Turistas, Go Home!

I found this list of movies about Americans in trouble abroad and have been watching a different one each night.

So far I've watched:

1. The Beach. I saw this movie when it first came out in 2000, it reminded me so much of my backpacking days, especially the music. Except I never found the beach, or maybe the beach is in all of us, or maybe there is no beach, or maybe the beach...ah, forget it.

2. Transsiberian. I like this movie a lot. I saw about 3/4 of it when it first came out and was pleasantly surprised to see that there was a whole other ending than what I remembered. As in, an entire other 1/4 of the movie!

3. Midnight Express. I'd only ever heard of this movie and glad I finally watched it. Man is it violent, I had to cover my eyes a lot. There is one scene that is particularly intense, I can't imagine acting that part out, very violent!

4. Brokedown Palace. Midnight Express is way better! I'll be honest, I still don't know who did it.

Next is Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason. I need something a little lighter before I go back into the heavy stuff.

Second snow day this week!

It's Nuit Blanche tonight in Montreal. The four activities I want to do are:

• swim at the Olympic pool with snorkel and mask to see the underwater art
• flashlight tour of the Redpath museum
• see the nocturnal animals at the Biodome
• meet up with Mark for the SoCalled show at the NFB

Seeing as I'm not much of a night owl...I'm not sure how many of these, if any (!!) I'll actually do!

I want to get a new (to me) dining set for my dining room, but I can't decide what direction to take. There are so many cute cheap sets out there!

Which would you choose? Vote over there on the left-hand side!

A.

B.

C.

Just bear with me...

One more, just to drive it home, especially starting at the 0:24 mark, ha!

Capilano!

Molly's Reach in Gibsons, BC!

Guess the tv show!

Mr. Bones feels rattlin' - that's a good one!

As I've said in the past, there is really only one Christmas album to listen to at this time of year: Bing Crosby's White Christmas. It's. The. Best. For the most part, I do not listen to any other Christmas songs. Bing and the Andrews Sisters singing Jingle Bells is awesome! So when Margaret suggested I watch White Christmas, starring Bing Crosby et. al., I was shocked that I'd never even considered watching it before.

Well, I watched it yesterday. Check out the gem of a joke at 1:20 - pretty macabre!

My Top 5 Favourite Christmas Movies!

In no particular order:

Uncle Buck (1989) - though not technically a Christmas movie, it does take place in the winter and you can catch on CTV around this time of year.

It's A Wonderful Life (1946) - One of my all-time favourite movies. I'll be honest though, it's not the same watching it without Dana. I haven't watched since she moved to Australia!

Elf (2003) - The funniest Christmas movie; it has so many great lines in it.

The Holiday (2006) - The best Chick Flick Christmas movie.

National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989) - Classic!

Awwww!

I have taken some really great train rides. Many years ago, I travelled 1532km on the Ghan form Adelaide to Alice Springs, Australia.

http://rac.com.au/Travel/RAC-Travel-eNews/2009/April-09/Ghan.aspx

I also travelled 730km on the Southern Spirit from Adelaide to Melbourne, in Australia.

http://www.news.com.au/travel/holiday-ideas/uluru-and-eastern-states-linked-by-rail-cruise/story-e6frfqd9-1225829575384

I also travelled about 200km from Greymouth to Christchurch in New Zealand on the TranzAlpine which passes through Arthur's Pass National Park, beautiful!

http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/media/photo/tranzalpine-train

And leaving on January 1st, 2011 I'm travelling for my very first time in a sleeper on the Canadian from Toronto to Vancouver!

http://www.canamerica.ie/holiday.php?id=263

Coffee, coffee, coffee, coffee, coffee, coffee

, coffee, coffee, coffee

, coffee, coffee, coffee, coffee, coffee

It's all people seem to talk about! Me included. I've given up coffee a few times and loved the freedom from it, but missed it's warmth, flavour and energy jolt. The last time I gave it up, Mark's birthday rolled around and he was gifted* a fancy burr grinder and espresso machine, bringing the number of coffee machines in my home to more than I can count on one hand.

The scent of freshly ground coffee beans, freshly pressed coffee and beautifully frothed milk was too much and I've been drinking at least one every day. But this weekend, I have conquered my addiction once again! No coffee yesterday, none today....let's see how long it lasts!

*I never thought I'd use the word "gifted" but it seems to be all the rage!

Gaz Métro has recently improved their "customer environment" for me! I'm not sure yet what this means, but so far, I know that I no longer have to look up my account number every time I want to log in, I can now create a username! This is great, because it was a hassle to have to find my account number somewhere so I can see how much my bill is.

However, creating a username is as far as I can get. You see, to attach my Gaz Métro account to my new username I need my Gaz Métro account number AND the number of my most recent bill. But I can't get that number because I can't access my bills because I can't complete the registration because I don't know the number of my most recent bill because I can't access my bills and so on.

Gah!

I like Bell's system more. They don't attach or include my bill in their emails every month, but they do include how much my bill is in the email, so I all I have to do is pay it.

Boy, this is a boring blog post. Wish I was in Bali like some people.

Mark and I took a stroll through Parc-nature du Bois-de-l’Île-Bizard the other day, here are some photos!

Have you heard of.....THE NOSE PAD KING? I almost never wear my glasses, so that pair that I have that you've never seen me wear, I've had for a good 5 or 6 years. As you can well imagine, the nose pads were wearing thin, as they do. One of them broke and fell off! I thought to myself, "Now's my chance to get some fancy new glasses!" but I just couldn't do it. I don't wear them enough to merit spending hundreds on new ones so I did the next best thing: I ordered a couple of 13mm HD asymmetrical 'D' shaped silicone nose pads!

I had no idea nose pads could be such big business and there is a King of nose pads running the show! You got your plastic nose pads, plug-in nose pads, round nose pads, slide-on nose pads, rimless nose pads, teardrop shaped nose pads, titanium nose pads, asymmetrical nose pads, symmetrical nose pads, the list goes on and on.

I love Bircher Muesli! When I was in Australia in August, my sister introduced me to Carman's Natural Bircher Muesli which I just loved. I bought a box to bring home, but I finished it long ago.

What is Bircher Muesli? Wikipedia wasn't too much help when I did my own research to figure out the difference between regular muesli and Bircher muesli. But I think Bircher usually has dried fruit, toasted nuts and honey. The traditional method of preparation is to mix the 500g box of Bircher muesli with 1000g of yogurt and a grated apple.

Edit: I actually mix all this together and keep in the fridge the whole week. I take out the amount I want each morning for breakfast and maybe add a dab of peanut butter and some cinnamon. By Friday, the mixture is really tasty and the texture really pleasing.

At my sister's place, we prepared it as if it were oatmeal (in hot water with a mashed banana) and it was delicious. When I got home, I decided to prepare the box I had brought in the suggested way, with the yogurt and apple. It was just so delicious!

So, in the last two weeks, I've been experimenting in making my own Bircher muesli: oats, raisins, walnuts, almonds, sunflower seeds, tons of cinnamon and a few butterscotch chips. It's good, but it's no Carman's.

Carman, when will you make your products available in Canada? Or allow me to order it online?

Outer Great Barrier Reef!