Dog Walking

It doesn't matter if it's cold out or if it's raining or perhaps the sun is beaming down and it's so hot out that you can't think straight......the dog needs to be walked. When you have a house with a yard, you open up the door, kick the dog out and let them back in later on. Unfortunately while living in a loft, you can't just open the door and throw out animals. Well, you could but I'm sure strata would have something to say about that.

I didn't realize how good I was at going from point A to point B while the weather was crap here in Vancouver. Since I've lived here I've never owned a rain jacket, rubber boots, or even an umbrella. Then I got a dog. That's when I realized that the dog could care less about what the weather is doing outside, she still wants/needs to go out. So now I own a rain coat, rubber boots, waterproof pants and a really good hat. So here I sit on Wednesday evening, the temperature outside I'm sure is below zero, knowing that I have to get dressed (takes about ten minutes) and go outside. Ugh.

So for all of you people out there that don't have pets or at least have a yard, I only have two words for you: lucky bastards!!!!!

Cooking for One

Cooking for one kind of sucks. It's really hard to make a meal for one. Also, I don't really "do" leftovers. My belly rebels against eating the same thing twice, back to back. So I'm not a good candidate for making lots and eating it again the next day for lunch. For dinner maybe, if I eat something completely non-related for lunch in between.

But tonight I finally succeeded at making myself a meal for one!!!!! Shepherd's Pie. My favorite. Yves veggie grind, carrots, celery, cauliflower, corn, tomatoes, garlic, topped with yummy mashed potatoes. I usually make a HUGE dish of it because Rob's usually here for dinner and he loves having it for lunch the next day. So tonight I decided to give it a whirl and make a smaller portion. As my mom will probably agree, her and I are not that great at making portions small. But tonight I did and I'm very proud of myself. :o)

So now that I'm full and finally warm (takes a while to warm up after standing outside with the dog) I'm going to run a hot bath and read my new book, Raven Stole the Moon by Garth Stein. He wrote another book I quite enjoyed, The Art of Racing in the Rain. Good stuff.

Night!

Race Time!!!!

Tomorrow morning is the last 10K race of the year, the Fall Classic held out at UBC. I'm sad that it's the last race. I usually sign up for the next one the day before I run a race, just to keep me motivated. But tomorrow's the last.

Anyway, tonight I did my usual routine and had my usual dinner. Baked potato with chives and sour cream, broccoli sauted with ginger, garlic, red chilies and a dash of soy sauce, baked chicken with my sundried tomato/artichoke topping. Yum yum. The only thing that I messed up was the time I actually sat down to eat it. Usually you need to eat at 6pm but tonight it was 7:30...hope that doesn't do anything.

So wish me luck. I'm off to bed to get a good sleep so I can hit the road running nice and early. Hope it's not too freakin' cold out.......

Random Nights

Last night was sort of random and sort of not. I went to a fabulous cooking class with my friend Tanya (who passed her motorcycle's license test earlier in the day YAY). It was a fancy schmancy cooking class and we had a blast! The chef, a lovely woman named Andrea made us the most delicious martini's ever, to sip while she demonstrated some of the dishes that we were going to make. OMG. So good. She is like me, she insists on having a martini in her kitchen while she cooks. She might not drink it all (neither do I) but the presence of it brings happiness in a weird way. I totally get it. I have a gin martini every time I cook. Sometimes I drink it, sometimes I just look at it and occasionally sip it. This is my kind of chef.

Anyway, we watched and learned and then broke off into groups to cook. What an amazing time!!!!! Tanya and I were in charge of the Cinnamon Duck Breast on Raisin Crostini's. Once again: OMG. We F'N rocked it!!!!! Ours were the most elegant looking, just like Andrea's, and they ended up being the favorite at the end of the night. That's right, toot toot of my own horn. I also learned how to properly cook a duck breast. And how to properly boil a lobster. Cut a pear without cutting yourself. Oh ya, I also had the best dicing skills in the class. I was shocked to see that most people can't dice effectively. I rocked the onion. I'm now getting off track....

So after we were all done cooking, everyone put out their trays of delicious food and they poured us wine and we ate and ate and ate. When I got home, Rob was there and asked if I wanted to go for dinner. I was full, but I also wanted to spend time with him. So we took pups for a quick walk around the block then off we went a walking. He wanted to try a new Indian place a few blocks from the loft on Broadway. I had no idea which place he was talking about but off we walked. About six blocks away he realized that he didn't know what he was talking about either. So I suggested the Banana Leaf as it was a block away. Got there....under reno's. So then we decided to hop on the bus and randomly go to Joey's at Granville. Now it's about 10:00pm and I'm tired as I was up at the crack of dawn and busy all day, but how can you pass a chance to hang out with your boyfriend on a crazy adventure!!!!

When we got on the bus, Rob paid my fare. Oh ya, a puuuurrreeee gentleman. Not all guys will pay a gal's bus fare. We got to Joey's, he had the usual, I gulped down their soup and we took the bus home. We chatted the whole time. Laughed. It was awesome. It was random and awesome. :)

Working & Schedules

I love working in the morning. There's something so inspiring about getting up and heading into the office bright and early. Right now the sun is beaming in through the window and I had to put up my black cloth blocking it out!!! What a glorious Tuesday!!!!!

The other thing about working in the morning is having the office to myself. I get so much more done when I'm by myself. However today I discovered something I wish I hadn't...... I can watch full episodes of CBC programs on my computer without having to download anything. So right now I'm watching Being Erica and I'm finding it a little distracting when I'm trying to do calculations. So I think I'll pause the show until 11am when I've scheduled myself to do filing. That's the other thing I do that most people don't. Schedule stuff all day long. And I don't mean meetings or lunches. For instance, this is my Tuesday:

6:30am wake up. wake up dog.
6:45am finish making lunches. wake up dog.
7:00am drag sleepy dog to car and take her to daycare.
7:25am get a coffee.
7:45am check for phone messages.
8:00am reply to copious amounts of emails and faxes.
8:30am work on File A and get summary out to investor.
8:45am work on File B and email orginating broker.
9:00am work on File C while talking to mom on phone.
9:30am - 10am read blogs and write a blog.
10am - 11am Bank Rec Masters/MCMC for Sept-Oct and send out two NSF letters.
11am - Noon file everything including receipts.
Noon each lunch and pay bills.
1pm - 2pm respond to emails, start marketing plan/business plan for the BCSC regarding Masters and bring Rob up to speed on the day's activities/messages.
2pm - 2:30pm finish two renewal packages and send them out and help Rob with File D.
3pm complete 9K run.
4pm pick up dog.
4:30pm shower and get ready to meet Tanya.
6pm - 9pm cooking class with Tanya!!!!
9:30pm - 10pm walk dog.

I schedule everyday like that. I have so much to do and so much responsibilities that if I just float around, nothing will get done. Each moment of my day is dedicated in blocks for work. Oh, it's getting close to 10am and time to stop writing and reading blogs. On to the next task.

Tuesday!!

Today didn't start out so great for moi. Starting around 4am I started to have belly pain :( It kept me up so I didn't get the greatest sleep. So today I decided to spend a day at home working, puttering around and getting ready for something awesome.......MOMMY TIME!

I bought this place in April of 2008, finally moved in, in August and tonight is the first night my mom is coming over. Bad kid, bad!!! Mommy time is hard to come by. There's many of us children, a needy husband, a busy travel schedule, so trying to fit mommy time in can be a challenge. My friend Heather mentioned to me the other night and has posted on her blog, that she's needing mommy time too. So why not share my mom?!!! So tonight they are coming over, vino in hand and we shall eat and drink and be merry!!!

Time to go to London Drugs and buy some Mr. Clean and wash my floors. These women deserve a nice clean, non-streaky floor. :)

AHHHHHHHHHHHHH

I just typed up a lovely blog post only to have my computer freeze and crash and I lost everything. ARGH! I don't have time right now to retype everything. :o(

Why bother!

I put myself on a strict budget. Now having to fork out the money for an apartment, my wallet has shrunk. Considerably. So I decided to cut out things and opt for the cheaper, perhaps no-name brands. Big mistake.

When I first moved into the loft it took me MONTHS to figure out the best mixture for cleaning the concrete floors. It's actually not that easy to clean concrete floors. A lot of brands left streaks or didn't bother cleaning at all. Until one day I found my orange bottle of Mr. Clean. LOVE IT. This magical orange liquid is perfect for my floors. Super awesome, no complaints. So for the past year and a half I've used this product.

The other day I went to Save On to grab some TP and floor cleaner. I only had $10 with me. I also like my TP, a certain kind and I don't like to waiver. Charmin. Yup, the brand promoted by cartoon bears. However, it tends to be a bit more on the pricey side. So I decided to go cheap with my floor cleaner instead (I did only have $10). So I bought the WF orange liquid thinking that would be the same. Obviously I forgot the first six months of living here. I HATE IT. Streaks everywhere. I even tried washing it with just warm water. NOPE.

So now I'm throwing the leash on the dog and heading to Save On to cough up the extra $2 to get what I want. Sometimes, it doesn't pay to be cheap.