Do you want fries with that?

As I briefly mentioned in a post a while ago, I got a McJob. So yay! Money! I haven't actually started yet but my orientation was today so I can pretty much start right away. While working at a fast food place was never my intention, at this point I will pretty much take whatever I can get, and whatever I can get is fast food at this moment in time. I plan to continue to look for work in different areas but this job means that I am not quite as terribly broke as I was getting to be. I am hoping that works out well for me. I have never worked in a fast food place before so this will be something new for me. I also enjoy that I will be paid for the three hour orientation I was at tonight so I having money coming in soon even if that is the only thing I am paid for on that pay cheque. So today's favourite thing is actually having money coming in.

Do you really want me to do that?

I think by now a regular reader of this blog would probably know that I watch quite a bit of television. Pretty much everything I watch, I record (except the poker tournaments and reruns of old shows and Simpsons marathons --wow, considering how many shows I record, I really do watch alot of TV). I find this really nice especially because we can start watching TV shows from the beginning even when they aren't finished recording yet. This is especially nice to skip commercials or to replay something, although occasionally it can be pretty sad. Particularly when you deliberately start watching the show fifteen minutes in just so you can fast forward the commercials. Or worse, pausing the TV just to be able to fast forward it (not that I've ever done that). Lately my sister and I have been watching certain shows live but then come across something my sister wants to replay or pause. Of course, we are watching it live so we can't, so I sarcastically ask if she wants me to play the tape and fast forward to the point she wants to see. Of course, she says yes. I feel a bit foolish but I do (while she mocks me for trying to fast forward too far). I am glad I did but I think in the future, I might just start watching the recording right from the beginning even when we do watch it live just so I can actually pause it without having to fast forward it just to pause it. That being said, today's favourite thing it the Chase-Play function on the DVR.

Putting the fun in fundraiser.

Tonight I went to a fundraiser put on by my bellydance teacher. It was to raise funds to help the family of a friend of hers. Her friend was badly injured in a motorcycle accident in India and the medical bills related to transporting her back to the US were astronomical. Thus far, there have been a number of fundraisers throughout the United States and now in Canada. Many of the performers and audience members there tonight did not know the girl but were there to show their support anyways. It was a very good show with a variety of different types of performance, many of them bellydance related. Those not related to bellydance included live musicians, a DJ, a VJ, a "visual artist", a burlesque performance, hula hoopers (that was pretty awesome), a Bollywood dance, and some sort of jester dude (that was just odd). It was a pretty great evening and I thought all of the support for someone who was a complete stranger was phenomenal.

The early worm....gets the worm? That doesn't seem right.

The past few months really, because I have really no absolutely pressing matters I have to attend to first thing in the morning, I have been sleeping in until noon (sometimes later, sadly). Today, miracle of miracles, I was awake and upstairs by 8:30. Impressive, especially for a Saturday. The best thing to come from it was that I completely threw my sister off. She wasn't expecting me for another 3-4 hours. The worst thing to come from it was that she roped me into helping her defrost the freezer (which actually wasn't that bad as it was amusing to watch her try to reach the bottom of the freezer). Me getting up early also meant that we were able to begin doing our Saturday errands 2-4 hours earlier than we had been doing them. This meant that we had a pretty uneventful afternoon of watching some TV and reading. So all together not a bad day aside from me being really tired as I write this. So today's favourite thing is waking up in the morning.

I don't think they're from California but I enjoy them anyway.

Lately, I've found myself eating a lot of raisins. They aren't something I would usually think of when I think of my favourite foods but I have really been enjying them lately. Possibly because they are quite small and relatively healthy. I am not a huge fan of them in things but just as a snack food, they are nice. I can go for long periods of time without eating them, but once I start, I can't seem to stop.

Ooh! Mail!

My mom went to Mexico a couple of weeks ago for a wedding. She bought necklaces for me and my sister. Today, they came in the mail along with some other stuff I needed sent. Actually, it came yesterday but mom sent it registered and I didn't hear the doorbell so we had to go to the post office today to pick it up. The necklaces were quite nice. They are cool because they are magnetic and that is how that attach together. To be honest, they are currently decorating our refrigerator. I do have to say that I rather enjoy the necklace I chose for myself more than I enjoy the one I left for my sister. So today's favourite things are the necklaces my mom bought in Mexico.

Yet another reason for my sister to give me funny looks.

The other day, I was sitting in the living room with my sister and I think we were waiting for something to come on TV. I have no idea what day it actually was, maybe Sunday but I am not sure. Anyway, I was flipping through the channels and came across a poker game, so I watched it. My sister thought I was very weird for some reason, but I do enjoy watching poker on occasion. It is the one thing on the sports network that I will actually watch, aside from the Olympics. I think I like watching it because it can be pretty suspenseful while also being lowkey. Also, I can actually follow it. I want to say that I enjoy it because I used to work in a casino, in actuality, I started watching it long before I started working at the casino. While we did watch the occasional poker game on the TV in the break room at the casino, we also watched a good many other things as well such as a plethora of shows about house flipping which I do not continue to watch (although I might if we actually TLC or whatever channel has them). I also think I surprised my sister by telling her that I had a favourite poker player because well, how many people watch enough poker to have chose favourites? Or remember the players from game to game? Anyway, today I didn't have a lot to do so I found another poker game and had an enjoyable time watching it. This game actually had my favourite player in it so I was actually even more interested in it. When it comes to actually playing poker, I suck but I do enjoy watching the professionals play. Especially on TV. I don't think I would ever go somewhere to watch it in the audience. So today's favourite thing is watching poker on TV.

In other news, I wore my glasses for the first time in months the other day so I could actually see what was happening in the poker game. Go figure.

Next Item in Gallery....

On my everyday travels through the internet, I go to a few different entertainment websites. My favourite ones are for Entertainment Weekly and TV Guide mainly because they feature slideshows based on different themes. Television Without Pity also occasionally has amusing slideshows. I like seeing what the theme for the slideshow is along with the captions for the various pictures. I don't really look at all of the different slideshows because some of the topics do not interest me in anyway, but if something looks remotely interesting, I am totally there. So today's favourite things are entertainment website slideshows.

What a thoughtful birthday present!

For my last birthday, my sister bought me a 37" flat screen TV. It was awesome and very, very generous. Well, that's what I like to tell people anyway. The truth is that she bought herself a 37" flat screen TV on my birthday. You can see where I may be confused, can't you? Anyway, she gave me her old TV to watch downstairs. I have to say, I enjoy having a TV that I can watch downstairs because I can do things down there while watching it or during commercials without having to worry about when it comes back on. I only tend to watch the TV on Sundays and Mondays. Sundays, because I tend to watch the Amazing Race while she watches The Simpsons, and Mondays, because Castle (a new show starring the awesome Nathan Fillion aka Captain Hammer aka Mal Reynolds...........where was I?) doesn't come on until 10 and I don't really like watching TV that late upstairs because Colette goes to bed earlier than that. I am usually done watching TV by 10 but Mondays, not so much. So, today's favourite thing is having a TV in my room.

"Oh, God! The sugar...."

Today after much hinting by my sister, I made brownies. It was the recipe that my mom always made but I don't remember ever personally making it, so I kept running into the living room to show it to her to make sure I was doing it right. It went alright. I mixed it all together and put it into a pan and then into the oven. That was when I went over the recipe again and realized I forgot the sugar. Luckily, when I realized I had forgotten it, it had only been less than a minute and I was able to take the brownies out. I then poured the sugar onto the brownies and started mixing it on the plan. It didn't work out that well and I got sugar everywhere but for seemed easier than scraping everything off the pan and into the bowl. In hindsight, it wasn't....Anyways, the brownies pretty good. So it all worked out okay. So today's favourite thing is screwing things up horribly and still having it work out okay.

"Extreme"ly satisfying!

Today for lunch, my sister and I went to Extreme Pita. It was quite enjoyable. Normally, when we are out grocery shopping et al. we go grab some shawarma but today we went to a different grocery store that was closer to the Extreme Pita than it was to any good shawarma place. I enjoy Extreme Pita because of a few reasons:

1. There is more than one size available.
2. You can get various vegetables grilled.
3. You can get freestyle pitas as well as chef creations.

Compared to Pita Pit, that is good because, well, Pita Pita doesn't have any of those things (Well, not since I was last there last summer). I also find, at least in Canada, that there seem to be more locations of Extreme Pita than there are of Pita Pit. I know there a quite a few locations in Regina, SK while Pita Pit only has two (which I have never been to, but I have been to Pita Pits in Montreal and Boston). I am not even sure where a Pita Pit is in Ottawa.

Wow....um, just wow!

So, for the last few weeks now, I've been watching the new Joss Whedon show, Dollhouse. While it hasn't been spectacular, it also hasn't been absolutely awful. I just wasn't exactly into the show without reservations. After tonight's episode, I am definitely much more intrigued by the show and interested in seeing what happens next. It had a rather shocking development, which I won't reveal here because shocking developments aren't quite the same without the shock. Tonight's episode definitely gave me much more excitement for the show and where it's going. While I still have some minor problems with the premise, I am more interested in sticking with it than I was previously. So today's favourite things are gasp-worthy moments on TV (or movies or books).

In other news, today I found out I was hired for a McJob so that's good. Yay, potential money!

You always got time for....

Tim Hortons. Anyway, today was my last French class. Because it is March break, the community centre was closed and the teacher hadn't let them know that we would be there so we had to go somewhere else. So we went to Tim Hortons instead. It was good. I like Tim Hortons and Robin's Donuts mostly because they offer more than just doughnuts and coffee. They also sell sandwiches and soup so, apart from the whole fact that they are a DOUGHNUT store, eating there doesn't seem quite so fattening. When I was in Boston, the nearest equivalent was Dunkin' Donuts and it didn't quite have the same feel. It was strictly a doughnut and coffee place with little to no seating. So, all in all, I enjoy Tim Hortons and Robin's much more.

Practice, Practice, Practice

Today, my sister and I finally went over some interview question that we were supposed to do on Monday, and then yesterday. I find that going over the questions really helps me focus on what I need to say rather than either babble or can't think of an answer. I find the practice helps me think of examples and my sister give me prompts that I wouldn't get in an actual interview. I don't have any interviews lined up but I think that the more I practice, the more prepared I will be if or when I actually get an interview. So today's favourite thing is interview practice with my sister no matter how much I dread it or hate it at the time.

Happy Saint Patrick's Day!

Being that I am half-Irish, we tended to have a bit of a Saint Patrick's Day tradition. For one thing, we got together with some members of the Irish half of my family (specifically the ones that lived closest to us) on or around the 17th. My mom also made Irish themed food such as Potato Soup. Anyway, today I made Potato Soup which actually turned out quite well aside from the rather large onion bits that maybe the soup could have done without. We also made green lemon pie (well, lemon meringue pie without the meringue) which was good as well. My family in Saskatchewan was pretty much having the exact same thing except that they were also having Irish Sodabread.

Sigh of relief!

Since I moved in with my sister in September, we have been meeting pretty much every week to discuss what my next step in my job hunting process. We were supposed to meet to discuss interview today (well, this weekend, but I thoughtfully neglected to mention it to her) but she was tired and didn't feel like it. Also, Monday has way too many good TV shows on so, you know, no time! Anyway, I really enjoyed the fact that we put it off until sometime in the future.

Fancy meeting you here!

Today, I went with my sister on her Lenten journey thingy where we go to a different church each week during lent. This is the first week I actually went with her because the service was actually at a time that it seemed likely that I might be able to be up on time for. Plus it was Catholic, so I didn't have to go to two different service in one weekend. Always, a bonus. I just moved to Ottawa so I don't know many people so I was surprised when some people came over and started to talk to me. It was my cousin's wife and daughter. I believe that it was the daughter's actual parish and her mom was just visiting for the week. It was rather cool to meet them there and a rather odd coincidence. So today's favourite thing is meeting people you know in unexpected places.

Another reason I love the internet!

A few days ago, around the time that we bought the Rice Krispies for the Rice Krispie Square, I got the urge to make Cracker Jack cookies because I knew they had Rice Krispies in them. I couldn't find a recipe for them in one of my recipe books (mind you, I only looked in the one my mother gave me). So I went on the internet to Allrecipes.com and found a recipe for them. I made them today and I quite enjoyed them.

A Friday tradition

Ever since I was little, Fridays have been a meat free day, especially during lent. Being that we were a pretty big meat-eating family, we didn't actually have a lot of ideas for meal ideas that didn't involve meat, so we tended to have Grandma's Big Pancakes for supper. They are quite similar to crepes in that they are thin and take up the entire area of a regular frying pan but they are cooked on both sides. They are typically served (in my family, at least) with butter and some sort of jam (rhubarb mostly, but occasionally other varieties). If for some reason, you don't eat them all the first night, they taste quite good if you cut them up into smaller pieces, and refry them the next morning so that the pieces are nice and crispy.
To make them you need:

• 3 cups flour (I usually put in 2 cups white and 1 cup whole wheat)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2/3 cup powdered milk
• a handful of rolled oats (we just recently started putting rolled oats in them, so I just improvise on the amount of them)
• 3 eggs
• water (My recipe says three cups but I have no idea how much I actually use)

Basically, you put all the dry ingredients and the eggs into a bowl. Then you put some water in the bowl and stir it in. You keep adding water until you get a nice thin pourable batter.

You melt some butter on the pan and take a ladle and scoop some of the batter onto the pan. Then you wiggle the pan around until the batter covers the entire bottom of the pan. Once it looks like the pancake is pretty much all a darker colour, you flip the pancake and cook it for a couple more minutes. Then you take it out and repeat as needed. The first pancake needs to be cooked for quite awhile because the pan is not quite hot enough yet. I also tend to flip the first pancake more than the others.

They may not be the healthiest meal, but are certainly quite good.

PS. Colette, this isn't the recipe you told me but it is the recipe that was in Mom's recipe book.

"Many's the long night I've dreamed of cheese - toasted, mostly.”

Today, I came to the rather late realization that I love cheese. I knew I like it for a while but I didn't realize the depths of my feeling for it until today. I like a number of different types of cheeses. I also love both toasted/melted cheese. I like cheese buns as well but I prefer the homemade ones more because they seem less salty or something.

E-e-excellent!!!!

This past weekend, I got the urge to have both Puffed Wheat squares and Rice Krispie squares. Unfortunately, my craving kicked in after my sister went grocery shopping for the week. So, no go. But today, my sister needed me to get some cookie crumbs so that she could make a Cheesecake during her lunch break, so I picked up some Rice Krispies and marshmallows while I was at the store. Unfortunately, I couldn't find Puffed Wheat. I got home and put everything on the counter and went downstairs. I had planned to make some Rice Krispie squares in the not too distant future; my procrastination skills at work once more. When I came upstairs the next time, my sister had made them. It was awesome!

C is for cooking

Today, I made Beef and Barley Soup with lots and lots of carrots. It was enjoyable. It was much better than the slow cooker stuff I made last week where I used way, way, way, way, way too much beef bouillon for 6 cups of water. I just used the bouillion because I forgot to get my sister to buy beef broth when she went grocery shopping. This week, I used less than half the beef bouillion for 9 cups than I did for six. I understand what I did wrong last week. I knew it seemed like excess use of beef bouillion but that's what I thought the instructions said. So, I enjoyed actually having the stuff that I need so that I don't improvise without actually knowing what I am doing.

"Within minutes, I become an atheist."

At the end of both "The Big Bang Theory" and "Two and a Half Men," the Chuck Lorre vanity card flashes on the screen. Until I started recording "The Big Bang Theory," I had never actually read them because the writing's pretty tiny and it goes by really quickly. But having it recorded makes a difference because I can pause it and actually read them. They definitely tend to amuse me. It is also enjoyable that there is a website that has past Vanity cards posted.

It's amazing!

I don't watch a lot of reality shows. In fact, until a few weeks ago, I didn't watch any. For some reason, I started watching The Amazing Race and have really been enjoying it. I like seeing the different countries and seeing what the different challenges will be and how well or badly the different teams handle everything. I don't really have a favourite team yet but some of the teams amaze me at how dense they are.

By the way, this was my 100th post. Wasn't it great?

"I think this line's mostly filler."

I went to the theatrical production of the musical "Nunsense" tonight which I enjoyed rather enjoyed. There's nothing like biblical humour ("Mary Magdalene tarts, they look easy." "And cheap!") I tend to enjoy musicals (both the plays and the movies). Some people get thrown off by people randomly bursting into song, but I am good with that because, quite frankly, I actually do occasionally randomly burst into song. The choreography needs work and I don't have the musical accompaniment, but other than that, I can relate. Some of my favourites include (but aren't limited to): Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog, the Once More With Feeling episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Chicago (both the movie and the play, but mostly the play), White Christmas, Singing in the Rain (other than the whole movie in the movie thing, that was weird), and probably many more.

"I'll be there for you!"

Every night on one of our TV channels (or actually, possibly more), Friends comes on at around 6:30. I watch it every now and then and I remember how much I enjoyed that show. It still makes me laugh. I continue to quote the show to this day; the most commonly used quote is the line about the 'moo point' and how "it's like a cow's opinion, it doesn't matter." I don't ever use the word 'moot' anymore, it's always 'moo.'

Bademöglichkeit!

Today was my weekly French class. I really enjoy learning new languages. In university, I took classes in French, Spanish, German, Old English and Cree and really enjoyed myself. I find that learning new languages helps you learn more about your own language because you have to think about language in a new way. I am not really fluent in any language other than English but have a very basic understanding of the construction of other languages. It may also help that I was a Linguistics major so language construction was pretty much what I studied in university, even without the language specific classes. The language that I have the best grasp of (aside from English) is French but that is because I took classes in it from early elementary school through Grade 12 in high school, plus two classes in university, plus living with some French speaking people for a few months. I am no where near bilingual but have a fairly good grasp of it. The class I am taking is pretty basic but it's good because it has a big focus on the pronunciation aspect of it which is my weak point.
I would like to study more of Spanish or German, maybe even Cree but I need to actually get a job first so that I can pay for classes. Other languages would be cool to learn too. I find that when I start to learn new languages, words get stuck in my heard completely out of context. When I first started studying German, the word "Bademöglichkeit" got stuck in my head. I will never forget that that word means 'swimming facility'. Now, if I am ever in a German speaking place and absolutely NEED to go swimming, I will know how to make my desire known as long as that is the only information they need. I could do well on the Amazing Race all of the challenges were at German swimming facilities. No problem getting to the location at all. Though there are probably a limited number of swimming facilities in German speaking countries, and even more limits to the number of activities you could do there. Here they are: swim, dive...that's about it. Maybe learning more German words would be useful after all and, you know, more than one word in other languages as well.

"Spare the snark, spoil the networks!"

I was introduced to Television Without Pity a few years ago. It continues to be one of my favourite websites. It is basically, at the very least, a site that had recaps of various TV Shows. The great thing about the recaps are that they don't just tell you what happened in the various shows, the recaps are really quite snarky and sarcastic, my favourite adjectives for reviews and recaps. The creators of TWoP also published a book about various TV related topics that is quite amusing as well. You can check their archives for shows they have covered in the past and maybe catch up on their recaps for shows you are currently watching. They don't recap every show out there but they cover quite a few.

Fail!

A few months ago I found out about the website Failblog. The name pretty much tells you everythng you need to know about it. It features videos and photos of some things that didn't exactly go right. If you have some time to kill, this website can keep you entertained. Some of the content may be a bit off colour but it's generally pretty tame. Occasionally they feature something that had a more positive outcome, but generally it's about stuff that went very very wrong.
What can I say? It amuses me.

One stop

Last year, my sister told me about iGoogle. I signed up for it shortly after and have really found it quite useful. I like it because I have 3 email addresses (Yahoo, GMail, and Hotmail) and with iGoogle I can check all three accounts by just looking at one page. You can add different content to your pages but email is pretty much the main reason I like iGoogle. It just saves me a lot of time, so, rather than going to three different websites to check my mail, I only have to go to one.

Somehow, paper is required when printing. Imagine that!

Apparently, I have been relegated to the role of my sister's "office assistant" since I am unemployed and seem to have taken over the computer with the attached printer. As such, I have been doing tasks such as scanning and printing and photocopying. In return, I get such privileges as food, water, a bed to sleep in, a car to drive, and a couple of TVs to watch. You know, the "unessentials." Win-win....win. Today's task was printing, a seemingly simple task. Even upon further analysis, it continued to be pretty simple. It was all well and good but we ran out of appropriate paper for the printer and she needed the printing done by the time she leaves for work tomorrow morning. "Screw gun," I thought, because it's my expletive of choice after hearing it an episode of The Office. So up the stairs I went, to see what my sister thought I should do. It turned out that she may or may not have been sleeping as her bedroom was dark. So I paced beside her door because I wanted to wake her up "unintentionally." She soon came to the same conclusion I did and told me to use the old school paper to print the stuff on. You remember the kind of paper with the holes on the sides, don't you? As I was tearing the holes off and the papers apart, I remember that I used to have fun with those lines of holes, especially when I was extremely bored or was supposed to be doing some sort of assignment. Good times.
In other printing news, apparently the printer took my command for it to collate the pages as more of a suggestion, as, it didn't. That made my triumph in figuring out how to make it print back-to-front rather than front-to-back rather unnecessarily.