Saturday was Coral & Darcy's wine & cheese birthday celebration extravaganza! It was SUCH a ladies night (poor Nigel), Cheena stopped by my place fairly early for hangouts, then Amanda & Keri came over to get dressed, then Bri - then we piled into Nigel's car and headed for the west end...



( twenty somethings.. mostly. )

Good Morning!

Today was the first day this fall that I've had to wake up in the dark for work. It was very.. confusing. You know that feeling where you're not sure if you woke up on your own and it's actually 3:00am and the whole shutting off the alarm thing was just a dream? That's totally what this morning was like. Hello fall '08.

This past weekend felt like summer all over again, all rolled into two days. I went to dinner with Dustin, a comedy show, Library Square for 90's night, I rode my bike all over the city, spent a morning photoshopping, an afternoon in the park drinking Strong Bow with Garret, Dustin, Jordan, Jake & Co., Coral & Darcy's wine & cheese birthday celebrations with EVERYONE (epic car rides there & back), breakfast with Nigel, Jordan & Darcy, then four square in McLean park for the rest of Sunday until haircut time with Tanis and a nice dinner at home with Nigel. Gossip Girl was on and I literally passed out from happy exhaustion around ten last night. Every weekend should be like this weekend.



( photos from the last few weeks... )

There are so many good things coming up this week too - Cherry & Matt hangouts today, lunch with Sacha tomorrow afternoon, L.A. on Wednesday! (art show Thursday, dancing Friday! etc. etc.) Ginks & Bella get shaved Saturday morning and I'll be home Sunday night with more pictures and hopefully a good story or two. ♥ ♥ ♥

I took last Friday off work to go camping with: smokes_outside, darcymercer, rowdyllama, coralcoralcoral, fakesharkstore, codycallon, mikesleckyesq, KC!, Joe & Marina!

The whole trip could probably be summed up with the words: FOUR SQUARE!, A WHOLE LOT OF FOOD!, SCOOBY SNACKS!, PHOSPHORESCENCE! and CAMPFIRES!


( click here to see a bunch of pictures of us just sitting around )

I've had a really, really nice few days.

Last Tuesday Amanda came by for one final afternoon on the fire escape before I move and she headed off on her week long vacation in Portland. I bought a bottle of white and we grabbed the camera and computer and sat outside in the sun the last few hours of the evening.. it was lovely ♥.


( girl talk.. )


Wednesday was the first night of the fireworks and coincidentally it was also poker night at Darcy & Jordans.. who happen to have a really sweet deck with a pretty sweet view of the whole thing. Nigel stopped by after work, I won $8 and watched Canada compete for .. what exactly? Does anyone know what they actually win?..


( explosions in the sky.. )

Two days ago Lindsay & I met up after work and had some terrific sangria at la bodega on Howe (@ Drake) - sort of expensive but the next time we can't figure out where to go and don't mind splurging a bit, I definitely recommend it. They had the very best peach/vanilla/brandy ice cream too... mmmm...
We stayed a few hours then headed back to her house with that Grey Goose that I STILL haven't finished for some much needed quality time. I wish I'd managed to go out with her & JHames, but it's just not in me these days.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Last night was the second night of the fireworks. Basil, one of the people I work for, invited us to his house (like last year) to watch and ooomg, it didn't disappoint..


( the good life.. )

There was this roll of film in my camera from last fall to early last week that I just couldn't seem to finish. It felt like I took a million frames with it, but there was always a picture or two left on the roll.. ( well, finally I'm done.. )

Friday night I stayed out late. "YOU'RE still here?!" - Jordan 3:00am

( Apparently I am. )

So Saturday morning was mostly a write off. I TRIED to get out of bed and get to Mal & Amandas new place by 11, but I think I arrived there closer to 1:30 - we were supposed to go watch hockey but I'm pretty sure most other people slept in too. Next week. I need some more time outside on the weekends.

I have an amazing picture on my 'real' camera from Saturday of Amanda & Malloreigh jamming Mal's mattress through the rag top on my car, I need to hurry and finish that roll from September, I'm pretty sure there's some real gems on it.

Sunday I stayed in bed ALL DAY LONG. Nigel went to work and then came home and made us breakfast for dinner, then we watched Get Shorty and I climbed right back into bed. I love it. I'm going to enjoy the shit weather the only way I can so when it gets beautiful outside I'll be tired of sleeping.

Speaking of the future (what a poor segue), there are suddenly a million awesome shows coming up that I've bought tickets for. Bon Iver on March 25th, Vampire Weekend on March 27th, Why? on April 16th, Cut Copy on April 29th and Vetiver on May 3rd!

This week is going to be busy. I'm getting my hair did this afternoon, then Lindsay & I have a million things to do in preparation for the show on the 19th (I can't believe we're actually getting this done). Wednesday is still being figured out, Thursday is that art show with Nicola.. Friday Amber is coming out and her, Mal & I are going to have a sleepover before driving out to Maple Ridge Saturday morning to pick up Carly and hopefully *fingers crosses for the weather* shoot a new SG set for Amber. Right now the forecast says Cloudy with Sunny Breaks, 8 degrees. (what's the plan if it's raining ladies?) We'll see how it goes.

Sunday after the party I woke up early at home and had the best shower of my life. I can't believe how sweaty & gross I was the night before.. ew ew ew. So anyway, I showered and grabbed my laptop and left my poor sleeping boyfriend for ( Lindsays house.. )

Happy New Year!

Don't 'they' say that where you are and who you're with when the clock hits midnight directly influences how you'll spend the following year? If that's the case, I won't complain since I was in the company of those I love the most while ringing in the New Year.



( Auld Lang Syne )

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I spent New Years morning with Dustin, Jordon, jasmine & Shannon - they phoned me from the beach at 8:00am (heh heh Jake) and came over to warm up and have some tea and croissants. Eventually we left my apartment and went to wake up everyone at Prior St. for more tea and new years stories and eventually three LARGE pizza's from Uncle Fhatihs. By the time I got home I was so tired that all I could do was crash on the couch for a few hours of mindless television before bed.. it was perfect.

So today is the 3rd, it's Marg Martini day at Moxies and I have a date with Lindsay & Coral. If you're in the West End, you should join us.

I'm well on my way to appreciating these brisk mornings and the snow way up on the mountains, so long as it's a safe distance away from the soggy park I walk through. This morning was beautiful.

I've had an eclectic week, starting off with the 1 year anniversary party for our website last Friday. I took the ENTIRE day off work to run around with Amanda & Lindsay, picking up cake, projectors, balloons, decorations, baby duck & dresses. (I'll post about a million photos from the party below) Generally I'd say it went really well, I think I need to learn how to calm the fuck down, but I wanted it to be special and Lindsay & I put a hell of a lot of work into it. Other then the Saturday morning cleanup (nothing like empty glasses, beer stench, panties, pill bottles & some else's puke to start off your morning), I would say it was a success. I ♥ my friends.

Saturday night Nigel & I met up with my Dad at Moxies for dinner, he'd been staying downtown all weekend working on the Santa Clause Parade. I haven't seen him in close to a month a least - I'm embarrassed at how few times I've been to Maple Ridge since Halloween (NONE!). I'm hoping I can make up for it over Christmas.. I plan on having the mellowest of holiday seasons.

I spent the better part of Sunday doing absolutely nothing other then refreshing facebook and .. you know, I don't even know what I did. But Sunday night Nigel & I met up with Neil, his mom, Anil, Amanda (his sister), etc. etc. for dinner and then a cultural adventure at the QE Theatre for 2007 KPOP! (check out the poster) It was actually pretty amazing and apparently (Amanda loosely translated for Nigel & I) the girl preforming, Ivy, had just been involved in a sex tape scandal in Korea and was a hair away from not coming to Vancouver, but had PROMISED, so she came anyway. She actually cried on stage and tried to explain everything (I think) and yeah.. drama drama. I totally just found the story online here - blackmail, male models, sex tapes, cheating and vandalism.

So, the rest of the week has mainly been trying to catch up on some much needed sleep, but last night anorexic_a & cherryvega came by for ANTM & Cherry b-day celebrations.. and we discovered just how amazing Nigels new video game was... OMG ROCK BAND. I think we only paused briefly to refill our wine glasses & grab some sushi when NIgel got home from work. I really like playing the drums. I need someone with Guitar Hero for Xbox to come over with their guitar so we can have Bass AND Lead in the band. :/




( ~~~Friday November 23, 2007 - No Tofu Studios~~~ )

( lighthouse park )

-----------------------------------------

I'm home from Mississippi with a renewed interest in work & definitely in seeing more of the Southern United States. I looked at the pictures I took last night but they can't possibly do the humidity or the accents or the general feeling of just... the south.. justice. I'll post them soon. xo

Last Saturday was Mal & Amanda's going away gathering at Crab Park (and if you know them but weren't there... *wags finger*) Amanda left for Guatemala Monday morning and Mal is leaving before the end of the month and I'm happy/sad about it all... it's been really hard to comprehend that I won't see either of them for months & months and now Nicola is moving to Toronto and I'm out three girlfriends in three weeks. This August has actually been pretty terrible.
Anyway, Saturday - Nigel & I bussed out to Crab Park around 7:00 for food & drinks ( & goodbyes )

ps - I love comments, but nobody leaves them anymore! What gives?!

I had the rest of my film developed this afternoon, the guy at the store gave me an expired roll of 100iso slide film for free - so I spent all day at work trying to figure out cross processing & pushing slide film without much luck, I need help. (help?)

I love the way the rest of our Barcelona photos came out.. ( they've got more character then the digital pictures. )

Everything else is just bits of pieces of the past few weeks. Like when Nigel & I went for breakfast at The Templeton with Malloreigh & ( met Ali.. )

..and then when Lindsay & I went out to East Van one Saturday morning to get Adrienne & meet up with everyone ( for greasey eggs & toast )

Nigel & I went to Playland last Wednesday.. we were too cheap to buy the pictures they take on the rides, ( so we took our own. )

Then Sunday afternoon was my Dad's surprise 55th birthday party, Nigel & I went out early to help my mom.. Dad was amazed to see us there at noon with four cases of beer, I don't think he believed he was really having a party until the guests started showing up. ( Erica was there.. )

What I'm most excited about though, is that I was waiting to get some photos back before I posted about the most amazing thing I've ever owned IN MY WHOLE ENTIRE LIFE. (you may recall this post a few weeks ago..) omg omg omg omg omg ( I totally bought it!! )

The second half of my Barcelona installment is Gaudi, Gaudi & MORE Gaudi...


( and a little ANTM.. )