For the year building up to the Olympics, it seemed as though most Victorians were content with their plans to avoid the Olympics altogether, citing their hatred of crowds and general craziness that would ensue. As it turns out, their plans have failed completely. The ferry ride in to Tsawwassen is proof enough of that. And that was only the beginning of the madness.

Downtown Vancouver is insanity. That’s the only way to describe. People are everywhere, streets are crowded, buses are full. And I’ve never seen anymore red in one location.

Downtown Vancouver Madness

But there was no time to stand around, we had a curling match to go see! The trek to the Olympic Center was short, but the crowd didn’t let up. After some I’ve-lost-a-ticket/someone-stole-a-ticket/someone’s-in-one-of-our-seats, we finally sat down to enjoy the game (read, not sport). Now I watched this event thinking to myself what the definition of a sport was and came up with this: a sport is an competitive activity in which you break

Packing to head to Van… for the Olympics! Oh yeah, gonna go check out where some of our tax dollars went. Maybe check out the zip line down Robson St. Click some pictures of the Gretzky torch.

Got the necessary Canada-gear. And will have to also bring the required “uncharacteristic outburst of patriotism and pride“.

Required hoser-hat.

Stay tuned for the highlights when we get back!

The thing with blogs is that you have to keep updating them if you want to share with the world. Some days, it would be so much easier if this machine would read my thoughts and spew forth a clever little blurb about my daily occurrences. Oh, how life doesn’t work that way. We get tied up with the daily drivel, work and the minutia of life. At some point we need to burst out of the routine bubble and realize that there’s no routine at all. Every day is actually different.

The last few weeks have been tough on the after-work motivation. A co-worker had lent us the first few seasons of Lost. Bad news. As much as I am frustrated by most of the characters, I want to see how far the rabbit hole goes. So we watch and watch, utterly consumed by the world they’ve created. I realize we’re not the only ones who have succumbed to the show and eventually we’ll get through this one, only to be consumed by the next.

TV is an interesting beast. After being back at work again, TV allows a comforting escape during the monsoon season here. Its too easy to get lost in it. But with the rains lifting, it’ll soon be time to head back outside into the world and enjoy some sunshine. Just yesterday we went for a walk in t-shirts. I’ll try to wish some nice weather on my East coast brethren, but chin up, spring’s on the way.

In the meantime, watch the Olympics. Vancouver is nearing full-spring mode

In a few days we’ll be arriving in Montreal, also known to us victorians, as winter. Well, its safe to say anywhere outside downtown Victoria is winter right now. At least its not Alberta and their negative million degrees. In any case, I’ll be bringing my bestest winter gear. I’m hoping there isn’t too much snow, as I feel I may have already forgotten the intricate dance required to stay upright on Montreal sidewalks. Maybe some golf cleats are in order.

See you all soon, and don’t forget to help us re-visit some of our favorite spots.

Look at Montreal right now. Hehe.

Ste-Catherine St. webcam courtesy of http://www.montrealcam.com/en-visitation.html

And just for reference (mostly to rub it in), downtown Vancouver is looking mighty nice

Vancouver Harbour Webcam

Winter. It brings up fuzzy feelings of coziness, snowball fights, and the holidays. Hanging out at home with family and friends while a light sprinkling of fluffy snow drapes over the yard.

It’s been quite some time since I last posted, considering the frequency I had been posting before. But life happened. All summer I spent my days looking for jobs and doing some yard work. Finally that all paid off about 6 weeks ago when I accepted a job offer with Chatwin Engineering, and now after working there for a little while I can happily say that it was a good decision.

And of course, with the new job we had to look for a place to live, which we found after only a week of searching! So this post is for the antsy family back home waiting to see the squalor in which we live, cuz it can never be as nice as being back home right?

This is just one picture for now of our view from the living room off of 1 of our 2 balconies. Hope you like it as much as we do.

South Facing view from our apartment.

Stay tuned for more frequent updates.

You know, every time I think about an oil change for my car, I’m surprised more people don’t do some maintenance of their own cars themselves. An oil change is kinda messy sometimes, but its really quite simple. Having some space to do it is important though. I lived in downtown Montreal for a while and doing on oil change on De Lorimier Street during rush hour definitely doesn’t sound appealing. But now that I have the space and tools, there’s no reason I need to go to a garage and spend a fortune to change my air filter. The last oil change cost me damn well near a hundred bucks (synthetic of course).

So instead, I decided to find the parts I needed online for a fraction of the price, got free UPS shipping (one business day), and installed them the next. Did the air filter, cabin filter, spark plugs, and dip stick (the old one was cracking and i think a few plastic bits ended up in the oil pan. All for like 40 bucks.

People, do your own maintenance. That’s my rant.

Old Filters and Plugs

Clean 1.8T Engine

Now adding to all this, I had another problem. My reverse lights wouldn’t come on anymore, and after lots of searching online forums, I found that it was likely a switch that is connected to the transmission. It was a cheap part to buy, but seeing as how it was located on the transmission, it was a bit deep in the engine compartment. I had to take the battery out and move a bunch of stuff. After getting to it, I discovered that it was actually some stripped wires that caused the problem. Hooray for electrical tape!

Digging into the engine bay

Found the problem, and put it all back.

Success!

Yeah, I missed it by a couple weeks and I’m posting late. But here are some picture of Symphony Splash which commemorate BC Day. Thousands of people convene to the inner harbour and listen to the Victoria symphony orchestra play on a barge. Instead of trying to weave through the crowds we decided to kayak down the river to the harbour and watch from the water. Turns out it was still crowded and we had to leave before dark to get back to the rental place, but it was still pretty awesome.

The Empress Hotel

Victoria Symphony Orchestra

Yup, you heard me right. There’s free kayaking for members of MEC (Mountain Equipment Co-op) right here in Victoria. Well, not all the time, that would be a pretty poor business plan. But it seems like in hopes to sell more kayaks, MEC sponsors a local rowing club to offer free kayaking for a couple hours on Fridays to members. Can’t complain. We decided to try them out one weekend and it was actually alot of fun, despite the salty palms afterwords (It’s the ocean after all).

Kayaking at the Gorge

Getting on a kayak for the first time in 2 years was very unnerving for the first 5 minutes. That whole feeling like you’re about to plunge into the water anytime you move a muscle goes away pretty quick but took a bit of practice. I definitely had my wallet and phone on me, which increased the “oh-crap” feeling.

Getting the hang of it

As you can see, we got the hang of it pretty quick. We did learn this one piece of valuable information. If ever you decide to kayak, get one with a rudder. It makes all the difference when battling currents. Saves your arms from doing all the work. This rowing club has a grand total of two kayaks with working rudders.

Johnson Street Bridge

We made it all the way to the Johnson Street Bridge before we realized that we have no idea what the rules of the waterway were in the inner harbour. There was a lot of traffic and sea-planes coming in and going out. Not wanting to get swallowed by those, we turned back. This stretch of water is also extremely popular for those die-hard rowers. Gotta hand it to them. I wouldn’t want to be paddling in a busy waterway and not be looking where I’m going.