Coldonion

Well as promised here are a couple of pictures of the Whirley I made, a little tribute to Cheesey Sci Fi.

For a long time I wanted to get a band tattoo sci fi way as well, might have to sit down and draw, trace or copy some cool stuff.

Anyhoo here they are.


The rocket is made of two mirrors placed back to back, the globe crystal is something Granddad found, it's supposed to be an asteroid, and the twisted wires are laser blasts from each ship....


Oh and it is snowing now lots more to come!!!!

Hi all,
not much happening here, we are battening down the hatches for another dump of snow tomorrow.
Today was spent at home, logging on to Canadian job sites and uploading my resume, so far 1 application has gone our, but I don't have any hopes up for that.
I finally cleaned up the whirley I made last week in Saskatoon, and hung it up, I'll try to take a picture of it tomorrow (if I can remember), I'll give you a hint, it has a 1950's sci fi theme to it. I was quite proud of it myself, and roanna helped me with some of her colored wire. Following paterns is fun, but I seem to have more fun doing something on my own.

Still lots of ideas running around my head, I wish we had the space to set up a workshop area, but for now these trips to Saskatoon will have to do.

I'll say a hi to my Uncle & Aunt, who both need a bit of cheering up, hopefully you feel better soon guys. Chatty, give me a week and I'll have something on your way that you might like....

Let's see other news, finally brought out our crock pot that we have had for some time, honestly neither of us can remember if it was a Christmas gift or wedding gift. Made a sorta stewish beef dinner tonight, think I better follow the recipies before I use it again......

Keep safe everyone.


Ian

Well, seems like Calgary has finally got some winter, lots of cold weather two weeks ago, now a week of snow, and not so bad cold weather. Personally I have had to dress in layers on more that one occasion, this is from the person who throws on a light jacket with a full sleaved t-shirt thick cotton top!!!

Yesterday we cancelled going to Banff to see Mark and Leanne, due to the fact that we could not find a cheepish place to stay for the night. If the weather conditions were better, I would have driving back from Banff after dinner, it's only 95 min or so trip. Though I deffinately DID NOT want to drive through snowy conditions at late at night. I did this once, and would avoid it if I could.

This morning I went out to the airport to meet Mark & Leanne, we chatted for a bit, and I gave them the hanging fish that Roanna & I made for them (looks like the fish below, except it has no fin but it has a copper hook in it's mouth). Leanne works at the Bermuda Aquarium, so I thought she would like that. Then they were off to wait in the departures lounge. Their plane was delayed by an hour when I left, but hopefully with luck, they are in the air by now.

Back home and a bit of shopping done, had some lunch, and currently making some Hungarian Goulash for dinner. Then tonight we are supposed to meet up with Debbie and Curtis for Movie and some drinks, then stay the night at thier place, then we don't have to worry about driving home. I think we are supposed to see the Matidor, though I guess we shall find out a bit later. Tonight we will also give Debbie and Curtis thier housewarming gift (we made it as well, but I won't say anything here yet).

Other than that, so far it is a quiet weekend, tomorrow we are off to visit the parents and show off some of our new items we made. Roanna went through the job section of the newspaper today (this is the bigger working section than the rest of the week), circled a few things, so I we can hopefully get a few more companies to send out resumes to...

Take care everyone.

Ian

This one is for my Mom, They got your gift, and it is displayed on the wall, sorry about the bad pic quality. 

Well as promised here are some photos of a few pieces of work that Roanna & I made.

Roanna made this "Under the sea" Whirley

This was my third piece, Granddad helped by making the frame.

Roanna & I made an assembly line the last day, and made two of these pretty quickly. One a hanger the other to be placed in a pot or the garden.

Well we got back just over two hours ago, safely and soundly, which is good cause in the morning they had tremendously bad weather in Calgary, snow, ice and visibility down to nothin'.
Luckily we were still in Saskatoon, so 7 hours driving, with 1 bathroom break, and we made it home, luckily we kinda drove into good weather for a bit. Driving at 110 KPH and not being able to see a car 300 meters in front of you is a be it heart pounding.

Anyhoo, we had a great long weekend with Roanna's Grandparent's, they went out of thier way to see that we were wanting for nothing, breakfast, morning cappacino's, lunch, afternoon cappacino's and chatting down in the workshop, then dinner. On the last night we went and picked up some fixin's and made them pizza's. This morning we were packed into our already packed car, with sandwiches, muffins, fruit, coffee and orange juice. We were so loaded down in the car (and in our bellies) we had to stop just on the outskirts of Calgary to put more fuel in the CAR!!!!!

So we will be showing some of our work that we made, some won't be shown as they are gifts for people that read this blog.

Take care everyone.

Well, been FREEZING cold the last two days, luckily the snow has been light and fluffy, so cleaning off the car has been quite easy.
We are getting ready to go to Saskatoon on Saturday morning, the car's wheels needed alignment, and balancing, so the drive should be a bit more smoother this time. There is a bit of snow in Saskatoon and cold weather, though once we get there we may not be going out much, just visiting and being in the workshop. Both Roanna and I wished we had an area where we could set up or tools and work on stained glass, but unfortunately we can't do it anywhere where paws may tread, if you know what I mean. So this will be a bit more practice for us this week, we are excited to get to see Grandma and Grandpa again, since we had to cancel our last visit since we had just moved into the apartment.

So right now I am cleaning up the apartment, the kitchen floor was getting a bit sticky, when you walk in some places your suddenly found your sock top by your ankle, and the rest of the sock six inches behind you. Luckily to cats were found stuck on their backs with thier feet in the air, they save their rolling for the carpet!!!

Tomorrow, I'll check the oil in the car, and top up the tires with air, so we can get an early start on the highway. We will have Roanna's Mum and Dad over for dinner for the usual bribe dinner so someone can come over and feed the cats (and clean out the litter box).

Well I don't have much else to say, so unless I post tommorrow, everyone enjoy thier long weekend, (Alberta it's family day, and for Americans it's President's Day).
Have a great one!

Well I was so excited about seeing the advert for the job fair on Tuesday, that I went to the Stampede exhibition hall early........about two months early.
Reading all the smaller stuff like TUESDAY, and very quickly stopped reading important bits like April 11th!!!!!!
Though on the plus side lots of exercise through walking today. Quiet night in, Roanna and I plan to celebrate with some a cheese fondue and some wine. I picked up a nice loaf of peacan and raisin, that should go well with the swiss chesse based fondue.

So to everyone, have a nice snuggle valentines with your loved one (or at least stand next to him/her as as the restraining order will allow!)

Night all.

Ian

Hi all,
Yesterday was a nice day, so we went to the zoo, to walk around for exercise. So I took my camera (as promised!) and snapped quite a few photos.

Enjoy...


Here is a photo from the Dinosaur exhibit.



Macro shot inside the Conservitory



In the Dinosaur Exhibit they have lots of different rock formations, I thought this was pretty neat


This was taken inside of the Butterfly exibit, they had reopened last weekend, so there were not to many butterflys there. The butterfly you see was from last year, it is pretty nice, they have an area where you can stand and watch the butterflys flit around you.

Here is a view of part of the African exibit at the Calgary Zoo on Sunday 

Well like millions of others around the world and in different time zones, we watched the opening ceremony last night. I was quite a proud moment to see Bermuda's lone entry, for the Skeleton, it was a bit disapointing to see that no one out of the four were wearing any "Bermuda shorts". Though it did look particularly cold out there, so not that big of a deal I guess.

Today was a maintenence day, cleaning and tiding those things we have been putting off for so long. Finally got a $10 bill changed up to "loonies" (that's what they call the 1$ coin up here). So some washing of clothes was done as well.

Tomorrow, we are off to the zoo to walk around for some exercise, then a small lunch at Roanna's Mum & Dads house. The weather is still very nice, and very sunny so might as well enjoy that while we still can.

Hi to all, and have a good weekend. I'll try to remember to take the camera, maybe I snap so zoo photos along the walk.

Well,
yesterday I got a new letter from the Canadian Immigration. They have informed me that my permanant residence card processing has been completed. I am now waiting for a call from the Calagary branch to approve it, then to go down and answer a few questions and pick up this card.

So good news there, it will probably be a few months before I get that call, but who knows....they seem to have suddenly picked up the pace.... I wasn't expecting this for another 12 months....So at least I can come and go as I please from this country now.... Though if I get this card early, I'm gonna be pissed off cause I really didn't need to spend extra money to get a work permit......

Ah well, maybe I can get a refund or something..... but getting money back from a Government is like (insert your impossible comparison here).

Though it is good news anyway.

Hi to everyone.


Ian

Hi all,
nothing really much happening, especially since I can't even think up a decent title for the blog. Today was spent walking over to a store, and mailing my CV to a Fire Instructor job, seems like a pretty good place to get a start at. Hopefully I can at least make an interview, I definately need the practice since the last job interview was WAYYYYYY back in 1993.....

Nothing much else happening, I spent about an hour in the afternoon assembling my IKEA dresser, which we picked up on Saturday morning. It has been sitting in the hallway for a few days. Only banged one finger and one thumb with the hammer, though the finger is got a nice shade of purple to it under the nail.

Hope everyone is doing well.

Ian

Hi all,

it was a pretty busy weekend for us, visiting neighbours and friends Friday, Saturday & Sunday.
Sat down yesterday afternoon at Mark & April's at watched to superbowl, honestly we had to be reminded who was playing, since New England went out of the running I haven't been following it since....
Though in the end, we sat down and picked the Steelers to win, and what a pretty exciting game it was. Unfortunately, the majority of comercials were edited out up here in Canada, but we did see most of the Budwiser ones.

Let's see, this morning went over to the coffee shop and went through the job listings, a few have caught my eye, but so far nothing that screams (IAN!). No need to jump into a job right away only to find a better one later, besides, in another 2 weeks, we will be going to Saskatoon to visit the Grandparents, so I figure not will make a new boss happy by asking for a few days off as soon as you start work. We are hoping that I can start a new job last week of Feb/ first week of March, we shall see....

Things are going well for us, the weather is like a cool fall day right now, though it is supposed to warm up again by the end of the week.

Anywho, when I came back from my walk / shopping tonight's dinner (fajita's), guess who is sleeping on the couch together... I guess they have decided to tolorate each other even more this year... silly cats!!!

Well, it has happened, yesterday, at around 1 o'clock.

I got my work permit!!!!!

It is sitting right in front of me, at the computer desk, so I know it is not a dream....


Now comes the part where I have to look for a job, I have already check on the Calgary F/D website, and they have recieved enough applications for 2006 (which is pretty unbalivable since it is only Jan at the time I looked). So we shall see, temporaraly some where close by, then I gotta find out what I have to do to get permission to go to school. Apparently even though I have a work permit, I am STILL not allowed to attend and educational institution, or take any academic, professional or vocational training course.
The plan was to attend an EMT course, and get some local medical qualifications, which wouldn't hurt when I apply for a F/D job. These courses are weekend courses, I could do this while working a full time job. Not to bad of a hiccup, but we shall see.

Anywhoo, everyone one is fine, the kittys are good, though they are now gonna have to get used to being alone at home now, hopefully they haven't picked up two many bad habits.
Gonna go wander off and pick up some supplies for the house, and scan the job section of today's paper.

cheers everyone.