Guido & Angelina, Montreal, PQ

I was craving Italian food for supper this evening so walked to Guido & Angelina on Rue Ste-Catherine W.

It was fairly quiet when I got there about 6:15ish.

Ye Olde Orchard Pub & Grill, Montreal, QC

I'm in Montreal 'til Thursday at the head office of the company I work for.

I felt like having supper at a pub so I walked to Ye Olde Orchard Pub & Grill on Rue de la Montagne  (a 20 minute walk from my hotel).  I was there in December and enjoyed it.

My Griffon Blonde was good.

Book ~ "I Have My Mother's Eyes: A Holocaust Memoir Across Generations" (2009) Barbara Ruth Bluman

From Goodreads ~ In "I Have My Mother's Eyes: A Holocaust Story Across Generations", author Barbara Ruth Bluman chronicles her mother's dramatic journey from Nazi-occupied Poland to western British Columbia, where her legacy lives on. 

Bluman sets an urgent and intimate tone as she follows Zosia Hoffenberg from her genteel upbringing in Warsaw through the shock of the Blitzkrieg and on to her escape from Europe through the Soviet Union and Japan. That escape required the help of Chiune Sugihara, the Japanese consul in Lithuania, who defied his superiors and helped several thousand Jews to flee. Bluman also reveals how, even as she was recording her mother's tale of survival, cancer was ravaging her own body. 

In this interwoven narrative, Bluman explains how she garnered strength from her mother's account as a refugee, as she "stared death in the face." These twin narratives blossom out of salvaged journal entries and letters, and from the photographs of family members who have reunited after years of displacement. A celebration of the universal struggle for survival, "I Have My Mother's Eyes" offers a hopeful response to one of history's darkest times.

Gord had won this book from the Book Mine Set a couple years ago and I finally picked it up and read it.

This book has two stories.  One is that of Zosia, the youngest daughter of Symcha, a fairly well-to-do Jewish businessman living in Poland during WWII.  It tells of Zosia's harrowing escape to Canada via Lithuania, Russia and Japan after she meets and marries Nathan.

The second story is that of the author, Barbara, who is the daughter of Zosia.  She tells of meeting and marrying and then the heartbreak when her husband left her for another woman.  She discovered she had cancer while writing this book (and eventually died) ... Barbara's daughter, Danielle, finished the book in honour of her grandmother and mother.

It's an interesting story ... I can't imagine what it was like going through what they did to survive and not knowing if your family was still alive.  The writing style was well-paced and I enjoyed this book.

There are lots of pictures so you can put a face to the people in the book along with a family tree (which I found helpful).

Billy Bishop Toronto City (aka Island) Airport, Toronto, ON

Whenever I fly, my first choice is out of the Island Airport.

Conceived in the 1930s as the main airport for Toronto, the construction of the airport was completed in 1939 by the Toronto Harbour Commission (THC). At the same time, the THC built Malton Airport (now Toronto Pearson International Airport) as an alternate but Malton became Toronto's main passenger airline hub instead, leaving the island airport for general aviation and military purposes.

It's a 10 minute/$15 cab ride to get there from home rather than a 30 minute ride/$50 cab ride to Pearson.

I use it when I'm heading on short trips like Montreal, Ottawa or Halifax (longer flights don't leave from this airport).

The only way to get to the airport is by ferry.  It's only 122m/400ft across and takes just a couple minutes.  The ferry is free and runs every 15 minutes.

Gingermania!

We have a neighbour upstairs who is Polish, retired and in her early 60s.  She had been here for a couple years when I moved in in June 2001.

Last year she bought a laptop.  She'd never used a computer before so the fella at the store gave her a quick lesson and sent her on her way.  She still doesn't get it so when she wants to check to see if she has gotten any emails, she'll come get me to do it.  She has me respond to emails ... they are always in Polish (she writes out what she wants me to type) and usually to a priest back home in Poland.  She sends me home with a bottle wine for my time (I always tell her she doesn't have to give me anything but she won't take no for an answer).

I've had a cough that's been hanging on for about a month that I can't shake.  When I was helping her last night, she asked about it and suggested that I get some fresh ginger.  All I would need is about a half an inch each time.  I should cut it into slivers or grate it and let it soak in hot water for about ten minutes and then drink the water.  She said to do it a couple times a day and it would clear up the congestion (my former neighbour, Monica, used to make me ginger tea when I was sick).  I told her I'd get some today.  In the meantime, she sent me home with five ginger tea bags (I took a couple to work today).

When I got home from work today, there was a grocery bag hanging on our doorknob from our neighbour.  In it was another box of ginger tea and a humungous amount of ginger (good thing I hadn't stopped for some!).

It was really nice of her but it's a lot of ginger and I don't know what to do with it all!  I Googled and apparently you can freeze it.  I'll have to find some recipes for it.

I think I've solved my sleeping problem

I haven't been sleeping well for about a year and a half.

It takes me awhile to get to sleep, sometimes a couple hours.  And when I do get to sleep, I usually wake up wide awake during the night and sometimes it takes me a couple hours to get back to sleep.  So I'm tired and dragged out.

Here's my journey:

• I'm not a napper and don't give in to the temptation in the evenings because I'm scared it will throw off my sleep even more.
• I bought a Contour Cloud Pillow and that seemed to help for a while.
• I don't drink coffee and don't drink a lot of Diet Coke.  I've started drinking Diet Coke with no caffeine.
• Nothing is stressing me out so I'm not laying awake at night worrying about anything.
• I have 90 minute relaxing massages every month or so.
• As I'm laying in bed, I tried to use a meditation technique and visualize a light coming down through my head and relaxing every part of my body.  
• I get up and try to sleep on the couch or the futon in the spare room.
• I tried Valerian, an herb, and it helped put and keep me to sleep for a while ... but then seemed to stop.
• I downloaded a 30 minute meditation to sleep onto my ipod.  I listened to it a few times and would be asleep in about ten minutes.  I would wake up sometime after it was over, put my ipod in my nightstand and then fall back asleep right away.  But after the first couple of times it didn't work ... I was still awake when it was over.
• We have digital music stations through our cable and one of them is spa music.  I put it on when I went to bed one night and left it on for about a half hour.  Alas, it didn't work. 
• Read Successful Sleep Strategies for Women by Julia Schlam Edelman.  Apparently you aren't supposed to view a back-lit screen like a TV, computer, ereader or phone about two hours before you go to bed as it stimulates the brain.  I watch TV and am on my lap at night ... plus I read in bed with my Kobo.

But I think I've found the solution. Yay!

When I stayed at the Sheraton in London last week, the clock radio in my room on Wednesday night had a function that played "bedtime beats" so I tried it. I thought it would be distracting and annoying but it wasn't.  It was soothing piano music and I didn't take long to get to sleep.

When I got home Thursday night, I downloaded Deep Sleep (Relaxing Music to Help You Sleep) from iTunes onto my ipod and connected it to old computer speakers which I put on my night stand.  There are fourteen songs and it's about 45 minutes.  I was asleep by about the fifth song.

I bought a alarm clock docking station on Friday and have been listening to the tunes every night since and have been falling asleep quickly.  And it's a deep sleep ... when I've been waking in the morning, I feel like I am climbing out of a fog.

Gord falls asleep within five minutes anyway so it hasn't been bothering him..

I thought I had figured out how to set the alarm but it didn't go off this morning ... good thing Gord was still home to make sure I was awake.

Toronto Wine & Spirits Festival, Toronto, ON

There were lots of things happening in Toronto today.

Gord and I decided to check out the Toronto Wine & Spirits Festival at Sugar Beach ... we'd never been before.

It was $30 at the gate ($21.50 online 'til 1pm ... we decided at 1:04pm to go!).  You got a glass and five drink tickets.  After that, tickets were $1 each.  Most sample drinks were two tickets each.

Here are the vendors:

Book ~ "Lay Death at Her Door" (2013) Elizabeth Buhmann

From RedAdeptPublishing ~ Twenty years ago, Kate Cranbrook's eyewitness testimony sent the wrong man to prison for rape and murder. When new evidence exonerates him, Kate says that in the darkness and confusion, she must have mistaken her attacker's identity.

She is lying.

Kate would like nothing better than to turn her back on the past, but she is trapped in a stand-off with the real killer. When a body turns up on her doorstep, she resorts to desperate measures to free herself once and for all from a secret that is ruining her life.


Elizabeth Buhmann is originally from Virginia, where her first novel is set, and like her main character, she lived several years abroad while growing up. She graduated magna cum laude from Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts, and has a PhD in Philosophy from the University of Pittsburgh. For twenty years, she worked for the Texas Attorney General as a researcher and writer on criminal justice and crime victim issues.

Elizabeth now lives in Austin, Texas, with her husband, dog, and two chickens. She is an avid gardener, loves murder mysteries, and has a black sash in Tai Chi.

Visit Elizabeth on her blog and Facebook! 

Topbox - June

My June Topbox arrived while I was in London this week and I opened it today.

For only $10 a month, you will receive a Topbox with 4 carefully selected, indulgent, beauty products. Then test the products in the comfort of your own home.

Here's what was in it ...

Four Points by Sheraton, London, ON

I had seminars and one-on-ones to conduct yesterday in London and I had to be at the client's site about 8:30am.  It's more than a two hour drive from Toronto so I drove down Tuesday and spent the night.  I stayed at the Four Points by Sheraton.

I like staying there because there are restaurants nearby I can walk to.  Parking, bottled water and WIFI are free.

I had a suite on the second floor.

Bentley's Lounge, London, ON

I had supper this evening at Bentley's Lounge. 

Until 6:30pm, they had free appies, wine and beer ... I got there in time to enjoy a glass of wine (6:15ish).

It was fairly crowded when I got there but lots left once happy hours were over.

I ordered a pork chop and garlic mashed potatoes for supper.  I've had it before and it was delish.  Today I think I got mustard grain mashed potatoes ... they were okay (not as good as the garlic mashed I've had there in the past).  The pork chop was juicy.

Chris was my server ... he was friendly and took good care of me.