star wars concert

As soon as I walked into the lobby of Roy Thomson Hall last night for the Star Wars concert, I knew I should have brought my camera. Princess Leia and a young Obi-Wan Kenobi (with a working light saber) were walking around in costume, for example...and those were just a couple of the concert attendees! Concert goers were also greeted by Storm Troopers, Darth Vader and a furry Wookie, and we could also gawk at an amazing full-size R2D2 and Darth Vader constructed completely of Lego.

Debuting in this city last night with a repeat performance tonight, the Star Wars concert is being performed by the Toronto Symphony Orchestra and The Mississauga Choral Society, conducted by Erich Kunzel, a long-time friend of Star Wars composer John Williams. Anthony Daniels, the actor behind the android C-3PO in the movie, narrated the concert.

I attended the concert with Luisa, Walter, Hrach, Vartan and Julie. We opted for cheaper seats ($30 incl tax) which overlooked the stage. I've never seen an orchestral concert from this perspective before, and really enjoyed the view of the conductor and performers, especially the percussionists. The only downside was that we couldn't see a few of the brass players, but I found it didn't detract that much from my enjoyment of the experience.



Anthony Daniels was a brilliant narrator, and highly entertaining. Whenever a mention of C3PO came up in the narrative, for example, Daniels would take great pleasure in adding an embellishment. Once he rambled on so long about how important and wonderful the android was in the story that Eric Kunzel, who was waiting to cue the orchestra, turned around and mock-glared at him.

:-D

Hearing the musical highlights from the six movies was a wonderful experience, particularly those from A New Hope, Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. Not only did the music remind me of my various favourite scenes from the films, but also evoked a strong sense of nostalgia from my childhood. I remembered Ruth and I going to see Star Wars for the first time at Shopper's World in Brampton. I remembered how my brother had a small figurine of the evil emperor which he used as a Christmas ornament; I have it now. I can still quote part of the final climactic scene between the evil emperor and Luke Skywalker:

EVIL EMPEROR: "Young fool...only now, at the end, do you understand. Your feeble skills are no match for the power of the Dark Side..."

Yes, I'm a Star Wars geek. :-)

One of my favourite musical bits, though, was from the newer movies...the music while Darth Maul and Qui-Gon are duelling. VERY cool to have such a great view of the percussionists, and the excitement generated by the frantic beat of the music and choir singing made me feel as if I was watching that scene for the first time again.

I think the performers were a bit taken aback by the strong positive response of the audience at the end, more like a rock concert than for a symphony orchestra performance. Lots of clapping, screaming, about 4 or 5 standing ovations (I lost count). To the immense delight of the audience, one of the encore pieces was the music from the Cantina scene in A New Hope, where the aliens are performing in that seedy bar. It was the first time I'd ever seen a symphony conductor actively encouraging the audience to clap along with the music.

After tonight's performance, the Star Wars concert is off to Chicago, Seattle, Cleveland, Denver and Cincinnati.

Thanks so much to Walter for organizing this outing!

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neighbours, office painting

Hey, look! Our one (1) rose plant is blooming! With one (1) rose!

So Jeff and I went to our (new) neighbourhood's annual street bbq yesterday afternoon. Our cul de sac was transformed into a picnic area with barbecues and folding tables covered with salads, corn on the cob, potatoes, hamburgers, hot dogs, desserts. Everyone brought something; we brought paper plates, serviettes, fruit salad, chocolate and carrot cakes. I borrowed an electric mixer from my sister and bought plastic storage containers from the local grocery store for the fruit salad since most of our kitchen stuff is still in storage.

Ray painting my office.

We had already met most of our neighbours, but this was a chance to get to know them a bit better. And of course they were curious about us. :-) Jeff and I both had a wonderful time, and I feel even more excited about moving into the house next month. We lingered until the party broke up; it was SO hard leaving the house and driving back downtown.

The whole neighbourhood community thing is a new experience for us; in our condo, everyone stayed mostly to themselves, exchanging the occasional greetings in elevators but that was about it. There were notices about social gatherings from time to time, but we generally didn't attend these.

Part of me regrets this now, but I found the atmosphere different in an apartment complex...when you're in very close proximity to your neighbours on almost all sides, you don't necessarily want to get to know them really well. Part of it is a defense mechanism, I'm sure; if conflicts develop or if you find you don't get along for some other reason, it could become awkward...you'll inevitably run into them in the hallway and elevators.

Jeff and Mark.

In a residential community, however, I can see some of the advantages of getting to know your neighbours. You can look out for each other, help each other out on occasion, share useful information. If your kids play together, then it makes even more sense to get to know the other family.

A survey:
1. Do you know the names of your immediate neighbours? (yes/no)
2. How often do you interact with them?
3. Do you participate in your neighbourhood community?

My new office is painted! Many thanks to Ray and Mark for helping out. I decided to go with an off-white colour after my paint colour failure earlier (the pale yellow that looked so harmless on the paint chip but that mutated into an alien exploded brain hue on the wall). I actually wanted to opt for a pure white to be safe, but Jeff and others convinced me to go for a slight tinge of colour. I'm now paranoid about yellow so opted for a bit of red. And I mean a BIT.

Watching the paint being mixed at Home Depot was interesting: the paint technician basically took a big can of white paint, stuck it under a machine, pressed some buttons, and a miniscule squirt of red came out. Jeff claims that the paint is still just white, but I'm insisting that it's actually an off-white. The paint chip had a boring colour name (numbers and letters) so I've come up with a more imaginative one: "Invisible Rose In Winter." Yep, that's the colour of my office wall.

Anyway, I decided to paint my office door off-white, inside and out, because I want to use it as a blank canvas. For what, exactly, I'm not sure yet. But it's sure to be interesting. I also bought a small can of glow-in-the-dark paint because I want stars on my ceiling. :-)

My carpet goes in on Wednesday!



Thanks to David Barker for letting me know that Ruth and her books were mentioned on CityTV's Breakfast Television last week. I was also amused by his last comment: "Hey, not only do I know two people who are famous, but I know their sisters as well. How lucky am I?"

:-D

Hey, speaking of Ruth...her newest book, Bottled Sunshine, will soon be available! Author: Andrea Spalding, illustrated by Ruth.



And a last Saskatoon berry bush comment: I've decided to let the birds have the Saskatoon berries this year. Too much going on to try harvesting enough for baking. I went out and counted the bushes: we have THREE Saskatoon berry bushes! I might try covering two of them with netting next year to let the berries ripen enough for my own use, and let the birds have one.

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Saskatoon berry pie

Dandelion at Niagara-on-the-Lake

Some of your postings yesterday have definitely inspired me to try baking a Saskatoon berry pie or tartlets (Kristen suggested with whipped cream, yum), if I can harvest the berries before the birds. Might be tricky this year, though, since the berries are likely going to fully ripen before Jeff and I move in (Graham says I should wait until the berries turn blue or purple), which means the birds will probably be feasting before then.

Don't know if I'd attempt the pastry crust from scratch, though. The last time I tried making pie pastry was a disaster. I served the pie to Jeff's sister shortly after we had met for the first time, wasn't my sister-in-law yet.

ME (nervous): "I think the crust might be a bit tough."

LARKIN: "Oh no, I'm sure it's fine, Debbie."

(Larkin struggles to cut her piece with a fork. Struggles very hard. The fork BENDS, unable to pierce the teflon-like material that is my pie crust.)

LARKIN: "Um, well, maybe it's a LITTLE tough..."

Sara fishing off the cottage dock last year.

This weekend, Jeff and Ray and I are going to paint my office. Then next week, my office gets a carpet! VERY hyped about this. Our storage locker isn't being unloaded into the house until the middle of next month when renovations are complete so I still won't be able to really use my office yet, but at least I can sit on the floor with my laptop and think happythoughts. :-)

Sent out a query about an article about the Northern Lights yesterday, got a go-ahead from the editor by the end of the day. I also think I may have sold my first gardening cartoon!

Got my Stokes, Richters and Veseys catalogs recently, woohoo! I've already started drooling over the Jiffy pots and grow lights and jaw-dropping number of interesting herbs and vegetables and flowers that could be growing in my garden next year. If I had a garden the size of the Northwest Territories, that is.

This year, I'm exerting enormous restraint and only planting a few herbs while I acquaint myself with our new garden. You can see pictures of all the plants I've managed to identify with the help of some of you, the previous owner, and the wonderful community at YouGrowGirl.com in this Flickr photo set.

Doing gardenstuff today, in fact. Ruth's sharing some of her groundcover plants and we're also visiting a nearby garden nursery so I can browse and get some fertilizer.

Had a nice evening yesterday. Jeff came home at an unprecedented hour (6 pm!) and we strolled along the lakefront, had dinner at a restaurant with outdoor patio, then visited GameTrek at the Royal York.

Sunrise at the cottage

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healthy snacks (poll results)

I dropped by the house late yesterday afternoon to check on the garden and was delighted to find robins feasting on the Saskatoon berry bushes. I was curious enough to try one of the berries...they're good! I might harvest some to use in cooking, but I'll share them with the birds. :-)

After doing some weeding and pruning of suckers from our Japanese quince, I worked on my laptop inside for about an hour, on a folding table set up during renovations. The contractors had gone home for the day, so it was nice to have the house all to myself even in its current war zone state.

Thanks so much to Bryan Snyder and Rick Hewett for their additions to my postcard collection! You can click on either postcard image below for a description and note, or visit my Flickr Postcard collection to see all the contributions so far. If you're in the mood to send me a postcard for the collection, please send to: Debbie Ridpath Ohi, 34 Eglinton Ave. W., P.O. Box 189, Toronto, ON Canada M4R 2H6. Thanks!

From Rick H.

Lots of interesting answers to my "healthy snack" poll. Here are a few:

"Healthy snack ideas: grapes, kiwi, apple, carrots with fat-free bean dip or fat-free hummus, air-popped popcorn (no extra stuff on it), make your own baked potato or sweet potato chips, cut up cantelope and watermelon, dried apple or banana chips (dehydrate in your oven or in a dehydrater)." (chirosinger)

"Snacks for me have to be *easy*, i.e. requiring little or no preparation, and I also quite like things to be crunchy/have a bite hence:
carrots, cucumbers, cherry tomatos, grapes, bananas, apples, baby sweetcorn, mange tout, pre-cut lettuce/salad leaves, sometimes broccoli or cauliflower - all raw." (bardling)

"Most kinds of raw vegetables work for me. There are vegetables that I dislike when they are cooked -- prime example, cauliflower -- but I absolutely love raw. Especially when dipped in hummus, which is fairly quick&easy to prepare from a mix. (Though sometime I'd like to try making it from scratch.)
I would add green grapes, one of the tarter apples, raisins and, of course, plums. Plums: the fruit that tastes more like candy than most candies. :-)
Unsalted, unbuttered popcorn is mighty tasty as well." (ldwheeler)

From Bryan S.

"Veggies and dip.
Various cut-up fruit, especially mangoes, papaya, pineapple, melons, etc. but only if someone else cuts it up ('cause much as I love it, I hate the cutting up).
Great big oranges.
Sherbet/sorbet in fruit flavours.
Salsa and tortillas (not chips)
Great multi-grain crackers, especially with sesame seeds." (jhayman)

"Popcorn.
It's not exactly a snack, but nonfat milk flavored with something yummy and sugar-free is always a favorite.
Sometimes I like small, fresh fruits, especially cherries, seedless grapes, and raspberries." (figmo)

"Cheese.
Celery with peanut butter. Apples with peanut butter. Really, a spoon with peanut butter would do.
Yogurt.
Dried fruit.
Soy nuts.
Tofu. Raw. Chunks of it. mmmmm." (missquirt)

"sugar snap peas
gensoy soy nuts (deep sea salted -- the other flavors
are poison)
unsalted brazil nuts
red, orange, and yellow peppers
del monte sunfresh grapefruit slices"
(Rand)

"I've been known to snack on thin slices of gruyere (mmmm, cheese!) or raw carrots. In fact, carrots are really high on my list of best all-around snacks; tasty and crunchy and also good for you." (Dave Weingart)

"I'm not sure how healthy this is, but a friend recently got me hooked on crackers and spicy hummus... " (Lady Turpentine)

"My favourite healthy snacks are chunky fries with malt vinegar, Ben and Jerry's Heath Bar Crunch ice cream, Stone Crock Bakery doughnuts, and Tofu squares in light soy sauce. HAHAHAHA! As if.
Well, they must be healthy because I'm not dead yet." (aiabx)

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door-shopping, healthy snacks

re: photo on the right. On the way to the house this past weekend, we saw this Starbucks sign. Is it just me, or is a "REMEMBER SUMMER" ad in June a bit odd?

Just over one month until we actually move into our New House. One of the rooms we're renovating is the master bedroom, which currently is open to the rest of the house. We're putting in a wall and a door for privacy and soundproofing, mainly at my insistence; I tend to wake up earlier than Jeff in the mornings, and want to be able to actually use the rest of the house without worrying about waking him up.

So on the weekend we went door-shopping (our friend Ray helped). Decisions to be made: number of doors (we went with double), type of wood, stain (decision to be made later), style of door, type of glass panels, number of glass panels, type of handle bla bla bla augh.

Both of us have been feeling pretty overwhelmed by the number of decisions to be made during this whole process. Started out with the Big Decision, of course (which house), but now the zillions of little decisions are gradually being whittled down.

I *SO* cannot wait until all the decisions have been made, at least enough that we can finally move in.



I'm very much into leftovers these days; Jeff's had to work late quite a bit these days so I'm on my own for meals. I tend to cook something big at the beginning of the week and live on the leftovers the rest of the week. Last week, I made a roast chicken and a big batch of Turkish kisir (bulghur salad).

My favourite drink recently is iced tea. I like herbal teas in general and have been experimenting with brewing tea then chilling it, sometimes combining different types. So far my favourites are licorice-mint, green iced tea and ginger-peach iced tea. I don't add sugar, just drink it straight, and I try to limit how much caffeinated iced tea I make.

My favourite snack these days is slices of cucumber, each with a dab of white miso. Yum. I'm a heavy snacker, by the way, grazing throughout the day, keeping meals small. The challenge is to keep snacks healthy and interesting (yes, baby carrots are healthy but if I eat too many of them, I want to chew my own head off), especially since I work at home.

So here's a survey:

What are your favourite healthy snacks?
I'll compile a list of results and post it in an upcoming Blatherings.

Some reader feedback from recent Blatherings:

Sherman:

"Pollination gets a bit complicated, Debbie. Some plants are self-pollinating, so you don't really need insects to do the fun stuff. For those who need pollinators, until recently you could generally count on bees, wasps, and other pollinators to do the job, though you could help by hand-pollinating. (In our yard, very few of the pollinators are hive bees. Most appear to be wasps and non-hive bees.)

Recently, though, there's been a vicious mite population that's been destroying hundreds of commercial hives in North America and will probably make a bunch of produce much more expensive in the next year or two. That's rather scary because, yes, flowers that are not in self-propagating plants will not germinate unless pollinated."

Margaret:

"If a particular flower doesn't get pollinated, it just dries up and falls off and doesn't make seeds. Which may be why lots of plants make clusters of flowers. If every flower in the cluster got pollinated, the clump of fruit would break off the branch-end. So there's slack in the system to allow for the bees missing some flowers."

Scott S.:

"Wow, great pictures of the barbeque. I sure wish I was Debbie Ohi's friend so I could hang out with such cool people. :-)"

Funny guy, that Scott Snyder.

;-)

By the way, congrats to Scott & Amanda on their recent babynews!

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