Kitty City

Last month my Dad & step-mum went to Aruba, and Mojo got a 2 week stay at Kitty City in Nisku.  Kitty City should be a feline paradise, with individual rooms (looked like a jail’s cell block) or kitty suites, a common area with play equipment, stairs, couches, chairs and a fireplace, scratching posts, hammocks, and other kitty-guests.

 

Sounds like a kitty club med, but being hauled out to the middle of nowhere and abandoned by her owners for 2 weeks, Mojo looked miserable when we went to pick her up.  She was looking skinny, and she hasn’t been grooming herself, and overall she looked stress out.

 

She sat on my lap  for the car ride home, claws kinda digging into my leg, not sure what was happening, and occassionally watching out the window, probably apprehensive about where we would take her next.

 

 

Eventually she calmed down in my arms.  I could actually see in her face that the stress had subsided.

 

 

 

 

A happier kitty!

IT Girl

I now know why guys laugh when I tell them I'm in IT.

Today I had to carry a (in girl terms) backup power thingy, (in IT terms) UPS, out of an office, down the elevator (a lady waiting for the elevator commented to me how there's never a man around when you need one...), through the hallway and out to my car. Then I drove it to my office, decided I would park in my regular spot (in the alley on the opposite side of the main door to the building) instead of being a sissy and dropping it off at the front door, then going to park my car.

Here is a picture of it. It doesn't look too intimidating.



As I was walking up to the building, there is a contractor getting a little drill from his truck and he goes into the building and doesn't even have the courtesy to told the door open behind him for me. So I struggle to put this heavy thing down so I can open the door, because it's so heavy that I can't put my leg up against the door and prop the thing on it while I pull the door open.

How heavy can it be? and why am I making such a big deal of this? When I got up the elevator and to my desk, I looked up this thingy online to see how much it weighed. 24kg!! (for the anti-metric peeps, that's 53lbs.)



No wonder my arms are still shaking 45 minutes after I put it down.

USB Stick

I have a new USB stick. It's a girl doctor! Last time I think they
only had boy doctors.

Getting Her Fix

Mojo loving da pets.

Go Team ISG!

Go with the BizAgi Flow

With a case of ITIL enthusiasm ripping through ISG, we have started using BizAgi, a program to design process models, to create and document the processes in our department. I like that I was able to change the UI to pink! And if I want, I can even colour the icons pink.

I was supposed to design a process for checking out and returning one of our resources, a digital recorder. I designed a nice little "happy path". I coloured it pink and proudly showed it to an analyst. He chewed it apart like a pitbull!

It was then that I realised what a difficult job analysts have! In order for me to create a return process, I had to create an entire checkout process first, because really, it's stupid to design the end process when you don't have the starting process in place. And there are so many "what-if's" along the way! You have to think about everything! I mean, I like analyzing things, but I guess I like to do it for fun, and I don't ever have to document any of it. Plus, it's a lot harder when you have to analyze your own processes since you take so many steps for granted. I was being prompted to break things down more and I asked, "At what point does common sense come factor in?"

Bale Out

I know this happened weeks ago, but this is now one of my favourite songs!

WARNING: f-bombs galore

When I die...

BEWARE OF IMITATORS

Shamwow!


But when we were at the motor bike show last month we didn't get the authentic Shamwow guy... there was this immitator instead.

Pink Truck

I bought a pink truck today… a bottle of Pink Truck wine, that is.

www.pinktruckwine.com

Screenshots

Lock screen

Home screen

Charging screen

But it’s not pink

Last weekend I skinned my iPhone, and to the surprise of many, it isn’t pink!

I want my cheesy poof!

Make a Southpark you here

Rat Bug Loves Her Teddy Bear

Isn’t this the cutest thing ever?!  We totally want a pet rat now!

This girl has pictures of her rat, Bug, on Flickr.  She has taken some super adorable pictures!  (but none top the teddy bear hug)

Here are a few more of my favourites:

Breakfast in bed

M and her friend M had a sleepover last night. While I was in the
showed this morning, they brought a surprise up to my room.

Tea, water, mandarin oranges, and crackers with peanut butter and red
sprinkles. The tray was dprinkled with candies I didn't even know we
had!

Self check out, or not to self check out

So the question is, should I use the self check out line, or should I
run through the old fashioned cashier line?

When I'm at Safeway, tired after a day of work and driving the child
around, lugging my basket because I don't do shopping carts, I want a
few moments where I can just stand and blank out. I like to do this in
the check out line, half the time not even paying attention to the
total, blindly swipping my bank card and punching in the pin. Why
would I want to scan and bag my own groceries when there are
individuals who get paid to do it fir me?

It seems like a no-brainer, that us until you factor in that the
majority of cashier are no-brainers, as they blank out and scan right
in front of me. I could care less about that, but it takes a lot of
brain power to properly bag groceries. They seem used to tossing three
items into a plastic bag then starting again with a new one. It's not
rocket science, afterall.

Unfortunatly for them (and me?) is that the grocery store introduced
this wonderful item call the "re-useable shopping bag" that throws a
wrench in the traditional grocery store bagging procedure. In this
lies my discontent for choosing the cashier line. It is a very rare
occassion when my bags are properly packed.

I unload my groceries (all 20 items at most) with the heaviest at the
front, lightest at the back. I hand over 2 re-useable bags. Common
sense seems to be that half of the heavy items go in one bag, the rest
in the other one, with the lighter items topping up both bags... Right?

No. The processes is, fill up one bag then put the remaining items in
the other, the result if which is Angel ends up with one mosterously
heavy bag and one feather light bag.

Today, I asked the cashier, as she was putting ALL the heavy items in
bag #1, if she could split up the heavy items since there are 2 bags.
She said ok, and started filling bag #2 with the remaining lighter
items.

As I was paying, bag #2 tips over because it was imbalanced. How does
she correct this? She takes the 4-pack of Redbull cans out of bag #1
and places them in bag #2, on top of the light items! Um hello? What
happens when you put cans on top of fresh peppers? I will give you a
hint ... ~squish~

That is a tad exagerated since my vegetables didn't get squished, but
they could have if the tomatoes had been in bag #1 instead of in bag #2.

I can bitch to the managers about the poorly trained cashier, but I
guarantee next week thing would be exactly the same. Or I can suck it
up and scan and bag my own groceries, since I know, why let someone do
a poor job when I can do better by myself...

Sent from my iPhone

Easily Distracted!

She was supposed to be studying, but instead she was listening to music.  She can’t get enough of Jonathan Davis of KoRn covering Lil’ Wayne’s Got Money.

Jonathan Davis ft. Jim Root (Slipknot) - Got Money (remix) | Audio | Rap Basement

Pulled the Plug

The internet was unplugged from my computer last week, so I spent 6 days PC internet free.  I haven’t been completely without web access, since I can still do 85% my web things on my iPhone.

What have I been doing with the time I usually spend being part of the collective: I watched a bunch of movies, read a lot, listened to some new music, talked on the phone, and actually spent time in rooms all over my place, instead of having my butt glued to the chair at the desk.  Yesterday I even sat with Miranda and watched a bunch of her favourite tween shows: the likes of Hannah Montana, Zoey 101, Suite Life of Zac and Cody…

Oh!  and I actually watched some of my favourite shows … on the television…!  I felt like a genius when I figured that one out.  I found it quite amusing that I had forgotten that a TV can be more than just a the display screen for video games and movies.

What part of not being plugged in did I miss the most?  The ability to download files, and to view Flash objects.

Hey You

SY,

I tried to send you an email yesterday but it bounced back to me.  I bet you still check up on things here.  Happy belated birthday, and best of luck.

-A.

Present of the Century

Miranda is so in love with her new Nintendo DS, just as much as I love my new Canon camera.  It has not left her site since Christmas morning.

ps – the DS and my camera are both pink

The Big Bang Theory

So yesterday the BF and I were lamenting about the cancellation of Eli Stone and how it sucks that all the good shows we enjoy get cancelled (e.g. jPod and The Black Donnelly's) and we agreed we would shoot ourselves in the head if How I Met Your Mother gets cancelled before pathetic shows like Gary Unmarried (me) and The Big Bang Theory (him).

This summer, I downloaded and watch the first season of The Big Bang Theory, and I was surprised it was going to renew for season 2.  The first episode I was not overly impressed, but I liked the premise, so I decided to give it another chance.  And then another and another.  I would not have recommended it to a friend, but yet I watch them all so the show couldn’t have been that painful, now could it?  I have even been downloading season 2, to watch in the summer when nothing but dumb reality shows are on TV.

I decided today to start watching season 2, and there was a super endearing moment  in the second episode that made me remember why I watched every episode before!!  One of the geeky boys (Leonard)  was dumped by his date (Sarah Gilbert, remember her from Rosanne)  when they got into a squabble over their had conflicting views on which theory better unites quantum mechanics with general relativity, string theory or loop quantum gravity.  She asked how would they bring up their children?!  He replied that they would let the kids decide their own beliefs when they are old enough.  hehehehe  That’s funny stuff!  albeit mildly funny stuff, so I can see how only a small percentage of the TV viewing population would find the humour in the show.  Although Leonard is the main character, Sheldon is my favourite.

ps – Penny, albeit a dumb blond who isn’t that hot and dresses poorly, has a pink bathrobe and a pink thermal coffee mug and a pink steering wheel cover thingy in her car and likes America’s Next Top Model!

pss – I think today’s word of the day is “albeit”.

OMG a super girly GH guitar!

.
I want it, I want it, I want it!!

It is soooooo me... *dreamy sign* (link)

Pop Art, by an 8-year old

For a Christmas gift, Miranda’s teacher had the class working on art projects to compile into a calendar for 2009. Of her pieces, my favourite is the pop art picture she made of herself.

She was give black & white pictures of herself, which she cut out and pasted onto the coloured rectangles already pasted on black paper. Then she coloured the photos.

Farewell and Goodnight

Our goodnight to Christmas 2008. Click here to watch!

Redneck Wrap Job

Who needs tape when you have zip ties?

Although, (FAIL) a true redneck would have used newspaper instead of gift wrap.

He was smart and left them loose enough that I could slide them off without having to cut the ties. It’s wrapped, I couldn’t care what was is in it, I already love it.

That girl can move!

M does Christmas, disco style!  Click here to watch.

A Country Celebration

Click to watch us dance an elf-tastic country hoe-down for you!

Disco Elves

Check out the disco elves I work with. The ISG boys don’t know yet that I have a blog ;) Click to watch the hilarious video of them dancing.

My Latest Obsession

On Sunday, the BF put a jailbreak on my iPhone and since then I have been obsessing over building my own custom theme.  Here are some screen shots. 

The home screen background transitions between two images.

 

I have been lazy and instead of creating my own icons, I have pieced together a few different sets.

  

Other mods:

lock & charging screen, with a calendar reminders displayed:

 

custom SMS screen & keyboard:

custom dialer and iTunes store:

I have done more, but this is highlighting the majority of the changes.

Dance Dance

Hotel room scene, getting ready for the Christmas party, Angel in one room, BF in the other.

BF: Woman, are these new shoes?!

(obviously he saw my new shoes on the bathroom floor)

Me: (in a slightly higher than usual pitched voice) Maybe...

BF: I thought I forbid you to buy these shoes!?

Me: (confidently) Nope! You just told me you thought they were ugly!

 

BF:  I must have dreamt it.

Honestly, he didn't forbid me to buy them; he simply had commented that they were ugly.

I told everyone I was going to get these shoes, even if it killed me... see HERE.

Everyone else loved them!  I was in the elevator and a cute guy told me they were great shoes!  Then I get off the elevator and I could hear 2 women getting on the elevator and saying wow those are cool shoes!!

 

Me dancing in my shoes.