Down the Toilet

Well its official....we are living in a toilet. A scientific study (Sierra Legal) has just declared that the Great Lakes (Toronto is situated on them and so is Chicago and Detroit) is a sewage dumping ground. Its so bad that according to these reports the equivalent of 100 olympic sized swimming pools of raw sewage is seeping into the lakes everyday. EVERYDAY!!

Needless to say this makes our small attempts at recycling and using the car less seem pretty pointless. But thats not the worst thing...the worst thing is that these lakes are supplying our faucets with our drinking water. We are actually ingesting this stuff daily! In fact we think we feel a law suit coming on!

The craziest part though (aside from the EPA declaring that pesticides are not a pollutant) is that every summer, despite the smell and warning signs...Torontonians jump into this water by the hundreds. They duck, they dive, they gulp and gag on the stuff...they even let their kids swim in it. Two years ago we thought this was good crazy fun. Now we just think its crazy.

Does anyone know a good lawyer??

For a Quick Smile

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnapzB-4tAk

Click on the above link for a chuckle. This has helped us to feel better when the long busy day is stretched out ahead...its too cute not to smile.

The Hanging of the Bauble

Well, after much harrassment and hype from the media we caved in and the tree was reluctantly retrieved from the dark depths or our basement (aka 'the junk room'). Brushing off its dusty branches we attached its three bushy levels together and presto....our pop-up tree was back in all its glory. No messy pine needles, no itchy noses, no sad little tree chopped down from its happy forest dwelling, just a shiny fake one with the lights already attached. Instant christmas!!

Anyway, that part went along fine...the tree decorations however were another story. For some reason the sight of a shiny red bauble can make the blood pressure rise. All those gold and silver globes, red and white candy canes, blue and yellow angels....its torture! Suddenly even the most stylish of residence look like they belong in the eighties, while all across the world innocent furniture is cruely and viciously attacked with brightly colored trinkets.

Sleek white sofas are smothered beneath fuzzy red Santa throws. Trendy coffee tables disappear under oversized candles and singing snowmen. What was once a happy minimilist dining table is now a display area for poinsettias, glittery table-runners, more candles, more singing snowmen and the enormous bowl of nuts that nobody eats. And don't even mention the hallway table....for where there just wasn't enough room in the lounge for the singing santa, singing reindeer and singing partridge....this table has just the spot. Pity the furniture over christmas....their beige world is turned upside down!

So consequently we ended up hanging only silver baubles, a compromise that worked out well. While our house is not exactly the sleek, neutral world that Alana would love to have, (Matt weirdly insists on adding comfort and color) it is our sanctuary in the midst of this crazy Canadian city and it works for us. So the tree has its spot back for another four weeks, the poinsettia is back on the dining table and the politically correct 'holiday' season has begun again. (Its supposedly only christmas here if you attend church....guess that makes Santa a big fat pagan!)

Anyway, we'll leave you all with a couple of cheesy pics of us in front of our 'holiday tree'.

Hollywood!!

While Alana was left stranded in Toronto fending for herself amongst the prematurely hung christmas decorations and endless TV jingles (its only November for crying out loud!) Matt ventured off to LA on business.

So while it rained, rained, and just for a change rained in Toronto, Matt basked in the warm Hollywood glow, wining and dining some big VFX producers along the way. After his week of sun and fun (and work of course...or so he says) he emerged this Monday morning, bleary-eyed, to face a wonderful day of...you guessed it...rain, rain, and more rain in Toronto.

So he is now hoping (pleading might be a better word) for us to win the US Green Card lottery so we can move permanently to Hollywood and live our own 'American Dream'. So we've got our fingers crossed!
(Since arriving back he has also assured Alana that he doesn't want to move to Hollywood because all the producers look like Carmen Electra... but we'll save that topic for another post). :)

So here are a couple of pics of LA LA land he took while away. (Matt is not in any of them but the Hollywood sign is...you can see it in the first pic WAY in the distance).

You might notice that there literally are only two pics. This is because Matt was born with an unfortunate affliction we like to call 'terrible-photographeritis'. It is in fact hereditary, as both his parents also suffer from this condition, and the poor soul is left taking endless shots of hands, feet, occasional trees and many many unidentified objects. We are however taking steps to overcome this terrible disease and as you can see from these rather nice pictures, we are gaining ground. Think positive thoughts for him won't you all?