Acclimatization

It’s been a while, and the year is almost at an end, so I thought I should give a brief update on how the acclimatization process has been going.

There have been a lot of changes to get used to over the past few months – hectic office hours, dealing with clients in-person and by phone, achieving a decent work/life balance, etc. More recently, however, it’s been the actual change in climate that’s caused me the most grief. The city basically shut down over the weekend due to the snowy weather, and daily transit has been a real pain as a result. It’s also really, really cold – Victoria definitely spoiled me in the weather department!

I can’t complain too much though – I’ve been coping pretty well so far, and will soon be halfway through the articling period. More importantly, I’ll be finishing my CPLED bar courses in a couple of months, which means I might actually have free time during the week – hurrah!

That said, I’m definitely looking forward to the Christmas break. It’ll be brief, but a holiday is a holiday!

Merry Christmas!
~ C.A.

Futurity

Hmm... tough to find time to blog much these days - Articling is keeping me pretty busy. It's been a pretty interesting experience so far, with a fair mix of rewarding moments and rather discouraging moments (ie. times when you screw up *o*). I'm still alive though, and I still want to be a lawyer, so I guess that's all that matters :)

Read this little snippet in Wired, and thought it'd be something worth sharing:

Things We'll Say to Our Grandkids

• Back in my day, we only needed 140 characters.
• There used to be so much snow up here, you could strap a board to your feet and slide all the way down.
• Televised contests gave cash prizes to whoever could store the most data in their head.
• Our bodies were made of meat and supported by little sticks of calcium.
• You used to keep files right on your computer, and you had to go back to that same computer to access them!

And the funniest one (in my opinion):

• 

Motivational

The parody motivational poster, or the 'demotivational poster', is a pretty common sight on the Internet these days.

As the saying goes, "If you can't beat em - join em":





...and my favorite of the lot:


Now that I actually have an office (albeit a puny one), I'm kind of tempted to buy one pre-framed, ready to hang. On second thought, however, it might be considered a little.... unprofessional...

OK Awesome

Hmm... I've been meaning to do this for a while now.

But first, I gotta say that July went by blazingly fast. There were so many new things to learn, so many new people to meet, and a whole new daily schedule to get used to (6am wakeups - bleh). Thankfully, on the days that I'm particularly busy, a 10-hour day comes and goes before you know it.

Back to the motif of this post though - I clearly have an ever-growing love of lists on my blogs, and today's post is business as usual. I wrote a rather ambitous top Simpsons episodes list before, but I don't think I will ever have the time to do that again. Instead, without further ado, here's my Top 7 How I Met Your Mother episodes:

(Minor Spoiler Alert – but if you haven’t watched the series, why are you reading this?)

7. Swarley (s2, ep7) - A great episode with loads of laughs. As with many of the other episodes on this list, it's always entertaining to see the normally cocky Barney get all flustered and exasperated.

6. Brunch (s2, ep3) - Another variant of the 'Run Lola Run' multiple-perspective style of storytelling, which is a fun change of pace for the viewer. It also has one of the most morbid (and funny) endings to a sitcom episode that I’ve ever seen.

5. Ten Sessions (s3, ep13) – One of those episodes where it’s hard not to root for Ted as he tries oh-so hard to find his wife. It’s kind of sad to watch it now though, after knowing that Stella turned out to be kind of a…. well, you know….

4. The Platinum Rule (s3, ep11) – A really clever piece of writing that puts a twist on the classic ‘main story / sub story’ relationship. It’s brilliant how you can figure out the time period of the flashback just by looking at Robin and Lily’s hairstyles.

3. Slapsgiving (s3, ep9) – An actually exciting episode to watch, especially with the sudden Ted-and-Robin ‘are they back together??’ moment that totally caught me off-guard. I’m kind of sad that slap #4 has yet to occur or even be mentioned recently, but I hope that means they’re cooking up something good.

2. Showdown (s2, ep20) – This is probably the episode that put Barney Stinson on the top of everyone’s ‘favorite TV character’ list. He is, in all honesty, an appalling character whose behaviour cannot be excused by even the most severe form of childhood trauma, but how can you not love a guy who plays a perfect game of The Price is Right just to talk to Bob Barker?

1. Slap Bet (s2, ep9) – This is just a really funny episode with a lot of jokes made at the expense of Canadian culture, but it’s also my current favourite because it’s the first HIMYM episode I ever watched. They kept replaying it on an Alaskan cruise I went on last summer and, seeing how there’s absolutely nothing to do on an Alaskan cruise, my cousins and I watched it enough times to be able to sing ‘Let’s Go to the Mall’ word-for-word. Two weeks later, the entire series made its way onto my hard drive (^_^)

Intermission

Note: Not to be confused with an 'Interlude'.

The TV season has more or less ended for me, with most of my favorite shows going on hiatus until the fall. As of now, most of my television time is spent watching the playoffs (Pens v. Caps was amazing), but the cup final will soon come and go. With not a whole lot to watch this summer, here's five shows that I've been meaning to catch up on / dive into:

1) Scrubs

I've heard from a number of people that Scrubs is a show I'd probably like. Seeing as how the show apparently features "...fast-paced dialogue, slapstick, and surreal vignettes", I'm not quite sure how to interpret what this means about my sense of humor. Nevertheless, I've seen bits and pieces of a few episodes, and I definitely like Zac Braff and Sarah Chalke in other shows. Eight seasons is a lot to catch up with though.


2) Battlestar Galactica

I watched the first season of BSG and was impressed by how grand of a production it was, but I never really got hooked. It was also a little strange to watch the characters sneak around Koerner library, which apparently doubles as a Cylon outpost at night. The show has got some great actors though, and that alone may be enough to win me back to the series. I'm also looking forward to sharing the feelings of frustration and disappointment that the entire Internet has apparently experienced after the series' finale.


3) Breaking Bad

I think I've seen 3 minutes of this show on AMC, and watching the dad from Malcolm in a Middle act like an unbalanced sociopath is probably enough reason to give the show a try. Also, the premise for the show gives me goosebumps: "A high-school chemistry teacher learns he's dying, so he takes up a new career as a meth producer in hopes of earning enough money to take care of his family." Sounds pretty epic to me.


4) Dexter

After watching season one and some of season two of Dexter, I really wanted to keep up with the show. It's got great pacing, a good mix of mystery/suspense, and successfully exploits the layman's fascination with serial killers and vigilantism. The show's pretty dark though, and I generally opt for the lighter fare when the school year is on (some of the cases you read in law school can be depressing enough). Of course, now that school's officially over, I fully intend to get caught up this summer . On a tangential note, does anyone else find it a bit strange that the actor who plays Dexter and the actress who plays Dexter's sister are now married?


5) Arrested Development

I keep putting this off, but I absolutely need to watch all three seasons of Arrested Development, this time in order. CBC featured the show a couple summers back and I got hooked, but the episodes weren't aired in chronological order. As a result, I have a very abstract sense of the show's storyline, but the episodes are funny enough on their own (I think I missed out on a lot of inside jokes though). Lawyer Fun Fact: Did you know the producers of the show were sued by the hip hop group Arrested Development over the use of the show's name? If you remember the ep with Ben Stiller (awesome cameo), he makes reference to this in having to change the title of his magic act video.

~ C.A.

Interlude

It's been a nice, relaxing summer so far - I've been enjoying my guilt-free unemployment (a novel experience) and have had plenty of opportunities to catch up with family and friends. I'm grateful that I have the chance to spend time with these people, as they helped make Vancouver and Victoria places that I could call 'home'. Yes, British Columbia has certainly been good to me these past seven years, and I'm sure I'll miss the BC life every once in a while. Who knows - I might even miss the rainy days!

Don't get me wrong though, I'm definitely not a kainotophobe - I'm actually pretty excited about moving onto the next chapter of my life. When I think about it though, it amazes me that my return to Calgary completes a seven year-long circle. During that time I have moved to seven different places - as you might expect, I'm hoping life will be a little less nomadic back in Cow Town.

I do have one major regret though - after living here for so long, how can I be missing the Winter Olympics by only six months??

Now that's just cruel.

~ C.A.

Life

As per usual, a new phase in life necessitates a new blog. This one's a biggie though.

I have still not fully comprehended the fact that my formal education is finished; that I will no longer be writing exams and essays for the satisfaction of a capital-cased letter written in red. No, my friends, I'm finally leaving the 'education' zone of the board and entering the much longer and potentially perilous 'career' part of the game.

Sure, I'm nervous right now (a feeling which will only intensify as July approaches), but I'm also confident that I will look back at this post one day and laugh. After all, this is why I write this blog and all the other ones - the opportunity to laugh at my past insecurities and anxieties.

What - you didn't think I was writing it for you guys, did you?

~C.A.