Wasaga Beach Outing...

And so the gang finally had some time to get together from their busy lives and headed out to a day without work or emails. It was fun to gather everyone once in a while as there were friends who worked in other cities (including myself a while ago), busy at school, or occupied with work. We met up early in the morning for breakfast and headed out to Wasaga beach this time. It was around 2hrs of drive away from Toronto and the great thing was that the weather was great during our outing weekend :) We set up Ka & Coconut's propane stove and aligned three benches to form a huge train of picnic tables. I haven't been back to Wasaga for a whole year already and was glad to be back to enjoy the fun @ the beach, not to mention the bikini scenery, and the crazy water-sports that we had that day... Stupid B-gor tackled me several times making me swallow several mouthful of water, but i got my revenge as we were doing marathon run in the beach when I tackled him from behind... ha ha. This guy was my friend since kindergarden in Hong King, then we went to elementary and high school together in Toronto, and now he's getting married! Wow, time flies... Well, after a relaxing and fun day at the beach where we originally planned to leave around 5, time past so fast and before we knew it; it was 7 already when started packing up, and I still didn't get a chance to bring out my blades yet... Nevertheless, it was a good time away from work once in a while and just to share time between good friends :)

Hooked on Bleach

Wow, bleach is really a good series. Started watching Bleach and got hooked on it. My friend Phatty had been saying it's good for a whole year already although I have only started watching it. The series is based on a hit Japanese manga and is still being released right now. I've watched quite a few anime before in university and from the 20eps that I have seen so far, Bleach is also one of best ones I've seen. Hopefully it doesn't turn bad towards the end. It does provide me with some relaxation despite there's some nasty scenes here and there... Watching it did gave me some nolgistic feeling of Rurouni Kenshien as well, both being able to define its' own genre with its' attractive storyline. Anyways, back to the series to ease my mind! Waha :)

Costs of living shooting up

House prices are just crazily shooting up toomuch lately. Was looking at some new townhouses ranging 2500 square ft around the neighbourhood and it's selling for 670k!!! It does look pretty nice though since the new construction area wanted to mimic something that of a European style so there are small shops along the street, and a nice terrace on top of all townhouses. It's amazing how much the costs of houses has rocketed lately, the average salary of someone making a midclass salary really can't keep up with the appreciation of the costs. Maybe it's due to too much immigrants and people who are investing and making $$$ off the turnaround of selling houses. I wonder what kind of security that the government will do to protect its' citizens with the costs of living raising much more sharply than average salaries.

Reckless Fire?

Now the fun begins.... I dunno what has happened or altered my chain of thoughts lately... but aside from regaining that drive and passion at work for myself; I've began looking at side things after work. Possibly after finding out that many friends have moved on after my trip back from Shanghai and Austin... I mean those expat and biz trips are helpful for my career; but I sometimes feel I am not doing enough as compared to close friends who are getting married, buying a house, making that big decision of relocating for work, etc... So, instead of procrastinating and looking back like not accomplishing anything, i'm moving forward and doing what I think i want to... regardless of small things ranging from jogging, to taking on a new project of renovating my parents' house basement, or starting to give that scam-off attitude to clueless people at work... Is this reckless fire? I don't know... but it sure energizes myself... and I hope i'm on the right path to make that successful next big step in life >:)

Long weekend in Vancouver

And so I headed out to Vancouver during the long weekend. The main thing was to meet up with relatives and visit grandma more than sightseeing and exploring the city this time. It was the first time for myself to try park'n fly but we had to use the service since the whole family was visiting. I was a bit weary that my car might get broken into or scratched, although I told myself that my VW was like 6 yrs old already - which sort of made myself feel a bit better. I had to transit through Calgary but was lucky enough to upgrade one leg of the flight to biz class from points earned from Aeroplan. After meeting up with the family in Vancity (we headed there on different flights since it was hard to book tix at the last min), we proceeded to pick up our rental car - a PT Cruiser. The pros to the car was that it looked pretty nice from afar due to its unique design, along with the fact that the car only got 2700 clicks on it. The cons however; was that the car lacked power (esp torque), requires a big radius for doing a U-turn, and various viewing angles were awkward.
Now, to the city Vancouver; lots of people told me that Vancouver is a nice city - one that is even better than Toronto, and also ranked atop one of the best cities to live in the world. The scenery was nice alright with the marina looking fairly nicely, lots of pretty girls possibly it's close to Asia, and of mountains overlooking the ocean view. However, the transportation infrastructure is just TERRIBLE! I can't beleive that their roads are mingled like spagetti, there are only limited alternate roads for detour, and there's no highway to most parts of the city. Motorists find themselves stuck in traffic for hrs if there's an accident or detour on one street. Other cons include lots of drug addicts in the city - interesting why the gov't decide to legalize drugs and also have drug houses offering free injection. My relatives told me that it was to control AIDs from spreading too quickly in the city as people were using recycled needles for drugs before they were legalized. Despite this fact, I think by doing so; people are encouraged to use them more and causing additional crime and prostitution in the city. Last observation was the slow pace of the city (motorists, getting served in a restaurant), I guess it's a retirement city afterall; and maybe i'll like it if i'm 70 or so... Eitherway, it's a nice short getaway from work and the hectic life in Toronto; and somehow i'm motivated again (not really from Vancouver trip)... but it's another story for another day :) Here's some pics!