Dessert By Candy

I suppose it is true that a person is more vulnerable when sickness hits. If my mom is still with me, now would be the perfect time for me to be her little girl and enjoy the luxury of being taken care of by a love one. What I wouldn’t give to just tagging along by her side, chatting about anything and nothing at all. I really miss her.

Well, I can’t turn back time.

Failing that, having a significant other who would ask how I’m doing would be nice. Unfortunately, I don’t think I actually have a "significant other" at this point. Going on casual dates is fun and all but at the end, it also involve mustering enough energy to present myself in the best possible light. Come to think of it, I don’t think I can even send a "I miss you" message without looking too imposing. My brain does not feel like functioning so coming up with a lighthearted witty message that wouldn’t be taken the wrong way is just too much work. Sigh, so much for living the life as a fabulous single girl.

Fortunately, I do have a lot of friends who care. I’ve been receiving lots of "get well soon" messages in the last few days and I am very touched by the sentiments.

Planning my meals when I’m sick is a tricky problem because planning and cooking require…energy. A few years ago, when I was on my own for the first time, I got through my first bout of flu by surviving on meal-replacement drinks like Ensure. At the time, I thought it was the most brilliant idea. Needless to say, I lost 10lbs after that little failed experiment. To this day, the metallic taste in the drink still gives me goosebumps.

I’ve been fighting a nasty cold in the last few days and it appears that I’m losing the battle. It’s been a while since I last gotten sick like this but fortunately, there’s no sign of fever. It certainly feels very strange to be weak all over–like all the strength has been drained from my body.

With a massive case of sore throat, I really don’t feel like eating much. Luckily, FR suggested that we go for congee and that’s exactly what I had for dinner last night after ice practice. I love congee with slices of fish, blood jello, and lots of cilantro…it is truly comfort food to me.

I don’t think I respond well to my cold medication though. Regardless of what the packaging say, cold medication makes me drowsy. My drive to work yesterday was a blur and I fell asleep on the couch last night while waiting for my laundry and roasted sweet potato to finish. By the time I woke up at 5 in the morning, I stumbled to sort out my laundry but was puzzled with the smell of cooking in the house. I didn’t recall the house smelling like food before I dozed off…and then I realized the sweet potatoes were still roasting in the oven!!! After over 6 hours of roasting, some parts were inedible but miraculously, most of the potatoes survived. I just had two and they actually don’t taste half bad.

Now that I’m fully awake, I don’t know if I should go back to sleep. This disruptive sleep schedule can’t possibly be good for recovering from my cold.

I returned to Nathan Phillips Square tonight once again for another free concert, this time featuring Sloan. Perhaps it was the slightly warmer weather, perhaps it was Saturday night, or perhaps Sloan attracts more fans…whatever the reason, the crowd was much bigger tonight and I could easily tell that there were some diehard fans in the crowd. The muscial style of Sloan is quite different from The Philosopher Kings but one common trait that really stood out was the importance of having a charismatic frontman. I’m not talking about a pretty face, rather, someone whose stage presense is larger than life in a way that positiviely connects with the audience.

Here is a brief video that I took during the concert, enjoy!

If you’re in Toronto during the next two weeks, I highly recommend you to check out our WinterCity Festival. I just came back from the opening festivities held at Nathan Phillips Square including a free concert by The Philosopher Kings, which played an awesome show btw. I’m not particularly familiar with their music but I went on the recommendation of a friend who recently went to their concert. Although my musical taste leans toward pop, I love the jazz influence of their music and this element made their sound so much more accessible to me. I’m also very impressed by the virtuosity of each members of the band, especially the little friendly duelling between the guitarist and bassist. Despite the cold and snow, the crowd really got into the music and I somehow managed to park myself at the second row in front of the stage! I love to attend outdoor concerts in general because of the energy of the shows and this time is no exception. However, I must say that this is the first time that I watch a concert in the snow! The sparkling curtain of snowflakes in the colourful lights was an unexpected visual treat. There’ll be a few more concerts coming up including Sloan, Mobile, and The New Pornographers. Hope to see you there!

Another really neat attraction at the Nathan Phillips Square is the Paintings Below Zero gallery of artist Gordon Halloran (see some of my pictures here). As the title suggested, this is an installation of paintings on ice. Don’t come here expecting your usual ice sculpture…the contrasts between light/shadow and warm/cold colour were really what captivated me. If you take a closer look, you can also see the crytalization patterns on the ice and how the colour brought out this natural beauty so vibrantly.

My time is all chewed up by training, work, and the occassional social activities so food has not exactly been at the forefront of my attention recently. It would be so nice to just sit and stare at the wall for no reason other than letting my thoughts drift.

There are a lot on my mind recently. I think things are generally on the upswing and I see lots of positive signs. I know myself well enough that all these feelings of wanting to spend time with you (I don’t really care what we do), of simply being around you have to mean something. I am not an open book but I choose to be completely honest, if only you would ask. However, I’m a little worry that I’m reading too much and all the perceived positive signals from you are merely fabrications of my imagination. Please tell me that I’m not imagining things.

That’s a lot of mumble jumble.

I’ve seen some questionable behaviours from people around me recently and such behaviours worry me. Whatever happen to being considerate of other people’s feelings? I believe that what goes around comes around so being intentionally hurtful like so is something that I cannot bring myself to do.

In general, I get along well with most people around me but lately I’ve been having a hard time with a few individuals in particular. There are people who refuse to accept other people’s ideas; there are people who give off a vibe of competitiveness without any provocation; there are people who are genuinely nice and friendly except that I simply can’t talk to them (I think the rhythm of our conversations was like syncopation…it was never where I expect it to be).

As you can tell, I’m a little grumpy today.

I had a really great time on Saturday. I had been thinking of asking a few questions in the last couple of days but wasn’t quite if I had the guts to ask nor was it the right time to ask. In the end, I just went right ahead and did it my way. I’m quite certain that there are better approaches. For example, I can just imagine how some of my friends may comment that I’m letting the other person have all the power to control the situation. However, to me, it is not about scheming to gain the upper hand. I prefer instead to make myself clear on where I stand and he can decide on what to do with that information. It’s a direct yet passive way of handling things. In a way, I feel very relief because I’ve done my part well and now I can watch the rippling effect of my action. Of course there’s a chance that I’ll be disappointed but such is the fact of life. In the mean time, I’m very happy with the way things unfolded, unconventional though it may be.

I woke up from my "nap" at 5am this morning only to realize that I had yet to finish doing my laundry. Normally, 5am is not wake-up time for me. More often than not, it is the hour which I go to sleep in earnest or crawl back into bed from an unintentional nap on the couch. However, by the time I sorted out my laundry, I was fully awake so I decided to do something useful instead. To start, I switched to a new set of bearings for my skates which has been lying around since I received them in the mail two months ago. I can’t believe I have been training with the set of bearings that I borrowed from my brother’s rec skates since the indoor season started back in November.

It was only 6:30am when I finished with my skates. I took one look at my kitchen counter and spotted the loaf of stale brioche, prime for bread pudding. I decided to make Regan Daley’s Brioche Bread Pudding With Poached Quince And Dried Cherries. I’ve used this recipe numerous times in some variations in the past but today is actually the first time that I have all the ingredients as listed. The poached quince has been sitting patiently in my fridge, waiting for the perfect opportunity to be turned into a marvelous dessert. I still have lots of dried sour cherries that I bought at a bargain price at Costco. I think this bread pudding is meant to be.

Having bread pudding for breakfast seems a little indulgent, isn’t it? If you think about it though, it actually makes a lot of sense. This bread pudding is just a mixture of bread (brioche), eggs, milk, cream, sugar, and fruit (poached quince and dried cherries). Doesn’t that read like any normal breakfast menu?

You can’t believe how nice it feels to sip on my morning coffee with the sweet scent of baking custard swirling around the house.