2006 December « Americanuck

Morning has broken

December 21, 2006

The sun is almost shining, I just got out of bed and I’m mere seconds away from a half pot of Tim Horton’s coffee as I hear the pot a’gurglin as we speak. Can we say bliss? I’m officially at the halfway point of my vacation time, but still far enough away from work to still feel somewhat Zen-like. Ahhhhh..

A few minutes later………………

So, I go to get my coffee and decided to use that new ‘raise money for breast cancer’ cute pink enamel travel mug, forgetting that the lid on it is dodgy at best with just water inside of it. I go to take a sip and…

Freaking hell!!! Hot hot hot!!

Cursing I go back into the kitchen looking for my stainless travel mug. RIGHT! It’s in the dishwasher. I open it, reach in to grab the mug and recall that the lid is in the cutlery trap to keep it from bouncing around inside the dishwasher.

I pull up the trap door a few inches to grab the lid and failed to notice the small serrated knife sitting along side it..

P.S. yeah I know, my cuticles are dry and there is no manicure in sight. Deal with it. I’m not girlie in THAT way. I’ve never given two shits about my nails and I’ve been surrounded all my life by friends that get regular manicures, go figure. I’ve dealt with the nail shame. Move on.

That slice is small but it HURT!

So much for Zen.

3 Comments | Accident prone | Permalink
Posted by americanuck

Southpark Christmas, starring Us

December 19, 2006

Southpark Christmas, starring Us

Originally uploaded by Americanuck.
Found a website where you can create Southpark-like characters. I put together one for each of us and I had a RIOT doing it.

I fashioned it to mimic this year’s Xmas photo below

Here is the LINK to the site. Have fun!

No Comments » | Famdamily, Humour, Picture posts, The Interweb is a magical place, fun in photoshop | Permalink
Posted by americanuck

Weekend wrap up

December 17, 2006

Chris with his new car. No, the paint isn’t damaged, it’s covered in frost (I took it in the evening). The car is over at his Father’s place until he gets his full license. He’s on ‘L’ plates for now but it’s a step in the right direction. Weird to think he has a car now! I didn’t have my own car until I was 23.

Speaking of cars, or at least driving… I got my notice to renew my driver’s license as it’s expiring in 2007. I’ve been living with one of the worst pictures in the history of mankind for the last five years and I was looking forward to it as a chance for a ‘do-over’. Plans didn’t quite fall into place to get my hair cut so expectations aren’t exactly high. Oh well, what’s another five years?

I had a nice weekend. Tom and I went out for dinner on Friday followed up by a couch-fest watching ‘Sleepless in Seattle’ accompanied by Crantini’s and bourbon respectively.

Popsicle stains

Tom and his jazz hands during the song “With a Wink and a smile” during the movie

Saturday I got to spend the afternoon/evening downtown with a dear friend I don’t get to see that often. After dinner we walked up to Tom’s station and he gave her the two cent tour.

Today I finished up my shopping and spend the rest of the day being totally LAZY.

Good times!

No Comments » | Famdamily, Home, time to get drunk | Permalink
Posted by americanuck

Stick me with a fork, I’m done

December 17, 2006

Yes. I can finally unequivocally say I am FINISHED my Christmas shopping. Now I can’t wait for everyone to see what I got them. I love to watch their faces when they open their gifts (though usually through a camera viewfinder/LCD screen). That’s my favourite part. I’m torn though, because I’m on vacation this coming week I don’t want to week to fly by too quickly!

Someone said to me the other day that they can’t stand how commercial Christmas has become. How people sit with their hands out expecting to be bought the latest and greatest thing. How people go into stress mode over the money they spend and lordy, not wanting to be seen as not “keeping up with the Jones’”. They said to me that Christmas should be about family.

I was a single mom for a number of years and sure I sacrificed a lot of stuff to make things like Christmas special for the boys, I saved for it and I went all out, as much as my budget would allow anyway. They didn’t grow up spoiled and they want to make Christmas special for their own Kids some day.

My opinion? Every day should be about family. Christmas is about family AND shiny things. Yes, I buy a lot. Yes I spoil people and YES I VERY MUCH enjoy doing that. I don’t care if Christmas is ‘commercialized’ that’s one of the things I like about it. I LIKE giving gifts, so sue me. I also don’t believe they have to be all that expensive though I’m not against that ;) I just think you need to really know the person you’re buying for and the perfect things will all but jump in your hands. If you can afford it, great, spend away. If not, choose wisely and you’ll do just fine.

As a kid Christmas was my parents fighting over money. I hated money and I hated Christmas. Having kids made it fun again, meeting Tom (the Christmas Elf) made it even more wonderful.

No Comments » | Famdamily, Growing Up | Permalink
Posted by americanuck

Crikey!

December 15, 2006

The weather the Greater Vancouver area has seen this fall has spanned the range from mild and warm to piles of snow. Today, Mother Nature decided she had a case of the ‘winds’.

Complete and total chaos on the streets; tree down on streets, houses and power-lines, skytrain not operating to my neck of the woods. Hours worth of commute time, lashing rain, snow and hail! Oh my!

Me on the other hand, I used my noggin and stayed home to work, of course, I started at 5:30 am. I mean hey, I was up already as I was about to get ready to go to work, so why not?

The news is saying there is over a quarter of a million people without power. Seattle got walloped too, they have over a million without power and a few people died in the tree through house scenario. From what I’ve heard a bunch of people heard the trees up here and skedaddled out of their beds with some kind of intuition and moments later crash, incoming tree.

With one lady the tree branch looked like a sword piercing her ceiling and stabbing into her bed. Crazy! Makes me glad there are no huge trees around us here, not like my own backyard growing up. We had some seriously big old evergreens in our back yard, one mere feet from my bedroom. I used to give it the hairy eyeball anytime we had a windy night.

I am now officially off call and on vacation. My cohort at the office just came back from her vacation and took her on call duties back and I passed the baton on a few items that need looking after. I’ve promised myself no surreptitious work email reading this time. I’m going to take an actual vacation. No peeking. No Belinda! Step away from the computer! Bad Belinda!

I’m also happy to report that we’ve pretty much got all our Christmas shopping done (apart from Chris who seems to have inherited the ‘Leave to the last minute gene’ from one who shall remain nameless). And most are even wrapped and under the tree, except the ones for my Mom and Chris’ to us (see above reason) I’ve been trying to resist the peek at the packages (wrapped of course!) and shake compulsion and so far have been able to resist. It’s going to be a long week + though so no guarantees.

It’s date night for Tom and I. We are going to head over to the nearby restaurant (within staggering distance) for dinners and a drink to toast all our good work. I’m hoping they will have that mmmm gingerbread cake they had last year around this time for a take home dessert but you never know.

Time enough to get on my diet!

I close with a picture of Tom and his ‘daughter’ from last night. The gal that has him wrapped around her little brown paws..