Nothing going on

It's Thursday and that's about all that's going on. This cold is still hanging on no matter how I try to shake it. I haven't been to the gym this week, although I want to go... I just don't think the treadmill would be nearly as glamorous with my nose running faster than me. The dark circles under the eyes persists, but not as bad as last week. I actually had to put a little coverup on for a picture Darrell took of me last night to hide the dark eyes. I really don't like being confronted with pictures of myself anymore. All I can see when I look at them is the damage inflicted by graft vs host disease.. the tightness of the skin makes me look alot older than I am, and when I see it in a picture for some reason it's a lot more prominent than just seeing myself in the bathroom mirror. I see the dermatologist on Dec 5 to talk about starting light therapy. It is designed to break down the swelling under the skin that cuases the tightness and the choking off of the hair folicles. I may be too long gone for any of the hair to come back, but it would be nice to see some elasticity restored. I was supposed to have the treatment in the summer, but it involves drugs that make you light sensitive, and you have to stay covered up and try to avoid the sun... Summer is not the season for that.

In the mean time there's nto much going on. We're taking tomorrow off because of rememberance day on Saturday, and have no plans for the weekend so far. We may actually get around to turning al lthat planed wood into moulding for the bedroom.

Beginning of November

So far November hasn't been too bad. This weekend was quite productive, although I still haven't been able to kick the nasty cold. I am feeling a lot better, but still haven't been to the gym (no good spreading it around)in over a week. Maybe Tomorrow.

We did very little on Friday after work, basically kicked back with the TV. I called my sister, Amanda, to say happy birthday and talked to her for about an hour. She is now officially a quarter of a century old.

Saturday was a beautiful day, so we hauled the planer up into the driveway and finally started planing all the wood we bought for the moulding in our bedroom. We bought it all last spring, but got so busy in the yard over the summer that all in house projects were put on hold for fall and winter.

We got a pretty big pile of shavings by the end of it, but luckily our neighbour Sylvia has a horse and a pony so she wanted them for bedding. I ended up taking four wheel barrow loads full over to her which the horses should enjoy.

Sunday was my Grandpa, Joe, and my Brother, Lorne's birthday so I called both of them. Lorne wasn't home (Never is) so I left a message, but I got to talk to Grandpa for a while.

Sunday was also the 400th Anniversary of Guy Faulks Day, and Helen, being a Brit, celebrates it every year. This year was no exectpion. She and Brian made up a dummy Guy Faulks who hung out with all of us last weekend during all the Halloween stuff. Then Sunday we went over to the Bonds, (Bertis was there as well, but Chad and Nancey couldn't make it), lit a big fire, and tossed Guy on.

Then we lit some sparklers

Darrell videotaped the whole thing

Then we had baked potatoes, Hotdogs, and a cinnamon bun

It really was alot of fun. I think next year we should dress guy up in a George Bush mask and kill two birds with one stone...hahaha.

If you're unaware of who Guy Faulks is, he tried to blow up the British Parliament 400 years ago and was caught and executed for treason. These days I don't know if we celebrate Guy Faulks day because he was caught and executed, or because he tried to blow up parliament (Which I'm sure many people have want to do from time to time)

Take the test

Found this on Christa's Blog... I'd say it's mostly right. I'm closer to the end than the beginning but everyone had to start somewhere...hehehehe

The Bachelor Deliberate Gentle Sex Master (DGSMm) Straight-up. Studly. Congratulations, you are The Bachelor. You're an honest, good-thinking guy, and though you're very sexually active, people don't perceive you as a male-slut or man-whore or guy-dick-putter-inner or whatever. You have a sterling reputation. You're a careful person, perhaps too much so for your friends' tastes, but guys like that in you. You probably don't kiss & tell. And you definitely don't brag. You know you don't have to prove anything to anyone. It's as if you believe in monogamy, so long as it's with lots of different people. Our guess is that you've got some kind of word-of-mouth going with the boys out there, and that in the future, your sex partners will get even more plentiful, and more attractive, too. You will settle down eventually, and make an excellent husband. You seem like the type who is into the idea of making copies of yourself, so you'll probably adopt lots of kids. Bear in mind, meanwhile, this can get expensive. ALWAYS AVOID: The Manchild CONSIDER: The Bachelor, The Backrubber Link: The 32-Type Dating Test by OkCupid - Free Online Dating.

Getting Better

I'm feeling alot better today. Still stuffy and sniffley, but not all dragged out and generally yucky like the past two days. I really should have taken yesterday off too, but couldn't justify it. I looked awful. Lately when I get sick for some reason the area around my eyes gets really dark like a racoon. It's something in the past couple years, but nothing my doctor has any concern about. Just not getting the rest required for this body which is a lot older than it used to be and doesn't bounce back as easily. Apparently it only gets Worse...so I've got that to look forward to. YAY.

I did manage to get a bunch done yesterday, despite the cold. I've got a long way to go..... and a short time to get there. (Couldn't resist)I think I'm okay for time as long as nothing large, surprising, and immediate comes through the door. Although with Christmas ads starting there's a good chance I'll be bogged down pretty soon.

Day Off

I took the day off yesterday and spent the majority of it wrapped in a blanket on the couch in front of the TV. Rosie O'Donnell is on The View now. Just thought I'd throw that in... I used to love her show when I was recovering at home.

We got absolutely no Trick or Treaters to the door last night. There's only two young kids on our street. Yet somehow the candy bowl kept getting emptier and emptier.

I'm not anywhere near 100% today, in fact 80% is something to aspire to at the moment, but I couldn't afford to take yet another day off. I would fall way to far behind and not get things done. The nice thing about a job like mine is that most everything works on a deadline, so as you can take a personal day here and there as long as you hit your deadline.... the drawback is that deadlines don't care if you catch a nasty cold.

Great weekend

We had a really good weekend. Friday night we went to Brian and Helen's place, for Bertis' freedom 36 party. He is leaving the law world and going back to something he loves, teaching piano. Of course he was there as well, and Chad and Nancy also made it out. Helen had goody bags made up and games picked out to play. We played pass the bag, where we all sat in a circle and passed a bag full of various wardrobe items around and around until the music stopped and the person left holding the bag had to pull something out and put it on. The person wearing the most items at the end (Which was me) won. The bag had lots of lovely ladies undergarments and scarves and various knitted things, it was really quite funny, especially watching Chad squeeze into a shirt that was Helen's size. We also had a game of Pin the tail on the donkey, which ended with a tie breaker round between Chad and Bertis. Some of the goody bags had bubble solution in them and that was alot of fun. We were blowing bubbles and the dogs were trying to catch them, well Elton and Yorky were trying to catch them, Tiff was having nothing to do with it. Lots of lovely coctails, laughs, and good conversations = really good time.

Saturday was a quiet morning. Our bookkeeper Trish dropped her computer by so Darrell could have a look at it, then we popped out to do some browsing. We found a nice throw rug for under the Dining room table on clearance. It's absolutely perfect as it has varying shades of green and a bamboo pattern on it, so it goes perfectly with the vase and giant bamboo plant in the center of the table. The rug helps break up the flooring a little for the eye. The flooring looks really great, but it was feeling pretty sparce with all that open space between the living and dining area, so this just breaks it up a little. We spent the rest of Saturday basically cleaning, trying to get rid of the thin layer of green dust created from cutting the flooring. Just when you think you've got it all, you move a pot or something and there's more.

Sunday I tried to get caught up on all the other household chores that fell by the wayside because of the new floor, like Laundry. I got most of it done, but we headed out around 5 to Bertis' place for dinner and a horror movie. Brian and Helen were there as well and Bertis and the Bonds dressed in Costume. Darrell and I were the spoil sports who arrived costumeless. Altough I was wearing faded jeans and a button up moosehead shirt over a t-shirt so Helen said I may have been dressed as a lesbian. Helen was dresses as a black cat with a feather boa, and in true cat fashion was shedding all over her chair... hehehe, Brian was dressed all in black with bat wings and black face paint, and Bertis was dressed as Clark Kent. Clark Kent You ask? yes, he was in a suit with the top buttons of the shirt open to reveal his superman shirt below. He had gone above and beyond decorating the inside of his house with carved pumpkins and candles everywhere, it was really nice. And he made "rest in peas" and "Rigga-mortis" (Named by Darrell) for dinner. The first was peas in a creamy sauce with a tombstone piece of toast and the second was a nice riggatoni pasta dish. Darrell & I brought everyone treats (Double thick caramilk Bars) and handed those out, then we watched "Scream", and had cake. We called it an early night being Sunday and all, and were home in time to catch Desperate Housewives then call it a night.

I've developed a runny nose today, so I'm not enjoying being at work, and hopefully I can get enough done that I may be able to stay at home tomorrow and get over it.

Friday Feast October 27, 2006

Appetizer
Create a new candle scent.
bacon... who doesn't love the sent of fresh cooked bacon? Or Chicken Soup. Or Banana Bread.

Soup
Name one way you show affection to others.
I'm a hugger.

Salad
What is your favorite writing instrument?
Just your basic ball point pen.(Not that I actually write much anymore, I mostly type and print)

Main Course
If you were given $25 to spend anywhere online, from which site would you buy?
Chapters.ca

Dessert
Are you dressing up for Halloween? If so, what are you going to be?
No I'm not. I don't normally go in for the Halloween dress up thing. I guess I could mismatch my belt and shoes and go as a straight guy.

Tis Done!

We got the last of the Transition pieces put down last night and the floor is now completely finished. I still have to paint the walls and ceiling sometime this year and replace all the awful old moulding, but the floor is done. There are now only two rooms on the main floor of the house with their original flooring... their days are numbered...it's a big number though because we have a pretty major renovation planned there and won't be able to afford it in the immediate future. It involves breaking through the bathroom wall into the spare bedroom closet and closing that off to extend the bathroom. Then the installation of a big whirlpool tub and separate shower... as I said, can't afford it now, in fact it may be a couple years off, so in the mean time some paint and little crack fill will have to suffice.

That's the thing about owning a home, you just finish one project and you're already planning the next five. I think if I ever came into a big chunck of money I would get into flipping houses. The market in Saint John is growing rapidly and I think someone with the right know how would make a lot of money. I love doing all that cosmetic type work, the tiling, flooring, painting... all that stuff is really fun to me, but I'd definitely need someone with more knowhow when it came to the big structural stuff... I mean I'm pretty good with the crack fill, but I've never tried or been shown how to actually do drywall... and while I'm good at changing a light fixture or moving a junction box...I'm certainly no electrician. I really like the idea of house flipping though, I don't know how the actual practical would go if I ever got into it, but the idea is nice.

I had a really good cardio workout yesterday and structured it differently than in the past. I started on the treadmill and alternated, running one full lap, then walking half a lap, running another full one. I actually managed to run an entire mile and walk another half mile in 20 minutes. Then I figured I'd try out the stair machine (never used it before)and did pretty good on it for a first timer. If I'd have known exactly how hard it was, I may have done it first instead of after the treadmill, but I got through the entire 20 minutes, 60 floors, set to random, and only having to pause a couple times near the end.

I bet I could head into our basement, hop on the eliptical trainer and sing "Willkommen" all the way through at this point even with the german accent and all the dialog. Maybe even get partway through "So What".

Flooring is Finished !!! Mostly

Well we got it all down with the exception of three transition strips that we will finish after work today. The channel for one of them needs to be widened a bit and there needs to be a slight riser put in all of them because we used the 12mm flooring. Incidentally if you are thinking of putting laminate flooring in your house, don't cheap out and buy the 7 or 8 mm stuff for 99 cents a square foot. You really do get what you pay for. This is the third time we've done laminate, the first was the bedroom and we used the 8mm it was pretty good to work with and we were mostly happy with the way it turned out, the second we also used the 8mm in Mike and Kathy's living room... it was a different brand and wasn't as easy to work with, but the 12mm is by far superior to either time. Spend the extra dollar a square foot, buy the brand name stuff, and don't use anything less than 10mm flooring and you'll have the best results.

As promised pictures.......

Saturday (Day 01) ripping up old flooring and cleaning floor

Sunday (Day 02) Laying the Laminate

Monday (Day 03)finshed the hallway

Got past the odd angle and called it a night

Tuesday (Day 04) Finished just about everything

Under the dog pictures is where the Aquarium will go

Installing transition strips

It passes the Tiffy test

There is still a channel to widen at the entryway for the transition strip to go down, and a riser to put at the top of the stairs for that transition to be glued to. We have enough left over to do the landing in the stairway, so I am going to get some white semigloss and some red oak stain, then paint the backs of the stairs white and plane the existing paint off the stair treads and stain them to match the flooring (At least that isn't an expensive undertaking).

OWW my knees!

We had a surprising weekend. Friday we left work early and hit O'Leary's for a beer, then went home had a little dinner, and popped over to our neighbours Dave & Kathy's place for a couple more beers.

Saturday we got up and really didn't have a plan of what we wanted to accomplish for the weekend. It was Darrell's first real chance for some down time since we got back, because he had to work last Saturday, so we intentionally didn't plan anything. We ended up taking a fateful trip to Kent just to look around and see what we could see. Well we saw 12mm laminate flooring on sale for $1.99 a square foot. From the moment we moved in, our plan was to take up the carpet in the living room, linolium in the hallway and dining area, and do the entire space with nice laminate flooring. Since it's an open concept house it is essentially all one floor. Once we did the ceramic tile in the entryway and kitchen we actually had five different sections of flooring from the kitchen to the hallway... we had tile in kitchen to linolium in Dining area, carpet in living area, tile in entryway, and linolium in Hallway... I hated it, but we weren't financially prepared to change it just yet. Well anyway, the flooring was on sale, so we bit the bullet, pulled out the Kent Card and took the plunge. After all we've redone six floors in the past couple months and none of them were ours... we really should have something to show for the bruises on our knees.

We got the flooring home and unloaded and proceeded to get right to work pulling up carpet and linolium, which was alot faster and easier than anticipated since the linolium was only partially glued in the Hallway and not glued at all in the dining room. Once we got all the floors stripped and cleaned we sat and watched a little TV then headed for bed.

Sunday we got up relatively early for a Sunday, and started putting the floor down. There were a few trips to the Kent store for various supplies (thank God for Sunday Shopping.... it was 20 years ago in BC), but we made it to the dividing wall that has the big dog pictures on it (Basically the edge of the dining area) and most of the way across the hallway, before stopping for the night.

Monday we headed into work as usual. I forgot my gym bag so I didn't get my work out in, but will make up for it today. Then stopped at Dolan Road Irving for some turkey Vegtable soup on the way home, then back to work once we got home. There was a bunch of stuff that needed to be done with plants etc since they were all sitting on the dining room side while we did the living room and that took a little while. I got to work finishing the hallway while Darrell starting on the dining room, then he popped out for more glue (yes we are actually using glue even though you don't have to... we found that some of the end joints in the bedroom laminate tend to pull a little and leave a very tiny gap... so the glue will stop this from happening), and then the power went out. So being stumped with no power, we decided to drive into Rothesay and get a coffee (surely there would be power there)... no good, they were also blacked out. We turned around headed back toward the airport (maybe that side would have power) it was all black up that way to. The glow from the city could be seen in the sky so we headed down Loch Lommand toward town figuring we'd eventually drive back into the power and find an Irving for Coffee. Just past Churchland road the lights came back on, so we aborted the mission, turned around, headed home and made coffee there. It must've been a big blackout though, from what we could tell it took out Rothesay and a huge chunk of East Saint John. At any rate we got back to work. I was on the very last row of the hallway when the lights went out so I finished that and started helping Darrell with the dining room. The part of the cabinet that juts out pastthe kitchen is on and angle and so is part of the kitchen floor, so the dining room wasn't a case of chop the end off the board and use the left over to start the next row. It required some extra attention and thought and was a lot slower going than the rest of the living room. We didn't actually finish either. It got be midnight and then started rounding on 1 O'clock by the time we got all the rows with the angles done, and instead of pushing on even later to finish the square section we called it a night.

Tonight we finish.....Tomorrow Pictures

Walk it off

Okay.. Today... Legs.... soooooooo Stiff and achey. But not so stiff and achey as in I overdid it, just stiff and achey as in stretch it out and walk around a bit.
It's all good.

Friday Feast October 20, 2006

Appetizer
What is your favorite beverage?
I don't know if I'd call it my favourite but I have it first thing everyday.... Coffee. The rest of the day I drink water. Every now and then I get a craving for a really really cold chocolate milk.

Soup
Name 3 things that are on your computer desk at home or work.
There's not a lot of room on my computer desk for much more than my computers. there are five moniters, a mixing board, a television moniter, DVD and VCR, stacks of blank DVDs, stacks of full back up DVDs, and more paper with scribbles and doodles and incomprehensible to anyone but me writing than you can imagine.

Salad
On a scale of 1-10 (with 10 being highest), how honest do you think you are?
I'm goning to go with a 9. I'm pretty much a call em like I see em kind of guy.

Main Course
If you could change the name of one city in the world, what would you rename it and why?
At the moment I'd rename Barrie Ontario to "Hell"... but that's just me being bitter from recent bad experiences there ... it's actually a very nice place.

Dessert
What stresses you out? What calms you down?
STRESSES ME OUT....People with no regard for others. People with cell phones clutched to their ears when they're driving... No one needs to talk to anyone that badly and if you do pull the hell over. There is a lack of basic courtesy and manners infiltrating society.

CALMS ME DOWN......... Singing, Reading, Painting, The Dogs, Soaking in the Tub, 20 Minutes on the treadmill

Tore it up today!

Okay I don't like to brag... who am I kidding I do too, but I really tore it up onthe treadmill today despite aching thighs and calfs. I actually ran the first two laps... that's right all the way through at an incline of 3.5 no less, but that's not all. I wlked the third and then... wait for it.... yep you guessed it, ran the fourth, and walked out the rest of the twenty minutes. Then just for good measure moved it over to the eliptical trainer and did another 20 minutes on random level two. Those of you superfit cardio nuts will be saying to yourself big deal... but to mister 35 year old, only runs from danger, gut hanging slightly over belt... it's a pretty big deal.

Busy being Busy

I have been trying to stay busy, working on my Animation project primarily. It's still in it's infancy stages and hasn't taken hold of me yet, but I wish it would soon as it is too easy to be distracted from it. I'm sure it will click any time now.

I've been burning up the treadmill at the gym. I read some really helpful stuff on Amber's Blog "Cafe Physique" and realized I wasn't getting the best bang for my buck on the eliptical trainer, so I switched to the treadmill for the gravity resistance aspect of the workout. I've been pumping the incline up to 11 and power walking on a speed varying from 3 to 3.5 for twenty minutes at a time and I really do feel a huge difference over the Eliptical trainer. Yesterday I even ran the first lap.(which is kind of huge for me since I don't run unless I'm being chased by something.) This is really my first week back to my routine at the gym since we got back. I didn't do any weights at all last week, so this week I'm feeling that ache and throb a little more acutely. Mostly in my left shoulder which has been kind of gymped since I was just a kid. It's where I developed a cancerous tumour of the gland under that arm when I was six. It was cut out and I had big doses of radiation there, so it hasn't developed and is considerably weaker than the other side. My left bicep tries to compensate but it's not good enough when I do legs and shoulders like I did yesterday. I can pretty much only tone at the gym and not build since my shoulder is never going to be proportionate and all the muscles connected to it (Chest, Back, Arm) aren't going to develop proportionately either, so I'd start looking pretty lopsided after awhile...haha.

Last night I made a big dinner of Chicken Stroganoff (Not going to help get rid of the gut, but soooooo good) with red and yellow peppers.... yummy. Then we popped over to Bond's for a visit with Bertis and the Bonds. It seems like we haven't all been together in ages and I really missed them so it was nice to catch up and compare war stories of the last two weeks.

Weekend Update

We had a really great visit with Darrell's uncle Ken last week. After work on friday we all went out to Swiss Chalet for dinner and ate way too much. This is the first time Ken has been to visit since we bought the house last year so he wanted to get us a house warming gift and bought us a 55 gallon aquarium from Walmart before we went for dinner. Darrell was torn between the aquarium and a dvd recorder, but Futureshop was out of stock on the recorder model he wanted so fate made the decision for him. We've actually wanted to get an aquarium for along time now, so we're really happy, and besides when someone buys you a housewarming gift that expensive and extravagant it should be something people see when they come to your house. A dvd recorder would have just sat on the shelf, and while it would have been useful it is ultimatey just another component in your stereo/tv stand... an aquarium on the other hand is hard to miss. It also gives us a project we can work on together over the next couple months because the Aquarium kit comes with all the filters etc but no stand. We are planning to build our own stand and tank topper so that should be a really fun project. We looked around at the Aquarium Store in Barrie when we were in Ontario and found lots of stuff we really liked, and I took a lot of pictures of stands and toppers with my camera phone to give me ideas. We will probably stick with fresh water to start with since Salt water tanks are a lot of work and require a lot more equipment...not to mention that in a small market like Saint John with no real outlets the cost of salt water fish is outrageous and the selection is awful. In Ontario there are stores that specialize in just aquariums, fish, equipment, and extras so the selection is excellent and the prices are great too. You can get living corral, lion fish you name it. One of the stores we were in had a 2000 gallon tank with two black tipped reef sharks in it, unfortunately I think the skarks were way too big for the tank and it seemed really cruel once you got over the initial excitement of seeing them so close.

Saturday Darrell had to go to Miramichi to shoot an interview for CTV. He had to get up really early so Ken decided to get up and head on his way home at the same time. I got up and said goodbye to Ken, it was around 7am, then once everyone was gone I went back to bed. I slept in until 10 ish when our neighbour down the road rang the doorbell with his son selling apples for Beavers. The only cash I had in the entire house was a Quarter so I gave it to him (No I didn't take an apple). Turns out Little girls are now allowed to join Cubs and Beavers... what the hell? I thought we had girl guides so they could have their own club. Why is it that Men and boys can no longer have clubs for just men and boys without some Bull feminist trying to break the door in. There seems to be no shortage of Women's only fitness and women's only this and that... hell even the gym I go to has a women's only section... but heaven forbid you try to open a men's club. And really, what sick parent would want their little girl joining a club called "Beavers" anyway? It's the kind of Irony only Larry Flynt could enjoy. But... I digress.

After Marshall and his son left I stayed up awhile to watch Saturday morning cartoons unfortunately they were all repeats of the ones I watched three weeks ago so I switched over to trading spaces or one of those other design shows on TLC. I just relaxed and watched TV until about 3 with Elton and Tiff lazing beside me on the couch, then Elton hopped up and headed into the bedroom, jumped up on the bed and curled up for a nap. It seemed like a good idea so I joined him and slept until 6. I really needed it.. the last two weeks of traveling and visiting and late nights tiling really wore me out. Darrell called a few minutes after I got up and I drove in to pick him up at CTV where he was dropping off their cruiser, then we headed home and basically flopped in front of the TV again until we went to bed at 10.

I slept in again on Sunday morning and for the first time in two weeks I actually felt like myself again. We did a bunch of those mundane chores around the house like laundry and cutting the grass, then we headed into town and wandered around the Kent store. They had a bunch of large area rugs on clearance and we found a really nice one for the bedroom. Then we headed home and cleaned and rearranged the bedroom. There's still a bunch of chores and stuff that need catching up, but all in all everything is back to business as usual around our place. We ended up with a three hour TV block consisting of the New Show.. Brothers & Sisters, The Amazing Race {(The girl with the amputated leg and her husband or boyfriend whichever came in first last night) I was pulling for them in the beginning but he's starting to annoy me}, and Desperate Housewives to cap it all off.

Today I have a commercial to produce and some work to do on my Canaport animation, then a trip to gym on my schedule.

Settling in

We are slowly settling back into our routine this week. It's nice to be home and back to something regular. I'm still pretty bitter and angry about the events and expense of our wasted vacation, but I'm thinking of it less and less as the days pass. It wasn't a complete waste but it ended so badly it tainted the entire trip. It's certainly not completely over either... Darrell is eventually going to have to find a way to forgive his mother for the hateful things she said and reestablish some kind of relationship with her... she's his flesh and blood after all. Lucky for me I don't share that connection so if I never see or speak to her again I won't lose any sleep over it, and if I do, for Darrell's sake, I will be polite.

This week has been fun having Darrell's Uncle here on his vacation. We are both wishing we hadn't gone to Ontario at all, and just taken our time off now while Ken is here instead. Ken brought his dog Jake with him and Jake is getting along well with Elton and Tiff. We had a nice dinner out at Swiss Chalet on Wednesday evening (I've never been to Swiss Chalet before believe it or not.) It was so good we plan to go back tonight for dinner. I made a big feast of Fetucinni Carbonara with some red and yellow bell peppers, and mushrooms for dinner last night. I usually make fetucinni when we're having someone for dinner it's one of those things that never misses.

We don't have any set plans about what we're doing this weekend yet. I think Ken may be heading back to Ontario on Saturday or Sunday, so we're playing everything by ear.

Finally Home!!

We are finally home from Ontario, or Hell whichever you prefer.
We left last Wednesday and drove strait through to Barrie. We spent the first night(and every night after) at Darrell's Uncle Ken's and then went out to the school where Darrell's dad works for the retirement party the other janitorial staff was throwing the next day. Friday was his official last day of work and we were all suposed to go out for a big fancy dinner, but Darrell's sister's (Steph) asthma kicked up a fuss and we got a bucket of KFC instead. Saturday we drove around a bit and checked out some of the stores we don't have in Saint John, and basically took it easy.
Sunday we got started on the tiling of the kitchen floor. We were originally only suposed to do the kitchen floor and the front landing but by the time we had got to Ontario somehow it had evolved into the Kitchen floor, Front landing, Upstairs Bathroom, Steph's Kitchen, and Steph's Bathroom. We spent the next four days on our hands and knees like Hebrew slaves tiling the various floors. It was hard work and we were up until roughly 2 am each night completing it. Needless to say there wasn't really an oportunity for visiting.
Thursday we headed into Toronto and spent the day wandering the downtown. We found the jewellery emporium where we bought Darrell's chain a while back and picked up another for me. Then we headed out to Sheridan Nurseries in Oakville where we got a really really great deal on a couple palm trees and a jasmine vine (as if we need more plants) all for just $25.
We were planning to leave on Saturday Morning, but Friday afternoon Darrell's Mother and Sister started a big ugly scene that I won't even get into on this blog, so we grabbed whatever we had at the house (We had been staying at Ken's so it wasn't much), headed back to Ken's, packed and were on the road between midnight and 1 O'clock it's all a bit of a blur. Ken followed us out (He's on vaction and was planning to come out with us anyway he just hadn't planned on it happening quite the way it did.) We drove strait through again with several stops along the way to rest and get coffee. We've always noticed that every coffee place in Ontario serves coffee so hot it's like it's been brewed through a thermonuclear reactor, but I have come to the conclusion on this trip that it is that hot because it is pumped strait from Hell.
We finally pulled into our driveway around midnight on Saturday, unpacked a little and hit the sack. We spent Sunday unpacking and picking up groceries etc, and Monday was a fairly laid back day. Now I think I could use an actual week off to recover from our "Vacation".

Another Monday

Another Weekend has come and gone. Friday night I went out to the Blue Olive to hear Opa and wish Alex all the best on his theatre tour. There was a good turn out of people and I had a really good time.

I spent Saturday morning watching Cartoons.I haven't done that in such a long time, but one of my favorite comics growing up (The Legion of Superheroes) has been made into a saturday morning cartoon and I just couldn't help myself. I ended up watching the new Shaggy and Scooby Doo and Batman before I finally got up and started cleaning the house.We spent the remainded of Saturday and most of Sunday cleaning the house and getting ready for our trip to Ontario. We're heading out Wednesday and won't be back until around the 9th. There's still some stuff to do between now and then, but thankfully not too much. We parked infront of the TV on Sunday night about 8 pm and watched a new show called Brothers and Sisters (which I really enjoyed), Followed by the Amazing Race (My favorite couple came first this week), then the season premiere of Desperate Housewives (Nearly pissed laughing over Bre's Orgasm bit), And then finally ended the evening with an episode of Footballer's Wives on the BBC. Wow what a way to waste four hours.

Today has been pretty good so far. I just got back from the gym after an hour and half long Upperbody workout and cardio. It kind of sucks I'll miss a whole week, but thankfully I'm only just getting back into it so it really won't be that big a deal in the long run. I still have alot of work to get finished before we take off so today and tomorrow are going to be busy busy days.

Friday Feast September 22, 2006

Appetizer
Measured in minutes or hours, how much exercise have you had in the last week?
It will be about 8 hours when I get back from the gym this morning. I've spent about and hour and a half a day for five straight days.

Soup
If you had to change your blog title to something else, what would it be?
Here I am

Salad
Name one television show you watched when you were 9-12 years old.
Superfriends

Main Course
If someone gave you $50 to spend with the one condition that it had to be educational, what would you purchase?
guitar lesson books

Dessert
Do you tend to prefer dark colors, neutral shades, or lighter/pastel hues?
I like bold strong colours. Deep reds, bright blues, dark greens.

Still a little sore

I'm surprised how easy it has been to fall back into the habit of hitting the gym everyday again. Granted it's only been a week, but I haven't missed a day or felt like missing one. I'm still a little sore in places, but it's a good sore. I did a day of Cardio & abs Friday, Chest & Back workout with some cardio and abs Monday, Cardio and abs Tuesday, Legs & Shoulders with some cardio and abs Wednesday, and am scheduled for cardio and abs today. Now I just have to wrk at adjusting my diet to get rid of my gut... no point having firm abs if they're hiding under a layer of flab.

We're off to Ontario next week for Darrell's father's retirement so I won't get a chance to make it to the gym and the diet adjustment is probably a no go for that week as well.

Monday

We had a pretty layed back weekend. Friday night we went out for dinner with Bertis and the Bonds at the Vitos in Rothesay. Saturday we popped over to Mike's for a few drinks, and Sunday we did not much at all. I started getting the fabric ripped off the chair and sofa set we got from Mike and Kathy. There are a lot of staples and the fabric is really dirty from ten years of Hound dog living on it, but the frame and springs are good. I found a couch I liked the look of in the Leon's flyer and am thinking I may try to reconstruct Mike and Kathy's in that style. It will mean taking the frame apart and rebuilding parts of it, but I think I'm up to the task. It's not something I'll be completing in the immediate future anyway, since I can't afford the fabric at the moment, but I can start planning and mapping it out, and maybe even get the wood I need to change the frame. I had thought of doing it in a combination of vinyl and suede, but the style I want to use calls for stuffed cushions and the covers can't be removed to wash them. So considering how bad it smells from one dog being on it all that time I don't think I'll use a fabric that can let in the smell of our two dogs. Granted Hound dogs have a very strong aroma compared to Larbador retrievers and ours are very clean dogs, but I just think I'll avoid the whole problem of cleaning by using all vinyl.

We tuned into the season premier of the Amazing Race last night and really enjoyed it. There are some really stupid people on a couple of the teams, and there is one couple where the wife is an amputee with only one leg. At the moment I'm pulling for them because she's a real sport. She scaled a rope up the side of the great wall of china... I think I would have a hell of a hard time with too legs but she did it with one, and they came in third.

We also caught the series premiere and second episode of Men in Trees, which was quirky and fun, so I will probably stick with it for awhile.

I popped into the gym this morning for a good upper body workout. My first in a long time so I will probably be pretty stiff later this evening and tomorrow morning.

Friday Feast September 15,2006

Appetizer
What was the very last song you listened to?
Something by Phil Collins.... His Greatest hits cd is playing in the truck.

Soup
What is one company/store/corporation you would recommend that people stay away from?
Walmart!
1) When Walmart comes to a town all the little mom and pop stores etc can't compete with their low prices so they go out of business.
2) Walmart takes more jobs out of a community than it puts in. They are so powerful as far as pricing and distribution that companies have to jump through hoops to have their products sold in Walmart. Companies have to lower their prices often to the point of making almost no profits for themselves, and Walmart execs even go so far to encourage or hint to these manufacturers to take their plants overseas for cheaper labour to lower costs. This takes plants and jobs out of our countries.
3) Walmart pays it's employees minimum wage with no benefits or overtime. They are not union and if a store such as the one in Quebec does unionize they close it.
4) Walmart may bring a few minimum wage jobs into our communities, but their bottom line all goes across the border to the United States in the pockets of their shareholders. Meanwhile actual Canadian owned and operated corporations that pay their employees union wages and benefits like "Zellers" can't compete.

I could type all day because there's alot more than that. Watch the documentary "The Age of Walmart" to see what kind of a corporation you're dollars are supporting.Maybe the extra couple dollars at Zellers or Canadian tire won't seem such a high price to pay to avoid shopping at Walmart afterward.

Salad
On a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being highest, how much do you enjoy having your picture made?
5

Main Course
Besides a bookmark, what is something you've used to keep your place in a book?
Usually if it's a hardcover I use the inside flap of the dust cover. Soft cover books I usually use the receipt from the bag they came in

Dessert
Name a food that you like that most people don't.
I can't think of one. I could probably name a food I don't like that most people do like green peppers (too bitter and their strong flavour takes over any dish they're in), or Mushrooms (Fungus grows inthe dark in shit).

Canadian wins again!

Two seasons of Rockstar, two Canadian winners! Woo hoo! I'm glad Lucas won, but personally I prefer to listen to Dilana sing. I think she's going to have a really great career if she doesn't self destruct. I don't care for the growly gutteral Lucas sound so it's pretty safe to say there won't be any Supernova CDs in my collection, but there will probably be a Dilana CD provided she goes ahead and makes one.

I finally took the plunge and reinstated my gym membership yesterday. I found working out at home just wasn't working out. It's too easy to come home, make dinner then park in front of the tv. I can go back to getting out of the office for an hour everyday and hitting the gym. I'm usually pretty good at sticking with it that way, and since my work is so flexible I can go at times when the gym isn't really busy. What would be perfect would be to find a workout buddy whose schedule is as flexible as mine.

Nice Weekend

I had a pretty relaxing and quiet weekend. I putzed around the house doing little chores but nothing major.
Darrell was pretty busy though, he had to do some work for the CCMAs over the course of the weekend. They had various events & Presentations happening all weekend long and he and Mike were out shooting at some of them. There is another show later in the week in Vancouver to name a theatre after Red Robinson and Darrell was called to film a congratualtory message from one of the Celebs attending the CCMAs who couldn't make it to the Vancouver presentation. The person he was tapeing is someone I've been a fan of for about as long as I can remember so I invited myself along to help out on the shoot. We headed over to her hotel room at the hilton around 6 and shot the video message then came back to the office to edit it and get it ready to be sent off. We didn't get home until almost 9 last night so it made for a very long work day, but it was worth it...

Not the best picture of Darrell and I ever taken but Anne Murray looks pretty damn good!

My New Nephew

Finally some pictures of the latest addition to our family. Seth Lee Loiselle, born August 26, 2006 at 11:30 am and weighin in at 7 lbs 11 oz.

Here is my Sister, Amanda (who may kill me for posting this pic) and her new son right after a very long labour

Both are very tired

The Whole family; Daddy James, Mommy Amanda, Big Brother Cole, and New baby Seth

The Loiselle Men

How cute is this?

One week old!

Nice Long Weekend

We had a really nice long weekend. We mostly took it easy and relaxed. On Saturday we went to Kizzy's BBQ, which was awsome. I made a couple blueberry pies to bring along on Friday night. I got to see a lot of people I don't see nearly enough of, and later everyone was sitting around the living room singing while Kizzy's Uncle Gord and Jeff Scott played guitar. It was a really nice evening but ended way too early, most everyone was gone by 9 O'clock.

Sunday and Monday were just kick back and relax days with a little house work thrown in.

Tuesday

Not much going on today. I have alot of work to do on a project I can't seem to get inspired about so I'm very easily distracted by just about everything, like updating blog entries etc. This is going to be one of those projects that is just excruciating in the the beginning and then eventually (Soon I hope) something will click and I will be going full steam ahead.

Aside from a lot of work to do, there isn't much else going on. I have to travel to Halifax on Thursday for my regular every three month check up with my transplant doctor and that's about it.

I noticed that Survivor is entering into it's death throws this year. They are splitting the teams into races this time around, ie White, Black, Asian, Hispanic. It's offensive on every level and causing quite a controversy which tells me they are very desperate for ratings. I'm not surprised, the show was really different and interesting the first season, but by the end of the third season I was over it, and even if I wasn't completely over it, Survivor Allstar definitely drove the final nail into the coffin. When you get right down to it, it's a very boring show.. it's a bunch of people camping and scheming. You can tell which team is going to lose the immunity challenge by which team's drama is featured most prominently in that episode. It's no wonder it's tanking in the rating, and they are so desperate to revive the poor dying thing that they are willing to piss off every special interest group in North America, just to get the show in the public eye again. They claim the reason for the races idea... too many complaints that minorities weren't well enough repersented on the show. Oh well, if nothing else they got people talking about them again (even posting on their blogs about it.) There's my contribution to the Hype ... Survivor R.I.P.

Awsome Weekend

The weekend was awsome. I went to the Blue Olive Friday night to see Kizzy sing with Opa. She looked and sounded great as always. She had a few new songs from the last time I heard her as well, which was great. I especially enjoyed Time after Time. Chad dropped by around midnight and after the band was finished we headed over to the Dolan Road Irving for a bite.

Saturday we had a corn boil with Bertis and the Bonds over at Brian and Helen's place. It wasn't your regulation corn boil where you drink until you can't see and eat only corn until you turn yellow. There was steak, salads, potatoes, deserts, and of course corn, lots and lots of corn. We had a fire and made some smores later on and it was a really great evening. Being Helen's first Canadian Corn Boil she was the only on of us to actually achieve the onjective of drinking until you can't see.

Sunday was a lazy day for me. I couldn't work up the enthusiasm to do much more than clean the kitchen a bit and do a little weeding in the flower boxes. Darrell worked on his truck trying to discover what is wrong with it. It quit on him coming back from a shoot in Amherst and he had to be towed all the way home from Moncton. Thankfully we have CAA.

The best part of the weekend though was the news that I am an uncle for the fourth time. My sister Amanda gave birth to a healthy baby boy (Which surprised us all because we thought for sure it would be a girl) on Saturday. He weighed in at 7lbs 11 ounces and his name is Seth Lee Loiselle. His older brother Cole got to spend five days with grandma because Amanda started having slight labour pains around Monday. She didn't go into the hospital until Friday, and Seth arrived Saturday morning. Needless to say everyone is a little worn out at the moment. I am expecting picture any moment (hint hint) since I know that Amanda and James had Mom's digital camera at the hospital with them. In the mean time here are pics of my other nephew and neices.

This is a Shot of Cole from Dec 2005 he is two in this one and will be turning three this September.

My neices are my Brother Lorne's Daughters. This is Brooke. The picture is From August 2005 (She was 3 about to turn 4).She will be Four this October.

This is Sydney also from August 2005, she had just turned 2 the month before, and just had her third Birthday last month.

Last Weekend of August

I can't believe we are already heading into the Last weekend in August. It has been such and hit and miss summer weatherwise that I feel kind of ripped off. It is already starting to cool off and we will be seeing changes in the leaves very soon. At least the forcast this weekend is for good weather. Fall is actually usually very nice in New Brunswick though, and the first part of September can sometimes be the best part of the year. I just can't believe how quickly the time flys by once the snow is gone. It felt like February/March was going to last a lifetime and now suddenly we're staring September in the face.

We are planning a trip back to Ontario in September for Darrell's Dad's Retirement, and then his Uncle Ken may drive back with us for a visit. I'm so far not committed to doing anything for Noises Off, but will leave myself open in case Bob needs a sound guy. I don't have any plans of auditioning for Glass Menagerie in March but may work backstage. I'm definitely still working toward Cabaret in May, that's the show that's number one on my list of things to do. If I have to, I'll show up at the auditions dressed as the Emcee in an effort to show Stephen I'm the best suited to that part. Hopefully it won't come to that, but I'll keep it in mind just in case. Whatever part comes along it will be a fun show to do.

I've been arranging all my online comic books into PDF files and posting them in my rapidshare folder. I don't know if anyone who reads this actually uses rapidshare or not, but if you do here's the link: Rapidshare Folder They allow non subscribers to download stuff, but there is an hourly limit.

Kizzy is singing at the Blue Olive tonight so I think I will pop in for a drink or two and cheer her on.

Friday Feast August 25,2006

Appetizer
If you could have a free subscription to any magazine, which one would you like to have?
There are a couple woodworking magazines that used to get delivered to our old address by mistake, and I always had a flip through them before returning them to their rightful owner. I would enjoy a subscription to something like that. I would prefer an online magazine subscription though, so I don't have a bunch of magazines needing a home and taking up space.

Soup
Describe your living room (furnishings, colors, etc.).
Our living room is on our things to do list. We've been saving the painting etc for fall/winter when the weather is not condusive to working outside. At present the walls are off white. Our place is open concept so the Livingroom/Diningroom/Kitchen all sort of run together. We have a vaulted ceiling that makes it feel even more open and gives the illusion that it is bigger than it really is. We have ceramic tile in the entryway (where you come in from outside. We put it down oourselves) and the same tile in the kitchen. The living room has a hideous blue carpet that ends at the old linolium in the dining room. Both those floors are going to be Maple laminate flooring like we used in our bedroom by this time next year. We have a great big picture window in the livingroom that provides light for our forest of house plants. Just in the living room itself we have; Cashew tree, Phoenix date palm,coconut palm, canary ilsand date palm, Fig tree (real fig tree that grows figs), Ponderosa Lemon Tree, Gold rush bush, corn tree, regular lemon tree, Weeping fig, another larger corn tree, and a banana tree. That's not counting the plants in the dining room where the sliding glass door is. As far as furnishings go there is a dark blue vinyl couch (That I reupholstered myself), a glide rocker and ottoman, a really cool coffee table that the top raises up and acts like a tv tray and matching end table, tv stand and Tv plus stereo, and a DVD holder.

Salad
What does the shape of a circle make you think of?
Infinity, no beginning no end

Main Course
Name 3 things in your life that you consider to be absolute necessities.
Family, Friends, Music

Dessert
What was the last really funny movie you watched?
I can't recall... it's been a really long time since I've watched a comedy movie. most of the new ones are that over the top absurd, lowest common denominator kind of humour. I don't need to be bashed over the head by a joke. I appreciate more subtle, intelligent, dry humour. Although that doesn't mean I haven't been laughing my ass off in a theatre lately, it's just been to live theatre not movies.(see posts about winging it)

Winging it 2

It was very hectic weekend. We were up until 2am Friday working on our script for winging it and back at it by 11 am Saturday trying to get everything together to perform the show at 8pm. At 8pm four teams of four were as ready as they were going to be to take the stage at the Mary Ohland theatre and perform for a live paying audience. It was hilarity from start to finish. I can't remember ever having quite that much fun at a theare event. The fun thing about it was that people knew these plays were all thrown together, created, learned, and performed in the course of 24 hours, so the bar wasn't really all that high. Although once teams started taking to the stage the bar really was a lot higher than one might expect. All the plays were clever and funny and the inevitable mistakes were even funnier. Being new to second stage I didn't know about the no food or drink rule and used beer as a prop which inevitably got spilled on the stage... Luckily it was a moosehead product so as Jay Pointed out we christened the Mary Ohland Stage with an Ohland Product. I just hope no one gets in trouble.

One of the neatest things about it (I found) was that some of the participants had never done anything with the Theatre company before.. talk about jumping in to the deep end. All in all it was a very fun and funny night and I know next year it will be bigger and better. There were a lot of people leaving the theatre who were kicking themselves for not signing up, but I know they'll waste no time signing up next year... I'll definitely be doing it again. (Maybe next year we'll try a musical...hahahaha)

The cast party for all the festival events was a really good time. A lot of the Winging it crowd left early, some of them were pretty exhausted. I called Darrell at 1:30 and asked him to come get me since I had pretty much finished off the rest of the props in the case. He met me at the office at 2 and we headed home.

Sunday we got up and had a late breakfast.... If you can call it breakfast at 1 in the afternoon. Then we met up with Bertis and the Bonds and headed to deer Island for cake. No really we went for cake. This was my first time to Deer Island, and we toured around a bit & went to see the Tidal whirlpools, which weren't very active since it was low tide. Then we went to the little diner that is on the right side of the road just after you get off the ferry. I can't remember the name of it...Island something. It's owned by a really nice French couple, they are super friendly, their food is really good, and their cake is worth traveling for. The prices are pretty good too. They were really flatterred when we told them we traveled down specifically for their cake and said they'd had lots of people say they had come for the food, but we were the first to say we came for the cake. Bertis, Helen and I all had the three layer chocolate cake with white (Butter) Icing. Darrell had the White/Vermouth cake also with Butter icing, and Brian had the Blueberry peach Cheesecake. Brian always orders something different than Helen because she usually doesn't finish and he gets the last quarter of her deserts. Very smart strategy.

Winging It

I went to the Museum last night for the first meeting for winging it. We were divided into four groups of four. I am grouped with Doug Fillmore, Vincent greg, and Andy Steeves. Then each team was given a prop and a line randomly picked by audience volunteers. Our Prop is a male head from a hairdressing school, and the line we have to incorporate into our play is "We are serving doughnuts on another Planet". So off we went armed with our porp and our line and 24 hours to come up with an original work of theatre. We stared writing a script right away, then left the museum and met back up at my house, where we worked away at it until 2am. With a draft script in the bag, we called it a night and met up again the next morning at 11. We made some revisions to our script, and started blocking the scene and learning our lines. It is now 3:44 and we are still learning our lines and marks. All our props are in place, we have our costumes and we will be able to do a technical run at 7:20 this evening before we perform for our live audience at 8. This is soooo much fun.

Reality Shows

I try to avoid reality shows like the plague with the notable exception of the Amazing race, but I have been watching Rock Star (I got sucked in last year just because I'm a huge INXS fan)and while I'm not a big Tommy Lee fan, the show is actuially pretty good. I think Dilana has a really good chance of winning. She's the most memorable each week and the most consistent. My onlu problem with the show... they want too much of my time, I mean really three nights. I normally watch it on NTV on tuesday so I get the monday show right before, and more often than not I don't watch the results show.

Another one that sucked me in was America's got Talent, which was really surprising since I have no patience for flat singing etc, and don't particulary care for Regis either. They sucked me in with the buzzers and the gong show feel of the early shows, then when the gong show part went away I was already invested. They asked the question Does America have Talent and the answer was a resounding yes. The variety of the acts was really good. There is no question now, America's Got Talent, although after the results of last nights final vote one might wonder if America has Taste. I found the performance of the girl who won terrible. She was 12, she was cute, she really wailed on the big high notes that get the crowds cheering, unfortunately that's all people seem to remember because her enunciation was awful, I barely understood a word she sang, and on every other note in the song that wasn't a huge show stopper she was pitchy at best and downright flat most of the time. It was painful to listen to. The little Yodalling girl was a much better singer so far as technique and vocal control are concerned and she had a better stage presence. The clog dancing groups were both awsome, especially those kids who also played the fiddle while they were dancing... very Leahy. I really liked the Quick change act, but have to agree with the arrogant English judge that they showed the exact same routine everytime and I was frankly bored with it by the end. He went about saying it all wrong when he critisized them, but the point he was trying to make was, if they had an hour long show.. there must be other elements to it that they could bring to the stage and show the audience instead of just doing the exact same routine over and over. The routine they did was really good, and really quick but based on it alone, I would call them a great opening act for a million dollar headliner. It was an interesting show all in all, but I doubt I'll be tuning in for a second season.

Friday Feast August 18, 2006

Appetizer
What color is your car?
I drive a dark Blue Olds Alero, that I purchased last year from Al's Ultracar, specifically so I could be inthe cast of Evita without spending a tonne of money on gas in Darrell's Blazer driving back and forth to rehearsals.

Soup
If you could wake up tomorrow with full training in another occupation and a job in that field, what would it be?
I would return to the field I left when I developed leukemia... Music. I would love to wake up tomorrow and have full musical training in piano, guitar, voice.. you name it.

Salad
How many times in your life have you had the flu (or something similar)?
I've had Cancer twice.. I don't pay attention to flus and colds.

Main Course
What is something that has happened to you this week that you didn't expect?
Nothing really unexpected happened to me specifically, But Saint John Theatre Company announced their plans for their new building this week, and although that wasn't unexpected the total on their funding drive so far was... they are over half way to their goal of $950,000.00. It's very exciting for everyone involved in theatre and the arts in this area.

Dessert
How old were you when you had your first kiss?
That's a tricky question. If we're talking innocent peck between two blushing kids.. I was probably about 7 or 8 with Debbie from down the street (I don't really remember). First time making out, I don't exactly remember that either, it may have been at Deanna's Party in junior high, or on a band trip. Being that I'm gay, it all felt fake to me anyway, so that could be why it's not that memorable. My first actual "passionate kiss with intent" was when I was 16 and working at the Double Day Mini Market, it was with the guy who worked int he aprts department of the Ford dealer next door... whose name I won't mention for privacy reasons. (and no he doesn't still work there)

Setting the Stage

Yesterday I managed to make it out to the Setting the Stage event at the new SJTC building. I almost didn't make it, I got in the Zone while working on an ad and when I glanced at the clock it was 11:56. Luckily the building is only about five doors up from us.
It's a really exciting time to be part of SJTC and I can't wait until things really start happening in the new space. There will be administration and rehearsal space, as well as set building, prop & costume storage areas, and basically anything else a flourishing theatre company could need. My hat's off to the board of SJTC and especially to Stephen Tobias for his vision and tireless hard work on all our behalf. Without them we wouldn't have a theatre club to be part of, and I really appreciate everything they've done and the years of hard work and dedication that went into making it happen.
I also managed to get my registration for winging it filled out and sent in yesterday. In case you don't know, Winging it is part of this weeks Theatre on the edge, where participants will be broken into groups, and each group given a line and an opject. Their task is to take these things and come up with a ten to fifteen minute original play... written, rehearsed, off book, staged, costumed, props, sound, and tech... to be performed in front of a live audience within 24 hours. Okay how fun is that?
I have avoided getting involved in any plays etc over the summer because I just don't want the commitments. We're working on our yard and the weather has been so unpredictable that it's just nice to be able to drop everything when the sun comes out and not worry about having to be someplace or do something specific. But taking 24 hours to put together a play with a group... that's just toooooooo fun to pass up.

Darrell's B Day

Yesterday was Darrell's actual birthday, even though we celebrated on Friday. He was in Halafax all day and didn't make it home until about 8 o'clock in the evening. Surprisingly I walked into the house about ten minutes before he did. I didn't get away from the office until just after 6, then had to stop at Home Hardware to pick up his present (A Bench Grinder). I popped home quickly to wrap it and then headed right back out the door to Dairy Queen for an ice cream cake. Since I hadn't eaten anything by that point I also got a double cheeseburger (I like Dairy Queen Burger way better than any of the other fast foodplaces with the exception of maybe Burger King). I got home and was just sittign down to my burger when Darrell pulled in. He hadn't eaten either so we hopped back in the truck and got another burger from Dairy Queen. In the place we used to live before buying the house that wouldn't have been possible, but now we live 10 minutes from everything.

I am hoping to get away from work and attend the launch of the new SJTC Capital Campaign this afternoon. I have a lot on my plate today and tend to lose trackof time when I get in the zone, so Hopefully I will remember to come up for air at noon and toddle down the street for the festivities.

Weekend

We had a really busy weekend. On Friday we left work early for a beer at O'Leary's, then headed over to Bertis' for Darrell's Birthday dinner. Bertis made an awsome lasagne and a Chocolate-chocolate cake with boiled icing. The Bonds were there as well of course, having returned from their camping trip to Montreal.

Earlier in the week we had thought of going to the pride dance on Saturday, but decided on Friday night that we would skip it. Basic reason...we really just couldn't afford it. Fifteen dollars each just to get through the door, then drinks = too expensive an evening. I still think it's offensive to make people pay a cover charge just to get into a bar, by the time you get in and get your first drink you've spent ten bucks. You might as well go to the liquor store and invite your friends over... it's cheaper and you can talk to each other without yelling all night.(There now you know... that's how old I've gotten)

We spent Saturday doing some small jobs around the house. We spread some more peat moss over the area we seeded. The little baby grass is starting to come up now and the ground has a slight green tinge to it, almost like a thin layer of mold but it's actually grass. I repotted a couple plants, & cleaned the kitchen. Darrell got a call from Mike, and we ended up going over to Mike and Cathy's to help them put in laminate flooring in their living room.

Sunday started out as a lazy day. I did the laundry and dried it on the line. Kathy and Elizabeth came over and we had some margaritas (I use vodka instead of tequilla). Then Darrell and I spent the rest of the day just doing odd little chores that needed doing while he got ready to head to Halifax this morning.

He was up and out the door at 4am, on his way to Halifax for an appointment with a thyroid specialist, and it's about bloody time too. He has been up and down and every which way with his thyroid over the past couple years and no one seems to be able to get the dose right. It doesn't help that he often adjusts the dose himself when he thinks it's not quite right. Hopefully this doctor will have some useful advise and he'll actually follow it.

Friday Feast August 11, 2006

Appetizer
Tell about a toy you remember from your childhood.
Star Wars stuff... I was only 6 when the Original Stars Wars movie hit the theatres. So I was one of the millions of children obsessed with the toys. I never actually got to see the original movie in the theatre however because I was in the Hospital engaged in my first battle with cancer, and coincidentally when I went into the Hospital in April/May 99 for my second cancer battle, The first Movie of the second Star Wars trilogy hit the theatres and I never got to see that in the theatre either. So..... If George Lucas annouces plans for a third trilogy I may have to have him assassinated.

Soup
If you could make one thing in the world absolutely free for everyone, what would it be?
I would pick a necessity... Food, shelter, heat, medicine, medical care. Take your pick of one of those they should all be free to some copassity. Although with the way things are going at the moment I may pick Gas!

Salad
Approximately how many times per day do you think about your significant other?
All the time... I couldn't even begin to count or guess at a number.

Main Course
What is something you believe in 100%?
Everything happens for a reason.

Dessert
Name one thing you have done this week that you would consider a "good deed."
To be honest I haven't done anything this week I would consider a good Deed. We helped our neighbor cut down a tree in her front yard, but I consider that just being neighbourly. I don't think of things like holding the door open for someone or helping someone carry stuff as good deeds I think of them as common coutesy... although it would be nice if they were a little more common.

Hummingbird

Darrell brought the camera home this weekend to try out a new component for it that the company may be buying. After the shoveling and raking in the hot sun, he got some footage of the little guy who visits the feeder on our deck.

Hummingbird footage


Here's shot of the area we spread with topsoil and seeded. We outlined it with sod to keep the soil from being washed down the hill by rain

And these are a few shots of the really cool storm clouds on Monday. They looked kind of like whipped frosting in the sky.

Not quite long enough

We had a great long weekend, but it wasn't long enough. We spent the majority of it doing yard work. More specifically shoveling and hauling dirt, then raking it out nice and even and seeding it with grass seed. We learned our lesson last time and ringed the entire area with sod to keep the edges from washing away in the rain. I'm not going to jinx it, but everything survived last night's thunder storm, so I'm hoping we did something right. Just as long as we don't get four straight days of rain like last time, we should be okay.

Saturday night we met up with Bertis and checked out opening night at the new Club Montreal. It is a much nicer place than the old one. The ceilings are higher so you don't feel like you're in a cave anymore. The new bar is above the liquor store on King Street, where we rehearsed Evita. Makes sense since the pool hall that was there never had anyone in it the entire two months we were rehearsing upstairs and we were starting to think it must be a front for something else... since no one ever went there.

We had the dirt moving and seeding all done on Sunday, and Monday was just a day to kick back and relax. All that shoveling and raking is damn hard work. I only managed to move 22 wheelbarrow loads on Saturday morning before I was completely wiped out and felt the world spin a couple times. That's when I switched to raking and let Darrell take over the shoveling job. He has a lot more stamina than I do and I'm not ashamed at all to admit that... I'm just a little guy after all. Not to say that the raking is much easier than the shoveling because it really isn't. I spent most of Sunday evening with my various muscle groups spasming from all the unaccustomed movement. Once or twice I thought I might cry, but it passed. Sunday night we watched Charlie and the Chocolate factory on the movie channel. I liked it... I wouldn't rush out and buy the DVD or even rent it for that matter, but as something on the movie channel it was a good waste of a couple hours.

Monday was a very slow and relaxed day. Nothing to stressful or strenuous. In fact I think the closest thing to physical labour I did that day was the dishes... but hey even God took a day off.

Forcast calls for more Shovelling and Raking

Last night we got another load of topsoil delivered to finish off the side of the house. So the next nice day will be spent shovelling, and wheelbarrowing, and raking, and raking, and seeding. The back looks really good now, there are still a few very small bare spots but they will fill in on their own. we may have to get some more sod to do the incline, so that the toorent of rain and fog that consitute our summer this year don't wash the topsoil away before the grass has a chance to take root. We're hoping to stretch this load so that we can seed in around the cedar trees as well.

We are also considering shortening our driveway this year, and turning the part directly in front of the house into lawn. We are going to have Rob come by and scrape it all down and widen it in a few places. Then we'll put down a good weed barrier and some compacted sand. Then we're considering pouring our own concrete bricks to pave it with. Down the road we intend to build a garage and the driveway will change locations so we don't want to have the existing one paved. It's way too expensive for something that isn't intended to be permanent... so the brick idea is most apealing. They can be taken up fairly easily when the time comes and used for something else.

Leanna's Saturday Soiree

We had a really nice weekend.

It didn't start off great, but it certainly ended well. I spent the majority of Friday pulling out what little hair I have left... trying to reinstall windows on my animation computer. Darrell had to do a late shoot, so I ended up still here at 9:30... still installing no less. The computer kept crashing and coming up with errors, and then I finally figured out that it was overheating. I finally got everything going, but had to redo it this morning.


Saturday we went over to Kingston Penn for Cristi's BBQ/camp out. It was a really good time. We brought the dogs and our neighbour Sylvia followed us over. She brought her dog as well, but he is a little more high maintenance and can't really be left to his own devises without wandering off, so she didn't end up staying. Elton and Tiff had a great time playing in the pong with Destiny's golden retriever Russell (it was his birthday and there was even cake.) When Chad and Nancy arrived they brought Bailey (chocolate lab) who also joined in the fun. We actually had the full array of retreivers when you think of it, a Black, yellow and Chocolate lab as well as a golden retriever.

A couple of times early in the party Mother nature opened up and went torrential on us, but then it cleared up and we had a perfect evening. Everyone brought salads and Cristi BBQ'd Hotdogs and Hamburgers. I made a huge potatoe salad and got quite a few compliments on it, which is pretty cool since I don't even like potatoe salad. A lot of people showed up and if I tried to list them all I'd miss someone so I won't. We threw frisbees for the dogs, sat around the fire and sang a few songs, there were water noodle wars in the pool, and a little frog jumped up Chad's pantleg and made him squeal like a little girl.... it was a really really good time. We had come prepared to camp, but around 2:30am decided to go home instead. We decided it would be too much hassle to set up the tent in the dark and weren't too keen on sharing it with two soaking wet dogs.

Sunday we got to some housecleaning that we've been putting off and did a little yard work. brain and Helen popped over in the evening and we watched a few episodes of Absolutely fabulous.

Friday Feast June 28, 2006

Appetizer
What's the funniest dream you can remember having?
I don't know that it's funny but, lately I've been having the same sort of dream really often. It involves being abducted by aliens (or someone from the future... it varies)And they use advanced science to clone my body and regrow it then transfer me into it. They stop the growth process at 26 instead of letting it catch up to 35 and of course there aren't all the scars and complications that came from battling cancer twice in one lifetime. I'm not sure if it's a dream or just wishful thinking.... here's hoping it's a premonition

Soup
If you were a dog, what breed would you be, and why?
I'd be a labradour Retreiver... duh. First clue.... I have two of them. Labs are the pants down the best dog breed going. They are smart, gentle, patient, extremely cuddly, and they're large enough and have a serious enough sounding bark that you'd think twice about entering uninvited.

Salad
Continue this sentence: "I get confused when..."
I get confused when I see a country of almost completely defencless innocent civilians having brutal destructive force rain down on them in response to a kidnapping by a small militant group. Yet the world "superpower" condones and encourages the Agressive Country while the rest of the free world calls for an immediate ceasefire. That confuses me

Main Course
Name two things that need to be done, but you are procrastinating in completing.
I desperately need to do a thorough cleaning on the house.
We also have to get to the molding inthe bedroom... We have all the wood, there just hasn't been a string of nice enough days to pull all the tools up into the driveway and plane it all.

Dessert
When was the last time you tried something new, and what was it?
Wednesday... Helen's Chaocolate cake with half a bottle of Triplesec.... it was definitely something new... and it was awsome.

Thursday

That's about all I can say about today so far... it's Thursday. AT least the sun is out and it looks like a nice day. Hopefully it holds until after work and doesn't change to fog by then. I am having to reformatt my animation computer thanks to a windows security update that screwed everything up. I always have the windows updater turned off.. always, but my virus scanner found vulnerabilities and asked if I wanted to update... and completely not thinking like a total moron I pressed ok... I knew it was a mistake the minute I pressed the button, but hindsight and all. I think it was kind of coming close to it's best by date anyway. Windows seems to have a best by date for all it's installations... it seems to run great for about six months and then things start acting all squirely, and inevitably you have to wipe everything out and start over.

Last night was nice. I went over to the Bond's for dinner. Chad and Nancey and Bertis were there also. Darrell was suposed to come, but couldn't because he had a bunch of work thrust upon him at the last minute. Helen made a fantastic meal and a really great chocolate cake with about half a bottle of triple sec in it. I even felt a bit of a buzz near the end of my piece.

It's only Tuesday?

We had a really nice weekend despite the terrible weather. At times like this I wish I was back in BC.... They're having a heat wave, I would gladly trade them all this rain and fog. You know you're having too much rain, when even the plants in your flower beds are drooping and starting to look wilted.

Friday we dropped out to Brain and Helen's after work, for a few drinks. Bertis was there as well of course.

Saturday was a relaxing day. I managed to sray a couple of my trees. All the rain has made it impossible and the caterpillars are everywhere. They've almost completely devastated my Pear tree. My first round of sraying did very little as there wasn't a dry enough period for it to have any effect. The spray was basically washed away almost as soon as it was on.

Sunday we took a drive out to Upham to look at hotubs. We aren't getting one in the imediate future mind you, but with a pruchase like that you need to start looking around and finding out what you need etc long before. It's not the kind of thing you just pop into Home depot and decide you want one day, or at least it shouldn't be. Our plans right now are to pour a concrete pad in the back where we intend to build our lower deck, and seeing as this is eventually where we want to put a hottub, we figured we should go shop around and find out if there was anything specific we needed to do as far as the concrete pad goes. The tub probably won't be in the budget until next spring at the earliest.

Monday was work as usual. On the way home I noticed a bunch of Teens from Quispamsis out on the side of the highway by the dolan road Irving with their Brandon Banners and plaques, urgin everyone to vote for him on Canadian Idol. I've only ever watched a couple episodes of that show in the past... I ahve no patience or tolerance for the episodes in the beginning with the awful auditions etc, but don't mind tuning in near the end when all the dead weight has been sifted through. I descided to turn it on last night and see if Brandon was all he's cracked up to be. OMG what an awful show! I turned it off halfway through, all I heard were very flat, toneless, mediochore at best singers, and the judges would gush at them about how wonderful them were after every performance... it was pitiful. I felt like I was watching a Junior Highschool talent show or something like that. I can't believe that's the best they could find from across the country. Maybe it's time to reevaluate the age restriction and let some older people with a little more vocal experience into the contest. It was just bloody painful listening to it, and I won't be doing it again.

Steady as she goes.

We have been plugging away at work and home. There's not a lot that's going on of any note though.

The weekend was nice. We went to Bertis' place on Friday for Brian's Birthday celebration. We spent the evening sitting out on the front porch, and had burgers and an amazing cake Bertis made. It was a beautiful night and he has a great view of the river. As alway we had alot of laughs and more than a couple martinis (although I only had a couple beer early in the evening as I was driving).

Saturday we got the final trellis put up on our flower boxes, and I moved my Clematis over to it. It is just a tiny starter plant and has an entire 8x4 foot trellis to fill so it may take awhile. I was going to move the wysteria over as well and leave the first trellis for the Kiwi vines, but it just seems so ideally situated at the corner of the house soaking up both morning and afternoon sun that I left it there. Hopefully it doesn't have to fight too hard for space with the kiwi... at any rate I'll cut back anyone who steps out of line hahaha. If the wysteria survives the winter, I'll get another one next spring for the bottom trellis, but they're too expensive to experiment with so I'm sticking to just the one for now.

We seemed to be really busy over the weekend working around the yard etc, but we didn't do anything big. Just lots of little maintenance type thing... mowing the grass, weeding, pruning trees.. that kind of thing. Of course we made a trip to the lake so the dogs could go for a swim (that kind of goes without saying since the lake is a five minute walk from the house).

I've been neglecting my house plants lately, but they don't seem to mind. House plants actually thrive on a little neglect from time to time. My cocoa tree is going crazy with all the heat and humidity... it has tonnes of new growth and blooms on it... I even had to cut a couple branches back to keep it out of the shower curtain (I am trying to encourage it to grow up as compared to out). I still haven't figured out how to get cuttings that will actually root from it yet. Sticking them in water doesn't work, rooting powder and soil don't seem to do the trick either. I tried slicing into the branch, adding rooting powder and some moist soil and then wrapping it with cling wrap while it was still attached to the tree, but I think I may have done it wrong. If any Horticulturists out there have any suggestions I would much appreciate it.

All in all it was a pretty lowkey relaxing kind of weekend.

Monday was back to work... still working on changes to my animation (really starting to lose interest in the project too which means it's time to finish it and get it gone). I've got another big animation just waiting for me to finish this one, and I'm itching to get to it.. plus I'm also working on a commercial for Rogers TV listing that involves some animation (just waiting for a final script). Busy Busy Busy. Darrell and Mike are booked solid with stuff as well, so it's heads down and full steam ahead for the next while.

After work Darrell and I popped over to the west side for dinner at Romanos. As always the food was great.. he had the Spagetti and Meatballs, and I had the Lasagne... it was a really nice treat.

The Sun finally the sun

What an awsome weekend. It was up near 30 degrees everyday and the sun was shining.
Friday started out not so good... working with a hang over is never fun. The work day ended not so good too... we drove home via our regular route, but got onto the highway at the Crown street onramp and found ourselves Bumper to bumper all the way to Rothesay Rd... with nowhere to get off in between. It was rediculous, and took nearly 30 minutes to drive that short distance. Then without any seeming reason whatsoever the traffic just started moving normally again. No Construction or signs of an accident or anything. I felt ripped off really... if I'm going to be bumper to bumper for that length of time, at the end of it I expect to see a reason why..... but there was nothing. For all anyone knows there could've been two cars driving 10 km per hour side by side on the highway just for the shits and giggles of it all. Of course once you do get going again you inevitably have those assholes who start weaving from lane to lane and tailgating everyone they think isn't going fast enough... because they are trying to make up the time they lost. (Which is never going to happen) With traffic that tightly packed they are a huge hazzard. If I were to win a lottery I'd be a dangerous person.... I'd go out and buy myself an old old car.. one of those old steel tanks like an old chyrsler or something and put some heavy duty reinforced bumpers on it.... then god help the asshole that tailgates me in their little peice of alluminum crap cause I'd just slam on the brakes and it would be their fault for not following at a safe distance.

Anyway onto other things. We, of course, spent the entire weekend working in the yard. Although it wasn't heavy duty work like we've been doing. I got my fruit trees sprayed, did a little gardening, Stained some trellis, Darrell pressure washed the side of the house, moved his wood pile, spread some gardening soil into the holes in the new lawn and put out more lawn seed. Just simple chores basically. We popped out to Brunswick Nurseries and got a nice little Sumac tree, and took the dogs to the lake. All in all a pretty relaxing weekend.

I also had a first this weekend.. I saw my first firefly. Seriously.. I've never actually seen one before. Darrell was talking about all the fireflies he saw across the street the night before and I said I'd never seen one so he went right out and caught one. I don't think there are fireflies in the interior of BC where I was raised... so that's probably how I've lived this long without seeing them. Of course I could be wrong... they might be there... I just never saw them.

End of a Long Week

The week after a long weekend always seems so long for some reason. This one was particularly long all things considered.

I attended the visitation for Jamie on Wednesday evening along with Bertis and Brian and Helen. I've never actually been to one before so I didn't know exactly what to do. There were lots of pictures of Jamie all around the room mounted on big poster paper and in various albums, and then there was ther recieving line where you talked to the family and got to kneel by the coffin to say your last goodbyes. I never know what to say to someone in that instance.... I'm sorry seems really hollow... so I basically made light conversation about how I knew him and gave Kizzy a big hug. There were a lot of people there and the line was quite long so we didn't stay long after going through.

Thursday morning I rushed through a quick ad for Rogers and then attended the funeral. I've never been to Catholic service of any kind before that I can recall, so I really didn't know what to expect... and there seems to be a lot of user knowledge involved in Catholic services. I have nothing to compare it to, but was told by a few people that by Catholic standards it was a fairly modern and light service. The Padre said some very nice things about Jamie, and Bob and Stephen both did readings. All the Poll bearers came in wearing bright Hawaiian shirts and I teared up when I saw them... I think most people did. I didn't get to know Jamie as well as I would have liked to in the short time I knew him, but I know there will be a noticable void in the places he once occupied. No cast party is ever going to be the same and neither will any production. He was definitely a one of a kind original.

After the service Kizzy had a big BBQ back at their house. It was the kind of celebration Jamie would have really appreciated, except nothing accidentally caught fire. There was lots and lots of food and drink, and singing and reminicing. It was a really good time and I stayed way too late and drank way too much.... so work this morning is not such a good time.

I remember the last BBQ at their place... last Canada Day, when Jamie was trying to get the Fire in the pit going and ended up lighting the gas can on fire... and it was also the day he proposed to Kizzy. It's so unfair they didn't have more time together. I've always believed that everything happens for a reason, but when someone dies so young it's hard to think what that reason could be.

Jamie

I just visited Dre's Blog to see how her weekend was and got very sad news. I don't even know what to say... so I won't say anything except I'll really miss you Jamie.

I just copied and pasted this from Dre's Site

Jamie

After a courageous battle with cancer, the death of James "Jamie" Harold Williams Jr., of Saint John, beloved husband of Kizzy Kaye, occurred on Monday, July 3, 2006 at the Saint John Regional Hospital. Born in Montreal, PQ on June 3, 1961, he was the son of James H. "Sonny" and Helene (Comeau) Williams of Saint John.

Resting at Brenanís Select Community Funeral Home, 111 Paradise Row, Saint John (634-7424), with visiting on Tuesday, July 4, 2006 from 7-9 pm and Wednesday, July 5, 2006 from 2-4 and 7-9 PM. Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated at St. Pius X Church, Somerset Street, on Thursday, July 6, 2006 at 11:00 AM, followed by cremation. In lieu of flowers remembrances may be made to a charity of the donorís choice.

Further details: www.brenansfh.com

Canada Day long Weekend

The sun managed to poke out a few time this weekend and we made the most of every moment. All the Rain was really starting to wear me out.

Friday after work we headed out to the old neighborhood, to George and Lorretta's, for Shauna's Graduation Dinner. They had a big chinese feast, enough to feed about 45 people... so they will be eating chinese food for some time. It was fun to see everyone... we haven't been out there for a few weeks.

Saturday was Canada Day and Bertis' Birthday celebration at Brian & Helen's. Bertis' birthday was Friday, but he wanted to run the Marathon or 10 k or something like that on Canada Day, so we postponed celebrating until Saturday. For the most part it was quite a nice day, then the rain came and spoiled our plans to have a bonfire and Smores. Brian managed to BBQ some burgers just before the rain started and ended up finishing them in the downpour. We did Chocolate Fondu with Pineapple and Strawberries, and had a pretty awsome Birthday Cake that Brian ordered. Brian is the official cake picker outer since he has done such a good job on both my birthday and now Bertis'. We also had lots of appletinnis. Good times.

Sunday I was feeling a little hung over. It was raining all day which didn't help the way I felt any. I ended up coming into work to get the last things in place on my animation and start it rendering. It's such a long project that it's a 39 hour Render and as I type, on Tuesday Morning, there is still three hours to go.

Monday was Gorgeous! One of the nicest days of the summer so far. After so much miserable weather, when the sun does peek out, you feel like you have to take full advantage of it so you end up working your ass off. At least we do anyway. I did the laundry and dried it on the clothes line. (I will let the clothes pile up in the summer if the weather isn't good enough to use the clothes line... I absolutely will not waste the money or power to run the dryer when the sun and wind are out there and absolutely free.) It blows my mind to see ads in Ontario asking people to restrict their airconditioner use and conserve power so there isn't another massive outage like last year, yet at the same time in Darrell's Parents neighbourhood in Barrie there is a bylaw against clothes lines. You can't have a clothes line in your own yard... that you mortgaged and pay taxes on.. even though they want you conserve energy... bullshit if you ask me.
Anyway.... when we were building our flower boxes I accidentally bought one can of stain that was opaque in stead of semi tranparent like the rest, so I hualed it out and stained the front steps. Darrell changed the front brakes on my car, we filled the last of the boxes with soil and plants, and basically soaked up the sun. Hopefully soon, we will have a weekend with nice weather all around, and nothing to do but sit on the deck and enjoy it.