I hate numbers. I hate crunching numbers. I hate writing reports, with minuscule page limits for the actual report and multitudinous pages of appendices, to be submitted in triplicate.

I am SO glad that I have vacation days next week! You have NO IDEA how excited I am about that.

Also, I don't care what my waistline says, I need a mocha. NEED!

OK, so THIS is the least useful email I've ever received

So, I get into work this morning and the hallway is abuzz with the fact that our computers aren't working. No email. No Internet access. No access to the one drive where everyone in our Centre saves all of our files. Nothing.

Two and a half hours later, when they finally got around to fixing the problem, I find this email in my inbox:

From: IT Services
Subject:
IMPORTANT NOTIFICATION - NON-SCHEDULED INTERRUPTION TO

OUTLOOK EMAIL AND FILE/APPLICATION SERVERS

Who is affected? All XXXXX clients across all XXXXX agencies.

What has happened? A power disruption occurred sometime this morning in one of the server rooms at XXXXX.

What is affected? Access to Outlook email servers may be intermittent.

However, the following applications are currently unavailable: X, Y and Z.

Other applications may be affected. XXXXX IT is currently in the process of identifying which applications are affected and will provide a further update as soon as more information is available.

You just emailed me to tell me that my email isn't working? Seriously??

So, without access to the Internet, email or any of my computer files, I did the only thing I could. File all the paper that's been piling up all over my office since the last time the computers weren't working.

This computer outage lasted so long, however, that not only did I file everything, I also wiped down all the coffee spills on my desk (of which there were many) and took apart my keyboard to get the crumbs out. Seriously, it was disgusting the amount of crumbs and dust and unidentifiable gunk that was in my keyboard.

While I had my computer apart, I took this photo for y'all:

Flu Shot Bribery

On my way to purchase a celebratory¹ extra-hot-soy-mocha-with-whip yesterday, I walked past a grizzly scene in the hallway. People rolling up their sleeves to voluntarily be stabbed in the arm with a needle. A NEEDLE!!

Ya, so, they are trying to get people at my workplace to get the flu shot. Getting the flu shot at this hallway-based "clinic" will serve as your entry into a draw for:

• Running Room gift certificates


• a digital camera


• an iPod


• fancy pants treatment at Spa Utopia


• a 3 hr charter sailboat trip²

This presents a conflict for me - a conflict between my desire for free stuff and my sheer terror of being stabbed with a needle. In this case, however, I'm coming down firmly on the side of "for the love of god, don't stab me in the arm!!!" But it's not just that I would like to avoid blubbering like a little baby, as I usually do when confronted with a needle, in front of co-workers. Generally speaking, I'm in favour of vaccines. I've had my MMR, tetanus and all those other delightful stabs in the arms that prevent much more painful conditions. But I'm not overly confident in the flu shot. The thing with the flu virus is, it mutates. A lot. And so every year when they design the flu vaccine, they try to predict what this year's flu will be. Sometimes they get it right (or at least close), but other times, not so much. As a healthy, immune competent adult, I don't feel it's worth getting a needle, possibly getting the "flu-like symptoms" as a side effect³, all for a vaccine that might be against a strain of flu that doesn't even exist.

What do you think? Do you get the flu shot? Would you if your workplace bribed you with fabulous prizes?

¹Celebrating (a) finally, at 2:30 in the afternoon, getting through the backlog of email/snail mail I had upon returning from my trip and (b) being awarded 3 assists in my Sunday night hockey game, two of which I remember actually getting⁴.
²A three hour tour. A three hour tour.^5
3They always make a point of saying that you can't get the actual flu from the flu vaccine, since it's not made from a live virus. But if you are getting "flu-like symptoms," isn't that pretty much just like having the flu?
⁴ In fairness, I got screwed out of an assist that I clearly made a few games ago that the ref didn't record, so this just evens things up .
⁵Sorry, I couldn't resist.

Photo attribution: That photo of a big scary needle was stolen from this guy, from here. But it had a Creative Commons license on it, so it's all good.

Blog Action Day

Although my previous post was, at least in part, about the environment it was not actually intended as part of Blog Action Day. I actually didn't know about Blog Action Day until Darren mentioned it in the comments on that post.

In his post, Darren asked "what is your big eco-sin?" Like most of his commenters, I try to be good to the environment:

• I don't own a car - I take the bus to work and for most of my transportation around the city, and I joined the car co-op for getting to hockey games
  
• even when I do take a co-op car, I usually try to do multiple things on a given trip (such as go to the grocery store after my hockey game) in order to minimize the number of car trips I take
  
• I'm a vegetarian and I don't wear leather
• I use a travel mug¹ to avoid using paper cups and I bring my own Tupperwear container to the cafeteria to avoid using Styrofoam containers
• I bring my own bag to the grocery store so I don't have to take plastic ones
• I recycle anything that can be recycled²
• I turn the lights out in the bathroom, the kitchen and the photocopy room at work when I leave them³
• I use the back of old printouts as note paper before I recycle them
• I don't buy anything new if I can get it used instead and buy almost all of my clothes in consignment & thrift stores
  
• I rarely fly anywhere⁴

But I do have one big eco-sin. I leave my computer on. All the time. 24/7. Even when I'm at work all day, my computer at home is on. And the main reason I do this is a rather ridiculous one - when I come home, I like there to be messages waiting for me. Even though I haven't had my landline and it's accompanying answering machine for months now, my natural inclination when I walk in the door is to look for the little flashing red light telling me that someone cared enough to call me! And since I don't have that anymore, my msn serves that purpose. With my computer on, people can msn me all day long and when I get home, I have messages waiting for me. OK, now that I write that down, I see it's silly. Starting tomorrow, I'm shutting my computers off when I leave.

On a related note: why, since the librarians have been on strike for four months, were all the lights on in the local library branch when I walked by there tonight?

¹A friend of mine said that he feels if he can't have his act together enough to bring his travel mug with him, then he feels that he doesn't deserve a coffee. I think this is a good philosophy
²and in light of the 4 month garbage strike that has, mercifully, just ended, this is a real sacrifice as I can barely fit in my kitchen because I have so much recycling piled up in there!
³and have noticed that some of my co-workers have started following my example
⁴Although, truth be told, this has more to do with my lack of money (thanks, $70,000 of student loans!) than with a conscience choice to fly less

Foot vs. Brain

In the battle between my injured foot and my brain's adenosine receptors, the adenosine receptors reigned supreme. Faced with the choice of hobbling all the way to the Tim Horton's on the other side of the building for an afternoon cup of coffee or resting my foot but forgoing my caffeine fix, there really was only one clear choice.

The Wisdom Teeth Extraction Adventures of Beth

So, I'm feeling much better today - my jaw is only a wee bit achy so I'm off the T3s which were making me all loopy and unable to type properly all day yesterday.

My adventure at the oral surgeon's office started off with the unpleasant discovery that they lied to me about the cost. I was told that my insurance covered most of the cost, I just have to pay the specialist fees¹ - they had gotten a pre-approval for the cost of what an extraction would be if I went to a regular dentist and for the deep sedation. They told me that since the sedation is through my extended health benefits, rather than dental benefits, I had to pay the $190 for that upfront (despite the insurance company pre-approving this, they said they "didn't trust" that the insurance would actually pay for it), and then they would pay me it back once they got the money from my insurance company (as opposed to the rest of the cost, which is covered by the dental benefits and so they would just charge to my insurance directly, trusting insurance would cover it). But when I go to pay for my part of the fees, I notice on the receipt that they've charged me $375, not $190 as I'd been told. And when I asked them about it, they are like, "Oh no, the insurance covers all except $190, you have to pay that. But we charge you the full amount and then reimburse you the difference when we get it from them." And so I'm like, "That's not what I was told and, in fact, I have it written down on this piece of paper exactly what you guys told me and that was that sedation costs $190 and my insurance will cover it." So they begrudging apologized that I "was given the wrong information" and so I told them that I supposed that it's too late to do anything about it now, but they should make sure they aren't giving people incorrect information like that, because $200 is a lot of money to suddenly be out of pocket.

Then I went and sat in the waiting room and caught up with Rachel, who I hadn't seen in ages, and it was good that we had the chance to do that because I couldn't talk much after the surgery (although the poor other guy in the waiting room sure got an earful about all my drama and our ensuing analysis of said drama). They finally called me to go into the surgery room and then I got to act like a big baby about the fact that they were going to be stabbing me with a needle. And putting a blood pressure cuff on me. I hate those, they make me feel so confined! And why, when you tell a nurse "I'm afraid of needles" do they always say "it's not that bad. It's just like a little bee sting"? Is this really supposed to make me feel better? I mean, seriously, am I supposed to say, "Oh good! Bee stings tickle!" So I say, "Um, I'm terrified of bee stings too. But thanks." So she takes my blood pressure and that gets me all freaked out and then even putting the little heart rate monitor on my finger freaks me out, so they strap my arm with the blood pressure cuff on it to the arm of the chair "too keep the blood pressure cuff in place" (translation: "to keep you from flailing around, you big baby") and by the time the surgeon comes in and puts the tourniquet on and tells me to open and close my hand to pump up my vein², I'm literally curled up in a fetal-like position (except with one arm strapped to a chair and the other arm raised as I make feeble attempts to open and close my hand without totally passing out from the queasiness of it all and saying, "how long until I can be unconscious?" and "I promise I'll be more compliant once I'm asleep!"

The thing with me and needles is that I have to watch the needle go in. My imagination of how big the needle is, and my terror at not knowing the exact moment they are going to stab me, make me more of a basketcase than just watching it happen. So when I say, "I have to watch" and the surgeon literally turns my face away, saying "look at this lady over here," I wanted to scream "you paternalistic bastard, I know myself and I have to watch"... but I restrained myself and left out the part about him being a paternalistic bastard. So the needle goes in fine and doesn't hurt too bad and then he says, "This will feel like a cold drink being poured into your hand when I put the medicine in," and I say, "Yup, that feels cold", followed shortly by, "that feels really uncomfortable" and then the next thing I know is some vague feeling that something is going on in the bottom left side of my jaw and then they are telling me to wake up, it's all over, get the hell out. OK, maybe they didn't say "get the hell out." It was more like, "we are taking you to the recovery area, be careful, you'll be pretty wobbly." So I stumble to the "recovery area," which is literally a bench, and they bring Rachel in and she's like "I can see why they insist on an escort, they really rush you out of here. You were only in there for 20 minutes." And that had to include 10 minutes of blood pressure taking, needle stabbing and my being a big wussy baby. Then the nurse proceeds to explain a bunch of instructions to us and thank god Rachel was there for that because I was so doped up, I totally felt like I was extremely drunk and the only thing I remember was some vague comment about not having caffeine. Of course, even in a drug addled state, I pick up on the caffeine comment. At this point, I can't feel my face, because of the local, but I notice that my hand, where they IV had been, was killing me and, despite the Dora the Explorer band-aid, is covered in dried blood. So I put some pressure on it with my opposite hand to try to lessen the pain a bit and that takes about all the brain power I have at the time.

We get a cab to the Shopper's Drug Mart by my place so we can pick up my prescriptions and the pharmacist is like "There are several people ahead of you, it will be at least 15 minutes and Rachel is like, "She just had her wisdom teeth out, can't you possible let us jump the line" and the pharmacist is like, "No. Besides you have 3 prescriptions." And why the hell does it take so long to fill prescriptions? I mean, you have to count 8, 15 and 18 pills out big bottles and put them into little bottles. My 2 year old niece could do that! So anyway, Rachel decides to bring me home and she'll come back for the drugs, 'cuz it's just a few blocks. I decide to buy some juice in Shopper's 'cuz the nurse said to try to get some sugar in me as soon as possible, since I wasn't allowed to eat since midnight the night before. And as I take the change back from the cashier, I realize that my hand, with which I'd handed over my Shopper's card and my cash to the cashier is covered in dried blood, from having used it to put pressure on my IV wound. It takes a minute for this to register as my brain is still all messed up on the sedation and I feel really bad for the poor cashier, and a bit surprised she didn't say anything like, oh I don't know, "Um, you are covered in blood."

Anyway, Rachel gets me home and gets my drugs and I take my Tylenol 3, which was quite challenging because they said to take it when the local starts to wear off, which you will know is happening because your nose will feel tingly, but at this point your mouth and tongue are still frozen and I have trouble swallowing pills at the best of time. But, after several attempts, I manage to get the pill down somehow and spend the rest of the day in the following routine: take a T3, try to email or chat or read blogs but go all loopy, then get all drowsy and fall asleep on couch with laptop on lap, wake up when someone calls/texts/pings me on msn/google talk to see how I'm doing, feel better, watch something on the internets, notice my jaw is sore, realize that I was supposed to take another dose of T3 an hour ago, so then take another T3. And repeat. Always repeat. Oh yes, and rotating ice packs on my face - take one out of the freezer, strap it to my face, replace it with an alternate when it loses it's coldness. For the entire day. During one of my less loopy phases, where I could actually figure out how to send an email, I emailed Rachel to find out what exactly they had said about caffeine, and it turned out that they said to just not have caffeine in my first drink. Which is a relief, since I was afraid they were going to have said, "don't have caffeine for the next week". Or something equally insane.

I end up watching 2.5 movies and a bunch of clips of Stephen Colbert, catching up on most of my blogs and even watching an episode of good ole Young & the Restless. My friend Clayton brought me pudding in the evening, because I discovered that the pudding mix I bought to make for myself had gelatin³ in it and I'd somehow missed that when I read the ingredient list when I bought it and somehow noticed when I took it out of the cupboard to make it. I had taken a T3 just before Clayton got here and apparently I was in my loopy phase, but didn't know it. I totally thought I was acting normal until he said, "You are on T3, aren't you?" And I was like "Why? I am acting weird?" and he laughed "Yes." But I really, totally didn't think I was! The T3 seemed to make me act like I had ADHD or something - I'd be like "I really should write down that I just took that T3... hey, what is that shiny thing?" And I also didn't notice that there was blood on the hand towel in my bathroom, which may have been from my IV wound, or possibly from when blood was dripping out of my mouth, but most certainly was not appropriate to have hanging on my towel rack when someone was over!

I took my other meds with my dinner (mango pudding), which is what the nurse had said to do. My other meds are an antibiotic, which apparently "should only be used for serious infections because infrequently there are severe, rarely fatal, intestinal problems," (which seem like an odd choice for a prophylactic antibiotic) and a corticosteroid, which may decrease my immune response (which seems like an odd choice for someone who is trying not to get an infection) and may stunt my growth (which is an odd choice for someone who is clearly due for a growth spurt any day now). And I followed Ann-Oni Mouse's advice and sprayed my gauze with Chloraseptic, which seemed to work well for killing pain and I'm hoping will contribute to infection prevention.
I took my last dose of T3 just before I headed to bed with Stephen Colbert, at about 12:30 am, figuring I would wake up about 5 hours later in need of another dose, but I slept right straight through until 11:30 am. And my jaw only had a dull ache, which seems to be the most prominent in my lower left side of my jaw, which is appropriate because that's the only place I remember feeling anything happen during the surgery, so I'm guessing that was the most difficult one to get out. Anyway, since the pain is fairly minor, I haven't even taken a single T3 today. I figure I'll be careful about taking my other meds as scheduled (I set the alarm in my Palm Pilot to remind me when to take it and then record that I took it... I'm kind of like that guy in Memento), gently clean my teeth as my surgeon recommends and keep my fingers crossed that I don't get any infections. My mother thinks I have inherited my father's propensity to heal really fast. I think that time I accidentally stabbed myself with that needle contaminated with rat blood in the lab, I took on the rat's super immune system capabilities⁴. Because we all know that super powers are gained by science lab mishaps.

I spent most of today sitting in the sun, either goofing around on the internet or talking on the phone (and then having my landlord make fun of the amount of times I used the word "like" in my conversation with Sarah... "not that I was listening in on your conversation, " he says, "but I counted that you used the work "like" 75 times since you came outside on your phone. Stupid, really, that everyone uses the word "like" so much.") Went for Frappuccinos with Kalev, who came to hang out a bit after he finished work and before the movie he was going to.

And to top off my crappy week, I did some laundry, during which I pulled the genius move of putting my bluetooth headset through the wash. Like I said, genius. I'm going to give it a few days to completely dry out before I try turning it on again. Which I've heard works for when you dump an entire bottle of water into your purse and soak the hell out of your cell phone⁵. But August 2007 Crapweek started last Saturday, so I figure that it's scheduled to be over in 7 minutes⁶. And, so long as I still feel as good tomorrow as I do right now, I'm hitting the town with some friends tomorrow night. 'cuz I so need a night on the town right now!

OK, probably time for little Bethy to take her med (need to check my notes to remember which one!) and hit the hay. Beth sleepy. Beth has comfy bed with soft, freshly laundered sheets in which to sleep.

OK, I just went to take my night time meds and discovered that I took the wrong med earlier today. I'm supposed to take my antibiotic three times a day (like morning, midway through the day, and night), and my steriod twice day (morning and night). But, for some unknown reason, I took my steroid in the middle of the day instead of my antibiotic. I think I can kiss that growth spurt goodbye.

¹I figure if someone is going to be messing with my face, it's really worth the extra money to go to the best of the best.
²For the record, just typing that out made me queasy.
³Since I'm a vegetarian, I don't eat gelatin, which is made from horse hooves and cow bones. Ick.
⁴Lab rats seems to have ridiculous awesome immune systems.
⁵For the record, this was not me.
⁶It was 11:53 pm on Friday night when I typed that.

Freebee Friday

I love free stuff. The offer of free stuff appeals to both my pack rat tendencies and my cheapness gene. And this week was a banner week for free stuff. As previously mentioned, I got to see TWO free movies this weekend - Arctic Tale (my movie review: meh.) on Monday and Skinwalkers (my movie review: I heart things that bite!) on Wednesday.

But Friday brought the motherload of free stuff! First, I got a free textbook from a publishing company. Publishing companies love to give instructors free textbooks, because if you like their book and make it the required one for your course, that's 100¹ kids who have to buy the overpriced thing. When I used to teach introductory nutrition, I received no less than four textbooks and two diet analysis software packages for free! After going to campus to pick up my free textbook, I headed out to the Georgia Straight office to pick up a prize package that I had won through one of their online contests. This prize pack consisted of 5 books, seen here sitting on my bedside bookshelf:

The book that had most appealed to me when I saw this contest was the Raw Shark Texts. I'd seen this book on a recent trip to the UBC Bookstore and it caught my eye because (a) I like sharks and (b) it had the shape of a shark cut out of the cover:

...so I read the back of the book and it sounded intriguing! I wasn't familiar with any of the other books, but I checked them out while waiting for the bus after picking them up and they all sound really good! So now I have a big stack of books to read - I'm just starting Infinite Jest³ though, which is about 2 million pages long, so it may be a while until I get to my new free books.

As an added bonus, I also got this free, snazzy new Georgia Straight bag, in which to carry my new books home:

And on the way home, I stopped by to see my hair stylist to get a free bang trim. I'm coming to discover that having bangs requires more than a once a year haircut.

OK, now as I was composing this posting, I just got a free bottle of water! I'm sitting at a coffee shop and the dude at the counter forget to make my toasted bagel so, as an apology for making me wait, he gave me a free bottle of water! It's my lucky week!

¹well, 100 kids in the case of my class, 'cuz that's about how big the class will be. If you teach one of those monster 500 student courses, that's a total goldmine for the publisher!

²the Georgia Straight, a local newspaper, was also the source of the Skinwalkers tickets.

³which I picked up at a used bookstore a while ago

Nightmares, Hump for the Hip and omg it's freaking hot out

Seeing as how I've been done school for almost an entire year, you'd think that I wouldn't have that nightmare where I'm supposed to write an exam but only discover this fact at the time of the exam - I don't know where the exam is being held and I certainly haven't studied for it, as I only just found out that I am even in the course! I haven't even taken an exam in over 3.5 years! To make it even weirder, it was an English exam... and I haven't had an English class since 1995!

In other news, I just listened to the best Hump at the Pump ever! Billed as "Hump for the Hip" as the participants won tickets to the Tragically Hip concert, as well as a catered suite where they get to meet the Hip, this H@tP involved a threesome (complete with man pagent to chose the lucky boy who got to partake) and police witnesses. I'll post a link to the video when it's up on the CFOX website.

In other, other news - it's freaking hot out. Already, at 8:13 am. And I live in a basement, where it is usually nice and cool. I guess that's what happens when it's the hottest day ever in the history of Vancouver, which is what today's forecast calls for. Yesterday was also one mofo of a hot day - I decided to sit outside in the sun (because I'm a masochist, apparently) and drink a Frappucino (because they are tasty, albeit calorific) in the afternoon while doing some reading (did I ever mention that I *love* my job?)... today may call for a repeat of that, if I don't melt first. Then I have a softball game. Let's consider the Frappucino carbo-loading and/or pre-hydration, k?

And speaking of work, I should go there now. Catch ya later.

My New Coffeemaker Looks Like A Spaceship

After work tonight, a trip to the mall in search of wedding shower presents. I very rarely go to the mall, as I much prefer to buy stuff at consignment stores. So I decided to take advantage of the mall trip and finally replace the coffeemaker that I broke¹. Spent an inordinate amount of time in Zellers trying to decide if it was worth double the price to get a coffeemaker with an alarm function so that I can wake up to a freshly made cup of coffee. I do so like to wake up to the smell of my organic, fair-trade Bolivian coffee brewing! But double the price?? Finally, my friend Linda arrived² to point out that I could buy the non-alarm coffeemaker and plug it in through a timer, so that it would function as an alarm, but without paying double the price. Linda is smart like that. So I get the cheap coffee pot, lug it around the mall as we grab some dinner and then head to the Bay in search of wedding shower presents. Spend an inordinate amount of time trying to decide what to get, then inspecting the items to ensure they are perfect³. Have attention drawn by giant yellow signs that read: "CLEARANCE! 50% OFF!" "That coffeemaker looks like a spaceship!!" yells Linda. And it really does. And it has the alarm function. And, at half off, it's the same price as the alarm-less one that I'm holding at the time. So I buy the spaceship and then lug *two* coffeemakers across the mall⁴ to return the first one. But it was so worth it! Check it out:

You know you are jealous!

Of course, by choosing form before function, I have the slightly inconvenient problem that this coffeemaker is too wide to share my meagre counter space with my (also over-sized) toaster, which was already fighting for space with my kettle. Meaning that I will need to do some creative rearranging of the kitchen (I've re-deployed the kettle to live next to the microwave, which sits under the stereo, but need to find a new home for the toaster). But the rearranging is long overdue, as evidenced by this note I had to put up for myself, after blowing the circuit one to many times:

Hmmm... maybe the toaster could go on top of the microwave and the stereo could go into the living room.. or on top of the other kitchen cabinet... which would require the liquor to be relocated... or... oh well, I'm sure I'll figure it out. Of course, I should probably unpack all my boxes of books, which would give me more room to do stuff. Which of course would require me to get a bookshelf on which to put those books... which would require someone with a vehicle...

¹I've given up looking for a replacement pot, as it's clear that I'm just never going to find the one that fits and they have long since discontinued that model. Now that I've bought the new coffeemaker, I'm certain that I will find the perfect pot the next time I go into a thrift shop.

²She had been delayed by the minor problem of having locked her keys in the trunk of her car. D'oh!

²I can't tell you what we got, on the off chance that the intended recepients of the gift reads this posting. I don't think they will, but my postings are imported into Facebook, so it's not outside the realm of possibility. I'll tell you later, 'cuz, if I do say myself, this might be the COOLEST. GIFT. EVER.

⁴OK, to be honest, Linda lugged one and I lugged the other. 'cuz she's a good friend like that.

Dropper of All Things Valuable

I was talking to my sister today and she was telling me about how she really wants an iPhone, but she is hestitant to get one when they come out since she is "dropper of all things valuable." I think this trait must be genetic, because I am also a DoATV. I drop my iPod on a regular basis (thank dog for the protective rubber case I have on it). I've dropped my digital camera a couple of times (always onto my carpeted floor though, so it's been ok so far). I even dropped my beloved new phone on the bus the other day (can anyone say "heart attack"?)! And then tonight, I broke the pot for my coffeemaker! Now, that might not seem to meet the V requirement of DoATV, especially when you consider that I had partially melted the handle of that pot in a previous episode of airheadedness, wherein I had left it sitting on the oven and then turned on the wrong burner¹ when I went to cook something, resulting in fire and melted plastic all over the stove. And so the handle was only very tenuously attached to the pot itself and I was pretty sure that I would one day spill a pot full of boiling hot coffee all over myself. So really, it's probably better that I knocked the pot off the pile of dishes in the dish drying rack, as opposed to getting third-degree burns over significant portions of my body. However, it does leave me in a bit of a predicament. I have a perfectly good coffeemaker, but no pot in which to make said coffee. What's a girl to do? Can you replace the coffee pot? I mean, you'd need to get the exact right model, or it wouldn't fit. But do they sell just the coffee pot part? If so, where? It would seem quite environmentally unfriendly to trash a perfectly good coffeemaker and get a new one just because you went and smashed the pot. People of the internets, I need your help! What do I do??

Also, on the topic of my airheadedness, I lost my key no fewer than once per day for the last three days. On Sunday I went for a run and so I had taken my key off the keychain to carry it in this little wrist band keyholder thing I have. I returned home from my run, absentmindedly put my key down and went about my day without thinking about it again until I went out. At that point, I checked my purse to make sure I had my keychain, which I did. But I had forgotten that the key was not attached to the key chain. So I locked myself out. Had to borrow the landlords's key to get back in. Spent hours looking for my key. Which turned out to be sitting underneath my laptop the entire time. *Sigh*

Oh man, it's so late right now. I'm up way past my bedtime. I have to be up in five and a half hours. And, of course, I won't be able to make myself any coffee in the morning!! Arrgh!

¹I constantly, despite my best efforts to avoid it, turn the wrong burner on. If I want to turn the front burner on, 9 times of out 10 I'll turn the back burner on. I believe I suffer from stove dyslexia.

Tying Up Some Loose Ends

Remember how I once accused my apartment of eating things? I was completely sure that it had eaten my favourite sweater. As it turns out, however, my apartment did not, in fact, eat my sweater. Rather, it mailed my sweater to my sister's apartment in Toronto. Why my apartment would do such a thing, I have no idea. It's sneaky. But how else can you explain how my sweater ended up there? Surely I did not forget it there when I visited last June! At any rate, my sister has mailed it back to me and now I have a nice sweater to wear to work*.

Remember how I sprung on you out of nowhere that I'd been working on a systematic review for "ages," even though I'd never mentioned it here ever before? I just got word that it's accepted for publication.

Remember when I told you about all the airheaded things I do? Add "pokes self in eye with mascara wand. On a regular basis." I forgot to add that to the list when I wrote that posting.

Remember how the bank didn't want to let me consolidate my 14 individual student loans and was telling me that I would have to make fourteen individual payments each month? Well, they went and consolidated them anyway, but now there appears to be no way for me to pay them through my online banking. There used to be an option to pay them in my "pay bills" section of my online banking, but now that they've consolidated my loans, that option is gone. It's almost like they don't want me to pay these damn things back**.

Remember how I complained that holding my coffee on the bus was just too taxing? My mom sent me this cool travel bag that has a million and one pockets, including a water bottle holder pocket that works perfectly as a coffee cup holder. I'm pretty sure my life is complete now.

*After I washed it to get all the cat hair out, of course.

**Which would be fine by me!!

Biz-ness

A few items of business. Because I know you all love business, right?

Remember back when this used to be a blog about thesis writing, and the similarity between writing a thesis and the seventh layer of hell? Well, my final paper from that thesis has now been accepted for publication in the journal Bone. For those of you not from the world of bone science, Bone is a pretty sweet journal to get published in. My other paper from my thesis is also there, so it's nice to have this one in the same journal, as it really does stem from the first paper. As an added bonus, we get to have one of the figures printed in colour - for free! Ordinarily it costs about US$1000 to get a figure printed for free, but they grant one request per month for a free colour image, as long as the colour is scientifically warranted. Which of course mine is. It also happens to be waaay prettier in colour than in black & white. But absolutely scientifically warranted.

I got my business cards last week. I would post them here, but as I discussed before, I'm avoiding mentioning where I work here in blogland*. Suffice it to say, they are wicked cool and you should be jealous of me.

In terms of my health, no one seems to know what's wrong with me. I am H. pylori negative, but that doesn't tell me why my tummy still hurts, or why I was vomitting coffee grounds***. I went back to the walk-in clinic, but the doctor I saw seemed to not really know what was wrong with me, and just wanted to criticize what the first doctor had done, despite the fact that he hadn't even opened up my file before he walked into the room and had no idea what was going on. He also told me that I need to completely eliminate caffeine, despite the fact there really isn't any scientific evidence to support that****. I need to find a real family doc and not rely on the walk in, because clearly continuity of care is not their strong point. I think I need a referral to a gastroenterologist to find out what the heck is going on. My plan is now to contact the (absolutely wonderful) doctor I used to see at Student Health***** to see if she knows of a good family doc that is accepting patients right now, and hopefully they will give me a referral, as well as a prescription for a proton-pump inhibitor, as I only currently have a sample package, and that will run out soon.

And finally, I really should get back to work. I'm working on revisions to a systematic review that I've been working on for ages (it kind of got sidetracked as my co-author, who is normally in Australia, went to Zimbabwe for a while and didn't have much access to the net**). It's due later this week and I'm hoping there aren't too many revisions (although I've had the reviewer's comments for a week, I got sidetracked with my health and haven't really looked at them up until now). There really is no rest for the wicked.


*not that that stopped a co-worker from Googling me and finding my blog!

**kind of like Field, BC.

***fortunately now it is just stomach pains that come and go, and no nausea or vomitting since that one time last Sunday.

****Had he suggested a trial period of caffeine elimination from my diet to test if that was causing trouble, I might have been willing to play along. But telling me to never have caffeine EVER AGAIN (which is what he said to do) and being completely dismissive of the fact that I'm experiencing withdrawl symptoms did not impress me in the least. I mean, I have tags for "coffee," "tea" and "diet pop" on my blog... I think I just might be a caffeine addict!

*****I can't go to Student Health anymore, as I'm not a student. =(

Coffee-ground vomitus

Like Sarah, I'm sure that everyone is dying to know why I know about coffee-ground vomitus. What's that? You really aren't all dying to know? Well, too bad, 'cuz I'm going to tell you anyway.

Actually, it's not nearly as exciting a story as it could be. But I think it has to do with this guy:


On Sunday I went out for my 18 K run. Felt great. Finished my run, had a shower. Started to feel not so great. I think "oh, I'll be fine", walked to the grocery store. Start getting groceries. Start to feel really, really not great. Like intense stomach pains, extreme weakness. Do I drop what I'm doing and go immediately home like a sensible person would? No, of course I don't. I finish getting my groceries, pay for them, and walk home, having to stop a few times to lean against a pole and gather my strength. Now, I think that someone who just ran 18K should surely be able to walk 4 blocks carrying a few groceries, no? Apparently, not so much. When I got home, I dropped the groceries on the floor and crawled into the bathroom, as by this time I was having the most intense stomach pains - I could actually feel my stomach muscle contracting! - and nausea. Really, really nauseous. "I've been food poisoned by the Power Gel I had on my run!" I decided. On my previous 18 K, my Power Gel (vanilla flavoured) did wonders, but this time, I'd clearly been poisoned. How could you let me down so, Strawberry-Banana Power Gel??

Every so often, I would gather my strength and crawl out to my living room and get something to bring back to the bathroom with me - first a pillow, since lying on the bathroom floor is not all the comfortable. Then my laptop* to try to distract myself, and possibly summon assistance. The pain and nausea got so bad that I thought, "Well, I have 2 options. I can sit here and continue to sob from the pain, or I can make myself throw up." Whenever I've had food poisoning, I've always felt so much better after vomiting. My body knows when there is something bad in my stomach and knows that getting it out is the best solution. So I did something I've never, ever done before. I actually stuck my finger down my throat to make myself throw up. And thus, the coffee-ground vomitus. It actually looked just like coffee grounds! It was so disgusting that the sight of it made me vomit even more**.

Now, I have never seen or heard of coffee-ground vomitus before, so, being a little freaked out, I consulted Dr. Google. I was pretty sure that I didn't actually have yellow fever, which is the oft cited cause of black vomit, but other causes of upper GI tract bleeds were a possibility (coffee-ground vomitus is the result of an upper GI tract bleed of some kind, as the heme iron in the blood becomes oxidized by gastric acid, resulting in the lovely black vomit), . So then I decided that perhaps I should consult my personal physician, Dr. Kaede***. After a series of questions, she determined that a possible cause could be a bleeding ulcer, although it is odd for it to come on so suddenly (I hadn't had any stomach issues prior to this).

So, on Monday after suffering through a day of stomach pain (but no nausea, thankfully) at work, I went to a walk-in clinic****. I got a ride there from my personal nurse*****, who asked me the same questions as my personal physician and came to the same conclusion. Although she did point out that my ridiculously high caffeine intake (which is usually about 2 large travel mugs of coffee and a diet Pepsi per day, sometimes more) probably doesn't help the old GI tract. "But I've been drinking this much caffeine for 15 years," I said. "Yeah, and that's probably catching up to you now!"

I wait at the walk-in clinic for an hour and fifteen minutes so that the doctor can ask me all the same questions as I had gone through with Dr. Google, Dr. Kaede and my nurse. And then ordered a test for H. pylori******, the bacteria that causes ulcers. I wish I could have just ordered the test myself and saved that hour and fifteen minutes.

On the plus side, I was given the option of either a breath test or a blood test. Obviously, being even more of a needle-phobe than I am a vomit-phobe, I opted for a breath test. The drawbacks are that you have to fast for at least four hours and that you can't take any antacids before the test*******. A small price to pay for keeping needles out of my arm, in my opinion. So I went for my breath test today... they made me drink some radioactive drink and blow through a straw into a tube. As far as I can tell, the radioactive drink has not given me any superpowers... yet. Test results should be back in a day or two. I'm really hoping it is H. pylori, because it's fairly easy to treat - just a week of antibiotics and you are good to go. If it isn't that, who the hell knows! And I don't want to be dealing with this - it's not fun to have constant stomach pain and I have a half marathon to run in less than 3 weeks, but right now I can barely walk the three blocks from the bus stop to my office.

Also, my mother is convinced that I am hemorrhaging to death. She is sure that somehow running 18K caused my internal organs to be ripped apart and my death from blood loss is imminent. So now, on top of the non-stop stomach pain, I have to deal with that guilt that I'm worrying my mother. The stress of that is enough to give me an ulcer!

*You know you are an internet junkie when...
**This will not be a surprise to Sarah, who gave me the nickname "Flush" after that party in high school were I was puking and I kept flushing the toilet mid-puke because I didn't want to look at it.
***OK, she's not actually my personal physician. She's a friend of mine who also happens to be a physician
****Since I don't actually have a family doctor. I'd been going to Student Health Services, where I had the best doctor EVER, but I can't go there anymore since I'm no longer a student.
*****OK, she's not actually my personal nurse. She's a friend of mine who also happens to be a nurse.
******See picture at the start of this posting, which seems like ages ago!
*******I got to take the antacid (which is actually an H+, K+, ATPase inhibitor - a pretty powerful antacid) after the test, but it didn't really seem to help at all anyway.

Comedy of Errors, Calgary-style

So, yesterday I was supposed to have a teleconference for work^*. After re-confirming 16 times that Pacific Time is one hour behind Mountain Time, not after it^**, and sorting out the whole issue that Justin doesn't actually have a landline (i.e., borrowing his cell phone instead and being very apologetic for using up all his minutes), I skipped out at the end of lunch just before 4 pm^*** (the scheduled time of the call), leaving Sarah, Dave and Justin in the restaurant to go sit in Justin's car with the cell phone to make my call. There was only one slight problem with this plan - the car was gone. Apparently we had parked at ~3 pm on a street where there is no parking between 3:30-6:30 pm. We'd parked at a meter and none of us had noticed the sign informing us of this salient fact. So I go running back up the street to tell S, D & J that the car is gone and that I would be across the street in the coffee shop doing my teleconference. I managed to call into the conference line and, fortunately, despite calling in at 4:02 pm, no one else was yet there^****. When the first person logs in, she informs me that the cell phone is totally breaking up and that I should really get on a landline. I inform her that the person I'm staying with doesn't have one, but I could go outside to the pay phone. Yes, outside in the -10 degree weather for what could potentially be an hour long conference call. So outside I go, forced to abandon the $2 coffee I'd just bought so that I could stay in the coffee shop^*****. However, by the time I got outside and across the road, we discovered that half the people on the call didn't, for various reasons, have the materials I'd couriered to them before I left, so we need to re-schedule the meeting for next week. Of course, I was secretly glad for this, because I really didn't relish the idea of staying outside on a payphone for an hour in the freakin' snow (!), although it does mean that I'll have to do some emailing to re-arrange the meeting. But at least I will be able to call in from the comfort of my own office, where it is warm and toasty and I have a view of the beautiful mountains and there is no snow^******. By the time I got off the call, Justin had confirmed that his car had, in fact, been towed and he and Dave were going to make the trek to the impound lot, while Sarah and I would trek back to Justin's apartment. I, without my touque, which I had left in the now impounded car, was not terribly happy about this development. However, we made it back, and Justin got his car out of impound^******* and then all was right with the world. And later on in the night, at a bar on the Red Mile, we watched the Flames lose to the San Jose Sharks and all was even more right with the world. Except for the lack of hot boys in this city. Every second girl you see in this city looks like a model, every guy appears to be 5 ft 1 or shorter. I did see one hot boy at The Mynt^******** last night, but I'm pretty sure he wasn't from here.

Also, check out Dave's blog to learn "More Things You Didn't Know About Calgary"

^*Yes, I'm working on my vacation. I'm *that* dedicated. Wait, I'm taking vacation one month into my new job... OK, maybe not so dedicated after all.

^**On the plane ride her, I switched my watch back an hour instead of forward an hour and couldn't figure out why it was so dark at 7:30 p.m. when we were landing.

^***Yes, we have lunch at 3 pm. So?

^****Since I was the one coordinating the meeting, I didn't want to be late.

^*****As I'd left my travel mug in the now towed car, I'd got my coffee in a to-stay mug and didn't think they'd appreciate if I took it out of the shop.

^******in my office. There will probably still be snow on the mountains.

^********Not to be mistaken for Gay Mynt Belfast, starring Titti von Tramp. Because I'm pretty sure that's illegal here in Cal-gary.

Five Somewhat Related Things

1. I did my 16K run on Tuesday, because I really didn't feel up to it on Sunday, and I had a late work day, followed by a dinner meeting, on Monday. I have been ravenously hungry since Tuesday. I feel like I've done nothing but eat since then.
2. Speaking of eating, a friend of Danielle's came over last night and made us the most delicious dal for dinner. So. Freaking. Delicious.
3. Speaking of delicious, a new Tim Horton's has been built that is even closer to my place than the one on Broadway. They build those things ridiculously fast... on Saturday when I went by there, there were construction workers inside building the place, and it was open by Monday. It has been open since Monday and, would you believe, I haven't been there yet? And did I mention that it is right next to the liquor store*?? But that's OK, I'm pretty sure that I'll get there soon because...
4. ... it's only 7 more sleeps until Sarah gets here!
5. Then it's only 5 more sleeps until we go to Calgary. Dave is meeting us there. We are staying with Justin. I am assured that hijinks will ensue.

*i.e., one stop shopping

You Can See The Clouds In Front of the Mountains From My Office!

Thoughts on my day:

• because there was a chance that I might have to stay late for a meeting this evening, I decided to get up early* to go for a run before work as I didn't want to run in the dark after getting home late. Apparently someone is unfamiliar with the concept of "spring forward." I got up at 6:30 a.m. and it was pitch fucking black. But, being the resourceful person that I am, I decided to have my breakfast/make my lunch/do the dishes/pack my bag for work before I ran, thus giving it time to get light out. And I got into work by 9:30 am, which is half an hour earlier than I had expected to.
• Apparently there is a reason that "free coffee" isn't a listed benefit. I discovered today that apparently the kitchenette on my floor has a coffee maker that is just for show. My hallmates** informed me, when I inquired about the coffee making situation, that "it's just for desperation" and the coffee maker in the main office, three floors below us, is much better... well, you would have to be quite desperate, not to mention very creative, to make coffee on our floor, as there are coffee filters, but no coffee***. So I went to the main office for my morning coffee, but their coffee maker is quite small and since I'm sure that satisfying my coffee dependency by continually making pots of it is not in any of the support staff's job descriptions, when I required an afternoon caffeine jolt****, I made the trip to Timmy Ho's. It's a long, convoluted, subterranean route to the Timmy's... a series of tubes, if you will, not unlike the internets.
  
• I'm hoping that walking through said series of tubes to Timmy's, as well as taking the stairs up and down to my 6th floor office a few times a day will counteract the nonstop sitting and snacking that comes along with a computer-based office job, so that I won't gain 50 lbs a minute.
• I'm listening to the Canucks game on the radio as I compose this posting and this brings up two things: (a) I saw on their website that the Canucks have called up relative cutie Nathan Smith from the Manitoba Moose, and (b) the Canucks are playing the Wild and I can't hear Shorty or Larscheid say the name "Carney" without giggling. I keep picturing a carnie rather than Carney.
• while waiting for the bus this morning I learned that, apparently, Matt (whoever Matt may be) is ripped and has 3 nipples and someone else "luvs to spooge":
• After two days at work, I'm interesting in learning how the hell anyone gets anything done when they are working 8 hours a day on things unrelated to blogging and emailing? Anyone have any idea?
  

*Yeah, I'm as surprised as you are.
**Is that a word?
***There's instant, but I won't dignify that by calling it coffee. Hey, does anyone remember the brief period when Tetley made instant tea? What was up with that?
****as my early afternoon diet Pepsi just wasn't cutting it.

A test of my will

The other day I was watching the Canucks game with some fellow scientists at Coppertank and Erika told a story about how she was burned as a young child when she spilled a scalding hot cup of hot chocolate on herself and she bears the scar tissue to this day. For some reason, this made me crave a hot chocolate*. And since Coppertank is right across the road from Timmy Ho's and I was walking home from the 'tank, I decided to pop in to satisfy that craving. And what did I discover when I entered Timmy's?

It's Roll Up The Rim To Win time. For you non-Canadians, RUTRTW is this promotion they have at Tim Horton's where you can, not surprisingly, win prizes by rolling up the rim of your coffee cup. Your disposable paper coffee cup.

This is where the test of my will comes in. As I have mentioned before, I bring a travel mug around with me, as I prefer not to use disposable cups, destroying trees and filling up landfills unnecessarily. When I emailed my sister the pic from the Metro, her response was "And look at you sporting your environmentally friendly coffee cup." It's what I do. However, I also like winning things. Hence, my dilemma. You can't very well win anything at Roll Up The Rim To Win if you don't take the paper coffee cup. So, I've been to Timmy's twice since RUTRTW started and used my travel mug both times, forgoing my opportunity to roll and win. But how long can I resist the siren song this is a chance to win an iPod**? And shouldn't they have a contest that rewards the use of non-disposable mugs, rather than promoting those who continue to fill up our landfills??

Me, modeling with a disposable paper cup at Timmy's (not a Roll Up The Rim To Win one, mind you) on a day when I was not practising what I preach. And yes, I always dress this nicely to go to Timmy's, don't you?

*I know. I'm weird.

**I know that I already have an iPod. But this one has more memory than mine!

The Latest Crazy Undertaking in the Life of Beth

OK, so it's not totally crazy. For example, it's not as crazy as making your life a Choose Your Own Adventure where your blog readers get to vote on things you do in life so that you end up showing up to a blogging conference in a dragon costume, like so:


So, I'm not that crazy. The crazy undertaking of which I speak is that, starting tomorrow, I am following the Food Guide. For a month. And recording everything I eat. Danielle and another friend of ours, Sheila, who is also in the Dietetics program, have decided to do this since, as dietitians, they will be telling people to follow the Food Guide, so they really should see what it is like to do it themselves. And I, as usual, am tagging along for the ride. I even made my own personalized Food Guide (.pdf), using some of my favourite foods as examples (you can play along at home and make your own personalized Food Guide by going to the Health Canada site). As a female, age 19-30*, I am allowed the following number of servings in a day:


And "Food Guide Servings" are a heck of a lot smaller than what you or I usually think of as a serving. For example, one English muffin = 2 servings. 50g (or 1.5 oz) of cheese (that's a piece of cheese about the size of your thumb) = 1 serving. And 6 spears of asparagus = 1 serving**. And for you meat eaters, 1/2 cup of meat = 1 serving - that's just 125 mL or 2.5 oz of beef!

The plan is to record everything we eat and try to actually consume the recommended number of servings. Now, the amount of food that the Food Guide allows us looks like it is going to be a fair bit less than what we usually eat - not overly surprising, seeing as how the Food Guide is meant for the "average Canadian" and I'm pretty sure that training for a half marathon is slighty more activity than the "average Canadian" gets... not to mention the fact that, compared to Danielle & Sheila (who regularly run half marathons, are training for a triathalon, are hardcore utli players and bike to school every day) I look like a sedentary couch potato. So, we've decided that if we do, indeed, end up eating more servings than the Food Guide recommends, we'll try to make those from the Fruit & Veg group. Danielle & I made up booklets in which to easily record all this and I dug through my many boxes of dishes to find my extra sets of measuring cups, as I think we'll be doing a lot of measuring to figure out how many servings of things we'll be getting. As well, I'm sure that we'll be consuming things not included in the Food Guide***, and those things will be recorded and duly noted as well. The point is not necessarily to follow the Guide rigidly (as it is a guide, not a hard and fast program - and we nutritional scientists are fond of saying "things are OK in moderation!"), but to get a sense of how easy or difficult it is to follow the Guide.

As I'm sure you are all *dying* to know how this goes, I'll be sure to keep you posted.

*I better enjoy this year, as next year I enter the 31-50 age range (omg, how depressing is that!) and I'm only allowed 7 servings of Fruit & Veg and 6 servings of Grain Products! That's TWO less servings of food every single day! =(

*um, wtf? Who the hell only eats 6 spears of asparagus???

*** coffee, Diet Pepsi, sweet sweet alcohol, I'm looking in your direction

Coffee, Sunshine, Singing Birds and A Blogging Conference

I'm sitting at Calhoun's right now, drinking coffee and availing myself of the free wifi*. I'm sitting on the patio. In the sunshine. Wearing sunglasses. No jacket. In FEBRUARY!!

I was lured out of my dark dank basement suite by the sounds of birds singing! I'm not making that up. Friggin' birds were friggin' singing outside my friggin' window. In the sunshine. In February. The Weather Network claims that it is 9 degrees out**, and Environment Canada would have you believe it is 8 degrees. This is complete bullshit. It must be at least 15. It's gorgeous. I'm pretty sure this is a conspiracy to keep the rest of the country from knowing how amazing it is here, as we have no room for any more people to move here.

Also, I'm going to a blogging conference tomorrow - Northern Voice! It's two days - tomorrow is Moose Camp, the unconference and Saturday is the more conferency part. I'm volunteering because I didn't have the $50*** it costs to attend. I'm really looking forward to it - it sounds like there is going to be a lot of really cool sessions, and it's sold out and so I'll get the chance to meet lots of really cool people. My friend Phillip is going, so I'll at least know one of the attendees. No doubt you'll be hearing all about it from me over the next couple of days.

*Free because UBC made a deal with fatport where anyone with a UBC Campus Wide Login (CWL) can use any fatport in Vancouver for free. Apparently it is a one-year trial. Of course, being UBC, they didn't bother to actually advertise this, so hardly anyone I've talked to knows about it. I only know about it because I have connections.

**That's 9 degrees Celsius. For my American friends, that's 48 degrees Fahrenheit.

***Yes, I'm aware that $50 is a fantastic deal for a 2 day conference. But I'm ungainfully unemployed, so to me that it a prohibitive amount. Thankfully Darren & Cyprien, two of the organizers, took pity on me and are letting me volunteer.

Surfin' in Tofino

Cast of Characters (in alphabetical order):

Alicia: friend of mine through school and through science outreach work.
Beth: um, this is me. But you knew that!
Danielle: my awesome roommate and former hockey team captain!
Jasmine & Jesse: Danielle's friends. It was Jesse's birthday too, so they have a bunch of friends coming on this adventure too.
Kalev: friend of mine through school, sort of. We worked together on a project once, ended up in San Fran together and the rest is history.
Kim: friend of mine through my and Danielle's hockey team.
Kyle: Kalev's boyfriend. He's a physicist.
Sheila: friend of mine through Danielle. We all play ultimate together.
Bunch'o'people, most of whose names I did not catch: Jasmine & Jesse's friends... I didn't catch most of their names, other than Brice who drove us around.

Locations:
Vancouver --> Horseshoe Bay ferry terminal in West Van --> Departure Bay ferry terminal in Nanaimo --> Tofino!!!

Action:
Saturday, January 13, 2007. At 6:25 am on a normal day, you are far more likely to find Beth just going to bed than you are to find her up and ready to go for the day. But there she is, showered, fed, full of coffee and on her way up the icy hill to catch the 6:35 am bus that will take her downtown to catch another bus to the ferry. And she only had to set three alarms and be slightly panicked that she wouldn't wake up in time in order to achieve this. Danielle is already over on the island and Sheila is taking another bus downtown, but everyone else gets on Beth's bus and make it downtown without incident. Alicia informs Beth, to her delight, that her birthday present is that they will be taking a pole dancing lesson! Sweet! Meeting up with Sheila downtown, they all hop on the bus to the ferry terminal, taking over the back of the bus and being rather rowdy for such an early hour. Their rowdiness continues into the ferry waiting area and the annoyance of the other early morning travellers (and their relief that we aren't getting on the same ferry as them) is palpable. Once on the ferry, someone inadvertently flips Sheila's off switch. The group soon (OK, two hours later) arrives and Beth declares that getting them to Departure Bay was the end of her responsibility insofar as knowing where they are going is concerned. She also declares that Departure Bay is inappropriately named, seeing as they have just arrived. Beth likes to declare things.

Danielle, Jasmine, Jesse and crew arrive to whisk the group to Tofino. That's "Tofino," not "casino" as Beth's, Kim's and Kyle's mothers all thought they were saying when they said "I'm going to Tofino this weekend!". "Whisking" involves a 3-hour drive, a Tim Horton's lunch break and much pondering on the snowiness of the surroundings, given that the group is on a surfing trip. As they near Tofino, Kalev declares that we should not pick up the hitchhiker, because he is "not nearly hot enough." The group scopes out the beach, checks into the cabin (Beth's crew) and suite (J&J's crew) and then heads to the surf rental shop. They discover that they are too late in the day to do a 4-hour rental and have to do a 24-hour rental instead. Seeing as it is only $5 more and it means they get to surf on Sunday morning in addition to Saturday afternoon, everyone is happy with that. Wetsuits are struggled into, and, at the end of it, they all look like Navy Seals. Kalev & Kyle have elected to stay at the cabin and Alicia and Kim have elected to act as official photographers and surf support team. Surf support team duties include picking up the surfers's food & booze & extra towels (because the surfers use up all the towels!) while they shower and struggle out of their wetsuits. Oh ya, and on Sunday morning it involved combing Beth's hair for her. Seriously, I'm not making that up.

Off to Chesterman Beach they go, for skimboarding, boogie boarding and surfing in the most spectacular sunset they've ever seen. Everyone marvels at the beauty surrounding them, thrills at the fun of diving through waves to get our far enough to then try to catch a big one and, with any luck, actually make it to some sort of standing-like position for falling off. Despite the cold weather, the wetsuits are so good that the surfers are warmer in the water than the surf support team is on the beach. Beth is thrilled that she actually managed to get up to her knees and catch a bit of wave... not too bad for a first time surfer! Beth decides that this is officially the best birthday EVER!

Once the sun is set, the crew returns to the cabin and the surfers shower and get out of the wetsuits while the surf support team performs their aforementioned food & booze retrieval duties. Cabin activities include, but are not limited to, watching the Canucks kick some Leafs butt (w00t!); calling Beth's dad to taunt over said Canucks victory; eating a communal dinner of chips, more chips, other snacks, various meal-like items, cookies and so forth; a variety of games; the eating of the birthday cupcakes. In a strange twist, Beth declines to consume alcohol, deciding that she consumed sufficient quantities on her actual birthday.

Sunday, January 14 , 2007. Sunday morning involves getting into the still-wet wetsuits for more surfing. All those things that were said about "wow, it's not even cold surfing in the winter!" are taken back. As is Beth's early morning comment of "how could you forget to duck & cover when you fall off your board?" Beth proceeds to blame her "head injury" (sometimes cited as a "brain injury") every time she says or does something stupid for the rest of the trip. Fortunately, Beth is relatively unharmed, making her mother's predictions that she get hurt while surfing and end up in a watery grave unfulfilled. However, ever the trooper, Beth continues to surf and actually does manage to get up to a standing-like pose on the board for at least a half a second before falling off. As a result, she contemplates a career as a pro surfer. After surfing to the point just shy of hypothermia, they group piles back into the vans to race back to the cabin to try to shower and pack before check-out time.

Beth learns that she shouldn't offer to take the last shower in a cabin of 7 people, as this results in the water going cold before she's even out of her wetsuit. This, combined with the fact that she got the crappy surfing gloves that morning and her hands were frozen to the point of nonfunctionality and that she didn't get to dry her hair as the group was already running late, resulted in her being freezing cold for the remainder of the trip.

The drive back to the now appropriately named Departure Bay ferry terminal at Nanaimo was fairly uneventful, mostly because Beth slept so as to escape sensation that she was freezing to death. She did wake up long enough to take a picture of the cool clouds by the mountain through the car window. Hitting *five* red lights in the home stretch to the ferry terminal leads the group to be 3 minutes too late to buy ferry tickets. Despite the fact that they could have easily run up the ramp to the ferry before it left, the ticket seller refuses and they are force to wait *two hours* until the next ferry. But such is the temperament of our intrepid group that they enjoyed their unexpected two-hour delay by meandering through a grocery store, consuming Timmy Ho or Quizno sandwiches, pretending to be sad about their delay, and taking a nice brisk walk back to the ferry after their food gathering adventures.

And after a two-hour ferry ride (during which they try, but never succeed, at throwing a chocolate covered raisin into Danielle's mouth), a very, very, very full bus ride and another bus ride, they were home again!!

And a good time was had by all. And not just a good time. An wickedly, amazingly, fantastically awesome time in fact. I wanted to do something exciting, something memorable, surrounded by great friends to embrace my 30th birthday and to start to make 2007 the fantastic year that I know it will be. That I will make it be, if it kills me! Life is, after all, what you make it.

So mark your calendars (and start saving your pennies) for January 11th, 2007 - my 40th birthday. The plan (subject to change over the next decade) is to go surfing in Australia or Hawaii. I'll keep you posted as plans develop ;-)

Note: The complete set of photos (all 200+ of them!) from the weekend, in their out-of-order splendor, can be seen on my Flickr.