Category Archives: Food

Recap

Hurrah, it’s finally raining! Which means, of course, that the mild sinus headache I’ve had all day has blossomed into what threatens to become a migraine.

So, the quick entry: Had a terrific evening of cider and relaxation with girlfriends at the local pub on Friday night; I ended up going home early because of a headache brought on by who knows what. Saturday I led an experimental meditation workshop on the weekend which by all acounts was a success. So successful, in fact, that instead of lunching together afterwards we all went our separate ways, drowsy and warm fuzzy-like. Sunday was wine and cheese with friends, and the joys of using the remote for my camera for the first time in four years (I kid you not).

I have an important idea brewing in my head concerning my future. It’s not quite fully formed yet; still vague. It seems important, though. I’ll let it incubate for a while longer.

Downs and Ups

Yesterday was good and bad for many reasons, most of which I will not go into. I will summarise it all by mentioning the following highlights:

~ I work with the best gang of people any woman could work with. Anyone who gives me loonies to put into a parking meter so that I can keep hanging around on my day off, simply because I slept horribly and felt cranky but didn’t want to be alone, is automatically nominated to demi-deity status in my world. Brenda, Tamu: you rock. And Dimitri, thanks for the tissues.

~ My husband finally got paid for the freelance work he did at Easter, which came right after I learned that my own little source of freelance income has indefinitely been put on hold, right on the verge of a nice new project to which I was looking forward to devoting ten to twenty hours a week. The gods taketh away, and the gods giveth.

~ I had chocolate mousse cake for dessert last night. Mmm.

~ And finally, at orchestra, I pulled off the Haydn with some sort of semi-capable style, and then proceeded to sight-read the Mozart with panache and 98% accuracy. Go me. For someone who hates Eine Kleine Nachtmusik and refuses to listen to it, I knew it pretty well. Then again, Mozart is so annoyingly perfect that I could have closed my eyes and played the cello line by prediction alone and still hit it dead on.

Looking at the writing I’ve been posting over at Owldaughter – Read, I’ve realised that I haven’t written short fiction in about eight years. As I’ll have more free time on my hands, I’ve decided to challenge myself to write one short story per week. I need to work on my ability to tell a story in 1,200 to 1,800 words alone. Besides, when I’ve finished a short story, it can be mailed off in submission somewhere, and maybe someday someone will even accept one.

At Tamu’s direction, I’ll also be working up a proposal for both my non-fiction work on alternative spirituality, as well as And By Many Other Names. I received a lecture on the necessity of selling oneself, a topic about which I’ve expressed my dismal and ineffectual flounderings before. She made it sound easier. Baby steps.

I see that I forgot to mention that I’m convinced the designs for the seagulls in Finding Nemo were lifted straight from Nick Park’s brain. Consider it done.

Phrase of the day about which to chortle: The obligation to tell long stories is more terrible than you might imagine. Even Scheherazade might stumble. And she was a far better word whore than I. From Caitlin R. Kiernan, of course.

Today

My husband wrenched his back somehow, so his plans for the day fell apart. To cheer him up, I told him he could take me out to the West Island to dig through second-hand bookstores. He countered with getting home-made ice cream. It was a deal.

I didn’t find any of the out-of-print books that I’m looking for – I’d rather find them around here than buy them second-hand over the Internet – but I did find three mysteries I’ve been reluctant to buy new that are on my to-read list. That plus the peanut butter-chocolate ice cream made it all worthwhile.

Yes, Virginia, I’m Still Anti-Social

We just got back from buying groceries, and for kicks my husband tossed a box of Sugar Crisp into the basket. We opened it when we got home for a quick nibble while we put the groceries away, and dear gods, it’s just the taste I remember from the isolated encounters I’ve had here and there in the past. How on earth to kids get away with eating this candy for breakfast? I’d ration it out as a treat, or dessert.

Although I had a wonderful class on Saturday discussing films, I’m still in that odd anti-social mood, complete with persistent headache. I’m not fit company for man or beast, as my cats have plainly shown me. The light hurt my eyes all weekend too, which was absolutely no help when it came to trying to read or sit down at the computer. This may or may not have something to do with removing and washing the front windows. The amount of filth that came off them was absolutely disgusting. I’m betting they haven’t been washed in well over two years. The light quality has certainly changed in the living room.

And in an effort to help strengthen my bad wrist, I picked up a 2 lb weight at Canadian Tire yesterday. I’ve been doing over and underhand curls with it while I read, and it feels great. My husband had to remind me to work the other wrist too, just to balance things out. We’ll see how things develop.

Yup. Doing some serious withdrawing, in case you hadn’t noticed. These are the highlights of my life.

Did I mention I woke up at 3.30 AM and decided to research Norse deities, since sleep was denied me? And that I received my new Medicare card in the mail?