Christmas time, mistletoe and wine...

Well....if you replace the word 'wine' with the word 'whiskey', and the word 'mistletoe' with the words 'selection boxes and crackers', you might have a more accurate account of our Christmas :)

Despite having to work Christmas Eve and Stephen's Day, Christmas was fantastic! Denise was off work from the 22nd, so we both went to an office Christmas party of hers in the middle of the day on the 23rd. We didn't stay too long :P After I finished work on Christmas Eve, we had a quick dinner and headed off to Christmas Mass. We were half an hour late...damn Cathedral is so far away. And we had to sneak into the back with bags of saucepans and bottles and such clattering around with us. The lads needed more pots to cook Christmas dinner, so we were helping :) After Mass we went straight to the lads and the revelary started! We spent a while there before heading out to a club, called The Roxy. I headed home then because I was to call the family in the morning, and if I didn't go then I would have missed the last Skytrain :( Also I have a bit of a headcold on me, so I thought it best if I tried to get a good nights sleep. Denise had a great night out though!

Woke up Christmas Day and ran down to the call-box in the cold to call the family. Spent about an hour on the side of the road talking to them. Waited ages for Denisheen to get home then :P I felt that the heads in that house were probably a bit sore that morning, so I ventured over at about 4 in the day, even though dinner was supposed to be at 2 or 3 ;) Anywho, preparations were well underway by the time I arrived. Christmas dinner turned out to be epic! The food was gorgeous! And we made short work of it! :)

We panned out on the couch then for the rest of the night. The couch that is epic. There is now even a sign up in the window of the flat, pointing down and saying: We have an epic couch. :D I stayed over that night coz I missed the last Skytrain, Denise had gone home earlier to change and missed the last Skytrain back in! :P Anywho, Stephen's Day I went off to work....bleurgh. Afterwards I had planned on going back ove rto the lads and heading out with them, Denise was there already, but I didn't feel very well on Stephen's Day, so i decided to stay home and nurse my tummy :P

Felt much better the next day so I went over and we all had another day on the epic couch. We stayed that night coz we missed the last Skytrain, again! Forgetting it was a Sunday, so they stopped earlier. Monday we cleaned up the flat and bit and came home and cleaned up a bit, before heading out to Mass.

After that we went back to the lads and went ICE-SKATING!! :D It was so cool!! We didn't have much time on the ice coz by the time we got there itw as almost closing, but considering it was only $3 we think it was money well spent for a few laps around :) Conor, one of the Dublin lads, was in fine form, windmilling around the rink, bringing down one or 2 people, and nearly getting the shite beat out of him coz of it :D

Not much done yesterday, I went to work and Denise shopped, cooked and cleaned. I came home then and we and Lynch, another of the lads, watched Love Actually for the night. I was...there;s no othre word for it...epic :)

Think that's our Christmas pretty much condensed! If anymore comes to me I'll be sure and fill ye in! :)
Hope ye all had a great Christmas and HAPPY NEW YEAR to everyone!!
See ye in 2010!!

Hugs! Denise & Jo xxxx

Snow all gone :(

Well after my last post we did have another day or 2 of snow. It was so cool! :) It was really light and powdery, not like any crappy snow you'd get at home ;) It's all gone now though, and it's been mostly raining, and surprisingly warm(-ish), the last while.

Well Denise is back tonight! She, on the other hand, had LOADS of snow where she was, in Vernon!! And she was freezing! The dote going around in all weathers for work; well, she has to keep me somehow ;)

I got a job doing security for the Olympics :) Doing training on the 6th and 7th of Jan., and the jobs start on the 22nd of Jan., but I might not neccessarily be starting that day. I think I'll get my schedule after training. I'm delighted though! The pay and benefits are so much better than where I am now! It'll be fun! :) ...So if any of ye are planning on coming over to see any of the Games in Van, just let me know and I'll work my newly acquired magic ;)

In the place that I'm in, they took on 3 seasonal staff, yours truely being one of them. We knew starting that they would probably be keeping one of us full-time after Christmas. Today the manager offered the position to me...HA!! I so knew I'd get that offer! Mostly coz I'm so much better and cooler than the other 2 they hired. :P Won't be taking it though, since I got the Olympic thing, which is so much better pay. I'm working straight through to Christmas day now. And Stephen's Day :(

Not much other newsies methinks. We both got some parcels from home, which was exciting :) I haven't opened mine yet. I don't know am I just waiting for Denise to get home, or for Christmas morning :P But a huge thank you to those who sent parcels and cards for Christmas. We really do appreciate them so much. Thank you so much. xx

Bought some Christmas lights too, so at least the place looks slightly festive :) Sent Christmas cards and stuff to family during the week, so hopefully anyone I sent them to will get them before Christmas...or in the case of home, before the 29th! ;)

That's all I can think of for now. I'm going to shtick the kittle on for Denisheen!

Hugs to all,
Denise & Jo xXx

Good news/Bad news

Good news: Denise has been here all week!! :) It's been great to have her here again :)
Bad news: Denise has to go away again next week :( It's gonna suck not to have her here for another 5 days :(

Not much been happening since last time. It's still horribly cold, and there was a small bit of snow on the ground today! That was pretty cool to see!! The novelty of it all! Lol! Hopefully we'll get to see a bit more! :)

Denise's boyfriend, Anthony, is arriving tonight for a visit. That'll be a break to the norm :)

I got a call this week to go for an interview next Wednesday with a security company for the Olympics. I'm very happy about that! :) If I get it I'll be getting paid twice as much as what I'm getting now. And apparently they give you a big ski jacket and all stuff to keep you warm and you get to keep them!! Woot! :D

Can't really think of any other newsies at the moment to be honest. Bit tired after work tonight :P I'll update ye when I can think of anymore :)

Miss ye loads,
Hugs, Denise & Jo xXx

Brrrrr.......-naby

Oh it is really getting cold now! But still, poor Denisheen has it worse this week. The place she is is about -6C every day. But she'll be home on Saturday (woot!!), so not long left of it now! There's loads of snow where she is too, and she promised to bring me some back in a box, so I'm very excited about that! :P It will get colder here though!! :(

Not much happening this week. I went to a staff meeting on Sunday. It was supposed to last 3hrs but we were done in an hour and we get paid for the 3...score! Canadians are so weird though, when the manager said we were finished and was there anything else we wanted to talk about or do, instead of everyone jumping up to go home, the suggestions were things like: Can we do skits where we deal with customer problems? Or: How about we clean the store a bit? Do some mopping and dusting? ...What is wrong with these people??! Let's go HOME people!! Which we eventually did, minus the skits and cleaning :P

I started work on Monday. Longest 5 and a half hours of my life. The shop has ok clothes, but they're very expensive brands, so not a lot of customers come in. It's so boring all day. And I hate how pushy you have to be with the customers, it's totally against the Irish culture, it's hard to get into it coz you feel pushy and mean being in the customer's face all the time, but apparently that's what they want! :P The days will be quite long methinks, and it's just boring coz I have no responsibility at all in the shop. There's even only a certain amount of the team allowed/trained to use the till, so I won't even be on the till. It's literally just being on the floor helping out customers...well at home, people aren't idiots. They can find what they want themselves, and if they can't or if they have a problem, they ask. But here....I don't know how people put up with the staff being in their face the whole time!! Oh yeah, and the staff get such a kick out of imitating the Irish accent; and getting it completely wrong...next time they do it I think I'm just gonna punch them in the face...that'll learn 'em ;) ...I seem to be developing a very very short fuse with these people...hmmm :P

Anywho! I was off the rest of the week and I'm off tomorrow (Friday) as well. Working Saturday and Sunday. Hopefully it'll be a bit busier on the weekends. So did nothing very exciting or productive all week. Can't wait for Denise to get back!!! :D :D :D I know she's freezing her arse off up there!

Hope everyone is keepng well at home. Miss ye all loads!
Chat soon! Hugs!!
Slán! Denise & Jo xXx

Mad as a hatter...

That would be me :P
Fantastic news!! Denise got that job!! So she's been working away very hard this week, out in all sorts of weather, going door to door trying to get people to sign up for some energy bill savings thing... :P She's going away for a week starting Monday for work as well; a team goes to a different area and tries to sell stuff there.

I haven't started work yet, so I've been stuck on my own in the house all this week, and going absolutely insane from boredom! :P I hope I get to start work on Monday and have lots to do next week so I won't be in the house too much on my own again with no Denise :(

Not much else to report, since been doing nothing all week :P

Hope everyone is well, missing ye loads!
Hugs!!
Caoi, Denise & Jo xXx

Rain rain go away...

Hello people!

Sorry we haven't written in so long...our bad :(

So! Since we last spoke...I got a job!!! Woot!! :D Haven't started it yet, coz I couldn't till I got my bank account set up, but I did that today (5th time I've gone in to do it >:| ), so that's another woot!! ;D It's in a clothes shop in that giant shopping center I was telling ye about. I have to go to a meeting this Sunday, so I guess I'll be starting soon after that. It had to have been the dumbest interview I was ever at; it was a group interview with 5 people, and it lasted all of 5mins, and the last question they asked us was: If you could be any animal, what would you be and why? ........... exactly. But feck it, it will do for now anyway :) It seems slightly better than the first place I was gonna be hired in; I felt like the shop was being run by children. I felt so much older than both the assistant manager, and the manager...probably because they were both such airheads...anywho. I asked the manager in this shop what the weekly hours would be, and she said, 'eeeemmmm, well it's kinda up to you guys really...' You gotta love the high level of professionalism in this country :P

Today Denise is at a kinda trial thing for a job. It's in a sales company, selling energy or natural gas or something along those lines :P She's in 11-8 learning about the company and learning how to do the job and all, and if she impresses her supervisor, she'll get hired! :) So fingers crossed! Even if it doesn't work out, she has another interview tomorrow morning in another clothes shop in that giant mall. So lots of options still! :)

Not much other news methinks...it's raining all the time, but I know we really can't complain what with the state of things at home at the moment :( I hope everyone we know is safe and dry and that yer houses or anything weren't damaged in the last weeks.

Well, I'm off to put on some dinner for a working Denise for when she comes in :)
Caoi for now! :)
Hugs, Denise & Jo xXx

Productive Day!! :D

We had a very proactive day today! :) We went into town in the morning and got our Social Insurance numbers, then went to the bank and got appointments to set up our accounts, which is really weird, but it's only tomorrow , so we don't have to wait long :)

After, we bought lasagne for dinner and went home to put it in the fridge and heat up with some soup before heading into town (Burnaby) to go job-hunting! We found our way to Metropolis at Metrotown, and...Oh. My. God. That place is the so frickin HUGE!!!!! You can't even comprehend how expansive it is unless you actually see it, but it just goes on and on and on and on and it never ends!!! There was a good few places with signs up looking for staff and we fired our resumes into loads of places! It was a very productive day! We were wrecked after walking around that giant mall, and Denise's legs are sore, but we think we did good :)

Another highlight of the day was that it wasn't raining, woot!! So we got home and had our lasagne and just chillaxed for the rest of the evening. I missed some calls though :( I bet they were shops calling about interviews...damn jeggings having no pockets!! >:( My phone was down in my room! :(

My bed is still killing me! I can't wait to get a new one!!

Plans for tomorrow: town for the Ireland vs. France match, that'll be 12.00 here, the our bank appointment, then probably print more resumes and see what we can do with them :)

It would be great to hear from you guys! Leave a comment or FB or something please!! Missing everyone :(

Till next time,
Hugs, Denise & Jo xXx

Another lazy Sunday

Oh the laziness is fabulous!! Didn't really leave the house today, but it was pi**ing rain anyway, so we were as well off :)

Got some neccessaties done anyway: we managed to finally work our shower and our washing machine, so we now have clean us and clean clothes, woot! :) Talked to families today too, and I sorted my 'resumé' (as they call it here) out a bit too for tomorrow. It's still a load of shite tough! Lol! ;D The plan for tomorrow is to head to a job center where they will clean up our resumés for us and we get free prints too we think :) We'll start firing them out to everywhere then. Wish us luck!

Had a Tayto sandwich and a mug of Barry's before bedtime...nothing like a taste of home to give you sweet dreams :)

I'll let ye know how we get on tomorrow. Till then,
Caoi caoi!! Hugs, Denise & Jo xXx

p.s. I wanna say a huge farewell and good luck to my Dawnie who is heading off for 4 months of travelling today!! You'll have an amazing time chick! I'm so jealous!! You're gonna rock Oz, Kiwi-land, Figi and Vegas! ;D Safe travels!! I'll be thinking of you, so stay in touch! :D xxxxxxx

New living quarters

Too tired to write much tonight, but we've successfully moved into our new apartment...woot! It's super warm except for the kitchen, but we have a little portable heater for there. We have to buy a few things for the kitchen, and in the weeks to come, I really want to get a new mattress for my bed, coz the one I have is really sore :( But other than that I don't think we have many complaints :)

We went back to the Irish pub, Doolans, beside the hostel to watch the match today. It was on at 12.00p.m here, so the drinking started early! Which inevitably meant we were home early enough too. That's ok though :) We got a salt and pepper for the kitchen out of it......

Sleep in day planned for tomorrow, then maybe a proper look around Burnaby, where we live now. It's super cold here, but it will get colder! :(
Serious starting looking for jobs on Monday. Wish us luck!! ;D
Hugs, Denise & Jo xXx

Thursday with J

Well last night we ended up not going out. Certain members of our party (Denise :P ) were feeling tired, so we said we'd take a rain check :P

We met up with our friend Jeannine from Galway today! It was so good to see her and catch up! And we had a great time; we went out to Granville Island, which has loads of little shops and markets on it. It's a tiny place, but very cute, and we really enjoyed it.

After we dropped J back to the train station, we did a few shops and then just back to the hostel for the evening. We ate dinner in that Doolans place again, it's really growing on me, the food is lovely!!!

Heading down to the bar downstairs now. See if there's any craic tonight, but I'm kinda tired this time, so if anything's going on I think it'll be an early one for me ;) Just in a trackie a film mood tonight!

Hopefully moving into our new place tomorrow!!! :D

Next post from there then ;)
Till then!
Hugs, Denise & Jo xXx

Everybody loves Chris

Not much done today. We had a bit of a lie in this morning, then did pretty much nothing all day only go out for lunch :P

We met Denise's boyfriend's friend tonight in an "Irish pub", Doolans, for dinner though. He's a local, and was very helpful, giving us loads of tips and advice on good accommodation, jobs, areas to go out, etc. He was so helpful! :)

We tried going down to a place called Ceilis afterwards, where they have $1.00 beer for a limited time tonight, but the queue was really long and going nowhere and it was super cold. So we called it quits and came back to the hostel for one. Think we'll try another club or bar in a while now. They're all so close to the hostel, it's so convenient!! :) Here's hoping we get in somewhere and have a good night! :)

We're meeting our friend from Galway, Jeannine, tomorrow morning. I can't wait!! :) It'll be so good to see her again and catch up :)

Haven't heard back from Whistler yet, and if we don't by tomorrow evening I think we're just gonna take that place here in Van. I'm still kinda holding out ridiculous hope that we'll hear back with some miraculous offer/help and we'll get to go up there...wishful thinking methinks...

Ah well
Till next time, caoi! :)
Hugs, Denise & Jo xXx

One week anniversary

We've been away from home one week today!! It seems sooooooooo much longer!!!!

So today was finally a productive day!!! :) We looked up so many places to live, and janey is Vancouver big!!! It's so hard to get the idea of Galway out of my head; the city spreading out from Shop St./college. There doesn't seem to be a center of Vancouver like that. There is so many areas and zones and districts, and you look at a map and you think somewhere is pretty close by, and then it takes you half an hour on a train to get there!! :P

We ended up getting to see 2 places today, but we contacted others and we have another list of people to ring tomorrow. The first place we saw was gorgeous!! It's a 2 bedroom basement suite (thanks J! ;) ), it's within our price range, it includes all utilities, and it has a train station near it, and a shopping center and loads of shops. It seems pretty convenient actually :) Even the bus out to it passes Grafton St., which makes us think we're at home! ;) The only downside is that it has no couch, but I'm sure we could pick one of them up easy enough, or 2 massive bean bags at the very least :) The second place we saw, while closer to Downtown Vancouver, was nowhere near as nice. So I think we're definately giving that one a miss.

We went out for chinese tonight, and it was possibly the best chinese I've ever had!! It was beautiful!!! And we were allowed to order what we wanted!! ;D

We've decided to go to Kelowna on Thursday this week. Just to check it out, see if it appeals to us. If we love it, we'll move there. It's a 10hr round trip, so it better be nice!! :P Hoping to hear some news from Whistler soon too...I'll keep ye updated there :P But there's still a slight possibility we'll get to move there...fingers crossed!! I bet it'd be beautiful! :)

No major plans tonight. We're meeting a friend of Denise's boyfriend tomorrow. He's a local, so he can probably give us loads of tips :)

I'll let ye know how it goes! :)
Chat soon,
Hugs, Denise & Jo xXx

Orientation Session

Well the orientation session this morning was so helpful! Yer wan giving the talk was so cute! She had such a cliché Canadian accent, and she thought that she sounded a bit Irish, which she so didn't. But she was lovely and very helpful :) We didn't do much else all day only look up accommodation in Vancouver, which we kind of seem to have settled on to stay in. I think Denise prefers it here, the atmosphere and convenience and all, and as she says, the mountains are close enough for any weekend ski trips or anything we'd like :)
Only other thing of the day to note is that I bought some Cadbury's chocolate! :P Haven't tasted it yet...wonder if it'll be just like home ;)
Hopefully tomorrow so we'll start viewing places and get one quick enough. I'll let ye know how it goes! Till then, caoi!
Hugs, Denise & Jo xXx

Lazy Sunday

Literally did f-all today. Highlight of my day was seeing a sign in a restaurant we went to that said "Free Air Guitars; Please take one"! I giggled :)
We've decided not to go to Whistler coz accommodation is too expensive and too hard to find. We still have to decide what exactly we are doing. I've been looking up accommodation in Vancouver and in a place called Kelowna, with the help of a few tips from our good friend Jeannine :) Thanks J! ;)
We have our visa orientation session in the morning, so we'll see if that yields anything. Fingers crossed people!
Hugs,
Denise & Jo xXx

San Fran to Vancouver

Well we had an early start yesterday. Got out to the airport on time, only to be told our flight was delayed by 2hrs anyway :P It wasn't too bad though, we did a bit of shopping, I got a San Fran hoodie and shot glass, and Denise got a good book that I promptly stole to read on the plane ;) and a San Fran lighter!

We eventually boarded our plane, only to see that the entire plane was Business Class!! It was so cool!! We had sooooo much leg room, it was great!! We had great entertainment on the flight, like 2 kids in a candy-store, discovering all the cool things our seats did! It was graet fun! :D We were also told that that exact plane had once been hired by U2, so were flying in U2's plane!! Sweet or what! :D

We arrived in Vancouver to the rain...nothing unfamiliar about that :P We checked into our hostel; the room is far too small for Denise's liking, and we don't have an en suite, but sure it's a roof over our heads for a while anyway :) It's clean enough and the staff and fellow hostellers are very nice and friendly. We went for dinner in the Irish Pub across the road, Johnnie Fox's Pub...sound familliar... ;)

We didn't do much then last night. Hung out downstairs at the bar in the hostel. Met some nice Australians...this place is crawling with Australians!! Oh yeah, and there's a girl from Kildare sharing our room...random! But we had mighty craic with our new found Aussies last night playing Ring of Fire before the bargirl came over to tell us drinking games weren't allowed...party-pooper :P Even card ganes weren't allowed she said! AND! Coz of some weird law here, in a place that primarily does food, you have to order something to eat with your second round of drinks...lame. Anyway, we crawled up to bed around half past the twelve. Room was roasting, but Denise fairly conked it anyway! :)

Think that's most of yesterday. Didn't do much today either. Went out for breakfast in a cute little diner. Then back here to the hostel. Moslty looking up accommodation and jobs and the like, but the internet is bitch slow :( Think we'll just have dinner and chill here tonight. It's still raining, so not much incentive to leave the heat of the hostel. It's frickin cold here too!!
Anywho, that's it for now! Chat ye soon!! And leave comments!! It's good to hear from ye :)
Hugs, Denise and Jo xXx

San Fran Day 2

What a f**king day!!! Started off great with breakfast in Denise's new fave restaurant, Lori's Diner, did a bit of shopping then in the usual spots...Tiffany's, Macy's, the largest Ferrari store in America, and Levi's. Then with our numerous purchases (yeah right :P) we went on an open-top bus tour of the city. It was so cool!! Was super cold and windy out on the Golden Gate Bridge, but it was so worth it! We learned so much about the city, that we promptly forgot, and took loads of pics!! :)

After we went back to the hotel for a while where we had mighty craic with the barman, and then we decided to be extremely cultured and go to an art exhibition launch across the street. After that we chilled in the room for a bit before heading for dinner in Chinatown...well. If that one didn't do our f-in heads in!!
...
Denise: I'll have the Chow Mein please.
Me: And I'll have the House Noodles please.
Yer one: No. You want something else.
....
eh...what?!
Yer one: You want the Nanking Chicken special.
...
Denise: Can I not just have the Chow Mein
Me: Yeah, and can I not just have the House Noodles with chicken
Yer one: No.
Denise: Can we not just get a noodle dish with chicken?
Yer one: No. You want a noodle dish, or a chicken dish, or a chicken and noodle dish?
Denise: A chicken and noodle dish.
Yer one: No. You can't have that. The Naking dish very popular. You like that. You should have that.
Me: Fine, I'll just have that.
Denise: Yeah, me too.
Yer one: Wait. You want how many Nanking Specials? One or two?
Me: I want one. And she wants one.
Yer one: No. You should not get that.
....
WTF!!!
Yer one: You get two different dishes. Then you each have it.
Denise: Ok, fine. I'll just take the Chicken Pita Wrap thing. And can we have rice with it. Egg-fried instead of boiled
Yer one: (After much humming and hawing and deliberation) Eeemmm, yeah. Ok.

She was so fecking pushy!! And horrible and rushing us!

Flying out to Vancouver early tomorrow. Hopefully our cases will come with us this time :P
So, till next time! From Canadia!!!
Caoi!! :)

San Francisco

First full day here, lovely weather. Spent most of the day wandering around, acting very touristy as we saw names of things we recognised and stuff ;) Saw a massive amount of sealions! It was so cool! We went to a chocolate tasting place too. And saw Alcatrz and the Golden Gate bridge from a distance ;) This city is so cool!! Got one of the street cars back to the hotel...the hills are insane!!

My cases still haven't arrived from Calgary :( Rang the airport again today, they told me the same shite, that they'll be here soon :P

Denise has been on to an old friend of hers, and we're off out to meet him for dinner now!
Laters!!