Canadian Respite

WWWeeellll...looky here who has a blog!!!  Kudos to Debbie Hawker (AKA Lebbie Dim) for setting me up. She is a gem...and anti-facebook, so we needed an alternate method for her to keep track of me. I mean, those epic emails were a bit much! Now, ya'll can read snippets a little at a time without feeling obligated to respond. Or tell me you've read it when really, you could give a rat's hiney about it. Which is totally cool with me. Or simply look at the pics. Which is what I do with books I read.
So a quick update, where previous email sort of left off....

January 26, (AKA Australia Day), I departed the sunburnt continent and boarded my Boeing to Vancouver.  The day I left Sydney, the temperature reached above 40 degrees Celsius. When I landed in Vancouver, I think it was barely above zero.  Luckily, I had the forethought to have Garrett (little brother) meet me with a winter jacket, boots and scarf. The flight itself was relatively uneventful. I flew with Cathay Pacific, and well, they were wonderful! Yummy food, good selection of entertainment AND an empty seat next to me for both legs of the journey.  Stellar.
Garrett and I headed to Amy Mason's (and Jeff's house too I guess), and spent the night there. I slept 14 hours!  We then boarded the ferry and headed over to Vancouver Island, to Parksville.  The entire reason for my premature return to Canada was to attend my Grammy's memorial.  She passed away suddenly in Mexico December 23, 2010.  It was a shock to lose my sprite and witty Gram, and I wanted to attend the memorial to celebrate and honour the life she lived.  She was just three days shy of 80 years.  Once we arrived at Grandpa's house, it was bittersweet. I got to see all my family, whom I hadn't seen for eleven months, yet, difficult because of the shadow Gram's death had cast.  The memorial went as well as these things can go.  Enough about that for now...

Hemlock Ski Lift

While in Canada, I had the opportunity to re-bond with my peeps.  Many of my friends now live in Vancouver, so I spent some time bumming around the city.  In Chilliwack, my parents were kind enough to allow me to stay with them.  I missed them while I was gone, it was so good to catch up, let them get sick of me, then take off again!  I also had the opportunity to snowboard almost every week!  I went to SunPeaks with my big brother, Nathan, his wife, Kelly and my adorable nephew and niece, Konnor and Kialyn.  Also present was Kelly's family, who just adopted me right in as a shirt-tail relative.  Conditions were more than amazing!  Also, one of the local mountains, Hemlock, has a free day for ladies on Thursday, so I went there a lot.

SunPeaks, Kamloops, BC
Perfect Conditions!

Ok, that about sums up the two months I spent in the Great White North. I leave March 23rd for Bangkok, Thailand.  From there, I shall hop a plane to Cambodia, where hopefully this Certificate-less, Degree-less, native english speaker can find a job teaching ESL. If anyone has any connections please let me know!!
Till later!
xo