My new family!

This is a picture of our Cat, Igor. He's one of the strangest pets I've ever had.
And, This is my lovely roommate, Ali. She's Rad.

New Haricut!

Great weekend

Hello all!

Sorry for the delay on the updates. Last week was crazy. I had midterms last week and it was awful. I had an oral exam en francais, and I received an 85 on it, which I think is pretty great. But the test that wasn't so great, was for my Canadian history class. I haven't taken history in soooo long, not since junior year of high school. so, four years ago? Anyway, the teacher never told us what to specifically study for, which is frustrating. He basically just said "study everything we've learned". oh how I hate vague people. He's actually a cool guy, but man, give me a ball park here. Anyway, I did absolutely terrible, although I haven't gotten it back, so I'm not quite sure how severe it was, BUT that midterm was 25% of my grade.

I met a new friend this weekend. Her name is Thea and she also goes to Concordia. I like her and her friends a lot. They are great company. This weekend, I got invited to a concert. So, I went with Thea and her friends, as well as my girls. They were pretty good, but it was mostly one of those "hey, I'm going to support my friend's mediocre band tonight, want to come?" type of thing. Apparently Perez Hilton talked a bunch about them on his blog, so perhaps they'll get bigger? not really sure. Anyway, they are called "said the whale". We ended up hanging out with the band afterward and it was really fun. The lead singer invited us to go see a few other bands the next evening (last night).

So, last night, I went to this venue I hadn't been to yet called "zoobizzare" and it was great. It was very small, but it was in (what we like to call) a cave. The ceiling was arched and it literally looked like a grey-bricked, medieval cave. We saw 3 bands play: Crystal Antlers (from L.A.), The Awkward Stage (from Vancouver), and Hot Panda (from Edmonton). They all played really well. I especially liked Hot Panda. They had a chick drummer, some kazoo playing (as well as melodica), and the lead singer must have gotten his vocal influence from Isaac Brock of Modest Mouse. They were really fun and the music was very danceable.

I also got a haircut this weekend at this great salon in mile end called "osalon". They were the nicest people (very funny as well), the give you a scalp massage (as you lay on a bed that leads up to the hair-washing sink), and they gave us some coffee to drink while we were getting the cut. Talk about hospitality! I will definitely be going back and telling all my friends to go there, not to mention I have a really sweet haircut.

Anyway, I'm exhausted and still have lots and lots of reading to do. Hopefully, my next entry will be a lot sooner!

A Bientot!

blurb.

Hey guys,
Just a little update before I go to my Theology class.

Usually I am partial to the late night, 2 dollar chow mein on st. laurent called "chez mein". I mean, how could you possibly beat that at 3am? Well, getting a little burnt out on peanutbutter noodles, Jenna and I decided to go to "Frites Alors!" Where we got an order of fries....and I must say, WOW. They were so good. If you know me, something you will pick up is that I love condiments with my food. It just makes things taste better. Well, At Frites Alors, they have about 10 different sauces or "dips" to choose from for the fries and seriously, I thought I was in heaven. It's been crazy, the amount of good foods we've come across. Yeah, It may be a dollar (loonie) more than the 2 dollar (twoonie) noodles, but I think it's worth it....

something else i've noticed.....
is this turning into a food blog? It might as well be. Just about every entry has mentioned some place i've eaten. That's pretty ridiculous.

On another note,
I really couldn't decide who my favorite acts for POP Montreal were...they were all so good...accept for The Dears. I kind of decided that I got a really weird vibe from that show. I mean, I guess they performed well, but I just really wasn't as in to it as I thought I would be. The Dodos were AH-MAZING. Meric looks incredibly similar to my friend Jordan at home....kinda weird. I was also blown away by Ratatat. I wasn't AS excited to see them as the others but it turned out that they put on a fantastic live show. It was cool to see how they actually play their music. It seems a little hard to imagine because of the way it sounds, but it was great. They closed with "Seventeen Years" and I was very much satisfied.

Volunteered at school again. Met some more cool people, cut some carrots, danced to some sweet jams. I'm likin' this place BEAUCOUP. =)

A long and drawn out story about technical difficulties.

So, Everyone's been going to yearbookyourself.com and I just couldn't help it. I this picture totally makes me look like my mother when she was in highschool! Pretty silly, eh?

Anyway...
This last week has been insane. All the shows at Pop Montreal were sooo lovely. I still have a bit of a cough, but hopefully that will settle down now that Pop Montreal is over. Just to let everyone know, I feel ridiculously accomplished because On Friday, my computer totally crashed and I fixed all by myself.
*Note-skip this paragraph if you don't feel like reading about stupid technology stuff*

It was very, VERY frustrating. It all started out when I was trying to do a security update. After that, the next time I logged in, I wasn't able to get to the long-in screen. I went to the genius bar at the apple store and they did what they could, but they said I would have to re-install all of my software. I was like "oh GREAT, too bad my software is in California, who knows how long it will take to get this 'fixed'". Then, I got the genius idea to use Ali's software....which worked, but THEN it told me I didn't have enough free space to install.....and then all I could think was, "Now what?!" How am i supposed to "make room" when I can't log in? So I resulted to calling applecare. They only kind of helped. They told me I could try to delete files via firewire through someone else's computer. So at 8pm, I made some phone calls and biked up to James, Chris, and Arthur's house. I got the firewire, and figured out how to go into my hard drive as an external through ali's computer. I was finally able to reinstall everything and keep my files! I was really worried there for a second. I really need to back up everything. eggh. After that entire ordeal, I felt relieved and accomplished. I did it all, like a big girl. hahaha

*pick up here*
So, I've got another French test this week. I've been using my Rosetta Stone and it has been helping. More so with pronunciation and a little less with the grammar, but perhaps it's because we are further along with the grammatical stuff in class. I actually really like Rosetta Stone-believe it or not. It's a bit embarrassing with people around, but hey, it's kind of fun.

I volunteered at People's Potato last week. I really like it there and I've met a few pretty cool people. I also got to take extra food home, which is totally awesome. Speaking of food, today Jenna and I went to this really delicious Indian (or "Indienne" as the French would say) food restaurant called "Pushap". We got samosas, curry, rice, bread, and tea for 5 bucks each. It was ridiculously cheap and they had generuese portions.

mon français améliore

This weekend was tourist weekend! I got a pass from the ISO that admitted me to 5 different tourist places in montreal for free! I got to go over to the Biodôme (which is a place that has a bunch of different ecosystems with animals and plants. It was awesome. I also go to go to the Jardin Botanique (botanical garden) and the planetarium. I looooved the planetarium. The exhibit was about the milky way, i'm really fascinated by stuff like that, I wish I had more oppurtunity to take classes like that. Anyway, The Jardin Botanique was very pretty. It was so massive, we weren't able to see all of it. I definitely plan on going back, it's a very peaceful place, far away from all the business of the city. School has been ok. I have a test in History this week and I have so much more reading to do! Unfortunately this past week I didn't get a chance to volunteer at people's potato, but I'm going to work extra hard to make my way in there. I'm really excited for this coming week because it is POP montreal! POP montreal is a music festival (much like, if not EXACTLY like Noise POP in san francisco.) I plan on going to a show every night starting from wednesday all the way until sunday! it's going to be fantastique! haha. Luckily, it doesn't interfere with any of my classes either. I get to go see:
You Say Party! We Say Die!/Winter Gloves/Beast
The Dears/The World Provider
Ratatat/Panther/Erock/Heidi Mortenson
The Dodos/Passion Pit

It's gonna be great. I also plan on seeing:
Of Montreal
The Rumble Strips/Birdmonster
Broken Social Scene
Okkervil River
Octopus Project

in the end of octobre!
Luckily all the shows are relatively inexpensive!!

and in novembre:
Matt&Kim
No Age
M83

J'aime Montréal.

P.s. Mom, I thought you'd get a kick out of the Cotton-top Tamarin Picture (and yes I saw some and chuckled to myself)

Owned!

Apartment pics!

1st: Living room
2nd: Kitchen
3rd: laundry/sewing/craft room
4th: living room/couch
5th: looking into kitchen from living room
6th: dining table (where all the homework happens.)
7th: my room, bare walls and all

Real update later, Feminist Theology homework awaits!