Madness In The Middle Kingdom

The summer is over and what a great summer it was. It’s funny but this summer we did the least in terms of travel and visiting and somehow managed to have the best time in a long time. We rested and spent time just hanging as a family (immediate and extended). How can your days not be great when you are hardly out of pyjamas by 10 AM and there is always hot coffee in the pot?

We enjoyed simple things like

• McDonald’s breakfasts with the kids playing in the most awesome playroom this side of the Pacific.
• Running, jumping, swinging, chasing in LeBourdais Park after dinner
• Blizzards at the downtown DQ
• 10 Mile Lake
• WalMart kids/baby section
• Dad’s F250 Diesel Truck which Carter refers to as ‘Ampa’s Truck’
• Carter pretending to drive the aforementioned truck
• DaLong’s 20 year reunion. “Joy .. pump it up, pump it up and PAIN”
• Carter making his grandparents laugh and laugh and laugh
• Nathan letting out his first pseudo-laugh
• Spending more time with my brother
• Marshall and Dalong’s hockey challenges
• Carter’s very belated birthday party tonight

And this is just a sample but I wanted to leave this post with some of my favourite photos from the last couple of days.

Well .. it was a long one but there you have it. To our Canadian friends .. see you next year and to our Chinese friends .. see you soon.

Since Carter seems to get more than his fair share of publicity here at MIMK it is now Nathan’s time to be in the spotlight.

He turned 2 months old on August 9th while we are on the road on our Merritt/Kamloops/100 Mile House trip. He celebrated by burping, spitting up, pooping, eating and sleeping. Enjoyable for all.

Today we took him to the local child health care clinic to weigh and measure. He is a long 62 cm (growing from 59 cm when we arrived a month ago) and a whopping 15.08 pounds (up from 13.1 pounds when we arrived). It probably goes without saying that he is eating well and he has laughed twice which was pretty cool to see.

He looks forward to his plane ride back to China but is also pretty content to be kicking in it in old Quesnel!

It arrived in the mail today - “Shinnny: The Hockey in All of Us”. It is a NFB production at first glance (only looked at a few tidbits) it seems very decent. This represents the last of my video purchases for the summer. Alice marvels at the price of media in this country and never fails to let me know about it …..

Look forward to its viewing this fall in China.

As the father on “Everybody Loves Raymond” would say … “HOLY CRAP!”
Why do I say this? Well this past weekend was my 20 year high school reunion and I had an absolute blast. It was more fun than I had imagined and I didn’t want it to end. We reminisced about past times and often tried to pretend we were 20 years younger.

I have to give total credit to my wife for putting up with my immature ways this past weekend and for taking care of the boys.

I will post more photos when I get a chance but for now this motivational poster is all you get.

As Dougie Sumo alluded to over at Just Be I have also fallen victim to the addiction of YouTube videos. They range from the inane to the downright heeelaaaiiirrriiiious. Check out the links below for 2 of my favourites from this evening’s search.
1) How Big is Your Deck? - I am sure you can appreciate the double entendre.
2) Prince George Bar Fight - When I searched for Prince George this was the FIRST video that came up. It’s an actual outside the bar fight and it has some coarse language so put the kiddies to bed and enjoy.

After much anticipation the video “Thunderbirds in China” has arrived. The video chronicles the 1974 Tbirds visit to China. Unfortunately it came in VHS even though I requested DVD format but hey .. that added to the 70’s feel of it.

One of the guys from our Dalian Ice Dragons Hockey Team, Paul Coffee (Zheng Zhe) , has a connection with this video. His father played against the Tbirds on this tour when the TBirds played in ChangChun. I am hoping that his father appears in the video (will check with him when we return to China).

Also while doing the Billy Barker Days Fun Run a few weeks ago I met a woman whose husband apparently played on that Tbirds team. I will look for him but I only know that his last name is Thomas.

The video is not very heavy on hockey action sadly but it is fun to see their experience. I loved watching them getting sloshed with Chinese guys at banquets after the games which is something the Dragons have done often. A description of baijiu as “half TNT, half gasoline” is especially poignant.

Look forward to watching it with “the boys” when we get back.

What does one do when they have a lot of time, a lot of lawn and a bored 2 year old? You take him out and get him to drive the riding lawnmower. Well .. the video is fairly low res but then so is the action.

I came home the other night and my 7 year old nephew Marshall was getting in some practice time for our daily “Hockey Challenge”. He has taken the previous 2 by scores of 15-13 and 15-14 by capitalizing on my supreme lack of physical condition and inability to play hockey. I prevailed tonight by winning 15-10 and got MY chance at playing “We are the Champions” from the CD Crazy Frog (the Frog Yodellling is my favourite) after hearing it for the past 2 nights.

Upon seeing him practice I whipped out the camera and caught the following riveting action.

Video #1 - Showing just the basics of his skill set. You can hear Carter cheering in the background.

Video #2 - Just dazzling action. Remember - this is NOT trick photography.

Video #3 - Clearly a move that can only be done in the Cariboo

Now if you want some sweet roller hockey moves click here for a 4 minute video of some nice action. Disclaimer - this is from youtube and NOT me or anyone I know.