Why I don't ski

This is Ashleigh McIvor. She is a skier.

This is me (on the right -- just in case you thought I was one of the hot young things). I am not a skier. See the wineglass in my hand? Drinker, not skier.


A month or so ago, Jen posted about her adventures in skiing. I laughed and laughed. And then I remembered why it is that I don't ski.

Growing up in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, I did a lot of cross-country skiing with my mum and sister:


It was fun and good exercise and almost obscenely healthy, but not really that exciting.

While in high school, in Windsor, Ontario, I went on a class ski trip to Pine Knob, Michigan. I was a total newbie on rented skis. While my expert skier friends went off to more advanced slopes, I grimly headed to the bunny hill to teach myself to ski. It didn't start off very auspiciously. I watched the skiers ahead of me effortlessly grab the tow rope that led up the beginner hill, and ride it up to the top. ' Right. I can do this', I thought. I came up to the tow rope and grabbed on tightly, like I'd been told. My ski mitts were immediately ripped from my hands and thrown 10 metres uphill, while I stood there, not moving.

After several attempts and several mitt retrievals, I managed to get to the top of the bunny hill and began a slow snowplow downwards. I didn't fall more than 5 or 6 times on the first descent. And after snowplowing down a few more times more successfully, I decided that maybe going fast would be fun. So instead of angling my skis towards each other, I stood with them parallel, then crouched slightly and pushed off. I skied speedily down the bunny hill, past the chalet, into the parking lot and into the side of a Jeep Cherokee.

FAIL.

It was a number of years before I tried skiing again. Fast forward to the early nineties. I was living in Toronto, and a group from work organized a day trip to Holiday Valley in Ellicotville, NY. Several carloads were going and meeting there. So, at O dark thirty in the morning, I crawled into a car with my co-workers Dave (old university friend), Glenn, and a gorgeous, funny Aussie girl with dual citizenship (her parents were Canadian, but she'd been in Australia all her life). I can't remember her name for sure, but I think it was Jill.

The fun started at the border crossing into Buffalo. We pulled up to the guard kiosk, our ID at the ready, and when the surly male border officer asked our citizenships, Dave, the driver, answered "All Canadian". This was apparently not good enough for Mr. Officious. We each had to say our citizenship out loud. This is what followed:

"Canadian"
"Canadian"
"Canadian"
"Ca-nye-dian"

"What?"

"Ca-nye-dian"

"Identification, please."

He really didn't like that Jill had a Canadian passport and an Australian accent, but grudgingly had to accept it -- after doing everything but X-raying it to ensure it was legitimate.

When we arrived at Holiday Valley, I skied the bunny slopes with my friend Trudy, who had come in a different car. After a while doing that, I felt brave enough to graduate to the next level of slope, which necessitated taking the ski lift halfway up the hill. I was doing pretty well, but was skiing about as conservatively as I possibly could -- wide sweeping turns that were using the entire width of the slope each time -- you know, so I could avoid going faster than a brisk walk and peeing my pants in fear:


Trudy zipped down the slope, waiting patiently a few times for me to catch up, and after wasting spending a couple of hours hanging out with me, she left to ski some of the more advanced runs. I kept on keepin' on. Wide, snowplow-y turns taking me from ditch to ditch, seeing if I could ski very slowly without actually stopping (and keeping an eye out for Jeeps). It was the end of the afternoon and the light was starting to fade. It had begun to snow. And then, this one time (at band camp), I miscalculated and didn't make the turn in time.

I skied over the edge and tumbled into the ditch. I landed on my back with my feet further up the hill than my head. My butt broke through the ice covering the stream that was flowing down the ditch, and so I was lying there on the ice with my ass in the water, unable to get up. One of my poles was just out of reach, but the other was still strapped to my wrist. I lay there for a couple of minutes, in shock, but then the cold trickle of water soaking into my nether regions convinced me that I needed to do something soon. I struggled, but couldn't get up. With my remaining ski pole I stabbed ineffectually at the release mechanism, so I could get my skis off and get to my feet. But it was hard, trying to raise my head up and look uphill at my feet. In the snow and decreasing light.

And then I heard the first shout from above. "Are you OK????" I looked up. Yes, I had fallen in the ditch that was directly under the ski lift. The situation looked something like this, only I was lying in a stream, which is too hard to draw, even for someone with my amazing Microsoft Paint skills:

And so for the next 15 minutes, it went something like this:

• Alison flails about like a landed salmon trying to take off her skis.

• "Are you OK?"someone calls down from the ski lift as they pass over her.

• "I'm fine!", Alison yells and flails for 1.7 minutes, which is the time period between ski lift chairs passing directly overhead.

• "Are you OK?" calls the next good Samaritan from the next ski lift chair.

• "I'm fine!" Alison yells with forced good cheer and flails around for another 1.7 minutes.

• Hysterical laughter from Dave and Kevin as they pass over on the ski lift.

• Alison manages to release one ski and works on the other for 1.7 minutes.

• "Are you OK?" calls the next good Samaritan from the next ski lift chair.

• "I'm fine!" Alison yells and starts stabbing at the other ski boot, finally freeing herself and dragging her tired, cold (and wet) self out of the ditch to meet Dave and Kevin, who have skied down to help.

I decided that I was finished skiing for the day. Or maybe for my lifetime. I'm thinking that maybe it's better that I don't ski again. I'd hate to be responsible for some poor family having photos like this of their ski trip:


You know, when they get out of the hospital and have recovered enough to upload them.

Tim, or, A Girl and her Spider

I don't think it has been a secret on this blog that I don't like spiders. I think I've made it clear once or twice before. But I'm trying really hard not to pass on my neuroses to my children. And I think it's working, because Leah adopted a spider in the basement and named him Tim.

Tim was a smallish black spider, just inside the size category that I'm OK with, who was sitting very still on a shiny white expanse of baseboard that showcased his blackness to full effect. Rae wanted to squash him, but Leah, my tender heart, rebelled. "I want him," she announced. "His name is Tim, and he's MY spider." Even Rae backed off when faced with this vehemence. Tim sat on his piece of baseboard for a while, and then wandered off to do whatever spiders do in recently renovated, hopefully bug-free basements. Leah was upset that he was gone, and responded only grudgingly to the logic that there wasn't a whole lot to do or to eat on the baseboard, and that Tim had probably gone looking for a meal.

The girls pulled out the barbies and set up a game on the basement floor. A few minutes later, I heard an excited cry of "Tim! Mummy, I found Tim!". I went downstairs to see an appreciably larger, grey spider, not at all in the size category that I'm comfortable with, on the floor. Leah was very happy. Me? Not so much. "Can I squish him?" Rachel asked hopefully. And while I secretly thought Rae's idea was aces, Leah's anguished cries quickly made me realize that I had to figure some way out of this mess that didn't involve squishing the new and improved Tim #2.

Leah had captured him with a sheet of paper and a plastic cup, but wanted to let him go to live in the basement. I had to think quickly. I pointed out that now the basement was finished and clean, there were no bugs for Tim to eat, plus, he was hard to see against the carpet and might accidentally get stepped on. If she really liked Tim, the best thing to do was to set him free outside where he could catch bugs to eat.

This did not go down well. There were tears and heartfelt declarations of affection for this new pet. Eventually, logic won out, and Tim was released into the wild out of the sliding glass doors at the back of the house, where he paused a moment and then disappeared down between the deck boards, where I hope he's living a life full of buggy deliciousness. Leah was inconsolable for 10 minutes or so, and then she and Rachel went out the front to ride their bikes on the driveway.

Leah came in all smiles a half hour later. "Guess what? I just saw Tim," she said. "He crossed the driveway while we were out there playing. Can you believe that he came all the way around the house just to see us?"

At least Tim #3 had the sense to stay outside.

That'll keep you regular

For an assignment in her English class, Rachel had to design a cereal box for a new cereal, and then write a letter to a cereal company and convince them to buy and market it. The idea was to teach the students to write persuasively and to use facts or reasons to back up their statements. The letters had to have an opening statement, three reasons why the company should buy the cereal, and a closing statement.

Of course, designing the box and naming the cereal was the fun part. I present to you, Wizerd Crunch! (The 'a' in Cranch was a mistake, I'm assured by the designer.) Produced by Magic inc, it prominently features 'games on the back' of the box. Cool! (Click picture to enlarge.)

But this is what caught my eye:


Yep, 568 grams of fiber. Yipes! The super-duper bran cereal that I sometimes choke down eat for breakfast has 13 grams of fiber. Sorry: fibre. (Rae needs some remedial Canadian spelling work.) I can only imagine that if you ate some Wizerd Crunch for breakfast you wouldn't want to wander too far from the bathroom. Or you might need a magic wand for cleanup.

Well, I'm glad we've got that settled

Overheard last night, coming from the bathroom where the girls were brushing teeth and getting ready for bed.

Leah: "No, no, no, no, no. You're weird and I'm odd."

Rachel: "Oh. Sorry. I keep getting that mixed up."

*************************

Rachel, while watching me cover the smoke alarm with plastic wrap to stop it going off after I accidentally melted some plastic on a stove element (I'd reset it, and then it would go off, over and over again, which was very annoying while I was trying to cook dinner):

"Sometimes you're a nut and sometimes you're a genius, and I don't know which one you are right now."

Lair of the evil ninja assassin cat

I am ignoring you, Large One.

You have no respect for my majesty. You do not respect the killing edge of my fangs. You do not respect the razor kiss of my claws. You pick me up and toy with me as if I weren't the manifestation of bloody death. You shall pay. Oh, you shall pay.

You think I'll overlook the many wounds to my dignity simply because you bring me a terrain de jeu...a play structure...a cat tree? Surely you jest. My disdain knows no bounds and words cannot convey my sarcasm.


I will not lower myself to set paw on this.....this....abomination.


Though it is plushy and soft. And it has many enticing levels where one may keep an eye on one's prey.


And the small fur mouse is intriguing.

I will ignore it totally!

Yes. Totally!




Except it has a mousie.



And a lair! I've always wanted a lair, it befits my assassin role. No one can see me in here. I shall swoop out and inflict death from above. Fear me, mortals!



And the rope thingie. To practice my martial arts and improve my lightning reflexes.

Alright, human, I shall accept your paltry gift.

Behold! The lair of the evil ninja assassin cat!

(Thank you, Natalie, the ENAC loves his cat tree - Alison)

O Canada, our home and home-like land

Among the many promises to balance the books and deal with the deficit in yesterday's throne speech by Governor General Michaelle Jean, one thing that raised eyebrows was the Conservatives' plan to ask Parliament "to examine the original gender-neutral English wording of the national anthem."

Let's see how that might be accomplished. Imagine, if you will, a grey committee room somewhere in a grey government office building where a couple of low-level functionaries are drafting a briefing note for Parliament.

"OK, let's get this done. Which line are we changing?"

"True patriot love in all thy sons command." It's sexist. No mention of women."

"Well, what are we changing it to? How about 'In all our kids command?' 'In all our people command'?"

"Apparently the original line from 1908 is 'True patriot love thou dost in us command'."

"Dost?? WTF is 'dost'?

"Ummm" [tapping furiously on laptop] "It's the archaic singular form of the present tense (indicative mood) of the the verb 'do'."

"Yeah, that's gonna fly. NOT."

[Sighs] "I know. But that's what they want. I guess we're done here."

"Heeeey, you know, if we make this change to make it more gender-neutral, you just know we're going to have to go back in later and make it more PC for other groups. Why don't we just be proactive, and..."

"I hate when you say 'proactive.' You're gonna start saying 'stakeholder' next, aren't you?"

"Shut up. Why don't we look at the rest of the lyrics and see if we can see any other trouble spots now? We can save time and put them all in this briefing note."

"Cool."

[Singing to himself] "'O Canada, our home and native land'...RED FLAG."

"Yeah, 'native'. Hmmmm. 'Our home and indigenous land'?"

"'Our home and aboriginal land'?"

"Or should we use 'First Nations'?"

"I don't think it's being used like that. I think it's 'native' like belonging to the land, you know, like native plants. People whose home Canada is."

"OK, how's this, 'O Canada, our home and home-like land'?"

"Now you're talking."

"K, next line's taken care of."

"I still think 'dost' sucks."

"Get over it. 'With glowing hearts, we see thee rise'. What do they mean by 'glowing hearts'?"

"I dunno, healthy hearts?"

"Is that going to be a problem? There are a lot of seniors with heart problems - number one killer of Canadians, etc., etc., blah, blah, blah. Do we want to alienate the seniors? They vote. A lot."

"I see your point. We don't want to give the impression that only people with good undamaged hearts are patriotic. Even someone with a myocardial infarc can be a loyal Canadian."

"Yeah, and why single out the heart? I think other organs can be patriotic. God knows we need a strong Canadian liver to deal with all the beer we drink."

"Good, good....I've got it: 'With competent organs, we see thee rise'."

"Bazinga! That's genius! They don't have to have healthy organs, just competent ones, and if the organs aren't even competent, well, they're not around to be or not to be patriotic, and ergo, can't complain about the lyrics. You're good.....Wait, something's still off. 'We see thee rise'? That totally excludes the visually impaired."

"Damn, you're right. 'With competent organs, we perceive thee rise'? That takes in all the senses, right?

"Yep. Good work. Next: 'The true north strong and free.' Not all Canada is north. Windsor, Ontario is actually south of Detroit. I'm thinking we lose the southwestern Ontario vote if we leave 'north' in. They're the geographically-challenged Canadians.

"How do we get around that one?"

"'The true north (and areas to the south of north) strong and free.'?

"It's not going to fit in with the music."

"They'll have to sing faster."

"OK. Moving on: 'From far and wide, O Canada'...is 'wide' a problem? We're not being weightist are we?"

"Nope, it's the country that's wide.'

"That's a relief."

"'We stand on guard for thee'. Can you believe it? The Paralympics are about to start, and everyone will be singing the anthem that excludes people with physical disabilities. Not everyone can stand, you know."

"I know. I can't believe that one got past people for this long."

"Let's make this positive: 'We accomplish being on guard for thee'. It side-steps the whole 'standing' issue and stresses accomplishment. "

"I like it."

"What's next?"

"'God keep our land, glorious and free.' Hello? Separation of church and state, anyone?"

"Yeah, maybe we should take 'God' outta there. But what do we put in instead?"

"'Something keep our land, glorious and free,' it's PERFECT. That way, the atheists can argue that 'Something' is ourselves and our secular moral values, while religious Canadians can see that 'Something' represents their deity of choice. It's the perfect word. It has diversity and can mean something different to each singer. We've added diversity. It's a good thing."

"OK, Martha, let's bring this baby home. We reprise with 'O Canada we accomplish being on guard for thee'."

"Love. It. So, from the top:

'O Canada, our home and home-like land,
True patriot love, thou dost in us command.
With competent organs, we perceive thee rise,
The true north (and areas to the south of north) strong and free.
From far and wide, O Canada,
We accomplish being on guard for thee.
Something keep our land, glorious and free,
O Canada, we accomplish being on guard for thee.
O Canada, we accomplish being on guard for thee.'"

"Epic!"

"What's next?"

"The Lord's Prayer"

"Damn."

(Disclaimer (because, you know, I'm Canadian [and a low-level government functionary to boot]): This is just my tongue-in-cheek way of saying, "Please don't mess with the lyrics, they are fine the way they are now. People searching for evidence to judge how women are treated in Canadian society should look at Canadian society, at the Governor General and women in every walk of life, and in every conceivable job in the workplace, and in the provincial and federal legislatures, and not at one small word, 'sons', in the national anthem. Seriously. Get a grip, people.)

So. Proud.

Photos courtesy of Google. Extreme national pride courtesy of all the amazing Canadian athletes. Thank you.

I'm not sure, I think they might be cheering for Slovakia

I wrote this blog last week, long before anyone knew that Canada's men's hockey team would be playing Slovakia in the semifinals. I was just looking for a country whose national colours are sort of similar to Canada's. You know, for comic effect. No one at our house is going to be cheering for Slovakia tonight. Really.

We've been watching a lot of Olympics at chez Party of 3.


It's been amazing. While we are cheering for Canada, of course, we have been blown away by the awe-inspiring performances of the Americans, the Swiss, the Germans, the Norwegians, and the Koreans, to name but a few.

It has been a dream come true to watch the best athletes from all over the world compete and win gold here in Canada.


But fair warning: when it comes to hockey, the women's and the men's, let us make one thing perfectly clear -- it's our game.

GO, CANADA, GO!!!

A moment in time

The Hacienda Hotel, Old Town, San Diego. A warm November night. Two friends and colleagues, their hair still in wind-blown disarray from a shoreline geology field trip of San Diego Bay on a boat, full and happy from margaritas and a wonderful Mexican dinner, are heading to their respective rooms.

So, your talk is right after lunch tomorrow?

Yep. The start of the second technical session.

And you have a Powerpoint presentation?

Nope. Linda, I *know* this stuff. I can give this talk with just speaker's notes. I don't need a slideshow.

You need a slideshow. Come on, we can make one right now.

[sort of pouting] But I'm tired.

Come on, Alison....I'll bring the laptop out to the table in the courtyard in front of my room and we'll work on it outside. [wheedling] I have a bottle of wine....Let's see if these California reds are anything to write to you about.

'Write home about'.

Merci. 'Write home about'.

[sighing] OK.

Some night-blooming flowers are scenting the air. The fountain on the courtyard wall splashes softly in the background. A lot of laughing accompanies the work on the laptop. The wine is very, very good.

Thanks, Linda. The talk will be better with a slideshow.

No problem.

You know, I could get used to this.

Which, Alison? The working out of doors? Or the wine? [grins]

All of it. Seriously, this is the way to live. Very civilized. Could you imagine doing all our work outside, with a glass of wine? We'd either be super-productive, or very liver-damaged.

[laughing] We couldn't do this in Ottawa though. I don't know if you would get people to participate into meetings outside in November.

Probably not. Here. Fill me up. [giggles] Hey, let me take a photo of this: "Linda, working hard at her laptop."

You are too funny. Wait, let me hold the bottle up. For effect. [grins]

Linda Guay
1963-2010
Tu me manques, mon amie.

This is what 10 looks like

This is what a pile of girlfriends looks like:

This is what tobogganing on a snowy afternoon looks like:

This is what a happy birthday girl looks like:

This is what excitement looks like:

This is what airborne looks like:

This is what an Olympic-inspired obstacle course looks like:

This is what damn near a whole can of aerosol whipped cream and lots of sprinkles on top of a carefully iced birthday cake looks like:



This is what blowing out the candles looks like:



This is what I love you, Leah looks like:

Happy 10th birthday, Big Girl.

Are you there chocolate? It's me, Alison.

Some days just defy description. On some days, you'd be just so much better off if you barricaded yourself in your bedroom with several bars of premium dark chocolate, a bottle of Bailey's, some trashy gossip mags and season one of Torchwood on DVD.

Some days find you realizing that Calgon just isn't going to cut it, and you start thinking, "Smirnoff, take me away!"

Some days find your daughter informing you that the next day is 100th Day at school and her project is due, a project that you vaguely remember reading about in the class newsletter several weeks previously, but didn't do anything about, like write "do a 100th Day project" on the kitchen calendar, leading to you finding yourself up at 4 a.m. hot gluing 100 googly eyes to a teeshirt, and 6 or 7 to your fingers.

Some days find you blearily noticing the blinking light on the electric toothbrush recharger in the predawn hours and thinking to yourself, "I'd better check my messages."

Some days find you filling the coffee maker with water, but forgetting the "put ground coffee in the filter" part of the process, resulting in a mug of hot, slightly brown-tinted water.

Some days find you talking on the phone early in the morning to a man with a sexy voice, but he's the CAA operator who's sending someone on a service call to your house because your car won't start.

Some days find you cursing at your inability to unlock your office door and then realizing that it's because you're using your house key.

Some days find you writing "Upwords, for Nat" on your hand in a vain attempt to remember to bring in a board game for the friend at work who always brings you home-baked muffins, and then washing it off and thus forgetting the game you *promised* to bring in, and then arriving at work and finding a note on your desk that says, "I brought you some home-made soup, it's in the fridge. N."

Some days find you sitting at your desk noticing that the two black socks you put on in the darkness of your bedroom are, in reality, a plain black sock, and a navy blue sock with a noticeable texture pattern.

I really wish all those some days wouldn't be all in the same week. Give a girl a break. And some more chocolate.

I got nothing

Except a new camera! (Thanks, Dad!)

I opened it up and started playing with it while I was at home and the girls were at school, so, the only family member available for portrait work was Max.

I'm working on a post about the 2010 Paralympic Canadian Men's Sledge Hockey team, who we saw play in Carp this week, and one about skiing, but they aren't done yet.

So you get cat pictures.

I'd say sorry, but he's pretty cute. Especially when he's not gnawing my leg.