Weekly Video - Evolution of Dance

I know we've all seen this a thousand times, but I would be remiss if I didn't include it in my blog video collection. Enjoy!!!

TV Review - Dirty Sexy Money

OK, yes I've been watching a lot of TV. But I have to check out all the new shows. It's just mandatory I tell you!!

Ever since reading a review in TV Weekly I've been waiting for this show. It's dirty. It's sexy. It's money. I mean, damn, the name says it all. Oh, and it's Peter Krause from Six Feet Under (which we all know by now is one of my all time fave shows)! Plus come on...Donald Sutherland too!!

I loved it!! Sure, it had a lot going on for a one hour show, but it's got a fairly big cast to introduce. Once everyone is established I'm sure it won't be quite so go, go, go. You have to learn about Krause's character, Nick, and the whole backstory about his Dad and their relationships with the Darling family....plus you have to get the skinny on each member of the dirty, sexy family. There's parents and like 5 kids!

I was thrilled to see that Krause has chosen another character that lets him really get into the part with anger, franticism and sarcasm. Nothing will ever top the writing for Nate on SFU but at least he's still really able to show his talents here. I think that the dynamic between him and Donald Sutherland will be one of the greatest parts of the show - love/hate is always good to watch.

Not sure if I totally love all of the kids in the family as of yet. Some of them seemed pretty over the top, but I guess that is the soap opera part of the show. At least they are all different so each one of them can appeal to a different kind of viewer. I think I'm loving that William Baldwin is playing the in-the-closet politician....hopefully they don't milk that cow of a storyline until it moos. The younger son is a total trainwreck...but an entertaining trainwreck. Father Brian annoyed me from the moment he stepped on screen. The sister with the rabid crush on Nick needs to take two steps back. And the youngest girl might be just a bit too much of a drama-queen even for this show. But I'll give them all the chance to win me over. Sometimes having someone to hate makes the show more interesting anyway!

I am looking forward to really getting into this show. Nothing has peeked my interest this much since the first season of Desparate Housewives so it's about time! (of course, I completely lost interest in DH by the time season two rolled around so hopefully that doesn't happen again!)

TV Review - Bionic Woman

After much anticipation, I raced home after kickboxing class to make sure I was showered and ready to go for 9:00. I've been waiting all Summer for this show!

It was pretty much what I expected...and I enjoyed it. I figured it would be somewhat Alias-esque and I think I was right. Not storyline-wise of course, but just the type of show it is. Michelle Ryan even has a bit of a Jennifer Garner look to her, but a little softer and prettier. Miguel Ferrer also reminds me of Victor Garber a little in his roll as the big boss.


They've opened up several good storylines to keep the viewers coming back. Jaime's relationship with her sister. The "bad" first bionic woman, as Jaime's nemesis. Will, Jaime's boyfriend that did this to her. And of course, how she will repay her debt for her life without becoming a mercenary or soldier.

The action was good and the special effects first rate for TV. As long as they keep that up for each episode I think people will watch just to see her kick some ass.

I look forward to future episodes and hope they unravel some cool twists and plotlines throughout the season. And I hope they keep Molly Price's hair looking super chic!!

Link - Roommates

http://myroommateisadick.com/

haha Mikey...you always find the best links. And I always love to steal them for posting here!

I'm so glad I never had any narsty-ass roommates like these! Closest I ever came was a roomie with a boyfriend that thought it was OK to party at our place after the bar when I had to work at 7:00am every Saturday. Dude, you don't pay rent so you don't get to be a dick!

TV Review - Reaper

Yup, death related. Seems I'm attracted to these shows for some reason. I wasn't expecting a lot from Reaper, but I was pleasantly surprised. It turned out to be pretty cute and I caught myself laughing out loud a couple of times. That's generally a good sign.

Premise is that the main dude, Sam, has just turned 21 and found out that his folks sold his soul to the devil. Now he has to work for Satan....as a bounty hunter. He has to go around recapturing bad guys that have escaped the depths of hell. And the best part is that his tool for collecting these guys is a Dirt Devil hand vac!

It's a bit goofy in the humour department (ie: cheesy sidekick buddy), but they kept it down to earth the best they could for the type of show it is. There's the cute girl he has a secret crush on, the crappy job at a major box store, the love of his parents....you know, all that stuff that keeps people interested in the storyline.

I read somewhere that the show would have a Buffy-esque feel to it. Although I didn't find that with the actual content or dialogue, I could see where that idea came from. Like, an evil demon blew the hell out of a house and left a big gapping hole in the earth and it just seemed like regular News at 11. Sort of like when weird stuff happened in Buffy, it never seemed to phase the general public.

Not sure this will be a weekly watch for me, but I'll definitely check it out again if I happen to be watching TV on a Tuesday night.

Milestone - 5000 Visitors!!!!

THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU!!

5000 visits thanks to all of you! It's only been about six months so I'm super excited that so many of you chose to visit my little blog so often. Please keep coming and let me know if you have any suggestions to keep the good times rollin'.

Did I mention THANK YOU?!!

Spur of the moment purchase...

Have you ever bought something because you were frustrated and it was the best thing you'd found all day? Even though it wasn't quite what you were looking for? Even if you aren't sure exactly what you were looking for, but you figured you would know it when you saw it? And this wasn't quite it, but you were determined to leave the mall with something anyway?

Well that's what I did on Sunday. I set out with a specific pair of boots in mind that I had seen on Aldo's website. And along with those boots I pictured new jeans and some kind of cute sweater or maybe a new Winter jacket. Except when I got to Aldo the boots didn't live up to expectation....so then the whole plan sort of fell apart.

So I spent a lot of the day looking at various boots and trying on WAY TOO MANY pairs of jeans. I finally found some jeans that fit properly and were long enough...but I'd given up on the skinny jeans because I never found the boots. HaHa! So this is where Murphy's Law comes in...because no less than 5 minutes after I bought the jeans, I found some boots.

Not exactly what I had started out looking for...they were sold out of black...and I was leary of the brown....what would I wear them with?...my winter coats are both black. But they were my size and on sale for a good price. So, screw it...I bought em and I'll figure the rest out later.

Well I finally got to wear them today (with a pair of jeans I already had...no skinny legs needed!) and boy am I glad I bought them. They are cute, different than what I'd usually wear, and to top it off they are really comfy! Yaaieeeeee!!

TV Review - Journeyman

This one wasn't even on my radar. But after the premiere of Heroes (which is a whole nother blog for some other time!) I didn't feel like getting off the couch so I checked the guide and decided to give Journeyman a try. It was either that or The Bachelor....ewwwwwwwww....where do they find these sad people every friggin season?!


So glad I chose Journeyman.


First, Kevin McKidd from Rome. Hello. Excellent! Second, who didn't love this concept the first time around on Quantum Leap?! Randomly travelling through time to assist in making sure someone's future happens. Nice.

I was happy to find that the concept came with a decent storyline, good characters, and an interesting hook (the dead ex-fiance.....). I was entertained for the whole episode and found myself smiling at the ending because I liked how he thought to prove the situation to his wife. So I'm already involved in the storyline, making friends with the characters, and looking forward to how this will play out in future weeks. How will he continue to explain his disappearances without seeming like a crazy person. Sure, his wife might believe him now, but what about all the other friends, family and coworkers? They all want to send him to rehab already...and he's only disappeared for a few days so far....

The leaps in time back to the 80s and 90s in this premiere episode also came with a cool soundtrack (a la Cold Case) which is always a good way to help keep their target audience (ie: people my age!) interested. :)

TV Review - Chuck

So I noticed this on the guide for tonight and thought I should give it a chance. I even told DBF to give it a go if he had nothing else to watch. (Note: he's 4 hours ahead of me). He emailed me after the show to let me know that after 20 minutes it hadn't captured his interest so he turned it off. I laughed at him because I thought 20 minutes wasn't long enough.

Interesting.... 20 mins after I started watching it my phone rang. And I didn't care if I missed the show. I guess 20 minutes was all that was needed to know this just isn't my kind of show.

Cute premise. Computer geek turns secret agent. I'm sure it will be popular, but for me it was a bit of an odd script, with odd characters, and an odd storyline. Not that I don't like odd...I guess this was just the wrong kind of odd for me (and DBF apparently). It might that it's that OC guy that created this... I don't seem to like his stuff much.

Of course, had I actually seen the entire show I might have understood why the blonde chick was flicking hair sticks at bad guys and pulling throwing knives out of her boot while dancing with Chuck. That seemed a little out there.... but I was just watching it happen while I chatted on the phone so I suppose it probably fit into the story just fine. :)

Weekly Video Clip - Popstar

Somewhere along the way I forgot about the Weekly Video Clip I'm supposed to post! Ooooops!

So here's one to make up for the past several weeks. I know you've probably all seen it since at least three of you have already posted it to my FunWall on Facebook, but it's worth a listen and a giggle.

Enjoy!!

Whine stops here.

So, this should be last post you hear about my stupid sore throat. Today it is lingering but more of a tickling ache in the back of my throat so I basically ignored it most of the day. Woooohooooo!!

Had a fantastic greasy spoon breaky at Floyd's with a friend, did some shopping, and had pizza and a movie at home with another friend.


Nothing like buying new LuluLemon pants to make a sick girl feel better!! Oh, except when they are size 8!!! and you find they have a cool hidden pocket in the waistband... :)

(mine are the traditional black top waist band, with a blue-green stripe)

Wish me luck!

I'm about to try to go outside! The giant lump in my throat is now only a small lump. I have just managed to eat a big bowl of soup, have a shower, do the dishes and get a batch of carrot cupcakes in the oven. So I figure that while I have energy left, I'm gonna take the poor doggie for a walk. Poor little bugger (OK, big bugger) is going stir crazy because I haven't been able to walk him since Monday. Not to mention that my back is starting to ache from all the sleeping and laying around. Time for a tiny bit of exercise while the sun is out...yaaieeee!!

At least it's not Mono!!

Nope, but it is strep throat. Yippee. At least I have me some penicillin now though. Here's hoping that helps kick this thing's ass over the weekend! Last night I loaded up on extra strength ibuprofen right before I went to sleep and I actually didn't wake up in the middle of the night. First time in three nights!! But even after only being up for about an hour and a half I still needed a nap...and slept for another 2 hours. My body seems to be trying to fight this finally. Woooooooo!! Swallowing still hurts like hell, but at least now I can sit up long enough to get some work done.

Sickypants

Gotta love illnesses that can't be diagnosed. Here I still feeling like a bag of poop, with a throat so sore that it brings tears to my eyes just to swallow my own spit. But since my tonsils aren't puss-covered this probably isn't strep. And my spleen isn't enlarged so it probably isn't mono. Great. My doctor took a throat swab and sent me for bloodwork, but since tomorrow is Friday we probably won't get the results until Monday. Whooopee. So I get to be tough for another three days. Argh! Hopefully the fact that I've gotten all achey tonight is a sign that I'm going to peak and will start getting better now. Pleeeease.

And not to be a big suck, but this is when I really wish DBF was home. I'm tough but man it would be nice to have someone to hug!

Big Brother Finale

Stupid Dick!!! Obviously I'm unimpressed that the big meany got the win. I don't care if the jury believed his strategy was better than Danielle's, because his strategy was to be an asshole. I don't think he should be rewarded for acting like super-jerk on national TV...but I guess that's just me.

Not that it matters because they are probably splitting the money (although it would be friggin awesome if next week they were in the tabloids for fighting about the money!!). Dick probably wants Danielle to travel with him and I'm sure she'll probably tell him to go piss up a rope the minute she gets her hands on her share of the cash. She'll take Nick and go lay naked on a beach somewhere!

TV Review - Gossip Girl

Strike one for new programming. Although I'm sure this will appeal to a large group of people, and although I'm sure that I'll wind up watching this from time to time when I'm too lazy to reach for the remote, this show did not live up to all the hype for me.

Based on a popular series of books the concept is interesting, but if it wasn't for the variety of texting devices, Sidekicks, and cell phones, the concept would have died. And honestly, who is going to be THAT interested in the goings on of only two local celebutants? Hopefully as the season goes on Gossip Girl will find other people to chat about too.

There is your typical bad girl turned good. Your usual jealous best friend. The mysterious, slightly dorky boy that wins your heart. The painstaking best friend's boyfriend in love with the wrong girl. And of course, the typical rich asshole bad boy that thinks he can do whatever he wants. Oh, and of course the innocent younger sister that seems to be getting herself entwined in the "popular" crowd.

Not sure that all of these cliches will make for a long lasting show, but I wrong about The OC so we shall see. I'll give it another chance before I completly shoot it down. :)

Fall 2007 TV Shows

As I mentioned yesterday, Fall is definitely setting in. I just walked the dog and was kicking fallen leaves almost the whole way. Another sign of Autumn is that all of the new shows are set to premiere on TV. Wooooo!

What are you looking forward to?

I have a few that I'll be checking out. I get excited every year over at least half a dozen shows, but honestly only one or two every make my regular weekly "must see TV" shows.

Bionic Woman - obviously!! I'm hoping it's got the Alias vibe that I think it will have.

Pushing Daisies - from the creator of Dead Like Me!! - I always seem to love these death related shows. The pilot is supposed to have amazing cinematography, and the plot sounds super-cool!

Reaper - yet another one about death! but with more of a Buffy vibe.

Dirty Sexy Money - HELLO Peter Krause!! My favorite actor from my favorite show (Six Feet Under)! TV's just been waiting for a new Dynasty!

Big Shots - Desperate Housewives except with men apparently. Not getting good reviews thus far though, so I'll probably lose interest in it just like I did with DH.

Others that I will probably check out if I'm home are: Gossip Girl, Private Practice, Chuck, and Women's Murder Club.

Fall Fresh Food

Fall is definitely here. The last week of beautiful weather may have tried to fool us, but as of today there's no denying it. I bought my first Halloween decorations of the year this week. I started looking at new sweaters and boots at the mall. I am planning my next trip to the hairdresser for more auburn and less blonde in my hair. Tonight I had to turn the furnance on for the first time since May to take the chill off the house.

Not sure that I'm ready for it yet. Fall colours are good. Fall weather here is not something I enjoy. Rain is not lovely.

But, since there's nothing I can do about that, I decided to make the best of it and take advantage of this year's crop of yummy Fall produce. There is a huge farm market in Duncan that I pass every time I travel up island to visit my Mom. Generally I drive by it. I've stopped a few times over the years and the best time is always Sept/Oct....especially to get a pumpkin for Halloween!

Not quite pumpkin time yet, but definitely time for other stuff. Today I spent only $16 and had four bags of food when I walked out. Two kinds of winter squash, yellow zucchini, fresh beets, local Romaine (beautiful and huge!), local carrots, parsnips, baby red potatoes, yellow pepper and corn on the cob. I even got fresh, local Gala apples (my favorite!) at only 35 cents/pound and bartlet pears fresh from the Okanagan.

I'm just drooling thinking of all the yummy, comfort food that I am going to enjoy over the next week or two. Roasted balsamic beets, carrot & squash soup, warm potato salad, spaghetti squash w/ olive oil & parmesan, mmmmmmmmm. Maybe a small apple/pear crisp. Yum!!

F'ing Ticketmaster

I'm so mad right now I think there might actually be steam coming out of my ears!!

So I got up early to try to get some Canucks tickets this morning. Got showered, made coffee, got ready and packed for my trip up island today. Gave myself a whole hour to click around Ticketmaster in the hopes of picking up a couple of sets of tickets. I did this last year and lucked out with two pairs of tickets.

At about 9:50ish I opened up the website to make sure I knew where to click and get all prepared. After about three clicks I received a message stating that I had exceded my number of page views. WTF?! I looked at like three pages. I didn't even try to order anything. I was just clicking the next button to get to the games I wanted. It tells me to wait several minutes and try again. Seriously? WTF?!

Fine, so I wait until after 10:00 when the ticket sales actually started. Nope, still no go. Closed IE, tried again. Cleared my cache, tried again. This is BULLSHIT! So, now it's 10:26, I still can't get in to the site and obviously any chance I had for tickets is long gone.

I wonder how many people this happened to? Cuz Ticketmaster will certainly be getting a scathing email from me (not that it will do me any good, but I'll feel better!) once I can actually get access to the f'ing site again.

Faaaaaaaargh!


"We limit the rate of web page requests that can be made by individual users in any given time period. Your web page requests have exceeded these limits and your access has been temporarily disabled. We impose these limits to protect the web site from automated programs, as part of our efforts to promote fair access to tickets. Please allow several minutes and then try again."

Fair, my ass!

Another blog from little ol' me!

Today I decided to separate my health habits from my general ramblings.

Please check out my new blog! Add me to your daily readings and please, please, please help keep me on my path to a healthier me!

http://bi0nic-eating-habits.blogspot.com/

Stupid Big Brother

I HATE DICK!! I hate him, I hate him, I hate him. Ugh. Ya, one more... I hate him.

I can't believe that egotistical, annoying, angry, cheating, lying, douchebag (thanks for that word Duv) has made it to the final two. I said from day one that I hated that Tommy Lee wannabe, and I am just sooooooo annoyed that his shitass tactics got him through to the end.

I can handle Danielle because most of her success has been earned. She tied Janelle for POV wins, that's no small feat. She won SEVEN competitions. She deserves to be in the final two (even if she did ride her Dad's coat-tails a little bit, she still worked her ass off).

But not Dick. Evel idiot!! King asshole! He's only there because he's a big bully.

At least I can feel good knowing that the jury all hate him too and there's no way that they will award him the prize money. I just hope that Daniele doesn't share it with him. Ya right!

Bionic Woman - Kicking it old school!

I was just surfing around looking for shows in the new fall line up and remembered that I've been waiting all summer for the new Bionic Woman series. Weeeeeeeeeeeeeee!! It starts on Sept 26th.

As a contrast to the updated version, check out this old school intro to the original show. Nice!

Great Canadian Beer Festival 2007 - Saturday

For the first time in years, it didn't rain for Beerfest! It's like Summer finally decided to arrive for a little while around here. Nice to not have to cart a jacket around or start out wearing jeans only to have the weather get better and wind up cooking because I'm overdressed. :)

Another plus to being a volunteer is that I didn't have to wait in the gianormous line at the main gate. I got to trot on down to the volunteer entrance and walk right in. Score! I was also smart enough to buy my tokens on Friday night before I left so I didn't have to line up for those either (although the line was basically non-existant anyway).


Got there a bit earlier than my friends, but ran in to some others so carefully picked out my first few beers. I always do pretty good actually thinking about what I want to try for the first couple of hours, but then after that just go wherever. I started with the Wraspberry Ale from Wild Rose...nice light, fruity beer to start off the sunny day. I then went for another Great Pumpkin Ale since I had a bit of time to kill (it must have been a younger keg because it wasn't as good as Friday's at all).


Once the friends arrived we really went for it. Some of my favorites of the day were Cannery's Blackberry Porter, Crannog's Pooka Cherry Ale (and of course the perenial favorite Backhand of God Stout), Tree Brewing's Thirsty Beaver Amber Ale, and Wildwood's Hefeweizen. The big winner for me for the day was Pike Brewery's Kilt Lifter Scotch Ale...soooo yummy....which thrilled me because they had cool stickers and I only want stickers from breweries I actually like! I like Pike!! They also had a Triple Ale that was very tasty. Close second was Russell Brewing's Lemon Wheat Ale, which sold out before I could get another one. And I should give an honorable mention to Big Rock, who showed up with a yummy cider this year!


Near the day's end we decided to leave a bit early to avoid being crushed in the 4000 person mad dash for the gate. Probably the best idea we've ever had. LOL. We were able to take some time to get a bite to eat, unwind, drop stuff off at the car, and wander downtown. We got to the pub early enough to get a good table, but not so early that it was boring.


Eventually the rest of our group trickled in (and a couple got the boot out for already being too drunk). It was a fun night of drinks, nachos and dancing!! Too bad trying to get a cab afterwards almost sucked the joy out of the night! But waking up the next morning without a hangover made up for that. :) Thanks to pacing myself, eating lots, and that huge glass of water before bed!

Great Canadian Beer Festival 2007 - Friday

I'm pooped. What a weekend!

This year I decided to volunteer because Tiffany volunteers every year and highly recommended it. Since it was my first time out, I didn't want to be working in a vendor booth, so signed up for token sales. As a volunteer, you get a free ticket that gets you in for the whole weekend (well, for the part you aren't working at least!) plus they throw a wicked party at the end.

Originally the shifts were supposed to be about 4 hours, but because the festival is only open for 5 hours on the Friday our shifts were extended to 6 hours. No big deal. I arrived at 2:00, and was put to work by about 2:05. Nothing difficult though....just putting together pre-packaged bags of tokens to help speed up the sales process. Previous experience told the co-ordinators that most people buy in $20 or $40 increments so we wanted to be prepared.

By 3:00 they had us divided up into 8 teams of 2 and we were ready to roll. Previous years there has always been a giant gong show at the token booth, so this year they moved the booth a little further out and had 8 wickets running. It worked awesome!! No waits more than about 10 minutes this year!

I spent the first hour or so as the token bitch, then switched up partners and became the cash bitch. I like taking drunk people's money! :) Around 5:30 I got a break, so covered up my volunteer shirt and went in search of friends I had seen come through. I found neighbor Jen and she gave me a token so we could try out Steamworks "great pumpkin ale"...one of my faves which generally runs out by the time I get to it. Yum!!

Back to my shift at 6:00 where I got picked to help the coordinator with a couple of cash runs. All very covert, with two of my very own security escorts! I felt very important!!!

I got back and was asked if I wanted to do cash again so got myself another new partner and went back to it. Around 7:00 the crowd really petered out, but then we got the folks that just needed another $5 worth to get them through. This carried on non-stop until we sent security to put a stop to the line just after 7:30. We had so much fun even though we were working our asses of. Tipsy people are hilarious when trying to figure out how many more beers they can cram into 45 minutes. And it helps that a girl gave us a $10 tip! Wooooooo!

They gave us the last half hour to cover up and enjoy a tiny bit more of the festival. I found a couple of friends out in the crowd and just relaxed a bit. Then we did a mad dash to pick up all of the token buckets from the booths....and that was it!!

I totally had fun...even though I was really working the whole time. Sorta reminded me why I worked in customer service for so long...if I'm not totally exhausted I actually enjoy it. Too bad I always felt exhausted, overworked and underpaid.

Now YOUR dog owes me $25

...cuz, yes folks, he wolfed back another box of cereal (apparently he just couldn't leave that half box of Vanilla Almond Special K in there all alone) and some instant oatmeal. You see, he couldn't reach anymore cereal so he just went for whatever cardboard box he could get his paws on. I'm guessing he didn't love the instant oatmeal though because most of that is all over our living room floor. How I love vacuuming at 10pm on a Friday!

Yup. Time to get the K9 a bank account of his own. And time for him to start working off some of his friggin cereal debt.

(and yes I am obviously locking that cupboard now that he can't seem to leave it alone!)

He's only MY dog when he's CUTE

Today, he is definitely YOUR dog. Yup, yup! I am happy to admit that right now I am just a glorified dog sitter. He is not MY dog. Not today.

Remember the brand new box of Fruity Cheerios? Gone. I had two bowls before he decided to raid the cereal cupboard while I was out last night. He also managed to hoover down a half box of All Bran (and I hope that was punishment enough for him!!) and part of a box of Frosted Flakes (which I could care less about so he saved some screaming on that one).

Then when all was forgotten today....it was a new day...he let me sleep in. So he could be MY dog again cuz he was so cute....

Yup, that's right. He broke in to the cupboard again and ate an entire brand new box of Vanilla Almond Special K. Argh. The one I just bought because it was on uber-cheap at Zellers. He couldn't have gotten into the almost empty box....Noooooo....that would have been too easy.

Leave my cereal cupboard alone you little bugger. You will become an orphan before your father gets home. You are HIS dog today. And maybe tomorrow too. I'm holding a grudge about the Fruity Cheerios.....hmmmm, and the Special K!

Recipe - Cucumber Salad

And since I know some of you are going to ask..... here's the salad recipe I used for a light side dish with the turkey burgers....

Cucumber Salad

1 English cucumber (halved & sliced)
1/2 white onion (sliced very thin)
2 tbsp light Miracle Whip
2 tbsp light sour cream
fresh dill
salt & pepper

Mix the MW & sour cream together. Put all ingredients in bowl (except salt) and toss gently until cukes are evenly coated with dressing. Cover with plastic wrap and let stand in fridge for an hour (or until you need it). Remove from fridge, add salt to taste, stir and serve.


WW = approx 1 -2 points per serving (depending how much you slather on the dressing!)

East Sooke Park

I think I am finally recovered from my tiring (but fun!) holiday Monday.

Someone had mentioned maybe going for a hike or something, then the next thing I knew I had planned a group hike and BBQ at my place. :) I was stoked because it's usually pretty hard to convince people to come all the way out to the boonies for dinner or drinks or anything. Everyone thinks it's tooooooo far. Hmmm....I wonder if they notice that I go into town like a bazillion times a week to visit them? Mhmmmmm.

So the six of us met up at my place just after noon, and then set out for our walk (hike!) around 1:00. Neighbor Jen and I brought the dogs....and yes, my car really needs a good interior detail! All we had decided at this point was to head for East Sooke Park. Jen was the only one that had even been there in the last few years. I think I was the only other person that had EVER been there.

After a few minutes of looking over the posted trail map, Jen and Robi led us off on the loop trail to Beechy Head. The dogs (OK, mostly our dog) acted like a barky asshole for a while, but once we got to a good off-leash spot they were all happy and much better behaved. We arrived quickly at the white sand beach (dude, I didn't even know that existed here!) and it was a good place for the dogs to get some running in and start to tire out a tiny bit.

We took some pictures and carried on along the beach, then found a connector back to the main trail. The trail mostly sticks right along the bluffs overlooking the ocean. It's definitely more of a hike than a walk, with lots of rocks and hilly bits to climb over. We had all worked up a pretty decent sweat by the time we got near Beechy Head. There was a fairly steep rockface to climb up, so Mike and Charmaine chose to carry on to check out the monument, while the rest of us stopped for a little rest and a doggy water break.

Mojo was so well behaved on this walk. I couldn't have been prouder!! I am so used to him trying to pull my arm off and/or taking off through the neighbor's yards when we walk around home, but he was a fairly good listener and mostly stayed on the trail. Of course, it helps that there were six of us to call after him if he got too far away!

After the little break, it was just a short walk through the end of the loop back to the car. All in all, it took about 2 hours. I will definitely be going back there and checking out the other trails. I love that it's a dog-friendly park and Mojo can go off leash. I love that it's right on the water. I love that there are several trail options to check out, so I can go for any length of hike I like.

We then returned to my place where we had all contributed something for dinner. Robi and Charmaine brought pre-dinner snacks of meats, cheeses, hummus, pita, chips and salsa....plus I had a spinach dip. Apparently we were all hungry from the activity, because we plowed through this stuff like there was no tomorrow!

By the time dinner came, we were all pretty full, but funny enough we were able to "suffer" our way through the meal. :) I prepared my famous horseradish turkey burgers (OK, fine, they are Rachel Ray's burgers....but I'm making them famous around here!), plus a cucumber salad. Tiffaney brought yummy potato salad and fresh corn on the cob. Mikey made baked zucchini topped with garlic butter & parmesan. Jen put together her fantastic homemade caesar salad, complete with homemade croutons. Dude, that's a lot of food.

And then there was dessert. I made Mandy's Crustless Pumpkin Pie. Yum! But Mikey brought one of his Mom's Chocolate Zucchini Loaves too. One of my personal favorites. So good!

Needless to say, it was a good thing we went for that hike. We were all stuffed to the max. I hope everyone stayed awake on their drives home!! I know I fell on the couch shortly after they all left and had trouble dragging myself up. LOL.

Good friends, good food, good fun!

Putting the fun back in funeral!

Last night I started re-watching Six Feet Under again. It hasn't been all that long since DBF and I watched the entire series, but apparently I'd already forgotten a lot from the beginning.

Why did they get rid of those hilarious commercials for funeral parlor products?

I can't wait to get to the singing and dancing and all-round awesome ridiculousness of future episodes!

Morbid, disturbing, real, thought provoking AND funny. How can you not love it!!

Maritime Adventure - Part Sixteen - The End

My last day!!! Nooooooo!!!

Seriously. Eighteen days sounds like a lot, but then you take off a couple for travel time, and then DBF is in class for five of the days, then all of a sudden it's not really eighteen days anymore.

Poo.

So we slept in and enjoyed ourselves just relaxing. We missed our free food opportunities at the mess hall, and not even the Timmy's was open on the weekend, so we snacked on our leftover cheeses, crackers and an assortment of crap I got out of the vending machines. Nice!

We had planned our final uber-dinner to be pretty fantastic so both of us wanted to be hungry when we got there so weren't too concerned about eating all day.

Unfortunately the shite weather continued which was a little disappointing for our last date night. As if the humidity in Halifax hadn't been bad enough for my hair but the crazy rain was not going to help! And I had a new dress to wear. With open toed shoes dammit. Oh, and of course we didn't have an umbrella. LOL.

Turned out we got ourselves an awesome cabbie. After the couple million we'd had since I got there it was great to have one that had a personality and good music. And he got us right up to the door of the restaurant so I was extremely greatful. No big poofy rain hair!!!

Our restaurant of choice this time was Da Maurizio (again, also owned by the same chef as Bish and Il Mercato). It had been recommended to us and we had researched online and were excited about the menu. How can we not go to a place that offers lobster risotto?!!

DBF picked out a Chateau Neuf Du Pap as our first bottle of wine. We have both always wanted to try one but usually restaurants only carry the over the top expensive ones, but at $88 this one was reasonable enough for us to try out. I don't remember the vinyard though. I quite enjoyed it...light enough for the season, but with the variety of grapes to give it lots of flavour, and a very smooth finish. More my taste than DBF's but we were both happy with the choice.

The restaurant offered five or six courses, so we decided to go with four (including dessert). I had a smoked salmon appy with yummy herbed marscapone cheese & crostini. DBF had seared sea scallops (of course!) with a port reduction. Both excellent!! We shared the lobster risotto for our second course.

For our second bottle of wine (yes, another one...I said uber-date!!) we asked for the sommolier's help. Generally we enjoy a nice rich Australian red so she recommended one for us, and it was one of the best recommendations we've ever had for wine. 2004 Sandalford - Cab Sav. For DBF it was perfect....for me it was excellent but maybe a bit too dark for the season...but because I had beef for dinner it paired very well. Definitely not complaining!!

As a main I had trouble deciding, but ordered veal scaloppini with fresh lobster in a cream sauce. So amazing! Creamy, rich, tender, yum! DBF almost ordered the lobster tail dinner, but had trouble passing up the steak...so we asked the server if they could do a surf and turf so he got the best of both worlds. He was able to complete his culinary adventure with one last lobster tail!

We of course finished dinner with a Tiramisu to share. It was yummy, but honestly not the best Tiramisu I've ever had...which was a little odd considering how AMAZING everything else was. But I enjoyed my cappucino w/ Amaretto with it...and DBF had a tasty little port.

I won't tell you the total of our bill because I wouldn't want you to fall off your chairs and hurt yourselves but I will tell you that it was the most expensive dinner we've ever had....and we have had a few whoppers. Prior to this, our first uber-date at Sooke Harbour House at $340 was the highest. But honestly, if you don't indulge like this once in a while, where's the fun?!!

After dinner, the rain had subsided so we decided to walk a few blocks and get a nightcap. I'll let you guess where we went. Yup, that's right....Shoe Shop. I was wrong about Friday night being that last time. :) We were hoping for a last little bit of "cougar row" entertainment....but alas we were mildly disappointed. Instead I enjoyed another overpriced Cosmopolitan and DBF enjoyed his White Russian and then we made our way back to the room.

Sadly this was my last night, and the next morning I left for home.....

(see here for details of my adventure to get home)

Maritime Adventure - Part Fifteen

I awoke at 3:45am to crazy-ass thunder and lightening. The rain was pounding down in sheets and the lightning was lighting up the room through the curtains. One crack of thunder sounded enough like a bomb that even DBF woke up....for about 12 seconds. Apparently being from the praries he is used to it, but I hadn't heard thunder like that since I was a little kid living in northern BC.

Needless to say that kept me awake for a while. It's sorta cool to watch!! But it made it rather difficult to drag myself outta bed come morning....so I didn't. :) I enjoyed a great sleep in and lounged around the room waiting for DBF to get home from class. We had plans to go out for the night so I wasn't overly concerned with going out during the day....especially since the rain never really let up.

Being my last big chance for a night out, we invited DBF's classmates out for some fun. But first, we met up with Marky and his wife and daughter for dinner. They suggested OPA! for some yummy Greek eats. We got a little burned on the wait time though...it was Friday, we didn't make a reservation, and half the city was out eating dinner because Cirque du Soleil was in town. Oooops.

Aside from the wait time...first for our table, then for our food...it was pretty good. Unfortunately DBF's dinner was a waste because he ordered a stuffed chicken breast...but when it came it had the leg attached and the skin on (DBF don't do meat on the bone...at all). It sucks when the menu doesn't mention the extra stuff....and he forgot to double check when he ordered. Doh. I explained it to the waitress, and although she was apologetic they still charged us for it...which is a bit unfair since they didn't describe the dish on the menu very well. Ah well, such is life! My souvlaki was absolutely fab though so I left pretty happy!

After dinner we met up with the rest of the gang at the Shoe Shop one last time. Marky's wife and daughter went home, but DBF was happy to keep Marky out to party. A few drinks later we were pretty crowded at our table so decided to head out. We made a stop for one drink at The Bitter End (so positive that we got $5 martinis there the first time, but somehow they were like $11 this time!!!)....then off to a place Colleen suggested...The Pogue Fado.

Reminded me somewhat of Darcy's Pub at home so I was pretty happy. DBF doesn't love the place, but he was happy to have everyone out so he made due. White Russian after White Russian makes us all pretty happy anyway. It was really all about hanging out with friends and having a good time so it didn't matter too much where we were.

After a while a couple of us girl's decided to check out the bar downstairs. Turns out they operate a completely separate bar with a separate musician and everything down there. Keith Andrews - one dude, with a guitar and a microphone....he was excellent! But it was stupid crowded (I'm thinking mostly Navy dudes since the bar was old school Navy themed and called The Frigate) so I went back upstairs to be with DBF.

When I got up there, a couple more of DBF's buddies had arrived. Including the dude that was supposed to be on Cape Breton when we went!! So I was able to give him a piece of my mind. Sort of. LOL.

At the end of the night some of the group tried to get us to go the Liquor Dome, but we opted to skip that again. Something about that place just doesn't call out to me. Pretty sure I didn't miss anything there. So off we went back to the hotel for our last proper night's sleep.

Maritime Adventure - Part Fourteen

Hold on folks...we're nearing the end of the journey...you can make it!!

It's Thursday now, and I had hoped to either go swimming (if the weather stayed good) or go shopping (somewhere other than downtown)...but unfortunately that didn't pan out. A friend I made while there, Colleen, had hoped to take me out but her poor kitty got sick and she didn't feel right leaving the little guy alone all day. Being a kitty lover myself I couldn't say I blamed her.

So left on my own with no wheels I decided that I would just walk downtown instead. I had taken a cab down there enough times to know that it wouldn't be too bad to walk. DBF had warned me to avoid the main street, Gottingen, leading to the base (it's likely safe during the day, but it's rather scary at night!)....but I opted to take the alternate route so all was good.

It was a hot day and I was pretty thirsty by the end, so I did get some water but I also went straight for a yummy coffee at Starbucks. I just can't help myself, I swear! I didn't really have a destination in mind, so mostly just wandered the boardwalk again and watched a few more of the buskers trying to make a few bucks. I needed to get some souvenir gifts and my obligatory vacation fridge magnet so was on the lookout for the cheesy tourist shops and such. After about four stores I finally found the cute stuffed lobsters I had been looking for and also settled on a Nova Scotia lobster fridge magnet.

After this I realized I hadn't eaten, and although the BeaverTails were calling my name I opted to stick with fish & chips and enjoyed them in the sun. Note: the seagulls in Halifax are HUGE compared to the ones here on the island...who knew!

Having tapped out about everything I could do on the waterfront I started heading up the hill and ended up turning a shortcut into a longcut. LOL. However, I did end up inside some sort of odd mall which turned out to be awesome. I finally found a cute little cap (army green....DBF referred to as my Cuban dictator hat) and there was a Radio Shack where I picked up some DVD-Rs so I could burn some of my photos since I had filled up my camera's memory card.

I picked up yet another coffee...this time an Iced Cap from Timmy's....then set out for the walk back to the hotel. Leaving the mall there was no easy way to get back to the way I had come downtown so I ended up heading towards Gottingen. I figured it wouldn't be so bad in the middle of the afternoon. Instead I wound up a couple of blocks off but heading in the right direction. Lovely street with some marked heritage homes and a beautiful park with a huge basketball court with tons of local teenagers. Only about a block of the street was scary...and not really scary....I just felt like the locals knew I was out of place. No worries. Home safe in one piece.

With really stinky feet.

We ended up grabbing dinner with some folks from DBF's class. We had wanted to try out Il Mercato (same chef owner as Bish) so thought this would be a good chance. Super yummy restaurant...casual, family style Italian with lots of yummy pasta, pizza, desserts and stuff. I had a fantastic wild mushroom soup....and a creamy mushroom ravioli. So good I don't remember what DBF had!!

After dinner one of DBF's bestest friends and his wife came and picked us up. They had asked us if it we would mind checking out their buddy's band and we thought it would be fun. Turns out it's a country band. In a country bar. On the Darmouth side. In an industrial park. Yeeehaw!

The band was awful and the bar wasn't busy....but the company was excellent and we laughed our asses off. DBF bought Marky a cowboy hat so he would fit in....too funny.

Once that novelty wore off we decided to head back to the Halifax side and go downtown. For ease of decision we went to the Shoe Shop for some nachos and a few more drinks. Another late night for us....but apparently we are professionals at that by now!