Not another post about lime yogurt

I basically need a tag for posts about lime yogurt since I write about it so much.  But I thought an update might be in order.

In one of those posts I mentioned that there was a lime yogurt I could buy only in the US.  It is one of those Yoplait non-fat ones with a million flavours, but since Oikos started making key lime Greek yogurt my life has been complete. 

While in the US on our honeymoon I decided to buy one of my old Yoplait friends and see how it measured up against my new favourite (Oikos).  I was happy to say that it was pretty disgusting in comparison, so GOOD JOB OIKOS, you make the best key lime yogurt on the market and I hope you never stop.

Best post ever amiright??

Cold Feet

Our wedding day started off maybe a tiny bit stressful.  We started pictures a few minutes late and they went longer than we meant them to.  About 15 minutes before we wanted to be at the venue (about a half hour drive out of town), Brahm and I found ourselves sitting in the lobby of my parents' hotel, waiting for them to finish packing up all the decorations at my house.  When they finally pulled up, my dad got out of the van wearing a t-shirt and shorts. 

I definitely had a 13 year old girl OMG DAAAAAAAD moment.  He threw on his suit in record time but we still made it out to The Berry Barn 30-40 minutes later than we wanted to be there to do some pictures.  We rushed through a bunch of family pictures and about 5-10 minutes before the ceremony was scheduled to start the girls went and took some pictures standing in the river, as per my mom's request.

I was kind of stressed because I really hate making people wait for me, even though Brahm kept reminding me "this is one day people can wait for us".  We took off our shoes and stepped into the river.

A man standing on the shore watching called out "be careful that she doesn't get cold feet!"

It was a totally lame joke but it was absolutely the tension breaker for the day.  We laughed harder at it than we needed to and then just waded around in the water for a few minutes, finally feeling relaxed, doing something fun like wading around in the river.

I think I'll be forever thankful to that random onlooker for breaking the tension on my wedding day.

Last photo by Organic Photography

Directions

When we first started putting together our wedding website, I realized that there was going to be a detour along the route to the wedding venue.  I put in a little note saying something like "Turn left onto X Ave. right after the Y building - it's the huge glass building along 11th St."  Brahm argued that this direction was not going to make sense to anyone, but I argued it would be much easier for me to follow that direction instead of just saying "Turn left onto Y Ave."  Both of us thought the other was crazy I think but we kept the landmark description on the website (the detour disappeared a few weeks before the wedding so we were able to take it out anyway).

Shortly after I was describing the conversation to my sisters and Megan said that there's a ton of evidence that men and women look at directions totally different - men rely on maps while women rely on landmarks.  Interesting!  And TOTALLY true.

I never really noticed this difference before until our disagreement about how to word the detour on the website, but now it's completely apparent.  I told Brahm I would place an order at a takeout restaurant for supper one evening so he could pick it up on his way home from work and he asked where it was.  "It's by the second Tim Horton's on 8th St" I texted.  Moments later, most likely after looking it up on a map, he replied back "Oh yeah, on the corner of 8th and Acadia."  Or, if we're going somewhere together and he's driving and I tell him I know where it is ("it's right across the street from that big brown house"), he still needs to look it up on a map to be sure.  Not that he doesn't trust my sense of direction but he has a fundamental need to see it in map form.

After living in Saskatoon for almost 10 years now, I know the city.  From house hunting pretty hardcore for a couple months in the spring, I know all the neighbourhoods and how to get to them.  I could give you map directions from memory if I thought about it really hard, but it's just so much easier to say "It's across from Superstore on 8th St." or "a block to the left of Bulk Cheese Warehouse".  Sometimes I still get disoriented when I'm driving downtown though and am not sure how to get out, so I just head towards the river.

I think this whole thing is kind of fascinating.  If you've never noticed it before, pay attention to it and you'll probably realize it's true with the people in your life too.

Massage Therapy

Massage therapy, where have you been all my life?

Several years ago when I was in university I started getting persistent headaches every day.  I figured I probably had a brain tumour or something so I went to the doctor and she said it sounded like tension headaches.  She told me to go get a massage.  I went and got one, my back hurt like crazy for several days after, but then my headaches were gone.  After that I didn't get another massage for a long time because I knew what tension headaches were and as soon as I felt them coming back, I just worked hard to relax my shoulders and stuff and they'd go away.

A few weeks ago I got a super stiff neck from I'm not sure what, so I sucked it up and booked a massage.  My neck got better, but a couple weeks later the tension headaches came back on the same side as my sore neck.  So, I went for another massage and I'm hoping this one worked.

The night before I went I told Brahm to rub my shoulders because I was pretty sure they were stiff.  When I went for the massage, the therapist was like "WOW your shoulders are tight" and she had to do all these weird things like pushing really hard into my armpit to fix everything.  She said my shoulder blades basically were not moving with my arms anymore which is bad, haha.

After the massage my shoulders were sore from being prodded around so I got Brahm to rub them and he said the difference between that day and the night before was extremely noticeable.  Who knew?  I have an excellent benefits plan through work so I might as well go every once in a while just to keep things loose.

The first time I went for a massage I expected it to be like, a relaxation massage.  I did not realize real massage therapy often has to be pretty painful for them to actually work out all the kinks.  But, it's pain that's worth it.

The only weird thing about massages that I don't really like is that it's basically a medical procedure because it's covered by health plans, but you're supposed to tip.  Do any other medical professionals get tipped?  No, so why do I have to tip my massage therapist like they just served me a meal?  Oh well.

Goyo Kumba Eggplant Part 2

I wrote a post a while ago about a neat thing I had discovered:  goyo kumba eggplant.  They are small, ornamental eggplants that look just like tiny pumpkins.  I decided to try and grow them this summer and it worked out well - most of the plants were ripening just in time to make a cool Thanksgiving centrepiece:

If I'd had more time I would have actually added some other greenery and stuff so it didn't look so bare but I think they still look cool!  They were pretty easy to grow too so next year I might grow them again, although it does take up a fair amount of growing space for something merely ornamental that takes all summer to mature.

Space Week

There are some memories I have of elementary school that sometimes make me hope that someday, my future will work out that I'll decide the right path to take is become an elementary school teacher.  Space Week is one of them.

I'm not sure which teacher came up with the idea for Space Week, but I hope they know how many awesome memories it made for so many little kids.  It all started when the whole school was called to the gymnasium for a routine assembly on Monday morning.  This was not unusual, we had assemblies from time to time and certain classes would perform a song with sign language, etc.  However, a couple minutes into this assembly, the lights started flashing and fog started pouring onto the stage.  Coloured lights blinked on and off, and a couple of creatures in tin foil suits stepped onto the stage from the wings.  When the smoke cleared, they announced that they were aliens from another planet and they had kidnapped our principal.

The crowd.  Went.  Wild.

The grade four teacher tried to confront the aliens.  "Wait just a minute!  You can't just barge in here and kidnap our principal!"  He was cut off as one of the aliens shot him with a ray gun.  He collapsed to the floor.

The aliens continued.  They had kidnapped our principal and replaced her with an alien lookalike, who they brought on stage.  This lookalike did look a LOT like our principal, but she wore a tin foil suit and had other various alien features.  She was going to do the job of our principal for a week, and on Friday night, at the wrap-up of Space Week, our principal would be returned to us IF we could find all of the pieces of a secret alien document they had hidden all over the school.  (To sweeten the deal, anyone finding one of the clues would receive a large chocolate bar if they returned it to the alien principal.)  Then, the aliens left, again in a cloud of smoke and blinking lights.

The grade four teacher groggily awoke and everyone filled him in on what had happened.  We kids spent the rest of the week at recess and lunch hour scouring the school for pieces of the alien puzzle, and I remember leading a search party one recess but one of my friends found the clue and not me :(  The alien principal, who looked just like our principal, continued to wear her alien getup ALL WEEK.  Now that is a teacher dedicated to doing something awesome.

One of the best parts of Space Week was the ending.  On Friday night, we all gathered again in the gymnasium with our parents, anxiously awaiting the return of the aliens and our principal.  A couple of teachers and the alien principal waited onstage.  With the same flourish as before, the aliens reappeared.  The teachers presented them with all of the clues that had been found by students over the week, and the aliens pronounced they were satisfied.  We were getting our principal back.

AND THEN OMG

OUR PRINCIPAL CAME ONSTAGE.  She was onstage WITH the alien principal.  All the junior skeptics who all week had insisted that the alien principal was just our principal dressed up, and that the aliens were really grade eight boys dressed up, and that it was just a giant teacher conspiracy were shocked.

Eventually of course, a kid whose parent was a teacher at the school explained how it had been done and we learned the truth.  But the planning and effort that all of our teachers put in planning Space Week is still something I remember so fondly and makes me sad that such a thing probably wouldn't fly in a school today (I can just imagine all the calls from parents, livid that they have to explain to their terrified children that aliens aren't real and the principal wasn't actually kidnapped and the aliens aren't coming to get them too blah blah blah) because it might just be my favourite memory of elementary school.

So thank you, Humboldt Public School teachers of the mid-nineties.  I hope Space Week was as much fun for you as it was for us.

The Demise of Quality Programming on Network TV

I saw this new show title on the CTV website:  Emily Owens, M.D.  "Oh brother," I thought, "another dumb show about a cute, white, female doctor looking for love."

Then I read the show description:

The Internship Begins...
Emily Owens is as a sweet medical school graduate who can’t escape her high school woes. As a first-year intern at Denver Memorial Hospital, Emily has the chance to work with world-famous cardiologist Dr. Gina Beckett and not-so-coincidentally alongside her med school crush and fellow intern Will Rider.

So why does everyone keep warning her that the hospital is just like high school? Emily soon finds out the hard way - her high school nemesis, the gorgeous, popular Cassandra Kopelson, is also just starting out at Denver Memorial, and it seems like they're rivals all over again - not only as surgical interns, but for Will's attention.

Emily's the new kid again, and it's just as awkward as high school. Only this time around, Emily has to balance the personal and emotional turmoil of social politics with the high-stakes world of life-and-death medical decisions. At least she has fellow intern Tyra and nerdy-but-cute resident Micah to count on as friends.

Emily is going to realize that although she may be a geek, she may also grow to be a great doctor. 

If I'd spent the time, I think I probably could have come up with a similar show description out of my imagination... because TV IS SO BAD AND PREDICTABLE these days.  I know how this show is going to go.  Eventually Emily and Will will get together BUT THEN she will realize he's not all that great after all and then will realize she actually likes nerdy-but-cute Micah who has been carrying a torch for this clumsy but adorable geek all along (it doesn't say she's clumsy but YOU KNOW IT WILL BE TRUE).  Whaaaat yup that's what will happen.

I read an article a while ago about how NBC is planning to only make "broad comedy" sitcoms from now on (i.e. shows with 95% sexual humour with a stupid laugh track).  Which means, a couple of my not-cancelled-yet favourites, Community and Parks and Recreation, are pretty much doomed, and with 30 Rock and The Office (not that good anymore anyway, last I saw) in their last seasons, the decent comedies on network TV are getting fewer and fewer.

If any good comes out of this, it's that 30 Rock has decided to create a storyline around how NBC is now committed to only putting garbage on TV, which is going to make for a hilarious final season.

Is this the last year there will be quality programming on network TV?  It looks that way.  Let's just hope NBC lets these amazing shows end properly and doesn't cancel them midseason to be replaced with Emily Owens: The Sitcom.

Basically it's Sneakernight

Hello everyone.  You may be sorry you read this post, because I'm about to introduce you to one of the worst songs in recent years.  It didn't get very big so you probably haven't heard it before, and it really isn't that catchy so don't worry about it being stuck in your head.  If you have 3 minutes, please take a look at this video for "Sneakernight" by Vanessa Hudgens (of High School Musical fame):



I have a few issues with this song.  First of all, the lyrics are super lame.  Now I am the last person to judge what is lame and what is cool because I honestly consider staying up until 10 to be really late (I work at 6 though okay), and part of me wants to be like "I am very happy to hear a song that asks if people had a snack before going out so they would have energy, and also ensures that everyone brought comfortable footwear" but SERIOUSLY THAT IS SO LAME.  Like, I would totally do that myself, but I am not cool.  I would never try to make a music video about it and pretend to be cool about it.  Because say what you like about cool and lame, and to each his own, but I think the consensus out there is that being practical is generally not a very popular subject to make dance videos about, unless they are parodies.

And also, the chorus "Basically what we're gonna do is dance"... I don't get it.  The word "basically" doesn't really fit in as a "cool" word either, thus upping the lameness of the song/video.  I suppose the word makes sense there but in the context of how it's used in normal conversation, it's more of a "here's basically how addition works, you have two things and two more things, then you have four things" not so much "are we going to PARTY???" "Basically!  Woooooooooo"  even though I suppose the very basis of Sneakernight IS dancing. 

Another thing that annoys me about this video, besides the lame lyrics, is the lame dancing.  If you're going to make a video about dancing you better at least have some good dancing in it, amiright?  I guess there is one guy who does the splits at some point.  But when the girls are dancing they are not synched well and the choreography is super boring.

AND then this "nerd" (guy dressed in cool clothes but has glasses) comes and wants to dance with the girls but they're all "EW YOU HAVE GLASSES, NERD" and laugh at him while he tries to dance with them, and then they see this "hot" guy in a red shirt, who honestly looks exactly like the "nerd" but doesn't have glasses, and so Vanessa goes and dances with him because he doesn't have glasses, but he is a way worse dancer than the nerd.  At least the nerd was trying.  This guy just sways back and forth a bit, grade 7 style.  COME ON Vanessa why are you so mean to the nerd, all he needed to do was take his glasses off and he would have been cool, just give him a chance and let him dance.

I also feel like the nerd scene goes against the very principles of Sneakernight.  "Basically what we're gonna do is dance."  So at the very basis of the night, the whole point is dancing.  So then shouldn't that mean that if a nerd wants to dance, you shouldn't try to suppress him?  You're not saying "We're only going to dance with cool people" you're saying "we had some snacks and got comfortable footwear on and now basically we are going to spend the whole night dancing NO MATTER WHAT".  So congratulations Vanessa, your stupid video totally went against your stupid song, and I am just confused about the whole situation here and how this song ever got recorded and made a single in the first place.

What happens im vegas

My sisters went to Las Vegas recently with some friends, and went to see Thunder From Down Under.  (That link isn't necessarily unsafe to click but just be warned you will see some shirtless men and your speakers will start blasting music if they're on.)

While my sisters were away my mom was texting me, asking me if I'd heard any stories about Vegas or Thunder From Down Under.  I told her I had not heard from them.

Mom:  Well perhaps they didnt think you would be that interested im how fun thunder down under was Haha they have pictures Haha

Mom:  As you know what happens im vegas stays im vegas Haha i just know they went to thunder and were im the front row Haha too close for me Haha

(If you're wondering though, apparently it is actually a pretty tame show that you wouldn't necessarily be too embarrassed to be at with your mom or grandma.)