Lobster Party 2007

G'day!

Friday June 8th our annual staff lobster party was held at the Bathurst Marina. This is an event that everyone really looks forward to every year (for obvious reasons :). I really debated whether I should attend, considering I'm still on crutches...but my rubber arm was twisted!

Tammy was once again our designated driver, so Jana, Tracy and myself all piled into her Jeep. We were on the road by 5:00. Of course before leaving Miramichi we HAD to make a stop at Tim's (Tammy needed something to drink too afterall..:), and while we were in Douglastown I decided to take a picture of the newest construction. This is the future home of Shoppers Drug Mart..

Once Tammy had her coffee fix, we were on the highway to Bathurst! Seeing how I don't get out much, I was quite camera happy most of the evening. Of course I had to get a shot of the girls on the trip up. Here's Tammy driving...

Jana and Tracy in the backseat sipping on some refreshments... :)

The drive up was quite uneventful picture-wise. The other carload of girls actually saw a moose on the road. We just blasted the tunes and sang, and laughed, and finally we were on the road to the Marina. The houses/cottages along Youghall Beach are out of this world. Some of the most beautiful that I've ever seen! This is one that really caught my eye though, if I could build a house from scratch it would look just like this one...

And finally..we're there!

As we pulled into the parking lot, the first person I saw was my old manager Al(he transferred to Newcastle in December). I haven't seen him since then, so it was nice to have a chat. He was really surprised to see me there!

We were there pretty early, so we immediately went in to claim a table for our group. The Marina is a really nice building, this was my view..

And the view when I turned around.. :) (Told ya I was camera-happy!)

After a few minutes, we realized that the outside deck was open to us as well. It was a beautiful evening, so why were we inside? I decided to abandon ship and head out for some fresh air and more pictures...





Soon after, we were all beckoned inside for the lobster feast! The funny thing? I was having so much fun, I'd almost forgot we were even having lobster. That says a lot! The meal was delicious...mmmm...yummy lobsters...


After the meal, we headed back to the deck until the entertainment started. I snapped a picture of Tammy and Tracy..

A really bad picture of myself (I look a little looped in this one)..which I was! :)

And Jana, who didn't want her picture taken, but too bad! Heh, heh..

Eventually we all went inside. Al was our MC for the night, and after a slideshow, the 50/50 draw (which Jana the lucky bugger won..$220), the festivities began.

These pictures are probably really hard to see (it was too dark), but I figured I'd add them in anyway. First up was a crazy bunch dressed up with garbages over the top half of their bodies and the bottom half clothed to look like..well, I don't know what the looked like actually! Anyway, they danced around and everyone had a great laugh at them...


After that, another group did "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire"...our group won! :) The prize...a whole pile of lotto tickets. So, we may become millionaires yet, ha ha!

The final bit was "Deal or No Deal" and they did an awesome job. It was hilarious! Here's Howie...

The prize board..lots of money to be won! Heh heh..

Here comes the "North Shore Models"..with their "suitcases"...

One of the funniest models.. :)

Once that stuff was overwith it was time to draw for doorprizes, and then the dance started. Tammy and I both won a magnum of champagne! Tammy doesn't drink, so she cracked hers open right away and we gave it a good home. I'm surprised the people that ran the bar there didn't complain!

Kinda funny seeing crutches and champagne together isn't it? Let me tell ya, the two don't mix very well! :)

Anyhew, we stayed on till almost midnight. We were one of the last groups to leave, suprise, surprise! All in all I had a blast! The only two complaints I have is the wet tile in the bathrooms (not fun on crutches), and not being able to dance (again, the damn crutches). Other than that it was great to get out, and especially great to spend time with my co-workers again! I missed you guys, and can't wait to get back in action!

Till next time,

Liss :)

Summer Is On It's Way!

Hello everybodee!

It's been awhile! The fact that my life is not too exciting lately, and that I've become addicted to Facebook, has kinda kept me away from my blogs. I figured I should do some kind of an update anyway, so here goes..

The past month and a half I've mostly spent housebound with the occasional drive and many trips to physiotherapy. Nothing very exciting. Things are progressing along much better now, especially since I've been given the OK to take off my "bionic brace" when exercising. I'm scheduled to start back to work on June 18th, (restricted work for the first 2 weeks though), so hopefully all goes well. I can't wait to get back to my old routine!!!

The rest of this post will just be some pictures that I took recently. First up is this crazy picture I snapped of my cat Teddy. He was in "mid-meow"..ha ha..



I figured I should add some pictures of Katie-Pooh since I mentioned her dilemma in my last entry. She's gotten much better, unfortunately she still has a tilted head. You can see how she holds it sideways in these pictures..poor girl!


This is a picture I took today standing inside of the kitchen. Because I'm special needs for a little while yet, and I'm really loving my deck, Darcy made a few additions. :) A ramp, and some handrails! Now, I can go in and out as often as I want throughout the day with no help..woo hoo!

Had to take a pic of our gravity chairs, these are the most comfortable things to sit in EVER!

The patio set..

And last but certainly not least, my handsome dude Mitch!


So, that's it for now! This coming weekend a whole crew of us are heading to the camp, (my first time since February). I'm really looking forward to it! I'll be sure to take lots of pictures and post them on the camp blog, it's been neglected too..

Take care everyone!

Liss :)

My "Overdue Update"

Howdy everyone!

Hope everyone is doing well...sorry it's taken me a long time to update! Figured it was time to fill ya all in on what's been happenin' the past month, and for those of you who already know..feel free to skip on through! :) So, here goes..

I finally had my ACL reconstruction surgery on March 16th. I was admitted to the hospital where I remained bed-ridden until March 21st. It sucked! I wish the doctor would have explained beforehand about being bed-ridden, that was something I did not expect. Maybe I could have prepared myself a little better for it...then again, I probably would have been even more nervous (if that's possible). Relying on nurses for absolutely everything that you need is just no fun! I am SO glad the whole ordeal is overwith.

Apparently the surgery went well. I've since seen the surgeon, who checked on his work and removed the staples from my knee. He says so far, so good! The scar(s) shouldn't be too bad, not that I really care anyway...hey, they don't call me "FrankenLiss" for nothing! I now have to wear my "bionic brace" constantly..even when I sleep! Not sure if I'll ever get used to it...it's so annoying! It has dials on the sides which can be set for "degrees of fluctuation" in my knee. I'm currently at 30 degrees, and it's supposed to move up 10 degrees every week until I reach 90 degrees. Exciting huh? :) This week I start back to physio..today is my first day actually! I'm really excited to get back, and it'll be nice to go outside again..ha ha! Approximately eleven weeks left on crutches..I'm hoping I'll get rid of the damn things sooner than that though.

I'd like to again thank all of my friends and family for everything...the hospital visits, the phone calls, the get-well wishes, the gifts, the flowers, cards..just everything! The time I spent in the hospital is quite a blur (thanks to my morphine injections..:)..so, sometimes I forget what I even talked to people about when they visited me! And I thought I was handling it so well! LOL

The other thing I should mention is my poor dog..Katie Pooh! She's been having some major health problems lately. The other night she had some kind of "spell"..and began walking like she was drunk, head tilted to one side, falling down..practically paralyzed. We figured she'd had a stroke, she is nine years old now! It was late so we put her on the couch and I stayed up with her all night till we could get her to the vet in the morning. I figured they'd put her to sleep for sure, I was SO upset! Saying goodbye was so hard, especially since I couldn't go to the vet's. The vet did a bunch of tests, and it turns out she's gonna be OK. She has something called "Canine Vestibular Disease"...something she should recover from. Apparently symptoms can last anywhere from 3 days to 3 weeks. All she needs is some TLC, and the vet says we should see a big improvement each day. He was right! She's able to walk again, even climb the steps on the deck outside by herself. She's eating again too, but her head is still tilted to one side. Poor thing! Hopefully she'll get better soon..

Mitch brought home his report card yesterday and is doing very well! I'm very proud of him this year..he managed to bring his marks up in 3 of his classes. He's looking forward to his summer vacation already though..heh heh! Here he is looking for vacation, and I'm looking to go back to work! :)

Anyway..still no photos of me..maybe someday I'll take some pics! Not! :) Believe me, you're not missing much! My friend Rick decided to get creative and make his own picture of me. He was worried it might be in "bad taste"..but I think it's hilarious! I may as well laugh, feels better than crying! I should give ya a bit of info though; Rick said that when he heard how long my surgery lasted, he began to wonder what else they may have fixed on me. He and another friend of mine, Brian, got to talkin' and Brian came up with "termi-knee-tor"..and the rest is history!!! :)



Well, that's all for now!

"I'll Be Back..."

Liss :)

Muddlin' Through...

Hi everyone!

Well..this is amazing! I did my camp blog post, and figured it was about time to update this blog too. Two posts in one day! I'm on a roll...ha ha!

Unfortunately, I really don't have too much to talk about. Life has been pretty tame for me the past few weeks. I'm pretty sure everyone knows about my "mishap"..so I won't bother explaining all of those details. I will give ya's a brief update on what's been happening the past week though (for those of you I haven't talked to on email and MSN).

Ummm..where to start? I had day surgery on Feb 15th, which was basically just a scope of my knee to assess the damage. They also cleaned out the debris in there, and clipped off broken cartilage. They discovered that I severed my ACL ligament, which is apparently not a good thing. It's located underneath the kneecap and connects the bottom leg bones to the top leg bones. I'm now waiting to have another surgery to replace that ligament, and will be the proud recipient of a "donor" ligament. The tentative surgery date is March 26th. Till then I have to undergo lots of physiotherapy which I started this past Friday. I was a little nervous about the physio, but it's really great! I'm learning lots of new stuff, and actually looking forward to my next appointment on Monday. It's also nice to get out of the house...startin' to get a bit "shack wacky"! The doctor said I'll be on crutches for approximately 12 weeks following my next surgery, so it looks like I won't be walking until the end of June! That sucks...but things could always be worse!

Before I move off of this topic, I wanted to give a huge "THANK YOU" to all of my family, friends and co-workers. Everyone has been so kind, helping out with daily stuff, bringing food, gifts, the list goes on! I consider myself one lucky girl to have such amazing people in my life...thank you all! :)

So, that's enough of that. As far as pictures..sorry folks! No photos of Liss in this condition, cameras are an absolute no-no in this house right now! :)

Instead, I started going through my picture folder and decided to post a random bunch of pictures. None of these are related in anyway (well, some are)..but mostly they are just shots that I like and didn't get to include in previous posts. Some are pictures that I scammed off of Mom's camera, and since she hasn't been posting pictures I figured I may as well go ahead! Sorry Mom! :)

This first picture was actually taken by Kim on the day we left for the Stones concert, but it's very appropriate for this point in time. If you were to walk into my house at any given moment (in the past 2 weeks), this is probably how you'd find Darcy...

He has unfortunately become "Molly Maid", and now does all of the laundry, dishes, cooking...well, just about everything! He's been a trooper about the whole thing, wish I could be more help, but such is life!

Recently Colleen sent me some pictures too! I absolutely love this picture of Daniel..he's growing up SO fast!

And here's a cute one of Coll and Daniel, taken during Christmas at her parent's house...

Melanie came over for a visit with Ben a few weeks ago, and when she was bundling him up to leave I had to take a picture. Nothing cuter than babies bundled up in snowsuits! Hee hee..

This is a picture that Mom took of Mitch at her house...not often I get a half decent picture of him (without his hair hanging in his face, or him making a face)..so I really wanted to include it. I just wish it wasn't so blurry..

Nick and Kari had some fun with Mom's camera this past fall..these were taken in Mom's backyard. I really like all three pictures, so I included them all...



Another pic from Mom..heh heh! This was taken at Halloween, Nick and Kari actually won a prize at the Opera House...cool costumes!

Here's Matt and Karine with Mom's cat Rosie in her lap...taken at Mom's when they were home at Christmas..

This bunch of pictures were all taken at my Nan's house on Christmas Day. I didn't have my camera with me, so thanks Mom!


I should explain this one a little better. Every year it's tradition to have Christmas dinner at Nan's and when we were kids, they always got a shot of the five grandchildren together. This is the first time in MANY years that all of us were together, so we had to pose. That's my cousin Jen sitting beside me on the back of the couch, and her brother Mike sitting beside Matt...

We also celebrate Nick's birthday on Christmas day..so here he is with his cake. The look on his face is hilarious..

This last one is of Ben and I at Mom's house on New Year's Eve (we were babysitting for Mel and Jody)...


So, that's it for now. As the title says, I'm "muddling through", and making a little more progress everyday. This past Saturday morning, Kim, Darcy, Mitch and I looked through two boxes of really old pictures. What a laugh! Why am I mentioning this? Well...the 'ol scanner is gonna get lots of use this week, because my next post is going to be a trip down "Memory Lane". Now, that should be good for a laugh! Heh heh!

Take care everyone!

Liss :)

The 24th Annual "Silver Bedpan" Curling Bonspiel

Howdie everyone!

This past Saturday my Mom invited us to curl in the hospital bonspiel, otherwise known as "The Silver Bedpan". For the past few years the turnout has been pretty low for the event, (last year there were only 14 teams). Since Mom was organizing it this year she told everyone that planned to attend to bring someone along. Much to her surprise 28 teams registered, which was awesome!

It was held at the new curling club which is located at French Fort Cove. I believe it's called the "Eco-Center", or something like that. It's a beautiful building, my only complaint is there's no bathrooms upstairs! :(

Before I get into pictures (which I have lots of), I wanted to explain how Mom set up the bonspiel. Each team had to play 3 games throughout the day, only 4 ends each. Then there was the complicated "points system"..heh heh! If you won the game, you got 4 points. A tie was 2 points. Each end that you won, was worth 2 points, and a blank end (no score) was a point for each team. Oh, and you also got points for the spread between the final score, which maxed out at 3 points. Still following me here? :) So, basically the most points you could possibly get for one game is 15. I normally wouldn't bother with all of this info, but it'll come into play later on in the story!

Mom set up the teams, so she put Darcy, Nick, Kari and I together with Darcy skipping. Mom skipped her own team which included my Nan and two of her co-workers from the hospital. Mom also made the mistake of putting her team against our team for the very first game..heh heh!

Here's a picture of our team when we first arrived on Saturday morning...

We had to wait a little while to play our first game, since there were already people on the ice. So, I wandered around and took a few pictures. This is a shot of the rink from the upstairs..

Everyone waiting to play...I really dig the look on Mom's face in this picture! Darcy is totally oblivious! :)

This is a shot of the entrance to the building. It's nice, but really bare! They desperately need to display some stuff there..

A picture of the "prize table", there were actually enough prizes for everyone to get something which was nice.

The coveted "Silver Bedpan" trophy..ha ha!
After taking those pictures, it was time to play! I must say, we played a great game! You have to remember that it was Nick and Kari's second time curling and Darcy and I haven't curled in years and years. We kicked Mom's butt..and she wasn't too impressed! At one point she was even yelling down the ice to Darcy saying, "Don't you skunk me Darcy!"..ha ha! We ended up finishing with 15 points, which put us at the top of the pack right from the get-go. Not too shabby!

Between games we hung out upstairs, had a few beers, and talked strategy! Not! No strategy for us..well not really! :) Here's everyone sittin' around..

This picture has a story behind it. Kari had to ask for the day off work to play, and this picture is the proof that she was actually in a curling bonspiel and playing for a silver bedpan. Look at Nick's face..hee hee!

A picture of the bar, and there's Mom looking out the window thinking up her future strategy..:) Couldn't resist Mom!

And here's what happens when Darcy has the camera...the next two shots are up close and personal!


Soon, it was time to hit the ice for game #2. We faired not too bad actually, we played against a team that also had 15 points. I must admit the competitive streak was coming out and we were all a bit worried. We managed to win the game and pick up 11 more points! Woo hoo! Once all of the teams had finished their second game we were in 2nd place. However, our final game was against the top team who was going into it with 30 points!

We decided to have a few more beers while we waited (don't think that helped our game much)! But hey..it's all for fun right? Kim showed up during the last game, so we have some actual shots of us in action..heh heh! Thanks for the pics Kim!

This is my Nan getting ready to throw her rock. She never ceases to amaze me, she's so "hip" for her age (and I won't mention your age Nan..no worries)!

This is one of my favorite pictures..Mom getting totally annoyed with Darcy! Hee hee..

The next few are of Mom and her team..



These next couple were taken right before our last game. This one of Nick and I cracks me up, Nick looks so serious! I think he was busy scoping out the competition...

And this is my team saying a prayer before we begin our last game..ha ha! Priceless!

The next bunch of pictures pretty much speak for themselves, so I won't bother explaining..







So, when it was all said and done, WE LOST! :( We did play a pretty good game though. We actually picked up 2 points on the first end, another point on the 2nd end, and then they took a point on the 3rd end. I thought we might actually win, especially since we had a 2 point lead, but they stole 3 points in the last end. We choked! But, we were still pretty happy with ourselves. Overall we came in 4th place, which is pretty good considering there were 28 teams.

After that game, we headed home to get cleaned up and have a few drinks before the prize ceremony and dance later on that evening. It was decided that Mom would cram all of us in her car since we were all drinking, so it was a tight squeeze! Darcy took the hatchback again, a replay of the "Stones Rescue"!

The prizes were awarded by random draw, (except for the top team). Mom was MC for the evening..here's a pic of her doing her duty..

Nick's name was the second one called, and I know Kim mentioned this in her post, but I have to say it again (it's too funny)! If you know Nick at all, he's the world's worst decision maker (not including me of course)! He stood at that prize table forever! About 20 more people went up to pick prizes and still, he was there browsing through everything. Everybody noticed and was laughing at him! Here's a picture of him trying to decide..

Finally he made a decision, which got a round of applause from the crowd! This is what he came back with..and he doesn't even drink coffee!

Darcy and Kari both got metal stools, but for some reason Darcy decided to pose with Mom's prize..

For the first time in history I made a quick decision and grabbed the hot pink rubbermaid container. :)


Once the prizes were all handed out, Mom had to give up the microphone (and I think she was more than happy to)! Gordioke Karaoke took over, and I have to say that this guy can really sing! He puts on a great show, and even has lots of props for people to use (wierd hats, plastic instruments, hula hoops)..lots of stuff! If any of you saw that picture of Nick playing the guitar on Kim's blog, you'll know what I mean when I say it makes for some great entertainment! I couldn't resist getting some video of Gordie singing, he was really awesome. I've decided to leave out the video of the other people singing (figured I'd spare ya that much..ha ha). So to see Gordie you can click here and here!

A great time was had by all, thanks for the invite Mom! By 11:00, we decided to head back to the house, and Dad offered to pick all of us up. It was a tight squeeze, but we managed to fit somehow! We carried the party on till the wee hours of 4:30am, and had a blast! :)

So, that's it for now! I'm sure nothing exciting will be happening till our next camp trip which is not for a couple of weeks. Till then, take 'er easy everybody!

Liss :)