Autumn's here

Bonjour tout mes amis!

Autumn is my favourite season, and it is so beautiful here in Montreal. The leaves are all changing colours and falling off the trees, and we've been having a lot of fun crunching the leaves as we walk through the streets. It's still nice enough to bike around, although you need mittens at night. I've been collecting red maple leaves to mail to my mom and my brother.

It turns out that Adam isn't going to be a butler/personal chef, but he is working in a restaurant making pastries. I think he's going to have a lot of freedom to come up with new recipes, so I hope he practices for me at home.


I'm still looking for work. It's a bit worrying, because I haven't really found anything in my field yet. My french isn't strong enough yet. I went to a community centre where some of my friends are taking cheap french lessons, and had an evaluation that placed me in level four. I'm glad they did evaluate me, I think I'd die if I had to start from square one. Apparently my past tense skills are good.


We went to Fairmont Bagel the other day to get ourselves a taste of Montreal. It is one of the oldest and best Montreal bagel shops, although many would say St. Viateur is better. I like Fairmont because they have the most variety, and have about a dozen different flavours, including onion, all dressed, blueberry and chocolate chip!
They were very tasty and we brought some home to put in the freezer.

This year for Thanksgiving Adam and I decided to make a roast duck instead of turkey. It was very delicious. We had our friend Theresa come over and had some wine, duck, stuffing, gravy, mashed potatoes, salad, and a raspberry sauce Adam made instead of cranberry sauce! It was non-traditional and fun, and because we made the effort it was easier to be away from home. Our friends Margot, Rachel and Dan had a dessert potluck for all their friends away from their families on the holiday weekend as well.

They came over to learn how to make Adam's pie crust recipe a few days before, and you can see the fruits of our labour above! Adam made a peach, plum, pear pie a la Joanna Newsom (although he forgot the pear), and Margot and Rachel made mirabelle pie, pumpkin pie, raspberry cream cheese, and apple I believe. It was very good. Someone also brought gingersnaps which are my favourite.


How are the rest of you enjoying the autumn weather? Has anyone done any baking?

cuttin' onions and fashion

Why hello again,

It's a strange thing, but lately I've been having the most vivid dreams. Last night I had a dream that I was back in high school, at my current age and with a university degree, because I decided that I wasn't going to get a job in my current field and so going back to high school and taking a few calculus and physics classes was really going to help me out. Some of my high school friends were there, and I think someone stole my bike. Later, I had a dream that I was a large black woman who investigated prison conditions down South. Strange.

I invented a dance move in my sleep. A couple nights ago Adam looked over at me while I was sleeping and I had a huge grin on my face, and then suddenly my eyes opened and I had a look of glee. I told him that I was dreaming about being in a dancing competition, where I won first prize for a dance move called the onion chop/cutting onions. It involved me actually cutting onions on a cutting board with a big knife on the dance floor, crying because of the onion-eyes, and also because the dance move was so graceful. It was probably the best dream ever.

We went to a fashion show on Tuesday. It was of 6 up and coming Montreal designers. To be honest I didn't really see anything that great or revolutionary (I have my Project Runway critical eye, haha) but it was really fun to go to something like that. It's fun being in a big city where you can do stuff like that on a whim.

Tonight we're going to go see Danielson and Deerhoof. I am so excited, and have been a fan of both for a long time. Check out a Danielson vid below: