TGIF

After a long week of work and going to the gym with Tracey a couple of times - it was nice to have dinner with the girls tonight. I like the fact that we're pretty flexible and can pull together a dinner meeting with only a half day's notice. :-)

We went back to Green Basil near Metrotown. The girls and I like the location as the food is great and the service is outstanding (also helps that I know the some of the staff). It was Tracey, Shannon and I tonight. Tracey and I indulged in a bit of retail therapy at Metrotown before having dinner. :-) Tracey is looking for the perfect pair of shoes to go with her wedding dress. I cringe when I see how high she wants the heels to be. Yikes! At dinner we giggled, sighed and groaned about the things that are going on in our lives. It was nice to touch bases with them in a more intimate environment. The food was wonderful as usual. I was a bit thrown off when one of the waitresses asked me if we wanted to order dessert. The 3 of us looked at each other awkwardly. :-) Thank goodness my buddy came over with 3 bowls of ice cream (on the house). It's funny, the icecream is always a "nice" gesture but I'm so use to it now that I EXPECT it with every meal! Lol...till next time!

running out of time

The last 2 days KA has been talking about running the Scotiabank Half Marathon and encouraging me to do it as well. It sparked my interest to the point that I had to spam some of the girls to see if they could be peer pressured into doing it as well. You see...I'm a lemming...I may not look like one at times but I am one. I need others to run off the cliff with me.

Truthfully - now that I've had a full day to think about it - the idea scares the crap out of me! I haven't run a real race in my life. The closest I come to exercising is doing the MS Bike Tour each year. Shannon has been pondering the idea as well. So much so that she even wrote about it in her own blog! :-) Josie suggested that we try a 10km run first before committing to a 21km one. She's interested in the Pacific Spirit Run. But that one is in a couple of weeks - no time to train (or pretend to train). It's just a "get-there-and-run" event.

There are so many pros to doing this. Pros included increased overall fitness, a sense of accomplishment and being able to say "I ran a half marathon ONCE". One of those things that you can check off of your "to-do" lists. I love lists. So why hesitate? I'm plagued by cons such as time commitment required for training, lack of enthusiasm as time passes (I tend to adopt hobbies in phases), possibility of injury and fear of failure. :-) Maybe I'll roll it around in my mind for a few more days....

give life

So I got my new drivers license in the mail today. The picture didn't turn out as bad as I thought it would. :-) Yah! Included in the package was a form to become an organ donor. I'm pretty sure I registered to be one a long time ago but I filled out this new card anyways (just in case). I'm all for giving others what I don't need when I pass away. Plus they make it so convenient for you...easy to fill in card, prepaid envelope...how much simpler can it get?!

birthday bashes

On Thursday last week I celebrated my 30th birthday. To my surprise and amusement, Robyn had decorated my cubicle so that everyone walking by knew it was my birthday and how old I was turning. :-) She's such a sweetie! We went out for lunch with some coworkers to celebrate. That night was pretty quiet. I had dinner with my parents then rushed to the mall to get my drivers license renewed. My 5 years was up and it was time for another picture. Thank goodness the Expressways are open till 8pm - otherwise it would have been the WestCoast Express for me the next day. I still have a paper interim license - waiting for the real card to be mailed out.

On Friday the celebrations continue. Robyn organized a dinner/drinking affair down at the Keg downtown. I had a delicious meal and drank way too much. Each of my coworkers bought me a drink. I'm a cheap drunk so just sniffing liquour gets me all red and blotchy. :-) Needless to say I wasn't able to drive home and had to call Chicky to my rescue. By that time I had emptied my tummy into the toilet and was feeling much better. We went back to Chicky's place where I filled up on some delicious KFC and watched this strange Japanese movie (Shinobi). I wasn't able to stay up for the second movie and crashed till the next morning.

Saturday was the big bbq. Chicky and I got up as early as I could manage (luckily there wasn't a hangover involved). Went out to Costco and filled up on groceries. I went home, cleaned the house and prepared some food for the guests. It was so nice seeing everyone as I missed the girls. Haven't seen you guys in such a long time! The hockey game was on and everyone seemed to have a good time mingling and munching on food. Nyah, Logan, Katarina and Joshua came to the party as well. They were the big hits! It was fun BBQing and I'm hoping to do more of it when the weather gets better. I've posted some of the pictures to my album.

07109

Kim's blog, Julian date 07109. As I leave the comforts of being 20-something and embark on the dirty thirties, I find time to reflect on what I have accomplished. I'm happy to say that I've done many different things, had good and bad experiences that made me grow as a person and cultivated friendships that will last a lifetime. My continuing mission: To explore strange new worlds. To seek out new life and new civilizations. To boldly go where no one has gone before.

On this day: Aisumasen (I'm Sorry) Day created as a day of reconciliation in 2005 for all who want atone and seek forgiveness; allowing us to put "the past in the past" and rather than letting them fester and effect the future. It was inspired by John Lennon's song by the same title.

The Syringa Tree

"The deeply evocative story of an abiding love between two families, one black and one white, and the two children that are born into their shared household in the early 1960s South Africa.."

On Wednesday night Tanya invited me to see The Syringa Tree at the Vancouver Playhouse. The show was intense and spectacular. I was surprised to find out that there was only one actress playing many characters. I was hesitant about what the performance would be like. When I saw the simple set (a swing) I was even more worried. I was blown away by her performance though. The character transitions were very smooth and the pace of the story was great. KA says I enjoyed it because I love audiobooks and this was in a sense an elaborate audiobook! Thank you Tanya for sharing the experience with me!

little boys

What are little boys made of?
Snips and snails, and puppy dogs tails
That's what little boys are made of!

Congratulations to Mary & Peter who are the proud parents of Nathan. Born April 17th at 5:57am. Weighing in at 6lbs 6ozs. Both mom and baby are doing well and are expected to be released from the hospital tomorrow.

first birthdays

First steps, first words, first birthdays - these are just some of the milestones that new parents get to look forward to. On the weekend we were invited to celebrate Katarina's 1st birthday. It was a wonderful party - in good old Lozada tradition (LOTS of food and family). I think I stuffed myself on all of Josie's mom's homemade dishes. Mmm...spring rolls!

Toshiki took many good pictures so you can view them here.

consolidating

For a while I didn't blog and now I'm posting like crazy tonight! Lol...must be a full moon.

2007 has been a year full of new babies. Many of the new mommies have asked me for photos of the other kids in the group. I've decided to create a shared album in which we can all enjoy images of the kids. You'll find the new album under my new link on the left hand side. This will consolidate all the pictures I have of the kids and give you a one-stop-glance of them (instead of visiting each blog site to see pics). Plus it's helpful for those that don't blog but want to share their beautiful babes with us.

picture this

I know everyone has been asking to see some pictures from the trip and I really want to show you guys too. But the primary reason I haven't been able to is that I wasn't able to upload the pictures into Blogger as they are way too big and too many. I've encountered some difficulty finding a photo sharing site that will allow me to load 3GB+ worth of images. That's a lot of pics. On top of that each time I see a button that says "sign up now" - I want to turn the other way. :-) I have too many sign in ids and passwords. So far I've only signed up for the Google photo sharing site as it makes sense (Blogger is managed by Google and so is my Calendar). I've linked the photo album to my photo blog as well. It only has 1GB of space so I've only chosen a few images to load - not that many of food.

Check out the pics from Malaysia here.

number crunchers

Did you guys ever play that game in school? It was a dorky computer game where a pacman like creature went around and ate fractions. Why am I talking about this? Oh - I just committed myself to another semester at Douglas College. Back to school time again. I feel like I'm a perpetual student. Realistically I never stop feeling like it. The schooling goes on and on without any light at the end of this academic tunnel. So what have we committed ourselves to for the next 3 months? Business Mathmatics. What does that have to do with anything I'm doing at work? ZIP. Why in the world would I take it? Because I have to (part of my program). In other academic news - I've been peer pressured into signing up for programming courses through work. I had my Performance Review last month. Once a year we get to "discuss" with our managers and supervisors on our work performance for the whole year, write a pretty little report and plan for my goals and expectations for the coming year. The underlying emphasis I've been getting is that they want me to UP my technical abilities. Unfortunately I don't score as well in that area. Boohoo...lol...just kidding - doesn't hurt my feelings as it's not shocking news. As you move up the ranks of being an analyst - the expectation is that you'll also be more technical than the junior staff (duh!). So 2007/2008 is dedicated to "training". Which equates to numerous programming and technical courses. I'm kind of looking forward to it (operative word here is "kind of"). I like to learn new things and if they're willing to pay for it then it's just topping on my cake!

Herman the German Giant

So my sister sent me an Happy Easter email the other day about Herman the German Giant. I'm intrigued by the picture and follow the link. Turns out it's about a giant breed of bunnies. That's right folks - that picture has not been digitally enhanced! Isn't he so cuddly looking? I'm sure I'd throw out my back trying to hug him - that or have him bite me - but he's so interesting looking that I want to touch him!

Right about now you're probably thinking to yourself: "I don't really care". :-) But I do! Lol - I'm always interested in naturally oddities. Which includes but is not limited to: medical miracles, new things discovered in space, people who have unique gifts, new inventions or gadgets (of course!) and anything else that has a "cool" or "gross" factor. As you can tell I was one of those little kids who pulled bugs limbs apart because I wanted to see what color their blood. Poor bugs - they were my favorite test subjects. :-) That's one thing we had lots of in Saskatoon - bugs. That and there wasn't that many things to do while growing up on the Prairies except for torturing insects - or maybe that was just me...

I'm a BIG fan of the Discovery Channel though. It's right up there with YTV and the Cartoon Network. :-) Can't live without my cartoons either. What is your favorite TV channel? Or do you even watch TV at all?

happy Easter

My family is doing Easter dinner today. Since it's Monday and everyone had to go back to work - except for me - I was in charge of cooking the big meal. So early this morning I went out to Save On Foods, pick up a butterball turkey (my favorite kind) and some other food. Came home and started thinking about what to make. The turkey was still frozen so that was a pain in the ass - had to run hot water over it for awhile for it to thaw out enough so that I could remove the innards. After some thought I started making garlic mash potatoes (which took some time as the potatoes had to boil), fried rice (mostly for lunch tomorrow), snow peas, garlic bread and a dip. Carol and them came over near dinner time and brought some food - so now we're ready to feast! Mmmm...so good. Now it's just a matter of waiting for KA/Mike to come home from the states so that we can eat. Where are those guys?!

changed the look

I was bored tonight so I changed the look of the blog. It's been a year since I've made any major changes to the layout. The new interface is much easier to navigate through - thus making the change seamless. I must say - these blog sites are making it easier and easier for the computer-unsavy-types to maintain blogs as well.

catching up

I've survived the first week back to work. I walked in on Monday to a room bustling with chatter from the call agents. It was nice to see everyone. I had some problems remembering what my passwords were (my only excuse is that I have way too many systems with passwords) and had to get them reset by my coworker. I soon found myself overwhelmed with the amount of emails in my Inbox. 600 emails - I cringed and decided that I would deal with them after I checked in with my supervisor. I then discovered that they had booked me to train a co-op student for that morning. That wasn't fair as was barely back and already the tasks were piling up. I grumbled and went back to my desk to try to look at the emails. Email has always been and will always be the greatest challenge at work. Trying to manage the amount is always daunting. Shifting through stuff that HAVE to be read and stuff that you can just skim is not fun. Good thing we have all kinds of ways to tag emails for importance. Make it easier for me to mass delete stuff! So as of now I only have 109 left to address. Blah - the only drawback of going on holidays...coming home to "email-jail".

The rest of the week was hectic. Between training the new person, attending meetings and catching up on my normal work, I found myself at the office for nearly 11 hours per night. Of course that's not paid time either. The good and bad thing about driving - people know you're not in a rush to catch a train so they want your attention for "just a sec" - which is never a "sec". But some of that time was also dedicated to catching up on Social Club work. Some of my thoughtful colleagues gave my name to "adventure" companies while I was gone. So now I'm being bombarded with reps who want to sell me this outdoor package or that package. They all sound like fun programs to buy into but nothing can be done till I get a handle on who will be part of the new executive. I wish the Club would just sign off on some of the proposed events and let me get on with other club duties. :-) I'm getting frustrated with the bureaucracy of it all. I'm so happy that we have a 4 day long weekend. I need a break from work! Lol - I think it's just a matter of catching up. I don't like having so many things uncompleted - makes me tense.

baby Clayton

Congratulations to Jane and Danny who gave birth to their son Clayton on March 6th. Wishing your family all the best in the coming months.

Easter Bunny time

On Sunday the Social club hosted it's annual Easter Egg Hunt. We held it at head office this year because Stanley Park is out of commission. A lot of work went into planning for this event and I'm happy it turned out well.

I woke up early, had a coffee and drove to work. We had to set up the tables, etc for the kids. Robyn took charge of the event and I just had to take pictures and direct people to the right places. One of our colleagues was the Easter Bunny. She was sweating in the costume but the majority of the kids loved it. Only a few of the really young ones were freaked out by a giant rabbit. I finally put the pictures together tonight to bring to work so that it can posted to the website.