Wedding Bells

We are off tonight to a friend's wedding. i am quite excited, it'll be the first one I have been to in a long time. It's also the first time i'll be part of the wedding party. I am excited about that too.

The wedding present has been arranged, the tux i go pick up tomorrow. It seems as if everything is arranged. It's probably been about a decade since I have been to a wedding. I guess it's getting to that point in life that I should be attending several over the next few years.

I hope that no one I know ever gets divorced, it seems like such an expensive proposition, not only in money, but in terms of the difficulties this puts on both parties, especially if children are involved. I think that our generation will hopefully be able to reduce the level of divorce. One of the reasons is that a lot of kids are from divorced families and won't want to put their own children through that. The other thing is that people are waiting longer to get married, which I would guess means they are putting more thought into the whole thing.

I hold the view that marriage really is about partnership, and my dad always said he didn't think he could raise a family or live his life fully without a partner. Here's hoping that we can all see the wisdom in that statement

Getting into a new routine

So far so good, i'm enjoying the new apartment and now that everything is all set up, i've been enjoying it even more.

I didn't realize how much i missed playoff hockey last year. Like most people, I guess I just sort of did without it. It's so exciting though, especially now that Ottawa is playing well.

Now the only thing left i have to go and pick up is my bike. I hope to ride a lot this summer, it'll keep me in better shape and I really enjoy the biking in Ottawa. I hope to explore more of the trails this year. I didn't do nearly enough of it last summer, so hopefully I can catch up on it this year.

I guess thats all I really have to say for now. I should update one more time before I leave for a friend's wedding tomorrow night.

A quick update

Well we are in the new apartment. We moved in on saturday and all went well. No major problems yet. A few leftovers still to pick up from Jen's place and then we're all done moving.

I don't particularly like moving, but then again who does.

I slept on an air mattress for the past week, so having the bed set up is nice.

I am not too sure what i'll be up to for the next little while. Now that our internet is set up, i guess i have to start the job hunt.

Out in the suburbs or is exurbs? or ex ex exurbs?

I'm here in Barrie, Ontario. It is actually interesting to me, to see how foreign such a place is. I am coming to realize why people move into and live in the suburbs, but i still can't get over the fact that it seems so generic.

Half the houses are identical, there are no trees because they won't mature for like 15 years, not a whole lot of sidewalks, and then they have these large empty parks that 100 houses back onto.

This is what it looks like in southern ontario, but i've never lived in a place like it. I don't find it that inspiring. Then again maybe this will change when I have kids and want a nice backyard. The main driver is of course also economic, people can actually afford to live in the suburbs, though they lose any supposed benefit if you consider the amount of time they waste in their cars, even if they don't have to drive miles to work.

I'll always remember in my first year of university being asked whether i lived in "the city" or not. I didn't even understand the question at first. Where I come from, you either live in Regina or you don't. There is nothing in between. It's a city of 200,000 people but there aren't really any suburbs. You can drive anywhere in the city in 15 minutes or less. I'm still not sire exactly what the person who asked it meant but I was very perplexed by it at the time. I suppose in an area like this one here, or the fact that pretty much everyone in southern Ontario relates their location to a distance from Toronto, it makes more sense.

I'm reading an interesting book, Whats the Matter with Kansas aside from taken shots at Ann Coulter every few pages, he looks into how Kansas became a Republican hotbed. Interesting read, i don't think there are a whole lot of parallels with the Canadian prairies though, so that's a bit disappointing.

I'm Heading back

I will be back in Ottawa on wednesday! Everything got moved up and i booked my ticket on sunday night.

I haven't been in Ottawa for some time now, I hope it is still the wonderful place I remember it being. A lot of thing are starting to fall into place, I'll be moving into an apartment with my girlfriend. I'll be starting to look for a new job.

I'm moving into an era of increased stability..The last few months of living out of a suitcase have taken a toll. It's been tough at times, to have to wear the same clothes week after week, and not really having a sense of stability. That's something i'm looking forward to for sure.

I can't wait to get into a routine..

Ottawa awaits!

Somehow finding the words

Yesterday I went to the ceremony celebrating the life of my father who passed away on April 1st, 2006.

It was a nice ceremony, and the church was packed. I didn't dare look back to see, but one gentleman came and told us he hadn't seen the church that full in the 50 years he had been going to the church.

I think that alone speaks volumes about the man my father was.

For me personally one of the things I have often thought about,(particularly as I have just been overseas and something which reinforced my feeling of being Canadian) was how the love I feel for Canada came from my dad. He was the one who forced us through French immersion, something for which I am especially grateful now that I live in Ottawa. He was so proud of this country, in a way only somebody who chose to come in here, made this place home out of all the other options he had to choose from. Unlike many of his countrymen he specifically chose Canada. He met Pierre Trudeau when he was on a trip through Guyana where he was born. He always talked about being a Trudeau Liberal.

These are the things that cannot be passed down. Those us who have grown up here, can't have quite the same undertstanding of what it means to be Canadian as those who have chosen to be here. It's just one of those things, immigrants have always given meaning to Canada, something those us born here just can't quite grasp.

It was fitting as well that on the memorial board at the reception after the service, that one of the pictures was my dad smiling (as he always was) and clutching his Canadian citizenship papers.

A bowl of soup

I had that at 10am this morning..

Yummy!

Land of the sane

For anyone who knows me and has heard this rant, I DO NOT apologize.

I hate daylight savings time. I think it is stupid. It gives no one anymore time to do anything. It moves around the times when people have sunshine. It doesn't add time to anyone's day. ANybody who beleives this obviously believes in 25 hour days. We all know that the length of a day is 24 hours (and some number of minutes i can't remember)

I am from a province that does not succumb to this stupidity and I am proud of it.

I think daylight savings time makes no sense. The arguments about how it will save the U.S energy are bogus, this has been proven in study after study. It makes no sense that the US chose to extend daylight savings. Oh well, i live in a province whihc has to follow the U.S on this one. Ontario has no choice if it wants its just on time delivery systems to be compatible with the U.S states...

Oh and I bought Great Big Sea's new album. I like it so far. Pretty interesting stuff, and the cover is funny. The cool thing is it comes with a DVD that explains some of the stories behind the songs they picked.