2006

Everybody's doing it, so will I... write a New Year's blog entry that is.

To start, I don't make New Year's resolutions - never have and I doubt I ever will. Actually, that's not true, I always make one New Year's resolution: don't make any New Year's resolutions. True, it is a New Year, but apart from writing 2006 instead of 2005, what's so new about it. I am not trying to be cynical, but think about it - January 1st is just another day, and in the case of this year, just another Sunday.

But I do believe in making resolutions and goals for myself (and yourself), I just make them throughout the year, as I see fit. I am always looking for new and interesting things, and ways to improve myself, I just don't feel like I have to wait until January 1st to "say" I am going to start working on those things.

So what of my end to 2005 and beginning to 2006?

With about three days to New Year's Eve, Colin and I had no definitive plans, so we decided to throw a small party. We invited a few friends over and I cooked dinner for everyone. We had just received our new, big screen tv a couple of days before that so we started the party at 3PM for anyone who wanted to come over early and watch the Canucks get decimated, yet again. I won't go there right now, that is deserving of it's own blog entry...

A friend of ours brought over his digital box, which also has HDTV, so we were able to watch both the Canucks Game and World Junior Canada-USA game in high def - now I'm ruined. Once you watch TV in high def, there's no turning back.

Once those two games were over and more people arrived, we kept on watching hockey, and a room full of Canuck fans sat and watched the Battle of Alberta. After hours of hockey (I think 6 or 7) we all turned our attention to the party. Later in the evening we broke out the board games and listened to an ailing Dick Clark ring in the new year.

At about 1 or 2 in the morning, we heard a lot of swearing and yelling outside our apartment. There were a few drunken teens outside. We didn't think to much of it, but kept an eye (and ear on the situation), and it was a good thing we did.

First they kicked over a couple of newspaper boxes. Stupid, but not detrimental. A few minutes after that, however they ran up to a car driving slowly by and punched the window. Right after that a stream of teens flooded out from the building next to us and began chasing the car. That's when we called 911. While waiting for the cops, a girl at the party was now standing below our window, arguing with a couple of the guys. It was starting to escalate and get physical, so we called 911 again.

Within minutes two cop cars showed up and were talking to the three teens for a good half hour. No one was arrested in the end, but we didn't hear a peep out of the culprits from the rest of the night. Mind you, by this time it was getting close to 3AM.

We returned to our games for a bit, then decided to pack in the party around 4AM.

All in all, it was pretty good way to ring in the New Year.

January 1 was unusual day, but a good one. On New Year's Eve we received a somewhat drunken phone call from a friend of ours who had come over from Victoria to spend New Year's Eve in Vancouver.

The next day we met up with Adam and our friend Jed for an all you can eat sushi lunch. Here we were after a late night of drinking, having serious, intellectual conversations about the state of the world, but of course this was interrupted by a moment of immaturity, as Adam just had to order the chicken knees. Why? Because they were chicken knees. I don't think he ended up eating them though.

On Tuesday, I had a great, Canadian experience. Yes I live in Canada and I experience it everyday, but not quite like this.

I had the opportunity to attend the World Junior Hockey Championships semi-final game between Canada and Finland. It was such an amazing and patriotic experience to be there among the red, white and maple leaf. And the fact that Canada won was doubly good.

It also gave me the opportunity to see Luc Bourdon in action... a Canuck draft pick. By the sounds of the game, I think the people of Vancouver have already taken to him. We could use someone good on defence right now...

So far that is my 2006. Not a bad start to the year...

I now just have to get my act together and start planning my 10 year reunion, because at some point last year I thought it would be a fun thing to do. Now I'm not so sure.