Things I learned in Canada

For my birthday weekend, I was treated to a long weekend get away in Victoria, BC.  I cannot post pictures and give you details of my trip b/c my camera died when we were on vacation AND I still need to organize my 6000+ photos before I load the 500 plus that I have waiting on Catrina's camera. Once I get the pictures loaded onto the computer, you'll get a full pictorial of the trip. 

So, instead, you get the "Things I learned in Canada" blog:

1.  When you go on vacation - always bring an extra camera!!  Thank goodness that Catrina brought hers or we'd be screwed.  On day 2 of our trip my camera decided to stop opening and closing. Yes, my less than 6mo camera...dead.   It's being shipped to the camera hospital as I type.  While that may not be a Canadian thing, it's just a good tip to remember!

2.  Canadians really do say Eh a lot. 

3.  Everybody is extremely friendly

4.  "Cheers" is used a greeting and a goodbye.

5.  Canadian's just don't understand our funny comments.  We thought of ourselves as very funny, but hardly a chuckle from anyone.  Humph! 

6.  Don't always rely on the people working at the Visitors Center.  We went in to ask where exactly was the "light colored named bricks which out line the footprint of the original Victoria fort" as it mentioned in our guidebook - we had been looking for the better part of an hour.  The girls looked at us like we had 2 heads and were speaking in a thick southern accent. 

7.  Victoria is one of the most haunted cities in the world.  Almost every building in the city has had some claim of haunting.  They say it's because of 3 factors:  The layer of Basalt rock under the city, the mountains surrounding and the salt water all keep the energy of spirits within.  TAKE THE HAUNTED TOUR, it was fantastic!

8.  Canadian's like their shoes.  While we may have a coffee place on every corner, there is a shoe store on every corner in Victoria.  And not just moderately priced shoes...NOOOO, these were shoes that you picked up, looked at the price tag and VERY VERY carefully put down as the $300+ price tag on a pair of simple flats suggests that you don't wear the shoes, you just admire them from behind a glass case. 

9.  Whatever you do, do NOT change your look after you get your passport!!  Don't grow your hair out, get contacts...nothing!  Canadian boarder patrol almost didn't let Catrina leave Canada b/c they truly didn't believe that it was her on her passport.  Her passport is 3-4 years old, she had shorter hair and glasses.  Today she has longer hair, is 3-4 years older and wears contacts.  Ok, she was wearing a baseball hat the day we were leaving, but she removed it and the guy still questioned whether it was her.  Also, Boarder Patrol on either side of the water does not appreciate our humor either. 

10.  The legal drinking age in Canada is 19.  When you go to a club, you feel VERY old!!  But the next day when you're taking a different tour and you mention that you were at XYZ club the night before and the guy says "I was there last night also", you suddenly have TONS to talk about and he really doesn't care how much time he's taking showing you around the city, even when the boss calls!!

Canada was a blast and Victoria is beautiful!  Can't wait to post pictures and tell all about it. 

Technology developed

I need to have faith in technology soon.  My computer is older and running out of memory.  I have more than 7,000 pictures saved on my computer and it's time to off load a lot them onto an external hard drive.  This is where my faith must come into play.  My faith that this will work because these photo's are D's entire history!  It's soooo scary.  I know that I could probably purge more than 1/2 of these, but how?  How do you choose 1 photo over another?  

This is where technology and old school compete.  Back when we had film camera's, we were only allowed to take a certain amount of photos.  Film rolls came in 12, 24, and I think 48 pictures - that's it.   When you got them back from the developer, you went through those hard copies and tossed out what you didn't like, but you were limited to the number of photos.  Well, with technology our digital camera's can take as many pictures as a 2, 4 or 8 gig card will hold.  Then we just download those photos onto the computer and the card is empty - start again.  Once those photos are downloaded on to the computer, yes, we can delete, but sometimes we keep those "silly" photos that we'd probably had purged in the past.  We keep the ones where Aunt Sally has her eyes closed because it's a fabulous picture of us, the multiple pictures of our infant baby just laying there because how do you purge pictures of your baby, and the multiple pictures of the flowers in the garden because it was the time where you were playing with your new cameras features.  Keep keep keep.  My edit button is broken, but edit I must and then I must have faith that the pictures will upload correctly to the external hard drive.  Crossing my fingers.