dear canada

dear canada

just wanted to drop a quick line to wish you a happy canada day.
i'm sorry i can't be there with you to celebrate your special day this year, although you should know that i really, really wish i was.

i hope to be back one day, perhaps i will bring audge too. (she sends her regards).
until then, i toast to the one-and-only, much loved, much missed, great and glorious nation of canada.

cheers.

a new post

Well, it's been a long time since I last posted.
Truth be told, life has been busy.
I wasn't sure what to insert into this very public white space, but I felt like I probably should put something here.
So I have decided to do a little guide of some of the places I've been recently, for those of you not familiar with London, all with the aid of some fantastic photographers off of flickr.

My trip to work everyday takes around 30mins; I get off at Canary Wharf tube station.

If I'm working early or on a close, I'll make time to get to my gym in West India Quay - it's a 7 minute walk from where I work and you cross a floating bridge on the docks to get there.

The gym is next door to a Cineworld. I have a good friend that's a real film buff, so I've ended up in Cineworld more times than I'd care to admit.

I've been playing a lot of tennis recently, mainly in New Cross in South London.

It's a great community, mainly afro-carribean - I'd never been there before until recently as I hardly ever go south of the river.
New Cross is also home to the only African-Japanese restaurant I've heard of.

Last week I went to see a new exhibition at the Tate Modern.

Urbanism - a fantastic artistic look into the growth of urbanism and urban culture around the world. I'll probably go back for another look before long.

Most of all, my mind has been full of the "what nexts'?" You know, the usual pre-marital thoughts and ponderances.
I'm quite excited for Audge to come and visit, although nervous at the same time... what if she doesn't like it? Will she enjoy herself here? Will she feel relaxed? Settle in?

The first few days back from Japan were really hard, although I have grown accustomed to the long periods of separation; one day they will end.
Until then, I wait.

a cut above

Apart from a trip to the cakeshop, one of my most favourite things to do when visiting a new country is to visit the hairdressers.
Getting one's noggin worked on in a strange environment is surely one of the easiest and most rewarding ways to interact in a new environment.

In Thailand, my scalp was caressed and massaged whilst my coiffure was whipped and sculpted into a frightful exposition of grandiose proportions.
South Korea was memorable particularly for the pampering and buffeting - administered by three seperate attendants. One girl's job was purely to hold a sponge on my forehead lest a shorn hair stray into my sightline.
I'm not sure exactly what happened in China. It was all a bit of a blur after I passed out on hairspray fumes.

I went to get my haircut here in London yesterday.
Audrey suggested I get it cut "...like David Beckham". I have no idea what David Beckham's hair looks like this week.
When I got to the hairdresser, I asked her to cut it "...like David Beckham. Or something."
I could tell she could barely contain her indifference to my request, and approximately three seconds later she was hacking away (one hand on hip), attacking my pate with her razor in much the same way a small child might torture a dying animal with a pointy stick.

I just checked online.
My hair looks nothing like David Beckham's.

completely unnecessary blog post here

No post for ages, incredibly busy etc etc...

The weather for the last month has been outrageously splendid.
Last weekend I found myself out and just kept walking... Oxford Circus, Holborn, Strand, City, Blackfriars, Bankside, Southwark, London Bridge, Upper Thames Street, Lower Thames Street, Monument, Aldagate... just kept going.
It's the simple things that keep surprising me.

I also spoiled myself last week with a new toy, which I will be taking with me on holiday this year. I can't wait!
*apologies for completely unispired and undetailed blog post.

More chin stroking intarnet geekery

Whilst the thought of another Meyers-Briggs test inspires as much excitement within me as an invitation to have my toes steamrolled by a large man in laderhosen yodelling the Namibian Anthem off-key, I did for some reason decide to take this test.

I actually found it to be quite accurate and somewhat helpful. *strokes chin in thoughtful and artistic manner*

It also gives you a neat looking square full of colours which represent something (not sure what yet) to purposely advertise your self-prescribed characteristics all over the intarnets OMG!!1

What's that? Can I hear the languid, fetal yelps of someone being "placed in a box"?!! *whimpers softly*

WARNING. POST CONTAINS GRAPHIC IMAGERY.

Lower left six.
Lower left six is no more.


After a failed root canal, years of irritation, months of aggravation, weeks of pain and a few sleepless nights lower left six is gone.Dr Levy successfully removed lower left six last thursday. I don't want to go into too much detail but it wasn't completely straightforward. The procedure involved injections, drilling, "shattering", twisting, extracting and stitching. Lots of "ings" are required for this sort of procedure.
I hope to receive a fetching "replacement" at somepoint in the near future.
Audrey is mad at me because apparently teeth are "...important to her"!
I recommend listening to "The Eraser" by Thom Yorke whilst reading this post.

Also, did you catch Tony Blair doing "Am I really bovvered, tho'?!" on Comic Relief the other night?!!

more on the world

I find this stuff fascinating.
This is taken from research that redefines a country proportionately according to it's strengths and weaknesses (in different categories).
(From a Daily Mail article).

Alcohol Consumption

HIV Prevalence

House Prices

Military Spending

War and Death

Toy Imports

Toy Exports

Wealth of Nations (1500)

Wealth of Nations (2002)

brother on brother brutality

This post is certified drivel of the highest order - it's main component superficially comprising of... me! Or rather, my fetching new shirt. (As you can tell from the myspace-ified photo above).

For those of you that were born an elder sibling and thus for the majority of your lives enjoyed superior physical prowess and dominance in the household food chain, let it be known that this position does not last forever.
For instance, in an effort to re-exert alpha male territory at my parents' place last weekend (due mainly to the diminishing supplies of dr pepper - chief culprit being my bruv), I attempted to lay down a little brother-on-brother brutality.
Except things didn't go according to plan, or at least how they used to... six years ago.

In the end, we ended up grappling towards a stalemate, before *bosh*!
*bosh*! is the sound a smoshy nose creates when it makes contact with a pointy appendage at a high speed.
He bled on my shirt.
My new shirt!!
And then attempted to throw me down the stairs.
I love playfights though, hadn't had a good one in ages even if I did lose and get my new shirt bled on.
Rarrrghhhh, my new shirt has blood on it!!
Beeennnnnddddddd!!!!!!

some of the amazing people i work with...

Pictures courtesy of Louis from Vancouver, who believe it or not also used to live on The Drive. Small world!

Our 2 year Anniversary.

When i first signed up for this Blogger thing, I wasn't exactly sure what I was going to do with it.
Everything was new and exciting - I had barely heard of "html" or "css", and I have to admit I was smitten with my lovely blank digital workbook.

You know what it's like when you're with that new blog platform? You're loving the feeling, wanting to spend more time with them - even thinking about what you're going to say next time you see them.
Those are some tell-tale signs.
You're in Kim Chi Stew territory, right there.

But before too long, far away in a different land I found myself on lockdown, away from the modcons and conveniences that The Internets provided.
And ashamed as I am to admit it it, I acted like a rabidly emotional schoolgirl. I forgot about blogger.
Blogger was no longer on my mind.
We were already in deep Marmite, and we both knew it.

I'm not proud of the what happened, God knows I would have changed things if I could have... but that all happened in the past, and after a few months Blogger and myself were reunited.
Wow! Buzzing with excitement, we hit an all time high - blogger and me are 100% Lamb Rogan Josh all over each other.
This time, things will be different. We know we're going to make it.
We had our superficial high, we had our depressing low, but we're still together and we're determined to make something of it.

For a while, there's a flurry of posts and activity. Asia is exciting and interesting, and there's no one to talk English to except Blogger!
Yet before too long, we're slipping back from Lamb Rogan Josh high and before we knew it we were Grilling Mackerel...

With nothing much interesting happening in day to day life, I wonder whether I have something interesting to say... or do I?
That's when I resorted to writing absurd stories about old Chinese Ladies and the such.
Yet even ridiculous posts that confused the hell out of my friends could do nothing to brake the impending slide into the Badlands of Blogoshpere known simply as Boiled Cabbage.

During Boiled Cabbage stage, posts are a rare occurence.
Blogger starts to get jealous.
"Is he seeing that Mysapce tart behind my back?!" Blogger wonders silently to itself.
You know what Boiled Cabbage stage is like. We've all been there, and it's not fun.
The less said about Boiled Cabbage stage, the better.

Recently however, Blogger and I have been on the up.
We're totally in that sitting-on-the-couch-all-evening-phase, content to be Grilled Mackerel together.
Things don't always have to be Lamb Rogan Josh in order to enjoy a healthy and fun posting relationship with your digital blogging platform, and we've both come to realise that more than ever, for us Blogging is about leaving a digital trail of rubbish and drivel that hopefully someone somewhere on the otherside of the world will read and not find you to be a complete moron.

larph - a candid update

"You used to post piffle and nonsense here all the time - what happened? I'm scared and confused. Please hold me."
I moved around two months ago from Vancouver to London.
During that timespace I reaquainted myself with my family (not seen for years), moved into a new place, got a job and began working pretty hard.
And by working pretty hard, I mean shooting Nazis up to level 7 on Medal of Honour 2.

"And now you work for The Evil Empire a global coffee conglomerate, no?"
That is correct. My days are now filled with pouring hot soy on to my feet and other appendages to numb the pain of interacting with rude customers and their furious lust for the now-discontinued Signature Toffee Nut Syrup. *wipes frothing foam from side of mouth*

"Where are you living now?"
At the moment I am renting a room in Barking, an area in the East End of London.
Burberry baseball caps are not compulsory.

"You must be earning large amounts of cash considering it is London?!"
They pay me in beans. I am assured they are MAGIC beans.
I have recently purchased a ticket to Tokyo, and my account is emptier than a eunuchs' underpants.
BTW OMFG2Eleven, I AM GOING TO JAPAN!!>!! AW3SOM3!11

"Blimey, Japan is a long way to go if you are going to go somewhere."
Well, between you, me and the internet, I am going to the otherside of the world to hang out with the most wonderful woman in the world.
And for the first time no DTS teams will be involved in this trip. I hope.

"Do you miss Vancouver?"
I miss Vancouver a great deal. But at the same time it is exciting to be in a new place with a new adventure to look forward to.
I have no idea what is going to happen.

"Hey, how come you don't talk on skype so much? Is it because of that... thing... that thing that happened... you know?"
No, it is not because of that thing.
I am in a very different time zone and working weird shifts mixed with freakish hours in a vain attempt to save some cash. I very much enjoy talking over skype, and at the moment I have mmy symbol set to "offline". However I am lazy and secretive and sometimes cannot be bothered to set it to "away". Please feel free to skype me, you can find my ID by doing a skype search under my real name. Those of you on the internet who do not know my real name are not allowed to skype me. And no, it has nothing to do with that thing, either. We both know the kitten had it coming.

"If you could do anything in life, what would you be doing right now?"
Honestly, right now if I could be doing anything in life I would be at home in a large vibrant city, writing and munching furiously on BBQ flavoured Hula Hoops. Although not necessarily in that order.

"Do you have any other extracurricular activities going on?"
To my shame, I continue to follow the misfortunes of West Ham United.
I have also been working on a new website which will hopefully provide an exhaustive list of information/weblinks relating to North Korea. It will eventually come online at northkorearesources.com when I can workout how to get PHP to talk to MySQL to talk to MAMF to talk to my webhosts. Watch this space.
Also, I fantasise about running around my local park.

long and lost

Hmmn, I don't really have anything particualrly interesting to post into this space, but why break a habit?!
Life at the moment has changed drastically, with alot of commuting between home, work, my parents', downtown, home again etc. The pace of life has sped up, although I can't say I'm disappointed. I think Ive surprised myself even with how comfortable it has been slotting back into the London life, however transient a time that may be for.
It's been interesting reading some of the blogs from back in the 'couve - I'm an outsider looking in, now. But positive vibrations and a thousand Fonzy thumbs-up for the Y Family and all the changes they are currently going through.

Whilst rummaging around in a cupboard at my parents' place, I happened upon a long lost friend.
Amongst other useless wonders: Boxes of VHS and cassette tapes; Courentey Cox poster (x2); Guns N Roses Belt Buckle; Sony Cassette Walkman; Maths Textbooks.

Did this really happen?

Did BC Place really colappse because someone decided not to turn the heater on?
Confirmation, please!!
Somewhere in The Lower Mainland, a monster trucks fan is weeping tears of hot pain right now.

As promised...

East meets West

As promised, the first of many blurred and pixelated images snapped on a telephone to come your way.
I used to work here. Before my years of vancouverism. This is just off of Soho Square in London. The fact that there are four muslim women in burkhas strolling past is more of a coincidence than anything else, although it does paint a cutting image. More poignant than I had meant my quick-snap-of-place-i-used-to-work-at to be.

One of the most exciting things about being back in the east end is the overwhelming accessibilty of great curry. I mean, really good curry.
In honour of a tradition instigated with wade and jo, I celebrated Christmas with such an indulgence - A great Chicken Korma. I have been celebrating since, with Prawn Curry, Chicken Dhosa, Lamb Vindaloo, Chicken Tikka Massala, Chicken Jalfrezi, Chicken Dhansak, Butter Chicken and a bloody amazing Lamb Roganjosh.

My bro at tonight's currying bonanza - this is actually the only picture of him I own where his middle finger is not the focal point of the image

After 3 weeks of exhaustion/laziness, I also finally got the router in yesterday.
Resisting no temptation to remain calm and relaxed, my landlord's ageing peecee received the fullest helping of a distinctly unrefined section of my vernacular.
Eventually after half an hour talking to an indian fellow outsourced ntl helpline employee, the router and the peecee decided to talk nicely and even let the mac join in not too much later.
For the techies, I went with a D-Link DWL-922 which seems to do well with either XP or OSX.

I was about to sit down

Well, I was about to sit down and punch in something about how making lattes and such sucks the life out of you, but then work called.
So instead I'm going in to make more lattes and cappuccinos for wealthy businessmen who wouldn't blink at dropping £4 on a cup of coffee. *wipes spitting foam from chin*

After Christmas i'm planning on doing a little revamp around here since we're coming up to two years, and larph will become larph v2.0

Merry Christmas, everyone.

Christmas Shopping - Rachel, please bring a car stereo or something.

So this is the complex that I work in.
My grandad used to work here years before when it was just: "The Docks."
All that has since changed. I'm stuck in one of the many underground malls that are networked under the all of these buildings.
There's a Canada Square in there, as well as a Canada Place and a Canada Water. You just can't have enough Canada in your life when you're in London.

For those interested (and I'm probably talking to Randy and Heidi here), we get a lot of footballers drop by work for their coffee.
Because it's east London, it's mainly my team (West Ham) and Charlton players who live in the Docklands.
Apparently, last week we had Darren Bent, Matty Etherington, Carlos Tevez, Bobby Zamora, Paul Konchesky, Hayden Mullins and James Collins all pop by.
I'm contemplating asking a few inside questions and delivering the juicy nuggets as a "London Correspondant" for a soccer radio show I listened to in Canada.

Life moves at a fast pace these days and the days seems to fly by.
I get my first day off tomorrow, and I'm hanging out with Henri and Rachel who I'm hoping can get her hands on a few cheap hub caps for me and my Christmas shoppinng.

More Larph than a Larphbot on maximum Larph.

I've decided that my newfound status as a repatriated expatriate deserves more airtime.
As soon as I can get my arse down to Curry's I'll buy a router and hopefully larph will be a thoroughly up to date blog retaining all of the mundane qualities that no one cared about in the first place.

To bring you up to date, I'm renting a room in the East End in a place called Barking. And - OMGWTF2eleven!!!! - I got a job!!!!
I'll be slinging cappuccinos for certain global conglomerate we all know well (by day). At a place not too far away called Canary Wharf. Only a 25mins commute on the tube. By night... still plotting.
It's great being back in the city. It's bloody expensive here, but there's just a great buzz about the place.

There's been a bit of a perspective realignment, too.
People here don't have much, but they seem quite grateful for it nonetheless.
If I ever felt hard off or sorry for myself, it was probably because I was comparing myself to those who [materially] had more. It's been a crushing reality check, but that's a good thing.
There's so much out there, so much opportunity, new things to do, new things to think about. Shoot me in the head if I ever start thinking like that again.

Oh, the other cool thing was the one specific thing I prayed for before looking for work was that I would be working with 1.) Chinese and 2.)Koreans.
And, of course, I will be.

This will be my first christmas at home since 2000, I think. It's nice to be back. Lastime I saw my brother he was 17. Now he's a bloody beast and could probably kick the shite out of me pretty easily. When I have saved up enough for a fancy telephone that takes pictures I plan to post them here in order to display visually in a very blurred and pixelated manner all of the intrincisities that make up daily life of a cappuccino slave in London.

Later potater.