2009 Year In Review

Time: 11:38pm
Mood: Excited for 2010
Song of the moment: Jay-Z - Empire State Of Mind

So I'm knitting my first ever pair of mitts and I'm very eager to get back to them so this will have to be quick... and quick b/c 2009 is fast coming to an end! Talk about procrastination on this year in review!

This year was the year of doing what I set my mind to doing. I've always had the urge to travel to Tibet, so this year, me and my love set off on a Tibetian adventure that took us to various monasteries, to the Potala Palace (my true inspiration of going to Tibet) and of course, Everest Base Camp. What an adventure! And along the way we got a glimpse of Nepal (Kathmandu was amazing!) and India (two words - Taj Mahal. Wow!), which we hope to expore more in the near future!

I made a unspoken resolution in 2009 to obtain my professional engineering status. I am happy to say I achieved this goal 2 Friday's ago - I made it! haha!

I am definitely looking forward to 2010. I'm looking forward to Paris and Peru, and whatever adventures life will lead Jimmy and I.

Happy New Year everyone :D Here's to a fantastic 2010!

Preparing for Christmas

Time: 9:10pm
Mood: Exhausted from a long work week
Song of the moment: Boys Like Girls - Love Drunk

Who would have thought I would have to prepare for Christmas one month prior to the day? I'm finding as you get older, there are more Christmas things you need to do. The only thing I used to worry about was "what gift should I get so-and-so?". Now its thinking of gift ideas, putting up the Christmas tree, making the house look festive, planning Christmas parties, attending Christmas parties, baking cookies... and I'm adding a new one this year - planning Christmas Day dinner. That's just an extra added stress to my already stressful month! This year Jimmy's family is coming over for Christmas dinner. I have a few problems that I have to overcome:

• My dining room table isn't very spacious. That's because my dining room is not very big. So fitting everyone in there plus fitting all the food on my not-so-big table is going to take some creativity.
• What to cook. I have never prepared a Christmas dinner before, and if I was to, I would only know how to make (pardon my lack of racial sensitivity) "white people" Christmas food. You know - like turkey, stuffing, mash potatoes... stuff my mom makes. My inlaws are not big on that kind of food. I'm thinking I might just end up picking up something from a Chinese restaurant and leaving it at that.

Something new that I'm doing this year - instead of making gingerbread cookies I've decided to make small little chocolate dipped shortbread cookies. I made a "dry-run" batch because I haven't made shortbread cookies in a really long time, and I wanted to make sure the receipe I was using actually tastes good. Well thank God I did a dry run - I ended up overbaking the first batch I put into the oven. Smaller cookies = less bake time. Lesson learned!!

Home Renos and a Delicious NZ Lamb Burger!

Time: 7:53pm
Mood: Glad it's Friday!
Song of the moment: Taylor Swift - You Belong With Me

So the home renos over the long weekend went well, but boy was painting a pain in the arse! I finally understand why no one offered to help us with painting that weekend. I did get a pity-offer from my sister, and I think it was because I was complaining about how no one offered to help. LoL :D But after all the hard work it turned out really good! I'm in love with chair rails now after doing our living room! Photos to come (I did take photos but it was when the room was still a mess. Now that we have moved the furniture back to it's original position I will take another photo). We also got the California blinds we had ordered mid-August and they are looking good too! Our next project - kitchen backsplash! I brought back some tile samples today - really loving the tumbled marble look! LoL we're really trying to take advantage of the home reno tax credit the Canadian gov't is offering. Why not right?

So earlier this month I was invited out for dinner with two of my coworkers. Apparently they go out every year to celebrate each other's birthdays, and they always pick a restaurant listed in the top 10 new Toronto restaurants. After being invited for some strange reason I felt like I had entered into this exclusive club - I was IN!! It felt really nice to be included though. On Tuesday we went to this French restaurant called Loire on Harbord St. While I was there I had what I consider the best New Zealand lamb burger I've ever had in my entire life. I am still thinking about how delicious it was! It just melted in my mouth. I suppose anything that contains brie cheese is a good thing! Must definitely go back to have that delicious burger!

Boy am I glad it's Friday! This has been... for a lack of a better word.. a strange one. It felt off and apparently I'm not the only one that felt this way. I felt like I was doing a puzzle and I kept trying to fit the wrong pieces together. Nothing sat right this week! And frustrations hit a high for me. I need to relax! On a good note, I had put together a report that, according to the CEO of the company I work for, was a f**king good report :D Glad I was able to do something right this week!!

Blogging iPod

So I've installed this blogging app on my iPod touch and I figured since I'm having trouble sleeping I might as well try it out!

The long weekend is coming up and I must say I am getting pretty excited! I am finally taking the big leap and going to finally start painting the house! Only 2 rooms though (technically it's 3 but the kitchen and family room are essentially one room). I chose the colours this weekend after spending $40 on paint sample pots. Really glad I did it though as it really gave me a good idea what colours looked good. Let's just say if I didn't buy painter pots I would have been stuck with a wall that was more blue than gray, and a wall too pale in contrast with my creme couches!

I've never painted before - maybe that's why I am excited about it! Everyone is telling me I'm going to get sick of it really fast. Let's hope not! I've got lots of painting to do!

Photos - Nepal, Tibet & India (May 2009)

Neighbourly Gifts

Time: 7:17pm
Mood: Laughing-kinda-mood
Song of the moment: Lady Gaga - Paparazzi

Hello blogging world! It's been a while! I still have to blog about Jimmy and I's trip to Nepal, Tibet & India and the fact that I've lived up to my New Year's resolution this year and applied for my P.Eng designation :D But that can wait - esp. since I'm still compiling my photos from my trip!

So ever since Jimmy and I have moved into our house, we've noticed we have some rather strange neighbours with behaviour I can't quite understand. Before we had our fence, we noticed our neighbour would leave food outside in their yard. We once found a half eaten sub tossed out into their yard... another time we found they had set out an aluminum tray with food bits. I found this behaviour a little odd considering you usually try to avoid attracting animals onto your property. Unfortunately we were the ones that suffered for this weird behaviour - the food attracted a rabbits and they left a half a grocery bag full of rabbit shit all over our lawn. Poor Jimmy had to pick it all up. It screwed up our grass as well - where the rabbit craps were, we had patches of grass missing. We're still trying to fix the patches!

So after our fence came up we thought the situation would improve. In fact, it has gotten stranger...

A few months ago Jimmy was mowing the lawn when he found something that was just made us scratch our heads. He found a half raw chicken wing. wtf?! And it was near the side of the fence we share with our strange neighbour. Since then, we've found random plastic bags, and just today we found a empty dirty styrofoam container.

So I've decided starting today, I am going to keep track of what ridiculous things I find in my yard courtesy of my neighbour.

Back To Dearborn

Time: 10:07pm
Mood: Exhausted
Song of the moment: Franz Ferdinand - Ulysses

April is fast becoming the most stressful month of the year! So much as been going on at work that I really haven't found the time to prepare for my upcoming trip in May, except for two weekend when Jimmy and I made the trip downtown to MEC to buy some trip supplies - ended up spending $200+ on stuff! haha! But any chance I am able to squeeze in some down time I just want to laze around and do nothing. Like last weekend - Easter weekend - I didn't even go to church! I've digressing from a "seasonal" Catholic (only going to church during seasonal occasions) to a "wedding" Catholic (only going to chuch for weddings). I feel awful about that.

As I mentioned before, work has been nuts. I had to do a major presentation last week for a major flooring manufacturer - my first one since I started working here. It went really well - it was actually more of a discussion than a presentation, but still, I was nervous! I'm back in Windsor this week for work (sarcastic *yay*) to run some material trials. I'm stressed about the trials because things don't seem to be going the way I would like them to, and it might mean I have to come back next week Monday to finish off the trials. I really don't want to do that! On top of that (to add to the pressure), the materials I'm running need to be submitted for testing - a test that I'm flying out to view. Plane tickets are already booked, so the clock is ticking on this! Ahhh!!

So I took a trip over to Dearborn today - I haven't been there since I quit PMP. Why did I go? I had to buy some flooring products from Home Depot. Unfortunately they don't sell that product in the Canadian Home Depot, but they sell it in the States. So I figured, since I was already in Windsor, might as well drive over and buy it. So I was at the Home Depot, walking towards the flooring product section when all of a sudden this crusty man walked by me and said "Girl! You know you're sexy!" WTF?!? ROFLMAO! The moment he walked away I couldn't help but burst out laughing. Most hilarous thing ever! Stuff like that could only happen in Detroit! haha!

I ended up meeting with Ruby for dinner. I haven't seen here since I stopped coming down to Detroit. It was great seeing her again :D I always like seeing old friends!

*sigh* 3 more days until I can go home....

80K!

Time: 12:33pm
Mood: Happy!
Song of the moment: The Killers - Spaceman

My car hit 80K on my way to Windsor yesterday! Aww it's getting older...

To commemorate this occasion I took a picture :) Taking picture while you're driving - not recommended! LoL

Facebook vs. Twitter

Time: 9:09pm
Mood: Awful (my stomach is upset... again.. blah!)
Song of the moment: Ne Yo - Mad

I've been hearing all the buzz about Twitter and how it's the "in" thing to do in terms of internet social networking. So I thought I would check it out to see what all the hype was about.

I can see that Twitter basically took the most popular thing out of Facebook - updates on what the person is doing. I admit, when I do go on Facebook, I no longer browse through my friend's profiles, or write on their walls. I'm checking up on their status and commenting on them. But I find I still like Facebook better. It is possible that I'm just used to the idea of Facebook, but I still find it fun. Or would it because I simply have more friends using Facebook than Twitter?

I guess I like the idea of having the option of doing more on Facebook. Let me give you an example. Last year, my coworkers are I were engaged in a fighting game which involved vampires, warewolves, zombies and slayers (I'm sure a lot of Facebookers know what I'm talking about). I admit this game was the dumbest game ever but we got so into it. It got really competitive.. and I do mean REALLY competitive. We started forming alliances with each other, even going on message boards to find people to fight us so we could gain more points. But the point of the matter is, this website and it's little games brought us together - it was that fun thing we all did.

Although I'm still enjoy Facebooking every day, I'm going to continue to try out Twitter for the time being. Lets see how long this lasts....

My New Obsession

Time: 6:20pm
Mood: Tired
Song of the moment: Lily Allen - The Fear

Ever since I got my camera I've been obsessed about taking photos. I have completely exhausted the items I can take pictures of inside my house... my fireplace mantle clock has called it quits on being my model LoL. I have been itching to go outside and take photos but it's been so bloody cold outside. I want to really practice my outdoor photography skills in preparation for my trip this year. The worst thing to do is to learn during my trip - I'm going to have horrible photos!

I've been reading up a lot on photography and how to use the camera. I think I've skimmed the manual about 10 times and each time I pick up I find something I didn't know about. I know I know... I should just read it instead of skimming it. But those who know me well know I'm very impatient, so reading it just doesn't cut it.

The newest skill I've been practicing - metering :D

So back to the fact that I've been itching to take photos outside. So this past Sunday, Jimmy and I decided to take a small little hiking trek around a park near our house. Apparently there is a park that's a 5 minute drive from our house that has a nice 2km hiking trail. My parents were there earlier that morning and told me about it. Since it was a nice sunny day, and it wasn't too chilly outside, I thought it would be an excellent opportunity to take photos outside. I'm really glad I went because now I know what I need to improve :)

Here are some of the photos I took at the park... plus one of my mantle clock! LoL

First Post Of 2009... A Little Late Eh?

Time: 1:03pm
Mood: Alright :D
Song of the moment: Taylor Swift - Love Story

I know I know... late February... a little late for the first post of 2009! I find as my life stabilizes I blog less. There's less to talk about yet so much as happened! Let's begin shall we?

2009 has been great so far! I managed to book our trip for this year, and it's going to cost me a pretty penny! Jimmy and I are headed to Nepal, Tibet and India in May! I'm SUPER excited about this one. I ended up booking a tour through Gap Adventures because I can't stand those tours that whisk you onto a bus and shuttle you around like cattle. No thanks to that! And I got some hook-ups so I got a slight discount on my trip :D So the tour has me flying into Kathmandu, Nepal and spending a few days there, then off to Lhasa, Tibet for 2 days to acclimatize to the elevation. Then we're going around to various villages in Tibet, which also includes a brief hike to Everest Base Camp #1. From there I will head back to Kathmandu and that's the end of the tour. I decided to add a small trip 2-day to New Delhi, since I have a stop-over there anyway. I really want to check out the Taj Mahal, which is located in Agra (about a 2-3h train ride from Delhi). I'm very excited about that!

Because we are going on this awesome trip that will offer spectacular visuals of landscape and culture, we had to get a nice fancy shmancy camera to capture all of it! We decided to splurge on a Nikon D60. Now I'm OBSESSED with everything photography! I've always been interested in photography, but I've never acted on it. Let me tell you - it's an expensive hobby! This camera has become like a Barbie doll for me - I've been getting all these accessories for it! In addition to spending money on the camera and the lens kit that came with it, I also bought an additional lens kit, plus filters and and a camera bag to hold it all. And I'm planning to buy more! LoL but I'm loving my new hobby. I'm still learning all the settings but I'm slowly getting the hang of it. I'm getting sick of taking photos around the house though...all I want to do now is just go outside and take photos! But it's way too cold right now.

Jimmy turned the big 3-0 last weekend. I can't believe my hubby's an oldie now! hah! But I still love him just the same, if not more :D We had a fun celebration at home - a pot luck. There was more food that you can swallow! And he had 3 birthday cakes! One for each decade of his life :D It was a fun day, but what followed was not so fun. Jimmy came home early on Tuesday with the stomach flu. Right then and there I knew I was going to be the next victim. And sure enough I was. The stomach flu is the worst - you can't eat, you're in pain... not a fun time. I was out of commission for 2 days! I guess it was good Jimmy had it too... we kept each other company on our sick days :) Turns out we weren't the only ones that had it... my mother-in-law got it, my sister-in-law and her husband got it. And the worst one of all, my poor little nephew got it. Poor little guy! I really hope no one else that came to the party had it :S