Isn't It a Shame?

Richard:

Many countries take claim to geographic and social diversity. Few however can substantiate those claims as well as Canada - home to lush British Columbia, the harsh and unforgiving Rockies, the vast and expansive Prairies, the sturdy but gentle Canadian Shield/Laurentiens, and the tumultuous character-rich East Coast.

At the geographic heart of this multi-faceted country lies one region above the rest: the Prairies. Here the great plains lie, far as the eye can see. An ocean of pale complexion; wheat waving wantonly in the wind, beckoning you home. Cattle, mottled in their blacks and browns grazing gracefully, glutons in their own right.

Roam Richard - feel the breeze at your back. See the sun set soothingly, miles distant. Embrace the freedom. Sense the spaciousnous. Dream of the dignity that hard work earns.

Farm girl, farm girl..will you be mine?

After some prompting from our friend Karen, I decided to undertake the challenge of a lifetime - making carrot soup.

Now, some of you might scoff, claiming that carrot soup making is a skill for beginners. You might claim that this simple undertaking could be completed by a child...

I beg to differ. Consider what goes into a soup...the chopping, the tireless efforts...the simmering...making the base...pureeing...oh, the labours of love!

Well - my soup was a glowing success. Carrot, cauliflower, ginger, milk. Yum. Yum. YUM!

i) Hanson was a band in the mid 90s.
ii) They had a song called mMmmM Bop.
iii) They looked like 3 twelve year old girls / a girl at my highschool that was friends with Jerome(hence the nickname "Hanson").
....
iv) Jump forward 10 years
v) Hanson is still a band, playing a major venue near you soon!

Yes, I kid you not...while checking out the Toronto Concert scene, I duly noted the soon to be sold out listing for Hanson...*shudders*

When carrots go on sale 10 pounds for $2,
expect me to buy.

Problem is,
what to do with 100 carrots?

Eat 10 a day, rabbit like?
Buy a horse to feed them to?

Nay; make carrot cake.

----
Mind you, while this sounds like flawless logic, it is worth noting that carrot cake really doesn't use up all that much carrot...like 3-4 carrots worth. Regardless, Laura and I made carrot cake yesterday, my first ever...and man, it was scrumptious.

The recipe called for raisins, walnuts, coconut and pineapple...so it ended up being quite a "meaty" cake, but I'm convinced I should quit my day job and become a baker.

So I signed up for an ultimate frisbee league. The first game was tonight, and I had an absolute ridiculously good time. It's kind of funny...there's only 2 teams in the league as of right now, so essentially it's the same two teams against each other every week. One legitimate teams of people that know each other, and one team of randoms, to which I belong.

Well, the teams ended up being basically exactly even(final score 15-12), and I'm seriously impressed with the calibre of play. I'm probably in the bottom 5-10 people there(which I guess out of 16 or so isn't really saying much). I need to get back in better shape...I was really zonked by the end and not able to keep up with the guys was marking.

The highlight for me though was this...one of the guys on my team's girlfriend was there to watch. She's a 4th year bio-chem student at McMaster, and I might add, simply for the record, that good lord almighty she was an attractive one. AND she was seriously good at frisbee. (yes, this IS going somewhere)....

Now, I probably shouldn't repeat this, but I simply have to because I was so thoroughly amused by it...if you've never played frisbee, the brilliance of it will be lost on you. During one of my breaks subbing off we were chatting and I asked her what she was doing in Toronto if she went to school at McMaster..she said it was her boyfriend's birthday today and that she'd come down to the frisbee game to "give him a good lay-out...and get really dirty". My lord I love frisbee girls...(a lay-out is a diving catch, generally resulting in one's shirt being dirt/grass stained).

Listening to: Interpol - Obstacle 2....does anyone else seriously wonder if the singer is the guy from Tragically Hip? Gord Downie?
On an associated note visit >http://www.wienerart.net I kid you not, this is Gord Downie, the musician from Tragically Hip's website.

Anyways, the reason for this post...I can't decide if this is Brilliant or a bad idea. Are kids more likely to eat up? Or more likely to not want to eat because it'll ruin their hello kitty?

I did my own private Terry Fox run today...ran down to the waterfront and back...was out for abotu 30 mins and figure I probably did somewhere between 3-4km, although I'm just guessing.

Talked to Karen today for the first time in ages, which was wonderful. I really do cherish my friendships with all of you so much!

It is often said that a relationship brings out the best in both people, and that the "whole is greater than the sum of the parts".

The same can be said for mashups(well atleast most of them). A mashup is when a DJ mixes 2 or more songs into one, often resulting in seriously catchy tunes.

The earliest example of this that I think we'd all be aware of is that wonderful mix of Kris Kross and Britney Spears.

Today I discovered perhaps the internet's greatest horde of mashups. This cornacopia can be explored at your leisure here(yes, 2300 streamable mashups in one place!). The only thing that would make this site better would be if the songs could be downloaded rather than streamed...

Post a comment letting me know which ones are your favourites!

The internet is a never ending stream of fascination for me.

I was trying to remember the name of the place the fairy takes the kids in Peter Pan, and couldn't for the life of me think of it. Wonderland? No, that's not it...

So, to google I go, looking for "Peter Pan".

The first result: You need to see this with your own eyes. Make sure you have the volume on to appreciate the true wonderfulness of this site. In case you don't catch this...dude is 51 years old.

I'm the lucky WINNNNNNAAAAR!

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I am the winner of my first ever ebay auction. I have NO idea how this happened...very spontaneous, but I decided to buy a bike from the Toronto Police Auction.

The bike, in all it's glory can be seen here(pictures and all)

Now the question is...will I like it? Or will I have blown my money for nothing? I figure it's a better bike than I could get for the same price at canadian tire, plus it is "used" and "broken in" and hopefully less likely to get stolen.

(p.s., Yes, you are correct, this *IS* my third post of the day!)

It's going up to 31 degrees here in Toronto today, and is supposed to be quite hot all week...the weatherman described it as a "Scorcher" this morning on tv.

Our brethren a few provinces down however were facing summer weather of a whole other kind...45 centimeters of snow

Now, I don't mean this to sound crude...but as I was walking into work this morning, I couldn't get this question out of my head(and I'm SURE many of you have wondered the same thing....)

What does squirrel poop look like?

This is one of those headlines that just makes you do a double take.

I kid you not.

CTV Apologizes: Loucien Bouchard Not Dead

I rented Beyond The Sea yesterday to watch with Laura...

I think you'd all probably really enjoy it...it's a musical/biography of Bobby Darin, staring Kevin Spacey. Now, unfortunately I fell asleep about halfway through the movie and missed some of the best parts...but the chunk of it I saw I really enjoyed. I'm probably going to pay the late fees on the movie so I can watch the rest of it.

It's a very musical, and seriously catchy movie. But the thing that wowed me the most is that Kevin Spacey actually did all the singing himself. I was WOWED. The entire time Laura kept going "it CAN'T be him singing" and I'd go "but it SOUNDS exactly like Kevin Spacey...". SO I researched it this morning, and he DID infact do the singing himself. This raises to coolness factor of the movie substantially in my opinion.

Anyways, yes...that's all : )

Last night I went out to Woodbine with a friend of mine from work to partake in my "maiden race"(read: first time gambling on horse racing).

While I had a really good time, I doubt I'll be going back any time soon...it's a really long commute out there(an hour plus on the streetcar/subway/bus), and it seems SO...haphazard. Like, the favourites only win about 30% of the time, and the odds of any given horse winning are adjusted dynamically based on the number of bets on all the different horses...so really, there's just too much information that all ends up being essentially useless, and you're more or less picking a horse based on it's name.

Then, the even more frustrating thing is that I had 4 "winning" bets during the night, but still ended up down money. Unless you pick a horse to win(rather than to "place" or "show" - top 2 or top 3), the payouts are pretty low...

Regardless, good times!

That will be all for now : )
(oh and thank you sara for the magnificent calligraphy)

Leamington(yes, Alison's Leamington, atleast as far as I can tell) is cracking down. They've had enough.

They take their garage-saling very seriously.

Had a good weekend! Friday I hung out with laura...just chillaxed, watched part of I 'Heart' Huckabees, but thought it was really weird, so we bailed. Saturday Simon was in town, and Justine Simon and I went out for sushi at Asahi. As always I was rightly and duly impressed. We had an interesting conversation about health regulations and how chinese restaurants do or don't meet up. Simon and Justine both thought it was perfectly normal for someone(just any old anyone) to walk in off the street and into the kitchen of a restaurant. I did not. But this we determined was just one of my "Crazy white man hang ups".

Yesterday Laura and I went to see Shakespeare in the Park....Much Ado About Nothing. They do it outside in High Park, and this was the last weekend for it. The turnout was HUGE, and the play was really terrific. The weather was gorgeous for it, and good fun was had by all. In future years, we'll learn from the real pros that brought seriously hardcore picnics with them(including wine).

Today we watched the Air Show from the room of Laura's condo. Saw lots of cool planes including the Snow Birds, which were quite impressive! All in all quite a busy weekend! (Not to mention, I watched like 12 episodes of '24' Season 2)