Tuesday, November 30, 2010

Annnnd heres an update

Wow way behind.  So this week has been nuts, as I said before.  LOTS and lots of work.  Heres a quick recap (if that’s even possible).

Wednesday:
-got up early and went on a run with Ngaire.  Its been great running with her.  She is a perfect pace, and we went probably around 4 or 5 miles in total.  LOVE running in the morning. 

-Headed off to work, and continued trying to get my Secondary pass going.  Man, it was getting tough.  Not only that, but the nerf wars continued, which was a blast, but still… its definitely been distracting, and I was WAY behind.  Tried focusing, but you know, you want to participate. 

It also didn’t help my work load having two hour lunch breaks just to check out apartments.  I had a bunch I wanted to see, and just getting out there, looking at the place, and getting back, takes a shockingly long amount of time.

At the end of the day, I was excited because Ngaire was coming to pick me up so that we could cook and have dinner.  I helped her cook for her family’s Thanksgiving dinner, and man we cook FAST.  Got everything done in just about an hour or so.  Then we made dinner, and it was really nice.  Really chill.  I enjoy talking and hanging out with them a lot.  Kinda sad they are moving back to the US soon.  After they get married in February as far as I know.  SAD!  And they are moving out to Meadowbank shortly, probably this weekend, to stay with their family since their apartment is rented.  No good.  Happy for them though for sure J

Then I came home, and its been shockingly quiet around here all week.  Can’t complain.  Thank goodness cause my week was stressful.  Yeesh!

Thursday:

I was deciding whether or not to move into a house that is literally a 10 minute walk from work.  On Franklin road.  Gorgeous tree covered street I walk down every day.  I decided last minute (after talking to Kyle on the phone) not to take the room in the house.  Though the location is perfect, and the room mates were awesome.  Well, at first meet anyway.  The price was high though…. $320 a week all in all… and really its pretty far over my budget.  I was thinking, if theres two of us, we could afford it, but I had to take into account the fact that Kyle doesn’t have a job still at the moment, and we have no idea when he would have a job.  Not to mention, we are looking into buying a car for us to share.  So, in the end even though I wanted it, it was smarter not to.  Kyle gave me a lot of reassurance too, that he could handle where Im living just fine, and that we would look for place together when he gets here.  That will be really nice as well so that he can have an opinion on where he lives.  So I’m going to wait then.

Had another stressful day at work, I knew I was not going to finish even close to everything by the time the weekend came.  PANIC!

It was Thanksgiving too, and no, I didn’t do anything special.  It was just me, plus I worked late, and had no time to make any kind of spiffy dinner (not to mention I wouldn’t want to here, theres just not enough space), so I had pasta and went to bed.  Was kind of a sad day for me, but I tried to keep my mind off of it.  Nothing I can do about it.

Friday:

Friday was good.  STRESSFUL because of course I was way beind on work, and freaking out about that.  But it was also Thanksgiving at home.  J  My whole family was together, and luckily dinner time at home doubles with lunch time here, so I brought in my computer, and took my lunch break to Skype with the whole family in the kitchen of the office!!!!  It was great.  Haha, a little crazy cause there were so many people all at once, but it was so nice to see everyone.  It realy does make the distance seem so much shorter when you can see people almost whenever you want.  Really enjoyed seeing everyone.  I wish I had been able to be there.  Holiday time is hard away from family.  Just SO incredibly Thankful that Kyle will be here for Christmas.  Otherwise, I think it might have been a difficult Christmas. 

I also realized quite a bit this week, just how thankful I am for where I am in my life.  Really.  I think about it quite often actually, when I am walking to work in the mornings especially.  I just put on my ipod and kind of zone out on the way.  Really makes me think about how greatful I am to have what I have.  My amazing friends and family, a boyfriend that’s more than I ever could have asked for, and honestly, I thin I just have some luck sometimes.  And when I think about it… I did this trip on my own really.  I saved the money, I bought the plane ticket, paid for our stay in the hotel, paid for my apartment, paid for all my groceries and whatnot.  Ive never been able to do that before.  It was kind of a cool feeling.  Not to mention, once Mom left… its been up to me.  And I’ve been able to do it!  Been here over a month now, and its pretty cool to think about the fact that I am making it happen.  It makes me think that anything is possible.  The world is so much smaller now…in a good way.  Ive just been so greatful for the fact that everyone has been so supportive.  Its an amazing feeling to have your friends and family proud of you for what you have taken on.  J  Gives me a great feeling.  And I miss everyone so much, but Im definitely happy about my decision. 

Anyway, after Skype, I headed back down to continue working until we all headed out for Matt’s Birthday bar evening.  That was fun.  We have a great office.  Everyone gets along well and enjoys eachother’s company.  Had a great time.  Lots of drinks and lots of food.  REALLY expensive though ($24 for a burger… yeesh!), but it was worth it for a night out.  We stayed til around 11 or so, and then Mercedes and Sam dropped me off back at home.  Again…. A shockingly quiet night, especially for a Friday…

Saturday

Unfortunately, Saturday I had to go into work.  I just had so much to do, I couldn’t avoid it.  I had told Fraser that I was behind, and wanted to come in, and he said that was fine.  Said that I didn’t even need to come in really, that Myke was happy with what he was seeing from me thus far, and that if I wanted to take the weekend, and thought I could keep up with a new quota the following week, so just enjoy the weekend.  I didn’t think I could keep up with another full quota though, so to the office it was!  Got in around 8 or so, and got to work.  Worked for a couple of hours, and then I got to meet Tamir and his girlfriend Francesca downtown.  That was a really nice break.  I enjoyed hanging out with them, and finally meeting Tamir.  What a great guy.  Lots to talk about.  We went and had a drink at a coffee shop, then headed across the street to an art gallery.  Haha… most random thing ever too.. while we were at the gallery, two girls were outside literally beating eachother… like, pulling hair, throwing punches, etc.  CRAZY!  People on the street stopped and were calling the cops and all that.  Yelling and screaming at them.  They were totally fighting over drugs too.  One of them in the tussle dropped what looked likc a crack pipe… insane.  Definitely interesting.  Young girls too.  Sad.  So we got our excitement in for the afternoon for sure. 

Then I headed back to the office,  showed Tamir where I worked, and he is super happy for me.  Really impressed to at what Im doing, and how the company is.  He said it sounds like a fantastic environment, and it really is.  One month in, and still loving it.  He offered to take me on a tour of Weta as well whenever I make it down to Wellington.  How awesome would that be?!  Kyle and I will have to take a trip out for sure. 

After that, I headed back to work and worked for most of the rest of the day.  Got a decent amount done, never as much as I want.  Then Kate got in touch with me, and she, Matt and Tiffany were headed out to Mission Bay for some ice cream.  I was starving cause I hadn’t had dinner, so I went and joined them.  I got a burger while they had their ice cream, and we went and sat outside.  A nice ending to a busy day.  I was going to go out with Mercedes, and was looking forward to it, but I was just so tired by the time I got home that I wasn’t up for it.  Instead, I ended up just chilling out and chatting with Alvaro and Ernesto.  Nia, Terry, Kira and Scott were all out of town for the weekend.  So the three of us were goofing off and talking about all kinds of different things, over a bottle of Pisco.  Haha, Pisco and cola.  YUM.  We killed the whole bottle between the three of us.  Yeesh!  I didn’t mean to do that!  It was fun though, and I sure slept well. 

Sunday

Went back into the office to get as much done as possible.  Finally got some shots submitted and was making some progress.  The Christmas parade was in the afternoon around 2 as well.. and I debated not going.  But I could hear all the sirens and whatnot from the office, so I decided at the last minute (around 1:50) that I was going to go.  It would be good to get out and enjoy some of the day at least, right? 

MAN what a crazy parade!!!!  I mean, dude, EVERYONE in the whole city must have been downtown.  Queen street was insane.  It was cool though for sure, not like any Christmas parade I had ever seen!!  It was like… a hybrid between Christmas, Halloween, and I don’t even know what!  Haha.  Lots of clowns, people on stilts in crazy costumes, marching bands, huge inflated balloons (hehe, there was one of a clown holding a ball in his hand… and this thing was MASSIVE… it was so big, that the balloon got caught on one of the light poles and ripped the balloon, and it started deflating right in front of me!!!  Haha, HILARIOUS!  Take a look at the photos)





Hahaha, and Kiwi to top it off.  :-D

So as I was watching the parade I decided to wander around some of the shops.  I wanted to find a little Christmas tree to put on my desk in the office.  Unfortunately, I couldn’t really get to the shops I wanted to go into to find one because of the parade.  Ah well.  It happens J  So anyway, I was browsing around throughout Queen street, and stumbled upon this clothing store called Jay Jays.  I decided to go in and just have a look around.  DUDE… they have affordable clothing there!!!  Not to mention they were having a sale, so I went in and got a bunch of shirts and tank tops to wear to work.  Some cute stuff!  I spent around $80 on like, 6 shirts and a couple of accessories.  Awesome!  Very very happy about that find!

After that, the parade was ending, so I decided to high-tail it back to the apartment.  I had to do laundry still, and I had pretty much worked as much as I was going to work for the weekend.  Came back, threw in the laundry and hung out watching some tv and surfing the internet.  Once the laundry was done, I actually sat down with a needle and thread and started fixing some clothes that I have that ended up with either tears or holes in them.  Seams broken, etc.  Man, I fixed like, 6 articles of clothing!  I bought this $2 pack of random thread colors, and I swear, I literally had every exact color I could have needed!  A bright pink, a lavender, a tan color, bright green, black... it was nuts.  And made me SO happy that now my clothes have no holes!!!!  And I was watching Happy feet with Nia and Terry as I fixed it all.  Awesome.  Made a sandwich for dinner, and just relaxed for the rest of the evening.  :-)  Twas a good Sunday.

 Monday was busy, I decided I needed to sit and focus on my work since I had gotten so far behind.  Luckily, they assigned me a smaller quota this week, so I should be able to catch up by Friday with my work.  Unfortunately we couldnt log in when I got to work because the internet was down... meaning we also couldnt even open our files through Maya, so I headed down to the Post Office real quick to get some stamps.  Figured those might be important.

Got back, and got to work.  I also got up and mentioned to everyone in the room, if we could kind of tone down the Nerf fights for the week.  Kate and I had both been in the office over the weekend (it was nice not to suffer alone ;-)), so clearly there was some issue with productivity.  Everyone seemed totally fine and in agreement with it, so fortunately, the whole day was really chill and quiet.  Everyone getting down to work.  It was really great actually.  I felt pretty productive because I was able to just straight up focus.

After work, Kate and I were going to head down to Kung Fu for some working out.  We left work a tad early (about 5:30) and headed out to get there.  Unfortunately, we didnt realize just how far it was, so we ended up missing the class.  Sucks, but at least we had a nice walk!  I think we're going to look into some other kind of martial arts or Kick Boxing to get into.  Excited about that for sure. 

Since we knew we were going to miss it once we realized just how far off we were, we kind of meandered around down Richmond road.  Kind of a nice road!  I could live down there, and we actualy saw some apartments for rent.  Something to consider.  We also stopped into a local grocery store, and I was able to pick up some stuff I needed... including some desk accessories!!!!!  Found some Buzz and Woody action figures for the top of my monitor.  Made me very happy :-D.  Got some strawberries too which are YUMMY!  Im glad I had them at the time as well, because once we started walking again, I started to crash.  I think Im having some issues with regulating my blood sugar a bit.  I notice I end up with these funky pseudo light headed / dizzy spells every once in a while.  I am going to cut the caffeine out quite a bit from what I have been doing (I think I crash after a caffeine / sugar high in the afternoons, and I know I had just had some coffee shortly before we left work... Im sure i was crashing from that), cause its not a good feeling.   Epsecially since I walk around the city essentially by myself most of the time, the last thing I need is to pass out randomly in the street or something.  Ugh, scary thought.  So Im trying to be better about that.  Got myself on track to lose weight as well, been eating healthier.  Lots more protein, veggies and fruits, less carbs.  I think I'll be ok now :-).

Anyway, we had a really nice walk, and then I headed back home, and Kate headed up to the bus.  :-)  I think we're going to be great friends, Kate is awesome.  I think we're a lot alike in some ways.  Cool for sure.  So, got home, and had a chill night.

Today, I skipped my run cause Ngaire couldnt meet me, and decided to sleep in a tad, since I hadnt all weekend since I was working.  Had a good day at work though.  Another chill day for sure.  Had half a coffee, and a tea instead today, so already on teh track of less caffeine.  Was pretty productive too.  I think Im going to get all of my shots done this week, and not have to come in on the weekend!  YESS!  Hopefully theres some beach time in store for me this weekend... that would be amazing.  So yes, good day for sure.  Half way through I went into Mykes office to ask him about a shot I was getting ready to start on.  We ended up having a nice little chat.  he's really happy with the work Ive been doing still, which is such a relief.  He thinks its funny because I have been so worried about staying on task, and making sure my stuff is good enough, especially since this is my first pass at Secondary, and its a big deal to me.  This is the hard stuff!  Its so nice though because he keeps reinforcing that I am doing just fine, and not to worry.  Even though I feel behind, he mentioned something to Fraser about maybe cutting me a little bit of a break in the coming week because of some of the rigs Ive had to work with.  Its been a challenge for sure!!!!!  More just time consuming.  The Elephant trunk in two shots, multiple characters, and running in another shot, the snake in like 4 or 5 shots, and whatever else.  The Snake in itself was a hell of a challenge.  So they smiled and it sounds like I might get to relax a bit coming up.  Its so nice to hear that sometimes they take that into account.  Im not SURE about it, but we'll see.  At least this week wasn't at full quota so I can catch up.

Either way, the day was good.  Got some feedback from Myke, which was small really (thank goodness I keep getting only minor changes to shots... whew!), so I have some things to continue working on, and then tomorrow Im hoping to dive into some of the quota for THIS week finally, and be done with last weeks shots.  Gotta keep the ball rolling!  I stayed about 12 hours today, got home around 9.  Hung out for a bit with the roomies... and now I am WIPED, so Im heading to bed.  Going to get up way early to run with Ngaire tomorrow.  Should be good.  Im gona be tired though... haha, apparently I do pretty well without sleep lately... or well, without much of it.  Hopefully I can catch up this weekend and make it a point to sleep in.  I dont ever do that really.  Another good reason to have Kyle here... he makes me sleep in :-).

Anyway, bed time for me.  Sorry its been so long since an update!!!!!

1 comment:

  1. :) You have been Busy again!!! :-* Good job with work, glad your getting great feed back!! I've always said you were good at that animatin stuff!! :-P

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