Monday, October 31, 2005

Who says there is no such thing as a free lunch?

Woke up at 9am to get ready for my cab. It was arriving at 11:15. At 11:25 I was starting to worry but Shoshana reminded me that it was time to change the clocks. Shit. I could have slept another hour.... dang.

So we sat around and chit-chatted till my cab arrived. I got to the airport 2 ½ hours early. Checked into Air Canada’s new asinine person-less computer check-in station. WTF? I want to talk to a real person. GIVE ME A REAL PERSON.

So I go the way I think I’m supposed to go and then realize I have no idea where to go...cause I talked to a computer and not a REAL PERSON. I finally tracked down a REAL PERSON and she informed me that my flight had been cancelled. WHAT?? Not again.

So she didn’t know what to tell me... but told me to go through customs and sit at my gate anyway, and someone there would tell me what was happening. Breezed through customs (wow that was easy) and the Air Canada attendant was fighting with her husband on the phone about custody stuff. “Hi. Can I ask you about my cancelled flight?”

Her finger went up in the air and she waved me away. Nice.... REAL PEOPLE suck.

So she finally helped me. Told me my flight was cancelled and that I would now be on the 4pm. I looked at the clock.. 12 noon. “Super. Would Air Canada like to buy me lunch?” She told me it wasn’t Air Canada’s policy to give out vouchers for anything less then a 5 hour wait but she gave me one anyway...after the lecture.


Wow. What a choice I had. Um.... pita with some grilled veggie.

It was disgusting. This sad sack of a pita plus a bottle of water cost $11. WTF? Thank god my voucher was for $8 or I’d kill somebody.

So here I sit waiting. Waiting. Waiting for my flight.
Dooo dee deee. Bored. Bored. Bored.


4:15. Holy crap. Finally in the air. These long days of sitting in airports are freakin killing me. I bought Steve Martins Novella Shop Girl and I love it. ... but is it ever hard to read in the airport while everyone else murmers. Sigh. I gave up and read a trashy magazine instead.

6:15. Holy crap. Flying over NYC at sunset is so pretty...I couldn’t get any good photos but
I could see all of Manhattan and we passed right over Shea Stadium. What a pretty start to my trip.

Caught a cab. My cab driver didn’t know he could use his break to slow down. It seemed the only speed he knew was fast and faster. *laugh* It was terrifying. I met Gerry at the Ho-Jo and I was soooo happy to see him.

We hopped a cab to Red Bamboo and mmm mmm mmm I ate too much.


BBQ Chicken Wings with a sesame garlic blue “cheese” sauce.


Breaded Fish Sticks served with Vegan Tartar sauce.




Gerry orderd a Philly Cheese Steak.


I ordered Butterfly Soy Chops which are lightly breaded soy “pork” served with fresh apple raisin sauce, collard greens with veggie ham and sweet corn mashed potatoes.


We ate WAY too much. *laugh*

Time for bed... I am so bushed.
Later

Sunday, October 30, 2005

whirlwind

YIKES
What a full day of playing catch-up.

I caught up on all the work I had to do on Friday, but missed cause I was in Regina. Then I got to hang out at GrassRoots and hang with my peeps.


If you haven’t been to Grassroots before, hop on the subway and check it out. It’s a lovely store full of fantastic stuff and the staff ROCKS!!


I signed books and chit-chatted with everyone. I got to meet Ashlee who made me start crying because she said really sweet things to me. I heart Ashlee!!


Then Holly came by. I gave her a bar of soap at the last cooking demo because she's a dirrrty girl. Read about her experience with me at Grassroots. It's funny.


My friend Lisa came by... I haven’t seen her in probably close to 10 years, so great to catch-up.


And of course Carrie and her Pa showed up. Yippee!


After my book signing, I met up with Andre and Sandra to do a radio interview. We were famished and they had never been to Pulp Kitchen.... so off we went to my fav place in Toronto.


My buddy Sam made us some incredible food.



We taste tested kohlorobi soup. Yummmmm.


And Andre had the Nocci...which I tasted and it was YUM!


I had potato curry and brown rice with a salad... but was so hungry I forgot to take a photo. I also had my favorite Pulp Kitchen dessert which is a fruit wrap thingy with a lavender cream sauce. .... oooooooh. It makes me feel high when I eat it. SO SO yummy.


Andre and Sandra dropped me off at the Buddies in Bad Times theater where I got to watch Shoshana perform. Then we hit a sushi restaurant (somewhere... I have no idea) and we grabbed a couple of avocado and cucumber rolls. Shoshana realized that the entire staff of this Japanese restaurant were speaking Chinese Mandarin. So she spoke to them in Mandarin and they all looked like they had been BUSTED. There was a lot of laughing and blushing. Sooo funny.

Then Sho and I went to bed early. I’m going to NYC tomorrow. NYC BABY!

Friday, October 28, 2005

Up up and away

Up up and away.... in my beautiful my beautiful airplane!!
I’m up! I’m out of here! I’m on my way to TO! Thank goodness.

So I woke up to fog. Lots of fog. I was so afraid the flight was going to be cancelled. Nobody at the airport seemed to know for sure.

This is the view from yesterday.

This is the view from the same window today. *laugh*
I had a nice breakfast of oatmeal and dry toast with jam. Brisdan totally went out of his way for me to make sure I had something to eat for the plane. The restaurant didn’t have many vegetables. (*laugh* That cracks me up. A restaurant without many vegetables...ha ha ha.) He made me a nice sandwich with tomatoes, lettuce, cucumber and an avocado that he purchased for me last night. He bought me an avocado. Come on. What a guy! If anyone lives in Regina and knows Brisdan or hangs out at the Travel Lodge Café and sees him. Tell him he’s a rad guy and I say hi.

So as I sit here The Go-Go’s singing into my earphones and my lap top warming up my lap ... I wonder what Gerry’s doing right now. I think he’s in the air right now as well... on his way to Baltimore to see Seth Ciferri and get a tattoo. I can’t wait to see him!!

Fergus is at the In-Laws and Gerry says he’s pretty stressed out. He took Fergus to the vet because he was worried about him. I’m sort of at a loss.... and Gerry doesn’t have any Rescue Remedy to give to him.

What do you guys do to help your fur-babies deal with stress? Any tips?

THE FOG....

*laugh* *cry* *laugh* *cry*

Woke up to fog. Might not be able to fly out.
More later... cross your fingers.

Thursday, October 27, 2005

Day from hell...

Day from hell.
Maybe not a day from hell... but a hella long day. That’s for sure. Woke up early. Felt great... had a good nights sleep. My leg still hurts like hell. I can hardly walk on it and going up and down stairs is impossible. I can see a bruise coming up, but I think the Arnica is helping. I had a nice breakfast got to the airport early. Used the internet, caught up on some e-mails. Got onto my plane... .sat on the tarmac for 40 minutes. HELLO? Is anyone going to update us?? FINALLY the captain comes on and tell us there is a glitch and they are going to fix it. 20 minutes later... the glitch can’t be fixed so we have to get off the plane and get a new one.

Thank GOD I was in the 4th row... so I only had to wait about 20 minutes for them to reschedule my flight. So they got me on the 3pm flight. Yay. I’ll be in TO by 11pm.

I’m bummed cause I am missing out on Shoshana’s birthday dinner... but at least I’ll be there for dessert.

They gave me a lunch voucher and I headed upstairs to the café with dread in my heart. WTF are they going to have up there? Well... they had a lot of nothing Vegan. I asked the dude if he could make me a vegetable sandwich with whatever veggie they had. He laughed at me and asked me why? I explained I was a strict vegetarian... so this is what I got.

It wasn’t bad. Wasn’t good... but wasn’t bad.

They also had a little store beside the café that had hand-crafted items by Saskatchewan artists. Nice stuff. I bought a pretty pair of earrings by Megan J. Hazel (no website...wassup with that?). Saskatchewan is rich with artists... I rag on this city a lot... but it’s a pretty cool. For Regina. *laugh* Now I’m wishing I had more time here so I could do some more exploring...

Internal Dialog: What am I saying? Don’t wish that!!

So I sat at my gate and thank GOD the airport has wireless internet. 3pm rolled around and they made an announcement for everyone on my new flight to come back down to the ticket counter (insert scary music here).

My flight was cancelled. Again. Next flight? Tomorrow. Ugh.
So they gave me more vouchers and sent me to the Travel Lodge in the South End. My old stomping grounds.

My hotel looks over the parking lot and I am RIGHT beside the Burger King that I used to hang out at. My room smells like burning animal flesh.

I called my Dad and met him to go for dinner. We hit a lovely restaurant called Michi and they even had little tiny carrot icons beside everything that was veggie/vegan friendly. That’s more like it! My food was good and I was SO hungry I forgot to take a photo...
I was going to see my Dad’s play again, but I’m so wiped that I decided to head back to the hotel and sleep. Hugged my dear old Paw-paw and headed to the mall to call a cab.

The Cornwall Center (or Corn-hole as we used to call it) was my hang. When I wasn’t at the theater, I was in the corn-hole hanging out with my peeps. The mall is exactly the same. *laugh* I guess malls don’t change much.

This is where me and my peeps would hang out and make fun of people and smoke cigarettes (smoking is bad. Don’t do it) and stare at boys and wished we were pretty like all the skinny blonde girls (we were, we just had no confidence) and just hang out

Had a cup of tea in the hotel and met the restaurant manager, Brisden. Who used to be Veggie and ran a veggie restaurant in BC before he moved here to be with his daughter. Nice dude. He’s gonna make me a special breakfast tomorrow. Ya for VFP’s!!! ( Veggie Friendly Peeps).

So I’m off to the airport. Bad things always happen to me in threes. I hurt my leg. The plane ride was cancelled. Let’s hope the lucky penny I found on the road will keep me safe.



Oh Regina....

Getting up at 5am makes me cranky... the flight from Van to Regina wasn’t long... but holy mother of crap was ever tired.


Watching the mountains melt into flatlands is really amazing.

What’s more amazing is trying to remember what it was like to live somewhere so flat. I always forget how f-n flat it is here. *laugh* You can watch your dog run away for 3 days... they say. Ahh Saskatchewan. Saskatchewan. There’s no place like Saskatchewan.

My girlfriend Leslie(of 30 years) picked me up and we drove to our old highschool. What an out of body experience it is to visit your old school. So weird. I can’t even explain it, but when the bell rang I got goose pimples. *laugh*

I went to the school to visit with my favorite teacher... say hello and give him a copy of LDV. What a lovely man he is. Even remembered who I was... and I graduated 20 years ago. *yikes* I guessI kind of stuck out from all the rest.
**Please take note of the AMAZING pink stole that Claire made me. It's hot!! Wait till you see my muff! :)

Then Leslie and I went back to her house and we had some homemade chili she made me from HIAV (what a good friend) and then we hopped in the car and headed down to The Globe to see my Dad’s play.

The theater has changed quite a bit since the last time I was there. New foyer, new bathrooms, the offices are on a different floor now... but the theater is still the same. It's a theater in the round, if you're a little confused. This is my childhood people!! I grew up here watching actors act and directors direct and watching my Mum and Dad take care of it all.

My Dad was phenomenal. What a powerhouse of an actor he is... He works mostly in film and tv now... but when he’s on stage he’s just a superstar. It was such a treat to see him in this show and to watch him kill. He just killed and the audience gave him a well deserved standing-o.

Hopped into bed and woke up ready to hit the airport and get to Toronto. I can’t wait to see Shoshana and celebrate her birthday.

Vancouver to Regina

So the bus (that I took across on the ferry) drops you off in Vancouver at the Train/Bus station.

As I pulled into the station I realized that it is the anniversary of my moving to BC. Holy crap. 18 years goes by fast.

So I got ready for the Fanny show. Made Rene’s Tomato Soup cake and garnished it with slivered almonds and banana chips. Got it all pretty for the show.
You do know that most cooking on tv is fake? Right? I pretend to make something then pull this baby out and wow the audience. Show business is all fake... but I love it. :)

So I get to the studio in the morning. More like the crack of morning... ugh. So early. Janice my trusty PR lady picked me up at 7:45am and drove me to the studio where they informed me they didn’t want me to do a cooking demo. Fanny just wanted to TALK to me. Yikes. I was not mentally prepared for that. I had been practicing in my head all the things I normally say when I do a cooking demo.

I was on the show with Red Robinson a local personality who I thought was dead... but was very pleased to see that he wasn’t.
The show went well... I think. I haven’t watched the video yet. I’m too scared. But Fanny gave a great interview and she made me feel right at home. I think I probably waved my hands around too much (I always do) but I think it went ok.
I totally forgot to plug Claire’s website because we were talking about Vegan products. Sorry Claire. I even had the pink stole (photos of me wearing it soon...) she made me on my lap... so I could talk about it. Ugh. I’m so sorry. So all of you reading this, go to her website and buy something to make up for my guffaw. *laugh* Or e-mail her and say hi.

So after Fanny’s show Janice drove me to the airport and I hopped a plane for Regina Saskatchewan. Or as we used to call it when we were kids "Vagina Sask-scratch-your-bum". My home town. My father is in a production at The Globe Theater and I don’t get to see him act on stage very often any more... so on my way to TO, Janice got me a flight to Regina. I’m only there for 17 hours. *laugh* Thank god. Hopefully I won’t bump into any old boyfriends. Yikes.

OH! And I forgot to tell you the best and worst part of my day.

First was when Janice picked me up from the train station, I took the baggage cart back to the sidewalk. I don’t know what happened, but I hit the curb and the cart bounced back and hit me on the leg so hard, that tears sprung into my eyes and I fell to the ground. I bashed the bone HARD! It was horrible. I hobbled back to the car... put ice and Arnica on my leg and woke up the next day to find that I can hardly walk. I’m going to see a doctor in Toronto (yay medicare) if it doesn’t start to feel any better soon. I am hurting for certain.

So that really wasn’t the best. The best was going into Capers to buy a sandwich for my plane trip to Regina (airlines don’t serve food anymore for some reason) and this woman grabbed me and hugged me and thanked me for writing the books. She said I’ve changed her life and she loves me. WOW! What a nice thing to have happen completely out of the blue.

Now for Regina. Wish me luck...

How can I leave??

So before I left town I got a chance to see Brian’s new movie called “Dead Inside”. Holy crap it gave me nightmares.


I then took Mr.Fergus to the beach for one last long walk before I leave town.


Willows Beach in Oak Bay is one of my favorite dog walking beaches. It’s about 45 minutes from one end to the other and by the time we get back to the car, Fergus is pooped and my head is clear and I feel fantastic.


Then I got ready to leave. Good lord... how can I leave my family again? This time I’m gone for 18 days. I think that’s the longest I’ve ever been gone. Fergus will be at the In-laws while Gerry is with me in NYC. I hope little Fergus doesn’t miss me too much. Poor baby.


As I stood at the bus depot
and said my good-byes... I decided that when I get back into town I’m going to do a “this is my Victoria” update for you all.

Victoria is such a neat city... and you can do city stuff or you can drive for 10 minutes and end up at the forest or the lake.

So when I get back I’m gonna do that. But let’s start with the ferry, shall we.

Victoria is on Vancouver Island and you gotta either fly, swim or take a ferry to get to the mainland. Being a local, I am soooo bored of taking the ferry, but I realized that when I first moved here it was quite a lot of fun and really beautiful. The ferry food sucked and the ferry itself wasn’t that great... but the view is always spectacular. You drive slowly by a bunch of the islands before you hit Vancouver island.

You can walk onto the ferry or ride your bike or take a bus. Driving is the most expensive way to cross over... but having a car is always handy. So first you have to wait in line to get on the ferry.
Sometimes the ferry is full, so you have to wait for the next sailing. In the summer, it’s fine. They run every hour. But in the winter it sucks... cause they are every other hour... so it can be a drag waiting with nothing to do, so always pack a deck of cards.


The ferry used to be pretty sparce, with a small store that sold candy and magazines. Now the ferry is tip-top (**It should be... it costs enough to get on**) and they have a large book/magazine shop that carries all sorts of reading materials and trinkets to buy and most importantly they carry HIAV and GOV. Haven’t seen LDV yet... but I’m sure they’ll carry it soon.

They also now have large TV’s for watching. The kids area is the best because they show kids movies and have sound. If you can deal with rug-rats, it beats watching the news channel in the other tv areas. The mute button is on and you have to read along.... who likes to read when the watch tv? Not me.

The ferry has a large cafeteria that has changed quite a bit over the years... thank god. There used to be hardly anything for Vegans except for fries, salad and juice.

But now they carry lovely salads and veggie chili, veggie burgers and soy milk.

I was really impressed with my salad. Cranberries! YUM!

And lastly... the view.
You can sit inside or sit on the deck and watch beautiful BC pass you by. It was really foggy the day I took the ferry... so this photo isn’t great.... but you get the idea. Trees. Ocean. Etc. Nature... it’s good.
So as I sit on the ferry eating my delish salad I am on my way to the Fanny Kifer show. I hope it goes well... I haven’t done TV in a while and I get a little nervous sometimes.