Category Archives: Food

Nicole’s Favourite Things: The “It’s Festivus For The Rest Of Us” Edition

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Happy Festivus, everyone!

As is tradition on this day, I will air some grievances.

To be honest, I don’t really have many grievances, but I do have a grievance-adjacent issue. It is a truth universally acknowledged that a house in possession of a furnace will have an issue with that furnace that only surfaces on the coldest day of the year. And so it was on Monday morning, when the windchill was minus 40, I noticed that the temperature in the house was below that at which the thermostat was set at, and the furnace was not running. The temperature started to drop fairly rapidly, which brings us to the Feats of Strength portion of Festivus. For me, it was less of a feat of physical strength, than mental.

I went down to the furnace room and shone a flashlight on the furnace, the heating equivalent of kicking tires. I noticed a sticker on the furnace with troubleshooting steps, starting with changing the furnace filter and ending with resetting the furnace by flipping the emergency switch. I did each of the steps, ending with the reset button. How many things in this world are fixed by just turning them off, and then turning them back on again? It worked for this girl! The furnace whooshed into action, and the house warmed up to its typical 20 degrees. I congratulated myself, put on several layers, and took Rex for a walk.

When we returned an hour later, the furnace had stopped and the house had cooled down a couple of degrees. I restarted the furnace again, considered my new full-time job of the modern day equivalent of stoking the fire, and called to leave a message with Tony the Hot Plumber, who has been my plumbing-related eye-candy for over a decade. It’s not a chore by any means to call Tony, but I figured that given the weather, it could be a day or maybe even a few days before he could get back to me. “This is like your Superbowl!” I said cheerfully in the message, suggesting that maybe there was a problem with the sensor since the actual furnace seemed to work.

Only a couple of hours later, I got a call from Tony. He had just finished a job, and could be at my house in half an hour!

I quickly zoomed around the house, gathering cash – it’s his preferred method of payment – and then I put together a cute little box of Christmas treats and applied lipstick. Don’t judge! You would do the same.

It WAS a problem with the sensor – am I about to embark on a new career as a heating and plumbing clairvoyant? – and it was easily fixed. “I see you changed the furnace filter,” Tony said, “And you even put it in the right way!” Written down, it sounds patronizing, but really it was said in a congratulatory and encouraging tone, albeit one that was perhaps pleasantly surprised. I am now eternally grateful for a reliable furnace, as well as having a reliable (and attractive) plumber. I was especially happy as the weather got worse over the next couple of days.

All right, grievances – such as they are – have been aired, feats of strength shown, it’s time to move on! This is a very long, roundabout introduction to the last Favourite Things of 2022. I wanted to show you some of my favourite holiday-related items to round off the year.

Nicole’s Favourite Things: The “It’s Festivus For The Rest Of Us” Edition

Gnome Sweet Gnome

I love gnomes at all times of the year, but I think they are especially fun during the holidays. Salvadore is enjoying hanging out in what I am calling Gnome Corner, with his friends Knightley, Elton, and Bingley, just in case you weren’t yet sure about one of my favourite authors.

Not to worry, Gaston is festively hanging out in the ball pit.

God, remember ball pits? There was one at the Beaners where my kids got their hair cut when they were small, and I recall one of my sons saying “Hey, my sock is all wet!” I looked over to see a small child in the ball pit with him look suddenly sheepish. Shudder. I am glad those days are in my rearview mirror.

My new tree gnomes are hanging out happily.

Pining For Christmas

Many years ago – at least twenty, but it might be more – I was visiting my in-laws and, while walking on their property, saw many beautiful, huge pine cones on the ground. I gathered a large number of them, intending to make a Christmas craft, temporarily forgetting that I have absolutely no craft-making qualities. Fortunately I remembered this aspect of myself before the pine cones became a pile of hot glue and shards. Instead of doing something that would only end in tears, every year I arrange the pine cones in a bowl and on various flat surfaces around the house – see Gaston’s photo, above.

Run, Run, As Fast As You Can

Speaking of my lack of craftiness, last Friday the boys and I engaged in our annual tradition of decorating gingerbread people. As always, I stuck with my assembly line of mini M&Ms and frosting tubes to make plates full of smiling, tri-buttoned people while the boys got creative.

My younger son concentrated on making the gingerbread equivalent of AEW wrestlers, complete with bladed foreheads – maybe don’t look that up – and a Walter White.

My older son created a Joe Biden and a Barry Bee, among others.

One of those “others” was the mom from Mean Girls, complete with Juicy tracksuit, for his own Cool Mom.

I laughingly suggested that I should get myself a Juicy tracksuit, and my younger son’s response was Not if you want to remain the Cool Mom. As if I would wear a pink tracksuit. I guess my Cool Mom status still stands.

Mint Squares

Mint chocolate is the festive season’s pumpkin spice: people either love it and anticipate it with excitement, or they don’t. I am a Love It person; it’s probably my favourite sweet flavour combination. To that end, years ago I created these vegan mint squares and they have been a Christmas staple ever since.

I also love reading my old recipes for the commentary; this one has a reference to Richard Scarry and Aunty Ant.

Feliz Navidad

Back in 1997, I was on a girls’ trip to Mexico, and I happened on a little shop that had all sorts of little knick-knacks, and I fell in love with these little creche figurines. The boys used to play with them when we would set up the creche every year, and Rex has wagged a few cows and sheep out of the barn, which is a testament to their fortitude (maybe they are celebrating Festivus, with feats of strength?).

Christmas Vacation

I love the movie Christmas Vacation with all my heart; we watch it every year and this year we were joined my my husband’s cousin and her husband, who also love it. My husband prepared for it by wearing this:

In a massive fail, I had worn mine to exercise in that morning, so it was in the wash:

The fact that we have these shirts represents my husband’s great love; he doesn’t even really like that movie, but he puts up with my obsession. He helped put together this puzzle:

Maybe he feels that the exterior lighting hits a bit too close to home.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays, my friends. I know this year is fraught with weather concerns and storms, and I hope you are all safe and warm and surrounded by love. xo

Fancy Festivities and Friends

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Here’s Your One Chance, Fancy, Don’t Let Me Down. Back in September 2020, when the kids first went back to in-person school after lockdown, my younger son told me that just walking through the halls and being around so many people made him really happy. I had that same feeling on Friday when my husband and I went to his company holiday party. I couldn’t stop smiling, just seeing other people all dressed up and looking universally beautiful. We are at a PARTY, I kept thinking, a HOLIDAY PARTY and everyone is DRESSED UP. I have no idea if this feeling of abject delight and wonder is going to continue throughout my life, but I hope it does.

It was so much fun, even if I am so unused to wearing heels that my feet were crying by the end of the night. What are you doing to me, where are our comfy shoes, what is happening right now.

We stayed at the party until TEN THIRTY PM and I wasn’t in bed until an hour later, and did you even know there was an 11:30 AT NIGHT? There is! I had prepared for this exciting and unheard of bout of wildness by doing two things I never do normally: I had a nap in the afternoon, and then I had a strong, caffeinated chai at 4:00 pm. WHEEEEEEE!

Last week I had invited all of you, my dear readers, to Ask Me Literally Anything, and I have had so many great questions that I will be answering in the coming weeks. My wild Friday night brings me to a question Pat (HI PAT) raised: I, like everyone else, am fascinated by you 4 a.m. wakeup. When you are on vacation, perhaps at your parents place, your lake house or a sunny destination, do you alter your schedule a bit? Maybe stay up till 9:30 and get up at 5? Well, Pat, on weekends I do sometimes sleep until 6 if I can! One thing about me is that my body seems to have a natural wakeup in the hour between 4 and 5, but on weekends or holidays I can usually lull myself back to sleep for another hour or two. I do try to stay up later when we are on vacation or visiting my parents, because it’s a bit ridiculous to go to bed at 8:30 when everyone is having fun and playing games. I thought maybe I could sleep in a bit this Saturday morning, but my son had a wrestling tournament and needed to be up by six, and although he drove himself to the school and is perfectly capable of getting through his own morning routine without his mother, I was still awake and drinking coffee by 6:05. You know how it goes, people.

And You May Ask Yourself, How Did I Get Here? I will be keeping the form open, mostly because I don’t know how to close it, so ask any questions you like. On the other hand, if you’re thinking really, I already know too much, that is cool too.

One question I did want to address came not from the form but from multiple comments about my Day in the Life post, with regards to teaching and practicing yoga. Some readers expressed surprise that I would practice yoga and then teach yoga in the same day, but those things are very separate to me. My personal yoga practice is a moving meditation, where I flow through postures – the Ashtanga primary series, with some additions and subtractions – doing breath work and ending with a nice savasana. I get on the mat every single day, even if it’s just a five minute seated meditation; I don’t feel like myself if I don’t practice. Teaching, on the other hand, is a different story: it’s work. I mean, it is fun work, and it is work that I enjoy, but it is work nonetheless. I am always “on,” and talking, and watching my students for cues that something is working or not working for them. I don’t focus on my own breathing, and it is not meditative in the least, because I am generally thinking of what posture we are going into next and how to include variations for students with a variety of old injuries and concerns.

I have been teaching many of my current students since 2017, so I have a good relationship with all of them, which I especially appreciated on Monday afternoon, when I was teaching my Strength and Tone ladies. We were in the middle of a downward dog when suddenly, with no warning whatsoever, my nose started bleeding, like that of a long-term cocaine addict. Such a thing has never happened to me before while teaching, and I hope it never happens again. When I say my nose started bleeding, I don’t mean a little trickle. I mean that I had to pause the class and it took TEN MINUTES to get things under control. Ten minutes is a very long time to be stanching a nose bleed, let me tell you. Fortunately my students are very kind and understanding, and were willing to independently use my tennis balls for some myofascial release at the wall while I went through every single tissue I had in my purse, and half the scratchy, recycled material paper towels that the community centre had next to the sink. I give my students homemade chocolates every year at Christmas, and I may have dropped a few extras in for these ladies, to thank them for their patience with my dramatically bleeding nose.

This Year, To Save Me From Tears, I’ll Give It To Someone Special. Last week I was having couple of down days; I felt mired in anxiety and worry about my children and their immediate and long-term futures, myself and my ability to handle Life’s Next Chapter, and also drooping sadness because it felt like everyone I was encountering was somehow yucking my yums. Normally I am a Que Sera, Sera Person, moving through life thinking we are doing our best, things will work out in the end, all will be well, and not being overly concerned if people don’t share my feelings about silly and fun things, but I just couldn’t shake my gloom. Part of this may have been due to the fact that I was short on sleep: one of the CO detectors’ battery died in the very early hours, waking me up with its incessant chirping even earlier than normal, and also that my Garmin was telling me that “it’s almost that time again!” which generally affects my sleep as well, in addition to my mood in general. I didn’t really need the reminder from my Garmin. My feelings of despair towards humanity were reminder enough, not to mention my giant swollen breasts that were spilling out of all of my yoga tanks.

My very dear friend Hannah who I love very much (HI HANNAH) somehow knew how I was feeling and sent me this, while I was standing in line at the post office, which in itself contributes to angst and despair:

It immediately turned my mood around; it made me so happy, and feel so seen. On days that I don’t get enough Last Christmas, I have been pulling out my sheet music and playing it on the piano. I am enjoying the fuck out of it.

Then, I came home to open a package sent to me by my dear friend Elise (HI ELISE), and I think I may have blacked out with excitement for a moment when I opened it.

Longtime readers will remember my obsession with the Sears Wish Book, and you just cannot even begin to imagine how exciting this was to receive in the mail. How did I get so lucky, to have such incredible friends? What an incredible gift! Thanks Elise!

This One’s For Becky. Back to the subject of music, I was driving home from the grocery store, listening to 70s on 7 – HI SUZ, the only other person I know who listens to that station – and Coward of the County came on. Let me just say that a) my parents were big Kenny Rogers fans, and b) I know the lyrics to almost every song I was exposed to more than once from my very young childhood to today, which means that probably 90% of my brain is song lyrics. If I could free up my brain power from remembering all these lyrics, I could probably cure cancer or something. Anyway, I hadn’t heard Coward of the County for many years but I still cheerfully sang along. Wow, that is one upbeat tune, given the grim nature of the song. Gang rape! Murder leading to lifetime incarceration! Generational trauma! I remember singing this song as a small child, which is unsettling to think of. Small Nicole, with her little bowl cut and her 70s clothing, singing Folks just called him Yellow! Son, you don’t have to fight to be a man.

I was likely singing and/ or talking in this photo, but it’s unlikely it was Coward of the County. Probably it was a Christmas song, or maybe just a stream of consciousness about the ornaments. Who can say.

Weekly Reading

Smoke Gets In Your Eyes. This seems like a bit of a morbid topic – the death/ mortuary/ funeral industry – but it is actually quite beautiful in a weird way, about honouring dead bodies and death rituals. I have always wondered about things like expensive caskets and the like, in a WHY kind of way. This was fascinating but not for the squeamish! One of my nephews is interested in pursuing a career in this industry, and reading it helped me understand the motivation.

Thanks For Waiting. This was an interesting concept for a memoir, from the cohost of Forever 35, one of my favourite podcasts. Shafrir talks about being a “late-bloomer,” achieving all those life milestones much later than all her peers, from tweenhood on. It goes from life as a writer in mice-infested NYC apartments, to living and dating in LA, to marriage and the incredible heartache of infertility treatments. It’s incredibly honest and brave, and I could hear her voice as I read this.

The Holiday Breakdown. You know I love a holiday romance, and this was just so delightful and fun. I smiled the whole time I was reading this sweet story; the main character was so fun and charming. The author cohosts Were You Raised By Wolves (two podcast-host books in a row!) and I could feel her warm and delightful personality shining though.

I hope you have a lovely week ahead of you. Maybe some festivities, as well? If you have some Heel Worthy Events, may I suggest some prophylactical Advil? That is, if you can get it. xo

Very Random November Observations

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Everybody Dance Now

The other day Gonna Make You Sweat came on while I was working out, and I realized that I cannot hear that song without immediately picturing the dance scene in Old School. That movie is stupid and problematic, and neither the story nor the timeline make any sense, and yet I will never not find it funny. Back in the day when I worked on a trade floor, my work group were all guys, and one of them lent me his Old School DVD, which led to us all quoting from it all the live-long day. Not an hour went by without someone saying “It has three speeds,” or “What my friend is trying to say is that love is blind,” or “HE’S GONNA DO ONE!” or “Once it hits your lips it’s so good,” “Denver. The Sunshine State,” or my personal favourite, “EARMUFFS!” I realize that none of these statements would make any sense to anyone who hadn’t watched the movie ten times, but imagine, if you will, that each of these statements were considered by us to be a satisfactory answer to almost any request or comment. Nicole, are the prices in yet? Bring your green hat, let’s go. (Translation: yes, the prices are in, and I’m running the numbers right now.)

There is a scene in the movie where Frank goes streaking, by himself, and that made me think of my late father-in-law, whose greatest regret in life was that he didn’t go streaking in the 70s, when it was semi-popular to do so. Remember the song The Streak? The 70s were a magical time. Regrets, we all have them. I have one in particular.

Flash Flash Flash

Remember when flash mobs were a thing? I wish I had been part of one. I regret never being in one because I don’t think flash mobs exist anymore, and even if they did, how would I get myself involved? In any case, my enthusiasm for dancing far exceeds my talent for dancing. I am like one of the twins in the Charlie Brown Christmas, bad hair and all.

Maybe one day! Maybe one day I will have the opportunity to dance in a flash mob, and if the universe is listening, I will dance to anything but Everybody Dance Now would be amazing.

Those Are The Fax, Ma’am

I don’t know what made me think of it, but I realized that, like flash mobs, fax machines are a thing of the past. Isn’t it strange and kind of sad to think of all these completely obsolete items, probably residing in landfills? I mean, who would use a fax machine these days? I asked my husband about it and he said he thought his office still had them, but no one uses them. RIP fax machines.

Speaking of things made obsolete by the internet, remember Adult Video Stores? Or the Adult Video Section in regular video stores, that was cordoned off by a curtain? I mean, since video stores no longer exist, I assume that neither of those things exist as well, but did something else take their place? I have, it should be admitted, never set foot inside an Adult Video Store but now I’m wondering if they just became Adult Stores, the kind of places that sell – I assume – different lubes or costumes or what have you. But then again, all those things are available on the internet and one wouldn’t have to risk running into That Guy From Church while perusing the Naughty Nurse costumes or flavoured lubricant or something really awesome that I don’t even know about*.

Lettuce Pray

I’m going to address the elephant in the room: the lettuce shortage! My friend Hannah (HI HANNAH) mentioned it to me early last week, and I was completely surprised. The week before, I hadn’t noticed anything amiss in the produce section. WELL. Things change, roll with the punches; I went to Superstore on Wednesday and while they did indeed have lettuce, it was insanely priced. Iceberg was $5/ head, which, as Hannah said, is a lot to pay for crunchy water. Romaine was $8 for a three-pack of hearts. I ended up buying two bunches of kale for our Sunday night dinner; I always make a salad to go with that particular meal, and kale Caesar is a very popular choice in our house. I mentioned the shortage to my Thursday morning yoga class, and one of the ladies said that when she was young, they never had salad in the winter, only potatoes, turnips, and canned vegetables. I mentioned frozen vegetables and how great they are to reduce food waste, and she said that frozen vegetables were brand new when she was a child and they never had them. This probably indicates to you the demographic of my students.

Although I don’t tend to notice the price on produce that much, a few weeks ago cauliflower was something like $7/ head. This past week, Superstore had them on limited special:

Whatever you do, don’t go over the limit!!! That’s my two cents, anyway.

Girls, Girls, Girls

I am very sad to say that Pippa the ornamental pepper plant has died. I was weirdly devastated by this. Apparently ornamental peppers are very easy to grow, as long as you live in a warm, humid climate, which is the opposite of the climate in which I reside. I kept looking sadly at her rapidly dropping leaves and wrinkly fruits, and then took matters into my own hands. Pippa ended up in the compost, and I ended up in the garden centre, and how I didn’t come home with a van full of gnomes, I will never know. Wow, the garden centre has a lot of Christmas gnomes. Anyway, what I did end up bringing home were two lovely plants that will hopefully not die in my chilly, dry house. Meet Eva and Stella!

Is my life goal of becoming a Crazy Plant Lady hampered by the Death of Pippa? I hope not. Actually, given the probably outsized nature of my sadness about Pippa, it probably escalates me firmly into Crazy Plant Lady Territory. Particularly since I refer to the plants, including Noelle the Christmas Cactus, as The Girls.

Weekly Reading

We All Want Impossible Things. Oh. You guys. I have been reading Catherine Newman since 2004, back in her Babycenter days, and, as I have surely mentioned, her writing was one of the inspirations to starting this blog. Her writing speaks to me so much, and I almost feel like I have one of those parasocial relationships with her. Anyway, this is her first novel, and I absolutely devoured it and didn’t want it to end. It is a novel based on her actual experience, of her best friend dying in hospice of cancer. The way she writes about hospice is beautiful and heartbreaking and also weirdly hilarious. It’s Signature Catherine Newman, that mix of wrenching and hilarity.

I listened to an interview of her on a podcast – I am not going to say which one because I DEEPLY dislike the podcast, but I made an exception for her – and she said that because this was her first novel, she read a book about how to write a novel, and I found that incredibly reassuring and inspirational. I mean. There is hope for all aspiring writers! And this book is about hope, and grief, and finding beauty in the most painful situation possible. There is also a scene in which she is plucking chin hair for her incapacitated friend, and I would like to tell my dear friends who in the terrible event that they are similarly incapacitated, I will offer my chin-hair-plucking-services. May that day never come, but I found that to be The Testament in Ultimate Friendship.

Startup. Speaking of parasocial relationships, I kind of feel like I have one with Doree Shafrir, who cohosts my current favourite podcast, Forever 35 (“a podcast about the things we do to take care of ourselves” – ladies, you are speaking my language). This is a novel about three women, whose lives become intertwined in the tech startup world. It’s a statement on toxic masculinity in tech culture, and I am here for it. It’s so smart and readable! The characters and their issues are so real; I dove into this book and did not want to come up for air.

So many random things to talk about! I have many more topics to touch on but that will have to wait for another day. Have a beautiful week, friends. Happy Thanksgiving week to all my American beauties! xo

*if you understand that reference, you have watched a lot of Old School. Not to worry, you’re in the Trust Tree with me.

Halloween and Teens

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Happy Halloween, everyone! Whatever your plans today, I hope they at least contain some Fun Sized chocolates. Because I am a Very Fancy Lady, I have a big bowlful of full-sized chocolate bars, and because I get weirdly paranoid about Halloween, I also have purchase three giant boxes of mini chocolate bars and fruity candy, because what if we get swarmed by children and I run out of the big chocolate bars? What if? This has never happened, but there is a first time for everything.

Does Rex want to be a cowboy for Halloween, or would he prefer a tiny sparkly sombrero? We don’t know. We also don’t know what he’s going to think of Trick-or-Treaters. He doesn’t bark when people come to the door, but he is very interested in people, so we are going to have to make sure he doesn’t accidentally bowl small Paw Patrollers over.

This is my Annual Reminder that Teens Are People Too; my very strict rule is that if someone comes to my door on Halloween, they will get a treat. There is no age limit to this, I don’t even care if there is a costume involved, and I certainly don’t have a performance or singing requirement. I’m not telling anyone else what to do with their stash of Fun-Size Kit Kats, but in this house, everyone gets a damn chocolate bar, and I don’t care if the Trick-or-Treater is 6’2″ and is just wearing regular clothes. Halloween is for everyone!

My own teens are not Trick-or-Treating and haven’t for a few years now, but they have been pilfering from my boxes of mini chocolate bars, so maybe I should buy another box, just in case?

No. I need to stay strong. I HAVE ENOUGH.

Besides which, the guys have a lot of sugar cookies to eat, because it isn’t a festivity if there aren’t cookies involved:

The snow mostly melted, just in time for more snow coming this week. Prior to that we had a lot of heavy winds, and some of the decorations took the hit, particularly our hanging mummy:

My husband was out of town for a few days, but the boys managed to fix the decorations that ended up tangled in tree branches, but the ground was so wet from all the snow that they couldn’t get the mummy to stand back up. It took some effort but they jerry-rigged it to a tree. Between that and my younger son putting the winter tires on my car, I am really celebrating having teens, even more than usual. Even when they eat into my stash of mini chocolate bars.

The guys gave me this shirt for Christmas, and it has spurred a whole series of Fuck Things around here. For example, the song September only needs to play for someone to comment “Earth, Wind, and Fire. Fuck water.” There was a restaurant in a small town that we drove past this summer, called “Breakfast Matters…Lunch Too!” at which point, my younger son said “Fuck dinner.”

Good times. Today I teach my Strength and Tone Yoga class, and I think I’m going to take my ladies some Lindors from my secret stash that no one but me knows about, which is why it still exists; maybe I’ll dig out my little witch fascinator as well. Will it stay on during downward dog? Who can say.

Weekly Reading

The Wild Iris. I have been reading this beautiful book of poetry each morning prior to my yoga practice, over the past couple of months. It’s gorgeous. Thanks so much to Suzanne (HI SUZANNE) for introducing me to the incredible Louise Gluck!

The Dictionary of Lost Words. I think it was from reading a Bill Bryson book that I realized…the Oxford English Dictionary didn’t always exist. I mean, obviously! Someone had to write it! But imagine the work that went into that. It took decades, and that is the basis of this novel; the writing of the OED. Importantly, the story deals with words the dictionary DOESN’T include. There was absolutely a bias in the writing of the dictionary; words predominantly used by women and lower classes were typically not included. (There is a whole chapter on the c-word.) Given the fascinating topic, this book should have been a home run for me, but it wasn’t. There were good parts and it was thought provoking, but the story didn’t grab me; I had a hard time getting into it and I found the characters flat. I liked it okay, but not as much as I thought I would. This book got rave reviews, so take my review with a grain of salt, but I just could not CARE about the story as it was written, although I spent a lot of time thinking about the Educated White Man bias that decided which words were important enough to end up in the dictionary.

Unmask Alice. Now, this WAS a home run for me. This book was bananas. B-A-N-A-N-A-S. Did you read Go Ask Alice when you were a teen? I sure did and it scared the bejesus out of me. I credit it for keeping me from ever trying LSD or any hard drugs, and believe me, I was no angel. Who could forget the final freak out? Who could forget her ripping out her own hair and skin because she thought she was crawling with maggots? Who could forget when she ran away, got her period, and had no feminine supplies. Not that these things are equal, but all distressing. Anyway, the “diary” was completely fake and as an adult, of course, I can see it. I mean, no one goes from acid to speed to HEROIN to…pot. What I didn’t know is how insidious the author of Go Ask Alice was. This book is nuts and it takes you on a wild ride. It covers everything from Satanism to Art Linkletter, of “Kids say the darnedest things” fame. It’s wild and the side notes are supremely funny. At the same time, the religious background of the author makes things like the homophobia of Go Ask Alice even more disturbing than it was on first read. I had no idea that the author of Go Ask Alice went on to “edit” “real diaries” of many other troubled teens, right up until before her death in the early 2000s, always pretending that those diaries were completely authentic, although they all SOMEHOW backed up her own belief system. And just as soon as you think you know what’s happening, this book takes a crazy turn at the end.

Happy Halloween, everyone! Tomorrow is the start of Tiny Secret Festive Season! My Christmas bracelet is waiting in the wings, I have festive-scented hand soaps for every sink, and the fall-themed tea towels are preparing to go back in the closet, to be replaced by all the holiday ones. It won’t be long before I bust out the Christmas playlists and songbooks.

Rex will probably be glad for some Christmas music; I have been learning Bridge Over Troubled Water and it is a BITCH with key changes and difficult fingering.

Enjoy the festivities tonight, whatever you are doing, and best of luck to all my friends starting NaBloPoMo tomorrow! I’ll do my best to keep up with you, but no promises! Have a great week. xo

First Step

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Happy Thanksgiving! I hope all my Canadian friends are enjoying this holiday Monday, and I hope you all – Canadian and beyond! – have had a beautiful weekend filled with delicious food and lots of love. I have so very much to be thankful for, not least of which was the Friday night with my parents. Due to my son’s work schedule, we headed up to visit on Friday, when my mom made an enormous dinner with three pies, and a chocolate cake for me, her spoiled daughter who does not like pie. We had a great night with lots of food, wine, and raucous dice games.

Last Monday one of my students brought up the quote “Gratitude is the first step to joy,” and I have been meditating on that all week. I have so much to be grateful for, the number one of which is my family; sometimes I just feel like my heart is going to explode thinking of it. Health, of course, is also a great source of gratitude. At my age, I am seeing more and more friends and acquaintances with health issues, both minor and, sadly, severe. One of my favourite Peloton instructors has a motivational phrase that goes along the lines of I woke up this morning, I put my feet on the ground, not everyone has that privilege. I am starting to completely understand why, when you talk to older people, the conversation veers towards all their friends who are sick and/or dead. Not to be grim, but the older we get the more of that we see, and so I am grateful, so very grateful, for my good health. I woke up this morning! I put my feet on the ground!

Good health is, of course, a broad umbrella. I have found that, with my kids going maskless most of the time, we are all like toddlers on their first foray into day care. Sniffles abound! But this is a minor complaint. In general, our health is good, and I hope tomorrow’s mammogram will confirm that as well.

It is, I will admit, that time in my cycle when my emotions are bigger and for me that means my feelings of gratitude for the mundane cannot be contained. But what better day to list such things than Thanksgiving?

Food, Glorious Food

Supply chain issues and my weird obsession with lemon juice and popcorn notwithstanding, isn’t it incredible that we can go into a grocery store at any time and purchase almost anything? Sure, prices are through the roof and yes, sriracha is still unavailable, but just think of the bounty and variety there for the taking. When I was a kid, the fruit that was available to me in the winter was restricted to bananas and apples, with the occasional bunch of green grapes and mandarin oranges at Christmas. Vegetables were largely frozen or canned, and that was that. Now look at the produce section. Strawberries! Available any time of the year! Somewhere in the world, there is a farmer who is growing strawberries, and Mother Nature is providing sunshine and rain for those strawberries, and people are picking them, and then people transport them, and then the lovely people at Superstore unload them into beautiful displays. So many factors go into our fruit and vegetables, and if I let myself think about it for just a moment, I feel overwhelmed with gratitude.

Now think of all the ways we can prepare food. A mere fifteen or twenty years ago, if I wanted to make a dish I would have to find a recipe in a cookbook, and figure things out. Now there are multitudes of recipes, for free, right in the literal palm of my hand, even the most obscure. A world of flavour at our disposal! Not that I’m great at following recipes, mind you, but inspiration has to come from somewhere.

Home, Sweet and Warm and With Running Water, Home

Maybe this is due to my son’s recent backcountry camping trip, but good lord, I am grateful for clean water. Isn’t it amazing that we can turn a tap and there is clean, safe water? Not only that but we can choose the temperature and it just HAPPENS. There is a water pipe system in place, a sewage system in place, there are people who treat water, and there are scientists who figured out what we need to do to have safe water, and here we are. Every shower and glass of water and load of laundry is a miracle of engineering and technology.

Not only is water heated with absolutely no effort from me except by turning the tap a certain way, but the house is also warm and snug. There’s no fire to stoke. There’s no fuel to haul. I touch the thermostat and the temperature adjusts. Isn’t that incredible? And if it doesn’t, I call Tony the Hot Plumber Who I Have a Bit of a Crush On, and he comes and fixes it. Within the DAY.

Baby You Can Drive My Car

A little while back, Elisabeth (HI ELISABETH) mentioned how grateful she was for being able to drive, and I see her, and raise her. Yes, I am incredibly grateful to a) have learned to drive as a mere 16-year-old, b) have a reliable vehicle, and c) be able to afford to put gas in the car. There are many places where women cannot drive, and there are many who cannot afford a vehicle or gasoline. But more than that I am grateful to have two children who drive. Specifically, I am so grateful my son can drive himself to wrestling practice in the evenings so that two evenings a week I don’t have to keep my regular clothes on until 8:30, at which point I can finally don my jammies and go to bed.

The Awesome Power of Nature

A few years ago, my friend Taryn (HI TARYN) and I were hiking in the mountains when we came across a rushing stream, at which point Taryn said in a booming, PBS-nature-special-voice, “BEHOLD! THE AWESOME POWER OF NATURE!” This was a running joke between her and her husband, and when she shared it with me I started thinking of it every time I saw something pretty in nature. I thought of it every day this week as I walked or ran, with the leaves turning and the skies so blue. Isn’t it amazing? Crunchy leaves underneath our feet, indicating that the trees are preparing for their wintering, just as I am, by digging out my boots and sweaters.

Our Community, Big and Small

I absolutely love the community I live in. I can walk to any number of amenities – grateful for those amenities! – and the people here are generally wonderful. I love my friends, who are all so special in different ways, and I love our blogging community. When I started this blog in 2008, I was part of a lovely little community of bloggers, only one of whom – HI ALLISON – is still blogging today. The blogging world changed for a while – remember sponsored content? – but then a few years ago, I started to belong to a new community. This community strengthened during the pandemic, and I am so grateful for all of you.

If you’re reading this, yes! I am talking to you. I am grateful for YOU. Thank you for being here.

Weekly Reading

Barreling Forward. We all know I really enjoy short stories, and I enjoyed this collection by a new Canadian author. I feel like she might be from Newfoundland, her stories have that flavour, if you know what I mean. If you know, you know.

Lessons in Chemistry. I had heard good things about this and it did not disappoint! It was truly a delight to read BUT…I started it at that time in my cycle when my always-simmering rage about our patriarchal society and institutionalized misogyny boils over. Reading the first fifty pages, with the gross and sexist treatment of the lovely, brilliant scientist main character, my rage boiled all over the stove and left burned on crusts, almost impossible to scrub off. Happily, before I gave up on it and threw it across the room, a dog was introduced as a main character and I was charmed enough to keep reading. It’s a wonderful book that is ultimately about the power of women and the importance of lifting each other up. Oh, and that dogs are smart and wonderful.

This Will All Be Over Soon. I heard about this on a podcast and I thought it sounded interesting enough: it is a memoir by SNL’s Cecily Strong, about mourning the loss of her cousin and then experiencing the early days of the pandemic. The podcast mentioned it was written in diary form, but it reads like her actual diary, which is to say from a writing point of view, it is not great, Bob. It’s not terrible, and it’s a fast read, but I didn’t find it to be particularly compelling or interesting. It did, however, make me feel hopeful as it reminded me just how bleak and scary those early pandemic days were. Over the past ten months or so, almost everyone I know has been boosted and also has had Covid, as have I on both counts, and so I kind of forgot just how deadly and terrifying the virus was back in 2020. It was also interesting to read about experiencing Covid in NYC, which was a different experience, I think, from the rest of the continent. On the whole though, I did not enjoy this.

Fun fact about today’s title: I cannot say the words “first step” without mentally singing “ask her out and treat her like a layyyydayyyy.” It’s impossible! Sometimes I am able to stop there, but mostly my mind will go all the way through the old Eddie Rabbit song. It’s fun to be me! There’s always music. Happy Thanksgiving, my friends. xo

Life, Unstaged and Unfiltered

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A couple of weeks ago I was at a farewell party for friends of ours who are relocating to the States; we had a very interesting conversation about what it’s like to buy a house from afar, and also about selling and listing a house in today’s market. The housing market in Calgary isn’t as hot as it was, but it’s still pretty spicy. My friend mentioned how tired she was from getting the house ready to list: decluttering and cleaning and staging, on top of having to disappear for hours while the house was being shown. It occurred to me at that very moment, that when we were house hunting, back in 2000, there was no such thing as “staging” your house. In fact, I clearly remember when I first heard the term “staging,” and that was in 2007 when a girlfriend was selling her very beautiful home, and hired a staging company which, because her home was already like a showhome, wasn’t really necessary.

The conversation quickly turned from Staging to Misleading Realtor Photos, which is a real phenomenon. Sometimes I’ll snoop on a realtor website to see homes in my 1960s-established neighbourhood to see houses that appear to contain enormous, spa-like bathrooms and infinitely spacious living areas, only to see that the curtains do not match the carpet, so to speak. Well, I guess it’s nothing like that. It’s more like this house is 1100 square feet, how is it housing all these giant rooms? Very good photography, that’s how.

Here is where I go back to my own experience, almost 23 years ago, in which there were no digital photographs and I don’t even think homes were listed on the internet. You found out what houses were available through a realtor or by seeing lawn signs. Wow. I feel like my own grandmother here, but I can still remember going to the open houses or scheduled showings, and being handed a sheet of paper with tiny, grainy photos of all the rooms of the house, plus the yard. There was no trick photography involved, and, as I said, no staging whatsoever. Generally the houses would have been cleaned before viewing, but not always, as evidenced by the house with the rabbit hutch, complete with several rabbits, in the basement of one house we looked at. If I think about it, I can honestly say I’m pretty sure this house, the one I live in now, was not at all cleaned when we viewed it. In fact, I’m pretty sure it smelled like old grease.

One of the things that I loved about house hunting, which would never happen now, was seeing all the little touches of home that painted a picture of the current residents and their lives. I loved seeing family photos on the walls, children’s toys in the rooms, even shampoo bottles in the shower. These people use Dove soap too! Just like me! I wonder if those hair masks really work. I loved it. Now, of course, everything is sanitized of anything that could indicate that people reside in the house that is on the market. Family photos are replaced by stock wall hangings, all toiletries are stashed under the immaculately clean sink, nothing about the kitchen would indicate that actual humans had cooked actual food in it ever, so pristine are the appliances.

Here’s a question: how do you live in your house when you are trying to sell it, what with keeping it pristine and staged? I realize people move house all the time, but people, HOW. It must be exhausting.

I find it so interesting that fancy, and possibly misleading, photography and special staging are such an important part of selling a home. It’s so in tune with the times that we live in, where everything is filtered and set up Just So, and then exhibited on social media. I came across a former yoga teacher’s instagram account, and all the photos of herself utilized a sparkling, soft-focus filter; when I say “sparkling,” I mean that they had literal sparkles on them. Listen, I like sparkly things as much as the next person, but it is so jarring to see someone In Real Life when you are used to seeing them Filtered, let alone with a Sparkle Filter.

I am just so fascinated by other people’s actual lives and homes, which is why I don’t like filters and I don’t like home staging. I absolutely loved this piece on Catherine Newman’s house; she was the very first blogger I ever read, and was an inspiration to me when I started the Boyhouse, back in 2008. Her home is glorious; I love every little beautiful detail. The puzzles! The books! The toiletry products! The lovely Ally Bean (HI ALLY) wrote about sharing slices of our lives that are messy, unstaged, and perfect in their perceived imperfections. I was inspired to show you a few completely unstaged, beautifully imperfect pieces of my life this past week:

Making dressing for a Thai-style quinoa salad. Fun fact: I recently was scolded on Instagram for calling it a Thai-style quinoa salad, as it contains tamari, which is Japanese. The scolder thought it should be a Western “Asian” sauce, which felt a little aggressive to me. I didn’t name it! That was what it was called! In any case, it’s delicious and everyone loves it and I think that Suzanne (HI SUZANNE) had originally linked to it, which gives me warm and fuzzy feelings when I make it. She posts so many good recipes on her “Dinners This Week” feature; if you’re not following her, you SHOULD.

Roasting lentils and chickpeas for the salad, and then cleaning up. My dishrack looks like this all the time. I don’t mind washing dishes but I HATE drying them. Hate it. It was always my job to dry dishes growing up and as god is my witness, I shall never do so again. (Lie: I do occasionally dry things, but only when there is so much stuff in the dishrack that one more item threatens to topple everything, like Aunty Ant climbing aboard the plane in Busy Busy World.)

Anyway, here is the end product:

This is our back entry/ mudroom, and this is as good as it ever looks, because I was the only one home. Generally there are more shoes, and since my younger son is a size 12, those shoes take up a lot of space. Note the bin to hold recycling, that is stuck on my boot. Usually once it’s in a state of Almost Overflow, someone will take it to the blue bin in the garage.

Speaking of my younger son, this was the sight that greeted me in the basement: his gear for this week’s camping trip was piled up and added to as items were obtained. It was like this for a solid week before he had to do the gear check at school and actually get everything into his backpack:

That sucker is heavy. Note the Aquatabs for water treatment on top of the day pack. Am I obsessed with the fact that they will have no potable water? Yes. I am.

Moving on! This is “my” side table in the living room, and it is a source of happiness for me. My mom gave me the piano-themed coasters when she was stuck in Moose Jaw during an enormous snow storm and couldn’t leave for three days, so she went shopping (I love my mom, shopping is her cure for everything). There is a jade plant and a vase given to me by former yoga students, pussy willows that I kept from a bouquet my friend Sarah (HI SARAH) gave me on my birthday, a family photo, and Barkley’s paw print. There are also books!

I always have a jumble of books from the library, plus a couple of books of my own that I’m slowly reading or referencing. My older, Seinfeld-obsessed son “won” a Seinfeld-themed Clue game that we haven’t played yet but I sure am looking forward to.

So those are a few pieces of my life this week, no filters, no staging, just little slices of joyful jumbles.

Weekly Reading

A People’s History of the United States. I finished! I finally finished! It took me at least six weeks to get through this because a) it’s huge, b) it’s really heavy, and c) it was so disheartening, dark, and depressing that I could only make it through a chapter a day at best. AT BEST. However, it’s a very important and eye-opening read. It’s very hard to read, particularly about the treatment of indigenous people, black people, immigrants, and basically anyone who is not a privileged white male. I’m not going to lie, some chapters were extremely dull, long, and repetitive – the formation of unions and strikebreaking chapters went on forever – but mostly this was a whole new look at things we may have taken for granted. There’s a very upsetting chapter on manifest destiny and if you’ve ever wondered how Hawaii became part of the US, well, it was annexed. The Dole family had a large part in that. There are, of course, chapters on the slavery, violence, and how white men thought it was perfectly fine to just eradicate Indigenous people, since they were unable to enslave them, in order to increase their living space. “Why shouldn’t we just take over everything and have everything at the expense of others?” seemed to be the major theme. This book delved into events that I remember from my own childhood but was fuzzy on, since I was a child, like the Iran-Contra affair. This is an incredibly important read, but very difficult as it challenges mainstream beliefs and is VERY upsetting. In case you think I’m being a Smug Canadian, I am not: I am fully aware that any “people’s history” of any western country would be also horrifying, for what it’s worth. Canada’s treatment of Indigenous people is the darkest stain on our history; it goes beyond horrifying. Anyway, this book is worth reading but be warned: it’s a monster of a tome and very heavy.

The Crown Dissected. Hugo Vickers has been a Royal commentator since 1973, and it brought me so much joy imagining him watching The Crown, frame by frame, and delving into it. Think about it! Elderly British man, sighing as he brings out his many reference books and notes, and then detailing every little thing in the episode and why it is historically incorrect. Some of the issues are big, and some are “Tommy Lascalles hair is parted on the wrong side and his moustache is too big.” I am 100% here for this. What an absolute delight to read. Listen, there are so many awful and horrifying things happening in the world; I was happy to be lost in ridiculous details such as the wrong insignia was used on personal stationary, or the purple on Prince Phillip’s uniform was too bright, or that the incorrect year was shown and dramatic license was taken with all the royal relationships. HERE FOR THIS.

Run Towards The Danger. Wow. I am very interested in the ways that trauma informs a person’s day-to-day life and wow, did this woman suffer a lot of trauma. These essays made me audibly gasp many times. From her experiences as a child star in a time when a child’s safety came secondary to everything else, to her scoliosis surgery, to extremely high risk pregnancies, to a debilitating head injury, to her silence during the Jian Ghomeshi trial due to her fears of repercussion (spoiler alert: this woman was yet another of his victims), these essays are at times distressing, horrifying, but ultimately hopeful. A must read from a brave woman. Fun fact: she was the main character in the show Road To Avonlea, which I never watched as I was just a bit too old, but was a Canadian staple in the early 90s.

So here we are, the last week of September already! It’s going to be a busy one. I hope you all have a lovely week! xo

Five For Friday: Nostalgia

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  • WILMA! I’M HOME. I floored to see this display at Costco; I didn’t know that Fruity Pebbles still existed. I have never eaten them in my life, so I have no opinion on the taste or quality of the cereal, but it seems like such an incredibly dated item. I mean, The Flintstones? Is this still part of the cultural zeitgeist? I used to love that show when I was a kid, but there weren’t many other options at the time, and I feel that if I watched an episode now I would be absolutely horrified. However, that doesn’t mean that seeing Fruity Pebbles didn’t give me a nice feeling of nostalgia; I remember watching commercials for such cereals on Saturday mornings while I ate my unsweetened Shreddies or Cheerios, or, if my mom was feeling especially indulgent, my Honey Nut Cheerios. The commercials would be for things like Count Chocula or Boo Berry cereal, items that my mother would have died before purchasing. Last Christmas I saw Elf cereal at the grocery store, and although I have followed in my mother’s footsteps when it comes to virtuously healthy cereal purchases, I bought a box, thinking it would be a fun snack. Reader, it was not. Even my teen boys couldn’t eat it, and I feel like that speaks volumes.
  • Twinkie Twinkie, Not A Star. Speaking of my youth, I loved Archie comics, and I would read them cover to cover, including all the advertisements for things like Sea Monkeys and Twinkies. Sea Monkeys, I have since learned, are dehydrated brine shrimp. Twinkies, though. They looked so delicious, along with Hostess Cupcakes and Ding Dongs; I longed for such treats but at the time they were only available in the US. Any other Canadian women of a certain age remember how you had to “cross the line” to get such things? At the time I’m remembering, the Canadian dollar was pretty much on par with the US, and things like clothing and shoes were so much cheaper “down south,” so we would often drive down to Montana or Washington to do some shopping for back-to-school clothes. It was on one of those trips – where we ate unsweetened but still exciting cereal from those tiny boxes that came in a multipack, in our motel room – that my mom bought Twinkies AND Hostess Cupcakes. No Ding Dongs, but no matter. I was so excited to finally try these long-anticipated snacks, and let me tell you, never was a child so disappointed. I may have accepted that no matter how much cherry Kool-Aid I consumed, the Kool-Aid Man was never going to crash through my kitchen wall; I may have come to terms with the fact that a giant sentient bubble would never appear and hang out with me in my Mr. Bubbles-filled bathtub, but I truly felt like a Twinkie or Ding Dong or Hostess Cupcake would deliciously transport me into the world in which I was shiny-haired Veronica Lodge, snacking while Archie fawned over me and my incredible wealth. I can still remember eating the weird spongy cakes with the flavourless creme fillings, and feeling like my world lost a little bit of colour. Now they are widely available in any Canadian grocery store, and I give them the side-eye every time I see them.
  • Pop Culture. My husband remembers, on a similar childhood trip Across The Line, being able to buy A&W Root Beer IN A CAN and that was as good as it got for him. That was also only available in the States, but since I have a strong aversion to root beer, it would have been wasted on me. My parents used to buy pop from The Pop Shoppe, and the glass bottles came in plastic cases that, along with the bottles, would be returned to the store. I remember one time that they definitely would have foregone the five cent bottle deposit. Generally they purchased cola and lemon-lime, but every once in a while there would be an orange or grape pop bottle in the case, and that would be a huge treat for me. I was told I could go downstairs and bring up “my” pop, but I was so excited I dropped the bottle on my foot; it shattered and I had to go into urgent care. The fourth toenail on that foot is still a little deformed to this day. Despite the fact that those drinks would be a treat for me, my number one favourite beverage at that time was the uncarbonated Orange Drink that came from McDonalds, and that was featured in every single Sports Day during elementary school. Along with the admittedly-probably-watered-down Orange Drink, it would have been considered extremely lucky to receive a little Dixie Cup of vanilla ice cream, the kind that came with a wooden spoon. I am pretty sure the Orange Drink is no longer in existence, and I would probably spin off the planet on a sugar high if I drank it now, but I wonder if those little ice cream cups are still part of this world?
  • When You Wish Upon A Wish Book. One thing that is not part of this world that I genuinely miss every fall is the Sears Wish Book. I have loved the Wish Book for my whole life and was bereft when Sears went out of business. I loved the “gifts for under $10” section, and I always wanted a Snoopy Sno Cone Machine. I’m sure it would have never worked and would have been at least as disappointing as the Twinkie/ Hostess Cupcake experience, but still. Something that was NOT disappointing was the Christmas morning that I opened up my very own Cabbage Patch Kid, named Kora Candi. I did not realize it at the time, but it was a HUGE deal for my mom to get one for me. She had to have her name on a list at Zellers (remember Zellers? Remember grilled cheese sandwiches with fries and gravy at the Zellers “restaurant?”), and when the time came, she was taken into a back room where the staff triple-bagged the box, so that no one would know what she had and would try to rob her in the parking lot. The things moms do to make Christmas magical! The things that happened in the 80s! Let’s not mention that Xavier Roberts completely stole the idea from a little old lady at a craft fair and became very wealthy in the process; I loved Kora Candi and I still do.
  • Your Mom Has Got It Going On. My younger son told me that, in his friend group, the response to “Anyone want to hang out?” is “Your mom does.” I didn’t know guys still insulted each other via “your mom” jokes anymore and, strangely, since I am apparently one of the butts of the joke, it made me happy. Ah, the circle of life. Frequently the question will be reframed as “Anyone want to hang out? Not with my mom.”

We have been having the most gorgeous summer with the longest stretch of absolutely perfect weather; I do not want summer to end. I guess that is why mid-August tends to be a nostalgic time of year for me; this year I’m thinking not just about when my kids were small and we’d be prepping for school, but when I was a kid myself. How about you, are you also feeling nostalgic these days? Is there anything from your past that makes you smile? Tell me everything. xo