sunday night jazz

Despite the hideous rainy weather,  Sunday night I had a great time out with my cousin in Nice. 

 

She took me to a teeny tiny jazz bar, which features the same jazz/blues/swing/bluegrass quartet every weekend.  The trombone player was a complete ham for attention! I loved their hats, how the lighting would change every minute or so, and the fact that they played songs from the Jungle Book soundtrack. It also amazes me how accents disappear while singing.

Cans for Comments

I was blog browsing earlier today, and came across a great idea that some photographers have been doing.  They call it Cans for Comments - and it's essentially a canned food drive for local food banks, and each comment left on the blog will result in one canned good being donated.

Here is where I read about it.  Anyway, I hope you'll click, and somehow I'll find the foodbank here to donate :)

Happy Thanksgiving!

Thank goodness for having American friends....

Last night the group of us language assistants celebrated American Thanksgiving, which was nice, because the Canadian one came and went for us like a regular Monday in October.  It was a huge potluck feast, hosted by the fabulous Katie and Natalee, at their actually-the-size-of-a-real-apartment-with-an-oven-in-the-kitchen home.  The food was incredible and our celebration truly did feel like a piece of home (without any of those awkward family issues.) We even did the traditional sharing of what we're thankful for, and introduced our British, Italian and Scottish friends to all of the usual fare.  Finding the French equivalent to each recipe ingredient was tricky in itself.

We had: sweet potatoes, stuffing, mashed potatoes, carrots, green bean casserole, spinach and cheese dip, creamy peas, cauliflower cheese, parsnips, escargot, 2 chickens and homemade gravy.  With apple apricot pie, banana caramel cream pie, marshmallow cherry "15's," chocolate krispies and vanilla ice cream for dessert and wine and cider.  Phew.   The pie says "Thanks give" because Lucy is British ;)

5 Things I am grateful for this Thanksgiving:

1. the internet, for keeping me in touch with my family and friends in Canada

2. it's silly but the dress i bought yesterday, that fits perfectly!! (for the christmas party)

3. the opportunity to live in the south of France (t-shirt weather yesterday!)

4. my new group of fantastic friends over here.  its always a blast.

5.  for having Steve here with me.  Even though we've had some tough days these past couple months, we're on this crazy adventure together and that means a lot.  and kudos to him for surviving the night with all of the girls.  he's the only male assistant around.  so cute...

Happy Thanksgiving, wherever you are!

Blog love

I was lucky enough to attend(and photograph some of) the gorgeous wedding of my good friends Amanda & Braydan, in July.  Amanda is an incredibly talented designer, and every detail of the wedding was perfect.  And so, she's being featured on the wedding planning blog 100 Layer Cake! It's exciting to see some of my photos on another site :)
If you'd like to check out more of Amanda's style, you can visit her blog highstreetlove.

weekend in Paris

As required for his graduate school applications, Steve wrote the GRE this past Saturday. After studying obsessively for over a month and filling every inch of scrap paper with equations, it came time to book the test at one of the official testing centres. Paris or Geneva. Geneva would have been great, but Paris was cheaper, and then I could also go :)

We stayed with Steve's cousins, who were extremely hospitable.  Little James is such a cutie.

As Steve wrote his exam on the saturday, I got the chance to wander and explore the city.  I didn't take a lot of pictures, I actually walked many many streets without much of interest, and eventually just got too tired to carry the camera anymore and brought it back home.  (it's not much of a shopping companion anyway)

The Galleries Lafayette are a chain of department stores in France, the best department stores. Think Dior, Chanel, D&G.... The one in Paris is of course the biggest, and was fully decked out for Christmas.  The building itself used to be an opera hall and is stunningly beautiful. 

After exhausting myself by walking 7+ hours in the city, we had a great Indian food and fun conversation with everyone at the house.  Fell asleep quite easily.

On Sunday we headed to get the essential Eiffel tower shot.  We wandered a few markets, had a picnic in a park with our findings, then wandered some more and found some flea markets.  The environment of the flea market is a bit different here - of course there are the booths of random junk, unfashionable clothes and old VHS tapes. But, maybe the French value things more, because the prices are high, and things I would normally collect at flea markets (vintage enamel flower brooches) are strictly reserved for antique sellers and cost well over 20 times what I pay at home.  We each found a treasure though - Steve a vintage Chinese propaganda poster, and me, a fashion magazine from April 1912.  We lost track of time and wore ourselves out before even beginning the walk to the tower.

We stumbled across a Starbucks and rested for a while.  This was a treat for Steve.  There are no Starbucks in the South of France and he was happy to have his 'usual.'  Something extra exciting about Starbucks when it has this view out the window.

Finally we hiked the rest of the way to the tower.  It's a long walk.  It was cold.  We sort of just wanted to get the picture and then leave. ha ha.  Snapped a few and grabbed the metro home.  End scene.

Overall a nice weekend.  Cannes feels really warm in comparison.  And we can visit again soon! We'll be staying at the same apartment for Christmas, while the cousins visit N. America.  Brilliant!

day trip to ventimiglia...

Every Friday morning, the Ventimiglia, Italy has a huge market.  It's blocks and blocks full of clothing, purses, household items, and of course, delicious Italian foods!  Here are some of the sights.

 

 

pasta available in hilarious shapes and varieties.  we bought the black one (squid ink flavour), some teddy bears, and some tricolour vegetable male anatomy.  ha ha couldn't resist.

 and i highly recommend the gelato. incredible.

odd jobs

i was thinking today that i have quite a crazy resume, if i actually include everything.  here's a list of the jobs i can remember.  feeling lost along the way, a definite.

cleaning fleets of government trucks - vacuum insides, dust, wash windows - with my grandparents business.  i miss hanging out with them every saturday.

flower shop - mostly sweeping floors and watering plants after school

grocery store - cashier, stockperson, deli counter worker (also when i became vegetarian)

camp co-founder - summer self-esteem and leadership camp for girls  - "Revolution Girl Style"

drycleaners - folding sheets and towels for local hotels

receptionist - local community theatre

ups store - lasted 3 months

staff photographer/writer - college newspaper, some fun interviews there

instructor - teen movie group. never again.

retail clothing - a combo Northern Getaway(kids) & Northern Reflections (puppy dog sweatshirts)

community development worker - at a law office specializing in pro bono

hair dresser's assistant - shampooed other people's hair.  too strange.  lasted a week.

filmmaker - documentary editor, assistant director, prop maker, costume designer, grip, the works. 

music store employee - longest lasting and easiest job.

photo store employee - loved looking at other people's pictures, getting the discount and meeting some of my best friends ever:

professional scrapbooker - at a boutique in toronto, before i moved to kingston.  it has now closed :(  such a quiet, not great paying job, but the most creative one i've ever had. love that!

university bookstore - in charge of the clothing department - go Queens!

language assistant - in cannes, france. here's one of my classes, when they realized my laptop would have the photobooth program.  they're fun.

photographer -  i love it. 

long week...

it's been a long and quite exhausting week.  i have many things to update, including a trip to paris, an official french medical visit, tutoring, enrolling in school and feeling a little bit "at home."
right now, i'm going to do a much needed round of laundry.
talk to you soon. hopefully tonight.

Window shopping at Chanel

i like this bow hairpiece, but maybe on a smaller scale.  i wonder how much it costs! i think the hairpins on this mannequin are better suited:

Sunday morning marathon

this morning was the annual marathon from nice to cannes.  i slept through the first round of finishers, but went for a couple hours to cheer on the rest.

i have to be honest, i don't think a marathon is anything i could ever do, which makes me appreciate even more the amount of determination and mental strength it takes.  excellent idea to have names on the shirt numbers.  i enjoyed hollering "allez jean paul allez!" with the crowd, but even more fun was finding runners wearing english paraphernalia.  their huge smiles when they'd hear "go wayne go!" or "way to go toronto!" (blue jays hat) was totally worth making a spectacle of myself.

 not sure who this man is, but fans were screaming for autographs when he finished.

only in cannes would you arrive on a red carpet ;)

i also loved watching the family members join in for the last stretch.  they are so proud.  and this woman who ran the last of it without shoes! you just have to see it.

well done!