A letter to Mother Nature...

Dear Mother Nature (aka Gaea):
Quit making those annoying vegetable cocktail commercials and get back to work fixing the weather in Edmonton.
Sincerely,
Carlos

I have edited a lot of "mother-effs" from this version

Just another snowy April 24th in Edmonton

Last night before bed, I decided to check my Facebook to see if Doug had found any girls interested in playing softball for the summer. Instead I found a lot of angry posts regarding the blizzard that I was unaware was happening outside at the time. Realizing that it is almost the end of April and that winter will not loosen its grip on this city, I decided to reject the outside world and headed to bed pretending I never read the posts.
It was surprisingly effective how ignoring the snow storm the previous night had cleared my memory of it ever happening. As if knowing that I had actively tried to forget it the previous night, winter left its mark on the landscape by covering everything in a layer of pristine snow. I can say I was not impressed by the blanket of white covering the ground when heading out to work this morning. I was impressed by the teenager that passed us by on his way to school riding a unicycle though. I was too slow to get my phone out to take a picture... but then again it wouldn't be a good idea to take pictures of kids near a school in the first place.
This got me thinking about all the randomness I see each day here in Edmonton and how easy it will be to document it all with an easily accessible camera. This will be great! I could have used a camera one night when kt and I were walking home and a moose ran by about a block away. We both stopped and looked again... I said "Is that a moose?"... "yep" kt replied. The moose was trotting by and was going at a pretty good speed. As it ran behind some buildings we decided not to make any sudden movements. We were still puzzled by the experience (and frankly kind of scared) when a very disheveled looking man ran by chasing the moose... he was yelling something but we couldn't make it out. We figured that guy must either be really drunk or really high... either way he was freaking out chasing the moose. We never saw the moose again, but I kept randomly telling people that I had lost my moose. I figured if the moose was still in the neighbourhood and they would stumble upon it they would think "it's Carlos' moose?! I thought he was lying". That incident was one of the many instances where we could have used a camera...
Last week when we were walking home from work we saw some litter on the side of the road. I didnt think much of it until we got closer and I spotted the most generic beer can ever *picture posted*. I found it so weird I took a picture of it. It may be one of the lamest things to take a picture of, but at least I remembered I had the camera.

On our way home today from the grocery store (to stock up on ice cream), I pointed out two guys playing catch.... across a field... with a boomerang. It took me a second to realize what was wrong with that picture... but it seemed to take them much longer to realize that the damned thing kept coming back to the person who was throwing it, each time frustrating the guy in the other side of the field. The last I saw of the two, they decided to stand beside each other and were taking turns catching the returning boomerang. Again I forgot the camera!... dang.. maybe next time.

Really funny video I found on the web. From this website: http://www.tweenbots.com/

23 and a half hours of almost catastrophe

Well, in true Carlos and Katie fashion, we've had another interesting day in the life of us. Yesterday we decided we'd go to the mall to buy me some new shirts because a small fetus named Peanut is growing exponentially and now all my shirts ride up past my almost-no-longer-concave bellybutton. So instead of going home right after work, we went shopping for a few hours, got me some multi-coloured shirts, picked up some groceries (milk, soap, bananas and gum...you know, the usual...), and headed home. We stepped inside and I flicked the light switch, but nothing happened. This didn't cause any alarm because that light switch needs another one to be turned on...what is it with us and weird electricity things?...like when our toaster turned on our hall light in our old apartment?...OK tangent....and I'm back. So Carlos jokingly says "uh oh EPCOR shut us down". We laughed. Then he tried the other switch. No light. Then we looked around and everything was off. That's when we realized "Oh shit...EPCOR shut us down."
Luckily it was 8:15pm and since the sun has reached the never-going-down phase way up here near the Arctic circle, it was still light out and we could maneuver around our place. It was starting to get dark though, so as I looked for a flashlight, Carlos proceded to check the breakers...no problems there. So he decided to venture downstairs to ask the neighbours if they had lights.
Carlos: "Hi, do you guys have power"
Raymond: "Um yup"
Carlos: "...cuz we don't"
Raymond: "Oh...and EPCOR guy came by and said he was here to shut down the power to Apartment 3. I thought that was the empty apartment."
Carlos: "No...we're 3."
*awkward silence*
Carlos then came back upstairs to find me reading my Discover magazine by wind-up flashlight, and he called our landlord (also Carlos' boss/supervisor), John. John had no idea what was going on, and I'd quote the conversation, but those two swear a lot at each other. Next call, EPCOR. ..."we have no record of anyone living at that residence, therefore we shut the power down, sir"...Hmmm. Well now things are getting more interesting. Oh and when can they turn it back on? We have to call during work hours...8am-8pm. It was 8:35pm. F-ing new shirts from the mall. Carlos asked if he could turn the power back on himself...
EPCOR: "That would be meter tampering, sir. You would get fined."
Carlos: "How much is the fine?"
EPCOR: "The police would get involved."
Carlos: "Thank you, bye."
Then call #2 to John...who, after trying to convince Carlos to turn the meter on and he'd take the fall (Carlos checked it out but couldn't find the switch...), he told us he's call them first thing in the morning and take care of it. Awesome. Carlos went back downstairs...
Raymond: "Any luck?"
Carlos: "What time did they come by today?"
Raymond: "11am"
Carlos: "Can we put some milk and stuff in your fridge?"
Meanwhile, I learned a bunch about tornadoes from my Discover magazine, and Carlos was rubbing his face a lot. And it was dark. Soon we realized the heat was steadily decreasing. Well, luckily it's not January and we figured we'd survive the night. Carlos joined me on the bed and we read the Discover magazine together until I accidentally dropped the flashlight on his face and somehow the light went directly into his eye and he may have gone temporarily blind. Once I could breathe again after laughing at his misfortune, he turned to me in a sad voice and said "...and I can't even use my breathing machine..." ...I'm still laughing about that one.
Needless to say we got a long night's sleep, cuz we got bored pretty quickly with no electronics to keep us entertained, and I left for school just before 8am. Carlos called me at 8:15am with the news that John had somehow managed to get the window of when the EPCOR guy would come back down from 1 week to 48 hours (bribery? kidnapping? we don't ask questions...), so Carlos had to stay home to wait, with no electricity, for the guy to come. I also noted the irony of this situation, since we live next to an EPCOR substation. Carlos didn't appreciate my humour.
Against all laws of thermodynamics and quantum physics, the EPCOR guy showed up at 10:30am. As you can see, we're back online. Only 23 and a half hours of chaos, but another day in the life of Carlos, Katie and Peanut.