Cadbury World

What can I say about Cadbury World? Well, let's say that it wasn't all I was hoping for and was a bit of a let down. But we did get free chocolate.

The first little bit was kind of interesting. We went through the "Aztec Jungle", which was just a bunch of plastic bushes with plastic people and plaques describing the discovery of cocoa beans. Very educational. Then we were told about John Cadbury's quest for the perfect chocolate. It seemed a bit much of propaganda to me, but I suppose, how else would they have it? A lady hologram was talking and asked if we could imagine a world without Cadbury's, and I figured Nestle would be happy.

The packaging plant area was such a let down as it was not operational. We couldn't even really see the conveyer belts because they blocked the view with boxes of Cadbury chocolates.

The Beanmobile ride was okay. You sat in a little car and it took you around "Beanville" and all the little cocoa beans sang and twirled around. It reminded me of "It's a Small World Afterall" in Disneyland. So what if some of the beans were broken? It was the magic of it all that counted!

There were some cool interactive things near the end that kids (big and small) liked. There was this one screen that you could stand in front of and pose, then it made you into a little chocolate sculpture. You could grow your own cocoa beans and test your green thumb through this video game.

I do have to say though, that the biggest scam of all was the 'make your own chocolate' bit. That's not what happens at all! You have 6-8 different fillings to choose from (popcorn, biscuit pieces, rice crispies, mint crunchies, etc), you can only choose one, and then they put it in a little cup and fill it with liquid chocolate. That's your amazing creation. You can't even mix the fillings. What a swizz.

This place should really have been called "Cadbury Dairy Milk World" because all of the chocolate that they talked about and sold there was made with their Dairy Milk chocolate. I was expecting to see more kinds of chocolate bars than just Dairy Milk, Flake, and Buttons. Although, that being said, I did spend a lot of money in that store. :-)

My First Balti

I have yet again been exposed to something that I've never heard of before and is so popular over here. A balti. It's an Indian dish that resembles a curry but it's cooked in a special bowl and eaten with nan bread. It is said that balti was first derived in Birmingham for the English palate and there seems to be many different ways it came about. More info on the Balti Experience.

I loved it! The balti that Alex and I shared were two mini ones, so we could have a taste of different types. The cute little bowls that they came in I wanted to take home with me. They're like little woks. I'm not a huge fan of curry, simply because it's usually too spicy for me, but this was great!


Check out the size of that nan...

Merry Chirstmas & Happy Boxing Day!

Merry Christmas... from England.

Christmas Pantomimes

Pantomimes are strange things. They're basically interactive plays put on for childern that re-enacte fairy tales or kids stories. Apparently the most famous of "pantos" is Cinderella. This is the panto that we went to see yesterday.

Pantos have been mainly described to me as a quote, "It's behind you!" and that it's a kids Christmas thing. Which made no sense to me as Cinderella has nothing to do with Christmas, and that particular one-liner didn't really paint a good picture. Now that I've been to one of these pantos, that quote is pretty acurate. The actors ask the audience questions, like if their dress is pretty, or if they should eat the apple (eg. Snow White), and, of course, for help finding someone (which apparently is the most popular question). I still don't get the Christmas connection though. :-)

Even though this was supposed to be purely for kids, Alex and I went with his mother and grandmother and we all enjoyed ourselves. Everyone seemed excited for me because this was my first time. The jokes in the play were a bit much for kids I felt though. Tons of adult jokes that I thought (and hoped) little kids wouldn't get. Which I guess made it funnier for us! The two ugly step-sisters were men (Peter and Nigel) in outrageous drag outfits. There was an added character who was the comic relief character of the play, Buttons. He was a standup comic in real life named Brian Conley. This show was by no means polished and the screw-ups and impromtu laughing bouts made it great! Like when one of the sister's wig fell off and one of his/her balloon boob popped. Apparently, these pantos aren't supposed to be smooth, which I guess is half the fun.

Check out http://www.its-behind-you.com/ and you'll start to comprehend what these crazy pantos are all about. Merry Christmas.

Dublin - Land of the Dear

"Dear" is a new word I've learned over here. It means expensive. And Dublin is certainly that. It's a good thing that we only had a day and a half in the city, otherwise I'm sure we would have spent most of our Christmas shopping money over there just getting a bite to eat. Our first night out we thought we'd do it cheapy-style and ordered fish and chips from a place that resembled a food court. The meal for the both of us wound up costing just over $30 CDN dollars! For bloody fish and chips! We each only had one piece as well. By the second night I had done a bit of research and realized that the cheapest restaurants to eat at were Italian and had a huge pizza for the same price as the one piece of fish & chips. But, still... all expensive in my books.

Jet lag is also being tough on us. With only having one full day in Dublin, we actually went to bed early the first night, intending to wake up early and get a head start on the day. Unfortunately, we slept in until past 2pm. So with half the day gone, we decided to just walk around and check out the Temple Bar area, down Grafton Street, and around St. Stephen's Green. I found my very own store too!

Of course we couldn't be in Dublin without going to a couple of different pubs. The first night we went to The Porterhouse Pub, which is supposed to be the best pub in town serving its own beer. Then the second night we went to The Temple Bar, which I believe is where the cobble-stoned area got its name from.

And no one should be in Dublin, be in pubs, and not have a Guinness - or at least a couple sips of someone else's Guinness. Apparently it's an acquired taste.

It's The Little Things...

So posting a few times a week might have been a little over ambitious. But I had to write something when I had a moment, at least just to say hello to everyone! As I have to be off to sleep shortly (catching planes dead-tired has never had a good track record for me), I thought I'd just mention a couple things I've found as odd.

Firstly, English taps are separate. Now I don't know who thought of putting them together in the first place, but I want to share my gratitude for sparing me from this atrocity like they have over here. One tap is freezing cold water. The other is scalding hot. To wash your hands, you have to move your hands from one side of the sink to the other super fast in order to mimic the likeness of lukewarm water. And we all can imagine just how often you come away with a wondrous hand-washing experience. More likely you're either burnt or have numb hands.

Secondly, their bathrooms have tiles on the walls, but carpet on the floors. I don't understand. This makes no sense to me no matter how I try and rationalize it. Can could get tile everywhere... but to have it on the walls and carpet on the floor, well, I'll just leave it at that. :-)

It's Christmas Time!

The view from my window....

This is what I saw this morning when I got up! It's actually snowing really hard, but you can't tell from this picture unfortunately. Wait, what if I mess around a bit with the picture... Or you can try this.

Or what about this?

Way cool! That means I'm a YouTubber. I can post videos now. Neato. This video was taken by the webcam so it's a bit grainy, but who cares! It's cool! I've been listening to Christmas music all morning and having a (now cold) cup of Holiday Spice Chai Tea. I'm contemplating trying to go for a walk around the corner to bring my overdue video back to Blockbuster, but I seem to still be here, worried about the pain it would cause when I inevitably fall on the sidewalk. At the same time, trying to walk in the snow is fun because you can catch snowflakes with your mouth and look at how beautiful the world is in a blanket of white! It's gorgeous! Alright, I think I convinced myself that I can trade a large bruise on my ass for a fun trip outside with a toque on and all bundled up. Ciao.

A Little 80's Nostalgia

"Cause I'm a Dentist..."

The one good thing about going to the dentist is the after effects of it. You get a better smile, your teeth don't ache, and it prolongs the use of lovely dentures. Of course at a price. The one bad thing about going to the dentist is getting the work done. That could be a billion dollar industry right there - dentistry without the pain and without the drilling sounds. Brilliant. Until then though millions of people are lining up to get a needle injected in the mouth and try some form of momentary meditation to distract them from the horrible, high pitched, screeching noise. I'm one of them.

Now as I've gotten older, the needle isn't the worst part. Partly because I think dentists are finally starting to learn that if the patient doesn't see it, there's less pain. My dentist is great like that. He never lets me see it. He'll have the needle in his hand, but down by his side and he'll say to me, "Now you'll feel just a pinch," and out of the corner of my eye I can see his shoulder and arm move. I brace myself and before I can even take a deep breath in (this is called psyching yourself out), he's got something in my mouth. And he even has me situated in the chair that I don't see this spike of terror being plunged into my face, I see the TV that's embedded in the ceiling above me. Since I've been given the remote, I even start to flip through the channels. Hmmm, poker. Ooh that's a good hand, it will for sure beat out the other guy's. (note - I wish I could sound smart right here and spew out a fancy name for a hand but you just get Sasha-speak instead.) And, viola, it's happened! The needle is done and all I feel is a weird tingle creeping through one side of my nose and up to my eye. Half of my face is now completely frozen. My face looks hilarious when I try to talk... it somehow reminds me of the picture to the right.

It's mainly the drilling sounds that get me and the fear I have that they somehow didn't put enough freezing in my mouth. Suddenly I'm going to feel everything they're doing and it's going to send me through the roof. Hey, fears have to come from somewhere... Luckily that time I didn't get catapulted from my seat with pain, I just suppose me twitching every time they touched a certain area wasn't normal. Solution - just add a few more needles and she'll be fine. It's times like that when you're a kid are traumatizing.

My New Web Album

Alright, just testing out a link to this photo album.

From Grandparents ...

Okay, so this is the actual picture with the album link below.

Hmmm... Try this:
http://picasaweb.google.com/sashaspics

That's better! I think. I don't know, more testing will have to be done as soon as I get more pictures into an album. :-) But this will be great as I get pictures posted while we travel. I can just post the link when I have updated new photos to prompt you to check it out. Easy!

Also, Alex set up Skype on his personal laptop (which is super slow) and we tested the video calling this morning. It's pretty cool. Well, in theory anyways. It just ended up as one picture frame because it froze. But on a faster computer it will be a lot better. So he will be downloading it onto his work laptop while we're away and we can use that.

Dinner time. So, like, I'll talk to you later, like, ok?

Our Anniversary

It was Alex & I's two year anniversary yesterday and I got spoiled.

A huge, beautiful bouquet of flowers came to my work as a wonderful surprise. The flowers were about half the size of me! And I don't even know where to start with the different kinds... the only one I know is Lilies, and they aren't even in bloom yet. Gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous.

Then Alex picked me up from work and we came back to his place to meet the mortgage specialist to sign our mortgage. (We have a new home!! Yippee! So excited.) I know it doesn't seem like a romantic thing to do, but we spun it as symbolic, and a cool way to ring in the specailness of the night. I mean, it's like we bought a house for our two year anniversary. :-)

Then Alex surprised me and took me to a restaurant I've been wanting to try for a while. Kobe Japanese Steak and Seafood House. It had a beautiful, wooden interior and was a split level eating/drinkin area. The entrance level was where we sat and had a drink before heading upstairs. That's a neat idea because it lets people lounge as long as they want in comfy chairs and couches, then decide to dine when they're ready. We sat down and ordered a couple of drinks, then went upstairs to eat pretty much right away. The way they have it set up is that the chef comes out when the table is full and starts cooking right in front of you. The chef we had was from Taiwan and he was entertaining. Knife wielding, canned jokes that were actually funny, and a terriyaki squirt bottle gone wrong all made the night super enjoyable. The steak was unbelievable! I've never had that melt-in-your-mouth, delicious steak before. We both had the terriyaki combination with steak and chicken, and if I were to go back, I would only order the steak - and lots of it! My Entertainment Card came in very handy as well. Superb showmanship like that always seems better when you know you're getting a good deal too. It was an amazing two year celebration.

Real Estate Rollercoaster

So last night was an emotionally tense one. Let's recap, shall we?

The tenants only let the realtor show the place on Wednesday's at 6pm. Which means the inspectors can only come at that time too. Now, when we signed the offer letter on Sunday (submitted it Monday and it was accepted Tuesday), Steve had put that we would remove the 'subject to' lines by midnight Wednesday. This in effect means that our offer is then concrete and the place is ours. This gave us no time to review the inspection report, or even have another good look and a round of discussion. The night had so many little things go wrong, that it left a bad taste in our mouths. Then, at about 7pm, Steve says to us that we need to have the bank see the inspection, along with all our documents, and have approved financing before the 'subject to' lines are lifted (by midnight).

This was impossible.

Basically it came down to either we close on the offer (take out the 'subject to' lines) and risk that the bank will actually lend us the amount of money we need. That's a huge half-a-million dollar debt over our heads that we would be looking at if anything went wrong. What a nightmare. Plus we were told that there was another couple who was looking at the place last night who had an offer in their hands, waiting for ours to expire. That is a lot of pressure. Either we risk a whole lot of money and possibly screw ourselves big-time, or we lose our offer on the townhome, opening it up for others to snatch, and thereby losing it.

I mean, how bad did we want this place? It actually doesn't allow pets, and I am never giving up Sukii, so we decided that she was small and quiet enough that no one would even know she was there. It doesn't allow BBQs of any kind on the patio, but we were going to have one anyway. The fact sheet put out on the property by the realtor had false information: it said pets were allowed, and there is no "Clubhouse". The building right beside the end unit (ours) is full of young people shouting and gathering in groups outside most nights, hence very noisy. The tenants are also a pain in the ass, as they seem very set in their ways and raise a stink seemingly about anything. One good thing is that we don't have to honour their year long lease if we don't want to, and evict them with two months notice. That would be fun kicking them out. I can just picture a lawsuit coming our way if we don't play this by the book with them.

Those are a lot of compromises that we had to think on. So it finally came down to crunch time and Alex made the call to Steve. We couldn't do it. The timeline was too close, and we couldn't risk so much money on something that just didn't seem right. If only we had an extension until tomorrow to clear things up with the bank. Then another crazy thing happened. Extension and wish granted. We could sleep and clear our minds... at least for the night. :-)

Townhome Blues

I didn't realize trying to buy a townhouse was so involved. I've never purchased real estate before, so I suppose, what do I know; except having a realtor is SMART.

At first we thought we could just scan the internet and check out the places we liked. That seemed to be going well and we sort of adopted Steve Birkic's homepage for finding good places. He has this cool thing were you can save searches on his VOW area and when new ones come on the market, his site emails the listings to you. The other great thing about his site is that he has every listing available, not just his own. Plus he's your one-stop shopping go-to guy. No matter who is listing the property, you just call Steve and he sets everything up. So, in a round-about-way, we sort of adopted Steve.



After quite a few viewings of various places, we saw the townhome we wanted and told Steve we were interested. Then came the package of papers. Tons of papers to go through. Me, being the detailed one of our duo, thought it would be best if I read this book-o-documents. And with no fight from the other end, I took out my highlighters, sticky-notes, different coloured pens, and a huge notepad and started reading.

After going through every strata meeting minute since 2004 and their bylaws, I realized that this might not be our dream home after all. One of the main reasons we wanted a patio was to have a BBQ on it, and one of the first bylaws was "Use and/or storage of barbecues is not permitted." Then, a bylaw was amended around early July of this year stating that no pets were allowed except for "a) a reasonable number of fish and small aquatic animals, b) up to two caged birds." Being a loving cat owner, this was unacceptable. But also being a responsible loving cat owner, I looked for this before even going to see the townhome, and on the realtor fact sheet it did indeed say "Cats: Yes; Dogs: Yes".

Once again, this is where our Steve has come in so handy. Just say the words "This is a deal-killer," and he'll get right back to you, usually with good news.

Google Map

Does this work?

New Blogger Syndrome

Trying to make things work isn't as easy as it looks. I wonder how long I'll be on here today figuring out how to do this and that? I need to learn how to write html code and I'm sure this will come together nicely.

Went out last night with Toby. We went to Samurai for Japanese food and then to Lickerish for a few martinis. We had a couple with Hypnotiq, something else, and Red Bull. Quite tasy actually. I would love to go back and try the Yam Fries. I swear I've been there before, but I can't remember with who... Anyway, we ended up at the Odyssey Night Club because we were in the West End and there wasn't a line up outside like Celebrities. We just happened to stumble upon "Fallen Angel Night" and this dancer MUST have taken little blue pills throughout the night because otherwise he performed the imposible. I couldn't believe they actually get fully nude. He did his go-go thing and came back out once to dance everyhour. Of course this was a male, gay night club, so I suppose it was only fitting.

So I'm proper tired today, maybe I'll do some laundry down at Alex's place. I dunno. We'll see if I actually get out of my pajamas today.

Pre-Thanksgiving Christmas

The countdown begins....