I rock!

Yesterday, I went to the climbing gym with Sarah. It was one of my best sessions so far. There's a route that was kicking my ass every time, it has two overhangs and part of the climb is on an incline (i.e. you're holding yourself on the wall). By the time I would make it to the second overhang, I was always so tired I couldn't pull myself up. Well, not yesterday. I was dead set on conquering this one and I did, with a mixture of strength and willpower. That was my first climb of the day, then I went on to try various 5.9s and even one 5.10a (didn't climb half of it properly, obviously). It was so much fun.

Tonight, I was invited to sub for my neighbor's beach volleyball team. One of their players has a broken finger and won't be playing for the rest of the summer. This was a bit of a trial, as I have only played 5-6 times outside with the Train & Play program, and my neighbor plays for an intermediate team. Apparently, I'm not doing too bad, because I was invited to join the team for the rest of the season. I'm playing in a competitive league!

Just ignore the bruises.

Social entrepreneurship around the world

PBS Frontline World is showcasing the work of social entrepreneurs around the planet and you can watch nine short movies on grassroot initiatives that are really making a difference on their web site.

Frustration

Two posts in a single day! Might this be the end of the dry-spell?

I haven't written much about running lately and it's not because of my not trying to get out now and then. Instead, it's because I physically cannot run. Well, not for long anyways. I've been diagnosed with Patellofemoral Syndrome in the right knee, a fairly-common injury for runners. It's a painful injury but fortunately, it's also treatable. Unfortunately, recovery is a long process and progress is slow.

My right knee started hurting a few months back, after a long run along the seawall. Walking was no problem, except when walking down a steep hill. When I went hiking with Joanne last month, the hike up was amazing, the hike down almost brought me to tears. I asked my GP about it and she sent me to a sports doctor at UBC. Apparently, I was lucky because my doctor is fairly known in Vancouver for treating serious athletes (and occasionally, sports enthusiasts like myself).

The treatment is not very complicated, I must do drop-squats every day with increasing weights. OK, not too bad. I can also continue running, but only for short times, and have to stop as soon as my knee starts hurting. The first week, that was around 5 minutes. Today, I can do about 10. Ten minutes... I'm so far from the half-marathon days :-( At this rate, I might be able to run a 5k in the fall.

This is very frustrating, especially considering that running is my own form of meditation and relaxation.

This is the song I'm listening to: Laisser l'été avoir 15 ans, Natasha St-Pier et Claude Dubois

All FUSEd out

This city is in dire need of something different. How else would you explain people lining up for 40 minutes to spend their Friday night at the Vancouver Art Gallery. Don't get me wrong, I think the gallery had the right idea when they organized their first all-night FUSE event. Vancouver doesn't often see artistic events that combine a mix of traditional visual arts and live performance, with the opportunity to enjoy a drink and chat about art. I just hope we start seeing more of this.

I visited the gallery last night with Gerri and Lara. We saw the Monet to Dali exhibit, walked around and listened to a bit of music, but decided to switch gears when we discovered there was a lineup to have a drink at the lounge. Instead, we walked over to Granville and spent the rest of the evening at the Republic Lounge. Republic has an interesting concept, if you want to go to the club, you'll need to line up and pay a cover charge. If you just want to settle at the bar for a drink, you can avoid the cover, the wait, and head for their lounge. The music is the same, the lounge was a bit less crowded, perfect.

This weekend will be the first where I don't have to go to school to work on a team assignment. I'm done with the presentations and group paper, now I only need to focus on my individual assignment and a final exam.

Oh kitty...

You know, if I had to come up with a strange way to spend my Friday night, I don't think I would have come up with the story I'm about to share with you.

It all started around 11, as I was getting ready for bed. My evening was fairly low-key, I watched a few episodes of Angel after making myself a yummy dinner. As soon as I turned the TV off, I could hear a cat meowing outside. It sounded pretty unhappy (think stray cats when they are about to fight each other). I was brushing my teeth, washing my face, wondering why the cat didn't sound like it was moving around. I could hear it as if it was right at my front door. So I decided to go check it out, especially now that I could hear a few people outside calling "kitty, kitty, where are you?"

I wasn't prepared for what came next. My next door neighbor and his girlfriend were standing by the front stairs, peering into the tight crawl space that separates our walkway from the building next door. I went to get a flashlight, pointed it the best I could to see where the meowing was coming from and there it was... Wedged in between the two concrete walls was an adult cat. My neighbor was lying in the neighbor's garden on his belly, trying to extend an arm to grab the cat, but no luck. The kitty went into the crawl space head first, its back legs were probably three feet below ground level and his head, about four feet. He was hanging in the air, stuck.

After realizing the absurdity of the situation, we called 911 and they contacted the SPCA's emergency response unit. A very nice lady pulled up in a truck about five minutes later, armed with a flashlight, two cat-poles (long pole with a loop that can be tighten at a distance). I'm sure she had seen all kinds of bizarre situations, but even she was surprised by this one. She tried placing the loop of the cat-pole around its head, but it was so tightly stuck that there wasn't enough space to get a hold of the animal.

Next step? She called the fire department. Yes, fire fighters are indeed called in to rescue cats and not only from trees. Four fire fighters came by a few minutes later with some heavy-duty equipment. They couldn't believe how the cat got himself in such trouble!! The only way they could think of getting the cat out of there was to dig out the neighbor's garden to allow someone to lower themselves enough to get a hold of the cat and pull him out.

It took 45 minutes, several shovels, five flashlights, two cat-poles, a few tools (to take out the railing for the stairs), a hockey stick, and a bottle of Dawn dishwashing liquid to finally yank the cat out of its spot. Yeah, dishwashing liquid, even when we were finally able to reach the cat, he was so jammed in we had to use the soap as kitty-lube. You can just imagine what this animal looked like when he was finally rescued and placed into a cage with a soft blanket. He didn't try escaping, I think he was so tired and scared that he let himself be carried away without much fuss. The SPCA lady then took him to a 24-hour emergency veterinarian. It was 1:30 a.m. by the time everything was over.

We still don't know who the cat belongs to, not anyone in the building as far as I know. He didn't have a collar (which would have helped us a lot).

Like I said, interesting way to spend a Friday night. At least, I got to know a few of my new neighbors...

Back from... where was I again?

I didn't realize it when I wrote the post, but the little one-liner you've been staring at for a week now was my 500th post! It's pretty crazy when you think about it, but not entirely surprising since the blog started in July 2004. Yes, A Frog in BC will be three-years old in a month!

I'm really enjoying this slow morning, it's raining outside, I'm having a coffee and catching up with e-mails... Hopefully the rain will stop before 5, I have a BBQ with the MBA crowd later today. Lucky me, it rained pretty much all week, but not yesterday, which is my beach volleyball day. I'm starting to get the hang of this game, even learning how to serve overhead. Not that the ball is making it over the net yet, but so close!

School's going well, but having all my group projects and presentations at the very beginning is tiring. Trying to meet with two different groups (one for each class) when people are working and we have evening classes means that weekends are spent in the vault. It's not a figure of speech, our meeting rooms at school are literally located in what used to be a bank vault. You can guess how many windows we have down there... By June 18, all my group work will be over and I can focus on my own assignments and exams.

I got good news from work: I'm getting a raise. I'm sure that the per-pay amount won't be extraordinary, but it's still nice to see that your work is appreciated. We haven't done any formal performance reviews since I started the new position and when you're caught in the day-to-day chaos, it's hard to tell if you're on the right track.

MIA

I'm not missing, just somehow very busy.