Month: February 2013

You’ve heard of tennis-elbow. Now watch out for skype-knee.
It occurs when your spouse is seated comfortably in a chair, video-chatting with a friend. You join the conversation, kneeling on one knee to get on camera. For the next couple of days, you notice a pain in the knee that bore your weight during the chat. Skype-knee is temporary and goes away on its own.

Why do ordinary Canadians get upset when a senator tries a 20 or 30 thousand dollar tax dodge? According to the pompous fatheads I heard on CBC yesterday, it’s because the numbers are small enough for us to “wrap our heads around”.
The idea is a cliché in certain circles of punditry. Big numbers overwhelm our small minds, but we can understand smaller ones. Interviewers often accept such drivel as if it were wisdom, revealing their own inclination to accept mouth noises as explanations.

Let’s face it, the Ontario Liberal government under Dalton McGuinty’s watch wasn’t exactly a success. Kathleen Wynne’s first job as premier is to erase the Liberal record from memory. She’s going to need a BIG eraser.

As esteemed senators Duffy, Wallin and Brazeau face public scrutiny over their eligibility to hold such cushy positions, they would probably like to quote their colleague, Senator Nancy Ruth.

(Senator Ruth offered that advice a couple of years ago, on another subject.)

We awoke this morning to a bright, sunny day. A neighbour’s cat cleared a sitting spot on the back fence and took in the scene. Very pretty.

You can see about 12 to 15 centimetres of snow piled up on the fence railings. The snow is still falling steadily as it has been for hours. No sign of a let up, so I haven’t gotten the snow blower out yet. Ploughs just cleared the front road, but they’ll have to return by evening. We expect to double the depth before we’re done.

Three Biblio-Mat groaners from the random vending machine in the Monkey’s Paw antiquarian bookstore. You never know what you’ll get for your toonie, but whatever comes out will be unusual and often good for a laugh.

What’s so Portuguese about a Vietnamese Restaurant? Nothing, actually, but it’s on Ossington (pronounced Ozington in the Torontonian dialect) and it serves great pho soup (pronounounced fuh by the Vietnamese). It just happens to be near the cluster of Portuguese businesses around Dundas West and Ossington. The small bowl of pho was $7.25 and the medium was only 75¢ more, so I’d always go for the medium. Why not? It’s a meal in itself…. nice big chunks of chicken and beef and tons of rice noodles in delicious broth. Brian ordered spring rolls before we got there… $4.00 for four of them… light and excellent. Somehow he resisted eating all of them and kept 2 for Danica and me to try when we arrived.
Service was friendly, efficient and helpful. We want to go again and try more menu items.
Not to neglect the fact that we were in Little Portugal, we went to the Nova Era Bakery and Pastry shop for dessert. Nice place, lots of little tables, gorgeous array of pastries and good coffee. Obviously a popular place with the locals and for good reason. Danica brought home some baked goodies for supper… and egg custard tarts for dessert.

We can make out some of the faded words on the side of the Sideshow Café wall. It was a Pool & Billiards Parlor (No Minors). And we can make out “CAMPBELL’S” well enough. But what the heck did that big line of type say, above the newly painted black base?
If you think a closer look will help, you are welcome to click the picture and get to the BIG 2000 pixel wide version.

12 servings
Two pieces of this plus a big bowl of thick, homemade cauliflower and roasted pepper soup makes a great comfort food supper. The focaccia dough contained mashed potatoes and rosemary. Toppings are grape tomatoes, black olives, sheep feta cheese and grated parmesan cheese. Very satisfying and only about 500 calories for the meal.