This past late November/early December, I went on my first G Adventures tour to Costa Rica. It was also my first adventure type, nature-y focused trip I’ve been on. I did things that were totally outside of my comfort zone, things I would normally be afraid of and would hesitate to do. Like, for example, I went canyoneering [while it was pouring rain], ziplining “Superman” style high up above the canopy forest and did the Super Tarzan Swing (where you jump off from high up and free fall for almost 5 seconds before you swing back and forth), went on a night walk through a forest where there were creepy crawlies galore including snakes, tarantulas, and insects. And most significantly, I went on the Cerro Chato EXTREME hike, which really was extreme, up an inactive volcano beside Arenal Volcano.

And while these were activities that made me all nervous and scared to do at first, I have no regrets and I’d even say this was one of my best trips I’ve been on.

More pics, videos and review on the activities below.

A mere month (or so) ago, I had put “meet Oprah” as my Before I Die aspiration, thinking it would never, ever happen. Sure, I may have deluded myself into thinking that Oprah and I were totes going to become BFFs, or the next incarnation of a buddy cop comedy duo like Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker, after she tweeted me back in October. But let’s be real, there’s us mere plebeians and there’s Oprah — these paths rarely cross.

But, the stars must have aligned because on April 13th, 2013, I did end up meeting Oprah-freakin’-Winfrey. Alas, this meeting didn’t result in her asking if she could adopt me or inviting me to a sleepover where we would braid each other’s hair and chat about cute boys (then eventually offering me a show on OWN to try out cupcakes, burgers and pizza all over the world). It was still a remarkable experience, one that I cannot put into words how awesome it was, but I will try to in this post. Weeks later, I am still in disbelief.

I just wanted to write a random blog and nothing more random than what songs I currently consider MY JAM which, when played in a bar or club setting, watch out for my drink spilling on you because I AM GONNA BUST A MOVE (or something).

But probably mainly just spill my drink because I can’t dance. Enthusiasm counts for something.

I saw Salt-n-Pepa perform at Toronto’s Festival of Beer a.k.a. Beerfest on July 27th, 2012. Years later, and frankly after seeing their episode on Oprah, I didn’t even know or think they were still touring and performing. Even though they are in their mid-late 40s, you really wouldn’t know it – they looked and sounded great, still as talented as ever!

DJ Spinderella wasn’t there though, it was just Cheryl ‘Salt’ James and Sandra ‘Pepa’ Denton from the original group.

Here are some photos and videos from their performance.

After reading Mindy Kaling’s “Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me (And Other Concerns)“, and reading her chapter on this topic, I thought I’d make my own list. Yep, totally stealing her idea.

There are certain obvious non-traumatic things that make me cry like, for example, movies like The Notebook and The Help, songs like Eric Clapton’s Tears in Heaven and those commercials with the sad abused animals and the Sarah McLachlan song playing in the background. Let’s ignore those because those are just givens (unless you are a robot and have robot emotions).

Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire had its gala screening at the Toronto International Film Festival and in attendance was director Lee Daniels, actors Paula Patton, Sherri Shepherd, Mariah Carey and newcomer Gabby Sidibe, and of course, executive producers Tyler Perry and Oprah. Mary J. Blige, who wrote the song “I Can See In Color” on the movie’s soundtrack, and Sapphire, author of Push, were also in attendance for the screening. Lucky for me, I had the opportunity to not only see them on stage to introduce the film, but also watch this incredibly powerful movie before it was released into theatres nationwide. Now the winner of TIFF’s People’s Choice Award!

March 18, 2009 — I went to the Britney Spears “Circus” concert at the Air Canada Centre. It was a visual spectacle. The production value was way up there, with elaborate sets and side-show acts to keep the audience entertained between costume changes. The stage was set as a three ring circus, with a larger middle ring above which numerous aerial acts involving wires and suspension were performed for certain numbers. For example, during the “Everytime” number, Britney sat on the handle of a giant umbrella as it was suspended above the arena. Due to the layout of the stage, any location within the arena provided a decent view of the show. However, and perhaps to the benefit of Britney, there was no jumbotron to show up-close shots of the stage. While there was a jumbotron there, that was circular and wrapped above the middle ring, it mostly served to show intro videos to performances, which were actually rather well done and reminiscent of an actual music video. One video shown right before “Freakshow” was played to the track of Marilyn Manson’s “Sweet Dreams (Are Made Of This)” from his 1995 Smells Like Children album — which seemed somewhat out of place but fitting nonetheless. The side-show acts with circus folk (or carnies?), though sometimes drawn on for a bit too long, provided entertainment between the lulls and really made it a circus atmosphere. Could’ve done without the clowns though, not a fan of clowns.

I found a solution! See bottom of this post.

Comedy Central’s Motherload is like the “interweb mecca” for The Daily Show and The Colbert Report fans. It offers a fairly large archive of clips for both shows, streamed for free 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Whenever you wanted a Jon Stewart or Stephen Colbert (or *insert your favourite correspondent’s name here*) fix, you knew where to go. Because we all know with the recent Viacom (Comedy Central’s parent company) versus YouTube lawsuit, it’s pretty much the only source for video clips for these shows.

Then there was news of a better, more spectacular and centralized new site set to be revealed in October for fans of The Daily Show. The new TheDailyShow.com was trumpeted as “the ultimate online destination for ‘The Daily Show with Jon Stewart’ fans”. No longer would The Daily Show have to piggyback off the main Comedy Central website and, most exciting of all, the new site would feature video clips from every episode dating back to 1999, the year Jon Stewart took over the reins of The Daily Show, and would be expanded to include the show’s entire video history, totaling well over 13,000 high-quality clips [ source ]. It was a TDS fan’s dream! (The Colbert Report currently does not have plans to have a similar video archive centric website of its own Updated Sept 2008: Colbert Nation has received a facelift and now has a video archive available)

Unfortunately, and quite sadly so, us TDS fans up north are being left out. We’re just on the outside, looking in, whimpering and greatly irritated by the fact that when we now click to either ComedyCentral.com or TheDailyShow.com, we are greeted by this lovely page seen on your right… before being redirected to thecomedynetwork.ca. Thanks a lot CTVglobemedia.

Lordy, the epic comeback performance of Britney Spears has been talked about to death all over the media outlets. Or shall I rephrase that, the epic mess of a performance. Nonetheless, I can’t let this magnitude of an event in pop culture history go down without adding my own commentary.

A three part “photoblog” on my October 2006 visit to Tokyo. Continuation from Part II. More pictures ahead!