poll: grocery shopping?

My Life In A Nutshell updated
Waiting For Frodo updated

Gorgeous day in Toronto yesterday. I decided to take yesterday off; my original plan had been to do some work, but I don't want to slip into my old habits of feeling compelled to work all the time and thus feeling guilty whenever I'm not, AND that sometimes I need to purposely take (*gasp) an entire day off.

Jeff had to work all day (he had already taken Friday off to go skiing with Sara), so I decided to explore the Kensington Market and Chinatown area on my own. Despite the fact that I've been living in or near Toronto all my life, I had never visited Kensington Market, an ethnic marketplace area packed with interesting little shops selling everything from vintage clothing to cheese to Chinese herbs to fresh seafood and produce.


I bought a freshly baked potato and cheese and broccoli bagel in Kensington Market and a mango bubble tea in Chinatown for lunch. Ok, I know I made fun of bubble tea back in January, but I confess that I kind of like it now. The little tapioca balls are gross but have an addictive texture mixed in with the flavoured drink. Mango's my favourite so far. I'm still working up my nerve to try chocolate bubble tea sometime.

Whenever I visit Chinatown, the shopkeepers inevitably speak Chinese (or maybe Korean, I can't tell) to me. I've generally found it easier just to smile blankly instead of trying to explain (over the crowd noise) that I only speak English. Reminded me of our visit to Japan, when the same sort of thing happened...I could generally blend into the crowd until I opened up my mouth and said something, immediately identifying myself as an outsider.

Picked up some smoked apple cheddar (my favourite cheese since discovering it at the St. Lawrence Market earlier this year) at the shop below:





Wonderful cheese shop, packed with every kind of cheese imaginable. Generous with taste samples, too, if you were curious about a particular kind of cheese.

Walked home via a bustling Queen Street, browsing the craft stands of some of the street vendors, listening to a guitarist singing a tantalizingly familiar folk tune. LOTS of great people-watching opportunities, and it was also interesting to compare the Queen St. crowd (more tourist-types, trendy chic, younger) to the Kensington Market (ethnic diversity, more grocery bags...people out to buy, not just look).

In the late afternoon (after a vigorous nap), I headed out to the St. Lawrence Market area for some ground beef; I'm making shepherd's pie for dinner tonight; my sister's family and my dad are visiting. I'm sure there were good meat shops in the Kensington Market area, but for some reason I only found the following:





As happy as the meat inside might have been, I decided to buy my ground beef from a place I was more familiar with. And this brings us to today's poll question:

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POLL:
Grocery shopping habits?

Do you enjoy grocery shopping? Do you take a list, or do you prefer to shop on impulse? Do you do one massive shopping every week or so, or just shop as you need things? Do you shop with your partner, or do you prefer shopping alone? Do you shop mainly by price, or by brand? Do you prefer shopping in mega supermarkets, or little shops? Do you tend to always shop in the same place? Have you ever done your grocery shopping online?

Answer in Blatherchat

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Jeff and I went to Fune for dinner with his family last night. It was Brittany's first time at a sushi restaurant! She liked the edamame, liked the raw oysters (she sucked down six of them), liked the fish eggs, the broiled eel. I admired her willingness to try everything; I know adults who aren't nearly that adventurous. :-)

We talked more about Larkin's and Rick's wedding plans during dinner. Turns out they'd like me to play my harp during the processional as well! I said yes, of course. Not sure what to play for the wedding processional; I'm going to go through my harp music books to look for potential material. I'm nervous (I've never played my harp in public before) but super-excited about the opportunity; it gives me something to work toward in my practising.

In the evening, Jeff and Scott went to the Paramount to see an 11 pm showing of "Resident Evil". I opted not to go; neither the movie nor the time appealed to me. However, they ended up getting there too late so decided to come back to our apartment and see John Woo's "The Killer" on DVD instead, a loan from Bryan. And because I'm a fool (but mainly for the company :-)), I watched it with them.

Wow, super-violent, but almost in a comical way. It was weird seeing Yun-Fat Chow (who was the hero in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) in such a different role. I was hoping for some romance (stop laughing) but ended up wishing that someone would finally shoot the heroine and get it over with...I got pretty tired of her shrieking for help all the time. Found it funny that the English dubbed version of the movie had Yun-Fat Chow's hitman character named Jeffrey. Jeffrey the Hitman.

Thing is, IMDB has a 8.2/10 user rating for this movie. I don't get it. Are users rating this movie as a serious action flick, or as a campy movie to make fun of with a group of pals? Or maybe they're rating the number of bullets fired. I'd be interested in hearing from any John Woo fans out there about this (in terms of his Hong Kong action flicks). Please post your comments in in Blatherchat.

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Today's Blatherpics:

	Some of the menu choices at a food stand in Chinatown I visited yesterday.
	Mango bubble tea.
	An amazingly diverse cheese shop.
	Cheerful meat shop.
	Chinatown fruit market.