Category: Friends

A song will lift as the mainsail shifts

Dan DickinsonLeave a comment

That lovely shawl you see up there is, in fact, my new cast. Pretty, no? I didn’t have a choice of colours, so they gave me the clown motif. I’m thinking I’ll need to cover that up.

Good news, though: I should only have to wear it for four weeks, not six or more. It’s also far more comfortable than that blasted splint (so far, anyway) and gives me more use of my fingers…though my thumb is basically useless now. And you know what’s hard to do sans thumb? Tying your shoes. Try it tomorrow. You’ll curse like you’ve never cursed before.

.:.

Quick hits:

  • MC Rove is hiding behind his mommy’s skirts.
  • Irish singer Tommy Makem died. I know very little of Tommy Makem, only that he was a singer and that he performed a beautiful rendition (along with the Clancy Brothers) of “When The Ship Comes In” at Bob Dylan’s 30th anniversary concert several years ago. If you haven’t heard it, you really should. There’s nothing quite like a protest song sung by old Irish men.
  • I want a pair of Joe’s new running shoes. Wish I’d thought of that before my birthday…

[tags]broken wrist, gaudy cast, karl rove, tommy makem, saucony[/tags]

A few more broken limbs and hellish weeks at work should do it

Dan DickinsonLeave a comment

Status du fatblogging:

  • Original weight: 233
  • Weight last week: 229.5
  • Weight this week: 226

Uhhh…ok. Not being able to exercise all week clearly didn’t hurt me as much as not having time to eat normal meals helped me. Still, that’s not sustainable. I’m hoping that I’ll be able to run again once the swelling goes down and I’m in the hard cast.

.:.

We’ve eaten two straight meals on the balcony. The weather’s been perfect for it, and now that we can grill things without fear of explosions I think we’ll be out there even more. Nellie popped down to St. Lawrence Market yesterday for some fruit (which we had this morning with breakfast) and some tofu. We heard there was a booth there that makes tofu palatable, so we tried a place called Ying Ying Soy Food. It was actually really good; one type Nellie grilled in bbq sauce, the other was left plain, and both were tasty. Throw in some grilled veggies and bread and a bottle of white…’twas a good night.

.:.

One more thing: happy birthday, T-Bone!!

[tags]fatblogging, bbq[/tags]

We'll keep the spider that bites the lady that cleans the couch that swallowed the fly

Dan DickinsonLeave a comment

Three things about the condo:

  1. We have a new couch. It’s big and squishy.
  2. We have a giant spider (seen here) living on our balcony. I’m not particularly fond of spiders, but he’s eating the swarm of insects that seems to frequent the area, so he can stay. Click on the picture if you want to see a higher-res version.
  3. Cleaning lady: best invention ever.

.:.

CBGB came over last night while I was at work and taught Nellie how to make GB’s excellent veggie burgers. I got home in time to enjoy the beautiful weather on the balcony with them. We actually spent the whole night out there, ate some pizza from Amato, and even saw some unexpected fireworks. It was a nice end to a long week.

.:.

Violent protests in Halifax? Ontario supporting public transit? Yesterday was topsy-turvy day, apparently…

[tags]condo furniture, spider, cleaning lady, amato pizza, fireworks, halifax protests, ontario public transit[/tags]

Is 36,000 BTUs enough to cook eggplant?

Dan DickinsonLeave a comment

It’s been a busy weekend. Yesterday we got up early, went to St. Lawrence Market to pick up some shrimp and scallops and fruit, ran a few errands, picked up some shirts we ordered from American Apparel, did some work (schoolwork, in my case) and went over to CBGB’s place for a barbeque. The barbeque fun didn’t stop there; we zipped around the corner to Home Depot and ordered a barbeque of our own: this one by Vermont Castings [pictured at right].

.:.

The party at CBGB’s (in belated honor of GB’s birthday) was a lot of fun…a packed front porch followed by a packed backyard patio, great food, cold beer, many laughs, and a slight overindulgence in the desserts. What’s better than that?

.:.

Today’s been great so far too: I slept in until 9:00 (the cats practically kicked me off the bed after that), got up, read the paper, went out to find some breakfast and came back raving about the perfect weather: it was warm but not hot, and breezy enough to keep the smog off. I collected Nellie and we headed off on a stroll to the Distillery District. We had a peek in a few galleries, stopped at the Mill Street Brew Pub for some brunch, got some amazing chocolate at Soma and wandered home along the Esplanade, popping up to Front Street so that we could see all the dogs at Woofstock. Now, sadly, it’s back to reality as Nellie has to work all day and I’m catching up on a bunch of stuff. It was a great way to spend a Sunday morning though…

.:.

My comment spam problem is getting worse and worse. Most of you never see it (unless you subscribe to my comment feed) because the comments are buried in old posts, and the vast majority of it gets caught, but when you get 1300/day a few are bound to slip past my spam filter. What does slip past is often very nasty too, so if you’re reading the comments and you see unpleasantness, I apoligize.

[tags]st. lawrence market, american apparel, home depot, vermont castings, distillery district, mill street brew pub, soma chocolate, woofstock, comment spam, akismet[/tags]

I wonder how her husband feels about that

Dan DickinsonLeave a comment

Today is my friend Marney’s birthday. Today is also Old Maid’s Day. I’m sure those two things are just coincidence.

.:.

Sad, Rebecca Eckler, sad. Only someone deep in the throes of hubris could think that someone stole the plot of Knocked Up from them. Quill & Quire offers their own take on the [ahem] story:

“A warning to comedy writers out there: if you’re working on a gag in which someone has to buy something embarrassing at the supermarket and the cashier calls for a price check on the store PA system, you better make sure Eckler hasn’t used that one – if she has, she’ll think you nicked it from her.”

Tee hee.

.:.

For the sake of my blood pressure, Christopher Hume needs to stop writing articles like this one about the Toronto waterfront.

[tags]old maid’s day, rebecca eckler, christopher hume, toronto waterfront[/tags]

Stoopid WordPress

Dan DickinsonLeave a comment

Gar. I had a long post all written up but WordPress (or possibly my host?) decided to cack and it disappeared. I can’t be bothered to remember it all or write it all again, so here’s the summary version:

  • We had dinner last night at Fieramosca with CBGB. That was great.
  • I got my hair cut today and ate some gelato. That was great.
  • I realized today that I have a paper due next week, and I haven’t even started it. That sucked.
  • Darth Vader’s a jackass.

Blargh.

[tags]fieramosca, gelato, darth vader[/tags]

Working for the weekend

Dan DickinsonLeave a comment

OK…just barely awake at this point. Got up at 6, got to work by 7, had hectic-ass day, and left work at 8…didn’t feel tired until I got to the Auld Spot, where Nellie & CBGB were waiting for me, and around 1/4 of the way through my second beer (and following a very good veggie burger) I hit the wall. Sleeeeeeeeepy. I finished my drink (I’m not dead, after all), got the bill and then got a cab. I wouldn’t have stayed awake for the subway ride home.

Now…must try to stay awake long enough to watch the end of the Spurs-Suns game 6…Icandoit…

Note to self: remember to write paper (which is due Tuesday) this weekend.

[tags]auld spot[/tags]

One host serving music, another serving veggie burgers

Dan DickinsonLeave a comment

Another busy day: we read newspapers, got a snack at Starbucks, went back to Canadian Tire to pick up a Roomba (which, upon opening, we found had already been used and was all scratched up and dirty…so that’ll be going back) and some other condo-y stuff, cleaned up, finally cleaned out my suitcase from last week, did some laundry, did some work, put together the other desk in the den and crossed a bunch of stuff of the to-do list.

.:.

Last night we went over to CBGB’s place, where GB cooked up some of his famous veggie burgers. These are the type that aren’t trying to simulate meat, but rather have a flavour all their own and just happen to sit between a bun. They were spicy and thick and I had three of them. Yum.

.:.

I just ordered one of these. I’m very excited. Not only does it do pictures & video and give me more room for music, but it also has a USB host feature, so I can download pictures to it directly from our camera without having to carry a laptop around or buy a gigantic memory card.

[tags]roomba, canadian tire, veggie burgers, creative zen vision m[/tags]

Kickin' it old skool

Dan DickinsonLeave a comment

I can’t believe I just used a 0% movie as the inspiration for my post title.

.:.

I’m back on course. It gets underway in an hour and ends five days from now. I don’t think this one will be too tough — it’s an IT course — so I’m actually thinking I’ll have time to get some real work done. I’m still trying to catch up after last week.

We had brunch with CBGB this morning. We didn’t have much time and it was a little early (kind of a pre-brunch brunch…and no, that’s not necessarily breakfast) so we just went down the street to the Hothouse Cafe. Better that than start on the cafeteria food before I absolutely have to.

[tags]kickin’ it old skool, toronto brunch, hothouse cafe[/tags]