Pillow Blog: Paired Pros and Cons of Cohabitation

In the tradition of the Sei Shonagon's Pillow Book, here's a Pillow Blog: an observational list on some subject or another. 

Dan and I have been living together for about nine months, and Marvin has still not stopped bitching about it. Like my extremely annoying but rather cute cat, cohabitation has been a mixed experience. In no particular order, here are some of the pros and cons of living together I've experienced so far:

• Dan works from home, so I can get him to pick up my holds at the library
• I have basically recreated my parents' relationship dynamics, which is weird and gross
• I now have access to Dan's impressive collection of DVDs and Blu-Rays
• My living room now has a shelf that functions as a shrine to dying technology, and I would really like to put an armchair there instead
• Regular warm body to cuddle up next to
• Regular obstacle to complete bed domination during sleep
• Dan's feelings towards the cat have improved
• Marvin's feelings towards us have worsened, and he now believes Dan and I have banded together to annoy him
• I now have a deep fryer, microwave, and popcorn popper
• Our kitchen isn't big enough for all of our kitchen crap
• Someone to talk to
• Someone who tries to kiss me when I'm trying to think
• Shared living costs
• Financial decisions must now also be shared
• Someone to watch Mad Men with
• Someone who refuses to watch Game of Thrones with me
• We can team up to make doughnuts together on a Sunday morning
• ... 
• ...
• There's no cons for that one

Overall, the pros are somewhat stronger than the cons, though the cat would beg to disagree.

The TMI Post: My Unreliable Body

I have never really trusted my body, but at least I felt like I knew it. That knowledge sometimes seemed like a collection of limitations, where I catalogued the things I couldn't reach, the dance moves I couldn't do, and the many yoga poses my body refused to hold. But there was something reliable about its many quirks and failings. I rarely thought about what was below my skin, but when I did, it was along the lines of a classroom anatomical model; the cutaway kind, where you can take the organs out and snap them back in again. Though the skin itself was idiosyncratic (a classy way of saying imperfect), I figured that the organs beneath were ideally shaped, all in their place, and practically made of plastic.

So it was disconcerting to find out last Monday that part of this system had gone rogue.

But let's start a few days before that, when you would find me on my back in a windowless basement room. An efficient Eastern European technician is in the middle of jimmying a rod back and forth in my vagina. I feel like a human joystick; the indignity of having to wear one of those stupid backless hospital robes compounded by the fact that I have to do so while an ultrasound wand is shoved up my hoo-ha. I am somewhat convinced that there will be a fire alarm, and I will have to waddle out into the street with the equipment in situ. This doesn't make any sense, of course, but that irrational fear is soon eclipsed when Magda the Impaler lets out an "hmmm."

A hmm when you're getting an ultrasound is never a comforting sound. Perhaps the technician can't get the ultrasound to work, or she's letting her mind wander towards dinner, but there's one word you start to think of when she grunts, and that word is cancer. "You're being irrational," you think, "it's far more likely just to be fibroids, or cysts, so stop being a drama queen- OH MY GOD, I did wait too long to write that novel."

But I won't hear that from Magda. Instead, the analysis will come from my family doctor a few days after, when I'm trying to shop for groceries on my lunch break. And the news is good! They don't think it's cancer at all. Trying to compare prices on tomato paste while fielding this call didn't seem so foolish when I heard that. But then the news turns good-ish, quickly. There's an it, and it's a cyst that's about 4-5cm in size. I foolishly tell myself that's really not that large--we're not talking 4-5 inches here--until I actually take out a ruler back at the office, and realize that 4-5cm is bigger than any mystery growth in my body has any right to be.

With the knowledge of my >4cm hop-on ("you're gonna get some hop-ons"), I've started to wonder what else my body could hide. For the first few days after that call, I had trouble sleeping. I would imagine the cyst industriously growing as I rested, and my body started to seem alien, like somebody had sewn a Lovecraftian horror into a people suit. Or perhaps I was just feeling alienated. This sac made me confront how little I really knew about my body, though I lived in it and operated it. My mind suddenly felt like a guest.

Since then, my conversations with other folks have assured me that large cysts or even multiple cysts are not uncommon. Some are even functional. I have another one of those invasive ultrasounds scheduled a few weeks from now, and I'm sure that after they'll either decide to excise my hop-on or leave it in peace. What should be comforting is that it's not what that I first thought when the technician went "hmm." My plans and goals, although a little fuzzy, still require the use of a body that's fairly healthy. I still have that, at least for now. I thought of a proverb when I left the medical imaging centre: "Man plans, God laughs." But more applicable to me then was a small edit: "Man plans, cells divide."

Domestic Sunday: Beer and Cookies

I've decided to spare you all another knitting post, since the blue baby sweater has already been yanked out once, so progress on that front is sadly minimal.

Instead, here are some cookies. I've been stringing Dan along with the promise of more of these maple pecan buttons, after I had made some for an office cookie exchange in December. Thursday I finally made good on that promise, and here they are:

The recipe is delicious, simple, and yet somewhat tedious, which is probably why I delayed making them. However, if you have the time, to make the dough, chill it, roll it into balls, bake those, cool them a little bit, roll the balls around in icing sugar, cool them completely, and then roll those suckers around in icing sugar again; well, you can find the recipe in Regan Daley's In the Sweet Kitchen. I had typed up a condensed version yesterday, but then Blogger ate my post, and I'm too bitter to try again. The book isn't out of print, like I once thought; Amazon has some paperback copies available, so you should really buy one now.

But if anyone asks nicely, I'll try to send the recipe via email.

This week's beer is actually from last Tuesday. I had no commitments that night (except to the cat), so I decided to stop by Thirsty and Miserable on my way home. There's a short list of bars I keep that are free from pretension, without falling over the line into crusty. Thirsty and Miserable is on that list; so are Hole in the Wall, Wise Bar, and Dave's. These are the sort of places where you can read a book at the bar, as I did with a pint of Kensington Brewing Company's Hops & The Grain Merchant. I really liked this beer, and if it's still on draught somewhere near you, give it a try. It has a hoppy profile, but the rye and dark malts keep it complex and quite drinkable. There's a danger in that though. I'm not sure what the ABV is, but I do know I was feeling pretty good when I left the bar, and this was just after one pint.

Big City Blues

I never really stuck to one dream job in my youth, but my ultimate goal was constant: get the hell out of Guelph and live in a big city. That Guelph was, comparatively, not all that small or boring was a discovery I was not prepared to make. It wouldn't have fit into the narrative I was attempting to write for myself, of a provincial, lumpy girl about to transform into a sleek and extremely cosmopolitan woman.

This meant going to school in Montreal and eventually moving to Toronto, though I've remained ever-lumpen throughout all of those moves. And yet, with my three year anniversary of Toronto residence having come and gone, I can confidently say that I've achieved my goal.

AND, OH DEAR GOD, I NEED TO LEAVE.

Why? Because Toronto is making me into a bad person. Or rather, Toronto is stripping away the veneer of sweetness I built up in smaller spaces, to reveal the angry hosebeast within.

Almost everything I experience in the city seems to go into my ledger of disrespect. People who walk two abreast and expect me to press myself against parked cars just so that they can pass. People who block the doors on subways. People who sit on the outside seat of public transit so their purse can have a window view, even during rush hour. TTC people who are rude. In fact, let's just say that the entire TTC experience is generally a giant checkmark in the "Go to Hell" column.

Because I'm young, female, and evidently unwealthy, I'm easy to ignore. However, because of most of those things I am also not actively avoided, and so the daily friction of interaction in this city is starting to take its toll. I've even found myself preparing to be irritated by someone, taking a certain gleeful joy in the thought that this time--THIS TIME--I am going to assert myself and stand up for my right to occupy space in this city! And then I'm actually disappointed when they step aside, and hold the door open for me, or even say sorry.

I started to reflect on my fermenting rage-ahol last Thursday, after an encounter with a TTC employee. I was trying to get to an appointment, was told my one TTC employee to use one gate only to get yelled out by another. While I would like to say that I responded with both kindness and yet an unwavering sense of self-respect, I did not. Instead, I was rather rude and snippy. 

And then the rest of my ride was filled with guilt.

See, the issue is that I have all of the rage inside me, but not quite enough self-confidence to keep the flames a-burning. Instead, I'm tossed between resentment and regret. "Oh! That person thought I could just be bodychecked off the sidewalk! OH! But now they think I'm mean because I glared at them. There's a stranger that thinks poorly of me. WHATEVER SHALL I DO?" What I should do: move to a smaller town. I'll have wide open spaces, homes I could potentially afford, and neighbours who express their aggression with savage gossip instead of face-to-face confrontation. Hooray!

Domestic Wednesday: More Knitting, Some Hometown Brewing

With the baby blanket winging its way to Colorado, I decided to try some new baby knitting. I already had some yarn on hand, six balls of the now-discontinued Patons Baby Bamboo, so I just had to pick a pattern. Generally, I like to knit baby stuff in bright, gender-neutral colours. This is a matter of personal aesthetics and, to a lesser degree, personal politics. I'm ambivalent enough about the gender binary to find the choice between colour-blasting your baby pink or blue to be a little... stark.

BUT. I also didn't want my friend to have to field any sass from strangers who assumed her baby had to be a boy because of the colour of their wee cardigan. So I'm trying to find middle ground with the Baby Valentine sweater, though so far I've only managed to screw up the increase rounds. This makes me wary of the lace that's coming. We'll see.

I also went back to my hometown, Guelph, this past weekend. They have a new-ish craft brewery, Royal City Brewing, which warranted a field trip. I had tried some of their beers at previous Society of Beer Drinking Ladies events though, and had mixed results. But the brewery surprised me. I enjoyed everything they poured from the taps, even the one fermented with kombucha. Which, as an aside, I can't imagine a more Guelph-like beer than one with freaking kombucha in it, unless they also threw in some grass from Hillside and a loaf of With the Grain bread during the mash.

A particular standout was the Smoked Honey, which found the right balance between smokey and sweet, and was tasty both from the cask and from the keg. I bought a bottle of it, along with a bottle of the 100 Step Stout, which I poured for myself on St. Patrick's Day. I didn't like it as much as the honey beer--this one was a little too thin--but it was fine too. And now I have another reason to go back to Guelph, besides my dad's coffee and my mom's advice.

Domestic Monday: Big Bad Baby Blanket and Endless Cider

After endless rows of stockinette and seed stitch, the Big Bad Baby Blanket is done and ready for a trip to Colorado.

And the baby isn't even born yet! This almost never happens when I knit for a baby. Usually they're saying their first words just as I'm casting off.

In spite of the time crunch, I loved knitting this. I knew the Koigu would be soft and squishy knit with a single strand, but doubled? Its texture makes me want to knit an adult-sized version, then quit my job so I can spend all day rolling around on it. Fortunately, the cost of Koigu keeps that dream out of reach. My only frustration was realizing, after too many rows had gone by to easily fix it, that one strand of yarn had been dropped on at least two stitches. The mistakes are barely noticeable; they're tearing me up inside.

As for this week's local beverage selection, bottle after green plastic bottle of u-brew cider kept me hydrated while knitting. My Christmas gift to my brother was booking cider-making at Fermentations! (exclamation point theirs.) It was less hands-on than I expected, but I'm not going to complain when we were left with 44 half-litre bottles of the stuff, which we split equally. We chose a Normandy-style cider, and it is very dry and wine-like. It reminds me a bit of the Brickworks cider you can find around Toronto. Sadly, it looks like Dan and I have almost finished off our stash. We have one last bottle to drink. Then I should probably borrow that juicer, get my one gallon fermenter back, and try some experimental small batches of cider. If the experiments don't kill me, I'll report back to you.

BC Dreamin'

If you haven't gathered from the sheer level of bitching on social media, parts of North America have been really, really cold over the past few weeks. Seasonal lows. Frozen pipes. A pale rider: and his name that sat on him was Death, and so on.

I've been surviving as best I can, with wool socks, subway tokens, and warm thoughts of a return to British Columbia. It didn't help that Quill and Quire seemed to present the perfect out a few weeks ago. Galliano Island Books wanted a part-time bookseller.

Why, I thought, I could be that part-time slinger of literature!

While going from a full-time to part-time job may seem like a demotion to some, this one isn't. At least not in my mind. It would be going to a part-time job on Galliano-freaking Island. That's like working cash in paradise. Not quite perfection, but as close as you can get without also having health benefits or an RRSP contribution plan. There would also be books and, one would hope, a discount on those books.

I even started to develop a plan to supplement my part-time income. Rent would be fairly inexpensive, as I was planning to purchase and then live out of a Delica van. Even if the Delica was more expensive than a cozy little apartment. Would that apartment be able to drive me to the beach, or come with a rocking bullbar? Doubtful.

The Delica could also become the manufacturing centre of my second source of income, Marty's Foraged Jams and Preserves. BC loves that stuff. All I would have to do was to come up with a full line of flavours that forced local delicacies into increasingly bizarre couplings and retailed for $15 (open to a barter system though). Suggested varieties: blackberry and seaweed, cattail and spruce tips, currant and pot from the neighbour's grow operation.

I described this plan to people. They laughed, I laughed. I was emphasizing a certain BC skillshare mania for effect, though it probably applies to about 3% of the BC population. I never applied for the job. But. But, underneath the absurdity of the foraged jam operation (which would probably lead to a Delica-shaped inferno in the middle of Galliano Island) is a genuine longing for British Columbia. I've always wondered if I made a mistake moving back east. I wonder a little more when it's the coldest February in Toronto in over a century, of course. But, even in spring, I would probably move back if I was given reason enough to do it, or full-time hours.

Domestic Monday: Double Beers, One Blanket

Sorry for the delay. It's so cold I forgot how to type.

Though I didn't forget how to knit. I finished the socks and, as expected, they fit fine. No repeats of Clifford the Big Red Hat. Unfortunately, my Mom spirited away her new pair of socks before I could take a picture. So you can use your imagination and imagine a finished pair here (suggestion: add lots of stray cat hair):

The next project is a baby blanket for my best friend. She's also due in April, so I should probably speed this up a little. It's the Big Bad Baby Blanket from Stitch 'n Bitch, knit in two strands of Koigu KPPM. This amuses me, because I spent a good half hour reviewing baby blanket patterns on Ravelry, searching for one that was NEW and DIFFERENT, yet SOPHISTICATED and PERFECT... and yet somehow I am knitting a pattern that's 12 years old, in yarn that looks like lovebirds in a blender. I hope you can believe me when I say that it somehow suits my best friend better than a delicate lacy blanket ever would, even one knit in a tasteful shade of jade or puce.

I've also been drinking some beer.

Febrewary continued at Victory Cafe with the Farm Table Mild Ale(L) and the Strong Patrick(R). The Mild was very mild. Beau's version wasn't as gentle as a mild from another brewery I just tried that tasted just like wort to me, but it was definitely a sudden shift from the Gruit. I preferred the Strong Patrick, which reminded me a bit of sweet oatcakes, a complexity probably owing to its barrel-aged background. Unfortunately, I struck out the third week with the Coeur Noir Black IPA. Victory had either sold out or hadn't yet tapped their delivery of Coeur Noir, and so I'll never know what it tasted like. Instead, I had to drown my sadness at missing out in four other beers. And a single victory at Star Trek Catan.

Will I Ever Spreek Nederlands?

Maturity has sometimes seemed like a multi-year project of coming to terms with all of the things I can't do, whether that means things I can't do well, or things I can't do at all. I can't sing. I can't write music. I'm terrible at chess. And when it came to woodworking I try to make up in spirit what I lack in talent, an approach that never seems to lead to right angles. Except for the singing, all of these conclusions are predated by another: I just have no talent for languages.

I realized this halfway through high school, after ten years of French Immersion had just made me nervous using any verb tense past the present. I tried to give that language another try by moving to Montreal, but it didn't work. Even my backup plan -- hoping a nice Québécois man would teach me both the language of love and the official language of his nation -- failed. 

Now I speak French in the same way that I can swim: I won't immediately die, but I can't do it for long. 

I also tried learning Russian in Montreal. I had hoped my Ukrainian DNA would kick in and help me speak the somewhat similar language of our oppressor, but I bailed after my second-year instructor made me cry. I did enjoy writing in Cyrillic though, and I've never forgotten the Russian words for the following things: refrigerator, drugstore, and the phrase "I am listening to the Billy Joel cassette tape." So it wasn't an entirely wasted effort, as long as I plan to visit Russia in the year 1987. 

And yet, I beat on. Now I'm trying to learn Dutch, which my employer reminded me was pointless, "since they all speak English anyway." He's not entirely wrong. Dan's grandparents emigrated from the Netherlands in the 1950s, but the extended family sometimes comes over to visit, bringing their fluent English and high foreheads [NOTE: "Everyone is't fluent, there are those too old to learn it, some that are learning it now and some haven't bothered at all!" -  Dan]. Even ignoring the lack of practical applications for Dutch (unless Canada feels like posting me as the ambassador to Suriname*), it's a difficult language to learn. 

But I'm enjoying it, in a way that I never did with the other languages. Perhaps it's because my interest is purely personal, and I don't feel like I'm trying to become a dynamic, valuable Young Worker in Canada's MarketTM, like I did with French. There is no pressure to learning Dutch. Instead, I can just enjoy the process of learning and forgetting and re-learning words, including those that sound amusing to my Anglo ears. Like pork: varkensvlees! I hope to be fluent enough to visit the Netherlands in a few years and Dutch my way through the country, even though I'm sure all the people I meet will answer my "Hoi!" with a perfectly inflected "Why, hello there."

*Government of Canada: I'm available and eager!

Pillow Blog: 80s Relationship Troika

In the tradition of the Sei Shonagon's Pillow Book, here's a Pillow Blog: an observational list on some subject or other.

Three perfect songs from the 1980s, arranged to form the story of an imaginary relationship:


Kate Bush, Hounds of Love (You fell in lust; "Oh, here I go! Don't let me go!")


New Order, Bizarre Love Triangle: (You're unsure; "Why can't we be ourselves like we were yesterday")


Womack and Womack, Teardrops: (You fucked it up; "And the music don't feel like it did when I felt it with you")