monday august 30

today i coped with the lack of groceries in our house by eating "hot dog burgers" for lunch. hot dogs chopped up and put inside hamburger buns, eaten like a hamburger. they were pretty good.

sunday august 29

today i threw on a pair of shorts shortly after waking up, intending to head downstairs to use the bathroom and grab a glass of water. when i made it about halfway down the stairs, i heard my roommate in the kitchen, which i wasn't expecting it. after a second's consideration, i returned to my room and threw a t-shirt on, before heading back downstairs. two years living together and i'm still not at a no-shirt comfort level.

saturday august 28

today i ran into a friend's roommate at the lakeview. since he lives three doors down from me, i commented on the fact that we'd only be neighbours for a few more days, before i "moved west." "oh," he replied. "are you heading out to b.c.?" "err, sorry," i chuckled. "by west i meant lansdowne."

friday august 27

today i was at the blue jays game when my attention was drawn to a woman sitting a few rows in front of me. she was taking photos with the camera held out in front of her, the viewscreen clearly visible. so even from four rows back, i could see that she had zoomed in as much as possible on the windows of the hotel rooms above the outfield and was taking photos of them.

thursday august 26

today i brought a can (tube?) of bbq pringles to the blue jays game. i'd never tried the flavour before, and after eating the first chip, i realized i didn't really like them. nonetheless, my friend and i ended up eating the entire can (tube?) by the time the game was over, for lack of anything better to eat.

wednesday august 25

today i saw a sign in the window of a nearby store advertising world cup memorabilia. it read: "buy 1, get 1 free or 50% off!" the message seemed redundant -- wouldn't "50% off" have sufficed?

tuesday august 24

today i was walking down the street when i heard someone complaining about how long a bus ride had taken. over the course of what should have been a 10-minute trip, he said, he'd had time to listen to "all of 'dogs' and half of fucking 'pigs.'" consulting my copy of pink floyd's animals later, i was able to deduce that his ride must have taken approximately 23 minutes.

monday august 23

today i went to communist's daughter for a couple drinks. having finished my first, i was hoping the bartender would come by so i could order a second, but i sat there for about ten minutes with no sign of him. finally, i decided to go up to the bar to secure my drink. i stood up and walked over, only to find that he was no longer behind the bar. i scanned up and down the counter before turning around to survey the rest of the place. oh, there he is, finally at my table.

sunday august 22

today i got a ride from london to toronto. on the way, i passed this bus overturned in the ditch, which made me rethink my previously-held assumption that any bus ride i took would almost certainly be accident-free.

saturday august 21

today i went to the gap intending to buy some jeans, a task i'd been putting off since last fall. after briefing looking at the selection, i picked out a pair i thought were my size and took that single pair to the change room. five minutes later, i was at the checkout counter paying for them. the speed with which i'd purchased the first pair of pants i tried on left me wondering why it had taken nearly a year for me to get around to the task.

friday august 20

today i ordered a pitcher of sangria at a bar and became confused when the server asked if we'd like "normal" sangria or "boozy" sangria. was there a standard form of sangria that didn't have alcohol in it?? to play it safe, i requested "boozy." as it turned out, this was just a more expensive version of alcoholic sangria that incorporated a cooler into its recipe rather than citrus juice.

thursday august 19

today i was standing in line waiting to buy a greyhound ticket for a 12:30 bus to london. with the clock on the wall reading 12:20 and me second in line, a woman two spots behind me in line started to panic about making a 12:30 bus (the same one as mine). she rushed to the front of the line and asked the guy standing in front of me if he was catching a 12:30 bus (he wasn't), then took his place at the front of the line. i wasn't sure whether to be offended that someone taking the same bus as me had jumped ahead of me, or amused that she was so concerned about missing it when i felt like i still had a ton of time to spare.

wednesday august 18

today i looked into why two library holds i'd made last week hadn't come in yet. after all, in the case of at least one of the books i'd reserved, there had been copies available in a few libraries -- it should've been delivered to my branch by now! after some brief research, i discovered that, because there'd been a fine on my library card for more than six weeks, a block had been placed on my card. for some reason, the website didn't notify me of this $0.60 obstacle when i'd actually placed the holds.

tuesday august 17

today i had a dream in which i was a major league pitcher. my line in my big league debut was 1 ip, 1 h, 0 er, 1 k.

monday august 16

today i found out that my brother broke his thumb and may need to have an operation to have a pin put in it. imagine if we both had metal put in our right arms/hands in the same year!

sunday august 15

today i noticed that my shawarma place of choice had a new soda in stock: cherry crush. fascinated by this flavour that i'd never seen before, i had to buy one. although it didn't immediately become my favourite soft drink or anything, i was happy i made the dollar investment. i also couldn't help but think back to the years of little league baseball when one parent would bring a cooler full of 24 cans of soda for the team to drink after the game: six each of root beer, crush cream soda, purple crush, and orange crush. having cherry crush in the mix back then would've changed everything.

saturday august 14

today i went to the scotiabank theatre to see scott pilgrim vs. the world. except, instead of going to the scotiabank theatre, i went to the varsity cinema, mixing them up in my head. scott pilgrim was NOT playing at varsity.

friday august 13

today i waited in line at the packed, about-to-close lcbo for approximately 15 minutes with a friend who was buying a bottle of wine. she ended up not even drinking a sip from the bottle, instead leaving it unopened at my house.

thursday august 12

today i was throwing a couple burgers on the barbecue when an old man yelled from the sidewalk across the street: "call me when dinner's ready!"

wednesday august 11

today i piled up my dirty dishes slightly precariously in the sink, intending to come back to them later. i walked out of the kitchen to dispose of some recycling and when i returned about 20 seconds later, my dishes had begun to slide off the pile. quickly, i sprinted across the kitchen and grabbed them just before the cutting board atop the pile fell onto the floor. my timing was so perfect and my execution so effective that i felt like it was something straight out of an action movie. a really boring, low-budget action movie.

tuesday august 10

today i bought a pair of beers at the blue jays game. one was for me, while the other was for my friend who had failed to bring any form of acceptable identification. unbeknownst to me, while she was waiting off to the side of the beer line, an usher came by and asked if she was, in fact, waiting for beer, which she denied. when i got the beers and went to hand one to her, she made no move to take it, instead whispering "don't give it to me." i walked with both drinks in my hands until the usher was clearly out of sight and no longer interested in us. the moment made me feel like i was taking part in some sort of drug deal out of the wire.

monday august 9

today i was in the shower when i absentmindedly read the label on a dove product sitting on the edge of the tub. i did a double-take when i was convinced i'd read the phrase "intensive despair" on the side of the bottle. after wiping the water out of my eyes and off the bottle, i realized it actually said "intensive repair," which made more sense.

sunday august 8

today i attended the best pitching performance of my life, when brandon morrow took a no-hitter into the ninth inning and struck out 17 rays. still, as much fun as i had at the game, the experience was ruined slightly by a rogers centre crowd that got really into the wave in the bottom of the 8th, then wouldn't stand up during the 9th. when a friend implored our section to get on their feet with one out in the 9th, one nearby fan replied, "i stood up for the wave." thank you toronto, for making me wish i grew up in boston or new york.

saturday august 7

today i slept through my alarm after a late night. when i randomly awoke, my clock read: 10:00. this was the exact time that i was to start my mlb trade rumors shift. was this the karmic reward i'd been hoping for after yesterday's moment of truth??

friday august 6

today i was buying a mickey of rum and three sapporos at the lcbo. however, when i checked out, the cashier charged me for just one of the three sapporos. before i could stop myself, i pointed out to him that i actually should be paying for three. the lcbo employee didn't even understand what i was referring to at first, and when he realized, seemed surprised that i would have said anything. "an honest man," he chuckled. i'm hoping that the extra $6 i charged myself will be repaid in karma down the road.

thursday august 5

today i was planning on making social plans for the evening, but found out around 5:00 pm that robyn's body talk pt. 2 had leaked. i decided to just stay in for the night instead.

wednesday august 4

today i realized, after a particularly intense mario party minigame, that when my doctor told me not to play any sports that involved contact or throwing until next spring, his instructions probably weren't thorough enough. the dull pain in my right arm suggested that he also should have cautioned me against playing wii games that involved violently shaking my arm up and down.

tuesday august 3

today i heard loud noises coming from outside and felt the house shaking a little. upon closer inspection i realized that, unbeknownst to me or my roommates, a group of workers was putting new eavestroughs on our house. at one point, this process resulted in a long-time fear of mine being realized, when the workers placed their ladders at the front of the house and made their way up onto our second-floor balcony. given that we never lock the balcony door, i've long considered, in the back of my mind, the possibility of someone coming up via ladder and easily entering the house. i decided to lock the door just to be safe.

monday august 2

today i was sitting at my computer in my room while our landlord showed our house to potential september tenants. thinking that people were done touring the house, i'd turned the volume back up on my music (bun b), and nearly fell out of my chair when i heard a girl's voice ask behind me, "can i come in?" the next 60 seconds or so made up the most embarrassing moment of my day, as she attempted to make friendly small talk and ask routine questions about the place, while i, still recovering from the initial surprise, answered pretty much every inquiry in the most awkward and roundabout way possible.

sunday august 1

today i was heading to a friend's place and realized i was out of subway tokens. this is always an unfortunate predicament. usually, i like to try to re-stock on tokens when i still have one or two left. that way, i don't have to worry about buying them when i'm running late somewhere, or having to wait in a long line of ttc customers. sure enough, when i approached the subway station, i saw the ttc attendant putting up the "back in a few" sign, though he continued to stand there. would he still sell me tokens? would i be able to sneak through when he left? a lot of questions were running through my mind as i walked up to the window. when i got there, i made eye contact and sort of gestured toward him with my wallet. to my surprise, he just smiled and waved his hand, indicating that i should just walk through. in retrospect, i'm not 100% sure "walk through without paying!" was what he meant, but when i did just that, no one stopped me.

saturday july 31

today i came out of the lcbo and saw the usual busker playing her guitar outside the entrance. knowing i was heading to the laundromat shortly and had no change, i briefly considered giving her a five dollar bill and asking if she could make change. i quickly eschewed this idea though, assuming that even if she got the better end of the deal (ie. i gave her $5 in exchange for two toonies), it would've just felt really wrong.