Nope - NOW I've seen it all

Okay, so after lunch today I had a little sweet tooth that was achin' for some lovin'. I went down to the Unicentre store to get something. I really wanted an all afternoon candy to suck or chew on like Gobstoppers. And then I saw it - Mentos - and I thought to myself "AHHHH....that's what I want."

As I reached for a pack out of the box they're shipped in, I stopped to read the label on the box. Mostly because it was big and white and not at all like the box in colour. When it finally computed, a few seconds later, I put the roll back. Something in my gut was saying that there wasn't something quite right about those Mentos, perhaps. I then knew I needed a pic. Sorry for the blurriness. It's hard to snap off a pic quickly without anyone noticing and when my camera says "Say CHEESE!" while taking the pic.












Yes, the label reads "For sale in Afghanistan only". And yes, someone did try and peel it off.

Now I've seen it all.

Now I've seen it all

A few weeks ago I went into a washroom at a pub and came across the most bizarre thing ever. Granted, I don't go out that much - contrary to what some of you may think - so who knows, perhaps this is standard fare in bars and clubs now? I dunno. All I know is that expect to see tampon dispensers, condom dispensers, perfume dispensers and even a variety of personal care products available (hand creams, hair sprays, nylons, etc.) but not this:

Yes, you see that right - that's a hair straightener. For $2 you can touch up your hair. And it'll tell you the time - apparently it was 11:20 when I came across this beauty.

Seriously, what will they think of next.

Forget Christopher Walken...

the nephews do me in with all their germs.

I was off sick on Thursday with the cold from Baby C who showed me the slobbery love last week when he visited with his two older bros for March break. While I fought and fought and fought, I finally succumbed to the sniffles, coughing and general fuzziness yesterday. Feeling better today which is good because I got big plans for this weekend - I'm off to the war museum to see some tanks. Oh yeah!

Christopher Walken did me in

Okay, I really didn't think I'd ever get to the point of letting 'Big Brother' watch over me and be comfortable with it. And then M-Pro goes and posts a note re. Christopher Walken's updates to Twitter on his Fakebook account. One reading and I was hooked. I wanted more.

And now I tweet. And I figured out how to tweet from my phone. One word - Dan-ger-OUS. If you tweet, follow me and let me know so I can follow you. Like the good stalker I am.

Epilogue: Apparently CWalken that I, M-Pro and JJ have been following is in fact not Christopher Walken and Twitter has decided that having him on the site misleading people by their own stupidity to believe it would in fact be Christopher Walken is in fact, not good for their image. Stupid Twitter - CWalking was funny.

Words from on high

So we've established that I'm not very religious. And that I have a one way ticket to hell secured. And that I think churches are funny.

So I'd be remiss if I didn't make my SIL drive around the parking lot of the church across from Little Ray's Reptile Zoo during the March break to make sure I got these photos, non?












Oh, that one about scaring the hell out of people cracks me up.

Take a hint already

Back in August, a friend came to stay with me for a few days. I like this gal, she's nice and all and we get along well for the first 48 hours or so and then I want to beat her. It's that fish and house guest theory, right? The both stinking after a few days?

Anyways, while she was visiting, I had a random friend request on Facebook from a friend of hers who is two years older than me so 3 years older than my friend. Now, the only thing that ties that girl and I together is that she dated my highschool sweetheart right before I did. That's it. We didn't have classes together, she wasn't a classmate of my older brother, nothing. In fact, I talked to her little brother who was 3 years younger than me more than I did her. Don't get me wrong, if we were alone and passed each other in the hall, we'd say hello but we weren't exactly friends and I wouldn't choose to have a conversation with her.

So, I said to our mutual, about-to-turn-putrid-like-rotting-fish, house-guest friend that I found it odd she was requesting me to be friends. She said that this gal routinely goes through her friends list and asks people to be friends with her. Given our mutual friend has like 8 million fakebook friends, there's quite the list to choose from. Mutual friend went on to say that because she was staying at my house and she speaks of me, that's the reason this gal is probably requesting me.

(insert record scratch)

What? She creeps mutual friend's friends list to add people to her list that she's not really friends with?

What? She wants to be my friend because you're staying at my house?

It was the first *ahem* "differing of opinions" (read: tense discussion that felt like it was about to lead to an all out war) that fishy house-guest and I had (that visit, might I add) and for some reason, she saw no issue with the fact that this gal does this. To me, what a shallow, impersonal act! As if I'm about to accept your offer of friendship fakeship on Facebook now. *insert tisk of disgust* So I did the only logical thing...

IG-NORE!

Well, mutual friend recently moved and sent photos of her new place in another city to an email distribution list that, unlike most emails she sends out of this nature, didn't have BCC on everyone's email addresses. That email came in this morning. And guess who I have a friend request from before noon today?

Ughhhh....take a hint already. I think I'm going to revert to a tried, tested and true response:

IG-NORE!

Heartbreak and green beer

For the first time ever, I went out on St. Patty's day yesterday.

Seeing as how I hate beer, going out on a "holiday" where it's celebrated with green food colouring isn't exactly my version of a good time. And being accosted by drunk people and asked multiple times if I'd like to have a little Irish in me is also not my version of a good time. Unless I be one of those fools which I wasn't as I still had to work this morning.

Moreover, I had my tender little heart broken once on a St. Patrick's day. Since then, I've quietly boycotted the day as a day to mourn that lost love. Sure, it was over a decade ago. Sure it was a highschool sweetheart but it was an impressionable first love and not a St. Patty's day goes by without me thinking about the first person to deliver a soul-shattering blow to my heart.

So an impromptu invite to go out (late) last night by an old friend was at first not at all appealing. But life is short and I hadn't seen him in 6 years and green beer be damned, it'd be good to catch up - which it was. Admittedly, with a little coaxing, I tried 2 different beers last night. Your gasps of shock are audible from here. And let me reiterate, I still don't like it. But at least I tried it, right?

Moral of the story for me this morning: there are few things in life that I dwell on. Perhaps it's time to let them go and enjoy life by moving forward.

How's that for a deep thought that comes from crowded, loud bars on a day that celebrates beer more than a nationality?

This one's for my brother

I have to think our aversion to drugs was from having this burned to memory during the formative years in the 80's. I especially remember the one at 42 seconds in - SOOO FUNNY!



BTW, shout out to G for posting this to his Fakebook account.

Age issues once more

This weekend's hoopla was yet another reminder of my age. I once again was reminded that at 30, your body doesn't bounce back from the hangovers like it did at 20 or even 25. But have I learned my lesson? NOOOOOO...... that's for sure....especially not when it's easily cured by greasy whistle dogs and cake for breakfast at 2:30 in the afternoon.

And then I went curling on Sunday. I am bruised and sore like never before and I bailed, HARD, on the ice while sweeping. Awesome. But I'm a trooper though and they've invited me back to play with them again so I can't be that bad.

And on another "I don't look my age" side note, I got into a conversation with a chap on Friday night who, in a discussion about music, told me that he easily had 15 years on me which is why I didn't know some obscure trumpet player that he did. While he had nice smiley wrinkled eyes, he certainly didn't look THAT old. When I pursued the issue with him, he guessed me at 23-24 but knowing that I was hanging out with the crowd I was with, he was going to say 25-26.

And so my age issues continue. I'm not sure why this bugs me so much but it does for some reason.

Eats Shoots and Leaves

So, a while back I was having a grammatical discussion with JJ about something and we got onto the topic of Eats Shoots and Leaves and the fact that it was one of my (now defunct) book club books that I couldn't get past the chapter on commas.

However, today I had a Fakebook ad that is a prime example of some of the grammatical blunders outlined in the book. But this one involves Katie Holmes so you KNOW it's got to be funny.

Case in point:

So, which of the scenarios would this be? Considering that there is no reference to facial wrinkles in the sub-text, could not all apply?

1) Read: Committing murder causes wrinkles. My sub-text: But Katie's still seriously thinking about getting rid of the Tom part in TomKat!
2) Read: There are problems (wrinkles) in the murder. My sub-text: But if you look thoughtful and use the innocence of being a mother to a cutie like Suri, can you still get away with murdering that little Gay Midget Dwarf.
3) Read: Violently cause an end to your facial creases. This is probably the intended message behind this ad.

See my point?

A moment of immodesty, if I may

As Canadians, we have an annoying habit of being overly modest. For me, this means I'm not especially good at taking a compliment. However, with my old age, and my new found 30 confidence, I'm getting better at just saying "thanks" versus any other mumbled "you must be kidding" utterance.

The one thing I've always been fairly modest about is my facial skin. I have baby's-ass smooth, rarely blemished skin. And I don't deserve it. I treat it like crap relative to the grand scheme of female skin care techniques. I can count, on one hand, the number of times I wash it or remove makeup before bed in a month, I rarely put sunscreen on it, and still, I am blessed with this alabaster loveliness. I rarely fess up to this to many people because well, for women, this is scandalous.

But last night, I went to Shoppers for a new face toner and cream. I've been using the same face wash for 17 years but I change up the face cream and toner a couple of times a year. I made the mistake of going in when an uber bored cosmetics counter gal was in super duper help mode and wanted to talk to everyone in her department.

Her first question to me was "So what are your problem areas?"
"Um, well, I don't have any."
*snort in a "you arrogant bitch" kinda way* "Well, that must be niiice."

She then tried to sell me on a bunch of things and I had to clarify with her. Cream and toner. No makeup remover. I don't use it. I own it and I use it sometimes in the mornings but even then, rarely.

"Well do you wear eye makeup?"
"Yes"
"Well what do you do to take it off at night?"
"I don't"
"What?!?!"
"I don't. I don't wash my face at night"
"So you go to bed with it on?"
"Yeah, I just wash my face once a day"

*Insert expression of extreme horror*

And further yet in the conversation, as I had rejected all the crazy expensive creams because they don't have an SPF and I'm lazy and don't want to use two products on my face, she says...

"Well, you might want to try this one. It helps with redness."
"But I don't have redness problems"
"I see redness in your face"
"Yes because I just did sports for an hour"
"Oh."

It must have been VERY frustrating for her to have to deal with me. It seems that every product out there is to solve some sort of problem and I, well, just don't suffer from them. She ended up selling me on a product that is supposed to be better than Aveeno but is only $2-3 more per product bottle than Aveeno. And it's got SPF 25. We both went away happy.

I think.

One of the guys

A while back I was lamenting to a fellow singleton about my apparent luck at being categorized into the "friend zone". It's something that I've been plagued with since the beginning of my dating history back in middle school. And let's face it. I'm not dainty. I have a potty mouth. I can appreciate slapstick rude humour over farts, burping and other vulgarities. I am not much of a girlie girl and as I've been called on on several occasions, I'm pretty aggressive.

So Tuesday night, I was taking a fellow dodgeball player to our game and we got on the topic of dating and age. He's the one that thought I was 24 some days back and didn't understand my outrage at being carded. Anyways, he was telling me how awesome I was, how when he first met me that he thought I was just this "chill chick who was into doing her own thing. You know, one of the guys. Someone who'd always be there for you, you know".

Hmm. While it stung to hear those "one of the guys" words yet again, I couldn't help but be flattered at the same time. Really, what he was telling me was that I am independent, not needy, someone who builds good friendships and is there for people. Sure, not exactly lustful qualities but perhaps ones that long term, can be attractive to someone of the opposite sex.

Brings me to another conversation that I had a while back with yet another singleton - as I think of all of them out there that I seem to be coming into contact with, why are none of them ones that I'd want to date??? Anyways, he was telling me that he's never been "friends" with anyone that he's dated. Not having the poker face I wish I did, my horror at this statement showed visibly. On the contrary, my view of dating is that a relationship is, at it's basic level, just a really great friendship with sex. Am I wrong? Is this what the demise of all of my other relationships have lead to? The fact that my mates basically are my best friends with benefits? Is this why I end up being just better friends than mates with people?

Or maybe it's that I think too much like a guy and that intimidates them away from me in that I'm good to be friends with but too much to handle as a mate? I had a guy friend tell me that he thinks I'm going to have a hard time finding someone to live up to me when I decide to get serious with someone again. Gee, thanks. Pour some fresh lemon juice on that wound, why don't 'cha?!? But it was a sentiment echoed to me from another female friend shortly after I reentered the dating scene. Hmmmm...it's definitely left me with some thinking.

Me and my potty mouth woes

So, the other day, my big brother and I are on the phone. The nephews jump on and after one cutie patootie tells me that he wants to come to my house to see me because he hasn't seen me for a long time (like 24 days to be exact), I think I'm off of speaker phone again. And out of my mouth slips one of my favourite phrases.

Oh my god.

Well, apparently, I was still on speaker phone. My cutie patootie "I miss you" nephew says,

"Don't say that, Aunt Wyn. Mommy says not to say that. Say "Oh my gosh". Okay?"

"Okay, sorry bud. I won't say it anymore. "

"Okay. I'll tell you again if you say it"

"Okay, ummm....thanks."

So, knowing how much of a trucker mouth I have - which I rightfully inherited from my red-neck father - I've pretty much decided that this little gaffer is not going to carry on the Alberta tradition of spewing profanities proudly. Guess there's always his brothers to corrupt, non? And could you imagine what he'd say if he only understood the depth and breadth of my verbal assaults? Oye.

How old is too old?

So, last night the lovely V gushed to me "oh, I so have to set you up with undisclosed name*. You two would be perfect together. " She then proceeded to gush for a good 10 minutes and would only move on to other topics if I promised to entertain the idea of a set up.

However, along the way, there were some fundamental tidbits of info that were shared that lead me to think that we wouldn't be all that great of a match. I think, *think* because I don't know him, that we may be at different places in our lives (as in he's older much more settled than I am). I know I shouldn't judge a book by a cover and for some people, age is just a number. Hell, some people can look much younger than their age - as is my case where I was recently carded to buy booze even though I'm 19-11. And then carded again to go in a pub. And then told I looked 24. I seem to not get a day over 26 these days which while I know I should relish, is a little disconcerting as it makes me wonder if that will affect who views me as "eligible" or not based on my age. I've already had once acquaintance tell me he "wasn't mackin' on" me because he thought I was "underage" (read younger than him and more like 24-25 to be exact).

Anyways, and this is going to make me the female equivalent of a total cad, but I'm curious to go out with him just to go out with him. As in just go for the date for the sake of a date. Not that I foresee a long term thing developing but just for fun. Does that make me a bad person? Am I wasting his time and mine? Should I just not date unless I'm 'serious'?

And more importantly, how old is too old for me to date? Give me your honest answer and I may just tell you how old he is. I *may* tell you.

*undisclosed name=then you can't Facebook creep him like I did (hey, his own fault for having an open profile) and to protect his identity in case I do decide to date him because then he'll need a cool nickname (ie. to the tune of the banker, the blind date, CBC), not just undisclosed identity.

I am lazy, hear me roar

I've begun an activity regime that felt a little bit hectic but in the last day I've come to realize is really quite a bit as I tell others what I'm up to. I play dodgeball Mon-Wed and badminton on Thursdays. That's 4 nights a week I'm doing some form of physical exercise. On top of that, I'm also on the treadmill doing a walk/must-work-up-to-running workout of 45-60 minutes 2-3 times a week (depending on the time of day, my mood, my schedule and how good the show on tv is that I'm watching). I still kick myself for not getting back into the pool more often than not but if you contrast that to a year ago when I was doing nothing, I'd say I've put my butt into gear.

But there are downsides to this. I'm constantly doing laundry, I have to struggle to stay on top of a controlled eating routine that is timely and focused so I don't end up eating out every meal of the day, and worst of all, my house is being neglected. Sure it's tidy - because it's not really lived in - but the tumble weeds of cat hair seem a little out of control. I *could* clean on the weekends but it really feels like that's the only time I have to spend with friends who I don't play on a team with so I hate the idea of giving up a morning or afternoon to cleaning...much less to cleaning if I could be sleeping in.

Well, one place where I just have been uber lazy is in, get this, the changing of the clocks in my house. Yes, back in November, I did not change clocks or even watches over from standard time. I did for the clocks that were easy to change or would cause great confusion if looked at quickly (ie. alarm clocks) but there are many clocks around the house that still read an hour ahead. But I figured, meh, I just have to change them back anyways so really, what's a few months of mental math, right?

Last night I was going to change one said clock back but didn't bother as I felt rather tired after dodgeball with the geriatrics (more on that later). Instead, I went to bed early. Well today I discovered that daylight savings time begins this Sunday to which I can't help but proclaim:

WOO HOO! I AM LAZY, HEAR ME ROAR!

I *knew* being lazy with an ability to do simple subtraction would pay off one day. ;o)

A true taste of TBay

Ahhh, Thunder Bay. The bane of my existence and the place were it all started - my life that is. While there are things that make me homesick, I never once thought it would be Rick Mercer.

RMR: Thunder Bay Winter Wonderland

So, here's some random info about me:

My mom lives within basball hitting distance from the Hoito where Rick goes and the best part about going is weighing yourself on the big scale behind the guy in the hat at 1:09 before you eat (and as you wait in an "orderly" fashion for a table) and then weighing yourself when you're done eating to see how much weight the syrup and Finnish pancakes have added to your person.

I have been ice climbing at Orient Bay - the 1.5 hour drive from TBay and north of Nipigon, Ontario. It's harder than it looks. I definitely want to do it again one day.

I grew up regularly using a sauna (see 6:00 for proper pronunciation) and am frequently mocked when I pronounce it like the Finn that I am (well, half). At least now it's made it onto national television that I'm not looney but grew up with Finnish roots. And yes, I've rolled in snow and then gone back into the sauna. In the summer you jump in the lake or river and then head back in.

Good on ya, Rick, good on ya.

Holy Jesus - pun intended

I'm pretty much speechless. Except to give you the pic and associated URL, ask if you've seen it in Facebook, feel no need to express my eye-rolling disdain at this initiative and point out the Hey-Zeuz Fish Icon in the URL address.













Actually, I guess I do have a one word thought on this - "Jesus".

BTW, shout out to new readers Wino J and KPro! I managed to suck you in - MOUAH AH AH AH AH!