Well, kind of. I might be coming back to freelance a day or two a week. But it's my penultimate day as a full-time employee, not an independent contractor.

Basically I wanted to take the chance to use "penultimate" correctly.

That is all.

Stumbled across this yesterday. Apparently I've been doing it wrong all this time.

Helpful video from Lifehacker.

Unfortunately, it's still winter and I won't be able to wear lace-up shoes for some time yet (and my boots are slip-ons) but I tried this technique on my bathrobe belt and it totally works! Better living through interwebs! A while back I posted a video showing how to fold a fitted sheet (I still get a kick out of that on laundry day - it works every time!) that finally made me feel like a grown-up. I feel like knowing how to make the reef knot instead of the granny knot is a similar development.

If anyone has any other cool videos or tutorials for stuff that we're all supposed to know how to do by now (but maybe can't do as well as we might), send 'em my way!

ETA: If the Lifehacker video didn't satisfy all your shoelace tying (not to mention lacing) needs, check out Ian's Shoelace Site. (Is it sad that I'm super excited to try out Straight Lacing and Over Under Lacing on my Converse look-alikes?

There are Montreal-style bagels (or a reasonable facsimile) to be found in Tokyo! Hurray!

Poko Bagel Café (Japanese-only site). They were talking about them on the CBC this morning, although they only said it was "in Tokyo". Um, Tokyo is a huge, sprawling metropolis. (Specifically, it is in Minato-ku, near the harbour.) Anyway, apparently the taste is pretty good although they made them look a bit too uniformly round (more like NY-style bagels) to appeal to Japanese consumers. At least I will not be totally bereft of delicious Montreal-style bagels if I'm living in Tokyo.

Okay, so I don't care that winter "officially" starts Dec. 21st. This morning it was -19 C with a wind chill of -29. That's winter in my book. Also, owing to toque issues, I have started crocheting myself a slouchy winter hat which I hope won't crush my hard-won curls flat against my head in quite the same manner. Naturally, I picked a chunky, poufy yarn that's extremely difficult to see the stitches in. Here's hoping I finish the hat before going blind! Haha.

All the H1N1 panic appears to have died down quite a bit (at least, I haven't been hearing about it quite so much) so I thought now would be a good time to get some opinions on the whole H1N1 vaccine thing. I keep going back and forth on the "Should I get it, should I not get it" issue. So far a number of my coworkers and three of my friends have got it, and a number of other coworkers and friends refuse to get it. I'm still pretty on the fence, although unless something drastic impels me to get it I'll probably end up not getting it out of sheer inertia.

Poll #1500195
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 3

Have you yet/do you plan to get the H1N1 shot?

So let's hear your opinions! I hope I put in a broad enough range of options, but if I've overlooked anything feel free to mention it in a comment. Also in case anyone ends up on either far end of the spectrum please be nice to each other.

In other news, I've started reading All Japanese All the Time and I've been really inspired. (Note: you can use this method with any other language, too.) I have a ton of Japanese tv shows and some movies on DVD, as well as a modest (but growing, I hope) collection of Japanese-language books and manga, so I definitely want to try to build myself more of an immersion environment, even if I don't end up doing it 18-24 hours a day the way Khatzumoto suggests. I think the hardest thing will be to cut down the time I spend reading and watching TV in English in favour of Japanese. On the subject, if anyone knows any good, Japanese-language webcomics I could add to my Google Reader (to painlessly increase my daily Japanese input) suggestions are welcome! I'm starting my Christmas holidays as of tomorrow afternoon and I'm resolved to start sitting down with Heisig and learning Kanji (I'm hoping 16 days at, say, 25/day will get me into the habit, even if I have to cut down to 12 or 15 a day once work starts again, at least until March.) The plan is to be kanji-literate, or mostly so, by the end of July so that I won't have to blunder around Japan relying solely on kana and romaji and the kindness of strangers. がんばりまーす！

Last night I dreamt that I was smoking crack with James Spader, and I accidentally set his headboard on fire. Make of that what you will, Freudians.

Was weirdly restless this afternoon, so I went for a walk. It's definitely fall. I was walking right around sunset; the light was almost purple and the smell of wood smoke was in the air and even though the trees are only just starting to change colours you could tell that fall is here. There's something weirdly melancholy about fall; it seems like a time of death, or at least hibernation. Summer and its infinite promise is over and you know that winter is coming ever closer. Graham of Tokyo Police Club once blogged that he always found fall very romantic, and I guess I could see that if you have someone, but I think if you're single fall is quite depressing. Fall and winter are the times when you want to nest and stay at home and cuddle under the blankets with someone, and if you don't have anyone you're just at home alone under a blanket. Le sigh.

In other news, I've been having major boy cravings lately. It's kind of a problem. I think I've finally figured out why, though; I went off the pill a couple of months ago and I'm now ovulating again for the first time in like ten years. I'd kind of forgotten what it's like. (Definitely high time to stop with the synthetic hormones, methinks.) But man, hormones fuck you up. Also I think it's pretty unfortunate that the pill that makes it safe to have lots of sex without getting pregnant makes you want sex less, and once you can get pregnant all of a sudden it's "Hey, you know what would be good right now? Sex." Not fair, I say. (Of course, that's why God invented condoms. No babies + sex drive. Yay!)

Okay, weird subject line but I discovered something awesome yesterday that seriously makes me feel like a grown-up for the first time. I'm not exactly full-on domestic goddess (although my love of sewing and crocheting and the like probably puts me ahead of a lot of my friends) but one thing that has always, always frustrated me is how to fold fitted sheets. Particularly since I finally replaced most of my old sheets that we ordered from Sears ages ago and the new ones all seem to be gathered all the way around as opposed to the old ones that were only gathered at the corners and flat in between. They never seemed to submit to the folding technique that (sort of) worked with the old ones, and I'll confess to some episodes of just balling them up hopelessly and shoving them into the closet ("Away! Away, demon sheets!"). But I finally found a technique that works. I came across this video yesterday afternoon. I happened to have sheets sitting in the laundry basket waiting to be folded and for the first time I was excited to go home and try folding my sheets. And it worked! My fitted sheet is now neatly folded and sitting primly on the shelf in my closet. I feel like June Cleaver or something! Next stop, vacuuming in heels and a frilly apron. (Okay, not really.)

But since I love you all out there in LJ-land, I will share this fantastic video with you. (I can't be the only twenty-something who couldn't fold a fitted sheet, can I?)


The full blog entry (explaining the cute kids and the 90s soundtrack) can be found here.

Also: I happened across this today and wow, is it ever inspiring. Not so much the actual content of the food (the concept of a Cobb salad is both full of some of the most indigestible things on my list and generally unappetizing to me, and her fear of carbs and anti-vegetarian position offend me; my stomach needs carbs, lots of 'em, or bad things happen, and yes, honestly, I don't like meat) but the concept and execution is amazing. I particularly loved the reimagining of the Jello shots. Those were the most elegant thing I've ever seen. Must try! I love Hypnotiq so that blue one looked amazing. Also I'd love to get some of those soy sheets and some strawberries and red bean paste and make concepty daifuku. Mmm, daifuku.

Going to dinner tonight, tentatively at a new ramen place in Chinatown. I don't necessarily expect authenticity although it would be nice. Ramen-ya is tasty but I don't usually order the ramen because it's not as silky smooth and delicious as the ramen I had in Japan and that makes me a little sad. (Also their zaru soba is soo delicious so I must have it! Om nom nom...) It's seriously almost impossible to find a recipe for ramen noodles. I've found only one and it uses eggs (real ramen noodles, or chuukamen, have no eggs; they're yellow from specific minerals present in the mineral water they're made with). I'd like to attempt it one day, so if anybody has an actual ramen noodle recipe, help a gal out.

Created by The Oatmeal

Totally zonked today because I stayed out late last night to play Monopoly. Already written one terrible pun today. More will undoubtedly follow.

Finally starting to feel better after a rather nasty cold. Tonight there's a hangout planned with the gang to celebrate my recovery by watching Wallace and Gromit and eating cookies, which sounds about my speed, really.

Woke up from an extremely weird dream this morning, am now somewhat disgruntled. It was a dream about Benny (remember him? the object of my University years' love/lust, whom I never see or talk to or even think about anymore, really, except when my subconscious dredges him up every so often. Yeah, that Benny) which are always sort of awkward to begin with, but this one was particularly bizarre. In it, my parents and I went for dinner at his parents' (and possibly his?) house, which was in the same suburb as I live in. His father had a very strong Eastern European accent and kept offering us sausages and doughnuts and stuff. I was quite surprised that Benny was there, as I hadn't expected him to be (for some reason, although I think I knew it was his parents' house) and we started talking and catching up. He ended up giving me this really cool sort of combination chainmail/metal plate ... okay I don't even know the word but those things that go around your wrist, over the back of your hand, and then attach over your finger? Not a glove, pretty medieval-looking... Anyway. And instead of just having a ring to go over the middle finger, his had a whole like armored finger-cover that came to a point. Very goth-chic. Anyway, in my dream I remembered him wearing this thing all the time in uni (which he never did, of course) and he gave it to me. Except that at some point he had glued or otherwise attached a huge handlebar moustache to it. Seriously, what has my subconscious been smoking? And he showed me this really nice chainmail ring and was like "This is from when I almost broke up with [gf name here]" and anyway throughout the whole of our conversation I never actually found out if he was single or not, which was annoying. Coy bastard.

So yeah, very weird on a number of counts (not even considering moustachioed jewellery) since a: Benny is from Toronto and may be living there now for all I know, but is almost certainly not living in the burbs of Montreal, b: he's of Irish descent, not the child of Eastern-European immigrants, c: I know that his dad passed away before I even met him and d: I shouldn't even be thinking about this guy in the first place, since he does bad things to my head. Aargh. Luckily for me, my boss called this morning while I was FB-stalking him, debating about whether or not to add him as a friend, returning me to sanity. If I ever do add him as a friend (and he's a cool guy, it's not his fault I fixate on him) it'll have to be when I no longer get so worked up thinking about him.

I made the awesomest mac and un-cheese last night. I like to play around with the Minute-Man Cheese Sauce recipe from the Uncheese Cookbook, since it's quick to make and doesn't require cooking, and last night I think I found a really nice combination. The basic recipe involves nutritional yeast flakes, tahini, ketchup, salt and water, and then you can add other things to play around with the flavours and stuff. (If  you, like me, can't do dairy and miss cheese, I highly recommend the Uncheese Cookbook.) I've attempted using miso, and for a while I was using hot mustard, but last night I added extra ketchup, garlic powder and a sprinkle of ground chipotle (and also used a little less tahini than usual) and omg it was frickin' awesome. I am so in love with my ground chipotle stuff, I've started putting it in everything. It's so smokey and delicious! I was going to add some cut up chicken hotdogs to stretch it a little and add some protein but by the time the sauce and the pasta was ready I was like, I'm too hungry to heat and slice hotdogs! OM NOM NOM. I have the leftovers for lunch today. :D

I should probably not be writing this now as I have a lovely eye-strainy headache of the stabbing pain above my right eye variety, but I'm bored, oh well. And I have twenty more minutes until I can go home and enjoy the lovely weather we are finally having.

Speaking of going home, yesterday I was leaving a few minutes before everyone else and I was suddenly overcome with a powerful urge to yell "Fuck all y'all, I'm going home!" I didn't, of course, because a: I don't want to get fired and b: I'm not Southern and I really can't make that sound the way it did in my head. (Seriously, I tried later on and my beige Canadianness just made it sound lame.) But it set me wondering where these weird little destructive impulses come from. I think we all have them - that little voice that suggests the perfect thing to say to a boss or a teacher that will be satisfying for the second and a half before all hell breaks loose, or that thought of "What if I stepped off this metro platform when the train is coming" or "What if I jumped off this extremely tall building/cliff" etc. They are (in most cases) things that we have no trouble actually stopping ourselves from doing, but why is there a part of our brain considering it in the first place?

In other news, interesting things are happening. I've pretty much decided I'm going to apply to JET for next year, which means that if all goes according to plan, this time next year I'll be moving to Japan. I'm still a little freaked out at the prospect but I've decided to just keep talking about it until it sounds real and doable and not pants-shittingly scary. And I know that if I ever actually want to get into translation then my Japanese needs to be way better than it is now and that's only going to happen with a couple years of actually living in Japan.

Also my random greenification without actually doing it on purpose continues! I've decided to go off the pill, since I've been on it for nearly ten years (Shit, really? Dude, I feel old.) and I haven't been "needing" it for the past few and I'm kind of interested to see what my body's like without chemical interventions. Also <a href="http://todgertalk.blogspot.com">Todger Talk</a> said something about it messing with your sense of smell so that you end up in relationships with people who have incompatible pheromones, so that when you eventually go off the pill you're like "This guy's repulsive! What was I thinking?" and for some reason this had a greater effect on me than all the blood clot, stroke, cancer, etc. etc. stats. (Incidentally Todger Talk is the most awesome and hilarious sex blog I've found recently, check it out if you get a chance.) So yeah. I'm still technically on the "rest" period so my body doesn't technically know I'm off the pill yet I guess, but as of Sunday I will be pill-free. (I was doing some research and one woman said her body was so messed up she didn't get a period for A YEAR after she went off the pill, I hope it won't come to that as I would get extremely paranoid, not that there's been any hanky-panky going on, but that would be the time it would happen, wouldn't it?) Also, I have a mysterious plan that involves Batman in my pants. More details to follow (I hope).

Yay, time to go home! Have a good weekend, kids.

What's up you guys. I think I am somewhat less tired today, hurray! I found out that I am not anemic but that my "iron stores", whatever that means, are low so I've been trying to bump up my iron consumption by eating more spinach and cruciferous vegetables and similar. I just had the most virtuous lunch I think I've ever packed - brown rice, spinach and eggplant. I know, right? In fact, it was pretty damn tasty and I couldn't even finish all the rice. Also I've started taking this rather odious tea that one of our many books on natural health etc. recommended for anemia (yellow dock root, if you're interested) although I was trying it brewed at medicinal strength and it seemed to be irritating my stomach a bit, so I took a break for 3 days and yesterday I tried it again brewed at normal drinking strength and so far so good. I got a pamphlet about iron for "teenage girls" from the doctor as well, and it seemed rather suspicious (emphasizing how important it is to eat heme iron from animal sources, especially beef, which is "leaner and more nutritious than you might think", because it's easier absorbed than non-heme; having only one tiny bullet point for what to do if you eat no animal products) and then I turned it over and saw that it's published by the Beef Information Centre. Niiiice. I know doctors don't really have to learn anything about nutrition but you'd think they could give out more balanced (i.e. not blatant beef industry propaganda) information in their offices. Oh well. Since I attempted to eat a tiny bit of beef after I heard that I had low iron and ended up with stomach cramps I think I'll stick to my non-heme sources.

Tonight I'm going for (if my calculations are correct) my penultimate laser hair removal treatment. I'm not completely sure that all the hair will be gone after two more treatments, but I've definitely noticed a huge improvement and if I have to buy another session or two as a sort of touch-up I don't mind too much. Last time I was all cocky because it was hurting less and less as the sessions progressed (the more hair you have, the more it hurts) and I was like, oh, this'll be the easiest yet, and then they went and jacked up the laser and I was like "Holy crap, ow!" or actually I was like "Seigneur!" because the technicians are all francophone, so I always end up in French mode and end up wanting to do my swearing in French, which is kind of weird when you think about it. Oh well. Anyway. So this time I'm expecting it to hurt a lot because I'm pretty sure they'll jack the laser up yet more, but I'm sure I can deal with it.

Tomorrow there is a plan for a girls only karaoke night, which I'm excited about. It's been ages since I last did karaoke and it's always hilarious. It's also supposed to be 28º and sunny tomorrow, which definitely beats the current 6º and rainy. (theweathernetwork.com is still rather optimistically maintaining that it'll get up to 20 today but considering that their hourly forecast is saying it should be around 15 or 16 by now, I'm not holding my breath.)