Archive for October, 2009

• The Story Behing the Status

  Date: 2009.10.26 | Category: Uncategorized | Response: 5

  I was reading posts at BlogHer and found this post – The Stories Behind the Statuses.

  I used to blog a lot more. It would be easy to blame Twitter, it’s easier to share links and quick thoughts during the day in 140 characters than to blog about it. It takes me all of five second to write a Twitter update. A blog post takes longer. Not always a lot longer but yes, longer. That’s the easy excuse. Twitter and BlogHer’s Chatter feature are quick and it’s makes it easy to be lazy.

  But the truth is, for better or for worse, a larger part of the reason is that people know who I am now. Before I was relatively anonymous. Sure, some people knew who I was but to the masses I was unknown. Now I’ve met a lot more people. Friends who didn’t know about this blog now do. People I work with (and for) know I blog. Heck, I think my father-in-law has found this blog (or maybe just my BlogHer one…I’m not really sure). I started censoring. I stopped writing silly little stories about my life. I stopped writing about things in the news and world. I pretty much just stopped writing.

  Of course there were other changes too. I moved again. I moved in with a guy. I eloped with said guy (patriarchy!). There were new boundaries and limits to consider. At what point is it my story or our story or both? (I don’t think he cares one way or the other.)

  Somewhere along the line I lost my voice, yet I can still be chatty in 140 characters. Maybe I should start telling some of the stories behind the statuses.

• I am not a breakfast person

  Date: 2009.10.21 | Category: What's for Dinner? | Response: 5

  I never have been a breakfast person. Not even when I was a kid. I was a chronic breakfast skipper.

  When I was a kid my parents used to go out for breakfast pretty much every Sunday. I liked the restaurant they went to well enough but it suffered from the chronic breakfast issue – eggs. All eggs. Nothing but eggs. Ok fine, there were also pancakes…that cost twice as much as eggs and bacon. (What is up with that anyway? It’s not like pancakes cost much to make.) They did make lovely breakfast potatoes though, ones that I’ve tried repeatedly to replicate but with no success. Sometimes we’d get there late enough that I could order something off the lunch menu, and sometimes they just took pity on me and let me order off of it anyway.

  It’s not that I don’t like eggs. I do. I like a good omelette or an egg over-easy or hard boiled just as well as the next person. I just don’t like eating eggs all the time. I’m not an egg everyday, or even an egg once a week, person. I’m an eggs when I want them and that’s about it person.

  What do I eat for breakfast? Um, at home? Yogurt. Fruit. Bagels with cream cheese. English muffins with peanut butter. That’s pretty much it. Sometimes I’ll mix it up and have yogurt AND fruit AND granola. Look at me go wild! On the weekend we might make blueberry pancakes and bacon. Or corn muffins. French toast. Something that takes a little bit more time than we’re willing to give up on a week day morning.

  Sometimes I wonder how eggs became so entrenched in our breakfast routine. Why did egg become the go-to breakfast item. I also wonder why pork is also so popular on breakfast menus – do the options of bacon, sausage or ham sound familiar?

  There’s nothing wrong with eggs for breakfast, in fact I ordered eggs this morning. But I’m just looking for a bit of variety in my breakfast options, both at some and when I’m eating out. What’s you’re favourite non-eggy breakfast?

• Effing Butternut Squash

  Date: 2009.10.11 | Category: What's for Dinner? | Response: 10

  Once upon a time I used to be able to peel and slice a butternut squash without a. swearing profusely and b. cutting myself. That no longer seems to be the case.

  I had grand plans for dinner tonight. Well, not really grand but yummy. There was going to be homemade butternut squash soup and some kind of olive bread-type of thing that I picked up from Art-Is-In Bakery at the farmer’s market this morning.

  Just like the last time I tried to slice through a butternut squash there was much swearing. And unfortunately I also cut myself. It was kind of the last straw in a day that started shortly after 4 when my upstairs neighbour’s alarm clock went off and his cat went nuts right above my head. The upstairs neighbour who is currently not home. The day then proceeded to not dressing properly for the farmers market and freezing my butt off. Then progressing to coming home and cleaning only to react both the dust and the cleaners (which are a “green” product…apparently green doesn’t equal “will not try to kill you”).

  The butternut squash was the last straw. After finding bandaids I can actually use (*someone* bought fabric bandaids which I cannot use, *ahem*) I scooped up the squash and threw it in the garbage. Yes. I know. Wasteful. Tell it to someone who cares because right now that’s not me.

  So how do you peel and cut a stupid butternut squash without losing an appendage? I’m really quite fond of my fingers, indeed much more so than the stupid squash. But I know it can be done so fess up, how do you do it? (And yes, my knives are sharp…)

  (To add insult to physical injury, we can smell the next door neighbours turkey. sigh)