It's not like I don't love you but you wear your braids...

This was tonight:

(Okay the picture is a bit crappy... I would have zoomed out, but there were these people making out on the street behind the sign, and I didn't need a picture of that to commemorate my evening.)

I had a super fun time. First of all, I feel a certain giddiness when I'm out on a school night. Especially when I have a drink or two (I had a couple beers at the show - beer, even in small quantities, hits me hard). I remember having a similar feeling sneaking out as a teenager and "fooling" the adults. Now I have a similar feeling as an adult from sort of shirking my responsibilities and having fun.

Secondly, It was sooooooooooo fun being at a small concert! Espeically since there was no cover... My 2006 concert going has been very disappointing. I need to improve in 2007. New year's resolution made already, I tell you.

The first band who played was called Howl and apparently it was their first show ever. They were fairly enjoyable. As I said to Becca T, I've seen a lot of worse bands in my day.

Colin Munroe (check out his myspace to listen to some songs), aka Becca T's musician friend, was quite good. His songs are really catchy. I'm looking forward to his CD coming out (apparently spring 2007).

Also, check out my friend Becksley's post from today. She's having a Christmas charity/scam dilemma. Feel free to advise her, oh you wise readers of my blog. ;)

We can wish on the pop of a light bulb or those photos lying yellow and curled.

Today's picture: the long line of newspaper boxes at a sample Toronto intersection.

Today was pretty good. I think I left my brand new lunch bag (that I got free with something else) on the subway. Oh well, easy come, easy go. Hopefully a hungry person finds it, since there were a couple of clementines and a banana in it. Unfortunately, so was my pretty and new-ish umbrella, so it's back to the old red one that I have that won't break or get lost for love nor money. A coworker of mine used to marvel about how I'd had the same umbrella for a really long time...

It looks like tomorrow night, Becca T and I will be seeing her friend Colin Munroe at the Rivoli. Yay! A concert! He's opening for someone or other, and since we're old and need to get to sleep at a decent time on a worknight, we'll leave after him. I mentioned his song "Your Braids" a couple of weeks ago. That song has actually sneaked up to become my most-listened-to song on my iPod.

So..... hopefully tomorrow's pic (which may be posted late) will be concert related. Woo!

Even though she is clear and true, she's very talented too, she isn't wearing the right boots.

The shoes on the right are my copper coloured, shiny Mary Jane Skechers that won't quite frankly cut it once the weather worsens.

The shoes on the left are the new shoes I bought today to wean myself off my Skechers. A couple staff members at work have similar ones, and I really like chunky shoes, and it's hard to find a good pair of them now days. They were kind of pricy, but my mom talked me into buying them with a "why do you have a job if you don't splurge once in awhile?" speech.

Pretty ones are hanging on the wings...

These weekends go too fast I tell you.

Friday - PD (professional development for AliMalie... this means there are no kids for a day) day was relaxing.

Caught train home from Union Station. Here's a picture of the busyness of Union Station for you:


Arrived in Ratford in good time. Met up with some friends. Attempted to go out for coffee. Turns out, all decent coffee places in Ratford close at 8 pm. Ended up wandering into a higher end bar for drinks. We ended up feeling a bit underdressed. Also, I accidentally ordered a $9 Irish coffee. Moral of story - never order something that isn't on the menu where you can safely see the price.

Saturday - Visited my mom in the hospital. Here is a picture of where I park. I use the lot near a nature area that we used to call the Old Grave. It has a different name now.

I used to ride my bike here as a kid with friends, and we'd plan tree forts and play in the river and the like. Anyhow, I always think I should go for a walk around the place since I'm always using its parking lot, but I'm always wearing the wrong shoes (Mary Jane Skechers that would result in me having muddy feet.)

I then drove to Waterloo to visit my friend Jo and have dinner. Good times.

Sunday - Ran errands, spent time with my dad. Took picture of train tracks at the end of the day so that I could continue my blog project. I figured that train tracks are quite representative of my life these past few months because I've spent a lot of time on trains.


Thankfully, the train was only 10 minutes late and I'm home safe and sound relatively on time.

ps My dear friend Becksley has started a blog. She is my friend from high school who got me into Hawksley Workman. Bless her soul and read her blog!

I don't know what it is that makes me feel alive.

Today's picture displays how I'm indulging after tonight's round of parent-teacher intereviews.

Yes, I am aware that I'm eating cheap ice cream. I don't believe in paying $7 for ice cream. Anyhow, this stuff is left over from something or other, so I figure eating some of it will help empty out the freezer.

Bonus fun game = my penguin ice cream scoop needs a name. Any suggestions?

Interviews went well tonight. I'm lucky, because the 'rents at my school tend to be supportive so I don't have any horror stories. I tend to more or less enjoy inteviews, even though it makes for a long night. I wasn't overly busy this year; I have two senior classes and only a small class of grade 9s. I spent a lot of time chatting with other un-busy teachers who were wandering around, and various students who were around. I won comment of the evening award when I interrupted someone to say "The big coffee I had just wore off." (Maybe we were over-tired and worn out from a long day, but it killed the people who I said it to.)

Tomorrow is a PD day. Can you all cross your fingers for me that it isn't overly boring?

Then I'm off on the train for another weekend in Ratford. Check ya tomorrow with another picture.

Takin' the long way around

I enjoyed "Shut Up and Sing" and of course went out and bought the Dixie Chicks' new CD today. Oh gosh. My first country CD. My friends from Ratford are going to be shocked. I hated country music with a passion back in high school. I have to admit, living in the city has made me a bit more "countrified" in my muscial tastes. I'm not a fan of anything that's new country, of course, but I'm totally into so-called alt country. A lot of my fave artists like Neko Case, Kathleen Edwards, and yes, even the Weakerthans have a bit of a country feel to their music. It was a matter of time before I got into something like the Dixie Chicks. Of course, the fact that they are ashamed of George Bush and their new song stuff is a bit more rock-ish and political would be the final hook for me.

Anyhow, since I was busy seeing movies and stuff last night, I didn't start my picture-a-day-for-a-week blog project. But I've started today. The picture below is the view of an intersection that I cross daily. I like being able to seeing the CN Tower in between other buildings.


After taking this picture, I thought about how living in Toronto was a dream of mine when I was a kid, but I never really acknowledged it. However, whenever I thought about what and who I wanted to be when I grew up, I always pictured myself in a city, usually that city would be Toronto.

Whenever I visited Toronto, I would be extremely excited, especially at the point where you are nearing the city and you can see the skyline in the far distance. I think that deep down excitement remains with me when I look down Yonge St. and see the CN Tower. It's pretty exciting to think that I'm living where I dreamed to live when I was younger.

And that's why I think I instinctively like my daily view of the CN Tower down Yonge St. as I come home from work.

Time is contagious, and everybody's getting old.

I am a girl who is surviving on three hours' sleep last night plus an after-work nap.

Why only two hours of sleep? Well, my Ratford to Toronto train was over 2 hours last night, getting me home at 1:45 am. And, of course the agitation of sittting around the Ratford train station, on very very uncomfy benches, for two hours made sleep evade me until about 3:45. Yuck.

Surprisingly, I was somehow less tired today than I am on a typical Monday. Go figure.

Here are all of the relevant updates after a 3 day break from blogging.

1) My roommate loved the Office themed gift. Mission accomplished.

2) Weekend was okay. Went home to visit the 'rents. Mom's still in the hospital getting lots of physiotherapy and Dad's back home sleeping a lot and hopefully slowly regaining his strength.

3) My iPod now is playing a mix Damien Rice and Sloan peppered with a healthy mix of Christmas music and other enjoyabilities.

4) New blog project = I want to go a week where I take a picture everyday and post it here. I am so going to start tomorrow.

5) Going to see the Dixie Chicks movie tomorrow night with the student teacher I ended up kind of adopting this past month. Should be fun.

6) Today I received a bottle of wine and some chocolates from various co-workers as a thank-you for my overall fabulousity.

Hmmm, is that the sound of lab reports I hear asking to be marked?

And it leans on me like a rootless tree..

Today's topics of discussion are:

1) Damien Rice's new CD: "9"

LOVE IT. Get it now. It's soooooooooo good.

Only one problem: my favourite song on the CD, Rootless Trees, has a chorus that starts off with a bit of swearing. The problem with this is that I'm constantly singing it and I'm terrified that I will absent-mindedly start singing it in class. Oops. So much for being a role-model.

2) Present for Roommate

...is finishsed. Thank you all for your fabulous ideas for a Michael gift, however I didn't have time to obtain a Chili's gift certificate, nor enough money to buy a Forman grill as a joke, nor the time/inclination/stomach to go to Hooter's. Soooo... I did my best and got her an Office Voodoo Kit that I came across at Indigo. Seemed like the type of thing Michael would give. On the tag, I wrote "Since you don't have an awesome boss like me, this will be useful. I have one myself. I use it on Toby. It doesn't seem to be very effective because he's still coming to work."

I managed to obtain all of the other gifts. I also made a "Schrute Farms: Scranton's best beets" label for the jar of beets. I was laughing maniacally while I was making it. It's too funny. I put a picture of Dwight on it.

3) Mission in the Rain

I ordered Becca T's Christmas present online. It arrived very quickly because it was Fed-Exed. Problem was this is that of course I'm not home when they come around so I have to make other arrangements to pick it up. Now, you think that Fed Ex would have a depot close to central Toronto to pick up packages. Nope. I had to take the subway north and then a freaking bus to pick up the package. I'm so not impressed. I've had things sent to me via Purolator, and I just have to walk a block up the street to pick it up. Anyhow, it took me over an hour to go pick it up.

However, it was totally worth it because it is an awesome gift. I'd tell you all what it is, but I suspect the girl reads my blog from time to time, unlike my roommate (so I hope), so I can't say what it is, nor give any hints.

4) My dislike of Suburbia

My mission in the rain took me into the north part of the city which is so suburban and blah. As I was walking, I realized that where I was looked like pretty much ANYWHERE and had no personality and was just extremely blah. I will never move away from the downtown/midtown areas of the city if I can help it. I cannot take suburban blahness.

That's it for today. Must go to bed. But seriously go buy Damien Rice's new CD. And buy his old one, "O", if you don't have it.

How'd it get this late so early?

I tried to post today. First blogger was out and then my internet went wonky. Gah.

Anyhow, the weekend was good. I enjoyed not having to catch a train, hanging with friends, seeing Becca T speak, being in the city, procrastinating and seeing the Nightmare Before Christmas in 3D. Good times.

Today was a relatively painless Monday. I think the kids got out their bad behavoiur last Monday. I really hope that's it for the semester.

I voted today in the municipal election. The polling station was in the lobby of my building. Talk about convienience. Everyone I voted for won. Wish that always happened (cough cough federal election).

Tomorrow I have to finish assembling my roommie's Office themed birthday gift. If I have time, I'm going to make a "Happy Birdday" card and sign it from "your Thursday night pals". I am going to label each gift from a character. Here's what I am going to get:
a) jello from Jim
b) jelly beans from Pam
c) M&Ms from Kevin
d) a tacky cat thing from the dollar store from Angela
e) a bottle of alcohol from Meredith
f) a crossword puzzle book from Stanley
g) a jar of beets from Dwight
h) the fabulous Office calendar from me

Okay, one thing: I want to give something from Michael. But what? I wish I lived in the States and could get a Chili's gift certificate. Yeesh. Huh. Any ideas?? I did see a voodoo kit for Offices... I could see Michael buying that for someone, but I want something from the show. (Oh, I could get her an iPod... but... she has one already and I haven't won the lottery yet.)

Anyhow, as you can tell, I do like to put effort into gifts. Nothing makes me happier than giving a good theme gift.

Right now I'm listening to a song I really like called "Your Braids" by Colin Munroe. It's available on iTunes. Anyway, he's a friend of Becca T's (I think they went to camp or something) and he's releasing a CD in the spring. This song will be the single and was apparently mixed by someone who worked with the Killers. It is a good song, hence I supported the cause by buying it from iTunes. I recommend it, if you're into happy indie pop.

Tomorrow night = Borat. Hmmmm, could I count it as professional development do you think? Perhaps seeing it will help my classroom management because I will be able to recognize off-task-Borat-related conversations much faster.

I think I will find some wood and build a house or maybe a boat, I don't know.

What a busy busy week. My lack of blog postage this week reflects said business. I had plenty of inspiration, just no time to write it all down. So here are some of my feeble recollections of this week:

a) I gasped in happiness when I found that the Hasty Market by my place had some Schwepps Raspberry Gingerale. That was my fave drink when I was perhaps 12. Yum. I'm drinking some right now.
(By the way, the Hasty Market is appropriately named. The prices there are quite inflated, so you'd only shop there when you're feeling hasty.)

b) Monday was a rough day at school but the rest of the days have been great. Last night, I stayed at school very late helping with the school open house and it was very successful and made me quite proud of some of my students. Oh, plus said students made me laugh a tonne of times with comments like "Miss, you have an iPod? I thought all teachers were against iPods!" Of course, I explained that I was anti-iPod in the classroom because I was not allowed to have mine with me, hence they were not allowed to have theirs.

c) The Democrats took the House and the Senate. Woot. Last night's Colbert Report made me cry with laughter at his reaction to the whole thing. And, in other earth-shattering news, Britney left K-Fed.

d) The Office was kickass yet again. And... Oh. My. God. Next week there will be a Jim and Pam reunion.

e) Don't you love how when you are exhausted from work, and you need to get home so you can make some chocolate macaroons for the staff potluck the following day, there are problems with the subway and you end up walking half the way home? I know I do.

f) May the pimping out of places for Christmas begin. It seems like today is the official start for a bajillion Christmas commercials on TV (admittedly, I haven't really watched TV in a week, so they could have been on early). Plus when I walked into Starbucks today, their menu was all holiday-ized.

Now.... one could be cynical and grumpy about the commercialization of Christmas and how it starts faaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrr too early. But... This means I can start listening to my favourite Christmas music!!! I love my Christmas music. My favourites albums/songs are:
1) Almost a Full Moon by Hawksley Workman - I cheat and listen to a lot of the song all year long. This is such an awesome original Christmas album.
2) Maybe This Christmas Tree - An amazing compiliation with Death Cab for Cutie, The Raveonettes, The Polyphonic Spree, Pilate and lots of other cool stuff. Get this. Seriously.
3) Lonely Christmas Eve - Ben Folds - This song is from the Jim Carrey Grinch soundtrack, but it's essentially the Grinch's speech about how he hates the whos summed up in a Ben Folds song.

I usually try to get one new Christmas CD each year. So far I'm tempted by the Sarah McLachlan one, but we'll see what else there is out there before I make my purchase.

g) I am staying in Toronto this weekend. I'm so enjoying the fact I will not be rushing to catch a 5:40 train tomorrow night. So far my plans for the weekend are to go to an event at which my pal Becca T is speaking, go see The Nightmare Before Christmas in 3D, catch up on cleaning and laundry, and get report card done. Apparently I'm quite wicked, becasue I get no rest.

h) There are a tonne of movies that I want to go see. Of course, I'm prioritizing and seeing the special 3D version of Nightmare, but I also want to see Borat, The Dixie Chicks movie and Stranger than Fiction. Hmmm... I'm going to do my best to see all of them.

Anyhow, hope you all have great weekends.

I open my mouth and I scream.

Oh gosh. Monday + full moon + kids spending the entire weekend eating Halloween candy (or such is my hypothesis) = frustrating day at work. Gah besmirch. It really sucks having a frustrating day at work, and then getting home only with the distasteful fact that I have a pile of work to get done. I'd much rather crawl into bed and go to sleep.

I really could rant on and on about my crappy day but I won't. I just hope my theory that bad days are usually followed by good ones (at least it seems to be the case in my profession) holds true.

At least Monday is over. I don't like Mondays.

The weekend was okay. I made another trip home, and hung out with my grumpy father. His grumpiness is a sign he's getting better. When he was sick, he was rather mild-tempered and wanted company. Very unlike himself.

I also did a bit of socializing on Saturday night. I feel like I have not been socializing enough in the past five weeks.

Incredibly, I went the WHOLE weekend without taking out my computer once. It sat in my bag the whole time I was home. The nice thing about neglecting the internet world for awhile, is that when you get back, you have a tonne of emails and feel quite popular.

All right, I think I'm gonna have a mini-nap and then attack my pile of work.

How great I am. Gotta tell myself, yeah, I'm the man.

Yay for the Office yet again! Oh, did I laugh. Oh, did Becca T, my roommie and I cry "Jim check your phone!!" I cannot wait 'til next week... He'll have to have seen the text message then, right?

Awhile ago, I was hanging out with my friend Sandee and I told her a story to which she replied "I can't believe you didn't put that on your blog!" So I will put it on my blog.

I was in the big Winners on Bay/Bloor street with my book club pals. (We took a break from discussing literature for a movie/shopping girls day.) Anyhow, we're in the shoe section and on the floor I see the shoes that I've been coveting on the floor and I say "Ohmigosh! They have the shoes I want here!" I go to pick one up to see the price and a lady is like "Oh, um those are my shoes."

I was sooooooooo embarassed. What kind of moron picks up another person's shoe when they're trying on other shoes?? I'm too cool.

Anyhow, that's my embarrassing story.

So the song line in today's title comes from Ben Folds' song Family of Me from the Over the Hedge soundtrack. I'm in love with his songs from that soundtrack.

Well, I'm going to off to the 'rents place again this weekend. Hope your weekends are super fun.

Let's waste time chasing cars around our heads.

Good news! My dad was released from the hospital today!

Now, just my mom has to get better. She admitted herself to the hospital last week because she's been having complications due to her MS. I didn't write about it because I was just tired of thinking and talking and writing about sickness related issues. It's actually good that she's there and getting care. Hopefully she will be home soon.

Halloween was non-eventful. Becca T came over and we watched a movie (Friends with Money - both of us enjoyed it) and had some beverages of the alcoholic type and some candy and popcorn.

Today I did what any good North American robot consumer would do the day after Halloween: I started my Christmas shopping.

In my defense, it was because I saw the perfect gift for the hardest person on my list. What a relief to not have that to worry about.

Okay, here's a call for help from all of you fellow Office fans out there. My roommate, who I am 99% sure does not read my blog, is having a birthday on November 18th and I'm getting her an Office-themed bday gift. It started with a kickass Office 2007 calendar that I found in Zellers in Stratford. Here are the other things I'm thinking of throwing in:
- jello
- M & Ms (Kevin's favourite candy)
- Cups of Noodles (Kevin's favourite lunch)
- a green teapot (if I can find it)
- a jar of beets?
So.... any other suggestions of Office related stuff that I can throw in??