We were all in Ottawa for CCA last week. LOVE it when nationals are in Ottawa! Linzee, Carmen, Chrissy, Eve and I had dinner with Jessie at Johnny Farina's and ran into Jeff D & Susan and then Lesley Naumowich at the racecourse. (btw, the reason I don't put Jeff's last name in is because anyone who googles the actor is directed here). Everyone looks fantastic and happy. What's not to be happy about - Ottawa's a great city. And I say that even though the weather was brutal the entire time. Humid and rainy every day. Left's wind - sort of - it was such a direct side wind that everyone had steering issues.
We did really well. Our C4 won gold and set a new record in Open women's 200m, senior women's war won gold and set a new record too. The women's canoe division was huge this year and the girls are fast and strong! Wicked to see. Anyway, Burloak won the overall burgee and Mississauga was second. I haven't gotten my photos developed yet (yeah I know. YOU send me the $4000 and I'll upgrade my equipment to digital!) but I've put some from my little party cam up on facebook. I'll post more as soon as I have time.

I've added more photos to the slideshow of Jackie's baby shower...

CCA has confirmed rumours that an athlete tested positive for drugs at the 3rd set of national team trials. It was for weed which is non-performance enhancing so I doubt the penalty will be huge. And it's not like this athlete was actually a contender for our national team anyway. In fact, dual citizenship allowed him to race at worlds for another country. I don't need to post his name, do I? I'll probably do up a photoshop for the occasion.

Very funny trailer for the upcoming parody of Walk the Line, "Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story", stars John C. Reilly, Kristen Wiig, Jenna Fischer, Matt Besser, Tim Meadows, and Chris Parnell. With cameos by Jack Black, Paul Rudd, Jonah Hill, Justin Long, Jason Schwartzman, Jack White, and Harold Ramis.

Louise, Mia and Jonathon have moved to Hong Kong. I like to be able to picture my friends when they're far away and in new environments but that's not always easy with photos and written descriptions. Of course it helps that I've been to Hong Kong but I never visited the area where their new home is situated - Repulse Bay. Louise's first photos immediately brought back memories of the overwhelming humidity but I still couldn't get a handle on where they were. So, unless I wanted to forever picture them at the Regal Riverside in Shatin or the Hong Kong "Y" on Salisbury Road, I figured I'd better pull some stalker-ish behaviour and look up their address on Google Earth. So here's the general area...

Nice beach, Louise!

There's some pretty fantastic architecture here but most of it is out of the shot...



Here's Repulse Bay in relation to Hong Kong (upper left)


I'm really jealous of Louise. I loved Hong Kong and considered getting a job at one of the Canadian schools there after meeting a group of teachers at a bar in Wan Chai. They were really drunk because school had finished that day and they were heading home to Halifax. They offered to hook me up with a job at one of these private schools but of course by the end of the night we still hadn't exchanged contact information. They went straight from the bar to the airport and I left for Guangzhou (Canton) a day later.
Anyway, I'm wishing you guys all the best in your new home. Hopefully I'll get a chance to come visit while you're still living there!

I'm hoping Meghan will forgive me for scamming this photo for those who aren't part of the FBook cult!

Benjamin Anderson Lea

born Saturday, August 11 at 3pm

11 pounds 6 ounces

Because I like soccer, the guys at work seem to think I have a thing for Beckham and keep sending me stuff like this. It's a good clip (thanks to Ali G) and although it's pretty clear that the whole thing is scripted, the couple seem more relaxed than in any other interview. The thing that struck me most is that Victoria looks quite different (aside from the fact that she's actually smiling). Has she had work done since this? It's difficult to put a finger on it, maybe her nose? At first I even thought it was some actress playing the Spice girl but no, it's her. What do you think?

This is pretty interesting. Two men, Anthony Bourke and John Rendall, raised this lion cub they bought from a London department store (that had acquired the orphan cub from a zoo). They named him Christian. When he got too big for them to take care of they released him into the wilds of Africa.
In this video clip, a year has passed and Christian has adapted to living with a pride of lions when his old friends come back to visit him. At first the lions approach seems to be, "mmmm...dinner" but you can see his attitude change as he realizes they're his friends. Shortly after the reunion, members of Christian's pride approach and seem to accept the humans. The random older guy without a shirt is George Adamson of Born Free fame.

Okay, there seems to have been some action out on the west coast - unconfirmed reports that Meghan has had a baby boy, Benjamin. I'll let you know as soon as I hear more.

10:30pm Update: I just got the following message from Meghan's sister, Paige;

"Hi Lynne,Just a quick message to let you know that Meg had her baby on Saturday, August 11 at 3pm. A bouncing baby boy at 11 pounds 6 ounces! Benjamin. They are at St. Paul's in Vancouver and will probably be at home tomorrow. Hope all is well! Cheers,Paige"


11 pounds 6 ounces!!!

ICF Worlds

Sunday, Day 4

200m Finals

C1 - Richard Dalton was 5th
W K1 - Emilie Fournel was 6th

500m Finals

M K1 - Adam van Koeverden was 1st

C1 - Mark Oldershaw was 5th

K2 - Richard Dober and Andrew Willows were 6th
C4 - Attila Buday, Dimo Joukovski, Rich Dalton and Tamas Buday jr were 5th

ICF Worlds

Saturday Day 3

200m

C1 - Rich was 2nd in heat and 2nd in semi

W K1 - Emilie was 1st in heat and 1st in semi

1000m Finals

M K1 - Adam was 2nd

W K1 - Karen was 6th

C1 - Mark was 9th

C4 - Attila, Dimo, Tom Hall and Tamas jr were 7th

I just heard that Tony Wilson passed away last night. I was a big fan of the bands produced under his label Factory Records and showcased at his Manchester club the Hacienda: The Happy Mondays, Joy Division and New Order, Durutti Column...
In 1976 he saw the Sex Pistols at the Manchester Lesser Free Trade Hall and immediately booked them for his music and culture show, "So It Goes". It was their first appearance on UK television.





In 2002 the movie 24 Hour Party People presented a dramatization of Tony's life and Manchester's pop music community from 1977 to 1997. He was diagnosed with cancer about a year ago and died of a heart attack last night in the hospital.

Photos from Jackie's baby shower. Did I mention there were lots of children? After watching the slideshow, I think it should be called "Kids and Cleavage"

ICF WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS 2007

DAY 2

500M

M K1 - Adam 1st in heat and 1st in semi

W K1 - Emilie 3rd in heat and 3rd in semi (B final)

M K2 - Richard and Andrew 1st in heat and 1st in semi

W K2 - Kristin and Mylanie 5th in heat and 6th in semi (B Final)

C1 - Mark 2nd in heat and 2nd in semi

C2 - Andrew and Gab 2nd in heat and 4th in the semi (B Final)

C4 - Attila, Dimo, Richard and Tamas jr 3rd in heat (direct to final)

This will be an exciting final to watch...

Less than a year to the Olympics in Beijing!

Huh. I completely forgot about this song. (watch it and you'll understand why). "Don't you know what's happening down there in the Bermuda Triangle? Elvis needs boats!"
Also check out the link for anothor Mojo Nixon song, "Debbie Gibson is Having my 2-Headed Love child. It's worth it just to see a really young Winona Ryder as Debbie Gibson.

The Flatwater worlds website (http://kanuwm.de/) is up and down due to high traffic but I was able to get some results off before it crashed again.

Womens K4 500m - Genevieve, Mylanie, Kristin & Tory were 6th in the heat and 8th in the semi (B-Final)

1000m heats & semis;
Men's K4 - 5th in heat & 6th in semi (B-Final)
men's K2 - 4th in heat and 5th in semi (C-Final)
Women's K1 - Karen was 2nd in the heat and 2nd in the semi
Men's K1 - Adam 1st in heat and 1st in semi
C1 - Mark was 2nd in heat & 2nd in semi
C2 - Andrew and Gab 1st in heat and 7th in semi-1 6th in semi-2 (B-final)
C4 - Attila, Dimo, Tom and Tamas jr were 3rd (direct to final)

Such a good weekend. I had some summer hours saved up so got out of work a few hours early. I got an emergency pedicure and headed down to the Boulevard Club where Marisha and I lounged on the lakeshore and wallowed in gossip mags.
Saturday afternoon was a baby shower for Jackie and babygirl Song-Hara. This was SUCH a great afternoon. I'd had a hectic morning ending up on the wrong side of the city which meant I arrived late, without the salad I'd promised to bring or Jackie's gift. Tat was so nice and met me at the door with assurances there was plenty of food and a glass of wine. There were children EVERYWHERE! All cute and fun and easygoing (read: not crying). Pictures soon.

Sunday - Toronto FC vs L.A. Galaxy.
There's been lots of speculation on whether David Beckham would play or not but it didn't matter. Plans to sell my extra ticket changed when I found out my son didn't have to work that day. And I'm so glad because we had an amazing afternoon together!

There was no traffic (people must have thought Caribana was still going on) so we got there super early. We just wandered around the stadium checking things out. Coming around the corner at the south-west end we saw a CBC trailer and tv cameras. We realized we were at the player's entrance and, given the amount of security, that the Galaxy hadn't arrived yet. We stuck around with about 20 other people and within 15 mintues their bus pulled up.
David Beckham was first out and was less than 5 feet from where we stood. Yeah, I was a total tourist! He is very, VERY good looking. Canadians are so funny - nobody yelled anything or cheered...nothing. I don't think he knew what to expect but he kind of hesitated then waved and walked on. I didn't have my purse so couldn't even ask for an autograph (alhtough I don't know what I'd do with one anyway, just seems the thing to do). After he'd gone through the door we all kind of looked at each other and shrugged.

Ryan and I were still high-fiving each other on another awesome mom-son moment when the ticket takers handed us our TFC baseball caps courtesy of of BMO. All that AND a hat? Could it get any better? Sort of. The Barenaked Ladies performed a song they wrote for the TFC (tepid) and both national anthems. The reason this was particularly cool is because, when Ryan was around 10, we went to one of the first BNL concerts at the Bathurst St. Theatre. We were actually there to see Meryn Cadell (where did SHE go?) and the second act just happened to be these guys who were introduced as buskers from Scarborough. We bought "The Yellow Tape" (from their moms who were selling them at the door) and became huge fans. Okay tangent over.
The TFC were definitely "on" for this game so the disappointment of not seeing Beckham's moves was minimal. As alway the fans in Toronto make the game as memorable as the plays. Final score was 0-0. Getting those seasons tickets was one of the best decisions I've made and they've paid for themselves a thousand times over in great memories for Ryan and me.

A look back at our trip to NYC in 2004...

Chrissy and I went to the TFC game on Sunday afternoon.

It was HOT. New York kind of hot. The bottom of my flops were melting on the bleachers. In spite of that and the fact we lost 3-nil to the Chicago Fire (Blan-coooooh), it was still great to be there! TFC play was pretty flat throughout but there's a long list of injured players at the moment. (the TFC have signed keeper Kyriakos "Kenny" Stamatopoulos - a kid from Markham who's played for Greece and Norway).
The most entertaining point of the game was when fans buried Blanco
with streamers during a corner kick.
Things in section 105 were a little flat too because the kid who sits two seats over (and is a true TFC superfan) was not there. His mom and little brother had the seats instead. He clearly did not get his cheerleading abilities from her. Actually, the last time we were there, he brought a girl and was considerably less entertaining than usual.

Anyway, after the game we booted it back to Oakville for a barbecue at Dray and Alyson's new house. Great house! And it was full of children. Two newborns - Hilary and Charlie - as well as Grayson, Meredith and Dylan. Okay, it may not sound like a lot of kids but it sure seemed like a houseful.