Ok everyone. Grab a coffee and something to eat. It's time for another two month installment of the roller coaster ride that is my life, with visual aids provided by my new camera :) Here we go...
At the time of my previous post, I had just moved from Whistler to Vancouver to begin the next chapter of my Canadian experience. I was aching from my first few days as a builders laborer but was excited about what the next few months had in store for me. I had no idea how good things were going to get!
Since so much has gone on over the past 8 weeks, I think I might start with a summary of everyday life, and then skip to the highlights.
My alarm goes off at 6:15am every morning, Monday to Friday. I get up, have a few bits of toast with peanut butter and honey (unfortunately I have depleted my Vegemite supply) and then chuck four sandwiches and a few bits of fruit into my back pack and head out the door.
My bus stop is at the intersection of W4th and Alma St. Fortnately, so is my house. The photo is taken from my front porch.
My house from the intersection (It's the green one. My bedroom window is the one behind the pine trees).
I am sitting at the bus stop one minute later awaiting the number 4 bus to UBC. If I miss that one, good old bus number 84 is there to back me up. I've only missed that one once (last Wednesday actually, you'll see why later) and I found that I have a back up for my back up, bus 44. All of which get me to work on time. I have a 15 minute walk from the UBC bus stop to my construction site. I work on Thunderbird Blvd (I haven't sat down and worked out the google maps API just yet, but if you go to maps.google.com and type search for "Thunderbird Blvd, Vancouver, Canada", you'll see where we are building. You can also see just how close W4th and Alma St is). Here it is:
We are building the place in two stages. We have finished framing the first stage and the roof is being lifted into place. We are working on the second stage which is closest to the road. The picutre above is of the thrid floor of 5 of the second stage.
This is kind of what it will look like when it is done.
Our tower crane.
Some walls that have been braced to keep them square for the joisters to sheet the floor on top. The braces come off when the sheeting is down.
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The fork lift that I learn't to drive on.
Coffee break.
A model of the finished building.
We work 7:30 to 4:00pm, with 30 minute coffee breaks at 10am and 1pm. That format works quite well because after two and a half hours of working your guts out in the hot (well, almost 30C) sun, you need a sit down. I drink between 2 and 3 liters of water during work, and plenty when I get home as well. I am part of the framing crew. We are responsible for building walls and that's it. There are many other teams on the site including formers (concrete), electricians, plumbers, and the joisters (they lay the flooring). Over the past 8 weeks, my job tasks have included cleaning up the site (a lot), using the fork lift to move the scaffolding from the underground carpark to the hire company truck (that was fun), building pieces for the walls (i.e. using a nail gun to make double/triple studs and wall intersection pieces), building walls, and most recently, laying out the mud sills and plates that determine where the walls will actually be stood. This is the most challenging work that I have done so far and I just so happen to be getting much better at it. So much so that I received my first pay rise on Friday. It feels great to be more than just a shit kicker. Really great. Sometimes we'll knock off early on payday Friday to have a beer with the boys and to give us a bit of extra time to get to the bank and cash our pay cheque. I'm usually pretty tired after work so definitely no extra-curricular sporting activities over here. The most I usually manage is a bit of Frisbee down at the beach with the guys next door. We head down there about two or three times a week and take our $20 portable gas BBQ from Canadian Tyre. It does the job. We generally hang out down there until just after the sun goes down (i.e. 10:30ish. I still can't get used to it being light that late). So that concludes my weekly routine.
Weekends are far from routine. I think I might break this next section into chronological order, starting from just after my last post.
Sat 13th May
I went for a jog in the morning in the hope that it might loosen up my aching joints a tad. Fortunately it did. Mariko, Rob and I headed down to Jericho Beach in the arvo for a bit of sun bathing and a few drinks. That evening, we went to a house party with John, a guy that I met from work. The party was pretty lame and Rob and Mariko were a little to intoxicated to maintain any form of manners and left without a good bye after no more than 5 minutes. I stuck around for a while and chatted with John, had a burger and took off.
Sun 14th May
Had a bit of a sleep in and then went down to the train station to meet Mike and Lisa who were heading off to Jasper that afternoon. It was great to see them again one more time. Spent the evening down at Jericho with Rob.
Sat 20th May
I did a bit of overtime since I didn't really have any money to do anything else and I thought it might be an opportunity to work closer to my boss so that he could see that I'm not just another drop kick laborer. It worked. I got to use a nail gun for the first time. Scary! After work I rushed off to the Pacific Central Station just in time to make the 6pm bus up to Whistler. I stayed with Ross (my old room mate), Ashley and Jordyn (Ross' new room mates). Thank's guys.
Sun 21st May
Had an awesome day riding Whistler with Ross, John, Mariko and Grizzle. We spent the entire day in the park and I was riding as well as I have throughout the season. Landing 540s like they were nothing. I was so pumped up. We had dinner at Merlins and then headed off to the Longhorn to see if we could run into any hanger'on'ers. Of course no night would be complete in Whistler without a visit to the pie shop on the way home. What better way to end a top day.
Mon 22nd May
Oh yeah, forgot to mention the long weekend. Monday was Victoria Day so another day riding Whistler. I didn't get up the hill until after lunch though. Spent the morning hanging out with Ben and Bron and planned a trip to Seattle for July to see Bela Fleck and the Flecktones. More on that later. I met John at the Roundhouse at about 1pm and we hit the park again for a few hours. It was a bit more slushy than Sunday but we still had a great day. I killed a bit of time back at Brio in the arvo and then caught the 6:30pm bus home to Vancouver. A thoroughly enjoyable weekend.
Sat 27th May
We had a bit of a lazy day. The highlight of the day was our house's first big meal together. We invited our upstairs neighbor Andria down for a roast pork banquet. We had succulent pork, oven roasted potatoes, carrots and turnip, broccoli au gratin, all topped in proper gravy. Desert was a lovely salad prepared by Andria. After dinner, we took a short bus ride up to 4th and Blanca for a house party for one of the guys who used to live in the house next door to us.
Sun 28th May
Another Sunday sleep in followed by a stroll up Broadway with Rob. We popped into a camera shop to do some comparisons and that got the ball rolling towards my new purchase.
Thurs 1st June
I built my first wall! The first of many to come.
Sat 3rd June
Had a bit of a lazy day and then headed 'round to John's place for a BBQ. John lives in a frat house at UBC and I can't for the life of me remember which Greek letters make up it's name. Pretty cool place though. Massive flat-screen TV and pool table in the common room. I may or may not have tried some of BC's finest for the first time. I've never giggled so much in my life. It was a top night.
Sun 4th June
Watched a few DVDs. Chill out day.
Fri 9th June
We had a slab party at work to celebrate the pour of the second half of the slab. It's a bit of a tradition to have a BBQ and some beers at certain project mile stones. The roof party is going to be great! Ross arrived on my doorstep at around 7pm. He came down to stay with me for a few days before taking off on a 6 week tour of Europe. I get emails from him every couple of weeks and he's having a great time.
Sat 10th June
I took Ross down to Kitsilano Beach to show him what all the fuss was about. We walked from Kits Beach to Granville Island and had a look around the market. It's a great market, filled with every cuisine you could think of. It was torture looking at all of the things that we couldn't afford. Watched a few DVDs in the evening.
Sun 11th June
Ross headed off for the airport in the morning, I don't have any notes from this day so I haven't got a clue what I did.
Wed 14th June
I'm not exactly sure when, but I hired a saxophone from the music shop around the corner from my house. I've got a student model Vito which is a mission to play, however I have my mouthpiece (thank god!) it is relatively in tune. It's only setting me back $60 per month and believe me when I say it had brought me much more happiness than that already! One of the guys from work (Phill, he's been a bit of a mentor for me. Thanks Phil) was talking about going to a jam session down at The Media Club that night. My ears tweaked up and I told him that I was a sax player and was interested in coming down. It turned out that the jam session was actually a competition run by one of the local radio stations, Rock 101 FM. 12 competitors, 1 song each. Oh well, one song is better than none. I perused the song list that the band was able to play and chose one of the two songs that I thought I could actually fit into. Superstitious by Stevie Wonder. The band were a little apprehensive to have me up on stage, considering the last sax player that played with them played one note, over and over again. I assured them that I knew "at least" 4 notes and counted them in. The song went great and I spent the next hour taking complements from every "musician" in the room. There were some interesting rockers let me tell you. I got invited to go play at a Blues jam session down at the Yale on Saturday afternoon. And so begins the best part of my Canadian experience so far.
Friday 16th June
Headed down to a pub on W4th Ave called Nevermind with my roomies and upstairs neighbours. It's a pretty cool little hangout. When we got back to the house at around 2am, the guys next door were having a get together on their front porch. One of the guys is a mean beat-boxer and has his own mic and amp. We had been meaning to have a jam and so what better time than 2am on a Saturday morning. It was great fun and we entertained the party (and our neighbours within a two block radius) for about three quarters of an hour.
Sat 17th June
Headed down to The Yale and signed up for the Blues Jam. I got teamed up with a few old guys and have no idea what songs we played, but it sounded pretty good. Blues is Blues when it all comes down to it. I got asked back up on stage to play with another group a little later on and I probably should have quit while I was ahead. The guitarist kept asking me if he was too loud because he was "deaf in his left ear and nearly deaf in his right". Oh well. I went out to all you can eat sushi in Robson Street with Phil's wife Rose and a few of their friends. One of the best meals I've had in Vancouver so far. It wasn't just sushi, it was sashimi, tempura, terriyaki, udon, gyoza, and a whole heap of other dishes whose names I have no idea. I organised to meet Kyle, another friend from work, at a cafe over on Comertial Dve to see a funk band play. Rose decided to come along so we headed over there. As I walked in the door, the bari sax player from the band said "What have you got there? A tenor? You should jump up and have a jam with us." Hell yeah! They were a cooking band. Two Guitars, Drums, Bass, Bari sax playing everything from James Brown to that song about Dinosaurs.... "Uh..Uh...Acka lacka lacka la" or something like that. I waited around until the last set and they finally called me up with two songs to go. The first song we played was just a riff opened up for solos. I went off! Such an amazing feeling to be up playing that sort of music again. Haven't done much of that since my old Derivative days back in high school. The band were bloody impressed and said I could stay up for the last song. I really worked in with the bari player, hitting as many harmonies as I could think of and coming up with a few stabs my self. I was buzzing for the rest of .... hang on, I'm still buzzing. That crappy student model sax is opening up a world of happiness for me that I have trouble explaining with my limited expressional vocabulary. That best $60 I've ever spent.
Sun 18th June
Slept in 'till about lunch time then met up with roomies and upstairs neighbours at a street festival on Comertial Dve. Comertial Dve reminds me a bit of West End. It's kind of trendy, grungy, with plenty of clothes shops and cafes. It was a really hot day and I was carrying my sax around as I hadn't been home from the night before. Stayed at Brooke's place, who is a friend of Phil and Rose. We hung out down at Comertial Dve until late afternoon, then headed home to grab some beers and a BBQ down at Jericho Beach. A great end to a great weekend.
Thurs 22nd June
I signed up at the local wind surfing shop for some free kite lessons down at Kits Beach. The idea is to learn on 3 foot trainer kites so that when you get out on the water with your 10 foot inflatable kite, you don't have to think about it and you are free to concentrate on more important things like not drowning. It was so much fun. The wind was a bit inconsistent but it kicked up at one stage and I just about got lifted off the ground. Those little kites pack a punch. Apparently you can snowboard behind a trainer kite so I may be investing in one of them over the next few weeks. I look forward to trying some kite boarding when I get back to Aus, if not before on Vancouver Island or Squamish. I met an Aussie guy called Dave who has been living here for 8 years. He's a foreman working over on the North Shore. He pointed out the two biggest cranes across the water, that was his site. Nice bloke, we'll probably catch up for a beer when he gets back from the States.
Sat 23rd June
I spent the day walking up and down Gastown watching some amazing acts in the Vancouver International Jazz Festival. One group in particular that stood out was the Flat Earth Society from Belgium. A 14 piece group with more energy than an atom bomb. Their last song was so full on that I had to close my eyes and hold on to the ground to stop myself from toppling over.
After watching FES, I was walking along Hastings St to the lower stage and I noticed a Jazz Club on the street called Rossini's. I went in to find out if they had a jam session on some time during the week. The waitress didn't know so she went over to the bar and got the owner of the club. I introduced myself to Arni and asked him about a jam session. He said they don't have a jam session but they sometimes have guests drop in with the house band. He firmly asked if I could play and I assured him that I could, so he told me to bring my horn down tomorrow night and I might be able to play a few tunes. Oh my god!!!! I walked out of that club with an elevated sense of life. ........
The Cat Empire were in town for the jazz fest so I rounded up a small following including Mariko, Rob, Jay (from downstairs) and Sky (Jay's frined) and we headed off to the commodore Ballroom for yet another electrifying performance. They really know how to get an audience up on their feet. Top night. Went back to our place and ended up jamming with G-Box on the front steps again until about 4am. I cringed as I saw the sun coming up just as I lay my head down on the pillow.
Sun 24th June
I woke up to the sound of Emma calling through my opened bedroom window. It was time for my first kayak lesson down at Jericho beach. I carried the little boat the four blocks north and three blocks west and I could have sworn that thing weighed less when we set off. Fortunately I am in good lifting shape. I splashed around for a while learning the basics of paddling and turning. I had a few attempts at rolling but I don't think I'm quite ready for white water just yet. The water was border line cold but the sun was shining and it was a beautiful morning. I decided that we weren't carrying the kayak back to the house and so went and got Emma's Mazda MX5 convertible. I probably could have got the boat back easily enough but then I wouldn't get to drive a hot little sports car with a right hand stick shift would I. So much fun! I dropped the kayak off, and then Emma and I went cruising around the UBC campus for half an hour. What a morning.
I had a bit of a blow on my sax for half an hour or so and by this time I was running a few hours late for day two of the jazz fest in Gastown so I said good bye to Emma, had a quick shower and high tailed it down town. Saw some more great bands, FES again, and even caught a bit of The Cat Empire again, who were the mystery band to wrap up the day. I would have loved to have stayed longer but I was due at Rossini's at 7pm. The house band were playing when I arrived. The Doug Louie Trio featuring Amanda Wood on vocals. I said hi to Arni, grabbed a beer and started absorbing the moment. After the first set, Arni introduced me to Doug and said I could jump up after the break. Doug told me to call a tune so I called the first standard that popped into my head, Nature Boy. Fortunately the notes came out right and I got to stay for another. Four, then another, and another. Amanda joined us on stage and the Doug Louie Trio was no longer a trio. I played right through until midnight and Arni told me I could come back any time. Wooohooo! Amanda booked me for a gig on the spot for the next weekend's Canada Day celebrations in New Westminster. Could I be making it as a muso in Vancouver??? Let's not get ahead of ourselves just yet. It still felt so good to be playing again.
Mon 25th June
Found out that my camera had arrived just in time for my trip to Seattle the next day. Rushed out to the FedEx depot out at the airport and made it with 20 minutes to spare!
Tues 26th June
Met Ben and Bron at the Pacific Central Station and grabbed some Maccas for breakfast. Hopped on the bus at about 10am bound for the States. Unfortunately we chose the three seats right next to the on bus toilet. That was a bus ride I choose to forget. The country is very green all the way down to and into Seattle. Lots of farm land and barns straight out of the TV series Smallville. We arrived at around 2pm and went our separate ways to check into our respective accommodations. Ben and Bron had a nice room in the Moore Hotel, which was the venue for Bela Fleck and The Flecktones the next night. I choose the slightly more affordable Green Tortoise Hostel, which was only two blocks from the Moore.
The Green Tortoise Hostel. Apparantly the block that it is a part of is called "crack alley".
It was great as far as hostels are concerned. I saved 10 percent because I stayed for three nights, breakfast was provided every morning, and even dinner on Wednesdays and Fridays. Unfortunately I missed the dinners, the former due to the concert, the latter due to the bus ride home. I would recommend it to anyone heading to Seattle.
Breakfast at the hostel, cooked by me.
I met up with Ben and Bron after checking in and we wondered down to the Pike Place Markets which were two blocks west of us. It was a nice market with lots of exotic things that I don't need. I helped myself to as many samples as I could find but unfortunately they didn't amount to a meal. We found a great little Thai restaurant in an arcade and I had a wonderful Red Thai Curry chicken for only $8. We book-marked that place for future meals and headed down to Pier 55, which is where the aquarium lives. We didn't have time to go in but we decided that we would come back either tomorrow or the next day. We headed back up to a park just next to Pike Place Market and sat on the grass with the homeless people for a while. We took a trip up to the observation deck of the Columbia Center Building. It was a fantastic 300 degree view of the city.
Seattle from the 74th floor of the Columbia Building
We decided to call it an early night and get some rest for a big day tomorrow. Say this guy walking home.
Completely made from lego! Yours for just US$10,000
Wed 27th June
I woke up feeling great after a 10 hour or so sleep. Cooked up a great breakfast of poached eggs on toast and waffles with banana and syrup. That was to be my stable breakfast for the next few days. Met up with Ben and Bron and went down to grab a coffee. Found a nice little cafe close to the starting point for the Seattle Underground Tour. The tour was really interesting and I would add that to the list of things to do if you are ever in town. After the tour, we grabbed a beer and contemplated what to do next...
A skylight to the underground. The skylight is actually in the footpath above.
After the underground tour, we went on a one hour harbour cruise. It was another great way to see the city.
Seattle from the Seattle Harbour and Elliot Bay
Pier 55
Me, Bron and Ben on the Argosy
Me with the Space Needle over my left shoulder. Someone was para sailing at the time.
We had some great fish and chips for dinner at Pier 55 and then headed home to get ready for the concert. It was great. Unfortunately we only recognised one song, the first one, but it was still a top night. I tried to record the whole concert on my camera. I haven't listened to it yet so I'm not sure what the quality will be like. I'd say not good but it was fun to play around with my new toy. We grabbed a few slices of pizza after the gig and then headed home for a well earned sleep.
Thurs 28th June
Hit the Aquarium in the morning, the Flight Museumin the arvo. They were great. Ben and I just about wet our pants from laughing when we tried out the flight simulator. You were supposed to shoot down enemy targets but we spent our 4 minutes doing barrel roles, loop the loops and crashing into the ground at full speed. It was so much fun.
A sea otter floating on it's back. They float around and clean themselves for hours.
The sea horses were beautiful
My Topgun experience.
Some of the jets. There were about 6 rooms as big if not bigger than this one filled with planes.
Checked out a three piece jazz band that were playing at the re-opening of a club. I think it was called the Aquarium Bar but don't quote me on that because it doesn't show up on a google search. It had a big fish tank in it but we weren't that impressed because we'd just spent 4 hours looking at bigger, more interesting fish tanks. We stayed for a set or so then headed off to our favorite Thai restaurant for another good cheap meal. I had the Green Thai Curry Chicken this time. Delicious.
Fri 29th June
Headed down to the Space Needle to take a few happy snaps.
Space Needle. Not a very practical building but impressive never the less.
Me and the Space Needle
Went in for a quick trip around the Pacific Science Center. Ben and I had fun testing our throwing speed. I managed 66Mph, which was dwarfed by Ben's impressive 68Mph toss. I'm putting it down to the fact that he is half a foot taller than me and the radar was mounted at the top of the ball cage, so naturally if you trace the arc of his throw it would appear to be traveling faster, when in actual fact, it was traveling at an equal or lesser speed. I have a detailed vector diagram that supports my claim if anyone wants a copy ;) Home time. Picked up our back packs, walked down to the bus stop. Vancouver by 6pm. Then what???
Sat 1st July
Happy Canada Day everyone! Amanda picked me up from my place at about 11am and we headed off to Queens Park in New Westminster. The gig was just a short one but we had fun and the crowd were appreciative.
Us in action
Doug, Amanda, Tony, Me
We rushed off after wards to get Doug back to Kitsilano Rossini's for his second of three gigs for the day and then Amanda, Jessie (Amanda's boy), Court (Jessie's mate) and Rob (my room mate) headed down to Spanish Banks for a bit of skim boarding. I didn't hurt myself which was more than I expected. It was good fun but not something that I would bother taking up. Amanda was playing down at Rossini's that night with the Bob York Trio and asked if I wanted to come along. I jumped at the chance to play again. Went home, got changed, headed down for another night of awesome jazz. Rossini's is my second home at the moment. I just can't get enough of the place.
Here's where my story, which I didn't think could get any better, gets better.
Amanda dropped me home after the gig at about 1am. As I was walking up my front steps, one of the guys that I hang out with down the beach, Thomas, just happened to be walking past with two girls, Lauren and Lauren. They were heading out to get a drink and asked if I would like to join them. Why not. I was still buzzing from the gig so I dropped off my sax and off we went. Now it's going to get a bit confusing having two Laurens, so I will assign a different colour to each. Aren't I clever?
We have Lauren who lives two blocks from me in this building. Photo.
and Lauren from New York.
Are you with me? Good. I will continue.
We headed down to Broadway Ave and a few blocks down from Alma to a bar called Copper Tank. It was full so we walked across the road to another bar called the Fringe Cafe. Not a lot going on in there but at least we could get in. We had a few drinks and since Lauren and Thom were fooling around, that left Lauren and I to chat. I found out that Lauren was a flautist who studied at The Julliard School of Music in NY, one of "the" top music schools in the world. This got me a little interested, aside from the fact that she was drop dead gorgeous. I said all the right things at all the right times and we really hit it off. The Fringe Cafe closed at about 1:30am so we headed back to Lauren's house. we stayed there for no more than 10 minutes and Lauren and I decided that we should go for a walk to the beach. Some where between Lauren's place and my place, we decided that it would be a great idea to go skinny dipping, so we stopped in to grab a few towels and continued on our walk to Jericho Beach. It was a clear night and there was not a breath of wind on the water. The moon was full and so was both of our excitement levels as we shed our clothes and sprinted into the icy waters of the Pacific. It was very exhilarating but an experience that should be had by all at some stage. We decided that all the night was missing was fireworks to celebrate Canada day and almost on queue a few guys started letting off rockets about 200m up the beach!
We decided that it was getting a bit nippy so grabbed our towels and headed on home. I walked Lauren home and we organised to meet up the next day. What a day!
Sun 2nd July
I got up relatively early considering the late night and did a long overdue load of washing. I called in at Lauren's place to see if the girl's were up. I snuck into the building as someone was leaving and managed to wake Lauren up by banging on the door a few times. We went down to Muffin Break and grabbed a coffee and chatted for a while. We decided to head down to the free concert at David Lam park as part of the continuing Jazz Festival so Lauren went home to wake up Lauren and get ready. I sat around patiently for about 4 hours while Lauren did god knows what to her house. I could have built an extension on the place in that time! Oh well. I got a few hours of sax practice in so it wasn't all that bad. The girls finally arrived at about 4pm and we headed down town. The party consisted of both Laurens, Jill (Lauren's next door neighbour), Rob and myself. We also organised to meet up with Chris and Nicky, a couple of Aussies that I met at Rossini's on Sat night. We sat out in the park.
We watched a band that weren't great but played some good old school Santana songs that I used to play in my Derivative days. We had a beer in the beer tent
Nicky, Chris, Me, Lauren, Rob
and then decided to head off and grab some all you can eat sushi.
We had a fantastic meal and got a little carried away with the drinks. We were by far the rowdiest table in the restaurant but we had a great time.
Rob tries samples a selection of delicious sushi
We met up with Tyler, Lauren's friend who lives in North Vancouver and is a Real Estate agent, but ex-race car driver and team owner! Cool guy.
We finished up our dinner and went and sat out by the beach at English Bay for a while. I was supposed to be playing down at Gastown Rossini's some time after 7pm and it was going on 10pm by this stage so I managed to drag the gang away from the water and Tyler drove us down to the club in his truck. Not sure what it is by you might see a photo one of these days.
It was a big night at Rossini's, the finale of the Jazz Fest. Doug was playing with special guest Bobby Tayler. For those of you who don't know, Bobby Taylor discovered the Jackson 5! When I found out that I had the oppertunity to play with him, my heart skipped a beat or 10. Anyway, we made it just in time for the last set, so I jumped up and away we went. It was a terrifying experience but a magical one at the same time. I relied on Doug to tell me exactly when to play and not to play. I didn't know all of the songs we played and so really had to concentrate the first time through the head so that I could learn the chords for the solo that I going to play the next time through! Fortunately that little something inside me pulled me through again.
Onstage at Rossini's Gastown
Bobby said I played great and told me to keep up the good work. He was and still is an amazing singer and showman and it was an honor to play with him.
I was glad that I had my friends there, old and new. I was lucky enough to catch up with my sister's friend Tanya, who was in town for a few days. She said, "Your sister didn't tell me you played the sax!". Surprise.
Me and Tanya at Rossini's
Tyler, Lauren, Lauren, Me, Rob
No skinny dipping, but another top night. I think Lauren may be a sucker for a sax player ;)
Mon 3rd July
Had a well deserved Canada Day holiday sleep in. Got up at about noon and headed over with Lauren to grab a coffee from Cuppa Joes. There was a guy playing some groovy tunes on his keyboard up stairs so we headed on up to check him out. His name was Gustav Joseph. Remember that name because in a few years time, that kid is going to be big. He is only 12 years old and I would have to say he is border line virtuoso. We were both very impressed and had a chat with him and his mum when he had finished playing.
After our coffee, we headed up to Lauren's place to spend the rest of the afternoon in the pool. What better opportunity to test out the waterproof qualities of my new camera. We had so much fun taking all of these shots.
The view from Lauren's balcony
We decided to have a BBQ down at Jericho for dinner. Tyler joined us and cooked up a feast of steaks, potatoes and an assortment of peppers in alfoil. We stayed down at the beach until about midnight.
Tyler, Lauren, Lauren and Rob
Tyler cooks up a storm
Rob does his thing
Isn't she cute?
Here's another just incase you didn't catch the first
It was going to be a tough day at work tomorrow.
Tues 4th July
I awoke to the very sad news that my Papa had finally lost his battle with cancer. I wasn't there to witness his decline as were the rest of my family, which I have mixed feelings about. I suppose the good thing is that my last memories of him are of when he was much healthier. He continues to live in my mind and in my heart.
It was a tough day at work however I have moved on to laying out the walls of the building. I am responsible for cutting the mud sills, top and bottom plates to within 1/16th of an inch accuracy. Needless to say my skill saw ability has improved out of sight. I really started getting the hang of it and continued throughout the week. The days fly by when you are busy, that's for sure.
I went for a walk down to Jericho Beach with Lauren after work. I called my family to see how everyone was coping. I was glad to speak with everyone. It was an emotional time and I was glad that Lauren was there for support.
Wed 5th July
Had another top day at work. Headed around to Tyler's place with both Laurens and Lisa, Lauren's friend, who also happened to be a flautist!
Lisa and Lauren in Tyler's kitchen
We enjoyed another beautiful feast, followed by a quick game of Cranium. It was getting late so we headed off home.
Thurs 6th July
I was really enjoying work. Layout is definitely my forte. Phil and I were killing it, moving really fast and keeping ahead of a team of 6 framers.
Lauren and Lauren headed off to Vancouver Island for a few days on Lauren's parents yacht. Not a bad life if you ask me. I had a much needed early night. It's hard work keeping up with a New Yorker!
Fri 7th July
Pay day! Pay rise! Great end to a great week of work.
Emma visited and we chatted about life for a few hours. I enjoy my conversations with Emma.
Sat 8th July
I went in to work for a few hours to help Richard with a stair case but ended up cleaning up the building site because the laborers that were supposed to be doing that didn't show up. I had a rehearsal with Bob from Jambalaya Band who I will be doing a wedding with in August. We had great fun playing all sorts of new styles of music but I began feeling a little faint after 4 hours of solid playing. Bob shouted me dinner down at Rossini's in Kits. I enjoyed some pasta and a few beers and after saying that there was no way I could possibly play after a 4 hour rehearsal, ended up sitting in with the Bob York Trio until 12:30am! I just can't help my self!
Sun 9th July
Went around to Amanda's place to watch Italy win the World Cup. It was a great game. I'd love to know what Materazzi said to Zidane to provoke that head but!
Did some washing in the arvo and started typing this blog. It's now Tuesday afternoon and I'm just coming to the end now! I still have to go back and put all of the pictures in!
So that is life for me at the moment. I'm having the time of my life. I'm not sure if I emphasised enough how much of a connection Lauren and I have made in just one week. Meeting her has brought on what I am calling a quarter life review or evaluation. I'll be 25 in a few weeks and I've been thinking a lot about what I have achieved so far in life and what I want to achieve over the coming years. I have decided that I am very happy with where I am now. It's a good feeling. I'm still working on the "what next" bit. I'll keep you posted.
If you have read to here, thanks for sticking with me. I appologise for the delay. I'm not sure if what i have written makes any sense at all because it is almost 2am and I just want to get the bloody thing up! Now you owe it to me to let me know how you are doing. I miss all of my Aussie friends very much and am really looking forward to seeing you again in the near future.
Here are a few more shots that I couldn't be bothered sorting out.
W12th Ave
Some walls that I built
W10th Ave, on the way into UBC
W4th Ave, on the way to UBC
Alma St, my street.
At the time of my previous post, I had just moved from Whistler to Vancouver to begin the next chapter of my Canadian experience. I was aching from my first few days as a builders laborer but was excited about what the next few months had in store for me. I had no idea how good things were going to get!
Since so much has gone on over the past 8 weeks, I think I might start with a summary of everyday life, and then skip to the highlights.
My alarm goes off at 6:15am every morning, Monday to Friday. I get up, have a few bits of toast with peanut butter and honey (unfortunately I have depleted my Vegemite supply) and then chuck four sandwiches and a few bits of fruit into my back pack and head out the door.
My bus stop is at the intersection of W4th and Alma St. Fortnately, so is my house. The photo is taken from my front porch.
My house from the intersection (It's the green one. My bedroom window is the one behind the pine trees).
I am sitting at the bus stop one minute later awaiting the number 4 bus to UBC. If I miss that one, good old bus number 84 is there to back me up. I've only missed that one once (last Wednesday actually, you'll see why later) and I found that I have a back up for my back up, bus 44. All of which get me to work on time. I have a 15 minute walk from the UBC bus stop to my construction site. I work on Thunderbird Blvd (I haven't sat down and worked out the google maps API just yet, but if you go to maps.google.com and type search for "Thunderbird Blvd, Vancouver, Canada", you'll see where we are building. You can also see just how close W4th and Alma St is). Here it is:
We are building the place in two stages. We have finished framing the first stage and the roof is being lifted into place. We are working on the second stage which is closest to the road. The picutre above is of the thrid floor of 5 of the second stage.
This is kind of what it will look like when it is done.
Our tower crane.
Some walls that have been braced to keep them square for the joisters to sheet the floor on top. The braces come off when the sheeting is down.
lThe fork lift that I learn't to drive on.
Coffee break.
A model of the finished building.
We work 7:30 to 4:00pm, with 30 minute coffee breaks at 10am and 1pm. That format works quite well because after two and a half hours of working your guts out in the hot (well, almost 30C) sun, you need a sit down. I drink between 2 and 3 liters of water during work, and plenty when I get home as well. I am part of the framing crew. We are responsible for building walls and that's it. There are many other teams on the site including formers (concrete), electricians, plumbers, and the joisters (they lay the flooring). Over the past 8 weeks, my job tasks have included cleaning up the site (a lot), using the fork lift to move the scaffolding from the underground carpark to the hire company truck (that was fun), building pieces for the walls (i.e. using a nail gun to make double/triple studs and wall intersection pieces), building walls, and most recently, laying out the mud sills and plates that determine where the walls will actually be stood. This is the most challenging work that I have done so far and I just so happen to be getting much better at it. So much so that I received my first pay rise on Friday. It feels great to be more than just a shit kicker. Really great. Sometimes we'll knock off early on payday Friday to have a beer with the boys and to give us a bit of extra time to get to the bank and cash our pay cheque. I'm usually pretty tired after work so definitely no extra-curricular sporting activities over here. The most I usually manage is a bit of Frisbee down at the beach with the guys next door. We head down there about two or three times a week and take our $20 portable gas BBQ from Canadian Tyre. It does the job. We generally hang out down there until just after the sun goes down (i.e. 10:30ish. I still can't get used to it being light that late). So that concludes my weekly routine.
Weekends are far from routine. I think I might break this next section into chronological order, starting from just after my last post.
Sat 13th May
I went for a jog in the morning in the hope that it might loosen up my aching joints a tad. Fortunately it did. Mariko, Rob and I headed down to Jericho Beach in the arvo for a bit of sun bathing and a few drinks. That evening, we went to a house party with John, a guy that I met from work. The party was pretty lame and Rob and Mariko were a little to intoxicated to maintain any form of manners and left without a good bye after no more than 5 minutes. I stuck around for a while and chatted with John, had a burger and took off.
Sun 14th May
Had a bit of a sleep in and then went down to the train station to meet Mike and Lisa who were heading off to Jasper that afternoon. It was great to see them again one more time. Spent the evening down at Jericho with Rob.
Sat 20th May
I did a bit of overtime since I didn't really have any money to do anything else and I thought it might be an opportunity to work closer to my boss so that he could see that I'm not just another drop kick laborer. It worked. I got to use a nail gun for the first time. Scary! After work I rushed off to the Pacific Central Station just in time to make the 6pm bus up to Whistler. I stayed with Ross (my old room mate), Ashley and Jordyn (Ross' new room mates). Thank's guys.
Sun 21st May
Had an awesome day riding Whistler with Ross, John, Mariko and Grizzle. We spent the entire day in the park and I was riding as well as I have throughout the season. Landing 540s like they were nothing. I was so pumped up. We had dinner at Merlins and then headed off to the Longhorn to see if we could run into any hanger'on'ers. Of course no night would be complete in Whistler without a visit to the pie shop on the way home. What better way to end a top day.
Mon 22nd May
Oh yeah, forgot to mention the long weekend. Monday was Victoria Day so another day riding Whistler. I didn't get up the hill until after lunch though. Spent the morning hanging out with Ben and Bron and planned a trip to Seattle for July to see Bela Fleck and the Flecktones. More on that later. I met John at the Roundhouse at about 1pm and we hit the park again for a few hours. It was a bit more slushy than Sunday but we still had a great day. I killed a bit of time back at Brio in the arvo and then caught the 6:30pm bus home to Vancouver. A thoroughly enjoyable weekend.
Sat 27th May
We had a bit of a lazy day. The highlight of the day was our house's first big meal together. We invited our upstairs neighbor Andria down for a roast pork banquet. We had succulent pork, oven roasted potatoes, carrots and turnip, broccoli au gratin, all topped in proper gravy. Desert was a lovely salad prepared by Andria. After dinner, we took a short bus ride up to 4th and Blanca for a house party for one of the guys who used to live in the house next door to us.
Sun 28th May
Another Sunday sleep in followed by a stroll up Broadway with Rob. We popped into a camera shop to do some comparisons and that got the ball rolling towards my new purchase.
Thurs 1st June
I built my first wall! The first of many to come.
Sat 3rd June
Had a bit of a lazy day and then headed 'round to John's place for a BBQ. John lives in a frat house at UBC and I can't for the life of me remember which Greek letters make up it's name. Pretty cool place though. Massive flat-screen TV and pool table in the common room. I may or may not have tried some of BC's finest for the first time. I've never giggled so much in my life. It was a top night.
Sun 4th June
Watched a few DVDs. Chill out day.
Fri 9th June
We had a slab party at work to celebrate the pour of the second half of the slab. It's a bit of a tradition to have a BBQ and some beers at certain project mile stones. The roof party is going to be great! Ross arrived on my doorstep at around 7pm. He came down to stay with me for a few days before taking off on a 6 week tour of Europe. I get emails from him every couple of weeks and he's having a great time.
Sat 10th June
I took Ross down to Kitsilano Beach to show him what all the fuss was about. We walked from Kits Beach to Granville Island and had a look around the market. It's a great market, filled with every cuisine you could think of. It was torture looking at all of the things that we couldn't afford. Watched a few DVDs in the evening.
Sun 11th June
Ross headed off for the airport in the morning, I don't have any notes from this day so I haven't got a clue what I did.
Wed 14th June
I'm not exactly sure when, but I hired a saxophone from the music shop around the corner from my house. I've got a student model Vito which is a mission to play, however I have my mouthpiece (thank god!) it is relatively in tune. It's only setting me back $60 per month and believe me when I say it had brought me much more happiness than that already! One of the guys from work (Phill, he's been a bit of a mentor for me. Thanks Phil) was talking about going to a jam session down at The Media Club that night. My ears tweaked up and I told him that I was a sax player and was interested in coming down. It turned out that the jam session was actually a competition run by one of the local radio stations, Rock 101 FM. 12 competitors, 1 song each. Oh well, one song is better than none. I perused the song list that the band was able to play and chose one of the two songs that I thought I could actually fit into. Superstitious by Stevie Wonder. The band were a little apprehensive to have me up on stage, considering the last sax player that played with them played one note, over and over again. I assured them that I knew "at least" 4 notes and counted them in. The song went great and I spent the next hour taking complements from every "musician" in the room. There were some interesting rockers let me tell you. I got invited to go play at a Blues jam session down at the Yale on Saturday afternoon. And so begins the best part of my Canadian experience so far.
Friday 16th June
Headed down to a pub on W4th Ave called Nevermind with my roomies and upstairs neighbours. It's a pretty cool little hangout. When we got back to the house at around 2am, the guys next door were having a get together on their front porch. One of the guys is a mean beat-boxer and has his own mic and amp. We had been meaning to have a jam and so what better time than 2am on a Saturday morning. It was great fun and we entertained the party (and our neighbours within a two block radius) for about three quarters of an hour.
Sat 17th June
Headed down to The Yale and signed up for the Blues Jam. I got teamed up with a few old guys and have no idea what songs we played, but it sounded pretty good. Blues is Blues when it all comes down to it. I got asked back up on stage to play with another group a little later on and I probably should have quit while I was ahead. The guitarist kept asking me if he was too loud because he was "deaf in his left ear and nearly deaf in his right". Oh well. I went out to all you can eat sushi in Robson Street with Phil's wife Rose and a few of their friends. One of the best meals I've had in Vancouver so far. It wasn't just sushi, it was sashimi, tempura, terriyaki, udon, gyoza, and a whole heap of other dishes whose names I have no idea. I organised to meet Kyle, another friend from work, at a cafe over on Comertial Dve to see a funk band play. Rose decided to come along so we headed over there. As I walked in the door, the bari sax player from the band said "What have you got there? A tenor? You should jump up and have a jam with us." Hell yeah! They were a cooking band. Two Guitars, Drums, Bass, Bari sax playing everything from James Brown to that song about Dinosaurs.... "Uh..Uh...Acka lacka lacka la" or something like that. I waited around until the last set and they finally called me up with two songs to go. The first song we played was just a riff opened up for solos. I went off! Such an amazing feeling to be up playing that sort of music again. Haven't done much of that since my old Derivative days back in high school. The band were bloody impressed and said I could stay up for the last song. I really worked in with the bari player, hitting as many harmonies as I could think of and coming up with a few stabs my self. I was buzzing for the rest of .... hang on, I'm still buzzing. That crappy student model sax is opening up a world of happiness for me that I have trouble explaining with my limited expressional vocabulary. That best $60 I've ever spent.
Sun 18th June
Slept in 'till about lunch time then met up with roomies and upstairs neighbours at a street festival on Comertial Dve. Comertial Dve reminds me a bit of West End. It's kind of trendy, grungy, with plenty of clothes shops and cafes. It was a really hot day and I was carrying my sax around as I hadn't been home from the night before. Stayed at Brooke's place, who is a friend of Phil and Rose. We hung out down at Comertial Dve until late afternoon, then headed home to grab some beers and a BBQ down at Jericho Beach. A great end to a great weekend.
Thurs 22nd June
I signed up at the local wind surfing shop for some free kite lessons down at Kits Beach. The idea is to learn on 3 foot trainer kites so that when you get out on the water with your 10 foot inflatable kite, you don't have to think about it and you are free to concentrate on more important things like not drowning. It was so much fun. The wind was a bit inconsistent but it kicked up at one stage and I just about got lifted off the ground. Those little kites pack a punch. Apparently you can snowboard behind a trainer kite so I may be investing in one of them over the next few weeks. I look forward to trying some kite boarding when I get back to Aus, if not before on Vancouver Island or Squamish. I met an Aussie guy called Dave who has been living here for 8 years. He's a foreman working over on the North Shore. He pointed out the two biggest cranes across the water, that was his site. Nice bloke, we'll probably catch up for a beer when he gets back from the States.
Sat 23rd June
I spent the day walking up and down Gastown watching some amazing acts in the Vancouver International Jazz Festival. One group in particular that stood out was the Flat Earth Society from Belgium. A 14 piece group with more energy than an atom bomb. Their last song was so full on that I had to close my eyes and hold on to the ground to stop myself from toppling over.
After watching FES, I was walking along Hastings St to the lower stage and I noticed a Jazz Club on the street called Rossini's. I went in to find out if they had a jam session on some time during the week. The waitress didn't know so she went over to the bar and got the owner of the club. I introduced myself to Arni and asked him about a jam session. He said they don't have a jam session but they sometimes have guests drop in with the house band. He firmly asked if I could play and I assured him that I could, so he told me to bring my horn down tomorrow night and I might be able to play a few tunes. Oh my god!!!! I walked out of that club with an elevated sense of life. ........
The Cat Empire were in town for the jazz fest so I rounded up a small following including Mariko, Rob, Jay (from downstairs) and Sky (Jay's frined) and we headed off to the commodore Ballroom for yet another electrifying performance. They really know how to get an audience up on their feet. Top night. Went back to our place and ended up jamming with G-Box on the front steps again until about 4am. I cringed as I saw the sun coming up just as I lay my head down on the pillow.
Sun 24th June
I woke up to the sound of Emma calling through my opened bedroom window. It was time for my first kayak lesson down at Jericho beach. I carried the little boat the four blocks north and three blocks west and I could have sworn that thing weighed less when we set off. Fortunately I am in good lifting shape. I splashed around for a while learning the basics of paddling and turning. I had a few attempts at rolling but I don't think I'm quite ready for white water just yet. The water was border line cold but the sun was shining and it was a beautiful morning. I decided that we weren't carrying the kayak back to the house and so went and got Emma's Mazda MX5 convertible. I probably could have got the boat back easily enough but then I wouldn't get to drive a hot little sports car with a right hand stick shift would I. So much fun! I dropped the kayak off, and then Emma and I went cruising around the UBC campus for half an hour. What a morning.
I had a bit of a blow on my sax for half an hour or so and by this time I was running a few hours late for day two of the jazz fest in Gastown so I said good bye to Emma, had a quick shower and high tailed it down town. Saw some more great bands, FES again, and even caught a bit of The Cat Empire again, who were the mystery band to wrap up the day. I would have loved to have stayed longer but I was due at Rossini's at 7pm. The house band were playing when I arrived. The Doug Louie Trio featuring Amanda Wood on vocals. I said hi to Arni, grabbed a beer and started absorbing the moment. After the first set, Arni introduced me to Doug and said I could jump up after the break. Doug told me to call a tune so I called the first standard that popped into my head, Nature Boy. Fortunately the notes came out right and I got to stay for another. Four, then another, and another. Amanda joined us on stage and the Doug Louie Trio was no longer a trio. I played right through until midnight and Arni told me I could come back any time. Wooohooo! Amanda booked me for a gig on the spot for the next weekend's Canada Day celebrations in New Westminster. Could I be making it as a muso in Vancouver??? Let's not get ahead of ourselves just yet. It still felt so good to be playing again.
Mon 25th June
Found out that my camera had arrived just in time for my trip to Seattle the next day. Rushed out to the FedEx depot out at the airport and made it with 20 minutes to spare!
Tues 26th June
Met Ben and Bron at the Pacific Central Station and grabbed some Maccas for breakfast. Hopped on the bus at about 10am bound for the States. Unfortunately we chose the three seats right next to the on bus toilet. That was a bus ride I choose to forget. The country is very green all the way down to and into Seattle. Lots of farm land and barns straight out of the TV series Smallville. We arrived at around 2pm and went our separate ways to check into our respective accommodations. Ben and Bron had a nice room in the Moore Hotel, which was the venue for Bela Fleck and The Flecktones the next night. I choose the slightly more affordable Green Tortoise Hostel, which was only two blocks from the Moore.
The Green Tortoise Hostel. Apparantly the block that it is a part of is called "crack alley".
It was great as far as hostels are concerned. I saved 10 percent because I stayed for three nights, breakfast was provided every morning, and even dinner on Wednesdays and Fridays. Unfortunately I missed the dinners, the former due to the concert, the latter due to the bus ride home. I would recommend it to anyone heading to Seattle.
Breakfast at the hostel, cooked by me.
I met up with Ben and Bron after checking in and we wondered down to the Pike Place Markets which were two blocks west of us. It was a nice market with lots of exotic things that I don't need. I helped myself to as many samples as I could find but unfortunately they didn't amount to a meal. We found a great little Thai restaurant in an arcade and I had a wonderful Red Thai Curry chicken for only $8. We book-marked that place for future meals and headed down to Pier 55, which is where the aquarium lives. We didn't have time to go in but we decided that we would come back either tomorrow or the next day. We headed back up to a park just next to Pike Place Market and sat on the grass with the homeless people for a while. We took a trip up to the observation deck of the Columbia Center Building. It was a fantastic 300 degree view of the city.
Seattle from the 74th floor of the Columbia Building
We decided to call it an early night and get some rest for a big day tomorrow. Say this guy walking home.
Completely made from lego! Yours for just US$10,000
Wed 27th June
I woke up feeling great after a 10 hour or so sleep. Cooked up a great breakfast of poached eggs on toast and waffles with banana and syrup. That was to be my stable breakfast for the next few days. Met up with Ben and Bron and went down to grab a coffee. Found a nice little cafe close to the starting point for the Seattle Underground Tour. The tour was really interesting and I would add that to the list of things to do if you are ever in town. After the tour, we grabbed a beer and contemplated what to do next...
A skylight to the underground. The skylight is actually in the footpath above.
After the underground tour, we went on a one hour harbour cruise. It was another great way to see the city.
Seattle from the Seattle Harbour and Elliot Bay
Pier 55
Me, Bron and Ben on the Argosy
Me with the Space Needle over my left shoulder. Someone was para sailing at the time.
We had some great fish and chips for dinner at Pier 55 and then headed home to get ready for the concert. It was great. Unfortunately we only recognised one song, the first one, but it was still a top night. I tried to record the whole concert on my camera. I haven't listened to it yet so I'm not sure what the quality will be like. I'd say not good but it was fun to play around with my new toy. We grabbed a few slices of pizza after the gig and then headed home for a well earned sleep.
Thurs 28th June
Hit the Aquarium in the morning, the Flight Museumin the arvo. They were great. Ben and I just about wet our pants from laughing when we tried out the flight simulator. You were supposed to shoot down enemy targets but we spent our 4 minutes doing barrel roles, loop the loops and crashing into the ground at full speed. It was so much fun.
A sea otter floating on it's back. They float around and clean themselves for hours.
The sea horses were beautiful
My Topgun experience.
Some of the jets. There were about 6 rooms as big if not bigger than this one filled with planes.
Checked out a three piece jazz band that were playing at the re-opening of a club. I think it was called the Aquarium Bar but don't quote me on that because it doesn't show up on a google search. It had a big fish tank in it but we weren't that impressed because we'd just spent 4 hours looking at bigger, more interesting fish tanks. We stayed for a set or so then headed off to our favorite Thai restaurant for another good cheap meal. I had the Green Thai Curry Chicken this time. Delicious.
Fri 29th June
Headed down to the Space Needle to take a few happy snaps.
Space Needle. Not a very practical building but impressive never the less.
Me and the Space Needle
Went in for a quick trip around the Pacific Science Center. Ben and I had fun testing our throwing speed. I managed 66Mph, which was dwarfed by Ben's impressive 68Mph toss. I'm putting it down to the fact that he is half a foot taller than me and the radar was mounted at the top of the ball cage, so naturally if you trace the arc of his throw it would appear to be traveling faster, when in actual fact, it was traveling at an equal or lesser speed. I have a detailed vector diagram that supports my claim if anyone wants a copy ;) Home time. Picked up our back packs, walked down to the bus stop. Vancouver by 6pm. Then what???
Sat 1st July
Happy Canada Day everyone! Amanda picked me up from my place at about 11am and we headed off to Queens Park in New Westminster. The gig was just a short one but we had fun and the crowd were appreciative.
Us in action
Doug, Amanda, Tony, Me
We rushed off after wards to get Doug back to Kitsilano Rossini's for his second of three gigs for the day and then Amanda, Jessie (Amanda's boy), Court (Jessie's mate) and Rob (my room mate) headed down to Spanish Banks for a bit of skim boarding. I didn't hurt myself which was more than I expected. It was good fun but not something that I would bother taking up. Amanda was playing down at Rossini's that night with the Bob York Trio and asked if I wanted to come along. I jumped at the chance to play again. Went home, got changed, headed down for another night of awesome jazz. Rossini's is my second home at the moment. I just can't get enough of the place.
Here's where my story, which I didn't think could get any better, gets better.
Amanda dropped me home after the gig at about 1am. As I was walking up my front steps, one of the guys that I hang out with down the beach, Thomas, just happened to be walking past with two girls, Lauren and Lauren. They were heading out to get a drink and asked if I would like to join them. Why not. I was still buzzing from the gig so I dropped off my sax and off we went. Now it's going to get a bit confusing having two Laurens, so I will assign a different colour to each. Aren't I clever?
We have Lauren who lives two blocks from me in this building. Photo.
and Lauren from New York.
Are you with me? Good. I will continue.
We headed down to Broadway Ave and a few blocks down from Alma to a bar called Copper Tank. It was full so we walked across the road to another bar called the Fringe Cafe. Not a lot going on in there but at least we could get in. We had a few drinks and since Lauren and Thom were fooling around, that left Lauren and I to chat. I found out that Lauren was a flautist who studied at The Julliard School of Music in NY, one of "the" top music schools in the world. This got me a little interested, aside from the fact that she was drop dead gorgeous. I said all the right things at all the right times and we really hit it off. The Fringe Cafe closed at about 1:30am so we headed back to Lauren's house. we stayed there for no more than 10 minutes and Lauren and I decided that we should go for a walk to the beach. Some where between Lauren's place and my place, we decided that it would be a great idea to go skinny dipping, so we stopped in to grab a few towels and continued on our walk to Jericho Beach. It was a clear night and there was not a breath of wind on the water. The moon was full and so was both of our excitement levels as we shed our clothes and sprinted into the icy waters of the Pacific. It was very exhilarating but an experience that should be had by all at some stage. We decided that all the night was missing was fireworks to celebrate Canada day and almost on queue a few guys started letting off rockets about 200m up the beach!
We decided that it was getting a bit nippy so grabbed our towels and headed on home. I walked Lauren home and we organised to meet up the next day. What a day!
Sun 2nd July
I got up relatively early considering the late night and did a long overdue load of washing. I called in at Lauren's place to see if the girl's were up. I snuck into the building as someone was leaving and managed to wake Lauren up by banging on the door a few times. We went down to Muffin Break and grabbed a coffee and chatted for a while. We decided to head down to the free concert at David Lam park as part of the continuing Jazz Festival so Lauren went home to wake up Lauren and get ready. I sat around patiently for about 4 hours while Lauren did god knows what to her house. I could have built an extension on the place in that time! Oh well. I got a few hours of sax practice in so it wasn't all that bad. The girls finally arrived at about 4pm and we headed down town. The party consisted of both Laurens, Jill (Lauren's next door neighbour), Rob and myself. We also organised to meet up with Chris and Nicky, a couple of Aussies that I met at Rossini's on Sat night. We sat out in the park.
We watched a band that weren't great but played some good old school Santana songs that I used to play in my Derivative days. We had a beer in the beer tent
Nicky, Chris, Me, Lauren, Rob
and then decided to head off and grab some all you can eat sushi.
We had a fantastic meal and got a little carried away with the drinks. We were by far the rowdiest table in the restaurant but we had a great time.
Rob tries samples a selection of delicious sushi
We met up with Tyler, Lauren's friend who lives in North Vancouver and is a Real Estate agent, but ex-race car driver and team owner! Cool guy.
We finished up our dinner and went and sat out by the beach at English Bay for a while. I was supposed to be playing down at Gastown Rossini's some time after 7pm and it was going on 10pm by this stage so I managed to drag the gang away from the water and Tyler drove us down to the club in his truck. Not sure what it is by you might see a photo one of these days.
It was a big night at Rossini's, the finale of the Jazz Fest. Doug was playing with special guest Bobby Tayler. For those of you who don't know, Bobby Taylor discovered the Jackson 5! When I found out that I had the oppertunity to play with him, my heart skipped a beat or 10. Anyway, we made it just in time for the last set, so I jumped up and away we went. It was a terrifying experience but a magical one at the same time. I relied on Doug to tell me exactly when to play and not to play. I didn't know all of the songs we played and so really had to concentrate the first time through the head so that I could learn the chords for the solo that I going to play the next time through! Fortunately that little something inside me pulled me through again.
Onstage at Rossini's Gastown
Bobby said I played great and told me to keep up the good work. He was and still is an amazing singer and showman and it was an honor to play with him.
I was glad that I had my friends there, old and new. I was lucky enough to catch up with my sister's friend Tanya, who was in town for a few days. She said, "Your sister didn't tell me you played the sax!". Surprise.
Me and Tanya at Rossini's
Tyler, Lauren, Lauren, Me, Rob
No skinny dipping, but another top night. I think Lauren may be a sucker for a sax player ;)
Mon 3rd July
Had a well deserved Canada Day holiday sleep in. Got up at about noon and headed over with Lauren to grab a coffee from Cuppa Joes. There was a guy playing some groovy tunes on his keyboard up stairs so we headed on up to check him out. His name was Gustav Joseph. Remember that name because in a few years time, that kid is going to be big. He is only 12 years old and I would have to say he is border line virtuoso. We were both very impressed and had a chat with him and his mum when he had finished playing.
After our coffee, we headed up to Lauren's place to spend the rest of the afternoon in the pool. What better opportunity to test out the waterproof qualities of my new camera. We had so much fun taking all of these shots.
The view from Lauren's balcony
We decided to have a BBQ down at Jericho for dinner. Tyler joined us and cooked up a feast of steaks, potatoes and an assortment of peppers in alfoil. We stayed down at the beach until about midnight.
Tyler, Lauren, Lauren and Rob
Tyler cooks up a storm
Rob does his thing
Isn't she cute?
Here's another just incase you didn't catch the first
It was going to be a tough day at work tomorrow.
Tues 4th July
I awoke to the very sad news that my Papa had finally lost his battle with cancer. I wasn't there to witness his decline as were the rest of my family, which I have mixed feelings about. I suppose the good thing is that my last memories of him are of when he was much healthier. He continues to live in my mind and in my heart.
It was a tough day at work however I have moved on to laying out the walls of the building. I am responsible for cutting the mud sills, top and bottom plates to within 1/16th of an inch accuracy. Needless to say my skill saw ability has improved out of sight. I really started getting the hang of it and continued throughout the week. The days fly by when you are busy, that's for sure.
I went for a walk down to Jericho Beach with Lauren after work. I called my family to see how everyone was coping. I was glad to speak with everyone. It was an emotional time and I was glad that Lauren was there for support.
Wed 5th July
Had another top day at work. Headed around to Tyler's place with both Laurens and Lisa, Lauren's friend, who also happened to be a flautist!
Lisa and Lauren in Tyler's kitchen
We enjoyed another beautiful feast, followed by a quick game of Cranium. It was getting late so we headed off home.
Thurs 6th July
I was really enjoying work. Layout is definitely my forte. Phil and I were killing it, moving really fast and keeping ahead of a team of 6 framers.
Lauren and Lauren headed off to Vancouver Island for a few days on Lauren's parents yacht. Not a bad life if you ask me. I had a much needed early night. It's hard work keeping up with a New Yorker!
Fri 7th July
Pay day! Pay rise! Great end to a great week of work.
Emma visited and we chatted about life for a few hours. I enjoy my conversations with Emma.
Sat 8th July
I went in to work for a few hours to help Richard with a stair case but ended up cleaning up the building site because the laborers that were supposed to be doing that didn't show up. I had a rehearsal with Bob from Jambalaya Band who I will be doing a wedding with in August. We had great fun playing all sorts of new styles of music but I began feeling a little faint after 4 hours of solid playing. Bob shouted me dinner down at Rossini's in Kits. I enjoyed some pasta and a few beers and after saying that there was no way I could possibly play after a 4 hour rehearsal, ended up sitting in with the Bob York Trio until 12:30am! I just can't help my self!
Sun 9th July
Went around to Amanda's place to watch Italy win the World Cup. It was a great game. I'd love to know what Materazzi said to Zidane to provoke that head but!
Did some washing in the arvo and started typing this blog. It's now Tuesday afternoon and I'm just coming to the end now! I still have to go back and put all of the pictures in!
So that is life for me at the moment. I'm having the time of my life. I'm not sure if I emphasised enough how much of a connection Lauren and I have made in just one week. Meeting her has brought on what I am calling a quarter life review or evaluation. I'll be 25 in a few weeks and I've been thinking a lot about what I have achieved so far in life and what I want to achieve over the coming years. I have decided that I am very happy with where I am now. It's a good feeling. I'm still working on the "what next" bit. I'll keep you posted.
If you have read to here, thanks for sticking with me. I appologise for the delay. I'm not sure if what i have written makes any sense at all because it is almost 2am and I just want to get the bloody thing up! Now you owe it to me to let me know how you are doing. I miss all of my Aussie friends very much and am really looking forward to seeing you again in the near future.
Here are a few more shots that I couldn't be bothered sorting out.
W12th Ave
Some walls that I built
W10th Ave, on the way into UBC
W4th Ave, on the way to UBC
Alma St, my street.
posted by Teddy at
10:40 pm
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