A Wonderful Toronto Weekend

I had an amazing time with Jason these past few days...

Friday Evening
- Appointment at L Studio to have my hair cut
- Three course Italian dinner at Caffino in Liberty Village
- Surprised with a night in The Ambulation Room at the Gladestone Art Hotel

Saturday
- Ran into Rob and Andrea during a walk on Queen St. West
- Got croissant sandwiches and other treats at Nadege Patisserie
- Had a picnic in Trinity-Bellwoods Park
- Bought some Succulents at West Elm
- Took the streetcar to MEC to buy lots of cycling stuff
- Came home and took a nap while Jason went for a bike ride
- Met up with Kristen and Noah to visit Taste of the Danforth

Sunday
- Slept in and watched TV
- Tried on my new Cycling Capris
- Went for a bike ride along the Beltline Trail with Jason
- Saw Guardians of the Galaxy with a big group of Jason`s friends
- Stopped for Menchie`s frozen yogurt on the way home

Road Trip Food

Sunday Mornin' Coming Down - A post about my Dad each Sunday, named after a song that he loved.

Any time I go on a car ride that is going to be three hours or more - I like to bring/have licorice. It is the perfect road trip treat. I definitely got this from my dad, as it was the preferred car snack growing up. My mom likes black licorice (gross), so we often had two bags going on bigger trips.

I once got a bag of red licorice for a drive up to Teri's cottage that I was doing with Greg and Monica a few years ago, and when I offered it to Greg, he turned it down saying, "I refuse to acknowledge that it is even food." Which has been one of my favourite quotes for years.

I don't really know where the road trip licorice tradition came from, but I think it was definitely more my dad's influence than my mom's. He probably did it for the same reasons that I have continued the practice: it is pretty cheap, delicious, isn't messy, is easy to eat in a car, it is a nice treat to have, wouldn't be something you ever really buy normally, etc.

Anniversary

Two years ago today, I was sitting on a streetcar in the St. Clair West station when Jason kissed me goodbye and started the greatest romance of my life. We use that event, the evening of August 9, 2012, as our anniversary and have been having a great day celebrating. I love him so much.

If Two Was Looking For A Job

------------ from Facebook (posted by JennD)

Automatically Awesome

There were some IT changes at work yesterday and now the company servers will automatically add standardized signatures to the end of all employee emails. Here is what mine looks like:

I think I have always made my own email signatures before. Even though there is the whole 'common look and feel' rules for the Federal Government, I am pretty sure I just typed my own up. However, they have never been as pretty as this new one! (The social media icons included are live links and you can click the logo to go to the company website.)

Grammar Thursday

Compound Adjectives: Hyphenate two or more words when they come before a noun that they modify (adjectives), when they act together as a single idea. (Hyphenation is not optional punctuation in these cases.)

For example:
Our in house team of programmers
--- Should be: Our in-house team of programmers 
globally recognized development corporations
--- Should be: globally-recognized development corporations

Please Please Please Don't Text While Driving

This new campaign is from the USA, where the Ad Council collaborated with the office of the State Attorneys General and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to work at Texting and Driving Prevention. I was very happy 5 years ago when Ontario put a Anti-Texting While Driving law on the books, here are the details:

Ontario's ban on hand-held devices while driving took effect on October 26, 2009. The law made it illegal for drivers to talk, text, type, dial or email using hand-held cell phones and other hand-held communications and entertainment devices. The use of hands-free devices is still permitted, and drivers may use hand-held devices to call 9-1-1. 'Hands-free' use means that apart from activating or deactivating the device, it is not held during use and the driver is not physically interacting with or manipulating it. Actions such as dialing or scrolling through contacts, or manually programming a GPS device, for example, are not allowed.

In Toronto the police often do 'blitzes' where they focus on a morning to catch as many distracted drivers as they can, fine them, and send a message. I don't know how effective this tactic is, but I am happy that something is done occasionally about this very serious issue. Especially as the American campaign details that research that shows: You're 3x more likely to crash if you text while driving. The scary thing it also mentions is that a recent survey showed that 42% of young adult drivers are very/somewhat confident that they can safely text while driving. You can't! (I don't care how good a driver or texter you are - it is not safe.)

Tips to help you stop texting while driving:
- Silence is golden.Turn notifications off. The less you hear your phone, the less tempted you'll be to respond while you're driving.
- Out of sight, out of mind.When you're in the car, put your phone where you can't get it. A place where you won't even be tempted to look for it. No phone. No texting.
- Set that shit up. As soon as you get in the car, set up your hands-free and/or driving mode features and check that it is functioning properly. If your car doesn't come with Bluetooth, portable devices that attach to the sun visor are available. (Jason has one for the Yaris.)
- Designate a texter. Give your phone to a friend or have them use their own. Passengers get the privilege of texting while in motion.

Thoughts On A Tuesday

If I have to borrow someone's deodorant, as soon as I put it on, I no longer feel totally myself. Somehow, a small percentage of my identity is tied to my regular brand.

I think birds hold dead people's souls.

Most people I know who grew up in an urban centre don't know how to use high beams properly. Also, it seems like the flashing light to mean 'advanced green' is being replaced by arrows on traffic lights.