doyenne

Today was my dad's birthday. Yes, he's Halloween baby. Funny thing is, he's a pretty fundamentalist Christian, so Halloween is very much a pagan holiday in his book. This has made for some interesing birthday celebrations in previous years. We usually celebrate with a birthday dinner at home, but when the trick-or-treaters would come ringing the doorbell, Dad would turn off all the lights and tell us to be quiet until the kids went away. Like the kids wouldn't notice the fact that the lights were one as they walked up the driveway, and the sounds of conversation filtering through the house, only to disappear the minute they reach the front door. But since it was Dad's day...we did as was requested of us and sat silently in the dark shaking our heads in embarassment. Part of our non-participation in so-called pagan rituals, I guess. Every so often, I'll get dressed up to go to work or to a party, and I know he's got a look of disappointment or disapproval on his face.

Anyway, this year, to avoid having to hide from the trick-or-treaters, we went out for dinner instead. We had planned on Japanese, but the place was closed, so we went to this great Indian Chinese place. Real fusion food without the pretentiousness of 'fashionable fusion.' The owner is a Chinese guy who grew up in India, so the menu is basically Chinese food with Indian flavourings.

We finished the evening off with cake - one that my sister and her fiance bought, and the other that I made...sorta. Ice cream cake topped with raspberry sorbet and decorated with whole raspberries and mint leaves glazed in a sugar syrup.

In addition to cake decorating, i've been a domestic doyenne the rest of this weekend as well. Cleaning...laundry...I even hemmed six pairs of pants - three pairs of khakis, two pairs of jeans, and a pair of cords. i broke two sewing machine needles in the process (damned jeans are way too thick for those wimpy little needles!), but at least it's all done. I've been putting it off for way too long, and since I was too cheap to get them to a tailor, I had to figure out how to do it myself.

I alo went to catch the Ray Charles biopic over the weekend. I liked that the movie portrayed the good and the bad and was not simply a glorified celebration of a musician's life. The man was unquestionably talented, but not without his faults and demons. Jamie Foxx was incredible. It wasn't until the end of the movie that I remembered that he was an actor portraying Ray, not Ray Charles himself as a younger man. If he doesn't get an Oscar for this performance come March, I will be shocked and dismayed. A hissy fit and questions about the competence of "The Academy" may follow, punctuatedwith many a cuss word.


"Deed I Do :: Blossom Dearie