I believe it was squid's eyeballs with chocolate sauce!

Yummmm...

Gabriel Iglesias is hilarious too. But nothing beats "$34.50". I'd give my right arm to see Russell Peters live again.

I had a friend who used to phone up Chinese restaurants in his best country bumpkin (I'm being polite here) accent and ask for crazy things like Dragon d*ck. His family was from Kowloon and he of course, spoke Cantonese. He'd translate for us when they'd start swearing at him. I still laugh thinking about all the fake accent pranks we used to do. Good times.

Russell Peters and Shaun Majumder are too funny. Have you seen Omid Djalili yet? He is a scream.

I am so fed up with my current situation. I just want to pack up and move back to Canada. Sigh.

That's too bad brad, what's going on?

Oh and I am sorry these other people have sullied your vent thread

What's wrong?

The poor man has been waiting a while for the AOS to come through - it must be freaking annoying I can imagine.



you too

Okay.. so tonite I received a new credit card.. Big news for little old me and my lack of credit history here in the US.. so I call the 1-800 number to activate the card. I get a guy who's obviously in a call center (I can hear people talking in the background), but all of a sudden there is like screaming and party noise!! It was so loud I couldn't even make out what the guy was saying!! It sounded like a pub or dance club or something!! It was unreal and I motioned to my hubby in another room to come and listen to the background noise.. HE couldn't believe it either!! So i stopped the guy and said.. I want to speak to your manager.. and he was like Sure!! So he transferred me to a woman who said she was the "manager" of the call center, and that they were having a "Santa look a like contest" to "spread some holiday cheer".. and they were just giving their employees something to have fun with. WHAT THE?

I told her it was TOTALLY unprofessional to answer a phone call from a customer and the noise be SO loud that they couldn't even HEAR.. not to mention when you are dealing with financial matters, it gave me a SICK feeling to know THESE JOKERS have my private personal information.. GAH!!!!! She told me she was sorry I was upset.. and I said.. is my card activate? and when she said yes.. i hung up..

Unbelievable... totally..

Just the idea of call center peepz walking around dressed like Santa Claus is way too funny, or creepy, or pathetic.
Sorry you had a bad experience, but wooohooo for the credit card!

That's sad

This is more of a whine than a vent. I was up until 2:30am baking Christmas cookies. My husband came home from work last night and at about 7:00pm mentioned that today would be his last staff meeting before Christmas and he would like to bring in some treats. I said I would make him some and sent him off to the store with a list of ingredients while I cleaned up after supper. Three stores, five phonecalls, and 2.5 hours later he came home with only some of the goodies. Apparently Canada's the only place where ground almonds or walnuts or pecans are available. (I don't have a Quisinart to grind my own.) So I modified my choice of cookies to the ingredients which were available and got started. Back up at 5:30am to fix breakfast for my husband and arrange said cookies into a nice presentation. So I am operating on 3 hours sleep but cannot go back to bed because I have a landscape designer coming over to draw up plans for the back yard as a Christmas present to myself. So I'm happy about that but grumpy because I've had no sleep.

I couldn't find ground walnuts or pecans here as well to make thumbprint cookies. So I just put them in a plastic zip bag (the pieces), and let all the air out of them...
and pounded the sh*t out of them!

It worked!

Carla

Apparently Canada holds the entire North American market on ground nuts then. But I made thumbprints last night too! In fact, I just had one for breffrus. I don't make mine with ground walnuts..... just crushed walnuts. Or "finely diced" as they like to call them here. It did cross my mind to "pound the sh*t out of them" but I SO did not feel like doing that at 10 o'clock at night.

hehehe - our coffee grinder is used more often grinding nuts and spices than it is for grinding coffee!

Hmmm. Never thought of the coffee grinder. Though I keep meaning to buy another one for spices. Wonder what coffee-flavoured almond (or walnut or pecan) crescents would taste like? lol

Sorry to read this Bradcanuck.
Here is much energetic love and support from your VJ peops to help see you through.

The entire process does test ones patience doesn't it. But things will be okay. You'll be okay. We're all here for you.

Excellent idea Kathryn41!! You need one dedicated to grinding nuts though. They're so inexpensive though, it's well worth it!

Carla

We're here for you Brad it's only a few days more, it's coming.

This might explain why I woke up in a plastic bag, feeling like someone had hit me with a hammer.

Mom used to whip out the old Braun coffee grinder and grind almonds (for things like marzipan). Did that for years. A bit easier than a mortar and pestle (old skool but still excellent) or a smooth stone (from the garden or a riverbank) and a wooden board (really old skool, but also quite good though more labour intensive).

I was thinking this morning about U.S. immigration (yes, off topic - no hang on....). Anyway, I was thinking of Canadian immigration vs U.S. and how much nicer we are (although Delicia might not agree - sorry Delicia!).

Then I was wondering what effect this long drawn out U.S. immigration process has on immigrants, at least some. So what if you get stuck in AP for a year or more and they lose your paperwork and etc etc. Then you immigrate and it takes weeks to get a SSN, if they even acknowledge you exist and employers aren't willing to hire you based on your visa alone (and those are IR people, K3 people go through much more once they arrive, as we all know).

How does this taint the new immigrants view of the U.S.. How can that be good for a country? Don't you want your new immigrants to love your country and have respect for your government and laws and blah blah blah.

As to how this relates to Canadian immigration, i'm sure in some quarters we appear soft, but whatever, we let married couples live together and a host of other things and that has to be good for Canada as a whole.

Anyway, just something I was thinking.

Even though I love the US and its people, I definitely have a love-hate relationship due to the crap that I've been put through. Not only with immigration, but with the regular day-to-day aspects of life as well. Since I've lived an entire adult life knowing and learning one set of rules, I thought I had it down pat. But nothing they do here is anything like they do in Canada, so it just gets so darn frustrating. *sigh*

I have one word for you:


XENOPHOBIA

This is TOTALLY how I feel Krikit.. very well put..

Every time I see a weather forecast for Edmonton, the predicted temps for the day I arrive get colder and colder!

That's my vent for the day.

-4 and sunshine for Saturday....that's a nice day, you have been out of the country tooooo long!

-4C is not bad. The site I checked gives a low of -18C and a high of -13C, not counting wind chill. Which is still a lot warmer than Minnesnowta, and not really cold enough for my fiance to have me wait in the departure area while he gets the car so I won't be cold (as he plans to do--- ), but I think I am going to go with your forecast. It makes me happier than weather.com's!

OMG, I spent Christmas with my Cousins in Edmonton once. Holy Mary Mother of God. The temps that year were actually colder in Edmonton than in the Arctic that year. One time we parked at the West Edmonton Mall and would literally run a few cars, duck down to get out of the wind (to thaw out the lungs), run another few cars, duck down, etc etc. I developed super-powers that winter. The air was so dry that I literally had lightening bolts flying off my fingertips whenever I went to touch something. The cat would run every time she saw me coming.

We had fun though. My friend and I were downstairs wrapping presents and --- this mighta been the wine --- but we decided to wrap a bunch of Cousin Tony's things that he already owned. So the next morning he's unwrapping gifts and going "A coat!" *pause* That's MY coat." *pause* *look of confusion*. Oh how laughed.

that's hilarious

Not only hilarious, it's a brilliant idea!

*Cogs start turning in evil brain of mine, wondering on whom I should play that trick...*

Sonoran Songbird...enjoy your holiday with your sweetie! You're leaving Saturday and we'll miss you! (Thought I'd better say that now in case I forget!)

Carla

Thank you, Carla. I am really looking forward to being with him again.

I might take a break. *sigh* I'm getting extremely desolate just thinking about my AOS and how paperwork stuff has been messing up since I moved here. The congressman's office has promised to look into it, but seeing as how things have gone lately I can't help but think that it's just going to get worse, like they'll accuse me of wasting their time or something. And I'm trying to get an internship in the meantime just to keep myself occupied, but sadly there's been no luck there.

It's getting very tiring to just sit at home, play video games or watch TV, wait for Bee to come home from his evening shift with dinner prepared and laundry done. Such is the price you pay for this process, but I can't help but feel incredibly frustrated at it. The prospect of looking forward to this for months is daunting. I'm trying to keep my chin up, but it's hard sometimes.

The worst part is that my family back home keeps pressing me about whether I've found a job yet, and I keep telling them, "My paperwork hasn't gone through yet." I've told them specifically that it could take a few months, and all they can do is ask about my job. It's honestly starting to become very stressful to talk to them even though I understand that they're just concerned.

I just feel horrible because I know I haven't really posted anything other than vents and I wish there was something good I can talk about... um, other than the fact that I found crackers from a Vancouver catering company at the grocery store the other day. Boy did that make me homesick. And boy were they also expensive

Oh Nini-gummy-bear,

I could use some staff. Would you like to help create a book on celestial navigation?
I'm kidding...it is intense.

I wish I had something to say to ease all this.
Waiting sucks the big one!

Personally I do not find myself ever bored.
I haven't lived with a TV in almost 2 decades, and, although extremely playful, I do not play "games".
I love to create, be it anything, and so there is never a shortage of things to make, do, learn, etc.
If I lived to be 200 I could not finish the projects i have started...this is what happens when you live with A.D.D.

I am digressing...
When others ask you whether you have found a job, see what it is about that that bugs you and see what it is that they are hiding behind. Maybe you could ask your peops to simply ask you how you are. Job, no job, you are still lovable you.

With so much cool stuff to do, try to find something that makes you feel GREAT and you lose yourself in it.
Maybe you want to learn to play an instrument.
Maybe you want to learn to make sushi.
Maybe it's something really rad.

Sit still and go in...deep...the answers are there.

You have the luxury of time.
Do not spend it carelessly.

You can do anything your heart desires.

Find out what that is.

Don't worry about venting---that's what we are here for!



That is very good advice, IMO.

Ahhhh Nini, you can't take a break, you just changed your display name for Heavens sake!

Anyway, if you only pop in to vent, that's ok, vent away, kind brad was nice enough to make this thread and if no one vents then it is wasted!

I don't work right now - through choice, but sometimes a day will go by when I haven't done anything particularily constructive. However! I have decided to just blow it off, constructive, smucktive, who cares, it's all good. We are kind of 'driven' sometimes to do whatever, but really it's quite nice to do not a lot of anything sometimes, it's all about how you look at it.

Everything you do is important, even if it is 'just' making dinner, may not feel like much to you but think of how happy it makes Bee!

Sometimes people don't realize what they are saying irritates you, this is hard but you have to tell them, tell them you feel bad that your paperwork isn't coming through as fast as you anticipated and so the whole topic is off limits, you can even make somewhat of a joke of it, so there are no hard feelings, but you should tell them (in my opinion ).


Is this cheering you up? Does it change the way you feel? No probably not, but I wish it could.

I love it, and this is exactly what I'm talkin' about!


This is why we are called
human beings
not
human doings.



Find the extraordinary in the ordinary.

(Oh yes, I'm full of 'em. Hee hee.)

I am sooooo sick of worrying about money. I don't have a lot of vacation time left so when the baby comes, I will be taking unpaid maternity leave. Ideally, I want to have at least 3-4 months salary saved for that time. Yes, we have lived on one salary before, but it SUCKS!!!! I didn't really start freaking until last night, paying bills. We had planned to go to Montreal for New Year's and had budgeted for it. Of course, we didn't expect that my hubby would be out of work for a week due to an injured back (of course without pay) and that I would not get paid either when my office was closed due to snow. So, we decided to cancel the Montreal trip. I was still feeling okay about money until I looked at the calendar, realized that hubby has 2 weeks coming up that he will only be working 3 days due to the holiday so less pay, his vehicle is making a funny noise and the mechanic estimates $200 - $300 to fix ... and then hubby told me he is worried about being laid off because apparently his company does not have a lot of jobs going on right now. Hubby is very good at what he does (which first made me think, oh his job is secure because his boss really likes his work and he is responsible unlike some of the other workers there) ... but then I thought of it from a business standpoint and realized that he makes a lot more than many of the other workers which may make him first to go. We do have some savings, but we shouldn't be touching them. And because he saw me worrying about money, hubby cancelled his upcoming chiropractor appt. .... which then made me feel so horrible and even more stressed, because if he doesn't fix his back, he will only be out of work more and I hate seeing him in pain.

Okay, done ranting!!!

BTW, I have to admit that the lovely pregnancy hormones tend to make everything worse .... so I normally would not be as stressed, but now it seems overwhelming.

SACRILEGE

My gosh - Bren and I were talking about this just yesterday - about common-law partners being able to petition for immigration, same-sex couples as well. It seems to me the Canadian system is better in some ways, and not so better in others (the points system screams elitism). We were particularly thinking of a gay friend who lives in Eugene, Oregon and is in love with a girl from Bolivia: tough nougies (or however you spell that) - no can't do.



Sister, I'm with on this one -as usual, great minds think alike-

I'm just glad to have the internet back after going a whole week (GASP) without it -- gotta love major ice storms!

Even though I love the US and its people, I definitely have a love-hate relationship due to the crap that I've been put through. Not only with immigration, but with the regular day-to-day aspects of life as well. Since I've lived an entire adult life knowing and learning one set of rules, I thought I had it down pat. But nothing they do here is anything like they do in Canada, so it just gets so darn frustrating. *sigh*
[/quote]

I agree. Growing up as a country close to the US I thought things weren't THAT different between us, but they are. I learned that when I went to school there, and even more so when I moved back to Canada. Love both places for their strenths and differences. Proud to be Canadian always though. I found myself arguing for both countries and against both countries depending on the issue. Everything will become routine though, hang in there! We will all have to get used to hearing to 'blame Canada' though. I used to hate that $hit:)

Whoooooaaa Nelly! (Or I guess Nini in this case.) Stop being so hard on yourself, girl!!! Sit back and enjoy the forced break. There's so very few of them given in this world. You can't work until you're authorized. End of story; end of conversation. I loooooooove preparing dinner and doing laundry when I want to instead of when I can do or when I have to. The paperwork will arrive in no time, and you'll be out working your butt off and wishing you'd appreciated the rest. Roll with it, sweetie. It's a nice place to be.

As for feeling horrible about posting vents.... Always remember to look for the light in a situation. Because if you don't find it, you'll always be in the dark.

OMG I have been sooooo saying this for so long.
This thread opened up that can of worms, but not too many wriggled out.
Oh well, I am a firm believer in free will, and this being stopped from living with one's husband, wife, parent, anything at all, really sucks, and completely unnecessary. A quick police check and let people through borders (regardless of country; I am not picking on the States).
If there were a country of saints (have I said this here before...sorry to repeat myself), then by all means build those high walls and keep us regular humans out.


I am so curious Krikit. Could you tell us more? I have spent a lot of time in the U.S. and mostly noticed the ridiculous amount of flags. I guess you need to be reminded of where you live in case you are too drunk or something...hahaha, ahem, and I do notice some philosophical difference, like about things like guns.

It's the details, huh?

I'm in complete agreement with you here Lincoln.
The blaming Canada for the weather just drives me nuts.
All of our weather in Montreal is due to the "midwest"...thanks a lot! Ha!

And I, too, argue for and against everything.

It is good to be balanced!

Awww Nini, please don't get too down. I agree with Kritkit...your paperwork will be here soon enough, and then you'll be wishing you had more time on your hands. This is the time of year as well, when a lot of people are not hiring. Relax and enjoy the season. Family, they always have good intentions eh? You have to be clear with them about what you can and can't do. Let them know that you'll let THEM know when you get your paperwork to start work, and that in the meantime, you know they're well meaning, but it does get you down. They'll feel badly for like...2 seconds! Then they'll be more attentive to what they say in the future.

Big Hugs!


Cassie....... we missed you! Glad to see you're back up and running! Dang ice!

autumnchick....damn those hormones eh? I lived for so many years worrying about money. I'm sure that it will shorten my life by 10 years. Worrying and stressing so much is not good for baby either. Did your husband say he cancelled his appointment because of the cost? That's too bad if he did. His physical health is important if he's going to maintain his job. And getting laid off...you said he's a good worker, very skilled. He will probably have good recourse to find new work. Christmas is a tough time of year kiddo. Reflect on you guys finally being together, with a little one on the way. Life IS good.

Big Hugs to you too!


Gosh, how about a group hug everyone???

Carla

A hug orgy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vr3x_RRJdd4
my favourite...mmmm...
I'm planning on doing one in Chicago as soon as I get there.

{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{GROUP HUG}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}