Finals, Facebook and Fringe

I finished my final exam yesterday, and now don't have another class until January! I am so close to being done with university and my Art History degree! Now, I can focus on enjoying the last bit of nice weather, working on items for my shop and on this blog.

I created a Facebook page for this blog where you can connect with me on all kinds of things - please 'like' my page and add your blog URL or facebook page link so I can follow you back!


I've been checking out some new-to-me sci-fi and fantasy shows the past few weeks. So far, I've enjoyed watching Fringe the most! I started watching it last year but stopped after a few episodes. Now, it's one of my favourite sci-fi shows. It's so much fun watching shows filmed in this city! Other shows I tried to watch but stopped:
-Rubicon
-Sanctuary
-Pillars of the Earth
and some others, but can't remember. . .
I also started watching Covert Affairs, mainly because of Piper Perabo. I don't know why I'm watching it, really. A show about the C.I.A.?!  I just started watching Stargate Atlantis, which I enjoy so far. I really love Stargate Universe, and look forward to seeing more next month.

Any shows you think that I should check out? I'm into trying new shows these days, before the regular ones I watch return in September.

Post-Birthday

I turned 30 a week ago today and haven't yet reported on how my birthday went!

Due to circumstances beyond my control, I am no longer taking a french course this summer, and therefore had my birthday off from school. I normally would have my Hindi Film (Bollywood) class the next day, a Thursday, but because of the Canada Day holiday, I got it off...and had a nice, 6 day weekend!

One of my gifts was a 'treasure chest' filled, in part, with a gift card for the Sony store to use towards some e-books for my Sony e-book reader, and a card listing the activities we will be enjoying during our mini-break in September! I will talk about budget and planning for that trip on one or some of my Travel Thursday posts. Basically, we will be using up some expiring-soon and other travel points to stay in hotels for free and taking an over-night cruise from Vancouver to Seattle (only 29$ or so!), for a trip to Seattle and down to Portland for a few days. I am so excited, as I had been wanting to go down to Portland for a long time, and I love Seattle.

Since the weather for the entire (mostly) month of June was wretched (muggy and grey), I didn't do much for my birthday outside, like I had wanted to.This picture is from last year, when we went to Victoria, on Vancouver Island (the provincial capital of B.C.) for 2 days.

And I had a picture of the Tardis cake that Greg made me but he made me take it down.

It was a (vegan) Tardis cake made with buttercream frosting, lemon cake and chocolate cake layers. It was delicious! If you don't know, I am a huge Doctor Who (new series, starting in 2005 onwards) fan! No pictures of my birthday party, because I didn't have one. G and I spent the time together and I was served delicious food all weekend!

Being Cultured: Best of the Week

This was the last week of classes for the regular semester! I still have some papers and finals in my future, but the end is in sight!

Best I've seen: Apart from watching quite a lot of The Amazing Race seasons of past, I also watched the last episode of Ugly Betty, which I wrote about here: an Ode to Ugly Betty. I also watched a few episodes of Stargate Universe and will probably watch the rest of the season this week. I also really loved watching episode 2 of the new Doctor Who season!

from ABC.com

from BBC.

Best I've heard: I got a chance to really listen to the Soap and Skin album "Lovetune for Vacuum." I really like it, as it makes me want to watch period dramas and look at costume sites all day (and wouldn't that be a fun way to spend my time, rather than working on my Art History paper?) - and sort of reminds me of Philip Glass a la The Hours. 

Being Cultured: An Ode to Ugly Betty

Bye-Bye Ugly Betty! 
I am quite sad that this show has been cancelled and that the last episode has all ready aired. However, having lasted 4 seasons, I'm not sure how much longer I wanted it to continue given the crazy story-lines and changes that have happened all ready.

Photo from ABC promo pics.

Why I liked the Show: The combination of different characters with different backgrounds, personalities and goals was refreshing. I feel that the characters all had a lot of depth and were fully developed. The series finale wrapped things up well with all main characters yet left some things up to the imagination - such as what happens between  Daniel and Betty.


Character(s) I most liked: Besides Betty, I really liked Christina who used to work at Mode Magazine in the clothing department and who later became a fashion designer in Scotland. I didn't feel like they gave Mark much development early on in the series but later - season 3 when he and Betty get into the YETI program, he and Betty get along much better and we see different sides of him.

Claire and Alexis

Favourite Story-lines: Alex/Alexis played by Rebecca Romijn - I didn't like every single twist with this character but a lot of interesting stories/episodes came out when this character was on the show. I liked when the family had to go to Mexico because Betty's dad almost killed someone and was using a dead person's Social Security Number. I didn't like when Justin (Betty's nephew) was a bad kid after his dad died.


Least Favourite story-lines: The new son - of Claire/Hartley was very boring and unnecessary. I didn't like any of the Henry plots, especially when Charlie and a baby were involved.


And now some Ugly Betty Fashion: The costume designers for the show are Eduardo Castro and Patricia Field (who worked on Sex and the City)

Early Betty Suarez versus later in the series (season 4 she finally gets her braces removed and changes glasses). I think that I have looked just like Betty in both of these pics - my eyebrows are quite thick and I wear glasses and have dark hair. I loved Betty for being so relatable among other things. I found it especially refreshing to not see everyone with contacts on - loved Betty in her glasses. 

Being Cultured: Best of the Week

I watched a great deal of the Amazing Race this week - all of season 14 (12 episodes!), all of season 16 up until current week (6 episodes?) and all of season 15, too. I think it is fair to say that I am pretty obsessed with the show.

Does anyone else watch the show? I love it because I get to see so many different places in the world, and I like to imagine myself doing the challenges...would I pick this or that detour?

Being Cultured: Best of the Week

Best things I watched last week (I forgot to post this last Sunday):
I was completely blown away with the sweet movie Adam, starring Damages' Rose Byrne as the neighbour of a man who has aspergers syndrome. It is a sweet but atypical rom-com that was perfect for my exhausted state of mind on Saturday afternoon while G was at work.
I was disappointed by this week's Private Practice and Grey's Anatomy. Sometimes I wonder why I still watch them. Make it or Break it was great as always this week.

Saturday(yesterday):

We finally checked out the Canamade marketplace in Gastown. The space used to be "Storywum", an interactive look at B.C.'s history. That major attraction only lasted for 2 years. It was expensive and just a bit inaccurate in its portrayal of how B.C. became B.C. Anyhow, the future of the space looks good. If everything works, it will be a series of art studies for various mediums and could be an interesting community space in the heart of the downtown eastside (DTES).

What about the marketplace, though? Well...it was disappointing to say the least. In fact, I am embarrassed that the art within the space is what international visitors saw as representative of Canadian art! I had been looking forward to going to Canamade for months. It was around for the Olympics and then again for the Paralympics, closing today. There are many 'craft' fairs in the city that are temporarily set-up throughout the year. The ones that I have been to have been a lot more interesting and featured much more diverse art and craft.

After going to Canamade, G and I went to check out the Canada Pavilion/Live City Downtown. The lineups were really long for all of the Olympics, so we waited until the last minute to check things out. We went through the lineup and poked around all within 40 minutes. Going to this was another huge disappointment. This is how we want to represent ourselves to visitors?

Hume: Canada's Olympic pavilion an ugly pre-fab dud

Feds' official building is a $10 million architectural portrait of public-sector cynicism  - you can read some of the criticism here and see a short video with some peoples' reactions to this monstrosity. 

CentrePlace Manitoba was also within the same area. You can look at the pavilion here. 


After grabbing a bite to eat at Nuba, we wandered around Robson St. for a bit before heading to an early show at the Media Club. I won tickets for G and I to go to the 'POSTDATA - 
BRIAN BORCHERDT, JULIE FADER' show. I really enjoyed the venue, which I had never been to before, and seeing Julie Fader live. The venue is nice and intimate, and Julie invited everyone to move up close to the stage and sit down in front of her. You can listen to her music here.

I watched lots of movies this week: 
-View From the Top starring Gwyneth Paltrow and Mark Ruffalo
-Great Expectations starring Gwyneth Paltrow and Ethan Hawke
-Thank You for Smoking starring Aaron Eckhart and in a small role, Katie Holmes
-Proof starring Gwyneth Paltrow and Jake Gyllenhaal

Being Canadian: The Big Show (Vancouver 2010)

The Big Show (Winter Olympics) is coming to an end this Sunday. Sure, the Paralympics is still ahead for March, but the majority of the pavilions and events in the city will be over in a couple of days. 

Since before I moved to this city from Calgary plans have been in place to construct different sites, the Olympic Village and a new mass-transit line to Richmond and the airport. It feels really strange to me. . .  all this build-up and expended energy (with humans and hydro-wise) for this (essentially) 2 week event, and soon it will all be over and millions of extra people will go home. I was kind of worried about all the extra people invading the buses and sidewalks of my city for so long, but then it all started, and people began to pour in. It was actually really nice to have so many people around downtown (walking distance from my place) especially, and out later than usual. Most places seem to close really early (by my standards anyway), around 5 or 6pm, so malls and other areas being open until 9pm, 11pm or even midnight (and some 24 hours!!) has been amazing! 

The day before the opening ceremonies (February 12th), my Art History Canadian Symbolism seminar met downtown and went to a few different pavilions to check things out and to be critical of the displays and what-not. The picture above is from the BC pavilion on the top floor of the Vancouver Art Gallery, which had free entry during the Olympics. We also went to the Royal Canadian Mint pavilion and Canada's Northern House. That is the kind of stuff I love - museums, cheesy touristy things and art galleries! I loved receiving some pins, even though I don't like the idea of more 'junk' being collected in my home. 

I have never really been sure how I felt about the whole Olympics thing, especially happening in my home town. (I was 8 when the Olympics happened in Calgary, but I lived in Houston at the time, but I did see some of the Olympic stuff there when I visited the city in 1987.) I definitely think that the millions (billions?) of dollars could have been better spent, but at the same time, I can't help feeling happy about certain aspects of the Big Show: the Canada Line to the airport which opened in August 2009, for instance! It sucks that for the entire time I have lived here since moving back (2004) just about everything has been under construction, and it feels like none of it was for us. Now that the Big Show is over I wonder what will remain - a void? Will all of this craziness have been worth it?