Change In Temp

At the beach-- in September..

















The weather is changing everyday. The air is a touch cooler than the last. I do enjoy the change here. In Alberta it isn't a gradual thing. It just kind of smacks you in the face. One day it is nice the next it isn't. The air is a lot cooler and the very next day there is three feet of snow. Summer was just winding down yesterday and today you have a blizzard in your back yard. Not to mention a lot of shoveling to do.

Rob and I took a drive the other day to the beach. We were bored and wanted something to do. The beach is always a good idea even if we don't really do much once we get there. The waves were crashing against the the shore and the wind was certainly in the air. But, it wasn't too over powering. It was kind of a comforting feeling, knowing that that is pretty much as bad as it gets here. The call for snow isn't impossible but fairly unlikely.

But with a snow less winter, comes a lot of rain. Last year Rob and I weren't really prepared for it. I found it somewhat depressing. There was never anything to do. With winter, there is Christmas. The Christmas comercials start to come on, the sound of carols are on all of the infomercials and I usually begin to get the familiar tickle in my stomach that I always get around that time of year. Christmas is around the corner and I get in a festive mood. I want to build a snowman or go sledding, maybe snowmobiling (if I had access to one, of course.) But here on the island, it doesn't feel as much like Christmas without the snow. We discussed what we should do to keep ourselves busy this coming winter. We came up with a couple of ideas. But I can't rely on ideas because they don't always happen.

First of all, I want to acknowledge the fact that I am on my third week of running/power walking. I was really down and out about my weight, the way I felt in general after not doing anything physical. So I decided on October 7th to first quit smoking. So I did. But at the same time I decided that eating junk food was probably a big reason why I felt so badly all of the time and also why my jeans suddenly fit like spandex. I quit smoking and eating junk. That day I decided to take a short walk. The next day was a Saturday and again I decided another walk was due. On that Monday I started on my little power walk that gradually turns into a nice joggish run and right back into a power walk down to the beach and then right back up to our house. I have never felt better. I feel more useful and energized, ready and willing to do a lot more things not only around the house but overall. I am happier with myself and the weight I am at. Even if I haven't lost anything I can look in the mirror now and say; "well I'm working on it. " That alone is my greatest accomplishement.

I am planning on continueing this routine through the winter if the streets don't get too slippery. Again having no snow, that probably shouldn't be too difficult. I am also starting a writing workshop through the college come November. I signed up today and payed for the course ahead of time so there's no backing out. I will be doing everything online so I will be able to write confidentally in the safety of my little orange home. This will also be really good for my relationship with Rob. We both need our own things. We may live together, but that doesn't mean we have to be sitting near one another every moment that we are home. Although I do love being around him, doing my own thing helps me feel confident and self reliant. He also enjoys just getting to play away on his guitar without me sitting there turning the t.v up over the sound!

Robert and I also keep ourselves busy. The other night we had my mom over for a sleep over. Rob noticed that our apple tree dropped about thirty apples in the back yard. So he picked them all and decided to make his very first apple pie! He had mom and I peeling him the apples while he rolled his dough with a glass cup. (no rolling pin.) Then I realized mom and I never did stuff like that together. We never sat there chatting, peeling apples and just enjoying each other's company. It was really nice and fun too.

Last night Rob and I made our own sushi. Haha!!!! We went online watched a video on how to make the California Roll by a sushi guy and everything. All I have to say is -- Those fuckers make it look sooooo easy! Well, it isn't! The sticky rice is like a plague. It won't go away. I am still finding traces of it on the kitchen floor, bottom of my socks... dish clothes. It was fun, but we were not successful. We suck at making sushi. But one day we will try it again.



My point is; we have both been keeping ourselves busy, and happy along with taking care of important family stuff together. I believe that this winter will be one of our most memorable. It will be our First Christmas together in our first home ever.

Free Admission

I was catchin up on blogs today. I was inspired by one, to put my pictures of the street concert we went to in Thunder Bay. I have always liked music, ever since my brother and sister started listening to it. Plus having our dad be a musician was an early introduction to it as well.

My dad was in a country music band in the early 90's and they were actually nominated for a Juno Award. The band was interviewed on a television show and they played their first single on the show. They even had a music video that was shown on CMT. They had been to Nashville and set up a booth between famous singers that everyone knows today. He met Trisha Yearwood and Shania Twain. The deal with Nashville is that if you're there, and no one knows you yet, the fans still get your autograph because just the fact that the band is there means that it will be famous very soon. The only thing that ended their career as a band was an unstable lead singer, that wanted to end his soon to be fame and fortune. I say; If you're going to ruin three other men's careers your attempt better work, asshole. Needless to say it didn't and it was just a cry for help and the very key point in the ending of their singing careers.

(**Side note: I didn't really want him to succeed in the "suicide"..but it's hard not to be pissed off**)

Like I said; I was really into music once my brother and sister were. Of course, I wanted to be just like them. They both loved the Beatles and of course, I followed along and found that I too really enjoyed some of their music. I mainly liked the music because my siblings did. But they introduced me to that music and it was later in life that I truly and fully enjoyed them. My sister had a good job for a 15 or 16 year old working at McDonalds. So she was buying cd's left and right, just to say that she had them sometimes. But what I would do, whenever she wasn't listening to them; I'd pop them into her cd player. (at the time she was the only one with a cd player in the house.) I'd listen to her cd's over and over again. I had a tape of her Cranberries cd that I listened to on my walkman as I played Mario Brothers on the Nintendo. After awhile I'd be singing to all the words to her Sheryl Crowe cd and it'd piss her off because I knew all the words and she barely had any time to listen to her new..a little used cd's.

It wasn't until my brother was 16 when he truly closed up. He would hide himself in his bedroom with the phone and play music after school until he was called for supper. His music quickly changed from the Beatles to Melincolin, Face to Face, AFI..etc. Bands that I had never heard of and quite frankly when I did, all I could hear was loud, fast talking with even louder music. He went to tons of concerts with his buddies over his highschool life. I can't say that my sister did. It was more my brother that was the concert type.

I don't know if I was ever really invited to a concert. But I am sure if I was my mom would have been against it. I am still told to this day to be careful with "that knife" when I am cutting something. Had one of my friends been into music and able to go to a concert I think I would have loved to actually go. But the chance never came up; until last summer.

My sister Kyli works at a kind of place that gives her these rewards, for a job well done. Last summer I think I mentioned at the time, she was given two box seats to the Avril Lavigne concert. So I went along with her. Mom had to drive me into Victoria, spend the evening with Joe and his friends. While Kyli and I sang our hearts out to the Avril, along with a thousand other little girls. It was a lot of fun. I didn't have my digital at the time, so I completely forgot to bring my camera. The seats were beautiful. We had food, snacks. We had beer and wine to drink while watching the concert. The security had to ask us to please leave once the show had been over, and all the other fans had cleared out of the arena. We hadn't finished our beers and didn't want to waste. We were escorted out, needless to say... But I will never forget it. It was my first concert, at the age of 20. The choice wasn't mine; Avril Lavigne is okay...but not my absolulte fav.

This summer Rob and I went back to his hometown, Thunder Bay, Ontario. We heard about a concert being held across from the casino and decided to go. Sam Roberts was playing and I couldn't believe it! An actual artist singing for FREE in some random Canadian city. These things just don't happen in Alberta, at least not where I was from. They certainly don't happen in Qualicum; seeing as the senior citizen ratio to other age groups is 100:10 Haha-- I don't really know how to do ratios..so I am not sure if that even made sense. In other words; there are a lot of old people in this town!!


AHHHHH -- I can't for the life of me put my pictures from the concert on here! I wanted to show off how good my camera was.. You can almost see right up Sam's nose! I don't understand why it won't let me post pictures!!!!!

Anonymous Message

It feels so good to be this far from "home!"

I was on the phone with my best friend. She was just telling me about another one of our friends that passed through our home town. Now she was the girl that hadn't visited Hinton since my step dad's "service". So she wasn't really looking forward to it. So she stopped in at the Smitty's (the one I worked at for far too long) and saw the very people that she did not want to see. She gets a an anonymous phone call hours later.. "if we ever see your face in Hinton again, we'll kick your ass."

Now, a couple of years ago this would have made me feel sick to my stomach with worry. But I mean... how old are we? It just makes me LAUGH. How can people still hold onto that bully thing years later.... many, many years after high school for some... It just is such a joke to me. Now this is the very reason why I am happy to be living in British Columbia, faaaar, faaaar away from that stink hole. (Hinton has a mill; therefore it stinks..literally.)

I walk around here and I am at ease and peace with the world. Even though Q.B resembles Pleasantville, it is a great place to live without drama. At least it's been working for Rob and I so far. Everything about this town is perfect. The flowers are perfect, the roads are perfect.. it is a strange occasion when garbage is actually seen on the ground, before someone picks it up.. Someone left their car keys ... and I'm not talking about a piece of shit car... but a Niiiiiiice car.. These car keys were forgotten, and someone taped them to the mail box that they were found near. These keys were there for weeks... WEEKS. It had an alarm push pad on the key ring as well, and no one stole it! Mind you-- ALLLL of my cd's and cd adaptor was stolen out of my car a few month ago. I think that the young kids around here are all messed up.. They're too bored and do the strangest things to keep themselves occupied. Other than the youth in this town.... everything else is perfect!!

I love my life here. I feel more independent and there are no strings connecting me to my hometown anymore. All of my friends have left and moved on with their lives. They'd probably agree with this post.

Every town is someone's hometown... Again; to each his own.

Say No To Junk

(Pissing my mom off on my b'day
at my gran's...)



















I am beginning to wonder how huge "blogging" is really becoming. There are all of these updates and new kinds of systems... The trouble is that I am attached to my blog and I fear I'll lose everything if I move on to greater, better blogging services. I was watching "Ellen" today. She was talking about blogs and interviewed a girl on her show about her "My Space". She said that over twenty thousand people have checked out her blog since she started two years ago. I am really beginning to wonder how many people actually flip through or read my blog that don't comment. I am sure I have a few regulars that don't like to comment, but rather just read what is going on in my world. But wow, I wonder ... Is my life interesting enough to check up on regularly? I'd have to say no...

I know that my life was more dramatic when I first moved over a year ago. I was undergoing many changes and feelings. But over a year later.. today; I fear that there really isn't that much to write about, that hasn't already been covered.

I have been worried about my body lately. I guess women in general probably stress a lot over these issues. The world has gotten a lot more cruel. Perhaps I was too young to have paid any attention to the media and celebrity magazines. But now it seems like everyone in Hollywood is dieting, excercising in at least two ways.... It's just unsettling really. I don't think that the world needs to be fat and lazy.. But I do think that there are more important issues to focus on, other than our weight or appearance in this world.

Everyday I criticize myself. I do. I look in the mirror and reject myself. How can this be sexy? Okay, put some clothes on me.. hide a few things and maybe, I can be sexier. But as I bare all, I really am forced to wonder what is appealing?? I am not looking for compliments.. I am just expressing my feelings for the passed.. LATELY.

I know that I could do a lot of things to improve my appearance. For one, I could stop smoking since I started up this June. I could try doing my 'at home exercises' like I did before the summer. I could buy a one piece bathing suit and hit the swimming pool that is literally two doors down from my front door. AND-- I know I could cut out some pretty stupid junk foods that I eat, all of the time. It's just so tough being skinny up until about 17 and then suddenly having to worry about all of this B.S. It is also easier to write and think about what I could do, rather than going out tomorrow and doing them.

I sometimes wish that I was just pregnant so that I would have an excuse, a real excuse for eating some of the bizarre foods I eat.

" Oh you mean, eating a breakfast bagel at 10pm isn't normal?? So I guess eating an entire bowl of popcorn is out as well???"

This is my vice. Junk food. I don't have a weight problem yet. But I fear soon enough I will, if I am not careful.