Fly-By-Updates?

So, I know I haven't been around for a while - things have been a little craaaazy. I'm still busy enough that I reeeeally shouldn't be posting this, but I'm feeling neglectful.

- Work is still really busy, but fun - challenging, exciting, a little scary. I'm about to start spending A LOT of my time in the field. I haven't done much field-travel yet, so it's intimidating, but really exciting - and good for my career in general. Attended a conference last week in Canmore, gave my presentation, and it went okay. Could have been better, could have been worse. I got lots of really positive feedback on it, but that might be just because a lot of them knew how nervous I was.

- Brian came to Canmore on the evening after my presentation. Brought a bottle of wine (mmm, Malbec...) and a loaf of freshly-baked bread (mmm, Rye...). After dinner with my group (and some of their wives), Brian and I went and sat in the hot tub, under the falling snow - very nice. Had great plans for the king-sized bed, too - but were so exhausted we fell asleep pretty quickly. Ahaha. Drove back to Calgary the next morning, and went back to work that afternoon. A very nice little mid-week-vaction.

- Brian's company had a foosball tournament on Friday evening, which was a lot of fun. Brian made it to the fourth round, which was pretty good - but somehow he had to play this one guy twice, who's absolutely INSANE. When he scores, you don't even see it, you just here the 'cha-lunk' as the score is made. Someone wondered where that amazing wrist action came from, and as I thought it, someone else said out-loud - He's a lonely, lonely, man... Ahaha...

- After the foosball tournament, Brian and I went to Edmonton. Yes, we arrived there at 11:30pm. Not much traffic to battle, at least. We went up there to visit Brian's best friend Trevor, and his wife Michele, and their two ADORABLE children Kaden (2yrs) and Isabelle (3mos).

- On Saturday I met another of Brian's friends (from like grade 8), and he showed me old year books. And I laughed. But in a completely loving way, of course. Actually, creepily enough, he looked A LOT like my first-ever boyfriend, Mike. I said it was the blond hair and glasses, and he was like "leave me alone, those glasses were TOTALLY the style at the time... And Fort St. John was a little behind the times..." which doesn't say much for Mike, considering he wore them like 8 years later... Hrm...

- Saturday afternoon/evening, I gave-in to my maternal instincts completely, and obsessed over Isabelle. I cooed at her and carried her around and cuddled her as much as I possibly could. It's so bizarre, the effect a baby can have on someone. I mean, they're just warm, soft, little people - but there is SO MUCH MAGIC in an infant. Maybe it's not everyone, maybe it's just me. But I can't get over the feeling of it. I don't have many babies in my life, so I get really excited when I do get access to one. I played with Kaden too - he's the most adorable, energetic, little blonde 2-year-old boy in the world. Seriously. We played with green playdough. And Brian taught him how to say kumquat. Ahahaha. So, I know maternal feelings go in waves, but holy crap, this weekend brought mine up to a serious level of "I want a family, dammit!" Ahahaha. Don't worry, I won't do anything sudden or stupid. But it can't hurt to dream of future possibilities, right? *sigh*

- On Sunday morning we came back to Calgary in time (okay, a little late) for my first-ever flickrmeet. This is a meeting that happens once a month in Calgary (and probably other cities) between local photographers who post their work on www.flickr.com. They seem to chose some different, random setting each time around, and this month they rented a bowling alley. There was some talk of formal wear, and then some people had some other ideas, but it seemed pretty open-to-interpretation. So I wore my favorite get-up, my corset (custom made for me when I was 30-40 lbs heavier - I should get it altered, but for now it just tightens all-the-way) and tutu (as seen above). We found Brian a white linen leisure suit and a hat with a feather in it. We had a lot of fun, and there were a lot of great photos taken. Due to NO TIME whatsoever, neither Brian nor I have any of our photos from the event posted yet, but if you want to see some of the amazing photos from other participants, go here.

Great. I did it again. Intended to spend 5 minutes on short but to-the-point updates, and wound up once again with a full-on blog entry. Bah. Why stop now?

- Incase you haven't had your fill of couple cuteness lately, head on over to www.sunmoonspacetime.blogspot.com, also on my links list. Not much there yet, but stay tuned...

- Got back in contact with a couple of old friends last week, which was nice. Always exciting when old, lost, connections are found again.

- Coming-up? Valentine's day tomorrow. Kinda stressful, I have to admit. I've never really had a Valentine's day with anyone truly amazing before. And Brian and I tend to be so cute and starry-eyed all the time, how do we get MORE romantic for Valentine's Day? So part of me thinks, do we really need this one particular day to be all lovey-dovey? No. But at the same time, there's this feeling of "should", or something. Ya know?

- I think I'm going snowboarding this weekend. That's exciting. Haven't been yet this year.

- My birthday's in a little under two weeks. Woo!

- Got a new and exciting light fixture for my stairwell. It's Chandelier-ish. Dark metal and glass and curves and bubbles and such.

- Reeeeeeally should get back to work. I MAY be going down to Turner Valley tomorrow afternoon, which means I SHOULD be doing an extra afternoon's worth of work today... Hrm...

I'll try not to be so long before I post again, but I make no promises - things are insane, and although blogging SHOULD be at the very top of my priority list above all, strangely it's not...