Archive for December, 2006
December 31st, 2006 -- Posted in General |
Well, 2006 is coming to a close and I won’t be awake to see 2007 come in (I might tune in to the Newfoundland channel and catch my new year early). We took off to the States for a few days and did some shopping and geocaching. It was our first experience with urban caching. We were excited to see so many caches on the GPS but then sad to discover they were all in the open in public places like the parking lots of Tim Horton’s and Wendy’s. So we tried to venture out and find a few outside the city and managed to find some neat places. One was on the trail of a recent murder and the other was beautiful waterfall. Geocaching was made a little tricky after the storm Buffalo had in October. So many trees are broken and covering many trails… it has added a whole new meaning to bushwacking! Doug did quite well on the clothes shopping venture and I managed to hit Bath and Body Works semi-annual sale! Woohoo! All in all a relaxing weekend and off to bed soon - I hope the new year still comes without me staying awake to welcome it in.
December 28th, 2006 -- Posted in General |
So Doug and I discovered this great cache today! There are 115 caches hidden at Cracker Barrell’s across the US!! How exciting is that?!! Yippeee!!! Now I just have to find them…
December 27th, 2006 -- Posted in General |
Not quite sure about these no returns until December 28th type of thing. I have visited a few stores that are nearly sold out of stuff because of sales (ie. Roots has EVERYTHING 50% off). If you had something in the wrong size, you have a slim chance of being able to get it after two days of sales. I have something I am thinking of exchanging but the store here has none left! Grrrr…..
December 27th, 2006 -- Posted in General |
Who says that? It’s such a cool phrase… right up there with “harshing my mellow”.
December 27th, 2006 -- Posted in General |
The cool thing (well, one of them) about geocaching is the statistics that can easily be collected. Here are my own stats - nothing too spectacular on their own, but for the sake of the depth of analysis, it’s pretty cool.
On a similar note, I spent ~2 hours last night developing a spreadsheet of my budget, RRSP contributions, planned retirement age, and more. It was so much fun developing it, and wrapping my mind around the options and possibilities. I think the root of this is the same as what I love about my job.
December 26th, 2006 -- Posted in General |
I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas. When it’s 7 degrees outside, it can be hard to get into the Christmas spirit! On Christmas Eve day we crammed into the morning church service - got two of the last few seats! Then we packed up and did a few geocaches on the way to my parents. Doug put his first cache out there - pretty exciting! We had a great Christmas at my parents and I feel quite spoiled by all of my family!! My brother bought me the best housecoat - extra super soft! Once again Christmas came and went too fast but I am looking forward to a week and a half of rest and relaxation! Thanks to all that have made Christmas extra special this year!! You know I love you!
December 25th, 2006 -- Posted in General |
Jenn wanted me to say “Merry Christmas” to everyone, so bah humbug, consider it done.
December 22nd, 2006 -- Posted in General |
Not long ago we posted about the problem with our neighbour’s dog. Well, technically the problem is with our neighbour’s downstairs tenant’s dog, but hey, it’s not like you know the difference. This morning I tried for the 6th time to talk to this individual and she was still not home. So I come back and write a note, try a 7th time (still no answer), and seeing as how there isn’t a mailbox, I go to the front door to see if the upstairs tenant or owner can pass the note on. Well, the guy living upstairs was really nice and apologetic (not his problem!) and said they’ve been somewhat annoyed by her. He states he’ll be happy to pass on the note. This afternoon the door bell rings and it’s the owner of the house - Chris (a young really nice guy!). He says he had no idea this was happening and apologizes as well (not his problem, either!) and says he’ll talk to her. He re-stated that he’d like to help with installing the fence in the spring. So, the problem isn’t with our neighbour - Chris is fantastic, friendly, and responsible. I imagine things’ll get fixed now. Woo hoo!
December 22nd, 2006 -- Posted in General |
In 13 hours I will be free! WOohoo!! Can’t wait. It is 1 a.m. and I am giddy with excitement and can’t sleep. Okay, I woke up and couldn’t fall back to sleep without checking the LL Bean deal of the day - which turned out to not be a deal at all… just an opportunity to buy a gift card! My impulse buy from last weekend did arrive this week though and my new backpack is better then expected!
December 17th, 2006 -- Posted in General |
Happy Birthday Doug! Wishing you another great decade ahead!
December 16th, 2006 -- Posted in General |
It’s probably not a good idea to shop online in the middle of the night. I couldn’t sleep so logged on and did some surfing. Then I remembered that LL Bean had their Christmas Countdown sale on and had to check what todays deal was. Well, it was a backpack. Do I need a backpack? No… was it a good deal? Yes. Well, I OFTEN just click it and put it in my shopping bag. I entered my free shipping code… but there was no duty or tax. There is ALWAYS duty and tax. How can I turn down that kind of deal… so my magic fingered pressed buy…. oops! Well… I’m sure there is someone that would love a backpack… or maybe I can get rid of some of my current ones.  I wonder what tomorrow’s sale will be?
December 16th, 2006 -- Posted in General |
… a lot like Christmas! WOohoo! One week until holidays! I can’t wait. Well, with Doug’s new job, he doesn’t really get holidays..I think he has to work on the 26th even. Oh well, I’m off… Perhaps we’ll do a weekend trip or something. I think most of my presents are bought and wrapped… even Doug’s birthday! WOohoo! I can’t believe he is FINALLY turning 30.. it seems like it has taken forever. He and were discussing ALL of the big events of the last 10 years… pretty amazing. I don’t know if there is another era in your life where so much happens. Kind of makes turning 30 a little depressing. Personally, I am not one for too much change so perhaps an uneventful decade for me is okay. I’m not sure what we’re doing for the birthday weekend but I hear the word ‘geocaching’ a lot! We’re off to pick out a birthday cake sometime as well… not sure about where we are eating… or if we are eating… Anyway, I’m hoping to pick up some more Christmas spirit this week. I hate that it comes early… disappears for a while… and hopefully makes it back in time for Christmas! It gets so busy at work with report cards, etc. that I lose some spirit in there. I can make up for it at March Break at Bronners.
December 13th, 2006 -- Posted in General |
We don’t have a fence up yet and it appears our backyard neighbours now have a dog. Doug counted 18 piles of poop in our backyard today… He has attempted to talk to them twice (never finding them at home). What do we do?? I was thinking we need to put up a temporary fence or something…. Grr…. I thought we moved away from our ‘interesting’ neighbours.
Oh… I hope to get all of your comments but we are getting about 300 spam comments a day that I am filtering through… so I will try to find yours in the hay stack!
December 10th, 2006 -- Posted in General |
Crazy… 14 days. 10 days left of work!  We went to St. Jacob’s yesterday and then on to Anna Mae’s. The weather was beautiful and the views spectacular. What a great way to spend the day. Today, my parents and I went to the Christmas concert at Benton Street Baptist. It had an orchestra and a choir… and actually sang real Christmas songs. I was at church this morning and they sang praise choruses! It’s advent…. haven’t they heard that you should sing Christmas carols during advent? Anyway, the concert was FANTASTIC and filled with festive cheer. They even sang an African song that I had sung in high school… I think I was the only one who had heard it before. I also sat about three rows back from the orchestra which was neat… I watched all the violinists play… neat. Well, off for another week of work!
December 8th, 2006 -- Posted in General |
Royal Bank screwed up, but normally you think that’d be a kick in the consumer’s rear end, but this time it was the bank that was scared. Seems that they lost our safety deposit box forms (some sort of a problem between the flow of paper from the front desk to the back desk). Jenn, diligent record keeper that she is, was quickly able to find our copy. After 3 calls from the bank lady in total desperation and fear of losing her job and a good night sleep in the Mitchell house, I brought our copy in so they could copy it and pretend that nothing bad happened at all. You’d think they had lost a million dollars by the way they were acting. So I say to the lady - “So, does this earn a couple of months of free banking services?” She incredulously asked why that would be. I explained that I was doing her a favour by coming in with the forms and she said, “Well, we’ll see what we can do”. On my way out she asks if I like Tim Hortons and gives me $10 in gift certificates, which though better than a kick in the pants, isn’t quite on par with what I’d expect would be the degree of appreciation I (a loyal customer of 8 years and counting) would receive. What can you do?
December 7th, 2006 -- Posted in General |
The snow yesterday was beautiful! I had so much fun during recess helping kids roll GIANT snowballs and lift them to make snowmen, etc. Some of those kids are pretty strong! The flakes falling were huge…
Tonight are parent interviews… wish me luck! Not my favourite part of the job!
December 3rd, 2006 -- Posted in General |
Only three weeks until Christmas, which means only three weeks left of work until a break! WOohooo! Report cards went home this past week and parent interviews are this coming week… and then hopefully I can relax a little. I don’t even have my Christmas cards done yet (I pride myself in usually having them in the mail Dec. 1). So I’m a little behind this year but I think I can live with that. I have most of my Christmas shopping done…. except for Doug! Oops! I should really get on that since he has a birthday coming up as well.