spring! (sort of)

the first false beginning of Spring has arrived!

60 degrees and walking around in flip flops today!

woot!

give it 5 or 6 more of these 'get your hopes up before smashing them to the ground with a 31 degree and windy' days and then it will actually be spring!

finally!

took 6 months, but I finally got T-Mobile to cancel my cell phone plan and waive the cancellation fee because I moved abroad where they do not have service.

it took that long to convince them that I actually did live in London and was not just trying to get out of my contract 3 month early.

I think it was the lease, pay stub, bank statement, National Insurance Number and the copy of the letter they sent to me at my london address stating that my previous forms of proof of address were not on their list of acceptable types that finally convinced them.....

anywho, glad that is over!

reminiscing

every once and a while I really miss the ease and simplicity of the first couple of years of college

talk about care free and no actual responsibility (although I suppose it didn't seem like it at the time), but it was a whole new beginning with a previously unknown lack of limitations

I really miss that

(listening to all the Dispatch albums on my iPod doesn't help either....)

a little flat math for ya

broken windows + tempremental shower + rampaging mouse + conning landlady = we will probably be looking for a new flat....soon

sigh....

yay!

getting so much closer to Ben getting here!!

yay!!

odd

the birds chirp at night here


it throws you off

friends!

I have two sets of friends coming to visit me!
One next month and one the month after that!
the last half of March and the first half of April is going to rock.

I am so excited :)
I miss everybody a lot, so this is just fantastic.
[now I just have to scheme a way to get them all to stay over here.......]

yay!

the squash is a pain to cut, but oh so delicious to eat

Butternut Squash Soup

Ingredients:

-2 shallots, chopped

-1 celery stalk, chopped

-1 carrot, chopped

-2 tbsp butter

-2 butternut squashes, peeled and chopped

-2 tart green apple, peeled and chopped (squash and apple should be a 3:1 ratio)

-5 to 6 cups of chicken (or veggie) broth, just enough to cover all veggies

-1 container (light) cream cheese

-2 tbsp apple cider vinegar

-pinches of nutmeg, brown sugar, cinnamon, salt and pepper (I did a lot of nutmeg)

Directions:

1. Combine butter, shallots, celery and carrot in large saucepan. Cook for five minutes.

2. Add squash, apple and broth. Bring to a boil.

3. Simmer for 10 minutes or until squash is soft. Puree cream cheese into vegetables. Add spices to taste. If ambitious, add crushed walnuts to the top of the soup, very delicious.

4. Enjoy!

city squares

this was in the front cover of a book I was reading, I thought it was pretty neat

animation!

So I tried to upload the better animation (this one was just the test run, lower quality, is missing some scenes and the movement is much more choppy than the final), but apparently the file was far too large for the site to handle. I left it to upload over night, but it had not even moved. So not so good animation it is! The shadows are spastic and you travel through a few walls, but there you go.

So basically the narrative is you start out in one of the housing unit types, move through it from the street to the interior of the block. There is a marsh land that functions as both a public space and retention area for the grey water from all the houses on the block (after it has gone through a septic system). Spin around that a bit, and then you move through a different housing unit type, and into the street. The houses are all set close to the street and in fairly high density. The minimal setbacks promote interaction between the neighbours and little shops attached to the houses on the street allow for homemade crafts and produce to be sold. The you pull away from the small portion of town I modeled to see the whole masterplan. All the coloured blocks are where new housing in to infill empty and vacant lots (some empty and vacant because of the gang violence that ripped the town apart up until a couple years ago).

And that is my animation!

I spent most of last week on this, to present it for staff presentations we had monday, but unfortunately the computer attached to the projector didn't have media player loaded, so it wouldn't play. Kinda made most of last week a moot point.....oh well.

It is posted here now!

sweeeeet

ummmm, there is a new book coming out entitled Pride and Prejudice and Zombies......

it is mostly Jane Austen's original text, but the (subsequent) author has infilled with a story where a zombie hoard attacks and the Bennett sisters and Darcy have to fight them.


in one word:

awesome

so I have this idea

it has been slowly brewing for a bit

would be exciting, very much so, but not sure if its feasible yet

but schemes are being made....that's for certain

it needs some discussion....hmmmmmm

soup so good I had to make it twice

in honor of black[bean] history month:

Cuban Black Bean Soup

Ingredients:

-1 15oz  can of black beans

-1 bay leaf

-1 1/2 tbsp recaito*

Directions:

1. Pour the can of black beans into the saucepan. Add recaito and bayleaf, bring to a boil and immediatly turn down heat and simmer for an hour on very low heat.

2. Heat.

*For Recaito

Ingredients:

-1/2 bellpepper

-1/2 yellow onion

-2 garlic cloves

-1 chili pepper (or sweet chili)

-2 tbsp cilantro

-1/2 tsp salt

Directions:

1. Process all the ingredients in a blender or food processor until almost mush.

2. This recipe can be doubled or tripled and kept in the freezer, this can be added to many dishes for flavor.

Notes:

1. top with sour cream mixed with lime and shredded cheddar cheese

soooooooo good

new favourite tea

twinings orange, mango + cinnamon 

muy muy deliciouso!

drawings

every first thursday of the month, the drawing school upstairs gives a free drawing class, and I finally made it to one (granted half way through cause I had to work late)

but I am actually pretty proud of what I did!

more Manikin + Hedgehog

either kicking in the door in the middle of a successful Hedgehog kidnapping...

or presenting Hedgehog a la lion king, complete with acrobatic moves

even more things

35. every once and a while, I will find myself in a place and am not quite sure how I got there, both in the physical sense and in the allegorical sense

36. there is an unspoken awareness of authority (and the propriety and "rules" that go along with it) that is somehow beyond me. bosses, CEO's (and hell, even royalty) don't stress me out the way they should. and it has gotten me into trouble.

37. buildings turn me on

38. I have the best flatmates ever!

39. I am more in love now than I ever have been

40. I have the worst directional sense known to man

41. I can feel myself evolving (very slowly, but very surely) into the person I eventually want to be

42. I prefer dark chocolate to milk chocolate

the adventures of Manikin and Hedgehog

So I have this drawing manikin on my desk at work

I also have a small stuffed hedgehog finger puppet that Bethania got for me in Norway

sometimes I come in and find the two of them in very different positions from what I left them in the night before...




Nisha did this one
Hedgehog is doubling as Manikin's fur hat as he dressed up as a Palace Guard

I think this one was particularly awkward for Hedgehog

not sure who did this one, but Manikin is giving Hedgehog a big bear hug

they look cozy

wellies

you know the puddles and wet spots on the streets that you try to avoid when wearing normal shoes?

do you ever head right towards them with this inane urge to jump in them when you are wearing weather-proof shoes?

I must have jumped in 4 or 5 puddles on the way into work this morning with my wellies on....

football fun

I am re-reading some old NFL posts by Sports Illustrated, and finding if funny looking back on what was written in predictions and such knowing now how the season panned out.



for example: putting the Pats winning the Superbowl based almost entirely on Tom Brady being Tom Brady (and not out for the season after one quarter of the first game with a hit to the knee)



or going out on a limb and naming Plaxio Burress one of the best receivers of the game this season. you know, before he literally shot himself in the foot at a nightclub with an illegally owned gun and most likely ended his NFL career.


you know, things like that.

the work week just keeps getting shorter!

as Dani pointed out: for an architectural charity, our building doesn't work very well...

no work again today because the power source that feeds the water, the phones and the first floor where the server room and internet hub are based, is out. really hard to do work when you can't access any of your files. or flush the toilet.

kinda cool

more things

26. I can tie a cherry stem in a knot with my tongue

27. I may outwardly apologize, but I like stealing all the blankets

28. at some point in my life I have sang in a choir, played the violin, been on a swim team, did track and field, played lacrosse, danced jazz and danced pointe and stage managed theater

29. I am honest to goodness terrified of heights

30. penguins were my first animal love, then sheep, then giraffes, then moose and now hedgehogs

31. I find my self talking to inanimate objects more often than I care to admit

32. I love snow days just as much now as I did when I was 9

33. I tend to like what are considered sophisticated drinks; gin, scotch and the like

34. I absolutely adore sushi, and would eat it for every meal if I could. 

snow day!!

so 6" of snow have shut down the entire city of London. 

no buses are running, almost all tube lines are suspended, and the airports have pretty much completely stopped functioning.

and, best of all, the office is closed! I have my first honest to goodness snow day since first year of university!

and there is more snow on the way for this afternoon!

best day ever!

add that to the absolutely fantastic superbowl last night (yes, I stayed up til 3:30 am watching it, what of it?), and my goodness, what a great weekend.

and I gotta say, really impressed with the Steelers, two minutes left in the game, they are down by 3 points after the Cardinals pulled down a touchdown to take the lead with 5 minutes left, Ben Roethlisberger coordinates an amazing drive down the field and finds Santonio Holmes for a touchdown with 35 seconds left. the extra point puts them 4 points ahead of the Cards. try as Kurt Warner might, it is just nigh on impossible to pull that off. fantastic game. and thats not even mentioning the steelers interception on the endzone line that got returned 100 yards for a touchdown in the first half.

god, I missed football.