The Quest for the Date Bun

When I was growing up in Kuwait, one of the special treats we got was the date bun. It's a simple enough thing: a yummy torus of baked dough with a few vents cut into the side, stuffed silly with date filling.



Once we moved to Montreal, I went into a great date bun drought ... until my parents discovered a Middle Eastern store, Marché Adonis, that had a large selection of baked goods. Baklava, halva, and yes, date buns.

Sadly, though, I've never been able to find them in Vancouver. Every so often, when I'm back in Montreal for a visit, I pick up one or two dozen to bring back. I freeze them and slowly ration them out over many days. Things would be so much simpler if I could hook up with a date bun dealer in Vancouver for my fix but all of the local Middle Eastern stores I've tried have never heard of them.

The Death of the (Film) Theatre

A friend and I went to see The Bank Job last night. I thoroughly enjoyed it. Apart from a resolution that strayed into action-movie territory, I thought it was a great heist movie, presenting everything from build-up to aftermath. Recommended.

Unfortunately, my curse with theatre experiences has come back. I had a relatively long run of seven or eight nights where I enjoyed watching movies with no annoying whispers, chit-chat, interruptions. However, last night we had:

• Two or three separate groups of talkers
• Annoying laughter guy braying at the back of the theatre
• Clapping and "Yeah!"s at certain characters getting their comeuppance

I know I'm a film snob. I know that preferring to watch films without audience participation is a predilection that's fast moving me into the minority (if I haven't already). I know that many of my friends have made the switch to home theatre as their primary venue for seeing movies rather than the cinema.

And I know that I'll follow pretty soon.

This lack of cinema etiquette is but one voice in the chorus that is sounding the death knell of the theatre. The others (digital downloads, home theatre improvements, HDTV, etc.) all factor in too. The combination will, I believe, relegate theatre-going to watch films into as much of a niche pastime as theatre-going to watch live shows.

It's just a question of time. My prediction is 5 years.

Interminable Game Shows

On Sunday night, I watched about two and a half episodes of "Are You Smarter Than a Canadian 5th Grader?"

[No, don't ask.]



The thing that drives me up the wall with the newer game shows ("Who Wants To Be a Millionaire?", "Deal or No Deal", etc.) is the sheer amount of time the host and the contestant spend blathering. If it takes you more than a minute to answer a question, I've already written off your show and switched channels.

[Again, don't ask.]

Not that I'm a huge fan of game shows anyway. I think I'll always have a soft spot for Jeopardy, but that's about it.

And coming back to "Are You Smarter Than a Canadian 5th Grader?" When the hell did "Biology" get renamed to "Life Systems"?

And Justice for Some

Observing how cops routinely flaunt the traffic laws, I've long suspected that they've got an unwritten rule never to ticket other cops.

Sadly, my suspicion has been confirmed.

I read a few of the submissions and it's hard to believe the sense of entitlement oozing from every word.

(via BoingBoing.)

Please Stand By

No, I haven't died.

As seems to be the case more and more often these days, my free time dwindled to almost nothing in the past few weeks. We finally moved back into our place, but then were occupied with unpacking everything. We also had to coordinate schedules with the restoration contractors for the remaining work.

And then work got stupid busy. So I spent a lot of time there.

And now my sister and her family are visiting, so I'm spending time with them.

I've realized that the main problem is that my home computer is slow as molasses, and I will actively avoid using it if I can help it. Hopefully, I can get a new computer soon. That will alleviate part of the problem.

Finding balance is the other part of the equation. This is a priority for me.

Demetri Martin's Findings

Courtesy of Toren Atkinson, I've discovered a new favourite comedian:



Here's Demetri Martin's site.

Yes, Please Clean Our Room

Once we'd moved into our hotel room at the Inn at False Creek, Kyenta and I thought we'd make it easier for both the cats and the hotel staff and use the "Do Not Disturb" door hanger throughout the week. That way, the cats would not freak out at having strangers invading their space, and the hotel staff would only have to clean 156 rooms instead of 157.

Our first weekend here, I ran into one of the maids in the hallway outside our room.

"Clean your room now?" she asked.

"Sure, yeah," I said. We'd been here a week and I could use the new towels. "Thank you."

"And during the week? What time do you leave?"

"We both go to work," I replied. "But it's OK, we don't need the room cleaned."

"Oh," she said. "But we can clean it when you've gone."

"Well, we've got two cats. So it's OK if you don't clean it. We're fine."

"If you have the sign on, we have to go home."

"Yes, it's OK. We're OK with that."

We went back and forth like this for a few seconds before I finally cottoned on to something she said: "We don't get paid by the hour." The hotel cleaning staff gets paid by the room; the more rooms they clean in a day, the more money they make. If a guest leaves the "Do Not Disturb" sign on the door for the whole day, it's the same as an unoccupied room to the hotel.

I thought I was being polite and considerate, and to the staff I was being the exact opposite.

"Ah," I said. "Sure. Please clean our room."

"Thank you!" she said. "Thank you so much."

I remembered the cats. "But no vacuum cleaner. Just towels will be fine."