art in the park

My favourite thing on Sunday was Art in the Park (which has been renamed the New Art Festival but I still prefer the old name). In fact, the Great Glebe Garage Sale and Art in the Park are my two favourite Ottawa weekend events. This year I discovered a new (to me) ceramic artist, Lesley McInally, whose work is beautifully and interestingly textured and evocative. I bought four(!) things from her--they were small--brought them home and liked them so much that I rode my bike back and bought one more. And I like them more and more each day. I'll try to take a picture one of these days and put it up here. And several years ago I "discovered" Meaghan Haughian at Art in the Park. One of her paintings is on the wall beside me now and I still love her work.

chimes

Last Thursday my favourite thing was watching Ben play chimes at a school concert. He was so concentrated and intent on the music. He now wants chimes for his birthday.

I don't think anyone mentioned playing music on the favourite things list but that might be because people were trying to suggest things I might like and everyone knows that I am not at all musical (I can't even clap on beat). But I do love listening to the kids!

tour la nuit & dusk

Tonight we went on the night bike tour organized by the city. It was amazing to have the roads closed and to see so many bikes out together (and so many inventive versions of bicycles) but I was most struck by that full-bodied scent that comes as dusk falls, the earth and grass and leaves and water all at once seemingly releasing their scents. The air was suddenly and warmly musky and alive with lush fragrance. This effect was intensified by all of the flowering trees in Ottawa: we passed through patches of lilacs and wild roses and various unidentified but powerful smelling blossoms. And so there was the smell of dusk interspersed with pockets of flowers. And then there was also the sliver of the moon and the deep blues and greens of the fields and trees in the Experimental Farm. But most of all: the almost intoxicating scent of dusk. I had forgotten how sudden and strong it is.

bird's nests and bedroom paint

This year we have a bird's nest tucked in the eaves of our front porch, a bird's nest in the fir tree outside our living room window, and a bird's nest on our bedroom window ledge. I love bird's nests and was happy to have so many so close by. But this afternoon the nest on the window ledge was blown apart in the high winds (that also sent all the papers flying in my study and the curtains blowing to the ceiling) and a baby bird fell to the ground. Our neighbour found it between our houses and made a makeshift nest to hang from a birdfeeder in our yard. The parents--blackbirds--were crying out like crazy, very agitated. I hope they'll find their baby and feed her/him. I wasn't with my neighbour when she found the bird but when I looked at it in its new "nest" it looked very forlorn and just-hatched. We'll see. The baby bird falling from the ledge was definitely not a favourite thing, of course, but it did remind me of how much I appreciate the nests, the sound of the hungry chicks, and the graceful elegance of birds (not counting pigeons) in general.

Since I've written about birds before I've used up bird references from the five-favourite-things list but bird's nests remind me of robin eggs which are blue and so here is Ari and Alisa's favourite bedroom paint colour: "Benjamin Moore Gossamer Blue."

variations on tea

Ever since Jodie introduced me to mauritius tea about six or seven years ago (which I can only find at Alice's Tea Cup in New York) I have had the exact same pot of tea five days a week. It is definitely in that rare and refined group of one of my five favourite things, one of those things that I wouldn't want to live without. Here's how to make it (and this, I think, is going to be the best recipe on this blog--nothing surpasses it).

One small teapot with a holder for loose tea ingredients.

One teaspoonful of mauritius tea (I've tried to find it other places but thus far have been unsuccessful. If you go to to NYC you should buy a lot. I usually ask for $100 worth while Joel W faints in line beside me and Joel E suggests I should seek treatment for my "habit"). IF you can't get to NYC, you can substitute a regular tea bag of strong tea (PG tips is ideal but Tetley will do) and a one-inch vanilla bean cut open or vanilla extract. Mauritius tea grows on the island Mauritius and is apparently naturally infused with the vanilla plants that grow alongside it.

Half a teaspoon of whole cloves.

Half to full teaspoon of cardamon (adjust to taste--some cardamon is stronger than others)

broken up cinnamon stick

hot pepper flakes (just a few)

1/2 cup or so hot milk (adjust to taste)

teaspoon of honey.

Mix it all together and you have the best hot drink in the world.

BUT there is recent breaking news on the tea front. This past weekend I bought a premade organic chai mixture from the hole-in-the-wall tea shop, "Tea and Ginseng," in Ottawa and I was shocked to discover that it is almost as good as the above recipe. I have tried dozens and dozens of premade chai's, trying to avoid the process above because it takes a comical amount of time to make, and this is the only one that is in any way comparable.

The best chai I've had in a restaurant was in Palo Alto waiting for the train to San Francisco. Sarah L introduced me to this place; in my memory it serves only tea (but in fact surely must serve more things). A woman was always there stirring an enormous vat of this milky tea and on the few occasions when my train came before I could get my tea I mourned my lost cup of tea all the way to SF.

The best tisane I know of is from Cha Yi's Maison de Thé. It's called honeybush vanilla.

And, finally from the list, Eran mentions Mariage Frere Tea as his favourite tea and lots of people (way more than those who mention sports) note drinking tea and reading as a favourite activity.

ottawa race weekend & sports

This weekend Michal ran the 5K with some other kids and teachers at her school. I took her to the race and cheered her on. It was exciting! The next day we went and cheered for those who were running the marathon (in the pouring rain!) a few blocks from our house. There was an extraordinary range of people and almost all of them, at 38K, looked great. We would cheer and often people would say "thanks!" and I was thinking, "are you crazy? don't thank us--save your breath!" They had only 4K to go and so we can hope that most of them made it. There was a family in front of us and the father kept calling to the kids to make sure their ball didn't roll into the track of the runners. As they left, he said to his kids, "be sure to clean up your banana peels." And then in an aside, "that would just be too cliché."

Not that many of my friends mentioned sports as a favourite activity (not surprisingly?). Here's Larry's response (which made me smile): 1. Favorite Winter Sport: Drinking Hot Cocoa (Those cups can be heavy); 2. Favorite Winter Sport, Active Division: Cross-Country Skiing with friends.

glacial lakes

Another huge gap in postings and another back log. A few weeks ago we went to Jasper, Alberta and I didn't have my computer (a rare occurrence) and, as a result, didn't write here. And, once again, as soon as the habit of writing slipped it slipped and slipped.

At any rate, while we were in Jasper I remembered a favourite thing that I had forgotten all about: the brilliant turquoise colour of glacial lakes. Jasper was great but my two favourite lakes in this regard are the lake just before one climbs Black Tusk in BC and a lake in the Sierras where I had what was probably the best swim of my life. The water was clear as crystal and each time we jumped in it was like glass cracking and splintering, the light going off in all directions, and then the sudden quiet when one is underwater. I can still remember the shocking cold but also the beauty of it all.

the perfect mango & the most eclectic list

There is no connection between my two topics today. My favourite thing today was a perfect mango that Imelda brought us. There is something about mangos: they slice beautifully, they are so spectacularly orange, they have a complex surprising flavour that changes closer to the skin and closer to the pit, they smell tangy, but most of all their texture is perfect. Something for all the senses. (Shortly after I moved to Ottawa, Erin M wrote and produced a play entitled The Perfect Mango that she put on for about 20 guests. We all sat on the floor in the small space of an art gallery that she'd also started and ever since then I can't experience a perfect mango without also thinking of Erin.)

You have to love the sheer exuberance of Bill's contribution to the 5 things list. I'm including about half of it here: "My problem, being excessive, is giving you a paltry five favorite things. I want to give you a thousand spots to see in my favorite city, and then move on to 5 poems (or a hundred), 5 songs (or a concert), 5 Chicago inflected films ( Ferris Bueller, Blues Brothers, Barbershop, The Fugitive, Chicago, the musical), 5 rockers, 5 novels (Sister Carrie, Native Son, Hard Times, Man With a Golden Arm, Nowhere Man), 5 films, 5 restaurants (Nueva Leone, Al's #1 Italian Beef, Carnitas Michuacan, Harold's, Ribs n Bibs), 5 Chicago writers (Brooks, Cisneros, Wright, Algren, Hansbury), 5 singers, 5 geniuses, 5 legends, 5 heroes, 5 saints and 5 demons. I want to set up special tours for folks beyond the great ones (Architecture, Blues, Gangland) already in existence: Immigrant Chicago, Civil Rights Chicago, Labor Chicago, Underground Chicago, Literary Chicago, Chicago Sports and Games (Montrose Harbor!), Chicago Faith, Chicago Avenues, Chicago Murals, Public Art, Chicago Museums, Chicago Theater, Dumpsters to Dive Into, Halsted Street from the Stockyards to the Shipyards, Chicago Cemeteries (including the graves of Emma Goldman and the martyrs), the Lakefront, Bronzeville, Haymarket Square and the statue, Malcolm X's home behind the Hon. Elijah Muhammad's residence, Hull House, Cook County Hospital, West Madison and the site of Fred Hampton's assassination, and more more more!

I want five essays about social justice, peace and love, novels, poems, people’s histories, memoir and autobiography, plays and film and painting, and the best songs and musicals. I want the classics—where would we be without Marx and Gramsci and Luxemburg?—and the newest stuff too, like Klein and Lebowitz. I want fighters like Che and Tanya and Malcolm and Emma Goldman and Ella and Cabral, and thinkers like DuBois and de Beauvoir and CLR James and Eqbal Ahmed and Edward Said and Freire, and then I want Dylan and Simone and Brooks and Ginsberg. I want manuals and instruction and how-to books, but I want inspiration as well. And, of course, every issue thoroughly covered from every angle: war and peace and empire, the destruction of Mother Earth and the utter madness of capitalism, oppression and exploitation in its endless forms, awakening and resistance and liberation in all its mighty creativity, the dance of the dialectic as it plays in a single life and through all time. I immediately want to assemble a reader with short stuff from every one of my all-time favorites.

havdalah & rembrant's jewish bride & roden's cookbook

Last night was Saturday night and so at a reconstructionist chavurah gathering we closed with havdalah. Every time we do this ritual, I think I will now definitely incorporate it into each week. But I never do. It is the ritual that recognizes the end of shabbat and the beginning of the week. I love the simplicity of it, the braided candle, the sizzling sound of it being doused, the spices, the melodies to the songs, and the way the occasion marks time.

I looked to the list for Jewish things and found two. Ruth notes Rembrandt's "The Jewish Bride" in the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam (see image above). And Luisa notes Claudia Roden’s Jewish Cookbook (another cookbook that I don't know but am eager to try. For the record, Luisa recommends the tagine from Roden's other cookbook, Arabesque, as her favourite recipe.)

mother's day & time on the weekend

One of my favourite days of the year is Mother's Day. Because I had kid's late, the whole being-a-mother thing still seems kind of miraculous and surprising to me. I love the pure pleasure of breakfast-in-bed, kid-made gifts, a holiday-for-a-day in the Spring. Today Ben woke up (he'd come into our bed in the middle of the night--one of the down sides of parenthood!) and grinned and hugged me, saying "Happy Mother's Day!" remembering right away even in his sleepy state. Less than an hour later, however, he threw all the presents he'd made me in the garbage because he was so unhappy about Joel taking him and Michal zip-lining. And so these moments don't always last! (And when they got home from ziplining, Ben was bursting with excitement because he hadn't been afraid after all and he shyly asked me to come into his room and then said that he wanted to take my presents out of the garbage and give them back to me.) In the morning we went to the Farmer's Market with Andre and kids. On the way home, Andre told us that the qualities he and Brenda both appreciated most in their mothers were kindness and compassion. He asked me about my mom and I was surprised by the sheer number of things that came to mind (her zest for life, her sense of humour, her enthusiasm for the creative projects we did as kids, her creativity in general, her appreciation of beauty, the zillions of little sayings she still repeats, and her compassion, and her kindness--the list went on).

And from the 5-favourite-things list: there were no reference to mothers, but Photini and George did identify something that seems apt for Mother's Day: "One parent taking one child for an outing - to a play, for a bike ride, anything." It's because Joel took the kids this afternoon that I can finally catch up a little here.

dawlish avenue

Last weekend I was in Toronto for a conference at Glendon College. Mom and Dad lent me their car and so on the way home I drove to the street on which I grew up, parked the car, and walked around the block. It was a strange and surreal experience. The afternoon was beautiful and sunny and I parked the car in front of 181, the huge old house in which my grandparents once lived and of which I have a black and white photo on my desk. Or rather, I have a photo of the "backyard" (if it can be called that)--trees and bushes and wild grasses and a rough two- track country road going off into the distance--and two people, uncharacteristically not identified by my grandmother in her distinctive fountain-pen handwriting on the back of the photo, who are my great-ancestors. The woman, stylishly dressed, sits in a hammock and the man, in a suit and tie, sits upright on the grass beside her. 181 was apparently the first house on the block but it is now just like any other house wedged between all the others. I walked down the street to where our house used to be. It is now gone, replaced by a much bigger (but to my mind, less beautiful) house. The entire street seemed wider and more spare than I remembered it. I remember more trees, the houses closer together, the street more boisterous and active. On this afternoon, it was quiet. There were no cars, no people. It didn't match-up with my interior image and that was unsettling. I think what was most surprising for me was the recognition that returning to this street where I spent the longest chunk of my childhood--from 9 to 18 years old--did not generate new memories the way that thinking about it does. In other words, my memory of the place is much more real to me than the place itself. And this recognition is only reinforced by the fact that now, a week later, my memories of Dawlish and the surrounding neighbourhood have already started to replace, as if moving in to repossess occupied territory, the "reality" that I saw so recently.

habit & sennett's the craftsman

Before trying to catch up on postings (sort of), I thought I'd reflect on the idea of the habit of writing itself. I intermittently drop the "habit" of posting entries here and those shifts are interesting to me. Often I've been in a frame of mind in which I look forward to posting and have difficulty selecting a favourite thing for the day because it feels like there are so many; other times, no favourite things arise on a given day; and still other times, I don't think about it at all. It's the last experience that interests me the most because it's on these occasions that I've lost the "habit" of writing. This whole blog drops off my radar. Oddly, when I'm busiest I write the most. But that makes sense: when I'm busy, I need structures to my day and I just fold blog writing into that structure. When I'm less busy, I rely on these structures less. Someone told me that it takes six weeks to develop a habit in such a way that it becomes second nature (that is, if you can just push yourself to do a thing for six weeks, after that period it will become a natural part of your day in the way that eating lunch or making coffee is not a chore but just what one does). In general I like habits that take me out of the mechanical rhythms of the day, that make me think about a particular moment in a new way or a decisive way, and that define the day differently than when I just move remotely through it. That said, there is something lovely about a totally unstructured day as well. And I'm sure there's some happy medium where habit meets fluidity and both improve each other.

All of this also made me think of Richard Sennett's The Craftsman. He doesn't talk about habit, per se, but he does talk about the value of craft—investing time in really mastering something slowly and attentively—and its fading role in our culture. This blog is not a craft in Sennett's terms--a thing made with one's hands--but my casual attitude toward it does maybe relate to the tendency he identifies in our culture to try something out, enjoy it for awhile, and then drop it and move on to the next thing. A certain impatience rather than a paying attention. In my own experience, I do love anything that requires concentration--from drawing to cooking to writing--and habits seem to suggest the opposite: that point where concentration is no longer necessary. But maybe not. Here's an interview with Sennett on his book.

beeswax candles & honey

I have a beeswax candle on my desk that I often light when I work. I like the way it looks (the warm rich yellow) and I like the way it smells (like my grandmother, weirdly); and it's nice to have a little flickering light on my desk as I work when it's stormy outside.

Mary's favourite honey is: "Wilson's honey, available at the Kingston (Ontario) farmers market and the Belleville farmers market on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays." Mary gave me some of this honey in the comb last summer and it was delicious: delicate and flavourful and chewy.

the first sip of a bridgehead latte & coffee

A huge gap in my posting these past ten days or so. I won't even try to catch up (as I sometimes have when I've missed three days). And so today's favourite thing was my first sip of Bridgehead coffee, standing at the counter in the cafe, after dropping Ben off at school in the pouring rain. I don't know why the first sip is so much better than every sip after (still good but not exquisite the way that first sip is). And I don't know why Bridgehead lattes are so much better than all other lattes. I ran into Daphne at Bridgehead once just after she'd returned from Europe (Europe!) and she said she always looked forward to coming home from abroad and getting coffee at Bridgehead because it just wasn't as good anywhere else.

Some of my favourite (or at least most memorable) coffee experiences: a perfectly hot and delicious coffee at a small hotel in Prague in the late 1980s when I was there with Ehud; coffee in a yellow mug that I made every morning for myself in Varaire with milk that was often still warm from the cow; coffee stops in Switzerland when Joel and I were hiking in the Alps; my first coffee in Italy when I was eighteen and the shock and thrill of how different it was from all other coffees I'd tried.

Oddly, at some point over the past fifteen years or so I've more or less stopped making coffee at home. But I used to be a finicky coffee-maker with an elaborate system that only I could execute; I always wanted my coffee "just so" and I enjoyed the ritual of it.

Several people mentioned coffee in the context of other things (usually reading). Miriam: "Long mornings in bed... with good coffee and the NY Times." Louise: "Drinking coffee on the dock at North Otter Lake on a summer morning (our cottage)." And Rick: " Really really good coffee and really really good book reading material, all on the porch."

grains, rice, and beans & rebar modern food cookbook

My favourite thing over the past few days has been making recipes from Kevin Graham's Grains, Rice, and Beans. This was the cookbook in which I found the "Spiced Lentils" recipe mentioned earlier and since then I've made polenta pizzas (delicious but not a success for a number of reasons mostly due to me) and "Spiced Cashew Sauce" (easy and delicious) among other things. I like this cookbook for the little tricks it teaches me in addition to the great recipes. But part of my pleasure in finding a new cookbook also stems from my pleasure in finding time to cook now that classes are over. When Michal came home from school on Thursday I told her I was making a new recipe that night and she rolled her eyes and said, "again?" And then I realized I'd made something new every night of the week.

Carol mentions the Rebar Modern Food Cookbook as her "favourite (new) cookbook"; I'll have to try that next.

sebald's austerlitz & photography

My favourite thing over the last few days has been rereading W. G. Sebald's novel, Austerlitz. It creates a world and texture of its own that is mesmerizing. I feel as if I fall into the cadences of the book and get absorbed into a completely different tempo of thought. I've always been perplexed by the contrast between Susan Sontag's deep appreciation for Sebald (and her great taste in writers in general) and her own novel (has she written more than one?) In America which is so surprisingly, the title notwithstanding, and strangely American in tone and style. Here's Sontag on Sebald: "Is literary greatness still possible? Given the implacable devolution of literary ambition, and the concurrent ascendancy of the tepid, the glib, and the senselessly cruel as normative fictional subjects, what would a noble literary enterprise look like now? One of the few answers available to English-language readers is the work of W. G. Sebald."

Sebald uses a lot of photographs in his novel (and Sontag, of course, often writes on photography) and so I thought I'd turn to the favourite things list for favourite photographers. And here was another interesting gap. No favourite photographers. Nor was photography itself listed by anyone as a favourite activity.

spring rain & "last night the rain spoke to me"

My favourite thing today was not the spring rain itself but Michal's delight in the rain. She was so happy when it started to pour and exclaimed: "I just love the rain!" Earlier a bunch of neighbourhood kids had been playing outside in the rain and got into a mud fight. Here's a picture of some of them:

After dinner Michal was frustrated that she had to do her Hebrew class because, as she put it, she felt like dancing in the rain. I like the rain too (the air smelled so full and rich) but it was Michal's pleasure that I liked the best today.

And because so many people mentioned Mary Oliver on the list I thought I'd include one of her rain poems here:

"Last Night the Rain Spoke to Me"

Last night

the rain

spoke to me

slowly, saying,

what joy

to come falling

out of the brisk cloud

to be happy again

in a new way

on the earth!

That's what it said

as it dropped,

smelling of iron,

and vanished

like a dream of the ocean

into the branches

and the grass below.

Then it was over.

The sky cleared.

I was standing

under a tree.

The tree was a tree

with happy leaves,

and I was myself,

and there were stars in the sky

that were also themselves

at the moment,

at which moment

my right hand

was holding my left hand

which was holding the tree

which was filled with stars

and the soft rain--

imagine! imagine!

the long and wondrous journeys

still to be ours.

first bike ride of spring & biking

Yesterday my favourite thing was getting on my bicycle for the first time this year. The air smelled of dirt, the wind was cool and fresh, and my bike was fast. I walk almost everywhere in the winter and it doesn't feel slow at all (I enjoy it)--but as soon as my bike is a transportation option again, walking becomes unthinkable. It is strange how sudden and unbending (even in heavy rain, even in cold wind) this change is.

(And two other bonus favourite things: meals with friends [I went out for lunch and I went out for dinner--definitely a marker of the end of term, the luxury of these leisurely meals and conversations]; a Chomsky talk at Carleton which was such an event.)

Biking was mentioned often on the favourite things list. Here are two examples, one general(ish) and one specific:

1) David M: "a good bike ride that explores and has an ocean swim bookending its exploration."

2) Pete H: "Bike ride to the ancient aquaducts outside Rome, followed by dinner and beer at Hang Zhou, a great Chinese restaurant in the Monti neighborhood of Rome."

And, for me, biking is one of those few things that would make it into my "top five." I'll have to think about whether I'd name a specific ride (one of those amazing rides in Provence, for example? or Scotland? or Spain? my favourite ride probably would be in Europe . . . but it is hard to choose between them all) or whether I'd keep it general: biking around town, biking at our cottage, biking in Quebec, bike trips etc.

pear and cheese sandwich & two more sandwiches

Today's favourite thing makes it to my list of ten top favourite things. Every day for lunch, if I can, I have exactly the same sandwich and it is always absolutely perfect, one of those rare combinations that never lets you down. Here's the "recipe":

Toasted (onion and dill or rosemary and garlic) Artisan bread (this is one reason it would be hard for me to move away from Ottawa--as far as I know this bread is only available here and it is amazing). Cover toasted bread with a medium cheddar cheese. Put in toaster oven until melted. Cover with thinly sliced pear. Eat and enjoy!

Joel teases me for always eating the same thing but apparently Wittgenstein always ate exactly the same potatoes and white bread for lunch (and possibly even for dinner--I should check) and the lack of variety seemed to do him good (along the lines of developing awe-inspiring philosophical theories that change the way we think).

Two people on the list also mentioned sandwiches as favourite things. Here they are:

1) Jan’s Favourite sandwich: "hummus, sharp cheddar and sliced dill pickle on whole wheat."

2) Peter G's favourite sandwich: "2 slices of rideau bakery light rye bread - toasted, slather with fresh pesto sauce, cover with slices of fresh garden tomato, top with 2 or 3 poached eggs and freshly ground black pepper; serve with fresh orange juice - ooooohhhhh baby, it's good." (I like the editorial!)

last snow

On Monday morning as I walked to Carleton the sky filled with thick snow that shifted the landscape from colour (albeit dull colour) to black-and-white. Everything was blurred and bleached like an old tv set with static. But I also felt a bit mournful because I suspected it was the last snowfall of the season and so there was something sad in this last hurrah of winter. Bittersweet though. I love the turning of the season, the cusp of the things, the way that a last snowfall can be a favourite thing. (And then, because this is Ottawa, it did snow again on Wednesday--but that time it was only flurries and nothing like Monday's dramatic, sudden, snow-filled sky.)

The only "last" thing in the favourite-things list is Louise Bourgeois' "Cell (The Last Climb)" which I've mentioned already. But it is so lovely and evocative that it never hurts to mention it again.

community theatre & bread and puppet theatre

My favourite thing over the last several days has been the clever, rambunctious, spirited, gleeful community theatre production of "GleeBE" at the Glebe community centre. It was amazing to watch not only Michal and Joel but also so many familiar faces from our neighbourhood up there on stage. And it reminded me of how much I love the way community theatre brings people together and creates something--something palpable and vibrant--that was not there before.

Theatre itself was only mentioned by one person on the list. One of Laura's five favourite things: Bread and Puppet Theatre (Glover, Vermont).

new year's resolutions & procrastination

Today I did my New Year's Resolutions (I know, I'm late! my first resolution should be to deal with my procrastination problem) and, to do so, I consulted my favourite new year's resolutions questions from David Allen's 2009 blog.

On the topic of procrastination, (and, for a change, unrelated to the favourite-things list), the best discussion I've found on this topic is, surprisingly (to me, anyway), in David Allen's Getting Things Done. (And so today's posting is a rare double endorsement of two aspects of gtd). Although I suppose this second recommendation is faint praise given that, even after reading the procrastination chapter, I'm still doing my New Year's Resolutions 3 months late.

murmur toronto & walking

I went to a talk today and discovered something entirely new: an oral history project that started in Toronto (but has now also moved to other places) that records idiosyncratic and unusual histories of places and streets that you can listen to on your cell phone as you walk. Here's the website: murmur toronto.

And one of Peter G's favourite things would mesh nicely with murmur (if only he lived in Toronto or one of the cities where murmur exists): "doing a 'walkabout' - walking out of our front door and, for the next few hours, following my curiosity wherever it takes me."

spiced lentils with apple crisps and curried yogurt & home-baked bread

Yesterday my favourite thing was having time to cook. And the favourite thing I cooked was a new recipe (for me) from Kevin Graham's Grains, Rice, and Beans. Despite the fact that the recipe says it takes a whopping five(!) hours to make, it really doesn't (read the fine print) and is, in fact, super easy. Here it is:

Title: SPICED LENTILS WITH APPLE CRISPS AND 

CURRIED YOGURT   

Categories: Appetizers  

Yield: 4 servings    Prep Time: 5 hours

1 tb Canola oil        

1 lg Yellow onion; peeled and finely diced

1 ts Garam masala; (Spice mixture sold at Indian food stores 

or other specialty shops)

1 md Bay leaf        

2 Granny Smith apples; peeled,cored, and finely diced        

1 c  Dried green lentils        

2 c  Chicken stock (I used veggie stock)             

Apple Crisps; (recipe follows)             

Curried Yogurt; (recipe follows)

-----------------------APPLE CRISPS------        

1 tb Confectioner’s sugar             

Juice of 2 lemons        

2    Granny Smith apples; peeled and cored    

----------------------CURRIED YOGURT-----        

1 tb Curry powder or garam masala        

1 Banana; peeled and finely diced        

2 c  Plain yogurt       

In a large, heavy saucepan, heat the oil over 

medium-high heat. Add the onion and saute until 

soft, about 4 minutes.  Add the garam masala, bay 

leaf, and apples, and cook, stirring continuously, 

for 2 more minutes. Add the lentils and stock and 

bring the mixture to a boil over high heat. Reduce 

to a simmer    and cook for about 25 minutes or 

until the lentils are tender, being careful not to 

overcook them.  Remove the pan from the heat, 

remove the bay leaf, and adjust seasoning to taste. 

Serve the lentils hot in one large serving bowl. 

Serve the yogurt and apple crisps separately and 

invite diners to combine all three components to 

their    personal taste. Makes 4 appetizer or 2 

main course servings.        

APPLE CRISPS: Preheat the oven to its lowest 

setting. In a small bowl, dissolve the sugar in the 

lemon juice.  Thinly slice the apples horizontally 

into rounds approximately 1/16-inch thick.  Lay the 

apple slices on a baking sheet lined with parchment 

paper and brush lightly with the sugared lemon juice.  

Place the baking sheet in the oven and allow the 

apples to dry, about 3 to 4 hours or overnight.  

Remove the baking sheet from the oven and gently 

peel the apple slices from the paper.(Some 

discoloration of the apple slices will occur.)  

Store in an airtight container until ready to use.  

They will last for 2 days in the refrigerator.        

CURRIED YOGURT:  Heat a small nonstick skillet 

over medium heat. Add the curry powder and toast 

until you can smell its intense aroma, about 30 

seconds. Remove pan from heat.  Combine the curry 

powder with the banana and yogurt in a serving 

bowl, stirring well. Refrigerate until ready to 

use.  Makes 2 cups.      

Source:  Grains, Rice, and Beans by Kevin Graham.     

And, from the list, here is Michael's "favourite recipe for home-baked bread" (a unique category for which there was no other competition on the list): Jim Lahey's No-Knead Bread.

I haven't tried this yet but hope to soon.

being wrong & failing quickly

This posting is inspired by Ted (although not because he is often wrong or failing quickly!) One of Ted's favourite books of the past year was Kathryn Schulz's book Being Wrong: Adventures in the Margins of Error. Shutz is a provocative, serious, and very funny writer. This is a non-fiction book and yet I found myself laughing out loud several times in the first chapter alone. She has an extraordinary knack for saying profound things at a quick and spirited pace so that you don’t even realize always what you’re taking in. Here’s the first paragraph (which gives a good sense of the book as whole):

"Why is it so much fun to be right? As pleasures go, it is, after all, a second-order one at best. Unlike many of life's other delights--chocolate, surfing, kissing--it does not enjoy any mainline access to our biochemistry: to our appetites, our adrenal glands, our limbic systems, our swoony hearts. And yet, the thrill be being right is undeniable, universal, and (perhaps most oddly) almost entirely undiscriminating. We can't enjoy kissing just anyone, but we can relish being right about almost anything. The stakes don't seem to matter much; it's more important to bet on the right foreign policy than the right racehorse, but we are perfectly capable of gloating over either one. Nor does subject matter; we can be equally pleased about correctly identifying an orange-crowned warbler or the sexual orientation of our coworker. Stranger still, we can enjoy being right even about disagreeable things: the downturn in the stock market, say, or the demise of a friend's relationship, or the fact that, at our spouse's insistence, we just spent fifteen minutes schlepping our suitcase in exactly the wrong direction" (3-4).

It is fun to be right. I especially like being right when Ted is wrong but what this book argues is that it's right to be wrong, or rather, there are things to be learned from being wrong, and that it is valuable to explore this terrain. It is also valuable, for ourselves and for society, to be wrong. It is out of these experiences that mistakes are corrected (and then corrected again when our new "right" turns out, as it so often does, to be "wrong").

All of this leads me to my second point, which is not favourite-things list related, but is a favourite mantra that Ted told me about a few summers ago at the cottage. Fail quickly. Apparently computer programmers use this attitude so that they don't get too waylaid and invested in projects that will end up going nowhere. It's better to get out early than to continue investing in something that will not have a pay-off in the end. This makes a lot of sense and can be extended from computers to the world of academia. It deflates the stakes and encourages experimentation and creativity without the expectation of success every time. While my work model looks much more like it's conforming to something like "fail slowly" (really, really really slowly) I still like the way this mantra encourages one to name failure and not to be afraid of it.

too much happiness & lines for the fortune cookies

Favourite thing yesterday (and over the last few days): rereading Alice Munro's Too Much Happiness. Before our book group, Joel and I often find ourselves speed reading the required book, looking at each other in stunned amazement--what? book group again? already?--not because we don't enjoy it but just because, despite the fact that we chastise our students for hurrying through material, it seems we can never be organized about such things ourselves. But in the case of Munro's book the speed reading shifted from obligation to pleasure to utter absorption. She is such a spell-binding writer. I'd read most of the stories before when they were first published in The New Yorker and was surprised to find the reading experience pretty much undiminished the second time round. But the story I enjoyed most, nevertheless, was one that I had not read before: "Fiction." I love the subtlety and yet seeringness of the shocks Munro delivers in her writing. When I finish a story it is as if Munro has carved out a little pause in my world, and I stop and think, and the entire world shifts just slightly and everything then continues to carry on.

No one mentioned Munro on the favourite-things list BUT I do have another connection (that is, admittedly, a stretch). Bill A notes Frank O'Hare's poem "Lines for the Fortune Cookies" and one of the lines in the poem is "Who do you think you are?" which is itself the title of a collection of Alice Munro's stories (a collection that, I think, had a different title when it was published in the States because it was believed that Americans would not be pleased by the provocation of the Canadian title.) Here's the poem:

Lines For The Fortune Cookies

Frank O’Hara

I think you're wonderful and so does everyone else.

Just as Jackie Kennedy has a baby boy, so will you—even bigger.

You will meet a tall beautiful blonde stranger, and you will not say hello.

You will take a long trip and you will be very happy, though alone.

You will marry the first person who tells you your eyes are like scrambled eggs.

In the beginning there was YOU—there will always be YOU, I guess.

You will write a great play and it will run for three performances.

Please phone The Village Voice immediately: they want to interview you.

Roger L. Stevens and Kermit Bloomgarden have their eyes on you.

Relax a little; one of your most celebrated nervous tics will be your undoing.

Your first volume of poetry will be published as soon as you finish it.

You may be a hit uptown, but downtown you're legendary!

Your walk has a musical quality which will bring you fame and fortune.

You will eat cake.

Who do you think you are, anyway? Jo Van Fleet?

You think your life is like Pirandello, but it's really like O'Neill.

A few dance lessons with James Waring and who knows? Maybe something will happen.

That's not a run in your stocking, it's a hand on your leg.

I realize you've lived in France, but that doesn't mean you know EVERYTHING!

You should wear white more often—it becomes you.

The next person to speak to you will have a very intriquing proposal to make.

A lot of people in this room wish they were you.

Have you been to Mike Goldberg's show? Al Leslie's? Lee Krasner's?

At times, your disinterestedness may seem insincere, to strangers.

Now that the election's over, what are you going to do with yourself?

You are a prisoner in a croissant factory and you love it.

You eat meat. Why do you eat meat?

Beyond the horizon there is a vale of gloom.

You too could be Premier of France, if only… if only…

two group conversations & conversations in general

My favourite thing today were two very different back-to-back conversations with groups of people. After Lauren's (excellent!) talk tonight at Carleton a bunch of people went to Paddy's and it reminded me of the basic pleasure of talking to people in a group about random shared things: why there are no longer any truly eccentric profs (Lauren's apt observation), how many Victorian novels a student will read in a semester without complaining, and variations on losing one's glasses, among other things. I had to leave early to return to documentary movie night at our house (due to a scheduling glitch on my part, the two events overlapped) and I arrived just in time for the discussion about the documentary. This was a very different group conversation about politics, the insidiousness of corporations, the way that all of the documentaries we watch always seem to arrive at Dick Cheney as the bad guy who started it all (Joel's observation), the genre of spelling bee documentaries (and Chris's incredulity: there's a genre for that?), and the question of why we never seem to watch "happy" documentaries (except for those spelling bee documentaries).

And in terms of conversations in general, many many people on the list noted good conversations in their list of five favourite things. Which is a heartening thing.

the first robin & canoeing

Favourite thing today: stepping outside this morning and seeing a pair of robins in the tree beside our porch. When I was Michal's age I used to record my first robin sighting each year (I can still remember the sense of time passing that it gave me after I'd done it for three years) and each time I see my first spring robin it reminds me of my early bird-watching years. I wanted to be an ornithologist from about 10 years old through 16 and my all-time favourite game (typically played with Steve, the only person I could convince this was fun) was going through our Field Guide to the Birds of North America, covering the names of the birds, and seeing who could identify the bird first. Another variation, possible to play alone, was to go through the Field Guide, covering the names, and to time how long it took to get through and at what level of accuracy. I have recently tried to introduce Michal to the pleasures of birdwatching (most of which I've now forgotten) and am learning what I suppose all parents know: that our own passions are not always our children's. She, alas, rolls her eyes. And I am dumbfounded since for me, still, there is a little bit of awe and wonderment (that feels so visceral that I think it must be universal and everyone must feel this way) with each bird sighting.

And since today's favourite thing is a robin, I thought I'd consult dad's favourite things from the list. One of them is: "paddling on Lake Rosseau." Canoeing, in fact, is another category in which there was a lot of overlap. At least five people listed canoeing as one of their favourite things. Including Steve L who wrote: "Waking at the crack of dawn to go on nature walks or canoeing."

spring snowfall & the man who mistook his wife for a hat

Favourite thing today: after a warm weekend that melted all the snow, I was happy to wake up this morning to a thick slow snowfall. The snow turned to rain at lunch and then back to snow again in the afternoon and it was one of those completely satisfying lazy snowfalls that cover everything in a perfect blanket of white. Here's a picture from our backyard.

And because we were at Rick's on the weekend and this book was on his coffee table, and spring snowfalls are almost as head-shaking as mistaking one's wife for a hat, the item from the favourite things list today is Parker's favourite book: Oliver Sack's The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat.

peter zumthor & architecture

Favourite thing yesterday: during a break from prepping for my class I opened an old New York Times Magazine and came across the last page of an article. I was struck by the beauty of the pictures of buildings and interiors but didn't know what the article was about (was it about the buildings? the place? design? the photography?) I flipped to the beginning and discovered an architect I've never heard of before: Peter Zumthor. There is something exquisite and ineffable about his buildings and I want to learn more about him. I haven't had time to read the article (I will today) but I was just happy to look at the images yesterday. (The two photos here are of his work.)

I consulted the list for references to architecture and found only two: the Tate Gallery in London and the National Gallery in Ottawa. But there are no other favourite buildings and no favourite architects at all.

the super moon

Favourite thing on Saturday: seeing the super moon. Thanks to Zoe, we learned that this moon comes once every eighteen years, is 20,000 miles closer to earth, and, as a result, is super bright--hence the super moon. We noticed it Saturday evening walking to Zoe's and, true to Zoe's report, it seemed brighter, sharper, and bigger than the full moon on an ordinary night. It was also beautiful to see the moon suspended just above the pond and the moonlight reflecting off the ice and snow.

breakfast with ben at wild oat & another favourite easy recipe

Favourite thing today: taking Ben to breakfast at Wild Oat. (And, completely by coincidence, going to Wild Oat again for lunch with Frances.) Our breakfast was so delicious--eggs and homefries for me, lemon crepe for Ben--that I thought to myself (unrealistically, but I still believe it even as I write now), "I'm going to come here everyday." And breakfast with Ben was especially great for the eight-year old quality of the conversation. For example: why do sugar cubes hold together in perfect squares if they're pure sugar? shouldn't they fall apart? (as Ben pounds at the cube with the base of his knife and I try to stop him) are they made in a machine? is it heat? do they melt and then stick back together? why do crepes taste better in Paris even when it is exactly the same ingredients? are they the same ingredients? our crepes are a bit better at home too--why? (followed by Ben's earnest reassurance that the crepes at Wild Oat still were really really really good). And so on.

My best breakfast memories: a place in Montreal, long since closed, that was on St Urbain and served baked eggs in oval dishes and impossible-to-replicate (despite the same ingredients when used at home!) cinnamon toast baguettes. Second favourite: a place in Prague that had the most perfect coffee I've ever had in my life (in Prague!)

And from the list I'm recording the "easy recipe" that Paul and Rose included with their "smart stick" recommendation: "Cut up some of your favorite fresh fruit, add some yogurt, a bit of honey and a few Ice cubes. Put into a pitcher, or if you want a single serving into a glass. Insert smart stick. Voila! You have a delicious smoothie."

golden pear soup & cuisinart smart stick

My favourite thing today: golden pear soup. Whenever people ask for my single all-time favourite recipe it's this soup. I've probably made it more than any other recipe and it works beautifully for every occasion: lunch, pregnancy (the one and only thing I could always eat!), general comfort food, fancy dinner party food, ordinary family dinner food. And an added bonus: it's a guaranteed success with (almost) all kids. Tonight we had it for dinner. It was our family plus four impromptu guests (mainly kids). Which is another favourite thing: people staying unexpectedly for dinner. I love the way it makes the house feel festive, the way the kids are always happier with more people, the array of food on the table, all the voices talking, and the sense it gives me of living in a village rather than a city.

Here's the recipe (I got it from the web) (it's from Molly Katzen's Still Life with Menu which is also a favourite cookbook):

Adapted from "Still Life With Menu."
Preparation time: 50 minutes
Yield: 6 servings
Click here for print-friendly version

Fresh pears and sweet potatoes are puréed together and finished off with touches of cinnamon, white wine, and cream. This unusual soup is slightly sweet, slightly tart, and deeply soothing. It is easy to make, and it's hard to believe something that tastes this good can be be so easy.

Steps 1 through 4 can be done ahead of time, and the purée can be refrigerated for a day or two before the finishing touches are added.

1 1/2 pounds sweet potatoes (acorn or butternut squash may be substituted.)
4 cups water
1 3-inch stick cinnamon
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
3 large ripe pears (any kind but Bosc)
1 to 2 tablespoons butter
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons dry white wine
1/3 cup half-and-half, light cream, or milk (lowfat or soy okay)
A few dashes of ground white pepper

1. Peel sweet potatoes (or squash), and cut into small pieces. Place in a large saucepan with water, cinnamon stick, and salt. Bring to a boil, cover, and simmer until tender (about 15 minutes). Remove the cover and let it simmer an additional 5 minutes over medium heat. Remove and discard the cinnamon stick. Set aside.
2. Peel and core the pears, and cut them into thin slices.
3. In a heavy skillet, sauté pears in butter for about 5 minutes over medium heat, stirring frequently. Add 1/4 cup wine, cover, and simmer about 10 minutes longer over medium heat.
4. Using a food processor with the steel blade or a blender, purée the sweet potatoes (squash) in the cooking water together with the pears-au-jus until smooth. (You may have to do this in several batches.) Transfer to a heavy soup pot or Dutch oven.
5. Add the cream or milk and the remaining 2 tablespoons of wine. Sprinkle in the white pepper. Heat very gently just before serving. (Don't let it boil.)

It says it takes 50 minutes but once you've made it several times, it's more like 15. There are very few things I make that take 50 minutes!

And from the list, Paul and Rose mention an item in the "favourite kitchen gadget" category that is essential to making this soup: Cuisinart Smart Stick. The "smart stick" is a million times easier than a blender.

birds & "one heart"

Favourite thing today: hearing the birds singing outside my window this morning. They're back!

And here's a poem from the list that references birds:

One Heart

Look at the birds. Even flying

is born

out of nothing. The first sky

is inside you, open

at either end of day.

The work of wings

was always freedom, fastening

one heart, to every falling thing.

~ Li-Young Lee

hut in the gatineau (2) & skiing

Yesterday we skied into a hut in the Gatineau for Joel's birthday dinner. Here are some of the highlights: the woods deserted except for our group of friends skiing in at twilight, the sense of darkness literally falling and filling up the spaces between the trees, the light of the half moon, the shadows of the trees and branches on the snow, the crisp, deliberate sound of the skies. And then getting to the hut nestled in a dip at the bottom of a hill: the surprise (it's always this way) when one leaves the quiet of the woods and walks inside to find the hut filled with people, candles flickering, the warmth of the woodburning stove, making cheese fondue, eating a rich and dense chooclate cake Michal made for Joel's birthday, taking Ben to the outhouse (really! this was fun and magical), Farley delighted by this unexpected bonus of a long winter walk. Skiing home: the flicker of lights from headlamps in the distance, and the philosophic stillness of the woods all around us.

(And then driving home and being jarred back into a reality more serious than usual: the fallout of the earthquake and tsunami in Japan.)

I consulted the five-favourite-things list and discovered that 8 (8!) people listed cross-country skiing or downhill skiing as one of their five favourite things. That might be the highest degree of overlap I've found thus far. Two of Brenda's favourite things (minus "cold" and "January") were combined for us last night: "cross-country skiing on a bright cold day in January" and "the night sky in the country."

the national gallery & the national gallery

My favourite thing today: going to the National Gallery with Joel and the kids. Carol had recommended the Wanda Koop exhibit, some of my students had recommended the nineteenth-century British photography exhibit, the kids love doing Artissimo, the weather was wretched, and so it seemed the perfect thing to do on a Saturday afternoon. We went to the Wanda Koop first. I liked it, especially the studio room and the human hybrid exhibit, but I didn't love it. As we exited from the series of adjoining rooms which housed the exhibit, I did see something that took my breath away: Louise Bourgeois's "Cell (the Last Climb)." There is a spiral staircase in the centre of a rod iron cage, blue glass balls are suspended in the cage and look fragile and magical against the dark grittiness of the iron. Tiny threads, almost invisible, also connect to a tear drop shape in the center. And there are two wooden balls on the floor that the descriptive card "explains" represent the artist's parents. When we told the kids this they were dumbfounded. But I found the display evocative in a stop-me-in-my-tracks sort of way. (Needless to say, the picture here does not do it justice.) The nineteenth century photography was great in an entirely different way and definitely worth seeing.

I just consulted the list, thinking I would add other art gallery recommendations, but I had forgotten that there are, in fact, two mentions of the National Gallery itself as a favourite thing. And so, for a change, my favourite thing coincides with the five-favourite-things list. Here's Judith's description: "The National Gallery. My favourite building in Ottawa, in part for the art, but mostly for the beautiful soaring design, the pinkish granite walls and all the magical little places to sit from the garden to the fountain area to the restored chapel. It also has a quiet, attractive cafeteria with decent food and great views onto Nepean Point and the Parliament buildings." Remarkably, Laura, who also lists the National Gallery, singles out the same Louise Bourgeois exhibit that I mention above.

commas & kid's books

My favourite thing the other day: As we were walking home from school Ben said excitedly, "Madame Goldberger read us an awesome book in English today." I asked him what it was, expecting it to be about superheroes or lions or something like that and he said, with great enthusiasm, "it was all about the powerful comma." I thought I was hearing things. The comma? I asked him to tell me about it, still thinking that the comma itself might be code for superhero. But Ben said it was about how commas change so much and have such power in sentences and he himself seemed amazed by this. I loved that Ben could be so excited about a comma (when he's older I'll get him to read the entry on favourite punctuation given his predilection in this area!). The next day I asked his teacher about the book and she said it was the kid's version of Eats, Shoots and Leaves by Lynn Truss.

This exchange with Ben reminded me that several people listed favourite kid's books as one of their favourite things. Here are two: (from Richard C): "Favourite book (currently) that I am reading to my son Daniel: The Tiger Who Came For Tea"; and (from Jennifer): "Favourite series of early chapter books for children: This category is here because my favourite thing to do is read with the kids--when they feel like paying attention! Arnold Loebel's Frog and Toad series."

cleaning my study & enchiladas

Favourite thing today: okay, it's not cleaning my study but rather the result. A clean study. After weeks (actually, months) of accumulated papers and books piled precariously on and around my desk, and post-its everywhere, and kids' drawings interspersed with my things, it is so great to file the papers, put away the books, throw away the post-its, display the drawings, and see the surfaces in this room again.

A few days ago I made one of Rachel's favourite things. Or rather, what she calls "favourit-ish things." Here it is:

Easy Recipe Michal Loves:

Enchilada Lasagna (takes 10 minutes – literally)

corn tortillas

cheddar/jack cheese, grated

Trader Joe’s Enchilada sauce (or any other brand)

Tofu

Cottage cheese

Corn

Black beans, if you want

Pour enough enchilada sauce in the bottom of a baking dish to cover the bottom. Then put a layer of corn tortillas on top, then layer the cheese, tofu, cottage cheese, corn and beans. Then pour over some sauce. Then repeat. On top layer (I usually do 2 layers), just pour sauce and then put cheese on top. Bake at 350 for 45 or so minutes.

This recipe was great and the kids and Joel both loved it. BUT it had one flaw specific to living in Ottawa. Ingredient #3--Trader Joe's enchilada sauce--isn't sold here. Worse, as far as I can tell, no enchilada sauce is sold here. Still, I was committed to making this recipe and so I went on the internet and found a recipe for enchilada sauce. It worked (and I was impressed with myself because it looked and tasted just like real--ie. bottled--enchilada sauce) but it definitely detracted from the "quick and easy" part that had appealed to me in the first place.

felix holt passage & wanting

Favourite thing yesterday: a passage from Felix Holt that I was teaching in class. Here are the last few lines of her powerfully nostalgic opening chapter: "The poets have told us of a dolorous enchanted forest in the under world. The thorn-bushes there, and the thick-barked stems, have human histories hidden in them; the power of unuttered cries dwells in the passionless-seeming branches, and the red warm blood is darkly feeding the quivering nerves of a sleepless memory that watches through all dreams. These things are a parable." It is such a weird and riveting and grim (given that those "human histories," following Dante on whom the passage is based, relate to suicides) and, ultimately, haunting way to open this novel (which is not, btw, my favourite Victorian novel although this is one of my favourite passages in a Victorian novel).

I thought I'd look to the list to see if anyone had mentioned a Victorian novel as a favourite thing. Alas, no one had. (Would I, I wonder?) But Franny mentioned a novel with a Victorian novelist as a character in it. Here it is: "Favourite recent read: William Flanagan, Wanting." I'll try to read it soon so that I can comment on it rather than just listing it here.

city sunset & country sunset

Favourite thing yesterday: Michal and I went shopping in the Glebe, turned off Bank onto 5th Ave, and right in front of us saw the most stunning sunset. The sky was a luminescent pink, the colour of the polished inside of a seashell, and the snow glowed from the reflected light. I know it is hokey but it took our breath away. There is something about city sunsets: you're in the city and you forget how spectacular natural beauty can be and then there it is piercing through everything--the houses, the telephone wires, the street, the mailboxes--this glowing brilliant pink. It deepened as we walked and was so surprising that in fact people were stopping in the street, pointing, and saying, look at that.

I thought I'd look on the list and see if there were any mentions of sunsets and, sure enough, there was one. Here is one of Maddy's favourite things (in her category of "favourite overlooks/views"): Height of Land in the Rangeley Lakes Region (Maine) at sunset.

While I have seen many sunsets there is one that I remember more vividly than all the others. I was seventeen, travelling with a friend through Europe, and we were in Oban, Scotland, looking across to the isle of Mull. The sun was a brilliant ever-deepening orange but I think what struck me the most were the angular hills lined up like cards, one behind the other, each a different shade of dark. I can remember eating fish and chips wrapped in newspaper and staring in stunned wonder at the brilliance and depth of the light in contrast to those dark gradated hills.

overnight hut in the gatineau & Steve's tahini and gomasio

(Not quite) favourite thing from two days ago: staying overnight at a hut in the Gatineau. It was "not quite," however, because Michal was sick and so I had to stay home with her while Joel went with Ben and our friends. It is one of my favourite things, though, and I want to mention it here so that others will know about this too. It's great to ski or snowshoe into the hut in the dark, to arrive and make a fire, to eat and drink wine, and then to sleep in the stillness of the woods. We do it every year and I was really sorry to miss it this year.

(I just noticed that the friends with whom Joel went to the cabin, Rob and Monique, have listed as one of their five favourite things: "Skiing under the starry skies." Little did I know that when we do this with them every year we are right up there in the "top five" of best things!)

Steve was here this weekend and he introduced us to one of his favourite things (not on his list, however): homemade tahini. This is how you do it:

get a bag of brown sesame seeds

soak them in water overnight

rinse them in the morning

toast them at 250 degrees until they dry (about 30 mins maybe) and then an additional 20 mins until they're golden brown

grind in a food processor (we have a mini one that is easy for this)

remove some for gomasio (just add salt to slightly ground sesame seeds and you have it!)

grind the rest of the seeds completely

add flax seed oil and salt

it's delicious!

We ate the entire jar this weekend and so Steve made us some more before he returned to Toronto this morning.

my macbook air & techie things

This afternoon I spilled an entire cup of tea on my keyboard. I did this once before about 15 years ago and it was a disaster; I have my fingers crossed that this time, after my computer dries, my computer will work. (And I'm now using all the willpower I have not to turn it on before the "drying time" of two days--some websites say two weeks!--is up.) Right now I'm typing on Ben's computer (which is to say: Joel's old computer, and then Michal's old computer, and now Ben's)--it does not feel like mine.

But this accident did make me think of Heidegger's ready-at-hand and present-to-hand. We aren't always aware of things we use every day until they break or go missing at which point they become present to us. You don't usually notice the sidewalk you're walking along, for example, until you come to a pothole and then you're suddenly very aware of the ground beneath your feet. Ditto my computer. It's gone (for two days, possibly forever) and I'm instantly aware that it is one of the most crucial, necessary, go-to material things in my world.

When I bought my macbook air, almost a year ago to the day, I thought it would be a travel computer; I would use it for conferences and research and to and from the university. But I would still work on my "main" (bigger, better) laptop at home. But my new computer quickly displaced my old computer: it went everywhere with me (so light! so convenient! so functional!) and the few times I travelled with it and the battery died, I felt bereft.

All of this has also made me think of the category of favourite things and computers and tech items in general. I would never have included my computer on a list of favourite things despite my obvious bond with it. Why? Partly, because it is replaceable. When the tea spilled I was distressed mainly because of the time factor (lost time, lost work) and not because of the loss of the thing (this calmness stems from my confidence--I hope not ill-founded--that I have a back-up even though Joel is disconcertingly uncertain about how we access it). But still, one of my favourite things, is my computer, even if I wouldn't include it on a list. In fact, no one included any tech things on the list. No smart phones. No computers. No ipods. (Or rather, I'm pretty sure that no one did; I can't know for sure because that info is on my tea-sodden computer--another example of its indispensability.) Is it because they're replaceable? Is it because tech things and favourite things are somehow at odds?

UPDATE: after waiting the requisite 2 days, my computer (miraculously) works again!

fresh flowers & flower gardens and flowers as food

My favourite thing today: fresh flowers in general, freesias in particular. It's 2 March, the snow is still deep, the wind chill was -19, and yet still I could buy flowers.
And here are some of your references to flowers from the list. One of Peter G's favourite things: "watching our vegetable/flower garden grow." Given the snow and the cold, I will have to wait awhile for this. Although I remember the first year I planted tulip bulbs and I was so amazed when their tiny green sprouts began to show. I felt like a genius--as if I'd made them myself. And here's Danny on flowers: "Favorite Salad Condiment: Nasturtiums: Season your next salad with nasturtium flowers from your hanging plants on the porch. They add a mildly peppery taste to your salad, plus texture and color. You can then try other edible flowers, among them carnations and squash blossoms."

finishing things & work (or lack of)

Yesterday's favourite thing was finishing projects--one large and one small--for two deadlines I had. It was very satisfying to feel, okay, now that is done. And something I need to remind myself of: so often I delay finishing, holding out for when things feel finished (which, of course, they never do!). The only reason yesterday's projects were finished, in fact, was because they both had inflexible, externally imposed deadlines.

An interesting detail from the list: very few people noted anything at all that was work-related.

Update: I was going through the list today and noticed an entry from Michal--my own daughter!--that I'd previously overlooked: "Finishing an assignment or report for school and knowing I did really well on it."

beauty & a blog

Since I mentioned two of my own favourite things the day before yesterday, today I'm going to note two favourite things from the list.

First: beauty. Suzy's favourite painting: Landscape with the Fall of Icarus, circa 1555 by Pieter Bruegel the Elder.

Second: a blog. Ted's favourite blog is: http://www.kottke.org/

This blog has the added bonus of noting its own favourite things in the "About" section: "My favorite font right now is Whitney by Hoefler & Frere-Jones. . . . One of my favorite things is that, for a moment after you dip your toe in, you can't tell the difference between really hot water and really cold water." (I assume that this is the font he likes.)

vinyl cafe (and public radio) & the dead

Today's favourite thing: listening to Vinyl Cafe on the radio as I made my lunch. It made me laugh out loud. It also reminded me of how returning home after visiting another country is so often captured by listening to favourite radio shows and hearing the announcer's familiar voice. (I should note that most people I know are not as enthusiastic about Vinyl Cafe as I am--I don't think they know what they're missing. But if you're tempted to listen, you can get the show as a podcast here--it's called "Razor's Edge.")

Another pleasure of returning home was waking up this morning to a light snowfall. And this reminded me of one of Peter's T's favourite things: James Joyce's "The Dead." Here is the conclusion to that story (which is even more powerful if you've read what comes before needless to say): "A few light taps upon the pane made him turn to the window. It had begun to snow again. He watched sleepily the flakes, silver and dark, falling obliquely against the lamplight. The time had come for him to set out on his journey westward. Yes, the newspapers were right: snow was general all over Ireland. It was falling on every part of the dark central plain, on the treeless hills, falling softly upon the Bog of Allen and, farther westward, softly falling into the dark mutinous Shannon waves. It was falling, too, upon every part of the lonely churchyard on the hill where Michael Furey lay buried. It lay thickly drifted on the crooked crosses and headstones, on the spears of the little gate, on the barren thorns. His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead."

lamb and flag passage & kazbar

Favourite thing today: (I'm resisting the desire to name a fat volume entitled 29 pamphlets as my favourite thing today [not to mention yesterday's two(!) volumes of pamphlets (tied together with a string; bound with marbled paper and leather) in the British library]) and instead noting Lamb and Flag Passage for the Britishness of it (Lamb and Flag? a passage that emerged almost out of nowhere and took me exactly where I wanted to go). Here's a picture:

I'm departing from my usual practice of consulting the list for a second favourite thing and instead giving another of my own: Kazbar restaurant. I mentioned this back in the fall when I listed my five favourite restaurants little knowing that I would actually go to this restaurant this year. It lived up to my expectations. It's a tapas place with very vegetarian friendly tapas, a great atmosphere, and good drinks. I went with Richard and Luisa and Daniel (who fell asleep about 15 minutes after arriving) and it was wonderful and relaxing and indulgent to eat, drink wine, and talk after an intensive work week.

And, last but not least: hearing Michal's voice on my cellphone tonight.

music & crossing bridges

Favourite thing today: stepping into a church on my walk from Paddington Station to the British Library and hearing music. A pianist and violinist were practicing at the front of the church for a concert that was happening later that day. I was all alone. The church was large but not too large. And their music filled it in a melancholy, moving way that was very beautiful.

And today I almost did something from the five-favourite things list. Here's the description of the favourite thing from Richard T: "Crossing bridges, especially over rivers in major cities. Always makes my heart take a little leap, no matter how many times I have done it. Crossing the Seine, Hudson, Thames, or even the St. Laurent connects me in a tranquil way to a hectic/crazy city. Brings out the beauty, accentuates the architecture, and is a link to a by-gone age, where the river was the raison-d'etre of why the city was established there. It also connects to a wider theme of connections, moving from one place in life to another, and bringing different people together. My favourite bridges are the Hungerford, between Charing Cross and Waterloo Stations, and the Millennium Bridge between the Tate Modern and St. Paul's. The views in all directions from both bridges are very special indeed. Plus, there are no cars!"

Last night I looked at a map and realized that, given time constraints, I wouldn't be able to visit either of these bridges (or the Tate, the second item on Richard T's list). But then the day was so tantalizing when I took my lunch break--there was SUN!, there were cherry blossoms!--and I decided to see how I could get. I got as far as Blackfriar's Bridge (and crossed it, just to cross a bridge--I love this category of favourite thing-- and will never see bridges in quite the same way again). Blackfriars's Bridge was beautiful; there's a wide wide sidewalk and an alarming low low railing and, alas, cars. Now I need to return to London sometime soon to experience those pedestrian bridges.