Big day.

Big, messed up emergency project.

No time for lunch or other projects or contract signing. Just fighting fires. Kind of an adrenalin rush though, I suppose.

Then off to my Wired Woman seminar "My Career, My Business". It was interesting. I wonder if I will find the courage to be an entrepreneur. I find that I am slowly but surely developing my confidence. I don't doubt that I have the talent and intelligence, but I surely doubt my self confidence. Given that, I worry that it would be too much of the things I don't enjoy. And so, I continue to hone myself and learn from other incredibly intelligent people in the 9-5 office world.

And lament my lack of freedom.

Sometimes all it takes a really good talk to make it all better.

I was feeling really restless and then I got together with Karen, a girl I met in Melbourne, who's now just finishing her travels and happened to be in Toronto.

We shopped and had a lovely dinner together and talked, talked, talked. It was great. Sharing the feelings that you have post-travel... it's just amazing to have someone who really understands.

We agreed that we want to continue living life in a similar way, treating each day as a new adventure. But our friends haven't had the same experience and they don't understand that drive. We're no longer content to sit at home and watch TV (at least, not regularly). At the end of it all, we're thinking about all the new and exciting things we could be experiencing. It's frustrating, because I don't want to lose this feeling, and yet I feel it seeping away.

We were both talking about our next trips that we want to do. We both want to go back to New Zealand. And we both want to go to Europe.

After dinner, since she had to go visit her gran, I went to the movies and saw "Forgotten" which was scary, and then hung and popped into another theatre to see "First Daughter" which was cheesey but cute. Everyone wore way too much makeup.

It was good to have some alone time. I think I really needed it.
And today I'm off to Word on the Street.

When I was a kid, I always thought that it would be really cool to have glasses or braces or a cast. I never had any of those things. But I pretended.

Since then, I have experienced braces. They were a big disappointment, let me tell you! Although, I don't regret it a bit. I have beautiful teeth.

And I can now tell you that having these two wrist splints on is highly overrated. Nothing is easy with these things. Plus, my wrists ache.

~Pouts~

Stupid wrists.

Sometimes I really like a good argument.

And other times, I just wanna veg out with David Gray and a good book. Like now.

How many of Canada's top ten films have you seen?
http://www.topten.ca/2003/content/press.html

I've only seen:
THE SWEET HEREAFTER (1997) Atom Egoyan
DEAD RINGERS (1988) David Cronenberg

I'm wondering why Cronenberg's eXistenZ isn't on the list. I liked it. I guess most people didn't. And what about Men With Brooms? I didn't see it, but I suppose it's not exactly the artsy film that this list espouses.

Saw the movie Hero last night. Such a beautiful film. Probably a little melodramatic, but I don't think such a film could be made any other way.

I don't know what's wrong with me these days, but I've been an emotional mess. Crying (or wanting to) at the drop of a hat. My hormones have gone crazy.

I was watching a comedy show at Alex's house and they were using a monkey as part of the skits and I finally couldn't take it anymore. My heart was ripping in half for the poor animal.

In Chapters, before the movie, I was reading The Dance by Oriah Mountain Dreamer. I was captivated by the cover: "What if the question is not why am i so infrequently the person I really want to be, but why do i so infrequently want to be the person I really am?" Tears welled in my eyes and I began walking around in a daze. I didn't know how to explain it to Alex and I'm sure he thinks I'm a freak (although he is endlessly endulgent with me). I was just so suddenly and so completely affected by the words.

It is small wonder, then, that this movie also affected me with its beauty.

I feel that there is a place inside my chest that is like a soft sponge, engorged to the choking point with emotion. At times it becomes too much for my chest to hold, and the sponge, squeezed, causes eruptions of emotion. Eruptions that I feel ill-equipped and ill-inclined to explain.

It's been an odd weekend.

On a lighter note, Alex got a new apartment and it's perfect and I'm jealous of and happy for him. It's right in the fashion district downtown (where I used to live and work) - a happening, artsy spot in which I'll be happy to take advantage of in my frequent visits.

I also bought another Jack Johnson CD as well as a David Gray CD. Listening to David Gray now. A contented smile is creeping across my face as the fiery sun sets outside the window behind me.

Well, I've really done it now: I've got hairline fractures on at least one of my wrists and possibly on both. Way to go. So much for living life with passion. Now it's all about living life with the sexy wrist splints.

The doc gave me the option of getting a cast, but said the splints might be good enough as long as I'm careful. Careful? ME?

I guess I won't be playing Ultimate again anytime soon.

And then I tell my account director at work about it and he sends me this:

Nice.

On the positive side, Sarah discovered the errant end-table tag that DW added to my code that broke my homepage and travel pages. YAY Sarah!

So I screwed up my homepage and my travel section. Honestly, I don't know what I did that made it screw up. Hence, I'm not sure how to fix it. The few things that I've had time to try didn't work. And I'm a busy girl, so I haven't had the time that I need to just take a look at the table structure and see if it's that. Only, I didn't change the table structure, so it should be fine, theoretically. However, obviously I did something and I will fix it. Just be patient.

In line with my "live life with passion" mantra, I played Ultimate Frisbee last night. And perhaps I had a little too much passion.

After an unglamorous fall to my ass, catching myself snow-boarding-wipe-out-style on the heels of my hands, I was possibly a little dazed to realize how much I'd actually hurt myself.

So now I sit typing awkwardly with my ultra-sexy wrist splint.
I'm off for x-rays tomorrow morning. I hope it wasn't my last Ultimate game, cause it was super fun! (If, by fun, I mean exhausting to the extreme for someone who hasn't exercised in about a xillion years.) Aside from the outstanding exercise, I met some great people!

I read an editorial in eye magazine on the weekend about the ridiculous notion of objectivity and bias in the media. It points out the lengths that journalists and news agencies will go to in order to preserve a facade of objectivity.

"Clinging relentlessly to a misguided idea of what constitutes objectivity, political reporters in the mainstream are forever hesitant to point out patent absurdities. Instead, they strive for balance, a he-said/she-said structure that isn't often satisfactory: if a White House press briefing told reporters that the White House was in fact black, the reporters doing stand-ups outside the clearly white building would quote colour experts and lay out the 'sharply divided opinion' on the subject."

Ridiculous of course. But then I considered that it might be a little dangerous to go against the White House.

However, the he-said/she-said is getting on my nerves. Case in point, this story:

"A Dutch professor became the first recipient of a new Swedish science prize in the field of medical education research, the awarding body said Monday."

Now, why can't they just write about the FACT that a Dutch professor (Dutch clearly being the most intelligent people in the world) won this award? Why are they reporting that someone SAID that he won? Are they so afraid that they might be wrong? Are they saying that the REAL piece of news here is that an awarding body made an announcement?

Don't get me wrong: I'm not saying that this journalist is any way at fault. Even had they written a different teaser paragraph, I know their editor would have rewritten it this way. I remember the formula writing that I learned in first-year newspaper reporting. I remember Joyce drilling this formula into my head and then understanding why it was that I found news stories to be so unimaginative.

Sometimes I'm really glad that I'm not in journalism.

This morning I read a story about the trend in school cafeterias : stocking them with organic food.

The story <Diet: no more mystery meat!> talks about how wonderful it is that there are more options than pizza and candy in the cafeteria.

The problem is, it seems to tout organic food as if it is the only healthy alternative to grease or sugar. I can see the importance of stocking cafeterias with more healthy food. But why organic?

"'Organic' doesn't necessarily mean 'healthy,' and pigging out on natural foods won't help your waistline. But organic programs such as the one in Lincoln Elementary have successfully gotten children to eat more fruits and vegetables, which will help improve their health in the long run."

While this is true, and while organic food can have many additional benefits for the environment, I object to the basic assumption that this article makes: that organic food is the only healthy alternative to greasy food. It doesn't even mention what "organic" means. The truth is that often "organic" doesn't mean much at all. And if getting healthful foods in school cafeterias is a cost issue, then perhaps we should first focus on cheaper healthful foods, since often (but not always) organic producers charge more for similar products.

I think we should first focus on providing accessible healthy food options for cafeterias (organic or otherwise) and reduce the bad eating habits of our children and then worry about improving that offering with well-chosen organic products.

So I got curious about why I'm feeling flabby. And I looked it up on my favourite thing, the web:

As a 150-lb (actually, I'm not sure about my weight, but it's a round number that's close enough to what I weigh), 5-foot-7-inch woman, my BMI is 23.5. Just barely in the "normal" range.

Doing light activity, I should eat approximately 1600 calories per day to maintain my weight (calculated at The Beehive).

Let's look at what I ate yesterday (I'm getting most of this information from CalorieCounter):

Brunch:
4 slices bread : 280 calories
butter 2 Tbsp: 200
cheese (1 oz): 114
orange juice (1cup): 107
tea with sugar/milk: 35

Snack:
Jet Fuel Coffee (2 cups of 1% milk?): 204

Dinner:
1 Grilled cheese sandwich (butter,cheese,bread): 300 (or more)
Deep n Delicious Cake (1/2 the cake, ugh): 800

Total: approx 2050 calories

Then, let's look at what I burned (I'm looking at Cool Nurse for info):

Walking 2mph (probably not even, as we were at the Cabbagetown Festival and we were sauntering) = 3.3/min = 390 calories

Watching TV = 145/hr? OK, seriously, this is no more strenuous than simply existing, so they MUST be talking about your basal metabolic rate and that's already taken into account in one's daily caloric intake. I mean, later in the page it says "sitting at rest = 1.6/hr". So I'm not counting this.

That means that I took in (and stored) 60 calories extra yesterday. It's as easy as that. And that's quite a normal food day for me (OK, eating half the cake is not normal. But if I hadn't eaten that, I'd have eaten something else). In fact, most days I'd say that I eat/drink much more than that (especially if I've gone out for drinks with a friend). But say I ate 100 calories too much every day (not tough to do). That means that I would gain 1 pound every month. (Info on calories-to-pounds). That's over 10 pounds a year!

Even if it had been a higher activity day, like if I'd played on my beach volleyball team for 100 minutes (and let's not kid ourselves that 6 people on the court is much exercise), I'd still have only burned 350 calories. Stll, better than nothing. And it means that I could eat an extra grilled cheese sandwich.

In this exercise of figuring out what I eat and exercise and all that, I've discovered that I'm not so bad, really. However, that's likely because I think about it from time to time and know something about it since my mom is a dietitian and drilled it into me as I was growing up.

But there are people who really think they're not overweight or unhealthy and they don't really pay much attention to what they eat or what they do in a day. Or maybe they do, but they have false ideas about what's good and bad for them. And that's how most of our population has gotten to be overweight. And that's how our healthcare system has become so overburdened.

Honestly, the number one reason/risk for healthcare problems is obesity. And I resent that I have to pay for people who abuse themselves, even in the face of so much public information on the subject. Same with smokers.

Genetic predisposition? Ya, I'm sorry for us: I have that problem too. I'm likely to develop diabetes as I get older. However, if I take care of myself now, the chances of this diminish.

I know I'm not perfect, but this is why I need to think about what I eat and how much I exercise. So that someday I will not be sitting in a hospital with a tube down my nose and an IV in my veins thinking "Dammit, I wish I'd taken better care of myself."

You don't have to be a neurotic person to care about your weight.

Now, take this exellent quiz and see what you actually know about weight loss. I thought I knew a lot, but some answers completely shocked me.

Taking a cue from Princess Top of the Woods, I would like to report that my name, in Dutch, means a group of fruit trees or orchard.

Went out to see a band (actually, a couple bands, but only one was really worth mentioning) at the Horseshoe last night. Jen and I went to school with two guys from the band Lifted and, since Jen is in town from Calgary, we decided to have a sisters-night-out to see this band for the first time.

Honestly, I didn't even know that my friend, Bill, from high school was even in the band until I saw him outside. It was a total double-take as he looks so different now! The last time I saw him I think I was in second-year university. I remember that he used to date my friend Anita. He was on my bus in high school. I remember that he came to visit me in the hospital when I was in grade 11 and had nearly died. He and his friend Chris nearly killed me with laughter.

And suddenly, there he is looking like Mr. Rocker outside the Horseshoe. And of course, he is so talented. In fact, the whole band was just amazing. Kind of Our-Lady-Peace-esque. They had real stage presence and outstanding songs.

I think about how much talent is out there and how little I actually get to hear any of it cause it never gets on the radio. What a shame. Talent is such a precious thing and we really don't do enough in Canada to support our artists.

Immediately afterwards, I went to the CHUM City Festival Schmooze, where Alex was working. He gave me a wristband so that we could go have a look at the party. Typically all the "BIG" stars had left. But it still strikes me that, even though the Toronto Film Festival is supposed to be about the indie films, it's still the big Hollywood stars that everyone wants to catch a glimpse of. I'm pretty sure that none of the people watching the red carpet even recognized most of the Canadian talent.

It's a sad truth: real artists are not properly appreciated. Their art is not supported because it's cheaper and easier to go with whatever is marketed best. We get spoon-fed whatever artist has the right connections. And art suddenly becomes so vanilla.

I want to make a point to support the arts more. I think it's an important mark of our civilization. And maybe if I do that, someday someone will support me to live my life expressing my talent and I can just write all day long.

Ohmygosh. Sarah made a cake. Even the picture of it makes my mouth water. Sarah is such an amazing baker. She made me the absolute BEST cheesecake for my 27th birthday. It was one of those "I want to put it all in my mouth right now cause it's so yummy, but I have to eat it slowly so I can savour and also I'm sad for when it's gone."

Maybe I can find a way to make sure that Sarah makes me a cake every week and then all I do that week is just eat it. Mmmm.

And no sharing.

Testing New Blogger Functionality

So Blogger suddeny has all this new functionality. You can send my posts to
a friend via email. I can email a post to publish on my site. It's crazy.
How do they manage to offer this for free? I'm pretty sure I should take
better advantage of what they have to offer; they make it all so easy!

No, they don't make me say this. I just tell people when I really like
something. Just like President's Choice Financial. Seriously, if you don't
have an account there already, what are you waiting for??

__________________
[cathy.bogaart]
don't.kid.yourself
cathy@webgoddesscathy.com
[WebGoddessCathy.com]

Just had my first Ultimate Frisbee practice. It was awesome. That's not to say that I was awesome, but it was great fun. I learned three basic throws, the basic rules of the game, and some of the players on the team.

I'm playing with my roommate, James, and his company. They need girls and so, there I am. I figured it would be great exercise... and it will be for sure!

First game: Tuesday!

Conversation at work: that Canadians are more receptive to UK accents than Americans.

Supporting point: in American movies, people with accents are usually bad guys.

I brought up Arnold Schwarzenegger and they dismissed me: he can't help it. What about Pierce Brosnan? Well, he was James Bond and that's a British-related film. Mike Myers as Austin Powers? Based on James Bond. "And, on the other hand, he has really bad teeth."

Do you have an example of an American movie that uses a character who has an accent who is NOT the bad guy?

Went out for dinner with my mom and Jen and Kendra at the Queen Mother Cafe. I had yummy Laotian food. Mom tried with varying degress of unsuccess to eat with chopsticks.

It was a nice dinner, but far too short.

In case you've read my Sept. 2nd blog about the wedding and were really concerned that I didn't think that Heather looked lovely, I will confirm it:

Heather looked like the quintessential magazine-style beautiful bride. Absolutely like a princess. Perfect.

I just thought that it was a forgone conclusion that she looked lovely. But now you know.

Sitting at home drinking tea in front of my computer - I really do feel that it's a home now. I have my computer hooked up to the internet, with my things surrounding me. I'm geeking out.

Sure, things aren't perfect.

I'm still unpacking and cleaning as I go.

I still don't know how to do my laundry here in this building.

The 24-hour Dominion was closed so I couldn't buy my breakfast this morning.

My computer speakers are still missing a power source, so I can't listen to music on them yet.

It's a beautiful holiday Monday outside and I'm inside, on my computer, on the phone, fixing my bike and putting together my bookcase INSIDE

All in all, I suppose I'm doing well. I'm really trying to update my website a little. I'm synching all the changes I've made in the past year with all my files on my computer. I'm downloading all the pictures that people have sent me that I haven't been able to put up yet. Finishing up vacation draft blogs. I'm working on it. Promise.

Updates first. Redesign later.

Just back from Bala where Alex was playing in a Battle of the Bands at The Kee. And what an ordeal!

We'd reserved a rental car and I was picking it up after work at Fairview Mall, just a quick bus ride away from my work.

"Sorry, your license has expired."

WHAT!?
Ya, on my birthday, my license expired. Oops.
Since Alex has neither license nor credit card, he couldn't rent either.

All his friends/bandmates had already left for Bala. I tried calling a couple of friends to see if there cars were for rent for the evening. No such luck.

So we had to get to a Ministry of Transportation Office QUICK. Hm. Government office open past 5:30pm on a Friday? And how to find out which might be open? Well, we needed internet access. Think we could find internet access in a mall in metro Toronto? It wasn't looking good. Finally, we begged a guy at a video games store who chucked a kid off a game of Doom, or something similarly important, who promptly snarked, "You just lost a customer, dude."

Whatever. Like he was ever going to do anything but play that game at the store every day after school.

Found the MTO office online. Can't renew your license online. Dammit. But the only office open past 6pm on a Friday is in Mississauga. Well, now you know.

So, off to find a cab. Think we can find a cab outside the mall? Not a chance.

Off to Sheppard, the major road nearby. No cabs. To the gas station to find a phone book/phone booth in which to call a cab. A taxi happens to be filling up and while Alex finds rental car agency numbers in the book, I grab the cabby and instruct him on where I need to go.

We're off.

About 45 minutres later (7pm), we arrive at the MTO office at Square One, Mississauga. And it's humungous line. So many people. At least an hour long.

Matt calls. I explain the situation and ask to use his car. But he's got appointments to see houses the next day. Fine, we can give him the rental vehicle that we organized on the taxi ride over. And then, like the hero he is, he's on the way over to meet us, while I continue to wait and try to get into the office before it closes.

Alex asks how long it takes to get to Mississauga from Guelph.
"An hour," I say.
Alex looks stunned. "I might not make it," he says.

Alex takes off to go get our backpacks out of the waiting taxi and pay the nice driver. He also makes some calls to the organizers of the band competition, telling them our sob story, and begging them to put his band on last. They say, "We'll see what we can do."

I continue to wait in line and finally, finally make it to the front where it takes me approximately 2 minutes to renew my licence.

Time Check: 7:55pm
We organize our stuff for Matt. There won't be time for us to drive him to the rental agency. When Matt arrives, I give him $40 for the cab, the rental reservation number and directions to the location. We show him where to get a cab and he shows me to his car. I'm so panicked, I sit in the driver's seat, looking around, confused.

"Cath," Matt says calmly, a smile on his face. "It's a manual transmission. Remember when you taught me how to drive manual?"

Um, yes. Of course. But I still manage to rev the engine before taking off out of the mall parking lot. Matt must've been worried.

Alex navigated and I drove a moderate high speed the whole way (getting a speeding ticket is the LAST thing I need), only almost killing us once. On the way, we get a call from Tanya, telling us that, had she been home she would've let us use her car. What a gem!

We're racing north up the highway when we get a call telling us that The Free Press is on last. Sighs all around. We will make it. We even have time to check into our hotel in Gravenhurst and stop at McDonald's for dinner, even though I have brought snacks.

I remember I was so proud of myself for remembering to bring healthy snacks for the leisurely albeit traffic-jammed drive north. It seems so long ago.

We arrive finally at the venue sometime after 11pm. We were supposed to be there around 7pm. I pay the $5 cover and enter, Alex taking the back door reserved for the "talent". I see the band and tell them that I left Alex behind; I figure I'm the important one here. I'm going to be there new drummer. No one seems really excited by this prospect.

We listen to the bands and finally they go on and do a rockin' show.
We hold our breath for the results.

And, while it would make for a really great story to say that they won, I can only sadly report that they didn't make the top three. They did, however, put on a great show, and some other talented bands won the cash and bragging rights.

Alex and I won the award for adventure. What a team.

VACATION UPDATE

CALGARY
Day 1: arrive in Calgary in time to go to bed. Note that Mom has negotiated for Baby-Cath to sleep in Jen's comfy bed, while Jen sleeps on an air mattress on the floor.

Day 2: Jen's soccer game. Sunny with chilly wind. Return to Jen's house before packing/leaving for Deadman's Flats, where we check into our motel and manage to squeeze in a hike at Johnston's Canyon. It rains.

Day 3: Up early for a big breakfast at the Husky next door before driving to Lake Louise to hike to the Plain of Six Glaciers. More rain.

Day 4: Check out of motel and drive to Jasper, which is somehow out of the clouds. We hike Wilcox Pass, visit the Athabasca Glacier and look around the visitor centre. Stay overnight in Field, BC at a lovely guest house. Eat buffalo burgers for dinner (which could possibly explain some GI distress for most of us). Rain, rain, rain.

Day 5: Up early in order to get to Lake O'Hara for the 8:30am bus into the park. Start our hike to Lake Oesa and Yukness Ledge right away, with socks on my hands to keep them warm. It is cold. But as we round Lake O'Hara and start to push upward, we start to warm up. On the way down, it starts to rain again, and I slip on a rock and fall on my face/shins. The last 15 minutes of the hike are pretty wet, but the worst of it comes when we're done, so we're pretty happy. I pay for coffee in Lake Louise before heading "home" to Jen's place in Calgary. Everyone has warming showers and we watch the Olympics all night.

Day 6: Jen goes to work, while the rest of us drive to >Drumheller to the Royal Tyrell Museum. Outstanding museum; definitely not enough time to spend there. I learned so much! I love museums when I have the time to spend. Back to Calgary to go to dinner at my dad's cousin's place.

VICTORIA
Day 7: Pack up and head for the airport. So long, Calgary! Arrive >>Victoria. Heather's mom Marlene picks us up at the airport and almost immediately starts crying. It's a portentious beginning. We check into the Strathcona, our home for the next 3 days and go for lunch with Mar, Aunt Joan and June (Heather's dad's aunts who are an absolute RIOT!). On to Marlene and Greg's place for a BBQ, see Heather and Steve (and Kevin, Heather's brother), talk, check out Heather's dress, shoes and jewlery, make place cards and centre pieces and stuff my face full of yummy food.

Day 8: Go get some Blendz coffee (a good coffee chain in Victoria, but almost as prolific as Charbucks) and make a manicure appointment and get my jewlery cleaned. Wow, does it look shiny after being cleaned. I had no idea it had so much crap on it! Meet Heather for her manicure at a fancy spa. Meet up with Steve and Paul (my wedding boyfriend) for lunch. Head out for my manicure. Walk around Victoria in some much-needed alone-time. I stumbled on a little market there and got to talking to some artists who had lived in New Zealand for 3 years. They sparked my craving for adventure again. I think I need to go there again. I bought a lovely hand-made book from them for Alex, since I was pretty crappy on his birthday. I love wandering through artisan markets. Too bad most people sell stuff that you can't USE. Meet up for the wedding rehearsal. Giggle a lot. Drive out to the most lovely setting for a rehearsal dinner, at a friend of Steve's family. Reminisce with Heather about when we she used to live in Alliston. Drink water as I do NOT want a migraine. Stay overnight at the Swans hotel.

Day 9: Heather's wedding. Wake up at 6am because a previous guest had set the alarm at that time. Curse them. Wake up with Heather at 7am or something. Get ready and to the hair dresser for 9am. Get hair done (unsatisfactorily, in my opinion). Taxi ride to the spa where Heather gets her make up done professionally and the rest of us just muddle around on our own faces.

Back to the Swans for some food and to get into our dresses. Toni (maid of honour) ties Heather into her dress while I strap on her shoes and Heidi (the third bridesmaid) takes photos of the melee. Enter Marlene and Greg and flower lady with bouquets. Exit hotel in order to meet horse and carriage who are, well, late. Later (much later) we arrive at the Parliament Buildings in our horse-drawn carriage, having waved at all the tourists along the way. Photos.

Panic moment: Heather's dress gets grease all down the front from the horse carriage wheel. Keep taking photos while Marlene and Greg find a dry cleaner who is open and can try to fix it. Off to the dry cleaner. No charge for the quick fix!

More photos at the beach. Off to Laurel Point for the ceremony.

Panic moment: Heather announces to me that the cake is ugly and that Marlene has asked the kitchen staff to "do something with it."

Walk down the aisle (the musicians have thankfully decided to play music while I walk, but not while the others walk, they are apparently retarded). Heather enters, vows, misty eyes, laughing, rings, kissing, signing and it's all over. So strange how all the preparation leads to that moment and it's over in, well, a moment.

More photos. Hor d'oeuvres and punch and talking to my parents about my day and laughing about my funny hair-do and too-big dress. The sun comes out and I can sit and relax (maybe too much) before the dinner.

It's funny being part of a wedding party. You're suddenly important. And yet, I didn't DO anything except try to be there for Heather. Her dad made a speech and 5 other people made speeches about Steve. And the yummy food kept on coming. Steve made a speech to thank everyone for coming.

Panic moment: the topiaries crash to the ground. All the men rush to right them.
Panic moment: Heather feels sick. Her uncle goes and gets her some antacid and throat lozenges.

Finally, the food stops coming and it's time for the ceremonial cutting of the cake and then the dancing.

Panic moment: I run dead-on into a glass wall. No real reason, except that I thought it was the door. Smash! I bounce off and look in confusion, not understanding what force-field could have thrown me. I'm pretending I'm fine, but then my nose starts gushing blood and I run to the bathroom, embarassed and in some serious pain. The blood stops eventually and I rejoin the dancing. Some guy breaks his knee and the dancing stops, although Steve and Heather have already retired to their complimentary suite for the evening. There's a bit of an ordeal, but the ambulance comes and the party breaks up. The Best Man walks me "home" to the Strathcona where I painfully pick out the hundreds of hairpins from my complicated, cemented coiffure. Sleep.

Day 10: More Blendz coffee and off to the airport with Marlene and Greg who then give us slices of the apparently ugly but delicious wedding cake before we check into our flight.

Panic moment: we discover that we're flying stand-by out of Vancouver, although no one told us this when I bought the tickets. Also, Cara, the foodservice provider for the airline is on strike, so they can't promise us food. We do get a meal. But we're seated right by the toilets. Ew.

And that's the adventure.

So tired I feel sick. My eyes don't want to open.

That'll show me to stay up past my bedtime! Whenever Raye comes to town, my life gets turned upside-down.

Last night, she had tickets for Urinetown, so I went to that instead of my last game of beach volleyball (I know, I'm a bad person). Urinetown closes on Sept. 4th, so if you were thinking of going to see it (and you should), hurry.

Great show!
Then, of course, we had to go for dessert afterwards at the Marchè where we decided we have to go to New York to see my boyfriend in his musical before it closes. Sadly, tickets for this Sunday were sold out. But Alex was a good enough sport to actually look it up for me.

Then we had to find our way home (to my new apartment!) where my roommate was actually home. We ended up talking, as we do, and suddenly it was 1am. And then it was 7am and time to get up. After a long string of nights of not getting enough sleep and having migraines, I'm starting to feel a wee bit burnt out.

More coffee.
~runs to the coffee machine~

Personal update:

Raye is in town!

I'm being offered a full-time contract at work!

I took an Amerge tablet and my migraine went away! (Well, you would wait too if your medication cost $20/pill and you only had 3 left.)

I finally put together my Jerker desk and set up my beloved computer

my nose is healing (that's another story that will come with the whole vacation update...)