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Good Coast
I am writing this from the East coast of Canada today in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia over looking the Harbour and the Halifax skyline. The annual BEAC (www.beac.ca) conference has taken me from coast to coast and now back to coast, and I am truly grateful for the colleagues and friends I have met over my now 10 year involvement. Over the last couple of years, Nathalie has joined me on the trip and we thought it was not going to happen this year but I am so happy we were able to pull it off. I did come one day early so I was a little worried what the lady taking care of my hotel room was going to think about me when she found the dress and matching black shoes and no other indication of a ladies presence. By the way, the shoes are too small!

Good Conversations
Traveling with the kids, we in most cases delve into some interesting conversations and this week one worthy of sharing was a conversation about sayings and expressions. What started it was something my Mom said months ago after winning $100.00 at bingo. The kids overheard the conversation and watched her put the single bill in her purse and heard her say “for a rainy day”. The kids bring this up every now and then and this week they reminded me that “Grandma has it still in her purse” and then it began. What does that mean “for a rainy day”? Well let’s see it means saving the money for when you need it. “Like we need new webkinz?” they say. Well not exactly! It would be something that Grandma needs. “OK Grandma we think you need to get us new webkinz” and on it went. We delved into other expressions and meanings but I will save “hungry like a horse” and “a bird in the hand’ for another post and just for the record, the $100.00 is still safe in her purse.

Goose News
I am very sad to report that it looks like the family of Canadian Geese living in a pond on King Street that I talked about the other week, have left the nest with no sign of little ones. I can tell you that there are lots of other signs of new life along the many routes of our commute. The grass and fields are rich with shades of green, horses play with their energetic colts and there is even one farm along the way with goats and sheep and their respective little ones running a-muck but I guess it was just not meant to be for our little friends on King Street.

Good Sense
Nathalie and I have this odd ability (her more then me), that when we walk into a room and make eye contact with the oddest or loudest or strangest person in a room, it is that person that ends up sitting beside us. So walking into the airport and lounge waiting to board area this week, I tried avoiding any friendly contact with the loud 18 month old running around like crazy. I tried but I knew that a very quick game of peek-a-boo across the lounge sealed the deal. I guess the good thing was they did not end up right beside me, it was over and up one seat, but they certainly where close enough to me for the extra sound effects. Thank God for the headphones and the in-seat entertainment to distract me.

Good Taste
I always know it is going to be an interesting comment when the girls ask me to turn down the radio in the car. After the car was quite enough and Julia had my full attention she said, “You know Daddy, you and Mommy have great taste”. Thank you Julia, but why would you say that? Then Julia said “Because you guys buy us nice things for our birthday”. There you go! Working her dad and getting set for her birthday in August and all that from a six year old! I am so in trouble.

Have a good week!
Jim

Power, Pain and a perfectly planned Party, presenting the week 3 blog, brought to you by the letter P

Spirit of the Radio
People who know me would likely know of my LOVE for radio, so it only makes sense that the soundtrack of most of my life is provided by this medium. As I write this, Alan Jackson sings, “It’s 5-oclock somewhere” on my Mom’s favourite country station playing in the kitchen. This morning on the drive back north, my friend Joanne Wilder on Toronto’s Q107 played Rush and it got me thinking about the spirit of radio and how integral a part of people’s daily lives it becomes and in many cases, how much we almost don’t realize the power it possesses.

Being a Radio Producer, I certainly understand its power; after all, it’s how I proposed to Nathalie more then 14 years ago, but I do love to point it out when I can. On Thursday morning, Nathalie almost drove of the road laughing so hard and I laughed when she told me about it. Not only did I laugh, but also when Nathalie got to work she told a bunch of her co-workers what she heard on the radio they laughed too. See the power of radio, today it is making people laugh and now it’s your turn. I will tell you that this is not for kids or the squeamish, because of what it is that is happening, but it is done tastefully so please check out Mad Dog and Billie on Virgin Radio 99.9 – http://www.virginradio999.com/node/931903

Are we nuts?
As the final part of what has turned into a weeklong birthday celebration for our now 10-year-old Jordyn, we are escorting her and three friends, along with Julia to the theater on Sunday to see Hannah Montana the Movie. I only mention this because when I asked the girls what I should put in my blog this morning they both said, almost at the same time, “the movie”. I guess they are looking forward to it so bring on the popcorn!

The return of Alligator Boy
I can almost close my eyes and see the room, the pictures on the wall and all of the events of one of the first vet appointments with Bentley the super dog more then 12 years ago. It was The Doctor and the nurse, Nathalie and myself trying to hold this little bundle of joy to trim his nails and the exact moment he got one of his nicknames – “Alligator Boy”. Every time I have trimmed his nails since, I have to laugh about it and now you know why. The good news is that over the last bunch of years he has gotten much better and but for 1 or 2 little snaps each time, I can do it mostly on my own and that I did today. Good boy Bent!

In closing
A couple of weeks ago, I noticed my favourite pair of shoes were a little less then comfortable. Well one anyway. I thought maybe a misaligned sock and I tried adjusting it, but still something was there. Days later, I thought maybe it was a stone or something, but every time I felt it, the pain was either gone before I found it, or not painful enough for me to commit to an actual full inspection. The fact that I never picked up my shoe and looked closely at it would probably dumfound most, but I just never did. That is until this week. Upon full inspection, I discovered the screw that was driven into the bottom of my sole.

No wonder I felt a pain when I put weight on my left foot! There is a screw sticking into the bottom of my foot! Some would probably never admit to such a seemingly stupid blunder, but not me. In the interest of learning and sharing I am turning this into a lesson for all. I am sure there are going to be times in your life that you will feel pain. It might be a small pain or it might be a major one, but when you do, and you are unable locate the source, try looking at the bottom of your shoe! You might be getting screwed and not in a good way.

Have a Perfect weekend!
Jim

Fowl, Fodder and fun but foolish thinking from a father with the week two blog, presented now in HD.

The drive
Do you have things on your commute that give you an indication of your timing? When we lived in Mississauga, it was the girl in the red coat along Winston Churchill. If we passed her and she was walking at Aquitaine, we were late, if we passed her and she was at Derry, we were early but if she was half way between, we were right on time for the bus.

Now I understand the problem with this travel time logic, and the number of variables involved with letting other people, busy in their own lives, provide some kind of indication of timing in ours, but I do it anyway.

Today we left the house 15 minutes late, so the cars we passed and the sights along our commute seemed odd or out of place and some how of a totally different world. I recognized nothing, until we turned on “goose Street”. Its actually called King street and it takes us west from Highway 10 to Mississauga Road, but because of what is happening in a smallest of ponds on the north side of the street, just past the railroad tracks, the girls have unofficially renamed it. There in the middle of this little bulrush laden pond is a nest with you guessed it, a Canadian goose sitting contently, awaiting an event of some kind.

The kids and I hope that the event will be a hatching but I am not sure how the timing of things like that work, but we look everyday and hope. A second goose is always hanging around, so we think that this is some kind of good sign, but at least today even that we where late it seemed ok, because buddy was still sitting there.

Late night thoughts
I hope I have the good sense to re-read this part well before uploading because I am VERY tired as I write this paragraph and who knows what I am trying to say.

How powerful is that part of the memory that we store things that, out of context we would never remember, but in the right frame of mind we are like “where did I pull that out of”?

Old expressions are like that. What started this was an MSN conversation early in the week with Nathalie. We where talking about a friends situation, and their need to build a case on someone (it’s no one you know!) and I used the expression “Fodder for the fire”. I said it in my head… typed it, but missed the fire part, and could not make sense of my thoughts, but I knew it was an expression I heard before. Leave a miss quoted old expression, to something like MSN and needless to say Nathalie was very confused but thank God for my friend Google! With a couple of keystrokes, and some creative spelling, boom there it is. References to an expression that somehow I pulled from the unused portion of my brain, and I some how used it in correct context (sort of?).

One definition of Fodder is “coarse food, especially for livestock” or another is “raw material, as for artistic creation” but the one I like is “a consumable, often inferior item or resource that is in demand and usually abundant supply” and when we are talking about this situation and the people involved, the expression works perfectly!

Across the miles
My twin sister Janey and her family moved last December to Newfoundland and we miss them all terribly, but it is sure nice to be able to share some good news from across the miles. She commented to me this week that she is enjoying the blog so I told her that she is fair game for content. The good news is that my brother-in-law has finished his EMR training with a great A+ on his final exam, and Janey starts her new job this week. Congratulations to the Coish’s and we miss you all and are very proud of all of you.

In closing
I have mentioned before that my girls (all of them) do not like the mornings and specifically getting up. This morning the reason for us being 15 minutes late, stemmed from Jordyn’s displeasure with light and moving anytime before 10AM. I reasoned with her that because she is turning 1 year older this weekend that 10-year-old girls no longer give their dads a hard time in the morning and love to get up. I told her I read it online, and that if it is on Google it must be true but she did not buy it. Nathalie, overhearing my comments smiled and said, “All I can hear in my head is California Dreaming”. I said “ like the mamas and papas, why? Are the leaves brown, or the sky grey?” and she said, “No, you are just dreaming”.

Well I know this and this is not a dream, because Saturday, our little girl goes to bed nine years old, and wakes up in double digits. Where has the time gone?

Happy Birthday Jordyn!
Jim