Guitar Hero, part 1

So I'm FINALLY getting around to playing Guitar Hero on the 360. Being a complete novice, I did the tutorial first, and then tried some practice songs before heading into career mode. Only the 4 practice songs I tried turned my fingers into goo. "Heart-Shaped Box" DESTROYED me. On easy mode.

I really need to practice more. A lot more. Once I can feel my fingers again.

Wherfore art thou, carne asada?

Toronto has some amazing food. The best Indian, Greek, and Chinese food I've ever had have been here. Which makes it especially disappointing that good Mexican food seems to be non-existant. I don't get it. You can get Chinese or Italian food ANYWHERE. Why not Mexican?? It's not like it's some kind of crazy exotic combination of foods that nobody likes. It's meat, rice, bread, and cheese, people, how can you go wrong?!?

Don't get me wrong, there is Mexican food here. And I don't mean Taco Bell. It's just not the same. I have YET to see a menu with either carne asada, carnitas, machaca, or tamales. I am seriously considering importing some Mexicans to start a restaurant with me. Something called Palomino's, or Juanita's, or Paco's. Some greasy little hole in the wall with mariachi music playing in the background and a salsa bar that looks like it's been there for 3 years. I even drove through the neighborhood which theoretically has the highest population of Hispanics in the city - nothing. Not even a Mexican market.

I'm still hopeful, however. There are a few Mexican restaurants downtown we haven't had a chance to try yet. I don't expect to ever see fish tacos here; but if I can order a tamale, some flautas, or a good ol' carne asada burrito, I'll be content.

All Smarties are not created equal

"When you eat your Smarties, do you eat the red ones last?"

Mark asked me this question a few weeks ago. I looked at him like he was nuts, because everyone knows there aren't any red Smarties. Or so I thought. Apparently, the little powdery sugar bombs I've been eating all my life are only "Smarties" in the U.S. Elsewhere, they're called "Rockets". Why? Because "Smarties" EVERYWHERE ELSE are these little gems, which are pretty much just M&Ms with a thicker, sweeter candy coating. I have to say, I prefer the chocolate Smarties.

Nooo! They be takin my JoCo!!

A few days ago I found out that Toronto plays host to a music festival, sort of a SXSW Jr., called (naturally) NXNE. This was exciting news; more so when I saw that my favorite Nerd Rocker Jonathan Coulton was scheduled to play on Friday night!!! Then this crazy weather deal happened, and we thought it would be wise to stay in tonight. But then it cleared up... so we decided to try to make it down anyway. Now, for some reason, I thought the show started at 8... so we rushed downtown, and made it at 7:45, only to discover when we purchased our wristbands that he wasn't scheduled until 9. What the gal who sold us said wristbands failed to mention, however, was that the crazy weather also disrupted air traffic and JoCo had to CANCEL. We did not discover this until we had returned to Reverb (which is a pretty cool place to see a small show, actually), waited around for about 15 minutes, and then saw this 5-man band get on stage. Thankfully the ticket girl was spared my murderous wrath, because the replacement band (Public) was pretty rockin'. Think Killers without the suits and the keyboards. So even though things did not go as planned, they turned out A-OK. The evening gets bonus points for a) HMV security dude smokin' it up on his break one doorway down from the shop, and b) strange old homeless lady talking to herself in the Second Cup.

I love downtown.

When did I get to Kansas?

Well, that was interesting. I'm sitting here at my desk, thinking about starting work on a paper I have to write for next week, when I start to hear strange noises from outside. I don't think much of it... this is a busy area, lots of people, lots of cars, and there's construction going on in the plaza across the street anyway. Then my curtains start billowing like crazy... okay, so it's windy, big deal. Then my plant gets knocked out of the window. Hmmmm... maybe time to close the window. I get up, look outside... and there are very large swirls of dust and debris spinning through the parking lot of that plaza. Then I see a big metal square, like part of the AC unit up on the roof, go tumbling down into the lawn below. Time to close ALL the windows. Then the rain starts, with the thunder and lightning and all that good stuff. Thankfully the wind is mostly gone now, although it's still gusting occasionally.

Sadly, I was too dumfounded to get any good pictures.

Milk in a bag... WTF, Canada???

Yup. It comes in bags. Also in cartons... but if you're serious about your milk, you get yourself a pitcher and bag it, baby.

It's funny how many people are surprised that I'm constantly amused by this concept. I may be wrong, but I'm pretty sure bagged milk doesn't exist in the US anywhere. Please, send me a link or a picture if it does.


Next, let's discuss the double-double. From their respective Wikis:

"A Canadian term made popular by Tim Hortons outlets is "double-double," which indicates a coffee with two creams and two sugars. It was added to the second edition of the Canadian Oxford Dictionary on August 10, 2004" (Tim Hortons)

""Double-Double" - a double cheeseburger (two slices of cheese and two meat patties)" (In-N-Out)

The first time I walked into a Tim Hortons and heard someone order a double-double I was disappointed that they did not walk away with a tasty, tasty burger. Keep in mind, they add the cream and sugar for you, which is why you don't just ask for a large coffee... you ask for a large coffee, double cream, double sugar. Or, a large double-double. This is now pretty much a daily staple of mine, considering that there are Timmy's EVERYWHERE. Canadians love their coffee. Unlike California, where your choices are generally Starbucks or 7-11, there are at least 4 major chains of coffee shops here. It's awesome.


We'll end with a little bit about weather. In SoCal, "summer" pretty much starts in April/May, with a brief timeout for some lovely June Gloom in San Diego, and it ends sometime in October. So imagine my surprise when the weather man last night tells people to cover up or bring inside your vulnerable plants, because the temp is going to drop to near freezing. IN JUNE. And it did!! I wake up this morning, the sun is shining outside, so I'm wearing a tshirt and flip flops. My feet were freezing by the time I got to school. And it's supposed to be back up to around 27 C tomorrow. So bizarre. The lesson here? Never put all of your blankets and sweaters away. You could need them at ANY TIME.

A brief clarification

It occurs to me that anyone not in on the whole Kandor plot is probably a bit confused, so let me clarify. (I would have done this sooner but I'm lazy, sue me).

Anyhow, I have quite a few friends that I only interact with online, through a message board called Comics Haven. We all met on the City of Heroes MMO message boards; however, you are only allowed to post on those boards as long as you are an active subscriber to the game. Several people were only paying their subscription fees in order to be able to post there, which frankly, is retarded. So when a new, Nazi-esque board moderator came to town, a few of us decided to jump ship and start our own little community where we can swear and tell fart jokes and derail threads with impunity.

So what happened is, they all knew I was moving to Toronto, and decided to surprise me with a housewarming present. They managed to keep it completely hidden from me, which is amazing. So one of them (I think it was Austinwulf) ordered it from eBay. Another guy, Dave, was in Philly visiting family for his sister's graduation. Dave's brother lives in Toronto. Austin passed it on to Dave, who passed it on to Dave's brother, who then met up with Mark the night we had sushi as seen in the previous post.

Hopefully that makes a bit more sense for anyone who wasn't in the loop!