Today, dear Choo Choo, you turned 3. And while the world seems to be spinning around me beyond my control, you sit there at the centre of the storm, giggling and playing and singing songs and making faces and smiling, smiling, smiling. Oh, how I cannot believe how much happier my life is when I get a big hug from you.

Like this morning, when you got up…

It wasn’t the greatest of mornings, sadly — your sister, Monkey, was having trouble getting moving. It was a struggle to get her to school on time, and even that didn’t go particularly well (her water bottle leaked, soaking her snow pants, which then froze). Things were better when I got home, and got a big hug from you.

Then you, Mommy, and I hopped in the car to go get your birthday presents. We decided to try something a little different this year, and let you choose what you got. So we headed over to Market Mall, where you played for a bit in the play area, and then marvelled at all the toys at the Toys ‘R Us.

And I have to say, kiddo, you were pretty conservative with your choices. When I was a boy, I would have gone bananas in a store like that, and would have tried to clean the place out. You hung onto a teddy bear dressed a Woody from Toy Story for most of the time, passed up on the lightsabres (which was good, we’d have to buy two and they ain’t cheap!), fell in love with a My Little Pony set and a Duplo set with Ariel, and a pair of sunglasses (which you needed, anyway). Mommy added in a Richard Scarry boardgame with airplanes (you’ve been wanting an airplane since before Christmas). And, finally, you gave up the teddy bear (why, I’m still not sure) for a Bubble Guppies stuffie.

As Mommy handled the transaction, you hugged your new stuffie tightly, looked at Mommy and I with big wide, eyes, and then gave us each a big hug.

After finding a coffee for mommy (and a hot chocolate for you), I got Megan from school and Mommy wrapped all of your presents so you could open them later. Then Mommy made a fresh carrot cake and I made dinner while you and Megan played. Then all of us went to go watch Megan’s last dance class. You sat on my lap for most of the class. I got lots of big hugs.

After a stop at the library to acquire a few new books, we returned home to find Grandma waiting for us. At first you were terrified of seeing Grandma (I have no idea why), though that quickly subsided and you were ecstatic to be around her again. You played with her until dinner time, and shovelled in your butter chicken, followed by your birthday carrot cake. (A note for next year — wait until we stop singing before you blow out your candles, okay?)

Present opening and playing came next, which was rapidly ending the day — both you and Monkey were tired, and tensions began to run very thin. Monkey, sadly, was feeling left out because it wasn’t her birthday, and no-one was paying her as much attention as we were paying to you. It’s understandable, and I guess I’m thankful I don’t remember doing the same to Auntie Cathy.

Finally, we packed you off to bed, where you settled into your warm sheets, your smile just as big as it was when you woke up. You talked about your new toys, and your new books, and were very happy about your new pyjamas. Then, with your turtle on, you lay down for sweet birthday dreams.

Right after you gave me a great, big, awesome hug.

Okay, yes, we all played hookie. We had a good reason. We’re helping out Mt. Norquay with some of their marketing needs. And who are we to pass up an opportunity to experience our client’s business while taking a much-needed day off to go skiing?

Though … is it worth mentioning that I haven’t been near a ski hill in about 25 years?

I met Allard just after 7:00 on the east side of 69th St., and from there we went to pick up Bill, followed very shortly after by breakfast for 35 from Tim Horton’s. Allard’s declaration to arrive at Canada Olympic Park (now officially known as WinSport), where we met with everyone else, boarded our bus, and hit the road into a foggy morning.

It was the first time I’d ever turned north off the Trans Canada at Mt. Norquay Road — I’d always gone south into Banff Townsite. And a slow, winding route up the side of the mountain brought us to a near-empty parking lot.

This, incidentally, is the reason we went on a Wednesday: mid-week attendance is low (a common problem at ski resorts, so I gather). This allowed us to have a room to ourselves, easy access to the runs (not a single line-up), and gloriously quiet. It also allowed us to get rentals quickly (Norquay does a brilliant job of group events, I have to say). Well, those of us who needed rentals — there were several people who were already on the hills before I’d even managed to figure out where the rentals were to be found.

I’d not worn ski boots in … well, a long time. The last time I’d worn them, flipped-up collars were still cool, and neon clothing was considered fashionable. Ski boots, from what I can recall, weren’t that hard to get on, and I have some vague memory that they were about as tight as a slightly-small pair of ice skates. ‘Course, that could be just the fact that I was 15 (do the math, folks) and a lot more supple than I am now. I broke a sweat just trying to get my foot in the first boot. I needed help to get the buckles done up.

We soon found our instructors (there seven of us — four going for snowboarding, and three of us for skiing), and went off to … the bunny hill. This was at the bottom of the much-larger hills behind us, the first time that I’d ever seen “alpine” ski runs. They were big. Like, scary big.

Oh, yeah, I should also mention that I was actually more than a little scared going skiing again. Age aside, I remembered very well that the last time I’d skied I still had big trouble with control. I couldn’t turn to the right and my ability to stop was horrid (so bad, in fact, that I’d had to wipe out to slow down … I broke the ski, and thankfully not myself). Many years later, on a much bigger hill, I started to wonder if this was such a wise idea…

Life is not lived if you never try. (Right?) So I joined Eric (who’d not skiied before) and Kirk (a 25-year snowboard veteran who wanted to try something different) with our Japanese instructor (honestly, it just sounds funny — she was fantastic), and re-learned what I’d supposedly learned all those years before.

It took a lot more effort than I thought it would. The hardest part was realizing that the ski was — shockingly – slippery. I’m still amazed that I didn’t fall over. Thankfully, I took poles, which were helpful, if not a bit of a crutch. They helped me move, and stay stable enough to get on the crazy carpet (basically, a conveyor belt to take us up the bunny hill) and get off at the top.

The hardest part was the stance. You have to stand just so on skis so you can turn and stop yourself. Or, as is my history, lose control and careen into Very Bad Things™. And there are a lot more trees on Mount Norquay than there are on the hills in Ontario, lemme tell ya.

After about five passes on the bunny hill, Kirk graduated to the real hill, while Eric and I kept doing bunny hill runs. Both Eric and I had trouble with control on our turns, and setting us loose on a much steeper hill was begging for trouble without a bit more confidence. But three more passes, and two more with our instructor, and we were on the chairlift heading our way up.

Was I worried? Yeah, maybe a little. But not remotely as much as when I’d gotten off the bus a couple of hours earlier. Our instructor had done a brilliant job setting us up for the basics. And we had a couple of minutes of discussion before we got to the top. And then we looked down.

Man, that hill looks a lot steeper when you’re at the top.

And away we went. Slowly, turning (and avoiding other, much faster skiers), we started down. I went side-to-side on the track (easily 25 metres wide), turning in a path that would almost look like parallel lines connected with (very rough) semi-circles all the way down. The instructor and Eric followed soon after. We went back up.

By this point, my feet were in agony. The boots were too tight, and my feet not accustomed to that sort of equipment. I was looking forward to getting out of them.

My next run, I found myself going straighter. And I don’t mean in terms of side-to-side straightness, I mean more “straight down”. My nice, parallel lines had become noticeably angled. About half-way down, the instructor had stopped to wait for us. She waved me on. At the bottom, Eric and Kirk suggested that I have a “problem with speed”. To which they were utterly correct — I do, which is how I got into so much trouble the last time I went skiing.

So of course, on our last run, I went even faster. (Idiot.) We went down a different run — on the other side of the bunny hill — which was slightly steeper. And my slightly-foggy goggles didn’t notice the drop. And I lost control. And let my pole stick into the snow. And I kind dropped my chin onto the top of said pole.

And that’s it. Honestly. I lucked out in ways I still can’t comprehend. I should’ve had, like, an injury or something. But instead it was more of a wake-up call to SLOW DOWN a bit, and take it easier. Which I did, all the way back down to the rental office to drop most of my equipment off.

Getting the boots off? Almost as hard as getting them on, and infinitely more comfortable.

Over lunch we all discussed our various exploits. Jim had managed to find powder somewhere off in the corners. Others had done runs down the moguls (which we could see from our room in the chalet, and it looked positively terrifying from my perspective), while others had gone over on other hills. Colin was the sole non-skier, and had spent his morning on the snow tubes, which was my destination after lunch.

The tubes were built at the end of the mogul run, and were six long slides on which you’d ride innertubes (well, commercialized versions with handles and a full bottom). You had to haul said innertube to the top of the runs (the crazy carpet was without power for some reason), which was a much harder climb than any of us were willing to believe — I was winded by the time I got to the top. But the trip down was worth it.

Peita and her family (who’d snuck up separately) were there as well, and they made a few runs before heading home. Marek joined us for two runs before he declared it “too much work” and headed back to skiing. Eric, like myself, had abandoned skiing and found the slides a blast. Colin also returned for a few runs before the two of us opted for a drink at the nearby patio.

We sat in plastic Muskoka/Adirondack chairs and watched as people screamed down the tube slides. Screaming aside, it was a nice day to sit back and relax a bit — something both of us admitted was difficult to do at home. Then Colin noticed the chairlift next to the patio … people were getting off, sans skis, at the bottom. He immediately declared that we needed to go up.

The chairlift brought us up to Norquay’s old tea house, which is the highest point at the resort. It’s a gorgeous view from up there, even if it was snowing, reducing our visibility. (I imagine the top of Sulphur Mountain is better, if only because it’s at the very top of the mountain, whereas the tea house is only on the east slope.) It was very peaceful up there.

Photo by Geoff S.

We got back to the chalet just after 3:00, and remained there until it was time to go. We piled onto the bus and headed into Banff for dinner at the Elk and Oarsman. We dominated the back room, and likely the entire bar’s volume level to boot.

Then it was back on the bus for our return to Calgary, watching Big Trouble In Little China. The driver got us back in what seemed to us a record time. Something, I think, we all preferred. I was home just after 9:00, and attempted to write this blog entry. I fell asleep from exhaustion, barely a paragraph in.

All said and done, it was  a brilliant day. And, thankfully, injury-free. Two days later, I’m still a bit sore (shovelling snow the morning after was much harder than usual), though nothing terrible. But I do have one small problem.

I think I like skiing.

For our wedding, Alex and I got a breadmaker. (I think we had it on our list.) It’s a good breadmaker, and we’ve used it many, many times, though we had eventually stopped using it for the baking aspect — the loaf size was odd, and if you forgot to take the paddle out, the hole in the bottom was annoying.

Then, about a year ago, Alex started an elimination diet that eliminated wheat from her plate. Thus began the long (and not-infrequently bad-tasting) search for something to replace the gluten (and thus, wheat) that had been removed. That meant finding a different way to make bread.

It was much harder than I thought.

There’s a lot of wheatless bread recipes out there, and I think (at some point) we went through nearly all of them. Many were dense and gooey, some had a terrible aftertaste, and there were a couple that I never even tasted — they just went in the garbage.

But, finally, nearly a year later, we’ve found something that produces what we consider to be one of the best loaves we’ve had since starting this search. And since I know there’s people out there in similar circumstances, the least we could do is share our discovery with you.

Now, point of note: this uses eggs and almond flour. If you are avoiding either of these, you’re going to have to keep looking. We’ve done the egg replacer thing, too, and  … well, frankly, it doesn’t work the same. Not remotely. And the almond flour seems to impart a few properties that rice flour on its own can’t bring to the table. (At least, this has been our experience. Your mileage may vary.)

Also, if you’re doing this sort of thing, we really recommend a flour mix that seems to be a solid “all purpose” gluten-free flour. It’s a 1:1:1 combination of white rice flour (water absorbency), brown rice flour (more of a glutenous texture), and almond flour/meal (taste, and really helps with the browning). We keep a large canister of this stuff handy for bread, cookies, pancakes, and so forth.

Okay, so on with the recipe! You’ll need the following:

• 2 cups of the “all purpose” flour (see above)
• 1 cup potato starch (this seems to be the magic for keeping the rise)
• 1/2 cup tapioca flour/starch (depending on what the label says; they’re the same thing)
• 2 tablespoons xanthan gum (very important, this — do not skimp, here!)
• 1 tablespoon dry bread yeast
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 2 tablespoons sugar (we use coconut sugar, which works beautifully)
• 1 1/2 cup of hot water (yes, hot)
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 3 large eggs
• 3 tablespoons cider vinegar

In a mixer with a large bowl (we use a Kitchenaid, which is perfect; a breakmaker may work for this, but we haven’t tried), add in the salt, sugar, vinegar, and hot water. Get the mixer going at about 40% speed, and make sure all the salt and sugar are dissolved. Then add the eggs, while the mixer is still going. It should froth a little.

While your wet is mixing, combine the flours and yeast. Once the wet has been mixing for a couple of minutes (so it’s well-mixed), turn the mixer off, add the flour, and resume mixing at about 20% speed. It’ll thicken pretty quickly, and look a little like a thick hummus. Let it mix for a couple of minutes, then stop and scrape down the dough that’s stuck to the sides and on the paddle (which, if yours is like ours, it’ll collect in a bit of a ball). You’ll want to do this twice, just to be certain.

While the dough is mixing, turn your oven on to its lowest possible setting. Most ovens seem to go no lower than 170 F/76.6 C. This is to help your dough rise. You get one shot at this (gluten-free breads can’t do multiple rises), so it’s important that your oven be warm.

When it’s all mixed, scrape (you’ll need to, trust me) the dough into a bread pan (we use a silicone one which is fantastic, and requires no greasing). Try to smooth the top out as much as you can — any peaks will be make their way through the final bake.

Now here’s the catch with the oven — yeast will die above about 104 F/40 C. So before popping your loaf into the oven, turn the oven off (trust me, this is important), and open the door for about a minute to let out the excess heat (relax, your oven will retain quite a bit of its latent heat). Insert ye olde pan and dough, close the door, and don’t you dare think of opening it again until it’s all done, hear me?

Set a timer for 30 minutes. Walk away.

After 30 minutes have elapsed, you’ll note that the bread only looks a little risen. Don’t panic. Turn your oven back on using its lowest setting (i.e. “Keep Warm”). Set the timer, another 30 minutes, and walk away again. When you come back, you’ll find (don’t open the door!) that it’s risen considerably.

Now set your oven to 350 F/176.6 C. If your oven can change temperatures fairly quickly, set your timer to about 50 minutes; if yours is slower (like mine), set it for 60. Again, walk away…

After the final timer goes off, make sure you get that loaf on a cooling rack as quickly as possible — there’s still quite a bit of moisture in that bread, and it’ll turn the bread to mush if you leave it in the pan. Also, you might want to turn the loaf on its side, as I’ve found it keeps it from sinking. Let it rest for at least an hour before cutting — you need to give it time to firm up.

So, yes, it’s a bit complicated but the results are worth it. You don’t need to freeze it (unlike some other gluten-free breads), and if you keep it in an airtight container, it’s good for almost a week, and maybe more … but we always eat it before then.

I honestly wish I could spin a yarn of difficulty, with a late, packed bus, screaming kids, barfing drunk people, a tired and beligerent driver, getting lost in who-knows-where Alberta before the engine gives out and stranding us in -15 C weather. I wish I could tell you that, because it would be a lot more interesting than what happened.

I got on the bus at 3:07 (the bus was a wee bit late), and I got off just after 6:00 (I didn’t look at the clock). I had two seats to myself. No-one made a sound save for the driver, who was very nice about announcing arrivals, and drove very well (so far as I could tell, anyway — I was trying to get some sleep, which I think I managed). I arrived with my head attached.

The worst part of this segment of the trip has been trying to find a decent place in Edmonton for breakfast. Your run-of-the-mill diner is hard to come by, though that’s likely due to the fact that it’s the downtown core, and not the funkier parts of town.

But I sit here, in the Three Bananas Cafe (eating a breakfast sandwich), looking out on the Edmonton City Centre building in his purplish glow, watching the signs at the top of the CN building tracing out the company’s logo over and over.

Yeah. Boring.

Sorry.

Back in July, during the Calgary Stampede, the Tragically Hip played the Calgary Roundup, the outdoor concert of the year. I had wanted to go, but I totally messed up where the tickets were sold (stupid me, I thought it was Ticketmaster), and by the time I’d realised it … it was too late. Sold out, and I was out of luck.

This is what brought me to Red Deer.

I’ve been listening to the Tragically Hip since their Road Apples album, back in my last year(s) of high school. I was immediately hooked, and remained that way ever since. The only thing I hadn’t done is gone to a lot of their concerts. There was usually a reason, I assure you. My own idiocy aside, it was either bad timing (I wasn’t around/available), or was without someone to go with (while I may see a movie solo, a concert is an entirely different matter).

So when the Hip announced Red Deer, I was quick to jump on getting tickets, this being the closest the Hip would come to Calgary this go around. Even with a presale code, the best I could do was 10th row on the floor (which, as it turns out, was still pretty darned good). My accomplice was a fellow former-Ontarioan, Scott — one of a few hundred Scotts that I seem to know.

We left Calgary shortly before 15:00 for our just-over-an-hour jaunt north. (Alex and the kids had left nearly 90 minutes earlier for their trip to Alberta Beach — we meet up tomorrow in Edmonton. More on that in a moment…) The worst problem we had beyond some less-than-savoury other drivers was some fog that reduced visibility to about 200 metres or so. Once we were past Olds, it seemed to clear up.

We arrived in Red Deer just after 16:00, and ran a couple of errands before holing up at the Toad and Turtle for a couple of hours of beer, nachos, and random conversation about … well, pretty much what you’d expect from a pair of geek programmer fathers who don’t get out enough. (If you are one, you’re nodding in agreement. If you’re not one, you probably don’t really want to know.)

Westerner Park (an oddly named place, IMO) lay a mere click away, and we quickly found a place to park the car. We were soon accosted by another concert-goer — originally from Hamilton — who swore he was going to start a chant so the Hip would play Wheat Kings. He was rather pleased to hear that both Scott and I originally hail from Ontario.

The concert venue is the two-tiered arena, primarily for the Red Deer Rebels, the local CHL team. So, as you can imagine, it’s not a big place. Which was completely fine with me. And so we waited for the opening act, to start at 20:00.

Opening was a band called The Arkells, out of Hamilton. Until the concert had been announced, I hadn’t heard of the Arkells. The announcement, of course, drove both Scott and I to check out their music. Within 10 minutes, I’d bought both of their albums and put them onto heavy rotation. This was not for any form of preparation, this was solely because the albums were that good. I cannot think, in my musical history, of any band that has turned out albums so strong that I’m compelled to buy and listen constantly for nearly two weeks. Several of their songs are still on my frequently-listened playlists. (Side note: I swear some of their songs must be written for people who work in marketing…)

Live? I was pretty much floored. Not only did the Arkells come out with a bang, they refused to let up. They got everyone on their feet, and they got the entire audience going. In terms of what an opening act should do, they did it far better than any opening act I’ve ever seen. It’s just a shame that their set was so short. I pray that they come to Calgary in the near future as a solo act, or with an opening act of their own.

The intermission was short, filled with roadies racing across the stage to clean off the Arkell’s equipment, and make sure the Hip’s equipment was good to go. Shortly before 21:00, some fifteen and a half years since the last time I’d seen them, the Tragically Hip took stage to a roar. And they kept roaring for two-odd hours.

It was sort of like listening to my own Tragically Hip playlist, which is a kind of “best of”. But live and loud, complete with Gord Downie’s interjections and rants, for which he is famous (though none as legendary as the Killer Whale Tank, or of July’s Roundup concert, which should approach the same level of epicness, if you ask me).

The encore was five songs, including Wheat Kings. I could hear the audience over the band. We were in the 10th row.

Following the concert, Scott dropped me off where I now am, at the Denny’s on Gaetz, before he headed back to Calgary. Why am I still here? Well, remember how I said I’m meeting Alex and the kids in Edmonton? Well, I have to get there. Right now, they’re in Alberta Beach (google it, folks) visiting a friend. In a little over two hours, with luck, I’ll be boarding a Greyhound bus for Edmonton, arriving at 6:00.

Yes, that’s 6:00 in the morning. Look at the datestamp folks, it’s after midnight.

This is what’s led me to sitting in a back booth at the Denny’s, using their wifi, to … um … well, kill time. Then I can walk (yes, walk) to the Greyhound station, and try get a couple of hours sleep before arriving in Edmonton, for a short vacation and some fun.

But for now, I’ve got the Hip and the Arkells on repeat in my head. ‘Cuz they’re a lot better than listening to some of the shmucks in this place…

So it wasn’t with any reservation that 2012 walked out of my life on Monday night, yet it still managed to leave me rather depressed. Sadly, 2013 woke me up looking already a lot like 2012, so I’m not sure if I’m able to look at this new year with much hope yet. Instead, I suppose I shall have to try harder to make things work more my way.

This not to say that I “didn’t like” 2012. It’s hard not to like an entire year in one’s life, especially one that brings so many new things to learn and experience. I just wish it hadn’t been so darned painful…

Like I said, 2012 was a busy, busy year. So there’s no way to know if I’m going to miss anything, because I did a pretty lousy job of documenting it. I can only hope that through extracting details from Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, and my blog, that I can stir enough memories to get this all straight.

• Experienced our first New Year’s Tea not at the Banff Springs
• Learned that my youngest, Choo Choo (no more than 2), was a lot smarter than I thought she was … and she only got smarter (and more defiant)
• Saw far too few friends for far too short a time
• Worked a lot, but not painfully so — I still had a (family) life outside of it. YAY FOR BALANCE!
• Developed a vicious cold that led to — no word of a lie — pulled rib muscles. Owie.
  • Had my first chest x-ray, taken by — drum roll, please — my wife, Alex!
• Discovered that Monkey loves shrimp, especially at dim sum
• Didn’t go to dim sum nearly enough
• Had some fairly steep automobile expenses (block heater for the Jetta, and a new car for Alex)
• Renewed a mortgage for the first time ever (instead of selling the house)
• Continued hating, loathing, and despising having to deal with the Facebook API
• Went through the agony, grief, despair, anger, bargaining, and acceptance of a major home renovation, as we redid our kitchen (and subsequently, floors and bathrooms)
  • I do so love our kitchen, though…
• Found my cooking skills steadily improving
  • Need to watch more cooking shows, and figure out some different techniques
• Broke my little toe. Why do the little bones always hurt more?
• Spent a lot of time ranting about how badly our Federal Government seems to want to drive Canadians to be not Canadian (specifically through bills C-11 and C-30, the ever-present Big Telco lobbies, revisiting the abortion laws, and Rob Anders)
• Disposed of my giant water jug container of coins (6,400+ of ‘em)
• Realized that building a “mobile” site is a pointless exercise, and that the design needs to adapt for all devices <– my professional epiphany of the year
• Lived (very basically) out of my contractor’s rental home for a month while our home was being torn apart
• Celebrated Choo Choo’s 2nd Birthday
• Cancelled TV at home, and went to internet-only for video content (still a work-in-progress)
• Saw the original cast of Star Trek: The Next Generation on stage
• Had my first ambulance ride, my first shot of morphine, and my first (and thankfully last) bout of appendicitis
  • Also had a sponge bath; nowhere near as much fun as it sounds
• Saw Avenue Q. Hurt myself laughing.
• Tried not to laugh when Monkey decided to cut Choo Choo’s hair. I failed.
• Learned that I cannot work from home, without breaking my children’s hearts
• Showed my children the “hole in the sun” as Venus transited our star — I think Monkey started to understand heliocentrism…
• Exited the year wondering how RIM/Blackberry is still a going concern, and why Microsoft hadn’t fired Ballmer
• Went to Fairmont Hot Springs
• Went to Oakville
• Went to Banff
• Aaaaand that’s it, folks. Depressingly boring year for travel.
• Turned 40. Or as I like to call it, “4, with an extraneous zero”.
• Watched in real-time (delayed by 7 minutes) as Curiosity landed on the surface of Mars using the single most insane landing procedure ever conceived
• Monkey became a 5 year old. I’ve been a parent for over five years now. And the world has not fallen apart (entirely). Who knew?
• Tried to stop drinking coffee. Boy that was dumb.
• Reminisced about being with the CBC TV 50th Anniversary project 10 years ago
• Took Monkey to her first day of kindergarten; oddly, I didn’t cry
• Accepted the reality that our family cannot operate without a second car
• Made jam for the first time, and I shall do it again!
• Made tomato sauce and tomato paste from scratch; there’s a reason they’re cheaper to buy in cans, sadly.
• Made a “perfect” prime rib. Now I need to make it again.
• Figured out how to make gluten-free stuffing for turkey (just need to tone down the spices a bit, as I discovered at Christmas)
• Used a roto-tiller for the first time. Sadly, it had very dull blades, so using it hurt. A lot.
• Felt my gut in my stomach as a man stood on the edge of the stratosphere. Then he jumped.
• Somehow acquired strep
• Got taken down, not by the strep, but by the stupid antibiotics I took to get rid of the strep. Go figure.
• Had a very long night of trying to get my frozen, snow-bound car out of the airport parking lot.
• Had a vicious cold knock me down for two days (minor flu?)
• Got a re-learning of high school physics when I tried to vacuum up a box of baking soda. (Try it yourself, if you dare.)
• Rode the new West LRT on the first day! Love that I take a train to work, now.
• I saw The Hobbit. Yes, I liked it.
• Had a minor outpatient surgery that didn’t exactly jingle my bells; made for an uncomfortable Christmas
• Got an iPad mini for Christmas from my company. Had to admit that the Mini is actually a good idea.
• Got (and installed) a Nest thermostat. I can’t stop fiddling with it.
• Finally went sledding for the first time in two years.

That brings me to the end of the year. So: busy, interesting, painful, trying, educational, somewhat wistful, and definitely productive. We’ll see what 2013 brings.

I just hope it means no more trips to hospitals…

Every year, so far able to be said to be “like clockwork”, we have Afternoon Tea on New Year’s Day. So far, every time has been at a Fairmont hotel (three times at the Banff Springs, once at the Hotel Vancouver), and I don’t suppose that tradition is likely to change any time soon. Though we’re definitely needing to branch out to other Fairmonts, and my sights are definitely set on the Empress in Victoria.

This year’s event was quieter, being just the four of us. Whereas last year we had more guests than the combined attendance of all previous NYTs, we intentionally kept it light and simple.

In fact, this year’s annual Tea almost didn’t happen.

Monkey is now 5, and she’s doing what five year-old kids usually do: test their parents, find the holes in their armour, and attack mercilessly until they collapse in a pile of weeping sorrow. (Honestly, it’s a wonder that the human race has survived, given children’s propensity to drive their parents nearly to genocide…)

Add this developmental stage to the delirium brought on by the new toys at Christmas and … well, “fire and gasoline” doesn’t really bring out the volatile situation, but you can get an idea. Adjustments have come in various forms (and is still on-going); one of them was a proposed cancellation of the annual Tea. We were more than a little concerned about behaviour not just in a restaurant, but in a High Tea environment.

I didn’t want to cancel it, even though I was the one who proposed it. I love New Year’s Tea. I love Afternoon (or High) Tea, and have had the luxury of having in several different countries, now. I was not looking forward to not going, and it actually hurt to suggest that we shouldn’t go.

Nevertheless, Monkey availed herself to recant (some of) her behaviour, which gave us enough faith to believe that we could make this work. (Choo Choo, not yet 3, has some education before her as well, but being young and painfully cute, has a way of getting away with things more readily.) So, we hurriedly packed up, and pressed out for Banff late this morning.

The first day of the New Year was bright and sunny, with the temp just below zero. Snow was still covering everything, and while the sun had melted the snow from the pine trees in most areas, there were still the stereotypically winter-white patches on the fringes once we got into the Rockies, in places the sun could not reach.

Banff was busy, busier than I can recall for any previous trip, but busy in a way that lent a wonderful energy. I would have loved to have gotten out of the car and walked up and down Banff Ave. a bit, if it weren’t for the fact that we were in a hurry. Despite leaving early enough, we somehow managed to arrive with only minutes to spare for our reservation.

Sadly, we were not near a window — a first for us, and I think affected the kids a bit; they were a bit antsy to eat. The waitstaff was typically wonderful, and we were quickly set up with our teas, and confirmed the trays that were to come out.

The egg salad croissants didn’t sit well with either of the kids, nor did the watercress (though that didn’t surprise me in the slightest). Peanut butter and jam were gone in seconds. Monkey loved the (absolutely delectable) creme brulée, but Choo Choo couldn’t really get into it. In fact, Choo Choo didn’t really eat much of the stacks, except for the scone (lathered in strawberry jam). Monkey ate, or at least tried, everything, and even had a second scone.

But the antsiness continued, and it was clear before long that Choo Choo wasn’t going to sit still for much longer. Monkey, for her part, did exceptionally well.

We headed out, and then up Sulphur Mountain to the Upper Hot Springs for a dip in the pool. It was, like the rest of Banff, quite busy, but not uncomfortably so. The water, however, was very comfortable, and lovely to rest in. We stayed no more than 15 minutes, mostly due to Choo Choo making a rather sudden dash across the shallow kiddie portion of the pool, aiming for a ladder into the deeper section. (One mother near me commented: “Wow, she’s fast!”) The swim was over.

Choo Choo, the Great Fighter of Nap Time,  was asleep before we got back on the highway for home.

I think this year will be the closest we ever come to not having New Year’s Tea, barring an emergency of some kind, as this will be the last year that I have wavering faith in my children’s behaviour. Next year, Monkey will be 6, and a perfect angel (right, Monkey??), and Choo Choo, though 3, will be learning much from her sister on how to behave well (right, Choo Choo??).

I needed today. I honestly did. The drive out of Calgary alone was worth it, as was the time in the mountains, however short it was. I ain’t saying I’m ready for this year to begin yet — I’ll be writing “2012″ for a while, I’m sure — but we at least got it off to a good start.

So leave it to my sister to — yet again — pull off a miracle. She has a knack for this. I don’t know where she’s acquired this skill, but she’s got it down and I’m fairly envious of it. (I struggle every year to return the favour. I suck at it.) Last year it was the most comfy sweatshirt I’ve ever owned. This year? She delivered to me one of the most whiz-bang things I think I’ve ever been given:

A thermostat.

Not just any thermostat. Oh no, this is not your run-of-the-mill doohickey. This is a Nest.

If ye not seen a Nest before, you need really only understand this: it was (originally) designed by the same guy who helped design the iPod product line, and was an Apple BigWig for a few years. If you’ve owned an iPod, or even seen an iPod, you have an idea of how much the iPod (and its kin) have changed user experience.

That’s what the Nest is doing for home heating. It’s a learning thermostat, and in about 7-10 days, it’ll figure out how we like to have our house heated, and we should (hopefully) start to have a better home heating experience. Either that, or this is really just the first step of SkyNet, and it’s going to boil us to death in the middle of the night…

Anyway, the experience starts with installing the thing. This is usually where most people freeze up — this is electrical and could potentially turn your house into either an oven or an icebox, if you’re not careful.

The thermostat itself (a little less than the diameter of a softball) is accompanied by a simple booklet, a wiring/seating plate, optional decorative (aka “hide the crap the old thermostat left behind”) plate, a rather nice multibit screwdriver, and self-tapping drywall screws — no anchors needed.

Mounting the plate was a snap. Did I mention that there’s a built-in bubble level in the bae plate to make sure your Nest is absolutely straight-line level? Brilliant move, that. Wiring? There’s an app for that. (Sorta.) It not only ensures that you can use a Nest, but also how the wires should translate from your current thermostat to the Nest.

Installation time? Less than 10 minutes.

Then the little unit booted, in a suitably cute way. Once it was up and running, it prompted me to connect to the internet. No, I’m not joking — it’s got a WiFi connection, so I can control the heat in my home from my iPhone. No, I’m not joking. I’m actually giddy about this. Then it asked me a few more questions, and then — without any prompting — updated its own software.

And that’s when I got the first error. E24. There’s a full explanation of that error on their website, too. Now this is where I was really awed. There was the typically cryptic error message that usually drives people bonkers. Someone had the foresight to have the actual thermostat tell me to go to the URL and use the guide.

Again: THE THERMOSTAT HELPED ME INSTALL ITSELF.

I went through the steps … and didn’t really get anywhere. The website told me to call Nest. This is usually where I cringe, as I’m about to talk to low-paid, likely distant people who are utterly disconnected from the company in question, and read from scripts. Every time I get one, I want to hang up. I can’t handle them anymore.

This person — and I deeply regret that I no longer remember her name — was (reasonably) cheerful, and immediately started by asking me for my email address. My email address is the unique identifier used to configure my account, and the Nest unit. Not some idiotic number, or even my name (which is equally pointless), and helped her identify not only the unit (which operates over Wi-Fi, so she could see the unit’s data, too), but also how to communicate with me later.

And so we started trying to figure out what was going on. Turns out our renovations introduced some rather strange behaviours that the Nest doesn’t much like. We have R (the power line), G (the fan line), Y (the cooling line), and W (the heating line), which run down to the blower in the basement, which divvies up the lines and figures out what needs to be done — including telling the boiler to start pumping hot water. In principle, these are mapped 1:1 (though the R became Rh, Y became Y1, and W became W1) on the Nest.

Y turned out to be pointless, since we have no cooling unit to begin with (it rarely ever gets hot enough here to worry about). Rh was moved to Rc (dunno what the difference is). We slowly made progress. The unit started reporting better electrical states (apparently it disliked having a dead Y, which I can now only assume was part of the issue), and the boiler could start and the heat would flow.

Only the blower’s fan would never turn off.

Eventually, it was determined that we have a “variable speed” fan (on, off, and low, instead of just the on/off), which the Nest doesn’t much like. In other words, technically incompatible.

To get to this point was 1:04. That’s ONE HOUR and FOUR MINUTES, by the way. I was on hold for about 10 minutes of that; the rest was us discussing what was happening, and trying different things. At no time did the tech show ANY signs of frustration. Not. Once.

I’m impressed by this – extremely so. For those of you who’ve not read this blog extensively (lucky you!), I used to do tech support. I know the types who call in for help. I know the burdens that are placed on you. Nest Labs, you have a fantastic technical support team, if the tech I talked to is representative of the lot. 

So first we have a simple device. It has no visible buttons, just a dial that spins infinitely in either direction; to select an option, you merely press the front. It has more options than my damn microwave, and is much simpler to operate.

Next, we have a company that recognizes that just because you have a simple device, you might not have a simple situation. HVAC systems are notoriously complex, especially when, like me, you’ve got some oddities out there. So provide smart, patient people who guide people though the (periodically complex) steps of setting the unit up.

Incidentally, I did get it working. The last instruction had been “remove the G wire, and plug it into Y1″. I’d gotten as far as “remove the G wire” and gone no further. That’s when the tech and I decided that I needed to do some more research on our blower and figure out how to disable the multi-speed option.

But, y’know, I just had to go back and try putting the G in the Y1. 

Boom.

It’s not exactly what we had before. Our old (dumb) thermostat somehow managed to turn the blower fan off completely when the heat wasn’t on. The Nest, for whatever reason, can’t. So when the heat’s off, the blower fan goes to a low setting, barely moving air through the house (I’m convinced it’s actually running slower than the old thermostat could on just the “fan” setting). Which, really, I don’t think I’ll mind.

Now I just need to stop staring at the thermostat data. It’s hypnotic…

Heck, it even makes me feel a bit young! Ish. Sort of.

Except for the prolonged yawning, anyway.

Tuesday evening, I went on a mission to find “Santa” presents for Monkey and Choo Choo, for a party Evans Hunt was holding for all the company’s children. I failed miserably for them (Alex would later prove to be a much better Santa in this regard), though it wasn’t a total wash for Christmas as a whole.

Wednesday night was wrapping, notably a batch of presents from my sister that came in sans trimmings and trappings. My folding skills got a dusting off.

Thursday was the Evans Hunt End of the World / Last Pitch party, our annual fest with clients and spouses. I honestly feel like I leave these parties too early, and I miss out on the good stories. I got the backfill the following day, and was moderately relieved to have missed some of the trouble.

Friday was something slightly different, but very exciting (for me). Along with Tamara, Adrian, and Barb, I went to go see The Hobbit: An Expected Journey. It had been 11 years (I’d thought it only 10 at the time, but I just double-checked) since Tamara, Adrian, myself, and a couple of others had sat and waited for hours in the hallways at the Famous Players Chinook theatre (now Scotiabank Cineplex) to wait for the opening night of The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring. A lot has happened in those years since…

Eleven years later, I still love movies like that: long, and epic.

I passed out nearly as soon as I got home, mostly due to exhaustion. (I’d also been running around before getting to the theatre, trying to find a Car2Go that I could actually get into — their system has been having issues for a couple of weeks, now.)

Saturday morning was a blur of surreptitious present wrapping for the afternoon’s Santa visit, helping/forcing the kids to clean up the basement, making breakfast, and something else that I now forget. Then it was a blur of lunch-making, dressing (notably the kids in their nice dresses), and then loading into the car for the trip down to Evans Hunt for the party.

This was the first office party for kids that I’ve ever attended, at any company. For reasons I’m sure someone much smarter than me could explain, Evans Hunt employees have a statistically high number of kids under the age of 10, and I’m willing to bet at least half are two or younger. At any rate, the fact that all of these kids existed was what led to the scheduling of the party, which we parents were quite happy for.

The sixth floor — the new part of the office — was chosen for the venue. The large boardroom was co-opted for gingerbread man decorating and crafts, the main space for what ended up being punch-clown tackling, with a large comfy chair set aside for the Big Man.

The kids rapidly multiplied, until the point where I think there may have been almost more kids than adults … though there have been more adults acting like kids after a while.

When Santa arrived (Santa was a friend of a friend who does this professionally), the kids went crazy … and Choo Choo almost never left his side, utterly desperate for, well, not so much a present as just talking to him. Quite the reverse of Monkey, who was terrified of Santa for the first three and a half years of life.

Monkey, interestingly, was the first one called up. She happily hopped up on his lap, talked a bit, got her present, and got down (with a hurried “thank you”) before going off to find out what the present was. (For the record, “Santa” was brilliant at finding things the kids seem to love.)

Poor Choo Choo then had to endure most of the other kids coming next, one after another. She sat, enthralled, desperately eager to get on his lap. I managed to drag her away after a little while to drink more of her juice, when suddenly Santa produced the present. Choo Choo was off my lap in the blink of an eye, and raced over to Santa as fast as she could. She happily jumped up, and promptly asked for a “plane”.

I have no idea where this “plane” thing was coming from. It’s now what she wants for Christmas. She was moderately disappointed at the Stella and Sam book she got instead.

Party over, we headed home so Alex and I could shower and change for the next event of the day, her office Christmas party. Grandma appeared shortly after 5:00, which was about the time I dropped dinner on the table for them, mostly so they could eat and not bother Alex and I long enough that we could get ready for going out.

We were gone just before 6:00, stopped at the hospital for Alex to get the tickets, and at the Ceili’s at Southland before 6:20. We sat at a table with Sarah, one of Alex’s regular co-workers, and Casey, who was one of the co-workers until she left to work at the new South hospital. It was the best move, since it was a good chance for us to chat with people we already knew.

We left by 9:00.

But lest ye think we were done … think again. Our destination? Toys ‘R Us. And not one, but two of them — one less than five minutes from the restaurant, and the other way up in the north. We didn’t get home until nearly 11:45. I got to bed a half-hour later after taking Grandma home.

Sunday. Today. Yet more stuff.

Mostly me doing my Christmas shopping, notably picking up things for Alex, and picking up the Playmobile toys for the girls that Grandma and I had found on Friday.

And then we went to Zoo Lights.

We’ve done this many times before, but this year we opted to try something a little differently. We opted to try going by C-Train, now that the new West LRT is open, and happens to run from here out to the Zoo. It seemed like a good idea, and we were — at least initially — excited to try out the new route.

For the record, the trip is a minimum of 35 minutes (45 if you happen to just miss the train, which we did on the outbound). And although it was only -3, it somehow felt quite a bit colder, which we all seemed to notice. Thankfully the kids were well-bundled, so it wasn’t too bad for them.

We got home at 9:00, well after some people’s bedtimes.

Like mine. Or at least, that’s what it feels like. ‘Cuz after all this, I feel really tired.

Sleep. Need sleep.

First off, thank you for putting yourself on the line for leadership of the Liberal Party of Canada. Names notwithstanding, the act is one that is necessarily of self-sacrifice, since the job of leading is often thankless, rarely appreciated for what it delivers, and may very well likely make you age before your time. It is the call of duty that is more admirable, that you would take on a responsibility that most Canadians would prefer to avoid. It will be refreshing to have a younger perspective on what has become a party bogged down in its past mistakes, real and perceived, and how that party could be transformed into something more relevant.

It is that relevance of which I am concerned. I am currently sitting in Calgary Centre, awaiting the outcome of a by-election. It’s been an interesting contest, and to some degree, has become even a microcosm of what we’ve seen across Canada. The same messages, the same tactics, and the same mistakes. It will be a turning point, of that I have little doubt, even if (regrettably) the “status quo” is maintained — there are lessons to be learned, here, Mr. Trudeau. And a very important one to which you need to pay very close attention:

Votes do not “split”.

This has been heard for decades in Canada — I remember this from when you and I were children (we are of the same era): people worried that unless there was some form of unity, people would split votes in the wrong place, and the “wrong” side would win an election. Indeed, with the way our electoral system works, association to a “right” or “left” tends to lead to a “right” victory, merely due to lack of options; the “left” necessarily loses due to dilution.

And here we arrive at the abhorrent use of “splitting votes”, which I’ve heard far too many times over the last few weeks. And nearly every single one of these utterances seemed to come from the Liberal candidate. He has been using fear as his tactic, to convince potential voters in Calgary Centre that if they didn’t vote for him, that the Converative would win (effectively) by default. If this is the sign of the Liberal strategy to come, Mr. Trudeau, then do yourself a favour and please step down. The Trudeau name has stood for far greater things than that, and it does not need to be sullied by pedantic schoolyard wailing.

Votes do not split, Mr. Trudeau. You know this to be true. If you fear a split vote, what you are really fearing is that no-one comprehends your political platform, that your message is not understood or not liked, and that you are failing to inspire people to listen. The only outcome of such lack of clarity and focus is a lack of support. Unity does not come from saying that other options are worse than your own mess of a statement.

Far too often, journalists and politicians alike shoehorn Canadians into either the “left” or the “right” sides when it comes to politics, to the detriment of reason. Reason — and history — state that we Canadians believe in people and ideas, that given a strong leader, we will gladly follow. This has happened since the days of Confederation, and has happened ever since. It is when we lack a strong leader that we founder, and allow fear to make our decisions for us.

You remember Mr. Layton. He may very well be remembered for more than a generation for a single election, a singular point in Canadian political history when he side-stepped fear, and instead did something that no other political has dared attempt in a very long time: he made us dream. He made us smile at the thought of hope. And then he made us want it so badly that tens of thousands of Canadians — myself included — voted differently than we had before. He went beyond the name-calling and past the mudslinging, and went directly to the people and asked them to think of a Canada that we’ve all been longing to see again, one we’ve thought lost. Losing Mr. Layton has turned out to be a tremendous tragedy for Canada, for we lost our path to that future, and are again struggling in the dark.

So what say you, Mr. Trudeau? Will you follow the same steps, dancing to the same tune? Or will you dare to sing of higher standards? Will you take your party into the future by making Canadians want to believe? Will you inspire them to feel civic duty again, get out of their homes and vote? Will you restore a belief in our nation that is not challenged by Federal draconianism, where Canadians come before corporations, and we do not fear for our children’s future?

So why you? Why not say this openly to all of our political leaders? To all the candidates of the Liberal leadership? If they choose to listen, we will all be better for it, but it’s been clear that few would. They continue to use fear to isolate, not encourage. This is why Mr. Layton’s message was so well-received — we’re tired of the isolation, and we want to live together as a nation.

I’ve chosen you because of your background, not just as the son of a former Prime Minister, but one who has experienced the youth programmes, the political and ideological differences (let alone lingua franca), has lived the life of a politician for a few years and still retains the burning fire to do better. That’s the same burning desire we all need to feel. You have presence in parliament, Canadian politics, and — especially — of mind. Someone who is recognized by many, and a voice that can be heard in the dark.

The Liberal party stands as perhaps the only party than can effectively bridge the “left” and “right” sides of our country, avoiding the extremism that comes from both sides. Conservative elements distrustful of perceived rampant social spending, Progressives terrified of living in a gestapo nation. A message of hope from the centre will succeed, but the centre needs to have hope. And all we see right now is the fear of division.

Hope eradicates fear. It gives us reason to rise in the morning, helps us look beyond our troubling present to see future solutions, allows us to believe in something that goes beyond ourselves. We need to hope that there is something better, something more meaningful.

You stepped to the podium, Mr. Trudeau. I hope you have something worth hearing.

So last week, I was huddled with my mom back in Oakville, Ontario. No, I didn’t publicize this because — and utterly no offense meant to anyone — I didn’t want to see anyone but my Mom (and by extension, my sister and her family).

The story here isn’t the journey to Oakville, or even the events in Oakville. This is about my trip home to Calgary.

To maximize all the time I could get with Mom, I booked an early morning departure from Calgary, and the last possible flight home. The last possible flight departed from Toronto (as normally scheduled) at 21:45, via WestJet (I don’t fly Air Craptastic anymore, unless I have literally no other option). This meant I could do visiting, and have a (mostly) relaxing flight back.

Murphy, it seems, stowed away in my luggage.

First off, there was a heavy snowfall warning in Calgary yesterday. This normally leads to massive delays (and cancellations) at the airport — hell, even a good thunderstorm can screw things up for hours. So I started watching the (online) arrivals board constantly, looking for problems.

(Side note, airports and airlines: Honestly, get your mobile support for your websites figured out. I want to RELOAD a page frequently, not resubmit a [CENSORED] form. Also: checking a flight status should always be prominent on your mobile home page. ALWAYS. And yes, calgaryairport.com, you need a mobile version. Badly.)

The day, however, seemed to go well in that respect, and the worst that happened was a posted 30 minute delay on my flight, because the equipment in use was inbound from Cancun (and presumably incurred a delay there). Half an hour is annoying, not brutal.

Cathy was very kind to drop me off at the airport (in lieu of a taxi); I had her drop me off early so I could get some more work done while waiting for the plane (I also knew she wanted to get home and relax herself, and the earlier she was home, the better). I had hoped to hang out in a bar, notably the Mill St. Brewery, which has a brewpub at Toronto Pearson.

Problem: Mill St.’s pub is in Terminal 1. WestJet flies from Terminal 3. I wasn’t keen on hopping terminals, just in case the flight got bumped to a different plane, and the times changed. That left Fionn McCool’s, an “Irish” pub just beyond security. I use the term “Irish” only in the sense that the term is what’s used to set expectations … every single one of which McCool’s missed. As I commented last night, the place was grossly lacking in authenticity.

The beer seemed half-strength in every possible meaning, and they somehow produced sweet potato fries without any discernible flavour whatsoever. Now, given, I was officially sick (exactly where I’d obtained said illness is a matter for pointless debate), so yes, I could chalk that up to dulled sense, I suppose. But I can’t, because I knew damn well I could taste the “spicy mayo”, which was … well, I dunno what was in it, and I’m not sure I want to. Saving grace, at least the staff there was so unorganized that I didn’t have to pay for the fries.

The plane for our flight didn’t arrive until nearly 20 minutes after time we were supposed to depart. It was another 40-45 minutes (honestly, I stopped keeping track) until we boarded (I half-expected WestJet to just cancel the flight and reschedule for the morning).

My highlight of the night? WestJet’s satellite TV. Discovery Channel. Three hours of MythBusters. I’m somewhat ashamed to say I passed out for about 30 minutes of one episode. (I’d been up since 6am; I was exhausted.)

We landed in Calgary just after 01:00 MT, taxied to the terminal, and headed down to get our bags. The moment I hit the baggage claim — the carousel hadn’t even started yet — I was on the phone with the Alberta Motor Association (our provincial branch of the CAA), to arrange for someone to come and unlock the car so I could go home.

Oh, right, I didn’t get to this part yet. Lemme rewind a couple days.

On Monday, it was realized that:

1. Allen and Jean (who’d come out to help Alex with the kids while I was gone) needed a way to get to the airport.
2. The process in which I’d driven to the airport, and deposited the keys with left luggage so Allen could pick up the car when he arrived in Calgary, had worked splendidly.
3. It would cost about $120 for two taxi rides (Allen and Jean to the airport; myself home).
4. Wouldn’t it make sense to do another car exchange? (Even with a $10/day parking fee.)

Well, there were some logistical issues. Notably: left luggage closes at 23:00, and I wasn’t (originally) due until midnight, thus making key exchange difficult to the point of impossible. (Well, without running fear of theft, anyway.)

The major problem was how to get into the car. I needed a key. After some back-and-forth, it was decided to mail the key to me in Oakville. Well, not so much “mail” as “least expensive couriered option possible”, since an overnight package for a mere car key would have been — wait for it — nearly $80. Which is a bit much. End result: two-day package with Canada Post, which — in theory — had enough time to arrive.

Now, I have to say “in theory” because that requires Canada Post to actually deliver the [CENSORED] thing. Which, three days later, they still haven’t. The tracking information says it’s only been accepted in Calgary. So far as we know, it still hasn’t left the [CENSORED] city of origin.

EPIC. FAIL.

Realizing this at 13:00 MT on Wednesday, we started Plan B. Which, oddly enough, was not to just take a taxi (which was my original preference, as I figured I’d be dog tired by the time I got in, and struggling with a car wasn’t on my list of things I wanted to do). Instead, I figured this was an excellent time to do something I’d been seriously considering for a while (but hadn’t done), and sign up for AMA again. We’d let our old membership expire when we moved to Costa Rica, and driving around with two kids was starting to worry me about having a car problem. (I’d had one before — thankfully solo — which was my first regret for not having the membership.)

$90 later, I had a membership number, and a backup in case the key didn’t show. Which, as of 19:00 ET last night, it still hadn’t. (As of 09:30 MT today, it still hasn’t.)

I called AMA as soon as I could because I figured it’d be a long wait, especially with all the snow. The agent confirmed that: roughly an hour and a half, but they’d seen calls answered in as little as 55 minutes. Either way, I had a while to wait.

I got my bag, found a bench, and tried to occupy myself doing things that didn’t involve using my iPhone, because I needed the battery to hold its charge long enough to get the call and meet with the AMA truck.

(Side note #2: My iPhone’s battery went way longer in Oakville than it does in Calgary. What the [CENSORED] is up with that, Rogers??)

The call came 26 minutes later. I was actually shocked. It was an automated call saying the truck would arrive in 10 minutes. So I grabbed the bags, bundled up for the -14 degree weather, and went to go find the car. Which, as my father-in-law had stated, was pretty much where I’d left it a week earlier. (How’s that for good parking karma?)

The truck arrived about 10 minutes later, as promised. The first words out of the driver (whose name, regrettably, I don’t think I ever got) was: “Is that a 2003?”

We have a 2006 Jetta TDI. It’s a decent car. (Read: Not a “great” car. It works. I don’t think I’d recommend it as a purchase. I don’t think I’d buy another one.) But apparently, Jettas are some of the hardest cars to get into, notably because of the security systems and the electronic locks, and 2003′s are particularly dicey. The driver, conferring with his AMA experts (who seem to know damn near everything), determined that the 2006 shouldn’t be too bad, and we should be able to open it. So, yay, we’re off to the races.

Or so we thought…

Getting the jimmy in the door wasn’t too hard. After that … well, the driver was stumped as to why the locks weren’t disengaging. If you’ve never seen a door jimmy, these are pretty interesting things. It’s basically a sturdy steel wire shaped with a big U, with a bent end and a metal tab that looks not unlike a guitar pick. The U part lets the tab duck under the window (which is assumedly raised, ‘cuz why else would you need someone to open the damn door), and then with some deft twisting, you press the tab into the door lock button, and presto! the door opens.

Except that it didn’t.

And wouldn’t.

No matter what the guy did, the door just sat there, laughing at him. And worse, he had to get the door open, because he needed his tool back, and you can’t remove the tool if you can’t open the door.

Did I mention that it was well after 02:00, -14 with a northerly wind, with lots of blowing snow? And this guy had frostbitten hands? (And my gloves were not meant for that cold.)

We huddled back in the truck, letting the blasting heat warm us up a bit. The guy hopped on the radio to discuss other options.

1. Break the window. Thanks, but no thanks. I did not want to pay untold (large) sums of money for a new window. I’d rather wait for the key to be returned, and pay the extra days to get it out of the lot.
2. Get a locksmith to break in. See above, but even moreso on the “no” side, merely for expense alone.
3. Tow the car to a dealership and let them get into the car. Still involves a lock, see above notes for cost.
4. Try the longer tool again?

In addition to the jimmy was a long (also very sturdy) metal rod that could be squeaked through the door (with an inflatable “jack” to move the door over a little), in hopes it could do a better job. The first one (he had two) hadn’t really done that great of a job, and had little effect. But after a pep talk, and a bit of hunting to find the “bigger” rod, we decided for one last shot before calling it a night. Early morning. Way too tired to really know which is better…

Anyway…

Bigger rod inserted (no euphemisms, please), and more fishing, pressing, hoping, and attempting to shine the light in the right place.

POP!

Two grown men, shouting like high school football players. That’s what you would have seen at 02:50 in the Economy Lot of the Calgary Airport Authority, just next to the #8 pole. Holy crap, were we ecstatic!

Swearing profusely, I managed to dig the key out of the trunk (I had to pull down one of the seats; the narrowest one, of course) and use the flashlight app on my phone (so glad I have one, and why isn’t this a built-in feature?) to retrieve the key that was, of course, as far away as it could possibly be from me. The car, realizing that the game was finally up and there was no more point in resisting, started without complaint.

The tool was removed, hands shook, bags loaded, car scraped (mostly) clean of the snow and ice, and home headed towards.

Hmm.

I titled this “A funny thing…”, didn’t I?

Oh well…

The first thing that came to mind was that the last time a major media mogul sold a widely-loved empire to Disney, he died not long after.

Okay, so the deal fell through at the time. Bear with me on this, already!

I doubt the deal will fall through this time. With the next movies being teed up already, there’s already quite a lot of business that will keep this moving forward. The question, of course, is how badly will Disney screw things up?

Therein lies an interesting question. If you look at Disney’s track record of late, they’ve done a reasonably good job of keeping things from going horribly off the rails, especially things that have a storied history behind them (witness Tron: Legacy), and far more attention to detail, story-wise, thanks to the creative leadership team acquired through their merger with Pixar. And we all know Pixar’s penchant for excellence.

I know, we’re talking about Star Wars, that bastion of geekdom that has suffered some serious slings and arrows of late. Notably with the Special Edition modifications from the late 1990s, and then the atrocities of Episodes I and II. Combine that with Disney’s ability to turn a buck (let’s remember, however, that it was Lucas that effectively pioneered the commercial movie tie-in), and we have some serious worry.

But I’m thinking it might not all be that bad. Some thoughts…

• With Lucas out of the picture, wiser minds within the geek world can appeal to Disney to “correct” the issues introduced into the movies. There’s fan cuts all over the place that remove the unnecessary CG, restoring scenes to their original states (Han shot first), and still get a proper high-tech colour and audio correction to bring it to more modern levels.
• Episodes I and II could be entirely overhauled (even reshot), with an experienced screenwriter and a decent director (hey, we could go with “visionary”, but I’ll be happy with anyone with decent chops) to fix those messes.
• The Expanded Universe has been getting a little … odd. Lucas has held the reigns on what was canon and what wasn’t, but even he admitted inconsistency.

Now for the big question: Episode 7. A lot of people are worried about that one. Here’s the simple reality: the canon post-Episode 6 is a very crowded land. Between video games and books (all of which use, create, or expand canon characters and plot), you couldn’t easily slide in a new movie (let alone a rumoured three) without really pissing off a lot of people. And unlike some other genres, I’ve found it rare that the lovers of the movies didn’t move into other media.

So it’s almost certain that one of the existing series would become the basis for the next movie(s). And of those, one of the best options (in my opinion) would be the “Thrawn Trilogy”, which has been begging for an adaptation for almost as long as they’ve been around (nearly 20 years, in case you’re wondering).

Obvious problem: the books take place a mere 9 years after the events of Episode 6. It’s been quite a lot longer since the last movie was filmed, and replacing the original actors would elicit howls of discontent.

So, here’s where creative license would have to play into the game. Like most books adapted to film, some things have to change. The original actors could be used, some smaller plots altered (others expanded), with the copious canon put to use to build the backstory. The movies would, I think necessarily, be considered non-canon, however, and be allowed to exist more for the fans, to see the universe exist again as we always loved it.

Don’t know where this will go, but I guess we’ll see soon enough… We can only hope that the acquisition opens Star Wars to the corrections it so greatly needs.

I don’t know if you’ll remember today by the time you read this, but today you lost your first tooth. Literally. In both ways you can take that sentence.

And man, is Mommy sad about that…

First off, your very first tooth, that popped out of your lower gums nearly five years ago, was named “Fred”, after one of Mommy’s co-workers. She named all of your teeth. Every single one of them. Some of them have less-than-interesting names (sadly, they happened during the months of July and August when were were first moving to Costa Rica, and originality was a bit lacking for all the other things we had to do), but you can pull up Mommy’s Map of your Mouth, and see them all, including the dates they first appeared.

Fred was joined very shortly afterwards by “Christena”, Fred’s immediate neighbour. Mommy is very anxious that Christena not befall Fred’s fate, for a number of reasons.

Now as for the second part, Fred started getting loose about two weeks ago. I was a little worried, since I honestly think it’s too early that you’re starting to loose teeth — maybe I’m old fashioned, but “older” just strikes me as being right. (That said, I don’t remember losing any of my foreteeth, though I have some fond memories of the sucking feeling from when my molars were loose.) While I didn’t really believe it at first, sure enough, it was loose. And it got looser and looser.

Yesterday, you could push Fred at a right angle to its previously anchored position, with only the nerve and blood vessel still connecting it. It was only a matter of time … or a pair of pliers, which you never let me go get, I should add. (Chicken.)

When I came home today, you were sitting with Erin and Mommy, munching on chips and drinking “tea” (I have no idea what the tea was). I was putting away dishes when Mommy suddenly shrieked: “It’s gone!” At first I had no idea what she meant, when it was quickly pointed out that Fred had disappeared — a gap, the first since your smile was made whole, remained.

Thus began the mad scramble – where had Fred gone? It wasn’t on the counter, the floor, the chair, your clothes, the chip bowl, your room, your laundry, or anywhere else that we could determine. The inevitable conclusion, it seems, is that you somehow swallowed Fred. Sadly, we will likely never see Fred again.

So we’re leaving an apology note to the Tooth Fairy under your pillow. Hopefully she/he doens’t mind that we can’t actually cough up the evidence.

You really did lose your first tooth. Please don’t lose your second one.

In particular, three things that I did. Notably, things I had never previously done before, and there was some concern (on a couple of them) as to how well they’d turn out.

As for how I turned out, that’s … well, part of the story.

Making Jam

For the record, my grandmother made jam. I think Mom did, too, once or twice. Me? I don’t even eat the stuff (buttered toast is my favourite, followed by peanut butter; I use clotted cream on my scones, thank you very much). So making it wasn’t really high on my list of priorities. But, thanks to one of my “brighter” ideas last fall, we ended up with a few bags of strawberries and raspberries, frozen solid, and sucking up space in our freezer.

Our freezer, incidentally, isn’t that big. (And no, before you suggest it, we (currently) have no realistic space for a deep freezer anywhere in the house.)

I’d originally been thinking “pie”, but Alex nixed it, saying the fruit would be goopy from freezing. Which suddenly got both of us to thinking that it’d be perfect for jam. The catch, of course, is who would make it? Well, actually, not much of a catch, because of course it would be me — I hate throwing things out, and if I wanted to keep the fruit from landing in the compost, I had to get … uh … jamming.

Enter one box of a dozen jam jars with heat seal lids, and one box of pectin (with jam-making instructions). Oh, and some decent memory of the things I’ve learned watching Alton Brown‘s Good Eats series (still a tragedy that it has run its course — an eminently instructive show).

For the record, if you can boil water, you can make jam. Almost. The real trick, honestly, is to follow the instructions that come with the pectin — they’re pretty specific. What you make the jam with is up to you, but you’d BETTER make sure you’ve got enough sugar, lemon juice, and water to make it all work. (Sugar makes the medium very difficult for anything to grow in, as does the lemon juice. Finally, boiling makes sure that the jam’s pretty darn sterile to begin with.)

The problem I ran into most was the size of my pot, which was too small to do more than four jars at a time. (This is why, ladies and germs, that canning pots exist.) Actually, there was a second problem: cavitation.

Cavitation is the bubbles that form in the water. When you’ve got nothing in boiling water, they’re just kind of fun to watch. But when you’ve got, oh, a glass jar sitting on top of the bubble, things get dicey — the jar will float up on the bubble, then slam down when the bubble gets around the jar. Bye-bye jar.

This is also why the jam instructions also include the word “rack”. Oddly enough, some strategically-placed forks did nearly the same job. (Next year, I’m getting a proper rack.)

That was Saturday morning. Today (Monday), I had jam on my rice bread toast. Geoff did good…

Gluten-Free Turkey Stuffing

Alex has been on a challenge diet for a few months. One of the challenges is trying to make everything work, and yet somehow appear more-or-less normal. (Maintain normalcy, you have a greater chance of success.) One aspect of that diet is avoiding gluten.

That’s really bloody hard. Gluten, in the form of wheat, barley, or oat flour, is in so many things that you become a voracious label-reader. You become very aware, very quickly, just how many things contain wheat flour that you’d never thought should.

The hardest part of this, on Alex, has been the lack of good bread. Alex is a bread addict, and has been since the first time I met her. And I’ve gotten pretty damned good at making bread at home, so the level of torture on poor Alex has just gotten worse and worse.

I finally decided it was time to stop making wheat bread, and start making gluten-free bread. Which is a lot harder than you think, especially if you’re trying to keep it (mostly) natural without using all sorts of kooky chemicals.

We’ve tried Bob’s Red Mill All Purpose Gluten-Free flour. It’s an effective one (it makes a pretty damned good pie crust, by the way), but it leaves a taste that I find … well, not ideal. (I’d been using it for a while with pancakes, and it got to the point where I stopped eating pancakes.) I hadn’t tried it for bread, but Alex’s baking (cookies and muffins that she could eat) had that same aftertaste that didn’t sit with me.

Hence, the move to rice bread. Rice makes a decent bread, all things considered, though I’ve found it’s a real stinker to get to rise and then hold when you bake it — my loaves keep collapsing when the baking actually starts. One day, I’ll figure this out.

I know, I’m rambling. But there’s a reason. Our turkey needed stuffing. And for most traditional stuffing recipes, you need bread cubes. And I wanted to make a stuffing that Alex could eat. And that meant a loaf of rice bread, baked, then cubed, and let to dry until Sunday, when I made up the stuffing.

The stuffing’s contents were “the usual”: onions, celery, carrots, walnuts, spices, and a cup of (homemade) chicken broth. I was worried that when this fairly soupy mix came in contact with the dried rice bread, that the entire thing would turn to mush. But it held its shape and consistency, right up until it was brought out of the turkey some four hours later.  I think, even, that I could do the same recipe with wheat bread, and no-one would be able to tell the difference.

Geoff did good, again!

Tilling the Garden

Last year, we hacked out some of our grass along the fence to make room for a garden. So far, the only thing we’ve planted in it are a bunch of flower bulbs, and some extremely late (but still exceedingly tasty) carrots. Otherwise, it’s been a neglected mess.

One (partial) issue are three highly-annoying shrubs that occupied that garden space that we had hoped to incorporate with a future (lovelier) garden. Instead, the insipid things mocked us through the entire year with their need for constant attention and sheltering of grasses that made it hard to see what we could have been doing (had we actually done anything).

So.

Just by pure fluke, yesterday, I ran into our neighbour, Alex (yes, having two Alexes in the neighbourhood gets very confusing during conversations; they’re often prefixed with “Not Your” or “Your”, and periodically “My” — we never seem to use “him” or “her”, however…), having a chat with another neighbour, John. John had a roto-tiller, which Alex was negotiating to borrow to till part of his backyard for a garden. I inserted myself for the same opportunity.

John, as it turns out, had just acquired the tiller second- (and possible fourth-) hand, and wasn’t even sure how well it worked. He offered it to us to try out, so we could let him know how well it worked. Alex then tried to negotiated with Amber to get an hour to try tilling the garden, to which Amber issued Executive Wife Order #4, and ordered him to get in the car so they could go to the lake for Thanksgiving.

As it turns out, Amber was utterly, totally right.

This morning, I accepted the mission to remove the shrubs from the garden space. They didn’t go without an epic fight (and a decent amount of the dirt, I should add). Merely removing the buggers was enough to suck the wind outta me. But I was far from done…

After spreading out the contents of our composter onto the garden bed, I traipsed over to John’s house, and brought back the tiller. If you’ve never seen one, it’s really little more than a lawnmower engine mounted on top of a set of four star-shaped blades, where each star tip is alternately angled 90 degrees. The theory goes that as the blades spin, they’ll cut into the sod and soil, give it all a good turn, and you get a nice, soft patch of soil in which you can plant whatever you desire.

It took me five minutes of heart-pounding pulling to finally get the damned thing going. (See above note about shrubs utterly weakening me.) With the machine off to the races, it was time to expand our garden space into something larger and (potentially) more productive!

At least, that was the theory. For the reality to happen, the blades need to be sharp — they have to cut through the sod to be able to chop it all up into little bits and loosen the soil. John’s unit, which I hadn’t thought to check — and John really didn’t care, since he was using it on an existing garden — was as dull as a [insert political joke here]. Even though the gizmo’s pretty front-heavy, which should push it down hard into the ground … it just kept bucking around, scraping away the grass, but making no difference whatsoever in the soil.

(The sod in our area is heavy with clay, which makes it very difficult to work with, and outright painful to walk on after all those damned worms make their mounds in the middle of the summer.)

Now, add to this the one thing I hadn’t expected — the tiller has a lot of oomph. Think of this as a half-dozen very large dogs trying to run ahead, while you attempt to keep them in place. It was hell. The machine bucked and jumped constantly, the handles vibrating harshly in my hands. I’ve done some pretty hard workouts in my day, but nothing beats trying to run a tiller properly. Especially one with dull blades.

Thankfully, inside the garden I’d already broken up, the machine worked much better, and although I’d never used one before myself, the concept was fairly simple. But I totally ruined my shoes (which, in my defence, were already falling apart, anyway), caked in a very thick and sticky combination of soil and compost.

It took me an hour of wrestling, wheezing, and wrangling to finally get something worthy of a garden. But it’s no bigger than we had before. Although the tiller did a decent job of mixing, it’s original purpose (expansion) fell horribly short.

Then Alex — Not My Alex, that is — tried that on his yard. Only he didn’t have the benefit of an existing space without the sod to start with. He, like I, will have trouble holding a pen tomorrow.

I’m in pain. Great pain. Between the shrub removal, the compost spreading, and that tiller, my hands are raw, my arms numb, my shoulders and back sore, and my legs are cramping. And I thought I was in reasonable shape, too. But the job is done, and now we can start planning for that garden…

Geoff did … too much. Owie.

It was a chance of a lifetime — something I knew then, and greatly appreciate now. A chance to connect with thousands of fellow Canadians, and experience our nation in a now-unique way. The memories were fond when it ended, and they’re stronger and more wonderful with every new day.

I’ve had people ask: Would I do it again? Damn right, I would!

That first day was a weird one. I was an outsider. I was brought in as a contractor, helping my friend Brenda (although, let’s be honest, here — she helped me) with a project that was dropped on her lap. She needed someone to spend (at the time) two months on a train, taking pictures, writing journals, and shooting video. Who the hell was she gonna find crazy/dumb enough to do that?!

(I owe Brenda huge, still, to this day. I mean, there’s just no other way to express the debt of gratitude that she would trust me with something such as that.)

So I boarded that bus, knowing no-one, realising very quickly that what was about to unfold was going to be a challenge unlike any I’d seen (and I’ll be damned lucky if I ever see it again). We unloaded at the Pacific Central Station, walked through to the platform, and prepared ourselves for … well, the unknown.

We didn’t know what was going to happen. We didn’t know if we’d all get along. But we had to. For over a month, we’d live in cramped quarters (often in the train itself), work under extreme deadlines, learn to love each others habits and quirks, make fun of each other, laugh, cry, tell stories, lend a helping hand, and share some very heavy loads. We had a crash course in friendship.

The thing I find most amazing is that everyone put up with me. First, the outsider — I wasn’t with the CBC. I was an unknown to nearly every group. The teams were fairly set: News, Sports, CBC Kids, the Boutique, and of course the ever-present and highly-awesome technical crew who made sure shit got done. (I was tapped with being responsible for New Media; my “team” was myself and one other, who changed three times during the course of the journey.) I was in everyone’s faces with my camera, and wrote extensively about almost everything we did (the CBC wisely cut down some of my blog posts, which periodically had an air of “Trans-Canada Pub Crawl” about them). Everyone put up with my incessant obsession with trains.

The video, thankfully, was turned over to someone else with considerably more experience.

We survived remnants of tropical storms, killer mosquitoes, diverted trains due to derailments, bears (in the railyards), trains (in the railyards), cold showers, intolerant visitors, periodically hostile local “assistance”, virulent viruses that took out nearly everyone at least once, broken feet, hangovers (see above note about the pub crawl), and lack of sleep. It created the kind of camaraderie you can’t explain to anyone who wasn’t there. There’s no analogy, no metaphor that can come close.

At the end, I think we all realised that we were in a mystical fog, a crazy daze that comes only from doing truly wonderful things. And on that fateful night, when the last call bell sounded and the lights came on, we all realised — very horribly — that our near-fantasy was over, and we had to return to a harsh reality that we had conveniently forgotten for a while. It’s a moment that rings as clear today as it did nearly 10 years ago … complete with the tears.

We all met up a year later, at the Elephant and Castle in downtown Toronto. We reminisced, we laughed, (we drank,) and many of us wished we could do it all over again.

Nine years later, I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one.

—-

For more details, should you be so crazy as to want them, I suggest reading a bit more. Like, a lot more.

And, of course, there are plenty of pictures.

But it’s coming to an end. Your infancy, as it were, is nearly over. You’re about to go to kindergarten. You’re officially growing past us.

I’m a little sad about this, if you haven’t figured it out. You’ve been my little Monkey for so long, now. Ever since the day you first landed in my arms, and we stared at each other trying to figure out what had just happened, you’ve had me entirely. Lock, stock, and barrel. No reservations.

In a week, you start school. Real school. Every day. You’re going to meet a lot of new friends. You’re going to be learning all sorts of new things. I can’t even imagine what changes you’re going to go through in the next few months. You’re reading on your own, and able to bike without training wheels. You paint real pictures, sing real music, tell amazing stories.

In a way, it’s a little scary for me. I guess it’s a normal father thing when it comes to daughters. I feel like it’s my job to … well, not so much protect you, but always be there for you. Be the one to help you, support you, cheer for you, teach you. You’ve been working on your independence already, much to my and Mommy’s extreme frustration at times, I have to say.

I don’t know what’s about to come. The uncertainty may keep me up at night. I’m afraid, Monkey. Afraid of losing you. It’s inevitable, I know. I’m being irrational. This is way things are, the way things will always be from now on. It’s life. You’ll always be my little girl, but more importantly, you’ll be more yourself with each day.

It took nearly 20 minutes for the bleeding to stop. It freaked me out a bit because I had no real reason as to why it had bled. By the time I got home, there was no indication whatsoever of any issue, either. But it was Alex who got me thinking. Her thought?

I’d been drinking way too much caffeine.

You may recall my first cup of coffee. It was yummy. And I knew, immediately, that I was screwed. I love the taste of coffee. Given the choice between just about anything (except beer) and coffee, I’ll choose coffee. (In the case of coffee-infused beer, I’m extra screwed.)

And I did. Since that fateful day, I’ve drank a lot of coffee. Most people start when they’re in university. In the three-odd years since I started, I’m pretty sure I’ve come close to making up the difference. At one point, about two months ago, I think I was downing nearly 12 cups a day.

Twelve.

I don’t care what the papers say, that ain’t natural. It would explain some of my more recent blepharospams, and lack of sleep (well, DUH).

So I stopped. Cold. And since then, I’ve not had a single cup. Not one. Not even a sip, or a whiff.

The headaches were bad. Brutal, even. Withdrawal sucks.

Water takes up most of my intake now, supplemented by (so far, non-caffeinated) tea. Effects, after a week? I feel significantly less irritable and getting to sleep isn’t as difficult as it has been for the last few months. However, I still feel drawn to the coffee settings on the office coffee maker (it takes packs that make tea, coffee, and other assorted beverages), and rough mornings (still have ‘em, of course) are that much harder without the kick in the butt.

Am I going to drink coffee again? Probably, but likely only on certain occasions, notably vacations (where I’m not tempted to drink coffee all day). During my regular 9ish-to-5ish? I may be permanently moving back to yerba matte, which I found to be less … dramatic.

So, this is kind of it, coffee. You were a good friend, a reliable companion. It’s definitely me, not you, at fault here, and it’s time we moved on. Not that I’m special to you, of course — there are many other addicts out there for you to have fun with. For now, I’ll just be happy to be … well, happy.

You’re not my “little” girl anymore. You’re a big girl now, really. (You’ll always be little, by the way. Just accept it and let’s move on, shall we?) I still find it hard to see you growing up, almost like you’re slowly getting away from me with every day.

I can’t believe you’re 5 already, Monkey.

It’s hard to think of all things you’ve been able to start doing on your own since the start of the year. You could already dress yourself, and you’re sort of okay with brushing your teeth, but now you’re starting to read on your own, and you no longer need training wheels on your bike. You’re big, Monkey!

It’s with that rather wistful thought that we review your birthday, which was today. (We had your party a couple of weeks ago, mostly because that was when we could actually get your friends to come over. Summers are hard to schedule.) We’d agreed on the event when Grandpa was here last — we were going (back) to Calaway Park.

We arrived just as the gates were opening, and zipped inside for a (half) day of fun. You and Mommy were on the bumper boats almost immediately, while Choo Choo and I tried to figure out how to stay occupied until the ride was over. (Sorry, Choo Choo, but you’re just not quite big enough for some of the more fun rides just yet.)

Then it was off to the “antique cars”. You drove, Choo Choo ran shotgun while Mommy and rode in the back. You drove very well … not that you had much of a choice — the track is pretty hard to get away from.

Mommy and you went on the spinny ride that Choo Choo didn’t much like — she went on the plane ride (which you followed on later). We went to the (laser) shooting range. You actually hit things (with a bit of help). Mommy won at the skeeball game; you and Choo Choo got a pair of unicorns from the deal. We did the train ride again, after you both went on the kiddie roller coaster. We had lunch.

The afternoon ended with a trip on the hot air balloon ferris wheel and a ride around on the Baja buggies before we headed back home. Grandma met us there for dinner. We had a ladybug-shaped cake (you wouldn’t believe how the black spots of the icing did a number on your lips, tongue, and teeth). You got some wonderful presents.

And you passed out, hard, Monkey. But you had a really, really big, wonderful day.

I still can’t believe you’re 5.

Wakened by one, though with hugs from both.
We sit. We eat. We chat.
Stories, changing of clothes and preparing for the day.
Teeth brushed.
Please, just let Mommy sleep a little while longer.

“Daddy, you going work?”
“Yes, honey…”
“But I miss you!”

Prometheus brought fire to man
And endured the eagle every day.
My heart faces the same eternity of destruction and healing
For everyday that I must leave.

Hugs. A kiss. A moment of love.
It is a fleeting moment, like your innocence
Too soon gone.

It’s a lonely trek away from you
Each step an ache
A string strung too far
Desperate to break.

Days are long
Time is short
You grow up too fast

Suddenly, another year passes
What did I miss?
I miss you. Every day.

Always.

I hate to leave you in the morning.

Well, hate is a strong word. I got bored of doing it. (Long story, suffice to say, I ended up making websites for a living.) But certainly the skill has never left me (I still write documentation to this day as part of my job), and I do know a few things about writing clearly and effectively.

Sadly, it’s not something that is done particularly well…

If you’re reading this, you’re (obviously) on the internet. And you’ve seen how badly the internet has been written. Spelling mistakes aside (even today’s modern spell checkers miss grammar and some syntax resulting from correctly-spelled, but incorrectly-used words), many people have trouble forming a cohesive idea, and an even harder time expressing it. As much as some scholars have said that the internet has (overall) improved the habit of written communication, I personally find the quality a bit lacking at times.

These days, you can easily find some fantastic how-to books on how to write documentation. This is not a new field, by any means — humanity’s been writing stuff like this for a couple hundred years, really. But over the years, I’ve found that most of the details can be boiled down to a few key points that you always keep in mind, and then you need to practice them over and over and over and over and over and over.

Oh, and you need to have a vicious editor. (Ideally, another writer with more experience.) Someone who can objectively tear apart your work, show you what’s good, what’s not so good, and help you improve your work. I learned more about the art of technical writing from two editors than I did from any book or professor, and I’m thankful for those people’s efforts (regardless of any heated arguments at the time). Writing is a two-person job: the author and the editor, and I’ll debate anyone who says otherwise…

There’s six fundamental parts to any good documentation (technical, or otherwise):

1. Organisation of concepts
2. Understanding your audience
3. Clarity
4. Brevity
5. Visual reinforcement
6. Consistency

 Organisation

This is Number 1 on the list for a reason. Even if you bugger everything else up in your documentation, you need to get this right. How you divide your document really speaks to how you introduce the concepts, explain them, and allow people to dig into things at a pace that’s comfortable for them.

As a general rule, you always start at a very high level — you introduce the very thing you’re about to explain. For example, imagine you’re writing a document on a plane. Your document may eventually detail the specific bolt that’s used to attach the engine, but you first have to start by telling the reader what a plane is, what it does, and (in some cases) even a wee bit of history. (Incidentally, a lot of Wikipedia articles are organised like this, and many are good examples of documentation.)

You then break your document into sections (or chapters, whatever you want to call them), which are the major topics of discussion. In the case of a plane (for example), you might want to have sections for the fuselage (the basic chassis of a plane), the powerplant (what makes a plane move), the wings (what makes a plane actually fly), the avionics (what helps the pilots steer the plane), the landing gear (because everything that goes up eventually has to come down), and the empennage (basically, the rear control mechanisms at the tail that allow steering).

Then, within each of those sections, you can more succinctly break down the topic more independently, allowing each section to have isolation from the other sections. Though not total isolation — any good documentation should refer to other parts of itself, or other documents, that provide additional detail.

It’s a simple mantra: start big, go small.

Thus we get to headings! All documentation has headings — it’s what breaks it up into parts that are digestible. All documentation has a heading hierarchy, too: always going from the first heading (often called Heading 1) to the second, to the third, and so on. You never, never, ever skip a heading. If you feel the urge to skip a heading, you have a flaw in your organisation.

The depth of heading hierarchies (how many heading levels you need) depends on the document. Some documents can get away with two; some (and I’ve written ones like this) need six or more. Don’t creating heading levels you don’t need — always keep a document as shallow as you can — but don’t be afraid to use them when you’re discussing a complex thing that needs a lot of breakdown.

It should be noted, especially with software documentation, that a heading hierarchy isn’t always a heading (such as “Organisation”, above). Sometimes it’s a function or a method that you need to document. For people reading API (application programming interface) specifications, the name of the function is in many cases far more valuable than heading you could create.

Understanding your Audience

It might sound trite, but you’re not writing a document for yourself. You’re writing it for someone else. You should always keep this in mind, as it will help focus the language you use, and the detail you need to provide.

Again, consider the plane documentation. There’s several different audiences who may need such a document: the people building the plane (they’ll need detailed specifications, including assembly instructions), the mechanics who’ll fix the plane later (similar to the build specifications, but they’ll also need information on best practices for repairs), pilots (who need to know how to fly the plane), and even passengers (they want to know more about the plane, and especially safety procedures). All of these audiences need special attention, and (frequently) very different information.

You would (almost) never write a general document that would address all people. It’s not to say that it can’t be done — it’s done every day, and done badly — but such a document becomes very hard to read, and even harder to understand. Writing different documents often helps make sure you’ve got the right subject and language for the right people.

Clarity

This is a tough one, and it relates to the previous two items. The more complex your topic, the more clarity you may need to provide. By “clarity”, I mean the ability to explain an inherently complex thing in (reasonably) simple terms.

I’ve written loads of technical documentation regarding software development and server architecture, often for project managers and clients who do not possess my level of understanding. (This is usually because I have to get budgets approved, and simply saying “we need to rewrite some code” isn’t good enough.) I’ve had to explain a problem in detail, propose the solution, and draw potential conclusions from the actions. All of it in such a way that someone who doesn’t need (or want) to understand the details.

I won’t lie: this is hard.

So how do you do it? Metaphor and simile. (I provided links, in case you can’t remember what those terms are. And yes, you could use allegory as well, but it takes a lot more effort, and we’re trying to keep things simple.) You need to convert the concept into something more familiar to the audience at hand.

For example, in software, we often talk about using a “framework” when building complex things. A framework is like being given a lumbermill to carve up an entire tree, rather than having to use a handsaw to do it all by yourself.

See what I did there? You’ve probably never sawed an entire tree by yourself — but you can imagine how much work it is. You don’t have to know what a “framework” really does, but you suddenly have an idea of what it can do for programmers. Hence, the importance of explaining things a different (but still valid!) way.

It’s important that you’ve explained a concept sufficiently. You have to carry an explanation all the way to the end, so that someone has a complete thought. Imagine if I’d stopped halfway through my framework definition, and left it at “lumbermill”. You’d probably be wondering where I was going with the idea, and likely no better off than when I’d started.

You also need to be specific. Avoid using vague words when you can use the actual term instead. This is particularly important as your detail increases. At a high level, you can talk about the bolts that go into assembling a plane; when you get to the exact bolt needed to attach a winglet to the wingtip, you’d better have the part number to go along with it.

Brevity

Those of you who know me will be snickering at me for this one. Yes, you need to try write the shortest documentation you can, all the while building on the items I’ve already mentioned. I say this because, generally, I still struggle with it.

It is very difficult to not want to explain everything in huge amounts of detail. I’ll tell you this (because I’m always telling it to myself): give people just enough information, not all the information — let someone learn enough to know what they need to get going, and they’ll (usually) figure out the rest for themselves.

Also, you keep it short because people just don’t want to read lots of words. They want the information, and move on. We’re a society of soundbites, not one of novels. That also means writing short sentences and short paragraphs – long ones are fine for telling stories, but they suck at instruction.

Visual Reinforcement

When you’re writing some documentation, you’ll come across the need to explain something that is inherently so complex that it’s difficult to write in words.

So don’t.

The saying “a picture’s worth a thousand words” is very true, and a single picture can eliminate the need to write lengthy explanations. In some cases, a diagram is the only way to properly provide information (such as technical specifications for the previously-mentioned airplane mechanics).

Do you have to make these diagrams yourself? Not always, but often a simple drawing tool will save you hours of hunting through the internet for an appropriate picture, or waiting for someone else to make it for you. Visio and Omnigraffle are life-savers when it comes to building quick and easy diagrams, especially where complex ideas like process flows need to be explained.

Consistency

I have this as a “last” important point, but it’s no less important than the previous two (Brevity and Visual Reinforcement). It’s important not because it helps convey information any more easily — it’s because it won’t annoy your reader.

Consistency, in this case, is about your writing style. You need to make sure you’re always approaching your writing in the same manner, in the same style, in the same voice, throughout an entire document. (This is where an editor really comes in to save a day, incidentally.)

Changing styles, or how you write, does not change the information you’re providing. But it does cause the reader to unconsciously start to hate you, because it’s difficult for a human to read different styles or word usage from page to page (or section to section).

Stick with your choice of spelling. You’ve probably noticed that I use “organisation”, not “organization”. I use a version of Canadian spelling. (This is in itself a bit debatable, as some Canadian spelling is British, and some is more American.) But once you start using it, keep using it. (Incidentally, I don’t normally use “organisation” — I’m using here to illustrate the point.)

You should also stick with your choice of terms. Once you start using a term, you need to keep using it, and use it in the correct context. As mentioned with the bolts earlier, if you ever mention a “19 mm close tolerance bolt”, you need to keep using that term, lest someone get confused with a different kind of bolt.

Similarly, once you start using a particular meme for your metaphors, you need to stick with them. If you start using planes as your metaphor, keep talking about planes – don’t switch to using trees and lumbermills. (See what I did there?)

Yes, this is a bit of psychology. But you want someone to read your document, and hopefully recommend it to someone else.

Some Final Notes

It ain’t easy summarising an entire career into a single blog post. Heck, it’s fool-hardy, really. But still, there’s a few other things that you might want to consider looking into.

First of all, read some examples. You don’t need to learn the material, but look at them for what they are. I’ve already mentioned Wikipedia, which is maintained by an army of editors, for whom I have the deepest respect. Also consider reading some books — things like the For Dummies series and pretty much anything out of O’Reilly are great examples of complex ideas broken down into digestible terms.

Your style is important, but not critical. Still, there are a few things you should keep an eye on:

• There is no “I” in technical writing, so don’t use it (the author might have a fancy picture on the cover, but inside the book they shouldn’t make themselves known)
• There is a “you” — always speak to your reader, it helps them attach themselves more to the topic
• Companies (et al) are referred to in the third person; avoid “we” if you can
• Avoid colloquialisms, vulgarity, stereotypes, catchphrases, and so on — those are for literature, not documentation

Learn some of the typographical aspects of writing. For example, the difference between a dash, an “en dash” and an “em dash”. You’d be surprised how often a simple change like that can affect the readability of a document. Similarly, spacing between headings and paragraphs, how to create legible lists, and simple formatting go a long way to making a document “friendly”.

Practice. You won’t get it right the first time. Or the second. Or the tenth. But you will get better, if you keep at it, and have a (trusted) person review your work.