Wow, long time since I've written anything here, I've even let my paid account expire.  Ah well.

So, the man and I are thinking of taking advantage of VIA Rail's 60% off all tickets to take an overnight (or maybe just a day) trip for our anniversary in October.  It's basically going to be Toronto, Montreal, or Quebec City.  Now TO is on the list because we know the city and it's easy to get around from the train station.  So I ask of you, for those who have traveled to Quebec City or Montreal (Goldy, I'm looking at you!), how is the public transport in those cities?  If we take a train in, is it going to be a pain in the ass getting around?  What I like about Toronto is that the train station is tied to the subway system, making it very easy to get around.

So, if anyone has any experience with either Montreal or Quebec City, please let me know!

My darling fellow Firefly fans!  Look where I was today!

So, I finally joined the world of Twitter.  No idea how much I'll use it, but I did sign up for it to leave little messages while I'm on vacation next week.  So, if you have Twitter and you want to follow me (I cannot promise anything but occasional randomness) I'm 'jenpritchard' there.

So I have, up until now, resisted the advertising for anything Apple.  Yeah, it's hip, it's cool, it's the in thing!  When everyone had an iPod I was very happy with my MP3 player from Dell.  I never really had an urge to buy a Mac.  Sure, they're sleek and pretty, but I'm a Dell girl and am happy with that.  I admit that Apple has had some really great marketing and while I've appreciated it, it's never made me just HAVE to have one of their products.

That all changed today.  I bought an iPod Touch and am instantly in love with this thing.  Like I said, there's never been an Apple product that I've just HAD to have, but ever since I saw the cute catchy commercials for the Touch, I was all over it.  So I spent some of my 'me' money and splurged, getting a 16GB one.  I'm currently downloading apps for it and creating playlists out of my mishmash of music files and loading them up.

And if my brother in law is reading this, I'm sorry!  If it was just an MP3 player I was after I would have followed your advice and bought a Zune but I wanted the touch for all the other things it can do, not just music.  I can't wait to try this baby out on vacation.  I'm already planning on sticking my maps on it.

Anyone have one (or an iPhone) and have some apps to recommend, I'm all ears!

This is just downright disgusting, I almost turned it off halfway through.  This is supposed to be funny?  Fuck Fox.  Oh, and the day this was taped?  4 Canadian soldiers died in Afghanistan.  I'm not going to embed it, I'll just link to it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcJn5XlbSFk

So the last couple of weeks the weather has been nice enough that people have gotten outside to do some yard cleanup from winter, and that includes burning old brush.  It's common around here and usually not a problem.  Until our idiot neighbors decided to burn something in their back field today.  When it's windy as hell.  Yeah, I bet you can see where this is going.  We look outside to see their back field on fire and firemen all over the place, trying to put it out.  *groan*  Thanks to the firemen who wet down the property line to keep the fire on their property and for keeping the fire away from the treelines.  So we're okay, but now I am wary about my neighbors.  I really hope it was one of their kids being stupid and one one of the parents (who should frickin' know better!)

But at least now it's out and I can feel better about heading up to Ottawa tonight to see Great Big Sea!  The doctor has cleared Chris to go, my feet are ready for some dancing, and I'm psyched to see them again!  DANCE DANCE DANCE!

This probably won't be of much interest to anyone that's not into Sims.  I know that Sims 3 is coming out later this year, but I'm still deeply entrenched in Sims 2 and don't think I'm going to jump immediately to Sims 3.   Up until today I've been content using Body Shop to make my own clothing and recoloring clothing (with using meshes made by others).  It's a lot of fun and I probably do more of that than playing lately.  I've been making Sims of various characters on Crossroads MUSH (visit my gallery!  Crossroads Sims)  But today I took the plunge and delved into mesh editing.  I downloaded SimPE and MilkShape last night, but in attempt to doing a tutorial last night my brain turned to mush and I decided to try again today when my brain was awake.

I've been successful on my first tutorial and am going to do a couple more before I attempt to alter some meshes I've wanted to make slight changes for.  Basically I don't have enough good meshes for the men of Crossroads, so I'm going to try and work on that.  It is a somewhat tedious process, but altering the meshes is fun, once you get the hang of it.  Extracting the particular pieces from the package, however, is a pain in the ass.  I'm hoping it gets easier the more I do it because geez, that part of the tutorial took me almost an hour.

I will never hear the proper words to this song ever again, thanks to this.

I love puzzles, always have.  So I'm always excited to find new ones line, especially original ones.  I have to pass this one on because it's really spectacular.  It's called Auditorium and the basic idea of the game is to direct the flow of light to get it to play the music.  The further you advance the more elaborate it becomes.  The graphics are really beautiful as is the music.  It's a lot of fun (and sometimes frustrating).  I've just finished it and I look forward to more updates.  If you enjoy these kinds of games, check it out.!

Auditorium

I know I haven't updated in a while, but I'm  happy to say that the hubby is finally home from the hospital.  He still has some recovering to do and a ton of pills he has to take daily, but he's home and getting back to normal, yay!  Thanks again to all my dear friends who have offered prayers and support, it has really been appreciated!  <3 to my buds!!

We went out for breakfast and then to walk around a little.  I took some pictures of all the snow we're getting here in Kingston.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/32550964@N07/sets/72157611484314954/

Just heard from the surgeon, he said Chris is out of surgery and heading to recovery.  Everything went well and he's pleased with the results, so hurrah!!  Again, many many thanks to everyone that kept him in their thoughts and prayers, it really means a lot.  I can't go and see him until tomorrow around 5pm because of all the tests and whatnot that needs doing, so I'll have another update tomorrow night smetime.

After hours of tests and waiting and waiting AND WAITING, we got the good news!  Chris was a match and he's going into surgery Monday morning/afternoon (still waiting for the details on that) and if all goes well he'll have a new fuctioning kidney!  I'm going between smiling like a loon and crying, this is so unexpected, but then again, I guess this kind of thing always is, yes?

So thank you THANK YOU to everyone that kept him in your thoughts and a request for more prayers, because there's still a ways to go.  However I'm told that Kingston General has the highest success rate in transplants because they are so picky which is a good thing.

I'd also ask people to keep in their thoughts the man or woman who was so generous to donate their organs.  It was very odd to think that somewhere else in the hospital was someone on life support, waiting to pass on.  I feel for their family and don't imagine we could ever thank them enough.  And a little prayer for the one man who was called and wasn't a match.  It was his third time in and I felt so horrible because this was Chris's first and getting a match on your first is extremely rare.  This really was a miracle.

So once again, thank you all and I'll post more info as soon as I have it!

Some potentially good news!  Transplant department called, they have two kidneys and one might be a match for Chris.  He's heading to the hospital now for tests and whatnot, we'll know in a few hours if he's a candidate for a transplant.  So if everyone can keep him in your thoughts and prayers, I'd really appreciate it. :)

So tonight was the season finale of Doctor Who Season 4 and boy am I glad I downloaded it when it was first out.  The episode was longer than the others, but the CBC butchered it to squeeze it into an hour.  Those that have seen Journey's End already know they rushed so much, but this chop job was horrible.  I'm so pissed for people that missed out on parts.  So, what did they cut? (Of the top of my head)

( Cut for spoilers, obviously )

Seriously CBC, you couldn't have scheduled a half hour more to properly show the whole episode?

I found this site, thought it was interesting enough to pass on.  Type in your zip or postal code and it will tell you when you can see a few different satellites in the night/morning sky.  It even includes the infamous lost toolbelt. :)

Satellite Tracker

I saw this posted in the comments of a friend's journal (O HAI GOLDY!) and it makes me laugh a lot, I have to share.



Confused?  I HAZ A LINK!

(The pic was posted by </a></b></a>noblealice , not sure if it's hers, but she gets the credit!)

New email today from Great Big Sea with info on new tour dates added and HURRAH!! A Saturday show in March in Ottawa!  Pre-sale is tomorrow morning, here's hoping I can get great seats again!  The slump has been averted, I shall suffer the slump in March!

And I shall remember to take extra batteries and film more this time, oh yes!

So I'm currently in my post-concert slump, the period of time where I'm having big withdrawls and I want another show like OMGNOW!  If there was money to toss around we'd be driving to Oshawa tonight, but stupid real life stuff has to come and bite us, so... :P  But this happens after every show, I just want more more more!  I want the energy, the high, the *fun* that comes from a GBS show.  I'll get over it and go on my happy little way until the next tour.

But now I have a bit of a boost.  While working on something else last night I found some vids on YouTube from the concert I was at.  I watched one and was like 'huh'.  Hey wait, that's the guy that was in front of me!  Turns out the woman sitting next to me is the one that put up the vids.  I did notice her taping near the end, but I didn't think much of it.  She even offers them for download on her blog which I found through YouTube and now I happily have little bits of the show to keep and watch over and over.  And yes, I can occasionally here myself on the recordings, ha!  It's kinda cool to have them, because they're basically from the same perspective I saw the show.