Oh, How I Love September

Oh joy! The two oldest are back to school tomorrow. How do I explain my feelings on this momentous occassion? I don't think there are adequate words. I am thrilled beyond belief. Finally, there will be an end to all the fighting, to requests for sleepovers 6 times a week, to kids telling me they have nothing to do when the great outdoors is only a screen door away (or a messy bedroom is upstairs), to doors slamming and waking up Saoirse. Life will be peaceful for 7 hours a day. We are back to waking up at 7am everyday, to me yelling at Taylor that it is now 7.30, yelling that is now 7.45, yelling that is now 8 am that we will be leaving in 20 minutes, to me rushing to make lunches that I was to lazy to make the night before, yelling at Taylor that she can not possibly leave the house with that rats nest upon her head, finally getting out the door with seconds to spare. It will be Liam's first time on the school bus as he is off to a new school tomorrow. Unfortunately, he is the driver's first pick up so has to be out at 7.36, a full hour before school starts. Our Friday morning coffee meetings will be back on, so there will be wasted calories on bagels and cream cheese. Unless I have to work, as I am due back in 2 weeks. Ach, for fecks sakes, I hate September!!

Bye Bye Ty

It was bad news for me tonight as JD was in the bottom three on Rockstar INXS. It was Ty that INXS eventually got rid of. Ty said something about how he had been in the bottom three for the last 3 weeks and didn't deserve it and mentioned something about "his people." And maybe he was right. Debate from the beginning said that a black man would not be considered a "rockstar." I thought Ty had a fantastic voice, and I would have rather seen him as the lead singer of INXS than Mig, the freaky Australian.
Tim Farris said that he had been in the bottom three for too long so had to go. And yet, Suzie was in the bottom three every week until last week. So I think Ty was right to call this racism.

Rockstar INXS

I thought I would hate Rockstar INXS. I loved INXS as a teenager, they are the only international band I have seen more than once. Somehow it seemed slightly sinful for a dead man's band to replace him and, even worse, to use a reality show to do so.

But I love it. I have yet to miss an episode. However, there are things about it that really piss me off. For instance, they say they searched the world for the best singers. So eleven of them came from the States? Out of 15? Somehow that doesn't make sense. Four were from Canada. One was from Australia. That is hardly "the world." William is under the impression that only an Australian male should be a member of INXS, so automatically he would have eliminated half the contestants for being female and non-Australians and the rest for not being Australian. Sadly then, you end up with Mig. Who I can't stand.

My favourite is JD. He is every good girl's dream....the bad boy. He's cocky and sexy and he can sing. And the tattoos. I love them. There are 6 left, including 2 Canadians...JD and a girl called Suzie. And if he doesn't win then I would go for her, not because she's Canadian, but because she has a very powerful voice. I'll miss this show when it's over, because no matter who wins I don't see INXS having great success again. They are 15 years past their prime I think.

Made in Canada

There is a series of commercials here that talks about different Canadian inventions. Today I saw the basketball one and wondered what else was invented by Canadians. I turned to trusty old google to find out. There are way to many to mention, and some of them I did know about, such as the telephone, gingerale, zippers, IMAX and Trivial Pursuit. Did you know the lightbulb was actually invented by a Canadian? Henry Woodward sold the patent to Thomas Edison. Other Canadian inventions include the prosthetic hand, garbage bags, snowblowers, snowmobiles (well who else would have a 5 month need for those two?), automatic postal sorters, the abominizer (a Canadian may have invented it, but judging by our obesity numbers, we certainly don't all use it), the pacemaker, the television and walkie talkies. I was dismayed to see that my favourite Canadian invention, the shooter, did not make it on to this list.

On a final note to this rather dull post, when you say "That's the real McCoy" * you are talking about a Canadian. Elijah McCoy invented many things including the lawn sprinkler and the automatic macinery lubricator (no idea what it is, but it sounds slightly sexual.)

* I have never actually heard anyone say "That's the real McCoy."

69, positions and other things about sex

That title is purely so I can see how many hits it generates. So sorry people seeking stuff about sex, there's none of that here. Look for Fred and Wilma. Or, if you have to be looking up sex positions, buy a book called "The Joy of Solo Sex." Chances are that one would come in handier than a site on positions. Since, ya know, you're probably by yourself. Or not. Who knows really.

The Joys and Perils of Statcounter

So I finally installed something to track my oh so many visitors. I tried Sitemeter and Neocounter and for some reason could get neither to install into my blog. Statcounter worked though. It has very easy to follow directions for eejits such as myself.

I must admit I find it somewhat frightening to see the information that people computer able could discover about you. I hear that you can do an awful lot with just an ISP address.But I could be wrong. As I have stated many times I am a complete computer moron. And I only have Windows 98, whereas every single person who has been on my blog in the last 2 days has Windows XP. Sigh. Anyways, my sitemeter has me being from Calgary, which I am most definitely not. I love Calgary, but there is absolutely no way I could live there as every federal riding is Conserative and only 3 provincial ridings are Liberal. Plus my 3 most hated politicians live there- Ralph Klein, Jason Kenney and Stephen Harper. Scum, the lot of them.

A few people have linked to me through http://unitedirelander.blogspot.com, a couple of them came from the Seven Things post. Both American, one from Iowa and one from California. That one linked 3 times but never left a comment. Makes me wonder. There were a couple of links through search engines, one looking for "black friday", "edmonton" (from Newfoundland...have I ever said how much I love Newfoundland? I really do, but so many of them live on my block and a couple come from different communities and there's alot of infighting. It's a bit crazy.) The other, which made me laugh, was for "disco duck song." I suppose they were looking for the lyrics.

The majority of my visitors came from Ireland. There were a couple from the UK, but for someone reason a city doesn't come up with it. Odd that. I can't figure out how many are returning, as I think I screwed up somewhere, but I've had visitors from 4 different countries this weekend. Well, I'd say 3 since I'm pretty sure the UK ones were all from the north of Ireland. 3 and a province if we must be fussy. Either way, it's not a very high number.

Feckin' Rooney

That Wayne Rooney really pisses me off. He's a whinger, constantly running into people and then looking for free kicks. And that game was all Newcastle until he scored, the wee bugger. Although I am not a Newcastle fan, I would go for them over Man U any day. I don't mind watching Newcastle because I think Shay Given is quite possibly the best looking player in the Premier League. But that bloody Rooney. He really put me in a bad mood. Ah well, at least Aston Villa won yesterday.

Minor rant over.

Male Cheerleaders Get No Respect

...this is what I learned last night at the football game. Apparently the Eskimos are the only team in the CFL with male cheerleaders (so someone told me, I have no idea if it's actually true) and people are so mean to them. I heard them called all sorts of names. Rodeo clowns, geeks, losers, nerds (honestly, nerds? The man saying that was well over 12, the last age at which you can actually use the word nerd and not sound like a complete eejit yourself.) I felt quite terrible for them, but I do have this question ...why is it that female cheerleaders must be extremely slim, fit and toned and the men..well, not so much. Some of those boys were on the wrong side of pudgy, I think. And seemed a little out of breath running around.

This is what else I learned at the game:
The $50 (well $49) ticket was actually $21. Those were for the seats in the stadium that we never used. I paid an extra $28 to have a tiny sausage on a huge bun and a wee bit of potato salad and coleslaw. I avoided the beans, as all sane people would. Later, we had a wee tiny piece of cake. We sat at ground level, behind a grille so couldn't really see the game. Another girl and I kept turning around to look at the jumbo tron.

I still don't understand football. The game goes right over my head. I have no idea what downs are or what balls on means. The score was 36-26 for Edmonton. Seconds before it ended it was 36-19. I never saw that other 7 points. I know that 7 points means a touchdown but I never saw the touchdown happen.

Those players are small! In the NFL some player just died and they said he weighed something like 345 lbs. I don't think there was a player on either team who would come close. We watched Montreal practice and we all commented on their lovely bums. Well, all the girls did anyway.

The atmosphere was amazing. There was 44,000+ in the stands, and they were very loud. There were fireworks when Edmonton scored a touchdown and at the end of the game. The mascot was hilarious and the cheerleaders and firefighters drove around in a truck throwing mini footballs to the crowd. It was alot more fun than I thought it would be.

The birthday girl is slightly mad, but not entirely. A group of men was raising money for her to streak across the field at half time. She actually stopped a cop and asked him what would happen if she was caught. He told her she would have a criminal record, a $2500 fine and community service. She then declined the offer.

So the night was good, I still don't like crowds of people I don't know, but she has so many friends from so many different places that not everyone knew each other. Oddly enough, aside from the crazy girl from junior high (who was slightly crazy, kept opening the door of the van while it was moving to yell at people on the street)
I knew 3 other people, a girl who I worked with for a brief few months, a girl I took Lamaze with 10 years ago and the cousin of a guy I went to school with. It's a small world.

Football vs. Scrapbooking

I am expected to go to a football game tonight, and not the good sort of football but the North American kind. It would be hard for me to describe to you all (maybe 8 or 9 of you now) how much I hate football but let's just leave it at the fact that I am not a fan. (Except for the time I went to a Super Bowl party and won $32 in a pool...this was only because I knew that football uses scores of 3 and 7 so I used my poor math skills and took all related numbers. Lucky thing I was the first to go.) The only advantage is this is Canadian football and not American, so I think the game is supposed to be slightly more entertaining. So people tell me anyway. The players definitely make alot less money.

I am going for my friends birthday and I am dreading it because a)there will be about 17 people I don't know (have I mentioned I am super shy?), b)there will be a girl I went to junior high with and though we were best friends at one point, she became a total bitch and according to the birthday girl, has become slightly crazy since her divorce,(well, maybe craziness will make the night worth it) c) this game is costing me $50 + drinks and food. (I hate to appear cheap but it is the end of August and I have two sets of school fees -the joys of Catholic school in Edmonton!- back to school clothes to buy, 2 sets of school supplies, rent and 3 major bills due. Plus I only have one more EI cheque and my hours at work are expected to be crap until December.) d) I am missing my monthly scrapbooking night. Since I only actually get anything done on this one night a month, I hate to miss it. Plus there's alot of interesting talk. It is amazing what you learn about people's sex lives in the course of an evening.

I suppose I will go to this game tonight and chances are I will probably enjoy myself. Or I will hate it and vow never again to go either a football game or out with a group of people I don't know.

Seven Things

I came across this quiz that is going around some blogs and I thought I may as well as do it too. I think a couple of the questions are quite stupid but we'll give it a go anyway.

Seven things I plan to do before I die.
1) a trip to Ireland. And not just the farce of a trip that I did before, where I did not go further south than Dublin. I want to see everything, every place I have ever read about, every birth place of the men and women I admire. Clonakilty, here I come!
2)have another child. Crazy? Possibly. Can hardly handle the three I have? Definitely. But do I love them? I do, like mad.
3)get a real job. Facing the reality that I will never win the lottery (since I never play it) I guess I better get a job to fund the trip to Ireland.
4)go to Australia. Just to meet the in laws. I'm still scared of the spiders.
5)get married. Yes, one day I would like to make my daughter and her future brother (it had better be a boy) legitamite.
6)move to another country. Possibly Scotland. Although my sister in law said she prefered it over here. Why are we never happy with our lot in life? (I would have said Ireland, but William and I could never agree on a place there we could both live in.)
7)see my kids happy, healthy and loved.

Seven things I can do
1)remember phone numbers and dates. I can not do simple math, but some things are stuck in my head forever.
2)cook. No one said this was a list of things you could do well.
3)annoy my partner. Just by being me!
4)spend money. As previously mentioned in a past post, I love to shop. It's even better if it's someone else's money.
5)sleep. I could sleep for Britain. I love my sleep.
6)it's private
7)so is this one.

Seven things I can not do.
1)drive legally. Due to the fact that I failed my test 3 times.
2)multi task. I'm not sure why since I constantly seem to have about 3 dozen things on the go at any one time.
3)climb down a mountain. I can get up one, but coming down terrifies me.
4)sun tan. Damn my parents for their places of birth. I burn and then go back to being my pasty white self.
5)garden. Because I hate spiders. And dirt.
6)be invisible. It's what I always used to choose in those "if you could have one super hero power what would it be" questions. I would not use it for super hero purposes, but just to know everything that goes on. Nosy thing that I am.
7)speak another language. I failed French consistantly for the 6 years I took it. I finally dropped it in the middle of Grade 10 and took Law instead. I did much better in that class. I can pick up a few Irish words, but that would hardly class me as being able to speak the language.

Seven things that I find attractive about the opposite sex.
(as if anyone really cares!)
1) eyes. I love blue eyes.
2) a nice smile.
3) good teeth. To make the nice smile worthwhile.
4)a sense of humour. There is nothing better than someone who can make you laugh when you are down.
5)a nice personality. What's the point in looks if underneath it, he's a complete arse?
6)short hair. I love short hair. Very sexy.
7)a bit of a belly. For some reason, I find it very comforting.

Seven things I say the most.
1)Ah, for fecks sake. All the time. Every day, to every one. Except my mother, she hates when I swear.
2)Love ya.
3)Sorshie-Porshie (to the baby)
4)Clean your room NOW (to Taylor)
5) If you don't pick these cards up off the floor I will throw them all out. (to Liam)
6)Is (insert name here) there, please? Because I am constantly on the phone.
7)Talk to you later. Because eventually I have to get off the phone.
...and because I am Canadian 'sorry' is automatically on my list.

Seven books I love.
*This is supposed to be 'Seven Celebrity Crushes' but other than the late River Phoenix I can't think of a single one.
1) Ireland's Unfinished Revolution. If you haven't read this book you should. No matter who you are.
2) Bandit Country.
3) Rebel Hearts
4) the April Grove series by Lilian Harry. I love wartime British fiction. And I thought it was time to throw some fiction in there.
5)Dublin Tenement Life
6) Eyewitness Bloody Sunday
7)Round Ireland With a Fridge. Made me laugh so hard it was almost a depends moment.
Honestly, I could do 777 books I love and still find another couple to mention.

Seven people I would like to see take this quiz.
Well, I don't think there are 7 people who even read this blog. But I know there are a few out there who have. You know who you are, so start writing!

$10,000 for Brad Pitt

A local radio station is offering $10,000 if you can get Brad Pitt to come in for an interview, $20, 000 if Angelina Jolie comes with him and $50, 000 if you can get Jennifer Aniston (but the picture looks an awful lot like Claire Danes) to join them. Unless Jen has turned to stalking her ex I doubt that she is likely to be found in the backwaters of Edmonton.

Brad Pitt is Edmonton later this week filming a movie about Jesse James. He will be here for a few weeks and apparently Angelina Jolie will be joining him. Rumour has is that she was in Calgary this past weekend with her 2 kids and returned to New York with only the baby. I don't care how lovely a person Brad Pitt is, or how long they have been together but there is no way I would leave my 4 year old son in another country with a man who was not his father, or an extremely long term partner. But that's just me and maybe other people would see things differently.

Anyway, I digress. I am not sure what all the fuss about these two are. Yes, they are good looking people. He's a bit more on the average side than she is, but still not half bad for the 40+ he is. What does this radio station (www.96x.ca) want with them anyway? Do they really think they will be the ones that get the scoop, whatever it is that that may be? "Yes, we had a crazy affair while Jen and I were married." or "We are the best of friends...no shared bed here!"

Frankly, I could care less what they do with their private lives, as long as the involved children are happy. And to Jen, I would say Vince is better looking anyway. So while I could definitely use the $10, 000 I won't be looking for Brad. I have better things to do with my time.

Getting On

Can someone please explain to me why I can not get along with my daughter? I thought that she would come back from England and everything would be grand, but I was so very wrong. We fight about absolutely everything. Why is this? She's only 10 for gods sakes, what will it be like when she is 13 or 16? I shudder to think. I don't know where her strong personality comes from...at her age I would have cowered if my mother yelled at me and meekly done whatever she wanted. Not my Taylor, though. She'd disagree with you if you told her that n comes after m.

Since it looks like we while be fighting for the next 8 years I will look at the positive things about Taylor's argumentive personality- 1) she'll make a great lawyer and 2) no man will walk over her.

I admire the woman she will one day become, but I hope I survive the child that she is.

The Scots have arrived (minus one)

Our Scottish visitors arrived on Wednesday evening, and so far we have done nothing but take them to the mall. Terrible. Today the 3 kids and the 2 men went to the waterpark, where they all had a great time. Next week, they are off to Drumheller for a day to see the dinosaur museum and whatnot. Though it holds no interest for me William and the kids are all excited. Saoirse's christening is tomorrow, bit of a spat over that but what can you do? William's nephew arrives on Tuesday, and they will be here for another week after that. I better get it together and find somewhere other than the mall for them to go.

Vandalism pt II

On Thursday the public school right across the street was broken into. Really, what is this neighbourhood coming to? I did not even mention the numerous stolen bikes (two belonging to my children, one of which was recovered) or the robbery at the local convenience store. I tell you, it's atrocious. Although I did just find out that there is a meth addiction treatment centre in the professional building near by so maybe a few people have had relapses. Who knows.

Vandalism at the Catholic school

Today graffitti saying 'God is bad' and 'Fuk da Pope' was noticed on the walls of our local Catholic school, the school both my children go to (well not Liam come September...that is a sad story of its own.) This is not the first time the school has had grafitti on it. Last May 1, there was a fantastically well done swastika. There have been other bits, kids messing about drawing body parts which are usually easily washed away. The police were called out for the swastika, which was photographed and then immediately painted over. There had been a number of swastikas found around the city at that time last year sadly.

It amazes me that people could be so disrespectful to a school (obviously not a building they spent alot of time in considering the spelling of certain words.) Last summer, as the kids and I were walking in the next neighbourhood over, we caught two adults(!!) setting fire to one of the portables of the school. I have seen girls performing oral sex on guys in the nooks and crannies of the public school across the street from me. And we live in a good neighbourhood...imagine what it's like in a bad one! It is such odd behaviour to me. Was I raised in such a different time? I'm sure it wasn't all that long ago. Schools were like sacred ground. You would have seen a bit of grafitti in the school parks but there was never anything on the building itself.

It's sad that these people will never be caught. I could honestly care less what they think about the pope (I'm not a big fan of him or the former one either) but I don't think you need to advertise your negative thoughts on the walls of a Catholic school.

I cannae think of a title

One of my favourite bloggers up and left today, saying that he was done blogging. I am not sure if this is a joke or not, I am thinking maybe his girlfriend/wife/significant other said enough is enough...it's her or the blog. (As he did seem to do an awful lot of it.) Or maybe he is just having everyone on. Maybe he's just changing his name. Who knows? I enjoyed reading his blog and the comments that went along with it. For the most part I agreed with most of what he said in regards to Ireland, but I was sorely disappointed in his choice of premiership teams. I mean, really, Man U? Puhleassse.

The tale of the bullet

Yesterday, while walking to the mall, William found a bullet. Which he then proceeded to bring home.
Being a nice girl, from a nice urban home, I have never before seen a bullet up close and personal. When he showed it to me I was shocked by the size. It was huge. Apparently, it belongs to a Winchester 303. I don't actually know what that looks like (again the nice urban home) but apparently it is a shotgun and therefore big. Hey, it's not my fault that most crimes on CSI and other related crime shows are done with a small gun...I think they call them handguns.

So I say to William 'What are we supposed to do with this?' He tells me to call the police, they will know. So I do and he asks me if it is spent. I said no, never been used. In my head, the police were already arriving at my door, sirens blazing, to take this dangerous thing out of my house. He says 'Just drop it off at any police station, we'll dispose of it.' Oh, and he told me not to drop it, as it could go off. He laughed quite heartily at my reply to that. Liam immediately asked for it and I know he was thinking about looking for a hammer so he could try and explode this bullet. Personally, I think that the police should have come and got it. There is something somewhat dangerous about leaving a bullet in a home with a 9 year old boy until we have the time to go drop it off. And it's not like they are busy or anything. For a city that is well on its way to being murder capital of Canada, the police are not very well represented on the streets of Edmonton. Just what are they doing? They always seem so bored if you ever do run into one.

The strangest email ever

This was in my inbox yesterday:


I can assure you Emma that we have more than mentioned this fact. Unfortunately we do not have a fair press and a massive admission such as this will not be investigated or talked up in case it upsets the IRA.

Jonathan

After almost dying of shock that I had an email from the DUP and responding with this:

Excuse me? How did you get my email address!? I am outraged that someone from the DUP has emailed me.

I wised up and scrolled down and saw an email from my bf to the DUP that said this:


I was just wondering why no one has made a mention of the fact that Gerry Adams and Martin said that they were standing down from the IRA army council, which means that they gave the orders for the Shankill bombings and many others so shouldn't they be facing charges? Can bin laden say he's resigned and then will Bush and Blair say 'Ok join us at the table?'


While I do not totally disagree with William's opinion of Gerry Adams (I exclude Martin McGuinness because for some unknown reason I rather like him as I have previously mentioned) that perhaps some responsibility should be held for IRA activities that took place while he was on the Army Council I am appalled that I am now probably on some DUP mailing list. Perish the thought. As for myself, I wouldn't make a connection between IRA activities and bin Laden but I suppose many people might. Ah well, I await my next email from Jonathan as I notice in my outbox that William sent another email to them explaining that he had not told me he had used my addy to email them, hence the reason they got the email from me.

Ach, my poor damaged leg

This is my first official 'please pity me' post. Yesterday morning I fell down the stairs and as I tried to steady myself at the bottom I stepped on Saoirse's bowl and totally lost my balance. I think my legs went in two different, slightly opposing, directions but I am not entirely sure as all I can really remember is screaming my head off. Now, being of a slightly clumsy nature, I have fallen down stairs many times, along with tripping on cracks in the sidewalk, however, I normally pick myself up and go on with my day. Not yesterday though, I lay on the floor for an hour and a half and then, when I was feeling brave, William helped me to stand up. I put my weight on the leg that didn't hurt and that ankle turned on me (the wee bugger.) I made it to the sofa where I lay for the majority of the day. Normally, I would give anything to lay on the sofa all day and read a good book (currently Marian Keyes 'Lucy Sullivan is Getting Married' for about the fifth time) and be served tea and other drinks and snacks and all and to have absolutely no responsibilities but this was most certainly the wrong time for this to happen. Taylor will be home on Monday and the Scots arrive on Wednesday, and as much as I love William he does not clean bathrooms and there are 3 to be done, and the last time he was here I banned him from doing laundry as he has a tendency to wash jeans with the whites and the results are none too pretty. We have 8 fences to replace this weekend and I have 2 housing inspections to do and as I said earlier, the timing is totally off.
I refuse to go to the doctor because mine is a quack and I won't go to the hospital, as I work there and do not want to run into anyone I know. Anyway, I was in too much pain to shave my legs and who wants a doctor running their hands down their prickly legs? Not me. My leg still hurts this morning, but if I turn it to the left and sort of slide it along the pain is not too awful. I'm not sure about going out in public but it will have to be done at some point today as I have to go to the hardware store for paintbrushes and whatnot for the fences. Poor me, I will be walking around looking like the guy from 'The Night of the Living Dead.' Shame.

How to say I'm sorry the Canadian way

When I go to another country, or have visitors from somewhere else, it is inevitably pointed out that I apologize...ALOT. I don't know why it is that Canadians have a tendency to say sorry for everything, but I have noticed recently that it is very true. Some examples:

At a resteraunt: "Excuse me, I'm sorry to bother you, but it seems I was brought a hamburger instead of a grilled chicken. I'm really sorry, but I would prefer the chicken."

In Old Navy's fitting room: "I'm sorry, but can I try this on?"

When ringing someone: "Sorry to bother you, but have you got a minute?"

When you bump into someone at the mall: "Oh, sorry, I didn't mean to walk into you. Sorry, I wasn't paying attention."

When someone bumps into you at the mall: "Och, sorry 'bout that!" (While thinking "ya wee fecker, you bumped into me!"

There are, I am sure, a few more ways to be a sorry Canadian. But it is time for my dinner, so sorry, but I am off.

Tattoos

I thought I had taken way too many pictures of Saoirse yesterday, so took one of my tattoo. Driven by a need to avoid housework today, I am wasting time by posting said picture.