I bought aerosol whipped cream today, hehe, I am such a kid!

jean bracket

I was thinking about an episode of Corner Gas when Lacy brings an expensive bottle of wine over to Oscar and Emma's for supper, and they liked it so much that they couldn't go back to drinking the cheap stuff. They entered a new 'wine bracket'. After going shopping today at a store that shall remain nameless....I think I have entered a new 'jean bracket'.

A few months ago I bought a pair of Aura jeans and they are an AWESOME fit! Maybe I need to step it up and stop cheaping out on clothes. I can't afford to spend $100 on every pair of jeans, but maybe a pair or two of $60 will fit better and make me look better. I have gotten into watching the show What Not to Wear on TLC, and I don't always agree with their fashion advice, but one thing that I think does make sense is that you usually get a better quality product when you pay a little more. I am a pretty good bargain hunter, I have a hard time paying full price for something (unless it's something I REALLY like), but the nameless store above just seems to be losing it's touch.

I remember the first time I saw that store...we were in the Mall of America and I was in grade 10. I instantly fell in love with it, and bought a couple of pieces of clothing there. But maybe it's just the styles now (80's ACK!), but in my opinion the quality of the clothes has declined as well. I need to find a store with decent quality clothes that aren't super trendy and have reasonable prices.

So happy

You may have already read about it on Jay's blog, but I am so happy I just had to mention it too. We finally got the water leak in our car taken care of. It was such a simple fix....some drainage tube from the sunroof on my car had gotten a kink in it so water was running back up and draining into the car instead of out of the car. It only cost 1 hour of labour and about $5 in parts. Ha! For a while they were telling us that they may need to remove the windshield because they thought it might be the seal around the windshield that was leaking. Glad to pay $67 then $400 for a windshield plus a few hours of labour. Hopefully it will continue being a good car for us for the next few years now :)

Yay!

For the very first time in my massage therapy career I have my very own cards with my name printed on them. In my first job, they just had a box of generic cards that I wrote my name on. Since I started at Pacific Ave Massage I have used the cards that belonged to the girl who quit before I started, and I just whited out her name and wrote my name on. So now for the first time here are my very own business cards. I feel quite excited to give them out! I debated about blacking out the phone number and address information, but really, it's not hard to find that information on the internet, so I decided to leave them in case someone saw this picture and felt inspired to book an appointment with me, hehe.

Hebrews 10:19-29

When I was reading my Bible this evening, this passage really stuck out to me and hit me. Thought I would share it with you.

19And so, dear brothers and sisters, we can boldly enter heaven's Most Holy Place because of the blood of Jesus. 20This is the new, life-giving way that Christ has opened up for us through the sacred curtain, by means of his death for us.
21And since we have a great High Priest who rules over God's people, 22let us go right into the presence of God, with true hearts fully trusting him. For our evil consciences have been sprinkled with Christ's blood to make us clean, and our bodies have been washed with pure water.
23Without wavering, let us hold tightly to the hope we say we have, for God can be trusted to keep his promise. 24Think of ways to encourage one another to outbursts of love and good deeds. 25And let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage and warn each other, especially now that the day of his coming back again is drawing near.
26Dear friends, if we deliberately continue sinning after we have received a full knowledge of the truth, there is no other sacrifice that will cover these sins. 27There will be nothing to look forward to but the terrible expectation of God's judgment and the raging fire that will consume his enemies. 28Anyone who refused to obey the law of Moses was put to death without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. 29Think how much more terrible the punishment will be for those who have trampled on the Son of God and have treated the blood of the covenant as if it were common and unholy. Such people have insulted and enraged the Holy Spirit who brings God's mercy to his people.

Feeling Discouraged

I have been feeling kind of discouraged lately. Mostly related to my work. I like what I do, and I enjoy the flexibility that being self-employed allows me. I appreciate the low rent that I pay at my place of work, and I like my clients. Lately things have been fairly slow and I feel discouraged. I know that I am not a terrible therapist because I do have a number of regular clients, but I tend to get a lot of people who tell me they will call to rebook and then never do. I know I can't control people, but it sure would be nice if people followed through on that offer. In the last two years I have learned that distributing fliers/brochures/etc. is not that effective in recruiting new clients. By far the most effective form of advertising in the massage therapy business is word of mouth and ads in the yellow pages. I am not going to give up and start looking for work elsewhere because I know that this is sort of the nature of the business...slow weeks and busy weeks. But it just seems that lately there have been far more slow weeks for me than busy weeks. There are a lot of things I like about where I work, but I just feel discouraged right now. If you would remember me in your prayers I would appreciate it :) And if anyone you know is looking for a massage therapist...

As you know, last week we had a lot of rain. It rained and rained and rained for about five days. When I was driving to work on Monday I noticed near the intersection of Clarence Ave and the freeway there was a por-0-potty in the ditch where they have been doing some construction. After the rain, the port-o-potty was in the middle of great big puddle. It made me laugh, and it stayed there for a couple of days. I noticed today that they had moved it. Today as I drove by it made me think of a quote from the Simpsons. Grandpa Simpson comes out of a port-o-potty and says "This elevator only goes to the basement, and someone made an aaawful mess down there." Just made me laugh and smile. I almost wish I could have gotten a picture of it. It may have been one of those pictures that circulates through the email circuits by people who like to forward things.

Sure is nice to have a little sunshine again....though they are calling for some cloudiness and possible rain in the next day or two. I took this picture last night from our balcony. I sure am going to miss our view from up here when we have a house, but I sure won't miss the smelly old lady perfume and our neighbour below us who vacuums 4 times a week (early in the morning).

I've had better days *sigh*

There is a puddle in my car that I really don't feel like dealing with right now. Jason and I both woke up feeling quite ill this morning. We both ate Quizno's for supper last night...same sub for both of us, and I am thinking there was something in there that maybe wasn't fresh or something. I am stiff (from yoga yesterday), and my stomach is alternating between cramping and just overall soreness. *sigh* And my hands smell like stinky old man cologne because I think my last client today bathed in it this morning (yes I did wash my hands, but usually it takes a few scrubs to get rid of it all....). At least it's Friday and I can give my car a chance to dry out, and I can sleep in tomorrow and laze around if I want to!

Jay made some new friends tonight at my sister's house. My aunt is in Saskatoon from Calgary so we had supper over there tonight. It's amazing to see how much Will has grown, and James just amazes me every time. He is so smart and cute! This was the first time Jay has been in Robin and Lorne's house, that was pretty cool too! Enjoy!

I have decided to try doing Yoga. Today at Costco I saw a little Yoga kit that included some flash cards and a DVD for only $7.39, so I picked it up. I have been interested in trying it for some time, however I am kind of self conscious about exercising in front of other people, so I think a home-video is the way to go. I plan to try doing it in the morning, but we'll see what happens. I may have to get over the self-consciousness and do it when Jason isn't in bed still ;)

Search and Destroy

The other day when we were bbqing 3 flies got into our house. Man are they annoying little critters. Last year when we had some flies in the house Jason went to the dollar store and bought a suction cup gun to go fly huntin'. Yesterday they were driving us bonkers so we dug out the gun and went on a search and destroy mission. I successfully managed to kill two of them (I thought that there were only two), but the third one was extra annoying. Jason managed to get it tonight after supper with the suction cup gun. If you want to have some fun with killing flies, go to the dollar store and buy a suction cup gun!!

My very first pie

Not only does it look good, it tastes good too. The pastry had me a little frustrated at first, but I figured out a way to roll it that made it easy to move into the pie plate. I am quite proud of myself.

Just call me Angie the plumber

Both of our toilets have been running/dripping for quite a while now. It really started to bug us when the one in our bedroom did because it would keep Jason from falling asleep *drip drip drip*. We came to the conclusion after a little tinkering that it was likely the flapper valve that was leaking. This morning I set off on my own to go to J and H to buy a couple of flapper valves. I took one of ours along just to ensure that I bought the right one. I picked up two (for a grand total of $9.06) and came home. I put them both on and VOILA no more dripping or running! I'm so handy :)

Apples

My sister gave me a bag of apples today. Their tree was filled with an incredible abundance of apples this year. I have never been given a large quantity of apples. I look forward to possibly trying to make my very first apple pie, however I have come to the conclusion that I definitely don't want an apple tree in our backyard. I think I know enough people with apple trees that I could get some apples if I want some in the future.

I heard on the radio this morning that the Crocodile Hunter (Steve Irwin) was killed this weekend in a freak diving accident. I used to enjoy watching his show, and can't believe he was killed in such a freaky way. When I first heard that he had died, I thought maybe a crocodile finally got him. But no...it was a stingray, that stung him in his heart. Weird!

Beware of food...

Yesterday Jason and I went to a fruit stand and picked up some BC peaches. We had gotten some at the farmer's market last week and they were so amazing we just had to go get some more. On the way home I was sniffing one of the peaches and accidentally touched it to my nose. Well the peach fuzz came off and stuck in my nose, like a bunch of little splinters. It was really quite uncomfortable, so now I know not to sniff peaches :P

Last night Jason and I went out for a drive then decided to stop in at Montana's for dessert. We have been impressed with their desserts in the past. We both decided to try the deep fried cheesecake. It is cheesecake, wrapped in a tortilla then deep fried and covered in whipped cream and chocolate (or caramel) sauce. It was very good, but Jason and I had terrible stomach aches after that. If you ever decide to try it, I would recommend sharing with someone. So we went home and went to bed and I had the most interesting dreams. I was in Pirates of the Carribean, and we were trying to pull a whale into our ship, but it wasn't a real whale, it was a cartoon whale. And there was another part where I showed up at work wearing my night shirt and nothing else. I was rather embarassed when I realized that I didn't have pants on, and my night shirt is a little on the threadbare side....there were other dreams as well but I can't remember them all. So beware the deep fried cheesecake from Montana's.