The haiku project

In November, I randomly decided to write my Facebook updates in haiku. I thought I might do it for a week, or maybe a month. Heading into my third month now, I'm not sure how much longer I'll keep at it. After all, it likely seems pretentious to people who read it.

But I like the challenge of it, so will keep at it. At least until my next update. 

Here are some favourites so far (although I just discovered Facebook doesn't seem to keep updates indefinitely, so I'm going to pretend there may have been some better ones prior to this...)

Today:

Ignore the ice. Look

up. Bare limbs, bathed in gold, have

much to teach of love.

Jan 6:

Velleity: (n)

an urge too weak to act on.

Sounds like my gym plans.

Dec. 26:

Ending the night with

a dwindling bowl of Twisties.

Does it get better?

Happy Australia Day!

It's snowy and 0 degrees today, so it must be Oz Day!  There may not be barbecues here in T-dot, nor the drinking-game-laden Hottest 100 games of my occasionally-wayward 20s, but I'll try to make sure there's at least some beer. 


You know, I've now been away from Australia for four years. Four years!! Bloody hell. Australia Day 2006 was spent in a Kenyan hut, feeding Tim Tams to a random group of people also trying to help save the black rhino. As you do. 
Since then, I've had one Aus. Day happily sweltering during a visit back to Brisbane, and the others rugged up in suitable Toronto gear, usually slipping by Hemingways at some point. (Yes, I know it's a Kiwi establishment, but sometimes one must simply make do.)


So whatever you do today, give a happy thought for all Australia adds to the world: drunken backpackers, the ultimate chocolate biscuit, and bizarre marsupials. Aussie! Aussie! Aussie!!!

Oz. Gotta love it.

(photo by my wonderful husband)

Getting inspired

T's and my good friend Louie Palu has been staying with us for a couple of days. Not only is he a disarmingly frank and funny friend, he's also a stunning freelance photographer, and a clumsy goof. There are three stairs to take you from the hallway down into our kitchen. This morning, he not only managed to fall down them, he somehow also obliterated our treasured wee bottle of Stanthorpe port (purchased when I took T. home to meet my family and tour the local Aussie vineyards). Glass shards went both up and down the stairs, and Louie has given the floorboards a slightly new stained tinge of, well, port.


I fed him hot sweet tea for the shock (he fell hard), and got on my hands and knees to clean the mess. Then he took me to lunch, and helped outline ways to nudge myself from 'journalist' to 'writer'. I think it's a fair trade.


This afternoon has been spent gazing at a heart-achingly beautiful blue sky and browsing the interweb for blogs, writing journals, and inspiration. Today's best find: Six Sentences. 
What can I do in six sentences? What can you?? I vote we try it out.

The writer's error

Sitting down to write the next little snippet of my current project, and I made the fatal error of reading through the opening chapter. Ugh. 
There are few faster ways to demoralize one's self. All that stuff I wrote after the 3-Day Novel contest about writing being fun and not-too-arduous if one can only stick to it? Scratch that. 

Sloooooow food

Okay. Confession time. I'm not the world's best chef. Many of my friends can attest to this, particularly those that have been forced to stand under fire alarms waving towels to clear the air. But I try. Damn, do I try. And my poor friends must endure the results. (T. doesn't endure. He loves it. At least, that's what he tells me. ;)
Some girlfriends are coming around tonight to drink tea and catch up. Kind of like a wine night, but better for our livers. Not, however, better for our thighs, thanks to a poundcake recipe I found at Joy the Baker today. This morning's contemplation went something like this: That lemony cake recipe in Joy's best cakes list looks amazing. But I don't have all the ingredients, and I'm out of grocery money. What can I make with things already in my pantry? Enter Joy's Glazed Lime Cake. Looks delish in the pic, no?
Problem is, not only am I a somewhat ... adventurous chef, I also have an extremely limited supply of tools and bakeware, and am often stymied by North American baking terms. No mixing machine? No problem! I'll cream that butter and sugar by hand. Have no idea what powdered sugar is? No worries! I'm sure I can whip up something similar using my mortar and pestle.
It all makes for some very, very slow cooking. And, sadly, some rather mixed results.


To start, powder your sugar!

Then cream the butter and sugar...

a little bit longer...

Oh, that'll do!!

Now add the flour and eggs and milk and stuff, and whop into prepared baking pan. BUT you don't have the right pan, do you? Nope. So, what do you do? Improvise! With pyrex, and a slightly lower cooking temp. Surely it'll be a breeze.

Righto. While that cooks, get into those limes. You'll have to hand-squeeze, though, because you don't have a juicer either.  

This is really starting to get on my nerves, but dang if the lime zest doesn't look cute!

Turn juice, zest and sugar into a lime syrup and let sit. Once cake is cooked, poke with a skewer while still warm and drizzle over some syrup. (Good in theory. Problem is, cake sank in the middle -- probably something to do with that dodgy stand-in baking pan -- so all syrup runs into the centre.)

'Whisk' remaining powdered sugar into lime syrup to create glaze. Indeed. The results of that effort were so bad, I didn't even photograph them. Needless to say, ground sugar does not, apparently, powdered sugar make. Or at least, it doesn't a glaze make. Pour pitiful attempt at 'glaze' over cake, and cut.  Voila!

Please be aware this is the best picture of the lot. And I took a few. Sorry in advance to my ladeez who will have to pretend to like this tonight.  If it helps, I'll be pretending to like it too.

Update: It actually was delicious - heavy and satisfying, with a distinct lime tang - but supersweet due to the ridiculous amount of sugar I used. Shall rectify when I attempt this again.

The Plan

It's 10:11a.m. and I'm officially at work. Kind of.
During a dear friend's farewell on Friday night, I was talking about writing with another of my uber-dear friends. This one works in publishing, and she said the best and only advice she could give was to write, at the same time, in the same place, each day.
Thus, I am now set up in our front room, heater on my right, pot of tea on my left, snowy neighbourhood outside the windows, and my trusty laptop awaiting my attention.


If I get enough work done today, I get to watch an episode of Battlestar Galactica. These are the things of incentives in my officeworld.
Wish me luck, folks.
 

Malaise

Today I am doing nothing. Literally. It's 1:30pm, and all I've done is tootle around the internet, read some new blogs, and go daydream-websurfing looking at rental villas in Europe. I'm running out of steam, people. I can't be arsed to be motivated, can't be bothered to even think of something to achieve, let alone to then set out and achieve it. 

I really don't know what to do. I'm kind of scared that, once my papers do arrive, I'll not only have forgotten how to be active and productive, but I'll be furious with myself for wasting my time like this.

If only all of the energy I expend mentally berating myself could be put to positive use.

My talented friends

I'm so often in awe of my amazing, talented friends. I have friends who keep people alive, friends who run marathons at the drop of a hat, friends move go whitewater rafting for fun, friends who start their own businesses, friends whose lives are so amazingly successful and sorted they leave me in awe, friends who can tell a joke without giggling before the punchline...


And friends like Ben, who co-wrote a Toronto Fringe Festival musical that was so successful, it's going to be restaged! T. and I tried to get in to this during the Fringe, but it was so bloody popular that the queue held twice as many people as the theatre. Dang!


That's not going to happen again! I bought tickets today for this Saturday's matinee and I can't wait! You can hear a snippet here.

Oh yeah: Happy new year!!!! 2010's going to be amazing. Just like my friends. :D