Paralympics

Remember how I was all excited to volunteer at the Paralympics? Well, it has been less exciting than I anticipated. This is *not* the sound of me complaining. I am still totally psyched that I was given an awesome uniform (two long sleeved shirts, fleece vest, shell jacket, toque and snow pants). And, since I'm taking the bus up to Whistler from Vancouver for each shift (which is 2 hours each way), I got a back pack and a "Club 99" pin. And I got another free pin just because they were giving stuff away. I also got a travel mug which got me a free second shot of espresso in my latte this morning. And so far I have driven a Buick Enclave (leather seats, shiny wood paneling, OnStar, side mirrors that move when I put the car in reverse) and a Cadillac CTS something-or-other. I even got to drive the Buick back to Vancouver after my first shift. But I haven't actually driven any passengers and haven't really met anyone new and exciting. No hot Paralympian athletes making googly eyes at me in the rearview mirror. It's fine though, they're long days and I'm not sure I would know my way around if someone asked me to drop them off at some random restaurant in Whistler village. I am going to try and get tickets to some events, just in case I don't get any calls at all.

Sunday morning

I'm procrastinating. On Sunday! About going out! I do this often. I just want to stay home and be spooned by my couch most of the time. Is that so much to ask? I'm a recovering grad student, after all.

Yesterday, I finally dragged my ass out of the house about 3 pm for coffee, cash and One of a Kind Show (yes, again). I want to post all of the awesome and cool things that I saw there! I know I said I would do that last week but I haven't had the energy. Maybe tonight? Ahh, who am I kidding? They will just live forever in my head and in the little pile of cards on my desk. I should find a place for those. Some great, unusual gift ideas lie in that little pile.

I spent around 3 hours at the show wandering around by myself, sampling food and buying trinkets for myself. I thought about the art that I wanted to put on my imaginary condo walls. And I decided that I'm going to wait until I have said condo and then put up some of my own photos. And one or two of MFV's. He's an incredible photographer.

I took the long way home - 2 streetcars instead of the subway. At Bathurst and Queen, I saw a woman standing, waiting for the southbound car dressed in a leopard hoodie/cape thing complete with little ears and whiskers. She was waving excitedly as we passed by. Then, a couple of blocks north of that, we passed a house with a sign in the window, "Steam baths". We have steam baths in Toronto? Apparently we do. As we passed the back of the house, two police officers were leading a large man out onto the street in handcuffs. I think that was my first arrest. Ahem, not *my* first arrest! But you know what I mean. My first time seeing one in real life. Crazy.

Then I had sushi with my toxic ex-coworker and her brother and his gf. I have decided I don't like her family that much either. Must spend less time.

And today, I'm off to the mall and the orifice, the post office and two feedings by nice Indian parents (not mine, fortunately!). While I do not object to the feedings, I could use a bit more couch time today.

My favourite things

There are three things I value about myself:

1. I can make people laugh. Not everyone all the time. But most of my friends and quite a few strangers. When it counts. And sometimes when it doesn't. Because unexpected hilarity is often the best kind.

2. I take good photos. I hesitated a moment before typing "good". But, actually, sometimes I get lucky. I have been to a couple of weddings where the couple ended up using my photos instead of (or as well as) the professional photos. The grad student who just had a baby changed her profile pic to one of the photos I took in the hospital. And she said another one that I took in the hospital made some of her husband's family cry. That's good enough for me.

3. I'm decent with Excel. This may sound ridiculous but I can colour-code spreadsheets like a maniac on the floor...

Ya, it's definitely time for bed.

Because I is a nerd

And my friends are too.

Geeky

I am always attracted to the geekiest guy in the room. Okay, not the geekiest guy in the room. But definitely the geekiest guy on TV. Like Chuck Bartowski and Adam on CSI:NY and Greg on CSI:LV and Reid on Criminal Minds. Today, I was talking to a boy on Google Wave. And another boy on MSN. I told that one that I would pwn him one day. Also, I sent my friends a science joke today. It was a joke about pH. But it was so funny and my friends appreciated it. I is a nerd. Nerds are cool! Omg, I'm such a turkey. Happy Thanksgiving y'all!

Nothing weekend

I have nothing to blog about so I'm going to blog about nothing.

This weekend, I did next to nothing. After I handed in my thesis on Friday afternoon, I have no recollection of what happened afterward. Oh wait, I do remember. I went to my friend's husband's restaurant on the Danforth and had to leave before 1.30 am because I was so tired. Stinkin' Taste of the Danforth shut down half the street. It's a stupid festival because they hold it during the hottest part of the summer and there is never any shade or seating. Lame.

On Saturday, I looked at some more condos with my realtor and got fed up. Then I went to some open houses with a former coworker and was even more miserable. After that, I had early dinner and a drink with a different former coworker at Kalendar in Little Italy which was the high point of the weekend. I was home, on the couch in my pjs by 8 pm. My friend was supposed to phone me and drag me out salsa dancing but she forgot about me. I'm glad she did.

Sunday, I stayed in bed ignoring the phone until 2 pm when I got up and bought groceries for the first time in several weeks. Then I came home and did nothing.

All in all, I needed the weekend of unproductivity but I made up for it by working late tonight. God, my life without thesis is mundane. Hopefully I will buy a place soon and be able to bitch and moan about being house-poor and a slave to my mortgage.

Excruciating

Last night, I dreamed that I tried to set myself on fire. I think this thesis thing is making me insane.

My fb status update today was:

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This just sucks. Grad school. Thesis. Late nights. Tuition fees. Journal articles. Search boxes. Ref Works. Inter-library loan. Burning eyes. Sore neck. Tense shoulder. Aching back. No new shoes. Missed movies. Canceled plans. Tears on the page. Bruises from banging a highlighter on my forehead in the hopes of speeding up the process. Someone shoot me with an elephant tranquilizer so I never have to wake up.

Random weekend update and other stuff

I'm rather busy at the moment. What with picking up a new bed tonight and leaving for NYC on Thursday morning, I don't have a lot of time to blog.

Last weekend, I shopped. A LOT. It's going to be an expensive month. Hopefully I don't break my credit card in New York.

First and foremost, I finally bought a bed. From West Elm. The overlapping squares headboard and the tall platform. I have been looking for a bed for two and a half years. I'm pretty excited about picking it up tonight. I am borrowing the man muscles of my friend's husband. 516 is coming to help out too. Not sure what to make of that. I texted him asking for help and he said yes. Who knew it could be that easy?

I also went to the Green Living show and shopped there too. I bought Aveda shampoo, Sweets from the Earth vegan cookies, bamboo yoga pants and a couple of tops.

Okay, I gots to run. My tummy hurts too. Blarg.

Predictably so

This one is for Awkward. Actually, I was already writing it in my head when I saw your comment.

The new guy never called. What is UP with that? I really believed him. He was so convincing. And I am so naive. Stupid gullible me.

TGI Friday. If only because I know I have to spend the entire day talking to stupid people. And I won't have to do that on the weekend. I have some really great friends. It's a good thing I don't *need* a man. How to fix the wanting part though?

http://xkcd.com/572/

Vaccuum

He's not going to call. I can feel it. I don't know why I'm so sure. The Universe sent me a vibe last night. I know that sounds utterly ridiculous. But it hasn't let up. I'm calling it a black hole. When there's nothing too look forward to. No prospects on the horizon. That, also, is utterly ridiculous. I'm going to NYC next weekend for the first time ever and I'm really looking forward to it. Intellectually and emotionally I know that I am going to have a good time while I'm there. But it seems so far away. I just feel as though the Universe is sucking the energy out of my soul. I don't know what to do with this feeling. I'm going to bed. In theory, I should feel energized when I get up but I never do. Even my bed isn't friendly anymore. Something needs to change.

Holy crap it's late

So much for an early night. We went to a small bar on Queen West. Waaay west. A friend was DJing and the man is truly inspired. I wish I could bring him home with me so that he could play the soundtrack to my life.

I met someone there too. Not the first, very large, white dude from Brampton that hit on me and kept calling me beautiful. The guy that rescued me from him. Friend of a friend of a friend of the friend that knows C le V and Grey. We talked and there was chemistry but I thought he was just being a flirt. But then he asked me for my number before he left and I must have asked him three times if he was serious. Who number closes anymore? He texted me right there. When I called him on it, he said he was texting this cute girl he met. It was sweet. I texted him back after he left and he said he would call me soon. Also, he wished me steak dreams because we had been talking about steak. It's affirmative. I liked him almost instantly but I'm scared that he'll turn out to be just like C le V. Apparently he is moving to Australia.

After we left that place, I ran into a brand new coworker outside the Drake. I mean, this guy started maybe 10 days ago. That's how new he is. The kicker was that he was high. HIGH. Not drunk. We agreed to pretend that we had not seen each other. See you Monday buddy! I'm still laughing.

Go play outside

I have a headache.

I went to a class at the gym that makes me want to puke. I'm not sure if it's because I overdid it or because I need to wear ear plugs. The Britney-esque instructor is a cheerleader from Alabama. I just wish she would lip sync too. She does little to motivate me but I didn't think of it until I looked at the clock and realized there was only 15 minutes left in the class. Then I really powered it up.

Also, BO Man apparently takes this class. Gross. I kept thinking it was me. I overheard some of the other girls saying they thought it was them too. That's how pervasive it was. Nasty. Maybe that's why the headache.

Speaking of the gym, check out this ScarJo article from my pants buddy, Awkward.

Listen, I'm not a fan of ScarJo but thank the stars for sensible celebs who write these things. If you don't have time for the whole thing, at the very least the third paragraph. 14 pounds = 2 heads!

I get that people want to be skinny. Hell, I want to be skinny! It's not nice to be called "chubby" by a virtual stranger (drunk stranger, but whatever, still hurts). But it's never going to happen. In order for me to be skinny, I would have to lose 10 pounds. Not going to happen. I need my cranium because my brain is just about the only thing going for me. Plus, I like having enough muscle strength to stand up and get out of bed in the morning. Snort.

Baby keeps trying to lose weight and, when she works out, she burns it like a high performance gasoline engine. We're talking 700 calories in 45 minutes on the elliptical. Her legs move so fast I can't even see them. She normally eats a lot because hot damn that girl's metabolism is high. She started depriving herself a few weeks ago and got sick. I think she was doing that because she's in Cali this week. Anyway, she started eating normally again and felt better. I told her to focus on the parts of her body she's unhappy with instead of trying to lose weight. That's why I go to pirates class. At least if I'm actively working on the rumblytummyblobmonster, I won't spend so much time feeling hideous when I look in the mirror. Right? Right.

Semi-productive

Today, I went to pirates class, came home and cleaned the kitchen and then made brownies. I also got almost caught up with my husband, Mr Chuck Bartowski aka Secret Agent Charles Carmichael. I say almost because I can't find last night's episode anywhere online and it didn't record because I couldn't get a signal on my rabbit ears.

I don't like where this season is going. I much preferred Season 1. It was much more funny and believable. *Cough* Anyway, off to bed. I have no idea what time it is but I don't care.

Escape from the pubicles

Tonight I discovered six more reasons to stay in Ontario after I am done school. I have some really great coworkers. They happen to all be women around my age. We went out for dinner and it was fun. I hope they feel the same way too. In general, not about me. That would be lame and sappy.

Some notable things happened to me this morning but I am too wiped to remember. I went for Chinese for dinner and something did not agree with me. My stomach is killing me.

Oh yeah, I finished the crossword and the sudoku on the subway ride to work this morning. And then I helped ditzy blonde girl in the office with it.

Okay, I'm going to bed early tonight. For real.

Liars vs. jerks.

Today I learned that I should never trust a man who doesn't freely admit to being a jerk. (Thanks for the tip, GH). I think that makes an excellent corollary to last night's lesson: zero tolerance for assholes.

Asshat, is there a difference between an asshole and a jerk? If yes, how do I spot them?

Okay, that's really all I got for tonight. I ran into one of the other grad students at the gym and we spent two hours not working out very hard. Until we got to the pirates component of Body Flow. I don't care if I hurt my back tonight. I'm going to the ball class tomorrow. That instructor was cute. I will probably fall flat on my ass again when I try to do side plank on the ball on my left side. But that's adorable right? Right.

Zero tolerance for assholes

That's the personal message on one of my friend's MSN today. I may have to adopt it for my new slogan. Hopefully it will remind me to not get too emotionally attached to guys before they have proven themselves to not be assholes. I'm not sure that's even possible though. Baby agreed with me today that all men are jerks. I was telling her that's basically the lesson I learned from the HJNTIY movie. That all men are jerks and even the ones that you want to believe are not jerks are also jerks. I think I wrote that in an earlier post.

Anyway, I booked my flight to NYC so I won't be an NYC virgin for much longer! I also folded the mountain of laundry in my hamper and washed the mats in my bathroom (more like giant fluffy floor towels). I'm going to try and get to the gym after work tomorrow. Normally I take Mondays off because they're painful but I skipped pirates and yoga this weekend because of Aunt Flow taking up so much of my energy. So I'm going to hit up a Body Jam class.

Friday night homebody

I can't do anything. Actually, I don't think I can feel anything either. I'm raining so I know I'm happy about that but everything seems numb.

I thought briefly about being sociable this evening but I ended up working late instead. I was playing with five different colours of post-it flags. Five! Normally I have red, orange, yellow and green. But today I had blue! Oooh! It was hard to tear myself away but by 7.30, the office was starting to feel creepy and I could hear my tummy over the distant sound of the cleaning staff and the voices in my head.

I came home and had pizza and brownies and sat my ass on the couch. I almost fell asleep with Pooh bear but I couldn't get my brain to shut down. It was whimpering but wouldn't die. Then, around midnight, I was so disgusted by the state of my apartment that I started cleaning. I did the kitchen and the bathroom but the laundry mountain will have to wait because I'm exhausted. Oh, I also waxed for pirates class tomorrow. But I ran out of wax so I'll have to buy some more tomorrow before banana pancakes at Fresh.

Shopping list:
1. Wax
2. Toilet bowl scrubby thingys
3. Conditioning mousse

Also, I found this website. I can't decide if it's funny or awful. Be careful, it's addictive.
www.fmylife.com

Brilliant

I'm not writing anything tonight. This post by Waiter is too visceral and anything I have to say would sound like a giant pity party. Which I'm having alone in the dark on the couch.
http://waiterrant.net/?p=1033

Randoms

Some funny/stupid shit I randomly wrote today.

You know Steve Harvey's book, "Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man"? Yeah, apparently I've been doing it all wrong. I thought it was "Think like a lady, act like a man". Duh.



My revised dating strategy should I ever attempt the online dating thing again:

1. Starbucks latte.
2. Chapters (that's like Barnes & Noble to you American peeps)
3. Finance aisle

Rationale: I can at least be guaranteed of doing something I enjoy. Expense is negligible (depending on how you feel about paying for Starbucks and paperbacks). If he looks askance at the finance books, that's a big red flag. And if he tries any hanky panky, hot coffee down the front of his pants.



In response to this ridiculous article:

Oh my goodness those are the WORST tips ever! When was that written? 1952?? Take a powder? Wear pastels?! Who has time to take a break 4 stinkin times a day? I can barely eat my lunch at my desk without being disturbed.

Okay, here are my 4 quick cures for crankiness:
1. Wear all black. Tell everyone it is a reflection of your mood.
2. Answer all questions with "Your momma has a mouldy basement".
3. Lie on the floor in child's pose moaning and muttering softly. If someone asks what's wrong, bark at them.
4. Punch someone in the head*.

Fine, these may not cure the crankiness but at least everyone will leave you the duck alone. ;)

*NOTE: I realize this is directly contradictory to Fish's advice but that is one classy lady and me... not so much.