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Ganaraska Conservation Area, Port Hope.

With exams, semester turnaround, and the start of semester two, it has been an extremely busy time. This semester is crazy for me; aside from my energetic new grade 12 World History class, I also have seven subjects within credit recovery: grade 9, 10 and 11 English, ESL B, Canadian History, Civics and Learning Strategies. When is March Break?

Therefore, it doesn’t come as a huge surprise to me that I have not been eating very healthfully. Plus, there was that vegan cinnamon bun two weekends ago…

So today I finally cooked some veggies – my favourites – mushrooms and zucchini. It was also so sunny in the kitchen that I decided to take a few photos with our rehabilitated little camera.

I’m taking the day off to catch up on some photography, skating and reading. Then it’s back to work tomorrow with a pile of marking. At least I’ll have some vitamins in me.

Our cottage has a pretty big garage, one I don’t go into very often. However, I thought it would make for an interesting photography destination.

There’s measurement.

There are hose-shaped things.

There are tools (mostly) neatly arranged.

There are unidentified objects (probably parts of power tools).

There’s even a bit of colour.

And of course there’s a TTC bus stop. Who wouldn’t have such a thing?

How could I forget – lots of random bike parts.

This Sunday morning I’ve been doing the following:

1. mark remaining part of Rome test
2. send invitations to presenters for February PD day conference in case this is not allowed during our job action
3. create a Taoism and Confucianism PPT for Monday
4. figure out who the new bird at the peanut feeder is: turns out to be a red-bellied woodpecker – his or her beak is so long it’s difficult to get a prize
5. eat vegan pancakes made by Val (his were non-vegan and much lighter)
6. catch up on the last Grand Prix figure skating event of the season – NHK in Japan
7. email Toronto Star food writer Karon Liu about a book he discussed in a column last week
8. finally, chop and roast the veggies for this week

And I was never a morning person! I don’t drink coffee.

Making roasted vegetables each weekend is my new thing. The process really shows off how much work vegans have to do to eat healthy, not including growing the food, of course.

Peel the carrots.

Chop the colourful carrots.

Mushrooms are easy. Just throw them in a bowl.

Don’t forgot to preheat the oven!

Play with your vegetables for some fun:)

Meanwhile, press the tofu with an improvised tofu teapot press.

“Finish” the press job.

More vegetables to go! Take the sweet potatoes for a mood-lighting photo because they’re so pretty.

Mix then salt and pepper the veggies.

Same for the tofu cubes.

Finally, ready for the oven.

Do the dishes while you wait for the veggies to cook.

Remove from the oven 40 minutes later.

Check if they’re done.

Behold the beauty the oven does and try not to eat them all this minute.

Make yourself a small bowl to eat now and of course take a pic before the light disappears.

Pack up the veggies for the week – can’t resist one more beauty shot.

There are bits of red here and there at the cottage.

Unfortunately, this Economist cover for Sept. 21-27, has an unmistakably red section, too, representing how much we have worsened temperature creep since the 1990s. Even The Economist admits: “It [climate change] is not a problem that can be put off for a few decades. It is here and now. … Its losses are already there and often mourned – on drab landscapes where the glaciers have died and on reefs bleached of their coral colours. Delay means that mankind will suffer more harm and face a vastly more costly scramble to make up for lost time.”

I had some friends over to the cottage for a bbq and forgot to serve the bean salad. It sat languishing in the fridge after I had worked to perfect the tarragon dressing using our own tarragon from the herb garden. And so, the bean salad deserves its due: a study in bean salad.

You’ll notice that I propped it up, de-propped it, moved locations, changed lighting conditions, and, finally, ate it.