What am I doing?

I am listening to excellent music and dreaming of visiting the east coast, by candlelight. I was at a party on Saturday and everyone was talking about the Maritimes. Now I want to go and sit by the ocean and not look at a computer for a week.

The excellent music I am listening to consists of two great records. The first one is this:

I got this at Value Village on the weekend, and you can probably tell from looking at it why I bought it. It’s basically the best record cover ever made. The awesome thing is that the record itself is in mint condition. It looks like it’s 1957 and I just bought it brand new. So the record is on my stereo and the cover is decorating the glass under my coffee table. Win-win!

The other thing I am listening to is a 12″ of remixes of “7 Seconds” by Nenah Cherry and Youssou N’Dour. All of the remixes sound basically the same, but that’s ok with me because I get to listen to the song a bunch of times before having to get up and flip the record and that makes me happy because this song is AMAZING. Click the link and go listen now. This song has been one of my favourites since it was released (in 1994!). I wanted to embed it, but since it’s major label content embedding is blocked. Because me streaming the video on my blog is going to eat into the massive sales of a 15 year old Neneh Cherry track:S.

Anyway. Go listen! And then tell me the best places to visit out east.

Adventures in Adorable

I love this song more than I can say – the lyrics are wonderful, and a while ago I wrote about how it popped into my life at the most appropriate time. Now it has an amazingly cute video to go with it:

My band’s first show ever

ALERT ALERT ALERT! My band is playing its first show ever on May 13 at Rancho Relaxo. Please mark it off on your calendar. I will love you forever if you come. And if you don’t… well, watch out. Hehehehe.

Please be forewarned that I am going to be harassing and annoying you about this from now until May 13.

You can hear our music at myspace.com/royalmanor. But you should come even if you don’t like it.

Today is not the greatest day I have ever known

Last weekend, I was watching TV at my parents’ house. I don’t have TV in Toronto. And I’m kind of glad about that.

During a commercial break, I heard the familiar strains (as in, I can recognize it from the first note) or the unmistakable intro riff to “Today” by The Smashing Pumpkins.

Now, I am NOT precious about songs in commercials. I think it’s great that bands can get paid, and get added exposure. It’s wonderful that Feist sold 85 kazillion records after the iPod ad came out. But as I heard the song play out, I felt uneasy. I waited to see what the commercial is for.

VISA! The bane of my existence, after student loans! I almost cried/vomited.

There was something really depressing about seeing an iconic song, by my favourite band of all time, in a VISA commerical. I was talking with someone about it, and I think it’s that when you see a developing artist in a commercial, you know it will help build their career. When you see a Smashing Pumpkins song in a VISA commerical, you know Billy Corgan just wants an extra million dollars.

Now I know how my dad felt when we heard a Who song in a car commercial. I didn’t get his annoyance at the time.

Food diary!

So when I started this blog almost a year ago, I proclaimed my goal to lose 20 pounds. You may have noticed that this hasn’t happened. I managed to lose about 7 or 8 pounds for a quick minute, but then I gained it back plus a little extra. The problem is that I haven’t tried very hard. I eat chips and candy and crap and then go, “Why have I gained weight? I’m perplexed!”

But I’m trying a new tactic, and I think this one just might work. Someone mentioned to me that they were doing an online diet tracker that tells you how many calories you can have per day to get to your goal weight. Since I am a visual learner, this sounded like a pretty good idea to me. It’s easy to go way over your calorie goals when you’re keeping tab in your head. It’s not the most precise method. Plus it’s easy to lie to yourself that way.

So I found a site where you type in your current weight and how much you want to lose per week, and in return it tells you how many calories you can have. Then you fill in everything you eat each day, plus your physical activity, and it calculates where you sit in relation to your calorie goals. There are a few reasons I think this might work for me. First, like I said, it will help me gauge what I’m eating in a realistic way. Second, it will make me eat less crap, because I’ll be sad if I look at my chart and see horrible eating habits and too many calories. Shame tactics! Lastly, it’s kind of a pain in the ass to fill in, so the less garbage I eat, the less I have to add to the chart! Also, it shows you where your calories are coming from in nifty pie chart form (carbs, fat, protein) so I can look at it and say, “Well shit, I eat a lot of carbs. I need more protein!” (Like I didn’t know that.)

This had better work, ’cause I’m pretty sick of pulling epic fails on my weight loss goals.

Adventures in Ottawa public transit

This weekend was not as annoying as my last tussle with Ottawa public transit. This time it was minor irritation mixed with “holy shit, did that just happen?”

This time when I tried to take the bus from the VIA station, it actually stopped for me instead of flying by repeatedly. When I got on, I asked the bus driver if the bus went to Bayview station and he said it did. He then proceeded to announce stops on a random basis, calling out some but not others. He called out most stations, except for Bayview. I saw the Bayview sign as the bus went flying by. I pressed the button immediately and ended up a 20 minute walk out of my way. At least it was exercise! Blarrghhh.

Then, as I was trying to get to the Greyhound station yesterday, I was on an OC Transpo bus when a woman turned to the stranger beside her (a tiny old man) and smacked him. He turned around punched her in the face, and then. It was messed up. It was crazier than the time I heard someone threaten to kill someone else on the Queen streetcar.

These are the things I will be missing out on as I ride my bike all summer. (Also, checking out cute boys on the streetcar.)