Crockpot

I tried the new slowcooker. We did a beef loin cut, with potatoes, carrots, leek, and parsnip, seasoned with just salt, pepper and cloves, and a bit of beef broth added, served with a side of couscous. Roughly based on the dish pot-au-feu, French for "pot of fire" and comparable to English beef stew. Inspiration came from the signature dish of my second host mother in Quebec during Canada World Youth. You might remember that I had a less-than-ideal relationship with my first Quebecois host family, but that I transitioned to another household before my French rotation was over.

My Malian counterpart referred to the Quebec "pot-au-feu" as "Canadian couscous" and the less intricate Malian recipe as "Malian couscous". One of my commenters made a very detailed explanation as to how those dishes might be more comparable than one might guess based on first impression.

Anyway, out of respect for my nostalgia, my mother insisted on using couscous and on calling the dish pot-au-feu. The attempt was successful. It was our first slow-cooked meal, so we were impatient and put it on high to lower the prep time to about six hours.

We've got a pork shoulder ready for tomorrow, and we're prepared to cook it on low for a full ten hours. This will be my life now. Delicious homemade meals done with minimal effort and fresh ingredients. It's funny how a microwave cooks things fast and is known for its convenience, and a crock pot cooks things slowly and is known for its convenience. Talk about two devices known for the same function with completely separate methods.

In other news, back at my place in Kitchener, I removed the carpet from my bedroom. The logic behind this was simply that tile is easier to clean than rug. My roommate first initiated concept by removing the carpet from his bedroom and then proposing we do so for the living room. For some reason, I thought this would take a certain amount of finesse, but he literally tore it out and revealed perfectly viable tiles beneath. So I grabbed a serrated knife and over the course of a few days, carved chunks out of the rug in my room, moving around heavy furniture such as my dresser and filing cabinet until I could get to everything.

I also got a new backpack. The last one I got was from a military surplus store. I wanted to get another one from the same place, but honestly, the shop owner scares me. I didn't want to arrive at his place with a destroyed version of his product, and honestly, I can never be without a backpack, so I opted for a more standard place at the mall. When that one is wrecked, I will go back to the military surplus store.

Duncan did the Pottermore test and got sorted into Gryffindor. So we are a household full of Gryffindores. I know not everyone makes it into that house, because I know two people outside the family who have done that test, and they are a Ravenclaw and a Slytherrin His Patronus was a sphinx cat, contrasting my adder snake and Mom's Newfoundland dog. His wand was similar to mine, but it was made with firwood and unyielding flexibility, making his key difference that he is much more rigid and focused on his goals, whereas I am more flexible and adaptable.

Christmas 2018

Christmas 2018 has passed by. As per usual, I spent it in Guelph with my mother and brother. There was some talk of a larger gathering, but conflicting schedules didn't let it happen

Big gift to me this year was a slow cooker. I've been curious about those things for awhile. My first impression was that they seemed counter intuitive, because why would you bother with a device that intentionally forces the preparation process to take longer than it has to? But I kept hearing that a slow cooker is an essential for people who want quality home-cooked meals but don't have a ton of time to prepare them. The thought behind this being, the slow cooker doesn't require active attention, unlike more standard preparation. I'll probably try it out tomorrow while I'm still on vacation.

It also came with a smaller device called the Little Dipper, for preparing dips and fondue.

This year, we agreed we wouldn't do a big gift exchange. However, my mother's laptop broke shortly before Christmas, so like...

...I put in an order for a laptop. Unfortunately, Canada Post is on a rotating strike and deliveries have been delayed. I'm sure they time the strike that way to put the company under pressure. Won't judge, sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do, but as a result of the strike, I didn't have a gift for my mother on Christmas day.

Aaaand... the day before I left for Guelph, my own laptop broke. It was really young, too, only about three months.

So I had a broken laptop, and was left waiting for a laptop that I had ordered for someone else.

My brother did some Frankenstein-like operation on my computer though, where he dug out the hard drive of one of my old devices and installed it into my current laptop. It works passably. The hard drive he used was from a tablet though, so it offers a touch screen option even though my current laptop doesn't have a touch screen.

My mother managed to revive another one of my old laptops, too. The only one capable of functioning, and also the oldest in my laptop graveyard. During its run, it lasted a mighty six years before developing an issue where it would scream and shut down when you tried to power it on. Turns out it only needed a rest, and after a six year reprieve, it is capable of running again. This is a twelve year old laptop, and although it is too outdated to do many things, my mother was able to update her adblock, and she can go on her email, Facebook, and Reddit.

However, I really want her to have a new laptop. I owned that computer between the ages of 17-23 and never thought anyone else would have access to it. She promised she wouldn't snoop around but... I can't say I remember everything I put on that thing, during those sensitive years of my life, and I don't know if I want my mother stumbling across them.

Between the revival of a new laptop, and successfully harvesting of an old hard drive from another one, really validates me keeping a laptop graveyard.

Before Christmas, I was a little concerned over my funds. Remember during the summer, when one of my Summer Program cheques failed to come through? I broke out my piggy bank and counted over $500 worth of change. The agency fixed their mistake though, I got paid before rent was due, and I didn't bother to deposit my change. Since then, I've used some of it on laundry, but still had about $300. Taking out the piggy bank again, I came to around $400. That means that, in total, I wound up going to the bank with a sack of coin rolls totaling over $700. That's a new personal record for coin collecting!

Three Month Review

I recently had my probationary review at WALES, which is a performance assessment that is required to be done after three months holding your position. Prior to the assessment, you  can be fired without cause. After, you're safe for nine months until your contract is up for revision. I felt pretty safe in that I would keep my position. Three months had already passed, so if he wanted to fire me, it would have been in his best interest to act sooner. Still, I was worried I would get a laundry list of "areas to improve".

Everybody's up for review at this time of year. For some reason, I decided to volunteer first. Everybody wanted to hear how it went, especially the other new employee, as she had never had a review done.

It wound up being fairly quick. He essentially said, "Fairly straightforward. I've recommended you for everything. There were a few hickups at the beginning, but that's to be expected and everything has smoothed out. I have no concerns moving forward. You do well keeping participants focused, and they all love you. Keep up the good work."

Then he said that the other part of the review was feedback and asked me how I felt about everything so far. I asked some exploratory questions, but didn't get too wild. Don't want to ruin a good thing.

We recently had our WALES Christmas party. Last party I spoke on was staff only, while this one was participant-focussed and happened during work hours.

Day started off with a gift exchange. Each participant had drawn the name of someone else, for whom they would be a "Secret Santa". We had a price limit of $10 each. Then we all went to Swiss Chalet for lunch.

I have received quite the number of gifts from office members this year. One was wine decanter, which didn't make any sense to me until I looked up what they're used for. Conveniently enough, someone else gifted me a bottle of wine, which gave me the opportunity to decant it.

Every year, I've wondered why egg nog is only a seasonal  thing. I've also wondered why it's specified s "egg" nog. If it's the only  kind of nog, why not just call it "Nog"? Why preface that this is the egg variant?

Well, this year has been pretty satisfying in that the first flavour of nog out was "Pumpkin spice egg nog". This is probably due to Christmas beginning its advertisements before Halloween is through, causing some hybrid products to be created. I recently noticed there is "Almond nog", following the theme of nuts trying to replace animal-based dairy for people who are lactose intollerant.  In addition, I saw a coconut-bsed egg nog, brnaded "Coconog".

So even if there were practical reasons behind the selections of each new brand of "nog", I'm still grateful that we have eventually branched out.

Right now I'm in Guelph for a week. WALES doesn't shut down on Christmas week because we don't prioritize holidays with a religious background, to respect the diversity of beliefs among the student population. That being said, most of the people we serve celebrate Christmas and choose to take a week off. So we leave only two staff to take care  of the few residents in the house. Because I am stationed in Guelph,I can't even offer to be backup, although it looks like they found the culprit.

Potentially Rebranding

Hi all, just so you know, I am trying to increase the 2018 post count, so make sure you check posts before this one, as I will be updating more frequently.

So, I finally got around to changing my blog's description. If you're not sure what that is, it's the line beneath the title "Lair of the Gryphon". It used to be "A daily blog about my life", and has presently been changed to "A casual blog about my life". Pretty lame, I know, but more accurate. When I started this blog, the intention was to pressure me into doing something worth talking about every day. But once I developed a lifestyle worth talking about, I was busy enough to have it frequently fall  by the wayside on my priorities list. Plus, much of the things worth talking about contained confidential information concerning those I serve, which I obviously can't blog about.

So it fell from a daily routine, and only now have I modified the description, some nine odd years later.

With that being said, I'm open to new ideas for what the description of the blog should be. I'm having difficulty developing a phrase that really encompasses what we do here.

And while I'm at it, I'm also open to ideas for renaming the blog itself. I originally named it "Lair of the Gryphon" partly because it contrasted my previous Livejournal blog, "Lair of the Rat Sage" (I owned pet rats at the time), and also because a gryphon is a mythical beast, and as a dragon has a "lair", so should a gryphon.

Unfortunately, the name of the blog has led to some BDSM jokes among fans (yes, I have fans)

I do enjoy the fact that the initials of the blog (LOTG) parallel closely with the Lord Of The Rings (LOTR), but that not be a concrete reason to keep things as they are.

So yeah, open to suggestions for blog title and description. Right now, for blog title, I'm thinking "The Gryphon's Roost" or "The Gryphon's Nest". Let me know what you think in the comments or if you have other ways of contacting me.

At any rate, what is new with me is that I recently chaired a Core Competency meeting at work. I was really stressed about it. Initially, I didn't know where to submit my story from the previous meeting or what topics I should be covering for the next  one. After some frantic investigation, I figured things out. I was to cover "Interpersonal Relationships and Respect", as well as "Strategic Planning". This would be the final sesssion of my group for the year. Kind of odd for me to experience, as this was only my second Core Comp meeting ever. Meeting went fine.

We are finally replacing the roof where I work. Somewhere between my student placement and my current employment, our roof developed leaks. This past week, we have had a crew fixing things up, although somehow, our agency remained open. Over the past few days,  we have been dealing with the sounds of banging on the roof, falling debris, and the smell of tar. We have had to strategically guide program participants to areas of the building where construction isn't actively being done.

I even got to host lunch hour in my office one day. I got to show everyone how I'm nursing a blue hyacinth back to life, I circulated around Summer Program photos, and we played clips from the show Friends on my computer. It was like a picnic.

WALES Christmas Party

Recently, we had the WALES staff Christmas party.  It was held at my boss's house, and everyone was bringing something to eat, so it was also a bit of a potluck. I chose to bring blueberry tarts and mini pumpkin pies.

I may have mentioned it, but during this year's Summer Program, my then-boss would frequently make a point of bringing some kind of treat for the team, usually on a Wednesday.  In response to this, other members would make sporadic offerings, often in the form of Tim Horton's Tim Bits.

As I was late to the party, I figured I needed to take things a step further to compensate, and chose to deliver a series of homemade treats. These included banana bread, pumpkin loaf, blueberry tarts, and mini pumpkin pies.

As the tarts had gone over well, I decided to recreate them.

The night before the event, I made two batches of blueberry tarts and found both subpar. I became angry and couldn't find it in myself to attempt the mini pumpkin pies. Day of, I bought some storebought butter tarts, pumpkin tarts, and Portuguese custard tarts.

On my way over, I contemplated my frustration with the blueberry tarts and remembered a similar past occurrence. When I was in college for Social Services, I was in a group that held a fundraiser bake sale. My contribution was banana bread, pumpkin loaf, and blueberry pies.

After finishing everything, I chose not to bring the pies. My colleague was like "What? You have to, you worked so hard on them."

I responded with something like, "Look at those cracked shells. They are abhorrent. I'm trying to run a business and those will not only not sell, we will look bad for displaying them."

Somehow he managed to talk me into bringing them. This is how, on the only day I ever brought pies into the college, it coincidentally happened on Pi Day, the day in which the day/month/year comprised the first digits of the math equation, Pi. Epic.

Anyway, I had to duck out from the bake sale for a bit at first. When I came back, I noticed half a blueberry pie. I was like, "You actually managed to sell half of one of those? And where's the ugly pie?"

They said "We sold it, it's our best selling item."

I said "You sold the ugly pie first?"

So between my attempt not to bring in the blueberry pies for the bake sale, and more recent decision that I couldn't bring the tarts for the WALES Christmas party, this led me to ask "Why are you so critical and overemotional about home baked blueberry products?"

Well, my grandparents own property in Canadian Shield country, in which blueberries grow in great quantities. As a child, I would pick them and my grandmother would bake them into wild blueberry pies.

When I realized this connection, I was like, "You're seriously not comparing your blueberry products with a memory of what Grandma made, are you? There's so much room for bias! Your memory contains love for your grandmother as well as pride in your ability to contribute as a child. You'll never be able to compete with nostalgia."

When everyone was eating my store bought tarts near the end of the night, and I was more than a few drinks in, I attempted to explain my misadventure in baking the homemade blueberry tarts, and potential for bias when deciding not to bring them. Memory's blurry, but one of my coworkers mentioned the impression I left on her boyfriend. He said, "That's a man who respects his Grandma".

I also got to sample insanely good Scotch at that party. Turns out, my boss is the head of some Scotch club. At one point he said, "Anyone who wants to try Scotch, come join me in the garage". This must have been code for "secret boy club meeting" because every male followed, and every female stayed in the kitchen. That has to be one of the most stereotype affirming moments I've ever witnessed. I know some women like Scotch, I know two women whose drink of preference is Scotch.

I drank some insanely expensive stuff. I don't remember exact price, but hearing it made me feel dizzy. It was so good, it made me feel guilty. It was like being with a woman who is obviously out of your league and everyone knows it. I tried going back to the stuff I'd brought but my boss caught me and put me back on the good stuff.

That was some good Scotch, yo.

With this update, we have beaten last year's count, and I have  successfully fulfilled last years New Year Resolution. I'm going to try and get some more in before the years end, to set a new record to break. I may update more frequently for this next half-month or so to up my 2018 post count.