Worried Sick

I am not really in the mood to blog today, honestly. I slept on a very good note yesterday after watching Dwayne Johnson's heroes, and was very inspired by Charles' selflessness when he walked away from a whopping $610,000. That money could have changed his life but as he put it, "I am walking away from everything I have always wanted". I found that really thought-provoking and was deeply touched. 

That was last night. Today is a different ballgame entirely. 

This morning, I woke up to a phone call from my mum and I guess she basically wanted to tell me that she was going to her friend's daughter's graduation ceremony in another city. I didn't like that. It unsettles me anytime my mum tells me she is travelling to another part of Nigeria by road. Not trying to paint a bad picture of my country here but let's be honest, Nigeria, like many other places, is not the safest place on earth's surface. I prayed inwardly and committed her into the hands of God. She shall return home safe and sound by God's grace and no evil shall befall her.

 I couldn't go back to bed after she called me so I picked up my iPhone to track my Visa application package via Canada Post. The Embassy has still not sent my visa. I am really beginning to get worried here. I sent them an email yesterday and they haven't replied. I hate more than anything else to be in limbo. To not know what's happening in regards to any issue that concerns me just bothers the hell out of me. I really want to go home this year but this whole embassy thing and their strike action is just stressing me out. I am hoping something changes soon. Or at least, let me hear back from them. I need to go home! I wanna see my mama!!!!!! Argh! lol. 

Anyways, time to go and start getting ready to work. Hopefully, the rest of the day would be much better than the way I am feeling right now. 

My Mini Heart Attack

I applied for a re-entry visa recently so that I could go home (Nigeria) this summer and not have to apply for a visa when I get home. The kind of person I am, I get mini heart attacks easily. I am very panicky. If I ever for one second lose sight of my wallet and not remember when or where last I saw it, my heart starts to thump. If my bunch of keys is not in in the left pocket of my purse or anywhere else where I can see it easily, my palms start to sweat and I get all jumpy. This very reason is why I like to take care of my business early. 

Anyways, as I was saying, I applied for my reentry visa on the 13 of June only to find out that the people who handle visa processing at Citizenship and Immigration Canada were (and still) taking strike action. This meant that visa processing times would increase and there's a chance that I might not be able to get the visa in time to travel. 

Uh.. excuse me? Not be able to travel to see my family this year?

 OH-MY-GOD. Why in the world did I not apply earlier? That was all I could think about when I saw the strike action notice on the CIC website. In all fairness to myself.. I have a legit reason for not applying earlier. I had a visa already.. but it was going to expire at the end of March.. so I had to wait for it to expire before applying for another one. 

So why didn't you apply for another one immediately the one you had expired?

I am as baffled as you are. I just don't know why! It had crossed my mind a number of times to get all my documents together and send the damn application (heck! Canada Post is just three blocks away from where I live) but I didn't! Now I'm facing the consequences, praying to God almighty that this visa shows up so that I don't lose the money that was used in booking tickets. 

Speaking of tickets.. okay. My journey to Nigeria is going to be three-legged. First, I'd have to take a flight or bus from this city where I live to Toronto. Then from Toronto, I'l take another flight to Germany and fly from Germany to Lagos. Guess what? The ticket for the first leg of the journey was still not booked as of the early hours of today.  I can't even put to words the way I felt when I remembered that I had not made the reservation. Frantically and with shaky hands, I headed to Air Canada's website to try to book a seat. Surprise.. all the seats were taken. Now, I'm starting to panic even more.

What am I going to do? Why did I have to wait until now..

..were the words floating in my head upon realizing that  I might have just killed the dreams of seeing my family this summer. I started trying different dates to see if I could get seat for any day else,  and maybe find a place to stay when I get to Toronto, but when I found out there were no seats available for even those dates,  frustration started setting in. I began to think hard! The thinking paid off. It finally occurred to me that I didn't necessarily have to fly from my city. I could go to a neighboring city and just catch a flight there! I started exploring other cities and  I was able to make a reservation for my intended date of travel! *Sigh*.

But right now, I am faced with another challenge. I'm brainstorming on how I'd get from here to that other city. Right now, my only option is to go by bus.. which I don't want to. 

We'll see how it goes. 

Take home message: Don't wanna have a mini heart attack? Then don't procrastinate like I did. 

Phew!

4/365: Happiness In a Cup

To tired to make lunch for myself yesterday, I decided to stop at Subway to get a sandwich instead. I got a steak and cheese sub on n foot long Italian herbs and cheese bread. I'm quite sure the attendants at the Subway I go to think I'm weird since anytime they ask me what veggies I want on my sandwich, my answer is always a very certain "everything". Sometimes they pass me the is-this-girl-for-real look and all I do is just stare them dead in the eye.. nod slowly and reiterate my previous reply - " lettuce, spinach, hot pepper, jalapenos, the kitchen sink, everything! I just want everything".

Yesterday, I got the meal deal. The one where they give you two cookies and a bottled drink or a drink from the fountain. I opted to have a fountain drink and my choice was Fruitopia~ the pink one. Except it's orange, pineapple or apple-flavored, I'm not a champion at telling what was used in flavoring a drink. I'm not quite sure what's in this very Fruitopia or what flavor they were trying to make an artificial version of, but boy is it good. It tastes AMAZING. Lots of calories.. but SO GOOD. Sipping this on a steaming afternoon just makes half your worries disappear.. at least for a while. lol. 

So that was how I spent my afternoon yesterday.. eating a sub and drinking this happiness in a cup!

How did you spend yours? 

Not Taking Life For Granted.

My 3/365 picture was that of a street wet with rainwater- the view from my front door. I was so happy it was finally raining and everything did not have to be so hot. A great relief from all that heat of the last little while. The overwhelming happiness I felt led me to act impulsively, however. Usually, when it's raining, I take a cab to work.. since I don't have a car yet.. but yesterday was different. I decided I would walk, after all,  it was only a 20 minutes walk and about 5 streets away. So I took out my umbrella and made for the door. The mistake I made though, was, I did not look at the weather report before leaving the house. All I knew was that it was raining and the ominously dark blue sky didn't look like it was inviting me out for a cup of coffee.I did not check to see how strong the wind was and if I was going to get blown away into an unknown world by what I would find out  could almost pass for a grade one hurricane. 

I made it past the first street okay.. but my umbrella was struggling. And because my umbrella was struggling, I started to struggle too. The wind was blowing us in all directions. And I found myself fighting to remain on the sidewalk, and not get thrown onto the main road. My umbrella at this point was still holding its own~ it wasn't quite doing it's job in the way that an umbrella is expected to, but at least it was shielding my hair and face from the rain.

After I had successfully made it past the second street and about crossing to the third, a fierce wind came that blew the canopy of my now-tired umbrella to the heavens. At this point, the "walk" sign came on and I had to make my way across the street. Embarrassed does not even begin to describe how I felt waking before all those cars and their owners. Only God can tell what they must have been thinking in their minds:

Oh, poor thing. I wish I  could give her a lift, but it's against the law in Canada to do so. She'll be fine.

So with me holding my umbrella pointing forward at waist level, I made it across the third street. Once I was able to collect myself and recover from the mortification that had just befallen me, I stopped on street 4, still under the pouring rain, to fix my umbrella.

I did a pretty good job. I got it fixed and continued on my journey. However, the fix did not hold for too long. My umbrella lost it again. By this time, the rain had gotten heavier and I was directly under it. I couldn't stop to take shelter anywhere because I'd be late for work, so I had to suck it up and keep going. Need I say that by the time I crossed the fifth street and made it to the front steps of my workplace, I was drenched silly. And everyone at work got a good laugh out of both my drenched self and my umbrella. 

It was quite the experience yesterday. But it was okay. I got a sense of what it feels like to be under the rain without having anywhere to go, and now I appreciate having a house to live in even more.

Now I know never to take life's little blessings such as basic shelter for granted. 

What's Yours?

I have a few of them actually but I'll share the ones I currently watch the most.

The show I wake up to every morning is Princess. It's a show about young women, usually between the ages of 18 to 30, who have issues staying on track financially. 

How I understand the show works is that a family member nominates the "princess" to receive financial counselling and during the course of the show, the princess is given challenges which they have to complete. 

The plan is that the challenges they are asked to complete would help remold their spending habits and prepare them for a more sustainable future. If they complete the challenges successfully (without wining or bitching), they get up to $5,000. It's a really interesting show from which you can learn a lot and I implore everyone to at least try and watch one episode. If you are interested, you can watch it here.

If you love drama and you are not a fan of the Real Housewives franchise, then you are seriously missing!!! And honestly, you just can never get bored of the show because there's more than one. 

The different Real Housewives shows are named based on where the housewives live. 

So for example, a show based on women in New Jersey would be called The Real Housewives of New Jersey (this actually exists by the way) and one based on women in Orange County would be called The Real Housewives of Orange County (you get the gist). These shows are filled with drama, intrigue, confusion, commotion and are just a great way to pass time. Watch Orange County and tell me what you think about it!

If you know you're not yet ready to retire from going to your favorite restaurant, you probably don't wanna watch this show. Watching Kitchen Nightmares has definitely opened my eyes to how restaurants work and all the struggles they have to go through in order to keep being in business. 

But this show has a downside to it. It shows you the inner workings of the restaurants, revealing the hygiene level that the kitchen runs on thereby making you want to quit going to restaurants altogether. But I won't quit. I love giving myself a treat from time to time. lol.

 This show is all about Gordon Ramsey, a top chef, helping to revive restaurant businesses that are on the brink of closing down. He remodels the restaurants if he has to and brings hope and smiles back to the owner and the customers.

 Like I said, watch at your own discretion. Okay. The show's not that bad. But what you see might shock you. You can watch Kitchen Nightmares here.

I wanna hear what your favorite shows are. Hopefully, I can find some to add to the three I highlighted above. 

Did My Boss Just Tap My Shoulder?

Hey girlies! :) How's everyone doing today? Enjoying the summer, are you? I wish I was. I don't know if I have said this before, but this has got to be the most busiest summer I've ever had. I am doing a lot more for myself this year and trying to make the best use of the "free" time that I have now. Like many college students on the block, I picked up a summer job. It's a really interesting job in the sense that all I have to do is maintain company websites and all, but boy, the hours stress me out.

Anyways, yesterday was quite interesting. I was hanging out here on blogger during one of my breaks when my supervisor creeped walked up to me very quietly and tapped me on the shoulder. I was startled! I was so tempted to blurt out the words "DO NOT DO THAT TO ME EVER AGAIN" but that would have cost me my job.. so no, thank you! Turns out the poor guy had good intentions though. All he wanted to do was go over my work performance for the last two months and let me know where I stand in comparison to my colleagues. I was beyond happy when he told me I was at a good place with my stats (yay for being a slacker and still managing to pull that off). He let me know that the company is really pleased to have me working for them and I was overjoyed! Appreciation is always a nice thing, eh?

We ended up just discussing about my (and his daughter's) future- we both wanna become dentists so that gave us common grounds to make a conversation out of. It ended really well and I felt good the rest of the day!

~What is what doing at all is worth doing well~

It's 20 Degrees Centigrade In Canada!

Who has been outside lately? How hot is it in your area? Do you find that you have to open all the windows in your house just so you can breathe, or do you find yourself in the pool of your own sweat when you wake up in the middle of the night to pee? These have been my fate of late! Here in the Maritimes, it's been awfully hot.

Since the year I got here, I have spent all my summers in Nigeria (which is hot anyway) so I was hoping for a cooler and much more breezy summer when I changed my itinerary and decided to not go home as early this year.  The fans in almost every store in this area are sold out. Everything is just so hot.. humid.. and the air is..for lack of a better word.. static. I never knew the day would come when I would see 20 degrees centigrade for this city on the weather report (it was 26 yesterday by the way). 

It is just so damn hooooot!

 A sure way to combat this temperature menace is by going to the pool and staying hydrated. These are the only things that seem to help. Of course an air-conditioning unit would be a superb option. Anything.. just anything to make this heat feel better. Haha.

My 21st Present

Okay, not exactly my 21st present, what it is, is the birthday present I got myself for my 21st birthday. Since I have no boyfriend or no friends who were so into me up to the extent of getting me a birthday present, I decided to get one for myself.

Guess what I got? A DSLR! I went crazy and bought myself the canon t3i for $622, with discounts and deductions! I would be broke for a while and a half, that's for sure; but I have wanted a DSLR since last year when I could not afford to buy one and still have enough money to eat. I am so happy with my purchase that I have been out and about taking pictures. For someone who hardly leaves her room, you should know this is a big deal. I am going to be uploading photos from time to time so stay tuned.

Here is the box of my canon, yes, I got an open box! It was the last one in the store and it was $30 cheaper. Cant go wrong with a discount.

Here are some other pictures too. :)

I am probably not going to be money on myself for a while but I do feel like this purchase was/is really worth it. Now I can take pictures of myself as i age and look at them sometime in the future and smile. I will be traveling back to my home country too so it's definitely going to be a photo galore! So excited for this camera and looking forward to dive into the world of photography. Cant wait. :D

Happy Birthday To Meeee!

Yay, it's my birthday. My 21st birthday.. haha! I am getting soo old, it's crazy. I vividly remember how I  celebrated my 12th, my mum got me this huge pink sparkly fruit cake which I adored and shared with my family. Now, the digits have flipped and I am 21! Yipeee! I feel like a big girl, like a true adult. I feel ready grab the world and shove it under me! I feel so in-control.

Above all that I have written, I am so grateful to God. So many things have happened in my life which I have all reasons to be thankful for. The fact that I am alive today is a huge testament of his love for me and a constant reminder that he is and will always be there for me. I may not be able to spend the day with my family today (they are all the way back in Nigeria and I am in Canada) but just knowing that they are well and okay puts a big smile on my face and makes me realize that I am truly blessed beyond words.

So people may be wondering how exactly I intend to celebrate this birthday I am so over the moon about. Well guess what, I am writing this from work. Haha! And I don't look red carpet eligible either. I have absolutely no make-up on and my front earrings are off! I actually rushed out of the house this morning to work.. my life has been a roller-coaster lately! But you know what? This roller coaster ride of a life that I have is what I am grateful for. The fact that I can breathe, walk, run, see, ...BREATHE... the fact that I am alive and can do everything I want is what I would spend today thanking God for. He has been soooooo faithful and I couldn't be more grateful!

Happy birthday to me and all my birthday mates all over the world! Wishing you all showers of blessings and  many more birthdays. :)

Kay!