Oh! Cliff-mas Tree
Posted by Candice on December 17, 2009 at 10:09 pm
I made it home. Barely. The flight was less than fun. Five babies, 2 dogs, 1 loud drunk woman, turbulence.
It’s all better now though.
Today Mom and Katelyn and I went to get a Christmas tree. Fun times. First Katelyn had to drive our car up a cliff only to realize that we went in the wrong direction and had to turn around. Then we all had to climb the cliff (which was a slippery, ice cliff) and freeze until Katelyn found the perfect tree. Personally I would have been content with any of them. Preferably one closer to the car. Really, what’s the fun in a perfect tree. I like mine to have a little character. The farm worker came and cut the tree down, hauled it down the hill, and binded it up to put in the trunk. Mom and I laughed and laughed and slipped down the cliff. Then mom drove down the cliff and we headed home.
I haven’t picked out a Christmas tree in years because of my predilection for homely ones because I’ve been really busy, so it was great to get out today with my family and do it. We have a lot of fun together. I’m sure all the other less happy tree-hunters were jealous of us.
Oh, and Tom made it home safely too.
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Posted by Tom on December 17, 2009 at 12:43 am
Cop out post of a pretty picture of Candice!
This was Candice last night, saying “I have no idea where we’re going tonight!”
Early Christmas Present!
Posted by Candice on December 16, 2009 at 1:10 am
Tom gave me an early Christmas present.
It started Sunday night when he told me I had to be packed before 6:00 on Tuesday (which I’m not). Then yesterday he told me that I had to be ready to leave the apartment by 6:00 on Tuesday and wear something nice because we were going somewhere.
I pretty much incessantly asked him what we were doing for the next 24 hours.I’m really not a fan of surprises. I didn’t know how to mentally or fashionably prepare myself.
Then at 6:30 we left the house and got on a bus. Then he told me we needed to get another bus. I had no idea where we were going. We got to the subway station and Tom led me to the North-bound trains. This totally confused me. What happens North of Sheppard/Yonge Station? There are only 2 stops.
We got off at the next station and Tom led me though a maze of plazas and municipal buildings. Then, as we crossed the street to the theatre I realised where we were going - to see Jersey Boys.
Jersey Boys is this eye-candy, corporate, musical production about Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons that has been running and heavily promoted since we moved here.
It was a fun show and I had a great time. It was a lovely present. I’ll “review” the experience in another post because now it’s bedtime and I have to be well rested for my flight tomorrow.
Gift Story
Posted by Tom on December 14, 2009 at 11:37 pm
You know how when you’re growing up and Christmas rolls around, and all of the toy ads start? And then the Christmas catalog shows up at the door and you spend hours and hours flipping through it, careful considering everything and wondering what best to ask for from Santa? And then you very carefully circle the things that you like the most, make sure that you write them out perfectly on your letter to Santa and also make sure that your parents know exactly what it is you’d like, just in case Santa can’t get something so maybe they could help.
One Christmas I really wanted this game called Crocodile Dentist. (My Mom has probably started laughing at this point.) Man-o-man I really wanted that game. It was a plastic crocodile that you had to try to pry the teeth from without it chomping on your fingers and coming after you. It looks like this. And for some reason I really wanted it for Christmas.
So Christmas rolls around and (if my memory serves me right) I was pretty sure that I wasn’t going to get it. After all the presents were open there was sadly no Crocodile Dentist. But I believe something happened along the lines of Dad finding a present that Santa hid down there that was for me and he brought it up. I tore open the wrapping and it was - *gasp* - Crocodile Dentist! Wicked-Super-Pumped!
Later that day, we took it out of the box and set it up on the dining room table. I probably managed to get one or two turns in before the crocodile slammed its mouth shut and chased after me.
And man was I terrified.
I screeched and bawled, and wanted Crocodile Dentist taken away forever. And it was. Phew.
A couple years later I remember finding it in the basement. I set it up and played once or twice, not really sure why I had made a big fuss. But… I guess weird things get to you when you’re a kid. Especially angry crocodiles with toothaches.
Bed Lunch
Posted by Candice on December 14, 2009 at 12:10 am
Today I read a little snippet in Women’s Health that said apparently “studies” show that couples who drink hot liquids together trust each other more. So now I’m pretty sure that Tom and I are still together because of all the tea. I think Tom and I have been having nightly cups of tea together every day for about five years. And these teas are often accompanied by bed lunches.
When we first started having bed lunches they were often after long evenings of dancing and were often carb-o-licious slices of raisin toast with butter. Then that whole thing with the gluten happened and my snacks shifted to having cereal or leftovers from supper. Tom would have, like, a roast or something. Now, that I’m not quite as active and don’t eat as much fruit during the day my bed lunches are usually just a piece of fruit and maybe some cheese. Mmm cheese.
But the point of this post is not meant to be some sort of food diary or exposition of my weird relationship to food. It’s meant to talk about the best bed lunches of all. Those when you’ve eaten all the good food you need to during the day, got all your micro and macro nutrients and the bed lunch is just the icing on the cake. And sometimes, it can even be icing. Or, cheese and crackers and jam; or a muffin; or a piece of banana bread crumbled into un-homogenized whole milk yogurt (can you guess what I had for a snack tonight?)!
So, if “hot liquids” keep couples trusting each other then I think bed lunches (or at least the good ones) can let couples know what their partner’s indulgences are and subsequently keep them interested in each other! The combo works well for us!
Holiday Party!
Posted by Tom on December 13, 2009 at 7:36 pm
The home stretch is in sight, and concentrating on study is incredibly difficult. Thankfully I got a diversion from schoolwork on Friday night when Candice and I headed downtown to go to the YFS’s annual holiday party.
The night started with us waiting for a bus that never came, followed by a quick subway ride and a short streetcar trip. We arrived at a very lovely loft in Kensington Market, full of smiles, food and drinks. We hung out for a couple of hours, talking with friends who you usually only see while at school or in the middle of a campaign, so it was nice to be able to see people in a different atmosphere.
Some awesome music helped turn the night into a great time, and I’m looking forward to doing it again. Another quick transit journey full of laughs and Peggle brought us back to our apartment in northern Toronto. There are a couple pictures from the night over here, if you’re interested.
Ps. Yes, this post is super late. Apologies. I’ll make up for it by seeing you soon.
Don’t be too grumpy with me!
Posted by Candice on December 12, 2009 at 2:17 pm
Alright, I dropped the ball and totally forgot to make a post yesterday.
Our days have been non-stop busy with hopes of getting at least a few things accomplished so that we can have a relaxing break at home.
However, to make up for it, I’m going to share perhaps the best Christmas special ever. At least watch one of the segments. It’s called Grumpy Old Women at Christmas and it is a bunch of British women complaining about Christmas traditions.
Snaps
Posted by Tom on December 10, 2009 at 11:41 pm
Over the past few days I’ve received a handful of emails from people asking me to send them some photos I’ve taken over the past year or so. These people were mainly looking for photos of family, but I was kind of shocked to find out that I had very few that I could send over. Unless it was an event where photos were expected to be taken (birthdays, parties, birthday parties), I didn’t have many.
It didn’t really surprise me after thinking about it for a second, since I’ve found that whenever the camera comes out during times when people aren’t done up, folks instinctively slink away from my viewfinder or ask me to put the camera away. But the whole point of me trying to take some photos at these times is so that I can capture the memories of when we were “just hanging out” or “just playing cards” or just being ourselves.
I love taking photos of animals, and I love taking photos of landscapes, and I really like taking photos of performances, but when I really enjoy is taking photos of friends and family so that when one of them emails me looking for a picture from that night where we sat around doing nothing except spending awesome time with each other, I can say sure, no sweat, here you go. Because lets face it, those are often the times that you want to remember more (or at least, I do).
This trip home I’m going to make an effort to try to get more shots of my friends and family. And really, what better time to spend awesome times with friends and family than at Christmas?
Friends don’t let friends get massages and then write term papers.
Posted by Candice on December 9, 2009 at 10:41 pm
Given that I am done with ballet for 2009, I decided that yesterday I would attempt to iron out some of the damage I have done to my back and hips all semester with a massage. Another great thing about the dance department at York is that they have a massage therapist and physiotherapist working in the building so I didn’t have to venture very far to find someone who knows exactly what is necessary after 3 months of arabesques.
So, at 1:10 I scooted over to the building and on to the table. However, I should have known better than to schedule a massage so early in the day. I thought it would be okay since she could only fit me in for a 1/2 hour, but no, I still got massage-drunk.
Massage-drunk is why I rarely get a massage in Corner Brook - because I can’t drive home after. I’m so relaxed that I can’t think straight, the world is going way to fast for me, and all I can do is stare off into space. I managed to make it home yesterday and attempted to work on a final paper but had to give up once nothing I was writing made any sense and I was starting to drool on the keyboard. Even though I had hours of school work to do I ended up taking a nap.
However, as unproductive as my day was it certainly felt healthy to relax a little and with today’s “big snowstorm” I was perfectly refreshed and content to stay snuggled up in the apartment and get some serious work done!
Community
Posted by Tom on December 9, 2009 at 12:33 am
I guess it comes as a result of living in a big city, but since we’ve moved here I’ve picked up on a lot of very cool ideas, a lot of which have to do with communicating about local issues. For example, there’s a message board called Urban Toronto where people discuss rant about local events and changes, and there’s sites like blogTO or Torontoist, blogs which write about local happenings and aggregate local news. Of course there’s also a bunch of local free weekly newspapers and radio stations.
Sure, this helps contribute to the stereotypical Torontonian who doesn’t know about anything that goes on outside the city limits (okay, so maybe they know a couple things that happen in the “greater Toronto area”), but it also provides a sense of community and city pride. These outlets provide people with easy access to things they probably should know about (and commentary on it), everything from major city budget issues to plans for a popular city landmark to be torn down.
I’ve started thinking a lot lately about how these ideas can be applied to smaller centers - namely, Corner Brook and the surrounding area. There is ongoing work happening at SWGC to create a community radio station based out of the school cafeteria and the group organising it are putting a lot of effort into ensuring that it is a community radio station and not university based. It’s going to start out being based online, eventually branching onto terrestrial airwaves, and if it works (where working would mean that people want to listen and participate in it) I think that it could mean a renewed sense of civic pride for Corner Brook. People could tune in to hear commentary (both positive and negative) on local issues, and when people actually know what these issues are, they’ll create opinions and want to get involved.
I would absolutely love to be involved with this, and help bring this to Corner Brook and the area, and I would particularly like to help bring this issues and ideas to the “younger” generation. For a long time, decisions in the city and the surrounding communities have been made by an “older” generation, largely because the younger generation is disinterested. Using methods like the radio station, or a community oriented blog or whatever, maybe we can get the younger generation caring. I mean, they’re going to have to run the city someday, right?