Blogger is back!

Blogger has been unavailable due to maintenance for practically an entire day and it was so weird to not be able to share when I wanted to!

Last night Lenny's family all came over and it turned into a surprise happy graduation party for myself and Vanessa, Lenny's brother Zac's girlfriend. Silvana got us a really cute cake with graduating rubber duckies on it as well as some gifts to mark the occasion. I got a necklace with eighth notes on it, and Vanessa got a ruby ring. Lenny's grandmother, Matilda, gave us each a beautiful picture frame for our grad photos.

The preparations for departing this evening have been going well. We've fit everything into the two backpacks that we're borrowing from my sister and her friend Kris, we're underweight by 30 lbs each, and we still have lots of room to put souvenirs in. After finishing the packing this morning we took Dakota out for a good two hour stroll while we did some geocaches in the area. We didn't have much success with that having only found 1 of the 3 we were looking for, but our legs did a big stretch before they'll have to be at rest on the plane for a few hours.

Well I'm off to see if I can upload the rest of the photos on the camera so we have a blank memory card for the beginning of the trip. With any luck I'll be able to upload some from last night!

Monday migraines

Well my trip back home has come and gone. I had a really good visit with my mom, dad, three sisters, and Starsky. Normally we're only all together for a few days around Christmas, so it was kind of nice to have another opportunity to catch up.

Today was a beautiful sun shiny day so after some sleeping in, I decided to unpack the bike and take it for its first spin of the season. Everything was going well until about 20 minutes in when my hands became very pins and needle-y and my legs felt like jello. I dismounted and watched the ducks go by for a while and once my heart rate was back down to normal I turned around and headed back. While I was stretching at home, I developed a pretty intense headache, which is still kicking 8 hours later. I've had post-exercising head aches like this before, but not since last summer. So sad that they have returned. Here's for hoping that eventually I figure out whether its too much water/food/salt, not enough, etc. I was secretly hoping that the daily antihistamines I've been taking for the oral allergy syndrome would help if my problem was an outdoor allergy related one.

Tomorrow I will work at the store for a few hours and Lenny will present his Masters-PhD reclassification presentation (at 1). After that, much celebration and packing will be had as we're planning on heading out on Wednesday to spend some time with his family before heading to Italy.

Well I'm off to find some more stumbleupon finds and finish watching some terrible tv. Ciao ciao!

Saturday, the day after Friday

Here's a pic of me chilling with the pooch that Keely took this afternoon. The pic is pretty good with the exception that I look a tad like a turtle that's pulled its head into its shell.  Anyhoo, Starsky is Very happy to have so many people home and has been getting lots of attention as demonstrated above.

This afternoon Paula, Keely, and I went to see Something Borrowed. It was a fairly cute movie about a girl who falls in love with her best friend's fiance. The part that stuck with me was that "sometimes nice and good people do stupid things." Ain't that the truth. Sometimes (ok a lot of the time) I'm too hard on myself and every time that I do something stupid, I'll get down on myself that I'm not a "good person". It's good to have a reminder every now and then even if it is from a movie.

I didn't finish any books today but I did spend some extra time with my mumsy. I'm going to forgo my bus fares and catch a ride home with Paula and visit my grandpa en route tomorrow. Here's for hoping for an uneventful car ride.

It's Official!

It's Official! I am done my current educational experiences! The last of my grades have been posted to the Registrar's Office and I will graduate in June with a Masters of Music in Literature and Performance, and a Bachelors of Management and Organizational Studies in Organizational and Human Resources. This will leave my with 16 letters after my name: CUTL, BMus, BMOS, MMus. Ideally sometime within the next few years I will add CHRP (Certified Human Resources Professional) to those designations.  It does seem a bit silly, even to me, to have so many degrees but I am starting to identify with the small sense of pride I should probably feel for having finished so much. Right now I'm just going to concentrate on the fact that this huge investment of time and energy is finito bandito. Thank you all for your support.

The Optimist by Laurence Shorter

I finished this book by Laurence Shorter last night. The beginning and middle presented a lot of really interesting approaches to optimism, but by the end I felt as though I was reading a really bad biography. He was apparently a comedian in a previous life but the British humour wasn't really obvious to me. Still a worthwhile read for many though I think.

Today I did a bit of shopping with my mom (clothes for me and a few books for her) and then I washed the windows. After my sister Paula arrived, we took the pooch out for a walk and then had pizza will the fam. Keely is also home for the weekend which is kind of fun; it's probably the first time all four of us have been home for a non-Christmas/Easter holiday for about 8 years. Talk about an out-of-the-ordinary Mothers' Day present!

Books

I finished this book last night. The Shopaholic series is one of the only sets of books that I've really ever been able to get into. Sad but true. Many thanks to Lenny for getting it for me. He knows me well and this book warmed my heart just as he does when we're together. Thanks honey buns :)

Wow

I am confused and very surprised by the election results. Wowsers. Not what I expected. I'm still quite shocked and don't have much to say.

Polling-wise it was a long day of having people state their name and address and listening to grandchildren stories told by my poll clerk. Everything went really smoothly and I only had one nutso who preached conspiracy theories at me for about 10 minutes... fun times.

Well it's bed time for me. Catching the bus fairly early tomorrow to go back home for a week so must go log some zzzs!