Christmas Christmas Christmas

Merry 29th of December, which as tonight's news informed me, is the Italian lucky gnocchi day (well the 29th of any month) so maybe you too will find gold coins under your plate of gnocchi tonight.

I have been home in the Soo for for the last week and a half, and enjoying time spent with family and friends (and not in the lab). What have I been doing most?

Christmas baking! before I left Calgary I made a Rum Cake and Brownie Roll-Out Cookies. Since I've been home I've added the following (from left to right):

• Macaroons
• Biscotti (well my mom made those)
• Mars Bars Squares
• Peppermint Bark
• Peanutbutter and Butterscotch haystacks
• Peanutbutter Cups hide-aways
• Gingerbread Cookies

If you want any of the recipes, leave me a comment and I'll get you a copy. In the future I promise to post some as I do the baking. They all turned out delicious, even the macaroons which kinda flattened out a bit.

Also this year, in an effort to beat the pre-holidays blues, I bought my first Christmas Tree, which I set up in my Calgary apartment (around Dec. 1st!). And I love it!

 My very own white, pre-lit (this is key, no struggling with lights) artificial tree! Decked out all in blue!

 With the exception of this little guy, who I got at Home Sense, for like 4 dollars....so worth it!

And yes, I did the cool thing, and took a picture reflected back in a bulb. You can see my cute little pink Sony Cyber-shot camera, that I use for all my pictures....for the last 3+ years. Maybe I`ll upgrade in 2012.


Anyhow! Merry Christmas! Happy Hanukkah! or Festivus! or Snowflake Day! or whatever! Hope you all enjoyed yours as much as I have been mine! Did you do any baking? Did you decorate a tree? Is it real or fake?

Things to do instead of writing a grant proposal

Have to write a grant proposal for a biochem/mol bio class..... it's due monday.

These are some things I did today instead.

Laundry, vacuuming, dishes

youtube, blogger, mahjong

Watched elf!

Baked amazing cookies, using my "animals of north america" cookies cutter set from ikea.

Get your own cookie cutters here.

Blogged about making the cookies.

Ate some of the cookies, Milk required.

Recipe for Brownie Roll-Out Cookies here. I had to add a bit of milk, since the dough crumbled when rolled, otherwise very tasty cookies!

Other things I might do before I finish this paper:




Chili is defrosting in the fridge, noodles are ready to go!

Anyways, off to sleep.

Keep it classy folks!

antlers....and why they're cool

So for Christmas I've asked my uncle for a set of antlers. Because bassically they are very cool. Here's why:

They make excellent places to hang your necklaces.

 

They make an awesome place to hang Christmas decorations.

Painted white they look uber cool just mounted the old fashioned way.

Better yet, paint them awesome colours.

You can wear them on your head and feel closer to your Cervidae brethren.

Okay, so maybe wearing them like that would make you look a little odd, why not give these a try then?

And before you point out "How could you, a poor deer had to die, like the way the evil hunter shot bambi's mom, so you could have something trendy!" Well guess what! Deer drop their antlers every year, and just leave them lying around in the forest where anyone can get some. Also, some of the loverly things above aren't real anyways. But also venison is very tasty.....


Cheers all!

Calgary Eating: UNA

Yeesh Bad Blogger

Hah! if I had a penny for every one of these posts, well lets just say I'd have a lot of pennies.

All settled in in Calgary by now, my place is mostly furnished (only took about a month and a half and a looming visit from family) pictures may eventually come.

What have I been doing in the mean time? Tis the season of grant applications, so busily working away on those. Having classes now, and therefor more reading to do than normal, plus got some new equipment set up at work. Mostly productive.

Here's what I wanna tell you about today tho, a Great place to eat in Calgary, Una (Pizza +Wine), it's on 17th SW and everybody should eat there.....lots.....and probably take me with you.

Cozy (read a smallish) restaurant with very fun staff, great food (freshly made (in front of you if you're seated at the bar)), reasonably priced, amazing wine (even tho we just had the house, still it was an Italian Import so can't be bad), there's a mural of the ninja turtles on the walls (it's all the turtle's weapons in Raphael's colours). Only con is no reservations, but they'll take down your cell and call you when your table's ready so gives you time to wander 17th ave (or go next door to RA clothing and buy things.... what we did).

What we ate: Grok, the broccolini, some sort of tasty potatoes that don't appear to be on the online menu, the pesto pizza, and the caramely dessert, and two bottles of the house red.

I'm back in my lab coat

I'm back, in the lab, full time, for the next 4-5-rest of my life years.

In the week since I've been back I ran an IHC, and took some cool pictures.

This is an arteriole, with the red blood cells visible, and the more collapsed vessel beside it is the matching vein.
Looks cool, only problem, this is just back ground flourescence, the negative control was the same as all the rest.

But enough science, Moved into my apartment, love it! will get some pictures up asap. But, don't have internet at home yet, so only around at work.

Happy September 1st btw!

Venice

From my trip to Venice this year, all photo's by me.

List time!

Time to hold myself accountable! And make a list of things to get done before the end of the month!

1. Room cleaned out (pack pack pack, you're moving soon!)
2. Make sure you have an apartment to live in (finger's crossed I already do)
3. 10 pounds, bye bye (gasp I never diet! but let's try to look our best before moving back out to Calgary)
4. to avoid having to diet, exercise....daily!!!! get off that lazy ass
5. hair - cut/dye/something it!
6. Garage sale this weekend
7. Refinish old chest into awesome coffee table chest!
8. finish at least one of your many (many!) works in progress
9. post post post....post!
10. many other things I can't think of now......shucks!

Have been quite busy lately, searching for apartments via the internet (hate doing that) and doing man's work (I painted a fence, went to the dump, and the scrap yard this week should have taken pics) and enjoying summer, which has finally decided to grace Sault Ste. Marie