Fight to Entertain

good ol' pun to start us off

This is me eating my words and wishing I had brought my sewing stuff to Stratford. Only a week in and I'm rudely reminded of how boring it can get in Stratford. I have to make a real effort to entertain myself and not just waste my days away on social media. That being said, I did do lots of fun things this week. 
It was Marissa's birthday on Friday, so on Thursday we drove to Kitchener to go trampolining. Mara and I had been to this place before, where they have 6 olympic grade trampolines. It was great fun. I almost did a full front flip (I just can't quite stick the landing and end up on my butt). Michelle however did gymnastics when she was younger and so was doing front flips, back flips, you name it. Definitely got my exercise in that day and felt it for the following two days. I'd like to go back at some point and see if I can't finally land a front flip.
Later that day we had our first SSC event of the term at a local pub. Much to our enjoyment, Thursday is now 25cent wing night. I made a slight misjudgement in how hungry I was and ordered 5 wings and a burger. Way too much food. But the wings were great. And I couldn't get over that it cost $1.25 for 5 wings! I'm no wing fanatic but even I know that's got to be a great deal. I might start making regular trips to the pub for 5 wings every Thursday night.
Friday morning started off great listening to Ed Sheeran's two new singles. I've come to realize that I almost always don't like a song when I first hear it if it's a song I'm expecting to like (i.e. from an artist I'm familiar with). So I didn't form any opinions until later. And as expected, I really like both of them. I'm not sure which one I like better; it might have to be Castle On The Hill.

Last night I had some friends over to play Catan (I won). I also made my new meal of the week: spinach salad with dried cranberries, chicken, avocado, and poppyseed dressing. To be honest I enjoyed it more than I thought I would. It might just make it on to my rotation of meals. I haven't decided what this week's recipe is going to be; it will depend on when I get to a grocery store next.

I also made rice krispie squares but they didn't turn out great. I think the marshmallows were past their prime.
Didn't do much today. Watched a sermon from The Meeting House online. I've started doing a daily doodle where I practice my lettering/doodling. It's not much but I'm trying out the concept that doing something everyday will help you get better at it. I'm patiently waiting for 9pm to roll around to watch the next Sherlock episode. I've had to stay off social media since this afternoon to avoid any spoilers, since Britain has already seen it and there are already things being posted about what happens.

Black Mirror

It has been a very slow, motivation-lacking weekend. Luckily, there wasn't much that I needed to get done. That being said, I'm not a fan of having unproductive days. I like to be able to say that I did something. Hence why I'm blogging.
Everybody has been frantically working on their work term report that is due on Tuesday. I had mine done about 3 weeks ago, so I've been doing my own thing. I actually submitted the report, so I officially don't have to worry about it any more. Did some laundry, went grocery shopping, 3D printed a couple more hexes for Settlers of Catan, baked some snickerdoodle blondie bars. Sill slowly hacking away at the list of things I need to do to my website.
This afternoon I went to the Perth Pop-Up market. It was disappointing. The space was very crowded and it was very dark, both of which made it difficult to see what the vendors were actually selling. I doubt I would have wanted much of it anyways. Since walking around the 'market' only took me about 5mins, I decided to pop into a couple of the stores along Ontario St. Again, didn't really want anything they were selling, but it occupied the time and it was nice to be outside. It actually wasn't that bad out today. This cold weather feels like it's come out of nowhere because we had that one weird patch where it was 25C.

On Friday, 6 new episodes of Black Mirror came out on Netflix. It's a great show. I found out about it a couple years ago from a classmate but never looked into it. It's all about technology in the future, in a grim, sci-fi kind of way. It's not hover-boards and time travel; it's eye contacts that film everything you see and implants in the brain that control digital selves. Each episode is a stand alone story, so you don't have to watch all of them or in any particular order.
It came up again in one of our lectures this term and I decided to watch it. At the time, they only had one episode - a Christmas special - on Netflix. Marissa and I watched that one, and we had our minds blown. It was very well done. I then looked into the actual seasons and was surprised to see that it's like Sherlock: there are only three episodes a season. I watched the first season, and while the stories were good, they didn't compare to the Christmas special we had watched. I have yet to watch season 2. Apparently the show was dropped or put on pause, then Netflix brought it back for a third season with 6 episodes. I was very happy to see that these new episodes are on the same level as the Christmas special. The episodes are about an hour long, give or take 10mins. I highly recommend it. Oh, and it's by the BBC!
Fun fact: it's called Black Mirror because when the screen of our electronic devices are off, they become a black mirror. I thought that was clever :)

QOTD
370. Ever been on a plane?
Yup. Lots, in fact. At least 18 (wow).

Catan > Bowling

It is with mixed feelings that I let you know that the SSC event for tonight - bowling - has been cancelled, after my last post boasted of the success of the club. We had 6 people sign up, but then two backed out, so we decided to cancel it. Hopefully our event next week will do better. I think bowling was a bit of a stretch for people anyways. People would rather watch movies or go to pubs together.
The upside of bowling being cancelled, on the other hand, is that Mara, Marissa and I are now going to play Settlers of Catan instead. I'd choose Catan over bowling any day. I'm especially excited because I've 3D printed two resource hexes (rock and wood), so I'll finally be able to put them to use.
We might be co-hosting an event with the GBDA Society next week for a horror movie night. Only, Mara, Marissa and I are not interested in watching horror movies. So basically, we're just going to help promote the event and then not watch the movie.
Our professor asked us today to bring half a dozen cardboard boxes to class tomorrow. He didn't elaborate at all. Where the heck am I going to get cardboard boxes? I might go to the LCBO across the road and see if they have any I can use. He also asked us to bring tape "or anything that sticks". I ain't bringing my tape and having it all wasted on what I'm sure will ultimately be a useless exercise.
Speaking of which, I should tell you about our guest lecture with Jordan. First of all, Jordan is my favourite Stratford Campus staff member. I was very excited when I heard that he would be guest lecturing in our class. The class consisted entirely of us playing with Little Bits and Makey Makey parts, both of which are electrical circuit toys for kids. He was using them as a representation of the Internet of Things and how all the parts interact. It was basically 2hrs of goofing off. Perhaps the more entertaining thing was everybody's snapchat stories. Just about every snapchat story I looked at that day was of people showing the Little Bits and saying things like "what even is university" "Engineering at UW" "#GBD4". But it was actually kind of cool because you could connect it to your laptop and play one-button games by interacting with the Little Bits.
I'm currently working on updating my personal website for a e-Portfolio project I have this term. And no, I won't tell you what the URL to my site is. Not until I'm done with it at least. It looks fine, but I'm thinking of changing the layout, or at least the colour scheme. It's also horribly outdated.
One last thing: I'm very excited for the second Guardians of the Galaxy movie, not just because the first one was awesome, and not just because I'd watch Chris Pratt in just about anything, but because of tiny Groot! He's way at the bottom of the poster, by Starlord's feet :) I'm going to be freaking out the entire movie purely about Groot *he's so cute*