Road Trip

I just realized that I never posted about this particular event.
Tomorrow, my mother, grandmother and I are embarking on a shopping trip to Maine and New Hampshire. Very exciting!
For a taste of similar, albeit admittedly shorter, trips with the same cast of characters, please refer to the post 'When Generations Collide'. I assure you this promises to be equally amusing.

Bath Day for Winnie

I spent yesterday and today cleaning the house in preperation for another visit from my grandfather later this week. Winnie is happy living in a now-clean environment, especially now that she too is clean: i.e. Today was bath day. I turned on the shower by accident at one point which kind of freaked her out.
Here I have written, for your amusement, the outcome of said mistake in the form of a screenplay:
Winnie: AHH! THE ROOF HAS DISAPPEEARED! IT'S RAINING INSIDE! THE SKY IS FALLING!
Livi is wrestling with 50 pounds of dripping wet labrador retriever
Livi: NO, NO, STAY IN THE TUB, STAY IN THE-OOF! AW, NOW I'M ALL WET TOO...NO, DON'T SHAKE! NOOO!
Livi manages to mop up most of the floor with her clothing as she slips around trying to get the dog outside with minimum water-damage to the house.
Good times, good times.

Two Days of Lunch

Yesterday, while taking a break in the house-cleaning frenzy, I made curry fried rice (http://www.hookedonheat.com/2005/10/27/spicy-curry-fried-rice/). I really enjoyed it, and clearly, so did the guys. Between them, they ate all the leftovers for supper and took what remained for lunch today. So, left high and dry with no left-over rice for lunch as I had planned, I tried this other recepie (http://www.hookedonheat.com/2006/06/19/reminiscence/). I didn't like it as much, although it was still pretty good, but mom loved it. Go figure.
And no baby yet. We're all so anxious to make his/her aquaintance!

At the Beach

As you may know, if you were in the area, Sunday was a beautiful sunny day. I spent most of it outside with the dog. She has this old fish crate out back that we fill with water, and she loves to splash in her 'pool'.



Then Geoff and I took her down to the lake. It was a liiittle too cold for us, but Winnie loved it.

My Precious

I went out on Friday and bought a new camera! I realize this seems an un-called-for moment of spontaneity, but it was on sale. The price was even better than it would have been in the states!
And it is my precious. It's a Fujifilm Finepix s1600, and it has rapid shoot, and panorama, and face detection...*sigh* I am in love...
Geoff's play was fantastic: best part was when they broke a sword in the middle of the fight in Macbeth. Geoff and Mac were laughing so hard on stage, and so was the audience, but they still managed the Scottish accents, in a giggily kind of way. And he was an excellent Hamlet.
Also, I just noticed that this is my 50th post. Quite the milestone, considering I expected to only continue for a week or so when I started in March. Let's see how long it takes until 100!

It is Now Midnight

Just in case you lost your watch. :)

Shakespearean Pants

Geoffrey's in a play called 'The Complete Wrks of Wllm Shkspre Abridged'. He's playing Hamlet, the lead, and they perform this Thursday and Friday night at Neptune Theatre.
Anyway, yesterday he remembers that he needs Shakespearean pants for the dress rehearsal which was today. My parents wanted to take these spare pants to a tailor, but noooo, I just had to volunteer.
I ended up working on them for about four hours straight last night. Thank goodness for velcro or I would have been another hour making button holes. They turned out pretty good in the end though!


My grandparents just came back from their winter home in Arizona. Tonigh my grandpa is sleeping over before heading to a meeting in the morning, which means little miss Livi is sleeping in the furnace room. But it is a very nice furnace room. It's tangerine coloured. Anyway, they brought me back a dress, which is veeerry pretty and some peanut brittle from Virginia.
I had never had peanut brittle before tonight, can you imagine? I am now addicted. Add that to my list, haha.

Little Frankie Moon

My cousin Erica's baby is due one week from today. I am really rather excited. I did a little research, and although only 5% of babies are actually born on their due date, 30% of those NOT born on their due date are born early! Which means our little Frankie could come at any time! We could get a call in five minutes!
I forgot to mention, I didn't win the sailing scholarship *sigh*. Oh well! Means more time to work, which means more money, which is usually a good thing.
Oh and about the 'Frankie Moon' bit: she's not naming the baby Frankie, or Moon, or any combination of the two. But they don't know whether baby is a girl or a boy, and they didn't want to call it 'it' for nine months. Hence 'Frankie Moon'.

Result

Attila the Hun won. In case you were wondering, aha.

What I Did Instead of Studying Biology

I curled my hair! I was a little worried it would come out looking like a cross between Little Orphan Annie and a red poodle. Which now that I think about it, isn't much of a cross. Annie did look like a little red poodle, albeit a very cute one.
But I'm pretty happy with it, and might think about getting my hair curled professionally. Maybe.
Right now I'm watching Deadliest Warrior with Geoffrey. It's between Alexander the Great and Attila the Hun. Geoff thinks Alexander will win, but I'm all Attila. I'm rather a big fan, he might be my favourite warrior-king of the mid 400s.

Balanced Breakfast

This study session powered by Reese Puffs Cereal! Don't worry, it's whole grain! And part of this balanced breakfast! How could it be bad for me?
Ah well, all that chocolate and sugar is keeping me going. You do what you have to in order to stay awake when you drink no coffee. And the dog is quite insulted because she thinks I'm eating her kibbles. She's sulking in a corner. Actually, they do look alot like dog food...

Happy Mother's Day!

I love my mumma! Just so y'all know.
Collectively, we got her a new bundt pan, some slippers, some gardening gloves and a magnolia.
Except the magnolia is grow-it-yourself and hence rife with pitfalls.
ie. Step 4. Do not over water. Do not underwater.
Me: wah?
We have a poor track record with house plants in our family. But you never know, this could be our year. Team effort!
She cried which is a good thing, I think. We had salmon for supper and mushroom risotto, it was so yummy... and I made chocolate cake again! Hooray for the ol' standby!
In conclusion: HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!

~The cake :)

Time Outside Before the Blackflies Invade

It's so beautiful out! The huge Indian Pear tree in our front yard is in full bloom. The petals are just beginning to drift slowly down when there's a breeze, and the Forget-me-nots, my favourite childhood flower, have covered the hill out back.
They creep a little into the woods, where they give way to these four-petaled white wildflowers. The stream is flowing happily, and, best of all, no flies yet!

The Great Escape

I feel like I'm walking on eggshells at the moment, but not in a bad way. Like if I do everything right, something wonderful will be waiting at the end.

When I was in junior high, I was a participant in the Duke of Edinbourgh's Award Program. I still get e-mails about various opportunities.The one I got a few nights ago literally made me so excited I was bouncing in my seat.

There's this tall ship that sails in the Great Lakes called the Unicorn. It's crewed by all women, and Duke of Ed is offering a bursary to go on a two week expedition on this boat, learning all the way! And it ends just in time for my cousin Josh's wedding near Toronto. Can you say fate?

There's only room for two kids, but I'm on the list, and they'll know by the 21st. Keep your fingers crossed, I know I will!

That should be interesting. . . writing the Chem exam with crossed fingers. . .

IB Students Will Rule the Land Because You Cannot Kill What Already Has No Life. . .

Bah, stupid math. Stupid bio. Stupid chem. No wait, I don't mean that! Please don't make me write double exams for dishonouring the sacred IB subjects of death! Nooooo...
I am so sick of studying at the moment. My mother is freaking out because I haven't cleaned my room since I started studying. So I can either study or clean my room. How ever shall I decide?
It's such a beautiful day outside. I don't even need a light on because the sun is shining so brightly through my bedroom window. The birds are singing, and everything outside is slightly glowy, gilded in that pre-sunset shimmer. This is definately my favourite time of day. Maybe I can sneak out and take some pictures, heheh...

Small Town Sky at Dusk with Storm Clouds Rolling In

My Dedicated Tutor

Here's Winnie helping me with my math practice exams. . .doesn't she look studious? We pay her a fortune in kibbles. . .

Just one more, and then I'll study, I swear!

And yet another detail which I forgot to share. No, no more ER stories. I've decided they're too depressing.

I don't think I've mentioned our neighbours here before. Gary and Suzie have lived next door since before my parents moved here, which is also before I was born.

Gary (whose real name is Derek..no idea why we call him Gary) is about eighty and originally from England. He's facinating, he has tons of war stories, and sailing stories, and RCMP stories. He's got a high tech microscope, a HAM radio tower, and a darkroom, not to mention he paints beautifully and builds boats. Mom says when they first came, she thought they'd moved in next to James Bond.

Suzie is younger, not quite sure how old she is. Her real name is Choo Poo (see, they both have code names!), and she's from Malaysia. She's an expert cook and gardener, her dahlia's are beautiful. She also knits these fantastic sweaters, they're the comfiest and warmest I've ever worn.

Anyway, now that you have been introduced, I will continue. Suzie's mother, Peggy, lives next door to them. Everyone pretty much just calls her Mother. Saturday was her 80th birthday. Suzie and Ann, her sister, went out to get her a cake. It was supposed to say 'Happy 80th Birthday Mother'. They didn't realize until they got it home that it actually read 'Happy 18th Birthday Mother'.

So we joked that she was actually turning 18. She got a big kick out of that, and took us all (Gary, Suzie, Ann, Vick, and my family) out to Fan's for dim sum. Suzie wrote down what it was we had so I'd remember all the names:
Har gau: shrimp dumpling
Sui mai: steamed pork and shrimp dumplings
Steamed buns: the actual name was really long and she spoke too fast. They were sweet and had pork in the middle
Fung Zao(pheonix talons): Chicken feet
Lou mai gai: gelatinous rice wrapped in lotus leaves
Wu gok: Taro dumplings, these were my favourite! I ate two, and they're not small...
Yau yu sou: deep fried squid, I didn't like this too much. The suction cups turned me off...
There were also a bunch of different types of noodle dishes and these honey-sesame things with mystery filling. It was soooo good. Plus they didn't try to feed us jelly fish this time. That was not fun.
-note: any errors in the above list are mine!

More True Stories from the ER

Bwahaha, isn't that a dramatic title? I think I'm getting better at this...

I just forgot to put this in the last post. Looking back at how looong it is, that's probably not a bad thing.

While waiting for the results of some blood work, my mother and I were placed in a small room with one other family: a girl about my age, her mother and her boyfriend. At one point, the girl goes out to use the washroom or something and when she comes back, she's all excited.

She goes to her mother and says "Mom, I just saw a doctor with a huge green taliban on his head!" For those of you who missed that, he was wearing a TURBAN on his head, not a member of the fundamentalist Islamic militia who took over Afghanistan in 1996
They proceeded to debate whether or not it was rude to talk about this man's "taliban".

I didn't know whether to laugh or to cry. As it was, I had to leave the room in order to avoid correcting her, which would have made for an awkward situation. My mom said it was kind of like a sketch from Saturday Night Live. It was just so ignorant...and yet so funny...

And the light shines through.

Hello IB. Oh, you need to suck all the joy out of my life? How's monday at 10 work for you?

Friday was my last official day of high school. It wasn't as eventfull as I had imagined it would be. I pictured parties and tears and fun goodbye classes...but no, the teachers just continued on as usual. I don't think anyone except the librarian even acknowledged it was our last day...I feel so...unloved...

Hah, just kidding. I guess they're saving all the good stuff for after exams.

I've been having pain in my side since Thursday, and the doctors thought it might be kidney stones or early onset appendicitis. As a result, I spent all of yesterday in Emergency participating in yucky tests, and didn't get home until midnight.

My least favourite was the CT scan. They make you drink three litres of this foul liquid over three hours (Ibleive it's barium or something?), except they don't tell you at first how much you're going to have to drink. The first glass is bad, but you manage to choke it down. You think you're done. Then comes the second glass (and these are BIG glasses, like plastic tankards!) and you deal with it, although it's alot harder. Finally, you think, no more!

Then they come out with the third glass. I was torn between crying and pouring it down the nurse's pants. It was horrible.

But I got through it. Honestly, forcing myself to drink those last couple sips has to have been one of the hardest things I can remember doing.

The CT scan itself was actually kind of cool. It looked so futuristic, I kept waiting for the Star Trek theme song to start. Dunnhhh Dunnnhhh... your appendix...the final frontier...And the machine talks to you. It tells you when to hold your breath.

Eight hours after being admitted, it turns out I just have a virus in my lymph nodes. Can you spell relief?

I have decided, however, that if I should ever end up working in the emergency centre at the QE II, I am so working the night shift. That's when all the cute, single, paramedic men are on duty ;)
The...juice...