Shopping Booty

State-side shopping was really good to us! I've become a huge fan of DSW, and we were introduced to Ross, TJ Maxx and Kolhs. My sister describes Ross as a step above Winners and TJ Maxx and Kolhs as a step above Ross, but all these stores still sell ridiculously discounted items.

My main frustration was that there weren't a lot of shoes in my size (still!). I'm a 5-5.5, and a lot of shoe manufactures start at size 6. Booo on them!

Both hubby and I spent just under $200 USD each, and we were a bit worried that we would have gone over the 48 hour limit (which was $200 CAD), but we discovered (at the Duty Free shop of all places) that it's now $400 CAD. Whoo hoo! Hubby landed some really nice Bostonian dark brown shoes from the Clark's store in Bellevue Square, an Addidas running hat that he's been looking for (in a shoe outlet store of all places), and a square bamboo cutting board which he is very proud of. My mom got some Royal Dalton for dirt cheap.

Here's a list of my stuff, in order of price:

I got this at the Nine West outlet store for $13.99. We were all shocked as it was marked higher. There were even two sales girls checking the price. But I'm not one to complain!



Also a Nine West purse, but got this one at Ross. This isn't the actual purse, but it's close enough to what I have. Mine has an additional size zip pocket on either end-s of the bag, and the buckle's slightly bigger:



From the Kenneth Cole outlet store:



From DSW, so cute! (Sorry pic is so big!)



From the Sketchers outlet store




And my most expensive purchase, at $49.99USD, I couldn't find a picture for. Booo! They're plain black leather ballet flats with a string bow at the toe, pretty simple looking.

The patio table has landed in Seattle

Well, after all the worrying about US Border Crossing Guards stopping us and searching our car, when we reached the border, that never happened. I think a lot of it is:

1. We've crossed the border with the same car several times before
2. We didn't fit their typical profile of a terrorist and/or drug dealer
3. We gave the guard our passports
4. We didn't lie when we answered the questions.
   
5. All three of us looked him directly in the eye and didn't act nervous or suspicous
   

We spent a total of 30 seconds talking to the guard. He asked us about the patio table and the bike (they were in plain sight for anyone to see), but then waved us through! I suppose that when he scanned our passports, our personal records probably came up, and there wasn't anything suspicious about us. We were nervous cause we sat forever in the lineup even though there were only a few cars ahead of us.

Anyways, mondo shopping tomorrow. Whoo!

The next few day...

Wednesday:

• Go to Chiropractor
• Go to work
• Go home and finish packing
• Go grab something to eat on our way to Seattle
• Crash at my sister's place

Thursday:

• Shopping! Probably at Bellevue Square, my favourite Seattle-area mall

Friday:

• Shopping at Seattle Premium Outlets
• Come home

A couple of notes:

• We will be going down with my mother (help me!), a large patio table and an old bike in the back (don't ask)
• We will be coming back sans large patio table and bike, but with my mom and my sister.

Confused. Welcome to my life. This quick trip down took a bit logistic juggling. I had already booked my days of for Wednesday and Thursday, but after talking to my mom and my sister, we changed it to Thursday and Friday as my sister wanted to come back up for my dad's birthday.

Even though I really shouldn't be spending more money, I discovered that I really need a bit of a break, so we decided to go stateside for couple of day; retail therapy is definitely in order. Hubby wants to look for a pair of brown shoes. I'm looking for a couple of cute pairs of shoes and a new bag/purse. I will post booty when we come back.

Right now, I'm more worried about getting that stupid table across the border.

Billy bounces balls.

Someone with too much time on his hands. I kept on gawking at how nice his (parent's, I'm assuming) house is. I also wonder how many takes they had to take to get all those clips. Like I said, someone has too much time on their hands.

Harry Potter, the next movie

Squeeeeee! I can't wait for July! I've been reading Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Price in preparation for the next and final book, also coming out in July. These stories stopped being children's stories a long time ago.

Darth Vader hits the skies

I'm more than a Star Wars loser than I thought. This is so cool.

[Source]

KOOKY: Multitasking

I noticed today that when my co-op student went to the loo, he brought his laptop with him. When I asked him about it, he said that he likes to "multitask" when sitting on the porcelain throne.

My co-op is a very strange boy.

Vacation Planning

So for the past little while, we've been trying to figure out holidays for this year. I had quite recently realized three things: 1) my summer's going to be very busy with work 2) I have 5 weeks of vacation, of which I have to use up at least 3 and 3) a lot of my co-workers have already booked time off. So I need to get my butt moving with the vacation plans.

Here's what we have planned so far:

• Shopping trip in the US end of this month
• Calgary visit end of June
• End of August - unknown location for 5th year Anniversary!
• October sometime (not Thanksgiving) - trip out to Toronto/Ottawa to visit friends (mostly hubby's)

One of the big things that we're working around for trip #1 & #2 is the fact that we have to cart family around, namely my mother and sister. That also requires working around work their work schedules. Mum is coming down with us for the Seattle trip, and on our way back up, we are bringing back my sister so we can do a birthday bash for my Dad. Then on trip #2, Mum's coming back with us to Calgary, but she's wanting to stay longer. Fine with me, but we have to book the tickets before the end of day tomorrow.

Let's see how everything eventually pans out....

The Ultimate Canuks Fan

This guy actually appeared on the front page of the local newspaper.

More Art!!

Between 11 and 25 March, Swiss artist Felice Varini and his team created an unusual piece of public art that is set to baffle and fascinate visitors to Cardiff Bay barrage. The piece, entitled 3 Ellipses for 3 Locks, was commissioned by arts agency CBAT for the Cardiff Harbour Authority and cost £25,000. A series of three yellow ellipses have been painted onto the working locks, gates and even the outer sea wall to create a piece that took a year to plan. The artist used photography, projection and painting to plan the piece which is his first in Wales and also his first work in the UK. Professional mountain climbers were required to access the barrage's difficult high structures. The piece was designed to highlight the main working parts of the barrage. The Harbour Authority approached CBAT to commission the piece, which compliments another 30 open air art projects dotted around the bay area. From virtually every angle the marks look like splashes of yellow colour against the backdrop of the Penarth headland and the Bristol channel. But on closer inspection visitors to the Barrage are treated to a visual spectacle featuring three perfectly formed yellow ellipses. All you have to do to see Felice Varini's 'anamorphic illusion' properly formed, like in the above picture, is find a precise vantage point somewhere on the barrage.

[Source]

Art!?!

The picture above is a four-story version of Donkey Kong. Made entirely of Post-It Notes. Someone has way too much time and money on their hands.

[Source]

Rest in peace Gramma

I never knew Augusta "Billye" Maver in real life, but I got to know her in cyberspace. I first "met" Gramma through someone on Hitched; it was this lady's grandmother whom she took care of at home.

Through the last year or so, I got to learn a lot about Gramma, especially through her blog that her granddaughter put up. This lady last December turned 100, definitely a huge milestone for anyone. I even sent her a birthday card.

I found out this morning that she had passed away in her sleep. While I never knew this woman personally, I found myself very affected by her death. I actually spent the morning fighting off tears and trying to concentrate on my job.

Please do read through her blog, she certainly was a spunky lady and she has certainly left an impression on me.

Pride and Prejudice: Barbie Style

Bawhahahah! I almost died when I saw this, although it took a second viewing to figure out who was who. The blonde is Bingley and Jane, the Ken doll with the beard is Darcy, and Aladdin is Wickham, who ends up with Lydia at the end. Good times!

Hello, I'm... Linux

Hubby's more or less gotten Ubuntu set up and he's loving it so far. I also noted that one of my co-workers also put Ubuntu on his spanking new laptop (same model as mine, but without the wide-screen). Here are some spoofs to keep you entertained...

[Source]

AWOL

I may not be posting for the next week or so. Life has suddenly become amazingly busy, and I don't know how much time I can even devote to my personal life. Going to the gym has already been thrown out the window for the rest of this week. Bah.

Some things that had happened so far this week:

• We had a new guy start at work (finally!)
  
• I almost melted at the gym last night. The air conditioning unit died during my step class. My instructor kept telling us that we didn't want to know how hot it was
• After several false starts, hubby's finally managed to download the Ubuntu iso and will be playing around with it for the next little while. He's going to wipe off the W2K on our 7 year old laptop and install Ubuntu. (He's also a little fed up with MS). This will be an interesting experiment. More to come later.
• We're trying to sell our coffee table

Things that are happening this week and next:

• My big project at work is finally starting up. I'll be in meeting most of Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, so I will be getting very little work done. Plus I don't know how busy I'll actually be until they start setting time lines late this week. We have2 months to make thing thing work, so it'll be tight. Lucky for me, they are feeding us, breakfast included. Whoo!
  
• I really need to continue on with school work, that's kinda stalled this whole month for various reasons
• I'm going to the car show. Whoo!
• We have visitors staying at our place all next week. I need to clean my house. Joy.
  

Movie Review: 300

Today, hubby and I went to go see 300. As I didn't know much about the movie, here are some impressions that I had.

Things I liked:

• Lots of really buff half-naked men wearing what looked like black Speedos and red capes. What I noticed was a lot of the actors were in their late 30s and early 40s, so there was an impressive amount of man-meat to drool over.
• The CGI was awesome and very well done. If you can watch this movie in IMAX, do so. I heard that they spent about 6 weeks filming in front of blue screens and 1.5 years doing the CGI. They managed to blend the CG in with the real people very well, and it was visually quite stunning.
  
• David Wenham. I've now seen him in Lord of the Rings and Van Helsing, as well as 300, and he's really impressed with the range of his acting skills. And he looks hot half-naked in black Speedos. Ha.
• The battle scenes were very well done.
  

Things I thought they could have improved upon:

• The script. The movie had too many battle scenes. About halfway through the movie, I checked the time. That's always a bad sign for me. And the plot was not very well developed and certain times I had to ask myself, why they did that with the plot, it did nothing to the storyline. Or something went over my head.
• Gerard Butler's accent. Don't get me wrong, I love Gerard Butler's accent, and he was very drool worthy flinging his half-naked body across the screen, and my beef isn't with him, it's with the director. Gerard Butler is Scottish, but I noted that pretty much everyone else spoke with a British accent in the movie. It may not be a big deal to some but I picked up on it and it grated on my nerves. Even David Wenham, whose Australian, managed a British accent. I suppose a part of this rant came from last night, when I watched most of Beowulf & Grendel on TV. That movie wasn't spectacular, and I was a bit disappointed as I really was looking forward to watching it. Not only did Gerard Butler's Scottish accent appear when everyone else had put on a British accent, but even worse, they allowed Sarah Polley, whom I love as an actress, to use her native Canadian accent. Another good example is The Phantom of the Opera, yet another Gerard Butler movie, where Christine and Raoul were very good, the actors were allowed to use their natural American accents, while the rest of the cast used English accents. I found this really jarring and it made me enjoy the movie less. Gerard Butler was very good in this role, and I think he made me fall in love with The Phantom all over again. My main rant is, unless the story allows for varying accents, please be consistent with the accents, as having conflicting accents when you're not expecting it really diminishes the over all effect that you're trying to make. It's the director's choice for doing stuff like this, not the actors, so I blame them.
  
• Lena Headey, who plays the Queen, slouches. I've picked on people in the past who slouches because I have really bad upper back problems due to computer work, so I suppose I'm hypersensitive to stuff like this.

So all in all, I give the movie 7 out of 10. The generous marks go to the awesome CGI work and the half-naked men.

Happy Birthday to Meeee!!!

Today is my birthday. I'm now coughthircoughtycoughfivecough. Um I'm 29. For the seventh time. Heh.

Not a very eventful birthday, but still fun. Hubby and I went to go see 300, review forthcoming. Afterwards, we went with my parents, my best friend N and his friend S to Baci Ristorante. The food was yummy. Anyone that lives in the area, you must go to this restaurant. Not only is the food really good, but it's not as expensive as some other places.

All in all, a good birthday!

Birthday Hair!

Yes, it's that time again folks, my yearly Birthday Hair Colour indulgence. Here are the before and after pictures:

Before (note that this was taken earlier in the week at my Grandma's birthday dinner. You are looking at a slightly drunk Weed. Heh)







And after! (I don't think that side of my face is the most photogenic, but you get to see the wicked colouring job. Plus, I need to get a better camera phone, my pictures somehow turn out all red!). I really am loving the red, although it's hard to see.

KOOKY: New toys

New toy for work. A Lenovo T60 15.4" wide screen, duo core Pentium processor laptop, with a huge hard drive and 3 GB of RAM. This thing is sweet! What you don't see is the dual 20.1" monitors (yes, I have two external monitors), a new Logitech wireless mouse and a big ass top-of-the-line docking station that I also got. All compliments of work. I had some fun trying to rearrange my desk yesterday with all the new toys. Heh.

We had some money left over in the budget, so a few of us got new laptops. My boss said, "Get whatever hardware you need to do your job, because I rather you be more efficient with your job with the equipment you need than doing your job poorly because you're not properly equipped. So go forth and spend the money."

I'm not going to argue against that. Spend money he says, and so spend money we did.

KOOKY: The Adventures of Weed

I wrote a really long post, then upon reflection, felt that it was one of the lamest posts that I've written, so I decided to delete it and give you the shortened version instead.

The highlights of my day:
- I had to deal with dog-pee on our office room carpet (it's still there by the way)
- My co-op student's landlord is a 57-year old single man who doesn't do much except watch B-rated slasher movies into the wee-hours of the morning. Apparently, he has hundreds of VHS tapes of B-rated slasher movies in every nook and cranny in his apartment, including my co-op's bedroom. Oh, and he's noticed that my co-op owns a meat cleaver.

I think I'll leave the rest up to your imagination, heaven knows it's probably going to be more interesting than what I wrote originally. And I work in IT!