Blog #4 - Christmas Memories

My favourite Christmas memory would have to be the ride home from my grandparents house on Christmas Eve. On Christmas Eve, my entire family would gather at my grandparents house to have a Christmas dinner together and celebrate by exchanging presents and laughter. However I was so impatient to get home and go to sleep so that Santa would come with presents that I always rushed my parents. When it was finally time to leave, which always seemed like ages, I would run out the front door and straight into the car. On the way home my parents would roll down the windows and ask “Can you hear that? It’s Jingle Bells from Santa’s sleigh!” My sister and I would first closely listen and then exclaim that we could hear a faint sound even though we couldn’t and we would scan the skies in search of the reindeer. From the back seat we would squeal and scream for my dad to drive faster so we would be get home before Santa got there. When we got home my sister and I would dash into the house and put out the milk and cookies by the fireplace, so excited that we spilled the milk everywhere. We also would put out carrots and water for the reindeer in case they needed a snack. We then would run to our bedrooms and dive into bed all before my parents had even got inside. Falling asleep was next to impossible on Christmas Eve and that Christmas Eve was no exception. Waking up the next morning was such a surprise because I had not even remembered falling asleep. I dashed into my sister’s room and she was already wide awake. I looked at her alarm clock which read 6:30am. Together we ran into my parent’s room and jumped on their bed until they acknowledged the fact that they had to wake up. What a surprise we had when we ran downstairs to find all the presents that Santa had left us. 

#474 When someone who doesn't like pizza crust gives you their pizza crust

I am that person. The one who gives away my pizza crusts.

I am not sure what it is, but I can never bring myself to eat the crust.

I do not know if it’s the texture or the taste but the crust is by far the worst part. Not only does it fill you up very fast, it’s the toughest part of the whole pizza and is sure to give your jaw a workout.

Quite possibly the reason why I refuse to eat the crust is a result of a scarring childhood experience. It all started when I attended my friend’s 10^th birthday party. In attendance were five of my closest friends who I had gone to school with since Kindergarten. For dinner we ate ourselves silly with pizza. Noticing all the pizza crusts left, we decided to have a contest to see who could eat the most crusts. I was determined to win. Crust after crust we continued eating until we could no longer eat and our tummies ached. My friend won with 12 crusts and I ate 10. This with the pizza I had previously eaten was too much and I threw up everything. This caused two of the other girls to follow in suit. First in shock everyone was silent and then allow of a sudden a burst of laughter filled the room. It was definitely a birthday to remember and to this day I refuse to eat pizza crusts.

However, there isn't a better feeling giving away your pizza crust to another person and watching their satisfaction. It often makes me question however what they find so enjoyable.

I’d rather give my crust away anyways because I don’t get full as fast which means I can eat more of the best part: the actual pizza.

AWESOME 

Everything's Funny After Midnight

Last year, my club basketball team travelled to Medicine Hat for a tournament which we finished in 2^nd so it was a very successful and fun tournament. Fun because of the bonding that went on the second night of the tournament. The three hotel rooms which myself and 11 other team mates were staying in were all connected by adjoining doors that opened into each of the rooms. Our coach had told us no shenanigans and that light out by 10:30 pm or we would be benched. So of course we were in bed and trying to sleep by 10:29pm. I remember waking up to this shriek of laughter and rolling over to look at the alarm clock which read “12:30”. I laid in bed staring at the ceiling for a second thinking that it was just in my dream until I heard another just like it. At the same time everyone in my room sat up in bed and turned on the lights. The laughter continued and we followed it into the middle room where we saw the girls from the far room join us and the others in the middle room. We turned on the lights to find our teammate on the floor laughing uncontrollably. Everyone was confused until we realized that the teammate that she was sharing a bed with had rolled over and pushed her out of the bed. All at once the room was flooded with shrills of laughter followed by girls clutching their stomachs from laughing so hard and falling over on the floor. Everything we did after that was hilarious and it’s safe to say that no one got any sleep that night. At 3:30am when there was a loud pounding on the door, we froze in terror glancing back and forth at each other and then burst out into another uncontrollable wave of laughter. After a few seconds, one brave girl answered the door to see our grumpy coach at the door to tell us that there was a noise complaint about the sound coming from our room. This made everyone laugh harder and before long we even had our grumpy coach laughing. 

Camping Memory

My favourite camping trip would have to be two summers ago when my parents, best friend and I packed up our trailer and traveled to Oregon where we spent 25 days camping along the coast. Along the way we stopped at many tourists’ destinations such as the Sea Lions Cave, Harris Beach, Crater Lake and the Oregon Caves. At night we found ourselves alongside the campfire sharing laughs and s’mores and enjoying each other’s company. My favourite memory during this trip would have to be going sandboarding. One part of Oregon is covered in sand dunes and the locals started the sport of sandboarding. Essentially sandboarding is like snowboarding except it is on sand, you don’t wear boots and after each run you have to wax your board otherwise you won’t slide down the hill. The first few runs I was hesitant as it took a lot of balance and I often took small tumbles but I eventually got the hang of it and was flying down the bunny hill in no time. Together, my friend Mackenzie and I spent nearly two hours climbing up the hill and riding back down. Feeling gutsy we decided to try the biggest hill. The first run we carefully made our way down the hill with success. Feeling even more confident I was determined to conquer the biggest hill at full speed. The first half of the run was successful and then I met my match when I hit a hidden rock in the sand. The board got caught up on the rock and my body proceeded to continue full speed and I somersaulted twice before landing head and face first deep in the sand. Wipe out. I remember thinking that since I was in the sand I may as well build a sand castle and then the next thing I knew there were 4 strangers digging me out of the sand and making sure I was okay and I could see my mom and friend barreling down the hill behind them. After I was brushed off, had spit out the mouth full of sand that had accumulated in my mouth and had gotten reoriented, me and all the other sand boarders on the hill couldn't help but fall over laughing at my graceful wipe out. Fortunately I walked away with only a little sand burn a minor headache and few pockets full of sand. Even though at the time my wipe out was very scary, it has left me with a lasting memory that always makes me giggle.