Mr. Mouse, the Goldfish

As I may have mentioned before, the Hubs is obsessed with getting Mr. Baz a mouse to play with on the patio.

For obvious reasons I am against this.

I am not, however, against a goldfish.

So the other day we bought Mr. Baz his very first goldfish. And then, because we were worried he was going to scare the goldfish to death, we bought it a friend, so they could um, be scared together.

To appease the Hubs, they are named Mr. and Mrs. Mouse.

On day 1, Mr. Baz drank the water from their bowl.

On day 2, he gave Mr. and Mrs. Mouse a passing glance on his way to eat the freshly planted grass and flowers instead.*

* Note: While buying our flowers for the patio, we also bought Mr. Baz two catnip plants. We even went to a second store to find the perfect flower pot in which to plant the catnip. And what does he think? He is not at all interested in the catnip. What kind of cat is not interested in catnip? A crazy one, that's what. He's like "I'm not into things that put "cat" in the title. Give me a scrap of steak, a crumble of parmiagiano, the tail from your dynamite sushi roll. But catnip? Fuhgeddaboudit.

On day 3, he ignored Mr. and Mrs. Mouse completely, but meowed incessantly when I pulled out the fish food (which are dehdrated worms or something equally disgusting).

And now I'm worried Mr. and Mrs. Mouse are going to die of boredom. They're like "Where's the big black cat? There's nothing to look at around here. This place sucks." It's a good thing we bought a pair, so they can amuse each other. So far they seem to be playing tag, though I can never tell which one's "it".

How to MC a wedding

Last weekend I was an MC.


Not that kind of MC.

The kind at a wedding. The Master of Ceremonies. Or, as I like to call it, The Mistress of Ceremonies.

Luckily, my initials are MC, so it wasn't at all confusing when people would call out "Hey MC!". I'm lying. Not a single person hollered that. But at the end of the night, some drunk guy was like "Hey, there goes the DJ!" to me as I walked by him on the dance floor. I didn't have the heart to tell him that the DJ was the one sitting behind the table, mixing music on his iPods. I guess he was confused by the lack of turntable action.

Anyway, I always think of MCs as guys. And funny. I'm neither, but then I remembered that my sister and sister-in-law were actually my co-MCs at my wedding so clearly I didn't think our MC had to be a guy. Or even just one guy. When I was preparing, I thought about what they did, to try to get some inspiration. At our destination wedding, though, their biggest task was to ensure no fat, bald guys in Speedos tried to sneak their way into the ceremony area or get caught in the background of any photos. So perhaps not really relevant, though it was the May 24 weekend, on a golf course, with a winery onsite and an open bar, so I didn't underestimate the reality that some people might decide to pound back a 2-4 and strip down.

Luckily, no one did, although I like to think they were going to, until I told them I'd kick their butt during my speech. So really I stopped them in their tracks. Go me. Either way, no embarrassing moments for the bride, and the most embarassing part was only when I explained how to get the bride and groom to suck face (aka the kissing game). My father appeared slightly mortified by my choice of words. Oh, Dad...

College Humor

Last night I was at an event where I was playing wing-girl to my friend who liked one of two guys. She talked to the one she liked, and the other guy (who was actually the one who liked her), got stuck talking to me, the married girl. Nothing sucks more than getting stuck talking to a girl who's happily hitched, while your friend hits on the girl you like. At least it was open bar.

Anyway, he sold ads for CollegeHumor.com! So even if he had a crappy time, I got to the bottom of this mystery! Do you know this website?

I discovered the show on MuchMusic a while ago, and am now addicted to it. It's hilarious, but I just assumed that the premise (a bunch of kids started the website to make beer money in college, and then turned the gig into a full-time business) was fake. Then I found the website, and it looked far too complex to be a fake site for the show. Then, I met the guy last night who confirmed it's for real! They did start this website and then it turned into a job and now that's where they all work, and now they get to star in the scripted TV show.

Just call me Nancy Drew.

Or maybe you already knew all that.

If you didn't, here's a clip to get you addicted too.

The evolution of the Trekkie

This weekend, I boldly went where I have never gone before.

To a Star Trek movie.

I spent all of Saturday doing the final* edits on Love Struck...

*Note: When I say "final" I mean, final until this week when I read it over one last time. And then send it to my editor and agent. And then they read it. And then I go to the next round of edits. But that is not for many, MANY weeks, and that is what I'm focusing on.

....and getting so excited every time I heard another clap of thunder because it meant I wasn't missing out on a sunny Saturday, stuck inside with my computer. I'm so selfish, I know.

To make me feel better, The Hubs did work too, because there's nothing like working while someone else is eating ice cream sandwiches and dancing in the living room.

Then, when I finished, he said I could choose whichever movie I wanted to see.**

**I'm pretty sure when he said "whichever" he did not really mean 17 Again, although he did tell me where it was playing. But I'm not that terrible.

Instead, I chose Star Trek. I really never imagined the day that I would see a Star Trek movie a) in a theatre and b) without complaining.

But that's what happens when J.J. Abrams makes a film with hot guys. It may be one of the best movies I've seen in a long time. I know you think I'm kidding right now, but I'm not. If J.J. had been around 30 years ago, maybe we'd all be Trekkies.

Now that the movie is over, I'm a little bit obsessed with the Star Trek the Movie website,
where you can upload a picture of yourself and turn into a Romulan or a Captain or an Officer, or my personal favourite, a Vulcan. You can also record yourself saying any phrase you like in Vulcan voice! I would show you but everytime I try to embed myself saying Live Long and Eat Cupcakes in my fab bowl cut, it crashes my browser. Oh well. Go beam yourself into the website so you can be a Vulcan too.

Toe crack

Yesterday I walked by this mannequin and noticed her flip-flops. Then I noticed she has no toe crack. No cleavage. She's like a web-toed frog. Is it me, or does it sort of freak you out to stare at her feet for too long?

Swine flu: Conspiracy theory?

I'm not really worried about the swine flu, which is weird, because I keep thinking I'm going to get a blood clot to my brain and have an aneurism and die on the spot, so it's not as though I'm not irrational or think I'm invincible. Maybe it's that when SARS hit, I really did not change my habits at all; I took the subway, went to class, went to work, went to grimy bars and kissed lots of boys. On the lips.

Ooh. How naughty.

Did Purell even exist back then? I don't think so. I don't remember using it. And I survived.

Side note: Do you know what Purell's slogan is? I'll tell you.

"Imagine a Touchable World."

Awesome. Sounds like the name of a George Michael song.

At my friend's work downtown, the company sent out a statement saying you can't have more than five people in a meeting at once. Which means that that they had to conference call people in another board room, just to have a regular meeting. It's kind of ridiculous, but at the same time, it's kind of scary.

To keep myself sane, I tell myself piggy stories. Like when I was in grade school I had a teacher who wore pig clothes, pig accessories, and carried pig accoutrements (like her lunch bag, umbrella, etc). It's a weird sight on its own, but see a woman in all pink piggy items every day in a school that is otherwise a mass of green plaid and it's even stranger. A lot of kids made fun of her. I'd like to say I didn't, but I'd by lying. Come on, pig paraphernalia? You'd have made fun too. That's what twelve-year-olds do. Then one day she told us that the reason she was so obsessed with pigs was because her heart stopped working and she got a pig valve put into her body. And so, a pig saved her life.

I felt like the biggest jerk ever for making fun.

I guess it's not that weird to wear pig clothes when you compare it to having part of a pig inside of your body. I wonder how she feels about pigs right now.

When I played baseball, one of the girls on my team had a pig as a pet. She'd bring him to all the games. He was black and had the shiniest coat ever and walked on a leash.

His name was Pigmalion.

No it wasn't. But that would be an awesome name for a pig, no?

My sister was set to go to Cabo last weekend. I emailed her in a panic to ask her if she was still going to go. She wrote back immediately to say that she was already in Mexico and it was a ghost town at the resort which meant she was living like royalty. (Royalty that's about to get piggy flu, I couldn't help but thinking). She said people were running for their lives to catch the last planes out of Mexico and that they were crazy, that it's the flu not a plague. She finished her email by telling me she thought it was a conspiracy by the US government to take our minds of the recession.

If that's true, I think it's working, though does that mean the people who have died are actors and are laughing. Ha ha ha, those crazy North Americans. They think we died from flu from a pig.

They made a movie about this sort of thought process in the 90s. It was called Wag the Dog, remember?

iheartintoronto - prettier than ever!

Several months ago I launched iheartintoronto.com -- a blog to talk about everything I loved but couldn't write about at my day job. Little did I know when I got a fabulous assistant, she would turn the site into this, which made its post-makeover debut yesterday!

Thanks so much to Jen, Suzanne and her guy Mo, we now have such a pretty site to talk about pretty things!

Let us know what you love, what you hate, and what you want to write about!

Cat Ladies, Bedtime Stories and Amadeus

We saw Mr. Baz on Friday night -- he did an amazing job! All three seconds that he was on the screen! But seriously, I was glad that he (and when I say "he" I really mean "we") weren't on the screen for too long because we (and when I say "we" I really mean "I") was sort of making jokes, and the film Cat Ladies was actually sort of sad. There were hilarious parts, but those were actually at the expense of the cat ladies. Not in a mean way, but the film obviously highlighted the stereotype of the "crazy cat lady" -- four of which were featured in the film.

One had three cats.

One had sixteen.

One had 123.

And the final one had too many to count. (The one with 123 actually counted them all.)

The film was incredible and I was so proud of my girl Christie Callan-Jones, the director. She did an amazing job.

There was a short film before Cat Ladies called Statistics, which showed the life of workers in a call centre in Norway. When I first graduated from university I took a government job, and spent my days on the phone helping people start up their small businesses. It was really just a glorified call centre as I spouted out memorized info while doing the daily crossword in the Metro. (I didn't even last my probation period before I went postal and quit). So I could totally relate. The film plays again this weekend - Saturday and Sunday and I highly recommend catching it with Cat Ladies. You won't be disappointed.

Then, to add a little low-brow content to my weekend I watched Bedtime Stories with Adam Sandler.

The film was super cute, but the best part was a scene with Adam Sandler in his truck, rockin out to Rock Me Amadeus. I can't find a clip, so you're getting the actual Falco vide. I forgot how awesome this song is.

Hot Docs: Cat Ladies & Mr. Baz's big-screen debut!

Tonight's the night! Mr. Baz is making his big screen debut in the closing credits of Cat Ladies, a documentary that's part of Hot Docs. Months ago, you might remember me blogging about Mr. Baz's experience filming for the documentary; at the time I just assumed the film would air on TV. But then it got accepted to Hot Docs and THEN, the other day OPRAH'S PEOPLE CALLED.

Oprah!

Oprah!

Apparently she's doing a show on documentaries. Could you even imagine if she talked about the Cat Ladies on her show? And what if she needed one of the cats to come? Sure, Mr. Baz isn't the star of the film (which follows women who have hundreds of cats), but he's the comic relief! And he dressed up! Surely she would want him to sit on her couch, wouldn't she?

I would even put him in a tutu, so he'd look pretty.

Compared to this...



...Mr. Baz would look so well-behaved!

Now, aren't you dying to see Cat Ladies? Well you can! Here's the sked:

Tonight, 6:30 pm at the Cumberland: Rush tickets only
Saturday, May 9, 9:45 pm at The Royal: Rush tickets only
Sunday, May 10, 9 pm at the Cumberland: Advance tickets still available.

And now... I'll leave you with this (Mr. Baz is not in this clip. You have to buy a ticket to see him!):