Transition to weebly

So after a lot (not really a lot) of consideration, I've decided to make the transition over to Weebly just because Blogspot drives me crazy with page formatting constraints. I'm still more comfortable with Blogspot's UI but if I want to have a blog and pages, Weebly still offers the most versatile formatting and is easy to build a full site with.

I know, I know, I've changed blogs so many times in the past. First wordpress, then tumblr, then blogspot, back to wordpress, and then blogspot, then tumblr, and back to blogspot, and then another blogspot attempt, and now weebly. The difference this time is I'm happy with how the new blog looks (because it's so customizable, it's crazy! I shouldn't be allowed this much freedom in design) and I'm actually updating the blog on a regular basis.

Click here for my new blog!

The Blog of Monte Cristo

According to my Kobo, I'm only 6% done (that's 8 chapters, or 74 pages) into The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas, who's also written stuff like The Three Musketeers and The Man in the Iron Mask -- all of which I've seen movie adaptations for in French class way back in grade 9 (2007? probably). As always, I have a running commentary in my mind and usually by the time I sit down to think and blog about it I've forgotten most of the thoughts.

(book cover borrowed from Goodreads.com)

I've debated the value of Tweeting some of my thoughts as I read (@swanships), but I generally don't use Twitter much at all. Maybe I'll give it a go again? We'll see.

Alright guys and gals if you see random comments out of context it's because I'm tweeting my reading of The Count of Monte Cristo.

— Alice (@swanships) June 18, 2014

Try as I might, I can't get the tweet to centre itself on the page. It's a minor issue, but it's bothering me. Maybe I'll just... not embed tweets?

In the meantime, here are some preliminary thoughts on the book thus far:

• Villefort is actually a pretty sympathetic character. I don't know if it's personal bias or what. Maybe it's just because I've only read up to Château d'If so even in the film adaptation he was sympathetic up to that point.

James Frain
as Villefort



Guy Pearce
as Fernand Mondego

• Fernand didn't start off as Edmond's best friend? That makes the entire betrayal arc (aka the entire plot) somehow less epic. I mean, it's still epic, being betrayed in such a fashion and spending 18 (I think?) years in prison for something you've never done, but being betrayed by one's best friend adds a whole new level do it. I think the film did that well.

The .epub I have has a really ... not appealing cover.
Is that supposed to be Edmond or Dumas?
Why can't I have a cover with the Château d'If too?

grilled goodies

I cannot express how much I love my panini press. I've made almost everything BUT paninis on it. I grilled some eggplant and zucchini (thank you Ksenia for showing me that not all zucchini is evil, just the raw stuff they put in salads) and added a ton of protein on the side. 

Note to self: season the veggies more.

Grilled zucchini and eggplant, tea egg, two different types of tofu.

Little updates, as told by Instagram

[massive post about everything that's happened so far this week below]

The MCAT is done, I'm back in Hamilton running experiments (all day, every day!), and have started hitting the gym in earnest. Also eating healthy because now I actually have time to cook properly for myself and experiment with new ways of preparing veggies.

Before I came back I faced the eternal struggle of which books to bring back with me. Here's my shelf of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time (someone borrowed The Eye of the World from me 2 years ago. They haven't read it nor have they given it back, and I recently got a copy of The Gathering Storm for $5 at Indigo, so I'm 2 books away from owning the entire series. Only The Gathering Storm was bought new; the rest came from 3 years' worth of scavenging used book stores and the Thrift Store), and Tolkien (yes, I own two copies of The Children of Hurin and The Silmarillion. Long story short, Ksenia got me the softcover version of The Children of Hurin for my birthday, but the hardcover one went on sale and she got it, but she lost the receipt to the softcover. So now I have both. And I bought the softcover The Silmarillion at Indigo, and on the same day I paid the Thrift Store around the corner a visit and voilà, there was a used hardcover copy of it. So I bought it and kept the new one because The Silmarillion is one of those books you don't just turn away. I also had an extra secondhand copy of the Lord of the Rings (movie cover edition) but my bookshelf was overflowing so I re-donated that set. The set I currently own was a Christmas gift from a family friend, right around the time I first saw The Return of the King (remind me to blog about how I got into the Lord of the Rings in the first place), so it's been around a while.). And then there are my classics collection, of which I've only read half. I've had the set since grade 4 and never really read any of it after middle school, even though now I should be able to actually understand the books. But, since I've got my Kobo, I don't need to lug around the classics because they're all under public domain and I can download them easily.

Done the MCAT!

I didn't know I had scheduled my MCAT for a Friday the 13th until somebody pointed it out a month ago. Was I fazed? Not really. But it was a bit of a surprise that I hadn't noticed it.

Still, today felt good. I can't discuss details because I signed a confidentiality agreement, but the Verbal Reasoning section went more smoothly than I could have hoped for and everything else was pretty much...par for the course. I think. 

My pre-MCAT selfie. Gameface ON. Purse full of food READY. Phone and Ring Of Barahir CHECK. Let's go kick some MCATbutt.

Back in Toronto!

It's been a while since I last updated, but that's understandable, seeing I've been studying for my MCAT almost non-stop for the past 2 weeks. I wish I had time to write more about the interesting things I've done since the last update, but there's really no time for any of that right now. Study, study, study. 

How do I feel? Pretty confident but at the same time still uncertain. My VR average is higher than it was last year, and I haven't really gotten below the double digits so that's a good sign. BUT I've been practicing with the AAMC tests I've already taken last year, which means the passages aren't brand new. I don't remember any of the answers to the passages, but I did remember all of the passages so I'm not sure if that has influenced my practice test scores. I also took a Kaplan free test and got a miraculous 12 on VR, BUT again it was weird. It was a weird test in general because instead of 40Q in 60min over 7 passages, it was 40Q in 50min over 6 passages. I'm not concerned about timing since I'm a fast test-taker, but having one less passage than normal means less passages to be stumped by...

Either way, it'll all be done and over with in less than 48 hours. I'm back in Toronto, for the first time since February.

Until next time (when I am free from the shackles of MCAT!),

~ Alice out