So I kinda of sort of went on an unintentional month long hiatus… I kept saying to myself I need to blog. I need to blog! But then I’d be like “I’ll post something tomorrow…”. Tomorrow would come and I would forget again. I’m the queen of procrastination! I am busy with work, and my family and all that. But still.

But I do have something to blog about! Keith (finally) got his licence back. And guess what? He bought a car. A 2006 Mazda 3 Sport (sedan). It’s dark grey and really nice. I’m driving it today. My car needs to go into the shop and get looked at so I am trying not to drive it much right now. So I am using his as much as I can. Which annoys him but he deals. I love driving it though. It’s an awesome car and I’m jealous a little… shh…. don’t tell him that! Cause I said I wasn’t

Tomorrow is Canada Day and guess what that means! Next Tuesday is going to be my 30th birthday! I’m excited for my Birthday. I have always loved birthdays but my 30th is bittersweet. I feel old!

We are going camping this weekend. We went 2 weekends past and are going again to weekends after. In other words every second weekend. We’re going to Digby. My parents, my brother, Keith and I, 3 dogs and 3 cats. Yes we are taking the cats camping… not commenting on that.

I’ve been working on a website idea. It’s not a new one by any means but I am working on a ghost story website using WordPress as a platform to enter stories. I am trying to come up with a domain name that is either a .ca or .com and that is distinctly Atlantic or “Maritime” Canadian related. I am having a hard time coming up with something that works and is not too long. I want something ghost or haunting related and with a Canadian theme or Maritime (Atlantic) theme. I just can’t seem to come up with anything. I think I’m gonna take a few days and try some things out.

More like Weekly and maybe sometimes by-weekly. In my defense we moved this weekend and the end of last week so I didn’t have much time. I know… excuses, excuses! I am not in much of a blogging or designing mood lately though. I think I found a Wacom Bamboo Tablet that I may try and pick  up tonight if the person messages me back. Maybe that’ll get me in the mood. There is tons of tutorials for drawing with tablets to get me started. I have been trying to do a little photo manipulation and also have put my 2 cameras up on kijiji.ca to see what I could get out of them. I want to either trade the two of them up for a better dSLR or sell them and buy one.

So I said we moved this weekend. We have everything finally in my parents place and guess what? On Saturday while in the middle of moving our water pipe decided to burst flooding the basement and endangering everything we just put down there. Not to mention the fact we spent most of the weekend with the water off while trying to first fix then replace the pipe. Lets just say there was no happy campers in my house this weekend.

I got a raise this pay, plus there was no rent to pay (other then the $50 bi/weekly we promised to pay mom each to live there to help with food and such) so for once I paid everything up a little in advance and still have a little left over. What a nice feeling!

Going to start back on walking every night tonight. Put it off for the weekend figuring that 1) there would be no time and 2) we’d be too tired and 3) we got enough excersise by lifting heavy furniture and sweating in the hot sun while doing it… so back to the daily grind tonight. If Keith won’t come I’ll grab a dog and go for a short walk with them just to get back into the swing of things.

What better way to end a warm sunny day then with a nice barbecued supper! Yes… I barbecued supper myself last night. Normally I avoid the barbecue but ours is pretty easy. Just turn the gas on, turn the burners on and hit a button and it lights itself! I guess it’s not that impressive since a lot of them do that now. But I am used to the ones you have to turn the gas on and guess at how much you should give it before dropping a lit match into the barbecue and hope like hell that you don’t blow yourself, your house, or your friends, family and neighbors up! Those are the kind I am used to and I do not like them!

I cooked Pork sirloin chops and baked potatoes. And for once I didn’t just throw them on the grill and hope for the best. I actually brined them first and then added a dry rub I made with random spices. I don’t remember what I just grabbed what I thought would taste good and hoped for the best… see a pattern going on here?? I also did baked potatoes in foil. We picked up a garden salad mix and all in all it was a good supper and only took me about an hour and a half.

It was a nice way to spend my day off. I alternated between staying in the nice cool house. Which was cool until the sun went down then it started to feel like a sauna in there. The other night I made potatoes on the grill to go with hot dogs. I sliced up potatoes and added butter, garlic, dried onions, thyme and oregano and wrapped them in foil and threw them on the grill beside the hot dogs.

I haven’t gotten out walking a lot though. I need to go every night I think. I could either do longer walks every 2-3 nights or a shorter walk every night. I think I am going to go with the shorter walks, but still building up and going farther every day, as if I only do a few a week and make them longer then I keep making excuses for not wanting to go. If I get in the habit of every single night then once I get into the habit I will miss it when I don’t and therefor I will… Or that’s the plan anyway.

I made the mistake last night of looking into how much it would cost to join a gym (one with a pool) or other weight loss membership kinds of things. And I was surprised really surprised, at how much some of them cost! I was looking for Yoga classes or something like that as I don’t just want to loose weight but also tone and improve my flexibility as well. But it’s like $60 a month to join the YMCA (since when did they get so expensive?) or the local sportsplex. Yoga classes at a Yoga studio near me were like $200 for 5 classes plus another $100 for the initial consultation fee. I just can’t afford that so it looks like I am going at it alone.

Once we get the pool up I plan on swimming every day and going for a walk every day. Which I am hoping will be soon since we have summer-like weather already. Yesterday it went up to 33°C (91°F). Today is supposed to go to 20°C (68°F).  But it’s kinda overcast right now. We have to move the rest of our stuff this weekend but then next I hope to get started on where the pool is going so dad can order sand and gravel. And Keith can build a retaining wall to keep it from rolling down the hill since the backyard is not completely level and needs to be dug out on one side and filled on the other.

I can’t wait for the really warm weather since I am minutes from the ocean, actually at the bottom of my street there is a dock and cove we can swim in that is part of the ocean. But at the same time nice and sheltered. I plan on enjoying this summer! Even if I hate the thought of myself in a swim suit. Speaking of which I need a new one…

Wow a whole week… and I was doing pretty good too! I guess that’s what happens when your busy and feel like you don’t have enough time to get everything done. We decided to move into my parents house a little early. We went for the weekend to visit last weekend and just never left.  It started out that we didn’t want to feel rushed by trying to move everything in the last weekend in May. So we started bringing things up that we are not using. Then we moved on to some clothing we used but not all the time. Next thing I know we are moving the bed or the mattress anyway up. After that we had no where to sleep other then my parents place.

This weekend we are taking Saturday to pack and move as many boxes as we can fit in my car (it’s a 4 door Cobalt so it’s roomy enough). Unpack things in the late afternoon and early evening on Saturday and then I plan on vegging Sunday for some of the day. Monday is Victoria Day in Canada. It’s a National Holiday but it is not Statutory (not a paid holiday) in Nova Scotia. However my employer has been kinda enough to give the day off to us with pay. Which is awesome! I still have to drive Keith in to work for 8 and pick him up for 4:30 or 5:30 but I have the rest of the day to do whatever I like. Which I plan to enjoy!

I have been walking 3-4 times since last weekend for about 3 km each walk. I plan on building it up to about 5 km 4 times a week by the end of next weekend. To the end of our road and back is about 1.8 km. I plan on walking to the end of the road and then going down the main road for another 1.6 km and then turning around and going back which will be 5 km total. The road into Chester is beautiful. I really want to create a weight loss blog but just haven’t found the time to get it set up beyond the install of wordpress in the directory. I have not had the time to create a theme or anything. Maybe I’ll just use one of my old themes to get it started…

My car has needed a new struts in the front for a little while now and I have been putting it off because I would end up loosing the car for a few days while they did it. I know not a very good reason… would I rather loose it for 2 days while they fix it or have something more happen because of it and loose it for a week or worse. My logic is rather faulty at the moment… Now, it seems there is something else wrong with my car. Ever put your emergency break on on a hill and then drove away forgetting to take it off? The car feels sluggish like it is breaking (obviously!) and sometimes you get that rubber burning smell. Well I do not have my emergency break on and it is doing that. Minus the burning smell (thank god). It kinda feels like that or like it’s just stuck in gear or something and is not changing gears. So now I need to take it in and have someone look at it. It’s fairly new too, a 2008, so I am hoping it is nothing serious. Nothing the warranty won’t cover hopefully.

Lizzie posted on her blog days that she will alway remember. I agree there are always days that you will never forget. Something so significant happened that you will always remember that day. Mine aren’t all specific dates in history. More just dates in my life that I will always remember. Here’s the 2 most memorable days in my life. That’s not saying that there aren’t more…

9/11

I’ll start off with the same one. As it was memorable and affected so many people. All over the world. For some of the same reasons and for some different ones.

I was at work. I was working at The Bay (a large Canadian Department store)  in Mic Mac Mall. I was behind the counter and the televisions where off to the left in the furniture department and we could clearly see them from behind the counter. I was ringing in someones transaction and just happened to glance over at the TV as I saw the broadcast of it happening I thought it was something someone had “computer” generated as I could not here the sound. Then someone said “Turn it up!” So they did. Just as the second plane hit. My mouth dropped open and the girl I was waiting on said “What is it”? I could only point. Then she stared in shocked horror too. We both went over there and she grabbed my hand (she was a complete stranger) as she started to ball when we realized it was real. I do not remember much of the rest of the day. I had to go home because my Dad was in New York or New Jersey and we were not sure where. Turns out he was very close…

Rolling my Car

If you’ve ever been in or seen a car accident you know how traumatic they can be or how it’s something you will never forget. I’ve only ever been in 2 that I can remember and neither one of them was that great but I really must have had someone on my side during one of them. It was on February 14th of last year (yep,Valentines day…) and I was in Halifax because I was getting some last minute stuff done before I went to Afghanistan. I was leaving for Ottawa for training in about 3 weeks and needed to all the paperwork ready for my passport and work visa and to do something with my boyfriend at the time. He never showed so I left. I was driving back home and it was snowing pretty heavily I was supposed to stop at Martock and pick up my brother on the way home but when I got there he had already gotten a ride home (thank god!) so I left and was driving towards home and there was a curve up ahead, same one I had been around a number of times.

And I lost control. I hit a patch of ice and couldn’t see where I was going and I new I was going to hit the guard rail and it wouldn’t be good. Only… there was no guardrail and I went right over the side and down steep hill. Steep enough you can not walk up it. There is a river down below. A small one but deep enough and fast enough to drown someone easily. The incline was also covered in trees. Large pine trees and some small ones. I hit a tree and flipped the car onto the drivers side. And slid through the snow down the hill hitting more trees along the way till I hit another large one which flipped my car onto the roof and I rolled sideways down the hill heading right for the river.

Luckily I hit another large tree (if you could call that lucky) which flipped me back onto my side and then upright and I ended up with my car in the water facing upstream. It quickly started filling with water and I panicked and call my ex-boyfriend then 911.  I managed to get out of the car (by breaking a window) and thankfully the snow was hard packed enough to not just roll away as I pulled myself up the hill by grabbing onto trees (the ones that were left anyways) and soft enough that I had something to help me get up the hill. It took a number of tries and I kept sliding back into the water and under the car.

Finally I managed to get up the hill and onto the road but I was scared someone would hit me in the snow storm so I headed for a bridge I new was up ahead hoping that I could get to a house that was just after it. Someone came along though and found me. But they couldn’t even see my car (pictures of the car and accident site on my facebook) from the road it was so far down and didn’t even believe me at first. My car was totaled but I was unhurt mostly (sore and hurt my neck and back a little but no lacerations or major injuries)!

The Day I arrived in Kandahar

We had training for a week prior to going and I had “months” to prepare myself for going. I was all excited and scared at the same time. I kind of knew what to expect but it was still a bit of a shock when I landed. As we were approaching I was listening to my mp3 player and I had my Nikon CoolPix (mine is an 8MP one from a year or two ago but you get the idea) out taking pictures. I did not take my good camera as I was scared sand and bugs and stuff would damage it but now I am wishing with the money I made there, and since I could have easily just bought another one, that I did take the good one. Anyway I was taking pictures and the guy in the seat beside me asked me to put it away and said that I needed to make sure nothing that could move was out. IE put everything away in the bag under your seat… So I did. And you have no idea how thankful I was that I did! Next thing I know were went from being in the air (way way up) to on the ground in a matter of a minute or less. It was a fast landing. My first days there were filled with trying to get all the ID’s I needed on base and settling into my 6×8 foot ‘room’ in my tent. And learning not to wear shorts and short sleeves as the sun burns! Sand got in everything. Even places you didn’t know existed! And it smelled. Really bad. But in the end when I left I had a lot of good and bad memories (like falling and biting 1/3 of my lip off… thankfully it was on the inside and grows back to a point but leaves a scar) to bring with me. And I was kinda sad to leave.

Maybe I will think of some more later. But that’s it for now…