August 2012 – Tiana Feng

Board Games: Starcraft, Mille Bornes, Crocodile Dentist, Pop-Up Pirate, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

August 30, 2012March 10, 2013Board Games, Entertainment, Food1 Comment

On Tuesday we got really bored of the CNE after 2 hours so we decided to waste the rest of the day at Snakes & Lattes. Since we had an unlimited amount of time we started with a rather complicated board game.

Sitting high on a shelf was Starcraft: The Board Game. I asked one of the employees to lend me a hand and his words were: “You don’t want to play that game. I’ve never seen anybody finish that game. They’d take 1 hour to read instructions, and another to set it up.” I wasn’t going to give up though and part of me really just wanted to prove him wrong.

There are around 60 pages of instructions but we read and setup the thing at the same time. It took around 2 hours to get through one game. The game actually plays a lot like the video game. There’s resources, units, fights and areas to take over. It’s like a card game and a board game in one. I don’t think there’s an easier way they could have written the instructions but it did take a bit to figure out. Once you play it once though, the second time is easy peasy. The game allows up to 6 players and it would have been even better with more than 2 people but explaining the game is the challenge.

After the Starcraft game we needed something a bit more brainless. Nash taught me how to play Mille Bornes.

The goal of the game is simply to get up to 1000 mph. There are distractions such as flat tires, red lights and other things that you can hinder your opponent with.

Then for some reason we went completely brainless and opted to play some children’s game starting with Crocodile Dentist.

It’s one of those games I really wanted to try as a kid because of those enticing YTV ads. It’s actually not that fun when you’re a grown up though because there’s a way of pushing down on the teeth to ensure that he won’t ensnare you.

Pop-Up Pirate did not require any brain power either. However, the first time through it scared the hell out of me when Nash poked a sword through and sent him flying. It was unexpectedly loud as it popped up.

We finished the day off with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Pizza Power Board Game. It was probably the most “board game” like thing we played the entire day with the exception of how you kill the bad guys. There was this dice bouncing seesaw thing where you had to bounce it into the right square. It was challenging.

I seriously wish I lived near at (or atleast near Snakes and Lattes). I don’t think you could ever get bored there with the HUGE selections of games they have for you to play. I’ll definitely be back, even if it’s to eat this prosciutto and brie sandwich again:

Bacon Nation at CNE

August 29, 2012March 10, 2013Fashion, Food, Restaurant Reviews, Street1 Comment

The food building was hilariously close to the farm.

One of the reasons I went to the CNE was to eat copious amounts of bacon. Of course we had to check out this so called Bacon Nation that was getting all the rage. We opted for the bacon wrapped hot dog with extra bacon as well as the Ba-conic Sandwich Explosion. To be honest, they were a little bit anti-climactic.

The bacon wrapped hot dog with bacon was literally a bacon wrapped hot dog with more bacon. It was good, but for almost $10, I half expected it to be huge.

The sandwich was bacon wrapped and stuffed sausage with lettuce, tomato and Jack Daniel’s sauce on a bun. The sausage bacon had a nice crunch to it that was nice. While it was delicious, it was nowhere near an explosion. I’ve eaten gourmet burgers bigger than it for the same (if not cheaper price). You can’t name something an explosion if it isn’t gigantic or at least super messy to eat!

We left the desert bacon things alone, mostly because we didn’t want to spend more money to be disappointed. I’m glad I tried them though, it was good but didn’t live up to my expectations.

How to Win at the Genius Bar

August 28, 2012March 10, 2013Business, Shopping, Technology, ThinkingLeave a Comment

My iPhone 4S’ wifi stopped working. I decided to take it in yesterday and ended up getting a replacement phone for free. I was in and out of the store in around 20 minutes.

Here are some tips to make your trip to the Genius Bar efficient and productive.

Backup your device. That way if you get a replacement product, you won’t have to waste time typing all your contacts and losing your photos. Also if the Genius Bar guy needs you to restore it, you can do that too.

Do your research. If there’s something wrong with your iPhone/iMac/iPod (or any other Apple product), make sure you read the Apple support site and try some of their suggestions. At least, know what those suggestions are so you can fire them at the guy saying you tried them before he tries to suggest them to you. Although there should really be something wrong with your device if you’re looking for a replacement, because they will fight you hard.

Be persistent. I wasn’t going to let the guy talk me into any solutions that were temporary. I assured him that nothing he suggested was going to work.

Prove it. From the beginning of my appointment, I showed him my phone did not detect wifi. He opened it up and said nothing was wrong. Then I proceeded to let him restore it, which temporarily fixed it. I knew in 5-10 minutes it would fail again. So we sat there. And waited 5 minutes. Sure enough, the phone had disconnected from the wifi and did not detect any networks.

Whether it’s a replacement or a repair you’re after, make sure you are prepared when going into the Apple Store. It will make your visit quick, efficient and less likely to end up in multiple trips!

Burgers at Buskerfest 2012

August 27, 2012October 13, 2012Food, Restaurant Reviews, Street1 Comment

Last weekend was Scotiabank BuskerFest in Toronto. While most people went there to see performers such as magic shows and silver Elvis, I visited for the food.

There was various vendors for food: ones that you normal find at fairs selling nuts and cotton candy and the fatty delicious foods. However on the first day me and Nash passed by the festival on the way to a concert we stopped by Yes to Fresh’s stand where they offered up Burgers with an Asian twist.

I accidentally ordered a portobello mushroom burger, not realizing the meat was the mushroom until Nash pointed it out. Luckily he ordered the pork tenderloin and we each had half of each other’s. They were both pretty delicious. The pork had some Thai corn that added a nice sweetness and the mushroom burger had crunchy onions of some sort. Both were served with a green salad.

Friday was my last day at work and we went to Buskerfest for lunch. We started with this Moroccan smoked meat sandwich from Berber.

The meat was really good but I wish there was more of it. There was an abundance of bun. The little pickles were a nice touch also. They were sweeter than usual.

Lastly we had a burger at Great Burger Kitchen. I wouldn’t say it’s the best one I’ve ever had but it wasn’t bad.

I’ll definitely stop by the actual restaurant to give their real burgers a try. Their menu has some drool inducing ones for sure.

We also found trucks giving out free slivers of pizza. The Mozzarellissima sponsored slice definitely highlighted the cheese.

I’m in love with the food at Toronto’s great festivals. However neat year, I am going to definitely make time to check out some of the performers at Buskerfest too!

That Is Old News…

August 22, 2012Social Media, TechnologyLeave a Comment

Yesterday we all learned the existence of Chadvil. An hour later I turned to Nash and said something along the lines of “WHY ON EARTH ARE PEOPLE STILL TALKING ABOUT THIS? IT’S OLD NEWS. WHY ARE THEY JUST FINDING OUT NOW?” Then he asked me how something from an hour ago is considered old news. It made me ponder.

Before social networks the phrase “That’s yesterday’s news” was still a thing. Now with Twitter and Facebook we are inundated with vast amounts of information, and we are able to find out about things almost instantly. It’s scary to think that maybe years from now an hour ago will be too slow. Imagine what our future kids would say. That’s 5 seconds ago’s news.

Whether it’s celebrity deaths, world news, the viral video, they’re instantly forgotten about as soon as they are posted. It also makes me wonder how fast actual news outlets have to be in order for them to survive. That’s a bit frightening.

Cavalia’s Odysseo = Beautiful

August 16, 2012Art, EntertainmentLeave a Comment

For our anniversary, Nash bought me tickets to Cavalia’s Odysseo. I’ve never seen the original Cavalia so this was my first time at the horse-show. If you’re from Toronto, you’ve probably seen the ads with beautiful white horse everywhere: on the subway, the streets, even in online banner ads. Whatever they did definitely worked. It is the extended running of the show here and yesterday it was pretty much sold out.

The show took place inside the Cavalia tent situated near Cherry Beach. The stage was huge. It’s something like 27,000 square feet. It was elevated slightly so parts of the show would look like horses were coming at you from a distance. The visual aspect of the entire show was thought out ingeniously. The lights could change the ground from green grass to dry land, and could even create the illusion of a path. The background projected moving landscapes on screens that look like they could be 2 or 3 times the size of a regular movie theatre screen.

Crappy iPhone photo makes it look farther than we actually were

What I love most about the show is that the horses seemed happy. They were even allowed for moments of impromptu performance. The audience laughed in delight and how adorable it was. They applauded when it went the right way. It’s amazing how lovely they made a line of horses look. I also didn’t understand how some of the riders didn’t fall off when performing some of their tricks. There was plenty of rest between horse-tricks as well. African American dancers did plenty of neat tricks and interacted with the crowd. There was even some call and response singing to lyrics we didn’t know how to say! I later learnt that the group was part of the Kalabante which raises money to build schools in Guinea. Therefore part of your ticket is supporting a great cause.

Near the end of the show, the ground filled with water to create a lake where the horses splashed and danced majestically in the water. What I didn’t realize until halfway through the show was that the music was live! They had musicians in boxes at the top right and left of the stages, but it was only when they were purposely lit up that you could see them.

I loved Odysseo and it was definitely an anniversary to remember.

Thanks For Putting Up With Me

August 13, 2012Life, RelationshipsLeave a Comment

Me and Nash’s anniversary is coming up. We think it’s tomorrow, but we’re not the type to count days. It seems more indefinite this way. Indefinite seems like a strange word. Like forever, but possibly a longer time. That’s a really long time to be with someone.

Then I realized, he must put up with a lot. The dude wrote me the most beautiful letter thing on my Facebook wall, so I thought I’d return the favor with this blog post thanking him for the myriad of things he must put up with while being with me.

Thanks for…

Not sleeping and coming to late night shows with me. Many of which have probably made you question my taste in music.

Eating burgers with me. We’ll probably grow obese and both die of heart-attacks, but it’ll be the best death ever.

Waiting to meet parents. Asian parents, enough said.

Being patient and waiting to watch the latest episode of Breaking Bad and Adventure Time with me. Even when their facebook pages contain spoilers.

Dealing with my social media addiction. You’ve let me instagram my food, foursquare places and twitter our stories. This is probably the third wheel in our relationship.

Losing video games on purpose. You must be losing occasionally right? I mean you can’t seriously get beaten by a girl in Tekken.

Letting Teddy lick your balls

Love you.

An iPhone Without 3G Is Like Popcorn Without Butter

August 7, 2012August 7, 2012iOS, Life, TechnologyLeave a Comment

willitblend — Without 3G you might as well blend it.

I went over my 1GB data plan today. I decided to turn my phone off instead of incurring any more fees. I’ve only had a smartphone since Christmas but I already feel like a cripple without it’s data-eating ways. Having an iPhone without 3G is as pointless as popcorn without butter.

Here are some things you can’t do without 3G:

iMessage: By default, iPhones running iOS 5 and higher send iMessages. I couldn’t receive messages from any one with an iPhone or send any without manually clicking “send as SMS” first. In addition, without data you can’t sent people pictures of your dog.

Social Networking: Can’t tweet, Facebook, Pinterest, Chime.in, Tumblr or Foursquare what I’m eating.

Find Out Where I am: I had to go pick something up in an area I’m not so familiar with. I took a streetcar, but didn’t get off on time. I even turned on my 3G (getting lost seems like a valid reason to). However, the service must disable itself after you too much over your data plan, because it would not work. I was stranded and had to ask Nash where exactly I was in relation to where I wanted to go.

Without internet to distract you, here are things you end up doing:

Looking at people on the bus: Since my head is not down and immersed in some sort of social network, I have to focus my eyes somewhere. Looking out the window resulted in a lot of sand in my eyes so I started looking around inside the bus. There’s a ton of funny looking people in the world.

Reading other people’s things: I ended up accidentally reading part of someone’s erotic novel.

Listening to brown people talk in circles: “you know?” They seemed to be having something delicious for dinner though.

Thinking to yourself: Sometimes I write blog posts while I’m on the train, but today I thought this one up in my head.

Thank goodness my cellphone billing period restarts tomorrow. One day of this nonsense was enough.

Photoset: Like A Cloud With A Face

August 6, 2012Art, Life, Pets, Photography, Teddy1 Comment

Long weekend here in Ontario. The weather is lovely and not too hot, so I let Teddy run around outside. He’s so white and puffy that sometimes he can be like a little cloud with a face.

Check out the rest of the set on Flickr.

Bacon Donuts and Pulled Pork Slider From Caplansky’s

August 5, 2012October 13, 2012Food, Restaurant Reviews, Street3 Comments

The last time I visited Caplansky’s I tried the bbq brisket slider and the smoked meat slider. I encountered the truck again at Hard Fest , so I decided to try the bacon donuts and the pulled pork slider.

The donuts were like timbits stuffed with bacon and glazed with maple. They were soft and warm and a strangely delicious mixture of savoury and sweet. It was like a mini bacon and maple pancake breakfast in one bite.

The pulled pork slider was mini but packed full of meat and coleslaw. It was a bit messy to eat but I ate any droppings with the stick that came with my donuts. It was yummy and if they didn’t cost like $4 each, I probably would have had 5 of them.

So far, I’ve been satisfied with everything I’ve eaten at the Caplansky’s Food Truck. Perhaps I should go check out the actual restaurant!