And this little piggie went to the market...

Granville Island market that is. Under the bridge. It's a great place to wonder with shops and the market and the strange performers (like the one that took Brian's shirt off last year).

Brian got home on Friday afternoon so we had a stay-in evening. Saturday we slept in and when we finally got up and did a spin we decided to head over the Granville Island by the new tram (which I had gotten excited about the other weekend) and meet up with Dan and pick out dinner fixings. So we spent some time wandering around the market. The pastas and the meats are amazing (as is everything else but I just get inspired by those two... or rather inspired by the pasta, drooly from the meats - prosciutto of every type and a caribou salami!!! I mean how can you not love a place like that??!!!).

And in the hat store. Which is the greatest store. They have every type of hat. From Derby hats to toques. I got my fushia fixator for my wedding there. So much fun to wonder around in and take pictures and laugh at your self. So I have lots of pictures from there.

The picture of the day was a tie between a mannequin and a self portrait done to look like a Polaroid - I like the tone in the self portrait. But I like the mannequin from an aesthetics point so I decided to pick both.

Friday Pic

central courtyard in our complex at 5 o'hell it's bloody early clock on my way to swimming.

Another evil in my life

Also known as Whole Paycheque... although given food prices in Vancouver in general, the prices here are actually comparable. And the meat really does taste better. And yes I have become one of THOSE girls: with the yoga pants and hoodie and vest: Princess of the Organic Kumquats. But I don't have the small, yappie-type dog or pug and yoga mat. Or the manicured nails and makeup (since I don't wear any day to day). If you had known me a few years back you'd be shaking your head. As I know Dan is right now.

We might have a problem here

Today I discovered something.

Why this something hadn't crossed my mind before is truely amazing.

Mocha plus caramel syrup.

The. Best. Coffeebasedbeverage. Ever.

I had two and had to fight myself against going for more.

Only thing better would be Green&Black's hazelnut spread in the hot milk to make the chocolate milk and then into the coffee.... ooooo you know I might be on to something there. This is bad. Very very bad. At least the milk is skim milk right? and it's my calcium intake. And vitamin D intake. And um... well, the cocoa bean IS a vegetable. Right? Technically?

And I did earn it. I got up and swam at 5:30 all by myself!

So yesterday happened...

And the truth is I didn't leave the house. At all. I stayed put. Just kinda blah. So yeah. That's about it. Picture of the day would be the bane of my existance: the alarm clock.


OK so on to today. Because that's now and happening. And I got outside. And as evidence I present an odd view of my front door.
Which makes it look like we live in a submarine (ah crap... cue the Beatles in my head...). But we don't, our building is clad in metal. Which was hip and cool and progressive 5 years ago I guess. At least it's different then the stucco places around here that have all had to be rain screened over the last 10 years.

Anyhow. Not much else to report. 3 more sleeps until Brian comes home and that means 4 more sleeps until the return of tea in bed in the morning and someone to snuggle with while listening to Stewart on Saturday morning.

Um... It's January people

And that means take down your Christmas lights! Geez!!!


Althought I don't know if that's so much the issue as is the fact that the flowers are blooming in January. I just liked the conflict of imagery here. Being from Canada I have in my childhood associated Christmas lights with snow not pretty pink flowers. It is pretty though.

So Sunday. Coaching for 2 and a bit hours in the steamy hot pool and then a little over a hour run. Where I felt dead. Like the running dead kind of dead. On autopilot. But some where along the line I ended up being the captain of the run and deciding whether we were turning left or right at trail intersections so I had to have some sort of brain function. This Brian being away thing is not good. No tea in the morning means autopilot for a few hours. Sigh. Come back home baby. Soon. Please. This can't end well. We might have to eat Alison next time when we get lost in the trails (which we didn't today... I'm just saying...)

I have been good though. Only had toast twice so far. French and with cheese. Tonight Jody came over and we made halibut and risotto and asparagus. Which is definitely not toast. And a bottle of wine. And good girl chat. Which was AWESOME. And the perfect way to end the weekend.

That and hearing that someone loves their mitts. And they look good on her and are making people jealous so I've pretty much achieved my goals there.

Well I'm getting better at this trail riding on skinny tires thing. I managed somehow to keep the rubber side down in a few places where I was sure I was going over into the log/bush/tree/mud bath. AWESOME.

And then we had french toast. Which is also pretty awesome.

Worked hard, played hard. Felt great.

I went and got new shoes after since my old mountain bike shoes have had the biscuit. I got them when I was in grad school and I got them used to save a few bucks. So it was time.

Walking home from MEC, the sky caught my eye and so here is the pic of the day.



And now I'm just chillin' by myself watching bad movies and eating soup and maybe some popcorn.

Well it was a great day. Except for the crappy bit where Brian left for Orlando for a week. Yeah that sucks. No tea in bed. No cuddles. No one to drive at night when it's raining (which I hate driving in). But on the flip side - lots of girl time, the whole bed to myself, no one snoring.... So we'll see how I'm feeling about this at the end of the weekend.

Anyhoo. After the first crappy 30 minutes of the day - the getting up at 5, saying goodbye and driving to swimming alone - it's been a pretty good day.

Swim was AMAZING. Water was a chill 77F because the heater broke. Which is FABULOUS. Worked super hard and just had a great time. I love the high 70s for water temp for swimming.

Then it was a great coffee time with the group. Where wee Eddo made his debut. He has a great face. No pics though sorry. But I did take a photo of the phrase of the day. Couldn't deside which treatment of the photo I liked so I'll post both and you can decide.

Photo A: Or Photo B:


The red thing below it is an old school scale which shows some of the inner mechanics so the enginerd in me liked it and am making it the photo of the day.


Speaking of my inner enginerd. I had forgotten that the new tram is up and running for the next few months as a show case and it runs the ~1.5 km from my place to Granville Island. I got unreasonably excited about taking it and so Jody and I are going to ride the rails as part of Sunday dinner. Yup. I'm a nerd.

Work has been crazy busy and today was no exception but I did manage to squeeze in a make up run along the seawall to Kits Beach. (All you snow covered frozen people to the east you might want to stop reading at this point) The city is already starting to bloom. There is pink starting to appear on trees. And fuzzy buds on the magnolias. Woot! It's a great temperature and it was sunny on my run. So I was all smiles. Spring is springing already around here. YAY!!!

Tonight I'm off for dinner with my fellow photo a day challenger Alison and tomorrow I'm hitting the trails with Dan on our cross bikes and hope to get a little muddy. So other then the fact that Brian's not here it's going to be a pretty damn good weekend.

We were bad athletes tonight and skipped practice. Brian's going away for a week tomorrow (yeah, I'm scared for me too. It'll be seven days of toast for dinner in my fortress of couch cushions). He had to get a hair cut and pack and do a few things so we thought we'd just spend the time together instead. So I'll do my run tomorrow instead.

Not much else to say but I have to say something since I'm posting a pic of the day. This is the side of a building I walked by on the way back from the post office today (when I picked up the rest of that dang sugoi order). I really liked the colours of the glass. It's not a great shot but the colours were nice. I need to get back on that roll I was on at the beginning.

Better late then never

I have a feeling there will be a few of these posts through the year. But yes, yesterday I did not post a picture. GASP! HOW COULD YOU!!!!

OK so yesterday's picture isn't anything to write home about. I treated myself at around 9:30 to a London Fog (which is Earl Grey tea (in the Brew-it in the background) with a shot of vanilla syrup and steamed milk) Yummy! The cheese ball mug was a freebie in a grab bag. But it's big so it's one of my favourites.



Today's pic was demanded by Nelson. Who was ashamed that you all know of her issues with peeing. So she was in my lap being cute and sweet and posing.

Looking for arms

Few days ago this was my pic of the day.

Look at them now!! Yeah baby. Cable knit fingerless mitts.


Now I need another project. Maybe another pair. They were fun and quick.

It might have started at 0'hell it's early for a Sunday clock but it was a good Sunday none the less.

Coaching swimming for two and a half hours is an interesting experience - first half with the full fledged swimmer who have gills and the second half with those still in the beginning of their mutation. It was a challenge to switch gears and expectations from one group to the next but it was a ton of fun and smaller groups in the pool means it's easier to pay attention to people and give feed back. Although I need to make sure to give good jobs to those who get things right away and not just give feedback to those doing things wrong.

Anyhow after that it was time for a 1:10 run. At a fairly good clip and then home to eat and rest a bit before date night.

Super fancy date night.

One Grouse Mountain at the tiny restaurant up there called the Observatory. Oh god the wine! the food! the service! the view!


The view!!!! yeah most restaurants would half ass the food if they had a view like this (not the greatest photo... the iphone lacks zoom and the reflection on the glass was hard to get out):



But this place?? The food was great. And the service was to die for but of course you pay through the nose for that. This date was a Christmas present so we were able to spoil ourselves a little.

Anyhow. To get up and down Grouse you either have to hike it or you ride in the gondola. And since there is snow up there and it's mucky and the trails are closed and we were in fancy wear, well, we didn't hike it. We rode up with the night skiers and snowboarders. During the Olympics the Today show will be broadcasting from up there and the ski hill, ice rink, restaurants and everything will be running 24 hours a day through the games.

Where was I? oh yes the gondola. This photo of the day is in honour of my boss and his family who are off in the land of people who mop the sidewalk outside their shops.

So we each hoovered a bag of chips today. They were the baked ones so they weren't THAT bad (170cal a serving and less than 3 servings in a bad.... but still.... really??? did I need the chips? Is there a magnet for oops?). And now I'm having wine. All this after having Malaysian last night. Oh those roti are so wrong but yet so right.

But we did get outside to play today. In the mud on our crossbikes. I love mud and cross riding. It was some good efforts up hills and some muddy, rocky, rooty bits that were challenging. But I don't think it justified the chips.

Pic of the day - mud mud glorious mud

Tomorrow is swim practice and long run day. We're trying out something new at LETC: two swim sessions back to back to fit all 50 members (!!!! I know!!!! we kinda grew this year). So I have two and a half hours of coaching to look forward to starting at 7:30. Gonna have to run extra hard to pay for those chips.

Before I have anymore wine I should post my pic of the day.

Which is appropriately our current table centre piece.



Post Script: for those of you following the Sugoi drama documented below, my woolie arrived today. As did a pair of loungy pants (the Energy Pants which are The. Best. Loungypants. Ever.) AND an order that I placed YESTERDAY of two pairs of Zap tights (capris for me and full for Brian). Still waiting on the rest of the original order from Ed. See Sugoi is awesome. Sugoi 3 Ed 0 and me 1 happy camper with new tights and loungy pants.

Stickin' to it

One of the draw backs to being a fairly good cook and a foodie is that you tend to want to eat. A lot. And therefore you must train even more. So to keep this eating under control I came up with a method of tracking calories that involved no math and almost no brains. It's my magnet method. I made magnets for all of the food servings were were supposed to have everyday and stuck them on the boards in the kitchen (the one downfall of SS appliances... no magnets - solution a few dollars at Ikea and you can have magnetic boards on the wall instead). And the results were fantastic. You eat a serving, you move a magnet. You want to eat something you have to see if you have a magnet to spare. Easy peasy. So today's photo is not artsy or pretty in anyway but it is a shot of one of the magnet boards in our kitchen which houses "The Diet Tracker".

And a funny bonus magnet if you can find it.


Feel free to steal the idea if it appeals to you. I can send you the magnet labels to print off onto address stickers and then put them on existing magnets or on a sheet of magnet material as I did. But no, you can't have the pony magnet. That's one of my favorites.

woops

Forgot to put up my pic yesterday. It was a looooong day. But ended really well with my Sugoi dude Chad being my super hero (probably in Zap Mid-Zero 3/4 tights) and finding and sending my new Wallaroo Woolie!!! Which according to Ed (see post below) was out of stock.

Sometimes you just need to fight for something. No matter how small. Because you need to feel in control of something when everything else is just kinda verging on crazy. Like work. And my addiction to chocolate. And when that happens you put the chocoate in the freezer and eat the elephant one bite at a time.

And make muffins for your bike mechanic and favourite bike shop owner because you can. Mmmm mocha muffins...

NEVER GO TO Champion Bikes in London

SUCKS MONKEY BUTT.

At least Ed does. He's useless.

I ordered some Sugoi stuff online. As one of those special peeps with a brand champion code my order should be routed directly to Sugoi. And they are WONDERFUL. Two day turn around, order filled, shipped, delivered (with the postperson asking for a signature (key)) and done and done.

But this time? Not such a good time. There was a mistake in the online system and they sent my order to one of their online retailers for filling. Champion Bikes. In London Ontario. WTF? Yeah. I know. A week later I get an email saying it's been shipped with Canada Post. Cool. So two weeks go by. No package. So I fish out that tracking number. Package does not exist. So I email Ed and ask about it and he sends me another tracking number with the note that it was sent with US Postal. WHAT???!!!! Ok finally figure out that the tracking number on the second email is the rtight one for the package sent by CANADA post. And that the package was delivered the day before.

Um. No. Nope. No package. I was home all day. No package on the porch as Canada Post is claiming. OK. Package with a neighbour? Nope. Package at the front gate? Nope. No package. So internal investigation with Canada Post and they say "our bad - we'll contact the seller and get them to refill and send the package". Which it turns out was insured for $100. Which was a QUARTER of the worth of the contents. Wondermonkey Ed strikes again.

So I send Ed an email asking about the package being refilled as it is now his fault. And he bitches me out for the fact that he is now out a pile of money. And this is my fault how??? It was his fault for not sending the package properly insured and requiring a signature on delivery. But he chewed me out for it? Yeah. So. Not. Impressed.

So anyhow it's not the 13th of January and I get yet another email from my buddy Asshat, I mean, Ed. He's resent the package. And low and behold, the tracking number does not exist in Canada Post's system.

In the meantime I've been relaying all of this to Sugoi's Customer Service department (no use complaining to Champion bikes the only email that exists for them is Ed's so there's no higher up to talk to. Again WTF???). But Sugoi has been wonderful and apologetic and have told me that I am not the first to want to tear Ed a new one. But still that doesn't get me my package and my new gear. And it doesn't get me my new Wallaroo top for winter running (I love wool tech tops. LOVE LOVE LOVE them) which is now (since initially placing the order) out of stock. Or so Ed claims.

Hear that banging? That's my head on the wall.

Well I better preface this with a big apology for all of you in the snow covered areas of Canada and the US and anywhere else where snow shoes seem like a mighty fine idea right about now thank you very much. Today it was so warm that when I walked to the grocery store I wore a hoodie and was too hot. Which is nice but at the same time a little worrying for that event that's happening in a little over 3 weeks from now. Yeah that WINTER ACTIVITY centric thing called the Olympic WINTER Games. WINTER being kind of a neccessary thing for activities like skiing and snowboarding and the general sense that yes it is only February. But yeah. It's kinda nice to be warm and to see things like this:


Why yes! that is a rhododendron getting ready to bloom into its hot pink glory. It does that here. In January/February. Yes indeed it is REALLY nice to not be running through the snow (this year). And yes we do like the fact that things are green and smell nice and the are no weird yellow patches on the snow outside out houses.

This can't last though. It never does. But we'll enjoy it while it does. Or at least until it starts raining again in a few hours. And we have to run in it. But as Brian says at least you don't have to shovel rain.

Sweet Dreams

So this month is all about things I do during the day. Or things I see on a regular basis. Well I didn't get out of the house today so that does limit the things I saw. So I had to figure out what else I do on a regular daily basis. I read. A lot. And currently I am working my way through Atlas Strugged which I am really enjoying dispite the fact that you can't really hold the tome up comfortably in bed. Or the bath. It being over a thousand pages long. And so here it sits waiting for me to come to bed and read after a day of work, training, making dinner, eating dinner, paying some attention to the boy, and of course posting this on the interwebs.

more domestic goddessness

As mentioned yesterday I have a bizarre love of a lot things domestic (not the vacuum cleaning and the folding though... I'm like a freakin' cat: scared of the vacuum and tend to nap in the clean clothes on the bed, especially when they are fresh out of the drier. Oh and cleaning the bathroom. I don't think I know anyone who likes THAT). Anyhow. I love to cook. And although I have been neglecting this, I am still trying out and working on various dishes. Today was no exception. I made goulash with spätzle.


Who doesn't love food with umlauts! I got a proper spätzle maker for Christmas so I was eager to try it out.

It turned out to be amazing, might have to dig into my memory and figure out what I did to make dinner and post it.

(don't be fooled: those are side plates -keeps the portions smaller and the illustion that you are getting more)

Work in progress

One of my domestic skills (in addition to the cooking bit) is knitting. I'm currently working on something for myself (I don't cook for myself and I rarely knit for myself so who knows someone might be getting nice white cabled fingerless mitts at some point). So this picture is of my "project on the go bag" and it's contents. So far I'm only about 3 inchs into mitt number 1. Might have to send these to someone in the east by the time their done in a few weeks... it'll be too warm here for such things but it'll probably still be snowy and yuck back there :)

Last night was Run Night. Which means sushi night. Naturally. But Brian was on a date with another woman so I was solo at running and came home after without sushi. So we had sushi tonight. Sushi is a regular occurance since it's so damn cheap and tasty and all around fabulous. Dinner for two at less than 20 bucks. Not too shabby.

I spy with my little i(phone)...

After much thought, I decided that I too had to post a pic. Since Alison doesn't get a partner for this 365 picture effort then Brian's photo (although super cool and I wish I took it) doesn't count towards my total.

So here is my effort for today. Which is totally out shone by Brian's photo below.

It's 4 of the 16 boxy shelves in my office. Which is also our second bedroom (without a bed) and our gym. I figure I see these every day and so it's part of a day in the life. I like the squareness of the squares in the photo.

The one shelf I look at most is this one:
Because it's right at eye level and something about it soothes me. Maybe it's the picture of Cousin Meg scratching her butt or me with my hand in my pocket (we were 2 at most). Maybe it's the fish. But in anycase. That's my favourite square in my bookshelf.

In Too Early

I'm not nearly as artistic as my fabulous wife, but this morning I got in on the picture taking action. I was in to the office well before dawn today so that I could have a conference call with some folks in the east, and as the sun began to rise, I got treated to some spectacular colours! While in the middle of my call, I managed to pull out my phone and take a quick picture of the view out my window. Lacking Amy's photoshop skills, I simply cropped out some of the crap in the foreground to leave this:


It's a bit small to see everything, but if you open the picture up, you can see the cranes down at the Port of Vancouver glowing like they're on fire!

Return of the social life

Jody summed it up well this morning at swimming: it's like my social life is back! I have friends again!

And so begins another season of LET(&S)C the &S being the & Social part of the club. It's Wednesday night and that means sweatin' it out on the bike while being yelled at by some guy who calls himself your coach. Good times!

She's right though. The last 4 years of my life wouldn't have been the same without this fine group of people and the fun and sweat and tears and celebrations. I heart all of you LETCers. You make my day. Everyday.

But I'm sure you don't want to see a gratuitous shot of men in spandex - especially this early in the season. No one needs to see Drew's muffin top. I'll wait at least a month before I start that.

In the mean time here is my fellow blogger, the one who got me into this mess of a photo a day, a fellow LETCer, and the woman who won the date with my husband (to the hockey game) at the LETC pressie grab: Alison.


As a bonus I feel this picture does show the pre-session madness of Wednesday night spinning.

Chicken pie time. I'm starving!

My office mate peed on my mail. But we have to celebrate this because as she is 18 and has a nasty habit of peeing in the middle of a room, peeing in a box of ANY kind is to be celebrated. I think it was an act partially brought on by old age and partially in anger as I haven't been around much to give her attention. But today I was around for over an hour so she got plenty of lap time. And might prevent my mail from being mistaken for the litter box.

And as Nelson (yes that is HER name) is a part of my day as an office cat I thought she deserved a picture. Getting cats to pose is about as easy as herding them. So I ended up with a few shots none that I am really happy with but working with cats... not so easy.

Fuel

So in an attempt to give this photo a day some direction and purpose I thought I should pick a theme. Then I freaked out about the commitment of 365 photos of a theme. Eeek. So I took a step back and said "There will be 12 themes. And the themes shall each last one month. And as there are 12 months the number of themes shall be 12."

First theme: A DAY IN THE LIFE

Which fits nicely with yesterday's first three shots which were snippets of things I regularly do: shop for food, and run in a gorgeous forest.

Today is about how I get through the mornings as a creature who would rather be hibrating.

Caffine. I regularly worship at the base of the silver dispenser of hot fuel. The espresso maker. And my vessel of choice:

But that seemed rather boring and so I channeled my inner Andy (and played in the photoshop app on my iPhone...) and made it into this:



Which I quite like. So now I have to think about what else I do on a regular basis to give you another glimpse into the Life and Times of Pants. And I have to think of 11 more themes. Crap!

One resolution

Alison issued a challenge. A photo a day. For the entire year. And I stupidly said.... oooo that sounds like fun. I mean I have two cameras. One that can do underwater and can be dropped and beaten and still take photos and one on my shiny new iPhone. So why not right? It would be photos of other things and keep me out of the line of the lens. Important because I don't do photos of myself. Seriously. I hate being photographed. Ick. I'm like Chandler. With the ackward smile and sudden inability to be me. So no photos of me. Just of other things. Like what we did or where we are or my feet (which might be a common subject since I work alone, at home, in my jammies (mmmm maybe getting out more during the day should be resolution number 2).

So photos. I am 3 days late to the party so you get three pictures all at the same time.

First up, the grocery store. Woot.




I like the potato photo better.

Then yesterday we went for a run in the woods to scout out the trails (muddy). And I took this photo on Nature (I think it was Nature... it was by Cleveland before the hill... maybe it's not Nature...)



So it's cheating a bit but there you go. Three days into the New Year and three pics done. Three hundred sixty-two to go.