Adventures of a Tofu Slut

My mom is going in for eye surgery on Friday (something to do with the muscles in her eyelids being too weak to lift her eyelids, making it very hard for her to see). She said that mostly she forgets that she's going to have this done, and then all of the sudden she'll panic that she'll be blind after. Then she said, if I go blind, you'll come visit me, right? I said, sure, I'll wear a big fluffy sweater so you'll have something to touch. She said, great, and wear flavoured lip balm so I have something to smell.

Hee.

On Saturday I took time out from my exhausting schedule of moping and weeping to go out to starfishchick's with sarcasma, sanity_clause and mystery_diva -- and we got to meet iseult_variante, who was in town staying with the Starfishfolk. Yay iseult_variante! You are fabulous, and I'm so glad we got to hang out. Also, I swear I'm not normally quite such a lush. But wine is tasty! I think I'll also blame the wine for the fact that I found myself watching boy band videos on YouTube at 3:30 in the morning. I admit it, I hate the music, but I love the boy band choreography. Of course, the downside is that this morning I woke up with the Backstreet Boys' "I Want It That Way" looping through my head. Yikes.

And then today we all met again for brunch and a trip to MAC, where mystery_diva made us over and I bought sparkly gold eyeshadow. It's much classier than it sounds, I promise. Seriously girly.

Now I'm going to watch Studio 60 and go to bed and get lots of sleep and go to work and do it all again. And buy some groceries, because all I have in the fridge is soy milk, orange juice, plain yogurt, half an orange pepper, and 3/4 of a red onion. That's not food, yo.

BPAL review: The Star (tarot oils)

voleuse, thank you so much for this sampler! It's fantastic -- coconut with a hint of lime and mint, and a rich vanilla undertone. Very much a scent for me. I can't stop sniffing myself!

I don't know anything about tarot, but The Star seems to be a card of hope and optimism, which is lovely thought to carry with me as I wear this.

* * *

Went out last night for the 2nd annual Anti-Valentine's Day celebrations with shoefiend, mystery_diva and MD's co-worker -- silly drinks and chocolate fondue in a snazzy lounge way up in the sky (with an awesome view of downtown Toronto). There were gifts, tiaras, laughter, and, of course, much cleavage. Good times. We've already made extensive plans for next year (which is kind of sad if you think about it - we're assuming that we'll all be single still next year).

I'm really out of it this morning, though. Oh yeah. When did I get too old to function on barely any sleep? Oh, that's right, ALWAYS.

* * *

Someone at Zip is totally mocking me -- last week I got sent Queer as Folk (UK), Kama Sutra, and Kinsey. THANKS. Like I'm not fully aware that I'm not having sex. I will share my thoughts on these movies when I'm awake enough to have thoughts, but let me just re-iterate that I have a SERIOUS crush on Peter Sarsgaard. And also a serious crush on Maggie Gyllenhaal, so they, as a couple, are the hottest thing around. Not that I haven't discussed this with many people before (including last night), but it bears repeating.

* * *

So what's going on with you lot? How's February treating you so far?

Why half-price martini Wednesdays are good

Half-price martinis.

If you start drinking right after work, you can have many, many martinis and still be home by 9pm.

Suddenly, Wednesday night will feel like Friday night.

Why half-price martini Wednesdays are not good

When your alarm goes off at 6am, you will realize that Wednesday is actually Wednesday and not Friday, which makes this Thursday and not Saturday, which is very sad.

Let's talk about Sondheim, shall we?

The cast recording of the new Sweeney Todd is coming out January 24th!! I didn't shriek at all, not even a little, when I read the release sheet, although there was luckily no-one around to hear me not shrieking, so there's no proof. I also didn't draw happy faces all over the page, or dance in my chair. Nope, not me. I've heard such good things about this production -- I wish I could go see it. It's almost enough to make me apply for the music cataloguer job at NYPL that just came up, although the fact that it doesn't even pay enough for me to live in New York, let alone see Broadway shows, is a bit of a detterent.

And in TV news

I've been watching Sports Night again, for the thousandth time. It really just never gets old. The episode where, at the end, Dan and Casey start naming off all the support staff -- I cry every time, even though it's not actually sad. It really takes almost nothing to get me to cry anymore. There was this brief period of about three years -- the glory days -- where I was a hard-hearted bitch with no sympathy for anything or anyone. I miss that! For one thing, it was much less embarrassing to read in public during that time.

So maybe I have one quirk

I really don't like starting watching TV series from the middle -- which is not unusual, I know. But I realized recently that even once I've already seen a show, I tend to watch it each time from the beginning right through. I don't pick certain episodes. I mean, it's not that I won't watch individual episodes, because I will happily, if I'm at someone else's house, or if I'm watching with someone. But when I'm watching a show by myself, no matter how many times I've seen it, I always start back at the beginning and watch all the way through (although I may skip past boring parts). Maybe this is why I couldn't name a favourite episode for so many of my favourite shows -- I think of the show as one unified season, not a bunch of distinct episodes.

Many people have many different opinions about Lost this week. How interesting.

( Mine. )

In other news, I just got back from last-minute pub lunch with sarcasma, shoefiend and lamagnifique, where I got to imagine that I, too, was an opera singer. And now I am sleepy. Luckily it's Thursday pretending to be Friday, and I can sleep in tomorrow. Hurray!

I had a very girly weekend. To wit:

-Friday night was spent with sarcasma, starfishchick and mystery_diva, drinking pink wine (girly!) and getting my ass kicked at Moot, although I mounted a daring comeback during Apples to Apples. Also involved was tasty girly pizza and winey worms.

-Saturday morning, sarcasma and I got pedicures (girly!) at her very classy local spa. My toes are very pretty, although the overall look is slightly spoiled by the (spoiler!) lovely blisters I got Saturday night. During this time, I learned that black is the new black. Ooookay.

-For the rest of Saturday I was starfishchick's date to a wedding in Guelph (girly!) (the wedding, not Guelph). The wedding, of people I didn't know, was actually fun -- we definitely had the fun table at dinner, and starfishchick and I later earned our dinner by dancing the night away, and attempting to convince other people to get up and dance with us. In this, sadly, the fun table was no fun at all. We danced so much that I actually lost the bottom part of my heel and got the aforementioned blisters. And as another lovely souvenir, I am now covered in mosquito bites. Mmm, itchy.

-Wedding was followed by a pyjama party in our hotel room in Guelph (girly!). Also by dragging ourselves out of bed after far too little sleep in order to go swimming in the morning.

-And then we got to see idella, who drove to Guelph just to hang out in a Second Cup for an hour with us! Which was awesome.

-After which we came home, and I took a nap and stressed about the lockout, which is not girly at all.

How were your weekends?

1. Summer. Also, smog alerts. Blech. I would warn you that now is the time when I start complaining about the weather, only it would appear I never stopped complaining. But now I'm going to start complaining about the heat, rather than the cold! Exciting, I know.

2. genarti had a birthday! I hope it was a good one.

3. Chicklit also had a birthday. I'm sure everyone celebrated by reading many, many books.

4. Chicklit t-shirts arrived! Speaking of Chicklit. I haven't seen them yet, but I'm assured they are lovely.

5. My apartment did not burn down, or get burgled, or become flooded. Although it is extraordinarily hot.

6. The library elves did not magically clean off my desk. In fact, it would appear that they added more papers and more CDs. Evil!

7. The Tony Awards. And I was on the plane. *sob*

The trip was a total success - it was excellent to meet/see people, and the wedding* was completely fun - but I'm exhausted (both physically and mentally) from all the socializing. Too much people time! Sadly, my grand plans of hiding out in my apartment** for the rest of the month and pretending I'm not home will not be happening, as other crazy people are out there planning bbqs and housewarmings and trips to the movie theatre, and I'm so in awe of the fact that people actually want me to be around that I can't say no.

*Not mine. In case you were wondering.

**Not that I would have been able to hide in my apartment anyway, because it's SO DAMN HOT. I hope I get used to it soon, or else sleep will become a thing of the past.

I went and stayed with sallym for the weekend, which was absolutely no fun at all, as I'm sure you can imagine. There was no sushi, no babies, no movies, no curry, no Pop Culture Trivial Pursuit, and definitely no vodka and wine.

Also no spamming. At all.

And now I'm home and being serenaded by some guy who is standing in the alleyway singing. Ah, Toronto.

Last night I got to meet my wonderful neighbour, emiline, which was lots of fun. She and I and sarcasma (and later sanity_clause) hung out at the local Second Cup (which is trying so hard for cute and just not quite making it, although we did manage to score the comfy chairs) for hours, and then at the end we all walked home. In the same direction, even! In my perfect world (the one with extra days to sit around watching DVDs) everyone I like is going to live within a 15 minute walk of me, in a neighbourhood that has cute coffeeshops, funky restaurants and good bookstores.

I'd like to apologize to emiline (and other people that I've met recently) for the fact that I get really nervous when I meet new people and as a consequence I talk a lot (loudly), laugh (loudly) and flail my hands about like some sort of bad ham actor. Some of you have seen this and know exactly what I mean. Which is not necessarily to say I'm not like this normally (I don't think of myself as a talkative person, but maybe I'm deluded), but it's hopefully not as obnoxious once you're used to it. I've probably always been like this on first meetings, but with all the LJ people I've met in the past year or so it's become especially apparent.

I wish I could see myself from the outside, or watch myself from across the room, or even listen in on conversations people have about me when I'm not there. Wow, now I sound really self-absorbed. It's not that I'm paranoid, or think people don't like me (although it has been known to be that), it's just that I'm always curious. It's like the voice thing -- we sound different in our own heads than we do to other people, and I, for one, am always thrown when I hear my speaking voice on a recording.

In conclusion, I could not sleep last night (I actually got up twice during the night to read and do logic puzzles because I was so bored of lying there pretending I was falling asleep), and I am blaming it on Ben Mulroney's chin. sanity_clause knows whereof I speak.

I'm leaving work...now! MWAHAHAHA!

This is my highly appropriate icon for the weekend - starfishchick, dramaqueen_23 and I are taking a road trip to hang out with sallym. There will be drinking and laughing and candy. And a hot tub. I already have a head start on the sugar high due to the cake AND pie that we just had at work.

Have fun, y'all. If you can't find any mini eggs in Toronto this weekend, it's because I bought them ALL.

So Maybe I Don't Entirely Hate Christmas After All. I'm in a much more festive mood today, possibly because I've been ignoring all the Christmas CDs on my desk in favour of dealing with the raft of Grammy nominations, none of which involve the words "Santa" or "Holly". Plus I have a candy cane, and the possibility of a singalong Messiah. VOLKORNBROT!

Aaaaand there's probably no-one reading at this point who gets the reference. Nevermind.

Candy Is Dessert Too, Right? Today I smell like licorice, courtesy of licorice soap from starfishchick and Absinthe from BPAL.

Fall under the spell of our Green Fairy! An intoxicating blend containing wormwood essence, light mints, cardamom, anise, hyssop, and the barest hint of lemon.

Whoa, licorice. Which I like, but I'm sure would cause many other people to run screaming from me. Luckily by the time I left the house the anise had faded, and other things had come through, namely the cardamom and something green, possibly the wormwood and hyssop. I like it, but it's fading quickly.

Wednesdays Are The Best Day Of The Week. ( LOST )

Where's My Toronto Camouflage? There's some sort of event happening downstairs that involves tables of free food. I was going to go down and see what I could score, but I noticed, as I was leaning over the railing, that everyone was wearing black. I think my brown and jean look would have been highly suspicious. The perils of being a west coast hippie in the big city.

Love Is In The Air, Quite Clearly. Those of you who are posting such wonderful things about the people on your flist, it's really lovely. There isn't nearly enough gratuitous ego-stroking in the world.

Yeah, I Got Nothing. I'd be defriending me right about now, too. :D