you are here.

so long

2008-11-30T13:54:00.002-03:30

this blog is dead. i'm on facebook and ravelry, you can find me there. there is a new blog set up and on the go, if you're interested, leave a comment and i'll let you know where.

j

weavity weave

2008-06-14T23:09:00.001-02:30

weaving. love it. started two weeks ago. can sense the addiction starting!

wool

2008-05-31T16:09:00.002-02:30

i packed all my yarn today and it fits in a BIGGEST plastic bin i could buy at Dominion. the size that you could store all your camping gear for life in. it's kind of scary. better get knitting...

AND, i'm learning how to weave this month. each saturday morning in june i'll be at the anna templeton centre taking an on-loom weaving class. cool eh? i'm really really looking forward to it.

:)

windy

2008-05-29T18:24:00.000-02:30

i had a consultant in the office helping me with some stuff last week. he was from Montreal and we had a very productive time together.

at one point, while walking to the car bent over almost perpendicular to the ground, he said "you know how they call Chicago the windy city? well, i've been to Chicago many times and it IS really windy there, but they have NOTHING ON THIS PLACE."

it was then that i looked at him and said "WHAT?" because i couldn't hear him over the wind that was howling past my ears.

exam...AGAIN

2008-03-10T12:06:00.002-02:30

i'm walking into an exam again today and i'm hoping that my WITS are going to come into play... yikes! i am once again not prepared...maybe next time it will work out better! fingers crossed for me that i pass this one and can cross it off the list. i've done well on the course material, but not having the books in front of me could prove to be my downfall.

i've been working on a hot water bottle cozy...in hopes that i won't need it anymore as soon as i finish it. this is a quick little knit and because it progresses so quickly i can feel like i accomplished something, which is a nice contrast to the studying. i'll be back to the socks tonight after the exam. if i can crank dad's out in a week i should be able to get michelle's completed by next week. yay!

if you haven't been to picasa in a while, go check it out. there are pics of london from before christmas, new year's eve (a small party in a BIG storm), and marble mountain last weekend.

j

plastic baggies = druggie

2008-03-08T17:37:00.003-03:30

chicago is going to ban plastic baggies. seriously? because you couldn't use a bigger baggie? or something else? doesn't this seem really odd to you?

*found through here.

a good day

2008-01-29T18:28:00.000-03:30

today was a good day. first off, i got my marks back from the exam and i PASSED. which, considering i didn't even read all the course material and i actually MADE STUFF UP on the test, means that i am totally brilliant. it's always nice to have confirmation on the magnitude of your brain power.

and then, i came out of work today at 5:15 to the most beautiful sunset. a deep red swath lined the horizon and there was still a hint of deep blue above us. it made me realize that the days are getting longer. even with leaving at 5pm every day (or thereabouts) i haven't seen the sunset in months. it feels good to know we are on the other side of darkness.

2008-01-26T16:43:00.000-03:30

It's cooold outside. -22 with the windchill...if you happen to be somewhere windy... I live in a pretty sheltered little hollow so it's not too bad down here. -14 maybe. I was going to go out on the snowshoes and I'll admit I chickened out at the windchill factor and went for a nice walk about the neighbourhood instead. Tomorrow is supposed to be another cold one but I think I'll risk the frostbite and go out into the woods for a trek. The trees will provide a lot of shelter and if I get to the top and think the ridge is too exposed and cold for trekking, I'll just head back down into the trees.

On my stroll I stopped in at the local grocery store to pick up a couple of things for tomorrow's dinner over at the big sister's. I just finished reading the 100-mile diet and as I stood in the middle of the store I will admit that I was stumped. None of the fruit would be ok to eat, the root veggies... well, PEI is more than 100 miles and so is New Brunswick... I bought parsnips that were packaged in Bishop Falls, but I have no idea where they are from (chances are they are from the Maritimes if not Newfoundland itself though). The raisin bread definitely broke all the rules...as did the Tostidos Hint of Lime chips... and the goat cheese mozzarella? Most definitely.

It's interesting to think about what you can eat from within your 100 miles though. You could easily have enough fruits and veggies just by shopping at Lester Farms. And if you canned and preserved enough for the winter...you'd be set. Root vegetables are a dime a dozen in this province and with a root cellar or other cold storage area it wouldn't be a problem to keep them for the winter. I'm allergic to dairy and eggs anyway so that's not an issue. Bread might be an issue. I know that oats and barley can grow here, but does anyone grow it and actually make flour a person can buy? As for protein, that wouldn't be a problem. I know where to get lamb, and I'm hoping there are local chicken farms (chickens are tough - they could live here!), and I'm sure you can buy moose from someone! The real test is the WANT quotient. I wanted to buy those bananas. And the kiwi fruits. And the peppers which were definitely not grown in a greenhouse on this island. I have found a solution for the issue of lettuce. Last winter I discovered The Lettuce Farm. They are a local hydroponics lettuce grow-op basically. You can buy their greens at Dominion and Belbin's for sure and I love it. It's not always available though which is too bad. I assume they supply their commercial buyers first - the local restaurants and catering companies - and the markets second. During the summer I also found another small greens farm selling their bags at Dominion...I completely forget the name but it was somewhere in Newfoundland. As for tomatoes, I plan on eventually getting a couple of indoor cherry tomato plants and seeing how that works out. I know people that grow their own indoors in Vancouver so I don't see why it wouldn't work here!

Then there would be the condiment issue. Yikes. There are two local spice/herb farms that I know of - The Spice Barn and Mt Scio Farm (as far as I can tell they only produce savoury, but I like savoury so that's ok!). Plus it's not hard to grow a lot of that at home if you wanted. Sugar - you'd have to use honey and there are several local honey producers. Wine...uh... nope, no good wine here. Beer...well if they aren't growing their own hops (which they aren't) then they are off limits. There are enough juniper berries to choke a herd of horses in this province so I could start a gin distillery! I can't even think of what else I use... salsa, but you could grow what you needed for that here and just can it.

I would need to quit my job in order to have the time to eat 100% locally I think. Or quit school.

I guess I need to get into the whole canning/preserving area of food preparation if I want to eat more locally year round. I just actually found rhubarb in my freezer that I froze from fresh during the summer when our organic veggie co-op overloaded us with the stuff. Too bad I didn't do the same with the strawberries! I can smell another pie coming on...

.

yuk.

2008-01-23T19:00:00.000-03:30

yesterday: windchill of -23. ouch.

today: 100 km/h winds with 6 inches of snow down on the ground....then about 10 mm of rain.... then more snow. ouch again.

i plan on staying inside as much as possible.

yikes

2008-01-20T17:53:00.000-03:30

the past month has been jam-packed and fraught with... well, pretty much everything...

lots of knitting: i'm currently working on finishing up the christmas socks. i've got 3 socks to go - one full pair and one half sock in two other pairs. can't wait until it's done!

this past week saw me volunteering to demote myself at work with no loss of pay or benefits. i just can't do the 50 or 60 hour weeks with the ridiculous frustrations caused by my superior and still be a happy person outside the office (or inside it for that matter). so, as we were hiring someone else anyway i just went ahead and suggested that they hire someone to do my job and i'll take over the clean-up of everything that has been ignored for the past two years. as well, i'll be working on special projects and moving more into working on the productivity improvement program we have underway. i'm really excited about the productivity improvement stuff actually. it's a company wide initiative being led by a third-party company. basically it is officially time for us all to pull up our freaking boot straps and get something done to address our problems. this is the kind of thing that gets me excited to go to work. lots of new processes being implemented, lots of decision making, lots of systems upgrades. very cool.
now of course it's a matter of them finding a suitable replacement for me. they had problems finding someone a year ago when they hired me, so i can't imagine it being any easier this year. in fact, i'd hazard a guess that it will be harder. for now i'll continue with my present duties and begin off-loading everything that i can onto the other accountant. i had been taking a slower approach with not, not knowing who we would be hiring, but now that i know i can easily divide my work between the two of them (isn't that sad, that my ENTIRE JOB is being split now between two people? ya. i thought so too. basically it means that i've been completely and totally used by the company for the past year.). this is part of my plan to live my life the way i want to live it. rather than always assuming that something external is going to happen to make things better, it's time that i just took things into my own hands and started making choices and decisions for myself. if that means stepping down from my current position into something less stressful then i'll do it. and i won't feel guilty about it.

this weekend was supposed to be fun-filled for me, but instead basically sucked. we were planning on getting out of town, however that didn't happen. turns out Boy didn't really want to go... he's been gone for the past two weekends and is going to be gone for the next two... he wanted to do what would make me happy, but didn't really want to do it himself. which is fine, we worked it out. we had fun in town actually, i shouldn't say it sucked. i went out on my new snowshoes again and tromped about in the woods and he did a similar thing with Joe-the-dog. i'm digging the snowshoes. considering how much i love going for walks, this is a great solution to my "oh no, i'm hip deep in snow again" problem with winter walking. so, the new plan is to get out to cornerbrook in late february. i'm going to keep him to that too. or else i'm going alone. either way, i'm getting there before march.

hmmm....what else... i should really have photos, but the light is so sparse these days i just haven't gotten around to taking any... i finally fixed the buttons on olivia's baby surprise sweater. i went over one night and fixed it while they were eating dinner. it is MUCH better. now i need to think about knitting her another sweater. maybe the i took the opportunity to try michelle's sock on her foot as well and i apparently guessed correctly on the sizing - it fits!

well, that's all for now. i really need to get some photos onto this here blog... and i need to get more regular about updating it. i'm even boring myself now...

oh ya, it's snowing again. nothing new. another 30cm expected over the day and tonight. it's nice though. gentle and fluffy. can't wait until it turns into ice pellets or maybe rains, causing it to turn to concrete. fun.

edited to add: i was just poking about online and came across this ecological footprint calculator. now, they remind you that it is grossly oversimplified and that it doesn't take a lot of things into account, blah blah blah. but still, pretty scary. we would need 5 planet earth's if everyone lived like i do. apparently, i suck. eek. i got there from the MEC site here.

BIG NEWS

2007-12-06T16:50:00.001-03:30

the exam is in an hour and a half. but that's not the big news. the big news is that it's snowing. again, not that exciting since it's december in newfoundland and this is not by far the first snowfall of the year... the big news is that it's been snowing STRAIGHT DOWN for the past couple of hours. no wind. no crazy blizzardness. just beautiful straight down snow... it's eerie and beautiful.

i just read this blog post over at crazyauntpurl and it really resonated with me. i have nothing to add here on it. just go read her post and maybe once the exam is done i'll come with something to add that's more relevant to my life...
.

t-21 hours

2007-12-05T20:53:00.000-03:30

in less than 24 hours i'll be writing the exam. in about 24 hours i'll be done.

eek.

i'm not ready. but maybe i'm ready as i'll ever be?

did i mention... eek?

study study. cram cram cram.

2007-12-04T21:41:00.000-03:30

the view from the study nook. note festive twinkly lights.

it has begun. the final push towards the exam is here. only two days to go... actually less than two days. i'm down to t-44.5 hours. not that i'm counting. i'm only about 4 hours behind on my study schedule, which, considering my study schedule involves bending the space-time continuum, means i'm doing fairly well. back at it i suppose. can't waste all my time blogging. gawd.

so why am i going to be an accountant?

2007-11-21T19:59:00.000-03:30

Benevolent Artist

.

no denying it

2007-11-18T12:49:00.001-03:30

there really is no reason to deny it anymore. winter is fast approaching. i've been trying to convince myself that the chilly mornings were just a passing thing, that maybe this year we wouldn't get winter... but, according to environment canada, winter might just visit us on monday. it's not so much the chance of flurries as the high of minus 1 that gets to me. the fact that the high doesn't even break the freezing point of water kind of irritates me. good thing my car goes in on thursday to get her studs on... today is chilly, but clear blue skies and very little wind. too bad i'm chained inside listening to accounting lectures.....

enjoy the silence?

2007-11-15T18:17:00.001-03:30

i can't believe it's been over two months since i've written anything here. the time has flown by and i must say that the fall has been.... in a nutshell? really really fun. i finally have a pretty solid crew of friends here on the rock and i must say, we know how to have fun. whether it's lunch, drinks, an all night party or just hanging out...they are a great group of people. and the really cool part is that i can actually understand them all through their sometimes gnarly accents. when i first met a few of them i remember thinking "holy COW, i will never pick this up...WHAT?" but now, it's good.

i got off the Avalon peninsula, finally, and went out to Fogo Island with my friend Krista. i am never one to turn down a bit of adventure and holy...an adventure it was. it's about a 4 hour drive (maybe 5 actually) to the ferry crossing, and then a 45 minute boat ride....then about another 30 minutes or so to Fogo proper. you basically leave St John's and drive to Gander, turn north and drive until the land ends, then get on a boat and chug out into the middle of Notre Dame bay and there you are....on an island in the middle of nowhere....which is off the coast of the bigger island in the middle of nowhere..... in the winter the island is surrounded by ice - the ferry needs a ice breaker pretty much continuously through the bad months to help it get through. the harbour freezes over solid (although not quite as solid as it used to according to the locals).

me and maggie overlooking the harbour and Fogo Head. we saw whales from here. i freaked out a little bit.

it's pretty desolate... this is actually the location of one of the old settlements.... if you turn right and look out to sea there is nothing but horizon staring back at you.

me, standing on Fogo Head with Change Islands behind. it was really windy, as evidenced by my hair. the binoculors were courtesy of krista's dad who insructed me to use them to look at Change Islands. i did, and it was cool. i also used them to spy on people in the town.... this is one of the four corners of the earth:

this was at Tilting, or Joe Batt's Arm, or some other little town.

Krista's family was really really fun, sort of what i would consider "typical" newfoundlanders. they fed us until we were full, filled us full of drink until i was pretty sure i was toxic and were so welcoming and friendly. very cool trip. i'd do it again...but maybe if it was warmer....

Olivia is getting huge, and has changed SO much since they moved back to the rock it's incredible. This is really the first time i've been around a kid this much as they are growing and it's really cool to see her develop. it helps that she has a great personality and isn't irritating. (that sounds really bad, but some kids are irritating. i'm allowed to say that. don't judge me.) she loves to play in my yarn baskets and take out the balls and squish them. it's really cute. and it's really the only thing she's interested in playing in (as opposed to say, the laptop, or the books on the shelf) so that's great!

other than that... school is basically draining the life out of me, but i'm trying to balance it with at least doing some writing for fun (which is going slowly and painfully). i think the events of my life are basically going to make a really cheesy/bad romance novel... the movie could make me a lot of coin though.... i wonder who would play me?

on the knitting front i'm full on into christmas knitting....only a few people are going to benefit from it this year because i've left it too late, procrastinated too much, was too indecive, and i knit too slowly. i've knit myself a pair of mittens, having lost my store bought pair. i'm not convinced they will be warm enough, but they might be. plus, they were quick and now that i've knit one pair i'm sure i can bang off a second pair easily enough. no pics of that though, it's too dark in the evenings by the time i get home from work and in the mornings i'm just not organized enough.

radio silence

2007-09-08T16:15:00.000-02:30

you can expect some pretty severe radio silence from me now. i'm leaving for a week to go back to BC for my grandfather's funeral and to see some friends; it's year end at work and we are (still) short staffed; i'm not into broadcasting the events of my life of late, what with all the upheavals.

plans to blog in the future are there...but i can't tell you when the future will be.

i expect the next few months to involve a lot of nights ending in empty pitchers...

nothing spells trouble like beer through a straw.

cheers.

.

last.fm

2007-09-02T11:37:00.000-02:30

if you listen to a lot of music and totally hate the radio stations in your town (hello!) last.fm might be the solution to your troubles. i had heard of last.fm, but thought it was something that wouldn't be any use to me. well, living without tv is great, but holy cow it can be quiet around here sometimes. so i do listen to a lot of music and am constantly wishing i could expand my play list. enter last.fm. i listen to whatever i normally would and it comes up with a list of things that i would probably like and i can listen to them online, just like the radio. or, you can put in that you want to listen to bands that sound like whoever, and it will generate a playlist of bands that are similar. sweet. i'm going to listen some more now.

100/70

2007-08-30T19:55:00.000-02:30

well that's more like it. although i had a really salty dinner last night and drank a coffee before going in. but still, when they said 100/70 i didn't think "am i dead?".

tomorrow we go for blood work. fun! nothing like being stuck with needles and peeing in a cup at 7:30 in the morning to really remind you that life is what you make of it.

i am quite proud that my resting heart rate is 60 though. and not something that would indicate i am the lazy sloth that i am. :)

in other news... it seems that if i'm not working late (which i am) then i'm on the biggest time suck of all time: facebook. oh, but then if i'm not on facebook or working late i'm on the biggest time suck of all time specific to fibre fetishists: ravelry. what is it about that site that just drains the minutes away? it's fantastic - i love it! i only wish i had more friends who knit.

90/55

2007-08-28T19:52:00.000-02:30

i went to see the Naturopath today and that was my blood pressure. 90/55. I don't think it's ever been so low (not like i know what it is all the time, but whenever i've had it taken and they say it's low it's never THAT low). she did ask me several times if i was ever dizzy. (which i'm not).

huh.

distraction from thinking too hard about the end

2007-08-26T11:21:00.000-02:30

My grandfather died last weekend. At this point I don't have too much to say about it as it's too recent for me to gather any concrete rational thoughts on it. The loss makes the distance between here and there feel even more immense. I'll go home in mid-September for the memorial. For anyone interested the obit can be accessed here.

Moving on to less tearful things....

my baby surprise sweater in action!

Now that I know how the sweater fits together I would stripe it differently the next time I knit this. (I really had no idea what I was doing. I'm not sure how I feel about the shorter sleeve (as per the original design) but I'll withhold judgement until I hear feedback from the parents. I'm sure EZ knew what she was doing when she designed it. And who am I to argue with EZ? I'm also not happy with the buttons - it needs bigger ones. the bottom two buttons in the picture aren't done up because really, there's no point if they are just going to fall out of the button holes every time the little one moves.

The WIP parade:

Something for someone for Christmas. That's all I can say for now and all I'll show until after the 25th of December! I think it will be a big hit. :)

I finally turned the heel on V's sock. I'm hoping to have these wrapped up within the month. The flight to the west coast and back should help with that.

More mindless knitting. The pocketbook slippers. My feet are always cold and I hate wearing socks so this could have been a good solution to that issue. I'm not convinced about this pattern for me. It might be better for someone with shorter feet. I'll finish the second one that is barely started so I have a pair. These really aren't using much of the wool (Patons SWS - 70% wool, 30% soy) so I'll have enough to make these slippers as well. I know I like this pattern so that should be better.

in case you weren't convinced they actually could be worn on the feet...

Thrums to make mittens! There is no way in hell my hands are going to be cold here this winter. Ha! Take that Newfoundland winter! Jen 1, Newfoundland Winter 0. (OK ok, it's more like Newfoundland Winter 8675, Jen 1... but whatever).
(and in case you have no idea what I'm talking about when I say thrums, THIS is what I mean. It's tradition. It's warm. I figure I can knit my own, no need to buy!)

The leisel scarf. I'm feeling particulary 'meh' about the pattern as a whole. The only reason I cast on for it was because I happened to have it lying around. This might get frogged in favour of the flame scarf from Knit and Tonic.

green scarf, lounging

another scarf, this one almost done. it's just a nice easy brioche stitch: cast on of a multiple of 3 and then *yo,sl1,k2tog* repeat. alternating greens every second row. niiiiiice and mindless. and the fabric created by brioche is really really soft and squooshy. yum. this one might get kept by me.

a big PS for Michelle... you complained that you don't figure prominently enough in my blog...does it count that i got your baby AND the back of your husband's head in this post??

busy

2007-08-18T11:15:00.000-02:30

the last two weeks have been really busy. with the tuckamore festival going on it's been seemingly non-stop chamber music. there is only one concert left on sunday and then we are done. i managed to somehow volunteer myself to work the merchandise table at almost all the concerts so i haven't been able to skip out at all.
V's dad was here the first week which was great. their concert was fantastic, as always, and it was fun to see him again. the shanghai quartet has been here for the past several days and their two concerts were also incredible. V is really good friends with the cellist, Nick, and I met him last august in new york so it was fun to see him again. i forgot my camera when we took him out to cape spear otherwise i'd have funny photos of him and big V. oh well.
i've gone on a couple of short hikes in the last week or so as well. Karen and i went on one that wasn't very good just north of ferryland. the views were incredible, but the hike itself was crap. then V and his dad and I hiked down to North Head from Cape Spear. we saw whales off of cape spear - or rather, one whale. it was neat. i think V's dad got some good photos of it. sometime this fall i want to hike to Maddox Cove. it wasn't in the cards for us this time though. i also want to do the hike from Cape Spear back into the city. apparently there is some really cool stuff to see.

cool caves on the crap hike

the trail to maddox cove

me at north head

saturday.

2007-08-05T12:44:00.001-02:30

map of the east coast trail; capespear to blackhead portion

yesterday was a wonderful day. it was beautiful and warm all day and we had a great time getting out and about. first off, after lounging around drinking coffee and eating croissant from the french bakery a few blocks away, we drove out to cape spear. from the parking lot there we walked south on the East Coast Trail down to Black Head. (on the map we started in the yellow area and walked down to the bottom point). it's around 4.5-5 km one direction so in a couple hours we wandered a good 8 km, maybe a bit more. we were moving pretty quickly though since we were on a tight schedule. the scenery is all the same basically: lots of boggy areas and long sweeping vistas of ocean. if it were still whale season it would be a great vantage point to watch them.

lighthouse of cape spear seen in the distance.

those brown specs in the grasses are pitcher plants

pitcher plants. the provincial flower of newfoundland, these are carnivorous.

the wind at this point was so strong that i was leaning into it and it was holding me up. it was pretty incredible, and only felt a wee bit like it was going to sweep me into the ocean.

view from along the trail

after our hiking around and around the cape, we wandered over to the annual Folk Fest being held at Bannerman park. there were some great groups from all over. this band was fantastic; i have no idea who they were or where they were from but the music was Greek and middle eastern-y. lots of fun to listen to. we enjoyed a cold beer from the beer tent and ate Indian food from the Hindu Temple Association tent. ah, nothing spells Folk Fest like Chickpea Masala, a cold Molson product and some international music.

I also stopped by all the craft tents and found a woman with a spinning wheel spinning yarn! she had beautiful sweaters for sale as well at the yarn itself. i bought a small skein and have already wound it into a ball. i really need to get a ball winder so that i can make nice cakes and not these lumpy bumpy hand rolled jobs. it does the trick though. i think this should be enough to make a hat. and if i like it, i know where i can get more! i also bought a teeny tiny little bowl from one of the potters - small enough to use as a salt cellar as i have nothing to put salt in and the box just looks wrong on the table.

hand spun 2-ply, 100% wool, 168 yards, grey and white.

all in all it was a great day.

2007-08-02T11:48:00.000-02:30

i came across this site while poking around the net looking for locally grown food ideas here in NL. it's a great idea and i'd love to try it. using their "find your 100 miles" calculator it seems that my 100 miles gets me over 50% open ocean and the land that i do have to eat off of is the rockiest of rocky Avalon peninsula. i know there is local meat here, a ton of seafood, berries.... some veg although that's a tough one.... canning would have to be involved.... no grain though... not even grain other than wheat (i don't know that 100% but this IS a big rock with no farmland. there is a reason why these people live on salt fish and .... salt fish.

something to consider though.

AND - big EXCITING news. you all need to go to this podcast and listen. in this game, "circles of mosquitos", when Sage says "and Jennifer created this soundscape"... she's talking about ME. ya. that's right. i'm gettin' involved. (the link is to the specific episode - oh, and it's only, like, 6 minutes long so yes you do have time to listen.)

ya. i rock.

oh, and i passed my exam. woo.

no pics...

2007-07-29T14:36:00.000-02:30

i have no pics from today, but nathan (the bro-in-law) and i went kayaking this morning. it was awesome. take the pics from yesterday, imagine similar scenery but viewed from the water, throw in some whales blowing a ways off and about eleventy billion puffins and you have our morning.

fun!

a good day for a hike

2007-07-27T23:17:00.000-02:30

today i drove 3 hours to go on a 2 hour hike. somehow, that didn't seem odd to me. could be my bc upbringing and how in order to get really "out" of the lower mainland you're looking at a good 3 hours in a car anyway. regardless, the drive was fantastic, the hike magnificent, and the scenery spectacular.

i saw a chipmunky squirrell thing, a few dead foxes and eleventy billion jellyfish. other than that, nature stayed away from me. too bad. i was looking for whales.

summer reading.

2007-07-25T19:34:00.000-02:30

read in only a few hours, spread over several days (darn job, getting in the way!) i finished the latest Potter last night. it was totally entertaining but i have to say i TOTALL CALLED IT while reading the last book. right down to the final ending part which i won't speak of here. but ya. jk offered me no surprises. maybe that's a good thing.

anyhoo. onto more exciting things. i'm back to reading simon winchester's krakatoa. and then i'll tackle gravity's rainbow. which i've been putting off because it weighs about 10 pounds and my wrists get sore looking at it. :)

jennifer is currently unavailable.

2007-07-21T22:50:00.001-02:30

one long day

2007-07-19T23:15:00.000-02:30

well, today was a looong day at the office but it went well... at the end... finally. with M gone for vacation and me all alone in charge of the big bad financial part it's a bit scary, but i think i'll manage fine. besides, he's taken a cell phone and i'm not afraid to use it.

as it stands now, it's 11:30, i've just gotten home and now i'm going to crawl into my nest and hibernate for a while.

M and N's move continues to go well (i think!) bar a few complications with the washer / dryer that they have given me. they are trying to get it all hooked up in spite of a wonky washer hose and i have high hopes they'll succeed. and if they don't then i'll call a handyman and for a bit of cash i'm sure it will all work out. as the apartment empties it's interesting to see the space differently and i will be able to better tell where the BIG holes are. like: gee a really need somewhere to put my glasses when i sleep, better buy a bedside table. or: gee that big wall is really empty now better buy...something...

:)

happiness is a warm couch.

2007-07-18T08:04:00.000-02:30

yay! enough said.

2007-07-02T18:23:00.001-02:30

i don't have much time, but here's a small update on our weekend.....

on saturday we took a big walk all around downtown looking in shops and strolling along the waterfront. that evening we went to the Geo Centre where our friend Ron was being honoured with the Ordre National du Merite which is a French Order of Chivalry. I got to meet the French ambassador. it was pretty cool.

on sunday we took a big hike around Signal Hill, took lots of pics and watched a bit of the military tattoo. then we hit george street for some live newfoundland music and a few drinks. we were home early because we are pumpkins. it was still really fun though. :)

more pictures of the hike can be found here

and then today we went shopping and i bought a chair! i totally love it. i love the colour, it's comfy but still classy and it will fill the corner nicely. i also bought the table beside it. both pieces were on sale and i'm feeling slightly smug because of that.

ok- i need to run and meet the boys for dinner!

j

and i thought i was harsh!

2007-06-30T14:34:00.001-02:30

apparently i really AM a goody-two-shoes.

this is based on

crappy (2x)
hell (1x)

well you know what i say to that? crappy hell.

.

101

2007-06-26T21:55:00.000-02:30

i couldn't let the chance of post number 101 going by without throwing a little depeche mode 101 on the headphones to accompany me as i type this. this brings back some great highshool (and college, and university, and post-uni) memories. i used to be a HUGE depeche mode fan. i guess i still am, because this album is fantastic and i'm loving hearing it again. (for those who care, i.e. paula, it's currently "nothing" off disc two, just about to head into "pleasure, little treasure"). i remember when we were in high school my sister paula worked at the arby's (at the mall!) and her name tag said "Paula C. of Truth". the "of truth" was underneath, or potentially on the back. if you're geeky enough to get that joke then hats off to you!

tonight i was going to have some great photos of middle cove, where michelle and olivia and i were going to go and watch the capelin roll in. the fishery opens tomorrow so we figure they must be around. there are so many that people can just go down and scoop them up in nets or whatever they have. i'm sure you actually need a license to fish them. we just wanted to go and look at the fishies. it's something i'd love to see. unfortunately, olivia had a late nap and that coincided with when we were going to go so we ended up staying put. but that's ok! we had a fantastic dinner together. we attempted to bbq with the little charcoal one but it was sufficiently windy enough to cause both of us to feel burning down the townhouse was a distinct possibility. we used the broiler instead. the scallop/veggie skewers didn't seem to mind. mmmm.

this past weekend i went to the easter seals 24 hour relay here in st john's. actually, it was in paradise which is very close. and not at all like paradise. that was obviously a marketing ploy to get people to go there. no offense to the place but we spent the day (i was only there for 14 hours, from 1pm until 3am) in a fog bank with wind and rain. fun! apparently after i left there was crazy thunder/lightning and they had to shut things down. they kept the hot tubs running though, which was good because it was about 4 degrees out. that's basically the only thing that kept people from freezing to death. all in all it was a fun event though - i'd do it again next year. i'll just make sure i'm better prepared to spend the whole night outside. like i'll bring all my winter gear and a rain suit aka i'm-an-offshore-fisherman-suit. it was nice to get to know a few of my coworkers better as well. seeing as how i spend all my time in my office staring at a computer screen and looking stern and/or official, it's nice when people who i don't deal with on a daily basis get to see that i'm not all business and that i'm actually partially crazy and a real riot to hang out with. (i'm assuming they share my perception of myself. i wonder if they noticed that i'm rather conceited?)

well, that's it for today. pretty boring eh? but vernon seemed to want an update so there you go. :) life just isn't that interesting these days....

here's a parting shot of olivia heading up the stairs. she's really mobile now. she's actually just starting to stand up on her own....

ps: good evening pasadena!
(man, i'm a geek.)

100

2007-06-18T20:15:00.000-02:30

well folks, this is it. post number 100. pretty cool, eh? i've been watching the number go up and up in the past few weeks and i was thinking "what should i blog about on number 100"? turns out, i came up with pretty much nothing. today was an ordinary day, in an ordinary week, with ordinary people doing ordinary things. not much to say there. it's been one year since this whole thing began. my first post was actually one year ago yesterday.... i think we were....somewhere.....wisconsin? toronto? yes, toronto. meeting V's dad for the first time! not scary at all, either. at least, not from my side. maybe it was for him, i'm not sure. although if it was, he covered it up very well. in fact, the entire family covered up the scariness of meeting me quite well. warm fuzzies all 'round for them. it's been a great year getting to know them all - even if it is mainly over great geographical distances.

and speaking of great geographical distances... oh how i miss vancouver. *sigh. *sniffle. *sigh. i wrote a big paragraph about all the things i miss....but i deleted it. that's not what this is about. yes, i miss home. yes i miss my friends (hi!). but i'm here now - so let's enjoy it! it's not snowing or incredibly windy so i'm going to relish that!

first though i should mention that after the hell exam last week (how could it have gone so badly? HOW?) V had collected the snacks i'd requested - yay V! there was also enough alcohol to kill a horse - which ended up being much needed. yay V!

secondly - as soon as the exam was finished i started knitting. dishclothes. ya. how boring is that? i can't help it - it's just so mindless. and soothing. so here's almost 4 dishclothes, plus one half finished man's sock. exciting, no? the sock is for V - he picked the yarn. i'm hoping it will fit him. he needs to bring his foot home so i can measure it again.

and thirdly - i picked up our first veggie order from the organic farm today. they didn't think they'd be open this early. in fact, he had emailed everyone to say they wouldn't be starting until early july (i think), but then it got hot and wow- the greens took off! so today we got a HUGE bunch of chinese cabbage (not bok choy, some other leafier variety - but still stiffer, like cabbage), salad greens, chives and green onions. you can tell that i'll be eating a big chivey salad tomorrow for lunch! the whole thing smells SO good too. i can't wait to eat it all. actual vegetables with FLAVOUR and SMELL. so rare in newfoundland. i hope vernon doesn't mind that he's missing the first one! ah well - they'll be many more.

as far as "milestone" posts go, this one basically sucks. maybe if i get some more sleep (entirely my fault - i just refuse to go to bed early. i'm like a three year old, i swear) i'll come up with some interesting top 100 list or 100 things (ick) but cooler. we'll see. or maybe i'll wait until 500. that'll buy me some time.........

the day

2007-06-17T23:17:00.000-02:30

today was totally different from what i had actually planned. yesterday i ended up staying up WAY. TOO. LATE. like 2am too late. whoops. for some reason, when vernon is out of town and i'm left to entertain myself i end up staying up until the wee hours. a bit of a night hawk i guess. anyhoo - the really late night turned into a really late morning. so rather than hop out of bed and head straight up signal hill i crawled out of bed, over to the bodum and spent two hours drinking coffee and reading trashy novels. yay! michelle called around noon and we made plans to go run around quidi vidi lake. so an hour and a half later found me, my sister, and my neice chugging around the lake in the hottest part of the day (not the swiftest of plans) and for some reason there was no breeze. ugh. after that haul we discussed why some overweight women have no cellulite and why we hate them. we also went to canadian tire where i purchased a fan (it's damn hot here people) and some cereal bowls (cute, stripey, cheap). michelle bought a garbage can and some hangers. we really are a heap of excitement i tell you. it was great fun.

now, it's 11:30 and i'm not tired at all. great. i suppose i should go at least lie in the bed, if i want a chance to get any decent amount of sleep before work tomorrow.

:)

a day of firsts

2007-06-16T21:38:00.000-02:30

well - today was a good day. and it was a day of definite firsts for me!

- it was the first saturday since moving to st john's that i haven't felt like i should really be studying...something....anything. this will be a short lived feeling but i'm planning on enjoying it.
- it was the first time that i have ever changed a diaper. not an experience that i was looking forward to...but what are you going to do when you've got a baby that needs attention and you're like, the adult person. luckily it was only number one. i thank olivia for the gentle introduction.
- it was the first time that i have ever bought a sofa. it's a sofa bed and will arrive just as mom and dad LEAVE which totally sucks. but it's the only one i liked (really really liked) and so it will be here for me the next time they are here! i'm pretty sure i can scrounge a therma rest out of the closet and that i'm young enough to handle sleeping on the floor.

now, i'm going to leave the computer and go read a trashy novel. aaah, trashy novels, how i've missed you during my last semester.

:)

on the docket for tomorrow - a big walk from my house, up signal hill, through quidi vidi and home. should be fun!

j

gah.

2007-06-13T22:34:00.000-02:30

that sucked. seriously.

ugh.

the one plus is that it's done. and that's really the only plus. ya.

alrighty.

so this is it.

2007-06-13T17:16:00.000-02:30

i feel vaguely ill. i've turned off the lectures, closed the books and now it's just up to fate. i could say that how well i do will depend solely on my own preparatory techniques, but i prefer to keep fate involved so if i crash as badly as i know is possible i can blame something other than myself.

i can feel the december exam at the back of my head - just sitting there, reminding me. i used that exam as one of my practice ones. it WAS a hard exam. the march one was hard too - but not as brutal as december. here's hoping june is a breeze. one of the funny things is that i do most of these things in my daily job...so it's not like i don't know "how". sitting here putting together a cash flow statement from random pieces of information given on an exam and making mistakes and forgetting components and feeling like a general idiot...i need to remind myself that when i go back to work tomorrow one of the things on my list for the day is to put together the financial statements. you know - income statement, balance sheet, STATEMENT OF CASH FLOWS. i do it every month, every month i somehow manage to get it to balance. so obviously in the real world i have a handle on the concept.... now it's just a matter of seeing if i can get that concept to translate back into the world of academia. this is a backwards motion. usually we struggle with the leap in the opposite direction.

ok all - fingers crossed. in an hour or so i'll be starting to write. and in 30 minutes i'll be driving in my car. and in 5 i'll be eating whatever i can find in the fridge for a sort-of dinner.

weeee.

24

2007-06-12T23:10:00.000-02:30

in 24 hours it will be over. actually, in about 21 or so hours it will be over. and i need to fit in much more reviewing and some serious sleeping in there as well. hmmm.

i definitely feel better about this compared to december... but do i feel "better enough"? i suppose time will tell.

the crappy part (ok, one of the crappy parts) is that it takes about 8 weeks to get the marks back on these exams. so i'll be into august before i know my fate. good thing i'm good at forgetting about it and not caring once that pencil goes down. i wouldn't want it to cramp my summer or anything.

ah summer. how i long for thee.

the weather gods smile upon me.....

2007-06-12T11:48:00.000-02:30

it's 6 degrees and drizzling. sweet! finally - i don't feel like i want to go run around outside and i can actually sit in here and get some work done. yay!

getting harder

2007-06-10T14:55:00.001-02:30

it's getting harder and harder to study. this whole weekend the weather has been fantastic - 23 or 24 degrees each day with the humidity pushing that higher and into the high 20's/low 30's. it's sunny, the plants are all in leafey greeney splendor and i want to be out IN it! not cooped up looking out the window at this view:

*sigh*

only 3 and a half more days to go!

i am downright weird.

2007-06-09T10:52:00.000-02:30

You Are a Pinky

You are fiercely independent, and possibly downright weird.
A great communicator, you can get along with almost anyone.
You are kind and sympathetic. You support all your friends - and love them for who they are.

You get along well with: The Ring Finger

Stay away from: The Thumb

What Finger Are You?

doug savage is fantastic.

2007-06-05T23:21:00.000-02:30

there is a guy at my sister's company who is a cartoonist (i have no idea what he does at his office job. office-ey type things i assume.). he has a site called Savage Chickens which is the most hilarious collection of chicken cartoons on post-it notes that i have ever seen. granted, it's the only collection of chicken cartoons on post-it notes that i've ever seen, but regardless - the man is sheer genius.

so when i was over there getting caught up on the last week or so of his postings i just about snorted tea out my nose at this one.

now...most of you know that i knit. sort of. i try anyway. and one of my favourite knitbloggers and authors is stephanie pearl-mcphee. she has several books and a great blog and she also has a brother-in-law who works with doctors without borders. a couple of years ago she issued a challenge to knitters to donate money, whatever they could, and started something called knitters without borders - you can see the link to it in my side bar. the idea was that if you can afford to buy yarn you can afford to give a up a little for people who need the help. it evolved out of the 2004 tsunami disaster but it has continued on well past that. you can read more about it here. it has been a raging success and to date the knitters have raised over 320,000 dollars. ya, i know. that's a lot of yarn money.

so when i saw that doug savage had drawn a cartoon for knitters without borders i just about keeled over. it's priceless. he needs to get that on a tshirt - STAT. or a tote bag. or a mug. or all three.

PS - doug actually commented on my blog on THIS post. paula, my sister, told him i had linked to him from here and he was nice enough to come on over and check it out.

'bergs

2007-06-04T19:54:00.001-02:30

i drove out to blackhead after work because i saw that, according to icebergfinder.com there was a berg there! there are a lot of icebergs around the area right now. we are definitely in iceberg season. this could explain the cool air. anyway, i knew this one would be easy to see from the side of the road so i decided to just head out there straight from the office. i don't have a lot of time to take study breaks on week nights but this was definitely worth it. these are the first actual icebergs that i've really truly seen in real life. it was pretty cool. although i didn't see any skeletons hanging off of them... i was pretty jealous of all the people that i saw out walking today as well - it was a georgeous day - incredibly sunny, coolish air but a warm sun, great views of icebergs - what i like to think of a stereotypical newfoundland day. if only i'd seen some whales breaching while puffins flew by it would have been perfect!

the view as i drove into blackhead

'bergy goodness

a close-up

lots of people climbing around the little ~~bergie bits~~ growlers that had
already washed up on shore (yes, ones this teeny are called growlers. bergy bits are
actually 1-4 metres tall and 5-10 metres long.

hey look - there's another one over by signal hill!

i drove up there and got a closer look - this one had lots of
bergie bits trailing after it AND a little boat is
actually down there (hard to see in the photo)

a view of the first iceberg i saw, at blackhead, from signal hill

i'm not happy with these photos, but you get the idea. i have a point and shoot and honestly, sometimes i can't figure it out. i'm that mechanically challenged. scary, but true.

weather....

2007-06-03T15:40:00.000-02:30

jenn left a comment yesterday to let me know that the high in kamloops for today was/is 36 degrees. ouch. that is h.o.t. so i'm coming back with a little "in-yo-face" attitude to let the entire world (yes, i labour under the delusion that the entire world reads my blog but is just too shy to comment) know that our high for wednesday of this week is supposedly going to be 18 degrees! 18!! that is like....warm! ya! i'm getting the capris out already. and the flipflops.

ya!

ps - i should add that we currently have a severe frost warning in effect. i'm not kidding.

pps - due to a glitch on the weather network website (and the tv apparently according to vernon) our morning temperature for tomorrow was being listed as -45 with a wind chill of -65. they've since fixed it. but we laughed. sort of. nervously.

list

2007-06-02T15:29:00.000-02:30

1. paula emailed and reminded me of bob ross and the joy of painting - how we loved bob and his almighty mountains and happy trees. she emailed this link to a list of tshirts that bob sells on his website....the ultimate in kitsch!

2. michelle walked over to borrow my car and it's so cold she was wearing her toque. it's extremely windy and about 10 degrees...and spitting rain....good thing she was wearing her 3 ply gortex. i am extremely tired of this weather.

3. the leaves are barely out on the trees. flowers are blooming, but only tulips on the sunny sides of streets are blooming yet. the others are still tightly closed in protest.

4. i'm still studying. hating every second of it. only 2 weeks to go.

paris pics

2007-05-30T21:19:00.001-02:30

pics from paris can be found HERE.

there are a lot.

and it's not even half of what i took.

this was l'elephant's first big excursion since the loss of monkey (may he rest in peace). we were all devastated by this great loss, however, through the healing powers of paris we have soldiered on. (l'elephant spent the majority of the trip drunk in my purse - hiccuping his way around the city with only a few minor accidents that fabric cleaner will surely take care of.)

:)

back on the rock....

2007-05-27T13:24:00.001-02:30

well...we're back. and i'm happy to report that the leaves are starting to come out onto the trees here so it's not quite as dismal as when i left.
paris was FANTASTIC. words can't describe how great that city is. we had a blast and i can't wait to go back. i don't have time for a big blog entry right now (i have to study, surprise, surprise!) but here are a few pics to tide you over.....

me, attempting to look suitably impressed but not totally gob-smacked.

notre dame - flying buttresses and rose window galore.

walking by the louvre....i'm holding my hands to keep from
flapping them about in fits of excitement.

much art was seen and many sculptures photographed...
i really am a lover of stone and bronze...

at a cafe after walking up to sacre coeur and strolling
around montmartre in the grey drizzle.
mine is, of course, the wine.

still awake

2007-05-15T23:59:00.001-02:30

i'm still awake. i can't sleep. i'm too excited.

*SIGH*

i had a bunch of things to say...

2007-05-15T17:47:00.000-02:30

i totally had a bunch of things to say and now i forget them all. huh. that's irritating.

today was a deceptive day. the sun was brilliant, the sky a deep crystal blue, and the air? frigid. i think it was maybe 6 degrees. yoiks. you can almost imagine it's warm outside until you realise that there are no leaves on the trees. what the hey, mang? it's still very very early spring. *sigh*

only a few hours left until paris. i'm under 24 now. i'm excited. but tired. i went to bed around 2 last night and was back up at 7 (well, i was awake at 7 and then i proceeded to pretend i was sleeping while listening to the cbc morning show for an hour. whoops.) i need to get packing. there are clothes strewn everywhere, shoes in every corner, half knit socks - it's crazy i tell you. crazy. i'm trying to go totally carry on - why, you ask? just because i can. i don't need much....so we'll see. also, when we get to paris vernon and i will switch suitcases and he will take the little one back and i'll take his giant one. he got dinged flying within europe with such a big bag - but the international restrictions are of course a lot looser, so i should be ok with it. so nobody worry - you're presents will all make it home with me.

i had my performance evaluation at work today. needless to say i'm doing juuuuust fine thank you very much. yup. i'm still totally awesome. too bad my boss can't mark my exams for me (although he's a very honest man and he'd fail me, too).

*update...several hours later...*

i'm almost finished packing. pretty much everything is actually in the suitcase i think. now i'm just tired. *yawn* i'm listening to As It Happens on CBC and Barbarb Budd just said, in reference to the funky song they were playing, "get down with your funky self" in that dry dead pan way that only she can. i'm so tired, that it really made me laugh.

alright - off to bed with me...

study break

2007-05-12T20:33:00.000-02:30

this afternoon, for my first study break of the day, i went over to vernon's and picked up his car. he had asked me to drive it once while he was away to get the juices flowing. so off i went to see if it would start....it sure did! like a charm. so me and the red jellybean drove out to cape spear. that car handles like a dream. a dream that is cranky and about 4 inches off the ground, but still. i love cape spear - windy and windswept with great sweeping vista of coastline. it's a great place to tromp around and waste an hour.

because of the camera incident with stuart mclean (and lack thereof) - i, of course, had my camera in my purse. so here you go. my study break in pictures.

you can see in this photo (click to make bigger) some wispy bits of fog lying over the ocean.
that is part of a larger fog bank that was rolling in while i was there.

this random stranger is standing at the eastern most point.
it was windy and cold. as per usual.

here's the point looking back towards the city and cabot tower.

the fog bank rolling ominously in.....

judging by the speed at which the fog bank was bearing down on us, i high tailed it out of the fog horn zone lickity split.

the old WWII battery (part of it. the part with the big gun.)

creepy tunnel part of the old WWII battery...i did not go into the creepy tunnels today.

my favourite coastline vista.

one more time, for the cheap seats in the back!

"fog eats coastline! locals not surprised."

day eight

2007-05-12T11:34:00.000-02:30

according to my sources, it's 18 degrees already. and it's only noon. I CAN'T BELIEVE I HAVE TO STAY INSIDE AT THE COMPUTER.

*sigh*

day...five? six?

2007-05-10T20:56:00.000-02:30

i can't remember what day it is. that's really too bad for me. last night i was at the office until 11pm. fun! now i'm just waiting for my boss to call me to go back in tonight. i have basically two more things to do until i can say the financials are done for the month. unfortunately i actually need some info from him before i can complete them. and he can't get back in until later. so we'll be there until all hours again. and because we were there last night late i didn't get any studying done then, and now i'm really tired and can't focus (which will probably come back to bite me later when i'm at the office too, hey?). i'm super grumpy.

on a side note - only 6 big sleeps until paris (i'm counting tonight as a big sleep even though it will probably be tiny). it's actually 6 big sleeps until i leave and 6 big sleeps, one tiny-broken-crappy-airplane sleep until paris. SWEET.

today was another beautiful sun shiny day. and sort of warm. or warm-ish. basically if you are as desperate as i am for summer right now, you could hallucinate warm. which is potentially what i did. i'm also sort of thinking that the nice weather might be a city wide mind melt. we are all just so desperate to not be in winter anymore that we've conjured a group sun sighting. somebody should really study that.

day two

2007-05-06T08:55:00.000-02:30

it's snowing. barely, and it's certainly not going to stick to anything. but there are actual white flakes coming out of the sky.

i know. i feel the same way.

edited to add: just got an email from Vernon. his camera was stolen in st petersburg. he's sad. it was a very very nice camera. sh. it. ty.

day one

2007-05-05T10:11:00.000-02:30

no more vernon. now - what to do?

~~1. listen to TWO weeks of lectures (week 5 and 6, both of which are past and both of which passed without me listening...)~~ DONE!
~~2. register myself and Karen for adult learn to row classes at the rowing club. the goal is to have biceps perceptible to the human eye by august~~ this is basically done. i picked up the forms, the person who needed to take our money had "gone for a walk". seriously. gotta love this town.
~~3. run/stroll/drag butt around quidi vidi lake~~ DONE!
~~4. get two questions completed on the midterm assignment (due the day i leave for paris)~~
5. mail off some packages and letters that are lying around
~~6. stare at navel and think about missing vernon some more~~ DONE!
7. finish charity knitting (~~2.5~~ 4 items down, ~~2.5~~ 1 to go. these are hats, quick and easy)

a short list of unrelated things

2007-04-27T18:40:00.000-02:30

1. yesterday it snowed. it didn't stick, and it only lasted about 30 minutes, but it was a complete white out. it was during dinner and i was staring out the window saying "what...is.......what is that?" it sort of started as hail and then turned into giant flakes. very odd.

2. tonight it the launch concert for the university orchestra (this is the one that vernon is taking to russia). they leave a week today. he is stressed, but as things fall into place he's getting excited which is great to see.

3. this weekend i need to buckle down and get and get cracking on my midterm assignment. it's due while i'm in paris....so i guess i should crank that out. after this week of having the flu and then a really bad cold i'm just not into it. hopefully by the morning that will change.

4. it was 20 degrees in paris today.

5. i am still dealing with the crushing blow caused by the knowledge that my favourite candies are dairy based. the joy-ride type thrill of realizing i can still get them here in the middle of the atlantic completely crashed by the ingredient list. things were so much easier Before Allergies.

flu bug marathon

2007-04-24T19:56:00.000-02:30

i have the flu. and have for 3 days. it came on sometime on saturday as a sore throat. and then became, well, the flu. i stayed home from work yesterday, went in for 2 hours this morning and then came home and crawled right back into the pajamas and onto the couch.

the only good thing about this is that i've completed these:

mom's belated (like by 2.5 months) birthday gift. bed socks of a design by her request,
just in time for the 22 degree weather they are having....ugh.

and an action shot...sort of....pretend i'm walking......

disregard the tissues on the carpet. i've spent two days propped in the corner of the couch engaged in a Lord of the Rings DVD marathon....what do you expect? only some of those tissues are from an actual cold. the rest are from when various bad things happen to various fantastic characters. yes, i've seen the movies before. yes, i know what happens. yes yes and yes to all the rest of your questions. i get somewhat...involved...in fantasty fiction. i can't help it - the men are wearing breast plates and have swords!

alright - i could rant about how 90% of the pine trees in kamloops are dead from the pine beetle already and there's no way they can remove all the dead trees from my parents neighbourhood by the time fire season comes along this year (think heavily wooded + lots of dead trees + fire = bad)...but i can't put enough coherent sentences together to tell the whole story. suffice to say - lots of trees dead. entire once beautifully wooded parks are treeless and barren. it's really really sad. i'm really really sad.

back to the couch for me. those hobbits haven't finished their journey and they won't with me just sitting here...

life meets the vinyl cafe

2007-04-19T20:03:00.000-02:30

it's been a while since i have blogged and for that...many apologies. life here has gotten a wee bit out of control. work is INSANELY busy. lots of good things happening which all require a lot of extra digging and figuring. school is chugging along and i can happily announce that i aced my last quiz. that's right, i got 100%. because of this i have gleefully decided that i'm remarkably brilliant and that last semester's small "issue" with getting the knowledge from my head to the paper was an inconvenience and nothing more. remarkably brilliant. yup.

last night vernon and i went to the Ship for folk night. live music, open mike, door prizes, good times. while there i got to meet stuart mclean. it was really cool. he's a really nice guy. i'm kind of hoping that i either didn't make a complete arse of myself (is that possible?) or that i never see him again. i'm sure i was fine.... he's taping two live shows here next week. it would be really fun to go. the band (hey rosetta!) that vernon did some recording with last year are one or the musical guests which is great for them. that album won a whole bunch of awards this year. but vernon and i don't have the money to go really. or rather, we have the money but i'm saving my 40$ for some fun in paris. you know, fun like wine and baguettes!

other than that - things here are pretty dull. i'm still working on mom's bday gift. this is like, 2 months overdue already. i think i finally have it figured out though and can now START AGAIN. sigh. the red scarf is almost done. but it's going in the xmas gift pile so you can't see it. because it might just be for you!

alright. i need a nap. i stayed up too late talking to stuart mclean. (i can not believe i didn't have my camera. i will officially never leave home without it. there could be a really cool picture of me WITH stuart mclean here, but alas. there is none.)

:)

2007-04-08T11:23:00.000-02:30

this weekend has been all about studying. it hasn't been fun, it hasn't been pretty, but at least i'm getting it done. i basically have nothing new to say. the snow is almost gone. it's patchy and there are still piles, but in comparison to how much was here, it's almost not even noticeable at this point. what is left is all brown and very dry and crumbly. all we need is a few good hard rains and it would all go away. instead we are getting a lot of faint drizzle which isn't doing anything. at least it isn't the 15-20 cm that the maritimes and the western parts of newfoundland were/are getting. i suppose i can't really complain!

i've started a new scarf:
just something mindless to give my hands something to do while listening to the TERRIBLE lecturer drone on and on. the pattern is adapted from Wendy's Fir Cone Wrap.
i have made quite a few mistakes in the pattern already but i'm not sure that i care enough to rip back. you can't really tell in the photo above (or at least i can't), but you can when you look closely:

i guess you just shouldn't look closely.

that's it for now. back to the books....

nothing to say.

2007-03-31T09:13:00.000-02:30

is it time for summer yet?? this is the weather than i'm waiting for!

i don't even know what to talk about today....but i felt the need to post some kind of update.

this week has been REALLY busy. we finally finished quarter end for Q2 and even though the auditors are now coming back with more in depth questions we are on top of it. it just takes time. generally lots of time. another month end starts tonight with me having to go into the office around 11pm to run reports. fun! oh well. whatever. it will only take an hour or so.

i need to start cracking down on school too. i'm paranoid that i will get behind when i go to paris (PARIS!) and want to be well ahead of the game by the time that comes around.

elga mailed me back the last harry potter book that i had lent her when i left town last year. she sent a cute note card with a sentiment so hilarious and inappropriate that i won't repeat it here. but i laughed. really hard. and then i missed her even more.

isn't that a cute card? i want one with a J!

i finished the first bed sock for mom. as you can see from the pictures below i have made some grave errors in judgement. BUT, that's ok. i've figured it out. i know how to make it and how it all fits together. it's knit in one piece which confused the heck out of me, and also made it hard for me to tell what part was what because it all sort of bunches up on the needles. now i just need to reknit two more and make more ankle, less foot. *sigh* i still thinks it's pretty amazing that i managed to get that far with no pattern and without actually taking it off the needles to see how it was working out.

my version. hmmmm....something is terribly wrong with this foot!

the original. knit by someone who knew what they were doing.

practicing my french*

2007-03-25T17:11:00.000-02:30

yesterday we had a big turkey dinner. very appropriate as the weather turned bitterly cold again and we awoke to snow beginning to fall. it didn't end up sticking, but the sentiment was there. mother nature knows i wore my spring coat last friday. and she is not amused. the day went something like this:

vernon and i lazily prep veggies and make salads.

here is vernon prepping avacodos for guac. doesn't he look relaxed?

the turkey was in the oven by 11:45. plenty of time for mr ding-dong* to cook and be out of the oven by 5:30. (guests are due to arrive shortly after and dinner is at 6:30). but then....

it's 4 o'clock and what's this?

holy crap the turkey was done! what-to-do-what-to-do?? i called mom. she wasn't home so vernon and i gave each other a hard shake and pulled it together. i put the joy of cooking away - realising that it would be of no use in an emergency of this magnitude. we didn't panic. or rather vernon didn't panic. and i didn't either. much. i convinced myself that having the turkey ready 2 hours before the guests were scheduled to arrive was much better than having to compose the obligatory "sorry i gave your children salmonella" emails if i fed it to them undercooked. look - here i am being very happy i'm not going to kill my guests with undercooked poultry.

am i disappointed about the turkey or the fact that vernon has decided to
document what could be a complete disaster in my culinary life to date?

needless to say, somehow it all came together. the turkey was so huge it kept warm for another hour while veggies roasted in the oven, i basted it to within an inch of it's life to keep it moist (i'd also cooked it upside down in an effort to keep those 18 pound turkey boobs from drying out - if i hadn't it probably would have been a bigger disaster). and it ended up being fall off the bone fantastic. the only thing that was missing was cranberries which i had completely forgotten about until the next morning when i woke up and thought "cranberries. dang."

and so today was full of turkey leftovers (as will be tomorrow.... and the next day....).

but now, it's off to curl up with this quartet of reading material....

michelle's "let's go paris" plus 3 other travel guides loaned to me by ron...

ps... by practicing my french i mean continuing the family tradition of referring to the turkey as mr ding-dong. aka. monsieur dinde. yes, i know it isn't pronounced ding-dong. work with me here.

paris? oui oui!

2007-03-19T19:54:00.000-02:30

why yes, that IS a calendar set to MAY with a picture of NOTRE DAME on it. and why yes, in MAY i will be standing in paris looking at it for real!

YAY!

the exam

2007-03-17T21:09:00.000-02:30

well b'ye. the exam is DONE. and it went WELL. ! yay! i am so so so relieved to have it done. and it felt really really good. i am so relaxed right now it's fantastic. i'm actually too relaxed to blog right now. i'm at vernon's and we had a fantastic day with his mom looking at antiques and visiting cape spear. go look at some pics of us at the cape here at vernon's blog.

alright. i'm done. like dinner. (which was fantastic by the way).

2007-03-11T13:09:00.000-02:30

i'm taking a break after nailing a concept that was so completely lost on me last night i was seriously starting to freak out. disaster averted. i can now read an ANOVA table and actually know what it means (ANOVA is "analysis of variance"...aka B.O.R.I.N.G.) ok. so i'm breaking and i cruise onto the internet and go get a fortune cookie. how creeped out am i that this is my fortune:

My Fortune Cookie told me:
On Sunday, a cellist will be tempted to assault you with a pear.
Get a cookie from Miss Fortune

is anyone else creeped out? i'll be keeping an eye on vernon during our dinner date tonight. gotta make sure he doesn't have any pears in his pockets.

morning light

2007-03-10T08:39:00.000-03:30

8:30 am
saturday

every morning this week, regardless of the weather later in the day, has been beautiful and sunny. the light coming into my apartment is so fantastic and wonderful at this time of year, i just had to share. (just ignore the pile of papers and calculators and knitting on the ottoman....there are only so many lectures a person can listen to before the knitting gets hauled out to give the fingers something to do between the note taking.)

friday.

2007-03-09T19:13:00.000-03:30

just a quick yoohoo to alert everyone to the fact that i haven't perished or become trapped under a pile of statistical data. i'm in vernon's office typing on his crappy keyboard (why is the keyboard crap when the computer is super fancy?). we were supposed to grab a quick bite between our work days and my super-crappy study evening and his have-fun-going-to-super-fun-recital-happy-fun-fun-joy evening. but his auditions are running overtime so it looks like we will have exactly enough time to say "hey, how are you? uh-huh. good. ok then, bye!" quick peck on the cheek and that's it until tomorrow. *sigh*. when do i get to have the super-fun-happy-fun-fun-joy evenings again?

alrighty.

if you want to watch a really cute animated short about knitting - go here. this is the kind of animation i like the most...and of course, i can relate....

ok. i'm done. i have no photos these days.... big *SIGH*

pressure cooker

2007-03-01T18:01:00.000-03:30

this past week has been like being in a pressure cooker. i can feel the tension in my life rising as i get closer to this exam. it might be panic as i remember the last exam that went oh-so-completely-wrong-wrong-WRONG.

i went to the track last week and felt my hip starting to hurt after 20 minutes of hauling myself around the track and did i stop? did i attempt to alleviate the problem? did i attempt to SAVE MYSELF? no. no, i just kept going. ok. i'm horribly out of shape. my hip is screwed up now - hurts to walk, hurts to sit, hurts to lie down, hurts to move. this isn't the first time this has happened. it's just started to rotate out of the socket. fun! so i need a massage and then a serious regime of strengthening exercises to tighten up those muscles so they can hold the bones together. doesn't' that sound great? anyhoo - because my hip is sore i'm overcompensating and now my back is all skewed.

alright then. enough lounging around. back to the books. you too web surfer - back to work.

testing

2007-02-25T20:31:00.000-03:30

i'm just testing the RSS feed - lack thereof. it's actually there - so yay! it works.

even on a mac. :)

that's right y'all....

2007-02-25T16:58:00.000-03:30

MAMA'S GOT A NEW PAIR OF SOCKS!

i apologize the pics are kind of dark...i didn't want to sully them with a flash. :)

STORM updated

2007-02-24T14:38:00.000-03:30

well. the reports of how much snow we received were grossly understated. in fact, the weather people came back and said that they were wrong (how often does THAT happen?). it was more like mid 40's centimetre wise. and some parts of the city got more like 60.

last night we had another foot. FUN! i seriously wondered where i was going to put it. the banks on either side of my driveway are about 7 feet high now and it's getting hard to throw the snow over that. luckily, vernon is taller than me, so he shovelled this morning for me.

there is precipitation coming down right now, and it's definitely snow....but it's heavier and distinctly smaller than normal (whatever normal is). i fear this is the dreaded snow/rain mix they were calling for.

on a side note, i don't think i ever showed you this toque. it's going to charity. not because i don't like it, but because i agreed to knit 5 things for charity and i sort of want to keep my part of the bargain. this is item #2.

and - so mom can see that actual progress is being made. here's a shot of the first booty in progress. i'm farther along now, but you get the idea of the pattern at least...

and now, i will leave you with this picture so that i can get back to school work. this is the stop sign on my street. note how if it snows again it will be gone. :)

ps: the house next door finally sold and i think the people may have now moved in....judging by the fact that there are 4 (FOUR!) kids running around the backyard (more trudging through waist deep snow than running really).... now they are jumping from the roof of the little shed into the giant snow pile that is their hard. that actually looks really fun!

STORM

2007-02-20T07:23:00.000-03:30

we received just over 30cm of snow last night. (i will add an update to say that some parts of the city got closer to 50cm. i may or may not have been in one of those parts.... people are saying that it is close to the storm they had last year, if not worse, and that one was 70cm. we just drove from vernon's house to mine and some of the main arteries aren't even plowed - or they were only able to do one pass so it's one lane. lots of black ice. lots of abandoned vehicles.) the winds were between 80 and 90 km/h with gusting over 110. it snowed most of yesterday and all night - the wind was raging all day and night. i think the craziest part is that when i awoke this morning - the wind was still howling. it hasn't died down yet. my phone rang at 7am and it was M (my boss), telling me the office was closed until at least noon. my office NEVER closes. last time they closed the banks and took the buses off the road i still worked my full day - we openly mock those who close in the face of a bit of "weather". apparently this is serious. our building manager will reassess at 10:30. if we hear nothing, we go in at noon.
here are some pics.

exhibit A: ok - in this one, although it's a crappy photo - you see that car across the street? in the driveway?

ok - now see in this photo taken this morning (about 16 hours later) how you can't see the wheels for the snow? (click on the pics to view them bigger)

exhibit B: my driveway. what driveway you ask? that's what i said when i looked out the window. obviously the plow came by during the night, BUT the snow at the front of my driveway is now as tall as the piles on either side. those piles are AS TALL AS MY RAV4. which is almost taller than me. that's going to be really really fun to shovel.

exhibit C: the snow on my deck. is up to my kitchen window.

exhibit D: speaking of snow on the deck. i'm sure my landlady is concerned about all that weight. too bad the kitchen door opens OUT. don't think i'm going to get out there for a while...

i have double checked and the snow is not drifted up on my front steps. so at least i can get outside to shovel the snow. i have my fingers crossed that the office will remain closed.

SNOW DAY! YA!

ps - vernon just emailed this photo of his back door - holy COW!

UPDATE: it's about an hour later now. the entire city is shut down (keep your fingers crossed i don't have to go to the office at all today!). the guy across the street has started snow blowing his driveway. i wonder where he plans on going. there is absolutely nothing open today. i honestly think that people here just like playing with their snow blowers. it's fairly comical - he is totally bundled up and covered in snow. i'm not starting to shovel for a few hours at least.

but the snow day will not go to waste! along with more stats lectures that i need to watch/listen to - i have one more sock to finish. i can't let this one go on without a mate (plus, my right foot is cold). :)

EDITED AGAIN: we dug out my driveway. by "we" i mean, my landlady and the two guys across the street. they brought a snowblower over to do the last 5 feet between the house and the street. that was chest deep. yikes. this pic is of my landlady just as we started to get to the part where we were wishing they would hurry up with snowblowing all the old folks walkways and bring the snowblower over! but at least now it's done. it took two hours and the office is officially closed for the whole day. yay!

ps....

2007-02-19T15:52:00.000-03:30

it seems that i have created a blogging monster.... he can be seen here:

cello prof on the rock

:)

the weekend

2007-02-19T10:12:00.000-03:30

this weekend the weather was fantastic - saturday was a mix of sun and cloud and intermittant snow all day. not a lot, but basically continuous. sunday dawned bright and clear which really spells one thing: STORM. the storm came last night in the form of a crap load of snow. tonight the winds will apparently come. fun! but for now, some pics.

the sock is getting longer. i'm about halfway done the leg i figure. i'm not really sure. part of me wants to just end it now but i know i'll be sad when it's not long enough. so i soldier on. we drove out to beachy cove and bauline on sunday afternoon. basically we just wanted to get out of the city and see some country. it was very picturesque. and very very cold. here's a church in beachy cove. it has a fantastic view of the water.

the cliffs of bell island. isn't that spectacular? the ferry was coming in while we were there and it was heaving something fierce though. i wouldn't want to have to take a boat in the winter here.

how windy was it? so windy, my eyes blew shut. my body, thanks to my shiny new far west jacket is very very warm. my legs, thanks to my midzero tights under my jeans are very very warm. my face is frozen solid. and the snow is very bright in the sun. but it was pretty. so there you go.
the next time we got out of the car (this time in bauline), i was smart and wore my break n' enter gear:
the locals looked at me funny but i was warm so whatever. also - in this photo i'm actually smiling. talk about a reflex eh?

more lists...

2007-02-18T10:45:00.000-03:30

lists have got to be, in my opinion, one of the greatest tools that we have at our disposal. i have lists for absolutely everything - a running list of groceries on the fridge, a list of potential christmas gift ideas for next year, a list of birthday ideas for everyone i know, a list of knitting projects (both in progress and future plans), a list of things to do each day.
at the end of every work day, i actually do clear my desk (as well as that can happen in the paper disaster that is my life) and make a coherent list of things that i need and want to get done the next day. this list then travels with me on my big notepad through the day. as things get accomplished i cross them out, as things come up i add them on. on any given day there are between 8 and 15 things on that list. and on any given day i accomplish about two of them. usually i just change the date on the top of the list and continue on the next day. on friday i accomplished nothing on my list. too many people came into my office with issues that needed dealing with immediately and everything else got pushed to the side. as i sit here in my little home office there are 3 lists around me - a list of knitting projects on the wall, a list of furniture i will need to buy when Michelle takes hers back and a grocery list on the desk. i come by this honestly. i come from a family of list makers.
whether my lists make me more organized or whether they just make me panicked, i'm not sure. probably a bit of both. but each month end as the list gets whittled down to nothing there is a great sense of accomplishment there. this sense of accomplishment does not occur when attempting to fill the grocery list, but such is the beast of grocery shopping in newfoundland. you just have to accept that cilantro is basically a thing of the past (although there is always a space for it...it's always empty) and that there will be days when there is no bread. or tomatoes. and that's just the way it is.
a new list for today:

1. ~~make apple crisp~~
2. go for relaxing drive around top of peninsula with V and witness Newfoundland winter outside of the city
3. ~~stress about homework~~

as you can see - i'm doing very well already, only one thing left to do!

lists

2007-02-17T11:19:00.000-03:30

me likey

3 great things about newfoundland

2007-02-15T18:17:00.000-03:30

1. you can buy beer at the gas station.
2. when you're inside, you're warm (ok, that applies to all places, but i've never really truly appreciated it until i moved here).
3. you can buy beer at the gas station.

'nough said.

random bits of goodness

2007-02-12T20:23:00.000-03:30

on friday night when vernon and i went out - he wore his new cufflinks! i bought these for him for christmas, to help fuel his passion for links of the cuff:and here, in all it's glory, is my first sock heel. look at that! it's on my foot! now i just have to decide on what i want to do for the top part. the foot of the sock is just plain old stocking stitch. i think i might do a few more rows in stocking stitch and then start a 2x2 rib or something. i'm worried the ankle might bag if i only rib the very top. and me no likey the baggy ankle. :) the picture is kind of blurry, sorry. and the heel was turned ~~absolutely horrendously and it will fall apart and get a big hole immediately, i can tell~~ fairly well for a first timer.

oh and look - behind my sock you can see a shelf of yarn. *ahem* ok fine - two shelves of yarn. i can't help it! i live in newfoundland where it's cold and there is nothing to do but knit and study stats. seriously.

and this. totally made me laugh:

nataliedee.com

the art of mothering

2007-02-06T15:02:00.000-03:30

to my mother,

"The art of mothering is to teach the art of living to children."
Elain Heffner

if that is what mothering is all about, then i think you have mastered the art beautifully. you have equipped all 3 of us with all the pieces that we need to live our lives to the fullest. honesty, compassion, kindness and love surround all of us as we wind our way through this world. and sometimes, being so very far away, just knowing you are there is all we need.

on this, your birthday, i wish you peace and rest. i had planned, quite seriously, to have your gift in your hand on your birthday. however, that does not seem to have happened.

your gift involves this:

becoming a pair of these:

as you can see they are a far cry from complete.... i have no pattern so i will be doing this one on the fly. my first attempt at this, so perhaps you'll find them in next year's christmas stocking. i am hopefully optimistic for spring (spring in newfoundland terms, not yours).

for all the kind words, gentle encouragements (and not so gentle), and love you have given me over the years, i thank you. we are truly lucky to have a mother as compassionate and caring as you.

enjoy your day mom - you deserve all the rest and relaxation in the world.

love jen.

bad nuns!

2007-02-01T21:56:00.000-03:30

An entire order of nuns has fled a convent on the Greek-Bulgarian border after running up huge debts.

The nuns' knitting business, serving 25 shops across Greece, has crashed.

and i'm not even making this up.....

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6311443.stm

knitting gone wild

2007-01-31T21:21:00.000-03:30

holy crap. i wish i was in new york. actually i wish i was in new york for a lot of different reasons...but this one is pretty cool too. the museum of art and design has an exhibit called "radical lace and subversive knits". check out these two pics from it:

i've seen this woman's work before - she knits with thread and pins. seriously. she makes some really intricate stuff. very cool. and tiny. me like the tiny things (why? why do i like miniatures? it's weird and odd and useless. but really cute.).

and then there is this one - look how big that is! crazy, i tell you. crazy.

a light dusting

2007-01-21T19:28:00.000-03:30

or, "why the weather man is a total moron"

here in newfoundland everyone always says that the weather people have no idea what they are talking about. part of me thought they were just being overly critical, until i moved here. then i realised that the weather changes so quickly that the weather people really don't have a hope in hell of making an accurate prediction. and then there was this weekend. on friday they were predicting between 5-10cm for today. by saturday night they were making announcements that the winds had shifted (that would be the winds of change i believe) and that st john's would only receive a light dusting. this morning we woke up to a weather alert of high winds and lots of snow (i believe they used the word "severe"....but since we pay little attention to the weather people....). they were still only predicting about 5-10cm though. so when it started snowing in the early afternoon we figured it would blow around a lot but not really accumulate much (or at least not more than 10cm). well. how wrong were we?

the wind is blowing fairly hard. we've got your nice standard sideways snow happening. and that's fine. already i'm being desensitized and thinking "whatever" at the sideways weather. but we are at 10cm at least already and it is not letting up. it's not even looking like it might let up. i just drove over to vernon's for dinner. my shiny new studded winter tires worked phenomenally. there were a lot of people stuck and i sailed right on past (after stopping to make sure they had phones/had a plan - the plan being getting the guy who happened to be walking by to push them out of their rut). but seriously - way more than 10 cm. i shoveled close to 15cm off my driveway before i left. and did i mention it's still snowing?

here's vernon's street, right after i arrived.

if any of you have been to my home over the past 8 years or so you may remember seeing these mittens hanging on my wall. they were bought in newfoundland in 1998 and they were WAY too warm for vancouver or even kamloops. i did attempt to wear them on a walk once at christmas with mom and i remember my hands completely overheated. today, i wore them to shovel my deck (which is my landlord's living room roof and i was concerned about the potential for too much weight - actually she was concerned so i shovelled). i've been having trouble keeping my hands warm when i'm outside for more than 15 minutes - my mittens don't really do it and my gloves don't really do it. so i dug these out thinking that the person who knit them knew cold and holy cow - my hands were so warm! i could have shoveled all day. :)

part of me feels bad actually wearing them because i think they are so beautiful. but that's what they were made for - so that's what i'll use them for.

here's the second part of my warm hand strategy. i knit these back in november and they have a lot of flaws. one of the thumbs is inside out, the cables don't match perfectly between the gloves, i used cheap yarn. they are actually "wrist warmers" which explains why i think the hands are thumbs are too short - i'd rather they came further past my knuckles. this photo doesn't show it well - but they actually cover more of my wrist and less of my hand than shown)... but if you throw them on under your mittens you eliminate that irritating cold bit of exposed skin that happens when you're outside and actually using your arms. yay! warm wrists! pattern is fetching from knitty - found here.

**update added 8:30pm - it's still snowing. hard. there are 6 people out shoveling right now. which is a high ratio for a street with 14 houses. weeee! my first newfoundland snow storm!

-29

2007-01-18T20:52:00.000-03:30

with the wind chill it was -29 today. seriously. are you kidding me?

on my way to work i had my coffee in the car with me. as i wrestled my purse and lunch bag (read: giant bag of food) out of the car, i forgot to grab my coffee. when i realised this i was already in the building and had my snow boots off and my coat off....so i said screw it and drank crap office coffee in the morning. because it was too cold to go back out and get the coffee. how cold does it have to be for me to ditch my good homemade auntie crae fresh ground dark roast in the car for crappy work coffee? apparently -29 is my breaking point. when i left work tonight i saw my mug and thought 'oh i'll just dump that out'. no such luck. it was a frozen coffee bar. tee hee!

feels like.....COLD

2007-01-17T19:56:00.000-03:30

It’s official – I am Canadian. In case anyone was wondering. After living in a place where a person really doesn’t need winter boots (current year not included) or winter tires (current year not included) and where every season is patio season (current year not included), I now live in a place with temperatures in the minus double digits, lots of snow (to me, 20cm in one day is a lot. I understand that this will slowly change over time until I too, look out into the face of 20cm of driving snow at minus-*insert large number here* and say “oh this is nothing, wait until winter starts”), and where the patios are mere fleeting memories of happier, more tanned times. I have weather appropriate footwear, headwear, handwear and a goretec jacket that could withstand a hurricane in winter. (thank you mom and dad for the Salomon snow boots that pinched mom’s feet, the jacket which was a Christmas gift and the mittens that were another gift from years ago). And now, weather appropriate tires for my car. The little Rav now grips those snowy, slushy roads rather than skating along the surface. This is making the whole “getting about town” thing much better, seeing as how I haven’t actually figured out how to get out of going to work completely while still receiving payments….

The temperature today here is COLD. Very cold for Newfoundland. Everyone is all a twitter at it – all you hear in the halls at work “so cold, I can’t believe it, I know, so cold today”. It’s -15. the wind chill is at -26. v and I have a had a lot of “conversations” about wind chill and how I think it’s good to know (there is a fine line between needing to wear a toque to go to the store and deciding you can live on popcorn for one more day because there is no chance in hell you are going outside at that temperature) and v thinks it is all hype – a scare tactic to make people think the weather is really colder than it is. He’s sort of right. I was outside with no hat and it didn’t feel like -26. -14 yes. I would even hazard a -18, -19. but -26? Actually I have no idea how cold that would be. I haven’t been in temperature that cold since I was a kid. It took me 4 minutes to walk to the car and my head was frozen with no hat. is that -18 or -26? Anyone know? I have little hair, does that affect my coldness factor? At least we're not in Labrador - they are around -50 with the wind chill in Labrador City. Even without the wind chill they are at -30 something. Ouch.

So I bought tires from my new mechanic today. My new mechanic place is fantastic – I love them, I really do. When I spoke with Tom, the owner, on the phone yesterday he was really nice and funny and soft spoken. Not loud and brash the way I envision most mechanics to be. (my boss did in fact tell me that he was the most un-mechanic-type he had every known). And when I went they offered me a Globe & Mail while I waited which was very nice. I responded that I had brought a book and his wife said “oh! Our perfect type of customer.” I mentioned that I was reading The Shipping News and they told me it was a great read, be sure to see the movie and then proceeded to have a conversation with me about other Newfoundland novels and movies and the like. Did I mention that this was my mechanic? Who I was having the conversation about literature with? Maybe I have stereotyped all mechanics unfairly in the past. Maybe they all sit at home voraciously reading and then blogging about Proust or something. I don’t know. All I know is that my mechanic reads and I like him. He put tires on my car that make it stick to the road. He told me to drive aggressively and slowly. He also said my car is in fantastic condition. All in all it was a good trip to the car mechanic guy.

v's new house

2007-01-14T18:32:00.000-03:30

this weekend was spent working (from home mainly, not so bad), and helping vernon unpack things at his new house. the movers come on tuesday for the big stuff, but for now we moved some boxes and set up his kitchen - yay! i took a bunch of pics, of course - so here you go. the first day at his new house, in pictures...

we uncovered a bunch of WEIRD stuff that the owners left behind......like these two bottles of Purity brand strawberry flavoured syrup. apparently you add it to water for a refreshing drink. um. gross.

and this twizzler dispenser....how many twizzlers did these people eat that they needed this dispenser box thing? or did they go into the convenience store and just buy the display because they need 200 pieces of twizzler?? in any event, very odd...
and these crazy christmas dishes. seriously crazy. there is a complete set of 4 place settings....

and they have this super tacky charming picture on them....

and matching tea cups.......

part of me actually wants to use them. after a few runs through the dishwasher of course.

so then the cleaning continued.....

we found the cuban rum that caused paula to conduct her very own imaginary orchestra!:

we drank the cheap beer that the old owners left in the fridge...very appropriate as the house backs onto the Labatt brewery. Too bad it didn't back onto a good brewery, like Quidi Vidi Brewing. but these were free and we drank them and liked it.

and we had our first dinner in the kitchen (sharing the ottoman as a chair because he hadn't actually bought kitchen chairs yet - he has now. they're nice.)

then i think i may have passed out from the cleaner fumes because i don't remember much after that. at some point i went home, stressed about work, stayed up too late "tidying" which really means i wandered around the apartment moving things from here to there.

the weather last night was brutal - not a lot of snow came down, most of it was going sideways or up. the wind was howling and was actually LOUD. very irritating when you're trying to sleep. we're supposed to get another "trace" of snow tonight. nothing too exciting.

i guess i have nothing else to say. maybe i will later in the week. my sock is still the same length. i have several ideas for other projects but i haven't actually started anything. work and school are taking all my time (or rather, work is taking all my time and i really wish i had more time for school to be taking up).

the sock...part 2

2007-01-07T14:18:00.000-03:30

well. the first sock was....shall we say.....baggy? i think baggy is a good word. it's not as harsh as "so totally wrong and messed up that maybe they would have fit big foot but even that might be a stretch" although that one may be more accurate. i was looking at it thinking "so it's a little baggy" and then i was wondering how i was ever going to recreate the exact same bagginess in sock number two. and i realised i would have one baggy sock and one normal one. so. i took it off the needles, took a second look at my tension (or technically this could be considered the first look at my tension since this was different, better, tension), and then i pulled the whole thing out. it was sad. so then i started again, from scratch, and wow - it's so much better. i am actually further along now than i was before and i'm still not past the part in the yarn where it hasn't been used yet. check it out. it's about 3 inches long now (from the toe) and it totally fits! yay!

now, on to the weather. it's windy here. really really windy. and now it's started to rain. so now it's almost "stormy". although not quite. i still think that this classifies as regular weather here. the big gusts are just starting to bend the trees outside my window to the point where i think "gee i hope that doesn't snap off and come through the window" and when it gusts like that the house creaks (which makes me think, gee i hope the house doesn't snap in half).

some people just walked by on the path behind my place and they were, literally, bent over at the waist almost perpendicular in order to walk into the wind. it was sort of funny. but sort of not.

ok back to work. and studying. and knitting. in that order.

my socks

2007-01-04T21:26:00.000-03:30

my sock (singular) is about two inches long. not quite a sock. and yet i managed to spend 30 minutes fiddling with my blog instead of knitting. or studying (oh right - school - that pesky business). BUT - look at my sidebar. i figured out how to make it be cool with little buttons as the links instead of just stupid words. it involved many visits to several websites, a membership to some host thing that was free because i only needed teeny tiny space, and a few very stupid questions like "what's html and why do i have it?". but now i'm happy. and it's pretty.

yay!

ps - thanks paula, for the new name.

happy new year.

2007-01-01T14:06:00.000-03:30

happy 2007!

on the last day of 2006 we:

had a great dinner of roast beast, roast veggies, salad and vino.....

went for a walk after dinner - we went past Winterholme, the house where we first met (makes it sound all romantic)...
and strolled through Georgetown...

then, decaf and sweet nibblies were had over two (count 'em - TWO) games of scrabble...

it appears that at some point we moved back to red wine.....
and then of course - on to the serious faux-champagne consumption. tee hee...

then a long winter night's sleep and bang-o, bob's yer uncle, it was a new year!

has it really been almost a month?

2006-12-28T11:43:00.000-03:30

has it really been almost a month since i've typed anything on here?? whoops!

well - the snow came, went, and came again. and christmas came and went. my lead up to christmas was full of surprises. lots of late nights at the office (job = good, but busy holy cow!), crazed trips to the dreaded mall to find that perfect something that no mall actually ever has, an occasional melt down and good cry over the shopping disasters, a surprise phone call from my fantastic friend Elga and finally, a 12 hour plane trip back home.

we had SO much fun. or rather, I had SO much fun! i just assume that everyone else did too. everyone was there - my two sisters plus husbands plus one with baby, my parents (handy that they were there since we were staying at their house), and then me and Vernon. i do have a ton of photos however they are all on my camera which is in Vernon's carry on which is in Vernon's house where Vernon is patiently waiting for the nice man to bring him the suitcase that didn't come out on the conveyor belt last night.

oh wait - no here's my camera. he must have left left it here because he knew i'd want it. yay! some exciting things that happened over christmas....

olivia learned to sit up by herself....look at how fast she moves! she's like the baby from the incredibles.....or maybe i need to learn how to use my camera?

we went for walks.....

we saw llamas!......

we basked in the beauty of nature (some of us basked in it by going out in it, some of us just looked at it while staying warm inside).....

and i shovelled snow - in training for what awaits me in the coming months back home....

vernon and i went snowboarding while michelle and nathan went cross country skiing - it was really fun! both the downhill group and the xcountry group had a great day. no pics though - i forgot my camera.

i taught paula how to knit.....look at her knitting!!

and started my first pair of socks!.....they might end up a bit baggy, but holy cow it's a toe! i made a toe!

olivia totally stole the show on christmas morning in her cute little outfit. she really is the cutest baby ever and so well behaved. it definitely shows that she is a well cared for little muffin as she is very content and happy (except during the limb-severing screaming episodes....but really, when you're overtired you feel like screaming too, right??)

so to all of you out there wherever you ended up this holiday season, whether you celebrate anything or not..... happy happy festive season to you! i miss everyone back home terribly - can't wait to see you all again.

winter!

2006-12-05T11:27:00.000-03:30

last night we got our first dump of snow - real snow. it came down sideways in a huge wind and now it's all piled up everywhere. i started worrying about driving and salt and all that crap - but when i got up this morning - the roads were nicely plowed and it was starting to get melty. there is still a lot of snow - and more is coming down now with more in the forcast for tonight. it's really pretty. of course - the forcast also says that on friday it's going to be 8 degrees with rain (100%), at time heavy. so the snow will be gone and it will just be gross.

this is what i saw last night - i had no idea it was snowing, when i came home and starting studying it wasn't even raining - weeeee!

and this morning!

oh right - so why am i posting during the day, you ask? (well you didn't, but i'll tell you anyway). i got up bright and early this morning - aiming to get to work at 7:30. got up, freaked out at the snow, got the driveway shoveled, freaked out at the snow, got in the car, drove to work, freaked out at the slush on the road and when i got into the building (after giving the nice man snow blowing the front walk at our building a nice warm smile) i heard the oddest noise...." beep.......beep.......beep". i looked at the alarm panel and thought "this can't be the burgalar alarm - there are other cars in the lot". so i peered at the panel and i read (in the dark) "fire alarm - evacuate building". and i thought - "well that's just stupid, there's no fire, there was no one else outside. besides, i don't SEE fire, so there must be no fire". (the inner firefighter in me knows this is stupid and had there been a fire i would have kicked myself - after rolling in the snow to put out the flames). anyhoo - the little panel also had a little "continue" option at the bottom so i pushed that so i could learn about the other 3 alarms going off (according to the panel). it then goes on, over about 37 little screens, to tell me what all the alarms sound like. if it beeps on every OTHER second then the building is on fire, if it beeps on every second then there's a burgalar with a pick ax coming after you, if it beeps loudly on every other second there is a really BIG fire, if it beeps quickly the unit needs servicing. are you kidding me? gee, let's see - how loud do they mean? this is just irritating loud, not shatter ear drums loud. but i don't know how loud this thing can go - so is it loud? no idea. beeping on every other second....well, it wasn't calibrated with the office clock that ticks so loud you can hear it (like the ones at schools!) so i would say the beeping was more "syncopated" - was there a syncopated option? does the unit need servicing? after poking a few more buttons and making sure i wasn't breaking it, i called the ADT number. where the man asked me for my address (aren't they suppose to know from the phone number you call from?) and then proceeds to tell me that yes they are aware of the alarm, they have already spoken to our security guru and "we're ignoring it until morning". um. ok. well, it's morning and i'm at the office and the entire building is BEEPING. what i actually said was "oh! great! you talked to so-and-so! great. ok then, thanks!" then he asked me for my security code, which i provided and he told me i wasn't in the system. he suggested it was maybe a word or something that i had chosen to remember it easily. i said , ya, it is - and it's what i just said! he tried again - hmmm, nope, not in the system. so i said "ok, well that's what it is, bye!"

then i sat in my dark office staring at my dark computer listening to the building go "beep......beep.......beep......" for about 25 minutes while drinking my coffee. it wasn't until my coffee was almost done and i realised the coffee machine at the office runs on power (which we were apparently mostly out of) that i decided to go home. i slapped a post it note on my bosses door with my number and told him to call me when the power was back on. that was at 8am. it's noon now - i just called the office and some random person answered the phone. my boss left for the day hours ago and there is still no power.

today is a total gift. i was freaking out about studying and not having enough time. now, i'm sitting at my desk at home, eating my chicken sandwich wrapped in saran out of my purse (nothing but class i tell you, nothing but class) and i've already studied for 3 hours. by the looks of it i've got nothing but another 12 hours of study time ahead of me. yeeeehaw!

j

The House

2006-12-02T13:09:00.000-03:30

Go and look at pics of V's new house. he takes possession January 11th. yay! i can't wait until summer so i can 'use' him for his great patio.

:)

i just had to know...

2006-12-02T10:22:00.001-03:30

You are The Empress

Beauty, happiness, pleasure, success, luxury, dissipation.

The Empress is associated with Venus, the feminine planet, so it represents,
beauty, charm, pleasure, luxury, and delight. You may be good at home
decorating, art or anything to do with making things beautiful.

The Empress is a creator, be it creation of life, of romance, of art or business. While the Magician is the primal spark, the idea made real, and the High Priestess is the one who gives the idea a form, the Empress is the womb where it gestates and grows till it is ready to be born. This is why her symbol is Venus, goddess of beautiful things as well as love. Even so, the Empress is more Demeter, goddess of abundance, then sensual Venus. She is the giver of Earthly gifts, yet at the same time, she can, in anger withhold, as Demeter did when her daughter, Persephone, was kidnapped. In fury and grief, she kept the Earth barren till her child was returned to her.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

all in all the job is going well!

2006-11-29T21:46:00.000-03:30

5 reasons why i know i'm screwed.....

1) my boss seems to giggle a lot for no reason....i think he realises that we are f'd.
2) my canker sore is rearing it's ugly head and for some reason i can't find canka anywhere in this city - what is WITH these people????? don't they get canker sores here?? the other crap i have does nothing, NOTHING for the pain. and it's not helping it heal either.
3) i was at work for 13 hours today and feel as thought nothing got done.
4) i accidentally microwaved my dinner for 7 minutes (instead of like, one) because i completely forgot that the gnawing feeling in my stomach indicated hunger and that i was trying to remedy that with food. oh - and i turned the microwave on for 50 minutes instead of seconds.
5) i'm not panicking.

first day

2006-11-27T21:03:00.000-03:30

i survived the first day of the new job. that's pretty much all i can say. i survived. yup.

now it's time to sleep.

*sigh*

ps - i think my canker sore is ever worse....

2006-11-26T11:38:00.000-03:30

it snowed!

ok so it was really just a skiff - it was gone quickly (like in a day) and i think the sand truck driving by was just a coincidence. or maybe he was practicing..... anyway - it was cool to wake up to a bit of white outside. not so cool to wake up to a FREEZING house - but once i cranked the heat i was happy again. basically i just turn on the electric fireplace and stand in front of it. i need to get a podium so i can do homework over there.

thanks for all the well wishes from everyone on the job....i'm really really stressed (and i have the canker sore to prove it!) but i think it will be better a)once i start and b)once this exam is over with as well. having the two things land all at once is stressful.

last night i went to my first christmas concert of the season. a local women's choir, Lady Cove, was doing a concert in conjunction with the Cellipeppers - a local cello choir. It was really great, lots of fun and beautiful. hopefully i'll be singing with them starting in the new year. they are full to capacity but the director might be willing to squash me in. it would be really fun!

alright - back to studying....

j

exhausted....

2006-11-18T20:12:00.000-03:30

well, i'm exhausted. i am busy trying to study and cram for this exam in a couple of weeks and the energy level is just not there. i stayed up waaaay too late last night (it was fun, but i'm old and tired now). ah well. can't wait to hit the sack tonight.

michelle and olivia left today - that was kind of sad. it was really great to have them here. olivia is super cute and obviously totally loves me. :) she's smart - she knows i'm a cool auntie. such a sweet baby and so much fun to play with. it was great to see michelle too and to actually have someone else in this town that i know and can wail at. i hope for my sake that they come back here, but i hope that for their sake they end up somewhere really cool (not that this couldn't be really cool, but you know)...

v and i went and looked at a house today. it was crooked. like, make you dizzy kind of crooked. really really irritating. oh well - there are more houses to see.

on another note - for anyone who hasn't heard: i got a great job! in newfoundland! i know - it's an oxymoron. :\ i'm the assistant controller for a company that makes, among other things, black boxes for ships. cool eh? ya, that's right. assistant controller. it makes me feel older than i feel i think. oh well. whatever.

alright. must sleep. and study. oh right - study first, sleep later.

*yawn*

sigh

2006-11-03T15:54:00.000-03:30

3 things that are unrelated:

1. i’ve been putting a lot of thought into this and….would anyone be offended if i decided not to become an accountant? because, you know, i've given it a lot of thought and i think that "professional full-contact knitter" has a nicer ring to it. would anyone REALLY care if i spent all my time knitting socks and scarves and hats and *gasp* sweaters? i didn't think so. because you all know that just as soon as i started i wouldn't be able to stop meaning too many knitted things for me and leaving me with no choice but to give it all away. i don't think anyone would mind that much. you'd all be warm. and it is sooo much more interesting than learning about leases. or pensions. or whatever it is that i'm learning about. now is probably the time when you all are getting up in arms starting to mumble things like "taxes, what about taxes, who's gonna do my taxes" and i have this to say - read the instructions and do it yourself. you know they have an 800 number that you just call and they answer questions on how to do your taxes. or how about h&r block. they train people to do it for you for like, cheap. 50 bucks or 30 bucks or something. and i think they have a half price day or free day or something. so there you go. or if you don't get money back you don't have to pay (i might have made that up but it sounds like a good idea). so there you go. decision made. bye bye accouting, hello knitmaster!

*sigh*

2. the weather here is, in a word, spectacular. i would like someone to remind me that i said that in about 5 months time when i'm alternating between tearing my hair out at all the snow and crying softly to myself in the bathtub as i wonder if i will every be warm when not fully immersed in a tub full of steaming water.
yesterday it was 11 degrees. that's double digits thank you - no mittens or hats needed today (granted, no one but me is wearing mittens and hats, but whatever). i actually felt quite nice when i was outside bundled up in my fleece. the sky was a fantastic shade of blue - a soft baby blue. and the moon, at 4:30 in the afternoon, was low and bright in the sky. (ok, that part was temporarily depressing).
today it is 15 degrees. it’s warm out. i’m wearing a tshirt and a windbreaker. now, granted it’s PISSING with rain that is coming sideways at you…..but the wind is warm so who cares?

3 . what i will continue to find less and less amusing as the winter progresses is that when you go to the weather network website and type in ‘st john’s’ it makes you choose between st john’s canada and st john’s in antigua and barbuda (where, by the way, it is 29 degrees but feels like 41). ya. 41 degrees. that spells siesta to me.
4. and on that note, it’s time for the ritualistic after friday trip to the duke.

happy hallowe'en....

2006-11-01T20:47:00.000-03:30

look at how cute my pumpkin is......here it's getting ready to become.......

a spooky little jack o'lantern! yay!

so it could sit in the window at vernon's and show all the little kiddies where to get their candy....

how cute is that?????
i would like the official hallowe'en record to show that vernon did not assist in the creation of the jack o'lantern that adorned his window last night. oh no. he wouldn't stoop to carving a pumpkin. he's not the carving type apparently. not the carving type? what the hell? who is this man? how can you not have a pumpkin? unless you're some kind of hallowe'en scrooge.... which he just might be..... nah. during his poo-pooing of the pumpkin carving i reminded him that when he has kids he will have to show more enthusiasm. that shut him up. whether it was the idea of actually having to carve a pumpkin or the idea of having kids, either way, he said no more. (oh my god she mentioned kids....step away from the girlfriend....no sudden moves....don't let her smell your fear....).

speaking of poo-pooing....or rather, just speaking of poo.... vernon and i went and looked at the biggest dump of a house tonight. actually we looked at a couple of houses, one of which was stunning and way out of our price range but the realtor guy wanted us to see it (i think he secretly just likes it and goes there whenever he can). anyhoo - the realtor was making comments at the junky house about where exactly he'd position the back hoe thingy when he was tearing it down (you know, so the bucket could just go up and over and come down and crush it to smithereens) and i was stunned almost speechless (oh but not quite!) by the dreadful DREADFUL purple mosaic 70's linoleum in the living room. but it was on the top floor when vernon pointed out the dog poop and i almost touched the underwear hanging over the banister that we realised.........we were in some sort of real estate black hole. that place where the nasty houses that keep getting relisted go. it was a bad bad place. the sad thing is that i didn't make that up thinking it would be funny to read it on here. there really was a little dog turd. and there was laundry hanging over the third floor railing and there really was a pair of gray boxers. that i almost touched. (shortly after arriving in the house i put my mittens back on. just in case i touched....well, anything really).

in the dog's defense i would like to note that the owners left it alone in the house when we were coming over and we basically scared the, well, crap out of it. the owners i don't think were that bright. at all.

anyhoo.

9 degrees, overcast, light rain

2006-10-29T19:22:00.000-03:30

that's the current weather listing on the weather network website. 9 degrees, overcast, light rain. the subtlety lies in what is over to the right of those words.....over on the side where it breaks it down into more specific details you'll see that it says:

WINDS 46 km/h
GUSTS 74 km/h

where are the hurrican warnings? where are the weather alerts and the freaking notices telling me "DON'T GO OUTSIDE. YOU WILL GET BLOWN AWAY. YOU ARE FROM BC. PUT YOUR BIRKENSTOCKS BACK ON AND MULL UP ANOTHER BOTTLE OF WINE IN YOUR SLOW COOKER." nowhere. they are nowhere because this does not register as a weather anomoly to these people. in vancouver, trees would be falling down. here, the trees are just really short and deeply rooted. the tree in vernon's backyard is basically lying flat on the ground but it won't fall down. between "gusts" it just pops back up and flails around wildly like a drunk teenager at a school dance. i am basically refusing to go outside. i'm saying it's because i'll get wet and cold but honestly it's because i'm scared i'll fall over. i am not accustomed to wind and it's really blowing. i've heard stories about people going for walks on windy days and having to turn back because they couldn't walk against the wind - it was pushing them back. and people here say that on really windy days the kids put rocks in their pockets to keep from getting blown over. um. ok. well they can bundle up and put whatever they want in their pockets - i'm staying home. (here we should note that i'm beginning to wonder what people tell me just to see if i'll believe it....they should have figured it out by now, i believe everything they tell me....and it all sounds weird.)

and in case anyone was wondering - home now looks like this:
the remains of a day of study....

the knitting chair. now, this is not where the knitting happens....this is where the knitting lives. i suppose i'll have to move it somewhere when michelle arrives......it won't be happy, but what can i do?? it is taking over the living room. you can't really tell, but that is 3 separate projects in progress. two that are becoming things and one that isn't. i'm most excited about the green that is becoming fingerless gloves. no more freezing my hands off at the office. the other ones we just won't talk about. maybe when they are done. we'll see.

is it just me or is anyone else freezing all the time on this island? i see people without hats and mittens every day and i am bundled up and still cold! we went for dinner at a friends the other night and when we arrived they made some comment about us walking over, thinking that we had because of all my clothes. how embarrassed was i when i said "oh no, we drove, it's just really really cold out there." they laughed. they seriously did. as i peeled off my toque, mittens, down vest, fleece and a sweater.... they all think it's cute that i'm freezing and getting "acclimatized". oh no, there will be no acclimatization happening. i'm going to buy more sweaters, bundle up, stay inside and stay my soft west coast self (birkenstocks at all, you don't think i let those at home did you?)

i just went to try to take a picture out the window of the storm and right when i was thinking that it wouldn't work because it's too dark outside i noticed water running down vernon's dining room window. on the inside. nice. we have a leak! it's not our house so we don't really care, and the landlord has been called and he'll come by tomorrow......probably doesn't help that the rain is coming at the house in all directions including up. anyhoo. that caused some minor excitement. i'm pretty much convinced that the weather is trying to get in at me because i have refused it's challenge and have decided to stay inside. well you know what? a rolled up towel will put it in it's place. ha!

alright. that's all i got. i'm lighting a fire and going back to my knitting. (i have officially become an 85 year old woman). we rented "water" - the deepa mehta film. should be good. i'll let you know.

:)

(ps - i just checked the weather again and it's a degree warmer now, up to 10, and the gusts are down to 54km/h. well - that's downright summery!)

monkey!

2006-10-26T09:50:00.000-02:30

the monkey is gone! GONE!! oh my gosh. i don't know where he is. he was here.... and then he was gone..... he might have flown out of the car window, or dropped out when we opened the door. i still have a couple of places to look (like my driveway) but right now he's GONE. the elephant is sad. he is hiding in the glovebox right now crying. *sigh* if you see him - tell him to call home!

:)

check it out...

2006-10-18T16:35:00.000-02:30

http://www.gov.nl.ca/brand/index.htm

the new newfoundland and labrador brand. they are supposed to be pitcher plants and yet look more like magic mushrooms. yeesh. how west coast is this?