January 1st, 2008

Liking in 2008

650. Not having the pay for TTC on New Year’s Eve.
651. Brisk walks
652. Really big olives
653. Hugs
654. Getting it
655. Dark dress shirt with a tie
656. Bulldogs
657. Linguists
658. Teachers
659. New beginnings

And now part II from AMT, this time aided and abetted by Marcin!

660. Batman
661. christmas wreathes
662. puppies and lasers on youtube
663. donuts
664. cilantro
665. MASH (the movie, and the tv show)
666. making fun of Adrienne Clarkson
667. santa hats, especially placed on inanimate objects to make them festive
668. the New Pornographers
669. doing favours
670. deciding who gets to be dominant
671. typos in take-out menus (current favourite: “Bean Curd in Ear-Then Pot”)
672. dried cherries
673. fireplaces
674. anchovies
675. feta
676. chopstick holders made out of wicker-basket material
677. boys that smell like good boy-deodorant (which maybe smells of ocean and pine trees?)
678. clementines
679. ray bradbury
680. david suzuki
681. being asked if there is something from the grocery store that you would like in the house when you arrive
682. the Soft Boys
683. shaving langourously
684. spackle
685. dogs running in their sleep
686. the name Esme
687. Winnie the Pooh and the House At Pooh Corner
688. Tom Waits
689. new subway systems to explore
690. it not mattering if you get lost
691. stark tree-lined winter fields
692. traffic jams that clear up as you get to them
693. seeing what ads google thinks my email warrants
694. finding old cryptic notes to myself
695. reading acknowledgements
696. Willard R. Espy
697. Shakespeare and Company bookstore
698. people who can actually wear berets and not look like morons
699. pastel jelly beans at easter
700. my grandmother
701. optimists who aren’t delusional about it
702. pessimists who aren’t mean about it
703. magnifying glasses
704. very small gift tags and envelopes
705. text messages from around the globe
706. the name of Pittsburgh’s public radio station: K*QED*
707. soft ginger cookies
708. mismatched coffee cups
709. the Blue Plate Diner in Edmonton
710. naan bread with lots of spices in it
711. hummus and olive oil brought from israel just for you
712. christmas cooking specials on the food network
713. the dubbing on the Japanese Iron Chef
714. souzaphones (really just the concept plus the name)
715. Williamsburg Bridge by Veda Hille
716. very short pop songs
717. renaissance paintings that include traditional christian images (the virgin, jesus, etc.) plus one surprising or anachronistic element (a pomegranite, the duke of urbino, the holy spirit dressed as a sailor, etc.)
718. toothpicks in cubes of cheese
719. (the memory of) Ben’s in Montreal (alas deceased)
720. oregano
721. cumin
722. smashing spices with mortar and pestle
723. my roommate who actually bought a mortar and pestle
724. all my roommates who have made me coffee
725. a pause in the conversation when you know that everyone in the room is happy
726. peter sellers
727. recoveries and close saves
728. running up the hill
729. the odd spate of exhibitionism
730. not having a television
731. expecting a package in the mail
732. shiny
733. La Vielle Europe deli in Montreal
734. that little green bookstore on Milton in the McGill ghetto…
735. huge sleeping but live cats in the windows of used bookstores
736. olive bars
737. very rubbery spatulas
738. the fact that my grandfather thought that last word was pronouced ‘spa-TSU-lah’
739. making one-night friends
740. walking down the aisles of empty theatres
741. ruby’s dining room table, made from a working Miss Pacman videogame
742. grenadine the bunny
743. contemporary pre-teens girls having crushes on e.g. Peter O’Toole or Ringo Starr, circa 1963
744. Pet Sounds by the Beach Boys
745. Very by the Pet Shop Boys
746. Steve Martin
747. Woody Allen and Diane Keaton in the planetarium in Manhattan (the movie)
749. whoever thought that Diane Keaton should wear very very wide belts in like 20 years’ worth of movies
750. watching Ana eat meatloaf
751. St. Sulpice in Montreal
752. Magoo’s in Toronto
753. the letter y
754. thinking up good facebook statuses
755. the story about Joey and the Box of Rocks
756. toy boxes and wooden trunkchests
757. old phonebooths in long rows in airplanes and train stations in 1970s movies
758. the original Thomas Crown Affair with Steve McQueen and Faye Dunaway
759. flirting with someone you are sleeping with, so you don’t have to, but it’s fun
760. really serious legwarmers
761. becky

Be It Resolved That, in 2008 I Will

1. Floss everyday. I’ve come too far, oral-health-wise, to go down for laziness.
2. Stop eating gelatin.
3. Stop reading things I don’t like just because I think I should. This applies to books and periodicals, even *The New Yorker*.
4. Investigate the condo market and make some sort of real estate plan.
5. Write something longer than 20 000 words that has a beginning, middle and end.
6. Resume my usual healthy eating habits that mysteriously disappeared in the latter part of 2007.
7. Attend more readings and other litsy events, but not indiscriminately.
8. Get the tv fixed and get a decent phone plan.
ADDED: 9. Buy local and non-corporate…as often as possible? Certainly more!
10. Go back to running, and try for a serious 10K.

My resolutions never include amorphous goals like, “be less tense” or “assume the best until proven otherwise” because those can’t be exactly acheived. But I certainly do mean to both those things, and many other amorphous things besides. This is going to be a very exciting 2008, doncha think?

Stop acting like a mama’s boy / instead of your father’s son
RR

December 30th, 2007

This Year in Review–the 2007 Resolutions

1. Health vigilance

Basically, I wanted to not die in surgery in January, and to recover from it with reasonable alacrity. And I did, so this one’s a win. The fact that I haven’t gotten the plague or fallen down a flight of stairs in the months since is simply bonus.

2. Apply for grants.

Did it.

3. Devote an hour a week to current events.

Failure. Utter and complete failure. I may be a bad person.

4. Get a real job.

Got one.

5. Read lots and read joyfully.

Um, this isn’t a real resolution, of course I read. A few books I dragged myself through when I probably should’ve just stopped. Perhaps more work on the joy next time.

6. Make a blog.

Hey, whadaya know!

7. Travel!

New York and Ottawa, huzzah. Maybe I’ll dream a little bigger next year!

8. Practice gratitude.

Um, this one seems in retrospect a bit airy-fairy. Hard to tell how I’m really doing on it. I think ok.

9. Write a book.

Hey, I did that one too.

Whoo, 7.5/9, perhaps my best year ever. Am I softballing myself, should I try for greater things? Stay tunned for the 2008 resolutions–maybe I’m going to climb the side of a building or something!!

You be 1948 / I’ll be 1981
RR

Likes from a Post-Christmas Party

618. Digital cameras
619. Men who don’t shave their backs (and women too, I guess)
620. Chocolate fondue with marshmallows
621. Monster trucks
622. Rachel Ray
623. George Eliot
624. George Strait
625. Missy (cat)
626. Horseback riding
627. Rodeo
628. Jack Daniels
629. Iron Bru
630. Cauliflower
631. Red wine
632. Lifelines on palms
633. John Deere tracotrs
634. Ben Still as Starsky
635. Kielbassa
636. Strawberries
637. Thermafores
638. Yoga (esp. Warrior pose)
639. Pictures of babies
640. Washable fabrics
641. Chenille sweaters
642. Varnished toilet seats
643. Pepsi blue
644. Dr. Pepper
645. Dr. Pepper Jellybellies
646. Tigger
647. Beeswax candles
648. Apple pie
649. Scottish spaghetti

December 29th, 2007

Things I Like, as of 2008 (from AMT)

You’d think it impossible for me to like Anne-Michelle any better after ten years, yet this list endears her to me still more, especially #529 and 543. Better still, the email that contained it was entitled “Part 1”!!

509. Sample-size bottles at the drugstore
510. Dangly earrings
511. Red gloves with matching scarves and fetching hats
512. Purses made entirely of zippers
513. People offering advice who don’t care if you take it or not
514. The smell of lily of the valley
515. Cufflinks
516. Arrested Development
517. More coffee when you have already clearly had enough, bordering on too much
518. New year’s eve parties where you know hardly anyone, but they work out
519. Champagne for no reason
520. Very nice pens
521. Silver instead of gold
522. Working fireplaces
523. Long walks in the woods in the snow with the dog
524. Scrabble
525. Scrabulous
526. Cleaning out a drawer entirely
527. Packing gifts to take to the people you will be visiting
528. Red shoes
529. Boots with short skirts and colourful tights, so you look like a superheroine
530. A streak of navy blue in black hair
531. Pretty boxes
532. Sending flowers
533. Receiving flowers
534. Remembering just in time
535. Losing something, looking at the bottom of your bag one last time, and
suddenly finding it there
536. Breakfast in bed
537. Discovering that someone went beyond the call of duty
538. Discovering that someone noticed you going beyond the call of duty
539. Official people being reasonable
540. Clean windows
541. Fog when you don’t need to see
542. Ducks in the pond
543. Excessive wind when you are indoors
544. Standing just inside the balcony at 4am in an August thunderstorm
545. Buying christmas cards in boxing day sales
546. Wandering around IKEA with a person you love helping them buy furniture
547. Putting the very last screw or nail into a piece of DYI IKEA furniture
548. Ribbons
549. Not having to say it
550. Bruises that are almost gone
551. A stack of things you have completed
552. Very good headphones
553. Mash-ups of Tijuana Brass and Public Enemy
554. Beginner’s luck
555. Laughing till your eyes well up, and when you throw your head back the
tears go flying at the person who made you laugh
556. Getting something really clean that was previously really dirty
557. A long drive in the sun in the Berkshire mountains
558. Fairmount Bagels
559. The Canada Day waterfall off the Edmonton High Level Bridge
560. The kids who really know how to figure skate at the West Edmonton Mall
561. Home-made crepes
562. Old record players that come with their own speakers
563. Typewriters
564. Amnesty International
565. Jade jewelry on glamourous old people
566. Grace Kelly
567. The romantic ideal, though not the practical details, of gambling in Monaco
568. Jimmy Stewart movies
569. Very bad infomercials and evangelist television on late late night TV
570. Croquet, actually
571. Getting letters
572. Mix CDs
573. Poirot with David Suget (sp?)
574. Very old friends
575. Creating websites of no consequence
576. Putting up fairy lights
577. Crispy leaves on the ground
578. Naturally curly hair
579. A dash of freckles
580. Fluevogs
581. Dolce de leche ice cream
582. Newberry St in Boston
583. The Internationale
584. Miniature music boxes
585. Zebras
586. Woman who can pull off wearing long scarves
587. Elegance
588. That Gene Kelly look of too-short pants with loafers, preferably with no socks
589. That very strong Dutch black licorice covered in salt
590. Real cranberry juice
591. Ouzo
592. Stationery stores
593. Eccentric diners
594. Local cable access TV, particularly the shows that involve polka or
municipal politics
595. The box store in Hadley, Massachusetts that sells nothing but pet food
and 2-litre bottles of pop
596. Vegan food that does not taste vegan
597. Vegan buffet in New York City
598. The Strand Bookstore in New York City
599. The huge pubs in Liverpool
600. Pastisse (sp?)
601. Bailey’s on ice
602. Blue spruces
603. Making tricky recipes for the first time with someone you like
604. Waking up on special days
605. Curling up in bed with nothing to do but rest
606. Siberian tigers
607. Emperor penguins
608. Montreal’s Biodome
609. The Museum of Anthropology at UBC
610. Subversive wrapping paper
611. Duct tape with sushi on it
612. Tweezers
613. Packing foam
614. Brand new tubes of toothpaste
615. Spooky movies
616. Nina Simone
617. Admitting that you like Beyonce

December 28th, 2007

Parental Likes

501. Chocolate
502. Short stories
503. Fires in fireplaces
504. Sleeping in
505. Rain on the roof
506. The smell of baking bread
507. The Rodin museum
508. Gin martinis

That list is pretty representative of my folks, but it does leave out a few personality facets. For example, the incident which occurred yesterday, wherein my father brought a measuring tape to the grocery store in order to settle a dispute with my mother, touching upon the dimesions of pizza shells. It was resolved amicably.

I have new boots!

Let this be a lesson
RR

December 27th, 2007

Neglected Likes

In honour of the warm after-glow of Christmas, I’m offering a special collections of things I like that, I fear, are not liked by many others. I try to like them extra, to make up for it!

462. Fruitcake
463. Chicken liver
464. Small talk, especially about the weather
465. Waiting rooms
466. Airports
467. Hospitals
468. Sleeping in public
469. Really really long lists

In other news, Christmas was nice. In case you doubted that I could do otherwise, I’ve been writing more or less steadily, but that’s a lot easiser when you don’t have anything else to do besides eat, sleep, read, and go to the amusing local gym, where you NEVER run into people from high school, even though you are totally braced for it. In fact, given the low-demand life I am leading, I’ve accomplished very little, but I do not care because I haven’t had more than one day off since July. I am totally entitled to sleep 10 hours a night and eat as much fruitcake as I can find. Also to watch a *Fraiser* marathon on television for reasons that now escape me, and play copious *Dance Dance Revolution* (OMG–I do not have my *Chicago Manual of Style* with me and I do not know what appropriate citation style for a video game is. Italics? Quotation marks? Something I haven’t even thought of yet, like angle brackets? Oh, the shame!!) My bro borrowed the PlayStation and *Dance Dance* (going with the italics for now) from his girl, and it’s been quite the hilarious entertainment. I fell off my mat, but only once.

Um…I’ve been outdoors. No, really. I went to see AMT for breakfast this am, and she was charming and her t-shirt showed a tiny mouse screaming, “Books rule!” and also she had red leather gloves. I have black leather gloves which are so elegant and grown-uppy, and I adore them and I know not how this meshes with my not eating beef. Cows–too cute to devour, but I’ll wrap my hands in their skin? Well, apparently, at least for now. I’ll get back to you on this.

I *do* like presents. No particular thing, just *stuff* for *me* you know. I think what I like best about gifts, letters, anything in the mail, really, is that it is evidence that someone thought about me when I wasn’t around. Something about the image of a loved one standing in a card shop, glaring at one of those Shoebox-silliness cards, thinking really hard–“Would RR laugh at this?” That just kills me.

I think a lot of thought went into this holiday. I am kilt.

This comes to you courtesy of my new Magnetic Fields’ cd, 69 Love Songs, vol. 2

Epitaph for My Heart

Caution caution caution
To prevent electric shock
Do not do not do not
Remove cover.
No user servicable parts inside
Refer servicing to qualified
Service personel.

RR

December 20th, 2007

Ben Likes

448. Anniversaries
449. Goats
450. Irony
451. Tina Fey
452. Animation for grown-ups
453. Men Behaving Badly
454. Blue
455. Sleeping in
456. Yawning
457. Humphrey Bogart
458. Dance Dance Revolution
459. Cream pies
460. Sunsets
461. People thinking I’m cool

December 19th, 2007

10+

414. Clone High (tv show)
415. Tinsel
416. Lunchtime
417. Accents
418. Chopped liver (really)
419. Green
420. Muppets
421. Stop-motion animation
422. Breakfast cereal
423. Synonyms
424. Defribullators
425. Swimming
426. Spelling yoghurt with an “h”
427. The way French people pronounce “h”
428. Banana chips
429. Christmas specials
430. Plans
431. The guided tour of Alcatraz Island
432. Birds
433. Eating an apple while walking jauntily down the street
434. Sesame Street
435. The difference between raisins and currents, whatever it is

December 18th, 2007

Yay!

404. Eavesdropping
405. Vacation pictures (anyone’s)
406. Short fingernails
407. Prizes
408. Chicken
409. Tegan & Sara
410. Long division
411. Hugs while wearing puffy coats
412. The word “llama”
413. The Chicago Manual of Style