Just for Brennan

You've all seen tea that eases upset stomachs, helps one sleep, calms one's nerves... there is tea for headaches, tea for nursing mothers, and tea for flatulence. But here in Spain, they have TEA FOR BRENNAN!

The Humility of Humidity

Figured it was time for a new post in the Entertainment Section. This is what happens to me when I get tumbled by a few waves, have my stuff washed out to sea in a tide I wasn't watching, then drive home for over an hour in a thunderstorm. Enjoy.

Salmon Run 2006

Yesterday Rodric and I went to see the salmon run in the Adams River for the third time. This time I brought my underwater camera and got some cool footage... here are a few pics, and if you want to see a video go to:



For those of you who don't know anything about sockeye salmon, basically what happens is that they are born in a river, they swim to the sea and hang out there for 4 years, and then something inexplicable happens and they decide to return to the exact spot that they were born to lay their eggs. The female digs a hole with her tail, puts in the eggs, then a male comes along and fertilizes them, they get buried, then both parents die. For some reason every fourth year (being this year) is a particularly large run, and the spawning grounds are packed with red salmon. As well as these live ones that you see, there were hundreds of dead ones floating along the shores which attract lots of birds and bears, etc. It's really amazing to see. Canada's version of the Great Migration... or something.

The Big Surprise

So for two weeks now Rodric has been telling me about this "Big Surprise" that he has planned for us after I finished teaching. He wouldn't tell me what it was, but kept giving me hints like "we need to take a ferry", "You need your tent", "It is really fancy and expensive", etc. etc. He said that we wouldn't be able to leave on this trip until Sunday or Monday, but that we could go for as long or as short a trip as I'd like and to celebrate my last night of school he would borrow his buddy's boat so that we could cruise around in English Bay for a couple of hours on Friday night. He even suggested that I invite friends along on this evening journey, so I asked Tom and Cecile if they'd like to cruise around and share some wine with us as well.
Meanwhile, in preparation for "The Big Surprise", Rodric has been running around like a madman, not sleeping, giggling at all hours of the night, and telling me repeatedly that I am "going to flip". I started truly believing that he really is nuts, because all the while he was also suggesting things like, "I think I'll go get us a little place up in North Van on the water..." "Don't you think we need a new vehicle?" "I think I'll put an offer in on a charter yacht..." "Maybe we should get some crab traps."
Now, after all of this, in my logical mind, I'm thinking that he has a serious spending issue and can't tell dreams from reality. I'm envisaging a) a new vehicle b) a very expensive open-ended journey c) a new water-front apartment in North Van d) a huge mortgage on some cruiser in the Caribbean... and all of this while we're planning to leave the country in 2 months for an unknown length of time. I'll admit that I had a breakdown on Thursday while he was in the middle of telling me about all of his dreams... he promised that it would all make sense soon.
OK. So the point of this story.
I finished work yesterday. Rodric told me to go to the Granville Island Ferry dock, so I did... with a bottle of wine and some cheese and crackers, all ready for an evening of floating in English Bay on his buddy's boat.
Sure enough, he showed up, in this:


And I hopped on board and said that his buddy is Mr. Fancypants. Rodric said, "Do you like it?" Of course I did, and was immediately wandering down into the cabin and opening doors, etc...
He then said, "Good. Because it's ours."
We also own the boathouse that it's parked in, under the Second Narrows Bridge in North Van. This is the new apartment and the holiday (he's taking me cruising through the Gulf Islands this week) and the reason for all of the odd giggles and unexplained stress. It's been his life-long dream to own a boat on which he can travel, so now we have her... all 30 feet of her, with new teak throughout and a brand-new engine that hasn't even been broken in for 6 hours yet.
I'm still trying to absorb it. In the meantime, we're off to spend the night at a local island. (The hints about the ferry ride, tent, etc. were all just to throw me off... as if I'd guess it or something!)

Understanding Boredom

OK, I like being bored the same way that Dave gets bored. It can be fun out here in Geek-land.




(See? I always wanted to be a Disney Princess....)

Le Grand Fromage

OK, you asked for it Dave... in an attempt to maintain my Good Contributor Award for postings, I shall inform the world of what has been going on in my life for the past few weeks. A miracle has taken place: Shannon has a boyfriend. And as a little pre-addendum for those readers who are faint of stomach, I must inform you that I have become painfully mushy and cheesy and somehow I am now half of one of those couples who used to make me want to vomit because they were so sappy.
I have been struggling to get to work on a regular basis, forgetting to eat, and suffering from spontaneous outbursts of songs, somewhat akin to Mary Poppins combined with Monty Python.
The onset of this ailment has been passed onto me by the ever so good-looking man in the (*another cheese warning*) photos below who goes by the name of Rodric. He informs me that I have caused equal chaos in his life, which is only fair. It would be unfair to disclose all of the information I have about him, but the general rundown is that he is so far the most thoughtful, caring, intelligent and attractive man I've ever met. The facts that he cooks like a chef, has traveled the world, speaks 6 languages, listens like an enraptured child and treats me like a rare diamond are all added bonuses. (My close family will find it ever so amusing that he has also been initiated into "Full Shannon Boyfriend" status because he has officially been down inside our septic tank and fixed our pump at the lake. That's right, laugh your faces off. I don't know where I find them.)
Without further ado, I offer you a couple of pictures. For a personal introduction, come to Grandma's birthday party on February 26th.

The Streets of London...

I made it! Can't believe it, but it's already over. I jetted off to London to surprise Alastair (www.roundtheworldbybike.com) at his official homecoming just for the weekend, and we had a blast. I even managed to deviously arrange for him to pick me up at the airport without him even knowing it, and the look on his face when he saw me step out into Heathrow was priceless. We then drove for over an hour in bumper-to-bumper traffic on the M25 out to Kent, where Sarah's (his girlfriend) parents were hosting a big dinner party for him. We had a lovely meal and I met some fabulous people, then slept on the floor with pretty much everyone. The following morning we headed into London, where Alastair took me to the Royal Geographical Society to hob-nob with world explorers and researchers. Very interesting!
I then met up with Emily Brown (from Saudi) for lunch, and spent the rest of the afternoon watching a rugby match (England vs. the All Blacks) in a pub.
That evening was Alastair's official "End of the World" party, where I had far too much really bad wine, and met many more amazingly friendly and funny people.
The following morning, (which felt like night for me) was horribly, horribly painful-- and I awoke on Duncan's (another friend, who came to Canada last year) sofabed with a carpet in my mouth and what seemed to be a jackhammer in my head. Despite actually putting my bed away, showering, and dressing myself, I somehow managed to fall asleep on the couch again before breakfast. Classy.Alastair, Sarah and their friends Kate, Wil and Paul (I think...) took me out for the afternoon on a lovely tour of London. Alastair took full control of my camera and took some fun toursity shots, including one of me climbing on some sidewalk monument (see below). We spent a few hours in the Tate Museum, which was absolutely hilarious, and wandered down Fleet Street and saw St. Paul's. After ordering a pizza at another friend's flat, Sarah took Alastair and I out to her flat in Reading, where we spent my last night.
Suddenly it was morning (evening?!) again, and I was packing up to go to Heathrow while Al was climbing back onto his bike for the last short journey right home to Yorkshire.
I made it back to Vancouver on Monday evening and was working again Tuesday morning. Time for a weekend!


Al and me on my first night in England.



Emily and me out for lunch




Al and Sarah... back together after 4 years apart!



A fun afternoon wandering around London being tourists



The boys boosting me onto a monument in an attempt to get a cheesy tourist shot



Me not fitting onto the monument quite the way we'd envisioned...



A London sunset... it was bright and sunny all weekend!

The Big Nasty Strike

For any of you who are unaware out there, the BC teachers have been on strike now for over a week. Basically we are wanting to negotiate a contract in which a variety of issues are addressed: namely class sizes, support for ESL and special needs students, increased funding for resources and books, and a salary increase. The government and the BCTF (BC Teachers' Federation) have been arguing about this for 18 months. Finally after the government addressed the issue with a "No, no and no" response, the BCTF arranged a strike and our premier (Gordon Campbell, unfortunately) decided to impose a law the night before the arranged strike that re-imposed an old contract from 2 years ago stating that teachers are an "Essential Service" and are therefore not legally allowed to strike. Well, we had an emergency vote and of those of us who voted, 90.5% of us voted in favour of holding an "illegal" wildcat strike.
Today there was a HUGE rally in Victoria. We have had tremendous support from parents, students, and other unions. It was estimated that there were up to 11,000 people marching from Centennial Square to the parliament buildings. Many other unions who supported us gave the government a taste of what a general strike would do to to the province... the city transit stopped for most of the day, even PCL coaches were off, Safeway and Save-On-Foods were closed, the libraries were closed, and many of the services at UVic and Camosun were down because the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) went on strike in support of us. We were marching with nurses, construction workers, children and engineers. It was amazing. Here are a few pics...This is me on my first day of striking.This is a view overlooking Centennial Square from a parkade-- it catches about a quarter of the people I could see from there.This shot is terrible because the weather sucked and I don't have a great zoom lens... but look beyond the guy walking there, and you'll see a stream of people marching down Government Street. This went on for at *least* another 20 minutes after I'd arrived, and had probably been going on for 20 minutes before I got there. The turnout was amazing.Around this there were 2 people walking with giant rat-heads on, wearing signs that said that the children of BC are Gordon Campbell's "lab rats". Will be interesting to see what happens next...

Fun and Games

Ok... you really have to try this... addictive... Click Here!

Cape Scott

After a long weekend of long drives, mud, and mosquitoes I made it back from another trip to Cape Scott. I went over to the Island on Thursday and picked up my friend Jeff in Victoria. We carried on up the east coast for 8 hours, then took a logging road left past Port Hardy and ended up in Cape Scott provincial park on the farthest Northwest Corner of the Island at about 8:45pm. We started hiking then and made pretty good time to our first campsite at Eric Lake, 3km in. We had the place all to ourselves-- except for the thousands of mosquitoes that are thriving in all of the mud up there. On Friday we hiked another 14km through the ruins of the Danish settlement attempts to Nels Bight-- a beautiful long, sandy beach where we set up camp and stayed for 2 nights. On Saturday we did a day trip to the Cape Scott lighthouse, where we had a lovely encounter with a large black bear. Jeff and I had been sitting at a picnic table at the lighthouse comparing mosquito bites and aching bones, and finally decided to stretch out and face the 5km hike through mud back to our campsite. As we tottered down the trail at the lighthouse, I said "Is that a bear? That's a bear."
Jeff said, "That's a bear."
Not 20 metres ahead of us was a large, shiny black bear staring right at us. We backed away and went back up to the lighthouse-keepers' lawn to have a safer view. The lighthouse keepers came out and realized that they had forgotten to close the door to their compost, so the bear was enjoying a large, healthy snack. We watched him for about 15 minutes before one of the keepers shooed him off and he waddled back into the forest. Jeff and I carried on our way, whistling and talking loudly.
Yesterday we were up early to break camp and hike the 17km back to the parking lot. We made great time, and even took a few minutes toward the end to have a swim and bath in Eric Lake. It felt wonderful! We then hopped into my car and after demolishing an entire pizza in Port McNeill we drove all the way to Victoria last night, getting in just before midnight.
Here are some pics:



This is the Shoe-Tree (also apparently called the "Sole Tree") which is on the logging road just past Port Hardy. No idea whose shoes they are, but some of them are really old.


This is another quirk of the crazy logging road... the first time I saw this I was with Janet Porter, whose car had just had a break-down followed by a flat tire and missing muffler. She rounded the bend, saw this and yelled, "Now ya tell me!"


View of Eric Lake


The mud was endless, but made great sounds when we walked through it.


Nels Bight, where we camped for 2 nights.


We did a wee bit o' illegal fishing and greatly enjoyed mussels for dinner one night.


The black bear at the lighthouse


This is a narrow neck of land that attaches the Cape to the Island. From the top of the meadow we could see ocean on either side.

Canadian Girl is Sad No Longer

I made it back from California in one piece. In 6 days I managed to meet my new niece, buy a new wardrobe with my Mom, drive to L.A. and Anaheim and back, and go for a couple of walks with Dave and Jen and Taita. Thanks to Chris for taking me to Disneyland and Universal Studios! We had a whirlwind trip through the Happiest Place on Earth and exhausted ourselves with 2 very long days at 2 very busy amusement parks-- but it was awesome. Here are some pics:It's a Small World-- my theme song!A moose-bush. I love it.The one Canadian symbol on the ride... blink and you'll miss it!Yay Goofy!Toon-Town... home of the day's longest lineup. (But it was a pretty cool ride).Universal Studios is even cooler than I remembered it to be.Chris just about got eaten by Jaws... but luckily I saved him right after I snapped this shot.Plane crash scene from an upcoming Tom Cruise movie.I tried to go undercover, but they found me anyway. There's just no avoiding the paparazzi these days. (I'll bet no one in the family was aware of Sandi Lee's new job...)