August 8th, 2002

Mick and Heather Volunteer at the Edmonton Folk Festival
Mick and Heather spent the weekend volunteering at the Edmonton Folk Music Festival this weekend. Mick served as Co-co-ordinator of the Records tent, and Heather volunteered as a volunteer in the Records tent. The two were also joined up with their old pals Jim and Pat and the like, and the weekend went off without any problems.

"When Mick insulted the McGarrigle sisters- now that was funny," pointed out Pat. "Anna and Kate were arguing about something, and he looks up at them and says, 'so, like, um, did you two actually write The Log Driver's Waltz? Or was that someone else?'"

Heather went on to explain that perhaps Mick did not need to get drunk and blabber at Sarah Harmer, either. "We were talking to her, and then all of a sudden Mick started talking and couldn't stop. She must have known he was drunk, because she was laughing and looking sympathetically at the rest of us."

The two are not sure if they will volunteer again next year, as Heather's brother is getting married that weekend next year.

July 27th, 2002

Mick and Heather Attend a Wedding in Weyburn
Mick and Heather continued their Saskatchewan Holiday today by attending a wedding in Weyburn. A childhood friend of the couple, Shea, was marrying a fellow by the name of Russ at a ceremony in the Weyburn Inn courtyard. The ceremony was lovely, with a harpist and a friend of the newlyweds singing at the ceremony.

"I was so happy for them. Shea looked beautiful, as did her mother, and it was such a nice ceremony and reception," Heather commented. The two sat with Heather's parents and their friend, Dean, for the ceremony and reception. Dean is a volleyball fanatic who grew up in Weyburn with both Mick and Heather.

"I was most surprised by the fact that neither of them use their first name. It was William marrying Allison, but no one calls them by those names. Maybe they'll do that for their kids- name the first one Engelbert Marshall, and then the kid will go by Marshall. Something like that. Sort of a neat tradition, I suppose," Mick figured. 

The supper was excellent, and despite Mick almost getting into a fist fight with the DJ over the direction of a fan, the couple had a wonderful time.

Photo: Shea and Russ smiling,  thinking, "Let's get out of here." 

July 25th, 2002

Mick and Heather Enjoy Snow Crab Legs with Friends
Mick and Heather had an entertaining evening with friends in Regina despite the warm weather and lack of good summer shoes on Mick's part. "He forgot his sandals in Bonnyville, and it was so hot and muggy out. I thought he wouldn't last through supper," explained Heather. "I don't really pay that much attention to him, but the people who were hosting us had shorts on and looked so cool, and we were so... hot."

The couple met their friends Aaron and Allison, who are getting married in October, at Luigi's Restaurant on the north end of Albert Street. The four of them were seated within inches of the couples to the right and left of them, which made it difficult to talk. "Yep. They really packed us in there. I thought that maybe they thought we were with those people. That would've made so much sense. But we weren't, so it was really foolish," suggested Aaron.

Despite the close seating arrangements, the supper was excellent, and the three snow crab legs for $3 deal was taken by all. Mick stated, "We were really taken for our three bucks, I say. It was good, but by the time you're done eating your three snow crab legs the twelve dollar entree you ordered is cold. The wine made up for it, though."

"Stop whining," replied Heather.

Photo: Apparently snow crab legs go with anything.

July 25th, 2002

Mick and Heather Book a DJ and Marriage Commissioner
Mick and Heather packed their bags and headed to Regina today, in hopes of getting more of their wedding plans finalized. 

Mick explained, "I just hope we get some of this stuff taken care of. I've got an alarm clock and a suit, so I'm ready for our wedding, but I think maybe I should help out more on some of this other stuff. I really want to have chicken at the supper, so I've got to pick out flowers to get Heather to come through on the chicken."

Mick made three telephone calls to pick out the DJ. The two are banking on the fact that if someone can have a DJ business, they must be able to not screw up a wedding reception. "Really, how can he mess it up?" questioned Heather.

The selection of an appropriate Marriage Commissioner was far more arduous. Resumes and applications were gone over again and again, and interviews were held at numerous undisclosed locations. With so many people wishing to perform the ceremony, it made it very difficult to choose the right person. That is, until they had coffee with Orville. 

"He was exactly what we were looking for. He had a keen sense of what we wanted, and had a good sense of humour. He's not going to need to wear clown feet or anything, but if he's got a sense of humour you can bet that if anything should happen it will be taken in stride. I'm not so worried about Mick passing out anymore. If he does, I think Orville can hold him up."

Photo: We can only hope that our DJ is as cool as this guy . 

July 11th, 2002

Mick and Heather Are Up All Night Because of a Car Alarm
Last night, at around 3:00 am, Heather and Mick were woken by a neighbours car alarm. Heather heard the alarm first, then rose from her slumber to go knock on Mick's door. Mick was already awake, but he chose to ignore the ruckus.

"I just wanted him to make it stop. He didn't need to get dressed and go outside. He could've done something else."

Mick walked out to the parking lot, where the alarm had been going off intermittently for the past two hours, to find the cars horn going non-stop. There was another neighbour out looking at it, and two buildings full of people out on their patio watching. Some people didn't even have clothes on.

"The other chap was a lot angrier about the commotion than I was. He was kicking the car, and shouting things. I gently moved my hand across the back window on the drivers side, then stood back. He looked at me like he was going to begin kicking me, then did the same thing. The car alarm stopped."

Mick tried to go back to sleep, but with an average temperature of 35 degrees in the apartment it proved difficult.

Photo: This luxurious 1983 Pontiac Bonneville wreaked havoc in Mick and Heather's neighbourhood. When you've got a great-looking car like this, you absolutely need a car alarm. 

June 26th, 2002

Mick and Heather Have Visitors from Out of Town
This weekend, Mick and Heather had guests come up from Calgary. The first pair of guests, who stayed both Friday and Saturday nights, had just recently moved from the United States. For personal reasons, the identities of these two will not be provided. 

"It was good to see Mr. and Mrs. X, as it's been almost nine months since we last saw them in X, Ontario." The group of four spent some time at the West Edmonton Mall as well as some other less touristy places. 

On Monday, Mick and Heather had lunch at Denny's with Charlie and Chantal from Calgary. The two were returning from a weekend in Fort McMurray. Charlie and Mick had an enlightening conversation about the pros and cons of Cyclic Steam Stimulation (CSS) oil recovery versus Steam Assisted Gravity Drainage (SAGD) technology. It was far out.

Photo: Denny's is now celebrating the 25th anniversary of the Grand Slam. 

June 25th, 2002

Mick and Heather's Graphics Card Goes on the Computer
Once again, Mick and Heather had computer problems. It is not known if these problems were related to the previous, but Mick was really angry.

"Next time this happens, I will be very upset."

Mick went to London Drugs and bought a card to replace his bad one, then went back to work up north.

June 15th, 2002

Mick and Heather's Computer Gets Hacked
While downloading free software last night, Mick forgot to turn the firewall on and their computer was hacked. "We left the computer on, overnight, so that the large files would download. I didn't realise that I hadn't turned it on yet."

Mick was dreaming about food when he heard the clatter, at roughly 7:30 am. The computer was making sounds that no computer should ever make, and when Mick went to check on it he was greeted with a Windows Explorer dialogue window indicating that he was transferring files into a directory on his hard drive that hadn't existed the night before. He cancelled the transfer, began deleting files in the directory, and then another window opened up indicating another file transfer was beginning. "What kind of sicko fills a guys hard drive with every Britney Spears album in separate directories, with more directories for each of her songs a dozen times?"

Mick was confronted with a blue screen of death from Microsoft, then tried to reboot his system several times. The hard drive had crashed and the latest backup was in April, so needless to say he was a little pissed.

Heather showed her concern by asking, "Does this mean that you're going to have to re-enter all of my stuff into Quicken again? You spent 2 or three hours a week putting that stuff in over the last year." 

Mick replaced the operating system, re-installed most of the software, then went back up north to work again.

Photo: Her mother picks out  her outfits. Mick has a number of five letter words to describe Ms. Spears. One rhymes with Itch. Another rhymes with Ore. 

June 14th, 2002

Mick and Heather Disappear from the Bar
Mick and Heather disappeared from a line-up outside a Whyte Avenue bar tonight, without their friends immediately noticing. "It's just what we do," said Mick, "We never say goodbye, we just sort of leave when no one's paying attention."

After having a pint with some friends at O'Byrne's pub on the patio, the group made their way to the Billiard Club, where Mick and Heather disappeared.

"I had no idea where they went!" exclaimed Diana, after realizing that the two had foiled her again. "We were in line, and then we were getting closer to the door, and then they just disappeared."

"I think that it's getting a little old," explained Heather, "We've been disappearing like this for a long time now. We leave parties like this, we tell people that we're going to dance at the bar then walk out the door on them, and now we're leaving people before we even get into the bar. No one's complained yet, so maybe they understand that we're getting old and can't stay out with the kids anymore."

Despite disappearing on people, they still have a good time. Mick suggested, "It's not like we don't like our friends. It's just that we get tired. It's sort of like when you're a little kid and you pick your nose and no one catches you so you laugh. That's what we're sort of doing. Picking our noses and laughing. Until it catches on and everyone else is randomly disappearing on their friends, we'll keep doing it. Or picking their noses and laughing, too."

Photo: O'Byrne's Irish Pub. 

June 7th, 2002

Mick and Heather Buy a Pile of "Bison" Meat
Mick and Heather bought some "bison" from an undisclosed source today, without even asking where the "bison" came from. The "meat" arrived from a fellow Mick apparently works with, but there was no proof that it was indeed bison meat. For forty dollars Mick and Heather received:

• 8 "Bison" Patties;
• 2 Packages of "Bison" Pepperoni;
• 4 Pounds of Ground "Bison";
• And a strange container with the word "Frank" covered up by a "Bison Meat" sticker.

So far the "meat" has been delicious. "It tastes sort of different. There's no fat content, which is odd. The pepperoni was good. But it gives me gas," Mick answered when asked about his purchase.

"Everything gives him gas. Why should this meat be any different," was all that Heather had to say about the purchase. They couple agrees that it is important to make sure that the people that you buy Bison from actually have them, or know some people who do.

Photo: Bison Cut Chart- None of these pictures looks remotely like what Mick and Heather bought..

May 28th, 2002

Mick and Heather get tickets to Neil Diamond
Using a special pre-sale password, Mick and Heather were able to beat the box office to some choice tickets to Neil Diamonds October 1st Concert in Edmonton.

"I got the password right at 10am on Tuesday. I bought the tickets at one minute past ten, when they went on sale. Second row was the best they could do," said Heather, anxious to go out and buy a shirt to match Mick's shiny Neil Diamond-esque shirt.

Upon questioning with regards to the concert, Mick replied, "I just hope that Heather doesn't embarrass me like my mother did when I took her to Tom Jones. That was funny, but a little tough to deal with," referring to his mother shouting, "Set that monster loose, Tom! Set that monster loose!" when Mr. Jones was pretending to unzip his fly while dancing in a provocative manner back in 1998.

Charge by phone tickets for Neil's Edmonton show are available June 3rd. Pre-sale tickets are available by going to Ticketmaster Canada's website.

May 13th, 2002

Mick registers for school
This morning, shortly after 6:00am, Heather dropped Mick off at NAIT to register for his 10 weeks of training for his apprenticeship program. The NAIT commissionaires were passing out numbers to students as they arrived to register at 8:00am, and Mick received number 263.

"We pretty much just stood around, chatting with other guys who were out working. We found out what jobs were going off, in case our current employers weren't giving us enough money (hint hint). And we had breakfast!" Mick stated.

The commissionaires ran out of numbers to give to students at around 7:30, although an estimated 1,500 students showed up after this point. NAIT is apparently the only school in the province that has a line-up on apprenticeship registration day, and the other 11 schools that offer apprenticeship training think it's pretty funny that NAIT has a big line-up. This is why they refuse to split up all the trades into two days of registration.

Mick waited in line, paid his $600, then made it out of the institute by 11:00. He's going to be in school from November 12th to January 28th, which coincidentally are the coldest days of the year to work.

Photo: Going to school over the winter doesn't sound too bad.

May 10th, 2002

Heather drives to Bonnyville to visit Mick
Late last Thursday afternoon Heather ventured off from her job in Fort Saskatchewan to make the journey to Mick's rotten apartment in Bonnyville. Upon arriving, shortly after 5:00pm, she sat in the car and waited until Mick came out to see her around 7:30. Immediately citing Heather's anger, Mick began to kiss ass to avoid an angry girlfriend.

An unidentified source from the apartment building overheard the initial conversation, explaining that Heather "was really, really mad" and that Mick was "stupid for thinking that she wasn't leaving work until 5:00."

The rest of Heather's weekend visit included a trip to Clarke's General Store in Cold Lake, ice cream at Dairy Queen in Bonnyville, Mick working all day Saturday, then more eating on Saturday night. Heather even managed to do a little shopping, although she never actually entered any stores, despite the SAAN store's magnetism.
Photo: SAAN carries a wide assortment of products for everyone.

May 5th, 2002

Mick and Heather win money in the lottery!

This past weekend, Mick and Heather struck it rich with some winning Super 7 lotto tickets. The tickets were purchased at the Mac's on the corner of 104th Avenue and 116th Street, in Edmonton.

Total value of their prize was $59.

This brings their total lottery winnings up to $312 not including 85 free tickets. The couple plans to spend the money on something exciting. "We could really use some toilet paper. Our stockpile is running below 24 rolls and they haven't had any sales worth buying a cart full in quite some time," Mick suggested.

"I'd just like to get a new shirt or something. Maybe two shirts. No, that's crazy talk. Just one nice shirt," was all Heather had in mind for the windfall.

The lucky couple is going to take a few weeks to decide what to do with their winnings.

Photo: Two other lottery winners from Winnipeg.

May 3rd, 2002

Pentecostal Church on Heather's Morning Drive Does Not Change Slogan on Sign for First Time in Years.

The Pentecostal church, situated just five blocks from Mick and Heather's apartment, has failed to change their funny message on their sign for the first time since being built in the 1960s.

The billboard outside the church, which usually features a quote representing the theme of the upcoming Sunday's sermon, has featured such notable quotes like, "Try our Sundays, they are better than Dairy Queen's" and the old favourite "No God No Peace, Know God Know Peace."

Last week's quote, "Every great achievement was once impossible," has now served well over a week. It is believed that the minister, or whatever the Pentecostals call their religious leader, still has yet to accomplish his great achievement.

Neither Mick nor Heather have attended any of these sermons, so the effectiveness of this religious advertising is still questionable.

Photo: Buddy Jesus from the film, "Dogma"

May 1st, 2002

Mick Gets Sick

Just past midnight, earlier this morning, Mick woke from his slumber feeling sick. Being in Bonnyville at the time, he was a little disoriented when he tried to stumble his way to the washroom.

Unfortunately Mick did not make it to the toilet. Instead, he was sick in the sink.

"I didn't even realize I'd eaten any lettuce. That was a real shocker!" Mick exclaimed.

His roommate, Colin, had a little more to say on the subject. "I heard him stumbling, then heard a loud splattering sound in the sink. I started to laugh, but then I heard it again. And then he blew his nose, and went and got the plunger. He must have been up to his elbows in the sink, getting the big chunks out before the plunging began."

The cause of Mick's sickness is unknown, but it is presumed that the liquor drank at a birthday party earlier had something to do with it.

Photo: Alleged cause of sickness.

April 20th, 2002

Mick and Heather Go Shopping in Chinatown

This morning Mick and Heather were sited on 97th Street at the Lucky 97 Grocery Store. They were seen carrying items including:

• A blue tin of Oolong Tea
• Some frozen Dynasty Vegetarian Somosas
• A package of Kam Yen Jan Chinese Style Sausage (Made with Pork and Chicken, hopefully)

Mick was also carrying a piece of literature he apparently received from a Chinese woman on the corner in front of the store, on the subject of freeing the Falun Gong followers.

Following their visit to Lucky 97 Grocery, they were trailed to the Houng Kong Bakery where they purchased both mini and regular sized BBQ Pork buns.

Photo: The Chinatown Gate in Edmonton

Mick and Heather "Buy" a Condo

According to Ed, a real estate broker with the Royal Lepage group, Mick and Heather have purchased a condo.

Though it has not been built yet, and the house on the property has not been knocked down yet, Mick and Heather put a $1,000 deposit down on their future property.

"We'd been looking for a long time. It's right in the neighbourhood we wanted to live in," explained Heather, when asked to justify the price. Due to an exploding market in Edmonton, the couple are having to shell out more than they thought they'd ever have to spend on anything ever in their lives. She went on to say, "I suppose that our rent was almost as high as the mortgage payment anyways."

The couple has decided to go with TD Canada Trust for their mortgage. "We're getting a variable mortgage that is .75% under prime. It's costing us next to nothing. Also, I'm happy that it's a short move. Our last move was across the hallway. This one is three whole blocks. I don't know if those movers will be able to handle it," stammered Mick.

The condo construction is slated to be completed in September of 2002.

Photo: Artist's rendering of the new condo, with some guy in shorts.

Mick Pops the Question

Sources say that Mick knelt down on one knee, through the cold, blowing wind, and asked Heather if she would be his bride.

"It was so cold. I kept thinking to myself, 'What the heck are they doing out on the deck? They should be inside,' but they kept standing there until he knelt down," said an elderly woman, who wished not to be identified.

Despite Mick starting out with, "I guess I should get this over with", the answer was a "Yes."

Sources said it was followed with "Where's the ring?"

The happy couple were later spotted at Birk's in Victoria, where they picked out a white gold ring with sapphires and diamonds inlaid in a channel setting. The ring was later purchased in Edmonton, after many phone calls and Edmonton Birk's representatives being denied the commission that was duly given to the gentleman who sold them the ring in Victoria.

Photo: The Queen of Oak Bay ferry, which is the actual ferry where the proposal took place.