Family day

Today I celebrated Family Day. Family day is a new statuatory holiday in Ontario - basically created to give people a day off between New Year`s and Easter. It started last year, but last year I ended up working, so this is the first year I had the day off.

It`s a bit of an odd holiday in the sense that everyone has the day off except federal employees. However, they get Rememberance Day and Easter Monday off (when no one else does), so I won`t lose a lot of sleep feeling bad for them. :)

It was a great day. I basically wasted the whole day doing nothing. Since work has been so busy lately, it was time off I desperately needed.

Inspired

First of all, last week's contest. The winner is Peter for his explanation. (The Easter bunny was early, and his basket was full, so he was dragging it. He got tired of dragging it, so he took the eggs and threw them around (into the neighbours' yards) and then hopped away when the basket was empty.) Peter, your gift will be in the mail as soon as I find your address. :) Thanks to all of you who gave me explanations. They all made me smile. (Also, who is the "Anonymous" who is claiming they sound like Daniel? It's a mystery.)

Let's move on to this week, shall we?

Somewhere around the beginning of the year, I stumbled across Choosy Beggars. It's a website about cooking, and it's very entertaining. In fact, it makes me want to cook which - as we all know - is unusual for me.

A while ago, they had a recipe for kibbeh. It sounded really good. Today, I made kibbeh. It's tasty (but, deep down, it's still meatloaf).
However, to quote Homer Simpson, we can't go this far and not go a little further, so I also made homemade pitas. And hummus.




Admittedly, the pitas turned out more like flat bread, but they are very tasty.

Perhaps I should be building an ark

I've decided that I need to update more often, even if I'm not actually doing new things. (Sorry, I blame work.) Let me tell you about my day - or at least the portion that happened before my alarm went off.

I don't believe I've ever talked about this, but I have no problems washing dishes. I don't dry them - I stack them in the drainboard, and they stay there until a) I have to kill some time in the kitchen, or b) I need to use them again.

So it's winter, and naturally there is snow outside. We didn't get our usual January thaw, but yesterday it started raining.

This morning at 4 a.m. (exactly) I heard rattling in the drainboard. I was very puzzled. And sleepy, let's not forget that.

I got up, and asked my sister what on earth she was doing. She told me that the basement was leaking.

I went downstairs. There was water on the floor - not over the whole basement, but enough to get my feet wet as I walked around.

I helped Wanda get all of her stuff off the floor. (One would think that perhaps that the floor wouldn't be the best place to store stuff, but apparently Wanda disagrees.) While she finished up, I went upstairs and made up another bed for her.

I don't know what happened exactly. My theory is that the rain plus the melting snow caused water to leak in the windows. It rained all day today, and everything is dry now.

I still don't know how rattling dishes was supposed to help.

Another contest

This is the scene in my backyard. There is a long, relatively straight furrow in the snow, with rabbit tracks going out from the end.

My theory is that someone went rabbit bowling (i.e. using a rabbit as a bowling ball), and when the rabbit stopped rolling, he simply jumped away.

What is your theory? Explain how these tracks in the snow happened in the comments (before Saturday, Feb. 14). The most interesting explanation will get a prize.

A follow up

Back in November or so, I mentioned that I was thinking about buying a new table. In January I ordered a table, chairs, buffet, and hutch. They arrived today.

I didn't do anything new, I just felt like sharing

Mmm, chocolate

I really wanted something sweet this evening. Due to someone (Wanda) eating all of the cookies, there was nothing in the house*.

Luckily, a couple of days ago I saw an article on how to make a cake in a mug on wikihow. Today I made a cake in a mug. I went for the second recipe. It puffed up while cooking, then went back down.

It was good, but I think I overcooked mine - it was a little dry in places.

* In the interest of full disclosure, she is the one who makes the cookies

Look at me cooking

I think I've mentioned that I've been working a lot. We had a big deadline on Friday, so this weekend I'm mostly not working. (OK, there were a couple of e-mails, but that's it.)

As a result, this weekend I made homemade pierogies.

I started by peeling (& boiling) enough potatoes to make about 2 or 3 cups of mashed potatoes.

While they were cooking, I made the dough:

You beat 2 eggs with 1/2 cup of oil until they're light in colour, then add 1.5 cups warm water and 1.5 tbsp salt. Next, you gradually add 5 cups flour and knead until it's a soft dough. (I started by using the mixer, but finished kneading it by hand.) Cover the dough, and let it rest for 10 minutes.

Luckily, while the dough is resting, you can grate the cheese. When the potatoes are soft, mash them, then add the grated cheese. Let it melt, then mix. Let them cool a bit so they don't burn your hands during the next step.

Next, stop eating the cheesy mashed potatoes. You can eat the leftovers later.

Roll out the dough, then cut in diamonds. (The recipe says to cut with a round cookie cutter, but I'm too lazy for that - diamonds work just as well, you just end up with triangles instead of half circles.

Put a scoop of the potato mixture on each diamond, then fold into triangles and seal the edges.

Put them in a container separated by waxed paper, and freeze (if you don't plan to eat them immediately).

To cook, boil a pot of salted water, drop the pierogies in and stir. Let them boil for about 10 minutes, then strain. (You want to let them cook several minutes after they float to the top.) After that, you can fry them in butter & onions if you want.

Registered

Life has been busy lately. (Well, mostly work has been busy lately.) I'm hoping it will get better on Friday & that I can actually enjoy a work-free weekend.

Anyway, enough whining. Today I sent a registered letter.

It was a little ridiculous cost wise, but necessary.

And there was much rejoicing throughout the ... house

My sister is awesome.

This morning she spotted my phone in the snow on the driveway. It was face down (like it is in the picture), so it was hard to spot.

I had driven over it at least once (it was in a tire track), but the snow cushioned it. We brought it in, wiped the snow off, and let it warm up. (I also dried it with my hairdryer, hoping that that would keep the snow from melting into the phone.) It's now on and working well. I have no plans to turn it off again anytime soon.

Let's talk about food

I think I've mentioned before that I don't particularly enjoy cooking. (This is another one of those things were I'm too lazy to search my own archives, so let's just assume I have.)

As a result, I'm always in favour of new ways to make cooking ... less necessary.

A year or so ago, I went to Dinner By Design in Kanata. This is a place where you do all of the assembly of a selection of meals, which then go in your freezer to be pulled out when necessary.

Because you do the assembly yourself, you can make small adjustments. For example, I can't eat peppers, so I can not put them in.

I wouldn't recommend it for anyone with a serious food allergy, but generally it's nice.

You choose either 6 or 12 meals to assemble, do the work there, and then pay and take them home.

Today I went to the Merivale location of Dinner By Design.

I went with a friend and my sister. The three of us assembled 18 meals in about an hour and a half. The total cost was around $450 - which works out to about $25 a meal, or $4 a serving.

I also changed one of my selections after I got there. The web site said that I could only make one Dijon Chicken Alfredo, and I wanted two. When I got there, I noticed that other people were making more than one, so I asked if I could change.

There is no whining in this post

I've mentioned boxing many times. I've also mentioned that I'm now in level 3.

In level 1, you work on the double hit on the speed bag. That consists of hitting the speed bag with the front of your hand, waiting until it hits the back of the platform, the front of the platform, and the back of the platform before you hit it with the side of the same hand. The bag again hits the platform 3 times, then you repeat with the other hand.

In level 2, you work on the single hit. This consists of hitting the bag at a 45 degree angle with the side of your hand, letting it bounce 3 times, then hitting it with the front of the other hand. You repeat this 10 times, then switch to the other side.

Now that I'm in level 3, I'm working on the double bounce. This is similar to the single hit, except that the bag only bounces once between the side hit and the front hit. The hands are supposed to move together, as if you're holding a bar in them.

It's pretty hard. I will be working on this for a while.

This week

This has been a frustrating week.

Monday I got home from the gym, and grabbed my gym bag & purse out of the back seat. My cell phone fell out of my purse, and I made a comment about how I never would have looked in the back seat of the car. I then picked up my cell phone and turned it off on the way into the house.

Tuesday morning I got up & left the house for an eye appointment. It took ages to get there due to increased traffic because of the bus strike that will not end. I reached for my cell phone, and it was not there.

I came home after my appointment, and it wasn't on the walk or the driveway.

I have cleaned the front hall, the coffee table, and my bedroom dresser. I found a necklace that I lost 2 years ago, but no cell phone. I have moved almost every piece of furniture on the main floor. I've gone through my gym bag & purse. I've moved the snow on top of the snow banks outside. Where is my cell phone?

Also, have I mentioned the bus strike? I am so sick of it ... and it's just a mild inconvenience for me. For some people, it means they're trapped in their houses.

So in other words, nothing new happening here, just much annoyance.

Let them eat cake (again)

At my former job, I worked with a great group of people. Somehow, I got elected the cake baker, and I baked cakes for everyone's birthdays. (This was not a sacrifice for me, I like baking.) My specialty was cheesecake (because one of the guys really, really likes cheesecake.

I tried a bunch of recipes, and ended up with a favourite - a graham cracker or oreo cookie crust with 3/4 of a can of pie filling


on it (baked for 15 minutes) and then the filling - 2 pkgs of cream cheese, 1 cup sugar, 2 cups of sour cream, 1.5 tsp vanilla, and 3 eggs. I then put the rest of the pie filling on top of the filling, then mix it in (like a marble
cake). It bakes for a long time - over an hour -but it's a pretty light tasting cheesecake. I vary it, but that's the basic recipe.

Anyway, last week was a tough week for my former co-workers, and one of them has a birthday tomorrow, so today I made a cheesecake to drop off at my former workplace. I cut out a piece of cardboard the shape of the pan, then covered it in tinfoil to make the cake easy to transfer to the plate. Tomorrow I have to leave early so I can make the detour on the way to my actual job. So basically, if any of them read this blog, they will not be surprised. (They know about it, but I don't think they check it regularly.)

[Edited to correct the recipe, and to let you all know that the guys were very happy with the cheesecake, and are already angling for another one. :) ]

Yes, I'm alive

Work deadlines, extremely cold weather, and general apathy have combined to distract me from new things.

I did do something new on Wednesday. I was at the gym, and I tried the scary pull up machine. Basically, it uses weights to counterbalance so that you aren't lifting your full body weight. It was fun - or, at least, a good arm workout.

Before I got to work today...

This isn't new, but I feel like ranting.

1. The temperature was -25C when I woke up, and -26C when I finished breakfast.
2. The internet didn't work (for a stupid reason), which made me try to fix it so I could read my e-mail while eating breakfast instead of ... actually eating breakfast.
3. There wasn't a lot of snow, but the snow from yesterday had drifted, so I had to walk through snow well over my boots to clean off the car. (OK, the other option would have been to shovel the snow, but let's be realistic.)
4. The inside windows of my car were completely fogged up. I waited 20 minutes (after cleaning off the outside), then gave up and scraped them.
5. I got to drive behind a tractor for about 10 minutes on the way to work (and I was much later than I wanted to be due to items 2 & 4).

So how is your day going?

Reflexive

This is a day I thought would happen last year - I went to my first level 3 boxing class. Level 3 is when you move out of beginner mode and into something more advanced. It is also when you first hit the reflex bag. The reflex bag is a small bag on a spring, so it bounces back when you hit it.

I was a little concerned that this would lead to disaster. Luckily, that did not happen. You start by hitting it lightly. It went better than I expected - I was able to control it much more easily than I thought it would.

Generally

Today I went to the annual general meeting for the compnay I work for. Oddly, I don't recall there being an annual meeting last year.

It was held at the new Isaac's in Stittsville. It's a nice facility (although almost everyone drove past it at first and had to turn around).

Believe it or not

Today I filled up my tires at an air pump I had to pay for. Apparently, it has been a while since I last had to fill up a tire. It was not as painful as I expected, considering that it is the middle of winter.

Also, on Sunday I went into the Sassy Bead Company. I had walked by it many times, but never actually gone in. They were not busy, and were very helpful - or tried to be, although I was not really there for any particular reason.

Spade

For those of you who are wondering, I'm tentatively planning to do at least one new thing a week. I'm not sure how that will work out - it might result in me never updating, so we'll have to see how it goes.

As part of that, they will hopefully be "bigger" new things - i.e. not things I did at the last minute in order to get something done.

Today's new thing is not terribly big, but it is exciting - I used my spade drill bits. I did not succeed in fixing my sister's closet (which was the goal), but I am excited to have used them since I got them several years ago & they have basically been collecting dust ever since.

To be continued

Apparently, it's hard to get out of the habit of posting every day.

So, anyway. I decided to do a new thing every day in 2008 in October, 2007 when I read about Jen's In The New blog.

At that point, I didn't know if I'd be able to do it. I also couldn't have anticipated some of the things that would happen in 2008 - such as going to Africa twice.

There were also things I knew I wanted to do - like 10-pin bowling, cooking spaghetti squash, and fencing.

There were things I thought I would do - like finishing level 2 boxing & starting level 3.

Now 2008 is over, and I did something new every day - some days more than one thing. (Admittedly, some of them were pretty sad, and only happened late in the day after a great deal of panic.) Obviously, the year didn't happen exactly as I expected.

Doing something new was definitely a good experience. The interesting part is that it has changed the way I think.

I've also enjoyed getting to know (virutally) other people who are crazy enough to try to do something new every day.

By nature, I am a planner. I'm also the kind of person who tends to go to a restaurant a second time and order the same thing as I did on the first visit.

I've noticed that after a year of doing something new every day, I'm far more likely to choose something new just because it's something I've never done before.

There are also things that I had wanted to do that I didn't get to do.

This year I'm not going to do something new every day - but I will continue doing new things and writing about it here. Stay tuned.