Beds...how much does size matter?

I've been debating on getting a murphy bed installed in my second bedroom for awhile. It's sort of turned into a giant storage room and I figured there's likely a better way to use the space. I'm sure an actual mattress is much more comfortable for guests to sleep on than the pull out couch. And then I can move my couch up to the cottage and replace the pull out there with one that's actually younger than I am. So, I finally had someone from Space Solutions come by today to give me a 'design consultation' and quote.

Here's my dilemma...apparently if I want to have some actual storage space built in with the bed (shelves and drawers and whatnot) I really need to go with a double bed instead of the queen that I was thinking about. Whatdya think? Is a double bed good enough for my guests??

Vacation(s) aftermath

So now what?? I've travelled from sea to ski in the past two weeks and now it's back to the real world with seemingly nothing else to look forward to.

Ah, but let's relive the memories shall we??

Ships & Dip III was truly fantastically fun. We arrived in Miami at about 1:00am on Saturday and checked into our airport motel (just couldn't justify spending the money to stay on the beach when we were heading out on a cruise). And while we had some thoughts of heading to the beach or doing some shopping on Saturday we ended up spending the day having cocktails around the pool and enjoying the sun. Am almost (almost) embarrassed to admit we ate both lunch and dinner in the hotel bar. But sticking around proved to be the first of many good decisions on the trip as we connected with Fin to get the shuttle schedule for the morning, got to say hello to Alan and Sean (of GBS) as they arrived and promptly copied our mojito order and reconnected with a bunch of people we had met on last year's cruise over appetizer dinners in the lounge.

Sunday's boarding was quick and uneventful. After strolling the ship and trying to get our bearings (trust me, this was much more difficult than it sounds, I ended up as the group navigator for the week and managed to get us pointed in the wrong direction only a couple of times) we got ourselves a beer and waited for our luggage to arrive. See, when you go on a cruise you tag your luggage and have to leave it with the porters as you arrive and then wait for it to be delivered to your cabin. It's like checking in at the aiport with the added anxiety of getting stuck on a ship with nothing to wear for the duration of your stay if your luggage goes astray. My little suitcase was there within about an hour and I was able to unpack and get organized pretty quickly. Mom's got dropped off sometime during the sail away concert so she could finally relax ;-). The mandatory muster drill (punchline: where's the ketchup) brings up thoughts of Titanic as you report to your station with your life jacket and hear about what would happen in the event of an actual on board emergency. And then we were off! 5 days of music and partying on the ocean.

I'm not sure I will never be able to enjoy a 'standard' cruise after the party that Sixthman puts on. In 5 days I think we saw 20 concerts and about 5 comedy sets, with full days in Grand Cayman and Jamaica in the middle there somewhere. I knew that the BNL and Great Big Sea shows would be great (and they were!) but all of the artists put on a great show. I enjoyed the smaller, more intimate sets by Jason Collett, Brian MacMillan, Joe Pisapia, Lori Cullen and Jason Plumb. And after missing them last year, I got to a Guster and Thinbuckle show. Mostly, it was just really cool to see really talented people jump up on stage and perform with each other spontaneously.

So to share a bit of the cruise, here are my two new fav GBS songs

Walk on the Moon...Thurs night Lido deck



Straight to Hell...Songwriters panel


And my other "new" find on the cruise was Boothby Graffoe who I managed to catch 1 1/2 times while on the boat. Funny, funny, comedian/singer/songwriter from the UK...and I'm not just saying that because we shared a seat on the shuttle back to the airport in Miami and I felt like I got my own personal 30 minute set ;-)



I've got to say, there's no way the John Mayercraft Carrier (which was getting ready to take off on the same boat on the day we got back) could have been half as much fun.

Mom and I also managed to make our way off the boat for a very fun excursion in Grand Cayman. We got to SeaDoo 4 miles out into the ocean to Stingray City, where we fed and held giant stingrays. Having never driven a personal watercraft on the ocean I was a bit unsure what to expect, only that it would likely be much different than taking off on our mostly calm lake. I think I got the hang of it after a while and developed a technique where I tried to ride through the waves like ski moguls but I also felt like I got a complimentary sea salt facial with the ride. The next day we spent a day on a beach in Jamaica drinking Red Stripe beer. And somewhere in all of that we managed to catch a few hours of sleep ;-).

We flew back into Toronto in the midst of a snowstorm, which was a reality slap in the face. Thankfully managed to get in with only a couple of hours delay. I feel like I'm tempting fate by even saying this but I've had nothing but good airline experiences recently.

And then I spent a whole 5 days back in the real world before heading out west for the weekend with some friends for what was supposed to be a ski outing. Not for me, of course, cause I may be the most inept person on the planet on a ski hill. My plan was to join them at Lake Louise, do some skating or just walking in the morning and spend the afternoon at the spa. Well, the best laid plans and all that...

Calgary/Canmore/Banff was cold this weekend. Seriously freeze your eyeballs cold.

Here's what Lake Louise can look like in the winter




Here's what it looked like when we were there

Not quite what we had planned :-). But we had a fun long weekend of relaxing, eating good food and drinking great wine. And at least managed to take the road trip to see Banff and Lake Louise...though I'll clearly have to go back and see it at it's best.

And that's what I've been up to for the last few weeks!

Come aboard...we're expecting you

It's vacation time people. As of tomorrow I'm leaving the snow and cold behind and heading south. Plans include, but are not limited to, seeing the Barenaked Ladies, Great Big Sea, Sarah Harmer, Harland Williams and others perform, visiting Stingray City, and having a number of umbrella drinks on board, in Grand Cayman, Jamaica and anywhere else we manage to find a bar ;-). Have a good week or so while I'm not around to keep up with the news on the interweb...

I'm in Love

Please meet the newest object of my affection. I believe we have a long and happy relationship ahead of us.














So I watch a lot of TV. I mean, a lot of TV. At any one time in the active television season I could be recording 25-30 shows a week on my PVR. (Now, of course, the strike means I've got some more time on my hands). I have a couple of friends who have mentioned planning an intervention to deal with my addiction. Now some of these people don't actually own televisions so really, what do they know?? When I finally got my hands on a PVR it felt like a religious conversion of some sort. It's not an overstatement to say it changed my life.

I have been watching all of this TV for the past 6 years on a 32” tube television, which wasn’t the height of technology when I purchased it at that time. (Why, I argued with myself, would I spend the extra $300 just to get a screen that was flat when I new there was better technology just around the corner). And since then I’ve been reluctant to commit, reluctant to spend the money, and fairly satisfied with the TV I owned.

I finally took the plunge. With the Christmas gift of some cash from my parents (with a cute little TV picture drawn in the memo section of the check) and the knowledge that my bonus this year was going to be my best ever, I headed out on Boxing ‘week’ to procure an HD TV. And have spent the last two weeks waiting for my spot in line in the delivery schedule. Well, last night it arrived. The very helpful delivery/installation guy helped me move the heavy old TV and the top section of the wall unit that housed the old TV and went to work connecting all of the wiring. After setting the TV up he said, “you know, I think your unit will still fit with the new TV”. And lo and behold it did, with mere millimeters to spare on either side. It looks IKEA custom designed it with this TV in mind…and I get to keep my shelf space!

I ordered a pizza (bad Heather!), poured myself a beer and settled in on the couch for the night. I’d still be there if I could. What the heck took me so long??

Hey, hey...it's January

I was recently taken to task for not having updated this page in a while...who knew anyone was actually reading it?!? And then I realized I had a half written post from the week before Christmas when I was killing time (I mean, working really hard) at the office, which makes no sense at all now. So, in the spirit of starting off the new year with a clean slate, I'll start over.


I know I'm not the only one having a hard time getting my shit together and back to productivity after the holidays. As evidenced by last Saturday night's "We're not ready to let go of 2007 Pub Crawl", many of you seem to be in the same boat. I'm not sure why it seems to be harder this year. Maybe it's rebelling against another year passing and feeling like I don't have much to show for it. Maybe it's feeling a bit exhausted at the thought of all the things I need to accomplish in the coming months. Or maybe it's just too many late nights and too much drinking over the holidays (no seriously, look at my facebook pictures, I'm holding a drink at almost every occasion) that's taking a bit more time to recover from. Whatever it is, I'm hoping that the recovery is just around the corner and I'm back to feeling productive and energized.

And I have a lot of good stuff coming up in the next little while. The Toronto Rock season kicks off with the home opener this Friday and the 9th season of Section 111ers is set to begin. I'm seeing a couple of plays/musicals/movies over then next few weeks. And in three weeks from Friday I'm taking off to Miami to set sail on Ships & Dip III (cause II is best not remembered) with my mom and a bunch of bands and comedians and hitting Grand Cayman and Ocho Rios en route (what was I saying about giving up late nights and drinking?).

I'll tell you what I won't be doing...watching the Golden Globe Awards on Sunday night. I had at least three people call or email to express their condolences when the cancellation was announced (apparently I've been quite vocal about the Globes being my favourite award show). I've been coping with this strike to date, while lamenting the abrupt endings to some of my fav shows, but this just might be too much. C'mon people...get it figured out!! And before the Oscars dammit! The latest victim of the strike for me is Gossip Girl...are you watching this show? If not, you should be. Last night's episode was the last one they managed to get written and filmed and I really, really need to know what happens to S and B next.

It's beginning to look...

I forget sometimes that once you get out of the city the snow tends to accumulate and stick around for a lot longer. I'm reminded of this every time my mom or friends come to visit and bring along their big winter boots to wear out on to sidewalks that stay pretty clear for the most part. This weekend wasn't one of those times. Watching the crazy blowing snow on Saturday night was definitely enough to kick me into the festive spirit.


My fantastic mom came to hang out last weekend and help me Christmasize my pad. Isn't my tree pretty? It makes me smile every night when I drive home from work and can see it sitting clearly in the window (gotta love timers).

I also made a last minute decision to take a long weekend and we also managed to make a dent in our Christmas shopping (though were a bit more successful shopping for ourselves) and seeing a Friday afternoon movie. We joined what seemed like a theatre full of mothers and daughters (though most of them were about 20 years younger than me) to see Enchanted, which was a really sweet, entertaining movie. And perfect for a winter afternoon.


In other news, I also had a really fun weekend hanging out with my 'niece' and introducing her to a girls' night. After the mess that was Dirty Dancing - the musical, it felt only right to get together with some friends, food and drink to watch the original. Bonus points if you know who had the empty glass ;-)

Dirty Dancing...a resounding meh

Well, I wish I could say that the 'Dirty Dancing: the Musical' was as fantastic as I was hoping it would be.

First, let me preface this by saying I love musicals. I mean, really love them. And I don't think there's a woman of my generation who doesn't have a soft spot for Dirty Dancing, even if they don't love it. I went to see the musical last night with my three theatre going friends, and all of us had a fairly vivid memory of our first viewing of the film. It was a birthday party, or a sleepover and 3 of the four of us remember rewinding scenes or even the whole film to watch it over and over again. So you definitely had 4 people who were predisposed to love the musical.

And really? It wasn't so good. It wasn't so much a musical as it was a reenactment of the movie onstage, with a mostly soundtrack backing of the action. And that's probably ok. In fact, it probably wouldn't work if they had scrapped the soundtrack that we all know so well and had new songs for Baby and Johnny to sing dialogue at each other. The three performers who actually sang some of the key songs in the production were very good, especially the final performance of "I've had the time of my life".


My biggest gripe with the production, no question, was that anytime there was a section of added dialogue or plot that wasn't in the movie it was jarring. That's not to say that they shouldn't have added to or changed the story, but if they were going to do it they needed to do a better job. The character of Baby's mom was given a trio of extra scenes with Baby, Jake (Baby's dad) and Penny (the knocked up dancer) which I think were supposed to give the character more depth or something, but she really didn't need to be more than the '60's mom' in order to drive the story. There was a whole added in storyline about racial equality that was an excuse for Baby and Johnny to have another argument to expand on their differences and to flash a picture of Martin Luther King on the screen (yes, you read that correctly) to which my only response was...Really?!? There was a bunch of added lines to stress the 'class' differences in the groups of people in the story...did they think we wouldn't get that?!?

My other issues were more minor. The actor playing Johnny Castle seemed to be a bit too pretty and polished (like a Disney prince come to life is how D put it). I think I had a different perspective on the inappropriateness of the relationship between the two seeing it fresh as a thirtysomething instead of a tween :-). There were a couple of moments that really weren't supposed to be funny that elicited laughter from the audience.

The good things? The set design was incredible...absolutely amazing to see how they managed to bring all the different locations to the stage. The log scene in the woods and lift practice in the water were among the moments that stood out. The final dance performance, kicked off with Johnny rushing to the stage from the back of the theatre, made you feel like you were living in the movie. The general nostalgic memories that kicked in with the opening bar on almost every song.


All that said, I know I'll end up seeing it again during it's run in Toronto (however long it lasts). As a musical it wouldn't make the top 20 list of productions I've seen, but as a night out with the girls involving some martinis and a chance to reminisce, it definitely delivers. We walked out of the theatre with plans to get together to watch the movie Saturday night.

But I really hope this isn't a sign as to how the rest of my top five are going to deliver.