I feel it fair to start with a disclaimer: I've never been a big baker. In fact, it's only in the last year or two that I've even used an oven for anything other than a miserable attempt or two at turkey. Baking, desserts in particular, is truly something I'm learning from square one.
Tonight's muffins were simple enough; As with sautéing, I wanted to start very basic so that I would be able to isolate mistakes. The gist of the recipe was this:
The first amusing "oops" was that the ingredients list for the recipe included a half-cup of melted butter but this butter was mysteriously absent from the actual directions. I ended up making the first 12 muffins sans butter, and added some at the last second for the last 4.
In the end, it all went well enough, aside from the fire alarm going off again - this time while the oven was preheating. The muffins came out moist-ish and a little chunky the way they should be. The problem was that when I ate a couple, I found that they just weren't anything special... kinda "meh", really. They weren't very sweet, but that wasn't the problem... they just weren't very tasty. It's generally the same sort of complaint I have of biscuits and scones.
I'll have to try something a little different next time. I know that some sort of sweet crumble or sprinkling sugar on top of the muffins before they go in the oven can add a lot of sweet goodness to them but I can't help but feel that just dodges the issue.
Tonight's muffins were simple enough; As with sautéing, I wanted to start very basic so that I would be able to isolate mistakes. The gist of the recipe was this:
- Sift:
- 2 c. flour
- 1 tbsp baking powder
- 1 tsp salt
- 1/2 c. sugar
- 2 c. flour
- Stir in 1/2 c. dark brown sugar
- Combine 1 c. milk & 3 eggs (beaten), then add to dry ingredients, mixing only until barely incorporated
- Fold in 1/2 c. blueberries
- Bake at 400° for ~30 min.
The first amusing "oops" was that the ingredients list for the recipe included a half-cup of melted butter but this butter was mysteriously absent from the actual directions. I ended up making the first 12 muffins sans butter, and added some at the last second for the last 4.
In the end, it all went well enough, aside from the fire alarm going off again - this time while the oven was preheating. The muffins came out moist-ish and a little chunky the way they should be. The problem was that when I ate a couple, I found that they just weren't anything special... kinda "meh", really. They weren't very sweet, but that wasn't the problem... they just weren't very tasty. It's generally the same sort of complaint I have of biscuits and scones.
I'll have to try something a little different next time. I know that some sort of sweet crumble or sprinkling sugar on top of the muffins before they go in the oven can add a lot of sweet goodness to them but I can't help but feel that just dodges the issue.
As part of my basic cooking education, I decided I needed to sit down and work on some of the fundamental techniques. First on the list was sautéing, which we've all done before. The trick was to get it just right. To that end, I started by preparing a batch of clarified butter.
Clarified (or drawn) butter is what's left when you remove the water and milk solids from butter, leaving a golden (or dare I say orange) liquid. While it lacks some of the nummy buttery goodness, what's left is a very robust fat that stands up to heat super well. With the milk solids gone, it can be heated much more than normal butter without burning, making it lovely for this sort of frying.
This was actually my first try at clarified butter. I set up a makeshift double-boiler out of two pots and put a pound of butter in the top. Truth be told, it's not necessary to double-boil it, but it's closer to idiot-proof that way since there's very little risk of burning. As per the standard instructions, I skimmed off the foam that rose to the top but was left to wonder how I would separate the clarified part from the milk solids, the part that sinks to the bottom of the pot. In the end, I took the ghetto approach, simply pouring the clarified butter off the top and through a fine-mesh strainer (though cheese cloth would've been ideal).
I bought a 3-lb fryer chicken today, intent on cutting it up "properly" for once. First, I lopped the legs off, as per tradition, yielding two "quarter chicken" legs. The first nifty trick is that by 'shaving' along the thighbone until you reach the joint with the drumstick, you can pull the thighbone right out. While the final presentation is much more elegant this way, my only worry is that until you get used to the procedure, the thigh looks a little mangled.
Next, it's been my habit to remove the back by cutting through the ribs, then split the breastbone to leave two breasts (bone-in). Today, I cut along the breastbone on either side, separating each breast from the bone... By following it down, you can eventually remove the wing from the ribcage, leaving you with two breast-and-wing pieces. Next, by cutting off the last two sections of the wing, you're left with two breast-and-drumstick pieces, that bear a startling resemblance to your drumstick-and-thigh pieces, only light meat instead of dark.
A quick aside: while pulling out a thighbone, I managed to stab myself with my cleaver. Yes, stab... not cut, stab. It was just a little stab, but how I managed that is a little beyond me. Those of you who know me well know that I have a great ability to cut myself on the oddest things (shelves, spoons, painfully dull knives) so I guess it's not that surprising, though.
With all that done, I finally set up to do the sauté itself. I heated up about 2 tbsp of my clarified butter until it was "pretty hot" (I don't have a thermometer yet). I took one of the drum-and-thigh pieces, dredged in flour (w/salt & pepper), and fried it up. Since the mangled side of the thigh wasn't cooking up too well, I spooned some of the hot butter into it, which helped it to cook a little. Finally, I tossed the pan into the 450° oven for 10 minutes so that the chicken could finish cooking. The clarified butter withstood all the heat on the range without smoking or burning, which is awfully neat when you've never seen that before.
The only problem here was that the oven started smoking like crazy, eventually setting off the alarm. One of a bunch of things could've gone wrong here: either there shouldn't have been any butter in the pan when I put it in the oven... or the butter isn't clarified as well as it should be.
Either way, the chicken turned out marvelously: a nice crispy coating, moist inside and almost perfectly cooked (could've stood another few minutes in the oven, I think). I skipped making a sauce today so that I could concentrate on the chicken itself, but now that it seems to have worked out, I'll try some sort of wine deglaze on the pan next time.
Next up tonight is blueberry muffins.
Clarified (or drawn) butter is what's left when you remove the water and milk solids from butter, leaving a golden (or dare I say orange) liquid. While it lacks some of the nummy buttery goodness, what's left is a very robust fat that stands up to heat super well. With the milk solids gone, it can be heated much more than normal butter without burning, making it lovely for this sort of frying.
This was actually my first try at clarified butter. I set up a makeshift double-boiler out of two pots and put a pound of butter in the top. Truth be told, it's not necessary to double-boil it, but it's closer to idiot-proof that way since there's very little risk of burning. As per the standard instructions, I skimmed off the foam that rose to the top but was left to wonder how I would separate the clarified part from the milk solids, the part that sinks to the bottom of the pot. In the end, I took the ghetto approach, simply pouring the clarified butter off the top and through a fine-mesh strainer (though cheese cloth would've been ideal).
I bought a 3-lb fryer chicken today, intent on cutting it up "properly" for once. First, I lopped the legs off, as per tradition, yielding two "quarter chicken" legs. The first nifty trick is that by 'shaving' along the thighbone until you reach the joint with the drumstick, you can pull the thighbone right out. While the final presentation is much more elegant this way, my only worry is that until you get used to the procedure, the thigh looks a little mangled.
Next, it's been my habit to remove the back by cutting through the ribs, then split the breastbone to leave two breasts (bone-in). Today, I cut along the breastbone on either side, separating each breast from the bone... By following it down, you can eventually remove the wing from the ribcage, leaving you with two breast-and-wing pieces. Next, by cutting off the last two sections of the wing, you're left with two breast-and-drumstick pieces, that bear a startling resemblance to your drumstick-and-thigh pieces, only light meat instead of dark.
A quick aside: while pulling out a thighbone, I managed to stab myself with my cleaver. Yes, stab... not cut, stab. It was just a little stab, but how I managed that is a little beyond me. Those of you who know me well know that I have a great ability to cut myself on the oddest things (shelves, spoons, painfully dull knives) so I guess it's not that surprising, though.
With all that done, I finally set up to do the sauté itself. I heated up about 2 tbsp of my clarified butter until it was "pretty hot" (I don't have a thermometer yet). I took one of the drum-and-thigh pieces, dredged in flour (w/salt & pepper), and fried it up. Since the mangled side of the thigh wasn't cooking up too well, I spooned some of the hot butter into it, which helped it to cook a little. Finally, I tossed the pan into the 450° oven for 10 minutes so that the chicken could finish cooking. The clarified butter withstood all the heat on the range without smoking or burning, which is awfully neat when you've never seen that before.
The only problem here was that the oven started smoking like crazy, eventually setting off the alarm. One of a bunch of things could've gone wrong here: either there shouldn't have been any butter in the pan when I put it in the oven... or the butter isn't clarified as well as it should be.
Either way, the chicken turned out marvelously: a nice crispy coating, moist inside and almost perfectly cooked (could've stood another few minutes in the oven, I think). I skipped making a sauce today so that I could concentrate on the chicken itself, but now that it seems to have worked out, I'll try some sort of wine deglaze on the pan next time.
Next up tonight is blueberry muffins.
Yes yes, it's been a long time. I'm sure no one actually reads this anymore, but on the off chance that you do, I thought I'd share what I had in mind for this journal. With Facebook handling my day-to-day updates (as well as Linkfest) and being much a more convenient way for people to stay in touch, I was left with wondering what to use this for.
The first thing I decided is that my video (and other) game ramblings just aren't all that interesting. They don't really need to be archived for any reason, though I might occasionally write about The Game, since I'd like to keep those ideas. The second thing that occurred to me that it might be nice to chronicle my adventures in cookery, something I really wanted to sink a lot of time into since my wife (Oh yes, did I mention I'm married now?) is out of town for a few months. I'll be exploring brave new worlds, like bread, desserts, sauces, stocks and (gasp) ovens!
The basic purpose of Cookasaurus Rex will be as an electronic notebook for my cooking experiments. I hope to include recipes I'm trying, what worked and didn't work, what sort of planning, equipment and ingredients were necessary, as well as thoughts for how to improve on what I've done. My hope is also to organize things by tagging entries based on cooking styles (eg. braising, baking, frying), various "cuisines" (eg. japanese, french, etc.), and specific recipes. The latter is particularly interesting for me, as I want to be able to see the progression of recipes over time. For those experiments that already have a history (like mac & cheese), I'll probably start with some sort of retrospective on it; I'm hoping this will also help me to organize my thoughts on the subject so that I know where to go next.
Finally, I'm hoping that everything from here on in will be fairly portable, in the ends of transferring it to a proper web site one day. While I have little interest in being one of those people that hands out URLs with "Come check out my site!", it'd be nice to have a real sense of stability to this. Maybe someday it'll even be stored locally on that UNIX box that's been collecting dust in my closet!... right... maybe not that.
The first thing I decided is that my video (and other) game ramblings just aren't all that interesting. They don't really need to be archived for any reason, though I might occasionally write about The Game, since I'd like to keep those ideas. The second thing that occurred to me that it might be nice to chronicle my adventures in cookery, something I really wanted to sink a lot of time into since my wife (Oh yes, did I mention I'm married now?) is out of town for a few months. I'll be exploring brave new worlds, like bread, desserts, sauces, stocks and (gasp) ovens!
The basic purpose of Cookasaurus Rex will be as an electronic notebook for my cooking experiments. I hope to include recipes I'm trying, what worked and didn't work, what sort of planning, equipment and ingredients were necessary, as well as thoughts for how to improve on what I've done. My hope is also to organize things by tagging entries based on cooking styles (eg. braising, baking, frying), various "cuisines" (eg. japanese, french, etc.), and specific recipes. The latter is particularly interesting for me, as I want to be able to see the progression of recipes over time. For those experiments that already have a history (like mac & cheese), I'll probably start with some sort of retrospective on it; I'm hoping this will also help me to organize my thoughts on the subject so that I know where to go next.
Finally, I'm hoping that everything from here on in will be fairly portable, in the ends of transferring it to a proper web site one day. While I have little interest in being one of those people that hands out URLs with "Come check out my site!", it'd be nice to have a real sense of stability to this. Maybe someday it'll even be stored locally on that UNIX box that's been collecting dust in my closet!... right... maybe not that.
Happy new year, everyone! I'm alive and everything, but I must admit I've had better New Year's. A few days ago, I got very suddenly very sick, probably one of the five zillion bugs that's floating around Vancouver at the moment. No tummy troubles yet (knock on wood), so probably not the gastro, but remarkably like a flu without the barfing. One way or the other, it refuses to be labelled by mutating every 8 hours or so.
Day 1: Light-headed to the point of stupid, standing up is a chore, restless tossing & turning with delusions like thinking my legs are melting, no cough, no sinus problems, wracked with body aches, in bed all day, zero appetite.
Night 1: Light-headed, persistent dry cough that ripped my throat raw, slightly more conscious than the day but still in a haze, no sinus problems, stiffness but no body pain, delusions are gone, no appetite.
Day 2: Alternating chills and cold sweats, increasingly phlegmy cough, fully conscious (about as much as a wimpy cold), tons of body pain, slight sniffle, hunger returned in force.
Night 2: Persistent cough that alternates between bone-dry and phlegmy, alternating periods of full consciousness and being zoned out, sniffle getting worse, body pain decided to squat in my lower back.
Day 3: Consistently phlegmy cough, several cold sweats, oodles of body pain, nose that runs like a faucet, still alternating periods of consciousness and zombieness, voraciously hungry.
Night 3 (now): Haziness returning, cough sustaining, runny nose getting worse, appetite gone again.
So, doc... what do I have?
Day 1: Light-headed to the point of stupid, standing up is a chore, restless tossing & turning with delusions like thinking my legs are melting, no cough, no sinus problems, wracked with body aches, in bed all day, zero appetite.
Night 1: Light-headed, persistent dry cough that ripped my throat raw, slightly more conscious than the day but still in a haze, no sinus problems, stiffness but no body pain, delusions are gone, no appetite.
Day 2: Alternating chills and cold sweats, increasingly phlegmy cough, fully conscious (about as much as a wimpy cold), tons of body pain, slight sniffle, hunger returned in force.
Night 2: Persistent cough that alternates between bone-dry and phlegmy, alternating periods of full consciousness and being zoned out, sniffle getting worse, body pain decided to squat in my lower back.
Day 3: Consistently phlegmy cough, several cold sweats, oodles of body pain, nose that runs like a faucet, still alternating periods of consciousness and zombieness, voraciously hungry.
Night 3 (now): Haziness returning, cough sustaining, runny nose getting worse, appetite gone again.
So, doc... what do I have?
It was all going so well.
I had gotten a little bit of WoW'ing out of my system, was all caught up on Digg, went to bed, then *KNOCK*KNOCK*KNOCK* "Are you awake?"
"I am now."
The heat in the bedrooms has been off for about a week. For a few days, it was out everywhere, but these old buildings being so hilariously funny, when they restored the heat, it only restored it to half the house. So here I sit, bleary-eyed, slurping somen, waiting for the damn plumber to come and bleed the radiator, which should fix the problem.
Not that it's really a problem. Vancouver is a ridiculous 2 to -2 degrees, even at night, and the small oil space heater my roommate had lying around was more than enough to keep the room comfortable. I guess the universe just decided that today wasn't going to be my day.
I had gotten a little bit of WoW'ing out of my system, was all caught up on Digg, went to bed, then *KNOCK*KNOCK*KNOCK* "Are you awake?"
"I am now."
The heat in the bedrooms has been off for about a week. For a few days, it was out everywhere, but these old buildings being so hilariously funny, when they restored the heat, it only restored it to half the house. So here I sit, bleary-eyed, slurping somen, waiting for the damn plumber to come and bleed the radiator, which should fix the problem.
Not that it's really a problem. Vancouver is a ridiculous 2 to -2 degrees, even at night, and the small oil space heater my roommate had lying around was more than enough to keep the room comfortable. I guess the universe just decided that today wasn't going to be my day.
Ah, the great birthday tradition. I thought it was about time I offered a more long-winded update than "Jonathan is in Vancouver now!" since Facebook doesn't really offer nice blogging options. Heck, even if it did, I'm not sure I would write them there. It seems kind of odd to write, knowing that everyone on your friends list will receive a "Jonathan has updated his blog!" It just seems... I dunno... gauche.
So yes, I'm in Vancouver now... again... As I mentioned I would be. I'm living in an apartment with a new roommate just outside of the downtown core and started a job at, yup, yet another organization working with "youth." (I think my use of the word "kids" doesn't impress them) So I find myself once again gainfully employed, but this time in a job I can imagine doing for some time... were it not for the fact that it's back on overnights. It's okay for now, and it certainly pays the bills, but once (if?) I develop some form of social life, I imagine I'll work my tail off to get something during the day or evenings.
You may have caught the allusion in my previous set of entries, but my sweetie will hopefully be joining me in the spring or summer of next year when we settle out permanent residency for her (she's American), but, of course, there's a missing step. And so I'm pleased to announce that we are now officially engaged. We even have the little piece of paper saying we can get married!
Meanwhile, I have just begun to celebrate my birthday with a steaming bowl of cream of wheat. No candles, sorry. I'm afraid today won't be very exciting, though. (No cleaning, for example) Since I worked last night and have to work tonight as well, much of it will be spent sleeping and working. For now, the plan is to do my scrabble moves on Facebook, do a little forum surfing/posting, maybe a little WoW, then off to bed. Maybe I'll have something interesting to say before then, but don't hold me to it!
By the way, Linkfest is now available via my "posted items" on Facebook. Poke me if you need to be friended!
So yes, I'm in Vancouver now... again... As I mentioned I would be. I'm living in an apartment with a new roommate just outside of the downtown core and started a job at, yup, yet another organization working with "youth." (I think my use of the word "kids" doesn't impress them) So I find myself once again gainfully employed, but this time in a job I can imagine doing for some time... were it not for the fact that it's back on overnights. It's okay for now, and it certainly pays the bills, but once (if?) I develop some form of social life, I imagine I'll work my tail off to get something during the day or evenings.
You may have caught the allusion in my previous set of entries, but my sweetie will hopefully be joining me in the spring or summer of next year when we settle out permanent residency for her (she's American), but, of course, there's a missing step. And so I'm pleased to announce that we are now officially engaged. We even have the little piece of paper saying we can get married!
Meanwhile, I have just begun to celebrate my birthday with a steaming bowl of cream of wheat. No candles, sorry. I'm afraid today won't be very exciting, though. (No cleaning, for example) Since I worked last night and have to work tonight as well, much of it will be spent sleeping and working. For now, the plan is to do my scrabble moves on Facebook, do a little forum surfing/posting, maybe a little WoW, then off to bed. Maybe I'll have something interesting to say before then, but don't hold me to it!
By the way, Linkfest is now available via my "posted items" on Facebook. Poke me if you need to be friended!
Heh...
Movies and videoclips:
This last one is to a Jim Henson tribute song entitled, "A Boy and His Frog." I hope you'll like it. It made me sniffle. (link)
- "That whore stole my haircut!"
- My wonderful girlfriend, commenting on Victoria Beckham's new 'do (link)
Movies and videoclips:
- The world's fastest (water) drinker. I particularly like the facial expressions of the hosts, audience and other competitors. (YouTube)
- Game Over: Stop animations of classic games, done with food. Wait, what?! (AtomFilms)
- Impatient kitty (College Humor)
- A narrated slideshow about a husky and wild polar bear spontaneously playing together (Public Radio)
- Dancing Otter (YouTube)
- Otters holding hands (at the Vancouver Aquarium) (YouTube)
- The Laugh-Out-Loud Cats, a cute, retro-comic styled around the current trend of LOLcats.
- Sinfest: A silly, rude but fairly honest comic about... well... sin.
- (Funny) Pictures of walls (gallery)
- Human Brain Cloud aka Free Association: The Game (Flash)
- Yet another archive of every Calvin & Hobbes ever written (gallery)
This last one is to a Jim Henson tribute song entitled, "A Boy and His Frog." I hope you'll like it. It made me sniffle. (link)
As per usual, most of my gaming time has been eaten up by World of Warcraft. We're currently raiding Karazhan and Gruul's Lair, so nothing too ridiculous, though. Despite this time sink, I've managed to try out a pile of games!
First up is Dwarf Fortress (link), a very fascinating and deep rogue-like of a different nature than most. One of the game modes is the classic "adventurer" game, where you explore the world, defeat baddies and collect treasure. The more important "dwarf" mode, however, is where the real magic happens:
In dwarf mode, the game becomes a sim-game, in which you take 7 dwarves to a mountain, start digging, and carve out an outpost, that can grow to a village, that can grow to a fortress, that can grow to an empire! With hundreds of dwarves, micro-management becomes a colossal task, so the game has many tools that help your fortress scale without too much pain. Eventually, though, your fortress will come to an end, either through invasion, digging too deep (*ominous music*) or simply quitting. At that point, the game turns the fortress into a ruin or dungeon, adds it to the world, and adds the significant events in its history to the lore of the world! Later on, in adventurer mode, you can explore the fortresses that you yourself created, after their collapse, hear in towns about the great king that ruled over it, and so on. Very exciting.
A new version will be released very shortly. (within weeks, most likely)
In a used video game store here in Portland, I managed to scrounge up a copy of Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, a not-so-vaguely Lovecraftian horror game for Gamecube. It received much critical acclaim, often being rated one of the best GC games, but it's notoriously hard to find. The plot revolves around Alexandra Roivas, who discovers the Tome of Eternal Darkness in her murdered uncle's mansion. In each chapter of the game, you control a different person in history, who finds their way to the Tome, and learn more about the history of The Ancients (à la Lovecraft) who have been manipulating people for thousands of years to take over the world, blah blah blah.
The important part of the game is a fascinating mechanic revolving around your character's "sanity bar", that gets affected every time they see something horrible. The kicker is that the more insane your character becomes, the more the game itself skews the world: the game display starts to tilt to one side... you begin hearing voices, screaming, knocking... the eyes of paintings and the heads on busts start to follow you as you pass... and occasionally, something dramatic like melting through a wall, or exploding in a gush of blood when you cast a spell. The game quickly reverts to the way it was (sometimes, your character will say something like, "Wait... that's not right.") but the effect is incredibly jarring and the game itself is scary. A real gem, if you ever get to try it out.
Starting with Dwarf Fortress, I started to become a little more interested in games from independent companies. Sure, I loved Uplink and Dominions, but I started to check out independent game news websites (like tigsource.com and gametunnel.com), where you stumble on all sorts of neat games. I think my favorites so far are Cave Story (link to tribute site), a classic, Nintendo-like platformer-adventure, and Blocksum (link), one of those painfully addictive Tetris-style puzzle games.
I'll probably Linkfest any others I find. For the moment, here's all the sites I'm checking lately:
Last, and probably least, I've started playing Bridge again. I discovered that one of the two bridge clubs in the city is about 5 minutes away from our house, so I decided to drop in and play there once a week or so. Naturally, I am the object of many jokes there, seeing as I'm 30 years younger than the average player there, but it's been a learning experience. I'm playing duplicate, which is a very different game from the social, rubber bridge I played back in Montreal and I'm playing in a club, which means all sorts of rules like bidding cards, alerts and stop-bids. Perhaps when I get up to Vancouver, I'll try it out there too!
First up is Dwarf Fortress (link), a very fascinating and deep rogue-like of a different nature than most. One of the game modes is the classic "adventurer" game, where you explore the world, defeat baddies and collect treasure. The more important "dwarf" mode, however, is where the real magic happens:
In dwarf mode, the game becomes a sim-game, in which you take 7 dwarves to a mountain, start digging, and carve out an outpost, that can grow to a village, that can grow to a fortress, that can grow to an empire! With hundreds of dwarves, micro-management becomes a colossal task, so the game has many tools that help your fortress scale without too much pain. Eventually, though, your fortress will come to an end, either through invasion, digging too deep (*ominous music*) or simply quitting. At that point, the game turns the fortress into a ruin or dungeon, adds it to the world, and adds the significant events in its history to the lore of the world! Later on, in adventurer mode, you can explore the fortresses that you yourself created, after their collapse, hear in towns about the great king that ruled over it, and so on. Very exciting.
A new version will be released very shortly. (within weeks, most likely)
In a used video game store here in Portland, I managed to scrounge up a copy of Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, a not-so-vaguely Lovecraftian horror game for Gamecube. It received much critical acclaim, often being rated one of the best GC games, but it's notoriously hard to find. The plot revolves around Alexandra Roivas, who discovers the Tome of Eternal Darkness in her murdered uncle's mansion. In each chapter of the game, you control a different person in history, who finds their way to the Tome, and learn more about the history of The Ancients (à la Lovecraft) who have been manipulating people for thousands of years to take over the world, blah blah blah.
The important part of the game is a fascinating mechanic revolving around your character's "sanity bar", that gets affected every time they see something horrible. The kicker is that the more insane your character becomes, the more the game itself skews the world: the game display starts to tilt to one side... you begin hearing voices, screaming, knocking... the eyes of paintings and the heads on busts start to follow you as you pass... and occasionally, something dramatic like melting through a wall, or exploding in a gush of blood when you cast a spell. The game quickly reverts to the way it was (sometimes, your character will say something like, "Wait... that's not right.") but the effect is incredibly jarring and the game itself is scary. A real gem, if you ever get to try it out.
Starting with Dwarf Fortress, I started to become a little more interested in games from independent companies. Sure, I loved Uplink and Dominions, but I started to check out independent game news websites (like tigsource.com and gametunnel.com), where you stumble on all sorts of neat games. I think my favorites so far are Cave Story (link to tribute site), a classic, Nintendo-like platformer-adventure, and Blocksum (link), one of those painfully addictive Tetris-style puzzle games.
I'll probably Linkfest any others I find. For the moment, here's all the sites I'm checking lately:
- Temple of the Roguelike
- The Experimental Gameplay Project
- Gametunnel
- The Independent Gaming Source
- Libregamewiki, a growing wiki dedicated to free gaming
Last, and probably least, I've started playing Bridge again. I discovered that one of the two bridge clubs in the city is about 5 minutes away from our house, so I decided to drop in and play there once a week or so. Naturally, I am the object of many jokes there, seeing as I'm 30 years younger than the average player there, but it's been a learning experience. I'm playing duplicate, which is a very different game from the social, rubber bridge I played back in Montreal and I'm playing in a club, which means all sorts of rules like bidding cards, alerts and stop-bids. Perhaps when I get up to Vancouver, I'll try it out there too!
I'm not dead yet.
Sorry for the long silence. Things got awfully complicated awfully quickly, as they've had a tendency to do on this trip. Let me try to sum up as quickly as possible:
I quit my job. That invalidated my TN visa. (I learned this after I had handed in my resignation) I applied to have my TN visa changed to a B2 (visitor) visa. While the application is being processed, I am generally not considered to be out of status, so that bought me some time to decide the next step, which took a little bit of doing. After talking about it many, many times, here's what we came up with:
I will move back to Canada (specifically back to Vancouver) at the end of September. We will begin the sponsorship application for her permanent residency as soon as financially possible. She will remain down here with the apartment (we'll be renting out half of the living room to a boarder) and complete her obligations, which will likely run until the spring of 2008. Hopefully by then, the permanent resident application will have been processed and she'll be able to move up to BC with me. At that point, we decide whether we stay out west for a bit, or head back to Montreal.
(As you may imagine, one of the big reasons I didn't want to discuss this while we were in the decision-making process was that some of the options on the table were less legitimate than others.)
Every day that passes, we get to know our little bundle of love, Sweets, a little better and better. It turns out her love of high places is pretty much restricted to shelves; If a closet or cupboard is left open, she will usually jump up to the highest shelf and fall asleep there. We've only seen her perch on shoulders two places: The Humane Society and the vet. So it looks like that's just a nervous habit. Oh, we were at the vet because she was due for her rabies shot, but discovered she has a slight ear infection. Let me tell you, holding her down to give her ear drops twice a day is a joy.
Aside from that, she loves canned tuna, but that's about the only treat she likes. Water is only acceptable if it comes from someplace other than her dish, so cups and glasses of standing water, running taps, etc. And true to the picture, she loves snuggling under blankets and falling asleep.
More pictures once we get a digital camera!
Sorry for the long silence. Things got awfully complicated awfully quickly, as they've had a tendency to do on this trip. Let me try to sum up as quickly as possible:
I quit my job. That invalidated my TN visa. (I learned this after I had handed in my resignation) I applied to have my TN visa changed to a B2 (visitor) visa. While the application is being processed, I am generally not considered to be out of status, so that bought me some time to decide the next step, which took a little bit of doing. After talking about it many, many times, here's what we came up with:
I will move back to Canada (specifically back to Vancouver) at the end of September. We will begin the sponsorship application for her permanent residency as soon as financially possible. She will remain down here with the apartment (we'll be renting out half of the living room to a boarder) and complete her obligations, which will likely run until the spring of 2008. Hopefully by then, the permanent resident application will have been processed and she'll be able to move up to BC with me. At that point, we decide whether we stay out west for a bit, or head back to Montreal.
(As you may imagine, one of the big reasons I didn't want to discuss this while we were in the decision-making process was that some of the options on the table were less legitimate than others.)
Every day that passes, we get to know our little bundle of love, Sweets, a little better and better. It turns out her love of high places is pretty much restricted to shelves; If a closet or cupboard is left open, she will usually jump up to the highest shelf and fall asleep there. We've only seen her perch on shoulders two places: The Humane Society and the vet. So it looks like that's just a nervous habit. Oh, we were at the vet because she was due for her rabies shot, but discovered she has a slight ear infection. Let me tell you, holding her down to give her ear drops twice a day is a joy.
Aside from that, she loves canned tuna, but that's about the only treat she likes. Water is only acceptable if it comes from someplace other than her dish, so cups and glasses of standing water, running taps, etc. And true to the picture, she loves snuggling under blankets and falling asleep.
More pictures once we get a digital camera!
Oh where to begin... I'm probably not going to go into too much detail, since I hate to do so before things are actually 100% settled, but I'll try to share what I can.
I've decided to leave my current job in residential. I've taken a week off to clear my head because clearly the change of position did nothing to help. I've been an absolute wreck and, though when I get back to regular life I feel great, the minute my mind slipped into the job, it was just more than I could stand.
This means, of course, that my TN visa will poof. No biggie, I'll simply petition the good folks at immigration for a little extra time to sort out my affairs. Our short-term plans are still quite firmly to stay here... it's just a question of what I'll have to do to make it happen.
More importantly, we have a new addition to the family.
This past weekend, we went to Petsmart where the Multnomah County humane society (or was it animal control?...) leases out a little space to do pet adoptions. There, we met Craig, a beautiful, friendly and humongous orange tabby. Not wanting to make a snap decision at the time, we decided to sleep on it... then had to sleep on it again, since my gf was working all day... and went back and he had already been adopted.
We'd been floundering around since then trying to decide what to do next and landed at the Oregon Humane Society this afternoon. And now, we has a new kitty named Sweets. She's very friendly, very curious and loves to perch on high places, like shelves and your shoulder.
And here she is:
I've decided to leave my current job in residential. I've taken a week off to clear my head because clearly the change of position did nothing to help. I've been an absolute wreck and, though when I get back to regular life I feel great, the minute my mind slipped into the job, it was just more than I could stand.
This means, of course, that my TN visa will poof. No biggie, I'll simply petition the good folks at immigration for a little extra time to sort out my affairs. Our short-term plans are still quite firmly to stay here... it's just a question of what I'll have to do to make it happen.
More importantly, we have a new addition to the family.
This past weekend, we went to Petsmart where the Multnomah County humane society (or was it animal control?...) leases out a little space to do pet adoptions. There, we met Craig, a beautiful, friendly and humongous orange tabby. Not wanting to make a snap decision at the time, we decided to sleep on it... then had to sleep on it again, since my gf was working all day... and went back and he had already been adopted.
We'd been floundering around since then trying to decide what to do next and landed at the Oregon Humane Society this afternoon. And now, we has a new kitty named Sweets. She's very friendly, very curious and loves to perch on high places, like shelves and your shoulder.
And here she is:
... and they demanded an update, so here I am. I apologize for the almost two months of silence. Things have been pretty busy and it just never occurred to me to update until today.
First and foremost, my sweetie and I are well. We've been perfectly healthy (aside from some sore backs) and relatively stress-free (aside from some "my job sucks") since our arrival. We've largely nested into our new apartment, which just needs some sort of eating surface before it's pretty effectively furnished. I recently discovered a tofu place up the street that makes their own fresh tofu and we've slowly discovered the little gems nestled in our neighbourhood, which is largely composed of mechanic shops and garages.
I've started my new job. I'm working with teenagers (12 to 17, actually) in a closed, residential setting. They're not the roughest kids in the world, but they come with their fair share of baggage. The hardest part about this is, of course, the setting; Unlike the shelter, they are very rarely here voluntarily and their presence here is not an especial privilege. As a result, you can't just kick them out when they, say, punch you in the face. Getting the picture?
Right away, I was struck with the punitive nature of the work. In a setting like this, the best thing you have to offer is often structure: something reliable and stable in an otherwise chaotic life. The flip side of this is that for many people, structure means rules. It obviously doesn't have to be that way exclusively. I was concerned, though open to, many of their methods. It's been a struggle.
In the end, though, the bottom line is that as much as I love working with teens, it's a very involved job that eats a lot of my mental energy. They make my brain run laps in ways that even I can't manage to do to myself (!!). As a result, I've requested a transfer to another unit, where I'll be working a slightly better schedule with younger kids (5-12). The work may be, unfortunately, often more punitive by nature for a while, but it will likely be physically exhausting rather than mentally exhausting... a welcome change. Having worked in both units, both feel very rewarding so I'd rather go with the one that offers me a little less stress, since being out nearly alone is plenty stressful enough sometimes.
Once that's settled, if I feel up to it, I may explore the possibility of another part-time job to help make ends meet.
As games go, I've been pretty quiet, both due to financial and time constraints. World of Warcraft is still my vice of choice, and eats a couple of full days every week. That aside, I've been fooling with the demo of Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords. The concept is simple and rather elegant: An RPG that uses a Bejeweled-style puzzle game in order to decide combat. The RPG side allows you to pick a class, dump points into the stats you want to push, complete quests, rescue maidens, blah blah blah. In the puzzle side, you and your opponent alternate single turns on the Bejeweled board... get 3 of a colour in a row and gain mana of that colour... get 3 skulls in a row and smite your opponent for damage... get 3 coins in a row and get extra gold... or skip your move and use your mana to cast a spell (or use a technique, I guess). Exceptionally well-executed and one of the sleeper hits of the year.
Linkfest!
First and foremost, my sweetie and I are well. We've been perfectly healthy (aside from some sore backs) and relatively stress-free (aside from some "my job sucks") since our arrival. We've largely nested into our new apartment, which just needs some sort of eating surface before it's pretty effectively furnished. I recently discovered a tofu place up the street that makes their own fresh tofu and we've slowly discovered the little gems nestled in our neighbourhood, which is largely composed of mechanic shops and garages.
I've started my new job. I'm working with teenagers (12 to 17, actually) in a closed, residential setting. They're not the roughest kids in the world, but they come with their fair share of baggage. The hardest part about this is, of course, the setting; Unlike the shelter, they are very rarely here voluntarily and their presence here is not an especial privilege. As a result, you can't just kick them out when they, say, punch you in the face. Getting the picture?
Right away, I was struck with the punitive nature of the work. In a setting like this, the best thing you have to offer is often structure: something reliable and stable in an otherwise chaotic life. The flip side of this is that for many people, structure means rules. It obviously doesn't have to be that way exclusively. I was concerned, though open to, many of their methods. It's been a struggle.
In the end, though, the bottom line is that as much as I love working with teens, it's a very involved job that eats a lot of my mental energy. They make my brain run laps in ways that even I can't manage to do to myself (!!). As a result, I've requested a transfer to another unit, where I'll be working a slightly better schedule with younger kids (5-12). The work may be, unfortunately, often more punitive by nature for a while, but it will likely be physically exhausting rather than mentally exhausting... a welcome change. Having worked in both units, both feel very rewarding so I'd rather go with the one that offers me a little less stress, since being out nearly alone is plenty stressful enough sometimes.
Once that's settled, if I feel up to it, I may explore the possibility of another part-time job to help make ends meet.
As games go, I've been pretty quiet, both due to financial and time constraints. World of Warcraft is still my vice of choice, and eats a couple of full days every week. That aside, I've been fooling with the demo of Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords. The concept is simple and rather elegant: An RPG that uses a Bejeweled-style puzzle game in order to decide combat. The RPG side allows you to pick a class, dump points into the stats you want to push, complete quests, rescue maidens, blah blah blah. In the puzzle side, you and your opponent alternate single turns on the Bejeweled board... get 3 of a colour in a row and gain mana of that colour... get 3 skulls in a row and smite your opponent for damage... get 3 coins in a row and get extra gold... or skip your move and use your mana to cast a spell (or use a technique, I guess). Exceptionally well-executed and one of the sleeper hits of the year.
Linkfest!
- Darth Vader vs. Cell Phone (funny video)
- Awesomest balloon animals ever (gallery)
- Lejo: Hand Puppeteer extraordinaire! (I've linked one of his videos before)
- Lejo vs. Kypski (the one I've linked before)
- Lejo: Sopdroe (whatever that means)
- Lejo: Robot
- Lejo: Gogul (the magic trick)
- Lejo vs. Kypski (the one I've linked before)
- Personals: "I need an unstable woman for a drama-filled relationship"
- Meet Pippy, the begging kitty. She wants... everything
- Cute Overload not enough for you? Get your dose of captioned cuteness at I CAN HAS CHEEZBURGER?
As I'm sure some of you have guessed by the silence, we've finally arrived safely in Portland. We've been busy settling into our new place, buying all the things we're missing, all the usual move-in stuff.
The border crossing, though successful, was just as eventful as usual. All my documentation was in order and the job was clearly in a TN category. However, I believe I could've been refused on the basis of (get this) salary. When I first showed the job offer letter to the agent, he wondered how it could possibly be that I would be able to live on "so little" money. I informed him that this was a pretty standard and that, yes, most social workers are destitute. "But this is practically at the poverty line!" *sigh* Yup.
Anyhow, the major problem with this is that it makes it look like they hired a Canadian to undercut U.S. salaries. Despite my insistence, they just could not believe that this was the going rate for most workers. Sad, isn't it?
More once we get settled. Today, we'll be trying to hook up the phone and internet.
<edit>
We're all signed up. We should have a local phone number and internet on Wednesday of next week.
</edit>
The border crossing, though successful, was just as eventful as usual. All my documentation was in order and the job was clearly in a TN category. However, I believe I could've been refused on the basis of (get this) salary. When I first showed the job offer letter to the agent, he wondered how it could possibly be that I would be able to live on "so little" money. I informed him that this was a pretty standard and that, yes, most social workers are destitute. "But this is practically at the poverty line!" *sigh* Yup.
Anyhow, the major problem with this is that it makes it look like they hired a Canadian to undercut U.S. salaries. Despite my insistence, they just could not believe that this was the going rate for most workers. Sad, isn't it?
More once we get settled. Today, we'll be trying to hook up the phone and internet.
<edit>
We're all signed up. We should have a local phone number and internet on Wednesday of next week.
</edit>
Well, the morning has been somewhat informative: I learned that the original job offer letter was returned due to insufficient postage. My contact was quick to try and arrange for a courier this morning but, apparently, the organization won't foot the bill for it. She sent out a letter via regular snail mail this morning, but frankly, I can't afford to wait another week or two. My better half needs to get back to work and at $20 a day, the trailer will bleed money until we return it, not to mention that I'm staying at the same house by Linda's good graces and nothing else at the moment.
Yet again, I find myself throwing money at a problem in order to speed up its resolution: I'm now FedEx's newest customer. They were actually very accomodating and I was surprised how quick and easy it was to get right down to business. The damage? ~$39 for overnight delivery, including pick-up. Barring any delays in customs, the letter should arrive tomorrow afternoon and we'll head off as soon as it's in my hands.
Yet again, I find myself throwing money at a problem in order to speed up its resolution: I'm now FedEx's newest customer. They were actually very accomodating and I was surprised how quick and easy it was to get right down to business. The damage? ~$39 for overnight delivery, including pick-up. Barring any delays in customs, the letter should arrive tomorrow afternoon and we'll head off as soon as it's in my hands.
What is this, some sort of joke?
Apparently not.
Yesterday, we went and fetched the trailer, a process that was long and not without its hitches. (*nyuk nyuk nyuk*) Seriously, though, there's a minor technical complication with the trailer that I won't detail here. Suffice it to say, it's minor and that compared to my other problems, it is but minutia.
The two of us packed up the trailer (wow, it's a lot tougher than when you have six friends to help... thank you guys so much!) and headed off to the border. At the border, we knew pretty much what to expect. We presented our passports and I declared my intention to apply for a visa. We were asked to pull in, got to the counter, at which point I was told my visa application would not be considered because my job offer letter was a facsimile and not an original.
We spent a little time trying to be as politely incredulous as possible, but it was clear that no compromise would be accepted. And so, once again, we headed back into Canada. We didn't have one of those little papers saying why we were refused entry, presumably because I actually refused to try to enter under a different pretense. The exchange was pretty funny: "How long have you been in the United States?" "About ten minutes."
The next step was clear enough, though: Call my employer and get an original version of the letter, signed & sealed, couriered to me as soon as possible. Needless to say, I probably wasn't going to be starting on Tuesday like we had planned, but nothing much we could do about it. In the next in a long chain of events showing that the universe is clearly mocking us, the entire human resources department was out of the office for the day today, so once again, the schedule gets bumped yet another day and we'll just have to try again tomorrow.
My new timeline: Get the letter sent tomorrow, receive it Wednesday morning, head for the border right away. Work will unfortunately have to wait until next week.
Apparently not.
Yesterday, we went and fetched the trailer, a process that was long and not without its hitches. (*nyuk nyuk nyuk*) Seriously, though, there's a minor technical complication with the trailer that I won't detail here. Suffice it to say, it's minor and that compared to my other problems, it is but minutia.
The two of us packed up the trailer (wow, it's a lot tougher than when you have six friends to help... thank you guys so much!) and headed off to the border. At the border, we knew pretty much what to expect. We presented our passports and I declared my intention to apply for a visa. We were asked to pull in, got to the counter, at which point I was told my visa application would not be considered because my job offer letter was a facsimile and not an original.
We spent a little time trying to be as politely incredulous as possible, but it was clear that no compromise would be accepted. And so, once again, we headed back into Canada. We didn't have one of those little papers saying why we were refused entry, presumably because I actually refused to try to enter under a different pretense. The exchange was pretty funny: "How long have you been in the United States?" "About ten minutes."
The next step was clear enough, though: Call my employer and get an original version of the letter, signed & sealed, couriered to me as soon as possible. Needless to say, I probably wasn't going to be starting on Tuesday like we had planned, but nothing much we could do about it. In the next in a long chain of events showing that the universe is clearly mocking us, the entire human resources department was out of the office for the day today, so once again, the schedule gets bumped yet another day and we'll just have to try again tomorrow.
My new timeline: Get the letter sent tomorrow, receive it Wednesday morning, head for the border right away. Work will unfortunately have to wait until next week.
Well, here it is, the day of reckoning.
Tomorrow, it finally gets decided, one way or the other. If the documents and attestations are sufficient, I will cross the border and go to Portland under my brand spankin' new TN-1 visa, move into my new home in the Mt. Tabor area and start my new job on Tuesday. If they are not, I've pretty much run out of means, and I'll just have to settle down here until we can figure out some completely different plan.
To be honest, I think it'll be fine. The job fits the requirements, I have all the documentation to prove the job offer, my qualifications, blah blah blah; I can prove that I have places to go and people to turn to when my visa expires so that I won't stay in the US; and we've left a paper trail since late last year that shows pretty solidly that we had hoped to settle down in Canada, and that Portland was both a second and very likely a temporary choice. If I can't get in with what we have, it probably means that I can't afford this visa because they needed me to, say, own property or rent a separate apartment somewhere in Canada to prove that I had somewhere to return to afterwards. Who in their right mind would buy a house with the intention of never living there?
*cough* Who in their right mind who doesn't have way too much money, I mean.
*cough* ... that isn't an investor.
Keep your fingers crossed for me.
Quote Lyric of the day!
This evening, for supper, we went to a Korean restaurant about two blocks from my house; I have walked it past many times but I had never really checked it out. This is mostly due to the fact that they've glued this kind of opaque paper to the windows, the kind you put on bathroom windows. Despite their great need for secrecy, the place was pretty straightforward: Buttloads of Korean posters, text in korean only all over the place, and soju by the crate. My schweetie opted for one of her favorites, duk mandu guk (ricecake & dumpling soup with a clear broth) and I had a spicy fish soup (with halibut). Both were pretty good (I was especially pleased to find tons of fish in my bowl) with the big standout being the nummy dumplings in her soup, clearly homemade and much more flavourful than the "stock" dumplings you'll often find. We also got to try, for the first time, gogumasun-namul, which are fried sweet potato stems, which came as part of our banchan (the neat little assortment of appetizer dishes you'll often get before starting your meal). Thankfully, unlike regular potato stems, these ones won't kill you.
$27 before tip, East Whalley Road just under 102nd. Not too bad. :D
My "landlord," the woman who owns this house, is awesome. She's a butt-kicker. Her daughter is also cool and very sociable. But really, as bad as it sounds, I'm going to miss the cat the most.
The cat, whose name I don't actually know but goes by "kitty kitty" to the homeowner (Linda) and her grandkids, has, near as we can tell, lived in this house longer than anyone here has. Linda moved into the house about 8 years ago and since that time, the cat has been coming and going more or less as it pleases and was already full-grown at the time. Best guess is that she's about 10-ish years old. She's quiet, a little jumpy and has a bunch of battle scars. Linda warned me when I first arrived to be reeeeal careful with her if I valued my hands. As it happens, I like cats a lot, so I would just leave myself available to her all the time... just hang out nearby. She'd wander over, I'd give her a quick and careful scratch and we'd both go on our merry way.
Since it's been somewhat of a boarding house here (Linda rents out up to 3 of the bedrooms, off and on), all the doors in the house are closed and often locked. So for the most part, the cat is stuck hanging out in the living room and can normally be found perched on the back of the couch. I left my door open, so eventually, she just took to coming in and making herself at home... perhaps because it was now the only bed to which she had access. Comfy!
Short story long, I'm very much taken by Kitty-Kitty now. I kind of wish I could take her with us, but at this age and considering how new I am to her, I wouldn't really want to risk it. It's too bad. For the past month and a half, I've been spending 8+ hours a day in my room at my computer and for over a month of that, I've had the pleasant company of a sleeping cat on the bed behind me.
Tonight, my sweetie noticed that Kitty-Kitty had a cat claw stuck in her forehead. We both dreaded the prospect of pulling it out... as much of a marshmallow as this cat has been with me, we've never really been "tested" either. But, we couldn't very well leave it there so we took a deep breath, hugged the cat and I held her head and pulled out the claw. And to our amazement, she sat perfectly still... then rubbed up against our hands happily.
I really think I'm going to miss her most of all.
Linkfest!
Tomorrow, it finally gets decided, one way or the other. If the documents and attestations are sufficient, I will cross the border and go to Portland under my brand spankin' new TN-1 visa, move into my new home in the Mt. Tabor area and start my new job on Tuesday. If they are not, I've pretty much run out of means, and I'll just have to settle down here until we can figure out some completely different plan.
To be honest, I think it'll be fine. The job fits the requirements, I have all the documentation to prove the job offer, my qualifications, blah blah blah; I can prove that I have places to go and people to turn to when my visa expires so that I won't stay in the US; and we've left a paper trail since late last year that shows pretty solidly that we had hoped to settle down in Canada, and that Portland was both a second and very likely a temporary choice. If I can't get in with what we have, it probably means that I can't afford this visa because they needed me to, say, own property or rent a separate apartment somewhere in Canada to prove that I had somewhere to return to afterwards. Who in their right mind would buy a house with the intention of never living there?
*cough* Who in their right mind who doesn't have way too much money, I mean.
*cough* ... that isn't an investor.
Keep your fingers crossed for me.
- "Coast to coast / L.A. to Chicago"
--Sade's Smooth Operator (*facepalm*)
This evening, for supper, we went to a Korean restaurant about two blocks from my house; I have walked it past many times but I had never really checked it out. This is mostly due to the fact that they've glued this kind of opaque paper to the windows, the kind you put on bathroom windows. Despite their great need for secrecy, the place was pretty straightforward: Buttloads of Korean posters, text in korean only all over the place, and soju by the crate. My schweetie opted for one of her favorites, duk mandu guk (ricecake & dumpling soup with a clear broth) and I had a spicy fish soup (with halibut). Both were pretty good (I was especially pleased to find tons of fish in my bowl) with the big standout being the nummy dumplings in her soup, clearly homemade and much more flavourful than the "stock" dumplings you'll often find. We also got to try, for the first time, gogumasun-namul, which are fried sweet potato stems, which came as part of our banchan (the neat little assortment of appetizer dishes you'll often get before starting your meal). Thankfully, unlike regular potato stems, these ones won't kill you.
$27 before tip, East Whalley Road just under 102nd. Not too bad. :D
My "landlord," the woman who owns this house, is awesome. She's a butt-kicker. Her daughter is also cool and very sociable. But really, as bad as it sounds, I'm going to miss the cat the most.
The cat, whose name I don't actually know but goes by "kitty kitty" to the homeowner (Linda) and her grandkids, has, near as we can tell, lived in this house longer than anyone here has. Linda moved into the house about 8 years ago and since that time, the cat has been coming and going more or less as it pleases and was already full-grown at the time. Best guess is that she's about 10-ish years old. She's quiet, a little jumpy and has a bunch of battle scars. Linda warned me when I first arrived to be reeeeal careful with her if I valued my hands. As it happens, I like cats a lot, so I would just leave myself available to her all the time... just hang out nearby. She'd wander over, I'd give her a quick and careful scratch and we'd both go on our merry way.
Since it's been somewhat of a boarding house here (Linda rents out up to 3 of the bedrooms, off and on), all the doors in the house are closed and often locked. So for the most part, the cat is stuck hanging out in the living room and can normally be found perched on the back of the couch. I left my door open, so eventually, she just took to coming in and making herself at home... perhaps because it was now the only bed to which she had access. Comfy!
Short story long, I'm very much taken by Kitty-Kitty now. I kind of wish I could take her with us, but at this age and considering how new I am to her, I wouldn't really want to risk it. It's too bad. For the past month and a half, I've been spending 8+ hours a day in my room at my computer and for over a month of that, I've had the pleasant company of a sleeping cat on the bed behind me.
Tonight, my sweetie noticed that Kitty-Kitty had a cat claw stuck in her forehead. We both dreaded the prospect of pulling it out... as much of a marshmallow as this cat has been with me, we've never really been "tested" either. But, we couldn't very well leave it there so we took a deep breath, hugged the cat and I held her head and pulled out the claw. And to our amazement, she sat perfectly still... then rubbed up against our hands happily.
I really think I'm going to miss her most of all.
Linkfest!
- Forsoothe! I hath pwnéd thee: Shakespeare, the MMORPG (news article)
- Top 15 Unintentionally funny comic book panels (gallery)
- Top 10 most magnificent trees in the world (gallery)
- For you hardcore fanbois out there, video game music, streamed to your computer! (web site)
- Google Maps = funny. Check leg #20. (*snerk*)
Ah, finally the stress-free portion of the trip! Heh, only sort of. I still have my visa, the move, and our future apartment to think about. All of it should be happening rather quickly. We established two weeks from Sunday (which will be April 1st) as our move-in day, so there's a bit to do before then. Really, though, the lion's share is hers: Finding the apartment. I'll be helping as much as I can remotely, but she'll be the one to actually see places, deal face-to-face with prospective landlords, all while starting her new job. I, on the other hand, will be planning my assault on the border: preparing documents for what I hope will be an airtight application. Frankly, though, there's only so much I can do for that. The rest of the time will be nervous fidgeting and waiting on paperwork from my new employer.
But enough about business.
Last night, as promised, we went downtown to an "old school" arcade. It truly was old, in that some of the games were absolutely ancient (ever seen a working Kingpin machine?) and certainly great nostalgia triggers... Tempest, Battle Zone, Track and Field, as well as a few cocktail-format games. Very cool, and licensed (albeit with bad beer) to boot! Unfortunately, the music was incredibly loud, obnoxious and not even remotely in theme. Frankly, that last bit I can forgive, but it would've taken the edge off of loud & obnoxious for sure.
I have long since thought the heyday of arcades to be dead. In Montreal, these kinds of arcades (with old games I mean - I wasn't aware of any normal, licensed arcades) have long since closed. The queue to challenge the sitting champion of Street Fighter, Daytona or Dance Dance Revolution has dwindled to the circle of friends they came with. I did, however, see a pretty solidly equipped arcade at a mall earlier today. It was beside (though not contained inside of) a cinema, but rather large and full of people. Maybe the arcade days aren't quite over yet.
Today, we've been pretty quiet. While my sweetie ran off to work this morning, I sat at home playing shockwave games, surfing the net and watching Dr. Who with her roommate. This evening, though, is far more interesting.
A couple of days ago, she dropped me off at Powell's while she went to work. Powell's, by the way, is a bookstore whose reputation frequently precedes it, largely based on its size, though I was not impressed... "Bah, it's big, but not that big." Little did I know that I wasn't at the right Powell's... merely an outlet that's a little closer to our neck of the woods. The true Powell's, appropriately called Powell's City of Books, occupies an entire block of downtown and three floors; It is supposedly the largest bookstore in the world. I'm there now, at the coffee shop.
It's ridiculous.
No, really. Completely ridiculous.
I thought I would get lost at first, but it's not quite that bad. But don't get me wrong, it's not manageable by any means. 68,000 square feet holds a lot of books and I barely dented the surface this evening, that's for sure. It is truly mind-blowing... the kind of place you could spend the entire day, from 9 til 9, and think, "crap, there's so much more I wanted to see."
I think I'll be spending many a day off here.
But enough about business.
Last night, as promised, we went downtown to an "old school" arcade. It truly was old, in that some of the games were absolutely ancient (ever seen a working Kingpin machine?) and certainly great nostalgia triggers... Tempest, Battle Zone, Track and Field, as well as a few cocktail-format games. Very cool, and licensed (albeit with bad beer) to boot! Unfortunately, the music was incredibly loud, obnoxious and not even remotely in theme. Frankly, that last bit I can forgive, but it would've taken the edge off of loud & obnoxious for sure.
I have long since thought the heyday of arcades to be dead. In Montreal, these kinds of arcades (with old games I mean - I wasn't aware of any normal, licensed arcades) have long since closed. The queue to challenge the sitting champion of Street Fighter, Daytona or Dance Dance Revolution has dwindled to the circle of friends they came with. I did, however, see a pretty solidly equipped arcade at a mall earlier today. It was beside (though not contained inside of) a cinema, but rather large and full of people. Maybe the arcade days aren't quite over yet.
Today, we've been pretty quiet. While my sweetie ran off to work this morning, I sat at home playing shockwave games, surfing the net and watching Dr. Who with her roommate. This evening, though, is far more interesting.
A couple of days ago, she dropped me off at Powell's while she went to work. Powell's, by the way, is a bookstore whose reputation frequently precedes it, largely based on its size, though I was not impressed... "Bah, it's big, but not that big." Little did I know that I wasn't at the right Powell's... merely an outlet that's a little closer to our neck of the woods. The true Powell's, appropriately called Powell's City of Books, occupies an entire block of downtown and three floors; It is supposedly the largest bookstore in the world. I'm there now, at the coffee shop.
It's ridiculous.
No, really. Completely ridiculous.
I thought I would get lost at first, but it's not quite that bad. But don't get me wrong, it's not manageable by any means. 68,000 square feet holds a lot of books and I barely dented the surface this evening, that's for sure. It is truly mind-blowing... the kind of place you could spend the entire day, from 9 til 9, and think, "crap, there's so much more I wanted to see."
I think I'll be spending many a day off here.
Doh, I totally forgot to write an entry yesterday! I guess that'll just make this one a little long, but here goes:
Quick leftover story from day 0: On our way out of the Seattle area, we stopped just outside Tacoma for foods. Neither of us had eaten for a good part of the day, so we were both pretty hungry. After exiting the highway, we found a stretch of fast food joints... your typical fare: McDonalds, KFC, Wendy's. Enticed by the thought of marginally less crappy food, we headed towards the Wendy's when I noticed a sign that will remained etched in my memory forever: Happy Teriyaki. (The actual name of the restaurant is, by the way, Happy At The Bay Teriyaki 7) I laughed and convinced my better half that we had to eat there. I could only imagine how bad it would be... what looked like a fast food Japanese joint in the middle of nowhere.
Boy was I wrong.
The restaurant promised "authentic teriyaki at fast food prices," and very much delivered. We ordered the Udon + california rolls combo, and a chicken teriyaki + gyoza (potstickers) meal. It was good. Not ridiculously good, but for $6 each, it was awesome. Very good and, true to their promise, authentic. The actual staff was Korean and they offered some Korean fare (as well as Mongolian bbq... mmm...) but I definitely want to stop there every time I pass by (in a car, at least).
Day 1 consisted largely of my one interview, and planning out Day 2. As it happened, one of the organizations I was visiting (an alternative school) ended up skipping my interview in their last set of hires purely by accident. The director told me that when I came to see the place, she wouldn't mind interviewing me while I was there, although there were no openings at the moment. Great!
The interview was with an organization that does residential treatment for kids with mental health issues. Twenty-odd minutes of chatting/questions at the beginning, then a tour of the four units. The units range from challenging to insane. When I heard (and saw) how heavy some of these cases were, I got pretty excited about the idea of working there. It looks monstrously hard, but very human, very organic, with solid teams filled with down-to-earth people. After almost an hour of visiting the units, talking with staff and some of the kids, we went back to an office and sat down for another ten minutes. They offered me a job. I told them I was excited, interested, but wanted to sleep on it. I had very few hesitations, but it was a lot to take in all at once.
This morning, I called them back to accept. Next is a letter with the actual job offer, after which I try to cross the border. I'm moving to Portland.
Big day, big trip. It was hard to see how it anything the alternative school could say would top it. But they did. The director and I sat down for about an hour, talking about what they do, what I want and bring to the table, as well as just chatting about what resources are out there in the Portland area. The director, who is also the founder, and I seemed to agree that this would've been a great spot for me; She was a little sorry she didn't have any openings since otherwise, I probably would've been hired. I was candid about my intention to take the other job, but we agreed to keep in touch; Most of the school's positions will be part-time, and if something opens up that meshes with my other schedule, I would love to try this out as well. I certainly don't mind working 60 hours a week, if it's all fantastic!
Tonight, a home-cooked meal, celebratory sake, and a trip to an old-school arcade downtown that also serves alcohol! The business end of this trip is over, so tomorrow will be purely pleasure.
Quick leftover story from day 0: On our way out of the Seattle area, we stopped just outside Tacoma for foods. Neither of us had eaten for a good part of the day, so we were both pretty hungry. After exiting the highway, we found a stretch of fast food joints... your typical fare: McDonalds, KFC, Wendy's. Enticed by the thought of marginally less crappy food, we headed towards the Wendy's when I noticed a sign that will remained etched in my memory forever: Happy Teriyaki. (The actual name of the restaurant is, by the way, Happy At The Bay Teriyaki 7) I laughed and convinced my better half that we had to eat there. I could only imagine how bad it would be... what looked like a fast food Japanese joint in the middle of nowhere.
Boy was I wrong.
The restaurant promised "authentic teriyaki at fast food prices," and very much delivered. We ordered the Udon + california rolls combo, and a chicken teriyaki + gyoza (potstickers) meal. It was good. Not ridiculously good, but for $6 each, it was awesome. Very good and, true to their promise, authentic. The actual staff was Korean and they offered some Korean fare (as well as Mongolian bbq... mmm...) but I definitely want to stop there every time I pass by (in a car, at least).
Day 1 consisted largely of my one interview, and planning out Day 2. As it happened, one of the organizations I was visiting (an alternative school) ended up skipping my interview in their last set of hires purely by accident. The director told me that when I came to see the place, she wouldn't mind interviewing me while I was there, although there were no openings at the moment. Great!
The interview was with an organization that does residential treatment for kids with mental health issues. Twenty-odd minutes of chatting/questions at the beginning, then a tour of the four units. The units range from challenging to insane. When I heard (and saw) how heavy some of these cases were, I got pretty excited about the idea of working there. It looks monstrously hard, but very human, very organic, with solid teams filled with down-to-earth people. After almost an hour of visiting the units, talking with staff and some of the kids, we went back to an office and sat down for another ten minutes. They offered me a job. I told them I was excited, interested, but wanted to sleep on it. I had very few hesitations, but it was a lot to take in all at once.
This morning, I called them back to accept. Next is a letter with the actual job offer, after which I try to cross the border. I'm moving to Portland.
Big day, big trip. It was hard to see how it anything the alternative school could say would top it. But they did. The director and I sat down for about an hour, talking about what they do, what I want and bring to the table, as well as just chatting about what resources are out there in the Portland area. The director, who is also the founder, and I seemed to agree that this would've been a great spot for me; She was a little sorry she didn't have any openings since otherwise, I probably would've been hired. I was candid about my intention to take the other job, but we agreed to keep in touch; Most of the school's positions will be part-time, and if something opens up that meshes with my other schedule, I would love to try this out as well. I certainly don't mind working 60 hours a week, if it's all fantastic!
Tonight, a home-cooked meal, celebratory sake, and a trip to an old-school arcade downtown that also serves alcohol! The business end of this trip is over, so tomorrow will be purely pleasure.
I hate being stressed.
I like to think that I work well under a reasonable amount of pressure, that I sometimes benefit from being surrounded in chaos because it helps me to find my own calm. But stress is different. For me, it's a rolling snowball of thought that gets me hung up on insignificant details and useless regrets. Obviously, no one likes being stressed, but I find it combines badly with my natural tendency to overthink things. I just end up being a big bundle of nerves. But that's not the worst part.
Easily the worst part, and today is one of the first times I've really noticed this, is that I'm really fricking dumb when I'm stressed. No, really! I get really distracted and end up really oblivious to the world around me... passive, autonomic and pokey.
I got up this morning bright and early to settle everything around the house and clean up after myself before leaving for Portland. This would be the first time since Sault Ste. Marie that I even tried to cross the border and I was a fair bit nervous. I had prepared a huge compilation of names, numbers, addresses, references in the hopes that this would go off without a hitch. It seems harmless enough, doesn't it? Visiting my girlfriend, one interview.
At the border, I queued up with the rest of the bus, only to be taken aside. "An agent will have to interview you." I was told. As it happens, it took almost an hour for someone to free up to see me. While I was waiting, the bus driver and I had talked about how long it was taking, how sorry I was, and when the next Greyhound would be passing. When someone came by to tell me it would be another half-hour wait, the driver piped up: "Oh hey, he says he'll wait for the next bus." Frankly, it didn't even occur to me to object... I was too lost in my own thoughts (stress dumb, remember?) and there it was: I would wait alone at the border, and hope to get on the next bus.
The interview was largely what I expected. A battery of questions covering this trip, "when was the last time you tried to cross the border," to my J-1 visa from 10 years ago, to the entire story of our cross-country trip, the border refusal and our future plans. The gist of it is this: No problem for the interview, no problem to go visit my girlfriend for a few days... However, I hadn't really established sufficient "ties and attachments" in Canada. My rented room was "hardly a home" (Thanks... thanks a lot) and I had no job ("Why would I want a job in this situation?... I'd just have to ditch it in a couple of weeks"). Normally, he explained, it takes 6 months to establish th... WTF?!
Thankfully, today's border guard was not only empathetic, but actually reasonable. It made sense to him that we weren't getting married - we'd rather do it on our own terms and figured it would just arouse suspicion at immigration anyhow. It made sense to him that I had few ties to Canada, since my intent was to move to Portland anyhow. And (eventually) it made sense to him that I would come back on Sunday as I said I would because... well, because I said I would. :)
Shortly after my interview was over, a bus full of Japanese tourists came through customs as I sat on the side waiting for the next Greyhound. After they were through, the driver sauntered over to me and asked which way I was going. "Seattle," I answered. He offered to drive me to downtown Seattle. In yet another fit of stress dumbness, I answered, "Oh, well I have a ride waiting for me at the bus station... I probably should wait for the next Greyhound." He shrugged and walked off. It took me a full two and a half hours of waiting (oh yes) to realize that, gee, that's probably where the bus station is anyhow, eh? *facepalm*
All that is behind me now, though. I am safely and happily in Portland with my shweetie. Tomorrow, I interview, contact the school I'm hoping to visit and spend some quality time with the love of my life.
I like to think that I work well under a reasonable amount of pressure, that I sometimes benefit from being surrounded in chaos because it helps me to find my own calm. But stress is different. For me, it's a rolling snowball of thought that gets me hung up on insignificant details and useless regrets. Obviously, no one likes being stressed, but I find it combines badly with my natural tendency to overthink things. I just end up being a big bundle of nerves. But that's not the worst part.
Easily the worst part, and today is one of the first times I've really noticed this, is that I'm really fricking dumb when I'm stressed. No, really! I get really distracted and end up really oblivious to the world around me... passive, autonomic and pokey.
I got up this morning bright and early to settle everything around the house and clean up after myself before leaving for Portland. This would be the first time since Sault Ste. Marie that I even tried to cross the border and I was a fair bit nervous. I had prepared a huge compilation of names, numbers, addresses, references in the hopes that this would go off without a hitch. It seems harmless enough, doesn't it? Visiting my girlfriend, one interview.
At the border, I queued up with the rest of the bus, only to be taken aside. "An agent will have to interview you." I was told. As it happens, it took almost an hour for someone to free up to see me. While I was waiting, the bus driver and I had talked about how long it was taking, how sorry I was, and when the next Greyhound would be passing. When someone came by to tell me it would be another half-hour wait, the driver piped up: "Oh hey, he says he'll wait for the next bus." Frankly, it didn't even occur to me to object... I was too lost in my own thoughts (stress dumb, remember?) and there it was: I would wait alone at the border, and hope to get on the next bus.
The interview was largely what I expected. A battery of questions covering this trip, "when was the last time you tried to cross the border," to my J-1 visa from 10 years ago, to the entire story of our cross-country trip, the border refusal and our future plans. The gist of it is this: No problem for the interview, no problem to go visit my girlfriend for a few days... However, I hadn't really established sufficient "ties and attachments" in Canada. My rented room was "hardly a home" (Thanks... thanks a lot) and I had no job ("Why would I want a job in this situation?... I'd just have to ditch it in a couple of weeks"). Normally, he explained, it takes 6 months to establish th... WTF?!
Thankfully, today's border guard was not only empathetic, but actually reasonable. It made sense to him that we weren't getting married - we'd rather do it on our own terms and figured it would just arouse suspicion at immigration anyhow. It made sense to him that I had few ties to Canada, since my intent was to move to Portland anyhow. And (eventually) it made sense to him that I would come back on Sunday as I said I would because... well, because I said I would. :)
Shortly after my interview was over, a bus full of Japanese tourists came through customs as I sat on the side waiting for the next Greyhound. After they were through, the driver sauntered over to me and asked which way I was going. "Seattle," I answered. He offered to drive me to downtown Seattle. In yet another fit of stress dumbness, I answered, "Oh, well I have a ride waiting for me at the bus station... I probably should wait for the next Greyhound." He shrugged and walked off. It took me a full two and a half hours of waiting (oh yes) to realize that, gee, that's probably where the bus station is anyhow, eh? *facepalm*
All that is behind me now, though. I am safely and happily in Portland with my shweetie. Tomorrow, I interview, contact the school I'm hoping to visit and spend some quality time with the love of my life.
So finally, after about a month, I'm starting to hear back from people.
I'll be going to Portland tomorrow to interview for a rather challenging-sounding position in a centre for kids with heavy mental illness problems. While I'm there, I'm hoping to visit with some of the other places I've applied to: An alternative school, a mega-collection of homeless youth resources and one of the largest organizations working with the homeless in the city. Admittedly, these visits are partially to be recognized, but I think it'll also be a good learning experience for me. One way or the other, I'll have to learn what's out there in the Portland area and what better way than to actually drop in and say hi, right?
The biggest challenge (though it's not that big of one) will be crossing the border for the first time since my refusal. They'll likely have lots of questions for me and I'm going as prepared as I can be, with phone numbers, addresses, names, a return ticket, the shipping manifest everything to convince them that I'm not planning on invading. Of course, it'll be interesting to see what happens if I get this job and try to cross for that. I'd like to think that immigration is fairly impartial and will be objective with my case; I'm not sure whether my ignorant attempt to cross at Sault Ste. Marie will be regarded as a bad intention or not.
For the moment, I've been trying to keep a low profile, mostly for the sake of saving money. I spend most of my day at home, often writing e-mails to Portland, preparing job apps, cooking, watching tv, and a lot of World of Warcraft. In some respects, it's pretty easy to do because I know next to nobody here in Vancouver so I don't go out much, but frankly, it's starting to get old. I'm not very social lately and I'm glad I have housemates... otherwise I'd be a right shut-in. I'm ready to have friends, though... although that might have to wait until I move down to Portland.
Ah, but once I have that and get some money, oh ho ho ho... I think a drink will be in order... pick up Supreme Commander... stock up a nice kitchen. I can't wait!
Linkfest!
I'll be going to Portland tomorrow to interview for a rather challenging-sounding position in a centre for kids with heavy mental illness problems. While I'm there, I'm hoping to visit with some of the other places I've applied to: An alternative school, a mega-collection of homeless youth resources and one of the largest organizations working with the homeless in the city. Admittedly, these visits are partially to be recognized, but I think it'll also be a good learning experience for me. One way or the other, I'll have to learn what's out there in the Portland area and what better way than to actually drop in and say hi, right?
The biggest challenge (though it's not that big of one) will be crossing the border for the first time since my refusal. They'll likely have lots of questions for me and I'm going as prepared as I can be, with phone numbers, addresses, names, a return ticket, the shipping manifest everything to convince them that I'm not planning on invading. Of course, it'll be interesting to see what happens if I get this job and try to cross for that. I'd like to think that immigration is fairly impartial and will be objective with my case; I'm not sure whether my ignorant attempt to cross at Sault Ste. Marie will be regarded as a bad intention or not.
For the moment, I've been trying to keep a low profile, mostly for the sake of saving money. I spend most of my day at home, often writing e-mails to Portland, preparing job apps, cooking, watching tv, and a lot of World of Warcraft. In some respects, it's pretty easy to do because I know next to nobody here in Vancouver so I don't go out much, but frankly, it's starting to get old. I'm not very social lately and I'm glad I have housemates... otherwise I'd be a right shut-in. I'm ready to have friends, though... although that might have to wait until I move down to Portland.
Ah, but once I have that and get some money, oh ho ho ho... I think a drink will be in order... pick up Supreme Commander... stock up a nice kitchen. I can't wait!
Linkfest!
- 80's Cartoon Intro Overload! An hour of Saturday morning cartoon intros! (first of 6 videos)
- Leilani, one of the students from my sweetie's old school. A ridiculously talented contortionist. (video)
- Buk buk buk... Freeze! Chicken Police, buk! (cute video)
- Baby seal on the beach. Make sure you wait for the *honk*. (cute video)
- Haven't you always wanted a Neon covered in Pokémon cards? The cheesy music really knocks this one out of the park (eBay item)
- Stranger than fiction: Underwear thief explains he was a female elf at the time ("news")
- Wow, I've always wanted a gummi bear chandelier... whoa, wait, a what?! (amazing images)
The job search continues... it's actually going better and better.
The challenge with looking for a job in a city this far away is developing any sort of rapport with people. For the past two weeks, I've been shotgunning my C.V. to the organizations and companies who post their ads in forums that can be accessed by internet but there's very few things as dry as a cover letter and C.V. sent by e-mail. For the (often larger) organizations that want it to be that dry, there is often an accompanying application or e-forms on their web sites and, certainly, that works fine with me. Usually you also have the option of just keeping your application in their files for other positions and applying for new openings is just a click away, which is super convenient.
In the end, though, I've always been of the mind that the best (and often only) way to find a job is to talk to people. Yes yes, ha ha, I know you it's hard to get a job without talking, but what I mean is that, lacking a "foot in the door" like a friend who already works there, I find the strongest impressions are made when you talk to managers, HR people, coordinators face-to-face (or, since I'm a little far away for that, on the phone). I've got the added bonus of having a great excuse to talk to people: I'm Canadian and need to make sure whether they can accommodate my visa needs. The people who are doing the actual hiring often understand that this is a necessary step, and that gives you a great excuse to have your name remembered. Similarly, my hope is, when I go down for an interview, that I can loiter an extra day and visit with some of those organizations... I'm hoping to be remembered as "that Canadian guy who trucked out here just to see the location." Oh, and it'd be nice if they thought I was a good person, too.
Why do all recorded phone solicitations now start with the message: "This is not a solicitation"? Who are they trying to convince?
Read from a billboard ad:
Linkfest!
The challenge with looking for a job in a city this far away is developing any sort of rapport with people. For the past two weeks, I've been shotgunning my C.V. to the organizations and companies who post their ads in forums that can be accessed by internet but there's very few things as dry as a cover letter and C.V. sent by e-mail. For the (often larger) organizations that want it to be that dry, there is often an accompanying application or e-forms on their web sites and, certainly, that works fine with me. Usually you also have the option of just keeping your application in their files for other positions and applying for new openings is just a click away, which is super convenient.
In the end, though, I've always been of the mind that the best (and often only) way to find a job is to talk to people. Yes yes, ha ha, I know you it's hard to get a job without talking, but what I mean is that, lacking a "foot in the door" like a friend who already works there, I find the strongest impressions are made when you talk to managers, HR people, coordinators face-to-face (or, since I'm a little far away for that, on the phone). I've got the added bonus of having a great excuse to talk to people: I'm Canadian and need to make sure whether they can accommodate my visa needs. The people who are doing the actual hiring often understand that this is a necessary step, and that gives you a great excuse to have your name remembered. Similarly, my hope is, when I go down for an interview, that I can loiter an extra day and visit with some of those organizations... I'm hoping to be remembered as "that Canadian guy who trucked out here just to see the location." Oh, and it'd be nice if they thought I was a good person, too.
Why do all recorded phone solicitations now start with the message: "This is not a solicitation"? Who are they trying to convince?
Read from a billboard ad:
- "If I wanted to be smarter, I'd watch a book."
Linkfest!
- Incredible animal carvings made from fruits and vegetables (collection of images)
- The Monkeysphere: An essay on significant & generalized others, and what monkeys have to do with the fall of modern civilization (odd, but interesting)
- 50 tips to reducing your carbon profile (treehugging suggestions)
- Beaver moves to the Bronx River, builds a house, gets named Jose (news article)
- A collection of the ads from the "NHL players are just like you and me..." campaign, courtesy of YouTube! Starring:
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