This past week has been a bit of a write off. I felt like pausing life for a while, but unfortunately, it just kept rolling on, so now I am OFF SCHEDULE.

I got the dreaded flu last week. It started all of a sudden, and I just felt like someone stuck a straw in me and sucked out my soul. I had no energy, and just slept and slept and slept. Then all the cold symptoms showed up, which was, you know, pleasant. I still have a few symptoms hanging around, especially when I come inside from being outside, namely, gross coughing spells and snotty nose. I still also feel sort of foggy, which has been steadily improving. I cancelled all of my driving classes week, knowing that the next class will be parking. I want to be as smart as possible for mastering that particular skill.

We are almost a month away from moving, and things are starting to sink in. Nothing beats living, and working, downtown. It's great to be able to walk around the beautiful downtown whenever we want, and enjoy all of the atmosphere. Everything is within walking distance, and I love, love, love my walk to and from work everyday. Now, it's not like we're moving into the woods, but it is not an easy walk to city center. It'll take some exploring, but the most direct route is on a freeway, which doesn't look to be pedestrian friendly. I guess we'll be there for at least 5 years, so I'll have some time to figure it out.

Well, maybe not. My first lesson, ending only minutes ago, went pretty well. If you discount the jello legs and heart palpitations. I don't have parents to show, so I will tell you all that Andre, my instructor, said it was an 'excellent first lesson'. He also said I handled the car very well, and that he couldn't understand why I didn't pass my test the first time (we're doing parking on Sunday, so I imagine he'll quickly learn why then). I also need to work on checking my mirrors more often, which I've been working on as a passenger, but I seem to forget when behind the wheel. That's just a habit I need to get into, though. So, if you're talking to me face to face, and I seem to avoid eye contact, it's not you, I'm just practicing looking at my side mirrors.

In other news, I totally watched a woman masturbate (like, for reals... a real woman in an instructional video) with a room full of 20 strangers. Fucken HELL, I love my job.

Just looking at the numbers, and it appears that Alice's birth announcement was post #666.

In any case, I wanted to update everyone a little bit on everything else happening in my life.

Everything, I believe, has been picked for our house, minus one range hood. Although the builders said they could "get us a great deal" from GE on our appliances, they completely failed to deliver, so got to use some of our allowance (that was build into the mortgage, to be used for upgrades, appliances, furniture, etc) on appliances somewhere else. As it happens, we managed to get a great deal at Leons on stainless steel appliances, which we wanted initially, but could not afford. As for all the other choices in cupboards, paint, flooring, etc, I figure I will hold off on that until we get to look at things.

It's weird picturing our new place. So much stuff we've 'purchased' recently (ie: we will be paying off for the next 30 years) is, well, obviously new, so I feel like I'm moving into a hotel room. It's exciting, but a little weird.

I'm halfway through the Young Drivers in class section. We had a test last week and I, ahem, got 100%. Now, on a few of the questions, I went back after I was finished and reread more carefully the questions, and corrected my mistakes before we marked them. I seem to be a strange breed in that my first gut feeling to something typically is wrong, and I need some extra time to really think things through. While this may be possible in multiple choice quizzes, I suspect that things will work out different when I'm behind the wheel. In my perfect world, I'd be able to drive 25 km/h everywhere, and never have to pass, merge, or drive behind a transport.

My first in-car lesson is on April 16th at 6:15. So, if you live in the city, and you see a little red YD Echo, you may want to jump out of the way.

And there you have it. Everyone is healthy and great and perfect. I dare say she looks a bit like me - considering my sister and I look nothing like, that is. She went from eating all the time to not eating for 10 hours, but it appears she's starting to get the hang of things.

I have some more house updates, but little Alice should really have her own post. It's the least I can do.