Franklin chocolate! And geeky college photos!

Happy St. Nicholas Day! Yesterday, a big box arrived from Germany, courtesy my friend Franklin. Inside: four gift bags filled with chocolate, one each for me, Allison, Jodi and Walter. The last bag was a thank you for some custom-made DVDs that Walter had sent Franklin after FKO.

The photo to the right was taken at Ju's place, just before we left for the castle.

The photo above shows the contents of my gift bag.

THANK YOU, FRANKLIN!




Above: A photo that my friend Reid posted on his Flickr page from 1985, taken in Robarts Library on the University of Toronto Campus. Michelle Sagara West is on the left, I'm on the right, and you can see our pal John Swain slinking around behind. Michelle is now a fantasy writer and John is an experimental high energy physicist at Northeastern University.

Check out Reid's blog entry for a 1983 photo of me, Luisa and Reid back in those days -- it remains one of my favourite from those days.

Reid also has a link to some other old photos from that entry. Reid and I were dating in those days (in case you're curious about why Jeff isn't around! He started hanging out with us a year or two later, I think) while Luisa was dating someone else. Years later, Reid and Luisa asked me to be Matron-Of-Honour at their wedding. :-)

As I mentioned in this Blathering a couple years ago, we were part of very close-knit crowd back then, like a big family. Then we graduated and some people moved away, some had families, some drifted to other friendships. Luisa's now one of my best friends; here are some reasons why. Jeff and I still hang out with some of the old gang now and then, like this boardgaming night.





1983 photo above courtesy Reid's Flickr page. From left to right: Luisa, ??, Tom West, me (seated), Andrew, Kaarel, John Chew's dad, Nick, Andy, Pontus, John Swain, Reid and John Chew.

Survey: Do YOU still keep in touch with / hang out with your friends from school?



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boardgames, paranoia and astrophysics

Happy birthday to Dave Clement and Steve Macdonald!

Jeff and I went gaming at John's and Kristen's last night. I got to finally meet their newest addition to the family (so cute! and he SMILED at me!!) and also chatted with Kristen about books before playing Shadows Over Camelot with John, Tom, Tom's teenaged son, Bruce, and Reid. It was the first time most of us had played the game; I liked it because its cooperative aspect. Basically, we were the Knights of the Round Table, battling against the forces of evil. However, there was a strong chance that ONE of us was a traitor, actually working against the group. The latter aspect added a great deal of fun and paranoia.



It was especially great to see our friend Bruce again (leftmost in the photo above); it's been years since we last saw each other. We hope to get together when Jeff and I visit California next March. Bruce is an astrophysicist at Livermore in California, and he recently completed a feasibility study for extrasolar planet detection using the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT), a collaboration between UC Observatories, the California Institute of Technology, and a number of Canadian universities. Bruce brought a (nonfunctional) sample of some adaptive optics technology for us to see:





The prototype deformable mirror above is made of an etched silicon microelectromechanical system which has 1,024 actuators that adjust the shape of the mirror hundreds of times per second. This enables astronomers to correct for air turbulence and atmospheric disturbances which limit the ability of telescopes to see detail.

You can find more info in the June 2006 issue of Science and Technology; our friend Bruce is mentioned in the article.





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Rand and Erin visit (part 2): friends, music and tea

WritersMarket.com and my Market Watch column is offline today while the site is majorly revamped. I haven't seen the new design yet, so am excited; the site hasn't changed in quite a few years and I'm sure will greatly benefit from a facelift. In theory, WritersMarket.com will be back online tomorrow at 9 a.m.



But back to Erin's and Rand's visit. We've been trying to arrange a visit for about almost a year now, but scheduling just hasn't worked out. I see the two of them occasionally at conventions, but only for the usual snatches of conversation or somewhat hurried meal between programming items.

I especially enjoyed getting some one-on-one conversation time with Erin. Friendships with couples is enjoyable, of course, but it's a much different thing than being able to spend time with a friend by themselves. It was fun to be able to chat with another writer about writing, and getting to know Erin a bit better.



Erin and Rand were able to take off work early on Friday, and they offered to take me out to dinner to a restaurant of my choice. I had a craving for food that was bad for me since I'd been very good all week, so I chose Duff's Wings, where fried mozzarella sticks and a plate o' deep-fried wings satisfied my craving. Thanks, E & R! For dessert, we dropped by Hollywood Gelato. Yum.

Erin and Rand were great houseguests. Like me, they each seemed to need some quieter (non-socializing) time each day, so we each spent that time doing our own thing. Erin and Rand would usually pull out their laptops and use the wireless access:



Jodi and Allison joined us on Saturday, and we had a great afternoon of conversation, music and tea. We listened to Chris Conway's and Mich Sampson's newest CDs, as well as some Jonathan Coulton music that Rand and Erin had brought. I've been hooked on Jonathan Coulton ever since hearing Tony Fabris perform Skullcrusher Mountain and Your Brains in his concert at OVFF. My favourite Coulton song is Skullcrusher Mountain so far...I've had the song on repeat for embarrassingly long periods of time since OVFF; I bought it and some other Coulton songs, but can already see that I'm going to be buying some albums as well. :-)



Lunch was a "make your own sandwich" affair with pulled pork from Cumbrae's, sliced meats, and other fillings along with rolls I had picked up from the bakery that morning. Dessert: chocolate-covered strawberries. I couldn't find insta-chocolate for dipping, so I melted semi-sweet chocolate chips instead.

Much tea was drunk throughout the weekend, and we talked about tea memories as we lingered over our choices. "1001 Nachts" (which I'm drinking right now, in fact) will always remind me of Juliane Honisch in Germany. Cardamom Cinnamon: Beckett Gladney in California. Blood Orange tea: Katy Dröge (who gave me some in Germany) and Anita T. (who introduced me to the stuff in her flat in Vienna). Casablanca tea: Kristen Chew, who got me hooked when she asked me to bring her some from Paris (because of course I had to get some for myself, too!). I love my "Debbie" tea mug from Lissa Allcock in the UK, and my Penguin tea-timer from Crystal and Steve. And I still use the Teavana tea-infuser I bought during Boskone in Boston: more wonderful con memories.



We did some music on Saturday afternoon as well. Allison, Jodi and I played some of our newer songs, including our new J.K. Rowling song, and Rand asked if we could do Allison's "A Twinkle In His Eye" for Erin. He had made the request in open filk at OVFF, but we never had the chance.

Dinner: a chicken stew recipe I had gotten from my mom-in-law, who got it from a Cooking Light magazine. I took out the onions for Erin. Side dish: make-your-own salad set-up, since everyone had such differing tastes. Dessert: lava cakes and fresh raspberries. Wine: a nice Shiraz, courtesy Jodi (thanks, Jodi!).

There were quiet moments during that day as well, when Erin was looking through my Guest Graffiti book for the first time, Allison was doing cross-stitch (I had asked her to sign the cross-stitched Christmas ornament she made for me) and Jodi was signing the Kathleen Sloan cookbook for Interfilk.



During a conversation about animated movies we liked, we discovered that Erin had never seen Lilo and Stitch, so we decided to watch it. Allison, Jodi, Erin and I all bawled, of course. I'm sure Rand was bawling inside, though he won't admit it.

;-D



On Sunday, we met my friend Parki for lunch at Cha Liu, a dim sum place on Yonge Street. It was Erin's first exposure to dim sum! In the photo below, Rand demonstrates his own unusual technique in holding chopsticks before showing her the standard technique.



After dim sum, we visited Sugar Mountain and a couple of bookstores before Parki headed back home. Rand, Erin and I went to a drugstore to pick up some allergy pills that aren't easily available in the U.S. as well as dropping by The Tea Emporium, where Rand and Erin stocked up on favourites as well as a few new teas. We managed to squeeze in one more visit to Hollywood Gelato (you can never have too much gelato, after all) before they had to drive back to Buffalo.

The photo yesterday, by the way, had Erin modeling her new Will Write For Chocolate t-shirt. I had originally ordered the shirt for myself from my Cafepress store but found that the style was in Youth size only, and the Medium was too small for me. But it fits Erin perfectly, yay! I ended up ordering XL, which fit me comfortably. Most of the other styles are in regular Adult sizes, never fear.



A fine weekend with good friends. And Jeff's home now, yay! He had loads of fun at BoardGameGeek.con, played over 40 games, came 18th in an elimination poker game that started with about 120 people, won a boardgame to take home, bought some new games.





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glass dragonfly

Above: the latest instalment of Will Write For Chocolate.

First off, I wanted to clarify something about my Hashimoto blathering, in case any of you had the mistaken impression that Jeff and I eat at Hashimoto regularly (I wish!). Hashimoto is a restaurant we reserve for rare occasions...like our 15th wedding anniversary. We went to Japan for our 10th wedding anniversary. I suppose we could have gone away for the weekend for our 15th, but we agreed to spoil ourselves with a extra-special dinner instead. :-)

But back to this weekend...

I had a very good Saturday. Went to Mountain Co-op and had lunch with my sister, then went to our friends' ice cream and dessert party in the afternoon. Laura Suzuki and Peter Cook are not only great dessert-makers, but both are immensely talented illustrators, writers and graphic designers; you can find out more at Doodletronics. You can also find a list of their science books for kids by searching for either of their names in Amazon.

Here's Laura:



I took a photo of her from above, then played around with the background for fun. And here's Peter, taking a picture of me:



I liked the blurriness of this photo. Most of the time I trash blurry photos as rejects, but every so often they capture the essence of a person or moment for me.

Here's my favourite photo of Peter, taken at a watergun party at Reid's and Luisa's place:



Anyway, Jeff and I were admiring a new glass panel in one of the doors at the dessert party...and then we found out that Peter designed and made most of it himself (with some assistance from someone with glass etching equipment):



Here's a detail of the head:



Pretty amazing, huh?

I also met some interesting people at the party. Mireille Messier, for example, who made me wish I had remembered more of my French from school. Erik Spigel, who made me wish I knew more Japanese! Also enjoyed meeting children's author/illustrators Loris Lesynski and Barbara Reid, and photographer Ian Crysler (Barbara's husband). Peter and Laura clearly have a lot of creative friends! I also picked Reid's brain about CSS and Wordpress stuff.

After stuffing ourselves with homemade pastries and chatting with friends, Jeff and I went to see The Illusionist with Ray and Parki. I enjoyed this much more than I expected; Edward Norton and Paul Giamatti were excellent. Afterward, we had dinner at Cha Liu, yum.



All in all, a good Saturday indeed.

:-)

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Wedding and birthday wishes!

Above: for Becca Allen and Graham Leathers, who are getting married today!

And HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my friend Scott Snyder!!



Had fun with Allison and Jodi last night. And I'm delighted to report that my first guest barbecue was a success. I didn't even set anything on fire. The menu:

Slices of melon wrapped in prosciutto

Caprese salad (with freshly picked basil!)

Grilled swordfish and grilled salmon

Tartufo and strawberries

Jodi brought a nice bottle of Shiraz, which we used to toast the health and happiness of Becca and Gray. We also played both their CDs in the background in honour of their wedding today. :-)

I took Luisa's and Reid's advice and only turned the salmon once, plus used the Grilltopper, and this time the fillets didn't fall apart - yay! I love our barbecue.

There are still squirrels in our house despite our adventure a few days ago. Both Allison and Jodi heard the racket in one wall beside our kitchen during dinner. Hm...Jeff and I are still not sure what to do about this; advice appreciated.

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