It Turns Out That Weeds Were My Friends

As a kid, I never understood the phrase "ignorance is bliss". This is in large part because the only other times I heard the word "ignorance" being used, it was in relation to racism. So, in my mind, "ignorance is bliss" equated to "racism is bliss" - which sounds like the sort of thing you'd expect to see on a postcard from a KKK compound or a cross-stitch in Hitler's powder room.

But now that I understand the full meaning of the word and the phrase, I can agree that ignorance can, in fact, be quite blissful.

I bring this up because today, the day after Patrick mowed our jungle of a lawn, I can now actually see more of the goings-on in our backyard. Specifically, the rat that keeps running between our neighbour's junk pile, across our property, and into our other neighbour's garden. Gross, gross, gross.

This paired with the fact that I saw a shadow dart along the ground in our furnace room the other day has turned me into a giant, jumpy, possibly (but probably not) paranoid freak.

Ugh. I'm not sure if I wish I didn't know, I just wish rat (and friends?) didn't exist in my bubble. One thing is clear: I sure as fuck won't be taking a 'vegan' approach to all this.

OMG, you're going to *eat* the rat?

Uh, no. But I won't be "humanely" trapping them only to release them into someone else'e neighbourhood either.

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Overheard: TV Relationships and More Weeping For the Future

While waiting for the streetcar at Broadview Station. Two possible co-workers are standing ahead of me in a conversation:

Young woman in pink blouse (YWIPB):  You know what I always wondered? Why didn't Ross and Monica ever get together?

Woman in pencil skirt (WIPS): Because that would have been incestuous.

YWIPB: Whatever! That whole show was incestuous! Rachel and Ross, Joey and Rachel, Chandler and Monica ...

WIPS: No, I mean, it would have literally been incestuous.

YWIPB: Wait ... I'm talking about the TV show, Friends, not a book! What are you thinking of?

WIPS (and me): Oh my God ...

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Sew Excited!

Guess what I did yesterday?

Trimmed your moustache?

Yes.

But I also went to my first sewing class! Relearning how to sew has long been on my list of to-dos for a lot of reasons - capabilities are good, I've always wanted to try to make my own clothes and home decor items, and I don't want to be a total moron when I eventually take on the 40s War Wife Experiment (eeee!), whose mantra of "Make Do and Mend" involved far, far more skills than I currently possess (and I doubt my strongest ability - yelling at the TV during Bachelor Pad while ignoring the little voice inside my head that says I should read a book instead - will be of much use).

Yesterday's was the first of six 'learn to sew' classes I'm taking at The Make Den in Toronto and it was awesome! It's during the afternoon, so there were only four of us there; two of us were the self-employed type, one was a Masters student and another girl who had an employer that basically lets her work from home and on her own hours (if only all offices were like that). In other words, three out of four of us taking the class were modern-day bums. Hurrah!

Along with learning how to thread the machine and checking out the different stitches, we made our first project - a headband with an elasticated back. Here it is modelled on moi - the girl who can't take a front-facing shot of herself to save her life:

Here's a shot that nine out of ten brooding teenage Twilight fans prefer:

Oooo. Can you feel the angst?

Before you know it, I'll be making other crafty headware, like the kind modelled on this lady from the I-shit-you-not-it's-actually-real cover of the July 1974 Women's Circle magazine:

If you thought the 50s housewife was a little nuts, I'm telling you, she had NOTHING on the 70s crafty housewife. The magazines I have from that era are full-on crazeballs (I'll scan some pics from those shortly. Total goldmine.).

I like to think that it's actually these women that got men on board with 'women's lib'; her husband would come home from work to discover his wife had spent the entire day making bizarre skunk hats, shitty teddy bears and a meal made with heaping amounts of 'healthy' margarine and Sweet n' Low.

"Honey, maybe you should get a job," he'd say as he'd bewilderedly stare at the growing collection of macramé owls and aluminium foil sculptures decorating the home.

"Oh, hush," she'd say, as she'd glue a googly eye onto her latest piece of art. "Do you really want a wife who works outside the home? I wouldn't have the time to do all these lovely things around the house. That reminds me, I made you a new vest ..."

Image Source: Handmade By Mother

I promise that this sewing class won't be the gateway drug into bad crocheted items. I hope.

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A Colourful Post

As the title suggests, this blog post is going to filled with the most filthy, adolescent, trashy, pearl-clutching language ever...

Or just a picture of my motherfucking salad:

A super colourful salad! It's watermelon, cucumber, lime juice, fresh mint and just a sprinkle of pink salt to tie it all together. It's like summer in a bowl - and now, summer is in my stomach.

I have still been at this mostly vegan, mostly raw business. The result thus far? Eight fatty pounds down, son! It actually would have been more had I not given in to the siren's call of wine and cake and hamburger and chips at a recent event, but, whatev. Now and again, crap is good for the soul.

The aforementioned event was my friend Siobhan's daughter's 2nd birthday. And because I am AWESOME and because I am CHEAP crafty, I made Charlotte a gift of homemade playdoughs.

 But these aren't ordinary playdoughs! Not only did I use some rather uppity natural food dyes, I also scented each dough wad with the most wonderful food-grade aromatherapy oils ever. Living Libations makes some of the best smelling oils and beauty products as well as yummy raw chocolate so 'buzzworthy' it was mistaken for hash at the Toronto airport. The goodies are made by a hard-working hippie couple operating out of beautiful lake country Ontario, so I like the added bonus that it's localish.

Anyhoo - I made lavender, peppermint, lime, cinnamon, lemon, and tangerine playdoughs. This is really one of the rare moments that I wish you could take a whiff of my surroundings. You'd have a nosegasm.

Charlotte's reaction to them was great and she basically stuck her face in each container and snorted them like an adorable cokehead. I point that out not only to emphasize how amazeballs me and my gifts are, but when the opportunity arises to use the phrase "adorable cokehead", you take it.

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