They All Wanted Something

So Thursday saw another one of Debbie and I's weekly days out. This week we took a trip to Jericho Beach which is sort of near UBC. We were originally going to go to the Museum of Anthropology if the weather wasn't nice but that's closed for renovation until March so we decided just to go to Jericho Beach anyway and deal with the weather. Afterall, we are Scottish, if we got into the habit of waiting for nice weather we'd never get anything done.
It took a bit of an adventure to get there but we got there in the end and it was cloudy as heck and freezing cold. We're hardy critters though and we persevered to walk along it for a while.

Me with the polar bear of Casa Blanca

Debbie with the polar bear of Casa Blanca

Me on Jericho Beach

Debbie on Jericho Beach

Jericho Beach

Jericho Beach looking the other way

A shell that looked like an owl

North Van in the stratocumulus

A fancy house that would look in place on The Sims

Quad bike tracks on Jericho Beach

The Vancouver skyline, feint in the distance

After our body temperature dropped significantly we walked up to 4th Avenue and got a bus along to Sophie's Cosmic Cafe which is this nice little diner place. I had a pretty fantastic hamburger and Debbie had potentially the best veggie burger she's ever had (although Tesco's Mexican beanburgers are good too, I'm informed). We then decided we were tough enough to go for desert too; Debbie ordered some apple pie and I had the chocolate cheesecake and we sorta shared. Debbie's pie looked like a medieval banquet. My cheesecake was pretty awesome and a manageable amount too.

The decor in Sophie's Cosmic Cafe. I want the tea sign.

The rest of the cafe

Debbie with her epic pie

Me with my cheesecake

Once we were full of food we went to our usual Thursday night hang out of Cafe Deux Soleils to watch the open mic night. The standard's always pretty high but I still maintain the first night we went was the best night. It's kinda nice to see people who do it every week. Maybe one day we'll even get around to speaking to some of them! Ha unlikely. Don't think we're ready to give up our creepy/enigmatic air just yet. Jeff from my work joined us after he'd finished tea-ing it up and some baaaaad photos resulted...

Strike a pose! (My default happy photoface)

We pretty much just went home after the acts finished. In fact, that's exactly what we did. And I can't wait until the roadworks are finished on Broadway and Cambie because they're causing lotsa disruption to my journeys.

Apart from that I haven't really been doing anything of note. Today I had another day off but because I'm usually working Saturdays I didn't really know what to do with myself. I ended up sleeping pretty late then taking a trip downtown to meet Debbie to chum her to her work. Then I bumped into Jeff in a coffee shop where I alighted in order to write a list of the things I needed to do and buy. Recharged with some caffeine and then did some food shopping for an unusually well-planned (so it seems thus far) week of meals. Cooked a meal of chicken and potatoes tonight; coated the chicken in paprika and honey and fried it and boiled some new potatoes then mixed them with some olive oil, lemon juice and rosemary and grilled them for a few minutes. Turned out better than expected and was pretty damn good- another one for the recipe book methinks! Now I think I'll go bathe and read and take it easy. I'm planning on making some soup and baking some bread tomorrow and having a proper Sunday of drinking plenty of tea and reading plenty of words. I wish I could find a shop that sells The Observer. I miss it. The 7 Eleven sells The Guardian but it's just the actual newspaper, it doesn't have any of the extra sections or supplements or anything though. I think Debbie wants to go and get bus passes tomorrow since it works out to be cheaper than buying the books of tickets if you're getting the bus as much as we do. And you can only buy bus passes in the first 3 days of the month too because they're just valid for the month in which you buy it.

Wow, wasn't that last little ditty mighty boring for anyone who doesn't care about the Vancouver transit system. Sorry.

Think I'll off and wash now.

DCUK.

On Saturday me and Debbie were invited to a party and we decided we were probably going to go because it was pretty near our house, and since we live out in the sticks we're probably not going to get invited to any other near-by parties in the foreseeable future. I finished work at 4 and Debbie reckoned she was gonna get away around 9ish so I went home and waited for her. Thing is though she didn't get away until midnight, even though the restaurant closes at 10pm and I caught a nasty case of acute cabin fever, since I had spent most of the period 5pm-midnight in my tiny room. Anyway, she eventually got home and we got ready in record time and headed to the party at around 2am. It was a pretty small gathering, but that was pretty good since we only knew one guy who was there. There was also some table football on the go and I like table football. Beat Debbie at that then retired as unbeaten champion.

I didn't feel hungover on Sunday, even though we didn't get home until 5am, and it was a sunny day so I made Jeff from my work take me to a park off Commercial Drive. It was called Trout Lake even though I didn't see any trout and I did see lots of crows and ducks and dogs.

Some crows in the snow

Closer

Some crows in a tree

Frozen trout lake and the mountains

Closer mountains and crows

Some fauna

There were so many birds everywhere

Lotsa ducks!

A crow in a tree

Sunset

It was pretty freezing outside so after a while watching dogs and ducks (and the huge flock of birds that flies back from downtown everyday at 5pm) we headed to a cafe to get some warm. Jeff's friend called him then and we went to meet him for a couple beers. The bar was this cool little restauranty place with an art gallery in the back. All in all I had a really good day but was glad to get bathed and ready for bed last night. Turns out walking about in the freezing cold really takes it outta you! Who knew?

Today I had work and it was pretty quiet but my Chemistry Worlds had arrived so I had some catching up to do with my old buddy science. Speaking of which, the course information for the MSc Forensic Toxicology went up today so now I gotta decide what direction my life's taking... Uh oh. For the time being, though, I think I'll get into my jammies and read some story.

Puppies and Kittens.

Yesterday me and Debbie went on another of our Thursday dates, since Steeps like to give me Thursdays off. After a morning of Cream Earl Grey and reading (a passive observer may have reasonably thought it Sunday), we headed out to Burnaby where Metrotown is. Metrotown is a massive shopping centre with lots and lots of shops in it. We were both pretty excited about it because Debbie had been there before and knew there was a petshop that sold puppies there. We were planning on heading straight to the puppy shop but my X chromosomes were running the show and I instinctively needed to shop, so it took a wee while. When we got there though...

Kittens in the window

Beagel! Want!

Can't remember what breed this little fellow was.

The saddest looking westie in history.

Sleeping ferrets

So I that was pretty excited. And I just wanna take this opportunity to remind everyone that it's my birthday March 25th.

After that we took the Skytrain back to Commercial Drive and me and Debbie looked like a couple on a date as we dined on Pizza in Marcellos (the arch rival of the restaurant Debbie works (perhaps soon to be past tense if they find out)). Then it was off to Cafe Deux Soleils again for the open mic night. I'd hate to be a newbie going up to sing there because everyone's always so good and are all total pros. There were a couple, though, that were a touch tedious. I was drinking tea all night because I had work at 10.30 this morning but next week I'm not in work until 3.30pm so I may treat myself to a few beers. We shall see.

I'm Beached As Bru.

See how easy it is? Now all you clever little critters can comment til your hearts are content!
Today I had another day off so I woke up around 9.30am and read some more of my book that I've been reading since I've been in Scotland. I'm getting towards the end so I'm gonna have to hurry up and join the library. Also phoned Margaret and Ronnie from Skype because I haven't spoken to them in a while.
After some lunch me and Debbie got 3 buses to a vintage flea market thing at the Croatian Cultural Centre on Commercial Drive. It was pretty massive and I kept finding other rooms full of stuff to look at. I saw a couple cool things and lots of nice teacups and saucers but I didn't find anything nice enough for me to buy. I kept hold of my money until we went into Dollarama in which everything is a dollar. I got an oil burner and a pack of three Sharpie-style pens. We then got the Sky Train Downtown and I bought some stuff in Lush while Debbie waited the longest time ever for a crepe. Debbie had to go to work after that and I was gonna get off the bus at Save on Foods but decided not to because I'd have to get another bus ticket to get home on if I did and I was too hungry to shop. I'll go before work tomorrow or something. Then I came home and told Greg to do the dishes because me and Debbie had done some recently and there was nothing that was clean. For my dinner I made a baked sweet potato and some chicken and some peas. I scooped all the insides out of the potato and mixed it with coconut milk, chilli flakes and red onion then put it back in the skins and in the oven for a wee bit longer. It kinda fell apart but was pretty good. I marinaded the chicken for a half hour or so in coconut milk, olive oil, garlic and lime juice and it tasted pretty fantastic. I have another piece of that for dinner tomorrow.
After I ate I read some more of my book and now I'm here writing this. Back to work tomorrow for an evening shift and my next day off's Thursday again. If it's nice think me and Debbie are going to go back to Stanley Park and if it's rainy we're going to go to the big shopping centre at Metrotown where they have puppies in a petshop!! Good times!

I just read over the first few posts I did on this, when I first came over and it's weird. I think I put a lot more effort in then. Sorry the standards have slipped so. It also made me really miss staying in the hostel and I know that I'm really going to miss being here. Me and Debbie were discussing it a while ago; like at the moment I'm just lying in my room on the internet but in a few years when I'm all grown up I know I'm going to look back and be like I really enjoyed being in Vancouver, I wish I was just on the internet in Vancouver again. Basically what I'm saying is I'm really enjoying it over here and I know how lucky I am to have the chance to be here and how my life's so easy at the moment; I have no responsibilities other than making sure my rent is paid on time. The only thing I really need to give any consideration to is what I'm doing after being here. I kind of want to stop working at the end of April and have a week or so being a proper tourist again (by that time we'll be back in the hostel) then have a couple weeks of travelling about. I'm not sure if I want to see the east coast at all because I've had some people telling me it's really nice and some people telling me there's nothing of interest there, or if I just want to go around Vancouver Island and the rest of B.C. I also need to decide if I'm going to go to Glasgow and do the MSc there. I do miss science and really want to return to it sometime but I'm worried that if I start it and don't have the motivation to finish it it'll have been a waste of time and money. Plus I've heard masters are a lot of work. The University of Glasgow haven't got the course descriptor up yet anyway so I can't make any decisions until I've seen that. I think, though, that I might want to go see other places now I've been here. I guess we'll just have to wait and see eh?

Moth Heaven.



Yesterday me and Debbie had a day out and it was pretty fun. We started out going to Queen Elizabeth Park which is pretty close to our house and has a conservatory which was pretty cool. It was really misty and cold but the mist added to the atmosphere I think.

There was some fancy birds in the conservatory and it was generally really nice. We sat in on a bench in the snow and ate our packed lunch which was surprisingly good. Here's some photos of that.

A creepy looking tree

A bridge and water and the view beyond in Queen Elizabeth Park


The view from the bridge

The mist and the trees

The lower part of the gardens

More view

Debbie wishing hard

Debbie on the bridge

A flower

A parrot

Another parrot-type bird. This guy spoke. He kept saying something about Charlie.

Another flower

This guy loved to preen

This one paraded about the place like he owned it.

I loved these little fellas

Birds from behind. Check out fluffy the one on the left is.

The clock outside the conservatory

Debbie with her packed lunch

After that we got on the bus and went to Granville Island. We were freezing cold so we got some tea in the public market then went to the brewery for a tour. The place is pretty tiny since they only actually brew the limited release beers there but included in the price of the tour is a taster thing of 4 beers. We tried the island lager which is alright but just a basic lager, the maple ale which has maple syrup in it and is quite nice, the winter ale which has white chocolate in it and was my favourite, and their porter which was too dark for me and I had to give it to Debbie.

My beers

Once we had drunk our beers we went back along Broadway to a place on Commercial Drive called Cafe Deux Soleil where they were having an open mic night. We got there pretty early and had some food. It's a vegetarian place so I had a veggie mexican burger which was pretty awesome then later on I had a brownie which was ok. We also drank some beer and waited until 9 when the open mic started. The place was pretty empty at the beginning and it was freezing but by the time the acts went on it was warming up.

There was loads of people who wanted to go up to sing which is odd cuz often at home there's not that many people who're willing to go up. Fifteen acts were picked out a jar and they were generally really good. Quite a few different types of music including a colaboration between a guitar, a rapper and a didgereedoo which was pretty incredible.

Greg joined us for the open mic

Greg overseeing Debbie's pint pouring

We stayed there until closing time then got the bus along Broadway and then home. It was 3am before I got to sleep and had work at 11 this morning so I'm pretty tired right now. Think I'll go have a bath and then go to sleep!