0. I can be really sarcastic and it doesn’t come across very well on a blog.  I’m not really a jerk. I swear.

ONE. I can’t sit with my back to the room without getting really agitated. It’s an anxiety thing I think.

DOS. I prefer sleeping in tents than houses… most of the time.  I affectionately refer to my tent as my home away from home. I also prefer to be outdoors and away from civilization and crowds. I will probably grow up to be a hermit.

TROIS. I love cooking, but not cleaning up… And I make almost everything from scratch. My freezer is full of leftovers. Delicious leftovers.

D. I don’t express excitement outwardly very often.  I get lost in thought a lot and need to process things internally before I am able to react. Then, while I’m processing, I usually get distracted and move on to another thought.

V. I’m not a fan of whiners. It is a very inefficient use of time and energy… I sound like a robot. If you are going to complain about something that is within your power to change, take a step and change it. I’ll even lend a hand. But if you aren’t willing to take that step, then please be stop whining.

SECHS. If I am in a room with a TV I become completely transfixed. It is impossible to have a conversation with me if there is a TV across from me. The moving pictures are hypnotizing.

ZEVEN. I think I’m an atheist, but I’m concerned that the gods will be mad at me.

THE NUMBER OF ARMS AN OCTOPUS HAS. I don’t really like rules.

Here’s the rules including the ones I broke:

1. Link the person who tagged you - check
2. Mention the rules on your blog - check
3. Tell about six (6) unspectacular quirks you possess - check + 2
4. Tag six (6) following bloggers by linking them - rather than making another list while I should be sleeping I’m going to leave this wide open. If you read this and write your own quirk post I’ll update this post with a link to your blog so all eight people who read my blog can find out all your dirty little secrets.
5. Leave a comment on each of the tagged blogger’s blogs letting them know that they have been tagged - see rule #4.

Also. Pay attention to the Green Party. They have an MP in the house now and I think this will shake things up a bit. I’m getting the impression the Harper feels threatened by them…

Conservative party officials, however, raised questions about Wilson’s legitimacy as a Green MP.

“Our view is there should only be one Liberal candidate in the leaders’ debate,” said Kory Teneycke, Harper’s communications director, citing the agreement between Dion and May last year not to contest one another’s ridings in the next election.

“You can’t have two candidates from essentially the same party in the debate.”

…In other news, Zoë seems to have tagged me in a blog version of an email chain letter. Because I’m such a good sport I’m going to play along.

Aaand, I just read The Watchmen for the first time and my mind is reeling. Read it. Watch it.

For example, I just got a message from a good friend announcing that she got a new job as “Wine Maker” at Andrew Peller. This is huge, but the thing that really made me smile was that she credited me for planting the idea in her head.

Some background: She was working a job that she didn’t enjoy and where she wasn’t treated very well. I’m pretty sure I simply asked her why she was working there if she didn’t like it so much. I was probably a little more preachy about it, but that would have been the general idea behind my argument.

I think one of the reasons I get worked up about things like this is because of the society we live in — we have everything we need and more.  When people get “stuck” in dead-end jobs/situations and complain about it I get really frustrated.  We have more opportunity here in Canada than most countries. It’s sometimes simply just a matter of taking that first step towards your dream job/life goal/whatever. It will almost definitely take some sacrifice, but coming out the other end you’ll be glad you took the risk.

Which brings me back to the “not as I do” part.  I’ve been in a bit of a rut since moving to Hamilton. I haven’t really put my finger on the source, but I’m almost positive it has to do with my lack of social life and abundance of sitting around on my in front of my computer.

I think it’s time for some ch-ch-ch-changes.

I’ve been trying to settle here in Hamilton for a while now and I always get bogged down by one thing or another. This lecture by Randy Pausch held a few really good time management tips which I wanted to write down so I won’t forget them later. I also wanted to share them.

Here’s the video:

Here’s my notes (which ended up being a lot longer that initially intended):

• Time is more valuable than money. You can earn more money later, but you will never get your time back. (5:50)

• Life is too short. If you aren’t enjoying what you’re doing, what’s the point? (11:25)

• Good judgment comes with experience and experience comes from bad judgment. Chances are if you’re making a lot of mistakes, you’re probably learning a lot and things will probably go a lot better later. (15:05)

• Have a plan. A plan doesn’t mean you’re locked in. If you have a plan it’s a lot easier to make changes later on.(18:20)

• Use to-do lists, break them down into workable steps and always start with the ugliest thing first.  “If you have to eat a frog, don’t spend a lot of time looking at it first, and if you have to eat more than one, don’t start with the small one.” (19:05)

• Covey’s Four Quadrant To Do List (21:00)

• Clutter:  If you keep the clutter in your life down to a minimum, you won’t get overwhelmed.

• Paperwork - Keep your desk clear (23:46) and have a place where you keep every piece of paper you have so that you can find them easily when necessary (26:46).

• Email - Your inbox is not your to do list. (24:26)

Keep your inbox clear.

When you get an email, either read it or file it and add an entry to your to do list.

Never delete any emails.

If you want to get something done, never send it to more than one person.

If people don’t respond to an email within 48 hours, they aren’t going to respond.

• Thank you notes (38:10): These are a tangible acknowledgments to let people know how you appreciated something someone has done for you.  This will also make you memorable to the receiver.

• Make your office comfortable for you, and optionally comfortable for others (42:20). This will help keep meetings and drop-ins to a minimum.

• Verbs are important.  “You do not find time for important things, you make it. And you make time by electing not to do something else.” (43:10)

• Learn to say “no.” (43:40)

• Find your creative time and defend it ruthlessly. Find your dead time and fill it with meetings, phone calls, exercise — mundane things that don’t require brain power. (45:20)

• Reduce interruptions (45:55). One interruption costs 6 to 9 minutes plus 4 minutes of recovery time. Turn off email notifications. Turn phone calls into emails by making your phone message

• Don’t interrupt others (47:30). Save up all the stuff you have for other people and give it to them all at once.

• Monitor your time and update throughout the day by keeping a time journal (49:10). Use it to figure out what you don’t need to do, what you can delegate and what you should/could spend more time on.

• You don’t make yourself more efficient at work so that you can work more, you make yourself more efficient so that you can go home at five (51:49).

• “You have to learn to focus your time and energy on things that matter and not worry about the things that don’t.” (53:15)

• Procrastination: “Doing things at the last minute is really expensive.” (56:36) Pushing things right up to the deadline is where all the stress comes from.  The trick is to make up a fake deadline and act like it’s real.

• Delegation: You can take on a lot more if you have help. (59:14)

If you are going to delegate, give them authority with responsibility — don’t micro-manage.

Always to the ugliest job yourself so that it is clear that you are willing to get dirt on your hands.

Don’t be vague. Give a specific task, deadline and reward. And the reward is for them, not you. Be clear.

Challenge people. Give them the opportunity.

Send confirmations via email. This provides a written record and ensures the task is clear.

Give objectives, not procedures.

Tell them the importance of the task to help them prioritize their workload.

Praise and thank them for the work they did.

If you don’t want to have things delegated to you, don’t learn how to do them.

• Meetings: Lock the door, unplug the phone and take away everyone’s blackberry’s (105:02).

Meetings should never last more than an hour.

All meetings should have an agenda. If there is no agenda then everyone just end up sitting around for the first bit trying to figure out what they are doing there.

Refuse to go to meetings if there is no agenda (105:30).  This forces the person calling the meeting to actually stop and figure out the purpose behind the meeting.

One minute minutes: “the scribe writes down what decisions were made and who is responsible for what by when then they email it out to everybody.” (105:50) That way everyone knows what task they are supposed to do and by when.

• Only use technology that helps you. “Computers do things faster, but take more time.”

• Vacation: It’s not a vacation if you reading email (I’m looking at you Colin :)

• Kill your television (113:00).

• Eat, sleep and exercise (113:50). Always make time to sleep, because without sleep, everything falls apart.

Here’s a point-form transcription of the lecture.

About Randy Pausch: (October 23, 1960 – July 25, 2008) was an American professor of computer science, human-computer interaction and design at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and a best-selling author who achieved worldwide fame for his “The Last Lecture” speech on September 18, 2007 at Carnegie Mellon. In summer 2007, Pausch conceived the lecture after he learned that his previously known pancreatic cancer was terminal. [cited from Wikipedia]

Here’s the result:

INGREDIENTS

“Ground Beef” (makes about 1 to 1.5 c.):

• 1/3 of a brick of extra firm tofu, crumbled.
• 1 healthy squirt of soy sauce or Bragg’s
• 4 or 5 drops of sesame oil.

Everything else:

• 3 potatoes sliced thinly, like chips
• 1 tomato
• 1 slice of red onion, chopped how you like it.
• 1 clove of garlic, chopped, minced or crushed.
• 1 can of black beans
• 2 c. of shredded cheddar.
• 2 c. Salsa
• 2 tsp. chili powder
• 1 tsp. cumin
• 1 dollop of red chili sauce (if you like it spicier)
• some butter for frying and greasing the pan

Aside: I use un-salted butter for most recipes because I’ve read too much about processed foods. Also, animal fats are really quite good for you, despite what the food industry, nutritional studies and the government might have us believe.

DIRECTIONS

1. Pre-heat the oven to 350˚F.

The Sauce:

1. Fry the onions and garlic in the butter until they are translucent.
2. Add the “ground beef” and cook until it’s nicely toasted.
3. Add the tomato, salsa, chili powder, cumin, red chili sauce and simmer for a few minutes to let the flavours do their thing.

The Assembly:

1. Grease a 9″ by 9″ glass baking pan-thing (can’t remember what it’s called..)
2. Add a layer of potato slices (half of the potatoes).
3. Add a layer of black beans (half of the beans).
4. Add a layer of the sauce (half again).
5. Repeat 2 to 4 with the other half of everything.
6. Sprinkle with cheese.

Bake:

1. At 350˚F for about about 60 minutes. Until the potatoes are done, the top is gold and the insides are all bubbly.

RESULT

Delicious.  Sounds really strange, but it’s super good. Really dense too. You won’t really need to eat too much.

TIP

Feel free to swap out the “ground beef” with ground beef.  It might even be better that way.  But don’t use too much or it won’t fit into the pan. Oh, and turn off your oven or your apartment will get really warm.

PHOTO

Here’s a few thoughts that I had about the event planning process:

• Do your research - Depending on what you’re planning, this may be as simple as calling your friends or or hours slaved over genealogy charts. The venue, food, rides and poisons all fit in here. The more you know beforehand, the less you’ll have to do later.
• Share the responsibility - Get other people involved. Get them to come up with ideas and make decisions. The more people involved the wider skill-set you’ll have at your disposal. The roles could be as big as contacting the invitees and keeping track of RSVPs, or as little as picking up the snacks from the store. The more ownership other people share, the less weight on your shoulders.
• Feed your guests - Eating is social.  Our society seems to have forgotten this somehow in the past 30 or 40 years. Sharing good food is one of the most enjoyable things I can think of doing with my friends.
• Do almost everything beforehand - The more you do before the actual event the more you can enjoy yourself during the event. Plain and simple.
• Go with the flow - If something goes wrong, take it in stride. It’s really not worth the stress. The research thing can also help with this. If you can foresee what might go wrong, you can have a plan B, C, D, etc.
• Enjoy it - What’s the point of hanging out with friends and/or family event if you can’t have fun?  There isn’t one.

Anyone else have any thoughts?

This past weekend I went to Hillside. Hillside is an annual music and culture festival that takes place on the island (peninsula) in Guelph Lake Conservation Area. This year was the 25th anniversary and (I think) the fifth year I attended.

Rather than going into an insane amount of detail and recounting the entire weekend I’m going to try and sum it up quickly with highlights.

• I look forward to this weekend every year and this weekend did no disappoint.
• Hillside is a big, mainstream, indie, hippie music festival and it is almost completely green. Reusable dishes are washed by Ninjas, all organics are composted recyclables recycled. Beer bottles are collected and returned and food is all locally prepared and supported.
• The Tibetan Monks were actually Tibetan Monks and not a band called Tibetan Monks. Super cool.
• Workshops are what differentiate Hillside from other music festivals. Workshops are when two or more bands get together on stage for an hour and just jam. Some of the stuff that comes out of those events is better than watching one band playing their own set. I had some videos, but Youtube doesn’t seem to like them. If they ever end up online, I’ll post it here.
• Tom King (writer and federal NDP candidate) and Ed Broadbent (former NDP leader) partook in a traditional Native American drum circle.
• Mike Nagy (federal Green Party candidate) was also floating around/organizing the festival (there is a federal by-election ciming up in Guelph)
• Stuart Mclean’s musical guest was Ron Sexsmith and not Bono as some people were expecting.
• The food, as usual, was super fantastic.
• I saw a number of people I see once a year at Hillside and it was great to catch up.
• One of these “annual friends,” Liz Buzza, makes bags which she was selling at the festival. I bought one and love it.  I’m going to make her a website for a customized laptop bag. It’s going to have lots of secret pockets (the bag, not the website… or.. maybe the website will too..)
• It didn’t rain until Sunday, after which there was an INCREDIBLE rainbow. Three full spectrums of colour. I wish my camera batteries hadn’t died.

Here’s some music (and their myspaces) I would highly recommend you check out:

• The Magic from Guelph, Ontario
• Spiral Beach from Toronto
• We are Wolves from Montreal
• Plants and Animals from Montreal
• Bell Orchestre from Montreal
• Islands from Montreal
• Thunderheist from Montreal/Toronto
• Mr. Something Something from Toronto
• Anything Pop Montreal (also on twitter)
• The Acorn from Ottawa

Aside: If you’re interested in this subject read In Defense of Food by Micheal Pollan. I’m reading it right now and it’s really simple, straight forward and not preachy.

Anyhow, my diet requires that I make food from scratch as much as possible. I usually make large quantities as well, for left-overs and random food days at work. No complaints so far…

Also, as luck would have it, the drop off location for Plan B Organics in Dundas is in the back yard at work.  This has really helped me keep up my veggie intake.  It has also resulted in a few veggies that I wouldn’t normally buy.

This week I have beets. I’ve never cooked with beets before, so I listed off a few ingredients on allrecipes.com and found this little gem Beets with Onion and Cumin.

It is currently simmering.  I decided after a short discussion with Rob and Zoe, that I should blog about my experiments as some of them have turned out quite well. This will be the first of many recipe posts.  Please let me know if you try any of these and how they turn out for you.

+ + + + + + + + + +

Just checked on it.  It’s incredibly pink an turning into a sauce.  I think I’m going to make some pasta to make it easier to eat. Back with more later.

+ + + + + + + + + +

Okay.  Here’s the recipe with my modifications… I modify a lot. Sometimes based on need, sometimes preference… Either way it hasn’t failed me yet. *knock on wood*

INGREDIENTS

• 2 tablespoons canola olive oil
• 1 small 2 large green onion, chopped
• 1 clove garlic, minced crushed
• 1 1/2 teaspoons cumin seed powder
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 5 medium beets eighth’d , peeled and quartered
• 2 tomatoes - peeled, seeded and chopped
• 1 Zucchini sliced and halved
• 1 1/2 cups water + some more when it got too thick
• 1 teaspoon salt

DIRECTIONS

1. Heat a medium saucepan over medium-high heat. Pour in oil and saute onion and garlic until translucent. Mix in cumin seed and saute an additional 2 minutes. Sprinkle in flour and saute 1 minute more.
2. Stir in beets, zucchini, tomatoes, water, and salt. Reduce heat to low, cover pan with lid, and allow to simmer 30 to 45 minutes, until beets are tender.

RESULT

Really surprisingly good!  Much more interesting than eating boiled beets. The sweetness (and colour) of the beets really takes over. I might add more cumin next time. I ate it with some pasta as a pasta sauce.  I also sprinkled some parmesan cheese on there because I thought it could use a bit more flavour.

TIP

Don’t let it touch anything that you like the colour of, cause whatever it is it will turn pink. Beets are quite possibly the most dangerous vegetable I’ve ever cooked with.

PHOTO

I recently came to the conclusion that the networks you join should be based on your online goals/needs. Everyone has a different reason for being online and, because there are so many different communities and/or conversations, it makes it easier to decide where you want to hang out if you know what you’re looking for.

I’d compare it to finding a favourite bar or restaurant. The decision isn’t just based on the food, but is also based on people, atmosphere, beverage selection, service, location, and amount of time you are willing/able to commit.

I guess what it comes down to for me is if I am going to hang out in the same place every day for the next few years it needs to keep me interested/cater to my interests. If it doesn’t, I probably shouldn’t have joined in the first place.