On Thursday night we had a potluck. It started out as two separate events that merged together in a positive way. I turned on the Quadra sign, lit some candles and put on The XX and pretty soon everyone was enjoying delicious food like seafood chowder and nut loaf with mushroom gravy and chocolate dipped strawberries from the Empress that looked like they were wearing little tuxedos. It was fun to see Jessica and Stephanie as friends!

On Friday I hung out with the Ministry of Cake crew. There were sharpeis!! Two of em! We went to the warm spring beach for sunset and then drank tons of wine and made sushi and a fine cheese platter at Stacy’s nostalgia-inducing house.

On Saturday Jordan and I went to Red Fish Blue Fish. It’s really popular now. I talked to all the tourists around me and they told me they saw it on the Today Show. At night we biked to Duncan’s and watched “Bad Boys” and half of “Bad Boys 2″ on his sweet projector set up. Tina was there too and it was a cozy nice time.

This photo is actually the VCAM screening from a couple weeks back but it shows the sweetness of the set up.

On Sunday we went for coffee at Habit and then Jordan went to a screen printing class and I came home and watched a movie about a nun starring a stoic Audrey Hepburn and “Precious” which I wasn’t really into because I read SO much about it online. I felt like an apathetic Chatrouletter watching it.

Today Jordan and I got a package from Anja! She sent Jordan the awesome Raybans he ordered and for me there was one of her Modcloth dresses (fits so well!) and a postcard from 1919 of Beacon Hill Park here in Victoria. Awesome! I love local history. Thank you Anjew. She also inspired me tonight to order a pair of Swedish clog sandals.

Does anyone want to be in my sweater club? Requirements: must enjoy tea before bed like an old lady (mint-chamomile, hybrid double whammy) be able to pick “Landslide” on the guitar (shaky singing is okay), likes to read up on the history of old houses in neighbourhood (around the corner from my place is a house built for a captain who sank a ship killing 343 people!), interested in discussing Gossip Girl live via text message (sample text: “Jack’s back and you know thats no good. He’s back for a reason”.)

I’ve been a neglectful buddy. I still feel the need to recap the big birthday weekend, even though it happened a month ago.

February 11th was the Pilau’s birthday. We gathered a small and intimate group of our friends together for drinks and food at Stage Wine Bar. While the atmosphere and food was amazing, the service was quite underwhelming. In an attempt to make the most of the evening, I tried to ignore the nagging feeling I had when, for example, my food came after everyone else was cleaning their respective plates, but as soon as we left, our entire party could talk about nothing but the bad service. Then after a good ten minutes of unbridled ranting (most of us being current or ex-servers), our server hurriedly emerged from where she had been standing in full listening distance half a block away and scurried past us down the street. Whoops! We all felt bad, but not that bad, cause she still had automatic 15% gratuity in her pocket. Dougie later wrote a restrained yet scathing letter on our behalf—it’s a secret passion of his.

As a birthday gift for Jordan, I bought us tickets to see Wilco at the Royal Theatre. The night after Stage, we tore ourselves away from the Olympics opening ceremonies and enjoyed their lengthy and energetic set in one of the most beautiful theatres in Victoria. There were multiple encores! I was really impressed with the stage and lights set up; one of the best moments was when Jeff Tweedy let the audience take over the vocals on “Jesus, etc”, and everyone took to the task with gusto, not missing a single word.

The next day was my birthday! Although we had “officially” celebrated the previous weekend with the karaoke party, people came over for brunch in the morning. Tina made CINNNAMON BUN PANCAKES! They were absolutely incredible. While attempting to watch the Olympics we somehow discovered that we have cable?! I have no idea how this happened, because we certainly are not paying for it. Shhh! The rest of the afternoon was spent making cards in preparation for Hate Day and watching said Olympics.

That evening Jessica, Jon, Kevin and Blair joined Jordan and I for a very special birthday/Valentines Day/couples swap/bon voyage, you’re going to Japan, Jessica! dinner at Brasserie l’ecole. After our mixed experience at Stage, I am relieved to report that Brasserie lived up to all of our expectations—fantastic service, food, drinks and ambience. It was a really wonderful evening with some of my closest and most beloved friends and dang, Jessica and I looked divine.

After dinner, cheeks rosy with wine and tummies full of food, we parted ways with Jess and Jon, and headed to the 50/50 arts collective for the Rugged Uncle show. I love Rugged Uncle! They are funny and sassy and they will let you in their band if you can play guitar with a beer in your hand. I had never been to this particular venue and I was amused and delighted by the speakeasy feel of the place. My brother even came along! He eyed everything with a sort of cool interest and joked to me about feeling like a fish out of water. Rugged Uncle was great, as usual, and I won’t go into details as to the rest of the evening, but it was funny enough that I drew it out in comic format afterward. The term “Weed Wizard” was born and Kevin and Blair put me into the safest, most awesome Safety Zone ever so that I could enjoy the last band of the night, Listening Party. Even with all the fun, the only casualty of the night ended up being my left over chicken drumstick from dinner, which I unceremoniously dropped on the sidewalk on the trek home.

Sunday was Valentine’s Day or as we know it around these parts, Hate Day!! We gathered at Blair’s place with Hate Cards in tow and feasted on Hate Tacos and Hate Hot Dogs and let each other know how we all REALLY felt. Boggle was also played. The end of best birthday weekend!

Alana took me for tea! When she told me she had a special birthday outing planned for me, I immediately guessed TEA TIME. Alana is my tea buddy. Hitting up the Laduree tea salon in Paris was one of the highlights of my last trip to Europe and she is never shy about sharing her precious Rose tea when I visit.

Denys and Jordy joined us at the White Heather Tea Room , where amongst a sea of white haired gentle ladies, we sipped our tea and contemplated our tower of tiny sandwiches, lemon flavoured pastries and miniature cheese crackers. Heaven! I must say however, our tea time conversation somehow turned to how we rated the size of our B.M.s (how many pounds you felt like you list on a scale of 1 to 10 pounds, in Starbucks sizes ie. tall, grande, venti, etc.) so I do hope no one was eavesdropping on our enthusiastic chatter.

We finished our afternoon with a walk in the balmy February sunshine (Victoria!!) through the already-blooming grounds of the Lieutenant Governor’s House grounds.

Thank you, Alana! You made my day so special– tea time will always be our time ♥

Booyah, internet! It’s January! You know what that means? It means I don’t want to leave the warm, dimly lit confines of Rockridge Manor! Every fibre of my being is fighting lately, half tells me I should be out seeing people and working on LIFE projects, the other half reminds me that there are still two seasons of “30 Rock” to be watched.

Isn’t “30 Rock” the best? Yes, I am very late to that party but oh! Banter! Wit! Being attracted to Alec Baldwin even though it feels so wrong! I want to be late to every television show party because then I have SO many wonderful things to watch. I made the mistake of starting on “True Blood” fairly early in the season and now I have to wait until next summer to see new episodes. (I was forced to sustain myself on the tasteless but nourishing pablum that is the “Southern Vampire Mysteries” series by Charlaine Harris. I think I read 15 of the things this summer.) I want to shout from the rooftops: I love good TV!!! My brother and I always are debating the merits of television. I still don’t quite comprehend why he thinks it’s such a waste of time: from what I can understand, his opinion lies somewhere between “feeding the fat cats in Hollywood” and controlling his own destiny. Alls I know is that “Teen Mom” exists and thus my own existence is a little more special.

This last weekend I was struck with an unshakable urge to join my friends for a night out on Friday in Vancouver. With the help of Denys, I showed up at Guu with Alana in tow. Jordy stared at me with a thrilled but confused expression. “How did you know where I was?!” He asked.

We went to Honey that night. They were playing Motown and Alana could barely contain herself in the line. She knew every song. By the way: BAR CULTURE. I don’t GET IT. Wait in line to get inside (watch d-bags pay the bouncer fat hunnies to get in ahead of you). Wait in line to check your coat. Wait in line to buy a drink. Wait in line to use the washroom. Thank DOG Alana is the most amazing person to dance with to Motown EVER. I had the weirdest sensation that dancing to that genre with Alana is the closest I will ever come to getting in a time machine and going to the era and dancing with the denizens of Motown in the 1960s. Al is that legit. Twisting and shouting aside, I think maybe watching youtube videos of our favourite MuchMusic Video Dance Party hits at Denys’ condo was preferable to wrastling girls in tube dresses and denim skirts and touseled Blake Lively hair for a spot at the bar. We ended the night with Jordy and I on the balcony talking about Highway 97 and Denys and Alana chatting en francais in the living room.

The next day Alana, Jordy and I attempted a shopping trip but I was burnt out after braving the Saturday Urban Outfitters crowd. After an afternoon of watching bad yet glorious cable at Alana’s, Jordy and I decided to fulfill one of our dreams and go to the huge Japanese dollar store, Daiso, in Richmond (with Darcy Tucker, of course). It was two stories of practical and kawaii every day objects and I was in HEAVEN. I had to put so much stuff away before we even got to the til. Afterward we trekked out to East Van and I ended the day chatting sleepily from the couch with Laura.

I went home on Sunday, but had to reflect on all the amazing restaurants I had tried that weekend as well. On my fourth attempt, I finally got to try Guu (Thank you Denys!), which was ridickalus. Deep fried BRIE!!!! Also finally tried La Taqueira (tasty but damn you Hernande’z, you still own my heart) and Vietsub (though I tasted those meatballs for hours) and BEARD PAPA!!! Beard Papa is a Japanese cream puff store! Can you even believe it? It got Jordy and I talking about Japan– we want to go together in the early summer this year. I think it would be the most enchanted trip ever, just me and Jordy and a million super cool things like funny uniforms in every store and tiny things to hang off my cell phone and Nomihodai. The South and Japan? That would definitely make for a happy year in traveling.

Oh yes, in order to balance out a month of TV watching, I am also trying to read more and keep a tally of what I’ve read so I can sneak an intelligent book in here or there. After an aborted attempt at “The Weaker Vessel: Women’s Lot in 17th Century England” by Antonia Fraser (okay, this one is just on pause) and “The Mists of Avalon”, so far this month I have read “Veronica” by Mary Gaitskill. Although I sought this book out because it was apparently about the seedy underbelly of the world of high fashion modeling, it was one of the 10 Best Books of the Year, as chosen by the New York Times Book Review, and it was a National Book Award finalist. Therefore, I will file this under “smart” books. I am also reading “The Collected Peanuts”, which is melancholy and clever and perhaps could be considered “smart” as well, and “Santa Olivia” by my patron saint of “dumb” books, Jacqueline Carey. JC, I worship at your feet.

Really, Times Colonist? Are your “food bloggers” so lazy the only idea they have for a column is describing the side of a McDonalds Filet O’ Fish box? No exaggeration, half of the post is describing in detail the appearance of a Quarter Pounder box, a Filet O’ Fish box and a bag of McNuggets. Also, what is with the terrible flash photos? How insulting to the city’s restaurant and food culture!

I love going out to eat. Since the pilau and I moved downtown, we eat out on a regular basis, a habit I have been trying, for the sake of my wallet, to break, or at least minimize, in vain for some time now. Victoria is not a large city, but there are plenty of fantastic and interesting restaurants in the downtown core and some scattered in the outlying neighbourhood.

For such a nice little scene, there are not too many food blogs devoted to Victoria that update with regularity. This is a shame! When I travelled to London this summer, restaurant blogs helped me discover some hidden gems around the city that my parents and I loved. Victoria has so much to offer outside of the Government and Wharf street strip that tourists blissfully pass by, unaware of the delicious food waiting inside!

Either way, here’s my collection of food blogs devoted to Victoria:

I’ve never been a coffee girl. The only time I ever drink the stuff is when I’m on vacation somewhere, preferably spiked with Carolans. As a kid, my Dad made coffee in a little stovetop maker. It was our job to turn off the element once the coffee began to burble and spit, because Dad was usually in the bath (he’s the only person I’ve ever met who takes a bath in the morning in lieu of a shower).

Despite my Dad’s penchant for coffee (the looks he used to get from the baristas when he’d hand over his Big Gulp sized mug!), he also introduced me to green tea. Now I’m starting to admit that without a huge pot of Genmaicha, I can’t make it through the day! I bought a cheap and pretty teapot from Chinatown that must be at least a litre and some days I find myself downing two pots. Things have certainly come full circle from Dad’s mug to this.

Lately my night time tea is Long Beach Sunset, a chamomile and mint blend, made by the Vancouver Island Tea Factory (who weirdly do not have a website) or a classic cup of Stash Peppermint. Not a huge fan of most herbal teas, certainly not liquorice (although for some odd reason I find it really cute when people love liquorice), and nothing that tastes like dessert!

Aside from early mornings working at Starbucks making frothy London Fogs with Joy tea (the seasonal Tazo blend made with green, black and oolong), my favourite tea memories seem to heavily feature Alana! One of our favourite things to do when she visits me in Victoria (and on a regular basis when her and James still lived in the city) is to share a pot of Earl Grey with bennies at Avalon Cafe.

However, when visiting her in Paris, we took tea to the next level, and at what better place than the world famous Ladurée? A mutual friend happened to be in Paris at the same time and, lucky for Mandy, her birthday coincided with her trip. We dressed up in pastel finery and took her for tea and dessert at Ladurée Royale, described on their website as “created in 1862 and decorated with wainscoting and frescos depicting angelic pastry chefs and voluptuous ladies”.

I could go on for pages and pages about the pastries* (Al’s pink, rose petal flavoured choux pastry was actually called Religieuse, due to its similarity to a religious experience, I imagine) but, oh, the tea! I ordered Thé à la Menthe, a ceylon tea that was served in a pot stuffed with fresh mint. Alternating between bites of chocolate and hot sips of tea– heaven! Imagine how thrilled I was months later, back in reality in west coast Canada, when Alana reached into her cupboard and revealed a package of Laduree Thé à la Rose. C’est hyper-cool!

Admittedly, as someone living in a city that fancies itself as “a little taste of England”, I’ve never taken advantage of any of the tea experiences offered in Victoria. There’s Afternoon Tea at the grand Empress Hotel, the Blethering Place tea room in Oak Bay, the James Bay Tea Room and a host of others. A nice post about tea at the Empress by a visitor to Victoria can be read here.

However, with places like Silk Road, Special Teas and Plenty all selling beautiful loose leaf tea, I prefer to sip in the comfort of my own home. My favourite is the locally made Earth’s Herbal, in particular the Energy Tea and the Tea for Sad People, best served in a lovely ceramic mug made by my friend, Renee Sala.

*you might recognize the pastries from Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette!

Oh, Weekend! With such alacrity* did you fly by! I’m still smiling from all the wonderful things that occurred, the weird and hilarious things witnessed.

Friday night was a reunion of the Summer of 2008 Crew: Jim, Al, Pilau, myself and (our darling) “fifth wheel” Dougie. 2008 was the summer many of my best friends left Victoria and although I felt their absences deeply, I discovered new and beautiful friendships blooming with others who slowly moved into centre stage of my life. And thank goodness for them! I wouldn’t give up the boys’ banter or my treasured kinship with Al about all things French/Chuck Bass for the world.

So, Friday! A perfect storm of Bubbles and Pinot Grigio, “What You Know About That?” and Canadian Club, “Whatever You Like” and Jim Beam, and yeah, Patron on ice! Ketchup chips, Werther’s, seeing all your friends at a show where your friends are playing (and it was an amazing show!), filthy backstages, filthier 20 piece McNugs, and who can forget, traipsing down your apartment stairs in a delightfully drunken whirl to find your acquaintance being taken out on a stretcher by the paramedics after he wandered into the stairwell for a tipsy little nap? (Don’t worry, it was much less serious than it sounds!)

The best part, of course, was reliving it all at breakfast. If you’ve never relived your Friday night over a West Coast Benny at Avalon, then you’ve never had a proper Saturday morning, my friend.

I can’t forget to mention that my lovely parents were also in town for the weekend. With my little brother’s birthday coming up in a week, they traveled to Victoria to help celebrate and spoiled us rotten with an over the top Italian dinner at Il Terrazzo. Dinner was lively, apparently once we’ve smashed a few bottles of vino, a flurries of debates inevitably crop up. Afterward, Jordan and I treated my parents to aperitifs, creme brulee and pot au chocolat at Brasserie l’ecole.

It was wonderful spending time with them. My mom and I walked 8km or so on the Galloping Goose on Sunday and then the family reunited for some take out (Il Posto Pizza… I am seriously obsessed with it!).

Thus ends a fabulous weekend. Judging by my calendar, December is going to hold much of the same. Can’t wait!

*alacrity is my favourite Jacqueline Carey word

Although becoming a distant memory already, the amount of calories consumed this past weekend will no doubt continue to linger with me for some time. But hey, that’s the price you pay when you decide to splurge on an over the top French meal at one of the best restaurants in town like we did on Friday night. Lucky for me Amanda enjoys white wine as much as I do, so armed with a bottle recommended by our server (whose colourful language made me think perhaps he was relieved to see some 20-somethings in a sea of Oak Bay wives) we embarked on a journey beginning with oysters and fancy frites, which led to truffled tagolini pasta and boeuf à la Bourguignonne and was capped off with, of course, crème brulee. I can’t resist the damn thing after watching Amelie declare that one of her favourite pleasures is cracking the caramel coloured shell. Of course, as the classic Seinfeld episode taught us all, heavy food and wine equals instant bedtime and by the end of our meal I was ready to head home and pass out. Thanks to Doug and Amanda for being the most charming of dinner mates, by the way.

My foul mood on Saturday morning matched the bitterly cold weather and I should have trusted my gut instinct to stay inside and start a Top Chef Masters marathon. Instead, after finally watching the Project Runway finale (meh), I ventured downtown to meet Jordan at Habit. Huge mistake, it was crowded, chilly and attempting to manoeuvre my bike along the sidewalks full of people was absolutely agonizing. When walked, my bike is as savage as Calvin’s evil bike, you know, the one waiting in his closet to attack him, but rather than beating me with tires it instead mercilessly stabs at my kneecaps with uncovered spokes, resulting in knees dotted with scars and torn nylons. As a result of this, my tulle polka dot tights met an untimely fate last week; my screamed obscenities echoed down Fort Street as I mourned my loss. Tearing tights is like throwing away money!

Things improved in the evening when we went to Castle Fireball for a birthday/welcome home potluck. The theme was childhood favourites, so I decided to attempt a classier version of my beloved tuna casserole, replacing the Campbells soup with a basic cream and chicken stock base and adding some gruyere cheese to spice up the cheddar. It was pretty delicious at home but mysteriously tasted like burning once I heated it up at the potluck. It all made sense when I realised I had charred a good three inches of macaroni on the bottom of the pot, I guess the old stove at Castle Fireball had a little more oomph to it than expected. Menu items at this potluck included Hamburger Helper, chow mein cookies, meatballs, rice krispie squares, and tempah sticks with sweet chilli sauce from someone obviously raised by hippies. It was a lovely evening of straight up socializing and eating until you felt sick (rice krispie squaries are weirdly not filling and can result in eating way more than necessary, by the way).

On Sunday I resisted any crazy urges to “go out and get some air” and spent a good portion indoors until I was struck with a desire to go thrifting and headed down to ValuVillage. I resisted the $24 sequined dress with the outrageous shoulder pads (could have been a good New Years frock) and the knit Pug sweater (it was kinda grody but otherwise you know I’d be on that shit) and came away with some skirts, couple dresses and a striped turtleneck which I am still not quite sold on.

Rest of the day was spent hanging out with Kevin, watching District 9, making the world’s most delicious red curry to ever come out of a can, and choir practice.

Now I’m mired in a Tuesday, waiting for the next weekend to start. It should be a good one, what with Jim and Al coming for a visit, and possibly the parentals as well. Onwards, to Friday!

As huge a cliche it may be, I am so relieved that my weekend is upon me. I’m in the latter half of the work day and can’t wait to get home and check out the Project Runway finale (even though I am sure I have spoiled it several times over, totally by accident! That’s what I get for having a million entertainment blogs on my Google Reader feed).

I’m also comfortably full of delicious soup and sandwich from Picnic, a little cafe on lower Fort St. I’d highly recommend it, you can customize your own sandwich with some great options (portabella! bacon! pretzel bread!) and with a soup on the side it’s $10. Plus the decor is amazing, fake autumn woods wallpaper and cardboard deer head mounts.

We got tickets to see Phoenix as well! Despite an incredibly irritating 45 minutes spent attempting to buy tickets, then trying to walk a friend through buying tickets for me, then having another friend eventually phone for tickets (seriously, I h8 u VANOC), we had success! Phoenix makes me think of Paris. The band is from Versailles, they were on the Marie Antoinette soundtrack and they definitely got some serious play on my iPod while I was travelling this spring.

So here’s me at Versailles! I’ll be thinking of it fondly when I see them in January.