January is over already?!

Holy crap. I can't believe January has flown by. And what's with the nice weather? I was out today without my jacket, thats how nice it was. Crazy.

I haven't been on for awhile and it's for a few different reasons. A: not much to really talk about, B: Just not motivated to write stuff and C: My roomy thought it would be funny to disconnect the phone line from the wall so I couldn't get on the net. Halarious. Now it's my turn to get him back somehow. I have to wait it out a little because he'll know. It's gotta be something good. Oh the things I could do...

Um, not much is new. I had a weird week. I thought I put my de-frizzer in my hair the other morning and for some reason is was sooo soft. I had no idea what I did differently. Well, the next morning I realised I put body lotion in my hair instead. Then on friday I went to the gym. Had a pretty good workout, pushed myself a little more and then thought I'd get in the hot tub for a few minutes until some of the showers were free. Sat in there with a few ladies from my class and all of a sudden I felt really hot and wasn't feeling good. I got up, grabbed my towel and got in one of the showers. Put the water on as cold as I could handle it and assumed it would go away. Oh no, the black spots started and I was panicking. What the F do I do?! I'm about ready to pass out. I managed to take the 2 steps to sit on the little bench thats in each stall. I passed out. Just quickly, but i passed out. Never said anything to anyone there, which is probably not smart! I then went to drink water and felt a little better. The rest of the night I felt "off". Ate supper and relaxed. No idea why that happened.

Next weekend I'm going to Toronto. I can't wait. I finally get to see Sherri & Will's new house and visit with them for a day. No idea what the plans are but we're gonna decide once I get there. Sherri is an AWESOME cook so I'm sure I'll be having some good grub. That's what I miss having when I lived with her. Then on Sunday I'm going to visit my buddy Duce and the rest of the Toronto clan. Duce is having his annual SuperBowl Party. Any party is good times with them. Good god I can see the trays of Jello shooters, food, Rye & Coke and whatever else they have planned. There's never any shortage of anything while you're there. Last time I was at Duce's I sorta got myself in some, well I want to call it trouble but it wasn't really. Ah well, shit happens and all you can do is laugh about it. It made for some good stories later.

Well, thats about it I guess. I've been doing pretty good with my gym classes. And if I miss a class I try to go and spend 35min on the treadmill. So far so good. Some weight is coming off but not nearly as fast as anyone would like. I'm still waiting for those majic scisors that lets you cut off what you don't want!!

Oh yeah, Jeff (my roomy) and I got some new pets. Last weekend, we went to the pet store and bought ourselfs some crabs. Thats right...Hermit Crabs. We got crabs! haha They're funny little animals and it's crazy how they know us already. Chrissy was over the other night and they would NOT come out of their shell for her. As soon as I held them they were out. I think they smell death though....Chrissy is known for her bad vibes on animals....and bamboo. Who kills bamboo Chrissy?! I thought I had you cured....

Well I'm outta here. Rented some movies for tonight and I'm getting cold so I'm going to make myself some tea. My new addiction by the way. I'm off the coffee and on to the tea!

Canada's 2006 Figure Skating Championship

I know figure skating isn't for everyone. So for those of you who don't enjoy it, move on. Those of you who do, I hope you enjoy the read!

This year's 2006 Canadian Figure Skating Championship was in Ottawa. Since my friend Meghan was going to be in town to watch her brother skate, I knew this would be my only time to see her because her and her family would be soo busy.

I managed to get a seat in the section next to her family's. Perfect, we could signal to each other when we were going to take a break. I was quite happy with that idea. I arrived and spotted Meghan's mom and grandmother almost right away outside. The excitement began. I hadn't seen Mr & Mrs. Buttle in many years. And I think the last time I saw Meghan was about 5 yrs ago. We keep in touch through email and it never fails that if there's a skating competition near by I'm there. I'd never miss out on what I enjoyed watching as a pre-teen & young teenager. It just so happened that Meghan's parents had an extra ticket and invited me to sit with them. Just like old time's sake. I had only bought a ticket for one day, but after all the excitement on friday I needed to buy a ticket for Saturday. My plan was to go home and get on the phone to buy a ticket for Saturday. Well, Meghan's parents, the nicest people ever, had an extra ticket for the entire day on saturday and gave me that also. That was after they bought me dinner!

My time at the Ottawa Civic Center this weekend was, to say the least, a great experience. It had been so long since I've seen Jeff compete that I seemed to have forgotten what the atmosphere of the rink brings: crowds cheering, smell of cantine food, nervousness of family members, beer, endless sound of music and my favorite of all, the sound of the blades on the ice.

Canada's Top Men's Figure Skater for 2 consecutive years! Way to go Jeffrey!!

Jeff was first after the qualifying round going into his short program on friday.

This is moments after Jeff scored 1st after the short program.

Keep smiling Jeff....you make the rest of the world want to smile back!



Saturday was a little more stressful. I don't know how families go through this all the time. I was nervous, anxious, excited all while my heart rate started to increase the closer it was time for Jeff to skate his long program. Thank goodness I was sitting near Jeff & Meghan's Nana who made me laugh on more than one occasion. She, was a pack of nerves and was priceless the closer it got to the final 3 skaters, one of them being, Emmanuel Sandhu. He's definitely not one of my favorite skaters only because he's cocky and that's one quality I hate, in anyone. There's a difference between cocky and confident. A person with confidence knows what they're good at but doesn't need to let others know exactly what those talents are. Cockyness makes you say things which later on will bite you in the ass, as Mr. Sandhu found out this weekend. It's called Kharma my friend and you got a taste of it as you so deserved.

So, Meghan and family I want to say a great big thanks for a fun weekend. I had many laughs, reminisced about old times and met some new people. Thank you so much for letting me be a part of this major event in your life. I wish you good health, lots of love, many laughs and memories that will last a lifetime! Here we are during one of our bathroom breaks. The lineups were crazy but it was a chance for Little Miss Popularity Meghan to meet up with old friends. Jeezuz the skating families ALL know each other. It's crazy. Meghan and I are in the center and her boyfriend Josh is behind us. The rest are friends of Meghan's which I forget their names! Some people were walking around asking us if we wanted a free picture taken. The first time he asked us Megs thought he was loonie and said no. I then explained that they give us a card with a pin and we get the picture online in a few days. Then she was all up for it!

Jeff, I wish you the best of luck in Turin. Stay strong, laugh a lot and don't ever lose your sense of humour (I just about pissed myself when your Mom showed me the article about the summers in the tent! You're crazy kid!!).

Enjoy every minute of this experience you're about to have.

Best of luck to you and be sure to kick butt!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY RAINA & JAMIE!!!

Alrighty girls. I hope you have a fantastic friday the 13th birthday. Be sure to have a drink or two on my behalf. Raina, next time I'm home we'll have to go out and celebrate both our birthdays. (even though they're 4 months apart! haha

So not much has been new in O-town and in my life. I've been trying to finish off Season 4 of 24 before the big season premier of Season 5 on Sunday (those of you who watch it's on from 8-10pm on Sunday and Monday. Four hours of one of the greatest shows ever.

I'm off at Noon today just for Raina's birthday. Okay, I'm lying. I'm off because I'm going to watch the Canadian Figure Skating Championships. I can't wait for a few reasons. My mom and I always watched skating and I've never been to see a live competition. Secondly, I get to see Jeff Buttle who, is an old friend of mine's brother. Plus I get to see Meghan (the old friend) after over 5 years. We keep in touch through email and when we're in the same general area we try to get together.

Her and I go way back. We used to laugh sooo much and I can't remember a time that I didn't have fun hanging out with Meg. We got in trouble together (it was the one and only time my parents said they were disappointed in me), we did doughnuts in the Molson Park Parking lot. Well...we had to teach her how firstly, right Megs?! Ate candy till we wanted to throw up. And created the famous waterfall technique. Oh yes, this is when you use your parents vehicle and run it along a snow bank or two and the snow flies over the car at which point you have no idea where you're driving. Yes Megs, you perfected that one!

So I can't wait. It's been way too long and I'm way too excited to see everyone again. Hopefully I can snap some pictures and post them next week sometime.

Oh yeah, I read the second part to "Million Little Pieces" called "My Friend Leonard". Very good book and I couldn't put it down. I started reading it after work last friday at 4:10pm. By the same time the following day I was done the book. I heard James Frey will be publishing a new novel sometime in March and I'll definitely be buying that when it comes out.

I should get going. Have a good one and enjoy the nice weather while we have it!

Have you ever......??

Have you ever been in a situation where you were at a loss for words but thought of the most perfect response after it was far-too-late? That's what happened to me today. For this to all make sense I need to rewind a little to 3 years ago.

I lived in a townhouse and was not too far from work. The total walking time was about 20min one way. I had to walk on this overpass over the Queensway and from there I was about 5min away. Well, as my older friends know, I have this magnet that attracts the weirdest people. They all seem to want to talk to me. I had one lady tell me Jesus loves me and that my Mother is truly blessed (just out of the blue she stopped me and told me so). Then, right when SARS was a hot issue I had this one guy start to follow me and yell some girls name. I had turned around because he was running towards me. He stopped dead in his tracks and realised I wasn't the right girl. He asked me a bunch of questions, which I didn't not answer truthfully and would not leave me alone. He started telling me he thought i was beautiful and blah blah blah and took my hand and kissed it! I didn't have time to react. He said something like "Your boyfriend is a very lucky man" and I responded "yeah, I keep telling him that". He laughed and stopped pestering me.

Now, today I decided to stop in at Farm Boy. I noticed this guy keep switching isles as I was moving around. We ended up at the lettuce bin. I looked at the price and grabbed one. He looked up and here's what happened.

-He said: "they're pretty cheap today eh?".
-"Uh...yeah I guess so"
-I think I know you from somewhere....
-I don't think so. You're probably mistaken me for someone else. I get that often..
-Well, I'm sure I know you. What's your name?
Okay...so I was stupid and wasn't thinking and gave him my first name.
-Oh..the name doesn't sound familiar but you have a look that you're a really nice person. Where do you live? (I avoided it and told him I lived in the opposite side of town) Where do you work? (again, I avoided it an office in Ottawa...which could mean anywhere)
_"Sorry, I dont recognise you and I remember faces. I really have to get going"
(Now I'm thinking, fuck...how do I get out of this? How can I escape this crazy man? And then it dawns on me. It's the crazy guy from the overpass. I'm sure of it. That's where he knows me from AND he's using the same line "i think i know you from somewhere". Think of something and think of something QUICK!!)

So, then he says it's really hard to find nice people in a big City and that he's glad he ran into me today. Yeah. ran into me my arse....he watched me walk around. Creep. Then he starts to say "well I'm telling you that you seem very nice and I was wondering if, um, maybe, sometime I could maybe take you out to dinner or we can do something?". Shit, fuck, damn, what do I say?!?! So I said as straight faced as possible "I really don't think it's a good idea". He asked why and I said "well I have a boyfriend...". He left me alone after that and did so pretty quickly.

So I was telling Chrissy about my little episode and telling her I was panicking because he was creeping me out and I didn't want to just turn around and walk away. As brilliant as Chrissy is she said "next time when he says "I recognise you from somewhere.." just say "Oh it must be through my boyfriend so-and-so". Why didn't I think of that?!?! I could have ended the conversation WAYYYY before he got too creepy.

Lesson learned: when you get the heeby jeebies from someone follow your gut.

What a way to start 2006. Get asked out on a date from a total strange creepy guy. Woohoo!!

It's a Brand New Year

So my first post of 2006. I really dont have much to write about since I'd written a huge long post last time. I'm back in O-town and recovered from my trip to Timmins. I've been sleeping like a baby and having strange dreams. I guess I was over-run-down-tired. But hey....it's once a year right?!

All went really well this Christmas. I spent time with everyone I wanted to, did some shopping, learned some scrapbooking techniques (yay for Raina), put a picture on my blog for my "profile" (again...yay for Raina and her rebel), saw the annual hockey games and laughed...a lot.

The hockey games I'm talking about is called "Le Tournoi des Anciens"; in other words a Tournament for the Oldies. For those of you who don't know this, I attended a french school my whole life. The first time I went to an english school was in college. My High School has an annual hockey tournament and each graduating class puts in a team of boys to represent their graduating year. It's a riot and it's pretty much a high school reunion every year. You get to see people have kids, get married, buy homes, and find out what they've been up to. I love going to these things because it just makes me think I'm still in high school, even though it's been 8 yrs already. SCARY!! Raina and Lisanne laughed bcause apparently "you know everyone and they all know you....you must have socialised a lot in school". Um, actually no I didn't much. I hung out with my friends and I never really was mean to anyone. How I know them and how they know me is a mystery to me. I do however remember faces. Ask Raina. I never ever forget a face. I had actually ran into a guy at the bar and I knew I recognised him from somewhere. I asked him a few questions and couldn't figure it out. As soon as he said where he moved to it clicked in. He worked at the same office I had my first real summer job in 1997. I don't forget faces. I may have forgotten how I know these people, or where I know them from but I remember the face.

I finished reading "A Million Little Pieces" by James Frey. It's the best book I've ever read. He's a drug addict-alcoholic and has hit rock bottom. It's his story on his recovery and how he dealt with himself and his anger. This book is easy to read, and it's a book that makes you think, so much so, you don't want to put it down. I don't want to say too much about it because I really think it should be read and experienced without knowing. If ever I had the chance to meet anyone, I honestly think it would be him. If you're going to read anything this year, buy this book. Read it and pass it along.

Well I guess that's it for tonight. I'm going to start reading another book that Lisanne lent me. It's not intense but more of a comedy...Sophie Kinsella. Gotta love her stuff. I hope everyone has a happy and healthy New Year and all the best to ya!