history_gurl

So, Thing Two had her grade 8 graduation last Thursday night. Grade 8 grad was NOT like this when I was there. Oh well. They got dressed up, and had a dance afterward. And they all looked like 21 year olds!

( I have the pics to prove it. )

So, for those of you who don't know, I have been running a safety consulting business for the past few years, here in my beautiful hometown. I work mostly with construction companies, and some commercial clients. And they work mostly with the two big nickel (hee, a pun) companies here in town.

Well, those two nickel giants are well on their way to rolling up the sidewalks here. They've announced layoffs and shutdowns, and there is a possible strike or lock out coming at one of them. This has not boded well for my future (or current, for that matter) employment. So, I've been trying to get myself a permanent, steady job with someone else for a few months now.

I had resigned myself, and the children (sometimes known as Thing 1 and Thing 2), to having to leave town for work. In fact, we almost moved to Edmonton, but they found someone local for that job. So, there I was, not pleased and looking even farther afield, when Canada Post called me about a job as a Health and Safety Officer I had applied for months ago. Long story short ... I got the damned job!

Now, not only will we not have to move, I gonna be workin' for the gov'mint. And we all know you pretty much have to kill someone to lose a government job. Bwahahahahahah! I got it made, kids.

So, yeah, I'm a little relieved. Can you tell? Gonna reduce a lot of stress around here. Gonna go do some more happy dancing now.

lend me your ear. I come not to praise my computer, but to ( bury it. )

To aithine

Happy birthday, lady! I'd offer you porn, but, um, the writing mojo is a little rusty right now. I'm working at it though.

Hope your day was made of awesome cakes, covered with awesome sauce, with awesome sprinkles. Wow, that was overboard, even for me.

*smooches*

So, um, yeah, I know I haven't posted in forever. Long story short ... work, work and more work. But I've started a new(ish) job. Same field, human hours. I even have supper with my kids every day! This is a good thing, as they threatened to divorce me.

Seeing as work would no longer be providing me with the amount of stress I've become accustomed to ... I bought a house. It's 91 years old, and it's adorable. Five bedrooms, two bathrooms, garage, partially finished basement. And we love it. We move in April 30.

Here's a picture of the outside. Oh, about the snow? We've actually had about three times that much snow this year, but it keeps melting between storms. Thank god!




Wow, I can't believe I bought a house. Mostly because it means I have to start packing again. Argh!

PS - Five bedrooms means lots of room for visitors. Hint Hint aithine

So, it seems that the Senators lost last night. And they lost big ... 6-2. What the hell is that? Anyway, they went down, four games to one, and the damn Ducks get to keep Lord Stanley's Cup. This, in and of itself, is a sad, sad thing. But there is worse, people!

You see, in a fit of optimism (I really should have known better, the Sens have choked every year in the playoffs) I made a little wager with cmk418. Now, to be honest, the Leafs are more my team than the Sens. And the Blackhawks are her addiction, not the Ducks. But, well, these teams made it to the finals, and they happen to be within our respective geo-political areas (state for her, province for me), so we callowly switched our allegiances. Yes, we jumped on those Cup-covered bandwagons. I know, shallow of me. But really, did you expect any different? I embrace my shallowness, people!

Anyway, I may have taunted that I would be eating roast Duck by the end of this thing. And she may have suggested that the person who lives closest to the losing team should write a request fic for the person who lives closest to the winning team. And I may have agreed. Oh, when will I ever learn not to wager?

So, hon ... hit me with your request. I may have to sit in a trailer for nine hours on Saturday. That should produce fic, no?

And if anyone else wants a specific fic/pairing/chance to berate me for not finishing the fic I already owe you, this would be the time to speak up.

So, I wasn't planning to wade into any of the latest kerfuffle, but I feel compelled to share this with any of my f-list who somehow hasn't managed to see it yet.

fandom_counts is tallying to number of LJ members who belong to fandom. Go, read the user info, join if you feel the need. I, personally, am interested to see what percentage of their customer base is being alienated by the purge.

Okay kids, we got more pics.  The first three are from yesterday, when the weather was fantastic and we spent six hours beside the pool.  The last two are from today.  The wind picked up a little and we had some cloud cover.  Made for a beautiful sunrise and some nice little white caps foaming over the reef.

Nothing but blue sky	Kids plus extra
Sunsetish	Sunrise
Windy day today

And look at me making the rich text work.  Yay me!!!!!!!!!!!!

IN BERMUDA!!!!!!!!!!!!11111111111111111!!!!!!!!!

Okay, seriously have NO inclination to go home ever again. We landed to a beautiful day with light cloud cover and a temperature hovering around 20 C, that'd be 70s to you fareheit folks. I have used the word balmy before. I even thought I understood the word balmy before. I was wrong. This place? Is balmy. And beautiful, did I mention beautiful?

The roads are narrow and twisty, with stone retaining walls. The houses and hotels are pastel coloured with white roofs that are used to catch the rain for drinking water. The palm trees are decorated at our hotel with literally thousands of mini Christmas lites. And the view? They upgraded us to an ocean view room with a balcony. This, my friends, is heaven.

I already killed a set of batteries on the camera. *snerk* But I shall try to figure out how to upload photos to the gallery later tonight or tomorrow. Without aithine to help me, I might just be screwed. Oh, wait, I don't care ... I'm on vacation in Bermuda.

For the record, the kids have already been in the ocean at the beach. It wasn't quite intentional, but hey, the footing was treacherous what with the fact that they were giggling and shoving each other.

I'm sure I have much more gushing to do, but I'm arm wrestling the kid for computer time. She has to keep all her peeps updated on MSN. Sheesh, it'd be much easier if she had LJ. Dear lord, pretend I never said that!

Wish me luck with the gallery thing! Oh, and by the way ... Bermuda is beautiful.

RULES: Each player of this game starts off with 10 weird things/habits/little known facts about yourself. People who get tagged need to write a blog entry of their own 10 weird habits/things/little known facts as well as state this rule clearly. At the end you need to choose 6 people to be tagged and list their names. No tagbacks.

Tagged by cmk418

1. I am fascinated by memes when I am extremely tired.

2. I sometimes count my steps when I walk. But I don't count the total, I only count to eight. I blame the dance lessons.

3. I really do hear the character voices in my head when I write. I also hear the original artist singing in my head when I try to remember a song. I think that's why I find it so difficult to make a song my own. I can't reconcile the changes I want to make with what I hear in my head.

4. I am terrified of moths to the point where just knowing that they are flying nearby makes me freak out inside. I try valiantly to hide this fear. I don't think I'm fooling anyone, least of all the moths.

5. My mother wanted to name me Stephanie. My father somehow vetoed that. Instead, I am named after a Hollies song and one of Bobby Kennedy's daughters. I hated my name when I was younger, but I really sorta like it now.

6. My oldest daughter is named after a porn star. Her father picked the name. I was unaware of the porn connection until well after her birth. He claims he didn't know about it either. I'm still suspicious.

7. I am going to be a biological aunt for the first (and likely only) time within the next month. Oddly enough, I am only moderately excited about this.

8. I really don't understand all the fuss about Harry Potter.

9. I haven't put up a single Christmas decoration this year since we'll be away. The experience has been strangely liberating. I do find myself singing a lot more Christmas songs though.

10. Writing this was a lot harder than I thought it would be. Neat though.

Since I'm not terribly good at following directions sometimes, I'm not going to tag six of you to play. Rather, I open this one up to the floor. Have at it if you wanna.

As for me? I'm off to sleep.