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Friday's Feast #02
2008-01-04 05:58:00
Appetizer - When was the last time you received a surprise in the mail, and what was it?I'm not sure, but I do remember the letters that my grandfather Pepe used to write me from Argentina. The first one he sent me, only had my name and my phone number in it, because he didn't know my address. And it still arrived!Soup - If you could have a summer and/or winter home, where would you want it to be?I would love to have a summer home in Georgian Bay (or even better, in Hudson Bay) and a winter home in Villa La Angostura, Argentina.Salad - Pick one: pineapple, orange, banana, apple, cherry.Oh, banana, without a doubt. It's probably the only fruit I like...Main Course - Describe the nicest piece of clothing that you own.This one is tricky, because I don't care a lot about clothes. But I do have some black jogging pants that I love. They're semi-destroyed already, but I still refuse to throw them away.Dessert - If you could forget one whole day from your life, which day would you cho...
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Guilty pleasures (1)
2008-01-03 18:35:00
There are two things that I am not too ashamed to accept I enjoy and they are professional wrestling and reading gossip blogs. I know, they're completely unrelated; so I will just elaborate on the first one today... I love pro wrestling. Of course I know it's fake. Well, I shouldn't say that. It's not 'fake', it's scripted; this means, both performers (or more if it's a tag team match, for example) know who's going to win and who's going to lose. But the blows are pretty real. Many times, you will see them getting injured, and in some cases they're career-ending injuries, like what happened to Bret Hart. I've been a fan of pro wrestling since I was a kid and watched "Titanes en el Ring" on Argentine TV. (I will write about this show later on). But it's hard for me to call 'fake' something that requires lots of training, an excellent physical condition and the ability to perform breathtaking stunts (think Shawn Michaels or Jeff Hardy). In most cases, you also have...
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Top Commentators December 2007
2008-01-02 14:47:00
(Please scroll down for my Wordless Wednesday post)   December has ended and I did my best at keeping track with the comments my posts received. Here's the ranking for the month of December 2007   Diciembre acaba de terminar y yo hice lo posible para seguir la cuenta de los comentarios que mis posts recibieron. Aquí esta el ranking del mes de Diciembre de 2007: Jorge (Valparaíso, Chile)...........23 Nata (Stockholm, Sweden)............20 Xel-Ha (Montreal, Canada)...........17 Guillermo (Waterloo, Canada)........14 Ana (Coatzacoalcos, Mexico).........13 Biddie (Kitchener, Canada)..........13 Tulip (Caracas, Venezuela)..........11 Paola (Vicente López, Argentina).... 8 Arturo (Montreal, Canada)........... 4 Jacqueline(Montreal, Canada)........ 4 Alejandra (Sherbrooke, Canada)...... 3 Alfonso (Montreal, Canada).......... 3 Maria Marta (Staines, England)...... 3 Mariposa (Cebu City, Philippines)... 3 14 readers with 2 comments each 57 readers with 1 comm...
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WW#03 - Stunt doubles
2008-01-02 06:08:00
Florencia (4) plays while Juan (9) and Santi (12) flywordless wednesday
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Happy New Year
2008-01-01 19:18:00
It's 1:18PM and all of my kids are still asleep. Or maybe not, I think Santi was probably playing with his Gameboy while still in bed...We had the Zieglers coming over for New Year 's Eve and we had a great time together. And we eat. Boy did we eat! As per my suggestion, we had cheese fondue for dinner... Gaby and her mom prepared all the little things that went into the pot, like ham cubes, salami, bread crumbs, little meatballs, vegetables, etc. Of all that , only some broccoli was left at the end of the night. It was getting dangerous to try to stick your hand in there...Just when we thought it had been enough food for the evening, the dessert arrived. And it was... chocolate fondue! Once again, Gaby and my mother-in-law had taken care of all the little things you would love to dip in there. The funny note was that the one we bought as an afterthought was the most successful of the evening: Rice Krispies squares. We bought a big box containing 24 of them, and only three are left...
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Pink underwear
2007-12-31 21:10:00
There are some odd traditions around Christmas and New Year, like eating 12 grapes at midnight on New Year's Day (which comes from Spain) or kissing under the mistletoe (mostly North American).Last night I found out about one that seems to come mostly from Argentina, and that is about buying pink underwear. I looked it up, and I couldn't find any references in English, so I assumed it was coming from Latin America; then I realized that all the pages I found were from Argentina, so I wonder if it's something that only comes from there. Image courtesy of La Gaceta onlineThere were different versions, some saying that you buy the underwear on Christmas Eve, another on New Year's Eve; others said that the underwear should be red or yellow (or pink for Christmas and then red for New Year's Day). In the end, the one that makes the most sense to me (if that could be possible) indicates that you should buy pink underwear for Christmas, and then wear it on New Year's Eve.There are some...
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Already?
2007-12-31 17:12:00
That's it. 2007 is about to end. It's time to make a balance. Was this a good year for you? I normally have a hard time trying to remember what happened in the year that is about to end, but I have some extra help this time: my blog!So let's recap and pick some old stories that will help me come up with an answer to the "was this a good year?" question:January:Well, I turned 40, and then I had a great birthday bash. In fact, I declared that day the best day of my life!February:I didn't write anything! It must have been a quiet one.March:I also moved to a different position and was really excited about this.April:This was the month when I decided to be a little more consistent about my blogging. I started to travel because of my new position, and had some mixed feelings about it ("I'm a horrible father").My favourite post so far was written on April 22, and it's about me and my kids singing in public on a Sat night, and me and my dad 'singing' together the following day. Love...

The day Santi stopped being a kid
2007-12-30 09:55:00
It happened at midnight on Christmas Eve. We were dealing with our presents (oh yes, we open them at 12:00 AM) and I could see Santi 's face transform as he was opening his. He definitely looked disappointed, so I waited until the rest of the kids had gone back downstairs (which took about an hour and a half :-) ) and then called him.I asked him what was going on, guessing what his answer would be; Santi said he was very disappointed because he thought that maybe this time, he would get some of the stuff other kids get for Christmas. Tears of frustration started to run down his face as I asked him: "Well, what were you exactly expecting". He replied "I don't know, nothing in particular, maybe some video games or some electronics things, like the stuff all my friends get", knowing that they were beyond our budget. He started to cry, same thing he had done the year before.I talked to him. You know, he's 12, so it's been a while since he knew how this works (can't say much about th...

Friday's Feast #1
2007-12-28 21:15:00
Appetizer - Name 2 things you would like to accomplish in 2008To be able to send Gaby to Argentina to visit her family, and to lose 50 more pounds (and never find them back).Soup - With which cartoon character do you share personality traits?Spike, which was Droopy's antagonist. I don't know if we're really alike, but he's my favourite cartoon character ever.Salad - What time of day (or night) were you born?If I don't remember it wrong, I was born at 3:40 AM. This might explain why I'm normally awake at that time!Main Course - Tell us something special about your hometownNecochea is one of the widest, most beautiful beaches in the world. Due to its orientation, you see the sun rise and set over the water, which is an amazing show.Dessert - If you could receive a letter from anyone in the world, who would you want to get one from?Other than those who are no longer among us, I guess it would be Fernando Parrado, one of the survivors of the Andes plane crash in 1972. I admire him...
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Happy, shining people
2007-12-28 16:35:00
Also heard on AM570 news, and in order to balance with the terrible news I just wrote about...The Canadian Institute for Advanced Research published a survey that shows that Saint John, New Brunswick is the happiest city in Canada, with a score of 8.6 of 10. Well, 'the happiest city' could be an overstatement, since they conducted this survey in... 18 cities.The top ten were as follows:Saint John, New BrunswickQuebec City, QuebecCharlottetown, Prince Edward Island(tied) Moncton, New Brunswick and Kitchener, OntarioSt. John's, NewfoundlandSaskatoon, SaskatchewanRegina, SaskatchewanWinnipeg, ManitobaHalifax, Nova ScotiaJohn Helliwell (no, not the guy from Supertramp) led this research project and said that "knowing your neighbours, and trusting those around you is a key reason why a city like Saint John tops the list". He also said that his work (still unpublished) suggests a correlation between lower levels of satisfaction in some of the country's biggest cities, like Vancouver, ...
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Daddy dearest
2007-12-28 16:14:00
I heard this on the Jeff Allan show on AM570 as I was coming to work today. A man from Saskatoon, SK, who molested his 4 year old daughter live over the internet was sentenced to four years and a month in prison. This means he could be free on parole in less than two years.CBC reports that "at least twice he sexually assaulted her (daughter) live in front of a webcam, sending the images to to other men".Had it not been for a Washington state-based undercover cop who alerted the police in Saskatoon, this could have continued for a long time. The man did plead guilty to "sexual assault, internet luring and producing and transmitting child pornography".The girl was reported to have said "Police came and put cuffs on Daddy so he won't touch me again. I guess I am not going to call him Daddy anymore". Callers to the radio show were breaking into tears upon hearing this.I'm a father of four, and one of them is a four year old. I find the fact that this beast got 4 years in prison outrag...
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An architectonic gem
2007-12-27 18:53:00
I found these pictures -and the corresponding post- at Kiwipulse, and I was just astonished.This is in Buenos Aires, Argentina. They have renovated the Grand Splendid theatre into a bookstore (El Ateneo), preserving the paintings, ornaments, stage and lighting. The place looks absolutely fantastic. I used to live two blocks away from there, and my school is just around the corner. Heck, I went there to watch movies many times (I remember watching Mel Gibson's "Gallipoli" with my friend Leonardo when I was 15 or so).I love bookstores, and so does Gaby. Had this been already there while we were still living in Buenos Aires, I would have camped there and never left...Look at the beautiful pictures; there are more if you go to the original post. Encontré estas fotos -y el correspondiente post- en Kiwipulse, y quedé maravillado.Esto es en Buenos Aires, Argentina. Han renovado el cine y teatro "Grand Splendid" y ahora es una librería de la cadena "El Ateneo", preservando las decoracio...

Boxing Day
2007-12-27 14:16:00
It finally happened. After years of refusing to go out on Boxing Day, we succumbed to our kids' pressure and went to the mall. It was a nut house, as I was expecting, and we even weren't at the busiest mall in town (we went to Conestoga Mall instead of Fairview Park).On our way there, we were amazed at the spectacle of the trees. They all had turned into white, even though it had barely snowed the night before. Gaby took a few pictures from the car (there are more pictures in a previous post by Guillermo). Some of the pictures taken by GabyThe parking lot was absolutely full, but that is never a problem when I'm driving, as I normally manage to find the best parking spot possible (as seen in a previous post). And yesterday wasn't an exception, as you can see. Gaby hates the fact that I'm so lucky; had she been the one driving, we would have ended parking closer to our home than to the mall... A picture of my mini-van from the door, and then a picture from the driver'...
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Wordless Wednesday - Just what I wanted!
2007-12-26 07:59:00
My daughter Florencia (4)wordless wednesday
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Peace
2007-12-24 16:59:00
It's Christmas Eve today. "Nochebuena", as we say in Spanish. We will celebrate according to our Argentine traditions, which means we will have a late dinner, and wait until midnight to open the presents (expect lots of excitement). We have my mother in law visiting us, and we'll have some friends sitting at the table as well (the Zieglers).Source: Dollye's blog (Eats, drinks and reads of an Organism)I guess there will still be a time for a little sadness, or if you want, nostalgia. Christmas is a celebration for the family, and ours is 10,000 km away. Internet brings everybody closer, but it's still not the same. We will all think of those Christmas dinners we used to have in the past, and we will surely remember those who have departed, especially since we left Argentina, like my father and my grandparents. But as my grandfather Pepe said himself, "life goes on". This is our present, this is where we are, and we have family and friends at the table, so we will celebrate!At mid...
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Soccer, for geeks
2007-12-24 07:05:00
Talking in my previous post about those cities we used to build with Rasti made me remember of another game we used to play and we liked even more (and was way easier to set up): football, or as they say in North America, "soccer". Using Rasti, of course.We would assemble several teams (consisting in ten players and a goalkeeper) and use little marbles as balls, and play for hours. It started with me and my older brother Guillermo first, but soon he was too big to keep playing with these toys so the torch was passed onto (once again) Martín. There was a brief 'transition' period, however, in which the three of us were playing.At first, the colours of our teams would reflect the most known soccer teams in Argentina: red and white for River Plate, yellow and blue for Boca Juniors, all red for Independiente, blue and red for San Lorenzo, all green for Ferro Carril Oeste (who was big in those years), etc. Of course, we had a green and white team for our beloved Estación Quequén (ou...
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Numbers
2007-12-22 04:49:00
I had a pre-surgical appointment today, for a nose surgery I'm having on January 4th. It's nothing serious, a septoplasty and turbinate reduction. But it will require general anesthesia, and I will have to stay at the hospital overnight, due to my sleep apnea.So, as I was saying, I went to the hospital this morning (at 7:00 AM!) and had blood works, ECG, etc. We went through all the procedure, the list of the medications I'm taking, etc etc. They said that there is the normal risk that a procedure like this involves, and also the risks of receiving general anesthesia, which I was expecting.They also said that I will have to be intubated, so there is a minute posibility that my vocal chords could be hurt, and that might cause me to lose my voice temporarily, or in extremely rare cases, permanently (I would be able to whisper, though).I told the doctor that I was a singer, so he promised he would be extra cautious; then I asked what was the probability of me ever losing my voice, t...
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We built this city
2007-12-21 12:16:00
I talked about this -briefly- in my "wheelbarrow" story, and that's when I remembered about the things I used to make with these "Rasti" blocks; and some of them are either hilarious ... or geeky.For example, me and my cousin (and later on my brother Martín) would spend days -yes, days- building a city. We would make houses with Rasti, some big, some small, some absolutely tiny ("those are for the poor neighbourhoods", we'd say). We would also make big buildings, but most of the time we'd use other materials for that (small boxes, toy car containers, etc.). My cousin had a lot of toy car (mostly Matchbox TM), so we would use his and place them all over the city.A good example of the cool stuff you could -and still can!- build with RastiDesigning the city was a lot of fun, actually. The first thing we would do was to assign tasks and ownerships: for example, I was going to be responsible for building the 'downtown', and once we were done, I would 'own' the police station and ...
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New story - The wheelbarrow
2007-12-20 17:16:00
I have translated another one of the stories I wrote for my kids. This one talks about the way celebrated Christmas back in Necochea, when I was a kid. Here's the link, and it's also in my 'Media links' section (don't forget to check for more stories)The wheelbarrow (English) La versión en español de esta historia la había subido hace tiempo, pero es bueno publicitarla un poco. Esta historia, que escribí para mis hijos, habla de cómo celebrábamos la Navidad en Necochea, cuando yo era chico. Aquí está el link, que también está en mi sección 'Media links' (no olviden de chequearla por más relatos).La carretilla (español)
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Talented kids
2007-12-20 15:51:00
Juan and Carolina took part of the Talent Show at school yesterday. I couldn't go, but Gaby and my mother in law did; Gaby took pictures and some video, which I decided to share with you... Juan y Carolina tomaron parte de un Talent Show ayer en la escuela. Yo no pude ir, pero Gaby y mi suegra sí lo hicieron; Gaby sacó fotos y algunos videos, los que decidí compartir con ustedes... Juan doing a very 'cool' dance with a friendJuan haciendo un baile muy 'cool' con una compañerita Carolina and her friend acting a song from "High School Musical",with the rest of the school singing in the back.Carolina y su amiga actuando un número de "High School Musical",con toda la escuela cantando de fondo.
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Wordless Wednesday - Ghost ship in Quequen, Argentina
2007-12-19 06:01:00
Source: A million minutes in Africawordless wednesday
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My company party
2007-12-19 03:54:00
I mentioned a little of it in previous posts; my company had the Chr...Holiday Party last Friday. The place was beautiful (The Waterloo Inn), the food was simply great, the entertainment was really good (first with the tango dancers Roxana and Fabián, and then with Carlos Siri conducting tango classes) and the prizes were... for somebody else. :-(Roxana needed some time to change her clothes during the performance, so Fabián brought his bandoneón and was about to play the tango "Malena". Carlos then told him that I was a (amateur) singer, so Fabián wanted to know more:- Do you know the tango "Malena"?- I know of it...- If you can get the lyrics, would you sing it for your co-workers?- ...I asked the other people responsible for the organization and they were delighted; then I asked a manager for his Blackberry and downloaded the lyrics from it. Five minutes later...Me singing "Malena" in front of my co-workers.My hand had never shaken like that before...It went really well, and ...
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An act of kindness that's been going on for years
2007-12-18 22:34:00
The Chamorros are the first Argentine family we befriended here in Canada. If you read previous posts, you will remember I have written about those two wonderful, gorgeous girls they have (which we call our nieces), here and here. They are family to us, and we know we're family to them as well.We met by pure coincidence. Charlie was on the internet, looking for people from his hometown (Mar del Plata) living in Canada; when he could not find anybody, he decided to take a look at the newspapers from cities nearby (like my hometown). That happened to be on the same day the local newspaper had published an article about us, which contained our e-mail address. They live in London, ON, so we're some 120Km away from each other (which is the same distance between Mar del Plata and Necochea, isn't it funny?); Charlie considered that 'close enough' and contacted us.We first met at an Argentine get together (which means, giant BBQ) in Fergus, ON. We spent the afternoon with them and had ...
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More Christmas Music
2007-12-18 15:44:00
My co-worker Anne sent me this video by Straight no Chaser, and I believe it's just great. Watch: Mi compañera Anne me mandó este video de Straight no Chaser, que me pareció fantástico. Miren:Here's another favourite of mine, this one by Eric Cartman....South Park - Cartman Sings O Holy Night
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Brave
2007-12-18 13:34:00
Every time I see these the same thought comes to my mind: "Who must have been the brave guy who put his/her foot there first?" Cada vez que veo éstos tengo el mismo pensamiento: "Quién habrá sido el valiente que puso su pie aquí primero?"  Technorati Tags: weather, cold, snow

Bloggers unite in acts of kindness - Report
2007-12-18 08:11:00
The "Bloggers Unit e in Act of Kindness " day is almost over, and I have to say, I got to read some of the most beautiful posts I have seen in a long while.There were over 100 posts, you can check the list here.I will take the liberty to recommend some to you (though there was no way I could have read them all), in no particular order:"Grander than the Bell and the Red Suit" from Pinoyhood"Bloggers unite" from A little piece of me"Acts of kindness" from Listening...learning...living (definitely my favourite so far)"Teaching my 5 year old the gift of giving" from BobAngus.com"Bloggers unite to do good..." from Life Prints"Acts of kindness" from Complete Business Systems"Bloggers unite in acts of kindness" from Transitenator"Acts of kindess" from Endangered Spaces"Starlight: Acts of kindness" from Imperfection @ its finestThere were many more, and I wonder if I will be able to read them all...
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Goodies
2007-12-18 07:06:00
As I mentioned in a previous post, my mother in law arrived on Sunday morning, and she brought TONS of stuff for us. We were overwhelmed by the number of people who contacted her and sent us 'little things' that turned out to be huge for us.My siblings Martin, Paco and Florencia, for example, sent each one of my kids a shirt. And they're all so cool, that I felt I had to show you pictures of them wearing them. Santi's shirt features Homer Simpson scoring with the help of 'The hand of God' I like Caro's shirt the most, because it features one of my favourite comedians ever, Ramón Valdez. Juan's shirt is very funny, and very creative! Florencia's shirt says "Future big star". I bet she will be one. Other people, knowing that I'm an avid -yet amateur- numismatic, sent me lots of old coins and bills from Argentina, most of which I didn't have yet (or I did, but they were in much better shape than mine). I'm having so much fun classifying coins right now.But the most ...
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Oh, the weather outside is frightful
2007-12-17 18:26:00
We had a big snowstorm between last Saturday and today. The accumulation is in the 30 cms already, and there's more snow expected. Not bad at all.It took me three times the time to get here from home today, I was driving so slow that I felt I was part of a funeral. Some of the roads, like the one where I live, hadn't been snowplowed yet, so it was a little dangerous to drive (especially if you consider that my house is 'on top of a little hill that is on top of a bigger hill'). But I got here safe and sound.Here are a couple of pictures I took with my cell phone... Tuvimos un gran temporal de nieve entre el sábado y hoy. Ya llevamos más de 30 cm de nieve acumulada, y esperan más para hoy. Nada mal.Me llevó tres veces lo normal llegar al trabajo desde casa, manejaba tan despacio que sentí que era parte de la procesión de un funeral. Algunas de las calles, como la de mi casa, no habían sido limpiadas todavía, así que era un poco peligroso manejar (sobre todo si uno consid...
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Bloggers unite in acts of kindness
2007-12-17 06:01:00
Today, December 17th, Bloggers Unit e is challenging bloggers everywhere to do an act of kindness, and then post about it.I am not too sure I like to talk about nice things that I have done, but I will still go for it. I will mention a nice thing I have done long ago, and another one that is very recent. Then I will see what can I do today, and I will post about it at the end of the day.===================================== An act of kindness from... 25 years ago=====================================T his one I won't forget about. For whatever reason, me and my brother decided to go to a retirement home in our native Necochea, and played and sang for the elderly residents there for a couple of hours. I don't think there was anybody there that we knew, and I don't even remember which songs we played, though I assume they were mostly old songs like the ones my father used to sing.The conditions in which we saw the retirement home were terrible. Some things we observed were hard to beli...
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This was my weekend...
2007-12-17 00:40:00
I have to warn you, this post will be long...We had so many things lined up for this weekend that we considered using Google Calendar to make sure we wouldn't forget about anything.On Friday, Gaby had to cater a dinner at a Community Centre and after that, we had to go to our Company's Holiday Party (we don't say "Christmas Party" anymore, even though there's a giant Christmas tree in the room and they play Christmas music non-stop, until well after dinner has been served; it seems that the only thing that might affect non-Christians is the name...) Gaby did great, and got fantastic feedback. I will write later about the party (once I get the pictures), but you already know what happened to me on my way there...Saturday didn't look any better. We had three events at the same time, so we had to make a choice based on which we had committed to do first. Santi had a soccer game in Vaughan (near Toronto), my company was holding the Children's Chris...Holiday Party from 4:00 to 7:0...
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