sailing away

I am at work, finishing things up before I leave for a cruise to Alaska this evening. We'll be aboard Celebrity's Infinity and though it should be exciting, I haven't had time to feel excited. Work has been so insanely busy I was worried I wouldn't even be able to finish things up in time today. However, things look a bit better for the time being. Meanwhile, this summer has been the driest in 52 years. I have been reading in the papers how more than 200 homes have been lost to the massive forest fires in the Kelowna area. Pretty scary. Also almost makes me feel guilty to be going on a trip like this.

ice cream for the masses

Last week, my office tower had ice cream day for the tenants. This is an annual summer event that I look forward to. I've been inviting my friend, Joleen, to come the past 2 years. This year, her office moved into a new building owned by the same property managers so that she also had an ice cream day. So we shared. :) She came to mine last Tuesday, and I went to hers on Wednesday. Good thing we grabbed it early on Tuesday - we both went for the rich Haagen Dazs but on Wednesday, all that was left were drumsticks and Oreo cookie sandwiches. Today, they had Ben & Jerry's downstairs. This is the second year they held this event. Last year, they gave away one mini container of ice cream. The lines were unbelievably long since it was open to the public. This year, they only gave out two scoops with a sugar cone. Still, it was a nice sweet treat and now I'll have to postpone my lunch til this afternoon!

Had a blast this weekend. Went to the Richmond Night Market on Friday night and went to the PNE last night. Long long days but they were fun. :) Looking forward to the trip this weekend...

take a picture

I went to a bridal salon close to UBC yesterday after work. No, I'm not getting married! I went because the lady was looking for models to expand her store's portfolio. She told me I was fine and that she'd give me a call sometime over the next while to set up a day for me to do the shoot. No money, but photos in exchange for time. We'll see how these turn out!!

monday non-monotony

I was feeling ok yesterday after work so I decided to go dancing. We had a wicked tap class at the studio and then the guy I had dinner with on Friday came by to pick me up for dinner. It was a nice dinner of sushi. We went to Future Shop afterwards to look at some accessories/memory cards for my camera. It was a breezy sunny evening - great except that the days are getting shorter so quickly! :( Didn't feel like a Monday though...which was really nice. :) He drove me home and we chatted some more. I finally told him how old I was. He had been scratching his head trying to figure out how many years I'd been in school and why I was in school for so long. I told him I had a masters and he looked completely shocked...he sort of froze and gapped at me. He looked stunned and then it sort of dawned on him, that's why she spent so long in school. It was pretty funny. Then I told him I had a second masters and for kicks added that I had a phD too.

companionship

It's been over a week that my dad has gone with my sister to help her settle into work. It's been a bit strange around the house but now that he's coming back tonight, things will go back to normal. It's been nice though having time with my mom. I must admit that I haven't been home enough.

This weekend has been packed. The dinner on Friday night went well. I got to know the guy I met better. We had a lot to chat about. We drove around and walked a bit. It was nice to have some company. Got home pretty late though.

Work on the weekend was a bit tedious with things going wrong. They always do; it seems like there's always something each weekend. The mic wasn't working properly and, my cash register wasn't working properly either. However, Al, Len, and Bren came and took my last tour. (Len and the others liked my hair. :) ) We went out to Ciao Bella for dinner and then went to Al's house to play DDR. It was my first time but after a few faulty starts, the guys were impressed. They thought I had a knack for it. I attribute it to my dance background. Al thinks I'll surpass his level if I practice. (He said I did better than when he started.) Ah. The weekend was too short!

flat out head turner

This morning I went to L'oreal's head office and my hair was straightened with the flat-iron. I like the look though my boss preferred yesterday's blow-dried look. I don't mind either as long as my hair stays mahogany! :) I thought there were actually going to be 8 models since that was what the lady told me, but there were only the 3 of us. Nice treat it was. Colin showed my hair to about 5 clients and one of the ladies said it was very pretty. I was only there for an hour, and since I had taken all morning off, I had time to go shopping. I popped back into the office to drop off my shampoo etc. and then decided to take a longer lunch instead so worked for a while.

After spending inordinate amounts of time online last night messaging, tonight I'm going out to dinner with this guy I met last week. It started out as coffee, turned into dessert, and now dinner since there's a big gap between work and dessert. It will be kinda cool since my hair is in its top form at the moment. One of the clients had joked that we'd all be going out clubbing tonight. Close...I'm glad my hairstyle (nor I) aren't getting wasted (pun intended). :)

colour my world

My play on words for today. Mahogany - I got my hair done again! Yay! I have colour back; it's a really lovely red and stuck well on the faded out copper that I had. All of my black-now-expresso brown hair was done in this red but it's only under sunlight that you can see the hints of red. The older pre-lightened sections are bright mahogany red and beautiful. I love it. Colin even trimmed my hair a bit to tidy it up. I told him I really liked my previous cut and didn't want to take it to someone else to have them ruin it. I think he did a pretty nice job on the cut today too but really, it was just a minor thing since we only had a couple of hours to do it in.

Have had a few comments on it already. One co-worker commented that she liked the way my hair was styled today. I told her that I had it re-coloured during lunch(!) and then she looked closer and said, "Oh yeah! It's nice." I don't have time to style my hair in the morning!! This morning I barely made it out the door in time for the bus. No earrings, no rings, no bracelets, no necklaces! The mail guy did a double take and asked when I had it done since he had only seen me this morning! He thought perhaps he needed to pay more attention to things. I reassured him it was this afternoon.

Black. There was a huge blackout in the East Coast - New York, Toronto, Ottawa, Detroit, Michigan all are without power. No one knows what is going on but they do not suspect terrorism.

Tomorrow I'll be doing a mini-show to some clients of L'Oreal so I've taken off the morning.

mid-week bbq

I went to a bbq at my supervisor's home last night. Wow. What a beautiful place. Sunny weather made it that much sweeter and the condo was surrounded by tall trees, it was like being in the middle of Stanley Park or Whistler.

After dinner, my co-worker drove me back downtown and I waited at a bus stop where I was the only person. It was just a bit before 9pm. An African-American guy walks down the street and passes me. I looked him in the eye to let him know that I was aware of him. He passed me by and turns around and comes back to me. He says, "Excuse me. But I just want to thank you from my heart that you didn't just shoo me away when I walked by you." I thought to myself, "Why would I have?" So what if he was a transient. Everyone has their own place and right to be. He then rambles on about being HIV positive and how he needed something. I couldn't hear exactly what but I think it was money. I held up my hand to stop him from talking, dug into my bag and pulled up a granola bar I had. I gave it to him. He was probably a little surprised, pauses and then launches into another spiel asking if I'd have a spare loon so he could buy something to drink for his medication. I pointedly told him, "Sorry" and waved my bus pass at him to show him I didn't have change. He walked off without saying thank you, and at the same time, didn't swear at me. I quickly moved onto another bus stop where there was more foot traffic. I wasn't intimidated by him nor did I feel threatened, but it's still unpleasant nevertheless.

I'm slowly recovering my sleep-deprivation. My sister's in Pittsburgh now with our dad so we get phone calls early in the morning before work to see what the news is. I've been icq-ing with my sister (poor girl's internet connection isn't very good that she must press her laptop against the window in her room!) She snagged a job as an RA already! But now she must deal with the visa problems and make a trip to the border and back. She'll probably head to Toronto as that's the closest location.

crash

I worked a double shift at work last night so that I was able to see the Grand Finale of the fireworks of the Celebration of Lights. I didn't get home til 2:30am and then out of the house by 8:30 this morning so I am exhausted. Luckily, there were only 2 harbour tours today - the third was cancelled because of a charter. Anyway, the show was good and it was a relatively easy job to do but I need to sleep.

so long for now

H. finally called me last night. Said he'd been really busy. I figured as much but it had been more than 2 week without a peep! You can't blame a girl for wondering. It was good to hear that he was doing ok. He was back in Singapore for a few days because of a problem that cropped up at work.

When I go home tonight, it will be the last time I see my sister until Christmas. She's leaving tonight to go to Carnegie Mellon in Pittsburgh. I don't envy her the city where it's located, but I am a teeny bit jealous that she's going to be travelling. It won't be easy for sure, but she'll have a good time I'm sure. My dad is going with her to help her settle into her apartment and to help bring some 4 packed suitcases over. I got her a little parting gift to remind her of home. One of those little notepads on a keychain with the girl saying "Go girl." It'll be a little bit strange when she's gone...

zest

It's definitely a sign that something needs changing around here since I was told by a student that I was looking a bit blah. My mom had a reading yesterday. Interesting stuff in which my grandparents (dad's side since my mom's side is still on this side) showed up. Very cool, but for me, she said I was lacking zest and wanted adventure in my job. She said travelling would be good for me - that opportunities would open up next year and I should go out on a limb. Sounds good to me. She said the job I have been eyeing won't happen and that I should go for whatever is offered. A year off is sounding more and more appealing to me.

constant stimulation

I phoned up my ex today to see how his new girlfriend liked the cruise. She enjoyed it but had asked if I always talked like that. I had to laugh. It was my narrative voice. Of course I didn't; I wouldn't have any friends left if I did! But that probably made her feel much better to put a face to the "enemy" or whatever you want to call me. Apparently she's not worried anymore. I told my ex that she probably wondered why he went out with a girl that talked funny. [She wasn't happy that he had taken me out on my birthday, but we hadn't even done the aquarium thing for 2 years and it was a yearly tradition of ours. After seeing me, she's fine. I don't know if it's a good thing or not. Am I that ugly or ??] Anyway, I'll be having dinner with him next weekend as a real birthday dinner. (She had said it was really nice that his friend had given him tickets to the cruise for his birthday, and she wondered why his friend didn't come along...my ex said he didn't want to tell her at the time that I was there, only that I was working!)

I finished Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (book 5) on the weekend. Quite a good read though I dragged it out because I wanted it to last. It really is a page turner, but leaves you dry and wanting more at the end. And now the next one won't be out until another 2 years?!

Been a pretty busy day at work for me which is a good thing, I guess since I need that constant stimulation...

click submit
I've just done it. Submitted an application to another cruise line. Took me a long time to complete it too as they didn't really ask for a resume - just filled out the forms. Ah...we'll see what happens.

irony
Went to work today - another beautiful day. I was glad it wasn't too hot out...at least in the morning. Lots of crowds of people and on the last cruise, people bought tons of drinks. But the tips still sucked. I made a total of a few bucks even though I sold about 30+ bottles of alcohol!

What I wanted to mention though, was that I had invited my ex to come aboard with his girlfriend as my b-day gift to him. After the cruise, we met. He hadn't told her that the narrator (i.e. me) was his ex until afterwards because he didn't want to have her worrying about it the whole trip. Smart. Anyway, we had been discussing what she had planned for him for yesterday...and I had thought maybe it was tickets to Mamma Mia or to Cirque. Turns out she bought tickets to the dinner cruise for the fireworks last night!! so they were here last night as well. Good thing he didn't book his harbour tour for yesterday. How ironic is that?? I guess it would have been more ironic if she had paid for tickets for the harbour tour yesterday...

The Pride parade is on this weekend and when I got off work, people (almost all men) were dressed in denim and leather (black straps!!) waiting to board one of the ships for the pride cruise. Another boatload were going to be arriving later to go for the go-go theme! Wow. What a sight it was. :) Too bad they were all gay. They reminded me of bikers but I felt relatively safe. I would love to work on one of those cruises!! It seems like it would be so much fun and I wouldn't have to worry about being hit on! What's more? I saw my BOSS there dressed up in uniform (like mine) and working. I'm not sure what he was doing or whether he was filling in because they were short-staffed but I will definitely ask!! It would be an experience not to be missed!

Oh yes. The show Naked Boys Singing was entertaining. And yes, the guys were nude but really, you do get used to it and don't pay much attention to "that part" of them, and more to their singing. I think mom was a little shocked at first but she too got a bit used to it! :p

naked boys singing and other oddities

Just so you know, that is the name of the show. Well, just the first part of it: Naked Boys Singing is an off-Broadway musical revue that was playing in NYC (Greenwich Village) while I was there in June. It's now travelling and playing here so I asked my mom if she wanted to go - she said definitely! How often do you ever see more than a trace of nudity?! :) And my sister's coming as well. So we've got excellent seats for tonight's show - 3rd row! Hmm...I hope the music's good! Good thing dad's working late tonight! :p

As for oddities...last night I stayed late to do some overtime. I went to grab dinner first after work and was walking along outside the cruise ship terminal when a young 20-something guy wearing a bandana calls out to me: "Excuse me..." I pause while walking and look in his direction. He's got a digital camera with a nice zoom and I figure he's going to ask me to take his photo for him. Instead he says, "Do you mind if I take a photo of you?" And I answer, "Yes, I do. Sorry." I give him a quick smile and keep walking. That was strange. Weird. Odd. I'm not quite sure what to make of it.

I stayed late last night - didn't leave til 10:45pm. The taxi driver (no. 89) took my cab card right away when we left and made an imprint. Then he handed it over to me to sign. I told him that I'd sign when I got home. What did he think I'd do? Sign him a blank cheque? I semi-napped in the car but when I woke up near home, I saw the meter jumping rapidly and don't know if he had anything to do with it. When I got home, he quickly cleared the fare screen but I was able to see what it said. He'd probably try to rip me off if I was asleep. I put in the total but left the tip blank. I was about to rip off my copy when he says he'll do it - so I hand it back to him. When he gives it back to me, he has modified my total and put in a tip to reflect that. What a total loser. I couldn't believe the nerve of him. I was quite tired in the car and got out; I didn't really sit to examine it, but I was fairly sure I hadn't written an 8 instead of a 0 and when I got inside the house, I was fuming since I knew I hadn't. It's called a tip because it's up to the person who is giving it - not so the person providing the service can tip himself however much he wants. I'm considering making a formal complaint about this.

On a side note, my left foot has been sore and I feel like I have been hobbling around as I need to take care when I step. It hurts across the ball of my foot whenever I put pressure on it (i.e. standing or walking.) BTW, still sunny and gorgeous out but definitely more pleasant as the temperature has cooled off to a balmy 23.