Olympics #2 - Doc Walker in Surrey

This post requires some back story. A few months ago I got a message from Jackie (thephotoalbumlady for the SSers here) asking fi I'd be willing to get a cd for her nephew. It was by a Canadian band and it wasn't available in the States yet. I said sure, found it and shipped it off no problem. I hadn't heard of the band (Mariana's Trench) but I texted my youngest brother Aaron and he had. It was REALLY weird for him to get a text asking about them from his country obsessed sister but he played along.

Fast forward to when the line up for the Surrey Live Site was announced and it turns out that Mariana's Trench and my all time favourite band, Doc Walker were both playing on the same night!!! I immediately texted Aaron to ask if he was interested in going which he was. We were both really looking forward to that night.
Of course as it got closer I heard that Erin and her husband Paul (front row on the left) were coming up and staying with Shannon (front row, second from the right) Terri (front row, right) and Sue (back row, second from the right) were meeting up and so I talked Aaron in to stopping by at Shannon`s before going to the Live Site. We stayed there for awhile and watched the first couple of periods of the Canada vs. Slovakia game and then headed to Boston Pizza for dinner.

After dinner Aaron and I headed over to the Live Site. We arrived while IllScarlett was on stage. We didn`t know they would be playing until a few days before the show and Aaron was super excited. Almost more so than for Mariana`s Trench (I don`t know either band so it didn`t matter to me). We only heard a few songs but we got to meet the band after which he was really happy about.

Mariana's Trench was actually on a different stage during Doc Walkers show. We're not sure what happened with scheduling. We were under the impression that the shows would be off set. Anyways, Aaron ended up chosing to coming to the DW show with me. It was pretty much the same format as last summer, minus the ballads (because they only had an hour) but including drummer Steve Broadhurst`s medly of songs including Kiss's "I Was Made for Loving You" and "Staying Alive" which are a ton of fun.

I am losing track of how many times I`ve seen Doc Walker live now but I don`t care. I love their music and any excuse to se them perform is good enough for me :D

Vancouver 2010 #1

I've been procrastinating on doing this blog entry because there are some pictures on my parents camera that I wanted to include. I have lots here though so I'll just write it with what i have. Monday, February 22nd I skipped Dance and Mom, Dad and I took the sky train in to Vancouver so we could soak up some Olympic atmosphere. Our first stop was at the cauldron. It was beautiful at night. The line to go up on the viewing platform was only about 25 minutes so we waited and enjoyed the view out across the water.

From there we popped in to Canada Place and got up close to to Sails which have Olympic images projected on to them. Very cool. Speaking of cool, it wasn't. Cool that is. It was actually really mild. Warm you might say. Yes I was wearing a winter coat and scarf but I had my Olympic mittens with me but it was too warm to wear them! It was dry that evening which was a bonus. It was quite a lovely evening weather wise.
We didn't really have a game plan on what we wanted to see as none of us had made it to the city before this night. We wandered up Granville Street because it was pedestrian only and quite well lit. We found the Canadian Mint Pavillion and enquired about the wait. It turned out that the line to see the medals had been closed off hours ago but the line to see the rest of the exhibits in the pavilion was only ten minutes so we queued up. It was really interesting in there! There was a real gold bar, a million dollar coin, brand new Olympic quarters that you could buy for 25 cents and more information about coins and the minting process than I could really properly take in. The picture of me is supposed to look like I'm standing on a big pile of coins :)

We continued up Granville taking in the sights and sounds. We stopped in at the Sleep Country store because they had lots of Olympic stuff on sale. I got to pose with these mascots as well :)

All the pictures in the world can't capture what it was really like to be in Vancouver during the Olympics. The whole city was charged with excitement. We were walking down the street when one of the gold medals was won. It was really easy to tell it had happened. Everyone was cheering.

I had met Mom & Dad right after work and we went directly into Vancouver so I didn't really have dinner. We popped in to Earls later in the evening and had some appetizers. When we came out the nightly show at Robson Square was in progress. I didn't get a really good view but we did get to see the fireworks which only added to the excitement.

This picture is kind of dark but it's the best one I have that shows both the cherry blossoms on the trees and the artwork on the Vancouver Art Gallery. Someone forgot to tell Mother Nature that it was the WINTER Olympics and instead she chose to decorate the city for spring and give gorgeous weather so the world knows why we love living here LOL

That's about it for my first time in. I'll add more soon.

Word of the Day #40: cogent

co·gent [koh-juhnt]
–adjective
1.convincing or believable by virtue of forcible, clear, or incisive presentation; telling.
2.to the point; relevant; pertinent.

You're in!

Friday morning before I left for Hemlock I checked my email and found one with the following subject line "Congratulations! You've been Admitted to UW's Faculty of Arts" (UW=University of Waterloo) It also stated that I had been "conditionally admitted" but I received the Offer of Admissions yesterday (that's it in the picture) and it says that I've been accepted without conditions. In any case, I now have TWO offers of admission...and here I had myself convinced that none of the schools would want me!

So between receiving the email and the package, I've been weighing the pros and cons of each school. UW was my first choice but that was totally arbitrary. I had nothing to base it on. Now that I've had a chance to get to know each school and talk to people that either did go to either or are going, I'm leaning towards Wilfrid Laurier University (WLU). They're just a few blocks apart physically so location isn't an issue.

I'm leaning towards WLU because it's a smaller "Liberal Arts" school. UW is massive and tends to focus more on sciences. The schools work very closely together though so if I enroll in WLU and then decide that I made a mistake, switching will be a pain but it will be very easy to do. The libraries of UW, WLU and Guelph (the third school I applied to) are all connected as well so I can order books from any of them...important for History, or so I've been told :)

I'll let you know when I finally pull the trigger, or click the "accept" (I technically have until May) but I think WLU will be my choice...unless I can come up with a reason not to.

Hemlock 2010

For our eighth annual trip to Hemlock Melissa and I swore we were going to go snowshoeing. We've been wanting to try it for awhile but the weather has either been nasty or we just haven't been motivated. This year I took the full day off work on Friday, drove up with Melissa, her DH Jevon, his sister Rachel and her boyfriend Scott. We arrived at the cabin by 10am. And found out that it had just been vacated the day before by the men's snow cross team who were practicing up there!!!

We unloaded the van, settled in, had lunch and then went snowshoeing because we knew if we left it to Saturday we'd never go. It was a gorgeous sunny day. There is no fresh snow at Hemlock right now so I feel like we could have done our trek in just regular boots but it was fun to try the snowshoes...even if we were sore the next day!

Our weekend fell on Melissa`s 29th birthday so on top of the regular playing board games and watching movies, we celebrated that. She had masks and tiaras for the girls and masks, bow ties and stick on facial hair for the guys on Saturday night, oh and feather boas for everyone :) We wore them while eating ice cream cake and playing Cranium.

Erin also brought up a pinata which was hanging up but soon fell so she bravely held it so we could smack it :)

It was another wonderful relaxing weekend. Possibly my last which is kind of sad. I will miss these guys!!!

Why History?

When I tell people I’m moving to Ontario to go to school the next question is always “what will you be taking”. I’m enrolling in the History program. Why History? Well, my first indication that this might be a good study areas was that, whenever my old boss would encourage me to look into schooling, I’d get online and look at the Business courses and inevitably “just check” to see what the History department was offering. I realized after doing this a few times that that’s probably what I’m actually interested in :P

Also, last year, last May specifically, I met with a career counsellor at my local university. We talked about my current job (which was fairly new at the time) what I liked about what I did and what I didn’t. We talked about what I do in my spare time (scrapbooking, visiting museums and historic sites…and scrapbooking about them, travelling, etc.) And we talked about how I could apply what I do in my spare time, to my career choice. He gave me some great resources for career research…which I confess I never really followed up on.

So fast forward through a lot of soul searching, through a lot of talking to people, and through another summer of doing the things I like doing and when the 2010/11 university application process opened, I put my name in and “declared” History as my subject area.

Inevitably, the follow up question to “what will you be taking” is “what do you want to do with that?” Everyone assumes I’ll be teaching. Maybe there’s a reason for that. The thing is I don’t want to teach. Definitely not high school anyways and probably not university. I like the idea of “teaching” in a non-traditional setting. Like being part of educational programs at a National Historic Site or museum that focuses on my area of interest. I like to tell people that I want to be a tour guide. Now I realize you don’t need a degree for that but by going to school I feel like I can explore those types of job opportunities better.

One of my (many) reasons for moving to Ontario is because there is so much more history there than there is on the West Coast. BC just celebrated 150 years. Woohoo. Seriously, it’s not that long. Quebec celebrated 400. That’s more like it. I’m not too excited about ancient history, or even European history but I’m looking for something a bit older than the fur trade.

I look at people who are “tour guides” or who do educational programs in historic sites and think “I could do that, I want to do that”. I’d like nothing more than to be in period costume all day. Maybe not for forever, but to start at least. I’m also not eliminating the possibility of getting back into administration, but hopefully for an organization where I can be passionate about what they do and the message they have to deliver.

So when people ask “what do you want to do” there’s a list of possibilities. I also realized a little while ago that I may not even know the title of the job I want to do! I don’t want to just do what I know is available. I want to explore options, and find the perfect job for ME, whatever it may be. I’ll let you know when I figure it out :)

12 of 12 February

As you can see, once the Olympics started, I kind of stopped blogging. I just didn't have time. I'm going to try and catch up now but I want to try and do it in order so I can capture the whole experience. The first day of the games also fell on February's 12 of 12 so that's where we begin.

This is the view at the end of my street. A beautiful morning!
Last year I took a picture of the paper marking the one year count down to the games, and now they're here!

Meredith and I went for lunch at Earls. Our server was a classmate of hers and he brought us free hot wings. I'm kicking myself for not taking a picture because they looked so pretty with the green celery but I was too interested in eating them. Instead I snagged this shot of the outside of the restaurant on the way home.
My mail. Thank you for giving blood four times this year. I have been a "donor for life" for at least seven years now. Probably more if I was to actually find all my pins.

For the opening ceremony Meredith and I went over to her sister-in-law's sister's house to watch it on tv. Claudia's daughter still had her face paint on from the celebrations at school.

We had a bunch of snack foods including some very out of season (sour!) strawberries.

"Oh Canada, we stand on guard for THEEEEEEE!!!"

Sam was constantly moving and having lots of fun :)

So I didn't take very many pictures of the ceremony but I have to include what I did take to meet my 12 quota. Overall I was very happy with the ceremony. I was proud of my country, proud to be Canadian and proud to welcome the world. I thought Wayne Gretzky (and the others) was a great choice to light the caludron. There's small things I could pick on about the ceremony, but I won't remember them too much in a year. My personal favourite parts were the whales and the trees, because that's what "BC" is to me. I also LOVED the slam poet and was designing a scrapbook page in my head while he was talking :D

Welcome World! Let the games begin!!!

Oh yeah, and the requiste last minute shot of me :D

A Subtle Change

I don’t know if it’s the Valentines Day hoopla that made me realize this or what but lately I’ve been noticing a subtle change in the way people address my “situation in life” (to borrow a phrase from Jane Austen). I’m 28 years old and I’m finding that people are changing their wording from “when you get married and have children” or “if” to “if you want to” or “do you want to”? Like I’m choosing to not have a relationship or family. In a day and age where it’s quite acceptable for women to remain unmarried and childless, it is viewed as a choice.

I’m not offended by it. The same as I’m really not offended by the endless “are you married yet? Anyone special in your life?” Questions. Mostly I realize that people just care and want me to be happy. I do find it amusing that they seem to think that I am choosing to not be married though.

Yes I choose to not date just anyone and I definitely don’t sleep around but I wouldn’t say I’m choosing to be single any more than I’d “choose” to be IN a relationship. I mean it’s not like you can just go to the store and buy a husband or child. I’d like nothing more than to change my “situation” but I don’t feel that it’s up to me to decide when that happens. And until it does happen, I’ll continue to live my life the best way I know how, and I’ll watch to see how people react.

The Russians are Comi....HERE!

Last Wednesday I stopped by one of our local rinks to watch the Russian Figure Skaters practicing. It's a popular place so I only was able to stay for 20 minutes. I watched Maria Mukhortova and Maxim Trankov. It definitely made it more interesting while watching the Pairs - Free Skating tonight! They finished seventh over all, but it was still fun to see them!

Other People's Normal

Funny the things that stick with you from childhood. Impressions of people. I remember in Grade 9 I was working on a French project with a girl I had known since primary school. We made plans to meet up after school to develop our project. I showed up at her place not long after school got out and, this may seem weird, I was caught totally off guard because she had changed into sweats and a t-shirt. "Comfy clothes" compared to what she had worn to school that day. For me, someone who was fashion challenged, and got dressed in the morning and stayed in the same clothes all day, that was a totally foriegn concept.

Now, after working in an office for ten years, I totally understand her. Most days, the first thing I do when I get home is strip out of my "work clothes". Sometimes into sweats and a t-shirt, sometimes just into more casual clothes. I rarely keep on what I was wearing that day though.

Even on the weekend it's not rare for me to change two or three times a day. Different events call for different clothes. I frequently stop at home just long enough to change my clothes or, if I'm prepared, I'll take a change of clothes with me. I'm far from being a fashion plate but I know what I like to wear, when. I often think of that girl when I'm changing after work. How shocked I was that she had changed, and now, how I wouldn't have it any other way!

Restless

Tonight I can't wait to move to Ontario. Church was cancelled in favour the AGM and I forgot about it till late this afternoon. I had "one of those days" at work and even though I got to see something interesting after work (I'll blog about that separately) I'm just feeling lost. I got home around 7 after stopping off at Mom and Dad's briefly and I still needed to eat. Despite the fact that I just spent $100 on groceries none of the food in my house inspired me. I called Mere but her phones off (I think she's at school). I feel like I want to do something spontaneous but it's raining and cold out. Not exactly conducive weather...and what would I do anyways? Know that saying "Familiarity breeds contempt?" That's exactly where I am right now. I'm sick of this town. Sick of knowing each and every restaurant and how long they're open. Sick of wanting to go for a drive but knowing exactly what every freaking street in this town looks like (well, not EVERY but you get the point). I couldn't get lost if I wanted to.

There are people I could call but everyone has their own problems and frankly I don't feel like talking to anyone. I can't go shopping (even though I was at Walmart earlier) because I'll just spend money I don't have to spend. I have stuff to do online (and despite the fact that I logged on to write this post) I really don't want to do it.

I just need something NEW. New places. New faces. Not the same old same old.

Sorry to be such a Debbie Downer. I don't really care though. Maybe it will be something different in this blog because I'm sure my readers get bored too :P

Olympic Torch Run Part 2

Well, part two for me at least. Even though I had witnessed the arrival of the torch on Sunday, I wanted to see it again. So Monday morning at 5am I drove to the next town over where the torch was starting it's trek for the day. It was dry and surprisingly warm and LOTS of people turned out.

The celebrations were spread out along First Avenue. I walked past the main stage as Carly Rae Jepsen was starting her set.
I was hoping to meet up with friends who were volunteering but I didn't end up finding them. Instead I hung out with some collegues of mine.




When the torch bearer finally came by, he was literally running so this is all I got for a photo. Oh well, at least I got to see it again :)

Wavelengths

So I'm sitting here at work filing and thinking "I should call Mom...but why. I don't have anything to say to her. Oh well." Thirty seconds later the phone rings.

"Heidi? It's Mom..."

Thankfully she had something to say, and I got to talk to my Mom. I love being on the same wavelength as her!

Olympic Torch Run

The Olympic torch arrived in my hometown this evening and I (and 20,000 others) were on hand to greet it. I actually saw it going down our main street while I was trying to drive to the festival site. I met up with my friend Mike and we walked up to the site together and Meredith met us there. I had tons of other friends around too. Some of which I saw, some I didn't (like my parents) although we did talk on the phone. There was stage entertainment up until the torch entered the stadium and then we watched in go around most of the track and up to the stage. There were lots of torch bearers around with their extinguished torches and they were all really awesome about letting us pose for pictures with them.

Once on stage the "cauldron" was lit and a bunch of politicians, including our Provincial Premier, Gordon Campbell gave speeches. Oh, and of course we sang O Canada.

Then there were dances by a local dance troupe, including dancing inukshuks. The were kind of cute...

To end the evening these two (he's from Nunavut, she's from New Brunswick...or maybe vice versa) they took the flame, and put it inside the little lantern she was carrying where it will stay over night. Then it's off to the rest of the lower mainland.

January 2010 12of12

Better late than never?

January 12, 2010 The "12 of 12" people always suggest putting your camera right by your bed so you start taking pictures first thing in the morning. This day, when my alarm when off, I grabbed my camera and took a picture of what I look like when I'm sleeping. Even though I was technically awake, it was only just.

The night before I had washed my hair. I brushed it out in the morning and before re-braiding it, I took a picture.
This day marked on year of being back at my old job, in my new position. How did I celebrate? By spending well over an hour in the non-ventilated server room on the phone with Telus and my video conference technician trying to fix some technical issues. I'm publishing this post on February 6th and it was this Thursday (the 4th) that these issues were finally, fully resolved. Uggh.
Because I was trapped in the server room, I took the time to organize it. The bucket shown here was FULL of cords. I took them out one by one, wrapped them up and divided them into drawers in this unit. Not the way I wanted to spend my morning but at least I achieved something useful.

After dealing with technicians all morning, I treated myself to Burger King for lunch. There is a location a few blocks from work that used to be a Burger King, then they became some other burger joint and recently they've had a "Burger King Coming Soon" sign up. It FINNALLY opened and this was my first visit. It was probably the worst BK food I've ever had (half the fries weren't done) but the staff was awesome. Very funny and engaging. I'll go back just to have them serve me.

While I ate I listened to Jane Austen's Pride & Prejudice on cd. It's our book club selection for the month. More on that in a bit.
After work I went and gave blood. Giving is always a crapshoot for me. I fail regularly for a variety of reasons. This time I was successful! And I got cookies...that's the best part of giving blood :D
So, back to book club. I mentioned in my last post that I had read a book about a club who read books and then did an activity based on the story. Well my friends Leah and Anj decided to form a book club that they have dubbed "Script to Screen" (S2S) the premise is that we will read a book and then watch the movie. Yes it limits us to books that have been turned into movies but there's TONS of those with more being made every year.

January 12th was our first meeting, an "orientation" of sorts. Everyone brought snacks to share. There were brownies with "movie tickets" that had quotes on them.
And tons of other yummy food.
Leah and Anj had a whole agenda worked out covering everything they thought would be important when you have a group of women getting together.

This was basically the same group that got together to watch Twilight and then go to see New Moon in November.
Leah hadn't seen the BBC version of Pride & Prejudice so that's what we selected for our first book. I'll put that in a separate post.

Leah and Anj went all out with decorating and staying in theme. Showing it all would go over 12 pictures but suffice to say, it was awesome. The last picture is one of the stacks of books they had as a centre piece on the table to get us in the mood :)

So that's my day. Better late than never and killing two birds with one stone because I got to talk about S2S in the same post!

Around the World in 80 Days

Last year I discovered a series of books by Laura Jensen Walker, called the Getaway Girls, well, I say series but I have only read two books. The third was just released this month. The premise of the books is that the girls read a book and then go on an adventure based on the story. The books are full of quotes and book recommendations and considering how much I love reading, they`re perfect for me.

One of the book suggestions was Around the World in 80 Days. I picked the book on cd up from the library a few days later and absolutley fell in love with the story. It`s smart and funny, very fast paced and even a love story. I`ve been raving about the book ever since.

A few weeks ago I heard that a local theatre group was doing the stage show. Mom and I made plans to go, and tonight was the night. It was fantastic. It is billed as a ``comedy adventure adapted by Mark Brown``. There are only five actors and each of them play many, many parts. They were all extremely talented and even though you knew it was the same actors, a few props, slight costume changes and an accent or two thrown in made you forget that it was a familiar face.

The stage show was just as enjoyable as the book had been. I recommend it just as highly as before I saw the show, actually, more so now :)

One Little Word

Lots of places suggest selecting one word as your word for the year. I am most familiar with the concept through Ali Edwards. This newsletter explains the concept.

“A single word can be a powerful thing. It can be the ripple in the pond that changes everything. It can be sharp and biting or rich and soft and slow.

Last fall in issue two of this newsletter I wrote about the power of words and gave my top ten tips for getting those words down when you are scrapbooking. Today I want to introduce you to the idea that a single word can be a catalyst for enriching your life as well as your scrapbook layouts”

I haven’t blogged about it before but for the last two years my word was “PEACE”. I gravitated towards songs that had that word in the lyrics and whenever I saw it somewhere or read a verse that contained it, a tangible peace would settle over me.

My song for 2009 was Jeremy Camp’s “Slow Down Time”. I included the lyrics at the end of this post: http://agent713.blogspot.com/2009/01/2008-year-that-was.html. The line that says “My only peace is waiting before You” really stuck with me all year.

My word for 2010 year is DREAM. I just realized as I am writing this entry that it coincides nicely with 2010 being the Olympic year. Lots of people have dreams of Olympic gold. My dreams are different and I feel like this year I am giving myself the permission to truly DREAM about the possibilities.

Many of my dreams are scheduled to come true this year. I mean how long have I been wanting to move to Ontario? This is the year that will happen. Even though I only quantified and verbalized the idea of going back to school recently, I am realizing that is a dream and it is a means to seeing another dream fulfilled, that is working in a field that I am truly passionate about. Maybe some year “passion” will be my word. For now, I am focusing on DREAMing about the possibilities in life.

I’ve only heard the song a few times but this is the front runner for song of the year for 2010 for me: Jessie Farrel’s “Burn So Bright”

If you’re waiting for the perfect time
To try something you’ve never tried
Time will pass you by and you won’t do it
Save nothing for a rainy day, you’ll blink and it will be too late
Why not start right now and just get to it?
Shut up the voice inside your head that says “stay in the shadows”

Burn so bright that the dream you have inside lights up the night
Burn so bright that the angels have to cover up their eyes
Dare to be bold, dare to be great
Leave a little love all over the place
It’s your life, burn so bright

Why talk why you can sing out loud?
Why hide when you can draw a crowd?
You deserve a future with no limits
Take baby steps until you’re done
Don’t miss out on all the fun
Put a memory in every minute
With every excuse you come up with
You’ll miss a door that opens

Burn so bright that the dream you have inside lights up the night
Burn so bright that the angels have to cover up their eyes
Dare to be bold, dare to be great
Leave a little love all over the place
It’s your life, burn so bright

Turn up that voice inside your head that says “you’re heard for a reason”

Burn so bright that the dream you have inside lights up the night
Burn so bright that the angels have to cover up their eyes
Dare to be bold, dare to be great
Leave a little love all over the place
It’s your life, burn so bright

I do feel that I’ve been “living in the shadows” and I’m excited to start “burning so bright”.

I also love the line “Put a memory in every minute”. Dierks has a song called “Every Mile a Memory” which I’ve always loved and (CREEPY!!! It just came on the radio!!!) but the idea of putting a memory in EVERY moment, is even more powerful. It implies that every small part of life should be memorable and I love that.

So there, this a freakishly long entry but now I’ve got it out there.

Now I can keep DREAMing.

1,000 Posts

I’ve been dancing around this particular post for a couple of months now. In December I posted that I was celebrating my 4th Anniversary of this blog.

Well, minus some posts that remain as drafts (some of which will see the light of day and others that won’t for various reasons) I can officially say that I have made 1,000 posts!!! (I say I’ve been dancing around this post because I keep going through the drafts and deleting some or posting them if they’re still relevant).

1000 blog entries in four years. I did almost 400 in the first year, and it’s tapered off since then, but I’m still blogging.

According to my labels the most popular categories are: general updates (168), stuff (97), work (72), gratitude (59) and country music (51). Scrapbooking (38) and Dierks (36) are the next highest. Interesting.

Here’s to another 1000. It will be interesting to see what my biggest categories are in the NEXT four years :)

Word of the Day #39: loquacious

lo⋅qua⋅cious
loh-kwey-shuh s
–adjective
1. talking or tending to talk much or freely; talkative; chattering; babbling; garrulous: a loquacious dinner guest.
2. characterized by excessive talk; wordy: easily the most loquacious play of the season.