We're teaching kids!

Soo y'all know how my mom's a teacher... well today she was helping out in a Gr 7 boys class and as part of their English studies they were learning about blogs. 

On the smartboard their teacher pulled up a professional music blog, then a professional sports blog, then my mother pulled up Trouser Trek.

I was a bit stunned and skeptical when she told me this - I'm not sure if 12 year old boys are really our intended audience! However she assured me that she read "A Short Story" to them and nothing more.

Their conversation of course turned to internet safety. Mother pointed out our blog names and the class thought we were quite smart. 

Hooray for teaching kids!

"Reading" week

Well let me start by saying that YES I *did* read, but NO, it was not for school.

I edited an essay (for Malcolm), and read 2 John Green Novels! (Looking for Alaska and Paper Towns)

Anyways a run down of my week let's see.

The lovely Valerie already covered Fri, which was a ton of fun! Moving right along then...

my Sat was spent slaving in a hot kitchen :P I made a roast beef dinner (my favourite meal) for Malcolm's family. That was a fun dinner. His fam joined mine at our place. I thought it would be more awkward but it wasn't. His lil sis got on well with mine and all was happy and good!

Sunday was mostly chilling with the fam jam. and on

MONDAY I went to the Toronto Zoo! (with Malcolm) he indulged my inner 5 year old and we had fun coming up with alternative names for animals. These guys for instance are actually called Pgymy Marmosets:

We called them Hamster Monkeys :P

and The Red Panda? 

Giant Ginger Raccoons

needless to Say Monday was a ton of fun.

on TUESDAY I went out for Tea with Alysha, Bartoli and the Scallywag. It was really nice to see them all :)

And then comes Wed. Wednesday was GIRLS DAY!

We all met up at Valerie's at 11am and STOP THE WORLD - Michele showed up at 10:58. that's EARLY.

DO YOU REALISE HOW EARTH SHATTERING THIS IS?!?!?!

anyways we hung out at V's, watched some videos of Michele playing guitar hero with the boy, caught up on goss, had lunch ( we had soup and grilled cheese, for the record - I do not like soup. But I did not let this on until after I had finished mine and definitely NOT in front of V's mom)

After lunch was SHOE SHOPPING!! V needed shoes for an MUN thinger so we headed off to Winners where we were SUCCESSFUL!! I also bought shoes. Dina would be so proud of me. They were SOO cute I just couldn't resist!!

Mine on the left, V's on the right. Looking forward to Dina's thoughts on these! :P

hmm hmm after the shoes we went to my place quickly, dropped off my stuff and watched the videos from Michele's b-day. too funny. Then we headed off to the barn to meet Michele's little girl!

 SQUEE!

The evening ended with us at Michele's watching The Notebook. very sappy and cute :P

ok let's see (I never knew my week was so busy!!)

Thursday I went to visit my grandparents and guess what I had for lunch? MORE SOUP. geez louise it's like the universal lunch food apparently.

That evening I went bowling with Malcolm, his lil sis and his 2 female cousins. His mom was worried that the cousins would tease me, but we got along swimmingly. what happened? The four girls spent the night teasing him :P

think think. I don't THINK I did anything exciting Friday or Sat... other than go shopping for b-day presents for pod-mate and ginger. Also hung out with said ginger. ( as usual reading "hung out with" as "made out with".... and possibly more:P )

I unfortunately didn't get to see my girls again before headed back to Ottawa but such is life.

My ride back to Ottawa was uneventful - I caught a ride with G-Patz and him sober on a 3 hour car ride is BORING. He read some book of communist jokes and I Listened to music.

anyways now that I'm back in Rez I feel like I should do some actual school work. bah procrastination!

As usual love you all and I look forward to getting the pants soon!!

The last day of break and birds

Hello ladies!

Long time no see! :P

It really has been too long since I've seen you. That will have to change at some point but considering how much work there is to do in the next few months... it may be a while.

I did not want to post on the blog because I want to rant about how sad I am for missing out on C4 time (even though I am quite sad about that). I didn't want to post on the blog to complain about how much my sunburn hurts but how I'm simultaneously impressed but how tan I look ("tan" actually reads "not pasty"). I didn't even want to post about how depressed I am about having to go back to school tomorrow and having so much work to do.

But now that I've mentioned it... ARGHHHHH!

Nope. I didn't want to post about any of those things. I wanted to post about a moment of weakness I had this afternoon.

I got Twitter.

Gah! I'd been doing so well at not having it and thinking it was ridiculous but now I have it! I'm not even that upset that I gave in. I'm not sure if my stoic approach to this is the most wise but I think it has a lot to do with the fact that 1) my Twitter account is not linked and will not ever be linked with my Facebook account and 2) I now get to "follow" awesome people like realjohngreen and hankgreen for super awesome updates on nerdtastic things including live shows where they answer questions.

I'm kind of excited about knowing when things are happening. Is that a bad thing?

Well there it is, I can tweet at people now.

(Nelly Furtado's I'm Like a Bird in anyone's head right now?)

And people can also follow me, though I'm really not sure why they would...

Anywho, if you ladies ever decide to go to the dark side to you can find me, Dina Briant or Dina_49 on Twitter here.

Now I must go out in search of some groceries because I am hungry!

Much love,

Dina

The Holiday

Ladies,

I would like to start off my mentioning how amazingly tired I am right now. I did not sleep well at all last night due to overexposure to the sun yesterday morning and woke up at 2:13am for no particular reason this morning. My eyeballs are trying really hard to close even though I keep telling them to stay open and my mind is spinning around like the top at the end of Inception.

Good movie.

Yup.

So, I went on a vacation this past week and it was lovely. It was in the 80s every day (I don’t think in Celsius when south of the border so you’ll have to look it up) and completely sun-tastic. Each morning was begun by a scrumptious breakfast and a walk on the beach. If that isn’t one of the best ways to start your day I’m really not sure what qualifies. Most often the scrumptious breakfast was had at our hotel (the plural is my family and I). They had a waffle iron that just begged to be used so I had several delicious waffles for breakfast.

As lovely as the hotel breakfasts were (and they actually were) there was one breakfast that was rather special. Can you guess why?

IHOP.

International House of Pancakes.

You ladies know that I’ve been heading down south in the States almost every winter season of my life and so it shouldn’t be such a surprise to know that I’ve developed some traditions during that time. One of those is always going to IHOP. When I was younger I had one order that I would always get and that was the chocolate chip Funny Face pancake. Now that I’m older and more respectable there have been some changes in my habits but what did I order when I was at IHOP on Thursday morning? That’s right, a Funny Face pancake!

(My order was actually the Pick-A-Pancake Combo and, of course, I picked chocolate chip pancakes. Just as the waitress was about to leave I said “It would kind of make my day if the whip cream on my pancakes made a smiley face…” and when my pancakes grinned up at my from my plate my day, needless to say, was most definitely made.)

So, after breakfast we went for a walk on the beach.

The beach in Bonita Springs is a pretty good walk. The walking part of the beach actually extends south to Naples and probably North to some other city but it takes a while to make a trek that long, especially when the sun is so hot. My family usually walks along the beach just within the range of the waves and they laugh at me when I get my feet wet for the first time because the water feels cold and I make like a sandpiper and scurry up the sand away from the water. I think that I have a perfectly normal reaction to cold water on my feet but that doesn’t stop any giggles.

The general routine we fell into was walking one hour up the beach and one hour back to where we had parked. It was funny because we’d be walking on one angle for the first hour and then it became a little difficult to switch our feet around when we turned around.

Why does it feel like it should be midnight when it’s only 8:00pm? Why?

One thing I absolutely love to do on the beach is play volleyball. Indoor court volleyball just doesn’t hold the same appeal. Something about the sun beating down on your back, the sand that gets everywhere as you dive for the ball and the people that play beach volleyball completely trumps indoor court volleyball.

Right beside the main parking for the Bonita Springs beach is a beach volleyball court. It tempted me every day until one morning there was a ball sitting in the court. As soon as I saw it my fingers practically itched to touch it. The famiglia went and got drinks and while we were sitting and enjoying a little bit of shade a guy got up and started hitting the ball into the net a few times and that was the last push I needed so I went out there and we chatted and passed for a while which was a lot of fun.

Here I would like to mention something I’ve noticed that relates directly to this incident.

I’m rather good at attracting 25-29 year old American men.

This guy that I met on Thursday is an example. He was probably 27. When I was in the Dominican Republic for Christmas a few years ago I had two guys that hung out with me all afternoon and then until 8:30 at night playing beach volleyball. Those two were 26 and 28. They were kind of hanging on my every word by the time I headed in that night, making enquiries about when they would see me again and if I was going to be at such and such a place at some time. I quite enjoyed the attention but it was a little bit strange to me, being only 17 at the time. I was jail bait and they knew it but that didn’t stop the flirty small talk.

Maybe I should start playing to my strengths…

That was my general morning for the past week and it was glorious.

The afternoons were somewhere between shopping and naps and swimming in the pool. I brought home a bunch of loot because my family has developed professional shopping habits. I was well rested, until today, because of slow paced days and the lack of alarm clocks in the morning. I proved that I’m still a tiny part fish as I swam in the hotel pool as the cotton tops looked on and frowned at my sister’s cannon ball (to be fair the majority of the cotton tops watching were cheering her on and then jokingly complained when she didn’t managed to hit them with the splash).

The food around Naples is superb. I had a food baby several nights after dinner but I was not about to complain about it when that food baby had tasted sooooooooooooooooooooo good! The orgasm steak was certainly the best but there were a few close runner-ups and that’s saying something. If you like to eat out when you travel Fort Meyers/Bonita Springs/Naples is a great place to be.

In short (or long if you read the whole post), I had a fabulous time this week.

Much love ladies,

Dina

For the Boys.

Hey everybody, it’s Malcom, better known as “the Ginger”. A few weeks ago I came up with the idea to create a blog post that will better help future boys understand what they have gotten themselves into. After painstaking research I have come up with a list of things that you should and shouldn’t do to get along with these lovely ladies. Follow these rules and you will get along swimmingly with Dawn, Dina, Michele, and Valerie. 

1        The girls are... how do I say this... NUCKING FUTS.  If you are a boy with any of the four you SHOULD be well acquainted with their oddities and quirks. Now take what you know, and times it by 546 and that’s how weird the four of them together are. They will make up random dance routines on ice and decide that they should be video documented, talk about girly things (tampons, boobs, etc.) and when they’re together, you WILL be talked about.

2         Nerd is no longer an insult. Being a nerd with these lovely ladies will get you closer to the norm.

3         The four of them are one. If you piss off one of them, you will officially piss off all of them. If you make one of them happy they will all love you. You are balancing on a very fine edge but the rewards are worth the risks.

4         Be prepared to be ignored. Sometimes things like baby horses, infant children, or shiny objects will grab their attention and they will temporarily ignore everything besides that. Just be patient, and when they look back – smile. They know what’s going on.

5         Learn not to become embarrassed. The girls are loud, often sing, and have so many inside jokes that you will slowly grow to learn, but for now just sound weird. Take this with good grace and you will survive.

6         Learn their middle names
7    DFTBA

As the first boy to be mentioned on the blog, I have gathered together lots of experience but I had to do this through trial and error. I decided to post this so that you guys don’t HAVE to do that.  Please use this, it will help you dramatically. Follow these steps and you will be intertwined in the happiness that is core four. Good luck and have fun!

-          The Ginger

hacking the mac book

Oh HEY there !! it's me! Michele!!! the girl who always forgets to write on the blog!! I spent a weekend with the BOY. we folded LOTS AND LOTS OF VERY ATTRACTIVE PANTS!!! and did NOTHING else. at all. ever. because we're lame and also full of hormomones.
but at least I got to see some pretty ladies today whom I love muchly!! and I thought they were SOOOOO freaking gorgeous! I ADORE them SOOOOO much!!! they are the BEST friends in the WHOLE WIDE WORLD!!

Helloooo!

Good morning angels!

I am currently prebreakfast chilling in my pajamas on my rather surprisingly lovely hotel room bed. For all the seniors in the sunshine state the day started a while ago but for my sister, who is next to me, there seems to be no sign of waking. She's a bit like Michele that way.

My highlights so far are:

The smell of the air that is only here and not other places. It's a little salty and humid from the ocean, a little greasy from all the fried food and a little like the semi-metallic smell that comes from money because goodness knows there are people with far too much of it around here.

A walk of the beach yesterday morning with the family, talking for a few hours about life and whatever happened to pass us by with the sand squishing between our toes and the sun smiling down on our skin. I only got a few little burn spots where I quite obviously missed with my sunscreen. The most amusing one, to me anyways, is my one collarbone which is come clearly identified with a red line. It looks very attractive. ;)

Shopping. Of course we did! You saw us do a bit while we hopped for dresses so you must know by now that we're practically professionals. Best catch of the day? Purple Ralph Lauren pumps, regular $100 for $30. They are loverly and I am always a huge Ralph Lauren fan. Thank you President's Day for your super sales!! Also worth mentioning was the three bras I got from this pretty upscale place. My mom had gotten some and loved them so she insisted on outfitting me and my sister and I can see why. I think she may have ruined me for other bras. Anywhos, I picked two of the Valentine's Day rack and they were 50% off as well as being super sexy and making the girls look fabulous!

The best steak I have ever eaten. Ever. I usually don't like to eat meat but I was have having an orgasm in my mouth from the first bite. At the same restaurant they had great cheesecake. The fact that the cheesecake is even mentioned at all after that steak should tell you how good it was.

That's all for now ladies!

Much love,

Dina

Damn she's fine...

Ladies, ladies, ladies…(and gentlemen? Comment if you are a gentleman and I'll make sure to mention you the next time I post. Comment if you’re a lady, too.)

WELCOME TO FREEDOM!

Reading week has commenced! Isn’t it exciting! You have absolutely nothing to do for the next entire week besides sleep, eat and breathe (those three being rather essential and not doing them having rather large and depressing side-effects).

You ladies know that I’m going south for my reading week. I’m spending some quality time with my sister and the BBM-happy parents who sent me some rather gorgeous pictures today from where they were having lunch.

Heart be still. I'm a little hot under the collar... I'm not even wearing a collar. *raises eyebrow*

I feel a bit bad drooling over these beauties when Lyra is only a few steps away but I like to think she understands. I don't think you ladies understand but that's okay. Our little group has always been about diversity.

I just wanted to let you know that, in terms of blogage and the book that smacks me in the face, I will most likely be in airplane mode for the next seven days. That and I'm going to miss hanging out with all of you at once. I give you all an enormous virtual hug (which might cause a few calcium deposits to unsettle themselves from your spine) and bid you have an absolutely lovely time pretending that you don't have anything to do.

Much love,

Dina

Yo quiero salir con mis amigos.

Good morning ladies it's Thursday! Do you know what that means???

it means several things!

1 - that I had a big assignment due this morning ( that I managed to do and get in on time! yay!)

2 - that I have a spanish midterm this afternoon (that I'm not ready for)

3 - that TOMORROW IS FRIDAY! and on Friday I will be HOME!!!

So here is what I am doing to 'study' for my Spanish midterm, watching this video on endless repeat.

The song is SO GOSH DARNED CATCHY!! The singer lady is a bit old and frumpy, but all the people in swim suits are entertaining :P Also HAVE YOU SEEN HOW THEY MOVE, holy moly you'd think they'd get tired!

OH also here is a translation of the lyrics ( Translated by my class and not google! lol )

All those who think that life is unfair, must know that it is not like that

That life is a beauty, one should live it

All those who think that they are along and sad, must know that it is not like that.

That in life no one is alone, there is always someone

you shouldn't cry, life is a carnival.

It's nicer to live singing.

you shouldn't cry, life is a carnival, and sorrows go away singing.

Carnival is for laughing. you shouldn't cry, just enjoy it!

Carnival, just enjoy it, you should live singing.

Carnival, life is a carnival.

You shouldn't cry, we can all sing.

You should live singing!

All those who think that life is cruel,

will never be alone. God is with them.

For those who are left alone,

For those who cricicize everything

for those who use weapons

for those who do not love us

for those who mistreat us

for those who serve us.

Carnival is for laughing. you shouldn't cry, just enjoy it!

Carnival, just enjoy it, you should live singing.

Carnival, life is a carnival.

You shouldn't cry, we can all sing.

You should live singing!

I like to sing so this makes me happy :) ANYWAYS that's just a real quick update on my life. 

FRENCH THE LLAMA I'M EXCITED FOR READING WEEK!

FEB 14 (someone had to)

Hello ladies!

Well, it's that time of year. The day when the air is full of love, our bellies are full of sugar and stores are full of incredibly tacky and hilarious gifts.

The day has been referred to also as "single's awareness day". But see here's the thing - not all singles are bitter! SO many are perfectly happy where they are.
And not all couples are all googly-eyed over valentine's day!
Oh stereotypes - aren't they fun?

Anyways I wanted to take this opportunity to let everyone reading know how beautiful they are, how important they are and how much they are loved!

YES!

Hey there ladies!

Who’s not studying right now?

Probably a bunch of people but I am in that group. As usual, I shouldn’t be. I really shouldn’t be.

I was just doing my dishes and listening to random music a la YouTube when Yes by LMFAO came on. This song is 1) super catchy 2) a bit offensive and 3) a little bit of a good mindset.

I don’t think I need to explain the first point. (I’m currently bopping along and trying to type at the same time which is really difficult to do but I can’t really stop the bopping bit to make it easier to type :P) This song, among others, has been the cause of some of my nerdtacular dancing in front of my big back windows which I think my neighbours can see… Fun times!

The second point is about the whole portrayal of women as objects in a man’s fantasy instead of individuals with their own thoughts and dreams. As I’m going to be doing a lot of feminism stuff for English this week that’s been on my mind more often than usual and it’s almost amazing how many items in popular culture portray this message. This song is particularly blatant about it so it bears mentioning.

The third point has to do with a bit of a chorus that happens at the beginning and sometime in the middle which says “Every day I see my dream” and where there are single aspects of the dream followed by the word “YES!”

This weekend I finished a salsa jar and turned it into a Hopes and Dreams jar (Valerie did an absolutely lovely job of decorating it). I do really think it’s important to keep in mind what you want and where you’re going. The winter semester of university is a dark, depressing piece of life sometimes and it helps to remember that there is a definite good reason why you’re going through it. It’s equally important to seize the fact that these hopes and dreams are achievable.

That’s what the YES is in the song. The confirmation that what you want can be had and will be had.

Want to finish second semester? YES!

Want to get your degree? YES!

Want a career you enjoy? YES!

Want to be happy? YES!

Want to travel? YES!

Want the blissful life you dreamed of when you were five years old? YES!

My parents have always been fans of asking “Is this what you want?” and if the answer is yes then “Let’s make it happen.” It really can be that simple. The process isn’t instant but a consistent desire and a continuous input of work can make any of those things possible.

Now I must hit the books (my input for: my science degree, eventual financial stability, happiness in an independent lifestyle, my path to a career that will make me feel fulfilled, my continued attendance of a brilliant school and community where I could meet “the companion on my future life”).

One week until reading week ladies! Let’s do it!

Much love,

Dina

Freaky-Deaky Phenomenons

So last night, I did something I have never done before, something i didn't even know was possible...

I texted in my sleep.

No joke. :P I went to bed just before 1am last night, and Andre was the last person I texted, to say good night and what not, and i left my phone beside me on the bed.

I had some pretty weird dreams last night, the details of which are now forgotten, but in the morning when Andre texted me again around 10am, he said to me "were you awake around 2:30 last night?" So i was like, ummm... i don't think so, but i had some weird dreams, so i guess i might have woken up briefly, why?

And he says, well I got 3 texts from you, all around 2:30 that say "Thats better :p lol, thanks"

WTF???? haha, i actually 100% do not remember doing that at all!! I can't believe i not only spelled the words correctly and made coherent thoughts, but also managed to send it 3 times to the same person! Soooo weird!

So this made me wonder if anyone else had ever had this happen to them. I found this article from the Star newspaper about it, and apparently its possible! Now according to the article, i may have actually been awake for the few seconds it took to write and send those messages, but I have no memory of doing so! So weird!

However, its made me wonder if I'm actually texting too much now... I mean, if texting has become so much of a second nature to me that i can do it in my sleep, does that mean its a problem?

What do you guys think?

Ch-ch-ch-changes!

I realized that while there have been lots of posts about how we’ve grown up and changed I haven’t really said all that much about me. I threw some ideas around, but haven’t really sat down and written anything to you about how I’ve changed over the years.

Now I’m sure you know the story of poor little loner Dawn in elementary school being SOO excited to start high school at a place where no one knew that reputation. Gosh was I crazy in grade 9 , enjoying the freedom of expression.

I’d say the biggest way I’ve changed since then is that I’ve calmed down a lot. Sure it’s still not a good idea to give me sugar or caffeine, but I think I’ve let my intellectual/emotional side grow but most importantly I share it more. I’ve kept a journal since grade 8 and I LOVE looking back on everything I’ve written, it’s an amazing way to watch yourself retrospectively grow up. 

But here’s the kicker – what does it mean to grow up anyways? 

My Friend Adam from camp wrote me a letter and in it he mentioned how he has “Watched me grow into an energetic, optimistic, passionate and caring young woman”

Was I not those things before? Or are these traits more prominent in my personality now?

I’d like to share with you an excerpt from my journal ( THIS IS A HUGE DEAL! :P ) 

I was excited about something, but then criticized myself for acting “childish”.

“I try to be grown-up about things before I realise – grownups have emotions too. Probably stronger, deeper emotions because of their life experiences. Adult feel things deeply and they too occasionally let their emotions take over – they too are sometimes scared of the magnitude of life. 

Maybe there isn’t a real difference between children and adults – not if you grow up right. Adults should still have the “child-like” qualities of curiosity and creativity and energy.

One thing I know is that there isn’t anything that just clicks into place. No one event turns you into an adult. No-body just flips a switch. Life is a process of changes but at the heart of it all – it’s just life.” 

I’d like to be able to say “________ changed my life”. But there are too many things to fill that blank in with.  High school, university, drama camp, Postsecret, Rent, Listening to Holocaust Survivor Eva Olssen, Grade 9 english, Grade 12 Challenge and Change in Society, going to camp, Harry Potter, poetry, The core 4, the pants, the boys I’ve dated, my family, the entire Europe trip, learning to express myself, Shel Silverstein, 1000 awesome things...

I don’t know if these rants of mine are intended to go anywhere, but I find them interesting and I’ll probably never stop doing them. Whether or not there is a greater truth to be found doesn’t matter to me as much as the fact that I can give myself (and others) some good thoughts to chew on – then maybe you’ll find your own epiphany. :)

Don't get too comfortable!

Hello my lovely ladies!

(I think it’s possible that we alienate any dudes that might read with our intros but I can’t seem to stop myself…)

There’s something I’ve noticed over my year and a half of university experience that I would like to share with you and it is simply this: the more comfortable you are, the less likely you are to do work.

I know what you’re saying (Dawn, at least), that your track pants are just so comfortable and nice and really, everyone wears them so it can’t be that bad, can it? To that I ask, have you ever tried doing one part of an assignment wearing jeans and the other half wearing track pants?

I vividly recall my very good intentions on going into my first ever exam period and saying to myself “I’m going to study for every exam every day until the very last one passes and I will totally ace everything!”

Did that ever happen? No way and my track pants are partially responsible.

I noticed that when I woke up and put on track pants for that first week of the exam period that I hardly did anything. I’d vaguely read over my notes but all that information trying to go into my brain through my eyes just bounced off in favour of my extreme laziness and three entire seasons of Criminal Minds (which is a great, if disturbing, show). The thought process going through my head every morning was something around the lines of “Oh, no class today… I don’t really have to get ready to go out so I’ll just wear track pants.”

I think this is where the problem lies. During my regularly scheduled classes I would always make an effort to get myself up and look presentable. The actual “looking presentable” part isn’t actually required for getting work done but the mindset behind it is. The thought of, “I have something I need to do and I need to be prepared” was really embedded in that ritual of getting up and dressing for class. When I lost it during the exam period is when I started to lose my entire focus.

The reason I bring this up today is that I have a lab tomorrow which requires me to know most of the bones in a cat skeleton and I have three rather intensive midterms next week.

Shouldn’t I be studying?

Yes, probably, but what am I doing instead?

I’m typing up a blog post in my track pants.

You’re welcome.

Much love,

Dina

The universe loves me

Hey there ladies!

I promise that this post won’t be as long as the last one, haha! No worries about that!

The title of this post is probably intriguing to you if you’ve read my sciency post on spirituality/philosophy but I’ll just head right on to it and maybe you’ll like it anyway.

There’s a YouTuber that I follow who calls himself Davey Wavey. I don’t know if you’ve heard of him or watched him before but during my very dark second semester last year I found him on YouTube and latched onto his sense of positivity. He’s very new aged in his beliefs, more along the lines of The Secret if you’ve ever read it, and believes that what you put into the world will come back to you. He chooses to try to put as much positivity into the world as he can because he believes that it will come back to him.

I’ve got to say that, while it seems a bit spacey and out there at first, there are obvious ways in which it can be seen as true. One of the easiest ways to see this is in social psychology where they’ve seen that, when someone is told that the person they will be meeting is horrible before they meet them, both people rate the interact as decidedly tense while, when someone is told that the person they are going to be meeting is funny and friendly, both people say that they really enjoyed meeting and talking with the other person in the significant majority of cases. This is a case where someone who is inclined could see that, when someone brings negativity into the interaction via anticipation of a nasty interview, negativity is given back. The same can be said of the positive scenario.

It’s certainly an interesting idea and there are other ways it works, too. For example, in order to make any money on the stock market you have to buy a stock first; putting money out is the way to get money back. Of course, it is also likely that the stock market could crash and you would lose the value that you’d put into the market but the fact remains that you would not be gaining or losing anything if you weren’t putting some part of yourself into that arena.

Back to Davey, in one of his videos he talked about how he collects money he finds on the street in a little bowl in his house and how he views each bit he finds as a gift from the universe. I particularly enjoyed this talkyblog because I love finding money on the ground and love picking it up to! Most people in university, as I’ve discovered since being here, like to think that they’re somehow “above” picking money off the ground. I’m not quite sure whether the money I find is a gift from the universe but something happened today that made me reconsider.

You’ve all probably seen my “dream board” that I keep somewhere near my study area. It’s a bit of corkboard that I pin things that make me happy to and it, too, was inspired by that dark second semester of last year, Davey Wavey and needing a way to stay positive.

The literal first thing I put on there was a page from a magazine I ripped out last spring which featured this gorgeous man who happened to be a piano player who had just come out this a new album. I kept that page because I love classical music and the guy was, as I might have mentioned, gorgeous and I had the intension of looking into his music.

Fast forward almost a year and there I was this morning walking along outside on my campus and trying to find the arts undergraduate office when I see that same exact picture of the handsome piano player staring at me from a card wedged into the snow beside where I was walking.

I did a bit of a double take because it literally was the exactly same picture. It was on one of those little free download cards that you get at Starbucks. I now have one song from the gorgeous piano player via iTunes that I have played on repeat while writing this and I love it!

Weird how things work out, isn’t it?

I hope you ladies are having a lovely day even if it wasn’t surprisingly filled with drool-worthy musicians!

Ciao,

Dina

Hello world!

Hello again my lovely ladies!

As you know I spent this weekend with the Ginger - or rather, he spent it with me.

After showing up on Thursday evening he was promptly ditched with my friends while I Skyped with Valerie and Michele. He teased me about ditching him but he knew that it was "important matters of the heart".

On Friday we went to the War museum and it was really awesome! Knowing how our relationship started - a history trip in Europe - one can imagine that it was a good date. He is a total history buff (what he wants to major in at Uni actually) and he knew a lot of stuff about the different wars in Canada's history! I was thoroughly impressed by him nerding out over battle strategies, types of weaponry, and just general historical knowledge.

Who doesn't love a nerd right?

( we also watched some Youtube including Vlogbrothers! )

Friday evening found us in the pod chilling with my podmates and friends. We had some drinks and socialized. After retiring for the evening we had probably one of the most important discussions of our relationships. (Well there have been a few of course including continuing our reltionship long distance, folding pants etc.) I'm not going to go into details, but he just told me some stories about his life that have really helped shape him as a person. We got a little emotional but it was really meaningful.

Saturday morning (ok afternoon it was like 1 ) we went to Cora's. if you have never been I suggest you go! Sooooo much delicious food!!! om nom nom nom nom!! We had planned to go skating  on Sat, but it was unseasonably warm ( like +3 or something!) and the canal was super slushy. We decided against skating and instead just went for walks in the snow. I acted like a child stomping around and making a mini snow man. (no surprise there :P )

Saturday evening we watched Indiana Jones ! (last crusade which is number 3, I've also seen Raiders of the lost ark which is number one. The Ginger says number 2 isn't as good and denies the existence of the 4th :P ) I've decided that Indiana Jones is freaking EPIC! Very enjoyable but the theme song ALWAYS gets stuck in my head!!

On sunday - that's today! we watched Inception. Holy moly. It messes with your mind, but ... I THINK I got it... I'm not sure lol. The end leaves you going " but, I , what!?!? " which is kind of awesome.

I just wanted to say that my capacity to watch movies with my boyfriend seems to be better than Michele's.

Ya we folded several pairs of pants over the course of the weekend, but this weekend was special to me for so many more reasons than just that.

In other news, I'm going swimming this evening! and then Glee is on! after the stupid-bowl (alternativly called the super-boring?)

anyways mucho love!

Longest post evaaaaa! (For realz!) Oh, and my house!

Good evening ladies,

This weekend was rather a big one for me. It’s strange because at the same time as realizing that this should be such an enormous moment in my life I find I experience it much like any other of those important things you’re supposed to remember, very much one moment at a time.

First I would like to point out that this whole moving process was planned earlier to occur on Friday and the only thing that was supposed to be done on Thursday (by me that is) was picking up the keys for the house. My parents were to sign all the paperwork with the lawyers and all the other people in Peterborough and then come up on Friday to help me move.

Needless to say, it didn’t really happen that way.

My mom came down on Tuesday for the pre-delivery inspection and stayed the entire week. My dad drove up very early Thursday morning. They signed and did all that stuff during the morning and beginning of the afternoon. Later in the afternoon my dad went over to my old place and cleaned it out of absolutely everything. Most of that stuff, as well as everything that my parents had brought up from home base, made it into the new house that afternoon. I didn’t get there until seven at night when it was all done. When I walked into my house for the first time most of my stuff was already in there, even if it wasn’t set up properly.

Yes, when I walked into my house for the very first time I was wearing the pants.

It was so bizarre to me that there were all these people and all this stuff in my house. It almost didn’t seem real. Those people and that stuff filled up that space more than me; does it make sense when I say that because of that it seemed that the space belonged to them too?

I could only take a few steps in a first because there was so much stuff in my kitchen. I think I helped more a few things inside before actually walking around inside. After that I plopped myself down on the one available place for sitting in the midst of the mess and had myself a few cold slices of pizza which was what was left of my parents’ dinner while they told me about the little things that had been happening during the day. It consisted of a lot of “…and then we went there”, “we signed this with so-and-so…”, “he took one look at the paint and…” , “in the middle of the room because…”, “we’ll need to do that sometime of course but first…” and so on.

I smiled and nodded a lot during that conversation. It was a bit one sided. Basically what it came down to was my mom was frustrated because the house was getting painted and while it was getting painted she could not move any of the things she wanted to move. The mess of all the packed items was getting to her and she wanted it all to be cleaned up and put away in proper places.

Quite frankly I was exhausted. The night before I had been up until 1:00am, I’d gotten up again at 6:30am that morning, I’d had class at 8:30 followed by a lab in which the learning and remembering of the names of most of the bones in four separate species of vertebrates was required, and I’d just come from an intense biochemistry midterm at school. It had been a busy day to say the least.

While I was quite happy to make the trek to my new home instead of the old one it has got to be one of the most bizarre feelings. I’ve taken the trip from the university to the house once before at this point. I’d used my GPS because I had an appointment and really didn’t want to be late and had no idea where I was going. I wasn’t using the GPS this time because I was all like “It’s my house now! I have to know how to get to my own house!”

I don’t really know how to describe the feeling I was having while I was driving. There was a little “Oh dear God, a hill. Please change light so I don’t have to stop! Yes! Success!” There was a little “Holy Salmon on a cracker I am so tired I will crash (as in sleep, not in my car) on the nearest horizontal surface I find when I get there.” There was some more “Hurray for parents and hugs”, some “What if I get lost”, and some “OMG EXCITED!!!”

All of those together make for a rather strange thought process.

When I got to the house I parked in the driveway and waited for my parents because my mom had sent me a text saying “We’re just picking up the last of your stuff. Head for the house and wait for us there.” I was a bit confused because the lights were on but she had said wait. About eight minutes later the parents pull up with the truck and trailer making a lot of noise (apparently the muffler on the truck went on the way past Toronto) and my mom’s first words to me were “Silly goose! Why didn’t you go inside?” to which I mumbled something about “waiting” and “didn’t know” and “you said” which made me sound like I was five years old again.

Did I mention I was really tired?

It turns out that the house had been open because the dude was repainting inside and I could have just walked in but it didn’t feel right to try and do it without them. I’m only 19 for crying out loud! I still need some room for a few more baby steps.

(Side note: Can you believe that we’re turning 20 this year?!)

After stepping inside things are a little bit of a blur but, as I mentioned before, it involved pizza. It also involved discovering some house warming gifts from my dad—a periodic table shower curtain and a Bazinga shirt! I had a little squee moment upon seeing both of these. They are serious awesomeness!

When things were settled a bit, and by settled I mean that the people in the house who were not my family had left and the kitchen disaster had some sort of a path doing through it, I went up to my room where my mattress was lying in the middle surrounded by boxes. This prompted a bit of a sigh because there were no blankets in the room. I found my comforter and blanket for my bed downstairs, through them on my bad, did the usual teeth and face things and then promptly buried myself in blankets and tried to ignore the street light shining directly in my eye in favour of falling asleep.

As I’ve already explained to Dawn, I was up at her crack on Friday because there were no light blocking devices in the house. It was a good thing anyways because I got to spend a bit of time with my parents before they took off to do some more house things that I didn’t really know about.

That was the first time I was in my house alone and I was a bit unnerved. There was so much to do that I couldn’t do and it was so quiet without anyone in it so I promptly bolted out the door and ended up at school an hour early. It was just me and all the stragglers of the earliest class on campus and that was a bit weird too. I promptly took out my Blackberry and started asking for updates on everything that was happening. That had pretty much been my state during the entire previous day when I was stuck at school so it was a pretty good fall back. This time though, it was only my parents I could talk to because, let’s face it, only people that have to be up that early are up that early at our age.

I must add at this point that I was wearing a rather awesome outfit that day which I was very proud of and which got me a few much appreciated compliments. I will have to wear it again for some other function where it can be properly admired.

A lot of things got done on Friday. Most of the kitchen mess migrated into various areas upstairs. A bunch of it got put into very proper places where it will most likely stay. More walls were painted and avoided while they were wet. There’s still being avoided really. Nothing is supposed to be put against them for any amount of time until at least a week has past. This seems simple at first but I’ve come to realize over the last few days that I’m a lot clutzier than I usually think I am and have a habit of bumping into things and knocking them against walls.

I learned how to put up towel rods and hooks on Friday, too. It was interesting. The next day I realized how lucky I had been to have a drill to do it but more on that later. I really enjoyed these little bits that you stuck through the drywall which you them poked with a special poker to make them open behind the wall and stay there. You know what they say about simple things and simple minds? Yes…

Besides the nerdtasticness of my periodic table shower curtain, another edition of nerdiness was added to my house on Friday—my wireless internet connection named “Evenstar”. It makes me immensely happy every time I see it.

Since I won’t get most of my appliances until the end of the week, my parents and I went out to the “family restaurant” that the guy we’d talked to at the post office had told us about. It was definitely worth a trip because it was super good! The food was delicious and most of the sauces are made actually in the restaurant instead of getting there in cans like some larger chain restaurants. The portions were also massive! I’m definitely going back. Noms…

On the way back from dinner we stopped at the LCBO and the parents stocked up on a bit of wine. When we got home they promptly tried to get me drunk which is frightfully easy because of my lack of experience. (Microsoft Word thinks that I should put “am frightfully easy” but I certainly am not!) It was around this time that I gave Valerie the virtual (via Skype) tour of the new house. I can’t wait to give the actual tour next weekend! It’s gonna be fun!

Saturday saw my dad leaving for home because he had a few funerals to attend. (Yes, a few. How morbid is that?) My mom and I went out and got some light blockers, aka blinds, for the house. Unfortunately, the place we got them didn’t have all the sizes we needed so they had to order some of them. More unfortunately, one of the ones we did take home was cut incorrectly and didn’t actually fit in the window. I have to take that back to the place to be re-cut sometime this week which is a pain.

The purchasing of blinds brought with it another learning experience, which is putting them up. Not so complicated either unless you want to be obsessive compulsive about it, which I almost was. I got over that pretty fast and they got up. I have a lovely blister and a bit of a sprained wrist to show for the labour I put in but now I have sun blockers which hopefully mean more sleep! Hurray!

I don’t know about where you ladies were but here on Saturday it started snowing like bad in the evening even though the weather forecast had said we’d get less than a centimetre. Liars! We had at least four inches! It was craziness! Cue the third thing I learned this weekend—how to drive Lyra in extreme snow! I made it out of my subdivision this weekend which was almost a miracle with how much snow there was.

The reason we had to leave the subdivision this morning at all was that we were going to get my food out of the fridge at the roommates’ place. When we pulled up to the house they were using the snow blower to clear the driveway… Oh, the snow blower works now does it? (Insert massive eyeroll here.) It was all civilized and we’ve broken the lease and all is good.

On an a happier note and also really nerdy note, I found a super awesome Harry Potter book at Wal-Mart today which has, among other things, a Marauder’s Map, a Yule Ball programme and a bunch of Educational Decrees. Like I said, it’s super awesome! I can’t wait to read it!

This post is already enormously large so I’ll stop here. I hope at least some of you read all of this but you should know that I would still love you even if you didn’t.

Ciao,

Dina

Snow, and lots of it

Happy day with snow ladies!

My university was one of a few that, while the entire area around it was shut down, was open and running classes. Curses upon ye who had the day off! Curses upon ye that declared my university to be open! Just lots of curses in general!

This morning I took one look outside and said “Nope, I’m not driving”, grabbed my bag and hopped on the bus. I’m really glad it’s been so easy to do. My new house also has a bus stop fairly nearby, even though it takes a lot longer to get from there to the university via the bus. I hope not to have to use it but there are always weather days and I don’t mind getting up a little earlier if it means I get where I’m going safely.

When I got to school my first professor was rather put out about having to come to class when so many other universities were closed and promptly gave us the email address of the person responsible for the decision to keep the university open. Needless to say, he will be getting a lot of hate mail today. Poor guy…

I did my usual round of classes and studying in the library while I was on campus. In Psych of Evil class we moved from “possession” on to “hate” which is super exciting. Genetics was the same old boring thing it usually is. Biochemistry had me almost falling asleep. This is how it usually goes.

When I got back I found this.

It made me laugh.

Only one more night until I get possession of my new place! Crazy exciting stuff!

(It’s also only one more sleep until my Biochemistry midterm but who wants to know about that?! :P)

Love you ladies muchly,

Dina

Painting and Personality

Good afternoon ladies!


Your pants have officially been in my house that is not yet my house! This is exciting!


The reason I was there was that I had to do a “pre-delivery inspection” which is where you go around the entire house with a roll of green painters tape and put a piece on anything that isn’t quite right. The majority of these things are either nail pops (a bump in the wall about the size of a dime or quarter caused by movement of the drywall or nail when the house settles) or painting touch-ups (the guy who did the painting was doing a quick job and the paint isn’t even or is touching things it isn’t suppose to).


When I got to the house the guy from the housing company was already there and had started putting up green tape in the entry area. By the time we were done there was green tape everywhere and the guy joked “If you wanted to paint the walls green that could have been arranged”. So basically my whole house has been repainted today to get ready for my closing on Thursday.


I’m not completely surprised with this outcome. I’ve always been very particular about the quality and order of my living space. My friend Tamina used to think it was funny to pretend to accidentally brush against something in my room so that she could watch me straighten it so it was once again in its place. This exacting kind of quality is often extended to the work I do at school or at my job when I have one. I’m very precise in making sure that the quality of my work is as high as I can make it and I really appreciate when others do the same.


In the last few years I’ve started to drop the ball a bit in terms of how organized my room is. Where back in my elementary school days there was not even a speck of dust on my floor now there are semi-ordered piles consisting of textbooks or folded clothes. It’s not the sprawl of a regular teenager’s room but my previous self would be a little bit horrified.


Let’s go with that and try out this comparing present and past selves shall we?


The biggest change that I’ve seen in myself over the last few years is a bit of gradual relaxation. It seems like a relatively insignificant thing when you compare it to the assertions that someone has become so much more “caring” and “confident” or has gone through “life changing experiences” but it’s what I view as what really happened.


I could say that I’ve become more comfortable in my own skin (or image or personality) but I think that has a lot to do with the gradual realization that it resists when I try to pull it into a different shape. I tried often when I was younger to act more outgoing and more personable. The most recent attempt was during grade nine in high school. I thought “Here’s a brand new school. No one knows me at all and I can be whoever I want to be so I’m going to try and be that person I want to be”.


While self-improvement is certainly an honourable goal what I’ve found is that, instead of trying to be or become something that I’m not, it’s better to try and be the person that you are. It’s just as difficult as trying to meet up with those arbitrary personality goals, if not more so, to figure out exactly what you’re working with and start polishing up the best parts.


Basically the point of this ramble is that while it’s perfectly acceptable to put a fresh coat of paint over the wall of your house it isn’t the smartest idea to paint over your personality, even if the paint looks really good.


Cheers,


Dina



P.S. I feel like we've been pretty serious for the last little bit so I offer this as a way to lighten the mood...
My ass, your pants. :P