My review of 2019:
4 out of 5 stars. It started out really cold and concluded on a slightly chilly note. I took one star away because I would not relive it. Moving across Canada by car with the cats in the backseat once was good enough.
Author: lkvy
I'm a Deaf vagabond currently living on Vancouver Island. Bicycles dominate my life, but I also make time for climbing, hiking, camping, and cats. And if I have time left over after all that, I write about it.
Dry January came early.
On Christmas Day, Yann and I hiked up Mt. Doug (elevation 225m) and passed people in t-shirts. From the top, we had a 360° view of the Capital Regional District and its total absence of snow. White Christmases are overrated.
Yann made an especially unnecessary observation when pointed out the observatory, which was obvious.
In the evening, we were served a Christmas meal by neither my nor Yann’s family, but Kristina’s family which meant there was significantly more signing involved than what I’m used to. Most of the time, THIS is what family dinners are like for me.
It would’ve been the perfect Christmas EXCEPT…
Smell my cathedral.
At the beginning of the month, several people messaged me on Instagram to say they were looking forward to seeing what I’d make for this year’s gingerbread creation.
I was flattered. I was also looking forward to seeing how far my cookie genius would take me.
Last year’s Ambani Gingerhouse involved the brilliance of molds made out of leftover gingerbread dough to create perfectly-sized hard candy windows. It also required working in the presence of two curious cats, and with limited counter space.
It wasn’t enough to woo the judges of the online contest I entered, but when I edited last year’s post to announce my defeat, I also mentioned recruiting a friend for 2019’s project.
Tammy is someone who, like me, is delighted to go overboard on baking projects. She specializes in not being able to decide which cake to bake; instead, she bakes them all to stack atop one another. In 2017, for her boyfriend’s birthday, she served up a cake that was about a foot tall and took her well into the wee hours of the night to make. As one of the attendees at this birthday party, I got to eat this magnificent cake.
Anyway! I asked her what she had in mind for our gingerbread project.
“St. Basil’s Cathedral!”
The early bird gets the worm, but the late bird gets that bird.
I found a tree with cherry blossoms today.
Victoria still hasn’t seen a single snowflake. Last night, while Yann and I were outside for our evening toke, feathers snowed on us. Right before that happened, Yann heard a noise and spotted an owl that had perched on the power lines. What about owls’ reputation for being silent predators of the night? The sounds were coming from its latest meal, which was still alive.
Continue reading “The early bird gets the worm, but the late bird gets that bird.”
Pink Friday.
I have an aversion to buying stuff I don’t need and a slightly less difficult time buying stuff I do need. Black Friday was going to have to survive without me.
Except I forgot about Black Friday until Yann reminded me when we were five minutes away from Canadian Tire.
Wonderful. Elbowing my way through a crowd of bargain hunters wasn’t how I wanted to spend my day off.
Frail lady.
It’s still easier to make hats than new friends.
Three and a half years go, I knitted my first scarf. Since then, I have knitted four toques. I nearly finished a fifth in the time it took to drive from Montréal to Vancouver, but when I got to the stitch decreases for the crown, I decided my handiwork was a waste of fancy yarn and unravelled the whole thing.
I’ve started something new, but it is not going well. Reading a knitting pattern is a skill I have yet to master. It goes something like this:
1: K1, P2, K2, K1togbl2, *K2, P2; rep from * across, end K2.
2: K1below, P3
3: Alternate between rows 1 and 2, until you realize that you’ve spent hours doing the wrong thing, and clench your jaw so hard in anger that your teeth shatter.
Ah, what a relaxing hobby.
Continue reading “It’s still easier to make hats than new friends.”
