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*NOTE TO RAFTERS* (Sally, Jaclyn, Ahmed): ATTENTION: be at my house -- 42 Alpine Cres. (the boat house) by 8:00am on Sunday morning, July 27, so that we can pack the stuff in the car and be on our way by 8:30am. We want to be at Wilderness Tours (the rafting resort at Ottawa) by 2:00pm. We'll be back on Friday August 1 at night. Here's a list of stuff you should bring to rafting ... > sunscreen > bug repellent > long-sleeved shirt or jacket, pants for at night > swimming suit (pretty important) > hat (just in case) > camera(s) - buy waterproof disposable if you wanna take pics *while* rafting > sandals that strap to your feet, *not* flipflop things (while rafting anyway) > soap, shampoo, toothbrush, whatever. (see other) > refillable water bottle. Never leave home without it. Stuff you don't need but may want to consider: > You shouldn't need money, unless you want souvenirs (see other) or something you forgot at home. > However, you may want to buy a cold drink or something at the resort building. > My parents will spring for donuts and whatnot on the way there and back, but in case you want soup or coffee or something, you should cover that yourself. > You don't need to bring a towel - they're provided. > You don't need a pillow or sleeping bag. Other notes: > Re: Souvenirs and stuff -- you can buy a 'professional' picture of our raft in action while we're there, and they put together a video of the highlights of our trip too. Cost: probably around $25 each. > Re: Cabins -- we're all in the same cabin. Too bad. > Re: Food -- 3 meals a day, eat until you explode, all paid for. > Re: Washrooms -- kind of a long walk. Showers are communal (not sure about the girl situation) you'll need to bring all your own toiletries & other bathroom stuff. > Re: Free time -- we'll have some. Not much. Wednesday is a free day though. Probably be very tired. However, you'll see there's so many options available to us morning to night. Cards, books, music, etc. are unnecessary but if we're ever relaxing, I always enjoy that sort of thing. > Re: Astronomy -- telescope provided. Oh yeah. > Re: Cameras -- bring them. If you don't, you'll later wish you did. Plus hot rafting guides all over. Girls, and, yes, guys. > Re: Fun -- you're going to have some. Lots. You're going to be asking me what week to book off next summer. Then I'm going to tell you. ---------------------- Jul 18.03 I'm going to be missing Sally's birthday parties, unfortunately (sorry!) because there is still so much that I have to do to prepare for Saturday. For those who don't know, and are interested, this is the schedule. >> Leave on Saturday morning. Cottage right up until Saturday 26. We should be home by afternoon, possibly night. >> On Sunday morning (July 27) at 8:00am, everyone arrives at my house so we can pack the stuff in the van, and get moving so we can be in Ottawa by about 2:00pm. Relaxing at the resort before Rafting2003betterthanpromwoohoo begins. That goes until Friday August 1 ... >> Which is when we get back from rafting. Then the next morning Saturday August 2 we head out to Killbear for camping until we get back home on August 8, with 3 days to register my timetable online at UT. As you can see, it's a very long, hectic 3 weeks, so I expect to be quite the frazzled burnt potato when I get back. I doubt that I'll have time to touch the website in the one-day intermissions when I'm home (in case anyone wants to check during the whole period), but I will try to check out and respond to e-mails or icq messages on those days if I have any. Hopefully I'll be back in one piece after three weeks with the family. If not, feel free to have me drugged and committed. Until then, everyone hold your breath. And pray for me. ---------------------- Jul 17.03 Loretta's birthday barbecue. Unfortunately, no Stripperella. Only car accidents. ---------------------- Jul 16.03 Downtown once again. Picked up shoes. Checked out the secondhand clothes. Looked for presents. ---------------------- Jul 15.03 Another failed attempt at tennis (God saw us and started crying). And more house of cards. This time, mine. ---------------------- Jul 14.03 Went downtown *again* , but this time I actually got some stuff done. Did some consulting, some department hopping, some UTcard getting. And found a $25 pair of fobby shoes that I want to get. While hanging around at Robarts, a little bird swooped down and started hopping and chirping around my feet. ---------------------- Jul 13.03 Attended the Metro Toronto Zoo on Fairchild's Chinese Day. Trotted the entire globe and then some, and saw some pret-ty interesting animals. And I'm not talking about the ones behind the fences. ---------------------- Jul 12.03 Woke up at 7:45am today, and since the clock was gone, had to get up to check the cell phone to figure it out, since I was all worried I'd miss my doctor's appointment at noon. Eventually got back to sleep, but never completely. You know how it is. At noon, arrived at the doctor's office where I had to wait one hour to be seen ... and when the doctor was ready, I had to wait in a room while next door he dealt with drawing blood from a crying kid who just *couldn't do it* even though his father told him he definitely could. After that, some lady started demanding that the doctor give her a 'negative' declaration for tuberculosis. She had already had two x-rays, and some sort of positive possibility, but she could not stand for a negative test result. She needed a negative TB status. And she needed the whole doctor's office to know. Half an hour of sitting in the room eventually led me to my much awaited appointment. Ten minutes later, I was out of there. Have started making timetable. Contact me to discuss classes together. Contact me to discuss burning down the University of Toronto. As a side note, I visited McGill University's website last night, you know, just to see if my application status had changed or anything like that. (it hadn't.) As I was leaving the site, I saw a link that read "Open letter to Ontario students who were refused admission". Well, considering that I had not received any replies to queries I had sent prior to being rejected, I figured maybe this would be an enlightening read. It turns out that Ontario is going through a double cohort year. And that Quebec did not receive financial support from the federal government to prepare for it. And that, regrettably, the standards increased. And I could go on and on like this forever but to make a long story short, McGill disregarded 99% in AMI4M1 (a performing arts course) and considered 79% in MGA4U1 (a non-performing arts course). Dropping my entering grade from 91.3% to 88.0%. Which is sadly one percent lower than the minimum grade needed to be considered this year. How unfortunate. Contact me to discuss burning down McGill University. Contact me to discuss rebuilding McGill University and attempting to run the new dean over with a car unsuccessfully because of my courageous and heroic insticts. ---------------------- Jul 11.03 Went downtown (again) to 401 Convenience (right next to the Loft 18+ Cinemas and the Zanzibar, among other things) to play in a Draft Magic Tournament at 6:30pm with Ahmed. Now *that* was an in-ter-est-ing experience. I was extremely nervous. After paying and getting a DCI card, we had to wait around for things to start, which gave me a chance to be intimidated by all the freaky good people. And by freaky good, I mean good, freakily so, and just freaky. Some of them I had a hard time placing on the fossil record ... were they 19 or were they 34? One had a receding hair line and looked like Mr.Kulscar (he talked a lot and generally gave me anxiety), one had grey/white hair and really hairy arms (but she was nice and made me feel at ease), and one had the sort of fingernails that looked like they were going to break any second (but he only had them only on every other finger or so). Anyway, those three were wearing *nationals* t-shirts so it's not like I had anything to be concerned about. Everyone was talking the lingo and at that time I sort of realized that Magic.com is different from Magic.hardware.hardcore. Eventually he called out names, splitting us into two groups (Ahmed and I were in different groups), and told my group to go upstairs. Me, I had heretofore had no idea there *was* an upstairs, and I was closest to the back of the store, where I assumed there would be the afforementioned stairs. There was a moment where I was quite disconcerted, but thankfully Receding Hairline, behind me as I started walking towards where I thought the stairs would be, called out that the door was locked. Not to me, but to the manager. The door was right behind me. He then made some 'funny' joke about wishing he could still phase through walls, and aptly demonstrated his lack of that ability. ... (continuing) ---------------------- Jul 10.03 Kenneth's house for Human Nature plus Serena, Renee and Sue. Conclusion, upon complete viewing: Human Nature is a great movie -- wacky and hilarious, like Being John Malkovich (other similarities include the whimsical soundtrack and the central love triangles) , but with much more thematic depth. Where Kenneth and Renee caught a lot of insightful points in Adaptation that I glazed over, I was able to see a lot of brilliant things that the director did with Human Nature ... (continued) Afteward, we watched Gary the Rat, which made me realize how ugly this whole Flash animation cartoon movement is (Freaky Stories, anyone?), and Stripperella, which was blisteringly funny beyond belief. Though it sometimes goes too much out of the way to be self-mocking (I guess they have to make it really obvious for the drunks), you gotta respect Pamela Anderson for being a good sport. Fluffy and trashy (but in self-deprecatingly good way) and loaded with hilarious references to media and pop-culture (Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, James Bond) with some product placement for good measure, Stripperella was jiggly good fun for everyone (meaning guys). ---------------------- Jul 09.03 Went downtown again. Had a completely homemade fast food breakfast -- the whole nine yards -- for only $4.00. Definitely going back there again. Checked out 89 Chestnut St., my would-be college residence. Then walked and shopped for four hours. Did the one-hour orientation. Walked and shopped some more. 25 km of walking. Walked all around and within the Queen-Bloor/Spadina-Yonge rectangle. I think I've familiarized myself with D.T.T.O. pretty well now. ---------------------- Jul 08.03 Kenneth's house of cards. Ate durian, which was just a bit pungent and had the consistency of rare meat. ---------------------- Jul 07.03 Went downtown to visit Woodsworth, get my course calender, make a drop-in appointment and get familiarized with stuff. I got dropped off at Sheppard subway station at around 9:00. Waited too long and got off at College, but I wandered around on UT campus (some guy in a car at a red light honked and started staring at me. I wasn't sure whether to act flattered or creeped out, so I just kept walking) and eventually got to St.George after about an hour. Nobody was around the Woodsworth college building when I got there after much strife (I wandered St.George for about 20 minutes) so I just started walking towards Yonge on Bloor. Then halfway there I changed my mind and came back. I picked up my course calender and timetable book, read it all over and then left. Continued walking toward Yonge on Bloor. Went into Chapters to avoid the drizzle, where I checked out the latest edition of The Backyard Astronomer's Guide (Toronto's own Terrence Dickensen, great writer) Went into Gap and tried on lots of clothes (which was fun with no one around waiting) ... (continuing) ---------------------- Jul 06.03 Watched The Hulk, which I think aspired to be Spiderman but just couldn't do it. There was lots of possibility in that movie but it just didn't come off that well. And when Spiderman had scenes that were completely CGI, at least it was fun to watch. Got the 2002-2003 UT anti-calender, which is pretty cool but kind of frightening. One first-year Psych class had 1736 students. ---------------------- Jul 05.03 Cousin's daughters' birthday barbecue today. Betty's solution to the pidgeon problem #1: whack them with brooms. Betty's solution to the pidgeon problem #2: throw candy at them (don't worry, candy is biodegradable). Betty's solution to the pidgeon problem #3: put strips of "spikes" where they land. Preferrably long nails. My solution to the pidgeon problem: feed them some bread. Dipped in bleach. Watched Human Nature, which was extremely funny, though unfortunately, had to leave right before the movie's climax. Note: Patricia Arquette is a really cool actress. Note: Miranda Otto ROCKS. ---------------------- Jul 04.03 My sister has a pidgeon problem. It sounds like a cell phone is vibrating from *inside the walls*. Ahmed and Kenneth came over to play Magic with me and Melanie. Conclusion: multiplayer is fun. ---------------------- Jul 03.03 I've been getting a lot of people asking me what I have in terms of "plans for the summer", so I figure I'll kill two birds with one stone and make this my daily post. Now, if you really wanted to know what my plans are, you'd be here on this website! Without further ado ...
Greg's plans for this summer:
1. Avoid getting a job
2. Learn how to drive (G1, anyone?)
3. Get stuff for university
4. *Do* the following at least once:
>The Rex
>Metro Toronto Zoo
>ROM
>AGO
>Ontario Science Centre
5. Build this website into the online empire as per my artistic vision
6. Get my yearbook signed by people this year
7. Rock the boat at white water rafting 2003!
8. Try to enjoy myself for the 1 week of family vacation before *and* after rafting
(yes, 3 consecutive weeks away from home - I'm missing Beaches Jazz!)
9. Throw/Attend the following parties:
>Pool (water and table)
>Scanner
>Film (B-movie and Chinese)
>Astro
>Barbecue
>Bowling
10. Help out (and leave my mark) at my second home, BSS room 71
11. Brush up on my billiards, snooker, Starcraft, Magic, chess, piano, trombone,
jazz, writing, bowling, Lazerquesting, visual arts, photography, film,
literature, astronomy and astrophysics
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Jul 02.03 Slowly building Music Trip 2003: Montreal/Quebec stuff ... working continuously on the Trip Log, as well as the standalone page for the whole thing itself. Check out the "rollover faces" group picture for the trip. Currently there are only name labels. When I figure out how to use Flash (groan) I'll add more stuff to it. ---------------------- Jul 01.03 Canada Day Went out on Lake Simcoe again. Got more sunburn. Studied for G1 written test. Got swarmed by a freaky school of minnows that kept following, circling, and bumping into my feet. Saw two dragonflies, mating in a *different* position. Strange. The one in front still had its thorax stuck on top of the other one's head or nech or something. But the one on bottom had its thorax curled and stuck, from underneath, to the front one's abdomen. They made a heart shape. Later, went to Kenneth's house for with Renee and Sue again (and newcomer Serena) for the B-movie showdown: Prom Queen 2 (Hello Mary Lou) vs. Crocodile 2 (Death Swamp). Both were excellent films but I have to say Crocodile 2 maimed Mary Lou, no question about it, with its long, pointless scenes (all ended by a crocodile attack), lots of shouting and usage of the F-word (possibly over 150 times), obvious CGI effects, hokey music and scene changes, studio shadows, spotlights and rain, and 2 minutes of 'crocodile' in the whole movie. We never even found out why it's a sequel. Prom Queen 2 was good, but aside from 80's fashion which can't be blamed (funny how 50's fashion is more appealing to our society right now) , a nude lesbian changeroom/shower kill scene and a freaky rocking horse (with a long tongue) it had nothing really going for it in the B-movie department. It was just an average old horror movie. Am starting to think, maybe we should start up our own film festival. ---------------------- |