PSA Formal 2007
I've been taking care of the PSA website for about 3 years now. I barely know any members of the association now. When I was at Carleton I knew a few but almost all of those students have graduated and left. Occassionally the PSA president would contact me and ask me to post new event information on the website or some new pictures in the Gallery section. The website needs an overhaul badly. Carleton's webserver doesn't allow any dynamic pages so its all static HTML and it can be a pain to update every single page for any change in the layout.
In any case, I got to know many people by name only over the past few years. I would get their emails, I would see their pictures, I would talk to them on MSN. I names but didn't know faces. I knew faces but didn't know names.
The PSA organizes a PSA Formal Dinner anually and the president would invite me each year. I would apologize and say that I'm in Toronto and I doubt I'll be visiting Ottawa anytime soon so thanks but I won't be able to make it.
This year lunato and I just happened to be in Ottawa when the PSA Formal 2007 was held. I called Sana Q, the current president (actually I think she's a co-president this year), and asked if she has extra tickets. She did. So, after skiing at Mont Cascades, we went back to dooh's place, washed up, and then went to 1135 March Road to attend the PSA Formal 2007. Taimoor and his wife didn't want to attend so after dropping them we picked up Sumaira, shekhar's co-worker, who lives close to the venue.
Lunato and I had never met Sumaira before. Amazingly enough, she had emailed me a few days ago asking where she can buy tickets for the PSA Formal. My email address is on the PSA website so she thought I would know details about ticket sales. I had replied to her saying that I'm in Toronto and I don't know about ticket sales and that she should contact Sana. And now, a few days later, I was parked in her driveway waiting to pick her up so we could go to the PSA Formal together. Small world!!
I met Sana Q for the first time in person. She's an excellent person. We'd been talking online for about 2 years now but hadn't had a chance to meet. I had graduated from Carleton by the time she became invovled in PSA. I also saw a lot of other faces that I recognized but didn't know the names of. It was a very well-organized event and all of us really enjoyed. I dubbed our table the "Informal Table" as everyone else was dressed up in fancy clothes with makeup and jewellery while we were in our jeans and coats :)
- Mr. and Miss Pakistan
- Paindoo of the Year
- Mariam Q from ZUNG singing
- Dance Dance Revolution
- Shekhar driving the PT Cruiser
We had fun. Lunato and I were pretty tired by 11PM since we had woken up at 3 AM, driven 550 km to Ottawa, then went skiing at Mont Cascades for 5 hours, and now this. We sneaked out and went to the closest gas station and bought Red Bull. That drink is really powerful. It woke us up instantly.. the 2nd or 3rd sip sends a jolt to your brain and *boom* you're awake. I've had it a few times when working late but it was the first time lunato drank it and she was surprised at how well it works.
Overall, it was a very nice event. Good food, good music, good people. If we get a chance, we'll try to visit next year as well. Hopefully by that time the PSA website will be more functional than it is now :)
how youtube led to skiing at mont cascades and more
i've spent more than half a dozen years browsing and commenting on the latest chatty on shacknews. it's become second nature to open Shacknews whenever i sit in front of the computer. Shacknews and Google News are the two most frequently visited websites on this computer.
friday evening i was skimming through the first page of the comments to see if anything interesting was posted. as usual there were multiple youtube links. click, open, watch, close; an endless repetitive cycle that the internet audience is addicted to. just as i was clicking on a random youtube link, lunato entered the room and asked if i wanted to clean the apartment now or wait until tomorrow.
give an option like that to a man and the answer will always be "later"
i replied, "nah, let's do it tomorrow. it's friday night, lets relax :)"
"ok..." she replied, then a short pause during which i finish clicking the youtube link and the youtube video starts loading.
"but lets..."
but the video had already started and i had already turned to watch it. to be honest, i don't even remember hearing the "but lets...". oh. shit.
when the video stopped playing, i turned to look if lunato had been watching it with me but she wasn't in the room. without having any knowledge of what was to come, i stayed put and continued idle browsing.
"zhhoooooooooooooooooo", the vaccum cleaner came to life. huh? lunato is cleaning? what? vaccuming is always my job and she knows that. sigh, i guess this is a call-to-arms.. or rather a call to get-the-fuck-off-the-computer-and-help-me-clean.
i went out and saw her in the living room. i took the vaccum cleaner from her and told her that i'll take care of it. i wasn't exactly happy. i wanted to relax after a busy friday but i guess that will have to wait. you must compromise otherwise your relationship will have many problems.
but shouldn't she be happy now? or at least smiling? and yet there is a frown on her face.
"what's wrong? is everything ok?"
*nod*
"seriously, is everything ok? you look upset about something"
"no, i'm fine" was the reply; a reply full of sarcasm.
"hey hey, what's wrong? we're cleaning now aren't we ? i didn't want to but ok, let's do it now."
"if you don't want to, then don't. leave it. i'll do it"
warning klaxons went off. what the heck is going on here?!?
"lunato, what's wrong? i can see you're upset about something"
"you cut me off! i was talking and you just looked away at that stupid video"
even if it was completely unintentional, small annoyances like this can spiral out of control and proportion very easily. must defuse before it bangs. we talked back and forth and resolved the issue but the overall mood had already soured.. on a friday evening.. just before the weekend. bah.
* ding * i thought of something.
"hey, shall we rent a car for the weekend?"
"YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
"we can go to the Mazda and Honda showrooms as well"
"YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!! but sikander, is the place still open?"
i called the local AVIS dealer right away and within 30 minutes we were at yonge/sheppard signing the rental agreement for a PT Cruiser. excellent car by the way. i wouldn't buy it but i would gladly accept it as a gift. the interior design and the indiglo clock are beautiful.
on the way home from AVIS, we stopped at IKEA. lunato loves their self-proclaimed "best coffee in town" and she really believes that it is the best coffee in town. i parked the car in the loading zone near the exit while she went inside.
* ding * i thought of something again.
yesterday, shekhar had IM'd me that he might be visiting toronto over the weekend. if not, then he would go skiing. he had said that he wanted to invite lunato and i to the ski resort but figured that it was too late. maybe it's not too late now that we have a car.
i called shekhar and asked for details about the ski trip. it was saturday morning at 10 am at Mont Cascades. shekhar was going with some friends so it was group event and the ticket price was only $28 for the ski rental and the lift. sounds like an excellent deal.
when lunato came back, i asked her if she wants to go skiing tomorrow.
"YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
"what about your paino class?"
"i'll cancel it!!!"
"shekhar, we're coming tomorrow! meet at 9:30 AM at dooh's place?"
it's 8 PM on friday night and we have to be in Ottawa by 9:30 AM. brilliant. dooh is going to have a fit and will complain about the spontaniety of the whole thing. lunato called dooh and asked if we can stay with him tonight. of course we can. but "what the hell? are you joking?." no, we're not. we're leaving in about 2 hours.
i had to get gloves. my grey wool gloves would freeze my hands because i know i will fall repeatedly. lunato wanted to get ski pants, if possible. we checked SportsChek, then Winners, then Walmart, and finally found some at Sears. by the time we finished this frantic shopping trip, it was already 9:15 PM.
it takes at least 4.5 hours to drive from Toronto to Ottawa so if we leave at 10 PM, it would be around 2:30 to 3:00 AM. friday was almost over and to drive to ottawa towards the end of the day would exhaust both lunato and me. we would definitely get only a few hours of sleep cuz when alidhooh, lunato, and i are together, we end up talking for hours on end about the most random, inane and yet highly interesting topics possible.
so lets sleep in Toronto, wake up early at 3:30 AM and then depart for Ottawa by 4:30 at the latest.
on the way home from the mall, lunato's phone rang. it was her piano teacher calling to ask if she can cancel saturday morning's piano class. wow. coincidences.
the universe is re-aligning itself in our favour and it wants us to ski. deal! the weekend is saved. let me just check Google News to make sure the world hasn't blown up yet. and then i'll sleep.
a perfect circle
two years and ten days later, lunato was in Ottawa again. dooh was more than happy to be our gracious host and we stayed with him for three days and two nights. Ottawa didn't change so much during this time.. all our favourite hang-outs were the same. Shwarma Laguna was exactly like how it was before. the meat-pie place was exactly the same with the same staff even!. Carleton's campus changed a lot though. new hockey rinks (two of them!! sheesh, my tuition paid for all this and i can't even use them) and major upgrades to the University centre.
we arrived in Ottawa late at night on the 29th and visited downtown with dooh for some drinks (that's Pepsi, Sprite, and Ginger Ale.. lol) and then crashed at dooh's apartment. saturday we spent with shekhar, andrea, diar, tony, and zaynab at T&Z's nice cosy house in Aylmer, Quebec. actually the very first time lunato and i went somewhere together was when we visited andrea when she participated in the Fleurs de Macadam festival in Aylmer. this was back on May 30th 2003.
tony and zaynab were excellent hosts. they have a lovely house in Aylmer. we were visiting them for the first time and both lunato and i were quite impressed with it. the back deck was especially nice with its own jacuzzi. the pizza, cake, and ice cream were delicious as well.
saturday night was memorable. the clubbing scene in Ottawa might be small compared to Toronto but once the music starts and the dance floor gets crowded it is probably just like any other. as always, whenever we (shekhar, dooh, lunato, and i) gather together we reminisce about the "good ol' days" and wish naraku was with us as well. we drank to his good health though (again, Pepsi, Red Bull, and Coke.. ah such losers :P)
after sleeping late into sunday afternoon, we packed ours bags, said tatahs to everyone, promised to visit again soon, and headed home after a quick stop at Carleton. the last time i had visited the campus, the UniCentre upgrade was still in progress. the extension of the building was complete now and it looked quite nice. the old tortuous staircase is, sadly, gone and is replaced by a much better one; one that does not force you to climb a 45° incline. it was good exercise for all!!
ah Ottawa... good times.
Die Hard Trilogy
as i mentioned earlier, last night dooh and i met at shekhar's house in barrhaven. we watched Underworld:Evolution (mainly because of kate beckinsale in a black skin tight leather suit... and vampires.. everyone like vampires!.. and also because there was nothing else worth watching) at the new Barrhaven theatre (small theatre but close for all the people living in barhaven). the movie was a sequel to Underworld and i had forgotten most of the first movie so couldn't really follow what was going on in this one. in any case, the vampire and werewolf fights were pretty fun to watch.
later we ordered pizza and went to the basement and started watching the Die Hard movies; Die Hard [1988], Die Hard 2 [1990], and Die Hard: With a vengeance [1995]. my personal favourite one is the second one. shekhar was really sleepy so we had to stop after watching the first two and decided to watch the third the next day... today. good times.
after finishing all three movies, we dropped dooh at home, and then i went to the bus station to take a Greyhound bus back home to mississauga. it was a fun weekend and hopefully i'll get to repeat it again. there are so many excellent movies that neither shekhar nor dooh have seen. i have much work to do to get these two up to date.
btw, here is dooh's writeup about the weekend.