Jon Bon I Love You!

On Dec 15 Rain and I went to see the Bon Jovi concert here in Vancouver at GM place.

Emily, Heather and Kim all went to see him in Edmonton just a couple of days earlier.

For Rain it was a surprise. I had planned on going with Mike (who was my reluctant substitute Bon Jovi fan). However Chris asked if I would rather have Rain come. I didn't know she was a fan! I think I had started to think that there weren't many kindred spirits who shared shared my passion for Jon.

However Chris wanted it to be a surprise. I didn't believe he would pull it off, but he did. When we met for supper Rain still had no idea where she was going, or that it was just the two of us going ;) She thought that she was going somewhere where she would have to dress warmly because that was what Chris had told her. (I guess Chris hasn't been to a concert in a while ;) .

So I finally told her by lamely singing a line from Blaze of Glory and she was stoked...and also confused about why she should dress warmly ;)


So we walked from the restaurant to the concert and found that we had pretty sucky seats. The were fairly close but behind the stage. Now I thought they were beside the stage and getting close to being behind, but these were definitely behind.

I had sort of counted on this. I bought cheaper tickets because Mike was not as enthusiastic about seeing Jon and there for I couldn't spend a fortune. I had planned on traveling around the auditorium and dancing in the isles which had worked last time for Heather and I and I wasn't disappointed. Not quite as close as last time, but pretty good! Rain was game for this tactic, thank goodness!
Here is another pretty close one. I had known about this. He did this last time too where he disappeared for a few minutes and then reappeared on the side of the stadium on a little platform.

Him and Richie had been on it together for a little while singing a duet.


Here is the whole band with Richie standing on the Juke Box.
The set was a house (Who says you can't go home) and it was complete with a BBQ, a bicycle leaning up against the door and for some reason a rack of 40 proof liquor bottles?

Here is a good one of Jon, Richie and the fiddle girl.

Pretty sure that must be Richie's current flavor of the Month.

Here is a good one of Jon and Richie saying good night. Overall it was a good energetic concert, but I would have appreciated a few more old songs. I was also a little irritated that Saturday Night was sung as a slow song and that at the end they sang a bunch of Christmas songs and oldies. I really would have appreciated Blaze of Glory, Always or Bed of Roses instead of "Shout", or "Run, run Rudolph", but oh well.
Here is Jon wearing the Santa hat with Santa throwing out some Bon Jovi swag.

After the concert we walked back home. They had stopped serving drinks at 9:00 at the Coliseum for some awful reason so we were two thirsty girls.

We also had to see how the boys were making out unsupervised. I had reserved the pool table for them and they had guitar hero to keep them entertained.


Then Rain tried her hand at guitar hero. She was amazingly good for her first try. Mike and I were a little jealous. However she was evened by Chris out who was amazingly ... ;0

Mike and I attribute it to the fact that she is a nurse and every day she has to do precise, dexterous, physical work. We need some kind of an excuse because she kicked our buts!

Anyway until next time we meet Jon. Won't be next year I don't think but we will meet again!

Sakura

Last night we went out to Sakura.

It is a sushi restaurant and it is so cool because it has these little rooms where you sit on the floor but there is a hole cut for your legs.

Also they close the little door when you are eating.


Here's Mike and I. Rain had to meet us later because she was working. She is working at St. Paul's looking after little babies in the ICU.

Chris and Rain gave me a gift certificate for a massage. I cannot wait to use it. I've been thinking about getting one for a long time.

Thanks Guys!

On the way home we went by St Paul's. It is covered in lights. Apparently they do this every year for charity, but it is a sight to behold.

I didn't know about it last year.


See what it looks like from a few blocks away.

Gorgeous! I got a hot apple cider and really started to feel a little more like Christmas is coming.

Birthday Flowers

Hey Mom and Dad,

These are the flowers you got me for my birthday.

Thanks again!

Christmas Party

My company Christmas party was on Friday . It was held a the same tapas restaurant which is a short walk from our house.

They served a wide range of tapas from beef and chicken skewers to crab cakes and sushi rolls.

There was also an open bar and the restaurant was closed to the public.

Here is a group enjoying a shot. I try to stay away from shots period, but at the company Christmas party definitely a no no for me.

We had a great time and took lots of pictures, but I don't like to post too many pictures of others online.

Outside the men were all puffing on stogies.

I thought this was kind of a cute picture.







Here's me. One guy was very dressed up and had this really cool hat.

I couldn't resist getting my picture taken in it.

Anyway that was a lot of fun. This year Mike's Christmas party consists of his company busing his office to Seattle, renting a big bowling alley and providing food and drinks.

Then they all are put up in a hotel and are bussed back the next day. That is the weirdest Christmas party I've ever heard of. Christmas parties are for getting dressed up and looking nice and having fancy food and drinks, not bowling, yeesh. Anyway we'll see. I'll get him to take some pictures.

Cheers!

Snow!

For my birthday I got snow!

Here is the park with the Christmas tree and pillars lit like candles.

The dogs love it and it is nice to have a little bit of snow to get into the Christmas spirit. It's still warm though so it won't last and all next week it is supposed to rain.

We go down to the park and throw snowballs and the dogs catch them in their mouth, they love it!


In this picture I'm trying to show how big the flakes are and how hard it is snowing.

It is snowing the way it rains here.

People love it. They are all outside sledding, building snowmen, taking picture of their infants in their snow garb and with little snowballs in their hands.

However stay off the roads because there are hardly any plows or salt trucks and no one knows how to drive in it. It is funny, some of them will go soooo slow. Like 20 KM an hour cause they are so sure they will start spinning out of control. I went out to dinner for my birthday last night, but my birthday is kind of at a crumby time of year. All the XMas office parties are on the weekend now. Mike got me the video game "Guitar Hero" for my birthday. Here I am below playing it. I find
I do better with my leg on the coffee table like it is an amp ;)

It is sooo much fun, we are havaing a great time playing it. I want to have a 'Guitar Hero" party and invite some people over to play.

It would definitely be a great party game.

Happy Birthday to my Grampie Nicholson too who I share my birthday with and thanks to everyone for all the nice presents.

Cheers! Love you all

Nissan Rogue Commercial

Go to the link below and you will see a movie clip.

http://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=HWb6lLv-MIA

Play it, it is an ad for the Nissan Rogue.

At the end the family gets out of the car. Here is the commercial being filmed, just down the street from me.

I took this picture from my balcony. Also the commercial was filmed in August and they used fake snow. They were there all day just for that little clip and then worked into the night to clean up the "snow".

Mike and Unos on TV

Mike and Unos were on Market Place recently.

Go to this link http://www.cbc.ca/marketplace/ and you'll see the picture of the cat which is a story about pet medication and vets . Click on it and there is a video. Almost in the middle of the video, you see this guy roller blading with a dog. That's Mike and Unos!

I was watching the story because it is about how vets can charge whatever they want for pet medication. The drug may cost them $20, but some vets charge $40 while another vet may charge $100 for the same drug. Tell me about it!

Just like they recommend, I've started buying my dog's drugs at pharmacies that carry pet meds, but what I didn't know was that you can actually ask the vet for a prescription and have it filled else where. Doing that really sends the message that people won't stand for being gouged anymore. People care about their pets and greedy vets are cashing in.

What I've been doing is buying it from the vet and then when the same illness reoccurred, buying it from the pharmacy because I now knew what I needed.

Anyway, I was watching and I see this guy roller blading with a dog on the seawall. I though, wow, that guy roller blades with his dog like Mike does. That dog really looks like Unos, That's Mike!

Mike says he remembers roller blading and seeing the camera crew rushing to get the camera going to film him.

Must have made it more interesting that he was on roller blades or something.

Enjoy!

Vancouver Zoo

Last weekend we went to the Vancouver Zoo.

The only thing going on in the city was the Santa Claus parade and apparently it is crazy busy and not much fun for anyone except those with kids.

So the entertainment booklet came in handy once again with a 2 for one coupon to the zoo.

Mr. Giraffe was one of the first animals to look at when we came in.






There were kangaroos, hopping around.







a lynx,











wolves










ducks and geese,










Flamingos. These little flamingos looked chilly. Most of them were in the shelter, but this little guy outside was cold.

His little leg was shaking back and forth. I thing these guys do better at Busch Gardens rather than BC.

I wonder how they're making out in the snow right now.






These guys I think are elk. I'm not much good at telling the difference between all the deer like species.





Then there was this moose. The geese in the background were honking at her quite ferociously.

Maybe she stays so close to the fence to be away from them.
Then there was this odd looking Yak, which looked like a Yak statue, or a stuffed Yak as it didn't move.





Then there were these massive hippos.

They do this weird thing where they open their mouths and run full tilt with their massive maws open. I have no idea why. Maybe to smell the air or something.

I could not get over how huge these things are and they were very close to the fence. They were also swimming in this little pond that had ice in it, so the cold obviously doesn't bother them.






This is some kind of mountain goat.

Here is Mike scratching it's forehead, which it really seemed to enjoy.

It also had it's mouth right outside the fencing which was good because it would have been easier to retrieve Mike's finger tips if need be.




Then at the end we took a look at the little monkeys.

This little guy is a squirrel monkey. We were around when they were feeding them.

He is finishing off a peach.

Well that's pretty much it for the zoo. We then went to the Super Store which we'd never done before here. Man those are some massive stores compared to the ones out East.

Just for Laughs

This Friday Mike and I decided to go to the Just for Laughs comedy tour that was playing at the Orpheum.

I love the Orpheum because it has a lot of character. It is a very old building and there are chandeliers everywhere. It has a very mid-evil sort of feel.

We met after work and went out for dinner at a place near the theater that we hadn't tried before.
It was very good and reasonable. We will go there again.
We had a drink while waiting for the show to begin.

Another thing the Orpheum has are all these cool antiquish chairs and sofas everywhere.

They had this guy who went on first to warm up the crowd. He had this routine of balancing and spitting balls out of his mouth and catching them on his hat and on different body parts.

We decided to miss that and enjoy our drinks and visit the restroom one last time. We can see that sort of thing any day if we go over to Granville Island.

So there were 5 comics in total with another comic who was introducing them and doing some stand up in between.

The whole show was about relationships. Single, dating, engaged, newly weds, married, married with kids, etc.

It was hilarious. So funny. We were crying, our sides hurt and could not catch our breath it was so funny.

I haven't laughed that hard in ages, it was worth it for sure. The comics were the sort of people who are regulars on David Letterman, Jay Leno and Conan O'Brian's shows.

As I write this it is starting to clear up. We'll probably get going and go for a walk somewhere.
We've had a really good Fall so far. Much less rain than last year I think and it's still fairly warm. I just compared our weather. I'm around 10 degrees here and you guys are close to freezing. Hopefully this year is better than last. Have a great week!

Swimming Doggies

Last weekend, I went out on Friday and watched the hockey game with some friends.

On Saturday, Mike and I brought the doggies to the beach for a swim.

Here is Tala retrieving sticks.

She loves to swim. We should take her more often. She loves to swim and Unos loves to run.




Here is Unos watching Tala bring in a stick.

He will follow her out and grip onto the stick she is bringing in to be like his big sister, but with out her around, I don't think he would even go in.

He just doesn't have the coat like she does he as very little hair and no undercoat for sure. There are places on him where he is white that I can see through to his skin. So after this, he was cold.

We warmed him up with a towel when we got home.

Because the cleanliness of that water is questionable, we get them to rinse of in the fountain outside our place which has clorinated water.

Also that weekend we ran with the dogs along the seawall. I jog and Mike roller blades.

If you can call having your dogs tow you like a dog sled roller blading. :)

Happy Halloween!

Halloween was on kind of an odd day this year (Wednesday) right in the middle of the week.

Mike and I had gone to Squamish for the weekend and missed any Halloween parties, but at my work quite a few people dress up every year.


So I bought a costume at Shoppers and some sort of witchy thing and some chocolate to pass out.



Here's a group picture. We've got a cowboy, jail bird and a cop, Kim Jong-il, a 70s detective, me (sorceress?), captain Kirk, some kind of messed up clown, a monster and a Mexican. Not bad for a small group.

On Halloween night we don't get trick or treaters because we live in a building (which I quite enjoy). The big thing to do in Vancouver for Halloween is set off fireworks. So I walked along the seawall and saw tons of fireworks that people were setting off. I think next year I'll do that myself. It looks like tons of fun.

Squamish

On the weekend Mike and I went to Squamish.

We rented a little cabin and brought the dogs.

One of the things to do in Squamish is to hike the Chief.

This is a picture of it here. Rock climbers actually scale the face of it. We saw people with binoculars observing their progress.

We did attempt to hike the chief, but it is very steep and technical. We had the dogs with us and we were afraid that they might break something (other than their necks).

Also Mike chickened out. After the whole summer of hiking the grind he complained that his legs were going to jelly and that it was too hard.

We got high enough to see this water fall.

I'm standing on this little wooden platform over the waterfall.


The chief is in the Stawamus Provincial Park. It looked like a decent campground and the surroundings were beautiful.

If we didn't hate tents so much we may have stayed there.

Also in the park is Shannon Falls. Here I am in front of the falls.





















The dogs really enjoyed having their own bed.

The cabin was pretty nice. A twin, a day bed, a stove and kitchenette for $100 a night.

Right behind the cabin is a river. We could hear it, it was so close.

This place is very popular with anglers and we saw them all day walking by with all their gear on. After seeing one man with a salmon that wend from his waist to his toes we decided to take a peak.

As we watched, fish after fish after massive fish jumped out of the water. It must have been every 10 seconds we'd see on jump. You'd have to be trying not to catch a fish here.

Then we came in and got warmed up by the fire and played Poker.

I won twice! Mike won once!



And of course we had a fire. The whole trip would surely have been for naught if there was no campfire!

Here is mike getting it just right and making the biggest fire he could!

Here is Unos sitting on my lap. Fire or no, he was cold and kept climbing into my lap to get warm.

Tala also had no intention of sitting on the ground. These are definitely city dogs.
Now one thing I liked about this place was that there were a lot of dogs and they were all off leash. Tala and Unos had a great time playing with them.

Mike was getting them all to sit for burnt hotdogs.
Now see that one dog with the green eyes? That is not a dog. What is it? With those green eyes, all the better to see you with my dear!

Yep it's a wolf and it was massive. The owner said it is half timberwolf, half some other kind of wolf. I didn't hear the second half because I was a little stunned. I think she thought she was Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman or something. After the yappy chihuahuas and prancing yorkies of Yaletown, we were dropped into another dimension. That dog beside the wolf was quite large. Bigger than Tala anyway for a comparison in size.
And the grand finale! Mike and his hotrod.

Dad this one is for you. That is (was) someone's nice new crow bar with the price sticker still on.

Mike are you sure you don't want to move back to NB? You look like you came right off the cover of the Zealand Inquisitor.

Just got your GED and ready for the world!

Well, that's it folks. We had a great time roughing it for the weekend. That's enough for me for a while.