More Harry Potter news!

JKs website now hase the name of the 7th book listed. You can play the game by going to Jks website, and doing the following:

Go to JKRowling.com. Click on the eraser on her desk.
1. Click doorway in mirror to see Christmas tree.
2. Click on the top half of the door to get the wreath.
3. Click on the top of the mirror to get the garland.
4. Click on the spider web right next to the door to make them go away.
5. Click the 4th chime in the window and get the key for the door.
6. Drag key to unlock the door.
7. Door opens to show a desk with a package.
8. Click the bow on the package and it will open.
9. Click the inside of the package and a game of Hangman is shown where you can play a game to guess the name of the seventh book.
10. You can keep playing till you get it right and when you do a check mark will appear.

Yay! If's she's releasing the name of it that it likely will be out next summer. that makes me VERY happy :)

In Non-Harry Potter stuff. Nothing too exciting is going on in my life these days. I'm busy with school and busy with non-school stuff (visiting friends and family and all that wonderful holiday stuff.

Yesterday I had a meeting with my supervisor and he was asking me whether I have a job yet, the answer of course was no. He said that he might have something for me in the new year. He's talking to a couple of the big modeling companies about getting money to add in the ISCO processes to one of the major 3-D models (think ModFlow or FEFlow). He was wondering if it was something I'd be interested in. I thought it would be cool to see my project to completion, and how cool would it be for my masters thesis to actually really be used in the real world! Neato :) So yeah, looks like I might have some contract work at the uni in the spring when I'm done. Then it'll be off on my own to find a real job :)

Harry Potter Stuff

Predictions for Book 7.

Apparently Borders (Book store in the US) has started taking reservations for it, but they aren't saying a release date or a book name. Hopefully that will be announced soon!

A few final Montreal thoughts

I did get to be close (physically) to some "famous" canadians.

-Bev Thomson from Canada AM walked right in front of us.
-Peter Mansbridge, John Manley, and Belinda Stronach were brodcasting right behind the Kennedy Area so we were watching them.
-Justin Trudeau supported Kennedy so he talked to as a group a couple of times. Once he wasn't more than 10 feet away from me.
-Jean Chretien, Paul Martin, Marc Garneau, Bill Graham, John Tuner and others walked within feet of us on their way to vote
-Ken Dryden and I practically brushed shoulders (we were walking in opposite directions)
-And Finally, Scott Simms who was my weather man crush when he worked for the Weather Network. I ran into him frequently over the weekend and was disappointed to find out he's 5 foot nothing. The Man is SHORT!

Long Post

Well, longer anyways. In case people out oni the blogging world are worried that I got kidnapped by an Ignatieff supporter and am being held hostage for the support of other Kennedy delegates. Nah, I actually posted the clip of me on Global from my dad's house in Belleville.

My weekend - Very cool. We arrived (I hitched a ride with the other Kennedy guy from Prince Edward - Hastings... Prince Edward, as in the county, not the island ;)) in Montreal late late late Thursday night, almsot Friday morning to be exact. By the time I got settled into my hotel room (fancy shmancy room at the Delta ;)) It was after one when I got to bed - doesn't bode well for the 6 am wake up call. Up first thing Friday morning to head to the Palais de Congres to register. Registration was open from 7 to 9, but there was a Gerrard Kennedy Rally thing at 7:30. So finally after the Rally grabbed some breakfast and headed back to my hotel room for a bit. Not realizing it would be several hours before returning. I had brought clothes with me to run in, but hadn't taken into consideration how dead I would be, so instead I crashed for about an hour and a half in my comfy king sized bed and it was wonderful.

Back to the convention hall it was. Time, 2:00, wouldn't get back to my hotel room until close to 12:00 that night. The next several hours were spent cheering, waiting in line to vote (for a long long time, they were apparently having computer problems), watching the speeches and cheering some more. By the time we were done at the palais de congres, it was probably 9:30, and I headed back to the Hyatt with John (guy from my riding - The Kennedy contingency was at the Hyatt, they were full when I booked so I was in the wrong hotel). The Kennedy Team was having a Party that night, so we got some dinner and then headed down to the main bar for the party. After waiting in line for 30 minutes and not getting served we decided to leave, me back to the Delta, John Upstairs (Note to self - should you ever chose to go to one of these again, book your hotel early to ensure you are in the same hotel as everyone else - I was in the Ignatieff hotel as it turned out).

I got back to my hotel room at around 11:45 and decided I wanted to stay up to see the results from the first ballot which were set to be announced at 12:00. In the meantime I arranged my wake-up call for 6:00 again so that I could run in the morning. Turns out they were announced the results late (like 12:20) and I couldn't just go to sleep I had to watch the analysis and what not, so again, didn't get to bed until 1:00. Ooops. I was embarrassed to call and rearrange my wake up call so decided to just grin and bare it. In the morning I ran on the treadmill for about 40 minutes, and felt awesome. I've lost a bit of weight, and am really noticing a difference in my running :). didn't stop me from being dead tired though.

I decided to pack up everything then and bring it over to the hyatt to leave with John so that we didn't have to head back to the delta later on. In my rush to leave in the morning I managed to forget 1) my laptop charger, 2) my brown hearing bone tweed dress pants, 3) My new blue button down dress shirt. Damn. Didn't realize this until Sunday morning. Hopefully as we speak these items are finding their way back to me via puralator or Fed ex. The first vote Saturday morning (2nd ballot) ran smoothly and we were in and out quickly. Waiting for the 2nd ballot results took forever, and we were all a bundle of nerves when they started reading out the numbers. It was sad when Kennedy failed to bring in much new support from the candidates that had dropped out and we were clearing in 4th place. We all thought that he had done exceptionally well with the speech the night before, but I guess others didn't feel that way.

While waiting in line for the next vote I was informed that Kennedy had dropped out and was asking his supporters to back Dion. I was okay with that since I had been impressed with Dion's speech the night before - And Ken Dryden actually, that one surprised me. So the rest, you hopefully know. Kennedy supporters were very loyal to him and over 90% followed him to vote for Dion. Dion surged into first, Rae was dropped. Rae supporters went more to Dion then Ignatieff (even though they weren't told which way to go by Rae) and Dion won on the 4th ballot.

After the votes were counted and the speeches were made we started out journey back to belleville. I was super tired and ended up sleeping for about an hour from brockville to kingston and when I woke up I knew I was in trouble - The lack of sleep over the past several weeks was catching up to me and I was getting a cold. Sunday morning sure enough, my throat hurts. Monday I came into school to try and get some stuff done before it got too bad, but Yesterday it took over and I stayed home sleeping a good portion of the day.

So how do I feel about the results? I'm content. Obviously not my first choice, but I'm happy to see Kennedy in a powerful position now and glad to see that the "old liberal" candidates did not win - Ignatieff was mainly being supported by the old Martin camp and Rae was mainly being supported by the old Chretien camp. I like that one of the underdogs one, and he one based on his message, not my the party brass saying he'd win. Hopefully this is a step in the right direction and the liberal party will get the renewal/change in so desperately needs.

Short post

Will post more later, but check this out

Here And scroll through the list until you see my name. I'm a dork :D

26 and Fabulous!

No question mark there.

So a couple of weeks since I posted. I've been busy, so sorry loyal readers! So busy in fact that I can't even remember what I did. Ooops! Okay, weekend of the 17-19, I don't think I really did anything in particular... saturday night we went out with the group in waterloo for desert from plantation and that was really nice, but for the life of me, I can't remember what else I did! Sunday I went christmas shopping... hmmmmm... That is weird. So last week was a busy week of lab analysis and what not...

Last week. I remember what I did :) Friday afternoon we left town early to go to B-ville to see my sister! Yay! BS1 is back in the country for good-ish. We had a great visit friday evening. Saturday was my birthday! Went for my annual birthday run. Kind of ran out of time since I was waiting around for the temperature to warm up and only got in 5.6 km. Boo! For lunch D and family came over and we all had a nice little visit. Well, except for God daughter 1 who was in an uber grumpy mood (apparently she has been sick this week so I guess we know why she was grumpy).

Mid afternoon we left belleville and headed up to peterpatch. I was guilt tripped into visiting my cousins new pad for a bit before heading over to C-dub and CTs place. (I say guilted, but it is always fun to see K&P so I was glad that I went. Their new place up there is amazing!). With the Girls and Boys we went out to Swiss Chalet for some festive specials (good me has only had 2 lindor truffles since then and have given the rest to the boy. I deserve a pat on the back for that). After that it was back to c-dubs for pre drinking and then going out and drinking more. Yep. Definitely had WAY too much to drink (probably haven't had that much since March? Maybe even last november).

Sunday morning we got to see the reception site for the wedding. It was gorgeous! I want to get married there... well, not really, but it was amazing! And then back to C's to look at Nej's pics from paris... well, I haven't seen J's pics, just her mums. we had to leave before we got to nej's.

So yeah, that was my uber busy weekend. Fabulous, but I needed a vacation from my weekend. Certainly not a relaxing time :)

This week back at school working hard, trying to get my lab results organized and writting. Love the writting. Got my first set of revisions on Chapters 1 & 2 back, and so far so good. Hopefully we can get this done quickly. Oh, and 1.5 days until I'm off to montreal!

Good news!

Big Sis 1 has her flights booked home and she will be back in the country for good (well, until she decides to move to the antartic or somewhere crazy like that). But Yay! I figure she'll stay in Canada for at least two years. She's home a week this afternoon, but I won't get to see her until the day after. I'm so freaking excited. I haven't spent a christmas (or any other holiday for that matter) with her since before my mum passed away and she hasn't met AF yet, and the only big important thing she HAS been in for (or one of us there) in three years is Big Sis 2's wedding. I'm excited because I miss her. Lots. Dang, now I'm getting all emotional again. Not enough sleep.

The last week or so has been pretty busy here in Laura land. Lots of long hours in at school, but I did manage to have a nice relaxing weekend last weekend and I didn't do any work. Go me! Not to last though. This week.

Monday - 9-6 at school - No lunch, but I did manage to get out for a swim
Tuesday - 9-6:30 at school - again no lunch
Wednesday - 8:30-9:30 at school. As in PM.
Today will be 8:15-6 pm

I love having to redo lab work :(

Okay, I have to go take more samples. Hope everyone is doing well!

Fun Suvey

I'm a Dork, I know :)

1. What is your occupation? Grad Student Extrodinare

2. What color are your socks right now? Grey with little snowmen. Yes, I am wearing christmas socks already. Take that christine!

3. What are you listening to right now? The Humming of my hard drive

4. What was the last thing that you ate? An Apple, but that was 2.5 hours ago. I'm hugry!

5. Can you drive a manual transmission? You bet :)

6. If you were a crayon, what color would you be? Red. Bright Red.

7. Last person you spoke to on the phone? Sandra the Department Head's secretary

8. Do you like the person who sent this to you? No! Actually, I think she is super cool :)

9. How old are you today? 25.95

10. Favorite drink? Water :)

11. What is your favorite sport to watch? Cycling!

12. Have you ever dyed your hair? Can't count. I used to love red hair and dyed my hair all the time in highschool.

13. Favorite curse word? Damn

14. Pets? Me, 1 cat, but my dad has two cats at his place, one of which I'm rather partial too :) Hopefully I will be getting a dog sometime within the next year.

15. Favorite food? Ooooh, now this is a toughy. I love my dad's steak. Mmmmmm... Baked potato, steak and corn on the cob. Best. Meal. Ever.

16. What was the last movie you watched? X3 while riding my bike trainer on Saturday afternoon. What the heck was with the part after the credits. If anyone would wish to discuss this let me know :) Actually, we also watched Bitter Moon Saturday night.

17. Favorite day of the year? Christmas and my birthday :)

18. What do you do to vent anger? I'm another crybaby :)

19. What was your favorite toy as a child? Not really a toy, but I loved my magic pillow <3 it kept away my nightmares. I would put it over my pillow when I slept and I was seriously afraid of what would happen if I slept without it! (I had bad nightmares as a child. Like picture the goriest horror movie and that was my dreams.

20. What is your favorite Fall or Spring? Fall. I love the trees changing :)

21. Hugs or kisses? Hugs. I love hugs :)

22. Cherry or Blueberry? Ummm... Rasberry?

23. Do you want your friends to email you back? Well, not really e-mail but they should all post on their blogs ;)

24. Who is most likely to respond? Burger. I'm predicting she is bored out of her mind by noon on Friday ;)

25. Who is least likely to respond? ???

26. Living arrangements? Me, the boy and Jenny-any-dots the psycho kitty.

27. When was the last time you cried? Ummm.... This morning? We got an e-mail about the memorial for that UW student who got killed last year on co-op and I got a little teary eyed. Also Saturday night in a movie I'm a big cry baby.

28. What is on the floor of your closet? A whole pile of shit. We have a bit of a space shortage in our 1 bdrm apt. The closets are packed.

29. Who is the friend you have had the longest relationship with that you
are sending this to? If Danielle reads this she wins the cake :)

30. What did you do last night? Worked :| Until close to 11 :|

31. Favorite smells? All Spice :)

32. What inspires you? Ironman Athletes :)

33. What are you afraid of? Never finishing my masters :|

34. Plain, cheese or spicy hamburgers? Cheese :)

35. Country you would most like to visit? Chile! I want to go to patagonia and pretend I'm living like a king. If anyone knows where that comes from bonus points to you! I do want to go to Chile right now. I also REALLY want to go back to Africa and Go to Greece.

36. Favorite dog breed? Chocolate Labs, though I would settle for yellow or black :)

37. Number of keys on your key ring? 10. Car, Dad's house, Apt Building, Apt, Bike, storage, Engineering buildings, Office, and 2 for the labs in DWE (borrowed temporarily)

38. How many years at your current job? 7 years as a student, 2.25 as a grad student.

39. Favorite day of the week? Saturday. Pure joy unless I'm having to work.

40. How many provinces have you lived in? 1 permanently but another one for one 4 month stint in co-op

41. Favorite holidays? Christmas! and Thanksgiving.

42. Have you ever driven a Motorcycle or machinery? Nope

43. Favorite quality in yourself? Unlike Mrs. JB, I like the fact that I'm emotional. I think it is a good thing :)

So my faithful readers

(Are you still faithful even with the lack of updates?)

Several of you have been asking me to update my blog. Yeah, I haven't had a real update since Oct. 17. Oops, that was over 3 weeks ago now. My bad. I've been busy.

So, what have I been up to? The week on the 16-20th was a really busy one for me at school since I was trying to get lab work done to verify (or validate, not sure which one) my model. On Friday of that week I was actually at school from 7 am to 7:30 pm. Not fun especially given that it was a friday. On the weekend after I went to visit my sister to see her new born bundle of joy. Pictures from my trip can be found here.

The following week was busy trying to get all my lab data organized which I seem to have failed miserably at. Something happened with the IC results and we need to sort it out ASAP since we will likely have to redo the experiment and need to know what went wrong last time before we can sort it out. That weekend though was a blast, we went down to Windsor for J&Ps Wedding (don't have the pictures up yet, sorry!) Good times were had by all.

Last week was more busy-ness at school nothing big is standing out in my mind except that on Wednesday I joined weight watchers online (at todays weigh in, I was down 1.7 pounds, so hopefully this will work :)) On the weekend I worked on my research and that is pretty much it :)

Oh, one thing I did remember to do last week though was upload my pictures from the Wasaga beach tri(du)athlon. They can be found here

One last thing that I have forgotten. At the end of October my inheritence finally came through, and I bought a laptop. I lurve it :)

I hope this works

The Story is here

Baby Post!

Here's Eddie!

Tired

Tired because...

My dad called last night at 12:30 and woke me up leaving a message on the phone. Something about baby, edward, 11:45... something something... to say the least the rest of my night was a little weird. Kept having strange dreams and waking up for the next 5 hours. I got up at 5:30 to go for a run, but first checked my e-mail and re-listened to the phone message. Yep, baby Edward born 11:45 last night, 7 lbs, 2.5 oz. Apparently the birth went well, but I haven't gotten any other details (I've tried my dad's home and cell phone this morning, but haven't been able to get a hold of him. Perhaps I'll try wes' cell phone too.). So yes. I'm officially now an Aunt :)

Not much else has been happening around here. Thanksgiving we went to AFs mums on Saturday and then carried on to my dad's that night. Sunday I dropped AF off at the train station and went to stay with my sis. My BIL works in downtown TO. His commute into work is 1.5-2 hours and he has to take via so he can't get back home at certain times due to the horrible train schedule. I was on baby duty last week working in Sarah's basement and ready to drive her to the hospital at a moments notice (not to mention doctors and dentists appointments!). Obviously my hospital driving services were not required.

Saturday night C-dub and CT came up for Oktoberfest. A grand time was had by all but we sure did miss not having nej around to liven up the party ;) The rest of the weekend was spent preparing for company and cleaning up from company. Sunday afternoon I did do a bit of work.

This week is really busy since I'm trying to get my lab work done, but I don't know how long it is going to take. Hopefully I'll be done everything by noon on Friday which would mean I could head down to visit my sister in the afternoon and come back here at night. I'm sure I'll figure out something :)

Montreal Calling

Not too long ago after the last federal election, I made a post in my blog stating that I was joining the federal liberal party to help rebuild it and reshape it to it's former scandal free self.

As the months followed and the potential leadership candidates came forth, I wasn't too happy with the candidates who were throwing there hats into the ring. Well, that was, until Gerrard Kennedy entered the race. I have met with this man before, and have heard him talk of a few occasions through my dad's involvement with the provincial liberals, and this was a man I could support. The more I learned about him, the more I liked what he had to say. So I was looking around for ways that I could help out his campaign to become the leader of the liberal party.

After talking to my dad about it, I decided to put my name forward as a Kennedy Delegate for the leadership convention in December in Montreal. Last weekend, when all liberal party members in canada participated in the first ballot of the leadership race, hundreds, if not thousands of party members in the Prince Edward Hasting Riding went to the voting station and voted for the leadership candidate they wanted, and the delegates they wished to represent their riding at the leadership convention. Each riding gets 14 delegates, and the breakdown goes by the first ballot vote.

Kennedy garnered 21% of the vote in my riding, and 21%*14 delegates = 3 delegates. My dad sent me an e-mail on Sunday morning informing me that I was chosen as one of the 3 Kennedy Delegates for our riding, apparently beating out some big wigs in local government. So Montreal, get ready for The Jones to take over at the beginning of December. Now all I have to do is read up on the other candidates since I'll have to vote for someone else if Kennedy gets dropped (each round of voting the candidate to recieve the lowest percent of the vote is removed until one candidate has 50+1% of the vote. I'm thinking that I'll go with either who Kennedy would support or going with the breakdown of my riding to keep with the riding wishes (6 ignatieff, 4 rae, 3 Kennedy, 1 Dion - which would indicate ignatieff).

You Are 26 Years Old

20-29: You are a twentysomething at heart. You feel excited about what's to come... love, work, and new experiences.

What Age Do You Act?

Looks like they got the right age group for me :) 26 in 1.5 months.

Can I go back to bed now???

I'm tired. Last night I got to bed at a decent time hoping to wake up early and go for a run. AF was awake at 4:30 to get a glass of water and I woke up then, fell back asleep for a bit but then the thunderstorm (crazy wicked intense thunderstorm) started and continued for about an hour. needless to say I didn't get up to run (getting hit by lightning and running in the pouring rain is not my idea of fun), but I've pretty much been awake since 4:30 now. Ugh. Between 5:30 and 6 the power went out twice, so I was out of bed twice during that time resetting the clock and alarm so that if we fell asleep we would still wake up. Not cool.

So Update? My weekend sucked, it was completely eaten up by moving and stuff, by the time sunday night rolled around I needed a vacation from my weekend. Friday we got almost everything out of my apartment and into AFs or storage, with just a few things leftover and started the unpacking. Saturday we went back to my old place to clean up and hand in the keys and get the few remaining things. then it was back to AFs (our?) place for putting furniture together, setting up our network and more fun unpacking. Sunday? You guessed it, more furniture assembly, unpacking and getting settled in. Most everything this done now though, so we can relax a bit in the evenings (mostly just need to clean up the place now.

Last week there was a career fair and QC and I went to it to check out what was going on. I handed out my resume to a couple of booths (unfortunately didn't get to the one that I really wanted to) but did get to talk to quite a few people in the industry. So Friday afternoon during unpacking I got a call from "Groundwater Modelling Company" and they wanted to interview me (already???) so yesterday I went in to have and interview with GMC and I'm supposed to contact them again when I start seriously searching for a job. Pretty crazy that it happened so quickly! Not sure that I want to work there, but it would be great experience to get for a couple of years.

Our favorite missing blogger returns

Eva Returns

T-4 days and counting

Till I move in with AF that is. Eeek! I'm a little nervous about it, but I'm getting better. For now, we'll be living in his one bedroom apartment (which is normal apartment sized and WAY bigger than my space has been. The only thing I'm really scared about right now is that I've been living on my own for so long, I'm used to my Laura Time where I don't have to worry about anyone else and just do my own thing, make as much mess or noise as I want. That said, the neighboring apartment is a two bedroom place with a storage closet and they are looking for Subletters. We are going to look into that and possibly move over there for the next 6 months or so while we think about where we (read I) want to buy a house. That would solve pretty much all the anxiety I have right there. I'd have a room that I could shut out the outside world and do my own thing in, and that would be wonderful :)

Lotus Bloom (like the new name BTW) asked me on my blog about AFs job situation. I actually haven't posted that on my blog, but I have told those of you that I see on a semi-regular basis. So he got offered the job in Missisauga (he currently works in cambridge (near sportsworld) and they were going to pay him more than what he was making. He hadn't got the official offer, but he went into work and told his boss... "Just so that you know, I've got a verbal job offer and next week when the paperwork gets completed, I'll be coming in and giving my 2 weeks notice". Long story short, the managers got all upset that he was going to leave and they are giving him a $9000 raise (this week will be his first pay check at this rate). His new position will be salaried instead of hourly and he'll be able to bank any of his overtime towards vacation (like on Saturday morning when he went in for 4 hours). We are both pretty excited about this since it'll mean he'll hopefully be able to save up enough over the next two years to be able to go back to school to finish his engineering degree (which he didn't get to finish befor immigrating to Canada).

Hmmmm... Other stuff? Not much. I guess most of the excitement in my life is taken up by those two points. I'm basically running/excersizing in the mornings, going to school during the day and packing at night. I'm really getting there with the packing and should be able to enjoy Grey's Anatomy and CSI on Thursday without having to pack then.

Laura Land

Hmm... Really, honestly, not much these days.

This past weekend we were in b-ville for my dad's 60th birthday. A good time was had by all. On Sunday we were at my sister's and did the Terry Fox run.

Other than that, my nights have been taken up by packing. Most of my apartment is now packed up and in a week tomorrow I'll be moving. I'm going to miss my tiny apartment :(

My Sisters Tummy

I'll post more later, but this picture is for Burger :)

Wasaga Beach SPRINT DUATHLON

So, the title says it all. Saturday was the day, that after 5 years of triathlons and a full season of training (including rides of up to 63 km, runs up to 12 km and bricks up to 40 km/5km) I was going to do my first every olympic triathlon (1500m swim, 40 km bike, 10 km run). Turns out the weather gods thought differently.

We arrived at the race site ready to go at 7:20 or so saturday morning. At our hotel there had been absolutely no wind and the pavement was dry. I was actually super excited for my race and the better than predicted weather. Not so much at the race site. The race is on the very bottom of Georgian bay. Strong winds from the north meant swells of 3-4 feet which were crashing for about the 200m closest to the shore. They announced as I was picking up my kit that the swim was cancelled and that they were changing the race to a duathlon. Every duathlon I've ever seen goes short run, bike, long run. Not so here, they had long run bike short run. So 10k run, 40 km bike, 5 km run. Joy.

I freaked out. I've never run before biking before (except running the mile to the gym to do a spinning workout, but I haven't even done that in a while). Secondly running 10K right now isn't easy so biking 40 km after running 10 km was very very daunting (not to mention having to run again) - Note: I've never done a duathlon before today. So I opted out of the olympic/international distance race and switched over to the sprint triathlon instead hoping for the water to calm down in the next few hours.

2 hours later, sure enough the swim got cancelled for the sprint as well, turning it into a duathlon as well, this one seemed a lot less daunting 5 km run, 20 km bike, and a 2.5 km run.

Run 1: My goal for the first run was to take it pretty easy and to finish in about 30 minutes (not easy long run pace, but not race pace either, my 5K best time is < 25 minutes but I doubt I could run that right now). The first 300m or so were in the sand (ick) so I started off super slowly and was definitely one of the last in my wave to get onto the pavement. The rest of the run was spent passing a few people in front of me that took off too fast and getting passed by a lot of people in the wave behind me. This put me onto a position in the bike that I've never been in before - at the end of the pack for my wave. I'm a good swimmer and am usually at the front of my wave. Finished in 28 something so faster than my plan

Bike: Yippee! fun course, there were about 3 km or so that were gradual uphill that were into the wind that were not so fun, but it made for a fast return with speeds getting up to 55.5 km/h :) I like hammering down hills. The benefit of starting the bike near the end of the wave is getting to pick people off I passed about a dozen people over the 20 km but only one or 2 were in my age group, the rest were 20-24 F. (with the odd guy thrown in). Man, if I were only a year younger that would have been a great ego boost Only one gal passed me the entire ride and she was the winner of 30-35 and in the top 5 over all. She started the race 2 waves behind me, but didn't pass until the final kms of the bike. My only problem on the bike course is that all summer I was focusing on going further and not faster so my calves were cramping a bit in protest. finished in 42 something, but my speed from my bike computer and the speed from the mats don't match so either the course was long or something wonky happened with timing in there.

Run 2: My calves knotted up in transition and I thought the run would be horrible but it worked itself out quickly. I didn't have a lot of oomph left, but the 2.5 km went super quickly and before I knew it, I was at the finish line with a bit of a look of confusion on my face. second run 12:5x (go me!)

Other thoughts - the run courses and the run in transitions were on beach and were like a death march. I hate running in sand.
- I don't understand why they had the long run at the beginning but meh.
-I didn't get to do my olympic triathlon but I did get to do something else new, a duathlon, so the day wasn't a complete waste.

I got 3rd place athena woman (ie. heavier than average), but still don't know my official times on any of it (other than the final finish time was 1:29:04 - I think I had a nap in T1 - my time was over 3 minutes! ack!)

After thoughts - I was disappointed that I didn't get to do my race that I have been training for all summer. For a bit I was upset and thought they should do the swim anyways since anyone doing an olympic race should be able to swim in that surf, but then I realized that it really is for the safety of the athletes that they cancelled it. I may be able to swim in that surf, but I'm a strong swimmer, and I know other people would be incredibly intimidated by it. I think I'll be mulling over it for a few days before I decide what to do. Next summer I want to do a Half Ironman, but I would have wanted to do an olympic race before I commit to the training. Now I don't have the experiance and being in the frigid north that is Canada, won't have another opportunity this season. I'll have to be thinking that one over.

Time for a real update

Well, not much is going on in Laura Land right now. I'm a little sick as I had a horrible cold last week. Feeling a lot better now, though I'm nervous that I ended up missing my peak training week for my tri since I was knocked on my ass all last week. I did get in a long ride and run on the weekend though when I was feeling better.

My long weekend was a day longer than planned since AF had Thursday and Friday off for a software migration at work. I took Friday off and we went to the saug for another meeting with the people he had his interview with a couple of weeks ago. He has been given a verbal offer, but has to still wait to hear the details of it (salary etc). We went to visit with his mum and aunt on friday afternoon and had a good visit with them (his mum even made my chicken soup for my cold :)). I haven't mentioned this before since I didn't know if AF would want everyone knowing, but his Aunt has applied for refuge status and it looks like she'll be here until at least January. She is fleeing an abusive (in all senses of the word - physically, emotionally, and sexually) marriage back in Iran and has next to no rights back in that country. Her biggest obstacle right now is that her mother and children do not support her decision (the children will be able to come over if her refuge application gets approved and it should since her life is in danger if she goes back home).

Saturday morning I got up early and left AF sleeping to get in my long ride. I got back when he had been up for about half an hour, so it was good timing. We picked up my dad's 60th birthday present in the afternoon and went for dinner at Red Lobster - He had never had lobster or crab before so we shared the ultimate feast platter and I think he enjoyed both the lobster and the crab and is eager to go back again.

Sunday morning I was up early again to get my run in. I felt like crap on it, but still managed to run 12 km on the hilly roads near AFs apartment. In the afternoon we took a road trip to guelph and went climbing at the gym there. I'm getting a bit better, but overall, I'm still very amateur! We are going to try to continue going on a semi-regular basis since I just bought climbing shoes the other week at MEC (they were majorly on sale and the right size!)

Monday was the laziest day on earth. We woke up late and watched a movie. started moving some of my stuff over to his apartment (ont even one car load) and then watched another movie at his place.

Today it is back to work and I'm not sure how productive the week will be. For the last hour I'll I've heard is crazy chanting and cheering outside with no end in site - ah, frosh week in Engineering (Who are we?!?!) Fun times for them, but not so good for me. Right now very loud cheering "We love EDCOM, We love EDCOM". God, can't you come up with an original cheer?

Okay, that is all I have to say for now. Enjoy your short week people!

Not suitable for my photoblog

But I like it anyways. Another Fun picture from Burgers wedding :)

A Burgerific Wedding

Just a quick post since I'm heading off to bed soon, but I just wanted to post quickly with some pictures from burgers big day. She'll have to tell the complete story since I just know the face value stuff.

The wedding was beautiful, and the butterflies were super cool. They would land on people, and I got a cool picture on one in burgers grandma's hair. A couple of minutes later she actually had two in her hair! The wedding went off without a hitch (as an observer, I'm sure burger might argue on that one) and the dinner was delish. The speaches were awesome with burgers mum and burger boy's brother (surprisingly) steeling the show. Very funny speeches. I'll post some of the wedding type photo's here, but I also have some cool non-wedding ones that I'll post this week on my photoblog.

one bad thing about my camera... takes too long to focus. As soon as she came into shot I pressed the button but the focus got confused I think.


Gen doing her reading...


At the end of the Ceremony, May I intoduce Burger and Burger boy!


Burger and Friends (AF was supposed to tell me if I was showing too much skin, but he was obviously slacking off on this job last night since I think he enjoyed looking at the skin while other people probably not so much.

Zzzzzzz...

For some reason I'm particularily tired these days. Perhaps I should be back on iron. who knows.

So this past week, what did I do? Good question :)

Friday - Went over to AFs apartment at night and we watched a movie. Hmm... trying to remember which movie it was. Right Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Weird movie, not entirely sure I liked it, but I do have to say that Johnny Depp was amazing in it like usual :)

Saturday - We did a bit of shopping, I finished buying Burger and Burger Boy's Wedding present and went picked up t a couple of CDs (New Sam Roberts and a Bob Marley Compilation thing). We later went to the Camera Store and I bought my new baby. The one, I posted last week - Nikon D70. It was expensive, but I love it :)

Sunday - we went for a longish bike ride together, I on my road bike and AF on his mountain bike. I'd ride ahead for a bit and cycle back to him. It was super windy and took a lot of effort, I did around 47 km on hills and in wind. We then headed over to AFs for the night

Monday - We took off the day sinc AF had an interview with for a job in Missisauga so we were there yesterday morning and then headed into Toronto for the afternoon. We went to MEC, wandered around, and went to the ROM. They have a LOT of stuff closed right now for renovations, but I think that we had both seen enough by the time we were done. Then it was back to the Loo last night and I seriously passed out for a good solid 9 hours. I feel like I could easily fall back asleep now, but I'm back at school today and must be productive.

So things to Note:
1) my Photoblog has one picture from this weekend posted right now, from playing around with my new camera. I'll have more posts this week with other stuff from this weekend so you can check out how my knew camera looks. It is AWESOME! I love it :)
2) AFs Job interview in missisauga. Yep, that is causing a lot of problems right with logistical crap. a) I'm moving into his apartment in Kitchener at the end of September and have already gotten rid of my apartment, b) Arash doesn't have his drivers licence, c) there is no easy way to commute on transit to Missisauga from waterloo, d) if Arash gets the job, he has to give 2 months notice to his current apartment building to move out. Man, this is just a messy situation. I don't want to even think about it right now. (Anyone know someone who commutes to the Saug everyday from KW that can give my Boy a ride???)

Another week another post

So what is going on in Laura Land? Not much to be honest. What was that the Nej was saying about nothing exciting in singledom. Well, nothing exciting in coupledom for me these days ;)

So last week...
Friday - Went for my usual Friday ride with PS, shorter than normal though since it was a "cutback week". In the evening I went over to AFs apartment and we got ready for his mum's visit to town. We went grocery shopping, had dinner, and I started preparing food for the weekend while AF finished cleaning his apartment. I must say, by the time we were done, the place was spotless.

Saturday - We picked up his mum and aunt at the bus station had a nice long lunch. In the afternoon we went out to st. jacobs to stroll around and had a quick tour of the campus (for his Aunt's sake, AF's mum worked on campus for about a year when they were still pretty new in Canada). We went to the maharaja for dinner (yummers!) and went out to the flying dog for about an hour at night to give his aunt the full Canadian experiance. I hope she wasn't too shocked by anything she saw, all in all people were pretty tame. We left by 12:15 though, so it could have gotten worse later at night.

Sunday - We all had breakfast together and I went out shopping for a bit with his mum and aunt while AF slept some more (he sleeps a lot, damn lazy boy, and I do realize you might be reading this ;)). We had lunch and it was time to head back to the bus station. Not too much exciting for the weekend, but it was nice anyways.

Monday - I worked from home after getting my car fixed. It had a leaky exhaust pipe and the shop was able to cut out the bad peice and weld in a new bit for $202 including taxes. I was putting it off for a long time since the dealership said $1300 and I was afraid of the cost, now that just seems silly to me :)

Tuesday - hmmm... not much yesterday. I was at school late so by the time I got home it was just regular type stuff.

Wednesday - today. Hmm... nothing so far. My legs are sore though, like muscle sore. It actually feels like it did a day or two after my marathon, well, my quads anways, not the rest of my legs, I can't for the life of me figure out why they hurt this way. Last week consisted of 2 runs (short, 6 km) one easy shmeasy swim where I did mostly pull and a shorter than normal bike ride but monday after my bike ride my legs were just killing me (did around 40 minutes total on my trainer since I kept getting interrupted). I can't figure out what is going on :(.

And that is it. Oh, and I decided that I'm going to get this :)

Mid August already?!?

Where the heck did the summer go?

Okay, so I guess it has been over a week since I last updated sorry gals? I just don't have the need to update when nothing too exciting is going on in my life. First a quick recap of my week.

Last Wednesday - Nothing? can't remember what I didn
Thruday - Ditto
Friday - AF and I went to a party for one of his friends taht was finishing her PhD. It was pretty goodtimes.
Saturday - we went for a mountain bike and then headed into TO to his mums place
Sunday - we went to the beach with his aunt and mum. It's amazing how quickly his aunt adjusted to Canada and had no problem walking around all day in her bikini. Note: in Iran, the womens beaches are blocked off with dividers from the main beach and the dividers actually go like 100-200 m into the water to keep the men and women separate. At night we drove back to Waterloo
Monday - Ultimate lazy day we slept in, watched a movie and talked. REally, nothing exciting.

This week has been more of nothing, back at school and what not. The only exciting thing to report is that I have been in contact with the person I know at dillon and she says that my resume is impressive and is giving me hints on what to change and helping me with my cover letter. Good stuff :)

Other stuff - So for some reason I'm starting to think about marathons again. I think I might do another one next fall. Originally I thought I'd wait at least 5 years before doing another one, but in hindsight I really truly enjoyed my long runs last fall. Crazy, I know! I guess I'll wait and see how the next few months go. Anyone up to doing a marathon with me? Please?

Damn it's hot!

Wow, yesterday we reached the highest humidex I ever remember seeing. It topped out around 44.7C. Yuck. Today, the air temperature is supposed to get up to 36C which will be the highest temperature ever recored in Southern Ontario. Yikes! Wouldn't be surprised if there humidex approached 50. Ugh. (Last night I drove in my car for about 15 minutes, when I got out of the car, my glasses fogged up, that is the first time this has ever happened to me in the summer. Wierd.

Okay, now onto the regularly scheduled post.

Friday I palnned to work from home, but if I'm honest, I'd let you know that I didn't do too much. I did a long workout and got ready to go out for the weekend. AF and I went camping on Friday night with one of his friends and we rock climed outside Friday evening. We were supposed to climb again on Saturday morning/afternoon but his friend was too hungover. instead we just took our time and packed up our stuff to head to Toronto for the rest of the weekend.

AFs other aunt is here right now from Tehran, so we visited and did a couple of errand type things and generally had a relaxing weekend. Sunday night we headed back to the loo and that was that.

Yesterday I worked from home for the day and got some progress made I'm now running my model again (well, doing the column calibration) and it is going a little slowly. Oh well, I guess that happens. Stay Cool Dudes and Dudettes!

Quiet place

The school that is. No one is around and everyone is on holidays. So it is pretty quiet in here these days.

Weekend Recap
Friday - I went for a bike ride with PS in the afternoon and it felt good. I'm getting stronger during these long bike rides and I am able to ride longer and faster than I used to be able to. We did 56 km averageing over 25km/hour not super speedy, but good for me considering the distance. One thing though, is that it is mighty uncomfy in my saddle that long. I need to do something about that. We then (AF and I) drove to B-ville.

Saturday - We were planning on going to the beach but woke up to rain and cool temps. No beach for us after all. We ended up heading into town and went to the bike store. AF bought a new bike (he's been looking for a while) and ended up getting a fantastic deal on a Norco mountain bike - Reg. $900, got it for $700 including tax which would be around $620+tax so around $280 off (it was last years model and the guy just wanted to clear it). I got a new bike saddle as well. We rented two movies (Syriana and Match point), and headed back to my Dad's

Sunday - Lots of visiting. Danielle and her family came over for lunch so we got to see the new baby and play with Maddy for a while. I dunked her underwater which she didn't like, but didn't stay mad at me for too long. I'm a firm believer of "dunk early and dunk often" when it comes to swimming and children. The more you do it, the less afraid they will be. In the evening we packed into the car and headed off to Sarah and Wes's where we had dinner and visited for a few hours before going back to belleville. I got to feel the baby kick which was pretty cool.

Monday - We lazed around at my dads for most of the day and went for a bike ride to test out AFs new wheels (awesome!). Around 1 when eating lunch we discussed what time we were going to leave and realized that unless we left then there was really no point in going for several more hours since we didn't want to contend with TO traffic. So more swimming and lazy around ensued. We got back to the Loo at around 8 pm. Very tired, and perhaps a little too relaxed to be working the next day. When I got back to my apartment Jenny was all lovey dovey and curled up in my lap (a rarity) for like 40 minutes while I talked to KB on the phone. Good talking to you chicky (if you are reading!).

Tuesday - I ended up sleeping in to 8:45 (remember, too relaxed to be working!) and decided to work from home since I could start right away instead of having to head into school and do those pesky things like getting dressed.

So that is what I've been up to. In other dialogue.

Tour De France. Yes Niki, I was watching again this year and I have to say. Stellar viewing all around. I love floyde and I'm so glad he won. It'll be interesting to see what happens after his hip surgery whether he is able to get back to this level again. I hope no one dares put that astricks beside his name because the big contenders weren't there. That guy showed guts, determination, and sheer passion for the sport to win the race and that should be enough.

My Photoblog. I updated again last night in hopes to inspire myself again. I'm looking at new cameras tonight. I've been wanting a digital SLR camera for a while now, so I'm thinking of biting the bullet and purchasing it. These are the ones I'm looking at right now.

Canon Rebel XT
Nikon d50
Nikon d70

A week in the life of...

Well. No updates means nothing is going on. Literally nothing.

Last friday we had an Unshower for Burger which was pretty fun. It was nice to see all the girls in town again since it is a while since we all got together (last November???) Wow, that is a long time!

Saturday I went shopping while AF studied for his exam (for the C# course he's taking at Conestoga... the exam was last mondya, he got 90% :)). I got a new skirt, a sweater and somethings from the Bombay company. All were great deals, but none were the a) dress, and b) sandals I was looking for. Oops!

Sunday we went out to my aunts and uncles for the afternoon and lazed around by their pool. That was nice...

Now this week... hmm... nothing that I can think of really. I mean nothing....

This weekend we are going to b-ville. My dad is still on vacation, but we will laze around the pool, visit with D and the girls, and S&W. We're also going to go to the beach (Sandbanks) on Saturday, so it should be a good time.

An update you want

an update you'll get. My world is tilting at a strange angle these days and you'll see why later in this post.

Weekend: great weekend with the girls in peterborough, I'll post a full race report if people want it, but to be short and sweet I'll leave it like this... I woke up with a wonky tummy and ignored it forcing down food (weird for me!) and did the race (wanting to throw up on the bike, why don't I practice biking hard, like ever?) and still managed to start the run 1 minute faster than last year. Didn't last though as my running is sucking and finished 1:10 slower than last year, but I'm pretty happy with that. Entered in weight category and finished 3/6 so I got a nice little plaque, but was only 5 seconds off the gal in second (had I known she was registered in the weight category I wouldn't have let her pass. Oh well.)

Monday morning I woke up still feeling off, but more so. I stayed home all day and slept a good portion of the day. Not eating much since I was feeling quesy and gross (not to mention lower GI stuff to boot). Laura's World Tilt 1: my dad informed me last week that I would likely be getting money from Granny's will but didn't go into details about anything. I thought, cool, I'll be able to pay off my debt and start real world with a fresh slate. Not so. I found out monday morning that my Granny was, in fact, a millionaire. She so did not live like one, but I guess that would be WHY she was a millionaire (she would go to a grocery store because bananas were 0.19/pound instead of 0.29). So turns out, I'll be inheriting somewhere over $60,000 from her and now have to decide what I'm going to do with the money. Buying a house seems like a really good option right now.

Tuesday I wake up feeling slightly better, and head into school. Around 10 am I get an e-mail from my dad. Weird tilting incident 2: My dad is now engaged to be married. He is in Japan on vacation with Nora (well, Taiwan now), but has apparently been thinking about it for a while. I've had a couple of days to mull over this and I can honestly say that I don't feel any different. I'm upset and hurt by my father that he didn't talk to us about this first. I realize it is his decision, and I do want him to be happy, but honestly, I don't think I'm ready for this. My mum just passed away 3 years ago, and I am not ready for him to remarry again since I still miss my mum so much. It has been a couple of very upsetting days regarding this. I am going to send him an e-mail tonight and let him know how I feel.

Wednesday morning I woke up feeling gross again and tried going to school anyways. Was home again before noon and slept most of the day... again... No weird new news, just feeling like shit most of the day.

Brings us to today. Still nothing weird going on (other than my two weirdo peices of info from the beginning of the week). I'm feeling somewhat better, but am still getting weird bouts of stomache upset here and there. Hopefully it will be back to normal by tomorrow.

Anywho, I'm heading home now, so I hope you all have a wonderful day.

Feeling a little better this morning

It is amazing what a good night sleep can do to a girl. I calmed down a bit and then thought about this on my run this morning. I'm going to talk to marguarite (the grad secretary) about filling out an intent to graduate form so that I know what the dealio is. I might be able to work it so that I am out of my apartment at the end of september with no withdrawl fee. I just have to make sure it is okay if I submit my intent to graduate form a little on the early side. (My optimistic goal is to be done by the end of september, but more realistically it'll be the end of october, but for the month of october I'm not going to be in at school much anyways.)

So anywho, I talked to my dad last night about the possibility of AF and I moving in together. His response was pretty much what I thought he would say.

Dad: "Do you want my opinion or my permission?"
Me: "Well, I'm 25 years old, I don't need your permission, but I want your opinion"
Dad: "I can hardly say no since your mum and I lived together for 8 months before we were married"
Me: "So, what is your opinion?"
Dad: "I'm not going to say anything that'll influence your decision, you're 25 years old now, you've been making good decisions for a while so I'll just have to trust you to do what you think is right for you. I'm pretty sure that Jane would have agreed with me on this".

So that is where things stand right now. I don't mind being in my apartment a month longer, it isn't that big of a deal, but it would suck to be stuck in it for October since I want to be in belleville a lot then (with S&W's baby due then). Also, should anything happen with AF, it'll be okay since I'll only need to be in waterloo a couple of days a week, I can easily crash on other peoples couches for a day.

I feel like crying.

I'm so incredibly frustrated right now. For anyone reading this NEVER EVER live at St. Paul's Grad apartments at the University of Waterloo. They have HORRIBLE communications skills that just ends up screwing the students. Case 1: QCs bike got stolen this spring. They knew there was a problem since another persons bike was stolen out of the shed in the fall. They neglected to inform the students with bikes in the shed and refused to take any responsibilty. QC is down one $700 bike which she can't afford to replace. Thank god I keep my road bike inside my apartment.

Case 2: AF and I talked this weekend about moving in together, we are both short of money these days and decided that we would be able to save $300-$400 each a month by moving in together. I called the office this morning to tell them I won't be staying for the fall term, and I was informed that I would have to pay a $500 penalty fee for canceling my agreement for the fall term. Note: I did not agree to anything for the fall term, but I did sign the "application for addition term of occupancy". I was also never informed of this penalty when I was talking to the people asking my questions about what would happen if I weren't around in the fall. I was never once told about this fee, or refered to the website about the policy. Had I known then, what I know now, I would not have filled out the application in the first place. I wasn't informed of any fee, and after double and triple checking my lease, there is no mention of the cancellation policy. I gave my two months notice as is required by the Ontario Tennants act, and they are screwing me. (Note: the Ontario Tennants act does not apply to me since my building is a residence). I'm so incredibly frustrated by this and I don't know what to do. I just know that I'm going to get screwed in this and probably end up having to pay more instead of saving money.

Good morning :)

Hi all, just thought Id give a quick update. AFs sister got released from the hospital on Friday and so far so good. Saturday afternoon we went to Niagara falls which was fun. I haven't been there in nice weather since I was a small child, so it was nice to take in the falls, the whirl pool and such.

Sunday we went down to the pride parade. I think AFs mum and aunt were a little shocked by what they saw, but all in all they were pretty cool with it. On the way back to the car we took a break and sat down on some benches. Some people came up to us all and gave us samples of lubricants. Not a comfortable situation to be in. AFs mum asked "What is this?". Talk about awkward.

Monday - hmmm... monday. Back to school and what not. Not much... nor tuesday for that matter. I'm slowly getting back into this whole excersize thing. This morning I managed to run 6 km, slowly, but I finished. Peterborough will be to finish, but I'll probably be disappointed if I get more than 1:30 since my bike and swim are still pretty strong.

Have a great day everyone!

Friday Friday

Hmm... news? Not much. AFs sister was supposed to get released yesterday but they ended up keeping her in the hospital another day. We're not sure why. I hope it isn't anything bad. We'll be heading down to TO tomorrow morning.

Other stuff? Not much. My apartment is spic-and-span right now, at least it was when I left Jenny there alone this morning! we'll have to wait and see what she manages to do today :) There was a chance that AFs family was going to come up to the 'loo this weekend, and I wanted to make sure my place wasn't a disaster. I've even tidied up the areas that have accumulated junk, and can see my desk top so I deserve a big pat on the back for that :).

Not much else going on really. Just writing away right now, trying to get my method down on paper so that the supervisor can review it before I get too far into continuing what I've been doing. Its pretty boring and hard to stay on track with this, but my goal is to get it done before the long weekend so starting July I can get back into my research. I'm hoping these days to be completely done by the end of October so heres to hoping :)

Uncreative title

Hi all, I was asked to update AFs sister, so here I am. Updating.

As of last night the drain was in her spine and collecting fluid. They are concerned that it isn't collecting enough fluid so they tried inserting it further and it wouldn't go in any more. they were going to try again later, but AFs mum went home. She is having a lot of pain again (I think it is because she is back in the hospital setting with nothing to do but lay around feeling sorry for herself all day) and is having problems with vomitting a constipation again - probably from the morphine. They are talking about possibly discharging her on Thursday. Her nose has again stopped leaking the spinal fluid, but is it because of the drain, or because it is healing? we don't know.

In other stuff, I got back the results from my Barium Upper GI X-ray and everything came back normal. For now, we are assuming it is gastritis and I have to continue on these meds for 6 weeks and then start to ween myself off them. If the symptoms come back at after I'm off the drugs than we'll do some more tests. Grrrr. I don't like having to deal with this ontop of everything else. At least the meds seem to be helping for the most part.

My excersizing is going so so these days. I feel strong in the pool, okay on the bike, but really weak on the run. I guess the time that I've been sick (3 months now) has really taken a toll on that. I guess I just have to work hard at it. IT is hard to believe where I was a year ago compared to now. I guess it'll come back with time.

UPDATE I'm bored, so I'm updating with not much. I just wanted to say that sometimes I seriously feel that if my head were not attached to my shoulders I would have lost it years ago. This morning I got almost all the way to school before realizing I forgot to take my pills this morning. I turned around (at the grad house) and got all the way to the other side of ring road before realize. Doh, no I didn't. Hmm... Longest walk to school ever! Silly me.

A mostly crappy weekend.

So as was expected, Wednesday and Thursday were pretty hard. I was glad I got the opportunity to see granny the way she was, just because it wasn't granny there, and it made me realize that she wasn't ever going to be the same and that we had already lost her. She said one thing to me when I was there it was "Has Jane made a decision about the house". Jane was my mum (who passed away 3 years ago) and the last house she bought was in 1976??? so I'm pretty sure she didn't realize who I was. Leaving on Thursday was really hard, but after getting into the car, no more real tears were shed.

Friday was pretty hard being at school and wondering what was going on in Ottawa, needless to say I didn't get much work accomplished. This weekend, was mine and Arash's six month anniversary and we went out to dinner on Friday night. I asked dad not to let me know until saturday if she passed on friday. Sure enough, 8:15 am Saturday morning the phone rings and I know immediately that granny passed away sometime on Friday. It was just before 3 pm, and both my auntie Jill and Auntie Anne were there with her. She slept all day long, and just stopped breathing at some point.

The rest of the day Saturday was busy. We were running errands and picked up AFs aunt at the airport (she is here from Sweeden for 10 days to help with the post surgery stuff). We had a nice dinner on Saturday night and a good visit. Sunday morning we had another nice breakfast and were deciding what to do for the day. AFs sister had to get her staples out (35 in total!) and they wanted to talk to a doctor about this fluid that has been draining out of her nose. So we went to emerge thinking it was going to be a really short visit. 5 hours later AF and I leave his mum and his aunt there with AF's sister being re-admitted into Neuro ICU. Turns out that the mysterious fluid is spinal fluid and that the fusing between the brain and the sinus cavity isn't working properly. They have to get it to stop because it can have some serious long term consequenses. She had to get a drain put into her spine and they will try that for a couple of days. If it doesn't work, she'll be going back into surgery (probably wednesday or so). We were at the hospital when this man was brought in. The cameramen were there before the ambulance and police man came in. It was pretty disgusting that they were there ready to record everything.

So as you can see it was a pretty crappy weekend. Now I'm back at school and I'm supposed to be handing in my Lit Review to the Supervisor today, but I don't think I'm going to be able to concentrate all that well. I guess we'll have to see.

Update: The drain wouldn't go in last night, so they are going to be trying again this afternoon. I hope everything goes well, man, my life is too stressful right now.

A turn for the worse

My granny that is, not AFs sister. My dad called around 9:30 last night to let me know that Granny was doing much worse. They fitted her yesterday with an IV so that she can go onto the Morphine drip sooner rather than later. At this point, my dad doesn't know if she is going to make it to this weekend which is when my sister and BIL are going up to visit. I'm taking off tomorrow and Thursday to go down and say goodbye and it seems like it'll pretty much be just in time. There is apparently a "no crying in front of granny rule" that I'm not sure I'll be able to hold up, but I'll try my best. I'm pretty upset about it to say the least - she is my last living grand parent...

AFs sister is doing well. She got discharged yesterday at noon, but had to go back into the hospital today to get the staples out of her head. Apparently after that happens, she is able to wash her head like normal. The only problems shes had for the past few days are from the painkillers, much the same as I had after my surgery. They gave her nausea and constipation, but apparently that is getting better.

ANY BOYS READING MAY WANT TO STOP HERE
She also ended up getting her period when she was in the hospital so she was pretty miserable in general. I offered a tampon to which I was promptly replied "Oh, no Azin can't use them, she's a virgin". I was pretty taken aback, I didn't know how to respond. I felt terrible now, I think that AFs mum must think I'm a slut or something. I think it is a cultural difference since here it isn't that much of a deal if you aren't a virgin when you get married. No one is waiting for the hymen blood on the wedding night to prove that their wife is "pure". I felt terrible though, since I've been using them since I first got my period back at age 12 (you kind of have to when you are a swimming instructor and lifeguard!)

Busy...

So I'm back from Toronto now, and it has been a pretty stressful time.

Wednedsay morning we were up before the crack of dawn (think 4 am) to head to Toronto. We were driving AF's sister to the hospital and we had to be there by 7 am. We got in at 6:20 or so and left immediately for the hospital. The pre op stuff seemed to last forever, but finally at 10:30 or so, his sister finally got rolled away into the surgical ward. Around 11 or 11:30, we headed off for a bit. the pre op was supposed to carry on for another 2 hours or so and then the surgery would last another 5-6 hours after that, so they thought everything would be over around 6-6:30. We had short naps in the afternoon and headed back to the hospital around 4:30 or so. And then the waiting continued... past 6... past 7... 7:45 before the surgeon came down to say that everything went okay, but we'd still need to wait another 2 hours (ended up being 2.5 hours) before they could get in to see her.

During that wait my dad called my cell phone. Never a good sign. He usually only calls when it is something big. Well, something big it was. He had been talking to my Uncle M in Ottawa on Wednesday and it seems that my Granny is slipping. Like really slipping. The doctor said at most that she has 1 month left, but that if she has to go onto morphine to manage her pain it will be a lot less. After losing all my other grandparents, you'd think it would get easier, but it doesn't. I'm now planning my trip to Ottawa (Hoping for the middle of next week so I can go with my dad) to say good bye to my granny. I hate to think that this will be the last time I will see her. I also feel a little selfish in that I want her to stay but I know shes in pain and that she'd rather it just end. Also, I feel sad for Sarah and Kate who might not get a chance to say goodbye. Kate definitely won't get too, and Sarah might not be able to because June is a shit month for teachers. She'll be busy doing her report cards and might not be able to make it down.

Okay, I've rambled on enough. I just have to suck it up. Granny is old, she's dying, and there is nothing I can do about it.

Edit - Oops, forgot to mention AFs sister. By yesterday morning everything was incredibly stable and all of the monitoring equipment had been removed, they transfered her to the regular care ward by noon. We last saw her around 5 yesterday and she was almost 100% back to normal behaviorly, if a little dopey due to the morphine. They were talking about discharging her today which is almost unheard of soon. All the nurses were shocked with how well she was doing.

To get in, they made an incision pretty much ear to ear at the front of her hair line. They had to shave a band about two inches thick which won't be fun to grow out for her (she has long thick hair). So, I'm planning on picking up some magazines and some type of hair covering for her to bring down with me tomorrow. Any suggestions?

So I'm a loser :)

Jenny now has a blog... yes, as in my cat :) I recommend that everyone go and visit and give her a treat :) I took another really cute picture of her this weekend and I'll add it once I download it from my computer.

Hmm... last week has gone well. I was pretty lazy last week at school just easing my way back into things after my conference. This week I want to pick it up again. Apparently if I finish by September 29th I make the fall convocation deadline. This is kind of my current goal. Hopefully I can do that. I'd also get 100% of my tuition back then.

I also took my car in last week for an oil change. I apparently have a leak in my exhaust system and to replace the part would be $1350! Way too much. I'm hoping a muffler place could repair it without replacing. even if it only lasts a year, I'll be able to afford that much better next year! I also got a new printer. It is nice, I'm happy with my purchase. I've been planning on getting a new one for a while... my old one is from first year and wasn't a great printer then, but it stuck it out for a long haul!

This week is probably going to go pretty quickly. On top of working hard again, I will be taking wednesday off to go to Toronto. AF's sister is having her neurosurgery that day so I'll be driving him to Toronto on Tuesday night and staying there the day with him and his mum. Barring any complications, I'll be back at school thursday and then back down to TO on Friday night or Saturday morning (AFs staying up at his mum's place the rest of the week).

The real update

Okay, so I've posted some information as of later - specifically god daughter cuteness, but I still haven't updated from my cali trip... I'll skim throught the last two weeks quickly...

May 20 - Saw DaVinci Code. Pretty good, I wasn't dissappointed that they left anyone big thing out, but I wasn't as captivated as I was with the book.
May 21 - Up at the crack of dawn and off to Cali. In the evening was the "Speakers Reception" where I thought I would be a lonely loser, turns out I met Kbum's friend and we ended up hanging out.
May 22 - Presented X's Poster and met some other academics that seemed pretty cool.
May 23 - My presentation Day! went well, I was nervous and talked fast, but all in all it went okay. In the afternoon we rented bicycles and biked along the cost (stay tuned to photoblog for cali pictures!)
May 24 - Conference in morning and flying back in afternoon, evening and night. Tired!
May 25 - Slept to after 1 pm when I got home at 9 am. Note to Self - Never take the red eye!
May 26 - Off to sisters house. Pretty uneventful. don't know whether I'd mentioned it before, but she has popped and is looking pregnant now.
May 27 - Busy day - breakfast with S&W, to my dad's to grab the canoe and lunch with D&C (and to meet Kailey!) and then an afternoon of Canoeing on the Bay of Quinte (I never realized just how beautiful it is! weird since I lived there for the first 19 years of my life!) Then a detour through prince edward county (again beautiful!) and back to my dad's for dinner.
May 28 - Up earlyish to head back to the big city. AF was working on his assignment in the afternoon, I read and had a very long nap (too long as sleeping was a little disturbed last night) and then it was back to my apartment last night.

Think I hit all of the highlights there. I'm tired this morning, but today is my first Dt Coke free day. I want to make it at least a couple of weeks before I have one to make sure I've weened my addiction again. I've done this before I can do it again! Happy Monday all!

Meet Kailey :)

My New God Daughter

Calea (don't know how to spell it, pronounced k-lee) Anne
Born yesterday (May 24th) at 7:55 pm Eastern Time
6 lbs 10 oz
19 inches.

I'm super excited about going home now :) Yay for babies! I'll be sure to take pictures. I think I'm also going to pick up something for Madison, it's got to be hard for her since she used to be the centre of her mums life and now she has to share that. So yep, I have another god daughter, there were no complications due to the hernia, but they induced labour after her water broke to try and shorten the length of the labour.

Do not adjust your monitors

The time stamp on this post is accurate. That is, it is 5:30. Ugh. Jenny and I are the only ones awake, possibly in the whole city. We are over at af's and I'm getting ready to head out for this conference broooha in Cali. I'll be leaving the city in around half an hour after I know I'm awake enouth to drive the hour to toronto.

Just wanted to send word out that I'm alive and okay and you won't be hearing from me until the 25th at the earliest. At which point in time, I'll be a much happier LJ. Enjoy your long weekends everyone!

Busy Bee

So this weekend was one word. Busy. Yep, lots of people to see, and only two short days to do it.

I left school at 2:45 on Friday and by 4:30 we were on the road headed east. We stopped breifly in TO for dinner with Dad and N. I had the salted black licorice from banff to give to my dad so it worked out well. After staying there too long we finally got back on the road and were making good time. Just outside belleville it occured to me "Oops, I forgot to give the salted black licorice to dad... wait... shit... I forgot my purse at N's". Yep. Not cool. We got off the highway in belleville and drove to my dad's where I called him. We both decided that I should carry on my merry way and do my best not to get arrested for driving sans licence. All this put me way behind schedule. We got back on the road headed to Ottawa at around 9:45. I called E to make sure that is was okay that we were going to be crazy late, she said it was so on we went. We ended up getting to her place at 12:15 and chatted for well over an hour before going to bed.

Saturday morning we did a driving tour of Ottawa and gatineau including brunch in the byward market. good times. I love Ottawa. Definitely a place I'd want to live. Saturday afternoon we visited with my Granny, saturday dinner was with my aunt, two uncles, and cousin. I think those that hadn't met A before thought he was very nice. After dinner we went downtown to visit A's friend from back home. They seemed like a nice couple and their 5 year old son was very cute.

Sunday morning I visited my Granny again, while my uncle showed A around the hightech areas and Granny came to my aunts for lunch which was nice. The drive home fit into our busy weekend schedule stopping in Castleton to drop something off for middle Sis. In Toronto we had dinner with A's mum and sister, and stopped to pick up my purse before getting back to town late last night.

Other important things - 1) My granny is doing much better than I was expecting after talking to my aunt. She over reacts and I was expecting Granster to be doing much worse than she is. 2) A has an interview this morning at RIM. Should be 1 hour in right now... it is a three hour interview! craziness! I hope he gets the job. It'll probably mean that we will get to spend less time together, but I know that he would much prefer this to what he is doing now.

Here I was...

Thinking I was starting to feel better again and I wake up feeling like ass this morning. Not good. I have a doctors appointment this morning to look at the ultrasound results, if the tests so far are inconclusive, then I think I'm going to ask if there are any over the counter med that they can recommend to alleviate my symtoms when we are trying to sort this out. Day in Day out nausea = not cool.

I've updated my photoblog a couple of more times. These times with picks from Drumheller. Both the badlands and the dinosaur museaum. More badlands and hoodoos to come :)

Other news? is there any? Not really. My granny is back in her home (halfway between retirement and nursing) after spending over a week in the hospital after a fall. I'm glad to be seeing her this weekend. AF is definitely going to come with me now too. Should be a good time. Mostly just working away getting ready for my conference. My presentation is due on friday, but I could bring a more up-to-date one with me to the conference. I'm getting close to being done, but I'm still waiting on one set of results that are taking forever. I think I might aske if we can change the concentration to something a little larger, I could get results a lot quicker that way.

*yawn*

I'm a busy girl these days.

The several weeks have been very hectic trying to get everything done for the conference I have to go to in California in a couple of weeks. Right now I'm working on my presentation and waiting for my last model runs to finish (two sets are looking like they are going to take forever now. Bah. Hopefully I'll have thos results by Wednesday morning.

Other stuff - let me think, I'm waiting to hear back from the doctors on the first slew of tests that I've had to try and identify Ethan Coli (my affectionately named parasite) (I've had blood work, an ultra sound and of course, the wonderful stool samples.) Hopefully we now have a little more insight to what this may be and hopefully we can get it sorted out.

This past weekend I spent most of my time with AF (until yesterday afternoon when he needed to do an assignment, and I needed to work on my presentation. We looked at mountain bikes for him on saturday afternoon which is always fun. I love bike stores :). I also got a few used DVDs... Mr. and Mrs Smith, Sideways, and Bride and Prejudice. 3 for $24, not a bad deal.

This coming weekend we (AF is pretty sure he's going to come) are going to Ottawa to visit with Eva on Friday/Saturday and my family on Saturday/Sunday. To add to my already stressed out self (with this conference and Ethan), I found out a couple of weeks ago that my granny really isn't doing well and she's pretty much started the slow decline to death. The doctors have said that they can't treat the problem they can only treat the symptoms. My aunt (always the family melodramatic) thinks my granny will pass away this summer, however, my Father thinks this is just Auntie J being Auntie J and that the Granster will stick around until at least seeing S&W's baby and K's return from Africa this fall. Either way she probably won't be with us this time next year. This makes me incredibly sad. And I don't want to go into too much detail here since I don't want to start bawling at school.

Oh yes, one last thing that I forgot. I updated my photoblog, and will probably update several times this week with pictures I've taken in the past couple of weeks. I'm trying to not be a slacker on this anymore!

9:15...

And I'm still at school. What fun. I'll update more later, right now, I'm just trying to finish up here so that I can get home. I have an appointment at 8 tomorrow morning and want to get a good night sleep.... sleep.......

Daffodils, Forsythia, Goslings...

What are signs of spring?

After school today I have an appointment at the contact lens clinic. I was supposed to wear my contacts, but I forgot to bring them this morning. This meant that I needed to run home at lunch and put them in. Let me tell you, it is beeeeautiful out there. The forsythia bushes are bright yellow, and I saw my first goslings of the baby animal season. So cute :) But now I am sitting in front of the computer again day dreaming about being able to enjoy this beautiful day. Soon Laura Soon.

The past two-three days have been extremely busy. Sunday night I was working on my paper until around midnight. Monday at school 9 am - 6 pm (working the entire time) and then spent the night doing my taxes (I owe $903, booo-urns!). Yesterday was worse, at school 9-6 took an hour off for dinner and worked from home from 7 pm - 11. Fun stuff. I'm finally making some headway with my paper though. I'm just waiting for some last minute results to make my last two figures and then I'm mostly done. I'll hopefully be done before I have to leave for my appointment. My goal is for El Cap (anyone get that?) to be able to proof read it tonight. I guess we'll see.

Other than that, just frantically trying to get stuff done before my trip with weekend. Thinkgs I still need to do (a) finish paper, (b) print off taxes and mail them, (c) contact appointment, (d) pack, (e) get Jenny's stuff organized... she's spending the weekend at her BF's apartment... note: Jenny thinks AF is her boyfriend, not mine. It's actually pretty cute :) She loves him. I also have to figure out what is next on my reading list and bring it out west with me. I love reading :)

3 down 1 to go

This collection business is grody. Yes, I just said Grody.

I got this forward, would rather do it here than harassing you all with an e-mail.

Place an 'X' by all the things you've done, or remove the 'X' from the ones,
you have not, and send it to all of your friends (including me).

This is for your entire life:
(x) Smoked a cigarette
(x) Drank so much you threw up
( ) Crashed a friends car
( ) Stole a car, even a parents
(x) Been in love
(x) Been dumped
(x) Been laid off/sacked (Lifeguard days, my employer amalgamated and closed the pool I worked at... I'm still bitter ;))
(x) Quit your job
(x) Been in love at first sight (or thought you were)
( ) Snuck out of your parents house
(x) Had feelings for someone who didn't have them back
( ) Been arrested
(x) Gone on a blind date
(x) Lied to a friend
( ) Skipped school
( ) Seen someone die
(x) Been to Canada
( ) Been to Mexico
(x) Been on a plane
(x) Been lost
(x) Been on the opposite side of the country
( ) Gone to Washington DC
(x) Swam in the ocean
( ) Felt like dying
(x) Cried yourself to sleep
(x) Played cops and robbers
( ) Recently colored with crayons
(x) Sang Karaoke
(x) Paid for a meal with only coins
(x) Did something you told yourself you wouldn't
(x) Made prank phone calls....
(x) Laughed until some kind of beverage came out of your nose
(x) Caught a snowflake on your tongue
(x) Danced in the rain
(x) Written a letter to Santa Claus
( ) Been kissed under the mistletoe
(x) Watched the sun rise with someone you care about or love
(x) Blown bubbles
(x) Made a bonfire on a beach (I didn't make it, but I was there!)
(x) Crashed a party
(x) Gone roller-skating
(x) Ice-skating

Any nicknames? Laura Jean, Lj, The Jones
Mothers name? Jane Elizabeth Jones (nee Edwards)
What is your favorite drink? Hot Chocolate, Chai tea, dt coke, oj, and water
Regrets? some days grad school, but I'm mostly a happy camper
Tattoos? sun on my inner left ankle
Body piercing? 1 hole each ear. Used to want my eyebrow, but I'm over that now.
How much do you love your job? meh, wish I were working most days. Too much to stress about in grad school
Birthplace? Belleville ON
Favorite vacation spot? Africa :)
Ever been to Africa? yeppers! see above :)
Ever steal any traffic signs? Do campsite signs count (like the bright orange ones in the back country?)
Ever been in a car accident? Nothing major
A, B, C, D, DD cup size? D. Ugh.
Salad dressing? Light ceasar, creamy poppy seed, sundried tomato and oregeno
Favorite pie? Hmmm... Apple or Lemon Meringue
Favorite number? 1
Favorite movies? Shawshank redemption, Princess Bride and Sound of Music
Favorite holiday? Christmas
Favorite food? Steak. mmmmm....
Favorite day of the week? Saturday
Favorite brand of body soap? Bath and Body Works. Luxurious!
Favorite TV shows? Project Runway, CSI, Amazing race
Toothpaste? Arm and Hammer Extra Whitening
Favorite smell? Cinnamon
What do you do to relax? Read
Message to your friends reading this? Stool samples are gross... beware of the water in Africa
Farthest place you will send this message? Ummm? I don't know, depends on who reads this? BC???

Stool Sample Grossness

Okay, so I don't know how much I've posted about this, but ever since I got back from Africa I've been having waves of nausea that last anywhere from a week to a month. I got tested back in the fall for Malaria to rule it out, and have just kind of lived with it since then. This week after feeling off for over a month and feeling terrible when I've been excersizing, I decided to make an appointment to try and get it sorted out. So now, I have a huge bag and I have to collect 4 stool samples, and I had my first rectal exam. Not fun, but all in all, it was better than a Gyny exam. Now I just have to collect my samples and wait for the results to come in. Oh, and I have an order for an ultrasound. never had one of those before.

Guess that is it for me. Not much going on, trying to get my results in order for this conference paper, but the runs are taking a long time. Damn computers.

Oh, one exciting thing - I get to dogsit the bailey this weekend. I'm pretty pumped about it. I miss having a dog.

Time flies

Literally. 4 months ago today I met AF for the first time. 3 months ago we became an official couple. Weird since it feels like just yesterday, but feels like we've been together forever at the same time.

Easter weekend was good. Thrusday night we went to a get together at AF's climing gym. They are closing at the end of the month so were having a big last hurrah where you'd see everyone one last time. It was okay. We went back to his place and watched the Butterfly effect. It was a pretty cool movie. I remember when it was in theaters I wanted to see it, but it got bad reviews so I didn't go, but I'm glad I watched it. I thought it had an interesting premises. Friday was off to B-ville to visit with daddy dearest and D which was pretty nice albeit a short visit. AF didn't come with me this time. I dropped him off at his mum's house so he could spend sometime with his sister before she headed back to Tehran for a visit. Saturday after dinner it was back to Waterloo.

Sunday we walked around downtown and were trying to grab lunch somewhere, turns out a lot of the restaurants were close which I found funny since a lot of them would have been open on CHRISTMAS day. Oh well, we ended up heading back to the plaza and having a late lunch there. I was planning on doing some marking last night, but by the time I drove AF back to his apartment, did my dishes and what not, it was close to 10 so I just headed to bed. This week is going to be pretty busy with marking and working on this paper for the california conference. Should be able to get it done though.

I feel like Poo

yep. That is right. I'm feeling under the weather yet again. Not cool. Will I make it through the day? that is yet to be determined. I will wait a bit and see if it passes. Hopefully it does. I was just in the bathroom and man, do I look like shit right now. I have these huge circles under my eyes. Looking at me, you'd think I hadn't slept last night, but I got close to 8 hours in. Meh. I'll see what the next hour or so brings. Might go home early and have a nap and finish up what I'm working on this evening.

Last night I finished the book I was reading. Something Borrowed. It was good for Chick lit. Trying to decide if I want to get the sequal to it (Something Blue) or if I want to read something serious again next.

The Bain of My Existence

Yep. Foiled by units yet again. Gar. Not a happy camper right now, but when am I ever happy about these stupid freaking units. Oh well, on the good side of things, yes, it renders what I've done on my model since around 11 am sunday morning useless, but also wonderful since my model now runs start to finish in like 5 minutes. Yipee! (before, it was taking like 5 minutes real time to model 1 minute simulated time - not cool! This means I'll be able to a) get the right results and b) fix problems a lot quicker).

Not much else going on here. I got my extension approved for Batelle, I have a week longer than we were assuming I'd get which means I might actually have a life and be able to enjoy this nice weather we are having a bit. Oh, yes, and get my marking done before the end of exams. Always a good thing.

Taking a moment

My model is running away in the background on my computer right now. And taking up a huge portion of my CPU I might add. I just wanted to take a minute out of my busy day to gush about my man. I realized this weekend that I love him. Yep, that is right. For the first time in 6 years Laura is in Love. Fun stuff. When I'm with him all my worries kind of melt away and when I'm in his arms there is no place in the world I'd rather be. He's even starting to bring me down a notch in high-strungness which is really saying something for anyone who knows me. I'm normally the type of person that has to be doing something every minute of the day and I don't tend to take time to enjoy the little pleasures in life. Enjoying good conversation over breakfast, relaxing for a day with nothing planned just enjoying what happens. Not really my normal style. Anywho, so yes. I love him... now if I can just get over my primal fear of telling HIM then we'll all be good. I decided not to say anything this weekend since he has his exam tonight and I didn't want to distract him. Well, that is my excuse anyways. Okay. Back to writting this fun little paper. Ciao kiddos.

And the stress is mounting again

It's noon on A Sunday and I'm modelling. Lots of fun. My damn program is taking so long right now. I had to increase the time step big time because some of the stuff is depleting way fast (read huge negative concentrations). Crapola I say. Okay, now that I have that off my chest.

I had my Fort Mac interview on friday. The first question he asked me was "Did I think I would want to work in Fort Mac?" I answered truthfully that I hadn't given it much thought, I'm not going to be ready to work until the earliest september, and that right now I'm adsorbed in my research. He seemed to accept that, and I'm supposed to give him a call in August if I'm interested. I asked him a few questions about the area and what not. Something to think about when the time comes, but I don't have to yet thankfully!

Other than that. The first half of my weekend was good. Friday night I was at AFs and some of his friends came over. It was nice for him to get to visit with them since he hadn't seen a few of them in a while. Saturday we just lazed around most of the day and I came back here last night. I have too much work to do and he has his exam on monday in his C# class so we both have to get work done.

A sigh of Relief

Ahhh... but don't let me sigh too long as it'll be getting busy again in no time flat... like tomorrow. So after two long days monday and tuesday, I finally got to relax a bit after my presentation yesterday. Monday I was at school 9-7, got home, had dinner and worked from 8-10:15... Tuesday was a little better - at school from 9-6, had dinner relaxed for a bit and worked from 8:30-11:00. Ah, what an exciting life. But I presented on Wednesday afternoon. I was a little nervous and a little frazzled (damn over head projectors), but I finished on time and didn't have any hard questions that I had to answer so that was good :). I'm so not winning the presenters award, but then again, I was hardly expecting to either!

When I got back to my office in the afternoon I had an e-mail from NL, the girl that stayed with me last may for feild school. Turns out she's in town for a WHI course and wanted to get together (I just got back from lunch with her and burger). It was nice to hear from her again. When I got home from school there was more kind of good/kind of scary news waiting on my answering machine.

Komex in Fort Mac wants to interview me. Tomorrow. Okay, I know I did give them my resume, but at the time it was more for practice than anything else. I also gave it to the Komex Calgary office, not Fort Mac. I'm not sure I want to live out west first off. Second off, Fort Mac? Would that really be a place I would want to live? Meh. I'll do the interview, but I don't think I'll except a job should they offer me one. Also, after 5.5 years of being unattached and not caring where I end up things are a little different now. I don't want to be one of those people that throws their life away because of a guy, but honestly, I don't think I'd have a problem getting a job in Waterloo or Guelph, or in the worst case, somewhere in the wasteland that is the GTA, I don't think I need to go to Alberta to get a job. Meh. This is too stressful. Why did AF have to go and complicate my life? Don't get me wrong, I really like this guy, but I guess this is a case where it is just easier to be single and have no stings tieing you somewhere.

Other than that, I'm at home marking today. It is taking me forever! Gar. I hate marking. I think this will be my last TA. I don't mind marking math, the text takes so much longer.