Thing I'm Destined to Love

Just cuz I've been disappointed in the past, doesn't mean I can't move forward with a clean slate. Once I've bitched, of course.

And, in truth, for every bad President's Choice product, I've tasted 15 excellent ones.

Imagine my glee on discovering (thanks to Ms. Espanya) these dark chocolate covered caramels with sea salt! That's salty, caramel, chocolate goodness. Nature's perfect taste combo.

Please forward the cause by visiting Tanya's site and begging her to give away a free box to the most compelling candidate. And if you can't convince her, you may be able to convince me :-)

Thanks, Tanya, for cutting at the last shreds of my healthy holiday lifestyle plan...

Midi

Here are a couple of photos of my fave work lunch spot. It's a bistro, quel surprise. It serves the best quiche in the city - made with crumbly buttery crust and lots of cream (as it should be). And you can choose between a lovely, huge salad on the side or frites - or both. I get the salad so that I can feel virtuous!

Last time I was in, reading a magazine to clear my head of work matters, the proprietor brought me an unexpected chocolat chaud, just because I am sweet (says he)! Talk about a high tip quotient :-) I love the French.

To Tree or Not to Tree?

Growing up, we always had a lovely tree. My mother, then an interior designer, knew how best to find the perfect scale and the perfect spruce, which we would chop down in some excellent smelling tree farm up north and then trim up in the most elegant way. In our home, fluffy needles were styled with white pin lights, popcorn strings, heirloom ornaments, a beautiful skirt which was, let's face it, obscured by the most fantastically and matchingly wrapped gifts.

Contrast this to my husband's childhood memory: articficial tree with ever-blinking rainbow-coloured lights, multicoloured tinsel, garland, cello wrapped candy-canes and terrific, if eclectically wrapped, presents.

I know it sounds like I'm judging. (Secretly, that's cuz I am.) And while I realize this hints at my bratty unwillingness to accept all the many ways to enjoy a Christmas tree, I think we should blame my mother for instilling me with such a strong sense of how things are supposed to look.

Dontcha love how I've managed to ding everyone for my own intransigence?

So, natch, being long-married and tired of fighting, Scott and I have worked out a kind of compromise on the tree front:

• It is fake (to save the trees from needless death) but
• It is bushy and 9 feet tall but
• It may have green lights but
• They will not flicker but
• There is garland but
• No tinsel
• And the presents will be wrapped in complementary paper and ribbon
• Until that runs out whereupon S will use whatever he can find but
• Those equally loved presents will go to the back of the tree behind the matchy ones.

Now you see why we try to go away at Xmas - whereupon there is only harmony in our family.

My question for y'all is, do you have a tree? If yes, how does it work (real, fake, mini, grand)? Is the tree an extension of your fashion philosophy? I'm so intrigued to know...

Beautiful Lady

I took this at the AGO opening. It's part of the permanent exhibit. Do you know that the Art Gallery of Ontario has the largest public collection of Henry Moore sculpture anywhere in the world? I've been looking at it all for 30 years now and I never tire of this piece.

It encapsulates the steely strength and elegant grace which coexist in so many women.

Mega Sale Alert

Club Monaco is having the sickest sale ever today and tomorrow. Most everything in the store is 30% off (except the 20 things that just arrived on Thursday) and everything that's already on sale is another 30% off.

So you know that cashmere scarf I paid $100.00 a month ago? It was $40.00 today. Natch, I bought 2 - one for my mother or father (unisex) and one for Scott. Oh, and they wrapped for free. Very classily.

It was such an awesome, adrenaline pumping sale - and I'm almost afraid to tell you this - I ended up buying Scott's Xmas presents for me (well a couple of them anyway). I figured, there they were and by the time he gets around to buying them they could be a) gone or b) back at full or not as deeply discounted price. Of course, I can't say anything about them now because they're gifts I haven't received yet.  But I will say I saved him $120.00 before tax.

Oh, and BTW, I'm finished the Xmas shopping altogether. Tout finit. I have to stay out of the stores now.

It's The Most Wonderful Time of the Year...

...Unless you love shopping and you have no impulse control.

Then it's the most dangerous time of the year.

Yes, I know, I'm breaking my own Xmas shopping rules left, right and centre. I'm a bad role model. But I have some cool stuff.

While sourcing some great loot for great friends, I discovered - and yes, purchased - this:


The piece, by Polli is actually much more delicate and lovely than this photo suggests. The chain, in particular, is much better... Each stainless steel pendant is thinner than a credit card but strangely tough. This one lies very nicely against my chest without calling too much attention to either itself or to my tits (except Hilary disagrees, she wants you to know, that it doesn't call attention). And yet it's substantial. I love its nod to the natural world, though it's constructed from a very industrial product.

Polli, which I had never heard of until a couple of weeks ago, is an Australian company comprised of two Sydney-trained industrial designers who bring sustainability and a Danish-meets-Japanese sensibility to their rather broad-ranging collection. Can the Aussies do nothing wrong?!?! One of my absolute fave TO stores bar-none, the chameleonic design stuff-meets-everything else Ziggy's at Home, sells a number of these pendants and earrings at rather reasonable prices. And Polli's website also provides a well-organized online shop.

Maybe one of the women in your life needs a little bauble over the holidays? Maybe you do?

I keep telling myself I'm going to give it to someone who's been really good...

In the Bag

Meet my latest "lunchtime Xmas Shopping, theoretically for others" purchase for myself:

Zara Sac with Chain Handle, $49.00

It's made of fake cow-hide but I can tell it will be one of those faux skin bags that lasts in spite of my torture. And it's got a wonderful way of being small until you start filling it up. At which point it seems to hold umbrellas, magazines, kid mittens and one's lunch (not that I ever bring mine to work).

And did I mention that I adore the light grey colour. And the chain. So "rock star on her day off, wandering the streets of Paris, smoking Gauloises and eating pastries".

The most fun part, other than that I own it and love it, is that I discovered it (the only one in the store) in the hands of another woman who was carting it around, putting it up against other merch, looking for a match.

With steely intent, I willed her to put it down. And 2 minutes later I succeeded.

Waiting the appropriate 5 second grace period (ya know, for second thoughts), I swooped in around her and grabbed it with contortionist precision. I mean, the woman gasped audibly.

Alas, her time was done. And I ran off to the cash with nary a look behind me. (Does this make me coldblooded?)