While at Indigo's the other day, I saw a calendar by a Canadian artist, Rob Gonsalves. To me it looked like a mixture of the surrealism of Salvador Dali (my favorite artist) and optical illusions of M.C. Escher.

(click to enlarge)

Apparently, the official genre is called magic realism, a term i had not previously heard of. The image above is called 'ladies lake'. As with many of his works, it uses a kind of fractalisation where a repeated subimage motif is used to define an outer image and fades out as it gets smaller.

congratulations saskatchewan roughriders! beating the calgary stampeders 27-17 in today's cfl western final.

it was an impressive win with my favorite play being the handoff to jason armstead, who then threw a long completion to rob bagg

saskatchewan will play montreal in the grey cup in calgary and have their work cut out. montreal has looked very good this season and anthony calvillo and ben cahoon always give them trouble. with cahoon only having a couple receptions in the blowout win for them this week, I would watch for him to explode at the grey cup.

however, if anyone can beat montreal this season it is the riders. with the game being in calgary, they are sure to get great fan support.

Yesterday I cooked shrimp pad thai from scratch for Tressa. And it actually turned out quite well! This was encouraging for very future attempts. It was spicy to me (but tolerable) and a good spice level for Tressa (who has a higher tolerance).

I am not a good cook. Actually, that is an unfair statement. I might be, I just haven't ever done it. Never felt the ambition to. Recently however, I have bought two cookbooks. I am trying to eat healthier, more from scratch, learn a new skill.

My friend Jon does cook a lot. He says he enjoys it, finds it calming. I can sorta buy that - as long as it is small scale - personal, friends, family - and not a restaurant for example.

Personally I like the measuring of ingredients and looking at wikipedia for culinary terms between steps. I am hoping I stick with this new hobby.

Update - 2012 I did stick with it and while I am not a superb chef, I am good, my timing has improved drastically and I can cook many dishes now : )

This Halloween was fun (I usually do not dress up as Halloween and I have a long, troubled past). Tressa and I dressed up as garden gnomes. We paraded around town - to my work on Friday the 30th, and to local businesses, including Walmart, Future Shop and Chili's restaurant. We enjoyed being oddballs ; )