Macy's

So maybe you've heard of the American department store Macy's. Kind of like the Bay but a tad more upscale. So we were in Seattle last month checking out the downtown are, and we came across a Macy's.

Carrie had been looking to buy a watch for some time since her previous one gave up the ghost, but there are very few styles she likes. She'd sourced a few in Canada but they were a little expensive. So when we saw the right style at Macy's, and since such things are cheaper across the border, we decided to buy it. There was a 10% off sale that day, which was nice. Then as a greater incentive, one could get another 15% off if one got a Macy's department store credit card. I didn't like the sound of that but 15% off is 15% off so we did it anyway. Fine, great watch, great deal.

A couple of weeks later I decided to see how I might pay the Macy's bill that should be arriving soon. I didn't like what my research dug up:
- to pay online, it must be from a US chequing account;
- paying by mail must be done with a money order in US funds;
- one can always pay in-store... if one can get to a store;
- last resort: get a friend who lives in the States doing the paying for you.

These were not great options. Even worse was reading about Canadians who didn't get their bill in the mail soon enough to send out a payment before the due date. And there are late fees. On top of the robbery that is the 24% annual fee (for those who for some reason carry a balance), there's a finance charge of $2 if you're late. I guess that's a processing fee of sorts. The real late fees are from $15 to $39 (depending on the balance outstanding) and are charged up to twice per monthly billing cycle! Who even gets away with that?!

Oh, and the finance charge apparently appears on bills regardless of whether you've failed to pay on time or not; officially you don't have to pay the charge unless you're paying after the due date. Of course that's not made clear, and people will likely opt to pay it first and ask questions later. This gimmick probably adds a couple million dollars to the company's cash flow. Not cool.

Anyway, after learning all this I jumped on it. We took the only feasible route and paid $6 for a money order and mailed it out, while also phoning them to let them know it was on the way. A bit of a hassle, but in the end we paid on time and now have a nice watch at a considerable discount. Plus $6.

And we cancelled the evil card.

Niece

A big congrats to Carrie's "little" brother and his wife who just had their first baby. Carrie's finally an auntie... from her side of the family. May there be dozens more...

That also makes Mom and Dad D new grandparents. Congratulations Opa & Oma! Or is it Grampy and Grammy? They can't just be called Grandpa & Grandma... that's so commonplace. Decisions, decisions.

Lately

Ahhh... August. The time of year when I really look forward to winter. Even more so, that is, than during the preceding three months. This would be because I would much rather go out and enjoy the great outdoors in the winter than during summer. Not that it's been much of a summer. Ottawa finally just had its first heat warning this week, so that comes a little later than most years.

Most people tend to think of water and swimming when things heat up. I'm not one of those people. On a hot summer day, water is good for drinking and that's about it. They say I'd think differently if I knew how to swim, but I'm not convinced. First, I can stay afloat for a solid two minutes before succumbing to gravity; does keeping one's head above water not constitute swimming? Second, knowing how to swim does not make the temperature of water any higher. Hot tubs are nice to relax in, but preferably when the ambient air temperature is below freezing. And I can handle warm indoor pool water since it's 'nice' and warm, but I wouldn't say the idea excites me. But outdoor bodies such as lakes? No thanks! I don't require the "refreshing" feel of cold water on a hot day; if I must be outside I'll just sit back and acclimatize (usually with jeans on). You don't need to understand, just know that I'd much rather step into my snowboard boots than my Speedo.

So a couple of weekends ago, we went with some friends to a beach. The beach is in Gatineau Park and costs money if you're driving. And it's almost hour away... considerably more if you count the ridiculous wait to get in that day. Everyone and their dog seemed intent on hitting the beach, no matter the inconvenience. Maybe it's the Houstonite in me, but if you have to wait in line for something, it better be really worthwhile. And beaches are very near the bottom of my 'worthwhile' list. To make matters worse, there was only one drive-through pay booth and no walk-in one. But I wasn't alone, so for the sake of all those present, I didn't complain too loudly. Upon asking a park attendant about the busy-ness, he assured us he'd never attempt a beach visit on a nice day like that day; he also stated that parking was a problem and if it got much busier they might have to close the gates for the day. Ughhh. But once we were in, it was surprisingly easy to find a parking spot and a picnic spot; it probably helped that it was near or after 4pm by that point and people were starting to leave.

The whole ordeal reminded me of Cultus Lake in the Fraser Valley. People enjoy the experience of long car line-ups to get in, crazy packed beach areas once there, and ridiculous traffic to get out. I can honestly say that I much prefer relaxing at home to all of that. But that's just me.

What else did we do? We visited people's campsites a couple of times. That's a nice way to get out for an evening and not have to do all the packing for camping. We'll probably go camping sometime yet ourselves at the end of the summer.

A couple of weeks ago was the Ottawa Busker Festival. I'd never been to a proper busker festival before, but I expected a whole lot of random street performers vying for crowd attention. That was not the case; the festival was held on one street downtown, with scheduled performances at five intersections. After 18 years, the festival has become quite the event, but I was more entertained than impressed. Perhaps in the interest of maximum income, they had a system and stuck to it. Each act had an hour time slot, and in general each would do progressively better stuff over the course of the hour with the promise of a grand finale. But too often the grand finale, while perhaps technically most difficult, was not near as astounding as much of the rest of the act. All this, along with numerous pleas for cash (including a "we aren't beggars, and by the way we think we're worth this much from you" speech right before the finale), failed to impress me. But in all, acts were entertaining enough (and free!).

Fire was a very common theme for performers. This act from Australia was particularly nice. A little late in the evening for the photos though.


Some local acrobats.


A talented artist, one of the few side shows.


Another weekend we attended an outdoor orchestra performance. Ottawa had its third annual Orchestras in the Park, which is a few evenings of free outdoor concerts. This is a nice way for people to enjoy the orchestra when they otherwise can't afford -- or can't be bothered -- to attend orchestra performances. It was quite well attended the night we were there, despite the threat of rain. We enjoyed two Beethoven's 'fifths' (symphony and piano concerto). Although the sound is obviously not of indoor quality and visibility depends whom you're stuck behind and whether that person brought a higher camping chair than you did, it was a decent experience; adding to the fun was some friends' one-year-old who kept us entertained with her antics.

Incidentally, we just bought a pass (five shows) for the NACO, Ottawa's own orchestra. We topped it up with a Messiah performance as it's been a few years (Halifax '04 or so) since we enjoyed one of those.

Last week we hosted (and made) some new friends from Guelph who wanted to check out Ottawa. They stayed a couple of nights and saw some of the key tourist sights. Perhaps we'll have to visit them soon and see the sights of Guelph (are there any?).

I'm so low on pictures (as I'm sure you've noticed above) I'm going to borrow one they sent me; with luck they won't hunt me down for posting this :).


This past Wednesday we went to a Thai restaurant for dinner with eight friends. The food was delicious, and the Thai beer was very drinkable. With rice and sautéed dishes galore, it was the kind of meal you'd expect to eat with chopsticks, but no such luck: apparently in Southeast Asia the only chopstick users are the Vietnamese. I guess now we know for next time.

That's all I've got.

Vanderveen out.

Summer holidays

Now that I'm fully recovered from our holiday I can finally blog about it. Last week I got that lousy (partial) molar pulled, so that distraction is finally behind me.

My little brother had kindly invited us to his wedding, so we flew to Edmonton on Canada Day. My two Ontarian sisters and a sister from BC (and their families) were to camp out with us at a provincial park a ways west of the city, while another my parents and another sister (with her family) stayed in Edmonton. The southern Ontarians took a flight to Edmonton the day before our flight, and one of them was at the airport to greet us when we landed.

(Aside: The chauffeur service was incredible during our entire trip! All told, people did 12 hours of extra driving to fetch us from or bring us to the various airports/stations. All that generosity, coupled with the fact we could travel lightly -- no checked luggage -- made our travels rather enjoyable. Thanks people!)

We and one sister (and family) headed out to the campground and found our site fully decked out with tents pitched and all the camping gear we'd need, thanks to another sister. We'd been told everything would be provided for us, but this was ridiculously awesome! Thanks, M!


We'd reserved a minivan for our travels but instead received the world's ugliest car, the Ford Flex. Strangely hardly anyone agrees with me, but I think it's right up there with the Aztec and the Prius. Ughhh... The Flex also has no power, but to its credit there's decent legroom and more headroom than I've experienced in any vehicle since I was about five.


The four camping families took up three campsites, though people spent most of their time at just one where all the cooking, eating and socializing took place. Two brothers-in-law are pretty handy in the kitchen, so we enjoyed some delicious meals, especially for camping standards. Here's B preparing steak over a charcoal fire.


Buying firewood at the campground was highway robbery as usual, so B and I decided to drive around one evening and look for somewhere else to buy some. We'd seen a sign for firewood somewhere nearby but we couldn't seem to locate it when we needed it. After driving backroads for a while with no success, we finally decided to stop at the next yard with firewood in it. Upon doing exactly that, some nice old guy let us fill the car up with free firewood! Sure beats paying $8 a bag.

The wedding was at 1pm on Friday. The weather was nice and we gained another sister-in-law. The last time all we siblings (with families) were together was four years ago at my younger sister's wedding; this time she left one of her two kids in Ontario, but other than that the whole clan was there, 26 people in all.

The immediate family.


The wedding party.


The reception involved a delicious dinner and more cake and other yummies than one could sample each of. It also involved plenty of entertainment, like the bride having to sweep the groom off his feet foot.


A sister had saved a bunch of drawings my brother drew when he was four, so we strung a few together to make a random story. Do these pictures explain why, years later, the biggest hurdle that would stand between him and high school graduation was a lousy art class?


I didn't do a whole lot of picture-taking during our trip, and it certainly didn't occur to me to single out each person for a shot or two. So I was surprised when it was pointed out to me that I took a disproportionate amount of pictures of Ontario nephews and nieces versus BC ones. In my defense, how can one pass this up...


I got a few western ones on film anyway...


...and our latest first cousin once removed. He graced us with his cute presence during an extended family barbecue that brought (some of) our Alberta cousins, uncle and aunt, plus another aunt from Holland to the lake.


On Saturday three brothers-in-law and I went golfing. The plan was to shoot 18 holes, but plans changed a little after hole 9... it hailed!!! That was not supposed to happen! Two guys in one golf cart went one way; another and I took the other cart the other way. The first cart found a sheltered spot behind some trees; our cart found no shelter whatsoever and got battered by big fat hailstones. We tried to drive it under some trees but sadly we were between those trees and the hail falling at a crazy angle. And wow, is hail ever LOUD on a golf cart. So lacking any real choices we decided to head in the general direction we recalled the pro shop to have been; visibility was near zero, partly because the hail was so thick and partly because we were driving directly into the wind and any exposed eyeballs could get severely battered by evil hailstones. Even breathing was difficult. But the cart managed to get us back to the pro shop through the several inches of hail and water on the ground -- and very slowly at that, thanks to a crazy headwind. We elicited several stares upon coming inside completely drenched. I was actually already thoroughly soaked within a minute after the hailstorm started. The other two guys drove in shortly, hardly wet at all. Not even fair. Anyway, the fields were literally white, as if it had snowed. Crazy prairie weather. We got rain checks for another full 18 holes and left. (I assume brother-in-law #4 used mine the following week since I wouldn't be around to enjoy it...)

I'd worn my dress pants for golfing in case they had some sort of dress code. Since these were now soaked, I hung them up in the hope they'd be dry for Sunday. No such luck; Sunday morning I dangled them over the campstove for a half hour to dry them off; the pockets now have singe marks as a nice reminder. My shoes I'd worn took a whole lot longer; they weren't dry enough to wear for another five days.

Sunday night five of us siblings plus spouses, including the newlyweds, hung out around the campfire and shot the breeze... something we don't get to do often. Good times...

Carrie and I flew to Seattle on Monday to meet up with friends who moved there from Ottawa half a year ago. They live 1.5hrs away so there was lots of driving involved. Our combined schedules didn't allow for much time together, but we made the best of what time we had. We met her wonderful family and got to see both her childhood home and her new place.

On Tuesday our friend and her sister drove us back to Seattle; on the way we stopped at Cabela's, an outdoorsy/hunting outfitter store. It was a big place with more stuffed animals than I've seen in one place. Mostly North American wildlife, but also an African section and an aquarium with live fish.


Also, in true American fashion, the store had a huge firearm section, with zillions of guns on display... rifles, handguns, shotguns, machine guns... Two words: Awe Some! There was also what was called the Gun Library, which is just a nook that houses a lot of used guns, for sale and in working condition, many of which have a known history several hundred years old.


We spent the day checking out Seattle's Pike Place Market and other parts of the city.


Ye Olde Curiosity Shop had all sort of weird and novelty stuff; I expect it's comparable to a Ripley's franchise. Here's what our dog would look like if we'd locked her in the house instead of farming her out to some friends.


We jumped on a bus which took us nonstop to the border. The bus had all of a dozen people on it. On arriving at the border, the driver half-jokingly warned us to be polite, since no one wants to be the one ornery person who gets yanked out of line and holds up the border crossing for everyone. Well, there was one person who, for some reason, got some extra attention but the entire border stop was probably only 20 minutes so it wasn't too bad.

We spent only two full days in Langley, which I'm sure is some sort of record. We visited the grandparents but didn't have time to visit any friends. We did manage to see a number of Carrie's relatives when they came over for a non-ladies-only baby shower-type thing for Carrie's brother and his 8-months-pregnant wife.


After a very short stay in town, the family headed to Whistler to spend a night there. We enjoyed the drive on the new Sea-to-Sky highway, which is fortunately much improved in time for the Olympics. Whistler is beautiful in the summer, with opportunities for swimming, golfing, biking, hiking, ziplining, bungee jumping, and of course (if you go high enough) skiing & boarding.


We first hit the beach where a few of us decided to try swimming. I tried to save them some trouble by pointing out that it was much too cold, but some people insist on finding out for themselves. They didn't last long.

We considered ziplining but we didn't have enough time for that.

The next morning a bunch of us drove out of town a ways to go on a hike called the Ancient Cedars trail. The highlight of this trip is supposed to be... you guessed it... ancient cedars. The lowlight would probably be the mosquitoes. Strangely I wasn't bothered by them at all for once; usually I'm the decoy that spares everyone else. This time I got to hear every one else complain. And watch them flail. Much preferable to doing so myself. The other lowlight was taking cars up the rather rough road up to the trailhead. Low-pro tires not terribly welcome.


The very pregnant sister-in-law came along on the medium-difficulty rated trail. There may have been times when some of us were worried this day might be Junior's birthday, but the woman is tough and could possibly have hiked circles around some of us... big belly and all.

So the cedars... some them were fairly large. We posed in front of one that's probably 30 feet around.


I climbed a huge fallen tree and took a picture of the ants people below.


If you look at the left side of this next picture, you'll see dad-in-law below the fallen conifer that is probably 4 feet in diameter or bigger; but it looks rather scrawny compared to the pair of massive cedars on the right that it fell between.


We enjoyed the walk despite the bugs, enjoying the sights along the way.


The entire experience took under two hours, after which we headed back to town for breakfast. That afternoon Carrie and I got a ride to Vancouver airport to finally end our holiday. We'll have to do it again some time.