Sunday, July 30

mash up

car stuff
the car meet was a lot of fun. i wasn't sure what to expect, but having fun friday night and all day saturday didn't seem likely. it felt neat to be part of something very visual. look at the picture - we had over 30 cars all driving together. we were in the front half of the pack but were fortunate enough to have a ton of cars behind us and enough in front of us to really get the impact of the caravan.



baseball
not much playing since my last post - only one practice, but a good one - but i've been thinking lots about provincials. provincials are this coming weekend in st. catharines. j and i are carpooling and rooming with big t and p so i think it'll be lots of fun, but tiring. in a good way though. the tournament is double knock-out format and we have one less game all five other teams so we're really hoping for a medal this year. last year we came fourth. i think we have a good shot.

work
my second and third weeks of work will be four days each. sweet! i'll be biking in on my own though since j is on vacation this week and away at the cottage. he's teaching himself how to windsurf.

Thursday, July 27

end of week one, beginning of pay

tomorrow is my last day of my first week at my new job. me me me. and i still like my job. impressive. but seriously, i'm really happy with my job: the actual job, the people, the location. everything.

everything except getting my body back into the habit of waking up early and biking every day. it's amazing how quickly you lose physical things like that. i'm almost constantly tired and my body is hurting. i'm not complaining i'm just explaining my feelings. j is always asking about my feelings. well j, here you go. i feel tired and ouchy.

moving on. i haven't been paid in a long while so i was pretty happy to see a cheque from my last job arrive in the mail today. thank you government for taking so damn long. thankfully i have a sugar daddy.

(oh boy, another scattered post.) my baseball season is winding down. we had our last regular season game last night against my old team. my old team is a level up and has beaten us every single time in the past two years. well, not this time! we won 3-2. it was a nice feeling, a content feeling.

this weekend is a huge mazda meet (it's the toronto-montreal-ottawa meet hosted by the ottawa mazda club) and i think i will be taking a photographer role instead of a wife role. at least i will have a purpose and something to show for my weekend. other than that i don't know what i'll be up to. though i think if you asked my cats they would say that i would be heading out and buying them some damn cat food (excuse the language, but the heat is getting to them).

Tuesday, July 25

miss universe

sunday night i watched a lot of the miss universe pageant. i have a couple things to say about it. first of all i will never look like those girls. second, i never want to. i don't think people would take me as seriously or maybe just the boys would... though i'm sure girls that pretty intimidate the hell out of most guys.

moving along. i tuned in during the swimsuit part. like i said, very pretty girls, but really, they looked so similar. the only difference between them was in their colouring. there was one "brown" girl and a couple asian girls but all the "white" girls were mega tanned so everyone, in my opinion, except the brown girl, were the same colour. perfect. exact same body types and exact same colour. good thing you have to look at their faces and hair too. but really, let's be honest about the hair. brown, dark brown or fake blonde. all similar styles. and then the faces. they were all pretty but their faces are what differentiated them and even then there were lots of twins, triplets even.

i almost forgot about the part that made me laugh outloud. while the girls were walking the stage, a little thing would pop up with their age, country and hobbies. so many were "being social" or "hanging out with friends". no wait, those were both for the same girl!

and then there was the dancing. i'm not joking. maybe this happens every time, i've never seen one of these things before, but the dancing. honestly. there was some hip hop dancy group thing who sang and jumped around on stage and the girls had some choreographed dance-a-long behind them, smiling the whole time. it was awful. reminded me of barbies. actual barbies. you know when you hold a barbie by its feet and make it dance. and the barbie is probably naked, with teased hair sticking up everywhere and makeup you put on her yourself with permanent marker way back. you know what i mean. well the girls didn't look quite that bad, but the dancing was horrible.

and then came the evening gown portion. some dresses were really nice, but some were horrible. again there was choreographed movements and more signing, some italian this time.

and then DUM DUM DUMMMMMM the question! "and this is the hardest part of the whole competition". right, let me give you an example of a question actually asked in the pageant. "what is your biggest fear?" and the answer: "losing my family." obviously.

the "tomboy" from the us came third or fourth or something. canada didn't even make the top ten (though don't scoff yet - canada won last year). i can't remember who won exactly but i can assure you she was tall and skinny with perfect skin and blazing white teeth. and definitely not me.

Monday, July 24

new job

i think "new job" has been the title of multiple posts. back that up - i KNOW it has. whose blog is this anyways? mine i tell you!

okay, so new job. yes i started my new job today after two weeks off (a blessing, and i don't often use that word) and i have lots to say.

first let me start off with this: i AM really excited about this job, but the actual me-jumping-around excitement wore off about two weeks ago. no one can run on adrenaline and pure joy for that long. so please forgive me if i don't sound super duper happy. i am, you just have to believe me.

i got to work on time - a good start to a new job - and parked in the pay lot. parking is super cheap, only $40/month compared to $120/month at my old building, and there's no waiting list. but i'll be biking, at least until it gets so cold it burns, so i opted out of the parking. today i drove because even though i was shown around the building (aka the maze) two fridays ago when i went in, there was no way i was going to be able to find the shower. the shower. that's right: there's only one shower in the whole building. it's an old building, i'll give them that, but you'd think that they could add in a shower or two here and there. i digress.

i drove to work because it was easier. i arrived on time and was promptly picked up at the front desk by my new boss who is super nice and taken to security to get my building pass. my picture turned out okay, not smashing. they never do.

then it was off to my little cubicle. it's actually big for a cubicle, but it's a second row cubicle meaning the only natural light i get bounces off the ceiling and into my space. not a problem cause i'm new and i was REALLY spoiled at my last job with the view i had.

today was mostly spent reading the orientation guide and stuff to do with the job. i'm working as an assistant scientific screening officer with the pesticide management regulatory agency, or pmra. i had a nice IT guy come and show me all sorts of things about the programs on my computer. you might think this is a little over-the-top, but health canada uses archeaic programs that i'm not all that familiar with so it was nice. plus he gave me all sorts of tips for using my double monitors. that's right baby, two 17-inch flat screens. all mine [insert evil laughter here].

i'm really fortunate because a guy i worked with two years ago at environment canada was in the same competition and started just over three weeks ago in the same group. so he's been really helpful at showing me the ropes, including the cafeteria across the street and the picnic tables outside. that's where we ate lunch and i got to talk to some of my new coworkers outside the office which is always nice.

i had a hard time staying alert and focused due to lack of sleep (two little cats think 5am is a good time to bother this girl and this was annoying but okay when i could sleep until 1pm) and being freezing (i get cold when i'm tired and hungry) but i got through lots of reading and managed to get a better handle on the building. i know my way to my desk and from there to the kitchen area, the bathroom and the shower. i will be biking tomorrow.

and so off i go to hopefully get more sleep than last night. i'm definitely looking forward to the exercise in the morning. it's been a while since i busted disco out, disco being my bike. if you have any questions about my new job i'm more than happy to answer them. i didn't want this post getting too out of control. so leave a comment or email me (gmail or work: myfirstname_mylastnameAThc-sc.gc.ca) and no, it's not batman_returns though i would be the coolest person if it was.

Sunday, July 23

double dipping the weekend

weekend number one
j and i went up to the cottage thursday night. we had a mission: clean up fallen trees. there was only one chainsaw so i read. i read lots. it was really lucky that there was no damage to the cottage.


we slept in the tent again friday night. i'm looking forward to when we have some decent mattresses, just two single thermarests or something (i know next to nothing about mattresses). that will make sleeping much more comfy and much less ouchy.

weekend number two
we got back to town saturday afternoon. j napped while i played around with flickr then we headed waaaay out of town for a house-warming party at a car guy's house. it was a nice house, but i really don't think i could live that far out. anyways, big t was my entertainment since i really couldn't handle the my-kid-has-learnin-disbilities (spelt wrong on purpose) talks going on with the wives. eek, i'm a wife! i decided that i don't make a good "wife" in this sense.

we got home, put in a movie and spent the rest of the night fighting off sleep. good times.

today was my last day of unemployment so i did lots and did nothing at the same time. i'm sure i'll have lots to say tomorrow about the new job. i'm sure it will be something like this: spent all day reading to learn all sorts of new things. have two smashing monitors though. tired. you know, along those lines.

Thursday, July 20

when weeks fly....

today feels like friday because j and i are heading up to the cottage tonight (he gets every second friday off from working compressed work weeks - good deal), but only staying until either tomorrow night or early saturday. we have things to do in town saturday and sunday. so it feels like a friday and i'm sitting here asking myself where my last week off has gone. but really, i had a good time. i packed it full of sleeping and going to the gym and playing baseball and hanging out with friends. i couldn't be luckier.

last night after our slaughter-fest of a game (we won 20-2) we all went to grace o'malleys. i had the fajita chicken wrap and loved it! i like that we make it out together lots. i have a good time every time we go, despite the slow slow service we normally get.


also, i came downstairs to finish some laundry i was doing and found this:

that's right, sandy in the dryer, cause it isn't hot enough already. they both love the heat and will lie in little patches of sun around the house. anyone else have cats who do this?

Tuesday, July 18

where to start?

i promised a post sunday. i'm late, but better be late posting than late for something else....

i'm going to apologize right now for the lack of flow in this post. there's so much going on in my head and it seems like i'm just blurting out thought after thought, but really, a blog isn't about a two-sided conversation, it's about my thoughts and there you have it.

we bought our tent and set it up for the first time on saturday, in less than 5 minutes. it's a nice little tent. we're very happy with it. here's a picture:



it's a sierra designs antares 3-person 3-season. it came with some extras: a footprint, a ceiling-hangy-thingy, and two hangy-thingies for "coffee" (where coffee = our water bottles). it has two doors and an idiot-proof fly. it's amazing what they think of when it's not a canadian tire special. spend a little more money, get a LOT more.

we were so happy that we slept in it saturday night. it is almost all screen so we were able to look up at the stars (bright out at the cottage compared to in the city). now we're in the market for some camping accessories so we can actually go camping. any takers? sometime in august or september?

sunday was s's birthday. we had dinner with the grandparents that involved cake. lots and lots of cake.



she's been getting card after card in the mail (think i'm jealous? i'm lucky to get a card or two, not tens of them!) and present after present. good haul, s!

***

my yesterday was great. i woke up to an email from a friend asking if i wanted to go to the beach. of course i did so i went to the gym and then showered and headed out. we went to britannia beach for about 3 hours. it was beautiful! i had never been and i'm not sure why. there were lots of people there, but it was definitely not packed. it was hothothot (31 but felt like 41) and the water was warm. the sand went all the way out into the water. beautiful, i'm telling you. and now i'm hooked. i want to go again today, but i'm a tad burnt. i put on tons of sunscreen but you can't really help it if it's that hot and you're out in the hottest part of the day. it wasreally a scorcher.

***

my big plan, and i'm really not sure if this will work, is to start going to the gym before work. i haven't been going much lately (like twice in the past two months - i'm terrible) but really, i get home from work and have baseball or have to get groceries or have to do something else.. there doesn't seem to be anytime for the gym. so i'm going to make time. and that time just happens to be early in the morning. but i figure if i work from 9-5 i should have time in the morning without getting up before the sun. i can bike to the gym, work out and then bike to work. bike home obviously and only have to shower twice instead of three times. i know i'll feel good about it so i'm going to do it. keep asking me about it.

Friday, July 14

restless in canada

just my luck: the night before the only morning that i have to be up for, i can't sleep. it might have something to do with the hour+ nap i had this afternoon (lying in the sun really drains you) or the 5+ cans of diet coke i had tonight. either way, it's after 3am and i'm wired.

contrary to my last post, i heard back from my new boss today and am expected there at 8:30 tomorrow morning. i'm excited but 8:30?? how quickly you forget that such a time actually exists.

so i go in for an hour and then i pack all sorts of things into my day and hope that my ~4 hours of sleep will keep me going. i have to mail some things off and find a birthday present for s and possibly my brother as well, i want to get my hair cut (but this won't likely happen) and go see a friend. i'm sure there are tons of other things.. oh, buy a tent while the sale is still on (we're leaning towards the sierra designs antares 3-season 3-person, m). but who knows, i might get home from "work" and sleep the day away. wouldn't that be grand.

so heading up to the cottage tomorrow once j gets home from work. have you seen the weather forcast? hot and sunny. for reals. part of me wants to stay in town just so i can shower (sulfur-smelling water makes for a non-clean-feeling shower) whenever the need arises. did i mention that i don't get along well with lake water?

onto the next train of thought: tonight was p's birthday and we went out to le biftheque, which was much more upscale than i imagined. i ate lots and drank copious amounts of diet pop (4 can-sized glasses - gross). i even had some chocolately chocolate cake. then bowling. i'm terrible at bowling, but managed to win the second game. i took pictures when i was ahead after the first frame(?) but not again at the end showing me as the big winner. but really, the big winner was big T who beat her closest opponent by ~90 points. wow. i didn't even score 90 points in the first game.

well enjoy whatever weekend summery plans you have. i'll report back sunday.

Thursday, July 13

quickly now

just a quick post to say that i heard back from my new manager and have a start date now: monday, july 24th. this is excellent. a forced two week holiday in the middle of the summer. i couldn't be happier. i'll go in monday or tuesday next week to sign everything and be shown around. other than that i will be at home soaking up the sun, going to the gym during the day, scrapbooking, knitting, watching tv or whatever else i choose to do. sweet deal!

speaking of scrapbooking, that's what i did yesterday between loads of laundry. i got three pages of my wedding album done and it's looking good. i've set up one of the bedrooms upstairs as my scrapbooking room. it's pretty nice.

to the backyard!

Wednesday, July 12

new job - on hold

i just realized that i haven't said anything about my new job yet and you all must be going crazy waiting for news. the news is this: i have not yet received my letter of offer so i'm sitting at home. i'm taking this as a forced couple of days/ a week off. i know that i have the job so i'm not worried, it's just a matter of HR coming through with the letter for me. as soon as i get the call i can go in and sign it and start the next day.

and i've heard from my buddy who also works there that they aren't starting training until i get there so he's bored out of his mind. sucker! but he's getting paid....

and so you have it. back to the couch, captain no-work!

Tuesday, July 11

happy anniversary! happy anniversary!

no joke, j and i sing this to each other. at least we did this year and last. so here it goes, in written form: happy anniversary! happy anniversary!

so we've been married two years and i finally get brought flowers... nevermind that it was only one flower and it was picked right outside our house.



it's the thought that counts.

and now, when i tell you what we did, please don't be expecting any super-romantic mushy expensive night because that's just not who we are. you should know us better than that.



we had every intention of buying a tent. yes, a tent for camping. on our anniversary we buy something that we can use together (last year it was sheets and that was because our cats essentially ruined our old ones) so this year a tent is the plan. we went into bell's corners where le baron is and had dinner at east side marios. j kept the surprises coming by ordering pasta with shrimp (and i thought i knew him well - philly steak sandwich is his usual) and caesar salad and eating just as much bread as i did. weird. we sat on the patio and had a good time.

once we were sufficiently stuffed we went over to le baron and found that it had been closed for 2 and a half hours. the best part is that we knew since s works there. oops! so we went to bayshore instead to get j some sandals. no luck.

we ended our night by watching derailed and eating jello and bananas. mmm mmmm mmmmm.

thanks to everyone who wished us a happy anniversary. and thanks to my ball team for playing without me last night.

oh, my parents came by sunday afternoon and brought us this:



4 funky placemats and napkins because 2nd anniversaries call for cotton. they will look really good in our new place.

Sunday, July 9

HOPE


i have officially finished my job. my desk was a complete mess and i was scrambling to get everything done and i did. i was able to leave just after 2pm.

j and i went to the east end and finished designing our new place. we decided to not tell anyone what kinds of things we picked and then j went and told a couple of our friends that night so i don't know what to tell you. i think i'll wait and post pictures once we're there and all set up.

afterwards, we went out to dinner at montana's. if you know me then you know that i love their country cob salad and get it all the time and this time was no different. i was starving so i ate the whole thing and loved every piece of it.

and then we went out to see the new pirates movie, which was great. i wrote more about it on my other blog, batman's library. it was great and i can't wait for the third one.

yesterday we spent all day on the beach at the hope beach volleyball tournament. it was fun but i definitely was getting really frustrated with my team. i was hoping for a higher skill level (but really shouldn't have been) and also for guys who wouldn't run right in front of me to get a ball. yeah, thanks, i could have had that. and i didn't even play like crap for them to think i couldn't do it. but it was nice to be outside and to see lots of people i knew. i even ran into my two local cousins who i never ever see.



we got home and showered (oh, what a wonderful feeling) and slept. after eating we went out to see our new place. the only updates are that they moved the dumpster.



then we ate some more and went to bed. obviously we were pretty worn out from our long day.

Friday, July 7

wee wee while on the welephone

i never EVER thought i would see this... but wait for it, i have to set it up. i spend 8 hours or so at work a day and so have to urinate at least once. i consider this normal. what is not normal is for someone else in the office to come into the bathroom wearing a headset, talking on said headset, and proceed to pee WHILE TALKING!!

i will admit that i can understand if you're at home and talking to someone who you don't particularly want to be talking to and they're talkingtalkingtalking. you know that kind of person, everyone does. they just keep going and going and you can't even tell them "sorry i really have to pee. i'll call you back" (and then conveniently forget to call them back because you can't stand their hour-long rants) so you pee. and you cover the phone because honestly, who pees while they're talking to someone on the phone. in this instance, i say all is forgiven because you aren't actually talking.

what i can't forgive is doing this at work in a communal bathroom when there's someone else around while talking! that was a huge sentence but everything is in there and you can add punctuation as you see fit. has this ever happened to you? i was stunned. so i finished washing my hands, dried them, and promptly went and told my coworkers. we all laughed.

Thursday, July 6

new fridge!



s stayed home yesterday morning and welcomed the fridge delivery guys. they unloaded our new fridge and brought it inside. when i got home from work it was already cold inside.

you better believe that i went out, and, $100 later, stocked the fridge. it still looks VERY bare, but it will until we've acquired 16 more jars of bbq sauce.

it's stainless steel with the freezer on the bottom. it's really nice and big and bright. you can see through into the crisper drawers so you know when your fruit is rotting. finally.

anyways, we're all really happy to have food in the house again. 5 days is too long to go without a fridge. i had cold water last night and orange juice and cheese and, like in the barenaked ladies song, i went upstairs and just opened the fridge.

Tuesday, July 4

flickr updated!

i (finally) updated my flickr page. there are new pictures from the cottage, canada day and other miscellaneous us pictures. enojy!

Monday, July 3

canada day long weekend

the canada day festivities started off with a bike ride in the rain over the richard's house where we watched the soccer game. i hadn't seen those guys in a long time and it was nice to see them and talk.

we managed to leave just in time to be caught in the rain again on the way home. we stopped at home before heading downtown. i was meeting with my university housemates but j went to the hill and met up with bananapants. i was at a bar called oz with lots of people i hadn't seen in over two years. it was lots of fun. here's a picture of triplek!



and keeping to our streak of rainy-luck, we biked home in a huge thunderstorm. we were completely soaked through when we got home. we got out of our second skin, aka our clothing, showered and ran to the car with all of our cottage stuff. two hours later we were at the cottage and exhausted.

the cottage was nice, but there were tons of people up and so it was loud, annoyingly so. plus, sunday morning, j and i went down to the beach to eat our breakfast (when i say 'morning' i really mean afternoon, and when i say 'breakfast' i really mean chicken burgers). we were sitting there minding our own business when i look down and see the biggest spider i've ever seen! it was easily the size of my palm (back me up here, j). being the nice guy he is, j squashed him with a rake, but the beach wasn't the same after that. i tanned and ate on the porch the rest of the time. i swear that spider snacked on birds. it was huge. *shudder*

we left pretty early today and got home to a disaster of a house. it surprises me how crazy things get when you remove a fridge. there is food everywhere, bottles of condiments and ice cube trays all over the counter. plus our regular crap. so i cleaned and did laundry while j washed the car.

and guess what? we went out to get some cash and pick up the pizza we ordered and got CAUGHT IN THE RAIN!! honestly. worst.luck.ever.

Saturday, July 1

soccer madness

i had to bus downtown after work yesterday to pick something up. i managed to time my trip perfectly and get caught in the rain, sporadic but intense rain, and got drenched. i picked up the package - and even called j to say that i had the package - and jumped on a bus to get home.

said bus goes through little italy. i don't follow soccer but there was no doubt that italia had a game and that they won. i have never seen anything like this in person. preston street, the street that is little italy, was packed with flags and cars honking and people screaming. it took us almost half an hour to get through about a 10km stretch and at one point there were actually people pounding on the bus. it was insane.

and i was told that there were car loads full of people (waving flags and screaming of course) who were just going up and down preston. they would get to the end, u-turn, and do it all over again. insane.

the package was actually some coupons from the bank where we got our mortgage. we used them to get a new fridge last night. it's a sexy stainless stell, bottom-freezer type that we are super pleased with. and the brick was able to get it to us mid-week next week, which beats the bay by 2 weeks, at the earliest. so we got a super nice fridge for super cheap.

this morning's task: throwing out the rest of the food. why one fridge had about 17 bottles of bbq sauce is beyond me. but i have to say that it felt so good tossing all that stuff. all we have left is a couple bottles of mustard (yes, we have multiple bottles of mustard) and some pickles. i imagine that wednesday night we will go hog-wild buying all new food.

mr. fridge has made his exit by the way. he's standing outside right beside the house. j sprayed him off with the hose cause he smelled terrible and was covered in pink sticky stuff. just ask sandy who managed to get sticky all over her back and tail and had her first bath. now she's all fluffy and smells like baby shampoo.