No sleep. NO Sleep.

Koda is lucky that he is so cute. Last night he woke me up more than 10 times, mostly by attacking my butt, but also by jumping on my nuts and when I finally kicked him out, clawing loudly at the carpet under the door. I was this close to de-clawing him with a paper cutter I was so mad. On the up side, we don't have a paper cutter. Funny thing, though. As soon as the alarm went off and we were supposed to get up, he was good as gold and better, just sitting next to Jenn and cuddling her.

Needless to say, I am grumpy today from the no sleep.

Yeah, Reading Week!...

Well, reading week is almost half over and I still have way too much to do! It's not a break at all for me this time. I am trying desperately to get through as much reading and work ahead on as many assignments as I possibly can so that when crunch time comes I am not going crazy and I can focus on my practicing and getting ready for my recital. So, if you haven't seen or heard from me, that's why.

School is going pretty good so far, and this semester is half over now, I am glad to say. I am already registered for two summer courses this year and am actually really looking forward to my practicum next year.

I was really excited to realize I get to buy a nice dress next year as well as this year as this year I needed a dress for my recital, and next year I will need a dress for my Grad! Woot!

The dress I got for my recital is hot, can't wait to show it off at my recital! You'd better all be there...

Today I made it up to Koda

I felt bad about getting Koda fixed and then rushing down to Calgary for the weekend leaving him at his sister's mercy, so today I used a scrap piece of fleece and all the catnip pellets I had left and some ground up honeysuckle branch to make him 16 new toys. I just put them in a pile on my chair and let him discover them. I have rarely seen such an excited cat. He has laready lost 8 of them under things, but that's fine, I can always make more.

Our trip to Calgary was fine, we had awesome chinese food at my mom and dad's place, and the roads only got really bad when we passed Red Deer on the way back. That started to suck when we ran out of wiper fluid, so I had to pull over and top off the tank with the jug I keep in the back. Then I went to work while Jenn worked on a couple of flutes, one of which is more or less finished now, yay.

I got my cat fixed and all he got was this lousy jingle ball.

Poor Koda had to go to the Vet yesterday to have his junk removed. He seems to be okay with it, however, which is good. He also has a cool new tattoo, which will probably make all the other cats in the neigbourhood jealous. (We live in that kind of a neigbourhood, with brake shops and peeler bars.)

On a less happy note, WHAT THE HELL WAS GOING ON IN THE CANADA-SWITZERLAND GAME? We don't win at bobsled, they don't win at hockey!

Oh, and back to happy, I just made my version of a gourmet pizza that we had in Esquimalt. It has BBQ sauce instead of tomato sauce, and the toppings consist of red peppers, caramelized shallots, blue cheese and feta, and roast chicken. If I had any, I would have added bacon. I know... It sounds wierd... Try it... You'll like it.

Oh, and I got an early birthday present in the form of this book! I love this series. I hope they keep making them. I would love it if I could find, "The Food of Vietnam: A Food Lover's Journey."

Mediation Training

So this week, I took the LESA Mediation of Divorce and Separation course. It was fairly intensive, but definitely a worthwhile experience. The plan at this point, then, is to get set up and start marketing a mediation practice as I finish my thesis. The bonus of this is that it is a lot more realistic to operate a mediation practice part time than to practice law part time, and that the pay is a bit better than the wine store, assuming I get any business. For those who are looking for great gifts for me for my birthday, you can think about checking out my wishlist at amazon.ca for books on mediation and small business. Or, on the other hand, you could check for things which are not related to that, and I would like those too.

Speaking of my birthday, I will be traveling to Calgary sometime between now and the Ides of March, and while I am there I will probably have a minor celebration of my first 29th birthday (the first of many, I assure you). If you are the sort of person who reads my blog, lives in Calgary, and would tend to attend my birthday, you can keep an eye on this space for updates on details of my super-happy 29th birthday bash.

Cat Vomit

Yesterday we awoke to that best of sounds, a cat vomiting on the floor. Repeatedly. Not to be outdone, that same cat had had a case of diahreaha all night, both inside and outside her box, culminating in a big pile in the hallway which disclosed the responsible party: a 10" piece of shoelace which she had eaten after chewing it off of my shoe.

This would normally be enough stomach blockage to kill a cat, but to Mandy, it is a single day's digestive discomfort, before she gets right back into the swing of things. On the up side, this means that our cat is now well again. On the down side, our shoelaces, string, tassles, mexican bikinis, hanging yarn, and other string like items are all waiting to dissappear into the endless gorge that is Mandolin, resulting in further episodes of unhappy mornings and cleaning up after my stupid cat who doesn't know not to deliberately chew off shoelaces in order to eat them.

Also, we now know that Mandy's super power is much like that of beloved 1960s era DC comics hero, "Matter Eater Lad."