The best simile I can think of is that the time spent trying to fix lace knitting mistakes feels like an awful, awful nightmare. I want to wake up so badly that I bite my own hand.

In a moment, though, my hands somehow found the right route and I muttered "Oh my Jesus Christ" aloud.

Decorated for Christmas and finally found a use for the odd sock Cecilia knit me. I forget how I'd won that bet.

Day Three Supreme

The things that are in the oven right now aren't really biscuits. I mean, there's no butter. They're not going to be flaky and fluffy and indulgent little things. But I think I wanted something like biscuits this morning and had certain ingredient constraints. This is my go at super simple and hearty breakfast bread. "Biscuits Springsteen" is a play on Homes & Gardens "Biscuits Supreme," honouring the soundtrack to my Wednesday morning off. As for the "recipe" itself, things got a little hazy, as they always do, but this is a first draft.

Simple Sunflower Biscuits Springsteen

Preheat the oven to 350!

Mix the dries together:

~1/2 C. milk pulp*

~1/4 C. ground flax

~1/3 C. buckwheat flour#

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp arrowroot starch**

pinch o' salt

Mix the wets together:

2 "eggs"***

3 tbsp olive oil****

Mix the wets and the dries together. Add in a little handful of sunflower seeds. Spoon onto a baking sheet in small mounds and flatten them out a little. It'll make about 10 spoonfuls. Put in the oven. Write a blog post, because they'll take about 25 minutes to cook.

And so, in the future:

These are OK (or, in the overused words of every student as my school, "so-so" with a quavering hand). They get the job done, and I topped them with butter and (dumpstered!) strawberry jam that Matt and I made back in September. They are definitely a vessel food, but great for the morning 'cause they have a bunch of good stuff inside. Definitely better when toasted. They could definitely do with some honey in the batter. I definitely wish I could be eating them drenched in nut butter and molasses with Suzanne.

I'll keep working on it.

This morning I ate them with steamed spinach and pear and sprinkled with some cinnamon. Miam miam!

And I sat on the floor in the living room reading 48 hour comics. Miam miam!

*My last batch was a mix of almond and sunflower seeds.

**I don't think this was really necessary, but a baking failure this morning would have been too upsetting after an herbed milk disaster last night. Thinking ahead in this way is sometimes important.

***I would've wanted to use real eggs, but used to 1 tbsp flax + 3 tbsp hotwater per egg because it was all I had that'd work. These babies are flaxed out.

****After an ill-fated mayonnaise-making attempt (two years ago) the smell is still unsettling to me, so canola oil would probably be fine, too. Or maybe I should have used melted butter.

#This note was added after all of the asterisks, and I'd have hated to shift everything. Ultimately, the sum of the dry ingredients was about 1 C. + 2 tbsp, though the dough was quite wet.

censored

"Subjects reported feeling good after making the long "e" sound, and feeling bad after the long "u.""

I made a haircut.

Always a sucker for cheap housing, even if it's an oversized laundry room.

Moving again may well be in my future. Electricity is more expensive than my dad had promised. A lot has changed about this province since he knew it.

Variations on a Theme

When the garbage gives you tiny apples, make tiny apple sauce.

Sometimes, when I make a Hallowe'en costume, I get too determined. And then I remember that I made hard cider so I crack a bottle. It tastes good, maybe a little too acidic, but it makes me feel really good, to drink it. I hope that it's not poison. The red electric tape label appropriately reads the details of the drink,

"no sugar

mould

not racked

sept 12?-oct 10"

And now I remember that I had an impressive to-do list of things to do, and all I've managed is papier maché!

What I wrote was, "What I want is for things to look intentional," and then I took it back.

time for work

s'cold.

On and on

Last night I took a look at my cider before taking a taste and noticed some little mould buddies floating on the top. Thusly it was decided that that shit had better get into bottles, and fast! It was sitting for about 4 weeks, I think, which seems reasonable as far as I can gather from the internet.

The "set up" included my two jugs, a 5 gallon canola oil bucket (former laundry bucket before I decided that maybe I don't feel like doing laundry in a bucket/my clothes are still dirty/my socks take a week to dry), a piece of plastic tubing from the hardware store (quincaillerie, in french, which as a word for 'hardware store', dates back to 1875. I learned this from someone who's really into that- the history of words- over wine and chocolate muffin cookies. Originally quincailles was the word for bells or something. Actual hard wares that make noise. I think. I can't pretend to remember all of this) down the road that I frequent all to often. The woman who works is friendly and patient and laughs a little when I walk in again. The little funnel was helpful. There's a jar for yumyumtasting, and the measuring cup holds dissolved honey for making one batch of (hopefully) *sparkling* cider.

The whole thing: very not-sterile.

Siphoning feels like all the frat parties I tried to avoid in university, except that it's good.

And then it goes in the Grolsch bottles, which came to me by way of an angel, I think, who whistled and ran across the road. She told me the chef had been saving some in his basement going on ten years, especially for me it'd seem.

I thought it'd be nice to have a portrait with the fruits of my labour, only to find fruit fliez already in the cider jar. But it's okay!

Other news as follows:

This happened very suddenly this morning. I had thought he was furling a parachute.

Got seeds/planted 'em in tins in the window/crossing my fingers/nowhere else to put my bike I guess it's fine.

CUTE MESCLUN BABIES.

And, lastly,

these are down at the river and I love those tiny houses so much. Quebecois graffiti is generally charming.

seething

I had never been looked at that way before.

The way the bottoms of her eyelids pulled up, making the gaps into tiny crescents, each set where eyes generally are in the head.

To me each little moon said, “You cunt.” Or the French equivalent. A truly sincere, “bitch,” would have sufficed, though I imagine the way she would have said it would leave the word lacking the weight I usually feel from it. She probably says it all the time. “Love ya, bitch!” No, she meant to slice me real deep.

Her name is Victoria. She looks at me the way only a girl who is 13, maybe 14, can. It is full of hate and anger and all of that shit that you really, really feel when you are 13 or 14. It means you practically can’t see straight and you hardly feel anything that wholly or purely ever again. She’s pissed. I remember being pissed, sure.

Often, in class, I try to figure out who I’d have been in that particular group of pre-teens. Generally, she has glasses and crooked teeth. She’s a good worker but she’s quiet, waiting for her successes to come back to her, keeping them lightly veiled but not too much. She draws carefully on her pencil case, careful to avoid regret, tries to keep things clean but not too clean. Victoria and the idea of interacting with Victoria would give her a stomach cramp.

The way Victoria keeps looking at me, now- over her right shoulder again and again- is basically seeming to be unsatisfying for her. She moves almost carefully, but not quite. She wants me to know that she’s so mad and she wants me to be afraid but she knows, too, that she must carry with her that I am ten years her senior. To her first look, I shoot back the tiny smile. It is knowing and confident and maybe a little petty. I am nearly ashamed for feeling for a millisecond some tit-for-tat politic, or maybe for taking advantage of my superiority and volleying over a condescending look.

Though worthless it might be, I try to give my respect and honesty to these kids. I figure they might not get a lot of it.

So, the next time our eyes meet my eyebrows are more relaxed and I mean for my smile to say, “Oh come on, it’s not that bad. Just wait to talk to your boytoy after class,” but I’m sure these two looks look the same. I’d say it’s my intention that makes a difference, but I spent a summer being told the road to hell is paved with good ones so I guess it makes no matter.

The girl in front of Victoria once told me her name is Baleine. She highlights her front teeth with this habit of tucking her top lip up and under itself, effectively putting out this overwhelming and accidental goofiness amidst these moments of complete despair. Like, now. Baleine keeps turning around and looks at me in solidarity with Victoria, though with less confidence. She's terrified that we should make actual eye contact. Solidarity, though. Right? Victoria probably says, “She’s such a cunt,” and Baleine, who I believe to have a good heart, probably responds, “Oh ya totally I know right?” But in French, yes, and quietly. In French, Baleine means Whale.

I bow down to the boy at the back, later toward whom Victoria grabs her breasts with vigor. He shakes his head often to arrange his hairs. I say, “I don’t think you’re supposed to pass notes in class,” with that same upward-eyebrow smile. I try to play the cool teacher, because I don’t tell the actual teacher about this. They would get in such shit. They monitor me the rest of the class because I stick around their desks at the back of the room.

Victoria is still looking at me, small glances. I imagine she’d projectile vomit over at me if she could, all the way to the back of the room. She’s only four desks ahead, but that is a long way to vomit when you consider resistance in a reversed digestive system. I believe she could do it, though, if she really wanted to. Her eyes would become smaller, near eclipses. She has bangs like The Little Mermaid; a lot of the girls here do. She lightly adjusts them and it ruins the mood of her fix on me. I wonder will she even remember next year that there was one tall woman who ruined her whole world for 75 minutes. She might. It could be one piece of nonsense that her head holds onto. She shares this story in teachers’ college and relates how a teacher must never retort with the tiny and rude smile. Maybe she and her boytoy reflect when they are old, how, “nothing could ever keep us apart- except, god, remember that awful cunt in English class?” Somehow I mostly doubt that. I do not get worried about these temporary enemies, here.

13 minutes by foot. I go down there to be near people, on Sundays, usually. He asks for a picture with the river in behind and his bike in front, she asks what I'm knitting. They are generally patient. There are, generally, a lot of cruise ships this time of year. One man asked me on the ferry, "Do you know what ship that is?" (in French, of course). I answered that it was maybe the Queen Mary 2- she's been here before, for days at a time. He believed it to be untrue, I could tell by his eyebrows, but I've learned not to worry about that.

I made it laundry day this Saturday. It was lengthy, unrewarding, and my clothes are still damp. I'm starting to smell. Sorry, children. How to balance convenience vs. political (?) vs. adapting?

What I've Been Up To

Bits and pieces, I mean:

Got a couple of boners fermenting in the cupboard. Really, hard cider. I unfortunately neglected to get a photo while both of the carboys were, um, erect, one with a yellow (formerly banana flavoured) buddy. Gross. Also free.

I had dinner with Lynn. Or, this is the closest I can get/I'll take what I can.

Been picklin' 'n'a preservin' a bunch! Beets, dilly beans, apple sauce, strawberry jam, tomatoes, and I've got some apple-tomato chutney on the stove boiling down right now. I'm trying to get "over" ketchup. Rather, I guess I am already kind of "over" ketchup, which I was seriously and whole heartedly "into", which leaves me searching for a sweet and acidic substitute for eggs and things. I think this will do the trick.

Left: piles waiting to become greens in the window. Middle-right: weird window into the storage-space hallway.

I WISH I HAD A DOG because then I would have a purpose on weekends.

Gettin' knitty.

on: fun

Once you decide, how do you become 'more fun', as a person? I mean, like, the person who is 'the fun person'. When someone says their name, the other someone will say one of two things, which are, "Which one?" or "Oh, they're so fun!" If the other someone said the first something, the first someone will respond, "Fun soandso," and other someone will light up and say, "Oh, yes, that person! I like to be around them." But they say that only if, by chance, they do not immediately recognize the person's name as the one who's 'fun', because, let's say, the fun person happens to have a common name.

And so someone and another someone call the fun one and they do good things, together.

How does one become the fun one?

YABBLE SIGH

I made a really good apple pie on Friday night, thank you. Gluten-free to boot and cripsy on the bottom.

I'm a real loosey-goosey kinda cooker, if you know what I mean, but I wrote out the recipe for the darling of darlings, Marybeth, and why not economize on the typing time?

I used whatever flours were around and so sometimes in little weird proportions. I'm sure you could substitute other flours/proportions in it if you liked. I made each part separate 'cause I only have one mixing bowl, and then just kept putting the stages of it in the fridge until it was ready to go in the oven (heated to 350, though I think partway through I turned it up to 375):

Bottom Crunchy Crust:
-1 1/4 C. oat flour (Just grind up oats in a blender or food processor until they become floury. They weren't totally uniform and it worked out just fine)
-1/4 C. buckwheat flour (the recipe called for all oat flour, but I didn't have enough, so i'm sure this isn't essential and you could just use 1 1/2 C. oat flour)
-1/2 tsp salt
-~2 tbsp oil
-~4-5 tbsp water

Mix all the dry, add the wet. I started with 2 tbsp oil and 4 tbsp water, but my mix was way too dry. Just add liquids until it sticks together, and then press it into the bottom of yr (buttered/oiled) pan. I used a big cast iron skillet, which was kind of awesome.

Filling:

-~7-8 apples (We had big paula reds [that we got to pick off the ground of a Pick-Your-Own farm for cheap]. You want enough so that they make a mound in yr pie crust)
-1 tbsp lemon juice
-1/2 C. cugar (I used 1/4 C. sucanat and 1/4 C. reg'lar granulated sugar)
-2 tbsp flour (I used buckwheat)
-1/4 tsp nutmeg, ~1tsp cinnamon (I didn't measure, just dumped. Lots, though. Probably more than I said. I encourage a buttload), a tiny dash of cloves (maybe 1 ground up?), 1/4 tsp salt.

Mix it all together and put it in yr bottom crust!

Top Buttery Crust:

-1 1/2 C. rice flour (I used brown rice flour)
-1/2 C. butter (or shortening, if you wanted)
-4 tbsp cold water

Cut the butter into the flour 'til its crumby. Add the water and mix it up. Work it with your hands. Once you can get it into a ball (you might have to add a little more water), put it in the fridge for a few minutes to get the butter hardened again in there. Take it out, roll it out, put it on your pie filling, cut some vents in and make it look real pretty.

I can't remember how long I baked it for- maybe 45 minutes? Just keep checking until it's *golden brown* and you can put a knife in it and everything feels soft and gooey and delicious.

ALSO WE HAD THIS FOR DINNER:

Really-extra-ginger and carrot soup with an emergency buckwheat biscuit

and chikn and mashed potatoes and roasted broccoli/cauliflower.

It was very good.

hi again

Today was a great big sadness and then, later, two small victories: beer bottles and a woman named Janine.

Today I just plain cut the top off of the ketchup bottle because I couldn't get it out. I broke the knife and there was hardly any left for my eggs, in any case. All of my walls are bare and I can't decide what exactly of all this shit is *essential*. Nothing, really. I just want it. It looks like so much more than, "I don't really have that much stuff, right?" when it's all in squares, like that. I couldn't get rid of those guys because they saw me through my first year (worst year) but really that was me and people and not some stupid foils I got from the Welland Goodwill, right?

Why me?

Taping the arms of my glasses so that they might stick to my face better conjures up an embarrassing memory: in the ninth grade, Scotch taping white paper to the middle of my glasses. At the mall on Friday nights, at school.

kiss me I'm rabid

(This is the tentative cover of the cassette I recorded that took 4 months but really only 20 minutes to finish.



Hah!)

"hear the drummer is taking you back to the land"

Grandma sends e-mails in the subject line only. She has learned to be very concise.

Also, computer, NO. It is NOT 6:24 AM on the 1st of January, 2003.

OR IS IT?

the "situation"

I want, more than most things, for you to be happy and to find the places that suit you fine.

I want, also, to be swimming right now.

seriously,

who will take care of me if my whole body turns into hair?

memo for: Winter

I'M NOT AFRAID OF YOU.

memo for: Ohio

I'M COMING FOR YOU, AND IF YOU DON'T LIKE IT, YOU CAN GIT OUT.

Finally get to working on a song after forever and the computer crashes.

Oh come on.

Ohio, though?

My breakfast would have tasted so much better had it just been on a better looking plate. I can't manage to clean my room because there is too much stuff but I can't get rid of it, not just yet. I spent last night drinking New Years' wine alone, trying to swallow some cheesy cover letter confidence.

Appropriately, I told my housemates I'll be leaving in May. HappeninghappeninghappeningohlordI'malittlescared.