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  1. Wine and Food Tasting!

    June 14, 2013 by Lesley

    I had the opportunity to attend a wine and food tasting in Vancouver at the beginning of June and thought I would share some photos from the event. My sister received free tickets the day of the event so it was a nice and welcome surprise. We had a fun girls’ night out and got all glammed up and took a taxi downtown to get our drink on! The funny thing is that we both are not fans of wine or wine people in general. I personally can’t stand red wine and have only found a few white wines that I have actually enjoyed. Weirdly enough, though, I absolutely LOVE sangria! But, anyway, I figured it would be good prep for any wine tastings I encounter in California this summer!

    The wine tasting actually started out pretty well. The event was held in the Vancouver Convention Centre and there were about 100 different wine vendors all liberally pouring all kinds of wine. We saw cute displays like this piggie one:

    Oink oink

    And even The Great One has started his own wine line!

    Wayne Gretzky Wine

    Sorry Wayne, but I did not enjoy your wine although that probably means it’s a fine red wine. The wines all started to taste the same to me by the end of the night; however, there was a really tasty Pinot Grigio by Sumac Ridge that I quite enjoyed as well as one called Autumn Gold by Wild Goose Vineyards that I think was a Riesling. Check them out! Especially if you’re not a big wine drinker like me and don’t really know what you’re talking about when it comes to wine!

    Moving on from the wine, the food really was the best part! There were stations on the perimeter of the conference room and each dish was prepared by talented chefs then paired with a wine that perfectly suited it. Or so they say… I couldn’t really tell! There was quite an assortment of food that went quickly but were well worth the wait as those skilful chefs plated more and more dishes for us!

    Chocolate Heaven

    Deeeelicious...

    Potatoes… My favourite food!

    Potatoes

    Croquettes stuffed with potato. Sooooo good.

    Croquettes

    Shrimp

    Shrimp

    Oxtail croquette and consommé… and a bit of red wine!

    Oxtail and Consommé

    Mmmm strawberries!

    Strawberry Dessert!

    After we had our fill of good food and decided we couldn’t drink any more wine we left the convention centre and walked around Vancouver like tourists, taking pictures and enjoying the view. The wine had definitely gone to my head at that point so I was feeling pretty good. All in all, a great night!

    The sun slowly disappearing in downtown Vancouver

    Category Life and Living | Tags: | No Comments

  2. Driving

    June 2, 2013 by Lesley

    Two months ago I decided to be proactive and learn how to drive. Yes, that’s correct. I’m 25 years old and I don’t know how to drive. Well, in my defence, I think Vancouver has an amazing public transportation system so I never felt the pressure to learn how to operate a vehicle when I turned 16. Some kids in high school did but they were few and far between. The one thing I loved about growing up in a suburb-like city was that everything was within walking distance. School was just 20 minutes away by foot and we walked there and back home every day. The grocery store was across the street from our house; the library, movie theatre and mall just 8 blocks up the road. If we needed to go anywhere else it was always just faster and easier to take the bus and/or skytrain. Plus, my parents never talked to my siblings and I about driving when we were growing up. Whether they didn’t have the time or inclination to teach us or they didn’t want to have to pay for lessons who knows, but my two older sisters and I all learned how to drive in our (late) twenties after we moved out and we all did it by our own initiative.

    So I started driving lessons about 2 months ago. I actually found a really good driving instructor who was able to take me from knowing next to nothing to being a fairly competent driver. I used to have really bad social anxiety and one thing that really brought it out was doing anything while I was being watched. My face would turn hot and red and I would immediately start to sweat. My eyes would often tear up for no reason and I would just feel horrible and pretty much like a failure because I felt like I was being judged for some inexplicable reason. I was pretty concerned about my social anxiety tendencies acting up again while being scrutinized so closely but it definitely wasn’t as bad as I thought it could have been. I had bad days of feeling overwhelmed and like everything I did was wrong and just wanting my instructor to stop pointing out every single little mistake I made instead of appreciating his feedback and trying to improve. But there were also good days where driving felt natural and I really felt in control and like I can TOTALLY do this thing called driving.

    The day of my road test was actually pretty nerve racking. I was stressing about something else but I knew I had to leave all that worry behind and pick it up later so I could focus all my attention on the task at hand. The Class 7 road test is 45 minutes and they test your general driving ability as well as parallel parking, reverse stall parking, pulling over, uphill/downhill parking, etc. You can make mistakes but you cannot make any violations or commit dangerous actions even once or you fail. I was really nervous when the instructor sat down in the passenger seat and started giving me instructions to turn out of the parking lot and onto the road.

    Honestly, it started out HORRIBLY. I was leaving the parking lot and there was a huge truck in front of me. I got all nervous and panicky and I wasn’t watching and totally missed the amber light and went through it when I should have stopped. I kind of blocked it out but I swear the light turned RED when I was in the middle of the street. In my head I was like “OH MY GOD. THIS IS BAD.” I pretty much had it in mind that if I failed it would be from that terrible, terrible thing that just happened. Somehow though I went on with the test and it surprisingly went very smoothly. My turns were all good and my parallel parking was pretty spot on which it usually isn’t so I was actually feeling good by the end except then I remembered what happened at the beginning. So, we pull back into the parking lot and the first thing he asks me is how I felt about the first light we went through. I look at him and I say, “not good”. He nods and agrees with me and tells me what I should have done. I agree with him and then he tells me that he’s not going to fail me for it because I made up for it with the rest of my driving and that I’ve PASSED! :D I was pretty shocked when he said that. So close to failing right out of the gate and yet somehow I passed!

    Often times, I think we feel like life is passing us by and we haven’t done nearly all the things we wanted to by now. For a long time, I’ve felt like I should have learned to drive ages ago… Like I’m 10 years too late to the driving game because I should have gotten my license at 16 and I’m just about 26. But my life doesn’t feel more justified because I’ve supposedly completed a rite of passage that all teenagers should go through. I feel good about getting my driver’s license because I’m going on a road trip in a month and want to be able to contribute to the trip and lighten the burden of driving on my travel partner if I can. Driving still scares the shit out of me but knowing that I have the skills to be a good driver makes it a little bit less scary each time I drive. And that’s all I can really ask for.

    Category Life and Living | Tags: | No Comments

  3. The Future of Blogging!

    May 14, 2013 by Lesley

    All right, seeing as how I’m currently averaging about 2 posts a year.. I want to start blogging again! Really! A lot of exciting things are going to be happening in the next year or so, so there’s no better time to get right back into it :)

    Right now, work is pretty much winding down. I’ve officially given notice at my job and my last day will probably be June 26th. I’ve been asked to come back and work for the same company in a year’s time but it would most likely require a relocation to Arizona and I’m not sure if I want to do that quite yet. Not only because I want a change from this industry but also because… Arizona. A change of scenery might be nice but I’m not sure how easy it would be to leave once I’m there… and you know me, I’d probably want to change things up probably sooner rather than later.

    For the past 3 months I’ve been living with my sister. I’ve rented out my condo to try and save money and it’s been a big help financially. I miss having my own place and having my own space but it’s actually not bad living with my sister. I get to see my parents more which isn’t always a good thing but it’s nice to not always come home to an empty place even if I do like my solitude.

    At the moment, I almost feel like I’m halfway to becoming an actual adult. I’ve been taking driving lessons for about a month now and while I’m still a bit hesitant behind the wheel I feel like I’ve taken an important step in adding to my independence. There’s a lot — I mean A LOT — of stuff I would rather be doing than driving but it’s an important skill that I think I’ve put off learning for too long.

    Part of my motivation for learning how to drive was an upcoming trip I’ll be taking this summer. Unlike Europe where we travelled by plane, train, bus, and foot everywhere this time around we’ll have the luxury of a car. Not only do I think having more than one able driver is just practical for a road trip but I would feel bad not being able to do my fair share of driving. That’s not to say I’ll be driving half of the time! If I even pass my road test I’ll still be a newbie driver and of all places I would not want to drive in the US; however, I can at least get behind the wheel if need be.

    Speaking of travel this summer… so, yes, I will be going on a road trip in the US for about a month. As much as we would have liked to, it won’t be an epic cross country trip. However, I’m sure it will be so much fun! We’ll spend time in Florida before exploring the west coast and doing the majority of the “road tripping” part of the trip there and ending up back in Vancouver. I’ll be home for a few days tying up loose ends, showing my friend a bit of Vancouver, and saying goodbye to friends and family before we’re off again to travel back to Iceland!

    As mentioned in my last blog post, I did apply to the University of Iceland and I’m happy to say that my application was accepted. That is of course only the first part of the process. Since then, I’ve sent off my application to be approved for a student visa so once again it’s just waiting. Regardless, I’ll be in Iceland beginning in August for a few months at least and if it all works as planned, I’ll be attending school at the same time.

    All this being said, I’m definitely going to be blogging more often in the near future. I’ve been requested by friends and family to keep them updated while I’m away and I’ve decided to make a new blog dedicated to my year in Iceland. I’m still going to keep this blog up and post to it but because I started this blog for myself that wasn’t meant to be read by just anybody I’d like to keep them separate. I’m still setting up my new blog so I’ll post the link as soon as it’s ready to go. My goal is to make it a daily travel blog but I’m still not sure how close I will be able to stick to that.

    I probably won’t be blogging much at all during my road trip but count on more posts (hopefully) in the next month and a half and (definitely) starting in August as I experience new and exciting things!

    Category Blogging, Iceland, Travel | Tags: | No Comments

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