Weekend Update

Haven't written since my post operation blog. Since then, my teeth/mouth/jaw area has started to improve so I guess that's a good thing. Overall, I guess I am quite happy with how the surgery went. Being put out was definitely the highlight - the way the room was spinning was the coolest thing and the awareness I thought I had was quite amusing in retrospect.

This weekend was a weekend of get togethers and parties so it was a lot of fun.

Friday night started with Ashwat. The two of us went to the Raptors-Nets game. I got to see (and Boo) Vince Carter in person. It was the Raptors second game of the year. It looked horrible. They played very poorly. There was no life in their game save only for Calderon (the rookie) and MoPete. Even Bosh was just looking ordinary. Araujo was definitely horrible. The 2 first round picks (Villenueva and Graham) both had flashes of brilliance and they looked pretty good. Overall though, it's gonna be a lllooonnnnggg season and there is no doubt about that. I didn't take my Tylenol 3 to the game and regretted it part way through cause I was starting to feel the pain more and more... (the perfomance on the court definitely wasn't helping).

Saturday morning, I watched the end of a Hindi movie called Swades. A very good movie with a great concept. Definitely not your typical Hindi Bollywood movie and I think that's why I liked it even more. The idea is that this guy (Mohan) goes back to India to find his nanny. In the process, he finds a childhood girl and they fall in love. But the real essence is how he teaches the villagers to produce for themselves and believe in themselves. It starts with education and climaxes with electricity. It's quite a powerful concept and I hope that projects like that are actually going on in India because there are several communities all around that could use them.

In the PM, I went to a "party" with Cris and Yollanda. It was for our friend Jess. A lot of girls from the office were there and I won one of the games so I got the "gender neutral" prize of chocolates. It was my first such party and definitely a unique experience. Fun overall so it's all good. Definitely a story and I'm sure I'll get made fun of for years for that one. After that, Cris and I went to Sarah's house for a potluck. Our friend Sarah is going to Kabul, Afganistan for the next 2 years to work with different organizations trying to help them with Rural Economic Development as a Grant Officer. I am definitely quite impressed with what she's going to be doing. I think it's very inspirational to see what she's gonna do and to hear about Ruth's adventures. It's great to hear when people our age are actually doing stuff out there that is helping others in such positive ways. Definitely powerful to think about!

Sunday afternoon was a blast! I organized a reunion with my OSC friends. For those that don't know, the OSC is the Ontario Science Centre and I went to a the OSC Science School back in Grade 12/OAC. It's a special program where you can take OAC Scienece Courses for a semester where I met some of the coolest people I've ever known. It was a lot of fun back then and now, 10 years later - it was totally a blast to catch up with one another and reminisce. Some brought spouses, some significant others and there was even a little munchkin named Madeline that made an appearance. Cathie (our program manager at the time) hosted the party - THANKS SO MUCH for all the cooking! It was so good to see everyone and it was even better hearing what you are all up to. It's a gang of such good people and although only handfuls of us are still very close, it's still nice to know that we each have such good people in our lives for pretty much any advice or suggestions. Between all of us, we've had such varied experiences as well so that makes for excellent discussions. Here are some pics from our great afternoon.

Sunday night marked the end of the weekend and it all about cleaning up. I threw a bunch of stuff out that I don't need anymore, went over my finances, organized some clothes. I even found some money and rolled up a bunch of coins. I found ~$20 in coins (pennies, nickels, dimes) that I didn't know I had so that was definitely a very pleasant surprise. It's always quite a healthy exercise to go through all of your "stuff" and do a pseudo "spring cleaning" from time to time (however, this one was in November so it was more like "fall cleaning" but same result, so that's all that matters. During my cleaning, I also found a few things to sell online. I've kinda been addicted to selling online of late by the way. In September/October - I sold a jacket, snowboard boots, monitor and a printer. Now, I've got a couple things for sale:

Panasonic SL-S361C Portable CD Player
JVC HA-W250RF Rechargeable Cordless Stereo Headphones (900 MHz)

Hopefully I find some homes for these gadgets...
Dinner time (hope I can start eating proper food soon).