it once in awhile, but no...much too sour.

I was still feeling full from the pizza last night, so instead of a bowl of oatmeal with all the fixins, I was in the mood for egg and toast. Mark always gets mad that I immediately put the bread in the freezer, and this time he insisted we keep it out and when I went to get a slice this morning, it was moldy! So I went for two mini pitas and a boiled egg, black coffee, water.

Today is:

- work

- home to clean a bit more

- meditation

- quick errand at the mall (because it didn't work out yesterday)

- welcome my parents to Montreal!

I decided tonight to have some sympathy pizza for Dana, seeing as...well, seeing as her pizza looked so good, I thought I'd have some too. On my way home from work I stopped at the mall for something and couldn't resist this terribly trashy novel I'm reading and a couple slices with a Diet Coke. I guess I'm alone in this, but for some reason I like reading trashy novels in food courts with diet soda. No pictures! I haven't been carrying the camera around with me.

I came home to a sparkling clean bathroom! Thank you Mark! Tonight's plan:

- 30 minute meditation

- clean the litter box

- clean the kitchen

- The Office!

- that's all folks!

Good morning! I'm always happy when Wednesdays are over! I forgot to mention that I got in about 40 minutes of walking yesterday.

On to today's breakfast!

The mix:

1/3 cup oats

1/3 cup water

1/3 cup of milk

1 tbsp ground flax

1 tbsp peanut butter

1/2 banana

1/4 cup frozen blueberries on the bottom

1 small triangle of chocolate

I discovered that when you put the blueberries on the bottom, if you wait a few minutes, the bottom part turns into a kind of upside-down cake which is delicious.

Today's lunch is tortellini with garlic, olive oil, broccoli, a bit of cheese, salt and pepper. Some cut up veggies and ranch dressing.

Today's plan is to go to work, a quick errand (if possible afterwards), then home to clean clean clean! My parents are visiting this weekend and despite my efforts this week in keeping things tidy around here, it's really not up to par. I'm dying for a bike ride to the Lachine Rapids, but it looks like it's going to rain all day and night! Booo!

Have I ever got a lot of catching up to do! I left off last night without posting my dinner so here it is. Arugula, a chicken thigh baked with bbq sauce, a mini pita, some chick peas and a chopped up slice of salami all drizzled with balsamic and olive oil.

Breakfast this morning was more oatmeal, water and black coffee. The mix:

1/3 cup oats

1/3 cup milk

1/3 cup water

1 tbsp ground flax

1/2 cup frozen blueberries (buried under the oatmeal so they'd melt)

1 tbsp peanut butter

a bit of dark chocolate!

Today for lunch I had another chicken thigh, a pear, a couple slices of cheese, some celery and peanut butter and a few almonds and another piece of that dark chocolate.

Because I went to a meditation workshop tonight almost right after work, I had a quick egg salad sandwich (whole wheat bun, couple of big leaves of romaine and egg salad) in between, sorry no picture! I just prepared lunch for tomorrow, but I'll wait until tomorrow to post it. However, here's the leftover that I decided to have right now.

And finally a little treat that I had in Turkey last year: yogurt, honey and poppy seeds.

Guf! I finally made it home! Tuesdays are an easy day for me, except the first Tuesday of every month when there is a meeting at 4pm that is supposed to finish at 5:30pm but usually runs until 6:05pm. Should I get on the horn with my union?

I didn't get any exercise today, except a 10 minute walk home from the metro. Perhaps there's still time, but I'm baking some chicken for dinner right now, so maybe not.

Breakfast was oatmeal, here's the mix:

1/3 cup oats

1/3 cup water

1/3 cup milk

about 8 sour cherries

1 tbsp ground flax

cinnamon

some peanut butter

1 cup black coffee

1 pint icy water

I blogged about lunch yesterday so let's not relive that. I did eat all of it throughout the day, though I didn't quite finish the celery, which I might do while I wait for dinner. Along with this little bowl of olives of course...

Well, the good news today is that I received some free samples! Though not food related, it was still nice to come to this little package of P&G goodness: Herbal Essences Shampoo and Conditioner and Olay Definity Re-Energizing Serum and Restorative Sleep Cream.

Now I'm going to sit back, relax and wait for dinner, see you lates!

I sure have been posting a lot, how does Kath do it? Here is my falafel dinner next to Willow on her chair. As you can see, I stuffed half a falafel into four mini pitas and inside each pita is a about a tsp of my homemade tzatziki. I don't mind telling you that the egg cup is holding ranch dressing (PC brand!). I just bought it today because in the last month I've bought a few pre-chopped carrot and celery cups that came with ranch dressing for dipping and I got a little addicted! It was the first bottle of salad dressing I've ever bought! The falafel were delicious! But can anyone tell me how to dispose of all that oil I used to deep fry them?

Here's a picture of the lunch I already put together for tomorrow. It's one thing to take all these pictures at home, but I don't feel like pulling out my camera in the staff room at work. A pear, four mini falafel pockets (2 falafel cut in half), celery, carrots, some almonds and my tzatziki.

Yes, I took that picture on top of the washing machine which is in the kitchen. I need to pay more attention to presentation!! I promise, every picture from now on will be on a pretty place mat!

What a productive day! You'll be happy to know I made it up the Atwater hill without having to stop and walk my bike! It's about an 18km trip return to Akhavan from my house so I think,  taking into consideration any coasting I did, I got at least 30 minutes of exercise in today. 

I stopped to nibble on some olives and almonds in Westmount park on my way home. At home, put together some arugula, chick peas and broccoli with balsamic vinegar, olive oil, salt and pepper. It was only "ok" - olive oil and vinegar isn't cutting it for me these days, I might start experimenting with making more interesting dressings. For desert I had some of that beautiful yogurt (so thick you can stand a spoon in it) with some sour cherries and of course, cool lemony water. I ate outside on the front balcony.

Twice since lunch I've had more olives and almonds (and a few crackers), they are just tooooooo good:

I just finished deep-frying (!!) falafel that I made from a mix I got at Akhavan. It was the first deep-frying I've ever done and the falafel look tasty! I mixed together a quick tzatziki to eat them with but after hovering over all that hot oil, I don't feel that hungry anymore. Don't worry, I'll take pictures when I eat later on!

I didn't take a picture, but last night I had some "cracker snacks". This is an invention by the brother-in-law. It's crackers each with a tiny slice of cheese, tiny slice of some kind of meat (preferably cured), maybe some onion and then a yum yum sliced pickle. Delish! Cracker snacks are the only reason I ever buy yum yums and then I have them once and forget they exist. But I remembered last night!

This is what Mark and I say every weekend morning*: I woke up at 6am and felt great! Then I fell asleep again and now I feel not so great.  :(

We seem to oversleep every weekend, get up at 9am or so and feel like we wasted a couple of hours. Oh well. Mark had to leave early for work (leaving for work at 9am is early for him), so we jumped out of bed for oatmeal at about 8am.

The mix:

- 1/3 cup of Old Mill Large Flake Oats

- 1/3 cup of parmalat 3% milk (I don't usually use 3%, but that's what we have)

- 1/3 cup of water

- 1/2 banana

- 1/2 cup Europe's Best raspberries

- 3 Amira almonds (which expired in January now that I happen to look at the package!)

- 1 tbsp Webber Naturals cold milled certified organic ground flax seed

- 1/2 tsp of chocolate sprinkles (at which Mark said, "I see you're playing Kath at her own game!")

Plus a coffee and some cool lemony water. I ate about 3/4 of the oatmeal - got too full!

Man, it's already a lot of work to blog so much, let alone come into the kitchen to find out what brands I'm using!

I actually did the breakfast dishes after watching last night's Family Guy (one of the funniest yet!). Now I'm off on my bike to buy some treats at Akhavan! I love their olives with chopped up garlic and those almonds that I think are mixed in some kind of tamarind flavouring. Plus that incredibly impossibly thick yogurt.

This bike ride will mark the first of the year going up "the hill" - that's what I call it anytime I go up towards downtown. I HATE the first few times going up "the hill" - it's murder, but it has to be done if it's going to get any easier, right?

*I consider Mondays to be the weekend still as I don't work on Mondays.

After rearranging a bunch of furniture, and getting rid of a REALLY ugly dresser that we were using as linen storage, I was feeling peckish and decided on peanut butter and banana on a few crackers.

What a relaxing day today is! It's sunny and windy, but a little chilly. I sat outside for a bit, but it was just too cold to really enjoy it.

For dinner I had pasta with tomato sauce, cheese on top and a slice of toast with butter. Does anyone else love the taste of buttered toast with pasta?

I'm feeling inspired to make my oatmeal more interesting so tomorrow I might ride my bike over to Akhavan for some yummy snacks and sour cherries.

We headed to Ikea to pick up a dresser for the living room to put our *new* tv on. I just spent 2 hours putting it together and already scratched it. Let this be the record: I am never shopping at Ikea again.

Lunch was leftover grilled vegetable salad from yesterday, bbq chicken and another glass of icy lemony water and then an iced coffee (not pictured).

I woke up at about 7:30 this morning and stayed in bed for about 20 minutes before I decided I'd better get started on Day 1 of becoming Kath. I did the first 30 minutes of the Basic Flow on my Yoga Shakti DVD then checked my blog feed. Dana's already posted, and what a post! She's really captured Kath. I felt inspired to get going even more so I swept and mopped the living room, hall, bathroom and dining room. Hearing all the noise, Mark asked what was going on and then wanted to know why I didn't turn this into Michelle Eats and do it all the time. Which is when I told him to go back to sleep or I'd punch him in the face; I think I was channeling Sylvana there more than Kath. 

Feeling incredulous that I was so productive without even my first cup of coffee, I got started on breakfast.

I'd put a banana in the freezer last night, intending to make smoothies this morning.

The mix for two servings:

- 1 banana

- 1/2 cup raspberries

- 2 tbsp hemp protein

- 1 1/2 cups of soy milk

Plus a coffee (no half decaf here my friend), whole-wheat toast with peanut butter and jam and a glass of cool lemony water. Now, Mark and I will actually clean the kitchen before we head out for the day instead of leaving it until....ooooh, sometime next week. Ciao!

Imitation is the highest form of flattery I guess

Due to our current, unhealthy one might say, obsession with a certain blog, Dana and I have decided to live for a week as said blog's writer. Her constant optimism, immaculate home, cute bowls and tiny bites of baked goods are starting to wear us down so instead of turning bitter, we'll walk a few miles in her shoes and see if our homes too can be without clutter, if our oatmeal can be as filling, if it's really possible to do an easy 20 minutes on the elliptical at 5am.

The guidelines are as follows:

1. no junk food for a week (or just little bites)

2. lots of good food, especially raw food

3. clean our houses and keep them clean

4. 1/2 hour min of exercise every day

5. blog about the food we eat every day

6. use place mats and buy fresh flowers

While that may seem like a mish-mash of rules, we think we've captured the true Kath-ness of Kath. We think living as Kath for a week will make us as upbeat as she is. 

In this spirit, I have downloaded a trial version of Post-it Digital to keep track of my to-do lists and have I ever got lots to do!

Tonight:

- relax

Tomorrow:

- wake up at 6am to do yoga

- sweep and mop the whole apartment

- quick trip to Ikea to buy a dresser

- 30 minutes on the elliptical

- throw away all the clutter

Last year, Mark, his brother David and I biked the Tour de l'Ile, a 50km bike ride with about 30 000 people, for the first time and we couldn't have picked a worse year to do it. The weather was awful! WET WET WET. The first hour was grey, but cool enough that the ride was enjoyable, but then it started raining and didn't stop. It was miserable, but we biked the whole thing and I got to see parts of Montreal that I'd never seen before. I also got more wet than I ever have before.

This year the Tour de l'Ile is celebrating its 25th year and we plan to bike it again! I'm especially excited to see that the route is a different one than last year. This year's route is one familiar to me as big parts of it run West along the canal and then back East along the river. Can't wait!

Something I have been keeping track of in a paper journal, but not in this blog are Mark and my "10 Great Dates". Now, listen here:

Mark's very generous and thoughtful mother put together a huge box of individually wrapped gifts, each relating to a great date from the book "10 Great Dates Before You Say I Do"*. The idea is to read each date's chapter, do the exercises as homework, open the accompanying gift and discuss the chapter's theme during a date. 

I would never have thought I would take part in something like this, but when someone is thoughtful enough to put such a wonderful package together just for us, I can't resist.

And so, on to Date #1:

On Easter Sunday Eve, we cracked open the book and read the first chapter: Sharing Hopes, Dreams and Expectations. The exercise was to rate from 1 to 5, eight important areas to a couple: commitment and security, companionship and friendship, sexuality and sensuality, affection and tenderness, encouragement, intellectual closeness, mutual activity and building a family. The next day,  we went to the Eggspectation** in the Old Port for breakfast and discussed. 

After having been together for a little over 6 years and having lived together for about 4, we have already shared our hopes and dreams many, many times. However, we've never explicitly (ok, maybe during a few fights over the years) discussed our expectations of each other and it was insightful to focus on this part of the date. The gift Mark's mother chose for Date #1 was a journal and pen, both of which we decided to use to keep track of each date, i.e. write a few notes, attach the homework and where the date took place. I think it'll be funny to look back on this journal in 15 or 20 years and see what we thought of our relationship just 6 years in.

Stay tuned for Date #2!

*For the record, Mark and I are not about to  say I do. 

** Man oh  man has Eggspectation ever gone downhill! That's my last visit for sure!

After everything that I've been doing since I last posted (Freaky Friday, March Break, Easter, The Class, Miroir Noir screening that I barely attended, 9 weeks left in the school year! + M. Ward show to look forward to!) two really funny things stick out.

1. HAPPY EASTER GUS! What a hat! Apparently this is normal in Australia. Email me, I'll show you the videos.

2. I got a parcel notice addressed to Willow Paquette! The lady at the post office had a laugh about that. She didn't even question me when I told her Willow is my cat, even though I had to show her picture I.D. to get the parcel that was addressed to me (an Etsy treat). Willow's enjoying her Feline Greenies Dental Treats as I type.

There's a party in my house and it's only 6:30 Wednesday night. Sheesh. Someone's making salad, someone's playing upright bass, someone's waiting for pizza, a few other people are loitering and Willow's sticking close to me.

This past weekend I had two great friends visit me from far away. With one, I did the ultimate Montreal bagel taste test and had a Fairmount bagel, walked a few blocks and had a St Viateur bagel. I'll say that Fairmount had a line out the door, but St Viateur sold individual-sized cream cheeses. Guess which bagel won (in both my and my friend's opinion)?

Then we had drinks at Dieu du Ciel where we monopolized Bruno the bartender: he is 31, is in police school, used to be a chef and spends all his time studying. 

Then we all went to Gibby's in the old port where I dined on shrimp cocktail! lobster tail! veal! wine! cosmopolitans! and had our picture taken by Mona, our waitress.

Then we all went back to the W Hotel which is OVERRATED! I'd never been inside and was excited to see what all the hype was about. While the outside looks like a mental hospital, the inside looks like someone wondered, "How many totally awesome neon light and water installations can I fit in one mental hospital?" and then fit as many awful neon light and water installations in it. 

Then I went home.

About my last post, Margaret commented, "okay, not to be the voice of doom and gloom here, but I heard the other day that historically, Montreal gets 23% of its annual snowfall in March, and March is only half over. I'm just saying...enjoy the moment." BUT I DON'T BELIEVE IT! 

Do you do an annual spring cleaning? I love spring cleaning but haven't felt the tug of the garbage bags strongly enough yet. I love throwing stuff out (or donating or recycling, etc).

Some more M. Ward...

The weather is GORGEOUS! I pulled the plastic off one of my living room windows and opened the window wide to let in some much-needed fresh air!

What a beautiful day today! I didn't find myself at the Expo Manger Santé this weekend like I thought I would, but rather waiting for Mark to come home and then off to dinner at my brother's house where we had a delicious dinner made exquisite with homemade coconut ice cream topped with spiced rum fresh off my sister-in-law's cruise in the Caribbean. Delicious!

Today we took advantage of the sun and walked to one our favourite breakfast places, and I just dined on some of Mark's best pizza yet.

I have just discovered TED and I think I'm one of the last to do so. Everyone keeps posting links to TED talks on Facebook and I finally clicked on one to see what it was all about. If you have 20 minutes to spare, go to TED and learn something!

...and how can a man like me remain in the light...

The second love of my life is coming to Montreal! Oh M Ward! I can't wait!

I need to get back on the blogging bandwagon here! After finding out that my cousin reads (how nice!) I feel I should be more diligent!

I just polished off a piece of toast with peanut butter and it was sadly disappointing. Why? Because I'm back to the same old-same old PC Just Peanuts stuff instead of the delicious (DELICIOUS) Trader Joe's peanut butter my parents brought back from the U.S. Man oh man, if you get a chance to buy Trader Joe's peanut butter, do it. It'll change you.

Yes, my parents are back from Australia and can't stop talking about how wonderfully warm and beautiful it is. They are in LOVE with Sydney and I'm in love with the macadamia nuts, Cadbury's milk chocolate and, although not from Australia, the above mentioned Trader Joe's peanut butter - all of which are gone, gone, gone.

This weekend, the Expo Manger Santé is happening in Montreal - maybe I'll find some nice peanut butter there. Until then, I hope you enjoy your glass of scotch after work tonight as much as I will!

Lately, I've been lamenting the lack of variety in food available in Canada. Maybe it's because I shop at Loblaws too much. But one does get tired of having a choice between Liberte and Sugar-and-Chemical-Laden yogurt. Until I found the brand Damafro at Segals.

Ah, there was a time I lived in Plateau and could walk to Segals - that bastion of CHEAP groceries and weird brands. I went there the other day at Mark's insistence, and he's never even lived in the Plateau. I found 3 individually sized Damafro (never even heard of Damafro, perfect!) yogurts with real sugar, real fruit and real yogurt for 1$.

My public service announcement to you is: buy your yogurt at Akhavan's. They have this kind of deli counter with too many kinds of fresh yogurt, it's to die for. Damafro's consistency is like something so disgusting, I won't even type it here because my mother reads this blog and I don't want to offend.

I am feeling more bright-eyed and bushy-tailed this morning than many a morning before. I have the popular children's song "Sally the Camel" in my head and timed my morning shower to the length of the song.

Mark made almond milk last night and I added some to my coffee - delish! I should have taken pictures, he was pretty chuffed!

Have you ever had an Irish Moss? It's the best drink ever and make of the weirdest stuff ever, including at least a half a pound of Irish Moss, a seaweed from the Atlantic Ocean.

Not only is Irish Moss (the drink) deliciously sweet and creamy, it's a popular aphrodisiac!

Check out your local Jamaican grocery and buy some now!

Or make your own. I'm pretty sure they do at Bon Appetit Des Caraibes and they're right on Notre Dame at Atwater, go!!

Happy Candlemas!

According to a book I have here at home, Candlemas (February 2nd) is the day to take stock of your candle inventory and add more if you feel you're missing some to take you through the rest of the dark winter. I can't find anything online to support this however. I did manage, sadly, to find one candlestick holder with a rather pathetic green stub of a candle and a single tea light. If there's to be any romance in this house on Valentine's Day, I'll definitely have to stock up.

(Ignore the ugly window trim, it's Mark's paint-stripping project.)

I also found this little poem:

If Candlemas day be fair and bright,

Winter will have another fight.

If Candlemas day brings cloud and rain,

Winter won't come again.

Unfortunately, today is BEAUTIFUL: sunny and mild.

I also found out that in France, Candlemas is celebrated with crêpes, eaten only after 8pm. If you can flip a crêpe while holding a coin in the other hand, you're assured prosperity throughout the coming year. I'm giving that a try tonight.

Today is also Groundhog Day and I guess North America's groundhogs all saw their shadows and so we'll have a "long" winter; 6 more weeks. But aren't we going to have at least 8 more anyway?

I'm watching Bill Murray in Groundhog Day to commemorate today and realize it's a lot more heartbreaking and warming than I remember. Well worth a watch if it's been a while since you've seen it.

Happy Candlemas!

Truth be told, there are quite a few blog posts awaiting posting. I write many posts and save them, without ever posting them. Not *that* many people read this blog, so I guess I shouldn't care *so* much, but I often wonder why I even have a blog and what direction it should take. Should it be merely about my personal life? Should I write about current events that peak my interest? Should I blog about pop culture? Music? Clothes? All of the above? Do I even *need* a direction?

Buoyed and inspired by Kath's Tribute to Oatmeal (have you ever seen anything like that?), I've decided to take a photo of my breakfast every single morning. Stay tuned!

Blue Imelda

Have I already posted this? Is not, it's time I did and if so, well it's worth posting again.

Final Fantasy's Blue Imelda

An SNL digital short

I wasn't Doogie Howser's biggest fan by a long shot, but the theme song is so great. When I saw this on SNL last weekend, I knew I had to post it here to share with all of you. I especially love the MPC and synth guys at 1:16. Beware: if you watch this video, you'll have the song in your head all day.

An Italian Playlist

Are there songs that when you hear them can only ever take you back in time to when you first heard them or when you listened to them a lot? For me, listening to Ratatat's Classics album takes me back to the beginning of 2007 and the 1km walk from the bus stop at St Jean and Autoroute 20 to Ecole Primaire Pointe-Claire during an internship I did there. I listened to that album over and over during that walk and I can't listen to it now without feeling the same emotions I felt walking to that school every day: excitement, stress, impatience.

I recently uploaded hundreds of songs to my iTunes including Andre 3000's Speakerboxxx and when I listen to it I'm taken back to my daily walk along the beach in Scalea, Italy 2003 - 2004. It's a funny feeling to not be able to listen to it without feeling the pebbly sand under my feet and the salty scent of the Mediterranean. So, here is your very own 2003-04 Italian Playlist:

Andre 3000 - Speakerboxxx
My Morning Jacket - At Dawn
Neutral Milk Hotel - In the Aeroplane Over the Sea
The Unicorns - Who Will Cut Our Hair When We're Gone?
Bonnie 'Prince' Billie - Bonnie 'Prince' Billie sings Greatest Palace Music
The Beatles - The White Album
Belle and Sebastian - Dear Catastrophe Waitress
Vincent Gallo - Recordings of Music for Film
Smog - Red Apple Falls
Mirah - Advisory Committee (produced in part by Phil Elvrum - awesome album!!!)
Dntel - Life is Full of Possibilities

Here is a video edesade made for Bonnie 'Prince' Billie's New Partner which also happens to be one of the first songs Mark ever sang to me:

The other day Mark spent some time with his friend who told him of his dream to move to Killaloe, near Algonquin Park, with his wife to live among the hippies and run a second-hand store of sorts. This got us talking about dreams and while Mark's are pretty vague yet lofty, mine are very specific and perfectly achievable. I keep them specific and achievable so that I can be assured of continually being appreciative and satisfied with the work I put into achieving them.

For example, I recently came upon an a journal I had forgotten I started where I wrote of two dreams: to have a sofa comfortable enough to take a nap on and to live somewhere with a nice view of a body of water. Now, if you'd spent as many years in your 20s being a student as I had, you'd understand the unattainability of having a nice sofa. While Salvation Army has many many affordable sofas, I can assure you, those that I've bought have been far from the kind I'd want to spend a couple of hours on on a lazy Sunday afternoon. Now, though, I have a lovely sofa that I spend many hours on reading, listening to music, watching movies and napping. This sofa that I thought was so far out of my reach is finally in my living room! Dream attained!

It was timely that Mark was just talking about dreams to his friend, because a blog I find so interesting for many reasons I might get into another time, mentioned Randy Pausch and two of his lectures, one about achieving childhood dreams and another about time management. If you shed a couple of tears watching this, you'll almost definitely shed a few watching the lecture about childhood dreams. It's not that it's a tear-jerker, but Randy had cancer and died just months later. The lecture is not about his death or cancer though, and I think it's an important lecture to listen to and watch if only to light a fire under your own dreams. Each lecture is over an hour long, but worth watching because as he says, if you're not spending time reaching your dreams, what are you spending your time doing?

Today is November 23rd and it's also Saint-Catherine's Day! I don't know about children who grew up in Quebec, but growing up in Northern Ontario (at least those in French and French Immersion schools) meant November 23rd was dedicated to making "tire" and wrapping up little pieces of it wax paper to take home, forget on the "rad" and then scrape off the next day. Sure, it's delicious, but what kid doesn't leave sticky sugary on hot surfaces because naturally they already ate a ton of it at school?


The maple stuff we dip a popsicle stick in and roll through the snow at a cabane a sucre is called "tire" in French and the stuff we made out of sugar and molasses on Saint-Catherine's day was also called "tire" even though it's referred to as "toffee" in English. It's not really toffee at all - it's really molasses and sugar. We were told that Catherine was a teacher who made the "tire" in order to lure little First Nations kids into her school so she could teach them.


Maison Saint-Gabriel, which happens to be just around the corner from my house, is the farmhouse/cottage where some of the first young single women from France lived and learned to housekeep, take care of animals and grow vegetables under the guidance of Sainte Marguerite Bourgeoys.


While Maison Saint-Gabriel's website mentions "tire", it doesn't say how it's connected to Catherine, rather it explains how she is the patron saint of young girls and unmarried young women. The Maison Saint-Gabriel is inviting all Catherinettes (women over 25 who are not yet married) to take part in the Sainte-Catherine day festivities today - sounds like personal invitation to me!




edit: St Catherine's Day is not on November 23rd, it's on November 25th! Thanks to Anonymous.

What the world needs now

Wow! Friday night I found myself with two great friends at Eglise Saint-Jean Baptiste...

...watching Burt Bacharach! I can't say enough great things about this show. The sound was incredible, the church is beautiful. He came on stage and started playing the piano for about 15 seconds, it was just him and the piano, and then he and the whole band launched into the chorus of "What the World Needs Now" - the sound was so huge and so perfect! What an experience! The rest of the show was great, great, great. Burt and the band played lots of medleys of his hits, he talked to the crowd a bit about studying at McGill and working with lots of great singers. His encore was really long - it seemed like neither he nor the crowd wanted him to leave the stage.

Look what happened at my school today!

Where to start...

Sigur Ros finally made it to Montreal again and I went to see them at the Quais of the Old Port. It was a beautiful mild evening with no rain - perfect for such a show. I got to go backstage too, but I didn't talk to the band. Cool! They were busy speaking Icelandic and playing some kind of wrestling game with the opening band. Here's my pass:

Here's me looking awesome during the show:

And here's the confetti that exploded from the stage at the end of the last song, which was Gobledigook!!! Click the link and watch the video. It's so scandalous that it was removed from youtube.com which is why I can't post it directly here. But I'm sure my readership is mature enough to handle it, hee hee!

The next big thing coming up is Pop Montreal. Hopefully I'll get to see Great Lake Swimmers, Akron Family and Hooded Fang. I'm told my connections aren't good enough to get me into Ratatat's already sold-out show, boooo!

Finally, after a couple of weeks of practice, Willow has managed to make it to the top of this door frame. She gets there by scaling the thin wooden frame around the glass of the door.

And now I'm off to catch the season premiere of Desperate Housewives!

Happy Birthday to Me!!

Today I am 31 years old; I can't believe it.

Every year, I try to get in as many birthday cakes as possible. So far I had one during my housewarming a few weeks ago, another today at a restaurant and a third tonight just between me and Mark. And, there is another one on it's way next weekend. Yahoo!

Mark and I decided to climb Mont St. Hilaire this afternoon. It was a lovely hike and an activity I love though don't do nearly as much as I could. Now that I'm working just 4 days a week, it's probably time to join the YMCA hiking club, whose website I visit seasonally but then I don't act on my desire to join. It's time!

Brown paper packages tied up with string

The best thing about Saturday morning is that my most pressing decision is whether to hold the newspaper in my hands and place my coffee on the table or hold my coffee in my hands and place the newspaper on the table.

More stay-cation news: I got my hair cut yesterday and it looks like a perfect little helmet. I love it. I also put together a kitter-litter box hiding contraption from a tip I found at Ikea-hacker. Pictures of both to follow soon.

After some hemming and hawing, we've decided to spend the next week or so on a stay-cation. Here are some photos from the first few adventures...

We went to Nocochi for coffee and cookies:


Followed by the Yves Saint Laurent restrospective:

Then the Old Port to relax in the sun:

Today we'll relax at home with Willow:

And do some laundry...

Well I finally made it to a viewing of the fireworks, with only two more displays to go. We had a couple of false starts in getting out the door:

"I'm too tired."
"It's going to rain."

And then when we were actually on our bikes:

"It's too cold, let's go back for sweaters."

And then when we had our sweaters and were walking out the door:

"I'm too tired."

We made it though and good thing we did. Summer is almost over and it feels like it never really started. The rain, the overcast skies and the chilly nights are making for a glum time this year.

Mark and I are fully moved into our new apartment and compared to our previous homes, it feels huge! Sometimes, we don't even know where to find each other in here.

And now I'm going to enjoy Ratatat's new album on my sofa.