WTF? Friday

 

Happy Halloween!!

Because I can never turn down and opportunity to eat junk food I stopped on my way in to work today and got some sweets for my colleagues who came to work dressed as ‘people who work at a digital marketing agency’.  

The rather yummy mix of sweets including mini Rolo, jelly tots, Kit kat, smarties and Aero.  Figuring that one of these would go nicely with my morning tea, I grabbed a box of mini smarties as they were always one of my all time faves (even better is when you put the box of Smarties in the microwave at full power for 7-10 seconds as it melts the middle slightly but still keeps the crisp, crunchy interior…amazing). 

I popped a few of the UK Smarties in my mouth then instantly remembered why I haven’t been eating them over here…they taste completely different, the chocolate centres seem fruity or perfumey and after a long debate with colleagues and some serious googling I confirmed that in fact the orange ones do have an orange flavour added to them which in my opinion makes all of the other flavours taste fruity too.  They also have stopped adding artificial colours so all of the Smarties are all pale now making them look like they have been made for Easter!

Anyway I ended up abandoning my half eaten pack of Smarties and now am enjoying some jelly tots and an aero…I needed both to get over the orange flavour trauma.

What not to say…

A touque

So we had snow in London on Tuesday…well technically it was only in North London but it was the first time in 70 years that it has snowed in any part of London in October. It has brought in some fairly chilly weather and was the main topic of conversation with just about anyone who ventured out during the day.

 

This sudden chillyness has made me acknowledge a few winter words which they absolutely do not use here:

1) Touque

2) Snow pants (or ski pants)

 

The first one I figured was pretty Canadian …a touque is a winter hat (or knit cap as my American colleague calls it) and admittedly sounds fairly French, pronounced um well….two-ke. So Canadians, if you are in London and say ‘Tomorrow I must remember my touque’ realise that most people have no idea what you are talking about and think that it could mean anything from a fancy name for your lunch, handbag or that you are bringing in two of something unknown. 

”

The second one isn’t so much about the snow or ski bit but it’s about the reference to pants. Pants here unequivocally means underwear…it’s not like when I say truck and they know I mean lorry, or sweater and they figure I mean a jumper…when you say pants in Britain  they assume undergarments so if you walk into the office on a rainy day and say aaaah I hate it when I get my pants wet, people will laugh, if you tell a colleague that you like her pants, she will reach awkwardly for her waistband and hike it up thinking that her thong is sticking out…trust me as I have done both.

‘

I have had trouble as ‘trousers’ as they call them here is an old man word and makes me think of a little geezer in a hat with a cane wearing wool patterned ‘trousers’.  I have slightly gotten over my stuffy perception of what trousers are and have started using it mainly because of the very odd looks I get from people when I talk about my ‘pants’ or need new ‘pants’.

‘

The term for ski pants here is ski trousers or the ever logical Salopallets…riiight…maybe I will wear my salopallets with my touque and screw everyone up.

 

 

 

Nice slippers

I am all for multi tasking. If there is a way I can get three things done at once so I can have more time to sit on the couch/watch tv/blog/play on my computer then I will find it. That is why I love these!!!

Take the effort out of dusting the floor! Simply pop these slippers on your feet and polish as you walk. Wash clean. One size.

Look at that…I can take the effort out of dusting my floor (as if I dust my floor) but now I can clean while running from room to room on commercial breaks!! God bless the gadgetpreneures and their great little ideas.

Fall behind

So we officially changed our clocks on Saturday night (okay technically Sunday morning, and technically since we can’t’ find our microwave manual, our microwave is still back on last week time) but back home they don’t actually change their clocks until next week. In the past we all did it on the same day until March 2007 when the US government decided that they would change it so that instead of being on the first Sunday in April and last Sunday in October (as we are), they would change it to the Second Sunday in March and the First Sunday in November.  Of course, most of Canada followed suit…hey everyone thinks we are American anyway!

I find it strange that all of a sudden someone decided that time change time, would change.  Are we as humans that easily programmable that someone just tells us to add or lose an hour and we will do it….the answer (in my household anyway) is yes.  And even though technically I don’t think I actually got an extra hour of sleep I woke up all refreshed this morning, enjoying the fact that it was light out when I woke up.  However, my extra hour of rest is long forgotten as it is 5:11pm here and is pitch black out…can I get another hour extra now?  Come on, you changed the dates of the time change, can’t you give us a 26 hour clock but keep the 8 hour work day? 

Although it is marginally more convenient to only be 4 hours ahead of our friends and family in Canada vs. the normal 5 but that only lasts for a week then we are back to normal…depressing normal winter time.  At least here though we don’t get freezing temperatures (rarely below 0C) and hardly get snow (except in April when my in laws visit)  so it is marginally more tolerable than at home…but since I said that I have a feeling we are in for a cold, snowy winter.

WTF? Friday – Baby Maker

I couldn’t help but share this website as I love kitchy sites like this one ( it doesn’t take much to amuse me). This site is for the Routan Baby Maker 3000 by Volkswagen to advertise one of their min vans (or people carrier as they call them here).  The site allows you to create your own baby by merging two people’s images together to see what their baby would look like – presumably because when you have babies you need a mini van type vehicle (or so I hear). 

So… I have spent the morning trying to make the little thing look half decent as it’s taken about 6 tries to merge pictures of the hubby and I.  Below I present to you our son Beresford (who is still pretty odd looking, he must get that from his father).

I have mentioned it before, and this morning just proved that I am much better place to be a PANK than a Mom (or Mum) as first of all, I got all squirmy when it said ’select a photo of Mom’ then saw my face and second of all it took 6 TRIES to make the kid look half decent…if I recall correctly there isn’t a ‘make new baby’ or edit undo function in real life and until there is I might stay on the Auntie side of the fence…plus I would want a girl and it kept giving me boys!

No menu required

Last night we went to our favourite restaurant in London called Relais de Venise.  It is a French restaurant and what I love about it (on top of the food) is that they literally only serve one dish…salad, bread and steak frites (steak and skinny fries).  You get to choose what to have to drink (although we recommend the house red) and how you want your meat done but that’s it.  If you don’t want steak and fries, don’t come to this restaurant.  They don’t give you butter for your bread or ketchup for your fries, you eat what is given to you, how it is given to you. 

 

It sounds a little strict but believe me it is great and the concept works, do one thing and do it well. Their skinny fries are lovely and crunchy, the steak beautiful and tender and the brownish green sauce they put on it is so lovely you could drink it.

 

Some pictures below of the meal…(and a hint at why else we love it)

Steak Frites

All gone

Second portion of fries!!

...and steak!

The best, best part…they automatically give you a second portion…which in my opinion, is better than the first as you already know how good it tastes and now you get a second portion that is piping hot again.

The restaurant is very popular with locations in London, Paris and Barcelona all of which we have eaten at and encountered queues as (not surprisingly) they don’t take reservations.  We waited almost an hour in Paris for a table but it was worth it.  We haven’t had to wait in London as we figured out you either go early or late to avoid them.  Last night when weleft there was a queue outside that stretched the length of the restaurant….on a Wednesday night, in the middle of a credit crunch…I told you it was good.

Back from golf heaven

We arrived back safe and sound from our trip to golf heaven Scotland. We took the overnight sleeper train up to Edinburgh on Wednesday night which albeit not glamorous, was very practical as you travel while you sleep. We got on the train just before midnight, headed to the bar car for a nightcap then were tucked into our bunk beds by just after midnight. We arrived to Edinburgh at 7:00 ready to head up to St Andrews.

The main reason for the trip was to get my Dad and hubbie on ‘The Old Course’ at St Andrews…although they don’t make it easy. Apparently you have to book a year in advance to get a guaranteed tee time otherwise you have to enter ‘the draw’. To enter the draw you have to call the day before you want to golf and get your name in the draw for a tee time the next day…luckily the guys did get a spot so we headed straight from Edinburgh by train to St Andrews so they could get on the course.

We had a lovely Scottish taxi driver who told us all about St Andrews and confirmed the fact that Prince William and Kate Middleton met at St Andrews University and had been living together for ages before the ‘media’ caught on…I was surprised by that as other than golf, a few shops and some (albeit beautiful) ruins, there wasn’t a lot else to do other than Prince William/Middleton watching so am surprised more stories weren’t leaked by Golfing WAGS who were stuck in the town while their hubbies golfed. I sure as hell would have been facebooking my pictures should I have seen those two popping into the Tesco on the high street!

In a nutshell the guys golfed the Old Course, New Course and one called Kingsbarns which they both said was the most amazing course they have ever played…my hubbie had the round of his life shooting an 81 (insert golf clap here)…at least he may have a fallback career for when the credit crunch hits us. I on the other hand can run tours of St Andrews for the golf WAGS and make up stories of William and Kate sightings.

Kingsbarns - the favourite course

Dad in a wee bit of trouble

All in all it was a great trip, pretty sure Dad enjoyed himself and it didn’t’ seem the hubbie was too put out by having to escort his father in law around some of the world’s best golf courses…he’s such a trooper.

WTF? Friday

So I promised haggis for today’s post and it wasn’t hard to find. I wasn’t entirely sure what haggis was but knew it had something to do with stomach linings so pretty much lost interest right there. I have since wikipedia-ed it and it apparently is made using sheeps pluck (pluck being the sheep heart, liver and lungs) which is minced with onion, oatmeal, spices and salt and boiled in the stomach for approximately three hours..hmmm. It is traditionally served with neeps and tatties – neeps are what we Canadians call turnip but the Brits call swede…so neeps and tatties are a mix of mashed turnip and potato.

When I took this picture there were three trays of haggis and three cows but when I went back 2 hours later there was only 1 tray of haggis left and 1 cow was missing…that seems like a lot of meat for a small city to devour on a Thursday afternoon.

Finally I couldn’t resist posting this…it might have been funnier because Mom and I had split a bottle of wine at lunch but seriously….how can’t you laugh when passing this building…

Its located on Butts Wynd Road…love it!

Happy Friday!

Arrived safe and sound…with plenty of processed food

So the ‘rents have arrived which means I am now fully stocked up on Cheez Whiz, homemade Rice Krispie Squares, Motrin (brand name ibuprofen but it works better than ibuprofen because it has a better name), Kraft Peanut butter and the 30 Rock season 1 DVD…nope, not sure how they got through immigration either but I am happy they did.

So far they have learned that Gammon is ham and milk is cheaper here than it is at home.  They also discovered Dark Chocolate McVities (although I prefer the caramel ones) and seemingly haven’t been too bothered by the fact that today was a very ‘London day’ that stayed pretty overcast.

 

Anyway we also surprised Dad with a golf trip to St Andrews Scotland (mom is coming too but the surprise was for dad’s retirement/upcoming 60th birthday).  We leave tonight on an overnight train to Edinburgh then the guys tee off on the Old Course (the famous one apparently) tomorrow morning.

I am pretty sure I will find loads of blog material on our trip and am hoping to have a WTF? Friday post that includes haggis.

Tickle me technology

Back in 1996 Tyco introduced the first Tickle Me Elmo…needless to say the toy was a huge success selling out almost instantly.  For those of you not familiar with this toy (who are you by the way?) the Elmo doll burst out into infectious laughter when you ‘tickled’ him (basically squeezed his belly or hands).  His giggle was pretty cute and could easily have grown adults in stitches (or maybe that was just me).  They came out with different versions over the years and for Christmas in 2001 I got one of the Surprise Edition Elmo’s (don’t do the math, suffice it to say I was not a kid when i got it but his laugh cracked me up)

Anyway the amazing thing about the Surprise edition was that there was some fancy Tickle timer in there and if you Tickled Elmo on  January 9th 2002 you would get a Surprise…for some it was that they had won a prize but for everyone else he said a fancy little rhyme talking about how you have tickled his belly, his hands and toes and the surprise now is that you can tickle his nose.  Basically there was another tickle point in his nose that when you tickled him he did a dance.  I loved this ‘time release technology’  and even tried to sell it into a client we were working with as we thought it would be a great promotional tool to get everyone to push a button on a trinket on a certain day to see if they won!!  Unfortunately client didn’t go for it

Anyway today a new Elmo has been released (and already sold out).  He’s called Elmo Live and with that name I was thinking that it must link wirelessly to the Internet or have some video camera in it..something to further push toy technology as they seemingly have done in the past.  I have searched for some info on new Elmo Live and there isn’t much…apparently the ‘Live’ refers to the fact that he now moves around more, shaking his head, crossing his legs and having his mouth move exactly when he speaks…to make him more life like. …or as life like as a red puppet monster can be.

I am a little disappointed as one of the quotes on the website says:

 ”Elmo Live is way too innovative and exciting to keep secret!” he says. “The level of technology and reality is industry changing to be sure, but even as amazing and awe-inspiring as that may be to adults and even as that may create a new standard for interactive plush…”

I guess moving around like that is pretty innovative but for £59.99 I want MORE…I want wireless connections, USB hubs in his bum, GPS triangulation and a bluetooth connection.  I want him to hook up with my GPS navigation and give me directions in his cute little Elmo voice, I want him to bluetooth to my Blackberry and read me my emails.

Then I rember one thing…he is a toy for pre-schoolers, not almost 30 year old computer nerds like me.  Damn it.