A Sock Saved Is A Penny Earned

Generally I have never had a problem with saving money, I’m pretty well self-disciplined and don’t spend a lot of money on things I don’t need. I actually rarely ever buy myself something, most of the time my money is spent doing things instead.

Even that time as a kid when my sister and I saved up all kinds of change and money to get our hamster, we always kept it in an old coffee tin and never ever took anything out of it to spend or play with. More recently, just last summer my family set up a savings jar to be able to afford for all of us to go to the PNE at the end of summer. It only took us two months to get enough money to pay for a hotel for 4 plus entry and ride tickets at the PNE. Then just last night my sister and I started a new savings jar that we will add to all year long until next summer so we can do something crazy.

Just from last night and today, we already have $69.96 in the jar. But of course I don’t expect it to keep filling up that fast. The first $40 was a donation from our parents, I added the $10 bill I had in my wallet; then the rest is from change I found in my room, my sister found, wallet, under the seats of all the cars in the family, and from cans and bottles that we had around the house.

What really kicked off our saving though was taking the dog for a walk last night. We took him around to all the three schools in this town and decided we would pick up all the cans in the area while we were walking.

Somehow we got talking about doing a trip next summer, and I told her my plans to do some crazy stuff. The mix of picking up the bottles got us thinking that maybe we should start saving for a trip or an adventure next year. So we started and really got into it. Heck, we even looked inside the garbage cans all over the three schools, which actually gave us a pretty good amount of bottles. Following that, we decided we would take a nice drive up some of the dirt roads and pick up a few bottles along them as well. By the end of the night, we filled up a garbage bag 3/4 of way with bottles and cans, making it a pretty successful night of collection.

Today I cashed in all the non-alcoholic bottles and cans, getting us $8 to add to our jar, but I still have to bring in the alcoholic ones which will give us a lot more money. I couldn’t do that today though because the liquor stores aren’t accepting them until after the long weekend.

It’s kinda funny actually how when my sister and I make a goal or start planning something, we really get into it and make our best strives to succeed in our plans or ideas. I feel like we will be pretty successful in this endeavour. Plus! I’m going to start putting away a certain percentage of my pay cheques in the jar to help as well. It wont be much since I’m cutting my hours down to two or three days a week, but it’ll still help!

Nasty. Dirty Feet Bother Me...

Once we returned from our short bottle hunting excursion, I started to try and think of other ways that we can add to our travel money jar. I know once the winter comes, there are always a couple of older folks that pay me a few dollars to shovel their driveway during snowfalls, which I can always add to the jar. Plus, I’ll probably keep hunting everyone’s cars for loose change as well since they add up quite a bit. I mean in our travel jar right now, we already have almost $14 in loose change.

When I was talking to one of my friends about my plans with my sister, he told me to sell my used, old and dirty socks/shoes on eBay. I laughed fairly heartily too because I thought he was joking, but I kinda got intrigued when he told me that he wasn’t kidding. So I went on eBay and typed in the search bar, “Used Socks”. It’s actually quite amazing how many old and used socks are posted on there, and people are getting anywhere from $2 to $20 on one pair of their used socks.

At first I thought that maybe people were buying them for crafts or to build a tattered sock puppet or something, but after thinking a little, it didn’t make sense because you could just buy a bag of socks at Wal-Mart for cheaper than some of those single pairs of socks. After researching on the internet a little bit though, I found it was more for the people that have a foot fetish, for some reason they got off by buying other people’s old used socks. For fun I also looked up used shoes, and they were selling pretty good as well, somewhere around $30 give and take. I’m not sure if I’m up for selling my old socks and old shoes though. I don’t really care what people would do with them and it doesn’t bother me, once they are out of my possession it doesn’t matter to me anymore. It’s just the principal of it that bothers me. I’m sure I’ll manage to save enough in my other methods though so it shouldn’t be needed to do this. Although, it is very odd, quite unique and baffling that people actually make quite a fortune selling their old socks.

 

“Never put a sock in the toaster.” Eddie Izzard

 

Tyson Trepidations.

Getting My Feet Wet Always On The Move

Myself, My Sister and April By Our Rapids

Today was pretty awesome and wild, definitely a step up from that horrible day I had the other day. Which reminds me, I have something to add to that as well.

I think I’ll start with that bit of an addition. A couple of posts ago, I talked about that horrible day at work when one of my co workers called in sick and I couldn’t find a cover shift. Well, after that I decided to go to the lake to just relax and soak up some sun; make the day a little better. So I went down to one of my families favorite spots where nobody else was swimming so I could have the nice peace and quiet.

A bit about the lake I was at: The entire shoreline is owned by BC Forestry, and there is a small campground they set up there with only 16 different camping spots. But they usually have a campground caretaker there, just to keep it clean and make sure nobody is bothering the wildlife, being dangerous or bothering other campers. It used to be this really nice older fellow, that was pretty relaxed but performed his job very well. Now for the last couple of summers, they have had this lady from Ontario in the position of caretaker.

We’ll just say she’s not the most pleasant person on earth.

Anyways, I was relaxing on the beach and actually starting to enjoy the late afternoon, when she came riding up rather loudly on her ATV and ultimately disturbing my peace. Then all she said was,

“Get off this beach. You can’t swim here, it’s for campers only. You can go swim at the boat launch.”

Normally, the only problem I would have had, would have been her attitude, though I’d have still listened. Except this time I knew I had full rights to use that beach. It’s owned by forestry, therefore public property. Plus, nowhere it said that that beach was only for campers. Secondly, I wasn’t going to the boat launch. Usually there are thirty people all in that area partying and whatever other shenanigans. Not to mention you always have to keep out of the way for the steady stream of boats coming in and going out.

So instead I just told her politely, “Sure, I’ll do that as soon as you show me the paperwork stating that this beach privately owned”.

This she did not like.

Rather than either telling me that she didn’t have any paperwork or just showing me her paperwork if she even had it, she got angry and told me, “If you don’t leave right now, I’m going to call the police!”.

So I just ignored her, and kept soaking up the sun, trying not to let that disturbance ruin the rest of my day. That became really difficult though, since the police showed up about twenty minutes later to “deal with me”.

Boy did I ever get perturbed now.

The cop didn’t really have much to say, he just asked me what the problem was. So I told him there was barely a problem, the caretaker just wouldn’t let me use the public beach to my advantage. Then I explained that I refused to move unless she showed me the paperwork saying that property was privately owned. Then out of my anger, I told him that if he wanted to nail someone, then he should give the caretaker a ticket for riding her ATV on the road without a helmet.

After I explained all that, the police officer walked over to the caretaker (whom was still on her ATV) and asked her if she could show him the paperwork stating the land was private. Then lucky for me (finally some luck!), she let him know that she didn’t have any paperwork and the land was owned by forestry. Then by golly, the cop really did give her a ticket for not wearing a helmet. I know it’s only something like $60, but it still helped me relax a little bit.

Once all of that was dealt with though, I didn’t really feel like being there anymore, plus I was getting hungry. But I stayed an extra half hour anyways, just to stick it to the caretaker a little more.

There's Me! Whitewater Rafting!

So that was the end of my bad day. Especially since I went whitewater rafting today, its in my rearview mirror! Today was pretty wicked with some crazy rapids that we got to experience. I had a blast to say the least!

My sister came with me along with one of my co workers and a friend of mine, April. Our guide and safety person was William, he’s from Peru and I was pretty happy with him, he was very funny, and even intentionally crashed us into a rock to get our hearts going early on. The trip was kinda funny too, my sister ended up bailing before we even got into the boats. Just another example of my accident prone family.

Halfway through the trip, our guide even stopped at this little island with a huge cliff and told us we could jump off of it, into the river if we wanted to. I was totally down for that, I’m always looking for something crazy to do! Plus I knew it would fun thanks to that one time I jumped off a 150 foot cliff with my own harness I made out of rope. This cliff obviously wasn’t THAT big, but it was still pretty sizeable at 8 metres, or almost 30 feet for my American friends. I was right too! The jump off that cliff was pretty amazing. Although only three of us from the entire tour did the jump, myself and two other girls that I didn’t even know.

There were a couple of awkward moments, I was the only guy in the boat (go figure!), somehow I always end up in those situations where I’m the only boy. As a result, whenever someone flew out of the boat or fell out, I always had to be the one to pull them back up. But when you pull them, they are pretty heavy from being soaking wet, so I had to push myself with my legs to yank them up. When I did that though, they always ended up sprawled out on top of me. One poor girl even had her face end up in my crotch.

All in all it was pretty crazy, and I think if anyone of my subscribers gets the chance, they should go and whitewater raft. Especially the level 4 and 5 rapids, but even more especially in beautiful British Columbia.

Here We Are, Catching A Wave

“An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered. An inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered.” – Gilbert K. Chesterton

Tyson Trepidations.

Let’s Go To Candy Mountain! Uphold Wonder!

On my last day off, my sister and I went up to Wells Grey Park, near Clearwater, British Columbia, Canada to do some hiking before the summer ends. We decided to do a semi-advanced day hike, although it would have been nice to do a multi day one, but with my job, the work weeks have been getting longer. Anyways, at that provincial park, there are tonnes of different hikes to choose from, but we chose the Trophy Mountain trails.

It actually took us a while to get there though. Clearwater is about an hour north from where I live, then Wells Grey Park is about another twenty minutes from there. For the Trophy Mountain trail there’s also this road that runs 15km, but it took me a long time to drive those because I had to take it really slow 4x4ing with my little car. Poor Gabriella… (Yes, I named my car Gabriella).

I’ll keep the talking short since I have pictures to display what I saw, although I gotta say, the pictures do the view no justice. It was so much more spectacular to actually be in the Trophy mountains. With that said though, we saw lots, a couple different lakes, several mountains and cliffs, all kinds of flora and fields of flowers. Not to mention the cool bridges and the ancient log house there too.

But here are the pics and enjoy. Also, I hope I inspired someone to do a little sightseeing in the most Beautiful Place on Earth. Supernatural British Columbia!

 

Trophy Mountain Meadows

 

My Sister And I In The Trophy Mountain Meadows

 

Galloping Through More Meadows!

 

Marshes

 

View From The Top Of Trophy Mountain

 

Sheila Lake

 

Me Near The Top Of Trophy Mountain

 

“I love to think of nature as an unlimited broadcasting station, through which God speaks to us every hour, if we will only tune in” – George Washington Carver

 

Tyson Trepidations.

NOS, Ke$ha and A Beautiful Night

Finally it was a beautiful day today! Western Canada has been so wet and dark so far all summer, which is something that never happens, especially in supernatural British Columbia. Usually its up to forty degrees Celsius as a normal around here in the summer, but not this year at all. I didn’t get to enjoy it as much as I wanted to though. My sister needed a ride home from work, so I had to wait around until four PM, which was fine though, I spent it reading Carte Blanche.

Afterwards though, I brought my sister home and hung around while she got changed and ready to head out into the beautiful and hot day! Once she was good to go (Which shockingly took little time), we headed to gas up, but my sister bought us a NOS each.

Bad idea.

Usually energy drinks just have a slight effect on me, but boy this time it really added a kick. They weren’t kidding on the can where it says, Caution: Powerful. I’ll expand on this a little later though.

We took a nice drive out of town because we felt like getting an icecream cone, but oddly enough my tiny little town doesn’t have a single place that sells an icecream cone. So we headed north to another small town called Clearwater, where they have a Dairy Queen. I got a medium chocolate dip cone, probably a bad idea too with all that added sugar.

Did I mention I don’t handle my sugar very well neither? I think its because I’m typically a very healthy eater, so I don’t make much room for the sweets.

After we ate our icecream, we randomly decided to head up to a provincial park in the area called Wells Gray Park. It’s actually extremely nice with a surplus of waterfalls, including some of the tallest in North America. Even beating Niagra Falls if I remember correctly. Although when we started to head there, it was already getting quite dark. That was didn’t bother us, I was too high on NOS and sugar to really care. But by the time we did eventually get to one of the falls (the beautiful Spahats Falls), it was almost fully dark. There was still a faint yellow glow in one corner of the sky that really had no effect, but in actuality it wasn’t too dark since the moon was really bright.

Now when you park to walk to the falls, its a good five minute hike along a trail. Its a very mild trail, so there really weren’t too many worries getting there. Except once we entered the trail, we realized it happened to get extremely dark in there since the monstrous trees overtook the moonlight.

Generally, the forest at night isn’t too bad for me, I don’t get scared by bears and cougars (or any other animal of the sort) from growing up in the back yard of a forest. But as soon as someone mentions ghosts or spirits in the forest, that’s when I start to hear things that your not sure are really there, or its just your imagination. Thanks to my sister freaking out, those creepy thoughts entered my mind and spooked me a little bit on the walk to the falls.

Once we got to Spahat Falls though, it was bright again from the moon and it actually was quite nice to see it in a new perspective of the night, plus we were the only ones there that late. That’s one thing I love about being out at night, is the new perspective that you can see things as compared to the daytime. Also, I wish I had my camera and my tripod with me so I could capture a photo with long exposure of the falls to share. But that’s alright, just gives me an excuse to go again sometime.

On the way home, I think is when the NOS really started to hit me good (Or bad?). We blasted all of my Ke$ha albums the entire time and it was basically like a party while I drove. Heck, I even threw in some pretty crazy moves with my feet while I was driving. I can’t imagine what my sister was thinking though while I was doing so. Don’t forget my singing too that’s always included in everything I do.

But I really enjoyed my night, and although its encroaching one AM, I’m still a little high from that NOS. It’s almost worse than alcohol.

Looking outside now, I think its the first time this summer I’ve been able to really see the stars. Living in a very small town is a huge plus though for that reason, nowhere else you can see the stars so clearly, and so many of them as well.

Looking at stars is actually one of my favorite summer activities too, especially when I get a chance to share the moment with a wonderful girl. But clearly tonight, that’s not happening. I’ll just enjoy them myself. It makes me want to know my constellations better in a way because at the moment I only know a small handful. I should get myself a star chart, and take it upon myself to learn some of those incredible constellations that carry some of the most incredible and ancient stories.

One more thing to add to my random post of the night. I need to add to Linkin Park and 3o Seconds to Mars among my list of concerts to see. They seem to be amazing performers with a beautiful array of songs. So I thought I’d share some music with you as well. Goodnight!

 

 

“Ce n’est pas la réalité. C’est un rêve” – Tout le monde

Tyson Trepidations.

Percey’s Seaside Antiques

This is the start to my story, it begins with an older lady named Angela Percey who owns an antique shop on the island of Saint Crista. Don’t worry though, the main character of this story isn’t this old lady with a bad memory, she just happens to the person I open with. Maybe you’ll meet the main character later though. But enjoy the small amount I’m posting of what’s going to turn into a zombie story!

Angela Percey was gazing outside the window of her little shop, Percey’s Seaside Antiques, when the sun began to fade behind the encroaching clouds.

To her it was just another day of business. She stood at her post behind the cash register, in wait for one of the shoppers to purchase some of her antiques; or as she liked to call them, her “pre-owned treasures”. Of course, she never really expected anyone to purchase anything, they rarely did. But she didn’t mind, being a widowed older lady in her mid-sixties, she just enjoyed the company of the occasional local or traveller to talk to. She actually loved to hear about the travelling and life stories of her visitors, as well as talking to some of the locals that stopped by. In fact, Angela loved her antique shop in general, it meant everything to her over the last thirty-five years that she’s been running it.

As the clouds overtook to sun, there were only four customers present at Percey’s. Only one Angela recognized as a local and like most of the residences that came in, she knew he was a fisherman. Other than that, she couldn’t remember his name, making her grow quite frustrated with her once quick mind.

She didn’t recognize any of the other three customers though, they were most likely tourists since the island of Saint Crista attracted an estimated half a million guests every year. That was always something that baffled Angela though, she could never understand nor envision that amount of people. It was probably since she only left the island once in her life, which is something she vowed to never do again. She liked the simple and stress free life that she had there, so she never felt as though she ever really needed to leave the island. For Angela, where most people see the world as small, it was always huge to her, and quite a monstrosity too.

She lived in the larger of the two towns on the island, Port Champlayne. In general, both of the towns were fairly small, with Port Chanplayne consisting of about four thousand people. Then there’s the smaller of the two, Bellwich Bay, having only about three hundred folks residing in the town. Other than the size though, both towns were mainly occupied by fishermen, retirees, and tourists from all over the world.

As Angela was lost in her own thoughts, the local fisherman then began to walk towards her, snapping her out of her own thoughts and also cause her to straighten her posture. The fisherman shot a smile at her, which she returned immediately, yet still fighting with her brain to remember his name. But almost as soon as he smiled, his face immediately went flat, straight into an empty and lifeless expression. Angela had never actually seen such an expression before, it was almost as if the soul had been sucked right out of the fisherman. All of the colour had left his face, his lips went completely flat, his eyes lifeless and no longer looking at Angela, moreso looking right through her. Angela began to feel an odd tingling sensation run over her body from head to toe, and even though it had passed quite quickly, her heart rate doubled as a result.

It was in that moment she noticed that the fisherman’s face didn’t just turn completely lifeless, his entire body did as well. He stood there in mid stride with his right foot protruded forward and arms still in their swing, but he was frozen in place. Not so much as a muscle twitch could be seen come off of his body. Nothing.

Everything about the fisherman began to horrify Angela, she reached up and placed her hands over the hollow of her neck, where her mothers medallion could always be found. She clutched onto it tightly, and told herself a quick prayer, something she had become quite accustomed to since her husband had passed away from a heart attack no more than two years prior. After a few minutes to take in the scene before her, Angela’s slow and old brain finally began to work again, and she reluctantly took her eyes off of the fisherman to look at the rest of the store.

Her shop was quite dark for mid afternoon, the clouds had blocked out a lot of the suns light, and caused an eerie green glow to protrude through the windows. Everything was very quiet though, and all Angela could hear was her own heart beating. The other three guests looked the same as the fisherman. Perfectly still. Almost as if God had pressed the pause button on all other life in her store.

Two of the people were together, Angela observed earlier when they arrived that they were a young couple, she assumed on a honeymoon or something of the sort. But now, they were frozen in place, looking at some of Angela’s antique tableware, holding her favorite bowl that she remembered was made in Sicily. On the outside, the bowl wasn’t anything special, just white porcelain. But on the inside it had the most beautiful hand painted rendition of Michelangelo’s The Creation of Adam. In the back of her mind, she wondered how she could remember a bowl was made in Sicily, but couldn’t remember a fisherman’s name. But that thought quickly passed.

The last person in Percey’s Seaside Antiques, was a middle aged woman who was completely still in a very thoughtful pose. To Angela, it looked almost as though the lady could be a mannequin, especially with her ghostly white face and the soulless expression that had subdued all of the customers in the antique store.

Angela closed her eyes, horrified at the frozen people before her, but partially frozen in place herself as a result of utter fear. She clenched her medallion with both of her hands tightly, causing the flesh in her knuckles to turn white. She prayed. It was a while since she last attended church, probably longer than she would have liked to admit. But she recited every prayer that she could remember in her head, with her eyes clamped tightly the whole time and embracing the medallion Angela’s mother had passed down to her during her childhood.

Suddenly there was a series of loud thuds that filled the room, accompanied by the sound of something breaking. The loud noise caused Angela to jump and snap open her eyes which immediately fell on the porcelain bowl, now in several pieces scattered across the floor. She scanned through the pieces of her beloved bowl and frowned deeply at the sight of it, but then she noticed the young couple that were admiring its beauty were now littered on the floor next to the porcelain shards.

Tears began to fill Angela’s eyes, as she continued to notice that all of her customers were now in a lifeless phase on the floor, appearing to be dead. Her legs began to shake under her due to fear of the situation and she fell to her knees as tears began to stream down her cheeks. She could not fathom what had happened, but was much too shaken still to try and do anything about it. Her hands finally broke free from her medallion, but only to bury her face into her hands instead, letting out a shriek of a mixture of grief, horror and shock.

After a few moments, she managed to take some deep breaths, or at least enough to stop the crying. As she wiped the tears from her cheeks and eyes, she took another glance around the room with a deep feeling that she was the only one alive in the entire store. Angela’s eyes eventually met the fisherman’s face, he still had his eyes open, a vision that would bothered her for the rest of what life she left. In his eyes, she could see the whites of them slowly turn red and his once brown iris was now completely black.

It was at that moment when she was looking into his strange eyes, she finally remembered his name.

“If you can dream it, then you can do it. Always remember this whole thing was started with a dream and a mouse” – Walt Disney

Tyson Trepidations.

She Raped My Braces!

I love visiting my friends in San Francisco, its an amazing and beautiful city with so many unique features and a very

A Picture I Took Of The Wacky Jacky Approaching San Fran!

homely feel. I’ve been there a couple of times already, but I’m still compelled to return to see and experience more that the city has to offer, even though I’ve seen quite a bit of it already. Everything that I have seen so far has been spectacular and really made me fall in love with the city. They have some wonderful beaches there, beautiful neighbourhoods, a great Chinatown, historical stories at places like Alcatraz and some great venues like the San Francisco Ballet and all the best food you can find.

The last time I was there was back in February, over reading break from the university. The other times I’ve been there, I have spent a couple weeks at a week a time, so this one was a tad shorter being only ten days. Even though it was shorter, I still had an incredible time and gained a lot of new experiences.

With that said, its not really what I’m making this post for though. This post is for a story of mine, an experience I had while partying in San Francisco with my friends. It took me this long to finally repeat it because still, to this day, I’m very confused by it and stunned as well.

My friends that I visit there are a large Mormon family that is quite attuned to their religion and attend church whenever they are able to. It’s actually something quite different to me, since I grew up without a religion, but I sure learned a lot from my friends there. Anyways, on one of the Friday nights that I was present, they were invited out to a party by a number of people they go to church with and decided to take me along.

I’m not too much of a partier myself, but every once in a while I like to go out, have a few drinks and meet new people. So I was happy to join them and experience how the people party around there.

It was quite different than what I’m used to.

Maybe other parties around San Francisco are similar to those that I have seen, but this one was off the wall. It was more like a house that was turned into a club/rave filled with Mormon’s of all ages. It was quite a nice house too, had an amazing view of the valley and featured three floors plus two basements. So needless to say, it didn’t take long for me to get separated from my friends, but that was alright at the time.

I was quite pumped from the energy there and also quite loose from some drinks I had before coming. Not to mention, when I got there the hosts gave us another couple of drinks, each.

Before long I was dancing with some random people that flagged me down into their group. I was actually having quite a bit of fun dancing and learning some crazy new moves from some of the random people that surrounded me. The people there were all so nice and got along great, I kinda wondered if they were all from the same church; I saw their church a few days before too, it was massive! So That wouldn’t have surprised me neither.

Usually when I go out, I don’t drink all too much, just a few drinks to let loose really and get a nice buzz. But that night I think I overdid it a little too much. Mostly, I think it was the type of drinks we had, usually I have something light, like a beer or a mix of gin and tonic as my favorite. That night though, I had some pretty heavy stuff. I don’t think any of them were under 30% alcohol, so I’m pretty sure I was a little more than drunk.

While in my group of new friends, there was this one girl that was getting pretty close to me and occasionally grinding against my body, throwing in some dirty dancing as well. At first it felt a little wrong to me, knowing that most of these girls were raised in a very respecting religious family (or at least that’s what I’ve been told), but again, after that many drinks it was only filtered into a tiny portion of my brain that swept the thought away pretty quickly.

Then she kissed me.

I didn’t really expect it, and honestly, I don’t even remember when she started, but that girl was going at my lips pretty savagely.

Then things started to get a little weird.

I’m referring to when that girl started licking my braces, its like when she started, she couldn’t stop! She just stuck her tongue right in there and licked it all over, even the parts in the back. I never knew someone could have a tongue that long! Heck, I think she would have tongued me right down my esophagus if I stayed much longer. Don’t get me wrong, I like a good kisser, but this girl really took things beyond my level of kissing, more towards the rapage of my poor braces…

… I sure hope I had no food hiding somewhere in them neither….

What really snapped me out of my drunken daze though, was what she said into my ear next. I was a little shocked and wasn’t sure if I heard it right at first, nor did I understand what she was talking about; but after a moment I knew what it was, mostly due to what she did.

“I like the feeling of it growing my hand”, is exactly what she said into my ear.

Like I mentioned, I had no idea what she was talking about. It all became apparent though because not long after she told me that, I could feel her hand sliding down to my crotch. Even though I was fairly drunk, what she said and did really woke me up and I felt very awkward in that position. She wasn’t a bad looking girl at all. But with all that, I just couldn’t function properly anymore.

Not in a good way neither.

So I told her that I would be right back to use the washroom.

But I never returned.

Instead, I found my friends and we all agreed that it was time to leave, and had a cab pick us up. It almost seemed like a cab was waiting for someone to call too, because basically as soon as we called, one was waiting outside for us. Which for me, wasn’t a bad thing. I was actually quite afraid that girl would come hunting for me.

So there you have it, my interesting experience partying in San Francisco. It also turns out that the girl does attend my friend’s church, and usually she’s a really shy and sweet individual. But for me, she always be known as the Braces Raping Girl.

 

“A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step” – Lao Tzu

 

Tyson Trepidations.

Plotting, Plotting and Plotting. Creativity!

I feel so lazy this summer.

I haven’t really done much at all during time off school. I did my roadtrip right at the start of the summer, so that’s my travel portion out of the way. In a way though, I kinda wish I saved it for closer to the middle of the summer so that it would be something to look forward to and also make me feel not so lazy and unproductive.

As a result though, I have been plotting things to do and ways to make up for it during the school year and next summer. There are some things that I have always been interested in, but never had the chance to tackle yet in my life. Mostly, its because I lived in a very small town that didn’t have many things to offer anyone growing up. But now that I’m an adult (at least age-wise), and can get myself around with my own car and means; that makes me able to do some of those things I never had the chance to as a kid. Also, since I’ve been doing nothing but working, especially with the cold, rainy and dark weather this summer has offered so far, I have been wanting to get a little more creative.

Ahhh creativity!

I think that I’m a pretty creative person. I always come up with some outrageous stories, songs and jokes. Not to mention I like to write, play guitar, and use my imagination whenever I can.

Actually, as a kid, my best friend and I had all kinds of different personalities we made up, along with different types of creatures and adventures we invented. In fact, for a lot of that stuff we did, we were probably a lot older than someone would expect to be doing that. But we had fun, and that’s really all that matters.

Actually, I think I’ll make a post about that sometime later too…

Anyways, back on topic!

Like I was saying, I’ve been feeling pretty creative sitting at home, not really doing anything but working and seeing the occasional movie. So I’m going to push myself to explore my creativity. Not just for the rest of the summer, but during the school year as well.

First, I want to take up tap dance lessons. I’ve always had an interest in that type of dance for a long time and as a result, always dreamed about learning it. So I looked up the Kamloops Dance Academy here and inquired about adult tap lessons for beginners. They have one class a week for ten months that I can register for, running every Thursday night from September until June. I think that would be a great opportunity for me, especially considering I need to be a little more physical and active these days. I even checked into the cost, which isn’t too bad, being about $44 a month, making it about as much as I pay for one University course.

The other thing I would like to do is get serious about writing a novel I’ve been planning for a while. This is something I’ve always wanted to do but never really dove right into. Over the last while, I have been building a plot and planning characters, give them certain dynamics within the story.

Writing a book is something I’ve also dreamed about doing, but I know its a lot of work, especially with the genre I’d be writing into. I know its not really a subject written about too often, so I’d be entering some virtually unexplored waters. But also with that said, its better that way to bring something new onto the table. I know its quite a big endeavor as well. Most people give up somewhere in the middle because things start to get stale for them. There are the stages where at the start its always exciting, and writing is the easiest, but then in the middle there’s that hump in the road which claims a lot of victims! If I can get over that hump, the home stretch will be the easiest part for me. I’m pretty determined of a person and I think its something I can do if I plan everything properly. So needless to say, I’m pretty excited to get going with this project and see where it ends up.

Other than that, there are my many plans for next summer, and I’m going to go for every single one of them. Whichever one I end up getting, I suppose I will go with… Hoping I get one in the first place that is. They are just things I want to do, to try and make the summer a lot better and worthwhile than the ones I’ve had in the last couple of years. Some of those things include getting a job with Parks Canada/BC, get accepted to the Youth Mobility Scheme in the UK for a working permit, or travel to Malaysia and Singapore.

So I have a few things I want to get done, the most difficult will be writing my book though. I hope all goes well and you will definitely hear about each of these endeavours as they are undertaken.

“Polygamy: An endeavour to get more out of life than there is in it” – Albert Hubbard

Tyson Trepidations.

Sending Kids To Summer Camp

During my childhood and part of my teenage years, I was fortunate enough to attend a summer camp five times. Every one that I went to is infused in my brain forever and stand out as some of the most fun and memorable moments of my life. So I think if a parent gets a chance or wonders if they should send their kid to summer camp, they should most definitely research one close by (or not necessarily close) and send their kid without hesitation. The skills, memories and friends they come home with, stay with them forever. Childhood memories are something I would never want to lose or replace with anything.

The first time I went to a summer camp was when I was about 10. I went to Sunnybrae Bible Camp, located along the incredible shores of Shuswap lake and at the base of the pristine Mount Bastion. It was a beautiful camp with really expert staff, and perfectly executed activities and plans. They definitely had the experience and the resources necessary to give kids the best of time while there.

At Sunnybrae, they have tonnes of activities to choose from to make for a new experience all the time, such things ranging from archery, to swimming, to learning a little more about the bible and religion. All of their camps for kids are a week long and cost $235 + British Columbia’s HST tax. But it isn’t just limited to kids, they have teen and family packs as well. Also, even if your kid isn’t raised with a religion (much like myself), I think its still a great opportunity in their development. At Bible camp, they don’t push religion onto anyone. I just think its just a great way to introduce the Bible to kids and a little of the western religious history. It’s an important part of the worlds development and culture, so I think its a little incompetent to not be at least be a little familiar with the Bible and religion.

The other four years that I went to a summer camp, were spend at the Vernon Army Cadet Summer Training Center (VACSTC). I was in cadets for seven years, from the time I was 12 until I aged out at 19.

When I was 14, I went to VACSTC for the first time doing a Cadet Leader course that lasted six weeks, then the year after that I did a Cadet Leader Instructor summer camp course in one of the prestigious Drill and Ceremonial platoons for another six weeks. During both of those years I had an amazing time, learned tonnes of new skills and made plenty new friends that I’m still friends with today.

While attending VACSTC there are a number of different camps to attend that are specialized for different purposes like music, drill, shooting, and athletics. With those camps come a series of lessons as well, based on the different types of camp you choose to go to. Besides the lesson, there are a tonne of fun activities included in each; things like absailing, beach days, water slides, sports nights and even looking at some of the local tourist attractions in and around Vernon, British Columbia. This camp is free, paid for by the Department of National Defence. But your kid actually gets a bonus for going, not much though, just $60 per week spent at camp and you have to be in cadets to be able to attend. But the memories and bonds that you make at Cadet camp are those in which you keep forever.

Myself and Two Other Staff Serving As Flag Party

Lastly, I also spent another 2 consecutive years at VACSTC. I had such an amazing time every time I went, that I wanted to return, but this time as staff. For the first year I was the high ranked warrant officer for the Rifle Coach platoon, specializing in familiarization with several different rifles. The next year I was again a Warrant officer, but this time for a platoon in Drill and Ceremonial. As a leader and staff, I was in charge of about 30 kids with one or two other platoon warrants at my side. We were in charge of their safety, supervision, fun and we were the ones that passed on the commands to them.

Since I was staff, it was a paid position (quite generously, I might add) under a seven week contract. The first week there is spent meeting the other staff and getting a rundown of what we would be doing with the kids for the last six weeks and going over the rules.

Even to this day I still make time to go and visit some of my friends from camp, as well as visit some of the kids that I taught while staffing there. Just before my roadtrip I went and visit with one of the kids I taught that lives in Vancouver, but in August I’m also going to visit some friends I staffed with in the place where it started, Vernon, BC. I honestly can’t wait to see them and I think if any parent gets the chance, they should send their kid to summer camp. It gets them out of the way for a little so the parent can relax for a bit of the summer themselves, but it also lets their kid explore different aspects of the world, learn tonnes of new skills, and come home with a million new friends. All-in-all, summer camp is amazing.

“To see the Summer Sky
Is Poetry, though never in a Book it lie –
True Poems flee” – Emily Dickinson

Tyson Trepidations.

Long Overdue Roadtrip Post: Western Canada!

This summer is the first in years that I haven’t made any big travel plans. This is partly because of the amount of money I don’t have and just the timing of everything this summer makes it a little hard to get away. So instead of leaving the country, I thought it would be nice to explore around home and see the amazing views Western Canada has to offer. I decided to stick with a roadtrip, it seemed like the cheaper choice and a better way to see the sights while heading to our destinations. I also invited a couple of my American friends from San Francisco, California to come and join me. Especially since they’ve given me the opportunity to explore some of the United States, I figured I should return the favour.

Basically for the trip, it mostly featured exploring Vancouver, the rocky mountains and Edmonton. As well as get in some good camping days.

But here’s the day by day breakdown of my roadtrip:

Jericho Beach In Vancouver, BC, Canada

Day 1:  This day I left in the afternoon heading towards Vancouver. Overall it wasn’t a bad drive, a nice 5 hours from the interior of British Columbia to the beautiful coastal city. I’ve been to Vancouver many times, mainly for things like concerts and the PNE, so I thought it would be nice to explore a little more as well. My american friends weren’t due to arrive until the next morning, so I actually left a day earlier to visit a couple of my friends in North Vancouver and spent the night at their place. It was a great visit and I think I ate so much sushi my stomach was about to explode!

Day 2: I guess this is the day the trip really started in regards to looking at the sights of Vancouver. After having breakfast (more sushi) I headed to the Vancouver airport to pick up my friends. Once we were all loaded up though, they were pretty tired from getting up so early and the plane ride. So we just headed to downtown Vancouver and checked out the shopping, Chinatown, the ocean and had some lunch. We were staying in a hotel in North Vancouver, so on the way, we also stopped at the Capilano Suspension bridges. They were actually pretty unique and quite awesome like the entire city of Vancouver.

My Kayak at Adams Lake, BC, Canada

Day 3: Now that my friends were all rested up and ready to go, we checked out of North Vancouver and headed on the road to our next destination. For our next stop, we decided to go camping for a few days. My friends have never really been camping out in the wild being that they were from San Francisco, so it was to be a new adventure for them. For the biggest

chunk of the day, we spent driving to Adams Lake, where we were to camp. Once we got there, my poor car looked like it went 4x4ing, covered in mud from top to bottom. So we just unpacked, pitched the tent, lit a fire and got dinner going.

Days 4 and 5: These two days were all camping and rough necking it out in the bush. They featured the typical sort of fun like fishing, hiking, roasting marshmallows, kayaking,  and enjoying the beach. We were pretty lucky too that the weather kept up the whole time and brought some of the hottest days in the year so far.

Day 6: This was the end of the camping portion of the trip. We had breakfast, packed everything up and left Adams lake in the afternoon. It was a bit of a good thing too because the long weekend was starting, so many people were showing at the lake for their parties and whatnot. We decided to head out on the back road to Enderby. It was a nice drive through the forest and saw a lot of wildlife, including a couple bears and many many deer. Later in the afternoon we got into Enderby and stopped by a local pizza shop for dinner. After that, we went to the Starlight Drive In Theater. I’ve been there once before and enjoyed it so much that I wanted to take my friends to experience it as well. I think that if anyone gets a chance, they should definitely check out a Drive In Theater. Especially Enderby’s considering it has the largest screen in North America. So we had a good night watching Fast Five and Hop. Then it was back on the road, with one stop in Revelstoke to sleep on the side of the road for the night.

Day 7: After waking up all cramped inside the back of my car, it was on the road once more to head into the rocky

Driving Through The Rockies, Canada

mountains to our next destination near Radium Hot Springs. It was a nice drive and took up most of the day, but eventually we found our way to our next accommodation, Addison’s Bungalows. I was pretty proud of myself for finding this place, its about 20 minutes from Radium Hot Springs and has a bunch of little bungalows all over this chunk of property in the woods. They were actually a fairly good size even with a full kitchen and many different but great features. For the rest of the night we really just relaxed, explored the town of Radium Hot Springs and drove through Kootenay National Park a little as well.

Day 8: After a refreshing sleep in an actual bed, we got up late and jumped into our swimsuits. We headed for the actual hot spring pools in Radium Hot Springs. We had a great time there and really enjoyed relaxing in the hot water. Later that night, we settled down and watched 8 Mile on the TV in the bungalows.

Day 9: After yet another night in the quaint little bungalows, we decided to head off to Banff. I thought it would be a nice stop since I haven’t been there before and neither have my friends. Once we arrived, we immediately started taking in the abundance of shopping and even purchased a few souvenirs at a couple of the shops. But then the rain really came, and it came hard. It started pouring like crazy, so we had a nice dinner at Tony Romas and hoped the rain would let off by the time we were done eating… It didn’t, so we decided to head back to the bungalows and call it a night.

Day 10: Even though there was that huge rainfall the day before, day 10 started out as a beautiful and sunny day. With that in mind we took it to our advantage and hit up our surroundings on some hiking trails. They have quite a few all over the National Parks in the rocky mountains and from what I saw, they are all really nice and beautiful hikes, different in their own way from one another. After a full day of hiking, it felt great to hit the shower and get a good nights sleep.

Lake Louise, AB, Canada

Day 11: Since this day was time to check out of our bungalow, it was also then time for us to leave the area of Radium Hot Springs. So once again, we packed up and headed off on the road, straight up towards Jasper. It was a very beautiful drive through the icefields and through 4 different national parks. I’m not sure how I missed such a beautiful drive so close to home. On the way to Jasper, we stopped at Lake Louise, still covered with a lot of ice and snow, but still very pretty. We also stopped at a few rest points to take in the view and get a couple pictures, along with some stops at the Athebasca icefields and falls. Then eventually that night we ended up late in Jasper. So we pulled into a campground nearby, pitched the tent and called it a night.

Day 12: After awakening, we realized how beautiful Jasper national park was, coming in the night before, it was getting dark and we didn’t take in the sights of our surroundings before going to bed. So we headed right int0 Jasper on that good start and just had to check out their famous tramway. It was a beautiful ride up the trams and really showed the vastness of the rocky mountains. After taking all that in, we went back into Jasper and checked out some of the many lakes in the area, all of which were beautiful in their own way. Next we started to head towards Edmonton but pulled off the main road to check out another hot spring, Miette Hot Springs. I thought this one was great and even better than the one in Radium with a magnificent view right in front of us as we soaked in the hot pools. Then it was eventually time to leave and really head to Edmonton. We ended up arriving quite late that night, sometime after midnight, so as a result we just pulled into a truck stop and called it a night, again in the back of my car.

Days 13, 14 and 15: For these days we checked into a hotel in Stony Plain (its much cheaper than getting one in Edmonton), then went into the city of Edmonton to take in some shopping at their famous West Edmonton Mall. It’s such a vast mall that it really did take us the whole day to check out all the little shops throughout the mall. The next day we devoted to their huge water park in the mall. It was a blast in the huge wave pool and checking out the many different water slides available. For the last day, we spent that checking out the amusement park, again in the mall, called Galaxyland. It was pretty awesome, and I loved the Red Rollercoaster with the triple loops! I gotta say though, if you plan on exploring the mall, make sure to have a few days to do it! There are really a lot of things to check out there.

Day 16: As our last day on a roadtrip, we just chilled in downtown Edmonton and walked around like a bunch of tourists. It was a beautiful day but sadly I had to take my friends to the airport and say goodbye. After that, it was to head back home for myself on the beautiful drive, back through the rocky mountains.

“The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page” – Saint Augustine

Tyson Trepidations.

The World And Exploring It

Even though this is only my second blog post, I’ve already mentioned this twice, but it’s worth mentioning for a third time. I find that building connections all over the world is very important with experiencing the different views of the world and understanding culture.

I know most people that travel (and travel smartly), will tell you that travelling is quite addicting. Once you start seeing and experiencing things you never laid your eyes on or felt before, its something you want to continue to do. Even though my travels have barely taken me out of North America, I can understand this concept and I feel that having the ability to travel is an opportunity that shouldn’t be wasted. In fact, a significant number of people from Canada and the United States have never left their province or state, let alone their country.

That all seems extremely robotic and systematic to me.

When I look to travel, I don’t actually look into the travel packages too much. A lot of them cover a lot of ground and show a person many many things in their destination. The problem I have with those is that they really rush you through places a lot of the time and its just non-stop. Especially the ones that cover many destinations or countries in something as short as a two week period. It basically goes that you get there, look around, take pictures and move on to the next attraction like a herd of cattle. For that, is why I think making worldwide connections is very important.

As a university student studying in Canada, I’m very lucky to have a vast diversity of cultures to interact with while going to school. It means I can make many friends and connections from all over the world. It’s these relationships that really help me to understand different cultures and create a foundation to travel to and with.

There’s also the internet for those that aren’t shy and confident with their ability to judge character and trust others. It’s such an easy way to connect with the earth, using the resources on the world wide web. It can be as simple as places like these (blogs), to start making the worldly connections and there are also places specialized for that, such as couch surfing. With that said though, you still have to be careful on the internet, even with fairly trustworthy methods like the official couch surfing site.

I guess the best way to end is to share the places I wish most to explore and start building connections into. So here they are:

Malaysia

Singapore

Peru

Santorini (Thira)

Czech Republic

 

“Life does not ask what we want. It presents us with options” – Thomas Sowell