Walking With Dinosaurs

Mitchell and I went to go see Walking with Dinosaurs at the MTS Centre on Saturday. Wow What a show! I was totally blown away. When you first walk in and the lights are bright, you are struck by how boring the setup looks. There is a whole lot of bare concrete floor and in the centre are these odd painted plywood polygons.
But when the show begins, the lights dim and the floor becomes lit by a textured light that makes it appear as the arena floor has been transformed into a mossy carpet. Combine this visual with the effective aural stimulation of small amphibian and bird noises and the setting is complete.
As the show progresses through the various eras (Triassic, Jurassic, Cretaceous, etc) the lighting changes as well to represent the changing biosphere. The plywood polygons represent various props. Mostly they act as a landscape to make the field less stark. But they also represent the shifting of the continental shelf from the original Pangea to the separated continents as they are today.
The whole show is narrated from the floor by an Indiana Jones-y kinda fellow. The dialog is clear and understandable by most everyone. I'm sure even Mitch, at 5 years old, was able to grasp alot of the points.
The creatures were really awesome. The smaller ones were portrayed by costumed actors, while the larger creatures were moved about on self propelled carts. Yet, if you didn't focus too much on the cart, the image was quite believable. The hulking Stegosaurus, and the huge Brachiosaur pair whose head seemed to almost make contact with the arena roof, were very impressive at staving off attack by the ferocious Albertosaur. But the obvious hero of the show was the T-rex. The momma T-rex and her baby were very loud and quite entertaning trading roars at the audience. All in all a very entertaining show.
I found out later that Mitchell had trouble visually digesting the "dinos on wheels" concept. So that took a little bit of the magic out of the show for him. Oh well. 21st century kid. They're pretty jaded by the CGI effects. But until someone actually develops a working holodeck, or a time machine, this is the best show I could imagine.

European Tour - Postponed

I thought I should update my progress on my guitar playing. Back in June, I got a nice new guitar for my birthday from my loving wife. Well, I can play it as well, or perhaps slightly better than I could play when I was in my musical peak in high school. I have picked up on a couple of tutorial websites which, while good, have not yet coaxed me to visit them while I am holding my guitar.

I do have aspirations to pick it up again, however. I have fun with it, and it would be fun to be able to play some songs around the campfire. It would likely thrill Tannis that I had actually made the effort to put some wind into the sails of the family music schooner. Brooke is taking piano lessons and doing quite well. And next year, we will probably get Mitch in there as well.

But for now, concert dates are not confirmed. Stay tuned.

The Oasis has Landed

As I type this, my wonderful wife is having the time of her life. The long-discussed, often-fretted Oasis has begun its maiden voyage. We worked hard this morning getting everything ready. Setting up the projector, taping down cables, sound check, writing...and subsequently re-writing the PowerPoint presentation ad infinitum. Well, it seems to have paid off. It sounds great, and from where I am sitting, everything looks and sounds great.

I am very proud of her efforts. I hope she gets the buy-in from the congregation she seeks. It would be nice to offer a service that caters to the musically inclined new-agers.

There has been a large pause in the sound, so I think I'll go out and see if they need any help.

What a day!

Hope you are having a good day. I spent the morning at the regional conference. It was great to be having to answer as many questions as possible while setting up the a/v systems in 2 rooms.

Now I am at the Waverley giving advice to a user who has the mannerisms of a budgie and the attention span of a strobe light.



I hope we have some scotch left.

Camping in Blue Lake

Blue Lake is awesome! We went with the Young(?) Couples Group from FGUC to Vermillion Bay Ontario. It is about 80KM East of Kenora. This is truly a jewel.

There was a large group camping area that had a nearly new picnic shelter and washroom building. And it ran alongside the lake, so we basically had our own private beach as well.

Being that it was later in the season, we had some cooler temperatures than on past trips, but al in all, it was a really great time. There were 8 or so families, and just about 25 people. The layout threw off Tannis and I as we are not used to having such an expansive campsite. Kitchen tent and sleeping tent have never been so far apart! But we tore down the kitchen tent after a day or so due to the wind and made do in the kitchen shelter on site.

We took a canoe out for an afternoon tour around the lake. Mitch hates canoeing. 100M from shore and he wants to go back. He's so worried about the thing tipping. Dude. You're wearing a life jacket that would keep us all afloat. Relax. I tried to keep him interested by dripping water from the paddles onto his legs. He wasn't buying it. I think he got a bit too much sun on that journey, though, cuz he was a bit pissy that evening. Brooke seemed pleased enough.

I had one of those parental "ping" moments watching Brooke play with some of the other girls. They had gone off on their own to some little piece of bush beside the lake to, well...be girls. They established territory in their place on the Canadian Shield. They had a bathroom...no, two bathrooms. One for pee, and one for, well, you get it. They had a stump that the one who was talking would stand on and the rest would have to listen. There was a kitchen, and I think a living room. When I asked about the absense of the bedroom, I was told that there was NO WAY they wanted to be out here in the dark.

We went out to do a few geocaches on one of the days. It was totally fun. We did a few caches, built an anukshuk, and got some snacks. These pictures are at Wanapigow falls. There was a cache nearby, so we couldn't resist the view. Tannis was wearing the worlds worst caching shoes, so she had to be extra careful. I think we ended up finding 5 or 6 caches. So It was a productive day by anyone's measure.







We all went to Fort Vermillion to do some miniature golfing on one of the nights. Great time. Everyone had a blast. The mini golf course groundskeepers were 8 and 3 years old. But they kept a tidy course. It seems that family issues may be forcing the privately run Fort Vermillion to close. I hope not. That place is a treasure.

We ended up staying an extra night after everyone else left. The last day we spent there was kinds gross and dreary. I approached Tannis to suggest we go into Vermillion Bay to get some ice cream or hot chocolate and shop around in the general store. She beats me to the punch and says "Wanna go do that other geocache on the trail behind the fort?" Why, yes. Yes I do! I love her.

That hike turned out to be the highlight of my weekend. It is less than 2 KM, but it is absolutely beautiful. Instead of turning back on the trail and returning the way we came, we did the entire trail loop and I am so glad we did. That is a beautiful piece of the world. Loved it.

On the day we packed up, the sun was shining brightly and the temperature was nice and warm. Would have rather had this weather on the previous day, but you take what you can get.

Facebook

I have at least a dozen friends on Facebook. Which is pretty remarkable considering I don't even have a profile. I could go back and count I suppose, but if memory serves, I have gotten approximately 10 e-mails inviting me to join the Facebook community. I will say here that I will never belong to Facebook.

It's nothing personal, and for those of you with Facebook accounts who are finally able to get in touch with the kid you once swapped sandwiches with in grade three...well good for you. Seriously. If that is what your life was missing then great. Facebook is a perfect vehicle for you.

Are there people from my past I would like to know about? You bet. Do I care enough to have people "poking" me or, and I hope this never happens, "super poke" me? Do I care enough about how so-and-so's divorce/tour in Afganistan/liposuction/trip to the mall/quadruple bypass/haircut/gender reassignment went that I need to publish my every action on a public website where it can be viewed by all?

I prefer to live in the now. That's just me. People aren't accepting that though. They ask, and I tell them Facebook is not for me. Then they defend. Like they are not happy to accept my answer as I have accepted theirs. I am amazed at what people are willing to put out there. Shit that would never be divulged in person, or for that matter, on any other web page.

Let's say that your bank suggested that as part of your online banking you could put pictures of all of your stuff, children, family pets etc. You know, for fun. When you log in, you could put your mood, or current status. "Scott is trading in small cap assets." No. You would balk. I don't get it. And to have each and every activity I perform be tagged, dated and published. Not my idea of fun.

"But you blog", they say. Yes. I blog. I choose what is said, done, read. And if I choose to look at another person's blog and write a comment, the fact that I have done this is not posted on my blog. Nice and simple. I can not have a mini personal profile done of me by someone who looks at what I have typed or clicked on over the past week. That is my comfort level. It is safe here in my box. And I like it.

Back from Vacation!

We have spent the past week at Luther Village just past Rushing River, Ontario. Awesome. The weather was perfect (if not a little too hot the first few days). The kids had a great time talking part in the morning programs and the beach was the agenda for most of the afternoons.

We spent the week with Don and Michelle and their brood. They had a cabin on the beach, while we camped in the ball field at the top of the hill. This was nice as we had a place for the kids to change and play indoors if the sun got too hot. It didn't hurt that they had a fridge for us to use when our ice packs needed re-freezing, or our drinks needed chilling.

Michelle's sister showed up from BC for the last couple of days. It was kinda funny as I didn't know she was there until she plopped down next to me at the picnic table. As she and Michelle are very close in general looks, I just turned to her and said "Hello". Then in my head, I'm like "WTF? Did Michelle just go and pluck her eyebrows? And then go to the gym?" Thank God Michelle's Dad was there to make the introductions. Renee is a fun person. A little mannish...ok, ALOT mannish. But that's fine for her. If I were making a team on Survivor, I would likely pick her.

I placed a geocache there on the Bog Walk. The view at the end is awesome. You can see for about 60 KM. Well worth the hike. It is only 800m or so, but much of it is on a pretty steep grade, so I don't expect alot of finders. It was a last minute cache, so we had to buy the container on one of our trips into Kenora and I had to hand write the stash note. The camp owner seemed enthusiastic about the cache, so we'll see how it goes.

We prepared all of our own meals there. That turned out to be a huge cost saver. Even though we had to do dishes every time we ate, it still worked out to be the best idea. I don't mind cleaning and cooking. And thankfully, Tannis managed the laundry and the (constant) cooler re-organization. I think the only casualty was a bag or two of perogies. And that was actually my fault. I sure am lucky to have her.

The kids slept great. Brooke only got up once. And it wasn't a big deal. She just came and watched us play cards and went back to bed on her own a few minutes later. With all of the sun and swimming, we all slept like logs most nights. There was one night that Tannis had trouble getting to sleep over the noisy neighbors, but othere than that. All was good.

The last night was capped off by having the Swiston-Armstrongs up to our campsite for a good old-fashioned cookout. It went great! Burgers, dogs, bacon, fried onions, beans...and paralyzers. I think I have a new favorite drink. Although, I think I need to lay off the liquor for a while and let my body de-toxify. That was a little excessive.
After the meal, the kids had fun with sparklers and then everyone had s'mores. Yummy.

It was overall a really nice time. Unlike camping trips in the past when we are ready to go home before it is time, we could have stayed another night. But we did have a concert to go to on Monday. Everyone, except the driver, had a nap on the way home in the van. We got home to find our house still standing (always a good sign).

Unfortunately, while we were gone, Toshya's grandfather passed away. He was 739 years old, and they had been expecting it for well over a year, but he was a really nice person and will definitely be missed.

Found my Username! W00T!

I am sooo happy. I have been unable to use this blog for ages cuz I lost my username somehow. Every week or so I have been trying to log in using various username and password combinations to no avail. Finally today...Success!

I totally attribute this victory to last weeks holidays. My newly relaxed state of mind has allowed me to recover memories that were previously lost!

W00T! I found my blog!

I had lost the login ID to this blog a couple of months ago. Depression ran thick, and I was forced to record my ridiculously average adventures on paper (ewwwww!) and finally another blog until now.
I will move my posts from blog deux over here, and update things. I guess I should backdate this post too. Maybe even delete it. Which begs the question...why am I writing this? Christ, I'm pathetic.

Spontaneous Caching Extravaganza

A certain unproductive Turdle lured me out of the office to head to the south end of the city to do some caching this afternoon. Had a great time finding a half dozen caches or so before heading to Boston Pizza for a yummy Popeye pizza.

Two members of the original Hungry? caching group where on hand to make an attempt at the queen's reprise Huh? cache.

In consistent form, we were unable to find the cache in a very deja vu moment. So after crawling around on the grass like a couple of drunk sailors that had lost their last condom, we shot another album cover worthy photo, this time without the drummer.

Happy Birthday to Me!

Yesterday was my 39th birthday. I had a great time. It was just the family. We went out on a "surprise" trip to Second Encore music and I got myself a new guitar! Very cool. I am looking forward to being able to play a couple of tunes before too long.

After that, we went out for dinner. Finding the Olive Garden full to capacity, we ventured on to Moxies at the MTS Centre. And boy am I glad we did.

Long story short, the manager turned a 110.00 bill into about 60.00. and then gave us a 50.00 gift card!! Was the service bad, you ask? Why, no! It was fine. But apparently the manager didn't think so. We didn't even complain.

So in my current inventory of restaurant gift certificates, I have a 50.00 Keg certificate, a 50.00 Bellissimos certificate, and now a 50.00 Moxie's certificate. Cool!

Too Many Pokes...

I have been given a few "gentle" reminders that I have not been a good blog updater. So I will try harder to please the masses.

Concubines-r-Us!

Tannis and I were invited by our friends Tim and Karen to a bellydancing show at the Marlborough Inn. This was one of those days where you have no control over what is going on. There was so much potential for a fun night here, but unfortunately it never panned out.
As always it is nice to see friends and meet people. But unfortunately it sometimes has to happen at locations you hate being. Like running into an old friend at the proctologist, I suppose.
The evening started nicely enough. My wife looked fantastic, we had a babysitter, there was promise of adventure.
Unfortunately the evening left little opportunity for table talk as it was mostly wall to wall dancers. So once seated and the show underway, you didn't communicate much until you were leaving some 3 hours later.
That's right...3 hours of Indian music. It was like a coast to coast cab ride. The MC was horrible. I was ready to go across the room and kill her. But unfortunately I was being blinded by the asshole photographer. The dude was taking double flash photos every 20 seconds. And he was sitting directly across the room from me. Grrr.
It would have been nice to have been able to visit a bit more with Tim and Karen, etc. But that never worked out. As I understand it, Karen was none too impressed with the execution of the show either. Too bad, seeing as she made the effort to invite so many friends and family there.
The best part of the night was going out for a drink with Tannis afterwards at the Yellow Dog Pub. Nice little neighborhood joint right behind the Burton Cummings theatre. I hope to go back there for a meal some time. Tannis and I finished the evening with a nice drink before we went home.

Recipe-White wine sauce

Here is a simple creamy white wine sauce that has had good reviews. I haven't tried it yet, but will post it here so I don't lose it:

INGREDIENTS
1 cup heavy whipping cream
3/4 cup white wine
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon dried parsley
DIRECTIONS
In a medium saucepan over medium high heat, combine the cream, wine, flour, salt and parsley. Stir all together bring to a boil.
Reduce heat to low and simmer until thickened.

Reviews say that the sauce is a little bland. So I think I'll add some basil or garlic.

En Suite...tout finis!!

Yay! The en suite is finished! And it looks fantastic. I took as much time as I could while Tannis was away visiting Angie to work on it. The kids kept themselves pretty busy, and they seemed to enjoy the outings to Rona...all 48 of them.

I made an executive decision on the toilet. It is a low profile unit with a real sexy look. Yes, you heard me. I just used "sexy" to describe a toilet. Tannis was initially concerned it might gag on some larger ...erm... deliveries. But I have put it through vigorous field testing and it has passed with flying colours.

I also changed the wall colour to a darker shade. This also turned out to be a good decision. I find it to be a very calming colour. It really looks nice against the white fixtures as well as the darker cabinets. Painted the bases and casings a shiny white and boy, does it look good.

Had some trouble with the sink drain, though. That was a tough one. Leaks were coming from the old plumbing, not the new stuff I just put in. It either happened when I tried to unsolder it, or when I cut the old plumbing to remove it. We finally had Andy, the housekeeper who was once a plumber, come in and fix it up. Being so close to the wall, I had alot of trouble figuring out how to fix it. Andy took care of it though. Except when he left, he was in such a hurry, he forgot to tighten the compression fittings, so it leaked like crazy! Tannis greeted me with the news of the leaks when I got home from work, but when I found it was just the compression fittings needed tightening, I was pretty relieved.

Now everything is together and looks great. Now to take care of the basement. It was a mess before I started the bathroom...

Abandoned

...not really. Tannis has gone to B.C. to visit Angie, Chris , and their son. I have forgotten his name, so I'll call him Felix.
This will hopefully be a good trip for Tannis. She could definitely use the break. On her way there she stopped in Calgary to visit her sister for a dose of abuse and judgement. That should be fun.
I have been going like mad on the bathroom renovation. I would like to get it done before she returns, but I know I am kidding myself. Won't be long now. Ready for paint! Woohoo!

MBGA 2nd Birthday Event

Had a fun night at the latest MBGA Pub night. This one was at Tavern United. Methinks we are going to run out of pubs soon. No matter. We can set our sights on taverns, bars, lounges, speakeasies, cabarets, and any other watering holes that will take our business.
One of the highlights of the night was a pre-celebration drink served up by Q! A unpretentious mead. Not without its charm...sort of like Q! himself.
Sadly the service left a bit to be desired. I have heard stories of inuit hunters who will stand motionless for 12 hours straight on the unsheltered ice braving the elements in the hopes of seeing the telltale bubbles of a seal coming up for air. These guys have nothing on Burchil. Burchil was wishing he had packed some trail mix to tide him over while he waited for his nachos.
There were a couple of unfortunate no-shows, but all in all, the event was very well attended. Especially for a Monday night. Looking forward to the next one.

Renovations....YAY

Currently I am trying to renovate the en suite. En suite is French for 'shitty little bathroom'. I had no idea how much we relied on this thing. Every morning I find myself making extra trips from our bedroom to the main bathroom because I forgot some portion of my ablutionary regimen.
It is going to be awesome. Tannis has surprised me with her choice of fixtures...pleasantly surprised. Nice dark wood with white fitures. Combined with a mocha coloured paint on the walls and we should have a pretty nice room soon.
Brooke and Mitch were really helpful in the work. Not because they worked really hard and made my job easier. But because they had fun using my hammer to smash the old drywall and pull out nails. Mitch even replaced the door handle almost single-handedly. Soon I'll get Brooke going on the plumbing. Woohoo!
I really wanted to either fix or replace the floor. But it is in pretty good shape. And Tan says she'll fix up the grout. So maybe it'll be ok after all.

COLD!

We are currently suffering through a serious cold snap. It hasn't gone above -22 in a week and a half. brrrr.
Went to a geocaching party on Friday at the Elephant and Castle. These pub nights are a hoot. It was nice to have it there, as there was alot less noise. The Kings Head last month was huge fun, but it would have been nicer to be able to hear what was going on.
I got to meet Manitoba Merv. The local version of Punxatawney Phil, the verminesque meteorologist. Usually I can get rather starstruck around celebrities, but I felt comfortable enough to stuff my hand inside him within 10 seconds of being introduced. He seemed receptive. I forecast 6 weeks of lovesickness for that poor rodent.
I bought a new playstation this past weekend. No, not the PS3. I am not quite that crazy. I just wanted to replace the old broken PS2 so I could play Ratchet, and Sly, and Jak. And what did I see when I visited the store? A new Sly Cooper game! Well, allllll riiiight! So far I like it, it even has a 3D option for some of the levels. I just don't know if I'm ready to have my wife make fun of me for playing video games AND wearing 3D glasses.

Snowshoe Marathon

Went on a fantastic walk with Charles and Tim in la Barriere Park the other day. We stopped at 6 caches and I was able to log 4 new finds. That was great. Glad we had Charles along as he had to do most of the climbing.
Altogether, we hiked nearly 10KM and the temperature hovered around -16 degrees. Comfortable for me, but the Turdle worked up quite a lather. And Charles...well he was a vision with his snotcicle beard. That guy is amazing, It was like he didn't even feel the cold.

Mitch's Nails

Wow, three blog posts in one day. I am truly in need of serious help. I am not at home because I am still here at work. I am struggling through my mileage claims and cell phone claims. I have got to get these done.
I miss my kids. If you guys ever do get to read this, I just want you to know: I wanted to be around more. I really did. I hope you grow up normal. I hope Mitch stops acting like a puppy. Either that or he had better learn to fight, cuz he will definitely be a target.
On New Years Eve Mitch and Brooke stayed over at Doug and Lorraines so that Tannis and I could ...well...fight. When we dropped them off we asked that Doug perhaps spend some time doing boyish things with Mitch as there was only him with Girl-aPalooza going on.
I would have been happy with him simply sitting and watching TV the whole time, I just didn't want him to spend the entire time being a baby or a puppy. I know Brooke loves him dearly, but she has got to learn that he is not one of her toys.
So we get there in the morning to pick them up and we are showed my son's newly painted fingernails AND toenails. Nice. I'm sorry, I thought I had mentioned that I wanted my son to have a normal boyish (if not neutral) time. Not have him subjected to having his fingers and toes painted. An act I am certain he only agreed to so that he could be part of the play group. He has such a kind heart. I know he has little idea of gender lines and painting his nails and toes will not make him gay. However, I submit that it also will not do much to develop his masculinity either. Whatever.
We both explained to him that boys don't paint their nails and he understood and was fine with us removing it. Thank God. TurdleEggs and Stuntman were coming over that night. I definitely don't need that stress.

Head Office - bleh

CHS has issues. They are the staffing office I take care of. When I first started helping them, they had their database on the local server. Everything worked fine. Nice and fast.
A year and a half ago, head office decided to put CHS's database on their server in Cambridge and have all of the users connect via Citrix to a remote session.
It hasn't worked properly since.
I have replaced every single computer in the building including the server. I know that doesn't make much of a difference when it comes to remote Citrix sessions, but it sure is nice to have new computers. :)
Josephine, the accountant, downloads a file through Citrix to her computer every 2 weeks. The file is around 2 MB. It should take about 15-20 seconds. It takes 4 hours sometimes. You see Citrix is not designed to transfer files. That capability is severely throttled to allow for fast access for the desktop sessions.
Head office has decided to send me a VPN router to speed this up. What they don't get is that we wil still be using Citrix to connect to HCMS. That is why things are slow. Not that it really matters. I can't seem to connect to the bloody citrix server to begin with. Perfect.

Hackers Suck - Part 2

So I just finished fixing the server that I was working on when I wrote the rant below, when...*ring*. My friends at Kildonan PCH are calling me wiht the same issues! ARGH! I have begun the restore and I hope it will be back up and running tomorrow. This time I won't be wasting my time trying to un-infect the thing. Why? I have all of the data backed up, I had might as well just reload the OS and re-share everything.

Hackers Suck

I wish my job was about happy, productive things. Like installing, training, testing... Instead much of my time is taken up by fixing the crap that bored teenagers decide to infect my systems with.

It's all I can do to keep up with the misadventure of the users. Let alone the focussed, malicious, self-aware attacks levelled upon my poor systems by these zit faced, dog fellating, children.

When I say misadventure, I'm talking about the "click on this e-card" and "send this to everyone on earth" idiots who, with uninhibited zeal, trustingly click on every link mailed to them, and then dutifully forward that mail to everyone on their contact list so that other unsuspecting IT guys can stay late at work fixing it and have less time with their kids. These are typically also the users who have the screensaver packs installed, which, when loaded, phone "home" with all of the browsing habits and IP information of the computer from which it was sent.

Then there is the slightly higher functioning idiot. These are the users who install those helpful programs that are the mainstays of an unproductive workplace. Yahoo Messenger, MSN, ICQ, any any one of a dozen other chat programs. These dandy jewels are very proficient at opening their own ports on the firewall using that helpful PnP option. Now the zipperheads can share those ridiculous e-cards and hoaxes in real time without having to wait for my e-mail server to pass its enormous e-turd of useless communications.

Now we visit the desk of the enigmatic, unaware, unbridled, uber-idiot. Trojan-riddled screensavers will simply whet the appetite, and the installation of the chat programs merely feeds the beast of experimentation. More often than not, this user had the highest legitimate requirement for a fast, stable internet connection. As I indicated above, however, this user is a bit of an enigma in that they are the ones who seem to go out of their way to throttle the available bandwidth to the point where they have turned a Niagara Falls-like data pipe into the constricted urethra of a 90 year old housefly.

iTunes, Limewire, Bearshare, you name it. These ever-present data stream hogs are lying there beside the clock in the system tray devouring any available unsuspecting bandwidth that may wander by. Downloading entire albums to listen to one song, warehousing movies and songs in their shared folder, unwittingly sharing it with all of the internet's great unwashed masses. And, yes, somewhere in Islamabagtaipeichewanistan, there is a young man quietly uploading a trojan horse to that shared folder. The payload of which makes a punch in the balls look like a hug from a super-model. Hackers Suck.

I love the Internet

http://www.crystalpro.com/worst/index.html

This is fantastic.

Mini-Caching Event/Marathon

Tim, Karen, Roger, and Gail came over last nite for a dinner party. We had some lasagne and naan with a salad. Pretty pedestrian fare for the Hewitt house. It worked out OK though as it allowed me more time to visit. Not that I really needed it. It seemed that our guests enjoyed our company as they stayed for 6 hours! Not that I mind, actually. Quite the opposite, I was just surprised. Usually a dinner party is a 2-3 hour thing. If I had known it would have been that well enjoyed, I would have planned another activity. Finally a party where we could have finished a game of Trivial Pursuit, or Monopoly.

After we closed the door when they left, Tannis and I looked at each other; puzzled. "What the hell was that?" It sure was nice to visit without being rushed, but seriously! We are so used to friends who come over with their kids of the same age and leave around 8:15 so they can get them in bed. We were both just tickled to have finally reached that eschilon in life where we are able to party a bit later. Thanks Roger, Gail, Tim and Karen. Thanks for helping us grow up.

The kids were real performers all night, climbing all over our guests. Brooke was taking surveys and Mitch was climbing on Roger like he was a jungle gym.

It appears I need more booze. We had an immediate lack of vodka, and it seems Roger likes whisky. Who knew? I had him pegged for a beer guy. Also, the gin seems to be missing. I'll have to rectify this.