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As you may or may not know, Vero and I are hitting the road for a giant trek for the next two weeks. While we have some things planned out, we are also going to drive by the seat of our pants.

Essentially we have from Wednesday August 15 until Friday August 24 to get ourselves down to New York City from London. I think our best bet is to head towards Montreal, hook down to Quebec City, visit Gaspe for a bit, then go down the coast towards Boston and then New York City.

But what do my faithful readers suggest? Is there any ‘must-see’ items along that general route? Take a look at the map and identify some fun things for us to do!

Most of the time we’ll probably be camping which will be a new experience for me. Usually my camping trips involve a weekend away…so I’m not sure of how easy it is to find camping grounds along the way ahead of time but I’m going to go on a whim and say there are probably tons and I shouldn’t have too much to worry about. Except when I hit New York City of course! That’s another dilemna…any idea of where I should park for the weekend? Should I just find a cheap parking lot?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20155039?GT1=10252

BERLIN – Germany’s national railway wasn’t about to risk sending a trainload of soccer fans to a German Cup match without beer.

Federal police said Monday that the beer tap failed aboard a special train carrying Bayer Leverkusen fans to Hamburg on Saturday. The fault was discovered half an hour into the journey.

“In order not to endanger the good mood” of the passengers, railway officials halted the train in Wuppertal for 25 minutes and had a replacement part delivered by taxi, a police statement said. It added that there was no trouble among the fans.

Their team was less obliging. Top-division Leverkusen’s 1-0 elimination from the cup by second-division St. Pauli in a first-round upset left its fans with plenty of sorrows to drown on the way home.

Clearly my vacation was amazing as I never ended up updating my blog about my travels.

My travels consisted of staying in Ottawa this time around. I ended up putting a few coats of pink primer on my garage door (it’s a nice shade of bubble gum pink now which my neighbours love) and I’ll be throwing up some maroon by the summer’s end. I would ideally like to finish it this week, but I have a final essay due by Friday. YIKES!

Tuesday had the safe return of Vero into our lives. The airplane was delayed by 3-4 hours due to some faulty brakes (???) so I ended up picking her up around 5:30. She appreciated the giant sign with her name on it as she said that throughout her travels, she always saw those signs but never for her!

We headed back to her place so she could show me some pictures and videos from the trip. In the end, she went to Austria, Italy, Southern France and Spain. She said Spain was super hot – one day it was 44 degrees without the humidity! She also saw some bullfighting in Spain which actually involves killing the bull (which we both were unaware of). She was pretty mortified as is not a clean kill to say the least.

I’m sure she will fill you all in on the little details in the future, but needless to say, she had a great time!

I spent some time with her meandering around Ottawa for the next few days getting her back on her feet and then I spent Thursday relaxing by cleaning up the house as my parents were coming in a day early. Mike and I had a few beers during the evening which turned into an impromptu pre-birthday bash for me as my parents and Eric showed up also. The beer was flowing well that night. After midnight when everyone wished me a happy birthday we headed for bed.

I awoke to my twenty-ninth year wondering where the heck I was and realized that I had slept downstairs that night as my parents were in my bedroom. After getting my bearings I headed upstairs to find a sweet new fishing rod in my possession from my parents! Thanks to the both of you!

We spent the rest of the day shopping around the area in which I got a great deal on a shirt and tie (such a great deal that I whispered to my parents that they should go start the car) and then we headed home, had a nap and went to a rushed supper at Eastside Mario’s as we had napped a little too long before having to pick up Nanny at the train station.

We then all headed home with Vero and her sister Andreane where I received some great gifts from Nanny (thanks Nanny!) and some great gifts from Vero from her travels. I don’t know how I did it, but I predicted that I would receive a Spanish Spider-Man comic book, which I did. Strange how that popped into my mind all of a sudden. I also got these cool maraca type percussion instruments which I’ll have to get the hang of. They have a trick to them which I haven’t figured out.

That’s that! My week off was great and the weather was SUPER FREAKIN’ AMAZING!!! I am having all the luck in the world with my vacation this year.

Now I’m ready to plan out the next big trek. It involve a wedding in Kitchener, a trip to London to see Troy and Connie and then 2 weeks with nothing much planned except finding our way to New York City. I think the two weeks will be spent traipsing along the coast with trips to Gaspe and Boston planned.

I suppose I should write that I’m on Day 6 of vacation considering I already took a week off to go fishing up North.

I’m updating this from my backyard where the sun is shining. I must admit that it’s a little hard to see the screen in the sunlight. Must be a drawback from having a glossy screen on the MacBook.

Friday night was spent heading over to Amelia and Ward’s place to see the newest addition to their family – Baby Ella. She’s pretty cool. Amelia and Ward are doing well and adjusting to the new bundle of joy. We had some good laughs and ordered some excellent pizza for supper.

Krista and I then bailed on going to see Planet of the Apes at the Westboro Beach because we thought it was going to storm something fierce. However, the storm must have hit somewhere else in Ottawa because we never saw it and Matt told us that the Westboro Beach only got a few drops of rain. DISAPPOINTMENT!

So we headed to the bowling lanes in Orleans (I suck!) and then played a game of pool in which I gave Krista a few pointers along the way. Always good to impart my knowledge of the game onto others.

Saturday was devoted to Jason’s bachelor party…I suppose that can be saved for an entire post altogether so I’ll wait to speak about that one. All I have to say is it was probably the most fun bachelor party I’ve ever been part of. Jason had a great time also which is what counts.

Sunday had me waking up and jumping up out of bed with this excruciating pain in my right pectoral. I have no idea how this happened as I was reading in bed for awhile before that and didn’t feel any pain. But as soon as I get out bed, argh! I think it may be a nerve pinch or something. This Monday morning, the pain is still there which is disappointing as I thought it may have left after a good sleep. I don’t think it’s as bad though…

I suppose it didn’t help that I went out to Kanata to help Rob move a fridge out of his grandparents basement and then bring it into his basement of his house. 😉 I thought maybe some physical activity would help out the situation! We managed to get the fridge out and into his house but with relative difficulty. It’s hard to get a grip on those things. We also brought in a few wall units into his house. I think another move or two and Rob and I will be certified ‘professional movers’.

Some good news comes Rob and Janice’s way as Janice gave birth to a baby girl (Jenna) on Saturday night. 45 minutes shy of being born on Sunday which is Rob’s birthday. She was 6 pounds…15 ounces? Something like that. It was a surprise as Jan was scheduled to go into the hospital on Monday and they were at a wedding (where Janice was part of the wedding party) when she had to go to the hospital. I was joking to Janice awhile ago that this would happen to her just like my friend Annie last year. Same exact scenario happened with people decked out in tuxedos and nice dresses entering the hospital. The nurses must have felt they were experiencing deja vu.

Anyhow, the baby and Janice are fine. Jenna is beautiful. At this point in the night, I could hardly move my entire right side of my body due to whatever was pinched (?) and I was thinking of paying the emergency room a visit. 😉

Got home and watched Smokey and the Bandit which I’ve never seen. Did you know that it was the second most grossing film in 1977 next to Star Wars? That must have been a pretty popular movie! It was a good time and chock full of laughs. The car chase scenes were pretty great also.

So here I sit in my backyard, listening to some tunes and wonder what I should do with the day. I was going to start the day off painting the garage door but I am considering bailing on that option to see if I should just relax my body to get rid of this muscle pain.

Vero comes back home tomorrow afternoon which is AMAZING! Man, I miss her. So her adventure in Europe will have ended, but she still has the rest of the summer to enjoy here.

iplaying: Someone Great – LCD Soundsystem (Sound of Silver)

Hmm…I have no pictures from the bachelor party. Mental note, hunt some down.

So Saturday morning I picked up Duncan and Matt and we headed over to Jason’s place. A last minute changeover in ride situations put me in the drivers seat for the afternoon which was fine with me.

The bachelor party consisted of a car rally which can be described as a form of scavenger hunt. I had heard rumours that we would have to go to Montreal at one point so I packed the car full of all needed provisions – beer, food and swimming trunks. I figured that would get us anywhere.

Turns out that this was not the case and we ended up staying in town with various (timed) checkpoints along the way.

Essentially, there were four cars of four guys and we were all armed with a video camera to document our escapades. We then had a list of things that would gain us points – the more challenging/embarassing received more points. For example, getting a McDonalds’ Happy Meal Toy got us 5 points whereas if we snuck into Lansdowne Park and kicked a field goal, then we would receive 400 points (which was done by two teams, but not ours).

The hunt ran from noon until 7PM with various checkpoints along the way so we could get back together, have a challenge and then be on our way. Let it be known that you got bonus points for pulling pranks on other teams which I must admit Duncan successfully accomplished as he snuck out of the house while we were listening to the instructions to let the air out of my car tire! I was not impressed but luckily I had an air compressor in my trunk. In hindsight, it was a brilliant move and I admire his ingenuity. But at the moment, I was pissed!

We then raced back to the house around 7PM, had a BBQ and settled in to watch every teams videos. I am proud to say that our team managed to only lose by 15 points…we had 3000+ points and we didn’t manage to get the two giant bonus items (400 points each) whereas the winning team managed to kick the field goal. So essentially our team (consisting of James, Matt, Fred and at one point, the bachelor himself as he switched cars at every checkpoint) pretty well obliterated the competition if it weren’t for the field goal that put us behind. To everyone’s defense, I think we got a slew of bonus points along the way also as we had some funny moments that had everyone cracking up.

I suppose I should write down a variety of things we did during the day:

Before First Checkpoint:

• Do a 1/4 mile race and win: Well, the way we did this one was to pit my car against Fred and James along a 1/4 mile. The car won.
• Build a fort in a store – Home Depot it was and we accomplished this one easily. God Bless insulation.
• Order some paint to be mixed but then walk away without telling anyone – Done.
• Sit on a toilet in a department store for one minute while reading a book – I was disappointed to see that we missed the part where we got bonus points if we made funny noises!
• Order 6 cents of gas and get a receipt – My personal fave of the morning. Here’s the conversation:
• James: (hands the attendant 6 cents) Can I get a receipt for that?
• Attendant: You want a receipt?
• James: Yes.
• Me: James, can you get some gum?
• James: Ah, no way man! I’m flat broke now!
• James: (gets receipt) Thanks man, this will get us to the South side of Kanata now

After First Checkpoint:

• Went for a swim in a public fountain
• Go tobogganing down some stairs
• Jump in the Ottawa Canal (ew! Good going James!)
• We did a bonus activity here by each getting into a recycling bin and jumping out. When I jumped out, I tipped the thing over and gave myself a faceplant. Thanks to Matt for not actually having the video camera recording for that part and we had to do it all over again. 😉
• Went to Future Shop with a load of dirty laundry, threw it into a laundry machine and ask the guy working there why it wasn’t working. You should have seen this guys’ face.

After Second Checkpoint:

• At this point we nabbed the bachelor for our car which helped us out immensely as people are more apt to helping guys out with scavenger items when there is a guy dressed in a wedding veil. We headed to the mall to conduct our activities which included…
• Running on a treadmill for 2 minutes.
• Conducting an aerobics class inside the mall and ask for volunteers. 2 minutes needed.
• Ask a girl to model underwear in La Senza for our girlfriends. We got bonus points for also getting her phone number.
• Ask someone to compete in a hula hoop contest inside a store. My favourite part was walking through trying to find the boys and I heard this guy say “I bet this video will end up on Youtube.” Sure enough, it was the guy who they challenged to the hula hoop contest. Ha ha!
• Special Note: James discovered Darth Vader on his Imperial Chopper. This is a must have for our toy collection.
• We headed to Burger King where the bachelor walked in and proclaimed himself to be the Burger King. We ended up getting a crown which was great!
• The bachelor shaved one of his armpits. Ouch.

After the third checkpoint:

• At this point, Fred had to leave us which was disappointing. Fred, if you’re reading this, you did us proud! We also ditched the bachelor because at this point, he would have slowed us down. We only had 2 hours now!
• We headed to Parliament Hill where we suntanned for 5 minutes.
• My other personal fave event happened when we talked to the RCMP officer on Parliament Hill and managed to get him to handcuff James and I together and he threw us in the back of the vehicle. He was having a good laugh at us when we tried to get out of the back seat.

We then headed back to home base where Matt called ahead to the bachelor’s Mom so she could put out a sign saying if you jumped into the pool with your clothes on, you get bonus points. We had a good laugh when a few guys did it (although they said it didn’t count as it was after 7PM. It was still funny.)

After watching the videos we headed out to Top Karting in Hull (as it was full during the afternoon when we attempted to go beforehand) but it was still full.

All in all, it was probably the most fun I’ve ever had at a bachelor party and I highly recommend taking part in a car rally if you have the chance! Jason had a great time and that’s what counts at the bachelor party. Gone are the days where they tar and feather your best mate. It’s all about making sure the guy has a good time.

iplaying: Hummer – Live at Asheville NC (2007.07.23) – The Smashing Pumpkins

For the life of me, I can’t seem to find any article confirming this but…

So Rob was sitting somewhere reading an article about how there is a surplus on mini-vans right now in the Ottawa area due to leases being renewed or rental companies having a surplus, hence there are some sweet deals on them right now.

Case in point, Rob picked one up on a whim which had excellent mileage, low year count and a steal of a deal.

If you’ve ever thought about a mini-van, take a look around Ottawa right now!