Can I Have your Number?

Here is a funny video ... enjoy!
Shout out to MD!



"I'm thankful for laughter even if milk comes out of my nose" WA
Mich

2010 Culture

Another Olympic post ... one of my favorite discoveries of how the Vancouver Games are shaping up are the very unique design of the medals ... no two medals are the same and they all incorporate local Indigenous art, the story is pretty cool. Check out the video if you are interested ...



"No culture can live, if it attempts to be exclusive and culture is the widening of the mind and spirit." MG
Mich

Canadian Creation

With great anticipation of a recently announced concert of one of my favorite Canadian musicians, thought I would post a video. Craig Cardiff is a very unique personality and when I saw the passion that he had for his art form last year at a small warehouse show in Winnipeg, I fell in love with his music even more. And I think this video can give you a like taste of his personality and what to expect from his shows. Mubo and Vanessa don't worry the date is marked on my calendar - we enjoy music fusion of all that is Craig Cardiff and he will be so much more than just an inspiring voice on your ipod!

That Band Live (1.6.07) from craig cardiff on Vimeo.

"Music can change the way your day evolves"
Mich

Blogger's Block

Events can inspire you, change you, shock you, rock you, shape you ... and new years bring new possibilities, constant change, inconceivable events and unforgettable memories. Reminders of lessons learned, living in the moment, and excitement for the future can never be too many. Constant inspiration and stories of humanity are what help us get up in the morning and to get excited about life ...
There are many things I could post to complement these random thoughts here is just one of many. Enjoy this classic video, its one of my favorite songs to come back to for any type of inspiration or perspective ...




"We don't beat the reaper by living longer, but by living well, and living fully — for the reaper will come for all of us. The question is: what do we do between the time we're born and the time he shows up" R.P.
- Mich

Love of the Theatre ...

This past week I got another taste of the never ending cultural experiences that Winnipeg seems to surprise me with. I scored some free tickets to a dress rehearsal of the current play that is on at Manitoba Theatre Centre 'The Drowsy Chaperone' - and it definitely didn't disappoint. It brought me back to all the fun times I had dressing up and going to the theatre with my mom as a kid. So if you are in Winnipeg and have a chance to go and check this out (or the theatre where ever you live :) ) I would highly recommend it for a fun night out and to rekindle or find your lost love of the theatre haha. It has it all - great acting, fun characters, broadway music feel, sexual jokes and no intermission!

And this particular play has canadian content and an interesting story to its creation. Check the story from the Winnipeg Free Press for more ...

And in the spirit of musical theatre check this fun youtube video out ...

"It is a hopeless endeavour to attract people to a theatre unless they can be first brought to believe that they will never get in." C.D.

Mich

Olympic Fever

For most Canadians the Olympic spirit is spreading across the country and into our cities whether we like it or not. Lucky for me I'm an Olympic junky and I get this kid-like excitment every two years when they roll around so I'm pumped :). Even more fun is to be had this time around though because Canada is hosting them ... so no one can escape the Olympic fever!! muhaha.
Needing to feel apart of the Games and knowing that attending them this time around was impossible (yes I'm implying one day I will be able to attend!!) I wasn't going to miss the torch run in Winnipeg. Knowing not many people would bare the elements of a Winnipeg winter to see something they liked let alone a little torch being lite, I tried to reason out the historic moment that we could be apart of (hard to see it when the possibility of frost bitten toes is in the equation). Lucky for me I was able to drag two great friends - Colleen and Eric out to share in my ridiculous excitement over the torch. The weather couldn't have been better all things considered and it definitely satisfied my craving to be a part of 2010. So as the excitement builds and the athletes prep I hope that everyone can enjoy a little or a lot of the Olympic spirit because it truly is one of most powerfully and world-unifying events!


(Probably one of few Olympic posts!)

"Hosting an Olympic Games means evoking history and are the quadrennial celebration of the human spirit" P.C.
Mich

The Return of the Forgotten ...

So I'm officially the worst blogger possible and have definitely not done a great job of keeping my posts up to date but at least it can only get better from here. With school consuming my every free hour of the day (in November and December) I became somewhat discourage about the fact that I really wasn't doing anything worth posting about and that everyone was probably stressing about exams or the holiday season so they didn't need to hear it from me. But fortunately for me I was able to see most of the people who actually read this blog over the holiday break so I don't feel as bad and for those few people that still are looking for and hoping that some posts will appear, here is my attempt to get back to blogging about my self proclaimed exciting day to day action. Enjoy if you may ...

"To think too long about doing a thing often becomes its undoing" E.Y.
Mich

Bison Brief

So I was asked to write a blog for bison sport ... first of all none of my teammates wanted to step up and take the task on so they are stuck with my inconsistent posting and second there is not much room to be creative with them so they are straight forward. Here is my second post ...

Coming off a hard week of practice last week, we were able to get a much needed win at home versus the University of Winnipeg! After our two disappointing loses to Calgary on opening weekend in our gym we had a lot to prove to ourselves last week in practice. But we worked hard and pushed through some long ‘runs’ and rewarded ourselves on Saturday night. We had a great start in the first quarter – feeding off our intense defense to take a big lead into the second quarter were the game balanced out a bit. But in the second half we played through some runs by U of W, stayed focus and got the W. All around team effort and we had a fun time doing it together!
So we head into this weekend with our first tough road-trip ahead of us. We leave for Calgary on Thursday afternoon followed by a two-hour bus ride to the University of Lethbridge. No matter who the opponent is, when the travel includes two modes of transportation and a day worth of sitting, it is mentally and physically challenging compared to playing at home. For myself it’s one of my favorite parts of getting to be a student athlete – nothing is better than going into someone else gym and getting two wins. So I’m excited for our rookies to get to experience that and I’m excited for our team to face the step big challenge to the season. Not to mention we always manage to have a good time in the process!
So look out Pronghorns a herd of Bison are rolling into town! Haha

"Due to their large size few predators attack bison." (Fierce face above haha)

Mich

All I Want for X-mas is my Teeth!!

SO THE WAIT IS FINALLY OVER!!

no no no not for a new blog post, all though it has been a while but I finally got my teeth put in! haha. Now I know to many of you that have all your perfect pearly whites accounted for you can't really understand my excitement but this has been a long 8 year process of space making, bone graphing, steel wearing and implants. And now I have my new teeth to show off - hopefully they will last me a long time and I will now be just a regular dentist attendee! Here is my first close up of my teeth .....

"The Simplest Things in Life are sometimes not free!"

Mich

Shout Out to Lola Shortt

An ultimate goal - love your job! Wether you work there for an hour, a week or 20 years if you love what you do it can make a difference in so many lives and your own.
So at the Pita Pit close to the university - obviously a great spot for late night dinner snacks - the pita artist that works there (the only one I ever see so I think she runs the place) loves her job.
She is always energtic and always ready to tell me how much she likes U of W better than U of M. Being on a sports team I can be passionate about my Bison Pride but I have learned to hold back the smart remarks - after all my soon to be food is in her hands and don't wanted any added 'ingredients' in my delicious pita. So much to my surprise the picture below was the pita special for the week. Isn't this the first step to being famous? Or maybe it was just a slow week ... either way I was pumped about it - how many people can say they have a pita named after them!


"Who has more fun us?"
Mich

Bison Brief: ?Pretty? in Pink

This past weekend we started league play in Brandon - we got off to a good start with two wins, may have not been pretty but we will take the W's when we can get them. The previous week we finished pre-season with our home tournament "Shoot for a Cure" and our major 'pink' campaign on campus to raise money for breast cancer awareness. For me it was a busy week full of: putting finishing touches on our bison night, selling pink t-shirts, family visits and convocation!
All in all a great week to celebrate some of my hard work over the past little bit and it was so great to see my fam-jam! Here are some pictures and videos to sum it all up!

Here is a sweet picture taken by one of the track athletes - I'm sporting the sweet pink jerseys that I helped get for our silent auction. It was so successful we had to order a second set of jerseys!


Here is a nice picture from convocation - with my bachelor of Kinesiology and parents of course.


And finally here is the sweet video we made for our Bison Night ... thanks to Eric for all the time put in for my creative version.



"Go out in the world like money doesn't matter. Sing as if no one is listening. Love as if you have never been hurt and dance as if no one is watching."

Mich

Old School Love

After finding my all-black Chuck Taylor All-Stars and rocking them around school I started to remember why I bought them. One of my favorite movies growing up was Sandlot and I always wanted my own pair of PF Flyers! .... Yeah thats right the shoes that "Make you jump higher and run faster!"

At the time it may have been my 'tom-boy' attitude that just wanted the shoes to look cooler than my brothers but these are classic vintage shoes. Now a days, after checking out their heritage and the huge role they played in the modern develop of the shoe, appeals to me the most (I mean don't get me wrong, everyone still probably thinks that this is still a 'tom-boy' attitude only now I'm a nerd too or should I say L-7 winnie! haha).

Hope you enjoy the reminiscing ... I did :).

Top 5 Old School Movies:

1. Sandlot

2. Standby Me

3. Goonies

4. Mighty Ducks

5. Now and Then

"Remember kid, there's heroes and there's legends. Heroes get remembered but legends never die, follow your heart kid, and you'll never go wrong"

Mich

The Red Dragon

Came upon this video awhile ago but just remembered about it ... it makes me laugh so hard every time I see it ... watch for the bum slaps! haha. 

enjoy

"Adversity often leads to opportunity  - hard tasks are always followed by fulfilled hearts."

Mich

BISON BREIF: 3 Wins, One Shiner, and Nothing Proven

Given basketball does rule my life here is a pre-season update ...

Started game play in Dryden, ON vs. Lakehead - don't mean to sound like a spoiled university athlete but it is tough playing in a high school gym after running endless drills on the full university court - needless to say the games were a little scrappy and a lot of 'controlled chaos' but we started the season with two wins so the complaining ends there.

Than for the first time since I have been at U of M we got to play against the University of Winnipeg in non-conference play - with the 'Duckworth Challenge' bragging right was up for grabs. We came out on fire from the field than played hard the rest of the game to earn the win. With the win we finally won outright (have tied in the past) the Duckworth Challenge, which is great for Bison Sports - because it was a combined win with the men's basketball team and the volleyball teams.

But like I said the games were still a little scrappy as everyone is trying to get back to game playing form. With scrappy play comes some funny and not so funny injuries: like team mates running into each other trying to get rebounds ending in some stitches and a face mask or giant goose egg black eyes. I was the fortunate recipient of the ladder injury and let me tell you it has been an interesting week with 'the eye'. So first off when I got the elbow to the face this thing instantly starting growing over my eye lid like a balloon being blown up. As my coach yells at me to keep playing hard as I run up the side line I begin to tell him that I'm slowing losing vision out of my one eye but I will try. When he does not hear me all it took was one look from him and a teammate at the next time out and I knew there was a massive growth now forming over my eye. Ok ok so I may be exaggerating but thats what it felt like! Needless to say a some ice helped maintain the size but the bruising as been a funny processes. Other than the fact that when I'm out in public people either stare at me thinking that I have really bad make-up or I must have a had a fun night the previous night and wanted to remember it haha (added some pics for your viewing).

And finally although we started the season with 3 wins in reality they mean nothing because they are pre-season games and secondly if I have learned anything about playing in the CIS you have to win when it matters to be successful! So nothing has been proven ...

"Trust the process - one game at a time."

Mich

Thoughts: Athletes Live In Their Own World

Seeing as I haven't posted in over a week is telling to the fact that I do sometimes live in my own little world. This world has no external issues that are greater than the 20 people I interact with on a daily bases. It is driven by the cycle of waking up, going to school, going to practice, doing homework/studying, going to bed and repeating. It can often be so narrow focused that anything I do outside of those 5 tasks almost seems out of body experiences and are often forgotten when trying to remember what the day consisted of. Now you may ask 'why would someone want to live such a repetitive and isolated lifestyle?', well the old phase 'it's all for the love of the game', sums it up pretty nicely for me. If I didn't love basketball, there is no way this lifestyle would make up my 'little world' haha. For me its easy to see all the positives to being a student athlete but unfortunately for those not in my imagery world I seem like a non-exist human in the 'real' world. So this is in no means an excuse for my lack of communication skills but merely a an explanation about what goes on in my world when I realize there is more to life than my little repetitive life cycle .....

"Your World is What You Make ...."

Mich