Holiday Delights Part 2: Kuwait Starbucks vs. Toronto Starbucks

Due to the positive responses I got for my last blog post (thank you all, by the way) I have decided to change the name from Holiday Horrors to Holiday Delights...since it did nothing but cause laughter and delight. (I would hit the back space button and erase that horribly cheesy line from existence but the back space button on my parents’ ancient-of-days keyboard does not work properly. You know how it is)

After one week of being in Kuwait, I still haven’t fully gotten over the jetlag. But I have gone out for a run in the park, which is an interesting story for another blog post; and I have successfully gotten through the first batch of Goan festivities with grace and aplomb. Don’t roll your eyes at me.

I spend my days eating and sleeping and spend my nights with my new best friend, Gravol. I have also challenged myself to watch every single episode of the Office. However, this has made me really miss going to work. And I say that with no sarcasm.

As everyone knows, I developed a new obsession with Starbucks some months ago so my dad took me to Starbucks the other day, a trip that I have been waiting for too long. I was pleasantly surprised to see that Kuwait Starbucks had adopted the Christmassy holiday cups! Score board: Kuwait Starbucks = 1, Toronto Starbucks= 0

This is the part that gets interesting though. Sit down for this:
So I scan the price list. Do you know how much a tall coffee in Kuwait Starbucks cost? $3.00.
Three effing bucks! (I did all the currency conversions for you. You’re welcome.) Now you can go to your local Starbucks and pay $1.79 for premium coffee with a big smile on your face, knowing that there are some poor schumck countries out there in the world that Starbucks rips off more than you. Score board: K.S.= 1, T.S.= 5
Anyway, I go to the cashier.
Karen: “ two tall coffees please”
Starbucks woman: “ Tall? You mean big?”
Big? WTH? I leave for a week and they change sizes on me?
Karen: “emm no, tall”
Starbucks woman: *looks kindly at me* “You mean large?”
Her kind look kind of scares me because I know that it is not in the Starbucks employee policy to have patience or look kindly upon customers who are confused about Starbucks cup sizes.
It then hits me. This woman has no idea what Starbucks cup sizes are. To her, it’s still a world of small medium, large...like it should be. There is no Tall, Grande or Venti.

I get exasperated. “No I mean tall. Tall. Your smallest size”
Starbucks woman: “Oh you want a small coffee!”
Seriously?
Starbucks barista man: “Would you like it with milk?”
I stare at him in dumb confusion. Don’t you do that part yourself?
Somewhere a Starbucks CEO must be cringing. Actually, all over the world, there are Starbucks employees cringing.

Karen: “No. Just give me a tall black coffee”
Starbucks man: “Are you absolutely sure you want it without milk?”
I don’t say anything.
“Yes” I hear my dad say. “Please just give us two black coffees”
I get my coffee and it comes with milk.
Score board: K.S. = -27, T.S.= 27
That was the end of my long awaited Kuwait Starbucks trip.

You know I learnt something from this. I realised that I must have come off as rude and frustrated with the cashier. But then I thought of the times when the Toronto Starbucks guy patronizingly corrected me when I ordered a large instead of a grande and that time when that SAME Starbucks loser guy looked at me like I was a crazy cat lady on crack when I asked him what a caramel macchiato was.

So I will give Kuwait Starbucks 27 points for balancing out karma and for once making Starbucks look like the fool instead of the customer.
The score as it stands: Kuwait Starbucks= 30 points. Toronto Starbucks = 29 points.

I gave Toronto Starbucks 2 extra points for being nearly 2 and half times cheaper.
However, Kuwait Starbucks still wins because I gave them 3 extra points for being so expensive and thus making me virtually guilt free for drinking Starbucks coffee on a regular basis.
And this pretty much is the most exciting thing that has happened in Kuwait so far.

Congratulations Kuwait Starbucks! For winning at sucking...and for yet another blog post about absolutely nothing.

Holiday Delights: Goan Party Landmines

I'm finally home for Christmas! Somewhere between trying to get adjusted to a whole different other planet at home, jet lag, really really bad dial-up interet and listening to Appu-style Indian accents EVERYWHERE, I realised that it wasn’t as hard finding humor at home as I thought it would be. I think even God has been having a bit of a laugh. Last time I was home, it was freezing. It was, dare I say, colder than Canada in December. I learnt my lesson. This Christmas, I packed nothing but hoodies, sweaters, tights, construction-man winter socks and jackets. This year the winter temperatures in Kuwait averaged to about 23 C. For all my American readers who need to get with the rest of the world, thats 73.4 degrees F. I was sweating it out at Christmas mass. You know what this means? This means I have no clothes. On the flip side, the weather is heck of a lot better than where you are :P
Its all good, my mother says. Now you have the perfect excuse to go shopping. She’s a woman of great wisdom.

Anyway, today I went for my first dreaded Goan Christmas party. Or Christmas “Tree” as it was fondly called by the Goans when I was a kid. The experience was all too familiar and predictable. For those of you lucky ones who are from Goa, this will be midly amusing. For those of you who aren’t fortunate enough to have to experience Goan Christmas parties yourselves, you are in luck as I decided to take notes.

At Goan parties:
10. The moment you step inside you hear the comment “Look at you all slim and trim. All these young girls are all on diets these days. Karen, are you dieting? How do you keep yourself so slim?”
This question is a given and is usually asked by the rather rotund women standing by the dessert table stuffing their face with lard-laden Goan sweets.
Good Answer: "No aunty." (every Susan, Sally, Sandra and her sister is your aunty), "I’m not on a diet." And then you proceed into throwing out all your Kine facts from your 4 years at York about how exercise could cure cancer.
Bad Answer: "Of course I’m on a diet. I keep myself slim by only eating soda crackers and ants. Now excuse me while I go and throw up the tea I drank this morning lest that 0.0000000002 calorie goes straight to my hips."

9. You are asked, “So how is school? Are you studying hard? Or hardly studying?”
This question doesn’t have a fart of a chance to be funny and usually is asked by the fat tipsy man who’s halfway through his glass of feni (Goan booze) followed by a volcanic laugh which sounds like he has lung cancer.
Good Answer: "I don't study. I work."
Bad Answer: "I don’t study. I skip class and waste daddy’s money on alcohol, drugs and boys. Wanna see my trampy tattoo?"

8. If you tell people you have a full time job, then that is usually followed by the next inevitable question “Oh what do you work as?”
Karen: “I work at a physiotherapy clinic as a Kinesiologist”
Since most people at this party don’t know what the HELL is a Kinesiologist or much less know how to even pronounce the damn word, I end up being called ‘the girl who went to Canada and became a physiotherapist. In situations like this, you play it up and make up bullshit about how you save the day by dealing with torn ligaments and broken fingers.

7. Somewhere in the middle of the party, the host will come out to announce that we will be playing our first “party game”. Apparently, party games aren’t the dying Goan tradition I thought they were. In normal Goan parties, party games are passing the parcel, musical chairs/arms, four corners/bombing the city, and everyone’s favourite “pin the tail on the donkey”. Party game of choice at Christmas time? Pin a pimple on Santa’s nose. Yes, we’re just that original.

6. If you have spent a considerable time abroad, you will get that up-down ‘look at that slut’ look followed by the question, “Look at you! Looking all high tech and American”
Good Answer: “I came from Canada, bitch”
Bad Answer: "I came from Canada, bitch."

5. You are always asked how many boyfriends you have.
Good Answer: I have one boyfriend. He became an engineer after he quit medical school. He cooks and quilts in his spare time and when he's not helping old ladies cross the street and rescuing kittens from trees, he' giving me a foot rub and vacuuming...at the same time.
Bad Answer: Sorry I don’t do boys. But I have a girlfriend and she’s dying to meet you. Would you like to know what we do on weekends?

4. When they know you have a job, the obvious comment/question is “You have a job in health care. You must be just making money left right and centre.”
Good Answer: *smile and save the annoyance for the treadmill*
Bad Answer: Yes of course I make money. I shake my tree of money that my boss planted at the clinic for me and blow my nose in dollar bills all day. It’s a hard job but someone’s got to do it.

3. There is always one aunty who will look at you with disgust and say “Oh you came from Canada? I wouldn’t want to send my daughter there because she’ll get spoilt by white people”
Good Answer: Laugh this one off. Sometimes its just refreshing to be in any environment thats ignorant and far from politically correct.
Bad Answer: Yes of course, you don’t want to be one of those foolish narrow-minded parents like mine who sent off their daughter to Canada so that she causes a scandal and spoils the family name by talking to the white girl sitting next to her in church.

2. You are ALWAYS asked to get the hell out of the way so that some drunk Goan uncles can take pictures of the food. What scared me though was that this time, I was one of them. This just proves that you can take the goan-ness out of the Canadian…but it comes right back eventually.

1. And the number 1 way to know you’re at a Goan Christmas party is when it takes so long for your parents to say goodbye and leave without getting sidetracked into another conversation that you actually have time to sit and write this entire list down on paper.

Fortunatley for me, whatever happens at the Christmas party is usually discussed and gossiped about at length on the ride home with the family. And that by far is my favourite part and makes the whole evening worth it. I missed that.
I hope your Christmas parties are going just as swimmingly as mine :D.

179 Pennies for some Red Lipstick

Monday morning and as per usual I'm running around like a headless chicken. I know at some point, this story gets old but bear with me because today there's actually a point to this story.

Anyway, where was I? Yes, headless chicken running. I don't know what came over me today but I decided to go all out. I straightened my hair, touseled in some Morrocan Oil and put on Friday morning make-up. Friday morning make-up is solely reserved for Friday (morning), but in my effort to inject some feel-goodness into my Monday morning, I said what the hell and went to town with it. The problem with having a beauty regime in the morning is that you have no time to do other things. Like put on your monster winter boots and run out the door. But boy! do you ever look and feel like a million bucks!

I get to Starbucks at 6:48am. My bus leaves in 7 minutes but I'm not sweatin' it this time because I look hot and the bus probably won't leave for about another 12 minutes anyway. The lady in front of me had to pay for her coffee. I wait patiently. 2 minutes and she's still paying for her coffee. I then realise with sick horror that she's off her rocker and is paying for her coffee in pennies!! IN PENNIES!! SERIOUSLY?! $1.79 IN PENNIES! WTF!

Several other people gathered in line behind me and this crazy woman's still counting her money. I looked at my watch. 6:51am. I'm not going to make my bus. Dear Lord, I'm not making this bus. The woman finally counted her change and gave it to the Starbucks girl...WHO THEN PROCEEDS TO COUNT THE PENNIES HERSELF! Excuse me while I go and repeatedly bang my head against a wall. Was she concerned that the crazy woman had given her a penny short??

I finally get my coffee and jet. And course, half my coffee is all over me. I make it to the bus loop and I see my beloved 77 waiting patiently for me in its spot. Thank you Jesus! But then I realised with dread that my bus pass was in my other jacket pocket! NOOOOO!! I ran to the ticket booth to buy a ticket and by the time I had done that, I caught the last glimpse of the 77 leaving the bus loop.

I stood there forlornly, telling God I hated crazy penny lady and the starbucks girl and the fact that I reeked of coffee. But really, it was my fault. If I hadn't been so damn VAIN this morning, I would have been on that bus.

Normally, my story would end here with some sort of lame sentence on how you have to see the silver lining and all that jizz-jazz. But today, the story goes on...

For reasons I'm not prepared to disclose, the continuation of this story will be left as a suspensful cliff hanger. If you would like to know the continuation and end of this story you may email me to recieve the full manuscript for a minimal fee of a grande Starbucks coffee (which is the only mode of payment for this reviting tale). I guarantee it will be well worth your $2.67 because who doesn't want to hear a story involving a hot guy and a MAJOR lapse in professionalism (is that a word?) on my part. Ha.

Just dont pay for it in pennies.

Shopping with Ms. Scrooge

Its that time of year again, folks. The time when everything in the mall is red and green with a SALE tag and when all you hear on 97.3 EasyRock is Jingle Bell Rock and All I want for Christmas is you. Quite frankly, I find myself being Little Miss Scrooge this Christmas. I cannot stand to hear any more Christmas carols on the radio and if they play Last Christmas one more time, I might just punch someone in the throat. Don't even get me started on Chipmunk Christmas songs. Who's genius idea was it to annoy the crap out of everyone with that grabage?

Today, I went to the mall to do my "Christmas shopping". I miss the days with my family when gift-giving was not the norm and you did not have to stress over what the hell each family member should get. I miss the days when Christmas decorations were put up on December 15th and Christmas CDs had carols like "First Noel", "Carol of Bells" and "Oh Holy Night" instead of 7 different versions of Santa Baby.

I had a conversation the other day with one of my patients who was beside herself with stress and grief because she had to still go to shop for gifts for her mailman and her son's first grade teacher. Her son is in grade 3!! This got me all stressed and bothered as I started to remember all sorts of people that I was going to have to buy gifts for. "You be ready", she said. "What if they give you some thing for Christmas, and they didn't make your list?"

She had a point. She was also appalled that I did not have a list.

Anyway, back to the point of this post...

So here I am at the mall, shopping for people I could care less about and hating everything because its God's birthday and I'm broke in wallet and spirit. I won't bore you with the details but I didn't buy you anything. There were tons of things that I could have bought for my loved-ones, hated-ones and tolerated-ones but I couldn't have been bothered waiting in line to pay for them. It was a complete waste of time. However, I did have a list of some items of need for myself. This winter I was in desperate need for some nice boots.

Here is the pretty boot(s) I had in mind:

Here are the pretty ugly boots I ended up buying:

In my defense, when I wear them to work tomorrow they will protect my poor feet from -43 degrees temperatures and will be completely waterproof! Take THAT you gorgeous hot tan to-die-for boots!

Number 2 on the list was a nice winter coat.

No dice on the coat.

Number 3 was a 2010 calender. I had my sights on a beautiful Quebec calendar, since I fell in love with the city when I visited last summer.

This is what I had in mind and in my hand for the longest time:

I dropped Quebec like a hot potato the moment I laid eyes on this:

I learnt a few things from this. I learnt that like many people, I was caught in the net of the Christmas GiftCurse. My list of need was more of a list of greed. I tried to think of what Jesus would do and I realised well, Jesus could care less about whether or not I had a Jacob purse or a cutsey coat or the fancy boots.

I'm sure He would be worried more about how cold my feet would be on my way to work, or how stupid I was to buy a completely ineffective winter coat. And as for the calendar, maybe its just time I move on from Quebec to some place warmer and more welcoming.

This year, I'm going to make your life easier. If I'm on your Christmas list, I ask you to please cut me off. If you bought me a Christmas gift, I ask you to please return it or give it to someone else. If you go to the mall and see something and say to yourself: "Hey! Thats something Karen would like!", please do not buy it. Instead, I urge you to buy yourself something that you REALLY need instead. Like a good pair of fugly but warm and trustworthy winter boots.

So please burn all your lists. That way you will have more money in the bank, more time to spend with people you love, a little something-something for yourself and more time to maybe ask Jesus what He wants for his birthday. $50 bucks says He's not asking for a flat screen TV this year. And if He is, they're on sale at Sears. You're welcome.

How to host a dinner party for two Catholic priests

For our first experience at hosting a dinner party, my roomate and I decided to invite Fr. Daren and Fr. Mark for goodtimes and some good food.

While the night was a success, as demonstrated by the smiles on their faces, the whole process was quite a learning experience (for me at least). Here's just a few handy tips that I picked up along the way when playing host.

Its time for a little Good Idea, Bad Idea:
Good Idea: Making a list of things on paper you need to get done over the course of the day.

Bad Idea: Making a list of things you need to get done over the course of the day...in your head while you're still half asleep cursing and stumbling to bathroom. (true story)

Good Idea: Making your grocery list with your roomate the night before so that you know exactly what each one is getting.

Bad Idea: Calling your roomate (who has no minutes on her phone) 300 times from Food Basics because you were too much of a lazy ASS to make a damn list.

Good Idea: Playing eye-contact tag with a cute stranger on the bus while going to the store.

Bad Idea: Playing eye-contact with a cute stranger on the bus but accidently making eye contact with the creeper sitting beside him instead. (this happens to me more often than you think)

Good Idea: Comparing prices between different brands of an item to maximise your budget.

Bad Idea: Wasting an hour comparing prices when you realise you don't need the item.

Good Idea: Putting out a nice scented candle in the living room for a warm welcoming atmosphere.

Bad Idea: Putting out two different types of scented candles and a fragrance oil burner in the living room for a bad headache.

Good Idea: Buying fancy wine.

Bad Idea: Buying fancy wine when you don't own a corkscrew.

Good Idea: Experimenting with different ways to set a table last minute to optimise space.

Bad Idea: Experimenting with different ingredients last minute to optimise taste.

Good Idea: Playing some soothing dinner music.

Bad Idea: Forgetting to make the soothing dinner music playlist and then having to deal with the awkwardness when all you hear is the chewing of food and Nelly Futardo singing Maneater.

Good Idea: Cooking spicy food for yourself and your roomate.

Bad Idea: Cooking spicy food for Fr. Daren and Fr. Mark.

Good Idea: Putting out dessert bowls.

Bad Idea: Forgetting to bring out the dessert.

Good Idea: Watching a Patrick Dempsey movie with a glass of wine after your guests have left.

Bad Idea: Watching Made of Honor (of all Patrick Dempsey movies)

Good Idea: Going to gym the next day and working out to songs that remind you of good times

Bad Idea: Going to the gym the next day and working out to Jingle Bell Rock and a really bad remix of Silent Night.

Good Idea: Reading this blog post on a Saturday night

Better Idea: Having a life on a Saturday night instead.

Would you like some fries with that slush?

Disclaimer: I want to let you know that this post is going to sound very weird to you. In fact, its not weird. Its downright crazy and pretentious but try and have an open mind. And if you can't then, I'll understand.

Toronto woke up this morning to the coming of the winter dragon. If you had the commute from hell this morning because of the terrible storm then I'm going to come clean and say I'm partly to blame for it. Let me explain why I'm taking responsibilty for today's crazy weather.

You see lately, I've been having a little trouble buying into this whole Jesus loves you sooooo much theory. I used to see it as a fact but for reasons I'm not ready to share, the Truth has been reduced to theory. I find myself choosing to be void of compassion, joy, love, patience, kindness and gentleness. I've basically been choosing to be a bitch and then been blaming that decision on God.

So today I think God decided that He finally had it with me. No more Mr. Nice Guy. It was time to bring out the big guns. My natural reaction was to think my stormy grief today was to punish me. But it wasn't. It was the exact opposite.

The 77 was 55 minutes late. This meant that there were two bus loads of people impatiently waiting for this one bus. I clutched my coffee in my hand, closed my eyes as tight as I could and prayed fervently for even a tiny shread of compassion for my fellow commuters. I pushed against the back door of the bus. This meant I now had a first hand view of what it was really like outside everytime the door opened. And it hit me the first time the door opened. To say the storm was fierce would be doing a grave injustice to God. It was unbelievable.

There was a tiny little Filipino woman waiting at the next stop. The bus stopped at the lights, while she patiently waited for the driver to let her in. He never did. The bus was too full. She knocked at the door pleading with him to open it but just got an apologetic look back.

At every bus stop, I saw rows of people beaten down by the snow, waiting for their salvation on wheels. But the bus just passed them by. I dont know what came over me but I began to cry for them. I prayed for them more intensely then I ever prayed for anything else in my life. I knew I had finally felt it. I felt compassion to a degree that I didnt think I was capable of feeling.

It took me three hours to get to work today. The snow was still coming down crazy when I got off the bus. I still had a 30 minute walk ahead of me before I would get to work. It was the walk of death. The sidewalks snowy and slushy. My toes had turned into 10 little frozen popsicles in my wet boots, my fingers were numb, I was drenched from head to toe thanks to a massive truck splashing all the sidewalk slush in my hair and face. But as I walked, something in me completly relaxed and I felt this undescribable joy. The harder the snow came down, the more joy I felt. I've been to tons of retreats, healing masses, spiritual direction sessions and nothing compared to the sheer joy I felt at that moment. Just pure joy for absolutley no reason in the face of a ridiculous massive snow storm. Because at that moment, I knew why I had to go through this.

You see the truth is, God doesnt care about your faults. He could care less whether you have the patience of a saint or the stubborness of a mule. He will do whatever it takes to shows you He loves you fiercely. Some of us fiercely feel His love when they see a daisy, while the rest of us need a light show...like a terribly fierce storm.

Everytime I bitched about how cold it was, or about how I had slush in my mouth because of that stupid truck, all I could hear in my head was:

"What?! Karen, are you serious?? Today you are that one sheep I'm looking for while I leave the rest of the 99 in the storm waiting for the bus and you're STILL not convinced that I love you? Not even a little?". Another gigantic splash of slush flies in my face from a passing car. I had to laugh. God and I didn't exactly share the same sense of humor.

And so folks, if you've had a hard time this morning because of this crazy storm, I apologise. You might say, well Karen its not your fault. Umm...I think it kinda is. If you've had a hard time feeling love from above, your package and a bunch of daisies are in the mail . Just have a vase, a warm winter coat and brace yourself. And if its any consolation, I'm still trying to get the sidewalk slush taste out of my mouth.

The next sunny day is on me, I promise.

Hot dumpling soup with a side of pillow punching

If some of you have noticed, I try ("try" being the key word here) to keep my posts somewhat optimistic and positive. And if I'm not able to do that, I try to make light of stressful situations with (bad) jokes and comments. It keeps my own views optimistic and helps purge out the negative. Besides, I figure you guys should not be subject to whiney bullshit at the end of your long day.

But tonight is not going to be like that. Tonight, I could care less about positive and optimism. I'm just going to throw all that new age, good zen crap out the window and tell you about the crappiest week in the history of life.

As you might have figured out, I love making lists and putting things in point form. I will therefore carry on this tradition and list out what made me such a bitter cow this week. I will try to keep this short:

1. Boiled-egg Bob's Sexual Harassment: We have a patient who for confidentiality purposes we'll call Boiled-egg Bob. I call him Boiled-egg Bob because his body looks just like a Boiled-egg. His hands and legs however are like toothpicks that stick out his oval body. Boiled-Egg Bob is 60 years old and has no concept of personal space. Just before I put on the electrodes for his IFC therapy on Monday morning, he turned me around and ran his hand down my back "to show me where I should put the electrodes". WTF!!!!

2. Almost losing my eyesight permanently: We have a machine that provides laser therapy. Its basically a laser beam that pentrates your skin in the area of pain. We actually have special glasses that need to be worn when using it because if the laser beam comes in direct contact with your eyes, you're screwed for life. Permanent blindness. Anyway, no one bothers using the glasses, because you just have to be careful not to directly point it at your face. However, Tuesday morning, I was so caught up with dealing with two patients at one time that I did not realise the laser beam was pointing upward in my face. I was not until an hour later that I realised what I had done. I almost made myself blind.

3. Getting drenched by the sidewalk puddle: Nothing is more miserable at 6:30 on a cold Wednesday morning than heavy rain, the screen door slamming in your face and then getting drenched by a TTC bus flying across a sidewalk puddle. How about some major coffee spillage to top it off!

4. Being half an inch away from being hit by an SUV: After dealing with sexual harassement, almost going blind, spilling your coffee, getting wet and having your face slammed by the screen door (which one day I will probably remove in a fit of rage), there is nothing you want to do more than get the hell out of Woodbridge and finish off your work week with Paul's amazing yoga/tai chi/pilates class. However, in my haste to not miss his class, I almost got myself killed while trying to cross a major intersection while the traffic lights were still green. And then I got yelled at by the bus driver, who almost didnt open the door for me to teach me a lesson. Lesson learnt, because I'm still very shaken up by it and keep replaying it in my head.

5. Forgetting my yoga mat at home: Yes, this was the mother of all cherries to top my cake of crap. I made it to Paul's class in time. But I forgot my yoga mat. I had to take one of the very gross common mats that are used by everyone and anyone. So it was deep breathing on a mat that smelt like 10 years of sweat and human feet. Truly an hour of joyness.

Just for kicks though, lets try to find the bright side:

1. I told Boiled-Egg Bob that I would stick those electrodes up where the sun don't shine if he touched me like that again (I didnt say it in so many words but he got the message)

2. I didn't lose my eyesight permanently.

3. My face does not have any visible screen-door-shaped bruise and I'm now dry from the sidewalk puddle and the coffee spillage.

4. I'm alive.

5. I risked my life for the most uncomfortable yoga experience but I got to talk to Paul at the end of the class who told me to go home and punch my pillow until I was exhausted. He also assured me that tomorrow would be a warm day.

So now, I will go have my hot dumpling soup, take Paul's advice and try to get this week out of my system.

Where the hell is my snooze button?

The start of this week has been pretty routine. Nothing too out of the ordinary. One thing that has had a noticeable change (for me at least) is the weather. It has definitely gotten colder in the mornings. While walking to the bus station at 6:30am may not be as pleasant as having some hot Tom Yum soup at Pho 88 with some good company, settling in the warmth of my bus with my morning coffee somewhat makes up for it.

This morning though, even that pleasure was almost taken from me. The Starbucks guy for some mind blowing reason decided to have a civilized conversation with me... which cost me some precious seconds. In my rush to get the hell out of there, I put the wrong lid on my cup. As I was madly trying to push it down while riding the escalator, the lid popped straight into my face. Squirts of coffee shot into my face and all over my coat. I flipped. Not because I was embarassed and had scalding coffee all over me, but because I had less coffee in my cup as usual, and just what if that wasn't enough to get me through the wacko crackos of today. Besides, the upside about waking up before God is that there aren't too many people to witness your special moments. Well, until now anyway.

And now that my cup had no lid, I couldnt semi-run with it without spilling the rest of it all over Finch Subway Station. So I did what any self respecting Starbucks junkie would do. I chugged. And of course had the bad case of oesophagus burn. You know exactly what that is. If you don't, drop everything you're doing, run to Starbucks right now, buy a coffee and chug it. Now you have a new term for what happens to your throat and foodpipe when you accidently take a huge gulp of a hot liquid whose temperature you badly misjudged. If anyone asks you where you got this phrase, please ask them to read my lifechanging blog.

I listened to Shakira all the way to work. She's a little too sexy for a Tuesday morning on the 77 but I guess it keeps things interesting. I tried to call on the feel-goodness of Paolo Nutini and Jason Mraz but they seemed to have called in sick today. Which is what I should have done.

Here's what I managed to salvage from these cold, crappy and blindingly bright sunny days.

That piece of furniture is going to be my new dresser/clothes/wine/purse storage. It looks like garbage now (which is appropriate because thats where I rescued it from) but it will be unrecognisable when I'm done with it.

And that other picture that looks like poop in a wok is mint beef. Good thing it doesn't taste like poop in a wok!

Tomorrow is Wackjob Wednesday. So if you will excuse me, I'm going to eat my minty beefy dinner while I mentally debate about whether to upgrade myself from a grande to a venti and drown out my sorrows in Spice Girls and Taylor Swift.