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Monday, March 31, 2003..............So much for the Spring weather. Last night another ice storm developed, and though not as severe as the last one, it still knocked out power in some parts of the city and with the rain, caused numerous floods all over the place in the Maritimes. A lot of roads had to be blocked off. No doubt the flooded areas are a Ford's worst nightmare. I got through my workday with no difficulties though really..........I got through the weekend feeling a bit sluggish and tired because of not a whole lot of sleep, where Saturday I didn't get my extra sleep that I kind of need, and then Wrestlemania night kept me up until past 2 in the morning. So I'm still looking for that big recharging. I ruled out TKD class tonight, and Janice began her work at the Trinity Drive Superstore, which seemed to get off to a rocky start as she wasn't exactly embraced by most of the people there. Janice is temporarily at Trinity Drive until the renovations at Main Street are completed, then she's more than happy to be going back...............Apparently, even ant Queen Elizabeth school where Alexandra goes, there was some flooding there too, but it didn't affect her class time any. I was late picking her up today because of a road closure on my way to her school........I'm still waiting on Cindy's Survivor comments for last week. My comments are up in the meantime, though.........At genesimmons.com, I actually got a letter of mine posted there which Gene Simmons himself responded to. And here it is:
Hey Gene....
 What are the chances of you getting interviews from hot movie directors? It's always been my opinion that they're often the unsung heroes of the movie world. I'd vote for you interviewing James Cameron (with the upcoming "Ghosts of the Abyss" on IMAX) and Christopher Nolan (who's now tapped to direct the next "Batman" film, which if true, could be monumentally great!).
Love GST.....keep 'em coming.
Mike in Moncton
Response from Gene:
Upcoming in issue 5 of GENE SIMMONS TONGUE is a John Singleton interview. Issue 4 has Phone Booth's JOEL SHOEMAKER
shumacher
Kinda cool, eh? Not a lengthy answer or anything, but an acknowledgment at least............Tonight we watched "Boston Public", a mediocre outing, with Verne Troyer as a guest star, and he's on again next week. Troyer, as you may know, was the infamous Mini-Me in the Austin Powers movies. It's a pretty quirky story on "BP" that he's involved in to say the least. After that was done we watched WWE's "Raw", where Bill Goldberg finally made his appearance. It looks like Steve Austin may be moving to "Smackdown!" to spread the star power around a bit...........That'll be about it for today. Take care and see you again next time.
Sunday, March 30, 2003.............I guess Janice had an interesting day. She had to get up at six this morning to go to the War Veteran's Health Care home, a five minute walk from here, and do her Co-Aid job from 6:30 to 12:30. She had to watch after an old guy and make sure he didn't pull his IV out of his arm. And, uh, give him a bath. Too much info? I kinda thought so...........I went to work, with Alexandra with me because there was no catechism class this morning. I took care of my usual Sunday stuff with work as well as make a delivery which got me a five dollar tip. Now those are few and far between outside of the holidays. When work was done, Lexy and me came home, where Janice had arrived ahead of us, and I proceeded to make pizzas for the pay per view tonight. One veggie one and two works ones, which I wasn't going to have any of because of my swearing off red meat for Lent. After that was all done, I made supper for the three of us, which was battered fried haddock and baked french fries (or "Freedom fries" if you're a republican in the U.S.), which we ate till we were stuffed to the...er....gills. This makes it seven straight days for no meat at all for me. The last time was chicken last Monday, which I fully intend on having again tomorrow. Steven and Sara showed up for Wrestlemania and my brother Greg shortly followed, bringing in a big ass all meat pizza from Costco. Janice broke her Lent rules and went ahead and had some. Tsk tsk. I opted for the veggie pizza. The pay per view was great! Aside from a dull spot here and there in the first half of it, the last three or four matches were especially engaging, with the best match of the night being between Rock vs Austin and Angle vs Lesnar. But there was a lot of great stuff to see. A very good pay per view, the best in a long long time.......... And that's all there is to say tonight. Have a good week, as we finish out the month of March, and I'll see you again on this page soon.
Saturday, March 29, 2003.............Though she tried, Janice just could not keep the house quiet enough for me to sleep in the one day that I get a chance to. ...and I sawwww my reflectiioooonnn in a ... snoowwww covered hilllll... "Alexandra, your dad's trying to sleep, be quiet". Ten minutes later.... PTANK... KLINK... PONK... KLEESH... "ALEXANDRA! What are you doing??" "I'm just counting my money in my bucket". "GET DOWN HERE!" Ten minutes later.... Hooowwwwwwlll..... mrrrrrrooowwwllll..... rrrrrrOOOOWWWW! "Geez o cripe"... stomp stomp stomp stomp..... SMUCK ... "What the hell is wrong with you Rocky?? Get out of here!" By then I'd given up on trying to stay unconcious, so I just got up. Kinda bleary eyed a lot of the day. Alexandra and Janice went to sparring class at TKD, which got Janice all nice and sore for the rest of the day. Which means she probably won't beat me up today. She had to go to work at 2 till 7, so Lexy and me watched "Monsters Inc." for the umpteenth time, and I let her play on the computer. We went and got Janice and went right to Champlain Place for our pretzel. When we came back home, Jeanette finally got a hold of us (actually Janice) and she let us know that she's currently in Port Hood, NS with her sister, and she'll hook up with us when she comes back. Janice has Jeanette half convinced to take a run at working for Co-Aid with her, and perhaps Superstore, where they are actually looking at hiring a bunch of people in the near future when the store has its grand re-opening when renovations are done. Oh, something else, we went to Dairy Queen so I could get Janice a Praline Pecan Parfait which she's wanted to try. She says it's her favorite thing from DQ now. We got Lex her favorite, a soft ice cream cone with sprinkles, and I opted for a tub of Haagen Daaz's Peanut Butter and Chocolate ice cream. I don't think I should have tried it for two reasons....one, I see a weight gain in the future because of this discovery, and two, I see a weight loss in my wallet because of it. That stuff ain't cheap! But holy, it's good. Anyway, back at home, Alexandra took off upstairs and we proceeded to wath "The Ring", which I'll wait and give my opinion on in my Heads Up page here. It certainly had its creepy moments. I'd gotten my week old EW magazine which I read after the show was over, and went to bed and that pretty much wrapped up a fairly quiet Saturday.........So, Wrestlemania tomorrow, and I half expect brother Greg to be here and totally expect Steven and Sara to come. Should be a good time. Till then, I'm outta here. See ya soon!
Friday, March 28, 2003............I've neglected to mention in the last number of entries that a big deal going on around the world lately is the discovery of this virus called SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome). Toronto is supposedly a hot spot for this virus, and Ontario has declared some kind of health state of emergency. Three people in Canada have died from it, although those people are either elderly or have compromised immune systems, which doesn't make them less important, but the general population is just going apeshit over this for nothing. Surgical mask sales have hit the stratosphere. This virus has pneumonia-like tendencies, but has seemed to react well to antiviral and antibiotic medications. It spreads through direct contact with an infected person, though you'd think somebody who looked at you funny might give it to you if some of the media had it their way...........It was another over-the-top crazy day at work. I sped all around town for both companies I work for today, and basically kept everything in order, though there were some trying times. I barely got to see my wife until I picked her up from work at nine tonight..........I got a couple of DVD's to rent in my travels today. "The Ring" and "Minority Report", the latter which I've wanted to see since Roger Ebert called it his favorite movie of 2002. And there's all kinds of talk about "The Ring". Tomorrow we'll watch "The Ring" and then "M R" maybe the next night.............We held fast to our no-meat Fridays, having the vegetable soup that I made the other day. Janice is consuming the bulk of it. Janice and a friend at TKD of hers watched the kids participate in Korean Wrestling today, which is basically sumo wrestling for smaller people, but you try to take down your opponent. Now Janice and her friend want to do it. Hey, I AM THERE! Somebody's gotta make sure they stay in line!..............There's all kinds of reports coming in about the war taking a very bad turn lately. The Iraqis are proving to be more resilient than the coalition forces had bargained on, and it looks like the war will go on much longer than expected. Just what no one wanted to hear. Lots of stories coming in about civilians and innocent lives being lost as a result of "friendly fire", stray missiles, people being in the wrong place at the wrong time, etc. NONE OF THIS WAS WORTH IT. People are dying and hundreds more are going to and it never had to start! Damn those Republicans. Is war all they know?? Like a bunch of retarded Klingons from a Star Trek convention?..............The weekend arrives at last. Hope it goes good for you, and take care yourself and stay out of trouble! The wrong kind at least.
Thursday, March 27, 2003............Wow, just when it looks like work is kinda calming down, a day like this comes along and smacks ya upside the head. A nice long list of places to deliver to came from both the sub shop and PreLam, and had me running all over town all day, while I had to look after Alexandra because there was no school, and Janice worked a shift for the health care company she works for from 7:30 to 3:30, then I had to get her and bring her to Superstore for 4:00 to 9:00, while bringing Alexandra somehow to TKD class at 3:30 at an entirely different end of town as well as make a catering delivery at another end of town for 4:00. So needless to say, it's been a very trying day, but I got through it. Anyway, after I picked up Lexy from TKD class, we went home and I gave Alexandra the other half of a sub that I'd bought her that afternoon, and she had that for supper, while I had toasted tomato sandwiches with organic protein bread. It's a lot heavier than it sounds. I had three of them and I was stuffed. Plus, I wound up adhering to a vegetarian week that I've been maintaining kind of accidentally..........It was "Smackdown!" night tonight, and Greg came over and we watched a somewhat lacklustre show, then headed to bed (yes, I'm actually writing this Friday) to catch some much needed battery-recharging Z's. And that's what brings me to now. We'll see ya again real soon....take care!
Wednesday, March 26, 2003..............Ooohhhh boy. I've got a bad feeling about "Survivor". If the women actually are still really playing the boys vs girls thing, I think Cindy might just have me. Don't tell her I said that! Janice and me just got done watching "Survivor" tonight, and if the guys don't get it together and get certain appendages out of their hands, the young guys anyway, they're gonna cost me a bet...........I just got done talking to Dale on messenger too, just before I signed into the sitebuilder here. Nice to hear from her once in a while. Apparently things are going very well at the Colburne household in Sydney...........No word from Jeanette yet, but I expect she may need time to settle a bit first. I look forward to hearing what she has to say.............My workday was unusually packed with stuff to do, yet it was all done in the time that was alotted to me, oddly enough. Eight catering deliveries were scheduled for today, yet all of it got done with my regular stuff within the eight hour shift. Kind of odd really, but I'm glad. Janice worked the evening shift tonight and we picked her up at nine to come home and watch "Survivor". Tonight I made my vegetable soup, complete with onions, potatoes, carrots, celery, garlic, basil, oregano, tomato paste, springwater and hot sauce. We're all set now till at least Friday for meals. Since Friday, I've only eaten meat, chicken breast on Monday, for one day. This is very unusual, and I don't think I've done anything like this before, cutting red meat out like this..............Didn't pay a whole lot of attention to the war today, kind of took a break from it. I do know I'm pretty livid with the Canadian ambassador from the U.S., or whoever he was, coming to Ottawa and saying that Washington is upset with Canada for not supporting their "brothers" in this war, saying that they'd be there for us. Well it's like this, pal.....we ARE there for you, and we HAVE been. Where did your planes land when Sept. 11/01 happened? Who took care of your people when they couldn't go home? We did. And we'd do it again. We went to Afghanistan to help fight the Taliban and root out Al Qaeda with our "brothers", and barely got any thanks. As a matter of fact, we got NO thanks for our participation in the Persian Gulf war. Instead we had to endure the proclamation that Mexico is the U.S.'s "best friends", according to monkeyman Bush. "We didn't feel a need to thank a brother". Oh, shit. What an ass. If your brother helps you out in life and death struggles aren't you going to thank him??? Canada isn't involved in this war because none of us have been forced to be involved. No one's invaded us. What's the next dictatorship run country to be invaded after this? Malaysia? Indonesia? Libya? Cuba? Vietnam? Pick one. There's plenty. Whichever one has the most oil I guess. Look, don't get me wrong, Saddam Hussein is first on everyone's list of who needs to burn for all eternity, but we have to find a way to get him and his cronies besides just blowing up the whole country. There was a building found suspected to have been making chemical weapons just the other day, but they don't know yet. Suppose it did make WOMD. If the U.N. weapons inspectors had been allowed to search Iraq for a few more months, don'tcha think they would've found it?? You can't hide a freakin' building. But itchy trigger fingers prevailed. If the U.N. would've found it, the vote to eject Saddam and his government would have been unanimous, and friction in the world would've been high, but not near as much as it is now. Now we have Russia, China and France breathing down the necks of the coalition and watching their every move. God, I hope this ends sooner than later...........I tend to rant on this subject, but I'm pretty passionate about it. Forgive me if I sound preachy. See you tomorrow and take care.
Tuesday, March 25, 2003.............I'm not going to make this entry too long winded, simply because it's very late--actually it's Wednesday now--and I'm walking the fine line between sleep and conciousness. So here we go.........I didn't pay a whole lot of attention to the war coverage today. I guess how I'm feeling right now is, I want the coalition forces to find these so-called plants that manufacture chemical and biological weapons. Why? Because I want those forces to be vindicated because of the risk of what'll happen if they aren't. If no weapons of mass destruction are found, how will this war be perceived by the likes of Russia, China, France and other countries that abstained from being a part of it? I hate the thought of retaliation or something by these countries. I also can't help wonder, hypothetically, if Iraq down the road is to be liberated, how are relations going to be with Kuwait down the road? (Kuwait is a dictator ruled country itself) Right now the U.S. supports and sells arms to them. History has shown that the countries the U.S. supports and sells arms to, it winds up going to war against some ten years later, provided the Republicans are in office. So many questions..........I'm getting to know Shawna a little bit at the sub shop. She's one of the newer girls who works there. We discuss one of her friends, how he took something of a nervous breakdown, and I tried convincing her the other day to do what it takes to get him to get help. This morning she told me he admitted himself to the hospital to do just that. On a related, kinda sorta, sub shop note, Jeanette missed her flight back into town yesterday, so supposedly she's in town tonight. I'm sure we'll hear from her soon..........Janice is working all evenings this week, so Lexy and me ate supper tonight by ourselves, which was a stir fry of rice, carrots, broccoli, onions, red peppers, garlic and corn with teriyaki sauce and Louisiana sauce. It turned out really good and tastes great, but my stomach's kind of rebelling against me having eaten it with a lot of gas. Could be quite the trying time getting sleep tonight..........We watched "Six Feet Under" in what I think was the best episode so far this season tonight, followed by a taped "24", which was another excellent and outstanding, albeit head-scratching, episode in that series........And that's it! I'm on my way to the bedroom. Take care and see you soon.
Monday, March 24, 2003.............I got pretty good news as soon as I walked in the door at work this morning. My workmate Elise informed me that Jeanette is coming back home, after finding out that the whole nun thing isn't for her. This is good news for us, because we all want her back and we all miss her a lot, but I have to wonder what her state of mind is about the whole thing, which we have to be mindful of. I just hope she doesn't look upon this as a failure, more like a successful investigative mission, where she found out if it was cut out for her or not. She wound up being pretty lonely, I guess, and now she's supposed to be on a plane coming home today. It's going to be great seeing her again. It's only been two months since she's been gone, but we do miss her, and look forward to picking up where we left off............The war is on everyone's minds, isn't it. Everyone has an opinion and everyone is very vocal about it. More people seem to be in support of the war now than before, and I can't quite understand it. My stance right now is, the troops are there, and it has to get over with now. It's unrealistic to say they should withdraw, and impractical given how far they've gone. What they do from this point on is what I'm concerned about. There are reports of more American and British casualities and POW's, and the Iraqi's are even breaking the Geneva Convention rules that clearly state it to be illegal to televise the images of POW's. Just one more dirty trick that bastard Saddam is using to get his way. With all the intelligence that exists, though, I don't understand why the forces choose to just bomb a shitload of buildings, no matter what district they're in, and just hope that the right people are in them. As much guesswork where human life is concerned should not be taken. That's what I find so pointless about this damned war. The problem is with Saddam and not the Iraqi people. In fact, the U.S. military and the President continually say that, yet don't seem to be taking care when they wind up shooting their own people or misguiding their "precision guided missiles". Clearly the war's going to get a whole lot uglier before it gets better..............Anyway, we went to TKD tonight, and exercised a bunch of kicking drills that I'm realizing now that I maybe shouldn't have taken part in, because I'm feeling that my foot is clearly not 100%. In fact it's more sore now than it's been since I injured it. I guess I'll take tomorrow off from it and go back Wednesday............We opted for these chicken breasts that I bought at Co-op last week on sale, and I tell you, I don't know what they were feeding those birds, but they're frickin' HUGE! Tasty too. The three of us had very full bellies when we were done eating that with carrots and turnips and rice.............Watched WWE's "Raw" tonight after "Boston Public", and it's the last "Raw" before "Wrestlemania 19" this weekend. The Rock and Stone Cold closed out the show, and it's awfully good that WWE has them back again. They're probably the most professional showmen on the whole WWE roster...............Until tomorrow, take care, and we'll see what happens as time goes on. "24" and "Six Feet Under" are on tomorrow---YAHOO!!!
Sunday, March 23, 2003..............The weather's getting better and better here in Moncton. The sun's out more, the days are lasting longer, and the temps are warming up big time. And it does a lot for people's moods too, for the better...........Janice went next door to her parents with Lexy like she does every Sunday after church to get together with all the family. Something that pissed me off quite a bit is one of her family members calling her a terrorist for not supporting the war in Iraq. Pointing fingers and everything. It's just one of the reasons I don't go to that house during these gatherings, because there's too much of that going on and I don't want to get involved, lest hard feelings surface. I wasn't there this time and I still got hard feelings............Work didn't last too long today, and I was done soon enough to be able to spend the afternoon with my kid just hanging out. I let her play on the computer this afternoon on the PBS Kids website where there's a few games good for development for kids. I went to pick up Janice at work only to be met with her sister Jennifer who was picking her up to go out to supper, which was planned for the evening. So they went out--Janice with her sisters Hazel and Jennifer, mother Martha and sis in law Dany, and went to some pasta place on Main Street. They had a good time, lots of laughs I guess. Lexy and me were here at home and we had those McCain potato smiles and salmon with Cy's spice and garlic butter. Good stuff.............By the time Janice got home I was beginning to watch the Academy Awards, which I watched from start to finish for the first time since "Titanic" was competing for statues five years ago. I was surprised to see Eminem win the award for movie theme. I think everyone expected U2 to win it, especially where they were there performing the song, and Eminem wasn't even present. I was pulling for Pedro Almodovar to win best screenplay and he did, for the subtitled movie "Talk To Her", which wasn't up for the foreign film award because it wasn't submitted by his country. It certainly would have won it, judging from what I've heard about it. I haven't seen the movie, because it's an independently released film, foreign and unsupported by any major distributors, so I'll have to just wait for the DVD release. "Chicago" won best picture, no surprise there, plus a bunch of others. I think I'd like to go see that movie in the theatre just to see the larger than life female legs in fishnets flying around, but bring earplugs because I can't stand the music! And, of course, as I said on this page previously, the moment to watch for throughout the show was Michael Moore receiving the award for best documentary, for which he graciously invited all the nominees to go up and accept with him. If you've seen it, you know about all the controversy with his acceptance speech. And let me be blunt: if you haven't read a book of his, or seen any of his TV presentations, or "Bowling For Columbine", then your negative opinion toward him is irrelevant. Despite a lot of accusations that he is anti-American or wants the coalition to lose the war, as that ass Bill O'Reilly accused him of on "The View", Moore actually loves America and is pointing out the flaws because no one else wants to. Everyone is so anxious to sugarcoat the U.S. and how it's presented, and by and large it's a fabulous country to live in, but there's room for improvement, and he's pointing out where there needs to be improvements. The idea that he pointed out FACTS on the Academy Awards show that people don't want to face sets some people back, but with such a large television audience, which far outnumbers a vocal booing studio audience, he had a good idea what the reaction would be, I'm sure. The fact of the matter is, it's got people talking, and that's exactly what he wants. He's not against the U.S. troops being in Iraq, rather that they were sent there to begin with. And who sent them? That's where his beef lies................That's it and that's all for now, take care and have a good week. Hope it's a good one, or at least a better one than this past one.
Saturday, March 22, 2003............Had to get up reeeeeal early this morning, well...maybe not THAT early, around 7, to call in to try to get WWE tickets to see the "Raw" live telecast May 5 in Halifax. After calling in constantly for an hour and forty five minutes to busy signals, I finally got through and got tickets in the upper bowl section with a decent view of the screen and the ring for Janice and me. So we are officially going. These live "Raw" telecasts are entirely different from the regular house shows and I'm really looking forward to it, where the last one we went to back in '97 was through-the-roof exciting...........Janice was in absolutely no shape to go to work this morning, and I basically forbid her to go. She stayed home while her husband and daughter catered to her while she laid on the recliner couch and took it very easy all day and night. It was a very dull day for Alexandra, as it usually is when one of us winds up sick, because then we focus on looking after the ill...........It wound up being two veggie days for us in a row today, as we opted for meatless spaghetti with garlic bread and fresh garlic cooked in for supper. I tell you, since we've been on this no red meat kick for Lent this year, we've all felt great. I'm by no means part of the "Save the Cows" movement or whatever, it's just a matter of preference and sacrifice, in this case of Lent, and it's working for us more than against us. It's forced us to be more creative with our meal choices, which is a good thing............"Saturday Night Fever" was on MuchMoreMusic tonight, which we made a point to watch. I was floored by how good this show is, compared to what I remember. Many hear "Saturday Night Fever" and instantly, polyester suits and dancing and the Bee Gees with John Travolta come immediately to mind, but it's really so much more than that. The dancing is just a subplot in this show, which more depicts a young man from a poor Italian family in New York struggling to get out of the rut that he's entrenched in with his fellow Maneros. I kind of related to it; the whole going to the clubs with the guys thing, living at home, having a tough time finding a good job. If you've seen it but it's been a long time, see it again. If you haven't seen it, it's definitely a great snapshot of the '70's where all is not always well with happy endings and heroes...........I've been watching CBC Newsworld a heck of a lot more than CTV NewsNet lately, where the former is just more redundant than anything. Newsworld is reporting the war coverage from all sides of the spectrum, showing the heroic and the tragic, and not sugar coating anything or hiding anything like that blasted CNN does on a constant basis. Now we hear that one of the U.S.'s own soldiers has killed his own with a grenade. It's one heartbreak after another when it comes to war. Also now, another "friendly fire" incident where the U.S. shot down a British plane this time. We Canadians can sympathize with them. Whoever in the U.S. army is in charge of identifying other soldiers and planes and such should really sharpen up. God bless the families of all of these victims. And especially the mothers and kids in Iraq, who I saw crouching in their houses in the corners in terror while bombs went off outside. Saddam has to be stopped, but human lives are being gambled with like chips on a Vegas table to do it, and it's just sickening. Why don't the U.S. go to Cuba and stop their dictator? There's no oil. And Cuba needs the money via the drug trade to pay the U.S. for their exports. Why not go to Vietnam and stop the communism there? Because they got their asses kicked last time. Why not go back and do it right? There's no oil! There are answers to all the questions. I'm thinking right now that it's bad to have just one superpower in the world, with no one to keep the other in check. Washington can pretty much go wherever they want in the world now and Americanize it. The coup in Iraq is a perfect example...........Watching the Academy Awards tomorrow night? It should be interesting hearing the comments. But I'll be primarily watching for Michael Moore's acceptance speech, should he win (I have a feeling this may be fixed). Keep an eye out for him if you're watching it............So that's all for today. Take care of yourselves and each other, and say a prayer for the soldiers sent overseas and the people they're told to kill. They all need God's help one way or another.
Friday, March 21, 2003.............Looks like the flu bug has descended upon the Cook household on Belmont Street. When I say "flu", I mean "flu", not "stomach virus", which is almost always confused with one another. She's got stiffness, headache, stuffy nose, fever, aches and pains, the whole nine yards. She toughed it through work when halfway through her shift she was pretty much floored by the onslaught of the illness and was pretty happy to see me when I picked her up at five. That effectively wiped out our TKD class tonight, which is fine really, because chances are it was going to be a huge class, which I'm not big on. When Lexy and me got Janice home, we took care of her, getting her into her jammies, laying her on the recliner couch and covering her up and playing servants to her, basically, the way she always, always does for us when we're sick. We did so by cooking supper, and it's veggie day so I'd gotten these Bagel Bites with three cheeses on them and nothing else, and we gobbled down a bunch of those. Janice had a lot of them while Lexy and me saved room for fresh battered and fried haddock. Wow, did it EVER turn out good! I never had made homemade fish before like that, least of all with homemade batter, but as sure as I'm sitting here it may have been the best fish I'd ever tasted. Alexandra just loved it, and pretty much inhaled her supper..........We'd borrowed Dany's video camera yesterday because Janice wanted to tape my testing at TKD, and we held onto it and taped Alexandra singing along to videos on MuchMoreMusic. Precious memories in the making. I tell you this, folks, I don't know to what level she'll take it, but our little girl is going to do something with her voice that's going to take her places. And a lot of people who've heard her say the same thing............War is raging in Iraq. It's really a one sided battle, because Iraq's armament is just no match for the U.S. and Britain. The images we witnessed on the news was positively bone chilling and frightening. Bombs going off all over Baghdad, pummelling the city relentlessly and no doubt causing far more unnecessary deaths than the media would care to report. I've never seen footage like I saw today. It nearly brought me to tears to see it. The guy providing commentary on location sounded frightened out of his mind, though he kept control, and you can only imagine the people in the city itself having to endure all this mindless carnage. There are innocent men, women and children in there that are subject to all of this aggression, of whose deaths if they happen, will only be labeled as collateral damage to war by the aggressors. But I don't think I could describe the feeling of absolute HATE that I felt come over me when I saw a soldier take down an Iraq flag in Baghdad and replace it with the American one. I said it already in the commentary I posted in the My 2 Cents page here on my site today, that Washington's intentions, though they vehemently deny it, is to overthrow Iraq's current government and occupy the territory for however long it takes to please the idiots in the Pentagon. But I digress.....the feeling of hate that I felt was scary when I saw that exchange of flags. Reportedly, the soldiers were ordered to take down the American flag by orders of the Pentagon, but that could just be propaganda to cover their own asses, which is far more likely. A photographer caught the moment, and had he not have done so, I think that flag would still be flying there. I must emphasize that I have no animosity toward the American people, just their government's policies and actions abroad. I know most Americans themselves are fed up with the performance of the Republicans right now. Something I saw while watching CTV NewsNet during their entertainment briefings, was the coverage on the Oscars, and how so many stars either don't want to be there, or want the show to go on, or want to at least tone down the glitter. But everybody's hero, Michael Moore, got on camera and was asked what he would do if he won and approached the podium to accept. And he said "the last thing they want is me up there accepting an award, not with what's been going on this week". Well I'll tell you what...he WILL win Best Documentary for "Bowling For Columbine" by miles ahead of his competitors, and if they actually let him accept on TV and not in pre-broadcast, what he has to say will be what everyone is waiting to hear. Trust me on that. I'll be watching the Academy Awards for that very reason...........Anyway, that's enough ranting. For today. Should be update day tomorrow, so I'll see you soon. Take care and thanks for your interest.
Thursday, March 20, 2003..............Testing finally happens. It was testing day for a lot of folks at ACTKD, and with Janice having the day off today, she went to the noon hour class, not to participate but to provide moral support for the people who were testing. I spent what was left of my noon hour from work staying home and fixing things on my site here, like the hit counter on the homepage that was malfunctioning for whatever reason. It was a problematic day at the sub shop, with two girls calling in sick, both of them the ones Carla just hired. Not promising. The strain was making itself evident on those who did show up for work, and I seemed to feel that Carla was actually reaching out a bit. At the end of the day I kissed her hand and told her I love working for her, because I think she needed to hear it from someone. I do love working for her. We have a nice working relationship and an equally nice friendly one. Her predecessor, Donnie, who sold her the business, is one hell of a tough act to follow, and it seems she is constantly being measured against the standards he set when he left, which is really quite unfair. Carla is learning as she goes, and the learning curve is a very long one in this case............We had chicken, rice and seasoned string beans for supper before heading out to ACTKD for my testing. We went early and I went over the stuff I needed to know before class began, and I felt pretty confident. By the time I tested, I screwed up Tae Geuk #1 and, in my opinion, performed sub-par in my sparring. When judging came, Master Lessard acknowledged that I messed up on my Tae Geuk, but so did everyone else who tested with me, and he thought the rest of my effort was solid. He commended me on my enthusiasm and work ethic, and says that my drive and determination are contagious to those around me. Those are shocking things to hear! I didn't expect to hear all that. But I was gracious. I did get my Yellow Belt, and after class he reiterated that he appreciates my work ethic and enthusiasm. Talk about a vote of confidence. So I'll take that ball and run with it. Onto my Green Stripe belt now............After TKD, we brought our friend Tobie with us, and she trains with us regularly. She is a black belt and a friend to us since Alexandra joined close to two years or so ago. We invited her over tonight to take in WWE's "Smackdown!", along with Steven and Greg as well. It was a good evening, with lots of talking and fun had by all sides. Sara was absent tonight due to a class project from school.............TGIF! It's actually Friday right now, 12:47 am to be exact, so I'm outta here to get some seriously needed sleep. Take care and come back soon.
Wednesday, March 19, 2003............Winter's last gasp. Tomorrow Spring finally arrives, and lemme tell ya, if you live in Canada it didn't come a day too soon. The fiercely cold temperatures are hopefully behind us, but there's no way to know, really, until May arrives..........As I type this, the news is on behind me at 11:32pm, and we think that war has actually broken out in Iraq close to ten p.m. A "window of opportunity" was taken by U.S. forces as they supposedly attacked a place of meeting of top Iraqi officials. No word right now on whether or not it was successful. We also hear that Iraqi radio has been taken over by the Americans. Strategy with that could be anything; but I would suggest broadcasting Michael Bolton songs until all the Iraqi's finally tap out. Might be a cruel and vicious way to do it, but whatever gets the job done!........Tonight Janice and Lexy and me went to evening TKD class where we went over my Tae Geuk, which is a form, or series of martial arts moves, which I need to get down to pass the test for my Yellow Belt tomorrow. I think I've got it nailed down. Same with my Self Defense #2, which is another manouevre used to defend oneself in a fight. I also need to know Kick Combination #2, which consists of front kick/left punch/right punch/turning kick in quick succession. It's tougher than it reads or sounds. Technique is of utmost importance in TKD, so as to maximize the effect of the blows being given. Free no-contact sparring is also part of the test. I'm sporting a different 'look', so to speak, with how I have my hair these days. What I'm doing is shaving my hair every month about an inch or two up from the bottom of my scalp from the back to the sides, and now it's long enough for a ponytail, so I slick it back and do that. Women--can you believe that?--have actually come up to me and said nice things. I can't help but wonder if Janice put them up to it...........I brought Alexandra's samples into the lab at the hospital to be tested this morning. I brought it into a room where blood tests were being done. I saw one needle about to go into an arm and I was like "Allllllright then, I'm OUTTA here." Man, I don't like needles, and the feeling's mutual I think! Although I believe I've mastered the art of taking them. The trick is, look the other way. Look at it though, and I might even barf. I did that once. At Christmas time several years ago, I was so dehydrated from vomiting that they had to hook an IV up to me to re-hydrate me, and they couldn't find the friggin' vein. And around four or five pokes into it, "wwwwwaaaaaallllllhhhhccckkkkk!" K, I just realized I talked way too long about needles...........Work was nutso today. Some of the girls in the shop were pulling in 12 hour shifts, which I think is just retarded and needs to be dealt with much, much better than it is. There were seven or eight catering deliveries, all but one for the morning. A lot of rushing around............After TKD was done tonight, we had Kentucky Fried Chicken for the first time in a long time. It was great, really, but we felt like shit afterwards. We really don't eat that kind of stuff too often, though, so we allowed ourselves the indulgence. To our surprise, we gave Alexandra the choice of that and a cheese omelet with toast, and she took that. Which is good, because the chicken wouldn't have sat well with her before bed.............We watched "Survivor" tonight, and I don't want to give too much away because there's one or two of you, maybe more, that want to see it on tape because you're working, but it was pretty good. I don't think it's quite as engaging as it was in the beginning, but it was entertaining. The sex quotient is elevated, to be sure, since the tribes have been mixed up.............Janice finally beat me in Yahtzee tonight, damn it. I won three and she won three, but her total score beat mine. There'll be another day!...........Guess I'll cut it here, since this instalment has been a little long-winded. See you in another day, and God knows, the next number of days could be more than interesting with the situation in the Persian Gulf. Take care and please come back.
Tuesday, March 18, 2003.............I'm listening to the news right now behind me as this day approaches the end, at 11:20 am, and war is all the talk of the world. I guess I can trust CTV with their coverage, but I just can't follow TPN and their biased reporting. Something interesting to note is that U.S. planes have dropped leaflets over Baghdad with instructions to Iraqi soldiers on how to lay down their arms and report to U.S. camps without fighting, or in a nutshell, surrender. A lot of them are taking the offer. I guess this is the best thing to hope for at this point, because war is now inevitable and going to happen, and minimizing the casualities is the only thing that can be wished for. Scary times are ahead...........Onto personal news, I got up this morning to a very stiff right foot from my TKD injury incurred yesterday. It was a major struggle getting through the morning at work, as my job consists of a lot of lifting and carrying and stair climbing, but the more mobile I got the easier my foot moved around. It stiffens up mostly when I stay still, but it still hurts to walk and stuff. When I picked up Janice after she was done her work at two o'clock, I finished out the afternoon for BJ's and went home to prepare for Tae Kwon Do class. Janice strapped my foot up and we went, and the class consisted of mostly kicking technique and some drills. It only really bothered me a lot when all my weight was on my right foot, which was a few times, but I minimized a lot of it. By the time class was over, I'd survived it, and we went to the sub shop and got some toasted grilled veggie subs for supper. After we ate, Janice performed the dubious task of collecting a stool sample from Alexandra for her required tests, we put her to bed and watched "Six Feet Under" at ten. I do love "SFU", and it's one of the best shows on TV, but the very top honor would have to go to "24" for me. "SFU" is off to a slow start this season, and I'm hoping the pace will quicken, but there's definitely something not quite right with it this time around.............Janice and me have been having these Yahtzee wars lately too. Tonight I once again beat her 4 games to 2, for the third time in a row, but for the third time in a row she also beat me in total score. So victory for either of us is somewhat indecisive still!..............That's it for tonight, kiddies. Still waiting for Cindy E's "Survivor" writeup, but mine's up for the time being. Catch you later.
Monday, March 17, 2003............Another somewhat challenging day to start off the workweek, if you don't count Sunday at least. Not concerning work, though. Although, Alexandra had to go see the doctor this morning so we can get to the bottom of some stomach pains she's had off and on the last number of weeks. I really think it's her overindulgence in the candy she got for Valentine's Day, but we wanted to be sure, especially when she jerked us around with a TKD class a little while ago. The doc thinks everything is fine, probably just gas (from too much junk, of course), but wants to be sure, so he's getting urine, stool and blood samples from her. And, uh, Janice will be in charge of collecting the non-blood ones. Hey, before you start on me, I clean out the cat's stinking disgusting box every week! For all of that beast's life!.............So Janice had to work in the afternoon, and Lexy stayed home after the doctor's appointment at 11 this morning. That means I had to keep her in the afternoon, except for when I dropped her off at ACTKD. When I picked her up, we came home and I let her get some more math skills via games on the computer, then we went to pick up Janice after we'd gotten dressed for the evening TKD class. I actually wasn't going to go because I hadn't been feeling up to par all day because of a rotten sleep last night, but sucked it up and went anyway. After all, I'm testing for my Yellow Belt this week. But now that's up in the air, because at class today when we did free sparring at the end, I went to make a fake against my opponent, where I'd slide toward him and slide back, but my front foot wouldn't slide and I wound up turning my foot upside down, twisting the top-outside of my right foot. I played Mr. Tough Guy and finished sparring, and the class, but came home barely able to walk. My right foot is swelled up more as time goes by here. This could also pose a problem for work, but we'll see in the morning if the swelling comes down. I do have insurance at Atlantic Coast in case of something like this, where my policy pays for my missed time at work should I get hurt in class. But I don't plan on missing work. And if I can help it, I don't plan on missing my Yellow Belt testing either. After all, the last belt I got, my Yellow Stripe, was with broken ribs. But we'll see..............We watched "Boston Public" tonight, a so-so episode, followed by WWE's "Raw", which was downright mediocre at best. After that I got on the PC here and finally fixed up the Survivor page here at the site after last weeks switcheroonie, and now I await Cindy E's response to post that too. And that brings me to this, now. And it's 1:43 AM, and I gotta get to bed! Wonder if I'll wake up to hear war has started over in Iraq...............That's it for the time being. Take care and see you soon.
Sunday, March 16, 2003............Laziness was the rule with the beginning of this week. Didn't do a heck of a lot besides do my three hours of work for the sub shop and sit around, watching Lexy play on the computer with the PBS Kids website games. We went and got Janice around 5:30 and came home to have supper consisting of a poutine: Gravy and fries with cheese. Heavy duty stuff. But at lunchtime I tried salmon for the first time with Alexandra, and we both thought it was pretty good, actually. I got some garlic butter and fried it in with some Cy's spice and had it as is with nothing else. I was curious to see if I'd like it. Salmon is really good to have because of its richness in omega-3's, so I'll see if Lex and me can eat it a couple of times a week, or once at least. Janice won't go anywhere near me for a couple of hours after I have it though. She HATES fish with a passion. Tonight we watched a little bit of "60 Minutes", taking in a story about how a lot of people joined the army reserves in the States after the September 11 stuff happened, and now they're being sent all over the place, especially into the Persian Gulf near Iraq. So much for Al Qaeda, eh? Not only that, but the fathers and mothers of some of the kids that'll be left alone at home won't see their spouses for over two years, because Iraq will have 200,000 American troops occupying their country for that time, probably longer. Any doubt that the U.S. folks have been hoodwinked into letting a monkey run the White House is now erased.............That's about it for this time, not a whole lot to write about the last couple of days. But I'm sure that'll change this week. Take care and have a good one.
Saturday, March 15, 2003...........Sleep-in day! And I did. Slept in right until about noon, when I awoke to Janice's legs wrapped around my neck saying wake up or else. Hey, no problem!...........What we did today was more or less take it easy. After making chicken wings around 2:30 or so, we headed out to Champlain Place to take care of a few things. Then I had to drop off Janice at Superstore for work for her 5 to 11 shift. So yup, that means it's just me and Lex for the evening. When we came home, Alexandra did whatever she normally does, like draw and watch Teletoon, while I attempted to make corn fritters in the deep fryer. I did, and they turned out, but rather heavily. Turns out the oil needed to be changed. Better luck next time I guess........The evening brought on pretty much a laid back time, with Alexandra having to still pretty much stay in because we want to be sure her ear infections go away and stay away. So she watched "The Powerpuff Girls Movie" while I frigged around on the computer. Michelle, my Bin Laden Bowling nemesis, is constantly after me after I topped her score on the game some time ago, and so I'm constantly looking to up my score so she won't catch me. She will be relentless if she catches me, so I gotta keep running!.............Picked up Janice at 11, and as Alexandra fell asleep in the van, we carted her upstairs to bed. Then Janice and me watched the news, followed by this sex show that's on CTV at midnight on Saturdays. Pretty graphic. They talked about some sexual myths, like is it really the size that matters. Like I say, it ain't the size of the pencil, it's how you write your name. Unless of course you have a Jiffy Marker............And that's all there is to talk about today. Stay tuned for more news as it happens.
Friday, March 14, 2003...............Another meatless Friday has come, where the three of us enjoyed a very hearty toasted grilled veggie sub from BJ's. Talk about kickin' ass! What a great sub that was. We had tomatoes, onions, mushrooms, green peppers and black olives grilled in italian oil topped with lettuce on a toasted bun with garlic spread, making a very filling but not bloating meal, like it would have been if it were a steak sub. This is going to be a staple in our diets..............I took Lexy along with me to work today, because Janice had to work the day shift and school wound up being cancelled because of a water main break in front of her school. Big surprise to me, I'm extremely suspicious of the quality of drinking water at that school to begin with. Anyway, when work got done, we geared up to go to Atlantic Coast Tae Kwon Do for forms class, where the evening wound up being quite interesting. It was a huge class, with around fourty people, probably at least eighty percent of them girls and women. Atlantic Coast's enrolment is largely female, as Master Lessard, the instructor and manager, said that the ladies outnumber the guys by about three to one or more. That's more than enough to give me the jitters, since I have kind of a fear of women anyway. So...with the huge class, the different belt levels took turns before the Master in showing their forms, while he critiqued and helped everyone perfect their movements. When this was over, he had us form lines of about eight people each, so we could participate in pad kicking drills, where a pad holder holds up this flat cushion while the students take turns in a line kicking it. When it was all done, Master Lessard had all the higher belts stay standing to participate in a highest-kick contest. Well, wouldn't you know it, ALL of the higher belts just happened to be in the same lineup that I was in. Master Lessard said I could sit down or give it a try, it was up to me, so obviously I opted to sit down. But as I began to walk back where everyone else was sitting, they all cheered me on to stay up! I was shocked. Lexy was among the loudest cheering me to try. How could I not? I walked back to the front and got this big ovation. WEIRD. It was a very 'Twilight Zone' moment. I was at the front of the line, and as the bar was set so to speak, I had to kick a pad that was set at eye level with a jumping turning kick, a bit tricky for a lower belt like me. But I did it. And the women watching gave me another ovation. WEIRD again! I guess it's the underdog thing. Everyone else was at least one full belt level ahead of me. The pad was raised to the top of the head level, and I got that too. More applause. Once more slightly over the head, and I got that. Louder applause. But the next time I came up a bit short, and I and others behind me began to drop off. When you miss, you sit down, so a lot of us sat down at that point. Still, Janice and Lexy were really proud of me, and for maybe the first time outside of getting a belt, I felt like a million bucks at class. I know I spent a lot of time talking about this, but it affected me quite positively. I was so touched by the support of everyone, even if it was just a playful little competition, that I won't forget it. Especially since I've got it in my journal here now...................We watched "W-5" tonight on CTV, Canada's answer to "20/20" or "60 Minutes". Talk about eye opening, the story they featured on David Hudak, a man from Canada that was accused not long ago of hourding missiles, 2400 of them, for a military threat against the U.S.; it gives completely new insight on the whole situation, and allows voices to be heard that never got a chance to be, and pretty much shows some Americans in Washington as being too overzealous in the post Sept. 11 era. Do yourself a favor and go to this LINK and watch the article online called "Missile Man David Hudak: Threat or Hero?"...........After that we lightened up a bit and watched "Legally Blonde" on TMN. A good movie for entertainment value, not necessarily as a literary piece or anything. But there is a place in the movie world for movies like this as long as they make some sense. I probably liked it more than Janice did..............That'll be all I'll write for tonight. Take care and come on back ASAP, okay?
Thursday, March 13, 2003..............The weather the last couple of days has been much improved, with sunnier skies and temperatures closer to zero, which is a great relief............Janice had to call into her work and tell them she couldn't make it in because of Alexandra being home from school from her ear infections. Actually she called in last night and told them, because it was clear we were going to keep her home. Lexy slept good through the night, and it looks like her medicine is working. It was really tough seeing her cry from the pain of her ears. Thank God she's getting better...........Our good friend Lucy is out of work at BJ's Subs for two weeks due to her problems with her ankles. Despite Janice's advice to Lucy to tell her doctor to get scanned for arthritis, she opted for anti-inflammatories and physiotherapy at the advice of her doctor. Which Janice and I both believe is wrong. Lucy is in for a long ride in finding out what is really wrong with her, because Janice went through the same thing..............It was TKD night tonight, as I continue down the path toward my Yellow Belt testing, one week from tonight. Janice is taking the liberty to invite people to come watch, which I find silly because I really am not that big of a deal with this. Janice getting her belts, now that's a big deal, because she's kind of handicapped with fibromyalgia, psoriatic arthritis and other things. Me, I'm just a schmuck with nagging injuries plodding along! Anyway, class was very aerobic tonight, with lots of kicking drills and run-thrus for forms. Tomorrow night when we go, we'll be refining our forms for the most part, in preparation for testing next week. Actually, I'm the only one testing this month, so it'll be mostly for me............Our friend Greg was here tonight for "Smackdown", as was Steven and Sara, and my sister Cindy even dropped in and gave Lexy MORE clothes. What a wardrobe that kid has now! Cindy and me discussed food for the most part, namely a corn fritter recipe she has that I've been meaning to get my hands on. Plus some tips on cooking salmon, which I'm making it a mission to get Janice to eat regularly because of its richness in Omega-3 fatty acids, which are extremely beneficial to everyone, and namely arthritis patients. Janice HATES fish, though. It's an uphill battle............After the "Smackdown" thing was over, we watched the newest instalment of "Survivor", which threw a huge curveball at us tonight. I don't want to talk about it too much here because there's a page at the site here for that, but suffice to say, I have to figure out how to arrange the stuff on the page now. Tune in soon to see what I do to it...........WWE's "RAW" is coming to Halifax, Nova Scotia in May, with tickets going on sale for that event a week from Saturday. I sent an e-mail to my brother Greg inviting him to join us in going. "RAW" is a big event to have in a city, because it's a live braodcast going out to millions around the world every Monday night from the respective cities that the WWE brings it to. When we saw it in Halifax back in '97, the air was positively electric, and we're looking forward to that same experience..........That's about all there is to write tonight. I'll be back here in a day or so with more news---take care and see you then.
Wednesday, March 12, 2003...............This was a fairly quiet Wednesday, with not a whole lot going on. But it got off to a rather lousy start for Alexandra, who woke up at five in the morning crying and complaining her ear hurts. Janice took her temperature and found no fever, so she gave her Tylenol and sent her to school. The Tylenol ended up wearing off and Lexy was in pain again, and we never got any word from them at school that there was anything wrong. When I picked her up at school and got her in the van, she began crying. This is a kid who doesn't cry from pain very often, she's pretty tough. So it tugged at my heartstrings big time. I kept her with me the rest of the afternoon, and when work was done made an appointment at an after hours clinic to get her looked at. When we picked up Janice and told her what was going on, she was irate that the school didn't contact us that Lexy wasn't feeling well. But fact of the matter is, we're the ones who sent her to school. Folks, we may be parents of a nearly seven year old little girl, but we'll never stop learning how to be parents, and the lessons keep coming. Anyway, Janice took Alexandra to the doctor, where it was discovered she had infections in both of her ears now, and prescribed antibiotics which we got right away. I cooked supper for us while they were at the doctor's. We're keeping her home from school tomorrow to give her a chance to bounce back. The doc said her ears will be hurting probably for another day.............Other than that, nothing really worthwhile reporting. At least now we know our little precious one is on the road to recovery. See you again tomorrow.
Tuesday, March 11, 2003..............It was cold enough again for Alexandra to get a drive to school again this morning, and my lovely wife Janice once again got out to start the van for a warmup before I got downstairs. This frigid and unpredictable weather's got a lot of people down, I'm finding, not that I'm immune to that effect myself, but I see a lot of people in my travels and the mood is less than celebratory............It was an average work day, and Janice worked four in the afternoon to nine tonight. I spoke to my friend Lucy at the shop today, and her ankle is swollen and getting worse by the day, and now it's starting on the other foot. It's getting to the point where she can barely walk, and that's actually sad. Lucy's the extremely dedicated type and won't call in sick for anything, but she almost did this morning. Anyway, the symptoms she's exhibiting are pretty much identical to what Janice had when she was diagnosed with her arthritis, but it took a lot of doctors' opinions before she got to that point. Where Lucy's appointment with her doctor is tomorrow, I wanted Janice to go in to talk to Lucy and tell her how to talk to her doctor about what's going on, to avoid all the bullshit that Janice had to go through. I hope Lucy took it all to heart. She won't be working at the shop much longer, I don't think, before she takes leave, but how long that leave will be depends on the diagnosis and treatment of what's going on. Lucy is a very good friend, and I am worried about her well being with this...........Lexy went to TKD today, but Janice and I did not because of her work schedule. When I picked Janice up tonight, we put Lex to bed when we got home and watched the new episode, #2, of "Six Feet Under". Again, like last week, I think it's a building-type of episode, and around mid-season I feel things will pick up. Kathy Bates is on board as a character as of tonight which really spiced things up. She's such a great actress............And that's all there is to say about today. Stay tuned and come on back soon.
Monday, March 10, 2003..............Well, finally we're back in the grind here at the My Life page. The sitebuilder's been presenting me with numerous challenges lately just getting on it to post stuff here, but I'm in now, so without much further adieu..........The weather is once again incredibly bitter cold. I mean, we're ten days away from the first day of Spring, and wind chill values are in the minus 30's. Alexandra headed back to school this morning after a very cold and somewhat lousy March Break, where she had a brutal cold for the most of it, and her uncle Gary from Janice's side gave her a drive to school with his own two kids. The work day played out pretty normally, with nothing overly big to take care of...........We had leftover vegetable soup from Sunday for supper today, because when I make my soup I make it in this very large pot, so it feeds us for a couple of days. It always seems to taste better the day after I've made it. So three of the last four days now have been vegetarian days for Janice and me, and the no red meat thing is still on for Lent. Janice is going full steam ahead still, too, with her no chips and bars deal...........The three of us went to TKD tonight, with Mr. Thorolly giving a largely nitpicky class refining our techniques. We'll be skipping class on Tuesday and then going the rest of the week, where Janice is working tomorrow night...........After putting the munchkin to bed, Janice and me watched a new episode of "Boston Public" followed by "Raw", both of which were pretty okay. BP is going to pick up over the next several weeks, I think, by the way tonight's episode ended, basically with Principal Harper shaking hands with the devil--proverbially of course. Raw was more or less predictable as usual, but with a slight twist on the end with The Rock getting beaten by Hurricane Helms, thanks to a non-physical appearance by Stone Cold. What I really want to know with the WWE is, with Kurt Angle scheduled to wrestle and drop the title this week on "Smackdown!" to Brock Lesnar due to his neck injury that'll put him out for a year like so many other wrestlers lately, what's going to be the main event at Wrestlemania with Kurt Angle on the shelf? It was being built up as Angle vs Lesnar as the big money match, and now that's out the window because of Angle's neck...............There sure is an awful lot of war talk these days, with the deadline du jour being March 17 of the show us your bombs or else ultimatum. With over a quarter of a million troops from the U.S. just waiting to pounce on the tiny country of Iraq, and Russia, France and China all glaring down at the States if they should attack, you have to be worried about what might happen if the Americans go in. My view is this: Here in Canada, we more or less get both sides of the story. I see on TPN (or CNN for most viewers) their portrayal of Hussein as a mad dictator bossing around his people and killing them if they don't do as he says. Yet on Canadian news, we see interviews with real Iraqi people saying how much they love the guy and how much they fear war is coming. This translates into propaganda on the U.S. government's part as well as "news" networks like TPN. The case is trying to be made through false pretenses for there to be war in Iraq. And war will happen, it's a matter of time. The American troops will not retreat without doing something over there. I'm just glad that Canada has taken the stance that war is incredibly unnecessary.............Anyway, enough blabbering. Till tomorrow, have a good today.
Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, March 5-9, 2003..............Geez, look what happens when things get away from you, eh? Most days that I've come to the sitebuilder here to post my journals, it wouldn't let me get in and do it for whatever reason, and some nights, Janice and me just wanted to go to bed without any stuff to deal with downstairs, so that's what brings me all the way here five days after the last entry. Let's see...last week, except for Tuesday, I wound up skipping Tae Kwon Do altogether, although Janice went most days anyway, but I don't find the really big classes do much good for me. There's no room for a taller guy to manouevre, and there's a lot of that going on in TKD class. Alexandra went to class once or twice a day most days. Around Thursday, she wound up picking up another cold from somewhere, coughing and sneezing all the time, and not getting a great sleep. Yesterday I picked up some Buckley's Jack and Jill cough syrup for her, and it's helping her get all that crap out of her throat and lungs once and for all. It's a bit heartbreaking, you know, when it's your kid that goes through that, you wish it could be you instead when you're the parent. Thursday night, anyway, we called off the Smackdown! gathering again, for the simple reason I didn't feel like watching it that night. It's gotten a little bit dull for me lately, and I was a lot more content on that night to be with my wife and daughter instead and taking it easy. We wound up watching "Survivor" after George W. (for "Windbag", in this instance) got done doing his "they better do this or else" speech about Iraq, and I was completely delighted to see the men basically wipe up the floor with the women this time around. Better still, I couldn't wait to gloat with Cindy Elward, my adversary on the Survivor: Mike vs Cindy page here on the site. It was fun, too, to watch it with Janice and hear her make the excuses for the women losing and their behaviour ("it's a known fact that women cry more than men"). Next week should be every bit as fun! Work in the last number of days was pretty par-for-the-course stuff, with no real fuss over great big deliveries or anything. Although on Wednesday, at the French hospital, there was a lot of equipment that was shipped into the building, leaving around fifty huge, thick cardboard casings to be broken down and sent out for recycling, but I wound up asking to take them myself, and got plenty of exercise from the task. These boxes weighed around thirty or so pounds each, and were very large and awkward even if they were folded up, and I needed to fold them more to make them fit in the van. It took two trips, but now I don't have to fetch cardboard for PreLam for a while. For the week, I'd gotten in 42 hours out of the six days I worked, which is pretty okay. Ash Wednesday hit this week, and we are participating in the Lent sacrifice this time, the first time since I was a kid that I can remember. Matter of fact, I don't even remember as a kid that I participated. So I wanted to make this one a doozy. I chose to give up red meat, and hamburger is a major staple here at the Cook kitchen, with our casseroles, spaghetti, meatloaf, and steaks too, taking up a lot of the space on our menu. Janice is going even farther with it. She's giving up red meat, chocolate and chips too, no easy task. I didn't want to go quite that far, knowing I'd blow it for sure sooner or later. Actually, we went out on Saturday to the mall to drop off a film at Wal Mart and get our pretzel, and to have our supper with a peeler card coupon, and we wound up going to New York Fries. We got these poutine type things, and it didn't hit us until we were halfway through our meals that there were bacon bits in our fries, and that we'd gotten Lexy a hot dog. So that's a bit of a blip on the radar, but we're going ahead with it. We did get the pictures, and the film wound up being of the pictures I took around town of the ice storm that happened last month. I'll post those pictures on an update next week. They're very freaky to look at! Oh, and we finally got the "Six Feet Under: Season One" DVD this week. Saturday night when we got home, Alexandra went to bed and we put in the discs with all the special features and goodies on them right away. At the mall, too, I got the new Entertainment Weekly with SFU as the cover story, with all kinds of writing on the show inside, so that made my night. On top of that, "24" was the cover story for this week's TV Guide, so I got that too, and found out it's renewed for next season. Oh yeah, Jennifer, Janice's sister, found out she is pregnant a little while ago, and she made the announcement to her family this past week. So everyone's excited about that. Dany, Janice's sis-in-law who lives next door, is due in the next three weeks, and Ryan, my nephew, has a kid due with his girlfriend Robin due near the same time. There's quite the population explosion going on around here. Let's see....now today, I decided with Alexandra's cold, that I'd make my very yummy (if I do say so myself) vegetable soup. Turned out very good. I make it with spring water, a whole bulb of garlic, three cans of tomato soup and one tomato with basil and oregano, potatoes, corn, carrots, and green beans. The broth always turns out great, thanks to the basil and oregano. And it's a meatless meal. In fact, the whole day was for us, maybe to make up for our screwing up Saturday with those friggin' bacon bits............I guess that's all there needs to be said about the past few days. It's back to TKD tomorrow, as I forge ahead for that elusive Yellow Belt. Janice, of course, is making outstanding progress. She's actually used as an example at Atlantic Coast for perseverance and dedication. And that's how I'm gonna leave this entry! Take care and see you around this week.
Tuesday, March 4, 2003.............Got off to a challenge right away this morning. I needed a shower desperately before I headed out into the bitter cold to work, but found out the hot water wasn't working in the shower. This was around 7:20 or so, and Janice had to be to work for eight, and I had to take Lexy with me and handle her until nine when our good pal Doriane, my friend Pete's wife, was to look after her along with her kid Spencer. Well, that was part one of the troubles....part two was, the van wouldn't start or even turn over. Janice had to call her work so someone there could come pick her up to drive her in. I called Carla, my boss, and she came and gave me a boost with her car and I was on my way. But wait.......Alexandra! I went back around the block to go home and there she was in the side entry of the house locked out wondering why her parents just deserted her! Actually that lasted all of one minute or so, so no biggie. Thank God! I'm not used to bringing her along to work with me with Janice working the mornings. Around nine, I dropped her off at Pete and Doriane's place, and man am I grateful for the help there; and I trodded around all morning wondering what the plumbing bill is going to be to fix the water in the shower. When work at the shop was done, I went home and tried to fix it myself, which I succeeded at, to my surprise, by removing the valves from the taps in the wall and getting some new ones at Kent Building Supplies and installing them myself. Easier than I thought it would be really, doesn't take a rocket scientist. While I was at it, I fixed a vent problem in Alexandra's room that was ongoing, where there was little heat getting in. I was surprised to find that I was good enough, smart enough, and doggone it, I fixed it too...........Picked up Janice and brought her to Doriane's to get Lexy, and I took off to finish the very short work day. I got home and we prepared eventually to go to TKD class, when Lexy pulled the fast one on us that her stomach didn't feel good and didn't want to participate. We were skeptical about this. Eventually we figured out that, indeed, her stomach must have been sore, because she ate a ton of chocolate in her bedroom upstairs out of our sight. A LOT of chocolate. She did participate in TKD class, but we were late joining it because of her excuses, didn't get a proper warm up and I wound up straining a knee during class. I don't think it's serious but it hurts...........We got home after that and Janice made the spaghetti dinner tonight, while I took my much needed shower. Alexandra was put to bed and we watched "24" and the season premiere of "Six Feet Under", finally, after waiting for what seemed like years. "24" was absolutely outstanding. It was a pivotal episode, in which the nuclear bomb that's the center of the series, actually went off after being flown out into the desert after being discovered. Now there's the prospect of retaliation, and in the story, three middle east countries are implicated in the making of the bomb and its target (being Los Angeles), but how authentic the information is that these three countries were in on this is in question; more likely a means to start World War III. It's going to get tense! "Six Feet Under", on the other hand, was confusing and maybe even a bit of a disappointment. We're going to watch it again, though, probably a few times, but there were so many curve balls thrown in this episode that it left us cross-eyed. Did Nate die after the operation on his brain, which began at the end of last season? At first it appeared he did. He was the opening death in this episode (every episode of SFU begins with a death), but then he wasn't, then a whole bunch of things happened to make you wonder what you were watching was real or not. I think this episode will be appreciated more once subsequent episodes are aired, but right now, Janice and me are scratching our heads............That's it for this Tuesday, March 4th, my dearly departed mother's birthday. Happy Birthday Mom---I miss you.
Monday, March 3, 2003.............Holy---let me tell you, I got up this morning, and it seemed quite nice out. The temperatures were a little above the freezing mark, quite acceptable compared to what we've gotten recently, and I headed out to work while Janice stayed at home with Lexy, who's on March Break now. Midway through the morning, the wind picked up, and the cold descended on us in a BIG way, with the temperatures dropping with the wind chill by about thirty degrees. Celcius. That's just nuts. We had pretty intense rain last night, and now it all flash-froze, pretty much, leaving ice everywhere in town. By Janice's work, which is right off Main Street, a massive water main broke making a huge mess all over the bottom of Main, slowing things down considerably at Janice's work. On my end for work, it was pretty smooth, except I got home at noon hour to maybe get a nap in after a pretty mediocre sleep (which has been the norm for the last two weeks). The pager went off, it was the sub shop, and Via Rail wanted twelve freakin' sandwiches. So I go back out and bring them. By the time I get back, there's only enough time to eat something and then leave again. I brought Janice to work for three o'clock, got Alexandra to her afternoon TKD class, and came home after I was done work and took a break. Pager went off again. Via Rail wanted stuff, again. I cursed and left the house and played slave to the train station for the second time today, picked up Alexandra from TKD, went home and began preparing meatloaf, and in the middle of it the pager went off. I was ready to find a bazooka somewhere so I could fire the damn thing at a brick wall at close range. Anyway, it was Janice, as she had gotten off early because of the problems with the water main breakage blocking traffic. I'd made Lexy some scrambled eggs to tide her over, and then when I got home I finished the meatloaf, made mashed potatoes and carrots and turnips and we ate like royalty. Let me tell you, folks, this meatloaf recipe that I use is like no other that you've ever tried. It's fabulous; and Janice never liked meatloaf before in her life, and she always eats seconds. Soooo, Alexandra went to bed around ten, we set the VCR to record the next two successive episodes of season 2 of "Six Feet Under", and went to the bedroom to watch WWE's "Raw". And that's that..........See you again soon, whenever you can get back here.
Sunday, March 2, 2003...........Finally the "Survivor" page here at my site is done, up and running, with both mine and Cindy Elward's take on the battle of the sexes. Go check it out, it should be quite a ride............This morning when I went to work, I faxed a limerick poem to the Times Transcript newspaper here in Moncton for a contest. The object is just to send in your very own limerick, commemorating St. Patrick's Day coming up. I guess there's prizes, but I just wanted to see if I could win it. Mine goes like this:
There once was a fellow named Blair
Who had spikey and prickly gelled hair
One day at a party
Where laughter was hearty
He became a balloon's worst nightmare
Think it'll get attention? I thought it was funny.........In the afternoon, Janice went to the baby shower for my nephew Ryan's girlfriend, Robin. Went over pretty good I guess. When I picked up Janice, who brought Lexy with her, I saw Sara and a few of Robin's young friends outside the building where the festivities took place. Janice said my sister Cindy was there, along with Dot and a lot of others...........What I did while that went on was shovel off all the ice and snow from the patio deck in the back of the house. What a friggin' job that was. There was around six inches of heavy snow on top of four inches of ice, which was on top of another couple of inches of more heavy snow. By the time I was done I was dragging my arse behind me. I went into the house and proceeded the nagging task of getting that "Survivor" page up on the site here, which I had to fight with the sitebuilder to get it happening. Janice and Lex came home, anyway, and I headed out to get some chicken pot pies for supper, which gave both Janice and me a wicked case of the farts all night. Not even close to my mom's chili recipe, but not pleasant either. We put Alexandra to bed and watched, yup, another two episodes of "SFU", with now only three more episodes to go to get the whole season 2, then season 3 starts. And that brings me to now. Outside at the moment, it's raining, and supposed to be raining all night, before the temperatures dip back way down tomorrow night and freezes everything............The week is about to start, we'll see where it takes us. Have a good one, and stay tuned for an update notice real soon.
Saturday, March 1, 2003...........My day off! Not that it means I get to sleep in. I had to get up early to drive Janice to work for her morning/afternoon shift and bring Lexy to sparring class at TKD, so after a so-so sleep, I was rather groggy today.........After I'd picked up Janice, we came home and decided that steak was in order for supper today, so I went out to Len's Meat Market and got a couple of top sirloins. When it came time to BBQ them, about halfway through baking the potatoes the propane ran out, so I wound up having to cook the steaks on the indoor grill. It actually turned out quite well, but we were looking forward to the BBQ..........We headed out to the mall tonight with the full intentions of getting a pretzel, but with our bellies loaded with the supper we just ate, we opted instead to walk it off at the mall. At Laura Secord, there were chocolates marked down 75%, and I have a super-sense for spotting that from a great distance. So we got two boxes of their minatures, one of which we wiped out tonight! Good stuff. We got Lexy an ice cream from Dairy Queen..........I met a girl tonight that Janice trained at Superstore. She's pretty tall, and I could've sworn Janice was trying to set up a wrestling match between us. Frig, let me get to know them first so I know I can kick their asses! Ah well, all in good fun.........We came home and settled in for a two hour "Six Feet Under" showing, episodes 7 and 8 of season 2, of which there are 13. We always remark at how great the makers of this program are at making you feel for the characters. Can't wait for Tuesday..........So a challenge has been issued to my friend Cindy for the "Survivor" bet we may have going, and I'm waiting for the response. This could be tense, folks, because the girls have us guys on the ropes BIG time so far. And Cindy isn't one to let up, so this one could get brutal!..........Tomorrow Janice goes to the baby shower for my nephew Ryan's girlfriend Robin. Hard to believe my brother Rick is going to be the first grampa of his generation. I really, really do hope everything goes well with Ryan and Robin. It's going to be a real challenge for them at these early stages of their lives............Alright, I'm done for today. I do hope everything is going okay on your end. And come back soon, okay? Promise?
Friday, February 28, 2003.............Another month comes to an end, folks, and it's one month closer to summer! You've gotta have some kind of positive outlook like that with the way this winter has been going. The freezing bitter cold temperatures, the heavier-than-normal snowfall and overall just a bad case of the winter blahs has everybody looking for some kind of escape from it all. Right now I'm hearing that next week will bring more bitter temperatures and perhaps two more snowstorms, one of them with freezing rain.............I worked through my lunch again today and got stuff done so I could be home relatively early, which I like on Fridays, because as soon as the workday is over my 'weekend' starts. That is, I only get Saturdays completely off, so it's nice to get that reprieve. Janice had to work the evening shift tonight until 10:30, so after supper, the mighty munchkin (Lexy) and I brought her to work and came home and watched TV, and pretty much took it easy. In fact, I dozed off for around half an hour, I was so zonked. I managed to get in 44 hours this week at work, so now it's time to recharge..............I got another e-mail from HBO about "Six Feet Under" season 3 starting up. We can't wait for this! The season begins Tuesday night at 10, the same time as "24", so one of those will have to be taped, likely "Six" because we want the episodes on tape anyway. The two best shows on TV on at the same damn time! Well at least we get to see them both. In the States, if there's still any of my netpals who come here and read this, "SFU" will be on HBO on Sunday nights if you want to check it out. In Canada it's on the Movie Network on Tuesdays.................Not much else to say really, so I'll get outta here. Take care of yourselves, and each other, and have a great weekend.
Thursday, February 27, 2003...........Ugh! Just got done watching "Survivor: Amazon", where the men again looked like buffoons and the women soundly disgraced their macho abilities, or lack of them. The guys lost both challenges this week, four out of five altogether, and that just doesn't look good for the male species, folks. I'd like to say I could do better, but I'm really just a weenie in the city, and no nature boy at all, but I do know that I wouldn't be spending SO much time with a stupid Magic 8 Ball and asking it if I'm gonna score with the chicks tonight. And maybe it's just me, but I'm not finding a lot of the girls all that attractive. The skin 'n' bones look just doesn't do anything for me, though I know it does for a lot of guys, and boobs---not the guys, but the spheric appendages hanging off the women's chests---never did anything for me. I'm strictly a legs and personality guy. So this bunch of girls, at this moment, don't really do it for me, but are they kicking the guy's asses or what?! Now I feel like I'm walking in a jungle myself, waiting for some net to go up with me in it and my galpal Cindy laughing at her catch this week. Cripes, turn it around next week, guys!!...........Anyway, after work we pretty much just hung out around the house and waited to go to TKD, where we had a somewhat more energetic class. All kinds of kicks and stuff practiced tonight.........Once we got home I made supper, we listened to Alexandra put on her MuchMoreMusic Top 10 at Ten performances (which we've got to get on tape) and then tucked her in, and we headed north to watch "Survivor" while taping "Smackdown". In other words there was no crowd here tonight, for the simple reason we needed downtime and quiet to Lexy could be assured of uninterrupted sleep. However, when we did go upstairs, Lexy wasn't in her bed. She wasn't in our bed, either. Not in the closets, the bathroom, under the beds, behind the furniture, or anywhere. Janice started to panic, we both screamed her name out which elicited no response, and finally we found her underneath a pile of blankets on the bed. It infuriated both of us when she didn't respond when we called out to her, because she was awake and heard us. So a talk, a stern one, is definitely in order..........We headed downstairs one more time to do a couple of things before retiring, and one of the things is me checking my e-mail, where I found that Michelle did NOT beat my Bin Laden Bowling score (yesssss!), and my friend Karleen sent me a link for an IQ test, where I posted an "above average" score of 106. Not bad for a dumb guy eh? Seriously, I think I landed just a little above the middle. I'm not a smart guy by any means. Go try it and tell me how YOU did at this link http://www.thespark.com/iq2 . By the way, take your time doing it and think it through................That's about it for today. The Survivor: Mike vs Cindy page is just about ready, so watch out for our little 'fights' online! See you again soon.
Wednesday, February 26, 2003................I think just about all of us around here have had about enough of this friggin' crap weather. No, there's no snow or ice pellets or anything, but it is SO COLD here lately that there isn't a brass monkey around that still has his testicles. Summer will not come soon enough..............On the work side for today, everything was handled easily. It's been a very busy week again, but working through most or all of my lunchbreaks minimizes the racing around that I have to do in the afternoons..............It was Janice's day off today, so when it was time to pick Lexy up at school, I drove Janice there and waited for them both so that they'd come with me, and then I dropped them off at Atlantic Coast TKD, where Lexy was due for her kid's class. Janice stayed and watched. Alexandra has her good days and her bad days, with the good outnumbering the bad, but today I guess wasn't a great one. Whatever..............When I was done work, I came home and we pretty much got ready to go back to TKD for the evening class, all three of us. It's been a fairly slack week at Atlantic Coast, with Master Lessard verbally going over the particulars of technique, which is of utmost importance in this sport. I know when some people watch class, they think it looks easy, but this isn't called 'martial arts' for nothing. There really is an art to it..............After we watched "Enterprise" tonight, and after I kicked Michelle's butt in Bin Laden Bowling on the PC, we decided it was time to head north (go upstairs to bed) and call it a night. Now, Janice will probably tell you she kicked my ass wrestling on the livingroom floor here again, but I'm here to tell you that did NOT happen this time! So if you should talk to her, beware of the sudden waft of hot air................That's all to say about today. Take care and see you again.
Tuesday, February 25, 2003.............Just got done watching "24" tonight. Cripes, there is no show on TV that provides a consistent edge the way that one does. Never a dull moment!.............Speaking of shows, this week we're gonna get our "Six Feet Under" Season 1 DVD set, and we're pretty anxious. We've seen all the episodes at least four or five times each, and can't wait to watch them again on DVD! Yes, it's that good..............It was busy as old hell again at work today. Pretty much the same as yesterday, but PreLam had a few extra things on top of what I had to do with them Monday. I'll say this, I HATE coffee. Holy frig do I hate it. I hate the smell of it, the look of it, I hate the way people are addicted to it and won't admit it (though it's not like smokes, to be fair), and most of all, numero uno, I HATE delivering it. Today I had to deliver more friggin' coffee to the Dept. of Justice again, twice. Spilling in the van, spilling on me, being a big pain in the ass to transport, and to rub salt in the wound, when I go retrieve the coffee machine, I find out that only maybe five cups had been taken! So I have to lug a full coffee machine around again until I return to the shop. I know, bitch whine moan, that's all I do eh? I think it's the weather. Everybody's cranky............So I was able to pick up Lex at school today and bring her to TKD. After work was over, we went and got Janice, came home, got suited up for TKD and went. Yes, I went. Number one, I paid for a month of membership, so until March 9 I can go. Number two, last Wednesday was a horrible TKD class for me. It seemed like the whole tide came against me and I felt it for days, not to mention last week was bad for me all around, I think. So I'm giving it another crack. At TKD we saw our friend Tina, who is Master Chris Lessard's girlfriend, and she tested for and got her Blue Stripe belt, one step up from Green belt. If you want to visualize what Tina looks like (and she is the sweetest person you'd ever meet, I gotta say), and this isn't just a plug, check out "Six Feet Under" and seek out a character named 'Lisa', the ladyfriend of Nate's that he got pregnant and had a baby with this past season. Tina is a dead ringer, totally, for Lisa.............We got back home after class and I cooked the classic spaghetti and garlic bread meal, and Alexandra entertained us afterward (though she doesn't really know) when we tuned in to MuchMoreMusic's Top Ten, and she watched and sung along with almost all the songs on it, because she loves a lot of them. Songs from the likes of the Dixie Chicks (or as I call them, the Dumpy Chucks, with Stumpy, Prego and Beanpole. Sorry...don't do cowshit music!), Sheryl Crow and Kid Rock, Celine Dion, and her very favorite singer these days, Shania Twain. She sings right along to it and it's a treat for her parents to hear. She carries a real good tune!..........After I tucked her into bed, Janice took in "American Idol" and I tackled the computer, where a friend of mine, Michelle (she's the one holding me down with her legs on the YQM CD cover, if you've seen it), issued me a challenge a couple of days ago to Bin Laden Bowling, and computer game, where she's been kicking my ass from here to Afghanistan since it started. But, ah, the tide is turning, and now after tonight I've been kicking hers. I will NOT be beaten by a woman anymore! Can you believe the thought actually crossed her mind she could physically outdo me even? I don't think so!..............So that's the kind of day it's been here on Belmont Street. Tune in again and find out the happenings at our humble home, and don't be shy, come often!
Monday, February 24, 2003.............Well, the week's off to a busy start. I went into the sub shop today to find a whole bunch of catering orders to do, like six or seven---on top of my regular stuff---plus there was something like seven or eight laminating deliveries to do for PreLam in the afternoon, with a couple of the catering orders actually in the afternoon. Plus the catering truck orders and the hospital order to take care of on top of that. Compounding things is the wickedly cold and windy weather that's revisited us, putting the temperatures with the wind chill at around minus 30 celcius. Makes for an interesting day of driving, I say. With the cargo van that I drive, which really never carries much weight, I can get stuck on a level surface on a patch of ice, and going uphill can be real trouble if I have to actually stop on an upgrade, which I had to do this morning. It can be a real challenge driving a Chevy Astro cargo van in the winter in the Maritimes.........Janice had to work the evening shift, so what we decided on is getting some cold cuts from BJ's for supper, and I drove her to work and picked her up around 8:30. Talked to my long lost (and missed) friend Dale briefly on messenger, who's doing very well apparently over in Cape Breton, where winter doesn't exactly bring blessings to the communities there. We tucked in Alexandra, who went to TKD today after school, and Janice and me took to the kitchen where I made multigrain scones, from a recipe from Dr. Weil's website. Excellent recipe. And this is stuff that can do no wrong for your body either: oatmeal, wheat bran, millet, cinnamon, a few other things, with a lemony glazed topping. Great for breakfast, and a worthy replacement of the chocolate and crap that I normally eat first thing in the day. So we hit the sack pretty much after that, watching WWE "Raw" in the bedroom. That's basically it............Until I see ya next time, take care and come back real soon!
Sunday, February 23, 2003...............Just got through watching WWE's "No Way Out" pay per view, which was okay. Watched the Rock and Vince McMahon "screw" Hogan out of a win with the help of a Quebec referee (it was in Montreal) and Stone Cold Steve Austin return to beat the living hell out of Eric Bischoff. Other than that a pretty normal ppv. Steven, Sara and Greg accompanied Janice and me as we watched it...........I worked my usual three hours this morning, and Janice worked her usual Sunday afternoon shift at Superstore, and when I picked her up we came back and I made a couple of pizzas, one with everything (mushrooms, onions, green & red peppers, hamburg, pepperoni, and bacon) and the other a veggie. Now Janice and I have the farts for the next day or so, courtesy of all the peppers. Lexy too. She can make her browning presentations in class tomorrow.........Wow, looking back, it was a really uneventful weekend. I'm thinking about what's happened today, and I know not much could be written about yesterday either. But it was a relaxing time too, something I needed I think. It was a mild day today, yesterday too, and everything is melting. Actually yesterday there was a bit of snow and then rain, now today everything that did fall is melting. Cripes, you KNOW there's nothing to talk about when you start gabbing about the weather.............That'll usher me out of here. Hope to see you here through the week! You know you're always welcome here. Buuuhhhh bye.
Saturday, February 22, 2003...........This is the time for R & R, and boy did I need it this week. It's been a relatively rough week as has been documented on this page, so I relaxed a lot and was quite unproductive around the house. This morning, Janice and Lexy went to sparring class at Atlantic Coast Tae Kwon Do while I slept in a bit. When they got back, Alexandra got an invitation to go to her friend Meagan's house to get together and have fun, so we brought her there, and then Janice and me went to the new Moncton Airport, which she had not seen yet. We went at a rather inactive time though, with no planes landing or taking off while we hung around there. But Janice was highly impressed with the high-tech facilities nonetheless. We left and went to the liquor store in Dieppe and picked up a bottle of Bailey's Irish Cream, and Janice got some blueberry bagels at the Great Canadian Bagel Store, then we picked up our kid and brought Janice to work for the evening. Alexandra and me had chicken soup from a can that didn't really agree with us, so we just laid around lazy all night, and then we went to pick up Janice while I got a bunch of ingredients for multigrain scones for a recipe I found on Dr. Weil's website. God knows we need more fibre in our diets around here. And so, that brings me to now, where I'm typing this just after midnight, and Janice and me are watching this sex show thing, an education on men and women's bodies and how they work. Seeing as we don't know. KIDDING. With that, I'm gone---see you again soon, update day is tomorrow.
Friday, February 21, 2003..............I'm glad to say that today was a heck of a lot easier to deal with than the last few days were. It was a far easier day at work, with only a couple of catering deliveries, and only a couple of PreLam deliveries too. I was done relatively early today.............Brought Alexandra to TKD class at 2:30, and then when I picked up Janice both her and Alexandra went to the evening class, something they weren't going to do because I said I wasn't going to go. I insisted that they do, while I prepare a broccoli casserole for supper to be had when they got back. So they went, and we did eat when they returned. I don't know what to think about TKD right now. Part of me is saying "go back", and of course the better part of me is saying not to. I'd have to say I'm not entirely thrilled with the evening class right now, how it goes, and the size of it. Of course, this past week or two the classes were much bigger because so many people were preparing for testing, so I guess that's the reasoning for that. I'll say one thing for sure, that's that Janice is getting to be one bad-ass through all the training. She kicks my ass big time everytime we wrestle now! So maybe I should go back just to keep up? Last night she literally wore me down to zero resistance while she was just getting started. Kind of embarrassing really, y'know...............We didn't do a whole lot tonight, but I'll tell you, what's become somewhat of a ritual on Friday nights is watching that Funniest Home Videos show with my wife and daughter. Without Janice, though, there's no point in watching it because it's just not even close to being as funny. She laughs so hard that you can't help but laugh just as hard yourself. Her face turns red, she starts crying from laughing hysterically and she cackles enough to put an entire coven of witches to shame. If you're in Moncton or around, do yourself a favor and come over some Friday night and witness this!................Not much else to talk about for today, so I'm outta here. Take care of yourself and have a good weekend.
Thursday, February 20, 2003..............Just got done watching "Survivor: Amazon" on tape, Janice and I did, with the guys winning the immunity challenge this week. For those of you out of the loop, it's a guys vs girls format this time around, and the girls won the immunity challenge last week in a pretty dramatic episode. This week, though, just blew chunks. Yeah, yippee, the guys won the immunity challenge, but how? Both teams had to memorize what was in these makeshift rooms and answer the most questions correctly. What a bore. The reward challenge was equally a yawner, with the girls winning this puzzle thing that each team had to assemble. I felt no excitement like last week's episode, and I'm afraid this week it gets a big thumbs down..........It was an absolutely freaky day for work. I got to work to find a list just as long as yesterday's in catering deliveries, and to compound things there was an equally long list over at PreLam to be delivered. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: with the generation of seniors that are currently on the road, there needs to be some kind of re-testing after a certain age. Many of them don't even break the law, but driving 35 km/h on a road that is minimum 50 is enough to make you pull your hair out. And I run into that on a constant basis, along with the no signal lights, no looking where they're turning, refusal to watch when traffic lights change color, etc. I guess though the awareness of all this was heightened by me today due to the stress of my extremely tight schedule...........I got home around 5:40, working through lunch hour and since 8 in the morning, and testing for Lexy and Janice was to begin around 6, so we were cutting it close. We did get there in lots of time though. A fair number of people tested, all of them passing, including my wife and little girl. I have to point out that Janice kicked some serious ass in her sparring test, being paired up with a higher belt student than her and more or less kicking circles around her. Alexandra, on the other hand, was timid in her sparring test which will be rectified before next testing by bringing her to more Saturday morning sparring classes. Other than that, though, Master Lessard said to her that he doesn't know what got into her in the last couple of months, but it seems like she's "been on a mission" and she should keep up that pace. What I did with Alexandra some time ago, was to try to be machine-like in precision and execution (not in those words, of course!), and I had her watch the movie "Rocky" for inspiration. It seemed to have worked. Janice's mother and sis-in-law Dany were there to witness the testing as well. I brought Lex and Jan to Dairy Queen when it was all over for supper to celebrate their successes..............It was "Smackdown" night tonight, and Greg and Steve with Sara showed up for the occasion. I've nicknamed Sara "Chuckles" because she's so very easy to get to laugh, and like Steven, is a complete pleasure to be around. Steven gave me an Ozzy CD, "The Essential Ozzy Osbourne", that he was given to review for his column he has for the Times Transcript through his high school. On February 24, the Stevester will be 19 at last. Send him some good cheer at steven_aie@hotmail.com .............The end of the workweek is nigh, and not a moment too soon. It's been a tough one. See you again soon.
Wednesday, February 19, 2003.............Let's see, what do I say about today..............I went to work this morning, and saw on the eraser board where my list of deliveries is a whole pile of catering orders. Around eight of them. I knew I was in for an interesting day. It wasn't all that difficult though. I worked through my lunch hour and had a fairly slack afternoon. When I went to PreLam, Shelly was feeling very upset about something, so when I went out and got the pickups and brought them back, I brought a bag of Dairy Milk chocolate hearts and a can of Diet Pepsi, an extremely appreciated treat. "You have no idea how good your timing is for this!" Oh yes I did...........Tae Kwon Do class tonight was to prepare those who are testing tomorrow. Janice is ready, and Alexandra is ready. I am not. I've had injuries. When's my next one going to be? Since August of last year, I've earned two belts. Now people who have joined a couple of months ago are moving ahead of me. In my eyes this is something I'm not meant for. I tried and failed at it and am quitting. I was so disgusted and mad at myself today, watching so many people moving up ahead of me, I felt like I needed a dunce hat to be participating in class. No more of this. Janice and Lexy are doing great, and will continue to do great. My towel is now thrown in.........When we got home from class, I went to shower right away and tossed my belt and uniform in a corner somewhere, with no intentions of putting it on again. Cooked supper, we ate and put Lexy to bed, watched "Enterprise" and now the night is pretty much over. This has been a lousy day, folks, I won't sugar coat it, but I do look forward to tomorrow, because it'll be better. Hey, everyone has a bad day sometimes............Take care and see you soon.
Tuesday, February 18, 2003...............Just watched a bitchin' trailer for "X Men 2" coming out at the beginning of May. If you want to see for yourself, go to http://www.apple.com/trailers/fox/x2/02/ ...hopefully that link works, or cut and paste it. I'm on cable and watched the medium trailer, but for any of you dial-up users you'd be best off using the small one. It's worth the trip!.............I finally was able to get into my site today, at least to paste my last three days worth of journals, but now I'm back to square one and typing this in my Hotmail draft folder again. I can bitch all I want, but fact of the matter is, it's a free site, and beggars can't be choosers in the end, right? But they can be bitchy...........Got to know the new chicks at BJ's a little bit today. As Cindy, a former BJ's co-worker pointed out to me recently, the only two left now of the old BJ's brat pack (I mean that in a good and playful way) are Lucy and Elise. So many staff has disappeared over the last couple of years. I got to know Priscilla a little bit more today too, after talking to her a little bit at Lyon's store on Lutes' Mountain just outside Moncton city limits. She's certainly a sweetheart, and has a big load to carry with raising four kids on her own............After Janice worked her day shift, I picked her up and we went to the evening TKD class tonight. What a kicker that was. Pretty intense aerobic exercises being done, as well as evaluations to see who is ready for testing this week. I opted out of testing for not being quite comfortable enough with my Tae Geuk training just yet; though I have the form memorized, it needs tweaking, and another month will do me some good. But Janice and Lexy will be testing, and I have no doubt they'll get their belts, Janice her Green Stripe, and Lexy her Green Belt. I'll be bringing a video camera to tape their testings................After I made supper tonight, I got back here on the computer and attempted to fix up my site and got stonewalled once again, and that basically brings me to now. And "24" is on in two minutes, soI'mgonnagetouttaherebeforeImissit!!! Seeyoulaterandtakecare!!
Monday, February 17, 2003..............Well, this is getting to be a pain in the ass. I haven't been on my site since Saturday afternoon, because I can't get on it, so this is the third straight entry I'm typing into my Hotmail draft folder, with the hopes that one day I can get back into my site and do stuff. As you read this, of course, that's been done, but not without a big fight. Geeeeez..............Work presented a bit of a challenge in that there was a huge 23 tray order going out to some company in the CN Building on Main Street here in Moncton. It took quite a bit of elbow grease getting the thing to its destination.............So Lexy went to school today, despite a low-grade fever. We gave her Tylenol and sent her off, and she did fine. She even went to tae kwon do, where she earned her testing sheet for her Green Belt. Not only that, but Janice stayed and watched, and Master Lessard, the head instructor of the school, used Lexy as an example of how they all should strive to be! I tell you, that made her parents proud as a flock of peacocks. See, Alexandra is learning Tae Geuk, with is a form to take in Tae Kwon Do which kids do not learn until they're older, because it's somewhat difficult. Well, Lexy's on Tae Geuk #3 now, and Lessard used her as more or less a template as to what the other kids should be like. How awesome is that?? I told her how extremely proud I was of her, as did Janice, but we tell her that every single day...............After I was done work, I brought Lex and Janice home and then headed out to gas up, because the van was low (that thing burns over 100 litres a WEEK). On my way home, at a busy intersection on the road, a fight broke out between two guys from their cars over some silly road rage thing, and they were going at it right there in the middle of the road. Probably half a dozen guys opened their car doors and looked to go break it up, but I got out and went right up and stepped between the two guys immediately. "C'mon guys, it's not worth it. C'mon, just get back in your cars and go home. Okay? Take a deep breath and let's just get past this, it's really not worth it." You know what? They listened! They got back in their cars, gritting their teeth and everything, but they did stop and got in their cars and carried on. And let me tell you, I have a handle on some tae kwon do, and it gave me the confidence to step up when I had to, because I really felt I could take care of myself if I had to. A year ago, I doubt I would've done that.............Nighttime comes around and I cooked grilled chicken breast and baked potatoes with corn for supper, and Janice left for the evening shift while I read Alexandra some of her children's Bible, gave her medication for her fever before going to sleep and tucked her in. That leaves me to where I am now, typing this, attempting for the umpteenth time to get into my sitebuilder to get stuff done, but you know. What can I do?............That's it for now, so I'll see ya hopefully sooner than later. Take care and have a good week.
Sunday, February 16, 2003..............Trellix still won't let me into my site to update or post my journals, so this entry may show up late as well. But, gotta get it down before memories slip away. SO----I woke up a wee bit late this morning, but still managed to get to work and finish up within two hours. Brought Janice to work, came home with Lexy and she watched shows or played or whatever while I wrestled with the computer to try to get on my website, and reading stuff and whatever. Kind of a dull afternoon. I did manage to talk to the lovely and talented Sara, however, on messenger...........The day's eating habits for me were certainly weird. Breakfast was a Diet Pepsi, lunch was cream peas on toast (that's cream of chicken soup with milk, heated up with peas), smoked oysters with Alexandra before supper, then a few strips of bacon and a toasted peanut butter and banana sandwich. Hey, I got lots of fibre though, didn't I? The bacon came from the unorthodox supper for Janice and Lexy in the form of bacon and eggs. At least it wasn't cream peas on toast. After supper we discovered Alexandra, yet again, has a fever. We're at a loss as to why she's getting sick so often. She eats very well, gets lots of exercise, is very clean and has every reason to be one of the healthiest kids around, but she gets every virus going. Hopefully she's going to be better when she wakes up............Now Janice and me are in the livingroom, with Janice gloating about her wrestling victory over me last night. She's threatening to tell all the womens at tae kwon do. Great. Just friggin' great, man! Now what?? Oh, and my wonderful and thoughtful friend Cindy sent me an e-mail saying she's keeping track of me through these journals. And she knows now she has to taunt me in any way possible about the women's Survivor: Amazon victories when they happen. LOOK, Cindy, there was ONE victory, and that's where they stop, K?! I offered her a friendly wager too, as to whether a guy or girl was going to be the last one left in the end. No response. See, she does actually realize the guys are going to win.................So hey, that's it for tonight; the next two episodes of "Six Feet Under" season 2 are on in five minutes, so I gotta go and tape them. Is Nate going to make it at the start of season 3? I think so...............Anyway, I'm outta here. See yaaaaaaa!
Saturday, February 15, 2003.............Got to sleep in until 10:30 this morning, and I'm pretty thankful for that. The Alexandra Express was a bit more quiet this time around while Janice went to work. I did the same that I've done the past couple of Saturdays now and vacuumed the house and did the immense pile of dishes that accumulated in the sink, and then picked up the wife. Then we came home, Janice unwound a little bit and the three of us upped and went to have supper at Boston Pizza, courtesy of the gift certificate I got for Christmas from PreLam bosses Don and Luc. We got this 13" deluxe pizza and stuffed potato skins with beverages, and it was pretty good. The restaurant is very cozy, with a very warm atmosphere. I really appreciated that there wasn't any annoying loud music pounding while we were talking; there are places for that, and I don't think they're necessarily eating establishments. So Janice and me snuck in some Valentine's Day candy into the restaurant without Alexandra knowing, and Janice gave the candy to the waiter who was serving us, and told him to bring it to the table saying that Cupid brought it to the restaurant and left it for her. She got some excited over that! Now she's got enough Valentine's Day candy to do her at least until Easter when she loads up again. After we got done dinner at the restaurant, we headed right to Champlain Place to walk it off, cruising the stores, checking things out. Janice wanted to see the DVD package for "Six Feet Under" season one that I'd put on layaway. We didn't bother with the pretzel this time, because coming from the restaurant, we were pretty full and not up to it. I checked the book store for Michael Moore's book, read the preface to it, then we left to come home for the evening. Janice and me finally watched "Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring", which I've had on tape now for a month and a half. I knew it was quite an investment in time to watch it, around three hours, but we had the time to do it and we did. Janice moderately liked it, and I thought it was pretty good. I'll have to discuss it and the second movie when I see it in a future posting in the Heads Up! section here. After we got done watching that, we watched another episode of "Six Feet Under" from season 2, which I'm trying to get chronologically on tape for now at least, and after Janice kind of outwrestled me in a little match we had (yes, dammit, I lost), we headed upstairs for bed, tucked in the kid, and passed out for the night. So yes, I am writing this after Saturday is actually over, because Trellix once again wouldn't let me into the site. And again, I'm typing this in a draft in Hotmail, so this will show up late. BUT, whatcanyado, eh?..............That's it, that's all---and I'm outta here! Take care and see you again really soon, hopefully. You're welcome back, you know.
Friday, February 14, 2003...........Happy Valentine's Day! Hey, I hope you did the right thing and saluted your sweetheart in the most effective way possible. I kind of got ahead of the game, as you can read in yesterday's entry, so I'm covered. Although now tomorrow, Saturday afternoon, the three of us are supposed to head out to Boston Pizza for a belated Valentine's Day dinner. We try to avoid the onslaught of traffic and fuss that you get on the actual V Day. It was kind of Alexandra's turn today, as she got tons of Valentines from school and lots from TKD class. She also got a small box of chocolates and some candies from 'Cupid', but tomorrow is when she'll really cash in. Every year at the restaurant, you see, 'Cupid' flies in when she isn't looking and leaves a gift for her. She's looking forward to tomorrow now..............My health is better, but has its ups and downs. This week has been weird for me. My appetite comes and goes, and everything I eat is basically a spin-the-wheel gamble on whether or not it'll agree with me...........The weather today is seemingly its coldest yet. The wind is stronger today than it's been since this cold snap started, and that just sends icicles right through you. When I got done my rather busy delivering schedule today, I had to bring the van in for an oil change at the garage up the street, only a ten minute walk. But any walk out in a climate that's -45 celcius with the wind chill is too long. Well, I did survive, and Janice is working as I type this as I wait for her to be done. Apparently there's not going to be a 'Nor-easter', as they call it, or a big snowstorm, because it's going to pass south of the Maritimes. But, that still leaves us with this bitter cold. So it's gonna be a stay-indoors weekend. Not that I mind that. I have to update the site here, so now's my chance............I was actually kind of puzzled as to why school wasn't cancelled today, as were a lot of parents I'd heard from. The roads are extremely icy, putting school buses as risk, and the temps are too cold for salt to melt the ice. Apparently, not all kids showed up at school with parents keeping them home..............I guess I'll leave it at that for today. Didn't watch any TV at all tonight, where I just laid on the couch and read, trying to get this weird feeling in my gut to pass. Alexandra's having to be patient with me, where I'm not all that active at all this past week. As it is, I'm out of here, and take care of yourself and stay out of the hot sun if you're in the Maritimes, eh?
Thursday, February 13, 2003.............The bone chilling temperatures are certainly not quitting here in the Maritimes. Wind chill values of anywhere between minus 30 to minus 45 are being felt with the high winds blowing the cold air through everyone's bodies, making us all feel like we're real close family to Jack Frost himself. This is just nuts. It's been one hell of a winter this year, perhaps the worst winter weather we've seen since the early '80's; although we did have that five feet of snow that came down in two days in the early '90's. Still, the crazy weather has stretched out all over the season this time around, and there's a lot more colds, flu and viruses going around this year than there has been in recent memory.............That being said, it's rather tricky driving a cargo van around all day, because with the light cargo that I carry, it makes for a vehicle with no weight, more or less. I wind up getting stuck even on level surfaces if there's an icy spot underneath the propelling wheel. It didn't help matters today that there was a ton of deliveries to do. One of them being to my old stomping grounds, Harrison Trimble High School. Funny, I walk in there, and I don't get that weird feeling that I expect to get. I spent the final years of my childhood there before becoming a young man, and I remember that I really did not enjoy those years. I felt like an outcast. I didn't wear the sweaters or the Brylcream haircuts and go with all the trends that there were, and if you didn't, you more or less were left to feel like you didn't belong, except there were a lot of us like that. Anyway...after I got done that, I went to MacArthur's Flower Shop to get roses for Janice for V-day. What I decided on doing was getting them alright, but have them delivered to her at Superstore while she was working today, rather than tomorrow, so I can have the element of surprise heightened. Plus, she'd be the only one there, most likely, with flowers. Turns out, she got the roses all right, 11 red ones with a yellow one in the middle (to represent Alexandra), and she was brought to tears with delight about it. Everyone in the store saw what she got, and the desired effect came to be. When we got home after I picked her up, she decided to give her Valentine's present to me too. It was a card, with a heart shaped box of Hershey kisses and Hershey miniatures from Alexandra, and a little monkey teddy bear who, when her belly is squeezed, whistles at you and says "I love you! I love you!" A very sweet and charming thing it is. Now it'll be Alexandra's turn tomorrow..............I wasn't feeling the very best today, or the last couple of days really, so we decided to head to bed around nine o'clock to watch "Survivor: Amazon" while "Smackdown!" taped downstairs. "Survivor" this time around is a battle of the sexes, with the male tribe against the female tribe. I really didn't have any doubts that the women were going to get their asses soundly kicked. When the show started off, it seemed I was right. The women couldn't get it together to have a shelter or even fire for themselves, and the guys had both of those things. The girls seemed like they were bumbling. Then came the immunity challenge, which basically was an obstacle course with a puzzle or two, and the men were running away with it. Until two of the more macho guys on the team seemed to not be able to resist humping their way across a balance-beam type of obstacle. They certainly showed themselves as the primates they really are, I tell you. It was sad to watch. See, you have to understand, I was watching this with Janice, and we were both staunchly defending our gender's representations, and then when the women caught the guys and passed them and beat them, soundly and effectively, Janice would NOT let up! I was left red-faced and, um, pretty silent for a bit. Then Jeff Probst interviewed the guys at Tribal Council, and the Testosterone-o-meter went off the scale. A couple of the idiot guys on the squad were actually talking about how hot the girls are on the opposing team. Well guys, Macho Brothers, all those looks, and brains and muscle too, apparently! The most macho of all the guys was the one booted off. Good riddance. Thank the Lord God Jeanette and Cindy aren't at the sub shop to razz me about the guys getting buried!................Gee, this was a long entry eh? I babbled a bit there, I guess. K, I better get going, so I can try to chase this ill feeling away. The one unrelated to my ego taking a shot with the guys getting hogtied and roasted on a spit on "Survivor". See you again next time.
Wednesday, February 12, 2003.............As I'm typing this, I've got this upset gut---not stomach, but lower---after having a supper consisting of lots of garlic and spaghetti and garlic bread. Big time pains here. Could be a challenge sleeping tonight. I think I have an idea why this is going on; it's that we started drinking pop by the can a lot more, and I've had a history of problems where I've drank too much canned pop and had a sore belly. Leaving me with a lot of...uh, canned heat, let's call it. Thing is, it doesn't escape, know what I mean? Anyway, it's kind of a drag...........It was bitchin' busy today at work. I got around it all and everything though. I didn't keep track of the mileage I did, but it's probably handy to 150 kliks. No lunch break either, but still, got it all done.............Janice had to work tonight, which pretty much screwed us out of our TKD class. Lexy went though, and she continues to impress her instructors. And her parents. Hey, everyone out there who might be reading this, all 2 of you...have a LOT of kids. They're a ball! Seriously...........So tonight I washed Lexy's hair in the sink and then took her upstairs to have a shower. The thing is that when she washes her hair in the shower, I have to help, then I wind up inadvertently taking a shower myself. After I read her a story, sung her the Punkin Pie song and tucked her in, I basically laid around like a bump on a log waiting for this pain to pass. Didn't happen---but I'll get by. Could be worse. I could be nauseous, and I HATE that feeling. HATE HATE HATE it. But this is kind of a drag too, eh?.............Guess I'll get out of here now and see what happens as I attempt voluntary unconciousness. Or sleep. Hope you do better at it than I think I'm gonna. Until tomorrow,take it easy, and come back soon.
Tuesday, February 11, 2003..............Well, work certainly did pick up today, and is supposed to keep up over the next few days I believe. I was all over town with catering and lamination deliveries today, and to top things off, more snow is coming down now, so matters of driving will be made worse. Lovely!............Not a heck of a lot went on today besides that. We did return again to tae kwon do class tonight though, and I neglected to wear my shin pads tonight and banged my foot up a wee bit, but not getting injured or anything. We did a lot of drills again tonight, which really helps sharpen up techniques regarding kicks and co-ordination.............I guess Jeanette sent a letter to Lucy at work to let her know how things are going in Cambridge, Ontario regarding her journey to become a nun. What I gather is that Jeanette is very lonely and is struggling with the idea that this may indeed be what it is she's going to do the rest of her life. At least she's giving this a try, and she'll know even if she finds out she doesn't want to do it that she made an informed decision. My selfish side hopes she comes back, of course..............Tonight we settled in and Janice watched "American Idol", which I've completely lost interest in, and then we both tuned in to "24", of course, as per every Tuesday night. Man, that show is getting HEAVY. And great. It's hard to say if it's better than last season, but cripes it's a good show. Tonight's big shock was Jack, the show's hero, having the terrorist leader's family of a wife and two kids kidnapped and held hostage until it was revealed from Sahid Ali (the terrorist's name) where the nuclear bomb's location was. The kids were to be killed one by one, then the wife, if he didn't comply with giving the information. To mine and everyone's surprise, Jack went ahead and had one of the kids shot! Boy, that freaked me out. Janice and I sat here with our heads in our hands and jaws to the floor in relative disbelief. Come to find out, Ali was actually watching a monitor where his wife and kids were in another country with his kid being shot, and the bullet actually didn't come close to the kid, though on tape it looked like it via a tape loop, so it didn't happen. Now the bomb is armed, Jack has a radius to get his people to search and the clock is ticking!!! AAGGHH! Am I rambling??...............Yayyyuuhhh, I'm outta here. Hope you're doing okay, and I hope you're interested enough to keep on coming back! See ya soon.
Monday, February 10, 2003.............A pretty quick, no-fuss time for work to start the week off, with only one catering delivery added to the usual stuff. No problem from my end on that. It's Janice's day off, and she took Lexy to TKD class in the afternoon, and went again in the evening with the both of us. It proved to be a good class for us, but for me especially, where I got to get back into a real groove with my technique and the drills. When we got back from class, Janice showed me properly how to do self defense #2, a manouevre you need to know when you test for Yellow Belt, which I'll do next month.........We watched "Boston Public" tonight and then WWE's "Raw", both of which were entertaining but somewhat left me feeling shortchanged. With "BP", one of the new characters on the season, a girl playing a teacher whose name and character escapes me, seems to be written off the show. And damn, she was a hot one! Ah well, win some lose some. And "Raw" wound up being what it seems to be more and more every week, which is basically an infomercial for their pay per views. Man...I really miss the old Bret Hart days when every match he fought seemed to mean something, even when he was against some of the lower tier wrestlers. Bret's going to be on "Off the Record" on TSN tomorrow, which I've been eagerly awaiting for a long time now. I feel so bad for the guy, many of his close family members have died in recent years, he was betrayed by his close friend and boss, fired wrongfully from his job, and now he's battling back from suffering a stroke last year. Talk about a guy who needs a break..........That's it for today, take care of yourself and your loved ones, and see you again. Oh.....and Happy Birthday, Cindy Elward, one of the hottest Legs of the Week girls ever on here!
Sunday, February 9, 2003.............After work this morning, which was from 9:30 to 12:30, thereabouts, I drove Janice to work for the afternoon, and headed back home to try to resolve things with the damn internet after I just about threw it through a window last night. I was successful, after attempting to post my entries for the fourth time. Honestly, there's a window here in the livingroom that was looking on in fear. Anyway, I got it done, and Alexandra was with Janice's mother and her sister Jennifer. When Lexy came back, I served her hot chocolate, and then I proceeded to play Mr. Mom, doing numerous loads of laundry, vacuuming the whole house, doing the biggest freakin' pile of dishes so high that I think Jack could've climbed it instead of the beanstalk to get to the giant, and then we went to get Janice at work. Came home then, and I cooked grilled chicken breast, rice and carrots for us for supper. Then Alexandra went to bed shortly after and Janice and me settled in to watch a couple of more episodes of "Six Feet Under", numbers 2 and 3 on season two, which I'm trying to get on tape, at least until the DVD of the second season comes out. Actually, we're kind of in the middle of that right now, so I better get going. Good luck this week, hope it all goes good. Plan something good for your sweetheart for Valentine's Day. If you don't have a sweetheart, do something great for yourself. God knows I've spent enough of those alone in my lifetime. A whole other story....life is great now! See you again.
Saturday, February 8, 2003.............Today, Alexandra woke me up again with breakfast in bed, in the form of a bowl of Reese's Peanut Butter Puffs and a can of Diet Pepsi Twist. Ah, the breakfast of champions! But you know, it hit the spot. Lexy knows her daddy!...........Janice worked a 9:30 to 2:30 shift, and when she got home, Lexy went outside and played in the snow while Janice and me took it easy. We took the time to watch a video my sister Cindy has been chasing me to watch called "The Real Presence", a video about the miracles of the Eucharist in the Catholic Church. Interesting, to be sure, but I'd heard of some of these miracles before. I don't disbelieve in them, but at the same time, I can't describe myself as fanatical about it. The Written Word in the New and Old Testaments I completely believe and follow, but remain skeptical and cautious about everything else. It was Jesus who said once, 'blessed is he who believes and has not seen'. Well, I believe and don't really need to see............Anyway, as I looked out the window, though, watching my daughter play by herself, I thought it would be nice if I suited up and went out there with her. It's a nice day, not too cold out, and the sun is shining. So after I went out, Janice decided she would join us. When she did, the three of us unanimously decided to get the sled and head to Centennial Park, as I've intended to do for a while now. Once we got there, we took to the hills and slid down over and over, sometimes Lexy by herself, sometimes her and me, sometimes her and Janice, and once even just Janice and myself, when Alexandra took a picture with her Barbie camera we gave her for Christmas. We got lots of pictures, actually, which will wind up on the website here once they're developed, sooner than later. We also walked around the pond at the park, pulling Lexy on the sled behind us. Janice, the cheeky monkey she is, took a picture of me from behind. We headed home after a couple of hours once it started getting colder and dark, and we ate a few quick TV dinners and headed out to Champlain Place for the ritualistic Pretzel Night. Dill Pickle won 2-1, where I ate the lone garlic pretzel. We got Janice some Hot Paws gloves for our next sled outing, and looked in vain for a toque for me to wear. You would think, in the Maritimes in CANADA, for crying out loud, that toques would be in abundance around here. NO! I found a few faux toques, those cheap things that teens wear year round posing as wiggers or whatever they call them now, but no genuine, knit-woven toques. Any women out there who can knit that wants to send me a toque, please go to the Contact Me page and get in touch! (sigh) Sooooooo-----we went home, gave Lex a snack and she passed out on her own watching Teletoon, and we transplanted her from our bed to hers, and came back downstairs to catch a re-run of the second season opener of "Six Feet Under". We cannot WAIT for the third season to start! The DVD box set of the first season is out, and costs something like a hundred bucks, dammit. So we're probably gonna put it on layaway this week at WallyWorld. And yes, we ARE die hards, like we are for "24"........... That's the end of the day, a GREAT one really. Hope your day was at least as good, and take care of yourself and yours. Count your blessings!!
Friday, February 7, 2003...........Wowee, what a nutso work day! Want me to run down what it is I did? No? Well too bad, here goes anyway---7:30: Got to work, had to deliver coffee and pastries and juice, or a 'continental breakfast', to the wonderful Heritage Court building I discussed yesterday. Back to the shop. 8:00: Packed up a 123 piece order to be shipped and merchandised at the French hospital by me, as well as a smaller 30 piece order going to the English hospital. Back to the shop again. 9:00: Packed orders for three stores here in Moncton to be delivered and merchandised, plus a fruit bag (the customer's too cheap to buy baskets) to the train station to be delivered as well. Also had to take with me a coffee machine full of coffee to the Dept. of Justice at Assumption Place with pastries and stuff for 10 AM. Numberous speed limits are broken and harsh names called out to senior citizens with their faces planted against their windshields to see in front of them. Back to the sub shop. 11:30: A delivery is to be made to the Chrysler dealership on Mountain Road for noon, so I decide to zip by PreLam and see what's in store there. The lovely and sexy Shelly halfways convinces me that skydiving would be a fun thing to do; sanity is restored after I leave, though. Picked up five things I have to deliver and pick up, then head to Chrysler. Then take the Trans-Canada to the Co-Op warehouse to bring a lamination delivery, then on to Mailboxes Etc. on Elmwood Drive, then to Superstore on Main Street, on to Superstore in Riverview, Abbass Photo in Industrial Park in Moncton, then pick up Lexy at school at 1:30 and head back to PreLam with the stuff I picked up. Then speed back to the sub shop, with peripheral vision heightened for cops lookout, and get another catering delivery to go to the Justice Dept. again for 2 o'clock. Then it's on to the English hospital to pick up whatever they didn't sell today, then back to the sub shop, pack the French hospital order of 130 pieces, deliver and merchandise that, and head back to the sub shop again after I've brought Lexy to TKD class. 3:00: Another delivery to be made for Broadcast Bureau of Measurement at the CNR Building on Main Street, and after that pick up the coffee equipment at the Dept. of Justice. Turns out they didn't even bother with the last order I brought them yet, so it was a wasted trip as I had to leave the equipment there. And then, ladies and gentlemen, the work day is done. How's that?...............After Janice was done work, the three of us agreed to use the Burger King coupons I'd won on the radio and have supper with them. It turned out to be the most gross meal I've had since the last time I ate at Rotten Ronnie's. The service was absolutely miserable (that's being generous, btw) and the food was worse. Tagamet was necessary later that evening to ward off the chickens and cows that haunted us for being part of our meals that evening............Ah yes, before we went to Burger King to eat, though, the three of us, Janice Lexy and me, went to TKD class (second time for Lexy today), and it was my first class back since my ribs injury. I did okay up until I had to do the 12-12-12's at the end of class (where we do two sets of 12 push ups, jumping jacks and sit ups in rapid succession), where I couldn't even do one sit up because of the pain in my side, where I broke my ribs. So instead, I did my push ups on my knuckles. Ever try that?? Not easy, folks. At least not at first. All in all, it was an okay class, but I have work to do to catch up. Alexandra was hurt too, brought to tears in fact, when I think she may have hyperextended her leg leading to pain in the groin area. But she was better later on. She took a break and got right back up and joined in class again. She's tough, I tell you. She will NOT give up!............The balance of the evening consisted of taking it easy, watching a bit of the telly, and heading to bed before the witching hour...............That's what happened on this Friday. As you may know, I'm late getting this entry in because of computer/website problems, but I'm catching up, so I'm outta here! See you....well, in a minute.
Thursday, February 6, 2003..........This week seemed long in one perspective and short in another, I think. The weather made it seem like forever, but with the quickness at work it made it seem short. Does that make sense? Well, in any case, it's good to see the weekend coming around again. But they're saying another friggin' storm is on the way. Note to Mother Nature: UNCLE!!..........It was pretty busy for work today. See, there's this place called the Heritage Court building downtown here in Moncton, and the security guards there have all the courtesy of a bull with chronic hemorroids. So I have to park the damned van way far away from the entrance of the building when I deliver there. I pick up the stuff, heavy enough to promote the creation of some hemorroids of my own, and I have to walk a long enough distance with it like a circus balancing act while I try to open big glass doors somehow with one hand. Anyway, there were two trips like that today there. Plus two deliveries to Assumption Place downtown, at the Justice Department. Justice my ass. It's similar circumstances to the Heritage Court building except I have to fight with the parking booth guy to not pay a buck for being there five minutes to make a delivery for the very people who are paying him. Now there's a guy who deserves hemorroids. Maybe I'm just being cheap for a buck, but the government is NOT gonna get any more cash out of me after I got a parking ticket for having my van outside the emergency parking area when I got my ribs broken. That's a whole 'nother story though----so I had to do a lot of deliveries, and pick up Lexy after school, bring Janice to work, bring Lexy to TKD class after that, do a couple more deliveries, do five pickups and deliveries for the lamination shop, deliver and stock a big order for the French hospital, put three more orders together for catering trucks, bring one to Riverview after that but not before first I picked up Lexy from TKD class, and finally head home. Finally! Right. Just as I turned the corner to get to my street, BEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEP. Work. Gotta go back to $*&##@ Heritage Court and get a coffee container because they just informed us that they want another order from us at eight in the **&$% morning tomorrow. Well I got that done, came home with Lexy and made supper in the form of some pizza's from Mike's (not Mike's the restaurant chain; Mike's as in ME), picked up Janice, came home and ate and had the usual "Smackdown!" company over with Steven, Sara and Greg, whom I had made a pizza for. Now the evening is over and it's time to get the heck upstairs. TGIF, and how............So I'll see ya on the flipside. Take care, and remember, don't go changin'!
Wednesday, February 5, 2003............School was cancelled today for the third straight day today, which kind of posed a problem with Janice and my work schedules. Janice went to work at 12:30 this afternoon, which left me with Alexandra to bring to work with me. She behaved herself quite well actually, and though I couldn't get around to bringing her to her TKD class for the afternoon, she went in the evening with her mother. Janice is looking at getting her Green Stripe Belt this month, and Alexandra will be targeting her Green Belt, which means Lexy will enter into the higher second half of the belt standings, with Janice knocking on the door. I've been left behind, obviously, because of nagging injuries to my ribs and my foot. Today, I refrained from going back to class because when I attempted to jog today, I still felt pain in my side where I was injured, so I will wait now until Friday, and go regardless...........I watched the U.S.'s Colin Powell state his case against Iraq and their failure to disarm from their weapons of mass destruction at noon hour today. I have to say that what I saw on display at the United Nations doesn't get a whole lot more clear than that. I suppose the real question is whether or not it warrants war. There are still hundreds of thousands of innocent people in that country who will no doubt get caught in the crossfire should war erupt, which makes you wonder what other ways there are to address a problem like this...........A health care plan was agreed upon, to some degree, between the premiers of Canada and Ottawa as to the direction and allocation of medicare and its fundings. Although not everyone is happy, I think most of us are satisfied that health care got a much needed shot in the arm in the form of thirteen billion dollars, four billion or so short of what was suggested in the Romanow report, but I doubt anyone thought that Ottawa would match what was recommended............Anyway............I made cookies again today, using fresh ingredients, and got much better results than I did last time. Damn things are addictive! My sister Cindy showed up tonight with a bag of clothes for Alexandra, all kinds of beautiful second hand garments that look virtually new. Cindy is always incredibly thoughtful that way. I got her to try my cookies, to which she gave me pretty big compliments...........After a smacking good spaghetti dinner with garlic bread, we watched some of the MuchMoreMusic countdown, which I watch pretty much every night to see a few songs played that I hope would be on (namely that Robbie Williams "Feel" song....MAN that kicks ass, it's that damn good), and we watched "Enterprise", which was good, and "Twilight Zone", which tonight was not so good. After a promising start, that show seems to be losing some steam. Now the news is playing behind me, and I'm just about ready to hit the sheets. Oh yes, now there's 7,000 without power in Southeastern NB, with that number coming down hourly, thank goodness, but not fast enough for the homes without power. It's been a very rough week, more for some people than others. Turns out the so-called storm last night turned out to be a dud, not that anyone's complaining about that. School should be back in tomorrow................That's the inside skinny on this lovely hump day of the week. Come back again when you get the urge, hopefully that's often! Take care.
Tuesday, February 4, 2003...........The recovery to the big ice storm continues. Obviously the city's preoccupied with what may come with more of the same stuff forecast to come in the next 24 hours, so we'll have to wait and see how close to the end of this we actually are. Being a driver for a living and covering the bulk of the city during the workday allows me to see a lot of the repercussions of the invasion of the Crystalline Entity (kind of an inside joke there for Star Trek: TNG fans). Power crews made lots of ground today on getting power back for more than half of the 60,000 or so southeastern NBers, which is good, but there's going to be a lot of people still left in the cold and dark until Thursday, they're saying. But the roads are good, the power's back on for a lot of us, and shelters are open to help those who are desperate, so I guess you could say that the pendulum on this storm is swinging the other way now. But we'll see after tonight what happens...........Alexandra went to two TKD classes today, one this afternoon and one this evening with her mom, and I'm set to go back maybe tomorrow or Thursday, depending on how my ribs hold up. As of right now, I'd say I'd be going tomorrow night, I feel pretty good. I've got a running gag/bet going that I won't get beat up by a woman this year, and you know, so far so good!.............Tonight we settled in for a warm evening with a grilled chicken breast with rice and carrots supper and a generous helping of TV, watching "American Idol" and, of course, "24". I started off watching "Idol" when the series began but lost interest pretty quick, but Janice is kind of into it. "24", on the other hand, I'm a total diehard for. Once again tonight, it left Janice and me cursing at the villains and trying to second guess who the moles might be...........That's gonna do it for today. Hopefully I won't have a lot of crap to tell you about storms and stuff in the next entry. But we'll see. Take care and thanks for dropping by.
Sunday and Monday, February 2-3, 2003...........I'd say this day is one that's going to go down in Moncton's meteorological history. We got POUNDED today by freezing rain and ice pellets, cutting power out for over 30,000 people in Moncton and surrounding area, with Riverview completely blacked out, and 60,000 in Southeastern New Brunswick suffering the same fate. In the morning when I left the house to go pick up a bread order for the sub shop, it looked threatening outside, but not dangerous yet. You could tell something bad was going to happen weatherwise, because the forecasts were saying that the temperatures were not going to rise to melt the ice that was forming on trees and power lines already. Janice was working the day shift at Superstore, and after I'd picked her up, we came home, and shortly after the power went out here at the house. We hunted down some candles and a flashlight in the house, got hold of a radio, and I went out to hunt for some batteries for it. As I travelled down Mountain Road to find a store that might be open that carries the elusive 'C' batteries, I thought it might be a good idea to get something to eat as well, where we didn't have power and weren't going to for what looked to be a while. I saw four or five bright flashes of blue light in the night sky off in the distance, and blackouts began to roll down Mountain Road. I pulled into a Deluxe restaurant near where I was at that point and got fish and chips and chicken for us, then I found some 'C' batteries for the radio and went home. The sight was rather eerie. No lights on in most of the city, hardly a car around on the road and ice weighing down the trees causing many to split or lose very large branches. We had our supper in the livingroom, and headed upstairs shortly after and gathered under the covers to keep warm. It wasn't really that cold anyway, with temperatures only around the freezing mark outside, so it was close to room temperature, slightly lower. Around 9:30 or so, power came back on, and we put Lexy to bed and we retired shortly after. When we got up Monday morning at 7:30, about ten centimetres of snow had fallen overnight, and after shoveling out the driveway with Janice and Alexandra helping, I left for work to face the incredibly bad roads. The ice on roadways was solid, and the slush was building up, making it extremely tricky to navigate some parts. I saw dozens and dozens of trees hunched over from ice, and many split down the middle, falling to the ground. Ice was on every tree I saw. Fire trucks seemed to cross my path every half hour, police were constantly on the go, power crews were constantly at work, city crews were working to keep up with the flooding, and I followed the rules of the road coming to a stop at every intersection with inoperative traffic lights, despite no one else doing so, not that I saw. When I delivered an order to a catering truck operator in Riverview, the power there was still completely out, stores and restaurants were closed, and the town, known for its huge and numerous trees, was under siege by the results of the ice storm. Emergency shelters have been set up in Moncton for those that are desperate for heat and food, and some areas won't be getting power for up to 72 hours, maybe even more. With another storm lingering on the horizon, almost literally, we're bracing for what might be the '2' of the '1-2' punch from Old Man Winter. Tonight, we're expecting snow overnight, changing to ice pellets, then freezing rain right through tomorrow. More freezing rain on top of the ice that's already on the powerlines could prove devastating. Crews from Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island have been called into Moncton to aid in the recovery with the local power crews. In spite of all of this, a lot of us are bitchy about it, but luckily, no one has been seriously hurt or anything up to now. The temperatures have been holding steady, although tonight they're supposed to dip to minus 11 celcius. In fact, my girl Cindy Day is doing the forecast behind me now....she says lots of snow followed by freezing rain then rain too. Could be a challenging day tomorrow, espcially for those of us who have to drive for a living............That's what's going on here lately, and the reason why I didn't post for Sunday night sooner. We'll see what happens next time I bring an entry onto this page. Take care till then, and see ya later.
Saturday, February 1, 2003............Yep, I did it; I had to backspace over the 'January' that I typed at the beginning of this entry and put 'February'. How time flies, eh? The first month of the year is gone, just like that............Well obviously today is going to go down in history as another tragic day in U.S. history, with the explosion of the shuttle Columbia over the earth's atmosphere. Just a few minutes from landing, coming back home after spending a couple of weeks in space, and this happens. What a crying shame.........Janice came home from working her morning shift and informed me that ten centimeters of snow fell on the ground since we went to bed last night. Alexandra still had a fever when she got up this morning, but was still in great spirits, as she always is when she's sick. But we opted to bring her to an after hours clinic to be sure she hasn't come down with an infection of some sort. All signs point toward her having the flu, with the coughing and sneezing and lethargy still playing a role in her health along with a stubborn fever...........I stayed in pretty much all day except for bringing Alexandra to the doctor to be seen. When we got home from that, we all had a little snooze up in our bedroom, then when we got up I made a casserole for supper, which Lexy had a good helping of along with her vegetable soup that she'd had earlier. So her appetite is definitely still there. Mine is not though, really, with Rocky behind me just hurling his treats that he had earlier. He does that from time to time. Let's out this howl that seems to say "I'm gonna hurl!" and coughs up whatever he's had the last couple hours. He's an old guy, so whatever........A lot of what I did this evening was install the updates on the site here that I'd been working on here and there throughout the week. Check 'em out and see what you think...........That's the business for today. Take care, and maybe say a prayer for the families of the Columbia disaster. It's going to be a tough while for them to get through. See you again.
Friday, January 31, 2003...........As it turns out, Lexy does not have the chickenpox, but a flu virus, leaving her coughing and sneezing and rather weak in the knees with a stubborn fever. We'll be giving her lots of TLC and keeping her in as she rests for a few days, much to her chagrin.............Today was quite the rollicking day at work. I had twenty trays of sandwiches, vegetables, pickles, cheese and sweets with tea and coffee to deliver to a big shindig at the old Moncton Airport flight college, on top of thirteen trays of food going to a funeral home in the morning with another catering order on top of that, along with the usual two hospital visits in the morning, two in the afternoon and three store visits and a delivery to the train station. I worked through the lunch hour, but that was small pickin's compared to my workmate Lucy, who pulled in something like a fifteen hour shift to help get all of this stuff done...........I got home to partake in the Catholic tradition of the no-meat Fridays, with the intentions of having a peanut butter and banana tortilla rollup once I'm done this. Hey look, if it's good on sandwiches, why not this? In the meantime I've been eating the oh so healthy supplement of rice krispies squares and chocolate chip/peanut butter chip cookies that I made last night. Yum!......... Janice gave PC Financial a huge chunk of her mind today. We'd missed a credit card payment because of the usual Christmas bills, and we'd called them to tell them so last month. They said it was okay. Now today we got a notice in the mail that our balance was forwarded to a collections agency. BEWARE, people, of PC Financial Mastercards. Even if you give notice that you'll be late with a payment, this may still happen. We will pay off the balance, cut up the card and continue to spread warning to everyone we come in contact with about this shit-on-your-customer behaviour...............Speaking of bad behaviour, we just received over a week's worth of mail today because our pussy of a mailman whined about a small patch of ice outside the house. Funny, we have a six year old little girl that doesn't have a problem with this, coming in and out of the house several times a day but this idiot can't get to the steps just once. Janice is on the lookout for him now, and her voicebox is loaded and ready. Feel sorry for this mailman, folks!....... Anyway, I'm outta here for now to enjoy my one day off tomorrow. Take care of yourself, and keep on coming back here when you think of it! I appreciate every visit that you make here. See you soon.
Thursday, January 30, 2003...............So I said to my wife yesterday, "I think tomorrow I'll try for that there Entertainment Trivia on the radio tomorrow morning, because now they're giving away a pair of movie tickets and a ten buck thingy from Burger King." Sure enough, this morning I took a stab at C103 radio's ET contest, and I nailed it. Even got to joke around a bit on the air. The question was, what dance show are they bringing back on the air after a twenty year absence--something like that. I took a shot in the dark and said "Dance Fever" after a few others got to guess, almost everyone guessed "American Bandstand". Anyway, I was right, and they got a kick out of the fact that a GUY got it right. I said 'oh no, the disco king is revealed', to which I got a few guffaws. Lisa Marshall says she never understood why John Travolta was seen as so sexy in his polyester suit back in those days, and I said "me neither", to which I was Mr. Funny for a minute at least. Anyway, that was a very long-winded story to say I won ET this morning. Not the funny alien who looks like Shelly Duvall, Entertainment Trivia......... It was a fairly busy day today for work, and Alexandra did not go to school because she woke up with a fever which seemed to disappear later in the morning. So we were able to send her to tae kwon do in the afternoon, when I brought Janice to work. When I picked her up, everything seemed to be fine, but went downhill from there, as she acted a bit funny; tired and kind of weak, pretty uncharacteristic of her. After I picked Janice up, we came home and had supper, and found a bit of a rash on Lexy's face. We looked under her shirt and found the same rash. So now we think maybe it's chickenpox, but before she went to bed the rash was gone, so we don't know what to think. The fever is back though. And it ain't for dancing either. So we'll see tomorrow morning, perhaps, what's up...........Janice and me called off the "Smackdown!" gathering tonight in light of the possibility of Lexy's illness. Janice watched "ER" and then we saw "SD!" then we headed north to get some Z's, but not before I get to do this.............That's about all I can remember about today. We'll see for sure tomorrow if Lexy has the chickenpox or not. Take care and see you again.
Wednesday, January 29, 2003............Not really a whole lot to discuss today, I don't think, just a pretty normal work day (only close to 100 km on the road today) and a very leisurely evening. Janice and Alexandra went to TKD class, Lexy actually went this afternoon as well, and I cooked supper for them before they got back home. What we did this evening was watch "Bowling For Columbine", which I actually found on iMesh, so I downloaded it and Janice watched it for the first time, and me for the second of course. It's great quality too. The copy I was seeing was actually one of those "for your consideration" type promo things that members of the Academy or whoever gets, to up the chances for said film getting nominated and/or winning awards. Clearly, "Columbine" will get documentary of the year, I can't imagine it not happening. But what I'd really like to see is it get a shot at Best Picture. I know it won't though, that's just the way it works. Anyway, Janice basically got the same reaction that the rest of us got from seeing it, that being a pretty changed person, a bit numbed, and kind of feeling like you'd just been shaken from a lengthy slumber that is the real world. I didn't really want to think it, but I do now; and that's that Charleton Heston is a racist. That's not an opinion, folks. There were no ventriloquists involved in this film, and the words that came out of his mouth were his own. One of the things he blamed the murder rate on in the movie was the ethnicity in the States, which is basically the same in Canada. I think if there's actually the word 'boob' in encyclopedias, in issues published from this point forward you'll see a picture of Mr. Moses wannabe himself............I forgot to mention in last night's entry how very pleased I am that my friend Wayne and his wife Elaine quit smoking, where they've been smokers for as long as I've known them. That's incredibly good news I was elated to hear!..........We're over the hump day, ladies and gentlemen. Two days left to the work week---well, for a lot of us anyway. And this freezing friggin' cold January is almost behind us, so keep starting those vehicles early to warm them up, bundle up a bit longer and remember, Spring is only what...49 days away? Something like that. Thanks for dropping in, and see you again soon.
Tuesday, January 28, 2003.............I just got back from seeing "Bowling For Columbine" tonight at the University. This documentary had a profound effect on the way I, and most likely everyone who was there to see it, views the world as we knew it. I say "knew" because I think anyone who sees this will look at a lot of aspects of life considerably differently. My nephew in Ottawa, Shawn, recently saw this in his city and it had the same effect on him, and he sent out a mass e-mail to everyone he knew that they just have to go see this to realize where he's coming from. I couldn't agree more. This is a film that must be seen by everyone, especially students in schools, but I do mean every one of us needs to see this. Yes, "needs". After the show was over, I went for a short drive with buddies Pete and Wayne as the three of us saw it together. It's unique, because we all walked away from the movie with different, but positive points of view. None of us disagreed with the direction the movie took. Pete felt hopeful after it was over, and so did I, in that we feel somewhat comforted, for lack of a better word, that someone is brave enough to stand up and point the finger and shout out what is blatantly wrong with a lot of things we deal with in day to day life. Wayne, on the other hand, came out perhaps slightly more shocked and a bit more hopeless, but enlightened nonetheless, knowing that he's now informed, against not being so............Ah, now the rest of the day...........I drove a rather busy 150 km on the road today on the job, pretty much hitting every damned corner of the city there is. I witnessed an accident, where an old lady slammed into a man's car as she tried hastily to turn left. Lots of people saw it, so I kept on going. Janice worked an odd noon to 3:30 shift, and we came home after I was done shortly after that and we had Domino's for supper, the quick fix, because Alexandra and Janice were going to tae kwon do and me to the movie. Evidently, Lexy missed me singing her "Punkin' Pie Song" before bed, which I sing to her every night, since she was a few weeks old. I'll have to do double time tomorrow night on that one...........HEADLINE OF THE DAY............I don't know what to do about this now. I know I have to be careful, but I realize there's maybe a few of you who are reading this that will see this "Headline of the Day" as what is the biggest news as far as I was concerned today. The biggest news of the day that I can give you at this point in time is, that a lot of news is irresponsible. In light of what I know now, what I've been shown tonight, I realize that I have to be careful in what I believe as is reported by the media. Having said that, I might not carry on this Headline feature anymore. We'll see............That's the kind of day it's been through the eyes of Michael Cook, folks. Thank you very much for reading, and please keep coming back! And if you like, let me know how you feel about anything I might have wrote here or anywhere else on the site. I appreciate the kind words, and even any criticism you might have. See you soon.
Monday, January 27, 2003............The beginning of the workweek, for most people anyway (the beginning of mine is Sunday), brings with it a bit of tension sometimes, doesn't it? Today I had a big pile of deliveries for the catering part of my job at noon hour, which required a lot of lifting heavy stuff. That called for my lovely and talented wife Janice, who tagged along and helped me with a massive delivery going to Riverview HIgh School, with soup for seventy people and sandwiches for as many. There were three other catering deliveries as well, fairly sizeable ones, two of which wound up being late because of some confusion back at the shop. Anyway, we got through it...........Janice finally got a Christmas present from me today that I had actually bought before Christmas, that being a pair of special shoes for tae kwon do. Pricey too, at $75, but she needed them. She's pretty anxious now to use them. She had the 4 to 9 shift this evening, so Lexy and me shoveled the heavy slush off of the driveway before the big freeze is supposed to happen overnight tonight, then I gave her a hot chocolate with marshmallows, cooked supper and we went back out to do a bit of shopping. Then we picked up Janice, came home, put Lexy to bed and settled in for a night of WWE television. Alexandra was on her very best behaviour tonight, for which I told her I was extremely proud...........So WWE's "Tough Enough", a reality type show where a group of contestants compete to show if they're tough enough to handle a career as a pro wrestler in the WWE, culminated tonight with the two winners that I had originally picked to take the contest, John and Matt. John has the skills and the heart while Matt has the same but a little extra presence.............Got an e-mail from my good buddy Wayne tonight to inform me that "Bowling For Columbine" will be playing at the University here in town Tuesday night, and asked if I'd like to tag along with him and my other pal Pete. So it looks like that's what I'm doing tomorrow night. I'm very much looking forward to seeing this, where all I've heard were good things about this Michael Moore documentary focusing largely on the gun problems in the U.S. Moore also has a book, "Stupid White Men, and Other Sorry Excuses For the State of America" (I think that's the title) that's been a bestseller for months now that I also want to get my hands on. He's also currently working on his next documentary following the posturing of politicians regarding the impending war against Iraq and how it will tie in with the around-the-corner U.S. elections. Now that will be VERY interesting too.............HEADLINE OF THE DAY...........A West Nile Virus vaccine? There's talk that there may be one around the corner, and tests on humans are forthcoming. Funny how when a virus as devastating as this one is in countries like Africa for decades and kills thousands doesn't get any attention, but as soon as it arrives in the western world scientists are on it like flies on shit............That's how the day has gone around here. Take care and see you again real soon.
Sunday, January 26, 2003.............This'll certainly be a short entry, where it was a very unevenful and rather boring day. It was a nice day to bring Alexandra out to Centennial Park, something that I'd thought about, because I want to bring her there with the sled and go down the hills and stuff, but as fate would have it my ribs are cracked and still hurting. So maybe next weekend. In the meantime, I did a whole lotta nothing today after I was done a short morning shift at work. My former workmate and gal pal Cindy called and asked if I wanted to see a movie at the theatre, but I wasn't really prepared for it, and took a rain check that hopefully in the very near future I'll cash, maybe next Sunday. There isn't a hell of a lot out there in theatres that I care about, and this is the time of year that is the dumping grounds for a lot of movies, many of which are taking up theatres right now. We'll see. I certainly love Cindy's company, so I'll just go anyway to hang out...........After I cooked a wonderful gourmet supper (Manwiches and McCain potato smilies), Lexy was put to bed and Janice and me sat around like bumps on a log and more or less waited for this dreadfully dull day to be over. Yup............HEADLINE OF THE DAY............You know what the friggin' headlines all are pretty much?? It's the old "if Iraq doesn't disarm soon, we're gonna do something about it!" crap that we've been hearing for the last number of months now. I'm sick of it. Until there's developments that are signifigant, I'm through paying attention to it..........Guess that's it for this weekend, the last one in January of this year. See you again soon, and hopefully we'll all have a good week, eh?
Saturday, January 25, 2003.........It was freaky. There I was, standing on the ground on the sidewalk, and I look up and this huge jetliner flies so low overhead, and slams right into the University of Moncton campgrounds. It was a big jet, just like in all the dreams like that which I have. Yes, obviously it was a dream. But it's a recurring one, and it's been recurring for years now. I hope that's all it ever is...........Janice worked the afternoon shift while Lexy and me watched the tube, and once we picked Janice up we came home and had grilled chicken breast, stuffing and corn for supper and headed out to the mall for, you guessed it, Pretzel Night. We got home and watched "Austin Powers: Goldmember" for the first time, and though Janice seemed to think it was just okay, I was sitting here sometimes in tears laughing. That Goldmember guy is pretty funny. What's Mike Myers going to do now for the next movie now that Dr. Evil isn't so eeeevuhhlll anymore?...........After that was over, we caught the tail end of "The Mothman Prophecies" on The Movie Network, which is supposed to be based on a true story. You have to be careful with Hollywood, because it's never "a true story" as much as "based on a true story". Anyway, with that grain of salt, it wasn't bad, what we saw.............HEADLINE OF THE DAY...........A worm of unknown origin hit the internet that disabled ATM's and business transactions around the world for a few hours today, and the FBI is investigating. It's the worst hit the internet has taken in 18 months, but no serious damage has been done.............That's the end of a pretty humdrum day. See you in a day or so, whenever you can come back here and check things out. Just remember, you're welcome all the time.
Friday, January 24, 2003............Just got done watching "Dateline" on TV, something that I extremely rarely do. But Janice and me watched tonight's episode about a couple accused of child abuse, allegations by the prosecutors which proved unfounded due to the child having Brittle Bone Disease, yet in light of those facts the prosecution forged ahead anyway. Some lawyers, honestly, are the true meaning of the term 'scum of the earth', eh? What a witch hunt that turned out to be............It was a fairly long day at work, with me giving up my lunch hour and working right through to get things done the way I wanted for the shop. Sounds like bullshit doesn't it? But I really do care about the job I do. My boss keeps me on in trust that I will do my job. That does sound corny, admittedly. Better move on!...........Tonight we didn't do a whole lot. I made peanut butter/marshmallow/chocolate squares, for supper I made veggie fajitas for the family--in keeping with our no-meat Fridays. Now I'm doing this and heading straight to bed where I'll read my Entertainment Weekly while Janice watches "20/20" on TV............The highlight of the day is OBVIOUSLY my supersexy weathergirl, Cindy Day, actually answering my weather question on the air tonight!! I was absolutely stunned. At her outfit I mean. Man, she looked heavenly! Really though, my question was, "Why do bridges freeze before roads do in frigid weather?" And her anchorman partner actually chimed in, saying "that's a good question, and very timely!" What tipped me off that she was actually answering my question was, she actually brought a road sign into the studio and held it up for the camera, that says "Bridge Freezes Before Road". Then I yelled at the top of my lungs to Janice, who was upstairs, to turn on the TV, and sure enough. ".....the question this week comes to me from Mike Cook in Moncton...." YEEE-HAAAA!!!!! Wow, did I flip! How many times she said that it was a great question was awesome, because for whatever reason, she thought it was very timely and good to know, when really I just sent this question in, in hopes of getting this Global Gift Pack that you get when she picks you. .....okay, okay, I wanted her to say my name. She did!...........Today I also saw my friend Tim that I haven't seen in ages. A few months, specifically. Things are stable in his neck of the woods, and he and his missus are now living together in an apartment building that he's a superintendant for. Tim's a longtime great friend of mine, and it was great seeing him again. Also got an e-mail from my pal Cindy with a movie invitation. Wow, that's a no-brainer, going to a show with a beautiful blonde, where the wife won't mind (Janice is a friend of Cindy's too)! But scheduling might be a problem, so I'll see tomorrow..........HEADLINE OF THE DAY...........Health care in Canada is a subject of contentious debate among many, and over the next couple of months that debate is going to get louder. The premiers are all getting together to discuss how they're going to present their ideas as to how Ottawa ought to distribute funds to the provinces to aid in their respective situations. The fear among the premiers is that Ottawa is going to tell them what they can and can't do with the funding..............End of the line for this lovely 'Cindy' day---ha, get it? WOO! See you next time, and take care.....thanks for stopping by!
Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday January 21-23, 2003...........Might as well post for three days right now eh? Seeing as I haven't posted in a bit. The reasons being, for one at least, that Tripod wouldn't let me sign into my website without a huge hassle, and a couple of days I just didn't have the patience to sit around and wait for the Site Builder page to load on my PC. So I'd put it off, come back, and the same old crap kept happening. Plus, Janice and me have gone to bed quite early this week, at 10 pm (although we watch TV upstairs for an hour and a half then pass out). But it's done a world of good for both of us. We wake up the following mornings feeling far more refreshed than we had been. We're starting to realize how very important sleep is to being healthy...........I was beginning to wonder though, I wake up in the mornings with a rather nagging, dull, throbbing headache. But the more sleep I got, the less recurring they've become, so I guess that says it all. Plus we had to get a couple of pillows out of the closet, because the down filled ones we've been using I think are haunted with angry ducks. Seriously, they're giving us the bills big time. So we gave the old pillows a quack at being used again and now everything's fine...........Our pal Michelle is finally on the internet. That'd be Michelle, Janice's friend from work, not my ex. I'd been wondering how much longer it would take before she showed up, but as fate would have it, I believe she got a PC for Christmas and now she's discovering the beauty of cyberspace...........I've also been communicating, finally, with my long lost pal Patcy via e-mail. Patcy's been a very busy woman on the police force here in Moncton, with a rash of robberies as of late. But let me tell ya, don't try to get away from her once she's got your number. This lady kicks some serious ass..........Speaking of ladies kicking ass, Janice went to Tae Kwon Do tonight to practice her forms a bit and provide support to some of the people who were testing for their next belts. Janice is very good at that, providing moral support to those who need it. I've always said, don't ever get on her bad side because she won't forget, but if you ever need a helping hand she will be there, guaranteed. That's not to say she's not forgiving, though...........Alexandra has been talking back to her mom lately, and today I took a different approach to rectify this situation. I sat her down in a corner in the house and got her to stare into the wall for five straight minutes, with no movement or sound, and no turning her head or anything. If she were to move or make noise, the clock would start over. Seems to have had an effect. I told her next time, it'll be ten minutes. She was awfully nice the rest of the day. We'll see what the long term results will tell............I'm not the sensitive guy I was years ago, where someone would crack a joke at me and I'd get all down about it. But the other day when I made a delivery to a store, a woman who works there made a comment, seemingly un-jokingly, that I was "over the hill". That bothered me for a few hours. Then I came to realize she was only a year or two younger than I was. So if I am, ...you know? But hell, I got lots of piss and vinegar in me yet. Geez, so do my brothers who are in their fifties. Youth is most certainly in the heart...........Our diets have been quite consistenly hot turkey sandwiches since Janice made that big bird a few days ago, but we've finally ran out of it. I didn't get sick of having it though. We found this turkey gravy that you mix yourself at the grocery store that turned out to be bitchin'! So we could've eaten hot turkey sandwiches until next Thanksgiving. But, we ran out, and today I made my homemade pizza. Which (ahem) is to die for. If you haven't tried it, you've gotta come over and taste for yourself! Our buddy Greg and nephew Steven were over tonight for "Smackdown!" night and I made a twelve inch one just for the two of them. I think they liked it. It didn't last too long...........HEADLINE OF THE LAST FEW DAYS............That's right, the last few days. It's been a while! Anyway, what seems to be dominating the news lately is the U.S. pushing their agenda for war against Iraq while most of the rest of the world is staunchly against it. And I have to say, if the majority of the world is against it, then I am too. Especially my own country. If Canada says it won't go into Iraq without backing from the United Nations, that's good enough for me. I think that most of the interest in Iraq lies in their oil resources anyway. Another tidbit of news I heard tonight, that I hope will make bold headlines in the very near future, is that there may be a vaccine for the West Nile Virus. We'll see how much credibility that story holds as time goes on...............Well, Janice is upstairs as I finish typing this, and it's near midnight, so I ought to follow. I hope life is treating you well, and thank you so much for having enough interest to visit my humble site. Especially if you're reading this, my journals. God bless ya! And come back again real soon. As usual, you're ALWAYS welcome.
Monday, January 20, 2003...........The ribs are getting better slowly but surely. Still a fair amount of soreness, especially when I wake up in the morning, but not unmanageable at all. I guess once I get moving I notice the pain a lot less, and as soon as I stop moving I notice it more. But thankfully, busted ribs don't take too long to heal. I should be back at tae kwon do in a week and a half or so. That's what I miss most right now, is doing TKD. Speaking of, Janice talked to the instructor today and he (Master Lessard) said that Alexandra is just about ready for her Green Belt testing, and that she's coming along very, very well. At the rate Alexandra is going, she will be Black Belt long before she's ten! Janice is probably going to be ready for her Green Stripe belt next month too. I should be ready for Yellow. We'll see............Today was Janice's day off, and she used it to cook a turkey that we'd gotten at Christmas from my boss, Carla. We had mashed potatoes and carrots with it, and although I kind of screwed up the potatoes, the whole meal was very enjoyable, especially the turkey. Now we've got a whole pile of bird meat for the next few days for hot sandwiches, which I like maybe even more than turkey dinners...........Alexandra was punished today despite the good news coming from her tae kwon do instructor. She was talking back, actually yelling back, to her mom and wouldn't relent, so she lost her TV priveleges for today as well as going to TKD class in the evening, which she loves doing. All in all, despite the odd bump in the road here and there, like a lot of kids Lexy has a bad day here and there, and overall I'm extremely proud of my little punkin..........We headed to bed after we watched "Boston Public" tonight and watched WWE's RAW and called it a night. Which brings me to right now. I'm outta here! Take care of yourself and see you back here hopefully soon.
Sunday, January 19, 2003............The night is done now, as we venture just past midnight with the WWE Royal Rumble just getting over. Not a bad show, but predictable, with Brock Lesnar winning the battle royal and Kurt Angle winning his title match with Chris Benoit, who put on an absolutely stellar performance with Angle in what is certain to be a match of the year candidate as the year goes on. Nephew Steve and friend Sara came to watch with us, as well as our pal Greg..........It was my netpal Karleen's birthday today. Happy Birthday, hun!..........I basically took it easy today for the most part, with Janice coming with me this morning to pick up a bread order for the sub shop at McBun's and come with me to the hospital to deliver eighty subs and sandwiches to the hospital. I wound up talking to the boss at McBun's, who I get along really well with, about "Bowling For Columbine", which he'd seen just this past week. I've heard a lot about this show, and I've been wanting to see it but have to wait for the video. I've always liked Michael Moore and the way he gets his journalistic work done, and he makes his points with such conviction. Anyway, I made a heavy duty pair of pizzas for supper that we ate before company came over................HEADLINE OF THE DAY............The peace demonstrations seem to have come off without much of a fuss, thankfully. And aside from that, in medical news, they're beginning to see the cancer fighting benefits of Tetracycline, an antibiotic used for years as acne medication..............On to another week. Have a good one, and believe me when I say I'm very grateful that you spend any amount of time at my site seeing what I'm writing or what I've been up to!
Saturday, January 18, 2003.........I awoke this morning to Lexy once again serving me breakfast in bed. How very cute, eh? She brought me cheez whiz on toast, a bowl of Honeycomb in milk, and a drinking box of orange juice. I had her eat the toast, because I'm not a big fan of cheez whiz, so we actually had breakfast in bed together. She watched her cartoons while I lay there in bed. When I got up, I was reminded once again that I still indeed have sore ribs from my slip-up yesterday. It's fine once I'm immobile for a while, but as soon as I start to move again, I have to get into some kind of continuity, even though the pain doesn't go away. Still, nothing I can't handle in the end...........I started doing laundry while Janice was out from eight in the morning till one on her work shift. She came home and bawled me out for doing anything. So I more or less sat my ass down on the reclining couch for the rest of the afternoon watching Saturday afternoon TV. Which is the equivalent to torture for any of us professional couch potatoes. We had a gourmet chicken and potatoes dinner with corn ----well, Swanson, to be honest---- and after a bit we headed out to Champlain Place to celebrate Pretzel night. This week, the famous Garlic pretzel won out with me, while Dill Pickle still was the choice of the ladies. We didn't stay long because being upright for any real length of time is a little bit painful at this point. So we came home and caught up on a lot of our taped shows. Janice is watching this past Thursday's "E.R." right now, as a matter of fact. I stopped watching that show a couple of years ago when all the original cast was gone, but Janice still is faithful. We saw a couple of "Friends" episodes from the last two Thursdays, too. Is it just me, or is Rachel back to being a snotty bitch again, like she was two or three seasons ago with Ross? Whatever, eh?.............HEADLINE OF THE DAY........... From all accounts, it looks like the peace demonstrations went off without any real trouble. And I guess it wasn't just Canada, but all over the world, including the U.S. themselves. I wonder if the people in the middle east know that? That the actual citizens in the United States, whom they're so dead set against, feel pretty much the same way about war as they or anyone else does? Not likely, unfortunately............Well, the update notice for the site here was sent out tonight, so hopefully, you're enjoying what it is I did. Something else I'm bouncing around is for Janice to have her own page here at the site. I wonder how it'd go over? Maybe we'll see. Anyway, take care, and have a very easy Sunday. Don't do any work if you can avoid it, K? Hey, if the Big Guy took the day off, you can too.
Friday, January 17, 2003...........Today turned out a little more interesting than I'd bargained on. The weather forecast from Slackerboy (aka Peter Coade, on the Maritimes' ATV television station; he earned that nickname from Janice and me for not providing more specific weather information than he should) indicated we'd be getting a "Nor-Easter", which I guess means a very bad northeastern storm. Cindy Day now, on the other hand (and my God she is HOT!), on rival station MITV, said we'd be getting between one and five cm of snow, making it rather slippery on the roads. So she was right. No, I did not get into a car accident. But I did manage to crack some ribs on the job slipping on some hidden ice under the freshly fallen snow. I went down fast and hard, with the knuckles on my right hand between the ground and my ribs. I lost my breath instantly and couldn't get it back; worse, Alexandra was in the van watching it all, as I lay on the ground gasping for air. Anyway, after a couple of minutes of struggling to get my breath back, I got back up, very slowly, and very painfully finished the afternoon, which included another seven deliveries around town for PreLam and six bins full of sandwiches going to the french hospital. The pain was absolutely unreal...or actually, too real. By the time I was done, Lexy and me had gone home and waited an hour or so until Janice was finished her Superstore shift, and we picked her up and went home to grab a bite to eat -- fish fries and potato smilies, for those keeping score of the no-meat Fridays -- and Janice's mom looked after Lexy while Janice took me to outpatients. An X-ray showed no internal bleeding or contusions, which is good news. I feared the worst, but as it turns out, it's only cracked and/or bruised ribs. I was prescribed Tylenol-3, given five days off work (which I won't take....I HATE calling in sick), and told to take it very easy for a while. We came home and, you guessed it, took it easy. I felt as useful as a beached whale, with Janice catering to my every whim. She even held a cup under me while I peed. No, that part's just a joke. But she offered to do everything else and wouldn't let me get up. Not that I could anyway. We're obviously retiring to bed early tonight, midnight, which is actually early for us on a Friday night. She works at 8 in the morning till one in the afternoon, so I'll pop the Tylenol and see how things evolve from here................HEADLINE OF THE DAY...........The word is that there's going to be such a huge demonstration for peace across Canada tomorrow that it'll rival those of the days of the Vietnam War. I'd actually be tempted to take part in something like that if I knew anything about it locally, but with my crushed ribs and lack of knowledge I guess it ain't gonna happen. But I hope that this rally for peace is just that, with no one getting into any trouble or anyone getting hurt...............That's the day in a nutshell. Hope your day was better, though mine could have been wayyyy worse! But I'll see you soon with an update announcement very shortly, seeing as I won't be able to do a lot else. Thank you very much for coming!
Thursday, January 16, 2003............This is an unusually quiet Thursday night, where usually I have a couple of guys over and we get into the spirit of WWE's Smackdown! program, but with my buddy Greg being called in to work and no word from my nephew Steve, I took the opportunity to lay a little lower. Alexandra was punished again yesterday for freaking out over her television priveliges, so instead tonight she took the extra time to clean upstairs, and I helped her take a shower before bed. Thing about helping her take a shower is I wind up taking one too, with my clothes on. Still, since her last urinary tract infection, or whatever it was, baths are pretty much out now..........Work was a little busier today, but nothing unusual. I got done in plenty of time to go grocery shopping for the week and bring home supper, a roast chicken from Superstore. Janice obviously had the evening shift tonight, and I opted to take tae kwon do tomorrow night instead of tonight so I can concentrate on my form and recoup from a pretty strenuous workout last night............So anyway, Smackdown! was fair, I guess, but it looks like its RAW counterpart seems to have taken over the momentum.............HEADLINE OF THE DAY.......So it looks like they may have found the "smoking gun" that's needed to force Iraq to comply or endure another Gulf War, when inspectors found warheads during inspections that were empty, but had carried chemicals for warfare. Could be trouble; but we should hope that Iraq will disarm (doubtful) so this can come to an end once and for all. It ain't gonna happen, folks. War is coming, is just a matter of when.............Time to go. Hope you're having a good week, and now that it's just about over, hope you're going to have a good weekend. Take care and, hopefully, see you soon.
Wednesday, January 15, 2003............It wasn't the best of sleeps last night. Janice woke me up at 3:30 in the morning and other times intermittently with some very intense---erhm....noises. And you know what, it's not going to get any better tonight, because on the menu for supper was, Thora Cook's Rootin' Tootin' Chili. Hey, though, it was great. We don't have that near often enough, and despite the rather atmospherically invading after effects, it's worth it to enjoy the meal!........The work day again was quite normal and easy to deal with. It's been a very good year up to now, but it's going to pick up sooner or later and become a challenge. Which is fine, actually. Don't want it to get too boring.............The three of us attended TKD class once again tonight, and it was much more a workout than yesterday. I think we were being evaluated for testing for our next belts, but I can't attempt my Yellow Belt yet because we just can't afford it. Monday, we got a huge stack of bills that gave us a big time awakening as to our financial state, and it ain't good. Not absolutely terrible, but could be much better. Much, much better. Anyway, things will pick up next month as far as that goes...........It's looking like Janice probably will not get that job she was going after. It's a shame, because it would've been ideal for her, and for us as a family actually, but easy come easy go.........My sister Cindy dropped by tonight and dropped off a lovely lamp for Lexy's room. Like, a REALLY nice lamp. It's looking like she and George are indeed moving to Halifax in the summertime, with him going ahead of her and her following him in the months ahead. Of the seven Cook kids, that leaves Rick, Greg and me still in Moncton..........The night's drawing to a close here, so let's get right into HEADLINE OF THE DAY...........North Korea's crimes against humanity are beginning to bubble to the surface. Far beyond the nightmare of what's been alleged lately about their dabbling into nuclear weaponry, it's being discovered that the crimes of Pingpong Wang and his totalitarian regime are monumental; indeed, Nazi-like. Follow this link and read the horrifying findings for yourself: http://www.msnbc.com/news/859191.asp?vts=011520031715&cp1=1#BODY ........W'e're over the hump day, folks. See you again real soon, and remember to keep on coming back whenever you get a chance!
Tuesday, January 14, 2003............It's been a long time since I participated in a tae kwon do class, but today I started back. It was good to finally get back into it. Rather than endure a class of intense cardio like we often do, I was able to concentrate on Tae Geuk, a form that needs to be learned to achieve Yellow Belt. I was able to nail it tonight, where normally I'd need two or three classes to pick up something like that. Perhaps the time off did some good, for more than just my foot..........The work day was again very smooth with no overly busy schedules to keep up on. I was able to finish soon enough to put together our spaghetti and garlic bread ready to be cooked after TKD class............The weather has been absolutely bone chilling lately. There's still no letup from the cold snap that's been going on for several days now, and there's no end in site. I think today the high was minus 14 celcius or something, and at night it's something like minus 24. At least there's no snow. There's this commercial on TV with Wayne Gretzky, and look---I like 'ol 99 as much as the next hockey fan, but he's in this car comemrcial where he says something like, "what's there to celebrate about Canada? Celebrate trees; celebrate ice; celebrate hard work"-----MY ARSE! I hate all those things! Well maybe not "hate", but I'm not going to 'celebrate' trees, hard work or especially ice. Cripes, talk about stereotyping Canada. Our neighbours to the south already think of us as lumberjacks amongst the trees, having ice and snow all year round..........We watched "24" again tonight, and let me tell you folks, this is the show to be watching on TV. Adults, anyway. It's very violent, but very smart and so well acted and written that you think you should be watching it on the silver screen. The crap thing about tonight's episode is, we found out that now we have to wait three weeks for the next new show. AARRRGGHHH!..............HEADLINE OF THE DAY............I have a big, BIG problem with the way the news media here in Canada keeps up on current events. I normally have to watch CNN to get a good grip on what's going on in the world, because I've seen the same damn three headlines in Canadian news for the past three days now. One: The Robert Pickton pig farm story, with the jackass that killed probably dozens of women and buried them on his pig farm. The media is doing their damndest to get every fibre of information on this story before it even has a chance to develop. And it's only a hearing!! Two: The "friendly fire" incident, about the Canadian soldiers who were accidentally killed by a U.S. plane bombing them who thought they might be the enemy. This is something that's been talked about EVERY FRIGGIN' DAY, for the last ten months or so since it happened. I hate the fact that it happened at all, of course, but WAIT until the trials are over for these things before you report them, PLEASE. Three: A school is on soft ground or something in Nova Scotia and it's slowly sinking into the ground. Well then, we'd better report that. Every day. For the next hundred years. DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT AND SHUT UP!!!!............So I didn't really have a Headline of the Day as much as a bitching about it. Sorry! We'll see what happens tomorrow. In the meantime, take care and see you again when you get a chance to come back!
Monday, January 13, 2003...........Monday, bloody Monday. I'm not crazy about them, I'll give you that. It's the one day of the week where you try to get going, and you just feel like you're spinning your wheels. Work was kind of like that today. You know how you drop everything you hold on some days, or you trip over your own shadow one time after another? That's the kind of day it's been. Could be worse, so I'll stop the bitching right there...........Janice worked the evening shift tonight. That left me with Alexandra and no TV, because she was grounded from watching it today after an outburst yesterday. We asked her to go to bed and she flipped her tutu, basically, so we said keep it up and no TV tomorrow. So she tried us, and now there's no TV today. That leaves me with the task of entertaining her somehow without the boob tube; so I cut up a honeydew melon that we shared, and then we just talked. It actually was a blessing in disguise, not having the television on. She asked me all kinds of questions that kids always ask, you know, like "how do fruits get so wet" and stuff. Anyway, after she went to bed I watched WWE's "Tough Enough", and this guy named Matt, who's one of the people competing for a WWE contract, got the snot beaten out of him by one of the trainers, Bob Holly. It was unwarranted, in my eyes. Matt got a black eye, a bloody lip and bashed all over. The objective in wrestling, because it is staged, is to look after your opponent so that he doesn't get seriously hurt. That seemed to have gone out the window here. I know there's a lot of controversy on wrestling internet websites about this incident, how Holly went overboard. Speaking of wrestling, Bret Hart and Vince McMahon, who've been at odds for over five years, apparently have buried the hatchet. I wonder if Hart will show up in WWE for an appearance sometime............HEADLINE OF THE DAY.............Pete Townshend was indeed arrested on child pornography charges, which he denies. What is it about the British and kiddie porn? Bee Gee Maurice Gibb, who died on the weekend, is another case stirring controversy, as now they're saying that after Gibb had a heart attack, and then not long after underwent surgery to remove a blockage in his abdomen. His brothers, Robin and Barry, question why surgery was done so soon after a heart attack. North Korea seems to also be backing down on all their threats to build a nuclear arsenal, and it seems like Pingpong Wang, or whatever the hell the name of their leader is, has a bark worse than his bite. Still, we'll see.............Monday is OVER. Good riddance! See you again soon.
Sunday, January 12, 2003..............As the night winds down here, a special from Australia plays on TV behind me of a Q and A with an audience and the Bee Gees with Janice watching on the couch. I'm hearing songs I haven't heard in a dog's age, at least. I don't own any Bee Gee's albums...well wait, I have the "Saturday Night Fever" CD...but I appreciate the mark they left on pop music. As you most likely know by the time you read this, Maurice Gibb died Saturday of a heart attack related to surgery he was having to address an abdominal condition..........With Janice working the afternoon, I did my little shift at the shop, and then made a couple of little cakes with Alexandra and her Easy Bake oven. She was some excited, I tell you. She saved one of the two cakes as a surprise for her mommy, and she gave it to her when we picked her up. It's magic to a kid like her, and magic to us to live it thru her eyes. Having a kid is great, folks. If you haven't had one yet, have a couple, at least. I wish we could have more, but we can't, because of Janice's health reasons, but we feel blessed to at least be able to have Lexy......I made our classic casserole tonight, and I can feel the garlic greasing up the Hershey highway right now! Sorry to get so graphic. But I kinda fear the results later on tonight with the wife. I have to remember where the clothespins are............HEADLINE OF THE DAY.............Obviously the Headline of the Day is the passing of Bee Gee Maurice Gibb. The guy was 53, far too young to be leaving the world. Apparently, he's had a history of problems with intestinal blockages. I remember back around '77 or '78, when "Saturday Night Fever" was all the rage, I played the dickens out of the record that my sister Cindy owned that was its soundtrack. I didn't really get anything else that they did, but I did see the reasons behind their popularity, especially with the ladies, with their crafty ballads coming off effortlessly one after the other. The other big headline that stuck out with me was hearing of Pete Townshend of The Who, who's being investigated for visiting a child porn site on the internet. Townshend says he was doing "research"based on the abuse he suffered as a child. What kind of research is that? Well, let's see how it plays out before anyone judges.............The week has begun. Take care of each other, and see you again as soon as you can get back here!
Saturday, January 11, 2003..............We just got done watching the DVD for "Signs", which we got as a gift for Christmas from Pete and Doriane, kinda. They gave us a gift cert for Future Shop, so that's what we used it on. It's a great DVD. Of course, the movie is awesome, that's a given, where we saw it already twice in the theatre. But funny enough, watching it again gave us the heebie jeebies, even though we knew all the stuff that was going to happen. The extras on the disc were especially interesting, with lots of commentary from writer/director/producer Shyamalan. I've said it before, this guy is the next James Cameron in movies, where everything he does is going to be great, and I'd even go so far as to say Shyamalan will one day surpass "Titanic" with the most moneymaking film ever. Might not be for a few years, but I think this guy's a genius with films...........I got up this morning after Janice had gone to work, with Alexandra serving me breakfast in bed (peanut butter on toast). What a sweet little girl we have. She always does stuff that will make us smile...........There was a mountain of dishes to be done, and the whole house needed vacuuming, so I got that done and whatever clothes that needed to be washed too so Janice wouldn't have any housework to do when she was done. After she got home, the three of us went to Champlain Place, where I bought a calendar that was 75% off. Kylie Minogue exactly. MAN, what a babe she is. It's one of those calendars where guys like me thank God I'm a man. Anyway, we used a peeler card coupon to get a free bag of popcorn at Kernels; where we ran into my nephew Ryan with his girlfriend Robyn (could be with an "i", not a "y") and her mother, who honestly looked like a sister more than a mom. We left the mall and went to BJ's to use another peeler card coupon and got subs. Janice and me each got a toasted He-Man sub and Lexy got a salami sub. Yep, that's what she wanted............After we were done eating, Janice and Lexy went out with Janice's sister Jennifer to get Alexandra's ears pierced. I guess Lexy handled it like a real trooper, barely even wincing. Hey, that's my girl! She's proud as a peacock now. So are her parents............So then we settled in, ate popcorn and watched "Signs" after Lex went to bed, which brings me to now, where I'm about to also go that way...........HEADLINE OF THE DAY...........Know what? I don't have a clue what the headlines were in the news today, I didn't watch it or read it...........On that neutral note, I'm outta here. Have a good weekend and see you again!
Friday, January 10, 2003.............Finished out the week with a fairly busy day, but quite normal. It's getting cold around here these days, like real cold. Minus 13 or something for a high. Makes working outside kind of a pain in the ass. God bless those guys that have to fix broken water mains and stuff like that, I don't know where they get the gumption to do their jobs..........Janice worked the evening shift tonight, so that left Lexy and me to just hang out and do whatever, so she watched her kid's videos and I read stuff on the internet and watched TV for the bulk of the evening. One very interesting show that was on was the MuchMoreMusic Bio on the making of Def Leppard's "Hysteria" album. I remember being a kid waiting for that album to come out, and Leppard fans waited for four years after "Pyromania". Once I knew Mutt Lange was producing again, I knew is was gonna kick ass in a big way, and did it ever; but it was extremely interesting hearing different perspectives on how it all came together........A song that I REALLY like that I heard this week is a song called "Feel", by Robbie Williams. I know this guy signed a massive record deal with, I believe Virgin Records? I could be wrong about the name; anyway, this song and its video is an early favorite and candidate for song/video of the year in 2003.............HEADLINE OF THE DAY............It's heating up with North Korea and the rest of the world. NK pulled out of its treaty with the UN to not make nuclear weapons, and their leader said if anyone tried to impose sanctions on his country to protest, it could lead to World War 3. Suddenly Saddam looks like a fuzzy caterpillar next to this wacko...........It's been a slow and uneventful end to the week, but that could be a good thing eh? Let's see how the weekend goes. Good luck on it; and see you again, hopefully.
Thursday, January 9, 2003............Something I've realized for quite a while now is everybody at work I get close to eventually ends up leaving. Tonight we said our goodbyes to Jeanette, who's off to Cambridge, Ontario to pursue her journey of becoming a nun. When Janice, Lexy and me started getting chummy with Jeanette last summer, I found myself regretting not having to get to know her a lot better sooner, but better late than never, I thought. Now she's gone for good, and we'll be lucky to see her within the two weeks a year she gets for vacation. She's not the first that's wound up like this; Jennifer, a girl who worked with me at the shop, became a good friend and then left too, and I haven't seen her since. There was a girl named Courtney that worked at the shop that I'd volunteered to drive to work, and was starting to know her a little more, then she quit. Cindy, another one, got together with us here and there outside of work, then not long afterward she was gone. It's like a curse. I'm beginning to wonder, really. Put it this way, I think I'll hesitate before I become close friends with anyone at work in the future, at least right now.............Yet another slow work day. I went to Wally World today and got Lexy a new backpack for school and a kid's shovel, which believe it or not, she really wanted............"Smackdown!" night with the boys was called off because of Jeanette coming over for that one final visit with us. She was here for an hour and a half, after which I was kind of numb knowing she's gone for good. Janice talked to Dale on the phone while I just sat here and stared into nothingness thinking of it. Jeanette, as you might know, was the Legs of the Week girl #2, after Dale, before I pulled the plug on the whole thing involving personal acquaintances..........HEADLINE OF THE DAY...........Funny enough, Alexandra talked to me today when I picked her up at school about how her friends are trying to scare her with stories of vampire bats. The news came up later in the night offering news contrary to that very perception, that the saliva in vampire bats may be extremely beneficial in preventing strokes in people. Who'd have thunk that?? They'll know in two years or so if this is true, when they're done clinical tests on humans..............Over and out. Take care and see you in a day or so.
Wednesday, January 8, 2003............Still another easy day at work. It'll be this way all week because of one of our catering truck customers, to whom I deliver his order to five days a week, blew the engine in his truck; thus giving him the week off. It means a few less hours to work, but it's starting the year off with a rather relaxed mood, and I like that, that's for sure..........Janice worked in the evening tonight, and her evenings working may be rather numbered upon word that she may be getting the job she applied to get. As it turns out, she'd be looking after an older woman with dimentia three streets over, on Cassidy Street, which was Emmerson Street, where I grew up. And only five houses down from where I'd lived. It would be a forty hour week, Monday to Friday, 8-4. We've both got our fingers crossed..........I went and made a clean spot upstairs in our rather large bedroom, and wound up overhauling the whole room like I did the kitchen and livingroom just recently. Had Lexy take a shower, got her a snack and put her to bed, and basically just relaxed the next couple of hours till Janice got home and we both retired for the evening. Makes for kind of a boring journal entry, but that's the way it was...........HEADLINE OF THE DAY...........The Ottawa Senators NHL franchise looks to be headed for the crapper financially. For anyone who might not know, the Senators are the hottest team in hockey these days with the best record in the league, but the owners may lose the team and the building due to rising salaries and costs. This all just goes to show that the high paychecks these pro athletes get is killing sports altogether, namely in Canada, where the Canadian dollar just does not compete with the American dollar these days. It's only a matter of time before you don't see Canadian teams in hockey anymore, or baseball, or basketball, regarding MLB, the NBA or NHL. I'm not surprised in the least. And it won't be all that long either before the Maple Leafs, Canadiens, Oilers and Flames are gone too. One by one they're gonna go. Probably the Flames or the Oilers after Ottawa............We're over the hump day of the week now, with the weekend fast approaching. Take care and I'll see you again, hopefully, right here on Belmont Street!
Tuesday, January 7, 2003...........We just got done watching this week's episode of "24". Cripes, is that getting crazy. It's going to be tough waiting a whole friggin' seven days to see the follow up to the end of the show we saw tonight...........Today was a very easy, very welcome work day, with only six hours to do the regular tasks. Although I really would like more hours, working a six day week comes in handy in the end as far as that goes...........I did even more shoveling today, making room around Lexy's swingset in the back yard so she can go back there and play around. I'm so glad she has tae kwon do to go to every day, because there's just no one around the neighbourhood for her to play with. It's a little sad watching her play by herself all the time, but she certainly finds ways to have fun even if no one else is around. We have to do more too, Janice and me, to have fun with our little girl while she's still little. Not that we neglect her or anything, of course not, but we have to let ourselves be kids with our kid probably a lot more than we are............Janice is just about at 100% now, with her voice all the way back, and her attending TKD class every day now, if she can. Alexandra also goes at least to one class a day, sometimes two. Lexy's teacher told us also that today was a big improvement over yesterday as far as her behaviour goes, so that's nice to hear..........HEADLINE OF THE DAY...........In London, England today I heard on CTV news that they found a bunch of guys that were in possession of this deadly substance that's 1000 more dangerous than cobra venom; can't remember the name of it though. Now that's going to send everyone into a panic. Also there's a lot of teeth chattering about North Korea's nuclear activity, where they're not backing down to the U.N.'s pleas to cease plans to go ahead to build a nuclear arsenal in their military. They even said they're ready to go to war for it. Happy happy, joy joy! What a bunch of party poopers..........That's it and that's all, folks, see you again in a day---thanks for dropping by!
Monday, January 6, 2003.............For all the complaining I've done about shoveling the last couple of days, I voluntarily shoveled a ton more of snow today for some reason. I made the length of our driveway wider and longer, and even made a path for Lexy to get to the backyard to play. I got this new shovel at Zellers today, and it made shoveling quite a bit quicker than with the antique shovel we had already. So now I fully expect my back to take out revenge on me..............Janice got a job offer today, to be a caregiver for an older lady with dimentia. The job would be eight to four, Monday to Friday, forty hours a week. She's considering taking it and keeping her Superstore job for one shift a week, to maintain the Blue Cross coverage............This morning, I did my usual delivery route for the job and I arrived at one of the stores where there's a woman there who's become a friend of mine and Janice's over the last number of months. I was shocked to learn that she's going through a very difficult time; and it made me realize you never know what anyone is going through. A lot of us really are closed books...........Lexy attended two Tae Kwon Do classes today, at her own request. She had a note sent home from her teacher today too, about her mild disobedience at school. We think this will turn around, but I won't think for a moment she's not capable of causing trouble just because she's my daughter. So we've got our ears to the ground about it............We settled in tonight to catch "Boston Public" and some of "Joe Millionaire", about a bunch of women vying to be the companion to a guy who's posing as a rich man, but who only makes $20,000 a year in construction, or something. It's pretty funny really. All these women saying 'it's really not because he's rich', and you know damned well that's why they're there. We'll see real soon anyway, right?...............HEADLINE OF THE DAY...........There's a lot of talk about how imminent war with Iraq is right now, with talk coming from Sadass Insane that the UN weapons inspectors are actually spies collecting information. More troops are moving in, as well as a huge medic ship from the U.S. to supposedly take care of any soldiers that may meet with injury during battle. With the date drawing nearer for the inspectors to be leaving Iraq, Hussein is urging his citizens to be defiant to the U.N. personnel knocking on the doors of his potential hideaways. The next couple of weeks will be tense........Have a good week folks, and take care of each other; maybe say a prayer for the innocents in Iraq, of which many may lose their lives needlessly should things continue to get worse. And thank God you were born here and not there!
Sunday, January 5, 2003.............Canada gets the silver again; kind of a drag. We just watched the Russians win the gold medal game in the World Junior Hockey Championship Tournament by a score of 3-2. Not a bad game, I guess, but the announcers made it sound like one of the best of all time. Come on now...............I knew when I got up this morning I'd have to shovel again, because when we went to bed last night it was still snowing a bit, and the wind was blowing the snow around that had already fallen. When I went out this morning, though, it's like we never shoveled at all last night. I spent another 45 minutes shoveling the van out again. Then I went to work, picked up a bread order for the shop, and when I got to BJ's I found out I had to shovel another half hour. I did that, finished my job four hours later, came home, and saw that I had to shovel another half hour or so to successfully navigate out of the walkway. Now my back is really pissy with me.............So I spent the rest of the afternoon resting a somewhat sore back. Janice made supper and Lexy came in from playing in the snow most of the day and we ate, and settled in for the hockey game. That brings me to now, writing this journal entry................HEADLINE OF THE DAY.............I guess one of the big stories is Canada settled for the silver medal in Junior Hockey tonight. Something I heard on the news just a few minutes ago, though, that kind of bothers me, is there's talk in the U.S. of re-introducing the draft for the military. With all the technology that exists today, I really don't believe that there needs to be any more people going to war than there is. If there was ever a draft in Canada, which I really don't believe there ever would be, I'd be living on a diet of Tim Horton's donuts and cheesecake toothpaste so I'd gain a hundred pounds and be deemed unfit for war. Call me chicken; I just can't see me killing another human being............That's the end of the day, folks. Hope you had a good weekend, and come see me again here whenever you like! You know I love visitors.
Saturday, January 4, 2003...........Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow. That's what we did today, we stayed in and we let it snow. It came down by the ton today, most of it in my driveway, which I shoveled out tonight with over an hour's worth of labour. Lots of exercise, that's for sure. Janice was outside with me, shoveling the walkway, and Alexandra frolicked in the huge snowbanks. I would venture to say somewhere between thirty to thirty five centimetres came down up to now, and it's still snowing out as I type this, and it's 10:39pm. Right now Lexy's behind me having a hot chocolate and marshmallows, one of her favorite treats lately. Suppertime consisted of a goulash that I threw together, with diced potatoes, ground beef, green and red peppers, onions, Louisiana hot sauce, and mushrooms. Pretty hearty, and it provided fuel for me for the huge shoveling job at hand later. Alexandra ate the whole thing, she loves all the stuff that was in it, and Janice was the same. Trouble is, lots of gas is being produced after we ate this stuff, so it could be interesting later on.............HEADLINE OF THE DAY...........Haven't tuned into the news too much today, but I did hear rumblings that gas and home heating oil prices are going to spike in the coming days. That could mean a lot of trouble for the economy, which is already coping with lofty prices in fuel. With gas currently at 84.9 cents a litre locally, they're talking about it going upwards of 90 cents a litre. The other headline getting a lot of attention is, of course, the snowstorm, dumping at least thirty centimetres on us up to now here in the city.........That's the kind of day it's been. See ya again soon, hopefully, as I try to put together enough stuff to announce an update here at the site. Come back soon!
Friday, January 3, 2003............Man oh man, I got up this morning thinking I was gonna hurl big time. I thought the stomach virus finally found me. This thing's been running rampant around here for a long time now, the last month especially, and hospitals all around the Maritimes are closing their emergency rooms and turning back visitors because of it. So I thought, seeing as I deliver to two hospitals three times a day, sooner or later my time will come. This morning, I thought it was it. I got dizzy, broke in a cold sweat, the whole nine yards, but never got sick. I toughed it out and went to work anyway. Eventually, it occured to me what my menu was the night before: Poppycock, nearly a half tray of Toffifee, barbecue chips, a hamburger just a half hour before bed, all topped off with some chocolate and a Diet Pepsi nightcap. Sounds like a nightmare recipe doesn't it? Mix together and barf. Well, I didn't barf, but I took a Gravol for luck and as luck would have it, I was fine............We did follow the meatless Friday thing though, as our sacrifice to the Big Guy. I made a nice vegetarian pizza and garlic fingers for us for supper, and got some bagels for us to snack on here and there rather than chips and Poppycock and chocolate all the friggin' time............We brought Alexandra to tae kwon do, and when we picked her up I finally bought my shin guards. Next week I start up again. It'll be nice to get the blood flowing.........Janice finally took my advice and went to outpatients tonight after calling in sick for work today, because she has absolutely no voice, and pain in the ears. That sounds like infection to me, so she went to see a doctor, who diagnosed her with more or less the same thing I had. Now it's her turn for the antibiotics, and the doc told her to take a few days off for some rest.........We spent the evening exploring the "Total Recall" DVD that Janice gave me for Christmas. That's certainly a classic movie in the science fiction realm. Seems like all the movies derived from writer Philip Dick are adapted for great movies, among them being "Total Recall", "Blade Runner", "A. I." and others I can't think of now.............HEADLINE OF THE DAY...........Seems like all the fuss around here today is the coming snowstorm that's starting overnight. We'll see how that pans out. Gas prices are a huge fuss lately too. It's topped out, at least up to now, at 84.9 cents a litre. That's friggin' insane...............Speaking of which, I have to head out to a grocery store and get a few necessities which I might not be able to get tomorrow. So I'm outta here---hope you're happy and healthy where you are, and thank you for coming to see me here at Belmont Street!
Thursday, January 2, 2003..............Tomorrow is Friday! That's just weird, because during the holidays, you get all screwed up and during Christmas and New Year's the days feel a lot like Sunday. So naturally today felt a lot like Monday, but the nice thing is, that tomorrow is the end of the work week. Not bad at all...........After doing a short shift for work again this morning/afternoon, after 2 PM I came home and while Lexy played outside, I took a pile of homemade CD's I've had for a long time and made labels and covers for them. What a job! But I got most of it all done. I picked up Janice from her afternoon shift hoping to get her in time to bring her and Lexy to TKD class, but when I picked her up it was clear she wasn't going anywhere. Her voice was all but completely gone. She has exactly the same illness that I'd had, fever and all. So tomorrow, we'll have her seen by a doctor who will likely give her the same meds that I was given to get rid of what I had...........My nephew Steven and his galpal Sara came over tonight to watch WWE Smackdown! with us. We haven't seen Sara in ages, and it's been quite some time since the Stevester has been here too. We caught up on things and had a nice little time. We had Sara laughing so hard she had to make a beeline for the bathroom, thanks in part to the portable whoopee cushion she had with her. Don't ask............HEADLINE OF THE DAY.....I guess the biggest story I heard today was that there might be some connection in Moncton to those five goons wanted by the FBI in the States. Now doesn't that make us look grand? Plus there's growing talk (no pun intended) about the de-criminalization of marijuana in Canada. That's a loaded ball of wax. I support it though, as I think ultimately it will free up a lot of space in Canadian penitentiaries, thus freeing up a lot of tax dollars and leaving law enforcement to focus on more serious issues than a bunch of folks caught with a joint in their wallet. We'll see how it all pans out...........Take care of yourselves, anyway, and of course take care of each other. Thank you for using your valuable time to come see me at my modest little website here!
Wednesday, January 1, 2003.............Ba-da-bing, it's a brand new year, folks. And for the Cook house here on Belmont Street, it's off to a quiet start, and I don't really mind that. Everything's closed anyway, so we basically just stayed at home and did a whole lotta nothing. Suppertime today consisted of leftover wings from last night, and that made for a lot too, because last night we kind of expected company and never got it, so that enabled us to eat with a lot less effort today. On the Space Channel, they played a Star Trek Movie Marathon, the first six Trek movies, and we caught some of it. We went out just to get some air this evening, and when we got back, we decided to watch "Miss Congeniality" starring Sandra Bullock which we had on tape for a while now. It was a very good show. Certainly, the character Bullock played is the type that appeals to guys like me, the girls who kick ass and take no prisoners type you know? Hey, I wound up marrying that type of girl, so there ya go!............HEADLINE OF THE DAY...........This is a new feature I'm going to see if I can keep up on, so I can look back on my recorded efforts in the journals here one day and say, "hey, I remember when that happened". Maybe the most notable thing that happened that sticks out in my head the most today is, that authorities failed to find five men who allegedly entered the United States illegally from Canada, and these men are suspected as terrorists linked to Al Qaeda. It made New Year's Eve a little tense in some parts of the U.S., and even here in Canada, but to us stay-at-homers, we just looked on and wondered. Good thing nothing happened.............That's the way the first day of 2003 went from this end, take care and keep on coming back!
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