picaloolu

the time for wallowing in after cruise blues is over.  the time for documentation is here.  these are a few pics that go with what i have already written.

feel free to congratulate me on how stupendously ugly i can make myself, as proven in the pic below.  this is taken on sarah's iphone in the toronto airport at a place called molson's pub.  truth is, i don't know if it's molson's or molson or what.  truth is, i don't much care. food and service were mediocre. we had buckets of cabin fever.  

sarah's caption: we're going on a cruise and you're not!

my favourite comments from fb:

Joseph McLean They're actually headed to a picturesque asylum for nutty people, but it's best if you just play along...

Bethany Clarke Shoults i find this picture alarming.

Alysha Clarke You guys are so attractive.

Karey Van Wieren I'm sure there will be a lot more pics like this by the end of the cruise. Have so much fun!!!

Doug Clarke Kyle offends me in this picture

every time i read doug's comment, i glance up at kyle and burst out laughing.

these next few pics were taken after we completed our self guided ship tour while were still in port and waiting to be under way and called to our muster station C

i felt like documenting the sky so i did.

 kyle and sarah chillin like villians.  i think this was deck 4.

 hi.  it's my 2nd day birthday and i'm on a cruise ship with some tiny heads.

later in the pool...

 a pencil jump in a tarty number.

 kyle pencil jumps and sarah goes dynamic.  not surprising from one of the co-creators of dynamic boccie ball.

  this may be the last pics taken of those particular sunnies.

 sisters in a pool on a cruise.  sarah tied my hair into a knot so i wouldn't get it wet.  she's a pal like that.

 kyle in the hot tub with the ladies.  keepin' it real.  so many times on this trip kyle made faces and expressions that reminded me of adriel.

 i read two sophie kinsella books on this trip.  one mostly on the way there and one mostly on the way back.  at this point i was almost finished.  then sarah and i traded.  she brought shopaholic and wasn't  far into it.  real neighbourly of her.

 our first night in the golden dining room with EDUARDO and ALBERT, kyle's brothers from another mother. note the gold wallpaper with cherry blossoms motif.  notice it and dig it.  sarah is wearing my newly purchased cruise shades.

 happiness!

vacay diaries 1

Well sarah and kyle are running right now.  I’m on my Pullman bed.  For those of you who don’t know, that’s a bunk bed.  We woke up at 9am, so much for my idea of doing the sunrise stretch!  Oh well. 

So anyways our night in Miami—we got there after 11pm and checked into our riverpark hotel (kind of scungy) and then weren’t tired.  12am Miami is only 9pm Vancouver, so…  so I forgot to say that a little guy in a bright pink button up shirt (one button undone in themiddle) and a very tall guy in a polo shirt helped us at the front desk.  Little Hispanic pink shirt—I could hardly understand anything he said.  He was spry and energetic.  Tall black guy—he was quiet.  Anyways pinkshirt said it was Saturday and not time for bed.  He was right.  When we left the hotel we found ourselves in a deserted part of town, and not too good looking either.  We wandered around a bit and found a Columbian restaurant open, which we did not go eat at.  Then kyle asked a guy walking behind us where we should go.  He told us to cross the bridge and we would find a Mexican place open.  That’s what we did.  It was super humid out, and not cold but super windy.  I enjoyed the wind. 

It seemed like we walked forever and did not find anything.  I was giving up hope.  Then kyle asked another guy and he told is it was all just on the street behind and directed us to go through a garage to the 3^rd stair on the right.  I believe very firmly in the 3^rd stair.  Well as soon as we came out onto the next street there were people and lights and life.  And there was the Mexican restaurant.

It blew our minds.  Blew. Our. Minds.  We each ordered something and shared.  I got carnitas, which was three small tortillas with yummy shredded pork on them and then you added pico de gallo (YUMMIEST), guac, and some sauted veggies.  Delish.  We each had one.  Kyle got something that came in a stone bowl, which he is prone to do.  It had yummy steak bites, and Mexican sundry that you piled in a tortilla.  Sarah got the super nachos.  We realized too late how large a plate of super nachos would be in the united states of large helpings.  And it was massive.  And it was the most delicious thing ever.  And we ate and were satisfied beyond description.

The walk back to ghettoville was shorter than I thought.

We slept without incident.

The next day we got out of our rooms by 11 and went down to the lobby where there was wifi.  We all logged in to our various devices.  While there we met a couple on the next couch.  They were going on the same cruise as us.  Kyle wanted us to walk to the port, something sarah and I felt iffy about.  Well this couple said there was a shuttle going there that cost only 6 bucks each so we signed on too.  The couple was from cincinatti ohio, and I was surprised at that by their accent.  Anywho the shuttle was supposed to pick us up at 12pm.  And there we were, all waiting for it outside the hotel when up pulls a taxi van.  We’re all, yo.  We’re waitin on the SHUttle yo!  He’s all yo, I charge y’all 15 bucks totally yo, that’s a cheap deal yo!  We’re all sold yo!  So we all cram into this taxi van, us and the couple, and he crams our luggage in, in unbelievable ways.  Like sarah and I were sitting in the back and the floor was sarah and kyle’s suitcase.  Yo.  Also none of the seatbelts seemed to work.  Also if we had walked we’d be dragging our suitcases on the shoulder of the highway.  Good idea kyle.  Ya that lookout is only a 4 minute hike.  1 minute per kilometre. 

When we got to the port this friendly blackman who was a porter helped us with tagging our luggages.  So we didn’t understand most of what he said.  We stood there standing like dummies  with blank faces while he was giving us instructions, over and over and yet we did not know what to do.  Finally he slowly and gently gave us instructions and we finally understood.  Like I pride myself in being able to understand people, but I did not know that English that he was speaking.

We weren’t supposed to get to the port before 1pm but the place was hoppin’.  We got in line not far behind a guy carrying a flat of water.  Does this guy think there’s no water on the ship?  I felt it was super wiewd that he was bringing a flat of water and could not help dwelling on it.  so we wound around to a lady who took our pics, gave us our cards and a map of the ship and then we went up some stairs and showed our cards a couple of times to some more people and then we were ON BOARD.

Once on board we wanted to head to the lido deck which is deck 9.  We know the lido deck because the lido deck is the food deck.  And we hadn’t eaten one single morsle yet that day.  However there was a bit of a jam up of the elevators. It took a while to find one going up, but eventually we nabbed one and stepped out onto the lido deck.  There was music blaring and people were already in the pool and hot tubs with drinks in hand.  I was all, did those people come to the cruise in their swim suits??

The first place we saw to eat was the burger joint, and we all chose the ringer.  Then sarah and I topped ours with mushrooms, bacon and carmalized onion.  Kyle ate his pure.  Kyle went and got us lemonade.  The lemonade was so strong that after I took mine and sarah’s back and filled it half way with water, it was still too strong.  Strong eh?  I found a soft serve ice cream and frozen yogurt machine and helped myself.  Then when we were done we decided to give ourselves a tour of the boat.  So we dropped our carry on luggage off in our room and discovered one king size bed in it.   it looked as though we were going to have a cozy night.

Then using our little map we checked out everything from top to bottom.  By the time we were done my feet hurt and I was tired.  We rested.

At basically 4 we had to go to muster station c for our emergency blah blah blah.  That was a bit of a tortuous thing.   Waiting in line ups, in layers with everyone’s body heat glowing.  A little girl behind me threw up.  It was a big deal, her family left, a person came in to clean it up.  Sarah had no idea of any of it occurring. Lala land.  When that was all over we gladly left.

That’s when we donned our suits.  I picked out a tarty number for sarah from her plethora of suits.  I wore my black polka dotted two piece tankini with a skirt and a black sundress maxi cover-up. Sarah had a short poip sundress cover up. We rocked the boat with our awesomeness.  When we got on to the top deck we were already moving away from miamaiamiami.  We found a spot and peaked at the sights.  Then we lay on some beach chairs.  I had a book.   We soon moved because it was so windy and although I tucked my hair under me,  sarah couldn’t.

We found ourselves on the back of the boat on the lido deck.  We found ourselves dipping our feet in the pool, and then we found ourselves sitting on the edge and suddenly we found ourselves in the pool itself.  I took clicks.  It was fun.  So we checked out the hot tubs.  Met some girls.  Got out, had some pizza… sarah and I had the funghi and kyle had the proscioutto.  I dripped.  I dripped hard. 

Eventually we came back to our rooms to change for dinner.  Sarah was the only one who changed to be brutally honest.  When in our rooms we met neil.  Neil wasn’t waiting for us in our room or anything.  Neil was at the door. Neil is our stateroom steward.  Sarah and I talked to him.  He said he would have my Pullman bed down and we decided that between 6 and 7 would be a good time.  We asked him a few questions about room service and sundry. 

It’s time to talk about neil.  Sarah and I wanted to wax our bikini lines but we have no way of warming up our wax.  We were discussing what to do and I said we could ask neil to warm it up.  And then I said “oh neeeilll!” in a high pitched snooty old woman way that can’t quite be described, “please heat up this wax for me!”  which really hit our funny bone.  “oh neeeeiiillll!” has become a constant saying.  As I was going into the bathroom this morning to change I dropped my garment top “oh neeeiiillll!” I crooned “I dropped something!”  kyle was getting out of the shower and held my wax out of the door “oh neeeeiiil!” he called in a hilarious falsetto.  “be a dear and wax kyle’s back!” sing songed sarah and i.  every time we come up with a new “oh neeeiiil” we kill ourselves with our hilarity.

Our dining time is whenever we want and our room is the golden dining room.  Our servers were Arnold and Eduardo and both were from the philipines.  Kyle has a bond with them that will never die.  I was undecided as to what appy I wanted but kyle was getting one of my choices and so I went for the other one.  Kyle got a tomato gazpacho.  It was really good and refreshing.  Sarah got a very very measly guac and chip and salsa.  I got smolked salmon with one candied cherry tomato.  We all chose the prawns with sweet and sour sauce and garlic fried rice noodles.  Kyle got a second  entrée thanks to Eduardo.  Tilapia.  So so.  Sarah and I got crème brule’s.  sooooo good.  Kyle got black forest cake 7/10, says kyle.  Wait! Depends on whether I’m rating it out of deliciousness or, out of how good a black forest cake could ever be? He asks.  So here’s the run down.  9/10 for black forest cakes, and 7/10 for deliciousness. 

 Last night after dinner we watched a show in the amber theatre.  There were some super cheesey singers and dancers.  One guy particularly made us laugh.  All the girls had long single braids from the top of their heads and sparkly dresses.  All the guys had velour suits with wide open vests that revealed their chests.    When doing ‘the edge of glory’ some dancers spun the singers around on some bleachers.  Then came the opening show with the cruise director named josh who seems to want to be called the big sexy.  Josh asked people where they were from and what they were celebrating etc. 

When we left the amber theatre  we decided to go to the hot tub.  Sarah was reluctant at first because she didn’t want to be freezing cold right after she got out but then she realized the bathrobes would work for such a purpose. 

So we changed and went in the hot tub where we found a guy from California, san jose actually.  We found out later he was a marine.  After a while the girls we met in the hot tub earlier came and had some flirtin’ with the marine.  They didn’t remember us.     We thought they were a doobie group. 

When the hot tub closed we found ourselves on the lido again and bam! Snack foods.  Our favourite is the chicken tenders foccocia sandwich.  Yumzie.   Snacky snacky beddy beddy.

It’s a crime to be so fine at 39!

My birthday started out with me missing my alarm and sleeping in half an hour later than I meant to.  Then I ran around like a person unhinged, frenzied and full of nervous energy.  Basically I flibberty-gibbetted about until dad arrived to pick us up.  Dad was rightfully indignant because I called him to make sure he would be on time and he drove like a mad man to get to my house and then found a mad woman inside.  I couldn’t find my new sunnies.  I forgot my just purchased sunscreen.  I hyperventilated.

I thought I left my sunnies at work so we stopped there to check.  They weren’t there.  “maybe they were in my purse all along.” I say in an unnaturally bright and chipper manner, a feverish gleam in my eye.  Dad looked at me. “laura, remind me never to travel with you.”  At which I could only laugh too heartily at.  “I’m not usually this bad!” I say to no one.  Dad’s saying how crazy mom gets.  Well I come by it honestly then, don’t I folks.

Dad gave me 20 american buckeroos for my birthday.  Thanks pops!  He dropped us off and kissed us goodbye and we fairly bounded into the terminal ready for adventure.  I had told sarah and kyle, a self proclaimed “fun couple” that it was their job to find me moon over my hammy for breaky.  So we naturally had to call out to each place we passed “moon over my hammy??”  finally I settled for a breakfast bagel (egg, cheese and ham) and sarah and kyle both got butter chicken wraps.

Me and kyle were seated together with sarah in front.  I traded with sarah and found myself in between a businessman going over some papers and little Indo Canadian woman returning to Toronto after a month away in Australia.  Me and the lady chatted a bit before we took off, but besides a short head lolling nap, I read my sophie kinsella book most of the way to Toronto.

We had a 4 hour lay over in teranna, so we spent a lot of it eating at the molson pub.  I got a not very good montreal smoked meat sandwich.  Kyle got a blue cheese bacon burger and sarah got fish and chips, except the chips were yammers.  After that we found our gate and settled in for some harry potter uno.  Kyle won each and every time which bugged sarah and i.

On the flight to Miami we were all together.  I got the window seat which pleased me very much….i really have to sleep now.  Suffice it to say we made it to Miami ami ami ami ami!  

once there was a girl who was old but still a girl. one day she decided to get up off of her bed, stop playing bubble shoot and go to the mall to look for a sun/maxi dress at old navy.  and so she did.  on the way to the mall the girl checked out her baked-potato-burnt-uvula in the rear view mirror and thought to herself about how  fun it was going to be to go on a cruise and not only that, but how fantastic a cruise would be with the right kind of cruise clothes.  soon the girl arrived at the mall.  i will look at vibram 5 finger shoes first! she inwardly exclaimed to herself. when the girl found out that 5 fingers were on sale she felt temptation but did not falter.  this did not, however, stop her from wasting the sales girl's time with five finger questions.

the girl then entered old navy and began to browse, keeping her eye out particularly for sun dresses/maxi dresses.  after collecting 3 or 4 appropriate numbers she retired to the fitting room to change.  a nice lady gave the girl a change room and it was the exact moment that the girl stepped into the change room that she saw it.  she saw what everyone the five finger sales girl, the mall patrons and other shoppers and had most certainly seen.  her fly was down and gaping open revealing a flash of brilliant white underneath.  perfect, thought the girl, just perfect.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            

a weekend in squameesh with H

wow.  i've been a bad bad blogger as well as a bad bad person because worth depends on how often you blog, as everyone knows.

ok so i'm in squameesh right now for conference weekend.  it's my conference tradition.  all year heather comes to visit me on lulu island.  twice a year i visit her in the mountains.  when heather visits me, i may or may not clean my house.  i may or may not have food in the house.  when i visit heather, she has a clean house with my bed already made and lots of food planned.  what i'm saying is that besides being a bad person and a bad blogger, i'm a bad host!  hahahahah....no.  i'm saying i appreciate what a good host heather is.  she's grrrrreat!

speaking of grrrrrrrrrrrrrreat, has anyone noticed what a terrific rolling 'r' president Uchtdorf has?  it's amazing.  he does a fantastic job rolling off all those names from all those different places.  i mean i like  watching him read the names of all the releases and all the new callings.  he doesn't just read them off. he puts excellence into it and i appreciate it.

i have really enjoyed watching conference so far.  i feel like so many of my thoughts and struggles and doubts and questions and deep down needs are met and answered in an overflowing, flood, spilling over and out and around kind of way.  he is a giver of good gifts.  hunger and thirst are satisfied.  windows of heaven do pour out blessings that i don't have room enough to receive.  i have learned that this he is constant and he keeps his promises.  i so wish that i kept mine better.

yesterday afternoon heather and i went 'downtown' squamish and did some lookiloos in the shops there.  there were lots of cute neato things that i wasn't willing to spend any of my meager cashflow on.  but then we came to a store front that said "bookstore"  "what!  i didn't know we had a bookstore!" exclaimed heather in surprise and delight.  we walked in.  it wasn't a book store towering with books in every corner by any means.  i'd describe it as quite sparse.  a man sitting behind a table with a ziplock baggie of cash explained to us that the bookstore was a community boookstore, that all adult books were 2.00 and all children's books were 1.00, and that all the money went to literacy.  you have to agree that literacy is a very good cause and that the price was right.  i didn't think i would find anything but that didn't stop me from diligently looking.

as i browsed i couldn't help but smile as the man behind the table with the ziplock of cash kept interrupting heather's browsing with instructions and what i would call 'unwanted info'.  heather was very nice about it.  nicer than i would have been, i feel.  anyways somewhere between browsing and smiling i found a book by sofie kinsella, which i snapped up because i learned from the last book of hers that i read, she is a super funny and sometimes hilarious as well, read.  then on a back table i found two treasures.  each were books, as one would expect in a BOOKSTORE , and each were poster sized books of posters of art.  by artists.  one was a bunch of different posters by different artists who made posters for different things.  the other is all by gustav klimt. i  love his work despite the frequent appearance of gratuitous nips.  so instantly i think this is cool because its' basically two books full of posters of art, some of which i can put up if i am so incline and others of which i can use to make cool things, such as books or WHATEVER I WANT.  so i bought them and am pleased with them.  one poster is even in SWEDISH.  hey! I SPEAK SWEDISH!  i hope you see how this is special and exciting.

we also went into this shop that was towering and squished with none other than piles and piles and piles of junk.  it reminded me of an inside version of the recycling place store.  heather said the store made her clausterphobic.  i try to emphathize with people who have feelings of clausterphobia, but its' hard because it's a feeling i don't ever feel.  although sometimes when walking through a store that is dimly lit with narrow aisles, i do feel some rage.  but that's different.  anyways i wanted to go in so heather came in with me, which was nice of her.  she's a nice person.  we've established that.  after inching our way down the barely traceable path that one might call an aisle if one is feeling generous, and down the other 'aisle' to the front, knocking over with a clatter a stack of tea cups placed on the floor just at the corner when one might run into them with almost 100% certainty...after that, i saw some cameras and lenses on the shelf behind the till.  i asked the sketchy looking but pleasant enough proprietor if they had any pentax lenses.  he half heartedly lifted a few lenses and then asked me if i wanted to come look.  i agreed and gingerly picked my way over to the shelf.  i then went through what lenses there were, some had tabacco leaf dust inside, others were precariously balanced on empty video boxes, and others were underneath naked plastic dolls.  they were all labeled 50.00.  the only pentax thing i found was a flash.  when i was done i looked around.  i didn't see heather.  could she have left the store, overcome by the threatening, leering piles of junk?  or was she swallowed up by the bowels of the store as i perused the filthy lenses?  i squeezed by some ladies and went outside. she wasn't there.  just as i began to think that heather was no more, that she probably lay, curled up in a ball in the stomach of the store who ate her, slowly being digested into junk herself, she emerged out of the darkness of the store into the sunlight of downtown squamish.  we looked at each other.  we were both survivors.  we made it out.  we were our own support group.  we shopped on.

after looking at some other stores and finding a bakery that was also a wool shop and bulk tea, organic nuts and grains and pastas and treats store we decided to explore a little bit.  i observed an abandoned building down by the river and we explored it. it was clear that a homeless person lived there and i think we met him as we left.  he had a long wiry grey beard and curly hair.  he answered a soft "hi" to my cheery "hello" as we both crossed the train tracks going the opposite direction.

heather showed me some apartment buildings that she lusted after.  perhaps.  she's not sure.  but she does like them.

then we drove to a view point but decided not to get out of the car and to drive to the sign and read it from inside.  then we drove to marin park.  the same place where years before karey, barb and i went for a quick impromptu dip in the lake.  the lake, which is browning lake, not marin lake as we thought, lies right beside the highway.  heather and i walked around a bit, went up on top of a bluff of sorts where a bench was waiting for us.  we sat for a few minutes but heather was hungry and that propelled us on.

we made enchiladas.  well heather made them.  i just performed some support duties like chopping two different kinds of onions and crumbling goat cheese.  that's right i said goat cheese!  these enchiladas had black beans and zuchini, onion and goat cheese was the filling.  enchilada sauce on top with some more goat cheese crumbled on top of that.  wow and yum.

then we watched two episodes of little dorritt which heather had not seen.

then we went to bed.  both nights i had more than 8 hours sleep and vivid interesting dreams.

time for the next session of conference.

hi!

i'm just back from our ward's relief society birthday party.  everyone shared their talents and put up displays of what they were into.  i was asked to do a short presentation on mine.  i'm glad they asked me, otherwise i might not have gone, truth be told.  i did a slide show on lil' lappie of some of my favourite photos from the last couple of years and i brought my blog book.  i talked about getting my first camera when i was 12 and how hilariously bad my first photos were, but how i fell in love with photography from that time.  how i am a recorder.  i want to capture, record and store everything.  i want to always remember and help other people remember our lives and our history.  i said photography inspires me and helps me see the beauty in the world.  to stop and see the little beautiful miracles around us.  that people are so beautiful and they don't know it, and how i love to capture it in them, and in their relationships.  then i danced a jig and put a feather in my cap.  i did.  i really did.

it was great to get to know people better and see the things they are passionate about.  it was also great to get lots of compliments from people (not going to lie!  :) ).  i found out that sister roeder loves to read.  as i was looking through her pile of books, she pointed out one to me and said she thought of me when she was bringing it.  i was surprised. "me?"  honto ni!? she lent it to me and i can already tell i'm going to love it.  it's called the diary of a provincial lady by e.m. delafield.  as sister roeder said "it's a teeeeensy bit sarcastic."  to which i say, perfect!

and i found out that melissa umbach besides being amazing at painting and sewing is also very into photography.  she had a book that she did of a safari that her and her daughter went on.  looked AHmazing!  

weissy chan made these amazing crocheted animals, and monsters, and fruit etc, for toys for her girls. i want to learn how to crochet just for that.  and sister anderson can break a board with her karate skilz... and sister deyell had these awesome stories from when she was a nurse in 1st nation and inuit communities up north...  

ya so anyways, it was cool....

i had an interview on monday.  it's for a job i applied for to do respite care for families with kids who have developmental disabilities.  my co-worker una suggested i apply for it (she's been doing it for a while)  well the interview was an hour long and INTENSE.  i got asked some pretty hard questions but it went pretty well.  then i had to go through a screening process.  a note from my doc.howie that i'm physically and mentally able, a written work reference and two written character references, people who had seen me working with kids aaaaaand a criminal record check.  apparently i got it all done in record time. i have orientation on monday.

this job is cool because i actually work as a contractor.  i choose my hours and who i work with and what we'll do.  i really like the flexibility of it.  after all of this, then kerstin, my coordinator will set up some meets with some families.  

yesterday while i was out being a newsie, (sometimes i listen to the newsie song in the midst of delivering papes too!), i noticed cherry blossoms just beginning to bloom and some weeping willow buds are starting to unfurl their leaves.  weeping willows are always amongst the first to leaf up.

when i got home from delivering papes, i was soaked through and through so i decided to have a shower and do my hair right then and there.  then against all reason, i pinned up my whole head of hair and went to bed.  woke up as a chubby 38 year old shirley temple in no mood for tap dancing.  as sarah says "when will you learn?".  yes, when??  a few people thought i got my hair cut because of how much shorter my hair looked.

my computer might die any minute.  i keep getting these foreboding messages from it.  not cool, little lappie.  not cool.

 

evan and i have just made a pact.  let it be done.

after a month of darkness i finally changed the light bulbs in my bedroom.  thanks to one karey van wieren for talking me through the process.

i leave you with a recent self portrait.  i think my eye looks grey.  once a blood donor clinic nurse asked me if i had grey eyes.  now i see why.

 be afraid.  be very afraid.

in which i spew forth

friday was the day of the party. sometimes when lisa house sits for her rich aunt she has a party.  this was one of those times.  lisa told me to leave work early to start on the paper route so i could make it to the party on time.  this is because parties are important.  

i set out with my load of papers at about 2:20.  nothing of real importance happened except that mid way through the route the light sprinkling turned into a steady downpour.  i got drenched.  i'm drrrenched! i said to myself, rolling the rrrrs like mrs. harris in anne of green gables.  "they et jonas selkirk." is what naturally followed.  then i had a private laugh.  it took me 3 hours and when i was done there was not a dry speck of flesh on my bod.

i dropped my clothes in a sodden heap on the door mat and streaked to the bedroom for some dry clothes.  i blow dried my hair to some semblance of presentableness, although frizzy and applied some make-ups.  then i went to the party.

the party was alright.  a large contingent left soon after i got there.  dave was super drunk already.  "he arrived drunk." lisa kept saying.  it was over by 8.  i drove kaz and stephen to the skytrain and went home and watched some shows.

saturday was my dim sum date with long lost selinas. turns out that her and her new hubby live like almost right beside my work. wuuuut.  it was nice catching up with her, getting to know her husband kelly a little bit and eating good foods.  selina introduced me to a new dim sum thing that i have never tried.  i don't really know how to describe them. they are balls filled with this liquidy yellow stuff that is sweet and salty.  sweet and salty are magic words, am i right?  deeelish.   

after dim sum i picked up some stuff at shopper's drug mart and went home and proceeded to spend most of the day on my back with my computer on my chest researching ways in which i could go live in sweden for a year--finding nothing, but the old longing.  amy started it all by sending me this link to a swedish photographer who does beautiful, very scandinavian work. 

 by the time the sun had set i decide to get up and go to a movie with a pass i got with my save on more points.  i went to see jack the giant slayer and enjoyed it very much.  when i got home i discovered a swedish series on netflix about a criminal journalist who was always getting into adventures.  i started watching the hour and a half episodes and couldn't stop.  in the morning the first words i thought were in swedish.  then i thought, how can i possibly go to church when i feel so abominably tired.  but i went and jerked in and out of doziness during sacrament meeting.  but luckily i did go because leilani was sick and mei lin left as soon as i walked into the primary room and only one teacher from junior primary was there.  that woke me up a bit.  

it was a good primary time though and the time flew as it always does.  after was choir.  we're doing an easter mash up and i think it's going to be good.  it combines the somberness of O Savior Thou who Wearest with the rejoicing of He is Risen.  back and forth.  key change or two.  bellybuttonangus.

at home i quickly ate a bowl of brown sugar and cinammon kashi with frozen raspberries and went to bed.  i set my alarm clock for 2 hours so i could get up and make rice for the potluck.  well i woke up at ten after six, after hitting the snooze button for what must have been the thousandth time.  the pot luck started at five thirty.  needless to say i brought nothing.  mom's rabbit curry had to stand on it's own but it did.  in fact it was delish.  i missed out on tracy's one rib a piece ribs. i thought of snatching one off of somebody else's plate but i didn't.  

lots of discussions and debates were had.  one interesting one was the ranking of offensive words.  mom kaiboshed that one though because of the grandkids.  madelaine was super disgusted by the utterance 'pallow' instead of pillow.  "pallow???  PALLOW??! throw it up in the toilet!" she exclaimed, causing doug to laugh in some shock.

delanie made a yummy pound cake and we had it for caleb and gabriel's birthdays.  next week is gabriel's baptizim.

evan has new couches and i didn't know.

a gaggle of geese

the snow geese visit often.  today i parked along side of them but as i got out of my car something startled them and the huge flock rose up, honking and raucous and were out of sight beyond the trees in seconds, leaving behind some surprised and stodgy mallards.  they looked around as if to say "what's their problem?" and waddled slowly about their business in the grass.  by the time i was up the stairs and meeting archie's soft round mewing head at the door, the gaggle was back circling the field and wildly flapping as they landed.  i stayed and watched them, amused.  here's some clicks i took one saturday in january.  january 26th to be precise.

i like the feet in the upper right corner.  i like how they glide in like airplanes before they drop with a flutter.

if last friday's paper route was a poem, yesterday's was not.  a couple of times i seriously considered throwing the papers in the watery ditch and going home.  yesterday's papers were super thick.  they didn't all fit in my cart.  they didn't come close to fitting.  the best i could do was stack them in, stuff down the sides and then keep stacking.  they reached far above the handle.  it was raining so i draped my tarp over the lot.  when i went to push the beast, the front wheels wouldn't budge.  it seems the papers were so heavy that the bar was pushed over the stop and down on the wheel.  somehow i managed to tip the tower back and rest it on my chest as i clumsily steered it on it's back wheels. hard to steer and heavy to boot.  stopping to deliver at my first house, a pile of papers slid out from under the tarp and fell in the wet dirt, flyers scattering everywhere.  i delivered a few wet and muddy papers as a result.  then a while down the road it happened again.  grrr.  grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.  instead of throwing the whole cart and it's load in the ditch and storming off with my thunder feet, i wrapped the tarp a different way, leaned the cart against me and jogged towards the next houses.  before long it all became more manageable and after a while i was able to lift the bar off of the wheel which was a great relief.  there was one insert that received the hate of my heart.  a little booklet about richmond attractions.  it slipped out of the folds of the paper countless times causing my everlasting enmity towards it.  at one of my last houses i was walking confidently down the drive in the pitch dark.  suddenly my ankle turned at an exact 90 degree angle, bouncing off the grass beside the drive and snapping back up.  i felt three things: surprise, pain and resignation.  i hobbled on, finished my route and rattled home with my empty cart.  my shoes and socks and pants were soaked.  i shed them all at the door, quickly ate some lettuce wraps and then climbed into bed.

please let the papers be smaller tomorrow.

at work right now i'm working on this project.  i'm going to hang pictures of all sorts of fruits and vegetables in the dinning room.  i'm writing health benefits on the backs.  i'm learning lots of things, like cabbage leaves can be used as a poultice for arthritic joints and tomatoes are native to south america, the cherry tomatoes from then andes, are the oldest.  almost every fruit or vegetable fights against cancer, helps your heart or skin, or eye sight.  apples can help your diarrhea OR constipation.  wild eh? avacados, besides being the perfect because it has protein, healthy fats, and carbs, helps with mood swings, depression and exhaustion.  potatoes have enough vitiamin c to protect against scurvy.... anyways, i'm enjoying this project, which i work on in all my spare time at work.

today sarah and i were texting about what she was going to make for dinner.  i felt it was a good time to ask her "are you going to have another bebe?"  her answer was "and yes.  we're going to make the bebe on the cruise. winky face."  great.  we're all sharing the same room.  guess i'll have to spend time at the late night buffet.