He Took Me to Paris

I traveled the world.

I saw a lot of things.

I lived in a lot of places (including our recent move, I have had over 25 addresses in my life.  Excessive, I know.)

I kissed a lot of frogs (okay, not so many frogs, but it sort of goes with the theme I've got goin' here).

And then I kissed Buzz.

He made me swoon.

He'd been making me swoon for many months prior to that first night out and every day since.  He's a late bloomer.  A bit slow on the uptake, if you know what I mean.

He makes me laugh.

He tickles my funny bone.

He loves my dogs.  Even when one of them stole his chocolate rum cake, ate the whole thing and then passed out at the foot of the bed - drunk.  I think that was a bonding moment for my boys.  Both of them have each had too much booze and passed out at the foot of my bed.  It happens.

More importantly, my dogs love him.  So much so that I often have to compete with one of them for his attention.   I often lose the competition.

He's smart.

He likes a lot of the same things I do.  

He thinks pajama days are as equally important as movie nights, live concerts, cheering for the Leafs and road trips.

He loves a good road trip.  We've taken just a few.

He took me to Paris.  

Although I had had plenty of opportunities to go, I had been saving Paris for "The One" for years.  Because Paris is a place you only go to with "The One".

He also took me to Florence.  

And Rome.

And Monte Carlo.

And Oregon and PEI and many points in between.

But he took me to Paris.  That's big.

On Tuesday he celebrates his ??? birthday.   I wish I could give him the equivalent of Paris.  Or Florence. Or Rome.  Or Portland or PEI or points in between.

Instead he'll get lasagna.   And while it doesn't compete with Paris...it is mighty fine lasagna.

Happy Birthday Buzz!

 

A Burgeoning Career?

When I lived on Maui I worked really hard to assimilate into the local culture.  Part of that process was to learn the Hawaiian equivalent of our English words.  Soon I was calling hors d'oeuvres "pu'u pu'us", going to the bathroom was "making shi-shi", the end of the work week was "pau hana" and when I was done giving Snickers his last snausage snack he was "all pau" (all POW).   If I wanted something to go fast it was "wiki-wiki" and the mouth-watering menu at my favorite restaurant was "ono-licious".    My favorite Hawaiian translation?  Mele Kalikimaka (Merry Christmas)

One thing I never really glommed onto though was the Hawaiian equivalent of my own name.  I didn't like it much.  It sounded too...manly...

But, in late October 2001 a friend of mine came to visit and she, ever the one to jump into the local scene with both feet, took all of about 2 days to figure out my Hawaiian name and from that day forward, whenever I see, speak or correspond with Elise, she calls me by my Hawaiian name:  Kimo.

I never cottoned to that name, but she's a great lady and a great friend so I've never really told her how much I dislike the name.  She's the only person in the world that can call me Kimo.  Just like Buzz and my cousin Lori are the only people that can get away with calling my Kimmie.  Don't ask me why, but when these two people use that version of my name, I don't mind it.  Anyone else?  I'll rip your head off.

Whatever.

This week Buzz came home from work and asked if I would mind driving one of his colleagues to the airport this morning.  Given that we live at the top of Todd Mountain and there isn't a regularly scheduled shuttle service between the resort and the local airport and given that a taxi between Point A and Point B costs the better part of a monthly rent payment, getting someone to run people to the airport is somewhat at a premium up here.  Given that I've been house bound all week (thanks to BC's unseasonable cold snap) and given that I hadn't seen the inside of a store in a week I jumped at the opportunity to get up at the crack of dawn, load up the dogs and my passenger and head down the mountain to the airport and then onward...to the mall...ahhhhh....

Anyway, as I was downtown today I got another email from Buzz - could I pick up his regional boss-lady on Tuesday?  And run her back down on Thursday?  Oh, and when the colleague that went out this morning comes back a week from Monday, could I make that run too?

The business plan is already formulating...Kimo's Limo?  Whatdya think?

I Should've Made a List

We made it.


We traveled from the Northumberland Strait to the soaring mountains of British Columbia;  across the Canadian Shield, dipping into Michigan's Upper Peninsula, through the great Prairies of North Dakota, Saskatchewan and Alberta and along BC's sketchiest mountain pass.  Some 5500 kms.  We made it.  We're home.  


That's over 60 hours alone in the car with the man I've barely seen these last few months as we wound down our time on the sandbar and prepared for our new adventure atop the mountains.  I'm happy to report, we still like each other.


We like road tripping.  We had lots to talk about.  We laughed A LOT.  We saw a lot of interesting things.  I should've made a list.  Before it all evaporates into the recesses of my gray matter, following are some highlights of our road west.


Buzz likes a three-way.  GET YOUR MIND OUT OF THE GUTTER.  Buzz, ever the guy with a back-up plan likes to not only have printed door-to-door  MapQuest directions between each day's Point A and Point B, but he also likes to refer to the North American Map Book that lives in the backseat of our car.  But that's not enough.  No....we also like to use our GPS navigational system too.  This way we have micro and macro views of where we're going and how we're getting there.  No looking out the window to read a road sign for us...no sireebob.


Michigan's Upper Peninsula (the U.P.) is the only place in North America that you can get a Pasty.  That's not a typo.  I said "Pasty".  It's pronounced "pass-tee".  When we first spied the signs for authentic U.P. Pasties I immediately thought of those things that cover a stripper's nipples;  Buzz thought it was a typo for pastries.  We were both wrong.  Pasties, for those who don't know are a type of meat pie brought to the area by Cornish miners in the 1800's.  A standard recipe includes a thin pie crust stuffed with rutabegas, diced potatoes, carrots, onions & ground beef seasoned to perfection.  We wouldn't know what they tasted like because we didn't buy one, but I wish we had.  Oh well, maybe next time we're in the U.P.  


Hunting season opened the weekend we were traveling through the U.P.  I have never seen so much cammo and flourescent orange in my life.  And guns.  Lots of guns.  And lots of small lodges, campgrounds and shacks "WELCOMING HUNTERS!!"   Don't even get me started on the trees.  I think the entire U.P. is one long series of National Forests.  For miles and miles on either side of our car, nothin' but trees.


Birds of Prey are everywhere...not just in our backyard on the Sandbar.  We saw eagles in every province and state we traveled through, but the most memorable was the great bald eagle we spotted not 30-feet from the side of the road devouring his breakfast.  I was driving and going way too fast to pull over and snap a photo, but whatever you've read or heard about eagles, multiply that by like a million and you're still not even close to the majesty of an eagle.  Plus its head was like the size of Snickers.  Not kidding.


Rugby, North Dakota is the geographic centre of North America.  You know how I know this?  I posed at the monument, of course!  

And speaking of North Dakota.   We loved Grand Forks.   Can't really say why, but we did.  Just loved it.

Eventually we wound our way back across the 49th parallel in Portal, Saskatchewan.  That morning we left Grand Forks in temps hovering around 60-degrees.   By the time we reached the border 7 hours later, our mother country welcomed us with open arms and one nasty weather bomb that dropped two feet of snow and ice on lower Saskatchewan.   The last 150-kms of that day were amongst the most treacherous we traveled.  Until the next morning when we literally skated across the province to Alberta.

Thanks to four-wheel drive we made it through Saskatchewan, which in my mind is one of the most beautiful landscapes our country has to offer.  That's saying a lot, because one thing I came to really appreciate this trip is just how spectacularly beautiful North America is.  Full stop.  

Saskatchewan is not known for winding roads.

And parts of it seemed a bit lonely

The morning light was spectacular

Blue skies, green fields, red barns

Moooooooooo

We overnighted in Calgary where we dined with friends and marveled at how much that city has grown in the three years since we were last there.  Or maybe we just never noticed it before.  But whatever, we both decided Cowtown was NOT our kind of place.  Too much traffic.  On the plus side though, gas was the cheapest here.

And that left us with one last day on the road.  Calgary to Sun Peaks.  Through Roger's Pass.  One of the scariest passes on the Trans Canada Highway.  I cannot believe transport carriers traverse this road on a daily basis.   Conveniently it snowed just as we got to the Pass, which turned a scary trip into a nail biter as our windshield wipers clogged up, making keeping pace with the spray from the trucks almost impossible.   By this point I was done with the road trip.

I will leave you with one last image of our trip west.  Imagine if you will a quaint boutique that sells this:

Suffice it to say, we didn't get a jar.

A laugh a day

One day at school a teacher was trying to instruct children in the relationship between color and taste.  To do this, she demonstrated using Lifesavers, the "candy with the hole."  The children began to identify the flavors by their color:

Red.....................Cherry

Yellow...................Lemon

Green...................Lime

Orange ...............Orange

Finally the teacher gave them all HONEY flavored lifesavers.

None of the children could identify the taste.

The teacher said, "I will give you all a clue.. It's what your

mother may sometimes call your father."

One little girl looked up in horror, spit her lifesaver out and

yelled, "Oh my God! They're ass-holes!"

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Now that I have your attention....oh my God, that joke made me howl when it landed in my in-box yesterday.  And boy did I need a laugh.  Because you know?  This whole "let's pack up our lives, sell our house and move clear cross country" thing we've decided to do?  Yup - it hasn't been much fun so far!!!


The house is still for sale.

 

We're leaving in 9 days.

 

We thought we had a week to ten days to get from the Atlantic to damn near the Pacific, but some big muckety-muck at the corporate office has decided it's best if Buzz started sooner rather than later so, yes, the plans we spent last weekend making (about what route we'd take, where we'd stop, where we'd stay) - those plans got thrown out the window long about 8pm on Monday night.  So now Buzz and I are driving together as far as Ontario where he'll leave me in the comfort and care of my folks and he'll fly to his new hotel, work with the big brass from the home office on some very important, so important, it couldn't POSSIBLY wait until you drive with your family across country in 8 days stuff.  Then, about a week later he'll fly back, collect me and the dude and the midget and we'll resume our trans-continental journey once more.

Ahem.


Wasn't laughing much at that one.


Then there's the whole sell the house before we move pressure.   UGH.  I hardly even want to rehash here how  I feel about living in a house that's on the market and so therefore must be "show ready" at all times.  Note:  I don't like it much.  Not much laughter wiping down faucets every time they're used.    But, whatever.  It's what we've decided to do and so therefore we're doing.

Selling houses season is almost over on the sandbar and like sand through the hourglass of time so is our time on the island.  So to expedite matters we buried a statue of St. Joseph upside down in our garden in the hopes that he'd hear our prayer and find us someone to love our home and buy it.  We pray this prayer to him every day.  NOT kidding.  Don't laugh.


Anyway, seems like good ol' St. Joe was lending us an ear because right about the time we decided to test the waters to see if there was anyone interested in renting our house while it's on the market, a lovely couple who own a business in our neighborhood have decided to winter-over on the sandbar and were looking for a short-term rental.  Like in month to month.  Like in until our house sells.  They move in next Saturday.  And while I wasn't exactly laughing when we finalized the application last night, I was very much relieved to know that two fine people will be caring for our house and keeping Frieda company over the winter months.  Not laughing, but definitely smiling.  And relieved. 


Part of the process of getting ready to move is figuring out what goes and what stays...one of the things that cannot go with us is the Fred-mobile, Buzz's car.  But what to do, what to do?  No one wants to buy a 1994 Chrysler LHS because really?  It's an old man vehicle if ever there was one and not in the "coooool" old man kind of way, but in the big beastly, gas-guzzling kind of way.  So we've decided to retire Buzz's ride and finally figured out the many hoops we have to jump through in order to retire Fred.  We've jumped through all but the last one which involves dropping it off next week before we leave the sandbar.  Done.  Next.

Next up...well, there's lots of things next up and I don't think they're going to get done any faster if I just sit here writing on my little blog!  So, 9 days and counting.  Looking for the laughter.

Sleepless on the Sandbar

We're counting down the days left on the sandbar (as of today 13 to be exact).  And almost as if to say "hey Kim & Buzz, let's make the most of the limited time you have left" our body clocks have turned off and so has our ability to sleep.

So amidst budget season at Buzz's hotel, my trying to impart the wisdom of debits and credits to my students, trying to sell a house, organize in preparation for the movers and selling off bits and pieces of our life here...we're also sleep deprived.

We're soooo looking forward to the time when our lives are more stable, when we have time to spend together, when we're settled in somewhere in the mountains of BC.

Of course by then I'll be complaining about being bored.

Such is the ying and yang of life.

uhn-sur-tn-tee

un·cer·tain·ty

Spelled[uhn-sur-tn-tee]

–noun,plural-ties for 2.

1.      the state of being uncertain; doubt; hesitancy.

2.      an instance of uncertainty, doubt, etc.

3.      unpredictability; indeterminacy; indefiniteness.

4.      the state of my life at this moment.

You know we’re moving, right?

Packing up, heading west?

To scale some mountain peaks?

Oh, and for Buzz to start a new job?

If you haven’t heard before…well, yes ma’am (sir) we sure are!  Buzz has accepted a transfer to do a clean-up job at a resort at the top of Tod Mountain, a quaint alpine resort just north of Kamloops, BC.

I’m thrilled for this move not only because the West is the Best, but also the fact that Buzz was tapped for this opportunity means the work he has done here on the sandbar is being recognized by those important people that count…you know…the ones that sit in their office towers in the centre of the universe and decide the fates of people below them?  Those people have Buzz on their radar and it’s a very good thing.

So yes, a couple of months ago the call came:  “We need you.  We want you.  We must have YOU.  Because YOU and only YOU can save the universe from collapsing in upon itself.  Oh, and because you did such a good job on the sandbar, we want MORE of your YOUness in the west.”

The decision to go wasn’t hard.  Aside from 30-days of pro’ing and con’ing, the choice to list our house, quit my job, load up the Dude & the Midget and make tracks west really wasn’t tough at all.

It’s all the OTHER stuff that came along with that one decision that’s filled our lives with so many “uhn-sur-tn-tees”.

We had some friends for dinner Saturday night and as our move is (theoretically) impending rather quickly of course the conversation turned to us and our plans.  They had lots of questions:

           

          Them                                                      Us

Q1       “So, when exactly are you leaving?”                          "um, don’t know."

Q2       “When do you start there?”                                       "um, don’t know that either."

Q3       “How long will it take you to get across country”     “depends on the answer to Q1 & Q2”

Q4       “Where will you live”                                                “um, not sure”

Q5       “What will you be doing, Kim?”                                “uh, don’t really know”

Q6       “Where will you spend Christmas?”                           “hopefully not in a tent, but don’t

really know”

Q7       “What will you do with your house if it doesn’t sell?”“REALLY don’t know”

Q8       “How long do you think you’ll live there?”               “beats me”

And so it went for over four hours.

Sigh.

It’s hard to make plans when you don’t have answers to some of life’s most basic questions.  And you all know, I’m a girl who always likes to have a plan.

I’m trying to look at this time before our move west as a real growth opportunity for me.  Not having a plan buttoned down means I’m trying not to control every little contingency.  It means an opportunity for me to take a deep breath and just go with the flow.  It’s a chance to really test my ability to not eat away my anxiety.  (So far, so good, if you don’t count the big bag of Hallowe’en candy I just bought for my “students” nudge, nudge, wink, wink).

Someone’s Facebook status update recently said:  “let go, let go, let go some more.”

It’s becoming my mantra as we approach the end of our time here on the sandbar.

Let go, let go, let go…some more.

It Has to STOP.

Usually I use the space on this blog to write about the minutiae of our life here on the sandbar and to muse about the uncertainties ahead on our road west.  I like to keep it lighthearted, humorous and mostly frivolous.  Usually.  But yesterday, I came across a post on a blog I follow that stopped me cold in my tracks, moved me to tears and made me so angry.  So today, my little blog, with my small following will become my soapbox in the hopes that the more people are aware that this is going on the more voices we can raise to stop the bullying that's killing kids.

I see it every day at the school where I teach.  Kids who think they're being funny, or smart, or just for the sport of it think it's okay to demean and demoralize another, just because they're different.  This particular article is about gay teenagers being bullied, literally to death...I haven't seen that yet at my school, but I can easily see how it could happen.  We've all become really good at tolerating intolerance, turning a blind eye, pretending we didn't hear that racial/sexist/homophobic slur.  When we pretend we don't hear or see we are in fact promoting the behavior.  It's time we stopped.  So they'll stop.  And then the kids will stop...killing themselves.  

 Here is the article I'm referring to.   I hope you'll read it.  And then do something in your local community/school/office/work-place/park/mall to  MAKE THIS STOP.

Tree, Frog, Downward Dog

This summer I took some time off from the fitness regime I started last year.  With the long, hot days of summer I just couldn't bear the thought of locking myself away in a gym to run on a treadmill, or even worse, to sit amongst 30 other  sweaty gym rats at a 90-minute hot yoga class.  Instead I tried to earn my activity points by daily walks, working in the garden, outdoor bootcamp, etc.  This is how much things have changed for me...I actually chose to go hiking when we were in Alberta & BC this summer.  Yup - I'm a certifiable move it or lose it kinda gal these days.

But, the days on the sandbar are getting shorter.  And wetter.  And windier.  With the coming of fall and the beginning of my teaching contract I don't have as much leisure time to slot my activities in whenever I feel like it, so I thought it best to get back into some sort of fitness routine.   I've returned to the gym and starting last week to my Monday Night Sweat-a-Thon - Hot Yoga.

If you've never taken a hot yoga class, or a Bikram's class let me tell you what you're missing.  Typically the classes are 90-minutes long.  The yoga studio is dimly lit and intensely hot.  So hot that the thermostat reads 105-degrees (f).  There's typically a fan blowing the hot air around the room and, in the case of the classes I take on the sandbar, about 30 other like-minded individuals in varying degrees of dress and undress spread on their mats about the room.  The less you wear, the less you suffocate.  The more you wear, the more you sweat.  A case can be made for either side.  I choose to dress somewhere in the middle - enough clothing to cover up all the jiggly bits and not so much that I die of asphyxiation.

So, last Monday, there I was kitted out in my bike shorts and tank top, lying prone on my neon green yoga mat trying to calm the voices in my head and clear away the day...breathing in...and...out...in...and...out...when I heard the creak of the studio door, felt the cool breeze of fresh air rushing into the room and with it, the smell of a newcomer. 

He smelled like old socks.  Old socks that had been left in a hockey bag to ferment over the winter.  Old socks in a hockey bag that had first been rolled in poop.

Guess where he chose to roll out his mat?

That's correct...right behind mine.

To add insult to injury (and let me tell you, I was injured after spending 90-minutes inhaling hot, sweaty and STINKY air) I managed to catch a glimpse of the offending yogi whilst twisted into a "happy baby" pose.  The guy with the big stink?  He was one of my former students.

So yeah, hot, tortuous class, coupled with overly ripe former student who was mostly nekked.

Can't wait for tonight's class!

Well, If Oprah Can Do It...

Oprah's been doing it for a couple of years.

I have other friends that have been doing it a while too.

This week, even my MOTHER started doing it.

So really, what choice did I have?

I had to join the Digitals and get with the program.  After-all, I couldn't be bested by a woman 21 years my senior who admittedly thinks the technology that allows us to pick up a plastic device in one's home and talk to someone on the other end of the country (you know....the "telephone") is mind-boggling.

I got a Skype account.

Let me tell you how my world has changed by simply downloading an application to my computer that allows me to call people and video chat with them...LIVE!  It is SO cool!

I know by even admitting how cool I think it is, I am now by definition completely and totally uncool, but there you go - that's the story of my life.

I Skyped with my mom first.  I watched her drink her scotch while we chatted.  All these years, I had no idea she drank while we talked.  The things you learn in a digital universe.

Yesterday I Skyped my 13-year old niece and we had a great laugh about where to position the camera so you don't have a double chin...or making sure to wipe the dust off the monitor so it doesn't appear that the person you're talking to has a big booger in their nose...you know, important stuff like that.  We also caught up on movies we've seen, how our school years have started and where we each respectively write our thoughts to share with the world.  I'm a blogger, so is she.  Again, the things you learn when you can look at someone when you're talking to them.

But here's what occurred to me this morning as I was thinking about the Skype call I'm scheduled to make today at noon.

Most of the time I look something like this:

(truth be told, I seldom have a glass of Sangria in my hand, but it's a cute picture, so there you have it)

But now that I'm Skyping to talk to my friends and family, I'm going to have to do my hair and make-up - otherwise everyone will know that in reality...I normally look like this:

So, did I just improve my life by learning how to video call or complicate it more?

I Don't Know Where I'm Going, But I'm on My Way!

Phhhhhhh…..Here I am blowing the dust off this old blog.   I’ve been gone for a few weeks and that seems to be the trending theme with this old blog lately.  Sorry.

I’ll tell you why I slowed down stopped writing a while ago.  It wasn’t that I was soooo busy redecorating, traveling, gardening or reading the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo trilogy.  Nope.  It wasn’t that I was too busy to write; au contraire, I had plenty of time to for that.  Uh-uh.  It wasn’t that I didn’t have things to say; if you know me, you know I always have something to say.  Nope, it wasn’t any of that at all.  Here’s what happened:

My blog got discovered.

I mean, ordinarily, in the blog-o-sphere having your blog discovered is considered a good thing.  Right?

More readers = happy writer?  Right?

Well, probably for most other bloggers that’d be true.

But not for me.

You see, my blog wasn’t discovered by “the masses”. 

Nope. 

It was discovered by one person. 

Snapshots was discovered by …

One of my former students.

And so, why would that keep me from writing you might ask?

Well, people, I had to pause for a bit to figure out how I felt about someone from my place of employment having insights into my personal life.    Because, just like in the Republic of the United States of America, I like to keep Church (work) and State (life) separate. 

I mean it’s one thing to share the details of our life with  friends and family spread across this vast and wide continent, but isn’t it another thing entirely to have people outside of my inner circle reading the daily minutia that makes up our lives here on the sandbar?

So, it’s taken me a couple of months of thought and here’s what I’ve decided.

There are really no state secrets on my blog.

It’s a great tool to share what’s happening in our world, so far from our families and closest friends.  It’s a creative outlet for me.  It’s a place I can showcase my growing skills at photog’ing (new word meaning the taking of photographic images).   It’s fun.  I like it.  I’m not giving it up dammit.

Buzz and I are about to embark on a really big adventure in uncertainty that will take us many more miles away from some family & close friends (but closer to others) and what better place to keep you all apprised of what’s happening with us than to continue to update here?

I may redesign this site.

I will probably rename this site.

I don’t know.

Just like almost everything else that’s going on in our lives, this too is changing.  Come along for the ride, won’t you?