Pictures are an issue with the current web editor and current bandwidth. Hopefully we can resolve those issues in late November and circle back.
October dawns for us in Edmonton, with a job at a turnaround a forty-five-minute drive from our daughter’s home. The job eats up most of the oxygen in my life for now, with Juanita, at least, getting much grandkids time.
At the point of this writing the job looks like it will last up to and, maybe a bit beyond, Thanksgiving (aka Columbus Day in warmer climes). In a perfect future this page will get updates as the month proceeds.
(Saturday, October 24th)
No updates happened during the month. There’s something about working 6 days a week, ten hours a day with a healthy commute each way that sap my interest in putting words to screen and then posting them.
Life happened on Sundays. We celebrated Becky’s birthday after church on October 4th. We all gathered in her bedroom where she is on bedrest expecting child six. After that Juanita and I went to use her birthday gift certificate at Boa & Hare. We arrived mid afternoon. There was on street parking available. We didn’t have to pay nine bucks to find out if their kitchen was open this Sunday. Pulled pork tacos with banana bread for dessert. Yum! The Sunday of Thanksgiving weekend Juanita and I had our Thanksgiving meal at Swiss Chalet. We had their version of a turkey dinner with all the fixin’s including pumpkin pie. They substitute a quarter chicken for the turkey.
A little of life happened other days. One Saturday evening we all celebrated Odelia’s birthday.
As the turnaround wound down, lay-offs happened in stages. The survivors worked straight through from Thanksgiving Day to the end. Even though I worked that last Sunday, we managed to get out to eat. While picking up fixings for the last few lunches I had noticed that the Empire Grill had not closed permanently but merely moved to the other end of the strip mall. After a quick shower after work, we went there for butter chicken. The layout is better than the previous location and the food is just as good.
Wednesday, the twenty-first, was my last day of work. A few others worked Thursday. I got off at two, walked to the parking lot, changed out of work boots and signed the out of work board on the union web site. By three o’clock the car was loaded in Nick and Becky’s driveway, and we were on the road to Meadow Lake. We took turns driving, arriving after dark to a cold house which, being tiny, warmed quickly. We unloaded the car and left everything in a pile for tomorrow, that wonderful labour-saving invention. Tomorrow came soon enough.
Thursday morning Juanita drove me to the shop to pick up the truck with its new ball joints. She carried on to get some blood tests. I went back home stopping on the way to get printouts of insurance and registration papers for what had been renewed online and by phone. I puttered briefly at the pile of stuff then went outside to dig potatoes and start at blowing leaves until it was time to take the car to town for winter tires. Then back for more leaf blowing.
Friday, we attacked the pile of stuff with more energy. By evening all the leaves were blown and the stuff had found it’s way to designated spots.
It’s Saturday.
We plan to get a key cut for the gate and finalize arrangements to get our driveway plowed before our return next spring. We don’t plan on heading south until January but the skid steer operator heads south in November. If we finish packing for the Vietnam trip today, we plan to go to Edmonton tomorrow.
We are scheduled to fly out of Edmonton for Vietnam on Tuesday, the 27th for a twelve-day tour of Vietnam. I will post the planned daily events and hopefully update those with the reality and photos, bandwidth and web editors permitting.
Here is the plan (cut and pasted from the Gate 1 Itinerary). We booked all the optional tours. They are part of our planned itinerary:
