b’s blog

I think this year is the year I’ve taken the most holidays ever! In May I went to Australia for 3 weeks, September to Toronto for 10 days, and October to Las Vegas for 5 days. Needless to say that there will be no more vacation for me until Boxing Day.

I met up with Adrian and his friend Drew at the MGM Grand for a night before booking myself into the Excalibur for another 3 nights. Adrian lamented the excessive cost of his room as compared to mine (>$130.00 vs. my $41.00).

I did the CSI experience with Adrian and now we are certified! That’s right, I’ve got the emailed certificate to prove it! We looked at a “crime scene” (staged set) and then went back to the ”labs” to figure out the answers to all the observations we saw earlier.

While we were in the process of completing the lab portion, a “lead CSI” (chick in hot pants with a handcuff belt) came by telling us that our “crime scene” was contaminated and that we should ignore the condom that was tossed into the “crime scene”. Too funny!

The weekend also consisted of a TON of shopping for the boys (I think over $300.00 in one shop!) while I helped them pick out clothes because I’m penniless. At least I thought I was. The bank machine told me I had “Insufficient Funds”. I was embarrassed but when I got back to Edmonton, my account had plenty of funds. The only thing I can figure is that it was an incompatible ATM to my bank. (although it did have the Cirrus logo on it…)

Why would it say “insufficent funds” when it’s just not compatible. It is less embarrassing and worrying if it would say “Card Error” rather than “Insufficient Funds” Don’t you think?

 I’ve got another funny story about Adrian, avoiding someone and McDonald’s so if you want to know, just ask.

I am so behind on posts; it’s not funny! I just wanted to sum up Toront by saying that there is so much fabulous food to eat out there! Sampling so many different kinds of ethnic foods is so much fun! You can do all the touristy things for a week or even less but the culinary tour would last you a month! oh YUM! And these are just the restaurants within walking distance from where we were staying.

One highlight - Craig Olejnik from “The Listener” was sitting across from us at an Italian Restaurant. The lineup for tables was at least 10 long! It was still busy at 8pm when we left the restaurant!

Beautiful ceremony at a quaint church outside of Christy’s hometown of Busby in mid-September. Although I was early for picking up Charlene and Dan at Spruce Grove, we were confused about the direction to take to find Hwy44 and therefore ended up about 10 minutes late for the ceremony. Luckily, the congregation was standing and we managed to squeeze in beside Angela nearer to the front of the chapel.

Charlene volunteered to play hostess for Beau’s mom at her home in Spruce so that the family and friends would have a place to relax and enjoy their time before heading to the reception. We were pretty organized and followed Sue’s instructions to the letter and then sat down to catch up with people I haven’t seen in ages.

The reception was really fun. You had to sing songs with the word “love” in them to get them to kiss as tinkling glasses just doesn’t cut it anymore.

The dance went on all night and Charlene, Ange, Calvin, Dan, Tanner, Lauren and Glen all closed down the dance floor! Beau took all the ladies for a spin on the dance floor between dancing with his wife. He is a very confident two stepper! Glen Rees surprised me with his dancing. Pics are now up on Facebook!

I’ve been here about 3.5 days now and the weather is absolutely perfect! Sarah arrived at the airport about an hour before I did so we took the TTC (subway) into town together and easily found our hostel. (Thank you Julie from WestJet for being so helpful when I realized I left the directions to the hostel at home) Clarence Castle is highly recommended. The hostel is newly renovated and small. It’s quiet and faces a park! And it’s within walking distance of the Waterfront, CN Tower, Air Canada Centre and Skydome.

I am making it my goal to feed Sarah a bunch of different foods she’s never tried before!

Wednesday night Andrea took us out for Korean BBQ.
Thursday we had Chinese bakery buns, celebrity stalking in Yorkville, and Street Salsa. (outdoor salsa dancing in the summer)
Friday we had Vietnamese Pho and Bun in Chinatown, strolled Kensington market and went up the CN tower
Saturday we went Canoeing in Paris, ate Tim Horton’s and went to the Leafs game (where we won in OT!)
today we strolled up Spadina to Auntie’s and Uncle’s, a brunch place recommended to me by Mish.

Scheduled:
Monday - local tour guide around the harbourfront
Tuesday - Niagara Falls
Wednesday - Dinner at Andrea’s
somewhere we need to fit in Greek food, Indian food, ethiopian food…. etc. This place is so multicultural!

Charlene, Dan, Jane and I took the time to do a small hiking trip after driving out to Mt. Robson for Jana and Jonathan’s wedding. It was my first back country camping experience and I think Jane’s also.

We had a great experienced leader who planned everything and all we had to do was show up with our backpacks and go! Thanks Charlene for making it a great trip. Every meal was planned very well and she got to break in her brand new camping stove.

The portion of the hike that Jane and I did was just an overnight up to campsite #2 beside a beautiful stream just across from a suspension bridge. I think it was either 11km or 14km in. The last 4 kms were inclined and so I was suffering the last bit. Dan and I were quite slow in comparison to Charlene and Jane but they were both very patient. Dan and Charlene continued onto Camp #5 nearer the top of the mountain and took an additional 2 days. The hike up to camp 5 starts steep, with switchbacks for quite a few kms. (I’m glad I skipped out on that for my first trip!)

At camp 1 we took a short rest break to enjoy the glacier lake. The water was so brilliantly blue, I love that colour! I would definitely recommend this hike to anyone who likes a bit of a challenge. Anyone want to come along next year?

(Pictures on Facebook. Lots of them are on Charlene’s profile but you can see some of them on mine.)

This weekend I invited Angela out to Lake Wabamun for tubing and swimming on a friend’s boat. It was a great day as the weather was hot (+30) but the lake was cool. We were trying out her new 3 person tube. It was huge and very stable so the driver had to work extra hard to dump us off! My friend Drew tried “surfing” the tube on the straightaways and the driver would always suddenly slow down to see if he’d fly off. I also tried that a couple times but I think I prefer staying safe so mainly I just sat like a good little girl, enjoying the bumps and wakes.

Angela got cramps in her arms and lost the feeling in her hands as she hung on for dear life on her first tubing experience ever. My friend wasn’t sure she had any fun while on the tube because there was no screaming…

I had tickets to the Esks game that evening so Angela and I went to watch one of the most exciting games ever! We were trailing by 2 points when the Esks’ field goal at 46Sec left in the game got the crowd wild! It was deafening and Angela’s voice was hoarse.

Rounding out this awesome day was ice cream, DDR, Rock Band and a movie. yay.

Drove out with Charlene and Dan on Saturday morning to Mt Robson, BC. Watched as Jana and Jon were married right near the mountain they love to hike so much. It was a very interesting wedding ceremony as they had a dog as the wedding bearer, the wedding party danced down the aisle to “You Can Leave Your Hat On” by Joe Cocker while Jana was lead down the aisle by both parents to an Elvis song. Their ceremony seemed really short, about 10 minutes. Then after the registry signing they danced back down the aisle to the Hamster song.

The wedding reception was a couple hours later under tents with plenty of party lights strung about. Charlene and I had fun with the prey cam that Jana’s dad had set up for the drink tent. It took pictures every time there was movement in the tent with a limit of 1 a minute. I always went to the tent with friends and posed as we walked in. Then I’d take less than a minute to get my drink and get everyone in the tent to pose making funny faces as we counted down the timer for the shot as we left the tent.

The nice thing was the fire ban was lifted that weekend so they had a large bon fire after dark. Also, Sara’s speech was really heart felt and she compiled all the dancing camping videos Jana has into one montage!

Starting this evening, the Edmonton Dragon Boat Festival will run all weekend. My team, Platinum Ratz, is racing on Saturday and Sunday. There will be entertainment, food and lots of stuff to see and do. Come by Louise McKinney Park if you are looking for something to do this weekend!

The Edmonton Queen Riverboat is proud to support the 13^th Annual Edmonton Dragon Boat Festival. From our top deck, you are invited to watch the second round of races on Saturday, August 22, 2009. Boarding is free, and food and drink are always available.

The General Schedule of events is:
FRIDAY
6pm opening ceremonies
7.10pm Challenge Cup Races (like all chinese boats racing or )
10pm beer gardens close

SATURDAY
8am first round of racing begins
11am Festival Entertainment - Yoga demo/ Tribal Danc
noon Hypnotist Wayne Lee
1pm 2nd round of racing begins
5pm racing done and paddlers’ party begins (everyone welcome)
SUNDAY
8am Semi Finals
10.30 am Stage Entertainment - Yoga/Tai Chi/Kung Fu Demos
noon Pink Ribbon Challenge and Remembrance Ceremony
12.30 pm Finals
3pm Eskimos Cheer Team
5.30pm Awards
9pm Beer Gardens close

UPDATE AUG 25/09:
MY TEAM WON A BRONZE MEDAL FOR OUR DIVISION! YAY!

This is the tenth year of street hockey for the group! I can’t believe it! 9 of them were at the Duggan rink. Yay for us for going so long!! I’ve uploaded pictures to Facebook with the group of us that were there last week because Dustin was in town for the photo. I hope to take some more pics of us when we have some bigger numbers.