The Art of Nonversation: 11/1/09

This was a nice week. Been working my bootay off but I feel good. I'm really starting to feel like I'm settling in, you know? I get along well with my team at work, I think the boss likes me (not certain, but I don't think she hates me, so that's good, right?). The only downside is I am FREAKING TIRED. Seriously, I get home from work and just end up collapsing onto my bed for as long as it takes to work up the energy to get up and change into my pjs, then I rest til I can work up the energy to rustle up some food. On Tuesday when my aunt offered me dinner, I seriously almost cried with gratitude cause I was standing in front of the fridge wondering how I was going to find the energy to make something to eat. She made chicken and chips and it was delicious. I have yet to try fish and chips but everyone keeps telling me that I should. But the only time I tried it at home, it was disgusting, too greasy. But clearly this is where it originated so they'll do it properly here, but I'm kinda scared that when done properly it's still super greasy. I'll try it eventually I'm sure.

Yesterday was the graduation ceremony at the College. I remember thinking at my U of W grad how organized it was and how much work must go into that. I had no idea. This was just a grad of 130 students and it was a ton of work, and that's just at the actual event. The work leading up to it started before my time at the college, long before my time. It went really well tho. I was a bit horrified at how idiotic and rude some grown ass people can be. There were grads running in at 7:05 when the ceremony started at 6:45 and grads were asked to be there between 5:30 and 6!!! They were rude, they wouldn't follow instructions, they took their cameras up on stage with them. It was unbeliveable. And these were higher education students, meaning they are adults, grown ass adults who should know better. They even got up and went to the washroom during the ceremony! I'm not gonna lie; I yelled at a few people and had to give a few people my look of death to get them to stop talking or to stop speaking rudely to me. But anyways it was a success so that's nice. And we got to come in later to work today because we were there until 10 last night.

As you've noticed, work has overtaken my life. But I still have weekends! I'm going out tomorrow night, should be fun. All my shopping in the past few weeks has left me with an abnormal problem: I have too many outfits to choose from. It's a problem I rarely have. I'm gonna see how I feel tomorrow night, see what my friend from work is wearing and see where we're going and then decide which outfit to where. They are both fabulous outfits, but in different ways :)

Winter is settling in here and it's cold and rainy. Not too cold, I just wear a fall jacket. But thank goodness my back is to the window cause it's not a fun sight to look out at all day long. But the fall colours are lovely with all the red, orange and yellow leaves everywhere. Yesterday was the offical start of winter--bonfire night/fireworks night. It's this strange British celebration that stems decades or centuries maybe to when this man tried to blow up parliament so that he could take over and enforce strict Catholic laws on the people. The man failed in his attempt and got caught. His punishment was to be hung, drawn and quartered. So first he was hung till he was close to dead. Then they stretched him ('drawn' apart by horses I assume) til he was closer to dead. Then they cut him open and pulled out his internal organs, while he was still alive. All this to send a message to the people that attempting to blow up parliament will be severely punished. So after that Brits celebrated the failure of this man's attempt at taking over Britain and enforcing strict Catholic rules by burning a bonfire of leaves on bonfire night and setting off fireworks. It's also the official start of winter cause they rake their yards and burn up all the fallen leaves. Apparently in the old days they also used to make scarecrow-like things and then the little kids would prop them up on the side of the street and when adults would walk by they would say 'penny for the fellah', or very similar to that, and they would collect all the change they got and use it to buy fireworks for the evening. I have no idea how fireworks or scarecrows fit into celebrating the 'burning of the catholic' but apparently they do.

It's funny cause my aunt was shocked at how horrified I was by this traditional celebration. She tried to say that thanksgiving is just as horrific if you go back far enough. I pointed out that no, that's not true, it's a celebration of the Indians and the pilgrims sitting down with one another and sharing and giving thanks together. But she pointed out that the pilgrims killed off most of the Indians, which is true. BUT that's not the part of our history that Thanksgiving celebrates. Their little bonfire night celebrates brutal public torture and punishment. Anyhoo, I was working so I missed out on the festivities and what I'm sure would have been a lively discussion as to which cultural celebration is more horrific.

I went to Windsor on Saturday with one of my mom's cousin and his Italian lodger. It was nice cause the Queen has a castle there. It's insanely huge. Eton and Windsor are two small little towns that are right next to each other and connected by a little footbridge so we parked in Eton and then walked over into Windsor. Super pretty. We wandered around Windsor and then ate at a pub, which was interesting. I'm still not too excited about British food, to my cousin's disappointment but I did opt for a traditional English dessert: sticky toffee pudding. It was AMAZING. AMAZING. I can not stress this enough. Anyone who comes to visit must try it. AMAZING!!!

Sunday I went to this Thai place with a couple of friends. It's in Soho and called Ubasa or Abasa or something like that. It was fantastic. Red curry is one of the best things ever on Earth. Period. And I tried a lamb red curry which was even more spectacular.

Aside from eating, I've been working my butt off. So far this week I've worked 9hrs each day and I have at least one more 9hr day left. It's a lot of fun tho and I'm starting to really get into the swing of things, which is nice. And it's busy all day long which is also nice because the days just fly by.

Back to food for a minute: I made roasted veggies for the first time yesterday. I cut up zucchini, red onions, mushrooms, orange peppers, whole cloves of garlic in the skin, green onions and baby corn and put them in a casserole dish. Then I mixed olive oil with a ton of garlic, mixed herbs, a little brown sugar, a splash of seasoned rice vinegar and some sea salt and then poured the mixture over the veggies, covered it all with foil and put it in the oven. The result: DELICIOUS.

Anyhoo, below are the pics from Windsor...