kaputt

Leaves at the cottage.


So my friends John and Kristen have gotten me hooked on Hikaru no Go, an animated series about a young boy named Shindo Hikaru who accidentally awakens the ghost of a Go master.

Yeah, I know ... it sounds incredibly dull, doesn't it? But the characters are fascinating, and the creators have done an excellent job at making the game of Go exciting. I don't know how to play, yet I find myself holding my breath as Hikaru examines the board with frightened eyes (HUGE frightened eyes, as seems to be the norm in many anime characters), about to place his stone.

And suddenly I want to learn to play Go! I almost caved when Parki and Jeff and I were in the game store under the Royal York Hotel and I saw a cheap Go board set. Realistically though, I know that once I finish watching the DVDs, my interest will wane. There are too many other things I want to do in my spare time, like write more music, learn German and Italian.

Yes, I've decided to learn a little bit of Italian. Jeff and I may be visiting Italy in a couple of years, plus my friend Luisa (who is fluent) says she is willing to let me practice on her. I hope she knows what she's in for. Reid's going to be learning as well.

My German studies plod along, and I'm still having a lot of fun. I'm working my way through reading a picture book. My new favorite word: "kaputt", which means broken. I'm also reading more about Vienna, to research in prep for our trip next month; I especially enjoy reading about the food.

In case you're wondering when I find the time to study these languages, it's mainly during the breaks I take to give my arms a rest throughout the day. I have all my language CDs on my iPod, so listen to them out in the living room while I do my arm stretches and exercises. These arm breaks only last about 10 minutes or so, but they add up over the day. I also spend a couple of solid hours here and there, usually on weekends or evenings when Jeff is working (which is pretty often these days).

Don't watch much regular TV anymore, and as a result I'm getting a lot more reading and language study into my life. When I do watch TV, it's usually the Discovery Channel or the Food network. I blame Jeff and Maya Bohnhoff for getting me hooked on the latter. Watched the Iron Chef Natto Challenge last night. :-)

November/2003 comments: Read | Post | LJ

Halloween poll

Survey: Halloween Have you already or do you plan to be involved in any Halloween activities which involve you dressing up in a costume? If yes, what costume? Of all Halloween costumes you've had as a child or an adult, which was your favorite? Updat on Sunday: Allison has a poll about Haloween costumes, too! see the discussion here, as well as photos of Allison in various costumes. Apologies to Allison... my arms have just gotten better enough to do some Livejournal catching up today, so I didn't see her entry until just now. This is me as Snow White at age 4, with Ruth (I have no idea what she is). Ray and me. Photo by Jeff. October/2003 comments: Read | Post | LJ

meat donuts

First off, thanks SO much for the supportive e-mails/postings/phonecalls (and OVFF photo of Andrea! :-) Thanks, JeffB) yesterday. They meant a lot to me. I've been generally coping all right with this tendinitis and not being able to type, but every so often frustrations accumulate and I let it get me down. Yesterday was a bit of a low point. Had a good dinner with Luisa last night. Luisa and I have known each other for about 22 years; we met in the computer science program at the University of Toronto. We hit it off immediately, and now she's one of my closest friends. We're also lucky in that we're also friends with each other's husbands, and they with each other. Reid (Luisa's husband), Luisa and I were in several computer science courses together. Jeff started showing up at our lunch gatherings at Robarts library as a friend of Tom West's (who is now Michelle Sagara's husband). Michelle became a part of the group through our friend Andy (who posts as "aiabx" in Blatherchat), and Andy became a part of the group through Reid. To add to the friendship mix, I used to date Reid and Tom back in university days. And we're all still friends, go figure. :-) October/2003 comments: Read | Post | LJ

vegetarian chicken

Thanks to Hrach Shehirian for his help with today's Waiting For Frodo strip. Got the go-ahead for three more articles: piano lesson tips, how to create an online comic strip, taking good digital photos. Column and an article due by the end of the week. Two articles due by the end of next week, another the following week. Got a poem (yes, I'm starting to submit poetry!) and two article ideas rejected. Tried a few times to edit my novel with ViaVoice, but the experience was extremely frustrating, and I could tell that my editing was suffering as a result. I'm thinking of postponing work on my novel until the new year, in hopes that my arms are completely healed by that point. I now have physiotherapy twice a week. Nick is no longer there (the unfeeling cad moved to Montreal), but Michelle is nice and seems to know what she's doing. I'm getting electrotherapy in addition to ultrasound and massage. It's been about eight months since this whole thing started with my arms, with lots of ups and downs. It's been hard not to get depressed sometimes, especially when ViaVoice isn't cooperating and I'm tired and am trying to get an article or column finished. But then I remind myself that it could be a lot worse. And Jeff has been wonderful throughout. The other major downer for me has been feeling isolated from out-of-town filk friends. Makes me appreciate how much I've been relying on e-mail and IRCs/online chat for that sort of thing; I've been phoning people from time to time, but different time zones, life schedules and long distance charges get in the way of the more casual contact that was possible in e-mail. Many thanks to those who haven't given up on me; the occasional e-mails or calls have been much appreciated. :-) I'm enjoying reading your online OVFF reports...sounds like it was great fun this year. I'd love to see some photos; any online yet? Thanks to Chris Conway for sending me the following in response to the menu I posted yesterday... Looking forward to seeing my friend Luisa tonight! October/2003 comments: Read | Post | LJ

bibimbap

I've discovered that I can use my Wacom artpad even with tendinitis since I only need the lightest pressure on the pad for drawing. Speaking of drawing, I recently got a paying cartoon assignment as a result of someone coming across my doodles in Blatherings. Ironic that even though my Blatherings are intended to be a fun writing exercise outside the realm of my regular work, I've sold photos, cartoons, and received writing assignments as a result of my daily online meanderings. Still using ViaVoice, and I've started up physiotherapy again. I've resolved not to be stupid and have another setback. This means that I will likely not be doing much personal e-mail for the next while, just to warn you all, and will also likely not be keeping up with LJs as regularly (too much clicking). Went through some OVFF withdrawal this past weekend. :-( I would love to hear some OVFF reports; please do post URLs if you have reports online. I had a pretty quiet weekend. Brunch with Parki and Jeff on Saturday. Spent the rest of the day at Mark's watching Jeff and others play Magic; I sat on the couch updating Waiting For Frodo, watching anime (called Hikaru, I think, about a little boy with the spirit of a Go master inside his head) on my laptop, and studying German. We had dinner at a Korean-Japanese restaurant where I enjoyed some dishes I've never tried before. In case you haven't already guessed, I love adventures in food; my attitude has always been that almost any type of food is worth trying once. This time, I was especially happy with my main dish, a Korean hot pot called Bibimbap (I think that's spelled correctly), which is basically vegetables and egg mixed with rice. The rice came in a separate dish as well as a container of what look like ketchup but was actually hot sauce; both were supposed to be dumped into the hot pot, and then everything is mixed together. Yum. The most unusual item that I tried that night was a glass of liquid that came at the end of the meal which the waitress called "rice water". It looks like slightly milky water with white bits floating in it... not too appetizing-looking. But it was good! Very refreshing, with a subtle gingery flavour. Menu at a Korean Japanese restaurant we visited on Saturday night with Mark, Vartan and Hrach. October/2003 comments: Read | Post | LJ