January 8, 2006
New hats in the meantime.
I guess it might be obvious that I’ve been despondent of late, and I have no wish to suffer in silence any longer. I’ll give it to you straight then. On the day before New Years Eve, they killed off half of my second-favourite EastEnders couple. The actor who played him talks about his departure here.
Spending the final day of my long long holiday reading “The Year of Magical Thinking” and listening to the new Dar Williams CD- “My Better Self”. Both are wonderful, really. Following the completion of my book, I shall cook my famous spaghetti for our supper, and then my husband and I will watch one hour dramas about forensic science. We don’t care which ones. And I will knit a blanket out of wool that was once my misshapen poncho. It has been the most splendid, carefree month with almost nothing to do except the things we want to do. And I have read so many books (in one sitting many times, which is the best way) and we’ve seen so many friends, and even though it’s January and an era of great impecunity, we’ll ride that wave into springtime. And we’ve got new coats and hats in the meantime.
January 4, 2006
Relish
Yesterday at lunch time, upon reading the final page of Margaret Drabble’s “The Red Queen”, I completed every work of fiction Margaret Drabble had ever written. It felt like there was a hole in soul, even though The Red Queen satisfied in so many ways. I love her works. I love seeing how they have developed over time, the social issues she has dabbled in, the birth of her international interests, the change in her narrative voices, the shapes of her novels. Her early works were best received but I like the later ones better, where it’s clear the novel is beginning to bore her and she is playing with it. Anyway, I was very happy to find out she has a new book due out in March 2006!
In other monumental book news, I am at a point in one’s reading experience that you just want to roll around in forever. I am in the midst of a good Zadie Smith book. Relish.
January 2, 2006
Idiot bias
That Leah McLaren was annoying this week will not come as a massive shock to most of you. That I keep reading her anyway is more surprising, but she just keeps turning up in my newspaper. Anyway, she wrote about debt this week. It reminded me of an article that was in the Globe a few weeks ago, about that poor twenty-four year old who didn’t realise that paying for your psychology degree with a credit card was perhaps not the best life choice and was now blaming all and sundry for her debt problems. And McLaren, who can’t understand why she amasses so much debt with such a modest lifestyle- car, house, cashmere. However it seems that Leah McLaren bought her house in a place where she doesn’t live, and so rents an apartment on top of mortgage payments. I am beginning to see her problems. I also doubt that Ms. McLaren drives a 1989 Honda Civic. So here are these poor twenty-somethings, debt-ridden, symptomatic of a quarter-life crisis.
I’ll give you a life crisis- the threat of death. All else is melodrama. If you are lucky to be 25 or thereabouts, save your crisis for when you’ll really need one. And if you are stupid enough to pay for your psychology degree with your credit card, please own up to your stupidity. Don’t blame your debt on teachers telling you to “follow your dream” or on-line poker. If you find it necessary to live far beyond your means, don’t market this in national newspapers as a fashionable choice. Do these idiotic people have no shame? And why must they keep hanging the “idiot” label upon my entire generation?
December 31, 2005
Year of Great Fortune
My best of the year:
Book: We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver
Single: Jerk It Out by The Caesars
Magazine: Spacing
CD: I’m a Mountain by Sarah Harmer
Holiday Destinations: (tie) Miyajima and Brighton
In Numbers:
Weddings: 2
Residences: 4
Continents: 3
Visas: 6
This time last year: in Tokyo!
This time next year: right here, happily.
December 30, 2005
Pickles at Pickle Me This!
Today was an exciting day at Pickle Me This. My friend Laura came to visit- and she brought pickles! She worked on a farm this last while and from it she brought pickled cucumbers, pickled beans, as well as tomatoes and tomato sauce. Who ever would have thought we’d have pickling news here at Pickle Me This? She also bought us pizza. We’re big fans of Laura, even if her pickles rival ours.
In less exciting news, our dear propriatress is sick with a strangely annoying symptoms, including sore eyes and sore skin. She is feeling better today than yesterday however.
And it was a Merry Christmas. This old world was quite generous to Stuart and I. We received some money, and a DVD player, a spice rack, and gift certificates, hats, a million books, socks and Miffy got a brownie uniform! Stuart gave me “I’m a Mountain” by Sarah Harmer which is the best CD I’ve heard in ever, and “The Red Queen” by Margaret Drabble. He also got me a beautiful pair of earrings. I also received “The Witch of Exmoor” (now reading) by Ms. Drabble, which completes my Drabble Fiction collection! Who would have thought what that innocent purchase of “The Radiant Way” in Kobe one and half years ago would start? Oh and we just got a million and one things, and feel very lucky and it is nice to have such lovely families and friends caring for us. However I think I can live with a little less Christmas for the next 300 or so days.
December 29, 2005
Tragedy Politicized
The Yonge Street shootings are not a political issue. They did not result from anything you can pinpoint so easily. In the last day I have heard this tragedy blamed rather bizarrely on gun registration, immigrants, Paul Martin, and the futility of social programs. To add this to an already towering political platform would be gross and tacky, and out of respect for the dead and injured, no candidate should do so. The problem of gang violence in Toronto won’t be fixed by a snappy campaign slogan. These are the kinds of problems that won’t be fixed soon, by any kind of blanket solution. It will be a long, expensive road of tiny steps, but of course this sort of reality is never popular in the lalaland of politics.
December 24, 2005
The eve is nigh!
Overheard in Red Pegasus: “Oh my god! Mechanical sushi. Emily is Chinese. She’d totally love that.”
Overhead in Shoppers Drug Mart in the last minute gift aisle: “Nothing says ‘You destroyed my family your filthy whore’ like rat poison.”
Stuart received a letter from Santa Claus yesterday. Lynn Crosbie’s response to Hughes News is hilarious. We had a spontaneous brunch out. We’re having chicken fajitas for dinner tonight, in year two of that great tradition. And we’re watching Love Actually, a Christmas ode to Stuart’s homeland. I am on last minute gift-knitting duty. We’ve been eating Christmas baking for over a week now, and we’ve nearly gone off it (and nearly finished it). A year ago, we were due to work in the morn and a three year old was due to pee in my presence. Here’s hoping that nobody pees on my carpet tomorrow, and that all the snow hasn’t washed away. Merriest of Christmases to all and the goodest of goodnights.
December 23, 2005
Meron Pan!
Here is a picture of a “Meron Pan” which is “Melon Bread” in English and was one of my favourite things to eat during my Japanese life. It’s a sweet bread, and the top crust is a sugary cookie and it gets it’s name from its meron-like shape. I miss meron pan. And then yesterday I got some! I had an urgent lack-of-knitting-project crisis and met Erin at Romni, and picked up enough wool to knit pair of socks (and a plan for a tea cosy). And then we popped into Sanko, the Japanese corner store and I bought a meron pan which turned out to be delicious. I also got mochi and a pack of Japanese curry. Oishi!
Here is a photo of AmPanMan, which means “Bean Bread Man”. He is a Japanese superhero, and is friends with noneother than Meron Pan Chan (“melon bread girl”) who I believe accompanies him in this photo. AmPanMan and his friends (various bread products, you may have guessed) help out people in bed by offering their heads for eating. Really. And you ask me why I miss my Japanese life…
December 21, 2005
A little bit of proof that the world is a good place
Yesterday we received a Christmas card from Northern Ireland that our friend forgot to stamp!
December 21, 2005
The Eskimo Way
Christmas has eaten our social life in the most delightful way. We’re busy every day and even double-booked some. And enjoying days spent doing exactly what we want. Chocolate has become perhaps too dear a friend however. We will have to be chary. Just finished “The Pursuit of Love” by the right hilarious Nancy Mitford, and onto a Penelope Lively book. Quite happily busy with a story of my own. And the world is a winter wonderland.
