more Domino inspiration

I love the bold use of colour

I love how rustic and unconventional this kitchen feels

I love how all the pieces in this dining room don't match and yet still feel very harmonious. I also love the random art in mismatched frames.

I love that sofa and coffee table. I just really love the overall feel of that whole room.

One thing I've started to notice as I've been going through my Dominos is that I really gravitate towards the quirky, unconventional, antique, and offbeat furniture and furniture arrangements. For example, something I realized I really want is mismatched chairs with my dining room table (I don't necessarily mean all different chairs, like in the examples above, but chairs that don't match with the table itself). I think I'm ok with the shape and line of the table, but I've just realized I've never liked the chairs.

I'm really starting to love the idea of wallpaper as a backsplash

we've been discussing the potential of turning the main floor living room into an office study-type lounge instead of having a 'formal' living room (that I almost guarantee we'd never use). The first Bookworm furniture setup makes me think that idea just might be possible afterall.

a disappearing art

I added "learn calligraphy" to my list of things to do this year. I've always loved writing and coming up with different styles for myself, so naturally calligraphy is something I've always wanted to do. A quick little search proved that yes! I can learn it on my own online! Sweet!

I found a good website (finally) that shows you exactly how to hold the pen and how to make each stroke. I was using one a couple weeks ago that only explained it (in minute detail) and I found that to be terribly demotivating. I like pictures. I learn best by doing, not reading. (Here's the site if you're interested.) Also I suck at math and telling me to hold the pen at a 21 degree angle to the page wasn't helping.

I'm sure you noted the "a couple weeks ago" statement. Yeah. As usual, I got some crazy idea in my head, looked it up, then never looked back. So since I've also been procrastinating on writing a letter to a friend, I've since made that my short term goal. Learn and practice enough calligraphy to be able to write her address on the envelope. Kills two birds with one stone.

Since making that goal, I immediately felt super rushed. I wanted a shortcut, and I figured the best thing to do was to learn just the letters I needed. Naturally that didn't work at all, and it added another week to my procrastination. Big surprise.

I started to think back to when I was first learning how to print and handwrite. Do you remember that?We had to write pages and pages of only G's or S's (all the letters) over and over again to practice the shape. We also had to practice drawing waves and other little patterns just so we would get better at manipulating our pencils, too. (I can still draw some pretty sweet waves.)

I sucked it up and started with the first letter in the foundational alphabet (arranged according to how the shape is made, not alphabetically. An O in this case), and I wrote it over and over until I could do it as perfectly as my highlighter would allow. And you wanna know what? I've actually found that that's made my calligraphy lessons go a lot smoother! I can see my progress. I can see when it looks bad and I can figure out what I did wrong. Procrastination is replaced with motivation!

I also switched from that stupid dull highlighter to some smelly Mr. Sketches today since they're the only other pen I have with a chisel tip. And if that's not motivating enough well, I don't know what more I could do.

note to self: buy a chisel tipped pen

things I got for cheap

matching milk glass mixing bowls

I couldn't pass up another mixing bowl with a spout, now could I? It's always best to have at least two of every kitchen aid, am I right or what?

walnut side table (to paint or not to paint? that is the question)

thing I made for Hermes for cheap

yeah ok. Technically I didn't really make this nor did I even come up with the idea for it, but it broke my heart to see him sliding his beak aimlessly along the empty twist tie that holds this mirror in place (trust me. It was the most cheerless and melancholy beak-sliding I've ever seen). So I took a measly 5 minutes of my time and slid some beads on. Now he can do some work sorting out the colours and making them even on both sides like his other store-beaded mirror. (Which, by the way, I really hate esthetically. Who groups red, green, yellow, and purple together? No one, that's who. Hermes knows it's wrong, too. He always groups them either with the purple bead by itself, yellow and purple together, or yellow, purple, and green, but never ever red. He's got style, that one -- or I need to do something other than watch him slide his beads back and forth)

things I wish I could have gotten for cheap

this amazing plate-bowl. It's the most perfect plate-bowl I've ever seen AND it's not covered in some tacky pasta pasta mama mia! pattern. It's everything I've ever dreamt of!! (in a plate-bowl, of course) Why didn't I get it? There was only one, and I don't think it'd be fair to Idle Husband for me to be using my kick-ass plate-bowl all the time while he's left with some junky regular plate OR bowl (not two in one like mine, suckah! -- and that's exactly how I'd be about it, too).

know thy enemy

Guess how much I hate mowing the lawn? Now guess what I've been doing today. I left it entirely too long (hey, it's been raining, snowing, I was sick for a couple weeks and you know what? I don't really consider it grass mowing time until the end of May anyway, so there you have it). It took me an hour just to do the backyard, and if it doesn't rain tomorrow, I should probably do it again on a lower mower setting.

I hate grass. It's the most useless creation ever. I don't understand why it's so popular. It's prone to weeds, most people have to devote at least half of their weekend time to mowing it, it needs lots of water if it's anywhere in full sun ($$),  you have to pay for and apply weed and feed, and...oh gah, just talking about it angers me. What a waste of time, money, and energy.

My neighbours have pristine grass. I'm definitely not down with that whole 'keeping up with the Joneses' junk, but sometimes I wonder how they do it. I've seen left neighbour out there, with his kids, on his hands and knees digging out each dandelion individually, and I've never actually seen right neighbour with a lawn mower or a push mower or anything. I'm starting to think he just uses a pair of scissors. Don't they have something better to do? Even staring at the wall is something better. That makes me think of a Seinfeld episode where Jerry asked Elaine what she did last night and she said, "Nothing. I sat in a chair and I stared." I guess she could have been mowing her lawn had she had one.

I'm sure my bias has a little something to do with the fact that I'm allergic to grass, but honestly. Don't people want plants they can enjoy? What's enjoyable about grass? And (besides kids) have you ever seen someone outside on their lawn physically enjoying it? Like seriously enjoying the hell out of it. Yay! Woo! Grass!! I've worked so hard on it! I'm going to sit on it, roll in it, have a picnic on it, happily walk around on it and enjoy that fresh grassy feeling on my bare feet!! Think about it. I know you haven't.

bagel chips

I was looking for something I could stuff in Idle Husband's lunch that didn't have a billion weird unpronounceable ingredients, was relatively healthy, and was something actually appetizing (as great as baby carrots are, come on, don't lie, they're not so hot).

On a friend's suggestion, I decided on making some bagel chips (here's her original recipe). I'll always make pita chips from my older pitas, but the concept of making chips out of bagels really didn't occur to me. Now I could have made my own bagels, I've made them before and they're not that hard, they're just time consuming. So for this application, I thought it would be really sad to go through all the work of making them only to turn them into chips directly after. So for this one application, I went in search for some cheap bagels at Superstore.

It must've been my lucky day because there were two large bags of them on the clearance cart last week. (In case you don't know, if you get to Superstore early enough, they've got a few carts set out near the bread aisle of day-old bread and pies and cakes and...well, anything, and yes, they're all perfectly fine and 50% off!) Each bag had roughly 15 assorted bagels in them for only $3! Initially I thought that 15 would be way too many, but then I decided to make a few different flavours and make them all up as soon as I got home so there wouldn't be any chance of spoilage.

I did this all in my toaster oven which may or may not have been a good thing. I probably would have got them all done a lot quicker had I used the oven because then I could have used more than one pan, but oh well. Live and learn. It turned out to be kinda handy because I could set my little dish of butter on top of the toaster oven (my secret warming plate) where it would keep warm and melt any additional butter I added. On my last round of bagels, I didn't want to melt any more butter, so I used some cooking spray which worked just as well and was an extra easy alternative to brushing butter on.

So all you have to do is slice the bagels thinly, brush with butter, and sprinkle on a topping. I cooked mine at 350 degrees for 4 minutes, rotated the pan, then 4 minutes more, rotate, then 2 minutes. That seemed to crisp them up evenly. For my toppings, I decided to go the savoury route just because I had already made those granola bars and whole wheat cookies, so I wanted something different. I used garlic powder for one batch, onion powder for another, and finally simple salt and pepper. The salt and pepper ones are the best ones, in my opinion.

terrible night picture!

These are really great with tzatziki, salsa, or (believe it or not) honey (I like that sweet/savoury flavour). We've been munching on them all weekend but luckily (since I made so many), we still have two generous bags full of them.

mmm crumbly feta...or is that mozzarella?

They really are the perfect little snack. Crispy and cracker-like without all the guilt that comes with the store-bought chips and crackers. And I love how I can make them up into either sweet or savoury flavours. I'll definitely be making these again.

weekend craft project

I actually did one of the DIYs I bookmarked! Oh wait. That's not the most impressive thing about this. The most impressive thing about this is that it actually worked! It looks decent enough to wear and not like some grade fiver slapped it together!

I made this felt dahlia for mother's day. I know I know. Mother's day was ages ago. It's ancient history. But I'm so terrible at getting around to see my mom that she only just got it today. And not only that, but I wore the smaller one about three times before giving it to her. Happy belated mom's day, mom! Oh and here's a slightly used gift for ya! Classic.

So now that I no longer have it in my possession, I'd better make another one. I found the tutorial for this particular flower here, and if you follow everything as closely as possible, it's actually quite easy to do.

the smaller one was made with the leftover petals I couldn't fit into the larger one

Cutting the petals out was really the most annoying part (and that's mostly due to my nonpatient attitude). It took the most time and left me with a nice little scissor indent in my right thumb. The rest went really quickly on account that I skipped all the la dee dah methods and used a glue gun. The amount of time waiting for hot glue to set is quite a lot quicker than fabric glue and the process was even quicker overall than if I had hand stiched the whole thing. In case you're wondering, the hot glue doesn't make this look like crap up close like some hot glued things are wont to do. I know you're thinking it. I would be. And despite my clutzy nature, I didn't have any issues with burning my fingers -- well, there were only a couple of ouch moments towards the end when the gun had been on too long and was getting almost too hot, but that's about it.

it's not very big, only about the size of my hand

Also, this whole project used up only one piece of felt. I had no idea how much I would use, so I chose the colour based on how much of the felt I had -- just in case. I didn't want to start and then be left with half a flower and no felt in that colour. I ended up really loving the oatmeal, though. I like that it's such an unexpected flower colour. Besides, oatmeal is kind of classic and match-with-anything, so in this use it works really well (nevermind that I'm on an oatmeal colour kick right now).

botanical print!

a little flower excitement

does sweating in an overly hot house while baking count as excercise?

I had to bake bread yesterday. Yesterday of all days where it was, like, 30 something-like-hell degrees out. I guess I didn't have to, but once I'm down to 5 slices of bread, there's no telling when it'll be gone and we'll need more. I can't judge that! I can't be like, oh well, I only need 2 slices each day for lunch and that'll take me to Friday, so I'll be good. Oh no. There's no telling when it'll all get toasted and slathered with honey at 11 p.m. for a snack. Naturally, I'm a little more upset about it because it rained last night and it's slightly cooler today. So, yeah. Thanks for the advanced warning on that one, weather.

Oh well. If I'm going to have to have the oven on for 30 minutes, I might as well use the hell out of it since it's going to heat up the whole house in those measly 30 minutes anyway. So along with bread, I decided to make granola and granola bars and eventually whole wheat chocolate chip cookies, though I didn't decide that until I realized sugar cookie bars with their 4 eggs and butter and sugar slathered with icing probably wasn't exactly a healthy sweet snack. Not like the cookies are either, but at least there's no icing and I used whole wheat flour and chocolate has some kind of antioxidants or whatever, right? and walnuts have healthy fats or something, right? Oh well. I had the butter on the counter all day. It was soft already, I had to do something with it.

Granola

This is for me. Something different for breakfast other than actually making a pan of baked oatmeal and eating it all week (which is really good and my favourite, but I'm starting to get bored with it). Now I can throw some of this in some plain yogurt and I'm good to go. It's pretty delicious in comparison to the store-bought granola I've been staring at in my cupboard for months now. I finally threw it out yesterday. That granola was just oats that had been honey coated only, no clusters or crunch with some extremely stale raisins thrown in for 'variety.' And by extremely stale, I mean, if they got even a little cold from coming into contact with cold yogurt, it would be even more impossible to chew them than if they were room temperature. That always makes me super nervous -- especially after I chipped a tooth once on a stupid popcorn kernel.

This recipe was really easy to make, and I loved that it didn't have stupid ingredients I'd have to make a special trip to the store to get. I hate those granolas, and that's usually one of the reasons I don't like to make my own in the first place. But another reason I usually don't make granola is because any time I make it, I either overcook it or undercook it. And guess what? This one was no different. I totally overcooked it. Mostly around the edges, so there's still some good stuff there and overall, it's really tasty. I want this recipe to work out so I'm going to try it a few more times. I really want to get it right. It's so much better than store-bought could ever think of being -- and I burnt it.

Granola Bars

I actually dried my own apples for this recipe since I didn't have any actual dried fruit on hand. It doesn't take very long to do, though I'll admit they weren't completely done by the time I needed them. All you have to do is slice whatever fruit you want to dry as thin as possible and let it dry out in a 200 degree oven. Mine were getting to the slightly dry-sticky/spongy stage after an hour and a half. I didn't think that would be so terrible in a granola bar, so I took them out and cut them into bite sized pieces with some scissors.

I didn't overcook the granola bars, surprisingly; in fact, I think I might have undercooked them a little. It's so damn hard with granola! It goes from looking a little golden to burnt in a minute! Anyway, had I had any patience whatsoever by the end of the day, I would have put this in the fridge overnight to really cool. Being out on the counter for 4 hours in a 27 degree house wasn't enough to cool it to the point where I could cut it into obvious bars. The corners came out well, but the middle was a crumble-fest. Regardless, it was tasty and healthy and because of that, I'm going to try making it again when we need more. Just read what they put in store-bought granola bars. I guarantee you won't know what half the ingredients are, and that's enough motivation for me.

Whole Wheat Chocolate Chip Cookies

I think I have a winner in the CCC category. These are the ones I was experimenting with before, but now I think I've finally got it. It's based on a recipe I got here, and my new recipe doesn't stray too far from that. I just don't grind any oatmeal anymore (that was my biggest pet peeve) and instead I use 2 cups of whole wheat flour and (about) 1 cup of white flour. I could add more whole wheat in instead, but the regular flour acts better as a binder than whole wheat which is why I don't make 100% whole wheat bread either. I'd have to add close to 10 cups of whole wheat flour, knead it for half an hour, and it'd be tough as nails. Around 60% is always a good amount when it comes to whole wheat -- at least for at-home baking. I could have kicked myself after because I wanted to add some ground flaxseed into these cookies as well (since I had already ground a bunch of it for the granola recipes). Oh well, next time.

Blueberry Frozen Yogurt (or the beginnings of it)

On the cooler side, I did attempt to make blueberry frozen yogurt with some frozen blueberries I've had in the freezer for way too long. I used the recipe I mentioned here for the strawberry frozen yogurt figuring it would work with pretty much any fruit. So anyway, nope it doesn't. I think the concept does, but you really have to make sure to taste and figure as you go along. After we tried some last night, I realized it would have been a whole lot better had I put it through a fine mesh strainer after pureeing the blueberries (yay! weird tasting skin pieces and bits of stem), and I really didn't have to add that much sugar --  it probably would have helped if I had had the patience to wait for them to unthaw completely first which probably effected the amount of sugar they eventually absorbed. Anyway, it's good, but it definitely could be better.

Are you just as tired from reading about my yesterday as I am reliving it?

please try sweet baby ray's honey bbq sauce

Idle Husband and I don't usually eat ribs. It's never something I think about cooking at home, and it's definitely something neither of us would ever consider eating out (way too messy!).

So I found myself in a weird spot when I suddenly felt the urge to buy ribs last week. Naturally, I blame the blogs for continually showing me delicious pictures of ribs slathered in BBQ sauce, nestled beside a serving of potato salad or corn or some other summery side dish.

Anyway, last night I made this recipe from a new online foodie (and other ideas, but mostly food)magazine Sweet Paul. You should check it out, it's a pretty cute mag!

Right, on to the recipe. Here's what I learned about ribs (having absolutely never cooked them myself):
- nothing. The only thing I did a tad differently is that I changed pans after lowering the temperature. The sugar had caramelized and started to burn on the first pan and the smell of burning sugar was putting me right off. I think the next time I make this (the ribs weren't that expensive, and I can get four meals from one package), I'd only cook it at 400 for maybe 30-40 minutes instead of the full hour. The sugar on the pan got very burned and smokey by the time that hour was up, and while most of the meat was super tender and delicious, some parts -- mostly the exposed top of the meat -- were a little tough and chewy.

The result was a really sweet, definitely sticky, and spicy rib. The only downside? I probably should have made more! I paired it with our regular salad (we have a salad with every meal), and I whipped together a rather easy and slap-dash potato salad. I don't have a recipe for that, so I just kinda made one up as I went along. On hindsight, I should have seasoned it a bit more, but the cool, creamyness of the salad went really well with the sweet and spicy taste of the ribs. What a great Sunday dinner!

Sorry I have no pictures, though! I was too focused on the deliciousness to bother getting my camera!

colour collections

inspiration

sweatshirts

I know it's technically summer (or it's getting there anyway), but I'm seriously lusting after old-school sweatshirts. I think it all started when mom brought me one she found at Superstore on clearance.

It turned out to be the best. Sweatshirt. Ever. If I could wear it every day, I totally would. We like to call it summer around here, but let's face it. It's still kinda chilly in the mornings and evenings. This is perfect for that. Just throw it on over a t-shirt and you're done. Super casual, but still cool, you know? It's not a coat! Not yet a woman! (That Britney Spears song just popped into my head! Shoot me now.) (I'm also kinda loving the idea of fancy socks with fancy sandals, but that's something I don't know if I'll ever be brave enough to try -- outside of the house, that is).

Illustrated People

Urban Outfitters

Little Ocean Annie

J. Crew

a handy printable guide to eating in Alberta!

It was brought to my attention that we don't, in fact, eat like college students. We eat like a married couple, fat and happy. Which, I conceeded, makes a lot of sense. Back in our bachelor days, we were both considerably...uh smaller, and that probably had a lot to do with the fact that both of us would forget to eat. Well, maybe I'm just speaking for myself here. I highly doubt Idle Husband would ever forget to eat.

A normal week would see me eating a very sparse breakfast (like a granola bar), yogurt and an apple for lunch (if I remembered to bring it), and usually I would get working on assignments or practicing at night and all of a sudden, it'd be 9 p.m. and I'd think, oh. I forgot about supper. Oh well, I'll eat tomorrow. Seriously. It's not exactly healthy per se, but it was a really good way to lose weight. From what I know of Idle Husband's diet, he would usually buy a lot of takeout, mostly pizza, that he'd eat throughout the week coupled with whatever he could scrounge up from the kitchen at work. And that's it.

Perhaps we should go on our previous bachelor diets instead of this new fangled idea of eating healthy meals every day and having homemade baked goods in the house.

Things that irritated me today that I wanted to write an entire blog post about but then decided not to because that would be mean and fight-inducing and catty and bitchy and eye-rolly and oh-no-you-didn'ty and...well, you get the point. Unfortunately for you, I still can't seem to let it go enough to write a completely different post, so I'll just quickly mention it now:

- people who are snobby about restaurant seafood quality when they live on the prairies.

Just so you know (and feel free to print it off as a handy guide), here's what we can grow rather successfully on the prairies (in alphabetical order and italicized for what we're most famous for):

• beef
• buffalo
• chicken
• ostrich
• pork
• sheep

Here's what we can't grow on the prairies:

• pretty much everything that lives in the ocean.

So in conclusion, if you want to guarantee you get the best meal possible from the majority of restaurants (shitty or otherwise) in this province, you should probably pick the meal we're well known for growing. Otherwise, you can pack your things and move to B.C. or the maritimes, thankyouverymuch and spare me the continual "oh this seafood is too small!" and "oh this seafood isn't fresh!" and (my personal favourite) "oh this seafood is terrible AND it cost me $17.99 AND just LOOK at this measly portion!" posts because I've really had it up to here with it.

Writing this ended with me laughing my ass off, actually. I just thought of something. He's originally FROM B.C. or the maritimes, isn't he?! ISN'T HE?! ahahaha! I know it. You are. It explains everything. It. Explains. Everything.

palettes

So I found this interesting website that makes colour palettes based on favourite photos and art. There's always something that draws us to a photo and colour is probably one of the strongest pulls. Anyway, it's also pretty great inspiration for choosing the paint colours for your whole house.

I kinda think that your house should flow. That doesn't mean that every room has to be the same colour, but I think it's important that every room relates to the others in some way. I went to a friend of a friend's house once for dinner, and the first time I was there really struck a colour nerve. It's not that their particular choices weren't good ones (each to their own, right?), but the combination really left me feeling unsettled. Royal purple in the dining room, lemon yellow in the kitchen, tomato red in the living room, aquamarine in the office area. There's nothing wrong with those colours on their own, but when they were in rooms that were adjoining each other where at different points you could see both the kitchen and dining room or the dining room and living room or the dining room and the office or all four at once, just didn't work. That's why it's nice to have a palette to work from. Different colours that are in the same tonal family or have the same base colour (like the difference between a blue white and a yellow white) will always work together. And that's something you really have to consider when choosing paint colours.

Anyway, after feeling so inspired by that website, I thought it would be pretty easy to do yourself with any picture you find that you like. Here are a few I threw together really quick (aka they're not 100% perfect cuz I don't feel like spending an hour on it right now):

Any of the brighter colours (like the orange and yellow above) I'd use as accent colours instead of actual wall colours. Then you can dot them throughout the house in the form of throw pillows, art, or vases of flowers even. Anyway, the idea is to give yourself a base. Something you can work from. I don't like the rooms in houses to be matchy, but they should at least work together harmoniously.

UPDATE #1: Thanks to Not Martha, there's a website where you can upload any photo and it'll find a colour palette for you. Genius!

UPDATE #2: I decided to see what Pictaculous would do with the photos above, and I think my versions are better.

In other news: the sweet potato I just bought last week imploded. I noticed a pool of sweet potato blood surrounding it yesterday as I was cleaning in the kitchen. It looked completely normal, except the entire inside was mush and it had a hole with potato liquid oozing out (I cruelly squeezed more of it's insides out through the hole. I can't resist squishy things). I thought it was quite strange. I've never seen a potato do that before.

randomest random post of random junk

Gah. I'm kind of at a loss to say today. We had one of those ho hum weekends, and while I do have a post ready to go, things didn't pan out on the weekend in order for me to be able to post it. Blurgh.

Here's the low down on what we were up to this weekend:
Saturday
- Idle Husband worked on his super exciting secret work project;
- I scanned the interwebs and finished them in all of an hour;
- we went to Michael's for a coupon sale, but we got there with 30 minutes remaining on the sale and I was all flustered trying to find everything I wanted. Finding specific craft junk in Michael's is like searching for a needle in a haystack. You might as well just resign yourself to the fact that you'll have to spend at least an hour in that swirling vortex of craft before you even find the aisle your thing maybe might be found in (and no, oddly enough, I don't remember even seeing one salesperson). I had two coupons, too, and I could have used them both and I didn't. In hindsight, I'm thinking like, why didn't I? I have nothing more to get there within the week now and I only ever go there once a year (if that. They're far too expensive, so I usually don't even consider them as a place to go for crafts);
- we were supposed to go out to dinner, but our plans were cancelled. So because of that, I had no idea what to make for us to eat and so we caved and bought premade burgers and fries...ok ok and greek chips again...from the Superstore. Do you know they sell skinny burger buns? They're buns, but they aren't so bun-y, they're thin and barely noticeable. I'm a complete carb-o-holic, but big thick bready buns really irritate me. The ratio of beef to bun is way too lopsided and all the filling always squishes out the back as soon as you bite in. Completely not the case with the skinny buns. Delish! I also got some gingerbeef which I didn't eat for dinner and I didn't really know when I'd eat it. I've just been wanting gingerbeef for so long and while it's not quite authentic coming prepackaged and cooked from the store, it's better than nothing (IH doesn't like chinese food, so I never get to have it anymore. Chinese food was like a staple in my family home). Note to self, find a makeable-for-me gingerbeef recipe;
- watched Battlestar Galactica. I'm not afraid to say that I'm getting a little hooked on it. I went from, oh gah that's even too nerdy for me to I think I'm enjoying this...yes, yes I'm enjoying this. Let's watch 5 more episodes in a row.
Sunday
- Idle Husband worked on his super exciting secret work project;
- I did a quick clean of the house and all the dishes from the weekend (I take the weekend off from doing dishes usually) because we were expecting company and then were going out to lunch/dinner;
- company cancelled;
- since we thought we were eating out for lunch, neither of us had breakfast (plus we were seriously still full from dinner);
- we didn't know what to do with ourselves, so we went to see if we should upgrade the appliances in the new house (it's not really a big deal and we probably won't do it, but we just like looking into our options and making sure we have all the facts instead of just listening to whatever the builders tell us), but the guy who works with the builders doesn't work on the weekends. Do you think they had some sort of handout or something for us to look at? Nope. No, no Bob's the only one in the world that works on it. Heaven forbid anything should happen to Bob or that store would be completely lost if anyone should come in asking about switching appliances in a new build;
- Idle Husband was hungry, and I was too, but I was in one of those funky moods where I didn't know what I wanted to eat. Have you had those? They're the worst. So the whole time I was like, I just don't know! Pick something YOU want and I'll just eat that. I don't care. I have no opinion on it. If we go home, I don't know what to make. AGAIN I haven't thought up any type of meal. I haven't got anything out or anything that can be made really quick. I can't even think up meals in this mood. My mind goes food-blank;
- so we went to Superstore again and while looking at appliances we saw a picture of pancakes and sausages on a grill box and decided to make breakfast for lunch;
- the pancakes were good, but the sausages...well, I'm not a huge fan of sausages to begin with, but the cooking instructions required they be steamed and then fried, and they turned this awful shade of grey and frying them didn't manage to cook them all the way through, so we saved them until dinner where I finally resorted to using the microwave to finish them off (first time using the microwave to cook something in over a month). I didn't even want them anymore, so that's when I enjoyed my gingerbeef. Not 100% fanastic, but it was still pretty great (if you shut your eyes. They're not exactly visually appealing);
- more Battlestar Galactica
- bed

The moral of this weekend story? WE'RE STILL EATING LIKE COLLEGE MORONS AND/OR SAD BACHELORS. I can't stand it! Mind you, I didn't set out without a plan on purpose, our plans just got cancelled which kind of screwed us for eating. Anyway, I don't have to tell you, but we're both thinking about carrot sticks and apples and salads after that weekend. Terrible. We have to figure out how to get better at this!

Today I really wanted to work outside, but I decided I should finish up all my half-assed spring cleaning projects. I only cleaned half the fridge, half the oven, half the counter -- I don't know why I did it like that. I think I was just doing too many other things at the same time. Or I'm just really bad at coordinating (see above).

in which I'm really not in a great mood at all

This day is super dragging for me and I'm in a super bad mood. I don't know if it's because I really want it to be 6 already or if it's just because what I set out to accomplish this morning turned out to be a total bust.

So, this morning, I went to WEM to have a walk, get out of the house, and (most importantly) search for one very specific item. I can't really go into details as to what that item was (ooh cryptic), but let's just say that after scouring all of my favourite stores (and some random stores), in every nook and cranny, I realized my initial idea wasn't going to happen, I wasn't going to find this item (or any item that could sub in for the original item for that matter -- thanks last-hope-store-I-was-totally-counting-on for being closed forever), and I finally decided to quit looking.

Anyway, I saw this little vignette in Anthropologie which I kinda liked. Um, mostly the tiny sofa but the concept of a greenhouse-like side table was pretty appealing, too. Not the weird cafe tables with dishes stacked on them. I also realized here that the staff is almost too friendly. When one caught me sniffing perfume (which I don't wear at all, I just like smelling it in stores. I'm not going to buy it even if I like it), she asked me what smells appeal to me. Well, ask a dumb question and you'll get a dumb answer. So I told her I've been looking for almond perfume my whole life. Which is partly true. It's one of my favourite smells, but I came to the conclusion a long time ago that no one else must like that smell because there's no almond perfume in existance. Sure they put it with other scents, but you can never just smell it on its own. She happily nodded and said she'd search the store cuz she thought they had something just like that. And I rolled my eyes and wished she'd just leave me alone already cuz I wasn't really in the mood to be all smiley and perky with her by this time -- I was still on my specific quest and it had nothing to do with me, my likes, and certainly not with perfume. She trotted back with something or other, I don't know, but it didn't smell anything at all like almond. Then another sales girl came carrying yet another scent that she thought would work which only really confirmed my suspicion that neither of them actually knew what almond smells like. And then I actually spotted a perfume that I really wanted to smell just because the bottle design worked with the parameters of my search, but I couldn't get the damn lid off. So. Yeah.

At least I could get a bubble tea. I mean, that's something that would perk my spirits and, gosh, I haven't had one in ages. But again, like usual, the tapioca balls weren't ready. Sigh. Can I have a mini-rant about the Dream Tea House in WEM? Sorry ahead of time. Stop reading if you don't want to hear it. 

I love their tea, so this is completely not about that. And I realize it takes a while for tapioca to cook, really. I do. I've made tapioca pudding. I get it. Plus I super get it cuz these tapioca balls are ginormous. So all right. They get extra cooking time and what not. But ok, here's what we all know to be facts about West Edmonton Mall.

1. it opens at 10;
2. just going by all my retail experiences, most employees probably get there at 9-9:30;
3. you can probably assume that once your doors are open, people are gonna want to come in and buy something, most likely something you sell;
4. it's the biggest, most popular damn mall in Edmonton.

So. WHY ARE THE TAPIOCA BALLS NOT COOKED BY 11?! WHY? EVERY.SINGLE.TIME.I.GO THE TAPIOCA BALLS ARE NOT COOKED. EVERY SINGLE TIME I GO, THE TAPIOCA BALLS WON'T BE READY FOR ANOTHER 15-20 MINUTES. IT DOESN'T SEEM TO MATTER WHAT TIME IT IS I ASK FOR TEA. IT'S ALWAYS ANOTHER 15-20 MINUTES.

So I smile politely and say I'll come back then. But guess what? I NEVER GO BACK. You know when I like to get a tea? WHEN I'M ON MY WAY OUT OF THE MALL. I don't want to carry a cold tea around with me in all the stores while I'm trying to look at shit. And guess what? When I'm on my way out. I'm on my way out. I'm certainly not sticking around for another -- I'm just going to go ahead and say half an hour for a friggin' $4 tea.

So, Dream Tea House. Here're your options:

• GET THERE EARLY AND COOK SOME TAPIOCA BALLS SO THEY'RE READY BY 10. YOU KNOW THEY TAKE HALF THE DAY TO COOK. SO, LIKE, GET THE HELL ON IT. I USED TO GET UP AT 5 A.M. FOR A JOB. 5 A.M. I DON'T KNOW ABOUT YOU, BUT I'M THINKING YOU WOULDN'T HAVE TO GET UP MUCH EARLIER THAN 8 TO ACCOMPLISH THIS SIMPLE TASK;
• CAN'T GET UP IN THE MORNING? GET THEM STARTED THE NIGHT BEFORE. I DON'T KNOW WHAT WOULD BE INVOLVED WITH IT, BUT FIGURE IT OUT SO YOU CAN AT LEAST GET THEM STARTED THE NIGHT BEFORE. START COOKING THEM AT HOME BEFORE COMING TO WORK. DO SOMETHING TO JUMPSTART THOSE CHEWY BASTARDS;
• HOW ABOUT YOU JUST DON'T OPEN YOUR DAMN STORE UNTIL THE TAPIOCA IS DONE? HOW ABOUT THAT? THERE'S A NEW AMAZING CONCEPT FOR YOU. INSTEAD OF SITTING THERE WITH YOUR LIGHTS ON AND YOUR STAFF BLENDING AND LOOKING ALL YUMMY AND PROMISING. INSTEAD OF MAKING ME STAND IN FRONT OF YOUR FLAVOUR LIST TRYING TO DECIDE WHICH DELICIOUS FLAVOUR I SHOULD GET. INSTEAD OF MAKING ME STAND AND WAIT FOR ONE OF YOUR STAFF TO NOTICE ME. AND INSTEAD OF HAVING THEM COME OVER AND TELL ME THE TAPIOCA WON'T BE READY FOR ANOTHER 20 MINUTES. HOW ABOUT YOU JUST STAY CLOSED UNTIL 12 OR WHENEVER THE HELL YOU DECIDE TO COOK SOME TAPIOCA?

Ok? Ok.

So then I came home and started searching my favourites for new ideas. New plans. New strategies. And I tried a couple things which were complete failures. And then I got a headache. And then I was completely starving but I have no idea what to eat except what I want to eat which is bread and sugar which I can't eat because I really shouldn't. And then I got a phone call. And I thought it was mom, so I went running for it but it was the stupid Telus phone spammers again. Ok. Can I rant about phone spam?

JUST ASSUME EVERYONE HAS CALLER I.D.

CUZ EVERYONE PROBABLY DOES.

SO IF WE HAVEN'T ANSWERED THE FIRST TIME.

IT'S NOT GOING TO MATTER IF YOU PHONE THE NEXT DAY AT LUNCH; OR THE NEXT DAY AT DINNER; OR THE NEXT DAY AT BREAKFAST; OR THE NEXT DAY IN THE EVENING.

WE KNOW WHO YOU ARE. WE GOOGLED YOUR NUMBER. CROSS OFF OUR NAME AND MOVE THE EF ON. CUZ I'M SERIOUSLY SICK OF RUNNING FOR THE PHONE (WHICH IS ALWAYS IN A DIFFERENT ROOM THAN I AM) ONLY TO SEE THAT IT'S YOU. AGAIN. EVERYDAY.

And really, when I answer it eventually -- because I always do JUST SO I CAN MAKE YOU STOP PHONE TORTURING ME, I want to tell you off so badly I can hardly contain myself. But I'm too polite and I realize your phoners are just trying to make a living like everyone else and don't really deserve to be yelled at (and are probably yelled at all day, every day). So I don't. You've already got our internet and our cell phone. Just be happy with that money and call it a day. We are your customers, so I just wish you used common sense about it. Really. I really really do. It's common sense. It's right there. I'm telling you it. Please.

On the bright side, I decided I like the chocolate bread afterall. I thought I hated it, but now I've decided it's good. It's better if it's room temperature and not straight out of the fridge. And it's probably a lot tastier when I'm super annoyed and angry.