Thursday, August 30, 2007

Cool...I love this book




You're Watership Down!

by Richard Adams

Though many think of you as a bit young, even childish, you're
actually incredibly deep and complex. You show people the need to rethink their
assumptions, and confront them on everything from how they think to where they
build their houses. You might be one of the greatest people of all time. You'd
be recognized as such if you weren't always talking about talking rabbits.



Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

Alphabet meme

I saw this and stole it...you're to write something you think/like/believe/follow/captures your "essence" for every letter of the alphabet. Feel tagged if you like. I'm too tired to chase you all down today.

Here goes...

Alternatives are often the best way to do something - ordinary is boring
Blessed are the cheesemakers
Cats are better than dogs
Do or do not, there is no try
Eccentricity is my goal in life
Friends keep you going through the rough stuff
Granola bars made from scratch are like a tiny bit of hippie heaven
Happiness is my one real goal in life
Inquiring minds want to know...
J is the love of my life
Kaleidescopes were my favorite toy as a girl
Love makes life better
Money does not
Nobody else has the power to change you except for you...unless there's torture involved
Orion is my favorite constellation
Pulsars fascinate me.
Quasars are something I keep trying to understand but can't...I sort of glaze over during the detaily bits
Realising you are worth it changes everything about how you live your life
Smiling at people makes them smile too
Telling the truth is so much simpler than trying to make up a believable story
Understanding others isn't as important as understanding yourself
Violins give me a headache
Wine is the secret ingredient to a lot of tasty food (in it, not beforehand...well Ok that too)
Xylophones - I want one. A BIG one. I'd play it for hours (well until Jay hid it)
Yellow is my favorite color
Zealous religion is not good. Extremes of belief can lead to very bad things.

Wednesday, August 29, 2007

Best Fish Ever

Had supper and movies with friends Heather & Lisa last night. We made the following, which was, as my friend Heather put it, "f*cking brilliant". So, hold your applause - just go make some...and yes, it really was that good.

Lemon Baked Pickerel

4 fillets of pickerel (~ 1 to 1 1/2 Lb worth), cut in half/deboned
~ 4 T butter
~2 T Mrs. Dash Lemon Pepper Mix (no salt) (or more if ya like)
~2 T dill (ditto)
1 large lemon, sliced thinly
1 small red onion, sliced thinly into rings
olive oil
6 cloves garlic, diced
1 small yellow pepper sliced thinly
tin foil

Tear off four 12" pieces of foil, layering 2 together, brushing olive oil onto one side.
On the 2 foil bits, fold in half, to know where the "pouch" will end. On 1/2 of each pouch, lay out the onion slices flat on the foil, together with the yellow pepper slices (jumble together to make 1 thin layer) and dot with 1/2 of butter. Put 2 fish fillets on top of each pouchy oniony layer and sprinkle spices on top. Scatter garlic on top and dabs of the rest of the butter. Layer the lemon slices on top of the fish. Fold up the foil pouches on the three sides to seal them up and place them on a baking sheet. Bake at 375 for 30-35 minutes.
Remove lemon slices and enjoy yummily with some wild rice, raspberry salad and white wine.
Yum.
Well off you go then...:)

Tuesday, August 28, 2007

SQUEEE!

My friends Trent and Colette (Ok Colette!) just had a beautiful baby girl!
Bree is so very sweet - the little walnut has hatched!

Congratulations my friends! :)

Thanks a whole lot BBC

I broke down and watched Doctor Who last night and man - the guy who wrote the other 2 spooky episodes (Unearthly child and the one about Mdm. Depompadeur) has managed to write another truly creepy show. Great - my childhood nightmares have popped up in the most recent episode. The weeping angels - I swear someone has peeked into my brain and knows how to completely creep me out. I mean, statues that move when you aren't looking and are secretly out to get you with their nasty toothy grabby arms? Nightmare city.
Gak.
And me with a husband who, for a time, moved a cardboard cutout around the house to scare the crap out of me occasionally by me seeing shadowy figures watching me from darkened rooms while I'm home "alone".
Yes. Hilarious.

But hey, I don't need to sleep - I can stay awake and not blink for at least a week.
Then I'll start hallucinating and it won't matter anyways...

Monday, August 27, 2007

I caught you a fish but I eated it

I had an FANTASTIC weekend at the lake.
I got to visit a lot with my folks, playing cards and dominoes and staying up late joking around drinking rum and coke and munching on rice krispie cake like when I was little (no not the rum, just the cake...). I got to cook with my Mom a lot and we ate yummy delicious things all weekend (like blueberry pancakes...mmm...no calories exist at the lake). Best of all, it didn't rain, so I went out fishing at Heart Lake with Dad and J. It's a small lake a short portage from the end of the lake where my parent's have their cabin. It's a nice ride down to the end of the lake and a short hike through the woods, past the old trapper's cabin to Heart Lake. We spent a lovely cloudy day out on the lake in a little boat watching the loons and pelicans and listening to the wind through the trees and hearing the rapids gurgle into the lake, smoking cigars. The fish weren't interested in being our lunch much, but we did manage to catch 3 fish, which was enough for a tasty supper. Both the fish I caught struck the hook right at the edge of the boat, scaring the bejeezus out of me. Heart Lake is rumoured to be ill luck by the local native population...it was only reinforced a while ago, when the trapper who used to live at the cabin got very ill, and when he tried to wander out to get medical help in the midst of the winter he got lost in the woods and kept coming back to his cabin, and was found in the woods later - he is buried there by what is now the ruins of his cabin, as it was where he'd spent his life. It's spooky, as I never told J this legend and on a previous time we were there he went off hiking into the woods and kept being brought back (no matter the direction he went) to the cabin. I told him the omens about the place and the story of the trapper when we went to see the gravesite afterwords and he got goosepimples over it all. ooooh...Spooky nootchies. Despite this, I've always found the place to be very beautiful and peaceful. I find it reassuring he kept being brought back to the cabin...I like to think the trapper is there looking out for us, keeping us from getting lost. He was said to be a kind man who kept to himself, so I can't se why he'd get all grumpy after the fact...:)

It's been ages since I've gotten to go and relax and visit my parents and have such a nice time. There were no plans or obligations and it was so nice to just relax. J and I even got to go for a 2 hour hike through the woods and up to the beach at the middle of the lake. The cabin is one of my favorite places in the whole world and I haven't seen my parents in ages, so it was a good weekend. I always feel refreshed (and way too full) after being there.
Good enough to jump back into the great big workld and get busy on my few days here before I (yay!) get to go back again for another weekend...

Friday, August 24, 2007

Running with my breast friends

I am very excited!
I just signed up to run the Breast Cancer Run for a Cure race here in Saskatoon on Sept. 30. I humbly ask - If anyone would like to pledge to my run, please contact me. You get a tax receipt...and a warm fuzzy feeling...and maybe help cure cancer by raising money for the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation. I'm on a team of tech's and patients from here at the hospital and we'd like to raise as much as we can...this is a cause I really believe in. It's part of what funds what I do and helps so many women.
And I get to run and train with a group of great women.

Bring it on!

Stardust





















J and I went to see Stardust last night.
I highly reccommend it - if I had more time I'd go into greater detail, but I am crazy busy, so my short review is: wonderful - like a good fantasy novel. It might not be in theatres long, so I want to encourage all of you to head out and see this film. It was original, intelligently funny, entertaining, beautiful and imaginitive: A tale of a fallen star, evil sorceresses, a magic land with a dying king, a young man who journeys beyond his own world, and even a flying pirate ship.
It was a wonderful fantasy for adults.
Go and see it.
I'm off to finish work and then it is off to the lake for the weekend...be back later!

Wednesday, August 22, 2007

I ated too much pie

Mmmm...2 1/2 pies down. Just a bit more left for devouring.
Thanks for coming over last night my pie eating friends. Others brought ice cream -let me say that anyone coming to my home bearing ice cream, well, please come again:) Sorry some of you had to miss out - I am sad at your pieless state. Grapecat - I'd send you a pie if I could figure out how...maybe dry ice and overnight international express? :) I remember you gave me a jar of peaches you'd canned yourself one summer...some of the best peaches I've ever had. Can you can a pie? Hmmm...

Yum. It turns out I love peach pie. I make a damn fine peach pie...and can eat a fair bit of it. I mean it's rude to watch people eat right? So when people come over all evening at random times I just couldn't be rude...so I just "had" to have many pieces of pie over the span of the evening.

Yum.

I've saved one to freeze to take up to the lake next weekend to share with my mom & dad and brother and his wife at the lake...and it might still be there by then!

OK. Seriously. Enough about pies.

dum de dum de dum...

tumbleweed rolls by

*checks watch*

So...erm...I'm off for lunch then. To eat...um...something.
Later.

Tuesday, August 21, 2007

Mmmm Mmmm time for pie

Well, last night I finally used up the entire flat of peaches we brought back from an orchard in BC when we were on holidays. They all went ripe at the same time, which was delicious, but believe me - a flat of peaches is a helluva lot of peaches.
So I made 4 peach pies last night from an old family recipe (from J's Aunt Lynn who cooks all things delicious)...even the crust was from scratch (please hold your applause). They've even got little latticy crusts on top and it was all I could do to stop from having a slice for breakfast this morning. I'm excited, as I've never acctually had peach pie before. I always resolved I'd wait till I had good fresh orchard peaches and make one some day, but till now I never got round to it.
And so, tonight is pie party night. We've called all our friends to let them know of our excess pie situation and hopefully they'll come over to our place tonight and have some pie...cuz god knows I can't eat them all by myself.
Although I'm willing to try...

Monday, August 20, 2007

Millions of peaches, peaches for me

In honour of the vast number of peaches being comsumed by me and J at the moment (soon in pie form too), here's the song that's been in my head all day...

Movin to the country gonna eat a lot of peaches
I'm movin to the country I'm gonna eat me a lot of peaches
I'm movin to the country I'm gonna eat a lot of peaches
Movin to the country I'm gonna eat a lot of peaches

Peaches come from a can they were put there by a man
In a factory downtown
If I had my little way I'd eat peaches everyday
Sun soakin bulges in the shade

Movin to the country I'm gonna eat a lot of peaches
Movin to the country I'm gonna eat a lot of peaches
Im movin to the country gonna eat a lot of peaches
Movin to the country gonna eat a lot of peaches

I took a little nap where the roots all twist
Squished a rotten peach in my fist
And dreamed about you woman
I poked my finger down inside makin a little room for an ant to hide
Natures candy in my hand or can or a pie

Millions of peaches peaches for me
Millions of peaches peaches for free
Millions of peaches peaches for me
Millions of peaches peaches for free


If anyone is around anywhere close to our place tomorrow night, Tuesday night is officially declared as "come to my house and put some peach pie in your face" night.
Seriously. I've enough peaches left still that I'm making 4 or 5 pies tonight. And there is a slice with your name on it...

Sunday, August 19, 2007

Why do we fall?

OK...I'm still sick, but I think I'm a little more on the level, with time to think and sneeze and rest a bit.
Sometimes you take a good look at yourself and realise there's some things you don't like and aren't proud of and have to work on and it's a more than a bit daunting. To realise there are things at faul personally can be a shock to the system and I'm a coward, so dealing with personal issues can be very daunting indeed. I'm not at any destination yet, but I think I'll figure out a direction soon...maybe even dig out a compass from the desk and have a go at it.

To quote a wise old butler "Why do we fall? So we can pick ourselves up."

So I'm going to pick myself up...and go make a pie.
Yes, a peach pie. With BC peaches.

Yum.
Later. Thanks for the thoughts guys...

Friday, August 17, 2007

lost in the wilderness

I fell at the moment to be caught up in a loop.
I don't know know what I need to do.
I don't know how to do it.
And yet I keep stumbling upon fundamental character flaws within gmyself that I don't understand, can't halt and have no idea how to reaarange or redirect.
It's like trying to get to a destination without a map, or a description of your destination.
At the moment I feel as though I have failed the important people in my life...that I need to be a better partner and friend. I seem unable to step outside of myself and consider the needs of others sometimes. I'm so afraid of unhappiness and conflict that I hide from it...and I can't deal with it in a way that makes me a partner and not a liability.
I've got a lot on my mind right now...it's all jumbled and hobbled together in a sticky mess and I can't for the life of me make any sense of it.
I don't know why I'm even writing this as it's not like I need advice.
I just need to try and make sense of it all and don't know where to start...

How do I find the road less travelled when I don't even know where I'm going?

Correction - it was this monday's episode!

It was THIS weeks doctor who I need - from monday of this week.
The first episode of the two parter Human Nature by Paul Cornell.
Last weeks about the ship falling into the sun - that one we have...not sure why it taped one and not the other...
It was the one that aired monday.... Oh please please!
Please help? :)

HELP!

So - would anyone happen to have taped last weeks' episode of Dr. Who?
Anyone?
ANyone?
It was the first half of the two parter by Paul Cornell, based on a favorite book of his by the same name - Human Nature. I and J have been waiting forever to see it and for some unknown reason the player didn't record it while we were away so we are SOL. Which sucks as it's about the only episode we've wanted to see all year. And no reason why it didn't record. It just didn't. Bollocks.

If anyone has a tape of it I'd be ever so grateful - the online viewing is so jagged and choppy I can't get thru it, and J is of the sort that once we miss an episode, we're right out for the rest of the season until the DVDs come out - that sucks. No more Doctore who. Meh. Not cool at all.
It is definitely mompey here in my home right now...

Please help.
Please?
I'll make you waffles...

Thursday, August 16, 2007

Venting

OK.
So, I'm trying not to be furious...but after a night of sleep and lunch I'm still mad.
Why?
Well, while we were away a few friends checking on our cats while we were away for 10 days, to be sure they were getting love and food and water.
And, when we got back last night they had NONE.
Not a drop of water or a scrap of food.
I left them 3 bowls of water and two large bowls of food to be on the safe side, in case they couldn't come every other day. I'm glad I did.
They were to be checked on every other day.
And so I raise a hearty WTF to the world?
No food at all...ALL GONE.
I'm not impressed AT ALL. My critters are very important. Knowing I can't trust my friends with things this important to me is very dissapointing...particularly as I do this for them all the time.
I'm wondering how long they were alone with no food...
*sigh*
From now on I'm asking my family to come by, even if it is an imposition.
I'm just glad they're OK...

I should hope so

You Are Rogue

You're reluctantly special. In fact, you long to be normal.
You consider your powers to be a curse, and something you can't control.

Powers: absorbing other people's memories and abilities, weakening and killing people with your touch


I always wanted to be her....hot damn. She was my favorite.
I even wanted the hair for a while in high school - My grandma went grey like that (my mom would have had a cat if I died it back then). I can only hope...

howdydoodleydoo

Well helloooooooo there.
I am finally back from my holiday.
True to form, I've caught a nasty cold while away, but I had a wonderful time and will have time to post about it later. I feel all recharged and happy with life, and had a fantastic time in the woods dancing like a monkey and hearing great music from around the globe.
Right now (unfortunately) I'm back at work after arriving in late last night and have much to catch up on. The world did carry on without me, as it turns out, but there is much for me to catch up on.
So I must run...
Just wanted to say hello and all that and will be back in a bit :)

Sunday, August 05, 2007

with slightly less suck

Well today an't great either, but whatever.
I'm getting ready for Shambhala and trying to see Fringe plays and sleep all at the same time.
whew...
Wish me luck. And if I don't have time to pop back before I go - talk amongst yourselves!
Back in a while!

Saturday, August 04, 2007

reboot

Today has been absolutely awful.
Suffice it to say it's right up there with worst few days ever.
I'd like to start again please.
It's not the day I signed up for...

Friday, August 03, 2007

An open letter to Baker's Secret Deluxe Bakeware

Dear Baker's Secret,

Today I used your deluxe, professional line of non-stick muffin pans.
I have only 4 words to describe my annoying experience with your "guaranteed non-stick bakeware":

Non stick, my ass.

Could you at least make an effort towards producing a quality product?
Do you still stand behind your product or should I just not bother with brand names that used to stand for quality and get back to random picking of the shiniest thing on the shelf when selecting new bakeware?

Ah. That's what I thought.
Good day to you then.

Sincerely,
Geosomin

A toast on a sunny afternoon


To old friends.
To happy memories.
To the thought of many new ones.
Cheers!

Counting down...




Shambhala is in 5 days...we're leaving in 4.
So much to do!
BUT I am no longer at work and hot damn, I may have a lot to do, but I can't wait.
No more work until the 16th...that is nice.

Today and tomorrow are food prep and finishing (I hope I hope) my new and improved tank girl costume 2.0.
I have the TANK belt (just made yesterday by my great friend Jason), and also (because I like obscure costumes to see who is as thoroughly geeky as I am) I have a sarah Silverman thing too - a cookie party T shirt I had made up (again by Jason after I geekily drew out the logo in photoshop), and I'll wander around with what looks like a bottle of orange cough syrup when I wear it. Free cookies to anyone who actually knows who I am...
And now, I must work out and go bake stuff and finish off anything world like and officially important things before I figure out how to strap 2 missiles to my chest in a way that still allows me to dance and hopefully not put too many eyes out...
I accept the challenge!

Wednesday, August 01, 2007

fashionably unconscious

It's very hot today.
What did I see in the hall?
A student in a miniskirt, and high heels with LEG WARMERS.

Leg warmers?
People, I remember wearing those in the 80s as a kid...to keep my legs warm...after skating.
Not in the hall at uni with heels. Next thing you know big hair and neon will be back... (or is it and I"m just not paying attention?)

*sigh*
Am I getting older or do I just have no sense of style?
I prefer to think I have a bit....but this sort of thing, like a toque with a brim - well it worries me.

Someone asked me the other day "what is your style?" ...to which I replied "well I jsut wear what I like". It's true. If I see something I like I wear it.
I'm sure I'll be a batty old lady with mismatched socks and funny hats when I'm older, but hey - I'll be happy - and I won't overheat in some silly fashion trend...

Cunning Plans

 Life is wierd ya know. It seems a lot of things have been hitting me hard lately. Been distant from people, including my partner who is dea...