James and Steph's Big Canadian Adventure

Evan at 5 months

2010-08-12T20:38:00.002-07:00

Some more pictures of the nipper in his fifth month:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jamesandsteph/sets/72157624568803345/

Remember that you need to log in to Flickr and add yourself as a contact to us if you want to see the pictures, as they are not public.

Sorry these blog posts aren't more exciting, but I am a bit too busy to spend much time on them at the moment :)

Evan's 4th Month

2010-07-19T12:43:00.002-07:00

Pictures from Evan's fourth month are now up on Flickr.

Evan's third month

2010-06-19T18:16:00.003-07:00

There are pictures from Evan's third month on Flickr now.

Evan's 2nd month

2010-05-22T18:54:00.003-07:00

Not much time for actual blogging these days, but here's a link to photos of month 2 of Evan on Flickr. Steph's mum came to stay with us for 4 weeks which was much enjoyed by everyone, including little Evan who got to meet his Nanna. He also had his first immunizations on Thursday, and was a very brave kid and hardly cried at all.

Until next time... Have a good one!

Evan's first month

2010-04-17T16:19:00.002-07:00

Evan was one month old on Thursday, and I've created an album on Flickr to celebrate the fact. It includes a bunch of new photos too as well as all the previous stuff.

Week 3 of Evan's life

2010-04-05T13:06:00.003-07:00

I've uploaded a few more photos from week 3. Prepare for more cuteness.

More Evan photos

2010-03-31T11:24:00.002-07:00

I just posted some photos to Flickr of week 2 of Evan's life, which included his first bath at home, and his first pram ride.

Baby Evan is born

2010-03-31T10:36:00.003-07:00

Born on Monday 15th March, 8 lbs 4 oz of cute. Mum and baby doing fine.

No time (and too tired) to write much more :)

Check our Flickr page for more photos, but remember that you will need to log in and add us as a contact to see any pictures of Evan, for privacy reasons.

Back again!

2010-03-07T18:16:00.005-08:00

Hello again. It's been a while since my last post - more than 4 months in fact. It's been a pretty crazy time - Christmas is always very busy with travelling home and such. Steph has also been very busy becoming increasingly pregnant.

We are now less than three weeks away from D-Day and its getting overwhelmingly exciting and scary. January was spent mostly running around and buying baby gear while we could still afford to rent a car, and then February came and car rental prices rocketed as the Winter Olympics began in Vancouver. It was crazy, crowded, and a lot of fun (crazy especially when Canada won the men's hockey final).

I've still been posting pictures to Flickr in the meantime as you may already have seen - here's a quick recap if you've missed them:

Christmas photos - some of these are public, and some are friends and family only.
The Winter Olympics torch relay that we watched from the end of our street on my birthday.
A tour we took of the Russian tall ship "Kruzenshtern".
Some miscellaneous photos and videos from the Winter Olympics.

If you want to see the friends and family stuff, you will need an account on Flickr that you can log into, so that you can add yourself as a contact of ours. When the baby comes, we'll be posting more pictures that will be restricted in this way.

Cheese and Wine... and Wigs!

2009-10-20T21:55:00.002-07:00

For our 3rd annual Cheese & Wine party, we decided it would be fun to add a little twist. Here are a few pictures.

Pearl Jam pictures

2009-10-20T19:52:00.003-07:00

I've uploaded a few pictures from the Pearl Jam concert we went to back at the end of September. Apologies for the quality but our camera is pretty old and bulky so we don't usually take it places - these pics were taken with Steph's phone which was all we had. Still, hopefully they catch a bit of the atmosphere. It was a bit of a wish come true for Steph as she'd always wanted to see them live but never had. I'm not a fan of Pearl Jam as such, but I still enjoyed it. They played for 2 hours 15 minutes, so we certainly got our value for money. Even after the second encore when the lights came up, they still kept playing :) A top evening. We also saw Kings of Leon at the same venue a couple of weeks earlier, but sadly we took no pictures of that.

More allotment pictures

2009-10-20T19:46:00.002-07:00

I've uploaded some more pictures to Flickr from our allotment recently, so I thought I'd post a few links:

We haven't been down to the allotment too much recently because the weather has turned somewhat cold and wet, but there is a work day on Sunday so perhaps I will try and snap a few pics then. Everything is mostly just dying anyway at the moment :)

Steph's parents visit

2009-10-12T10:49:00.002-07:00

Steph's parents came to visit us recently. They spent a week on a road trip through the Rockies, and then joined us for 10 days in Vancouver. They had superb weather throughout, and had a very enjoyable holiday I think. We hired a car for one long weekend and did a bunch of day trips to different places around Vancouver. We also spent plenty of time buying, cooking and eating food :) It was lovely having them to stay.

I've uploaded some pictures from their visit to Flickr. You can see them here.

Oregon Coast camping

2009-08-10T20:10:00.003-07:00

We spent a recent weekend travelling down the Oregon Coast with some friends. Up until last week, the weather in Vancouver had been sweltering, so we were quite happy to be driving in an air-conditioned car and to go somewhere where the temperatures were a bit cooler. After crossing the border, we spent the night in a hotel in Olympia. The next day, we drove down to Waldport where we were camping. Unfortunately, our campsite was a big disappointment - too cramped and with no privacy. It felt rather like camping in someone's front drive :) The next day we moved to a much nicer campsite just up the road and were a lot happier then. The weather was mixed, and it had a tendency to drizzle gently on us every evening, but we had lots of good food and campfires, and even got in some beach time. The sand down on the Oregon Coast is fantastic; it rivalled Hawaii in quality I think, especially in the Oregon Dunes area. Other places we really liked were Astoria and Cannon Beach.

I've uploaded some pictures of our trip to Flickr. I hope to get hold of more photos at some point from our friends' camera too.

Camping at Goldstream Provincial Park

2009-08-04T19:04:00.002-07:00

We spent last weekend camping on Vancouver Island at Goldstream Provincial Park. We went with some friends of ours and had an excellent time. Highlights included:

A super-hot 4 hour hike around the park, with several wrong turns thanks to some bad trail maps :/
A freak thunderstorm, that cut short one of our evenings as we had to retreat to our tents to avoid getting a bit wet.
Ma Miller's pub just outside the park entrance - cold beer was soooo welcome after a long walk in the sun.

You know the drill - photos on Flickr.

Fireworks 2009

2009-08-04T18:53:00.002-07:00

The annual Celebration of Light fireworks displays have been and gone again. Steph and I watched two displays this year - Canada and the UK - both from the beach on English Bay. We missed the two weekend displays (South Africa and China) as we were away on camping trips. If you are interested, you can visit the official site for more info or watch the displays on YouTube - I might do that to catch up on the ones that I missed. We took a few photos at the first event, which are now on Flickr.

My Mum and Gran visit, and other things

2009-07-19T08:57:00.003-07:00

I've uploaded a whole heap of photos to Flickr from the recent visit from my Mum and Gran. I think they enjoyed their holiday here in Canada, though sometimes I think perhaps they sent each other a bit crazy - too alike I think :) These are just the photos from the time that we all spent doing stuff together - my Mum has loads more from their coach trip to the Rockies!

They had very good weather for their holiday, barring one day when they arrived and the last couple of days before they left, which were rainy. Since then, the weather has returned to being scorching hot again. I think this might be about the best summer I've seen here in Vancouver in 4 years, and it isn't over yet.

Last weekend was the Strathcona Gardens open day and plant sale. This is the place where we have our allotment, and Steph has been helping out a lot with the plant sale this year. On the Saturday she probably spent 7 hours there helping with the set-up, and I joined her later on for about 4 hours. It was hard work, but fun. On the Sunday, Steph helped with the actual sale itself too, for about 5 hours. I decided to take it easy that day :)

We are thinking about holidays whilst the weather is so good. There's a chance we might go away next weekend for camping on Vancouver Island with friends, but we're not yet sure if that will happen. We are also planning a camping trip down to the Oregon Coast with some other friends, which might be in a couple of weeks. Hopefully it will happen, but we need to get off our bums and sort it out!

We saw Up last night at the cinema, which is a great movie. I think it might be one of my favourite Pixar films. Tonight, we are going to watch an outdoor showing of Ghostbusters with friends, and having a picnic tea. Ought to be very pleasant.

The annual Celebration of Light fireworks displays start this Wednesday too, beginning with Canada. The UK are one of the countries competing this year, which will be interesting to see. I reckon we'll be down there as usual, oo-ing and ah-ing with the rest :)

Lynn Canyon walk

2009-06-29T20:04:00.002-07:00

I've uploaded a bunch of photos to Flickr from a walk we did at Lynn Canyon a few weeks ago, with our friends Chris and Orla. This was our second trip to Lynn Canyon, but this time we actually walked a decent distance - last time we got lost without a map and did a tiny loop that only took an hour :)

Allotment action!

2009-06-20T11:17:00.003-07:00

Latest photos from the allotment are now on Flickr. Thanks to lots of sun recently, things are really rocketing skywards. We're already eating kale, chard, and mustard greens from the plot which make some great summer salads. Nice.

Summer Sun

2009-06-20T09:28:00.004-07:00

A while since the last post, I see. Too many things to do now that summer is here.

For about the last four weeks, it has been dry and sunny weather non-stop which has been wonderful. We've been making the most of it with lots of cycling, sunbathing and picnics :) Steph has gotten back into swimming at the outdoor pool on Second Beach too.

Unfortunately we've both been sick recently, with a weird cold bug that had mild symptoms but a long and lingering cough. Steph was worse than me, and is only finally getting over hers after three weeks or more. I've had my cold for probably two weeks and I'm just about over it now. Poor Steph had to sleep on the sofa for a couple of nights as it helped her to stop coughing! And she missed a whole week of super-hot weather because she was too sick to go out.

We had a couple of nice meals with friends to celebrate birthdays - one at Brix which is fine dining I guess, and one at The Naam which is a casual vegetarian restaurant with great food. Both were excellent.

Steph did a day of kayaking a few weeks back with friends Conor and Sandro. The weather was good and they enjoyed it, but getting back proved to be really hard thanks to head winds and a rising tide. There are a few photos on Flickr, though sadly none of Steph! Since then, she has discovered a website which shows the tide times and levels for Deep Cove, so in future she'll be checking first to make sure it is a good time to go.

Other big news is that my Mum and Gran are arriving on Tuesday for a fortnight's holiday in Vancouver. They are looking forward to it, and so are we. Expect to see a deluge of photos soon from our tourist adventures :)

Spring sunshine

2009-05-02T19:29:00.005-07:00

A couple of months since our last post, and spring has arrived proper. We've had a few weeks of sunny days, although with some cold winds too. Still, the dry weather and sun has been most welcome.

Our big weekend in Whistler was absolutely great. There were 20 of us staying in three separate places, including one larger house where we cooked food for everybody on one evening - excellent fun. We completely lucked out with the conditions too, as the snow had been thin and hard the week previously but it snowed pretty much non-stop for the whole long weekend we were there, which meant lots of fresh snow every day - we couldn't have asked for more! I've uploaded a few pictures and a video from that weekend - wish we had taken more of our friends though!

Since then, we've been spending a lot of weekends out shopping for food, or cooking food, and always eating food. Yes, we love food. We've made some of our old favourites like lentil and turkey stews, some cracking pizza slices, and a fab mac and cheese. Steph also made a Linzertorte (a kind of almond tart with raspberry jam) that is gorgeous. Last night we also knocked up a lamb curry made from happy lambs from an organic butcher we discovered. Yep, we're not going hungry. Fortunately the good weather means we are getting enough exercise to stop us getting fat - I am still doing gym class twice a week, plus plenty of walking to work (about 40 minutes), and Steph has been swimming and taking yoga classes.

The allotment is coming along slowly. We've had some kale already which is nice in salads, and the garlic is growing very well. This month, Steph and her friend Marissa will probably harvest the remaining kale, and plant a bunch more stuff (vegetables and greens) that they've already started in pots, so fingers-crossed they will do well. There have been a bunch of failures so far, with some of the winter crops not coming up, but it's a learning experience so there's no real loss. I've uploaded some photos of how things are doing taken at the middle and the end of April.

Just this last week, my friend Matt who I have known for years has been visiting Vancouver with his friend Lee, and we met up one evening for food and lots of gassing about what we've all been up to. It was great to catch up after several years.

One last bit of photographic goodness with this post - some pictures and a video from a recent walk we took in Lynn Canyon Park.

Trip to Cypress Mountain

2009-03-01T18:42:00.003-08:00

We went to Cypress Mountain on Saturday with our friends Conor and Brit. They both snowboard, and Steph skis of course, so they went off and did their thing in the Downhill area. I got dropped off in the Nordic area and did some snowshoeing in and around the cross-country ski trails. It was sunny and bright in the morning, but clouded over as the day went on. Thanks to a heap of snow last week, the conditions were great for everybody - skiing and snowboarding was good, and I had lots of soft fresh snow to tramp through. It was good practice for our big weekend in Whistler we have arranged for March.

I took a couple of photos and a few videos, and I've uploaded them to Flickr.

Wedding photos

2009-03-01T18:36:00.003-08:00

Here are the pictures we took at the wedding of our friends Jon and Marissa last weekend. The civil ceremony was outdoors at Locarno Beach, and the weather even decided to cooperate, being bright and dry - hooray! Afterwards, there was a reception at Radha (a great vegetarian restaurant near Downtown). All in all, there was much rejoicing.

Happy Pancake Day!

2009-02-25T22:00:00.003-08:00

For yesterday, obviously :)

What a long time it's been since my last blog post. It's almost the end of February already. So what's been happening?

Weather wise, we are having a most unseasonably dry Winter. We've had little or no rain at all to speak of which is very unusual for Vancouver, and the slopes of the local mountains are green - hardly a drop of snow in sight. A bad year for skiing so far. The last day or so it has actually started raining again, and there's been some snowfall at higher elevations. We are probably going to Cypress Mountain on Saturday (one of the local mountains) so that Steph can ski and I can maybe do my first snowshoeing of the season. We also have a big Whistler trip booked for mid-March with 18 0ther friends. That ought to be lively - let's hope there has been plenty more snow by then!

I am busy finishing Prototype which is the video game I am currently working on. Steph is still working too - her contract got extended a few weeks into March which was good news. Not much work around at the moment for when she finishes her current contract, but we are crossing our fingers.

My Mum has finally decided to come visit me this year - hooray! My grandmother might also come too which would be nice. We are currently sorting out flights and suchlike. I think it will be my Mum's first transatlantic flight - quite an adventure I expect.

Steph and I are in reasonably fine fettle, though I've been having a bunch of problems with my shoulder recently. I've always had trouble with it, but it has been a lot worse over the last month. I've had some massage which helped a little, but I'm going to the doctor's this week I expect to see what they can do, if anything.

Oh yeah - our friends Jon and Marissa got married! It was a very simple affair, but very pleasant indeed. We have a few photos that I will post when I get some time. Congratulations guys!

Until next time...

New Year Photos

2009-01-21T22:36:00.002-08:00

Here's a bunch of pictures on Flickr that we took at New Year. Steph and I went to Whitstable in Kent for a "Shipwrecked" party at the Duke of Cumberland pub. How wonderfully English! Some of the photos are a bit small because I nicked them off our friend Tamsin's Facebook page :)

Vancouver fog

2009-01-21T20:57:00.004-08:00

Happy New Year, by the way!

First post of 2009. Woohoo - exciting. To start the year, here's another weather image showing the fog over Downtown Vancouver over the past few days. We live near to the buildings sticking out, but under the fog sadly. It's been like this on and off since we got back.

Steph and I had a cracking Christmas and New Year. We visited England for two weeks to see all our friends and family, which was wonderful. I have some New Year's Eve photos coming shortly, and at some point hopefully Steph will sort out her Christmas pictures to upload too.

Another exciting thing happening is that Steph is working again. She started a short-term contract the day after we returned to Canada, and is enjoying the rat race once more :)

Vancouver snow

2008-12-22T10:58:00.002-08:00

Just a couple of pictures of Downtown Vancouver after the recent snow.

Merry Christmas!

2008-12-21T22:21:00.003-08:00

The year is almost over, and the last few months have been lean on posts, I know. We've been occupied with job and life stuff I'm afraid.

Winter has landed hard on Vancouver - yesterday was -20C with wind chill. I thought my nose was going to freeze off! Today we've been watching the snow fall from our apartment and wondering whether our flight home to England is going to leave tomorrow. There have been loads of cancellations and delays today. Tomorrow's weather forecast is a little better so we are crossing our fingers.

We are flying home for a fortnight to see family and a few friends in the UK. We originally had our flights with Zoom.... and then they went bust. Our new itinerary means less time at home, so we won't get to see everyone that we'd like to.

A big Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from me and Steph to all our friends and family, and just for you here's a delightful Canadian treat - a grizzly bear tree ornament :)

See you in 2009!

Halloween (better late than never)

2008-11-22T23:31:00.002-08:00

It was almost a month ago now, but here are this year's Halloween pics.

Firstly, there are a few photos from our pumpkin carving efforts that I've uploaded to Flickr. We went over to our friends' place for lots of food and drink, some pumpkin carving, and also to watch Halloween (the original movie). It was a very enjoyable evening.

Secondly, we went to a Halloween fancy dress party with some other friends of ours. You can see the pictures on our friend's website.

Photos from Big Island

2008-11-16T18:19:00.004-08:00

We uploaded two more sets of photos from our Hawaii holiday to Flickr.

The first set of photos are from our stay on the east side of the island, near Hilo. The highlight on this side was undoubtedly the volcano, but we also did lots of sight-seeing too.

The second set of photos are from our time on the west side of the island, close to Kona. The end of our holiday was deliberately more relaxed, with lots more beach time. Highlights of this last part of the holiday were probably our trip to the summit of Mauna Kea, and the lovely self-catered apartment we stayed in at Chez Marquis.

Ah Hawaii... we miss you!

Photos from Kauai

2008-11-08T16:12:00.004-08:00

We've uploaded photos from the first Hawaiian island that we visited on our recent holiday - Kauai. We spent 6 days on Kauai, and 8 days on Big Island. I think Kauai was our favourite. It's the oldest island in the group, which makes its landscape some of the most beautiful. It's also a small island, with our very relaxed atmosphere. The highlight of this part of the holiday was probably the helicopter flight we did with Jack Harter Helicopters - brilliant! You can find the photos here on Flickr.

First Hawaii photos

2008-11-03T19:11:00.003-08:00

It's been a long haul, but we're getting there. We've been pretty busy since we got back, and it's taken longer than we expected to go through all the photos we took in Hawaii. Here's the first lot that we've uploaded to Flickr (or at least Steph has - she's done all the work on this one). They're a bunch of photos Steph took with underwater cameras whilst snorkelling.

Still to come (once we title them all) - lots of photos of Hawaii itself :)

Back from our Hawaiian getaway

2008-10-20T23:02:00.002-07:00

Yes, it's all over. We got back to Vancouver on Friday at lunchtime, after a long but uneventful return trip. Hawaii was incredible - the best holiday I think we've ever had. There was jaw-dropping scenery, volcanoes, loads of gorgeous beaches, stunning waterfalls, tropical fruit and beautiful fish. I'm running out of superlatives. And it was lovely and warm too!

We are currently wading through over 500 photos and an hour of video, and once we've sorted it all we'll upload the best stuff. Until then, it's nice to be home but we kind of wish we could have stayed a bit longer...

:)

Holidays

2008-09-30T22:41:00.003-07:00

Steph's parents left last Thursday after spending a two week holiday with us. I think they had a good time (they certainly had some good weather), and we enjoyed having them to stay. Steph went away with them on a trip the week before to Powell River and Vancouver Island, and I've uploaded some pictures from that trip to Flickr. The weekend before they left, the weather turned a bit dodgy and we ended up doing a rather soggy walk out at Deep Cove, but it was fun nonetheless (pictures also on Flickr). We also had a superb meal together at Brix last Tuesday - it's been ages since we've been there but the food and service are still great.

Only a few days now until we are off to Hawaii - woohoo! So it's panic stations as we hurriedly sort out all the holiday-related stuff we've been putting off due to other things :) I'll be glad when the preparation is all over and we finally get there, as I get rather stressed out by at all - the opposite of what a holiday should be about!

In other news - we got ourselves an allotment! We went to a work day on Sunday again (our second so far) and there was a plot free so we got it. It's actually a triple plot and is 21 feet by 15 feet in size. Right now its a mess, though we spent a good couple of hours on Sunday cleaning it up a bit. There'll be more cleanup required before winter comes though, I expect. We're hoping that a couple of friends who are interested will help out too. When we get back from holiday, we'll have to post up some photos. Let's hope that next year we'll be eating lovely home-grown produce :)

More sunny days

2008-09-13T17:01:00.002-07:00

In my last post, I started by mentioning that it had finally stopped raining. Well, guess what? Nope, you're wrong. It's still sunny! It's been sunny all September so far. That's already made up for those couple of dreadful weeks in August. We're making the most of it while we can. Steph has been getting out and about in the daytime while she's not working, and I've been cycling to and from work as much as I can, which has been great for exercise.

Last weekend, we cycled around Stanley Park which is much nicer now that the heaving summer crowds are dying down. We followed that with a swim (for Steph), and a walk up to Prospect Point and back for me. It was lovely to walk through the park again, as I haven't done it in ages. Shame to see that they've constructed a huge car park at Prospect Point. I expect there will be a mall and a bunch of fast food restaurants there soon :/ The park itself is still lovely though.

On Thursday, Steph's parents arrived for a two-week holiday, so they are currently enjoying the sunshine with us. Steph has been attending an animation festival called SPARK over the last few days, and has been thoroughly enjoying the various talks. I went with her to see the directors of Horton Hears a Who! from Blue Sky studios, which was very entertaining, and that was followed by a screening of the film which was excellent.

Tomorrow, we are off to the beach to enjoy some of this late summer sun. I hope the weather is good wherever you are.

Labor Day weekend

2008-09-01T15:13:00.002-07:00

It's a long weekend - yay! It finally stopped raining - yay!

August has been a pretty awful month. It's supposed to be the hottest and driest of the summer, but instead it has rained consistently for over two weeks! This weekend has been much better though - still some cloud around, but plenty of sunshine too.

On Saturday, we invited our good friends Colin and Jo round for food. They were very nice to Steph recently and let her use their computer to prepare her showreel for job hunting, so as a thankyou we made them home-made pizzas, followed by honey cake and custard. Om nom nom nom :) We were all happy and full.

Yesterday, we did some gardening (!). Steph wants to get an allotment plot to grow some stuff, so we went to a work party at Strathcona gardens. This enabled us to put our name down on the waiting list for an allotment there. Apparently, there are about eight others on the list, but free plots get given to those who show up for the work parties once a month, so if we put in the effort we might get lucky. We both enjoyed getting to do some outdoor stuff anyway - we picked apples in the orchard there and helped to clear some weeds. Everyone got to take a share of the fruit home, and Steph has some earmarked for an apple and blackberry crumble - nice.

Today has been pretty lazy so far. In a while, we are going to a BBQ held by some friends and work colleagues. Let's hope this good weather will stick around for a while.

Bowen Island

2008-09-01T14:59:00.002-07:00

Last weekend Steph organized a day-trip to Bowen Island for a whole load of us. Steph and most of the others went to do some kayaking, but I don't like sitting in kayaks so I did some walking with a few friends. We originally intended to walk to the top of Mount Gardner on the island, but when we realized how long that would take we wimped out and went for a nice stroll around Killarney Lake instead.

We had accidentally chosen the weekend for our trip that was also"Bowfest" which is some sort of annual fair / festival on the island. We were going to check it out after we finished our walk (while waiting for the kayakers to return) but it cost good money to get in so instead we went to the pub :) It was called Doc Morgan's and had a very nice location by the water (shame about the service though).

We also lucked out on the weather. The week before had been dreadful (see my previous post about Radiohead), and the following week was also dreadful. In fact, even the next day it poured with rain but on the Saturday we had warm weather and sunshine. Hooray!

I've uploaded some photos to Flickr. Sadly, I don't have any of the kayaking, or the pub. I'll see if I can dig up any from other people.

Drowned Rats

2008-09-01T14:34:00.005-07:00

I spoke too soon in my last post about the weather. The next week, things turned for the worst. Our Radiohead gig on Tuesday evening was very soggy indeed. It was certainly memorable for a variety of reasons:

I lost my umbrella - they wouldn't let people into the event with them :(
We ended up more wet than we'd ever been in our lives.
At the end, there were thousands of people trying to get out of UBC, which caused gridlock on the roads, and completely overwhelmed the bus services. We were very lucky to push and shove our way onto a bus late that night, or we might have ended up stranded miles from home when the bus service stopped.

Still, I think everyone enjoyed Radiohead anyway. And although I was still non-plussed by them after the gig, I now really like their latest album. Weird.

Here's a couple of dodgy movies with awful sound :)

Bad news

2008-08-17T17:08:00.005-07:00

If you are in the UK right now, you probably won't have too much sympathy for us, but it's hot here right now in Vancouver! Summer is in full force, but the weather is turning today with possible thunderstorms later, which precedes a coming week of rain and showers.

To say that it's been a stressful week would be a major understatement. The company where Steph and I work has been going through some "realignment" under its new management, which meant more than 100 people being made redundant. Unfortunately, Steph was one of those people.

On the lighter side, Steph's friend Helen is visiting us and having a good time so far. She's been travelling a lot so we haven't seen so much of her so far. She comes back this evening from the Okanagan valley. This week we are all going to see Radiohead play outdoors at UBC Thunderbird Stadium, and then at the weekend we are going on a day trip to Bowen Island for some kayaking and walking, with a bunch of friends. So plenty of good stuff ahead.

Last night was a wedding celebration for Steve and Janine - good friends of ours - which was great fun. There are some photos on the web taken by other friends of ours if you'd like to take a look.

Let's hope next week is better than this one!

Fireworks, and other things

2008-08-03T14:08:00.006-07:00

July was a busy month for stuff. We saw a bunch of movies, which I'll maybe get around to reviewing at some point soon. July was mostly great summer weather, apart from the last week which was cold and wet. We spent time on the beach, and cycling too. The last two weeks has been the Celebration of Light again, which for those that don't know is four big fireworks displays from English Bay (close to where we live). This year Canada, USA and China competed, and Canada won again for the second year running. I reckon it must be a fix, as China was the best in my opinion (they were the best last year too). Last Saturday we had people round to ours for drinks and to watch the fireworks from our apartment, which was cool. Yesterday was the final display, and our friend Jon has a BBQ at his place which was fun. It eventually degenerated into several hours of Singstar karaoke which was quite hilarious (especially Rick Astley). It's a long weekend here (Monday is BC Day) so we'll be taking it easy for the rest of it.

If you are interested, there are pictures from the fireworks here, and some from last night's karaoke fun here. Or check out the movie below :)

Funny sign

2008-08-03T14:07:00.001-07:00

Spotted whilst walking back from Kitsilano Beach one afternoon.

Spamalot!

2008-08-03T14:00:00.002-07:00

The theatre show based on Monty Python's The Holy Grail (and some other Python stuff) came to Vancouver, and a bunch of us went to see it. It was enjoyable enough, but mostly just regurgitated the funniest scenes from the film, performed with bad English accents (which sometimes added to the enjoyment) and slightly suspect coming timing and delivery (which did not). I am glad we got our tickets half-price as otherwise it would have been rather a rip-off. As it was, the production was good and the song and dance routines were most enjoyable, but it would have been cheaper and funnier to watch the movie again.

Paul and Jane visit

2008-08-03T13:43:00.003-07:00

I'm so late mentioning this, but better late than never. Our friends Paul and Jane stayed with us for a long weekend at the beginning of July, pretty much straight after our weekend in Seattle. They were on a round-the-world trip virtually, from Australia where they now live, via San Francisco. I used to share a house with Paul when I lived in Cambridge so we are good friends. He moved to Melbourne in Australia probably a year or so ago now with his then-girlfriend Jane. Recently they got married but I missed the wedding as Steph and I were too busy to travel at the time. It was really great to see them, and we packed in a few tourist-type things in the short time they were here - a trip to Granville Island Market and to Grouse Mountain. We also got together with Chris and Katie and their new baby Lucas for the evening (we all knew each other from when we worked at Sony and lived in Cambridge). After leaving here, they went back to the UK for a wedding reception for the guys that couldn't make the Melbourne wedding, and then on to Italy for a week of actual holiday before returning to Australia. An epic journey indeed. I heard the other day that they made it back safe and sound, but narrowly avoided being on the Quantas plane that nearly crashed that day. It was only because that flight was overbooked that they ended up on another one. A close shave!

Oh yes, and one other thing. While they were visiting, we learnt that Jane is pregnant. Congratulations guys!!

Seattle

2008-07-20T09:33:00.001-07:00

On the last weekend in June, we travelled down to Seattle to meet up with our friends Holly and Pat, whose wedding we went to in Florida last year. They were travelling to a family reunion in Oregon. That weekend was a real scorcher - up to 35 degrees C in Seattle. We hired a car and drove down at what we thought was a pretty early time, but we had awful queues at the border. It took 3 hours 15 minutes to travel the final 800m to the border crossing - aaaaarrrrgh! So we arrived mid-afternoon in Seattle which was much later than expected, but actually tied in pretty well with Holly and Pat's schedule as it turned out. We did some walking around Downtown that afternoon and along the promenade, but it was baking hot and we had to keep hiding in the shade :)

The next day we had brunch and then Holly and Pat left to start their journey to Oregon. It was a brief rendezvous, but great to see them nonetheless. After our border ordeal on Saturday I decided that we should wait until late at night to attempt the crossing back to Canada, so we thought we'd spend the whole day in Seattle and make the most of it. We did loads of walking all around the Downtown area and got a flavour of most of the different districts. We found a great little place for lunch in Pike's Place Market too, called the Soundview Cafe - recommended. In the afternoon we had to escape the heat so we spent a couple of hours in the Aquarium which was pretty cool - bigger and better than the one in Vancouver. We topped off the day with a tasty meal at Anthony's on Pier 66, and then set off for home. This time we reached the border at about 10.45pm and waited only 10 minutes - bliss!

We certainly enjoyed the trip, and we liked Seattle too (thought perhaps the lovely weather helped). There seemed to be lots to see and do there. Perhaps we will go back again sometime. You can find the photos we took on Flickr.

Dad's visit to Vancouver

2008-07-05T10:06:00.003-07:00

I've put together an album of photos from my Dad's recent visit to Vancouver. He left a week last Thursday. I already blogged about our first weekend when we did the long drive, and there are some photos in this bunch of that trip. The first week was not the greatest weather, and remained cool and overcast but without much rain. My Dad did a bus tour, and loads and loads of walking around town. The second weekend, we went up Grouse Mountain and spent a day on the beach - very relaxing. The good weather continued into the second week, which gave Dad more chances to relax on the beach a bit. I think he enjoyed his holiday overall, although I think it was a little strange for him to travel by himself. It was great to have him visit, and Steph and I especially miss the washing up he did for us :) You are welcome back any time, Dad!

A scenic drive, and a kayak weekend

2008-06-22T19:47:00.002-07:00

My Dad arrived to stay just over a week ago, and last weekend we hired a car and did a drive around some of British Columbia. We were lucky to get gorgeous weather for both days which made the sightseeing all the more enjoyable.

We started off on Saturday morning, and drove along the Sea-To-Sky Highway to Whistler. There we stopped for the night. I was hoping to take my Dad up to the top of Whistler for the view, and I'd even checked online to make sure it was available. However, sadly I missed the small print that said "from June 28th", so it wasn't yet open. Poo! As a backup plan, we did some walking around the Lost Lake Park which was lovely in the sunshine. The area around the lake looks very different in the summer - there were lots of people hanging out on the grass, and even one brave swimmer.

In the evening we had a great meal at Ric's Grill in Whistler Village (highly recommended) and stayed the night at the Holiday Inn Sunspree, which I'd also recommend except for the rowdy youngsters that kept us awake outside from 1am to 3am (not the hotel's fault though). If I stayed in Whistler again in the summertime, I'd pick a place out of the village that ought to be quieter!

On the Sunday we did a loooong drive from Whistler, through Pemberton, Lillooet, Lytton, Boston Bar, Hope, and back to Vancouver. This is a route I've done once before not long after we arrived in Canada (with Steph and her friend), and I very much enjoyed it then. This trip was great too. We stopped for a late lunch at the Hell's Gate Airtram which I've also been to twice before but which is always enjoyable. This time the water was fairly high, and the river was spectacular to watch from this vantage point.

We covered 600km in two days (with 460km on the Sunday), and saw a lot of trees, lakes and valleys. Brilliant.

Whilst I was doing that, Steph was on a kayaking and camping weekend with 13 other friends! She'd been organizing this one for ages. They started from Deep Cove and kayaked up to Granite Falls where they camped overnight. Everything they needed had to be squeezed into and onto the kayaks - no mean feat! It was apparently an excellent weekend (the lovely weather helped, after forecasts of rain earlier in the week). The journey back was arduous however because of strong currents and a headwind, which made paddling tough work, and if you stopped you started floating backwards. Despite being exhausted by the end of it, some of them are already thinking about next time :)

Steph recently sorted out her photos, and uploaded them to Flickr. I'll hopefully upload some of my Dad's too in the near future.

Steve's Stag Day

2008-06-18T08:24:00.002-07:00

Our friends Steve and Janine are getting married in July. The wedding is going to be back in the UK, but they wanted to involve some of their friends here too so Steve had a Canadian Stag Day, which was the Saturday before last.

It started with stodgy breakfast at Denny's, which I decided to skip in favour of something more healthy. We all arrived in our prescribed uniforms - the worst shirt and tie we could find. And believe me, we found some pretty bad ones. It was also at this point that Steve was presented with his gift for the day - a lustrous blonde wig to die for.

After that, we all went off for a day at the races - Hastings Racecourse to be precise. The weather was decent (it didn't rain at least, which was good because we were outside all day), and it was most enjoyable. We drank some beer and had a little flutter. I won on the first horse I bet on, and was overjoyed until it was disqualified about 5 minutes later. Arse. That was my first and last "win" that day.

Next was a trip back into Downtown for dinner - which was curry, in the English tradition. The waiter saw our big group coming I think, and talked us into ordering far too much food, so we left the place completely stuffed.

And so began the inevitable pub crawl down into the gutter. I actually quit fairly early, with my excuse - I had to clean our apartment before my Dad arrived to stay :) I was very glad that I did, as I got to take part in my Sunday, unlike the rest of them.

I didn't take photos any myself, but here are a few if you are interested.

Pender Harbour weekend

2008-05-25T10:44:00.002-07:00

Last weekend was a long one thanks to Victoria Day on the Monday, and it was also the last weekend that Steph's aunts were staying with us. We rented a car and took a trip up the Sunshine Coast to the Pender Harbour area. We really lucked out with the weather, because Saturday and Sunday were the first real summer days we have had this year - gorgeous. On Monday it rained of course, but there you go. We stayed at a place called Pender Harbour Resort. It was a very pretty location, although a little more remote than we had intended. Unfortunately, the cottage we stayed in was a big disappointment - it was over-priced, scruffy and the kitchen was poorly equipped. Worst of all though, there was no separate bedroom for Steph's aunts - we all slept in the same room! The people who ran the place didn't seem to care about my complaints either , so I don't recommend this place - we will stay somewhere else next time.

The Pender Harbour area itself was beautiful - lots of great coastline and cool little islands. It's quite remote, and there isn't much in the way of shops and such. Most of the things to do involve hiking, boating or swimming, so it's probably for the active sort mostly. I think Steph's aunts still enjoyed it though, thanks to the sunshine and the relaxation. Steph and I managed to squeeze in a short walk to Skookumchuck Rapids too, and arrived in time to see a big ebb tide and lots of drama. We'd definitely think about going back to this area of the Sunshine Coast in future to do some more exploring or for a romantic weekend.

You can see some photos of the weekend on our Flickr page.

Two gigs and a lecture

2008-05-25T09:45:00.002-07:00

As it turned out, we had quite a few evening engagements while Steph's aunts were staying, so we had to leave them to their own devices on some evenings.

Firstly, we saw Elbow play at St. Andrew's-Wesley Church in Downtown. We missed it when Sufjan Stevens played there, and we were determined to catch another gig at such an interesting venue. They made us stand outside in a huge line for a good hour, which was annoying. Technical problems apparently. The church was lovely inside, and everyone sat on the pews to watch the music - a strange atmosphere for sure. I expected the acoustics of a church to be great, but to be honest they tended to over-exaggerate the low-end and make it hard to make out voices and such. The support band that came on first - Air Traffic - had this problem in spades. Their sound mix was all bass and no vocals, so it was impossible to hear any lyrics apart from on the occasional quiet track. They weren't bad though. Elbow themselves had much better sound balance, and performed a great set. They were pretty chuffed to be playing in a church, and mentioned it several times. The lead singer was quite chatty, and had a bunch of interesting little stories to tell between songs. He also got us singing along to a couple of songs too. I enjoyed it very much (I am the Elbow fan really) but Steph also liked it a lot.

The night after the Elbow gig, we went to see a guy called Syd Mead talk about his work. He calls himself a "visual futurist" and worked as a concept artist on a bunch of big movies such as Blade Runner, Aliens and TRON. The lecture was a weird format - he launched into a series of slides showing pictures he had created, and then talked about the background for each one. For a couple of hours - that was it. He was very confident and full of himself, but interesting to listen to all the same. The thing I liked best was how he often thought up elaborate scenarios behind each of his pictures, so that it all made some sort of logical sense to him. He mentioned several times that good fantasy was all about taking something that people know and recognize, and then combining it with something strange and unfamiliar. As a science-fiction fan, I really enjoyed hearing about the crazy worlds he invented in his head for each picture.

Lastly, we saw another gig at the Commodore Ballroom - KT Tunstall was playing again. Last time, we saw her at Richards on Richards which is a really small, intimate venue and it was great. This time the venue was larger, and so was the band - five of them this time. The extra band members meant more elaborate versions of the songs with extra vocals and so on which were different from the album versions and interesting to hear. She also has two albums of music to draw from now for her gigs, so there was more variety. She was chatty between songs, and the whole band seemed to be enjoying themselves which is always nice to see. Her singing was awesome as ever - she really does have a knockout voice. I liked the quiet numbers best of course, especially "Paper Aeroplane" which was beautiful, and an epic version of "Beauty of Uncertainty". Lovely.

Mini Film Review - Iron Man

2008-05-25T09:30:00.003-07:00

Generally, I like super-hero movies because they are pure escapism and fantasy, and there aren't enough of those kind of films these days. Fortunately, Iron Man was one of the better films of this kind. The script was sharp and witty, and most of the main characters were well-written and interesting. I think Robert Downey Jr. pretty much made the film for me - he really suited his part well and did a great job. He was also looking very buff for his age - perhaps it's down to all the time he spends in prison :) Jeff Bridges was excellent too. I thought that Gwyneth Paltrow's character was a little one-dimensional, and unfortunately named (Pepper Potts??). She was also looking heavily made-up in the close-up shots. I guess she's not quite as young and smooth-skinned as she used to be. The computer graphics were excellent - it's rare these days that they aren't - and the film seemed well-paced with an exciting finale. Here's hoping they make another. Oh yes, and there's an extra bit after the credits, but it's probably not worth waiting for...

Dr. Sun Yat Sen Chinese Garden

2008-05-24T20:54:00.002-07:00

The first weekend that Steph's aunts were staying with us, we went to the Chinese Garden just outside Downtown. Steph and I hadn't yet been so we were more than happy to join them. As it turned out, there are kind of two gardens which are adjoining and share the same large pond. One is Dr. Sun Yat Sen Park which is open to the public and free to enter, and the other is the Chinese Garden which requires a ticket. We were kind of disappointed at the size of the garden - it was actually smaller than the public park - and the entry prices seemed a little steep for something so small ($10 per adult), but it was very pretty and rather relaxing. The weather wasn't half bad that day either. I've uploaded some photos on Flickr.

I'm way behind with my blogging, but hopefully there will be more coming soon. Summer has arrived at last (we've had three great days already) so it's hard to find the enthusiasm to sit at the computer and write stuff :)

Whistler photos up on Flickr

2008-05-05T22:02:00.003-07:00

I've uploaded two sets of photos that I took whilst walking the Valley Trail around Whistler, one from Saturday and one from Sunday. The third set are photos nicked from mobile phones so the resolution isn't so hot, but at least they feature actual people unlike my walking pictures :)

Whistler

2008-05-04T19:56:00.006-07:00

Last weekend, we did another big trip to Whistler. The exact group of people going was up and down until the last minute, but eventually there were 13 of us - so many that we didn't fit in one condo, so Steph rented two next door to each other. A lot of us went up on the Friday evening after work, and a couple more people came down on the Saturday.

It has been a cold Spring, so there was a fair amount of snow on the mountains themselves. Unfortunately, Whistler Mountain had closed already for the season, but Blackcomb Mountain was still open. Saturday was the most beautiful weather - the first real day of Summer this year. People were skiing and snowboarding in T-shirts and such, and quite a few of us got a little bit of sunburn that day. The snow conditions were pretty good too.

I had originally intended to take a hiking trip to Joffre Lakes. However, for a couple of days leading up to the Friday I was feeling a bit weird, like I was coming down with some kind of sickness. In the end, I didn't arrange the trip because of that (and as it turned out I was fine and didn't get sick - oh well). Our rental car got a flat tyre too, as I discovered when I went down to the parking garage on Saturday morning - I was looking forward to having my own transport. I had to swap it for the lame little emergency spare. I was a bit iffy about driving somewhere until I knew that tyre was good, so I thought I'd do some walking in Lost Lake Park because I could get there easily on foot. The cross-country skiing was over and I wasn't able to get a map of the trails, and the idea of walking the trails with no-one else around and with no map didn't appeal to me, so I had to find an alternative. I ended up walking some of the Valley Trail, which is mostly a paved path for walkers and cyclists (although part of my route followed a few of the cross-country trails at Lost Lake where I was still walking on snow.) The weather was great, and I walked about 9km on Saturday altogether - very enjoyable.

Sunday was overcast, and rained later in the day. The snow conditions were worse that day because of the mild temperatures and the rain, but I think most people still enjoyed it. The spare tyre had held up fine overnight, so I had an idea to drive out to the Cheakamus River and walk the trail there (which we did with Steph's parents last Summer), but the tourist information guys told me it would be too wet and muddy and put me off. Instead, I walked some more of the Valley Trail in a different direction, and although the weather was nowhere near as good, I still enjoyed myself and clocked another 9km. Some of our friends went home on the Sunday afternoon and evening, because they couldn't get a day off work on Monday.

Monday was a lousy day anyway - cold and wet. Steph, Tim and Chris proved to be the hardcore of the bunch and did a couple of hours of skiing despite the conditions. I had walked pretty much everywhere I could, so I hung out in Whistler Village with a couple of other friends who didn't want to snowboard that day. We left soon after lunch because of the lousy weather, and made our way home slowly and carefully thanks to our little emergency tyre which was speed-limited to 80kph. It got us home without incident though. I had a somewhat unpleasant discovery when I dropped the rental car back though - apparently a flat tyre is considered as "damage" as far as they are concerned so they will probably charge me - what a rip-off.

It was a great weekend though, and I think everyone had a good time. I was a little limited with my walking options, but the hot-tub, great food, Rock Band, and excellent company more than made up for it. Oh yes, and I recommend the movie "The Fallen Ones" if you get a chance to catch it ;) I think the organizing of it all tired Steph out quite a lot, and she wasn't sure about doing something with so many people in future. Then everybody clubbed together and bought her a bottle of scotch as a thank-you prezzie, so I think she might have changed her mind :)

I have some photos, which I haven't sorted out yet. I'll be posting those up in the next few days.

8 Film Reviews (count 'em!)

2008-04-13T10:38:00.013-07:00

This might be the biggest bunch of reviews I've ever posted at the same time! It took bleedin' ages to write as well. I'll have to keep up a little better in future (or watch fewer films).

Beowulf

This film impressed me more than I expected. It looked fantastic - I think they were some of the best human characters I've ever seen in a CG film. I wasn't expecting their acting performances to be so good though. The nuances captured, especially in the faces, were superb - so much so that after about 15 minutes of watching the film I forgot that I was wasn't watching real actors. Truly impressive. And to cap it all, the story was more interesting and more mature than I thought it would be as well, with far fewer cliches than I had feared. I still think Ray Winstone was a strange choice to voice the lead character, and sometimes he would lapse into a rough "Landan" accent when over-excited. In summary though, this movie was a pleasant surprise and well worth a watch.

In The Valley Of Elah

This film reminded me of Redacted in its choice of subject matter, but don't worry - it's much better! It's a simple movie that tells a straightforward story, but the script and the acting performances in particular raised it to a very high level. It's an emotional film, and there's no feel-good ending so pick a good time to watch it :) Tommy Lee Jones gives another superb, understated performance in this film. Like a fine wine, this guy just seems to get better with age and now I really look forward to movies he is in. The rest of the cast give good performances too, and that combined with the powerful issues that the story raises should mean that this film is likely to stick in your memory. Recommended.

American Gangster

It was mainly the draw of Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe that made me watch this movie - I knew pretty much nothing about it. Well, I guess I'm not giving anything away by saying it's all about organized crime :) Denzel was decent, although I find he tends to play Denzel Washington in every movie, plus or minus a bit of "crazy". In this movie, Denzel played Denzel Washington with a fair bit of crazy. Man On Fire was Denzel playing Denzel with a smaller amount of crazy. You get the idea. Russell Crowe I thought outshone Denzel somewhat, although his "rough diamond" was probably not much of a stretch for him either. His character had an extremely strong sense of right and wrong though which was pretty interesting. The movie was good but somewhat by the numbers. It's nothing you haven't seen before and the leads certainly stay way within their acting comfort zone. Very competent, and reasonably enjoyable.

There Will Be Blood

Daniel Day-Lewis won best actor for this movie and I can see why - his performance is totally intense and gripping to watch. His character dominates this movie so totally that there isn't a lot of room for anyone else (though the preacher is also excellent). At times, things get rather melodramatic and there was more than a slice or two of ham. It felt like someone needed to reign in Day-Lewis's performance one or two notches and then it would have been perfect. I loved the musical score which dominated some of the best scenes and was powerful and brooding, kind of like the main character, and the dark ending was not your typical Hollywood happy-ever-after. I would have preferred just a touch more restraint to the acting, but there is no denying that this is a great film with a great central character, and very much worth a watch.

Hard Candy

We had a little film night round our place one Saturday evening with a few friends. The idea was for it to be a scary movie, but we picked up four very different films for people to choose from - this one and the following three reviewed here. This was the only film that none of us had seen, so it was the one we watched.

So, I'll get it out of the way right now - this is a film about paedophilia. Or rather, the effects of paedophilia on an adult and a child. This film must have started as a stage play as there are only two characters and pretty much only one location. It's an interesting film with an excellent performance by Ellen Page as a 13-year old with revenge on her mind. It does seem a little contrived, and I felt that the dialogue sometimes fell flat and wasn't all it could have been. There are a few genuine chills (and some uncomfortable moments), but neither main character is particularly sympathetic and the end result was rather a mess. Memorable, but not fantastic.

Michael Clayton

George Clooney just keeps making good movies these days, and this one is excellent. He plays a "fixer" who get rich people out of their legal troubles on the hush-hush, until he gets involved in a class-action lawsuit against a huge agrochemical company (which is fictional of course, but basically Monsanto). What follows is a taut thriller with strong, measured performances by a brilliant ensemble cast. Clooney gets a lot of screen time, but by no means dominates, and compared to the histrionics seen in There Will Be Blood this is a lesson in less-is-more. I didn't expect to enjoy this film as much as I did - it's a top-class piece of serious drama and comes highly recommended whether you are a fan of Clooney or not.

Zodiac

This film was long! Good, but long. Good, but not great either. I liked the premise of a serial killer who is never caught, and there are some really good performances in the movie, but for some reason it never quite blew me away, and ended up being somewhat forgettable. The actual murders are pretty brutal too, if you're a little squeamish. Watch it if you like a more cerebral kind of thriller, and you have plenty of patience :)

Land Of The Dead

The make-up and effects rocked. Steph didn't like all the gore, but it is so over-the-top it just made me laugh. Compared to your Saws and Hostels, this movie is like a very black comedy. Also a comedy was the plot, the script, and most of the acting. John Leguizamo hams it up throughout with a permanent leer on his face, and manages to save the film from mediocrity. The male lead however is instantly forgettable, Dennis Hopper seems to be unsure of where he actually is, and Asia Argento is little more than eye-candy for the gentlemen. Not George Romero's finest hour, but entertaining enough with some friends, some drink, and a strong stomach for fake guts.

A busy week

2008-04-05T11:52:00.002-07:00

Last weekend was further evidence that climate change is real. It was the end of March, and for both Saturday and Sunday it hailed and snowed in Vancouver. It was very strange to see, and caught the city unprepared. The snow didn't last long though, with rain following and then plenty of sunshine this week.

Big congratulations are in order for my cousin Andrew and his wife Vicky who gave birth to a little baby boy on Tuesday! The delivery was by caesarean (as planned), and both mother and baby are doing well.

On Thursday, we saw Eddie Vedder play at the Centre for Performing Arts. Our seats kind of sucked - they were a long way from the stage, but we enjoyed it anyway. No photos this time I am afraid, due to the distance. I wasn't really a fan of his or of Pearl Jam, but I recently heard his soundtrack to the movie "Into the Wild" (which I highly recommend - both the film and the soundtrack), and liked it a lot. The gig was very "MTV Unplugged" with Eddie on his own on a stool with a bunch of guitars, a ukelele, and a banjo. The simple presentation really let his fantastic voice shine through, and for almost 2 hours he was riveting to listen to. Oh yes, he can play the guitar too :) Superb.

It's been a very busy week for both Steph and myself at work, and I'm glad that the weekend is here. We intend to relax and enjoy it as much as possible. Tonight we are having a few friends round and will probably watch a scary movie of some sort, providing we can find a good one. Hope you have a good weekend too :)

Fantastic Easter Weekend

2008-03-26T08:07:00.003-07:00

I hope you enjoyed yours. I worked out that this was the best weekend of the year, because:

It's the only 4-day weekend of the year
It was pay-day on Thursday
Pay-day was also annual bonus day

So not only did we have lots of free time, but money in our pockets to boot. Hooray :)

We didn't go anywhere special, but we got to do plenty of relaxing. Unfortunately, Steph had to work some of the Friday, while I went for a 3-hour walk in Stanley Park. It was lovely to get out in the fresh air and have some peace and quiet. On Saturday we cycled around the park - the first time this year we have ridden our bikes. They are still in one piece, and nothing got stolen from them over the Winter which was lucky as we left our helmets and tyre pump in the storage room - oops! After the bike ride Steph cooked a fantastic veggie lasagne, and I went out and bought a new TV. I can connect it to my computer, so now we can watch our downloaded TV and stuff on a big screen - ace.

On Sunday we went for lunch with some friends at Cardero's in Coal Harbour. Sunday afternoon was cleaning (boo) but I also made a bread and butter pudding for dessert, which was somewhat successful (it tasted pretty good, but was very wet). Monday, we went to see "There Will Be Blood" at the cinema (review coming soon) and then went to Vij's restaurant for some fab Indian food.

I reckon that was a pretty fine way to spend four days :)

An update on stuff...

2008-03-16T11:55:00.004-07:00

It's been a busy few weeks, and I've finally found some time to do a little blogging about it all :)

So where were we? Yes, there was Whistler in February, but you know about that, and now you can see all the pictures (see my previous post). Since then both Steph and I have been very busy at work, but have found the time to get out and about at weekends, especially since the weather has been pretty good for the time of year - more than our usual share of dry and bright.

My friend Iain Brown, who I know from my old days working at Sony in Cambridge, was here in Vancouver for an EA company conference. He stayed with us for a few days and we hung out which was fun. We went to the Planetarium and the Space Exhibition which was cool, although really aimed for kids. They had a simulator ride which was a laugh, and we got to touch real Moon rock (I'll have to dig out that picture). Oh yes, and we went for a nice meal (with Chris and Katie too) at Bistro Pastis which is a great French restaurant. Anyway, I uploaded a few pictures from February to Flickr.

Last weekend I made a crazy whistle-stop visit to England to attend my youngest nephew's christening. It was a tiring few days, but it was great to see my family again and especially my niece and nephews, who are all growing up so fast. The christening itself was really good - great weather on the day and Zachary behaved perfectly. He spent the whole service staring at the Vicar, bless him. The trip back was kind of stressful, as it coincided with a big winter storm in England with very high winds. I didn't think I would make it back on time, and lots of flights were cancelled out of Heathrow but mine got away with no delays. Fantastic. I have a couple of photos from the christening that I uploaded, and I will try to get hold of some more - there were lots of people with cameras.

This week I had a dentist's appointment, and I'm finally going to get a clenching guard to protect my teeth at night. I have a nervous habit of clenching my teeth, mostly in the daytime I think, but the night guard should help. I really need to learn to relax a bit more, but I've always been a stress bunny and it's not getting better with age :) We also saw Yoav play which was awesome - the guy is so talented, and I think (and hope) he is going to be really big in 2008. Check him out. There are a few photos from the gig on Flickr.

Last night was our friend Lauren's 30th birthday, which was good fun. There was much drunken cuddling, as expected. It was a pretty late night, so today we are taking it easy and sorting out some boring stuff like taxes and so on. Looking forward to Easter weekend coming up, which means more days off - yay!

Whistler photos

2008-03-16T11:15:00.001-07:00

It took a while, but I've assembled photos from various cameras from our Whistler weekend in February, and uploaded them to Flickr.

More updates to the blog coming soon (hopefully).

Some quick film reviews

2008-02-16T12:01:00.007-08:00

Catching up on some movies from the last couple of months.

No Country For Old Men

A crime thriller and chase movie I guess. Lots of weird and interesting characters. It's a Coen Brothers film, and probably one of the best and the most accessible I've seen - not quite as crazy as some others, and with a plot that is easy to follow. The best thing about the film are the characters and how they are portrayed, and there are some great performances. Highly recommended, but it is quite brutal and also quite dark - don't expect the film to cheer you up :)

The Golden Compass

Both Steph and I have read the trilogy of books - His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman - so we were looking forward to the movie. I was kind of disappointed though. Despite an excellent cast and good special effects, something about the film just didn't engage me. I found a lot of the characters unsympathetic, and so did not care too much about what happened to them. I wasn't emotionally involved like I was when reading the book. I've heard the movie didn't do so well, but I hope they continue to make the other books as movies - perhaps they'll do a better job on the next one.

Atonement

Steph read the book a while ago, and loved it, so she practically dragged me to this film. I knew little or nothing about it. Keira Knightley annoyed me as usual - I think she's overrated - but generally the performances were very good, especially Romola Garai. The story told in the film was engaging and exceptionally sad. It was a really good film though.

I Am Legend

I'm a big fan of the book by Richard Matheson, so I was interested to see how the film would be handled. Overall, I was pleasantly surprised. The film makes a number of changes, but they all seem to work to make it more exciting to watch - a movie made straight from the book would have been nowhere near as much fun. The special effects were excellent, and reminded me a lot of I, Robot, which was no surprise when I checked and found it was the same effects company. The movie relies a lot more on scary jumps than I expected, rather than being a straightforward action film. I think that may have spoilt it for Steph a little. Also, there is a completely unnecessary car advert sequence at the beginning of the film that spoils the first ten minutes and makes no sense at all. Just stick with it, wipe the start from your mind, and everything will be fine. I wouldn't recommend the movie to everyone, but if you like sci-fi or horror I think you'd like this.

Cloverfield

I was quite excited about this film ever since I saw the teaser trailer. I liked the fact that I didn't know much about the film before I saw it - I think that added to the fun. Yes, there is far too much shaky-cam - don't sit anywhere near the front of the cinema or you will be sick. The characters are rather self-absorbed and not particularly likeable, but I think that's the point to some extent. What the film does really well is put you in the midst of a crazy disaster movie, where you never know what is going to happen next. It was a real thrill ride, with some scary moments (like the subway bit). I've heard varying opinions about this movie, but I think if you like sci-fi or monster films then you'll probably like this a lot. Oh yeah, and the special effects are fantastic - seamless and completely believable.

Birthdays, and Whistler

2008-02-16T11:36:00.002-08:00

There's been quite a bit happening since my last post. Lots of birthdays this month so far, including my sister and me, Steph's sister and her dad. Phew. A big happy birthday to all of us!

Last weekend we spent a long weekend in Whistler with some friends, which was brilliant. There was no sun unfortunately, but lots of snow. The conditions for skiing and snowboarding were excellent, and all the "thrillseekers" had more than their fix. Steph had a great time. I did lots of snowshoeing - three days in a row in fact. For a change, I wasn't alone either - I had a friend to accompany me on each day which was cool. It was great to get away and forget about everything, and there was so much fresh air and exercise - fantastic. Makes you want to quit your office job for sure. Some of our friends took Rock Band along with them too, and there was much rejoicing.

I didn't do anything big for my birthday, but I did go out that night with some friends for a few drinks. We have this thing where we go out for booze on the same night that the wives / girlfriends have their book club meeting. It's only once a month, but this time happened to fall on my birthday. The rest of this week has been spent trying to catch up on sleep after Whistler. One of our friends from the UK has moved to Vancouver, and arrived this week, so we went out for food together last night which was cool.

That meal will be our last out for a little while. Today, we are starting on a detox for a week. Both Steph and I felt we've been eating too much crap recently and that it isn't doing us much good, so it felt like time. We've prepared pretty well and cooked a bunch of meals already, so it shouldn't be such a chore with food preparation as it has been in the past. The first time we did it, we were sick of chopping raw vegetables by the end. On the second go, we didn't even follow the rules strictly, and ended up quitting early. This time hopefully, we'll do it properly.

Got a busy weekend of boring stuff ahead - housework, paperwork, that kind of thing. The weather forecast says sun for tomorrow though which will be nice - we'll have to find an excuse to get out. If I find any time, I'll try to get some photos together from Whistler and upload them this week.

Christmas and New Year photos at last

2008-01-26T17:17:00.000-08:00

It's taken long enough, but I've finally uploaded the photos we took during our trip back to England at Christmas. We've been super-lazy since we got back, and I've just gotten round to it. Apologies for those of you pictured in the photos - I hope you can remember them :)

It's a cold, sunny, snowy, rainy winter this year. A bit of everything really. The last week was cold and sunny, and we took the opportunity to walk to work most days which was great. Steph finally got to do some skiing too last Thursday night after work. She had a great time, although probably wore herself out. Time for another lazy weekend I think! Right now the snow is falling again.

Hopefully, we are off to see Cloverfield tomorrow at the cinema with some friends. I've got a small backlog of mini movie reviews I ought to post. Maybe sometime in February at this rate...

Happy New Year!

2008-01-12T14:33:00.000-08:00

I'm a bit late with this salutation, but who cares? Steph and I had a wonderful trip back to the UK over Christmas and the New Year. We saw lots of family and friends, ate and drank too much, and generally had a great time. Thankyou to everybody who put us up or just turned up to say hello - much appreciated :) We have lots of photos from our Christmas trip, but I haven't had a chance to sort them out yet. Maybe this coming week.

So what's new? Well, I'm actually returning to the UK in March for my nephew Zachary's christening, but its going to be a whistle-stop and I won't really get a chance to see anybody beyond my immediate family. Also, we had our annual heating breakdown in our apartment block this week, but it was only out for a couple of days this time.

On the bad news front, I heard on Friday that my tenants are leaving my house in Cambridge. I hope that my next bunch are as nice as the last. I also hope that I won't be without my rental income for too long - January isn't the best time of year to be looking.

Last night we went out to Yuk Yuk's comedy club with some friends, and had a really good time. Not much on the horizon for this week so far, but we'll see what it brings.

December is here

2007-12-01T19:03:00.000-08:00

First things first. Some new pictures from two gigs we went to: Suzanne Vega and Athlete, both at Richards on Richards. They were both great, although I definitely enjoyed Athlete the most. I know more of their music, and it was more energetic :) On Monday night we are going to see Tori Amos at the Orpheum theatre (a sit-down affair). Really looking forward to it - I'm a big fan and I've never seen her live. Woohoo!

I can't believe we fly home to England in only two weeks. How time has flown by! I'm really looking forward to seeing family again - 12 months is a long time without visiting. Right now things are very busy. Work is getting pretty crazy for me, with one project that I work on hitting a major deadline just before Christmas. Then of course there is some present shopping to do, although as usual my family are helping me with that - thanks guys! And we are also trying to squeeze some last-minute socializing with friends here before we fly home. Also, this weekend the snow has arrived for the first time this year. It's early too - I think we are going to be in for a cold hard winter if this is anything to go by. Still, Steph will get her skiing I guess :)

We had our work Christmas party on Wednesday night at a bar called The Republic which was very nice. Plenty of free drink and good company. This coming Friday is the Christmas party for ATG (the team I work in) which will be a far more subdued event I am sure. We have plenty of other stuff coming up this week too. We are lucky guys to have such a nice life :)

Bumper Mini Movie Review Extravaganza

2007-11-10T15:10:00.000-08:00

Hold onto a convenient piece of nearby furniture, because here comes not one, not two, but NINE reviews all in one delicious variety pack. The first 6 are movies we saw during the Vancouver Film Festival at the beginning of October, and then there are 3 more recent viewings. Let's get it on!

Before The Devil Knows You're Dead

Philip Seymour Hoffman and Ethan Hawke star in this crime drama as brothers who plan a heist on a jewelery store that goes very wrong. This film was well acted, but the characters are an unsympathetic bunch and you don't feel like rooting for any of them. That, plus a lack of motivation for some of their behaviour left me with an impression that the film wasn't quite the sum of its parts and ought to have been better. Flawed, but interesting.

Taken For A Ride

This was a documentary about how General Motors and other car manufacturers deliberately engineered the collapse of public transport in the United States and led to the total mess the country is now in with traffic jams in every city. This wasn't something we knew much about, so Steph and I found it fascinating. Seems that the general public loved their trams and they were very effective, but GM decided they wanted to sell cars so they bought all the transit systems and then ran them into the ground. Recommended for its educational value, and maybe because it might encourage people to shout louder for better public transit (and that doesn't mean buses!)

Redacted

Loosely based on true events, this is a Brian De Palma film that tells the story of US marines in Iraq who rape and kill a young girl. It was overacted, and annoying in the way it shoved its political message down your throat. Some shock value perhaps, and I'd give it credit for trying to show the reality of the war in Iraq but I can't recommend this movie because in many ways it sucked.

Steep

If you are at all interested in snow sports or the outdoors in general then you must see this movie. It tells the story of a bunch of crazy men and women who climb or fly to the top of the highest mountain peaks and then ski down them in the most dangerous conditions, purely for the adventure of it all. The moutain visuals are breathtaking, and the people although obviously adrenaline junkies are a likeable bunch and they genuinely inspired and moved me with their commentaries. Makes you want to get outdoors and do stuff, which is a very good thing. Watch it!

London To Brighton

A British gangster chase thriller (phew), but fortunately not in the style of Lock, Stock etc. This is a bleak, gritty, unrelenting England without comic accents and "cockney geezers". It's a very simple movie with few characters (all unknown actors pretty much) and a bare-bones plot, but it totally engrosses thanks to believable performances, good pacing, and a strong, oppressive tension throughout. One of the best thrillers I've seen in a long time, and totally recommended.

The Walker

Woody Harrelson plays a gay socialite who "escorts" a group of rich women to various high-class events, but then gets mixed up in a murder. A strange premise, and a movie I wasn't sure would engage me but thankfully it did, thanks to Harrelson's brilliant performance (plus a great supporting cast) and a superb script. Slow paced for sure, but never dull and thoroughly enjoyable. Give it a try.

In The Shadow Of The Moon

This is a documentary about the NASA moon landings, told by the astronauts who actually did it. There's lots of fascinating archive footage from the time that has been spruced up with some modern technology. The result is a movie that is amazing to watch, but the best thing about this film are the personal accounts from the men themselves, and in particular their insights into seeing the Earth from such a unique perspective. I left feeling uplifted, but also reminded that our planet is a very precious thing that we should do all we can to protect. Everyone should see this movie, and I reckon they should show it to kids in school too.

The Darjeeling Ltd.

Went to see this movie because we've liked other films by the same director (Wes Anderson), such as The Royal Tenenbaums and The Life Aquatic. In my opinion this movie was better than both. It's the story of three brothers and a "spiritual" journey they make together across India. The characters are quirky for sure - a Wes Anderson trademark perhaps - but nevertheless I cared plenty about them which made the movie most enjoyable. Poignant and funny in equal measure, and with heaps and heaps of gorgeous scenery, this movie is both a travel brochure for India and a well-crafted character piece. Highly recommended.

Into The Wild

This film is based on a book by John Krakauer and a true story about a young man who "opts out" from the rat race and spends two years travelling America before finally heading to Alaska. His journey is as much emotional as it is physical, and the movie is at its best when it is detailing the people he meets along the way and how his passing through affects their lives, almost more than his. It's also a film that celebrates the diversity and natural beauty of North America. At over 2 hours it is a little long but doesn't really feel it - superb and tight performances by all involved maintained my interest. A beautiful film, and one I'd urge you to check out.

Halloween

2007-10-29T20:38:00.000-07:00

On Saturday night we were invited by Laurie and Bob to do some pumpkin carving and watch a scary movie. Neither Steph or I had every carved a pumpkin before, so we were complete beginners. It was good fun though, and easier than I expected with the right tools. The end results were pretty good too - take a look at our finished pumpkins on Flickr. The insides didn't go to waste - we made pumpkin soup with them and it is really good. Oh yes, and the film we watched was An American Werewolf in London - not particularly scary these days, but enjoyable all the same.

In other news, the heating in our apartment broke in the on position, so it is super-hot in here all the time. We are having to open the windows in order to avoid sweltering. It's especially bad for sleeping at night. Hopefully it will get fixed soon by the building people before we waste more precious energy!

Okanagan weekend

2007-10-29T20:21:00.000-07:00

Here finally are the photos from our wine weekend in the Okanagan at the end of October. We were hoping for a bit of late summer sun, but we didn't get it unfortunately - it was cold and wet. We did stay at a great bed & breakfast though called Ram's Ridge - highly recommended if you are thinking of staying in the Okanagan valley. We also visited a lot of wineries (12 in all I think) and easily broke our record of 9 bottles of wine from last year: this year we bought 20! Yes, we'll be drunk all winter :)

Cocktails

2007-10-26T18:42:00.001-07:00

Here are a few more photos from Kay's visit to Vancouver - this time from when we had some drinks at the Cloud 9 restaurant at the top of the Empire Landmark Hotel. It revolves, and has a great view of the surrounding area.

NOTE: These photos are limited to friends and family only, so you'll need to be logged into Flickr in order to see them.

Museum of Anthropology

2007-10-23T19:19:00.001-07:00

While Steph's sister Kay was staying with us in September, we visited the Museum of Anthropology at UBC (University of British Columbia). The museum is all about the Haida people and their culture, who originate from the Queen Charlotte islands in northern British Columbia. We'd like to go to the Queen Charlottess at some point, but for now we just have these photos from the museum to whet our appetite.

New nephew Zachary

2007-10-23T19:07:00.001-07:00

Yes, I am hopelessly behind with this blogging lark. Four weeks ago today, on the 25th September, my sister gave birth to a baby boy which she has named Zachary. He's doing great (as is my sister), and apparently he looks like his older brother Jacob. Here's a picture from shortly after he was born. Go Zack! Looking forward to meeting you when I visit the UK at Christmas.

More whale watching photos

2007-10-15T21:24:00.001-07:00

Much belated, but I got a chance this weekend to look through the photos that Steph's sister Kay left for us that she took on her camera. I've added a few more photos from their whale watching trip to the photoset on Flickr. More to come soon.

Goodbye Tom

2007-10-11T22:47:00.000-07:00

My grandad on my mother's side was named Tom. He had been in good health all his life, but recently suffered a minor stroke which left him with a condition called vascular dementia which is similar in symptoms to Alzheimer's. For the last year or so, his condition got steadily worse. He was often confused about where he was, and sometimes wandered out of the house or got angry and violent for no reason. He also had a number of bad falls. Several weeks ago, he was admitted to hospital with a chest infection. Whilst in hospital he had another fall (and possibly another minor stroke) and sadly this proved too much. The decision was made to stop his care when it became clear that he was not going to recover from all these complications, and he passed away a week ago last Friday. He was 85 years old.

Today was my grandad's funeral. Unfortunately I couldn't be there to give my support to my grandma or the rest of the family, but my thoughts were with them. Tom was a wonderful man - strong willed and not afraid to speak his mind, but also generous and fun-loving. We will all miss him very much.

The Flaming Lips

2007-09-23T21:40:00.000-07:00

Last Tuesday we saw The Flaming Lips. This was another gig that was supposed to be at the Orpheum Theatre but got relocated because of the civic workers strike, and once again the new venue was Malkin Bowl in Stanley Park. As it turned out, it was raining all that day so we readied ourselves for another wet evening, but fortunately the rain stopped in the afternoon and the night was dry, although cold. Steph is really the Flaming Lips fan, though I do like a few of their songs. They gave a very entertaining performance, with stage dancers, balloons, confetti and other fun toys. It was most enjoyable. We took some photos which came out surprisingly well.

Whale watching

2007-09-23T20:54:00.000-07:00

I've uploaded a few photos that Steph and Kay took when they went whale watching last Saturday (15th September). They took a bus trip straight out of downtown Vancouver down to Tsawassen and then out on a zodiac inflatable boat to see some of the Orcas that live around Vancouver Island.

Goat Mountain hike

2007-09-16T16:06:00.000-07:00

Last Sunday we hiked to Goat Mountain. We went with some friends, and lucked out on the weather as it was a gorgeous day. We started off early, meeting at the seabus at 9am, and then caught another bus to the base of Grouse. Then we took the SkyRide (a glorified cable car) to the top of Grouse where we started our hike from. In took us just over 2 hours from there to the peak of Goat Mountain, a distance of just over 5km and an increase of 250m in elevation, although the trail has lots of ups and downs. It's a great walk with some excellent views. There was a bear at the top too! It was our first encounter with a bear out in the open, and it was quite exciting. Previously, we have spotted them on Vancouver Island when travelling in the car, which is a bit different. We would have been more scared if the bear hadn't been a few metres below us, with no particularly easy route up to where we were. That gave us enough confidence to hang around for a few photos. After that we stopped for lunch on the way down, and then had a nice cold beer when we got back to Grouse Mountain, before returning home. Steph wasn't sure whether her feet would be up for the walk, as she gets pains in the nerves of her feet, but she managed it with no problems which was great. Perhaps we'll be okay to do more walking in future, because I really enjoy it. I've uploaded the photos to Flickr here. Also, as a special bonus, here's a movie I took of the panoramic view from the top of Goat Mountain.

Visitors

2007-09-14T08:04:00.000-07:00

Steph's sister Karin arrived yesterday from the UK. She is staying with us for a couple of weeks, although for a few days she'll be off to Santa Barbara to visit some friends. I hope the weather stays good for her visit: it has been sunny and warm now for the last two weeks.

Tonight we are all going to the launch party of Radical's latest game: Crash Of The Titans. Tomorow, Steph and Karin are going on a whale-watching trip straight out of Vancouver (I think they drive down to Tsawassen and take a boat from there). Not sure what I will get up to yet, but if the weather is good I'll be out somewhere for sure.

Have a nice weekend everybody!

Magic Music Maker!

2007-09-14T07:56:00.000-07:00

I've fallen in love with this thing. It's called the Tenori-On and it's an interactive electronic instrument. It is hard to describe, so go check out this video instead. Or go to the official website. Shame it's only available in the UK at the moment, and that it's so expensive - around 600 pounds!

Photos from Tofino weekend

2007-09-14T07:42:00.001-07:00

I wanted to wait until I had gathered together some photos from other people's cameras before I uploaded this set. Now I have some surfing pictures too, and a few photos of when we all ate together one evening. Check out the photos here.

We all had a good time in Tofino, despite the rain. I've come to the conclusion though that I've walked pretty much everywhere interesting there is to walk around Tofino and Ucluelet, and it's time for me to find somewhere new. If we do go back that way for surfing, I might have to take a trip to an island or something where the terrain is more varied - Tofino is a bit flat!

Crowded House

2007-09-08T18:34:00.000-07:00

I've posted some photos on Flickr of this gig, which was on Monday (Labor Day). We came back early from Tofino for it, and unfortunately it was still raining. By the end of the evening we were quite thoroughly damp, but the music was great and watching it outdoors was a refreshing change that just made the whole thing more memorable. They played plenty of big hits to keep the crowd happy. It was a good night, and I am glad we went. Steph loved it.

Go Physics Team!

2007-09-08T17:24:00.000-07:00

Two weeks ago yesterday, we had the ATG summer event at work. ATG is the group I work for at Radical Entertainment. It stands for Advanced Technology Group, and we work on the common engine used by all the games that Radical makes. The summer event was an amazing race around the downtown Vancouver area on foot and using public transport. Thirteen or fourteen teams competed in all, half from ATG and half from a game team called HairClub. Those guys made the Hulk games in the past. It was a hot afternoon and got pretty sweaty running from here to there. There were also challenges at each destination such as singing and a hula hoop, and many more. My team was made up of the guys who work on Physics within ATG. In the end we came in 5th which was pretty respectable, although we could have done better - we were actually leading at one point. Steph was also racing in a HairClub team, but her team quit after a while and lazed around instead. Slackers! In the overall scores, ATG won a decisive victory over HairClub. Once again the geeks are victorious (we beat the game teams in the BBQ tug-of-war too). It was good exercise, and afterwards we got free booze and food. The picture shows me and the physics guys at the end of the race (in Gastown).

More photos from Tim's cabin in Vernon

2007-09-08T00:10:00.000-07:00

This is a bit old hat now, but I finally sorted out some of the photos that Tim and Carla took on their camera to add to our own. I've added them to the existing photoset on Flickr. Enjoy.

Coming soon - lots more photos from Tofino and Crowded House.

Tofino again!

2007-08-30T21:05:00.000-07:00

We are off to Tofino for the Labor Day weekend. We are leaving around 7am tomorrow to catch an 8.30am ferry to the island with our friend Jon. On Saturday, more of our friends are making their own way - Laurie and Bob, Mark, and Colin and Jo. All in one car - that will be cozy! Some of us are surfing this weekend (which includes Steph, but not me), and the rest of us will do some walking I expect. Sadly, the weather once again forecasts rain. This will be the third time we've been to Tofino, and it has rained every time :)

We are leaving early on holiday Monday to come back. That is partly because the ferries are really busy and we could only get on an early one, and partly because we are going to see Crowded House in the evening. We got our dates a bit mixed up, but never mind. They changed the time and the venue at the last minute too. It was going to be at the Orpheum theatre, but because of the continuing strikes involving civil workers, the theatre is closed at the moment. So instead the gig will be outdoors in Stanley Park. That should be fun, although possibly a little damp if it is still raining. We'll see.

Have a nice weekend!

Mini Film Review Trio

2007-08-29T08:21:00.000-07:00

I'm getting behind with this blogging lark. Not last weekend but the weekend before, we ended up seeing three movies in a row on consecutive days. We hadn't planned to, but got invites from various people so it turned out that way. Here are my opinions.

Ratatouille

This is probably the best CG movie I have ever seen. It looked totally gorgeous - flawless in fact. The animation is beautiful, especially the facial animation which blew me away. It's also a great story with a lot of good humour. I expected to like this movie, but not this much. I can't recommended this film highly enough - sheer genius. You must see it!

Sunshine

I like a good sci-fi movie, but sadly they don't make many so when a new one comes out I am always interested. So, is Sunshine a good sci-fi movie? Yes! Surprisingly good in fact. It manages to capture the feeling of isolation and vulnerability that made 2001 a good film, but combines that with a nail-biting suspense plot that builds continuously as the film progresses. The tension is thick in this film, and in a similar way to 28 Weeks Later I felt kind of exhausted after the film ended from the adrenaline and the stress I was feeling. I'm weird, but I like when a movie can do that to me. Oh, and the "sci" in this sci-fi movie is nicely done too - sort of modern technology plus, rather than crazy out-there stuff. Plausible for sure. If I have to criticize, the characters could have been a little more likeable, although I did manage to care about them nonetheless. Also, towards the end things get a little bizarre and stretch your suspension of disbelief somewhat. Still, if you like science-fiction then you'll probably get a lot from this movie like I did.

Stardust

Last but not least: an adaptation of a book by Neil Gaiman. I haven't read the book, and I knew nothing about this movie before I went to see it, which is always great. It's especially great when the movie turns out to be really good like this one. The nearest comparison I can think of is probably The Princess Bride, but it is basically a comic fantasy. It's probably a little darker than The Princess Bride maybe. Anyway, it's a strong cast and if you are English like me you'll appreciate spotting lots of British comedy actors in the movie. The whole film has a very English feel about it actually. The jokes are funny, the action is satisfying, and apart from a few cheesy or predictable moments, the film delivers. Going to see a movie you know nothing about that turns out to be a great movie is one of life's little pleasures. Why not try this movie yourself?

Superbugs 1 Anti-bacterial Soap 0

2007-08-20T07:13:00.000-07:00

Whilst I am posting news articles that interest me, Steph pointed me at this one a couple of days ago. Apparently anti-bacterial soap is no better at cleaning your hands than the regular kind, and may actually be worse. This is something else I have generally always felt was true. I suppose it is all part and parcel of how modern life is far too obsessed with germs and how we should annihilate them. I blame big chemical companies for instilling that particular fear in us, so they can push their myriad of cleaning products. There's lots of good science to suggest that this unnecessary degree of cleanliness leads to allergies, asthma, eczema and digestive conditions, among other things.

Safer in the back

2007-08-20T07:08:00.000-07:00

I always suspected tha the rear of a plane was the safest place to sit in the event of a crash. Not sure why - maybe it was the intuition that the rear of the plane is the furthest away from the end that hits things, or maybe because it is also furthest away from the wings (which are usually filled with higly flammable fuel). Anyway, recently I came across this article from Popular Mechanics. They examined data from all 20 US plane crashes since 1971 and crunched the survival statistics. Check it out.

Kayaking up Indian Arm

2007-08-19T14:08:00.001-07:00

Steph has uploaded a bunch of kayaking photos (yes, Steph! Who'd have thought? :) ).

Some of them are from a disposable waterproof camera that we used several times this year, so they span quite a period of time. So we added a few to some older sets for Steph's parents visit and Deep Cove kayaking.

The rest are from a day trip that Steph and a bunch of our friends did last Sunday. They started at Deep Cove again and paddled up Indian Arm. It was around 33km in all which is impressive, and I think everyone had a good time. Check out the photos here.

I didn't go that day, as I've been having some problems recently with my right hip that has made it uncomfortable for me to sit a long time. I'll probably go to the doctors this week about that.

Mini Film Review: The Bourne Ultimatum

2007-08-19T13:59:00.000-07:00

More of the same, which made me happy because I loved the first two movies. The camera was even wobblier this time around - perhaps a little too wobbly. I liked the fact that the film had a really minimal script, and did a lot without much dialogue. I particular liked the relationship between Jason Bourne and Julia Stiles's character - few words, lots of moody glances. Great fight scene too (as always). Oh yes, and the car chases down Italian streets made me a little homesick for Europe - everything's a grid here. Shame this is the last movie. And Bourne would obviously kick Bond's arse (though it would be close).

Back to nature (sort of)

2007-08-11T13:38:00.000-07:00

Last weekend was a holiday weekend here in British Columbia, celebrating BC Day on the Monday. We were very lucky to be invited by our friends Tim and Carla to spend the weekend in Tim's cabin near Vernon.

We took the Friday as a holiday so we could have four whole days off, and drove up with Tim on the Thursday evening. The journey is about 6 hours by car, and was made more exciting thanks to Tim and Carla's cat Maggie which roamed loose in the car at times and tried to bite me and Steph :)

The cabin lies on the edge of Kalamalka Lake which is just south of Vernon itself. It's a gorgeous location. It's very comfortable, but what we didn't know before we arrived was that the cabin has no electricity or running water, so we'd packed a little inappropriately. Still, it was a surprise when we got there!

On the Friday it was just the three of us, but on Friday evening Carla arrived with another couple, Katrina and Ivan, who were good friends of Tim and Carla. They were very nice guys, and we all got along nicely I think. On Saturday, Tim and Carla's neighbour Mark arrived too. He was good fun, and told some excellent stories.

We pretty much spent the whole weekend engaged in arduous activities such as:

Eating large meals
Preparing large meals to eat
Drinking (anything we could, from mid-morning onwards)
Lying in the sun
Swimming in the lake

Sounds pretty tough eh? Well, it wasn't - it was sweet! There was also some sailing too, when the wind permitted. I thought I wouldn't get on too well without my creature comforts, but really the lack of modern trappings just made it all the more relaxing - no TV to distract or anything. Steph and I even spent a couple of nights sleeping out in a tent for the hell of it which was fun, especially when I woke up one morning to find the inner mesh layer of the tent surrounded by mosquitoes. It was like starring in GNATS! The Movie! Thank god they didn't find a way inside.

So yes, a good time was had by all I think, and us especially. One of the best holidays we've had here in Canada. I've uploaded our photos, and hopefully I will get my hands on some more as there were two other cameras taking snaps.

Mini Film Review: Transformers

2007-08-11T13:18:00.000-07:00

+ The robots were pretty cool to look at.
+ Shia LaBeouf was great, but totally wasted. This guy has lots of talent, and a strong presence on-screen. He could be the next big thing if he can find the right movies (like not this one :) ).
+ Lots of bangs to keep you awake.

- Too many inappropriate comedy moments
- Too long - learn to edit, film-makers!
- Not sure if I was just sitting too close to the screen, but all the blurred motion and fast cuts made me dizzy at times.

OVERALL: Entertainment for a few hours, but quite forgettable. This film satisfied, but probably isn't going to make anybody's Top Ten.

Celebration of Light

2007-08-11T11:46:00.000-07:00

This year, Spain, Canada and China held firework displays to music. Steph and I watched Spain and China from the beach at English Bay, and it was great - very loud. It seemed busier this year than last year too, especially for China's display. We saw Canada from our friend Jon's place - he had a barbecue with some other friends too. Jon has a pretty good view of English Bay from his flat in Kitsilano. We thought that China was by far the best fireworks display this year, but in the end Canada won the competition. There are more photos from the fireworks here.

A few photos from Steph's parents visit

2007-08-11T11:43:00.000-07:00

These are pretty old now too - I haven't updated the blog in a while. Anyway, here are the photos.

More Tug-Of-War

2007-08-11T11:29:00.000-07:00

Very belated, but I've uploaded a bunch more photos of the Radical summer barbecue, and in particular my double tug-of-war victory.

Tug-Of-War

2007-07-26T07:27:00.001-07:00

This was sort of ages ago now - on Friday 13th July in fact. We had our company barbecue at Trout Lake Park, which included lots of food. No drink though - it's a family affair and also it is illegal to consume alcohol in public here. Always feels strange for an English person to be outside in the summer time without booze :)

Anyway, after food there was a tug-of-war, or two in fact. The first was Europeans vs. Canadians, and the second was ATG (the tools and tech group that I work in) vs. Game Teams. I took part in both, and we won both times! This is a clear indication that I was the best at tug-of-war. See the attached photo which proves this beyond any doubt. I'm the angry-looking one.

(Not So) Mini Film Review: Live Free Or Die Hard

2007-07-15T18:22:00.000-07:00

Yes, I made Steph go see it too! I was in the mood for some mindless action. The plot certainly plucks a lot of comtemporary elements from today's headlines, and then mixes them together into something a little ridiculous. Don't even start looking for the holes either: it would be like shooting fish in a barrel. Just sit back and let it wash over you. There are some excellent action sequences (gawd bless computer graphics), and Willis does his wise-cracking cop bit once again and quite adequately while he gets the crap beaten out of him. Surprise takeaways for me from this movie were:

The geeky sidekick character (played by Justin Long) who stayed just on the right side of irritating with his sharp dialogue - I thought he would quickly irritate but he was a great addition to the film. Kudos to the scriptwriter(s).
Mindless violence. Something didn't sit right with me while watching this movie, and afterwards Steph hit the nail right on the head - the killing in this movie is frequent and extremely casual. Life is cheap, and people get wasted left and right by the "good guys" without pause for thought. Even for an action movie, this seems to lack some sort of moral backbone. I must be getting old :)

Warm weekends :)

2007-07-08T17:26:00.000-07:00

Summer is back - woohoo! I am delighted to report that the weather forecasts were wrong for last weekend. We had sunshine and only a little cloud, and lovely warm temperatures. It was awesome. We got in several hours of walking over two days, and some good food. We even watched part of an exciting bmx championship. A very good weekend. You can see some photos of it here.

Since that weekend, the good weather has stayed. It has been a great week with really warm, summer weather and this weekend has been the same. Steph's parents visited the Okanagan this week while we were at work, and had an excellent time I think. Yesterday, we did some kayaking again at Deep Cove. We hired two double kayaks for three hours in the afternoon. It was pretty hairy at first as there was a lot of boat traffic. Fast-moving boats create big wakes that can really upset a kayak, though they don't seem to appreciate that - damn them!

Once we had gotten away from all the boats, things were much more pleasant. We stopped off at Belcarra Park and relaxed on the grass for a little while. Steph and her mum took a quick dip in the water but it is cold so they didn't last long. The paddle back was much better as a lot of the boats had disappeared. It was fun afternoon, and John and Ursula really enjoyed the experience I think, though it was hard work. We took some photos, but they are on a waterproof disposable camera. I think there are about 7 photos left, so at some point fairly soon we can develop the film and upload them.

Today, we've taken it much easier. We went out for coffee and lunch, and then popped over to Granville Island to buy some food for this evening. We have some lovely fresh tuna steaks to accompany another nice bottle of BC wine. Superb! My gum graft is pretty much recovered completely now, and I am really enjoying my food again.

Next week, Steph's parents are away again: Vancouver Island this time. They will be back on Thursday evening for their last few days, and we'll probably have a nice posh meal next Saturday before they leave - possibly at Bistro Pastis. Yes, definitely enjoying my food again!

Canada Day weekend

2007-06-30T09:45:00.000-07:00

Steph's Mum and Dad arrived on Thursday. This Sunday is Canada Day and Monday is a bank holiday, so we are taking advantage of the long weekend to take a trip to Whistler together. We are hoping to do a bit of sightseeing and perhaps some walking. The weather forecasts are in disagreement, but sadly don't look good. It is still pretty wet here - very disappointing for the end of June. We are taking rain gear, and preparing to get wet while we walk :) Doubtless there will be photos next week to upload.

Hope all our friends and family have a good weekend too!

Mini Film Review: Paprika

2007-06-30T09:41:00.000-07:00

This is as unusual Japanese anime about dreams. It is pretty crazy, but quite inventive and with some fantastic imagery. Lots of imagination on display. The story treads a fine line but barely remains comprehensible, which was a relief. It's one of those movies that leaves you feeling pretty good at the end too. If you like Miyazaki movies and that kind of whimsical Japanese fantasy, you'll probably like this movie too. Thoroughly pleasant!

Life stuff

2007-06-24T17:32:00.000-07:00

It's raining again. Where's the nice summer weather we had last year? It actually thundered a little this afternoon which is very rare for Vancouver - it might only be the second or third time we've seen that.

Last week was pretty uneventful, and slightly miserable for me as I'm recovering from my gum graft. We did go out on the Friday evening for an Indian. The food wasn't bad, but not fantastic either. We met Tom and Amy, who are visiting some of our other friends. They were very nice.

Yesterday, Lauren and Woody had a housewarming barbeque. They've bought an awesome house in Kitsilano that Steph and I thought was ace. We arrived a little late at 3pm, and finally left around 1am when we were all kicked out :) The food and drink never stopped. All credit to Lauren and Woody for putting on a damn good do. There was plenty of inane drunken conversation later in the evening too which is always nice. We took a few photos which I uploaded here.

This week Steph's parents arrive for about two and a half weeks holiday. We are going to Whistler next weekend with them. I hope the weather improves! And tonight we are going to see Paprika at the cinema with Laurie and Bob. I'm hoping it will be good - it looks completely mental.

Gum watch part 2

2007-06-24T16:45:00.000-07:00

I had the dressings taken out on Thursday when I returned to my periodontist. He was very pleased with the progress of the graft, and reckoned it looked like two weeks of healing rather than just one. Unfortunately, removing the dressings revealed that the roof of my mouth (where the graft was taken from) was still very raw. It was bleeding a little on Thursday, and since then has been improving, but more slowly than I expected. Even today it is too tender to touch things that I eat, which means I am still limited with my meals - nothing hard or sharp. I can at least bite my teeth together now, so chewing is possible again. I'm very happy that the graft itself has gone well though. I've also had good news on the financial front, as my dental insurance should pick up most of the cost. Hurrah!

Micro Film Review: Day Watch

2007-06-24T16:36:00.000-07:00

This is a Russian fantasy thriller, and the sequel to Night Watch. Night Watch was a pretty entertaining film with lots of inventive moments. Unfortunately, Day Watch was fairly awful. The plot is disjointed and mostly incomprehensible. The dialogue is mostly bizarre or just bad. What little action there is does not manage to thrill at all. There are still a few parts of the film that show some creativity, but they are not worth having to sit through the rest of the film for. I think there is going to be a third movie in the series, but I won't bother with it unless I see some good reviews first.

Gum graft

2007-06-14T21:56:00.000-07:00

Today, I had my gum graft. I've postponed several times because of visitors and other things, though probably in the back of my mind I was dodging the inevitable - I was not looking forward to it. I have receding gums (I think it might run in the family) and the gums around my lower front teeth are particularly bad. My periodontist said that if I didn't have the graft the teeth would eventually fall out, so that motivated me into doing it.

I was awake for the whole thing this time (I had a general anaesthetic for my wisdom teeth). It lasted about 45 minutes and was a little uncomfortable throughout, but no pain. They removed a piece of tissue from the roof of my mouth, and then attached it over my lower front gum area.

The rest of the day has been spent ice-packing my face to reduce the swelling. I did get some useful stuff done too - I managed to create a DVD from a load of camcorder movies I have of my family. I like my new Mac - it's fast enough to do cool stuff :) Eating is quite difficult, because I have hard dressings over the donor site and the graft, so I can't actually close my teeth completely to bite. I am staring down the barrel of another exciting week of eating soup and feeling really hungry. Looking forward to it. Still no pain yet though, so it's not all bad. Oh yes, and it cost nearly C$1800 dollars! I hope my dental plan will cough up...