The rest of the camp out…

After we finished up with the swearing in ceremony, we went back to our place for a meat and cheese tray I picked up yesterday, and just to top off the morning, the guy from the flower shop pulled up the same time as us with the Bouquet of flowers I got her. Red roses and white orchids. Good job Neil, good job. She loved it all. Gramma and Grampa left to go back to work and Traci and I relaxed for a bit and talked about the ceremony. We both decided it was very classy and quite emotional at times. We really enjoyed it and Traci is glad she did it. Traci and Andrew started missing the camper, so off they went, and I stayed behind to work…

We had a nice evening again, with another fire. Traci had made friends with the couple that had moved in next door during the day and we invited them over for a fire. Al and Diane were a really incredible couple, we chatted about all manner of things, not the least of which is Xavier their 2 year old grandson (the other cousins call him Mr. X hehe) and how those stories are almost identical to Andrews. At about 9:30 Diane said she was going in as it was a bit cold out, but it turns out she enjoyed herself enough that she stayed out until 11pm. over the next couple days we spent quite some time chatting and visiting with these nice people. We gave them some directions to their next destinations and helped Al start his fire one night, and then on Saturday night Al came over with a bottle of wine for us and said, `this is for you two, for Traci's citizenship, for your anniversary(12 years) and for just being nice people`. Thanks Al and Diane, you made our stay that much more enjoyable. OH, and the hickabees on the other side got evicted… it was a good day.

Also on Saturday, we had Gramma and Grampa, and Mary Jo, Greg and Sophie out for a nice `welcome to Canada`lunch for Traci. We had a ball. Burgers, Potato Salad, Cupcakes, and to top it off, the weather was amazing. We had our anniversary supper Saturday (It is actually on Sunday, but we are hauling back into town), we walked up to Safeway and bought some incredible steaks on sale and had quite the feast. The day was topped with another fire and a bunch more smores! What a life! We are sad to leave on Sunday, as we have enjoyed our stay immensely, and will surely be back soon! We will leave you with some nice pictures of our camping experience!

Oh Canada (not canada day yet tho..)

On Wednesday Traci and Andrew came into town because Traci was taking her Oath to become a Canadian Citizen early Thursday morning. Traci is originally from South-western Pennsylvania, but has lived up here for the past 12 years. She always said if we had a child she would get her Canadian Citizenship. Well… we had a child and she’s now a citizen. the Ceremony was really nice. There were 75 people being sworn in as Canadian, from 23 different countries. They all went up and received their paperwork from the judge and a Mountie in the full red serge uniform. Nice.

At the start of the ceremony, the presiding clerk asked that everyone shut off their phones and if a child acts up, could they please leave the room. Andrew had to leave for a while but there was a family that had 5 year old that was having an all out tantrum. The Judge actually stopped the ceremony and asked this person to take the kid out. I think the kid was actually being sworn in, so the dad didn’t think he wasn’t really supposed to leave. He left. There was also a cell phone that went off, boy di she get the ol`stinkeye from the clerk… hooweee…

Here was Traci a month ago, going in to write the test. (she looks nervous)And here is Traci going in for the swearing in ceremony! Yay, way to go! And look how much the plants have grown!!!

Traci is waiting for the time to go in. If you miss this appointment for any reason, you must start the application over again from the start. We were 45 minutes early… obviously.We are all so happy and can’t wait…While we waited, Andrew made sure we were all ready for the big event!Here is the judge and the Mountie! very fancy…Andrew and Gramma got to see most of the ceremony from over there… he was happier on the move today than when he was sitting…Traci is now a Canadian Citizen. We are proud to have her!

Really nice days…

Traci and Andrew really seem to like living out at the trailer. They play all day, at the playground, in the campsite, in the camper… sounds like a life to strive for. I have been dealing with the computer issues as noted in a previous post. On Monday I got back out to the camper around 5:15 and Traci had supper ready for the BBQ , I cooked the chicken and it was very tasty. Cooking outside makes everything taste better. I mentioned that the furnace was acting up, and it still was, but it so happened that there is an RV repairman living in the campground for the summer. Tony and his wife are fulltimers from Vancouver who work for 5 months up here, then move to Arizona and Mexico for the winter. I called the number on his truck and within a 1/2 hour he had us fixed. it cost us $20.00 for the service call and $260.00 for the new part (a circuit board was the culprit). And just like that, all worries about the furnace were washed away! yeehaw! Tony is a pretty cool guy as well. After reading all about other RV repair horror stories, I took an extra card because he is a terrific resource.

On Sunday night Andrew had a pretty uncomfortable sleep in the Pack and Play, so tonight we went over to Walmart and bought a bed rail and after a few modification, Voila! Andrew is ready for his first night in a big boy bed. (side note: I left my phone and wallet on the roof of the car when we left Walmart, so as we got out on the main street the wallet fell onto the road and just as we looked back it got run over by another car, it looked like a dead gopher on the road, complete with tire tracks. hehe, stupid me, it was ok tho, the phone stayed on the trunk) He went down about 9pm in our bed (we transfer him over when we are ready for bed) and we made a fire! It was quite nice. Our new neighbour had moved in, but he didn’t have a proper connector for his sewer hose and every time they went, well you know, Traci could smell it. Yuck. I went over the the office and complained to them, a well as the hick neighbours on the other side as they had a fire pit full of garbage that they were going to burn later. The attendant came a spoke to both of them. Our new neighbour told him that he wasn’t using the hose. Ok, why even connect it then? Oh well, we had a nice fire and went to bed. We moved Andrew into the dinette bed and he seemed really comfortable.

He woke up at about 2 am, we gave him a bottle in our bed then moved him back to his bed and he went back to sleep. The next morning at about 6 am he was at the end of the dinette looking at us seemingly saying, c’mon get up, the day has started! We got up got ready for the day and I went into town.

Apparently it was another great day for A and T, as there was more recreational activities and some good solid naps. We purchased some roof vent covers to help darken the trailer during the day, and it seemed to help greatly for his nap time. Traci made Tinfoil dinners and had them ready for the Q when I got there. Mmmmm, I always forget how tasty tinfoil dinners are until we have them… yum. We had a fire again. While Traci was getting Andrew settled for bed, I was outside chopping wood when the sewer hose neighbour came over to me with a couple pieces of wood. He just walked over without saying a word and dropped the wood, turned around and left. huh… a few seconds later he comes around again with some more wood and then stopped to chat. Turns out he is a really nice guy. He and his wife are from the Netherlands. Traci said they looked like they were in their mid fifties, and I thought the same thing. As we are chatting (he had very bad English) I asked him what he does for a living that allows him to travel. He says, ‘good god man, I’m 75 years old, I haven’t worked for 15 years’ wow, you look great mister. He has been all over Western Canada and Alaska the past few years. This trip he and his wife started in Calgary, rented a class C and drove down to Yellowstone park, and back up through Washington state and BC. This was his last night in the camper and was going in to Calgary for 2 nights in the Holiday Inn before flying back to Amsterdam. It was a fun conversation, with a lot of charades to figure out what each of us were saying.

Traci and I had some really tasty s’mores. You heat the marshmallow first, then you shove the chocolate into the marshmallow (it doesn’t matter what kind of chocolate, I like little peanut butter cups myself), and then squish it between the graham crackers and then re-heat it over the fire to finish the melting. ooohhhhhh mmmmmyyyyyyy…

All in all a couple of nice days… sure wish I didn’t have to work…

Camping (living), in Okotoks…

So, after my computer issues, we finally got out to the campground. I took pictures every kilometer from my house just to make the trip more exciting and I ended up with 21 pictures.

I arrived at Okotoks Lions Campground on next to the beautiful Sheep River.Because I was going to commute back to work each day, Traci and Andrew hung back at the house for about an hour to give me time to get all set up for them. We are staying for a week so I wanted to do a really good job of setting them up to be comfortable.

I got set up in good time, Traci and Andrew showed up and went inside to get things ready for the week, and as I was doing the final touch-ups on the site, and elderly gentleman from the next site walks over and introduces himself. I think he said his name was Feryl (sp). He reached out to shake my hand and said he was very impressed with me, as I was the most organized camper set up he had ever seen. cool. Thanks Feryl. Later in the evening I had a chance to have a short conversation with him. It turns out he was a tail-gunner in a bomber in WWII. Wow. He went on to tell me he never fired one bullet. I was like ‘huh?’. He told me that every eighth bullet was a tracer and once you were spotted you were done. Turns out the best way to bomb Germany is to do it undetected. He said they never had any encounters with enemy aircraft in all his missions. I wonder how few people have that story. Remember the movie Memphis Belle? How amazing it was to have gone their 20 missions without an incident, and how it must have so incredibly nerve wracking on every mission, let alone the final one!! hoooooweee… Nice to meet you Feryl.

We spent some time getting settled in and then we just did some relaxing. We were both quite tired so it was hotdogs and chips for supper and then some more relaxing. Andrew seems quite content here in Okotoks doesn't he?

Our site backs onto the access road to the park which runs parallel to the 4 lane main thoroughfare in Okotoks… so it’s a bit noisy at times, not too noticeable during the noise of the day, but pretty noticeable as you are relaxing in the evening. It was a conscious choice to stay here instead of somewhere more remote for Traci’s comfort level while I am away during the day. Our biggest issue is the Homeless Family (it seems by the look of their site) who have 8 people staying in one small 5th wheel trailer. There is the Grandpa and Grandma, Mom, 3 kids and 2 boyfriends. The youngest girl in the site is 15 and she is pregnant ( it is a HUGE joke amongst the group). They all smoke like chimneys, sit and drink coffee all day and every second word out of each of them is F***. The (allegedly) father of the baby walks around all day without a shirt, in blue jeans and cowboy boots, with the most MASSIVE belt buckle and the skoal ring in the back pocket. He drive a rusty Dodge Dakota with no muffler and the words ‘caution redneck’ painted on the bumper. Apparently they have been here for 6 weeks. I don’t know why. Oh, they burned their garbage in the fire pit.

It’s amazing how the single bad thing takes away from all the good. The rest of the park is very nice. I got to meet my first real ‘fulltimers’ There are 3 couples that staff this park all summer, then they all go down to the BLMs in Arizona near Yuma for the rest of the year. They have nice rigs and are very hard working and very friendly.

Andrew got to sleep about 9:30, about 1.5 hours late, but we figured it would be as he sleeps in a blacked out room at home and it’s light SO late here right now. We weren’t to far behind him, and had a fairly good sleep. Andrew was a little restless as he was in his pack and play crib, which seemed a bit too small for him. Maybe tomorrow night we will figure out a better way for him. All in all a good start to the week long living-out experience.

Oh, We are still having problems with the furnace, it is very frustrating when it waits until 3:30am to stop lighting without some manual manipulation. Fractured sleep, my favorite.

Oh no…

If any of you have had to go through this, then you know… how much frustration is involved with blanking your computer because of a windows system problem.

I posted the previous blog on Saturday night and just shut down normally when I was done. I have had a couple of glitches in the past when restarting (it wouldn’t), and had to perform a system restore to push the setting back to a point where there was no problems. When I started the computer up Sunday morning, I had the same problem (it wouldn’t). So as per the past few times, I restart in safe mode, and go through the system restore routine. This time, nothing. Well ,almost nothing. the mouse cursor was on the screen, but nothing else.

Sunday morning… we are supposed to be packing up and going camping for a week and I am literally pulling my hair out trying to get my computer to restart.

I keep the following items on this computer…

Photos – about 15,000 of them, Videos – of Andrew from before he was born, Music, and to top it off, ALL my designs for work, and if that's not enough, My entire company books.

I am sick. I have NOT completed a full offsite backup in about 2 months. I completed a backup for the company about 2 weeks ago, but it is a local backup, even though Quickbooks recommends against it. No guff… I don’t want to hear it, all necessary lessons learned, thank you very much…

I call Dell. I found the number, and I called. I didn’t have to wait too long to get through and got started some diagnostic stuff happening. I had to end the call early though as the girl next door had another Seizure and was being carted into an ambulance. (they still don’t know what is wrong with her). We ended up leaving for the campground without any resolution to the issue, but I was able to let it run on some ‘deep’ diagnostics. Let’s hope it turns up something.

Monday… I come in to work and the first order of business was to call Dell again because nothing came out of the diagnostics. I will do the short version of this part of the story because it still makes me angry. I was shuffled from 1-800 number to 1-800 number about 6 times, each time with a Monday morning wait of 1/2 hour each before they realized they couldn’t help me and had to pass me on. Well, after 4 hours, they actually passed me back to the first number I called. Seriously. PLUS 1 number earlier, they told me they could help me for a fee, but didn’t have a way to take my money from Canada? SERIOUSLY?… anyway, a few curse words and I got hung up on. The solution they wanted to charge me $249.00 for?

“Re-format your hard drive. “

But there has to be a way to get the information off the computer.

‘nope. Reformat”

Ok, you suck.

I called Nerds on Site. Tuesday Bryce came and within 15 minutes had me set up with a SATA connector that pulled all the information from the supposedly dead hard drive, into a 1 terabyte portable harddrive, effectively rescuing and backing up ALL my information. Yay. Ok, I can handle this from here, no point in wasting your time. So he had all my answers, set me up with all the hardware, and taught me all the tools to fix it in the future AND to avoid the issue, all in about an hour, for the price of … you guessed… $249.00. Yep, I think i love Bryce. Once everything was transferred, I restored the computer. It was surprisingly satisfying by now… hehe.

Anyway I am back online, in more ways than one, and none the worse for wear.

I have an immense amount to blog about too.

Our trip 21km south to Okotoks (which isn’t over yet), The lancaster tail gunner from WWII that was camped next to us the first night, The 75 year old Dane that camped next to on day 2, the hillbillies on the other side of us, the RV repairman who lives in our campground, that fixed the furnace (finally), having my wallet run over, Andrew, Andrew and more Andrew, Andrew in a big boy bed in the camper, meeting real fulltimers, surprising real fulltimers with how much I know about fulltiming( thanks Howard and Linda)…. and on and on.

Should I do it all in one? or break it up?… we’ll see… won’t we…

Fathers Day, Saturday…

We are going out to Okotoks tomorrow to spend a week in the trailer, just because we like it! I will commute back to the house for work (about 15 minutes) and Traci and Andrew will party party party, all week long! For this reason we had our Fathers Day weenie roast today!    

Grampa is really excited about his Saskatchewan Roughriders Gnome. Because he really likes the Saskatchewan Roughriders, and Gnomes!  

The Picnic is in Full swing. We had Hotdogs, Potato Chips, Coleslaw, Baked beans, Cheesecake, Oreo Treat, and lots of non alcoholic bevies.

Grampa is crafting some amazing toasted Marshmallows. The cage was to keep Andrew from running into the firepit… 

Thank you Traci, for a wonderful Fathers Day Picnic… 

She says I am always the one taking pictures and never in the pictures… so here…

Afterwards, Andrew was wiped out… look how tired…

He did stay up long enough to give me my presents… I told him when he was born, All I ever need is socks for presents from him. This Fathers day I got TWO pair! woowoo I am LUCKY!!

Andrew LOVES to read the cards… Traci got me the coolest gift. She searched all over the place and finally came up with what is called a ‘bib keeper’. It is a scrapbook for all my race bibs. She is the first person in Canada that had one shipped from this guy in New York. It is very cool. I will put my first three bibs in it this week! Thanks sweetie! 

Here are some beauty shots of our yard. It has been 5 painstaking years to get it looking like this, But we LOVE it. It is so enjoyable to sit out and relax now… Traci is fully responsible for the look of it this year. Nice job!

Our first lilac bloom!

Traci’s fern had a baby, see!, at the bottom!

I am in charge of selecting the 4 hanging baskets each year. I think I outdid myself this year though, if i do say so myself… oh, I did.\

Not your typical Sunday…

…well, it started out pretty typical. A nice run in the morning, a nice breakfast, playing in the yard with Andrew, naps, and then once Andrew woke up, He and I went to Safeway for some groceries while Traci takes a nap.

We are in Safeway with a pretty full cart of groceries, and we are headed to the checkout when my phone rings.

Neil: “hello?”… Traci “where are you?” … Neil “Safeway” … Traci “ Angie has had an accident in Carseland and Betty doesn’t know how to get there”… Neil “ I’ll be right there, I’ll take her”

So, I scooped up Andrew and his diaper bag, left the full cart in the checkout line (sorry Safeway) and fought traffic back home…

Ok, some background. Angie is Betty’s 16 year old daughter. They as a family are 2 years new to Calgary, and Canada for that matter, and Frank, Angie’s Dad is on a company trip about 20 hours away by boat, helicopter and airplane. Betty had gotten a phone call saying that Angie had passed out and had a seizure, was unconscious, and they have called an ambulance. Of course they are way out in the country and it takes some time get an ambulance there and Betty can’t get any more information.

What my ears heard when Traci originally told me that she had an accident, I heard CAR accident. And the road out to Carseland is notorious for bad wrecks… Also, when Scott, Betty’s son came over to ask us for help, he didn’t really know how to tell us what was wrong, and Betty came out right behind him and was totally gone. She was a mess, and couldn’t get the information relayed to Traci properly. So Traci took over and made some phone calls and was able to figure out that Angie was being taken to Strathmore Hospital, was conscious, but no other information was known.

So when I get home, I hand off Andrew to Traci and grab my keys to the cube (yes we have to go in the cube, because the Buick is low on gas) and Betty and Scott hop in and away we go. Betty is still a mess, but is able to finally get the information to me as to what has happened, so I am relived it is not a car wreck, but still, it’s obviously not good if she has been transported by ambulance. It is normally a 40 minute ride out to Strathmore, we made it in 30. I am sure it was the LONGEST 30 minutes she has ever had to endure, but, we made it. I did speed, quite significantly at times, but figured it would be best that we get there in once piece, than not at all, so I just tried to drive steady. It was a pretty quite drive, as I figured it wasn’t the time or the place for small talk.

We got into Strathmore and we follow the ‘H’ signs to a point where there is an ‘H’ sign without a directional arrow. As I whip right past the sign, Betty almost has a heart attack as she thought we were there, and I kept driving. I told her it wasn’t there, that I have an ‘idea’ where it is, and it wasn’t there. She actually stopped breathing for a minute in anticipation of getting there. Fortunately there WAS another directional ‘H’ sign just up the road, and soon we arrived at the hospital. As we were turning into the parking lot I told her “I will drop you off at the door, then go park, and I will wait as long as you need me to, don’t worry about me”. Off she and Scott go.

I go and park the car, and call Traci to tell her we made it.

side note: I am parched. I was thirsty when I was in Safeway and hour ago, and now am really parched. I look around the cube and oh no. I didn’t bring my wallet and the cube is still so new, it hasn’t had time to build up a change stash. No money, in a strange town, not knowing how long I am staying. Anyway, to shorten this part of the story, Betty came out of the ER about an hour later and I had to ask her for money for a bottle of water. That helped.

Ok, so it was about 4 hours of waiting (on my end). Angie was seen really quickly, as the small towns around Calgary seem to have shorter wait times than the big hospitals here, so that was good. Apparently they ran all sorts of tests on her. She was conscious, responding well and has no real side effects of her seizure except she was tired.

I the mean time, I get squeezed out of the waiting room as it is getting busier, so I go outside and sit on a bench and watch my little private version of the TV show ER. Not nearly as exciting though. A few really old people come in, a kid with a suspected broken arm, and a few hospital residents wheeling out for a smoke. So I have no idea what is happening, I am just sitting around, so I figure I’ll call Traci. Nope. Battery is dying on the my cell, and AGAIN, the cube is so new, I haven’t put my car charger in yet, and I am stuck, no money, no cell phone. geez.

So, Scott comes and sits with me for a while. Nice kid, 13 years old, not much for the small talk though. So we just sit there. Earlier in the wait, as I was sitting inside,  I read a car magazine. 4 hours later I go back inside, grab a different magazine from a different area of the ER, and lo and behold, it’s the same issue of the same magazine… oh well, i didn’t feel like going back inside, so I read it again.

Betty comes out and tells us that the Doctor has seen Angie and can’t seem to see anything that would have caused the seizure so she may go home. About a 1/2 hour later Betty comes out in tears again, sits down and just kind of breaks down. When she pulls herself together, she tells me that she is going in the Ambulance with Angie to Children's Hospital for a CT scan, as a precaution. Ok, that’s not so bad, Children’s has the best care in Western Canada. I think the whole situation just caught up to Betty, and she just broke down. Once she got it out of her system, we had to make a plan for Scott. First plan was he was to come to our house, and possibly stay overnight with us. hehe… the look on his face when his Mom suggested that was priceless. We are not particularly close as neighbours, so I look at him and said “Trust me Scott, I KNOW it would be awkward for you, but let’s see what happens tonight and go from there, ok?” He was ok with that plan.

So, Scott and I left. I did tell Betty that if she, or they needed a ride home later, to just call.

Turns out, the high speed trip out to Strathmore burned more fuel than I anticipated and we just barely made it back (remember I don’t have a wallet). So as Scott goes into his house, I tell him, Your mom said NO Friends, and I have my eye on him. He smiles and says, ok. Traci comes out with a plate of supper for him, and inside we go. Traci has a warm supper plate for me and we just sit and decompress for a bit. We had asked Betty to call us with any updates, and we hadn’t heard from her for about 2 hours when the doorbell rings and it’s Scott looking quite worried “have you heard anything from my mom? he asks. Nope, sorry, but we will let you know as soon as we do. Not 5 minutes later we get a call from her. They still haven’t been seen, as there are many more critical emergencies coming in, but are hopeful they are close.

Another hour later, we are set to go to bed and Betty calls again. They are ready to come home. Ok, off I go. I had to stop for gas and it took 42.5 litres. The tank holds 44, yikes. Anyway, all is good now, I got a full tank. So, Driving around on Sunday Night in Calgary is fairly creepy, I don’t know what it is, it’s just different on the roads. anyway I get there and Betty and Angie are waiting. Angie gets in the car and I look at her “If you wanted a ride in the cube, you could have just asked” hehe… was the response. oh well, I am glad she is ok.

She was diagnosed with sleep deprivation.

I got home about 11:30, and had a but of a hard time getting to sleep - how ironic… hehe… I had a pretty good dose of perspective during all this so I didn’t dwell on it and finally fell asleep. We had a pretty normal day today, didn’t hear anything from next door until about 2pm when the doorbell rang, and a much calmer Betty was on the step with an ‘Edible Bouquet”. Have you ever seen these? How cool, and how friggin tasty! Thanks Betty, it wasn’t necessary, we were just glad we were there to help, and would do it again for you and anyone else in need. Like I said, we are glad it wasn’t more serious and you are all ok.

We really appreciated the fruit bouquet. It had chocolate cover strawberries, YUM.

Just an update…

We booked an entire week at the Okotoks Lions Campground. It is exactly 25km from our front door. Yep.

I will drive in each day and work while Traci and Andrew live it up. They will play and read and nap and just generally hang out. No housework, no phone calls, no doorbells, no nothing. I envy them. Traci and I will actually celebrate our 12th Anniversary the day we pack up and come home. So we will celebrate a day earlier, probably with a nice juicy steak. yum.

Traci took Andrew to Heritage Park yesterday, they had a hoot, Andrew fell asleep in the car on the way home, then had a FOUR HOUR nap! like wow, he was in a GOOD mood after that. Here is Andrew hamming it up for the camera.

And again, riding in the steam train.

Today, we took a ride out to the Campground in Okotoks, just to make sure it will work for Traci for the week, and we are happy with it. It is very well staffed and has very tight security at night. It is right next to the sheep river, so there may be an opportunity for some swimming. 11 years ago, when we lived in our first apartment in Calgary, we would drive out here and swim to cool off as we didn’t have A/C in our apt or even our car…

I have a couple of fun hobbies, one of them is driving a Nitro fuelled remote control truck. The full size truck I used to drive for our company was a new Chevy 3/4ton. I found a blank car body for the RC car that matched the real truck and had our signage company cut out some logos… here is the result… I think it turned out really cool…My neighbour's comment was, ‘have a little spare time on your hands?’ ... NO, I just like it. ya donk. sheesh… if you don’t have anything nice to say… 

Anyway, I say it used to be my truck because my new ride is finally here. This sexy little thing is a Nissan Cube. We named it rubi.