Crowded cry

I went to see the movie If I Stay with a friend a couple weeks back. It's pretty sad, about a girl who's in a car accident with her family, and her body is in a coma. She decides if she wants to stay living in our world, or pass on. It flashes back to her life, the day of the accident, and her life since. Now when I say it's pretty sad, I mean it. Closer to downright heartbreaking. And I'm so in touch with my emotions, I've cried at commercials occasionally, so needless to say, I was a balling mess. But isn't that weird how we do that? I realized I was in a room full of strangers, in the dark, attempting to cry quietly, as were all of them. Kinda strange really...

Bottle me up

Somewhat accidentally, I started contributing to my fundraising for the Ride to Conquer Cancer by taking in my friends bottle returns. It's more lucrative than you'd think! I've made $120 so far! I'd try to thank everyone, but then I'd miss someone. This picture below is from a lovely family who celebrated a wedding, and donated their bottle returns. Want to guess how much it came to?  

$45 was that pull. Even the random guy I bought my bike rack from donated me a carload when he found out I was doing the ride. $20 from that one. He'll be doing it with me next year, should I make it. When I make it. 

But this might work right? Maybe we're onto something. Bottles. A change jar. It's still a donation to a great cause. I need this win guys, help me get there. 

Here's a link to my fundraising page:

http://www.conquercancer.ca/site/TR/Events/Vancouver2015?px=3775976&pg=personal&fr_id=1524

First ride

My cousin and I went on our first of many training rides this past Sunday. I've signed up to do the 2015 Ride to Conquer Cancer, and should I make my fundraising goal of $2500, I'll ride 260km from here to Seattle next August. Sundays ride was significantly less since it was my first time on my new bike, we rode 18.4km in an 1h18mins, with an average speed of 14.1km. All of these stats were tracked on a bike monitor thingy my cousin has .Very cool really, I WANT ONE!! 

We had a rocky start, since she lives in a complex with a steep, sharp incline to get to the road. There I was, new biking shorts, new bike, grunting up the very SMALL hill thinking, "what on earth have I gotten myself into this time..." And when we got to the top, we had a frustrating encounter with a hand bike tire pump, but I was just happy to have a change to catch my breath. 

The GREAT thing about this ride was I discovered I do in fact like long distance biking. Because that would be the absolute shits if I didn't. I also discovered there's a lot to gears, and changing them to match hills and such. Weird. I just had this idea I was going to jump on the bike and go. A long ways. There's SKILL involved? 

I did ok though, mostly with the guidance from my ubber patient cousin. "So Jay, we do try not to ride in the middle of the road like that..." Near the end of the ride, I was liking it so much, we did an extra loop to make the route longer. "Nah, I'm good to go, LET'S DO THIS!!" 

I'm going to train my arse off, and I'll get my body ready, I need your help to get there though. I've included a link to my fundraising page: 

http://www.conquercancer.ca/site/TR/Events/Vancouver2015?px=3775976&pg=personal&fr_id=1524

I signed up to do this ride on Father's Day, and the money I raise will go directly to the type of Cancer that Dad fought, and lost earlier this year. This cause, this ride, this challenge is close to my heart. Help me get there.

Singles Mingler

Just in case you thought my ramblings about single life were over with Tinder, I want to tell you about a Singles Mingler I went to last week. First thing I did wrong was show up on time. Just like clubs, they don't get off their feet right away. I also went by myself, because #singledoesntstopme and I thought I might be more approachable that way, but almost every other girl there came in a clump. So I got my class of wine, and mingled away.

The people I got along the best with, women and men, were the people I made jokes with. One gentlemen showed me magic tricks. The event was 19+, emphasis on the plus. A couple guys I was talking to, I was busy doing the math in my head while they talked, until I'd come to the conclusion, "Yup, he's old enough to be my dad..." We had the opportunity to write messaged to each other based on our  number. I wrote my first one...

Yea, I wrote it to myself. I was also the first one to receive a real message though. It asked me what brought me here, and I never found poor number 4 all night. I got a message saying a guy liked my smile. One guy gave me his number. I stayed for a couple hours. 

It wasn't until I was putting my glass away back at the bar that I found the giant cluster of people my age. Hanging out near the bar, I should have guessed. They all seemed quite normal too. 

That's the kicker people. The big take away I got from this event was how I spoon feed people my craziness. You laugh, but it's true. Through this entire process, I've felt a giant hesitation to be too much myself, because lets face it, I'm pretty out of the box. I like to differentiate between good crazy, and bad crazy, but I doubt anyone would let me get that far. 

Only once throughout all of Tinder did I actually relax and act truly myself, and shit it was refreshing. My friend put it in the best words, "wave your freak flag" she said. Best advice I've gotten so far. It helps that she's in a ridiculously happy relationship with an awesome guy. "I found someone else waving theirs too!" Brilliant. Going forward, my freak flag flies.     

Also a shout out to my readers, the I'm Yelling Tinder post hit 200 page views this past week, and I couldn't be happier. I love you all. Especially the green dots in Russia I've never met, I'm sure you're all swell. 

Touchless

I was using a public washroom yesterday,  with those super nifty sensor taps that rarely work properly. It got me thinking. I was raised in a super loving environment, my parents always hugged and kissed me, and before they left, "I love you have a good day" and before bed, "I love you, goodnight". Since living on my own, it's occurred to me that I can go entire days without touching anyone. I'm a touchy-feely kinda girl, but I've never put much thought into it. I hug my coworkers, my sisters, strangers...but it occurred to me that sometimes we live in a touchless world. Cuddles people!  They're important to your emotional health, do not take this lightly. Keep calm and hug on.

Creepy bobbing heads

If you haven't been forced to download the new Facebook messenger, you will. I was buying something off a buy/sell/swap group on Facebook when it put the block on me. I needed that stupid address or I would have avoided it on principle.

When you're chatting with someone now, it's a whole separate app, that runs in conjunction with any other app you're running. What it does is turns the person's profile picture into a small sphere on your screen that you're able to click on to keep talking to them.

So you could be up until the wee hours, Tindering away, and if you talked to your Grams that day, there her face is. In the app. Judging you.

Or my problem was, a friend did one of those "what you'll look like in 60 years" photos and made it his profile picture. Harmless enough, until that creepy little head was EVERYWHERE I went on my phone. I made him change it so the night terrors would go away.

Hold your finger on the heads, and you can move them around your screen wherever you wish. With a little imagination, that gets fun quick. But when youre done, hold them down and a little X bubble appears at the bottom, where you can swipe the obediently into and they disappear. For another volcanic day. Oops!

Toodles Tinder

My sister created a new verb, "Are you Tindering again?" when we hang out. I've made a habit of getting a large tea in the morning so I don't fall asleep at work due to staying up half the night. I went to a party last weekend, and my blog was the only interesting thing that's happened to me lately. We are long past the point where this is a problem. 

I also realized in all my Tinder sequels, with all the turns offs and swipe rights, I've never composed a list of all my good qualities. I've realized I have a lot to offer. And world, be ready for me. Serena told me today I'm taking on dating like, "force of destruction". She meant it as a compliment; I'm the writer in the family by the way. She meant that I'm taking it head on, and being single doesn't stop me. (my very own witty hashtag #singledoesntstopme, it's not viral, YET) 

Its been a fun confidence booster, whether or not I actually end up meeting anyone to write home about. This sounds open ended because if you haven't noticed, I don't write about someone until it hasn't worked out, call it superstition. As a leaving present, some gems I've found lately, since I figured out how to take screen shots. 

Please note some cameo's here, thanks to the new Facebook messenger. Don't ask how I've mentally justified posting these, my answer might include unquestionable stupidity and a sincere inquiry on the state of the world. Toodles Tinder, its been fun.