The Steamboat trip was a LOT of fun! 
Pictures posted soon. I have way too much to do this week, especially with the Open House coming up this Friday! Should be fun to meet everyone from the Relic community and finally put a face to the name of some dear friends from the forums.
Here’s a teaser pic in the meantime
Edit: Here’s another one, just for good measure 
Well, I’m heading to Colorado tomorrow (Friday) through to Monday to Steamboat for a ski trip. Check out the snow report, looks pretty AWESOME eh. Inches and inches of new snow. I’ll be going with friends from work — Allan, Chris (deggy), and Kris. Should be a lot of fun. We have a 3 day lift pass and we’re there for 4 days. We’ll be renting a car to get to and from the resort from the Denver airport. Now as much as I love new snow, let’s hope that it doesn’t ground the planes!
So I’ll be away from the community for a couple days. Sorry about that! I’m also hoping my neck will heal in time. It’s still really sore, I can barely move it. I can barely walk around or sit at my desk (I took two days off work sick). I’m not sure if I’ll be able to ski… it’s really unfortunate. Maybe the boys can pull me around on a sled or something Either way, the trip will be fun and hopefully I’m able to ski at least one of the days.
I’m still super excited for the trip! Anything with Relic people is always fun… I’m sure this will be no exception.
As usual, I’ll be posting pics when I get back!
See you guys soon
Check out this screenshot that Vitensby took while we were playing CoH. I’m a big noob for the most part, so we were laughing about this huge gang of Riflemen (aka Riflemen spam) that I made, eventually titled the Buggo Gang. It was pretty sweet, the other players didn’t know what hit ‘em
Thanks Vitensby!
Argh, yesterday I injured my neck while skiing, FOUR DAYS before I go on the Colorado trip to the Steamboat ski resort with some work buddies. Grrrrr! I can’t move my head at all and I can barely stand sitting at my computer here at work. It BETTER heal before Friday or ELSE. 
Also, I can’t believe Children of Men didn’t win any Oscars last night. What a slap in the face to a brilliant, brilliant movie.
Oh, I installed XM Satellite Radio in my car yesterday ^_^… it sounds sweet! The companies are merging (Sirius and XM) so hopefully they’ll be around for a while.
Also, in other news, how many of you use the Movie Maker tool in CoH? Do you know how to use it? What would help?
There’s been a lot of changes happening lately at Relic. Good ones, I think
We’ve been starting to post up a lot of stuff up walls. When illustrating processes, or brain storming, you’ll see sheets of paper all over the walls in some organized fashion. It’s awesome.
We’re getting new couches in soon for our meeting rooms/lounges. Hopefully they’ll be nice. I also hear they will be working on changing some of the lighting around here to be more “pleasant”.
I’m still freezing at my desk… how many times do I have to call the air conditioning guys? I guess I should resign to just putting on layers of sweatshirts like everyone else, but… *sigh* fashion over function sometimes!
Oooh, also, last week we had a submission box and voting for the name of a new game coming up. It’s really quite cool, and simple. I think I like it! Hopefully marketing at THQ approves it.
We’re also having a bunch of “Relic Values” meetings. Everyone from the company has to go to one of them… it’s small groups, brainstorming about Relic’s strengths and weaknesses, and what values are important to us. I’m pretty sure most people feel like they are making a difference by going to them.
And yes, it’s been a great week so far! I’m enjoying my car and have been driving around a lot! Found a new gym downtown that is pretty good so I’ll start going to that. Haven’t worked out in a long time regularly. Should be nice since it is on the same block as the office.
That’s about it for now
… that I played Homeworld for the first time a couple weeks ago. It was amazing! The story was great and I loved the cutscenes. It was also SO hard. I ended up after every mission with my fleet completely devastated I need to work on my micro
Here are some pics of my fleet
And thanks to the amazing RelicNews staff who sent me a personalized copy of HW complete with strategy guide and manual!
<3
I’m going on a quick roadtrip to Seattle to visit a friend (and drive my new car muahahaha)… anyone know any good places to hit up? Restaurants… shops… activities?
:)
It seems that 10-20 times a day I get “comments” on blog entries that are pure spam with links. It is SO annoying having to delete those. The thing is, they are different every time so I can’t set up filters or something.
Anyone have any good ideas of how to prevent this?
It was the Relic ski trip this past weekend, and man was it amazing. I can honestly say it was one of the best weekends of my life. Every year, a good portion of the studio goes up to Big White (a ski resort near Kelowna, BC) for a full weekend of skiing. This year, about 25% of the company made it up. This was my first Relic ski trip (and certainly not my last), and I can now see what all the hype was about.
There are a TON of pictures, so you’ll have to click the link below to see.
Friday morning
I finally make it into the office… somehow managing to lug a pair of skis, poles, ski boots, helmet, camera bag, and suitcase to my cubicle. It’s always fun to look around and see who has their stuff because you know they are coming to the trip as well. I proudly positioned my skis next to my desk and watched the clock tick by all day. I managed to get a good amount of work done since I got in very early to make up time. While waiting, the awesome people in my cabin (Dilks, Degnan, Woods, Nutter, Botha, and Dinehart) and I e-mailed back and forth to each other psyching each other up.
(more…)
I’ll think of more later
Let’s make a list!
I’m sure there are a lot more… but for now, there is so much to look forward to!
I especially can’t wait for the ski trip. I’ll be taking a ton of pictures. I’m also going to be bringing my Nikon D50 DSLR up so I can take some hot action shots. For those of you who haven’t seen my photography, there’s a bunch in the Studio subforum on the RelicNews fansite.
… so after I Post-It-Noted Mike’s desk (see a few blog posts below), he stuck a huge sign “Loser” on the back of my favourite player’s jersey which I hang on the wall behind me desk, Trevor Linden. So basically he put “Loser” where “Linden” is on the jersey. I didn’t notice for a couple days. OH IT’S GAME ON NOW, MIKE!Also, some of my coworkers got into my unlocked computer (yes I know, my fault), and sent out e-mails to various people in the company saying “My name is Allie and I suck at foos” just because I beat them at foosball that day .
So I had to get them back someone. I created an e-mail that appeared to have been sent to their boss (the Sound Director) and our HR director saying this:
Hi Jenn,
I’m really not impressed by the level of maturity that some of the people in your team are displaying. Not only is it unprofessional, but it is unethical for John and Glenn to be using my computer and sending e-mails from my account.
As much as I like them as people, I think they have crossed the line. I have also sent this to Winnie for disciplinary action.
I hope you both take the appropriate action.
Thanks,
Allie
And I got Jenn in on the joke and she pretended to have a word with them and get upset. They both came to my desk to apologize and I said, “Well, you should be sorry” in a deadpan voice. They both freaked out. So then Jenn and I ran by by their offices yelling “PUNKED!!!”. Hahaha. Needless to say they weren’t very happy
So of course I came in this morning to find an entire ball of tape wrapped around my mouse. LOL.
SO I ASK YOU, dear readers, what kind of pranks should I play on these miscreants?
… the Canucks win against the Sens and Buffalo this weekend, I will wear my Canucks jersey all next week at work. Every day.
So I went up skiing on Friday night at Cypress… it was REALLY cold. -20 or something? Supposed to be the coldest night of the year… and my friend that went with my injured his ankle, sprained it. Meanwhile, I was skiing down quite quickly back to the lift… on the left side of the run. There’s a fork in the run here, the left side going down to the chairlift, and the right side going down to the ski rentals area. Well this guy was beside me going even faster, on the left side of the left fork, and SUDDENLY goes across to the right, heading to the rentals area. He didn’t even shoulder check or make sure to see who was beside him, and he collided with me. I flew in the air a bit, and the back of my head hit the ice. Ouch. According to my friend, I blacked out for 30 seconds. The guy picked up his ski and went off without even asking me if I was okay. I got snowmobiled to first aid (that was pretty fun!). But apparently I have a concussion. Boo. They tried to catch the guy but couldn’t find him.
Anyway, needless to say I am recovering and try not to move my stiff neck too much at work
Don’t get me wrong though, skiing is still AWESOME! I’ve been going on a skiing binge lately, going up once or twice a week for the past couple months. It’s been great snow here lately. Hopefully I’ll be back to skiing soon after some recovery. You can’t get rid of me that easily
So I saw a post on RelicNews about a co-worker covering his buddy’s desk in Yellow Post-It Notes.
Anyway, there’s this co-worker of mine who keeps insulting my favourite Canucks player (Trevor Linden) because he knows it ticks me off…. I’m threatening him with a prank for a while… and I finally had time to do it
I covered every object on his desk… it’s a bit hard to tell from the picture. I still think the one from RN is better, but ah well, I thought I’d give it a shot Mike Doyle, never insult my Trevor again!
I can’t believe it… in the midst of our snow storm look what happened to one of our huge stadiums in the city!
Here’s what it looked like before..
And here’s what it looks like today…
First of all, mail server is back up it looks like, so feel free to e-mail me again.
And….. here are the Christmas pictures as promised
Our tree at home
Tree at my relatives place…
I love homemade waffles from scratch on Christmas morning…. especially when accompanied with strawberry and blueberry sauce made from the berries picked in our garden (in the summer). And of course… amazing Canadian pure maple syrup! Yum!
I love mine with strawberries and Canadian back bacon 
My dad likes his with blueberries, strawberries.. AND ice cream, lol.
Don’t ask why, but my little bro decided to put all these little LEGO skeletons in the wrapping of my present (a new tripod for my camera!)
My little bro plays some of the new music he received for Christmas… among them, the theme from Hockey Night in Canada ^____^
Came up with this big scheme of cards full of hints for my parents that eventually led to their Christmas present (hidden behind a couch)… a new HDTV! (Oh baby did the Xbox 360 ever look SWEET on it)
Haha… so my little brother and I bought this “Sonic Santa” from the As Seen on TV store for only $5… it was a steal. It sings and dances and even turns on when you clap… AND it recognizes the edges of a table or surface so it never falls off. Yes, we played it again and again.
Some Christmas decorations on a pole outside..
I know this is SO cliche, but I had to do one of the Christmas lights on my house!
More lights…
A view from the top…
Christmas ornament…
Well, Happy Holidays everyone! I am flying out to New York tomorrow for my vacation… I’ll be back on the 2nd and I probably won’t have access to internet. Miss you guys! <3
Merry Christmas! It’s been a great day so far…. here’s hoping all the Relic fans around the world are having an amazing Christmas. I shall post up some pics later…
Oh BTW, it appears our Relic mail server is down for some reason… for anyone who has tried to send me e-mail, please try again in a few days and hopefully it will be back up.
One of the great things about working at Relic is we get 2 free company ski passes to Cypress Mountain.Here are some pictures from the past couple days I’ve gone with Relic people…. I gotta practice up because I’m rooming with some pretty hardcore people for the Relic Ski trip at Big White
Check out these pics:
Beautiful British Columbia
Some Relic folks up at the top
Another beautiful view
Allan hanging on over a steep slope by a tree
The gang
They stole my poles and starting fencing down the hill while I rushed after them video taping..
Shawn slides down over a cliff :S
They rescue a girl stuck in the snow… !
… wow, I just spent all last night and early this morning writing Christmas cards. Some, for members of the community who have contributed a lot, such as administrators of major fansites — and others for people at Relic. And yes, I did write some to friends and family. All in all, I’ve written about 136 cards so far, with about 52 to go. Almost done! I wish I could write them during work hours, but a) that wouldn’t be very professional… and b) I’ve got so much work to do this week.
Why? Well I go on vacation starting tomorrow! Until about January 1st. Relic is closed from the 22nd till the 1st, so I’m really only taking one week of vacation. I’m sure I’ll still be checking the forums and my e-mails over the holidays anyway… that’s the fun thing about being a community manager, your job never ends!
Anyone who knows me would say I’m a pretty festive person. My desk in the office is decorated with Christmas lights, and I have red velvet bows, Santa hats, and of course a bowl of candy canes for any visitors. I love Christmas! Good thing the Relic Christmas party is tomorrow night… I always hear it is a fun time. I might even share some pictures with you guys afterwards!
Anyway, look forward to a few more posts today… I have a lot to announce… and one announcement in particular you won’t want to miss ^_^