Folk Fest - Day One

Nathan and I were lucky enough to get 4 day passes to the Folk Fest this year from his Uncle Les (he works for the festival). I've only ever been to one evening before this and I really enjoyed that. So needless to say I was looking forward to having 4 glorious days of folky-ness. This is first summery thing that Nathan and I have done this year. All the rest of our time has been filled with yard work and other such craziness. So even though we have 6 untouched pallets of wall stones sitting in our parking pad, I am revelling in the bliss that is doing nothing important for 4 days. Sigh....

The first thing that I will say about last night was the atmosphere. I don't know what it is, but as soon as Nathan and I had bought our little Folk Fest chairs (worth every penny, BTW) and set them up in the field in front of the mainstage, I felt infinitely more relaxed. There's certainly something about sitting in a field, in the late afternoon sunshine, with a bunch of easy-going people, listening to great tunes. It was wonderful. Soooooo relaxing.

The acts were good. I didn't really hear anything that I didn't like. First up was Lubo Alexandrov and Kaba Horo. They're kind of a Bulgarian, gypsy type band that lives in Quebec. Very cool and fun. I like gypsy music. =D Next up was The Sadies. Despite their awful 70s suits and hair, they were fantastic. Some of their stuff sounded familiar, so I wonder if I've heard it before and just not known who it was. I think I might have to get one of their cds. Next was City and Colour. I have never heard of these people, but apparently they're quite popular. The lead singer has another band, but the music styles are quite different according to Nathan. They were great. Such pure vocals and melodies. There was also just the 3 of them which was neat to see too. Nathan bought me one of their cds. And last, but not least, Rufus Wainwright. I laughed when he pranced on stage in his cute little leiderhosen! So incredibly gay, and he just doesn't give a shit. I love his voice and he's an amazing musician. I have to say though that I'm kind of split on his stuff. Some I really like and others I really don't. His band's pretty cool though too. But he was a good entertainer and he played Hallelujah for his encore.

All in all it was a great night. So relaxing and groovy and just the most perfect way to spend a sunny Thursday evening. And I get 3 more days of it!

Strange days

It's very weird to not have Rowena, Geoff and Gillian around. I keep forgetting that they don't live here anymore. They left Sunday for the mad dash across Canada to their new house in Canning, Nova Scotia. I swear they've just gone on a holiday and will be back in a couple of weeks. I think it will definitely take me (and everyone else, I'm sure) some time to get used to the fact that they're not coming back and that I won't see them on a regular basis. Very weird.

I've been working on scheduling a "girl's night" with my 2 close friends that I've known since I was 12. Nathan said to me "Have fun going out with the old married ladies!". It took me a while to figure out who he was talking about!! But I suppose it's true, since we're all married now. Thought I think I would argue the "old" part. =D L&A just got back from their honeymoon and H&B are just 7 weeks away from the birth of their first child. Sometimes that kind of wigs me out, but most times I'm excited. I have been known to prance about the house, chanting "I'm going to be an auntie, I'm going to be an auntie!" Nathan reminds me that I already am an auntie (his nephew Caspian). It's funny. Even though I am actually legally related to Caspian, I think I will consider H&B's baby more of a niece or nephew than I do him. Funny how things like that work.

Another odd thing is that all of a sudden I have a couple drafting/design to do for people on the side. Very weird, since both the jobs came up less than a week apart. I wonder why it happened now? Maybe there isn't any reason, but sometimes coincidences are indicators of something more (read the Celestine Prophecy, you'll know what I'm getting at). Really, right now I should be drafting house plans, but I have a hard time forcing myself to do extra drafting at work. I did some at home last night and I was rocking. Today at lunch I was dragging and finally gave up. I think it's the atmosphere....

And on top of it all is the ever present yard work. We're making progress though! That makes me happy. We are planning to stun my dad with how much we got done while he and Mom were on holidays. More pictures to come, I promise!

Anyway, those are my musings for this Thursday lunch hour.

Bad Day

So today is starting out with a bang. The bang is me hitting my head repeatedly on my desk. Since not many people I know are familiar with AutoCAD, I will just say this:

ARCHITECTS ARE STUPID!!!! I'm not spending HOURS fixing their drawings. Do it yourself!! Especially since we've already discussed the right way to do it and now they've gone back to the old, wrong, horrible, ugly way. And these drawings are going out on Monday.

I was close to being very aggressive with my monitor this morning. Now I get to go to site, which is okay, because it's a completely different job. Except part of my lunch hour will be taken by a meeting. A completely unnecessary, useless, stupid meeting that I have to go to.

I'm going to work out like crazy at the gym tonight. Maybe it will get rid of the cranky ache in my belly. I think I might let my uncoordinated self try the elliptical runner.... In the meantime, I will try to keep my snarky tongue in my head and not direct my crankiness at the other people in my office.

My First EVER!

Today I received my first ever bit of corporate swag. Not everyone in the office got one, there were only a couple, addressed to specific people and I was one. It was labeled PERSONAL & CONFIDENTIAL.

Unfortunately, it was cheesy Stampede bandana from Sizeland Evans (interior designer). But it's the thought that counts! I was so proud. Corporate swag addressed to me, because they like me. Yea me!

Cheesy, but fun! I wonder what I'll get for Christmas....

More yard work

As requested, I have posted some pictures of the yard in progress on our Picasa site.

I must admit, I'm getting a bit frustrated and a bit overwhelmed by the whole process. But if I just think about how far we've gotten already, it makes it a little better. I will be so glad when this part is over and I can think about things like plants. Hard landscaping is just that - HARD! I'm pretty sure they meant the physical and mental effort that it takes - nothing to do with the materials at all!

Anyway, little by little it's getting done. My goal is to have the walls and the patio stones done by the end of July. Then we've still got a month of summer left to relax and enjoy all our hard work!

Yard work

So our yard looks a bit like a war zone at the moment. We're working on it, but the rain and other obligations are cutting into my carefully crafted schedule. We are supposed to be done levelling by Saturday. We still have to dig up the gravel where the trees will be and then refill that and the weeping tile trench with soil. And then we have to level. Yup, that's right, we haven't started. So I have mentally modified the schedule. So long as we're ready to lay paving stones when Nathan's parents come and stay with us, I'll be happy. Rowena loves to lay pavers, so she's offered to do some while they're here. My ultimate goal is to have all the hardscaping done by the end of July. Then in August we can relax and enjoy the summer!

In other house related news, I finally hemmed the downstairs curtains this past Sunday. It only took me two years.... I've also bought a programmable thermostat that I'm going to replace the standard one with. This will be my first foray into anything electrical. Wish me luck! Don't worry, I'll turn off the breaker. I have no illusions about my clutziness.

Farmor

I will remember many things about Farmor. I will remember her laugh, which, when I was little, I thought was the most joyous sound in the world. I will remember her smile and her teasing my dad, her baby boy. I will remember her singing, by far the best singer of all her children. I will remember my dad, curled up on our couch with his head in his mom's lap as she knitted. I will remember her asking for us to bring her Canadian Club when we would go to Denmark.

There are so many wonderful things about Farmor that I could even begin to tell them all to you. I admire her greatly. I always think to myself "That's how I want to be when I get old". She lived on her own, in her own little apartment right up until she passed away. She was supposed to be moved to a long term care facility today, but I guess she had decided that that wasn't for her. She had strokes, broken bones, lost her eyesight and still she just kept on trucking. She altered her activities to deal with her new limitations, but she never stopped living and she hardly ever complained.

Now she's gone and I am entirely without grandparents. It's a sad feeling. Even though I didn't know them all that well, it's still a hard thing to deal with. But I have to remember that all of my grandparents had very full lives and they were all ready to pass on.

I will remember them fondly and with laughter, as that's really all I can do.

People are weird

So the strangest thing happened on Sunday night. Mom and Dad were over for supper and cards and we were a hand or two into our game of canasta, when all of a sudden Dad says "What's that guy doing?".

There was some random guy standing on our lawn, examining our tree (which is completely covered in lovely pink flowers). Then he reached up and took the tag off the branch, which I had specifically left on, because I knew I wouldn't remember what kind of tree it was. Then he walked away, our tree tag in hand.

Dad was all for jumping out the door and calling him on it, but I wasn't overly offended, just perplexed. Our curtains were wide open and I'm sure he could see us all sitting there and he still proceeded to steal our tree tag.

Speculations abound. Did he like the tree so much he wanted one and so, needed to know what kind it was? Does he have one and have no idea what it is? Was he just trolling the neighbourhood for tree tags? There are lots of our kind of tree on our street, but I guess we were the only ones to leave the tag on. You'd think that alone would have given him cause to pause before stealing our tag. If we're the only ones with the tag on the tree, surely it must be there for a reason.

People are very strange. Anyway, I remember the kind of tree: Makamik flowering Crabapple.

France

Well, here's my promised post about France. Only a week or so late...

The trip was sensational. This is what I say whenever anyone asks me. It was sensational. Not good, not great, SENSATIONAL! I mean we had our rainy days and day where my stomach rebelled, and near the end I was getting a bit tired of living out of a suitcase and doing my laundry in a bathroom, but for the most part (the part that counts, anyway) it was a perfect trip.

I have to admit I was especially enthralled by all the architecture in France. It's quite overwhelming. Everywhere you look there are fantastic old buildings, all with their own unique personalities and quirks. Churches galore, mostly similar if you don't look hard, but they are vastly different if you take the time to walk, stand and admire. I did a lot of this. We'd be walking somewhere and I would just stop and stare for a while. I was on sensory overload for the first few days!

My particular favourites from the trip were Mont Saint Michel, Normandy, Nogent-sur-Seine and Parc Asterix.

Mont Saint Michel was the most organic structure I have ever seen. It was incredibly moving and peaceful. I could have quite happily spent days there and I probably still wouldn't have seen it all. I'm glad they're working on a project to eliminate the causeway and parking lots that are blocking the bay from encircling the mont at high tide. They will have parking on the mainland, and a bridge for tour buses and foot traffic across the bay.

I really enjoyed Normandy as well (Mont Saint Michel is on the border between Normandy and Brittany). I especially liked our tour of Juno beach. We went with a tour company called Battlebus that does tours in minibuses (like a minivan but boxier). They specialize in English-speaking tours and our guide was a Brit. He had a marvelous little flip book with pictures of the towns and of different soldiers that he would show us when he was telling a particular story. The tour was really well done, I highly recommend it. I always find history much more engaging when there's a personal aspect to it and this tour certainly had that.

Nogent was a pretty, sleepy little town with a contrasting nuclear power plant. I think that for a vacation it's much better to be more often out of Paris than not. Paris is such a huge city that moves very fast (except from 12-2pm), that I could definitely feel myself gearing down when we were outside of it. Don't get me wrong, Paris was great and full of things to see and do, but I really enjoyed our time in little towns.


And then... oh and then! Parc Asterix! I could wax poetic about this goofy amusement park for hours! It was like living in a cartoon. Goofy soundtrack, goofy actors, goofy buildings and puns and jokes everywhere! It was completely awesome. If you plan on going to France, read one Asterix book before you leave and then go to this park. It's really great. I was grinning like an idiot and giggling for pretty much a whole day. The perfect thing to do on our last day in France.

So those are some highlights for all of you. Whenever you happen to see Nathan and I, we'll be sure to show you the full range of photos and tell you all the stories.

And Nathan's right about the La Vie En Rose music box. It may be cheesy and totally aimed at the tourists, but whenever I hear it played I can transport myself back to Paris, walking by the Seine, hand in hand with my love.

New Look

Hi all,

Nathan and I have just gotten back from France, and somehow this led to me deciding that the blog needed a new title and look. As you all know my poor SBV ipod died recently, so I thought a change was in order. Stay tuned for a France post and some pics. Now it's off to get a pedicure!

I figured it out!

I think I've figured out the secret as to why the French people are not plagued with obesity like the North American populace.

It's the stairs.

Stairs up and down and up and down to get to the metro, stairs in the churches, stairs in the hotels and apartement buildings, stairs in the double decker trains and buses. Stairs everywhere! And not only do they all take the stairs, if there happens to be an escalator, they walk up those too. Or run.

My right knee is protesting a bit at all the stairs, but I think it's getting used to it. At least that's what I tell myself. It also helps that I get rewarded with panoramic views of Paris from Notre Dame or Monmarte, or creepy views of ossuaries in the catacombs of Paris. I think the stairs are worth it. I also think my butt is getting skinnier....

Bonjour all!

Hello to everyone from Paris!

After a very long flight we arrived in Paris tired and hot and sweaty. We didn't have any problems navigating Pearson or CDG, but we were a little confused about which trains we needed to take to get to our hotel. We were so hot and tired, that our brains were totally NOT working, so it was a little difficult to navigate in French. We got on one wrong train, and ended up walking up and down so many flights of stairs in the subway that we were even more tired and hot. At this point, I was thinking that this might have been a mistake. I was so cranky and confused and overtired and over heated, that all I wanted was to be back in Calgary. But we finally made it to the hotel, which is great. Our room wasn't quite ready, but they fixed it up quick for us. We had showers and then naps and then we went to have dinner on the patio of a nice French restaurant. That's when I started to enjoy myself. Nathan had duck confit and I had cheesy mashed potatoes with a sausage. Yummy!

Yesterday was Notre Dame, Sainte Chappelle, the crypt under Notre Dame and the Medieval Museum. Lots of walking and lots to see. Today we're off to walk up the towers of Notre Dame and then to the catacombes.

This place really does have a certain Je ne sais quoi!

T-minus 75 hours and counting....

Do you think I'm excited? No, of course not...

I can't wait to get on that plane and go. It's going to be such a nice trip. The weather in Paris the past week has been holding steady at about 23-26C, either partly cloudy or full sun. This is going to be so awesome! I also phoned my first French person on Saturday. One of the hotels that we wanted to stay in doesn't have email, so we had faxed a request to them. By the end of last week we hadn't heard back, so Nathan convinced me that we had to call them. I wrote out what I wanted to say (in French, of course) and then I dialed. A man picked up the phone and said 'Allo?'. Not 'Allo, Hotel de la Gare'. So I had no idea if I had the right phone number and of course asking that question was not part of my script. So I said 'Bonjour...ummm....'. And then he said 'I speak English, madame'. Apparently I was quite obviously not French. Oh well, at least I was prepared to make an effort. =D

Now all I have to do is attempt to accomplish things at work in the next three days. Not that I have a lot to do, but I can't just sit here and stare at the clock. Well, maybe for a couple of hours every day I could do that...

I have shoots!!!

I am so incredibly happy with myself! I have grown plants! Of course, they're bulbs that I just put in the ground and now, lo and behold, I have little shoots coming up! Look, look!


The green ones are crocuses and the purple are tulips. Of course, there are a whole bunch that aren't poking they're heads through right now. These are just the early risers I guess! More pictures to come as my little babies get bigger!

I'm cured!

I think the last 4 days have cured me of wanting a pet. Thank goodness! I was getting perilously close to being desperate for something furry and cuddly to cuddle. Not that there's anything wrong with Belal and Turtle, but the days of house/pet sitting has reminded me how much work a pet is and how much it restricts your life. All in all, it was a pretty uneventful 4 days. There were only a couple of wigging out episodes. =D I won't go into all the details of my irrational irritation with the pets. In any case, I'm extremely glad to go home to my own little house and my own bed and my own stuff. And my slippers. I miss my slippers.

I can't wait for the 3 day weekend! Lucky Nathan gets 4, since he never works Mondays anyway. At least we'll have 3 days to putter around together and relax in a pet free, fur free, slobber free, soft cat food free house. Ick.

Sleep deprivation

Oh, to be able to sleep soundly. I have been having a hell of a week trying to get enough sleep. Maybe 2 of the last 5 nights have been good nights' sleeps. Yesterday was bad. I was so sleepy and exhausted (mentally that is), that I actually was snappy at Nathan. Now I'm sure some of you think, so what? Well, we're NEVER snappy at each other. It was only once and it was such a little thing to snap about, but I felt completely horrible the instant I did it. He said it was fine and actually kind of funny, but I still felt bad.

The last 2 weeks have been all over the map for me. My grandmother passing away, my mom leaving to go to Denmark, Nathan's parents almost 100% convinced they're moving to Nova Scotia, the truck not working, working, not working, deadlines at work creeping closer, contemplating changing jobs, the pool at the U having some sort of mechanical problem so no DWW class, etc., etc. I'm hanging on to my sanity and my temper by a thread here people! I resort to using my earphones at work, all day, every day, so I won't completely wig out on certainly guys at work.

I want it to be the 26th of April!! I want to go to France and relax for 3 weeks. At the moment, I'll admit I'm kind of in avoidance mode. I want to go away and forget about all of this, deal with it later. I know some of it will be resolved before we go, but at the moment, I feel like turtling.

And I need to buy some new capris. And socks.

To find the words

For more than a week now I have been trying to find the words to say goodbye to my grandmother. This has been much harder for me this time around, probably due to worry. I worry about my aunt, who has lost both her parents, her uncle and her husband in the space of about 9 months. I worry about my mom, who is in Denmark right now, dealing with the huge task of cleaning out her mom's little room at the nursing home and sorting all the stuff that was packed away after Morfar died last summer.

I'm sad Mormor is gone, but at the same time, I'm glad it was a peaceful passing and now she can be with Morfar. After living so long with one person (more that 65 years), it must have been extremely hard for her to be without him. But now they are together again, and I can almost feel them out there somewhere watching over all of us.

Goodbye.

Rest In Peace

It is with heavy heart that I must announce the passing of my dear friend, Strawberry Blue Viking. (For those of you that don't remember, SBV is my ipod)

SBV passed away suddenly on Wednesday night. He was an innocent, caught in the crossfire of a floor and a badminton net pole. For clarity: I hung my coat with SBV in the pocket on a badminton net pole at the university. Said pole promptly fell over with a crash to the floor.

I did not discover this tragedy until this morning, when I whipped out my trusty friend on the bus and discovered one of the headphones was cracked. Disappointing, but replaceable. Then I looked at the screen. A mess of broken digital inkiness. Sigh... So I had to listen to the lady with the bubbly belly laugh all the way downtown.

Time to shop for a new friend I guess... and quick. I can't stand that lady's laugh.

Tah Dah!

I just found this cool template online! Isn't it perfect? Ever so cute and just in time for spring. Do any of you html savvy people know how to center the blog in the window?

I got the Family Tree Maker software yesterday and had a lot of fun playing with it. It's very good and extremely easy to use. I'm excited about this project. I can't wait to have everything organized and clear (to me anyway!). If you're thinking of doing a family tree, I can recommend this program, even after just one day of usage. Very cool.

But now it might be time for a bed and a book. I had a headache for most of the day (related to the icky perfumey body wash I bought I think), and then I went and swam laps and then I shoveled the walk while Nathan cooked dinner. I am completely exhausted! But in a good way...

Places to go...

Nathan keeps giving me such good blog ideas! After looking at his list of things that he wants to do/see before he dies, I started thinking about my own list. Mine consists mostly of places to go, not surprisingly. I think I must have wanderlust. Anyway, here is the start of my list.

Ride the Trans Siberian Railway. I want to do this so bad! All the way from Moscow to Vladivostok. I don't know what season I want to do it in, but the whole thing sounds so adventurous and romantic.

Go North. In a similar vein, I would like to travel up to northern Canada. The Yukon, the Northwest Territories, Nunavut. Mostly, I think I want to see the landscape and the wildlife. Especially the musk ox. They're so cute and shaggy!

Walking tour of Spain. This actually fits quite nicely with Nathan's desire to go on a pilgrimage, and we didn't even plan it that way! I have a Lonely Planet book that is exclusively walking tours and they all look absolutely amazing. Now to pick one...

Australia. I want to go back just as a tourist. I want to go back to Adelaide and Uluru and then I want to go down the west coast. I know that the Great Barrier Reef is on the east coast, but the west is so wild and untamed and unpopulated that I think I would like it better. The natural land formations are amazing.

Fiji. I only stopped there for an hour on my way to Australia, but I've been in love with it ever since. The sunrise was beautiful, the airport was so quaint, and it just had an atmosphere that seeped into my soul. Must go there during the day next time.

Go on an African Safari. I don't care where. So long as there's hippos, I'll be happy. Lots and lots and LOTS of hippos. And yes, I know they won't let me cuddle them.

Develop our family tree. My uncle in Denmark has traced a branch of our family to way back in the middle ages (15th or 16th century, I can't remember) and I would like to expand on what he's done. Also, I'd like to do it was software program so we don't have to worry about losing a page or something. Inspired by these ideas, I bought a program on Amazon yesterday. It's even got website publishing software on it, to publish your findings. I'll keep you posted!

Become a gardener. I will make no aspirations to becoming a GOOD gardener, but I want to be one. I like to play in the dirt and watch things grow. Still hoping this will be my hobby.

Have a dog. I want one of my own. I want to do agility with it and cuddle it and love it. Must restrain myself....

And the big one...

Have a low stress, enjoyable, flexible, well paying job. 'Nuff said.

Well, that's my list so far. Like I said, mostly places to go, but I think it's all attainable eventually. I'd like to tick off the low stress job sooner rather than later, but that requires a certain effort by myself that I'm not quite willing to do yet. For the moment I can cope and my job has 2 of the 4 characteristics: well paying and enjoyable. Of course, the high stress has a negative impact on the enjoyability....

The world awaits. Travel safe!