two thousand and ten

heyyylo,
i'm feeling pretty fine right now with some extra time, so i thought i'd drop into the blog zone ya'll.

had some pretty good holidays. paul came with me to vermilion with me for 5 days and hung out with my parents, grandparents, and caylie. nice to be back though with books to read and hammocks to lay in. i'm reading a ton of books right now, all of them are really good. i have going:
The End of Money & the Future of Civilization by Thomas Greco
The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy
Change your brain by Tim Leary
No Gods No Masters: An Anthology of Anarchism by Daniel Guerin


new years eve, resolutions blah blah. apparently i didn't put any down in the blog last new year, which is disappointing. i'd like to look back and see what my priorities were.

anyway, here are my 2010 resolutions:


1. be more connected with people. my friends who i suck at keeping in touch with. new friends who i will never meet if i keep this shit up. my family even. ways i will do this: more hanging out, letter writing, getting more out of time spent, being a better listener, cultivating hobbies, creating circles of people. ways i will probably not do this: facebooking, phone talking, making plans in advance.

2. learn to knit. for fuckin' realz.

3. keep learning, reading, and getting smarter. improve on communicating ideas. open mindedness and peace. get better with bikes.

4. write more letters to politicians.

vancouver

was awesome. here is my trip:

we spent around 16 hours on the greyhound to get there, but it wasn't really that bad. it went pretty fast, despite greyhound being so ghetto. i took a bunch of stuff to keep myself entertained on the bus, like some knitting, some pants i wanted to patch up, and a book (in case i happened to be post-carsick), but they didn't have any lights on at all. not the low lit panel that goes along the side, and there were no overhead personal lights. we had to board in the dark and when we got off the bus i ended up seeing a brownish stain on my seat, eww! there was a lot more examples of the ghetto-ness, but oh well, it got us there and it was cheap.

when we got off the bus, we charged our phone at a coffee shop and for some reason Paul bought a china-man hat... you know the ones, right? then we walked directly though east hastings. fucking crazy and it was only 10 am!

we found our way out to Richmond, where we were staying. paul carried all my stuff, and even pushed me in a shopping cart for the last leg. we were staying at some calgary friend's of his, and they have a great apartment filled with bikes and a hammock.
we stayed out there for a few days, going for awesome bike rides and blazin' and having the usual stoner conversation about how the world is messed up.

all of us went on a mountain side ride that was nice. we got to share the path with a million longboarders in training, it was cute. we got off the path for a bit and watched some dragonfly sex and looked at trees. paul and i road in to granville island, stanley park, and downtown 'couver.

for a few days after that we stayed with my friend in the downtown east side and it was a nice change, and kind of funny, suddenly being so close to everything that we had just struggled to ride our bikes too the previous day. we had brought a "fun" chocolate bar along with us that we were sort of rationing. we finally ate the majority of that and hit up an awesome arcade downtown. i love pinball! it's my new favorite thing. i love the combination of digital and analog that makes up the machine. my favorite was the adam's family one. oh look, here is a picture of it that i googled.
we did some more bike rides and i attempted to find shoes because mine were on the verge, but it's impossible. i ended up getting some at a vintage clothing store in kitsilano pretty randomly on the last day.
we ended the trip with the nudie beach at UBC. it was wonderful - so hot and sunny, and being naked on the beach is GREAT.

we decided to fly back and we got a ride from paul's brother, straight from the beach to the airport with no time to spare.

i tend to not take great photos, but here are 5 sort of:

• a slug on the path. we were all kind of concerned he would get run over so we watched him cross for quite a while.
• paul in the only underwear he brought on the trip, on a beach downtown.
• me walking to wreck beach. i knew the nude portion was coming up, so i was half way there already.
• a night bike ride. i think i was actually from a boys' only ride. i was in the hammock sleeping already.
• bamboo in stanley park. paul climbed it, i watched.

soon.

• soon i will have the most organized desk ever. i took everything out, organized it into logical piles and now i'm putting it back in.

• my teeth hurt all the time. well not ALL the time. only when i eat really sugary stuff... which is ALMOST all the time. ow, it hurts. i will go to the dentist soon

• dan leahul is back in calgary for a month. we are hanging out as soon as he gets here.

• i'm taking a long long bus ride to vancouver with paul tomorrow. we just bought the tickets today. we didn't plan very much of anything and now the trip is very soon.

ps - i brought my new bike home today. it's still got a free wheel (single speed) on it, but you can probably guess when i will be changing that.... (SOON!)

marathon of hizzope.

today was a pretty great day.

work was busy, boring and whatever. i left at 1 to go volunteer with my 50+ craft group/esl class of immigrant women. they are so adorable.
at 4:30 i left and decided to check out a couple grocery stores in china town, which is right on my way home. it was fantastic. i ran into this guy who works at safeway (i forget why i know him actually. its the safeway beside my other job... between the two jobs i'm starting to have a lot of random people recognizing me around downtown). we talked about not living up to our potential (he studied hydro engineering in algeria, and now works in a produce department). that was kind of nice.
i didn't buy anything because i was intimidated by the lack of english labels on products. but i will go back; there are TWO grocery stores right beside each other there and a meat shop across the street.

the grocery store thing had me feeling really good for some reason; a brief moment where i feel like i might miss calgary if/when i leave.

after i finish this blog and put on some pants i'm going for supper with erin at the heartland cafe. i'm excited she invited me to go there, i'm kind of obsessed with it lately. they have the most amazing cider there.




last night jonathan and i ended up at Walmart, checking the Toy Department to see what we could get for his 2 year old cousin. nothing at all. toys mostly suck, and walmart... also sucks. BUT jonathan let me buy/bought me Terry, the movie about Terry Fox starring Shawn Ashmore (it was 2/$10, and he bought dracula). when we got home i suggested we watch it and he agreed. i love terry fox. i cried like a million times, at all the same parts that made me cry last time.

ignore the lame song:

holy love!

holy i love longboarding on warm summer nights. and making new friends. and fireworks. and being a cheap drunk.

beats that repeat

jonathan waits for me.


bod and mitch wait for trevor.


i wait for bus and make friends.

it makes you look like a lumberjack, but are you man enough to wear it?

this week so far has been pretty grande.



monday - i went over to chris' place and he did my taxes and i drank beer and internetted it up. then i went to work at the drug store for an hour because some people are punks who don't show up for their shifts. it was a good night though.

tuesday - i invited some people to go for wings. and they showed up! and we had fun! hobbs showed up, and i ate some hot wings! crazy!

wednesday - i went to screen printing class, but left early. there is dissension in the ranks, everyone is complaining about the class and douglas didn't show up. there's only 4 weeks left though.

something strange/awesome happened tonight too. i'm not sure how to explain it, i think the best way is to say that i re-connected with a friend that i'd lost touch with. we're hanging out friday night and i'm pretty pumped!



i really need to clean my house. again. i have a problem.

simple minds do simple things

today was nice.

after work i picked up my car, and parked it. hopefully it'll be parked for a while.
i talked to bod on the phone a bit, and then rode my bike to chris' house. on the way i got my tires filled with air, and then went to burger inn with chris, ryan, and mat [what a crew of ordinary-named guys]. i got the harvest gold burger & a root beer. rode my bike home.
then dan came over and we played the most epic game of tile rummy ever.

good day.

time for bed.

the go in the go-for-it

phewf, what a week.

• started my job at the drug store - apparently doodling is NOT allowed

• had my first class of screen printing, which was so fun i said "this is FUN!" during the first project. a guy in my group, james agreed, and at the end he and our other group member, doug, high fived. but, there are no crush prospects in the class.

• made lunch every day for work (except for my trade day - mat made pizza subs mmm)

• i haven't been running - no time, too cold.

• finally went to broken city

• i bought a bus pass for february, but i can't find it now. guh-reat.


plus, the weekend.

• had caylie over and told her about zodiac signs and the science of sweating.

• bought the best socks ever




EDIT: here are some photos, weekend aftermath. my camera blows and i didn't get a good picture of all the embroidery hoop crafts we made, so take my word for it, they look super cute as a set. there's also some buttons i spilled after caylie left, our piles of sculpey crap, wonderful tea, and my amazing socks (me and the socks had a total photo shoot, i love them so much!).

a kiss is not a contract (but it's very nice)

so a CERTAIN situation has gone from cute/nervous/awkward to awkward/nervous/awkward. i'm over it, but it's hard to be at ease with all that weird energy about.

man, i have been spending too much time on the internet! but that'll be over soon. i'm handing out resumes for a second job today, and my wednesday class starts next week. PLUS the bod's moving to calgary in february. so excited to have another girl friend here.

i found a new favorite show -the flight of the conchords. i love the internet.