Saturday, July 28, 2007

big turk

turkey was hot. and sunny. and friendly. we had a great time. gerry read 5 books in the week, and i read 4, and O magazine. :o) we both got tanned, but mine's definitely the better of the two. gerry is a shade or so darker, but he spent most of his time under umbrellas while i was basking in the much missed golden rays of that thing called the sun.

we went to the greek island of Kos/Cos one day and had great greek food, and a very very shelly beach which hurt my feet. there were so many dutch people there, it was crazy. and day-amn, it was hawt.

we did a bunch of excursions while we were in turkey. one day we were out on a dive boat which was great... probably our favourite day of the vacation. everything was taken care of, equipment and lunch. we went for two dives. one was to bubble cave which was so cool-first we went in the cave to see what it's like inside, and then we went above it and saw all of these bubbles coming out. and then we went for a dive around a cove, and there were heaps of fish, a few of which can be seen in our pic below.

we went to a covered market one day and sweat like f'ing crazy and had a little tour of the city. monday night we did a moonlit cruise that i hated. it was supposed to be romantic and nice, and it sort of was, except for the blasting of music. it was cool to be on the boat and watch shooting stars, and it would have been way better, without the music.

there was lots of shopping going on. it's really geared to tourists, but we didn't really want a challenging holiday. i think i was so desperate for sun, i would have gone anywhere. it was nice that turkey was somewhere i had interest in going, and it was a direct flight from cork.

on saturday i was feeling sick. when we were waiting for the plane on sunday i was feeling hellish and dry heaving in the toilet. finally i barfed a bit, but since it was so early, i only had some M&Ms to barf. the rice cakes didn't come up. i was feeling sick until thursday, but now i feel 100% better. and am really happy about our trip.

at the end of august we're going to be meeting louis, katie and sarah in prague (in less than two weeks, sarah will be here for a visit). and we're looking for weekends to scotland and spain and a christmas market in winter. i don't have many days off left, so we'll see how that goes but that will bring us to the end of the year, i'd say. and then, hopefully, we'll be off to thailand and australia and then home. but those details haven't been worked out yet... it sure helps time go by when you're looking forward to something!

Wednesday, July 25, 2007

going down in turkey


okay, not a great pic of us, but one of the better ones.

Saturday, July 07, 2007

goodbye toni & guy

i've decided i'm no longer going to get my hair done at Toni & Guy. i will also no longer be recommending it to others.

i do still think that ruth is great. and then the girl who coloured my hair, kelly was brilliant. kudos to them.

here's the thing. other than ruth and kelly the service has been shit. the manager there, whatever her name is, is so rude and full of herself that i can't convince myself to patron there.

when elaine went in to complain that jessica, the girl who cut her hair went mad for thinning it out, despite elaine saying she liked her hair thick, and didn't want it thinned much, she was basically like: shut up and let me talk. fair enough, elaine got 50E off a hair colour, but for now, she doesn't have the cut she wanted, and she went in with two pictures of herself with the hair cut she wanted.

anyway, yeah. toni & guy: not in my good books.

and you are?

yesterday, after it rained, the sun finally came out. how exciting. it's been the crappest weather here; you can't tell the difference between now and winter. i'm not kidding.

but today it's sunny. i'm gonna skip the gym and try to find a pair of light-weight short pants for turkey, and a pair of comfortable shoes that i can wear with my inserts, while being cool enough to wear in turkey. i'd say i've got about a 30% chance of doing these things today.

gerry's parents and his sister, corona, came down last night. i skipped the work barbeque, which actually sounded like it'd be a good one. we had our own little barbeque here, and managed to celebrate having glimpsed the almost unrecognisable sun.

today is carol's birthday barbeque. how frustrasting is this? i bought and ordered a present for her over a month ago. they said it would take up to two weeks. i said no problem. in case it was a bit longer, i had some time. i was worried when i hadn't received a call saying it had arrived. well, i didn't get called because it's not in yet! grr. that is annoying. when you plan something really well, and then it just doesn't happen. they're trying to get it for me, and it looks like maybe at the end of this week coming up.

at least it's sunny right now.

Thursday, July 05, 2007

chicken? no, turkey!

yay!

it is official. the holidays are approved, the package is booked. gerry and i are off to turkey in 10 sleeps. it was pretty much a last-minute kind of thing and initially we were looking at morocco. turkey is a bit of a longer flight, but we can get there direct from cork.

whatever will we do there? well, hopefully my PADI card will get here in time so that we can go for a dive or two. and otherwise, i plan to check out the markets, the knock-off bags, the beach and a turkish bath.

what could be better? doing in in 35 degree weather, all the while it's pissing rain here.

whoot indeed.

Sunday, July 01, 2007

how canadian

the potluck was spanish omelettes, veg sushi, tortilla chips and salsa, hummous and veg, veg burgers, german potato salad, swedish sticky chocolate cake, and strawberry pavlova. oh-some peanut butter cups to finish it all off. very multi-cultural, to celebrate the country that first coined the term.

it was a nice way to celebrate a birthday (which i love) for a place that i miss. to top things off we played trivial pursuit.

happy birthday indeed.

happy birthday canada!

hey, guess what? it's july. eek! where did that one sneak up from?

well, today is a potluck. it's going to be small, as we are still recovering from quarter-end. and potluck style means it's not all up to me. how exciting! aldi's special items on thursday included reese's peanut butter cups, maple syrup and some jelly-belly style jelly beans, which i stocked up on. sure they're meant for americans celebrating july 4th, but as the maple syrup and the peanut butter cups were made in canada, i had no shame in buying these symbols of 'americana'.

new and exciting things include that my new job is going well, but i'm totally going to post a 'characters at work' blog. hopefully later this evening. because there really are some characters. so , while i may not being doing the job i love right now, i am doing a job that will hold me through until the end of the year (this means two more quarter ends... i think i must be crazy) and i'm doing a job that's paying me decently enough that my economy isn't too bad.

i also got my orthotics on thursday. i don't mind wearing them at all. they make me feel like i'm standing properly. it's true, after a while my feet get a bit sore, but since i've been at work most of my days, and then on saturday i only got up once my stomach was growling like mad and then to go to matilda's going away party, it's not like i've been doing much standing since i got them.

i'm hoping that now things will slow down a bit at work, i should be able to go to the gym as much as i had initially planned. i can enjoy 2.5 months of normal-ish work hours! the gym we joined is grand, there aren't any kids running around, except in the pool area. and it's so close to my work. so i really hope i'll be able to fit into the pants i bought last year soon. maybe buying the peanut butter cups wasn't a great idea.