Smoke is smoke wherever you go.

Recently, I've come across something quite entertaining:

the newspaper.

Well, the newspaper online. I felt guilty for only making an effort to buy the Sunday paper, and not even a Sunday paper subscription, at that. I'm not sure how, but I started reading the News & Record online. And, I'm not sure when, but I started reading the comments on there, too.

Enter-freaking-taining.

Well, at this point, I've noticed that the same and relatively small group of people are forever commenting on the articles, letters to the editor, etc. Hm, I wonder if the people commenting are also often the same people who send in the letters to the editor that are published. Anyhow, now onto some thread of thought I've noticed in the recent squawk over the smoking ban.

Some people opposing the smoking ban are opposed to the suppression of their rights to smoke and/or the rights of private establishments deciding whether or not they will be smoke-free establishments. Along that line of thought, some people have recommended that if someone who is offended by cigarette smoke, he/she has the right to not visit establishments that allow smoking.

Ok. Now let's wait a minute. I'm not really even going to get into the whole--Oh, you have a right to smoke wherever you want? Well, what about my right to breathe cleaner air?!--thing. It's a public health issue, people. Your smoke is just straight-up nasty. Yay for being nasty.

Anyways, back to the--Well, you aren't being forced to go into establishments that allow smokers.--argument. Ok, that is very true, but if that is the sentiment, then how sad and limited are the lives of people if that were their reality. If 95% of restaurants (I am totally making up numbers here) allow smoking in one way or another and I was steadfast in not wanting to inhale second-hand cigarette, cigar and pipe smoke, then what a lame life I would have as a foodie. Ok, I'm a fake foodie, but that's just not fair. Come one, you can smoke any where you want in...um, I guess I'll say "private". Maybe your smoking is social (even if you are smoking alone...at the bar...with a beer you could have bought for half-price at Wal-Mart). Maybe you only smoke when you drink (awesome!). Wherever you do it, when you do it shouldn't matter. (Oh, wait, it can be an addiction, sorry.)

THE POINT (which I haven't made yet) is that, every restaurant isn't the same. Your smoke will always be the same. Maybe I am missing some important nuances about smoking cigarettes in public, but when your smoking "right" in a restaurant, let's say, trumps my goal of experiencing the food and atmosphere of that restaurant, it's really sad. If I have to limit myself to all of the restaurants that are smoke-free, yes I might appreciate that they are smoke-free, but...the food might suck.

We are on this Earth...together.

I know that in the current situation involving Haiti, action is more important than words.

Still, this situation just made me think of a thought that I've often had twirling in my head ever since, I suppose, I started my geography degree back in the day...

But, before I get to that, I'd just like to point out that I am not one to make sweeping hypotheticals concerning human nature e.g., "Can't we all just get along?" and "If women ran the world, there'd be no war."

In any case, I often think, Why do we humans waste so much time trying to fight each other when we have bigger and less discriminating things to worry about, like natural disasters?

Ok, now I'm done ignoring sociology or history or whatever it takes to describe the convolution of civilization.

I feel really, really bad about the earthquake in Haiti. That is a disaster. This event should have no lack of sympathy worldwide. I am watching the rescues unfold and am interested in what recovery will look like.

And, just to be pop-topical, there is nothing worth saying about Pat Robertson.

Good night.

These cupcakes remind me of breakfast.

Instead of making Power Balls tonight, I decided to stop procrastinating and finally try out the (vegan) maple cupcake recipe I have. I lacked maple essence or flavor or whatever it's called, but the 1/2 cup of maple syrup was enough to make me think of waffles. :)

I didn't know if I would frost them or not and was on my way to making a quick ganache with some Ginger Green & Black's. Green & Black's was on sale, 2/$5, last month all over town. That was weird, but it worked because I've got a stack of the bars in my kitchen waiting to be devoured.

I finally ended up making my trusty ol' (vegan) cream cheese frosting and slyly dumped an extra ingredient--more maple syrup--into the mix. Having this KitchenAid mixer makes this a million and a half times easier than using a hand mixer. I burned out the motor in my one hand mixer but fortunately, I have a back up still tucked in it's original box...wait, what the heck...fortunately, I got a freakin' KitchenAid mixer!

Yay, domestication! Woohoo! Ok, back to reading Jezebel...haha

Ok, I digressed. Let's take a look at these babies:

The regular. Boooring, I know.

Ended up shaving some of the ginger chocolate on there.



This was done for kicks...and to calm my shame of discarding too much frosting.

Enough of this...time to eat! My New Year's resolution is to bake more cupcakes, so there!

Or something to that effect. I also bought some celery yesterday to offset the cake, so...

Good night!

The "d" word

I've been thinking.

I know, I know...the holidays are over and, hey, I'm staring at my Christmas tree feeling guilty about procrastinating and not cleaning that mess up.

When I racked my brain for gift ideas this holiday season...when I wentout to shop...when I finally made the purchasse...I thought that I should stop and do something else.

I figure, why not buy some food and donate to a food pantry? Why not buy a toy and donate it to a cause I find worthy? Why not give some money to whom I wish?

I mean, come on. Plenty of days I spend money on frivolous things. Well, let me take that back. I buy things, perhaps, capriciously, but I do so with a muted sense of adventure and indulgence and I truly appreciate the experience whether it ends up good or bad. Sounds like addiction :) Look, I am talking about trying a new smoothie flavor here, or buying a fancy cupcake, not anything big. But, I can get those "good" feelings doing the "d" word...you know, donating.

Sometimes the capriciousness can find itself in donating but sometimes you want to do enough research to make sure you are all-around content with your donation.

Anyways, instead of the [insert whatever here] that I was going to get today or may get tomorrow, I'll think of others who may not be so close to me that I will drive and spend gas to find the perfect ribbon for a personalized ornament.

But, I can donate some canned goods.

Give time, give stuff, give money. Whatever. It's not that hard. But don't just do it because "it's not that hard." Do it from the heart...and the head.

Mmmmm...well, that's what I was thinking just now.

There's no such thing as "two cannolis". *Sigh*

Today, Danielle and I scurried on down to the Festivale Italiano in downtown GSO. "Festivale"? Anyways, I was pretty puzzled that there was an Italian festival in the works since I never really felt an Italian cultural presence in the area. Sure, I know of the people and the places and the groups that are or are all about things Italian, but it just hasn't seemed like the same organized effort as I have seen with other groups.

Anyhow, I accidentally matched the folks wearing the Italia jerseys and t-shirts with my brand spankin' new blue Hanes sweatshirt ($5 at Walmart, get you some). I can't believe I just used the word folks, but it made me feel all warm and fuzzy and Americana using it.

We missed the bike race but we came in at the last minute to grab some cannoli. Oh my gosh, I almost added an "s" to the end of "cannoli". That's crazy because the reason behind this post is my current pet peeve of people misusing Italian plural nouns in English. I even scoured message boards and forums and other websites to get some insight on this. I am often a sucker for blog commentary and forums. Come on, I get most of my news from Jezebel.

Well, my passion for the immediate education of the American masses on the use of foreign words in English has died down. I mean, if we are going to do that, we can't stop at Italian. And, like the melting pot/salad bowl of the States we have here, English is famous/notorius for adopting (or bastardizing, if you chose to be so, you know, negative) foreign words. Hey, it's what we do.

Eh, basically all languages do it.

Well, I agree with many commentators on the subject that, no, it won't help to try to directly or indirectly correct people on the pronunciation of certain words. However, in the food industry, for example, restaurateurs and the like should take it upon themselves to correctly present the terms for their menu items, especially if they are selling themselves as Italian or Italian-inspired. Well, it may be too much to ask for.

There are so many other things to nitpick about. Obsessed with punctuation? Please take some time with this very post and see how I probably misused hyphens, dashes, commas, etc.

Oh, the passion. Well, I did eat a cannolo (!) and a half. In honor of Chris' absence this weekend. I have taken a break from the tiramisu trials due to my current avoidance of dairy. I have a tiramisu-inspired dessert in the works and a tub of marscapone cheese waiting in the refrigerator...waiting to be discovered.

I also have some motivation to whip up my own cannoli, as well. Pre-made shells of course. I don't need to do all that. :)

Am I slowly but surely making my way to feta??? I surely hope not! This cheese train has GOT TO STOP!

Pass me the broccoli.

I think I'll stick with the nebulous-ness for now.

I just don't know what to do with this blog.

I don't know if I want to actively promote it.
I don't know if I can actively maintain it.
I don't know what I want it to be about.

Ok, it could just be my random musings. That's true.

I do know that I love the title. I supposed that I would dedicate the re-birth of my blogging to the blog title, a remnant of a post or two on my last blog. Did I just misuse a comma? Ugh, I hate when I think I do that.

Anyhow, I often do things and think, Hey, I should write about that in my blog! But, then, who is going to read it? Do I care if anyone reads it? I could just...just be there. But if I think that each post is special in and of itself, would I feel bad that someone starting to read my posts may not take the initiative to start reading from the very first post?

Oh, I know what I am doing.

I am over-thinking this.

On to the blogging.

I apparently love ferries

Well, looky here...an update!

I know, I haven't been updating this (same old song) and I have been scolded...which only feels great because that means that someone other than me is reading this!

These past few months have been a relative whirlwind and now I am blindly entering the next stage of my life which is now more representative than realized.

I finished all of my classes for my grad degree this summer and when I submitted my last assignment it felt GOOD. It was something like...euphoria. Now, I love learning, and I tend to make learning moments out of most situations, but I was glad to divorce myself from life being measured in semesters.

At the end of August, Chris left to Macau to work and I spontaneously decided to visit him with the support/insistence of him and others. I didn't know what I was getting into when I bought that ticket and I just decided to make no assumptions and enjoy the ride and I am glad I went. It was a life experience and I am glad that I could share it with Chris.

Lucky me that I faced procrastination and beat it with the ugly stick and finally got my passport this summer. Chris made fun of me for buying the passport card, too, but it sure made me feel safe at times that I didn't bring my passport around with me because I just didn't feel safe carrying it around.

Anyhow, I have summed up the stay in Macau in a few sentences. (1) I spent a lot of time getting lost, but I like to call it "exploring" instead. (2) What made things different (giving me that 'Aha!' cultural moment) was that things were similar but not the same. (3)...well, I have forgotten my third summary, but it may come to mind later.

Since Chris was working many hours in the week, I mostly saw him at night. I felt like a welcome distraction but I made sure not to be to imposing since he did need to be well-rested for the next days work. I spent the days alone and some independent spirit awoke soon after I arrived and I decided to go down to the bus stop and take a bus to wherever it may take me, knowing that it wouldn't go farther than Macau proper (and I always kept enough money to take a cab if I got lost enough). Well, I must have stayed on the bus too long because after crossing the bridge from Taipa to Macau, the bus driver started yelling at me in Cantonese, I suppose, and pointing to me to get off of the bus. I attempted to communicate that...that...I had no idea what was going on...but, for better or worse, the buses are on a tight schedule and so I scurried off of the bus and stared walking up the sidewalk in who-knows-where.

I started panicking pretty quickly but ended up flagging down a cab to go back to Taipa. Unfortunately, the cab driver couldn't understand my desired destination even though I showed him the business card that includes the address of the apartment I was living in. i mean, come on, you're a taxi driver...this is an address and a pretty small island!

Transportation issues seemed prominent for me. I swore off buses after that first ride and I got pretty frustrated with cab drivers for a while after that. Look, this is my line of thought: you are a cab driver and I would think, then that you know your way around town pretty well; this is also a tourist destination where most places are known by a Cantonese and/or Portuguese and/or English name so I would think that you know somewhere in English (or even Portuguese) if I say it (especially if that destination is plastered as an ad all over your car). I was pretty surprised that when I said "Ocean Gardens", cab drivers most often didn't know what I was talking about even though it is a very prominent residential area. And, I am just saying this about cab drivers because, well, you make your living off of driving people around!

And that could include acting like you don't know where something is and then just drive around as much as possible to jack up the cost of the ride. But, hey, that is just being cynical. On my cab ride from getting lost in Macau, I had NO idea where I was directing the cab driver and so I ended up on Taipa Pequena, the smaller hill on the island (though I didn't know that at the time) and was more lost than ever. The ride was costing a pretty pataca and so I just told him to drop me off there and I'd, you know, find my way...

But, things really just went uphill (haha, get it?) from then. I then swore off both cabs and buses on my own and decided to walk everywhere in Taipa. I was also on a mission to buy a few items and so I had a goal for my journey, too, then. Though I got lost most often in the beginning, at least it really didn't cost anything but time and I had plenty of that. Also, getting lost just involved me, not a driver or anyone else.

I got to know the island relatively well and I began to use the buses again with a renewed spirit and feet tired from walking so much :) I think the best thing of all that exploring was that I had new places to show Chris and felt more confident about where we were going. He didn't relly have time to do that on his own, so I became his tour guide! And I was only visiting! I loved it.

And, so, there wasn't really an overwhelming [cultural] differences in Taipa. When I first got there, I was so excited that I would constantly say to Chris (with accompanying dramatic hand gestures) that "I can't believe I'm in China!" I got over that soon enough and I realized that, yeah, I am far from home. Looking out on the river and the mountains I knew that, nope, no ferry, bus, cab, or walk was going to get me back to Greensboro, but at the moment there was no desire to do so. The language barrier was not so much of a barrier. Yes, you mostly heard Cantonese everywhere but it was hardly a problem, though when it was, it an annoying situation. A lot of people spoke English enough and aside from the funny/outrageous Engrish, there was enough English to direct me well.

Now, I'm not trying to say that I was totally pissed that there was no English around for my ease of tourist-ing, it's just that I have NO idea about Cantonese. As a couple of my friends and I have agreed on, it's not like a language with at least Latin letters where you could TRY to figure out what it says. Ich kann kein Deutsch much anymore but I could surely figure it out. I attempted another alphabet by diving into Russian, which was a humbling but profound experience, but I just haven't touch an East Asian Language. Now, I am capriciously promising Chris that I'll learn Cantonese and be his interpreter when needed!

In about the third week, I started feeling a slump, not wanting to go out of the apartment. I completed the few shopping goals I had and I knew my way around town well enough and saw as much as anyone. it was a slightly awkward feeling to be there for a month--longer than a tourist stay, I suppose, but shorter than a more permanent stay. I began to feel like more of a local even though I knew there was a lot more to learn if I were to stay there longer. I began reading one book that I was assigned for a summer class and that was nice...to sit on the couch in silence facing the Pearl River, reading. We spent many nights eating out on the town but I started to feel the cost/feel others feel the cost, even in patacas, and I started eating in more often. My menu was a basic one: rice, black beans, pasta and Sara Lee pound cake, but it would do. Then, I decided that there had to be more to see and do in al of the time that I was in the apartment during the day.

There was a road that was pretty mysterious to me in taht I just wanted to know where the heck it went! It was around the corner from Ocean Gardens and it went uphill; it became too tempting and so I made me a little adventure. What I found--after hours of a lot of figuring out and getting lost--was the Taipa Pequena hill. For the last week, I spent quality time hiking the trail on the hill and I loved it. Everyday I went a bit farther and loved finding new things. I found a perfect spot--a bench on a little rest stop on the top of the hill--where the breeze came in PERFECTLY. I would sit there and read a least a chapter of my book, working through the bad part of the breeze--fluttering pages. I always took the backpack with me that stored my purse and a bottle of water at the least. It left me preeeetty sweaty and I often thought I looked foolish since most other people who were using the trail to work out had the least bit on their bodies, but I was having a blast anyways.

My favorite part was my last day in Taipa, the morning before I left to the airport that night. I finally took Chris up there for a hike (after having a blast at Casa Museu da Taipa) and we had so much fun.

Ahhh...back in Greensboro. Now that's a whole other story. Life is a-changing, but I suppose that if there is enough tiramisu, it should all be OK...

A few other things:
-I never went to the Taipa Grande hill, but I don't regret that.
-Fashion was a whole situation there, for me of course.
-I guess that the McDonald's in Hong Kong doesn't have a fire code? I don't think anymore people could have fit int there!