Come see how pretty I look!

I finally got around to making a real layout/I played around with the templates and came up with something I like. I took the background picture myself. It's some foxgloves at Stanley Park in Vancouver (just in case someone thought I meant the Stanley Park in Kitchener). I would love a fancier camera than the one I have, but it's just not in the cards. That being said, the quality can only be so good when the maximum file size for backgrounds is 300 kilobytes. Still, it looks freaking awesome.

I'm getting closer to being able to make a decent loaf of bread. I found a different recipe and made modifications so that it wouldn't be too sweet or too dry. It tastes alright, but I can never seem to slash it correctly. It always ends up torn by the oven spring on one side with pretty slash marks on the top. I'm wondering if the water I'm brushing on them isn't cold enough or if the slashes are too short. Maybe I should actually take a trip to Home Depot and get a pack of razor blades (and cheesecloth while I'm at it) because my kitchen knives, while very sharp, are still not sharp enough for the task. Maybe the flour I'm using sucks, or I get too tired to knead in enough flour (although that's not the worst thing because too little flour is always better than too much). Maybe it's all of those factors. Trial and error, dammit.

I really miss waking up in the morning, doing something productive during the day, coming home in the evening and sleeping at night. I never thought I would. There is nothing worth doing after 11 pm aside from this job, which, although part time, is wearing me out. I hear friends of mine in other jobs and even coworkers who don't work in the kitchen complain of boredom. What a luxury it must be to complain of boredom and get paid for it! I'll take that over nine hours without even standing still for a second and waking up with legs and feet so sore I can barely balance on them. I am so ready to be done with that for good but I can't afford it yet.

It's late. Gross.

Back again!

I'll start this time with a bit of humour. I am totally serious when I say I will disown anyone gullible enough to buy this product:

http://www.amazon.com/review/RTADRUSXBGGWU/ref=cm_cr_pr_viewpnt#RTADRUSXBGGWU

This is the better of its two reviews. The other is just as sarcastic (I hope) but this says it all. I get it, it isn't easy to find 18 pounds of obsidian that you can craft into a perfect, nicely polished sphere, but after an unsurprisingly brief search on eBay I was able to find decorative obsidian for much cheaper. Here's the thing, though - this is not sold as a decoration. The seller claims this ball of dried-up volcano jizz is supposed to protect you from harm just by sitting there - after all, 18 pounds is too heavy for a lot of people to throw at their enemies effectively.

Oh, no! I should stay away from these guys - the have the Obsidian Ball 04 Rainbow Crystal Black Volcanic Glass Protection Stone Healing Therapy Super Deluxe 18 Lbs. Spiritual Orb 8"! I'll spontaneously combust if I get too close!

I'm not the first to say that crystal healing is a load of crap. Scientific organizations have humoured practitioners with studies that have only ever concluded that it does nothing. Hell, even the Catholic church, which has built up a reputation over the last 2000-odd years for not making sense at the best of times, says not to partake in it because crystals have no intrinsic power.

Hint: They are correct about that.

While crystals do produce an electrical current when compressed, the few practical uses for that effect include record player needles and devices that measure pressure, force and acceleration - buying an expensive crystal, bathing it, leaving it out in the sun, sleeping with it, feeding it, talking to it and blowing your nose on it will only reassure you that you are fucking insane. It will not make all of your problems disappear, unless, of course, your only problems are that you have too much money and too much time on your hands.

TL;DR: Crystal healing is the Pet Rock of alternative medicine.

Back to earth...

By the way, I forgave the Catholic church for most of their infractions when I found out that a Catholic priest originally came up with the Big Bang. It's true. Look it up if you don't believe me. Step two: gay marriage.

It's looking like I'll have a second job on Saturdays busing tables at the gay bar. The shifts end later than at Williams, but knowing that it will only be on Saturday and not two random days of the week will help me prepare for it, I'll never have to work late on a weekday during the school year and since my roommate works there and has a car, she can drive me home. Besides that, the gay bar is a good time. There are few other places where you can have the valuable experience of hearing a DJ say, "First person to show me a Prince Albert wins a prize!"

For those of you who have to look up what a Prince Albert is, don't go right to Google Images if you're squeamish.

As for the garden, it's been quite underwhelming lately. The marigold seedlings I had all died, the lettuce bolted and I cut back the stalk and it's already starting to regrow, the strawberries are still producing, the tomato plant has past its peak, the carrots are stunted but they taste fine, the sunflowers have buds on them, the herbs are doing fine, I have a fair amount of dried chamomile saved up (and lots of seeds), and the tea is taking its time to germinate as expected.

And that's it. Time for bed.

Maybe I should post more frequently or something.

Between the last time I posted and now, my marigold seeds started sprouting. The tea seeds are taking their time and the lettuce is now at a point that I can eat it. I take off a leaf every day for sandwiches. I've eaten quite a few of the strawberries and many more of the cherry tomatoes, and dried a fair amount of chamomile flowers. I'm already thinking about what I want to plant next year. I may not know where I exactly I'll be living, but it will have some outdoor space to plant some food and it will not be a basement.

I checked out my audience statistics a while ago and I've had three pageviews from Russia. Who are these Russians/this Russian who has viewed my page three times?

Just checked again and found one from Germany and one from Argentina.

It's certainly not a bad thing, just unexpected. I think I'll leave it alone for a while and see what happens. Or maybe I won't leave it alone for a while, since I don't anticipate becoming less curious any time soon and I'll still be able to see what happens if I don't leave it alone.

I'm in the midst of knitting a scarf. It's the second thing I've ever knitted and it's looking awesome. The first thing was a coaster that gets narrower towards the top because I was actually knitting it tightly enough for the last 9/17 of it.

This does mean that I counted the rows and reduced the fraction.

The ends are going to be a checkered stockinette pattern and the middle is whatever stockinette-based pattern I feel like. It's looking awesome so far - knitting is very mechanical in nature and I just so happen to be mechanically oriented. One of these days I'm going to get some different kinds of needles and learn how to knit things that are not scarves or made with just knit and purl stitches. I figure if I'm going to have a hobby, why not have one that results in a cheap article of clothing?

I'm probably using the wrong-sized needles. I bought them from a store that was closing down and the biggest ones I could find as a pair were 4.5mm.

I suppose I'll end it there. I'll have more to say at a better time of day. Goodnight, world.

No Marigolds, Gromit!

Yes, the title means the marigolds still haven't germinated. I'd like them to bloom before the summer is over... Everything else is flourishing, though, and I've started drying the chamomile in a pasta strainer.

I'd be at work right now if I felt any better. I'm not quite sure what happened myself because I felt fine until the first hour at work. I started to feel weak and thought it was just because I was hungry, but when I went for my break, my stomach hurt and I couldn't keep my dinner down. I do feel a bit better now - not 100%, but since I prepare meals at work it's probably for the best that I went home in case it is contagious.

I'm starting to use Opera (the browser) and I think I'll keep it. It runs pretty fast compared to the other ones I've used, which would include MSIE, Firefox, Chrome and Netscape.

Wow, when did I last use Netscape? Almost a decade ago, if not a bit more than that. Do people still use Netscape? Wikipedia says it was discontinued in 2008. I wonder if the latest version still plays the meteor animation while the page is loading.


I still find myself going to Firefox every so often, mainly because it is still technically my main browser and when other applications use the internet, they open Firefox. Not a huge deal. I still need it because a handful of sites don't work so well in Opera, but not enough to bother me. Not that anyone is really interested in which browser I use.

I went to check my referring sites on the Blogger dashboard just for shits. Turns out this blog made its way to Stumbleupon somehow. I signed up a few minutes ago to try to find it, but I couldn't. Weird.

Another thing I've started using is Wish. Basically, you make a wish list and earn rewards based on your activity. I've already been rewarded with this. The funny thing is even though I like it, I didn't really want it badly, I just wished for it as a favour to the person who added it. Out of the three people who wished for it, she was the only one who didn't get it, which I found weird because one of the ways in which you can get rewards is by having someone who follows you wish for something you added. Stupid Paypal wouldn't let me transfer the rebate to my bank account because it was too low, but I was able to put it towards one of my boyfriend's birthday presents.

I'm not saying what it is because I know he reads this and it will ruin the surprise.

I should probably be in bed, but I am so used to being up later than this that I wouldn't be able to sleep anyway. Hopefully I'll get enough OSAP this year that I'll be able to sort-of quit/only work a few 4-hour shifts when I'm needed and not until close. That would be great.

Over the last few days...

I've been meaning to post more. I've been going back and forth between Waterloo and Whitby over the last week and a bit and I just haven't got around to it. I will predictably start with the garden.

The tea plant came in the day after I made my last post. All five seeds are planted and hopefully they will all have germinated by September. Apparently, it takes at least a month and I have to keep them moist. Not having to pay for tea in three years will be amazing. Speaking of tea, I forgot to take some oolong from home before I left...

I now have more strawberry fruits, blossoms and buds than I care to count. I won't even bother counting the tomatoes. The chamomile is also blooming like crazy and I have enough fresh herbs to last a while. The sunflowers are getting big, but the marigolds don't seem to want to germinate - apparently, putting plastic wrap over the pot will prevent the soil from drying out too much as long as you remove it once they sprout. Perhaps I'll try that.

As for other things, take a guess as to what this is.

If you guessed a blueberry and cherry Kuchen, you're right! I made one last night. Here is a picture of it from farther away. It looks much more appealing from that distance.

I didn't get a picture of it before it ended up half-eaten because it looked and smelled so damn good. Tasted just as good, too. I got the recipe from this book here:

Isn't that cover ridiculous? Closeup on the photo of the authors:

Oh my. Now, this picture was taken from my camera phone, so it doesn't quite capture how ridiculous this is. But seriously, look at that hair! Look at that shirt! (Or pillowcase?) Look at those necklaces! I can't even identify the era this book was written by their clothes. I just can't bring myself to believe that was ever in style. I can imagine those ladies looking at it all these years later and saying, "What were we thinking?" Perhaps they still dress that way. That is scary to think about.

My curiosity got the better of me and I looked them up on Google images. They don't. Existential crisis averted.

Just before I left to go back to Waterloo, there was one small piece left. I had three pieces myself. I brought back with me my mom's like-new pastry cutter that she used just once when I was a baby (if I was even born then). The next thing I use it for will be buttermilk biscuits, which I will have with my breakfast over the next few days.

If you have not yet figured it out, I like baking and making fun of out-of-style outfits on cookbook covers. I'm pretty good at both.

And that's it for tonight. I am tired.

Took me long enough.

This time, I'm writing at a reasonable hour. I stay up late because my job keeps me up at night and I just can't rearrange my sleep schedule a few times a week. Hopefully the new Walmart going in down the street will give me a call so I can change that. I miss being able to wake up in the morning without feeling gross.

So, what's new...

Of course, my mind goes right to the balcony garden, but I can't help myself. I love it and I'll hate the winter even more this year.

The tea plant seeds have yet to arrive. They must be stuck in customs. Until they finally do, I'll keep checking every the mail box day. I want to plant them, dammit!

I thought I'd only be growing food, but on Thursday I caved and bought some flower seeds to bring in the bees. I planted dwarf varieties of marigolds and sunflowers. Today, three of the sunflowers poked their little heads out of the soil - so much for seven days to germinate! Sunflowers are my favourite flower and it will break my heart to have to thin them in a few weeks, but I suppose that's better than letting the roots get tangled.

The chamomile is starting to flower like crazy. I'm going to have so much tea by the time the summer is over. I'll have to buy a small window screen to dry the flowers on. Since I cut strawberry runner, the mother plant has blossomed like crazy, and even the baby has two buds of its own. I counted 24 strawberries - fruits, blossoms or buds - in total so far. I can't wait to eat them.

I had to thin the lettuce a week ago from three plants to two, so I put the whole plant I tore out on a sandwich. It will be a while before I can eat any more of it, but it was satisfying. I still have yet to figure out how to make a decent loaf of bread, but I'll get there. Eventually. The recipe I keep using and modifying calls for a tablespoon of yeast for one loaf, which I think is way too much. Once I figure it all out, I'm going to make a sourdough starter and start using that instead.

Aside from food and plants, I've been asked to substitute with the Cambridge Symphony Orchestra for their concert on Friday. It's opera excerpts and it just so happens to include one of my favourite scenes in all opera - the Te Deum from Tosca.

Cornell MacNeil (RIP) was the best Scarpia ever. You can't even look at him - that's how you know he did it right.

Seriously, I'm excited. This makes up for that horrible production of Tosca that I saw in Rome with my high school. Never again will I regret being sober at an opera quite so much as I did when it was finally over. They say that if a theatre is about to fail financially, putting on Tosca will save it - not that one. I went to look it up later only to find that it shut down and now houses one of those "Occupy" movements that seem to have gone out of style now.

How bad was it? Well, the singers were good, and the set was decently decorated, but even the condensed version of Tosca was too ambitious for this theatre, which was better suited to the more economical genre of opera seria (a type of Baroque opera that was popular when the theatre was built). By that, I mean the theatre was too small. The pit could not comfortably fit a full-sized orchestra inside it, so they just used a bunch of keyboards. Just imagine how hilarious a timpani roll sounds on a keyboard! It was enough to ruin it.

The moral of the story: when you go to see an opera, call the theatre before you buy the tickets to make sure they are using a real orchestra. Not that you should have to...

One of these days I'll get around to taking pictures of the balcony garden. In the mean time, have a wonderful day, everyone!

The next day...

Is it just me or has Toronto been a trainwreck in the last few days? I'm glad I haven't been there for either of them. As a side note, I had a dream I lived in an apartment that was attached to the Eaton Center the other night.

As I type, some homemade ginger muffins are in the oven. They smell divine and I can't wait to eat one.

Anyway, I picked up my free box of John Frieda Precision Foam Hair Colour in medium golden blonde at Shoppers. It that was the lightest blonde they had. It turned out to be a coppery colour in the end, but I actually like it. My hair is really thick and strong and always takes longer to colour than it says on the box, which may be the reason it turned out darker than I expected. The box said 20 minutes, but I had it in for almost an hour. I probably could have kept it in longer, but I was worried about overprocessing it.

No exciting updates today on the garden front, but if I feel like it and have time before work, I might just post some pictures of it. I'm pretty proud of it so far.

There is a walking path near my apartment that I like to take whenever I can, and I did on the way home from picking up the box. It is covered by trees and has a lot of wild rhubarb. When it matures I'll pick some and make a pie. There are lots of trilliums, but the flowers were already wilted when I discovered them - kind of abates the barely existing temptation of being all badass and picking one.

Anyone curious about how I came across my free samples that I mentioned yesterday, I found them with the help of a site called Munchkin Sandwich. Click on your country in the sidebar and knock yourself out. I expect this to be a means of cutting down on my living expenses, which is important when you're a dirt poor university student like myself.

My muffin was delicious, by the way. Who needs coherency when you have a good muffin?

Anyway, it is quite late and I really need to try to go to bed earlier than, say, an hour and a half from now - not so easy to do when you sometimes work this late. But since that will be delayed by the fact that I now have a cat on my lap, I might as well write a bit more before heading off. My apologies if it is dreadfully boring, but nothing exciting has really happened in my life recently.

I'm in the midst of finding a second/replacement job. My only complaints about my current job are that I don't get enough hours and the late nights are really doing me in. There will be a new Walmart going in at a nearby plaza in the next few weeks, and I'm hopeful that I will get in there.

And now that the cat is finished with laying down on my lap, I can get to bed. Goodnight, world! Catch you later.