winter is coming ...

Actually, as I live in Calgary, winter has been here for awhile.  Seriously, the snow has been on the ground for a solid month.   Seeing as we never had an actual fall season, I won't dwell on that but let's discuss what I miss most about summer.  It will also give you an idea of what I've been doing since my last post, which I recognize was basically 4 months ago.  It's a short list - one thing for every month that I've been gone.  Here you go:

1. Topsiders:  I know this is a random one, but I love that they made a comeback this year.  I love preppy boys, so the summer uniform of long shorts, cardigans and topsiders made me very happy.  I do love a good peacoat and scarf combo too, so now that it's winter I can't complain too much, but I will miss the boat shoes that were all over town this summer.

2. Orcas: I went to a wedding this summer on beautiful Galiano island.  On Friday afternoon we went for a sail and came across a few pods of orcas.  While it was not quite this close, if you want to see how many there were and how awesome they are, check out this video from Outside Mag - it was in the same area and the same time. Oh and the wedding was fun too.  CG married her man Bill on a beautiful day overlooking the ocean.  We drank, we danced, we made wished on Thai lanterns and there was a risque photo shoot that is still being talked about.

3. Patios: It really goes without saying, but I had quite a few great afternoons on the various patios around town this summer.  A special shoutout to National, the Ship and Local 510.  Great places to drink beer and watch the world go by.

4. Bronze medals: I spent a lot of time watching the London Olympics.  Not a surprise really if you look back at some of my posts from February 2010 (here, here and here).  Canadians didn't do quite as well as expected and there were a lot of jokes about how many bronzes we won.  The bronze we lost in the men's 4X100 was particularly heartbreaking.  Listening to my father explain the rules of tae-kwon-do was particularly hilarious.  Watching the Brits cheer on that Mo guy to the 5,000 and 10,000 was awesome.  But most of all, watching the Canadian women lose so unfairly to the Americans in the soccer semi-finals and then squeak out a victory in the bronze medal game was amazing.  I played soccer all summer on an absolutely horrible team - we barely ever scored, but when we did, this is the face I was making.

a list for a sunday

I have been known to post a variety of lists - lists of things I've done, things not to do, things to be thankful for, books to read, music to listen to, and top moments from various events.  This time I'm gonna post somebody else's list.  It comes from the Lists of Note blog. It's taken from a letter that F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote to his 11 year old daughter in 1933.  Here's an excerpts - I gotta say, I think it's a pretty good list of things to consider when going through life.


Things to worry about:
Worry about courage
Worry about cleanliness
Worry about efficiency
Worry about horsemanship

Things not to worry about: 
Don’t worry about popular opinion
Don’t worry about dolls
Don’t worry about the past
Don’t worry about the future
Don’t worry about growing up
Don’t worry about anybody getting ahead of you
Don’t worry about triumph
Don’t worry about failure unless it comes through your own fault
Don’t worry about mosquitoes
Don’t worry about flies
Don’t worry about insects in general
Don’t worry about parents
Don’t worry about boys
Don’t worry about disappointments
Don’t worry about pleasures
Don’t worry about satisfactions


I'm not sure why it struck me at this particular moment in time ... but it's a beautiful sunny Sunday morning in February, I'm packing to go away for a week of work and friend time, and I'm feeling somewhat reflective.  I don't know that I'll ever worry about horsemanship or not worry about boys, but I feel like this is a good list to remind me what's important in life.  

it's always the quiet ones

I've mentioned the struggles I sometimes have with my job. Well one day last week was one of them. Last Monday I unwittingly took part in a social experiment … at about 1PM I realized that beyond exchanging pleasantries with coworkers in the kitchen and bathroom (as in “hi, how are you, good, how are you, not bad, have a good day”) I did not have a substantive conversation with anyone in my office. There are 400 people that work in my organization. About 90 or so are on my floor, 60 of whom are in my business unit and 12 people who have offices along my hallway and not one of them went out of their way to engage me in conversation. I guess the question could be, well, why didn’t you make more of an effort? And I did – I said hi to the guy parking his bike beside mine this morning. I asked a colleague if she wanted to grab a coffee. She had a meeting so couldn’t. And then I ran into someone from another floor in the elevator and she said we should go for coffee later. I said sure, but she never did ask me for coffee.

So on this particular Monday, when I realized that I really hadn’t talked to anyone in depth, I wondered if I could make it through the rest of the day without doing so. No suspense really – it was easy. No one came by my office and no one said hello when I passed them in the halls. I even made sure to get up and move around more than usual. Seriously - I did laps around my floor. I hung out in the kitchen, pretending to read the paper, ready to discuss current events with people who came in to grab something from the fridge. Still nothing. They say silence is golden, but this was a bit ridiculous. It's not always this way of course, but I'm pretty sure I could become a mute and my co-workers might not notice. It's a good thing I have such interesting voices inside my head - otherwise I might never have a conversation with anyone ever again.

on laziness and vampires

I have been remarkably bad at updating my blog this summer and so on this Saturday night as I lie here on my couch catching up on True Blood - which as a sidebar, I think we can all agree went super downhill this year - I don't know about you, but I don't care about witches. At all. Also, Eric in sport shorts and hoodies? Me no likey - give me back the black leather and tank tops. At least in tonight's episode he was back ... when he ripped that dude's heart out and then licked his finger? Well, come on. Just beautiful.

Ok, back to the task at hand. Now that September has arrived and the fun of summer is slowly coming to an end (more on that later), I vow to get back to the blogging on a more regular basis. Because I know my 7 readers have missed me, I will write something at least twice a week! Oh and I will also eat fewer carbs and exercise more regularly. I find I need to set more than one goal, because then if I only meet one, I don't feel so badly about totally failing at the others.

safety first pt. 3

So it's been awhile since I've discussed the obsession my workplace has with safety (for a quick refresher, see here and here), but the quarterly internal magazine just came out and there was an article in it that struck me. It was called "Exercise vs. Egress." Some of the highlights are below:

"A number of employees use the stairs to run up a flight or two rather than wait for the elevators. Why not, it saves time and allows you to get in a little exercise at the same time. But, the question is, "is it always safe?" In a building as old as this one, stairwells were built solely for egress (the act of exiting), which is why they are so narrow .... if an emergency were to occur there could be extreme congestion if the stairs are not being used for their true purpose ... The building has already experienced a number of near misses. The stairwells are

not monitored by building security, so one scenario to consider is that if while using the stairwell you were to trip or experience a medical emergency it is quite possible you would not be found for quite some time."

For reals. Apparently at my place of employment, safety trumps fitness. I'm obviously not the only one who chooses to flaunt this workplace health and safety guideline as I often run into people in the stairwell - which incidentally is easily wide enough to fit two people going in opposite direction - so I know that should I trip and hit my head, I would found promptly enough. But as a bonus, I did learn a new word = egress. I will now try to use it at least once a day from now on. Sentence for today: If my employer comes up with one more ridiculous safety guideline, I will have to egress through the nearest open window!

I'm your girl ...

So while my new job certainly has the potential to be interesting, as of right now I don’t have much to do. Nor do I see much potential for busy-ness in the near future. As a result I will have to think of other things to do during the day to pass the time. So I am fielding requests! Need a health issue researched? I’m your girl. Wondering what “industry standard” is for things like when to first sleep with a guy or who should say I love you first? I can look into that for you. Looking for a trip itinerary to San Francisco or Paris? I can be your travel agent. The opportunities for me to do your menial tasks are endless …

I’m also considering writing something longer than a 500 word blog post – a short story perhaps? The problem is that I have no idea of what to write about … so if anyone out there has a super creative idea but just doesn’t have the time to flush it out, please feel free to send it my way and I will expand on it as best I can. Should it get picked up for a screenplay, I will give you a full co-author credit. I’ll even split the profits ... not 50/50 obviously, but you'll get something. But if it wins an Academy Award, please be warned that I will not share the 45 second time allotment for the speech.

safety first pt. 2

I'm starting to get a bit concerned about my choice of new job. In training on Tuesday we went over the bomb threat checklist. The memo begins with "Bomb threats should never be treated lightly. The following guidelines will assist to minimize confusion ...."

For reals. And so I say again, what the hell have I gotten myself into?

safety first

So as previously mentioned I recently started a new job. Here is some sample training material from said new job:

"An inexperienced float plane passenger attempting to assist the pilot to dock is exposed to extreme danger from the rotating propeller."

Hmm. Not sure what I've gotten myself into ....

thanks again

Another thing I am thankful for = frequent flyer miles.

Thanks to aeroplan and my numerous flights to visit friends and family, I now have enough points to fly to Hawaii for free in 3 weeks. Let the countdown begin. Aloha!

thefacebook

Last night I saw The Social Network. I am not a movie reviewer, but here are my thoughts, take 'em or leave 'em.

First off, it was a very good movie. Was it the best movie I've seen this year (as some reviewers have taken to calling it)? No. Movies that I liked better than this one include The Kids are Alright, Me Too (a Spanish movie I saw at the film fest last week), and maybe even Inception. But still it was really good.

Obviously it's a great story - 19 year old screws over friends to become the youngest billionaire in the world. And more importantly, he created the phenomenon that is Facebook, of which I have been a member since sometime in 2007. To be able to write the code (whatever the hell that means), have it go viral, then mainstream and figure out how to make money from something that is ostensibly free is amazing. Even if it might not have been his idea to start out with, he took it and ran with it. Congrats Mr. Zuckerberg. The script was great - lots of talking, with subtle humour that you really have to listen for. I laughed out loud numerous times (and often times alone ... not sure if the rest of the theatre just wasn't paying as much attention as I was). The acting is great - Jesse Eisenberg in particular. And Andrew Garfield as the original CFO who really got screwed over. He was fabulous. It helps that he is super cute. And not at all age appropriate for me to be crushing on, but whatever. JT was good too - but really, I think I prefer him as a singer.

One thing I will say though is that there are no strong female characters in the movie. If we take this movies at face value (which I know we're not supposed to), it appears that there were no smart girls at Harvard in the early years of this decade - only groupies, girls bused in for parties, one night stands, slutty interns or complete whackos. I suppose you could argue that a female is responsible for the whole phenomenon (she breaks up with Zuckerberg, he starts an early version of facebook and then mopes when she doesn't accept his friend request right away), but really, this movie is about horny boys who happen to write computer code and turn out to be evil genuises.

What's almost more interesting than the movie itself is all of the coverage around it (mostly through blogs and other forms of social meadia) - what's true, what's not, what could be, and what definitely isn't. Seriously, if you want to waste a few solid hours reading some very entertaining articles, click on any of the above.

And as an appropriate coda to show just how useful Facebook really is, last night I did some Facebook stalking (one of my specialties) and found out that yankee hat guy and threesome date guy are friends. For serious. This city is just too damn small.