Messages from abroad, not massages from a broad

It’s been a while since I contributed to this, and I’ve let a lot of thoughts and stories pile up in my head.  I’ve been on vacation the last two weeks and I was simply too lazy to write while I was back in the Couv.

So I’m going to throw out some quickies first.  Well last time I wrote, there was a major storm going on outside and shortly after I wrapped up, the power went out.  Close call.  I woulda been totally choked if I had been mid-way through my previous post, only to lose it due to a lack of power.  I was in bed when the power went out and there was this incessant beep that went off every 30 seconds.  It was actually two beeps, cause I heard it in the living room, and then in my bedroom.  I was looking all over the place in the dark to find the source, but alas, I never found it and it took a huge toll on my night of sleep that evening.  Piss me off.  Thinking about it 3 weeks later and I’m still choked.

Ben and Jerry’s, akin to Baskin Robbins stores in Canada, offered up a free scoop day recently.  Some of us decided to check it out mid-day during work and we walked over to the local BJ’s up the street.  It’s amazing how many people were standing in line.  It was probably a good 40 foot line and I’d imagine about a 50-60 min wait for a single scoop of ice cream.  I like free stuff as much as anyone, but waiting an hour to save $2 is dumb.  Especially when you can go to the grocery store and buy a little tub for $2.50.  Needless to say, we didn’t wait.  It was probably a good thing because this was the same location where I once saw the night clerk closing up at night.  She was sweeping the floor and when she got to a table with some garbage on it, she took the broom and swept the garbage off the table to the floor.  I thought this was kinda gross because people eat off the tables and I’m pretty sure if she was too lazy to clean off the table properly, then she was probably too lazy to go back and wipe the table properly.  Ackk!

I’ve been meaning to mention this for a long time now too, but the acoustics in the metro station escalator wells are amazing.  The sound just bounces off the walls and you can hear everyone’s conversation loud and clear even if they’re a long distance away.  It’s most prevalent when you go up the escalator and you can hear the conversations of people coming down.  You hear women talking about their men, and how much they hate so-and-so.  It’s kinda funny.  Try it out if you’re ever in town.

Alright, so I was back in Vancouver for 12 days and I had a great time.  The flight home was decent.  I was inadvertently upgraded to the Economy Plus seating when a women and her young kids realized they couldn’t sit near the exit because they wouldn’t be able to help in case of an emergency.  Too bad this was on the shorter leg of my flight.  The second part of the flight home was not nearly as good.  When I switched planes in Chicago, I ended up sitting next to some dude that took all of the armrest.  The asshole had stinky breath too.  I knew this because he yawned a helluvalot!  It was even worse when he decided to buy a snack pack from the airline.  What was in the snack pack?  Tuna!  Lucky me.  Bad breath + tuna = super bad breath!  I should also mention that my hair was pretty long at the time.  When the flight attendants came around with their beverage cart, I was looking out the window with my back to the aisle and the male attendant asked ‘Ma’am, would you like a beverage?’  I knew he was talking to me because there were only males in my row and because they generally started from the window seat.  So I was mistaken for a women because of my long locks!  Either that or he was just an idiot.  Anyway, I turned around and he corrected himself and said ‘Err, Sir’.  Unbelievable!

So I waited a few days and I went and got a haircut at Axis on Georgia.  Thanks to Andy, who got me a 50% card, I let a sweet, cute thing, named Elissa cut my hair.  Alright, who am I kidding, she was pretty hot and literally a MILF ( a mother of a two year old).  Anyway, it was a good experience as I had never gone to a salon for a haircut.  I was telling Christine that I would have been perfectly fine getting a cut from a gay hairstylist, because they probably would have been better at cutting hair, but the trade-off was just fine with me.  Cute chesty blonds are just as good, and the haircut she gave me was fine with me.  Here’s a bit of a before and after look. However, the Before picture is actually 2 months old, so my hair was much longer in the back. 
Stupid me, I didn’t take any pictures of myself before I went to the salon.  I think the last picture taken of me prior was at the Canucks game.  Mary, if you have the pictures that you took during the game, could you send me a photo?

I feel fortunate that I went home during that particular week because as I mentioned earlier, I was able to go to Game 7 of the Canucks/Stars series.  It was probably one of the best hockey games I had ever been to and with all the screaming and hollering that night, I was sporting a raspy voice for a few days after.  I had tickets for a second round Canucks game too, but it conflicted with the John Mayer concert that same night.  In the end, there was a bit of a ticket fiasco and it turned out that the dates didn’t conflict after all, but I still had the opportunity to go to the concert.  It was a pretty good show, and even though John Mayer mumbles and makes a lot of weird noises with his music, I have to admit that I enjoy his music.  Good company, good tunes!

I celebrated my 30th birthday last week.  Check out the beautiful cake that Una made for us April babies.   Thanks Una!
I am now in
the ‘thirty-something’ category.  This doesn’t bother me at all.  I
think hitting 40 might be depressing for me though.  I dunno why, but it seems like a substantial milestones.  One that will make me reflect on accomplishments and life in general.  Anyway, that’s a decade away.  I’ll look forward to my mid-life crisis 10 years from now.  And so, before I knew it, 12 days had blown by and I was on my way home.  I was on a plane the next day, and I ended up sitting to another clown.  He clearly didn’t know how to drink because he made loud sipping noises every time he took a sip of his juice or coffee.  I’ll demonstrate how annoying it was next time I see you.  Just ask me for a demo.  What’s wrong with people on planes?  Anyway, I felt more sad to leave this time than in January.  Now that I know what I have to come back to in DC, I realize that I miss Vancouver a lot.  I miss my friends, family, and the comforts of home.

Other than people at work, I know one other person (Kelly) here that I met through Jen.  Well, Kelly messages me the other day and she tells me that she’s joined my Kickball team.  I thought, ‘Cool, who do you know on the team?’.  It turns out, she doesn’t know anyone on the team.  She just joined the league on her own and was randomly seeded onto my team.  What a coincidence!  It’s trippy stuff and I guess that goes to show how small this big world really is.

Some final quick bits and shoutouts:

-my niece Ava is adorable as ever; she can stand on her own now

-Ray & Deb’s baby is so cute too; that’s one good looking baby

-it was good seeing some of the old WebCT crew, too bad I couldn’t see everyone (next time though)

-$2 US bills are more common than I thought

-magazine subscriptions in the US are awesome

-gas prices in Canada are ridiculous; I’m glad I don’t drive much

Anyway, next stop, Las Vegas.  Talk to ya’ll later.

Do you ever get that dreadful feeling when you know that there’s something crappy that you’re going to have to deal with at work or perhaps it’s the mere thought of facing  something that is just really shitty in general.  Well, I know I’ve experienced this a couple of times in the last little while and there’s this built up anxiety that looms over me every time it happens. I woke up the other day and that was the first feeling that came over me.  It’s a troubling feeling when you wake up and it’s doom and gloom right away.  And it was all because I knew it was going to be a busy crappy day.  On the flip side, I’ve also noticed that I usually over-anticipate things.  So when the time comes and it’s time to face the music, it’s usually not that bad.  It’s one hell of a defense-mechanism.  I’ve got a lot of grey hairs to show for it.

I don’t know what is so special about these candies here, but everybody has them.  I shit you not, when I say everyone because I see them every place I go to.  All the restaurants have them, all of the lobby’s carry them, the banks, etc…  They all have these complimentary candies that they leave out and they’re all the same assortment of hard sweets: some Werther’s Originals, A&W candies, butterscotch, strawberry, different flavoured swirly candies.  I don’t get it.  There must be a group of people that peddle these things for charity cause everywhere I go, I find them staring at me, coaxing me to have one. I generally don’t unless they have Werther’s Originals, and that’s only sometimes too.  I’m just sick of seeing them.  It’s weird when a bowl of variety candies isn’t enough variety for me.  I guess I am just more and more difficult to please.

This weekend, it felt like Groundhog Day, I somehow managed to go to Costco four times, and IKEA twice.  It’s not that I love going to Costco that much, it just worked out that way.  I went the first time to specifically pick up beer, a second time with the intentions to buy a rug, a third time to actually buy the rug (from a different location), and a fourth time so that my colleague Gurp could buy a rug too.  We would have gone to the one in Woodbridge too, but it wasn’t open yet (not until May 5th).  You must be thinking, ‘that must be one hell of a rug!’  Well, to quote The Dude from the Big Lebowski, "That rug really tied the room together" and I think that statement holds true.  I love the rug that I bought.  The price was good, the size was nice (10′x7′), and the different patterns they carried were nice too.
Anyway, all of the trips weren’t that bad because most of the visits were relatively short.  But admittedly, it was probably three too many trips.   IKEA is always sold out of stuff.  They just need to carry more products in black-brown.  If you go to the self-serve area to pick up your desired item, there’s a good chance that the bin will be empty.  Anyway, I picked up a coffee table for $40 cause I was tired of using the stupid futon.  I picked up a TV stand too. I was sick of watching it off of the floor. 

Lately the weather has sucked something fierce.  It’s been cloudy and grey the past few days here and right now, the wind is trying to blow my windows out.  It is seriously scary because this building is old and I don’t have a lot of faith in these windows.  I’m sure I’ve lost my window screens too.  I thought having windows was a good thing, but when they keep rattling like they are right now, then it’s just unnerving.  I live on the top floor so I actually hear the wind from the roof too.  I just hope it doesn’t keep me up.  I wonder if this kind of weather wreaks the same havoc as it does in Vancouver.  There are a lot of trees here too, so it wouldn’t surprise me if I wake up to stories of giant trees being uprooted and blocking the highway.  Scary shit!

I’m going to close this off for now, and I wanna put out some final thoughts:

- stop voting for Sanjaya people!

- Lost was great last week; finally something interesting

- 24 finally took a turn for the better; Chinese people sure are relentless

- Go Canucks!

- if there’s any interest of going to NJ for a concert, let me know, I think I’ll be going in July

- I’m out!

Earlier this week, I started off one day on a great note.  On my way to work, I was getting off the trolley bus when I stepped onto the sidewalk and my feet decided to do something to embarrass me.  So I tripped, and it was like slow motion, and I had a quick flashback of when I tripped a few years back crossing the street by Red Robins on Broadway.  This was maybe the second most embarrassing fall in recent history because there was a bus load of people getting off with me and I had my IPOD blasting away in my ears, so I couldn’t hear myself when I said "Oh shit!" as I fell.  So I don’t really have an idea of how loud I said it, or how many heard me say it, nor do I know how many people noticed me fall.  I braced myself with my hands and rolled over on my back.  So I ended up looking up into the sky and back at the bus.  Good job eh?!?  The fall was actually a lot more gentle than I had initially anticipated and I didn’t scrape my hands or anything.  Anyway, I wanted to share that moment with everyone.  If you’ve had a bad day or a bad experience, just think about the one I had and see who had it worse.

Earlier this week, I was buying groceries at the local Giant store, and the cashier was trying to make small talk with me so the first thing he said was ‘Do you like Chinese food?’.  Well, I thought it was an interesting question since I felt I was being racially profiled.  It was innocent enough and I wasn’t really offended by it or anything, but I figured his line of questioning was a tad odd.  Like I said, it didn’t really piss me off per se, but I guess I kinda thought it was inappropriate.  I think he might offend some people if he started to ask African Americans if they liked fried chicken and grits or if he started to ask every Latino if they enjoyed living in America. 

Yesterday, I decided to take a break in the afternoon and I went for a quick walk with Anand.  We found a place near the office that sold Bubble Tea.  Shocking stuff cause I didn’t think anybody would sell that out here.  They had 3 flavours to choose from: Strawberry, Mango, and Green Tea.  I mustered up the courage and ordered a mango one.  Boy did it suck!  I knew I was in trouble when I tried to take a sip from it and the whole straw was plugged up.  The ‘pearls’ were clumped together and they refused to go up the straw.  I pulled the straw out and there was a huge chunk of goopy shit at the end so I took of it and it was exactly what I feared.  Soft and sticky pearls with a gross hard crumbly center.  That was pretty disgusting, but I hadn’t even tried the liquid part of the drink yet.  I unplugged the straw and took a sip of the mango drink and I could definitely tell there was a huge problem with it.  I guess they didn’t use regular milk cause I could taste a distinct and overpowering taste of condensed milk throughout the drink.  It was rich and gross.  It wasn’t what I was expecting and it was too different for my liking.  I took 4 sips from it and I threw it out.  I cannot wait to get some L&G or Pearl Castle bubble tea when I get home.

And finally tonight, I found out that the hockey pool I had led for about 90% of the season, was all for nothing.  I finished 2nd because of some crappy goal that was scored in the final minute of the final game of the NHL regular season.  That fucking sucked!  Talk about getting the rugged pulled out from under me.  It was like a swift kick to the nuts.  I literally spent hours watching hockey this weekend, only to find out I was going to finish second fiddle.  Bah!  Congrats to that cocksucker Wes!  I’m not even that upset to come in second.  I just don’t wanna hear Wes brag about it cause he won two pools.  The only good thing that came outta the weekend was that the Maple Leafs were knocked out of the playoffs.  Woohoo!

On a closing note, lately I’ve been feeling very emotional and moody.  I’ve had a lot
of things irk me or make me really ticked off.  I don’t know how to
explain this petulance.  I think it’s a lack of a stronger support
group out here.  It’s not quite the same out here as when I had my close friends around me at home.  Oh well.  I’ll get over the crap that happened this week.  I’ll be home soon, and in May, when I come back to DC, I’ll get to play Kickball too.  Yes, I joined a California Kickball league.  It should be fun.  I hear it’s beer drinking league.  Anyway, wish me luck for a better week.  Peace!

Anthony