The Coronation of King Ignatieff of the Liberal Party of Canada

I think the title speaks for itself. I’m neutral in this year’s leadership race. Kennedy came out to support Rae yesterday, and others from his camp have supported Ignatieff. I personally remain neutral. Why? Simple – I don’t like either candidate as leader of the Liberals.

Rae. I like Bob Rae. I always have (except perhaps in 1995 when he was defeated by a crushing majority of the Neo-Con Harris Conservatives who cared more about their own pocket book than the social wellness of Ontarians. Rae has a bad wrap, I think mostly because he was leader of the wrong party. He was a centre-left NDP in a party that had now room for anyone so close to centre. Yes, he was elected leader of the party, but the members of the NDP tried to overthrow him several times. The NDP didn’t like him because he was too centre; the Liberals and Conservatives didn’t like him because he was NDP. Long story short, Rae ruled Ontario in one of the toughest economic times in recent history, and took the flack. Much the same as Michael Peterson is still widely unpopular. Rae could not be as strong in Ontario as the Liberals need to be to win a majority government. He would likely do well in Cities, but I doubt he would be strong in Rural Ontario that has gone conservative the last two elections.

Ignatieff. I don’t like Ignatieff. I never have. Sure, he is an intellect. Sure, he has a smidgeon of charisma. But the guy does NOT no when to shut-up. He is smug. He feels he is entitled to the Liberal Leadership. On top of that he is a little too right for my liking and I think he would have been better suited with the former PC party than the Liberals. At the last leadership race, the Ignatieff supporters were so obnoxious in their refusal to work with the other leadership contenders should one of them win. They full out said they were joining the conservative Party the next day. They refused to believe that the party grassroots were strongly against Ignatieff and to a smaller extent Rae which lead to the selection of Dion as the leader in the first place. Based on my experience from the 2006 leadership convention I am certain that the Ignatieff supporters worked behind the scenes against Dion since 2006 and are partially to blame for the poor showing in the last election. My Liberal party has no room for those kinds of actions.

This being said, I was all ready to accept Ignatieff as leader. I think that he is more electable and I feel his supporters would again undermine the liberal party if Rae had been selected as the leader.

Now, the latest political gossip is that Rae is set to drop out of the leadership race this afternoon. The thing I like the absolute least about the liberal party is the elitism of the Party Brass and the lack of respect for the Party’s grassroots (myself one of them. I never belonged to the Federal Liberals until Gerard Kennedy joined the Leadership race). The fact that the party brass was going to appoint a leader without consultation with its members is absolutely mind boggling. I strongly suspect the Party Brass is also behind the strong arming of Bob Rae out of the Leadership race.

I have already mentioned this to a friend in e-mail, one who doesn’t like to make her political affiliations generally known, but if this is the way the Liberals are going to act, I’m not sure I will support them anymore.

A Few Thoughts on a Thursday Morning

As I sit at work organizing field files from projects over the summer that need to be filed away permanently, I’m anxious to see the outcome of the meeting between Harper and Jean this morning. Obviously, as a supporter of the Coalition, I hope that Jean will deny prorogration pending Harpers proof that he has the confidence of the house of commons. We will learn all that our great Country is to face within the next few hours. But it does give me cause for some thought.

1) What if Jean denies prorogation like the majority of voting Canadians wish? Will the conservatives attack the office of the governor general? Is this the beginning of the end of Canada being a Commonwealth Country? I have a feeling, that if prorogation is denied that conservatives across the land are going to rise up and denounce the office. They will cry, not for Senate Reform, but for abolishment of the Senate, the Governors General, and everything in the country that is Commonwealth. I think that they would have every right to this opinion, but I personally don’t support it. I think it could possibly be a future referendum question that divides the country. Then again, if Jean goes against the obvious will of the House of Commons and grants prorogation, the pro-coalition supporters might call for removal of the governor general.
2) I think all this week is doing in my mind is cementing the idea of proportional representation/mixed member proportional representation. I voted against it in the Ontario referendum last year mainly because I couldn’t wrap my head around it. This week is giving everyone a good idea of how it would work. Likely, the PM would be Liberal, NDP, or Conservative, but they would have to work with other members of parliament and represent the majority of Canadians, and I don’t think this could be a bad thing any more. Coalition governments would no longer be rare, they would be an every day occasion. Unless a party elected has greater than 50% of the seats, they will have to prove that they can work with other members to pass legislation before they are given power. It took a constitutional crisis, but I’ve finally wrapped my head around the idea of mixed member proportional representation, and I think I like it :).

My thoughts on the Economic Update and PM Harpers Lack of Respect

So, I'm guessing that most of you have heard by now that the federal government may be defeated on the first opposition day over the economic update. The Conservatives are busy spinning their spin, trying to convince anyone who will listen that the opposition parties are being undemocratic and that all this is a "power grab" by "backroom politicians".

For several reasons I believe that Harper and the Conservatives at the ones being undemocratic.

1) The Canadian voters gave the Conservatives a minority government. Not a majority. They need to stop ruling like they have a majority, and respect the fact that almost 2/3 of candians who voted did NOT vote for the conservatives and did not chose Harper to be the prime minister.
2) At the first sign that Harper did something wrong, what does he do? He cancels opposition day so that the opposition doesn't have the opportunity to get their message across. How is this democratic? Not letting the people voted in by Canadians have their turn to speak?
3) Canada is NOT a two party system. There are checks and balances like the one being saught by the Liberals and the NDP to make sure that Minority governments rule on behalf of the country, not out of self interest.
4) This is not unprecedented. The Liberals and NDP formed a coalition government in Ontario in the 1980s to defeat the minority conservatives. The coalition served for a year and then called an election at a specified date which the liberals went on to win and practically destroy the conservatives in Ontario. (Obviously in that case the Liberal and NDP coalition pleased the Ontario public).
5) This kind of thing happens pretty frequently in European countries that aren't two party systems, including: Norway, Sweeden, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxemburg, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Turkey, and Israel.


Top this off with the fact that the Conservatives failed miserably to provide any much needed economic stimulus to help protect Canadian Jobs. I understand that they are saying "We don't know where to spend it yet, so wait until March". But is that realistic? If we wait until March the Auto industry in Canada could be virtually destroyed as the american package will come much quicker and you can be guaranteed that there will be clauses for job protection and creation in the US. What I believe Canada should have done (and likely will do with a Liberal/NDP coalition government) is annouce an $X billion stimulus package with the details to be worked out over the coming weeks.

As for the public funding of political parties - the issue the conservatives are trying to make this about - the issue that even after it was removed from the economic statement failed to turn around the momentum of the Liberals/NDP.

1) Obviously this wasn't the issue that upset the liberals and NDP the most since even after it was removed, they are still going full steam ahead.
2) In my opinion is a little undemocratic. Yes, taxpayers shouldn't have to pay party subsides, but to announce overnight that these subsidies are going to be removed without giving the parties that rely on them time to recover financially? It is a power grab, pure and simple. The conservatives have made it no secret that it is their ambition to ruin the Liberal Party.
3) I don't believe that this issue would have even ruined the liberals. I bet from that one day alone (after the economic update was released), the Liberals probably recieved upwards of half a million in political donations from Liberals (myself included) that got scared and figured that it was time to support their party more.

Happy Birthday to Me!

So, 28. I’m old ;) Funny, I don’t feel that old. It is actually comforting. My office hires almost exclusively people with masters degrees for the professional track, so even though I was so late starting work (26 versus 22 had I gone to a different university and not done my masters), I am still considered a youngin’ here, even compared to others at my same level.

So, it’s been a month since I last updated. Woopsies.

Brief run down. First weekend in Nov. A’s mum came down. We had a good visit with her. Following week I was up in Sarnia doing stuff at a refinery, next weekend we got our furniture so spent most of the day Saturday putting it all together. Following week mostly in the office with one long day up in Thornbury. I liked it up there. I would move there in a heart beat if I didn’t have to work for a living. Following weekend, Sound of Music! Amazing. On Sunday A left for a week in Victoria for work and my Aunt and Uncle came for dinner and stayed over night. We had a good visit and I got to use our new china for the first time! Last week was a short week for me. Three days of work, then off Thursday and Friday to babysit D’s kids and their 12 week old puppy. LOTS of work. I was happy to be back at work yesterday since it afforded me a chance to relax. Let me run Thursday by you as an example.

Wake up at 6:30, puppy is whining to go out to the bathroom, I take her outside. M is awake. She colours for about half an hour before K wakes up. I get them breakfast, L (puppy) has peed on the floor. I clean it up, while I’m cleaning up pee, L steels dirty diaper (#1 only thank god) from K’s room and proceeds to rip it up. Clean up mess. Get kids dressed, teeth brushed, and hair done. L has peed on the floor again. Turn the house upside down trying to find hats and mitts for the kids, can’t find M’s snow pants for school. Finally about 5 minutes late, I have kids in Car driving M to school and L is locked in her kennel.

After dropping M. at school, I take K to my dad’s house for a visit before he goes off on vacation for a week and a half. I had a meeting with my financial planer at 2 pm. At 1 pm – right before I wanted to leave so that I could run some errands first, I realize K has a smelly diaper. I take off her pants to change, and poop is everywhere, all over her pants. Eew! I changed her diaper, washed her pants, put them in the dryer. 30 minutes later, my meeting is supposed to be starting, K’s pants are *almost dry* so we head off into town. Meeting went well, got myself set up for RRSP contributions. Everyone at the office though K was adorable (which she is!). After meeting we picked Maddy up for school and go home.

L got out of her kennel. Peed and pooped of the floor, tore apart another diaper, my book, and one of the drawings Maddy had done that morning. Ugh. Clean it all up. M and K colouring and playing. Cook dinner, play hide and seek, bathe kids, get ready for bed, done. Wash, Rinse Repeat, 2.5 times.
So conclusions from my foray into parenting.

1) Puppies are cute but a lot of work
2) Kids are cute but a lot of work
3) I’m not ready to give up my life for Kids. I like being independent. Every minute of my day from the minute I woke up in the morning to when they fell asleep (on Friday that was 11 pm for K), my life was devoted to them.
4) I want a puppy  I wish my job allowed for that, but alas, it does not.
5) Getting a puppy while I’m on Mat leave (my original plan) is NOT a good idea!!!

Other than that, not much. I will be posting pictures from this weekend on facebook – probably Thursday? Today is my birthday. Kind of sucks to be at work. In grad school I could just stay home, and last year it was on a Sunday. I guess the last time I had to work on my birthday was in 2003 at club H. A and I are going out for dinner tonight. Not sure where, most of the restaurants in Woodstock are chains, which I kind of feel Meh about, I would much rather go to a family run independent place. That is one thing I miss about KW.

*yawn*

I’ve been meaning to update for a while, but I really don’t have that much to say. More of the same I guess.

The first weekend after the honeymoon we hung out at home all weekend. On Saturday I unpacked some wedding/shower presents to find them homes and on Sunday I started to Winterize the garden – started, still have at least half a day left!!! I’ve taken out half of the annuals and cut down the perennials. I have to do some replanting – moving flowers around in a way that makes more sense, get rid of the golden rod (we let it grow this summer since we didn’t know what it was. As soon as it became obvious, we cut it down, but the roots were too deep to pull out), and cut down the tree in our garden – a really ugly over pruned pine tree that I have hated since day one.

Last week went by slowly. Only one day of field work, and nothing too exciting happened.

Last weekend – as I wrote on Burger’s blog comments – we went to see one of Arash’s favourite bands in Toronto (a Persian rock band). We just drove down for the evening. We also cleaned the house… not exciting.

It’s weird. Now that the wedding is over we have all this extra time on our hands. Weekends upon weekends with no plans, no project that I work on in the evening and on the weekends. There are a heck of a lot of thank-you cards to write, but the list of presents is at my dad’s house along with most of the presents, and we want to include a photo with our thank-you cards, and our photos aren’t ready yet… I guess what I should be doing is spending time working on the house – touching up the paint problems and stuff like that, but meh. I’m bored of house renovations. What I really want to do is organize another event… perhaps I will have a Christmas party…

In other news, we spent some of our wedding money this weekend. We went to Leons and got a new table, chairs and buffet (for our new dishes, glasses, and cutlery). I’m very excited to have a table that can comfortably fit 6 around it!!!

http://www.leons.ca/shared/product/product.aspx?ItemId=1377171&ChildItemId=1377171

Only difference is that we didn’t get the hutch to go with the buffet, so we just have the bottom part of the cabinet shown.

Well, I’m back.

It has been a busy two weeks. First the wedding. Then the Honeymoon. And then (well, overlapping really) the cold from hell.

Wedding went well. It’s more fun GOING to a wedding than actually being the one getting married, I have decided. I didn’t get to visit with anyone and wasn’t really able to relax and enjoy myself until 9:30. Arash agrees. He asked if we could get married again because the whole thing happened too fast and we didn’t get a chance to enjoy ourselves. Oh well, it’s done, it was nice seeing everyone but way too brief! I’m super sad that I didn’t get a chance to visit with Quinn and Rod and my Vancouver cousins longer. I think that was the most disappointing thing about it.

The good news was… and everyone who was at the wedding knows this by now! Was that my sister had her baby on Oct. 1 so was able to come to the wedding after all!!! Yay! Still didn’t get a great chance to visit with them though, hopefully in the next couple of weeks we can head down that way so that I can meet my new niece .

Honeymoon was good but with both ended up getting sick. I’ll run through the highlights.

Sunday – Flight was delayed by almost 2 hours when a) Air Canada over booked the flight, b) they downsized the plane and c) there was a mechanical problem which meant than an additional 6 people were kicked off the flight and refused to get off. FUN!

Monday – Dinosaur Museum. Cool. Visit with Niki – extra cool. Little Logan is so cute! Not cool – hotel charging $16/day for internet! Boo!

Tuesday – Drive to Jasper via MEC where we spent too much money – we bought a new camping stove, and I got a thermarest. Camped in Jasper. When we were setting up our tent Elk wandered through our Campsite. Arash tested out the bear spray and it got in my face irritating my eyes, nose, mouth and face. Ended up going to the Jasper hospital. Very cold at night. Down to about -2. cough starting to get worse

Wednesday – hiked up Whisters peak in Jasper. My first mountain. Arash was proud. Cough getting worse in the cold thin air. Got very wet in hike with sweat and SNOW! And cold. Decided to get a room in the town of jasper instead of camping for fear of getting more sick

Thursday – Drive from Jasper to Banff. Stopped at: Mount Edith Cavell. Cool. Athabasca Falls. Very Cool. Columbia icefields. Downright cold! I remember when we were there in the 80s being able to walk on the bottom of the glacier but you are no longer allowed. Global warming has made it unsafe to do so. Boo! By the time we got to Banff Arash was starting to feel more sick. We had a nap and went to dinner and then to bed.

Friday – we puttered around Banff for most of the day. Found a place to eat breakfast, had a nap, went to the Cave and Basin (original hotsprings) and then to the new hotsprings. Then went into the Banff for dinner and passed out when we got back.

Saturday – had breakfast at hotel. $60 for two!!! Wow! Went for a hike in the afternoon. Got about 1/3 up Mount Rundle and had to call it quits. Both of us were having major difficulties breathing. At this point my cold was still in my throat and chest, but not good for physical activity. Went back to the hotel and went for a swim in the outdoor pool and then out for a nice dinner for a 1 week anniversary ;)

Sunday – woke up sick as a dog. My cold moved into my head and had a very runny nose. We checked out of our room and drove up to lake louise. We were both in pretty rough shape, but we got to see Lake Louise and Moraine lake (partially frozen – this was the lake that used to be on the $20 bill. We were both feeling way too lousy to do any hiking  how horrible!!! We went back to Calgary – got there by 5:45 pm. Our flight wasn’t until 12:15 so we decided to catch a movie – Body of Lies – not bad but no Syriana.

One word. Taking the Red-eye while sick = no fun. I was hacking up a storm the whole way back to Ontario so I didn’t get much sleep. I made myself stay awake on Monday and go to bed at a normal time to adjust to the time zone, but it didn’t help my cold any. Monday was miserable. Tuesday I called in sick and ended up sleeping for 5 hours during the day. Today I’m feeling a little more normal though everyone at work doesn’t think I should be here. At this point I think my cold sounds worse than it actually is thank-goodness.

Today isn’t so bad at work. I have a tonne of things to do so that is helping. I am sad though. My friend Mandy had her last day on Friday, so I miss her .

All in all a good honeymoon though. It kind of sucked that we were both sick but it didn’t slow us down too much and it was good that we were both sick so that the other one wasn’t disappointed in not doing as much as we wanted.

As for the election. I’m in denial, I don’t want to talk about it ;) Actually, I posted my thoughts on Jen’s Blog. I don’t think Dion was the problem, I think the problem was the idea of changing the fundamentals of the tax system when the economy is in such trouble. Also, the people who call themselves liberal but have gone to long lengths to make Dion look bad.

I have a new car!

Well, not new, and not yet, but I did come to my decision. My new car will be a 2005 Silver Camry with 37,000 km on it. It is pretty :) and it is in good condition. I should be able to pick it up on Thursday or Friday. Yay!

Wedding stuff is coming along well. We had a party for co-workers on Saturday that can't come/weren't invited to the wedding. All day saturday I spent preparing food. there was a lot of it. Fruits, veggies, nacho dip, cheese straws, lemon bars (I had memories of making them in Quinn's Appartment that one year at christmas!), chocolate chip muffins, nut burgers, scotch eggs, and deviled eggs. Oh my. Now we have all the leftovers... some items were more popular than others though, but I guess you expect that kind of thing.

All of the big stuff is taken care of for the wedding now, I've even confirmed with most of the vendors. There are still a few small details that we still have to figure out though. like wedding vows, and order of speeches and that sort of thing.

On the weekend we got our honeymoon all booked. before, we just had the flights.

Our itenerary.

Arrive in Calgary 8:30 MT on Oct. 5.
Oct. 6 - Either see calgary or drumhellar - I think Arash would like it - and then drive to edmonton, hopefully stopping for a visit with a certain awesome family in blackfalds
Oct. 7 - Drive from Edmonton to Jasper where we are camping. Do some hiking
Oct. 9 - Drive from Jasper to Banff where we are staying at THE BANFF SPRINGS HOTEL!!!!!!!! (Expedia had rooms for super cheap! more than $100 off the regular price!)
October 12 drive back to Calgary in the evening for the Red eye flight home.

We plan on doing quite a bit of hiking when we are out there and seeing the sights and what not. I'm getting really excited. This is my first vacation in well over a year, and I definitely need it. Now I just have to make it through 4.5 days of work... I'm almost at the point of counting down working hours left!!!

Two updates in one week. Oh my!

I’m actually sitting here today at work, and I’m a little light on work. Yay! This is the first time this has happened since, I don’t know, February? I don’t think I’ve had to ask anyone for work since Christmas. I’m going to relish in it for a bit. I’m sure there is stuff I can do (like clean out the equipment room and order stuff, and what not, since I’m supposed to be in charge of it, and haven’t done anything since July really. Ooopsies! I just compile one of my Huge @ss reports that we have to do every year. The report itself is 70 pages with all the figures, tables, and appendices, it is two three inch binders! Anywho, sent it off this morning to Mississauga for senior review. The other report I had to do for this project that has been hanging over my shoulders has been cancelled. Yay! We had to do interim and annual reports, and the interim got cancelled because the landfill has officially been closed and cover is complete.

Sure, there is stuff I could do, write PDFs for the appendices (boring! This would take like 2-3 hours, of printing files to a PDF writer – Last year I had a tech do it), Coordinate the fall sampling of a landfill that I’m apparently now in charge of, and work some magic in the equipment room, but I’m going to relax a minute instead. Bad employee ;). I was actually out at a site in Woodstock this morning and they didn’t have enough holding tank capacity to dewater the excavation to continue excavating and sampling, so I had work to do, just not anymore.

So Christine was asking how the car shopping is going? Truth – too many options. I think it is much harder to buy a used car than it is to buy a new car. Not only do you have to narrow down on which model you want, but you also have to decide between a dozen different cars with different mileage, different years, and different price tags. On top of that, do I buy a car in Woodstock? In London? In Kitchener?

We decided we wanted an ’04 to ’06 Camry with lowish mileage, but even then, there are half a dozen options. I went to Kitchener Monday night, Woodstock Tuesday night, and London Wednesday night. I have driven 5 camrys, 1 used matrix and the 09 corolla (I don’t want to buy it since it will cost more to get the things that I had on it last time and I don’t want to be paying for that for another 60 months… It did drive nicer than my 08 corolla, but still no comparison to a camry).

I have my top favourite at each dealership. There is an 06 Camry in London with 45 Ks, it is gold coloured though and I think it is kind of ugly. The interior is immaculate, but the exterior have a few chips in the paint, and the front bumper looks like of like it is was in a fender bender and wasn’t properly fixed which has me nervous. In Woodstock there is an 06 camry with 113 Ks, but is 3000 cheaper. Not as immaculate inside, but better outside and a nicer colour (grey). In Kitchener there is a 05 with 30 Ks, cheaper than London, more expensive than Woodstock. It is silver. We haven’t had a chance to look on the inside/outside yet though, so I’m not sure the condition it is in. We are going to see it tonight after work, so I have to leave a little early. Right now this one is the front runner, but that could all turn upside down tonight.

What a week.

So I guess the last time I updated was September 4… A lot has happened since then.

That weekend we went to Toronto to visit A’s mum. We took care of some wedding things and did some shopping. I got new contacts (not sure that I like them), and a new jacket (white trench, in hindsight, not the best option for me), and make-up for the wedding. Expensive make up. I shouldn’t have spent that much. Oh well, I never spend money on make-up, so once every three years, splurging isn’t a big deal.

On Monday morning I was driving in to work to do my timesheet and take care of a couple of loose ends before I went up north again for the week. I went around a bend in the road just 500 metres from my house, and the light blinded me. I haven’t driven that way in about 2 weeks, so I didn’t realize it was the time of year that the sun is blinding on the drive into work, so I was driving faster than I normally would. (40 in a 40 zone, but when the sun is blinding (about two weeks in September and two in April), I would normally drive around that bend at no more than 30). I got into the shade and all the sudden I see a parked truck about 5 metres in front of me. I tried to veer, but I didn’t have time. I hit it with the front passenger side of my car. The truck was a 1984 truck, in sustained not too much damage. Solid steel construction at what not. My car on the other hand was totalled. No worries about me though. I am relatively okay. Very shooken up, with a sore hand – my thumb got stretch back by the steering wheel, but no serious injuries. I got the call from the insurance person last week. $18,000 to fix it. Nice. So now I’m in the market for another car. I have to sort it out before Thursday or pay extra for a rental car. Boo.

I still ended up going north, but much later than planned. I wanted to leave Woodstock at 10:30 and didn’t end up leaving until almost 4! They sent another girl up with me to drive though, so that was nice.

I took last Friday off to get some wedding stuff taken care of. I did my trial hair run on Friday and then went for my second dress fitting (it still fits!). Made some head way with ceremony music and went bridesmaid dress shopping with D&M on Friday evening. We didn’t find anything, but D assures me she will find one this week. On Saturday I went to meet with the DJ, got presents for people in the wedding and picked up A from the train station. My sis came over that evening and got us all organized for the wedding. I now have a list of all the things I have to do before the wedding. Hopefully I can manage to get everything on it done!!! On Sunday we met with our officient for the second time and I have a digital copy of the ceremony. After that, we drove to Toronto and picked up a CD with our engagement photos on them on the way through Trenton. They are AWESOME! I’m going to post them (at least some of them ) on facebook when I get a chance. I’m so happy with they way they turned out. Last night we took my dad to see Spamalot for Father’s Day. It was actually his birthday yesterday too! He really enjoyed the show. I think A did as well. He was laughing quite a bit, but I think he missed some of the humor in the songs due to the language.

Le Sigh

I'm starting to sound like a broken record here. I'm busy. I have no time for wedding stuff, life, whatever. That is my life.

The weekend of the 23rd my sister came down from thunder bay. It was nice to get to visit with her. We also had a family picnic at my aunts and uncles in winterbourne. it was nice to see (almost) everyone. two of my cousins on Dad's side will be missing the wedding, so it was nice to get the chance to see them.

Last week there was a tanker roll over on the 402 in Sarnia and I got called out to it. 28.5 hours in 2 days. FUN. Insert eye roll here. It was definitely a morale low point to say the least.

Last weekend was pretty awesome. I got a good chance to relax. Saturday we went to kitchener and went shopping and finished our registry. We then went to a party at A's coworkers. It was an okay time. Not stellar because I didn't really know anyone there. The coworkers that A is close with didn't end up going.

Sunday we went to the beach. Long Point. It was great. Beautiful sunny day. Nice an hot, but not humid. The water was nice too. we took a bunch of photos, perhaps I'll post some if I get a chance. Monday was okay. we did a lot of house cleaning. Boo. I really want to hire a cleaning person. We make enough money for it. when I'm at home on the weekends, I want to be enjoying myself and relaxing not working. I do enough of that Monday to Friday!!!

Tuesday I found out that I have to go up to Mattawa again on Monday. So now I'm scrambling to get stuff done this week. Not fun. Particularily since I was out in the field on Tuesday and yesterday. Oh well, I can only get done so much.

Oh. I almost forgot to mention. Our photographer has posted a few pictures from our engagement session on her blog. Ignore the error in my name!!! I particularly like the last one. I have it as my desk top at work now, though I can't figure out what is on A's knee.