A new student at Hogwarts?

I got misdirected emails a long time ago, people who just guessed at their friend’s email address and wound up with me. I always tried to be polite and redirect them-or at least tell them to try something different. I got another one the other day and felt playful. Here is what I originally got from a complete stranger:

Hi Cait-
Hope you are enjoying your 1st day back in school ;o)

Please send me your parent’s email addresses

Thanks,
Coach Katie

Don’t ask me why I decided to have fun, must have just been my mood. My response:

School is great. Professor Snape is teaching potions again this year, so I have nothing to worry about. No major mishaps on the Hogwarts express either.

Ooh, Ron just farted, gotta go,

Cait

Ps My parents don’t have email, they still use owls.

I thought that would end it, but no:

Thanks for the laugh Cait!
See you in a couple hours!

Awesome, eh? So at soccer practice (or whatever sport they’re up to), good old Coach Katie had a laugh with one confused Caitlin.

And I got another email today, reminding me of practices. I can’t be bothered to write her again, I think I couldn’t do it without extreme sarcasm.

Published 09/02/2010 – 1:14 pm Categories: a good day, haha | Comments (2)

CNE too

Shannon already blogged about our day and I am completely distracted by what must be the world’s sorest feet, but I did think I needed to add my own 2 cents:

Poor old Michael Jackson. Even a year after his death they haven’t found his nose.

Published 08/28/2010 – 8:21 pm Categories: a good day, fucking weird man, seriously? | Comments (4)

A quilting I will go

Just when you (and I) thought I had given up on quilting completely, I went ahead and finished one quilt, made another and started a third. Go figure.

The first one was for Saira and Michael’s baby, Kiran. Yes, I’d made her a sweater too and given the quilt over at the baby shower, but I hadn’t actually finished it completely, so I took it back home and it sat for a while. Spurred by my last visit there, I got up off my duff and bound the shit out of it. It’s done and it’s awful cute.

The front:

The back:

Now don’t be asking me what the different fabrics are: I don’t know. I’m not fussy/obsessive about that sort of thing, ok? The pictures don’t really do it justice anyway, it’s way bright, the binding is mustard yellow bandanna print fabric. I used variegated thread on the top to quilt it and red on the back. I don’t have a walking foot so it’s a little lumpy.

The quilt I made and finished and shipped off to Meeps, I forgot to take pictures of. Maybe if I asked Ashley nicely she’d post one.

And finally, I don’t know who this is for, I was inspired by various flickr groups and realized that a zig-zag quilt would be super easy, so I crunched some numbers (and flopped all my fabric stash around a lot) and came up with this:

The orange, black and white with orange/pink/black are all from Ikea, while the tiny floral pink fabric is from India, I got it from a vendor at a trunk show at the workroom. I’m planning on using light pink to make a border (or sashing, right?) and then more of the same orange to bind. Light pink again for the back, or maybe dark pink. We’ll see!

Published 08/27/2010 – 7:38 pm Categories: Art!, a good day, making stuff is good | Comments (8)

GPOYW #1

Stumbled upon on tumblr,  and because  I haven’t updated in a while, here’s what I look like right now, today:

I had a long day: worked out at the gym until I thought I broke something inside, subway to Yonge and Bloor and then I walked home. It’s about 6km if I include all the extra walking I did, roaming in shops and grocery stores and pit stopping at the library for a pee. Funny how the pillow case and the tattoos all sort of blend together.

Big day tomorrow.

Published 08/25/2010 – 10:28 pm Categories: a good day, work | Comments (3)

Lakeside Park, so many memories

Anyone that grew up in the Niagara Region has spent time at Lakeside Park in Port Dalhousie. Even Neil Peart, a local hero, wrote a song about it. The wonderful merry-go-round is still there and it still only costs five cents a ride. A good deal for kids of all ages. There are more than just horses on it too, lots of goats, camels, giraffes, lions and benches for the fogies or for people with infants.

And even on a sunny Saturday afternoon we only had to wait one song to hop on.

Ari took a few minutes to test out horses before going with a dark charcoal one with a long, real horsehair, tail. She rode a couple more times after that, picking different horses each time.

I was very happy to see these three fellows that have been around that park since I was a kid. I wonder how many times they’ve been repainted.

They’re garbage bins, if you couldn’t tell. I wish I had these at my house!

Published 08/14/2010 – 10:11 pm Categories: a good day, we have fun | Comments (4)

Caitlin and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.

It’s actually already come to an end, but the badness started about 24 hours ago and it’s all George Lucas’ fault. Or Spielberg’s.  Let me explain:

I’ve been very much addicted to the Lego Indiana Jones game for DS. I play it a lot because, frankly, it’s crazy fun. And Ari is playing it too so we compare notes and have become a little competitive. Except I’d been ignoring a fizzy sort of pain in my right hand, in my pinky finger for a while, it would happen and then I would just shake my hand thinking it had gone to sleep but now that pain is here to stay.

Yes. I think I have carpal tunnel syndrome. I might be wrong, but the symptoms sure do match. Tingly pinky and the pinky side of my ring finger, that shoots right up into my elbow and into my shoulder. Or hopefully just a weird pinched nerve, as my second reading of wikipedia makes me think CTS is normally the index and middle fingers.

So guess what, I barely slept last night. My stupid finger hurt and it was stressing me out. Finding a comfortable position for my arm-which really wanted to be curled up on my chest but somehow that felt like it might exacerbate the situation-was impossible. So, right, no sleep.

I had to work today and I suspect my boss also got very little sleep as she seemed to be in the mood to argue with me and make shit up for no reason. I was not in the mood to argue and luckily it’s a big swimming pool so I just moved away from her.

Then on my way home I got bit by a dog. Not a big bite, no bleeding ok, but there’s a mark and a bruise, on my elbow. My RIGHT elbow (see above). At that point I barely made it home before I had a complete emotional breakdown, crying for about half an hour. No one was home to comfort me either, that somehow made it all seem worse.

I’m fixing to cut off my dang right arm.

Of course I tried to have a nap, it seemed the only thing to do but just as I was dozing off my next door nabe decided that was the perfect time to blast ICP. Not that I normally mind his music, not much, but it was just fantastically bad timing.

Hopefully it’s all over now. I’m taking a couple Advil and maybe a sleeping pill and reading a couple pages then heading off to sleep before tomorrow, hopefully a much better day.

Published 08/11/2010 – 9:53 pm Categories: Griping, seriously? | Comments (12)

New favourite

Pop. So it’s not the most exciting blog post? I can only find this at one store in all of Toronto, and believe me, I’ve been to ALL the stores here. All of them. Well, most of them.

Can’t you just taste it right now? So delicious. So full of artificial everything. Yummmm.

Ok, and confidential to Gillian and Laura (no spoilers, don’t worry):

Here’s how I currently feel about BBUK.

I’m angry with John James for being a baby. He’s all angry and miserable lately and I guess it’s because he’s been nominated and is stressed out but spare me the hissy fits, please. He’s slowly crawling his way down my ladder. My love ladder. I’m not so sure if it’s John James ftw.

I hope Rachel goes home tomorrow. I don’t like her. But then again, I didn’t like Corin in the beginning and now I do.

Corin. I want to hate her but I guess I don’t. Like Gillian said, the whole diary room “He’s fit, right? Fit? Not fit? Is he?” turned me around. And then the fake video on BBLB (I think or maybe the post or pre eviction show) of kids acting as various house guests and the little girl with orange on her face “I’m buzzin’!”  killed me. I love her tragic back story and I super love that she’s very much aware of who she is.

Dave is still gross, I’d like the Baron to leave, Josie is always Josie, Andrew is a weirdo, JJ is fit, Jo and Mario are  just boring and that brings us to Sam Pepper.

I’m horrified by this child. He completely revolts me. He is, like Josie said, a ratty little brother, but he’s 21. I hate that he’s from Kent, where my family lives. I’d probably want to murder him if I had to spend more than half an hour with him, I am really feeling sorry for Josie. And everyone else. I understand that he thinks he’s being honest but he’s got no tact and that’s a part of being an adult. Ugh.

Published 08/05/2010 – 9:25 pm Categories: food, friends, seriously? | Comments (10)

Boosting the Blue Jays

I went to another ball game last night, Blue Jays vs. Cleveland Indians. We got great seats because we went with a friend who’s in a wheelchair: disabled seating’s quite fantastic, actually, you’re on the floor right behind the 100′s and they give you folding chairs, so there’s tons of legroom, you can stand up and scream and not worry about blocking anyone’s view and you’re right at the concession stands and washrooms. Worth every penny of the $24.00 it cost for 2 tickets.  It was also Fan Friday and we all got free towels to twirl in the air whenever the Jays got a run.

And let me tell ya, my arm is tired. Final score? 8-1 for the Jays! Yahoo!

The seats weren’t perfect, I guess. We were pretty far out to the left (or is it right?) field and couldn’t see the Jumbotron. Oh well. It was still better than nosebleeds!

I also spent a while trying on Jays baseball hats, I really want one but they were either outrageously expensive (I mean, really? $47 for a CAP??!?) or had a velcro closure that ripped out my hair. Or were too small for my giant head. So I looked online and found a couple that I’ll never order, including this one.  It is described as such:

The 2008 MLB “Stars and Stripes” cap by New Era features a light navy crown and visor, with the teams primary logo embroidered with a US flag design. The MLB logo on the back is also embroidered with the “Stars and Stripes” pattern. A portion of the proceeds that New Era receives will go to WELCOMEBACKVETERANS.ORG, a foundation to help out returning military soldiers.

Which I don’t have a problem with, except that it has a Canadian flag design. So. Yeah.

(And I am not a huge fan of the newer Jays logo anyway, I want old skool.)

Published 07/31/2010 – 1:42 pm Categories: a good day, seriously?, we have fun | Comments (7)

Exciting give away time!

Shannon ordered the three shirt surprise pack from teefury and liked only 2 of them. This is where I come in. Rather than let shirt #3 rot on the couch, I thought I could mail it to a deserving recipient.

This is a Lost shirt, a men’s size XL, it’s pretty big. This is the front and there’s nothing on the back:

I guess, uh, the first person to comment on this blog post that wants it, gets it. But be specific, “I WANT THAT SHIRT!” or something to that effect, ok?

Published 07/26/2010 – 12:41 pm Categories: we have fun | Comments (24)

Also delicious

Crumbles be damned, from this day forward I am a Cobbler girl. I think I got this recipe from PW and it’s a total winner:

1 stick butter, melted

1.25 C sugar

1 C self-rising flour

1 C milk (I used goat milk because that’s what we have here these days)

2 C blackberries

Whisk together 1 C sugar, flour and milk, add butter, mix

Butter a baking dish (I used an 8×8 square dark metal pan) and pour in batter, sprinkle in berries and 1/4 C sugar over top.

Bake at 350 for 1 hour (although I took mine out at 45 min because it smelled good, was brown around the edges and was cooked all the way through).

Eat with whipped cream and laugh your troubles away.

Published 07/20/2010 – 9:58 pm Categories: food, making stuff is good | Comments (6)