About A Stepdad

There are so many great things to see and do in the world yet few things are more satisfying than a home-cooked dinner with friends (and wine). Ok, maybe something better, a home-cooked meal, friends and wine and watching Game of Thrones with another fanboy (girl).

I have to say, for an impromptu dinner, this was really spectacular – a proper turkey dinner.

But not just a Joe-dinner with a dry turkey and brussels sprouts and stuffing and a few overcooked veggies and some instant mash potatoes, oh no, this was done by a masterful cook.

Listen to this.  Soft and moist turkey.  Lovely corn.  Stuffing.  Gravy.  Sauted brussels sprouts with bacon and shallots.  Vegetable Tian with new potatoes, heirloom tomatoes, and zucchini with onion, garlic and thyme.  Puree of yams with butter and brown sugar.  Soooooo good!

For dessert- homemade cocoa meringues with fresh strawberries, vanilla ice cream and chocolate drizzle.  OMGYHTTT good.

It took 4 hours to prepare and about ten minutes to eat, and another ten to eat more and then another ten for dessert.

It was one of those times that I wish I could eat my own weight in food.  It was so fantastic to eat a meal made with love and gravy.

Then, like a second dessert, we watched the Game of Thrones.  IMO there is not a better show on TV.   Intrigue, betrayal, nudity, compassion, weaseling, heroism, cowardice, oh this show has it all.  I had to sit still and not jump up and down as some of my most favourite characters appeared on-stage for the first time and how some the favourites from last year I knew to be dead men (or women) walking.  And there are still so many great characters still to come.   Great battles to be fought.   Tragedy and pain to be heaped on everyone we love.

But it’s a show I hate (HATE!!!!) waiting until next week.  I want to see it all now.  NOW, dammit.

However, I guess a good show, like a good meal, always leaves you wanting more (or at least wanting to come back.)

I know I do.  Not simply, ‘sit’ or ‘come’ or ‘get away from the garbage, you silly bugger’.  No, Sometimes I sing to them.  Sometimes I tell them a story.  Sometimes I like to explain things to them.  And, what’s more, sometimes I think they understand.

Take for example tonight.  While I was watching the hockey game, they sat at me feet, their eyes riveted on me just waiting for me to tell them something about the game.  Ok, some would say they were keeping an eye on the pizza in my hand but I say no, I say they wanted to know why Burrows shouldn’t have gotten that high sticking penalty in the first period.  I mean, it was a freaking follow-through, were the refs blind?

The doggies didn’t disagree.  They know a bad call when they see one.

Personally, I think it’s helpful to talk to your doggies as much as possible.  While the nuances of the English language may be lost of them, (they still look at me blankly when I explain you’re and your to them), it makes no difference, they wag their tails and prance around.

See, the thing is, they are great listeners.  They don’t tell you you’re wrong.  They don’t roll their eyes when you say something silly.  They don’t even leave half way through something you’re saying.

Like any good friend, they listen.

Hmm.  Maybe that’s something I should learn from my dogs.

The Bodega.  Howe St.   Downtown Vancouver

At the risk of spoiling the ending, another great meal, made all the better by sharing it with good friends.

But here’s the neat thing.  Not only was The Bodega an award-winning Spanish restaurante, it was a tapa bar and there’s nothing better than being able to order a variety of dishes to share.

Walking in, it has an authentic old-world feel to it, something you might very well find in Spain, complete with a picture of a castle on a wall and checkered table clothes.  We were led upstairs and, because of our early dining hour, we had the whole place to ourselves for a time.

We ordered a bottle of wine and began the process of choosing our dishes.  In the end, we decided to get some help and asked the waitress what she would recommend.  We wanted to try the Paella for sure but also wanted to be a tiny bit adventurous so we added three other plates.  Baby squid.  Zesty potatoes (Patatas Bravas).  White bean salad.   We didn’t have the heart to try any chicken livers.

The paella was fantastic even if a certain person at our table decided to fling the prawns on the floor.  The baby squid were more tender than I was expecting and had a nice garlicky zing to it.  The potatoes were ok but nothing I’d write home about.  But the beans, oh the beans, they were fantastic.

After the wine and food were all gone, we ordered dessert.  Peaches and Ice cream and liquor.  And caramel flan (I want to say caramel custard but I’m told it’s really a flan.)

Oh so good.

All the food aside, though, what made it such a great experience was the company.  In the end, eating alone can be fun.  Sure.  But with friends, we can share more food, talk about it right away, discuss the nature of the universe, rail against the injustices of the world, or laugh together.

Hard to laugh alone (or if you do, you certainly get some strange looks.)

So, if you ever get the chance, don’t dine alone.  Bring a friend.  Or two.  Or ten.  It makes the meal that much better.

For some reason, I went on-line house shopping today.  Specifically, I went and looked at properties in and around downtown Vancouver.  I guess a part of me loved the few days I’ve spent wandering around there and while I knew prices were bad, I had no idea just how bad.

And by bad, I mean expensive.

To afford a $1.2M condo, I would need to make $240,000 a year.  I know some people do, but most of us, even with the entire family working would be hardpressed to come up with that cash.

However, I won’t rant too much about this because someone else is actually doing a better job of it.

Please check out…http://thethirtiesgrind.com/2012/03/28/absurd-vancouver-property-of-the-week/ because what is really, really frightening is just what $1.2 million will buy you these days.

Now, compare this to Arizona…. 4 bed, 4 bath.  $99,000

I guess the millionaires and billionaires love the rain.

Ok, so everyone on planet earth has seen the Hunger Games at least once.  Most of them have read the book.

I am, however, one of the 12 people who haven’t read the book.  So I went in knowing nothing about the movie other than it seemed like a bunch of teenagers in a competition to kill each other.  Sort of like a better version of survivor with bows and arrows, and swords and spears.  Hey, I’d watch a show like that.  Apparently a lot of us would.

So here’s the thing.  If you haven’t read the book, it’s a different movie than if you did.

No, I don’t mean it’s like I-Robot where Asimov crafts a brilliant story about the humanity of robots and then Hollywood snorts enough blow up their collective noses and comes up with a Wil Smith vehicle where robots are pawns for some uber-villain out to control the world.

No, this movie is one story because you are in the head of the main character and one where you are not.

I saw the one where you are not.

For those who know nothing about the story, it’s sort of like North Korea with kids from different districts who must fight each other so their people can get enough food.   Cool concept and it has Donald Sutherland as some sort of President or dictator or CEO so I didn’t think it could be all that bad.

It wasn’t.

In fact, I have to say, I really liked the movie.  I would recommend seeing it.  Oh sure, they did that jerky camera work a bit too much but it succeeds because of the choice of actress (Jennifer Lawrence) to play the main character, Katniss.  She is FANTASTIC.  Awkward at times, brave yet vulnerable, a child sometimes, an adult other times, smart and driven, always.  The movie lives or dies on how much we can connect to this character and she makes us love her.

But the movie also does a great job with a lot of the other characters.  Kids we root for, kids we don’t.  Kids whose death we feel very deeply.  The mentor, played by Woody Harrelson, who has sent so many kids to their deaths that he no longer cares… until she makes him.  The make-up artist, unbelievably played with depth and emotion by Lenny Kravitz.  That’s right.  Lenny Kravitz.

But for me, the movie succeeded because I loved the two star crossed lovers.  How he admitted he loved on TV, how they came together in the games, how they nurtured each other, how they fought side-by-side.

A lovely little love story.

Ok, I like those.

Sue me.

But!!!!

But!!!!!!!!!!!

It seems that, in the book, that love is not so clear at all.

In fact, or so I am told, she uses him (as he, perhaps uses her), just to survive and win the game.

!!!!!

When I heard this, I nearly fell off my barstool.  Knowing that makes this a completely different movie.  Not a better one, not a worse one, just a different one.

So, if you haven’t read the book, go for the characters, the wonderful imaging of a dystopian world and for the romance.  If you have read the book, check out what they did with the controllers, see what an amazing choice they made with who they cast for Rue, and see if you can spot her inner thoughts by the way she acts.  I suspect you can if you are not a romantic fool.

I may just have to see this again.  And sit a bit farther back so I don’t barf when they jerk the camera around like the operator is having an epileptic fit.

Ok, so last episode of the season, and, as it turns out, the entire series.

The colonists are about to be attacked by the sixers and their evil backers who wear evil black berets and scowl a lot.  All led by, it turns out, Commander Taylor’s son.  Of course.

The bad guys are planning a big invasion of dinotopia.  You know, lots of guys in camo marching back and forth.  Why?  Seems there is a lot of meteoric rock that is worth billions and all they have to do is strip mine it.  Easy-peasy.  They plan to come with the next pilgrimage.  Through the portal, apparently.

But Commander Taylor gets wind of the planned invasion and what does he do?  Does he surround the portal with trenches and built-up defensive berms or put out some 23rd century barbed wire, no, he gets his guys to stand in a clump (some in the field of fire of others) and waits.  No wall of APCs with big ass guns.  No mines.  Nothing.  It’s like he’s new to this war stuff.

Despite his name.  COMMANDER Taylor.

However,  ok, at least there’s going to be a big battle and I do love big battles.

But wait, the evil guys don’t come through the portal because, like, they don’t have to.  Duh. Apparently this is common knowledge to everyone but Commander Taylor whose job it is to, like, you know, know this stuff.

Well, the baddies blow up detective dad and he gets knocked out.  All the other people in the blast radius catch fire or are blown 20 feet into the air but no, he gets a boo-boo on his head.   His son’s girlfriend, predictably, is not so lucky.

But her death means nothing to us because we don’t know her. We don’t care about her.  She is window dressing.  The son gets weepy but who the hell cares? We are supposed to feel something but all I can think is that the wee beasties will feast on lots of little bits of flesh tonight.

You know a story has gone horribly wrong when you start rooting for the dinosaurs

3 days later detective dad awakes and finds the camp has been taken by the evil black beret squad.  No big battle.  No seeing Commander Nathaniel Taylor in action.  Nope.  It’s all over.

The only thing I was looking forward to has been told to us in summary.  It’s like having Luke Skywalker sitting in a Cantina and telling us they blew up the Deathstar, not actually seeing him blow the damn thing up.

Either way, the bad guys have won.  Do they slaughter everyone?  Nope.  Do they feed a few teenagers to the dinos?  I wish, but nope.  All they do, (I kid you not, I couldn’t make this stuff up), is wander around acting all superior.

And when detective dad wakes up, they allow him to wander around in a stupor instead of shooting him or at least wondering who the hell is this moron and why is he staggering up to the command bungalow?

Why?

Because it would spoil the whole plot if any single bad hat has a brain cell.

Detective dad, being very smart, plays deaf and dumb.  He fools all the villains into thinking he is a complete moron.  He doesn’t fool me, though, he IS a complete moron.

Anyway, detective dad decides to create an underground resistance but first, he has to find a way to contact Commander Taylor.  But Commander Taylor has very cleverly etched his coordinates onto bullets he fires into the black beret guys.  (Ok, that was kinda cool).  Detective deaf and dumb dad sneaks out and contacts Taylor and together they set up ambushes, killing the black beret guys and placing tacking devices on their vehicles, and all along, the bad guys are wondering, gosh, who is doing this?

Now, being bad guys, do they do like the Germans did and take hostages and shoot them publicly?  No, cause that would make the story a lot darker and, well, better.  Do they interrogate people with all sorts of fancy 22nd century anal probes?  Nope.  The black beret troopers sit in the bar and drink and reveal vital secrets while the villainous son stomps around and breaks things and the evil corporate dudes take a ride out into the countryside and shoot a cute looking dino just for fun to show that, yes, they actually are evil.

I know.  It makes no sense but then again, they’re evil and don’t need a reason for anything that would get in the way of the plot.  They don’t see how dangerous Taylor or dad detective dad can be.  They don’t even think it’s wise to honor their agreement with the sixers, their allies.  Nope.  All they are interested in is blowing up all the trees and cuter dinos and mining some sort of rockie stuff.

Like all terribly written villains, they suffer from overwhelming stupidity.

So, big surprise, the good guys stop the bad guys from blowing up dinos and even though the evil son sees his father getting away and has some sort of acme rocket launcher, his father escapes ’cause, like, the rocket launcher misses.  Yup.  200 years to make a rocket launcher that can hit something and this one misses.  Wille E Coyote style.

Why?

The plot demanded it.

That leads to a decision by the resistance dudes to close the portal once and for all.  From the earth end.  It’s up to detective dad to ninja sneak back to the 22^nd century.

Easy, right?

Well, actually it turns out it is.  He sneaks onto a supply truck with a ploy so obvious that it could have been spotted by a freckled-face ten year old slurping on a dripping ice cream cone but do the hard-core, battle-hardened, elite mercenaries see anything.  Nope.  They all manage to look in the wrong direction and so the ploy works out just fine.  Why?  ‘Cause it has to.  The plot demands it.

And guess what?  Detective dad gets back to the 22^nd century.  Oooh, big surprise.   Now, he didn’t actually have to do anything to get through, the black berets just stand around looking smug and sinister.

Meanwhile, CommanderTaylor and his son meet in an EPIC battle.  Father vs son.  The son hates him, it turns out, because Commander Taylor was given a Sophie’s choice way back in Somalia.  Seems the Somalis captured him and his family and gave him a choice, you could only save one and he saved the son.  Somehow, the son now blames the dad for getting mommy raped and murdered.  So he’s gonna wreck the world cause he thinks his dad was a douche.

Well, such an epic battle you have not seen!  Two punches later the son is on the ground all teary eyed and asks his dad, Commander Taylor, to forgive him and of course dad gives him a big hug and, ooooh wait, huge surprise, the son has a knife and stabs dad.

But then son is shot twice – TWICE, mind you – in the chest, when Commander Taylor’s daughter somehow manages to arrive on scene in the nick of time, despite this battle being the jungle somewhere.   She rushes to her dad, Commander Taylor and then, wait, the son is gone!  Oh my god, he got up after being shot twice in the chest?

Why?

‘Cause the plot demands it.

Back on earth, Detective dad unleashes a nasty surprise – a big ass dino charges out and eats all the greedy corporate types, the last one eaten while he is having a merry chat with Detective dad and somehow neither hears nor sees nor feels the thunderous feet of the great, bloody T-rex!  I mean, really?  Why?  (Oh, you know the answer by now).

So detective dad plants a big bomb and it goes off and like all big bombs, detective dad can run from it with a dino on his ass.  Running from explosions is pretty easy, apparently.  The blast goes nice and slow and even if you look back and stumble a little, don’t worry, it’s not like it’s traveling nearly than the speed of sound.

But wait, back in dinotopia, there are still a lot of those evil beret boys with lots of gun and boots and fancy cars.  What a great battle this will be.  The outnumbered and outgunned forces of light will have to attack a fortified position with hostages.  Oh boy, this will be great.

It might have been but no, the beret boys just left.  Just.  Left.

Everyone is safe.  The beret boys are heading to the bad lands for something mysterious.  Like they couldn’t have sent ten guys.

Everyone is happy.

The Ewoks sing.

But seriously, Whisky Tango Forxtrot?

Netflix has decided not the pick-up Terra Nova so it looks like the show is finally dead.

Thank goodness.  If there was ever a show that had so much promise and faileld so terribly, this was it.   It was actually a show I was excited to try out and, by the end, it just made me angry.

For those who haven’t seen it, here’s the plot: A bunch of people go back in time to the age of Dinosaurs.  How cool is that?  So many great possibilities.

No idea why they’re going back to that specific time but they’re escaping a world filled with pollution and depressed-looking people and as far as I can tell, no McDonalds.  Do they send back prisoners, like some sort of futuristic Australia?  No, cause that would be cool.  Instead they send back all the most boring people in the world.  Not a bad, practical idea but doesn’t make for good storytelling.

After going through some mysterious portal (I would have preferred a huge phonebooth but whatever) the so-called pilgrims are taken to a fortified compound with armed guards and giant holes under the walls that teenagers can sneak through should the writers run out of plot ideas.

The compound is led by commander Taylor, played by Stephen Lang, the same guy who I actually rooted for in Avatar.  Is it a democracy?  A dictatorship?   A commune?  A Orwellian world where some animals are more equal than others?  An insightful examination of what type of government would be needed to flourish in a hostile and alien environment?

No.

It’s a bunch of boring people going about their own business, with some people (*cough*teenagers*cough) sitting on their butts like there is nothing to do because clearly in a world populated by big growly dinosaurs, where the colonists would have to grow and process their own food and water and shelter and fix the damn holes in the fortified wall, people (*cough*teenagers*cough*) have a ton of time on their hands.

Into this well-thought-out utopia come the Shannon clan.  Dad, an ex-cop slash ex-con, a super pretty wife slash medical biologist, a son slash must-do-something-stupid-each episode teenager, and two daughters.  Oh, I can feel the drama.  What if daughter one can’t get her nail polisher to work?

But wait, the writers realized this and have added more conflict.  Like they sat around the table and after six martinis and it suddenly occured to them that you couldn’t really have a show where the dinos are baddies since the t-rexs are not that organized and the wall pretty much stops them from eating everyone’s faces.

Shhooo, we getz the sixers, some lame group of previous pilgrims who believe in something bad.  Not sure what.  Not sure the writers ever knew either because by then they had moved on to coke lines.

Anyway, there are episodes where the teenagers have to be utterly stupid for any sort of plot to happen, or the sixers are up to something or there’s a plague of little beasties or big beasties.   There are family problems and will-the-boy-like-me problems and all sorts of script problems.

Don’t get me started on why all the armed guards have guns that can’t kill a dinosaur.  I mean, it’s like 2141 and they don’t have something that can kill a big beastie?  It’s like they all arrived and went, hey, dude, did you know they had dinosaurs here?  And even if that came as a big freaking shock to them, they could have phoned back home and said, eerrr, send bigger guns.

Or what about the CGI, pretty much the one thing they had to get right?  Jurassic Park, was about 20 years ago, (1993) and they did a much, much better job.

No, this was an epic fail from day 1 and it had so much potential.  But a swiss family robinson show with dinosaurs was not the way to go.  Not in today’s market.  Not by a long shot.

Personally, I think the picture says it all.  Dad looking confused as if to say, oh for the love of all that is holy, are all the good writers dead?  Or Taylor looking on, thinking, I should just shoot them all, while the rest of the family is wondering why they are just cardboard cut outs.

Not surprisingly, the show was cancelled and has not been picked up.  Perhaps the best reason example of why is the very last episode, the one that could have, should have, saved the show.

I had a blast doing a week of restaurant reviews.  I got a chance to visit new places, try new foods and go on new adventures.  Sadly, though, it’s too expensive to do every day.  So, a new plan.

I’ll still do a blog a day.  One movie review.  Two foodie fun times.  At least one pop culture rant.  A bit or two about regular life, about my dogs, my writing, about the world around us.  And one adventure.  Each week.  Something out of my comfort zone. 

Who knows what I’ll find?

Who knows what will happen?

But I guess that’s the point of life.  Finding out.

Central Bistro.  Denman.  Vancouver

A hunt today.  A nice, cozy restaurant in downtown Vancouver that served a slightly different breakfast, something hip, something fun, something popular without a lineup.

Easy, right?

Well, it’s almost too easy and at a certain point, I found myself thinking, hmm, there is a gentleman sitting at that table who looks like my 12^th grade English teacher and I hated him so we’re not eating there.  Oh, look, the doors open inward and I like doors that open outward so we’re not eating there.

My goodness, is it ever easy to be so damn picky.  If this was just a one-restaurant-town with a place called Ma’s Diner and all they served was what Ma made that day, the choice would be simple.  But no, there are fancy bakeries and cool looking coffee shops and little hallway-sized café’s serving $2.99 breakfast all day and bistros serving all-you-can-eat buffets.

Fortunately, I wasn’t alone.  I had my foodie expert with me and ended up at one of her favourite places and went in.  Even though the door opened outwards.  It was the funkiest little place near the seawall that had, I think, a house on the roof.

It was perfect.  Not too big, not too small, only a few minutes wait for a window table.  It had a vibrant feel to it (despite the dark interior) and it had a chalkboard.  Seems I like chalkboards.

We were seated and our order taken promptly and we even learned something new.   HP sauce.  HP stands for Houses of Parliament.  Even if it’s not true, it’s cool and I loved that the waiter teased us about it when he brought the bottle to our table.  He even teased us when we asked what eggs benny he would recommend, the West Coast one or the Central one and he said neither, recommending the Portabella benny.

The breakfast was fantastic.  I ordered thick-sliced French bread with fruit and berry compote, and yogurt.  Totally yummy.  And warm.  And squishy but not soggy.   My foodie expert loved her Portabella benny.

Which creates a whole other problem.  Aren’t I supposed to find something to complain about?  To say that the bennies were not perfectly centered on the plate or that the owner did nothing to stop the rain outside?  Aren’t I supposed to be critical?  Mean?

I blame my foodie expert.  I could probably have found a crappy place and ragged on it.  But no, she found another neat little place to eat that I would highly recommend to anyone in that area.

Cafeteria.  Main St.  Vancouver.

I was so looking forward to dinner with friends tonight.  They live within walking distance of so many interesting restaurants and they have never failed to choose a great one.  So when they said, hey, let’s go eat at the Cafeteria, I thought it was a joke or they had lost their minds.  Both were equally possible.

But no, there is a small, quaint place on Main called The Cafeteria.  Easy to walk right by if you didn’t know it was there.   It’s almost like they want to hide it.  Put up a few potted plants in front and a sign that says, look over there and you’d walk right by it.

But I had the address so I couldn’t miss it.  I walked in, parted the heavy wool-like drape and there it was, a neat little diner with all the tables filled with people.  It had a wonderful smell of onions and tomatoes and roast chicken and spices I will probably never really understand.  And there in the corner, were my friends.

I sat down and the waiter came over to explain how things worked.  Being a bit doped up on cold meds, I got completely confused about how the 3 course meal worked but I saw a few things that I just had to try, things I’ve never had before.  So I went with the soup, a pureed French onion soup.  Lamb tagine with olives, almonds, apricot rice, and harissa.  Being me, I had to ask what ‘tagine’ was (it’s cooked on a conical earthen pot) and ‘harissa’ (the rest I had a handle on even if I had no idea how they were going to make it all work in on dish.)  Harissa, I was told, was a Tunisian chili sauce, very spicy, very hot, with chilis, and spices and hotness.

Sign me up, something hot, something adventurous.  So cool.

The soup was, well, you know my word OMGYHTTT.  Actually, it started out with oh my God, you have to smell this.  It was like the best smelling French onion soup of all time.  It tasted great, too, don’t get me wrong but the smell… pure heaven.

At some point, as I was slurping the soup like a starving nomad, the waiter plopped down a small dish of Harissa.  It looked spicy.  After I finished my soup, I looked at the small dish then did what I usually do when I’m not sure how hot, HOT really is.  I stuck a fork in it.  Just the tips (tines?).  Then I licked the tips/tines.

Hmm.  Not bad.  A little hot.

Hmmm.

Wait, getting hotter.

Hotter.

Good God all mighty!

Fire!  Fire!

Water!

At that was just a wee taste.  Had I sucked it back like I did with wasabi one time, my head would probably have literally caught fire and exploded.  Splat.  Brains everywhere.  Hot spicy flaming brains.

However, I can now say I tried Harissa so next time I’m in Tunis and there’s a wee small dish of spicy-looking paste, I will say, no thank you, sir, I do not wish to catch fire and explode.

The main dish, the lamb was fantastic.  OMGYHTTT fantastic.  The meat was so tender and somehow all the ingredients came together to make the most amazing meal.  Now, on the surface, it looks like something I would have made when I had run out of food.   A can of olives from 1998.  A package of almonds.  Some rice.  A bag of dried apricots that I had bought back in 2001 thinking I would eat healthy and a bit of lamb I found frozen to the bottom of the freezer.  But no, this was all fresh, all tastes worked well together and `it made for an honest to goodness new culinary experience.

Whoohoo.

Add to that, a waiter that seemed to love explaining everything.  I mean, either I was drunk, (which is possible) or he genuinely liked to talk about the food, the combinations, the spices, the methods of cooking and the whole creation process.  Oh sure, he didn’t call me hon, but he made that experience just THAT much better by his attentive enthusiasm.

The meal was finished off with a nice dessert, a lemon pound cake with sour cherries, but, to be honest, I was pretty darned full at that point

Such a nice meal, made even more special by being able to share it with wonderful friends.

So, if you’re up for some cafeteria food like you’ve never tasted, give this one a shot.  It’s not inexpensive, $54 with tip and a glass of wine, but the food is simply outstanding and the staff remarkably patient with people who like to try new things.

(My apologies for lack of proper pictures but in my medicated state, I forgot to bring my good camera and the iphone shots just didn’t do the food justice.)