That game of football was really really really fun. Anytime you guys need a player, call me up, I'm game. I played really well (even tossing 2 TD passes...although the second one was just to up my throwing stats, since I could have easily ran it in myslef...I was 2 yards away from the goal line on a bootleg when I tossed it to one of the other guys). But one thing I forgot about playing in 12 inches of snow (30 cm for you metric kiddies) is how much the snow takes out of your legs. Every step in snow is like 3 steps on regular grass. By the end everybody had sore legs. I also managed to stay injury free (except for one good shot in the lower back by my running back...so much for providing a lead block). Come to think of it, I don't think I caught a ball today. Ahh well I had fun and that's all that matters.

Checked out that place Picaddily's Cirucs last night. It was alright considering downtown was dead. But hey, I got me some free parking so I'm happy! $10 for a pitcher was pretty good too! I think I'm playing some football today, so we'll see how that goes. It's -10, but the cold doesn't bother me at all. It's not knowing what kind of footware to bring with me. Do I go with my boots and keep my feet dry? Running shoes if it's icy? Or do I bust out my cleats for extra grip? I don't know, I'll bring all 3. What really sucks is I'm going to have to wear hand warmers under my football gloves which I know is going to cause me to drop more than a few balls today. But then again, the gloves may help me pick off a ball or two, so it could work both ways.

Ribs were good last night (if a bit on the pricey side...but I didn't care). Damm good ribs actually...I can't wait to go back (maybe in 2 weeks...don't think I could handle it in consecutive weeks). I've known Hairy Greek for about 5 years, yet I'm still amazed at how the guy can put back 4 racks of ribs easily...and still have room for more. I didn't think it was humanly possible for a man to eat as much as he did yet still be fine afterwards. He is truly an eating machine. So in conclusion, go to Montana's for the all u can eat ribs if you are free on a Wednesday night.

Mmm...all u can eat Ribs at Montana's. Gotta wait 2 hours to eat, but I can already feel myself getting hungry. Not much else to say except I've had a productive day at work. I'm close to convincing them to buy me a palm pilot so that I can learn how to troubleshoot users better when they have issues. Actually it was the Sr. Network Technician's idea...I just played along with it. Yeah that's about it...it's been slow around here.

Went to work today. Yeah that stupid e-mail worm that's been floating around hit us, but luckily we got rid of it pretty quick. By 10am it was gone from the network. I also managed to upgrade a user to office XP today then defend my title as office ping pong champ. Ok so what if I needed a 15 point lead to win...the key point is my record is 3-2 and that's a winning record!

Drove home in the snow yesterday and today. Today was much worse than yesterday. I can't believe how much snow has fallen over the past two days. You gotta hand it to mother nature....she gave us a nice dose of winter. But hey I love the snow so it's all good. What kind of winter would it be if we didn't get dumped on?

Didn't go out this weekend, got lazy. Well that and I needed some clothes for work so my normal party budget was spent on clothing. Bought a couple of shirts. I couldn't believe how packed Sherway Gardens and Sqaure One were. Both Saturday and Sunday those places were rammed. Parking was hard to find. Hey at least it bodes well for the economy. With the malls that packed, people have to be spending money which in turn means people are making money to spend. Hopefully it means more jobs for the CST crew (even though it's in tottally unrelated fields).

My first full week at work has finished and I'm proud to say I'm already the IT Ping Pong Champion. Ok, that title may be a little tainted since I needed a 10 point advantage to stay close, but the key is I won and became IT Ping Pong Champion. Add in a bagel for breakfast and the fact that I got the wireless systems working after they were down and it was a productive day at the office for me.

If you get a chance, I highly recommend watching the unrated version of American Wedding! Some funny shit in the extended version, espically that bachelor party scene. I was a little skeptical at first because I know how many of those uncut/extend versions tend to have nothing more than 10 seconds...but this one had close to 5 minutes of extra footage. And unlike most movies, this extra footage was actually good!

Just watched the third episode of The Apprentice. Man it sucks to see the guys get their asses kicked. I guess they could hide behind the fact that the women have whored themseleves twice out of the 3 challenges and appealed to the lowest common denomenator in the third, but they keep winning and that's all that counts. Sam is an idiot, but you got to hand it to the guy, he's had some great ideas...he just couldn't get it working, kinda like Marty Morhninweg.

Works been good so far, got to configure one of the servers to use a mirrored drive before. I haven't really had a chance to do anything like that at my previous jobs. Plus it was kinda cool to play around with Windows 2003 Server, I've never used it before. It's such a relief to not have to worry about older hardware/software like at my past two jobs, these guys have everything top of the line. And to boot, our (former) CEO is going to make a run for the leadership of the Conservative party (we all know where my vote is going now). Of course, there's already a bunch of former politicians on our board of directors, so you gotta believe we got some kind of pull.

My head hurts. That's all.

Monday came and went. Other than the president not being too impressed with me in the boardroom during an IMPORTANT meeting (see really important stuff) it went pretty smooth. I'm begining to settle in at the workplace which is taking less time than I had anticipated. Although one thing I noticed is EVERYBODY is really friendly and EVERYBODY works hard at what they do. No wonder this company makes so much money. Although give me a month and I'll eventually find out who the slackers are. But so far, based on my first impressions, these are some pretty good people working at Tesma. Honestly, I think it's all the free food, juice and pop going around the office. An employee that isn't hungry is a happy employee. Take note penny pinching companies *cough* Toys R Us *cough*.

Took the weekend easy...I needed a break. Friday night I was dead. Watched the apprentice I taped from Thursday night (great show btw, if you love survivor but don't care much for the bug bites, I recommend you watch this show...plus Donald Trump is the ultimate rich guy so it doesn't hurt to take a few pointers from the way he conducts himself). After the apprentice, I tried to watch pirates of the caribiean around 8....I woke up at 10. Decided to have a quick snack and then get some sleep.

Saturday, I finally got DAB for my car! Man this stuff is so cool. For those that don't know, finding an antenna adapter for my focus has been a HUGE problem for me. I think I went to about 8 different car audio shops before I actually found the dammed part. $20 later, I'm loving DAB and all the joy it brings. Getting weather updates and song titles while I listen to the radio will really be helpful while I'm stuck in traffic on the drive home (since I've already exhuasted a few MP3 cd's).

Today, I spent time with family. My grandfather had a stroke a few weeks ago, and I've felt horrible that I've been too busy to see him. So today I went and spent some time with him. I never had to shave another person before. If you are wondering how I did, I got halfway through before he took the razor out of my hand and finished the job himself. Looks like I'll never get my fathers chair at the barbershop. Then I cleared the driveway of snow and ran his car for a bit (the engine hadn't been started in a couple of weeks and with this weather, it's important to let the car idle for a bit). After that I watched the Pats game (blah, Manning is a great QB but like the Lion from the wizard of oz...not the Detroit Lions, he lacks a heart).

I'm begining to like this job. Today for breakfast I had a crossiant. Lunch I had chicken stir fry. Snack between lunch and going home time was a ham sub, had a few drinks with each meal and I can say I'm full. Not to mention I got some work done. Things are looking up. And I got some actual responsibilities at that place. But it's 6:45 now and I'm hungry again. Suddenly the food at home doesn't sound as good as before I had the sub.

Work day #2 came and went. Pretty average day I guess. At lunch went to the training center to take leftovers from training only to find out there wasn't any :( So I went out for lunch only to find that Rutherford was closed between Credit Stone and Keele..but luckily I found a way out (and back in). Had an apple juice and bottle of water today. (can you tell i'm stretching for info?) Oh yeah, I also found out how many auto parts this company makes, damm they could almsot build an engine.

My new job is pretty cool...people are really nice, building is super nice (I'll take pics soon). Anyways, here's the condensed version of Saturday Sunday and Monday.

Saturday: Bruins - Red Wings game was...well boring. Was nice to see all those Red Wings fans in the building, but that couldn't make up for the fact that the game itself just wasn't entertaining. Highlight of the game was the two hot girls that took out the garbage cans to the ice when they had to clean it up. Now that's entertainment!

Alright, after the game it was off to Faneuil Hall. Really really nice place, I wouldn't mind going there again in the summer (one of the few places in Boston that I liked...wait lemme rephrase that. Boston the city I liked...just their alcohol laws were super gay. So after Faneuil Hall...we decided to find a bar to watch the football games. We stumbled upon this little bar with $1 beers! OMFG, I'm in heaven! I wish they had a place like that up here. Only disappointment was the beer didn't really do anything to me (it was American beer after all, and it is true, you do get more alcohol from your garden hose...try it some time you'll see what I mean). So after 7 beers and 1 1/2 football games, we decided to head back to the apartment. On the way back we stopped at a restaurant for my one and only Sam Adams beer. Note to the wise, this beer isn't good.

Sunday....umm, we got to sleep in. Went to New Hampshire (where their license plates say "Live Free Or Die"). 4 different stores...still couldn't find my antenna adapter for my radio...I'll give it one last try on Saturday, if I still haven't found one, I'll just give up and order it off the interweb. Did a driving tour of Downtown Boston...saw all the major sights...went inside the original Cheers, walked outside Fenway Park...saw a couple of landmarks.

On the ride back I try to play hero and take a shortcut. What do I get for my efforts? A flat tire of course. So there goes my Monday tour of Boston as I had to stay in the suburbs and get my tire repaired (well...in the meantime I did find time to drive 130 Km's on the doughnut tire).

You know what I noticed most about visiting the Boston area...how much Americans are missing when it comes to doughnut shops. Take Dunkin Doughnuts for example. Sure their doughnuts are big, coffee is big, but just because the portions are big, doesn't mean it's good. I'm used to having the (mostly) friendly staff at Tim Hortons put the butter on my bagel for me...Dunkin Doughnuts thinks I should do it myself. And the coffee...I asked for a large double double...guy behind the counter replies with "So what do you want in it?" IDIOT! Not to mention they had doughnuts the size of loafs of bread (I forgot my camera or else I would have taken a picture for you guys). And possibly the one sign that sums up the typical American mentality:

Fight for peace
America Will Prevail

Ok, that's enough talking for one more day, later all!

I'm back from Boston. Well that trip was...hmm, how should I put this...well...umm....Boston was a really nice city. The trip just was a comedy of errors right from the outset. Evidently, NOBODY can tell time. A 2pm departure time, actually ended up being closer to 3:30pm. I felt like I was with a group of women when we had to make a stop at the outlet mall (although the Old Navy store did have some pretty sweet deals). So we actually didn't leave the buffalo area until 6pm or so. Add in stops every hour or 2 and it was a long drive. The highlight of the ride down there was this one small town somewhere in upstate New York we stopped in. I don't know what it is, but I love stopping in small towns like that to get gas. I don't know why...I just do. So anyways stop by get some gas, then walk in to get some beer ($7.99 for a 12 pack is a pretty sweet price). Well I'm in the store and you can tell the locals know how to spot an out of towner a mile away (they have teeth). So one of the girls there is giving me this weird look...and I'm thinking to myself...you shouldn't look at me that way...I'm going to end up doing something funny.

So I pay for my beer and get carded (nothing speical I guess). Woman looks at my ID for not more than 5 seconds and says "I give up...where's the date?" And I just look at her for a second and think to myself...do you even know how to breathe? THE FUCKING DATE IS RIGHT ON THAT CARD YOU IDIOT...THERE ISN'T MUCH TEXT ON IT. So I pay for my beer and walk out having lost more respect for Americans (well that is kinda hard since I don't respect them at all to begin with, but my point will be reinfocred on this trip). Americans are stupid. So into the car I go and strange American girl is still giving me weird looks. Ok it's time to show off for a bit if she wants to stare...pull out of the gas station, grab the e-brake and turn the wheel. I did a pretty nice swing out turn getting out of the gas station, and I'm happily on my way to Boston. Of course Brown Cow has to wait until I'm halfway down the street to point out that I did that turn RIGHT INFRONT of the local police station. Yeah I can safely say I'm never going back to that town again.


So that was it for the ride down...we finally made it to the apartment around 3am I think it was. Nice place, but really far out of town. So Saturday morning comes around and me and Hairy Greek decide it's a good idea to go out and get breakfast for Brown Cow and Hobie. So we set out on our happy way to get some BK (start time approx 9:30am). Pull out onto the road and we realize neither of us has any shampoo left. So we look for a Pharmacy. That's when I get the idea we should look around a supermarket. Well we stumble upon some BONE SUCKIN SAUCE (only in America will you find a product with that name).



So we leave the supermarket around 10:20 and head back to BK to pick up our order of 6 crosandwhices. Well we get there and we find out they only have 3 eggs left...so either half of us get a breakfast or nobody does. Well we chose the nobody does option and headed back to the apartment. Boy were they shocked when the only food we came back with was a bag of peanuts. (come to think of it, I'd be kinda upset too if I sent two idiots out to buy breakfast and all they came back with was a bag of peanuts).

This blog is dragging on, I'll make it a 2 parter, but here's a couple of photos to hold you guys over.

That's the bridge to cross over the river...the Fleet Center is on the right.



Without a doubt, the DUMBEST LAW in the land. Hey out of towners...we don't want your money! Yes evidently I can enter into their country with my drivers license, but don't you dare buy a beer.


$1 beers?!? I love this bar more than Cheers!

Ok time for a real update since I'm not going to update this weekend. Why you might ask? I'm heading out to Boston later tonight with the Jane St. Posse. As I was writing this blog, Hairy Greek called me up and told me he got some Bruin tickets for the Saturday afternoon game ($20 USD ticket...take that Maple Leafs!) Sweet! I can watch hockey in the afternoon, then the Patriots football game in the evening (well watching it in a bar with a bunch of drunken homers). Man this weekend is going to be pretty sweet. In addition I found out there's one less person going with us, so the focus just got a bit roomier. 4 people instead of 5.

What else is planned? Umm...the offical reason for going is Brown Cow has an interview with the dental school at Tufts university (They don't have a division IA football team, that's why I've never heard of them). So I don't know what else I'm doing when I go down there...maybe when I"m at Tufts, I'll sneak into a lecture hall and pretend to be part of a class. I could easily pull it off as I still look like a student (even though I reek of CST Graduate...hehehe).

I took the focus in this morning to get that hesitiation looked at. Hopefully they'll have it fixed by 12:30 so I can be off on my way to Boston. The problem isn't TOO bad, as I was able to push the car past 150 on the highway after the fuel line treatment, however hesitation was noticeable espically going uphill, so it's something that needs to be looked at. But then again, it is pretty cold outside today too, so you want to keep your cars issues to a minimum. Pretty cold is an understatement actually, MINUS 22 FREAKING DEGREES before the windchill is FUCKING COLD! Although the air is nice and crisp and breathing in this weather is really easy so I won't complain. Thank god for Touques!

Oh yeah, the dude from Tesma is supposed to let me know today about his decision. He's got my cell number and already called one of my references so things are looking up for me. Lets hope for the best!

So farewell until Monday or Tuesday or whenever it is I update my blog next.

Check out the Random CST pics on the sidebar. That way you guys will know what we've been up to the last two semesters.

Had a job interview today, went pretty smooth, or at least I hope it did. I never had an interview last an hour before, so that may be a good sign. Weirdest thing happend to me during the interview. Buddy (who was a pretty cool guy let me add...can you tell I'm kissing ass?). Anyways he asked me if I knew Person X? I thought...person X...name sounds familiar, but where do I know him from? Then it hit me! Person X (name hidden to protect his identity since he doesn't read this webpage) is the guy that I worked my first Coop with! Back in the day when I was a SCIM coop, I handled the stuff at the Davis campus while Person X handled the stuff at the Trafalgar campus. So after I told interviewer guy that I knew him, things went really smoothly. Evidently, Person X left a really good impression on the company, so he may have indirectly helped me get the job!

Give me 2 days at work and I'll post as soon as things die down. After an super busy day yesterday, things in here are D-E-A-D, just the way I like it. Well not really dead, but at least I've got time to sit down and rest my ass. Yesterday I was on my feet for the first 4 hours of my shift because we were so busy.

And why is it whenever somebody comes to the front desk they look at me before the female coop sitting next to me? I know whenever I come in for service, I ALWAYS go to the female before the male. Dunno why, I just do. Maybe Sheridan has more homosexuals than I thought.

I've been slacking off with the updates lately, but that's to be expected. See when I've got stuff to do, I've got stuff to avoid, and hence I have a reason to blog. Now that I've got nothing at all to do, no homework, no job, then I've got nothing to avoid. That's why there haven't been many updates lately, and there probably won't be many in the future until something changes. But hey, at least I'm still alive.

I'm probably heading out to Boston this weekend. Since I don't have any job or school to hold me back I figured now is a good time to travel and just blow some money. I probably will never get a chance to do stuff like this again, so I might as well take advantage of it while I still can. My sister is moving out to California in the next two weeks, so if I'm not working by super bowl time, I think I'll be paying her a visit (plus I've never been to the Los Angeles area and I've always wanted to be on the price is right).

Well another year, I'll post the rest of my Year 2003 in review another time. 2004 came in with a bang for me. Had an amazying time down in Montreal. So much crap happend that there's no way I'm going to be able to post it all. Where do I begin? Taking my MP3 player down with me was probably the best decision I've made ever, because having 160 songs on one cd for a road trip was a great idea. Comedy MP3's work great on road trips for those that were wondering.

The hotel down there was perfect for the party atmosphere. It was a basement loft with a mini kitchen. It was a perfect place to house 7 people for 2 nights of wild partying. The thing I'll remember the most from the loft was going into the bathroom to get ready to party (with only a few extra guests in the loft), sparying some Axe Body spray on me, and then coming out to a full party going on. I was like WTF just happend here? So yes, from now on, I'm not going ANYWHERE without my axe.

The club the first night wasn't too good. But the urinal in the washroom was pretty cool, because it was a waterfall. Then they charged me $6.75 for a Hieniken and I got all pissed off. I remember saying to Arthur that I wanted to puke inside of the club because they charged me so much for a drink. And not just puke in the washroom, but puke on some of the good furniture so they have to pay extra to clean it up.

After the club we walked down to McDonalds for some late night eats. Who would of known they had cappucino at McDonalds? I'd be the last to have guessed that. I've never seen a guy as happy to get some McDonalds as Arthur was that night. The next day was pretty good too, Eaton Center in Montrea is a pretty big mall on its own, but it's also connected to a couple other places which combined to make one HUGE mall. It was pretty cool too, because all their stores were on 2 levels. And they had so much better selection of clothes down there then they do up here (wait...this sounds a little gay). Anyways, I bought myself a new shirt. As can be seen in this picture



I wasn't sure about the shirt when I bought it, although everybody was saying how good it looked on me. I'm still not sure if they really liked it, or silently made fun of me behind my back. But whatever, I made out with 2 girls with this shirt on, so I must be doing something right! And I remember being pissed at the club because Mike told me somebody had the same shirt on as me..but then I was like...but nobody has the 45 degree stripes like me, everybody else has horizontal or vertical stripes on.

I also managed to get myself thrown out of a club (for the first time in my life) for throwing up in the washroom (what kind of rule is that?) I was puking, then when I was done, a bouncer takes me by the arm and starts escorting me out. That's when Mike came up HUGE with the save and convinced them to only toss me out for 10 minutes before I could be let back in. It was pretty funny too, because Mike and Diana were trying to round up the group and the drunken people just kept wandering away, in some cases (like your's truly) I was being a hero and picking up girls that couldn't stand on their own (of course I ended up making out with one of them...after I threw up). We eventually managed to get all of us (sans Yan) outside the club together and walk across the road to the burger king. I was told that on the walk across I started banging on some car saying happy new year. What I didn't know at the time was there was some family in the car with kids and I scared the shit out of them. Heheh, that's pretty funny now that I think of it.

Umm, I had one poutine at the BK down there, I told some girl in line I was getting one, and she was an american (so obviously very dumb) and she's like You can't order salty poo tang here. Then there was the walk back to the hotel. I saw some butterfly knife on the ground...some guy says to me "yo that's mine" so I pick it up, give it to him and say "Please don't stab me" as I walk along.

Lets see, I threw up when we got back to the hotel, that's when we decided it was time to go search for Yan. But what I'm trying to figure out now is why did we try to go the McDonalds first if all we were doing was looking for Yan. Anyways, McDonalds was closed (24 hours my ass), so we went to Burger King. Along the way, some guy was trying to get people into the afterhours club. He said "hey guys, do you feel like drinking some more?"

I replied with "No thanks, I've thrown up twice already".
So he says to me "That's ok, leaves room for more alcohol!"

We get to Burger King, and who do we find there? YAN! It was a true CST miracle. So after meeting some guy we called Jesus and Mike pretending to pick a fight with him (it would have worked out better if the door wasn't locked) we walk back to the hotel. On the walk back, Yan does a pretty sick hood slide on a taxi cab, we find a mailbox that has been knocked over and managed to take some tags off of parking meters.

So that's the ultra condensed version of our weekend. So much crap happend it wasn't even funny. By far the best new years eve EVER for myself and I'm going back for sure next year. I LOVE MONTREAL!