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Random Thoughts about life in general, living in the big city of Toronto

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True or False – Answers

September 15, 2006 by Tricia

A number of you tried to guess the answers to my little Thursday Thirteen quiz (see 2 posts below). Are you ready for the answers?

1 and 2. Both True- Rockstar SuperNova was one of the few shows that I watched on TV over the summer. I was addicted and I was pleased that Lucas Rossi won. For those that don’t know, Super Nova is a new band comprised of Tommy Lee, Gilby Clarke and Jason Newstead and they were looking for a lead singer for their band- hence the Rockstar reality TV show.

3. False. I’m sure there are a lot of fantastic singers in Toronto, but not everyone here can carry a tune. We don’t kick the bad singers out, but I’ve certainly heard some singing bad enough that it made me think of moving!

4. True – Doesn’t everyone think their singing is fantastic in the shower?

5. False – My husband is a musician. He plays 13 instruments. He doesn’t make a living playing music but I’m sure he could.

6. I think just about everyone said false for this one but it’s actually true. When I became a jeweller and started my own business things weren’t going well and I need to make some extra money (legally!) to get by. I’d always been interesting in acting and I’d been in all the Drama classes in high school. So, I signed up with some agencies and I did some extra work in commercials for a few years on the side, and I was even in two movies, one very prominently. No it wasn’t that kind of movie either, but I can’t say that it was a good movie.

7. False – If you’ve been reading this site for any length of time you probably know that my husbands nickname here is “Sir Talk A lot”. He’s almost never quiet.

8. True – Yep, as I just said above I was a Jeweller. My companies name was Diamond Cuts. I used a huge milling machine to cut designs into various types of jewellery with a diamond and did some hand cutting too. I also did gold plating and made molds for new designs. Prior to starting my own business I worked for another jeweller and I was a caster there, and then the manager. During my time in the jewellery trade I worked with a lot of dangerous chemicals such as cyanide on a daily basis and I sometimes wonder if any of those chemicals have contributed to my current illness.

9. False – I never go to bed early unless I fall asleep on the couch while watching TV in the evening with my husband. When that happens its from sheer exhaustion. I don’t sleep much due to my abdominal pain – it’s at it’s worst at night.

10. False- Look at my header, see the iguana on the couch? Yep I’m a reptile lover.

11. 12. and 13 are all True.

I’m an A type personality and I guess you could say I’m in my third career. I do have my make up artist and special effects certificate.

I’ve written several articles for magazines and other publications – most of them with little or no pay for my contributions. I currently have an article that’s just been published in an annual magazine called Reptiles USA Annual 2007 (It’s the water dragon article). I haven’t received my two free copies of the magazine yet and I haven’t seen it in any pet stores, but I’m told it’s out there.

Last but not least I’ve been off work due to illness for over 9 months now. I’m going stir crazy and I want to get better and get back to work.

That’s it. Exciting huh?





Filed Under: General Musings, Jeweller/Jewellery Tagged With: Answers, Jeweller Jewellery, quiz, True or false

Strange noises at night

September 2, 2006 by Tricia

The other night I was up late. Actually I had fallen asleep on the couch while watching TV with my husband. I awoke at a little past 4 a.m. to find that Chris had abandoned me there. Silly husband, I guess he prefers sleeping in bed.

I was groggy but I knew that I wasn’t ready to go to my real bed yet so I turned the T.V. back on and started to watch what came on. It was the end of Saturday night fever. Man, I haven’t seen that movie in ages. John Travolta’s hair was so stiff looking- probably hard with hairspray – that it looked like a wig. It’s kind of weird to revisit old movies that were part of your younger years. I think I was 10 or 11 when it first came out.

I was so out of it that I kept watching T.V. when Saturday night Fever ended, and ended up watching Smallville. I’ve never seen a whole episode of that show. I guess it was ok, but it’s not the type of show that I would set time aside to watch.

As I watched T.V. I kept hearing weird noises.

Was that a strange banging noise in the driveway? Or was that noise further away?

Klunk. Sounds like something fell down in the basement?

Then, at 5 a.m. I heard it. The creepiest noise of all. I heard what sounded like someone trying to open our front door. The lock gave a distinctive click or clunk.

Lying on the couch, perhaps 12 feet from the front door, I was frozen in fear. After a minute or two, with no further sounds coming from the door lock, I slowly sat up. Should I walk over to the door and take a look? Uh huh. I’d be tempted to open it and what if someone really is there? Ok then, I’ll peek out the front window.

It took me a few minutes to work up the guts to even peek out the window. No one inside the front porch. No one on the sidewalk or street. Whew that’s good. So I walked over to the front door and tested the lock. Secure.

I still felt nervous, and surprise, surprise I wasn’t the least bit sleepy anymore. I went on the computer for a while to check my fan mail e-mail. I eventually went to bed, to the safety and security of being near by husband, but until I nodded off to sleep I was listening for anymore strange noises.

Now, I’m often up very late at night, so I’m used to strange noises the house makes when all is quite. None of the noises I heard between 4 and 5 a.m. sounded familiar to me. It was a cool night so I suppose it’s possible that some of the noises were house cooling noises, but I don’t think so. I’m pretty sure someone was on the front porch and that they tried the door.

Less than two months ago someone came into our enclosed front porch in the middle of the night and tried on all of our running shoes. Odd huh? Well, they didn’t just try them on, they stole a pair of Chris’ and left their old decrepit shoes. Yuck!

I didn’t tell my husband about the strange noises until Friday evening when I told him I’d probably make a post about it. I said I was going to call the post Noises in the Night (but I already did one with that title before), then, as if on cue we both sang “Noises in the Night” to the tune of “Strangers in the Night”. Yeah, we’re weird.

Tell me about your experiences with strange noises in the house. Has anyone tried to break in while you’ve been home? Do night house noises give you the creeps?

Talk to me.

Filed Under: General Musings Tagged With: break in, creepy, frightened, late at night, Strange noises

She’s Gone

August 25, 2006 by Tricia

The boarder from Hell left 15 minutes ago.

I should be ecstatic with joy but I’m angry instead. What has this girl done to me? I’m never filled with such anger.

When she was saying good-bye she looked at my husband 95% of the time. Barely made eye contact with me. That really ticked me off. I’m the one who cooked for her, took her damn orders, consoled her when she was upset (even though I didn’t really want to), and helped her with her silly homework questions. Not Chris.

I always treated her with respect, even though it wasn’t reciprocated (well, it was if she wanted something from me). I talked to her kindly too.

I guess her good-bye was my opportunity for me to tell her what a selfish ungrateful person she is, but I’m better than that. Her day will come and life won’t be so great when she realizes that the people she’s been using won’t take it anymore.

Now, to change the locks, and let the neighbors know that if she comes back she’s person non grata here. Yeah yeah, she’s supposed to be getting on a plane to Vancouver at 6 p.m. But I just don’t trust her.

Ok, that’s the last grumble.

Filed Under: General Musings Tagged With: boarder from Hell, General Musings, moved out, ungrateful

What Fun!

August 24, 2006 by Tricia

Seriously, I don’t have a mean bone in my body, or at least I didn’t until about a month ago. For the last month all the meanness has been brewing, and brewing and well, tonight it’s bubbling over.

I promise this will be my last negative post about our boarder. Honest. BTW since people have been asking. Our boarders are people coming from other countries to learn english. Their stay is often short, one or two months. Angela is our second boarder.

As you can see from my last post, Angela has been quite and idiot in this house, and she’s made life very difficult for us (and that’s just skimming the surface). The only reason we have a boarder is because I’m sick with Crohns and I’ve been off work for almost 9 months now. I’m not getting any sick pay, or medical leave anymore, so we have to do something to make up for my loss of income. That’s the only reason we have a boarder. If I could work something out so that we didn’t have to do this I certainly would, especially after this experience.

Since she’s leaving to go back home to Korea tomorrow she’s been busy every evening this week saying good-bye to all the friends she’s made. That’s been fine with me ’cause she hasn’t been around to drive me INSANE as much.

On Tuesday she said she’d be home by 6 p.m. for dinner and then she’d be going out with friends. She didn’t come home until at least 9 and didn’t want dinner. Whatever. However she did inform me that she’d be going out with friends on Wednesday evening and that she wanted dinner by 6 pm because she was going out at 7 pm. She also told me that she was going out on Thursday evening for dinner with friends so Wednesdays dinner would be our last together.

First off, I’m ticked because she actually ordered me to make dinner by a certain time. AGAIN. But then I thought about it, and thought ok, that’s the last time, one last meal. So I got some very nice chicken breasts out and on Wednesday I had dinner already to go by 5 p.m. Chris was supposed to have been off work by 4:30 p.m. but he didn’t come back until 5:30 p.m. and he brought a friend from work with him that neither of us had seen for a couple of months. So we went outside to talk and have a drink in the garden.

Naturally I’m still waiting for the Princess to come home. I had no plans to start cooking until she did, because well, with her history, she often does the opposite of what she says.

She finally arrived home at 6:30 and promptly informed us that she’d be having dinner out with friends. In my head I was thinking that’s fine B*tch – make me fix a nice dinner for you, our last, and then not be home to eat it; but I was also clapping my hands and jumping up and down with joy inside too, because I didn’t really want to sit and eat with her anyway.

It ended up ruining my evening though, because I couldn’t believe the gall. Demand dinner and then telling me she was going out with her friends instead. That’s just rude, ignorant, inconsiderate, and selfish. I was just fuming inside, no – raging.

We’ve confronted her twice in the last month and a half about things she’s done, and both times she’s ended up in tears and tried to turn it around on us. Read some of my past posts. In one confrontation she accused me of trespassing on her privacy. Yeah right chickie poo, like you haven’t invaded my privacy every single day with your actions.

This evening she didn’t come home until 9 p.m. I was outside watering the front garden when she arrived. She said a limp hi and continued walking towards the door. I said to her that she hasn’t studied much this week. She always has a major test on Fridays and tomorrows will be her last one, and she failed last weeks test apparently. If she fails this one she won’t get her certificate, so she might as well have left four weeks ago.

She replied that oh, her friends wanted to throw her a going away party, and she’s not worried about her test, she’s been studying. Yeah, whatever. I continue watering and she goes ahead inside.

My computer was on so I tried to peer in the windows as I watered to make sure she didn’t use it. I eventually walked in and unplugged the power to the modem so there wouldn’t be an internet connection. Yeah mean, but she’s not allowed to use the computer without my permission and I was in the middle of writing a few things when I decided to give up on trying to use a sprinkler on the garden and hand water instead.

(Funny, now that I just tried to open something I’ve discovered that my internet connection really is down. Pay back I guess.)

Now one thing that we have asked her was that if one of us was watering the garden to either let us know when she was going to have a shower so we’d stop, or find out how much longer we’d be and possibly wait for us to finish. She’s actually been pretty good about that, but this evening she wasn’t. Suddenly my water pressure dropped. I thought, Ok, maybe she’s just used the washroom and flushed the toilet. The water pressure never came back up.

I went inside the house and discovered that she was showering. Keep in mind the time please – 9:15 p.m. So I went back outside again and continued watering, but this time I did something different. Since it was taking forever anyways with the lessened water pressure I decide to play a game. I would stop watering for a few minutes … hoping that she had adjusted the shower temperature to account for my watering outside. My stopping watering would increase the water pressure in the shower and probably make the shower get colder.

I finally finished watering at about 9:45 and she was STILL showering or doing whatever she does up there. Her showers sound funny … the water goes on and off a lot (and MY towels get wet!).

Hey, what if I had to use the washroom? Ah ha! If you were here you would have seen a bright light bulb go off over my head. I went to the basement bathroom and used it (even though I really didn’t need to) and flushed the toilet. When the tank had refinished filling I flushed again and came back upstairs.

Still showering I see. Hmmm Should I?

Yep, I kept going to the basement and flushing the toilet every five minutes or so. I think I did it at least three more times, so five in total.

Now as I said I really don’t have a mean bone in my body and that’s probably why our boarder from hell has gotten away with a lot of the stuff that she has. Well, she hasn’t gotten away with it, but she’s still here right? Yeah, 1 point for her. So, as mean as some of this might sound to some of you reading your first account of me versus the boarder – she deserved it, and it’s about time I did something isn’t it?

She didn’t come out of the shower until 10:10. That’s an awfully long time to shower isn’t it? When she came out I asked her if she has a shower while I was watering (playing dumb) and she said “ohhhh, Sorry!” She didn’t let me know if her shower was too hot or too cold though. I’m sure it was both.

I feel evil for doing that, but I just couldn’t help myself. Muhhh ha ha ha ha.

If she ever comes downstairs I plan on getting our key from her tonight. Well, whether she comes downstairs or not she’s giving us our key back this evening, not tomorrow morning.

I haven’t decided yet, but either this evening when we get the key from her, or tomorrow morning as she’s trying to be all huggy and say good bye I plan on telling her what a total inconsiderate and rude person she’s been. I’d like to do that anyway, but I sort of feel like I might be stepping down to her level if I do.

My behavior this evening might not be setting a great example for Canadian people, but I can’t say that her behavior in the two and a half months that she’s been here has set any great example for her people either. I certainly hope that not all South Korean people are selfish, ignorant and conceited. I think it will be a while before we take on another Korean boarder, if ever.

Filed Under: General Musings Tagged With: bad boarder, boarder, border, General Musings, Korean ESL student, rude, selfish, student

Short Notice Visit

August 18, 2006 by Tricia

It seems that I’m having another busy week. Last week was the two weddings and activities with the in-out-laws, and this week has been a surprise visit by my brother.

My brother came into town late Tuesday night. He lives in beautiful Vancouver, B.C. Whenever he comes into Toronto it always seems to be a last minute thing and he rarely lets us know even a day ahead of time. We just get a call “I’m in town for some meetings (or a conference), wanna get together for dinner?”.

He’s a geologist who happens to be the president of a mining company based in British Columbia. He’s here this week trying to get some businesses to invest in the old mine that his company is re-opening.

I didn’t know he was in town until late Wednesday afternoon when he called. Naturally I wanted to get together with him. I rarely see him and he’s such a great guy. He came over to our house and we went to the Danforth for Greek food. Terry, my brother, was having trouble deciding what to eat because everything on the menu looked so good to him, so we ended up ordering several appetizers. Saganaki (Greek goat cheese – flamed), Dolmades (rice and meat rolled in grape leaves), Spinach Dip, and Kalamari. We had a very nice Merot from Chile to accompany our meal. All the food and drink were great. Our neighbor is a waiter at the restaurant and he ended up serving us. We happened to still be at the restaurant when our neighbors shift ended so we drove him home and he invited us in for some Ozo.

I haven’t been feeling very well this week at all. I think last weeks four days of wedding preparation, weddings and then family outings were too much for me. I spent Sunday feeling terrible and trying to recover. By Wednesday when we went out with my brother I was feeling somewhat better. But I woke up feeling absolutely terrible on Thursday morning and didn’t get much better over the course of the day.

Even though I wasn’t feeling well I wasn’t going to miss and opportunity to see my brother again on Thursday evening. You see, not only do I not see him very often, I also happen to be very lucky just to have him around. Back in 1992 he had non-hodgkins lymphoma. It was discovered only because he started to feel like he suddenly had a chest infection or pneumonia so he went to the hospital for an xray and they discovered a huge tumor in his chest. Shortly after they biopsied the tumor they found that a number of other smaller tumors had started up in his abdomen and spine. He was started immediately on one of the heaviest doses of chemo that can be given. We are all very happy that the treatment worked so well for him. He’s been cancer free since 1993. Unfortunately when you have a cancer that is that bad, and a treatment that is so heavy, there is a higher chance of it coming back or another cancer developing. So every visit, every moment I can spend with him has been a gift and I wouldn’t miss an opportunity to see him no matter how bad I’m feeling.

So on Thursday evening we went out with my brother to an Italian restaurant downtown. My other brother that lives just outside of Toronto joined us, and so did my sister who happens to live downtown. That’s another nice thing about Terry’s visits, it gives us all an opportunity to get together. I used to work with my sister when we were both in the Jewellery trade, and in fact lived with her for my first two years in Toronto, but these days we don’t see each other very often. It’s the same thing with my brother who lives just outside of town. (and I worked with him too when I first came to Toronto) We all just have busy lives and it’s hard to connect. Well my life isn’t so busy these days with my being home sick, but their lives are busy, and when I do get back to work again my shifts make it difficult too. So Terry’s visits are a great opportunity for all of us to catch up, because we all make time to see Vancouver brother.

My poor brother. He was supposed to have a vacation with his wife next week. They rented a house boat and they were going to tour around part of British Columbia in it. However, he’s is still in Toronto. He’s going home for the weekend but then he’s coming back on Monday for some more meetings and then he’s going to the United States – to five cities- for more meetings. He hopes to get back home to Vancouver some time late Tuesday. Maybe he’ll be able to salvage part of his holiday.

Filed Under: General Musings, Jeweller/Jewellery Tagged With: brother, dinner, Family, Jeweller Jewellery, restaurant, sister, visit

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I have two mottos-
1. Live life to the fullest; and
2. Don't have any regrets.

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