aurora borealis

For some reason (that I do not know) I was up at 2am this morning and couldn't get back to sleep. So I skipped going shopping as I was pretty shattered. While I normally do a lot of cleaning on Saturday I was too wiped so when James went to play at Duncan's house, I settled in to watch 'aurora borealis'. I picked it because it has Joshua Jackson in it. It was quite good. I liked the growth in Joshua's character- I thought it was very well done.

Making pizza for dinner tonight- hope to go shopping instead tomorrow morning before Rustle.

inbetween

3 days of running exams is exhausting. Now at least there is the 3 day weekend.

The weather has turned cooler and I am wearing pants. Yup, cool enough for pants is something in July.

I am going shopping tomorrow at 7am and have got shopping list block as I can't think of what to make for dinner for Sun and Mon.

A BB funny seems to be every goodbye message to people voted off from Rachel seems to be about how that person tried to get between her and her man. Are that many people really trying to get between her and her man? And there aren't that many people in the house!

Hockey power!

James has been up early all week doing a pretty intense hockey camp. He's having a great time mainly because his buddies are at the camp with him. I don't know if he would enjoy it so much without them.

Today was the first day of the July exams and it was super crazy with stuff going on and to top it all off, the storm hit at close to the end of the exam day making the lights flicker but the power did not go out (thankfully!) I can't believe running 1 exam venue is as tiring as running 7 of them!

Kim's back!

My world traveller friend is back. She hardly ate and hardly slept for almost 2 weeks but she had a great time and she looks fabulous. Luckily, working shift work and never sleeping prepared her well for the trip!

The funniest thing she said was "It's going to be really hard to walk into a room and NOT have everyone clap and cheer". Apparently, they were treated like royalty or something and everyone was always very excited to see them! I made a note to myself to clap and cheer the next time she comes in a room, just so she doesn't miss the Philippines too much!

When I went to Kim's house her mother (a.k.a. the walking miracle) came RUNNING out to see me. She looks sooo good. I wish I could put into words. She is getting her hair back and her eyes are clearer than I've ever seen them. She wants to buy a car so she can get out and about again.

I asked Zully how he fared while Kim was away and the said that there was noone to boss him around for 10 days so that was good, but that he missed being bossed around so that wasn't so good. (He was joking around)

Switching to James' sensitivity:
At the end of Robbie's birthday party last week there was a girl that wanted to hug and kiss James goodbye. James burst into tears. Apparently she violated Man Code.

At Vacation Bible School last week, one of the days they did a story from the Bible where a person had died. The teacher told me that James had cried because his Granny had also died. This did happen about a year ago but he has a trip to Moncton coming up so that may make things a bit raw again.

And on to James' persistence:
James has decided he wants the FIFA 2010 Wii game and so he pesters everyone he can think of about this game. Especially me. We have this conversation MULTIPLE times a day:
J: I want FIFA 2010 WII
Me: I understand
J: Can I get it?
Me: For Christmas.

The thing is a lot of the Wii games really are too difficult for him. The Wii hockey he basically lets the computer play on its own and he watches it (though he has gotten a lot better at it, he still mainly runs it in 'demo' mode).
He has found lot of the Fifa Wii games on Youtube and he watches them as videos, which may not be too different from what he would do if he had the game itself (except he could pick the teams)

When AJ came over one day last week he brought some of his Wii games and I wasn't too keen on them due to the amount of shooting. He had a tank game and the new Ben 10 game. I like Rachel's mom's note for her sons' birthday invites asking for no violent toys. I hope to apply this even when he wants violent games. I am ok with sports but will try to make sure he avoids the violent ones as long as I can!

Baseball

James was very excited about the baseball game at the Rustle picnic. He was so looking forward to it. Water balloons were an added bonus.
And he did enjoy it too, though he didn't really know the rules beforehand. With the interesting rules that were used in the game I'm not sure he's much better off now.

I got a GREAT picture of Al that he says I'm not allowed to post. But he didn't say I couldn't send it to people if they ask for it! lol.

Carolyn cut James' hair today- she did a super job. Pictures will follow, I'm just heading out with Kim who is back from Thailand and the Philippines.

'R' for 'Rain' and 'Rachel'

More rain today. Yesterday I managed to get a LOT of laundry hung out before I went to work- 3 loads. But now the rain has returned. I am hoping for a break to do another load.

James has his big 'finale' at Vacation Bible School so I have the day off work today. He's pretty excited about the song his class will sing.

As Big Brother is on this summer, there will also be BB notes on the blog. Just ignore if you are not watching! I keep up with a lot of the spoilers of the show but had missed the 'house meeting' that Rachel called to 'out' Matt. That was a really silly thing to do, in my opinion. Now she's made an enemy out of Matt who was not really one before. He volunteered to be put up as a pawn on the condition that she didn't tell anyone he volunteered. But she told everyone at the meeting. Why couldn't he play both sides if he volunteers to be the pawn? Rachel's thinking was just wrong, she should have left it alone. I think she should be voted out for this.
Funny how in her goodbye speeches to the girls that were evicted she accuses all of them of trying to break up her and her 'man'. Insecure much? He's only been her 'man' for what 20 days? Yep, I'm sucked into BB again.

Seeing red

The colour went odd on our tv- it is now a red and black tv. It's not THAT bad- I just think green is missing. I don't miss it. I still watched big brother fine, just missed if anyone was wearing green!

James and I watched a swarm of ants take a worm away. Like a whole earthworm. Ants are pretty amazing in some ways.

Something has eaten all the beans from the bean plant my neighbour gave me and left me none!

This house had HUGE sunflowers growing in front of it(over the roof line!):

James took these 3 of me:



Rainbow after the storm today:

interesting

Sometimes things have very interesting lessons that you don't expect. That you may expect you'll learn something but what you learn is completely unrelated to where you thought you were going.
Well, a house came up for sale about a block away from Russell- on Thomas St. I like the idea of living nearer to Russell and the house is in very good condition so I thought I would take a look at it. Now, it was more of a whim as I don't know that it's the right time for us to move yet. But I didn't think it would hurt to look.
I had some conversations with the agent and arranged to see it today at 5pm.
When I told James that I was going to go and look, he had a BREAKDOWN. He didn't want to move. He didn't want to loose his things and his soccer field (our front lawn!). He sat on my lap and wept. I tried to explain that sometimes change brings about growth and there are new good things to discover. But he was pretty adamant that he didn't believe that!
We went outside to play soccer before I had to go and only were outside for minute before James decided he was going to come with me and we were going to leave NOW.
So off we went. We met the agent and went through the lovely house. And it is really very nice but not terribly suitable for an 8 year old boy. It is very landscaped and orderly and not so much designed for the rough and tumble. However, as James left he was like - how much is it? We need to BUY it. Within a few hours how quickly things can change!

Then we came home and had dinner and then it was time for the B'ette and Frank. Frank left. Ali was devastated and said how selfish Frank was- but if we remember back a few months when she was on Jake's season, didn't she leave in about the same manner at about the same time in the season. And then didn't she call him when he was on fantasy date week and ask to come back? She called Frank a coward but I think he was very courageous really!

Hail!

There were giant chunks of hail that fell at the start of the storm last night. Who would have thought when you have 30 degree weather (37 with humidex) you could get hail?

10 minutes until Big Brother. James and I are both spoiled as to what will happen.

James is in Vacation Bible School tomorrow. I am using up some lieu time this week so I can drop him off before work.

same kind of different as me

Today was a very full day.
At 8am I went grocery shopping. After I got home and unloaded James and I headed off to AJ's birthday party. There was a location change so I helped walk the kids back to AJ's place (safely!). Then I went to Rustle for prayer. Then I headed back to AJs place to pick up James.
We came home, I did some yard work and biked to the library to look for more Red Green for James. Then AJ came over in the afternoon and is still here having a sleep- over.
James is an exceptionally good child when he has a friend over. The things he might complain to me about if he is on his own - nary a peep when a friend is over. I like it! However, I did not get off complaint free as AJ seemed to pick up where James left off. Funny!

I finished reading "Same kind of different as me" by Ron Hall, Denver Moore and Lynn Vincent. Barbara mentioned it on her blog and I ordered it. It was indeed very good. The book is a little bit about homelessness and a bit about friendship but mainly about God moving through painful circumstances to bring about redemption.

A couple of my favorite excerpts:

p.155 "Most people want to be circled with safety, not by the unexpected. The unexpected can take you out. But the unexpected can also take you over and change your life. (Ron)"
p.45 "See, we don't need to be tryin to drag the homeless, or any kinda needy people, to "programs", to "services." What people needs is people.
And needy people don't need no perfect people neither. When Jesus sent his disciples out, He sent Peter right along, knowin that Peter had a bad temper and a potty mouth and was goin' deny Him three times. He sent John and James even though they was full a' pride and fighting over the best seat at the table. He even sent Judas, knowin that Judas was gon' betray Him. Even though Jesus knowed all a' their sin and weakness, He sent 'em anyway...If you is waitin to clean up your own life before you get out and help someone else, you may as well take off your shoes and crawl back in the bed 'cause it ain't never gon' happen. (Denver)"

Sabotage

The saboteur got voted off BB tonight- before she had a chance to really do too much. It's too bad- after the first night I thought Annie was very well spoken and would be a good narrator for the season. Sometimes they get people who can't read too well. This may be why they are on a reality tv show to earn money of course. This season they seem to be pretty smart though. Always interesting.

My credit card sent me a message this week indicating that in September my monthly bill will show how long it would take to pay off my balance if I only paid the monthly payment each month. Now I don't plan on using this feature other than for amusement as I only put things on my credit card if I have the money to pay it off so I don't use the minimum payment feature. My interest with this new reporting method is trying to understand what the aim of the credit card company is by doing this. Do they want people to make more than the minimum payment each month when they see that it will take 59.6 years to pay off their balance if they only make the minimum payment? Isn't it better for the credit card companies if people do only make the min payment? Don't they earn more interest that way? Or are they having problems with people dying before their balance is paid? This could of course backfire on them in a bad way as people may say- I'll still have a balance when I'm dead, so why bother paying more than the minimum payment? So many questions!

James was feeling better today and returned to hockey camp. Tomorrow is the last day.
Saturday and Sunday James has birthday parties to go to. As James' hockey camp is by toys r us after camp they went to pick out birthday presents for the 2 boys. One of the things he picked out was a gun (with the nerf bullets) but I am making them take it back because I don't think that gun's are appropriate gifts even if they only have nerf bullets. Call me hardline.

I wish I was a messenger and that all the news was good

evidence

James was not feeling well today and had to spend the day resting instead of going to his expensive hockey camp. He seems to be feeling better now.

Our moving guys were moving exam booklets today and I was directing traffic as to where they should go. They had gone back down to the moving truck and I was waiting for them to return when the door opened and Lee and Dennis (from ITS) arrived. I was rather startled to see them as I was expecting the moving guys. Apparently they came to update the computers. After they had got going and the booklets were organized, I go back down to do my work and then get an email from a different guy in ITS asking me when the room is free to do the update. I gave him the dates, but I was like - dude- there's a guy upstairs right now doing the updates!

Who is watching Big Brother this season? I'm liking Matt so far. I think the saboteur twist has added a lot more early paranoia!

Surprise visit

James was up at 3am this morning- probably fell out of bed.

My parents surprised us with a visit at lunchtime and went to see James' hockey camp.

My eyeballs hurt a lot now!
Listening to Pearl Jam's Wish List that Tim and the band sung on Sunday!

Lunch plans

Our office closes at lunchtime in the summer and so I feel free-er to leave during my lunch than maybe other times in the year. So, when there aren't people to hang out with- on Tuesday I get to see Melissa and Thursday la Lisa- I plan to bike down to the water and get to enjoy a bit of that during my favorite season!

Work was very busy this morning as it was my first day back after vacation. I am working on fixing a lot of problems :)

Canadian Tire is still working on my new bike. At first they told me it wasn't under warranty but now they are saying they will try to get it fixed under warranty so who knows?

James is doing offensive skills training with Kent Hawley this week. He played in the NHL I think? Kent's wife was one of James' daycare teachers.

Yet another new blog

As if y'all weren't having enough trouble keeping track of all my blogs, I have added another one.
However, this one probably won't be of much interest to anyone- it is just my log of the goings on of the apartment across the street from me that likely houses a neighbourhood drug dealer. I called it "Small time dealing" I'll keep all updates there regarding that apartment.
Since any photos you take on a public space are public domain then anything you see in a public space must also be public domain :)

After the rain

After the rain

James likes to build with magnetics.

James in the shorts he picked out himself. I told him it had to be size 6X but I think in the future I will no longer take him to the 'boys' section. Size 7/8 in the young men is more appropriate!
And the England hat, which is white. On a boy. I don't know how long it will stay that way!

What the soccer guys do before the game starts:

More pictures at James blog

Chiang Mai

Kim is now in Chiang Mai. Hopefully sleeping.

In celebration of her being in Thailand, I am wearing the shirt my mother brought me back from her trip to Thailand.

Karen is coming over around 2:30 to watch the soccer game with James.

I am making Morrocan Lentil Soup for dinner tonight. It was originally made as a vegetarian meal but I adjusted it a bit so I could use up my leftover chicken. It has: carrots, celery, tomatoes, chicken, lentils, chick peas, kidney beans. I used chicken stock instead of vegetable stock and added ginger, nutmeg, cinnamon, garlic and cayenne pepper. If you are in the area at dinner time and want to check it out, feel free to come over- the slow cooker is very full!

Bangkok

Kim is now in Bangkok. 34 degrees Celsius the airport tells me.

I was *lucky* enough to be woken up by heavy rain and a cat attacking something so that I could look up Kim's airplane and write this post. Bangkok had the same (annoying) flight system as Manila. I am getting more used to it now. The system tells you what the scheduled times are but only tells you if something deviates from schedule. So it doesn't tell you if it has landed or taken off or anything- you just have to infer from the schedule that all is going to plan. Which is not terribly helpful as I have her schedule and I just like confirmation that the plane has landed. But I guess they are of the opinion that everything runs just as scheduled.

Kim is now due to fly out in an hour and a half to Chiang Mai, where she will actually get to sleep. The airport tells me that the plane arriving in Chiang Mai will be 4 minutes late. I find this a bit odd since the aircraft has not left yet. Do they know it is going to leave 4 minutes late? Do they plan this just to mess their computers up a bit?

Yesterday I came to the realization that the young lad who moved into the apartment in the house across the road is likely involved in drugs. He moved in a few weeks ago and I noticed there was some traffic but I thought -he's a young guy- he's just having some friends drop by. But after last night I think differently.
-one guy arrived at the house across the road with some type of cloth in his hand. He used this cloth to open the door. I guess so there are no fingerprints? He didn't knock (most of them don't)
-a police car drove down the street and shone a light in my eyes. I think they were probably looking for house numbers. I don't know if that was related.
-shortly after the police left another car (burgundy) showed up and a guy got out with a bag. The guy did not know where he was going and the outdoor light was off (maybe on purpose as he normally has it on) and he was wandering a bit. He spotted the stairs to the 'real' neighbours house (the landlord part) and almost went up but must have been on a cell phone with the apartment-guy as he abruptly turned away. (I was really hoping that he would make the landlord aware of what was going on!) Then he found his was in the dark to the back apartment. He knocked on the door. The car waiting for him drove around the block and then waited across the street instead of waiting outside the house.

In talking last night with Sarah, I think I am going to talk to the guy next door. He has 4 kids and is very neighbourhood savvy. Maybe I'll also write a letter with the details to the police as well. I'll keep watching on the weekend if I'm awake. The birds are chirping now. I'll try to get back to bed.

Manila

Now Kim is in Manila. For the record, Manila has a very poor aircraft reporting system, I find.
Don't you feel like you are on a world tour too? I like to be all-inclusive!
In a few hours she leaves again- heading for Thailand this time. It takes a few days to get where she is going, I guess.

The rain has come and the rain is nice and warm. Much better than the sprinkler that was icy cold!

Over the Pacific

Heh, this has become like Kim's travel blog except I don't *really* know what's going on- I'm just tracking the flights. When she lands in Manila the time difference between here and there will be exactly 12 hours. In about 1/2 hour I will be able to start tracking her flight through the Manila airport. They are almost in tomorrow.

It is still very hot here. I went grocery shopping in the morning, though forgot the can of chick peas I need for tomorrow's dinner so I'll probably pop out tomorrow as well. I like going for a bike ride every day even in the extreme heat. I'll just have to take a run through the sprinkler after.

James is expecting a package through UPS and the UPS truck had the audacity to show up and deliver a parcel to the house across the street. James was very disappointed!

Kim is now in Vancouver

Kim landed safely in Vancouver. Though her plane was 21 minutes late leaving TO, they must have made up time in the air as it arrived 15 minutes early in Vancouver. She must be pretty relieved that she made it through the first stage ok.
She doesn't leave Vancouver until about 3am in my timezone heading to Manila.

Big Brother was on tonight- the first episode- and they revealed a 'saboteur' twist. This scared James quite a bit. He cried. I guess he doesn't like saboteurs.

Kim is off on her world tour

Kim's plane left Toronto airport at 4:21. 21 minutes late. Her stopover in Vancouver is a few hours so 21 minutes should not affect her next plane. I am very excited for her and for all the obstacles she has overcome to get to this point!

Yesterday I took a proper vacation day. I read a novel "Shades of Blue" by Karen Kingsbury and watched a movie "Bonneville"

Today I went downtown and got some groceries. There weren't many people braving the heat in the morning. I also bought some scissors for James and for work. The dollar store has awesome scissors for only a dollar. At work they pay more and get shoddy scissors so I am improving the workplace :)

Then James and I ran through the sprinkler for a while. I needed a bit of a nap in the afternoon due to the 3am wake-up. Then I worked on cleaning the bedroom. I am trying to clean one room each remaining day of vacation!

steven

James' new friend that I referred to in the last post is named steven. There seem to be quite a lot of people who live in his house- I can't quite keep track of all the relationships. But his sisters daughters son lives there- he's about 2 but with the conversational style of a 30 year old. Smart kid. Steven sits on his front porch most of the day, shielded by a sun umbrella. He likes to talk to the people on the street. Maybe he doesn't have AC so it is nicer outside than in. I know that is true of our house! Anyway James likes having a friend down the street. He asks to go for 'promenades' during the day so he can say hello to his friend. He also likes playing hockey with the younger boy. As the boy is 2 and James is 8, James pretty much smokes him.

Steven's older brother and sister seem to be buried on his front yard, which is a bit odd but interesting in a way, I guess.

James was up at 3am this morning saying he was hungry. He had a bite to eat and then immediately fell back asleep. But I have been up since then!

"We don't care about the dog" Chris H.

I was really tired when I wrote yesterdays entry so I didn't really cover what I wanted.

I did watch the B'ette but found the episode a bit flat as it was followed by the drama of Jake and Vienna. Jake and Vienna came out and argued about GPS and rearranging furniture and her dog. Chris H. gave the best line of the night "We don't care about the dog". Evidently, only Vienna did. I think Jake knew that Vienna would get all emotional in the interview and thought that would make him look good, but it really made him look pretty callous. Though she DID interrupt him all the time, which was a tad annoying.

Kim is leaving on her world tour on the 8th. Zully sent me her itinerary. Kim does NOT like flying so she asked if I would pray for her flights. She has an awful lot of them!

The days are hot and muggy- perfect for baking laundry dry. Yesterday James had me out playing soccer too, but today all he's mustered up is a walk around the block.

He has made up a new playoff league to play with his paper men. He made outfits for all of them from his clothing. They are all his bed now. I would have objected as I just organized but he's having fun with 'costumes'. I'll probably have a lot more laundry to do though! I also told him I knew all the national anthems of the world. And he believed me. So I have to sing at the start of each game.

James has made a new friend down the road. He's a man- maybe in his 60s- with 2 cats. The man is pretty friendly with James and talked to him while we were playing soccer. James really likes the fact that the guy has cats. I think the guy is very (physically) ill. He moves really slowly so I worry about him. He seems in good spirits though. Most of the neighbourhood stops and talks with him as he sits on his front porch.

I biked to the Metro this morning and picked up some turkey on sale to pop in the slow cooker for today. I also got a roast for tomorrow.

And the Netherlands just won the soccer game!!!

ousted

Toronto lost a lot of power just before 5pm. That would be rush hour. I would think that traffic would be crazy unless there is an army of people that can direct it.

James and I went to the Cat center this morning. He picked out some nice new swimming shorts (on sale) that were size 6X. I thought 6X would be big on him but it just fits him nicely. I will no longer shop for him in the 'boys' section- he's in the young men now- size 7/8. What a realization!

We bought hornet spray as we have a couple of nests being built in the edges of the house.

James has been getting up very early in the morning so I am very tired, but must stay up for the B'ette. James doesn't STAY up when he wakes up at 5 or 6- he goes right back to sleep- but I stay up!

Transformation

If you had been by our house recently and looked in James' room you would have seen a 'disaster' (his word). Whatever you just pictured, now picture something 100 times worse and you may be getting close. As I had been working so much, the house has been a bit neglected, shall we say? And James' clothes were still stored on the change table I used when he was a baby. So I dragged everything out of his room, sorted the stuff, gave the change table away, moved the new dresser in (a la Al- thank you!) and the result is the above photo. (His bed is so large as he is very squirmy and falls out of single beds sometimes!)
I showed the photo to Henrie (who has been doing our housekeeping) and she declared me a 'miracle worker'- that just goes to show you how bad it was! Then she asked if it would stay nice like this. My first response was "It better!" and my second response was "In life there are no guarantees".

James has become quite the prolific writer, but only in regards to sport. I read the title of one and it was "Would Cup" instead of "World Cup" and I wonder if that's what he really thinks- they "would" have the cup so they have to play for it. He has a funny ingenious mind!