Here’s how to make Bacon Breakfast bundles (or a veggie Dairy free one which is the bacon free one)

1) pre-heat oven to 350 C (we cooked ours at 400 today so the bottom of the bread got a bit dark and the yolks went hard after 13 minutes of cooking time)
2) butter/oil your muffin tin
3) cut a circle of bread for the bottom (we used Raisin Challah which is quite tasty)
4) Cook your bacon (or fake meat) until it’s 75% done. Turkey bacon actually works better to wrap the inside of the tin.
5) Place your bacon around the tin creating a basket in the center for your egg. Watch your fingers. It’s hot! I only had veggie sausage so I put a layer on the top of the bread with a bit of salsa for flavor. Next time I’m going to try smoked salmon! Yum!
6) break an egg in the center and place in the oven.
7) after 5 minutes, add cheese to the top if you want.
8) cook 5-8 more minutes. Yolks will continue to cook so make sure you take them out when still soft.

We had these bad boys with spinach cooked with fresh salsa and oven roasted potatoes. Happy days!

Finding your joy

See this man? He cut my keys this morning. I know, I know. Key cutting isn’t usually anything more than a mundane task after someone (aka me) has lost a set of keys. In my case, it was in my own house. But I digress.

This man was called over to cut my keys. I have a set of three. Two normal keys and one skinny key.

The skinny key needs a special machine. You measure the key, mark where you cut and the depth of cut, and then go for it. The first key he cut wasn’t quite right so he tried again. I didn’t mind. I was absorbed by a Buzzfeed article.

He cut it again. Brushed the key off and held it to the original.

The key matched! He cheered! “I did it! Yeeessss” This was a World Cup goal scoring level of excitement.

"Why are you so excited?" I asked.

He explained that not everyone can cut a key like that and he hadn’t seen one in ages. It’s a special technique and he explained how the machine cut a key by combining a number and position of the lever - like creating halves. Most of the team didn’t understand the half system so it was his own special technique.

He cut the next two keys, a grin from ear to ear.

I left the hardware store buoyant. He found his moment of joy, his work white whale, in a long thin key. Where was I going to find mine today?

That search for joy reminds me of #100dayshappy, a one a day photo challenge that has you capture one happy moment of your day. A reminder to yourself that every day has a bit of happiness in it. That we need to look for those moments of sunshine in our lives so that everyday is sunny.

It’s so easy to get up and resent your long day ahead. Get bogged down in minutia. But what will you create that will give you that joy? How will you nudge the needle forward? Get one step closer to making a difference? One step further on the path to your goals?

How will you find your one moment of joy today?

Breaking the food abuse cycle

I’ve been really re-inspired by the people around me who got on the healthy living train this year.

Last year I battled with myself, refound my love of running, ate healthy, cut out alcohol and lost 35 pounds. I wrote about it every step of the way and it helped me stay accountable.

Then I ran my marathon and promptly stopped all this good behavior. Now I’m back to where I started and I’m not happy about it.

I use food and drink as a crutch. There. I said it. Celebrations mean food. Sad days mean food. Stressed? Food. Bad day at work? Pass the fried calamari and red wine. Food. Food. Food. Nom. Nom. Drink. Drink. Blergh.

And as soon as I’m busy, goodbye exercise. Even though this would help me feel better, sleep better and be less stressed, I always have an excuse. Even though it’s only 30 minutes to maybe an hour. That’s it. I’ll lie in bed and watch a program for 45 minutes. Why not go for a run instead? Or do some weights. Or anything!

First things first, I have to have a spring clean. Get rid of old clothes. Old food. Old paperwork. Everything that is cluttering my life and my brain. Then make myself a promise.

When I’m stressed, bored, angry, upset, happy, don’t eat. Dance, go for a run, walk it out. And when it comes to rewards? Not food. Anything but food.

When I was a kid, we didn’t have a lot of money. Pay day meant a shared happy meal. A job well done? A treat. It’s not a bad thing. My mom rocked. And frankly food is cheaper than anything else a kid would like. Chocolate bars are only a dollar! There’s nothing wrong with the occasional treat but I still think of food being the best reward you can get.

Now I’m not saying food is bad. I love food. Food should be enjoyed. You should want a good meal. But I’m abusing it. I’m making myself a victim of food. And like a victim, I keep going back.

I need to change my relationship with food. This is forever thing. And I like eating healthy, I really do. So I just have to change how I think of food. It’s not the golden ticket. It’s not really going to make my day/night/life better. And I can’t just cut everything “good.” It’s about moderation and good choices.

It takes 30 days to form a habit. Today is day one.

Who’s with me?

Pee on the seat? Really?

OK ladies. We are grown ups here.

This is not acceptable. If you are the afraid to put your delicate bottom on a toilet seat and choose instead to pee all over it and leave it covered in your waste, you are the problem.

If you must do this, then clean up after yourself. You are not an animal and you do not live in a barn.

When I walk in a stall I’m so often tempted to turn back to the woman leaving it and say “Really? Are you still potty training? Are you expecting your mother to come in and clean up after you?”

But I don’t. I just inwardly rage. Is there something we can do to change this? All I want to do is sit down when I pee. Is that too much to ask?

When do you choose to give over to creativity?

Having a free afternoon in Paris, I decided to take advantage of the day and hit up the Musee D’Orsey. It’s one of my favourites with it’s huge collection of Art Nouveau furniture and full floor of impressionist paintings.

As it was the first Sunday of the month, the gallery was free so I was able to not only get into the museum, but also see the special exhibits. The month it was: Van Gogh/ Artaud: Le suicide de la societe.

I knew Artaud through my theatre studies - he was the creator of the Theatre of the Oppressed. But I never knew of his stays in the Asylum and that while he was in there, he wrote a comprehensive essay blaming society for Van Gogh’s suicide.

Two months from now, in the anniversary of the day Van Gogh took his life in 1890. He was only 37 years old.

At 27, he decided to be an artist. Just dropped everything and started to paint. At what point does someone turn everything on its head and say I’m doing that? I’m giving up on path for another? In only 10 years, Van Gogh created a body of work now touted as genius. But maybe it wasn’t a choice. Maybe he had to.

No one has ever written or painted, sculpted, modeled, built, invented, except to get out of hell.
-Artaud

With a family member supporting him, Van Gogh created the Potato Eaters - dark, morose work. And then bounced from schools until he settled in the south of France where he painted a whole bunch of sunflowers and cut off part of his ear.*

I’m always interested in how creativity plays itself out. Finds a way. Eats at your insides. Makes you restless.

I haven’t been giving time to my own creativity. In fact, I haven’t given time for me to sleep or see friends or keep fit, so it’s understandable. In a way.

I have a love/ hate relationship with what I create. The idea comes and it’s painful to get out. I procrastinate more than anyone I know (this is purely a guess). I’d rather clean the house sometimes than work on my writing or edit a film. It gnaws at my insides to even think about it.

The deep despairs followed by the high elations. The hair pulling and long walks hoping the spirit rushes through me so I can grab it by the tail and just make. But for the last few years, it’s felt elusive. I’ve crowded out my creativity and i feel an aching hole where I used to feel the passion and drive to make.

In September, I’ll be the same age as Van Gogh when he took his own life. Artaud said:

Yes I think more than ever that it was to Dr Gachet of Auvers-sur-oise
Owed, I say, his exit from life,
For Van Gogh was one of those natures whose superior lucidity enables them, in all circumstances, to see farther, infinitely and dangerously farther, than the immediate and apparent reality of facts.

Did he feel there was a limit to his time of creativity? 10 years was enough? Or was he so weighed down by society that he couldn’t see that one day his work would be coveted by the masses.

But still he tried. He took the leap. Picked up his trade and gave it everything he got, until he felt he couldn’t give anymore.

Do you feel you have given enough? Are you doing what you love? Have you pushed through the fear and give yourself completely to your end goal?

*This is a very truncated version of his successes and failures. See a full history of Van Gogh here