A night off

I'm not a very important person, but my calendar tends to get pretty full on any given week.  One of my best friends in the whole world is visiting Toronto right now and so for his stay here, I booked off every evening so that I could hang out with him when he's free.  He's not free tonight, and neither is my girlfriend, so that means I've booked a night off for... myself.  It happened by accident, basically, but I am very happy with the consequences.

I work part-time from home, and part-time from my office at the organization I work for, which is located in Port Hope, Ontario; a little over an hour east of Toronto.  I lived here in Port Hope for two years, during which time I bought a car.  As such, I took my car in for oil changes and repairs at a local dealership, which I've become accustomed to.  I haven't had an evening after work in PH where I had time for an oil change for a while now, but I do tonight.  So once my workday is done, that'll be my first stop.

Then I can take a leisurely drive home.  Nothing to rush for, no errands to make... 

I made dinner for my girlfriend K. and I last night and there are leftovers.  So when I get home, there's no dinner to get right to cooking.  I'm going to change into comfy clothes, snuggle up with my cat, chill with my iPad, have some delicious leftovers, and maybe watch a little of "The West Wing" (my latest interest on Netflix).

Then I might even do a little work... sometimes I think of all the unpaid work I need to do but might not be appropriate to work on during the day.  Maybe I'll do a little of that tonight.

Maybe I'll clean my room, do the dishes, organize the DVDs, sort through my in-tray...

The possibilities... 

I am no longer a music God.

I had a friend named Jess who - under "favourite music" on Facebook (back when people would actually list their favourite artists and it didn't mean they had to "Like" that artist on Facebook) - used to write "Anything Maeve recommends - she is a music God".  Maeve is my name, by the way.

Anything Maeve recommends - she is a music God.

I was obsessed with that.  I took that declaration so seriously that I used to check every once in a while to make sure it was still there, and then post recommendations for great songs/artists on her wall to ensure I would always be her music God.

Facebook doesn't work quite the same way as it used to, so the declaration is no longer there.  I know it's not because I failed as a music God, but the truth is, years later, that I'm not a music God anymore.

Back in high school, I used to buy every issue of Rolling Stone magazine and look at the top 40 albums on the back page, and highlight all the ones I wanted to own.  I used to go home and spend hours downloading music by "The Artists to Watch" (that's how I discovered Regina Spektor back in 2003/2004 ish), and it would take forever because Kazaa or Limewire or whatever I used back then used to take forever.  I would watch every music channel, download every song played on "The O.C.", "Dawson's Creek", and of course the entire soundtrack from "Garden State", and then I'd listen to it all while I did homework, hung out in my room, or walked anywhere.  I was obsessed with music.  I wanted to know every song and artist worth knowing, and most of the time I did.

University was no different, for the most part.  My music tastes changed somewhat, but my passion for curating an excellent collection of music stayed the same.  As time passed there were faster ways to get music, easier ways to download full albums, and more legit ways to find music worth listening to.  I was older, but no less a music God.

And then I started working full-time - not that I blame work at all - and focusing on other things in my life.  I don't know what... I guess, cooking... reading, maybe?  Or maybe I just had less free time in the day to focus on hunting for and listening to music.  But that can't really be it... that seems like a cop-out.  I guess the truth is that although my love for music has not died out, my desire to have my finger on the pulse of music worth listening to has.  My interest in spending hours searching for new music is no more.  My time available to dedicate to a lot of music listening is less than it's been, and I just don't have the interest in making extra time for it.

This is not to say that I don't listen to or love music anymore.  Nor does it mean that I don't occasionally find some new music and love it and spread the word about it.  It just doesn't happen that often, and not with the strength that it used to.  It's more of an accident now, less of a vocation.

And it's hard to accept this, being that it seemed to be a real part of me at one point, but now that I've put it out into the universe, I'm going to accept it.  There's nothing wrong with it, but the fact remains that I am no longer a music God.

I'd like to thank the Academy...

I can't believe I haven't updated this blog in over a month.  I hate looking at my favourite blogs and not seeing an update, and I try not to let that happen with S&G, but oh well...

Life is good... but busy!!!, which explains the lack of blogging.  Although I am not a teacher, I do work at a school and so the energy inevitably comes back to campus and my workload the moment the academic year starts again.  I love it though!  During the summer I am so bored, and although it's nice to have a break and have things quiet down a bit, I much prefer overwhelmingly busy to overwhelmingly bored.  Always.

Right now my plate is full of work associated with an event that takes place this Tuesday, so the end is in sight!  Things are in good shape so it's just a matter of working my butt off until Tuesday at around 10:00 pm, spending the rest of the week doing the follow-up on the event, and then... well, starting work on the next event, which takes place on November 6th.  And then when that's over, I'll work on the next event, which takes place on January 18th... and then I have a bit of a break.  Event-planning is hard... and I'm not even an event planner.  Oh well!

In other news, I have not been reading.  I really need to make time to read, but I always want to do something mindless when I'm not working.  I will try to get reading back into my life.

And the award for the most boring blog update goes to...


Currently reading: Nothing.
Posts to come: My thoughts on "Orange is the New Black"... eventually...

Montreal.

As you know, I used to travel by train a lot when I was living in Port Hope and regularly travelling to Toronto by VIA Rail.  I travel by train less so now because I have my beautiful car Hubble, but even still I travel once and a while for work.  Thankfully I was collecting VIA Preference points that entire time, and one day I decided to see how many I had.  Turns out I had enough for a free round trip to Montreal!!!  Since my girlfriend K. was still away in Halifax and I’ve been trying desperately to keep occupied while she’s away, I thought, why don’t I go to Montreal?  So I did.

**Sidenote: She's coming home tomorrow.  Woo hoo!!!

I’m lucky to have friends living all over the country/world, so I arranged to stay with my friend Katherine who moved to MTL in March of this year.  She graciously hosted me, so with my free accommodations and free travel I knew I could really have some fun in the city.

I left Toronto Friday morning and did my workday from the train.  I actually found my time on the train extremely productive .  I got a lot done and the time went by really quickly.  I arrived in Montreal at about 2:30 pm.

I went from the train station first to Café Trisip, a nearby cafe.  I killed about two hours there waiting for Katherine to meet me to give me her spare key.  

Cafe Trisip.

I got to her place around 5:00 pm, dropped my bags, freshened up, and then cabbed down to China Town (Rene Levesque & Saint Laurent) where I met my long-time bestie Rachel for some pre-concert pho at My Canh.  Rachel lives in St. John’s, Newfoundland normally, but she’s in Montreal for around five weeks for the Orchestre Francophonie festival (she plays the cello).  So cool!  Unfortunately she wasn’t performing that evening, but we got to watch a very casual concert in a park.  It was excellent!

Orchestre Francophonie in the park.

Some pretty building with significance I can't remember.

After the concert, Rachel and I headed north to meet up with Katherine for some drinks closer to Katherine’s neighbourhood.  We went to two bars, but I can only remember the name of the first: Big in Japan (bar, not restaurant; there's one of each).  Great name, and great spot; very classy, kinda old school speakeasy feel.  However, you can only have so many $10 gin cocktails, so we moved to a more casual spot (can't remember the name) with $5 drinks and hung out there for a while.  Then we parted ways with Rachel, and Katherine and I went back to her place for a late night chat, mostly focused on "Orange is the New Black" (I'll save that for another post).

Katherine & I.

(L to R) Katherine, Me!, Rachel

After a good sleep and a great shower, I was ready to take on Saturday with Katherine.  We started things off at Le Souvenir for brunch.  I had excellent huevos rancheros on their patio and tried not to get burned in the sun, and had more amazing chats with Katherine.  Then we wandered a bit, popping into a great store with trinkets and stuff for home... cooking accessories and the like.  I love those stores.  Then we went to Drawn & Quarterly, an amazing and hipstery bookstore in her neighbourhood.  So great!

Huevos Rancheros

Drawn & Quarterly

Then I believe we stopped at Katherine's place for a bit where I put on lots of sunscreen, changed into running shoes, and we headed off to conquer Mont Royal.  It was a decent walk to get to the mountain, first of all, and then the hike up it was substantial!  It was great though.  The paths were very small inclines, very shaded with a canopy of trees, and the conversation - once again - was fabulous.  I was winded a few times (namely, when we had to climb stairs instead of the slow incline), but it felt great, and man was it worth the view!  We even got all the way to the top where the cross is!!!

View from almost the top of Mont Royal.

The cross at the top.

The cross from the bottom.  Can you see it way up there in the distance?

After that great adventure we went home to shower and chill.  And then we went to dinner at Lola Rosa (a friend's suggestion; thank you, Facebook), a vegetarian restaurant not too far from Katherine's.  Her friend met up with us, too, and we had veggie nachos to share and then each got a hemp burger with a side salad and a few chickpea fries.  It was filling, but delicious, and the service was amazing.

After a long day and a lot of walking, we decided to take it easy on Saturday night, and so I introduced Katherine to "Portlandia".  Of course, she loved it.

Proof that Montreal is Canada's Portland: abandoned cassette tapes found on the way home from dinner.

We had a slightly earlier morning on Sunday and got an early start on exploring Old Montreal.  We started with brunch outside of Old Montreal, at Le Passe Compose.  That place was amazing!  Definitely more Francophone than I'd experienced thus far.  I can read simple French really well; I've still maintained a pretty solid vocabulary, which I'm grateful for.  But I think my verbal French is probably pretty weak, and my comprehension would be even worse.  I could say thank you and order my coffee and eggs Benny, but it doesn't go much further than that.  However, the food was excellent and good service, good conversation... you're getting the picture.

My salmon eggs Benny at Le Passe Compose.

Then we walked again and this time into Old Montreal.  It's so beautiful there; so old Europe, artsy, and it was a gorgeous, sunny day with lots of people out and about so it was a great place to be.  We browsed shops, walked the cobblestone, and that sat down on a park bench for a while just taking it all in.  We also had a quick (planned) encounter with my friend Jennifer; I had something of her's and so we had a quick exchange.  Always nice to see a familiar face.

An artist in Old Montreal.

Old Montreal.

Street performer.

More walking, more browsing, and then we headed back to Katherine's, stopping for a bite along the way at Burger de Ville.  I'm trying to eat healthier these days, but I couldn't fathom being in Montreal/Quebec and not having poutine.  So I did!

Need I say more?

And then it was back to Katherine's to pack up and ship out.  I cabbed to the train station, had a massive delay on the train, and then was home sweet home Sunday evening.

Thanks to friends & Montreal for such a great trip.  A bientot! 

Currently reading... Little Bets by Peter Sims (and the latest Toronto Life)

Posts to come... "Orange is the New Black" (obv)

Legit Jams (2013 Edition)

I did a series of "Legit Jams" back in July 2011 and to keep this blog light I decided to bring them back.

Starting with this obvious choice.  I know it's all over the airwaves, but it still makes me chair dance.




And then this: a total throwback to - I think - my summer of '09.




And then one of Icona Pop's amazing jams.  "I Love It" is absolutely unreal, but their whole album (self-titled) is amazing.  So here's "Top Rated".



BAM.

Cottages & Nephews (or 1 cottage and 1 nephew)

I can't even tell you how many times I've tried to write a new blog post and yet again I've got a bit of writer's block.  Maybe it's because so much has happened and it's hard to get it all down / articulate my feelings about all the wonderful things that are and have been happening.  However, I'm keen to update, so I'm going to start with two items and save more for posts later on.  So without further ado.....

(1) My 6 days in Muskoka

I only get so many vacation days each year so I usually save them up for a big trip I’m planning.  Next Spring I’m hoping to go to Finland (!!!), for example.  So when my parents rented a cottage in Muskoka this summer, I originally planned on just a weekend there… maybe one extra weekday thrown in to make it a long weekend… but one thing led to another and I ended up taking 3 vacation days and stayed at the cottage from Fri Jul 26 to Wed Jul 31.  I’m so glad I did.

Wellesley the cottage dog

View from the deck

It takes time to relax, and then once you do you need to enjoy it, and then you also need time to ramp yourself back up to feel ready (and maybe even excited) to go back to work and routine.  Going through all those motions is too hard in a weekend; doubling my time made it that much easier.

My favourite meal of the trip; UNBELIEVABLE ribs

One of the things I love about a cottage holiday is that you aren’t expected to do anything!  Unlike a vacation in Europe – where I’d feel guilty if I wasn’t out and about taking it all in – cottages are meant for pure relaxation.

So what did I do?  I relaxed.  I slept (9 hours every night), I sunned (with many, many sunscreen applications), I swam (just a dip in the lake almost every day), I read (finished Jane Hamilton’s The Book of Ruth and started Peter Sims’ Little Bets), I played cards, I chatted with my family, and I ate!  I ate chicken, sausages, ribs (my favourite of all the meats), and more chicken!  You may know I cook exclusively vegetarian at home, so it was pretty wild eating that much meat.  It was a holiday though and that totally added to the experience.

So, clearly, my 6 days at the cottage were divine.

(2) My new nephew

While I was at the cottage the hot topic was my sister as she was due to have a baby “any day now” at that point.  She lives two hours north of where we were in Muskoka, so I felt like at any point we’d get the call and spring to action, driving to Sudbury where she is.  It was all we could talk about and we were so excited for the baby’s arrival.

Unfortunately the baby didn’t arrive during my stay in Muskoka, but he arrived shortly after, just after midnight on Friday, August 2nd.  He and my sister were happy and healthy, and our family was all thrilled!  YAY!

I left on the morning of Saturday, August 3rd from Toronto to Sudbury to visit my sister and my new nephew, Teoman a.k.a. Teo (pronounced TAYO).  I spent about 24 hours with them plus my brother-in-law and his parents, and it was absolutely incredible.  In some ways it was surreal, seeing my younger sister with her baby!!!  In all ways she seemed totally natural, and seeing her with a baby seemed absolutely normal and right.  I always imagined that seeing my sisters become mothers would transform them instantly, and in the case of Ali – my sister – it was an instant transformation, but it wasn’t a jarring one.  She seemed exactly who she is, but then a mother also.  It’s hard to articulate, but it was beautiful to see.  We were talking to each other like nothing had changed, but everything had, but it was normal and beautiful.  I don’t know how else to put it!

I love my nephew!  He’s perfect, adorable, mellow (funny to say, but true), and generally amazing.  I got to hold him a lot and I was just totally taken away.  My mom says nothing helps you stay in the present moment like a baby, and I totally understand that now.

It was a wonderful experience; to see my sister and her new family, to hold a baby on his second day in the world, to help her out and be there for her… all of it!  I love Teo!!!

Currently reading... Little Bets by Peter Sims

Posts to come... my 48 hours in Montreal

"rc-5": The Unofficial Reading Challenge

Remember how I decided I wasn't going to do a reading challenge this year and then I realized that the reading challenges mattered?  Well, unofficially I still have a goal of reading 20 books this year, and I can't help but want to blog about it, so whether we call it rc-5 (Reading Challenge 5) or not, here goes...

"rc-5" (read 20 books in 2013)

1. Grace by Grace Coddington
2. The Hour I First Believed by Wally Lamb
3. Onward by Howard Schultz
4. Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk by David Sedaris
5. Quiet by Susan Cain
6. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
7. The perks of being a wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
8. Please Sir, I Mean Ma'am by Marion Walker Garland

3 non-fiction, 5 fiction.  Here are some brief thoughts on all of them.

Grace: The memoir by Grace Coddington, Fashion Director of American Vogue.  I fell in love with Grace when I first watched "The September Issue", and then fell in love over and over again as I re-watched the doc.  Her memoir was great - written interestingly, and she's lived about a million lives for my very meager one.

The Hour I First Believed: Oh Wally Lamb, how you totally nourish me.  His books just do things to me that no other books - except maybe John Irving's - can.  I was so delighted recently to hear that he's about to release another.  Anyway, THIFB was another brilliant one from him; a fascinating look at how the lives of those involved with the Columbine shootings were dramatically changed.  I highly recommend!

Onward: As a "fan" of Starbucks, it was very interesting to read Onward, the story of Starbucks, but more specifically the story of Starbucks during its trying times from about 2007-2010.  So yes, it was interesting, and interesting to learn about the development of certain products (Via, Clover...), but it was just so self-congratulatory!  I maybe learned a few good habits of a CEO, but... ugh!  Stop patting yourself on the back, Howard.  It's not becoming.

Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk: Totally different than Onward, and refreshing!  I love David Sedaris, and SSC is his collection of the antithesis to Aesop's Fables.  They're stories of animals in bizarre and hilarious human-like situations.  A fun, quick read!

Quiet: This took me a while to get through; not because it wasn't interesting, but more because it was very heavy.  That said, it was fantastic!  It's about the power of introverts in a world that favours extroverts.  It's about how this came to be, and how introverts can best manage in the (North American) culture as it is today.  There's also this wonderful and moving section near the end on how parents and teachers can best work with introverted children.  There were some things that really hit close to home, and it was a wonderful and worthwhile book.

The Great Gatsby: I was assigned this during my undergrad but never finished it.  After a few false starts over the years, I finally read it, and I really enjoyed it.  I've heard it referred to as the Great American Novel, so I was really surprised at how dark and pessimistic it was.  Perhaps pessimistic is too harsh a word, but I thought it would be a lot more "rah rah America!" than it was.  That said, it was an excellent look at an interest time period in American history, and I really enjoyed the book and its many symbols.

I also went and saw Baz Luhrmann's movie adaptation of the book last week, with Leonardo DiCaprio as Gatsby and Tobey Maguire as Nick Carraway.  I thought it was a great interpretation.  Very true to the book, a confident and consistent visual style, and it really brought the most memorable scenes from the book to life.  It also made some things make more sense, which is always a good thing.  I'm glad I finally got to reading it.

The perks of being a wallflower: I moved onto this next, which was a total change of pace.  TPOBAW was a re-read for me, and it was more intense and dark than I remembered... maybe I didn't get all of it the first time around.  Anyway, it really is a great read; I like an epistolary novel... mostly because it allows me to call back on my (worthwhile) English degree and use the word "epistolary", but also because it breaks things up easily, gives you a sense of the protagonist in a different respect, and definitely changes things up after The Great Gatsby.  Anyway, it's a charming and equally sad story, but I enjoyed it the second time around.

Please Sir, I Mean Ma'am: This book was totally different.  My Dad gave me this book to read.  It's a modestly-published (and unfortunately poorly edited) book written by a woman who taught for 30 years at the school where I work (and which my Dad attended back in the 60's).  It was an all boys' school back then and the woman who wrote the book (Marion Walker Garland) was the first female teacher.  It's fiction though, but I use that term loosely.  Names are barely changed, and circumstances are likely very close to the truth.  It's about her experience as a female teacher, the stories of the boys, and the general goings-on of the school.  It was enlightening as a staff member, and really just charming.  Not a great novel by any stretch, but a really enjoyable read.  I wouldn't recommend it though, because I doubt the charm translates if you have no connection to the school.

And so there you go!  My eight books so far in the year.  At this rate I could hit 16, but maybe I should take the rate up to the next level.  20 books in 2013 is in my sights yet!!!



Currently reading... The Book of Ruth by Jane Hamilton (and the most recent issue of Toronto Life)

Upcoming posts... How I intend to make life not consist of work and then laziness