dreaming over the ocean

so, last spring, I compilated Amo's Hotshots 1. I have just done amo's hotshots 2, yet to be distributed. the following are the play lists. Pretty sweet songs.... time to relax the offspring Beat The Drum Great Big Sea Your Daughters and Your Sons The Duhks Mushaboom Feist Fidelity Regina Spektor Love Is The Seventh Wave The Duhks johnny's camaro David Wilcox African Queen 2Face Idibia Collide (Acoustic) 4:37 Howie Day No Bravery 4:03 James Blunt Elias 6:37 Dispatch 0% Interest (acoustic) 4:11 Jason Mraz God Of Creation 4:14 David Crowder Band Let's Go Dancing 2:38 Teitur Braille 4:56 Regina Spektor One Evening 3:36 Feist life for rent 3:43 Dido Amo's hot shot's 2 Boom Snap Clap 2:53 A.M. The Rain 3:54 k-os Indigo Girl 4:26 Watershed Kingdom Come 4:11 Coldplay Hard To Concentrate 4:02 Red Hot Chili Peppers Steal My Kisses 4:05 Ben Harper broke down with you ...

for visiting friends. apparently. This month of december, I have more days that i have friends from out of town, who are in town, than days that I do not have. the thing that give me great joy about this is that i find it amazing when you do have to see someone frequently, to still be close to them. For instance, Kevin, I had not seen for over 2 years. yet, he is still among my best guy friends. My friend Terry left on tuesday night, after being here for 8 days. This was amazing. becasue, i have maybe, *maybe* seen him 5 times in the last 5 years. Terry Lui is an individual who was a really close friend of mine in grade 12, and for a number of reasons, we weren't really in touch. and, it is really neat to be able to re-connect with someone that you know, but haven't really known. for instance, i knew general things about him, like, what he was doing in school, that he likes cars, and listens to alternative rock; but now i know what his favourite snack is, and that his boots lea...

so, what a weekend. it was really my first weekend in a long time (at least all of march!) where I have not spent the entire time stressing out about school work. What a relief. I was able to spend time with friends, I was able to laugh. I was able to race. I was able to go to palm sunday service. i was able to not think about school for a while (right now, though, I am back at it.) Let's talk a little about what was going on. Friday night started with not one, but 2 birthday parties. first it was louis-andre , at Hurley's pub. Louis, and Steph are two of the UdM rowers. And they are fantastic, and It was sooo enjoyable to have see them, since I haven't been able to coach for the last month. Second, it was my favourite man nurse, Will. Will takes fantastic photographs, but, I am not so sure I look great in this. However, here we are. Happy birthday Will. I am glad you are in my life! Then came saturday. All I did on saturday was sleep in until 11:30 (what are yo...

So. What an incredible weekend. actually... two incredible weekends in a row. and, next weekend will be incredible as well. This past weekend, on saturday, I rode my bike from Montreal to ottawa. and, it was beautiful. It was really fricken long. I went with a friend, Ben, and props to him, because he rode the whole thing on a 10 speed, steel frame oldschool bike with an awful saddle, and a milk crate strapped to the back. and, it is not like he trains for things like this. I know it was challenging for him. FOr me, I felt amazing. i got to have a few more breaks than ben did, due to the fact that I would ride, and then turn around and not be able to see him. so, I would stop and wait. but, here are the highlights and lowlights: cows. deer. horses. open fields, and long rivers. stopping for french fries. finally crossing the ottawa river. our final 50km into ottawa, the rolling hills, the sunset. stopping for pizza dinner. stories of lost love. picture taking and video shooting...

as is the common theme recently, this is going to be short and sweet. I have to explain some stats in a presentation during my first class, so, I need to do some last minute reviewing! Last night, a friend of mine asked me why i blog. It was a good question, and good conversation. so, I throw it back to you (my creepy internet friends)... why do you blog? I will post my answers and thoughts tomorrow. for now, just a few points. 1) I love making food with friends . Last night, my friend Ben and I ( same ben that I rode with to ottawa last spring, and danced in spandex to raise money for the L&L society ) made some delicious food! and, he was even good to me with keeping in my tight eating. we made: delicious pumpkin chili. a salad with apples and peanuts and carrots and onions. some roasted cauliflower. and, then his roommates offered a piece of apple pie. i took one, but it was small! 2) this week in numbers. swim: 2hrs, 4500m bike: 2.5hrs run: 1hr 45min. strength + cro...

This past fall, i had the advantage of seeing many friends, and family... here are a few of the photos.... To start off with, a bit of the beautiful country of Jasper National Park. This photo on the right is not black and white. Two of the funniest, and most amazing men in my life, Stephen Klebs, and Robert Stowe. From my segue trip. Introducing my nephew, Landon Thomas Payne. He was born Dec 2006. He lives in Calgary. What a handsome little man!!! One of my best friends in the world, Kevin Shon, currently on the direct other side of the continent, in Florida everglades, doing an outward bound school. Some of my co-students at UBC. During a christmas gathering... Lastly, a few more of Ben, Zach, and Christina, and the amazing December. Beautiful whistler from our Condo...

This weather is LAME! yesterday, it downpoured all day long, and was melting snow. Today, it has changed to snow, and it accumulating like crazy. and, you want my bet... that walking outside will be hazardous, because there is probably a large sheet of ice underneath this nice blanket of snow. deadly. and, i have no desire to do a long (1.5hrs) run on the treadmills at the Y. Esp. since you are only supposed to run on them for 30 minutes at a time. spring, please come soon. so, I have been a bit moody this week. I think that it started off with my concept map presentation early this week, in which I felt I did awful. I sent a follow up email about it, which did make me feel better about it. just because i felt like I was able to voice some of my thoughts. so, hopefully i won't fail. But, my guess, is that I will get about 60%. Which, in my program is a fail. and, i hate that. On thursday night, I also had a 3hr long conversation with the boy that i like. and, to tell ...

to those of you who are visiting because I just sent my NewYear's Newsletter, please leave a comment! I would LOVE to hear from you! On the 27th-29th of december (Snowboarding the 28th), I went to Whistler with Sean, to meet up with some of my favourite people in the world: Zach and Ben Mauss. The 28th was Zach's 27th B-day. Here are 4 photos! "birthday cake in a cup" Irish Car Bombs with two USARMY Officers! yup, the translation of this sign is: SICK RIDING TODAY! As always, a little sushi is needed in life. Me and those two Mauss boys. Love 'em.

so, tomorrow, to get ready to cheer my friends Beth and Leanna on at at the Ottawa 1/2 marathon , I am going to be going on an epic bike ride. I am so excited that they have reached their goals, and that this weekend, they will see how they will actually be able to succeed in running. Their perseverance, and attainment of goals has encouraged me. I am going to be riding with my friend, Ben, from Montreal to Ottawa. It is about 200km, and will take. well. the whole day. All I gotta say, is that those crazy ironpeople (aka... look at my teammate blog roll list) who are going to ride 180km, and then run a fricken marathon. crazy I say. See our bike route here. My 1/2 marathon for Team in Training is still about a month away. I am so priviledged to be able to go out and do something I love, and meet so many people who have some sort of story with this battle. CLICK HERE TO DONATE Once again, I am going to tell you about where I am with my fundraising. I know that th...

So, we are one day into 2008. What I have found funny, is the silence of blogs over the holidays. To me, this is a good sign. it means that people are doing better things than sitting on the computer, writing about themselves. but alas, it is a new year, and people are writing on their blogs again. as for myself, I wanted to take the time to write in my journal to figure out some of my thoughts, before I was going to give a cap of the last 10 days or so. I do believe, that I have just had the best christmas that I have ever had in my life . My friends from the states came up to visit: Christina from DC (my best friend, who i haven't seen in 3 years!!!!), and Zach and Ben Mauss. They arrived on the 20th, and we went to whistler from the 22nd, to 26th; we then travelled to Tacoma, and dropped the boys off, and Christina left on the 30th. Im not going to lie, but post christmas sadness sucks. It is like a emotional hangover . Whistler was beautiful. Although I was not able t...

And yesterday I didn't write thrive thursday, but, I have been thinking about it. So, Here it goes. But, first, hit the play button on the video to have a christmas song playing while you read! This is a on going series that is posted on thursday's, to answer the question: "What helps you to thrive in your environment?" The series is written by myself, and a variety of guest Contributors. This week, I want to comment on Christmas. Christmas to me has been a time of year which is generally not very consistent. the only consistency is that I know that I am able to spend time with people that I love. and, to me, that is one of the most important things about this time of year. spending it with people you love. so, let me reflect back on the christmases past: 2010: Victoria with the Birch Family. 2009: Missisauga with the Patterson Family 2008: Road Trip with Anya to Georgia and Florida. 2007: Whistler with Christina, Zach, and Ben 2006: Down to Tacoma with my Dad....

So, I ran my icey, and windy 5km this morning. It was not fast. and, my intestines did not like me eating a bowl of oats and greek yougurt (i didn't have any bagels, which is my regular pre-race breakfast) less than 2 hrs in advance. (this is the second time that eating oats has made me want to chuck while on a run... mental note. no oats pre-run). Anyway, after riding up to the race with my friend Ben (and, i mean UP! the "camillien houde" road up the mountain is rough), we were definitely warmed up. So, we shuffled ourselves away, in the opposite direction from last year. so, the uphill part of the race (About 3km) was more broken up this year. not sure if i prefer it or not. It was quite icey, since we have not had any real snow yet this year, but plenty of cold rain. stomach was in knots about 3km in. but, stuck at it, and at the turn around, realized i was in #1, but with #2 girl (a former rower of mine) right on my heels. She is 130lbs, so up the final h...

every once and a while, a surprise hits out of the blue. I have recently started (in september) working as a personal trainer, at a fitness studio in the point grey area of vancouver. It is certainly different from working at the bike shop on commercial drive, as well as at MEC. It is a totally different atmosphere, and clients vs customers. Of course, there are great things about it, and other things which are sometimes frustrating. For instance, there is definently a group of people that when working out, just loooooove to complain about every exercise. And, i bet that you can imagine how much I appreciate that. anyways, i had a frustrating client yesterday, which put me a little out of sorts... but, I had two clients immediately after whom I really enjoy working with. So, rah rah rah, having a conversation about my impending trip to whistler with Christina, and Zach, and his brother ben. we have been planning on staying in the youth hostel up there, which is nice, but a litt...