Future and Past

Hello, how was your Christmas?

I'm ever so slowly typing this post on my new iPod Touch. So strange.

Especially since I'm in the oldest city in North America. That's right. D and I are in Newfoundland.

More to come on our adventures!

What a bright time

When I came home this morning, I found this taped to my door:



Our friend Lindsey made us this sweet little card to wish us a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. It's cards and gestures like this that I love the most about Christmas. When I was little it was always the act of making things at Christmas that I liked the best. Making food, making gifts & cards, decorating the tree, wrapping presents...making magic. These are the reasons that Christmas feels magical and special. And I think we often forget that.

A String of Pearls

When I listen to Glenn Miller, I think of my grandfather. When I think of my grandfather, I think of the sound of his voice, the easy way he walked and the things he loved. One of these things was Glenn Miller. He also loved golf, really good scotch and my grandmother.

I think about all of these things, but now, more than ever, I think about the kind of person I want to be when I think about Grandpa.

Listening to Glenn Miller and thinking about Grandpa keeps me going in the right direction, especially on the days when I think I may have started to stray too far away from the woman I want to keep becoming.

Game. Set. Match. Point. Game Over. End of Game.

I was shut down in a similar fashion earlier today while freezing my ass off and waiting for an elevator.

Man: You know you shouldn't be dressed like that in this weather.
Me: I know.
Man: At least you're not working outside.
Me: I have boots, they're upstairs! I just didn't put them on.
Man: You're only human.

(I'm wearing a skirt today with flats. I'm about to put my boots on and go home.)

Home

Go home and watch Planet Earth right now.


And if you've already seen it, watch Blue Planet.


And if you've already seen them both, then I have nothing else to say to you...except this:

I think Planet Earth and Blue Planet are the most important films of our time.

In Good Company

I give you John Milton:

And Judi Dench:

Every morning

I take the TTC to work everyday. The 501 along Queen St. to be specific.

Every morning at Sumach St. an older couple get on the streetcar together. Then, one stop later, the man gets off the streetcar after smothering his wife in kisses and handing her lunch for the day. Then he stands on the sidewalk and waves as the streetcar continues down the street.

This makes me feel so happy. I look forward to seeing them.

Texting

My one and only sister is in South Korea right now and for the first time yesterday, we texted. We've talked on the phone and over Skype; we've emailed...but something about getting texts from her was really exciting. Naturally, speaking with her is always the best, but getting these little texts just felt so instantaneous and personal. It was great.

With so many various ways of communicating nowadays, certain modes of communication are considered more acceptable for certain situations than they used to be. How many people out there have now been invited to a wedding via email? Email?! I think this has become okay because email is the crown jewel of electronic communication. If someone really cares, they'll send an email. If someone sends a text or a FB message...not so much.

Here's is how I rank electronic communication, by importance:

1. Phonecall
2. Text
3. Email
4. Facebook/MySpace message
5. Twitter

Am I forgetting something?

Now, of course there are exceptions. Text and email are easily blurred, depending on who you are talking to and how much you have to say. For instance, my mother doesn't text and I obviously don't feel like she cares less because she emails me instead. (Actually, she always calls; she's the best.)

So, to bring this post full circle, getting these texts from my sister, who is oh-so far away, felt surprisingly personal. Although she and I call and email, it's hard to catch each other because of the time difference, schedules and cost. But with texting, it can be a spur-of-the-moment, sweet message. Just a quick little hello, from across the ocean, no matter what's going on. All our disconnects disappear and it's straight from her to me.

I love you, M.

My boyfriend jeans

In the past year or so, the "boyfriend" jeans trend came around again. American Eagle, for one, has carried boyfriend style jeans for quite a while now. My understanding of the boyfriend jean is this: they are jeans that are loose, often torn and usually rolled up at the bottom.

For example:


Well, I actually wore my boyfriend's jeans today (to work!) and let me tell you, they did not look like the jeans above. In fact, I seldomly see men wearing jeans that look like the "boyfriend" jeans. Those jeans are more like Huckleberry Finn jeans...and I'm down with that. However, my boyfriend's jeans, like most mens jeans are dark, smooth and fitted. And they look better on him.

If you're wondering why I wore my boyfriend's jeans to work, please see yesterday's post and I'm sure you'll figure it out.

The Office Christmas Party

So tonight is our office Christmas Party. It's being held at 7 Numbers, which I highly recommend to those of you in the area.

Office parties are fun in my experience, but they can also bring up a lot of gossip, which has already been swirling around like crazy here lately. We'll see how tonight goes...as for myself, I'm going to focus on the food and the dancing.

And now, a picture, of everyone's favourite boss at Christmas time:

This city

As you may have realized by now, I live in Toronto. And it's cold here. Both the climate and the people (okay, a lot of the people).

Tonight when I was waiting for the 501 at Queen and Yonge, the city felt more aggressive and unforgiving than usual. It's raining, there were several ambulances and firetrucks screaming past and everyone at the streetcar stop seemed more irritable than usual. This isn't an uncommon scene for Toronto, but there was something different tonight. It felt more like Gotham City.

There are a lot of things I like about Toronto, but I'm having a hard time remembering what those things are lately. Maybe I just don't like cities or maybe I'm just not spending enough time with Toronto herself. Most of my time spent in the city is in the neighbourhood where I work (quite snobby, not very friendly) or on the TTC (where people are at their most miserable). Of course, the neighbourhood I live in is lovely and I adore my little apartment. It's my little haven in the city.

I grew up near Toronto and never thought I would live here. I much preferred the country when I was little, but somehow, here I am. I moved here for work, for love, to change my life, to challenge myself and so on. More and more I find myself thinking, why am I living here? Especially when I know there are places like this out there:

And this:

And this:


P.S. I have been to all of these places.

I remind myself

The more it snows, the more it goes; the more it goes on snowing.

(from The Tao of Pooh)

Self-portrait & sunshine.

Today at work, my computer decided to update...again. I have Windows Vista at work (not by choice) and I have lost hours of my life waiting for updates to complete or reinstalling the OS entirely. It's ridiculous.

Anyway...

We have a spare office set up for occasions such as these (shouldn't that tell you something when you, the boss, is making a decision about computer software for your office? Okay, enough about Vista.) and I set up shop in there today. It was great because there are nice, big windows in this office with a view of the city. Today the sun was reflecting off the lake and making shine like silver. It was very pretty. On clear days you can see the windmill down at the Exhibition grounds, which I love (windmills always give me such a sense of hope). I happened to have my camera on me today, so I took a couple of pictures.

I love the graininess of this one:

And here is one of me, with my giant headphones on for podcasting:

Being in the spare office was a welcome break from my windowless area of the office. I love the sunshine and it's hard for me to watch it go as winter comes. I guess it wasn't so bad that Vista decided to update after all.

The most beautiful sound in the world

This weekend, we watched one of my all-time favourite movies, The Sound of Music. I don't remember watching this movie for the first time or how many times I've seen it, but I have loved it for as long as I can remember. Unfortunately, few people I know share the same love for it and thus, I end up watching this movie alone most of the time. D watched it with me this time and though he liked it, I think he's partial to the stage version (preposterous, I know).

We have a copy of the 40th Anniversary Edition of the movie, which also included the A&E biography of the real Von Trapp family. The real story is similar, with a few key differences. One the biggest being that Maria did not love the Captain, sadly. The other major difference was the way in which the movie characters of Maria and the Captain are portrayed. In real life, their characteristics are reversed- the Captain was a sweet, gentle man and Maria was a bit of a tyrant...although, to her credit, she kept the family alive.

I just realized that this blog was turning into a book report. The bottom line is, both the movie and the true story are incredible in their own right. And as for the influence of the Sound of Music on people and popular culture...well, just search YouTube for some footage of the massive Sound of Music singalongs that take place all over the world and I think you'll get an idea.

The real Von Trapps:

Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer as the Von Trapps:

It's that time again...

I know a lot of people don't like Christmas music or just get really sick of it due to overexposure, but I love it. I really do. Especially at this exact time of year. Christmas is still a month away and the holiday machine is still warming up.

I've been particularly sentimental lately and listening to my favourite holiday songs reminds me of being a kid and going to my grandparents houses on Christmas day. I can almost smell the pine, hear the wrapping paper and feel the itchy tights my mom would make me wear against my legs.

For your listening pleasure, just a few of my all-time favourites:

Blue Christmas - Elvis Presley
Rockin Around the Christmas Tree - Brenda Lee
White Christmas - Otis Redding

Happy Xmas (War is Over) - John Lennon

Vanished!

I read an article in Wired today about a writer who intentionally vanished for a month this year. It was a test, just to see if he could, in this digital age of ours.

I won't ruin the story for you, but it really got me thinking (again) about technology, communication, the future of our world and our relationship with it and each other. I've been a reluctant internet communicator over the years. First with email, then IM, then MySpace, Facebook, Flickr, etc. With each one of these steps, I've been hesitant about what I really gain from each one of them and constantly log in to to change the privacy settings. What is often comes to down to is this: it just doesn't feel good. Or real. The "it" being wrapped up in online communication and social networking.

At this point, I see the value in some of these tools, but they will never replace the real thing for me. I know most people would agree with me, but sometimes I really wonder when I see people constantly checking their Blackberrys, Facebook and Twitter accounts.

I'll definitely be writing more about this topic. I think about it a lot.

In the meantime, check out the story in Wired. It's amazing. In a part of the world where people are getting carpal tunnel syndrome from using their cell phones too often, it's inspiring to read about a man willfully disappearing to see if it's still possible at this time in North America.

Photo credit: Wired.com

Oh, deer.

A deer somehow made its way into downtown Toronto this morning. I hope she's okay now.

Counting Sheep

I'm about to go to bed, so I'll leave you with a question.



After you count sheep, where do they go?

When D and I went to Germany this summer, we slept in until 5pm (!!) our first day there. Naturally, we had some trouble sleeping that night when we were back in bed a mere 7 hours later. We found each other wide awake at about 3am and got into quite a serious discussion about where our sheep go after they've cleared the fence (there's always a fence) and run off into the distance. Are they gone forever? Is there an endless stream of sheep? Or do they loop back around and jump again?

I think we both came to the comclusion that we picture the same sheep jumping over and over again.

What about you?

Saying I'm sorry

I apologized to an old man in Fed Ex the other day because I bumped into him.

He told me to watch the movie Love Story and then I would understand why I should never say I'm sorry.