Listening to

"Rolling in the deep" — Adele

Thoughts

That's really great that the Nicorette inhaler is helping people quit smoking, but they could have made it look less like a tampon.

Listening to

"40 Day Dream" — Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros

A great lunch sandwich

I got this recipe from Jennifer at Sweet on Veg—she tweeted it and I made it the next afternoon for lunch. It's called the Avocado Dream Sandwich, and it's magnificent. I made a few small changes to suit my tastes, and here's how it looks:

Ingredients:
1 Avocado (that's enough for 2 people)
Chips (I favour Miss Vickie's Sea Salt & Malt Vinegar)
Spinach
2 slices of bread or a ciabatta bun
Extra virgin olive oil
Balsamic vinegar
Mayo
Salt and pepper to taste
(and tomato slices if that's your thing—it's not mine!)

Spread a thin layer of mayo on one piece of bread (or both) so your spinach has something to cling to.

Mash your avocado in a bowl with the olive oil and salt. I like to add some balsamic as well.

Spread your avocado mixture on one side of the bread.

Sprinkle your spinach leaves on the other side.

Drizzle the avocado mixture with balsamic and top with chips.

Et voila!

Listening to

"Crash years" — The New Pornographers

Skinny actresses on ELLE magazine covers

I've been doing some digital publishing research for school, and I came across some troubling magazine covers from ELLE magazine.

Are these actresses actually this thin? Or were they photoshopped to look like this? Either way, I find this very disturbing. I used to read ELLE in high school and university, and these are three consecutive months of unrealistic body images. I can't imagine being confronted with these cover models (ahem, actresses...) when I was a teenager. Even now, with more healthy body-image campaigns out there and having more acceptance of my own body, I have a hard time looking at these. 

And if anyone is tempted to tell me that I shouldn't be condemning people for being thin, that's not at all my angle. There are plenty of naturally thin, naturally petite women out there..but I dare anyone to call these three women natural looking. 

My take on awards shows

Awards shows: The good speeches aren't nearly good enough to outweigh the insufferable awkwardness of the bad speeches to make me want to watch them.

On elevators and the morons who ride them

How's this for a good old fashioned rant? I hate people who don't pay attention in the elevator. This afternoon I took the garbage out (to P1) and had to go back up to the 2nd floor (where there's a street-level exit). As the elevator arrived at P1 (it had come up from P2), the man inside tried to push past me to get out, only to realize that it wasn't his floor...and he pushed past me once again to get inside the elevator. It was just the two of us.

Out of curiosity, I looked at the buttons in the elevator, figuring he was just going up to the lobby. Do you know which button was lit up? Floor 27. He thought that in the two seconds it took to go from P2 to P1 that the elevator had magically rocketed up 29 floors. I don't get that. And what's with the pushing?  That's my rant.

How I Met Your Mother countdown

Among my 6 must-see sitcoms each week is How I Met Your Mother —hilarious, kitschy at times, slapstick in all the right ways, and two words: Barney Stinson. Neil Patrick Harris is a ridiculous comedian: timing, physical humour, inflection...he cracks me up every time.

*Spoiler alert*

But tonight's episode had a curious twist: a countdown. In the background of several scenes, numbers appeared on various props—a beer can, an apartment door, a medical folder, a news channel, and 46 other random things. I was over-thinking it (as per usual) and figured that the items on which the numbers appeared could be combined to convey some kind of message. I was wrong. I followed the countdown eagerly from 50 down to 1 only to discover that the episode was counting down to the death of Marshall's father.

It seems sinister for a sitcom to run an episode-long countdown only to reveal the death of a cursory (yet beloved) character. There must be something more to this. Maybe it's a tribute to something that happened off-screen, like the loss of a set-dresser's loved one? Or a writer's family member? I can't accept that the How I Met Your Mother countdown was solely devoted to counting down the final minutes of Mr. Erikson.

Does anyone else who watches the show have any thoughts? I'm assuming they're going for the "with death comes new life" thing—Marshall's dad dies, but now he and Lily get pregnant with a son of their own. But what of the countdown? What else was the show trying to say?

I resolve to be resolute in my hatred of resolutions

I didn't make any resolutions this year—I'm buying into the whole "new year, new me" less and less as I get older. I think I'm just becoming more cynical. No, actually, I know I'm becoming more cynical. And I'm not resolving to change that. Nor am I resolving to lose weight, or cook a new recipe each week, or stop swearing when people cut me off.

I'm too stubborn to let 2011-Kristen start some stupid diet or join a cooking class just because 2010-Kristen thought it would make her a better person. New Year's Eve alone taught me that past-Kristen can't be trusted. Yeah, just one more drink and I'll still be fine the next morning. Thanks 2010-Kristen, you're super.

However, despite my stubbornness and determination to do things on my own terms without the New Year giving me the all-important cue, there are a few things I have to accomplish in 2011—like completing the move-in process, which includes setting up the second bedroom and finding out what that mystery light switch in the living room does. I also need to finish writing my thesis so that I can officially get my Masters degree.

We got a head start on the second bedroom thing this afternoon by going out and buying a bed. Last night our best friends were reduced to sleeping on piles of blankets stacked on the floor. I awoke this morning with a deep sense of shame, and Luc and I immediately left the house to purchase a bed.

As for the mystery switch, we hit a brick wall after twenty minutes of plug testing and cursing.

But the year's off to a good start: I actually got my blog banner up in time (unlike hectic December), we've already snowshoed to the top of Cypress mountain, and compared to my stress levels at the beginning of 2010, I'm doing juuuust fiiiine!

So, Happy New Year, blog readers! Thanks for sticking around I promise to do plenty of ill-advised things in 2011 and document them all. First up: sliding down a snowshoe trail on a garbage bag and crashing into a tree. Stay tuned...

Reading

Let's Bring Back: An Encyclopedia Of Forgotten-Yet-Delightful, Chic, Useful, Curious, and Otherwise Commendable Things From Times Gone By - Lesley M. M. Blume

January 2011 Banner

Monthly Photo - January 2011

Christmas Eve walk in Wolseley, SK.