Eat, Love and Share

Geez, it's no wonder Thanksgiving comes in the form of a long weekend. It gives you the time to not worry about going into work and/or school the next day on Sunday night. And I don't mean to sound sappy and sentimental (so not me, right?), but when you're in the hubbub of the grind of Monday-Friday-work-work-school-work-deadlines-sleep, you don't have time to 'stop and smell the roses'.

Yesterday I baked, whipped and rolled my apple pie and tiramisu for Dev's dinner all day. We all gathered in his little kitchen that would, making the last-minute preparations before 15 or so of us sat down to a meal of turkey (moist turkey! Good job, Dev), potato salad, Cajun couscous (Me: "I'm thankful for couscous and it's versatility. I mean, you can put it in anything!"), orange beef, stuffing and the rest of the goodness. The table was too small to fit all of us and I was elbow to elbow with Andru and Alex but nevertheless, one of my most favourite things ever. Jon provided us with some entertainment when I paid him $20 (and Tommy and Nam added some pocket change) to drink the leftover gravy. The money and food-hungry person that Jon is... he did it. He says it was worth every penny but I don't think his clogged arteries would agree. And as per usual, we Poker-ed all night and I even managed to finish reading a chapter for and writing one page of my Philosophy paper! Now, that's what I call a productive night.

^It passed the first test, and I didn't go blind

^Sarah, Cuong and Nam waiting for the grub ^Jon getting a lil too friendly with Dru..

^I can't believe he ate the whole thing...actually, I can

Today, I planned on writing the rest of my paper, but I went to bed at 5 am and didn't get up until noon. I wrote about half a page before I went out for lunch and coffee with some more friends. It is now 4:30 pm and I have yet to really get into writing my paper even further. I'm not even too worried about it as I was before this weekend. This weekend has just made me realized that school and work has just voided me of all serenity and gratefulness before starting my 4th year and working. I've also realized that a measely Philosophy paper is minor compared to things you take for granted because nothing lasts forever.

This was more confirmed for me today when I found out that my highschool French teacher, who was perpetually pregnant when I was still in highschool, died this weekend. I've never really had anyone close to me pass away, so Death has never been so real to me, especially after a death of a teacher from my past is considered to me 'pretty close to home'. A good teacher, at that, really shows me how real Life is, too. I had another teacher, Mrs. Pitt who died, who was terminally ill, and I will always remember her as she was the one who taught me to type with incredible efficiency and speed.

Mme Tyson, however, seemed young and healthy. French may not have been my most favourite subject in highschool (due to my lack of ability to grasp new languages and how I detested oral presentations), but she wasn't a terrible teacher at all. I even remembered when she first got married. She was young and I expect she has young children (because she was pregnant alot) now so I really sympathize for her littluns. Her death was sudden, and on Thanksgiving weekend of all times, so it's a really big shocker to me.