>So because I haven’t got enough going on, I’m going to start training for the full marathon for Ottawa Race weekend 2010. I’ve wanted to do this for ages and have decided that this is the year. With luck I’ll look like these stealth running beets by May 2010 (without the spears and frightening blue teeth, of course)…

…but odds are, I’ll look like this. To be fair to myself, I have been running for awhile now. And I can make pretty decent time if I’m only running for an hour. But 40km? That’s going to take some work. Thankfully, Fialonia has agreed to train with me. Training in pairs is the way to go.

Go team “Losing Emo”!

>hello!
I haven’t been updating lately because I’m in Prince George, BC with my new (and first) niece! Freja Jean Livingstone Norrgard, 5 lbs of cuteness with the best blonde curly faux hawk I’ve ever seen. Prince George may be a hole but Freja Jean makes the visit totally worth it. Love – this – kid.

So I’ll write something more substantial when I get back next week but I thought you’d all be interested to know that I decided not to buy the dress. Indeed, I decided to avoid dress buying altogether for another couple of months. I just can’t be bothered. I’m kind of on the fence about buying one at all to be perfectly honest. Perhaps I could wear a nice white bikini instead. Or maybe a rockin’ hot pair of jeans with a white shirt of some kind and sparkly heels. Ooooh sparkly heels! Hmmm…

>So there’s this dress…. It’s a Vera Wang gown circa 2002. Pretty, no?

Here’s the stunning train…

And a nice picture of it hanging in all its Vera-ness.

And here is the stupid stain. The Stain is one of two reasons I am hesitating on purchasing this dress. It is an $8000.00 USD dress. And do you know how much the seller wants for it? $1250.00 USD. A $1250.00 Vera Wang Lux Collection dress. Just – wow.

So as I say, The Stain is one reason. The other reason is this – I’m not sure if I suit this dress. I mean I love it – it’s beautifully made, I love the design, I love the way it hangs, and honestly, I think I can work around the stain by taking out this part of the applique (it’s only on the lace…it’s an iron burn) and balancing it out on the other side of the train. But I didn’t picture myself in this dress…I think I pictured something more…I don’t know…funky? Funky but bridal…is that even possible?

But this dress is SUCH an amazing deal – even with alterations, total cost is going to be about $1600 for an $8000 gown. And it is stunning.

Help me decide!!

>
I could write a rave review about the above book that I just finished reading, but so many have been written already and I have little to add concerning the story itself. I will say this: it was a delicious book. Delicious and haunting and unnerving and perfect.

I’ve known Emily St. John Mandel since she was Emily St. John Fairbanks, physical resident of Denman Island, avid ballerina, hater of all things Wallace. When we were about 14, Emily started staying at my house every Friday – she lived on an island, well, a smaller island, and the last dance class on Fridays made her miss the last boat. So we had a permanent sleepover date each Friday and each Saturday, after sipping tea with my mum, Emily would head back to her island.

While teenagers, Emily and I were completely different. I spent most of highschool perpetually on the edge, hating everything. And I was loud. Emily was not loud. She was quiet and always thinking. I cannot imagine what it must have been like to visit my family each week – a family that was slowly falling apart, the five members ultimately becoming perfect strangers all under the same roof. I cannot imagine what it was like to have to deal with me – I was never in a good mood, I chain-smoked, and I was very much caught up in the tangles that I made in my own life. Later, I would be struck with guilt at having subjected Emily to those Fridays. I can actually still feel it now.

As soon as she could, Emily moved to Toronto and began writing me letters. Brilliantly funny letters that glossed over or rephrased the various terrifying things that happened to her while there. When I moved to Toronto a few years later, I found Emily transformed from round-eyed ballerina, to edgy, red-haired pixie. She looked slightly crazy in a comforting way. And she had crazy stories. Emily is the kind of person things happen to, good and bad. Indeed, she didn’t stay longer than a year after I arrived because something happened to her and within days she had sold everything and was whisked away to New York.

Why am I getting into all of this? Because when I was reading the book, I could hear and see Emily. I felt like I was reading one of her letters at times – at other times I felt like I was watching her life again. Each character contained whisps of Emily or someone I knew through her in that strange 7 months or so that we were together in Toronto. And I could really feel that life in Toronto – cold coffee, stale cigarettes, and smelly unwelcoming subways. It was a strange and sad and wonderful way to spend three short evenings and one long morning.

I see a trip to NY in the very near future.

>So a guy I went to UVic with has gone missing. I haven’t seen Dan in years – he’s the guy you know while in residence but lose touch with once the toga parties, floor crawls and general chaos that is residence life is over. Pictures of him are peppered throughout my UVic scrapbooks – dressed as one of the Village People here, doing Absolut Lemon shots there. He had the best music list for rez parties, a wicked party room (bed held up by milk crates and spiffy lighting…that sort of thing), and one of those perfect rez guy personalities where you feel like you’ve known him for years when you have only known him for seconds. Dan took the first picture of me with a girl – the fantastic NW; to my knowledge, it is the only one that exists. He also taught me how to dance one wild night at a “Cluster” wine and cheese fiesta – at a party where everyone else was dressed in the typical over-sized dress shirt with jeans and cheesy tie, Dan was in a full on suit with bowler hat and cane. Excellent.

All in all, I find the news of his disappearance most troubling. So I’m posting the “gone missing” link to sort of spread the word to my good blogger buddies in BC, particularly the Vancouver area. Let’s hope he’s ok.

>
I just liked this cartoon. I love Cyanide and Happiness.

I also love sleep. But sleep and I are in a long distance relationship right now and we all know how those go. She says she’ll call, or visit some weekend, and she never follows through. I’m not much better – I make promises I can’t keep. Oh don’t worry, I say, I’ll join you in bed this evening. No, I promise it won’t be on the couch or floor again. Yes, I promise to not read until four am. But I’m lying to sleep. I have no intention of joining her in bed until I’ve finished school.

So in five years.

Ugh.

>
Actually, don’t add the tofu. It was disappointing. Not zesty enough – tofu (especially the cheaper stuff that I can afford) needs all the help it can get. I adapted the recipe to give it more oompf but the tofu still tasted like, well, tofu. Meh. So while the picture above has yummy lemon-y purple kale with lime coconut basmati rice, sesame seeds, green onions and “orange sesame tofu”, I’m only giving you the recipe for the rice (because let’s face it, purple kale is awesome no matter how you eat it – I added 1/2 cup lemon juice, some tamari, bit of sesame oil, and some cayenne…).

“‘Put the lime in the coconut and add rice’ Rice”

*1 cup basmati rice
*1 tin coconut milk (I went with an organic ‘light’ one…but that’s only because it was the cheaper one at the shop)
*3-4 limes (I used three, but I think four would have really been the best. Lime-tastic! You’ll be using the zest and the juice)
*1/4 tsp or so of sea salt
*1-2 tbsp sesame seeds (optional)
*2 green onions (optional but I love love love green onions in rice)

Soak your rice while you are chopping up stuff (leafy greens and so on). Zest your limes and then juice the hell out of them (you can put this all in one bowl). In a pot, add the rice, 1/2 cup of water, the salt, and the tin of coconut milk and bring to boil. Once boiling, cover and turn down to low and cook as you would any old rice (except this isn’t any old rice…this is glorious rice). Once the rice is cooked (pretty much all of the liquid should be soaked up) stir in the lime juice, zest, green onions and sesame seeds. Set aside for five minutes (covered) and then serve with leafy greens, some tamari sauce (or soy), and a protein (NOT orange sesame tofu…perhaps a handful of toasted almonds…or 1/2 cup of chickpeas with lemon or lime juice).

Yummy!!

>
So today, A. and I put together a tentative wedding guest list to see where we are at with numbers. This may sound early to you but there is no way in hell I’m planning a wedding during the school year so bite me. Anyway, so we got the list together and it is exactly the number that fits the wedding location. And that’s if we only count the definites; that is, we’re leaving no room for undecideds. And most of our good friends aren’t on the list. Argh.

Problem number one: both A. and I have big immediate families (and by ‘immediate’ I mean first cousins, aunts and uncles, grandparents, folks, and siblings). Our grandparents on the paternal sides were big into babies. Our mothers’ families weren’t far behind. Plus our cousins and siblings (ok, my cousins and siblings) insist on getting married and having kids. Which I’m happy about and all, but our family number alone is a pretty decent size wedding. And the thing that drives me nuts about family is you can’t NOT invite them. Even the ones you don’t really like…they have to get an invite don’t they? Well, not necessarily. I mean, technically, techinically, there have been family weddings to which I have not been invited…close family too. Yet I am expected to invite these people. It’s a generational double standard. Or it’s a second marriage – first marriage double standard. One of the two. Either way, I’m not a fan.

Problem number two: our family and friends have children. Now, I’m a fan of kids. Love them. Hope to have them myself one day. But, and I say this in the nicest way possible, why do people assume that they can bring little Jim, Jane and the twins to the wedding? And p.s. why on Earth would they want to? I understand if the kid is still on the boob or if they are under 5 or so but otherwise, I just don’t get it. Unfortunately, there is no nice way to write “leave the kids at home” on an invitation. There should be, but there isn’t. I know – I’ve done the research. Martha Stewart didn’t even have any idea of the etiquette for this one and you know what? I don’t think a lot of kids go to MS weddings so she should really get on that. Say something useful, Martha, instead of telling me how to make a handmade bouquet from 100 roses.

Problem number three: the seating. I took a few moments to run some table numbers and well, it’s not looking pretty. And I know what some of you will say – oh, no one will care where they sit. That, my friends, is horseshit and do you know how I know? Because I care. I hate going to a wedding for a friend, especially a friend that I’m close to but whose other friends I don’t know, and getting stuck at a table with great aunt Sylvie and the father-of-the-bride’s single, and old, best golfing buddy. It sucks. People care.

Problem number four: children are dying all over the world and I’m wondering about who to invite to my wedding. Good. God.

>
So Archie is getting married. To Veronica. Interesting. My gut reaction to this piece of news was “What!? But Veronica is such a snob! And Betty is, well, Betty! Sweet, innocent, doting Betty!” And heaps of people feel the same way. Archie comic readers everywhere are “outraged” according to the Globe and Mail article on the subject and when I posted the marriage notice on Facebook, I got similar reactions.

But then I took a second.

See, I always actually liked Veronica more. When I was little it was because she seemed more exotic than Betty’s good-girl-nextdoor image. She had better clothes, better hair, and all the boys were after her. Plus she had all this money!! As I got older though I started liking Veronica for different reasons. Veronica knew what she wanted and always got it. She was ruthless and authoritative. And Betty, well Betty did good things like help drowning puppies and plant trees and whatnot. But she was so….boring. And she was always whining about Archie and trying to win him over. That’s not the right image to be sending to girls (or boys for that matter) – “Keep nagging and pining and convince them to like you”? Ick. So I disagree with those who suggest that Archie only wanted Veronica for her money. I like to think that Archie wanted Veronica (and clearly still does) because she’s a stronger woman than Betty.

And despite what some people say, I think Veronica genuinely liked (likes) Archie. I don’t think that she wanted him because Betty wanted him or because he fawned all over her or because her dad didn’t like him. I like to think that Veronica liked Archie because he was a nice guy – because he was real. Reggie was always a dick and didn’t balance Veronica out in the right way. But Archie was a balanced fellow, with his average-good marks, his jalopy and his all-round good guy nature. And he didn’t put up with all of her crap (although he probably put up with more than he should have). I don’t understand why people aren’t happy that the nice guy won. Are we forgetting the competition between Reggie and Archie? Now what WOULD be outrageous is if Betty married Reggie. Then Betty is a bigger idiot than I thought.

Of course, there is always the idea that Archie was the real dick in this ridiculous (and yes, I realize, fake) love triangle. He kind of strung both girls along and really, got the best of both worlds in the process. Both girls longed for him and wanted to make him happy – and now he has deigned to choose one of them (implying that they did not have a choice in the matter – can Veronica say “No you tool, I will not marry you because it took you too bloody long to figure out just how fantastic I am”? No, she cannot). How very 1950s male. A raging feminist like myself should be upset that either girl would want to marry Archie – but I would be more upset if he chose Betty, only because then he’s choosing the steady girl who will do shit for him and, likely, having an affair with Veronica on the side. And Betty would say yes without thinking it through. Because she’s a good wifey type.

Anyway, that’s my opinion. Archie and Veronica = good pair. Thoughts?

Update: Just talked to A. and he thinks I’m like Betty. Because I’m nice. I don’t know how to take that. On the one hand, Betty IS nice. But on the other hand, she’s a wimp. Hmmm.

>
As promised, here is a picture of me with the shiny new specs. They are growing on me….

I haven’t been much for posting these past few days because I’ve been deep into the thesis-ing. My sister is having a baby, see, and I want to visit her and said baby in June without a giant thesis cloud hanging over my head. I’ve decided that sleep is for the weak. As is food, water, and relaxation. And anything else that society has told you that you “need” in order to survive. Pfft to society and their norms.

Seriously though, I’m stupid busy and I don’t like it. It’s sunny out and all I want to do is sit on my patio or go to a park and read a good book with an apple. Instead, I’m eating plain tofu with kale because it’s all I have left in the fridge and groaning over sentence structure and what the hell the “critical ecological feminist methodology” I claim to employ in my thesis actually means for my interpretation of green citizenship. Vomit.