(no subject)

[geminigirl]

We arrived home on Wednesday, July 4th. Later than expected-our fight was delayed a bit, then when we landed, we sat on the tarmac for about 45 minutes waiting for a gate. And, we stopped briefly at the grocery store on the way home, too. My tomatoes are mostly dead; apparently the sitter forgot to water them (though my indoor plants are alive, and my cats are very happy.) There are, however, some beautiful tomatoes on the plants now, and I may see if I can get some new tomato plants this week (not likely, but I'll try) or start some seeds. They're dead despite the rain that we apparently got while we were gone...just not enough, I guess. And the grass is tremendously high, but it's too wet to mow today. The crepe myrtle flowered while we were gone, and is looking very pretty.

Our trip was actually rather pleasant, though I'm sorry we didn't get to see friends in the NY area while we were there. We ended up with family obligations over the first few days we were there, and then a visit to Canada and a really lovely wedding, and then another day with my parents, plus an early celebration for my brother's birthday, and we flew home on the 4th, on a nearly empty flight. We'd expected to get home in time to see fireworks, but sat on the ground for about an hour waiting for a gate because of severe storms that had been in the area earlier.

The more complete summary:


Uneventful airport trip, mostly. Misinformed flight attendant provides incorrect information to the woman travelling with a lap infant behind us. (The flight attendant tells the woman that breastfeeding is prohibited by the FAA on take off and landing, which is not the case, but apparently the deal is not that breastfeeding is prohibited, but the prescribed position for holding a lap infant during take off and landing makes it effectively impossible to breastfeed.) Arrive at MacArthur Airport, which tends to be pleasant, as the airport is still pretty small. It's small, but I'm amazed each time we fly into it at how it's grown. When I was a kid and we were first flying in and out of there, baggage claim was outdoors, and there was only one. It's nice though, that we can get reasonably inexpensive direct flights from Orlando to there though. We arrive, we claim our stuff, we meet my Mom, and stop for something to eat on the way home since, as Mom points out, there's nothing to eat in her house. (Diner food is one of those things that I miss-it's not haute cuisine by any stretch of the imagination, but it's familiar and comfortable and every once in a while, it's just what I want.) Mom tells me to make sure I call my younger brother.



Our plans for the day include picking up some groceries, and getting a baby shower gift, and a wedding gift. I try and find something for breakfast, only to discover that Mom is right, there's really not much in her house, and I end up making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Mom finds out where we're planning to go and asks if we would please return a shirt to the mall for her as well. Cayne drives my Mom to work, we head out a bit after that.

While doing Mom's errand, Cayne discovers a fantastic lingere chest, which will be on sale til July 7, and did I want it, since, in addition to lingere storage, it had a nice set up for jewelry storage too. I waver over spending $200 on it, and decide to make a decision while we're traveling, since we can always go and purchase it when we come home if I decide the answer is yes. I also discover that one of the stores that I thought was in front of the mall is no longer there, leading to a phone call to my Mom and asking us where it had moved to. And another reminder to call my brother, which I've been avoiding.

My brother, though he's grown up quite a bit only calls me when he's in trouble. And the last thing I want to deal with is that-it's much more comfortable to deal with my brother's trouble when I'm several hundred miles away. I call my brother, find out what the problem is (he's having issues with his girlfriend, who he's been living with for the last few months) and decide they're more serious than I feel like dealing with over the cell phones, so we decide to meet my brother for lunch. (My brother is in sales for a beverage company on Long Island, thus, he travels around quite a bit.) Turns out, he's actually right near where the place we planned to purchase the baby shower gift, so we have a long lunch with him, and try to give him enough support and information to begin resolving some of the problems, or making a decision to get out of the relationship, and then go purchase the baby shower gift. We finish doing that, then head back to where we'd just been, to pick up the wedding gift. My brother calls my mother and complains that she told us to take him to lunch. I call and reassure him that she hadn't mentioned it at all, and that it was entirely my choice to do that.

By the time we finish all this, it's nearly time to pick my mother up, so we head back towards home. It's Friday night, which meant the traditional Chinese take out for supper. We eat Chinese food, go grocery shopping with Mom (to get food that we're bringing for the bbq/baby shower the following day) and head home. It's getting late, Cayne goes to play with the computer, and Mom and I play a game of gin. During this game of gin, Mom decides she's getting the beginning of a UTI, and asks me what to do. I offer to run to CVS and get some stuff for her. She declines, though a few hours later she changes her mind. She cuts up fruit, I go out to CVS and get some Uristat, and cranberry tablets for her, and then I return and make a lemon berry tart, before I finally fall into bed at about 3.



I've arranged to pick up a rental car in the morning with my Mom (cheaper to borrow Mom's car to drive to Canada, and get a rental car for her to use while we're gone than to rent a car for us and drive to Canada in it.) Mom decides that this is indeed a UTI, and that she needs to go to the walk in clinic. I adjust the rental car pick up time, Mom heads to the clinic, and we all proceed to get ready to go to this party, (which I'm not looking forward to.) Mom comes home, we go to pick up the rental car, which took and excessively long amount of time. We start off for the party, which is somewhere up around the Orange/Rockland county line at my cousin's house (it's a BBQ/baby shower for his wife.) Three hours in the car with my parents, who often snipe at each other in the car is not my idea of a thrill, but we manage to arrive only an hour or so later than the official start time.

We eat food, I socialize with the relatives I do like, and try my best to politely avoid the ones I don't care for. I'm distressed to see how much worse my uncle seems to be, but there's nothing that really can be done. (My uncle has multiple sclerosis which has seemed to worsen rapidly over the last few years.) I see my brother's girlfriend for the first time since Thanksgiving, and realize she's put on quite a significant amount of weight, which may be contributing to some of the problems that my brother described the day before over lunch, and so I pull him aside and discuss this with him. Karen opens her gifts, I do a bang up job at not letting on how much it hurts to to not be pregnant and to find it so difficult to get there. (Thankfully, no one asked us about our plans for a family, or I'd have lost it, I think. My mother made only one remark the entire time we visited about our lack of children, and not to me, either. It was to Cayne, and it was something like, "Well, at least you're trying.") The day is, all in all, not as unpleasant as it might have been.

(Please note, because it's happened before in this LJ that I have to explain/defend my attendance at family events I don't want to go to: I realize that there are people who will read this and say "but you don't want to be there, so why did you go?" Family obligation. I realize that some people don't have the same sense of family obligation as I do, but, some families, for example, would think it acceptable to not show up to a first cousin's wedding, or great aunt's funeral or similar events. With few execptions, that's not okay in my family of origin, and so, I've attended a number of family events that I have no desire to go to, but it's not acceptable behavior to skip certain events. And so I go, and visit with the relatives I do like, and make polite and pleasant small talk with the ones I don't like as much, and it's not like it causes me harm to be there, beyond the minor irritation of not being able to do what I would rather be doing. Thus, I'm not going to argue the point in comments...what's acceptable behavior in my family may very well be different from your own, and I'm okay with that, and don't need convincing that all I need to do is put my foot down and refuse to attend this event or that event.)



My Dad turned 70 on June 19, and as a combine Father's day/birthday gift, my Mom had given him a flight on a World War II era bi-plane that was visiting the area. He'd taken a similar flight on a different plane for his 65th birthday, and had enjoyed it greatly. This time, however, he wanted the whole group of us to join him to watch. (Most of the one hour flight took place not in sight of the airport though.) Cayne and I, my younger sister and my younger brother and his girlfriend all joined him and my Mom at the airport. Surprisingly enough, he's also invited my older brother and his wife and children to the airport, and out to eat after. (My Dad was married before he married my Mom. He had two children with his first wife, my half brother and half sister, who I rarely bother to make that distinction about. My sister, through her own choices for reasons that no one actually knows is largely estranged from the family-she attended my bridal shower, and she, but not her husband or children attended my wedding. I get a card from her for the winter holidays, and a birthday card from her. Occasionally, she'll forward me an e-mail. My brother's relationship with my Dad is very strained, for rather complicated reasons on both sides-my brother feels like he wasn't given the same opportunities that I, and my younger siblings were given, my parents have been very hurt and frustrated by my brother's dishonesty about some things, and about his inability to stand up for himself at times. It's something that I know only the barest of details about, and yet seem to get caught in the middle of, because both my sister in law and my mother discuss it with me.)

I hung out outside with my older brother, Cayne, my nephew, and my younger brother. My sister, my brother's girlfriend, my niece and my sister in law hung out inside, with my mother. While I don't mind my sister in law, I can handle her for only so long, and since I figured I'd probably end up sitting with them when we went out to eat, I figured I'd hang out with people I prefer. My brother and I, despite being 41 and 32 still roughhoused a bit, while we hung out, as we always do. Mostly we just chatted...my niece is whiny and clingy, my nephew, wishy-washy. I'm not surprised about my nephew. I am surprised about my niece, but I'm afraid that my sister in law is guiding her not towards college, where she probably should be heading, but towards simply finding a job out of high school, and hanging on to that until she finds a husband and has children. And, from here, and with the strain between my Dad and brother, there's only so much I can do to counter that influence.

Dad took his flight, and enjoyed it greatly, we all went to eat at a restaurant that I'm not a big fan of (especially on Sunday when one doesn't order the fish) and we headed back to Mom and Dad's place. Cayne and I took off shortly after for Canada, dropping my sister at the train station on the way back.



We set off for Canada, opting to cross the border at Niagara Falls rather than Kingston. It was a rather uneventful trip, actually, with the exception of the crazy border crossing. We arrive at the border, passports in hand, pull up to the guard booth, and go through the usual list of questions about our citizenship, Cayne's status in the US, what we're bringing in to Canada, and then we get to the firearms question. We're used to being asked if we've got any firearms or weapons with us (no) but we were both rather taken aback at being asked if we've got firearms at home. The border guard also had more than the usual number of questions about Cayne's job, but we were still waved on our way fairly quickly and headed across the QEW and then up towards Sudbury. We discovered that we were both having cell signal issues, so we stopped at a Bell Canada store, and bought a pay as you go phone, which took far longer than it should have, and we stopped for lunch as well. Wow a lot of road widening has happened since we last drove north. There are still very few places to stop though...we pulled off at a new rest stop somewhere around Point au Baril, I think-there's a new tourist information stop, along with a Tim Hortons/Dairy Queen combo, and had sandwiches for supper, driving onward to Sudbury, and spending a little time with my in laws that evening.



We visit with my in laws, play Euchre a bunch, and hang around with my sister in law (Cayne's sister) and her kids. We spend one evening at my sister in law's, with her kids who are five and about fifteen and a half months. We play many hand of Go Fish, and watch the kids splash in the kiddie pool. My sister in law brings out towels for the kids and instructs my nephew to remove his swimsuit before he comes into the house. He suddenly has an attack of shyness, and doesn't want us to see him nude. I offer to hold his towel around him while he removes his suit, and while I turn my back. He accepts this as an option, removes his swimsuit, and takes his towel from me. He runs around for a moment outside in his towel, and then, after the fuss about being seen nude, flashes Cayne and I, who have a good giggle about it. I go clothes shopping, as all the summer things are on sale in Canada, and well, I wear warm weather clothes just about all year.

I spend quite a bit of time studying. It's a generally quiet but pleasant visit. We picked up a few fun, Canada themed things, and a new flag for our Civic Holiday party in August.



We try and figure out the new fertility monitor which involve some giggles. (I'm planning a separate post about that to the fertility filter, but if people actually want to read it, I may make it more public.)

We took my nephew to play minigolf on Friday morning and out for lunch. I haven't uploaded the photos, but I'll post a few photos from this trip shortly. Minigolf took much less time than we'd expected, but it was so very much fun to watch a five year old experience minigolf for the first time.

With warnings of a possible First Nations action blocking roads the following day, and fears from my father in law and sister in law that we wouldn't get to Hamilton in time if we waited to leave the following morning, we scrambled for a quick hotel reservation and set off that evening for Missasauga, where we often stay. We're kind of geeky-we chose our hotel for the night not only because of the location, but also because they offered high speed internet...a good way to pass the time when there's not much to do. We set off that evening, and head south. At some point during the trip, Cayne hands me his glasses to clean and they come apart in my hand. He pulls over, we switch places, and I drive to the next significant destination (Parry Sound) where we wander up the road and find a very depressing, largely deserted mall, which has a Pearle Vision where we get his glasses repaired, and set off on our southbound journey, stopping for supper along the way in Barrie, and then heading onward to Missasauga, where we discover that the hotel we picked (a Traveloge) isn't the one we thought it was, but are pleasantly surprised to find that it's quite a bit nicer than the one we usually stay at, and not much further away from the airport.



We get up, get dressed, pack our things, and set off towards Toronto, where we're picking up baratron and her partner before heading west to Hamilton. There's heavy traffic going west though, so we consider alternate routes. We find our travelling companions without much difficulty, load everyone in the car, and start off towards Hamilton, where we're thwarted along several alternate routes, but eventually arrive at our Hamilton hotel, where we change clothes, though baratron suffers a wardrobe malfunction with the zipper on her dress, and head off towards the pre-wedding reception, which is at a lovely place on Lake Ontario. We see the bride and groom, along with meeting face to face for the first time some new people, and visiting with people we've known for quite a while and haven't seen in two and a half years. We wander around near the lake after the meal, and then head off towards the meetighouse where the wedding ceremony was to take place. The wedding was different from any that I had attended before, but was very interesting and quite lovely. There were elements that reminded me of some of the pagan rituals I've been at, and the marriage certificate reminded me of my own ketubah, as well. There was more receptioning over punch and cake, and a toast and such after the wedding.

Following the wedding, a group of soc.biters gathered in the hotel lobby for some more socializing over laptops (an unofficial yasb-p, I suppose) and a hand of Euchre, before heading our separate ways to bed.



We'd made plans to visit with Cayne's cousin for brunch-we don't see them often, and they live in Hamilton. We arrive for brunch, but discover that brunch is going to be a bit later than we'd anticipated. We get in touch with baratron and discover that she's not feeling well. (The whole story is posted over in her LJ) but, Cayne, his cousin's husband and baratron's partner head off for a walk in clinic with her, while I socialize with Cayne's cousin and the children. As walk in clinics go, this of course, takes a while, but they eventually finish up, and return to Cayne's cousins house, where we eat, and the four of us set off for Niagara falls, sadly, having missed meeting up with nooks and family. Cayne and I check into an indulgent hotel room with a fantastic view of the falls, and the four of us wash up and share a very nice meal at the hotel restaurant, also overlooking the falls. Shortly after supper, baratron and company head for the bus station to go back to Toronto, and we head up to our room to watch the Canada Day fireworks (the point of the indulgent hotel room.) The view of the fireworks was wonderful-we'd turned the sofa in the hotel to face out the window, and cuddled and watched fireworks over the falls, which were lit up in red and white, with a giant Canadian flag projected on the Canadian side of the falls. And, we enjoyed a little time for ourselves, which we hadn't really had in a few months while Cayne was finishing the game.



Because Canada Day was a Sunday, Monday was the observed holiday. We declared it to be a lazy morning, and enjoyed room service breakfast. We washed up, packed up, and set off to find a grocery store that was open on the holiday to pick up dill pickle chops, chocolate, Tim Horton's coffee, Joe Louies and some other assorted Canadian treats. We made a quick stop at the duty free for a gift for my brother, and then we headed for the border, and waited quite a while to cross. This border agent didn't ask quite the same questions as we'd been asked on the way in-the usual citizenship, status, where were you, why were you there, what are you bringing back. He did ask us to turn the car off, give him the keys and pop the trunk, where he rifled through our things, and sent us on our way. We stopped near Buffalo to have a late lunch with sandboxdiva and then drove the rest of the way home, uneventfully. We had some serious talk about the whole fertility thing that we're going through, and I'm relieved to know that even if he's not talking about it with me, Cayne is talking about it with someone. We stopped near Cortland to find bathrooms and something to eat, and stopped at Subway for sandwiches (we weren't hungry, but it was getting late enough that if we hadn't stopped, we'd have ended up in the great void of pretty much nowhere to stop along Route 17, so subs hold up better than a lot of other things) and I think we found the only Subway without a bathroom. We continued our drive home, and arrived at my Mom and Dad's at about 1 AM, to find my mother still awake, and desperate to show me the new kittens they had acquired-two from the litter of four born to the ferral cat who lives in their yard, and two that had been rescued from a ferral cat by a professor that Mom works with. All about eight or nine weeks old, and as kittens tend to be, very cute. I collapse into bed after admiring the kittens and submitting my suggestions for names.



The only things I know of planned for today is returnng the rental car and celebrating my brother's birthday, so I decide that I'm going to spend the day writing my paper, which is due Thursday night, and sorting a box of t-shirts that's been at my Mom's into ones I want to keep (I want to do something crafty with them, in a way that shows off the logos/pictures, I think) and ones that can be donated/recycled. I discover, however, when I get up, that someone has shot out my brother's car window, throwing everything into an uproar. Arrangements are quickly made to deliver Dad's car to my brother, and to take my brother's car to have the window repaired after the police are done. Meanwhile, Mom needs to go to work, the rental car needs to be returned and two of the kittens need to go to the vet. Everything falls into place though, and the day goes on. We go to the UPS store and ship a package to ourselves, which includes a Storm Station which my Dad purchased for us, and some other things. My brother and his girlfriend arrive for dinner, we have a pleasant meal, do a little packing, and have a nice evening together.



We pick up bagels to bring home for us, and for some friends. We get a pizza for lunch because good pizza just doesn't exist here. We pack, we play with kittens, nothing exciting happens, and we set off for the airport, and fly home. The plane was rather empty, though there were quite a few children on the flight. It was a relatively quite flight until the end, when we were stuck on the plane, sitting on the ground-the unaccompanied kids sitting near us got a little rambunctious, and the flight attendant had a hard time getting them settled again. We stopped for a little food on the way home, and returned to grateful cats, and our own bed.


And that was our summer trip up north. I'd do it this way again-fly to Long Island, spend a few days there, rent a car/borrow a car drive to Canada, visit there, and then drive back. I don't think I'd do it in the winter, with less predictable weather, but it worked nicely in the summer. I'm sorry we had no time to see anyone-we ended up saddled with family obligations that I hadn't planned for, but we'll try and see everyone next time.

Comments

[tronochick.livejournal.com]

if you mean Dill Pickle Ch'i'ps, Lays has picked up the brand in the states and sells them... somewhere.

i saw them in portland in the Safeway and another grocer. check around. if not Publix, maybe Albertson's?

Dude. Jos. Louis.. OMG. crack.

[geminigirl]

I've never had one, but I have two boxes in my house tempting me. I'm being good and saving them for Civic Holiday (come for Civic Holiday and I'll save you one.)

We bought a couple of bags of the Humpty Dumpty brand chips for the party but I will keep my eyes open for the Lays brand ones. I'm sure that Cayne would love that. (I actually find the smell repulsive, but that's okay, he likes them.)

I've also got Smarties, KitKat, Aero, Coffee Crisp, Oh Henry, Mars Bars, and some Christie's Maple Leafs. I think in my personal stash of stuff there are a couple of Crispie Crunch bars left, more Aero, and two bags of peanut butter Smarties. There's also a package of Peanut Butter Oreos that we haven't decided on saving or opening yet.

[tronochick.livejournal.com]

oh how you tease me.

tell Cayne you can buy Aeros, Coffee Crisp, and Crunchie bars at Publix in the Brit food section.

Humpty Dumpty was bought by Lays in the late 90s, so it's the same recipe... just a matter of finding the chips.
Did you every try Ketchup? they are actually more yummier than pickle, and i *love* pickle.

[geminigirl]

Come for Civic Holiday. That's what we're saving most of it for. It's probably going to be 8/5 or 8/6-which is actually a Monday, but we're trying to get the expats to take the day off. I'm still composing the invite, but I'll e-mail you one when it's done.

I've never tried the ketchup ones, but I'm not a huge fan of potato chips. I'll keep my eyes open for them though.

Funny that you mention Publix; the Publix near where we used to live/down by Cayne's office, has a Brit food section, but the one up by us in Apopka doesn't. The one across the street from Altamonte Mall used to (and may still-I haven't been in a while) have a great Kosher section.

[tronochick.livejournal.com]

i can't make it! i'll be in Germany until the 12th!

Can't get Ketchup in the states. sad, actually- it's the best.

[geminigirl]

Oh no! I'll save you some treats though.

[wait.livejournal.com]

Wegmans also sells their own brand of dill pickle chips. :)

[geminigirl]

Some of us live hundreds of miles from the nearest Wegmans.

[wait.livejournal.com]

Just sayin' you can find them outside the Canadian boarder... :)

[vix.livejournal.com]

What a great recap! I'm glad you guys had such a nice time. :)