Yay!

From what I can tell, they held the plane in Chicago and John was able to make the flight. I had already contacted my brother earlier today just in case he got stuck overnight in Montreal. Would have been weird for them to meet that way, but at least it wouldn't have meant sleeping in the airport.

I am now at the airport waiting for him to land. Very glad he wasn't coming through Toronto this time - the late flight has been cancelled. The Montreal flight is listed as being on time, despite the density level of the fog out there tonight. Go Dash 8!

So glad he was able to make it here in one day. I imagine he'll be pretty tired coming off the plane. I took tomorrow off so we can spend it together. I need a day off myself, work has been so crazy lately. Oh, and I did label the piece of equipment I went digging for today. Those lucky pennies I always stop for are paying off. :)

Unluckiest traveler ever

If it wasn't for bad luck, John would have no luck at all. I just checked the status of his flight. Due to a crew change, his flight has been delayed by an hour, leaving him a 23min connection time in Chicago, during which he has to walk between terminals. United shuts the doors of their flights 15min before departure. I don't think he's going to make it unless they do arrive earlier than it says. Funny, I think he said something to me last night about there being no way his flight out of OC would be delayed...

Please cut the guy some slack!! No wonder he hates traveling.

Now that I've proven I *can* mow my lawn,

I never want to mow a lawn again. Ever. Holy crap am I sore today. Mowing semi-damp lawn with a heavy mower on an incline with no upper body strength is not fun. I got the whole front and side done, but the back still needs to be hayed. Yes, hayed. That enjoyment I leave for John. Welcome home, honey!

Today at work I get to go back in time. Circumstances have me digging through old equipment to figure out which piece belonged to which location, so that it can be re-installed and do things old-school. I have no idea if I'll be able to easily identify the correct piece of equipment. I wasn't smart enough to label them, as I couldn't dream of ever needing it again... famous last words. I guess that will teach me to label things.

John comes in tonight on the late flight from Montreal at 11pm. I hope he has an easier time flying today. He has bad luck when it comes to flights being on-time when he travels here. This trip he's opted to only have a carry-on, which should speed things up going through Customs... unless they ask why he's only bringing a carry-on for a week's stay. He also has a terminal change in Chicago, an airport he's unfamiliar with, but I sent him a map of O'Hare. O'Hare is well signed and he doesn't have to go through Customs there, just change terminals, and he has 1.25h to do so as long as his flight isn't late. He just always seems to have some kind of flying adventure to tell me when he gets off the plane... I hope it's less eventful for him today. On his flight between Chicago and Montreal, he's on an Embraer 175, which has the personal viewscreens on the seat in front of you.

He made a funny comment to me last night about looking forward to seeing the fog. I'm hoping he brings some sunshine with him instead. So far it's not shaping up to be that great a summer.

Just got an email from him, actually. He's just waiting for the shuttle to arrive to pick him up and get to the airport. It's coming up on 6am out there right now, which is pretty early for an 8:35am flight, but as we learned last time I was there, you need to be checked in 2h in advance of an "international" flight. At least he's flying out of Orange County and not LAX, so a much shorter drive.

Oh, and Caly, the apartment is not your litterbox. Be a good cat while John is gone. That means not peeing everywhere. I know this is probably too much to ask, but thought I'd try.

Canada Day shindig

I guess I haven't made any real announcement on this yet, but I'm having a shindig on Canada Day. Some backyard BBQ and hopefully I can get the badminton net up in the backyard.

I will have the usual plates, cups, condiments, cupcakes, chips, and pop. Bring something to BBQ and WW-friendly snacks if chips & cupcakes aren't on your menu. Wear your Canada Day shirts if you have them.

I guess a start time depends on Shakespeare rehearsal. Late afternoon is good if we want to do any badminton, before it gets post-supper and cold.


As far as the rest of things going on with me, there really hasn't been much to talk about. I've been working a lot and watching Season 2 of original Star Trek. That's literally it. This week I'm preparing for John's arrival -- he arrives late Thursday night. Still need a few last minute groceries, including a new variety of 1/2 moon, with strawberry as well as vanilla filling. He should enjoy that. I'm really happy I was able to find some lactose-free ice cream at Superstore for him. 3 days to go. Been a long time since he was here, I will be glad to have him back in my own surroundings again.

Just like SoCal

I am in my car, inching toward the Harbour Bridge. I'm on my way to Bathurst, but it looks like it's going to take me a while to get out of the West Side. It started backing up beside Lancaster Mall. Supposedly a tractor trailer came unhinged around the Market Square exit. Crazy.

Going to be a long day if this keeps up. I have to drive to Bathurst, work there, then drive back to Moncton. I'll stay overnight tonight in Moncton and work there tomorrow.

Glad I have the XM for my road trip. :)

Go play in your own yard

In the last 3 days, I have had kids in my yard.

Two nights ago, I was walking into the bathroom when I heard a voice outside. The kid from the house behind mine was trying to corral his dog. They ended up walking all over my lawn. I hope I escaped dog crap. There's nothing worse than not owning a dog and still having to clean up its crap. At least this appearance in my yard wasn't intentional as it looks like the dog got away from the kid.

Last night I found kids in my driveway when I arrived home. I believe they were playing with my hose because the area beneath it was wet and had not been wet when I left the house to go get gas. They saw me coming and somewhat reluctantly and slowly moved out of my driveway and went 3 doors down to drive up someone else's driveway. Later last night, as I sat on the deck resting, a kid came to the back edge of my property, crossed the ditch, and walked his bike across my back lawn, onto my driveway, and up the street.

Tonight, I was home watching TV and heard voices near the house. I live alone, and hearing strange voices nearby on the outside of my house scares me. I looked outside and saw a second kid driving his bike over my lawn -- my $5000 lawn that I am trying desperately to keep in good shape in its tender growing stage. There are still areas, particularly in the front, where the grass is just beginning to take root. I ran to the door and firmly but not yelling told him to not drive on the grass, and told them to go play somewhere else.

Apparently my yard has become the neighborhood playground. It is also apparent that their parents haven't taught them to stay out of other people's yards. If I want kids driving over my lawn, I'll get some of my own. In the meantime, don't scare the crap out of me by going right up to my porch and going under it or whatever the heck they were doing.

This is my property. I pay for it, I maintain it, and I decide what happens on it. It doesn't include being an entertainment area/transportation path for uninvited children. You have your own yard and yards of friends. Go play on those and leave mine alone.

I can mow

I just mowed most of the front and side of my lawn. First time ever mowing. Wish it was my last too. I did ok, it's just really damn heavy because it's not self-propelled. Bag kept filling up really quickly because it was so long. Some of my land is swampy and I didn't mow it. I'm not convinced there should be lawn in places because it will always be swampy, even when it's not raining every day.

So tired. But I did it.

The short version

Been doing funeral stuff the last few days. I'm glad it's over. It was great to have my brother home for a couple of days, even if it was under sad circumstances. In our non-funeral time we watched some Star Trek. I got up at 5am this morning to drive him to the airport. Then I came home and went back to bed before getting up for work.

The good thing to come out of this funeral scenario is that my mother is speaking to us again. I am approaching things cautiously. I don't want to fall back into old patterns.

John has blogged a good summary of our move status, I won't repeat that here, but if you're interested, head over there to see where we're at.

Apparently the problem with my lawn mower was that it didn't have enough gas. With help from my brother, I bought a gas tank and a weed whacker last night, but now it's raining again and I haven't had a chance to tackle either of those things. But at least I don't have to water the lawn. It's been getting plenty of that.

Raccoons keep knocking over my compost bin.

I now have a crack in my windshield that I didn't notice until after it had spread. Now I'll have to get that replaced. Car is also making humming noise, conveniently just days after the warranty has run out. And of course the crack in front end that I've had for a couple of years, which I still haven't fixed.

I am thinking of going to see The Lake House on Sunday or next week sometime. I have a free pass that is good Sunday-Thursday. If anyone is interested in going, let me know.

I think John and I will plan on having people over on Canada Day. Backyard BBQ and maybe even some badminton if the grass is in good enough shape by then. Let me know if you'd be interested in that too.

Long Day

Let me start off by talking about my day yesterday. Got up at 6:30am Atlantic (4:30 Central) so we’d be able to get to the airport in time for the minimum 2h international departure. Learned that lesson after leaving Orange County last time. We made it through everything with plenty of time to wait. Got on the plane bound for Chicago, and made it there with no problems. We had just over an hour wait in Chicago before heading for Toronto. We get on the plane in Toronto, and then are informed that the plane was being taken out of service as they had found a problem with it. We deplaned, and they sent us across the hall with another plane having just landed and we’d be able to use. We waited for the cleaners to go through, and boarded the second plane. Sat and waited. And waited. The captain comes over the speaker and says we have to deplane again, now *this* plane was being taken out of service because of some dents. We got off that plane and lined up for meal vouchers.

Supposedly the meal vouchers were good at any airport vendor – that’s what it said on the paper. All I wanted was some popcorn and pop, but noooo, “we don’t take vouchers anymore.” GRRRRR. After deplaning twice I was losing my patience.

They somehow quickly found us a third plane, which had just finished repairs (gives you a warm & cozy feeling, doesn’t it?) We boarded that plane, then had to sit and wait and wait and wait for bags to be loaded. Then we waited while they unloaded someone’s bag who had changed flights. Eventually we did take off, about 4 hours behind schedule. This meant no chance of making my 5pm flight home. We got off the plane at 4:30pm in Toronto, but with Customs, baggage, and terminal change I knew it just wasn’t going to happen. Luckily the late flight was not full and we all managed to get a seat on that flight. It was a really long day and I just wanted to get home. I’m going to have a hard few days coming up, with the funeral parlour and funeral to attend.

Grampy

I wasn’t surprised by the news because he’d been diagnosed as terminal, but what is bothering me the most is going through all of the funeral-related stuff again, especially with my mother not speaking to me. I doubt this will make any difference to the mother situation. I hear that she asked my aunts, after he passed away, "Who will call my children?" Um, how about you call us yourself!!!! I am actually more upset about how to deal with my mother than I am about the death.

The funeral is Monday morning at 10am at the Cathedral. Grampy went there for most of the last 10 years or so as it was easier for Grammy to get into, before she was house-bound. The funeral parlour stuff begins on Saturday, but please do not worry about coming, I will have lots of family around and I know how weird it is to go while not knowing the deceased. My older brother is coming home Sunday around lunchtime and has to head back home again early Monday morning. He'll be staying with me since it's closer than staying at Dad's house. My sister-in-law won't be able to make it since she's still recovering from her neck surgery.

Thanks to everyone who left comments and/or sent emails. I appreciate your thoughts & well-wishes.

New Orleans

On to my trip itself. There are some comments I can’t make here about parts of my trip as they are work-related, but the meeting we went there for turned out to give me lots of info. Again I realize I have a lot of work to do.

As an aside, I also may get myself on a user group with our software provider that would see me going to quarterly meetings in the US, usually to fairly nice places. There is one next week in Orlando, but I won’t make it on the committee in time to attend that meeting. The next one may be tacked on to the beginning or end of the conference in Kentucky in the fall. I’m excited about this as it’s the best way to make myself heard with our software supplier, and I know it will provide me with a great learning opportunity; something I’ve been craving for a while now.

We landed in New Orleans on Tuesday and headed to Morgan City, LA. Along the way you could see lots of hurricane damage, leaning power poles, destroyed roofs/buildings, debris, etc. Overall things are either brand new because they’ve been rebuilt already, or they still look like they did right after the hurricane. There is a lot of damage and it’s going to take years to get back in shape.

We arrived in Morgan City and checked in to our hotel. To my delight, Tuesday night was karaoke night at the hotel bar. Other than bowling and karaoke, I don’t think anything else was happening in Morgan City that night. Pretty small place. That meant karaoke was pretty full of townsfolk, and the hosts weren’t very good at keeping the list in order, just doing whatever they wanted. Two of my co-workers joined me but did not sing. I did an average of about a song an hour, finishing up just after 11pm. Smoking in bars is legal there, so by the time I got up to do my third song, my voice was hoarse and I couldn’t sing it very well. I did get compliments from a couple of women in the bathroom, and the desk clerk the next morning when I checked out. I had the requisite drunk creepy guy tap me on the shoulder and tell me I needed to sing louder, and another come by and ask if I was going to sing Barbra Streisand. I made sure I was escorted to my room after that (our rooms had exterior doors).

I have to say, there were some great male karaoke performances that night. At least 3 really good male singers doing alt rock. Also a kick-ass female performer, I forget what song she did. Morgan City karaoke singers are tough to follow.

Wednesday was our meeting, and after grabbing a quick bite for lunch, we headed back to New Orleans. We checked in to a hotel near the airport, and then headed downtown to meet up with colleagues and see famed Bourbon St. Can’t say as that was my thing, seeing as how I don’t enjoy female strippers and I don’t drink, but at least I can say I’ve been there. We had dinner at the Red Fish Grill, but not being much of one for seafood, I ended up getting steak. I checked my Blackberry after finishing dinner and that was when I got word to call home and hear the news about Grampy.

After dinner we headed back to the hotel to drop someone off, then two co-workers wanted to go shopping, so I joined them at the mall to keep my mind occupied. I picked up a few things at the semi-annual Bath & Body Works sale. Pretty picked over by the time we were shopping. Also went into a huge, 2 level Target, but it was close to closing time so my tour was pretty short. I came back to the hotel and finished up the evening chatting with John. Got to bed pretty late and then had an early rise.

I did take some pictures, but my camera is in my luggage, so I’ll have to post them later.

Grampy

My grandfather, Lorne McQuade (Mum's dad), passed away this evening at about 6:15pm. The pneumonia he caught after finishing his radiation is unfortunately what did him in. I am still in New Orleans, but am scheduled to come home on Thursday anyway. Since this only happened a few hours ago, no plans have been made just yet. One of my aunts is in Texas for work and is trying to get back home.

With terminal cancer, we knew it would only be a matter of time. We just didn't think it would be this soon. I'm glad I was able to see him at the hospital a couple of times over the past few weeks.

This now leaves me with only one grandparent. Thankfully after the low heart rate issues, Gug has been doing relatively well. I want to make sure I get back over to see him this weekend.

How convenient!

Where Does Your Inner Californian Belong?

Orange County

You're rich, pretty, and living a charmed life. (Or you seriously wish you were.) From Disneyland to Laguna Beach, you're all about living the California dream life. Just make sure to marry rich - so you don't have to work for it!

Where Does Your Inner Californian Belong?

Please won't you be my neighbor?

I came home tonight to see the house next door is up for sale. It's the single-storey house to the left of me. Click here to see the listing.

Funny, they forgot to add "free West Side Shuttle™" and "must mow next door neighbor's lawn" to the ad... I'll have to mention that to them. :)

Big mistake. Huge.

I've come to the realization that putting in a lawn was a very stupid idea - I don't want to care for it. It was looking pretty crappy this month, so I called the landscaper who did the hydroseeding for me last fall. I said apart from the areas that were washed out, it wasn't looking so good and may need to be re-sprayed. They said ok, we'll come over and take a look at it.

Saturday morning I slept in and was woken up by the doorbell. Still being in my PJs and bedhead, I didn't want to go to the door unless it was family. I took a peek out the blinds but didn't recognize who it was, so I didn't get the door. I got up to go to the bathroom and saw my lawn was a strange shade of green... hey, they re-sprayed this morning, that must have been who was at the door. And oh, they re-sprayed right over the mini-ditch of washout in my front yard. Great. Thanks for giving me the opportunity to fix it. I appreciate the fact that they addressed it so quickly, but really, does it make any sense to re-spray right over an area of washout? They actually could have easily sold me a fix on that. I would have paid them to dump some top soil in there and fill it in. They didn't bother to ask, and lost a sales opportunity.

Every day since then I have been spending an hour a day watering my "lawn" on top of working overtime at work. I go to work, come home, eat something, water the lawn, and go back to work. Last night I had the idea that hey, a sprinkler has a wider and farther reach that the spray nozzle, maybe that can cut down my watering time if I hold it and and spray the lawn. Yeah. Forgot to take into account the leaking part where the hose meets the sprinkler. I got sopping wet, took me just as long, and didn't do as good a job. Tonight it will be back to the spray nozzle for an hour before coming back in to work.

On Sunday I attempted to mow the part of the lawn that is actually the city's right-of-way. It's not like the city is going to come along and mow it, and it blends right in with my property, so I'm stuck with it. I have never mowed a lawn in my life. As of today, I still haven't. I took the lawn mower out of the garage, did what Dad told me to get it started, and nothing happened. It didn't even sputter... dead as a doornail. Later that day Dad called, and I mentioned I couldn't get the mower started. He asked about a couple of things, one of which was gas. I said yeah, you filled it up last fall and then I didn't use it after that. He said, "wait, didn't you winterize it?" Winterize?! How in hell am I supposed to know that?!?! Apparently there is some kind of additive I was supposed to put in the gas tank over the winter. Dad said it's likely toast, he'd come over and look at it but wouldn't promise me he could get it going. I told him I wasn't in any hurry. I can barely push the damn thing (not self-propelled), I have no idea how I'm going to mow my whole yard when the time comes.

So I may need to buy a new lawn mower. The first one was free, my stepmother didn't need it anymore, but I still didn't intend on screwing it up. I also need a weed whacker because the City sodded the ditch that runs through my yard, and that's about the only way to keep things under control there. Probably around $800 by the time I'm done, and then I still have to figure out how to find the time to do all of this mowing and weed whacking. And no, I don't want a neighborhood kid to come over and mow my lawn.

This really isn't what I wanted out of my yard. They hydroseeded in areas I specifically told them not to - beside the garage, right up against the rocks in the front yard - and that is making maintenance more difficult. When I bought the property, I also didn't know I'd have to contend with a ditch running through all of my property... I had dreams of making it user-friendly when it came to maintenance. Now it seems like it's one big giant pain in the ass.

I'm not sure what to do. John won't be here permanently this summer, not at the rate things are going, so I have to handle this myself. If my lawn mower is indeed toast, do I spend the money to get a new one, or do I consider paying a local company for lawn maintenance? If I buy a new lawn mower now, it will be here for a few years, and in the long run will cost less money. If I pay someone to come and mow, that money is gone after this summer with nothing to show for it, but I don't have to deal with any of this crap. The idea is certainly appealing.

Deciding to put in a lawn has been a big mistake. I should have stuck with the weeds and the dirt until I was ready to care for it (maybe never!) or I had someone living with me who wanted to do it. I just don't have the knowledge on my own about this stuff, and I'm tired of relying on help from other people... it's not their problem, it's mine. I have to admit, I am envious of those of you with husbands/significant others living with you to take care of this stuff. It's not John's fault that he's not here, we're doing as much as we can in trying to get him here. It's just really frustrating to me to have to deal with all of this in addition to laundry, meals, the floors I haven't mopped yet, the dirty carpet, the windows that need washing... I can't do everything. This is how I end up eating popcorn or chips for supper some nights.

During my trips to SoCal, John and I looked at the houses and neighborhoods as we drove by. We talked about the scarcity of houses that have their own yard - most neighborhoods have a shared common area, but the houses themselves are crammed together with no real yard of their own. I said at the time that I wouldn't like that, you'd have no private area to entertain, you couldn't have your own patio furniture and leave it outside, etc. What's the point of having a house in SoCal if you can't have your own space outside to enjoy it? The past couple of weeks have taught me that maybe that kind of living isn't as bad as I thought. No yard means little to no maintenance. The common area would be taken care of through a neighborhood association. Now I see.


In other areas of my life, things have been really busy. Work has picked up again and I have been working overtime this week to get things done. It's a safe bet that I will have to work one of the days this weekend as I am running out of time to replace expiring software. My to-do list is currently 30 items long, and I pray the phone doesn't ring to add to that.

Both of my grandfathers are dealing with the hospital. Grampy (Mum's dad) has been in since the end of March. They discovered a tumor in his throat and he had radiation treatments for it. He has a traech (sp?) still in his neck despite having finished the treatments as the doctors can't decide whether to take it out or not. With that still in his neck, he can't talk and make himself understood, and that is very frustrating to him - you can clearly see it on his face. His cancer is terminal, but he wanted the treatments to buy him more time. In addition to the cancer, though, he has heart problems, kidney problems, diabetes, other things I'm probably not remembering... when/if he gets out of the hospital, he won't be going home without full-time care.

My other grandfather (Dad's dad) had to go to the hospital on Thursday with blurred vision. His heart rate went down too low, so they brought him in for observation and talked about putting in a pacemaker. The decrease in heart rate was caused by a bad reaction to dye from a test last week, as well as a change in medication that he had last week. He caught a staph infection last year when he had his leg operated on, so anytime he's in the hospital you have to dress up in a gown, gloves & mask just to be able to visit, and it also means he can't exercise by walking the halls - he's confined to the room. He likes to keep the circulation going and walk around a bit, but being confined didn't help matters much. Yesterday the doctors finally came by to see him and let him go home. They decided his heartbeat was strong enough that he didn't need the pacemaker, have given him instructions for his family doctor regarding medication, and he got home last night. He's outside today tending to his garden and doing well. I'm glad that turned out ok.

My sister-in-law had surgery done on her neck on Monday. She came through it fine, my brother says she's not as mobile as they'd hoped, but they hope she'll go home from the hospital today. Unfortunately the hospital told her she would only get 2 days' notice before having the surgery, so they've been waiting for the call and finally got it on Saturday. At least now it's done, she can start recovering and move forward. Don't ask me exactly what the surgery had to do with on her neck as I can't seem to recall right now, I am having brain freeze.

Last but certainly not least, John has booked his flights for his next visit. He'll be arriving late on June 29th, and leaving again on July 11th. My brother might come home around the weekend of the 8th, but he's not sure. It depends on how my sister-in-law is doing and whether she feels like traveling. I still haven't introduced them to John, so I hope they are able to make it down for a visit. My nephew will also be with them at that time, he starts 3 weeks with his Dad on the Canada Day weekend.

It seems like I know a lot of people with health problems at the moment. My thoughts & prayers are with you, you know who you are. I'm very fortunate to be in good health myself. Gotta stay in shape to deal with this &^%*@! lawn.

Celebrating Hondouran Independence

While I was away, I picked up a $5 t-shirt at Target to wear on July 4th. An effort to fit in with my American fiancé. :) Just a simple navy t-shirt with an American flag made up of dots.

I unpacked it from the suitcase tonight, and much to my chagrin, the label said "Made in Hondouras". Somehow that just seems wrong. Lots of clothing is made outside of the US... but a 4th of July shirt made in Hondouras just doesn't exude Independence Day to me.

Home again

I made it home and am sifting through the pile of stuff waiting for me at work.

In a lovely "welcome home" gesture, the gate on the b-pass lane of the Harbour Bridge decided to smash down on the roof of my car this morning on my drive to work. Left scratches. And no, I was paid up and didn't run the gate. It just decided it wanted to hurt me. GRRRRR!

A funny thing happened on the way to the airport

Or more accurately, at the airport. We arrived there to insanely long lines -- the line for security was running the length of the terminal. After realizing I couldn't do kiosk check-in because I was checking a bag, we got in line for regular check-in, which was backed up and moving at a snail's pace. We overheard someone talking about the airport having just come back online from a 1.5h power failure, which explained why we waited in the check-in line for 35 minutes before getting to the front. By the time I tried to check in, the console told me I was too late, so I had to get assistance from the clerk. With Dixie's help, I got rebooked for tomorrow with the same flights. Dixie was also very kind enough to have already checked me in and issued my boarding passes for tomorrow. With the time zone difference and scarce number of flights to SJ, I knew I'd be better off to stay here than try to get to Toronto or Montreal today and then have to stay overnight. John is, of course, ecstatic to have me for one more night, even though he had to go in to work today.

On the last 2 trips I have flown in and out of LAX. Air Canada allows you to do web check-in from select US cities, LA being one of those. Since I am flying out of Orange County this time, I am flying United for part of the journey, and I wasn't able to do web check-in and had to stand in the giant line with a lot of other people. LAX does have that advantage, I can check in before leaving the apartment, and since Air Canada only flies to a few cities from LAX, the lines are not too long. Food for thought for next time. LAX is definitely cheaper, but is so much farther away from here compared to John Wayne Airport.

So, I find myself still here in SoCal this morning, with lots of time on my hands. I called Stew to let him know I wouldn't need to be picked up at the airport tonight. I also called and left a message for my boss. "Power failure at airport" sounds an awful lot like "dog ate my homework", but here's the brief story on the problem.

Not sure what I will do with the rest of my day now. I may go for a walk, as long as the rain stays away. There are dark clouds and it will shower on & off, but it looks bright at the same time, and is about 17C out.

As to the weekend that was, I arrived on the earlier-scheduled flight and John picked me up just after 4pm. John Wayne Airport is only about 2 miles from his office, and not far from his apartment either. We then headed straight for See's Candies, since we were very close to it, and I got a couple more boxes of Awesome Peanut Brittle Bar to bring back home with me. We made a stop at Vons grocery store to get some Grape Crush (in glass bottles) and a few other essentials. We headed back home and spent the evening in.

Saturday we ventured out on some errands. John found a place where he could drop off electronics for recycling and has been meaning to get there for ages, so he loaded the truck and we finally made it there and got that done. Next we headed over to Fashion Island where I wanted to turn in a coupon for a free pair of underwear. We had lunch at The Cheesecake Factory, and took our cheesecakes to go. We each got a slice of the Godiva Chocolate Cheesecake, and if you think the picture looks good, it tastes even better. Delicious! But not as good as Suzy's.

We also went across the street to Bed, Bath & Beyond to look for the shower curtain I was going to pick up for Jenn. They didn't have any at that store, but did have some at Yorba Linda, about 20min away. We got them to put it on hold and we'd pick it up on Sunday.

John somehow threw his back out on Saturday so I left him home to rest and went to church by myself. Masses here are frustrating. This weekend's mass was more like people reading the bible over kids acting out in a plain room that looks nothing like a church. I really didn't get anything out of that mass and ended up leaving after communion. Definitely miss that about home. I take our beautiful old church for granted and the fact that the mass I usually attend is mostly full of adults.

Saturday night we attempted to go see MI:III but strangely enough it was sold out. We ended up going to Target instead since we hadn't made it there earlier. We came back and stayed in for the night, watched Alias from the other night and had cheesecake for supper :)

Sunday we got up and decided it was likely more comfortable to sit together in a movie theatre than hang out on his uncomfortable couch, so we decided to hit 2 movies in one day. We went to the 11:30am showing of Da Vinci Code. Good movie, but they followed the book so closely that I basically sat through it saying, yeah, I know what's going to happen next. After that movie we headed over to Yorba Linda for the shower curtain, and also stopped at Petsmart and picked up a fountain-type water dish for Caly. So far she's confused by it, but hopefully she'll give it a try soon. We stopped for a burger and then headed to see MI:III. Fun movie, a bit cheesy in spots, but a good summer blockbuster movie. Don't know that I would bother watching it again, though.

We stopped at the grocery store to pick up a few more things, and John cooked us some steak for supper. I packed up what few things I had taken out since arriving and a few things I had bought. Didn't buy much on this trip, especially after having spent extra on the ticket change. Glad I did, though. Any extra time is worth it. Guess I have to thank the power failure for even more time :)

Seattle pics

Started out at the Pike Place Market, one of the best spots to go.

It happened to be the weekend of the Seattle Cheese Festival

The famous Seattle fish

Just a small section of the market. Reminiscent of home, but on a much larger scale.

It was also Mother's Day the day I was there, and everyone seemed to be walking by with fresh flowers.

Very busy day at the market.

Space Needle. I didn't go up, it seemed small compared to previous trips up the CN Tower and Sears Tower :P

Experience Music Project and Science Fiction Museum. They wouldn't let me take any pics inside.

Not just any old French bakery. This one is very French. I should have went inside to see what that meant... or maybe I didn't need to know.

A view of the water and the Olympic Mountains. Seattle has been getting a lot more cruise ship traffic after having taken some away from Vancouver.

Totem pole

A funky parking garage

Took this one for Anthony. Hacky sacks and chile pepper lights, together at last.

The white arch is Qwest Stadium, home of the Seattle Seahawks.

Ye Olde Curiosity Shop, down on the waterfront

Just a few of the huge trees. Had I been able to take pictures at the house I visited mid-week, that would have been even more stunning.

I'm behind

Yes, I know, I am incredibly behind in updating my blog. It's been a very hectic and busy trip. Even now I am typing this entry on my Blackberry as that seems to be the only time I have. They have wisely restricted my internet access in a training environment, although I would never be so rude as to play solitaire the whole day. It's just cramping my style when I need to check in with work.

I did make it downtown on Sunday with surprisingly little trouble. I only had directions from a couple of people and a small map. Having the Space Needle as a landmark and reference point really does help a lot, I must say. I got to the SciFi Museum, but they wouldn't allow pictures inside. So I saw Capt Kirk's chair, you'll just have to take my word for it. I never noticed the arms of his chair had wood on them. As to the rest of my downtown excursion, I will try to post some pics soon. I hate posting pics in Blogger... takes forever.

After I got back on Sunday night, I drove down to the offices where I'm having training so I knew where I'd be going in Monday morning traffic. Good thing I did as it wasn't the easiest to find. Managed to stay up until 11pm that night. The time change adjustment has been easier this time, I guess it comes with practice.

When I got up Sunday morning, I discovered my Blackberry wasn't working, and continued to not work during the rest of the day. Still wasn't working Monday morning when I got up, so I put a call in to my account manager at Aliant. She hooked me up with support, and late Monday night it started working again. Talk about feeling like you've lost your right arm, though. 2 days without it while also being away from home, and only having internet access at the hotel was a giant pain.

The biggest thing about Monday was finding out that the other class participants had decided class will end early tomorrow... Like 10am early. My flight out of here to SoCal was 7pm. I was pretty mad when I found this out, as I had specifically asked when class would end so that I could book the appropriate flight. Because I booked the flight with a travel agent, I had to go through her for any changes, which was a pain and no doubt added to my cost. The time difference of trying to get a hold of her just componded the problem. After a lot of thought and not wanting to hang around here all day when I could be with John, I decided to change my ticket. The bad news is that it ended up costing $360 *just to changeit* on top of the $185 originally for the ticket. OUCH. Love is expensive! But with how little I get to see him, any extra time is worth it. So I am now leaving tomorrow at 1:05pm, arriving at the airport 2 miles from John's office at 4pm, then we can have the whole evening together instead of arriving at 9:30pm. Feels a bit like buying time - I get 5.5h more if I pay $360. Luckily I also got an email this week that said my bonus cheque is waiting for me when I get home, so that most definitely helps.

Tuesday things became a little more normal. My Blackberry was back in action, but I was really feeling the suckiness of having to eat every meal alone in a restaurant. My classmates weren't very social and didn't invite me along with them (not to mention I was a little angry with them about the class change). Eating home alone is different than eating in a restaurant by yourself.

I have to say, the service out here is excellent. I've been to Olive Garden, Outback Steakhouse, even KFC, Subway and especially Wendy's, and all have had great or outstanding service. The guy working at Wendy's the other night could be in a commercial for them, I swear. Such a refreshing change from the crap we take at home. It's made me start thinking about not taking crap from wait staff anymore... I'm going to start thinking about speaking to the manager and complaining. It's so nice to go to a restaurant and have the server smile at you for a change. I've been leaving good tips because they've deserved it. I've never had the experience of waiting tables, so no, I don't know what it's like. What I do know is that, in general, you shouldn't be rude to others if you're having a bad day or hate your job. In my job I do deal with a lot of people, some I like and some I don't, but I still have to help them. There seem to be an awful lot of wait staff out there who like to take their problems out on their customers.

Wednesday after class we were all invited out to the head programmer's house for dinner. She lives with one of the account managers (for a brief time he was my acct mgr) at the same company. I have known them for a couple of years of going to the conferences but I had no idea they were a couple until now. They had two people staying with them for the weekend, clients but also friends. I had actually met them before at conferences as well.

The hostess has owned the house for approx 30 years and it is out in the country, so to speak. Not that far, really, just seems more country in comparison. The house was amazing. Not huge, but design-wise it was very different. Basically two round buildings put together. Patios and decks everywhere. The tallest trees I have ever seen, just amazing. Beautiful gardens too - they've done a lot of work to their land/yard.

Everything is so incredibly green here, so many trees and vegetation. Very environmentally conscious as well, lots of compost bins and I don't think I have seen a single piece of litter.

Back to the house. The outside walls on one side, including the master bedroom, were glass. There is so much greenery around, plus more land between houses so there is still privacy. A neat idea. Sort of sleeping under the stars.

We had a Southern cuisine menu, as the host was originally a Southerner. The hostess was originally from Oregon. We had pork tenderloin with bbq sauce, "corn stuff" (grits, corn and cheese), cornbread, steamed veggies, and salad. Yummy. We ate pretty late as they didn't have much time to begin preparing before we arrived. We left around 9pm after an enjoyable evening.

Now it is Thursday and I'm finishing this entry during class. They're covering a module that is not applocable to Canadian companies.

It's been a spectacular week for weather, abnormally hot. Today is slightly cooler at 24-25C. The past few days have been close to 30C. It's supposed to rain on the weekend but I will be gone by then.

Tonight I'll have to get packed up and ready to leave. We'll prob end class tomorrow around 10am so the others can catch their flight. Should leave me with lots of time to get to SeaTac, return the rental car, and go catch my flight. One more sleep, I can't wait!!

I'll try to get my pics from downtown up later tonight. I also want to get some pics of the trees. Maybe on my walk tonight after class. There is a cemetery I drove by the other day that looked more like a nice park, so I may go explore that tonight.

Safe & Sound

Made it to Seattle after a long day of travel - essentially 12h worth of travel. I am currently in Kirkland but amd heading out in a few minutes to explore Seattle Center, once I figure out how to get there. Perhaps the overzealous car rental agent was right, I could have used a GPS in the car. Somehow I don't think my boss would agree.

I hate renting cars. They always play on your guilt regarding insurance and you wind up spending the rest of the trip worried you're going to smash the car up and have someone tell you "I told you so." I checked with my boss before I left and I am covered under the company's insurance, so I didn't take any. This of course made the agent say at least three times that I'd be held liable... thanks, I think I understand what declining insurance means. They did get me on the refueling option though. I took it so I wouldn't have to worry about gassing up near the airport. The day I leave will be tight time-wise. I get the feeling I shouldn't have chosen that option, but coming from Canada, where gas is priced per Litre, gallons don't mean anything to me. The price per gallon that they're charging on this option is not unreasonable, I knew enough to understand that, at least. I just don't know what the posted price at gas stations are right now in this area. I hate renting cars.

I managed to stay up until 10pm last night, and yet still woke up at 4:30am. I forced myself back asleep and got up around 6:45am to make it to 7:30am mass. I was a couple of minutes late and sat in a reserved pew, oops. At least mass was more normal than SoCal - a cantor & pianist. The cantor was very into her music, tapping her toes and smiling the whole time. They got me again with the Nicene Creed, which I muttered my way through... I'm going to have to bite the bullet and memorize that so I know it when I attend mass away from home.

Anyway, it is 9am and I want to begin exploring while I am still somewhat awake & conscious. Going to get some advice from the front desk, get myself a map, and head downtown. Picking through the tourist brochures, I noticed that the Science Fiction Museum is the home of Captain Kirk's command chair... I have a mission! But not a 5-year mission :) I also must hit the Pike Place Market. Anything else is gravy.

It's weird, but I am having the same reaction to here as John had the first time he arrived in SJ - it's so green! Way more green that I'd see at home, it's beautiful. The freeway drive from the airport to the hotel last night was beautiful.

I guess I'd better be off. Hope to have some pics to post here later.

INXS rocked

Just got back from the INXS show at the Moncton Coliseum. Since I had earned a free night's stay at the Rodd, I decided to stay up overnight after the show. There is always something work-wise to do in Moncton, so I might as well kill 2 birds with 1 stone.

The show was really great. Our seats -- if we had actually sat in them -- were in the front row of the second section on the floor. Not bad. However, social butterfly that the Jaybird is, at the Frederiction show he had met some ladies from Fortune 448 who had empty seats around them in the second row. He staked the seats out and we planned to make a break for it. Under careful instruction to not make eye contact with security, we owned our stolen seats and spent the whole show in the second row!!! Close enough to see the sweat!

Since there were 4 of us going to the show, and there are 4 letters in INXS, we all got together last weekend and made shirts to wear to the concert. Dan was "I", Jaybird was "N", Dre was "X", and I formed the head, er, I mean, I was "S". The shirts were a big hit with people walking by. A girl in the lineup for the bathroom turned to me and said "cool shirts". But even better than that, at least 2 of the band members saw us. Kirk in particular got a chuckle out of it, so that was pretty cool for us INXS-ophiles.

My only negative comments on the evening had to do with a couple of strange things JD did onstage. He did a graphic humping of the microphone & stand which I didn't think was all that necessary. Not something I needed to see. The other thing he did was annihilate some roses a fan had thrown onstage. Smashing them to bits is entertainment? Just those two things I thought were a bit unnecessary.

JD did seem really overwhelmed by the "hometown" crowd. He kept saying how great it was to be home, how he loved the support from Canada. During the latter part of the concert he even wore a shirt that said "Bluenoser". :)

The setlist was great, they played new as well as lots of old stuff. I thought JD did a great job with the old stuff. Certainly there is no replacing Hutch, but it was a nice balance between making it his own and not sounding completely different. Ending with Don't Change, as they are wont to do, was really awesome. We danced, we bounced, we sang, and man am I tired! But we had a great, great time.

A big shout out to the Jaybird, who got us the tickets in the first place through his fanclub membership, and then managed to get us in the second row. Wouldn't have been there without your help -- thanks!!!


As to the rest of my life during the past week, it's consisted mainly of being insanely busy at work. Thankfully today was a bit more sane, and I will be working hard the rest of the week in preparation for another week out of the office. I leave on Saturday for my training course in Kirkland, WA. The course itself doesn't begin until Monday, so I will have Sunday to explore Seattle on my own. I'm not a huge fan of doing a tour by myself, but I may relent and do a walking tour of the city for 1/2 day so I can see some of the major sights. The course runs Monday - Friday, then after class on Friday I hop a plane for SoCal. It can't come soon enough.