This kind of winter

I love this kind of winter.

A massive winter storm rolled in over night and hasn't let up all day.  I don't have to worry about driving to work, so I enjoyed the snowy-but-warm walk to the station and hopped on the train and made it to work early.  Then I watched the river valley turn completely white from my office window until 2:57, when they sent out an email telling us all to go home.

The train was totally running smoothly, and the driver even made announcements about the treacherous conditions on the platforms telling us to watch our step and have a great evening.  I love it when LRT drivers talk like they are flight pilots.  Makes my day every time.  The platforms have piles of snow that were almost as big as the ones I remember from my childhood.

After trudging (literally) through the deep snow, I arrived home and decided to shovel my car out, the driveway, the sidewalks, etc.  The entire time, my iPod chose songs on shuffle that were totally rocking my face off.  M. Ward, Wilco, Stars, Sufjan Stevens.  It took about an hour and when I got into the house the bottoms of my pants WEREN'T EVEN WET.  That is how fluffy this snow is, my friends.

Let's do a quick recap: snow day, fluffy snow, lrt, awesome!

Enjoy it.

My brother sewed a stuffed penguin on his own initiative.

Last weekend, my sis came to town for a crafting weekend with me, my mom, and my sister in law. it ended up with the kidlets as well as scott and my dad, and it was such a great weekend.

We busted out Amy Grant's "A Christmas Album", and ate dessert for breakfast while we worked on various projects and hung out. Kaeli sewed stuffed birds out of fabric from Italy. I worked on flags for the Royal Bison. Francis made some a gingerbread house and train set with Heidi. Geneva was adorable. Mom knit. Dad teased us and read the paper. And our brother, Scott, sewed a stuffed penguin, with a little help from us.

Ingenuity

Although I sometimes get teased for my 'methods', sometimes I just have to risk the teasing and share the genius.

My most recent stroke of brilliance came when - after weeks of hunting for wool tights so that I could extend the dress wearing season late into the fall (thus putting off the inevitable evil of winter that is wearing DRESS PANTS to work) - I wore my new tights once and busted a hole through the toes. Darn toenails.

Soooo, I pulled out my tiniest pair of ankle socks and slid them on first next time I wore my tights. Not only are my feet totally warmer when I walk to work in the morning, but you would NEVER KNOW that I have socks on under my tights. Seriously people.

And, in summary, that is how much I hate dress pants.

Rolodex Love

Growing up I often asked for very...utilitarian...Christmas and birthday gifts.  Dustbusters, rolodexes.  So, I've had (and loved) this rolodex for many years, but because I just can't leave stuff alone once I get in in my head that it might be spray-paintable I did a little rolodex makeover this weekend.  All it involved was spraying the dividers with my favourite blue paint and affixing cork letters.  Easy and so much cuter now.

Little things that make my day better

I love customizing the spaces that I occupy; however, I once read an article that said people will view you as unprofessional if you have too many personal artifacts in your work space.  These two things are butting heads.  So, I have to be sneaky in my customization.  And it is the little things that bring me tiny bits of joy throughout the day.  Some of them are obvious and some of them more clandestine.  So today I stealthily snapped some photos of them and here they are, starting from the left upperhand corner:

• A plant from my dear friend Karen (plants are innocuous enough, right?), with a card from my dear co-worker Amy stuck on a card pick.  
• Next, a totally vintage tape dispenser that I found (to my extreme joy) in the reject cupboard at work.  I quickly grabbed it and switched it with my black plastic one.  It rocks.  
• Natasha's show postcard from last year, and a red polka dot nail file that I keep on hand to prevent those pesky rough edges that send me into nail biting fits.  
• My desk phone, which I frequently use to call Amy (who, coincidentally is leaving me for another job at the end of next week.  Sadness.  Amy if you are reading this: I WILL MISS YOU and our daily chats).
  
• My many pairs of shoes.  Usually hidden in a filling cabinet, but some of them end up on the floor under my desk.
• A felt bird I made last year before Christmas and put up as a decoration.  I could never bear to take it down.  Plus it looked so cute with the typewriter key thumbtacks.
• Framed Emily Carr postcard from Lisa.  I love it.  Had it at my last job too, but I recently painted the frame.

So, there you have it.  A little tour of the things that make me smile throughout the workday.  

The mounting obsession with coconut

I decided last minute that Joel must have coconut cupcakes for his birthday, so I headed to the grocery store over my lunch break in search of some vanilla cupcake ingredients.  I planned to just buy some coconut and sprinkle it on top of them as a finishing touch, since the two of us have been egging each other on in our coconut obsessions.  In the cake section, I found a boxed 'Barefoot Contessa' coconut cupcake mix, so I took it as a sign and bought it.  It was amazing.  And the cupcakes were beautiful.  

 

And the birthday boy was happy.

Parkour!

I took a quick trip east this past week to visit my old friend and former co-editor of the Chronicle, Lisa DeMoor. I blame our shared history of ridiculously late nights spent bonding in the Chronicle office for the silliness that eventually ensued. But I'll get to that later. First I have to mention a few of the other things that I did while I was away.

Firstly, we drove straight from the airport to Toronto to see U2 play a show at the skydome. It was awesome. They had the roof rolled back, which meant that the CN Tower was visible right next to us, all lit up in (slightly tacky) coloured lights. Summary of the concert: Bono's still got it. Photo of the concert = don't have one, so you'll have to settle for one of me reading a review the next day on the train.



The next day was tickle trunk day! We went to the CBC museum and saw it. For reals. It's amazing. They had old clips of Mr. Dressup shows and other such delights. No puppets of Casey and Finnegan though. Other item of note: Mr. Dressup's glasses back in the day were essentially the same as Joel's current glasses. I feel that Freud would have something to say about that. Gotta love him.

The rest of the day was spent going up the CN Tower, shopping, wandering through Chinatown, finding the best coffee of our lives, seeing Kensington Market, and being taken out for a lovely French meal by my cousin Aaron and his fiance Karen. They took us to an art opening after dinner. We are so scene.

Next day we drove back to Ottawa. I cheated on the Lush pact* because I was seduced by a coconut scented product and then caught up on the season premiere of The Office. Well worth it, considering our activities the next day when we decided on a whim to head to Montreal (because we could) and spend the day wandering around. We managed to see a bit of the waterfront and Old Montreal before we regressed into a fit of parkour madness, inspired by The Office. In the end, we didn't actually see a whole lot of Montreal. But we sure had a great day.

Parliament the next day, where we crashed a suffragettes tea party and then I sat on Lester B. Pearson's lap. And then we headed off to eat some sandwiches. Apparently I am a big jerk for wanting swiss cheese on mine, but I suppose that was evident already with my choice of a red sports car avec spoiler for a rental. And that's the summary of my most excellent trip east.


* Lush Pact is a vow to never shop at Lush that I made with Joel some time ago. We made the pact because the store stinks and we hate it. Well, mostly hate it. Except this one product.

summer pout

we went for a lovely picnic on the pedestrian bridge by louise mckinney park tonight. i forget how exactly i offended joel before this picture, but that is a real pout my friends. ahh the magic of summer evenings.

Camp Counsellor

Today I sorted through a huge box of letters and notes that I had stored at my parents' house. I figured it was time to get them out of there and get rid of some of them. You can see the bag full of recycle next to me, and the consolidated letters sorted into shoeboxes.


Of course in the process a few gems were discovered. Like this picture, drawn by Tash. She hates cats. The sketch below is a cat being run over by a truck that says "devil patrol" on it.


I threw away most of the letters from people I have lost touch with totally, and a lot from summer camp friends. But I couldn't bear to get rid of one letter...most of you know that at one time I was a summer camp counsellor. Those were some of my glory summers, and one of my favourite campers was a 10 year old girl who came to the 'roughin' it' camp out at the tipis, where we lived away from the main camp and cooked our meals over a fire and played in the creek and all that good stuff. Anyways, this letter wins points for cuteness. Click on each page to view it larger - it's much more readable that way.

Our very own town troubadour

ALL CAPS UPDATE: HE PLAYED 'ALL AROUND THE MULBERRY BUSH' AGAIN THE OTHER DAY, AND THEN LINDA FREAKING DUNCAN WALKED UP AND GREETED HIM LIKE AN OLD FRIEND. I STARED. AND MISSED MY FRIEND KERRY.

One of my favourite things about Churchill Square on weekdays is the busker on the corner who calls himself "The Electronic Busker". Most days he's out there with his silver sequined suit jacket and his flowing grey hair. He is often playing familiar riffs from classic rock or whatever he feels like. One time, two or three days after I had a conversation about the song "Ghost riders in the sky" with Lewis, he played that very song as if he knew. Today it was "All around the mulberry bush". Made my day.

I didn't know this, but I just checked and he sure does have a website, with an entire album available for download. Check him out.

Decidedly not

Do you ever go through a phase where you find a new hairdo and it works perfectly for a couple of weeks, and then all of a sudden one day you wake up and it's impossible to get it to do that ever again? It may not look that fabulous to you here, but I was having some seriously fabulous and huge messy buns just after my trip to Europe with Joel, and now they are gone. The fabulous hugeness has disappeared, which is decidedly counter-intuitive since my hair is longer and huger now than it has ever been. Sadness.



Speaking of Joel, there is a rumor floating around Kings-land that we are engaged (we are not). Here is a cute picture of him lying on my sidewalk though. Is it wrong that I am amused and almost pleased to know that I am being discussed among the peripheries of my acquaintances? Maybe we are not supposed to admit it when we get pleasure out of such a narcissistic thought. But I just did. Don't judge too harsh.

That's all folks.

Think Big

Above: Joel and Tash looking conspiratory

JK thinks big when it comes to gift giving. He thinks big a lot of other times too, but I'd say this feature of his personality is really highlighted around holidays such as birthdays and Christmas. You may recall the thoughtful the handcrafted ampersand as an example. Well, this year for my birthday he FLEW MY FRIEND NATASHA HERE FROM SEATTLE TO SPEND THE WEEKEND WITH ME. It was the best conspiracy I have ever benefitted from. He sent us off to spend the day together with his polaroid camera. I PROMISE to scan them in so you can see them. Just not tonight.

Beth and Tash on their way to Capital EX



Beth making out with a corn. And twirling his silk in her fingers.

Ha ha.

London: The Last Europe Installment

• First meal in London: theme song from Notting Hill plays in the empty pub.
• Sushi and Starbucks on Shaftsbury Avenue
• Letterpress extravaganza at Covent Garden
• Fish and chips and disgusting gravy. Also, room temperature beer
• British Museum of Natural History Gift Shop: Should I buy a miniature bust of Charles Darwin?
• Awww, Joel loves little birds
• Flashback to Paris: thirsty pigeon falls into the pond
• Hunting for peacocks in Holland Park. We find the most boring peacock of all time
• pints of cider over ice at the Churchill Arms. No celebrities spotted.
• Hey, remember that trip to Europe when Bethany ate meat salad twice?
• Jamie Oliver's restaurant: when the appetizer comes on a cutting board you know it's going to be good
• Tate Modern: big table and chairs make me feel like a little kid
• Millenium Bridge and St. Paul's Cathedral
• 20 pence for a toilet. Don't tell Kaeli!
• Camden Market feels just like Whyte Ave
• Coffee at Flat White in Soho
• Harrods London - I mistook it for Buckingham Palace
• Krispy Kreme donuts in Harrods? Weird. But tasty.
• Cruising on the double decker night bus
• Three o'clock in the morning at the bus stop Joel discovers the yogurt has spilled all over his cameras.
• It's not white. It's oat.
• 4:15 a.m.: 30-something man walks past in a plaid suit and orange dress shirt...is it Elton?
• Soundtrack of 4:30 a.m.: "Sugarlumps" for JK, "Ain't no Sunshine" for BB
• Apparently other people are awake at 4:30. Who knew?
• Joel drinks 5-hour energy followed by a latte. All before 4:30 a.m.
• Free breakfast on Eurostar first class trains
• Joel loves butter
• Joel: "I am the world's best traveller! Oh wait a minute...where are my boarding passes?" Bethany: "Over there on the floor of the airport".

Status Updates from Europe continued

The Paris Installment

• Spotted in Paris: man with shoulder bag containing dog with pink highlights in its fur
• Falafel in the Jewish quarter involves big beards, black hats, and tasty tasty-ness
• Oo! Oo! Look at the dancer on the stairs! She's dancing!
• Dancing, singing French man sells umbrellas and other delights
• Coffee in France is not as good as coffee in Edmonton. Consolation = finding the archetypal donut in a "Beignet de creme"
• At the Pere Lachaise cemetery we see a concerned locfal proceting Oscar Wilde's tombstone from getting any more kisses from tourists with red lipstick
• The super sleuths find free toilets at Starbucks in Paris
• Role reversal as Joel navigates the appalingly large department store like an old pro and Bethany freaks out because it's too overwhelming
• Collette: wealthy hipsters of the world unite!
• Lawn chairs for all at the gardens of tuileries palace
• Free bathrooms at McDonalds
• My Paris shopping consists of one pillowcase
• Meet me at the Eiffel Tower. Wear white. All white. And bring your friends.
• Man dangles cherries over his ears and yells en francais from behind his fruit stand at the Paris market.
• Man dances with a goldfish bowl on his head
• National day of music in France is more like cover bands playing "Proud Mary" all over the city. We heard it three times!

The Mont-St-Michel Installment

• Not enough seats on the train ride to Mont St Michel. I stand for an hour
• Settling nicely into tourist mode, we contemplate purchasing a likeness of the abbey that is made of chocolate
• Train ride home from the Mont takes 3 hours. We pass the time by turning up the iPOD volume to MAX and putting the earbuds in Joel's nose to test the vibrations

An interlude in the status updates

This is a video that we recorded in Annecy, France. We love Kerry!

The Journey to Annecy, France

• How to spot fellow Eurail pass travellers: Beer and bananas at 9 a.m.
• Thought we didn't need a reservation for the train. Oops, that'll be 30 extra Euros.
• Annecy's got hills like Huemoz, Switz.
• "In France, the train rides you!" - Joel Kelly after an exceedingly unpleasant experience at the train station.
• After train ticket nightmare, I buy a leather jacket on impulse.
• Maxi pain au chocolat is bigger than my head.
• Hot hot hot weather by Lake Annecy.
• Swimming in the lake. Not all French beaches are nude.
• Remember how bad that baking-soda-water was? Bleh. Never buy mineralized water in Europe. Ever.
• Death by fondue. Cheese babies are a whole new breed of food babies.
• Paddle boating on the lake results in sunburns all around.
  

Note: the central photo features Joel beginning to digest his cheese baby.

The Germany Installment

• German man on train doesn’t realize Mel speaks fluent German and pontificates to the rest of the people in the train car that we are “American Scientists” and “Obama-sisters”, whatever that means.
• It’s fun to push the button on the bread dispenser at the discount market. Fresh pretzels!
• Walking on a Roman road in Cologne.
• Funf beers please! Joel’s pronunciation of five is misinterpreted as fifteen
• The lotus effect was discovered here.
• Beethoven's place of origin is in Bonn. No photos allowed so we purchase a miniature bust.
  
• Germany smells so good at night.
• 12 different kinds of schnitzel!
• Kaffe and Kuchen in Bonn!
• It's raining in Cologne. We take refuge under a Starbucks patio umbrella.
• Going 170 km/h on the autobahn. Nearly get cut off by a slow-moving van.

Status updates are the new way to journal

After being on hiatus from journaling since early 2006, I have discovered a new way to journal. I was a committed journaller through university, but hadn’t been able to sustain it in the past few years. Sometimes I was fine with that, but other times I really missed having the record of my thoughts and activities.

Before I left for my trip, my mom gave me a little journal peppered with Oscar Wilde quotes, so I packed it and thought I’d try to use it. I find Oscar Wilde’s quotes pretty amusing, and his grave is in the Pere Lachaise cemetery in Paris, so it seemed fitting.

Without meaning to, I started filling the little journal with one-line snapshots of what was happening, and decided that this was a manageable way to capture a few of the noteworthy events of my trip. So, I decided that to share my trip, I would blog some of the ‘status updates’ that I wrote along the way.

I’m starting with my arrival in Paris and trip to Strasbourg to meet up with Joel at the Chemistry conference and will continue on with the other parts of the trip in subsequent posts.

---

Was serenaded by French accordion players on the train ride in to Paris.

Ran into trouble – no train reservations are available for Strasbourg and I’ll be four hours late meeting Joel but have no way to get ahold of him to let him know!

Old nun on the train laughs at me when I fumble with my suitcase.

Nun proceeds to pull a rectangular prism wrapped meticulously in foil out of her purse and shake it thoroughly. After several minutes, she opens it carefully and drinks the tetra pack full of chocolate milk that was inside the foil. Strange.

Within the hour, said nun pulls a water bottle wrapped in foil out of her purse and does the same thing. Doubly strange.

Walking to the hotel and run into Joel on the street! He was coming to find me. Fancy meeting you here.

Hey, remember that time we followed a trail of rice on the street and got a free macaron at the end of it?

Man in straw hat feeds us slices of Munster cheese off his knife at the Saturday market in Strasbourg.

Marie Antoinette slept here.

Our answer to the question what does royalty do?: make babies and colossal mistakes.

Leaving the Motherland

I said goodbye to Natasha tonight. She is moving to Seattle while I am on vacation, so I will come back to an empty city. To celebrate our many years of Edmonton-based friendship, we enjoyed a good meal at Bualong followed by dessert and a trip to Lucky 97 market to buy tamarind candies. Which inevitably resulted in the purchase of a coconut bun. Then we made a trip to Michaels, and (dare I admit it) Walmart. And then it was back to Tash's house where we sang "Onward Christian Soldiers" over and over again while I lay on her bed in a heap of curry and coconut bun.

She is one of my most favourite friends and I will miss her a lot.

And now, I will sign off because tomorrow I am heading to France to meet up with Joel and spend two weeks having fun in France, Germany and London. Love it.

hijacked

bethany's blog has been hijacked.

best friend ever

you know you were destined to be friends when you find a pic like this in the family archives. i have no idea who took this photo, but it surfaced in a slideshow at my grandma's funeral last week. my jaw dropped when i saw it. it is my new favourite and i never knew it existed. that's me on the left and my cousin-friend melissa on the right. we are totally bffs. even though her socks don't match in this photo. and she is bald. LOVE YOU MEL! oh, and that's my dad holding us.

See ya later, Toots

I went to see a terrible movie last night with Kerry, Natasha, and Nathan. Despite the awful movie, something happened at the theatre that made me laugh harder than I have in at least a year.

As we grabbed our seats Tash took off to the bathroom and about a minute later I decided I had to go too and headed in the same direction. I got to the bathroom just as Tash walked out of the stall, so she saw me go into the stall as she went to wash her hands. As I walked into the stall Tash was walking out and saw me but didn't say anything.

I realized right away that I had chosen a stall right next to the only other person in the whole washroom, which is a slight breach of bathroom etiquette, but what can you do...so, to make it worse, the person in the adjacent stall let one rip as they did their business. Right away, Tash was all "Whoa!" from where she was washing her hands.

I remained silent, not wanting to further embarrass the person next to me by yelling to Tash that it wasn't actually me who had farted, but rather the person next to me. As I realized that she probably had no idea there was anyone else in the bathroom, I started to laugh but tried to hold it in. I just sat there in the stall shaking with laughter. Then the person let another one rip, and Tash yelled out "See ya later, Toots!" and left the bathroom.

I about died with silent laughter, and when I got back to my seat, I was pretty much beside myself as I tried to fill Tash et al. in on what had just happened. Maybe it's immature, but it was also amazing.

But I don't want to buy an RV to go with my new mop...

It's no secret that I miss my old, dear work friends. I complain (more than I probably need to) about not having real friends at my new job - a fact that is made worse by awkward conversations with new co-workers and multiple invitations to tupperware parties. Forceful invitations. And requests that I host a tupperware party at my house. And that I ask my friends if they will host them too. It makes me angry. Not a good way to forge a new frienship in my opinion.

And now, the promised transcription of a conversation. This is with someone who I have declined to host a tupperware party for...

Her (almost inaudibly): Hi, how are you?

I keep working, not noticing that I was being spoken to

Her: so, I think we are going to ‘go green’ with our cleaning supplies.

Me: Oh, Hi. That's cool

Her: we went to a Norwex party on the weekend and they had lots of cleaning supplies. Environmentally friendly ones. I think I want to buy the mop.

Me: oh, cool

Her: It's like $130 mop and I already have the other mop that was $70 from princess house. It's a steam cleaning mop. You plug it in and it heats up and cleans. The new one though - the $130 one - is really good for cleaning flies off of the outside of your RV.

Me: cool. I heard you can use vinegar as a cleaning supply if you want to avoid the harsh cleaners. And lemons too. They are better for the environment too.

Her: Yeah. Well, like I said to Keith, you could just go to parties all the time instead of going out. There's the princess house party, the tupperware party, the norwex cleaning supplies party, and even parties where you can buy clothes. You don't have to go out at all. You can just go to parties that people host in their homes, right?

Me: *dies a little*

cell phone

Joel and I road tripped to Calgary and Canmore this past weekend. The photos below are a record of our antics as we approached Mel's house and needed directions. If you've ridden in my car in the past several months, I probably showed you my genius little plastic directions holder.
The actual case was a gift many years ago. I think it is supposed to be for holding your credit cards or something. I never had a good use for it because it wasn't really big enough to be a functional wallet, so instead it sat in a box of crap in my old room at my parents' house. Sandwiched between a toy boat and a pewter picture frame with an ivy design.

Anyways, when I was in my car one day looking for some directions I had written on the back of a receipt and then proceeded to step on all winter with my muddy shoes as I ground the directions firmly into my floor mats, I realized there had to be a better, more organized way to get from A to B. Then it came to me. I could re-use my old business cards by writing directions on to the back of each one and keeping them all together. WPK ordered me about 500 business cards and I think I gave out ONE legitimate card in the entire time I worked there. Oh wait, I can think of two.

So, after I decided to use the cards, I had this weird flashback to the plastic case and thought that I had to find it. So I drove over to my parents' house, walked up to my old room, lifted up a box and looked inside and VOILA. There it was, exactly where I thought it would be. And then I put a stack of business cards in it and they fit perfectly. SO satisfying. You have no idea.

I think I get such a kick out of this silly little organizational tool because it combines many things I like:

1) Reusing things destined for the garbage
2) Repurposing things that were never used and just sat in a pile
3) Organizing
4) Knowing where I am going and how I will get there

I use it all the time. And so as we pulled into Calgary I pulled it out and got us to Mel's house without any trouble. I called it my cell phone and pretended I was calling her for directions. Hence the photos. That's Joel texting in the last photo:

talking in four locations

After I was done with my work duties in Calgary last week I met Kerry, Mel, and Kaeli and spent my Friday night with them. It was so excellent to be hanging out together. I can’t say that we have spent a lot of time together as the four of us before, but we have spent a lot of time in various combinations, each with the other. Mel lived with our fam in university for a while, and eventually had Kerry as a roommate. Despite their amusing differences (want to know more? ask me about the Spiderman-Kleenex-in-lieu-of-toilet-paper story) they got along. Basically we moved from talking at Starbucks in Marda Loop to talking at Opa to talking at Mel’s house and then out for a drink to talk some more. It’s what we do. And it was a good time. I love my friends, and I am MAD AT YOU ALL FOR MOVING AWAY. Natasha, this includes you even though you haven't left yet. Didn't you guys learn anything from Anne of Green Gables? You aren't supposed to go looking for your ideals outside of Avonlea. Gosh.

porcelain veneers will make you beautiful

I went to Calgary last weekend for my job. Most of the work I have done in the past four months has been getting ready for our annual conference and awards gala, so I was actually pretty excited to go. Also, I’ve had a "long distance (work) relationship" with the girl who does my job in the Calgary office, and we get along really well, so I was looking forward to seeing here again and working with her in person. Especially considering the lack of friends I have in the Edmonton office (blog post to come later with transcription of awkward work conversation with non-friend at work).

They put me up in the Fairmont Palliser hotel, which is a fancy hotel in downtown Calgary. The first thing I did when I got to my room was hop onto the bed and set up my camera for some bed-jumping photos. Maybe would have been a cooler thing to do if I wasn’t all by myself, but hey, what else was I going to do? Then every night I was there I stayed up until 1 a.m. watching “Style by Jury”. They think they can make anyone attractive by giving them porcelain veneers on their teeth. And the weird thing is that they sort of can. Thank you mom for making me get braces (against my will) in grade ten.

Crepes and Daffodils

My Sunday afternoon included crepes, daffodils, and an impromptu viewing of three amazing episodes of Road to Avonlea including the episode where Gus Pike proposes to Felicity.

I rarely make crepes, but Tash, Joel and I made them a few years ago. Tash was a pro at flipping the crepes with a dandy flick of her wrist (Tash, that was just for you), but that was with a non-stick frying pan. This time around we were using a different pan and flipping was near impossible. The cranky photo that resulted is on the top (second from the left).

Aside from our flipping difficulties, the rest of the meal was great. And the Road to Avonlea was awe-inspring. See the first photo in the collage for a screen shot of Janet and Felicity.

I'm so handsome

I found some old pics of my handsome dad in his younger days...

Wasn't he

Winter song, spring song

March has been a good month of friends. I've had visitors three weekends in a row: Theresa, Lisa, Kaeli, and Trixie.


Additionally, my brother and his wife moved into their snazzy new house. My brother has been working like a...hard working man building it for the past year and a half. They had a very large and very warm housewarming party last weekend to celebrate and got Colleen Brown (our talented cousin) to play a house concert. I took a little video of the show just for fun:

As I mentioned, my friend Trixie is visiting us from Vancouver this weekend and we started the day yesterday with this video: Winter Song but then we went outside and it wasn't really very wintry after all. The next thing we did was enjoy an excellent breakfast at the Mill Creek Cafe with Dave, Jamie, Joel and Trixie. I had a fried egg sandwich and orange juice and found a sweet photo of a man riding a lion in the Edmonton Journal. You can't ask for a better breakfast.


As a first bonus, we ended up walking down Whyte on one of the first days that felt like spring. And as a second bonus we discussed oxford commas and other similar delights as we walked in the sunshine.

The weekend continued with pizza, Balderdash, church at King's, coffee with Scott (and Francis and Geneva), Guinness wings at O'Byrnes, and a movie night.

I freaking love weekends.

itemized

Several people have asked me what I have been up to lately and I keep not delivering a very good answer. I'm not so good on my feet sometimes. So, I'm going to make a little list here for my inquisitive friends.

• I have been on Global, The Sun Online, and on City TV Twice in the past 10 days as a media spokesperson for various work events. I definitely never would have predicted that in my future (especially in light of my claim that I am not that quick on my feet), but here I am.
  
• On that note, I am starting to enjoy my job more and more in a lot of ways. I don't know if would go so far as to say that me and my job are soulmates, but I think we are starting to like each other. Or at least figure out that we both have a lot to offer each other. A symbiotic relationship of sorts. It's a good feeling.
  
• I still don't really have any friends at work. I had one, and then she quit. Sucks. I miss my old work friends a whole lot. They are gems.
  
• My computer has been broken for a couple of weeks. I guess Dell really sucks at power cords. That's the word on the street at least. But the good news is that they were really good about replacing it in a timely manner, so that was nice.
• I cleared out some of my old/ancient crafty supplies the other night. The thing about never moving very far from home is that it's easier to take all your crap with you. I have some seriously vintage craft supplies. Furry monkey stickers, for example.
• Joel has been really busy getting ready for the Synchotron which means I haven't seen him a whole lot lately, but he had some down time this weekend finally where we got to go to the Sugarbowl and sit at the bar and eat copious amounts of excellent Huevos Rancheros. It was exactly what I wanted to be doing.
  
• I went and saw 'The Reader' last week with Kim and Caylie. It was a random little movie-watching group, but a very good movie. I am a Kate Winslet fan, which is sort of a new realization, since I had been holding Titanic against her for quite a while. Not that she was actually terrible in it. Just because it was Titanic.
  
• Luke Doucet and the White Falcon played a concert at the Myer Horowitz that I had tickets for as a Christmas present from Joel. He put on a really great, long show to celebrate his first time headlining in a soft-seat theatre.
• Francis greeted me this week with an enthusiastic "HI. I LOVE YOU!" It is the first time he has ever done that and it was completely awesome. I love him too. Nephews and nieces are good, good things.
• Karen, Bri and I discussed the whats/whys/hows of marriage around my kitchen table. It was interesting. And then we watched "On a Boat" ft. T-Pain and had a good laugh.
  
• I fit a ham sandwich into a plastic lemon. It was a highlight of last week, let me tell you.

That's all for now, folks.

Even years later, I am still swooning over this one

Anyone who has ever asked me for a book recommendation has undoubtedly received my heartfelt endorsement for "The Brothers K". It is my favourite book and has been for about 7 years, ever since I first read it. My previous favourite was by the same author, a book called "The River Why". I may have given you the pitch for this one as well. I can't say it changed my life, but it definitely filled my heart in only the way that perfect storytelling can, and forever changed my expectations for a good novel.

That was just setting the scene for the rest of this post. I was thinking the other day about nice things people have done for me, and recalled a postcard I received in 2005, while I was in Switzerland.

So, in lieu of a sappy valentines post, I thought I would post the least sappy, most amazingly thoughtful thing that perhaps anyone has ever done for me.

When I was in Switzerland, the coming of the mail was an exciting event. Email access there was a bit limited and slow, and letters from home were always more thrilling anyways. I got lots of nice letters and postcards from Joel. He often sends me postcards because his parents are in the postcard business and as a result he has a bit of an endless supply of Edmonton and Jasper themed items.

One particular day the mail came just before lunch. I grabbed my mail for the day and headed down to the Chalet where I would be eating. It was a formal lunch, which meant that we were having a group discussion, but I spent most of the meal puzzling over a postcard I had received. It appeared to be a Kelly family special featuring Edmonton's river valley, but the stamps on it were decidedly American and the message centered around fishing and "a note from one Joel Kelly, asking me to drop you a line". I couldn't make out the signature.

It took me until the end of the meal to realize that I was holding a personal note from my absolute favourite author.

Knowing of my love for David James Duncan's works, Joel decided to write him a letter sincerely (and knowing Joel, probably very earnestly and politely) requesting that he fill out the already-stamped and addressed (to me in Switzerland) postcard with a personal message for me. So he did it. Joel had no idea when he sent it to him whether he would do it or not, so he was almost as surprised as I was when I called to let him know what I got in the mail that day.



Swoon.

Something to look forward to

"Taco in a bag" is fast becoming a favourite dinner party choice for me and a certain bunch of friends. We had our second T.I.A.B. night at the end of the holidays and it was, once again, a hit.

Also added this time was a couple of incredible rounds of Pit. I'm not kidding about it being incredible. We used to play Pit when I was little because my parents had the deluxe edition with the orange bell, but over time we ended up using the bell to play school instead of actually playing pit. So the game was more of a distant memory for me when we started playing. I can still picture the styrofoam card-and-bell holder that we had colored on with Mr. Sketch markers in an attempt to make it prettier. This beautification attempt was a failure, just in case you were wondering.

Steven took a video of a round near the end, after too many snacks and beers, without any of us knowing it. Steven is behind the camera and counter clockwise around the table are Joel, Reba, Kevin, and me.


As you can see, it was one of those nights that we never could have planned.

In other news, I am now completely wisdom toothless. It feels so good to know that I will never have to get them out again. I realize that I am not safe from other dental calamities, but this is one thing that I have been dreading pretty much since I was 10 years old. It feels good to get it off my list of things to not look forward to.

I swear they began talking about you

Tonight I had a crafting date with Caylie and Natasha. I spent the entire time transcribing some of my favourite poems into a book where I keep my favourite poems. It was a good time.

They hassled me about not blogging, so I thought I would toss them a bone and share this link: Click here to see the wooden laptop case of your dreams. Seriously.

A favourite poem:

Carry
By Billy Collins

I want to carry you
and for you to carry me
the way voices are said to carry over water.

Just this morning on the shore,
I could hear two people talking quietly
in a rowboat on the far side of the lake.

They were talking about fishing,
then one changed the subject,
and, I swear, they began talking about you.

visit from a friend

My friend Kenton, who I met in Switzerland, came to visit me last week. What I remember most about him at L'Abri is that we always had good laughs together and that he taught me that it is better not to wet your toothbrush before you brush your teeth because it is more effective in cleaning them when you don't. We still have good laughs together, and I still think of him sometimes when I am brushing my teeth. It was fun to see him in his Australian goodness after all this time.

In other news, my Christmas break is drawing to a close. It was filled with family dinners, a baby baptism, a sister being in town, some movie watching, good friends from out of town, and a bit of skating.


But it's not over yet. Taco in a bag party happens tonight.