And now, I totally want a winch

Posted on October 2, 2008
Filed Under Australia - The land down under, Stupidity and randomness, Breaking news, A "How-to" tutorial of insanity | Leave a Comment

Recently, Brian and I decided that it was time to upgrade the ute. We were both dead tired of the “white work ute” look (him more than me) and he wanted something a little flashier. More bells and whistles and whatnot.  (Is whatnot an actual word or just a lazy persons slur? - I’m using it anyway)

After a lot of consideration, we decided to move away from Toyota (gasp!) and spring for a Mitsubishi Triton. It’s perty lookin’, it has all the bells and whistles and whatnot (hehe) a person could ask for and it’s a 4 wheel drive.

*insert collective “Oooooh!” here.

So now that we can go off-roading, we of course feel the burning need to drive on surfaces that are not meant for cars. Beaches are pretty cool, rocky trails are cooler.. and hey! camping is fun right?

This is totally going to change our lives! *Note sarcasm. For those of you that know me, you know that Murphy keeps a constant eye on my doings so it stands to reason that we’ll need rescue gear ‘just in case.’ Recently, friends of ours wound up paying over $1000.00 for a tow to get out of trouble (as an alternative to sleeping over at creepy tow-truck-guys house - as offered.)

Now I really don’t want to be spending nights in the bush with creepy tow-truck guys so I guess we’re gonna need a winch.

But first…. it’d be great if the truck was ready…

Watch this space!

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How time has flown…

Posted on September 19, 2008
Filed Under Australia - The land down under, Stupidity and randomness, Breaking news, A "How-to" tutorial of insanity, Photography - All about the photos Baby! | 2 Comments

  

Christina and teddy, originally uploaded by She’ll Be Apples.

With my (not so) recent intrest in photography, I been hunting down old photos on my hard drive for inspection and came accross this one that had been scanned into the PC.
It was taken about 7 years ago in front of Dorval Shops in Montreal, Quebec.

The teddy bear, was Chelsea’s Christmas present that year (I had just finished shopping) and a friend had a few frames left on a camera she was taking in for processing and decided to snap this picture as a xmas gift for Brian. I sent it, nicely framed and to this day, it sits on our bookcase.

Seems like just yesterday I posed for this picture!

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The “C” word

Posted on August 15, 2008
Filed Under Australia - The land down under, Irony Anyone?, Breaking news, A "How-to" tutorial of insanity | 3 Comments

Recently, we had a bit of a cancer scare at home. And by “a bit of” I mean full blown panic. A large portion of my family has been lost to cancer of one kind or another so I can be a bit paranoid at the slightest change in a mole or freckle much less the dreaded word tumour.

My father passed away from a melanoma on his cheek, a gruelling and terrible thing to witness, so when my husband had a bump in his nose checked out and the doctor as much as blurted “Cancer!” I went into full meltdown mode…

Upon recovery, we made plans to see a specialist and have the offending “bump” removed. It turned out to be a full blown surgery that had Brian in the hospital all day and rather groggy that night. Thankfully, the pressure that had preceded the operation has eased instantly, leaving him feeling a bit better.

From there, it was simply the waiting game. Wait for pathology to check it out, wait for another appointment with the specialist. Wait, wait, wait…

I hate waiting in the queue at the bank, this nearly did me in!

Finally, we managed an appointment after the results had come in. The verdict was…non-cancerous tumour.

There is, however a 30% - 40% chance of it growing back and there is no guarentee that it won’t be cancerous next time, so Brian is meant to go back to the doctor shortly for a post op exam and then every 3 - 6 months for follow-ups to make sure there is no re-growth.

It’s certainly not something I’d ever wanted to have to go through with my husband, and I think I uderstand a little more how my mother felt when my dad went in to have a “little bump” checked.

Somehow, knowing that there is always going to be the possibility of disaster is more real now. You don’t think about getting hit by a bus everyday of your life, but a near-miss will make you look both ways…twice.

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Day 14 - Tokyo…ANOTHER Earthquake!

Posted on July 14, 2008
Filed Under Australia - The land down under, Japan, Holidays, Breaking news, A "How-to" tutorial of insanity, Photography - All about the photos Baby! | Leave a Comment

As a woman, I must admit that I love to shop and with the end of our holiday looming we were in dire need of souvenirs for friends, family and work colleagues. We had managed to pick up a few small things in Kyoto and Mt Fuji but now it was time for the big guns…

We took the train to Asakusa where we found the best market ever! More stores than I could count with everything from paper fans to kimonos, key chains to beautifully painted porcelain dishes, mobile phone trinkets to gold statues…and so much more.

We wandered from stand to stand trying to figure out what gift would suit which person and trying not to buy things for ourselves. This was gift shopping!

Alas, I have no control…lol I bought 2 yukutas for myself while choosing one for my mother and best mate Maggy.  I bought a painted porcelain fan for Sandy and one for myself because they were too beautiful to choose between.

Laden with bags we stopped for brunch in a little café above the markets. I had a rice omelette with miso soup (OMG YUM) and Sandy stuck to non-Japanese food in the form of cinnamon toast with whipped cream (also yummy…lol)

By the time the proprietor had stopped piling food on our table, I had to use the facilities pretty badly. We hadn’t seen any public washrooms anywhere in the markets so figured this was our last chance. I asked where the toilet was and was pointed to the back of the café whereupon I found…a single Japanese style toilet.

Uh oh.

Up until now, I had always manage to find (or wait until I found) a western style toilet. In the end, desperation won out and I managed to successfully use the facilities without falling in or embarrassing myself. I did however warn Sandy before she got up and she chose to wait. LOL

We made our way down to the end of the markets where we found…another temple!

 

(They really are EVERYWHERE) What was new, was that the fortune shirne had bilingual fortunes. Sandy had gotten one in Ueno but as it was written in Kanji, she didn’t know whether to keep it or not. (If it is a bad fortune, you are meant to tie it to the shrine where the wind blows the bad luck away from you.) She had planned on bringing it back to the Ryokan to ask the staff dor a translation but somewhere between Ueno and home…. It disappeared.

Sandy was very disappointed and upset that her fist fortune in Japan (something she had been really looking forward to) had disappeared and she didn’t know whether the bad luck would stay with her.  I reasoned that if it was bad luck, it blew away on its own…a good thing!

In any case, we had found another shrine and one with English! Sandy pulled twice and both times got terrible fortunes. Both were tied to the shrine post haste. The third time was obviously a charm (Sandy was determined to get a good fortune.) She finally got one that was positive… an excellent keepsake of our trip to Japan!

The Bad Fortune

To Sandy’s chagrin, the first fortune I pulled out was glowing. It couldn’t have gotten any better. I think I may frame it, if I ever remember to pull it out of my “Japan” file at home.

Back at the hotel, we desperately made an attempt to pack our souvenir spoils into our already bulging suitcases.  We looked at the pile of shopping carnage (bags, boxes and paper removed to make packing easier) and wondered how in the world we were going to get this all back home.

Time to do some strategic paring down of our “necessities.”  Anything that got ruined in the wash, socks with holes worn in them from incessant walking … bin. Anything not needed back home (travel soaps, shampoos, creams etc…) got put on the table for our use on the last day and then binned. I lost my favourite pair of jeans to a split in the leg that I have hoped to repair but gave in and tossed them in lieu of my new yukatas. It was a difficult process but in the end, we managed to pack everything.

We had popped into the local corner store to pick up dinner and drinks on the way home.  I had bought what looked to be a juice box and Sandy had gotten us a treat…a butterscotch sundae. Thr juice box turned out to be Jello and the butterscotch sundae turned out to be made with actual scotch. It reeked of alcohol. Needless to say, we ate it anyway *grin*I decided to make a documentary video of our room in Tokyo for our families and we had a good time showing the room, the shopping carnage and our horror movie bathroom which we both agreed was so creepy we could picture ourselves being murdered horribly within its walls.

As we sat reviewing the tape, the floor started rolling under our feet… AGAIN!

This time, we were awake and alert so we ran into the doorway and waited for the earthquake to finish. It was at least twice as long, and much stronger than the one we had our first night in the Ryokan. I cannot stress how much the building swayed during these quakes. We started looking at the cracks in the walls with new eyes and thanked our lucky stars that we were leaving the next day.
Here’s the link to the news story

I wasn’t able to find a news story for the first one. Obviously, it wasn’t big enough to merit more than a mention on the news.

We both went to sleep knowing that it was our last day in Japan. We’d be flying out of Narita airport at 5pm and 8pm the next day.

Sadness…

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Day 13 - Harajuku

Posted on June 29, 2008
Filed Under Australia - The land down under, Japan, Holidays, Breaking news, A "How-to" tutorial of insanity, Things that give me inspiration, Photography - All about the photos Baby! | Leave a Comment

Today was an exciting day for us. We were going to Harajuku, the punk, goth, fashion capital of Japan.

Both of us were happy to simply wander through the shops and people watch. BOY are there some cool people to watch in Harajuku! The fashion there seems to be “whatever you want” although I did notice that the girls very commonly dressed like little dolls. Goth dolls, baby dolls, maids etc… They all had the “cute little girl” look in common and I have to say, Japanese girls are beautiful! Their dark eyes and flawless skin is striking to say the least and being young, they glow with health as well.

I could have taken pictures all day if I’d had my camera with me! I had forgotten it at the Ryokan that morning. Even if I’d had it with me, I don’t think it would have made a difference. Unfortunately, thought my phone’s camera is pretty decent under most circumstances, it doesn’t’ zoom well. Which means far away pictures or blurry close ups. That, or asking people to pose… I wasn’t that brave!

I have stolen a few pictures from Gideon though to give you an idea. (I hope you don’t mind Gideon, I certainly give you full credit!!) He’s a great photographer and really inspired to me to take some photography courses and get a decent camera.

 

I bought a pair of shoe to DIE for in Harajuku but Sandy struggled to find shoes in her size. They come in S (5) M (6) L (7) and LL (8) There must have been places with bigger shoes but we didn’t find them!

We went back to Ueno for a bit more browsing and a dinner of kebabs before heading home for the night. More massage chair madness and finally, Sandy hears the noises the coffee Thermos is making. Thought I was going nuts!

 

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