a new twist on apartment living

here's a new twist on apartment living.....
i was trying to read my textbook in the living room, while R was talking on the phone in the kitchen. since it was a bit distracting, due to our pea-sized apartment, i thought i'd go into another room.... or should i say, the other room (the bathroom doesn't count). well, i think the girl downstairs was studying too and maybe a bit annoyed at R's voice perhaps because she suddenly turned her music on really loud.
but here's the twist, once again, it sounded like instrumental, maybe classical music? and then, as it got louder, i realized that it was christmas music. so i sat in our room listening to Silent Night, reading my text. and it was LOUD. but i can't say that i minded at all. (now, 2 songs later, and she's turned it off).

okay, i wasn't going to tell this other story to the whole world, but it's been a few days, and now i find it funny. so on friday i made this for supper. i recommend it, if it's 5:30pm and you still don't have any idea what to make. i've made it a few times before, it's super easy and really yummy. usually.

except, however, on friday, i apparently didn't cook all the chicken all the way though. it LOOKED done and white and stringy, but i thought it tasted... mushy. oh well, thought i. it looks done. well, apparently, i need to get a meat thermometer.
as i was going to bed, i suddenly felt rather nasty, but i thought that it was because i was super exhausted from clinical that day. so i went to bed and feel asleep. at about 2 am, i woke up, jumped up, yelled to R, "i'm gonna puke!" and ran to the bathroom and did just that.
and then, to top it off, while i was sitting on the bathroom floor, recouperating, i looked up at my bath towel and there was a huge white-ish spider crawling on it! i think i was a bit delirious or something because i started running around trying to find something to kill it with, saying something like, "i need to kill it, i need to kill it." meanwhile, i'm still sweating and there's tears streaming down my cheeks ....

so, ya, food poisoning. thankfully, that was really the worst of it (not the flu- no ache, fever, chills, etc.). i just felt nasty all day on saturday at oma's surprise birthday party, and then in the evening when we went to the franklin graham festival with the youth group and saw tree63 and newsboys! singing worship songs with 15,000 people.... that was amazing!
[i'm feeling great again btw - and no i'm not pregnant, don't even ask, and don't get me started on how i feel when people boldly ask that when a female feels remotely ill - i think it's incredibly rude and private, even if you mean it as a joke - and i hate it so much that i was even afraid to tell my family that i was sick when i was with them on saturday....]


... but anyways, school is going okay. clinical is crazy, but i'm learning tons, and that's all that matters. i'll tell you all more about that another day, about suctioning babies' noses, infected gastrostomy tubes, teaching moms how to check blood sugar levels on their babies, giving meds, weighing poopy diapers, etc. ahhh, fun times...

live specimens

did you know that you can send "live specimens" in the mail? in the post office today, we had a parcel delivered from ontario going down to the bio dept, that said, "live specimens. keep out of extreme heat and cold." (guess you wouldn't mail your grubs to winnipeg in winter or summer). we were very curious and my co-worker told me that she's had boxes with moving things inside.
now you can't just go and mail any creature you like, say, some of the canadian geese that poop all over the path where you walk to school so that by the time you get to school you have nasty green pasties glued to the bottom of your shoes. no, the way i understand it, “live specimens" can only be plants and creepy crawlies. Oh, and baby chicks that are only a few days old or haven't pooped yet or something (no joke).
so my curiosity was stimulated and i began to browse through a brochure to see what one cannot send through the mail. "infectious blood." why would i be mailing infectious blood to someone? how about "strong magnets?" who decides what is "strong"? hmmm, very odd.
i once got a pumpkin in the mail from a good friend from camp. no box or anything, just a pumpkin. the address, message and, of course, the jack-o-lantern face were all Sharpie'd right onto the pumpkin.

oh ya... so this package at the post office today.... when the guy came to pick it up, we asked him what was inside. ...mmmm. mealworms.

finally.... our whistler trip!

i finally got these pics to work. i'm gonna have to change a few things yet with the whole stupid beta thing (when i try to use picasa, which is supposed to be the easiest thing ever, it brings up a login window that tries to log my into the old blogger and won't let me, since i've upgraded. still trying to figure that one out).

anyways..... here's what this was supposed to look like:

genifer and bowen

happy birthday you twos

yipeeee!!

yet another wonderfully delicious meal

uncle R reads clifford the big red dog to his cativated audience

these girlies LOVE their black olives.... the crazies!

did i mention that our trip was super great? and flying wasn't too bad, even with the ever-heightened security. as you probably know, you can't take fluids on the plane now. fluids of any kind. as in, they inspected my mascara. i had to put it in a little ziplock baggy and send it through the machine separately. but hey, that little ziplock saved the airplane from possible mascara-induced explosion.

our dancing ballerinas

cutie~pies!

when we got to whister, we explored the place that we were staying at. and, looking outside, we were greeted by a very large black bear. it was just grazing in the back yard! it looked at us, with all our cameras, and then went back to eating. hmmm. good thing our nieces weren't there yet, they would have been scared out our their minds....

it worked??

somewhere between whistler and squamish... 

we're back!!

we're back from b.c.! it was an amazing trip! genifer and bowen picked us up from the airport when we arrived in vancouver on saturday and we had a super time hanging out at IKEA.

then we drove up to whistler and hung out with all of ryan's family there for a few days, in a resort home, complete with 6 bedrooms, living room, loft, rec room, hot tub, pool table, etc. etc. it was great fun!! our nieces are so incredibly adorable and fun!! the whole family was out, including ryan's uncle and steve's girlfriend, angela. (angela, did we tell you that we think you're the cat's pj's?). ah, yes. good times. the whole the trip was MUCH too short....

we have quite a few sweet pics, but i just switched to the beta version, and man, am i ever having problems posting pictures!! any advice??? i've tried uploading them the way i used to. i've tried going through picasa and clicking on "blog this" and it appears to work, but then once i've published, it just vanishes...
i'm so frustrated!

hang on...

i am attempting to enter the new and improved world of the beta version....

october?

yes, despite the 26 degrees yesterday, it really is october already. we celebrated thanksgiving with my parents and chris and aurelie yesterday. it felt like a day full of random, fun things. after a too-short nap in the afternoon, we drove to steinbach with c&a, but stopped for a free round of mini golf. arrrrr, that be a jolly good time, matey!
mom had, of course, made an amazing thanksgiving feast. and the evening was complete with a campfire with flames of well... the usual... orange, yellow, blue... green.... and discovering what happens when 6 people throw handfuls of flour into a fire. oh, and the blowing of gigantic bubbles at night in the dark. like i said, random, but fun. i really have to say that i love my family very much! (5 days till i get to see genifer!)
the fall colours are so amazing right now! i love it.... i can't get enough of the oranges and reds. and the fresh crisp air (crisp, yet it's still t-shirt weather. so bizzare!). so beautiful that R and i had to take some family photos.