First Book Club

I've joined my first book club (thanks Charlotte for inviting me) and last night was my first meeting (I didn't join until after the first meeting). I think there are about ten women in the club and I knew four of them prior to going into the meeting.

The first book (for me) was Book of Negroes by Lawrence Hill. It was an excellent book and I would highly recommend reading it. I think we probably gave it an 8 out of 10. A couple of us felt that it lost a bit of momentum (and believability) just over half way through. But, even with that the story is well told and extremely interesting (and was very well researched - that part was very interesting to me).

I had a great time at the meeting. We had some really great discussions (and not just about the book).

Our next book: The Ten Year Nap.

Twilight Fun

Okay, I keep meaning to blog about my obsession with Twilight, but that will have to wait.

This blog I found is awesome! Check it out: I may need to get the Buffy action figure and the Edward Cullen doll to go with my Angel puppet.

http://jezebel.com/5298281/whatever-edward-cull+ken--youre-not-the-sparkliest-doll-on-the-block

(I love the quip from Buffy in the comments: "Oh, yay. It's a disco-vamp.")

But, the best part? The clip on this page. It's phenomenal. I miss Buffy!

http://jezebel.com/5298683/buffy-shuts-down-edward-cullen-in-the-best-clip-ever (I may need to check out other Rebellious Pixels work).

Awesome Birthday

This past weekend was my birthday and I had the most amazing time! On Friday four of my friends took me out for dinner. The food was great and the company was excellent (Sue refused to be in the picture).
On Saturday a group of us travelled to Niagara Falls to really celebrate my birthday. I always like to do something crazy and fun for my birthday. This year it was a trip to the casino for some gambling. I used to work there, but wasn't able to check out the casino so I was excited to check it out.

Originally we were going to check out the Maid of the Mist as a touristy thing to do before the casino (since I've never really done anything touristy at the falls - on my grade 8 trip to the falls we went shopping). But, Sharon's friend Nick recommended that we head over to the American side and check out Goat Island and go to the Cave of Winds (http://www.niagarafallsstatepark.com/Activities_CaveOfTheWinds.aspx). It was the best suggestion. Cave of the Winds takes you into the Bridal Veil Falls (in between the Horseshoe and American falls). We were able to stand pretty much directly under the falls. It was wicked! I loved it. I highly recommend checking out if you are ever in the area. It was only $11 and worth every penny. We were soaking wet by the end. I could have stayed for hours (above: the group before and below, the group during).
After getting soaked, we walked around the falls area and it was pretty cool. It was an overcast, rainy day. It would be nice to go and check it out again when it's nice.

We then headed back to Canada and got cleaned up at the hotel. Off to find a place to eat. We ended up eating at the Shoeless Joe's at Fallsview. The food was quite good (surprisingly so) and the beer was nice and cold! Tim had worn jeans to the falls and they had to be dried out at the hotel, then at the end of dinner he spilled an entire glass of water on his jeans. Poor Tim.

The plan was to play craps at Fallsview, but the tables were a little out of our price range. So, we decided to head over to Casino Niagara. I had such a good time. Julia kicked some butt at throwing the nice; I once again learned that I should not touch the dice at a craps table. After a few hours of me losing money we decided to head out for some dancing (to me it's an awesome birthday if I get to dance).

After the bar we went back to the casino and ended up playing craps until they closed the table. Then I decided it would be a good idea to try some poker (at 4am). Not a good idea. But, I had an awesome time regardless of how much I lost at the casino (but, I only lost what I could afford to).

It was a phenomenal birthday and I am so thankful for all my awesome friends that made it so memorable!

Horrible Female Character

So, I'm once again listening to a book on CD in my car. The problem with this one: the main character. She's SOOO annoying. I'm listening to a book called Ladykiller. The main character is a female lawyer but she has no backbone whatsoever. Now, I don't know a lot of lawyers, but I've always been under the impression that they kind of know what the hell they are doing. This character lets everyone walk all over her and doesn't stand up for herself at all. Now, I suppose there could be lawyers like that, but I find it very unbelievable. I find myself yelling at her constantly. Come on people if you are going to write a female character could you not make her more strong-willed? I think the book would have been more interesting (as it would not have affected the story) if she had have shown some bit of a backbone.

Finished Knitting Project

A friend asked me to knit something for her baby and so I decided to try a pattern from my new book. This pattern had a number of different things going on. I'm really happy with how it turned out. It isn't perfect, but I learned a number of new techniques. I hope Aiden likes it!

Olympic Uniforms

I can't believe our government voted to include seal products in the Canadian Olympic uniforms. They don't have better things to do? If they want to do something about seals then maybe they should vote to end the seal hunt. That seems like a much better use of voting time. Normally I love Canada - right now I'm not happy with it at all.

I hope the Olympic committee decides that this is a bad idea and I hope that our government finally ends the seal hunt.

Books on CD

I almost always have a book on CD playing in my car. Back when I was driving to Niagara Falls everyday I found that this really helped with the long drive. I still find it helpful for the short drives to work - there are even times when I don't want to get out of the car because I want to know what happens next.

The book I'm listening to right now is really throwing me. I think the voice actor read another book I've listened to - where she was reading as a sixteen year old. In the current book she's supposed to be a thirty year old woman, but she sounds exactly the same. So, when she's talking about having sex with the hot neighbour it really throws me. Maybe she just sounds really young.

Last week I finished listening to the latest Janet Evanovich book and I already miss Stephanie Plum. Lorelai King (sp?) is such a great voice actor. I can't wait for the next installment.

Dollhouse

This last episode of Whedon's Dollhouse was sooo good. Even though the spoiler was out on the net months ago it still threw me.

There are still parts of the show I'm not too keen on, but for the most part I am really enjoying this show. I really hope it gets picked up for another season.

-spoilers-
So, the rumour on the net way back at the beginning of the season was that Wash from Firefly was Alpha (the rogue doll). I forgot all about the rumour because there hadn't been much talk of Alpha since then. Part way through Friday's episode there was Wash, not acting at all like what I expected Alpha to be like so I actually thought the rumours were wrong and that Alan Tudyk was just in the show. The scenes with him and Helo (he'll always be Helo from BSG to me - Tahmoh Penikett) were awesome. I was laughing my ass off. And then.... he totally turns into Alpha. Awesome!
- end spoilers-

The episode before that was great as well. Topher being all nerdy and having fun was really good.

Eve of Destruction

Last week I downloaded a song from itunes that I hadn't heard in ages. I don't know when / why it disappeared from my ipod, but I realized that 'Eve of Destruction' by Barry McGuire was missing and went ahead and purchased it.

I love this song. It's definitely one of my all-time favourites and that goes back to probably when I was five years old. Now, when I was 5 I had no idea what the song was about, but I'm sure it was one of the ones I played over and over again - and that continues to be the case. There is just something about this song.

I loved my father's record collection. Well, I also loved my mother's but they were very different. My dad's collection consisted of all these cool albums with crazy artwork that just mesmerized me (the album for The Who's Tommy had me enthralled). I wanted to understand the stories behind the covers and would make up my own stories about what they meant. My mom's collection was mostly 45's. No artwork there - just fun songs for me to dance around the living to.

I think I may go and check out the albums tonight and take myself back to all those days I spent on the floor of the dining room (that's where the stereo was) sifting through the covers and replaying songs over and over again.