My working day: 5:30am - wake up 6:00am – leave for work 6:30am – Bus for work leaves mall 5km from where I’ve been living 8:00am – start work 4:00pm – finish work 4:40pm – Bus from work leaves for home 5:30pm – ride bike home 6:00pm – Get home
So things have been a little hectic. My working day is long and tiring. Living out of town with no car is not the most convenient of things… the family I’m living with have been amazing. They’ve been driving me to the bus stop every morning.
The work is the easiest work I’ve done. Look at peoples forms, give them ski or snow boots of the right size. Put them back at the end of the day. Tech peoples ski’s so they fit their boots, and change the din number.
I’ve been learning how to snow board, had a couple of lessons, it’s pretty damn fun. It snowed in town and covered the place in snow, it was really beautiful.
Christmas was awesome, I went back to Vancouver. The day before Christmas I met up with my Aussie friend Dan, we went ice skating and hired bikes and rode around Stanley Park. On Christmas day I went to the neighbours for Mexican food and crepes, so damn good. Then in the afternoon I went to my mate Trina’s for orphans xmas, again, amazing food, drinking, played some games. Then on Boxing Day I went back to Courtenay and had my third Xmas dinner, turkey again, more drinking, more games. So good.
Just moved myself and way too much of my crap to Courtenay on Vancouver Island.
I brought a snow board, a push bike, my back pack, a smaller back pack and an enormous suit case filled with my shit. It was a bit of a pain in the arse. People on the sky train into downtown Vancouver were laughing at me. Luckily my mate Hugues agreed to drive me from down town to the Horseshoe bay Ferry terminal, saved a lot of hassle. I had to take my bike out on the bus the day before, wouldn’t have been physically possible other wise.
The family I’ve moved in with have been real lovely and welcoming. Jessie, who I worked with at Stanley park had made me space in her bathroom, and even printed off a label with my name and stuck it on an empty draw for me to put my stuff, sweetest shit ever.
This is the smallest town I’ve lived in since I was 3. It’s the furthest I’ve lived from shops. It’s 5km’s from the house to Downtown Courtenay. It’ll take a little bit of getting used to.
I gave myself a 4 day weekend last weekend and took the ferry from Horseshoe Bay to Nanaimo to meet up with mate Jessie, who I worked with at Stanley Park. There was a job fair at Mt Washington, the ski mountain on Vancouver Island near Courtenay, where Jessie lives with her mum, dad and younger brother. I’d been flirting with the idea of moving there ever since I worked with Jessie in spring, and Jessies family had very kindly said I could live with them. Jessie let me know that there was a job fair happening.
To keep the story short, I went there, it was nuts, many people, but I got a job in the rentals department, presumably helping people rent ski/snow boarding equipment and clothing? I hear it’s a good job to have.. at least it’ll be inside… not sure I could handle the outside cold. So I move out on the 1st of December. Just when I’d settled back into Vancouver. Ahh well, good to have a change.. I came to Canada to see and do new shit.. so here I am. Living the Aussie dream.. haha! I’m pretty pumped, slightly nervous, but mostly excited. Job starts on the 4th of December, and I think the season goes on until the end of March..? Depends on the snow I guess. Good times here we come.
Halloween, a celebration I feel that Australia is really missing out on. For me it started by selling a whole bunch of costumes and candy to people at Toys R Us, and by purchasing and constructing my own costume and getting all excited. On the 30th I went to this mad party at Beck and Hugues house, hell damn fun. I carved me a pumpkin! Here’s a photo of my costume:
I made the hat myself (Marti helped with the sewing machine).
Marti took me Trick or Treating. I’d been asking customers buying candy for Trick or Treating if they would give me candy or not, if it would be appropriate, most said yes. I’d never done it before, mum had always referred to it as American shit. It’s not so popular in Australia. But anyway, we had a back up story, I was 14… Marti was taking his Australian cousin out (me), because I’d never done it before. Knocking on the first door was hell nerve racking. It was this super sweet old lady though who gave us the rest of her candy coz it was “getting late” (7.45pm).
After the first 5 or so it got really easy though, the candy bag starting getting some weight to it and I felt super happy. Best celebration ever, dressing up, getting candy, boozing it up and parties for the adults. So much damn fun. So many cute kids handing out candy. I loved it.
I gots me a new job… at Toys R Us… yay?! $9.50/hour. Not so great. Better than Tim Hortons at least. That was $8.35/hour, plus had less breaks, plus stank of coffee and donuts afterwards.
Perks – 15% off, not too stressful (mostly)
Negative – shit pay, customers, mega pressure to sell toy warranties to customers. 5 percent of sales we make we are meant to seel these waranties. Huge profit for Toys R Us.
It’s been okay so far, only had 8 shifts. I’m not super excited, but hopefully it’ll be enough to pay the rent. Most other people who work there are 15-19 years old or they’re a manager. The girl who trained me has no social skills and seems to get frustrated easily. I sure hope she doesn’t read this. She’s fine, she’s been working there 8 years, is still just working service at the registers. Instead of communicating what she wants, or acknowledging me, she just gives me this look of disdain/frustration or totally ignores me. Not so pleasant. There are some people there who are quite cool though. Pommy dude who is also trained to be a teacher, he is real nice/chatty. This chick who is real chill and likes to make a whole bunch of swears, and this manager who is also super friendly/helpful and chill.
I am still searching for other work, I am quite unsure as to what I want to do. Working an office job would melt my brain I think, the not moving, staring at a computer screen. Yuck. Bar/café work means tips, but also means shit hours, working weekends, possibly dealing with drunk people and late shifts. I could do teacher stuff maybe? ESL work? I’m not sure if that would kill my brain either, sounds like the best option so far, not sure how to get into it though. If you have any suggestions for my future work endeavors that would be much appreciated.
All these thinks make me wonder what I want to do when I get back to Australia. I still have no bloody idea, less idea than when I left even maybe. Not teaching I don’t think. It still hurts my brain too much to think about doing that. Casual relief teaching maybe. Maybe move back to Wagga, live with parents and study creative arts at TAFE?! Haha, who knows.
That’s right, I have a yeast infection… of the vagina. Unpleasant. I suspect that a lot of woman do, but that not many really talk about it. Apparently there are many causes:
- Increased pH of vagina - Wearing non cotton underwear or pants that are too tight - Poor diet - Taking antibiotics - Taking birth control pill - Chemicals – soaps/dyes/perfumes (never use soap on your bits ladies) - Hormones – pregnant women get it more often - Weak immune system/stress
The treatment part seems like a real bitch. These are some options.
- Taking this one time pill, diflucan. I have tried that, it came back. - Externally using anti fungal vagina creams, tried it, no good. - Squeezing vag cream into applicator, sticking it up your bits and dispensing it all up there. Best to do this one before bed, it leaks out a bit, so better if horizontal, need to wear a pad (tried it, still yeasty) - Whole bunch of herbal things like oil of oregano and grape seed extract - taking probiotics like acidophilus - changing diet, apparently the things that are worst for you to eat when you have a yeast infection are my favourite things: booze and sugar. A full on candida diet means no dairy, no gluten, no fruit, no sugar, no nuts, no beans. It’s prob easier to name the things you can eat: eggs, meat with minimal fat – no bacon, veggies (not potatoes, corn, carrots, mushrooms).. Worst damn diet in the whole world. I’m gonna give it a go for 2 weeks. I’m doubting my ability to stick with it though, I’m not very good at the self control thing. Plus to me it seems like an unhealthy way to eat.
All of this was just found out from info on the net.
From Seattle I met mum and dad in San Francisco and traveled around the west side of states with them for two weeks on an Intrepid/Suntrek tour (Click here for trip details).
From there mum went back to Australia for work and Dad and I went on to New York/New Jersey where we met my bro Cameron.
Too much has happened to really give this trip justice, but here are some of the highlights/interesting points/things I remember:
- Catching up with parents, it had been at least 6 months since I’d seen them (I know, vomit).
- Pitching tents and taking them down the next day for 2 weeks. Using horribly smelly pit toilets. Showering with a frog. Sitting in a tight van with 13 other people. Camp we were on had 5 Germans, 1 swiss, 3 Danish, 1 Malay/Aussie and 3 Armstrongs. Eric and Cheryl were significantly older than the rest, it all worked out very well though, it was a great group.
- Dads interpretation of group dynamics when travelling on a tour like we did: 1) Anticipation about other members of tour, what will they be like, how old will they be, where will they be from. 2) Meet group, chat to everyone, find out more about them. 3) Form friendship groups. 4) Bitch and gossip about other members of group. I think that’s pretty accurate, happened on every tour I’ve been on.
- Red wood/sequoia forests. Trees are awesome.
- Being generic and loving every moment spent in LA – Hollywood boulevard and Venice beach. Even though every one seemed to be there doing the same thing I still really liked it. I really wanted to go on one of those tours where you sus out stars houses and stalk them. No time though.
- The really crazy change in scenery in the States. California looked a lot like Australia. Dry as shit, all these Eucalypts everywhere. Crazy desserts, death valley, Grand Canyon, Yosemite, big rocks, all sorts of shit. Hot as hell some places, damn cold in other. Good times. It’s a damn big country with a lot to see.
- Helicopter ride over Grand Canyon. Luckily mum didn’t spew this time.
- Las Vegas. Awful but wonderful at the same time. Lion enclosures, flamingos, roller coasters, gambling, bright lights. Our tour group were told we were going on a limousine ride,, about 30 of us, and that there would be booze and stripper poles. Much to my disappointment Cheryl and Eric said that they wanted to join everyone on this. Boo. For some reason it wasn’t quite what they expected, what with all the loud music, strobe lights, drunken people dancing around the stripper poles. STRIPPER POLES and included booze, how can you not know what it was going to be like. Dad said he thought it would be a nice tour of Vegas where you got out and saw the main highlights... silly man. Went on Rollercoaster in New York New York, too hung over to really enjoy it. I made wee wee time in a car park, booze bus didn’t’ have toilets or toilet stops. Bad idea.
- Love, Beatles show in Las Vegas. I had no idea what this would be like, mum and dad forked out pennies though, so I was happy. It was mother fucking awesome! Crazy acrobatics, awesome costumes and props, Beatles music played on the best sound system ever. It was damn amazing. Best show EVER!
- I put 10 bucks on the roulette table, I almost put it all on 5, chickened out though, only put 2 on 5 and scattered the rest around. It landed on 5. I won like 70 bucks at least. Dad won 16 bucks on the pokies.
- Met up with Eliza in San Francisco AND in New York. Damn good times, she’s a good bloody woman.
- New York is full of the most wretched, aggressive, unfriendly and mean people I have met in my entire life. People rave about New York, and how they either loved living there or would love to live there. I personally will never live there. Sure, it has heaps going on, cool shit to see and do. Living in a place to me isn’t all about that though (to me). If the people are wretched cunts, what’s the point. Even (or especially) people working in information desks. So damn rude, didn’t want to help you at all, just gave you the impression they would be happy to see you get run over and die slowly and painfully. Dad told one woman to fuck of, I was really proud/impressed. I really came out hating New York. Even the dude at the Newark Airport as I was leaving was super rude, and aggressively hurled my bag onto the conveyer belt. The airport thought it would be best to take away humans to help you check in and replaced them with stupid machines that don’t make sense. The humans that remain there are useless aggressive bastards who don’t want to help you and give you a look of annoyance should you dare need help. Then they charge you 15/20 fucking dollars to check your bag in, and don’t provide a meal. CUNTS.
- Niagra, damn cool, American side was nasty though, hadn’t put any money into making it nice, apparently Canadian side is much better, we didn’t have time though
- Ithaca, super cute uni town south east of Niagra. Loved it. Wanted to go to a frat party, again, no time.
- 6 FLAGS GREAT ADVENTURE BABY!!!! I have always wanted to do a rollercoaster tour of the states. On this trip, I went on 2 coasters on the west coast, and every one I could get my hands on at 6 flags (went with my older bro Cameron). Best damn day ever. I would like to describe each coaster, where I sat on it, and how many times I went on them, I will try not to though. All up I went on 17 rollercoaster rides. We went on Kingda Ka twice (click here for you tube video), the tallest/fastest rollercoaster in the world. It looks like it has been designed purely to break these records. You reach the fastest speed in the first 3 seconds of the ride. Shot on this straight, then launched up this vertical incline, over the top, then vertically down. That’s the whole ride. We lined up for like 50 mins to sit at the front. Once we were strapped in at the front there was an announcement that the ride was closed due to ride. Bugger. We waited more and eventually rain went away and we got on. Wind was damn crazy. View, nauseating. Glad I did it though. I usually like wooden rollercoasters best. The one there, El Toro was damn crazy though. I like wooden coasters coz they’re kinda old and rickety, no upside down, or crazy though, it’s just a real good old fashioned adventure. This one was nuts though, real smooth, went up the chains real fast, the declines…. Holy jesus, so freakin steep, and it went really freakin fast. I wasn’t ready for it the first time, scared the shit out of me, better the second time. My fave rides were Bizzaro and Nitro.
- Saw Phantom of the Opera in New York. Pretty good, good to tick off my to do list, broadway show. I don’t think musicals are really my thing though.
- Went to Intercourse, Pennsylvania, to see Amish people, all the shit they were selling was made in China and there were hardly any of them around. Good for a day away though.
There is so much more, but I don’t want to be too boring. Photos are updated on my flickr.
Things were pretty nuts for a time there in Vancouver, 7 people under the roof of the house where Eliza and I were staying. Really mother fucking good to see Eliza though, remember all those little quirks of hers. Was real ace though, she got me an apple when I felt sick. First Aussie friend I'd seen other than Beck and Hugues, and even though Eliza hasn't been in Aus for as long as me it was still good to catch up on things and talk about home.
I'm currently in Seattle... I like it. There's some sus people hanging around, but I sure like what I've seen so far. Went to the public Markets yesterday, to the music project museum today, been into some crazy shops. Hostel I'm staying in is real nice, best I've ever stayed in, beds have curtains around them, and power points right next to each bed. Breakfast is included, eggs, pancakes, toast etc, plus dinner on Tuesday/Thursday/Sunday. Seattle seems real environmentally friendly, seen some cool lookin peeps hanging out, could see myself spending more time here, checking out the local live music scene.. next time, it's not so far from Vancouver. Checking out Jimi Hendrix's grave tomorrow, Bruce Lee too... Kurt Cobain's house. I'm pumped.
I was looking for my Resume and ended up wasting time looking through old computer files. I found this poem I wrote in 2004, 2nd year of uni. I called it Happy Days... What the hell, dark.
The worlds woe spills and gushes Into a vast expanse that doesn’t care Like water from a broken fish tank Fish left lying dead on the floor At first flapping about madly Then slowing down Life leaks from its small helpless body
Mindless chatter fills the room Problems a plenty But no one that cares to listen Fake laughter runs clear But is soon forgotten Amongst the air so thick of pretense Fake as plastic plants Hideous and lifeless
An insurmountable heap of rubbish All that can be seen, heard and felt for miles There is no bringing back the dead No finding the lost No saving those in danger No helping the weak and poor Nothing All that was pure has gone forever
Putrid ash spills forth Shit leaks into the world Bins over flow The sun is shining But for how much longer?
When I was in Vancouver last I was sleeping in the lounge room of the house I was living in with April. Aprils work has moved to Toronto and instead of moving with them April has turned the lounge room into an office, so at 7am in the morning for the last 3 days or so I spent in Vancouver the room I was sleeping in became an office and I moved my sleepy arse into Aprils bed.
This is a less than optimal situation, for starters I just feel bad that I’m taking up so much space and not paying rent, if it was just April’s house I’d feel okay, but two other people live there also, and I suspect that they were less than happy about the situation (even though they didn’t say anything about it).
The other alternative living situation is staying with my man friend, he has 4 other house mates who I don’t really know all that well though, so I’d feel bad being this strange Aussie girl hanging out all the time.
This would all be okay I guess, except I really like to spread my belongings out, I like to know what I’ve got, and I like to be able to see it all at once. This of course is just not possible in the current situation. So I have things, but they’re in unmarked/unorganized boxes and bags under Aprils bed, under the kitchen pantry, and in under a bench thing at the entrance of the house. Yay?!
The icing on the cake…. Eliza is coming to visit for 5 days!!! Hahah. I’m super mother fucking pumped to hang out with Eliza, my Aussie mate from College who I lived with for about a year (or more?). It’s all gonna be a little bat shit freakin crazy though. It’ll sort itself out… man friend has charitably offered his Van as accommodation, there’s a cool mattress in there.. it’ll be ace…
Basically I feel like I’m just a big homeless (and financially poor) pain in the arse to everyone. Things will be better as soon as I move back in with April and get a job (hopefully in October).
End of my Canadian adventure went well, went white water rafting. Always wanted to do it. It was real fun, rapids could have been more hardcore though. There was an opportunity to go skydiving and for the first time in my life I actually thought it might be an okay idea (probably because for the first time ever I didn’t really have enough money to do it). Next time?
I leave for the States in a week or two to meet up with the parentals. I’m super excited as I haven’t seen them since late January. I’m slightly nervous too as they are people who I’m very comfortable with, so I’m nervous I’m gonna let out any pent up bad moods/emotions out on them as I haven’t really been comfortable enough with people in Canada to do it. I’m sure I’ll be able to make the effort to not be a moody bitch?! I sure hope so anyway.
People who snore in hostels are the absolute pits. I hate them. If you snore and travel in hostels – Fuck you. I really wish that there was a room in hostels just for people who snore. It’s so damn rude. About 80 percent of the rooms I stayed in while traveling around had someone who snored. It’s so damn awful when trying to sleep. In one room of 8 people 3 were snorers. Together the effect was awful. One of them had this bone rattling bloody wheeze while he snored. One girl in the room got up and shook them all awake and told them to stop. It was so awesome. I just said, “thank god”. It was real funny, one of them kinda jolted up in bed and yelled a little when she woke him up. It worked though, no more snoring for the rest of the night.
So many places we went to in Canada there were lots of little squirrels, so cute! They were getting really close though, a sure sign that people had been feeding them. I saw about 6 people feeding them. I gave all of them death stares and told them not to feed them. In a way it’s cruel to feed wild animals, and selfish. It’s not food made for the animals, so it’s not good for them for starters. It means they stop fending for themselves and looking for their own food. It also gives them a false sense of hope, they think that there’s going to be a plentiful source of food, so they start having lots of babies, but then over winter when tourists stop going to the touristy locations their food source diminishes and there’s not enough food for them and there’s a huge die off. Cruel. Boo to people who feed animals.
In about 1998 my Dad sent me a post card from Edmonton with a picture of a rollercoaster inside the Edmonton Mall. Ever since then I have wanted to go to Edmonton. Today, that dream became a reality!
The following is what I wrote in my travel journal:
Holy mother fucking Jesus Christ! What a day! I spent the first half of the day with a stupid excited grin on my face and the other half with a more tired/satisfied look. The mall was definitely everything I had dreamt it would be. It satisfied my big mall with rollercoaster needs. Everything about the mall was big, bright and excessive. I loved it, I reckon today was the best day ever since leaving Vancouver to travel BC/Alberta. Even the washrooms were very lovely and clean. - There was a sloth! I got to see it move around and scratch its bits, pretty awesome. Good timing too because it waltzed away and wasn’t to be seen for the rest of the day.
- Fish aquarium, really cool
- Fire breathing plastic dragon near cinemas, every 20 mins or so this thing came to life, lots of lightning and shit, and it would breathe fire.
- Seal show, this cute seal did tricks like collect rings and jump up real high at a ball and stuff
- The rollercoasters!!! I went on two, the third looked mega lame. The first one was in an individual cart thing with 4 seats. The cart spun around while going along the tracks. Pretty cool, could have been more fun/scary. The second one was fucking nuts. Looked and sounded real scary. I sat myself right up the front, wanted to make it worth my time and money. The freakin thing stopped dead on the tracks 5 seconds into the ride. We were stopped there for like 5 mins, I was already shitting my pants about the ride. It ended up all good though. Ride scared the hell out of me but was damn fun. I would have gone on it again immediately except it was super pricey.
Anyway, great freakin day. Super glad I came to Edmonton, best shit ever. Dream fulfilled. It’s almost embarrassing how much fun I had, sorry Canadian Rockies, you’re alright.
Seen so many freakin’ trees, big mountains, lakes and rivers in the last 5 days or so. Don’t get me wrong, it’s stunning as hell… but you get over exposed and it becomes less exciting.
I’m really bloody glad I’m getting out and about and seeing Canada. Felt weird when people would ask me where in Canada I’d been and all I could say was Vancouver. Things are definitely on the up in that department though.
Highlights:
- jumping off a high rock into an icy freakin cold lake
- sitting around a fire with Moose tour group drinking beer and listening to German dude Tobias play guitar/sing.
- Lake Louise, tourist as hell, pretty bloody lovely though. Really awesome coloured water. I’m really sad at myself for not jumping in. That was one of my aims for this trip, jump into as many stupidly cold Canadian rivers and lakes. It was so fucking cold though, and there were these rocks… making it hard to get in, and there were so many freakin tourists hanging around… excuses, excuses. I know… boo.
- Getting an elevator to the top of the stupid motel that faces Lake Louise and convincing a lady who works there to let about 5 of us from the Moose tour into a room and take photos of the lake from a higher vantage point.
- Canadian animals, saw me some deer, elk, mountain goat or something… more squirrels (still high up on my fave animal list, so damn cute). We also saw this baby black bear. So many people stopped on the side of the road getting photos. Some of them were stupid enough to get out of their cars and try and get close. Silly fuckers.
- Staying at hostels in Edith Cavell and Rampart Creek that didn’t have electricity or running water. Made for some good and smelly times. Took a shit in a pit (one of those smelly pit toilets). These hostels were much cooler than the other ones. Much quieter, not full of rowdy young back packers. Made for some real nice times.
- Moose group. Ended up being a real cool group of people, made for many good times. Had to say bye to most of them today, kinda sad. That’s the hard thing about traveling I guess (one of them). Make all theses friends that you have to leave. You add them on facebook, but you know it’s never gonna be the same.
- Hot Springs in Jasper. Damn cool, they were outside and surrounded by mountains and trees and shit. Looked just like a pool, but the water was supplied by natural hot water from the ground or some shit. Really awesome temperature. Lots of fun running between the hot ones and the cold ones.
- Went up some glacier, got up there in a truck. The helicopter ride and hike around a glacier in New Zealand shat all over this experience though.
- Kayaking on some river thing.. in Revelstoke. Family business, they took photos for you and put them up on net for free. All the boats were hand made by the guy who took us around. They gave us this real cute packed lunch at the end. Real nice. Click here for photos.
So time in Van flew real damn fast. I did a lot of hanging out and catching up with people, organising of future travel. Nothing really to note except that it was excellent/relaxed. Went to another hippie festival, got naked again, same shit. April had her birthday, Marti and I slaved away to make her a gluten free cake, real pain, but real worth the happy times on her face.
Left for Whistler yesterday. I'm going on this tour around BC/Alberta in Canada for 2 weeks with this company called Moose. It's been okay so far, good starter for a trip, relaxed. Realised I really need to be in the mood for conversing with strangers while travel. Wasn't really feeling it yesterday. When I turned up to meet my tour group I overheard the last group getting off the bus complaining about how the Aussies on their trip had just been real obnoxious and drunk... yay.
I had a few beers, wasn't really feeling it though, usually a bit of a booze hound, I just felt like chilling though, so went to bed relatively early (lame). Oh well.
Travel Itinerary: Shuswap Lake Banff Rampart Creek Edith Cavell Jasper Edmonton Jasper Banff Kelowna
Should be ace, other people who had done the trip already had good things to say. I'm excited!
Things went very well in Asheville. Susie and Brian, who we were staying with are extremely lovely people. Both are teachers. I had a very excellent time hanging out with them and they both did so much to show Rich and I the sights and bring on the good times.
The day before Rich and I were meant to leave for 10 000 lakes I looked up the website and discovered that the festival isn't actually located near Detroit in Michigan, as Rich had said, but was infact located in Detroil Lakes, Minnisota. Many mother fucking kilometers further. I'm not going to lie, things hadn't been going particularly well between Rich and I. We both had very different ideas about how the trip was going to play out, and what we wanted from it. I think we are just very different people also. I found him very annoying. I turned into a teenager again around him. I'm not particularly proud of the way I responded to the situation, but something about him put me in this downward angry spiral. I ended up yelling at him... I can't remember the last time I was so angry at someone I felt I had to yell at them.
Anyway... The extra distance the money we would have to spend on gas, the extra time I would have to spend in a car with Rich, and his reaction to my reaction to the extra distance lead to me purchasing a ticket on the next plane back to Vancouver. So here I am, back in Van and I'm very fucking happy about it.
So much has happened. I will try and keep it brief, suspect I will fail though.
Basically I was dumped in Pine Bush, New York. Small town in the middle of no where. I wont get into details, but it was a bit of a shock to the system after at least three of the best weekends of partying in a row ever. Was staying with Richard, guy I met at Woodford folk festival over last New Years.
We drove to this festival called All Good. http://www.allgoodfestival.com/ I hadn’t heard of any of the bands. I was expecting something kinda small. It was huge though. More than 20 000 people. We got there on Thursday and left on Monday. It was the most drugged out festival I’ve ever been to. Never have I seen drugs sold or consumed more obviously. We had to walk down this street to get to the main stage. We called it crack alley. People were just standing on the side of the road yelling out the name of the drug that they were selling. Every second person was smoking weed or popping pills. On the walk back to the tent at night this street was lined with people with balloons of nitrus oxide, I’ve been told it’s just laughing gas, starves your brain of oxygen, real bad for you. Every prick was doing it at this festival. There were used balloons everywhere. So gross.
We were camped next to these two dudes, both early forties. They’ve been friends for ages, met in College. Once a year they make this pilgrimage to the All Good festival to take as many drugs as they can and party as hard as they can. They were actually really damn cool. Never have I met anyone who can party as hard. For the whole 4 days they got about 4 hours sleep and had two meals. They were taking pills, dropping tabs of acid, eating Marley (crushed Ecstasy?) snorting coke, drinking beer and who knows what else. One morning I was up and heard them playing Ween, so I came out to investigate. There they were sucking up some nitrus. They were surrounded by all these little canisters of the stuff and had an almost empty box of 50 canisters sitting next to them. Funny as hell.
At one point there was a few of sitting around drinking and talking. It got onto the topping of a lot of the world really disliking America. One girl said "They're probably just jealous". Man, I laughed so mother freakin' hard. I couldn't stop myself. I'm pretty sure she was damn offended. I just couldn't help myself.
Once that was over we drove towards Asheville, North Carolina. We mainly drove the scenic way, doubling our drive time, but seeing a lot of cool out of the way places. Can’t even remember where we were. Think we saw Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Virginia… not real sure. So here we are in Asheville, staying with Rich’s college friend. It’s this cool little town, full of artsy alternative types. Lots of live music and art galleries. All sorts of good things. I’m liking it.
Plans are: stay here for about a week, drink home brew, eat good food, see live music, hit up some art galleries and go Kayaking. From here we drive to Michigan, to the 10 000 lakes music festival http://www.10klf.com/. It seems way less druggy, more straight edge, bands I’ve heard of. Should be heaps good. Then back to Vancouver at the end of the month. YAY!
I wanted to add photos, but I'm on this old shitty computer that wont let me. Click on the flickr link on the right for photos.
Arrived in America safe. Haven't seen or done anything yet except meet Rich at airport, get driven to his place in Pine Bush, New York. I've slept, had something to eat and checked my facebook (all the important things).
Still not really sure where we're going or what we're doing. Sure it'll be ace though.
All my life I've been the kinda person who has a lot of friends, all really different types of people. I've been fairly good friends with a lot of people, but have never had a group of REALLY close friends, or someone who I could hang out with all the time, or whatever. I always noticed other people and their close friendships and just presumed I wasn't the kind of person who would ever have a super close friend... a best friend... or whatever.
I have been proven wrong! Thank you April! April is the coolest mother fucking chick ever. I've never spent this much time with anyone. We just get along so well. It's damn awesome. We're really different, but really the same. We always go to say the same thing, read each others minds, other soppy shit like that. It was a really damn sad day yesterday when I had to leave Vancouver. I'll be back... but I prob wont be living with April. So much sadness.
Apriil recently said that she went to the supermarket and one of the lady's who worked there asked her where her friend was (ME!). She said that everyone who worked at the supermarket knew when we were there. We were always singing, dancing around, being crude, loud and obnoxious (in a good way).
I just discovered recently that a friend of April and mine thought that we were lesbians. He said something like - you're always hanging out together, dancing together, linking arms walked around together... shit like that. When I told April this, she said that one of her friends had asked her if she was a lesbian, and if I was a lesbian. I'm really curious to know how many people thought we were lesbians. No wonder we hadn't been getting any boy action.
Last weekend was the third weekend that April and I partied relatively hard. It was real worth it though.
Highlights: - Critical Mass - big bike ride that happens on the last Friday of every month. Everyone congregates downtown at the art gallery and follows who knows who to all diff places around the city. There are shit loads of people who do it. We took over three different main bridges throughout the evening. Ended up in Stanley Park (where I worked teaching kids about trees) for an awesome ride through the forest. We stopped at English bay and watched the sun set. This was followed by an awesome all you can eat sushi meal. So good.
- Fish's Farewell. Fish is a friend of April's, and now a friend of mine. He had this crazy party at his house as he is leaving Vancouver. The highlight for this party was watching party do a handstand against the wall. He had seen April and I do it an make it look so effortless. Tried to do it himself and just sunk to the ground. Hilarious. Another highlight is April saying she'll take off her clothes and dance around if the DJ played Michael Jackson. This was at about 6/7am in the morning. Fish had requested chill out music, we wanted to keep dancing though. So on came Michael Jackson and off came the clothes. So it was her, Marty, myself dancing around in underwear. There were like 4 other people dancing fully clothed. Fun times. April went to the bathroom, so marty thought it would be a good idea to put on Aprils dress. So I put on his clothes. April was happily surprised and put my clothes on. Good damn times.
- After Fish's the three of us walked to Bons. Cheap breakfast joint for 3 dollar breakfast. Paid for it with money found at party. Spent the rest of the day falling asleep to flight of the concords.
- Evening BBQ. On same day as sleepy Concords we invited some people around for BBQ. While April was getting food ready Marty and I got outside organised. Marty is full of good ideas. We were setting up the futon couch outside and he suggested that we make a trail of rose petals from outside the kitchen where April was leading down the stairs to the backyard and ending up to to the couch where Marty and I were laying down in our underwear. Unfortunately some guests arrived before April discovered us, slightly embarrassing. We got them to go knock on the front door so April would see the trail of rose petals. She loved it.
- 200 flavoured ice cream. Curry, blue cheese, wasabi, all sorts of crazy shit. I opted for the more straight edge fruity flavours.
- Package from parents. Most awesome thing ever. It was kind of ill timed though. I pretty much hadn't had any sleep. The weekend kinda ended on Tuesday at 11:30am. Meaning I had half an hour to move everything out of my room for the new house mate to arrive. I got that done, and when she was moving her shit in with 3 other people the package arrived. I was feeling pretty emo... had to go hide out in the backyard to open it. Dad had made Anzac biscuits, mum sent me this really nice soft fabric shirt. There was all this strange candy (presumably Ben's idea), there was the Wagga News paper, and an Australian newspaper. The highlight though was this kids toy that records and warps voices. When I hit play there was this awesome message from Mum, Dad and Ben. Ben's was my fave. It was a string of swears that had been warped. There was also an Australian flag I had chosen not to take with me when I left Australia. I am glad to have it now though, gonna put it on the dash of the car when Rich and I drive around the states.
Wow, what a mother freaking excellent weekend. One of the best ever I would say. Went to this festival – Burn in the forest/Entheos. Full of hippies and some of the worst music ever. Bad techno/trance/psy trance. The people and the atmosphere were just amazing though. Main highlights:
1) Getting naked and walking through freezing mother fucking glacial water to get on this sand bank. Softest sand I’ve ever felt. Sat around with these other naked people. Had a naked girl on girl hug. Did handstands and cartwheels. Performed a skit with a naked dude. Sat in a clump of about 6 naked people hugging. Did a waltz with a naked stranger. Had a running race. All naked. Before this weekend I’d never done the public nudity thing. I’d had the opportunity to a couple of times here at the nudie beach. It just seemed so pervy though, and there were so many damn people. This was really normal/perfect though. Forgot I was even naked. Felt damn good.
2) Cuddle puddles. The area of the festival where I was camping had this enormous tie dyed canvas tarp hooked up to some trees with some kind of alter and pillows underneath. I spent pretty much the entirety of Saturday night underneath this canvas in a cuddle puddle. A big group of people just lying down and hugging. It was so good. It got real hippy and everyone was telling everyone how much they loved each other. Hell funny. These hippies are softening my heart a little…
3) Dancing when the sun comes up. The cuddle puddle finished when the sun came up. We got up and hit up one of the stages. It was on the sand bank of the river, overlooking these amazing mountains covered in trees. One of them had a glacier and was all nice and snow covered. Real nice. Great dancing time goodness.
4) Tostadas. One of the food stalls sold these. So delicious.
5) Man wearing blue overalls carrying a knife and a watermelon walking towards us like he was completely insane. Scary. Shortly after we saw him walking around with his pierced penis showing through the fly of his pants.
6) Watching April cover two separate naked men in food. One in mustard, the other in almond milk. Hell funny.
7) The generosity, openness and general awesomeness of the people there. So many cool people here. Makes me really not wanna leave Vancouver to travel.
It’s been a really long time since I’ve hosted a house party. The last event was a house warming at old Crisp Avenue, Brunswick to warm the house of Eliza and Kate. It was an amazing evening where many friends turned up who I hadn’t seen for ages. There was a great vibe the whole night and it ended up in a game of 500 till the sun came up. With this kind of event behind me I was nervous. It was freaking amazing though.
I invited pretty much everyone I know in Vancouver (about 10 people, HA). It began with chilled out afternoon chatting and boozing and reached its pinnacle when my mate Kevin’s Gypsy band Mezamazing cut loose their invigorating tunes. Everyone was up and dancing like a crazy. They finished playing and all who witnessed the event had a heart on fire. It was hard to know how to follow such an act, what music could I play that would come even close to being suitable afterwards.
I tried to teach everyone to do the heel-toe-polka. Bad move. Teaching a group of 7-10 year olds was a cinch compared to a group of about 20 drunk people. Everyone was so loud and uncooperative. At one staged I just yelled at everyone to “shut the fuck up”. Even that didn’t work. It was a total flop. Shortly after most of the party dispersed and it was some more chilled out dancing. The evening ended on another high when the final song was played. Ween – Your Party. It was on shuffle, I couldn’t have chosen better if I’d tried though.
Oh Jens, my hero, so dreamy. Again, another fantastic gig. First gig I’ve ever been to where I hadn’t and didn’t consume any alcohol. It made it a lot harder to tolerate inconsiderate tall people and people being rowdy. It really shits me when tall people decide to move directly in front of me in the middle of a show. Fair enough before the music starts, I’ll talk to you, or find a better spot… in the middle of the show though… c’mon, that’s bull shit. Be a little considerate. This particular tall guy (there were a few this evening) had really fairly annoying boisterous friends who were dancing like crazies as well. It was really off putting. One of them must have been high on ecstasy or something, he was dancing like a real freakin crazy, and Jens is so chilled and boppy, so miss matched. Boo, oh well, lucky they were obnoxious enough to push their way even further to the front away from me.
All up, great gig though, it wasn’t the same without Eliza and co though. Their company would have made it amazing! See photo from last time, where we got to chat to the Man himself:
Went Kayaking with April, Trina and Trina’s friend Liz last weekend in Deep Cove. It was freakin ace. Makes me wanna do more outside physical activities.
I was feeling real sick today and yesterday. I took some cold and flu before the Jens gig though. Man, that shit is good. I feel so damn awake and headache free now. But alas, I have work tomorrow morning… just take some night time ones and hope they send me to sleep…
Went to playland yesterday. It had been a really long time since I’d been on a rollercoaster. I was mother freakin excited, but surprisingly nervous at the same time. It was AMAZING. Everything I dreamt it would be. Wooden roller coasters are by far my favourite, they feel dangerous, like they may break down or fall off the track at any moment. This one was big enough that you got a lot of speed and my arse left the seat quite a few times. So damn good. There was a smaller steel rollercoaster where you were strapped in and it did a few loops and crap, it was pretty fun, but no where near the same level of fun as the wooden one. The other rides were fine, but mainly small rides that just spin around in circles. That’s just a whole bunch of vom and boredom.
Seeing all these kids reminded me of how fearless you are as a kid. Just go on all these crazy rides without hesitation, get real dizzy, line up for the same ride or another as soon as the ride’s over. I love it. Made me remember that sensation of wanting to rush around and not waste one minute not being on, or lining up for a ride. Glad I’ve chilled a bit since then.
Last weekends adventure involved getting on a bus to Lynn Valley. It was real damn pretty. Love being outside! Went on this freakin’ epic walk from there to deep cove. A bit more than 10k’s I reckon. I don’t mind hiking I’ve realized, I just don’t like it when there are steep hills and declines.
Found out yesterday that some kid died the day we were there, was in the water for too long, it was real cold and he died. Not cool.
Finally got to see my favourite band ever, the Doves play live. I wanted to get tickets to their Australian show a few years ago, sold out before I got a chance though. They were pretty damn good. Played more new stuff than I would have like though, I wanted to hear all the old classics.
I only have a bit more than a month left working at Stanley Park. I’m getting slightly anxious and sad about leaving. I’m really freakin liking my job and where and who I’m living with. I’m making friends and going on adventures. Life is sweet. I do wanna travel around and see things though. So I better get off my arse and organise something. Going on an Intrepid camping trip with the parents in September. That’s a good start I guess. I’m worried I will get home sick while I’m traveling around before they come though.
My Australian flag fell off my backpack. I don't think this means anything. I glued it back on. I was lucky I didn't lose it. The nice people at the laundro mat knew it was mine and gave it back to me.
My job at Stanley Park is for the most park quite good. Best job I’ve had so far. I get to be out side in this awesome park walking around all day and teaching kids about things. It’s made me think about a few things. I’m nervous for the next generation. The age range of the kids is from 10 – 13. Many of the girls in the first group I took had mirrors and were asking other students about how their hair looked. Others had hand sanitizer that they used ALL the freakin time. Shitty immune systems here we come. I’ve been helping by encouraging children to not wash their hands and to eat food that they dropped on the ground. Hopefully parents don’t hear about this.
Some children have complained about doing the dishes and told me that it was child labour. Arguing with kids is great though, a lot easier than with adults anyway. I just said… what being forced to clean up after yourselves? She looked ashamed and shut the hell up.
I feel especially bad for some of the spoilt kids from rich families. Some of the teachers have told me that these kids don’t even wipe their own arse or blow their own, that nanny’s do all that for them. A lot of the stuff they had to do on a two day camp totally shocked them. I like that.
Unrelated story: Yesterday I saw a crow pecking a baby duckling to bits. Bits of feathers were going everywhere. It was a wretched sight. Baby ducklings are just so damn cute. Stupid crows. They make me nervous.
I have a new favourite animal. The Douglas Squirrel. It’s native to Stanley Park and is the cutest little thing ever. It’s really shy and has this really timid cute way of running.
Yesterday was amazing. It consisted of me for the first time in ages being movitaved enough to do something creative of my own accord. I’m beginning to decorate these shorts I bought from an op shop to replicate ones I saw in Japan but was being too much of a tight arse to purchase.
So far I’ve made Jiji, the kitty from Kiki’s delivery service. Not sure if I’m gonna do a bow yet. Thinking about putting a Canadian flag sewable patch on there, that may be going too far though, seems regrettable. Can always take it off though. Will post a photo of the finished product.
The afternoon was spent playing badminton and gardening in the backyard with April. Forgot how much I love just hanging out in the backyard with people. Used to do it all the time as kid, it’s something that’s faded now I have a computer and extreme laziness. Like the good old days of playing badminton in the backyard as a kid, we had strung up a make shift net using a piece of string. Golden.
I also picked up the guts (with the help of April) to venture to the house two doors down to enquire about using their drum kit every now and then. Luckily they were real nice and more than happy to let me have a crack. They also said that they plan on having a few barbeques at theirs and said we could come along. Hoorah!
In the evening April, my other house mate Rodney and I took the sky train into town to meet Beck and Hugues for Japanese food in Gastown. It was this amazing Japanese restaurant that was heaps like the ones in Japan, heaps of yelling. Food was bloody good too.
To top of this excellent day we went home and watched a shitty American movie that required no thinking at all – The Step Brothers. Ahhhh.. what a day.
I received and cashed my last Tim Hortons cheque today. I worked in total a little over a month = 25 shifts = 185 hours. I earnt $1438.27. I would earn that in two weeks of teaching…. Should have saved way more before I came here… oh well.
New job: going fairly well. Had my first camp on Thursday/Friday. Was pretty dang full on. Had no idea what I was really teaching. Really reconfirmed that teaching isn’t my fave thing in the world. It went okay, and at least it’s gonna be the same thing I’m teaching each week so I really get the hang of it. It’s still better than Tim Hortons. Kids are pretty dang funny. They had to build shelters in the forest in teams. This one kid wouldn’t give up his rope claiming that he was a boy scout and that he was sure they would need it later. One of his team mates got so frustrated he yelled “are you gonna marry it or something?!”… ahahah. Hell funny. Half the girls had hand sanitizer, and used it all the times… they’re gonna have such shit immune systems later. One girl had a mirror she carried around with her and all the other girls wanted to borrow it to check their hair… Jesus H! They’re 12! How did this happen.
Life’s getting a bit normal now. I’ve got weekly routines. Some of my old laziness has returned. Makes me glad that this job ends in June to force me to get off my arse and travel around. I’ll really miss living in this house though, it’s been really freakin ace so far.
People keep telling me that Montreal is freakin ace, so I reckon I wanna work there next summer. Force me to learn a bit of French maybe… (prob not).
I left Australia 81 days ago now. I still feel pretty good about being away, I hope that continues.
I’m building a bit of a reputation as being the small Aussie girl who swears a lot and says crude things. A big part of me really likes this. Another part of me things maybe I should make more of an effort to be less crude. I just find it so damn entertaining though.
Last week at work I made my first attempt at driving on the right side of the road. I think I did pretty damn well for a first crack. Drove right through the downtown area in this huge freakin van. Lucky it was automatic. It was still fairly nerve racking, and I’m worried that if ever a rushed decision needs to be made I may go back to my old Aussie driving habits. The blinkers are on the left, not the right of the steering wheel. The gear shift is on the right…. Uh oh… sure I’ll get comfortable with it soon enough.
Vancouver doesn’t have the same awesome pubs and bars that Melbourne has, but I’m really appreciating the house parties and the people at the moment. When I go out in Melbourne, usually I’ve got my little posse of people, and would tell any male who approached me to fuck off. I guess that’s not the most conducive way to meet people. I do seem to be a lot more open to meeting people and talking to them at the moment. I guess not being so dang frazzled and drained from teaching help, as does being in another country and not knowing heaps of people. I’m liking it.
April and I went to this excellent house party on the weekend. Dress up theme ‘Dirty Thirties’. He we are looking at our best:
Spring is in the air, everywhere I look around.
Went to VanDusen Botanical gardens yesterday with Beck and Hugues. We were tempted to do a guided tour, but ended up just walking off to explore on our own. Out popped this lovely little old German lady to give us a tour though. At first I was a little peeved as I was still seedy from the previous nights partying and didn’t think I wanted to listen to someone drivel on about plants. It turned out quite well though. She was highly cute and entertaining.
Last week I was waiting for the bus to work. It was 6am, it was freaking cold. It started hailing. Usually I would have found this a most uncomfortable horrible situation. All I could do is laugh though. I think I’ve chilled out about things a lot more, I like this.
Canadians (the ones in Vancouver anyway) for the most part are quite unfashionable. I can only presume because of the weather? It’s all jeans, hiking type shoes and rain/camping type jackets, The north face type thing. I really like this, dressing for practicality and comfort. It’s my kind of dressing.
Last weekend I went out on the town with April and a friend of hers. We were walking through the city at about 2 in the morning? Maybe earlier, can’t remember. We walked by a 7/11 and there were 2 security looking dudes standing outside. I laughed and said, why the hell are there security guards at 7/11. April informed me that they were infact police officers, and then I noticed the rather awful looking woman slumped up against the wall. Yuck. Then as we continued our journey there was a woman who broke down in tears on the street, couldn’t find her phone, or cigarettes, something about a boyfriend who had left her. Then several zombie like people wandered by us. They had blank soulless eyes and had slow strange movements. Earlier on in the night we also saw heaps of homeless people set up with tents. April said that one of them had a crack pipe out. I have decided that Vancouver at night is not my favourite place.
In Vancouver everyone is quite considerate as far as making way for anything who is aged, pregnant, or with a pram on public transport. This older woman came onto one bus with a pram and people got up and made way. Only upon her exiting the bus did I realize that she had a stupid looking miniature dog in there… fuck. That’s so stupid. People are weird.
April and I were walking home from the supermarket or something and noticed that there was this awesome looking New York taxi from the 70’s. Had all the cables on the top where the light went. Had NY taxi painted on the side. We kinda stood there admiring for a little when the owner came over. We thought he thought we were gonna try and knock off his car. But when we explained that we were just admiring it he asked us if we wanted to go for a ride. We said no, and started walking off… then he said… “wanna come back to my house”. We said no again and walked a little faster. Then he got in the car and took off in the same direction as us. When he got to us we were about level with our house. He stopped, made a get in motion, beeped, we shook our heads, he kept going. We walked past our house until we couldn’t see him and then ran back as fast as we could. Yuckers.
I took last Friday off work and April and I hopped onto the sky train, and then on a bus, and then on a Ferry to get to a weekend long Festival, Recompression. It’s an offshoot of the Burning Man festival that happens every year in the Nevada desert. It’s more tame though as food is provided and we got to sleep in cabins (it’s too cold and rainy in BC this time of year to do it any other way). I’ve never seen so many crazy costumes ever. It was awesome. Made me feel really tame. Each of the cabins had themes and decorated them accordingly. I was staying in the Enchanted Orifice. The rooms were themed, the mouth, the ear, the nose, the vag, the arsehole. The vag was connected to the womb, which was set out like a chill space, sheets draped from the roof, cushions, soft lighting. It was really awesome.
People would enter our cabin and be blind folded and offered a taste testing. Then they were taken to one of three chairs. Kiss, lick or bite. Whichever one they sat at, that thing was done to them by a member of our cabin. It was pretty damn crazy. People could stick their fist in the arsehole and get a treat, there was chocolate pudding, sheep, birds, all sorts of crazy shit up there. The ear had a microphone attached to it and when they spoke into it, it echoed and made crazy sounds. People put so much effort into this, just for the one weekend. Made me realize how lazy I am.
The festival was great. The only thing I’d change was the music, all this shitty electronic trance, techno crap. Not my favourite. I liked how relaxed it was during the day though, at Woodford Folk festival there was just too much stuff to see and do, always had the feeling I was missing out on something. This was good coz it was so much smaller, less people, more relaxed. All in all, a great weekend.
Many strange things are happening lately. Keeps things interesting at least. Sorry if this was lengthy and uninteresting. As the title suggests, I am tired and sickly. Forgivable.. yes?! Would put up photo’s, but I can’t be arsed. Perhaps tomorrow.
Oh yeah, started new job today, seems real ace, heaps better than Tim Hortons. Real nervous about driving a van around Vancouver on the right side of the road. Sure I’ll survive.
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
I really like the look of Canadian houses. They look so livable, so much charm and character. I went a bit nuts on the weekend and took heaps of photos. Here’s one.
I went snow tubing on the weekend. It was freakin’ awesome!! Really made me think seriously about working on the snow fields next winter, somewhere outside of Vancouver to avoid the Olympic crazyness. Be a good opportunity to learn how to ski and snowboard. Here’s a couple of photo’s and video my English friend Alex took of my snow tubing. She forgot to press stop… can’t be bothered learning how to edit it. I think I mention something about almost choking on my tongue towards the end there.
I got the job at Stanley Park! I really wanted the night time job, as it means less responsibilityGood and bad news.
Good: - more money than tim hortons. - Better hours than tim Hortons - Less soul destroying and degrading than Tim Hortons - No Tim Hortons uniform or hat
Bad: - Wont get to travel with Rich in May - Similar to teaching – means more responsibility – nervous that teaching isn’t really my thing, this eliminates most planning, reporting etc, this means being in charge of children though. This will be a good test to see if teaching is really not where I wanna be.
To do list: - see ice hockey game - go ice skating - Science World - Go skiing
Suzanne Peterson, a teacher who I worked closely with last year passed away last week. Really shocking and sad news. I can’t imagine how people at school must be feeling. It’s so weird being away from it all. This really naïve silly part of me secretly thought that I’d come back to Australia and everything would be exactly the same as when I left.. That’s ridiculous though.
I have finally decided that I shouldn't feel guilty for swears posted on my blog. If people don't like swears, then too bad. Swears are a part of me, they represent me. I'm not gonna stop for nobody...
That aside... here are a few exciting things that happened today:
1) It really shits me how on public transport people sit in the isle seal on buses and leave room next to them, making it difficult to get a seat. It's okay if there's no one on the bus, but when it's busy, be a little considerate please, move over, make room for others. That being said, I think there are right and wrong ways to go about asking these isle hogs to move over, or to aquire the spare seat. On the B-line bus this morning (6:30am) just as I hopped on the bus I saw a guy (Sir Shovealot) launching himself over this other guy (Mr stabby) to get to the window seat, from what I've gathered Sir Shovealot had asked Mr Stabby to move over, but Mr Stabby had head phones in and didn't move, I didn't see any of this though, I just saw the shoving.. Mr Stabby's face was totally mushed with this other guys bag. So anyway, Mr Stabby totally over reacts to this. He starts shoving the guy with his arm, like a five year old with no confrontational skills. This goes on for a few minutes. Then he gets the worlds smallest pocket knife out of his bag and makes pretend stabbing motions towards Mr Shovealot. Mr Shovealot is not happy. He asks Mr Stabby something, I'm not sure what, presumably.. are you gonna stab me you cunt.. then he pushes past Mr Stabby and goes and dobs to the bus driver. The bus stops.. we all have to wait around a bit. I couldn't hear the conversation they had. The bus waits for ages, you hear passengers at the front making mention of someone with a knife. Finally knife guy takes a hint that this isn't a pleasant situation that's going to go away and gets off the bus. I yelled out that he'd gone, was tempted to stay around and help out... I was late for work though, and hopped on the next bus.
People can be damn silly. It's not cool to shove people.. it's not cool to make stabbing motions at people with a miniature pocket knife. It all could have been avoided if they both hadn't been arse holes though.. *sigh*
Real tempted to do a re-enactment using my camera.. see if I can convince April and Trina to participate.
2) Had a job interview for this job. It's with the Stanley Park Ecological Society. I'm not real sure how I feel about it. Part of me thinks it would be awesome, hanging out in a cool park, teaching kids about the environment. Part of me says it will be a little bit too much like teaching, sounds like a fair amount of responsibility. It'll be just me, no one else running this group. The kids will be a fair bit older than what I'm used to teaching. I'll have to drive some kind of van, which makes me nervous. It also means I won't be able to travel around with Rich, dude I met at woodford. Which makes me sad, we can always do it in July though I guess.
There's also a night one, which means sleeping in a tent at Stanley park 3 nights a week, maybe it's two nights though. That sounds pretty cool too though, I'm not sure.. could mean a lot of non sleep. It means less responsibility in the way of actually teaching kids things and is more like showing them how to put up tents and stuff like that.
I find out next week. I wont worry too much until I hear back from them. Anything beats Tim Hortons, it'd be hard to say no to this.
The World According to Garp - John Irving Breaking Dawn - Stephanie Meyer Eclipse - Stephanie Meyer New Moon - Stephanie Meyer Twilight - Stephanie Meyer The Diviners - Margaret Laurence To Kill a Whale - Farley Mowat Catcher in the Rye - J. D. Salinger Shantaram - Gregory David Roberts Wind Up Bird Chronicle - Haruki Murakami
