Things To Do During Birthday Week if You’re Me

1. Sleep in if you can. Preferably with feline companionship of the rumbly purry sort. Refuse to feel guilty about it.
2. Decide to share the birthday joy and opt for cupcakes instead of a regular birthday cake. Make sure everyone gets to blow out a candle and make a wish.
3. Be thankful for the carefully considered gifts you receive (particularly the two PATD tix from your beloved). Squish the Nutbrown Hare from Shu often.
4. Spend a day doing nothing but hanging out with your sweetie. Make a point of leaving the baggage behind. Leave space for possibilities. Drive lots.
5. Embrace your inner TV geek and invest in yet another set of DVD’s.
6. Take your actual birth day off work. First thing in the morning, open all the blinds, find a warm spot on the carpet and contemplate the quality of light.
7. Make yourself an indulgent breakfast and a steaming pot of tea. Hang out at the dining room table with a good book and the company of the kitties until you feel like moving…
8. Give yourself the gift of a sweet-smelling cat by bathing the eldest. Choose not to take photos of her looking like a soggy bath mitt, but give in to the urge to capture her sweet little wet feet.
9. Download photos. Revisit moments. Cull. Be grateful you didn’t have to spend a fortune in film processing.
10. Go out to dinner with your honey. Drink mead. Giggle lots. Try not to drop cutlery.
11. At the end… take a moment to bask. Then get started on the thank you notes.

You know it’s been a while..

…when it takes 22 minutes for your computer to download all the photos off your camera.

And then you find out you have photos on there dating back to mid March.

Unmotivated? No, not me!

Sharing!

Ever have one of those days when you keep singing the same song over and over again?

Yeah. Me too. Usually it’s something inane like the Smurfs theme song or (gah!) something annoyingly perky from a 70’s game show.

Thankfully, today is NOT one of those days.

No, today it’s all about the latest song from one of the most overplayed bands on my mp3 player.

If you haven’t heard of The Hush Sound before, you’re in for a treat. 

Honey from their latest Goodbye Blues

Your turn - what music are you really loving right now that you want others to know about?

Count Your Blessings, Numero Dos

Love - Despite the fact that winter is lingering, parts of nature are sticking to their schedules, and my city is a-bloom; magnolia trees in the west end, cherry blossoms all over the downtown, tulips on my balcony.

Love - That I’ve been able to go back to a cherished routine; coming home from work, opening the balcony doors wide, and watching the furkids go out for a sniff and a stretch. I’m determined to make our balcony even more cat friendly this year, and am eying seating for future sun naps.

Love - That I’ve been able to introduce one of my favourite bloggers to two of my favourite Mary Stewart books. Yes, I get my sense of accomplishment where I can.

Love - That it’s getting nice enough out there for me to want to take my bike out. I see more frequent loops round the seawall in my future. Since it gets me all the way round Science World and to Granville Island, I may also have some panniers in my future too.

Love - Street art. Whether it be chalk-art, signage, stickers or something more permanent. so I really love this twist on street art…

Love - The dog park next to my old elementary school. My sister introduced me to it when we took her girl Emma for a walk recently, and I’ve been tempted to go back ‘just to watch’, more than once. So many dogs! How sad is it that I want more Emma time just so we can go to the park?

 So… what’s on your list today?

Grab your hat and fetch your camera, film the world before it happens*

Captured: Riding with the windows down, sun glittering off the bay, unexpected scent of spring in motion and infinite possibilities…

* Post title shamelessly stolen from lyrics in PATD’s “She’s A Handsome Woman”

Peace In Our Paws?

Courtesy of the fine folk over at Cute Overload. Yeah, I like my cute animal stories, what of it?

I’ve watched it a few times, for different reasons - the aw factor, what their companion Gregory Pike has to say, and of course, for the crowd reaction.

 

And is it just toooo twelve-year-old-girl of me to think that the cat grooming the rat is endearing?

After the week I’ve had, this gives me hope. And hope? Priceless.

Have You Ever?

Yeah for Fridays!

Stole this one from the delightful Barbie2Be. Was rather surprised at the number of things I have done (bolded), and even more interested by the things I thought should be added. Yes, of course I added comments. I’m opinionated.

Anyways here’s more about me than you ever wanted to know -

1. Bought everyone in the bar a drink
2. Swam with wild dolphins (Can I get points for seals though? I’ve swum with them - unintentionally)
3. Climbed a mountain
4. Taken a Ferrari for a test drive
5. Been inside the Great Pyramid
6. Held a tarantula
7. Taken a candlelit bath with someone
8. Said “I love you” and meant it (this one I do regularly  ’cause I’m a big sap)
9. Hugged a tree
10. Bungee jumped
11. Visited Paris
12. Watched a lightning storm at sea
13. Stayed up all night long and saw the sun rise
14. Seen the Northern Lights
15. Gone to a huge sports game
16. Walked the stairs to the top of the leaning Tower of Pisa
17. Grown and eaten your own vegetables
18. Touched an iceberg
19. Slept under the stars
20. Changed a baby’s diaper
21. Taken a trip in a hot air balloon
22. Watched a meteor shower
23. Gotten drunk on champagne
24. Given more than you can afford to charity
25. Looked up at the night sky through a telescope
26. Had an uncontrollable giggling fit at the worst possible moment
27. Had a food fight
28. Bet on a winning horse
29. Asked out a stranger
30. Had a snowball fight
31. Screamed as loudly as you possibly can
32. Held a lamb
33. Seen a total eclipse
34. Ridden a roller coaster
35. Hit a home run (only in love baby, only in love…)
36. Danced like a fool and didn’t care who was looking
37. Adopted an accent for an entire day (yup - a bad one)
38. Actually felt happy about your life, even for just a moment
39. Had two hard drives for your computer
40. Visited all 50 states
41. Taken care of someone who was drunk (what comes around goes around)
42. Had amazing friends
43. Danced with a stranger in a foreign country
44. Watched whales
45. Stolen a sign
46. Backpacked in Europe
47. Taken a road-trip
48. Gone rock climbing
49. Midnight walk on the beach
50. Gone sky diving
51. Visited Ireland
52. Been heartbroken longer than you were actually in love
53. In a restaurant, sat at a stranger’s table and had a meal with them
54. Visited Japan
55. Milked a cow
56. Alphabetized your CDs (I leave that to Ironhead!)
57. Pretended to be a superhero (What do you mean pretended? I AM a superhero. Just need a sidekick and my own comic book.)
58. Sung karaoke
59. Lounged around in bed all day
60. Played touch football
61. Gone scuba diving
62. Kissed in the rain (Snort - where do you think The Notebook got the idea?)
63. Played in the mud
64. Played in the rain
65. Gone to a drive-in theater
66. Visited the Great Wall of China
67. Started a business
68. Fallen in love and not had your heart broken
69. Toured ancient sites
70. Taken a martial arts class
71. Played D&D for more than 6 hours straight
72. Gotten married
73. Been in a movie
74. Crashed a party
75. Gotten divorced
76. Gone without food for 5 days
77. Made cookies from scratch
78. Won first prize in a costume contest
79. Ridden a gondola in Venice
80. Gotten a tattoo (it’s in the works! I swear!)
81. Rafted the Snake River
82. Been on television news programs as an “expert”
83. Gotten flowers for no reason (…and from a stranger too)
84. Performed on stage
85. Been to Las Vegas
86. Recorded music
87. Eaten shark
88. Kissed on the first date
89. Gone to Thailand
90. Bought a house
91. Been in a combat zone (only when I’ve created it)
92. Buried one/both of your parents
93. Been on a cruise ship
94. Spoken more than one language fluently
95. Performed in Rocky Horror
96. Raised children (cats, rats, eyebrows, blood pressure, hemlength, possibly my top - but no, no kids)
97. Followed your favorite band/singer on tour
98. Passed out cold
99. Taken an exotic bicycle tour in a foreign country
100. Picked up and moved to another city to just start over
101. Walked the Golden Gate Bridge
102. Sang loudly in the car, and didn’t stop when you knew someone was looking
103. Had plastic surgery
104. Survived an accident that you shouldn’t have survived
105. Wrote articles for a large publication
106. Lost over 100 pounds (Do ex-boyfriends count?)
107. Held someone while they were having a flashback
108. Piloted an airplane
109. Touched a stingray
110. Broken someone’s heart
111. Helped an animal give birth
112. Won money on a T.V. game show
113. Broken a bone (Nope. I’m boneless.)
114. Gone on an African photo safari
115. Had a facial part pierced other than your ears
116. Fired a rifle, shotgun, or pistol (Next on the list is the cross-bow!)
117. Eaten mushrooms that were gathered in the wild
118. Ridden a horse
119. Had major surgery
120. Had a snake as a pet (Nope, but I had rats - two of ‘em)
121. Hiked to the bottom of the Grand Canyon
122. Slept for more than 30 hours over the course of 48 hours
123. Visited more foreign countries than U.S. states
124. Visited all 7 continents
125. Taken a canoe trip that lasted more than 2 days
126. Eaten kangaroo meat (Um.. ew?!?)
127. Eaten sushi
128. Had your picture in the newspaper
129. Changed someone’s mind about something you care deeply about
130. Gone back to school
131. Parasailed
132. Touched a cockroach
133. Eaten fried green tomatoes
134. Read The Iliad - and the Odyssey
135. Selected one “important” author who you missed in school, and read one of their works
136. Killed and prepared an animal for eating
137. Skipped all your school reunions
138. Communicated with someone without sharing a common spoken language
139. Been elected to public office
140. Written your own computer language
141. Thought to yourself that you’re living your dream
142. Had to put someone you love into hospice care
143. Built your own PC from parts
144. Sold your artwork to someone you didn’t know
145. Had a booth at a street fair
146. Dyed your hair
147. Been a DJ
148. Shaved your head
149. Caused a car accident (Yeah, me and my stunning good looks {aherm})
150. Saved someone’s life

So there you have it - feel free to steal!

ETA: The darling boy stole it, and made it funny. Dammit.

Reprise

Now about that concert…

I’ve been kinda maybe sorta a little in love with José González since his stint on Zero 7’s The Garden. (And I’ve loved Zero 7 since Simple Things, but that’s another post).  When serendipity struck and I won two tickets to his concert at St. Andrews-Wesley, I did a spontaneous happy dance in my kitchen.

Yeah, really.

See, in my opinion, there are three kinds of music - the kind you don’t like, the type that you play every once in a while and somewhat enjoy, but which never really blends into your life, and the kind that belongs in your life’s soundtrack and which you naturally reach for.  Zero 7 quickly fell into the latter category, and the first time I heard José’s In Our Nature I knew his music belonged there too; it blended wonderfully with the constant patter of rain, the rustle of pages turning, and the gentle snore from the cat atop her tuffet. It also made great ‘driving to Deep Cove” music, and “if I were to bake something what would it be?” music. (The only thing it didn’t seem to go well with was our regular bout of bickering, but nothing short of the 1812 overture would do that justice…)

And really, that’s where I’d expect this story to end.

But then came the concert, and a whole new reason to rhapsodize. I blame it on the venue. Despite hearing how amazing Sigur Rós had been when they performed there, I thought a church was an odd place to be holding a concert. What I didn’t consider (and should’ve) is that a church would naturally need good acoustics — how else do you get the word to the bodies seated in the last pew? St. Andrews-Wesley had amazing acoustics, buoyed by an excellent sound system and atmosphere. If you get a chance, I highly recommend checking out a concert there - it’s such a pared down environment you can wallow in the sound as much as you’d like.

Truly, Madly, Deeply

Years ago a well-intentioned soul introduced me to Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way. “You’re creative” they said as they pressed the book into my hand. “You’ll love her.”

Sadly I never did have a wild and passionate affair with her book, but I did read it, and even attempted the two activities she recommended - Morning Pages (three pages, written in longhand, first thing every morning), and the Artist’s Date (a weekly block of two hours spent observing, experiencing, and sensing).

The Morning Pages part of the experiment didn’t last long; my finely honed night owl tendencies (thank you higher education!) were simply too entrenched. Morning Pages soon became Afternoon Pages, then regressed to just-before-bed-while-the-cat-tries-to steal-the-pen-and-pouts-pages.

Apparently Morning Pages were not my thing.

The Artist’s Date was something else altogether. Taking time out each week to do something that would feed my creativity was something I could really get into, and did. In the past decade I’ve visited the usual art galleries, museums, gardens, and heritage buildings, but also taken spontaneous meanders in neighbourhoods I didn’t know and talked to people I might not have otherwise met. All different, all interesting, all cherished.

For the past couple of years I’ve been spending a quiet hour or two at the Vancouver Art Gallery whenever possible. With only the occasional quiet murmur of another patron and my own footsteps to keep me company, I’ve had the chance to see art work that sometimes leaves me puzzled, sometimes dazed, but always like I’ve been in the presence of something more.

My current favourite is the TruthBeauty exhibit, which has taken me ages to work through. I’m blaming it on Oscar Reyjlander (an example of his work, “Homeless” dated 1860, is posted above) and Frederick H. Evans (a British photographer with an amazing ability to make the mundane ethereal). I know little about both and have only recently started researching their contribution to the art, so I won’t even try to give a summary of who they are here. If you are interested in learning more, you can go here, here, here or there.

Sadly TruthBeauty - Pictorialism and the Photograph as Art, 1845-1945 closes April 17th, and once it’s gone, the chance of seeing these small wonders first hand and up close is gone too.

Jose Has Stolen My Heart

Yes, I lucked out and saw him on the very last date of his North American tour. More when I get my brain cells back.