Carving on a deadline

This weekend, my parents came to visit. Sunday night, we went to dinner at Sherri's, while Bryan stayed at home to "finish up a paper for school." I came home to mysterious darkness to find this:

From Engagement

From Engagement

Now, THIS is how much he loves me: our farm-picked pumpkin molded in the 80 degree weather we had mid-last week, so he had to go buy a new pumpkin. It was Sunday before Halloween, so all of the THREE stores he went to were out of pumpkin carving knives. With only about 3 hours to accomplish everything before I came home, he carved this with a kitchen knife! Have you ever carved a pumpkin with a kitchen knife? It is very difficult. Hence his oh-so-cute, (but totally unnecessary) explaination of "I really wanted it to say 'Will you marry me,' but I couldn't do that with a kitchen knife, so I hope this is creative enough." Yes, baby, it's creative enough.

Of course I said Yes!

I'm now the luckiest girl in the world, and I'm wearing this, which has so much significance to me it's a bit overwhelming, in the best way possible.

From Engagement

What can $2 getcha?

Well, in Rochester, it gets you a pretty fun date night with some second run movies. Last week we saw this:



A friend said that I HAD to see it because it was great, and he was right. I was reluctant because I loathe Michael Moore, but this was an eye-opening look at the US healthcare system. While I knew our system was terrible, I didn't know quite how terrible it is. The movie left me feeling ashamed of being American and we left with comments of "when should we move to Canada or France?" I highly recommend this movie.

Last night we had a "boy" date night to do a little cheering up after a rough week. We had some yummy sushi (for him) and tempura shrimp and veggies (for me). Then we went to see this:



This was a movie that garnered the quote "That was one of the best movies I have seen in a long time. Sort of like a modern Princess Bride." I should note that I did not utter said quote, but it was an interesting and enjoyable movie. It had many plotlines that all eventually converged, and had many pieces of humor laced throughout. The concept of a star fallen from sky represented by Claire Danes was akin to Alanis Morisette playing God in Dogma, but an interesting premise nonetheless. It was a unique movie, and one we both enjoyed. For $2, it doesn't take much to entertain me!

Toronto

The boyfriend and I went to Toronto last weekend, so I figure it deserves some pictoral updates and some witty (or, let's face it, not witty at all) banter.

Upon our arrival in Toronto after a lengthy travel time (45 minutes at the border crossing and 15 minutes figuring out how to get into our hotel), we changed and got ready for dinner at the top of the CN Tower, which is the world's tallest tower. The restaurant makes a full rotation every 72 minutes. It was neat because we had an early dinner (5:45), so we got to see everything in daylight and at night. But first, the scrumptiously painful (i.e. too much) menu for the evening.

Appetizer
WILD MUSHROOM AND VIDALIA ONION BISQUE
Quebec ash rolled goat’s cheese, cracked olive crostini, tarragon crème fraiche

From Toronto Oct 2007

Main Course
Tia: PAN SEARED FILLET OF ATLANTIC SALMON ON WILTED BABY SPINACH
Creamer potatoes, coriander sprouts, toasted pumpkin seeds, warm green tomato vinaigrette

From Toronto Oct 2007

Bryan: TRUFFLE SCENTED PORTOBELLO MUSHROOM STEAK ON FRESH HORSERADISH MASH WITH ROASTED KING OYSTER MUSHROOMS
Grilled asparagus, morel mushroom cream

From Toronto Oct 2007

Dessert
Tia: NIAGARA PEACH AND STRAWBERRY CRUMBLE
Cinnamon crème Anglaise, vanilla ice cream

From Toronto Oct 2007

Bryan: DARK CHOCOLATE TOWER WITH SUMMER FRUITS
Raspberry vanilla crème Anglaise

From Toronto Oct 2007

Although it was quite the splurge for us, we had an amazing time and the food was delicious. A few shots from the tower.

Lake view:

From Toronto Oct 2007

Sunset:

From Toronto Oct 2007

The city of Toronto:

From Toronto Oct 2007

Us at dinner. We scored a table right next to the window!

From Toronto Oct 2007

If you look closely, you can see that this is the view below (to the street) from the glass floor in the tower. It was so scary to stand on, even though it is entirely mental!

From Toronto Oct 2007

The view from our hotel room:

From Toronto Oct 2007

On Saturday we walked alllllll around, for a solid 8 hours, mostly in Chinatown. It was great to be back in a city with some ethnic foods. For dinner we decided to go to a sushi-go-round, which we miss immensely from Portland. This place sounded so cool too...the go-round part was boats that were actually in water. Well, it turns out that the sushi was very expensive, and the soba with chicken that I got was so gross that I barely ate any of it. So we paid $31 for nothing, and walked to this great Irish Pub and had a great time while watching some baseball, hearing some nice live music, having some fantastic drinks, and getting dinner #2 (putine, which is a Canadian thing...basically fries with gravy. Sounds nasty, but it was really good). We were seated in this raised section and had it all to ourselves for the 3ish hours we were there.

From Toronto Oct 2007

We did a little shopping while we were there, but with the weak value of the dollar, we couldn't afford much of anything! Of course we did stop at Ikea and get a few little trinkets, including my favorite new striped apron. We also got some fun new stuff at Lush, including a blueberry mask and some shampoo that is in a bar form.

At some point during the weekend I was telling Bryan how he just isn't the type of guy to buy me flowers. It's totally fine, and he shows me he loves me a million other ways then buying me something that is going to die. I came home Tuesday after running some errands, and he said "come here, I have a surprise for you." He had hidden (in my closet, which I still think is really funny), these pretty pansies.

From Toronto Oct 2007

You can't tell from this picture, but this is a big heavy planter full of them. I guess I made him feel bad, so he went out and bought me flowers. Too cute! I think they will dress up the house nicely for the upcoming upon house.

For more pictures, click here

More next week after the Niagara Falls trip.

This Old House

The lack of blogs lately is just a result of little worth blogging about. I know you all are waiting on the edge of your seat to hear about doing laundry, washing dishes, grocery shopping, and the like (dripping with sarcasm).

This weekend my fabulous other half helped me with the many house projects that befall us here, some so laden with ironicness (is that a word?) that we just have to laugh. While we were outside hanging the new side door light, Krista, dripping from the shower, appears holding a mysterious object saying "This fell out while I was in the shower." It turns out the object was the built in ceramic 1962 soap dish from her shower. It just randomly gave way and fell out. Back to Lowe's for the second time, where some fantastic men (one a shopper himself) talked us through how to reinstall it (plaster of paris and 100% silicone caulking). Lowe's is head and shoulders above Home Depot. So this weekend "we" (and by "we" I mean Bryan while I supervised and generally got in the way, unless I was being helpful and holding the flashlight):
- Put up a new outside light
- Re-installed the soap dish
- Mastered the rented carpet cleaner and cleaned the carpets and rugs
- Replaced 2 bulb fixtures that were broken in the attic and basement
- Tried to put new rails on a drawer (but we need one more Lowe's trip for a bracket)

We celebrated all of the successful projects with a yummy dinner at Dinosaur Barbecue. Just to sum up the house horrors, we also found out last week that the furnace has a crack in it and we need AN ENTIRELY NEW FURNACE. Please pray that this house sells quickly before more things break. It went back on the market with a new realtor on Friday.

On the up side, we did do some fun things this weekend. Friday night we did the Light the Night walk to raise money for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. Bryan's best friend had non-hodgkins lymphoma in his early 20's (and is now doing well), and it's always nice to support causes that resonate personally. It's neat because it is done at night and everyone gets a lighted balloon. This is a horrible picture, but shows a couple of the lights in the dark.

From Sept 2007

From Sept 2007

Saturday Bryan, Krista and I went to the Hilton Apple Fest. Admittedly it was a bit disappointing as there were few apple things there. It was very odd! But they DID have Kelly's non-pasturized apple cider, which is just heavenly. Even better, it comes in these really cute little sippy things.

From Sept 2007

But despite the non-appleness of the Apple Fest, the weather was beautiful and it was nice to get out and wander and eat yummy fair food. Next weekend we're off to Toronto, so I'm sure I'll at least have some fun pictures from that.

The excitement of normalicy

This weekend we had the house to ourselves and just enjoyed having our first mellow, low-key weekend in a long time. Very few discussions about where we are going to spend the next 8 months, and instead we focused on spending some fun time together. "Fun" to us even involves chores like grocery shopping.

Friday night we went to some friend's house who have.....CABLE! We are in the rapidly shrinking group of people that still use *gasp* an antenna. Cable is just too pricey for us right now, and with how busy we are we don't need the distraction. Five fuzzy stations, the internet, and Netflix provide us with plenty of entertainment. But MY OH MY how we love cable. Our friends DVR stuff for us, and every other Friday or so we hang out, eat pizza and beer, and watch 4+ hours of TV in amongst lots of chatting with our friends. We love it!

Saturday we went to our favorite local diner for breakfast, did a bunch of chores, and watched some episodes of Six Feet Under, the current Netflix series we are watching. A super mellow fall day. The weather is getting colder here, but I'm avoiding turning the heat on quite yet since by next weekend the high is 83.

Sunday...oh how we love Sundays during football season! We "studied" (Bryan for nursing, me for the eval class I'm teaching) while watching the games (and I mowed the lawn). My lone trip out of the house was to get pizza (shh, don't tell that we had pizza twice this weekend!).

October is shaping up to be a fantastically busy, fantastically fun month. The first weekend is fall break for UR (meaning no school Monday), so we are going to spend the weekend in Toronto. Thanks to the wonder of the internet, we got a 4.5 star luxury hotel in an excellent location for $99 a night! We are so excited to have a get-away weekend and to explore Toronto before it gets cold. The biggest dilemma is if we should cough up the $100 a ticket to see Cirque du Soleil while we are there. With our current financial shortage we'll probably pass, but it sure is tempting since it is the last weekend they will be there. Bryan has hinted that our weekend might have a special *surprise* associated with it, but we'll see ;)

The second weekend will be a trip to Niagara Falls with 2 friends from high school. One lives in Pittsburgh and one lives in Erie, so we're meeting in NF for a girl's weekend. It will be great to see them both and catch up. We haven't ever been together as over 21, so it should be a fun time!

The last weekend my parents come. Yipee! It's so hard to be so far from them, and I'm so excited for their visit. I think I'll take them to Niagara-on-the-lake for wine tasting one day, and maybe the Corning Museum of Glass for the second. We'll see! It is going to be a great month with lots of trips. October is nice here - the time when the air is crisp and the leaves are changing colors, but no humidity and no snow. I'm glad I'll be able to enjoy it before the long cold winter sets in. It always seems to come so quickly!

The end of summer

Labor Day weekend is always sad because it is the unofficial marker of the end of summer. Here is Rochester, it is more the beginning of the wild swings in weather. Yesterday was overcast and a bit chilly, the first day all summer (minus the gym) that I wore shoes and socks. Today was 91 and humid.

To celebrate Labor Day weekend, we went wine tasting with some friends in the finger lakes. The weather was beautiful, and we had a great time. I think we ended up going to 6-7 wineries, but the hands-down winner for everyone was the organic winery.

The gang...Bryan, me, Kim, Anthony, Kristina, Nick

From Wine tasting ...

A winery/meadery

From Wine tasting ...

Bryan at Belhurst winery, Seneca Lake in the background

From Wine tasting ...

Our loot...the apple one is for our apple themed supper club on Saturday

From Wine tasting ...

Now it's back to school for Bryan and Krista, and working for me as usual. I'm also going to be co-teaching program evaluation at UR to grad students on Mondays this term, and I'm super excited about that. It's nice to have some thought-provoking evaluation discussions now and then. I think Bryan doesn't appreciate me saying "Please, before you go to bed, let's discuss the merits of RCTs as the gold standard" (and yes, I did that last night, and he was a good sport and played along).

I'm not sure of the last update here, but the condo is back on, hopefully to close late this month. No one seems to be able to do their job, so no one will commit to a firm closing date. The house didn't sell and officially went off the market on the 4th. I learned a lot of lessons in that process, but won't elaborate too fully since I don't know who all reads this thing. We hopefully have a renter lined up though (I'm still waiting for her check to arrive). We'll reassess what we want to do in the spring.

"That's hot"

Yes, my friends, "hot" barely begins to define S. Florida in late August. It is a kind of heat I can't even fathom, which lies right up there in "things I don't understand" with swimming in the ocean. The idea of the ocean being 89 just doesn't compute to me. My brain's dictionary definition of "ocean" is: "thing that is too cold to get in, even in the summer, even just your pinky toe."

Our trip to Florida may have been unbearable hot for my tastes, but it was a beautiful slice of respite that Bryan and I so desperately needed. His mom spoiled us rotten with a trip to the spa, shopping, 3 days in Venice (gulf coast), wonderful food, and just an all-around good time.

While we were in Venice, we got to see some beautiful sunsets.

From Florida 2007

From Florida 2007

From Florida 2007

Venice is known for it's shark teeth. I sadly didn't find one, but Bryan and his mom found a few. His mom (on the left in the pic) also invite along a very nice friend of hers from work, Lynn, and we all had a great time. Especially at the bar watching some crazy 40-year-olds dance. I don't know what age it is when people lose the ability to be embarrassed, but everyone there clearly was passed it, to the great amusement of me!

From Florida 2007

A fabulous dessert I had our last night there.

From Florida 2007

Despite religious application of SPF 45, I still got a tan! Much to the amusement of Bryan, we discovered that when I am exposed to the sun, I get freckles. Huge, ugly ones! But at least I got somewhat of a "tan" (whatever that means when you start out a zero on the tan scale!) and my hair is quite a few shades lighter. Although I like the warm oceans and the sun, but I'll pass on the heat and humidity! I think I'm a northern girl at heart :)