My team fell a few points short of the challengers this weekend, so our run was short-lived. It was still a fairly solid show on the whole… I don’t think I showcased my best work but I did a decent job and had a fun time doing it.
I had a moment of weakness a while ago and purchased a stick-on decal for my laptop. I’m not normally the kind of person who abides this kind of thing, but I simply couldn’t resist the idea of having Yoshi eating the apple in the middle of my Macbook Pro:
The construction continues on my condo; my building is now fully naked of its siding and wrapped in clear plastic. I was supposed to move my barbecue out of their way a while ago, but was unable to because I had lost the key to the cable I’ve used to secure it to the patio. They offered to cut the padlock for me and finally got around to doing so, and today I went to put the barbecue into my storage locker. I hadn’t been to my storage space in at least a year, and was shocked to discover that someone had apparently attempted to break into it. I don’t think they succeeded as the lock is still in place, but the metal hinge it’s on is all mangled from someone attempting to break it off. Unfortunately, their tampering deformed the hinge in such a way that I can no longer open the door, even after removing the lock. I tried using a couple of tools to bend it back close enough to its original shape that I might be able to open it again, but I think short of grabbing a hammer and bashing it clean off the door it’s beyond my abilities. I’ve notified the property manager, though, and I expect they’ll take responsibility for repairing it. In the meantime I’ve had to leave the barbecue in the hallway with an apologetic note for those it winds up obstructing. Oh well.
Moving to the States from Canada gives you a lot of perspective. As countries around the world go it is nearly identical to our own, but the differences are still so very striking… I think about how in the species of dogs you can have two labradors that are more alike to each other than to any of the terriers, poodles, beagles, etc. and still be completely and unmistakably different animals.
The subtler cultural and regional differences notwithstanding, I thought I had a firm grasp on the superficial differences when it came to brands and products. No Shreddies, Rowntree-brand chocolates, ketchup chips, Harveys/Swiss Chalet, Tim Hortons or President’s Choice to name just a few. Well after more than five years of living abroad in the States, I finally discovered another: frozen yogurt.
It’s not like I go out for frozen yogurt very often. The few times I’ve gone, though, I’ve been surprised that the places I’ve ended up only had soft-serve machines with pre-mixed flavours in them. The experience I’m used to and that I’ve had my entire lifetime before moving to the United States is far more robust: they have a machine that they drop a bar of plain frozen yogurt and a cup of fresh fruit into, which then proceeds to pulverize, grind and mix the two together so that what comes out is a made-to-order flavoured frozen yogurt. It’s an evolutionary leap forward in terms of quality, as not only can you have any flavour you choose instead of just picking from whatever few they already have prepared in the soft-serve machines, but the fresh fruit ground in there tastes immeasurably better than the pre-blended stuff.
At first I thought I was just having trouble finding the right chain, as they have quite a few out here. I furiously Googled, thinking that somewhere nearby must offer the genuine confection I was craving and not merely some pale shadow of it, but it turns out that in these parts, soft-serve is simply what frozen yogurt is understood to be. I even found an article about a Yogen Früz that had opened in San Francisco, and this innovative, futuristic technique they had for blending custom-flavoured frozen yogurts (which has, of course, been the status quo my entire life).
I am beside myself, apoplectic with disbelief and sadness. I mean, these cro-magnons are thumping around trying to figure out which end of the spear sticks into the animal, while everyone else is tilling soil, raising cattle and sleeping on beds instead of cave floors. There’s nothing to be done about it… but next time I go to Canada, I’m definitely paying a visit to Dutch Dreams.
Dan.