It’s raining out there today. On the drive to work this morning, the clouds parted just enough so I could see Grouse Mountain again. It use to be brown, now it’s white. And here we thought Spring was around the corner.

Chad is working extra shifts, which is hard to imagine considering the amount of shifts he is already working. I’ve gotten use to him not being around. That probably sounds negative, but its true. We talk all day online, but  as far as physically being in the same place as each other, it’s been a while, or one of us has been asleep. But it will all come to an end soon. The Paralympics won’t be as stressful as the regular Olympics, which is good.

Today is Friday. This office just hasn’t seemed normal this year. Theres a lot more negativity floating around. I can’t really explain it, you just have to be here to feel it. I have a feeling things are going to come to a head this year.

On the good news front, Chad finally hooked up my Uncle with a police pup in training. Apparently, female dogs usually don’t make it through as they aren’t aggressive enough, so they usually sell them to good homes. It’s hard to get one as they go fast (as we’ve learned) and they need to check you out before they give you a pup. Clearly they don’t want bad folk getting their hands on these prized German Shepard’s. Her name is Barra and my Uncle is driving up to Innisfail on Sunday to pick her up. I can’t wait to meet her! Chad says he kind of feels like an adoption agency or a foster parent since he had a hand in getting the dog.

Tonight will be a quiet night. I’m kind of tired of all the downtown hupla. I much prefer sitting at home and watching all the events on TV. That said, I think we are going to try and head downtown Saturday night for one last Gong Show attempt. Sunday, Chad will be working, so I will spend the day at the parentals watching all the closing stuff.

As exciting as all of this is, I’m getting tired. I will miss it when it’s gone, but right now, I just want things to go back to normal.

More Olympic Pictures, More Olympic Pictures!!!

Saturday, while Chad was at work (whata good boy) I headed downtown with the Famiglia.

PHOTO EXPLOSION

Cristina and I got ID’d at Germany House. It was 11am, pretty sure I’m not about to get wasted!

Ma, Pa, and Cristina

Cooking up some German Meat.

A Brat for Breakfast. I even got sauerkraut. I have never been a fan of it, but I figured, if I was going to be German for an hour I was going to be FULLY German.

Inside the actual house. Already packed watching the days events.

German signed car.

Walking towards the torch.

March forward.

The flame from far away.

Probably a little creepy that I took a picture of someones kid, but it was too cute not to. He made his own torch. Omg, *sniff* adorable.

Thar she blows.

Speaking of blowing, you would not believe how many Russians were downtown on Saturday. There were tons of young Navy guys as well. It was nuts.

Everyone’s in Red. Do we look related!?

The view of the torch from downtown.

Shangra La

CTV

My buddies.

A floral VAG.

The Rossis

Melbourne and Cortina d’Ampezzo, where both sides of my family live!

MUKMUK <3

QUATCHI <3

Oh look! Another picture of the damn lanterns!

So apparently my Mother discovered that not only was there Casa Italia represented at the Olympics, but there was also Casa Calabria! Weird, yet interesting. Considering we will be travelling around Calabria in 7 months it only made sense to check it out.

Hand Made Glass Art

Damn Southerners!

Cheese and coffee and things.

Made it to Casa Italia, yet again. This time they were actually serving CHEESE! Hahah Mom and Dad got handfuls.

Cheese please.

Pappa Rossi

I could be a Skier.

I had this discussion with my Mom that Casa Italia would have been 10 times better if they decided to serve Pasta and Wine. Umm hello, talk about making a killing if you did that. At all our Italian events we serve a plate of pasta and wine for 8 bucks and we always sell out. People go nuts for that kind of thing and it is so cheap to do. I’m going to have to speak to the Casa Italia Organizing Committee. Clearly they were not very organized. Or they just like being snobs and only serving that kind of thing to the VIPs. Oh those Italians.

The Sea Wall in Yaletown.

Yes, this is why we live here.

Sunnies and a Toque.

After Eight. The biggest friggin Yacht I have ever seen!

Waiting in line for the Sea Bus, which, for some reason, we all thought was FREE.

GROUP SHOT.

SEA BUS

Checkin out the city

Love this building

Swiss House on Granville Island

Leaving the ‘Island’

Walking some where. Check out the Cherry Blossoms!

Yacht Club.

Sea Wall Fashion.

PIRATE SHIP

What a beautiful day!

Dreamy

Shadows

RCMP Boat

Us Italians

CANADA LINE SQUISH.

Our plan was to do many things, many things that all had very long line ups, so we just did a lot of walking around the city. All transit was packed so we had to squish.

By the time I got home I was so tired I actually thought I was going to die. I passed out for two hours and felt like crap for the rest of the evening.

That is what you get for never exercising!

Just another beautiful Olympic day in Vancouver!

Ok so I am going to try and pump out some Olympic posts.

Last Monday, Ryan and Elise joined us for some downtown Olympic goodness. This was the second time in a row where we went downtown and the weather was crappy, only this time, we didn’t bring an umbrella. Pretty stupid considering we bought an Olympic umbrella on Saturday. OH WELL.

Elise claims that because these mittens are made in China, that is the reason why they are falling apart. Umm…I’ve had mine for the exact same amount of time and mine don’t look like they got eaten by a dog! Something smells funny here Elise.

Chad and Ryan on la skytrain.

Hey, look who it is.

It was our first time on the Canada Line. The giant underground hole was a little freaky. It’s HUGE.

Hat twins. I hope Ryan doesn’t get confused as to whose who.

Waiting for the Granville Island street car at the Olympic Village Terminal.

Chad and Ryan on the Street Car!!!

Elise on the Street Car. I WAS SO EXCITED!!!

Here we be! Granville Island.

The line up to get into Atlantic House. Yea, I don’t think so.

We decided to head over to the Cats Social House instead. Less people and seats at the bar.

The Mojito.

Elise and I were on a Mojito rampage, as we usually are. These ones looked huge, but then we just realized it was just full of ice. They were tasty none the less.

Watching the snow boarders at the Bar.

We stayed for one drink and one appy and then ‘bar hopped’ as Elise called it.

This is how Chad protects himself from the rain.

Bombardier!

Elise was in love with the way the seats faced each other.

Back on the Canada Line heading downtown.

WOOOOO.

Back at the Bay.

More pictures of the lanterns in the pouring rain.

Why do I feel the need to take a picture of these guys every time I see them?

Mojito number 2.

Elise thinks I should start a Mojito blog. Ha. Like I need another blog.

The service and beer at the Olympic Bar and Grill was not the best this time around.

Ryan’s beer was warm so Elise decided to add to it.

It’s couple time.

An insight into our relationship.

It was a good night, but I was tired by the end of it. The rain sucked but the atmosphere outside was good. I slept like a baby when I got home.

I need to go downtown when it is not raining!

I’ve been a horrible blogger. I have had pictures from our Monday Olympic adventure sitting in flickr for days waiting to be titled and blogged about and here I sit with no time to do any of it. Plus, tomorrow I am going on more Olympic adventures which means there is going to be a giant back log. This no time thing is no fun.

I have no idea when I am going to get a chance to do the overflowing amount of laundry sitting in the bedroom. Or clean the house. Or finish all this work on my desk. Or research Italy. Or plan the next month of our lives. I AM FEELING STRESSED PEOPLE!!!

Tomorrow I am going downtown with the parentals while Chad works away in the office. Saturday night we’ll actually be able to eat dinner together and probably just hang out and do nothing. Hopefully this is true so that I can do the laundry while doing nothing.

Sunday I’ve decided to go to my Moms and scrapbook all day, which is probably not the best way to spend my time but the pressure to finish this scrapbook and exit the premises is mounting, as much as my Mother says its not.

Tonight we are helping Dario move, but hopefully there will be some beers and pizza and socialization post move.

As for now, I’m just going to continue complaining that I have no time!!!

Valentines Day!

Yes! An excuse for cookies and chocolates and dinner out!

That is the best part of Valentines Day, all the food.

This is this years stash.

We got each other the exact same things.

Chocolates and Cookies.

I guess Chad loves me more since my Choclates and Cookies were bigger.

And here I was trying to SAVE money!

Just another thing to prove we are meant for each other.

We got each other the exact same kind of Valentines Day card that talks about all the goofy things we do and how we can make each other mad but in the end we love each other kind of thing. Then we went through the card and personalized each situation with something that has really happened to us. Both cards included situations revolving around the recycling.

We are way too similar.

We walked up to Earls for dinner. Sat close to the bar so we could watch all the Olympic stuff that was going on.

We has Chicken Tacos for an appy and then I had Prawn and Scallop Pasta. Both were soooo friggin good. Not to mention the Raspberry Martini and glass of Red Wine. Yum yum yum!

We came back home where I severed the Chocolate Covered Marshmallows that I had slaved over all day. I friggin burnt the chocolate in the microwave trying to melt it, so badly that smoke was coming out of it and filled the whole apartemnt. Don’t ask. It was a total disasted. Second time around was much better though!

Chad then realized it was 10:00 and he was way passed his bed time (for having to get up at 5:30 the next morning for work) so he went to bed and passed out. Ha.

Yay for Valentines Day during his Olympic Rotation!!!

We decided to head down to where all the action was on Saturday Morning. We lazed around in bed for a bit, watching Olympic coverage on TV before heading downtown. Then of course, we heard about all those Ass Hats causing damage to the Bay, which got me pretty upset because I’ve been overly sensitive about the Olympics lately.

We took the skytrain down and got off at Granville hoping to stop by at the Olympic Store at the Bay (despite the damage done) to pick up some merch, but they closed it all off so you couldn’t get to it through the inside of the Bay, which sucked big time, and the line (from the outside) to get in was way too long so we gave up.

24 hour glass repair was on site right away. There was a lot of ‘Go Canada Go’ chanting going on which was cool.

I’m a Lumberjack.

Everyone’s already taken photos of this stuff, but I haven’t so here it is.

Walking south along Granville, checking out all the art.

In classic Danielle mode, I originally wrote ‘Here come the Cheques!’.

I made Chad take a picture of my good Bang day. (Thank you Marlee!)

For lunch we stopped in at the Olympia Bar & Grill on Granville. It looks fairly new, but then again, I haven’t been down to Granville in a while. The place was totally empty when we looked inside, but the wait staff was so nice and inviting that we decided to stay. Chad was astonish at how cheap the beer was ($4.25 to be exact) that he fell in love with the place and wants to go back ASAP. We might hit it up tonight if your original plan fails. I had the Mediterranean Pizza and Chad had a Calzone. Both were really good. I liked the atmosphere of the bar, so I’m pretty sure we will be back. By the time we left, the place was pretty full. Chad joked that they should give us a discount because we ‘brought the people in’. I think they actually did.

After lunch we headed to Yaletown. By this point it was pretty cold and rainy so we stopped in a little boutique that had some Olympic Merch (including an umbrella) so we picked one up. The store was adorable, expensive, but amazing. I would love to go back there. They had such cute home decor stuff and baby stuff.

We pit stopped it in the Roundhouse in Yaletown before going next door to Casa Italia cause Chad had to pee. Ha. He said it was the nicest portable he had ever been in. It even had granite counter tops! TMI?

Casa Italia. I don’t know what an of these words are suppose to mean.

Represent!

A map of places to climb, I believe.

Italian Olympic Merch.

I’m sorry Italy, I love you and all, but what the hell were you thinking?

Each item of clothing ran $300 to $450. Um…are you kidding me!?

A lot of fake cheese.

The had this section of Italian art which was pretty neat. I loved this clock with the little bird waiting to pop out. There was even this set of dishes that when you stacked them the right way they made a globe. Pretty friggin neat if you ask me.

Checking out all the sporting footwear. I, of course, loved the ice pick/hiking boots because of the sharpe violent spikes on the end. Kind of maybe wanted to use them on the ‘Anarchists’.

Walked through Yaletown and found this little building. I don’t know what it was but there was a lot of people on computers. Maybe the Yahoo house?

I asked Chad to take a picture of me.

“No, Chad, can you move back and get the whole thing?”

“What the hell, you don’t even see what I am looking at”

“Yea well I would have had to move really far back”

…

I swear to God.

I’m pretty sure I was British in my previous life.

Back downtown on Robson where all the madness was.

He can never give me a normal face. What, do I disgust you that much!?

CTV insanity.

Chad and our new umbrella!

A couple of Moms commented on how cute it was. Chad wasn’t impressed.

Adorable!

We walked up Robson so I could check out a couple of stores, but I didn’t find anything worth buying, so I grabbed a Starbucks and we headed home.

Found this really cool art installation at the Burrard Skytrain Station. I think is was a project done by an Emily Carr student.

See, we can never get a normal face.

Shhhh, look, theres Chads security pass. Don’t tell anyone.

You can’t really tell, but I swear to you that he looks Asian on all his Accreditation tags.

Good times spent downtown. Once Chad gets home from work tonight we are going to go down to Granville Island and *try* to get into the Atlantic House. But I have a feeling thats going to be a huge fail, especially since we are not going to stand in line for 2 hours, so we will probably end up back at the Olympia Bar & Grill. Fine by me anyways!

Alicia and I were both very excited this morning, dressed in our Olympic gear, waiting for the excitement and entertainment that is the Opening Ceremonies of the 2010 Olympics.

My Mom kept phoning us giving us updates on the torch relay and we were following it on Twitter and Facebook. Then all of a sudden out of the corner of my eye I saw a bunch of Cops riding on horses right in front of my window at work. I screamed in excitement. I’ve never been so excited to see cops on horses in my life. We watched in anticipation to see what was going on, but they just trotted up the street. I then realized that I had heard that the torch would be making its way down Commercial Street and quickly checked the status of it. It was currently at a pit stop not to far away, so Alicia and I grabbed our stuff, said we were going out for an early lunch and hulled ass up the hill to Commercial Street.

I imedietly saw the horses and started to squeel in excitement. These Olympic games, they have me getting excited over the weirdest things. There were people everywhere and we were a bit confused as to what was going on. Then the cops told everyone to get out of the way and they blocked the street with the horses.

We quickly saw a flood of people heading out way down Commercial. The first crowd was filled with Protesters, but there were people carrying Canadian flags behind them. We were very confused as to what was going on.

The look of pure excitement and exhaustion on our faces. Running up the hill was death, but the horses has me so excited like something REAL was going to happen. Also notice my giant 2 front teeth. Got to love them!

It was very disappointing to be so excited that we had the chance to see the Olympic Torch pass by, and then for it to be ruined by protesters, who didn’t even know what they were fighting for. Everyone was yelling random shit and I was getting so angry. It’s very hard to see people bashing and hating on something you love and feel so passionately about.

We wondered North down Commercial to see if the protesters were in front of the torch, but quickly realized there was no torch. A bunch of kids from the local school were walking behind them waving Canadian flags in support and we asked them what was going on. They informed us that everything has been re-routed because of the protesters. I yelled ‘Effing Hippie Douchebag Protesters’ really loud in frustration and they all laughed and cheered, which I thought was pretty funny.

Alicia and I took off towards First ave hoping we could catch it there but no matter how many blockaids the police set up the protesters kept by passing them. The more it went on the angreier Alicia and I got and the more we yelled back at them. I even got into a personal verbal scuffle with a couple of them. I was Italian Raging inside.

Eventually they took over the intersection of First and Commercial causing a major traffic jam, and really doing nothing other then annoying the shit out of people. A ‘Go Canada Go’ chant started to fight back all the bullshit they were chanting.  The torch had been completely re routed and they were no where near it so it was all pretty pointless and annoying.

Alicia called her Mom to see where it was now and we headed in that direction. However, people were already walking back so there was no point.

Just as we turned the corner I noticed an Olympic Torch Bearer standing around a bunch of people. I quickly pointed her out and Alicia and I went up to her and she asked if we wanted to take a picture with the torch. It was so nice of her! We didn’t get her name, and I tried to look online if there was a list of all the torch bearers but I couldn’t find anything.

It was a pretty neat experience dispite all the negative crap that was going on around the Drive. It was very nice of her to come up and to see all the people who missed the torch relay because of the protesters.

It really sucked not being able to be a part of the torch relay, and when I found out it was going to be so close to work I thought I was going to have the chance of a lifetime. I know people have the right to protest, but it really upsets me when their protesting prevents something from happening, something GOOD from happening. Think about all the torch bearers who were excited to run down the street with people cheering for them, having to be re routed just to run down a street where there is no one cheering you on, because no one knows you are there!  It also really bugged me that the protesters prevented the torch from being presented at Victory Square where Veterans had been waiting all morning to see it.

It was also really horrible to hear of the news of the Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili passing away today in Whistler. Alicia and I were sick to our stomachs when we first heard. What a horrible, horrible thing to have happen.

Now I kind of feel down about everything, even though I was so excited this morning. Hopefully getting toegther with friends to watch the Opening Ceremonies picks up everyones spirits!