Countdown begins

Well with less than a month to go I guess I should start doing some thinking & planning for my trip. I'm taking a milk run to Oslo for my cousins' reunion (søskenbarn-treffet in Norwegian) on September 1st. Since I was planning to go to New York this spring, and had already booked my Aeroplan flight before hearing about the Norway thing, I'm combining both holidays. But it means I'm spending the day of Aug 28th flying from Kelowna-Toronto-New York (arriving around 10 pm) and then turning around and flying out to Oslo at 8:15 the next night. I arrive in Oslo nearly 48 hours after leaving home!!

But then I have a week in Norway, flying back to New York on the 6th (the day after my birthday) until the 12th...no way was I flying on September 11th! I'm sure I will have a great time and I'm looking forward to seeing all my cousins again. But maybe once I turn the calendar to August it will all seem a bit more 'real'!

Canine-less in Kelowna

I did go to the SPCA at lunch on Friday, visited the dogs. Buddy is cute but he's definitely a border collie through and through and he's also pretty young, and very focused. Obviously too much work for this family! Many other cute dogs, including Humie (pronounced 'who me') who is lovely but can climb 6 foot high chain link fences. Furry (formerly advertised as 'Fury') is a shepherd/lab cross who I've been kind of interested in for awhile and Friday I actually got to meet her briefly while she was on her way back to her kennel. Mike, the kennel guy, thought she might be a good match for us - she's a pretty low maintenance dog. So today I got Greg to go the SPCA with me and had another look at her. But you know, it was the same impression that I got the very first time I saw her: she just seems to be in her own little world. You call her name - she ignores you, she doesn't come over to the door when you approach (virtually all the other dogs do) and just seemed kind of zoned out. So I declined the invitation to visit in the quiet room with her. Maybe I'm foolish but I think there has to be a spark there right off the bat. So I'm okay with that. I will continue to look.

Stayed up till 1:00 last night reading Harry Potter! Very tired today but it was a great read. I can't say anything else obviously but I liked it a lot and didn't cry too too much. So then it was Holly's turn and I'm shocked that she's not that interested in reading it asap. We left her home today so she could read (she starts a 2-week day camp tomorrow) but she only made it through about 70 pages before moving on to something else. However I read a couple of chapters aloud to her just now and she enjoyed it so we may have to do it that way. That's all right, I kind of wanted to re-read it immediately anyway!

Doggie Anxiety

OK I was just cruising through the SPCA website as I do every couple of days and - gasp - today the last dog on the list is a young male border collie named Buddy. No photo at the moment but the description sounds very nice. I practically have heart palpitations! I know Greg really doesn't want another dog; too much work is his opinion which is very valid. Holly couldn't care less, she's a cat person. And the idea of having to walk a dog twice a day in 35+ temperatures doesn't appeal to me either. But still... I get an hour & a half for lunch tomorrow so I may take a drive to the SPCA. See if they know if Buddy likes cats...

Modern Times

 

Greg brought home a new laptop a few days ago for me to try out but after 24 hours I've decided to stick with old faithful here (a Toshiba). The new one was very shiny, had a 17" monitor but I like this one better.

Then I thought I would like to be able to get pictures off my cell phone & onto my laptop. The guy in the Rogers store said emailing them was the best way. I just found some bare bones instructions and it seems you can only send them right after you take them. I couldn't find any way to get pictures currently stored on the phone to email...too bad, there were a few Artistry pictures on there I would have like to see in bigger than 1x1 format! Anyway I took this one of Greg and thought it came out not too bad for so few pixels.

And today (thinking I would actually scrapbook something) I printed some pictures directly off my memory card in the printer. That was impressively easy! But have I done anything with them? Nooooooo!

My Precious

A while back I had my status on Facebook as "relieved". This is the story behind it.

A few weeks ago I was home sick and thought since I was home feeling crappy I would fill in an extended health care claim form. I was searching for a particular receipt and couldn't find it. Looked all over the house with no success. But I did find an old Costco receipt in the bedroom (specifically from December 23, 2000). The last thing on the receipt was 'diamond earrings $200'. WTF?! I never got no diamond earrings... so I'm laying (or is that lying, I always get those mixed up) on the couch feeling like crap and fretting. Greg bought diamond earrings and they weren't for me?! oh dear. This goes on for awhile. Then I have this sudden flash of memory, opening a pair of heart-shaped earrings with a little diamond chip on them and him saying 'they're real diamonds'. oh right, I remember now... go look in the jewelry drawer. No such earrings to be found. Oh shit. Because...

A few weeks prior to that I'd received an email from a librarian who was organizing a fundraiser for the SLAIS Alumni (UBC's library school) - donate your old unwanted jewelry to be sold to raise funds for the school. Boy I got really into that and went through all my jewelry and packed up a huge bag of stuff that I hadn't worn in years. Including apparently one pair of what turned out to be very expensive diamond earrings. Now you have to understand that my husband does not buy expensive gifts...ever. Except for this one Christmas 7 years ago.

So (did I tell you this was going to be long?) I had taken this bag of jewelry to BCLA with me in April to donate. But by this time I can't remember exactly what it was in aid of or who had organized it. I made a couple of phone calls, nobody seems to know much about it. I go through my old inbox and find the original email, write back to her. No response. Turns out she's on vacation. So I write to another librarian I know at VPL to see if she happens to know anything. Yes the jewelry was actually sold at BCLA, Corinne's away but she'll check with her when she gets back.

Meanwhile I've ransacked the house several times over, looking everywhere I can think of, old purses, makeup bags, etc etc. Weeks go by, Corinne is back from vacation so I write again. She doesn't remember any such earrings but will check at home. Another couple of days go by and I write again, thinking I will put out an appeal to the listserv & find whoever bought them. But then the next day she emails me, she found them!! In the bottom of a box at work. They meet the description, hallelujah! (This is when I became relieved...) I'm going to Vancouver in a few days so will meet her to pick them up.

Thursday Holly and I trundle down to VPL, meet Corinne & she pulls out this little bubble-wrapped package and gives it to me. I open it, look at at them and go...

I don't think that's them.

Seriously - how many pairs of earrings like that would you expect to find at this thing? But these just don't seem to be quite the way I remember them. However, we decide what the heck, I'm taking them. I will take them to my jeweler friend & inquire as to their value and then just put the whole episode out of my mind. Greg would never know anyway (and he doesn't read my blog!) and it makes a good story. But it just goes to show that expensive gifts are wasted on me after all and I should quit my whining when birthdays come along...

I'm baaack

Well that may be the longest I've been away from a computer in quite some time! 250 junk mails in 6 days - wow!

Holly and left for Vancouver last Wednesday night. We stayed four nights in Steveston at our favourite B&B, which won't be in business for much longer so I'm glad we went. Thursday we headed downtown and went to VPL, where I had a couple of people to see. Then we took the Skytrain out to Burnaby for Holly to shop at the Crystal Mall under the Hilton Hotel in Metrotown, home of all things Asian & anime. She picked herself up some Naruto stuff and then we went back downtown for awhile before heading back to Richmond. That bus ride was the only time it rained while we were there which was amazing.

Friday was R&R - we did next to nothing, wandered around Steveston & generally were lazy. Got to watch all the TV shows we don't get to watch at home (heavy on CSI & What Not to Wear).

Saturday morning my friend Marjory came out and we went out for breakfast to the Steveston Hotel. She then drove us into Vancouver to A-M's place. We went down to Granville Island for the afternoon, spent too much money at I'm Impressed, and watched some very funny (but very long) street theatre.

Canada Day we left Steveston (and did not go to the parade, shame shame) for A-M's place. Wandered South Granville a bit and went to see Pirates of the Caribbean which was better than I expected.



Monday we went down to A-M's pool and the sun actually came out! Later in the afternoon James & Richard picked us up and we went out for dinner and to the Casa di Gelato for dessert. Fantastic ice cream!

Afterwards we went back to their place and watched an Eddie Izzard DVD called "Dress to Kill". OMG we laughed & laughed...in fact I did actually laugh so hard I spit red wine on myself (and am hoping it'll come out of my shorts!)

Then this morning we flew back to Kelowna. So there you have it - it was fairly low-key but we had fun.