Burning up, counting down

I spent most of the past two weeks "helping" Calum play the Spongebob Squarepants game for Xbox.  When I started having dreams about collecting golden spatulas (you get these as rewards for completing various tasks in the game, and they allow you to enter new levels once you've got a certain number) I was very glad the game was due back at Blockbuster.  I can't say Calum felt the same way.

So, yesterday we were all up early for a change - Jeff and Megan are determined late risers but happened to wake up at what I consider a "normal" hour.  We decided to drive out and visit the Rainforest Reptile Refuge in south Surrey.  Alas, when we got there the place was closed (I later realized I hadn't checked the hours carefully, we got there about 20 min before they opened! Duh!) so we quickly changed our plans and drove into nearby White Rock.  We got there in time to catch the end of the annual "Tour De White Rock" bicycle race.  Man, those people have got to be the fittest I have ever seen to be able to whiz up steep hills at such speeds.  I'm pleased to say though, that unlike in "The Triplets of Belleville" the cyclists seemed to have very normal shaped legs.

White Rock is a really beautiful place.  They have a long beach with a brick promenade so you can walk along staring out at the ocean.  There are the ever-present mountains on the horizon.  Eventually you reach a wooden pier which juts out pretty far into the water, and people were fishing for crabs off the end of it.  I'd been noticing all these people walking along with buckets and weird looking metal racks and finally I realized these were crab traps.   We watched people hauling these huge "yucky" (Calum's opinion) crabs out of the water and loading up their buckets, and then had a rather disturbing conversation about various ways to cook a live crab.

Along behind the promenade there's a retail strip with an ice cream store every few yards so the kids were satisfied with our alternative day out.   Unfortuntely due to not having any sunscreen or hats with us we all came away looking quite a bit redder than before.  Even Calum with his dark skin has a bit of the sun on his nose.  Ooops. 

Meanwhile Megan is counting the days for us until we move into our new place.  We are supposed to get the keys on Saturday or Sunday and then we'll have a couple of days to paint and do any necessary cleaning before our stuff arrives on Monday the 3rd.   Megan has put a little homemade chart on the wall in our kitchen and crosses off a box each day.  I think she is looking forward to moving in.  Personally, having lived for a couple of months now without most of our belongings, I am feeling rather frightened by the coming deluge of STUFF, particularly since we are going to be cramming the contents of a three level townhouse into an apartment.  Luckily I just read about this neat website, freecycle.org where you can join a yahoo email list for your local area (the Vancouver one has well over a thousand members) and send emails out to the group offering stuff you don't want any more, free to anyone who wants to come and pick it up.  I sense I'll be making good use of this site in the coming weeks.

Today Jeff's company is giving everyone a day at the beach, complete with free BBQ food.  I guess this is to make up for all that overtime during the past couple of weeks.  Megan figured out last night that her bathing suit no longer fits her (ARRRRGGGHHH, when will this kid stop growing??) so we need to make a very quick shopping trip before doing that.  I'd better get off the computer!