So I moved.

Well I'm in Toronto now and loving it. I endured about a month of mostly just sitting around the condo waiting for something to happen and applying to jobs. Everyone else was off doing their own thing, and me, I was just cleaning up after them. At first I certainly enjoyed not having to head to work, but that feeling soon subsided. After just four weeks 'off' I'm back to the grind, landing my first Canadian job!

Little story: Bill is made a bet with me that I couldn't land a job within four month (July 1) - he's quite the pessimist so from his perspective four months was pretty good odds for him. The wager: if I landed a job he'd get me a MacBook Air, if I didn't, well I'm not sure what I owed him and it doesn't matter now anyhow. I'm typing this out on my new MacBook Air and loving it. Of course I have to fight him for it - its so damn light and the backlit keyboard comes in handy.

Not having a DVD drive, ethernet port or firewire port was a small downer when it came time to transfer files from the iMac, but between an external hard drive and my iPod it wasn't much of a challenge. The hard drive on the MBA is smaller than what I'm used to so I've junked all the junk but I still have 30 GB open.

But wait, there's more. I mentioned during my interview that I'm a Mac user/fan/fanatic/devotee - so guess what they purchased for me?! A MacBook - so in about one week I've received two new Mac laptops. Being able to work on a Mac at the office is a dream come true for me - I'm delighted to finally have the option and the freedom it represents. I know it might be dorky, but it really is a huge perk for me.

So there it is. I'm working again, but on a Mac this time. Kitty is a Canadian immigrant now and loving being back with "mom and dad." Life is good - the wait to get here was long and emotional but its done now.

Dear SuperTarget,

Oh how I will miss thee. You've been so good to me - most of the time - and though I've enjoyed my visits I couldn't help but smile this evening. You see, I won't be visiting anymore. That was the last time for awhile I'll swipe my shiny red Target card at your register. I'm moving on to a land deprived of SuperTargets or Targets of any kind. Sad, yes I know but I think you'll agree its a small sacrifice I must make. Oh and don't worry about visits to Wal-Mart - that for sure as hell ain't happenin'. Maybe I'll get a chance to visit you in Buffalo. Are you Super in Buffalo? (Is anything super in Buffalo?!)

Thanks again for everything SuperTarget! I'll miss your little lemon poppy seed scones - with the bit of frosting on top. I'm having a couple right now.

Sincerely,
Erik

Most annoying comment about moving to Canada

"Wow, I hope you like the cold."

Welcome to Canada

Well the time has finally come. After many months of putting my application together and waiting for an official response, I've been invited to immigrate to Canada. During the wait, the months dragged on and on and now that the time has finally come it feels like its only been a couple of weeks waiting. Today I gave my resignation at work and planned the going-away happy hour. Then on March 2nd, kitty and I are jumping in a packed Coop and driving on through to Toronto. Well, as long as the border officer is nice...

2 Things that Stink about Canadian Immigration

First, the application is a pain to complete and put together. Though fortunately its not so complicated as to need a lawyer, but grr I didn't have fun doing it.

Second, would be the waiting. Its a killer...

It was about this time a year ago I embarked on a bit of a journey to get in better shape. It was certainly no New Years resolution - the timing was coincidental. Since that time I'm dropped about 40 pounds and three pants sizes, but its still certainly a work in progress. Its a struggle to eat better - or often times just eating less. I love food! But its getting better, and certainly easier. Now its all about turning things up a notch and finally building some muscle. I just don't have any to show and never have - but I know they are there.

Hello MINI

Switching to 2%

I never really understood why Starbucks used whole milk as the standard with their espresso drinks. Apparently enough people have been requesting lower-fat milk, that Starbucks is going to switch to 2% as their default. The article mentions doing so eliminates 70 calories from a grande latte.

I went through thier nutritional information page a few months ago and realized just how many calories are in some of their drinks. I've been going low-fat, sugar-free and no whip ever since - now I don't feel so guilty when I have a little treat.

Success

Work has been crazy busy and all the homework on top hasn't been helping with the stress levels, but I still managed to learn just enough Flash to make something useful. In our office, we have these three 40" LCDs in the lobby, and I was fortunate enough to get the chance to work with them. Though not incredibly exciting, its my first chance at learning Flash and seeing what it can do.

Anyway, there were more than a few kinks to work out and I still have plenty of little things to learn. But I've managed to build a relatively nice looking movie that fills out the screens (no easy task) and looks good doing it. I have a few guide books to read and I'm taking a two-day class next month - I'll be an old pro in no time.

Here we come Cozumel!

We finally settled on a vacation spot for some fun in the sun. Its pretty much my first ‘real’ vacation on my own - and the first more-than-a-weekend vacation together with Bill. We’ve planned for seven days at an all-inclusive beach resort, there will be snorkeling, mopeding, site-seeing, para-sailing, and certainly lots of laying around.

Work was just a bevy of nightmares these past two weeks. Two major deadlines within days of each other - and the bigger the project and tighter the deadline = the more things that go wrong. And my late nights in the office were completely surpassed by one of my co-workers who was there almost non-stop. I can tell my homework this week suffered a little bit, not too much that I'm going to do bad in the course, but enough to disappoint myself. Ofcourse the week was focused on distribution, not one of the most delightful aspects of marketing thats for sure.

On top of it, our new printer for the office isn't connected to the network just yet - so that means lots of running back and forth between buildings to get anything printed in color. What fun - but it works out since sort of since I haven't made it to the gym in a while. I haven't been doing horrible on that front - just maintaining my current wait during all these late nights and 'some' poor eating - but I swear I watched it.

Holy crap I have to teach myself Flash quick fast and in a hurry. I'm the resident tech-guy at work, so that means anything 'fancy' means I'm it. Not to complain though, looks cool and should be interesting.

Vidcast time

Daddy got Daddy a new iPod for Christmas - one of those shiny ones that does video. So that means its finally vid-cast time - not that I couldn't have before but where was the fun in that? My first vidcast subscription, and potentially my favorite has to be: the show with zefrank.

Check it out - seriously intellectual, funny, informative and wacky.

The New Year

Its all over baby! And so is the week+ of vacation which has been just what the doctor ordered - going back to work tomorrow is going to require pain meds or something. We went over to Ontario for the holiday to spend some time with Bill's family and we took the Wii along for a little extra fun. Little did we know how much fun - our Wii hadn't seen as much continuous play since we got it on that chilly November morning not so long ago. His mom turned out to be a huge fan of Wii Sports Bowling - and the quest for the Pro status and the new shiny ball was on everyone's agenda. When we weren't playing, we were looking for a Wii console for the family (or an extra nunchuck for ourselves). We got real close to finding a system, twice, but neither time was successful. Nor did we find any nunchucks, but we did score two classic controllers.

Alas its time for resolutions to start out the new year with high ambitions only to see most of them fail miserably. Ok, so I'm not a fan of the resolutions bit that people do every year at this time, but I have a few goals to keep in mind this year. First of all, getting through grad school this year with high marks - so far so good, but the tough classes are coming up soon. We have finally signed back up at a gym after a hiatus longer than I care to admit. Not the best timing to go back with all the resolution gym visits that will be taking place, but we're going back anyway and that is important. And the oddball goal - oddball for me perhaps - is to atleast try kayaking. I don't have any particular reason, but it looks fun and should do something outside.

Oh its been a bit of a boring week for me..

The weather has been unseasonably warm, which does nothing for putting me in the Christmas spirit. So I suppose its a good thing I have all my Christmas shopping done already.

Call of Duty 3 took way too little time to pass - Easy level or not. This seriously bums me out - Bill has been playing that Zelda game for weeks now and still isn't to the end.

New Jersey passed a civil unions bill - thats pretty darn exciting. At least democracy is protecting minorities in one more state - but its not much compared to all the states with bans.

I have been playing with the Vox blogger community/engine. Its interesting and certainly looks good, but its not matching up to Blogger in features and convenience.

One more episode of Dexter left for the season and its going to be a real nail biter. How the hell is Dexter going to make it out of that?! Will Deb get chopped up?! Why do we have to wait until late 2007 for the next season?! Questions, questions, questions...

Bad "luck" comes in 3s

1. Appendectomy
2. Grama passed on Thanksgiving
3. Furnace broke at the start of our first real cold spell

Fun!!

Dexter

Dexter has got to be my new favorite show of the season - not that Heroes and BSG don't have very high places of honor as well, but Dexter is stealing the show. Sunday's episode was fantastic, the kind that cements a show in the viewers conscience as being really damn good. The story comes together, the characters are better revealed and the plot sure as hell thickens. Hmm, hmm, good!

We have Wii!

Holy crap last night was cold (17-20F) - especially since we didn't fully plan on going out last night, at least we didn't have a plan for making it through all those hours. We ended up heading out at 3:30am to a Target that was said to have 200+ units available. We got there at about 70th in line and figured even if they had fewer than 200 units we'd be fine. I had never seen tents lined up outside a store before - all my line moments for the Apple Store were indoors.

Anyway, shortly before 8am we got our ticket, a Wii t-shirt, cookies and a little shopping card to select all the games and accessories we wanted. By 8:18 we were in the car and finally headed home to have a little fun and take one heck of a rewarding nap.

Canuck Hunks

Oh la la Paris links to the Calgary Sun's Sexiest Canadian Man Alive - apparently they weren't all that thrilled with Clooney winning again. When will his saggy ass go away?! I'm just sayin'. Anyway, Ryan Reynolds takes home the crown - gotta love that!! Ryan Gosling takes second place - yummy!

Game Console Weekend

Alirght, so who is going to be in line tomorrow morning for the release of the Playstation 3?! Wednesday afternoon at about 3pm I saw two middleage men curled up in blankets outside a relatively backwater Circuit City. It was surreal and stupid all at the same time. The PS3 is going to be nice for sure, especially after they get all the kinks worked out of it, but I can't help but feel the price is just too much to ask yet. So my money is going to be on the Wii Sunday morning. Bill and I are headed out early in the morning in hopes of getting placed well at a store - we'll have several to choose from just incase. I saw a commerical for the WIi and how the new remote is going to kick ass - that sold it for me right there. (If I can find the video again I'll post it here.) Its all about the remote, oh and its half as much!!

Appendectomy

One sure fire way to ruin a weekend: have a bad meal at Thai restaurant, set off appendicitis, and have surgery. I had never gone under the knife before or stayed in the hospital overnight - so this was all sorts of a new experience for me to say the least. But the worst it over, it wasn't just blocked gas like I had thought for much of the day on Saturday, for the pain that is. The bill hasn't arrived yet and all expectations are for a big headache. Bill, coming for the land of universal health care to the north, is quite upset knowing a bill is coming for something he'd normally not know how much it cost. And just before Christmas too - no Nintendo Wii for this household.

Ah well, now I have plenty of time to catch up and get ahead on the homework front. I got an extension on the final, but I don't want to prolong that any longer than necessary.

Update: I did want to mention the fine treatment Bill received while he was at the hospital with me during this process. I think we've all read some of the horror stories about partners and boyfriends not being able to stay at each other's side in the hospital. Having not been a patient in a hospital before, I wasn't quite sure what to expect. Much to my relief the staff treated Bill with respect just as I would have wanted. We were both impressed that his presence was such a non-issue for everyone at the hospital.

One step at a time.