has just gotten busier. I thought that working at the Boys and Girls Club full-time, playing ultimate with Strange Brew on Monday nights, coaching ultimate with O2 (the OCUA Juniors B team) on Wednesday nights, and practicing with seVen on Tuesday and Thursday nights, plus touring to different cities (Middlebury VT, Devens MA, North Bay ON, etc) wasn't enough, but
I have accepted a contract position at Alcatel until the end of August. I will be doing the same sort of stuff that I was doing prior to quitting - verification of systems. They must really need people as I received a call Thursday evening to see if I would be interested, and I am starting on Tuesday (tomorrow). I am excited to see all of the people that I used to work with, but at the same time a little nervous because I haven't done this kind of work in the past year, so it should be an interesting first couple of days.
Monday, June 20, 2005
Thursday, June 16, 2005
Sad for the Seaborns
Yesterday morning Geofford's Uncle Tim passed away. Although I only met him a few times, I could see that he was a wonderful person, and he will be missed by the rest of the family.
Sunday, June 12, 2005
Still Tired
Wow, I can't believe that it has been over a month since I last posted. Well I guess I can believe it because this past month has been super busy.
The month of May started off pretty crappy as we were making the final cuts for seVen which was very tough and I also got very sick. Against my better judgement, I played in Vermont, which was okay the first day, but my cold/infection decided to better me and render me completely useless on Sunday, monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. I was completely out of commission and even went to the doctor because I felt so miserable. I ended up having to take antibiotics because I had developed a bacterial infection in my sinuses. It was so bad that my entire right cheek and my top right molars were very tender because my sinuses were so bad. I learned that sometimes people with this type of inection think that they have something wrong with their teeth.
It took me most of May to fight off the infection, but I was able to go to Cawaja to Geoff's parents' place to visit his mom (his dad was camping), and his aunts and uncles. It was a fun time especially since we got to spend some time with his cousin Cassie and her boyfriend Pierre who drove down to Cawaja from Ottawa with us. They are entering into the competitive ultimate scene playing on Scarlett (the OCUA women's B team) and Firebird (OCUA's open B team) respectively. I think that we got some funny looks on the beach while we were sprinting down the beach doing some tempo runs while friends of another cousin looked on. This long weekend was much more pleasant than the last May long weekend that I spent at Cawaja completely bedridden while they received a record rainfall. We were quite lucky with the weather this time as it didn't rain on us until Monday when we were leaving.
Ultimate has also kept me quite busy. The past three weekends I have spent most of my time doing something ultimate related, and most of my weeks have also been devoted to ultimate. The last weekend of May, seVen played in Layout for Life, but didn't get to finish the tournament due to thunder and lightening. We ended up winning all of our games to that point but not being able to match up against Lunchbox, who is the other strong coed team in Ottawa. We ended up scrimmaging against them the Tuesday after, but lost which was quite unfortunate. The first weekend in June, we travelled to Devens, MA (which is about an hour outside of Boston), which is a long drive away. We were 1 and 3 on Saturday, although we did lose two of our games by 1 point and the other by 4 points, so we thought we played some evenly matched games. We just have to be able to finish the game and not let the other team get the better of us. This put us in the 17-25 bracket on Sunday. We ended up winning our first two games, but lost our last game quite badly, which put us 19/20th place. This was quite unfortunate because it meant that we didn't qualify for the Boston Invitational at the end of June. Instead we will be going to North Bay next weekend, where we hopefully be able to match up against some strong Ontario and Quebec teams. This will be an important weekend to continue building towards Regionals, which will be in Toronto the weekend of July 9/10.
Other than playing at tournaments and practicing with seVen, I have been playing on Monday nights with Strange Brew. We are currently undefeated and hope to continue this streak so that we can move up from Tier 10 to hopefully Tier 9. On Wednesdays I have been coaching the OCUA Juniors B team - O2. That has been a great deal of fun, and it is exciting to watch these young ultimate players develop.
Other than ultimate I really haven't been doing much else - except maybe my internship at the Boys and Girls Club of Ottawa. I am learning quite a bit about event coordination. I am also hoping to learn more about volunteer management and the programs at the Boys and Girls Club. I am finally starting to settle into a groove there, which is good, trying to find out where I can help them while developing my sport administration skills.
I can't believe I have just about 6 months left of my master's program and then I will have to go out into the real world again. If anyone has any leads for jobs coming up in 6 months, please let me know, I'm able to do both engineering and sport administration, but if I can do a combination of both, that would be quite ideal.
The month of May started off pretty crappy as we were making the final cuts for seVen which was very tough and I also got very sick. Against my better judgement, I played in Vermont, which was okay the first day, but my cold/infection decided to better me and render me completely useless on Sunday, monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. I was completely out of commission and even went to the doctor because I felt so miserable. I ended up having to take antibiotics because I had developed a bacterial infection in my sinuses. It was so bad that my entire right cheek and my top right molars were very tender because my sinuses were so bad. I learned that sometimes people with this type of inection think that they have something wrong with their teeth.
It took me most of May to fight off the infection, but I was able to go to Cawaja to Geoff's parents' place to visit his mom (his dad was camping), and his aunts and uncles. It was a fun time especially since we got to spend some time with his cousin Cassie and her boyfriend Pierre who drove down to Cawaja from Ottawa with us. They are entering into the competitive ultimate scene playing on Scarlett (the OCUA women's B team) and Firebird (OCUA's open B team) respectively. I think that we got some funny looks on the beach while we were sprinting down the beach doing some tempo runs while friends of another cousin looked on. This long weekend was much more pleasant than the last May long weekend that I spent at Cawaja completely bedridden while they received a record rainfall. We were quite lucky with the weather this time as it didn't rain on us until Monday when we were leaving.
Ultimate has also kept me quite busy. The past three weekends I have spent most of my time doing something ultimate related, and most of my weeks have also been devoted to ultimate. The last weekend of May, seVen played in Layout for Life, but didn't get to finish the tournament due to thunder and lightening. We ended up winning all of our games to that point but not being able to match up against Lunchbox, who is the other strong coed team in Ottawa. We ended up scrimmaging against them the Tuesday after, but lost which was quite unfortunate. The first weekend in June, we travelled to Devens, MA (which is about an hour outside of Boston), which is a long drive away. We were 1 and 3 on Saturday, although we did lose two of our games by 1 point and the other by 4 points, so we thought we played some evenly matched games. We just have to be able to finish the game and not let the other team get the better of us. This put us in the 17-25 bracket on Sunday. We ended up winning our first two games, but lost our last game quite badly, which put us 19/20th place. This was quite unfortunate because it meant that we didn't qualify for the Boston Invitational at the end of June. Instead we will be going to North Bay next weekend, where we hopefully be able to match up against some strong Ontario and Quebec teams. This will be an important weekend to continue building towards Regionals, which will be in Toronto the weekend of July 9/10.
Other than playing at tournaments and practicing with seVen, I have been playing on Monday nights with Strange Brew. We are currently undefeated and hope to continue this streak so that we can move up from Tier 10 to hopefully Tier 9. On Wednesdays I have been coaching the OCUA Juniors B team - O2. That has been a great deal of fun, and it is exciting to watch these young ultimate players develop.
Other than ultimate I really haven't been doing much else - except maybe my internship at the Boys and Girls Club of Ottawa. I am learning quite a bit about event coordination. I am also hoping to learn more about volunteer management and the programs at the Boys and Girls Club. I am finally starting to settle into a groove there, which is good, trying to find out where I can help them while developing my sport administration skills.
I can't believe I have just about 6 months left of my master's program and then I will have to go out into the real world again. If anyone has any leads for jobs coming up in 6 months, please let me know, I'm able to do both engineering and sport administration, but if I can do a combination of both, that would be quite ideal.
Friday, April 29, 2005
Exhaustion has set in, and I'm only beginning
I would have thought that I would have had a lot more free time once school ended, but since school ended two weeks ago, I have felt very busy. I think part of that stems from me trying to catch up with my sleep, but there are just so many things to do in a day.
Part of the lack of free time can be attributed to Ultimate. We are currently going through tryouts from the Coed Competitive Stream of OCUA. We had about 90 people at our first tryout and just over 110 at our second tryout. Trying to manage that many people when we are looking for 40-45 is quite difficult. We made our first cut on Wednesday night, which was quite difficult to do, but we still have quite large numbers. As we go to our first tournament next weekend, we have a lot of work to do in the next week.
I start my internship at the Boys and Girls Club of Ottawa next week. I started this week with a part-time job at the Boys and Girls Club helping out with their special events. I hope that I will be able to transition well from school to working again. The job this week was only two days, but starting next week for the whole summer I will be working 5 days a week. I am looking forward to it as it will get me out of the house, but at the same time, it will be a big change.
Part of the lack of free time can be attributed to Ultimate. We are currently going through tryouts from the Coed Competitive Stream of OCUA. We had about 90 people at our first tryout and just over 110 at our second tryout. Trying to manage that many people when we are looking for 40-45 is quite difficult. We made our first cut on Wednesday night, which was quite difficult to do, but we still have quite large numbers. As we go to our first tournament next weekend, we have a lot of work to do in the next week.
I start my internship at the Boys and Girls Club of Ottawa next week. I started this week with a part-time job at the Boys and Girls Club helping out with their special events. I hope that I will be able to transition well from school to working again. The job this week was only two days, but starting next week for the whole summer I will be working 5 days a week. I am looking forward to it as it will get me out of the house, but at the same time, it will be a big change.
Monday, April 18, 2005
Cabane à Sucre
Melissa organized a trip to the Sucrerie Le Palais Gommé (this is the satellite map of the place) in L'Ange-Gardien (Quebec) over the weekend. It was a lot of fun, Geofford and I got to meet up with Melissa, Steve, and Tanya - who we met in Mexico for Rachel and Clayton's wedding. I also got to meet Nick - Tracy's new boyfriend as they came along too.
Fortunately, I was very hungry because they served up a great meal. We had pea soup to start, which was quite tasty, and the feast came out onto the table. After the soup was cleared from the table: bacon, sausages, ham, potatoes, eggs (it looked like a pie), and beans were placed in stainless steel bowls on the table. It was a huge feast. The bacon wasn't normal bacon (see picture at left), but it was a lot thicker and harder, and it was called "les oreilles de crisse". After the main courses, we were allowed to choose our dessert, which was a choice of: cake with maple topping, pancake, or a sugar tart. I chose the cake and it was delicious. Nick being the smart one, took two desserts. I was very jealous because although I was really full, I would have liked to try another dessert. :)
After lunch, we were too full to get our maple taffy or "tire" as they call it in French, so we decided to go on a horse ride. At first I thought that this horse ride would be on a horse, but it turned out to be a horse drawn wagon. It wasn't all that long, but Steve kept us laughing the entire time, so it was quite amusing. We got a little tour of the farm, but we never saw any maple trees, so we were unsure if they actually made maple syrup at this sugar bush.
Despite being full, we had to indulge on the maple taffy or "tire sur la neige". Basically they take over-boiled maple syrup (in our case it was microwaved...) and pour it over snow in thin strips. After a few seconds, we took a popsicle stick and rolled the sticky taffy onto the stick. It's super sticky but very sweet and yummy. I'm showing off my maple taffy in the picture to the left. We got two of these maple taffy, and I'm not sure if I could have eaten another as they were so sweet.
All in all, the trip to the Cabane à Sucre was good. Good times with good food and good people. Can't wait to go again next spring!
Note: All pictures posted by:
The picture of Geofford and I was taken by Steve Wallace.
Fortunately, I was very hungry because they served up a great meal. We had pea soup to start, which was quite tasty, and the feast came out onto the table. After the soup was cleared from the table: bacon, sausages, ham, potatoes, eggs (it looked like a pie), and beans were placed in stainless steel bowls on the table. It was a huge feast. The bacon wasn't normal bacon (see picture at left), but it was a lot thicker and harder, and it was called "les oreilles de crisse". After the main courses, we were allowed to choose our dessert, which was a choice of: cake with maple topping, pancake, or a sugar tart. I chose the cake and it was delicious. Nick being the smart one, took two desserts. I was very jealous because although I was really full, I would have liked to try another dessert. :)After lunch, we were too full to get our maple taffy or "tire" as they call it in French, so we decided to go on a horse ride. At first I thought that this horse ride would be on a horse, but it turned out to be a horse drawn wagon. It wasn't all that long, but Steve kept us laughing the entire time, so it was quite amusing. We got a little tour of the farm, but we never saw any maple trees, so we were unsure if they actually made maple syrup at this sugar bush.
Despite being full, we had to indulge on the maple taffy or "tire sur la neige". Basically they take over-boiled maple syrup (in our case it was microwaved...) and pour it over snow in thin strips. After a few seconds, we took a popsicle stick and rolled the sticky taffy onto the stick. It's super sticky but very sweet and yummy. I'm showing off my maple taffy in the picture to the left. We got two of these maple taffy, and I'm not sure if I could have eaten another as they were so sweet.All in all, the trip to the Cabane à Sucre was good. Good times with good food and good people. Can't wait to go again next spring!
Note: All pictures posted by:
The picture of Geofford and I was taken by Steve Wallace.
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