I'm Sick and it Sucks.

All right, I do believe it is permissible for people to complain once in a while, when they have adequate reason. And I feel like complaining. Not because I'm overworked and paying to do so (kuz we all are, jeez are we nuts??), or because I haven't slept more than three hours a night for about two or three days, but because I'm sick and have been for the last two and a half weeks. So I thought I should listen to my wheezing and visit the doctor. And she has the gall to inform me that my bronchitis is not yet acute but will be shortly if I don't take a mountain of horse-sized pills. So I am perturbed. Yes, perturbed. Because unfortunately, unlike other people who may decide they get to have a day off to recover, I have class from 8 am until 8:30 pm and cannot miss a single one. And to finish off this wonderful spiel of complaining about everything and nothing in particular, if you could have any superpower, what would it be?

Care Packages

All right, this is for everyone living away from home... or they don't even have to be!! How great is it to get something from a friend or family in the post?? Really, think about looking in your mailbox and finding a big thick letter from someone, or getting a parcel with presents!!! How can that not put a smile on your face?? Okay, well, this Thursday I got a big parcel full of presents... two new hoodies, a card, a letter, and a fridge magnet from camp. As if that wasn't great enough, on Friday I got a big envelope from my wife back in camp, Pixie. You can see the envelope below in the picture. And the back said "...Indeed I licked the seal. Mmmm seal. The postman must think I'm nuts. Hi Postman! Or woman. Mr. Mailman! So confusing." Honestly, who wouldn't be excited (or a little worried) to open a letter like that? Unfortunately, I couldn't open it right away because I had to blade to my bio class, but it had a fantastic card filled with tons of photocopied pictures that I made into my camp collage. But this is just a big public thanks to everyone I love down at the ranch... try not to get eaten by grizzles this summer, I need to make it down to Ski Scape!!! Okay, now for everyone reading this post, what are the best thing(s) you've ever received snail mail style?? It doesn't even have to be super cool. All right, heading to bed. Nite!

This is me in my new room. Cozy, hey? The daisy from above is part of my lantern that hung in my princess net at camp. 

My beautiful collage, made from the kana pictures taken this summer... if you can spot my picture with the roses near the top, the quote says "I'm generally the person dancing at the party who everybody always thinks is the intoxicated one, but I'm really not." Thanks, Pixie!! I have no clue where you found it but it made me laugh for a good five minutes.  

Lirez-vous français?

All right, I guess it's time I let some of my friends know what I've been up to, since I haven't really let on in a while. I started swimming again; I'm being pretty lazy, only doing like 30 laps or so and then I hop out. The pool's always super crowded and there's just not enough "fast" lanes and the mediocre speed people like to be in them too, which only makes sense... except it's so hard to swim around them when the lanes are full and there's people that only seem to stand at the edge so you can't do a flip turn... arrrgh!! Why do people come if they don't swim? Kinda like the people that just sit in the chalet when you go to the ski hill. What's up with that? When I swim enough to get my shoulder back into shape, I think I'll play a bit of rec volleyball, that should be fun. Anyways, if reincarnation exists, I hope I come back as a fish. But what I really want to be doing right now is wakeboarding or snowboarding. Either would make me happy. What is it about sports that makes me happy inside? Ooo!! This is a kinda strange but interesting enough random story. In my psychology course, we touched on "athletic anorexia" where I guess people do sports to make them happy, and it replaces the satisfaction that comes from eating. This sounds weird, and something you would only expect from people like adolescent teenagers or gymnasts and dancers, except I guess they did this experiment with rats, to slowly get them to prefer running around to eating, until they could put food in the cage and the rats would just ignore it because they were so obsessed with running. Then they would put the rats in a small cage with food, so there wasn't enough room to exercise, so eventually the rats started eating again. So, yeah, I guess that was a bit interesting since I've had a bunch of friends with eating disorders that have needed help. Hmm... I think most of my friends know I'm in an international house this year, so I like to spend lots of time getting to know my roomates, they're pretty cool. I've got one from Thailand, one from Beijing, one from Japan, one from Germany, and one from Hong Kong. And they all speak different languages... so I decided to speak french. Which is currently killing me slowly. Je vais devenir une folle un jour bientôt, je pense. All right, that's enough of an update. Next blog will be on another completely random subject. Keep your ears peeled... comme un banane...

I just think this is friggin' hilarious. That's pretty much all I can think of to say.  

This picture of an iceberg was sent to me through my chain of Shad Valley contacts.. I guess a friend's coworker was doing some sort of scuba diving work in the ocean, and when she came back up, she was able to see the iceberg like this because the sun was shining perfectly straight overhead.  

This is the gift pack... I wonder how many jars of peanut butter it would take to win this? 

Washable Crayons

I got hungry today while working on my research proposal for my biology lab, so I found a banana and attacked it with a jar of peanut butter. Well, postmortum, I noticed that my peanut butter jar had a cool label, that says "every pack wins" on it, with a website to go to. Always looking for a way to procrastinate, I of course did this, where I got to play a cool game and win a pack of washable crayons. The game was a little strange though... you drive a bus and if you hit the chocolate chip cookies it damages your bus. I'm used to Crash Bandicoot and Ape Escape where you try to get the cookies/apples. Anyways, I love getting free stuff online. Another great place to go to get free stuff is the Jelly Belly Website, where you can play a quiz and then get a free sample of jelly belly beans. I'm all about the free stuff. It used to be that if you were one of the first 100 people to visit the website every day, you could automatically win, but they stopped doing that. Maybe it had something to do with time zones. Anyways, if you happen to have a jar of kraft peanut butter, or perhaps some kraft dinner or cheeze whiz or oreos might work, I suggest you go play the game at the website while looking for a way to procrastinate.

I like mustard, too!

Okay, this is a random blog about college food. Doug's comment about mustard got me going. Have you ever tried carrots and mustard? sounds strange, but I like it. I happen to live off of cereal. I'm not ashamed to admit it. It's a good thing I love cereal. But I also have a thing for peanut butter, but I don't buy bread because I don't care to make sandwiches, and I'm not a huge toast fan. So, last night, I was trying to figure out a good way to eat peanut butter with the limited amount of things in my kitchen... because as good as peanut butter is all by itself, you usually should have it with something else. So, I decided that because peanut butter is really good with chocolate and with milk, I decided to make some chocolate milk and add peanut butter. And then I realized that peanut butter is an oil.. and doesn't mix with aqueous things normally... so I heated it up. And voila! it was practically like a reese peanut butter cup in liquid form. And it was wonderful. All right... so what else do I eat at school?? I make stirfry sometimes for supper when I'm home.. which has been about twice in the past two weeks. I take vegetables and more cereal to school with me. Sometimes when I'm really tired I have a thing for eating jello for supper and then going to bed. I also drink lots of tea. Oh, and I make lots of salad and add stuff like tuna and egg... I like to nuke eggs and add dill weed, I swear, it's fantastic. But that's only when I'm home for supper or lunch, which isn't that often once again. And I have discovered that frozen yogurt tubes are marvellous things. You'd think I'd be a pro cook after working in a kitchen all summer, but that's completely up to interpretation. All right, I hope everyone gets a chance to comment on their own college food experiences.

I'm back!

All right, I've come to the conclusion that everyone needs to make mistakes in order to learn, and that the mistakes that we make make us all better people in the end. Thanks, Audreé, for putting everything into perspective for me!! Hindsight is 20-20, n'est-ce-pas? That's a little french thrown in for both Audreé and for the sake of my french class. Which is making "stress" an understatement... imagine taking a class where half of what everyone else is saying is jibberish, and being expected to not only understand everything but reply in nearly flawless jibberish...but hopefully, after an insane amount of studying and hard work, I'll come out of the class with a basic start to being bilingual. That's my goal. Ike. Better get back to mon dictionnaire.

Stupid me

All right, this week I am venting about myself. Yes, you heard me correctly. I'm sure that we've all done stupid things occasionally, but this Friday, I really messed up with probably the worst thing I've ever done that I can think of. And I'm not going to say what it was. I'm not even going to hint. Hopefully it won't come back to haunt me.... and I daresay I really learned my lesson. So I've decided to try my best to put it behing me forever. But all I can say to all of my friends out there, is never let anything or anyone stand in the way of what you know really is right. And I sincerely hope that you can look in the mirror every day, being proud of who you are because you stand up for what you know is right, and never be ashamed that you have compromised yourself. And that is all that I have to say... for tonight. Bonne nuite.

Thems Wacked-out People

Ahhh! I just wrote a big long blog (hey, those three words look cool together.. kind of like a backwards alliteration with the g's) but when I hit "publish" it just didn't publish. Made me angry. Okay, well, I will rewrite part of my story, anyways. This is in reference to Ian's ETS blurb, and Doug's subsequent comment about the wonderful public transit people we all meet occasionally. Today I met a crazy man. I know everyone likes crazy people stories... so this is how it happened. I made a stop at Future Shop downtown after Orientation today, and hopped on the LRT to get back to the university... and I happened to sit on the seat next to a guy that looked completely normal, and possibly even good-looking. So, there I am, still decked out in all my OL garb, my blue lightbulb shirt with pins all over it, green tattoo on my face, nametag still on. Then this guy starts talking to himself... which wouldn't really bother me, because I am semi-crazy myself sometimes and will mumble things without realizing it. But then he gets louder and louder, then jumps up and runs to one door, then the other, then he sits down again. And then he shouts, "bloody hell!" and whispers to me…. "Are you a cop? They're all coming to get me." At which point, I realize that he's a little more then at the semi-point. So, I reply, "No, I'm just a student. Juuuuuust a student." And then he says, "At the university?? I'm not allowed there. Not allowed there for the next 37 years... just for opening a damned book." At this point, I nod wisely, because that's always a good thing to know. And he asks me… "Can you get me books?" But then, it's the final stop (and my stop), so I hop off and say "Nope! Sorry! Got to go!" and go up the escalator for a bit. But then I look back, and he's still on the train, staring at me. Which wouldn't be that creepy, except his eyes are really wide open and his face is totally expressionless (think horror movies). He turns and gets off, and then heads up the escalator, still staring at me, at which point I bolt and run. Not sure if he followed me, but I didn't look back to check. OoOoOoO. Still gives me the shivers.

Orientation 2004... "Welcome to the Jungle"

Orientation

Today was the first official day of orientation... so, after a weekend of grueling training, including drills on things like doing a proper human knot and countless cheers ("Bananas unite!!", "I once knew a boy... his name was silly Willy", "What are we wearing? Pants Pants Pants! Science Pants HUH!" and my personal favourite... the penguin dance!) I thought I would be prepared for almost anything that could possibly come my way. Well, I had some fun experiences today. First, one of the new students got so nervous she threw up everywhere.. all over herself.. etc. And although I was really sympathetic with her OL (orientation leader) who kinda stood there and watched, saying "there, there... um....yeah... okay..." I felt much worse for the poor student. So, I helped her out, took her to where the bathroom was, helped her clean up, etc, and gave her my sweater to wear for the day. And... going above and beyond the call of duty, I kept hers for her because she had nowhere to put it. Hence, the wonderful smell in the separate compartment in my backpack. Better clean that tonight. Anyways, I thought that was a funny story to share with everyone... especially since I think every OL (all six hundred of them) had heard about this by the end of the day. What a way to start your first year at school... poor thing.
Anyways, the rest of the day went pretty good, I think tomorrow will be better. Today, though, I happened to lead my students into the wrong room in ETLC, having them sit down and get settled in their seats only to get up and move again.... not once, not twice, but THREE times. Wow. I think I deserve an award. Yes, my name is Jeanine and I will be your official Orientation Leader... because I really do know where I am....

This is how Nick cooks steak. And removes his eyebrows simultaneously!! Whoever said guys couldn't multitask? 

John Mayer

This is a funny story about a celebrity that amuses me. Some of you out there may have already heard it. This summer at camp, I worked with a guy named Jedi (aka Jeremie... he's the guy in the middle of the picture below). Since I like to listen to John Mayer occasionally, I put on a CD and went back to work. I casually asked Jedi what he thought of John Mayer, and he said "Well, I hate him. I don't really mind all his music, it's just him personally I can't stand. " So, I guess he used to date a girl who was cousins with Sting's manager. One night, Jeremie and his girlfriend were at Sting's birthday party, and John Mayer was there. He came up to everyone and introduced himself by saying: "Hello. I'm John Mayer. The musician." And then he proceeded to hit on all the girls at the party, including Jeremie's then girlfriend, asking her to go out with him (even though it was obvious she was with someone else). So Jeremie said... "Excuse me? Hello. I'm Jeremie. The boyfriend." But Jedi's pretty cool, he just laughs about it now.

There are just some pictures that must be shared with the world. This is one of them. Congratulations, Marc and Trent, I hope your lives together will be as beautiful as you both are.

This is the camp I worked at... the hike up and back down Horton Hill to take this picture was only about an hour, but it was pretty brutal (there was a part where you had to grab a rope line kuz it was too steep to climb up!!). But Kananaskis is gorgeous and I'd do anything to be back there again.

Yuk!! Who in their right minds eats this stuff? 

Here's to Skippy, for belaying me like a superhero! 

Artichokes

Well, while working this summer at camp, I had the distinct pleasure of working with artichoke hearts. Well, they're highly overrated, along with avocados and eggplants. That's where the "choke" part comes in. Still, there are many words that amuse me and artichoke is one of them. Hence, the title of my blog page. Because I blog all the time to myself but why not let other poor souls be blogged?