The Wild World of Pamela

So much better than regular eating

Tue, 10 Apr 2007 23:05:48 GMT

I have used my lil' scoops spoon to eat all of my cream filled eggs from the inside out!

I think my first mistake was trying to walk and take a drink at the same time

Sun, 21 Jan 2007 01:08:31 GMT

My little nalgene bottle delivered me a huge gulp of a bolus of water and when I tried to swallow it, water started shooting out my nose!

On the Baked Potato Scale...

Mon, 15 Jan 2007 17:34:52 GMT

the Thursday night Wide Mouth Mason concert at Urban Lounge gets EXTRA CRISPY

for those who prefer the Godzilla Scale that equates to Stomp of Approval

Wed, 13 Dec 2006 21:53:44 GMT

Check out who I ran into at the Globe!

Watch out Angelina

Centurian, Yeah!

Thu, 09 Nov 2006 08:12:11 GMT

Just got home from completing a Centruian! Yeah! Frickin Pilsner. Yeah! Woot! 100 shots done! Me and Shannon were the only 1st years!

Pub Crawl Pictures

Tue, 31 Oct 2006 05:27:23 GMT

As promised, here are some pictures of my Blossom costume from the Superhero Pubcrawl. Unfortunately there aren't any clear shots to capture the costume in its full glory.
Only one person in the whole pub crawl knew who I was; that made me sad.

From left to right there is ??? in the wig and glasses, Aaron, Tracy, Me, Batman and Tara.

Darren is the one "surprising women since 1996", and I can't remember who the 2 other people are

Ashley as Elastigirl, Jon and Aaron as the Trainees, Rich as the Coach, ??? as a little boy dressed as a superhero, Me as Blossom, and Jamie as She Ra

Pam's picks for best costumes: Thor, god of thunder and Megaman.

Totally Creeped out!

Fri, 20 Oct 2006 00:02:18 GMT

For my Anatomy class, we have a lab component. In it we dissect cadavers. Today, I got my first case of The Creeps. We were dissecting the hand and I was trying to clean away the fascia and fat around the thumb and so I tried pulling the thumb out a bit and it FELT LIKE IT WAS PULLING BACK!!!! It didn't help that our guy's hand is still fairly normal looking (some of the other bodies have curled up fingers or the skin is discolored or some other feature that makes them not look alive.)

I neahly got the vapouhs!

Sorry, that was supposed to be read in southern belle accent, hence the H's instead of R's

Tue, 17 Oct 2006 04:24:06 GMT

Yays! I am going to the pub crawl as Blossom from the Powerpuff Girls. All I need is a big pink bow and my costume will be GOLD!

The question is do I reuse the costume for Hallowe'en? I guess that will be a matter of how much time I have to make one of my original halloween costume ideas: Jail Escapee or Tinkerbell. Or maybe another forbidden love child?

My patience has paid off

Tue, 12 Sep 2006 05:59:42 GMT

Good News Everyone!

There was finally a torrent of Season 1 and 2 of teen drama/comedy Popular! Sucks to you, Family Channel, I don't need you anymore!

Tue, 12 Sep 2006 02:02:53 GMT

The Results are in:

1. Speaking objectively and non-flirtatiously, you have the most alluring voice of any girl I know.
2. The Oreo Sundae at Denny's. It's really amazingly lethally sweet.
3. Olive green.
4. Those cute/funny little illustrations you drew in the margins of Ross' Chemistry 11 textbook, which I later inherited.
5. UN Model Assembly, 2001: you wore blue jeans, white shirt and red undershirt because we were the United States. Also, Geoff announced we were present during attendance and everyone laughed because he sounded like Worf from Star Trek. Sadly, that laughter would be stilled by the horrific events of Model September 11.
6. A...monkey? No, wait: an orangutan. Like those robe-wearing, staff-toting orangutans from Planet of the Apes.
7. Why the blue-eye contacts? Are you still wearing those?

I completed #2 Friday night. We had some of the slowest service at Denny's; it was slow for Denny's even. And the sweetness was not exaggerated. It was like a giant thing of the good part of ice cream cake. Based on the fact I went to Denny's, you may have surmised that I went out to THE BAR. I even stayed all the way until the bar closed! That hasn't happened in forever!

Why blue contacts? For a change and to have the spice. I break them out from time to time still

Another thing of note: The first sexy shenanigan of PT happened at the bar. Just 2 classmates making out, but with 60 girls and 12 guys, it can only get juicier from here!

First day of School

Wed, 06 Sep 2006 02:46:26 GMT

What a looong day. It was all orientation, which is just sitting and listening, but paying attention all day gives me a headache.

Tomorrow is the first real day of class, starting at 8am :-(

Here are the extra curriculars I plan to join:
Ultimate
Underwater Hockey
Toastmasters
Volleyball

I just learned earlier today how underwater hockey works. I am pumped to give it a try! If I like it, I'm gonna try to convince my team to do a 'Swimming V'!

Scariest Spider Evar

Wed, 30 Aug 2006 08:48:17 GMT

There is one of those mean looking spiders sitting on the shelf I am about to disassemble. You know, the ones that have the tiny heads with the much larger thorax/abdomen. I don't trust it at all. I am hoping that it will disappear on its own without confrontation.

I am beginning to think the Pog of Millard Fillmore doesn't actually have his picture on it. Earlier tonight, the topic of hot presidents came up again, and I mentioned that Fillmore was my favorite. When I got home I did a google image search of his name and found only pictures of an ugly old coot, not the young bedroom-eyed go-getter that is on my pog at all. I think I'll need to rethink about the question of who is the hottest president

I wonder if I could restore MY manhood?

Fri, 21 Jul 2006 06:26:47 GMT

So I just saw this Hummer ad on TV. The slogan was "Restore your Manhood" All I have to say is wow, that has got to be the worst ad I've ever seen in my whole life.

Don't, don't, don't, don't, don't want, don't want, don't want, don't want no...

Plumber's coming tomorrow!!

Sat, 15 Jul 2006 01:00:59 GMT

I really hope something gets done this time. He/She is coming at 9am, so I am skipping bogging (hee hee hee, I just learned another meaning for bog a few days ago).

le sigh

Mon, 10 Jul 2006 08:16:37 GMT

My gringo pants are coming apart already :-( Well, they were fun while they lasted

Ow, ow ow!

Wed, 05 Jul 2006 23:43:16 GMT

So I was minding my own business, sitting in the hammock, reading and listening to music. Out of nowhere I feel a stinging feeling on my shin, so I look down, and somehow a bee had gotten trapped in the folds of my skirt and it had the nerve to sting me!

ooh!

I am such a Mark.

Mon, 26 Jun 2006 20:49:15 GMT

This story begins a couple months ago. Specifically the day everyone but me had soooooo much fun at playland. I was waiting at the bus stop to go to Sam's for the BBQ they were having afterward (bitter aside: lowest energy bbq I have ever seen). Its about 9pm and this woman comes up to me and she goes into this sob story about how her son is sick and in the hospital in Surrey, and he's taken a turn for the worse, and her husband is in a wheelchair, and so they need a special taxi to get there, but they don't have the money to pay for it. Now at first I am thinking that she is scamming me (HandyDarts only cost $2.25 for person in chair + attendant), but she is on the verge of tears, and seems legitimately distressed. I only had less than $.50 in pennies, nickels and dimes in my wallet, so was not too concerned about whether or not she was for real, and handed over the change.

On Saturday, on the way home from the Bon Ton, a woman comes up to me and I immediately recognise her before she even opens her mouth, and know exactly what she is going to say. I was totally scammed! She got something like $.38 cents from me. I will never believe anyone's sob story ever again

On Sunday, I did the Grouse Grind with Cathryn. When we arrived, less than a minute after getting out of the car I got crapped on by a bird! Other than that the only thing I have to say about that is the people who do it all the time are nuts! It is not even that nice of a hike, you can't see anything until the top, and its just stairs all the way up.

Homeward Bound

Thu, 22 Jun 2006 03:26:22 GMT

After realizing that we had done all of the major things that we'd wanted to do, and that we were running low on $$$, Kim and I decided to look into whether we could switch to an earlier flight. It turned out that the only flight that had space was June 22 2 am (later tonight). So in a split decision we decided boot it, amazing race style up from Arica to Lima to catch the flight. We should be in Vancouver airport 6pm tomorrow night.

The day before yesterday we took the bus from La Paz to Arica. We got to watch bootleg movies on the bus! Garfield, King Kong, The Day After Tomorrow. Garfield was the highlight because I could actually follow what was going on. I also scored some digits while on the bus. The bus steward came up to me halfway through the trip and handed me a piece of paper with a name, phone number and email address on it. I didn't understand what he was saying to me, but apparently the paper was from this creepy old guy with a beard and moustache who was snoring earlier in the trip

There wasn't all that much to do in Arica. We saw 2 buildings designed by Gustav Eifel, and hung out on the beach (deserted because it is almost winter solstice). The couple who run the hotel we stayed at spoke French and Spanish, and it is amazing how much more French I understand compared to Spanish. And here I thought I'd forgotten everything I'd learned in Trios-Riviéres. I can't remember how to say anything in French, however.

Back from the Jungle

Sun, 18 Jun 2006 16:54:13 GMT

That's right, we are back in La Paz.

The jungle was amazingly beautiful, but suffocatingly humid. I am glad to be back in the dry altiplano that's for sure. Kim is the exact opposite, she doesn't like the cool dry air or the cold nights. We have decided that this is probably because I was brought up in the altiplano-ish area of of BC and Kim was brought up in the rainforest area.

Anyways, the next morning our flight did leave for Rurrenabaque, then returned to La Paz after take off because it was too foggy to land, and then left again about an hour later and arrived! There were people on our flight who had been waiting for 4 days to get to Rurre, but then, they did keep rescheduling for the 2nd flight of the day instead of the first.

2 of the Waiting For 4 Days crowd were booked at the same ecolodge as us. The one guy from Australia was such a long-winded, know-it-all, who didn't know any spanish at all and didn't even make any effort to try. And he spoke down to our guide whenever the guide didn't understand right away what he was talking about. UGGH.

We spent the first day in Rurrenebaque, which is a very small place, with not much to do other than book tours and go to the bar. So we did go to the bar, and watched part of some big soccer thing that's going on right now, hahah, that's right, the World Cup. I wouldn't have remembered that it was going on other than lots of other travellers have been talking about it.

Later in the evening, we went to our first Karaoke bar! There are tonnes of them all over the place. We went with 2 of the Waiting for 4 Day-ers (not obnoxious Australian thankfully), and our tour guide, Sergio. The karaoke machine gave you a rating at the end of your song for how well you sang. I kept getting 98%s, which must mean I am just an awesome karaoke singer. I think it actually had to do with how loud you sang, because as the night went on locals who were actually good singers started coming in, and they were scoring lower.

The next morning we departed for the Chalalan Ecolodge. The lodge is run by a village in the rainforest. All of the guides, cooks, boat drivers; everyone that works there is part of the vilage. We saw two types of monkeys, heard howler monkeys, saw tarantulas, caimens (an alligator-like creature). We went on hikes and canoe rides. The canoes were made out of giant logs and we didn't have to do any actual paddling, our guide did it all (the lake was very still, it probably wouldnt be hard).

I have decided that I don't like the jungle. I found the air in the forest hard to breath. It was so warm and humid that it felt like I wasn't getting any fresh air when I was breathing. It also creeped me out how damp everything was: the bedding, all my clothes. It makes me feel like everything is rotting.

Yesterday we went by boat from the lodge to Rurre. The drivers on the way back were younger than the drivers on the way up, they also hit quite a few more rocks. Kim and I joked that this was probably due to the recklessness of youth. After that we flew back to La Paz; our flight left as scheduled, which was unexpected.

Stuck in La Paz

Tue, 13 Jun 2006 22:20:51 GMT

Just spent all day at La Paz's airport waiting for a flight to Rurrenabaque, which was finally cancelled 8+ hours after it was scheduled to depart. We'll be doing it all again tomorrow, all for that sweet Amazon. Rurre has bad internet, so I will be incomunicado for 4 days minimum, more if our return flight gets delayed, which is not unlikely.

In Bolivia

Sun, 11 Jun 2006 00:52:07 GMT

Today we went on our first non-tourist bus. It was a bit of an adventure because we didn't know where to pay for our ticket, and a nice old lady on the bus was trying to explain it to us but we couldn't understand. So we stood around trying to figure it out, then the bus looked like it was going to leave, so we decided to just get on and see what would happen. It turned out this was what we were supposed to do. Halfway through the trip a lady came around to collect the fare. The bus took us from Puno a town on the border (whose name I've already forgotten).We then took a cab to the actual border, and not just your run of the mill automobile taxi, but a bicycle taxi! Then after successfully going through Peruvian and Bolivian immigration we caught another bus to Copacabana.

The Election: Voting day for the Presidential election in Peru was last Sunday. The 2 candidates were Alan, who i believe is more conservative and was president some time in the past, and Ollanta, who is a populist and was a military general before entering politics. One of our tour guides talked about the election a bit, and she said that most people thought neither were all that great, and would be voting for the lesser of two evils. Alan ended up winning, and there was no noticable unrest regarding the results, and we were in Ollanta territory.

A few days ago, Kim was looking for a non-alpaca scarf to buy. Most knit items are made of some type of wool, and it is quite rare to see anything otherwise. The shopkeeper handed her a scarf and said, this one is cotton, but then when Kim inspected it, there was a large tag that said "100% Baby Alpaca". We aren't sure if the scarf was actually cotton, and the tag was there to trick tourists, or if the saleslady was saying whatever she needed to say to make the sale.

There have been a disturbing amount of pigeons in the Plaza de Armas of most of the cities we've been to. In Arequipa, it felt like I was in "The Birds" walking through the main square. In Aguas Calientes, one bird swooped at me from behind and came within inches of my head! (no exageration). This just firmly cements my dislike of birds.

There is this one songs that we have heard so many times that it is practically Peru's national anthem: Condor Pass. I recognized it the first time I heard it, and assumed that it is one of those songs that everyone has heard before. Kim had never heard it before, though, and so I now think it is only because my dad has a CD of Andean music that I know the song.

In Puno

Sat, 10 Jun 2006 01:39:52 GMT

Hello again

A couple things i forgot from last time:

Fresh fruit juice. It is huge here, almost every restaurant has fresh juice. For example I ordered apple juice expecting the canadian version, and what i got was almost as thick as apple sauce. And fresh mandarin juice... mmmh.

I have been meaning to settle once and for all which direction the toilet flushes in the southern hemisphere, but any time i think about we have had non flushing toilets. I think i have heard at some point that it is all a myth the opposite flushing, but i don´t care

On wednesday, we went out to the bar in Cuzco. One of the places we went was Mama Africa´s!!! This is also the name of a hot sauce that is in Ross´s and my fridge at home, so I was very glad we went there. I liked the music they played which was mostly dance stuff and a style called raggae-ta. You may have heard the song "gasolina", which is archetypical raggae-ta. It was fun, but we ended up staying out until about 5 am, and the bus we planned to catch left at 7:30, so we stayed up and then slept (tried at least) on the bus to puno.

We actually haven´t done anything in puno. When we arrived the first thing we did was book a tour of the islands of Lake Titikaka for the next day.

In the tour of lake titikaka, we got to see the floating Uros islands. The people who live on the floating islands make their homes and the islands themselves out of reeds that grow in the shallow parts of the lake. They also eat the innards of the reeds like bananas. I think there are maybe 20 islands and each one has about 5-10 families living on them.

After that we went to Amantani island which is a real island that has 8 villages and about 4000 people. There we stayed with a family, but because of the language barrier we couldnt really get to know them very well. We got to eat typical food, which was soup, potatoes and rice for lunch, soup and vegetable stew with rice for dinner and then bread for breakfast. It was quite plain, but tasty enough. At night the family dressed us in traditional island clothing and we went to a dance. The traditional dance was quite repetative and the each song went on for about what you would expect for 3 songs, so the dancing was a bit tiresome (who would have thought i would say such a thing?)

We were woken up at 6 am the next morning. It turned out that our boat didn´t actually leave until 8 am, so we really could have slept in until 7 and still been on time, but whatever. We left Amantani to head to Taquile, which is a similar island nearby. The men there wear knit caps that give away their marital status. Red cap = married. White and red cap with pom pom to the side = single. White and red cap with pom pom to the back = has girlfriend.

Next on the agenda... COPACABANA, the hottest spot south of Havana...

Back in Cusco

Tue, 06 Jun 2006 01:04:39 GMT

Hello Again,

I'd made a note of the "notable" things that have happened in the last few days, but I left it in my room, so i'll have to go from memory.

Firstly, it is much colder at night here than expected. Well, not so much that it is colder, but that indoors is colder, because most places don't have heating. I am very glad I brought my down booties and a pair of long underwear.

Right now, most of my clothes are being laundered. They actually might be almost done now, but after today I've made the decision that I am only going to wear a skirt during laundry day. Kim and I both wore skirts today because they were the least dirty of the clothes (being the least worn). And even though my capri pants are tighter and slightly shorter, we got significantly more cat calls today going about town than any other day.

I bought a llama toque while in aguas calientes, but I've decided not to wear it until I get home because I will look like a nerd wearing it while here. Truthfully, I am wearing it right now because I am cold (my pants are in the wash), it is warmer than my toque i brought and because there are only gringos in the hostel.

While we were in a cab, we saw a pack of dogs all different breeds running together. It looked like Tramp's gang, from Lady and the Tramp.

The train to Machu Picchu

We took the mid priced train to Machu Picchu and on the way up, it was as expected, with a snack and a drink; a lot like on a plane. On the way back though, after our snack loud techno music began to play and the 2 train attendants began doing a fashion show modelling a bunch of stuff made from alpaca. We definitely wouldn't have seen that on the cheap-o train.

Anyways, I know I've forgotten some stuff, but I'll add it later.

In Cusco now

Fri, 02 Jun 2006 23:23:25 GMT

Hello,

Nothing much has happened today. We were supposed to have a spanish lesson this morning, but I was feeling sick, so I stayed in bed while Kim went and learned. She had a test to write and is apparently not a beginner anymore. I'd still say that we are both pretty bad at Spanish still.

We flew to Cusco in the afternoon. Because we have less time than originally planned, we decided to speed things up a bit by flying some of the time. On our way from the airport to the hostel, we drove through a slummy part of town. At this point, about all of the real Peru that I care to see is through a car window. As awful as that may sound, I am glad we are doing the touristy thing. The hostel we are staying in is very nice. It used to be a presidential palace, and be home to the mayor of Cusco. It is huge, and has a great view of the city from our room. It seems like it is going to be a party hostel though. It has its own bar. In other circumstances that would be great, but right now, I am still feeling a bit ill, so just want to rest.

I have a hilarious story that happened a few days ago that I forgot to mention. We were walking home to the hostel after a day of exploring Arequipa. We had to get cross the street in both directions to get to our hostel. If we crossed the street straight ahead there was a pack of wild dogs ravaging a bag of garbage! If we crossed the street to the left, there was a pack of intimidating men! What were we to do? Fortunately the street was strangely car-free, so we were able to cross diagonally and get back to the hostel without trouble.

The other thing happened yesterday. We were walking towards a market when we saw what appeared to be a demonstration. Heeding the guidebook we turned down the street towards the plaza de armas to try to get avoid it. When we arrived at the plaza, what were we to find, but another demonstration! This one seemed like a happy 'get out the vote' sort of parade, but we didn't stick around to find out.

Anyways, that is all for now.

Last Day in Arequipa

Thu, 01 Jun 2006 23:56:40 GMT

Later on day one in Arequipa, we wandered around the town a bit. We went to a big cathedral in the main square which was really pretty. It was rebuilt after the earthquake in 2001. There were mannequins of Saints and Jesus and Mary all around the cathedral, which apparently seems quite common here.

On Monday we went to a monastery which was opened in the 1600s. This one had even more mannequins of Jesus. The statues were made to be very lifelike and depicted Jesus usually bloody and with a pained expression on his face. This was to put the fear of god in the indigenous people to convince them to convert. Some of the statues had human hair from the nuns and BABY TEETH!!!

On Tuesday we began a tour of the Colca Valley and Cruz del Condor. We got to see Vicuñas, which are wild relatives of Llamas. Their wool is ridiculously expensive, something like $500 per pound. We also got to see rock structures that are like the 2010 olympic mascot. These ones were wishes made by shamans/tourists.

We stayed in a town called Chivay. The shower in our hotel was a tonne better than the one in the basement suite Ross and I are in now. It was everything a shower should be: hot water, good pressure, high shower head.

There is a hot springs there that we went to as part of the tour. There was an indoor pool and an outdoor pool. When we moved from the indoor to the outdoor pool we accidentally went into the pool that was meant for locals. When we first walked into the pool, I thought it was strange that there were no other white people in the pool because there other tour buses doing the same tour. We didn't realize there was another pool for gringos until a guy on our tour, Philipe, found out from a local. He was also in the wrong pool. It was quite a contrast switching to the tourist pool. The pool looked newer with people drinking beer and cocktails. I'm not sure if the segregation would be for the tourists' sake or for the locals', or if it was by choice.

While we were there, the sun was setting and it looked like a black velvet southwest painting, with the moon and a silhouette of a cactus. We tried taking a picture, but the cactus silhouette isn't in focus, so it isn't as awesome as it could be.

In the evening, we saw a show with traditional Colca canyon songs and dancing. Kim was brought onstage during an audience participation part. She had to do a dance where first the guy whipped her on the ass, then she whipped the guy on the ass. Then the guy fell on the ground and began to shake from yellow fever, and so she stood above him and shook her skirt over his head to try to cure him, then the guy got up and carried her off. Unfortunately my camera ran out of film and I didn't get it reloaded in time to get any pictures.

Yesterday I woke up feeling sick. I think it was something I ate the day before. So it was a miserable day spent feeling rotten on a tour bus. Mind you it was a pretty nice tour bus, Mercedes Benz, with A/C. I only spent about 5 minutes looking at the condors before going to lay down in the tour bus until it was time to go.

Today we initially wanted to go rafting, but the girl at the hostel who books tours said there wasn't a trip for today, so instead we went to see the colonial part of town, which was pretty, but not too interesting, and a museum that had Juanita the Ice Princess in it.

Juanita was found at the top of a volcano; she is a frozen mummy from 500 years ago. The Incas sacrificed her to the mountain. The mountains were Gods to them. She is the best preserved mummy in the world. Her internal organs are still there, and the skin on her hand still looks like skin, and she still has eyelashes.

Exciting food updates:
-tried Alpaca steak. Tastes like beef
-we've decided Inca Kola tastes like banana, not pineapple as originally reported.
-I had chocolate cake yesterday evening and it was spicy. My tongue was tingling!

Tomorrow we are off to Cusco.