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hauling our own garage
2007-11-09 21:18:00
While at Charlene's place in Maple Ridge this summer, I snapped this pic of my Smart car in front of her trailer. We were heading off for a camping trip, but NO, we didn't haul this (relatively) monstrous thing behind us. The Smart was loaded with everything we needed for a tenting holiday. In fact, at a campsite in Manning Park a German tourist took a picture of the Smart all packed up, to prove to his friends back home that it IS possible to go camping in a Smart.
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emerging at last
2007-11-08 21:25:00
The cats haven't enjoyed the move to our new house. They spent the first couple of months sleeping/hiding under the duvet most days, only emerging after dark to eat, poop, and explore their new territory. Things are improving now, however. Both of them come out during the daytime, and it seems their appetites have picked up too. Leica has discovered a new favourite place to sleep: Rajeev's pile of dirty laundry in the closet. They still don't know what to make of Kevin, however.

kevin makes himself right at home
2007-11-07 21:14:00
Here's Kevin , the cat who lives across the street. Every day he wanders the neighbourhood and makes a stop at our place. If we leave the door open, he'll waddle in and make himself comfy. He has even had the audacity to snuggle up on the bed whilst my cats are asleep under the covers. If they only knew ....
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so sari
2007-11-06 19:58:00
It's taken me awhile, but here at last are a few pics from Rajeev's parents' visit. Allow me to present a family portrait:You can see how Rajeev is an ethnic mix of his mum (Parsi) and dad (Tamil), and they're just as fun and easy-going as he is. The Tall genes must have skipped a generation, however. Bala, Rajeev's dad, is wearing a traditional South Indian ... um, thing. I can't remember what it's called. Rajeev might wear this to our wedding next year.As for me, I'm considering wearing a sari. With this in mind, we took a trip to Vancouver to visit Little India (49th and Main) for lunch and a meeting with a tailor. I have two saris and the tops need to be custom made. There aren't any sari tailors in Victoria. Colleen and John came along, as Colleen needed to get her sari top made too. Here we are on the ferry.And here's Colleen at the tailor's.Sari s are gorgeous and thankfully cover lots of flesh. As Colleen said, she only has to work out her right arm.

how do you say Happy Birthday in Hawaiian?
2007-11-05 20:46:00
Here's a pic of Rajeev looking totally cool after giving me the best birthday gift of my life: plane tickets to Hawaii for Christmas. Believe me, before this photo was taken, there was lots of screaming, yahoo-ing, kissing and "NO way! I can't believe it!" going on.
More About: Happy , Birthday , Happy Birthday , Hawaiian

cat-o'lantern
2007-11-03 19:14:00
It's a big change, moving from an apartment into a house. For one thing, you get to celebrate things like Halloween in a completely different way. Kids rarely visit apartment buildings to Trick-or-Treat, so all those years I lived on Dallas Road I didn't get any visitors on Halloween. That didn't stop me from buying a nice bag of mini Mars bars, however. You know. Just in case.Now that we're in a house in Fernwood, a neighbourhood with a large population of folks of Trick-or-Treating age, we expected it would be a different scenario. We bought around 300 mini chocolate bars, carved a pumpkin, turned on the porch light and hoped for the best.Here's Rajeev carving his first pumpkin ever. The whiskers were the hardest part.Our cat-o-lantern stands at the ready.As for the Trick-or-Treaters, we were visited by tigers, spiders, Dumbledores, devils and angels:Based on our experiences on Halloween night, we have two observations about kids these days:1. Parents need to teach their kidl...

spontaneous is always best
2007-11-02 17:54:00
I just had to share this video I found today. The group Naturally 7 bursts into song on a Paris subway. Watch how the other passengers slowly get into it.
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my sister, the painter
2007-11-01 17:55:00
Stefany has a new exhibit of her paintings opening this weekend at the Summit Gallery in Banff. The coolest thing about her style of painting is not just that the finished product looks cool and three dimensional, but that she works on each painting in only one go, scraping away layers of "twigs" until it's done. I wish I could afford to buy one for the new house ... hint, hint, Stef.
More About: Sister , Painter

mission accomplished
2007-10-30 18:58:00
They're gone.It was a good week, meeting Rajeev's parents. But I am completely spent. It's a lot of work being "on stage" 24/7, hoping to impress and trying not to care so much, cooking meals for 6 people every night, and thinking of touristy things to do in rotten weather.I will post pics soon.Meanwhile, we're sleeping. A lot.
More About: Mission , Missi

they're here
2007-10-18 20:33:00
Rajeev's parents arrived last night and are staying with us for a week. Unfortunately they've come just as the first storms of the season are rolling in. This blustry, cold weather is very different from the current hot stuff in Bombay, so it must be a bit of a shock. Poor Aban (Rajeev's mum) is freezing most of the time; although, so am I, so we already have that in common.Much feasting and socializing is on the agenda for the next while. Stay tuned.

he rides again
2007-10-16 03:52:00
Mild-mannered realtor by day, hard-core biker by weekend. Patrick and his beloved.

thanxgiving dins #2
2007-10-15 03:34:00
Talk about turkey overload. Here are pics from the second feast to which we were treated last weekend, this time at Colleen & John's "ranch" in Saltair:John and Rajeev with the bird:Lori with wine: Lori's homegrown pumpkin:The gang, post-pig-out:Who needs sedatives? Turkey makes you so sleepy:Even the beasts were konked out:

thanxgiving dins #1
2007-10-13 03:16:00
These are some pics from the first round of turkey, last weekend at Stef and Jeff's new house.The kitchen/dining room is really nice (I love being able to eat in the kitchen):Stef and the bird:Jeff and the bird:The day after:

view from the Sylvia
2007-10-13 03:08:00
Here's where we stayed last Friday night: the Sylvia , a nice old hotel on English Bay. Each time I've stayed here, it's been for work, so I never get to hang around and actually enjoy the room. This is the view on Saturday morning at 8:30 as I headed off for a day of editing classes. Behold the ever-present Vancouver drizzle.
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cat fix #1
2007-10-09 21:48:00
I was in Vancouver on the weekend for some editing training. As soon as my class finished at 5 pm on Saturday, our round of turkey dinners began.In all, our travels took us from Victoria to Vancouver, Nanaimo and Saltair, stopping for thanksgiving dinner in two places and getting plenty of cat fixes too.Here we are in Nanaimo at my grandfather's house, holding Oliver.This cat has adopted grandpa and comes over daily for peace, quiet and cuddles.

not again
2007-09-26 21:34:00
They're digging up the road in front of our house AGAIN. It began a month ago, after we moved in. They put a gas line through and took 2 weeks to dig up one block. We hoped that the city would then pave the entire road, because it's a very bumpy ride and makes you feel like you're in a grotty neighbourhood. But no. They neglected us for a few weeks as they moved their way up the street, and now they're back. Digging up the same stretch of trench (and filling it up again at the end of each day) as before.Did one of the workers lose his watch in the dirt or something?

the house is warmed
2007-09-25 21:23:00
We had our housewarming party on the weekend. As we imagined, this is a good party house. 20 people could spread out and form pods in different zones.For example, there was the fire pit pod,the food table pod,the kitchen/dining room pod (seen behind Shorn),the patio pod (with certain folks still noshing at the food table),and the living room pod (I didn't get a pic of that one).Even though there was loads of food, potluck style, Rajeev and I found that we were so busy flitting from one pod to the next, attending to all our guests, that we didn't get much to eat or drink during the party. Thank god for leftovers! The evening went by way too quickly.
More About: House , The House , Armed

cocktail chockies
2007-09-22 03:05:00
Colleen & John went to Las Vegas and brought us back loads of good loot, as usual, including this box of chocolates in "cocktail" flavours. Unfortunately they looked better than they tasted. As is usually the case with American chocolates, they're too sweet. But they sure look cool!
More About: Cocktail , Tail , Chock

just don't look at the greasy food
2007-09-20 03:30:00
Here's another pic from our Kootenay trip. After taking a dip in the highly over-rated Ainsworth Hot Springs, we had dinner in the highly over-rated restaurant next door. The nearest GOOD restaurants being way back in Nelson (pick any restaurant in that town, you'll have great food), we were too hungry to drive all the way back on empty stomachs. At least this place had a nice view, even if my food was swimming in oil.
More About: Food , The G

why I hate telemarketers
2007-09-19 00:22:00
Is it just me, or are telemarketers a special breed of irritant second only to dental hygienists?I can't stand them. I know they are human beings who are just earning a living, but why must they do so by bothering me? When did Bothering People become a viable career option?Telemarketer s have been pestering the world for decades, and I say we need to fight back. Those 1-800 numbers calling during dinnertime are a dead give-away. I don't even answer them anymore. You know it's one of THEM calling when the first sound you hear after answering the phone is silence, followed by a click, then ambient noise of a room full of telemarketers talking, then "hello?" Some long distance calls, especially if they're coming from the other side of the world, begin with a click and delay too, but the way I can tell them apart from the telemarketers is the background hum of computers and people talking on headsets. What's even worse is when they don't realize that there IS a delay, and are enjoy...
More About: Hate , Marketers , Marketer

I didn't realize they had such strong teeth
2007-09-18 02:22:00
This summer we spent about a week in the Kootenays, and one day we drove up to the Kokanee Glacier park for a stroll. Most people who head up to this park are serious hikers, prepared for a long hike up to the glacier and perhaps several days camping in the mountains. We did not belong to this group. We didn't have time for a huge hike, but we heard there was a small lake at the trailhead which we could hike around in about an hour, and that seemed good enough.While I knew it was grizzly country, I wasn't prepared to encounter any other dangerous animals. And truth be told, I wasn't prepared for grizzlies either, as my bear bell was somewhere at home in Victoria. Which I was acutely aware of when we spotted fresh bear poop in the middle of the trail.Upon arrival in the parking lot, you are greeted by this sign. Yikes. Can porcupines really chew up your car??Sure enough, many cars in the lot took this warning seriously, and surrounded their cars with fortifications.
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taking the plunge
2007-09-17 03:12:00
Here's a video of Rajeev jumping off a trestle near Grand Forks, BC. We were on a paddling trip down the Kettle River in August with about 15 people, and stopped for a swim. I wasn't brave enough to jump off that thing, and most of those who did took about half an hour thinking about it first.
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go ahead, make my day
2007-09-16 02:17:00
Mild-mannered realtor by day, serious gardener by weekend. Patrick blasts the leaves on our back patio.
More About: Make , Ahead

it's starting to feel more like home now
2007-09-13 17:48:00
I wrenched my back at a dance class two days ago, which made me feel like a total geezer. I was in agony all day yesterday, wondering why a year of minimal physical activity could get me this out of shape (DUH). Fortunately, this morning I woke up pain-free and the world is a much brighter place.
More About: Home , Feel

new leaf
2007-09-12 17:48:00
One of the plants in our pond has big purple leaves that look almost like iron. We didn't think it was real at first glance, but it is definitely alive. As you can see, it is growing a new leaf. It's very appropriate to our current circumstance; getting engaged and buying a house is a huge new chapter in our lives.
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meet the neighbours
2007-09-11 17:47:00
Rajeev and I have been enjoying our new patio, especially in the evenings when it's still warm enough to sit outside. There's plenty of protection from the wind, which is something we were lacking at Dallas Road. I still miss the ocean view immensely; when you've lived in that kind of luxury for almost a decade, it's very difficult to be without it. I have upgraded in other ways with this move, but the daily changing ocean/mountain views were priceless and I miss them.We've slowly been meeting our neighbours. Here's Kevin, the neighbourhood tom cat who has decided he likes our patio. He wanders in every day and makes himself at home. This would be great if we didn't already have two cats that we want to encourage to go outside (mostly to use the litterbox of the great outdoors). Even though Kevin is a geezerly old guy whom my cats could easily outrun, his presence means that Leica and Bailey are more wary of going out. Having been indoor cats all their lives, they aren't exa...
More About: Neighbours , Meet

our new hobby
2007-09-10 17:38:00
We've spent the past couple of weekends getting acquainted with our new place, especially the garden. While it's been landscaped and well cared for in the past, it was neglected while the house was on the market (a few months). We have ripped down a truckload of ivy, blown a lot of leaves around, hacked back the bamboo, weeded, and cut the grass. We still don't know the names of most of the plants in the garden, being first time house owners, but we figure we'll just maintain it for the first year and see what flowers.It sure takes a lot of time, though. Now I know why friends have always seemed to disappear into a black hole when they bought houses -- there's no time for anything else in the first little while.
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the local thugs
2007-09-09 19:41:00
Crows like the berries on one of our trees. Every evening they gather in huge gangs and muscle their way around the neighbourhood.
More About: Local , Loca

sky
2007-09-06 19:44:00
So I don't have an ocean view any more, but at least I can go out on my patio and look UP.

the new view
2007-09-05 19:38:00
The day after we moved in, city workers began digging up our street to put in a gas line. Our peaceful oasis turned into a noisy construction zone complete with piles of dirt, and the street was closed off for a couple of weeks. The up side: it's gas! We can get a gas stove! (someday in the distant future when we can afford it ...)
More About: View