26 October 10

Kitchen windowsill, with my new succulents.

25 October 10

Jeff took me to dinner at Brown's Social House in North Van. It was simple but delicious, and we didn't have to choose what dessert we wanted, because they had the option of a half-piece of each pie! They are chocolate pecan and key lime.

24 October 10

We went to IKEA and I wore the same outfit I wore to Gogol Bordello the night before because I liked it and it didn't get too sweaty. I bought some succulents and picture frames and we had lunch meatballs and beer.

23 October 10

This is Kayla, having a drink in my kitchen before heading to see Gogol Bordello at the Commodore. Alice and Aaron and a girl I'd never met named Hayley were there too. The show was fucking fantastic, although Alice and Aaron and I got separated from the other girls at some point and had no way of contacting them to make sure they got home ok. We kind of hovered around various parts of the venue and then outside the doors until almost 2am when we finally gave up and got a taxi back to my place.

Anyway, I will continue to see Gogol Bordello live until they stop being a band.

22 October 10

One more for good measure.

21 October 10

Because fake polaroid is the new greyscale.

20 October 10

19 October 10

This is near my house. I don't know how these things pop up so fast (they certainly weren't there three days prior), but I love them and I wish it was my lawn. In fact, I wish I had a backyard that was not cement kind.

18 October 10

Met MaryAnne after work for dinner & drinks at The Reef on the Drive.

17 October 10

I went downtown and started my Christmas shopping on Sunday, and ended up with gifts for six people! Unfortunately that is only about a third of the people I intend to give presents to.
I also bought myself a skirt, marked down from $58 to $20. It is stripey and eggplant coloured so I thought it would be a nice change from my usual grey, black, navy, and white. Plus it is three paycheque month and I don't know when I will have cash to spare again. I didn't try it on because the line was super long and the waist is elastic, so hopefully it doesn't look like poo.

16 October 10

Jeff and I had a pretty quiet Saturday because we are both poor. Had breakfast, had a shower, had sex, bought some groceries, took some pictures in the park, made dinner, had some whiskey, and watched Up, which is an incredible movie. Basically if you aren't in tears at some point in the 10-minute opening sequence, you're a soulless monster.

15 October 10

Jeff met me after work and we walked around Coal Harbour until we got cold and hungry. I like this bright houseboat with ITS OWN GARDEN in the middle of so many cold, white yachts. Afterwards we went to Rogue for some food and beer, and then came home to watch the Canucks fail.
couple more photos here.

14 October 10

Vegan pumpkin loaf with chopped walnuts. I ran out of pumpkin so I threw in a half cup of grated zucchini instead.

13 October 10

dumpster art on Commercial Drive. more shitty iphone photography!

12 October 10

'I love you' messages like these are scrawled all over East Van. Perhaps you have seen some.

taken with my iphone, hence the crap quality.

11 October 10

Thanksgiving dinner at our house consisted of:

turkey infused with maple, sage, and boar bacon
a Dutch-style mash of onions, potato, parsnip, and purple yam
in-bird stuffing
vegetarian stuffing
poultry gravy
mushroom gravy
maple-soy marinated salmon, coated in cracked pepper
ginger beer glazed carrots & asparagus
roasted brussels sprouts (actually delicious unlike the boiled kind which taste like compost and smell like feet) & beets
cranberry-orange-fig sauce
homemade pumpkin pie and pumpkin cheesecake, served with cognac-infused whipped cream
four bottles of wine, including the pumpkin wine pictured above

A few more photos can be viewed here, if you're interested.

10 October 10

Cookbooks. Well, some of them. We keep the baking and general foodie-type ones on this shelf, and the 'ethnic' foods and booze-related stuff on the upper one. In the box are all my handwritten recipe cards - stuff I've manipulated from online recipes, or stuff I've made up or got from relatives/friends.

I made mushroom stock and later, mushroom gravy. It was FUCKING DELICIOUS. I see homemade poutine in my future.

09 October 10

We went to my dad's for Thanksgiving (part 1). Sharon's nephews rigged up something so we could get the hockey game going despite the fact that there is no cable in that house. Unfortunately someone had to hold this coaxial cable in place all night. This is Kenny taking his turn as human antenna.
And after all our hard work, those lousy bums had the gall to lose in shoot out!

08 October 10

Jeff preparing for Thanksgiving cooking with three cookbooks spread out on the table with his computer. And a pumpkin.

07 October 10

The things I generally carry with me. Clockwise, starting at top left:
1. iphone
2. makeup bag
2a) hand sanitizer
2b) Burt's Bees tinted gloss
2c) Make-Up Forever tinted gloss
2d) Kiehl's lip balm
2e) Marc Jacobs perfume sample
3. Boscia blotting papers
4. birth control pills
5. Bare Minerals sunscreen powder
6. passport
7. transit map & various business cards
8. book (in this case, Neil Gaiman's "Neverwhere")
9. Altoids
10. wallet
11. shopping bags
12. compact mirror
13. Sharpie
14. Bliss hand cream
15. keys
16. mini flashlight
17. headphones

06 October 10

See that, east coast? We can have autumn, too!

05 October 10

Some guy was an asshole to me at the bus stop for no reason and then I had to stand next to him for like 10 minutes because the bus didn't come until almost twenty past five. I didn't get home until nearly 6, 15 minutes AFTER I would normally leave to get to my Tuesday night yoga, and since I was already in such a terrible mood I didn't bother going.
At least the weather was nice.

04 October 10

Jeff amd I met up after work and went to Steamworks, where delicious pumpkin beer was consumed.

03 October 10

I got up early and went to yoga, and then to brunch at Amanda's. Laryssa and Dan and Jeff D and a couple other people were there also. Brunch was mimosas, hash browns, and crepes filled with tempeh, spinach, fried mushrooms and onions, and fresh tomato. Afterwards I went downtown and bought ONLY the precise things I intended to buy - possibly a first for me. I met up with Jeff after his shift ended and we came home together to make dinner and watch Mad Men.

I am really making an effort to stay more up-to-date with this blog... not only does not posting make me unmotivated to take more photos because of all the catching up I have to do, but I sometimes find it difficult to recall what went on I take a photo and when I post it, and part of the point of this was to keep a better record of my day-to-day life.

02 October 10

Jeff and I went to Maple Ridge to have dinner with my mom. Alice joined us a little later to regale us with horrible work stories.

01 October 10

Our sage bush. It used to be bigger, but I don't think the people our landlord hires to do the landscaping know what sage looks like, because they left my herb marker beside an amaryllis plant and ripped up half the bush.

30 September 10

A mossy corner of our cement backyard.
Malloreigh, Amanda, Laryssa, and Steph came over for a clothes swap and afterwards we had some wine and played Apples to Apples. A thoroughly enjoyable evening.

29 September 10

/
Jeff says he likes the cats best when they are sleeping.

28 September 10

I came home in a really horrid mood for some reason, and Jeff wanted to go to this Melissa Auf der Maur film release thing but I didn't feel like it because I wanted to go to yoga, and then I felt guilty so I decided not to go to yoga, but then I didn't go to the film thing either. I just sat at home and did nothing. It was pretty lame.
This photo makes me miss Florida; I'm not sure why.

27 September 10

Jeff and I hosted this month's cookoff - mushooms! This was his entry, which won: crimini mushroom caps stuffed with black soybean hummus and topped with homemade cucumber salsa, black sesame seeds, onion hair, and deep-fried enoki mushrooms. I made the portobello risotto I made a few weeks ago when Mal and Kaylie came for dinner; I was going to make mushroom paté but I was short on time and everyone seemed to like the risotto a lot (I came in third).
Most of my photos didn't turn out well, but there are a couple more here.

26 September 10

I slept late and then spent the day watching Six Feet Under with Steph.

25 September 10

Jeff, preparing meticulously cut cucumber for his cookoff entry. In the evening we had some drinks with Sarah before she and company went to the bar for her birthday, and then we went up the street to another birthday, Jeff's friend Maddie. It was a good party with lots of wine, weed, and food. Someone made a bacon cheesecake (the bacon bits were crushed up in the crust with oreo crumbs) which was surprisingly tasty. It was piss pouring rain and even though it was only five or six blocks away AND we had umbrellas, we still got drenched.

24 September 10

Steph's birthday happened at Rev's in Burnaby. I didn't bowl, but I did have a good time talking to everyone and drinking Pilsner and taking ghost bowling photos, like this one of Lucas.

23 September 10

The two little zucchini plants that Jesse planted in our garden in the spring have grown and prospered like you wouldn't believe! We have already picked and consumed probably 10 zucchinis, and some of them are GIGANTIC!