by ·4 Comments

Saturday morning headed out to Michael’s early because they were having an extra 25% off sale in the morning. We got big canvases for super cheap. I thought they were $9.99 for each pack of two, so we got two packs, but then they rang up as only $4.99, and then 25% off of that, so I made the cashier wait while I grabbed another pack! Immediately after we left the store I realized I should have gotten the bigger size, since they were so cheap. I really wish there was such thing as rewind of life.

Anyway, 6 canvases for $11 is pretty good. Now we can do tons of masterpieces. Scott has another video game-y one in mind, and I have a geometric series idea and also a melted crayon thing I saw on Pinterest that looks super cool. It needs a hair dryer though and I don’t have one. Rosemarie???

After Michael’s we went by the old house to pick up our mail and then to the farmers market. We spent too much money a coffee, a korean short rib taco, homemade ginger ale, strawberries, tiny peppers, potatoes, and tomatoes. I wanted to get some plants too, but we need to do a bit of research about what can grow indoors, in the dark.

We came home, and started the squares project. Then I decided we REALLY needed a level to do it so we hoofed it over to Metrotown to pick one up. We also got some Coldstone ice cream with a 50% off coupon. I had a cup with cookie dough, choc chips, caramel and fudge, and Scott had a mint one with brownie, choc chips and fudge. They were both very good, but too large, and neither of us really liked the chocolate chips. If we go back we will definitely share. On the way home we stopped by a girl’s apartment to pick up a desk chair I saw on Craigslist. It’s green and funky. She lived right around the corner so it was super convenient!

Scott made a pizza for dinner with sweet potato and lentils and some other things. He’s gotten quite good at making the crust, but the toppings were too carbolicious.

I just realized I never actually took any pictures of the other paintings I did, at the old apartment. I will, I promise! I only have one more week left of work (WOOHOOOOOOO) and then I will have lots of free time.

Sunday was mostly spent bumming around. We watched some Masterchef, the movie Paul, played Agricola, talked with Rosemarie, and now Scott is out at The Keg with some of his friends. I don’t know what he will get to eat there!

I also did some online shopping. We ordered this antenna thing to pick up free HD channels (bet you didn’t know about that!). Apparently there are 6 free HD channels floating around in Vancouver and all you need is an antenna to pick them up. You can get CBC, Global, CTV and three others that I forget right now. That’s all we need! We also ordered some new jeans for Scott and more of my favourite t-shirts for me. Yay!

by ·3 Comments

Yesterday was such an awesome day!

Well it didn’t start off that way. Work was boring as usual and I still couldn’t get in touch with the BCIT lady. I had to email Toronto by about lunchtime to accept my offer and time was ticking. I never reached her so I had no choice but to accept Toronto.

Scott got an interview this week for a new job that pays quite well. Even more reasons why I desperately wanted to get in to BCIT! Also I’d looked up truck rentals and gas prices the night before and it looked like it would cost $2500+ to drive across to Toronto. Ack.

I actually started tearing up at work because I was so frustrated and anxious with anticipation.

At 4:30PM I left work to head to Brian’s to watch the hockey game. I’d just left the building and saw that I had a missed call and a voice mail on my phone, and it was from the BCIT lady!!!! I went back up to the office to use the phone and hyperventilated! She said that she had been away on a conference and didn’t get back until today and that YES they considered me a strong applicant and wanted to offer me admission! She left me her cell phone number so I called her back and she repeated all that stuff and said she will get my offer sent out on Monday IF I WANTED IT. I was like YESSS YES YES YES I WANT IT!

I was giddy with excitement as I fought through the crowds in the city (CBC.ca says estimated 100,000 people gathered on the streets!!!) We all watched the game at Brian’s. It was incredibly stressful. We were all tense right up to the last second of the game since I think we were all remembering all the other games where horrible things happened in the last moments of the games. Canucks did it though and won! Everyone expects them to lose again in Boston though and then we’ll have game 7 here in Vancouver on Wednesday.

They might lose though because Scott has to shave his playoff beard on Tuesday night now for the interview!! ;)

After the game we went out to the streets for a few minutes but everyone was really moving around a lot and it was a bit rough in the crowds so I didn’t like it. I tried Japadog (and loved it) and then we went home. My mouth is burnt and scraped from the delicious hotdog but I’m so relieved and so much less stressed and feeling a lot better than I have in a long time. Oh and the Toronto dude wrote back and cancelled my acceptance so we don’t have to pay $500.

More later.

by ·3 Comments

Blossoms on our street.

Another week gone by, nothing from NAIT.

Nothing from BCIT either yet, but since I did the bio challenge and finished the first half of physics (I got an A) I should hear from them any day now.

We just want to make some plans!!!

Ah Canucks in the Stanley Cup finals! We watched the last game downtown. It was nutso, as soon as they won people started screaming and honking their horns everywhere downtown. It was crazy noisy! We all rushed down to Granville Street where everyone was singing and cheering and high fiving each other. Apparently 20,000 people flooded Granville Street! That wasn’t even the finals!!

 

We took some videos too. Maybe Scott will post one on his blog IF HE EVER WRITES AGAIN.

Work has become very very very boring. I’ve mastered all the different documents so nothing is challenging any more. I could do it with my eyes closed. Well not really, but almost. I’ll obviously keep at it for the next couple months but I will admit I have been dreaming about my last day for a while now.

Well time to do something productive now… so I’m off!

by ·1 Comment

STUFF I LOVE #1

Audiobooks

I recently decided that I LOVE AUDIOBOOKS! I read listened to an entire book in two days, WHILE WORKING. How’s that for multi-tasking.

I’m sure I could have curled up in bed and read the whole book in two days too, but who has time for that!? Now I can earn money and “read” at the same time. I feel like I’ve opened up a huge new chunk of day for me to take advantage of. Plus it was also kind of… comforting… like the old days when dad used to read to me at night time. A nice feeling.

I was listening to Terry Fallis’ The Best Laid Plans which he podcasted one chapter at a time a while ago when he was having trouble getting it published. You can get it for free off iTunes. Then it won the CBC Canada Reads 2011 contest and I’m sure he’s doing a lot better now. It’s a good story, check it out!

I suppose some books are better for listening to than others. The Best Laid Plans worked well, but we also downloaded audio files of Jasper Fforde’s books and now I am thinking that they might not be as good since he does a lot of clever things with different fonts or intentional ‘myspelings’, which would be lost.

I’ve also listened to Bill Bryson’s A Short History of Nearly Everything which was also quite interesting, but that was a serious time commitment since it really is not short at all. Now I need some kind of audiobook library (does that exist? probably) to pick what next! Any suggestions?

The question is, does listening to a book have the same educational benefit as reading a book? It certainly is a lot more passive. But I think I personally absorb more from listening than reading.

by ·2 Comments

SO COLD THIS WEEK.

Not only has Vancouver been having colder than usual weather (-3°C?????!!!), it was -15°C in Calgary on Wednesday. I forgot how going out into super cold air makes you cough. Ha.

I am super spoiled and was lucky enough to have my friend from Dal not only pick me up from the airport, but give me a mini tour of Calgary, stop for hot chocolate, AND pick me up from the school and drive me back to the airport!!!!! So nice! It was awesome to catch up with her, after like three years!

However the interview was not as nice. I was expecting one-on-one traditional style interviews but 30 seconds before I had to go in I found out it was MMI style. I was SO not prepared. There were 4 of us and we had to go to 5 different tables. At each table you got 2 minutes to read over a scenario and some questions, and then 4 minutes to answer. The problem was I thought some of the scenarios were so simple that there is no possible way at all I could talk about it for 4 minutes (ex. You are an imaging technologist at a small clinic with one other technician and a secretary. You notice the secretary has been repeatedly making the same mistake. What do you do? Ummmm…. nicely go over the mistake with the secretary?? WHAT ELSE COULD I SAY?? If I notice a mistake I’m not going to creep around it.)

This made me very nervous and a little rambly and just… unsure. Which is probably the exact opposite of what I should have been. It is REALLY weird talking to someone who is totally unresponsive. I only figured out they were probably told to me like that several hours later.

Anyway after the last table that was it. ‘Interview’ over.

Blargh. It’s really frustrating that I don’t feel like I rocked it. I knew about this style of interview (they use it at Michener) but I just didn’t know this one would be like that and instead of practicing public speaking I focused more on my history, my customer service experience, the course requirements, and challenging situations I have had to deal with.

Who knows, maybe I did ok. The other girls didn’t use up the whole 4 minutes each time either.

My flight back ended up being delayed 2.5 hours. The worst part was that no other flight seemed to have been affected. Even the next WestJet flight ended up leaving 15 minutes before mine. :( So instead of getting home at a reasonable 7:30 I got home at 10:00 and talked with Scott a bit and went straight to bed. I was so tired and had super bleary eyes at work the next day.

Work is challenging again. I’m not doing the old forms I am so used to that I could do in my sleep, and now have to learn 50 million new rules and things. Maybe soon I won’t have to type any more.

Oh and I’m still off dairy. I had some when I was in Calgary and I did feel a little sick that day so I went off it again. It’s just really hard to tell if I feel better without dairy or the same. The differences are so slight and inconsistent I still haven’t been able to reach any conclusions. I made quiche this morning with a store-bought crust (it uses cheapo oils instead of butter), and soy milk. It was good.