Things have been so busy the past week that I haven't really had the opportunity to blog, save for throwing a few pictures up. Here are some brief updates:

Christmas
Christmas was super busy. We were at the Jessen's on the 23rd, my Dad's on the 24th, Christmas morning at our house, and then Christmas afternoon & evening at my Dad's. We spent the night at my Dad's on the 25th but it was hell because Elodie had to sleep in the room with us and woke up every hour. Overall though Christmas was fun and it was great to spend some quality time with family. We all cleaned up in the gift department too! :) Thankfully Elodie only got a couple gifts that make noise.

Birthday
As I mentioned, it was our Birthday yesterday. Kayla and I spent pretty much all day on the 27th & 28th cleaning the house so we could have people over for supper. It was a lot of work, but totally worth it. After the family went home we had some friends over. Since Kayla and I are total nerds our birthday consisted of libations and Wii. Good times.

Elodie

Not much to report. She's slowly getting more vocal and she said "Fut" the other day, so that concerns me a little. She's learned to shake her head 'no', but I'm not entirely convinced she knows it means 'no'. There's no crawling yet, but she can feel free to take her time with that. If I have to carry her to her first day of school, so be it.

Games
I beat Zelda tonight :( It took 45 hours, but it ended too soon. Looks like I'll have to use some of that Birthday money to pick up another game.

Blog
I have no clue how to get my comments working again, so it looks like I need a new template.

Today I turn 25 and Kayla turns 22. I forgot to take pictures so there is no record of me actually turning 25.

Each year on Boxing Day my friends Jen & James rent out an arena for us all to get our skate on. I missed it during the past two years, but was able to go today. We didn't stay long since Elodie was still really tired from Christmas.

Kayla and I were really tired too, but I'll blog about Christmas later.

Enjoy the pictures.

Here is Christmas Eve at my Dad's house:

We had Christmas with Kayla's family last night because they are leaving for Saskatchewan today. We had a nice dinner of pork roast and veggies and then took a trip to see the Airdrie Festival of Lights. After that we came back and started to open our presents. I know it's not all about the gifts, but Kayla and I cleaned up. I got a DVD camcorder (Woo!) and Kayla got a sewing machine and a lot of clothes. Elodie got all kinds of stuff, mainly toys. The best part about the camcorder (aside from the fact that I really wanted one) is that I can use it for Christmas morning tomorrow.

Here are some pictures of last night:

Last night we went to Jack's house to have Christmas dinner with him and some of the other Strathmore folk. I didn't take as many pictures as I should have, but here are some of Elodie opening her gifts from Jack, Theresa, and Brian.

It looks like my custom template doesn't agree with the new Blogger. Everything seems to be working except for the comments, so I'll see if I can get that fixed.

You know how I love to post Xbox 360 deals! I mainly do this too piss off Kayla.

Anyway, it looks like come Boxing Day there will be a number of stores offering them at $399 for the premium system. Roger's Video is even offering it at $399 plus Gears of War. If you're impatient and don't want to wait until the 26th you can get it at Dell right now for $399.

$399...

I made a student cry today. I refused to bend some rules and she just welled up and let go. She pleaded with me and tried formulating other options but it just wasn't going to happen. This went on for a good 30 minutes. It broke my heart and I wanted to help her but it was out of my control. Finally she came up with one last ditch option and I thought about it and said "that just might work." It was one of those 'why didn't I think of that' situations and after consulting some other staff it was confirmed that we could do it.

In the end the student left my office smiling and thanking me profusely. Thank God for that because I don't think I could have dealt with having her on my conscience the entire holidays.

I love the original Rocky, it's one of my favourite films. I have no interest in boxing, but Stalone's character was so likeable and the plot enjoyable. Its sequels ranged from fun to terrible and typically got worse as time went on. It's because of this that I cringed when I heard that Stalone was making a sixth Rocky film. What's the point? Isn't he too old? I'd probably rent it out of curiosity, but didn't have much hope for it.

Apparently I was wrong.

I have not seen the film but reviews are surprisingly strong. Even some of the negative reviews comment on how it's not nearly as bad as people expected it to me. Apparently this is a fitting end to the series and wraps up the character quite well. Now I have too see it.

I love my job, I really do. The thing is, I haven't had anything more than a long weekend for a year now and I'm burnt out. Nevermind the whole parenting thing!

It's only Tuesday but the work week is already hectic. I'm seeing students in all kinds of unique situations and I have to jump through a load of hoops to even see if I can consider them for school. Once I've done that I have to go through all sorts of hoops to get them signed up for school. Did I mention the new semester starts on January 8th and the College is closed as of Friday. I don't want anything waiting for me when I come back in January, so I have three days to wrap everything up here.

It wouldn't be so bad but I'm still a newbie around here and I have to consult someone on every new situation. I make occasional (ok, frequent) mistakes that just prolong everything.

Friday can't come soon enough.

Sunday we had our Christmas party with our friends and James and Jen made a huge announcement - they're having a baby! Jen is due in July and will be a bridesmaid at our June 30th wedding. That should be interesting...

I also forgot to mention that Torie got engaged a couple of weeks ago and will be getting married in August.

Our little group of high school friends sure is growing up.

I see your 12 days of Christmas oddity, and raise you one video:

These guys and gals pwn me on the nerdometer.

There are tons of people/organizations that could use support over the holidays. I couldn't possibly link them all, but here are two I find interesting:

Calgary Homeless Christmas Wish List

Child's Play

Stolen for Joanna's blog.

Type "Robbie is" (but make Robbie your name, and INCLUDE the quotation marks) into google, and add the best 10 things you can find. MINE ARE:

Robbie is simply the best.

Robbie is king.

Robbie is depressed.

Robbie is really growing fast, he is so big now.

Robbie is well adjusted because otherwise he would be a lot to handle.

Robbie is off the booze.

Robbie is trained by 'Old Jingle', a mad old coach.

Robbie is huge everywhere.

Robbie is our modern Casanova.

Robbie is a Class-A discrete tube microphone and instrument preamplifier.

Toby tagged me on this:

Grab the book closest to you.
Open to page 123, go down to the fifth sentence.
Post the text of next 3 sentences, the name of the book, and the author on your blog.
Tag three people.

I'm loathe to post this, but here it is:

He wasn’t sure – and that frightened him as well. “So,” Rolamee said, “there he is, the very human you warned us about. A dangerous individual who is largely responsible for the six-score casualties inflicted in this raid alone, not to mention the loss of a valuable prisoner, and six Shades which the enemy managed to steal.”

William C. Dietz – Halo: The Flood

In defense to myself, I haven't actually read this yet. It has become an unofficial tradition of mine to devote myself to some light reading over the holidays. In the past few years that usually meant reading a few Harry Potter or Narnia books. It's all about being a kid again. Anyway, I thought I'd toss it up a bit this Christmas and try some nerd popcorn-fiction. It's like a summer blockbuster movie except it's a book... based off of a video game.

Yeah.

Anyway, I tag Kayla, Stephen, and Laura

I haven't posted pictures of Elodie in a while because I haven't been able to get many good ones. She has a tendency to close her yes or make a funny face when the flash goes off. Example:


Instead here are some videos. My apologies for them being so dark, but it is a fault of my camera. I promise you I do not live in some sort of unlit dungeon.

Video 1: Observe as my daughter, apparently drunk on cheerios, verbally berates me and then assaults our cat.


Video 2: Observe Elodie's early attraction of electronics. She takes after her Dad.


(If the videos aren't working, check back later. They may not have gone 'live' yet.)

More of a mail-in rebate than free, but still a pretty damn good deal.

Tuition deal offered to university students in attempt to keep graduates in province

JOE FRIESEN
From Wednesday's Globe and Mail

WINNIPEG — University tuition in Manitoba will be virtually free for students willing to stay in the province under a policy initiative designed to stem the loss of young graduates.
A sketch of the plan was announced last month by the provincial government. It proposed tax rebates equivalent to 60 per cent of total tuition fees for graduates who spend six years in Manitoba after finishing university. Combined with existing federal and provincial tax credits, a typical Manitoba student would now receive more in tax benefits than he or she ever paid in tuition.

Under the new plan, a graduate of a four-year science program who paid $13,258 in tuition would get $7,955 back over a period of six years. That same student would also have received $3,498 in tuition tax credits and $3,379 in education tax credits during the four years of study, for a total of $14,832 in possible earned-income credits.