A Seriously Strenuous Sightseeing and Shopping Saturday

Well colour me exhausted. LOL. I am a born shopper but after today's adventure, I dunno. He almost did me in. The "he" in question is my buddy J.D. who just moved to Ottawa. I knew him in another life :)

Anyhow, being new to Ottawa, I took him around town today and man, did we get around. We started over near Hog's Back for Breakfast. There was an entire girls soccer team in the restaurant, out for a team breakfast to celebrate the birthday of one of the team members. They were all 13 and 14 year olds so it was a little on the rowdy side, but they were well behaved.

After breakfast, I showed J.D. why the area was called "Hog's Back". It's simple, we have the "Hog's Back Falls" there. The rock in the middle of the falls looks like the back of a pig apparently, and that's how it got the name. My grandmother once told me that she went swimming in those falls as a teenager. I'm not sure if I believe her or not. Next we moved onto my alma mater, Carleton University. Did a quick drive around campus and I pointed out the dorm I lived in and such. Then we took Colonel By all the way into downtown so that he could see more of the canal and I could show him Landsdown Park before the stadium is completely torn down. We then drove through Vanier and out into the east end where we passed the Notre Dame cemetery (where Laurier is burried) and Beechwood Cemetery (Where the Canadian National War Cemetery is) and then we headed for an errand run back this way out to Barrhaven. I should point out that there was a bathroom and coffee/hot chocolate stop in there.

Once in Barrhaven, I stopped to drop off something to a friend and got to witness several young ladies hopped up on sugar, running a muck. LOL. It was a "decorate your own cupcake" stage of her daughter's birthday party. Sadly, I couldn't visit for long as J.D. waiting in the car (and seemed rather glad to have done so) so after a quick catch up session, I headed out...but not before the entire house hold said goodbye to me. LOL. Those girls were so adorable! And I really would have loved to have stayed and chatted longer. This friend is a wonderful woman and you can't help but feel happy in her presence. It's like her super power power or something. Anyhow, after our mini tour of suburbia was done, we headed to Ikea.

Ahhh, Ikea. I love that place. It's my idea of fantasy land. All those pretty rooms, all neat and tidy. It makes you believe that you really can make a tiny space into something awesome. Then I come home and look at my disaster and reality comes crashing back down. On this trip, I finally bought myself a real desk chair! I also picked up a cool door mat and some more hand towels for the kitchen. J.D. seemed rather impressed by our HUGE Ikea (biggest in Canada don't ya know). We then stopped by my apartment to drop off the Ikea stuff and headed back out. We needed sustenance after Ikea so we headed to The Butchery in Bells Corners for milk shakes from Vera's Burger Shack. They were very good. Since we'd refuelled, we continued on our way. Giant Tiger was next (where I got reduced to clear socks!!) followed by Walmart.

I need to point something out here. I am a fairly frugal shopper. I compare prices, collect coupons and price match in order to get the best deal, but I'm not extreme about it. Certain items I'm willing to pay full price for and I usually know a good deal when I see. J.D takes frugal to a whole new level. This made shopping very, very, very painful. He is very indecisive as a result and will hum and haw about something for a good long time before deciding to for go it all together. I'm pretty sure I threatened him with physical violence no less than 3 times today. The last time was a threat of hitting him with a bag of frozen vegetable if he didn't hurry up and pick one!! I ended up picking one out for him.

We both get out of Walmart alive. For a better part of the day, he's been mulling over whether or not to buy a tv for his room. As we're walking out to the car, he decides that he's going to get one. Ok. I agree that I'm up for one last shopping adventure so we head to Future Shop. I got wise. I looked at tvs for a few minutes with him and then went and said in the amazingly comfortable chairs in front of the GIANT tv they have in their home theatre section and I just watched hockey and waited for J.D. and the sales guy to figure things out smartest move of my day. LOL. He got a very nice tv (I'm kind of jealous actually) and we headed home.

I ordered Swiss Chalet for dinner and then rented Hotel Transylvania. It was a very fun little movie. Very cute and amusing too. I really quite enjoyed it.

Talking with J.D was quite interesting today. I remember him being a very happy go lucky person. He was still cheerful today but he's very nervous and quite worried. Not just about starting the new job and being in a  new city but worried about life as a whole. I can't really fault him for it as that was me a few years ago. All I could really tell him was to focus on the positive, allow himself to be happy and enjoy the good times when they're around. None of us can know what's coming next and worrying about intangible things like that is counter productive to our own happiness. I only know that because I lived it and it's only been over the last 2 years that I've made a conscious effort to relax and not to worry so much. I hope he listened and I hope he can find his own path to happier and healthier life. I think he just needs to get through this first week and then he'll be feeling a little better.

All in all, I showed J.D: Hog's Back, Mooney's Bay, Carleton, Lansdown, Vanier, Beechwood, Barrhaven and Bell's Corners today. I think that covered a good chunk of places :)

I do believe it's time to go to bed now. I've had a long (but fun!) day and I really need to get laundry and house work done tomorrow. I tore the living room apart looking for something last night and it now looks 5 times worse than it did before tornado Sarah blew on by. Sigh.

Good Night!

Sarah

My high school grad photo!