Week 01

So far, so good. One full week of no medication and so far, no problems to report. It's really the next two weeks that will be the determining factor though. The meds are still in there slowly diluting and leaving at this point, so next week they should be gone, and if anything nasty is going to happen it should be apparent by the week after. I'm pretty confident that everything is good, and things will continue to get better.

The past week has been pretty productive and quite expensive. I had to have some repairs to my car, and they turned out to be way more than anticipated. Obviously my car has realized that it is closed to being paid off. I knew I had a wheel bearing in the front going that needed to be replaced... what I didn't know, was that both needed to be replaced along with the struts, brakes, and rotars...so $1400 later my car rides like it's brand new again.... it should, the repairs cost twice as much as my first car. Luckily our mechanic is someone we know and has been working on our vehicles for a number of years. He doesn't cut corners and always shops around for the best deal, so I know that I wasn't overcharged, and I also know that the work was absolutely necessary.... it just really hurt our budget.

We got a lot accomplished on our aquarium project/basement renovation. The rest of the house is an absolute disaster because of it, so I will be very very happy to have this finished and cleaned up. The Aquarium canopies are now completely built, and their various pieces are in various stages of urithaning. This weekend things will be being tranfered to their new homes and I will be looking to start building the new canopy for our existing tank upstairs. I have to redesign what we have with the eel in mind (they are notoriuos escape artists). I will also be looking to paint the upstairs, and redesign and reupholster the couch and chair in the basement. I may actually go hog wild and reupholster our upstairs couch as well, as it has had a couple years of wear and tear since I last did it. As usual it looks like one project is going to transition right into the next one.... there's always something.

Day 01

I spent the majority of yesterday in the waiting room on the Moncton Hospital Oncology department, waiting to see my specialist for my regular appointment. My appointment was for 11:15 and I finally managed to see her at 3, only in the health care industry can you make appointments like that and still stay in business.

The appointment went well, all things are fine blah blah blah, and we finally decided it was time to take the plunge and go off my anti-rejection drugs. So, last night, for the first time in Nine years, since having my bone marrow transplant, I did not take a pill to supress my immune system. Fingers crossed that all goes well and my body has built up a tollerance to the new bone marrow, so I can finally put all the little problems and annoyances of the past nine years in the past.

The next few weeks I will have to pay very close attention to my skin and make sure it doesn't start to thicken up again. At the first sign of any tightness I will be popping my pills again to make sure it doens't get a good grip on me like it did years ago. It only took a few weeks for my skin to thicken up, my body hair to dissapear, my pigment to go all blotchy, my skin to get all wrinkley, and my flexibilty to be greatly inhibited. Then it took years for it to heal to the point where it is now...which is still not 100%, so I will be paying extra special close care to every little thing as far as my skin/body/health is concerned for the next month or two.

All that aside, my gut tells me everything is going to be fine.

After the appointment I popped into Noble Aquriums and picked up a few snails and a lawnmower Blenny for our aquarium, then came home.

Honorable Mention

Life has been fairly hohum, humdrum lately. Routine, routine, routine. I had yesterday off because the guys were shooting some green screen stuff in the office and it takes up so much space that it's just easier to not have the extra bodies around.

I got some stuff accomplished on my canopy build, and did two workout cycles on the treadmill before heading off to teach my classes. My painting classes are coming along very well, and the adult students are now wanting us to extend the class to two hours in the spring. My guitar lessons are working out quite well too, although I wish I could be more disiplined about practicing. I find the week just flashes by and before I know it it's Thrusday and I haven't practiced all week, which is kind of a waste of both my time and Wes's because we have to go over the same stuff again and again. I am learning to finger pick, which is basically a classical guitar style, so it is quite difficult to start off with.

The winners for the photo contest i was pestering everyone to vote in were announced. I did not win, but I did get honorable mention which I guess was 4th place... so that's nothing to sneeze at.

I am still hopelessly addicted to the Knighthood application on facebook as well as scrabulous (I think I have ten games on the go right now). If you're not playing knighthood with me, you should be.... it is so fun. For all intents and purposes it is a Medieval Sims game, with a social factor added in. There is a certain amount of inviting involved, but not as intense as some facebook apps. The way the inviting works is different as well. If you invite someone, and they don't accept they are still in your court for 7 days. So if I've invited you and you didn't accept expect another one in 7 days. IF they do accept however, they stay in your court even if they uninstall the app after installing it and you don't have to reinvite them. So there you go...even if you don't want to play, just install it and uninstall it an presto...no more invites....tee hee.

Sick and Tired

I had a very long and tiring week last week. I started developing a cold on Wednesday, and have been stuffy and yucky ever since. I took Friday off and stayed in my road most of the day. I had to get dressed and go in to teach my class at 6 so it wasn't a total day off, but it helped.

On Saturday I had a birthday party at the school for 8 (originally but it grew to 10) 9-11 year old girls, from 4 until 6:30. They wanted an hour of animation and then some acting. They spent a little longer than an hour in the animation room, since the girls were having fun, and while they animated I came along with blank strips of paper and got them to write down stuff like their favorite movie, song, cartoon etc. I then used those slips after the animation class to play charades. Charades, after all, is acting. Charades didn't last very long before it just became chaos, but thankfully by then, it was time for cake, and time for me to go.

After the party I hurried home, so we could make it out to the Bond's for Helen's Chinese New Year Party. Helen thought it would be fun to try something new and she was right. She did a lot of work and research and the whole night was really fun. She even dressed up in Chinese attire along with a stunning black wig that she purchased victoriously. We had a big feast of Chinese food and at each of our places there were little picture frames with cards inside and a write up about each of our Chinese astrological signs. We all had lucky envelopes with chocolate coins in them, because apparently the banks out here don't have any yen on hand. Helen also had traditional snacks laid out on little plates in the middle of the table, each with a card to tell what it symbolized. There was candied melon,lychee nut, coconut, and a bunch of other things I can't recall off the top of my head. We all sampled a little something from each plate... including Darrell who is not super adventurous when it comes to trying new foods. Then for desert Helen brought out two traditional Chinese New Year deserts. She went to the Chinese market and asked a lot of questions and really put together a great party.

Sunday I put a big dent in the work for building the canopy to go over the aquariums. Darrell checked the water chemistry from the new setup and it is almost completely cycled...so the sooner I can get those lights up and running, the sooner we can do the big move and reclaim a small portion of our lives.....hehehe

Today I am taking another sick day, and I have no classes tonight. It is noon and I am still in my robe.

Feb. 4, 2008

There's not a lot going on these days other than the same old, same old.

Last week we worked late a few nights in a row and by the weekend I was pretty burned out and feeling very lazy. Our house is a complete pig stye and I was too lazy to care. I did get some boards glued together as a start to building the canopy for the aquariums. Other than that the weekend was very laid back and quiet.

We bought a treadmill, so I gave up my gym membership, since the treadmill seems to be the only thing I use there lately. It's a nordic track treadmill and works very well. We have it set up in the spare room with the TV and stereo, so you can watch television or listen to music while working out. I can even sing karaoke while I run/walk if I want. I like being able to sing out loud while doing cardio, I think it helps expand my lung capacity and endurance. I found that during Cabaret I had alot more stamina for singing and dancing at the same time and I atribute a big portion of that to singing while working out on my eliptical trainer at home. I sold the eliptical trainer though, since Darrell didn't feel coordinated enough to use it, and now we have the treadmill in it's place.

I've been having a really good time teaching my classes. Everyone is really into what we're doing, so it's a piece of cake. I had one real challenge in my Friday evening Animation class. I have one boy who is autistic and he is also new, so he's not familiar with me. Friday I finally cracked the code on him. I've been sitting next to him the past three weeks, but basically letting him do his own thing and trying not to get into his space very much. Friday I grabbed one of the stuffed pokemon figures down off the shelf and started drawing it in flash, and when one of the other kids noticed and asked how I did it, I offered to show them how. That was the key that unlocked the door for me. I finally found something he was really interested in and by the end of the class he was talking to me and asking questions. Up until then the only question he had asked was where the bathroom was. I look at it a lot like cracking a code because I think everyone has a code that needs to be cracked where learning is concerned because everyone learns in a way that is unique to them. With most people though, they will help you along by telling you what they get and what they don't, and it's easier to see how they learn things best. With autistic kids it's much more challenging, because you really have to let them come to you, and sometimes it takes a while before they feel comfortable in new surrounding, with new people. Anyway... I feel like we got somewhere and that made me feel really good, so it was a great way to end off the work week.

Addiction Addiction Addiction

I have a very addictive personality. Always have, always will. Thankfully I am aware of it, and in the past decade or so have managed to limit my addictions to things that aren't self destructive or hazzardous to my health... like smoking (which I did for 14 years).

Right now I am addicted to a couple things. The biggest and most expensive being our aquarium hobby. The only problem with this addiction is it is one Darrell and I share, so there is no other side to the relationship, saying "Don't you think it's time to take a step back?" Thankfully we are now in the finishing stages of the building downstairs. I am working on getting the lighting canopy built and then it will just be a matter of waiting for the tanks to cycle so we can move all the fish and corals over. So far, I have to say, hopefully without sounding too concieted, that I think we have done an exceptional job transforming that space in the basement, and my design idea looks pretty good if you ask me.

The tanks are on the stand, and there is salt water cycling in them. There's even rock and a couple fish already. Now it's just a matter of finishing that canopy, so I can move on to rebuilding and reupholstering the furniture for the room.



The other addiciton I have been indulging in is kind of silly. It's a facebook application called kighthood. Unlike all the other facebook apps out there, I don't have to continuously invite my friends to join over and over and over, in fact I've only sent out a few invites and that was a week ago. I am still playing and everything is going fine. It's kind of like an online role playing game, and I was never much for role playing games (they didn't really become popular until I was too far into my teens to care) but for some reason I am all over this one. Too much fun!
*Amendment: It's actually more like a SIM game, than role playing... so if you like games like SimCity...you will love Knighthood*

Yesterday I took the last half of the day off, so I could work from home catalogueing some tapes. I had a few stops to make on the way home, and then spent the better part of the afternoon on the floor of the spare bedroom going through footage and writing down information. I got through two tapes and started a third and only had to break twice because my ass kept falling asleep from sitting on the basement floor (doesn't help that I slipped on the ice on Wednesday and landed on the step so I have a giant bruise on my ass right across the left cheek). I was a little full of myself having gotten through as much fo the footage as I had, until this morning when Darrell declared I need to learn to make better use of time... since I "only" got through 2 tapes and started the third. Here I thought I was ticking right along. Oh well...what can you do? In my defence I almost never catalogue tapes, so it's not like I know what I'm doing, or do it all the time.

Friday

I haven't posted in a little while (bad blogger). There isn't a lot to blog about really. We got the tanks up on the stands and there is now water in them. It's not salt water just yet, but it is water and it is circulating through Darrell's plumbing without mishap. We have a few things still on order and few more things that have to be built but all in all we are in very good shape to have some residents in these tanks in about 6 weeks. (The water has to go through an entire biological cycling process before it is safe to add fish etc.)

We lost one of the fish we got on our trip to Maine, to worms and parasites. We weren't prepared to deal with worms, as it is the first time we've encountered it... we'll be ready next time though. The other fish are all doing well and seem very healthy.

Darrell had to go to Portsmouth last week for a couple days to do a shoot for Irving, and while he was there he brought back a couple little clownfish for a lady in Shippagen. We know her through the online marine forum and she was looking for little nemo fish, only a black variety of them. All the dealers around NB basically looked at her like she had two heads when she asked about them, but they had an abundance of them in Bangor, so Darrell picked a couple up for her while there and we took a trip to Moncton yesterday to deliver them. She met us at Nobles and was very happy with her new additions.

One more thing on the fish front. Thank you to everyone who continued to vote everyday for my fish pic in the contest. I was super suprised (event hough I shouldn't have been...I have the most awsome friends and family) to not only get up into the top 20, but to end the voting at number 2. Not only did my first pick picture make it to number two, my second picture (that I had basically given up on in the beginning) made it to number 15, thanks to splitting my voting team once the first one had managed to secure it's place in the top 20. So thank you all for helping me out. Now the top 20 pictures will be judged by a panel of three judges and the one they pick will be the winner of a $250 gift certificate to the pet store of that persons choice. Fingers crossed and wish me luck.... thanks to everyone's help I actually have two shots at winning.

Atlantica started up it's winter programs last week, and I have a few new students. There weren't enough to add extra nights so we're incorporating them into existing classes, and I am splitting my time between beginners and more advanced. It is a little challenging right now, but in a couple weeks it will even out.

1st post of 2008

The "Holidays" were good. We had fun and got a lot of work done on our reno/upgrade project. New Years Eve was quiet. The Bonds dropped over and we had a few drinks. We didn't make it back to work on the 2nd like we planned, because of the snowstorm, but we were back on the 3rd. I then took Friday off to stay home and clean up the basement. The stand is now finished to the point where the plumbing can go on and the tanks can be set up. I still need to build doors and do the trim for the room but the big stuff is done and the rest can be done a little at a time. Next up Darrell has to get things plumbed and up and running, then I have to build a canopy for the lights for the tanks.

Sadly, Eddie the pufferfish died over the Holidays, and we're not exactly sure why. As heartbreaking as it was, it was ultimately for the best, since he would've outgrown our 77 gallon and we would have had to do another upgrade, which just isn't going to happen. One of the guys we talked to in Maine said he doesn't even bother with puffers because they come with all sorts of parasites and worms and generally don't live. I wish I had known that prior to getting him, because he was such a cool fish and really had a neat personality... that's right the fish had a personality, he would see you coming and come up to the glass and beg for food... just like a dog.

On a happier note our clownfish, who have had a very tumultuous relationship, laid eggs. When we first put the anemone in the tank, the female took it over and chased the male away, then little by little he managed to work his way back over, now they have mated. We aren't prepared to do anything about the eggs so they will hatch and the little fry will not make it, and probably be eaten by the other fish in the tank, but I am assured by another hobbyist who has been having a lot of luck raising baby clownfish, that once they lay eggs once, it will become a regular occurrence, so we can get set up and consider raising babies in the future.

Here's some shots of the before and afters from downstairs.
There's more pics of the entire process from start up until now on my flikr site


Before:


After:


Not quite enough room for snorkeling:



The Stairs are on my Radar now!

Christmas "Fishing trip" to Maine - thursday Dec. 28, 2007

We decided to brave the potential winter storm and take our Fishing Trip to Maine on Thursday. We loaded up the dogs into the blazer, and, armed with our passports and an empty cooler we headed to St. Stephen bright and early to cross into the US. It was our first time taking the dog across the border, and we were pleasantly surprised at how easy it was... well I guess anything is easy when you are prepared with all the proper documents in order. It was actually impressive to see trucks out on the Maine highways spraying deicer on the roads in preparation for the coming snow.

Our first stop was Maine Pets & Aquariums in Ellsworth, where we found a pretty good selection of fish and corals (Too bad you can't bring corals back to Canada). All we bought on that first visit was a couple pigs ears for the dogs, it was more of a selection and pricing outing.

Then we were off to Bucksport, Maine to Check out Vance's Tropical Fish and Guitars. He had a really unique store setup with some Nice fish as well. He also was very knowledgeable and we took away a lot of great information from our conversation with him. There was a really large Powder Blue Tang there that caught my eye, but he was a little too big for my plans so I passed. There was also a really beautiful angel fish, that is quite rare in the aquarium trade (I wish I had written down what she was called, but she was white and with blue and black markings), but she was more money that I was willing to pay for one fish that day, and I just didn't feel experienced enough to venture into something rare just yet. We did purchase an in tank filter that filters the surface water. One of our problems with our main tank, since it isn't sumped is that film you get on the surface, so this will prove quite handy once we reset the tank for the Eel. The snow started while we were visiting, but we were undeterred from our course, and headed back to Ellsworth, where we picked up a smaller Powder Blue Tang and a fairly large Flame Angel.

Next it was up to Pro Pets, by the Airport in Bangor. This is a fairly new store, owned by the same owner as Maine Pets in Ellsworth. Their salt water selection was much larger and more nicely laid out. Unfortunately we got so carried away talking and shopping that we didn't take any pictures, and by the time we realized it the snow was really piling up. We picked up a really nice foxface rabbitfish and a 20 gallon long tank that will be our permanent quarantine tank once everything is up and running. I like the length because it gives us the ability to section it off easier if we need to quarantine fish that may not be compatible.

Then we started the long and treacherous drive home. I was actually very easy going through Maine, since they had been out all day in prepping the roads and there were plows everywhere. I was really impressed with how well they looked after the roads. We crossed the border into Canada with absolutely no hassles at all, we didn't even get searched,which surprised the hell out of me considering we had the dogs and live tropical fish.

Once we started up the highway from St. Stephen we began to appreciate the Maine Department of Highways even more, because the roads in NB were absolute, complete shit. They had dropped a layer of salt down so underneath the snow was a layer of slush and we didn't see a single plow until quite a ways after St. George. There was an almost constant stream of oncoming traffic, but we were generally the only vehicle on our side of the road for the majority of the way. Needless to say it was slow going and we arrived quite home quite late. We were up even later setting up our new tank and acclimating our new treasures. We are taking no chances this time around since we have a tang of the powder variety, and have the quarantine tank treated with a half dose of cupramine for the next two weeks. We aren't going to do a full dose, since all the fish we got were in copper treated water when we got them, and this is only a buffer measure. By the time these fish are ready to come out of their four - six week quarantine period the new tanks will be set up and cycled so everything will be able to be added at the same time.

I don't have any pics of our new additions yet, but took a few of our little adventure, they are in a photo set here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/blaine16/sets/72157603577682035/

Holidays

We have had a very quiet and subdued Holiday Season so far, which has been quite nice.
X-Mas eve day we did some shopping with our Friend Silvia from next door, afterwards she came by for dinner. I made Fetuccinni Carbonara and a Caesar Salad and we had a very nice time just hanging out while it cooked. She couldn't stay too long since she had a thing going on at the church, so afterward we headed out to our old neighbourhood and visited with George & Loretta and clan. We got to see nearly everyone from out there and it was good catching up, we haven't been out in a fairly long time.

X-Mas day was another quiet and lowkey affair. We didn't do gifts for each other, since we have been going nuts with our reno and aquarium addiction. Instead we planned a trip to Maine to do a little pet store shopping. We had Christmas dinner at Mike and Kathy's place, and called it an early night. Over the course of those two days we managed to get in phone calls to most of our respective family members as well.

We took advantage of the time off to get a lot of work done on the basement. We got the area under the stairs framed in and sheetrocked, and most of the boards for the cabinet top glued together. I hope to get the rest finished today so I can cut the top, sand it and finish it, and get the wall under the stairs painted.

Blah blah blah

We had a pretty productive weekend again. The Bonds popped in for a visit Friday night, and Saturday night was Brian Chisholm's annual Christmas openhouse, which was quite fun.

We got some 2x4s on Sunday during the storm and built a scafholding/support structure in our stairway, so I could reach the ceiling and upper walls to paint. I got most of that finished by Monday night, but still have some touch ups and a second coat to do on the bottom part of the stairwell.

Our little Puffer fish is now officially called Eddie. It's a strange hop how I got there, but the name suits him. He looks like E.T., but for some strange reason whenever I think ET, my brain does a hop to Cheech and Chong's "Still Smokin'" and their Et/ Eddie Torez with the extra (male body part that sounds a lot like Terrestrial)sketch. That coupled with the fact that the puffer fish in Finding Nemo was played by Brad Garrett (Robert from Everybody Loves Raymond) and Brad has a new show out call, 'Til Death, in which he plays a character named...you guessed it... Eddie. So there's the bizzar and convalluted path my fragile little mind took with the name of our puffer fish.

It is now December 19th, and I've done absolutely nothing even remotely Christmas like, and I really have no desire at all to do anything about it. I can't remember a time in my life when I've actually cared less about something, but for some reason this year, the spirit has completely skipped me. I haven't even gotten around to starting on my nephew's PJs yet. I have the fabric, it's washed and ready to go, but I just haven't managed to work up the energy to do anything else with it, not that it would get there on time at this rate anyway. I'm just not feeling it. I am feeling acutely aware of how far away my family is right now, and the more people around me hype up the holidays, the larger that distance feels. To tell the truth I just wish I could hybernate and wake up when the weather's nicer.

Leslie Hall

I took Friday off work and spent the day catching up on stuff at home. I had to come into town to teach my animation class (the last Friday Class for a few weeks now). Not everyone got finished their projects, but it was becuase they were doing very intricate and detailed things, so I consider it a success. After class I went down into the studio to visit with Kelli and Mark and they were watching this histerical gal on You Tube. Her name is Leslie Hall and you will pee yourself watching her music videos. Leslie Hall - How We Go Out

The Bonds dropped by on Friday night, for a surprise vist. I really like it when people just pop in, it's like an added bonus that you weren't expecting.

Saturday I stopped into Richies and got the rest of the paint for my rec room. There was still quite a bit wall fixing that had to be done with the drywall compound so I didn't get around to actually getting some paint onthe walls until last night.

After Richies it was off to Stephens for a read through of Tuesdays with Morrie. There were a lot of tears by the end of the read, but not all sad tears... it's a very uplifting story, that leaves you feeling like you should go phone your Dad afterwards just to say I love you.

Yesterday I started getting a very sore throat and today I am completely stuffed up. If I hadn't had to go do a shoot with Darrell today I wouldn't have bothered coming in. Then I got here and found out I don't have to do the shoot afterall. Oh well, I'm here now, and I have my last Tuesday class tonight so I will just tuff it out.

New Addition

Wednesday after work we couldn't resist heading to the pet store to pick up this little guy we saw there a couple days before.



Isn't he cool? He's a porcupine puffer fish. Yes he inflates, and did it a couple times in the process of capture and release, but it's not good for them so it's not encouraged. He eats like a little pig, mostly shellfish, and we feed him shrimp and scallops right off a wooden skewer. He's got a pretty powerful beak, that is for breaking through shells in nature, so I wouldn't want to risk getting nipped on the finger, otherwise I might be temped to try feeding him by hand. He's kind of like a little dog, and comes swimming up to the glass when he sees you coming so he can beg for food. I also think he looks a lot like E.T. ... That may become his name.

Looks a lot like Winter

We took a snow day yesterday. It was nice to just stay home and not deal with the snow on the road and the others who may not be so good at driving in it. Darrell actually spent a good part of yesterday driving though. He got his plow hooked up on the truck and drove around our neighborhood digging people out.

Over the weekend we got the ceramic tiles put up on the back wall over the cabinet, so I took the oportunity to grout them yesterday. I have to clean them with vinegar and water tonight when I get home.

The school also shut down due to the snow, so I was able to have a complete day off, with no extra trip in in the evening. This is my last week of classes and then we break for a few weeks. I have classes on Thursday & Friday, and because of cancelling last night I will have to go in next Tuesday to finish off that class as well. So I guess this technically isn't my last week of classes any more, next week is.

It looks like lots of people went by the contest page to help me out with voting... thanks a lot I really appreciate it. Don't stop now though, since it still has a lot longer to go, and I'm still fifty votes away from the top 20. I need to get into that top section in order to qualify to have the picture judged by qualified judges.....so please pleas please keep going to the site and voting for the pic, every day. If you have interent at work and at home, try and hit it twice. The link is in the post below.

Photo Contest

I entered a picture of my clarkii in her Anemone in an on-line magazines photo contest, but now I need your help. Turns out the contest is being decided by people visiting the site, casting votes.... so therefore it's a bit of a popularity thing, and people who have entered have recruited their friends to inlfate their numbers. You can tell by the fact that the leader so far is a blurry picture of a fish behind a dirty galss.... it's bad. Anyway the contest organizers have changed the rules as of today and will take the top 20 and have them judged by professional photographers. I still need your help to get into the top 20 though.

Here's the pic I entered. (I actually entered two but the second one is so far down the list it's a lost cause)




This is the link for the contest

Contest Page

You can vote by selecting vote now at the top of the picture. You can vote three times per day for the next 60 days. So if you could help me out I would really apreciate it.

Hump day

I took yesterday off and got some stuff celaned up at home (mostly dished). The guys were working on a deadline for the OBAs so I decided I would just be in the way and took a day to hang out in my robe and get a little extra sleep.

I popped out to superstore and got some porkchops on sale, so I made a giant stirfry of pork ctrips, mnixed veggies and brown rice. There's enough for lunches all week long, then I headed into town to teach my class. I stopped off at the office with some stirfry for Darrell and dropped the dogs off, then went to the school. One of my kids didn'tmake it, so it was only the two girls and one of them said something very cool, that really didn't occur to me until she said it.

they were talking about the movie Hairspray, because rachel was using You can't stopthe neat in her animation. Then Rachel said something about the movie Grease and Louise said she didn't like the way it ended. I thought that was strange because the ending was thebest part with two huge numbers, and I asked her why she didn't like the end. She said because of the way Sandy changed in the end just to impress Danny... she thought people weren't supposed to change themselves just to impress others. From the mouths of babes.

Scary

We got the tiles for the back wall over the cabinet downstairs, and decided it would be easier to do them, and set the mortar if we finally replaced the baseboard heater that didn't work. Darrell went out and got a new heater, took the old off and was trying to trace the current through the wires. For some reason only one was giving him a reading and both should have. I suggested he check the thermostat to see if everything was hooked up properly, and when he unscrewed it and pulled it away a little, he found all the wires in the box were scorched, and black. Like once upon a time they had been on fire. No wonder the baseboard heater wasn't working. It hasn't worked since we bought the house, but wasn't a high priority fix, since we didn't really use the room a lot. Who knew it was a giant fire hazzard? It now has us wondering if we should maybe go open up a few other things and see what's going on in the walls downstairs, just in case.

Of course all this happened on Sunday and nothing was open to change out the dead thermostat, so no work got done on the tiling. It's not that big a deal anyway, since I have to wait two weeks for the wood for the top of the cabinet. Hunter Lake Lumber didn't have any lengths long enough, so I am waiting for the next batch to come out of the kiln. I could have bought shorter lengths and joined them, but it's not a big panic so why not just wait? Besides, now that I have the tiles it seems to make more sense to put them on first anyway.

DVDs

DVDs...I still have them.... Please come get them. I'm begging here, I've had these ready for over a month now..... you said you wanted them, come and get them... bring cash!

If they're still here when we take time off for X-Mas, I'm sending them all to friends out west and you will be SOL (stands for "Shit Out of Luck" in case it's a BC saying that people out here aren't experienced with.)

Another Monday

I'm feeling kind of blah lately. Just from the weather and the time change I guess. It was weird having it later this year, there was really no gradual darkening of the skies that way. One day it's getting dark by 6:30, the next it's dark when you're driving home from work. Didn't help that it snowed that night as well. It felt like a punch in the gut, and my system hasn't really recovered yet.

I didn't get a chance to see Dracula, which I'm kind of bummed about. The week was just too busy and I was working late too many nights to get out to it, then Saturday just got completely away from me with stuff to do at home. Heard good things about it from everyone who did see it though, and judging from the people in the cast I know I really missed a good one. Sorry guys.

I took the day off Thursday to get some stuff done around the house. I had to teach that night, so it wasn't a total day off. I went out to Hunter Lake lumber and got the boards I need for the moulding on my cabinet. It was a pretty cool trip. The guy was all by himself so I got to help him get the stuff I needed, and got to watch him reset the planer. He was nice enough to plane all the rough lumber to the width and thickness I needed at no extra charge, it just meant I had to hang around and visit for a half hour while he set up the machine, which didn't bother me. Plus it was interesting to see the inner working of the big industrial planer, makes our little delta planer look like a tinker toy.

I got my wood home and used the weekend to router the edges, sand, and urithane. Tonight when I get home I'll be able to put the moulding on. The only thing left that has to be done before the tanks can go on the cabinet now, it the very top. Hopefully I can afford the wood this week. I still have to build the doors, but the cabinet doesn't need to have doors for the tanks to be set up. I have to do the top and tile the back wall, and then the tanks can be put in place and the plumbing done, and the whole thing can be started up.

We're battling a parasite in our quarantine tank that is killing the fish. It came on the Powder Brown Tang we bought. We lost that fish first, then yesterday our racoon butterfly died. We're treating the tank with copper to kill the parasite, but I'm afraid it may be too late for the fish that remain. I'm keeping my fingers crossed, because it really makes me sad. I get way too attached to these fish. I'm just glad that we didn't do something stupid like put the fish in the main tank to have everything get infected. It's a hard lesson about the importance of quarantining new livestock, and we're lucky that we're learning it in the quarantine tank, not the main display. Even so it still makes me really really sad.

Fairly Productive

The extra long weekend was good for helping us get a little bit more caught up on things that we have fallen behind on at home. Being so busy with deadlines and home projects, simple little chores like dishes have taken on monsterous lives of their own in the past week and a half, so cleaning the kitchen and the general living area took priority this weekend. We also got alot of stuff done in the basement. I had enough money to get my oak for the trim on the stand, but when we called Hunter Lake Lumber all we ever got was a recording from Thursday, so we didn't know if they were open. Instead I opted to finish the ceiling and get it painted. It's still not quite done, because I didn't tape out the seams quite right (it's the first time I've ever done it so there were bound to be mistakes) There were a couple places where I didn't get enough or any compound under the drywall tape and so it bubbled. I had to cut those out and re-crack fill them. There's no heat on in that room so it's taking alittle while to dry. Aside from that I got the rest of the ceiling painted in 90's beige (taupe). We also painted the backs of both the tanks in a super bright blue called Jamaican Sea.. I have to throw a coat of urithane over it so it won't chip off easily.
We also got the canopy extension finished and the metal halide light installed on our main tank. The extra light is fantastic, and it creates that shimmer effect you see under water. So far we only have it on for a few hours each day so the corals can get used to it gradually, but evntually it will be on most of the day. I'm mourning the loss of one of my new fish. My powder Brown tang died unexpectedly on Monday. They are really delicate and hard to keep fish so his survival was far from a guarantee when I got him, but he seemed to be doing well for a while and I had high hopes. I don't think I'll be trying that kind of fish again they're just not very hardy and should probably be left out in the ocean (they may be just fish but you get attached them).
Since I had a little extra money left over that I hadn't planned on I decided it would ba a good time to renew my prescription. I was expecting a big hit financially sinec the last time I actually bought the stuff it cost me $180 (that's with 80% of it covered by my health plan). I had been making special trips to the hospital in Halifax and getting it there until they cut me off, and I finally got to a point where I'm starting to run out. My dose has been cut considerably since the last time I bought it, and has actually been cut in half since I put the prescrition in to be filled, so I asked if I could take half of it instead of the full dose, since (fingers crossed) in three months I may actually be completely off the stuff, and they said yes. It only cost me $46 for three months worth, significant difference from $180. I did the math and I'm paying 50 cents per 250mg pill, which means the full hit on it without a drug plan is $2.50 per 250mg pill.... still pretty expensive... especially when you consider that once upon a time I was taking 750 mg (3 pills) twice a day, every day.....$15 per day ($3 per day with my drug plan, but still quite a hit)

Another Long Weekend

We are coming on yet another long weekend, and a very important one at that. Sunday is Rememberance Day. WW1 & 2 were a very long time ago, and the farther into history they go, the more important it is to remember what happened and why, so we don't repeat it. My Great Grandfather was a veteran of the First world war, two of my great uncles were vets of the second, and I'm pretty sure all of us can climb down our respective family trees a little ways and find someone who was a vet... so treat the day with the respect it deserves.

That said, as with any and all long weekends, we will of course be taking the holiday Monday as well as Friday, so today is my Friday.... very happy about that (but only in the most serious and respectful of ways of course). I have my classes tonight, and an hour long class on Friday, but other than that I'm off til Tuesday. I am taking a few copies of the DVD home with me, so if you want to get in touch with me and arrange to meet somewhere, I don't mind bringing it to you.... basically I just want these things gone now. I believe Mike will be in on Friday for a little while working on something, so if he happens to be here, you can get your copy from him. Anyway, enjoy your long weekend, and sometime during it, take a few moments to think about the brave young men and women who laid down their lives for our freedom to do so.

ow my face!

I've been feeling like I slumped into a negative space lately. Not enough sleep and too much to do are taking a toll.

That said, we've got alot accomplished lately. The weekend was very busy with lots and lots to do. Mostly trying to catch up on the stuff that we've fallen behind on. There were a few late nights at work during the week to meet a deadline, so the rest of our life took a back seat.

We ventured out in the "Great Storm" on Saturday (was that really only on Saturday... it seems like longer.) and drove up to Moncton to pick up our 65 gallon tall aquarium. It is the same width and height as the 130 but half the length, both will sit side by side on the stand and have one big canopy across the top, giving the impression of one long 9 foot tank. (I know the fish obsession is getting out of hand) I also started building an extension for the canopy on our existing setup, so we can add the new metal hallide light and start acclimating the corals to the different light intensity they will be receiving once we finally get this big set up finish. The new eel is doing well and is eating. I made a blunder and got a mandarin Dragonet from Pets Unlimited. Basically because I thought it was a female (already have a male) and because the salt water section at PU is still too new to have any kind of copod population so the poor little thing would've starved there. Turns out once the little thing got some pods in it's belly and was feeling better it flashed up it's back fin and was a male.... can't have two males in a tank... they'll kill each other.... so he's now living in the quarantine tank (which doesn't have a super healthy pod population, so I'm looking at some suppliments and other things I can do inthe mean time. If I can find him a good home I will, if not he will live in the 65 tasll with my little nemos when we upgrade...i just have to keep him healthy until then. There's a few things I can do and I'm starting to figure out how to do them with some help from the people on the ARRG forum.

Darrell ended up having to work on Sunday, late into the night. So we came in quite late on Monday.

Tuesday was the setting the stage press release for the SJTC so we both went to that to see how work onthe building is coming along. It looks like the skeleton of a building right now, but you can really see how it's going to be pretty awsome when it's all done.

I got the the gym for the first time in a couple weeks yesterday as well, and instead of making me feel good like it normally does, I just felt like a creaky old man by the end of it. I hate it when I miss time there, and have to start over. It doesn't take to long to get back into the swing of things, but you feel like you're constantly starting over at the bottom of a long hill. The up side is I know whithin a week i'll be back to where I left off.

Last night I had my animation class. I have one boy who is a huge handful and very disruptive. I'm still trying to figure out how to deal with him the most effectively. One of the parents sat in last night and watched his daughter work, his son was with him as well, so I gave him a quick lesson and left him working away on a computer so he wouldn't be bored. Then at the end of the class in a mad rush to get out of the building because it was Jim's wife's birthday and he was already late, the lights in the hallway got turned out while I was still in the computer room shutting stuff down. I guess he thought I was right behind him but I wasn't. The door to the room wasn't open all the way or closed, it was on an angle facing into the room and when I turned to go out I smashed right into the edge of it face firt and got a pretty good gash on my eyebrow and bruised my cheek. Luckily I didn't hit nose first (mine is big enough as it is hahahah). Oh well, it hurt like hell but it was an accident. I wonder if karma is trying to tell me something? Like maybe take a day off and get a little rest.

Oh ... here's little progress picture on the work downstairs..... I know there are people who are going to say, that colour is so dark, but it's only that wall, and the rest of the room is going to be in much lighter browns so it will look really great when it's done. i also plan to redo the stairway in oak, but that's a project for thefuture not right now.

Friday!!!!!!!

I took most of Wednesday off, and I didn't go to work yesterday either....woooohooo!! I managed to get my two walls painted a really deep rich brown that looks like dark chocolate!! It looks amazing, and when the room downstairs is finally all finished and the tanks are up and running, we will be able to go down, snuggle up on the couch I'm going to redesign and reupholster, turn off the lights, and just relax watching the fish swim around. With the lights off the wall and the dark slate tiles will just disappear and all that will be left will be 9 feet of lit up coral reef to watch. Can't wait!!! It really is a very theraputic experience to just sit and watch an aquarium.

Yesterday we also struck gold at Pets Unlimited. Their new shipment came in and it had a snowflake eel in it. This is number one on Darrell's wish list, so we got it, plus a really pretty little Powder Brown Tang. I think we're pretty much stocked up on the fish we're looking for... well... mostly.

We had no little weeners come by for all our candy on Wednesday, so now I am stuck with a supurlus of chocolate..... oh well... life's hard sometimes.

Down Time

I finally got everything for my animations all done. At least everything I can do, now it's up to the computer and the powers that be to render out beautiful and (fingers crossed) perfectly times animation to cover the sultry voice over of one Tim Turnell.
As a result of life being up to the computer, I decided to take the rest of the day off, and de-stress at home with my roller and gallon of chocolate coloured paint. Darrell, will unfortunately be working late to finish up his portion of the project which is significantly larger than mine.

I don't know why I've been so frustrated over the Cabaret DVD really, it has only been two weeks after, and I did take nearly six months to finish it. At any rate, if I haven't heard from you, and you know who you are, get in touch with me to at least acknowledge whether or not you want it. I'm really very easy to find and extremely accommodating.

I can't wait to see if we get any little weeners at the door tonight... the chances are slim being that there's only two little kids on this road and they live at the other end of it... but you never know. We didn't get any last year, and ended up eating all that junk food ourselves. This year we didn't go over the top for candy, just got two of those boxes of little chocolate bars, and bulk bag of little potatoe chip bags.....hehehehehehe.

Happy Halloween!

Spoke too Soon

I haven't posted since this time last week, and at the time I felt like I had just come off the longest week ever... I was wrong. It was just getting warmed up. We worked late every evening last week, plus I had my classes. Then we worked both Saturday and Sunday as well, and are working late most of this week to boot. We have a deadline looming on Thursday and a lot of work to get done before it comes, which translates into working late and weekends.

I got some nice paint for the walls in the recroom that border my cabinet, but spent most of my free time on the weekend (what little there was of it) patching the drywall. I'm itching to get painting, but don't know when that will happen. We also popped out to Hunter Lake Lumber and picked up some nice oak to build an extension on our existing canopy for the 77 gallon. We want to hook up one of the Metal hallide lights to acclimate the corals to the higher light intensity they will recive when the 130 is up and running... I just wish I could squeeze out some time to get that done. I'd also like to be able to squeeze out 20 minutes a day to practice my guitar. I got some practicing done on Saturday, but that's the last time I was able to pick it up. Taking lessons doesn't do anyone any good if they can't practice between them.

It wasn't all hectic, work work work, on the weekend though. We had a nice little shopping trip to Richies where we found some nice tile for the back wall over the cabinet. We didn't buy it yet, but at least we've finally settled on something. That was how I was able to get a paint colour for the walls.

I had a really nice visit with June Garnett on Saturday, when she dropped by the house to pick up her Cabaret DVD. She's one busy lady. She's singing in just about everything that going on right now. She's got a pretty strong voice so I can see why she's in such demand.

I'm starting to get pretty seriously frustrated with the whole Cabaret DVD thing. I have 17 people still left on the list that said they wanted them, but haven't heard back from most of them. It's starting to feel like Guys & Dolls all over again, when I ended up out of pocket for the supplies with a whole bunch of copies left over. I mean come on, the very least you can do is send me a bloody e-mail. I know some people are out of town, but here's the kicker....I've heard from all of them. In fact Alex, who is traveling around the country at the moment somehow managed to make arrangements to have his copy picked up.... so why is it so hard for people who live right uptown, or work just two blocks away? I'm not saying people should rush in here tripping all over themselves, but at least call or send an e-mail....acknowledge the fact that you ordered it and still intend to get it... cause I'm sick of chasing people around... I mean hell, I've even offered to arrange to drop it off to people or meet them here in the evening, if they'd bother to get in touch me. I don't think this is something I'll be doing again. I gave up too much of my free time, and spent too much of my own money on it, and frankly it doesn't feel worth it. I could've used the weekends and evenings I spent in here editing my pilot, which could actually make this company quite a bit of money if it flies, instead I did Cabaret, and it's looking more and more like I'm going to be left with a bunch of copies and a big expense... it hardly seems worth it.

Longest week ever

Last week felt like the longest ever. Not sleeping well, combined with a few drinks on Monday night, a busy work week, and something to do every evening, made for a week from hell.

I did the Board of Trade Mixer on Wednesday, and was actually quite surprised how much I managed to paint in just an hour and a half. I got my entire picture blocked out. I haven't had a chance to sit down and finish it yet, but maybe this weekend.

Thursdays classes were fine. I wish I could have found some time to get a little guitar practice in before my lesson though. I am going to work extra hard the next three days to squeeze out 20 minutes a day to practice.... oh to be a kid again and have nothing but school and homework to take up my time.

Friday after my class ended at 7, Darrell and I headed up to Fredericton, to see a guy who was selling off all his salt water gear. He's in the military and heading to Italy to learn to inspect container ships so he can't maintain his tank. We got a computerized aquacontroller, which will pretty much run your entire house if you set it up right it seems. You can program it to turn lights on and off, you can log on from work and checkout your aquarium stats, you can even program it to e-mail you if your tank gets too many degrees over your desired temperature....pretty cool thing, and seemingly very complicated to figure out at the moment. I'm sure by the end of the week Darrell will have it purring like a kitten. We also got his very large, very expensive skimmer, and a large rock with a nice coral and some xenias on it. He had a maroon clownfish, named Atlantis, that no one wanted (maybe because he described it as the spawn of Satan) and he just gave her to us. We have her in our little 20 gallon quarantine tank at the moment because he said she was quite agressive. We're going to put her in the 77 gallon that will have the snowflake eel, when everything else if finally done. She's a really beautiful fish. We can't put her in our main tank or the 25 tall though, because the main has our clarkii clowns and the 25 has our nemo clowns, and you just can't mix them.

Saturday morning I taught animation for a birthday party at the school from 10 - 12. It was a party of 9 eleven year old girls, and it was suposed to be an hour of animation and an hour of painting, but after the first hour on the computers the girls didn't want to stop, so it turned into two hours of animation. When we were in Fredericton the night before the guy had two really nice pieces of live rock that I wanted, but he had promised them to someone else. The guy he promised them two flaked out, and he called me to tell me he was coming into Saint John for a party, and asked if I still wanted the rock, so I said yes. I met him in the parking lot of the Colonial Inn, and I'm sure to the casual observer it would have looked like quite the deal was going down. I handed him some cash, he put a package in my trunk, I drove away... it looked alot like a drug deal, although I'm beginning to think drugs would be a cheaper hobby hehehe. When I got the rock home it was a lot bigger than I remembered it, and we had to take apart and rebuild an entire section of the reef to fit it all in, but it looks great now. There is lots and lot of really great stuff growing on the new rocks, which is part of the reason I wanted them. There are tonnes of xenias, a few spots of some as yet unidentified coral, and some blue mushrooms.

Once we got the tank put back together we were off to Brian and Helen's to hang out with them and Bertis and Colin, and Chad and Michelle. We had a good time sitting around talking and having a few drinks.

Sunday I got some work done on my cabinet. I got the pieces of plywood for the top cut and the first coat of urithane on them. This is only the first top, then a solid oak top goes on top of that. We also did a little cleaning, and then spent the evening in with Brothers & Sisters, Kyle XY, and Desperate Housewives.

Tonight I will be spending the evening on the couch with my must see TV.... Two and a Half Men, Rules of Engagement, How I met your Mother, The Big Bang Theory, and of course..... Heroes!!!!!

Wednesday

It really feels like hump day today. Drinking at Monday's party was a bad idea. I've been pretty dragged out all week.

Tonight there is a Board of Trade Open house at Atlantica and I've been asked to come in and paint while it's happening. As with all events at the school, we are always looking toward enrollment in the next session of classes. There will be displays of the services offered and instructors on hand to explaint heir courses. If you're interested in popping in, I believe it starts at 6.

Tomorrow will be a fairly late evening since I have my painting classes until 9. Friday a have an evening class until 7, and then Saturday there is a birthday party from 10 until 12. I'll have 9 eleven year old girls for two hours. No rest for this guy.

Construction in the basement has been coming along fine. I now have the actual front on the cabinet....yay. There's still lots to do and I don't have the time nor money to do any of it at the moment.

Work is super busy and I have three things on the go at the moment aside from my other pet project... my pilot. I had to get my first pet project "Cabaret" out of the way, before I could even think about starting my pilot, and I have a feeling it is going to be another of those, edit a bit... move it to storage... edit a bit.. move it to storage... stay late a few evenings... come in on a few weekends....etc etc etc. It's kind of sad when you think of it, since the pilot is designed to sell a series that will be a big money maker for the company, but the actual pilot itself isn't paying us anything so it has to come last in line.

The weekend

I feel like there was lot of stuff crammed into the weekend, but I can't think of what it was.
Friday I taught my class. I have four boys, all roughly the same age and they are all very gung ho students. I have a lot of fun teaching them, because they are so excited about animation. I was showing them how to do keyframing and build a walking loop, and told them that sometimes, when you're doing character animation it just helps if you get up and do the action you're trying to animate and break it down into parts to identify the key frames, so of course by the end of the class I had four boys all getting up and moving around and really studying the way they were moving... honestly, it's the first time the students in my class have actually followed through on that, in my previous class, they had already been with a different instructor and been taught different methods, so it was hard to bring them around to what I was trying to show them, because we had to go backwards a bit. These new classes, I'm starting them off fresh and it's cool to watch them go along with me... it's also cool to see that what I'm doing is working.

Friday night Bertis and the Bonds were over. I haven't seen Bertis in what seems like a very long time, because he's been very busy working. We had a private screening of the Cabaret DVD, because I had to test it and make sure everything worked on it and it played in our DVD player which is a few years old. Today I am labelling the boxes... the final step in the final product to be shown tonight at the Sommerset. We are starting at 7. Act one is 1:40 minutes long, and act 2 is about 40 minutes long. The show starts at 7:30 so it should be finishing up around 10. I know there are lots of people who can't make it because of rehearsals, but if you are wrapping up around 9:30 or 10 and want to stop in at the Sommerset to get your DVD after let me know, and I'll stick around a little while. If not, I'll see you throughout the week, I'm sure, as you drop by the office. For those of you in the Rothesay area, if it's easier for you to drop by the house let me know and I'll take some home with me.

Saturday, I got some work done on my cabinet in the basement, and also did some work on an animation of a penguin, I'm working on, for an educational website. We popped out to the pet store and picked up some aquarium substrate so we'll have it when it's time to set up the new system, and I finally managed to talk the guy at vilage Pets into giving me the Neon Goby they had there for $30. It was listed at $39.99 which is insane for a fish that lists at J&L in Vancouver for $15. We are doing a fish order in the near future, because we have to get our livestock before the winter comes and J&L stops shipping. It is a really sad, that we can order fish from Vancouver, have them sent here on aircanada, and it still works out a lot cheaper than buying them from our local pet store. It's hard to not feel completely ripped off. As a comparison, at Village Pets they are selling a Yellow tang for $79.99. The same fish at J&L is $24, granted their minimum shipping rate is $54 to Saint John, but that is for five bags of livestock, so you can have five fish shipped to you for that. Even if it was just that one fish, it still works out to a dollar cheaper, spread that shipping cost over five fish. Plus if you don't have five fish you want, you can do a group order, and someone else in Saint John can phone up and add to your order, then you split the shipping. There's a reef aquarium forum for the Atlantic and they're doing group orders all the time. I try very hard to support local business, but when you're getting screwed by them, why bother? I didn't mind paying $30 for the Goby, considering they had it there for a month so I knew it was healthy, and I could chalk the extra $15 up to shipping, but I certainly wasn't going to pay $40 for it...... end rant.

The Goby now resides in our smaller tank with the Nemos, Regal Tang, and Racoon Butterfly. The Racoon has been harrassing it to clean him ever since the fish was put in.... (they're a cleaner species, but unlike cleaner wrasses, Neon Gobys don't live solely by cleaning other fish, and eat other food, plus they will reproduce in captivity.)

Sunday I got the front put on the cabinet. Now I need to get a piece of plywood for the top, some oak 1x4s for the molding, and some oak 1x6s for the actual top. I'm doing the plywood top first and screwing that down into the support walls, then gluing the solid oak top on top of that. That way there is a solid inch and a half top surface, to support the over 200 gallons of water that will be sitting on top of it. The cabinet itself is over nine feet long, and our 130 gallon tank is only 6 feet long, so we have ordered another 65 gallon tall tank, that is three feet long, with the same depth and height dimensions as the 130. This way I can run one big long canopy over both of them, and it will seem like there's one giant 9 foot tank up there..... It's gonna be awsome!!!!

Almost off the drugs!!!!!

Yesterday's trip to Moncton almost felt wasted at first. I got to the hospital and parked a block away in the two hour residential parking. I can't imagine anyone would bother with the pay lot when you can walk an extra block and park for free, but there are some lazy lazy people out there. Granted some people can't walk that far, which is why they're at the hospital to begin with, but they shouldn't have to pay for parking on principle alone. I think it's insane that patients have to pay to park their cars at the hospital... it's criminal really. Anyway.....

So I get up to the Oncology clinic to see my doctor and he wasn't there, it was one of the other doctors from Halifax who doesn't know me from a hole in the ground. I was starting to feel like I had totally wasted my time and money on this trip when I talked to nurse and discovered that my doctor was no longer going to be coming to the Moncton clinics and this new doctor was who I would be seeing fro now on. Anyway, it was a long discussion. I saw the doctor and she looked over my skin etc and decided to lower my dose once again. I've been off my cyclosporin for three months now with no problems, and now I'm down to the lowest possible dose of Celcept. In three months when all is well, I will go off that as well. I actually coule have gone right off it uesterday, but my doctor has been doing everything extremely gradually, and I made the call that I wanted to go from taking the pill twice a day to once a day before going off completely. It only took a month for my skin to tighten up tot he point I couldn't stretch my arms out completely straight and it's taken a few years for it to heal to the point it has gotten to so far, so I'm in no rush to potentially relapse.

Being in Moncton, of crouse I couldn't help myself and stopped at Noble Aquariums. They are right by the hospital so not stopping would just be rude. I ended up buying a new fish... surprise. I got a little Mandarin Dragonet. He's beautiful. According to my fish book he produces a toxic slime coat that protects him from predator, but won't protect him from anemones. I have six anemones in the tank, so I'm hoping that , like other fish he instinctively avoids them. He would make for a very expensive anemone snack. I'm not going to worry about it too much, though. If he suddenly disapears I'll know what hapened, but I'm going to be optimistic that won't happen.

When I got home from Moncton Darrell and I came into town to get some errands done, had a couple whoppers for dinner, and stopped at Starbucks for a hazelnut mocha. I've been to MacAllister Mall more times inthe past month than I think I have the entire nine years I've lived in Saint John.... Oh Starbucks, How I have missed ye.

Long Week, Longer Weekend!

Last week went generally quite well. I haven't been sleeping too well lately so I've been kind of dragged out. I'm almost finished my last feature for the Cabaret disk 2. Hopefully that is done today and I can start authoring it. Then get down to the business of duplication. Having an actaul deadline now, is going to help. Of course now that I do have ad eadline and stoll have some work to do n it, a bunch of stuff is flooding through the door to hinder my progress. But, no fear I will finish on time.

Things at Atlantica are going well. My classes are running smoothly and everyone seems to be enjoying themselves and making good progress. One hour painting classes aren't long enough though. It's so relaxing and fun to paint that the our blows by to quickly. I started them on their first full scene last week, and they got the sky and distant mountains all done, which is quite a bit for an hour, where everyone is learning how to do stuff. In my kids class it's quite a mix, From a grade 12 student who just got an art scholarship, to a 10 year old girl, to a young chinese student who speaks no English, yet still everyone is keeping up and doing fine.

Being a long weekend, we took Friday off as well and streched it into four days. I still had to come in for my 6 O'clock animation class, but that was no big deal. I got a lot done on my cabinet downstairs this weekend. We went to Hunter lake lumber and bought some rough oak for the front. They even planed it down to the exact width and thickness I wanted for no extra charge. Saved me a lot of time and mess ahving to do it at home. They have an industrial planer that does all four side at the same time....I WANT ONE!

Saturday we went to on of our neighbour's houses for a Turkey Fry. They deep fried three turkeys over the course of the day. I've never had deep fried turkey before, but it was really good. Of course you miss out on the stuffing and the gravy that way, but it was still really good. After that we went to another nieghbour's house for a bon fire that lasted until the wee hours.

Sunday We went to Brian and Helen's for a really great dinner, and stayed quite late there as well, just hanging out watching Sunday night TV.

Monday I worked all day downstairs on the cabinet. I got the last of the inside back panels urithaned, and most of the rails glued for the front. tonight I will glue the last fo them, then Wednesday I'll put that baby together!!!!

I'm in Moncton tomorrow for a doctor's appointment.

Premiers

There have been some really good premiers in the past couple weeks. Heroes of course tops my list. I love that show so much it is probably sad. How i met your Mother, Two and a Hals Men, and Rules of Engagment have all started off really good. The new show grouped with them, the Big Bang Theary, so far has been quite funny. I wonder what happened to cancel The Class though, it was really good. Brothers & Sisters, and Desperate Housewives are both looking good this season, although the plot line with Justin on Brothers and Sisters is pretty predictable. He's been recalled by the Army and sent to Iraq, his contract with the show hasn't expired, they can't show him in a different country all the time, and since the tours of duty are being extending in unfathomable ways over there, there's only really two ways soldiers are coming back from there lately; either injured or in body bags, so obviously he is going to be injured and sent home......duh. Unless they have the Senator (Rob Lowe) pull some strings behind the scenes, which won't happen because he has designs on running for president.

New Shows: Have caught three episodes of Gossip Girl, it's okay, I may might stick with it. Although I think if I start getting busy it will be one of the first to go, and certainly won't make the "must see" list. That's basically reserved for Sunday and Monday anyway. New Bionic Woman.... Jury's still out on that one. Interesting idea, but I'm a fan of the original, so.... I'll give it a chance to win me over. Pushing Daisies, very interesting and quirky so far. It's kind of a mix of Dead Like Me and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.... I think I like it. If they can keep up the quirky I'll keep up with it.

There is one show I've been watching alot of lately and it's really nothing short of spectacular. It hasn't come out yet, but I've had the privledge of private advance screenings and I can't wait for you to see it. In fact I believe the premier will be Monday the 15th, right here in Saint John at the Sommerset Pub... time to be annouced later. Here's a couple previews:

So What


Don't Tell Mama

October 1

Been lazy about posting lately. There hasn't been a whole lot going on. I'm working on the DVD still. I have gotten to the program and bio section and am just waiting for a picture and a bio that weren't in the program before that part can be finished. I also have to edit the photo section which will take a little time, but hopefully I can get this thing put to bed soon.

My classes have been going well. The kids for the animation classes are very keep so it's been quite easy to get them on track. This week they will be recording their voice overs for their projects. My painting classes are also going really well. I have five kids in my kids class and nine adults in the my adults class, and so far no one has quit or fled the room in tears, so all is going well.

I've been busy workng on the new cabinet downstairs. It's been slow going because I've been doing it in pieces as we can afford it.

The anemone that split is still doing fine. All the pieces formed up and they were fed for the first time this weekend. All of them grabbed the food and ate, so we are hopeful that they will all survive and thrive.

Went to a wrap party at Greg's on Friday. It was a really good time. Unfortunately Darrell had to work Saturday so we couldn't stick around long, otherwise we probably would've watched the usn come up with the rest. Saturday night we went to Trish and Mike's for Ramoli, and Sunday we stayed home and caught up on some house hold chores. I got some more panels cut, sanded, and the first coats of urithane on each, for the cabinet. I am now at the point of needing some rough Oak to do the front.

My workouts have been going really well lately. I've managed to get back into the swing of things int he past couple weeks, after missing a bunch over the summer. I'm back to being able to run the entire 20 minutes on the treadmill. Not ready for any 10K s or anything like that, but still doing pretty good none the less.

So that's the long and short of it I guess...same old same old.

Busy Busy

Last night was the first of my new classes. I have one new girl, a returning Girl whose quite advanced, and a returning boy who came to few classes in the spring, so it's a nice small class with lots of oportunity to spend one on one time with everyone. I wouldn't mind a couple more kids though, because once they get the hang of what they're doing and get into their projects I'll be mostly pacing around, plus it's better for the school if we have a couple more to fill the class out.

Last night was animation and tomorrow is painting night. I'm very excited to start the painting classes, partly because I never seem to find time to paint anymore, and partly because I already know some of the students who will be attending and have a pretty good idea of what they're capable of, so I can't wait to see what they start turning out.

I don'thave a as many classes as originally planned out in the flyer, but that may be a blessing in disgise. I don't want to suddenly find myself overwhelmed by an unruley schedule. Four classes spread over three nights should be a good start, and hopefully in the spring once word has spread and some results are in from the fall, we'll fill out those other classes.

My animation project at work is going quite well, and seems to be on pace. I actually have some character animation in it which excites me. Doing mostly corporate work doesn't call for much character stuff, so it's nice to get something that lets me play. I may have to come in and work another weekend if I ever want to finish Cabaret. So that's what I may end up doing this weekend if I get the time.

Back to School

Tonight I start back to teaching in the evenings. Not all the classes that were planned are going to materialize, because there wasn't enough interest in all of them, but that's actually a bit of a blessing in disguise, since I don't want to be overwhelmed by the sheer number of classes I have on top of my full time job. All my painting classes are full which I'm really happy about, and my animation for kids classes are a go, but I think we're breaking it into just two classes, one for beginners and one for intermediate, instead of the age group breakdown, I'll know for sure when I talk to Kelli tonight. Tonight's class is beginner animation, so I have to print off some poems and in preparation. The number of hours in the 12 week programs actually works out to less than the number of hours in the summer camp, but I'm planning to do the same thing with the beginners as I did with the summer camp. The intermediate class is another story, because it is filled with kids who have already been coming regularly and many of them have stuff on the go already. I'm going to have to structure what they're working on a little better, because they're all at different levels and places, but I think I can streamline that and get them all in the same ballpark. To tell the truth, once you get the basics of animation the higher level is really just about adding more detail, and making things more complex and professional looking.

When I got off work and got home yesterday Darrell, pointed out that the anemone didn't split into four. It split into five. There are three that are quite small and then two that are larger. The largest of the two is still not formed up together and is strung along the rock still, so it may actually rip in half again. I'm hoping it doesn't. I've heard when they break into just three the mortallity rate for the little third one is usually pretty high, so breaking into five can't be a good thing. We are keeping our fingers crossed and our breath held that they all form up properly and are healthy and happy.

Monday Monday... baah daah, baah dah dah dah

We had a pretty kicked back weekend. I got another couple panels done on my stand downstairs, it is taking a long time because we are trying to do this one without busting the bank.

Sunday we spent the day watching one of the coolest things ever. Our Bubble Tip Anemone decided to split. I don't know if it was just time for it to do it, or if there was a water quality issue or what, butover the course of the day and last night it divided into four. So now there are four little anemones where one used to be. It was really quite amazing to watch, because we were watching a living creature quite literally rip itself in half, which is probably why it took so long. I know if I were going to rip myself in half, well quarters actually, I would take my time and make sure I got that right. I only wish we had known what it was doing when it first started happening so we could've set up the video camera and done a time lapse on it. At first we just thought it was stressed from the change in water flow and the new filter and moving to a new location. Then Darrell thought it was dying for a little while, although I figured it would take more than just one day of wonky water levels to kill an anemone. Then before we knew it it was inthe process of ripping apart and we missed our oportunity to film. It would've made a great feature in my pilot. Oh well, live and learn. We will be prepared next time.

Last Week before School

So this is the last week I have left before my classes start at Atlantica. I am excited to get going, and if the open house last week is any indication I will have really good students who are excited and interested, so my job is going to be super easy.

I spent the weekend at work, editing. It is very hard to get a pet project finished when it is continually pushed to the back of the line by company business so I took the oportunity this weekend to finally edit Cabaret. Don't cheer too loudly yet...I'm not completely finished. I have the play edited, but I realized Sunday that I didn't have two programs installed that I really needed, and they're things Darrell had to install so they didn't get put on until Monday. I still have alot to do for the DVD, including making all the menus etc, but the heavy lifting is finshed so (fingers crossed) you'll be getting a call in the near future. At the moment I am burried beneath and animation project that will take up my week, but hopfully I can find a little spare time to squeak out some stuff.

Update

It's been a little while since I've posted anything here. Not that there's been much to post about really. The long weekend was really good. As usual we took the extra day and stretched it into a four day weekend. It kind of screwed Darrell though, since he was already taking a week off, and it having a four day weekend in the middle of it meant he only really got three days holiday instead of a full week.

The editor is finally back up and running (I hope I didn't jinx it by saying that) and I've finally got all the programs reinstalled and files moved back over to it. I've been editing my ass off the past few days trying to finish up some stuff before a bunch of new stuff comes through the door. Yes I'm working on it, and yes I'm getting a lot of it done, but I'm not saying anything more about it because I don't want to jinx anything. You all know what I'm talking about anyway, so we'll leave it at that.

I ended up coming into work for a couple hours on Friday even though I had the day off, because I had to shut stuff down. I left a bunch of files transferring before leaving Thursday so I had to finish that up.

I broke a vow this weekend... twice. When we got our cleaner wrasse in the aquarium I did some research after the fact and vowed if we ever lost him I wouldn't replace him. Well, we had that hot spell and didn't have an airconditioner yet, and the tank overheated and he jumped out while we were at work, and I lost him. I was really sad too, because he was oneof my favorite fish. This weekend Pets Unlimited had some in and, even though i know I shouldn't buy them because they should stay in the wild, I bought one and put it in the main tank. Then just to make matters worse, I bought another one and put it in my small nemo tank (He now seems to be missing... completely vanished for the past two days). We also got a really pretty racoon butterfly fish who will live in the 77 gallon tank once everything else has moved to the 130.(He eats corals and anemones so he can't go in the main tank). My stand downstairs is coming along...it's moving a lot slower than the original stand because I don't have the cash to put it together all at once and I'm doing it bit by bit.

We did a little visiting with the Bonds this weekend as well. Helen's mother Margaret is visiting from England for a few weeks, so we got to catch up with her. We'll be seeing them tonight as well.

So far this week has gone very fast. Last night there was an open house at Atlantica for people to come and see the school and talk to the instructors about upcoming classes. I had a lot of interest in my animation and painting classes, and signed up several new people, so it should be alot of fun in the next couple weeks when everything starts up. All my classes start the week of the 20th. I've made a few exceptions in the age areas, because there's a couple mothers who want to take the painting classes with their daughters... which I don't mind at all. In fact if I had enough interest in that regard I'd open another night just for that. I don't like the idea of everyone sitting behind their own easle painting in their own little space and the instructor wandering around the room looking over everyone's shoulder... it's took sterile. That's not how I learned to paint, infact I probably wouldn't have learned to paint if that were the case. I like the idea of everyone sitting around a big table... more like we're getting together for coffee and just happen to be painting as well.

I've also decided to throw in a guitar lesson for myself on mone of my class nights. I already know most of the chords and can strum the guitar okay, but I'd like to be able to go to a party and actually sit around the fire playing the guitar with some confidence. Also I would like to be able to sing whatever I want as compared to trying to find songs the guitar player and I both know.

Freddy Town

Wednesday after work we picked up Thomas and headed out to the beach at Gardner Creek to shoot the opening segment for my pilot. It went very well and was a gorgeous day. We were all done by 7.

Was up in Fred'ton yesterday filing my passport application. It was a surprisingly quick process with only one person in line ahead of me. We stopped at the pet store while there (of course) and got some live rock for my 25 gallon nemo tank, and then headed home. The entire round trip took four hours...not a bad way to spend a Thursday really.

Spare Change

So I'm on my way to the gym yesterday afternoon, first time in a couple weeks :( ...things just kept getting in the way, and a guy wearing $200 runners asks me for spare change. Don't ask me for change if you're wearing better shoes than me!!!

Good work out though.

Update

I haven't really been keeping up with this blog very well, and it's been a week between posts.

Last week was pretty good. Darrell was out of town on Monday and Tuesday. Tuesday was his birthday, but he wasn't around we went out to dinner at Romanos on Thursday instead with Bertis and the Bonds. The computers at work are still acting up. Darrell finally got the editor up and running and everything working beautifully, then we went to install this program called ghost so he could make an image of the working computer for future installs, and everything f^%ked up. So... no I don't have Cabaret finished yet.... but I swear it is the very first thing I am going to do when the computer works again.

The weekend was really good. I got a little bit done on the new cabinet on Friday before runnign out of wood. Saturday I got somemore wood, then went to Kizzy's birthday party. Lots and lots of fun. As usual there were plenty of guitars players on hand and lots of singing, and catching up with everyone. I stayed until about 1am, I was going to leave sooner, but Jeff Scott showed up with his guitar and we got busy singing, and the next thing you know it was 1.

Sunday I got a little more work done on the cabinet, then Brian and Helen dropped by for a visit. We watched Sicko and a few episodes of Little Britain. If you haven't seen Sicko yet, you really should. It's very well done. I used to think Canada had a great medical system, and compared to the US it does, but compared to Britain, France, and Cuba... it needs some work. Britain, France, and Cuba's systems are head and shoulders above Canada's and all of them are light years ahead of the United States. Any time you hear a politician start talking about a more private health care system more similar to the US, grab the biggest hardest thing you can find and bean them in the head with it.....Remember MPs all live locally. The doc showed footage of one of the richest university hospitals in the United States taking patients who couldn't afford their care and dropping them off on skid row in front of a shelter, and a man who cut off the ends of two of his fingers having to decide which one he could afford to have put back on.... and that was just the very tip of the iceberg. I could start a huge rant right now, but will spare you... this time.


We are still as fish crazy as ever. I am endlessly fasinated by the female Clarkii clownfish and her relationship with the Bubble Tipp Anemone. It is fun watching her nest inside it, and feed it, and chase off other fish. She will even come right up and take little pieces of cut up shrimp out of my fingers to feed the anemone. It is sooo cool.




I was going to be part of Shakespeare, but several weeks agao I pulled out. At the time my schedule would've allowed me to do it, but there was potential that it was going to get very packed and I would have to pull out later, and I didn't want to do that. Now I'm glad I did, but the potential I foresaw has been realized and I would be pulling out now, at the last minute instead of giving them time to replace me before they even started. At the moment my classes at Atlantica are closed down for the rest of the season (except for my summer camp on tuesday mornings) and due to start up again in September. In September I'll be teaching a total of nine classes. I have three beginner animation; ages 7-10, 11-17, and adult, Three beginner painting; ages 7-10, 11-17, and adult, and two beginner acting; ages 7-10, and 11-17. All this is in the evening after work... so I'm going to be very busy. There is a broshure floating around the city, but if you haven't come across it and are interested in knowing anything else about the school, just give me a shout.

Long Weekend - The Sequel

We took Friday off and had a second long weekend. It was glorious!!! hahaha

There was a guy on the Reef forum whose Bubble Tip Anemone split and he was selling the second one. I messaged him, but didn't hear back, so I thought it may already be gone. On Friday we decided to take a trip up to Moncton and check out Noble Aquariums while we were there. It was a very expensive trip!! I picked up a 25 gallon tall tank that was on sale. I'm going to use it for my ocellarus clownfish (like Nemo). A couple months ago I took them out of the main tank because we had an ich outbreak and now I can't put them back in, because the larger more agressive Clarkiis are well established in the tank and will pick on the little ocellarus to death. I had planned on putting them all in at the same time when I get the 130 up and running, but still wasn't completely convinced, so when I saw the 25 gallon tall tank on sale it changed my mind. I am going to set that up for my little guys with some live rock and really good lighting, then when it's established enough I'll get them a Riterri anemone that they can inhabit and possibly breed in.

At Noble's we also got a couple new corals, a decorated goby fish, and a Bubble tip anemone since we hadn't heard back from Ray and Noble's had some. Of course the second we got home and I checked my messages on the forum I heard back from Ray (he had been awy for a couple days) and he was willing to sell me his Bubble Tip.... no problem we have rooom for two.

Saturday we took a trip up to Sussex and visited Ray. He had a really cool tank with some of the biggest colt corals I've ever seen. (Darrell's probably seen lots larger, but I've never been diving). We got the Bubble tip (which was twice the size of the one we got the day before) and a frag of another SPS coral from him.

In an aquarium Clarkii Clowns are not fussy and will host in nearly any anemone you put in the tank, in fact they'll host in a frilly mushroom if there's no anemone around, but in nature they they are mainly found in Bubble tips, so I shouldn't have been surpised that by Sunday night the female clarkii was sleeping in the larger anemone.... I was... because I was under the impression it took a little time for them to discover and warm up to the anemone, but our Clarkiis were over investgating the second I put the firt BTA in the tank, so Saturday when the second one came along they must've been ready. This morning when I fed them she was still in there wiggling around. The Male was on the other side of the tank and I'm not sure if he's as interested in the anemones as she is, plus she tends to push him around a lot so I don't think they've decided to pair off yet, but maybe the anemone will change her feelings toward him for the better and they may even spawn... fingers crossed.

This is why keeping a reef tank is so addictive, there's so much learning and it's all so interesting. Basically you're setting up a self contained ecosystem and watching it mature. Anyway...there's pics on facebook and Flikr.

Sunday I finally got back to my tasks downstairs and got the seams on the ceiling sanded and another coat of mud on them. It is very hard on the shoulders sanding a ceiling, so I broke down and bought myself a ceiling sander on a pole thinking that would make it easier. It did a little bit but my shoulders were already sore by then so it was hard to tell the difference. I also got the boards all ripped and the main base for the new cabinets built, then I ran out of wood.

Darrell mustered up all his bravery and decided to go ahead and drill the 130 gallon tank. He cut a 2 inch hole in the back for the outflow pipe and it went beautifully. He tossed the drilling idea round for a long time before he finally mustered up the nerve. It's quite a risk really, if you screw up and break the panel you just ruined a $500 tank, so you really have to take some time and think about it before rushing in. I just wish someone had of told us before we ordered it that for $35 we could've had the factory predrill it before they shipped it out and then there would've been no stress at all. Oh well, live and learn, and now Darrell has a more interesting story to tell about how he drilled it himself and the events leading up to it etc, instead of saying "oh we bought it that way."

Things that Smell.

The long weekend was a really good one. We took Friday off as well and turned it into a four day holiday. I still had to come into town on Friday and teach my class, but that just helped break up the day. We didn't have any plans to go anywhere, because Duke was still with us, but there was plenty to keep us occupied at home.

We got a good dent put into the work downstairs. Darrell got the sockets all wired up, and we got the insulation put back into the wall, the vapor seal back on, the strips of drywall taken out of the ceiling screwed back up in, and the wall closed back up with plywood. There was only one little strip of drywall that was too damaged to put back up but luckily Brian & Helen had some left over from when they did their bathroom and it was the right thickness.

Brian & Helen came over Saturday night and we hung out and watched The Incredibles.

Sunday I got the ceiling taped and the first coat of mud on it. I also got a start on planing my 2x4s down to 1x2 for my cabinet framing. Mike got back from his holiday and came too pick up Duke. Duke was really excited when he saw the truck pull in. Sunday night we popped over to Sylvia's next door and watched Finding Nemo (it was a real 3d kind of weekend), she had never seen it before and it's such a cute movie, we don't mind watching it a few times.

Monday I got the joining and planing done on all my boards and am now ready to rip them to width this evening.

In the Fall we got a really nice Jasmin vine when we were in Ontario at one of the nurseries there. I have it in a window box up on the window ledge for the stair way, and it has started blooming. Now whenever you open the door to go downstairs you're greeted with this awsome scent of blooming Jasmin. Plus after planing all those board s, the whole house smells of pine.

This morning I was in a rush to get into town in time to teach my class, and my car wouldn't start. I don't know why, it just won't fire up, so Darrell will have to look at it when we get home, because, while I could learn how to do it and have done it in the past.... I'm not mechanically inclined and he is. I'll fix it if I have to, but I'd just as soon have someone else do it. How's that for a guy who grew up in a family of professional truck drivers and heavy duty mechanics? At any rate, we got into town, late, but it didn't matter because the school was all locked up. I guess they decided not to have the summer camp this week because of the short week, but someone forgot to tell me.

Hopefully the car car thing is something stupid and easy to fix, or just one of those things where you get home it fires up and you never really know why it wouldn't before.... that would be nice.

What's New.

In a word...nothing.

The Weekend was fine. We didn't do too much. Ended up pruchasing an airconditioner to keep the living room at moderate temps, so far it isn't working all that well and we have a service guy coming on Friday to check it out.

Last week my cleaner wrasse jumped out of the tank while we were out and I found him in the plant too late to save him. I'm really sad about it too because, even though he was a purchase done without research and I vow never to get another one because they belong in the wild and mostly die in captivity, he was doing really well. He was eating prepared food and getting along famously with all the other tank inhabitants .... in fact he was one of my favourite fish to watch. The heat must've raised the tank temp to a place he didn't like so he abandoned the reef in search of cooler places ... :(

We are still puppy sitting. Duke has made himself very at home, and doesn't whine or do any of the things Mike said he would, but then again we're dog people. I don't think I'd actually ever own a beagle though. Don't get me wrong they're cute as all get out and have lovely personalities, but they need even more care and attention than most other dogs. Of course once Underdog hits all the theatres and families fall in love with that superdog, kids everywhere will be wanting a beagle of their very own... here's hoping their parents do some reading first so they know what they're getting into (doubt that but here's hoping). Beagles are hound dogs, and they smell like hound dogs which is a considerably more pungent musky aroma than even the dirties lab or shepard. Beagles also track things like all other hound dogs, and have a tendency to stick their nose to the ground, find an interesting scent, and follow it wherever it may lead, completely ignoring the world around them and your calls for it to come back. (that's the whole needs extra care part... you have to keep them very clean all the time and you always have to spend hours upon hours with them when they are young to train them to stay, and even then you have to monitor them or keep them fensed or on a leash.) So in summary.... lovable, cute, adorable, small dogs.... but they stink and they wander.