The main guy at Urban Yukon left me a comment the other day, reminding me that there is already a site where you can see what other Yukoner’s have to say about life, the universe, and the grand state of the Canadian Winter Games. Check it out: urbanyukon.com.
Call for submissions from Yukoners
23 February 2007 By Leave a Comment
I’m inviting my readers in the Yukon to submit to this blog their stories, pictures, and video clips of their experiences of the Canadian Winter Games.
It will be interesting to see what pure Yukoners have to say about all the excitement as well as it will give my readers in other parts of the world a true picture of the Canadian North. You don’t have to be a writer. You don’t have to make your submission perfect. You just have to be a Yukoner–just make it a raw Yukoner perspective.
I’d love to hear from you. You can use this contact form to send me an email.
I hope I get a load of submissions. We’ll see.
Canada Winter Games Start in Whitehorse
23 February 2007 By Leave a Comment
This is the first time the Canadian Winter Games have been held in the true north (north of the 60th parallel). Whitehorse is buzzing (and not from the traditional Yukon Sourdough Rendezvous celebrations either). It’s going to be a busy few weeks for my parents. My Dad is working security at the Canada Games Center and my Mum is taking tickets and working the information kiosk for spectator sports at Mount McKintyre Rec Center. Brrrrr. It’s cold up there–but hey–it is the winter games. You couldn’t really have winter games without a bit of -30C weather. The forecast is even more foreboding.
My parents went to the dress rehearsals for the opening ceremonies last night. ” They are going to be broadcast today at 4:00 pm, and again on Saturday. It was impressive!”
I’m going to invite my readers in the Yukon to submit to this blog their stories and pictures and video clips of their experiences of the Canadian Winter Games. That would be fun: The Canadian Winter Games through the eyes of Yukoners! I’ll have to create a separate entry for that–stay tuned!
For CBC coverage of the Winter Games: CBC sports.
For the weather forecast for Whitehorse, Yukon: the weather network.
For coverage of the Winter Games through the eyes of Yukoners: www.yukonjen.com.
Hug a slug!
21 February 2007 By Leave a Comment
We had a break through moment in our English lessons today. I have been teaching English and computers to my friend and colleague at Bush-Field. A few weeks ago, we decided to axe the computer lessons and workout after work instead. He still gets English, I get a workout. Pretty good exchange I think.
Today, during our workout, he said his legs feel sluggish. Except, I had a bit of a time understanding when he said the word: sluggish. Afterwards, when I dropped him off at the library, I got him to say that word again. It turns out, the reason I was having a hard time understanding him was because he was trying to use the front of his tongue at the back of his mouth to pronounce the sound UG (as in slug).
Ah hah! I got him to say a few words with the guttural G sound: ogre, frog, hug, mug, jug, dug, bug. Not too much luck. He was still trying to use the front of his tongue at the back of his mouth so it made for interesting sounds.
Finally, though–he clamped the front of his tongue between his front teeth and started making the UG sound with his throat. “UG! UG! UG!” Makes for quite a scenario outside the library–but it seemed to work.
OK–now with your tongue between your teeth, say a few “ug” words. How hard is that? It’s easy to say HUG, LUG, BUG. It’s not easy to say SLUG. But he tried it anyway. Then he tried again with a liberated tongue. Still not great pronounciation on the SLUG–but a definite improvement.
I started to get him to say UGGER with letters of the alphabet starting from A. By B–we were peeling with laughter–except he didn’t know what BUGGER meant. I had to explain–mischeiveous urchin. Ah. OK. CUGGER. DUGGER. FUGGER. It was too much. I was in stitches again. He kept going though and made it through the alphabet. The interesting thing is he got to S and said SLUGGER no problem. He still has a bit of a time saying SLUG though.
He’s going to go home and practice speaking his UG words with his tongue between his teeth. Then, he’s going to make nonsense sentences with all the words. Before he left, we came up with HUG A SLUG. So that is our new official slogan for our workouts. HUG A SLUG.
I lost my cell phone today
15 February 2007 By Leave a Comment
But I found it again. No worries. Or not too many at least. I went to pick up wine from the warehouse, then I ran a few errands. I apparently left my phone at the checkout at the grocery store. When I finally figured out where I’d left it, I went back to the grocery store to the information desk and asked if they’d seen it.
The lady looked at me and laughed. She said: “I phoned your parents” (the first entry in my phone book). My Dad answered and told her that he didn’t have a daughter or son who had lost their cell phone. I bet he’d just woken up or something and couldn’t be bothered by a complete stranger trying to do the right thing and return a lost cell phone.
How would he tell me anyway? I’m usually using the cell phone when I talk to them. Regardless, I put an entry at the top of my phone list now: 1. If found, please call. Hopefully, if I loose my cell phone again, the person can call my alternate number and let me know they found it.
Don’t Ham It Up on Valentine’s Day
14 February 2007 By Leave a Comment
I’m not much of a believer in Hallmark occasions–like today–Valentine’s Day. I am one of those people who is likely to forget the actual day on the day–but I do remember it–eventually. For example, I remember my neice and nephew’s birthdays–usually a few months either before or after the actual birthday, but I do remember it. I send them presents or I send them a card. I think they like to receive the extra attention on a day when it is not actually their birthday. When I was in university, I routinely remembered to send my parents their Christmas presents in March. And once, when I was married, I remembered my husband’s birthday far too late and ended up buying him a ham at the all-night grocery store. And now, you might smile and nod your head and think: “Ah Ha. Recipe for disaster. She bought him a ham. A ham for his birthday.”
But it was a funny story. It’s not a great story and I am kind of ashamed about it, but it is quite funny. I remembered that it was his birthday too late to get him anything special–and I was doing the grocery shopping. I bought him a ham. I thought I could get home and give it to him and say: “Hey Hubby–how ’bout we ham it up on your birthday?” And then we would laugh our heads off at the ridiculousness of receiving a ham for your birthday. I wasn’t even planning on preparing it in any way–I just thought it would be funny to give him a ham for his birthday.
Nope. A definite recipe for disaster: One husband. One birthday. One raw ham. Not quite the right ingredients and I don’t believe I ever redeemed myself. So–if there is one thing I can say to all those people out there who are thinking about last minute gifts for Valentine’s Day–don’t buy the ham. It’s not going to get you anywhere.
Bush-Field Boot Camp
6 February 2007 By Leave a Comment
I have been working with my friend and colleague here at Bush-Field to improve his English and computer skills. We were talking last week that we would both like to be in better shape. So we decided to axe the computer lessons and start working out instead.
Today was our first workout. I was expecting a stretching session–a gentle sort of let’s-get-back-into-a-routine-or-something session. What I got was a high energy, kickboxing, and calesthetic boot camp session. It was wicked!
A little known fact about my Spanish friend: he used to be an ace kick boxer in Mexico. So, instead of gentle stretches and planning future workouts and laughing at our inflexibilities, we first jumped (quite literally) headlong into a 45-minute cardio kickboxing workout.
I feel awesome. I am so completely uncoordinated and I think I probably look like a frog in a blender trying to kick and punch and crunch at the same time. And my body doesn’t bend in the way it’s supposed to bend. And I can’t punch with one hand and block with the other and do a little dancy thing with my feet–all at the same time. I am definitely out of my comfort zone, but I guess I will be working it.
We decided we were going to stay after work three times a week and do our boot camp calestetics down by the barn. So, if you see me hobbling around Petaluma in the next three months, you’ll know why. Smile. Say hi. Be encouraging. I’m going to need all the help I can get.
All About My Butt
1 February 2007 By Leave a Comment
Somebody pointed out to me the other day that I have an awful lot of stories about my butt: “You should give it its own category on your blog.” So I did. Here it is: All About My Butt. As you may have read, my butt has saved my life–you can’t help but love something that has saved your life a few times. I now love my butt. I can laugh about my butt. It’s a good and loyal butt. I have however, abused it a few times. I’ve published the story about the hand sanitizer. And today, I will publish my story about how I burned my butt.
The same year I was hit by the car (and my butt saved my life), I was using the gym at the Skyline Hotel in Ottawa for recovery (because I did total the Ford Tempo with my body). I liked to workout, then swim, then shower, then dry off and relax in the sauna. I loved those mornings I was able to do that. I felt like I was taking care of myself and I was healing.
This particular Friday morning I had just finished a great workout and swim. I had the shower to wash away the chlorine and I was going to dry off in the sauna. As I opened the door of the sauna, I dropped my hair barrette on the floor. I bent down to pick it up. The sauna was small. The door was crowded. I didn’t have much space. As I bent over, I burned my butt on the sauna stove.
I was paralysed. What to do? What do you do? I danced around a bit, but I couldn’t even sit down and collect my thoughts.
I think I ran to my locker, dressed as gingerly as I could, and ran out the door. I was so very embarrassed. What was I supposed to do? Tell somebody at the front desk: “Uh. Hi. Can you help me? I burned my butt.” How would they be able to help anyway? I was humiliated. I do remember I had to bike home though because I was in university and back then, my bike was my main mode of transportation. That was tricky. Try biking with a burned buttock, standing up, with one leg. Not the easiest feat, so good job home was just down the hill.
I was lucky my roommate at the time was a registered nurse. She was able to dress the wound and sooth my ego–NOT. She was in hysterics the whole time. I made her treat my wound for the entire week before I forgave her. The best part about this incident was I had an essay due on the following Monday. I couldn’t finish it. I was stuck on my tummy for a few days until I learned about the product Second Skin. I told my story to my professor. She smirked and reluctantly gave me another week to finish my essay. I definitely I got points for having such an original story though.
That’s it. I burned my butt. My poor butt. It’s definitely had it’s share of trauma. This year, I’m going to work on it–give it the attention it deserves. Build it up so that it’s good and strong. Then, it will be a good and strong and loyal butt and you can’t get any better than that.
