구름이 피워낸 꽃

I also found a webtoon that solidly secured a place in my list of favourites within...18 chapters. The Flower That Was Bloomed By A Cloud. My feels at chapter 18 was exactly how I felt at the end of Knight Run's second prologue. The art is pretty, the characters are great, and the plot is set up soooo well for a tragedy! The characters are drawn with very subtly expressive faces, which seem to be a theme with Korean artists (namely Cheese in the Trap and all of Kim Yeon Joo's works). Most importantly, the point of differentiation is that the arc that transpire right before chapter 18 gives a legitimate reason for why Hong Lyon goes from:

to

kitsune

Okay I think I've found mu favourite Toronto restaurant, although it is a New York transplant: Raku

Food: udon is great, like really great. Noodle is not the traditional chewy and dense udon, it's like...pillow-y, similar to gnocchi. The broth is amazing, I can actually very clearly taste the smoky bonito. Jeff got the niku udon and the beef broth is delicious as well. It's regular downtown level of pricing, but the portions are large and very filling.

Decor: just my style, bonus points for their nice bathroom with a very nice hand soap that isn't Aesop or Le Labo.

...

Bonus photo of what I thought was very amusing: a tree in it's full autumnal glory in front of a wall with a birch forest graffiti

murr

A very late Thanksgiving weekend photolog:

Jeff and I cooked a meal for my parents. His contributions are the steamed fish, steamed shrimp topped tofu, stir fried gailan, and steamed eggplant with peanut sauce (all the steamed dishes gave my parents the false impression that his usual cooking is healthy), while my contribution is the radish braised beef, and tomato egg drop soup (I still stand that a long enough simmering can redeem the crappiest supermarket tomatoes)

We then drove up to Lagoon City:

More spectacular fall colours were actually seen on the way up as there were more woodlands along the highway. But I was asleep most of time. In fact the biggest win of that weekend was that I slept a lot, about 12 hours Friday night, 10 hours Saturday night, 14 hours Sunday night, and then 2 hours in the car. It honestly feels so good not being in a constant state of sleep deprivation, why did I do that to myself in university -_-

seven

Another day, another emerging sunset on Toronto's skyline:

wrinkle

Some recent eats:

I don't know why I continue to eat ramen in NA when they don't specialize in shio. This is tantan men from Hakkata Shoryuken Ramen, which is fine, but not shio ramen ;o; Luckily udon seems to be rising in popularity, so I plan on shifting my noodle consumption towards that.

North of Brooklyn has replaced Maker Pizza as my default for some time now, but it's only today that I really appreciated how good this pizza is. The bread is sooo good! The crust has such nice little blisters, but the inside crumb is still pleasantly soft and chewy. The topping is the initial attraction, but the bread is what makes one stay :)

My breakfast staple of oatmeals has a slight change, it's the same base of:

• oat - ⅓ cup
• chia seed - 2 tsp
• hemp seed - 2 tsp
• water - ⅔ cup

with toppings of:

• pumpkin seed and nut (walnut default), roasted and tossed with salt, sumac and turmeric
• honey
• splash of milk or plant milk
• dried fruits: my default is dried tart cherries, but it's pricey af so I've switched to cranberries which still maintains a hint of tartness. I've also done dried apple slices with gooseberry jam instead of honey

rich with all this love

bell

Having no signal on the subway gives me a good chunk of time to think on my way back from work. One day I was analyzing just why my goal(s) of regularly exercising is never, ever, accomplished. Aside from the fact that I find absolute no joy in the activity itself, since I figure all of the health benefits is enough to neutralize that hate.

I've always knew that the trick is to fit it into my schedule in some frictionless way, but I never successfully implemented that. I've tried making it the last thing I do before sleep, which didn't work because some nights I am way tired and easily makes the excuse to hold it off till the next day. I've tried not tying it to a particular time and just doing it as a study break, which did work for a good...2 or 3 month when I was in Bath, but eventually the irregular schedule overthrew my willpower. I considered scheduling it right after I come back from work, since I usually do have the energy to get through one chore, but that conflicts with days when I need to cook or wash my hair. Mornings are out of the question. Another big hurdle is that I hate sweating, so I want to shower after working out, but I don't want to shower twice, so exercising is constraint to before when I'd naturally shower.

Considering all that...my latest plan is to work out twice a week: after work on Wednesday and on a weekend day that I stay in. And if I happen to skip one, which will definitely happen, then I will actually try my hardest not to skip the next one. I might also try to just block off Wednesday evening to read as well, since I've not found a long undisturbed chunk of time for that.

straight

I quite like this mix of patterns

It is cooling down fast, suppose I should tally up my late summer / autumn wear count.

someone I use to see

joint

This (passed) week's meal prep, the incredible cabbage soup that I did not believe to taste so good:

Added lentils this time, lentils in soup is generally a good idea

I find that if I am cooking eggs alone (aka no other food to drop the water temperature more / act as more thermal mass), 7 minutes followed by immediate soaking in cold water results in well set whites with still jammy yolk. I use to do 6 minutes with an unquantified air resting period, which produces generally similar results but is less precise.

horsing around

I finaaaally finished watching all the current seasons (5) of Bojack Horseman, now I can go on the subreddit without fear of spoilers ;o; Stay tuned for thoughts.

flip

Toronto day & (white) night:

sleep is a time machine

Owl City was big...back in high school? I very much liked Fireflies and the song that had "wear your paper heart on your sleeves" as the lyric, Tidal Waves? I was pleasantly surprised when a remix of their song came up in my feed. There are also many lines that I like in this song, those that narrowly missed being the title of the post are the opening of "I am a light sleeper / but I am a heavy dreamer" and "my heartache, it seems  / so terribly vain"

horizontal

My appreciation for the aesthetics of low-light situations don't fare well with my phone's sensor, but the noise kinda adds to the beauty of the scene?

At dawn and dusk:

this can totally be an Impressionist Dutch still life 

edge

It's already October and I've barely seen any signs of fall, not sure how to feel about that.

Same subject, same idea, different composition and editing:

Maybe I should consider upgrading my personal phone, the image quality does leave a lot to be desired.