A hot topic

With the outcry at recent cauliflower prices soaring as high as $8 per head, I was astounded to catch this low price at my local Chinese grocer, so I snapped a picture and shared it with some friends who were trustworthy for reactions.

Of course then, the following ensued:

Me: Affordable cauliflower...but at a Chinese grocer...I bet it's an imitation cauliflower

Me: "Caurifrower"

dimps: LMFAO

dimps: that was too good. 

Malcolm: Forget caurifrower, what's Finger Hot?

Nightcrawler: Lol! That's an STD.

I hadn't even noticed.

A true "what she saw/what he saw" situation...

Didn't feel the Phantom yesterday

I saw a poor production of The Phantom of the Opera last night. I complained to my husband that it just didn’t give me “the feels” like I thought it should. The pace of the entire production was way too fast, the sound engineering was poor, there was no emotion, there were no dramatic pauses, there was no chemistry between the actors…no feels. The characters who were supposed to be in love didn't touch each other or stand close until they had to finally kiss. The sets were different, but not spectacular. I know that it wasn’t a dedicated “Phantom” theatre like how the Pantages was built, but it was still lackluster.

Then I felt bad for thinking so lowly of the production. These were professionals putting on a classic production – could I have done any better? Who was I to judge? Maybe after so many years – decades, in fact – since the last time I’d seen the show, maybe my tastes had matured and The Phantom was not something that was any good to begin with, but my immature theatre-sense at the time didn’t know any better. I’d seen it so long ago and unwarrantedly put it on this fantastically high pedestal that nothing would ever be able to come close to. That had to be it, right?

And yet, here I am at work (maybe I shouldn’t include that fact), listening to the original London cast soundtrack on YouTube with a shitty pair of headphones, and…the feels!

I mean, it’s not fair to compare last night’s singers to Michael Crawford or Sarah Brightman, okay fine. But just the emotion that you can hear in their performances is enough to confirm to me that this IS a production that can give me goosebumps. As I listen, I can totally envision the original production that I saw on stage so long ago with the rich colours and costumes and set design; the billowing mist of the underwater lake, the smoke of the hundreds of candles that rose magically from the stage, the elaborate, glittering, infamous chandelier.

And it’s not just the singers or the remembered visuals – the accompanying orchestra for this soundtrack version is just so expressive – it’s a character of the musical itself. There are pleading strings, ominous brasses, thundering percussion. I got the feels more from these recorded instruments than I did from the onstage actors last night.

I appreciate the efforts of a production company to put on a show – I really do – but they just happened to miss the mark with this one. They’re all talented individuals in their own rights, but this combination was just not a winning one. As my brother commented, “we should have watched the [2004] movie version before watching this show…that way anything by comparison to the movie would have been better.”

True story.

It should have been safe

When you're on a conference call at work, it's customary to call in, and then put yourself on mute while you listen. With that in mind, when I had to burp during my after-lunch meeting, it should have been safe to do so, so I did.

..except I wasn't on mute.

Office lingo

I've been back to work for a few weeks now and while I'm pretty much adjusted to it, I'm still a little rusty on my office lingo. For example, the following conversation happened:

Boss: YOA come to 6F oooppss
Me: ?????
Me: are you asking me to come to 6F
Boss: Yes.

If I'd been in full swing, I wouldn't have had to question it. Duh.

The muffin (wo)man

In an attempt to be the wholesome, ideal mother save a couple of bucks every week, I've been trying to make use of my muffin tins by baking muffins once a week to serve as a quick grab item for breakfast. I've tried a couple of recipes so far and the best one to date was a banana chocolate chip muffin. Being banana, this recipe was great because it also allowed me to make use of all the overripe bananas I was prone to having at the end of the week.

So far, my plan was going well:
1. Muffins from home so I'm not buying muffins while at work.
2. Banana muffins mean I'm getting to use overripe bananas instead of tossing them out.
3. Chocolate chip banana muffins mean "yum, chocolate!"

However, this week, the batch didn't turn out so hot. I was trying to convey that the muffins weren't "throw immediately into the garbage" no good, but they just weren't tasty. Some couldn't understand how they could be bad when there was chocolate involved, some just thought I was being modest. But the conversation I had with Malcolm last night perfectly relayed why they weren't so hot.

Me: Sorry the muffins this week weren't so great.
Malc: Oh, honey, don't be hard on yourself, they're good!
Me: No they're not, you can barely taste the banana.
Malc: These are banana muffins?!

See? Chocolate chip banana muffin fail. Accidental chocolate chip only muffin win.

The boots of regret

Something like 10 years ago, I went down to Washington D. C. to play in an annual volleyball tournament. Along the way, our driving convoy stopped in Grove City, PA to shop at the outlets there. It was my first time there, and man, were there ever deals!

I was still a new player back then, young and probably barely employed. But I made out like a bandit on things that cost me no more than $10 - 20 apiece. I stuck to the stores that I was familiar with and was pretty sure that I could afford to shop in: The GAP, Aeropostale (and this was before it came to Canada), the Nike Store...it was there I scored some great deals. Thinking I'd done all I could, I tagged along with another friend into a shoe store I'd never heard of before. Today, I couldn't tell you what it was called, but that's where this story REALLY began.

While she shopped, I browsed. As I browsed, I came across a pair of knee-high boots. Back then, I guess stretchy leather was not as common because when it came to these kinds of boots, you either had tiny little calves that fit the all-leather made boots, or you had giant-sized calves that had to be squeezed into boots that were part leather, part ugly-black-elastic-stretch-section-in-the-back. Being of the latter half of the population, I didn't have high hopes with these all-leather boots.

But then.

They fit! They fit like a glove! They were all leather! I was astounded. I took a few steps in them and they were comfortable. I checked out the brand name on the box - Kenneth Cole. All I knew was that it was a brand name that was typically out of range for my starving-student budget.

But then.

I flipped my heel and looked at the price tag stapled to the bottom of the boot: $98. $98?! You can never get boots - knee-high boots - for less than a hundred dollars!

But then.

My inexperienced shopping mind made the following "logical" deduction:

• I hadn't come on this volleyball trip prepared to shop
• Everything else I had bought on this unexpected trip was less than $20
• These boots were $98 and were 5x more expensive than anything else I'd bought so far
• I didn't need the boots
• Therefore, don't buy the boots.

And so, feeling good about brain power, I didn't buy the boots, got in the car, and continued on with the caravan, away from the outlets and on to our volleyball tournament in Washington. Surprisingly, it wasn't until I got back to Toronto the next weekend that it kicked in.

I should have bought those boots.

Perhaps I should have. but hey, they were just boots, I could find another pair. And so, feeling a little bit of regret, I decided to find myself a pair of replacement boots. That's when the REAL regret kicked in.

I couldn't find another pair.

All leather boots didn't fit me. Boots that did fit me had that terrible ugly elastic section in the back. Any boots that came close to being not-ugly-enough-to-want-to-buy were astronomically expensive. None of them were comfortable.

It plagued me for years that I couldn't find another pair. The scene played over and over in my mind: me standing there with the boots ON my feet, deciding I didn't need them, and then me walking out of the store without them. I wanted to scream at that past reflection of myself, buy the damn boots! You'll never find the same!

I regretted it. Oh, I regretted it hard. For YEARS. Since then, I've made it a point in my life to be sure that I'll never regret NOT buying something while I could, again. And that is the story, of the boots of regret...
...

...and that, honey, is why I HAD to buy these new Kenneth Cole boots while I was supposed to be grocery shopping!

After the show it's the after party

And usually the after party (of the party, that is...I'm not exactly putting on any [free] shows at my house) involves a mountain of dishes, a buffet of leftovers, further party-activity coordination, table and floor clean-up, simultaneous guest entertainment, not to mention baby-watching. Is it worth all the trouble, just to have a few hours of socializing with friends?

Always.

Besides, many hands make light work and none of the guests could be coerced to sit down and enjoy themselves. Dishes were washed, leftovers were packed, tables and floors cleaned and swept, and the baby not just watched, but bathed! With all of that so quickly out of the way, it was no time before we jammed a candle into a box of doughnuts and called it a cake for the birthday guest amongst us (despite the actual cake sitting a little further away on the table).

Anyway, I just wanted to say that I had a good time with good friends and family last night. That's all.