Birthdays!

Today is my birthday (Chris), and we're renting a car.
Aimee said to me, "what do you want to do?" and I replied "Drive".
Aimee has a job interview tomorrow too, so it's going to be convenient to be able to drive her there.

I've just realised something else I need for my birthday - towels.
I only brought 2 with me, but they were older and even with regular washing they smell a bit.
It was also highlited last week when we went swimming at Canada's wonderland and my towel went missing while we were in line for the waterslide. Fortunately it turned up exactly where we'd left it, an hour later. Somebody had simply 'borrowed' it.

Yesterday we celebrated 2 other birthdays. The 2 females in this house both have their birthdays on July 30th, and since yesterday was my birthday in NZ we had a triple celebration. Cookies and Cream cake, ice cream... mmmm, drool


Anyway, that brings me to my next order of business. Things I miss about NZ;

1. Familiarity. Knowing who you are, where you are, where to go and how to get there.
Edit: This includes family and friends of course! Hi sis!

2. My bike.

3. My car. It wasn't much, but it was mine and took me where I needed to go.

4. Steak and cheese pies. Being part of the commonwealth means there is a lot of british influence, so we can get Fish and Chips at quite a few locations and it is actually fish and chips, but there's still no pies.

5. Pizza. Now you may say "but Toronto is half Italian so how?" and I say,
"when you're limited to 2 toppings, and one of them has to be pepperoni, that's not pizza".

6. My computer and a decent internet connection. While people bitch and moan about Telecom's poor speed, I was pretty happy with my 5mbps download ADSL line thanks very much. Here most people are on cable, and out in the 'burbs we've got a stunning 256kbps line.
I also have to line up to use Aimee's laptop. When I get a job and move into my own place that's the first thing on my shopping list, desktop computer with a 22-30" widescreen.

7. Jaffas. We can get most things Cadbury and Nestle here, but haven't seen Jaffas anywhere.

8. A job. Looking forward to getting a job, getting to meet and work with real Canadians and finding out all the little differences in our culture.

9. Coffee. Although i'm not really a big coffee drinker, I miss all the cafe's of wellington. Here if you want anything other than straight black coffee, you're limited to Starbucks or Tim Hortons.
Timmy's was Canadian owned and is a combination of Starbucks, Dunkin donuts and Subway.


Movies I've seen lately; Harry Potter, Transformers, Fantastic Four. All of them I'd rate about 7/10.

DVDs you need to see soon;

Who killed the Electric Car. An excellent expose on electric cars and how the car and oil companies are working so hard to keep them from getting to mass market.
It's totally changed my views on it all. DON'T buy a hydrogen car unless you also intend to buy a kit to make hydrogen at home.
Go get a hybrid. We had a ride in a Prius in Vancouver. Brilliant cars and all the American car companies are saying "How can Toyota be making any money" to try and stop people from buying them.

Then once you're done with that DVD, watch An Inconvenient Truth. Al Gore makes a lot of very good points in his filmed lecture about the science behind global warming.

Right, I've got to go now and pick up our rental car. A gas guzzling V6.