via Jenn

I scored as Geek/Nerd. Haha! ok. go computer geeks! Geek/Nerd 40% Loner 33% Punk 33% Hot 20% Goth 13% Emo Kid 13% Prep 7% Jock 7% Stoner 0% "Ghetto" 0% What Highschool Clique Do You Belong To?

joys of messenger

I was out picking some tile and hardwood for the new place, and I came back to this message, from Jenn

JennX says:
Random funny thing.. there's a place at the market that sells your typical mid easter type stuff.. tabouli, samosas, hummus... We were there on the weekend, and I think they their sign maker needs help with their english, cuz they were selling "homos" for $2.50 a container.

too funny.

warning, mushy post

so, my dear boy has been a bit difficult the past few days. He just, every now and then throughout the day, generally when he's tired, will go from happy-giggling baby to screaming- as-if-we're-pulling-his-arms-off baby. This is a bit hard to deal with, since there is no apparent cause for his distress. He's not hungry, dirty, wet, or in pain as far as I can tell. He's not teething, and if one more person suggests that to me, I'm going to slap them. Either that or this is the longest, strangest, randomest teething session ever. Anyway, that coupled with the still not sleeping through the night thing, which has also been worse the past few days, and I'm feeling pretty sorry for myself. I know it can be worse, obviously, but it can also be better. I think that the moving / house stress is probably not helping either. Anyway, I'm watching Today, because it's the only thing on at 8am worth watching. There is a story on about this woman, a photographer. A few years ago, her sister gave birth to a baby, and was told that the baby was not going to survive more than a few days. This woman offered to do anything she could to help her sister out, and was asked to come and take photographs of her tiny neice so that they could always remember her clearly. She did, and although she admits it was the hardest day of her life, the fact that it helped her family so much led her to a career of sorts, taking pictures of babies and small children who are not expected to live very long. So, I'm sitting in the chair with my cranky boy, who has calmed down some and is eating and dosing off, and I'm watching all these poor parents with their poor, sick children, smiling and laughing in the pictures, or pictures of their babies who have died, and I'm just weeping.

Sometimes you just don't even come close to realising how good you have it.

edit:

just a little sidebar to that last post, I didn't want to make it any longer. After discovering his new talent of rolling from front to back, I go in to my dear boy's room last night, or this morning I suppose, at about 3:30, he's crying because he's rolled himself onto his stomach and has apparently forgotten that he is able to flip himself back over. Silly rabbit.

frigging productive day

and I'm effing tired. I did 3 loads of laundry, changed kitty litter, vaccuumed the kitchen and bathroom (the kitty litter will not be in the bathroom in the new house), unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher, washed a bunch of pots and pans, made banana muffins, bought a new tv stand (we're trying to downgrade some of our enormous furniture), looked for a dvd stand, and priced hardwood flooring and ceramic tile. Not all in that order. I also tried my dear boy on some apple juice, which he just didn't really know what to do with. He made some pretty funny faces, but didn't drink much. Apparently you can give them apple or pear juice twice a day to go with their age, so at 4 months, he can have 4oz twice a day. It helps them get used to different flavours and makes introducing food later on a bit easier. I think I'll try the pear tomorrow though, it's a milder flavour so might be better to start. Honestly, I have no idea how any of us survived past babyhood. We slept on our stomachs, weren't all breastfed, were given food before 6 months. I'm going to ask about a few things like that at his next appointment...more needles, I'm not looking forward to it any more than my poor baby would be if he had any idea what was coming.

Also, he rolled over today, front to back, which was pretty exciting. Now, theoretically, he can roll over and over, since he rolled back to front a few weeks ago. It could take time for him to figure that out though. The fiancé and I were playing with him and put him on his tummy, as babies are supposed to do when playing sometimes, and he worked and worked and flipped himself over. Between the surprise of landing on his back and our clapping and cheering for his having done it, the little guy just kind of laid there for a minute with a look of 'what the HELL just happened??" on his face, but then realized we were happy and smiled and wiggled his happiness in response.

Random sidetrack. A few nights ago I made my version of East Side Marios linguine (linguini?) chicken amatriciana. It was fantastic, I'm proud to report. Thus, I figure I will post the recipe. Makes lots, enough for 2-3 with leftovers.

5-6 mushrooms, sliced
2T butter
1/2lb bacon, cut into 1/2" pieces
2 boneless skinless chicken breasts, cut into bite size pieces
1 clove garlic, squished / diced / pressed
1/2 bottle marinara sauce and 1/2 bottle alfredo sauce
OR a bottle of rosé sauce.
linguine, enough for however many people you're feeding
salt, pepper, parmasean cheese

This is good to do all in one pan, that way all the flavours mix together and you have fewer dishes.

brown the mushrooms a bit in the butter, just until they start to turn transluscent. take them out of the pan and set them aside for later.
cook the bacon, not crispy, just done. put it with the mushrooms.
start cooking your pasta.
cook the chicken pieces together with the garlic and some salt and pepper, in the bacon grease. mmmm.
put the bacon and mushrooms back in with the chicken, and add your sauce. I added a bit more marinara sauce than alfredo, but you can frig with it until it's to your liking. once the pasta is cooked, drain it, do NOT rinse it (sauce sticks better to unrinsed pasta) and add it to the pot.
mix everything together and serve to your guests. use pasta bowl-plate things if you can, they're fun. Serve with parmasean cheese if you like. If you want to get really fancy, make some garlic bread, I really like the PC frozen u-bake stuff, it's delish. Don't make too much though, since the linguine is really filling.

enjoy!

recent searches

people are interesting, and weird things lead them to my site. Searches for the following:
during exam" pee wet (ok, that's just funny)

sneakers (I actually get a lot of searches for sneakers, I'm not sure if people have like, sneaker fetishes, or if they're just looking for fashion tips)

what kind of rides at the FREX (in answer to that one, regular carnival type rides, I suppose. Ferris wheels, that kind of thing. One year they had a super fun hang-gliding type ride, but I didn't see it last year.

Most of my other referrals come from my lovely amigos over on the sidebar there, from people looking up my Blogger profile for whatever reason, and from people looking for spicy things, the sort of which I do not have here. My apologies. I don't get nearly the variety that Jenn gets though.

funny

I got this a while ago from my mom, who thought I'd see the humour in it, now that I'm a mom. It's pretty big, almost 2megs, so I'd recommend staying away if you're anywhere near a dial-up connection, but if you have a few minutes and are or have ever known a mother, this will be pretty funny to you too.

enjoy

p.s. It took me a really long time to type that last line, as I have apparently forgotten where all the non-letter keys lie on the keyboard. Unfortunate.

so, it's official

pretty much. Our bid's been accepted, with the conditions we put on about things found in the inspection needing to be fixed (nothing big, since it is a new house), there's no ecoli in the water, and we close August 15th. Go have a gander, I made a movie. It's broken into 2 parts, and ends rather abruptly because I was trying to make it small enough for my parents to see on their cottage dial-up account.
downstairs and upstairs. Enjoy my sweet narration at the beginning. Apologies for the format, I don't know if everyone will be able to see it, but the only program I had to change the ginormous .avi file into anything more manageable was Windows Movie Maker, which of course saves in its own file format.

In other news, I'm up and posting at 7am because, as some of you may be aware, babies don't understand about weekends and sleeping in. He's up, happy as ever, gnawing on the edges of his excersaucer, which he's actually not quite big enough for. I think he's not teething, because he's been gnawing on stuff for a couple of weeks now, but he really does put everything he comes in contact with into his mouth. And tries to gum it to death. We also had him in the jolly jumper yesterday, which he enjoys, even though he's also not technically big enough for that either. Well, he's *big* enough for both of them, he weighs about 17lbs, but he can't sit up on his own, so he's not supposed to be in them. Whatev, he likes it, and I'm not going to leave him in either while I go get a spa treatment or anything. We're going to have to buy him a new carseat too, because he's almost too big for his infant carrier jobbie. I'm pretty sure they're supposed to last more than 4 months, but maybe not. He doesn't really seem big enough for the stroller without the carseat in it, but I guess he must be.

That's about all my news. I can hear my dear boy putting a great deal of effort into soiling himself, so I suppose I had better go take care of that.

all grown up

sort of. we may have just bought a house. That's pretty scary. I'm not going to post any pictures or anything yet, because I want to wait until we get all the inspections and everything done before I get too excited. It's outside the city, really pretty location, with a yard and stuff. Not huge, but we're a pretty small family, so it's perfect. Really nice, cedar shingles, all pine interior, loads of windows and glass doors and well insulated so that we won't cook all summer. I'm excited.

man...within a year, get pregnant, get engaged, have a baby, buy a house. If we actually end up getting married, we'll have done like, every major stressful life event inside of about 15 months. That's just silly.

as promised

the missing cat poster.

hmm

edit: sorry the blog was all buggered, blogger is being difficult today...


Apparently that last post about the 26 things project was for June, and there's a new list out for July. If you, like me, didn't take a single picture for the June list, you can pretend you didn't know about it, and just start fresh with this new list.

discarded
sunday
sleep
round
light up
important
profile
unkept
impressive
layers
eat
celebrate
clear
baby (gee, I wonder what that picture will be of...maybe I'll surprise you!)
six
stamp
faux
photographer
publication
storage
floppy
parking sign
entertainment
mixed bag
aged
down the street

Have fun!

I did get a picture of that lost kitty sign, I'll upload it later when the babe is napping.

two days in a row, wow

I just had to though. I was out and about today, getting a gift bag and tissue paper for my dear fiancé's birthday present, renting a movie, buying things at Superstore. On my way home from the movie store, I saw the sweetest and yet heartbreaking thing. There was a missing cat poster on the lamp post, but rather than your standard photo and phone number, this was a work of art. By, I'm guessing, 4 year olds. It had a hand-drawn picture of possibly the ugliest cat ever, described as grey, coloured in solid black with a white face. His name is Radar. The kids had written all over it things like "we love Rabar" and "I (heart) Ray" and their phone number with backwards 4s in it. The grown-up in the house had written in small but very clear letters in the top right corner 'if you have any infomation please call 455-xxxx'. I wanted to take a picture of it, but all I had on my was my cell phone which can take pictures, but not great ones, and then the light changed for me to cross the street. I'm very seriously considering going back to take a picture with my camera. I really hope they find their cat, it's so sad to lose a pet, you just never know what happened or where they went for sure. We lost a cat when I was 11, but we (a friend of my sister's actually, while babysitting) found him a few months later living with another family. Weird eh? What are the odds? We lost a couple of other cats too though, and didn't have such luck.

baby you can drive my car

seriously, you can. I think I'm going to sell it and lease something a *little* bigger with a/c. I like my car, and it still has warantee and everything on it, but I think with the amount of stuff we need to lug with us now, it's not going to work very well. I have discovered that I can fit my stroller in the trunk, but it has to go in just so, and the handle still meets prematurely with the trunk when it closes, but it will close. Also, then I can't fit anything else in, like a playpen or, say, luggage. Good times. I don't know why, it's a good size trunk and a normal stroller. Clearly not a family car!

As I've been thinking of selling though, I've been thinking more about the car itself, and when I was driving back from Moncton the other day, I decided that a person could tell a great deal about me by going for a drive with me in my car.

For example:

-I couldn't afford a really sweet car when I bought this one, but it's decent.
-My favourite colour is blue, so that's what colour my car is. I think the colour of your car is very important, you shouldn't just get whatever colour they have in the lot.
-I like to drive about 15 over the speed limit. I've basically convinced myself that the limit is actually 120, not 110, so I don't feel like I'm speeding much.
-I generally eat something unhealthy while driving, as evidenced by the chip bags in the little holder thing on the driver's side door
-I like doo-dads, but not too many. I have a flower that I won at the FREX a couple of years ago wrapped around the rearview mirror, and 2 bobbleheads in the back.
-I become emotionally attached to my belongings. One of the aforementioned bobbleheads, a dog named Bob, is broken and no longer bobs, but just sits by the rear windshield with his friend Lester, the bobbing lobster, who does indeed bob. They're both sort of old and faded, and Bob is a good 3-4 years old, but I just can't bear to part with him.
-I enjoy a variety of music. My sunvisor cd holder has cds by Coldplay, Fiona Apple, Maroon 5, Sheryl Crow, Robbie Williams, John Mayer, Tragically Hip, Sam Roberts, the Garden State soundtrack, and several homemade mixed cds with everything from Donovan to the B-52s to John Lennon.
-I still buy cds, I haven't downloaded more than a couple of songs in the past year.
-I have a baby. I care about said baby, so I have a carseat base, window shades, and one of those mirrors on the rear windshield so I can see him while I'm driving.

that's all I can think of for now, but that's a lot to tell about a person just from their car, isn't it?

money well spent

we bought the baby a mobile yesterday, and he digs it. It's all fancy, it plays classical music, lullabyes, or white noise (except that the white noise you have to turn up a lot to hear, so then if you switch back to the music you'll be deafened), and has things with apparently interesting patterns that move around, but pause every now and then to let the baby focus. This is all apparently good stuff. And he likes it, and it comes with a remote, which is also cool.

In less fun baby news, yesterday he had such a giant crap while we were at Superstore that I had to wash everything he was touching at the time, including the carseat (which luckily has a removeable, washable cover), and had to rinse him off in the sink, which he did not enjoy but seemed to get used to as I explained to him that it was just like a bath, but with moving water. All that poo, and he hardly kicked up a fuss until I took him out of the seat and was like, hmm, your pants are wet...that's odd. Maybe he sensed my grossed-outedness and was just responding to that.

Either way, gross.

on a more serious note

the Moncton SPCA has way, way too many cats. There are way, way too many really stupid people who don't understand that you shouldn't own pets if you can't afford to properly care for them (get your pets spayed or neutered, Bob Barker agrees..), and they're getting about 30 cats a day now. Sick. Because they need so badly to get these little guys adopted, they're waiving the fee for adopting adult cats, and you just have to pay the spay/neuter deposit if you'd rather a kitten. Go on, get one. Or 2, they like to have a friend. They may try to kill each other at first, but that will stop.

non-baby post!

I only ever did the 2003 one, but there was one last summer too. You should play, no prizes or anything, but it's a fun sort of photographic scavenger hunt. Check it out.

The list of things to photograph. Use your imagination and discretion to decide what each thing means to you.

Direction
Used
Carry
Falling
Permanent
Connection
Unfamiliar
Silence
Pile
In/Out
Amazing
Sometimes
Everyday
Can't Live Without
On the Move
Holding Back
Out of Control
Awe Inspiring
Just a Sample
On the Edge
Do You See What I See?
All Grown Up
What The?
Making It Official
In Two's
Unfinished Business

for your reassurance

just so you don't think I only take mocking pictures of my dear boy, here is one I made that I think is pretty neat.

oh my gross

I think I just saw my first Junebug (sorry I couldn't find a bigger picture, lol), and do I ever hate those giant, swarmy, stupid bastard bugs....barf. I love summer, but I could definitely do without this particular harbinger of warm weather. Is that spelled right? Or even used right? whatev, I'm tired and going to bed.

picture time

enjoy!

new linky-love

random factoids to keep your days interesting. I'll put it on the sidebar too, in case you're too lazy to bookmark it yourself.

also, from Mitch, StoreWars. Odd, but entertaining.

funny

also, 2 people in recent tracking history have stumbled across my site because of my link in a previous post to the Ronco Yogurt Maker and Beef Jerky Machine. That still makes me laugh. And shudder a bit.

some of you may recall

I got engaged a while back. We've been fairly busy what with the having a baby and moving to Fredericton thing, but that's all relatively settled out now, so we're thinking maybe we should actually start planning this wedding thing. Since I've only been to like, 4 weddings (1 park, 1 church, 1 catholic church (yes, it's its own category) and 1 in a home), and the fiancé is a man, we're sort of hard up for ideas. Going away is nice, but we both have broke friends who wouldn't be able to make it anywhere exciting. At the same time, I don't want to have a lame-o wedding that I'll regret for not being cooler.

We sort of thought of having it at my parents cottage, but there just isn't space there for people to hang out / stay over, or at their house because they have a nice huge yard, but we'd have to decide that really soon, because I think we're aiming for a fall wedding, and the decorating in my parents' yard is courtesy of hurricane Juan. That guy was a jerk. It's totally do-able, but would take a little time. So basically, I'm looking for ideas.

I've been watching Wedding Story on TLC, but the weddings on there are almost exclusively churchy, and we're just not. We're also not the "Life's Weird Weddings" type though, where they get married underwater and whatnot. I may not be the princess type, but I do want to have a nice dress and flowers. So any ideas in general, or locations, or good places to have receptions, I'm all ears. Or eyes, in this case, since I'll be reading. I feel sort of silly, like that as a girl I should have all this stuff planned out, but I just don't. I don't even know where to begin.

Eloping is tempting, but out of the question as our parents would quite literally kill us.

I think also we should involve the cats. They can wear little kitty tuxedoes or something.

Just kidding. They wouldn't wear tuxedos. Just fancy collars.

how do you expect me to post

when you don't come over and hold the baby?

just kidding, I did have some visitors, and it was a good week overall. it's quite something though, the difference it makes to have someone else home, even though it's only for a few hours at night.

I went through all the digital baby photos and chose a bunch to print off; I figure the guy should have a proper album, not just pictures in folders on the computer. I'll have to get Mitch to show me how to do his fancy photo pages, then I'll do up an online album too. I also took black and white (well, colour printed in black and white) pictures of like, his feet, ear, tummy, etc, and am looking for a frame to do a sort of baby bits collage. I can't find a nice frame though, it needs to hold 8 pictures, and I'd rather they not just be in 2 rows, that's boring.

Ever hopeful, I rented 3 movies today. I'm too lazy for links, look them up yourselves. Birth, This Girl's Life, and After the Sunset. An ecclectic collection, I agree. They're all full week rentals, and the baby has been having longer stretches of being awake but not crying lately, so we should be able to watch them. Madagascar starts this weekend, I'm so frigging excited. Somebody has to come babysit so I can go...I don't think tiny babies and movie theatres mix very well. A friend of mine mentioned something about family movie days, which sounds very promising, and I think Madagascar is a fine movie to have for that sort of thing. Apparently it's afternoon or early evening movies, the sound is turned down and the lights aren't all the way off, and you don't have to feel bad if you have a screaming infant. Well, not as bad as you would at a normal movie, anyway.

ah, the boy awakes. later skaters.

who wants to hold the baby??

I'm all by my lonesome this week, until Thursday anyway. The fiancé has gone to Halifax for work, so it's just me and my small / furry boys here. Open invitation to anyone who wants to drop by and visit me / hold a generally happy but lately less so (gassy and growing pains and whatnot) baby.

Things are still going pretty well, the baby spent the night in his crib last night, he had been sleeping in a bassinet in our room because it's just easier for the nighttime feedings and stuff if he's right there. He's getting to be on more of a schedule now though, and also getting to be a noisy sleeper, so those things lend themselves well to him sleeping in his own room.

In non-baby news, I had to let my school know that I'm most likely not going back next year, which was hard. We can't find work for my sweetie pie though (really, not being all that picky or anything) and he really likes his job here, and I can't really go back to Moncton by myself with or without the baby to work. I've been playing Set For Life lately in the hopes that I won't have to go back to work anyway. It's worth a try, yes? I really do hold a legitimate hope that I'll win the lottery someday. You just never know.

I have no idea what I used to think about or talk about before the baby came along, because he occupies literally every moment of my thoughts now. Probably doesn't help that I'm not working or leaving the house much. My apologies for the suffering of the blog.

pictures

of course there are more, he has his own folder on the computer for heaven's sake, but these are good for now.

in answer to Mitch's question

no, the baby doesn't really sleep all that much. Except at night, but then so do I. He's going through his 2 week growth spurt right now, which apparently involves eating a lot more and being generally unhappy, but should only last a couple of days. I haven't updated earlier because for one, I have very little going on that doesn't involve the baby, and he really isn't very exciting to anyone but us, he's adorable but just eats, sleeps, and dirties diapers. He's getting to have more awake / alert time now, which is fun, but isn't generally up for much beyond cuddling and being walked around. Also, this taking care of an infant thing is quite time-consuming. It's very much moment-to-moment, like, ok, what does the baby need now? Food? ok. Ok, what does the baby need now? New diaper, check. Now? More food? Ok. We're starting to get into more of a routine, he's starting to go a bit longer between eating times, so all is pretty well.

Like I said, nothing else going on. Haven't seen any good movies lately, have been watching tv and staying up until about 11-12 at night because that's when the baby gets up to eat his bedtime snack meal, so I might as well stay up as be woken up shortly after going to bed myself. The cats are dealing with the interruption to their lives pretty well, they entertain themselves most of the time, and one of us is always available to pet them, so they're fine. They haven't quite figured out what this new little alien creature is, but don't seem to care too much either way.

My dear fiancé is going to do the bedtime snack feeding, so I'm going to go to bed myself.

baby!

posted this on the olde preggo blog, but just in case anyone hasn't wandered over there yet, here you go..

ok, so short and to the point, because I'm tired, and frankly would rather be hanging out with my sweet boy or napping than sitting in this remarkably uncomfy chair at the computer.

woke up at about 2am Saturday with contractions, they were far apart though, so we just sat tight and I went back to sleep. Woke up at about 3:30, they had progressed to what I would say is fairly painful and about 5 minutes apart. Woke everybody up and headed to the hospital. 12.5 hours, GBS antibiotics, phentenol, laughing gas, and a pedundal block later, I have this to show for it.


Robert Kieran (Kieran, not Robert)
8lbs 9oz
Born April 9, 2005 at 6:24pm


I wouldn't rush out and do it again, it was really painful and incredibly tiring, and every part of me aches still. It wasn't absolutely horrible though, and I think I managed pretty well. I'm amazed at myself, and what my body knows how to do, and what the last 9 months have given us. I'm way more hormonal now than I ever was while pregnant, my stomach is just...horrific, lol, but that's to be expected, and I'm so tired I could fall over. And it's so worth it. I'm going to go look at my baby. He's so soft and perfect and I just want to look at him and touch him and sniff him all the time.

More later when things settle down.

update

No baby yet...so, if nothing happens before Sunday (I'm still hoping, but it's looking less and less hopeful), I'm scheduled for an induction Sunday morning. It's kind of scary, since I don't know what to expect exactly. I mean, I'm going to have my water broken, but I mean as far as the whole labour process goes.

I rented Sideways, and just was not in the mood to watch it. I feel bad, because I'm pretty sure it's a really good movie. I got just over halfway through, and then gave up. It was a really nice day out, so I went for a walk and sat out on the deck instead. What can you do? I'm excited for Fever Pitch, it came out today. I know it's going to be predictable, but hey, Ebert and Roeper gave it "two thumbs WAY up", so it must be decent. I'm hoping Jimmy Fallon is good, he was SO good in SNL, but his movies have just looked...terrible.

yeah, update for real, baby is here, I'll add more later, he was born Saturday evening and is absolutely gorgeous. We're all home safe and sound!

(that first part was supposed to publish like, last friday, but didn't)

finally (or, most links ever)

some good stuff on video! 3 movies came out today that I'm excited about. Or at least happy about, and will be watching. One, Spanglish, I've seen, and recommend that you all see also. Adam Sandler also has a new movie coming out, a(nother) remake of The Longest Yard; it looks pretty funny. I'm very excited about Sideways, because it never came to theatres near me. Fredericton is the worst, Closer came to the theatre here 3 weeks ago, the movie came out on video last week. Nicely done. They overlapped for almost a week. Idiots. Anway, I'm also looking forward to watching Suspect 0, because it looks cool, and has Ben Kingsley, who's one of those respectable type actors, as well as Aaron Eckhart, who I just really like, and Carrie-Ann Moss.

Today is the day I find out if they're going to let me be pregnant forever, I'll be sure to update you on whatever I find out.

My hair is getting really long, probably the longest it's been in years. I've actually stopped automatically putting it in a ponytail every day, and I think it apprecitates that. It's also looking pretty good, considering I've only dyed it once, with a washout at that, the whole time I've been pregnant. It's not that I need to dye my hair, but I have been since high school, and I enjoy it. It's been just about every colour, but not black. I'm pretty sure that wouldn't go with my 'yes, actually, I do go outside, but no, you can't really tell' complexion.

Noah, no!

all over the world...or at least continent, women's hearts are breaking. I know my sister's is for sure. They do have a new cute doctor guy on there, but still. Noah is the only guy left who's been on ER the whole time. It's kind of sad, but he's leaving for legitimate reasons, so that's good. Bring on the new cute doctors!

This is kind of a pathetic update, but there's just not much going on.

I (heart) spring in Canada

yesterday, it was +13, sunny, beautiful. No jacket required. Presently, it is freezing raining / hailing / wet snowing and definitely not +13. April Fools, it's not really spring!

I (heart) Google

no need to ask why, really. Gotta love a company with a sense of humour. Also check out your gmail account today, fun things going on there. My favourite is the graph, so sophisticated looking! If any of you want / need gmail, I have invites still, or again, or something. I think everyone I know has it though.

Happy April Fools! nobody pulled any pranks on me today. It's also spring forward weekend, which is significantly less fun than fall back weekend. Unless you're working on call or something, in which case it's fun to lose an hour of time.

mmm, virusy

hey. so, some time in the fairly recent past, my computer got that about: blank virus. I got rid of it, but now my sweetie pie's parents have my computer and it seems to be infected again. I had gotten 2 programs to get rid of it, I believe one was called something like Browser Hijack Blaster or something, but I can't remember the other one. I'd like to remember so that I can get them and fix my computer, even though I don't have it anymore. They're going to bring it up next time they come so I can fix it. Good times. I'll also be able to get my files and stuff off it though, which is nice. Anyway, if anyone has suggestions for really good spyware / virus removing software, that'd be great. I have adaware, but it just doesn't do it all the time.

thanks.

archives, nice and organised

haha, not really, but what the hell do I care. It took me forever just to get them all to display, I'm not sure what's wrong with what I had before, but it stopped working. Blogger doesn't really like when you tell it to republish the entire site, it tends to just say 0% for like, an hour, and not do anything. So for now, that's what it's going to look like.

edit: apparently my making it a list thing *did* work. it was all just bunched up before. whatev.

I put up a thingy on the right hand sidebar that shows how people get referred to my site, it's pretty fun. It has kind of an ugly giant advertising button that I can't get rid of, but it's interesting to see how people are finding my site. Some people are just searching 'moderately spicy', (come on, bookmark me!), while others are doing searches for totally random things. I hope they're finding me useful.

This is annoying, because I wanted to post this morning but Blogger wasn't working. I'm liking it less and less lately, but I do so love it when it's working. I tried to set up some other programs, but I'm so used to having Blogger do everything for me, that I have no idea how to do anything in the more advanced-type programs that expect me to think for myself. Anyway, so I have no idea what I was going to talk about, but I did have a couple of things, and now, obviously, I have crap.

It's super nice out, so I think I'll go clean off the deck chairs (how DO they get so scummy from being snowed on??) and have a sit outside for a bit. The windows in this apartment are really hard to open, so that in itself was a bit of a workout. I'm hoping to induce labour. I was out and about today, and every single cashier asked me if I was due soon. I said yes, today actually. That's fun to do, you should try it. It's true though, and so not really fun, because the baby was supposed to already be here. He's a jokester.

Hey, it's Van Gogh's birthday, check out Google. They're so fun, I wish I got to design the logo things.

"Then they had some kind of emotional reaction and vomited."

It's one of those things that's funny, and yet not funny at all, at the same time.

I thought it was interesting to know that they make their chili from scratch though. Good for them!

"Somewhere, somebody is missing a finger."

See what I mean about funny and not funny at all? That line is worthy of Horatio Cane himself!

super funny

I had a hard time with some of the answers, I've never really thought about what kind of food my dream man is like, but it's fun regardless.

dream date finder

leave a comment telling me who you got, and I'll tell you who I got.

technical difficulties

Why don't I have archives for Feb / March? Since you can't just republish your archives any more, I republished the whole gd site, so it's probably all the new colours now, not really what I wanted, and still no archives for Feb or March. Weird. Or, I just checked, and it didn't even republish everything, it just pretended to and took a really long time, but only redid the March page, which doesn't show up on the archives link page, and the index. Useful.

My printer turns on and makes working noises, but when I try to print something, the little icon comes up and says it is offline. Not helpful. We unplugged it from the computer and plugged it back in, and it 'found new hardware' and installed, but now is not working again.

It's spring, and almost Easter! I need to get myself some tulips I think. Not lillies, they're bad for kitties.

Speaking of kitties, for those concerned, it seems George may have a small ulcer in his stomach, which would explain his random barfing since it would get irritated from time to time. We're treating that with delicious medicine that he loves (ha), so hopefully this'll do the trick.

a note to (stupid) pet owners

Just because it's still technically winter, doesn't mean that you can lock your dog in your car with the windows up. It's about a million degrees in the sun today, and it will still get quite warm in the car. You are an idiot, and deserve to be kicked squarely in the face.

Would I have gotten in trouble if I had broken a window in that guy's car? I don't think I should. I'd probably get in more trouble for doing that than he would for endangering or killing his dog, because that's the super effective way that animal cruelty laws work.

random updates

I had possibly the worst sleep of my life last night, and have been wide awake and starving since about 5. I've eaten lots, but am still hungry.

I'm worried about my cat. He's at the vet, getting xrays, a barium series, and bloodwork to see why he keeps barfing. He's so tiny and cute, it makes me sad that he's sick. Animals being sick is always sad though, because they can't tell you what's wrong, and most of the time don't even show that something is. I'm also a little annoyed that my other cat doesn't seem to care that George isn't here. I feel awful leaving my cat at the vet's, I can't imagine how I'm going to deal with like, dropping my son off at his first day of school.

I want to meet my baby. I'm going insane. I am not, nor have I ever been, a patient person. This is worse than waiting for Christmas, because at least you know exactly when Christmas will arrive. It can't just show up 2 weeks early or a week late.

11am and 2pm are the worst times for daytime tv. Even HGTV and TLC don't have anything good on. I'm not sure how TLC can get away with being called that, it's totally non-educational. A&E is also, as MadTV put it, now neither artistic nor entertaining. Dog the Bounty Hunter? Come on.

Ever since I was in the hospital, I'm far too aware of what's on tv at any given time on any given weekday. Not good.

I bought the new Jack Johnson cd the other day, while I was out to get The Incredibles on DVD. If you haven't seen it, you really should, at least rent it. Also, as expected, Jack's new cd is great. He's mellow, but not so mellow so as to make you want to shoot yourself in the face. I think I may start a sidebar column here for my sister's musical recommendations. She's usually way ahead of the game, and right on the money.

It's St. Patrick's day, and I'm wearing red. That's not right. Did you know he wasn't even Irish? He was born in Wales and kidnapped by Irish pirates, and sold into slavery in Ireland. Looks like things worked out alright for him after that though.

I got paid today, finally. I'm pretty happy about that. I still don't have any money, but at least I have less no money than before. Does that make sense?

It took me 21 minutes to write this post. I'm easily distracted.

It took another hour before I was able to post it, because Blogger is being a piece of shit.

edit: Georges is ok, apparently. This is good news, of course, but still frustrating, because we don't know why he barfs. Apparently some cats just do. Also, Mort keeps hissing and growling at him because he has vet / medicine smell on him still. Poor guy!

blockbuster

I've been wondering what exactly the deal is with this 'no more late fees' thing, so I looked it up. I thought I'd share it with you, since most everyone I know rents movies. I've actually been thinking of joining zip.ca or something similar to the US Netflix, but haven't yet.

Anyway, so if you rent a movie at Blockbuster, you can keep it a week past its due date. On the 8th day, they charge you the price of the movie - new price if it's not available as a pre-viewed sale yet, and pre-viewed price if it is, and they subtract the price you paid to rent it. If you end up returning it sometime in the next 30 days, you'll get that sale price money back, less a $1.75 'restocking fee'. I had heard bad things, but that seems like a totally reasonable system to me. If you're going to keep the movie for over a month, you really do deserve to have to pay for it. I'm one of the 'oh, crap, the movie was due back at noon' customers, who gets it back, but maybe a few hours late or the next day occasionally. This is great for me.

domestic goddess

hells yeah. I made turkey pot pie last night for supper, and it was effing delicious. The hardest part was making pastry, but it wasn't too bad. If you're ever looking to make said pie, basically you just mix all of your leftover turkey dinner stuff - meat, veg, gravy, and put it in a pie shell, and bake it. Mmmmm.

In other news, my cat has been barfing a lot, so we're taking him in for some tests this afternoon. I took him in on the weekend and the vet said she couldn't see anything wrong, but could run tests if I wanted. I opted for no, because apparently I'm a bad cat-mom. She did say though that her cat does the same thing and there's nothing wrong with him, so I felt not bad about not testing. So, hopefully they'll find something, but it won't be anything serious, and they'll fix it.

We have everything put away in our apartment, basically. I know I said that a while ago, but everything is organised now and looks good. We got a closet organiser that took the fiancé's dad the entire afternoon to install, but now we have shelving, which is very useful, since we only have one dresser between us and I currently have 2 wardrobes. The office needs some shelves or something, it has this giant desk thing attached to the wall, with one drawer and no shelves, so all the computer stuff is just scattered all over the place.

The baby continues to mambo daily, showing that he's not running out of room like he's supposed to. I just keep expanding to accommodate his giant-ness. Very thoughtful of me, no? I'm officially full-term now, and am hoping to go into labour at any moment. My sister's coming up tomorrow, that would be a fun way to welcome her! Anyway, see the preggo blog for full deets on preggo stuff, and some whining.

2 things

part I: so gross

I toasted myself a bagel this morning that I had bought on Wednesday. Seems safe, yes? I then ate half of aforementioned bagel before noticing spots of mold growing on it. Not cool.

part II: why I'm a dork

Because I find stuff like this really interesting.

I rrrrolled and won!

I think that's a good sign. My first rrrroll up of the season, and I won a coffee. It's no thousand dollars, true, but it's better than a re-essayez. I gave it to my almost father-in-law. He was up here yesterday painting the nursery, and had a bit of an accident where the gallon bucket of paint knocked over and spilled all over the carpet. No good. Somehow though, he managed to get it out, and you'd never know anything was there if you didn't know. Even though I know, I can't tell. Mr. Clean and Shout Oxy Power did the trick. And lots of scrubbing.

My cat barfs a lot. The vet thought it might be worms, and gave him medicine for that, but he still barfs, so as I suspected (how would an indoor cat get worms?) it seems not to have been that. My vet said it could be hairballs that won't come up, so I'm now trying "intensive hairball treatment". It's basically normal hairball stuff, from the vet so it's a little stronger, given en masse for 3 days. Poor George. He hates it, so I have to squish it into the fur on his front leg so he'll lick it off. I feel bad using his natural instinct to be clean against him, but there's not much else I can do. I'm not cleaning up barf daily, that's just gross. I'm giving some to Mort daily too, he likes it, and it can't hurt. I'll switch to weekly after a bit.

Hmm, what else is exciting. I soaked my showerhead in vinegar and scrubbed it with a toothbrush so that water will shoot out of all of the holes, and in a relatively straight fashion. Who needs CLR? Not me! I also read reviews of a bunch of stuff on the Shopping Bags website, you should too. They've reviewed everything. Even cats. I also went with a friend to the Clay Café and painted a dinosaur piggy bank. All in all, a productive day, and a damn interesting one.

rrrrrroll up the rrrrrim!

I love it! I very rarely win anything, but whatever. It means that spring is coming, for one thing, and it does make drinking your coffee / hot chocolate more exciting. I had another ultrasound today, and am still not very impressed with the hospital here vs. the hospital in Moncton, but this will just have to do!

things are still a bit of a mess here, but there are a couple of piles of empty boxes, so when they get dealt with it'll be slightly better. I have roughly 8000 pieces of old mail, bills and such, that we don't need, but I have to go through them and see what's old and what's recent, and shred the old stuff. Good times. I also have a good-sized pile of cds and disks with no labels on them, so I have to go through them and see what's blank and what's useless. I just got my final bill from NBPower, apparently I've established an excellent credit record with them, and they thank me very much for my business.

OK, survey time. I hate Rogers. It's just a fact. They just sent me my final bill for our cable / internet service at the old place, since I've closed the account. Thing is, 2 things. One, the account isn't in my name, and they hassle me *every* time I call in, even though my name is attached to the account so that I'm able to call in and change things. Two, we didn't ask to have the account closed, just moved to here. Thus, them sending a bill to me personally, telling me to contact them soon to pay it before it gets sent to collections (pardon?) sends me into a near rage. I know I overreact a bit, but I just can't stand stupidity, especially when it's making me look bad. So, I don't really think I want to deal with them. We have to for cable, we have no options here other than sattelite, which is no better and no cheaper. I was going to downgrade my internet to hi-speed lite/express, which is still faster than dial-up, but only $30/month instead of $44. For the amount of downloading etc that I do, should be fine. Aliant has a deal on right now, that if you sign a year contract, their regular high-speed is $30/month also. Would be faster than the Rogers lite hi-speed, and I wouldn't have to deal with Rogers for internet. Which is good. They say there's a $35 installation charge, but I'm hopeful that I could work my way out of that, since I'd be switching to them and signing a contract. If not, I'll tell them to eff off, I'll stay with Rogers. Who has Aliant, is it good? I haven't had it for a long time, not since it first came out and was super super fast. I know it's not that way anymore, they (as well as Rogers) cap how fast you can download and upload. I think I'll just switch, it can't be worse, and their service is so much better. At the very least, they haven't truly pissed me off lately, and Rogers has, several times. They sent someone to our apartment to do the move, install the cable here, and the next week had no record of any of that, the request to move or the guy having been here. What? Just awful.

This post is random, I apologize.

good news / faith in humanity restored

Well. When I went to the hospital many moons ago...or a month, whichever...I did not think I would be staying long. I drove around a bit trying to decide where to park; I didn't really consider myself to be an emergency, so that was out, nor am I a visitor or a physician. That left only the street for parking. So I parked, smiling to myself that it was late enough that I didn't have to pay the meter. Then, well, I ended up staying for 2.5 weeks. I was able to get my car moved the next day, but it already had a ticket on it. Not for an expired meter, as you might expect, but for being parked overnight on the street in the winter, which as you know is strictly verboten here in the Maritimes.

I sort of forgot about it, since I never actually saw the ticket myself, until I got a friendly reminder from the City, telling me that if I didn't pay within 30 days of the violation, I'd get another notice and the fine would go up. No good. So, today, day 29 I think, haha, I call to pay my fine. Just on a whim, I ask the woman if I can possibly talk to someone about the ticket, since it was really unavoidable. It's $30, after all. She says sure, and sends me to the commissionaire. He's a super nice guy. I explain to him exactly what happened, that I know very well not to park on the street, but I didn't know where else to park, and didn't think I'd be staying for any length of time. He agreed that there was very little else I could have done, and changed the ticket to a warning.

Happy camper. I was fully prepared for them to tell me to shove it, but they didn't. That was nice of them.

floor space!

well, we're not quite done, but we put a good dent in the stuff that needed putting away today. I got all my clothes except sweaters away, which is no small task. I helped a little with sorting of boxes of junk collected from the computer desk and coffee table, and, well, floor, of the old apartment, so we've got most of that done too. The cats are very helpful with all of this, with their jumping in and out of boxes and whatnot. They've actually taken quite a liking to the nursery; it's nice and sunny in there most of the day, so they just laze around in the sun pools. I would too, if I were a cat.

I haven't showered yet today, and on any other day I probably just wouldn't bother, but I figure since it's poker night here tonight, I should look somewhat presentable. Does anybody want to buy an xBox? If I have to watch one more game of NHL 2005 I'm going to vomit. Seriously. It was very helpfully pointed out to me that I'll soon be surrounded by boys, except for some of my fish, but they really don't count. I'll be needing lots of girly visitors.

funny, and yet really offensive

weird how that works out. go ahead, click. via Kim.

Man, I'm still super bored. I'll be done bedrest on Wednesday, but I'm not even sure I'll make it that long. I start to feel really gross after a while of just lying around. Lack of movement and fresh air is no good for me. I saw a woman on the View this morning who's been on bedrest since November though, so I really have no right to complain.

Still working very slowly on getting things put away. It's a bit tricky to get all the clothes away, because I have basically 2 wardrobes now. At least one and a half. I don't want to store the regular stuff anywhere, because hopefully I'll be wearing those clothes in the not-too-distant future. I obviously also have to keep the preggo clothes out, because I'm ENORMOUS. I now have only 1 box of clothes in the nursery, but only because we moved the other one into the bedroom. Meh, whatever. I'm on my own all day today, which is brutal. I do have the cats, and they follow me around whenever I do get off my ass, which isn't often. They like having someone home all day to follow and sleep on. I'm interested but not worried at all to see how they'll react to the baby. The little experience they have had with babies, they are either afraid of them or just show no interest, since the little ones can't pet them or anything.

The couch and something more substantial than mini eggs for lunch is calling, so I should go and answer one of them at least. I may get adventurous and put some clothes away later, but no promises.

you missed me

so here I sit at home. Better than the hospital, I have to say, though not terribly more exciting. The TV is cheaper though. I'm looking around, and when I see something I can do that doesn't look too physically demanding (no bending or lifting or anything) I'll think about doing it. I put some baby clothes in the top drawer of the dresser yesterday, that was pretty exciting. They're all clean and just waiting for a baby now.

The new place is great, very nice, very clean, which is a nice change from what we're used to when moving into a new place. Grant has gone to pick up the last of our stuff in Moncton, and is quite worried that I'm going to go into labour while he's away. I think I'll be ok. Big plans for the day include vegetating in front of the tv, thinking about showering (I just did yesterday, what's the rush?), and hoping that somebody else is as bored as I am and comes to visit me and my messy apartment. I'm pretty bitter right now that I'm not at the market; that's one of the best things about Fredericton. Hopefully in a few weeks.

oh, right

happy valentine's day!

haha

yawn, or, I think I'm dying

but at least we get red napkins on our food trays today.

I've had about enough of this, I'll tell ya. I now have a wicked cold, for which I can take Halls and cough syrup. Not only don't the work very well on the actual coughing part, but they do absolutely nothing for the sneezing, head about to explode, general feeling like shit symptoms. Sweet. So yeah, good times

Sorry for the lack of updates, but there's really not a whole lot going on here. I have some lovely flowers that have (miraculously) not died yet, so that's nice. My roommate (Madam Snoreypants) and her baby (I Only Cry at Night) have gone home, so that's nice too. She was really nice, but not much fun to share a room with at night. Also now I can open the curtain and get some daylight on my side of the room. I thought of asking to move over to the window bed, but then I'd have a different phone number and stuff. Plus, theoretically, I'm only here til Wednesday. Wish me luck.

My lunch has arrived and looks DELICIOUS, so I must be off. I did get ice cream for dessert, that's pretty exciting.

mmm, bedrest

so, obviously everyone is really concerned about why I haven't posted for so long.

...

jerks! all of you!

anyway, I'm in the hospital, on bedrest. It's a pretty rockin' time. I'll spare you the details, I'll post them all on the preggo blog, but suffice to say the baby wants to come out now, and we don't want it to! I'll be in the hospital at least until next Wednesday, or until I have the baby, whichever comes first. Hopefully next Wednesday comes first.

Due to the fact that I've been in the effing hospital for over a week now, there's very little going on in my life to report on. Hospital food is not very good, but I've had fantastic visits from friends and family, and have a good supply of pretty flowery plant things and candy.

The good news is that I did manage to (just) finish first semester. I had my last exam on Monday afternoon, got it marked (only 9 kids wrote, lord love exemptions), and got all my final marks into the spreadsheets so I could fill in the bubble sheets. I went to Toys R Us and made a registry for the baby, not a lot of things, but fun things. I came home, surfed a bit, and then started having a lot of braxton-hicks contractions. They're fake, they don't usually mean anything. Unless you're having them every 3 minutes. So, I came here, and haven't been allowed out since. Unfortunate. I week and 2 days to go. Emails and comments to entertain me are appreciated. I don't have to help in the moving to Fredericton, which is nice. For me, not for anyone else.

I'll be on a bit now that I have dialup and a computer, but for now, that's about it. Must off and update the preggo blog.

because it's fun to start posts with "because"

so, exam week is over, but we still have one day of exams. That's hardly fair. Effing snow. I say fuggit, the theatre arts exam isn't that important, let's just skip it. But no. So I have kids writing an exam Monday afternoon, marks are due Tuesday morning, then we have probably Tuesday afternoon to 'prep' for semester 2, and then classes start Wednesday. Super. I still have no idea what I'm doing. Well, no, I have some idea, but no concrete plans. How hard can it be to get through 4 weeks and 3 days, really? Also, my prep class is moving to period 3, right before lunch, which is exciting. It's period 5 right now, and I generally feel like doing absolutely nothing by the time last period rolls around, so it's not a really productive time for me.

In other news...I have no other news. I was looking for a bit more feedback on the new colour scheme, but no news is good news, or you're all just too lazy to say anything. Except for the, yeah, one person who did comment. Thanks, Kim!.

For now, I have to go cook my sweetie some supper, and then just sit the hell down and relax for a bit. It is the weekend, after all. I have my very first baby shower tomorrow, I'm pretty excited for that. That's about the sum total of my plans for the weekend though. Finish marking exams, and relax some more. Sweet.

because you all want to know more about me

I can tell.

via PSMC, via GG, via Trinity.


- I am: sleepy.
- I know: enough about the English language that I'm annoyed by much of what I see / read on tv.
- I have: too much stuff.
- I wish: for something every time I notice the time is 11:11. I have my sister to thank for that.
- I hate: ignorant people.
- I miss: being small and carefree.
- I fear: being alone.
- I hear: the 3rd blizzard of the week raging outside.
- I search: for the good in people. It can take a while.
- I wonder: what it will be like to be a mom.
- I regret: not participating in much while I was in school.
- I love: my family.
- I ache: when I think about how little I can impact the really big issues in the world.
- I care: what people think of me, even though I know I shouldn't for the most part.
- I always: smile at people when I make eye contact. It's involuntary, and I hope people don't think I'm weird.
- I am not: a very good liar.
- I dance: like a moron, I'm fairly sure. but I have fun.
- I sing: very often, and pretty well, I think.
- I do not always: clean my fishtank as often as I should.
- I should not: spend so much time on the computer.
- I write: much less than I used to. I'll put a link back up to the writings I had posted a while back, on my other site.
- I win: at Scrabble and Scene It.
- I lose: patience quickly when I don't understand something.
- I confuse: my students' names sometimes, even when they've been in my class for a while. I feel badly about that.
- I listen: to cds obsessively when I buy them.
- I go: a little stir crazy when I'm here by myself with nothing to do.
- I am happy about: the way things are turning out for us so far.

because I can

needed a change, I suppose. May not quite be finished, but I think the change of colour scheme will keep me happy for a while. Make sure to reload to get all the new pretty stuff, and let me know what you think. As long as you think it's good. haha. No, really, I can handle well-said constructive criticism too.

snow? again? really?

That's just silly. We once again have the red screen of doom on the weather channel, calling for some ridiculous amount like 40cm to fall tomorrow. Luckily, it's starting tomorrow morning, so hopefully it will be finished by Monday morning, and I can go to work, and my sweet fiancé (who is choosing to risk it instead of go home early like last weekend) will be able to make the treck back to Freddy. Tomorrow will probably be dedicated to not much, sticking close to home and watching tv or movies. I have to clean the fish tank. Wooh!

I had a relatively productive day today. Did some dishes, went to school to photocopy my exams, got some groceries for here and some cleaning stuff for the new apartment. That took me a surprisingly long time. Oh, I also got new wipers for both of our cars, and some good winter wash. Mine claims to be good to -40, you know, the classic blue stuff, but it freezes on my windshield when I try to wash it, when it's nowhere near 40 below. So, I got the same wipers and wash as last year, the motomaster teflon winter stuff, it worked really well for me last winter.

I am greatly enjoying wearing overalls today, they're quite comfy with their lack of waist. In other baby news, I now have just under 10 weeks to go, a baby shower next weekend thrown by the (future) in-laws (mom and aunts), and picked out a crib and dresser for the nursery. That's all, I'm trying to keep the baby stuff on the preggo blog.

We, well, the fiancé and his burly friends and family, moved a bunch of large stuff to Fredericton, to the new place. I am now without, and not missing horribly, I'll say, the futon, the loveseat (which is a pullout, and weighs roughly 2.8 tonnes), the kitchen table and chairs, my regular desk, and the giant tv stand. Also a bunch of boxes of books and stuff, and the 2 bookshelves. We still have a lot of stuff though. People keep telling me that of course this is a great time to clean house, and I agree, and I do throw stuff out, but really and truly most of the stuff we have is useful. Like, I have a lot of clothes, yes, but I wear them all. I go through every now and then and prune out what I don't. We just have enough stuff that we could live in a house and not need to get much. One of the biggest pains in the ass to move is the fish, since I have to catch most of them and drain a bunch of the water out. I'm not going to catch Cletus this time, he can ride in the half-full tank. I think that will be much easier on both of us than me trying to catch him with my inadequately sized net, and him being in a bag not much bigger than him for any amount of time. He likes to hang out on the bottom, or wherever, so it should be ok. If anyone has any great fish moving tips, pass them along. I've done this before, and am better now than I was, but I'm sure there's a better way.

edit

apparently I was unclear in my post about that stupid anti-immigration flyer thing. Now my family thinks I'm being targeted by psychopaths. Have you never come out to find some random flyer on your car? If not, you are very fortunate indeed. Most people have. This is what happened here. The flyer had nothing to do with me personally, or my website, and I didn't think that I had implied that in any way, but just in case, here I am un-implying it.

that's all.

by the by, here's what he wrote back to me. I'm not even going to bother commenting, but I invite you to!



Dear (jallápenno):

Thank you for taking the time to express your views about our leaflet.

Fewer than 18 per cent of Canadians were born abroad. Europeans were the founding/settler people of Canada as we now know it. To say that everyone – and that includes the Natives, who migrated from Asia about 10,000 B.C. – came from somewhere else originally is to say nothing.

There’s a rule of nature. If you don’t control the territory you live in, you won’t have it for long. The Natives were overwhelmed by the newcomers. The reality is that they no longer control the land they once lived in. We have a choice. We can continue to say, “come one, come all,” despite our high unemployment rate. The result, according to Stats Canada, is that by 2050, people of European descent will be a minority. In other words, others, probably East Indians and Chinese will be the majority and, as such, willl impose their ways. If that’s okay with you, do nothing, because that will be the world your children and grandchildren will live in. If it bothers you, join us and seek real immigration reform and a Canada First policy.


Paul Fromm

CFIRC

help!

I have internet, but messenger won't sign in! I feel alone! I have today off, as predicted, because of the wicked-ass blizzard blowing itself all over the place here. The roads are actually pretty clear in front of my place, but that's because the plows go by roughly every 10 minutes. It pays to live across from the fire department.

Anyway, feel free to email me, I'm lonely. Still marking, will finish today, and will further impress myself with my Excel mastery while I create my marking systems. Free hot chocolate and popcorn to whomever decides to drop by! I can pretty much guarantee I'll be here to welcome you, I doubt there's much going on in the hub city today. Plus I don't want to shovel out my car.

I'm watching an amazing show about extreme surgeries, and this poor guy got his whole head and face really badly burned, so they're doing grafts, and it's really gross, but I'm interested to see how it turns out.

it never ends

well, it'll have to end after Wednesday, except for the exams, but there is just far too much marking crap in this teaching job. Especially for English, because there's really no other way to see if the little bastards are learning anything, if not by getting them to do things that I then have to mark. Anyway, I'm hoping to get finished up this latest bunch of stuff today so that I can focus on the horribly complicated exam exemptions process that we're test-driving this year. I understand that of course, there's no other time of year when we could really figure out who's exempt other than now, at exam / end of semester time, but it's just already such a busy time of year.

anyway, on a totally unrelated note...we went to see In Good Company last night, and it was pretty good. A little different than I expected, funny parts but not overall hilarious, but good. We had to park roughly a mile away from the entrance, because there was some kind of conference going on at Crystal Palace. So, went to the movie, enjoyed it, came out to find some hate literature on my car. I was astounded. I visited the website and sent them an email telling them how ridiculous they are, and I encourage you to do the same. Apparently they forgot the part of this country's history where THEIR relatives immigrated from somewhere less wonderful, and were allowed to stay and build a life here. I reminded them of that, but honestly, I'm not expecting much understanding from these folks. It just left a bad taste in my mouth at the end of the night to come out and find that crap on my car. I was surprised that it would even be legal to do so, and sad to be reminded that such small minds exist in today's society.

I'll get down off the soap box now.

marking!

I *finally* finished marking my students' short stories. It took me a really, really long time, because a) I hate marking, and b) the damn kids can't write. I had a few that were really quite good, but so, SO many more that were poorly written in every way. Lame plots, very little detail / thought, and enough spelling, grammar, and punctuation errors to make any literate person vomit. I had to keep taking breaks. Anyway, I won't go into details about the travesties against the English language that I have been forced to witness, but suffice to say I had to just stop correcting a lot of them and try to muddle my way through to attempt to at least get the gist of the plot.

I just looked over at my aquarium and my giant algae eater is on the side of the tank facing me, and he scared the living crap out of me. The light is off, and his underside is lighter with crazy labyrinthy patterns on it, and ... he's enormous. Scary. It's a very pet-centred desk I have here, both of my cats are currently laying in front of the monitor, which makes it tricky to type this post.

What else is new. We have 2 weeks of school until exams, which is fun, because I've never prepared an English exam before. I'm hoping to get some help in that area from the other grade 9 teachers, and hopefully have a look at old exams for the 113 English and theatre arts classes. There's then a week of exams, 2 turn around days, and then 4 weeks and 2 days until March Break. That's when I'm done like dinner. Ack.

I need a hair cut, that's pretty exciting. I think that's it though. I need to go to bed; I've been staying up late all week for some reason, and it's definitely catching up with me.

useful info

speed up Firefox, if you're on broadband.

happy new year!

I have to say though, I've never really gotten the excitement about new years. I've even had a couple of years when I just didn't bother to stay up. Granted, those were years I was spending the break with my parents in PA, but still. As I get older and more mature (haha), I just don't really feel the need to wait for one more excuse to get blitzed and fend off slobbering strangers.

That said, this past 12 months has been quite eventful. As I was planning out my list of what has gone on, I noticed that Tirexl has beat me to the punch, but here is my list of what made this year so much more ... interesting? than years psst.

1. I fully accepted the possible fate of continuing to work in a position I didn't consider my ideal, only to be told later that day that it was no longer available to me


2. I got my dream job a few weeks later


3. My parents moved back from the states to the much more visit-friendly Halifax


4. Even though I had my job lined up, the fact that I didn't know exactly what I was teaching made it possible for me to do basically nothing the whole summer


5. Also making that possible, the fact that I found out I was pregnant in late July, and was rendered unproductive for a couple of months


6. Even though that was terrifying at first, it seems to be working out really well


7. My sweetie got an engineering job that he really, really likes


8. We got engaged


9. We started looking for a house. We've put that on hold for now, but it's definitely a big thing.


10. I can look at my fiancé and smile at how in love I am


11. I can look at my tummy and smile at the giant alien baby growing in there, who seems to be trying to escape, or perhaps doing kung fu.

Made for some stress, I'll tell ya, but it's all going pretty well now. The alien baby thumps my innards as we speak, and the fiancé is happily playing NHL 2005. Things are good. I'm happy.

Happy Boxing Day!

No shopping yet though. Santa found me and my family, and we gorged ourselves on turkey et al last night. Good times. We're hosting what has become an annual boxing day event here at our house this year, where we get together with my dad's sister and her family for dinner and general merriment, usually involving drinking and board games. We have a couple of new games this year, Battle of the Sexes and Scene It, which I got for Christmas. I also got a sweet pair of pink gloves to go with my sweet pink hat that I got last year. Very hard to find, apparently. Anyway, here in Halifax we're supposed to get like 50cm of snow. That's a lot. Moncton is supposed to get 30cm, which is also a lot, but it's no 50! Since we had only planned on leaving Tuesday, we're not too worried. It's supposed to stop tomorrow, just snow a crapload this afternoon and tonight. I'll keep you posted though.

I got loads of stuff, I must say. Some things for the baby, which is great, a jolly jumper thing and a snuggly carrier thing, and my parents got us a stroller / infant car seat that took us a good hour to put together and figure out how to use. The stroller was just a baby present though, not for Christmas.

Anyway, off to get clean and spend some more time with the fam. Hope all is well in your neck of the woods!

the countdown is on

and the holiday visiting is officially beginning. The kitties are going this aft to their holiday hotel, I'm heading up to see my sweetie, and then on Friday we're heading down to see my parents. Wooh! I'll probably be online a bit, because everywhere I'm going for the next few days has internet, but just in case, I wanted to send out my happy holiday wishes to you all now.

Eat lots, drink lots (not necessarily alcoholic, mind you), and be merry. Enjoy your time with your loved ones, and I hope Santa finds you all!

via Mitch

hmmm, good points.

wooh!

it's vacation, and am I EVER having fun so far!

just kidding.

So far, I've gotten up about half an hour later than I usually do on a Monday morning, to go to a dentist appointment I had completely forgotten about. Then, I went to the clinic to have some blood work done, which involved me waiting in line, then drinking something really sweet and gross, and then waiting for another hour, and then having my blood taken. Good times. I stopped in at Superstore to get some kitty litter and enough food to get me through the next 3 days. The boys will be spending their holiday with the almost-in-laws, as they have the past few years. They could, technically, spend it at my parents' place this year, since they're so much closer than previous years, but we'll only actually be there for a few days, and the a-i-ls' place is much close, and we'll be heading there after my parents' place anyway. They're heading there on Wednesday afternoon, after which I'll be heading up to Fredericton to see my sister and my sweetie, and hopefully Tirexl, whom I haven't seen for a while. I'm hoping to see Jenn soon-ish too, now that she's back in town.

I have to get the boys' stuff all ready to go, which shouldn't be too hard, since they have a litter pan and stuff where they're headed. I need to clean the fishtank and figure out exactly when we're coming back, and if I'll need someone to stop in and feed them before we do get back. Quite likely. They can go a couple of days, and have gone longer when the fiancé was left in charge, but I don't know that it's really good for them to do so. Must get this place cleaned up a bit, because coming home to a messy house is never fun when you've been away. I think that's it though. Shopping is done, wrapping is done except for my Grannie's present, which is large and can wait for now to be wrapped.

What last-minute things do you have to take care of in the next...4 days? I say 4, not 5, becuase in 5 it's actually Christmas, and there's not much you can do then, except open presents and eat lots.

so close

almost break time. I'm very excited. Actually, I'm very tired. I'm done my shopping, my gifts are wrapped, I even have a tree up, with lights but no ornaments. Why? Because I don't have any ornaments. I didn't mean to get a tree, I meant to get a wreath. They didn't have any wreaths, so I got sold into buying a tree. It's nice, smells good and whatnot, and the cats haven't peed on it or climbed it or anything, and it looks pretty with the lights on, so I guess it's good overall.

I have a test tomorrow for one of my classes, and I have some none-too-challenging work for my 9s, novel questions and some holiday related stuff. Friday I'm anticipating to be a total write-off. The Christmas semi-formal is tomorrow night, I'm chaperoning the 1st half. It goes until 11, and apparently basically everyone goes out to eat and / or drink afterward. Now, I would have had to go to school the next day, but kids seem to get to do basically whatever they want, for the most part. That, combined with the fact that all Friday afternoon is an assembly, leads me to believe that there will not be much accomplished that day. It's too bad really. We could end school whenever, but as soon as you get down to the last few days before break, the kids just go into holiday mode. They're like, why don't we just cancel school on Friday? Nobody's coming anyway! Well, for one, people are coming, some students have responsible parents, believe it or not. And for two, if we cancelled Friday, then Thursday would be the last day before vacation, and it would be just like Friday. They don't really get it, but whatever. So, tomorrow is Friday, in some ways. But, not in the way that you get to sleep in the next day because it's the weekend. Because it's not really Friday.

I made cookies tonight. It took me a while, because I kept getting distracted. I put lights on the tree, talked to my parents, sent a birthday card to the fiancés brother. Did eventually make cookies, and they're tasty. Now, cookies made, I think I have to go to bed. I even made my lunch for tomorrow. Go me!

holiday greetings, from my cats

Darwin Awards

It's one of those things that isn't really funny, but really is...


Hard to believe, but another year has passed. Once again, it is time for the Darwin Award Nominees. The Darwins are awarded every year to the persons who died in the most stupid manner, thereby removing themselves from the gene pool. This year's nine nominees are:




Nominee No. 1: [San Jose Mercury News]:

An unidentified man, using a shotgun like a club to break a former girlfriend's windshield, accidentally shot himself to death when the gun discharged, blowing a hole in his gut.




Nominee No. 2: [Kalamazoo Gazette]:

James Burns, 34, (a mechanic) of Alamo, MI, was killed in March as he was trying to repair what police describe as a "farm-type truck." Burns got a friend to drive the truck on a highway while Burns hung underneath so that he could ascertain the source of a noise. Burns' clothes caught on something, however, and the other man found Burns "wrapped in the drive shaft."




Nominee No. 3: [Hickory Daily Record]:

Ken Charles Barger, 47, accidentally shot himself to death in December in Newton, NC. Awakening to the sound of a ringing telephone beside his bed, he reached for the phone but grabbed instead a Smith & Wesson 38 Special, which discharged when he drew it to his ear. (For whatever reason, residents of Southern states always seem to figure prominently among the Darwin nominees.)




Nominee No. 4: [UPI, Toronto]:

Police said a lawyer demonstrating the safety of windows in a downtown Toronto skyscraper crashed through a pane with his shoulder and plunged 24 floors to his death. A police spokesman said Garry Hoy, 39, fell into the courtyard of the Toronto Dominion Bank Tower early Friday evening as he was explaining the strength of the building's windows to visiting law students. Hoy previously has conducted demonstrations of window strength according to police reports. Peter Lawson, managing partner of the firm Holden Day, told the Toronto Sun newspaper that Hoy was "one of the best and brightest" members of the 200-man association.




Nominee No. 5: [Bloomberg News Service]:

A terrible diet and a room with no ventilation are being blamed for the death of a man who was killed by his own gas emissions. There was no mark on his body, and an autopsy showed large amounts of methane gas in his system. His diet had consisted primarily of beans and cabbage (and a couple of other things). It was just the right combination of foods. It appears that the man died in his sleep from breathing the poisonous cloud that was hanging over his bed. Had he been outside or had his windows been opened, it wouldn't have been fatal. But the man was shut up in his nearly airtight bedroom. According to the article, "He was a big man with a huge capacity for creating "this deadly gas" Three of the rescuers got sick, and one was hospitalized.




Nominee No. 6: [The News of the Weird]:

Michael Anderson Godwin made News of the Weird posthumously. He had spent several years awaiting South Carolina's electric chair on a murder conviction before having his sentence reduced to life in prison. While sitting on a metal toilet in his cell attempting to fix his small TV set, he bit into a wire and was electrocuted.




Nominee No. 7: [The Indianapolis Star]:

A cigarette lighter may have triggered a fatal explosion in Dunkirk, IN. A Jay County man, using a cigarette lighter to check the barrel of a muzzleloader, was killed Monday night when the weapon discharged in his face, sheriff's investigators said. Gregory David Pryor, 19, died in his parents' rural Dunkirk home at about 11:30 PM. Investigators said Pryor was cleaning a 54-caliber muzzleloader that had not been firing properly. He was using the lighter to look into the barrel when the gunpowder ignited.




Nominee No. 8: [Reuters, Mississauga, Ontario]:

A man cleaning a bird feeder on the balcony of his condominium apartment in this Toronto suburb slipped and fell 23 stories to his death. Stefan Macko, 55, was standing on a wheeled chair when the accident occurred, said Inspector D'Arcy Honer of the Peel Regional Police. "It appears that the chair moved, and he went over the balcony," Honer said.




Finally, THE WINNER!!!: [Arkansas Democrat Gazette]:

Two local men were injured when their pickup truck left the road and struck a tree near Cotton Patch on State Highway 38 early Monday. Woodruff County deputy Dovey Snyder reported the accident shortly after midnight Monday. Thurston Poole, 33, of Des Arc, and Billy Ray Wallis, 38, of Little Rock, were returning to Des Arc after a frog gigging trip on an overcast Sunday night when Poole's pickup truck headlights malfunctioned.


The two men concluded that the headlight fuse on the older-model truck had burned out. As a replacement fuse was not available, Wallis noticed that the .22 caliber bullet from his pistol fit perfectly into the fuse box next to the steering-wheel column. Upon inserting the bullet the headlights again began to operate properly, and the two men proceeded on eastbound toward the White River Bridge.


After traveling approximately 20 miles, and just before crossing the river, the bullet apparently overheated, discharged, and struck Poole in the testicles.


The vehicle swerved sharply right, exiting the pavement, and striking a tree. Poole suffered only minor cuts and abrasions from the accident, but will require extensive surgery to repair the damage to his testicles, which will never operate as intended. Wallis sustained a broken clavicle and was treated and released. "Thank God we weren't on that bridge when Thurston shot his balls off, or we might both be dead," stated Wallis. "I've been a trooper for 10 years in this part of the world, but this is a first for me. I can't believe that those two would admit how this accident happened," said Snyder. Upon being notified of the wreck, Lavinia (Poole's wife) asked how many frogs the boys had caught and did anyone get them from the truck???


(Though Poole and Wallis did not die as a result of their misadventure as normally required by Darwin Award Official Rules, it can be argued that Poole DID, in fact, effectively remove himself from the gene pool). "People are not stupid... They just have a different knowledge base"

survey time

due to recent events, I'm forced to consider my opinion on the death penalty. I'm just really not sure. There are a lot of faults with the system, for sure. In the article linked above there, you'll see what I mean.

"California's death row has grown to house about 650 condemned men and women since the state brought back capital punishment in 1978. Since then, only 10 executions have been carried out — the last one in 2002. It can take years for even the first phase of the appeals process to begin."

It seems kind of stupid to maintain a system which is intended to kill people but that doesn't, really. I think that life (literally meaning life, not 25 years) without the possibility of parole is a pretty decent punishment. Killing someone as punishment seems a bit eye-for-an-eye, old fashioned, perhaps barbaric. I know this is simplifying to the extreme, but is it not a bit strange to say to a child, 'do not hit your sister, no hitting!' as you smack said child? Sends a bit of a mixed message, no? Back to the killing people though, I think maybe they should just be locked up somewhere with only their basic human survival needs being met, and they should live that way for the rest of their lives. No free education, no weight training, no tv. If you're committed of a crime for which there is no seeming rehabilitation available, then you just get locked up, and the key is destroyed, and that's the end. I briefly thought that perhaps you should die in the way that you killed people, but that would never get past congress. As you can see, my opinion changes, but I think I feel now, and of course my opinion would quite possibly change if I were to ever find myself in a situation like Laci's family, that I might quite possibly want the satisfaction of knowing my daughter's murderer was no longer a breathing member of society...but I think as it stands now, I vote for life in a non-luxury jail cell.

Also, how would you ever know the person was guilty, for sure. You can go with the evidence, and especially now with all the high-tech DNA stuff and whatnot, it's pretty accurate. There have been quite a few convicted murderers on death row released due to new techniques and re-examining the evidence. Who's to say that in 15 years we won't have something else that totally outdates the stuff we have now, that may even prove what we're doing isn't all that accurate? How do you know? Should we just trust the evidence and the juries and judges and fry the bastards / inject them with deadly things? I just don't know. I think maybe that's one of my main issues with the death penalty. Surely the gross majority of convicted death-rowers are guilty, for real and for sure. But what about that one person who isn't? For whom there was enough evidence and just not enough of an alibi?

What do you think?

snow day, snow day, la la la

I didn't blog about it yesterday for fear of being lynched by all you non-snowday blessed readers. Today, I gloat. It was fantastic. I have to say, Wednesday is the best possible day to have a snow day, because it's a little mini-weekend right in the middle of your week. I worked one day, and it's Friday tomorrow! Sweet. I went out with 2 friends, got a couple of tops at Thyme and some conditioner. Not a horribly productive trip, but enjoyable nonetheless. I'm really really almost done my shopping, I need one more thing for my dad, and then I think I'll call it a day. I have this problem where when I go shopping, I buy too much. And usually a little something for myself. It's problematic lately, because I can actually justify buying clothes, since my current wardrobe is limited. I got myself a blouse, a shirt, and 2 ponchos. I have to say, I am *loving* the ponchos. I wore one today, and it kept me surprisingly warm, and I felt totally rockin in it. I received several compliments from students and co-workers. Also, I matched really well today, which probably helped. I never pictured myself as a poncho person, and I don't know that non-preggo me will be, but preggo me is diggin it.

I gave my 113s back their photo essay projects today. I've had them for a month, so it was time. I just marked them though, haha. Anyway, one guy lost 30% (3 days late, 10% a day) so only got a 66% when he really earned 96%. I had another guy who got a 60% because he really didn't follow the project guidelines at all. They both told me they were never doing another project, since it's just not worth it. I told them that quite the opposite, if you do things on time, and follow directions, you'll generally do quite well. They disagreed, so I said, yes, you're right, I should just let you hand things in whenever you want to and give you 100% regardless of effort or quality of product. That would be better. I'm just a big meanie. That at least got a smile out of one guy. The other guy (kind of an odd duck, really) said he wasn't doing any more work, and when I told him he'd have to leave the class if he refused to do work, he said "it would be a blessing to get out of this dump". That went over well. He had a chat with me and then with the vp. Good times.

Now, I must get myself some supper, quickly, before I succumb to the beckoning call of the golden arches...

holiday tips

via Trinity.


1. Avoid carrot sticks. Anyone who puts carrots on a holiday buffet table knows nothing of the Christmas spirit. In fact, if you see carrots, leave immediately. Go next door, where they're serving rum balls.

2. Drink as much eggnog as you can. And quickly. Like fine single-malt scotch, it's rare. In fact, it's even rarer than single-malt scotch. You can't find it any other time of year but now. So drink up! Who cares that it has 10,000 calories in every sip? It's not as if you're going to turn into an eggnog-aholic or something. It's a treat. Enjoy it. Have one for me. Have two. It's later than you think. It's Christmas!

3. If something comes with gravy, use it. That's the whole point of gravy. Gravy does not stand alone. Pour it on. Make a volcano out of your mashed potatoes. Fill it with gravy. Eat the volcano. Repeat.

4. As for mashed potatoes, always ask if they're made with skim milk or whole milk. If it's skim, pass. Why bother? It's like buying a sports car with an automatic transmission.

5. Do not have a snack before going to a party in an effort to control your eating. The whole point of going to a Christmas party is to eat other people's food for free. Lots of it. Hello?

6. Under no circumstances should you exercise between now and New Year's. You can do that in January when you have nothing else to do. This is the time for long naps, which you'll need after circling the buffet table while carrying a 10-pound plate of food and that vat of eggnog.

7. If you come across something really good at a buffet table, like frosted Christmas cookies in the shape and size of Santa, position yourself near them and don't budge. Have as many as you can before becoming the center of attention. They're like a beautiful pair of shoes. If you leave them behind, you're never going to see them again.

8. Same for pies. Apple. Pumpkin. Mincemeat. Have a slice of each. Or, if you don't like mincemeat, have two apples and one pumpkin. Always have three. When else do you get to have more than one dessert? Labour Day?

9. Did someone mention fruitcake? Granted, it's loaded with the mandatory celebratory calories, but avoid it at all cost. I mean, have some standards.

10. One final tip: If you don't feel terrible when you leave the party or get up from the table, you haven't been paying attention. Reread all tips; start over, but hurry, January is just around the corner.

time flies, even if you're not really having fun

weird eh? I have 8.5 days of class left, since tomorrow I have the morning off for an appointment. My 11 class was like, you miss more time than we do! (which is funny, because they miss a lot of time, because they hate school, and also completely inaccurate; I only miss .5 days per month, plus one morning when we did the school matinee of our play). Anyway, I don't really give a shit. I'm getting much better at leaving lesson plans, which is good, because it really shouldn't be more work to take a day off than to go in and work yourself. Tomorrow, and for the next week, my 11s are working on a project for the novel Hunter in the Dark. I must say, I was pretty impressed with myself, because I could not find a blessed thing to help me teach that book. I had chapter questions, that's it. I made up a project with 5 choices, and I think there's something that appeals, as much as possible, to everyone. My 9s and I are working our way through The Outsiders, which is taking a pretty long time. I'm going to pick up the pace a bit and see if we can't get mostly done before the break. There are 5 chapters left, we should be able to do 2-3, I just have to speed them up and stop doing the stupid activities along the way. I have some good projects for them to do too, but we have to get through the friggin book first. As for the last day, we have an assembly all afternoon, but 3/4 of my classes are in the morning, so I'm just sort of hoping nobody shows up. We'll do something marginally relevant but holiday themed. It's a problem, because kids don't come because we don't do anything because kids don't come. See how it works?

I've got a good start on my shopping, I'm mostly done I think. I have to get some things for my dad, he's hard to shop for because he gives no hints other than socks, which really, he can only use so many of. I have a couple of ideas though, so I should be alright. Other than that, I'm pretty much done family. Friends are going to get warm wishes and hugs and cards I think, because I have about 40 cents in my bank account. This mastercard statement should be interesting.

On that note, we're not buying a house. It's just too much, and we have enough stress going on in every other area in our lives. Now, however, we have to find a nice, 2+ bedroom apartment that takes cats, and babies, and has laundry. Good luck to us! Oh, and that doesn't cost $1000 a month. If anyone knows of any, please pass that info along. Any time between now and March is good. I emailed our old landlord in Fredericton, but he has nothing for us. He was good enough to forward my letter on to a real estate rental guy, who is clearly an idiot, and sent me a link to a 2 bedroom that does not take pets and has no laundry. Useful. So we won't be getting in touch with him. Most of his other stuff is giant apartment buildings anyway, which suck.

ok, I'm done.