Being a Fan

TEAM CANADA Hockey fans!

When I was 16, I bought this cheesy little book called The Fun Book! 102 ways for girls to have some in some bargain bin at some bookstore. It had lots of suggestions, like rent a convertible for a day and tie a scarf around your hair while you drive (preferably beside the ocean or a long desert highway), and go have a drink in a hotel bar. I couldn't rent cars or drink in bars then but they seemed like cool ideas for when I was older. Now that I am older, I haven't rented a convertible, and while I've been to a few hotel bars it's not a regular habit. They still seem like cool ideas though. One of my favourite suggestions in the book was "Be a fan" - complete with a really cute illustration (the book had really good illustrations) of this curly haired woman wearing a team jersey and watching sports on TV while cheering. I loved that one then because I was a big sports fan in high school.

Here's the book

In 2000, 2001 and 2002 the Toronto Raptors basketball team were good enough to make the playoffs. So many of my friends liked the Raptors. It was always fun to get to school and talk about the Raptors game from the night before. And I was lucky enough (thanks to my dad) to get to go to a lot of games, including a playoff game in May 2001 when the Raptors were playing (and that game beat) the Philadelphia 76ers. Going to games was always so much fun! That year the Raptors heartbreakingly lost Game 7 in Philadelphia at the buzzer and I was crushed. The next year, if I remember correctly, they lost in the first round of the playoffs. But those years of cheering on the Raptors were so fun! Now they haven't made the playoffs in years and aren't that good anymore but I still do like them and hope they will get good again. I definitely know the best players from the early 2000s way better than I know or care about the best players today. I obviously loved Vince Carter (we all did and we were all sad that  he ended up leaving the Raps) since he was a Raptor but I also loved Chris Webber (C-Webb) of the Sacramento Kings. He was the best!

C-Webb

In terms of Toronto professional sports teams, I like the Blue Jays and Raptors best (it's a tie).  My love of the Jays stems from the early 1990s when they won the World Series twice (1992 and 1993) and were awesome!! Last year and this year, mostly thanks to my dad who is a big Jays fan, I have gotten back into them. I like watching the video replays of the game highlights that they win. Last year, my parents, D. and I went to two games (the Jays won both times) which were a lot of fun. I was (and definitely still am) a fair weather Leafs fan. I only ever care when they are in the playoffs.When I was in high school they made it as far as the conference finals a couple of times and that was  exciting. But I have just always preferred baseball and basketball.

The three outfielders do this every time the Jays win!

But in addition to baseball and basketball, I really like professional tennis. Tennis also one of the few sports where professional women players get as much attention as professional male athletes do, which is awesome (it's just sad that doesn't happen in more sports.) My all-time favourite tennis player is Steffi Graf. I also really really like Andre Agassi though and I love that they are married! I also really like Serena Williams, Venus Williams and Rafael Nadal. Tennis can be a really exciting sport to watch. I also like how it's an individual sport. Team sports are cool but there's also something neat about competing for (and relying only on) yourself.

Steffi

Serena and Venus

The worst part about being a fan is that it is so hard when your team loses! I especially feel like I can't take it when the team/player I like starts to lose. I remember when I was a kid and Steffi Graf was still playing tennis. I would start to watch the final of whatever grand slam tournament it happened to be and if she started to lose I wouldn't be able to handle it and would just off the TV and run upstairs. This year's Jays have so far in the season been a disappointment. They just cannot get to 6 games below .500 (at least so far) and that's bad! That's terrible in fact. They keep plateauing out at 7 games below.500 and it is really frustrating! If I am watching a game or checking the score and they are losing, I just turn off the computer and decide not to watch. Then I also try to avoid The Toronto Star's website because they always put  the Blue Jays score right on the homepage. It's nice to be surprised though. For example during last year's women's US Open tennis final, I saw that Serena Williams was down in the final set and it looked like she was going to lose. So I turned off the computer and figured she had lost. The next day when I went online, I saw a headline about Serena's comeback and to my happy surprise discovered she had actually come from behind and won. So that was nice! But yes, normally the way I deal with it when my team/favourite player loses is to pretend the match/game didn't happen :)

In some ways it's embarrassing that I care (it's embarrassing that anyone does) when my team loses. But on the other hand, I guess that's what makes it so much more fun when my/your team wins. There's this line in the song 11th Dimension by Julian Casablancas where he sings "Where cities come together to hate each other in the name of sport." I read an interview with him where he said he was thinking specifically of the Philadelphia Phillies and the NY Mets rivalry and how Philadelphia and New York supposedly hate each other because of that rivalry. Julian Casablancas also said in this same interview that he is a Mets fan which I love because I feel like most celebrities are Yankees fans so I think it's cool he prefers the Mets. But anyway, I get his overall point that cities hating each other because of sports is ridiculous. But I also think it's pretty confined to that one sport. In that, people from Philadelphia hate Mets fans and hate NY in regards to its association with the Mets but can have other objective opinions about NY not based around baseball. Maybe for some really intense diehard baseball fans it's a different story and they'd disagree with me, but I'd still like to think most people would be able to separate their sports and non-sports feelings.

So to conclude, being a fan is a good way for girls (and guys) to have fun. But it's also difficult at times. For now, I will just hope that in June the Jays can finally make it to 6 (and hopefully 5-4-3-2-1-0) games below 500, and that the tennis players I like win the French Open.

The Intriguing World of TV Spies

Recently I've watched a few different TV shows about spies and have been thinking quite a bit about the things that go along with being one. My aunt, uncle and I went to the Spy museum in DC back in the fall of 2006. It is a really cool museum. Unfortunately I don't remember that many details of our visit but I do remember reading a story about this couple (it's all a bit hazy so I can't remember everything) where the man was a Russian spy and his wife didn't find out until after he died! It must have been just so crazy to find something like that out after your husband dies. The next time I go to DC (and I do really want to go visit L. there) I will for sure go to the spy museum again.

D. and I started watching the show Homeland this past fall (we watched both season 1 which had aired the previous fall and season 2 which aired this past fall) and I am really into it! It has really sparked my interest in the CIA. I added some books about the history of the CIA to my Amazon wishlist and I look forward to reading them at some point. Claire Danes' character is an analyst - not a spy - as are most of the people she works with; so even though they are not spies I still think it works to talk about that show here. D. and I watched half (to be honest the movie was a bit slow and we just never went back and finished the whole thing) of the movie Fair Game which is based on that CIA spy Valerie Plame who Dick Cheney outed as a spy. Both Plame and her husband wrote memoirs about the incident (both of which are on my Amazon wishlist as well) which I am curious to read. Plame, unlike Carrie (Claire Danes' character on Homeland) was a spy, and thus could not tell her friends or family (including her husband and kids) about her assignments, where she was going, etc. Her friends didn't even know she was a spy or worked for the CIA. Spies had always seemed glamourous to me. (I imagined tall attractive people in trenchcoats walking down dark rainy streets.) The idea of continually getting to try different personas and be someone you're not at first seemed appealing. But when I think about it, not being able to tell people who you really are and what you really do seem like really acute downsides.

I imagined spies wearing trench coats like this.

Another show I've just begun to watch in the past few months is The Americans. I have long been fascinated with Russia/the Soviet Union and the Cold War and this show is all about that! It takes place during the early 1980s in Washington DC and is about a seemingly all-American couple named Elizabeth and Phillip who are actually secret KGB spies. Elizabeth is played by Keri Russell who I have loved ever since she played Chloe on Malibu Shores way back in the day. (Side note: the movie Salt with Angelina Jolie also deals with Russian spies in the USA and it is a really good movie!) The show is really interesting. In addition to all their spy work (which involves wicked disguises. Elizabeth and Phillip are constantly trying out different wigs, glasses, etc. each episode) the show raises a lot of interesting questions. Elizabeth and Phillip have two kids - Paige and Henry - who don't know their parents are really Russian. Elizabeth and Phillip are pretty different. Phillip seems to like living in the US a lot, while Elizabeth is completely devoted to Russia and her job as a KGB agent. Despite her hatred of all things American, Elizabeth convincingly plays the role of perfect American wife and mom. It's fascinating. She also doesn't seem to get stressed (or at least show her stress) by living under false pretences all the time. While she seems to genuinely care about her kids, it's clear that the KGB and Russia come first which is really interesting. Neither Elizabeth nor Phillip seem to give much thought to how their kids would feel if they were ever to discover that their parents were actually Russian spies which to me is crazy. Their poor kids would have their lives totally upturned if their parents' real identities were ever discovered!

Some of Elizabeth's various disguises. 

Keri Russell on Malibu Shores!

Two other interesting things I've noticed from The Americans: 1. KGB spies are trained really well and are amazing at hand to hand combat! It's always really interesting to watch how good Elizabeth and Phillip are when physically fighting others. 2. The show gives viewers lots to think about in relation to the role of women in early 1980s society, and in traditional male spheres like the FBI. Women are subjected to sexual violence - or feel the need to use sex in order to get information - on a regular basis. I'd like to think things have changed in the 30 plus years since then but the answer is probably that they have not changed enough. 


D. and I have also been watching this funny TV show called Archer recently. It takes place during the 1970s (except they have cell phones and the internet) and involves a spy agency called ISIS. The show is a comedy though, and is also animated. It is very funny. I always used to hear D. watching it and wondered what he was watching and laughing at. So I watched a few episodes with him and thought the show was actually really funny. We started at the beginning and are now in season 3 (there are four seasons and it's still going) and it's actually a really funny show. I love that they're spies/secret agents but my favourite character is the HR person at ISIS, Pam. (It's hard to pick a favourite though - all of the characters are pretty funny!) Mallory Archer, the head of ISIS, also  has been having a secret, many years on-going affair with the head of the KGB which is really funny too. Watch it! It is a light-hearted and fun spy show.

Here's Pam!

So far from my previous view of spies as alluring, attractive people in stylish clothes who jet set around the globe, these shows have shown me that the life of a spy can be difficult, amusing and at times seemingly mundane. Regardless, all of these shows reinforce the fact that shows about spies in any form are still a lot of fun to watch.

Simply Smoothies

When I was a teenager, one thing I liked about visiting the US was getting to go to this smoothie chain called Jamba Juice. When I would occasionally get them I thought they were really good. I love berries so much and since berries seem to be a key ingredient for smoothies have also always liked smoothies. There is a Jamba Juice (or at least there used to be) in Berkeley on Bancroft right across from the main entrance to UC Berkeley and sometimes during my first year I would go there for a smoothie. I started to think after a while, however, that Jamba Juice's smoothies had a somewhat generic and manufactured taste. They tasted kind of like the ingredients were not all that natural. They tasted (to me anyway) like they sugar in them instead of just letting the berries sweeten the drink.

During our first year at Berkeley, S. discovered Brewed Awakening (primarily a coffee shop) and its fabulous smoothies. We used to go there regularly for smoothies. I can't remember which flavours I liked best anymore but I know I always got the berry ones. Brewed Awakening's smoothies tasted "homemade" and were made with natural ingredients right in front of you. S. and I always had a lot of fun going to get smoothies and then going for a walk around north side.

When I spent five lovely days in Aix-en-Provence in early July 2008 doing research, I found this little stand that made juices/smoothies. It is sometimes hard to know the difference between a juice and a smoothie. Are smoothies supposed to have milk or yogurt in them? Maybe. If they are, this place made juices then because there was no dairy in their products. I really liked the drink I got there (and I went almost every day of my visit) and observed the recipe closely so I could make it on my own. They made the juice like this: ice, an entire banana, strawberries (cut up) and/or raspberries, a glass of water, and the juice of an entire lemon (this part I especially liked because I love using a lemon squeezer). I loved the juice so much that that whole following year in Austin I would make that exact juice almost every day.

My brother A. makes smoothies with almond butter. I can't remember what else he put in the smoothie but I think blueberries and maybe yogurt? I should ask him. In any event, almond butter seemed like such a unique and delicious option for smoothies. Almond products seem like a good addition to smoothies in general. Since moving to Montreal, I have fallen in love with this smoothie place called  Liquid Nutrition. In my opinion, it is the best "chain" smoothie place ever. I am super excited because I just went to their website and discovered they now have two locations in Toronto. They are both way downtown (so not near where I normally go) but still so cool! I'm happy! I think the company started in Montreal and now is trying to expand. In any event, they have a location on the McGill campus and I go there all the time. Their smoothies are delicious and never taste manufactured or fake. They taste like they are made with real ingredients. My favourite smoothie is called "Douceur" (it's called Sweetness in English but I always - even if ordering in English - just ask for the Douceur because they only have their menu up on the board in French). It used to be called La Vie en Rose which is a better name, but they changed the name (but not the smoothie) maybe a year and a half ago. I once tried another smoothie there which was also good but I can't remember what that one was called. I probably only had it 3 times whereas I've had Douceur so so many times. Douceur is made with banana, strawberries, raspberries, (maybe blueberries too?) honey, ice and almond milk. Typing this is making me want one so badly right now. Liquid Nutrition also sells a lot of supplements and things like that. I've never tried any of those things. I had had their muffins a few times - which were just okay - and a sandwich there once - which was also not amazing but fine. They are primarily a smoothie place and it shows. Anyway, I just love the Douceur smoothie and I really recommend going there if you have the chance.

Secret ingredient

When I moved back to Toronto in the summer of 2009, I had to get a new blender (I had left my previous one in Austin) and I didn't like it as much as my old one. Maybe this was all just in my head but I felt that same drink I used to make in Austin just did not taste as good at all. After trying a few more times, I stopped making it and haven't made them on my own since. I could easily make the Douceur at home but I don't. It probably wouldn't taste as good as the Liquid Nutrition one but still. I should try! I really should get a blender and get back into making them. First, because I am positive there will be no Liquid Nutrition where I live next year and so if I want a Douceur I'll have no choice but to make it; and second, because as almond butter or almond milk attests, there are so many possibilities for smoothies I need to explore!

Thoughts on Texts & more importantly Emojis!

My favourites are all in the first row: the two with blushing cheeks, the winking one and the blowing a kiss

I've never been - and am still not - that big a fan of text messaging. I prefer sending emails to texts because I can type on a computer keyboard much faster than I can "type" on a phone. I have gotten used to them now and I understand their utility but I still don't love them. So many people I know love texting though and send texts all the time! Maybe one of the reasons I've never wholeheartedly embraced texts is that my phone plan didn't have a texting option when texts first caught on. I think the first text I ever received was from A. back when we were both at Berkeley and I was so confused to see a written message from him on my phone :) Wait, it just occurred to me that I would occasionally text in Santiago. So A.'s text wasn't the first I ever received. Texting was pretty popular in Chile. I remember L. remarking once that texting was way more popular in other parts of the world than in North America (that has changed I believe!). So correction: the first text I received in North America was from A. Regardless, as that last year at Berkeley continued on, more friends started to send me texts and it was frustrating to be unable to text them back!!

When I lived in Paris in 2007, my cell phone came with a text option (texting - called either "textos" or SMS -  was really popular in France) and I got more used to sending texts. My British friends C. and S. texted a lot and would always end their texts with an "x" which I really liked. When I came back to North America, and then ended up in Austin, I made sure to get a cell phone with a texting option. I didn't send a ton of texts but I definitely sent them fairly regularly as it caught on more and more. What was super frustrating about that plan though (my carrier was Verizon) was that for some reason whenever I went back to Toronto, my phone refused to send texts. E. had the same plan as me (she lived in NYC at the time) and when she came back to Toronto she could send texts. No fair :) I even called Verizon and they weren't particularly helpful just telling me that they weren't sure why some people could send texts when in Canada and others couldn't.

My pre-iphone phone looked like this. Texting is hard on one of these!

When I moved back to Toronto and got a cell phone with Koodo, I was happy to see that texting was included with all their plans. However, I soon learned, much to my annoyance, that I could not make smiley faces like this :) on my phone. So annoying! Those smiley faces are much more useful than I initially knew they would be. I feel like they could change the whole tone of a message (tone in general can be so difficult to convey over text) in an important way. I can think of countless times when I wanted to put in a smiley face but couldn't and was frustrated!

Finally, at the beginning of last November, so five months ago, I got an iphone. Besides it being great that I can now check my email from anywhere (I especially like checking from bed when my laptop is in the other room) and that I have cool apps like a flashlight app and UNO (which D. and I play a lot!), and that  texting is much easier now that I have a keypad vs. having to type everything with my thumbs on a regular number pad like on my old phone, the hands down main reason I love my iphone is because of the emojis. They are so much fun! Emojis are Japanese which is so unsurprising to me because the Japanese are just so great at things I like like stationery and stickers and clothes and cool kitchen supplies and loving French culture and so of course they'd be great at emojis. I now try to use emojis as much as possible. D. and my mom also love them and so I can use as many emojis as I want when sending them texts. Emojis just add so much to a text. They make them cuter and more fun and sweet. And easier! Why type "I feel like a glass of wine" when you could replace "glass of wine" with an emoji of a glass of wine? My very favourites (and most used) are the blushing ones, the one blowing a kiss, and the one with the sunglasses but I seriously love all the emojis. I love the hearts and the lips & all the random ones. I hope you can use emojis too, and if you can't just enjoy looking at all these pictures. And, be sure to click on this link which features drawings of all the emojis. Super cool!

Here is a screenshot from my very own phone! You can see all the emojis I recently used. You can also see that I asked D. if I could post this on my blog and he obligingly said "Of course"  :)

One of my most used

So this is another screenshot from my phone. See the bubble with the dots, it means D. is writing something and is about to send me a text! In my recently used, you can see more of my favourites like the bathtub, the pink heart with the bow (I think that's my mom's favourite one) and the sunglasses one! 

I included this one to show all the variety: there are animals, flowers, foods, fruits, etc. etc. 

Bathtub Bliss

This looks relaxing to me except I never put my leg up like that :)

In the debate over bathtub v. shower (is there a real debate or did I just make that up? regardless...) I am hands down on the bathtub side. I do enjoy showers (and even though I sometimes (more like rarely) will wash my hair in the bath it's not particularly efficient and I always end up with way too much water in my ears) and believe they are better for washing  hair. Showers are also much quicker than baths, which can be a good thing depending on the time of day, the reason for wanting to clean yourself, etc. Sometimes necessity also forces me to take showers as for examples the two apartments I have lived in in Montreal both had showers in a bathtub but the bathtubs looked utterly unappealing (and are also small) when I moved in and so I never (or have never) took (taken) a bath in either one. But overall there are just so many positives for baths. A bath at the end of the day (or in late afternoon, or even in the morning) is the epitome of relaxation for me. Sometimes I like to lie in the bath and read; sometimes I like to just lie there and think. I can easily spend 45 minutes in a bathtub only realizing that much time has passed because my fingers are pruned.

I like this bathtub a lot because of its position in a corner with windows on both sides

My absolute favourite bathtub in the world is my bathtub in the second floor bathroom in my house in Toronto. It does not have claw feet but the rest of it is like an old-fashioned bath tub as it is very deep, quite long and has the sides that curve over - perfect for resting my head. It is just the most comforting and comfortable and relaxing bath tub in the world. Whenever I am home I crave taking baths, and sometimes take two a day, just so I can lie there and luxuriate. I like reading in that tub but there's also a window (fairly small but good enough size) facing it and so I also sometimes like to just lie there and look out at the sky. The bathroom on the third floor of our house has a bathtub too and it's decent. It's long and fairly deep - the two key criteria. I've taken a few baths there but mostly just to try it out. Given my love for the second floor bathtub, it doesn't make sense to take baths anywhere else. 

Out of all the apartments I've lived in which did have usable bath tubs (the number is 3) the bathtub in the Hilgard apt in Berkeley sticks out the most. I don't remember it being particularly long but it was fairly deep and I would often take bubble baths there. Oh! I should mention quickly that I am a big fan of bubble baths but I am just as content to take a non-bubble bath. If I have some in my house, I will usually put it in but if I'm out my enjoyment of the bath won't be diminished. Back to Hilgard: the good thing was that the bath had this really good drain which meant the bath could never overflow. I was so bad too many nights for the environment and would let the water flow and flow while I got distracted on the internet or doing something else. Amazingly, the hot water seemed to never run out there. I used to take baths at Hilgard almost every night and they were always a highlight of my day. I rarely read in that tub, preferring to just lie there and think. In addition to all my great memories of that apartment, the bathtub is another one.

As far as other bathtubs I've used a fair bit and enjoyed go, the condo at Mont Tremblant has two bathrooms both with quite good bath tubs. They are long and quite deep and generally quite comfortable. It's been great I've been able to go up to Tremblant quite a bit while living in Montreal because I always make sure to take baths to make up for my lack of them in my Montreal apartments.
One other very positive bath experience I want to write about took place at those friends of ours - A. and her son S. (although he lives in Paris now) - apartment just outside Paris (from whose balcony you have an amazing view of the Eiffel Tower). I stayed there my first week in Paris in January 2007 and on the Thursday night (I was moving to my lovely Batignolles apartment on the Friday) A. said I could take a bath in her big bathtub. It was so nice and so relaxing. I also got to use all her nice smelling soaps and it felt so relaxing. I was nervous about moving the next day, but also excited and that bath helped put me in the right frame of mind.

I have also taken baths in some really crappy (mostly hotel) bathtubs. The number one complaint I have with most hotel bathtubs is that they are far too shallow. They are also usually never long enough. The shallowness is the worst part though. One of the best parts of taking baths is to be submerged in water and so it's very unpleasant to sit in a tub with water barely covering my stomach. Sometimes my need to take a bath was so great that I'd still take one, even in a crappy tub. I've stopped doing that though as I've finally realized that taking showers in those situations is just a better option.

I have spent lots of time imagining my dream bathtub. Ideally I would like a bathroom with a claw foot old fashioned tub and directly above it I would like a skylight. This way I could take baths in the moonlight on nights when the moon is full or giving off a lot of light. I also like seeing the sky so if I took a bath during the day time I could lie back in the tub and stare up at the sky. I love natural light and I love bathtubs and I think they go great together. No matter where I end up eventually living more permanently, I will one day ensure that I get my dream bathtub.

I like the skylight but I'm not a huge fan of the marble.

This is the bathtub I'd like in the picture above. 

Beloved Birkenstocks

Birkenstocks are my absolute favourite brand of shoes in the world. I got my first pair of Birkenstocks (they were sandals) the summer of 1997 when I was 13. My mom had been wearing them for as long as I can remember so I'm not sure why I waited until I was 13 to get my first pair but I fell in love then and haven't looked back. I've gone through so many different pairs of sandals. Last spring, I went to buy some new ones and decided to try out a new style.

This is the new style

I'm so glad I did as I love these new ones and I received tons of compliments on them :) My old ones (of which I had several pairs) looked like this

 

 and while these ones are great, I prefer the new style. It was funny because when my mom and I went to buy them (we go to this shoe store called Dorfer Shoes on Dupont St in Toronto which is owned by a mom and daughter (I think) and which has very odd opening and closing hours. The daughter especially likes to talk but she's very nice) we asked her if it was a new style. The woman (the daughter) told us that people kept asking that but no they had been around for a long time. Odd, because I had never noticed them before in all my years of buying Birks.

My biggest problem with Birkenstocks is that I wear out the soles (despite the fact that I love walking, I sometimes drag my heels when I walk which causes me to wear down the heel part of whichever shoes I happen to be wearing), which are made of cork. I wear them out so badly I get holes in the cork and then they are unwearable. It's possible to get your shoes re-soled but you have to time it exactly right. There comes a moment when it's impossible to re-sole them and then you have to wait for the holes to happen and then you have to go buy another pair.

My very favourite kind of Birkenstocks (although it's really really hard to have a favourite as a I love them all) are the clogs. On my fifteenth birthday, way back in January 1999, my mom gave me my very first pair of navy blue suede clogs and I practically lived in them for the rest of high school. Navy blue is my favourite colour. And I love slip on shoes. And they just look great with everything. I went through 2 other pairs until age 26.  Then, much to my dismay, I discovered sometime around age 24 or 25 that Birkenstock (the company) had stopped manufacturing navy blue clogs. You could get them in brown and black and even red I think (and various shades of brown as well) but no more navy blue. I was crushed. I contemplated getting a different colour but my heart wasn't in it and so for a while I was clogless. Then, in May 2010, I went to Japan on a trip with my parents. Near the beginning of our trip we went to Hiroshima and we came across a Birkenstock store. We went in, and much to my delight they had navy blue clogs! I was so glad I hadn't decided to buy a different colour pair. These ones aren't exactly the same as the pairs I had before because the soles are white, not brown. I don't really know why they're white, and I don't know if navy blue is popular in Japan and that's why Birkenstock Japan decided to keep making navy blue ones. And the salespeople didn't speak English and I don't speak Japanese so I wasn't able to ask these questions. I was just so grateful and happy to find the shoes I wanted. I think the sales people could tell. I was smiling so hard and they seemed happy for me.

Here they are! Japanese Birkenstock Navy Blue Clogs

Here is their white sole

My second biggest problem with Birkenstocks is the way the selection in Canada is way worse than in the US. Dorfer Shoes gets the catalogues for both Canada and the US and the US gets so many more Birkenstock varieties. Dorfer often orders the shoes directly from Germany but it's annoying sometimes to have to go through the store and wait for the shoes to come from Germany when if I were in the US I could just order them directly from the Birkenstock USA website. The woman from the store says the US gets more varieties because it is just a bigger country but it's still annoying. I also hate the way Birkenstock has discontinued two of my favourite pairs (the navy blue clogs and see below for the other discontinued line). I don't get why! Navy blue is such a classic colour and I don't get why they would discontinue it. Even though I was thrilled to buy the navy clogs in Hiroshima, I haven't been able to enjoy them as much as I would have liked. I am scared to wear them for fear of wearing them out and missing that magical window of re-soling. I know that's silly but I can't help it. In the almost three years since I've bought them, I've probably only worn them outside a handful of times and instead have worn them as inside winter shoes the past few years. But even then I don't wear them that often. It's sad. They are my favourite shoes (although I have to admit I prefer the non-white sole) and I really should wear them more!

Sometime in 2009, my mom bought a pair of these Birkenstocks.

I liked them so much I decided to buy a pair myself in the spring of 2010. I love them!! I think of them as my Birkenstock running shoes. They look good with a variety of things, are super comfortable and are really practical - and normally I hate tying shoe laces! But I love these shoes. Unfortunately, I found out last spring that Birkenstock discontinued the line. So I just hope I never wear them out. They have a rubber sole as opposed to a cork one like other Birkenstock shoes so that's a bonus for not wearing them out.

 Then there are my black "London" (that's their official name - all Birkenstock shoes have names (I think) many named after cities but the only name I can remember is "London") Birks. Although I actually don't have a pair right now. My last pair was so worn out and old I threw it out in the fall and have yet to buy a new pair. I love these shoes though!!!! And I will definitely buy a new pair maybe over the summer so that I'll be all ready to wear them in the fall. The first few months I was in Paris in 2007 I didn't have any with me because I was between pairs. My parents came to visit in April and I asked my mom to bring me a new pair. I was so happy she did and proceeded to wear them almost every day. I'd been wearing an assortment of other shoes (and some boots) in Paris until then - which were mostly good but sometimes hurt my feet - and I was so happy to be back in my wonderful black Birks. I have two other stories surrounding these shoes: the History graduate department advisor/coordinator at UT Austin, M., complimented me on these very shoes multiple times and I always encouraged her to get her own pair. Finally, I saw her one day and she was wearing her own pair! Yay! Another time, several years ago now, my mom had a party at our house for someone from her work. It was quite crowded at our house and everyone's shoes were strewn around the front hallway. My dad actually had to leave early to go his own work event and I was driving him downtown. I put on these very shoes and a guest at the party came up to me and said "I think you're wearing my shoes." I told him I didn't think so but then we discovered that he had actually worn the exact same shoes to the party. I was wearing my own pair (we located his) but it was funny.

The London

This guy I knew in grad school, G., once spoke sort of disparagingly about this prof who I TAed for (and really really liked) commenting on how he always showed up to teach in jeans and birkenstocks. That comment made me think of this US political ad I saw once (made by a Republican of course) attacking Birkenstock wearing liberals in Vermont. I always find comments like that very funny because a) I'd be happy to be considered a Birkenstock wearing liberal professor :) and b) because I don't really understand how Birkenstocks became a dirty word for right wing people.

While google-imaging around for pictures for this post, I found this:

It's funny but it also makes me think that Birks are way less non-mainstream these days. I remember feeling so cool when I was 15 because I was the only person I knew with those navy blue blogs, but then more and more people from my high school started wearing Birks (luckily no one picked navy blue :) ) and I didn't like it. And sure enough I see them all over now. I also no longer (happily I have matured) feel annoyed that others wear them. In fact, I really like seeing fellow Birkenstock wearers around. I know their feet must be so comfortable.  I am pretty much 100% sure they will always be my favourite type of shoe and I look forward to many more pairs to come. 

Where life's a mountain not a beach

When I was a little kid, my brother went on a ski trip with his school to Kimberley and Fernie in BC and he brought me back this t-shirt with a picture of a mountain and it said "Where life's a mountain not a beach." Ever since I was a kid and we used to go to out west to Whistler or Lake Louise over March break I have always loved ski towns. I liked skiing all morning, sometimes into early afternoon and then coming in for lunch. My dad would make toasted peanut butter sandwiches, or toasted ham and cheese sandwiches (always on whole wheat bread) or we'd have soup. Somehow all those things always tasted better when we ate them on ski trips. I like how ski towns are called villages (or at least at Whistler and Mont Tremblant they are) and how they are full of people who are on vacation and usually seem very happy. There's a familiarity and a similarity to these types of places that I've noticed not just at Whistler and Tremblant but in Moab, Utah and Lake Tahoe too. I always wonder what it would be like to live in one of those places year round. To have this vacation land be your every day land. Every time I've been on an island/beach vacation I've wondered that too. I know normal life exists on those places but I think I'd find it difficult to go about my normal life when the beach and all that it promises - swimming, reading, relaxing, tanning - is so close.

Since 1997 when my parents got their condo in Mont Tremblant I have been there countless times, and I absolutely always love going there. Even though I haven't skied in over 10 years, I still love going to Tremblant in the winter. It's very pretty with all the snow, I like seeing all the skiiers, you can go skating and walking in the snow is fun. Best of all, I love the feeling of being warm inside and seeing all the snow outside. I always feel really safe and happy. I also love going to Tremblant in the summer - it's green and warm. I like looking at the lake and I always feel so relaxed.

This is the outside of the condo complex 

For all the happiness I've felt in ski towns, there is something very sad about a ski/vacation town with no one in it. A large part of those feelings of safety and happiness, I'm realizing, must come from feeling like other people are there feeling the exact same positive things as I am. I've been to Tremblant twice around the end of the first week of May (so around the 8/9/10th of May) and it's a really depressing time there! Don't go! S. and I went there for two nights in May 2010 and it rained - really hard - the whole time. Aside from going to the nearly deserted village to eat at Catherine's Crepes, we stayed inside and watched movies all day. That part was fun but being there when no one else was wasn't.  C. and I went last May in the middle of the week - a Wednesday - to benefit from this spa deal that the Scandinavian Spa was having on Tuesdays and Wednesdays during May and June. The Tremblant village was absolutely dead. Weirdly, many of the restaurants had 'closed for renovations' signs in their windows but there was no sign of renovations actually taking place. It was like this village wide joke that we didn't get. We ate at the one place that was open  - this Mexican restaurant - and we were the only ones in the restaurant.

Evidently the period between when the ski season ends and Victoria Day weekend when the summer season starts is the off season when Tremblant pretty much shuts down and there are very few tourists. D., his brother A., sister-in-law V., their daughter C., and I went to Tremblant the last weekend of October this past year and it was also a weird in-between time as the Fall season ends on Thanksgiving weekend and the ski season doesn't start until American thanksgiving. Almost all of the leaves had fallen too so we didn't get to enjoy the fall foliage. There were still a fair number of tourists around though, definitely better than May, and there were other people staying at the condo complex so it felt much better than going in early May. 

Another downside of ski towns is that food (and probably clothes and other things people shop for) are often ridiculously overpriced/expensive. However, the food is often really good in those places so people, like me, still go out to eat. Or at least the food is really good at Tremblant. I love Catherine's Crepes and this Italian place that I know the location of but not the name. And of course Tremblant has beaver tails! Beaver tails are the best! I always get Killaloe Sunrise which is a beaver tail with the usual cinnamon sugar mix plus lemon juice. So delicious! Even though you can get beaver tails in other places now (like the Toronto Zoo!), I like them the best in Mont Tremblant.

A Beavertail

Another highlight of Tremblant which I promised I'd talk about in my last blog post is the amazing swimming pool there called Aqua Club La Source. It is a very fun swimming pool which is big and has lots of balls and noodles you can play with/on. There is also a tarzan rope and one deep area you can jump into. The rest of the pool doesn't have a real deep end though - it goes to maybe 5'4 or so because I can stand there - which isn't good. But I just love that swimming pool! I've gone so many times and I always have a fun time. The last few times with D. have been especially fun because we've played catch and swum around and done more actual swimming.  La Source also has an outdoor hot tub and a steam room. I could write another post about steam rooms. They are amazing. This one is very very hot. It feels amazing. If you go to Tremblant, go to this pool! It's very fun!

So many windows! It's great!

Finally, I need to end this post by talking about one of my favourite things about Tremblant - the Cabriolet!! (Another reason Tremblant is sad in the off season (and the October off-season too): the Cabriolet doesn't run.) The Cabriolet is this gondola that goes really fast and is meant to transport skiiers from the bottom of the village up to where they get the chairlifts and big gondolas to the top of the mountain to ski. It's free and so much fun to ride! When I used to go to Tremblant with A., E. and L. back when I was 14 and 15 we used to ride the Cabriolet up and down multiple times. So fun!

The fabulous Cabriolet!

In closing, ski towns are lots of fun! I like going only so often though because then I appreciate them all the more. Going back to the title of this post though, it's so hard for me to say whether life's a mountain or a beach. For longer vacations (5 days or more, ideally a week or 8 days) I would undoubtedly choose a beach vacation. But I prefer ski towns for weekends just because you can pop in, relax, and pop out and feel great. With beach holidays, I always want to be there longer but with ski town weekends, though I would also like to stay longer a weekend is enough.

Outdoor hot tub at the Scandinavian Spa...so relaxing!