MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

... Happy Hanukka, and a happy new year as well, of course!

Well, I hope everyone has been having a great, relaxing, safe, and joyful holiday so far! Christmas day this year was great. It started (for some...I slept in until nine) at around eight a.m. as people opened stockings, and it continued on until 10 pm.

There were lots of people around for the day--in our house for Christmas morning was me, Kate, my sister, her boyfriend Matt, Jamie's wife Dina ( Jamie had to work the day shift at the firehall), Mum and dad, and Mum's brother david, visiting from Ontario! at around 11 a.m., grandma, grandad, uncle rick, aunty bev, uncle pat, cousin dawn and husband Todd and their two boys all came over for brunchas well. we all (plus a few more) had dinner at my aunty Bev's place, by which time Jamie's shift was over, and afterwards the immediate family went back to my parents house to finish opening pressies now that Jamie was on scene.

Whew!

Kate and I have just had a 'second Christmas morning' with Kate's Mum and Marion as well here at our own house ( that's our tree in the picturwe! awww! ain't it pretty?), so there has been no shortage of gift giving / receiving in the last few days!

But now that Christmas is over, it's time to go full boar on wedding mode, the big event now just three days away!! The masses will be flying into Vancouver for the next few days--since the Pineapple Express has been blowing in from the Pacific Ocean for the last while, we certainly don't have to worry about snow holding people up, thank goodness. Sometimes 12 degrees and raining in December can be a good thing!

Okay, that's enough for now! By the next time I do a blog update, it'll be the New year, and I'll be a married man!!!! Looking forward to seeing those of you that are coming to the wedding, and as for the rest, hope to see you in the new year.

Here's to you and yours over the remaining holday season! Hopefully no one has to work too much, and you have time for a few cups of cheer!

In Memoriam: The Gipper 2002-2005

Today, I remember an old friend (to be read in slow, eulogizing style).

His name is The Gipper, my 1989 B2200 series Mazda pickup truck. My first car, bought when I was 22 years young.

Though made back in '89, he came to me in 2002. He needed a home, and I needed a vehicle for my move to Edmonton.

And so, with an exchange of $2,000, it was less a transaction than the start of a relationship. A love-hate relationship, that is.

If I had unlimited funds, I admit, I'd love to get you running again, but I don't have the resources, or the lack of sense to pump any more cash into that lemon. But seriously, I love ya, Gipper.

over the last few years, The Gipper has received a few costly transplants and upgrades. Most notably, a replaced transmission, the usual brake work and oil changes, a new bumper when some jackass rearended me. It cost a lot, but all is fogiven when I think of the good times on the open road, camping in the back of you, or the way the wind would roar through the cab when a kayak was tied to your roof.

I chose to ignore the shocks problem, and I basically learned to drive a standard with you, so the clutch had to be replaced somewhere in the course of our relationship. But our love can never be replaced.
You'd take half an hour to warm up properly, the Chernobyl-sized curl of black smoke finally reducing to a mere Three-Mile Island cloud of grey. But radiate in my heart you always will.

remember the time someone broke into you while parked outside the house on a cool spring night in Edmonton? Your locks were never the same, and the thief got 65 cents in loose change and a pack of gum--they could never take your soul though.
Never.

Oil still to this day leaks into the fuel line, and the battery is so weak from my monthly habit of leaving the headlights on (thanks to all of you over the years that helped me jump start the truck) that now, a jump start is the only way to get you going.
Yes,you had your foibles, as do we all. You were always good on gas though. >sniff<

But now, it's time to part ways. You've got a future ahead of you as a Kidney car, Gipper, and you're gonna do good things. The money the BC kidney foundation will get for your resale will go towards their programs. And, if they can't sell you (c'mon, who wouldn't want you), they'll strip you down and sell your parts--memories and
all--and you'll probably bring in even more money for the BC kidney Foundation than if you get sold as a whole vehicle.

And me, I'll be left with a $60 dollar tax receipt and the remembrance of our time together. The rubber ducky with the sunglasses has been taken off the rear view mirror, the dancing hula girl has been pried off her sticky pedestal on the dash, and the CD car kit ejected from your old school radio / tape player one last time.

You were a piece of shit, Gipper.
But you were my piece of shit, and I loved ya.
When the Kidney foundation tows you away this coming Tuesday morning, I know what I'll be thinking.

They say that you never forget your first one.
You haven't even left the car port yet, but you know what?

I already know that they're right.

well the weather outside is frightful....

... and the fire is not so delightful, thanks to our leaking chimney. We're geting it repaired soon...


Aaaanywho...this here is a view out the backyard from this morning; We awoke to a blanket of heavy snow which has since turned into slush. Once the sun came up, the falling snow turned to rain and..well, you get the picture... the front of the house looks much the same, except that we put up our Xmas lights a few days early (it was sunny and warmer on saturday), so it looks brighter out front!... okay, on to more pleasant things...

SO! I got to go to the Grey Cup on Sunday, and lemmee tell ya.. GOOD TIMES! the last Grey cup I went to was in Edmonton with Deb, and we were not treated to a great show then. Not only did the Eskies lose that one to Montréal, but the crushing crowd was so immovable that we missed all the pre-game fun leading up to the game, simply because people couldn't figure out how to move through the Commmonwealth stadium concourse.

This time, however, it was all good. Same teams playing, oddly enough, but with much different results. Edmonton took the championship by a field goal in the second overtime, and I saw it all from the 19th row on the goal line. SO MUCH FUN!! I went to the game on my own, having just gotten a free ticket the day before the game (thanks Marion!). Kate was at one of her three bridal showers that afternoon, and has little interest in Football anyway. So I had fun on my own. My only regret was not winning the $46,000 50/50 draw. yowza. I honestly didn't go in there expecting to cheer for Edmonton after they knocked out the Lions last weekend, but I licked my wounds and jumped on the Western division band wagon.

in other news, school is just two weeks away from being done for the semester, save one final exam on dec. 15th. It's a lot of papers and projects right now, but it's coming along. I should be able to put a few things to bed in the next few days... check that... HAVE to put a few things to bed. they're due this week...

Off to Kamloops this weekend coming up! Kate has her third of three bridal showers with my side of the family and friends, and I will go up to see the 'rents. Mum is fresh off report card-writing period, and has felt some releif as she always does, and dad's chemo treatments are going well, but as much as you hear it, it's always nice to see it for yourself.

okay, I s'pose that's about it... one month until the wedding--just waiting for people to respond to their invitiations now!(ahem)... plans are otherwise pretty much in order!

okay, musty get back to the homework... hope all are well out there! talk to you soon!

Mending broken wings a big success!

whoa... it's been like, a REALLY long time since I wrote on this. SO much has happend since my last post a month ago, most noteably, perhaps, our PR class event back on November 9th. Our fundraiser, 'Mending Broken Wings, one youth at a time' was a great big success, and we raised $9,000.00 for Covenant House Vancouver.

The evening was a lot of fun, though a lot of work for the whole class. We pulled it off though! And, as you can see from the photos, we all looked SO good in white ;) To those of you who could make it--thanks!! your donations really make a difference with this organization. And to those of you who couldn't... well, you missed a good night! I myself didn't get to partake in any of the eating--nor did any of my other classmates, really. we were too busy running around executing our tasks. I was the MC for the night, so I just had to make sure that I didn't fumble too much through my speeches, or swear into the mike or anything like that... My opener was a bit of 'ummm' and 'uuhhhh' But I recoverded after that!

Pictured here is Vancouver's outgoing Mayor Larry Campbell.
He was at the event to speak to the crowd, and to help us draw the grand prize for the evening, (a flight for two to Toronto or Las Vegas), and he otherwise generally just moved around the room bidding on all sorts of our silent auction items and being goofy.

Once the room cleared out for the night, we all had a chance to raise a glass ( we had some special martinis made for the night, and this was our chance to sample them...), relax for a few minutes... or strike a pose... and then it was time to tear down our setup and either go home and crash or go out for more drinking.

I was amongst those going home to crash. Not only was the week about the event, but in the Journalism half of my degree, I was busy with daily newspaper production which kept me and the rest of the j-schoolers plenty busy from monday to thursday.

so, with those two major things out of the way for the semester, it was time to focus on the rest of the assignments for the semester! ack! gotta go do that work! bye!

Japanese lantern with Fall colours.  

view across Nitobe Gardens pond.. might be a little dark in this version... sorry about that. 

artsy close up of leaves fallen on the path in Nitobe Gardens 

Two weeks until the main event!

Well, it is just two weeks until our PR class puts itself on the line by hosting a fundraising event for Covenant House Vancouver(CHV), the shelter for homeless street youth. Check out the links on the side bar, the CHV main page has a link to our event right at the top, so check things out! The event is called 'Mending Broken Wings, One Youth at a Time'.

If you're too lazy to follow the links...well, I can respect that, so here's the basic details. It will be a cocktail evening with a silent auction, and some guest speakers will say their two bits about all the good things that CVH does. I am the MC, so I'll get to say my two bits as well!

The last month ( and then some), our class has been working hard to put this thing together and to find sponsors. I must say, the I have a greater appreciation for the generosity of the community after going around asking business for money and silent auction items. We have a sweet grand prize for the evening; a flight for two to Toronto or Las Vegas (winner's choice) on Harmony Airlines. And there is all sorts of other good stuff to bid on as part of the silent auction; hotel stays, restaurant gift certificates, gift baskets, etc. etc.!

Really, anyone in the Lower Mainland that's reading this should come. and the rest of you, you shoudl donate to our fundraising efforts for CHV :)

okay, that's my plug :0) but seriously. Go to Covenant House BC for more info on them, and on our event.

So what else is going on? lotsa school work. The 10 and 12 hour school days are well underway now, and the assignment factory (me) is churing out the merchandise. It's fair to say that the quality has slipped form last year, but the quantity is astounding!

As part of one of my newspaper stories, I took a few photos, as you can see below this post. The story was a just a fluffy 'tourist in your own town' article, and I did the Nitobe Memorial Gardens at UBC. The pics above are some of those that I took while I was there. sorry for the quality of some of them; I haven't had a chance to photoshop out my lack of talent yet :)

------------

My Parents were around this past weekend--Kate and my mum wnet and did flower arrangement stuff for the wedding while dad and I went downtown to do a bit of suit shopping. Naturally, they didn't have my size in store (sometimes being a freak means waiting for clothes to be shipped into town), but I will have a really sweet suit in just a few days... or do I mean suite suit... or suite sweet... I get confused...

okay, enough of that. Enough of all of this!! see ya later!

New look for the blog, post-Thanksgiving!

Hello everyone! welcome to the new look of the blog! I updated it with a brighter colour scheme to combat the Autumn blues! You'll also notice that down the right hand side bar some links have been added, so you can go take a look at some other sites that I like to hit up! I have decided at this point to take away the 'comments' feature on the blog, 1) because most people just end up directly emailing me, and 2) I am getting spammed! SO annoying! BOOO Spammers! BOOOO!

aaaanyway, the reason the Covenant House website is listed as one of my links is becuase my graduatign Public Relations class is doing a fundraiser for them this semester. we will be holding several events over the next few weeks leading up to our big night, which will be a cocktail evening and silent auction fund raiser. Covenant House is a non-profit organization dedicated to helping street kids get off the street, through use of a program that gives continuing care instead of just a hot meal and a bed, then back out into the street.

It's pretty cool, so check out the website (and hey, if you want to buy tickets in support of our fundraiser, let me know!)

So, Thanksgiving has come and gone for another year; I hope you all had the chance to fill yourself with the turkey bird! THis year's celebrations were up in whistler, which was quite nice! there were nine of us for dinner, and we got stuffed! ...then, with the leftovers, we did it all again for lunch the next day :)

Okay, that's enough of that; I really have to get to the homework! have a great week!

happy birthday to meeeee... (belated!)

Well, October 2 has come and gone once more, which means my B-day has also come and gone. I turned 26 years old yesterday! ( Yes, journalism students, I realize this blog posting is already rife with CP style errors!) I was up in Kamloops for the occasion; the first time I have been with my family for my birthday since I don't even know when. In high school and in university, I was always away on a volleyball trip, and while living in Edmonton, I was...just... in Edmonton, which makes it a bit far to come home just for a birthday. Anyway, it was good times hanging out with the family! Kate's dad, Peter & his partner Allison, as well as Kate's brother Michael, all came to Kamloops on saturday night from Kelowna to join us for dinner, so that was nice! My sister-in-law, Dina, was also there. It's her Birthday on oct. 6, so this was a duel celebration!

Highlights of the weekend: got a new hacksaw! Got a new power sander! got some new dvd's! Got a new housecoat! some of those were presents, some of it was bought by me. either way, I got stuff. yipee!

There was plenty of wildlife to be seen / heard this weekend. Coyotes tried to make lunch out of the neighbour's dog while we were all walking in the woods (we scared them away and reeled in the dog before they could actually lay a paw on the pooch, though!), and a black bear came a-wanderin' through some of the properties out the back of our house. I tried to get his/her attention (you know, for a photo op...), but he/she paid no attention. Too busy looking for food / garbage or something like that. The / A bear as already picked the neighbourhood clean, though. My mum & dad were silly enough to leave to bags of plums on the front step of the house to keep cool. They disappeared, as did some bird seed. You only make that mistake once, then all the food gets put out of reach :)

so that's about it! we arrived back to vancouver last night, and this weekend coming up, we'll be headed up to Whistler for Thanksgiving weekend! TTFN!

to end off, my quote for the post!
"I'm not 26 years old, I'm 18 years old with eight years experience!"

killing time before class...

I have fourty minutes until my evening class starts, so I think I'll update the ol' blog!

so, did everyone get out to / donate to Terry Fox last weekend? Yes? you did? good. :0)

It's my birthday coming up next weekend! the big 26 this year. Kate and I are likely going to head up to Kamloops to hang around with the folks. My sister in-law has her Birthday on Oct. 6th, so I think we're going to do some sort of combined birthday dinner thingy, which should be good! Since I have no classes on Fridays--nor does Kate on a regular basis--we should be able to leave earlyish that day, so as to get a few quality days out of the trip. It sucks to drive for hours, then not really have the time to hang out very long at your destination. It also sucks to pay 114.9 a litre for the gas to get you there and back, so definitely the longer you can stay and enjoy, the better!

Did a bit of roofing on the weekend; just some patch work that has been ongoing. Luckily it's nice and warm out these days with no rain, so the idea is to get all the work done before our house springs a leak :0) other than painting some siding that needed replacing, we're all up to speed!

Other than roofing, there were a few social opportunities. friday night was a gathering at Dominique and Jim's house. Dom is a classmate of Kate's. I stuffed myself on all sorts of goodies and had a broad mixture of spirits which were kindly provided by the hosts. I had Pisco for the first time, a Peruvian spirit made out of grapes. Not wine, and a heck of a lot more like liquid fire, if I do say so myself.

Saturday, a fellow that Kate had gone to Oxford with was in town. He has been living aboard a boat for the last seven months as part of a Quicksilver-sponsored sort of world tour. there are a bunch of guys on board this 73-footer, and they have been cruising around in search of unsurfed territory.
Yep, that's right, it's their job.

Bob was(the tour just ended for him on sunday) the ship's scientist. Amidst surfing for seven months, he performed checks on the health of the reefs that they found. sounds like there was a lot more surfing going on than science, but whatever. The point of all of this is that Quicksilver put on a party in Vancouver this past weekend, and we went in to soak in a few free drinks and listen to see how many people at this party we could hear saying "Bro" and "dude"...

...we lost count at 40 million.

It was wall to wall surfers and boarders. All totally pissed, all hugging each other saying "I love you Bro!" etc, etc.
anywho, that is the bulk of any news that's fit to print, and it's round about time to go to class. blah.

peace out! I love all you bro's out there. and dudes too. and dudettes. and... awww, shut it, stoo.

Terry Fox, Engagements, school!

TERRY FOX!! this year marks the 25th anniversary of Terry Fox's Marathon of Hope, and I think it's totally important that on sunday, September 18th, people find a way to show their support! either get out there and run, or donate some cash to the cause. Cancer is something that has an effect on us all, and it's so great that something like the Terry Fox run has continuosly been able to give so much money to so much different research.

Do you know that the type of cancer Terry had was osteogenic sarcoma(bone cancer)? When Terry was diagnosed, patients only had a 20% chance of survival. Nowadays, thanks to research, an osteogenic sarcoma patient has an 80% chance of survival. Pretty amazing! So get out your piggy banks!

I am particularly inspired to donate this year and do something about raising money for cancer research as my dad has had to take on fighting cancer himself, and lord knows that if I can do something to help other people's dads not have to go through what our family is just starting to go through, then it's totally worth it to just ask. Terry wanted all Canadians to donate just one dollar each to cancer research during his marathon of Hope. Maybe this year, you can do the same, and maybe more!

Go to https://www.terryfoxrun.org/english/donations/donate/default.asp?s=1 to do a donation using a credit card. It's easy, and it's worth it. I already did in honour of my dad, and for everyone else out there dealing with that nasty cancer bug!

"I'm not a dreamer, and I'm not saying this will initiate any kind of definitive answer or cure to cancer, but I believe in miracles. I have to.” --Terry Fox

And now, ON to lighter things!!!

It's been a few weeks since I wrote anything on this website, and as pretty much everyone in the free world is now aware, I got engaged to Kate during that time frame! I'm not sure that many people know how I proposed, but there have been requests to know, so here are "the deets"...

Kate was up at Whistler for the last week of August, and on Thursday aug 31st, I headed up after my work shift, as I had the next day off. Now, the standard practice while at Whistler is to get up in the morning at a comfortable hour ( 8,9,10, 11 am... whatever it may be for the day), and pile into Kate's mum's room to have morning tea, everyone piled on to the bed. Or as many as will fit comfortably.

I didn't bring a cup of tea in to the bedroom, but rather Kate's laptop, on which I had saved a powerpoint slideshow that I had been chipping away at for weeks. It was a whole 'the story of stu and kate' sort of thing, ever since we met as teenagers. At the end of it, it asked her to marry me (all set to music for that extra dramatic effect...). when it was over, I cracked out the ring--a band of white gold, with a tension-set amethyst, with one wee diamond on either side of the stone. I had been getting it made by a jeweller on granville island for a few weeks prior. And Kate likes it, thank goodness! (sorry, there are no photos of the ring yet, but maybe sometime!). If yu really want to see the slideshow, I can maybe email it. It's a big file though, and you won't get the music!)

so that's basically that! we're going to have the ceremony and partay on December 30th here in Vancouver!

------------------------------------------------

school is back in session, and I am now into the final year of my journalism degree, minoring in PR. there was some initial worry that I wouldn't be able to pick up some of the course until fall 2006 / spring 2007, but I did enough begging and yelling to get that sorted out, so this will be my final year!! hurray! Some of the classes seem like snoozers--take 'Advanced Editing', for example. Gah? does this seem like an exciting topic to ANYONE? oh well, it must be done... thankfully, I have Friday's off as well as much of thursday, so it's a relatively short week. It's also a relatively shrot semester for many course I am in, as a work term occupies the better part of November, and a week of December. I have credit for the work I did this sumer though, so I just get five weeks off of class! Giddyup!!!! the PR will still have to be done, as well as the english course I am taking, but that's it. Suh-weet, I say!

Lucy the puppy! she belongs to my parents. clearly she enjoys getting into stuff. her dog food bag for one...  

from the left, Kate, Georgia (kate's sister), Allison (kate's dad's g'friend), Peter (kate's dad), Stuart (me)  

kate and stu at lake louise!  

the good news, and the bad news...

so, since I haven't done a blog udpate in... oh, say... over a month now, I won't bother you all with an epic tale, so I'll try to keep it to the basics. some of the past month has been good, some of it bad, so we'lll just stick to that theme, shall we??

here goes!

The good news is, I has some time off attached to the august long weekend--along with Kate--to go visit her family at their cabin on Lac Anne in the Laurentians in Quebec. It was four days of fun in the sun. Swimming, water skiing, eating, lounging, etc.

Hey, that's good!

On the way home, we were flying WestJet from Montreal to T.O., then on to Vancouver. Unfortunately, we got stuck in Toronto for an extra couple of hours, and we were already on a bit of a late flight.

Hey, that's bad.

To make up for that, Westjet gave us $10.00 meal vouchers at the airport that night, so we got to eat while we waited.

Hey, that's good!

In the end, though, all that was open was Tim Hortons, and they were out of... well, pretty much everything. We didn't get home to Vancouver until 2:00 am, and then Kate and I had to get up at 6:30 and go to work :0(

Hey, that's bad.

But not to worry, it was only a four day work week, and then we flew off to Calgary early early saturday morning (August 6th) to visit some of Kate's family on her Dad's side, as well as tour in the Rockies a little bit, a la Banff and Lake Louise.

Hey, that's good!

Due to some mix-ups, general delays, and lack of ability in coordinating family affairs, there was really no visit with the bulk of the family until later in the day on Sunday, and Kate and I had to fly out of Calgary early early on Monday morning so we could go to work that day, so the party ended early.

Hey that's bad.

The next week seemed to go pretty quickly, though.Kate's sister georgia had come back with us to Vancouver to spend some time at our house, so that was fun. During the same period, Westjet sent both Kate and I $264.00 each in credit, for the 2-hour delay we "endured" in Toronto

Hey, that's good!

But during the same week, my dad had to have surgery to remove a section of his colon in which it was discovered a cancerous tumour was growing. Back at our house, George the cat had AGAIN gone off missing ( see blog entries frmo june / July)

Hey, that's really bad. (the cancer part, that is. the cat was just disappointing)

Luckily, as reported through my mother, the surgery went well, and dad was already on speedy recovery.

Hey, that's really good!

Unfortunately, by Saturday morning Kate, Georgia and I were on the road headed for Kamloops, as word was given to my dad and mum that in fact dad's cancer was not dealt with, and it was also found in his liver, as well as in other places.

That, also, is really bad.

Kate and I dropped off Georgia in Merritt, and she took the Greyhound from there back to her parent's house in Kelowna. Being in Kamloops was a good surprise to dad, who didn't expect us, and it was important to be around my family just then.

Hey, that's good!

it would seem putting georgia on a bus wasn't our best plan, though, as her bus crashed in Kelowna.

Hey, that's bad.

Nothing serious, luckily, just a fender bender, but until we got all the details, a bit disconcerting. Meanwhile, My sister and her Boyfriend flew in from England, also to be back with the family. Those Westjet flight credits helped out in getting Kari home, too.

Hey, that's great!

as the week continued up in Kamloops, we called back to our Vancouver house to see if our roommate, Robbie, had seen anything of Goerge the cat. No dice. And to add to the pot, our garage got broken into and robbed of some items.

Hey, that bites.

thankfully, while we were at home, dad got out of the hospital and is recovering well from his initial surgery. He's pretty thin at the moment, but spirits and appetite are doing well.

that pretty much brings me up to right now. Work for the rest of the summmer consists of 12 hours shifts instead of the usual eight hours, but that's okay, there's a day off here and there. there is another trip back to Kamloops this weekend coming to attend a wedding, and of course to see how dad is doing (as well as mum...). I've signed up for my courses this Fall, and school is back underway in two weeks. who knows where the summer has gone!

Oh, and in case the pics abouve aren't self-explanatory enough, they're from the calgary weekend, with exception of the dog's ass, which belongs to a very cute puppy named lucy that my parents are now the proud owners of!

ta for now! I leave you today with a quote from one of my faves! just sort of speaks to today's theme, as despite the number and weight of some of the "hey, that's bad" comments above, I'm still smilin! :)


"Don't waste yourself in rejection, nor bark against the bad, but chant the beauty of the good."
--Ralph Waldo Emerson

Me and my cousin Bryony, visiting from Toronto. we had a chance to catch up over dinner. check out the photos then read the details below!  

me and Kate and bry's friend Liz, outside the restaurant 

me and Kate, soaking it up on Ouzeri's patio. Yes, I realize we look like dorks.  

me and my cousin Bryony, outside Ouzeri's. 

biking--high above green lake!  

biking around a whistler ghost town, called parkurst. found this beauty of a truck. what woudl the insurance on this be, do you suppose??  

hiking above whistler (pre-thumb slicing incident...) 

from the left, Gord, Marion (on the ground), Penny, Diane, miss Mariss, Stu, Kate (on the ground), Ben. The Whistler clan!  

soaking the fresh wound in a glacial stream. sliced open thumb acquired from my walking stick, which usually, you would think, would help your performance. not hinder it. stupid walking stick ;( 

not a great image, but you get the gist... maybe. FeEL mY pAiN!! 

catching up!

It's been a few weeks since I've updated this thing.... seems to me I start most of my posts saying that... I suck.

anywho, lets go back to Canada day. The day our tenants moved in, and, of course, the time to commemorate this great country's founding (insert patriotic strains of 'O Canada' Here...). Kate and I went out with our friend Stew (no relation)and his girlfriend, Heather.

Kate and I had dinner at our house, and I had a drink with the meal. Over to Heather's house, where each of us had a drink or two. Then it was off to the beach to watch the fireworks. before we got to the beach, however, we hit a roadcheck. Being the responsible youths that we are, I had been selected as the D.D. for the evening. None the less, either the collective smell of booze in the car or the relatively slow-witted responsiveness of yours truly prompted the Po-Po to pull-Pull me out of the car for a breathalizer. The Alberta license I am still using after telling them I moved back to vancouver last september probably didn't help the situation either. I dunno. In any case, I blew a very safe. .02 blood / alcohol reading, well below the limits of the law. A quick lecture about my semi-legal license, and we were on our way! Turns out that while I was getting tested, another officer was playing 'good cop', joking with the others in the car as to wether I would pass or not. sneaky devils, trying to get the 'real' truth out of my fellow canada day revellers.

all being well, we headed to the beack to watch fireworks, which were actually allllll the way across English bay from us, but none the less entertaining. Happy belated Canada day everyone!

Next item: A short but enjoyable dinner visit with my cousin Bryony from (shudder) Toronto ( I mean 'shudder', Toronto--not 'shudder', Bryony). The pictures above that feature the blonde haired girl with a chin generally matching mine are the shots of bryony. The other blonde haired girl is Kate, and to confuse Kate and Bryony just makes it creepy, so don't. The lot of us went to Ouzeri's greek restaurant for dinner that night. A lovely evening, save the cattle-ranching techniques of our waitress, affording us little to no time to revel in our after dinner drink and evening's glow before trying to shunt us out, just so she could fill the table with some pushy guys wanting our table. ah weill, c'est la vie... or however you say it in Greek.
*
Work: we've had a slough of stupid americans come by the site recently, asking questions about the local geography, such as (as they stare out across the burrard inlet towards the North Shore Mountains) "okay, so over there, across the "river"... is that still Canada?", (yes, she was a Texan... as is this next fellow). Another gem: We've been reading up on the museum of anthropology, and we're wondering, do they still have igloos up there this time of year, or have they melted off by now?"

you can't make this stuff up folks.

Lastly, the pictures way back above are of the weekend (and resulting injuries) I just had up at whistler at Kate's families place. look for the names and places listed under the pics!

ta ta for now! oh, PS! our tenants are great! some odd smells waft up from the kitchen here and there... largely fish-related... but other than that, all's well!

a brief hello and goodbye!

sorry for the delay in a new blog post folks, I am just too busy / lazy these days! I promise I have some topics lined up, but for the moment I will afford you just a few teasers!
... Canada day celebrations: Stuart vs. the roadcheck breathalizer
...A short visit with my cousin (photos to be included if she manages to email them)
...musings from the job site.

see you soon! ... maybe!

"Procrastination: why do today what you can put off until tomorrow?"

-anonymous

Hi, remember me? I'm George, the cat that was gonna run away. clearly, as indicated by my blissful sprawl across the spare room bed, I have reneged on my intentions to leave. Meow.  

Okay, I can roll over and die a happy man now

..I'll get to the gushy gushy stuff that relates to my blog title first so that it will not be dragged out or dwelled upon for too long, so that any of you out there reading this will not be subject to this any longer than need be :)

SO, last night I FINALLY had the chance to see, live and in concert, the wonderful and incomprable Ms. Sarah Mclachlan! wooHOOOO! For any of you that aren't aware, I am a stomach-turningly large fan of her music, her personality, her hair...etc. I have like, 12 of her CD's, I'm in the fan club... okay, 'nuff said.

short of seeing her perform a few songs as part of a tsunami benefit concert a while back, I have never seen her live, so this was HUGE for me! It was especially kewl that she played here in Vancouver. It was the last show of her Afterglow tour, which has been going on for the better part of two years. The show was a long time coming--having purchased tix for a kelowna show a while back, Sarah got sick and couldn't perform. I thought that would be the last chance to see her before she went into retirement... fast forward once again, Kate and I hit the town last night to take in the show, and it was GREAT!! Life is good! OKay, I said I wouldn't dwell on it, which I already have, so it's time to move on!

*You can see from the photo above that George the cat has happily moved back into this house. there's your update on the cat*

The better part of the last few weeks has been spent trying to get the basement suite up to rentable shape, and we are near the completion! not only that, we may have found some tenants, too! the girl next door (sounds cliché, I know, but don't worry, this doesn't turn into porn) has just had some family arrived from the phillipines, and they need somewhere to live. convenient that we should have a space to fill, yes?

the only catch is that there will be, if all goes according to plan, up to seven people lving in the basement--four adults, three kids (no, we won't be running a sweatshop...)we've met them and they seem great, so we'll see in the coming days if all shall come to pass! seems like a nice thing to do to help some people get started here in Canada! I shall keep you posted! feel free to blogpost / email me with your opinions!)

ta for now!

Mug shot, George the cat 

the cat came back, the very next... week...

Today I shall relate to you the curious account of George the cat ( Not to be confused with Curious George, the monkey)

The cat you see pictured above is named George. He is Kate's cat. Being a stray in the first place (Kate came to aquire him through adopting him as a stray in England), it should not surprise you as a reader to know that this photo of george is part of his 'Lost' poster.

George decided to make himself a stray again.

Kate and I went down to Seattle on the may 14th-15th weekend, entrusting the care of the cat to the neighbour. Well, George wasn't having any of that. He seems to have thought we abandoned him or something, and excused himself from our lives. the next week was spent doing a bit of searching, calling the SPCA a few times, and generally asking around the neighbourhood if George had been seen.

And he had!

So, hope being kept alive, we have gone about our business, assuming that George would show up at home if he felt like it. And thusly, over the long weekend just passed, George waltzed in the front door on Sunday as though he had never left. There was much rejoicing, breaking of bread, drinking of wine, etc. Okay, it was more like cracking open a fresh tin of fancy feast and applying flea medication, but you get the gist.

And, no sooner had George eaten, taken his drugs, and lazed about on the front lawn for a while, while the garden was being weeded, he up and left again. It would seem, ladies and gentleman, that we are being used for the occasional meal and some shelter.

Since Sunday, George has only shown himself a few times, and he's only here long enough to eat food. As of this very moment, he is in fact lounging on the couch. The story behind his return this eve is as follows: A neighbour called, having seen the poster we put up near her house. She called me to say that goerge was in her arms. I trotted over to the house ( just a block up and a few houses over), and there was george, biting the hand that has been feeding him. As it turns out, he's been hanging around there for a few weeks, and he's been getting fed, acting like a stray. Kate's cat is a tramp!

as for why George has acted as he has, who knows. As for knowing if he will stay, time will tell, I suppose!. George has the life of any cat, I guess: a cat will like you if it feels inclinded to do so, our want of it's attentions being secondary to that condition!

I always liked dogs better anyway ;)

A cat is there when you call it - if it doesn't have something better to do.
--Bill Adler

In order to keep a true perspective of one's importance, everyone should have a dog that will worship him and a cat that will ignore him. --Dereke Bruce

the work site! a similar photo appeared in one of vancouvers new dailies, 24 hours... If they were willing to print a picture of me, it musta been a slow 24 hours, I guess!!  

what's new in my world...

Hey folks, sorry about the break. It's been a hectic few weeks! I am now on my summer job--this entails standing in front of the Vancouver Convention Center Expansion Project in a hardhat (see above) and quenching the intellectual desires put forth by the thirsty minds of the public. It's been good so far, and my tan is kicking ass ;0)

three of us were hired for the job--we spent a week talking to various stakeholders to get their perspective on the project and find out about their involvement. It left us with a deep well of knowledge about the project. So, for the rest of the summer, the three of us will cruise the sidewalks, letting the public pump our brains dry of it's information!

After work, I generally go to the gym, then get home with time enough to eat dinner, watch some TV and go to bed. Today, however, I skipped the gym and came home to work on the garden. This, along with Kate, has become a rather geriatric-type of hobby around the property (well, it would be with Kate perhaps, but she is on practicum in Victoria for eight weeks). Despite the unfortunate association between gardening and old age, lemee ask you this: who's gonna get to eat veggies out of their ground, instead of paying for them? Hmm? who is it? Hmm you? no, of course it's not you. that's right, it's me ;)

in other news, it's been quite the week of life and death round these parts. Kate's grandmother died, as did the father of a family friend of ours. Kate's dad was also in the hopsital getting his arteries cleared of a 99% blockage, and another friend of Kate's whom is working in the States is quite ill and is stuck in hospital. On my side of the family, my 16-year-old cousin has had some tests done on his heart after suffering a few bouts of heart-attack-like symptoms.

Good times, good times.

so really, that's the bulk of it. work, gym, gardening, work, gym, gardening. Oh, this past saturday I had opportunity to attend a celebration of the career of Kamini Jain, a friend that is on the national canoe and Kayak team--it was a great chance not only to see kamini get some deserved recognition for her hard work, but also to catch up with padlers that I haven't seen since before moving to edmonton!

This weekend coming up will be spent in Seattle! I hear it's supposed to rain a whole crapload, but that's okay. I haven't been out of town in ages, with exception of going to Kamloops at easter, so this should be fun!

Last, but not least, I leave you with just two of seven photos that my best friend Doug has sent on in the last week. Last year, he decided to do seven haircuts in seven days in support of the easter seals camp he works for. this year, he has repeated his performance! this is just a peak of some of the hair. If you want any more of the seven, just email me, I'll be happy to send on the lot of them!

ta for now! looking forward to a week of no more deaths or illnesses, thank you very much!

Life is just one damned thing after another.

--Elbert Hubbard

;0)

This is doug in all his mullet madness hotness. Not.