Canoe Trip Extraordinaire

This past long weekend I went on a canoe trip in the Whiteshell with Matt and 10 of our friends.  It was, obviously, amazing.

On Friday evening we rented canoes at Caddy Lake (where my grandparents have a cabin) and canoed north through to South Cross Lake, where we camped the night.  Two friends of ours had already found the site and set up, so when we got there we unpacked the hot dogs and started taking care of the beer we brought with us.

The next morning, we packed up and headed through the second tunnel to North Cross Lake, and across to the portage over to Sailing Lake.  We found a creepy cabin along the bank near the portage area, and contemplated setting up there for the next two nights.  The possibility of campsite hauntings were too great, so we decided to head around the corner to a different site – one that didn’t feature the ghost of a lonely old man.  We set up next to a set of rapids, and spent the rest of the day and evening swimming, eating delicious food, and drinking around the fire.  Breccan even brought the fixin’s for campsite brownies!  Delish.

The tunnel into North Cross Lake – don’t forget to duck!

Canoe Team victory post-tunnel

Creepy cabin

Our less haunted campsite

Enjoying the rapids

Burgers!

The glorious brownies

Sunday was spent enjoying a lunchtime adventure, as we packed up a bit of food and took the portage over to Sailing Lake, and found a spot to hang out and swim.  The weather was absolutely gorgeous, and we were virtually the only people around – we saw one other canoe on the lake that day.  We went back to our site later that afternoon and cooked up a delicious dinner, and hung out around the fire.

The portaging adventure

Sailing Lake

Our lunchtime spot

Dinner!

Breccan’s second treat: chocolate pudding!

On Monday morning we made breakfast and packed up our gear, and then headed off around 10:30 a.m.  We made it through to South Cross Lake before we stopped for lunch and ate the leftovers we had with us.  From there, we only had about an hour and a half to go before we’d be back, but a strong south wind and unnerving waves made it difficult to paddle what seemed to be a canoe nightmare.  Having just smoked a joint (and having spent the weekend in a weedy haze), Matt and I could only laugh as we tried to plow through waves that splashed up over the end of the canoe and drenched my legs.  Worst. Thing. Ever.  But, we made it, and got back to the rental place around 4:00 p.m.

Lunchtime cook-up

We’re finally here and my ass is sore

What an awesome, relaxing weekend.  Amazing weather, great friends, delicious food, and a weekend outdoors.  The perfect way to cap off the summer.

Deal with Disability

I was directed to this blog via someone on Twitter, and while I usually don’t take the time to read through someone’s entire blog, I couldn’t stop reading when I checked this one out.  Eva is a 26-year-old woman with Cerebral Palsy who has a video camera attached to her wheelchair so that she can discreetly capture people treating her in bizarre (and derogatory) ways.  So interesting!  Reading about how random people or store staff treat her really makes me wonder if I’ve ever inadvertently done something like this myself (sweet jesus I hope not).  More importantly, though, I think this is a great blog for simply providing some insight into the ways in which people with disabilities (or even just Eva herself) are perceived.  Eye opening.  At any rate, check it out for yourself here.

Weekend Bingo

This past weekend Matt and I went to his family’s cabin at Sandy Hook with his Dad and stepmom.  We went out Saturday afternoon and spent the day garage sale-ing (sailing?) – so much junk, but so many treasures – and walking around Gimli.  I always feel extra Icelandic when I go to Gimli.  It’s such a cute little town.

Most importantly, though, after a dinner at Beach Boy Restaurant (lemon roasted potatoes: dripping with oil but worth every coronary risk!), we went to the Gimli Legion to play bingo.  Hot damn it was fun.  It was fun just to sit there and watch everyone else, and to see this little community of seniors form as they all came early to set up their spots and get all of their lucky daubers out.  It was a little stressful keeping track of everything at first, but I got the hang of it and eventually daubed my way to a cool 30 bones!  Fucken eh.  I won that sweet cash prize on the “roving kite” (four squares in the corner with a diagonal line, if that makes sense).  I was so excited when I won that all I could muster was throwing my arms in the air in victory.  Matt had to said “bingo!” for me.

“…I 30, I 3-0…”

Matt feverishly daubing

Sweet, sweet cash prize

Despite being hungover and exhausted, Saturday proved to be a damn good time.  Who knew bingo at the legion with a bunch of octogenarians could be so fun?

Doer Out

So Manitoba’s NDP Premier has stepped down in order to go work for the Conservatives?  I guess he’s showing his true colours.  Besides the colour of a terrible spray-tan, that is.  I wonder if they can find an even more Liberal NDPer to take his place?

Do the Bus a Bus

I can’t do hangovers like I could ten years ago.  Despite the fact that this admission makes me feel incredibly, boringly old, it is the harsh reality that I was faced with this morning at 8:30 a.m. as I awoke to a wave of pain and anguish after drinking my face off on a Monday night at a Busta Rhymes concert.

The ladies came over around 8:00 to pre-game (still rockin’ the pre-game like I did when I was 18, that’s for sure) and watch hilarious episodes of Cake Boss and Dating in the Dark (the amazing show where people meet and ‘date’ in complete darkness, are given the opportunity to see one another in the light, and then must decide if they want to continue seeing each other or run for their lives).  Drinking lime vodka at my place resulted in realizing around 9:45 p.m. that we hadn’t picked up our tickets from the will-call window at the MTS centre, and could very well be fucked if said window was closed.  It was closed, and we were fucked.  That is, until we sped home, printed out the confirmation email from Ticketmaster, and Meghan worked her charm on the door man (we even got to skip the line!).  Thank the sweet lord for that, because a half-cut, dolled up, super stoked Jessica who is made to lose a $50 ticket because she’s an idiot is not something you want to dance with.  She’s one mean Sally.

And she drinks beer like an Englishman

At any rate, we got in, did a celebratory shot (lemon drops!), and quickly made ourselves comfortable acting the fool, drinking too much, and dancing to various opening acts that I was pretty much unaware of and paid little attention to.  Meghan managed to catch the eye of some scrawny kid who was apparently someone important (he had a pass around his neck, that actually could have said “underage” or “needs parental supervision” for all I knew) and got us into the VIP section for a hot minute.  We watched Belly’s set from up there until we were led downstairs by said tween to the side of the stage and introduced to a man that turned out to be Spliff Star or something – at any rate, he was on stage with Busta.  Clearly, I’ve amassed an intimate knowledge of contemporary hip hop.

Busta took the stage and killed it.  It was high energy the whole way through, and the crowd was nuts.  We managed to get back upstairs (Meghan told the security guard “I’m back” and he let us up…apparently the security is easily swayed) and we watched the show from the second floor, which was an awesome view.

Someone threw their laundry-day undies onto the stage…Busta made hilarious fun of him/her.

Other than the show itself, the night is a bit of a haze of bad jokes and free shots.  I saw a bar friend there – one of those people that you only see when you’re out drinking, and are always BFFs over the course of the night, but would never consider actually hanging out with him or her while sober/on a the reg.  He provided numerous unneeded drinks and shots that I, obviously, welcomed with open arms.  Because we started the night with Cake Boss, I spent the majority of my time talking with a terrible Italian accent and doing a lot of “eeeh, oooh, eeeh” – to the point where I introduced myself as Gino to some fool on the patio that was all up in our business, and “eeeh, oooh, eeeh”-ed him out of our way.  It seemed like a good idea at the time, but this morning as I was trying to do damage control and get myself to work for a 9:00 a.m. staff meeting I thought otherwise.

So, while I didn’t get to hang out with Busta and his entourage in his giant red Flipmode bus (his bus a bus?), and while I can’t add a photo of me and Busta giving the thumbs up to my growing collection of Jess-with-Rappers photos, I had a damn fine time at a show that I almost didn’t make it in to.  Thanks, Busta, for puttin’ your show where my eyes could see.

Get outta my bedroom, Big Pharma

I think I want to firebomb my local pharmacy.

Okay, so maybe only theoretically, but still.  The pharmacy shenanigans that go on in this town are enough to drive me fucking crazy.  I take serious issue with the way that birth control is treated like some kind of privilege.  Here’s the deal: I need a new pack every month, no surprises there.  My doctor will only give me a prescription for three months’ worth at a time.  So I have to schlep back to the damn doctor every 2.5 months, wait in their smelly waiting room with screaming babies and sick people, then wait in his stupid little office staring at the poster on the wall that details some kind of terrible infection, until I finally get to see him – all to say “I need another prescription for birth control.”  A complete waste of his time and mine.  Why I can’t get a year’s worth is beyond me: it doesn’t get you high, nobody is selling it on the black market, and it’s my right to choose to take it or not.  So why is it treated like friggin’ Oxycontin or something?  I’m not grinding this shit up and snorting it.  I’m taking it so that I don’t end up with a goddamn baby.  We aren’t living in the 1950s – you don’t need to ration it or treat it like something that’s going to turn me into a raving whore.  It’s like Tylenol, for fuck’s sake!  Just hand it over!

I went to the pharmacy a few years ago to pick up an extra pack of pills because I was going away and needed it, and when I went up to the counter and gave them my name and asked for the refill they had on record for me, the pharmacist said “You picked up your last pack two weeks ago. Why do you need this? You should still be using the last pack.”  Excuse me?  Oh, well actually I’m going to use them to decorate my bathroom mirror.  I’m going to top a birthday cake with them.  I’m going hiking and I need to be able to find my way home.  Fuck you, man!  What are you, the Birth Control Gestapo?  Give me a goddamn break!  I told him that I needed it, I know how to take the pill (once a day, it’s fairly simple), and to please fill it as I was in a hurry.  Sweet jesus.  It’s none of your goddamn business why I need another pack.

So after dealing with making a doctor’s appointment every 2.5 months just to waste half my day to get a refill, I find out that I can call my pharmacy and have them fax in a refill request.  Awesome.  So I do that.  Not only does the doctor take his sweet goddamn time getting it back to the pharmacy (I understand you’re a busy man, but 4 days? Really?), but the pharmacy forgets to call me when it’s ready, even after THEY suggested they could do that, and after I visited them twice to see if the prescription was ready.  So I show up there this morning, hoping that it’s ready and they just forgot to call me, and end up standing there like an idiot while the pharmacist ignores me and continues to print out labels and move pills from one bottle to another (or whatever the fuck they do back there).  She finally decides to help me, and I get my prescription.  I tell her, quite nicely, that they didn’t call me to tell me the prescription was ready two days ago, and now it’s too late to start a pack of pills.  She says, “oh, well my guess is that someone forgot to call you.”  Yes.  Thank you.  I KNOW.  That’s the fucking problem, you dipshit.  So thanks a lot, now my body is all fucked up and confused and full of wonky hormones.  I ask her for advice as to when I can start a new pack or what the hell I can do, and she reads the instructions and tells me to take the pills I missed all at once. That doesn’t work if you’ve missed more than two days, so I point to the section that starts “If You’ve Missed Three or More Pills” and she says, “Oh, yeah, you can do what they recommend there.”  Uh…aren’t you a pharmacist?  Didn’t you study this?  Aren’t you trained?  You can’t even read the fucking instructions properly?  No wonder you people didn’t call me back.  I’m surprised you can even function on a daily basis.

Since my idiot doctor only gave me a refill for two months, I ask the pharmacist to fax him back for another refill, just to avoid this situation again and to be sure I have it on hand when I need it.  She smiles and says “I’ll write a really big note this time.”  Great.

Housewarming Shenanigans

This weekend we had our first party in the new house: a belated birthday party for me, and a housewarming party for the two of us.  It was sooo fun.  Both Matt and I were nervous about whether or not people would show up, but it turns out we had a full house: about 30 people came.  We were both so happy that everyone seemed to have a good time.  I know I sure as hell did.  We managed to get rid of some shot glasses, too – Matt’s collection has grown to over 300, so we made everyone choose a shot glass and take a shot of Jagermeister as soon as they arrived, and then they had to take their shot glass home as a souvenir. My parents even came!

We went to town on the apps.  Well, for us, anyway.  We made a bunch of dips and delicious things, and friends brought their own dips and things: Breccan and Deirdre both brought birthday cakes, and Rachel brought cupcakes!  They were delicious.

The night was amazing, and we felt totally loved.  Lots of good friends, tons of booze, and a Michael Jackson dance party at 2am.  What more could you ask for?  I love having people over, and the party this weekend just made me realize that we need to have people over more often – especially now that we can accommodate so many different groups of friends at once.  Living in this new place is going to be so much better for my social life, seeing as people won’t be scared of getting bedbugs when they come over.  Everyone was so incredibly thoughtful – bringing gifts and singing a boisterous rendition of ‘Happy Birthday’ in the kitchen for me.  It was great.  If this is a sign of things to come, then I’m in like Flynn.

This Old House: After

The house has finally started to feel like a home.  We’ve spent the summer cleaning, painting, and decorating, and we’re both really happy with how it’s turned out.  The paint colours that were originally a bit of a gamble have turned out to be just fine, and we’re so happy to be in a space that is so big and comfortable, compared to our little apartment.  We still have a lot of work left to do – the windows need to be replaced, the backsplash in the kitchen needs to be installed, the toilet and bathroom floor need to be replaced, the basement needs to be finished – but, for the most part, we’re done stage one of the reno/move-in process.

So here’s a taste of what we’ve done so far (please forgive the poor photo quality).  On the main floor we have the kitchen and dining room, and on the second floor there are two smaller rooms, the bathroom, and our bedroom (complete with amazing walk-in closet).  You can see the before photos here.

The kitchen

Vacation Highlights

After realizing that my dreams of sandy beaches and fancy drinks with umbrellas in them were not meant to be, I thought that my summer vacation was kiboshed.  But, always the amazing friends that they are, the lovely folks in Montreal responded to my desperate, last minute e-mail request for a possible Montreal retreat with a resounding “yes!”  On top of that, I got in touch with my cousin in Toronto, and she immediately arranged for me to stay with her and her amazing fam for the weekend.  Thanks to these people, my vacation was a hit.

I flew in to Montreal on the morning of Friday, July 17th, and was even able to get the remainder of my pre-workshop assignments completed on the plane.  This trip, like every trip I make to Montreal, was fantastic.  After Montreal, I took a train to Toronto with Dallas and Brian (the last train before the VIA rail strike began…phew!) and went to stay with my cousin, Tannis, and her family.  From there, I went to Vancouver for Simon Fraser University’s Book Editing workshop to learn the ins and outs of editing non-fiction.  Overall, my two weeks away this summer were amazing.  Here are some highlights:

1. Roller Derby

The final match before the championships for the Montreal Roller Derby League was held on Saturday, July 18th, and it was quite possibly the most fun I’ve ever had at a sporting event.  The arena was filled with an eclectic mix of people – older couples, children, young people, drunk people – but the atmosphere was positive and exciting.  We were lucky enough to have the boyfriend of one of the players sitting with us, so he explained the rules, some of the ref’s calls, and some of the team strategies as they played out on the rink.  We drank beer (two for $5!), cheered loudly, built a beer-amid, and came up with our own roller derby names (Wrath of Khan, Mark my Words, Dallas Does Derby, and Brian Gofuckyourself).  It was all kinds of fun.  The after party, held at Caigibi, made for some hilarious shenanigans, and was eventually taken to Mod Night at Blizzarts.  There, we danced to awesome 60s music while an Elvis movie played on the screen behind the DJs.

2. Cheesecake and Birthday Wishes

My 28th birthday was on Monday, July 20th, and I had an amazing day.  I woke up early, went for a run, and got dressed up to spend the day shopping.  Karen, Lee, and I spent a relaxing few hours on their back patio before heading over to Dallas and Brian’s for an absolutely amazing Thai dinner prepared by the gracious hosts themselves.  Karen, Lee, Dallas, Brian, Mark, and I relaxed, drank wine, talked, and enjoyed a delicious banana chocolate cheesecake care of Dallas’ amazing culinary skills.  Mark and Brian left for band practice and Karen and Lee retired for bed while Dallas and I stayed up talking about the realities of growing older, the increasing frequency of friends’ nuptials, and terrible shoes.  We capped off the night, after Brian returned from band practice, with some It’s Always Sunny.  Best birthday ever.

3. Just for Laughs with Aziz Ansari and Marc Maron

On Tuesday night we all met up on St. Denis, which was blocked off for the Just for Laughs Festival.  We had dinner at a cheap little Thai restaurant and made our way over to Theatre Saint-Catherine for the Aziz Ansari show.  The theatre itself only seats maybe 100 people, so the show was small and intimate, which was excellent.  All of the performers that night were great – the opener was hilarious, Aziz was funny (albeit a total name-dropper), and the ‘free’ show after Aziz, Marc Maron, was an hour spent drifting between the extreme depression and boiterous laughter.  That guy can tell a story, but Jesus H. Christ he’s got issues.  I even saw Gary Gulman in the audience.  Exciting!

4. Yoga with Karen

One of the things that I look forward to every time I visit Montreal is going with Karen to her yoga class.  Not only is her class itself relaxing and challenging, all at the same time, but the drive there and back gives us a chance to talk and catch up and I really value that time to and from her class.  She’s an amazing yoga instructor to boot, so those classes are good for my body as well as for my soul.  Provided I don’t fall over (ha!).

5. Tattoos with Tannis

After a joke about getting matching Jem and the Holograms tattoos, Tannis and I spent the week leading up to my arrival in Toronto frantically e-mailing back and forth to try to decide on a tattoo design that we could agree on.  What started as a joke became “one of the greatest ideas we’ve ever had.”  Tannis booked us an appointment at TCB Tattoo in Toronto and the swallows were inked into our skin – hers on her ribcage, and mine on my arm.  Matching tattoos may be cheezy to some, but they’re always fun for me.  I’m so glad we got them done.

6. The Badass Shoe Museum

A running joke for the weekend in Toronto: I mis-heard Tannis when she said we were going to the Bata Shoe Museum, thinking she said the Badass Shoe Museum.  Badass or not, it was a great outing with her, Todd, and the kiddies.  Who knew shoes could be so interesting?

7. Birthday Dinner with the Family

On Saturday night, Tannis invited the rest of the Toronto Family – my aunt and cousin – over for a birthday dinner.  Spending time with my family for my birthday felt like being at home, and I was really touched that they went all out, with a cake and everything!  Just being able to hang out with those adorable little kids and to see the members of my family that I rarely get to see was a real treat.  Plus, the cake caused me to fall into an amazing a chocolate coma.

8. Beaches Jazz Festival

After the birthday dinner, my aunt very graciously offered to look after the kids so that Tannis, Todd, and I could head out for the night.  We met up with Tannis’ friend Bianca at the Beaches Jazz Festival.  Queen Street East was blocked off for what seemed like miles and miles, and makeshift stages were set up at every block where different jazz or blues bands would play.  It was amazing: there were tons of people, great music, and we had an awesome night filled with beer and jokes.  The night ended with us waking up my aunt as we microwaved dinner leftovers at 3am.  Good times, good times.

9. Vancouver Solo Redux

The Book Editing program was excellent – just like last year, I met some great people, learned a hell of a lot in a short period of time, and had a chance to see some more of Vancouver.  I met up with my cousin and his girlfriend for dinner one night, and, given that this year’s workshop was much less intense than last year’s, I was able to spend some time alone during the evenings walking around, taking photos, and enjoying some patios.  Vancouver’s record-breaking heat wave was a welcome change from the dreary and rainy weather I’d faced in Montreal and Toronto, and back at home in Winnipeg.  It was a sweaty good time, and I welcomed the solo time to relax and unwind in the sun.

What the Folk

I’ve been going to the Winnipeg Folk Fest for a very, very long time.  My parents took me there when I was but a wee child, and I started camping there every year with friends when I was about 16 or 17 – whatever age it is when your parents start to losen their grip on your independence.  The past few years I haven’t camped – last year I missed it altogether because I was in Vancouver for the SFU Book Publishing workshop; the year before that I didn’t camp because I had just moved back from Montreal.  This year, I was excited to camp again – there’s something about spending the weekend at Bird’s Hill Park with friends and strangers, dealing with mosquitoes and mud and melting cooler icepacks, that really just makes the whole Folk Fest experience complete.  I was in Ottawa in May for Congress, but figured that I would just buy my camping ticket when I returned.  I found out, however, that campground tickets sold out sometime in mid-May, much to my disappointment (and blinding rage, to be honest, the day I found out).  So, this year I went out to the festival Friday night, all day Saturday, and all day Sunday, and enjoyed as much of the music and people and amazing food as I could.  I soaked it in, baby.

Despite the fact that this year there weren’t a ton of musical acts that I was really excited about – although there certainly were a few – I think this was one of the better Folk Fests I’ve had.  I spent a lot of time with my parents (who volunteer every year in the campground box office) and the friends of mine that were out there camping (who had managed to get tickets).  I saw some amazing acts – Arlo Guthrie, Burning Spear, Hey Rosetta!, a Southern gospel choir – soaked up some lovely sunshine, and really just enjoyed myself.  The fact that I wasn’t camping may not have been such a terrible thing after all, as with camping comes late nights, lots of booze, and some illicit drugs that make enjoying early morning stages and workshops nearly impossible.  I got a ride out to the festival and back every day with my parents (Matt’s not a Folk Fest Fan, so he stayed in the city and worked on the house), so I was able to get at least eight hours of sleep every night, which made the days that much more enjoyable.

Next year, however, I’m going to buy my tickets as soon as they go on sale (in January, I think), so that I can camp.  I was lucky enough to get a campground wristband from Deirdre – she fell asleep at the mainstage on Friday night and when she woke up it was sitting on her stomach.  It must have fallen off someone’s wrist, but when she couldn’t find the owner, she gave it to me so that I could come visit their campsite and have dinner with them when I was out on Saturday.  Just being in the campground made me feel better – like I had at least seen what I was missing and felt a little more a part of it all.  Being in the campground for a few hours on Saturday evening also had me witness the most bizarre marching band/gypsy caravan troupe of campers I have ever seen.  Some people put so much energy into enjoying themselves, and I really appreciate it, in all of it’s weirdness:

I only managed to get slightly sun-kissed, as opposed to the usually awkward blotchy sunburn that seems to grace my pale skin every summer.  So, it would appear, I am becoming more of a regular adult and less of a ridiculous child (which seems to be a running theme as of late).  All said and done, this year’s Festival was excellent, and I can’t wait to enjoy it again next year.  It’s a Winnipeg staple that I’ve realized I must have in my life.