My very first attempt at You tube

There isn't any sound, but it's a video of Salem and Marley playing. For some reason you tube has resized the video. It doesn't look all that great. But not bad for a first attempt.

420 Baseball tournament

This weekend was the 420 year-end tournament. The pressure was on as they were the defending champions. Sarah, Shannon and Darren came over the night before to make t-shirts for the event. We were the team cheerleaders for the weekend, copmlete with pom-poms. The shirts were a big hit and people on the team all wanted to wear the leftover shirts. The slogans on day one included "420's Ball washer", "Jesus loves the 420's", and "It's 420 time".



Brendan thought of an awesome idea and brought the supplies for a huge slip and slide. It was a very fast 100 foot stretch. Much better than the store bought one. Here's Pat getting a face full of soap.


The team sitting around in between games. Three games were played the first day, 2 wins and one lost.


Day 2 brought new outfits. These awesome shirts were much admired, Pat wore the third one: "Taking you to 420 town"



Cheering is much more difficult than you would guess. It's hard to keep the energy going when things are going bad, and by the end of the weekend my voice was nearly gone. We managed to come up with nicknames for nearly the whole team, and most people also got a personalized theme song/cheer.

Shannon brought along blue body paint, and everyone got something painted on their arms. The 420 girls with painted arms


For some reason I only took one game picture, and the person up to bat is on the other team!



While waiting for the last game to start, we broke out the body paint again. We also had those black under the eye sticker things. Ryan was being silly in his "It's 420 time" shirt.

3 games were played on day 2. The first was lost, but the next two were won. Which means that the team came in 5th

Marcell went up to accept the award


"Damn, this thing is a lot smaller than last years"


The team photo

Marley

Marley is my new kitten. She likes the laptop, especially music videos. And typing, I have to lock her in the bedroom when I want to type. Her she is watching a video.


kitty in between the couch cushions, I think she looks guilty, or confused or maybe worried


Salem and Marley get along very well. The two hot cats trying to cool off. It's hard to tell, but Marley is still tiny compared to Salem, she's only 9 weeks old. I am anxiously waiting to get my balcony screened-in so that I can open my sliding door again. These last few days have been very hot with all the doors closed!


UPDATE: the kitties love each other, and now sleep curled up together. I guess Salem looks like Marley's mom or something because Marley tries to nurse from Salem, and Salem allows it. It's very strange, I'm not sure what to do about it.

Joey's

On Canada Day, I met Whitney downtown for lunch. I wasn't sure which bus to take, so I asked the driver, sadly, the driver was wrong. I hopped off the bus when I realized, and called Whitney. Thank goodness for cell phones! I get lost a lot, without a cell phone I would never be found.

Is that her?

Yup! Finally we found one another

Time for lunch, off to Joey's. The restaurant has the craziest bathroom ever. When you walk in there is couch, mirror and a long staircase. This is the view from the top, the wall is copper, and there is a huge painting. The floors are slate and dark hardwood.

The toilets are in a loft. The sink is a trough-style~ they make me nervous because anything dropped in the sink is gone forever.

It was kind of hard to get pictures of the bathroom, I had to wait for a bulimic girl and her friends to leave. Finally they left, and I started snapping pics.

The food was pretty good too, I like the rooftop lounge, very nice. Recommended

How big is your footprint?

I'm not asking what size shoes you wear, but how big your ecological footprint is. It's a calculation that determines your use of the world's resources. The smaller the number the better. I have been kinda wondering what my number is and I finally found a quiz! In an ideal world you should have a number near 1.8. Here are my results:


CATEGORY GLOBAL HECTARES

FOOD 1.1
MOBILITY 0.2
SHELTER 1.6
GOODS/SERVICES 1.4

TOTAL FOOTPRINT 4.3

IN COMPARISON, THE AVERAGE ECOLOGICAL FOOTPRINT IN YOUR COUNTRY IS 8.8

GLOBAL HECTARES PER PERSON. WORLDWIDE, THERE EXIST 1.8 BIOLOGICALLY PRODUCTIVE GLOBAL HECTARES PER PERSON.

IF EVERYONE LIVED LIKE YOU, WE WOULD NEED 2.4 PLANETS.

I have a lower than average score because I'm a veggie, don't drive and because I live in high-density housing. However, according to this quiz, I still consume too much. I don't think this is the best quiz because it doesn't ask very detailed questions, and some of the multiple choice answers didn't fit me. It only takes 2 mintues to take the quiz.

http://www.earthday.net/footprint/info.asp

So what's you score??

What to do before you turn 30?

Ever wondered what you should be doing now? As I come to the last few weeks of school, random people have been giving me advice on what I should do in my post-university life. Most of the advice reflects them- usually what they did at 27, or what they wished they had done at 27. All good and well if I wanted to be them!

So in an effort to find direction, I looked to the world wide web. What I should be doing really varies according to who you ask. According to http://www.kiplinger.com/, there are 8 things I need to do:
1. Identify your goals
2. Start an emergency fund
3. Pay off credit cards
4. Start investing
5. Establish credit
6. Set up a strategy to pay off student loans
7. Take calculated risks
8. Travel
What? Did I ask a banker or something? All very sensible things to do. Amazingly, I've actually done about half of those things. But not exactly a thrilling life.


I want a second opinion. So according to http://www.bankrate.com/ I should:
1. Drive a wickedly cool car, even if you have to rent it
2. Date against type
3. See the world
4. live in a cool place
5. If you're going to drink a lot, do it when you're young
6. Take risks with your job
7. do something physically adventurous
8. take your parents out for dinner
9. Do volunteer work
10. use this decade to go to extremes

Ugh, I don't like this list either. why?
1. I don't drive because I'm anti-car
2. that implies that I have a type and that I am aware of it
3. ok, that one's ok
4. New Foundland and Ontario where cool in the winter...
5. I don't really drink
6. you mean like not triple checking that I am giving someone the correct meds?
7. ok, that one's ok too
8. whatever!
9. sure
10. I think I'm over going to extremes

So, in some ways the web has failed me. But with all the advice I've been getting lately I have a rather impressive list of things I do NOT want to do. Most people have been telling me to apply for grad school- let's not. Or sell everything I own and travel- but let's be honest no one is going to buy my crap. One of my co-worker thinks that I need to go to India before I can do anything. I decided the flights are too expensive, so I watched a couple Bollywood movies instead. Didn't really change my life.

What the heck is that thing in the sky?

What happened to all the fluffy clouds? Blue sky??? I haven't seen that in MONTHS. An hour spent at the SFU fish pond and I am a french fry. I hope everyone else sucked up some much needed Vitamin D today. I am going to pack my wool socks and scarves away for the third time this year. Hopefully summer is here to stay.

Garden pics

There isn't much colour going on in my garden at the moment. But I do have a few pics:



I didn't mean to plant these flowers. I thought I bought a white trailing flower, but instead I got three colours. I think that they are very pretty, and definately not what I bought. Someone must have switched the tags

Music

Some people are forever losing things, and others rarely do. I'm the second type. I had only lost 1 set of keys, 1 ring, 2 earrings and some socks in the course of my life. A few weeks ago I went to Choices and bought too many groceries to walk home. I called a cab and put all my stuff on a table as I was waiting. When the cab came, I gathered my stuff and left. About an hour later I started to wonder where my MP3 player was (and the brand new headphones I bought 3 days before). By the time I realized, it was too late and my stuff was gone.

I was really angry at myself for about a week and a half. I don't lose things. Since then, the world has been pretty quiet. My 45 minute commute to and from school is really long and walking to Safeway isn't tons of fun anymore. I don't like that I have no option but to overhear other peoples conversations on the bus. I like being able to drown stupid people out. Working out, again, is fairly boring. Ever tried to work out to the music in your head? What am I supposed to do if I'm not listening to music? Whitney suggested thinking or daydreaming about celebrities. I discovered that I don't have enough interesting thoughts to fill the time. I don't think it's very surprising, I was raised in the age of video games.

Even though I was angry at myself for my absent mindedness, I was a little excited at the idea of buying a new MP3 player. I found "the one." But it was full price, and I decided to punish myself further and live in a boring world until it went on sale. After 3 weeks it has finally gone on sale, and I bought it today! Isn't it pretty? It doesn't have any buttons, it has a touch screen, and it can hold pictures and do a slideshow as I listen to music! I chose to have it shipped to my house instead of going and picking it up in store. I like new toys, so I opted to have it arrive after I'm done midterms, so I can focus. No more trying to entertain myself by thinking!

Admittedly, this is a fairly strange post.

Actually, it's for the birds.
On a message board I frequent, someone was asking about a bird call that was driving them crazy. Amazingly enough, someone actually knew the bird, and posted a link. I spent a few minutes cruising around the site and found my favorite bird. I call it the camping bird because I only hear it when I'm camping, and it's always the first thing I wake up to. Click on play to hear the camping bird. http://birdweb.org/birdweb/bird_details.aspx?id=352

This is a different camping bird. http://birdweb.org/birdweb/bird_details.aspx?id=279

Whiskey jacks are good camping birds too because they are so friendly, and they force you to keep your campsite clean. But they don't sing pretty songs, so I don't have a link.

End of an era

This just in:

A Thank You Note
We wanted to let you know that the time has come for a change. As of Sunday at midnight, Z95-3 is no longer.
We can't thank you enough for your support of Z over the years. We really appreciate it.
On Tuesday, you will hear a new radio station on your radio at 95-3 FM.
We hope you like it. We think you will.
Best Regards,
The Team at Z95-3

OMG! Good thing I didn't waste my time collecting Z-points. Remember when z-95.3 first started, and how it was big competition for LG-73? Remember when you made the switch to FM? Remember how important it was to get your Z-sticker? Z-95.3 will always remind me of Ace of Base, "Sex, Lies and Audiotape" with Rhona Raskin and 90's techno.
Truly the end of an era

Pamela Martin and Bill Good

Apparently, I should have posted these pics from the parade too:

Perry, and Bill Good's back. A horrible picture

And here's Pamela Martin. She's really tiny in real life.

Back to Earth Day

Avid blog readers may remember my Earth Day resolution/rant to cut my use of plastics. I have been looking for the following product:


waxed paper bags, that you can use instead of plastic ziploc bags. I have been searching, but can only find them in the states. Normally, I would just buy online, but the shipping fees are too high to make it worth while. So if any of you are out and about and stumble along some waxed paper bags, let me know!

Movies etc

It's been a while since the last post. I went to the drive in movie for the first time, it was pretty good, but I wish it didn't go so late. Pirates of the Carribean was too long (3 hours long), and I was falling asleep. But it is a decent eye-candy movie. Driving home at 3:30 in the morning made me a little nervous because we passed a really bad accident on the #1. It was a flipped SUV that ran into an overpass, I avoided the news the next day because I didn't want to hear how many people died. There is no way anyone lived through that crash. Anyways, Ocean's 13 is opening soon, any one want to go? I have a movie pass which is about to expire, so I gotta go and see the movies instead of downloading them.

Catching up on the camera pics, more kitty cuteness. But don't worry that's the last of the cat pictures for a long while.

And last weekend was the Hyack parade, I saw celebrities. Bill Good and Pamela Martin and Mee Jung Lee.... oh my!

Bus tales

A lot has been happening on the bus lately. I sometimes think that my life would be completely uneventful if it weren't for the strange things that happen to me on the bus.


Today as I was preparing to get off the bus, a couple of young guys were talking about me. I thought it was funny because they were about 19 or 20 years old and were talking really loudly. I was feeling pretty hot today, I had just dropped a mint at the mall, the sun was shining, and my hair was awesome, and now I had some hot young thing checking me out. Decent. One of them was about to talk to me when his friend said "Dude, she's like, 12 man." I was so shocked that I just got off the bus. I look 12? How the hell did that happen? Last month I was in the dumps because I'm almost 30! Little did I know that I'm really single because I look pre-pubescent!


Now for the ugly. I was heading to work last week, it was the first nice sunny day in a long while. I was wearing my favorite Capri's and flip flops. Again, feeling pretty hot. The bus was packed with old ladies, so I stood at the front of the bus, near the driver. I got to work and was getting changed into the dreaded uniform. Somehow my nice, white dress shirt had got stained with purple overnight. As I had no immediate remedy for my situation, I put it on anyways. As I was buttoning it up, I found that my shirt was now also missing a button in a rather unfortunate place. How did that happen? It sucks, but I can live with my stained peek-a-boob shirt. I was folding up my favorite Capri's when I noticed that the ass had ripped! OMG! I got on a packed bus and stood at the front with the ass of my pants ripped!

Strangely enough, I am much more upset about the pants than I am about showing half of the city my pink underwear.

Opportunity knocking

Does anyone have a vehicle and a couple hours to spare? half a million books are going on auction on thursday in Coquitlam. Prices should be pretty cheap, as there is a huge amount of books up for grabs. I want to go and buy a pallet or two (that equals about 4000 books) depending on the price. But there is no way for me to do this without a vehicle.

What will you get for your efforts? Gas money, eternal gratitude, dinner and drinks and one hell of a workout.

Where are the books going? possibly to a storage locker at Braid station. Or else to my living room....

Anyone interested in helping me? I'm 100% serious

Thanks to those that offered their services, very much appreciated! A friend emailed me a ton of pictures of the books. I was not too thrilled, the books were good, but not the type that would fly off the shelves. Normally I wouldn't care how long it took for a book to sell, but if I had 4000 books in my livingroom, that's like a whole different story. I'm not sure that I can stand keeping 4000 books for more than 2 months. It would probably take me at least 2 months to list all of them, and then I would have to wait for them to sell. I have visions of Salem climbing the book piles, and I would be found by the police smothered under a pile of books, half eatten by my cat.

Let's not.

Hyack

The songs have been burned into your head. You know the dances, you probably still have the frilly dress you wore. If you live in New West, then you already know that it is the Hyack festival! So much to do! Wednesday at 12 is May Day. And Saturday is the parade and pancake breakfast and street fare at 6th and 6th. The petting zoo is now open for the summer, and so is the spray park if it wasn't so cold.

As I was looking for pictures of the NWSS marching band in their awful uniforms, I found the NWSS music department website. Back when I was a band geek, the big band trips were to Anaheim and San Fran. Times have changed, they went to NYC this year!

I saw you

Yes I am still reading the I saw you's. This one is funny.

Crazy depressed hot girl on Skytrain - May 2 - m4w - 31

It was the 2nd time I saw you on Skytrain. The first time your eyes were puffy from what looked like a long crying session. My brother and I agreed that we wanted to cheer you up cause you were totally hot. At the same time I was afraid to say hi because you looked like you might go crazy. Crazy like "throw shit at me and accuse me of shit that was the fault of your shithead boyfriend".

This time I saw you again and text messaged my brother who was standing a few feet away from you. You still looked crazy but you didn't look like you've cried in a while, maybe the anti-depressants are sorta working. You still looked totally sad but also totally hot. Like totally crazy in bed hot.

Maybe we can have a coffee or something. Caffeine is an anti-depressant you know.


Insulting a person is not the best way to get them to go out with you. Who knew that crazy and puffy, red eyes were hot? I'll have to try that next time I go out. Oh and coffee isn't an anti-depressant, but it is a stimulant.

BENJI

Benji is Dad and Judy's cat. He is about a year and half old, and full of energy. I have had requests for picture updates of their baby.

The 'get to know you' stage of their relationship. Benji came for a sleepover last weekend to make sure that he and Salem would get along.


Followed by the hiding and pouncing stage.


And the adventure stage. Benji is learning about the dogs that live downstairs.


And they are now in the BFF stage. It only took 2 days.

Birthday

Well, now that the Canucks are out of the playoffs, I can catch up on other blog stuff. A couple weeks ago was my birthday.

We went for a walk that turned into a 2 and a half hour hour hike. It was nice.

A cool nurse tree

Birthday rose flavoured Creme Brule courtesy of Christina. It actually tasted like roses! My new favourite dessert