Tag: McDonald’s

Vancouver, BC

Place 72 – Day 960: Vancouver, BC – It’s Not Coming Home

Kim & Curtis Hale

We woke up at the same time as yesterday and got coffee and croissants for breakfast again.

We chatted with Kim’s parents for about an hour and then the football started! Curtis watched it, not that he really cared, but it could’ve been a big moment. Unfortunately for England, they didn’t win, but Curtis still didn’t really care at all.

Whilst Curtis watched football, Kim went out to the beach with a friend and also got some ice cream, too! Once she was done there and the football was done, Curtis walked to meet Kim at Sportchek to get some shoes for wearing to the gym as well as some gym clothes.

We got back home and then walked over the street to the (not good) supermarket to get a few things for the week and then we decided we fancied burgers tonight, so we ordered McDonald’s for dinner!

We watched some TV and a film in the evening and relaxed.

This Time Last Year

Mr And Mrs Hale

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Vancouver, BC

Place 72 – Day 917: Vancouver, BC – Yet Another Game & New Tables

Kim & Curtis Hale

Hockey, Family Chat & Haircut

Curtis stayed awake until 04:30 and watched Great Britain lose pretty heavily to Czech Republic. Great Britain were tired and it was very obvious.

After waking up this morning, Kim had a chat with her family and Curtis went out to get his haircut.

Curtis’ barber, who has done a great job, is heading back to live in his home country, Australia, so it was the final cut before he leaves.

Kim spoke with her family the entire time Curtis was at his haircut and then once she was done, we went for a walk.

We got Vietnamese coffee and a duck banh mi which was alright.

We had our walk and once we got back home, Curtis watched hockey. The leafs lost, yet again, so they have just the one game remaining to get into the next round of the playoffs.

Kim watched a bit of TV whilst Curtis watched hockey and she did some admin.

We had leftover pasta for dinner an then we went out to get a couple of side tables that Kim found on Facebook. These are much nicer for our living room!

We then went to get a milkshake from McDonald’s and came to to relax for the evening, but then we had a long night walk!

This Time Last Year

Mr And Mrs Hale

Vancouver, BC

Place 72 – Day 875: Vancouver, BC – Busy Beaches

Kim & Curtis Hale

We had a nice lay in and slept very well laat night.

We had some breakfast and got ourselves ready, then had a chat with Kim’s family.

After this, we went out for a walk.

We stopped to get a fancy coffee Kim had seen online, which was honey comb and cream coffee. It was sweet but pretty nice! Kim also got a cheese tart to go with it, which was delightful.

We got that and walked for a couple of hours, down to the beaches. The beaches and around the beaches was VERY busy (you can be in a group of up to 10 outside here, at the moment, for some reason) so it was a little stressful walking around, but the weather was beautiful and hot!

We got pretty hungry and thirsty, so we got a lemonade each from a place near the beach and then we headed back home.

Once we got home, we ordered some McDonald’s because we really fancied it and we stuffed our faces with that.

We then, after rolling off the sofa, very full, went to the supermarket to do an actual shop as we’re basically out of everything now!

We got that shop done and on the way back we picked up a storage rack to put in our walk in closet for our clothes.

We got back home and were going to unpack, but it was 10pm so we just wanted to chill and will tackle that tomorrow.

This Time Last Year!

Mr & Mrs Hale

Vancouver, BC

Place 72 – Day 521: Vancouver, BC – First Apartment Viewings

Kim & Curtis Hale

We woke up at a really good time, got ourselves showered and had a bit of breakfast.

Right after that, we got right into doing the final clean and tidy, which took us a couple of hours.

We felt the apartment looked incredible once we were done, and the realtor felt the same, which was great!

Curtis welcomed the realtor and showed her to the storage and parking, and then we left and let her do her thing.

We went first to get a coffee/hot chocolate from a place down in Gastown.

The hot chocolate was part of the festival again and was a malt-style hot chocolate. It was nice, but not exactly what Kim was expecting. Curtis got an Americano from there too which was fantastic.

We left here and walked for a bit towards Curtis’ work.

We had a gift card from his work building for the food court next door, so we went there to get some lunch. Unfortunately, the card didn’t work, but we still got the food and went to find a place to eat it.

Whilst we were finding a place, we noticed that Jack Poole Plaza was slightly different with a lot of new random signs around etc.

It turns out, Ryan Reynolds is filming there and making it into another location!

We ate our lunch and then continued with our walk. It’s certainly got colder now and it’s rumoured that it will snow tonight, but we shall see!

We walked for a couple of hours what was really nice (but cold) and then we headed back home to meet the realtor and get our keys back.

We got back in and just relaxed for ages! We even had a nice nap.

For dinner, we had some frozen chili we had made before, so we made that into quesadillas!

We watched a comedy show whilst we ate that and watched a few other things for the evening.

Whilst all the walking was fun today, we do play to relax tomorrow!

This Time Last Year!

Mr & Mrs Hale

Vancouver, BC

Place 72 – Day 398: Vancouver, BC – No More Job For You

Kim & Curtis Hale

Curtis’ Day

Curtis had a whole day of doing onboards and laptop setups.

Curtis created some accounts in the morning and then he walked down to the office.

Once he got to the office, he got 2 laptops, 2 monitors, 2 keyboards, 2 mice and 2 headsets to get ready for the new hires.

He spent a long time getting the laptops setup and packaged up and ready to ship out.

He then had to wait for a courier to arrive, which took a couple of hours, but he did some other work whilst he waited.

Eventually, the courier arrived and then he was able to head home and finish up working there, as well as chat with Kim about her fun day, as you’ll see below.

Kim’s Day (In 1st Person Today…Exciting!)

As you can imagine from the title and from reading Curtis’s blog, today was not a good day for me! I had an idea that I would lose my job today…And I did. I was laid off and not fired, so there is no need to panic.

I got into the office and finished packing up my desk after saying a quick hello to my manager. After this I made sure all the little tasks from last week and yesterday were done, re-saved a receipt for my credit card and sent out a laptop to someone. I then worked on writing up a handover list for my colleague, outlining a few things that I was expecting to be delivered, an update on a few contacts and links to logs, documents and other things I had been working on. I finished that all just before my 10am meeting.

I walked into the meeting room and said ‘its okay, I know whats going on, I understand and its okay’. I felt very George walking Lenny to look at the bunnies, but I was both George and Lenny, it was very strange. I was certain of what was going to happen, but still a little hopeful that it wouldn’t. Once I sat down it was confirmed that I was let go. They went over a few things together and then Kims manager handed over to a teammate who was going to explain everything in a bit more detail. Just before she did I sent the handover email to my colleague and sent Curtis a quick message to let him know what had happened.

My teammate then went over everything in a little more detail. I then collected my things and headed home.

Once I was home I facetimed my parents which was just what I needed. I was able to laugh and cry about it all and rationalise a plan for the next few days and weeks. After this I called my sister and did much of the same. We had a great chat and it was lovely to see her face.

I quickly updated my LinkedIn and then tried to go over my CV, but that didn’t last long. Instead I started tidying up the apartment, doing laundry, finishing unpacking from the trip and bagging up my IT equipment to take back to the office at some point, but not today! That took me ages because every now and again I would get a message from someone within the company and I would respond and have a little cry! I have received a fair few messages, that is a LOT of crying time.

While I had come to terms with the idea of losing my job over the past day it was still so upsetting to have it happen. I loved that job, I would brag to anyone who would listen about how amazing the people are and how interesting, diverse and fun my role specifically was. It is clear that I was in the right job for me, the love and support I have received has been incredible! And I just want to say a massive thank you to everyone I worked with and who made the last 16 months so incredible! Finding a new job will be a challenge and I can only hope that I get to work with people half as incredible as you all!

Thank you for all the opportunities, challenges and memories, it was a wonderful experience!

As I have said many times times today – it’s okay, I’m okay and it’ll be okay!

I know I’m not the only person to experience this, especially during the current pandemic, but I wanted to express my feelings on this platform.

Tomorrow I will start my job hunt. I have already been given a few companies to check out and a few specific roles to look into, so I am off to a great start. Let’s see where this new adventure and opportunity will take me!

Evening

Once we had a bit of a chat about Kim’s unfortunate news, we hopped in the car and drove it to the garage for its appointment tomorrow.

We then walked back home which was a nice thing to do after such a stressful day.

After our 33 minute walk, the elevators were taking forever in our building and you cannot take the stairs, so there was a lot of waiting there.

We got hungry, so we ordered McDonald’s as Kim had a hard day and we couldn’t really be bothered to cook.

When the food arrived, Curtis went downstairs to get it and there was a large queue again for the elevators.

Curtis had to wait a long time as just one elevator was working, but he got upstairs eventually.

We ate our food and watched TV for the remainder of the evening.

What a day, huh?

This Time Last Year!

Mr & Mrs Hale

Vancouver, BC

Place 72 – Day 354: Vancouver, BC – Sliced Finger!

Kim & Curtis Hale

Curtis’ Day

Curtis certainly had an eventful day!

The morning was filled with Curtis completing an onboard for the Denver office.

Curtis did this over an hour or two as he had some tickets to do, as well.

Then, Curtis went through the tickets that had come in today and got a few of those completed.

At 13:00, Curtis had a meeting with someone to help them test something.

After this, Curtis planned to have lunch, but whilst slicing some bread with a bread knife, he managed to slice his finger instead!

It was a pretty bad cut and he fainted, too, in typical Curtis fashion!

Kim came back home to check on him and make sure the wound was properly cleaned and dressed, then we got the apartment cleaned up, but Kim did most of the cleaning as Curtis was still a little woozy.

Curtis eventually got up and had just the beans he had heated up for lunch and then got back to doing some work and then Kim headed back to the office.

Curtis had a few things to do in the afternoon, so he did those and then just relaxed.

Kim’s Day

Kim hosted the midweek catch-up, but no one turned up! So she just went into the office. The first thing she did was send a few emails and catch up on some admin.

Then Kim packaged up some stuff to send to a new hire. She then called UPS in regards to a pickup that didnt happen yesterday and they were able to set it up for the afternoon, which was great!

After her lunch Kim called Curtis as he said he cut himself. Then she ran home to make sure everything was okay!

When she got back into the office Kim spent the rest of the afternoon and evening putting the quiz onto Kahoot, finding media and changing a few of the questions! She is really happy with how it is turning out.

Evening

As Kim worked late, she came back home fairly late, too.

Kim then cleaned the inside of the oven which meant we couldn’t use it, so we ordered McDonald’s to have for dinner.

After dinner, we did a bit more cleaning up and then sat down to watch some TV for the evening.

This Time Last Year!

Mr & Mrs Hale

Vancouver, BC

Place 72 – Day 351: Vancouver, BC – NHL Playoffs!

Kim & Curtis Hale

Beach Walk!

We were going to go and play some mini golf today, but we decided we wanted to have a walk instead, so we walked down to English Bay for a walk on the beach!

We had some breakfast, some delicious french toast with strawberries, banana & syrup.

We left our apartment and grabbed a coffee on the way to the beach.

We got to the beach after a decent walk and it wasn’t too busy.

We walked on the sand, which was very hot, and then we got to the water and walked in the cool water for a bit, which was really nice with the hot sun!

We left the beach when we got to the end and sat in the shade on the grass and finished our coffee before continuing to walk.

We walked for a while and then got a little hungry, so we popped to McDonald’s to get a snack!

We ate our McDonald’s and our very melted mcflurry and then we walked through Stanley Park for a bit, which was in the shade so that was a nice break from the heat.

NHL Playoffs!

We walked back home and then the Leafs played their first game of the playoffs! It was a close, intense, game, which Curtis really enjoyed, but unfortunately the Leafs lost it.

After the game, Kim made a really nice veggie lasagna, which was very tasty, though we didn’t eat too much as we weren’t too hungry.

We watched some TV for the rest of the evening, though we did eat dinner quite late.

This Time Last Year!

Mr & Mrs Hale

Vancouver, BC

Place 72 – Day 284: Vancouver, BC – Hopefully The Last Deep Clean!

Kim & Curtis Hale

Curtis’ Day

Curtis did a lot of work on his Hackathon project today! It’s that time again, and he is in the same team as last time, which was the winning team, of course!

The idea has really got some legs now, thanks to multiple meetings during the day and the wonderful developer getting it built out.

Curtis did a few of the admin things for that and a few tickets around this. He also attended the weekly Zoom webinar.

Curtis did some work around some requested approvals and he also showed his team what to look for and how to approve these correctly.

Curtis did a bunch more work on the Hackathon and some more meetings for it and then was done for the day!

Kim’s Day

Kim woke up and then stressed thinking that she was 15 mintues late for the midweek catch up, this would have been the case on most days but it turns out that today Kim was 45 minutes late for a resilience and mindfulness webinar, so that wasn’t great! Luckily it was voluntary and recorded so Kim can catch up on it.

She then got ready for the midweek catchup and had a lovely chat with people from the Vancouver and Toronto offices. It was great!

Kim then spent some time catching up on emails and general admin. She also wrote some notes for upcoming meeting and plans. Mid morning Kim jumped on a call with a colleague to talk about the plans for the kitchen, Kim has already looked into getting a new dishwasher but they are also looking into replacing something else too. After this call Kim spent a while looking for things that are needed in the office.

In the afternoon Kim had her 1-1 and it went well. For the rest of the afternoon Kim continued shopping for things that they need in the office.

Hopefully The Last Deep Clean

We left home right after finishing work and went to the old apartment, with a stop at the liquor store and Home Depot for supplies.

We had a long list of things we needed to do, so we got right on it.

Most of it was easy stuff, but the one main thing that was a pain was the oven! It was just not getting clean! We tried many different techniques but none seemed to help. Due to this, we think we need to pay someone to come and clean it!

We got everything else done though and drove back home.

We showered when we got home and then ordered a McDonald’s for dinner as we were too tired and couldn’t really be bothered to make anything that late.

We ate that and then had some of the new whiskey we bought to wind down the evening with some TV.

This Time Last Year!

Mr & Mrs Hale

Victoria,BC

Place 70 – Day 31: Victoria, BC – Brunch & Stockings!

Kim & Curtis Hale

Brunch

We began the day by heading out to brunch!

Linda had heard about a place called Courtney’s Room so we went to check that out.

The service wasn’t great and the food was just alright, so we don’t think we’d go again.

Stockings!

We left here and waddled back to Linda’s apartment.

Linda was very kind and bought us both stockings full of gifts!

Curtis got some new gloves and Kim some slippers. We also got some gift cards, chocolate and some tree ornaments.

We were incredibly thankful of these gifts from Linda.

Travel Home

We relaxed with Linda for a couple of hours and then said our goodbyes to walk down to the bus station.

We were going to get pizza, but decided it was too far away, so we got a Starbucks coffee and a small McDonald’s burger instead.

We got on the bus which took us to the ferry. The whole journey was uneventful and the ferry was much less bumpy than Thursday’s trip!

We got to the stop in Vancouver and walked home, which was only about 15 minutes, but we did stop in at the supermarket to get a potato each for dinner.

Learning

Kim went out to see a friend as she will be looking after their cat whilst they’re away for Christmas.

Kim had to learn what to do, when and also get the apartment keys from them.

Dinner

We had baked potatoes for dinner with tuna. We watched some TV which took us to bedtime!

We both have work tomorrow, but Kim doesn’t have work on Tuesday!

This Time Last Year!

Mr & Mrs Hale

Vancouver, BC

Place 72 – Day 215: Vancouver, BC – Sleep Recovery

Kim & Curtis Hale

What A Party!

We woke up at 12:00, after getting home for around 03:00 this morning!

We stayed to help tidy last night, after Kim’s holiday party, which she organised excellently!

We had a great time, and got to dress up which was fun.

McDonald’s

After we woke up, Curtis went up to McDonald’s to get us some breakfast.

Sleep Recovery

We do not over exaggerate when we say we didn’t do anything today.

We watched TV, Curtis watched hockey and that was entirely it!

For dinner, Kim had soup and Curtis had tortellini with a homemade tomato sauce.

And that was our day. Not all all exciting, but we were very tired (not hungover, though!) From the party last night.

This Time Last Year!

Mr & Mrs Hale