Sunday, February 26, 2006

Stupid Idea #37

Stay up till all hours of the morning watching movies at a friend's house: watch a funny one first, then end the evening with the 6th Sense. Proceed to go home at 3:30 in the morning in the dark, and walk through a big open snowy area with previously mentioned giant snowmonster rabbits lurking nearby. Startle the rabbits into jumping out from their sneaky little hidey places, which in turn startles you when you jump to the conclusion that they're scary dead girls running to vomit on you.

Stupid M. Night Shamalama-ding-dong.

Friday, February 24, 2006

Oh, those Crazy Canucks

Leave it to them to serve you a dish that looks like enchiladas, but tastes funny and includes parsley and miracle whip, then call it fajitas, but pronounce the word as "fee-adas."

I sure love these people. Their ignorance in the realm of mexican food is kind of endearing. The lack of any corn tortillas in the entire province, however, is not endearing. How am I supposed to make real enchiladas?

What do you do when your wife is in love with a priest?

This evening I went over to a friend's house to watch movies. Which friend, you may ask? You know that guy that I haven't been able to come up with a suitable 'nym for yet? Yeah, it's that guy. Tonight I found out one more thing that he isn't, and a few more things that he is, but none of those things would be good for making up a name. Well, one would be, except I might someday want to tell him about the site, and I'm not sure he would be flattered by the name. Perhaps I'll just call him Nameless Joe for now.

So Nameless Joe, one of the short Christian girls, and I watched movies tonight- one was What To Do In Case of Fire, a German film about a group of anarchists who grow up and sell out, then have to get back together when one of their unexploded bombs suddenly explodes unexpectedly. Very funny, pretty interesting. The other movie was I Confess, an older Hitchcock movie that I'd never heard of. You've probably never heard of it, either, and for a good reason: it's not that great of a movie. It wasn't a bad movie- while I was watching it, I found it pretty gripping and interesting, but when it had finished, I felt strangely unsatisfied. Kind of jipped, you know? Like I had been tricked into watching something that wasn't quite right.

The evening as a whole was entertaining, enlightening, and enrapturing. Ok, not really enrapturing. I just wanted something to round out my alliterative phrase. I learned much about my host, a fair deal about the other guest, and a good bit about fun, fun music.

Ra, ra, Rasputin!

Monday, February 20, 2006

Man oh man

Okay. I'm pretty sure you all need to go over to Albino Blacksheep (there's a link on the left) and take a look at Brokeback to the Future. It's about the funniest thing I've seen for... well, for an hour. But that's only because I just heard a guy describe himself as having "washboard abs," then amend it by saying that there's "a load in the wash."

Anyway. Go see Michael J Fox and Christopher Lloyd in the roles they were truly meant to play.

What I did over my summer vacation, I mean this weekend


I'm back! The trip was very fun, and I'm sad that we couldn't have stayed longer. As it is, though, I got to see the city, meet new friends, go sledding and geocaching, get lost, get unlost, eat at a fun health-food restaurant, and nearly freeze to death taking pictures at the border in what must have been minus 40 weather and wind (oh, how windy it was!).

We also spent about 45 minutes in a cool indoor market that reminded me of the farmer's market in LA, then out to run around a few hundred yards east of there where people were playing hockey on the river, and there was an ice skating path on the pedestrian bridge that went over the lake. We didn't have any skates, but we had fun sliding around on the slick ice, and scurrying out of the way when we saw somebody skating towards us at high velocity.

We mostly hung out with a cute semi-newly married couple, who live in a cute brown house in the cute French area of town, right near downtown, convenient to everything. They enjoyed going caching with us, and the husband and the guy we came with had fun racing each other through the park to where they thought the cache was, then back through the park to the car, making their way through knee-high snow, leaping down into the streambed and climbing back up the other side. Us ladies took it a little slower :).

It seemed like everywhere we drove in the city, there were these huge snow sculptures that people had made; not like snowmen, but like things that could easily have been permanent granite statues and works of public art. I believe there's a bunch in the downtown here in Parts Unknown, and since I have the week off, probably I'll go and take a look at them today or tomorrow.

It was a great weekend, kind of a whirlwind trip. For awhile I considered staying for a day or two in Parts Moreknown, where I dropped off my travelling companions, before heading back home, but by the time we got there, I was ready to sleep in my own bed, bathe in my own shower, and eat more normal, non-trip food. I made my way home therefore, and the trip seemed to go by really quickly, even though it was a 2 1/2 hour drive. I played music and sang along really loud, and stuffed fig newtons down my throat to keep myself awake. The fig newtons and singing seemed to work very well, as I didn't really feel tired until I got out of my car and started the long trek from the parking lot to my apartment.

I now have had my share of fun and adventure for this week, and can spend the next 7 days doing homework and getting prepared for the rest of the semester. Hooray! I guess a fast and short trip was the best thing all around, giving me time to have fun and time to do work.

Wednesday, February 15, 2006

Leavin' on a Jet Plane

Or rather, leavin' in my car. With a couple of friends. On a spur of the moment (alright, planned two days ahead) trip.

This will be the most spontaneous thing I've done so far... in my life. I guess. Well, I guess coming to Parts Unknown was a spontaneous decision, but after the decision, I still had like 6 months to prepare. Anyway. We drive East on Friday. With the wind.

Perhaps I should start packing.

Tuesday, February 14, 2006

Happy St Valentine's Day!

I will be celebrating by going to the gym and getting sweaty, then coming home and studying for awhile, then to top it all off, I'm going to go compare prices on printers!

I hope you all have days as wonderful as mine will be.

Sunday, February 12, 2006

My final final

Yup, I'll be done with worrisome tasks on April 21. Just so you know. In case you wanted to, you know, fly up here and have a road trip with me.

Saturday, February 11, 2006

I think I just electrocuted my lips




I have this bad habit of putting things into my mouth. Things like small toys, pencils, my fingers, and anything else that is smooth or brightly colored.

I now know one more thing that I shouldn't put in my mouth or on my lips: the firewire cord for my iPod when it's plugged into my computer.

No, Mom, I'm not damaged. Neither is my computer. Nothing exciting happened, I just brushed it against my lips and felt heat, kind of a popping like if you spread pop rocks on your lips. And now that I know what it does, I will not do it again.

I am a human being, and I learn from my mistakes.

Wednesday, February 8, 2006

Sweat is apparently a good thing.

What a wonderful feeling it is when you come home from the gym in the evening, and talk to your roommate, who tells you "Good Job!"

That feeling is topped, however, when that roommate continues, saying that her mom (who was over a few days before) asked if you had lost weight. Yes, people, the change is significant enough for my roommate's mom to notice.

I think I'll strut around the apartment with my fists on my hips, looking proud.

Tuesday, February 7, 2006

More details to come, when I'm less tired

remind me to tell you guys about the escapade the LHC and I had tonight. Hint: it involves snow.

What kind of socks do pirates wear? :arrrrrgyle!

I’ve got these two friends at church, who for some reason, think I’m the funniest person on the planet. I therefore feel encouraged to be funny, and say things that I usually only let myself think. Today I had to go out, but all of my jeans were dirty, so I instead wore my only other pair of pants, some orange plaid capris that I think are pretty snazzy. However, since it was snowing, I thought it best to wear something to cover the rest of my leg, as well. When you’re wearing orange plaid pants, you can’t try to look normal, so I figured it’d be best if I went with the feeling, so I wore a green robot tshirt, and pink white and blue argyle tights under my pants. And some white tennies with blue stripes. The ensemble was pretty striking, and I put my hair up into two buns, like you might see on a sailor moon character. When my two friends saw me, they both started laughing, and told me how cool I looked. And they really thought I looked cool. As they remarked on my clothing, I simply said to them, “Happy Laundry Day!” My little holiday caused quite the stir, and several people came up and told me how much they liked my outfit, &c. Not sure how many really enjoyed it, and how many were just trying to be free and accepting of my weirdness in order to look Hip and With It. At any rate, I completely stole the evening, and my two friends were pretty much hysterical for about ten minutes, not because I said anything particularly funny, but because they expected everything I said to be funny, and therefore found it that way. It makes me happy to be so entertaining to my friends.

I’m going to have to declare Laundry Day more often.

Monday, February 6, 2006

We're not that close

My roommate and I both walk out of our rooms at the same time, preparing to go to bed. She's in her pink bathrobe with a towel in her hair, and I'm in a tshirt and pj bottoms. We stand at opposite ends of the hallway, facing each other, and silently wave.

"How're you doing over there?"
'Good. I'm putting this stuff on my knuckles because they're all cracked and dry.'
"...what?"
'My knuckles' (I hold my hand up, to illustrate). 'They're really dry.'
"You don't even want to know what I thought you said just now."
'Do you really think that's something I would even say out loud?'
"...well, you ARE getting more comfortable around us..."
'Not that comfortable.'

Saturday, February 4, 2006

In this city, "east" pretty much means "south"


After a couple of hours of do-gooding at the local rescue mission, we were to go to a supposedly great toboganning hill on the north side of town. Being unfamiliar with the north side of town, I got directions from a girl who lives up there on how to get to the hill. I must have missed something she said, because we drove straight out of town, and were pretty much headed for the north pole before we realized, hey, it's really foggy out, and it doesn't look like we're in the civilized world anymore. We turned around, and headed back towards town. During this little trip, I learned that turning your brights on in fog actually makes it harder to see, not easier. Good thing there wasn't anyone else on the road for miles and miles for me to run into.

We finally found our own way to the hill, and being unfamiliar with the park it's in, we parked on the wrong side of the hill, and it was a mighty hike to get to the top. It was worth it, though. There's something beautiful about going sledding with a group of people, with no one else there, on a lovely foggy night. Especially when the fog intermittantly turns to cute snow. We had fun, and I got to experience going on a long sled, with like four other people on it. They all said that the best seat is in the front, but I've decided the best seat is in the middle, because in the front, you can't hear what anyone is saying, and you feel responsible if the sled turns sideways.

The evening culminated at a friend's house, where we drank hot chocolate and played mafia till about two in the morning. It took a surprisingly long time- we played twice, and it took two hours. Perhaps it was just because most of the people hadn't played before. Anyway, it was a grand evening with the Long Haired Christian, and the guy who still has no name, because I still haven't decided on a suitable 'nym. As well as several other fun people who I know even less well.