Rambling About Nothing Really

Six months of marital bliss

2012-01-31T22:43:00.000-05:00

Can it really already be six months since the wedding?

Can it really only be six months since the wedding?

I am still gobsmacked sometimes to think that I am in fact, married, and that the wedding wasn't just a dream.

But the glow that continues to surround us proves it was all real.

Last year at this time we were just getting into the nitty gritty of wedding planning - the flowers and the invitations and the cake. The wedding itself seemed so far away. But the time flew by as have the six months since.

Time really does fly when you are having fun.

We celebrated today by meeting with a mortgage specialist to discuss some financing options for the new house. Which I am happy to report now has windows, a roof and a front door! They are rolling despite the snow and freezing rain we've been having.

We have made most of our selections for interior finishes, including the kitchen layout and design. Just some small details to finalize there. Next week we meet with the electricsl contractor to discuss wiring options and lighting and other such things. Not the sexiest of choices to make. It important ones nonetheless. Putting a light switch in the wrong spot can annoy you forever!

Winter blahs and miscellany

2012-01-30T16:28:00.001-05:00

The end of January really blows.

I know this year winter was late but I'm already tired of it. The freezing rain cycle we seem to be in really sucks. The thick layers of snow and ice on the driveway and the front walk and the front steps are treachourous and annoying.

It makes me want to curl up in a ball under the covers and not come out until the daffodils do.

I did embrace winter a couple of times so far. We went skating twice - once on a neighbourhood rink near my sister-in-law's and once on the Rideau Canal. I felt incredibly Canadian to skate on the canal, chug some hot chocolate and indulge in a beaver tail.

But now I'm kind of over it. Ready for spring. And clear sidewalks. And not worrying about the car getting stuck in the driveway.

The groundhog gets to do his thing later this week. If he sees his shadow I might just burrow down into that hole with him for awhile.

*****

It seldom ceases to amaze me how some people can coast through the day as if nobody else has anywhere else to be.

There are occasionally really nice people who spot you in the grocery line with two items and let you sneak ahead of them with their two full carts of groceries. Those people are the yielders in life, the ones who make sure not to hog the whole sidewalk and wait their proper turn at a four-way stop.

Then there are the non-yielders. Often these are also just the truly clueless. The rest are simply rude.
This afternoon I snuck downstairs for a post-Question Period caffeine fix (yes it can and does put me into a coma - Question Period that is, not the caffeine), and was pleased to see only a small line at the Starbucks in our building. Sometimes the line is out the door. Today there were just three people ahead of me.

Plenty of time to decide what I wanted, read a few messages on my blackberry, check out the new coffee they have for sale.

Apparently the pony-tailed woman in front of me isn't used to using line-waiting time to determine her order. Who knows what the heck she was doing in the five minutes or so she waited but it wasn't deciding what she wanted to order nor was it getting her payment ready. No she saved those activities for when she got to the till. And hemmed and hawed over her drink purchase. Then proceeded to take several minutes to peruse the salad and sandwich offerings in the cooler.

When she finally decided, she then proceeded to want to pay with exact change. From the bottom of her humongous purse. It was like someone was pulling my nails out with tweezers as I watched her keep reaching into her big Prada bag (yes I stood there so long I even noted what kind of purse she was carrying!) and pull out another nickel and a dime and a penny. Oh and another penny.

I seriously wanted to dump her coffee on her head.

Building progress

2012-01-08T17:03:00.001-05:00

We stopped by our house site this afternoon and my gosh what a surprise again!

Less than a month after the start of construction and they are already finished the framing for the main floor! We have windows in the basement, the partitions indicating where rooms are going to go on the main floor, even the visual of a front entrance!

It's so exciting to see it taking shape. It of course feels and looks much smaller than it will when it's finished, but it was definitely fun to see it today.

We followed our visit with a trip to the design centre to try and nail down some more choices for our interior finishes. We have another appointment with our designer next week and have to start making some decisions about the bathrooms and kitchen.

Here are photos of the progression.

The lot - September 2011

The foundation is in and curing - Dec. 18, 2011

Here comes the wood Dec. 22, 2011

Ladies and gentleman - we have walls - Jan. 8, 2011

In front of the garage.

View from the back.

These will be the family room windwos.

Outside what will be patio doors and the kitchen.

Happy New Year

2012-01-02T10:46:00.000-05:00

It's probably not a great thing to start the new year off with indigestion.

A delicious Indian meal cooked by a friend followed by a performance at the NAC of Blue Man Group left both Chad and I reaching for the Rolaids last night. It was delicious food. A so-so show with some funny moments but many bizarre "I don't get it" moments for me. But I'm pretty sure the food and not the show were what upset my stomach. (Even if the use of a scope that went right into the body of one of the audience members in the front row made me queasy).

Regardless it was nice to start the new year with fun and friendship. We spent New Year's Eve with good friends playing games and eating great food. We should all be so lucky.

Now comes New Year's Resolution time. Which for me means jumping off the post-wedding gluttony train and jumping back on the diet and exercise train. Which means the bacon cheddar potato pie recipe I made for New year's Eve dinner is going back into the vault like a Disney movie which only makes and appearance once in a blue moon. It was delicious but was aptly nicknames "heart attack pie" by Sylvain.

A friend posted a Facebook suggestion on Saturday noting she was going to do a 30-day challenge to try and incorporate 30 minutes of activity every day for 30 days. I think it's immensely doable and I am going to follow suit.

Activity can be anything really. Yesterday I spent two hours cleaning the house. It counts. I need to spend at least two more hours before I'm satisfied with the state of the house because it needs a good scrubbing and two hours yesterday didn't even finish the main floor. (Remind me again why we're building a bigger house?)

So day one of the 30-minutes a day challenge is complete.

Tonight we have a dance class so that is something but I'm hoping to fit in a Wii Active workout before then. Kick it up a notch. And maybe get in some more cleaning. I'm actually working today so have some things to do there before any exercise and cleaning and dancing can commence. But it's a slow news day (so much so that I have received no emails for work since 6:14 a.m.) so it will be a research day and one I can mix in a little exercise at least.

Breaking the New Year's resolution on day one would definitely be worse than ringing in the New Year with indigestion.

What a wonderful world

2011-12-19T15:55:00.001-05:00

I sit here starting to write this post wondering if I should in fact be using such a title. In the last week two friends have said their final goodbyes to a parent.

One of Chad's closest friends' said goodbye to his mother on Saturday. A colleague and friend from Winnipeg lost his father on Thursday. Both died of cancer. In July our good friend Lorraine didn't get to say goodbye when her father suddenly died of a heart attack.

In August, Chad's cousin Rob ended up in the hospital in a coma for several weeks, suffering from a septic shock related to a strep A infection. A healthy man suddenly struck down so suddenly and brought so close to the unspeakable. He is still recovering slowly and we are thankful every day for that.

So many times I am reminded of how much we have, how lucky I am, how blessed for our health and our happiness. I get frustrated at work and have bad days. Like Friday, which was just an annoying and frustrating day. A Friday which had me at the office still at 7 p.m. awaiting a response for a story, and then getting a call from Chad letting me know I had to come and get him because the transmission on his car had just conked out.

Merry Christmas, I thought.

But I really thought hard as I felt sorry myself about how ridiculous I was being. So a coworker was being an obnoxious git. So my computer crashed for the umpeeth time. So we suddenly had a $1,300 car repair bill. I was going to pick up my husband, and go home with the man I love, and the man who loves me, even though I get impatient sometimes, and frustrated sometimes.

We were going to a warm home with two beautiful and loving cats, and a comfortable bed and many choices of what to eat for dinner. We were spending time on the weekend with family and friends.

Seriously, I have nothing to complain about. And so much to be thankful for and happy about.

And it really has been a wonderful year. One I couldn't have imagined happening just a few years ago.

A year ago, I was planning to have Christmas away from my parents for the first time ever. Chad and I were preparing to host our first Christmas dinner. I was making a list and definitely checking it twice. Roast beef? Check. Wine? Check.

We moved on into January and I headed off to Seattle for an all too short but lovely visit with Reese and Grant and their beautiful daughter, Yael. She was just four months old at the time and I was smitten from the word go.
When I returned to Ottawa, we began some heavy duty wedding planning. Meetings with the cake bakers and candy store and invitation designers.
I came down with the flu, the first time in years it has felled me. But I recovered and Chad kept me well cared for with lots of ice cream and juice.

February brought a visit from my mother, and I got to go and try on my wedding dress.
Unfortunately, February was also the month we lost my grandmother.

March brought the federal election and once again a lot of traveling and long days at work. But at the same time I got to catch up with some friends in Toronto, visit with my brother in Montreal, and tour around parts of the Niagara region I hadn't seen before.

April was a blur with the election, and it helped pass the time towards July and the big day.

It started to feel more real in May when we put the invitations in the mail.

In June I decided it was time for some serious butt kicking action and I signed up for boot camp. It certainly kicked my butt. I had been hestitant before but I really enjoyed it and it did the job!
We also started dancing lessons and met our wonderful teachers, Jason and Meaghan and starting tangoing and cha-cha-ing and swing-ing like pros. Okay, maybe like semi-pros!

July began with a whirlwind trip to Kenora for my grandmother's memorial. It was the first time all the cousins had been together in the same place ever. It was a hectic and emotional trip but despite the sombre occasion, it was nice to see everyone and enjoy the family cottage as a family. My grandmother would have been smiling down on us I'm sure.

Once we returned to Ottawa the days flew past. Between boot camp and dancing and last-minute planning there were few moments to spare. I almost enjoyed being at work during the day for the break!

And then my mom arrived and the wedding events started to happen. And of course the big day itself was just wonderful. We are still somewhat gob smacked at how many people travelled to be here to celebrate with us and we really felt our own love and committment to each other was enveloped in a gigantic hug of support and well-wishes for our future.

The day could not have gone off better. The small things which went wrong are fading away, the memories and the joy are still with us every day. We have a photo taken at the reception when we are listening to someone speaking, and there is candid and pure happiness written across our faces. If I could capture that moment and relive it every day I could never be unhappy.

August was a rest month in many ways. Chad was unfortunately sick for several weeks and we laid pretty low, catching up on sleep and some needed time alone. We got good news from the vet for our dear little Missy, who had a good check-up four years after being diagnosed with kidney failure.
It was also the month when Rob got sick. Which was a very frightening time and while we did what we could to support Jen and their three children, it never felt like enough. I feel lucky that in one sense it let us get to know their children much better, but I wish it had been in different circumstances.

In September we decided to keep the excitement booming and put down the first deposit on a lot to begin building a new house. It was a big decision and one we went back and forth with a lot but the timing and the location all sort of fell into place and we forged ahead.
I spent a week at the end of the month in Winnipeg helping with the provincial election. I had a good visit with my family and saw some coworkers I hadn't seen in years.

Then October dawned and we were off to Italy for a wonderful 17 day-long honeymoon. We wrote about it in such detail here I won't recap it except to say the memories will last a lifetime. I am beginning to put together a photo book with our 1,500+ images, and it's like getting to relive them all over again.

November brought with it a visit from Reese and Yael, who is still the happiest baby ever and sweet as she can be. It was a nice chance to visit with Reese and cuddle with Yael as I hadn't had lots of time to spend with them when they were here for the wedding in July.
I also had our big fundraiser for the Ronald McDonald House of Ottawa. It was a successful cake auction and champagne and dessert evening. It was a lot of work and I was glad it was over and even more glad it went so well.

We then moved into our first few design meetings for the house. Choosing kitchens and floor tile and mulling over wall colours and hardood shades.

And the busy fall season of work trudged along. We have continued with our dancing lessons although I'm sad to admit my boot camp days lagged and I've let the food demons catch up with me a bit more than I wanted. We spend time almost every other week with Chad's family and have celebrated three 40th birthdays with friends in the last two months. (Four this year!) Chad's big 4-0 is coming next May. (Shh, don't tell him I told you!)

And here we are once again at Christmas. We are prearing to head off to Winnipeg for the holidays for what I'm sure will be a busy and loud but happy and joyous few days. We'll catch up with some friends.

Before we know it 2012 will be here and hope for more wonderful things to come. Including of course preparing this house to be sold and moving into the new house in September.

Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukah, Seasons Greets, and Happy New Year to everyone out there. May your blessings be big and your happiness even bigger.

Mmm Mmm good

2011-12-05T12:59:00.001-05:00

I'm still in my soup phase. It's still not really that cold outside (it's 8 degrees Celcius today) but it's still cold and damp enough to warrant having soup as the mainstay of one's diet.

So yesterday I decided to make a slow-cooker chicken noodle soup from Cook's Unlimited that I've been wanting to try for awhile.

It was supposed to be for dinner and then leftovers for lunch but sleeping in a bit, working a bit, going for a house appointment, working some more and then visiting with the neighbour who I haven't seen in a long time kind of put me off schedule. So it didn't get into the slow cooker until 5:30, which meant it wasn't ready until after 10 p.m. So I made oven barbecued chicken with rice and a green salad for dinner instead.

All the while the luscious smells of chicken soup wafting through the house. It's not exactly a set-it-and-forget-it kind of slow cooker soup. Cook's Unlimited doesn't usually go for the easy route. But the soup I must say is delicious.

Even if at 11 p.m. when I went to move the soup from the slow cooker into containers to put in the fridge I ended up spilling some all over the kitchen counter. And the floor. And the mat. And it kind of got into most of the drawers. Thankfully I have a wonderful husband who helped me clean it up even though I kind of got soup in his hair.

But despite all that the soup is delicious. And satisfying. Much better than something that comes in a can.

If anyone is interested, here's the recipe. I used 2 quarts of stock rather than 3 and just 2 chicken breasts rather than 4 because my crock pot isn't big enough.

Slow Cooker Chicken Noodle Soup

3 quarts low-sodium chicken stock
4 celery ribs, chopped
6 carrots, peeled and cut into 1/2" coins
2 medium onions, chopped
1 tbsp butter
6 bone-in chicken thighs
4 garlic cloves, peeled and minced
1 tsp thyme
2 bay leaves
4 bone-in chicken breasts
2 c. egg noodles, cooked
1 c. frozen peas

Season chicken breasts and thighs with salt and pepper.
Wrap chicken breasts tightly in foil and set aside.
In a dutch oven, melt butter and cook chicken thighs over med-high heat, skin side down, until skin is golden brown. (8-10 minutes). Remove chicken and put into bottom of slow cooker.
Drain all but 1 tbsp of fat from pot. Add onion, carrots and celery and cook until softened. Stir in 1 c. chicken stock, garlic and thyme.
Pour into slow cooker. Add bay leaves, the rest of the chicken stock and some salt and pepper.
Place foil packet of chicken breasts on top, cover and cook on low 4 to 4 1/2 hours. (This way the chicken breast doesn't get overcooked and dry).
Remove chicken breasts and thighs from soup and let cool. Then chop into pieces or shred.
Remove bay leaves.
Return chicken to pot, add peas and noodles, cook a few minutes more until peas are softened and noodles are warmed.

I kept the noodles separate to add in as I eat each bowl. It's a wonderfully hearty soup and so filling I couldn't finish my entire lunch today!

Wrong mail. Again.

2011-12-02T10:54:00.000-05:00

My parents lived in the house I grew up in for 25 years and I remember them still getting the occasional letter for the person who lived there before them even when I was in high school.

It was sort of amusing when a Christmas card or a letter would show up years after we moved in.

Chad and I don't find it sort of amusing here anymore. Several times a week we get mail for at least three or four previous residents. And now it seems we are receiving mail for someone new - at least this is mail addressed to someone we hadn't seen before.

Some days there is more mail in the mailbox for people who don't live here than there is for us. Capital One has had so many "wrong address" envelopes returned to them for one person you'd think they'd get the picture already.

It's not just junk mail either. We've had letters from Ontario Health, letters from doctor's offices, letters from the bank. I think once we got a set of new cheques mailed to us. Which I am pretty sure you have to specifically order. Who orders cheques but doesn't change their address with the bank on said cheques? We apprently aren't living in a house previously occupied by a lot of geniuses.

Yesterday took the cake though.

I arrived home and when I opened the outside front door a box slipped out. It's a box of baby formula. It's more than just a single free sample as advertising that some companies occasionally send. No it's a full on box with several cans. Chad eventually noticed it was actually mailed to someone named Shawn Jacob, who apparently ordered a free box from the company. Either he, or they, got the address wrong.

When we move next year I'm already lamenting losing the luxury of door to door mail service. Canada Post doesn't do that in the suburbs. We get mail boxes on the street and have to pick it up. It's not a huge deal for us because the box ends up being right across the street but that's still not my doorstep.

But moving will afford us one big bonus. Nobody will have lived in that house or at that address before. So when we do make the effort to go across the street to pick up the mail, we can be pretty sure the mail inside will be for us.

Mmmm. . .soup

2011-11-30T12:42:00.000-05:00

It's not quite winter here yet. We've had one snow fall but it disappeared faster than it fell. Yesterday it poured rain all day.

It's sort of odd to see the Christmas lights all over the place when there is no snow and it's 10 degrees outside.

But that all said it's still the end of November cool and wet enough for it to be soup season. And I love soup season!

There is something so comforting about a warm bowl of hearty goodness.

I've made several batches of creamy butternut squash soup for lunches already because it is quick and easy and delicious. This week I decided to go for something different and made a Chicken Wild Rice soup from one of my low-calorie cookbooks.

It is extremely filling and Chad even learned how to make wild rice, since I was late at work and asked him to put it on for me.

Last night for dinner I made a Vietnamese beef noodle soup. Also delicious. And filling! I just need to figure out how to pull rice vermicelli apart before cooking it because the package makes enough noodles to serve the Duggars and I ended up throwing half of them out. The other half saved for leftovers tonight! Yum.

Here are the recipes.

Chicken wild rice soup

1 celery stalk, chopped
1 carrot, chopped or grated (I chopped several mini carrots because I didn't have one big one)
1 medium onion, chopped
1/4 c butter
1/2 c flour
1 c. cooked chicken, cubed (I used two chicken breasts which made more like 3 c. of chicken, yum extra protein!)
1 c. wild rice, cooked
salt and pepper
8 c. chicken broth
1 c. fat free condensed milk

In a large soup pot, melt butter and saute onion, celery and carrot until soft.
Stir in flour.
Add broth slowly, stirring well.
Bring to a boil. Add chicken, rice and salt and pepper. Simmer a few minutes until broth starts to thicken.
Add in milk, cook three to five minutes more.

Vietnamese Beef Noodle Soup

5 c. low-sodium chicken broth
4 cloves garlic, peeled and smashed
1 4" piece of fresh ginger, peeled and cut into several large pieces and then smashed with the handle of a knife
3 cinnamon sticks
2 star anise pods
2 tbsp fish sauce
1 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp sugar
12 oz. top loin beef, sliced into 4" long thin pieces, and cooked
rice vermicelli
1/2 c. fresh cilantro, chopped
3-4 mint leaves, chopped
3-4 basil leaves, chopped
2 green onions, chopped
1 jalapeno pepper, diced
1 c. bean sprouts

Add broth to pot and stir in garlic, ginger, cinnamon sticks, star anise, fish sauce, soy sauce and sugar. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and let simmer, partially covered, for 20 minutes.
Bring 8 quarts water to boil. Remove from heat, add vermicelli and let sit 15 - 20 minutes.
Strain broth and discard everything but the broth.
Strain any remaining water from the noodles.
In individual bowls place portion of noodles, beef, top with green onions, chopped cilantro, basil, mint, and a portion of green onions, jalapeno and bean sprouts. Top with broth.
Serve immediately.

The end

2011-10-30T18:23:00.000-04:00

Seventeen days of honeymoon heaven are over.

We are back in Rome for one night and we fly home tomorrow afternoon.

We just spent a few moments enjoying a glass of wine on our rooftop terrace, because, yes, we got upgraded to the honeymoon suite again! We are starting to really like Rome! We've been going over our favorite moments.

But first, the final day. . .

We started off our last morning in Sorrento enjoying our final glimpses of the spectacular views of the Bay of Naples.

Then it was into the car for the three-hour drive to Rome. It was a much easier drive in the sun rather than the rain we had on the drive there? We could gaze again in awe at Mt. Vesuvius, which always seems to have a swirl of cloud floating around its peak, as if the volcano is steaming. Chad didn't initially like it when I said it looked like the volcano was smoking but he did eventually admit that's what it seemed like.

The drive back was uneventful until we had to find a gas station to fill the car. And found out Rome gas stations generally don't take credit cards on Sunday's! We had to find a bank machine as our euro collection was dwindling and then had to feed an automatic gas machine with money until the car was full. We ended up wasting 7 euros because the final 20 we put into the machine was far more than enough. It was frustrating and we were happy to finally get rid of the car.

We spent the afternoon at St. Peter's Basilica. We decided to give our feet a break and took the metro there for our second money scam of the day. We bought our tickets for the metro and the machine gave us one rather than three euros in change. Chad complained to the woman in the ticket booth who initially said it wasn't her problem but then seemed to find her conscience and allowed us to ride one way for free (the cost of the two euros we were shorted) and use the tickets we bought for the trip back.

We arrived in St. Peter's Square (it's really an ellipse if were being technical!) to find the line to get into the basilica snaked all the way around the piazza. It was the longest line we've seen to date. I balked a little as it looked like we'd be there all night! But in the end it took us an hour to wind our way towards the entrance, get through the security checkpoint,evade the line butters, and even pass the dress police - no shorts, no bare shoulders, no mini skirts.

It was well worth the wait. The church really is spectacular. We even got to hear the opening of one of the regular masses held in the apse, and the sound of singing was quite beautiful as it echoed through the enormous building. When you first enter, the other end of the church is two football fields away. The main altar is seven stories tall, and the writing all the way around the church, of all the things Jesus said to St. Peter in the bible, well those words are seven feet high!

We left St. Peters and stopped for a gelato on the way back to the metro. It was my first and only Rome gelato and I'd mark it as third best on the list. Siena is still number one in my books. Sorrento is number two (I went to the Mona Lissa ristorante for gelato three times!) and then Rome.

We had our final dinner at a little restaurant not too far away, our final pasta meal in awhile I expect. I don't know what I'm going to do on Tuesday morning when there is no buffet breakfast awaiting us downstairs! But I'm sure the scale will be happy for the return to less indulgent meals!

We're now enjoying the bottle of wine the first Rome hotel gave us as a welcome gift ( and we never opened before) and are remembering all we've seen and done in the last 17 days.

Chad says his favorite part is spending time with me. Aww. . .I have to say I feel the same way. To share this experience together has been simply wonderful. I always find myself looking over my shoulder for him, reaching my hand out behind me to make sure he's still there. He is alwayss behind me or beside me because he is paranoid someone or something is going to nab me from the streets of Italy and ferry me away to a far off land. In fact only once reluctantly did he let me out of his sight, when he wasn't feeling well yesterday and I ran out to grab some drinks and snacks. (the hotel mini bar was charging 6.50 euros for a single can of soda! No thank you!)

Our favorite moments beyond just spending time together are as follows:

In Venice, just being there. The city is unique and wandering its streets and waking up on the grand canal as boats hurried past toting people, goods, even garbage, was an incredible way to start the trip. And who could forget tangling in Piazza San Marco. . .

Chianti was probably my favorite overall. I loved the quaintness and rustic charm of it, the quietness, the food! Maria Luisa's cooking will not soon be forgotten.

Florence is so steeped in history and romance, you almost don't know where to start. Seeing Michaelangelo's David was a definite highlight. I'm always impressed when something so famous, and something so built up in hype, surpasses all expectation. It is a rare occurrence and I could barely peel my eyes from him.

Walking across the river and up a large hill for a great view of the city was an unexpected wow, but we should have expected it. The hill is named after Michaelangelo's and pretty much anything his name is attached to here is beautiful.

(Chad says, "oh the naked David." But it wasn't really his well-endowed manliness, but the awe of what someone can do with marble. I can't even make a person out of play-doh!)

Rome. Ah Roma. My feet may never fully forgive me but such history around every corner. Such beauty in every square. It is a big city and not without the big city plights, odd smells, poverty and homelessness, dirt. But Rome is still beautiful. I think the Villa Borghese gardens and the Sistine chapel may have been my favorite places but also the quiet moments we had together on our rooftop terrace.

Finally Sorrento. The views of the bay were second to none. The quieter pace was welcome. Both of us were most awed by Mt. Vesuvius.

We are both now ready to go home. We've already bought our train tickets for the airport train and are counting down the hours until we can curl up with the cats in our own bed with our own pillows!

But we are already talking about our next adventure. . .

Climb every Vesuvius

2011-10-30T02:27:00.002-04:00

We had one day left in Sorrento and no specific plans. We weren't really interested in going to Capri. We are sort of done with crowds and heavy tourist stops.

So we opted instead to have a lazy morning, and then drive up to Mt. Vesuvius. It was the perfect choice. We used our own GPS which seemed to serve us much better. No back roads today, only the typical crazy Italian scooter drivers, including one woman scooting around with her purse slung casually over her shoulder, and another motoring about in a cape and high heels, clutching a potted plant.

The GPS navigated us successfully all the way to a car park (parcheggio) half way up the mountain. From there we joined a compulsory bus tour which drove us on big, hummer-type buses almost to the summit.

It was a bumpy ride and I dared not look down too much, as some times the only thing between us and a steep slide downhill was a rickety-looking wooden fence.

We had about a 20-minute hike to the crater itself. It was not too hard though it did get our hearts pumping a bit. And it was worth it.

We have viewed this mountain from the distance across the Bay of Naples every day since we've been here and now we were on top of it!

It was not very busy but there were still souvenir shops and wine bars at the summit! At times we were the only ones on the path and the only sounds we could hear were the crunch of gravel and soil under our shoes, and the whispering wind. Flora and fauna still survive and thrive despite the volcanic rock and ash, with trees and shrubs and every so often a tiny lizard scurrying across the path. Wild orchids in pinks and yellows stood out among the green and brown terrain. On the way down I spotted a bush with bright red and yellow cherries on it's branches.

But the higher we got, the less vegetation there was, leaving mainly red, sandy and rocky dirt.

To gaze into the crater was to be amazed at the power of Mother Nature. At times near the crater, it felt much like one might imagine it feels like to walk on the moon. Without the space suit of course!

We had to ration our photo taking because just as we got to the top, we realized the camera battery was low. But we still got enough photos.

We only had a little over an hour to hike to the top and view the summit. We had a slight scare on the way back because they had roped off the path back to the parking lot and our car. But it was reserved only for people who had come up that way so we got through by showing the sticker they had given us when we bought our tickets. Phew!

On the other side from the crater are simply stunning views of the Naples coastline. It was slightly hazy so we could not see civilization on the other side of the bay where our hotel and Sorrento are, but we could see the outline of Capri.

Chad is now napping, not really feeling great today. We are going to order room service and have a quiet night.

I am happy to chill and enjoy our views and read.

Neither of us can believe we head home in less than 2 days. We have one day left, mainly a travel day back to Rome. But we will head to St. Peter's in the afternoon.

Ciao for now.

Pompeii Day

2011-10-29T04:43:00.000-04:00

I'm not sure we can say Pompeii was our favorite day so far but the ruins are really quite impressive nonetheless.

The day began waking up to these stunning views and bright blue skies from our terrace doors. (If you can call a few feet of marble hanging over the edge a terrace, but it doesn't seem right to refer to them simply as balconies when the view is that gorgeous!)

After breakfast it was into the car for the short drive to Pompeii.

It was only supposed to be 18 km away.

Well the GPS in the car seems to think it's fun to take unknowing tourists offroading. It started out well on main roads, which while narrow and windy by Canadian standards, were heavenly by Italian ones.

But then suddenly she took us off the main road and onto narrow local roads, and even worse, told us to turn right onto what in Canada we'd refer to as a back alley. I suspected we shouldn't do it and tried to get Chad to stay the other way but he didn't have time to react with the crazy Italian drivers whizzing around. So there we were stuck in a crazy narrow road. The saving grace sort of was that there was a delivery truck in front of us and we knew if he could fit through, we could. It didn't make it much less stressful, and we pulled in the side mirrors to keep them from hitting walls and other cars. But we made it.

Today, the car GPS is being fired in favor of our own. She sucks! On the way back we followed the highway signs for Sorrento instead and the route was perfectly fine. No cutting through towns and cities, no back alleys, no craziness.

The area around Pompeii is pretty ugly. It kind of reminded me of our industrial parks but older and mixed with restaurants and housing. There are lots of big parking lots near the site which was helpful though not cheap. The one we parked in said if we ate in their restaurant we would park for free. We didn't but it is a good scam!

The roads leading into the site itself are as usual lined with crap dealers. It was busy but not overly crowded and they weren't really pushy. I found a magnet to buy for my collection and when Chad asked "conto" or how much, the seller said 5 euros. I just said no, and we turned to walk away. So he said, "how much do you want to pay?" We got it for 3 euros, still pricy but crap dealers on site are always more expensive. The magnet completed my collection from this trip.

Pompeii wasn't actually buried in lava from Mt. Vesuvius, but with it's ash. When it erupted in AD 79 the clouds blew 12 miles into the air and the clouds of ash that rained down buried Pompeii, killing 2,000 people out of it's population of around 20,000.

Basically it entombed the entire city, which was really an amazingly modern metropolis. Considering the time, they had heated floors in their bathhouses, and even water pipes bringing water right into some homes. Knowing we can't even apparently get running water in homes on reserves in northern Manitoba, that says a lot about both the Roman ingenuity and our own lack of will.

When Pompeii was excavated, the ash had preserved the ruins in a much better state than other Roman towns and cities. As you walk the streets you can see where there were homes, wander through homes and see how they lived, where they kept their water, how they cooked. There is even graffiti on some walls, welcome mat mosaics and beautifully preserved frescoes. There are shops and a bathhouse with tubs so well preserved they look like they could be filled with water and used today. They designed the ceilings in the bathhouse to draw condensation down the walls rather than having it drip on people from above.

The stones that pave the roads are positioned to indicate what type of traffic can flow. If it is a pedestrian only street, they use large "beaver teeth" stones to block the chariots. The width of a road determines whether it is one way only, or if two or even three chariots could pass. To keep the roads clean they regularly flooded them with water, and to keep people moving they placed stepping stones across roadways to allow pedestrians to cross from sidewalk to sidewalk without getting their feet wet. The stepping stones were placed at exact widths to allow chariots to pass over them without trouble.

Some of the roads are well worn by chariot wheels and you can see the grooves the wheels carved into the zones.

There was a theatre, a bakery with cool flour grinders that used donkeys or horses walking in circles to grind the grain, and an oven so big it could make a heck of a lot of cupcakes! There were even "fast food joints" with marble counters. Romans in Pompeii did not often cook for themselves. It was a burgeoning middle class city and the homes were quite large, even by today's standards.

And Chad wants to make sure I mention the lupinari, or brothel. It was a hot bed of activity (says Chad!). There were frescoes painted on the wall of the services available, small rooms with stone beds and pillows and lists of the names of the prostitutes on the wall, some of them with scorecards for the number of clients they had served.

It was a really hot and sunny day, and I even got a bit of a tan! We returned to Sorrento and Chad put on shorts for the first time! I put on Capri pants, fitting since we are a 20minute boat ride from Capri. However we aren't going there. Just not our scene today.

We splurged and had gelato for lunch!

Then I had a manicure. It was not much different than my manicure place at home, since they do not speak English in either one.

We made it through without a siesta yesterday, but did relax in our room for a bit before dinner. We had a lovely meal in one of Sorrento's main piazza's. The pizza here is far better than anywhere else we have been. If you are ever in Italy, know the cuisine as such: pastries and sweets in the north, meats in Tuscany, and pasta and pizza in the south. Pizza particularly around Naples is said to be the best and that has been our experience.

We ended our day with several pieces of good news, the best being that our brother-in-law, Shawn, starts a new job on Monday. We also got confirmation that our special purchase from Venice was delivered to Chad's office. We'll find out on Wednesday if it made it in one piece! Fingers crossed!

It is hard to believe we have just two days left on our honeymoon. Chad seems to be coming down with the cold I had earlier so we are hoping he stays well enough to enjoy our final time here. We are both however looking forward to going home as well. It has been an amazing trip but home is always a sweet place to be.

Amalfi amore

2011-10-27T16:14:00.001-04:00

I have heard about the fabled Amalfi Coast drive for years and knew it was one place I didn't want to miss on our Italian honeymoon.

So today was the day.

We rose and had breakfast overlooking the Bay of Naples, with Mount Vesuvius in the distance. The sun was almost shining.

We had decided to forego the drive ourself and splurge on a private driver. His name was Francesco and he was great. He is from here but has actually lived in Ottawa for two winters with a girlfriend! He had many great stories and was very laid back.

The windy roads were in the end not quite as scary as I had expected but having the driver was helpful in knowing where to go, where to park and especially knowing the rules of the Italian road.

Which in no particular order include:

1. If there was a small rock slide and the road is closed, you can go as long as there are no police at the barricades. (yes this happened today. There were a few rocks on the road between Sorrento and Positano after yesterday's heavy rain so it was technically closed but we went right by without trouble.)
2. If you get to the stop sign second and the car in front of you stops you can go because "I'm with him." If you are third in line you can go because "we are all together like a train."
3. People who drive Smart cars are compensating because they are "dummies." Beware.
4. The rules are strict but are not really meant to be followed.

The drive really is beautiful. The road is narrow but somehow there is usually enough room for two-way traffic, including big enormous tour buses. Occasionally you have to stop and pull tight to the side to let someone pass. Francesco had side mirrors on his van which had a switch to make them close when things got too narrow.

You can easily tell the locals from the tourists. Locals just go. Tourists stop. As our driver Francesco said, "they think if they stop they get smaller."

The views are simply stunning. The day was a bit overcast still but the water was bright blue and the vegetation lush. The road is lined with lemon trees and olive trees, so close you could reach out and grab some as you pass. Vines of bougainvillea and morning glories climb everywhere.

Our first stop was Positano, a small fishing village. It, like all the towns along the Amalfi Coast, is built into the cliffs. We were able to drive about half way to the bottom, and we walked the rest of the way. We spent some time on the beach, and I got to touch the ocean, while running from the waves. I didn't want to get soaked!

From Positano it was on to Amalfi, passing by several great lookouts along the way. One included a bridge which is at least 50 meters from the water and which each year hosts a diving competition! There are ceramic factories and shops all along the way, one of the local trades. We stopped at one on the way back.

We saw Sophia Loren's house from afar, and the Siren Islands, named after sirens who went crazy after being unable to woo Ulysses as he passed by in a boat. The local legend says they were so offended by his ability to go past without succumbing to them, they threw themselves into the water and turned to stone.

Many towns have adorable little replica towns built on the side of the road, which at Christmas become nativity scenes. It is funny to see the Christmas stuff appearing in the stores here. It still feels like summer to us!

Amalfi was very busy. A cruise ship was in port and there were at least a dozen big buses in the parking lot. We wandered in town briefly, and gazed out at the water. After awhile all the shops start to look and smell the same. There aren't many chain stores but they might as well be as they all sell very similar things. Limoncello is popular here, made nearby, and at least one store in three sells it and all sorts of lemon flavored candies and scented soaps and lemon-themed clothing. We didn't buy any.

We headed off to Ravello, a beautiful spot high in the cliffs with the prettiest town square and lots of cats. Made us miss the cats lots!

We had lunch in Pontone at Ristorante San Giovanni overlooking the cliffs and the water. At first we were the only ones there. A nice bonus from being with a private driver rather than a big tour. We had the best pizza we have had yet in Italy. Great crust, great flavour. I had sheep's milk cheese with bacon, onion and tomato. Chad had potato, ham, spicy sausage and mushrooms.

After lunch we began our trip back to Sorrento. Francesco was worried the road might now be closed "officially" so spent much time communicating with fellow drivers on Facebook to find out. No worries in the end, we made it. If it had been closed we would have had a three-hour detour, so we and our wallet were happy! We were on an hourly rate with our driver!

It was definitely siesta time when we got back. Nice to snooze with the beautiful views of the water, and a gentle breeze.

We headed back out for dinner and a walk around town. We had the best restaurant meal so far. Nothing can compare to the cooking of Maria Luisa in Chianti but this was a great place. It was recommended by Francesco. The atmosphere was lovely (though we could have done without the loudish tour group that came in, especially the woman in my direct vision who seemed to think chewing was an open-mouthed activity.)

But the food was delicious starting with the fresh bread and freshly-baked pizza dough they served with the Caprese salad. The Caprese was one of the best I've had yet (I've been having it a lot!) Chad had a penne with spicy tomato sauce and sausage. I had seafood risotto. It was packed with clams and mussels and squid and shrimp. Yum, yum, yum. The service was great, and we were even surprised they neither charged us the "coperto" or a "servizo." Most restaurants here charge 1.5 to 2 euros per person just for sitting down, and most will also automatically include the tip of 10 to 12 per cent. Ristorante Zi'ntonio kept racking up the pluses by charging neither. Which meant we actually left a bigger tip than usual because we had such a good experience. We may even go back!

We then wandered the streets for awhile to walk off some of dinner. It seemed like we were lazy today after so many days of walking! But we aren't complaining!

We are heading to Pompeii tomorrow. So many places I've always wanted to see in one trip! Truly amazing!

Southern comforts

2011-10-26T17:13:00.000-04:00

Arrivederci Roma.

We awoke this morning to copious amounts of rain. It was pouring! Chad made an executive decision that we would skip the Pope. I was asleep and he let me sleep. We would have been soaked and then had no real place to change because we had to check out of our hotel before we went to St. Peter's.

So instead we had a bit of a lazy morning which was well needed after five very busy days in a row in Florence and Rome.

We headed over to the train station to pick up our rental car in a bit of a break in the downpour. It was a longer wait than expected but worth it because she gave us a free upgrade. (I also got to chat with a woman from New york and play peekaboo with her 20 month old daughter who was adorable!) We were supposed to have a compact. We got a luxury Volvo SUV. It made us laugh that we got our own GPS all set up on the dash, then started the car and realized the car has it's own GPS built-in!

The Volvo's proper sounding British woman got us out of Rome without trouble and on our way to Sorrento. The autostrade is great. It's a toll road so just getting from Rome to Naples cost nearly 15 Euros, but they seem to invest the money in keeping the roads smooth and clean. Unfortunately we did pass a bad accident - a truck had hit the middle guard rail and flipped over. We were there not long after it happened and there were no ambulances so we hope the driver was unhurt.

Shortly after Naples, the GPS decided to take us the scenic route into Sorrento. We hit cobblestone streets in small, seaside towns where roads would suddenly become one way , others that should have been one way because they had no room for two cars to pass, were still two-way. But it brought us into Sorrento with some beautiful views, even with the pounding rain.

The views from our room will be even more spectacular tomorrow when the sun comes out. The weather promises to be warm and sunny for us while we are here! It was so overcast when we arrived we didn't realize there was land all the way across the bay from where we are. All we could see was water and fog! But the weather has already lifted and the lights are now twinkling from Naples.

The hotel we are in is apparently a writer's paradise. Among those who have stayed here are Byron, Keats, Harriet Beecher Stowe and Henrik Ibsen. I'm hoping perhaps it will inspire my pen. Chad says one day they will add me to the list. :) It is a nice thought for sure!

We are unwinding now and getting used to a different pace from the hustle of Rome. Sorrento is a seaside resort town, but much smaller than most of the places we've been (with the exception of Chianti). We strolled around a little after checking in, had a late lunch/early dinner, and some of the best Gelato ever. The Gelato merchant even hand designed our cones, using a spoon to "carve" into the ice cream and small cones and candies for facial features and hats. Chad told him he must be from Florence because he was so artistic.
We then returned to the room where we have simply been relaxing. I've been reading my kindle (I've finished two books so far in Italy) and Chad played on the IPad. We are loving hearing the waves lap against the shoreline which is right below our window, which will lull us to sleep. The hotel, like most buildings here, is perched in the cliffs over the sea. You look down from our small balcony and see only water!

We have no wifi in the room so for the most part we are cut off from the world! It's a weird but liberating feeling. Especially since we know it won't last long. We will post this blog using the WiFi in the lobby probably.

Tomorrow we are on for a drive down the Amalfi Coast. We have hired a driver so we can both simply enjoy the views - Chad without having to drive, and me without having to backseat drive.

The Sistine Chapel - worth the walk

2011-10-25T16:35:00.001-04:00

If the first two days in Rome were all about walking, the third day took the walking cake.

From 10 a.m. until about 6 p.m. we were on our feet. Thankfully it was yet another gorgeous day. I didn't even bring a sweater this time and we both spent the day in short sleeves. We even ended up with a little sunburn!

We started out heading south towards Trastavere, a neighborhood on the other side of the Tiber that was said to be a true taste of the real Rome. It was a charming place, with narrow but vibrant streets. It was less busy than other parts of tourist Rome, though not entirely off the beaten track.

From there we wandered back over the Tiber - a little out of our way on the first wrong turn of the day - towards the Jewish Ghetto. I had a few moments of sadness at the unfairness and horror of mankind in the square named Largo 16 Ottobre 1943. That was the date 2,000 Jews from Rome were rounded up by the Nazis in that very place and taken off to concentration camps. Very few would return.

It was nice to see a small Jewish community thriving now however, with kosher shops and restaurants, a beautiful Synagogue and even the voices of children singing in Hebrew wafting out of the local school. The ever present threats were however still felt with lots of security around.

It was then off to Campo de' Fiori for the colorful and fun outdoor market. Stalls of fresh fruit and vegetables, spice stands, clothes and flowers and more. I got my hands on some balsamic vinegar, we discovered a local candy stand, and Chad had a ball bargaining with the merchants on some other souvenirs and gifts.

It was already past noon so we headed northwest towards the Vatican. Or so we thought. Our second wrong turn of the day took us a little out of our way (maybe about 40 minutes or so in the wrong direction) before we finally turned around. We did however wander along a pretty park path and overlook with a gorgeous view of the city so it wasn't entirely bad. If we had only gone one block further when we first made the mistake we would have seen St. Peter's. Oh well.

But by the time we did make it to St. Peter's Square we were hot, sweaty and tired. And our feet were screaming.

We got into line to get our reserved and prepaid tickets for the Vatican Museums only to find out another mistake had been made. The happy guy in the booth looked at my paper and said, "you are a little late." The tickets were for the day before!I think he could see I was about to burst into tears after the long walk to find the place so he quickly said, "and now we will fix."

There was no line to speak of when we were there so I'm guessing if it were a busier time fixing my mistake wouldn't have been as simple. But we finally made it in!

The Vatican is truly a house of artistic opulence. In every hallway, niche, crevice and floor is a work of creative genius - tapestries and frescoes and paintings and sculptures as far as the eye could see. (And more gift shops than anywhere else we have been). We were so tired we did not get to enjoy the beauty of it all but we did find some of the sculptures and paintings I remembered from my art history class in university.

And we got to end in the Sistine Chapel, which was really the whole reason I wanted to go in the first place. Who hasn't heard of Michelangelo's famous ceiling? All the hype could not do it justice. Despite the crowds and the obnoxious tourists conveniently ignoring the no photo rule, the chapel was simply magnificent. I did not know where to rest my eyes!

We left the chapel reluctantly and headed back to the bag check (my glass bottle of balsamic vinegar was a no-no for the Vatican and had to be checked at the door) and realized we were simply too tired to take in St. Peter's. We will leave that until we return to Rome on the 30th.

Instead we found a nearby cafe for a very late lunch and a rest and then took our first ride on the Rome Metro. It was rush hour and the trains were jammed but still it was better than the hour walk it would have been to get back to the hotel.

We had one last errand to do to pick up our free tickets to see the Pope tomorrow morning. Finally we made it back to the room and collapsed. A few hours of rest on the rooftop terrace and another soak in the jacuzzi tub gave us just enough energy to make it back out for dinner.

It was a quick and simple meal, with a delightful if flirty waiter whose charms got him into trouble with the boss. Though he turned them more on the table of a mom and her two daughters beside us, than on us or the other couples around.

It was not a long walk back to the hotel but it was long enough on sore and tired feet, and we were happy to call it a night.

Roma, giorno due

2011-10-24T17:55:00.000-04:00

Rome day 2. AKA - sore feet.

It was another gorgeous day in the Italian capital. Chad didn't even wear a jacket, just a t-shirt. I wore my light cardigan and had it tied around my waist after about 20 minutes, where it remained the rest of the day.

Our first order of business today (after another complimentary hotel breakfast buffet) was to be laundry and mailing a box home with a new find for our new home. The former didn't work when the place the hotel sent us wanted to charge us 60 euros to do basically one large or two medium loads of laundry. As Chad just said, "the day started off with us trying to get robbed at the laundry place." We returned to the hotel with our laundry to sort it out later.

We did manage to mail off our box, lightening our luggage load. Please Fedex, get it there safely!!!

From there we headed over to the Colosseum, where the line up to get in was crazy long. We had decided to forgo a city pass that would have let us skip the line because we decided it wasn't worth it. So we tried the entrance at Palatine hill instead. Still about 40 minutes to get in but much better than the other way.

Palatine hill is the former location of the emperor's palaces. There is not much left now. The Roman Forum is truly amazing. We sat just a few yards from where Julius Caesar's body was burned, walked the same stones where emperors like Augustus and the horrible Caligula walked. The size and scope of the buildings created by the Romans is truly remarkable.

Of course then I was reminded many of them, including the Colosseum, were built by Jewish slaves, defeated by the Romans in Israel and forced back to Rome. The Romans weren't exactly a peaceful people . . .

Nevertheless the Colosseum is an amazing structure. Even if the gladiator games were barbaric.

The crap sellers outside were joined in full force by men dressed as gladiators offering to pose with you for a photo. Of course for cash! One of them tried to convince a woman behind us by calling her "miss America" and saying "you know I'm the man of your dreams." I didn't see very many people taking them up on the offer, but there were so many, that they must get some business. I don't see many people buying from the street sellers either, but there are thousands of them so they must be selling to someone.

We wandered away from the colosseum to get my requisite tacky magnet, since it was 3 euros at the Colosseum itself and 1 euro a few blocks away. Chad's idea! We also spotted some of my italian colleagues waiting outside the entrance to a building, clearly someone impotant was inside. The place was crawling with cabanieri.

From there it was on to the Pantheon, browsing in a few shops along the way. We passed by several but skipped the priest's costume stores, (okay, Chad says they're called liturgical supply stores) so no nun habit or priest robes for us!

The Pantheon is yet another simply amazing building. It is the only ancient Roman building that has been continuously used since it was built, (it is still a church), and is a perfectly spherical dome. It was used by Michelangelo as the basis for st. Peter's basilica.

By now we were thoroughly exhausted and our feet were very tired, so we slowly made our way back to the hotel. Along the way we passed several Italian government buildings and someone in a motorcade whipped passed. No idea if it was Berlusconi or not. (When we were walking through a park without a monument (that has to be a rarity here!) Chad suggested they could build one of Berlusconi and his hookers.

We picked up a small picnic at a grocery store near the hotel and had a lovely, late lunch on our private rooftop terrace and a much needed soak in the jacuzzi tub.

We finally hit a laundromat and have clean laundry to show for it. We did not spend 60 euros to do it, and even met a family from Vancouver at the laundromat.

Dinner was room service, and we have enjoyed a quiet night. Well until Chad got a huge scare. He was sitting out in the sunroom when he suddenly spotted a strange man walking across our balcony. It turned out the hotel staff needed access to the roof to fix the elevator (which btw, is the second time in two days the only elevator has broken down in a hotel we are staying at) but it might have been nice for them to give us the head's up. Chad's heart is still racing!

We have one full day left in Rome which will include the Vatican and the Jewish ghetto. How is that for a clash of cultures!

As long as our feet hold up, we should have a great day!

Roman Holiday

2011-10-23T17:26:00.002-04:00

When in Rome. . .walk, walk, walk.

So Italy's capital city is a lot more crowded and a lot more, um dirty, than the rest of Italy. We arrived here early afternoon by train from Florence. We had an interesting journey, sitting with two other newlyweds from Arizona, much younger than us!

It was another gorgeous day, and we actually walked from the train station to our hotel without much trouble. We could easily have walked right passed it because they number the streets very oddly here. But eagle eye Chad saw the hotel sign and we sailed right in. (note to Hotel Orologio in Florence: signs work and make your guests very happy!) the good news just kept on coming and when we checked in they upgraded us to the honeymoon suite!

And when I saw suite, I mean sweet! The bedroom is about the same size as our other hotels, but then there is a living room area with a couch and table and another television and then the best part is a huge (and I mean huge!) rooftop terrace! It has two outdoor couches, a patio table and chairs, and even room to dance.

We started off just enjoying the sunshine on our private roof deck, and relaxing.

Which was a good thing because then came the walking. If Rome wasn't built in a day I think we almost walked it in one! We must have logged close to 15 km on foot today. To the Spanish steps, on to the lovely villa Borghese gardens (rome's answer to central park), back to the Spanish steps and down them, to the Trevi Fountain, the palazzo colonno near Italy's parliament, the pantheon, piazza navona and finally campo de' fiori.

It was a lovely evening walking tour. Rome is very pretty at night (I think partly because you don't see as much of the dirt!). It was the warmest it has been since we arrived, and I even ventured outside with only a thin cardigan. I even took it off for awhile!

We sat under the portico at the Pantheon and imagined how amazing it is that Michelangelo probably stood there too and looked on in as much awe as we did. (though he likely didn't have to put up with crazy pushy rose sellers and crap dealers peddling all sorts of unnecessary widgets. I lost my cool a little with a rose seller tonight after they repeatedly shoved their flowers right into my face.)

We are in awe of the fact that no matter what corner you turn, there seems to be an amazing site.

We had dinner in campo de' fiori and it was the first disappointing restaurant experience we have had. The service was just horrible. We waited over an hour for our meal, including the simple green salad appetizer. They brought us an extra plate of potatoes we didn't order and then charged us for them. They passed food for another table right over my head. And when they finally brought the bill they disappeared with Chad's credit card for more than 15 minutes. At least the food was good. Chad had a filet of beef with rosemary potatoes and I had tagliatelle with bolognese sauce and ricotta.

We left and made our way back to the hotel on foot, passing the north edge of the roman forum on the way. And I don't know yet who victor Emmanuel is but he must have been someone because the monument for him is enormous!

We got back to the hotel with very tired feet and capped off our first night with a drink on the roof terrace.

Not too shabby!

Tomorrow is laundry day, then the colisseum, roman forum and inside the pantheon. If our feet can hold up. Might have to make use of the jacuzzi tub in the bathroom first!

Firenze

2011-10-22T18:00:00.000-04:00

Florence. The Renaissance city.

We arrived here Friday morning from our relaxing stay in Chianti expecting a complete change of pace. The drive to return the car was far easier than I think we both expected, and we got the car back in one piece.

We have had a tendency thus far to have pretty good luck with lines. In Venice we bought tickets in advance to avoid the lines at Basilica San Marco, but in the end the line for non reserved entry was only a few people deep at the time we were waiting to go inside. We bought tickets for the Palazzo Ducale at a different museum to avoid the long line at the palazzo itself, that had formed when we first got there. When we returned to the palazzo, there was no line! At the car rental place on arriving in Florence on Tuesday, we got there just ahead of a big rush. We were third in line, and the line was about 12 people deep when we left.

We thought we had just beaten the rush on Friday morning as well since when we delivered the car in the garage, about six cars drove in right behind us. But no such luck in the office itself. We had about a 30 minute wait. Not too big of a deal since we were very early to check into the hotel.

We had a short walk to our hotel with our luggage. Well it should have been a short walk. We could not find it! We walked way past it, thought we saw it and it was the wrong one, so we went back and still could not see it. So many hotels have big signs. Not ours. A local shop keeper directed us but still we couldn't see a sign.

We did eventually find it, and I was a little annoyed. The only sign we eventually saw is so small you practically need to be standing next to it to see it. I wasn't feeling wonderful which did not help. We were able to leave our luggage at the front desk because we couldn't check in for three more hours.

So off we went to explore Florence. We started with a lovely walk past the famous Duomo, down towards the river Arno and then over the Ponte Vecchio (a little underwhelming IMO after so much hype and nothing as beautiful as the Rialto bridge in Venice). We wandered along the south shore of the Arno towards Piazzale Michelangelo, a beautiful lookout with a gorgeous view of Florence. It was a bit of a hike to get there and a bit of a steep climb to the top but it was worth it.

From there it was a walk back across the river for lunch at a small trattoria where we had the tourist menu for the first time. Usually that is a plate of pasta (often a choice between two or three kinds), a simple second (usually a meat course) and either an appetizer or a side dish. It is usually a far cheaper option than ordering separately. Here Chad had penne with meat sauce, a chicken cutlet and French fries. I had the other three options - spaghetti with meat sauce, a Ham and cheese omelette and a garden salad.

After the break we headed to Piazza di Signoria, one of the most well known piazza's in Florence. It was crowded, had horses and carriages, pigeons and lots of people. We sat on the curb and drank in some people watching and sunshine while we waited for our appointed time to go to the Uffizi gallery.

Once again we had prebooked tickets but the line at the other door was very short. Oh well. Better safe than sorry. The gallery is chock full of renaissance masterpieces by da Vinci, Botticelli, Titan etc. One of my favorite paintings, the Birth of Venus, is there in it's glory. We went through with an audio guide podcast we downloaded before we left home. It is an excellent way to learn a lot, get through a museum without wandering aimlessly, and not get overwhelmed.

After that it was back to the hotel to check in. We stopped along the way at an outdoor market and I bought a gorgeous scarf and an Italian-made wool shawl to help keep me warm. Chad thinks it makes me look very chic. :)

I desperately needed a nap so we had a rest for several hours. It was the worst day for my cold.

We went to dinner at a place nearby recommended by trip advisor and had a lovely meal surrounded by tourists and Italians alike. Usually if locals eat there the food has to be pretty good! I had a gnocchi with bacon and pecorino, Chad had truffle ravioli with asparagus and we shared a pork scallopini with mushroom sauce. We splurged and had dessert as well -I had the house specialty chocolate and pear tart and Chad had a strawberry tiramisu.

After a good night sleep I felt much better this morning. Not 100 per cent but definitely I am on the mend. Thankfully I remembered to stick my inhaler in my luggage because the chest cough has worked some magic with my asthma.

Chad let me sleep in a bit so we had a late breakfast and didn't get out of the hotel until after 11. We started with a trip to the leather markets for a few gifts and a belt for Chad. Then it was off to Santa Croce, a church some distance away in the area where Michelangelo grew up and the church where he is buried. It is also the burial place of Dante, Machiavelli, Marconi and Galileo. It is another huge and beautiful church but we have to admit they are starting to get somewhat redundant! Though not many have that many famous renaissance figures buried inside.

Along the way to Santa Croce, we crossed paths with a parade of renaissance dressed characters playing music. No idea what it was for but it was fun to see.

After Santa Croce we walked to the Accademmia, and sat out in the square outside while we waited for our entrance time. This time we did actually avoid a line by having booked ahead of time. They even let us in early. Inside is Michelangelo's David, and it did not disappoint. No matter that it is one of the most famous sculptures in the world, it was remarkable in every way. I could not take my eyes off of it. (The statue not his, um, man jewels, as Chad just thought as he proofread this blog.)

None of the other paintings or sculptures were that memorable there.

We were both exhausted and hungry so we gave up our plan to buy a panini on the corner and instead sat down in a restaurant to eat. It was a good break but not enough to get us the energy to wait in the very long line to get inside the Duomo. So we headed back to the hotel.

I bet Chad a euro we would pass at least one gelateria on the way, and we passed two! But we ended up walking across the square to a better one. It was good but still not as good as Siena.

Then it was nap time. And a wonderful nap it was, with the windows open and the sounds of the people in the piazza below wafting up. That included a John Lennon wannabe musician crooning Beatles and Joan Baez and Cindy Lauper for hours. And the second parade of the day. Albeit a much smaller one.

We are both about full to the brim with food but did venture out for a small dinner. After a week away all the food and eating out is getting a little heavy. Chad said tonight it is paninis or bust all through Rome!

At dinner tonight I almost spent my first cash since we arrived. Chad has been the money man ever since our first lunch in Venice. His credit card was in his money belt and he didn't want to get it out. So I paid and the look of disgust the waiter gave Chad was amusing and apparently effective! I Haven't paid for a thing since! I almost gave the tip for dinner (you always have to leave the tip in cash here) but Chad ended up just trading a 10 for two fives with me so it didn't really count.

I am definitely on the mend though still coughing up a lung. Hopefully another night of sleep will propel me towards wellness. We are off to Rome tomorrow. It is hard to believe we have been here a week already and still have eight days left!

Arrividerci Chianti. It was love at first bite!

2011-10-21T12:39:00.000-04:00

Our final day in Chianti might have just been the most beautiful.

Although it was the first day we have encountered rain since we arrived in Italy and the first day the region has had rain in four months!

But no matter, here every single view is a breathtaking postcard.

We made breakfast this time and what a spread. Maria Luisa and Giada had a table full of fresh bread and jams, coffee cakes, apple streudel, an omelette, prosciutto, cereal, granola and yogurt. We had a feast!

Then it was on to the winery Castella di Verrazzano, which is the same family after which the verrazzanno bridge in New York City was named. They are one of the oldest wineries in Chianti. Views of vineyards and olive groves and other castellos perched high on hills as far as the eye could see.

The tour was more than at the glass factory in Venice. We saw where they hang the grapes to dry, the huge oak barrels where it is fermented and aged, and of course had a taste. The tasting came complete with a plate of cheese, bread and local cured meats. We didn't like most of the latter but the aged balsamic vinegar was amazing.

Then it was into the car for a scenic, back roads drive to Siena. When I say back roads, imagine lanes that literally cut across people's yards! We wanted to stop every five minutes for a picture!

It took about an hour, one wrong turn and another ode to the wonder of the gps and we arrived in Siena, a medieval city with one of the most storied cathedrals and the best piazza in Italy. It was worth the drive. The cathedral interior is made of black and white striped marble, and has marble floors with every square inch used for a design or a carved scene from the bible or other stories. Simply stunning.

Right now Siena is also in the lead for the best gelato I've had in Italy. It was also the least crowded and least touristy of the places we have been. We joked we would know when we were close to the piazza or the duomo when we saw the hordes of "crap dealers" but there really were very few to be seen. A refreshing change to be sure.

From there it was back in the car for the drive back to villa Il Leccio for dinner. Chad was determined to make it before dark, and he drove the Italian roads like a pro. We didn't take the off-roading option on the way back but it was still a slim, two-lane very windy highway through the hills.

We finally made it into the town of Greve, the centre of the area where we were, on the trip back. It looks like a definite place to visit next time we come here. We are already planning our return to chianti!

Dinner was another feast though not the best of our stay. An appetizer of warm cheese and grilled tomatoes for bread, followed by penne with a tomato and meat sauce, and pork in braised onions with a squash fried in tomatoes. Dessert was a panacotta and a Bavarian cream.

I unfortunately have come down with a cold. :( Hopefully the coughing and stuffy nose do not last long.

Waking up this morning to the clean Tuscan air and these beautiful views has to help!

We are now off to Florence for the weekend. We need to walk off our three days of eating in Chianti!

Pisa and pizza

2011-10-19T15:16:00.002-04:00

As a kid growing up the only thing I probably knew about Italy was that it had a leaning tower of Pisa. I didn't even know that Pisa was a city.

So to come to Italy and not go to see it seemed wrong no matter how touristy I was told it was.

So today was the day.

Except the day started out a little later than planned because we overslept. A comfortable bed and shutters which kept out every drop of sunlight, combined with fatigue from the day before and we slept until 10:40!

We missed breakfast at the villa but did get on the road to Pisa before noon. Chad even had me take a photo of him in the shower because it is somewhat unique. He will decide if it ever gets posted.

Chad managed the sometimes challenging roads, avoiding the cyclists (they barely have car lanes here let alone bike lanes!) and got us to Pisa by 1 pm.

Oy was it touristy! We parked the car and literally waded past row upon row of tourist stalls selling all sorts of junk. We nicknamed it the "hall of crap." There was even a McDonalds at the entrance to the Field of Miracles for the full tourist affect.

But the tower was worth it, it really is leaning and the cathedral for which the tower is the bell tower is absolutely breathtaking. We climbed the 290+ steps to the top, thankfully getting a break midway up for a view. A pushy lady who cut in front of several people in line at the bottom seemed intent on making it all the way to the top first. But Chad was quite excited that we made it before her in the end, as we found the final staircase before she did.

The view of the city is beautiful, although I freaked out a little at the height, especially when Chad leaned against the railing to take a photo of another couple. The walk down was not remotely so bad.

We had lunch in a restaurant near the base, with the tower behind us. We also spent time in the cathedral, which had stunning paintings and mosaics.

The weather was so nice today there are even photos of me without my sweater. Thus far every day I look like I'm wearing the same thing because I only brought one sweater!

The drive back was easy and we had time to enjoy the garden and a walk in the olive grove before dinner.
There was a tour group here for dinner tonight but we got to dine alone in a private room with a roaring fire. It used to be the kitchen for the villa but is now a dining room.

A puffed pastry filled with ham and cheese and topped with mushroom sauce for the antipasti. Tagliatelle with pomodoro sauce and another with wild boar sauce for the primo. Chicken marinated in chianti, roasted potatoes and salad for the secondi. A mini muffin with whipped cream and a toffee glaze for dessert.

Once again I am stuffed to the gills.

We are leaving the shutters open tonight so hopefully tomorrow we don't sleep through breakfast! Maria Luisa is such a fabulous cook, I can't wait to see what she has for us for breakfast!

Tomorrow is a tour of a local vineyard and a drive down to Siena. Another lazy day in the beautiful hills of Tuscany!

Honeymoon part two - Strada in Chianti

2011-10-18T16:27:00.000-04:00

Ah Tuscany. How I love thee so.

If Venice was cosmopolitan magic, Chianti is rustic beauty perfected.

We arrived in Florence by train and had our first taste of busy Italian city life. A short walk from the train station to the rental car shop was stressful by the bumpy sidewalks and constant stream of people and cars.

The rental office was packed with people, a tiny office with so many bodies I started to get claustrophobic! But we got our car and got on the road and finally got the GPS to work. Chad was driving and I was happy to be in the passenger seat since I was stressed enough just helping navigate. People really do drive like crazy people here! Especially the scooter drivers. They are nuts! Pedestrians and cyclists just move as they want, almost no regard for the cars.

We found our way easily with the help of the gps and in just over 30 minutes we stopped for lunch in a little Tuscan town called Greve. At least we thought it was Greve. Greve was actually further south, so we have no idea what the name is of the town we stopped in! But lunch was delicious. A little osteria. I had tortellini with truffles and Parmesan. Chad had pasta with a meat sauce. I had my first salad in days, just fresh greens and tomatoes. Chad had a bean soup.

We got back in the car and drove on, surprised and saddened to see prostitutes on the side of the road at varying locations. At first I tried to convince myself they were just scantily clad women waiting for a ride but when we saw three more I could no longer fool myself.

We headed on to the Villa Il Lecchio, in Strada in Chianti. We were greeted by Maria Luisa whose family has owned this house for nine generations. She showed us around a bit, and to our room, which is enormous! At first the windows and shutters were closed but she offered to open them so we said sure.

And wow! The view is just spectacular. Rolling hills with fields of vegetables and vineyards and forests in every direction. The garden has lemon trees and lavender and rose bushes, vineyards, olive groves and a swimming pool.

We walked around the grounds for a bit and then returned for an afternoon siesta. We almost napped through our cooking lesson we were so tired from a late night dancing in Venice and a 6:30 a.m. start to catch our train this morning.

Then it was time for our cooking class with Maria Luisa, her daughter Giada and Giada's husband Paolo. A very sweet family, Giada taught us tiramisu, then Maria Luisa taught us a tagaliatelle with mushroom and sausage sauce, beef scallopini wrapped around grape tomatoes stuffed with buffalo mozzarella, and crostini with sausage and stracchino cheese.

It was all simple and absolutely delicious. We are stuffed!

Now enjoying a relaxing and very quiet evening. We are the only guests here tonight. Tomorrow they are having a group of 49 for dinner. We are going to Pisa tomorrow.

Leaning Tower here we come.

Italian honeymoon - Venice

2011-10-17T19:54:00.001-04:00

We are nearing the close of our three days in Venice. Most ways we are sad for the first stop on our honeymoon extravaganza to come to an end.

Venice is a magical place. We have said several times it feels like being on a movie set. Everything is so picture perfect and beautiful. The canals, the uneven stone streets and narrow alleys, the bridges and unbelievable palaces - my art history memory is slowly coming back to me. Renaissance, baroque, Byzantine, neoclassical, gothic, you name it, Venice has a building in that style.

We arrived Saturday after about a 12-hour journey that included driving to Montreal and flying to Venice. As soon as we landed we were greeted with bright blue skies and warmish though not summery weather. Good thing I have a husband to help keep me warm because I did not pack enough warm clothes, especially for the evenings.

We had a lovely walking tour on Saturdat night with Nicoletta. What was to have been a group tour was just us! She walked us through seemingly deserted alleys and lane ways and introduced to Venice with stories of the people, the places, and of course the architecture. We capped it off with a stop at a wine bar and then a boat trip back to the hotel. The public transit lines are easy to use and a three-day pass has served us well.

What a difference from those quiet streets later at night to the daytime when most of the streets are so crowded with tourists. Tour guides walk the streets holding poles in the air so their group can follow them like band leaders in a marching band. The main tourist traps on Piazza San Marco, near the train station and Rialto are overflowing with tchotkes stores selling Venetian masks and glass and magnets and t-shirts and all sorts of crap really. You must dodge people at every turn. And this isn't high season either! It is the only thing about Venice that is slightly annoying, the overwhelming touristy feel of certain places.

But if you look past the obnoxiousness of the touristy-ness there is just so much magic and beauty.

Piazza San Marco is stunning and the basilica and the doge's palace are must sees. Tonight Chad and I had our final dinner in a quiet restaurant outside the main tourist areas and then we went to piazza San Marco and Tangoed to the live music played by bands at three of the cafes around the square. Tangoing under the stars, in the shadows of the most unique basilica in the world? Not too shabby!

We went for the requisite Gondola ride - pricey for sure but it would be like going to Paris and skipping the Eiffel tower! Oh wait. I did that! Saw it but never went up it.
Drifting along the small side canals, we were often alone on the water with our gondolier, his paddle in the water and the lapping of the waves the only sound while we passed a palace that once was home to Napolean and numerous palaces that have been converted to private apartments.

During the day, often the only signs people actually live here are the laundry lines hanging out windows.

We took a boat trip to murano, the island famous for Venetian glass. We went only to see it being made and ended up walking away with a major purchase - a glass chandellier for our new house. How it gets back to Canada is a mystery since Chad bargained down the price by a huge amount but that meant they wouldn't ship it for us. The box is a little big for carry on luggage so we're devising a plan. we have a beautiful memento of our honeymoon that is unique and beautiful.

Mostly Venice has been about walking and enjoying the scenery.

Tomorrow we leave for Chianti, and three days in the Tuscan hillsides, Pisa and some quieter days.

Sorry no pictures yet. That will have to wait until we are home.

If you need a picture, Imagine us strolling hand in hand along the bridges and laneyways of this most magical city, waking up in our room overlooking the Grand Canal as the Venetian world goes by, falling asleep with the moonlight reflecting on the water as the occasion boat or gondola floats past.

Like I said.

It is like living in a movie set.

Decisions, decisions

2011-09-22T12:40:00.000-04:00

The choices have officially started.

The pile of dirt is still, well, a pile of dirt. But the house that will overtake it is coming together, at least as far as the design process is concerned.

We met with the sales manager on the weekend to go over structural choices. We picked the colours for the brick, the siding, the shingles, the garage and front doors, and went over things like the location of outdoor taps and whether windows are operational or fixed.

We visited the design centre to make our flooring choice for the hardwood. It was a lot less overwhelming when we only had one decision to make and it didn't turn out to be too difficult to choose.

There is a lot of back and forth about specifics I'd never normally think about - like the size and location of a person-door out of the garage. Do we want or need such a beast? Will the snowblower fit through it? What is the configuration of the laundry room for the washer and dryer.

Because we're now going forward with appliances. Although we don't need them for almost a year, they need the specifications sometime in the next few months so they can plan the kitchen and laundry room around them. So we're taking advantage of sales on right now to just knock that off the list.

It's a lot different than it was buying appliances on my own for my first house in Winnipeg. I was on a pretty tight budget then and the fridge we're now looking at probably costs more than the fridge, stove and washer and dryer I bought in 2003 all cost together! Still staying reasonably within a budget but getting things with a slightly higher luxury than the basic appliances we have now.

The hardest part? Waiting for an entire year to use them!

Ah well.

It will fly by.

Random thoughts with no connection

2011-09-20T11:59:00.000-04:00

I try not to talk about politics on this blog because really I get enough of that in my professional world.
But something made me laugh really loud and hard yesterday.

U.S. President Barack Obama has introduced his economy saving plan including raising taxes on really wealthy Americans. They are calling it the Buffet Tax, as in Warren BUFF-ett, the American tycoon who promoted the idea and said the really rich should pay more.

However one of my fellow reporters in the national press gallery yesterday accidentally read as BUH-fay tax. As in that horrible dining option where everyone gets to collect their own food from a central food station bar. She thought Obama was a genius. He could solve the U.S. debt crisis and the obesity epidemic in one fell swoop!

No such luck.

***********

Completely unrelated (see title), it is driving me crazy that people who work in my office building think it's cool to draw on the elevator walls. There is one elevator out of the four that go to our floor, which has been lined with plywood. The service elevator is being repaired (why it can take an entire summer to fix one blood elevator I don't know.) so they made a temporary service elevator with the plywood so major deliveries won't bang up the faux wood finish normally there. And every day more and more people have scribbled on the plywood with ballpoint pen. It is one thing to see defacing on bathroom stalls in fast food restaurants. Not acceptable but still different than a building filled with professionals - lawyers, civil servants, diplomats.

Morons, every one of the scribblers.

Movin' on up to the west side

2011-09-14T11:23:00.002-04:00

So you might be wondering what this pile of dirt is and why I'm posting a photo of it to my blog?

Well the answer is simple.

This is our pile of dirt.

Chad and I are embarking on a new adventure to build a house.

We've been looking at the idea for months but I didn't want to move forward before the wedding. But we'd visited enough show homes in various areas to know what we wanted to build and where. We just needed to find the perfect spot.

We revisited the idea shortly after the wedding but the area we wanted had just one lot left. And by the time we hemmed and hawed about whether to take the last lot or not, and finally decided to do so, it had been sold to someone else.

Big pouty face.

So we resolved to wait until the next series of lots became available in the neighbourhood, which wasn't likely to be until next year but could have been as long as 2013.

What a pleasant surprise then two Sundays ago to get a call from the builder to let us know the lot had once again become available and was ours if we wanted it.

We jumped at it.

The lot is within walking distance to Chad's office. It's across the street from a large forested park and a running/walking path is just a few houses away. Two of our favourite sinful restaurants are two blocks or so away including the breakfast place that has breakfast potatoes that I am totally addicted to. When we drove past the lot on the Sunday when they called us, we saw three deer across the street.

It's fitting into a mostly established community and we will be one of the last houses finished on our street so we won't be surrounded by construction for years to come. The street even has a sidewalk. The lack of sidewalks has always been one of my pet peeves about newer neighbourhoods.

It's really quite exciting to be able to build from scratch. We have often joked about building "the mansion" whenever something in our house doesn't work, or isn't big enough or we don't have something. Like a hood fan, or a garage that fits both our cars and doesn't have a door that breaks every so often. More counter space in the kitchen. A dishwasher.

We aren't really building a mansion but it's a mansion to us and would be to a lot of people. We want to build something that has the amount of space we will use, without much space that is wasted or ignored.

So I'm getting my dream kitchen. It won't have absolutely everything I've ever wanted but it will be darn close! When we had friends over for dinner on Sunday I was definitely dreaming of it when Chad had to keep waving a magazine in front of the smoke detector every time I opened the oven to check the roast. And as Chad said "maybe in the new house we won't have to put serving dishes on stools around the table when we have people over."

Chad will get his double, attached garage with plenty of space to store the snowblower. I will get a real pantry and tons of counter space. Chad will get his longed for dishwasher.

Now come all the fun (yet somewhat overwhelming) decisions about what extras to include? Hardwood stairs? Tile or hardood in the kitchen? What colour on the walls? Or on the brick exterior? Kitchen cabinets and counters and bathroom floors and tiled versus acrylic showers and windows and doors and fireplaces and bevelled counter top edges.

I've already learned more words than I ever wanted to about construction.

This time next year we should be all moved in.

Assuming we sell this house of course.

So if anyone knows anyone who wants to buy a semi-detached house in central Ottawa let us know!

You get knocked down but you get up again

2011-08-23T12:51:00.006-04:00

I hate writing death stories.

It's partly why I preferred politics to general assignment reporting. Way less death.

So the week beginning with the news of Jack Layton's death isn't really a great start.

Coupled with the ongoing concern for Rob there has been a lot of bad news in our world lately. (Rob officially has Streptococcal Toxic Shock Syndrome. He has been making baby step improvements but is still critically ill.)

So yesterday getting a nice pick me up was definitely a welcome distraction. It came in the form of our professional photography shots from the wedding.

You can see all 280 of them on our amazing photographer, Andre Forget's website. Just click weddings and then we are the first couple under galleries. It makes me relive that amazing day all over again.

I have no plans to be one of those people who makes a bedspread out of her wedding photo. (Yes, someone has done that!) But is it so wrong if I keep going back to look at the photos again and again and again?

This isn't one of his shots. We don't have the DVD yet so I can't upload them here myself. This was taken by our amazing friend Cass during the ceremony.

Living every day

2011-08-17T09:59:00.004-04:00

Nothing can eat into the reverie of being a newlywed like some cold, hard doses of reality.

Chad and I are still basking in the after

glow from our amazing wedding and loving every minute of wedded life.

But last night we got news that his cousin Jennifer's husband Rob is in the hospital. What started out seemingly as just a bad case of the stomach flu has landed him in the intensive care unit at the hospital. He's on a ventilator now and awaiting dialysis. They don't know yet what is causing it.

It is terrifying for us, and I can't imagine what his wife and his kids are thinking. I don't know what the kids know about what is going on but certainly they will be aware that something is really wrong.

Just two weeks ago we were laughing and partying with them at the wedding. On Monday we were talking about going to their son, Ryan's, 6th birthday party and sending them some photos of the kids from the wedding.

In the middle of hearing that news I also read this article in the Ottawa Citizen.

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/life/bittersweet+wedding+longtime+partners/5264275/story.html

It is heartbreaking. I cannot imagine our wedding not being the beginning of our plans for a long future together. We don't of course know what will happen but we certainly have the hope of a long future together.

Rob's illness and the story about Rob and Barry make me remember that every day really is a gift, and that nothing should ever be taken for granted.

Praying for Rob's recovery doesn't seem like enough but it's all we can do for now.

We said "I do!"

2011-08-03T09:12:00.021-04:00

I simply can't imagine a more amazing day.

Our wedding on Sunday was simply the best day ever from start to finish. From the start we wanted the wedding to be fun and it was exactly that.

Fun. Amazing. Wonderful. We still can't stop smiling.

It started at 5:30 a.m. when I woke up and was just too excited to sleep anymore.

Especially after I checked the weather on my Ipad and the thunderstorms that on Saturday had been projected during our ceremony and photos had disappeared and just sunny skies were on the horizon.

I was surprisingly calm all day. Me, who can get hot under the collar just by having to wait at a red light. Apparently, my hairdresser and make-up artist told my mother they'd never worked on a wedding party that was as calm and collected. I just was so happy all day long, nothing

seemed to be able to phase me.

The weather was the one thing we could not control and it delivered a beautiful, sunny day. Slightly on the hot side but with a nice breeze.

Chad and I had some quiet moments to ourselves in the morning and exchanged gifts. His gift to me is our dancing lessons that we have been taking since May. But he bought me a silver anklet with a pair of dance shoes as a charm to remind me. Months ago he asked me if I would sing at the wedding but I knew that wasn't a good idea as strong emotions would get the better of me. So instead I found a local singing teacher and recorded a song for him on a CD.

We really had very little go wrong. And the things that did go wrong were for the most part not a big deal.

The biggest problem was probably my dress. The snaps and loops sewn on for the bustle tore during the ceremony and post-ceremony photos and bustling the dress so I could dance was a problem. Thankfully my aunt is a seamstress and was able to fix it. Not once. Not twice. But three times! She was my dress hero!

I could never pick just one moment that was my favourite. There were just too many. Like getting the photo I wanted with my precious little cat Missy. (Even if it took a little cajoling and I ended up with a bleeding scratch on my arm.) I'll post the photo when we get it from our photographer. (Who was so awesome he just blended in when we were getting ready and who was just a calm, cool force around us during the day.)

So here are some of our favourite moments, in no particular order.

Walking down the aisle. I think every little girl dreams about this moment. It all went by in a bit of a blur but I do remember it well. I entered to "She's got a way about her" by Billy Joel, played by a string quartet. My parents walked out in front of me and I was just kind of gobsmacked that it was happening.

I walked down to meet them, and then finally I got to turn and see my stunning groom standing waiting for me at the end of the aisle. I was very emotional as I realized I was actually getting married and Chad was there waiting for me, and all these people were here to celebrate with us.

I just kept my gaze focused solely on him and did my best not to cry too much! When I got to him he almost went to kiss me hello like we always do before realizing, uh we're not at that part yet. Which made us both kind of giggle. And then my dad forgot to say goodbye to me which made us giggle even more. All in all it was every bit as amazing as I could have imagined.

Our vows. We decided to write our own vows. We had to have them finished by the end of June

for our final meeting with our officiant before our wedding. We also decided we didn't want to see each other's vows until the wedding. Yet somehow we both wrote a mix of traditional and individualized vows that combined the heartfelt sentiment with some funny tidbits.

Many of our guests asked for a copy of our vows so here they are.

Chad's vows:

"I, Chad Simons, take thee, Mia Rason, to be my lawfully wedded wife, to love and to cherish, during good times and difficult times, from this day forward. I promise to always consult you and respect your opinion regarding important life and family decisions even though we may not always agree. I promise to always love and support you and our family in any way I can. I promise to handle those chores that you like less, like taking out the garbage, cleaning the cat litter or rinsing out the milk bag, until such time as we are able to manufacture suitable new family members to assist with these tasks if we are t be so lucky and blessed by God."

Mia's vows:

"Chad, from this day forward I join my life to yours.

Every day you make me feel like the most special person in the world.

As my protector, you make me feel safer than I ever have before.

As my lover, you make me feel more beautiful than I could ever have dreamed.

You are my biggest fan and my constant source of support.

I promise you today I will spend the rest of my life trying to do the same for you.

I will be honest, patient and always listen to you when you speak.

I will encourage you, comfort you and cherish you.

I will never stop trying to make you laugh, always make you your favourite banana cake (for your birthday) and try not to schedule things that interfere with football Sundays.

I will love you and cherish you every minute of every day.

You are my one true love."

Our reception entrance. We had decided long ago to use the song "Hey Baby" to enter the reception. It's been a song we play all the time in the boat with our friends when we're wakeboarding and we're constantly singing and humming it. Our entrance was delayed slightly by the dress malfunction but when we finally got to come into the room, (which was full of guests on a sugar high after they devoured our candy centrepieces in less than an hour!) we were announced as Chad and Mia Simons and the song started playing and it was one of the most amazing few minutes of the night. All of our guests were on their feet, clapping and singing at the top of their lungs. We were dancing and hugging people hello. It was such a huge adrenaline rush. Even now it gives me shivers thinking about it.

The muppets. We decided last winter we were going to get our bridal party personalized muppets as thank you gifts. And we got some for ourselves too. They brought them all to the reception and we had our guests use them to tell stories about us instead of clanging glasses with spoons to get us to kiss. They were a huge hit and everyone seemed to love them. Keeping the muppets a secret was hard! But the look on their faces when they opened them and the fun our guests had with them, made keeping the secret worthwhile.

The candy. Even though we barely got any. In keeping with our theme of "fun" we decided to go with candy-filled apothecary jars as our centrepieces. Each table had a different candy and each guest was given a cellophane bag to fill up with treats. We hoped it would encourage people to mingle with other tables and who isn't happier on a sugar high! The candy was such a hit it was almost all gone by the time we made our entrance.

The first dance. We decided months ago to take a few dance lessons so our first dance would be a little bit more interesting than a grade eight sock hop. But it turned out we fell in love with our dance teacher and dancing and have been taking three to five lessons a week since the end of May. And our first dance couldn't have gone better. We chose "Lucky" by Jason Mraz/Colbie Caillait as our song because it was fun and light yet heartfelt. I was a little worried about pulling it off because of my dress issues but it all worked out just fine and we had a blast on the dance floor. Our dip at the end was one of our best dips ever.

We even got to end the night with our own dance to our second choice song, "I'm Yours" by Jason Mraz. We didn't get to dance too much during the reception because of my dress and because we were trying to talk to as many people as we could. But we got some dancing in and our friends and family were rocking the dance floor all night. My brother was the DJ and he did an awesome job, taking requests, keeping things going and moving the tempo around to keep things interesting. It was all amazing.

The worst thing about the wedding really is that it is over! But we had such an amazing day, it has to be a good omen for the years to come.

Things that make you go "WTF"

2011-07-19T11:23:00.004-04:00

Okay, so maybe I'm not quite young enough anymore to get away with speaking in acronyms like "WTF" but at least I can pretend I'm still young and hip.

Even if I was never really hip when I was young"er".

It always amazes me how often in a day I could use that little phrase however.

Like yesterday while walking to the car from the office at the end of the day, I could have used it at the lady walking with her son who looked to be about three. Said child was carrying a very large stick. And swinging it around. And nearly took out the eye of a man passing by. Mom looked embarassed and apologized but I kind of thought "um lady, what do you THINK is going to happen when you let your preschooler walk down the street swinging a stick bigger than he is?"

Or a few moments later when not one, not two, but THREE OC Transpo buses in a row turned right in front of several pedestrians trying to cross the street.

There was the moment a few weeks ago when I could only shake my head at the tourists who decided letting off passengers, getting out the stroller and pulling a sleeping child from his car seat was a fine thing to do while stopped right in front of the driveway entrance and exit to the Hill. So none of the shuttle buses or security vans or RCMP vehicles could get in or out. All the driver had to do was stop 10 feet further ahead and it wouldn't have been a problem. But he apparently would rather grind the traffic around the hill to a complete halt to accommodate his needs.

But perhaps the biggest WTF moment of the last month happened to my fiance. (Who will be my husband in 12 days! Egads!)

I refer to our little neighbourhood as "up and coming." He prefers to call it "Little Winnipeg." The public housing complexes and low-rent buildings around keep the locals colourful anyway. Things have improved since the drug dealer up the street and the crazy couple with the roaming pit bulls three doors down all got evicted. Even the rent-a-truck that used to stay parked all the time in front is gone. I called it the mobile meth lab even though I had no idea what was inside. I just thought it was kind of odd for a single rent-a-truck from varying companies to always be parked there. But then I'm suspicious of the ice cream truck man because I've probably watched too many creepy crime dramas and it just seems that a grown man using an enclosed white truck to lure in children isn't right.

But I digress. I do my best to defend our community and for the most part I can make some good arguments. But I think I lost any points I had ever scored when Chad got panhandled walking to his car. From our front door.

Seriously.

WTF?

Guess who will soon be moving to Kanata. . .

26 days and counting

2011-07-05T11:26:00.003-04:00

A year ago Chad and I were just starting to get used to the whole idea of planning a wedding.

We spent Canada Day weekend last year at our friends' cottage near Coboconk, Ontario, and I didn't even have my ring back yet from the jeweller where it was being resized.

When we finally settled on July 31, 2011 for the date it seemed so far away.

Here we are with just under four weeks to go and woah where has the year gone.?
There were definitely times when time dragged. But lately the days are just flashes as we try to squeeze everything in.
Last night we had a dance lesson right after work and then I went straight to my friend Cass's and spent four hours DIYing menus and labels and candle holders. Thankfully Cass is crafty and has all the right tools and equipment to do things well. If it were left up to me people would probably have to guess what they were eating.

We are both recovering from a fun but tiring weekend trip to my family cottage in Kenora, Ont. to bury my grandmother on Rabson Island. It's the same place my grandfather was buried 31 years ago and it's where she longed to be.

It was a sad moment on the island but a good family weekend overall. The first time ever that all of my dad's siblings and their spouses and kids were in the same place at the same time. Hard to believe when my grandmother had only three kids and there are just seven grandkids. But when everyone lives all over the place it's not easy to bring everyone together.

But three days away that included eight hours of travelling to get there and another eight to get back home is somewhat draining. Particularly when the accomodations on the weekend included a houseboat. It was a good idea and gave us the extra room we needed to fit 17 people into a cottage with four bedrooms and room for 10 to sleep. 12 if we use the couches in the living room. But the first night was hot and muggy and buggy and neither Chad nor I slept very much at all.

Oh well. Sometimes it's worth it. This was one of those times.

As usual my mother was amazing in her organization and ability to pll everything off without any glitches. She organized the food for the weekend which is a huge endeavour, especially when you're feeding people whose appetites are really healthy but varied. We had most of my grandmother's favourite recipes.

Now it's back to trying to focus on work and fitting in everything that has to get done.

An engaging anniversary

2011-06-24T13:31:00.002-04:00

One year ago today, at just about now, I arrived home in Ottawa to the biggest surprise of my life.

Chad was of course waiting for me at the airport with a single rose and a beautiful ring and the promise of spending the rest of my life with him.

It was a magical day. I still get goosebumps and all giggly when I think about it.

It's hard to believe a year has passed already.

And now just 37 days to W-day! Yikes!

Thankfully I'm either not noticing the gazillion things I should be doing or I'm simply not planning to do them, but I don't feel stressed or worried. Almost everything is already in place. Only a few things are left to do that would prevent the wedding from happening. Like our final meeting with the officiant to get our ceremony and vows finalized, scheduled for next week, and meeting with the manager at the reception venue to finalize the details for the day.

But everything is falling into place, we have all our RSVPs in, and are just excited about getting to celebrate our special day with so many people we love.

Meet Gina

2011-05-25T16:57:00.005-04:00

Meet poor starving Leo.

Our wonderful cat, with the laid back disposition and a hunger for kibble that can almost never be sated.

Leo has been on a diet for more than a year and is down from at least 20 pounds to under 14 pounds. That's huge for a cat. It's 31 per cent at least of his body weight. It would be the equivalent of a 200-pound woman losing 62 pounds.

As he lost weight we noticed he was getting more agile. He runs and jumps and just generally moves around with so much more ease it is clearly worth the effort Chad goes through to carefully measure Leo's food each day and dole it out in small amounts.

It also has meant Leo plays with his cat toys far more often and far more vigorously. Mostly these are toy mice which he bats around and chases. His ritual at night when we go to bed is to hunt one of his mice, meowing at high decibels as he parades his kill and drops it proudly beside Chad's side of the bed. (Which I much prefer to Missy's escapades at the lake with live mice, including the time two summers ago when she brought the dead mouse into bed. With us. yes. You can scream now.)

But a few months ago Leo graduated from just carrying his toys around the house to going after clothing. It started with socks left down by the laundry machines or on the floor in our bedroom. Then he graduated to one of my bras, which he thankfully saw fit to bring downstairs with him when nobody else was home.

One day we were sitting on the couch when Leo came through the cat door from the basement pulling a pair of my sweatpants behind him thrugh the cat door and all.

But now Leo has a new true love.

I left the front hall closet door open a few weeks ago when I was doing a bit of spring cleaning and Leo discovered an old mocassin of mine.

He has been dragging it all over the house ever since. He plays with her. Licks her. Brings her into bed with him. It's adorable. I have even recently discovered I think he's having his way with her.

I have taken to calling her Gina. Not sure where the name came from but it seemed he loved the moccassin so much she needed a name.

MMM.. .jambalaya

2011-05-11T12:58:00.002-04:00

It was Chad's birthday this week. I don't know if most families are like mine but I seem to have birthday clusters.
In March, we celebrate my mom, dad, brother, two aunts, one cousin and it also used to be the month my grandmother had her birthday. Add to that at least two good friends who have their birthdays that month and I can keep Hallmark stock high all by myself.

Now May is getting to be almost as bad. Or good. I guess! My aunt, granny, two cousins and Chad are all born between May 1 and May 9. Plus another good friend.

Growing up I was the only one with a birthday in the fall. But I now join his sister, niece and nephew who are born in October and December. And another good friend the week before me.

But I digress.

We celebrated Chad's birthday with friends on the weekend (barbecued steak, salad and oven fries) and will celebrate with his family this coming weekend. He is very busy at work so we decided not to go out on his actual birthday. I told him I'd make anythign he wanted for dinner since I mostly had the day off.

He requested Jambalaya. I have one recipe I made before that was good but wanted a better one.

It was great. Very filling. Easy. One pot cooking is great. The only thing I'd do differently is kick up the spice a little bit. The original recipe called for only 1/2 teaspoon of red chile sauce. I doubled it. I think I'd put in 2 tsps next time.

JAMBALAYA

6 oz. lean italian sausage
1/2 lb. shrimp, peeled and deveined
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp minced garlic
1 c. chopped onion
1 c. chopped red pepper
1 c. long grain white rice
1 tsp. paprika
1 tsp. fresh ground black pepper
1 tsp. dried oregano
1/2 tsp dried thyme
1/2 tsp onion powder
1/4 tsp garlic salt
1 bay leaf
2 c. chicken broth
3/4 c. water
1 - 2 tsps hot red pepper sauce
14.5 oz can diced tomatoes
1 tbsp tomato paste

Heat oil in medium cast iron pot (or large dutch oven) over med-high heat.
Stir in garlic, onion and sausuage and cook 5-7 minutes until onions are soft.
Add rice and spices. Cook 2 minutes
Add broth, water, hot sauce, diced tomatoes and tomato paste. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat and cover. Simmer 20 minutes.
Add shrimp. Cook another 5 minutes.
Let sit two minutes before serving.

Serves 4. Approx 420 calories per serving.

People can be really dumb

2011-05-05T11:09:00.003-04:00

It never ceases to amaze me the depths of the stupidity which can exist in our society.

The people who can so easily be swayed by others to believe anything. (Case in point that something like a third of Americans don't think Obama is an American).

Chad and I hate the junk mail and the flyers and the solicitors. So a few months ago, after talking about doing so for ages, I put up a sticker asking people not to deliver flyers and not to solicit on our doorstep.

Instead of some big ugly sign printed on a normal 8.5 x 11 sheet of paper I went to vistaprint.ca and ordered a window sticker. It's kind of cute, with a cartoon bulldog and the words "Absolutely no flyers and no soliciting."

Now I've looked repeatedly and nowhere on there does it say "except for you."

But either there are a lot of illiterate people hired by door-to-door companies or they are just all really ignorant. A few weeks ago I had not one, but two, door to door people from the same annoying company knock on the door within an hour. I shouldn't say knock. I should say pound. Because apparently they were trained to bang their fists on the door like a toddler having a temper tantrum.

And when I pointed to the sticker and said I don't deal with door to door salespeople he tried to deny that he was in fact, a door to door salesperson. Apparently stupid people think everyone else is also equally stupid.

After that we moved the sticker to a more prominent place on the door, right in front of someone's face. There is absolutely no way one could miss it.

We still get flyers all the time. And don't even get me started about the never ending mail from Capital One for someone who hasn't lived here in years, no matter how often we send it back with the word "moved" on it. But that's mail so I guess doesn't really qualify as a flyer although I think it should.

Periodically we've had women from some local evangelist church coming by trying to convert the neighbourhood. This morning even they completely ignored the sign. Sorry folks but I pretty much consider both the attempted sale of fixed hydro rates and God in the same category: soliciting.

Three months to go!

2011-05-01T10:16:00.002-04:00

Today officially marks the three months until the wedding day day!

Chad and I went to the post office together yesterday afternoon to put our invitations in the mail. It is pretty exciting because we actually got them done ahead of schedule, only slightly over budget, and well, it means there is no turning back now!

Now it's the wait and watch for RSVPs to come in spectacular dance.

Chad's sister and I also succesfully found dresses and shoes for her daughters for their flower girl duties. Thank you Sears and Payless. :)

Thanks to the election wedding planning has been playing second fiddle lately but that's okay. It helps to pass the days. Lots still left to do but nothing that would prevent the wedding from happening if it doesn't get done, now that the invitations are on their way out.

I was surprisingly not that interested in the royal wedding last week. I am never really a big royal watcher but somehow being in the midst of wedding plans myself I thought I should care more. All I wanted to see really was the dress. She looked beautiful. It upset me that some people talked about her sister upstaging her.

It's almost impossible to steal a bride's thunder unless the maid of honour shows up in haute couture and the bride doesn't show at all.

I told Chad that we should be glad we're planning an outdoor ceremony rather than inside. That way our trees are already in place. No need to trek trees inside! Now it's just to hope Mother Nature cooperates or we will say I do in a tent with a view of the trees instead of underneath them.

So far it's not been a great spring. Only a few warm and sunny days to speak of, no leaves on the trees yet and the tulips are just popping out now. But there are three full months for the beauty of Mother Nature to kick into full lushness.

Groundhog Day

2011-03-10T07:31:00.002-05:00

"If I get my hands on that groundhog I'm going to kill him!"

Seriously.

That whole winter was over Feb. 2 thing that Phil or Willie or any of those creatures suggested it was thing?

Total lie.

We awoke this morning to another 20 cm of snow on the ground topped with a nice layer of freezing rain for good measure. And just in case we weren't entirely defeated by winter yet, now we're getting rain. Like 30 mm or so in the next two days.

Poor Chad was up before sunrise trying to move the cars so he could clear the rest of the driveway and get us both out to work. I'm leaning towards bussing it in. Considering the language I used about OC Transpo the last time I boarded a bus is a pretty big clue to how bad the roads are. (For the record that was last year just after the strike ended and the bus drivers were still pissed off and deciding on a whim to skip stops and leave passengers stranded).

On the positive news front we won our playoff game at basketball last night by one point. It was a good game. And probably a great thing that they only had four players. Although in our defence if you added up all the heights of the players on the floor, they probably matched our five with their four. Yeebus giants they were!

We now have a week off (it's spring break here next week) and then we play again. I'm always mixed about the end of the season. I like playing and will miss it. But at the same time ending the weekly scramble to ensure we have enough players and being able to come home on a Wednesday and not go back out again is appealing. Not to mention it seems Mother Nature thinks Wednesdays are the best day of the week to dump her madness upon us.

Two days until it's the weekend. It can't come fast enough.

Elizabeth Rabson, March 30, 1915 - Feb. 11, 2011

2011-02-11T10:08:00.005-05:00

My grandmother died overnight.

She was almost 96 years old.

She was confined to her bed in a nursing home, mostly blind and nearly deaf.

For the last decade almost she lived like that in a veterans' home in Victoria. Her mind was still sharp. Although her speech began to deteriorate recently and her ability to find the word she wanted to use was failing her, she still knew much about the world around her from her radio.

She had long said she was ready to die and it gives me great comfort to think that she may finally be back with her beloved husband, the grandfather I never got to meet. He died in 1970.

She was never a big technology person. I doubt she had ever used a computer. Words like Ipod and DVD were probably never uttered from her mouth. She seldom watched television before she moved into the home and never afterwards.

She filled her days with her memories.

Oh she had stories. Many of them I heard so often I could recite them to you word for word. As a child my parents sent me to Victoria to visit her several summers in a row. We'd feed the ducks in the park, go for ice cream, walk down and see the ocean.

And she would talk. Memories from the Second World War where she was a nursing sister. Her romance with my grandfather, their wedding.

About 15 years ago I had the great fortune of being chosen to write my grandma's memoirs. She dictated them on cassette and mailed them to me in Toronto where I was living. I typed them out and sent them back to her.

I got to learn more about her than I ever had and it was interesting to hear her life as she remembered it, good and bad.

She was born in Winnipeg and lived there until the 1960s. She and my grandfather were married in England in 1945. They had three children. My father, my uncle Rick and my Auntie Wendy. In 1966 they moved to Toronto.

My grandfather died in 1970. He was only 59.

After his death, my grandmother moved to Ottawa for a time and ultimately out to Victoria where she had spent several years as a small child and where the weather was less punishing.

Every summer until I was a teenager she would return to Clearwater Bay where she and my grandfather had bought property in 1950. "The lake" was where we really got to spend time with her.

I often have counted my brother and I lucky that we got Grandma when she was still young and agile enough to play with us. She took us fishing in the little boat with her little egg beater motor. She would let us have toast and brown sugar for a bedtime snack. She was a wicked card player and I'm still not entirely sure I ever beat her at Gin.

I have a distinct memory of her ringing the bell on the porch calling Lawrie and I home for dinner and we got in trouble for not coming. She didn't realize she was ringing the bell and calling her younger two children's names not ours.

We didn't know we had to answer to calls for "Wendy and Rick."

One of my favourite memories of her was when I was probably about six she and my Auntie Peggy drove my brother and I into town for swimming lessons. She parallel parked the car and when it was time to leave two cars had parked close to her front and back bumpers.

We're not talking a modern compact little vehicle. This was a 1970s behemoth sedan with an engine and a trunk that by themselves were bigger than my car is today.

She got out of the parking spot by driving back and forth bumping into the other cars until they were out of her way. I'm pretty sure my dad took away her license after that.

I have several things around my house to remind me of her. Not the least of which is my own image in the mirror. I look a lot like she did.

She also decided years ago to start divvying up her belongings among her kids and grandkids. She started with little labels on everything. If you picked up a lamp it surely would have someone's name on a piece of paper taped to the bottom.

As she started to get older she stopped just assigning her belongings and started giving them away. She sent me the clasps she used on her nursing cape, the pearls my grandfather gave her the day my father was born, an entire set of classic novels she had ordered from Reader's Digest.

I had the fortune to visit her twice in the last year and a half. The first time was with my fiance and I'm glad Chad had the chance to meet her. We were visiting friends in Seattle and went over to Victoria by boat overnight. She loved having visitors and we spent several hours at her bedside both days. The first day when she was getting tired and I said we were leaving she got quite upset. When I told her we were coming back the next day her face lit up with a smile I will always remember.

She might have been bedridden and failing but she could still sometimes feel joy.

The last time I saw her was in April when I was on the west coast for a business trip. On that second trip, she gave me her wedding ring. Somehow she seemed to foreshadow what was about to happen. It is the ring my grandfather gave her when they were married in England after the war. She still wore it on her left hand when she took it off and gave it to me.

Three months later Chad proposed. The ring is now polished and refitted and is awaiting our wedding this summer.

We knew she wasn't going to be able to be there but she will be in another way.

She had a wonderful sense of humour and often said hilarious things. She loved to complain about her health.

If I asked her how she was she would say "not good. I woke up."

Once she told me the only muscle left on her body that worked was her tongue.

When I told her Chad and I were engaged she was very excited. But her first response was "What took you so long."

Then she told us "don't you wait so long to do what else is required."

It is never easy to lose someone you love. But there is also a guilty sense of relief. She had little quality to her life anymore. She expressed a wish to die many times.

Although we've known for awhile she was failing and that this phone call was going to come, Grandma has just always been there.

I expect she will be buried this summer at the Lake of the Woods. Her ashes will be scattered off the island where my grandfather's were, 41 years ago. She will be with him again, which is the one thing she has wanted the most since he died.

We will miss her. But thanks to her own memory, and now our own, she will be with us forever.

Rest in peace Grandma. We love you.

Coworkers can be the most annoying parts of your day

2011-01-06T15:22:00.002-05:00

Everyone who works in an office has them. Well at least everyone who works in an office with more than say, two or three people.

I'm talking about coworkers who drive you crazy.

The ones who never seem to be able to step up and help in a pinch, who always have a personal crisis preventing them from staying late or coming in early.

The ones who are always leaving half-eaten lunches in the refrigerator until they pass the science experiment stage.

The ones who think everyone else in the office should be constantly subjected to their pleas to buy chocolate covered almonds or some other such crappy junk food at $3 a pop to raise money so they can put their kid into gymnastics or hockey or buy new computers for the school.

They are the probably the same ones who think the office e-mail system is a great place for swap and shop and will send e-mails to one and all looking for restaurant suggestions, or people to buy their crap so they don't have to host a garage sale or better yet, lug all their crap out to the Value Village and let them sell it.

We've got some doozies here.

There is the perfectly pleasant woman who sits about 20 metres from me in an open-concept cubicle newsroom. When she laughs I jump out of my skin. It is a grating, high-pitched, loud cackle that could drive Jimmy Hoffa from whatever grave he is actually in. I wonder if I am the only one who feels the urge to go postal on the next person who tells her something funny.

There is the one whose nickname speaks for itself. We call him the Little Ball of Hate. He is loud. And obnoxious. And he hates. everything. From morning until night he complains about everything. The television on his desk (we're in the news business so yes we get to have TVs) is always tuned to the same channels but he never seems to think anything they report is newsy or interesting. Nothing he ever reads is clever. His bosses are always asking him to do things he just couldn't be bothered with. He once broke his own phone because he repeatedly slammed it into its cradle in a fit of rage and then had the audacity to get the tech guy to come back into the office after he had left to fix it.

Unfortunately the Little Ball of Hate recently lost one of his "friends" in the office in an exodus that saw 10 people leave this place after Christmas. Now he has set his sights on me being interested in all his complaints. I need to start wearing headphones and looking really busy all the time or I am done for.

Then there are those unknown co-workers who can't seem to ever rinse their coffee mug and put it in the dishwasher, put the coffee-milk back into the fridge or take home their tupperware. Seriously. This morning someone cleaned out the cupboards in the office kitchen and loaded all the lost tupperware onto one of the tables. It looks like a tupperware party exploded. No make that a tupperware gala.

I am only led to believe that people who are so casual about the location of their tupperware are neither responsible for filling it nor buying it at home.

I can only wonder when these people go home at night if they treat their families and their homes the same way they do the office and their colleagues.

Six months of magic

2010-12-24T23:18:00.002-05:00

Exactly six months ago today Chad popped the question.

In seven months and seven days I will get to marry my best friend.

I am sometimes in awe that out of six billion people in the world, I managed to find him.

There is nothing "Santa" could put under the tree tonight that could top the gift of having him in my life.

Merry Christmas everyone.

'Tis the season

2010-12-10T11:25:00.003-05:00

Has it really been since Sept. 24 that I last posted in here.

I guess that's a sign of the busy fall we have had. Heck, it's been a busy year.

I can hardly think back to what was going on at the start of the year. I know it was a nice mild winter in Ottawa. Just my kind of season. We didn't get out skating or skiing.

There were some career ups and downs and I learned a little bit more about facing adversity, handling people you don't like and maintaining professionalism despite wanting to rant and rave like a lunatic. The phrase that which does not kill us makes us stronger seems to apply.

I'd by lying if I said it hadn't made me rethink my career choice a few times and certainly it's made me view politics and politicians with a somewhat different lens.

April brought me out west for a week to a conference for work and then to spend a few days visiting my friend Reese in Seattle. I also got in a brief visit with my grandmother in Victoria before flying home.

It was during that visit that my grandmother gave me her wedding ring. It is the ring she actually got married with in London in 1945 just after the Second World War ended. She replaced it years later when she and my grandfather renewed their vows, but she still had the original ring.

Perhaps it was a foreshadowing of things to come.

In May I ran my first ever road race in the Ottawa Race Weekend 5K event. I didn't make my personal best but I finished the race without stopping and felt good about the results. Next year I will be faster and more experienced. Hopefully less nervous.

I also in the spring joined the Friends Committee of the Ronald McDonald House of Ottawa. I quickly became the committee secretary and am now also the chair of the RMH Ottawa Home Run, a charity run fundraiser scheduled for May 1, 2011.

June brought with it a trip home to Winnipeg for a visit with my folks and a Dixie Chicks concert. The Dixie Chicks have been one of my favourite bands for several years. The Gods were smiling on me that day because amid torrential rains in Winnipeg that left the city and surrounding areas drenched and flooded, there were forecasts for more rain and thundershowers that night. All the stores were sold out of disposable ponchos. But the evening could not have been more perfect. It was clear and warm and there wasn't even a mosquito to be swatted.

The Chicks only played for an hour but it was worth it.

But then came the big event. I returned to Ottawa and Chad proposed. Most of you have heard the story and I won't repeat it here. It still gives me goosebumps remembering that day and I will never feel the same about the Ottawa Airport. It set off the makings of events for the rest of the year and for next as well!

The summer seemed to completely fly by. We went to the Lake of the Woods for a long weekend and thankfully Chad got to see it for the beautiful and relaxing spot that it really is. The weather was beautiful and we got out swimming and wakeboarding and had lots of time on the dock.

We visited a friend's cottage, worked on wedding plans, fit in lots of running time and time outdoors.

The fall dawned busier than ever. Early October brought a visit from my family, which included going wedding dress shopping with my mother. It was a wonderful experience, far better than I ever could have imagined. We had Thanksgiving at our house again with my family and Chad's. Other than wishing for a bigger dining room table, it was a great time and a good tradition I hope we continue to carry forward.

The weekend after Thanksgiving we returned to Winnipeg for an amazing engagement party thrown by my parents. We could never thank them enough for the wonderful event.

I also cannot thank my good friend Monica enough for spending an afternoon taking photos of Chad and I so I can have some "wedding" photos in Winnipeg. I got to return to my old haunts at the Manitoba Legislature and we have some beautiful engagement photos as a result.

There were more house guests after that as friends from Toronto came up with their daughter for a long awaited visit. Again the desire for a bigger dining room table resulted but we managed. And I got to completely fall in love with three-year-old Olivia who is as sweet as she can be. As Chad said: "I am totally smitten with her."

They brought me the gift of Martha Stewart's Cupcake cookbook, which has spawned me to try and make all the different varieties of cupcakes in the book. Thus far I've done 3. Red velvet, mini chocolate cupcakes with salted caramel filling, and Devil's Food. I expect to try the gingerbread cupcakes this week. Only 71 more to go after that!

November brought with it my birthday and a much anticipated dinner at our favourite restaurant, MeKong. MMmmm. . .crispy beef.

Throw in basketball games in the women's rec league I play in once a week, my Ronald McDonald House commitments, wedding planning and the usual business of work and play and it's been a whirlwind.

We are staying in Ottawa for Christmas this year. It will be the first time I've not spent the holidays with my parents and I am a little wistful. But yet looking forward to nesting and beginning holiday traditions with Chad.

We have the tree up and I added a wreath on the door and some stockings and a garland on the fireplace.

I know 2011 will be a very busy but very meaningful year for us and I can't wait.

Fall has arrived

2010-09-24T11:59:00.004-04:00

According to the calendar, fall officially began three days ago.

According to me, it officially began today.

Why is that you may wonder? Other than one tree near the canal that I think was actually diseased I haven't noticed any leaves changing colour yet. The stores have had Halloween candy out since July so that is no longer the big tell about fall. So what it is it that makes today feel like fall?

1. I am wearing a sweater for the first time in months. Well okay, what I really mean is I am wearing a knit sweater that I pulled out of my winter clothes stash for the first time in months. The sweater I wear almost daily at the office because of the Arctic temperature they insist on keeping the air conditioning at doesn't count.

2. The slow cooker has made an appearance. It is currently bubbling chili all day long in preparation for our neighbours coming for dinner tonight. I am imagining how good the house smells. It will smell even better when the bread I am making and that is currently rising on the counter in the kitchen at home goes into the oven.
Oh the heavenly smells in the house to come!

3. I kind of wished I had worn gloves this morning when I was walking from my car to the office. Gloves!

Some things just hit hard

2010-09-21T12:37:00.004-04:00

With all the murder and mayhem reported by my business daily I seem to have become somewhat immune to many of the tragic stories we report.

But every so often, a case happens that for some reason I can't stop thinking about. Like in March 1998 when an 11-year-old and a 13-year-old stole guns from their grandfather, tricked their schoolmates and teachers to leave their building by pulling the fire alarm, and then opened fire on them, killing four little girls and a teacher and wounding 10 others. It was 12 years ago but I still sometimes follow any news on the case, despite the dozens of other school shootings that have occurred since. The fact that an 11-year-old kid not only knew how to operate a gun, but had access to one, and used it to kill four of his classmates and a teacher has always left me with an uneasy feeling.

This week I can't stop thinking about a tragic car accident that took the lives of a young couple. They were 35 and 36 years old and have three daughters, who are 15, 14 and 12 years old. The couple were waiting at a bus stop a block from my office last Thursday night after watching a movie. A 20-year-old boy driving a sports car came flying around the corner and went out of control, barrelling into them.
Leo Paul Regnier was killed instantly. Sherryanne was tended to by a coworker who was at the same bus stop on his way home from work. Paramedics revived her and she lived for three days, dying in the night on Monday.

The driver has been charged with any number of things. Dangerous driving, driving under the influence of alcohol (he was under the legal limit but as a 20-year-old isn't allowed to have any alcohol in his blood when he drives under a new Ontario law). He was also charged with stunt racing.

I can't stop thinking about those three girls. I can't stop imagining how a couple of bad decisions by a 20-year-old kid has turned their lives upside down. In the span of a few seconds, the lives of six people were ruined.
Two are dead. Three are orphans. One is a 20-year-old who will spend many of the next years in prison and the rest of his life knowing he killed two people.

You can't stop living for fear of bad things happening. But some times, when those bad things happen, I can't stop thinking about it either.

Odds and sods

2010-08-19T15:24:00.002-04:00

Chad and I are both recovering if not entirely recovered from some sort of summer cold bug.

He seemed to get hit worse than I did but I maintain that's due to my ingestion of the Cold F/X miracle drug (not actually getting endorsement fee from them but would gladly accept one if they want to!).

It's weird to have a cold in the summer time. It's more than annoying that it got in the way of my running regimen just as I was really getting it going again. I ran five times in seven days. Then woke up with a chest cough and boom. Running shoes sat empty for nearly a week.

Finally yesterday I hit the road again. Sometimes when I am going for a run I am dragging my backside out the door with the excitement of facing a firing squad. Yesterday I was tired and hungry when I got home from work but the weather was perfect. It was in the mid-20s, not that humid, a slight breeze, early evening sunshine.

And as I started to run at the corner stop sign that marks our starting line, I felt myself smile.

It was in that moment that I knew I actually do like this running thing.

***********

It was sunny earlier today. The day was beautiful in fact. So beautiful I left my umbrella at home. Unfortunately at the moment the sight outside the windows is more impending apocalypse that sunshiny days. That can't be good.

***********

I think Chad and I may need a support group. We discovered last weekend our favourite game is available in a computer version and an Xbox version. So we got them both. How did we spend our Saturday night you ask? Sitting side by side on the couch while one played the computer game and the other played on the Xbox. Conversation was mostly limited to occasional outbursts of "not another seven" or "Stop picking on me" aimed at computer players who can't hear us. If it wasn't so much fun (and so funny) it would almost be sad. Oh well. At least we have something to do other than wedding planning.
And I should, in our defence, note that the lawn got mowed, the house got cleaned, the laundry got done and we managed to pick up Missy's fluids, groceries, batteries for my Kindle light that has been dark for more than two months, and hand soap for the bathroom from Bath and Body Works which only has one store in the entire city. (I know Chad loves me when he indulged my need to go to the mall just to pick up hand soap which I know is available at each and every one of the 1,000 drug stores we passed between our house and the mall. And he didn't even complain about it!)

Shared anniversary

2010-07-27T14:46:00.003-04:00

I read today that Chelsea Clinton will be married this weekend in New York.

On July 31, 2010. One year before Chad and I will be married in Ottawa.

We will share her anniversary. (Which I doubt is significant really, anymore than my sharing a birthday with Nadia Comaneci is significant).

But we will not share her wedding plans.

Our budget will be nowhere near $3 million. Granted I'm doubting we'll have to hire a security detail to keep away the paparazzi and secure the air space around our reception. Nor is Oprah Winfrey or the current or former president of any country on our guest list.

For that I am truly thankful.

383 more sleeps!

2010-07-12T13:04:00.005-04:00

Has it really only been 2.5 weeks since Chad proposed?

So much has already happened it seems like it was so long ago!

But we officially have a date.

July 31, 2011.

We have 384 days to plan. (Or 383 more sleeps to go!)

I think my favourite response thus far was from my Grandma, who upon hearing I was engaged said "What took you so long?" She then added "and don't you wait so long to do what else is required."

Several friends who have just been married or are in the process of planning their own weddings have told me the first few weeks of planning are the worst. Trying to sort out a date and a venue and make those two things meld with all the things you and those important to you want, has certainly been an eye-opening and not all that easy experience.

When you're still on the emotional high from getting engaged you can come crashing down to earth rather quickly when you find out the venues you want are already booked for most of next summer.

But we made it through. I had a couple of small meltdowns, an one panic attack-induced moment of bridezilla competitiveness when another couple was trying to take our venue out from underneath us. We won. Then I felt bad for the other bride because I know how I'd feel if I were in her shoes.

But having the date and place finalized lifted a huge amount of stress and worry from our shoulders.

Now supposedly comes the fun stuff. Picking a dress, finding flowers, and dreaming about walking down the aisle for another 383 sleeps.

When you can't stop smiling

2010-06-27T10:59:00.005-04:00

I apologize in advance if I am easily distracted in the coming weeks.

I have this sudden inability to stop staring at a bright shiny object.

It's on my left hand.

It's gorgeous and sparkly.

On Thursday afternoon, as I returned to Ottawa after a visit to Winnipeg, Chad met me at the airport with a single red rose and a big surprise. When I got off the escalator in the arrivals area he asked me to marry him.

He insists I said yes immediately. I was a little bamboozled by the ring and the excitement and all I remember saying was "seriously?" Then I remember saying "yes, yes, yes, yes, yes."

I haven't stopped smiling since.

He whisked me home to a waiting picnic (baguette and cheese and kolbassa) and homemade banana cake and more flowers.

Every detail was thought through. He called my dad first to ask for his blessing but waited until I was in the air ("somewhere between Timmins and Toronto) to make sure I wouldn't have any chance of finding out until I landed.

We are now caught up in the whirlwind excitement of telling family and friends, learning a new language (words like "fiance" and ") and planning our big day. All I know is that I get to spend the rest of my life with the most wonderful man in the world. Nothing is better than that.

Random musings

2010-06-08T15:17:00.007-04:00

Last night we saw a television commercial for some U.S. men's retailer that I found truly offensive.

They had World War I era soldiers in trenches fighting a battle, and some dude looking for cheap suits running around looking for the store so he could make it to the sale. Nice way to cheapen a war, Mr. advertiser.

How did that make it past one person's filter, let alone the army of approvals normally needed for ad campaigns.

I only wish I shopped at the Men's Wearhouse before so I could stop shopping there now and tell them why.

***********

It's amazing how quickly one's mood can change based on a simple act of nature. I left work early on Monday and was feeling quite happy about it. I even maintained my good mood through a stop in at Cost-Co which is practically a miracle in and of itself. But then I turned on the barbecue to cook some chicken and when I went back outside to turn the meat over, it had started to rain.

My mood was immensely soured at that point.

Not only was I getting wet but the beautiful new barbecue was getting wet. I was more upset about the latter. I can dry without rusting. The barbecue can't. Besides, it's big enough to cook at least 18 hamburgers at the same time, and you can even grill the word Cuisinart right into the meat if you put it on the right spot. Not that that is important. It's just kind of funny eating chicken stamped with the Cuisinart logo.

Muttering to myself about stupid rain while I finished cooking the meat didn't seem to help much.

But then as I went out for the final trip to turn the barbecue off, I looked up into the sky and saw this:

It is impossible to stay grouchy when there is a rainbow over your backyard.

Running on full

2010-06-03T17:01:00.006-04:00

Nine days ago I ran the first road race I've ever entered. Before that the only running races I'd ever competed in were sprints during junior high track meets.

I entered the 5k for the Ottawa Race Weekend and found it an extremely motivating draw to keep running. I will admit there are many times before I go for a run that I try to come up with excuses not to run. But more than 90 per cent of the time after I go I feel 1,000 times better. I love the sense of accomplishment it gives me. It's not really showing on the scale the way I'd like yet but I know it's making a difference in how I feel and my health.

I didn't run my fastest time in the race (and unfortunately the race photos they sent are horrible and will never see the light of day) but I met my goal of running in under 35 minutes and without having to stop to walk.

I took a few days off from running after the race but now I've started a 10 K training program hoping next year to enter that distance instead. Plus Chad and I and some friends have signed up for another 5K race in September. Lots of motivation to keep running.

When I started training in mid-April after taking several months off from running (not counting the occasional treadmill workout), I was averaging over 7 minutes and 20 seconds per kilometre, walking frequently, and taking over 36 minutes to complete 5K. By mid-May I shaved it to just over 7 minutes per kilometre and on May 21, just over a week before race day I hit 6 minutes, 45 seconds per kilometre and ran 5K in 33:48.

On race day, I managed 34:44 which was almost a minute behind my best time but accounting for nerves, crowds and the hot day, I was more than happy with the results.

On Sunday I ran 5 K in 32:30, 6:31 per kilometre average. This morning, after a restless sleep and not wanting to run, I dragged my derriere outside mainly because it was the first official day of my 10 K training program and who wants to mess up the first day? The result? 6 minutes and 25 seconds per kilometre, and 32:06 for 5K.

I've been floating on air ever since.

Imagine what is going to happen when I pull it off in under 30 minutes. It's a ways to go before that I expect. But the results are encouraging.

Green thumbs and sunshine

2010-05-28T10:10:00.002-04:00

$200 worth of plants carefully selected and purchased? Check.
New garden bed by fence tilled and prepared for planting? Check.
45 kg of soil lugged off Canadian Tire's shelves, loaded into the trunk and then generously spread across above mentioned new garden bed, and poured into pots? Check.
$&*#($ gazillion dandelions pulled from the yard?
Grass mowed? Check
Aforementioned plants put into the ground? Check.

Having a yard I can play gardener in again? Priceless!

When I first moved here the yard was a bit of a mess. There was the ugly old swing set, a shed that had seen better days and a lawn that was more yellow weed than green grass. There were however many perennials already planted along the fence and int he front yard and I didn't need to do too much planting. A pot of geraniums here or there and some effort to pull dandelions was good enough.

Then in April 2009 the windstorm tore through and upended the yard. We spent all of last season putting things back together. The fence builders pretty much killed most of the plants and what they left behind we pulled out to make way for the hot tub. Chad nearly killed himself digging the pad for the tub, and he also redid the patio stones for the table which had not been laid properly the first time and were sinking.

But by the time it was all done the season was over and there would be no planting. Sniff.

So all winter long I dreamed about the yard. What could I do with it? How to make it look nice without making a garden I'd have to spend hours tending to each week. I poured through a book my dad gave me for Christmas listing all sorts of plants.

We had such an early spring the itch was on weeks ago to get going. But every weekend had some sort of reason I had no yard time and planting before the May long weekend is akin to tempting the devil.

So I waited.

At long last the long weekend arrived and I got into the yard. It's not perfect. By Sunday night after two days of digging, planting, hauling, mowing, weeding, tilling, watering etc I could hardly walk. (Thank God for the hot tub!)

But the yard looks great. The perennial bed by the back fence is new and has a few years yet before it looks really good but it's on its way. The planters of geraniums and daisy's and azalias on the patio bring some colour. I've already snipped some of the fresh herbs for use in a barbecue marinade. Hopefully by August the tomatoes and cucumbers will be generously providing us with the fruits of their labour.

It's been so hot here this week with only a few rain drops so I have been watering each night and so far things are flourishing. Some creature I think ate the sunflower tops and knocked over one of my lilies. :(

But I feel as if the chaos of the yard has been quelled.

I run for life

2010-05-09T19:03:00.002-04:00

Five years ago I probably wouldn't have been able to run an entire city block without stopping to gasp for breath. Then I bought a treadmill and started walking. When walking got boring I started running. When spring came I started running outside.

Today, despite the freezing temperatures (-1 with the windchill) and howling winds (33 km/h with gusts up to 43 km/h) I ran 4.85 K in 32 minutes and 47 seconds. On Friday, in far nicer weather, I ran 5 K in 33 minutes and 54 seconds. I beat my season's personal best by more than a minute.

I wouldn't say I'm a great runner. Not even a particularly obsessive one. I have gone several months at a time without putting on the shoes. But the sense of accomplishment and health I feel when I finish a run is almost second to none.

It's a really nice feeling to be proud of yourself for accomplishing something real.

Crispy beef addicts anonymous

2010-05-03T13:49:00.005-04:00

For my birthday two years ago Chad introduced me to a restaurant in Ottawa called Mekong. It bills itself as specializing in Cantonese, Szechuan, Vietnamese and Thai foods. It should say it specializes in crispy beef.

This restaurant, in Ottawa's small Chinatown, has become our restaurant of choice for taking out of towners, special occasions, you name it.

I like the atmosphere, the owner is a really nice man named Dennis who often sends over special dishes on the house, and the food is all really really good.

Especially the crispy beef. Something about the fried, crispy thin slices of beef in this subtly sweet and sour sauce with a hint of chili spices, just makes me swoon.

I have discovered I'm not the only one. Some of our closest friends, Syl and Cass, here also love Mekong and also love the crispy beef.

Last night we celebrated Cass's birthday and Chad's birthday. A party of 13, with Mekong takeout. Pretty much everyone at the table was almost as in love with the crispy beef as I am. In fact, one of the couples there had been to Mekong three times in three days! Even Cass and Syl's four-year-old son loved it. In fact it, and rice, were the only things he ate.

In fairness, Chad's love of Mekong includes a green bean dish with minced pork that isn't on the menu. It too is delish.

If you're ever in Ottawa I totally recommend Mekong. if you're coming to visit us you'll probably end up there for sure!

For the birthday party yesterday I also made two cakes. Cass loves cheesecake so I tried a recipe I've been wanting to make for awhile - pineapple cheesecake with white chocolate sauce and macadamia nuts. It's in the At Home with Magnolia cookbook. it was quite simple once I found macadamia nuts (thank you Bulk Barn - boo on you Loblaws for not carrying them!)

I also made a basic three layer vanilla cake with chocolate ganache filling and chocolate buttercream icing. I put some of the skills I learned last year in cake decorating class to the test. I hadn't really done it in oh, a year. Thankfully the workbook provides good instructions!

Pineapple cheesecake with White chocolate sauce and macadamia nuts.

Vanilla birthday cake with chocolate ganache filling and chocolate buttercream frosting.

Absence makes the heart grow fonder

2010-04-29T13:23:00.004-04:00

So my title is just my sincere hope that the fact I haven't actually posted anything here in um, almost three months, that any readers I may actually have in cyberspace are maybe clamouring for a new post.

I know. I live in a world devoid of reality.

I could have blogged about many things in the last few months. The fact that by the beginning of March we already had no snow on the ground, which is remarkable considering two years ago when I first moved here we got 100 cm of snow in the first week of March alone.

The fact that spring arrived so early crocuses were blooming on St. Patrick's Day and I haven't worn winter boots in pretty much the same amount of time since I last blogged!

When I made my first appearance on CTV Question Period.

A great Easter visit to Ottawa by my brother that included sitting outside on the patio in 30 degree weather and debating with Chad all day long about whether we could seriously turn on the air conditioner on April 3. He won the debate when the house was 28 degrees inside late afternoon. It still seems wrong but heck if it can snow in July we can turn on the air conditioning in early April.

My very first ever Ottawa Senators game. I hadn't been to an NHL game since I was in Washington in the fall of 2000, so it was definitely well overdue. Chad bought me a Sens sweatshirt to commemorate the occasion. Except for the boorish, drunken slobs next to us who spent most of the game threatening other fans, loudly complaining about everything and just being generally obnoxious, it was fun. Unfortunately Ottawa lost. Last weekend we went to see them in game six of the playoffs against the Pittsburgh Penguins. It was a better game, we had great seats and there were no boors around us. But unfortunately they lost.
My new goal is to go to a Sens game and have them win.

In mid-April I went out west for a conference and tacked on a few extra days to go see Reese in Seattle. I refer to the trip as the planes, trains and automobiles adventure. I'm pretty sure I hit almost all major forms of transportation on the trip - cab, plane, train, bus, boat, rental car.

My vow to not give up my running training regimen meant I managed to sacrifice precious space in my carry-on suitcase for running shoes and clothes and actually ran twice while I was away. It was breathtaking running along the seawall and into Stanley Park with the mountains in the background. The next time I tried a different route, this time along English Bay. Also breathtaking, with the smell of saltwater and the mountains and the waters of the Pacific, and then the lushness of Stanley Park. Where I proceeded to get lost and really have to wonder if
there is some law in Vancouver against putting up signs so people know where the heck they are. I also found giant cupcakes at a Vancouver cupcake bakery chain that were almost worth the $2.75 pricetag and wondering if maybe I should have gone into the cupcake business after all.
(At $2.75 pop clearly the recession is over).

I bussed down to Seattle to see Reese and Grant who are expecting their first baby in September. It was almost like old times as I helped them unpack at their new house and Reese and I tooted around the city running errands together. They were also able to prove to me that it does actually get sunny and warm in Seattle.

On the way back I stopped in Victoria to see my Grandma Rabson. She isn't really doing all that well but when I saw her last fall I expected it might be the last time I saw her and I made it for another visit. She gave me her wedding ring on this visit (I'm sure it's some not-so-subtle "I'm 95 years old and can do what I want" hint she's making to Chad and I but I'll just cherish it for its sentimental value).

On the way back to Ottawa I also had a brief layover in the Toronto airport and finally got to meet my friend Adrienne's son Aidan. Who is nine months old and a crawling dirvish of energy and cuteness.

Finally I made it home to Ottawa and was very happy to see Chad at the airport. Four cities, and that many modes of transportation in eight days was not exactly restful. I like to get away. I love coming home.

I'd post some photos but despite having my camera with me I took exactly zero photos until the Toronto airport when I snapped some of Aidan. But the camera battery died and I haven't yet recharged it and uploaded the pictures to the computer. I am just not destined to be the family photographer, that's for sure! If some computer genius can figure out a way to get the images from my memory onto Facebook that would be great!

I returned home to mostly nice weather (it snowed two days ago but I chalk that up to Mother Nature's reminder that she finds it a lot of fun to occasionally piss us all off).

Next on the agenda are Chad's birthday (May 9), my first 5K race (May 29) and then a visit back to Winnipeg in June to see the Dixie Chicks! Yes, my obsession with them lives long and prospers.

Lazy Saturdays and Lamb Chops

2010-02-10T14:49:00.006-05:00

Sometimes you have those crazy weekends when you actually look forward to going back to work on Monday to get a rest.

And sometimes you have those wonderful weekends when you have nothing planned and can just do nothing.

Chad and I refer to those days as "Lazy Saturday." We had one last weekend and it was glorious. While Chad spent the day civilizing the world on his computer, I got to curl up on the sofa with the newspaper and actually read it for fun. I pulled out the Saturday crossword and relished being able to not finish it because I can't figure out a seven-letter word for "Backspace on a PC" not because I ran out of time to work on it.

We were so into our lazy Saturday that we ended up being late for a dinner with some friends at our favourite sushi place because we kept delaying getting up to have a shower.

It made the weekend lovely even though Sunday wasn't really a great day between the Colts losing the Superbowl and my pecan caramel brownies made for the superbowl party being one of my worst baking disasters ever. They spilled over the side of the pan and burnt to a crisp on the bottom of the oven. Which our smoke detector didn't like. And probably because I was distracted by the wailing siren of our home alarm system which is connected to said smoke detector, when I tested the brownies for doneness I got it very wrong.
When I went to cut them after they had cooled and I'd already drizzled them with caramel, they were completely raw inside.

Speaking of the smoke detector, it reminds me of how much I want a vent hood for the kitchen. It goes off pretty much anytime there is even a modest amount of smoke. Last night, as I broiled Greek lamb chops poor Chad kept the smoke detector happy by waving a towel over it for more than 10 minutes with all the windows open.

Unfortunately this kitchen isn't really designed for a vent hood and I have a feeling waving a towel over the smoke detector is going to become a constant in Chad's unofficial list of household responsibilities. I told him the other day it probably fell in the "other duties as assigned" category of being a good boyfriend.

It's either that or we switch to a raw, vegan diet that doesn't require the use of the oven.

Un-settling

2010-01-30T19:28:00.002-05:00

I have a confession to make.

I think I am an addict.

But in my defence, I think last night I found a bunch of codependents on my habit.

About a year ago or so, maybe longer, our friends Sylvain and Cassandre introduced us to a game called Settlers of Catan. I'd never heard of it before and when they suggested we play it sounded very complicated and a little like I imagined Dungeons and Dragons might be without the dungeons or dragons.

But I agreed and it was a ton of fun. The gist for those of you not lucky enough to have been introduced to it, is gaining points by building cities, settlements, roads and depending on the variations, knights, boats, camel caravans, fish, etc. You pay for the building using resources such as wheat, brick and ore, which you either get by having some in reach of your cities and settlements or trading what you have with another player for what you need.
I know. It sounds complicated. But once you play once it makes a lot more sense.

We played it at Syl and Cass's all the time. A regular weekend would likely see us heading to their place for a night of games.

Then one weekend we ventured into a comic book store near our house for a reason that escapes me now. Just stepping foot in there made me feel kind of like I think I'd feel if forced to attend a Star Trek convention but I digress. They have a fabulous selection of board games. And a new expansion version of Settlers - the cool people of course drop the "of Catan" when referring to this awesome game. :)

It was an expansion Syl and Cass did not have so we got it. But then realized it was intended to go with an updated version of the original game and wouldn't work with their older version. So we got the original version. And because the regular game is for 3-4 players but sometimes we'd play with 5-6 we needed to get the "extension" sets to both expansion sets.

Following yet?

Settlers isn't just a game. It's a freaking investment.

By the time we had picked up the two other expansion sets that go with the original game and the 5-6 player extensions for both we had eight boxes of gaming goodness.

And because I am a total organizing nerd I spent one Sunday morning happily organizing all the pieces and cards into ziploc baggies each labelled with their contents so putting the game away is easy and setting it up again is far more efficient when you're not digging through boxes looking for the chip labeled "Aa" or the missing wheat hexagon.

We found the perfect "travelling" bag for the games in the form of a reusable tote from a women's clothing store I'd saved from two years ago. It is such an important bag at Christmas we found it fit some boxes of cookies we took back to Winnipeg and the bag's whereabouts were a constant concern. When my dad used it to bring some drinks over to my cousins' home, I eagle eyed it all night to make sure it went home with us.

Our obsession with the game has led us to introduce it to Chad's family at our biweekly game days and our neighbours. Before Christmas I realized my good friend Daphne and her husband also like it so we had htem over for dinner and Settler's last weekend.

On New year's eve, we were at Syl and Cass's with some other friends and because there were 8 of us we had two games going simultaneously.

But last night took the cake.

At dinner we gave a travel version of the game to Syl and Cass who are off on a sailing trip to the Caribbean for three weeks today.

We then headed to the home of some friends in Gatineau who were also in attendance on New Year's Eve for the Settlers double-showing. Chad decided just in case we should put the Settlers bag in the trunk. We got there and sure enough while some party goers hit the poker table, six of us settled down for some Settlers.
And we discovered that we were not the only ones to tote our game with us. Another couple had all their Settlers boxes in a bag in the trunk. I can't verify if they had theirs as neatly (read: obsessively) labelled as ours because our hosts also have the game. But we did spend a few moments comparing tote bags.

That's when I realized I had become an official Settlers dork.

If they ever develop a nine-step program for Settlers addicts, I might be the first patient.

Counting calories

2010-01-08T14:12:00.005-05:00

Ah January.

The time for realizing how tight the waistband of one's jeans has become and therefore a return to pretending to enjoy eating a carefully weighed-out portion of snap peas and mini carrots as an afternoon snack.

But I knew today my resolve was lessening when I was making a Weight Watchers' frozen entree quesadillas for lunch (and by making I mean putting in the microwave) when disappointment hit like a delivery of a dozen dead roses.

I opened the box to happily discover 2 quesadillas inside.

Then I read the instructions.

Remove one quesadilla. Return second quesadilla to box and put back in the freezer.

I actually debated eating both of them anyway but the weight watchers angel on my left shoulder prevailed over the tubby-looking devil with chocolate on her top lip who is perched on the right.

But I managed to soothe my disappointment by cutting off corner from the cherry-filled coffee crumb cake some cruel co-worker left in the lunch room.

Wait a second.

Do you think there are more than 220 calories in a corner of cherry-filled coffee crumb cake?

Cripes. I should have just eaten both quesadillas.

Stupid angel.

Two years ago today

2010-01-02T11:04:00.014-05:00

Exactly two years ago today I boarded a plane bound for Ottawa and another new road in my life.

It's hard to believe it's already been two years which seems like a long time. Then I counted it in days and 730 days somehow doesn't seem as long.

It's been a wonderful journey so far.

This past year has been up and down, as I'm sure many years are but despite the little annoyances, larger frustrations and occasionally bad things that happened, we are healthy and happy and can only be thankful really for everything.

The year began with layoffs in my newsroom and we had to watch as four reporters were given their notices. January 2009 also for me brought evidence of my accident-prone ways, with a fall down the stairs to "the pit" parking lot at work resulting in a bruised tailbone and a slide into the garage in a snow storm resulting in a nice dent in the front of my car.

A city bus strike carried over from December 2008 into February, leaving driving annoying and parking at the office difficult.

In April a big windstorm/small tornado roared through the backyard and left destruction in its wake. Thankfully nobody was hurt and the damage was only to the yard not the house. You can see the photos I posted here.

But the strike ended, the tailbone healed, insurance helped pay for a new shed and fence and by the end of the year, the Free Press seemed to be pulling back together as we were rehiring some of the layoffs and casting out a notice for a new reporting job.

The car is still dented but oh well.

I decided 2009 would be the year I stopped being unCanadian and embraced winter. I made it as far as skating once and going downhill skiing. It was the first time I'd been on the slopes in almost 10 years and I have to admit I was terrified. I realized halfway up the chair lift that I was much braver when I was younger. But after a few trips down and getting through the crazy leg pain of muscles that had not been taxed that way in a very long time, I enjoyed myself. Sorry but the new camera wasn't purchased until November so photos before the fall are scarce. . .

The spring arrived with a big life decision - Chad and I decided to embark upon "Project Chad", also known as moving in together. Though the official move-in date wasn't to be until the end of the summer, we spent many weeks sorting through belongings on both ends and slowly moved things over from Barrhaven to Carlington.

Late spring also brought with it a couple of accolades for the Free Press. In early June Chad and I went to Toronto to attend the Journalism Foundation gala dinner where the Free Press was awarded the distinction of news organization of the year. It is a big honour and a testament I think to the individuality of our paper.

The event included a video of the newsroom and a snippet of myself in action on Parliament Hill. Which was funny mainly because the day they asked me to get some footage of myself taken on the Hill I was busy and cranky and didn't want to do it. I didn't know what it was for and spent many minutes complaining about the ridiculousness of it. . .

We returned to Ottawa the next morning only for me to don my black gown and head to Rideau Hall for the Michener Awards. Myself, and colleagues Lindor Reynolds and Mary Agnes Welch were nominated for the public service journalism award for our series on aboriginal child welfare in Manitoba. We didn't win but it didn't matter. (See previous post on that).

Right after that my mom and Amy came for a visit. We took them to our favourite restaurant (MeKong), a tour of Parliament, and for Amy, a trip to Ikea! I also took them to the annual press gallery party at the Prime Minister's residence.

On June 21 we welcomed a new addition to Chad's family. His sister, Kristy, and brother-in-law Shawn, and niece Elizabeth added Evalyn Summer to their family. Evalyn is now six months old and although I'm biased, I think she's pretty darn cute.

I headed to Toronto for a weekend in June to see some friends and celebrate my good friend Adrienne's baby shower. Little Aidan didn't make his appearance for a few more weeks but we were able to fete Adrienne, Andrew and baby boy to be at her new condo. I made her shower cake after spending a few weeks in May taking cake decorating and had a lot of fun doing it.

In early July my best friend Reese came to visit for a few days. We had not seen each other in over a year and I was so excited to see her and she to see me that as she came down the escalator at the Ottawa airport we both burst into tears. It was a nice reunion. She spent the first night helping us uncrate our new bedroom furniture which was delivered that afternoon.
We had our new mattress for a few weeks already - a king sized slice of mattress heaven that made sleeping an entirely more wonderful endeavour - but now had the bed frame, etc to go with it.

We tried to take her wakeboarding with our friends Syl and Cass but the weather as usual was not cooperating and there was little chance I was getting anywhere near the water. But we went out in the boat anyway and Chad and Syl demonstrated their testosterone prowess.

We also introduced her to Settlers of Catan, the game Syl and Cass introduced us to last year and which has become our favourite. We play with them quite often. Almost every second week we also get together with Chad's family for game night. We've played Settlers several times, but also enjoy Clue, Stone Age, and of course, Wii.

July also brought with it a trip back to Winnipeg and the first time I showed Chad Lake of the Woods. It was a trip of 40s. We celebrated my parents and my aunt and uncle's 40th wedding anniversaries with a party in La Salle and celebrated my friend Michelle's 40th birthday with a surprise party at her boyfriend's home. I also introduced Chad to Rae and Jerry's, the Winnipeg slurpee craze and Assiniboine Park. We travelled out to Portage la Prairie to see my auntie Wendy and cousins Jonathan and Selena who I hadn't seen in several years.
Then we hit the lake, for a week of cold rainy weather.
It was okay though - several days of complete relaxation on the screen porch huddled next to space heaters was just what the doctor ordered. :) We did have some sunshine and got out in the boat a couple of times.

We returned to Ottawa for the great Missy and Leo experiment. Which went remarkably well. After the first weekend of hissing, and spitting and unhappy cats, they settled into their new life together without much trouble. Leo even seems to have taught Missy how to eat as she has gained almost two pounds since he moved in and her kidney numbers are the best they have been since she was diagnosed with kidney failure two and a half years ago.

The last weeks of August brought the final push to move Chad in, along with housing fixes and renos. He became a handyman installing a new front door, a cat door, new cabinets in the kitchen. We tested our relationship with construction projects including a television stand with more small parts than the space station, and the new shed, but came through without difficulty. Except to acknowledge that you should really never disagree with the instructions and you should read said instructions all the way through before attempting the work. . .

Our wakeboarding fun was somewhat limited by the move and other activities but I did manage to actually figure out how to get up every time and how to cross the wake inside and out. I also had my first pretty spectacular fall but was none the worse for wear.

In the fall we settled into our new life together and kept busy with work, visiting with friends and travel.

Our new "baby" arrived in late September and our hot tub has been a wonderful addition to our home. I'll add a photo when I get it off Chad's camera. :)

My parents came for a visit for Thanksgiving and we took them to the Diefenbunker and The Works. We also hosted a big dinner for Chad's family and mine. It was a great success, turkey and all.

I headed to Washington, D.C. in early November for a few days to spend some time covering former premier turned Canada's ambassador to Washington, Gary Doer. Then we both headed off to Seattle and Victoria to see Reese and Grant and my Grandma Rabson. (Where Reese and I again discovered we tend to dress alike, both showing up for lunch one day in almost identical grey and white striped sweaters. . .)

We travelled again in December to Winnipeg for Christmas. We discovered how much fun Rock Band is and I expect a set of drums and a wireless guitar are in store for us in 2010.

Now it's looking ahead to 2010 and the year's adventures ahead. A New Year always brings with it so much promise.

Happy 2010 to everyone from Chad, Leo, Missy and me.

Merry Christmas

2009-12-23T22:55:00.002-05:00

The bags are almost packed.

At least the presents all fit anyway. We might end up wearing the same clothes for the next four days but oh well.

I've spent the last 24 hours in the kitchen baking up a storm. This morning when I started round 2, I thought I was having fun. I had Christmas carols playing, it was snowing lightly outside, and I was baking cookies. It was very Norman Rockwell.

More than 12 hours and 200 cookies later it stopped being fun. But I made five varieties: Lemon sandwich cookies dipped in chocolate and sprinkles, Sweet potato cookies with praline topping, oatmeal cranberry chocolate chip drizzled with milk and white chocolate, Cracklin' Cookie crackers and Molasses Crinkle cookies. I'll report back later on the verdict. After baking all day I can't fathom eating any of them right now.

We are taking an extra bag just to get the cookies to Winnipeg but at least I feel I did something to help get ready for Christmas!

It's not even that cold in Winnipeg right now! Last year it was -30 when I arrived.

Now if the snow holds off and we get off the ground on time I'll be amazed.

Winter delayed not winter denied

2009-12-10T16:27:00.002-05:00

On Tuesday morning, there was still green grass visible on most lawns in Ottawa. There was some snow but it was a paltry amount. It was Dec. 8 and snow-lovers the city over were wailing from the late onset of winter.

By Wednesday morning, the city was encased in full on winter. The first snow storm of the season dumped about 20 cm it seems on us. It's hard to know exactly because it seems every weather report I've heard or read reports a different number.

Chad was happy because he finally got to try out the new snowblower. I'm secretly of the belief it's purchase was the reason we got all the way to December before seeing any significant snow.

I was on the bus this morning and although it's been a day since it started feeling like winter, it was like an old friend you kind of like but who quickly wears out her welcome had just returned. The thick blanket of white makes Christmas lights look that much prettier to me.

But climbing over a snow bank to get on the bus? Sitting and sweating and feeling like the michelin man in heavy winter coats and hats? The snow-covered woman who decided the seat next to me was the best place for her to sit and shed snow clumps onto my otherwise dry attire?

Those I could live without.

It would be nice to think this would all be gone in another couple of weeks. Alas, they keep reminding me global warming is a bad thing and green grass in Ottawa in January would probably not be really all that good for the world.

Maybe this will be the year I truly embrace winter. Skating on the canal followed by hot chocolate and marshmallows? Skiing the Gatineau hills followed by a nice long soak in the hot tub.

I'm guessing by the end of the season the hot chocolate, marshmallows and long soaks in the hot tub will be present and checked off said list. The skating and the skiing? That's debatable.

The spirit of things

2009-12-06T20:39:00.011-05:00

It's snowing outside.

So far we've still got green grass but I have a feeling by the end of this week it will really feel like winter.

They are forecasting up to 20 cm of snow for Wednesday. With a high of 0 and rain also forecast I don't expect 20 cm to stay on the ground but at least it will stop feeling so weird seeing Christmas decorations all over the place with green grass.

Which is a good thing because it's definitely beginning to feel a lot like Christmas around here.

I have never had a Christmas tree of my own.

As a child we used to go to my grandmother's to help decorate her tree, often with my cousins. I also remember going to some family friends to decorate their tree with their kids. It was where I learned to string popcorn and cranberries together as garlands. It was also where my dad started playing Santa Claus until us kids got wise and recognized him.

In high school, my brother's girlfriend stayed with us for Christmas one year and she and my brother got a tree together. It was in the living room but it was "their" tree.

Until now it's never really been something that interested me either. I saw the whole idea of putting up a tree as a hassle. There were Christmas trees everywhere I went pretty much so why bother with one of my own? As an adult we've always had Christmas events at my parents or other relatives never at my house so there was never a need to decorate. My mother - the Christmas decorations guru - had plenty to go around.

But this year for some reason I decided I wanted a tree. My mother thinks I'm "nesting" now that Chad has moved in. Perhaps she's right. But whatever the reason, and even though we won't be celebrating Christmas here this year anyway, Chad has obliged me and we have a tree.

Chad already had a tree to use but we aren't sure where any of his decorations are so there was a trip to Canadian Tire for my first tree decoration buying extravaganza.

Now apparently trying to buy Christmas ornaments at Canadian Tire on a Saturday in December is not a good idea. I think perhaps it should be barred in some UN anti-torture convention.

But we survived. Sort of. I had a near heart attack when what I thought was a Santa Claus mannequin suddenly came alive as I walked passed it because it really was a voice-activated singing life-size Santa.

I also thought it was funny when a woman asked us if we thought the green ornaments she was holding would go with the silver and blue ones we had in our cart. She said she had similar colours at home and was looking to branch out.

We made it out of the maelstrom - after getting a package of 48 silver ornaments for half-price because one of them was broken - and home in one piece.

Chad started pulling out the lights, I helped him string some of them, and then I excitedly watched as he plugged them in.

Oops.

Nobody told me clear white lights come in different colours!

We had initially selected just one box of lights then later decided we needed a second. I thought I checked the boxes to make sure they were the same but apparently not close enough.

One box was "warm white" and the other "cool white."

And we had a funny looking tree.

Necessitating a second trip to Canadian Tire. It was decidedly less busy at 5 p.m. than it had been at noon and it was far easier to accomplish this task.

We got home just before 6 and we had guests coming over at 7 for dinner but I was determined to have the tree up for their arrival.

New lights were strung and soon it was time to hang the first ornament.

It didn't take long. We don't have that many ornaments to hang. One special one I bought on our recent trip to Seattle to start our own collection but mostly just blue and silver balls. And three silver dragonflies we found at Canadian Tire which I had to buy since I love dragonflies.

Ba da boom.

Version one of the tree.

We had it up and the mess cleaned up with seconds to spare. I sent Chad running upstairs with the last pile of papers from the living room as our guests rang the doorbell. Now I not only had my very own Christmas tree but it was on display for guests!

Unfortunately Canadian Tire's selection of tree toppers was lacking and they didn't have the ribbon I wanted. But I found both today at Loblaw's and was able to finally finish it.

Much rain, much fun

2009-11-26T12:50:00.024-05:00

Ah home sweet home. I enjoy traveling but I also love coming home. Seeing the cats, sleeping in my own bed, having my entire wardrobe to select from rather than just a few things from a suitcase.

No more travel sized shampoos and conditioners.

But it was a great trip.

We flew to Seattle November 17th, with one stop in Chicago. It was an easy trip, not crowded, and no delays. I have decided traveling in the off-season is actually a great idea - crowds and line-ups are almost non-existent.

Our first stay in Seattle was short - a quick visit with friends Reese and Grant who graciously picked us up at the airport at almost midnight, put us up for the night and ferried us downtown to the boat docks at almost the crack of dawn.

They had to work the next day. We got to go off to explore Victoria.

The main purpose of the visit to Victoria was seeing my grandma. I believe the last time I saw her was about 4.5 years ago. She is 94 years old and she is blind, partly deaf and unable to get out of, or even sit up in, bed. But she has not lost any of the spunk that carried her through more than nine decades of life.

She has long been one to complain that she is living longer than she wanted and once even told my father she was lying in bed practicing to be a corpse. A month before our visit, when I told her we were coming, she told me she would "try to hang on" until we got there.

The first thing she said to me when we arrived was that she had "hung on."

She has many stories to tell and while I've heard most of them before I still enjoy listening to her remembering episodes in her life. I was most excited to introduce her to Chad. She seemed very happy to know I have found the love of my life.

Her room seems very barren to me and I had to keep reminding myself she cannot see anything so she doesn't notice it. But we stopped on the way back on the second day and bought her a cuddly stuffed lamb with a voice recorder in its paw with my voice on it.

She loved it. And I like to think for the time being she at least has a little bit of something from us with her.

While in Victoria I also took Chad around to some of the places my grandmother used to take me when I visited her when I was young. I used to go and spend time with her in Victoria on my own. It was raining - it rained the entire time we were there pretty much - so I couldn't take him to feed the ducks in the park like I wanted. But we drove by it. We did go to the beach though for a few minutes where Chad got to touch the Pacific Ocean.

We escaped the rain and had tea at The Empress hotel, something I've always wanted to do. Mmmm. . .scones. Probably not worth the cost but I can check it off my bucket list anyway. :)

After Victoria it was back to Seattle on the Clipper, a high speed catamaran. A decent trip but a little rocky with high winds. Thanks to the staff suggesting and offering motion sickness pills for 25 cents a dose I did not have to make use of the barf bags. We spent the next three days in Seattle, visiting with Reese and Grant.
Here we are posing in Pioneer Square, the start of Seattle. It was also where we went on the Underground tour.

It's a series of tunnels underneath the Pioneer Square area of downtown Seattle. I would explain it better but the tour guide we had, Gael, was a bit nuts. She had her moments but she was all over the place and more into telling jokes than giving good explanations of the underground.
Basically the first floor of most buildings in the area are now underground because of some sort of drainage, mud-flats issue.

Here Gael is resorting to using hand puppets because we weren't being responsive enough to her stories.

We went up the Seattle Space Needle on a VERY windy morning. It's a nice view and again, thanks to being in off season, there was no line-up and the observation deck wasn't very crowded.

On our last day we headed to the iconic Pike Place Market which I first learned about in Sleepless in Seattle and have always wanted to go see. I loved the bright colours of all the produce at this stand. There were also lots of fish stands where they were tossing fish around, giant lobster tails and a very ugly Monk Fish.

My favourite part of the market was the visit to the very first ever Starbucks. It hasn't been updated to match their other stores because of the rules of the market. So it has wood floors and a different logo. They also toss the cups around like they do the fish! I had to buy a coffee there and also got a few souvenirs for our cat sitters.

One other highlight of the trip included a tour of the Boeing plant in Everett. Cameras weren't allowed so I couldn't take any pictures at but it was really cool. We got to see 747s, 777s and the new Dreamliner 787 under construction and completed. It is the largest building in the world by volume. Apparently you could fit more than 2,100 2,000 square foot homes inside.
With 30,000 employees there are also more people working there than there are in pretty much every city and town in Manitoba except Winnipeg.

The final evening we had dinner at Reese and Grant's. Yummy Dungeness crab in black bean sauce. Here are Herman and Sherman the crabs resigned to their fate.

Crab aftermath.

The trip ended with an unexpected layover in Chicago due to fog in Ottawa. But the frustration was overcome by the in-room entertainment. It seems the room next door was rented by a man seeking some professional company. The walls were very thin and we heard everything! It left us in fits of giggles and gave us a great story to take home.

Hard to believe it's only four weeks now until Christmas. Is that even possible?

Randomness

2009-11-16T15:40:00.003-05:00

I've had many thoughts about things to blog about of late but never when I'm anywhere near a computer where I can actually post them.

Among the ones I can remember:

1. I bought myself a new digital camera this weekend as a birthday gift to myself. When Chad and I were in the parking lot outside the store we were talking about the whole "don't pay for xxx number of days months years etc" promotions almost every store has these days.
He joked that the next promotion we're going to hear is "don't pay until after your dead."
Which prompted me to respond: "Buy now. Let your insurance company pay for it later."

And then I thought hmmm. . .do these stores make you provide a health clearance to prove you won't just buy and then kick the bucket before you pay?

2. I went to get my H1N1 vaccine last weekend. I'm now 8 days post-vaccine, my arm is no longer sore and I'm apparently within 2 days of being potentially 80 to 90 per cent immune from H1N1. I wasn't going to get the shot - despite having asthma I just didn't feel like I should be a priority. but I did on Chad's encouragement. And now I'm glad I did. When a 38-year-old, otherwise healthy professor dies suddenly from H1N1 in Ottawa, it kind of makes me a little bit more worried about this virus than I was.

3. I have for the last several years bucked the whole idea of Christmas decorations. Sure I enjoy buying gifts for people and getting together with family. For a day or two I may even feel like playing Christmas carols. But I have utterly refused to so much as put up a red candle for decorating. I was almost proud of the absence of decorations in my house.
This year for some reason is different. I found myself looking for decorations online. I'm even trying to convince Chad to put up a Christmas tree and outdoor lights. I wonder if there was some poinsetta oil or elf dust in that h1N1 shot?

4. Chad and I are going to see my Grandma Rabson in a few days. I haven't seen her in many years and I am looking forward to the visit. But my Grandma has a tendency to constantly remind you she wants you to think she wishes she was dead. She once told my dad she was lying in bed practicing to be a corpse. She will often answer the question "How are you" with "Not Good. I woke up."
About a month ago when I told her we were going to come for a visit she told me she would "try to hang on" until we got there.
Yesterday I told her I couldn't wait to see her and she responded:
"Me too. I hung on didn't I?"
She might be in her mid-90s and she might be bed-bound, nearly blind and partly deaf. But she's got a great memory!

Isn't it ironic

2009-10-23T13:08:00.002-04:00

It's been a busy few weeks around here, and we've not indulged in the use of our new hot tub as much as we'd like.

So on Tuesday morning we pledged to have a soak that night. But in the evening one thing led to another and I decided I didn't have the energy so we made a pact to go in the next night after my basketball game.

When I got home from the game - a fabulous one that resulted in a tie but was played against a really nice team and was just plain fun - it was pouring rain.

But I was determined. As soon as I noticed the rain had stopped for a minute I ordered Chad to strip (don't worry, bathing suits are not optional so really I meant put on your suit and this is still a family friendly blog) and out I went. I pulled back the cover, and jumped in.

And thought, hmmm, this doesn't feel right. . .it's cold.

The temperature in the tub was just 89. Chad got in and tried to jack up the heat and figure out what was wrong but to no avail. I was sitting there, neck deep in the water, hugging my legs to my body for warmth while my teeth chattered and my lips took on a slightly bluish tinge. Well it felt that way anyway.

We giggled and stuck it out for a few minutes until I said enough, and went flying into the house - if crouched over in a towel trying not to bite my tongue off with my chattering teeth while creeping slowly can be considered flying - and upstairs to jump into a warm shower.

When Chad found me there a few minutes later I was still hunched over in said towel waiting for the water to warm up. Which wasn't going to happen because just before we went outside to the hot tub - erm cold tub - I had put on a load of laundry.

Chad took one look at me, wet, shivering and whining about the laundry and he collapsed into a fit of laughter. He did however eventually gather himself to turn off the washing machine so the shower would warm up.

Unfortunately it is more than 24 hours later and the tub is still cold. Poor Chad spent all evening until after 1 a.m. draining it, refilling it, and trying to prime the pumps but to no avail. He was up this morning to chat with the service place and figured out one of the filters was all clogged. Hopefully a new filter will be installed today and maybe, just maybe the water will heat up in time for a soak tomorrow night.

I hope so because we've invited our neighbours over to try it for the first time.

All I know is this time i'm checking the temperature before I get into the water. Or making Chad go first.

Capitvating a newsroom

2009-10-15T17:43:00.002-04:00

Nothing apparently says group activity like watching a homemade helium-filled UFO speed across the skies with a six-year-old boy in its basket.

The coverage of the events in Colorado this afternoon had everyone in my office glued to the television. We're reporters you see and we all have small televisions on our desks. mostly they are tuned to the 24-hour news stations (though occasionally my nearby colleague has his on the latest Scottish football match).

Today you knew everyone was watching when the balloon finally came down and someone in the far reaches of the office could be heard clapping and yelling at the people on the ground to grab the balloon.

Granted she was shouting "run Forest run" but we caught her drift.

Equally horrified by the thought of the little boy being in the basket, and the thought that maybe he had fallen out. Now it seems he wasn't ever in it to begin with.

And then the bad jokes began.

The man in the office we refer to as "the little ball of hate" was guffawing about "balloon boy."

And that was before we found out the family had been on Wife Swap and was making this balloon to try and find ET.

I sincerely hope they find little Falcon alive and well. Maybe he's just hiding under his bed, afraid to come out because of all the furor he may have caused.

If he isn't alive then millions of people will have a lot to feel guilty about.

Turkey Day Hangover

2009-10-12T10:45:00.004-04:00

Turkey Day in our house came a day before the technical holiday.

But I think it's safe to say it was a success. The food was all cooked on time and was more or less still warm when served. The guests all arrived on time.

Somehow we managed to fit nine adults, two children and a baby in our home, and around the table, without too much crowding.

Somehow, even with almost twice as many people as we had last year there seemed to be fewer dishes. Maybe there were just more hands to do them.

It was a nice evening of family. To have most of the people who are important to us around the same table at the same time was surely something to be thankful for.

Something else to be thankful for? The lack of guilt associated with day-after-turkey-day breakfast of chocolate brownies and pumpkin ice cream. Someone has to eat the leftovers! :)

Happy Thanksgiving one and all. Enjoy the turkey coma.

Thanks be for giving

2009-10-07T13:28:00.003-04:00

I have hosted a few Thanksgiving dinners before. In Winnipeg I hosted a couple of different turkey feasts for the "orphans" among us. Those whose families were not within driving distance. They always turned out to be fun events.

My first turkey never cooked leaving us to try and put already sliced pieces of the gobbler back into the oven on cookie sheets hoping to de-pinkify it.

The second attempt a couple of years later was far more successful.

Last year my parents came to visit and we had a small thanksgiving dinner with them, Chad and I and my parents friends. A table for six was nice and small.

This Sunday my parents are back for round two, but we've kicked the whole thing up a notch. Chad's family and my family will all be there. (We're either insane or very loving, or possibly both).

Nine adults, two children and a baby. I'm not entirely sure yet how we're going to get everyone around the table, even with the addition of a card table. It will be loud, it will be raucous but hopefully it will just be a good time for all.

I'm keeping the menu simple.
Turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, cranberry sauce, those are staples.
Corn, green beans, carrots. Those are universally liked.
Sweet potato biscuits because the recipe sounds like fun.
Regular dinner rolls for those who might think sweet potato biscuits are for the dogs.
And for dessert three kinds of pie. Only two of which I am making. Chocolate pecan being one of them.
I'm not a big fan of pumpkin pie. Not because of the flavour but because the gelatinous, icky texture.
So I found an alternative.

Pumpkin pie ice cream. It really does taste like pumpkin pie. My plan is to put it in a pie crust and serve it as such on Sunday.

If you're looking for a fun way to beef up thanksgiving dinner, and have an ice cream maker, try it. The recipe made too much for my ice cream maker to freeze in one fell swoop. So next time I'll split in half and do it in two batches.

Pumpkin pie ice cream

1 1/2 c. whole milk, well chilled
1 c. brown sugar, packed
2 tbsp molasses
1 3/4 c. pumpkin puree
1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ginger
1/4 tsp nutmeg
2 1/2 c. heavy cream.
1 tsp vanilla
1 c. crumbled ginger snaps,. vanilla butter cookies or graham crackers

With a hand mixer or stand mixer, mix together milk and sugar and molasses until sugar has dissolved. About 1-2 minutes. Stir in pumpkin and spices. Add heavy cream and vanilla. Pour ice cream mixture into ice cream maker as described in machine's instructions.
Churn 20-25 minutes. Add the crumbled cookies in the last five minutes.
Transfer to an airtight container and place in freezer for about 2 hours.

It's time to play the music

2009-10-06T14:12:00.002-04:00

"You don't sew with a fork so I don't see why you should eat with knitting needles."

This quote from Miss Piggy makes me realize how much I miss the Muppets.

There is no substitute for them or their wisdom.

EnGendering the roles

2009-09-27T00:59:00.005-04:00

I sometimes feel guilty that I am not some sort of alpha female type who bucks against centuries of sexism by working as a rocket scientist or construction worker.
Something that seems so unnaturally female that surely it must mean women have arrived.

But the fact of the matter is I like doing things that some might think are sexist. I love to cook and bake. Cleaning the house on a Sunday afternoon isn't a chore, it's a stress reliever. Knitting relaxes me.

So why the guilt.

I grew up in a home where being a girl was never seen as a limitation. In fact in my home, the gender stereotypes were surely turned on their head. My brother wanted to be a dancer. I wanted to be a doctor.

I went to an all girls' high school where we were pushed into the sciences with a sense that to choose history over chemistry was somehow turning your back on feminism and letting generations of future women to fight the good fight instead.

I headed off to university as a math major with every intention of hitting medical school.

But it was not too long after I started first year that I realized my passions and my talents were aiming in the wrong direction.
It's not that I couldn't do well in math and med school. It's that I didn't want to.

I switched my major to English and drama, started writing for fun.

I began pursuing journalism rather than medicine.

Life got sweeter.

I found my calling. I found myself among people who got me.

It was like this new world was opening up to me.

It took a lot longer however for me to accept that it is no less sexist to not pursue something you like in the name of feminism, than it is to not pursue something because you are in fact female.

My Julie Powell Moment

2009-09-14T15:15:00.003-04:00

I finally went to see Julie and Julia yesterday.

This had to be a movie made for me. A story about a writer who loves to cook?

Granted Julie Powell is way more adventurous than me. I'd never bother making beef aspic. Just the thought of it makes me throw up a little bit in my mouth.

It's one of those based-on-reality stories though that forces you to remember that people do have sudden life-changing moments for real.

If I came home from work one day to find my answering machine loaded with messages from publishers and literary agents wanting to publish a book I wrote I'd be over the moon.

Something tells me this blog isn't exactly going to get anyone's attention that way. Besides. Turning a blog into a book has to be so 2004. . .

But how can someone like me not drive home from that movie wondering how I can have my "Julie Powell" moment?

Blogging about my life would be a yawn.

Sunday: Woke up. Had a croissant for breakfast. Wrote my column for Monday's paper. Went to a movie. Went grocery shopping. Swore several times under breath when grocery store was so busy no carts were available except for three outside the entranceway that had been abandoned because the wheels were broken. And I of course tried all three of them before accepting they were sitting there for a reason. Ran into a girl I went to elementary school with. Went home. Cleaned the second floor. Made cookies. Did laundry. Watched football and knitted.
Went to bed.

Maybe there is something in there about watching football and knitting at the same time. That can't be common.

Or the fact that tonight I'm going to watch the New England Patriots on Monday Night Football and wear my Randy Moss jersey Chad gave me last Christmas for the first time. That surely will get the editors banging down my door. . .

Alas I fear my Julie Powell moment is a ways away yet.

Before and after

2009-09-09T13:07:00.004-04:00

April 2009

Mother Nature's wrath brings fury to Carlington.

September 2009

Peace and tranquility are restored.

If I was a more dedicated picture taker I would have provided some shots of the shed building in action. Or even a video. But I did not.

So you just have to imagine it.

7 hours over two days. Only about three F-bombs that I can remember. A lesson learned that when it tells you to read the directions through before starting it is to ensure you don't try to put all the walls up before adding the braces that keep them up, thereby spending several minutes running around trying to grab walls as they are falling and coming apart.
One moment of hilarity whereby Mia realizes she is not six feet tall and that waving her arms frantically at the roof pieces above her head does not make her arms grow longer or the roof descend towards her. And the growing love of the "click" sound when the plastic pieces lock into place.

Why I fell in love with my job

2009-08-20T16:49:00.004-04:00

As a kid if anybody asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up I'd have more than likely said a doctor. But by the time I graduated high school and spent two weeks in first year university, I was quickly realizing that wasn't for me.

I was maturing and realizing my one true love was writing and journalism came calling.

In my profession you get to touch on so many different stories, meet so many interesting people, learn about so many interesting topics. Heck this summer alone I thought my brain was going to explode when I had to become a mini-expert in Canada's financial system and banking industry one week, followed by nuclear reactors and isotopes the next.

I realized very quickly that while not everything I write causes a change, it does have an impact. Stories can compel people to think about issues in a new way, open up their hearts, their minds, their wallets, to help out.

It's a little harder to affect change in government or other large organizations. Usually the decision makers - be they CEOs or prime ministers, MLAs or managers, of big companies and big governments are jaded. They deal with the media every day and it's just one more part of the puzzle of getting their agenda across.

Stories critical of their actions are dismissed as belly-aching.

But every so often, you get one that sticks.

I began writing about Manitoba's child welfare system shortly after I began working at the Winnipeg Free Press. But in 2007, my colleague Lindor Reynolds and I were tasked by our boss with putting together a series to find out whether the decision to give control of aboriginal kids and families to aboriginal-run agencies had been done too quickly and contributed to the deaths of a number of kids in care.

It was not an easy series to produce. Lindor and I spent countless hours reading horrific accounts of the lives of abused children, speaking with foster parents, biological parents, social workers, former foster kids. Government officials, agency heads, aboriginal leaders.

We were up many nights into the wee hours transcribing interviews, writing stories, sorting through statistics.

We were accused of being racist.

The series was first published in September 2007. It ran over three days. What we found was a system that despite its best intentions had created a horrible mess. Kids were falling through the cracks because reuniting kids with family was the be-all goal.

It is an unfortunate fact that Canada's aboriginal population is broken. Generations of families have been tortured and tormented by colonialism, residential schools, the 60s scoop. It created a population where substance abuse is rampant and poverty is the norm. I've been to reserves where six-year-old children are sleeping off a night spent sniffing gasoline in the woods.

Fixing the problem is not simple but the child welfare system was compounding the harm by deciding that culture was more important than safety and sound training.

After the series ran we continued to write about the problems. More people came forward with information and questions and findings and the stories of more kids who died in the "system" were uncovered.

The government continued to insist there were problems but it was putting in more money and that's all it would take. It would hire more social workers, find more foster families. What the government would not do is admit it had made a mistake.

Until March of 2008, when it finally admitted it needed to do something. So the law was changed so that safety was the first and only priority when deciding the placement of a child. Considerations such as family and culture can only be looked at once a child's safety has been determined.

It may seem like a small change but it felt like we had just moved the earth.

It isn't fixing Manitoba's system. There are still thousands of kids in foster care, and thousands of others whose parents are struggling to cope.

But this is why I fell in love with my job. To have an impact.

Last June we were honoured with a nomination for a Michener Award for the stories. We didn't win, but that night we spent hours with other nominees from other news organizations all of whom had done amazing work.

They uncovered lead-laden toys and convinced the government to do something about it. They uncovered a cover up of an outbreak in hospitals and warned people about it. They got the country's 9-1-1 system updated to allow for the new technology of cell phones and computer-based phones etc. And the winners, they spent months testing Tasers and found out the devices were malfunctioning at an alarming rate.

Any one of the entries was worthy of winning and I remember sitting there that night thinking this is what journalism is really all about. We are often lambasted by the public, held up for ridicule by cynics who believe we are as much a part of the problems of our world as anyone. Sometimes that's true. The media industry is far from perfect and I rant often about the problems and how much better it should be.

But that one night, I go back to it whenever I have a bad day at the office. And I remind myself why I love my job. It wasn't about winning an award. It was about seeing that journalism, for all its downfalls and problems, can still be a good thing.

Why do I write of this now?

Because I got an email yesterday with a copy of the photo taken that night, and a link to a website where you can see all of this work, ours included.

http://www.michenerawards.ca/english/winaward2008.htm

Is it me?

2009-07-30T12:20:00.003-04:00

Okay. I moved to Ottawa in January 2008 and that winter we came within a few centimetres of breaking the all-time snowiest winter record in Ottawa.

You've all heard me complain about it and talk about the snowbanks that were taller than my garage.

I left Winnipeg with mixed feelings but thinking at the very least I'd be leaving the winters of my discontent behind. I was wrong. -40 is unpleasant but being buried alive in my house by snowbanks was just as bad.

Last summer I was bracing myself for the humidity and hot lazy hazy days of summer this region is supposed to get. Other than about a week of 30+ temperatures in early June (most of which occurred when my central air was broken) the summer just never got hot. It rained almost every day, and was generally colder than usual. There were tons of mosquitoes.

But it was all abnormal I was told. It's not usual they said.

So I braced myself for this winter, hired a snow clearing company to remove the snow from the driveway, and what happened? We got the usual amount of snow. Still a lot more than I was used to in Winnipeg but a lot less than in 2008. I thought, okay, this is a lot better. Particularly as my friends and family back in Winnipeg suffered through endless months of temperatures colder than even a polar bear can stomach.

And the weather folk said, hey the summer is going to be warmer than usual.

I was happy.

Then in April a tornado ripped through my backyard.

May arrived in all its tulip filled glory and it was so cold friends who visited the tulip festival with their kids did so wearing parkas.

June arrived with a few days of 30+ weather, and this year at least my air conditioner wasn't broken.

But once again every day I look at the forecast it is calling for rain. Last year the rain came daily but in small amounts.

A friend from Seattle visited and I hoped to show her all of this area's gorgeous outdoor parks and gardens and wildlife. It rained constantly until the morning we took her back to the airport.

I think mother nature has mistaken the Ottawa Valley for monsoon-country.

Yesterday July officially became the rainiest ever in Ottawa. Thanks to a thunderstorm that pelted water down on the nation's capital with such force I thought the windows of my 13th floor downtown office building were going to crack.

I'm starting to think I've got some weather curse on my shoulder.

10,000 things to be happy about

2009-06-24T23:19:00.005-04:00

Another blogger I read occasionally wrote recently about a book she used to have called 10,000 things to be happy about.

Apparently it was a long list of all the things that made the author happy.

Aside from the cynic in me thinking that is a bit of a lame way to get your name on a book, I actually think it's kind of a neat idea.

I mean, we spend so much of our lives usually rushing from one stress to the next, it's good sometimes to remind ourselves of things that make us happy.

Like the first warm day of spring after a long winter. Or gardens in full bloom with sweet scents wafting from them.

A crisp fall day where the leaves crunch under your feet.

An absolutely still lake.

Simple things like a complete stranger holding the door for you. Or your boss sending you an unexpected complement.

Waking up to sunshine when the weather person called for rain.

I am also sometimes reminded not to get cross about things when they don't exactly go as planned.

I am in the process of making a cake for my friend Adrienne's baby shower this weekend. She - and the shower - are in Toronto. I am not. So it's a multi-stepped task that involves transporting the cake in parts and finishing it there.

I baked the cakes last night. There was too much batter for one of the pans so I used the remainder to make six large cupcakes.

The cakes I wrapped and put in the freezer to prepare for transport. The cupcakes I put on a paper plate and covered with plastic wrap and left on the counter because there is no more room in the freezer.

I often joke that my little Missy is a carb addict. Her favourite food in the world is easily chicken. But she also loves bread. Particularly cake crumbs and pizza crusts and buttered bagels.

So it should have dawned on me that leaving the cupcakes on the counter was inviting trouble.

This is what I arrived home to tonight.

I think she probably snacked on it all day long, all the while thinking "my mom has either gone nuts or is going to be really mad but I don't care. Yum!"

Oh well. If she'd eaten one of the "good" cakes I'd have been unhappy. But since she didn't and she hasn't thrown up (at least not yet) and this probably made her very happy, I can giggle about this. A lot.

Busy bee

2009-06-18T12:47:00.005-04:00

It's been a little while since I managed to get on here to post something. Things have been a whirlwind of late.

Last week Chad and I were in Toronto briefly for the Canadian Journalism Foundation gala awards. Morley Safter and Joe Schlessinger were both honoured with lifetime achievement awards. And the Free Press was named the news organization of the year. It's a pretty big honour, voted on by the biggest players in this industry in the country.

It was a fun evening and nice to be a part of it.

Wednesday was back to Ottawa for the Michener Awards. I have never been nominated for anything before in my life so this was a first and it was so much fun. They were held at Rideau Hall, hosted by the Governor General and it was a black tie event.
It really didn't matter that we didn't win, as all the nominees were exceptional and anyone would have been a deserving winner. We had anticipated ahead of time the CBC/Canadian Press Taser investigation would win so it was not a surprise to us to hear their name called.
But it really was an event where throughout most of the ceremony all the nominees were lauded the same and then at the very end it was "oh yeah, and this one won."

After the awards we had our photo taken with the Michaelle Jean.

Of course leave it to the all-ladies entry to confound the photo taking period by sneaking out to grab a glass of wine. In our defence half of our group was taken to the bar room instead of the photo room at first and we had already imbibed when they came to find us for the photo. Then the other half of our group wanted wine as well.

But the delay didn't seem to matter much.

They also had a fabulous dinner reception with various food stations with oysters, sushi, and a ton of other food that was all delicious, and a dessert bar to make anyone swoon.

And we got a tour of the house, parts most often not open to the public, like the parlour where the Queen is taken when she visits, the formal and small dining rooms, and a magnificent greenhouse. The art on the walls was all Canadian modern art and absolutely fabulous.

After the event the group of us went back to the Chateau Laurier for a glass of champagne and a toast. The waitress, seeing us all dressed up, inquired what event we had been at and we explained the awards. So she got the kitchen to make each of us a plate that said Congratulations in chocolate and had two homemade chocolate truffles on it. yum!

Even getting stopped by the RIDE program on the way home didn't ruin the night.

Since then I have been entertaining my mother and Amy in Ottawa. It was a good visit, and we got a lot packed in, including a trip to Montreal to visit Lawrie and Kendra, a tour of parliament, and Amy's favourite I'm sure, a visit to IKEA.

Then last night I made it out onto the water for wakeboarding for the first time. It was a beautiful night, the water had warmed up to a balmy 18.1 degrees and I got up on my first try. I stayed up on my second try!

Now it's on to a hopefully restful weekend before I head to Toronto for a friend's baby shower, come home to have a visit from my dear friend Reese, and then prepare to head to Winnipeg and Kenora with Chad for our summer holiday. (Cheers to the politicos for not making me cover an election and ruining my summer holiday for the second year in a row.)

A heavenly sleep

2009-06-05T10:07:00.003-04:00

Exactly seven days ago our new mattress arrived.

It is a king sized, Serta pillow top and I have to say it is the best thing ever.

Sometimes I just stand in the doorway of the bedroom and gaze at it, expecting it to disappear because nothing can really be that good right?

I kind of get those commercials now where the poor counting sheep are put out of business!

We had counted down the days - er sleeps - until its arrival. The old mattress was from IKEA, purchased when I was first starting out as a full time employed person making more than $11 an hour (my previous high paying job) and it was the best I could afford at the time.

But it was hard, lumpy and overall not the most comfortable thing. I woke up most mornings stiff and achy.

Enter new mattress. When it arrived on Saturday they carted the old mattress away, and the old bed frame we laid out on the lawn for anyone to take. It was gone in less than an hour.

But I digress. Other than some brief stress about getting a king sized mattress up the staircase, which included me sitting on the couch in the living room with my hands over my ears so I didn't hear anything break, it went in beautifully.

A quick trip for a new duvet and sheets to fit the bigger bed later and we climbed in for a nap.

I haven't slept that well in years.

It was so comfortable we went to bed at 11 on a Saturday night (okay, we'd been out past 3 a.m. the night before so it wasn't just the bed!) and on Sunday, took a two hour nap of sweet, mattress goodness.

Now it's just to await the rest of the bedroom furniture, hopefully arriving in a couple of weeks.

Missy loves the new bed as well. Her only beef is that last night she lost her favourite torture device. We used to have a bedside light mounted over the bed that had a cord hanging straight down the wall. She loved to climb up on the pillows and gnaw on the cord knowing full well it would get us awake and up to feed her a snack.

Well last night that light, tooth marked cord and all, was removed and replaced with much better bedside lights.

At 6 a.m. this morning, I stirred to see poor Missy standing on the bed gazing up at the wall where the cord used to be with a very confused look on her face.

She figured out the whereabouts of the cord on the new light about five minutes later.

Oh well. At least I was lying in luxurious comfort while I watched that episode!

Cake photos

2009-06-05T10:03:00.004-04:00

Here is the final cake from cake decorating.

Next stop: a baby shower cake for a friend that somehow has to travel to Toronto. The cake that is. The friend already lives there.

Yes. Before you ask. I am crazy.

Graduation Day

2009-05-28T23:52:00.004-04:00

I finished my fourth and final cake decorating class tonight. And I have the graduation certificate to prove it!

I will post a photo of the final cake but I can't tonight. When I got home from class it was pouring and the cake would have been destroyed in the rain. So it is spending the night in the car. But we spent the last class perfecting the rose technique (okay so maybe perfecting is a stretch. Practicing is probably a closer fit.)

We also learned how to make sweet peas, vines and leaves.

I'm going to meet with the instructor on a Saturday sometime in the next little while to learn how to properly use fondant.

All in all, a useful and fun exercise even if preparing for each class was a crap-load of work.

And even if I'm pretty sure I've gone through half a bottle of dish soap to clean the crisco-based icing from the mixer, utensils and piping bags and tips.

And even if the leftovers of the icing are probably clogging my drain as I write this.

The other good news, completely unrelated to cake decorating, is that Missy had her six month check with the vet yesterday. She did great. I have only a few scars on my hand from her protesting while I was trying to get the blood pressure cuff onto her leg.

And the great news, is that 23 months after diagnosis, her kidneys are holding on. One of her numbers is normal and the other is down over 100 points since November.

She has lost 0.6 pounds and is down to 6.6 pounds. Which isn't great. And she has a bladder infection and is starting antibiotics. But her blood pressure is normal, her heart is strong and she is the same feisty, cuddly, wonderful little cat she has been her entire life.

Who would have thought, 23 months ago, when the horrible first vet we encountered the day she was diagnosed was ready to put her down then and there, that she would be almost two years out and still going strong.

And that makes her mama one happy camper.

Oh rosy days

2009-05-22T00:08:00.006-04:00

Overall the day sucked. Just one of those days when everything seems to go wrong, and every little thing annoys me.

Nothing major. Things like knocking over the recycling bin on the way to take out the garbage and having to chase after blowing plastic bags all over the driveway. And as I was putting them back in the bin somehow I dropped the the garage remote and had to dig through the recycling bin to find it.

I was late to cake decorating and got stuck behind a guy driving a truck who slammed on his brakes every time he hit 70 even though the speed limit was 80.

On the way home from class I had to hit the brakes to avoid a cyclist and the cake shifted and cracked and the clown toppled over and now he has a sort of war-amps them to his left arm.

Stuff like that.

But I made to the class and guess what? I learned how to make the darn rose!

And a clown.

It's not the prettiest cake you'll ever see but it's progress!

Ace of Cakes, lookout! Yeah right.

It's supposed to be fun

2009-05-21T00:38:00.002-04:00

Two years ago, my friend Christine and I signed up to take a cake decorating class together.

We both loved to bake and thought this would add a little pizazz to our desserts. Plus we both really wanted to learn how to make a rose out of icing.

We made it to the first class where the instructor had a small cake and six cupcakes prepared for everyone, and we learned how to put a base layer of icing on a cake, make some simple borders, make leaves, grass and a few other things I can't remember now.

We also got a "kit" with some tips and a few other odds and ends inside.

For the second and third classes we were to arrive with a cake already made, and with the base layer of icing on it, ready for decorating.

I made the cake. But two days before the second class the provincial election was called and I never made it back to class.

I never learned how to make that rose.

I experimented a few times after that and used some books to try and learn more.

But this spring I thought hey, I'm going to take another class.

So I signed up again this time in Ottawa. The first two classes have already passed.

In week one we learned how to make icing, how to ice a cake, and a few other things I pretty much already knew.

Again we have to bring cakes for the successive classes. But this time we have to bring all our own supplies as well. No materials came with the course fee. I spent $50 on the class and about $100 already on supplies.

And for the last two Wednesdays in a row, I've had dinner plans with some girlfriends, come home around 9:30 and had to make my cake and get a bunch of icing made, separated, and tinted the right colours.

It is a huge amount of work.

I feel like I just got run over by a mac truck after standing in the kitchen for three hours. And the icing this class uses is kind of gross. Decorator's icing has to be pretty stiff to make all those pretty flowers and designs. But it's made with Crisco. I think I've only ever bought Crisco once before in my life.

I've decided it's nasty stuff. Cleaning dishes that have had this icing on it is like removing industrial waste.

I keep reminding myself this is supposed to be fun. I'm learning something. The promised lesson on making a rose hasn't happened yet but maybe tomorrow.

Kind of makes me glad I haven't given up my day job to be a baker though.

I'm exhausted.

Overheard on the way to work

2009-05-12T23:42:00.003-04:00

I've probably not complained about the 'stairs' here yet.

You see when I first moved here I was determined to take the bus to work. And I did. For almost an entire year I was a bus commuter. I was proud of myself for saving the planet, mileage and gas money all at the same time.

What I fail to mention was the main incentive for taking the bus is the parking lot at work is 76 stairs from street level. Known as the "pit" it is nestled down beside the Ottawa River in a quite lovely spot with Parliament looming overhead and the sound of birds calling and water rushing by. But to get back up to the land of the living you must climb. And climb. And climb.

I often dread those stairs. But in December when OC Transpo went on strike for eight weeks and then in March when they had been back for a bit finally but started a work to rule campaign that left people waiting for buses that never came, I gave up on the bus entirely.

I'm back to driving. And I've come to make peace with those stairs.I've come to view the morning walk up (and subsequent 3 blocks or so from the top to the office) as part of my exercise efforts. (I can burn 60 calories on the jaunt according to my new heart rate monitor).

Needless to say I am still somewhat sympathetic to anyone climbing the stairs.

This morning though I had to laugh.

As I drove past the bottom of the stairs on the way to park, I spotted two women chatting on the second landing.

By the time I drove over to the end of the lot where our spots are, parked, checked my blackberry, answered a few messages, got out, locked the car and walked back to the stairs (at least five minutes or more) they had made it about 2/3 of the way to the top.

Where they were clinging to the railing and muttering profanities in between gasping for breath.

But I had to choke back a chuckle when I passed them.

"We're almost there," said one woman to her friend. "And when we get there I know where there is a bathroom and an ice cream shop."

It kind of made me wonder how long they'd been on the stairs and whether or not a few less ice creams and a few more stairs may have prevented this long torturous journey for them in the first place.

I also thought, 'nothing like a pee and a dipped cone as the dangling carrot to keep one trudging up those damn stairs."

Spring cleaning

2009-05-10T23:19:00.002-04:00

Things accomplished and discovered during spring closet purging activities 2009:

-filled three garbage bags and one box with clothes, shoes and bags for charity

-filled 1/4 of a green garbage bag with non-donatable clothes, shoes etc.

-filled two Rubbermaid storage bins with winter clothes I now won't need for hopefully six months, but then thought maybe it was premature since my neighbour insists he saw snow on the ground this morning and the high today was somewhere south of 7 degrees Celcius.

-discovered I can easily part ways with favourite pajama bottoms that have been accidentally bleach-stained, formerly favourite sweaters that are a little too pilled to be considered chic anymore, (as if they ever were to begin with but I can live in denial right?) and even the very first sweater I ever knit myself because, well, it never really fit right anyway. But damn it if deciding to get rid of any one of my purses was not pure torture.

-Feel vindicated knowing I did finally manage to put in the charity pile at least five purses which is five more than were in that pile after the first go around with purse purging.

-Wonder how far $21.78 will go in replacing those five purses since that is the amount of change I found when going through all of my purses.

-Realized next time I need hair elastics I should shop in the purse closet before hitting Shopper's Drug Mart since every purse contained at least one.

-Wonder why I seem to have an aversion to ever tossing away bus transfers, ATM receipts or unreadable cash register receipts, and feel a need to always leave at least one of each in every bag I own along with the aforementions hair elastic.

Name game

2009-05-08T15:34:00.003-04:00

When I was growing up I remember wishing my parents had named me something more popular.

Like Kristin or Jennifer.

Partly because I seemed to think as a child that having a popular name helped your social status at school.

Partly because my name was never on any of those glittery pencils or rulers or magnets or other unacceptably expensive novelty items.

As I got older I wished I had a more popular name because I got tired of always correcting people in the pronunciation. Especially among people who seem to not be able to correct their mistake after being told several times they are wrong.

Someone who pronounces my name properly the first time always gets extra points in my eyes.

It's just one of those pet peeve things.

I have however grown to believe having a more unique name is nice.

But it still for some reason gives me great glee to see my name moving up the ranks of popularity.

When I was born, Mia was the 494th most popular baby name in the U.S.

According to the latest statistics released by the U.S. government today, in 2008, my name had
vaulted all the way up to no. 14. I'm about to crack the top 10 baby!

I am jazzed about this mainly because the more popular it becomes, the more likely it is people will know how to pronounce it and not constantly call me M-eye-a.

I also know that my name is now likely to be on those glittery pencils. And I can guarantee you the next time I see one I am going to buy it, just because I can!

So long swing set

2009-05-06T09:28:00.010-04:00

When I first came to look at this house in November 2007 I loved almost everything.

Except the swings.

A set of old, rusty, metal swing set. It has been there I'm sure for 30 years. It is the type kids played on in the 1980s, and resulted in many emergency room visits because the metal is sharp, and kids being kids, found more ways to use them than just swinging.

I am sure when that swing set was installed there were some very happy kids living here. I bet they couldn't wait to get home from school to play in the yard on their swings.

I imagine there were birthday parties in the back yard where the swings got great use.

But by the time I moved in they had become an eye sore and a safety hazard.

Last summer I had a barbecue for some old university friends most of whom had kids. And said kids thought the swing set was a great thing. Until they tried to sit on the bucket-swing thing built for two and the seats promptly broke off.

Just another reason to get rid of the swing set.

But that thing was built like a freaking indestructable statue. Nothing moved it. The metal poles were secured in the ground in cement blocks.

Not even that tornado that funneled its way through my backyard almost two weeks ago now.

But I am proud to say on Sunday morning, while we were cleaning up what was left of the debris from the tornado, Chad decided to make a go at the swings.

And discovered the cement blocks were neither that deep nor that wide.

About an hour of work to dig the six blocks up, take apart the bolts and pull the whole thing out of the ground and boom it's a goner.

Now when I look out at my yard from the house I don't see the eye sore I see lawn. Well okay, right not it's lawn littered with swing set pieces that haven't yet been taken to the dump. But if I sit down in the dining room the window blocks the view of that and all I see if emptiness. No swings!

Yay!

This is the swing set after the tornado. You can see the huge trees the storm took down in the background.
But that swing set was still standing tall. (Though you can also see that the two-sided swing thing on the left side is missing one seat.)

Look Ma! No Swings!

All that is left are six big holes in the ground where the cement blocks were. Not quite deep enough to see China.

Now all that is left of the swings are these poles, still secured in their cement casings.

And that is all that is left of the swings and the rest of the debris from the shed. Hopefully most of it will disappear tomorrow when the garbage guys come.

And remember that trashy-looking pile the tornado left after tearing apart the shed?

All clean! Now it's just a matter of settling with the insurance company and getting the new shed and fence in place and it will seem as if it never happened. . .

So much space

2009-04-29T23:43:00.003-04:00

They came and hauled the trees away today. Well most of them. There are still some logs in my yard and the trunk of one pine tree in my neighbour's.

But when I got home from work today it really was evident how much we are going to miss those big trees.

My yard seems vast and empty right now.

It's amazing how much that big pine tree and the shed cozied it up.

Now come the decisions about how to go about rebuilding it so it's cozy once again.

I'm pretty sure it's going to involve a fence. The cheap, low, chain-link fence that was there is pretty much gonzo. It was no match for the weight of 50-year-old plus trees.

I've learned the hard way how awful it can be to deal with insurance companies and contractors and adjusters and assessors and neighbours in a stressful situation. I did very well the first few days after the initial shock wore off. But I had a mini melt down this morning when nothing was coming together and nobody seemed to be doing what I needed them to do and the pressure was driving me around the bend.

But I was talked off the ledge and it all worked out. I'll spare you the details because nobody really needs to hear me whining. But let's just say I hope all the people who respond after a disaster treat people who lost far more than a few trees and a shed and a fence, a lot more professionally and competently than they have handled me this week.

All I tell myself now is this too shall pass. It is summer. It's beautiful outside. And in the grand scheme of things life is pretty darn good right now.

If tornadoes gave you some warning

2009-04-26T21:40:00.007-04:00

I could show a before and after photo of my back yard.

But all I can do is show the after because the funnel cloud that swept through my neighbourhood last night showed up without so much as a by your leave please.

It had been a gorgeous day - 28 degrees and sunny for the most part and I spent the better part of the day in my yard cleaning it up from the winter. Raking, digging out some overgrown raspberry bushes. Chad helped me get the patio set out of the shed where it had been stored all winter, and I got that all set up on the patio.

Around 6:45 I left the house for the night and it was very muggy and still very warm. It started to rain shortly after that and a storm looked imminent but other than some hard rain and a bit of wind it didn't seem that bad at the south end of the city where I was.

Meanwhile my neighbours were watching craziness. They said around 7:30 the sky got black and they decided to pack up their patio dinner and head indoors. Literally a minute after they went inside, a crazy wind came through. It knocked over trees all over the place.

It appears now it was a funnel cloud. You'd never know anything happened until you turned onto my street where there are trees down everywhere. I'd say at least two dozen gorgeous huge cedars and pines and Elms came down.

It was like a domino effect and one started coming down and taking out the next so there are trees lying down across all our yards.

It destroyed my shed, sent my giant pine tree shooting into my neighbours fence destroying that, and yet it left the yard right to the south of me, which is about a 10 foot distance from my shed, completely untouched. Not even a single plastic plant pot is overturned.

Thankfully nobody was hurt. It is a bit wild to look outside and see the damage. There are phone and cable lines down all over the place. Some neighbours had trees fall on and destroy their cars. At least one had four trees fall on their house and they have been told not to stay there because there might be structural damage.
A few streets west, the roof got ripped off an apartment building.

Of course the ugly old swing set that I've been wanting to get rid of since I moved here is perfectly fine. I fear what that means about how hard it really is going to be to get it removed.

The damage is all very localized in pockets which is why everyone thinks it had to be a funnel cloud. So far one witness says he saw what looked like one.

All I know is I'm glad I wasn't home when it happened and I'm glad the damage isn't worse. Nobody got hurt. And except for the one family with the house damage, the trees for the most part took out sheds and garages and cars, and left the homes intact.

There is a lot of clean-up coming our way and my first call in the morning will be to my insurance agent.

I hope I'm not about to learn the hard way how difficult insurance claims can become.

Laughing all the way

2009-04-19T23:13:00.002-04:00

Four spots in the car filled with happy, shopping-hungry women? Check.

Target parking lot almost empty upon arrival? Check.

No wait at Texas Roadhouse for those amazing hot buns with apple cinnamon butter? Check.

An outlet mall surrounded by barnyard smells in the middle of nowhere New York? Check.

Fabulous find of middle eastern restaurant in cool part of Syracuse? Check.

Hotel with hot tub and make-your-own waffles for breakfast? Check.

Afternoon spent at the mall with a Pottery Barn AND a Cold Stone Creamery? Check.

Laughter until my stomach almost burst? Check.

It was a great girls' weekend and I returned home weary, a little poorer but more stylish, and to a clean house, a happy, well-fed, well-loved cat, and the warm arms of my favourite person.

What more could a girl want I wonder.

Not very much.

Easter Monday Sunshine

2009-04-13T12:03:00.003-04:00

It's been awhile since I actually wrote in here. Life keeps ticking along well but usually is too boring to post about.

I have the day off today. It's not a regular holiday for us but because the government offices are closed I decided to take the day as well.

Of course Stephen Harper's penchant for messing up my vacations is repeating itself because he is planning to be in Winnipeg tomorrow and I am spending part of my day off working trying to figure out the details of the visit. But I'm trying hard not to focus too much on that and focus instead of just enjoying the day.

I am getting my car oil changed, and then having a massage and a manicure and pedicure this afternoon. So I will get to enjoy it even if I have to fit some work around the play.

It's chilly out but sunny and the week promises to be gorgeous. By Friday it is supposed to be 18 degrees outside! I can't even remember what 18 degrees feels like!

Easter weekend was nice and relaxing for the most part. I didn't accomplish much other than reminding myself I'm supposed to be dieting not chowing down on hot cross buns and Mccain deep and delicious cake. . .My plan was to get up and run this morning seeing as I didn't have to race off to work but I stayed up until 2 a.m. playing a new game on the Wii and I slept in and haven't been near the treadmill. Maybe later. We'll see.

Right now I am making menu plans and grocery lists for the week. That is half the battle - having the right foods in the house.

I did manage to pay some homage to both Easter and passover. On Saturday morning we had hot cross buns for first breakfast and fried matzo for second breakfast. And I made matzo ball soup to have for dinner this week. Yum.

Next weekend I am escaping Ottawa with some girlfriends for a shopping trip to Syracuse.

And then the month will almost be over and hopefully it will be getting warm enough to start doing yard work. In the meantime I have an aggressive plan to clean out my closets and drawers. You'd think I wouldn't have too much to go through having just majorly purged my belongings a year and a half ago when I moved here. But I'm feeling the urge to purge. . .

Water water everywhere

2009-03-27T00:03:00.002-04:00

I think it is my lot in life to always have water where it doesn't belong.

And then I feel guilty because I am here in Ottawa and not in Manitoba where they have more water than they ever wanted and people are losing their homes. Or in Fargo where the entire city might be flooded.

But in the two homes I have owned (well okay rented from the bank!) the most common problem is always related to water.

In Winnipeg it was water seeping through the basement walls, water backing up through the main floor drain, water coming back up the sink, water leaking from the bathtub pipes, water leaking through the roof. Then there was the year there wasn't enough water and the ground started to separate from the house and the solution was to turn the hose on the ground and let it run so often my water bill was somewhere north of ginormous.
But normally it was all about water, so much so that I seriously considered looking for a plumbing dating service because I thought the fates were trying to send me a message or something with the number of plumbers I had come through my house.

Here in Ottawa I thought I might be free of the water. And so far, knock on wood, I have not had water coming through the basement walls.

But in the last fifteen months I have had to have a plumber come out and fix the clog in the main floor drain, which just for fun is located underneath the floor of the finished bedroom in the basement without any easy access point.

And about a month ago I woke up to find my furnace not working and the house very cold. And the problem was that the drains from the furnace were clogged. Apparently a high efficiency furnace like I have drains water. Who knew?

The furnace repair people who I had somehow thoughtfully put on a year-long warranty plan happily came out and fixed the drain. And I didn't have to pay a cent. Or so I thought. . .

This morning I awoke and thought, hmm, it's cold in here. And sure enough. The thermostat was measuring below 17 degrees and it was set to be 20. And the furnace was not on.

Down to the basement and what do I find. Water water everywhere.

It turns out the drain the furnace was connected to is the same one my kitchen sink goes through and whenever I was running water in the sink it was actually going straight into the furnace! There was so much water in the furnace it was backing up the pipe that carries the exhaust outside!

The repair man was surprised. Not as much as I was when I watched him blow on the dirty gross gungy drain hose from the furnace to get the water flowing the other way which nearly made both of us throw up. . .

Regardless. . .

My hometown is facing off against a flood and despite all my water woes, I am high and dry and hoping for the waters to pass as quickly and as peacefully as possible.

Mother Nature is certainly exacting her revenge on Manitoba and North Dakota right now.

Be safe everyone.

Pressure packed

2009-03-25T21:07:00.003-04:00

It was playoff day for our basketball league.

You know the one I joined in September and proved to be one of the best decisions I've made because I loved it?

We were supposed to play two weeks ago but the league messed up the reffing schedule and we got there at 10 p.m. for our game but there were no refs. So it was rescheduled as a double header tonight. If we won - we played again right away.

First game. First quarter. We were up by 3 points.
Second quarter. We were up by 5.
Third quarter. Up by a few. I don't remember.
Fourth quarter. In the final minute they scored and put themselves up by two. So we called a time out, just like in a real game!!! And played our shooters and drew the foul and Karine was on the line. There were eight seconds left. If she missed one, we'd lose.

First shot. Nothing but net. Swoosh!

Second shot. You could hear a pin drop. Or maybe that was my stomach churning! Swoosh!

She made them both! We tied the game up and it went into overtime.

But it was a sudden death overtime. Whoever got the first basket won. They got it. We lost.

It is somewhat sad but it was a good ending in many ways to a great season. And we're all talking about playing again next year.

But we're going to get real jerseys this time. That's going to make all the difference.

Well that and I think I may invest in a basketball hoop for my driveway and spend the summer practicing. My driveway is so long it could be an entire regulation length basketball court I think!

Now the really important part comes.

The season wind-up!

Wiiing all the way

2009-03-23T12:28:00.003-04:00

Since Christmas I have been searching for the elusive Wii Fit balance board.

I finally found one online and it was delivered last week. I have to admit it is perhaps one of the best inventions I've seen of late.

It combines fun with fitness and has me actually really wanting to work out. It's one thing to step on the scale when you've had one too many caramilk easter eggs. It's a whole other thing to step on the Wii Fit and watch the cartoon character plump up with ominious music and then hang their head in shame. . .

Between slalom skiing and hula hooping and ski jumping and heading soccer balls you can do sit ups and leg lifts and step aerobics and even run on the spot while chasing a cartoon character around a cartoon course.

Two other women here in the office have one and every day we've had fun comparing Wii Fit stories and achievements. And it keeps track of your progress so if you are in any way competitive you want to keep going back and trying again to beat your record, be it running the race or keeping your balance while holding your leg up etc.

It has a few flaws - the Wii Fit age estimator is a little wonky IMO. I was 45 the first time I stepped on it. Two hours later I redid the body test and I was 38. The next day I was 31. On Saturday I was back up to 41 and yesterday back down to 31. Now unless my balance and centre of gravity is taking some source of illegal narcotic I am not aware of, the age business is already meaningless to me.

Plus a friend of mine who was using hers was pregnant and there was no way to let the machine know she was supposed to be gaining weight. So every time she stepped onto it it admonished her for snacking etc.

But considering the only exercise most video games give you is for your fingers, this is a fabulous way to combine activities and games. It won't totally replace activity - running on the spot in front of a cartoon course is going to lose its novelty really quickly so I think I'll stick to my treadmill in winter/outdoor paths in summer running plans. But I find myself wanting to get on it every day and check my body test and try and best my old records.

Ask me in six months whether the balance board has the same thick layer of dust on it as my weight bench and free weights, but I'm pretty sure this is going to have been a pretty wise investment.

Mondays don't always suck

2009-03-16T23:08:00.002-04:00

Except for the brief afternoon interlude with a very annoying communications person from the department of defence (whose title I think should be changed from communicator to information refuser), today was about as good as a Monday can get.

One-on-one interview with potential future prime minister of Canada? Check.

Not making an ass of oneself during said interview? Check.

Getting to said interview on time? Check. Okay that one is a 'phew, he was later than I was" sort of check.

Sunny blue skies, and above zero temperatures making for a pleasant afternoon stroll when running over to the Hill to pick up a report? Check.

Sticking well to diet plan and not eating anything off list, even that really scrumptious looking chocolate chunk cookie at Starbucks when purchasing afternoon caffeine fix? Check.

Pleasant and relaxing evening with boyfriend, chicken salad, and Monday night comedies? Check.

Now, if I can get my bedtime routine on time and get a decent sleep maybe my goal to get up and run on the treadmill before work tomorrow will happen and Tuesday will start off just as well as Monday.

All the things you never wanted to know about Barbie

2009-03-12T13:16:00.006-04:00

I wasn't ever really a big Barbie kid. I had Barbies. Lots of them. But for some reason I was more enamoured with Strawberry Shortcake and her fruity friends than Buxom Barbie and hers.

But I do remember playing with Barbie. And I do remember fighting with my brother after he thought it would be fun to shave one of my Barbie's heads and draw "tattoos" on her forehead.

Now Barbie is 50. She turned the half century point March 9, 50 years after she made her debut at the American International Toy Fair.

So this week we are inundated with Barbie. Mattel created a new division, Barbie Media, to help document the milestone and provide inquiring minds like mine with information.

Barbie may only be a toy but she is pretty darn influential. She's run for president four times, has had 108 careers, and been dressed by 70 of the world's leading fashion designers. She has a team of 100 people including stylists, seamstresses and pattern makers to create a new outfit.
All that is pretty good for an 11 1/2 inch busty woman forced to always walk on her tippy toes. (I'm only mildly miffed that a plastic doll has her own stylists and I don't but I digress. . .)

Mattel claims there are three Barbie dolls sold every second around the world. She's on the shelves in about 150 different countries. But not in Saudi Arabia. She was banned from there because she's icky.

She has been studied by medical researchers - who claim she is too skinny and would lack the 17 to 22 per cent body fat a woman needs to um, be able to bear children. She has been studied by sociological researchers, one of whom found girls seem to go through a phase where they destroy their Barbie dolls which is some sort of weird end of childhood ritual. (I didn't notice whether she studied why brothers seem fascinated with destroying Barbies but I'm guessing that's probably just because they are also fascinated with annoying their sisters).

She has been the subject of no end of court cases, most of which involved Mattel suing someone else for copyright. Mattel doesn't win many of them but they hit the motherload recently when a judge in the U.S. ordered MGA Entertainment to pay Mattel $100 million and stop selling Bratz dolls because the person who created Bratz was working for Mattel when Bratz were created. (Bratz are those freaky-looking sort of Barbies with disproportionately sized heads and buggy eyes).

Law makers in West Virginia just this year introduced a bill to ban her from being sold in that state because she influences girls to want to be beautiful.
(Um, then we'd have to ban the use of attractive women anywhere, but I digress).

She has been the subject of polls, including one by Harris-Decima which apparently uncovered the incredibly important fact that women from Alberta are the most likely to have played with her as a child.

Why that's important to know I'm not sure but it can't be any less important than knowing that Barbie has had 40 pets in her life including a giraffe, which is I'm pretty sure impossible because who has a pet giraffe?

I think Barbie dolls now sell for about $20. But the first one sold for $3. According to Mattel, an original 1959 Barbie in mint condition would be worth about $27,450 today. Not a bad investment apparently.

I wonder how much the hair-less Barbie with an unfortunate tattoo on her forehead would fetch on ebay?

Giving winter a small hug

2009-03-11T13:50:00.004-04:00

At the beginning of this winter I decided enough was enough with my hate on for the coldest months of the year.

I'm Canadian darn it all and I should start acting like one.

So I decided it was time to embrace winter. I bought a new ski jacket and ski pants since my hot pink and lime green 1980s era Sun Ice jacket is slightly out of style. . .I had visions of spending long Sunday afternoons skating on the canal, and was going to dust off the old downhill skis for the first time in years.

Alas, time passes quickly. The ski jacket got good use as a warm jacket for walking to and from my car and the office. But the weeks passed and there was no skating. No skiing.

Finally a few weeks ago we did end up going skating, not on the canal but at a neighbourhood rink and it was tons of fun. It was a beautiful day, and I had a lot of fun helping Chad's three-year-old niece learn to skate.

We didn't make it out again but at least we went once.

Then this past weekend we finally did the skiing thing.

I was quite excited about it. The day was going to be perfect - warm and sunny. But then we got to the hill and I was looking up at the mountain and thinking, 'man that looks pretty steep!'

And then we strapped on the skis and got to the chair lift and I was getting more nervous by the minute. Half way up the chair lift, I realized something profound.

I was a lot braver when I was younger.

The idea of getting off that chair lift terrified me.

But somehow as soon as we reached the top the skis and my body seemed to remember what to do. It was like riding a bike.

The muscles in my legs were not all that impressed with me the first few times down the hill, but I got braver and more comfortable with each run.

So skating once. Skiing once. Maybe I didn't really embrace winter but I think I can honestly say I gave it a little hug.

But all that said. It's 10 degrees outside today, I saw pockets of green grass poking through the snow on the boulevard on the way to work, and the forecast for the next week is all above zero.

Spring is on the way. And after spring comes summer.

Now that's a season I can have a serious relationship with.

Economic stimulus run amok

2009-03-04T12:48:00.002-05:00

I know right now any cent spent can help remove the mushroom cloud that is lurking over the world's economy.

But since I am still one who thinks $40 is a lot to pay for a hair cut, I'm curious if this can be considered an economic stimulus or whether it's just plain crazy.

$80,000 hair style

Triple whammy

2009-03-02T13:53:00.003-05:00

I was awakened this morning by the furry white creature who believes herself to be an alarm clock.
And when I opened my eyes, about 6:40 a.m., I felt like I had been run over by a truck.
Achy? check? Headache? check. Stuffed up? check.

Seems the cold fairy has descended on me.

After ignoring her left her to attempt to eat the books on my bookshelf, I got up to feed her and went downstairs to think, hmmm, it's unusually cold in here. A thermostat check confirmed my fears - it was only 15 degrees and although the thermostat was set for 18 the furnace was not on. Uh oh.

But feeling like crap I fed the white creature and returned to bed hoping when I woke up again about 45 minutes later when my real alarm clock went off,t hat the furnace would magically be working.

Nope.

Feeling even worse myself, I called in sick to work, turned on the fireplaces and went back to sleep.

When I finally got up from my coma, mid-morning, it was to the sound of said furry creature throwing up. Again. And Again. And again.

It was a triple whammy bad day.

Thankfully another dose of my allergy medication and some advil seemed to perk me up. Stomach meds for the cat seemed to stop her vomiting. And a call to the furnace company led to a very quick visit by a technician who fixed the furnace at no charge. (well, okay I am paying to be on a service plan with them but it didn't cost me any more than I have already paid to have him come out and now it makes it worthwhile that I joined said service plan).

So now I have done a little work from home - minor stuff like getting another reporter to take on a story I should have done today, and answering some questions from an editor.

And having assuaged my guilt at staying home (I could be one step from the grave and I'd still feel guilty about calling in sick) I am heading to the couch for some good old fashioned television watching. Now that the den is no longer so cold I can see my breath that is.

And if bad things come in threes I figure I'm clear for at least this week. . .

Nothing can stop me now

2009-02-23T15:42:00.004-05:00

I was actually excited to leave the house to go to work this morning.

And it wasn't because President Obama wasn't back for an encore.

And I was excited even though it was Monday morning, and -22 with the windchill outside, and my cat decided that 5:52 a.m. was a perfectly reasonable time to wake me up to request breakfast.

Why was I excited? Because for the first time since moving into my house almost 14 months ago, I have a working garage door opener.

There was no struggling to lift the heavy door from the bottom, no having to get out of the car to close the door after backing out.

It was as simple as press the button, get into the car, reverse, press the button, go on my merry way.

Yes I'm aware this makes it seem as if I need to get out more and that I am so lazy getting out of the car to close the door is too much to handle.

But I think my excitement at this turn of events stemmed in part from the fact that the process to get a simple garage door opener working was more complicated the landing a man on the moon.

First, I had to have an electrician come out and figure out why the power wasn't working in the garage.

Then I had to (okay, Chad had to) grease the door's rails or whatever they are called so the wheels on the door could slide more easily.

But the door itself wouldn't go down unless you held onto the button.

So, then (well okay, three months later) out came the garage door repair man, who spent over an hour fixing little issues (which by the way, did not include the button having to be held down because as soon as he arrived that problem was miraculously fixed!).

And then finally came the search for a clicker that would work with the somewhat ancient contraption in the garage as the universal remote I bought at Canadian Tire did not.

But it is finally working and even though I was starting to think it might have been easier and cheaper to just rebuild the entire garage, I am very happy it is finally working.

And my excitement at using it on the way out today is nothing compared to my excitement at the prospect of using it on the way home tonight.

Someone's got to take the fall

2009-02-13T15:35:00.004-05:00

In keeping with my love of list making I saw today a headline that made me think: "Wow, now there's a list I am glad I'm not on."

25 People to Blame for the Financial Crisis

It's nice to know when you're not alone

2009-02-06T11:36:00.003-05:00

About a year ago or so I posted a blog complaining about the state of the kitchen in our office.

The science projects in the fridge, the endless piles of dirty, food-encrusted dishes in the sink, next to the sink, all over the place really.

I ended up bringing my own dishes from home so I always knew I'd have clean cutlery, glasses, coffee mugs and a bowl to use when I need it. When I use them, I wash them and bring them back to my desk so they don't get contaminated by kitchen crud.

This morning I found out I am apparently not the only one grossed out and frustrated by the colleagues who seem to think the communal kitchen is to be used like we're living in a frat house.

A guy who sits right next to me sent the following e-mail:

Colleagues:

I love you all dearly and don't say that often enough but my love has been sorely tested these last few mornings when, upon arriving in the kitchen to prepare a mug of coffee, I am confronted with this:

Now I realize my time might not be as valuable as your, but could I gently ask that, if the dishwasher is running when you arrive in he kitchen with a dirty dish, why not just quickly wash whatever you used by hand and replace it in the cupboard? If the dishwasher is full with clean dishes, earn that extra good karma and take a minute or two to empty it. If you use a paper coffee cup, perhaps you could go those extra few feet and put it in the trash rather than leave it next to the sink?"

We have no system for ensuring the kitchen is kept clean - one of the receptionists usually takes it upon herself to put the dishes in the dishwasher before she goes home at night and turn the dishwasher on, but that shouldn't be her job alone.

I can hope this latest email will help solve the problem but I have a feeling if I held my breath waiting for that to happen, I'd suffocate long before any of the slobs figured out what the Sunlight bottle next to the sink is for.

Adrenaline rushes of an armchair quarterback

2009-02-02T11:33:00.004-05:00

For the first time yesterday I watched the Super Bowl and actually had a team to cheer for, knew some of the players, knew some of what they were doing and could actually cheer when good things were happening and hide my head when things weren't going so well.

It was fun. But I was a stress case of the first order.

The adrenaline rushes, and abject stomach-ache causing worry whenever something good or bad was about to happen were a bit insane.

I think it's probably a good thing I was never interested in pursuing higher athletics. I think I'd have spent most of the games in the bathroom praying to the porcelain god.

Anyway, it was still fun. Even if the Cardinals lost. And even if some of the reffing was suspect.

And I got to make cupcakes which for me is high on my list of fun things to do.

You will notice there is an absence of any cupcakes made for the uh, Super Bowl champions.
We did suggest to eat a cupcake you had to be cheering for the Cardinals . . .

25 random things about me

2009-01-30T15:32:00.003-05:00

There is a thing going around, mostly via Facebook, about 25 random things about yourself. I've enjoyed reading the few I've seen but rather than post in on Facebook and tag a bunch of people who then may feel obligated to read it, I thought I'd put it here, so only people who actually like reading my random musings will be hit with them.

In no particular order:

25 random things about Mia.

1. When I was a baby one of my first words apparently was four letters long and rhymes with Duck but starts with an F. But in my defence I was trying to say Truck but apparently couldn't pronounce the "T".

2. I am a big fan of gymnastics. Partly because I was a gymnast when I was young and have always regretted quitting at 12 when my gym went bankrupt and I was too nervous to try a new one. One of my odd talents would probably be an ability to name every women's gold medalist in the Olympics in gymnastics in every event since at least 1992.

3. I have lived in nine cities in three different countries throughout my life. And I have had 15 different addresses. My favourite place would probably be Washington, D.C.

4. Among the famous people I have met or seen in person are Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Jimmy Carter, Carol Shields, Keanu Reeves, Ralph Nader. Al Gore, and Liza Minnelli. I once thought I was getting onto the same plane as Jodi Foster but then decided it wasn't her when she was also sitting in coach.

5. The absolute most beautiful spot on earth is the pools of the Seven Sisters near Hana, Hawaii.

6. I hate red lights.

7. When I was about 10 I was obsessed with Little House on the Prairie. I wanted to be Laura Ingalls and used to mix all the nuts and sunflower seeds I got in my Halloween candy bag together to make a 'stew" because that's what Laura ate. And I would fall asleep at night wishing I could wake up in Minnesota, circa 1890.

8. I used to not even be able to run as far as a single city block. But in 2006 I started training to run further and in October 2006 I ran a 5K charity race without stopping. It's not that far but it was a huge accomplishment for me.

9. If I was on a deserted island I'd like to have with me my cat, a box of pens and an endless supply of notebooks.

10. If I wasn't a journalist I think I'd like own my own bakery.

11. If I could choose between winning an Olympic gold medal, a Nobel Prize or an Academy Award I'd go for the medal.

12. If liver were the only food left on the planet, I'd starve to death.

13. I can't stand it when people beat each other up on t.v. Or in the movies. Or in hockey.

14. Six months ago I could barely name you a single NFL team. Now I think Randy Moss is da bomb, Matt Cassel is a cutey patooti, and since New England didn't make the playoffs, Go Arizona go!

15. Among the nicknames I've had in my life are Princess, Pooky, Mama Mia, M, Mee and Meezers.

16. I have had 10 different pets in my life. Currently there is Missy - a.k.a. Missy Moo, the Boj, Bobo, Meesha, Miss Miss or Prissy.

17. My favourite colours are pink and blue. My least favourite colour is beige.

18. I have To Kill a Mockingbird and Jane Eyre at least a dozen times each.

19. I could probably recite the entire script and sing every song in The Sound of Music.

20. My first crush was Corey Hart.

21. If I could interview anybody on earth it would be a toss up between Nelson Mandela and Madonna.

22. I generally hate reality television. But if I could go on the Amazing Race that'd be awesome.

23. I am addicted to crossword puzzles and coffee.

24. I love to laugh but I don't think I'm funny.

25. The best foods in the world are cupcakes, bacon and the breakfast potatoes at Broadway's in Ottawa.

The magic shoes

2009-01-28T22:47:00.003-05:00

Today was one of those days.

You know the kind when the first thing you think when you get up is how long it will be until you can go back to bed?

I was late for work because . . .well I'm almost always late for work. (Before you think I'm looney I don't have a set start time really so when I say I'm late it's late for the start time I set for myself).

But between spending extra time on my hair and make-up to prepare for a television hit, and having to stop for gas, and the start of a snow storm, by the time I got to the office I was later than usual.

And there was no parking because the bus strike is still on.

SoI had to make it back up the very snowy and slippery hill of the "pit" parking lot, back through downtown and over to the overflow lot which in good weather might be a 15-minute walk to the office.

It was snowing hard and crazy windy. By the time I trudged to the office all the work I'd put into straightening my hair had gone out the window and it was a wind-blown, wet mess.

As I was sitting at my desk, pondering what to do about that, I went online to check our website and see how the stories I wrote on the federal budget had ended up once in the paper. Only I couldn't do that because somehow, more than 12 hours after the paper had gone to bed, they still hadn't been uploaded.

Combined with having a bad hair day it put me in a very bad mood. It made everything just more annoying. Including the colleague who sits two spaces away from me and is loud and obnoxious on a good day. Today, he was surly, argumentative and just plain a pain in the you know where.

Just as I was wishing I could call in sick the first good news of the day arrived.

Barack Obama is coming to Ottawa and I should get to cover whatever event(s) he does here. Yay!

It cheered me up immensely. As did the news that I no longer had to do the television hit so my bad hair day wasn't so worrisome. And then I heard back about the website and instead of being told to stop kvetching heard word that I wasn't the only frustrated about the situation. It felt good just to know I wasn't just being a bee-atch and someone agreed with me.

And then the day got infinitely better when I found out that after 50 days of bad roads, traffic snarls, frustrations finding parking due the bus strike, the government was finally going to step in and legislate them back to work.

I left the office feeling somewhat elated.

Which diminished slowly over the hour and a bit it took to get to my car, clear off the car from the 15-20 cm dump of snow we got today, commute home through said snow, and then shovel out enough of my driveway to get the car into the garage because once again the snow clearing service I hired hadn't shown up yet.

I was hungry, tired and wanting to curl and take a nap. But it was basketball night.

So I had something to eat, and was just changing into my basketball clothes when I discovered my cat - miss finicky my litter box has to be pristine - had peed on my bed!

So off came the duvet, the duvet cover, the sheets, and down I took them to the washing machine. Put them all in. Turned it on. Went back upstairs and put clean sheets on the bed.

Only to head back to the basement to put the duvet and cover in the dryer to find the washing machine had broken down, there was water all over the basement floor and water still in the machine along with very damp, very heavy bedding.

I raced out the door when my carpool arrived, worrying about the washer, and the water and wondering again why this day just couldn't be over but thinking at least I could pound out some of my frustrations on the basketball court.

Five minutes before we got to the gym I realized I had left my sneakers at home.

It was like the bad day God reminding me it ain't over yet.

But then the angel of salvage the day mercy showed up and there was a pair of running shoes exactly my size in the lost and found.

We ended up losing the basketball game. My washing machine is still broken. My driveway is still full of snow. The bus strike is likely to go on for at least another two weeks while the back to work legislation makes its way through the House.

But somehow the fact that at the very end of a day full of endless frustrations, there were those shoes makes it all seem worth it.

It's like a subtle little reminder that many times, things work out just fine.