Fun With Filo
Mood:  hungry
Now Playing: BBC Radio 4
Topic: Elisabeth's Entries
Stephen has been having fun with Filo the past 24 hours. Last night he made spinach & feta filo parcels, and tonight he's making a Green Kulbyaka, which is basically a Russian casserole using rice, lentils, onions, mushrooms all baked in filo pastry. MMMMMmmmm lots of butter & smells so good!

For dessrt I will attempt to make chocolate filo truffles. But I've discovered, or perhaps the better word is admitted, that Stephen is the better cook between the two of us, which is fine with me. In genereal I'm a rubbish housekeeper...I did the laundry today and remembered only half way through the cycle to add soap. : [

Now, onto more important things: The Whisky Marmalade contest:

Since our blog host erased some of ourcomments for the contest for answereing the question "why is Stephen calling our Bonzai plant Buckaroo?" we have decided to forfeit that competetion. The answer lies in a fabulour movie (screened in 1984) called Buckaroo Banzai. Check it out. You will NOT be disappointed!

SO THE NEW CONTEST::

Please submit your favorite filo pastry receipe, and the best tasting dish will be judged the winner of one jar of whisky marmalade, which will be posted to your mailing address free of charge.

We look forward to receiving your receipes!!!!!

Good Morning
Mood:  caffeinated
Topic: Stephen Says
Here's your anti-Bush article of the day.

I've got to get going this morning - the job papers are out. Unfortunately, according to one of Elisabeth's co-workers, the job market doesn't heat up 'til mid-February; once all the companies have gotten their accounts in order after the Christmas chaos and have realized that they aren't about to file for chapter 11.

Damn, Bush was on a role yesterday. This one's got a few gems.

Random blah blah blahing
Mood:  caffeinated
Now Playing: BBC Radio 4
Topic: Stephen Says
It snowed, sort of, this morning. Cars had some white stuff on top of them but the ground was pretty green. No schools were closed, as far as I can tell. It's sad that Britons will never experience tales of winter survival like this one. Ah, the good old days.

If you're in the mood for a pretty well researched anti-Bush tirade, click here.

Meanwhile, England continues to excel with its reputation of culinary greatness and I invite you all to read about the pros & cons of fox hunting. The photographs are priceless.

They said it couldn't be done
Mood:  spacey
Topic: Stephen Says
I changed the guestbook questions at long last. Sorry about that, I know it's been a few weeks.

What's going on?!
Mood:  irritated
Now Playing: The bloody laundry machine
Topic: Stephen Says
First the blog was on the fritz, now I can't access my Hotmail account and the UK Job Center web site is down so I can't look for work! Is it my computer? I doubt it - I've got no problem going to sites I don't care about, but the 3 I want to, no need to go to, arg, I'm gonna start cursing. I'm gonna go put another load of laundry in and go read my book (Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami).

Whatever
Topic: Stephen Says
Okay, well the technical problems seem to be over. Angelfire's sent me an e-mail saying that what ever it was is fixed, though comments are still missing and don't look like they're coming back. I've looked into moving the blog to another company but, unless Angelfire keeps screwing up, it's just too much work to shift evrything over. Plus, we've still got tonnes of space to fill up here, so blah blah blah...

Um... I don't have anything to say. Elisabeth said she'd take care of this last night while was out, but didn't. So I'm doing it now.

Here's our vacation itinary for the 1st half of this year:
Next week: South of England.
February: Paris for a long weekend
April: Elisabeth's in Hong Kong/China for 9 days
May/June: We'll fly to T-dot, drive to Mtl, then back to T-dot to fly back with an attempt to get to Newfoundland.

Here's a kick-arse (Look at me, I'm British!) Sandwich:
1 baguette with 1 1/2 tsp olive oil on each half.
Add tomoatoes, another tsp of oil, salt, pepper.
Add smelly-foot cheese, sliced green peppers, black olives & fresh basil.
wrap tightly in plastic then catch the to train to London and eat it in Trafalgar Square at the foot of the National Gallery.
Interrupt only to take some pictures of Americans.

Technical Problems
As in, this site is having them.
Stay tuned.

3rd blog of the day!
Mood:  caffeinated
Now Playing: The BBC bobble heads discussing the extent to which Bush is screwed with regard to his foreign policy.
This is part of a real-life e-mail I got a few minutes ago from my darling wife. I'll let it speak for itself:

Hey-

Guess where I was this morning: LONDON! I got on the wrong train and had to plead with the ticket office at Waterloo not to fine me #15.00. I ended up having to pay for a 1-way to Woking from London, #7.70 and arrived at work at 10:30. Can you please the insanity! I am such a boggle brain!

So I wouldn't mind a tipple of vino tonight!!!

No blogging for a week and then 2 entries in 1 day
Mood:  silly
Now Playing: Public Enemy - Muse-Sick in Hour Mess-Age
Ok, ok, I'm going to try something...

...you see last year, I bought Elisabeth this little Zen sand garden in a box for her desk so that it would help her zone, I mean chill out at work when things got stressful. Unfortunately the sand would sort of get everywhere and, as they say in Kabuki-land, it was "not a very useful present."

...so in the spirit of not learning from my mistakes, I bought her a banzaii in a box this year. Grow a banzaii from a seed, etc.

...in the spirit of learning from her mistakes, she hasn't taken it to work and I'm going to grow it myself. I started yesterday and am soaking the seeds, I've got to cold-stratify them for a week and, should they not have disintegrated in the mean time, will be sowing the seeds in a little over a weeks time.

SO!

...in the spirit of silly contests that we rarely fulfil our half of the bargain in, here's my contest: The winner gets a small jar (very small) of swanky marmalade. Why have I named my soon-to-be-tree Buckaroo? Post your answers on the message board and you could have some tasty marmalade!

Where did all the blogging go?
Mood:  lazy
The way of the dodo, I think. It has been super-duper quiet over here. Elisabeth's eased into her job and the nice thing is that she's not working the insane hours that she once was. I've eased into this job searching thingy.

I had a good interview yesterday and the job's mine if I want it, I just don't know if I do. It's a trainee position with a small, established company that's got a very good record of having it's employees stick around for years and years and years. The downside is that I'll be doing repetitive work that's disturbingly like tele-marketing for the first few months until I get moved over and even then, I'm having a hard time convincing myself that I'll like what I'm doing, even though the people there seem really nice (There are only 4 others in the company). Especially considering that I've sent off applications for jobs that I'd much rather have but won't hear from them for a while. Arg, the conflict! Advice, anyone? I've got to let them know by tomorrow, I suppose. Monday at the maximum, maximum latest.

The weather's been all rainy & drizley over here. A damp chill that buggers up my bad wrist but makes everything a shocking neon-green that you just don't see in Canada. When I go out to pick up a job paper, I'll rub some of the neon moss on it & see what happens.

It's Georgie-boy's coronation today and I hope that you all join is with the screaming today.