It’s definitely Monday..
So I 'woke up' this morning with my eyes more fused shut then ever and was achy all over and thought to myself why and then I remembered what a week/end it had been...The fact that it's gloomy, rainy and cold out did not help the situation much.
As you may know from my last blog, I was working night shift last week from about 12-8AM. But what I was really doing was living 2 lives. You see, I was still doing the things that I normally did after work and during the day it felt like I had a day off so I was doing stuff I normally couldn't do, all on about an average of 4 hours of sleep a night (I know, I know that may sound like a lot to those in my audience who are new parents..but still!). And then night would fall, all my friends would go to sleep and I would 'begin' my day. But really I'm feeling the effects of this 24 cycle today.
The bonus is that I got to drive my car around a lot and truly realized what a change it has had on my life - I mean no longer do I have to take the bus if I don’t want to, walk home from the autoparc (which taking the right shortcuts takes about 20 minutes but is really a 5 min car ride) fuming the whole way after just missing my connecting bus by like 1 min (as I see it drive off while we wait for about 8 minutes at the lights on Taschereau which is the duration of the entire trip from downtown)..But sometimes having the car causes normal logic to fail. You see, Saturday morning, Arshia and I made plans to go check out the St.Laurent Street Festival (they basically bring all the designer clothes outside at more ‘affordable’ prices) and decided we would be back home by 4PM and chill before going out again at night to celebrate Angela’s birthday.
However, the ‘plan’ was to park the car at the autoparc because parking would be madness on a Saturday, take the bus from there and then just walk…Which is what we would always do, with the added bonus of having the car waiting for us when we got back and not have to wait for (or miss) our connecting bus…much time would be saved (try 2 hours). Just as I was about to make the turn to the autoparc, the wheels had a mind of their own and next thing you know we’re crossing the span of the Champlain Bridge. Oh well, we say, we’ll get home faster…..Ya, right. We only got there at 2PM, shopped, got hungry and found ourselves sitting outside on a terrace at 4:30PM ordering a ‘snack’ of pizza (after arguing for about 2O minutes whether we wanted mezzo or mega-only to realize that we wanted the same thing but were using the wrong terms..) So basically, by the time we had finished it was already 6PM (and Angela’s birthday reservations were for 7PM on the same street).
Realizing at that point we would be late (my plan was to blame Arshia who is known for being the late one), we kept saying we should have just brought our change of clothes because we would basically be driving all the way home to literally change and come back. Under normal circumstances, we would never have attempted this (ie. Take the bus twice in the same Saturday?! Virtually impossible!) and would have made our plans much more logically. But there we were, racing back home, changing and back on St.Laurent, over an hour later. I guess now with my car the bus is definitely a thing of my past. But then again, if gas prices keep soaring……normal logic may soon prevail.
Say Cheese!
So there we were, Arshia, myself and her sister walking up St-Laurent street, our eyes scanning the sales and as I was thinking to myself-‘what a great day to be outside..’, my thoughts were interrupted with a –‘hey, girls!’..Normally, I wouldn’t even pay attention but it was too late as I glanced over in the calling voice’s direction and a guy extended his digital camera and asked me if I could take a picture for him and his friends who were sitting on a terrace. Without hesitation, I take his camera (it’s happened so often that tourists approach me so this was nothing out of the usual) and just say-‘Do I press this?’ and I noticed the picture wasn’t really going to come out well but he told me to take it regardless. I should also mention at this point that these were a bunch of (young) brown guys but there were a few other people there as well.
At this point, Arshia and her sister walk over to see what all the fuss is about. So I’m still taking the picture and this other guy walks up to me (who I thought worked there) and says-‘here let me take the picture, you go in it’ and I was like-‘I don’t even know them! They’re not my friends’ and he goes..’ah, that’s okay!’ So now at this point, there’s like 4 guys in front of us, all giving us there cameras and asking us to take their picture! It then dawned on me what was happening and I go-‘hahah..what a pick up line’ and they all start laughing in unison and say ‘..She got it!’
Meanwhile, Arshia now has a camera in her hand and is talking to a guy who with an undistinguishable accent said-‘I’m Bourat from Khazakstan!’ and continued talking. Finally, having enough-Arshia goes-Okay, go over there so I can take your picture’ and he goes-‘I rather just stand here and talk to you’….This kind of thing happens to Arshia often…..
Finally, their gig was up and they just started asking us about things to do from Montreal because they were down from New York for the weekend. However, Mr.Khazakstan was still trying and said something about how he had an idea for a show where they did this kind of thing and then mentioned how Canadians didn’t produce those kinds of shows. I said ‘ya we do-we go to the States and ask you guys simple questions that you get wrong!’..They seemed to enjoy that. As we walked away, one of them yells out-‘Does my skin look dry…do you have any lotion?’…..ya, um we could see where that was going…
Why don’t guys ask for directions?
So this brings me to Sunday. After sleeping barely 3 hours (the work effects still lingering coupled with the late night from Ange’s birthday), I was up at 6:30AM to begin my next adventure…The lack of sleep was starting to catch up on me but there’s nothing like a shower to wake someone up. Some people drink coffee in the morning, well, I shower.
So there we were, on Highway 10 East, driving towards Sherbrooke to get to our race at 10:30AM. We met the rest of our team at the autoparc (seems like my the place to be) and were only 5 minutes late (had to fill up on...umm gas!) and our phones were already ringing. The guys asked me to lead but I was like ‘no-no..you guys go ahead’…what a mistake! With the exception of maybe taking the Champlain Bridge exit (ie. Going in the wrong direction to start off..I blame the lack of sleep), I think I would have fared much, much better. That just goes to show…
So anyways, we drove and drove and I had to keep telling Sukhi to wake up as she was trying to doze off behind her sunglasses, while our team mate in the backseat would just not stop talking. I thought I was a morning person…This girl was way too happy, cheery and positive and everything was ‘great’ and life was just way too peachy at 7:30AM. Nonetheless, she kept me awake with her stories, although I didn’t get in a word...
Anyways, so just when we were like maybe half an hour away from our destination, the car leading (full of guys) decided to exit early. Immediately, Sukhi bolts out of her sleep-like state and starts yelling-‘They’re taking the wrong exit! That’s the wrong one!’…Then she thought maybe they knew of a shortcut and settled back down and continued enjoying the ‘view’…However, 20 minutes of driving we realize that they don’t know where they’re going and have passed Sherbrooke and were on our way to who knows where. By now we’ve exited off the highway and are driving along this main street full of lights but obviously nowhere near our destination as there wasn’t any water in sight. So we continue driving and are now back on a highway and I noticed a sign that says ‘SHERBROOKE-LEFT’..but these guys continue to drive and then decide to try to pull over on a ramp. That was unsuccessful so they continued to drive and then pulled over. They realized they missed the exit so the game plan was to somehow get back on the highway. However, we were at an intersection-left was the highway and right was like farm country. I start to turn left as logically it makes sense to get back on the highway and then turn around at the next exit, but was honked at by every car that was behind us as they chose right because it seemed like the direction we wanted to go in. I begrudgingly follow and we drove for several kilometres, obviously in the wrong direction, as more and more farms popped up with their cows and horses grazing in the fields. After like one more farm, the consensus in our car was that this was so not happening so we turned around and decided to take our original option. (Sounds like a choose your own-adventure gone wrong).
We finally got there, with half an hour to spare, threw on our lifejackets and jumped in the boat…Okay, fine, maybe not jumped-that would be a sight-22 of us jumping on the boat…We’re already known for tipping….
All in all, it was a good day-the sun was out and we raced well.
So I 'woke up' this morning with my eyes more fused shut then ever and was achy all over and thought to myself why and then I remembered what a week/end it had been...The fact that it's gloomy, rainy and cold out did not help the situation much.
As you may know from my last blog, I was working night shift last week from about 12-8AM. But what I was really doing was living 2 lives. You see, I was still doing the things that I normally did after work and during the day it felt like I had a day off so I was doing stuff I normally couldn't do, all on about an average of 4 hours of sleep a night (I know, I know that may sound like a lot to those in my audience who are new parents..but still!). And then night would fall, all my friends would go to sleep and I would 'begin' my day. But really I'm feeling the effects of this 24 cycle today.
The bonus is that I got to drive my car around a lot and truly realized what a change it has had on my life - I mean no longer do I have to take the bus if I don’t want to, walk home from the autoparc (which taking the right shortcuts takes about 20 minutes but is really a 5 min car ride) fuming the whole way after just missing my connecting bus by like 1 min (as I see it drive off while we wait for about 8 minutes at the lights on Taschereau which is the duration of the entire trip from downtown)..But sometimes having the car causes normal logic to fail. You see, Saturday morning, Arshia and I made plans to go check out the St.Laurent Street Festival (they basically bring all the designer clothes outside at more ‘affordable’ prices) and decided we would be back home by 4PM and chill before going out again at night to celebrate Angela’s birthday.
However, the ‘plan’ was to park the car at the autoparc because parking would be madness on a Saturday, take the bus from there and then just walk…Which is what we would always do, with the added bonus of having the car waiting for us when we got back and not have to wait for (or miss) our connecting bus…much time would be saved (try 2 hours). Just as I was about to make the turn to the autoparc, the wheels had a mind of their own and next thing you know we’re crossing the span of the Champlain Bridge. Oh well, we say, we’ll get home faster…..Ya, right. We only got there at 2PM, shopped, got hungry and found ourselves sitting outside on a terrace at 4:30PM ordering a ‘snack’ of pizza (after arguing for about 2O minutes whether we wanted mezzo or mega-only to realize that we wanted the same thing but were using the wrong terms..) So basically, by the time we had finished it was already 6PM (and Angela’s birthday reservations were for 7PM on the same street).
Realizing at that point we would be late (my plan was to blame Arshia who is known for being the late one), we kept saying we should have just brought our change of clothes because we would basically be driving all the way home to literally change and come back. Under normal circumstances, we would never have attempted this (ie. Take the bus twice in the same Saturday?! Virtually impossible!) and would have made our plans much more logically. But there we were, racing back home, changing and back on St.Laurent, over an hour later. I guess now with my car the bus is definitely a thing of my past. But then again, if gas prices keep soaring……normal logic may soon prevail.
Say Cheese!
So there we were, Arshia, myself and her sister walking up St-Laurent street, our eyes scanning the sales and as I was thinking to myself-‘what a great day to be outside..’, my thoughts were interrupted with a –‘hey, girls!’..Normally, I wouldn’t even pay attention but it was too late as I glanced over in the calling voice’s direction and a guy extended his digital camera and asked me if I could take a picture for him and his friends who were sitting on a terrace. Without hesitation, I take his camera (it’s happened so often that tourists approach me so this was nothing out of the usual) and just say-‘Do I press this?’ and I noticed the picture wasn’t really going to come out well but he told me to take it regardless. I should also mention at this point that these were a bunch of (young) brown guys but there were a few other people there as well.
At this point, Arshia and her sister walk over to see what all the fuss is about. So I’m still taking the picture and this other guy walks up to me (who I thought worked there) and says-‘here let me take the picture, you go in it’ and I was like-‘I don’t even know them! They’re not my friends’ and he goes..’ah, that’s okay!’ So now at this point, there’s like 4 guys in front of us, all giving us there cameras and asking us to take their picture! It then dawned on me what was happening and I go-‘hahah..what a pick up line’ and they all start laughing in unison and say ‘..She got it!’
Meanwhile, Arshia now has a camera in her hand and is talking to a guy who with an undistinguishable accent said-‘I’m Bourat from Khazakstan!’ and continued talking. Finally, having enough-Arshia goes-Okay, go over there so I can take your picture’ and he goes-‘I rather just stand here and talk to you’….This kind of thing happens to Arshia often…..
Finally, their gig was up and they just started asking us about things to do from Montreal because they were down from New York for the weekend. However, Mr.Khazakstan was still trying and said something about how he had an idea for a show where they did this kind of thing and then mentioned how Canadians didn’t produce those kinds of shows. I said ‘ya we do-we go to the States and ask you guys simple questions that you get wrong!’..They seemed to enjoy that. As we walked away, one of them yells out-‘Does my skin look dry…do you have any lotion?’…..ya, um we could see where that was going…
Why don’t guys ask for directions?
So this brings me to Sunday. After sleeping barely 3 hours (the work effects still lingering coupled with the late night from Ange’s birthday), I was up at 6:30AM to begin my next adventure…The lack of sleep was starting to catch up on me but there’s nothing like a shower to wake someone up. Some people drink coffee in the morning, well, I shower.
So there we were, on Highway 10 East, driving towards Sherbrooke to get to our race at 10:30AM. We met the rest of our team at the autoparc (seems like my the place to be) and were only 5 minutes late (had to fill up on...umm gas!) and our phones were already ringing. The guys asked me to lead but I was like ‘no-no..you guys go ahead’…what a mistake! With the exception of maybe taking the Champlain Bridge exit (ie. Going in the wrong direction to start off..I blame the lack of sleep), I think I would have fared much, much better. That just goes to show…
So anyways, we drove and drove and I had to keep telling Sukhi to wake up as she was trying to doze off behind her sunglasses, while our team mate in the backseat would just not stop talking. I thought I was a morning person…This girl was way too happy, cheery and positive and everything was ‘great’ and life was just way too peachy at 7:30AM. Nonetheless, she kept me awake with her stories, although I didn’t get in a word...
Anyways, so just when we were like maybe half an hour away from our destination, the car leading (full of guys) decided to exit early. Immediately, Sukhi bolts out of her sleep-like state and starts yelling-‘They’re taking the wrong exit! That’s the wrong one!’…Then she thought maybe they knew of a shortcut and settled back down and continued enjoying the ‘view’…However, 20 minutes of driving we realize that they don’t know where they’re going and have passed Sherbrooke and were on our way to who knows where. By now we’ve exited off the highway and are driving along this main street full of lights but obviously nowhere near our destination as there wasn’t any water in sight. So we continue driving and are now back on a highway and I noticed a sign that says ‘SHERBROOKE-LEFT’..but these guys continue to drive and then decide to try to pull over on a ramp. That was unsuccessful so they continued to drive and then pulled over. They realized they missed the exit so the game plan was to somehow get back on the highway. However, we were at an intersection-left was the highway and right was like farm country. I start to turn left as logically it makes sense to get back on the highway and then turn around at the next exit, but was honked at by every car that was behind us as they chose right because it seemed like the direction we wanted to go in. I begrudgingly follow and we drove for several kilometres, obviously in the wrong direction, as more and more farms popped up with their cows and horses grazing in the fields. After like one more farm, the consensus in our car was that this was so not happening so we turned around and decided to take our original option. (Sounds like a choose your own-adventure gone wrong).
We finally got there, with half an hour to spare, threw on our lifejackets and jumped in the boat…Okay, fine, maybe not jumped-that would be a sight-22 of us jumping on the boat…We’re already known for tipping….
All in all, it was a good day-the sun was out and we raced well.
