Now that it’s been three months that I have firmly moved out of my apartment and will not return to it nor would I ever consider buying it, it is now an acceptable time to talk specifically about my little abode that I called home for over six years (February 2005 until September 2011)!
On my tiny student stipend, I have no idea how I initially afforded the rent plus utilities like hydro, cable/Internet to pay myself. Rent for my 439 sq.ft. “alcove studio” (i.e., a fancy way to say “bachelor”) …

Cari and I were at the VPD north of Chinatown to pick up/have sent our criminal records to the place we will volunteer. It was a bust because while the station is open until 7, the records office closed at 5:30. I thought I might suggest we go to The Naam or Don Guacamoles, two restaurants I have not yet gone to.
But Cari had recently read about two new-ish Asian fusion restaurants in Chinatown and I picked the one that kind of had better reviews across dinehere.ca, Urbanspoon, and Yelp: …

I went on a little vegetarian bender for 8 consecutive meals before it was smashed to bits by devouring a sukiyaki beef rice burger at the night market on Saturday night. It was fun while it lasted, and I get to blog about two quite unique meals for my repertoire.
Organic Lives
My friend Cari read about Organic Lives in The Georgia Straight and suggested it as a place we could try. We could easily assume that our usual dining companions, our boyfriends, would vehemently refuse to go to a place that …

So, I only managed to go to three Dineout Vancouver 2010 dinners and I can’t really imagine a fourth one topping the dinners so far, if only because I’m so Dined Out now.
hidden tasting bar + lounge
I was so excited to try hidden, a new restaurant in the centrally located Westin Grand hotel, within a week of it opening, and I knew another couple would be game for the ride. Plus, if it was a real bust, it was only an $18 Dineout (3-course) menu. We joked (not that I …

< Go to 2008 list | Go to 2011 list >
Yes, wyn is copping out a little (a lot) and posting the list that I fastidiously made after Joyce tweeted about Vancouver Magazine’s recently released 2009 list of 101 foods to find yourself eating around the city. Because I like having yet another list to refer to… and that means there will be about one more year to make it through this list and last year’s list until the next list, right??
Legend/Guide:
* Bolded — I’ve had that and /or been there and/or I’ve had …

Go to 2009 list > Go to 2011 list >>
One of the things I would miss a lot if I left Vancouver is the dining options.
My apartment’s proximity to a great eating distict/neighbourhood (after decades of living in the suburbs) makes me think in passing that I live in a cool Asian city where I can walk down from my apartment and be greeted at street-level with a buffet of restaurant offerings. In truth, I have to walk about 5 blocks and it’s not a true buffet; still, it is a far cry from …

I think we have clearly established how I’m finding reasons to create personalized Google maps for anything greater than 2 destinations within a city :D.
For the past few weeks, I have been combining that useful app with the latest thing to turn my whimsical head: Eagles in the City, public art/sculpture/painting that can be found in locations across the Vancouver Lower Mainland and beyond.
I have not particularly enjoyed the past two installments: orcas from before I moved here and the tail end of the spirit bears when I first arrived. …

Wayyyyy back in December 15, 2008, faced with an earlier-than-usual early bird deadline, I decided to “get Vancouver Marathon out of the way”. With three marathons down in three consecutive years, I didn’t have to think that I would do one in ’09 and doing one in Vancouver made a host of decisions trivial or no-brainer.
I was challenging myself in several arenas that I had previously hidden myself from. I would have to train in the dead of winter (but fortunately after that December-snowing thing laid off). And “with my …

View Cambie Street Corridor in a larger map
It started innocently enough when I wanted to map the grocery stores (green pins) in my neighbourhood, the Cambie Street Corridor (or Cambie Village, if you please) since a big competitor is set to open its doors on April 29.

Why did I not play with Google My Maps until now??
I’ve already become dependent on Google products, deeply integrating them into my life: GMail, Google Reader (106 subscriptions), Google Documents (my comprehensive to-do list and documents I share with NPY), Google Calendar (I have 2 calendars for separate activities) and, until recently, I was using Blogger by Google.
Using Google My Maps came about first because I was using it for work. For that case, I couldn’t stab and change the placemark colour for my 1,000+ points so I started learning …