Have I mentioned that I hate packing and moving? We're supposed to leave in just a few hours, almost nothing is packed and I have the headache from hell....gah.

I hate packing.

I haven't updated in forever! I'm not sure why. I've had so many little things I've needed to get done, that when I did anything else I felt so guilty. But I finally managed to send out my Camp DVD's and I finally wrote my resignation letter for work, so they know I'm not coming back in January. (although, I'm still technically employed so I can work there on any of my breaks). I felt like a HUGE weight was lifted when I finished those things. Now I just have the GIANT stack of names and addresses to enter into the datbase for dad. But Tarah is helping me with it, so hopefully it will be done soon.

So, my family Christmas was this weekend. It was nuts trying to get ready for it though. Tarah and I had an epic trip to Kingston where we almost got run over, almost froze to death and almost got arrested at costco. Good times. (note to everyone, you CANNOT go in to costco with your mothers card, even if the picture is 3/4 scratched off and you have a letter of perission with you...A very angry cashierwill spank you with her eyes and look like she might call security, give you a big lecture and make you think you're going to have to put back all of your $200 of groceries piece by piece in shame. Luckily, she eventually let us through...tarah and I almost cried...or peed ourselves...it was scary)

Family Christmas was really fun, we stopped buying everyone a gift a few years ago, and now we do a 'chinese present exachange' also known as 'the present grabbing game' Everyone brings a gift on a theme (this year was 'relaxation'), you draw names and one at a time you take a gift either from the pile, or from someone who has already taken one. I ended up with a super comfy blanket. I also got some very nice things in my stocking and Julie gave me this gorgeous wrap/scarf thing. So yay for presents, and we're having a whole other christmas on actual Christmas! I ate a few two many home made gingerbread cookies (tarah and I are excellent bakers) with buttercream icing though..and My stomach is rather sore.

So my aunt, uncle and two cousins and Julie were going to leave yesterday afternoon. Unfortunately the giant storm (aka the BEAST) had hit us full force, tons of snow and wind that made the house feel like it was going to fall over. But they decided to leave anyway...I have a few pictures that I'll probably post later, but they were TOTALLY stuck in the bat for about half an hour. IT took six people pushing the car out of a giant snowbank, and using boards and stuff but they did finally get out. We called them about 20 minutes later and they were stuck at the gas station (that is about 5 minutes away.) They planned to continue on but Julie decided that there was no way she was getting back inthe car, so we got confirmation that it would be ok for her to make up her exam that she would miss and she would stay another night. Now, to rescue her from the gas station, dad called up a friend who lives along our service road, who has a snowmobile. So julie got rescued by snowmobile. Big adventure. lol.

The storm continued untill midnight or so, we have SO much snow it's unbeleivable. We haven't had this much for a really long time. Mom bought us a snowtubethough...so as soon as we get that filled up, we're going to try it out! yay!

So my manager from the portrait studio just called me...I'll be working 40 hours next week (I don't ever do more than 28) which is great..but I'll be spending the first three days in a giant Shrek mascot costume....yup...dressed as Shrek, running around a grocery store. I am awesomeness incarnate.

Incidentally, people in mascot costumes freak me out and I tend to avoid them at all costs...and I'm claustrophobic...this should be a really interesting experience.

Today I had a nap in the middle of the day and had the most BIZARRE dream. and I felt the need to record it in some form, so here it is for posterity, and your reading pleasure.

My family was going to see a show on Broadway, we were really excited because it was Annie. (now...in real life I don't think I would ever actually pay money to see annie unless I knew someone in it...) While we were waiting in line outside the theatre, Bernadette Peters is waiting in line and getting really impatient that they won't let her jump the line. She started yelling things like "I'm in costume for gods sakes, I just want my ice cream" which seemed really weird. Eventually someone asked to take a picture with her across the street and she went with them, there was the flash and then she dissapeared. Then mom and I ran in to the theatre, we were late. The overture was just finishing up so we ran to our seats, but apparently you had to put an american quarter in the seat to get it to fold down, we didn't have quarters so we had to sort of perch on top of the chairs. The stage didn't look like a stage, it looked like an old church where the altar had been ripped out and a platform had been stuck up...sort of like st. peters church in brockville...(I think thats the right one..we have sooo many churches...the one where the youth choir performed). And then the girls started sining 'maybe'. And it was awful. They weren't singing in time, adn some were singing the wrong notes. Then Annie (who was black, with ridiculously bright red hair...think lesley andrew...but black and 12 years old) started to sing, but because everyone had given her such a crappy intro, she couldn't find the tempo or the key. It was AWFUL. Then some guy (i think it was daddy warbux, because he was bald) rode an old fasioned bicycle in front of the front of the stage, from one side to the other ringing the bicycle bell, but he left the door to backstage open and I could see all the chorus people and more orphans smoking.

Then I woke up.

Am I on crack or what?

Ok..so a quote from annie as the title is cheesy...
( here is a super long entry with pictures about my recent trip to NYC where I saw rent with Adam Pascall and Anthony Rapp, and Spamalot, and did other fun stuff... )

So Mom and Tarah and I went grocery shopping at the superstore at 8:30 tonight, right before it closed. (I handed in my resume to work at the portrait studio as well..we'll see how that goes) And as I was standing in line at the checkout (mom was grabbing some last minute item and Tarah was looking for something and also not in line) this guy comes and stands behind me in line, not a creepy thing as this is the only checkout available, and then suddenly it was like everything smelled weird and all my hair stood up and I was incredibly creeped out. It wasn't a bad smell, like he stunk, or a creepy smell like too much alchol or pott, it was just, wrong. So I start freaking out a little and the guy asks to cut in front of me because all he has is this one thing of pre-prepared chicken. So I say sure go ahead, to get him away as fast as possible. Whereupon he asks the cashier "so...are you here all alone tonight?" in an extrememly creepy voice. When she had checked him through she called her supervisor because she was totaly creeped out and that was the second time he had come through her cash in the last 20 minutes. When we finaly got through and left with our groceries he was standing in the front entrace of the store...eating his chicken and staring at the entrace door. It was really really creepy..when tarah walked past him all her hair stood up...it was weird, I've never had the instict to just run the second I came near someone. Mom went back in and told the cashier that he was still there, security was kicking him out as we drove away... but all in all, very creepy. And I'm creeped out that it was a weird smell that tipped me off. I mean, I've always had a good sense of smell but apparently..I can smell badness...

weird.

I have a university degree...and I am unprepared for real life. I have NO IDEA how to write a cover letter.
I googled it and got some fairly vague outlines of what should be in a cover letter but as my education and background have pretty much nothing to do with the jobs I'll be applying for (bank teller, waitress, retail etc) I really don't know what to do as my examples aren't very helpful the examples that I could find were for things like summer internships with big pharmaceutical companies.
As with most things that I don't know how to do, I've just been putting this off...that is not good as I need a job so that I can go to school in January...eeeps! Any help would be appreciated! does anyone have a copy of their cover letters applying for jobs like these that I could look at? You could be my personal hero!

Phew....I'm done. Harry Potter that is. Wow.

( Cut for Spoilers! )

Thanks to those who had their fingers crossed...I would like to introduce the newest member of the Kennedy family...

TA DA

That's him out in the yard...

Here's him with Tarah


Here he is hiding under the table...he likes to sit by dads feet while he works...


Here he is with his dishes and Julie's (craigs girlfriend) shoes! It shows his size really well..he's so TINY!


He's more or less completely adorable. He's a Maltese (supposedly purebred, but we got him from a petstore, not a breeder so he has no papers, which is fine) he's super tiny, really really friendly and easygoing and loves to run around outside. Dad and Craig brought him home today and ran him aroudn so much that he was totaly pooped when we (Mom, Tarah and I) got home from Ottawa.
He is yet to be named. Dublin was the main choice and we'd sort of been calling him that in the petstore...but Dad isn't sure he liked it. I like Guiness (ginny for short!) Tarah hates it, we all like Liam, but Tarah wants to name one of her kids that someday and doesn't want it to be weird, also currently underconsideration is 'Aidan'. Clearly we want some sort of irish inspired name for the pup.

tee hee!

Yesterday morning I was awakened (awoke?) by a bloodcurdling scream from downstairs where I thought my sister was being brutally murdered. So I run to the top of the stairs and she is screaming and pointing "SQUIRREL!" and there was a squirrel panicking and running all over our dining room...it was weird. He eventually dove under the couch (after trying to get out of all the screened windows and launching himself hedlong into the glass door.). Where he remained trying to poke his out out for about half an hour...I caught the little monster on film...




My mom threw a corn muffin out the door and after a lot of waiting she stood on the side of the room away from the door and made noise until he escaped. He ran way. We closed the door and five minutes later, he came back and stole the corn muffin!!! This is a squirrel unafraid of people. But we coudln't figure out how he got in....until we went to check Tarahs room...



He had chewed a hole in the screen!
and broken her guitar lamp!



She then yelled at me to stop taking pictures like a CSI. So I did. But there was no food in her room and NO reason for the squirrel to go to the trouble of chewing through her screen...weird.
I caught him hanging around the glass doors at the front...looking for away to get in..he's not afriad of people either...I think Dad or Craig may be going on a hunt this evening....

yipes! The joy of living in the country!

So today the flower shop delivers a single yellow rose addressed to Dad. He wasn't home but mom opened up the card and it said "thinking of you" from the Brockville animal Hospital and the flower shop. Mom almost cried, then I almost cried, then Tarah almost cried. But really, how sweet is that that the Vet's would send us a flower because they knew we would be sad. I thought it was really nice.

so...I'm trying to come up with a name to use for my theatre co. for this summer, I wasn't sure I was going to do anything, but now its looking like a bunch of concerts and a musical...probably lucky stiff...but I can't get a perusal or rights without a name..I don't want to use the same name I've used for the past two years because that was Jess's group as well, and she's in vancouver, plus I think she didn't return a perusal..or had it forever and I don't want to have that assumed about me. Plus, our old BYT bank account is closed, so I need to start all over anyway... so..I need a new name..Stat! It would be nice if it had somehting to do wiht the St. lawrence river, that Brockville is on...but it doesn't have to..and I like players because really its just a group of us putting on a show...

I like...

Rivers edge players

Spotlight productions (but I think there are 1000 groups already called this)

St. Lawrence players (there is one other group with this name that I could fine, and they're in the states...)

Brockville Youth Theatre (keeps the BYT while being something different..but it's boring..and I think a camp might have this name)

The Show Must Go On theatre co. (this is long..but I sort of like it)

Spotlight on the Water Theatre Co. (again..long..but likeable...)

I need opinions and votes! lol.

He's gone. It was so sad. I've randomly been crying all day, and then I think, this is dumb, he was just a dog, then I think, no it's totaly justified he was a member of my family for 14 years and it's sad and weird that he's gone.

He would sing with me, he would wake Tarah up when her sugar was critically low and no one else noticed (about four cases of this happening...I have no idea how he knew), he would run around like crazy after a bath and let Tarah dress him up in pj's when she was little. He would always greet us at the door when you came home, or lie near you when you were sick. He was completely devoted to my dad. I used to make little jumps in the front yard and make him go over them. He would attack any dog bigger than him to 'protect' us and always barked at the bad guys or any animal on the TV. (he could pick out a badguy before we could sometimes) I'm so very very sad that he's gone.

*sigh*

The TCD stands for 'the christmas dog' as he was a Christmas present even though we technically got him november 17th. We got a fax from Santa that there was an exciting present waiting for us at home, Dad got a fax from Santa telling him that there was a dog waiting for us at the Humane society in Ottawa and frisbee's ID number (I saw both faxes..and they were from the number 1 800 north pole, so I'm pretty sure they were legit! :) ) and there he was. When dad picked him up he was a mere two hours away from being put down because of his chronic ear infections that made him 'unsuitable' for adoption. (a totaly easy fix with antibiotics) And then he was ours for 14 years. I named him. We wanted to call him 'frisky' because he was..well..jumping around and frisky..but Craig had a fish named Frisky at the time and you can't have two pets of the same name so I figured Frisbee was kind of close. And thus the crazy name was born. He was about two when we got him...and 16 is really old for a dog, and he was very sick and unhappy...so it really was time for him to go. He even seemed happy to be at the vet, which is totaly totaly unlike him. And it was really quick, and totaly painless, he just relaxed...lay down and went to sleep. And it was so hard to leave him there, except that it was with the vet that really liked him...so, that made it easier. We pick up his ashes next week and we're going to bury him in the garden.

*sigh*

I'm going to miss him.

Tomorow..3 o'clock appointment at the vet. Then no more Frisbee. I keep crying, it's really ridiculous.

And for more fun, we were sitting on the couch watching a movie, and my mom found a tick on her neck. (we live in the country and yet we've never seen ticks before (Any of us)) So that prompted a massive freak out, running around, calling telehealth and everyone checking each other for ticks. Followed by everyone fighting too go first for a really hot shower. (I got to go second) *shudder* We have the little thing in a ziplock bag...apparently there are more of them than usual this year. yipee.

This was officially a bad day.

I think we're going to have to put my dog down. He's super old and covered in lumps and keeps having weird seizures. It's ridiculously sad, and I wish he would just die naturally because the thought of being directly responsible for his death makes me cry. Poor puppy....

I AM DONE!!
I just finished my last exam of my university career! HOORAH!!

Ok..so I haven't been watching any of my TV shows lately because I've had no time (V-mars, which is done anyway, Battlestar Galactica, Lost, Gilmore girls) so tonight I had time..and I downloaded all the Battlestar ones, watched about five and made it through the season finale. Holy crap! I get affected by TV WAY to much, I was sitting there BAWLING during one episode, and during the season finale I was totaly creeped out, and then sat there for ten minutes with my jaw hanging open..it was SO amazing. But now I have to wait until JANUARY!!! for the next episodes... *sigh*. I like good storytelling way to much..lol. It's addictive! Next project...catch up on LOST!

In other news..Im at my limit of 15 userpics...This makes me very much want to buy a paid account.....hmmmmm....

So a week of relative craziness has come and gone. The whole weekend was Easter related activities, including a nice dinner and fun times with little cousins.
Monday night was fun LMT dinner at Mongolian, good times!

Tuesday was my skills performance exam, for which I had to use the paper because it was so damn hard! and I was REALLY freaking out that I had failed the course (and therefore, not earned my degree!) However, I did just get my skills mark back yesterday, and I did pass! (not even a D- a good solid D!!!) Hooorah! this means I get to graduate! yay!

Wednesday was my jury! eeeks! Stressfull! But it went pretty well and I had a massive sleep the night before (I actually got into bed when the clock still said..PM! shocking!) They didn't ask for one song that I actually really wanted to sing...but luckily it was one I was doing in my recital..so I did get to perform it. Even the crazy 20th Century piece that Heidi and I had never done without stopping and Lynda had never heard the accopmaniment for, went well. One small mistake where I had to slide up to the right note quickly, but other than that it was all good!

Thursday was my opera history exam, which I was FREAKING out about. However, I studied as much as I could (with less than 24 hours to study...I tend to take things like this one at a time, so when they're close together, it poses a problem for me...), and I think I did fairly well on the exam, and I got my paper back wiht a good mark, despite the fact that she personally disagreed with almsot everything I said. Ah well..the comments she wrote are hilarious! Some are helpful, some are just funny. (ie: puccini would role over in his grave~!) I spent thursday night making programs for...

MY RECITAL! was on friday. It wasn't just mine, it was Danielle and Angela as well. It was probably the most thrown together, fly by the seat of your pants recital ever in the history of Laurier, but thats ok. We actually managed to make 318 pretty, my mom bought tons and tons of flowers to make it look nice, we had fruit and goodies (some that my grandma made) and cheese and crackers and Punch! (we realized that none of us how to make punch..so I made up a punch recipe and everyone loved it...its very simple: Gingerale, Cranberry juice, frozen lemonade concentrate, frozen fruit...mmmm! mix in bowl...the end) My songs went well, I liked my dress and I wore my hairband with the fun feathery thing for my Weill song...it was very diva-ish..I enjoyed.


Close up of weird headband...weird or cool? You decide!


Me after the recital with flowers from my Grandmas and aunt!


All three of us afterwards...

My parents, sister, two grandmas, aunt and cousin were all there plus music student friends and LMT friends..so that was great! I felt good about my singing, particularly the Amy Cheney Beach songs...they are so fun! and are full of high notes! tee hee... It's funny, but a lot of my friends haven't heard me sing classical...and My family hasn't really either, for a long time, and never like this. So that was really exciting! Im excited to get the recording! yay! Ally and her boyfriend came up from Brockville/Montreal to see the recital...afterwards we watched her 'Little shop of Horrors' production from this year and my 'Bat Boy'. It was rather fun. I forgot how much I loved our show until I watch the DVD again..Im SOO proud of it, for myself and for the club and for everyone who worked on it..its just...amazing. And as many problems as we've had with exec...hearing about how allys theatre club is run makes ours sound like some kind of utopia... so that's always good to hear.

So now Im super exaughsted and should go to bed..though tomorow will be a day of lounging around and going to Lianes grad recital! yay!

So now I only have ONE more exam..EVER in my University career, and it's not for a week! I say party/packing time! yay!