Playground Pick-Up

Do You have a BandAid? I Just Scraped My Knee Falling For You.

Many of us left the single scene years ago but as a parent of young children, the pick-up lines all come back into play.

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Viva la Velo, Part II

I live three kilometres away from my office. Heck, I live four kilometres away from Germany, and five kilometres away from France. But that’s not my point. My point is that I get to ride my bike to work every day, and I don’t have to wear “riding gear” and get all sweaty and stuff. [...]

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More Beer, Less Suck

I’ve spent much of the past few years in Victoria enjoying the wonders of local craft beer. I love it. Topping my list of Victoria craft breweries is Phillips Brewing Company, whose Amnesiac double-IPA is a wonderous invention, Lighthouse Brewing Company, and Spinnaker’s Brew Pub. In the not-too-distant-past, I went on a triple-brewery tour in [...]

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Unexpected Friendships

In our apartment building, we are on what they call “Erdgeschoss” or EG (ground level).  The “first floor” is actually one flight of stairs up — what North Americans would consider the second floor.  And basement floors are never considered “1″ like they may be in North America. That’s called “Untergeschoss”, or UG.  I know, [...]

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A Jaunt to Germany

It’s like a highly contagious rash that you simply can’t avoid. It’s only a matter of time before you come down with it. And once you get it, it spreads quickly…like a weed. I speak of IKEA. Now, even while in North America, I was never a big fan of IKEA. I loved the idea [...]

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Thanksgiving, eh?

Tim and I planned a traditional Thanksgiving dinner to celebrate our first Canadian holiday as expats.  While most of you were enjoying turkey, stuffing and pumpkin pie a week ago, the boys and I were still zombies recovering from the 9-hour time difference.  After a week of adjusting our sleeping patterns, visiting countless grocery stores, [...]

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A Pizza By Any Other Name

It’s been an exiting two weeks since my last post. Maybe not a full two weeks… but it’s certainly been busy. Welcoming a young family to a foreign country is hard work! I’m back to good health, and the family is no longer on Pacific Standard Time, so we are developing a pretty good daily [...]

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The McFondue — I’m Not Lovin’ It

Tim doesn’t know this yet but I finally caved today and bought the boys their coveted “french fries, hamburger and dip” (dip being ketchup) at a Swiss McDonald’s. Sssshhhh! Unfortunately, it was my first awkward I-don’t-speak-more-than-ten-words-of-German experience and I nearly walked away with something called a Cheeseburger Royale that cost CHF 14 (that’s like 15 [...]

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Annnnddd….we’re back!

…phew! That’s all I can say about the past five days. After a fairly seamless flight from Victoria to Basel (16 hours later), it’s been a crazy time-warped adventure with frequent middle-of-the-night cartoons/snacking followed by somewhat groggy daytime trips through the beautiful city of Basel. The pictures of our home didn’t really do it justice [...]

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