Saturday, October 20, 2007

Dance

This blew my mind away. An amazing piece of choreography.
Eh....

So I was making an observation about the weather this week. I turned to Ian and said, "It's a nice day, eh?"

I think I am adjusting to Canadian life quite well.

Amazing day though. It looks like it's snowing red and yellow leaves. The wind is whipping the leaves from the enormous tree over the apartment building and gusting them over the lawns. THe squirrels are in their elements.

We are going to Niagara this evening with my brother. We will stay there overnight taking in the cheese of the town. Tomorrow it's off to the Falls. My brother had a tendency as a child to fall into swimming pools with all his clothes on. A little clumsy. The Falls are on a slightly grander scale so I am hoping, against all odds, that he will remain on terra firma. My lifesaving skills aren't up to waterfall/swirling mass of water standard.

Friday, October 12, 2007

Gramaticul errurs

I ought to apologise for the complete lack of care being show to grammar, spelling and general content of my recent posts.


I am suffering from blog apathy.

Thursday, October 11, 2007

Weather

I am going through a little dose of 'weather shock'. On Monday the temperature was at a mean 31 Celsius. Today, Wednesday, it dropped to 13! I am 100% unprepared for this. So in the space of two to three days I have gone from shorts and a t-shirt to boots, tights and the whole winter woolly ensemble. Perhaps, not winter woolly, but something that will will stop the knife like wind from giving me a facial. That said I am very happy it has started to cool down. Humidity and high pressure are two things in life I am ill-equipped to contend with. My body structure indicates that I was built for cold weather. So imagine what Maebh was forced to listen to every time we went on a holiday to a hot humid destination. Yup, me droning like a hornet about how hot I was and then getting in a sulk with her when she would make me turn the air con off as she had lost the feeling in her legs an hour earlier.

Aaahh..memories.
Shameful..with hot hair

There are times when I really let myself down. This evening after work I was sprawled on the couch watching chewing gum for the eyes on the TV when I decided I needed to get a little more active, what with the office job and all. It is a curse. I have worked out that I am in a sitting position for nigh on 10 hours a day. My fingers are getting a wonderful workout what with all the typing, (and they do look fabulous in that odd yoga muscle way) as is my neck from craning over the cubicle wall trying to see what's happening. That is nothing short of disgraceful- and there is only so much hold-in knickers can do. Those of you that are regular readers will be all too aware of my 2006 goal of Running Around The Lake Faster Than Those Age Sixty And Up. I fear I may have to set myself a similar goal this year. There is Lake Ontario down the road but I would need an entire management team to work out the logistics of that one so instead I have decided to keep up with my walking around Old Whitby and mix it up with a bit of jogging for the laugh. This evening saw my first excursion. While I was stomping around the town scaring children with my red, sweaty face, heavy breathing and complete lack of fashion sense I trundled past the local hair saloooon. Obviously it was a sign so I jogged on in completely incapable of stopping seeing as my muscles were running on autopilot..or were starting to sieze up, one or the other. Anyway as I was thundering in I noticed a sign reading, "2006 Canadian Salon of the Year", (2006 was obviously the year for bettering oneself) and as I came to an abrupt stop at the counter I was almost blinded by the glare from receptionist wan's hair. Never have I seen salon staff with such fabulous, glowing, amazing hair. To hell with print advertising, they should just plant the staff on the street and hand out sunglasses. Seeing as the staff were oh-so-beautiful and the big sign was still saying "2006 Canadian Salon of the Year" I figured I was at the right place. There I stood leaning on the counter like a war veteran would a crutch, sweating over the dry flower arrangement and wheezing out my name. I had almost regained my composure until I saw the price list. There'll be no eating in this house for a few weeks I tell you. Which is good as I need to get to work fast on looking 'fabulous' for my appointment.

Monday, October 08, 2007

Thanksgiving!

I was having far too much fun last night to take many pictures. But I shall post the limited few that I took! Thanksgiving dinner was held at Sarah and Jay's house with assorted family members and friends turning up! We had food, drinks, hockey game games and so much fun,. A pretty impressive and memorable first Thanksgiving.


Cooking Phase 4 , Auxillary Team, Oshawa Division, in action
Over the course of the day we experienced two storms. The second storm was spectacular as lightning shot across the sky for about an hour before a pelting hail storm moved in. Below you can see the size of the hail stones as it rests on one of the girl's hands. Now imagine thousands of those coming at you. Scary, huh?



The feast. I only got around to taking one picture of the food, (and that's not even all of it below), as the raving savages that we are ensured little to no food was left. Some people made absolute pigs of themselves. I shall not point any fingers.


Sienna with her godmother, Jamie


There are times when the love of my life just baffles me and leaves me lost for words. Last night as people fought over white meat, brown meat or legs, Ian was busy rummaging through the innards of the turkey looking for the heart and liver. I was able to distract him for a few seconds to capture the image of his plate. The below can be regarded as his appetizer, a little piece of heaven, even to him. Absolutely revolting to me.



The Thanksgiving Table. I love the scattered leaves.


Grandad Jim with a rather shell shocked looking Sienna.


Jay grappling with the might of the turkey


Me with my first Thanksgiving turkey


Ian working on his Gordon Ramsay impression.


The most unflattering photo of Jamie, me and Shannon. I blame the photographer- no Mario Testino.

Sienna and Jim. Great picture! The defintion of happiness.

Ian made it as far as Jay and Sarah's bed. This photo was taken moments after Ian was almost decapitated after standing too high on the bed resulting in the room fan blades shot over his head. I think it was all the gel in his hair, creating the "brick" effect that saved his life.


Even the poor dog was pooped. Here is Tyson passed out at the bottom of the stairs.


Thursday, October 04, 2007

Look!

I finally got to see a real General Store. I had plans to go in and set up a slate but god damn it they were out of business. Paying attention to the name, anyone think that the owners were Irish?!



This is an odd little picture. Ian passes this on his way to work so while zipping by I managed to catch this shot. People are tying shoe wear to the tree without much of an explanation. Odd, yet interesting.
Allo Allo

"The Tudors" was mediocre at best. A rather odd choice in lead casting and a scene or two nicked from "A Man For All Seasons".

Sigh.

However our cable is working like a dream. It is a little slice of heaven to have hundreds of channels at my fingertips. I am rather enamoured with time delay programming. To explain- we pick up the same channels from 150 on but from British Colombia, so seeing as they are a few hours behind us, if I miss a show I can catch it at a later time. This was included in our package deal to prevent Ian and I killing each other. No one comes between me and 'America's Next Top Model' and the same can be said for Ian and his love of sports. Therefore, Domestic War should be at Danger Level-Green for the next few weeks, at least.

Today I was at a conference for work. Forget the conference! It paled in comparison to the food on offer. The event was being held at the Carlu in downtown Toronto. It's a swanky little place so I dressed to the nines and put on my best pouty face with my best killer heels to fit in with all the Marketing gurus. However, once my friend and I saw the food on offer all decorum went out the window as we loaded our plates to such an extent that observers would be forgiven for thinking a famine was fast approaching. Once the conference was done, we just HAD to go shopping. Hey, the conference was done early, we were downtown what else was there to do!? People, I cracked. I am ashamed to say I cracked. I KNOW Ugg boots are not fashionable in Europe anymore, but everyone has them here ( bear in mind North America is at least one season behind Europe fashionably) and they will keep my feet warm during winter and they look lovely under my three quarter length jeans and they aren't real Uggs and I had to buy them a size too big as they are flying out of stores and they only had one size in the colour I wanted and I love them and here they are. And before all the Canadians say something, yes, I know not to wear them in snow.




Ian and I travelled North last weekend to see the turning of the leaves. Magnificent. Sadly our photographic skills are not so magnificent and the resulting pictures fail to display the true beauty of an Ontario Fall. Nevertheless you are getting a look at some of them. You just know that I would be one of those annoying neighbours that would invite the whole street over to see my 'holiday snaps'. 'Here I am by the sun lounger, here I am on the sun lounger, here I am falling off the sun lounger, here is the sun lounger on its own, here I am with the waiter and the sun lounger...'. I really must do something like that soon........ repeats of annoying pictures but each with a humorous anecdote. Anyway, Fall pictures below




While on our Autumnal Tour, we came across a few stud farms. One had this young colt running around like a mad man so I felt compelled to stop and photograph Ian getting his finger eaten by a horse. A beautiful colt. I'd have stolen him if there had been room on the backseat.


We stopped at a farm to buy fresh bumbleberry pie (drool...) and while paying I noticed they had a pumpkin patch!! Even though I knew pumpkins grew in a patch, I had never really put two and two together. I was flabbergasted to see pumpkins growing on the ground. Again, for the North Americans, you would have to walk a long way to see a pumpkin patch in Ireland, so this was quite the eye opening experience. I think Ian feels he is with a child at times, such is my fascination with the simple things in life.

I cannot convey how excited I am to have my very first Thanksgiving this weekend! Hopefully one of the above pumpkins will be in my pie

Wednesday, October 03, 2007

"The Tudors" is premiering right now on CTV. I may pee with excitement. I'll be back in an hour