oh, the fun you can have with photobooth....

Juno which movie you should see?!

I was going to write about this last weekend but totally forgot, so here goes:
So, last weekend, Greg, Erin, Jen, Brent and I saw Juno. I'm not going to explain the plot- just watch the trailer... but it was smart and hilarious in a slightly uncomfortable, but really "feel-good" way. If you like Arrested Development, Jason Bateman and Michael Cera (Michael & George-Michael, respectively) and are both in it. Also, it was filmed in Vancouver.

So, surprise surprise, I'm still in Victoria. I sent off the appropriate form of payment (I THINK!!) on Thursday, so hopefully my visa & passport will arrive on Monday or Tuesday. I sold my car yesterday, which is good, except I now don't have a car. Which makes doing errands fairly difficult.

Thursday, I had meeting with Jazz to solidify some coaching stuff. I also heard from some triathlon contacts in Cairo that there is a spot where people can run outdoors fairly near to where I'm planning to live, which is great, because, after a fairly embarrassing incident at the Uvic gym 10 years ago, treadmills and I are not on speaking terms :|

Okay off to pack more, but go see Juno!

So much to do....

.....so little time! The last few days have been a blur. I've accomplished a lot though....my bike is now in pieces inside a box ready for its plane ride, AND I think I know how to put it together again at the other end (thanks to Cam & Gabor @ Fort St Cycle!), my car is sold, and have had the chance to catch up with lots of friends this week which has sort of made me think twice about leaving them all. On the weekend my swim team had a going away party for me- thanks so much to Lisa and Micki for organizing and for making the yummy food! And like any real party it (naturally!) ended with a game of twister!?

Visa/passport still are not here and at 7am today I got a call from the embassy:
C: Hello
E: That cheque that you sent is not registered.
C: {still groggy from being woken up} Pardon, who is this?
E: The Embassy of Egypt cannot possibly accept a personal cheque. I TOLD you to send a registered cheque.
C: {thinks: you did not TELL me to send a registered cheque, otherwise I would have SENT you a registered cheque!} um okay...I'll get one today then.
E: hangs up.
So, this could delay things a little (more), thankfully I haven't booked my ticket yet. Maybe I should change the name of this blog to catinvictoriawaitingforhervisa.blogspot.com, should make for some seriously interesting reading.

Okay, off to get a REGISTERED cheque!

Happy Birthday Mum!

So, (I've noticed that I start almost every post with "So,..."). Anyway, I told you a few days ago that I had a bunch of vaccines last weekend, and I'm just finishing up the typhoid one this week...you have to take one pill every other day for a week, and you take it first thing in the morning and you can't eat for a WHOLE HOUR afterwards....which is really hard when you haven't eaten for the 8ish hours beforehand because you were sleeping!!! I am STARVING right now, so I thought I'd write a post to distract myself from the fact that I still have 26 minutes before I can eat!!!!

So, yesterday was my mum's birthday....(what was it mum? your 39th or so?!) ....and she insisted on celebrating by having a going away party for me! It was great to have so many people there to say good bye... neighbours, family friends, friends from school and the pool and two of Michael's ex girlfriends (in the same room at the same time) and it wasn't awkward at all (not that I was worried, really.....)! It was nice to have a little distraction from all the stuff I have to do this week. Yesterday I finally finished everything at work and just have to meet with Dan on monday to pass everything on, so now I'm officially in tasmanian-devil mode trying to sort out my personal stuff. It's going okay, but the main obstacle right now is that I STILL don't have my visa and passport back- the embassy insists money order that the immigration lawyers sent is from a US bank and they can't accept it, but the lawyers insist that it's drawn from a canadian one.... anyway it's only $112... I am just going to send one of my own on monday but even if I fedex the cheque and they fedex the passport back, I still probably won't have it till next weekend.....oh well, it just gives me more time to do everything else!

In other news........... after a chat with my new coach, Jasper, I have a shopping list of tri equipment that I have to get before I go as well. Since cycling is my weakest leg, I am really excited that training indoors will allow me to use two tools that will really help me improve...a windtrainer (or "trainer") and a set of rollers... the trainer holds your bike in place and puts resistance on the back wheel while you pedal, and the rollers are essentially a treadmill for your bike, and you have to make sure you're riding really straight and have good form, otherwise it doesn't work.... I've heard they are a little difficult to get the hang of initially.... actually I think Jasper said to make sure there was soft stuff to land on around the bike the first few times you try. Here's a couple of videos I found on youtube...one of what I will likely look like, and one of what I hope to look like after a few months/years.... ;) Okay, it's almost time to eat now!!!

Tetris anyone!?

Wii, that was fun!

I've never really been interested in video games, {well, except for Supermario Allstars which Michael and I had for our/his Nintendo 64 in the early 90's} but this winter I feel like I'm channeling a 14 year old boy...I can't count the number of giddy conversations I've had lately with people about either Guitar Hero or wii. I'm actually glad I don't own either, otherwise I don't think I'd get anything done. seriously. Although to be honest, I'm really not making much progress lately...the cholera-polio-flu really slowed things down this week. Car still isn't sold. I still haven't moved. or packed. I still don't have my visa..... or an airline ticket. Small details really. But tomorrow I should be finished everything at work (inshallah), so starting Friday I can enter tazmanian devil mode and power through the errands.

I did, however, accomplish one thing today... I had a great meeting with a potential tri coach (from a distance) for the coming year....the details still need to be sorted out, but I think it'll work out really well.

Happy New Year!!!

So, in the last few days, I've discovered that people (besides my parents) are actually reading this blog!! Suddenly I have "a readership"! I now feel a little pressure to make my posts really interesting and informative....which my life sometimes isn't.... then again, I guess you're all reading this to get a Cat update, whatever that entails, but nevertheless, I apologize in advance if it gets a bit boring at times....maybe I'll throw some use-ful/less trivia in once in a while so, if nothing else, you might learn something!
So..... it's 2008 now....the Year of the Rat - the 'Earth Rat' to be more specific (useful fact!) and the year of the Summer Olympics in Beijing! My cold/flu/cholera/polio was pretty bad on NYE morning so I wasn't sure if I'd be able to do anything in the evening, but I left work early and slept most of the day and woke up at about 5:30 feeling relatively normal. Greg and I had planned to spend NYE together, but between us we had tentative plans to be at 4 different events (yes, it IS tiring being this popular!), the first was a quick stop at my parents' annual NYE 'gala' to say goodbye to some family friends who I might not see before I go, then we were off to Sean's 50th annual NYE party (maybe that's exaggerating a little, but except for 2001, when I was living in whistler, I have been to Sean's party every year since about '98....), it was nice to catch up with some good friends that live too far away for regular visits. After a few hours there, it was off to Greg's ex-roommates' party...it was nice to see Emily and Aaron again, as well as Mike, who was very entertaining with his card tricks and uncomfortable questions.

I hope you all had a great New Year's eve and that 2008 is shaping up to be your best year yet!