Unhibernation League...again

Unhibernation league is going to start up again the first week in February. Thanks to Ali and Andrew for hosting the first event in December. For those of you who couldn't make it we had a great time decorating gingerbread houses...well until Jon accidentally stepped on Maarten's gingerbread house, that part was pretty sad...especially for Maarten. I have too much homework to get anything planned for this week but it is definitely starting the week after because I really can't handle too many more nights hanging out at home with my dog. (wow, that sounds even more pathetic in print than it did in my head). Anyways, for those of you who are interested I'll be sending out an email with an event sometime this week. If you don't hear from me send me an email to remind me to plan something...I'm a bit forgetful.

oh, also an update on my new years resolutions...I'm switching it to one chin up...they're REALLY hard!

The Golden Globes

Phrases uttered in my house while watching the Golden Globes:

My dog's life is hard like Beyonce's

If you're Diddy, I'm Chingy

It must suck to be that one non-funny British person. Everyone would have such high expectations and then nothing.

I'd hate to go to an awards show. I'd feel so homely. I mean, I realize these celebrities have a lot of people helping to make them beautiful, but I don't think they're exactly uggo's when they wake up in the morning.

I wonder if they use paint chips to match the colour of their spray on tans to their dresses

Why is that guy from that movie with Jessica Simpson presenting at the Golden Globes?

Resolutions

I think I'm generally against the idea of new years resolutions. Primarily because I have a hard time wrapping my head around a period of time as long as a whole year. So I think this list is really more of a list of general things I'd like to be able to do in the next little while...let's say 3 months-ish.

1. Do 5 chin-ups...in a row. Currently I can do 0 chin-ups.
   
2. Knit something other than a scarf
3. Run faster
4. Drink champagne for a whole night to see if i have a hangover the next day. (there is a rumor that you won't get a hangover from champagne if that is all you drink...I'm intrigued)
5. Read the Economist every week

I think if I can accomplish at least 3 of these I'll be pretty happy.

Hawaiitis

I seem to be suffering from a fairly severe case of hawaiitis. It is a pretty debilitating disease. The symptoms are as follows:

• Lethargy
• reddening (or browning) of the skin
• increased body temperature
• cravings for alcohol and "tapas"
• inability to make decisions

I've been doing my best to work through the disease but its pretty hard. Anyways, happy new year!

Mele Kalikimaka

A few pictures from Christmas day here in Hawaii. Luckily Santa was still able to find us here and mom cooked a great turkey! (I was responsible for making the Hawaiian eggnog aka Pina Colada's and I'm happy to say they were very well received.)

The pastiest people in Hawaii. We're working on it...I promise.

The girls wearing some festive jewels from Grandma

View from the Lanai

Hawaii bound

Off to Hawaii tomorrow morning! I'm really excited. I hope I don't get eaten by a shark.
Merry Christmas everyone (or other holiday wishes if you don't celebrate Christmas). See you in two weeks!

Unhibernation League

It's time to start up the unhibernation league again. Really it was time to start up the league in October, but I was lazy and busy getting used to being in school and didn't get my act together. So, I think the league should start after January 7th. Here are a few ideas I have so far:

• Climbing
• Speed Skating (either Steph or Maarten will need to be recruited in order for this one to work I think.)
• Roller Skating
• Skeleton
• Andrew's annual scavenger hunt

I'm pretty excited for the league to start up again. I had a lot of fun last year!

Wii

I'm thinking of buying a Wii. From what I've heard the sports games are supposed to be pretty fun (not to mention the potential of "Dance Factory") and you don't have to be one of those "gamers" to have one. I'm waffling about it though because they are still a bit expensive and I'm a poor student. Seems like fun though!

Farewell to Milton Friedman

Milton Friedman passed away last Thursday. I'm really surprised how little I've heard about it in the media. Maybe I'm just watching the wrong shows, or perhaps things have gotten so bad that the death of one of the most significant economist of the 20th century isn't important enough to interrupt the 24/7 coverage of the "TomKat" wedding. Either way it's always sad to lose a smartie.

procrastination strikes again

Procrastination has been getting the better of me lately. I just can't seem to convince myself to get anything done, especially school work and laundry. If this keeps up I may just have to buy new clothes. In addition this blog has also taken a bit of a hit due to my procrastination. So, in an attempt to rectify the situation here are a few things that I've been thinking about lately but haven't managed to get into print:

1. Short people. Short Pants: Why do I keep seeing short people in excessively short pants? Inevitably the people in short pants are also wearing white socks and bad shoes which only makes things worse and apparently these people are completely oblivious to the breeze on their ankles. I mean I can understand that tall people who don't care about their clothes sometimes end up with short pants because their legs are just too long for regular pants, but these short people actually had to put in effort to make their pants too short...they had to get them hemmed like that! Is this some sort of sick joke being played by tailors all across Calgary?
2. Bathroom reno: I'm renovating the bathroom. Today I had to go choose tile at the contractor approved tile store. The lady who was "helping" me was horrible...she was one of those people who is determined to do the least amount of work possible while at work without any consideration for the difficulty this will cause for the customer. Here's how our conversation went: I said: " I'm renovating my bathroom. My contractor said I needed to come here to choose tile. I think I like this tile here but I would like to take it home to see what it looks like in my bathroom. Can I do that?" Her response: "Well, I can't let you take the sample we have out here, so I'd have to check in the back for another sample" - awkward pause - Then I said: " Ok, I can just keep looking while you go check" -awkward pause - Then she said: "Oh, well I guess you can probably take the one out here if you can bring it back on Monday". Then i said:" Ok, could you tell me the price on this tile?" and she said: "Well I'd have to go to the back to get that"...I think you get the idea. This is when you really start to see the negative effects of the labour shortage...I think I'd prefer if they just hired monkeys or something.
3. I had more things I was going to write about...procrastination and juvenile alzheimers is not a good combination.

Football and Climbing!

I went to the Stamps game yesterday. They lost. I'm not really that committed to football though, so I wasn't too upset. Plus, the Roughriders are really all that people in Saskatchewan have to cheer for, so the least we can do is let them win once in a while.

I also had my first climbing lesson last night. Wow is it ever fun! (also a lot less hugging than football). I'm taking the class with my friend Stephanie and we are both at about the same level which makes it much less intimidating. The first climb up the wall was a bit scary, but after that we made it to the top a few times on one of the easier walls and we were sufficiently tired by the end of the two hours. I can't wait for next Sunday!

If I won the lottery

I had a dream a while ago that I won 300 million dollars in the lottery. In the dream I mailed a plane ticket to Hawaii to everyone I know with a sticky note saying "hope you can make it". Needless to say I woke up in a really great mood and I started thinking about what else I would do if I won the lottery. Here is my list so far:

• take everyone to Hawaii (as mentioned above)
• buy an iPod
• renovate my condo
• pay off the mortgage on the condo
• buy a house
• renovate my new house to include a room for Brinkley made entirely of that stuff they use to make Kong dog toys, and add a climbing wall to the kitchen
• hire a professional pooper-scooper to follow Brinkley around outside
• hire a dog nanny like Oprah

That's all I have so far...I'll add new items as I think of them. Suggestions welcome.

"Feelings"

I don't want to write the paper I should be working on right now. The main challenge with most of the writing I am expected to do for the teaching program is that I am supposed to express the "feelings" that the topic brings out in me and relate this to my past experiences. Now I realize that this doesn't sound that challenging, and in a lot of ways it isn't. For one thing, the amount of research required is minimal. However, the problem with this whole "feelings" thing is that I generally only have 2 feelings about the topics discussed in our classes. Feeling #1: That was pretty fun, I liked it. Feeling #2: That wasn't very fun. I didn't like it. This is completely the opposite of a lot of the people in this program who have WAY too many feelings. One girl even cried. It was ridiculous.

In an attempt to try to fit in better with some of my classmates (not the crier though...she's just insane), I have decided to start practicing the different emotions so that I can bring them out on command in my classes. The emotions that seem to be used the most by my classmates are: insulted, angry, overwhelmed, sad, and happy. I'm already pretty good at happy, so I'm going to start off by focusing on the other 4. I'll keep you posted on my progress.

A girl on the train

A girl sitting across from me on the train today took off her shoe, smelled it, and put it back on. I don't know how to respond to that.

Overwhelmed by toothpaste

I saw a toothpaste commerical on TV today that I can't stop thinking about. The toothpaste is Aquafresh White and Shine. Basically the message of the commercial is that this toothpaste will not only make your teeth white, it will also make them shiny! So apparently now its not good enough to have white teeth, they have to be shiny...go ahead and start feeling unnecessarily self-conscious now. At first the only goal was clean teeth, then they threw whitening in their and now they've added shiny. Based on this trend, I'm guessing the next step is tooth glitter. I can't wait.

Update on the TV remotes

So about an hour after I wrote my entry about the TV remotes Brinkley got another one! This time it was the remote for Sheena's DVD player...whoopsies! I was searching for a sock in my closet and he snuck downstairs and took the remote. As it turns out I think the reason I couldn't find the sock was because Brinkley ate it. Also, Sheena and I recounted and between the remotes he has destroyed at my house combined with the remotes he has destroyed at my parents house the count is actually up to 8.

Mourning the loss of TV remotes #4 and 5

Brinkley destroyed 2 TV remotes today. The first one was my fault. I accidentally left it sitting on the coffee table and went into the kitchen for a few seconds. I was going into the kitchen to get a handful of chocolate chips, yes I eat chocolate chips right out of the bag...don't try to pretend you don't do the same thing. In Brinkley-land leaving the TV remote on the coffee table is apparently a clear invitation to take the remote. It really only takes him one good chomp to destroy the remote...I wonder if they make titanium TV remotes?

(The second TV remote lost its life while I was having a shower. Brinkley managed to open the drawer where I keep the TV remote and destroyed it along with a pen. There is also a pretty good chance he ate a hair elastic.)

Winter Activities #2

Winter activity #1 is taken care of. My friend Steph and I are going to take climbing lessons! I'm really excited about it. From what I can tell climbing has some of the same benefits as yoga (makes you stronger, bendier, more coordinated) but without all the standing still and crazy breathing. I'm still looking into Skeleton as the other potential activity. The COP website doesn't have any information on it anymore, but a girl that I go to school with knows some of the bobsledder/luger/skeleton-ers so she's going to try to find some info for me.

YAY! So excited!

Winter Activities

I'm in the process of trying to sort out my activities for this winter. I figure that with school and the dog I can probably manage one evening activity during the week and then another activity on Friday and potentially something else on the weekend. Here are the ideas I have so far:

• (un)hibernation league
• skeleton
• pottery
• yoga
• pilates
• skate skiing

At the moment I think that I will forsure have (un)hibernation league, and maybe yoga during the day on Friday, and then hopefully skeleton or skate skiing sometime during the week.

Skool!

This week is immersion week at school. That means that I get spend the whole week with my grade 1-2 class. So far its been a blast and I am slowly getting the hang of things. Here are a few things I've learned so far:

1. If you wear shiny shoes, people are going to feel a need to touch them.
2. Never take someone's eraser without asking AND waiting for them to say yes...they may burst into tears.
3. Recess is seems even shorter when you're a teacher.
4. It's hard to sniff smelly markers without colouring your nose.

I'll keep you posted on what else I learn!