Not Fair!

Pharm was my most challenging course this past semester (besides Clinic, but let's not get into that).  One of the last questions on our 130 multiple choice final was:

128.  Which one of these statements is incorrect?

a) ASA is not an anticoagulant*

* Okay, so I don't remember what b, c and d were, but that's only because I only needed to know the one correct answer.

I don't think teachers should be allowed to abuse double negatives in final exams. After 127 questions about parasympathomimetics, HMG coA reductase inhibitors, ACE inhibitors, barbituates and nonbarbituates and  carbamezipines, Dr. Mohanta's use of these negations nearly caused my brain to spontaneously combust. Which is just the sort of thing she gets off of, I'm sure.

Point - Counterpoint

Point

You are good to me. We can talk for hours with no effort at all. You help me study, you buy me birthday presents, you take me out for breakfast. You introduce me to your friends, and everybody you know knows my name, even though they've never met me. You have very nice teeth and gorgeous blue eyes. You take me to the airport and pick me up when it's raining. You call me to let me know when the cheese I like is on sale. Your very beautiful condo is always impeccably clean, no cleaning ladies involved. You bring me veggies from your mama's garden. The second you first saw me I could see your eyes light up, and they still do every time.

Counterpoint.

You only just moved out of you parents house as you entered your 30's. You're kinda bald, although I suppose that's not your fault. Everything you eat is composed of butter, red meats, bleached white flour and high fructose corn syrup. And rye, yechk. You take a lot of medications...again maybe that's not fair, but meds just weird me out. How about cutting back on the buttered meats before popping the Lipitors? You tell me about your money troubles (we all have them), but then you buy an Audi? You won't come to my school so I can clean your teeth. You don't floss. You snore. You shave your chest (WHY on earth do men do this? For the bikini shoot that's coming up? I don't get it.) You use Pert Plus. Back to the Audi thing....you place too much importance on these things. A cottage, condo and a luxury vehicle are great, but why not live within your means and not be a gazillion dollars in debt? You would never honestly appreciate a (hypothetical) dinner I'd cook for you. You won't let me clean your teeth the second time I asked you to come in when a client didn't show for me. 

So maybe I'm being incredibly picky; and I probably just revealed a whole lot of my own  shortcomings. But I still can't stop thinking about him. Le sigh.

Flexitarian

I've often referred to myself as a 'flexitarian'. Although I wish I could say I was clever enough to have created the phrase on my own, I read it in a random magazine at some random time and I think it is a term that describes my diet well. 

I can go probably a month without eating meat and not even realize it. I feel like my meat preparing skills are lacking, and am always shocked when I  compare a can of beans ($.79) to 2 chicken breasts ($8). 

But from time to time, I absolutely CRAVE meat and will stop at nothing until my hunger is satisfied. Here are my favorite meat dishes. If it weren't for them, I could be a vegetarian in a heartbeat. 

Rare Beef Noodle Soup (Pho) - Especially good served satay style sprinkled with peanuts, and with lots of basil, bean sprouts, fresh lime juice, hoisin and hot sauce. This delicious soup will cure you of any cold or sinus thing you got going on. You know the place is authentic when you write your own order down. You see, with the Vietnamese, their Pho making abilities decrease with the more English they speak. Its a fact. 

Greek Lamb - A lot of people don't seem to care for lamb, something about the smell. I, on the other hand, love it very rare, with any sort of oregano/mint seasoning. If I were on death row, my request for my last supper would be lamb, pita bread, tzatziki, kalamata olives, a fresh cuc and tomato salad and lemon wedges. Drool. Incidentally, that would also be my meal of choice for a Tuesday.

Sushi - Sushi? Sashimi? Regardless, I love em both. BBQ eel, yellowfin tuna, California rolls with real crab, no fake crap...mmm. Recently I discovered that I enjoy the little guys that have the fish eggs in them. I know it sounds so gross, but they crackle in your mouth 100 times more than rice crispies ever could! And they look like pretty, shiny jewels. I love how sushi doesn't weigh you down, and how it takes so long to eat. On the other hand, it drives me crazy when your friend, maybe someone from school, says "I LOOOVVE sushi, my boyfriend is  a quarter Japanese so we like, have sushi all the time" and then when you to MakiMaki they order tempura vegetables, edamame ( which she absolutley drowns in high sodium soy sauce ) and teriyaki chicken. YOU my friend, do not love sushi. 

I like leaving these tasty, meaty dishes to the pros who know what they're doing. So when my iron levels are getting low, this is how I indulge. What are your fave meat dishes?

Marco freaking Polo

I like kids. I really like the ones that belong to my sisters. I generally like other people's kids, and always smile or make funny faces at them in the elevator. 

But when all I here when I'm doing homework is "MARRRRCO POOOOLLLLOOOO" for 2 hours with increasing intensity and volume, it makes me want to build a gingerbread house, and, well, you know the rest of that tune. 

The Little Kid Table

When I was a kid, I always lamented the fact that I had to sit at the little kid table. It was so not my scene. Between bites of mashed potatoes and roast beast, I would glance over at the grown up table and dream of being included in their intellectual conversations, which were no doubt about the economy and foreign trade policies. Year after year of holiday gatherings I sat in those plastic chairs, with those plastic cups mocking me after every sip. I can drink orange juice out of a glass cup without breaking OR spilling damn it! 

Yknow what made it even worse? There was no set age at which one graduated from the kid table to the grown up table. It was completely subjective! As the teen years arrived, I would say to myself, "This is it, Nawana. This is the year, I can feel it!". I think because I stopped growing around the ripe old age of eleven, it threw things off for me. 

And to add insult to injury, ( salt in the wound,  pickle in the sandwich, whatever adage you prefer), after I got a couple Christmases and Easters under my belt at the grown up table, all these 'husbands' started showing up at our house. Before you knew it, I was demoted to the kiddie table! Well screw you "brother-in-law"! You can't just show up at OUR house and expect your male grown-up status to trump the bond of blood! I knew these people before they reached sexual maturity! 

I think there should be a brother-in-law table where you guys can all sit in the plastic chairs and talk about how miserable your existence was before you were honored to meet my sisters. And when you come to the big table to get an extra jug of O.J. we'll all glare at you for being such an annoyance. 

I'm not bitter, not at all. 

 

I Heart Scarves

I am home alone this long weekend, and can only look at so many pictures of diseases of the mouth before I needed a break. So I decided to catalogue my scarf collection and wanted to share it with you. Yknow, for insurance purposes. Here are all the scarves I own, in no specific order, each with a story of its own. 

This is my most recent addition, from my San Fransisco-Eve visit. It doesn't have any fond memory associated with it yet, its still just a baby love scarf. And that is my kick ass name tag. It makes me feel important.

This was bought from a vintage shop in Camrose, and I adore the silk and paisley pattern. This scarf is purely decorational. When Bunny recently visited, we were just out the door and I said  "Wait, it might be cold, let me get a scarf", and returned with this one. She scoffed. 

This scarf is in the top 3. It is warm and pretty. Me and my good friend Jill waited in line outside the Edmonton H&M on opening day, and when they opened the doors and released us hungry wolves inside, it was one of the first things I grabbed. It has lots of coffee stains on it, and I also wore it at Patience's Winter Wonderland Wedding.

This scarf is ok. I bought it on sale at the Jacob Outlet. 

This scarf is the one that started it all! Patience went to Paris for a few months and returned bearing gifts, and in doing so, marked the beginning of my addiction. I don't wear it a lot, to be honest I'm not crazy about the dusty-rose shade, but love it because it was the first. A girl always remember her first.

This is my hippy love-child scarf, and I usually wear it in my hair like this. I rocked this look when we were in Nice when I had ugly-salty-ocean-sunscreen-my-north-american-styling-tools-do-not-work-in-Europe hair. It has a certain smell to it.

I bought this scarf in green for Bunny. I wore it in my hair and went camping with some Camrose friends, but left it in while I slept and almost choked.

Hey, I forgot I had this one! Will incorporate it into my look this week.

This is for when I'm feeling royal.

This scarf is ugly but very warm. I wish I knew how to quit you.

I really love this one. I've always been drawn to this mustard-yellow shade. I left it at Betina's once. It was a lonely couple of months full of uncertainty. I wore this scarf last night and scored myself a client, woohoo! Way to go yellow scarf.

This one is from Paris. Okay, okay, it's from the Zara's in Paris, and I'm sure that in the Summer 2006 season that Zara's the world over had this scarf in stock, but I don't like to think about that.

Boys always kiss me when I wear this scarf. Its the most magical thing I own, but as we have all learnt from Harry Potter, magical objects with a mind of their own are not to be trusted. 

I wore this scarf to a Gwen Stefani concert, but unfortunatley, I ate and drank and was very merry in the pre-concert jubilee and had to go home before Gwen even made it on stage. Just ask Serinda for the details. 

This is a classic black scarf from American Apparel. In their ads, they have emancipated girls wearing it as a dress or a tube top, but I just stick to wearing it this way.

*Author's Note - I also have a beautiful golden scarf from Ethiopia, but it is cut in such a way of which I'm not familiar, so I drape it over a tupperware bin and ta-da! Nightstand!

Friendly Umbrellas

I left the house yesterday quite early, while the sun was still shining. 12 hours later this was not the case, and me any my cute outfit got completely soaked in the heavy rain. 

Then at the crosswalk, with my cashmere cardigan I got on sale and love lots and lots over my head, the cutest Filipino lady motioned for me to huddle under her umbrella with her. She even went a couple blocks out of her way to walk me to my bus stop. This put a huge smile on my face for the rest of the day, as it was so kind and simple and sweet. Thank you so much for your act of kindness Umbrella lady, it was very much appreciated and made my day!