Tag Archives: travel

oops, title.

Posted in everyday kimli by

After an uncomfortable evening and a day filled with worrying that I smell bad, I’m happy to report that my luggage finally showed up this afternoon. The contents may have shifted during flight, but everything was intact (that is, sloppily folded and crammed into corners) and unmolested. Since returning to my hotel early this evening, I’ve had a luxurious shower, enjoyed a pair of clean socks, and thought briefly about burning the clothes I wore yesterday and today but reconsidered because I really like my octopus cardigan even if I don’t want to look at it right now. My devices are charged, I have a large supply of Diet Coke and ice cubes within reach, and all my internets are working. Things are good. And only in America can someone go from washing their panties in a hotel sink to the stock market floor within half a day. THANKS OBAMA!

Now that I’m clean and full of meat and no longer as grumpy as I was, Chicago is really neat. I wish I had more of an opportunity to wander around in daylight, but I’m here doing Important Business Things and not for the Seeing of the Sights. Still, when I went to feed this evening, I walked around the area for a bit before the lure of a quiet hotel room with internet access (um, and new nail polish) won the battle. I’m hoping to make my way to THE BEAN tomorrow evening, and then I fly home (hopefully with all my luggage this time – I’m looking at you, Westjet) stupid early Wednesday morning. Chicago may very well be a place I endeavour to visit again – the architecture alone is making me sigh with happy.

I can’t help but feel that someone should have told them this building went up crooked, though:

this building is slightly askew.

this building is slightly askew.

two minutes for traveling

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It’s times like these that I thank a wide selection of deities from across the universe that my mother, during one of our many heartfelt mother-daughter talks, shared this advice with me:

“Watch your drink, because Americans are good at the sex.”

Still as true today as it was on that warm spring day back in 1999, when I told my mother I had to travel to Cincinnati for work. “Watch your drink”, she said. I must have looked confused, because she immediately explained: “because Americans are good at the sex.”

How many times has this advice saved me? A hundred times? A thousand? It could be a thousand. I am around Americans a lot; all of whom are constantly eyeballing my drink so they can have sex with it. But they can’t. Because I watch my drink, like my mother taught me to. Thanks, mom!

On Sunday morning, I’m flying to Chicago via Toronto for Business Stuff. I haven’t been on a business trip since 2001 (unless you count going to Langley, which I clearly do not), and I’m a little worried that things have changed since then: what if I do meetings wrong? What if there are new steps I haven’t memorized, or if someone offers me a drink that I have not watched? I won’t know what to do! I wasn’t worried about this trip before, but now I’m freaking out a little. I’m rusty with people skills. I’m off-putting and weird. And what’s in Chicago? Do they even HAVE Diet Coke there?! Is it too late to stay home?

.. I just realized that although I laugh at my mom’s advice, I DO watch my drink all the time: I carry a reusable cup around with me everywhere, and supply my own drinks and ice. I claim it’s because I don’t trust that the world will provide me with Diet Coke when I want it, but what if I’m subliminally doing what my mother said?? No one can poison my drink or flop their wiener around in it if I’m the only one with access to my cup, and only a fool would get between me and my Diet Coke. Oh my god – I took my mother’s advice. EVERYBODY PANIC! THE WORLD IS OBVIOUSLY ENDING!

Apocalypse aside, how do you Chicago?

dreamthink

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There are three things I want very much, and any one of the three would make the other two impossible or at least highly problematic. How do I decide?

For the sake of Science, let’s assume that whichever thing(s) I choose I can do without hassle (because all I’m really doing is entertaining high fantasy anyway). There are many logistical things like “money” and “details” and “Ed” that would require sorting out, but this isn’t a depressing exercise in realism: it’s 100% thought masturbation. As long as we’re all on the same page about that, I can count on everyone to not be so rude as to introduce facts and logic and cold water to my wishful thinking, right?

So, here’s the situation: I turn fucking 40 next June. If I drank, I’d be drinking right now: even admitting to MYSELF how old I am makes me queasy; blurting it out to the internet at large makes me want to throw up and cry. I am old. This depresses me.

To help me forget my extreme elderly state and so I can enjoy the little time I have left on this planet, I have decided I need to do something special for my birthday. Really special. “Common sense and consequences be damned” special. After all, I only turn so, so, so old once, so I may as well enjoy it in a way that is much more spectacular and memorable than tacos and cake for dinner.

I have three spectacular and memorable things specifically in mind:

KITTY
I miss Sasha. I know that I can never replace her, but I also know that none of our current cat army are “mine” – I miss having a cat who adores me and wants to be all up in my area at all times. To that end, I want to adopt a calico cat or kitten. I know there’s no guarantee that I’ll have another Sasha-like relationship, but getting another calico (who’ll be female coz that’s how they work) would be a big comfort to me. Since I’ll be turning so incredibly old, being comforted would be nice. It would go well with my dinner at 4pm and slipper shuffling.

PUG
I still very much want a pug. In fact, I had previously set up a deadline of “pug by 40”. I don’t know if Ed still thinks I’m joking or if he’s ignoring the issue in the hopes I don’t make it to the deadline, but I’m very serious: I want a dog (preferably a pug but I will also accept a French Bulldog) and I want one next June and there is no negotiation about this. I have been waiting for my pug for a VERY LONG TIME. Enough stalling; make with the dog already. PUG.

LONDON (and maybe other parts of Europe too but let’s face it mostly London)
You may not know this, but I very much like London and I would like to go back. It seems fitting to me that I celebrate my descent into doddering senility in my favourite place of all for a long time – all of June, actually. I want to birthday like I’ve never birthday’d before by spending the entire month overseas, living a ridiculous life of European splendor and Instagram photos of old buildings. Some idle research on my part showed me that this is not that outrageous a thing to want: I could do it quite easily, and for far cheaper than I thought. It’s also the easiest thing of all on my birthday list to do, and the thing I want most of all .. right now. Ask me again in ten minutes, and my answer will change.

Any of those things would make for a giddily happy birthday to me. Using my pretend science (hell, even using real logic and facts), not a single one of my potential birthday plans are impossible or even all that difficult. I could throw caution to the wind and demand all three, but that’s just greedy: I’d settle for one. But which one? I can’t decide. Taking a crazy trip seems like the obvious winner, but would that come at the expense of my insane longing for a dog? If I got a dog, I wouldn’t be able to get any more cats .. but if I got another cat, I’d be putting off the dog-getting for another 15+ years. I could go to Europe for my birthday and adopt a new best friend when I return, but for reasons I am married to I don’t see that happening due to whatever anti-justification excuses come up at the time. The thought of never having a dog makes my insides hurt. The thought of no best cat friend makes my insides hurt. Not being in London now or making a concrete plan to go next year makes my insides hurt. My insides are OLD and can’t take all this strife: what do I want to do?

I CAN’T DECIDE.

Help me, internet. Grant me my ridiculous daydreaming and fear of getting old and help me figure out some fun I can work towards.

reality bites

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As we near the start of fall, I’m beginning to worry that I’m not going to get to go to London this year (as I have for the two years previous).

Even though I had no plans concrete cotton candy or otherwise to go to overseas this year, I’ve been quietly scheming in the back of my mind since last October, hoping that some way, somehow, I’d find a reason/the money/an excuse to go. I crossed my fingers and desperately wished that things would just sort of .. happen, but it’s almost September and no magical genie or raise or random strange happening has materialized. I’ve got no real feasible way to get to London, and that’s making my heart ache: I want to be back there so very badly I could cry. I’m drastically close to throwing caution to the wind and following my heart, even if only for a week or so .. I could do it, if I forgot about everything for a little while. I could take the cheapest of uncomfortable, no-frills, baby-packed flights and stay at a hostel or in the London equivalent of the Cecil. Hell, I could even be rom-com-style foolish and spend money I don’t have for an actual room; one with a lumpy bed and no hot water and a family of raccoons living in the closet. I could go a week without eating and live on excitement only; soaking up history and culture and things built before 1985 and not out of glass. I could do all these things.

But I probably won’t.

I don’t know when I gained a sense of responsibility, but I’m finding it incredibly inconvenient – it gets in my way and stops me from doing the things I desperately want to do: own a pug, go to London, adopt all the cats, eat nothing but tacos, travel on a whim, do crazy things for the sake of the stories I could tell. I want all of these things, but I also want a home to come back to .. so I can’t have them.

I wonder if I could use the “well, you got to go to Edmonton so now I’m gonna go to London” excuse.

I could sell all my things. I have a lot of things, and a flight to London is only $280 (plus $604 in fees).

I should get off the internet before I click buttons I shouldn’t click.

There’s still time .. this could still happen, right?

#longing

common cents

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So. The internet. You may not have noticed this, but I use the internet a lot. I am connected 24/7, and use the internet like an extension of my arm (an extension that just happens to have a great deal of porn). My internet use extends to meatspace as well: when I’m not in front of a computer, I use my phone to access any kind of information imaginable. I am one of THOSE people, and I make no apology for it: it’s just what I do.

My internetting does not stop when I travel. For this reason, I long ago signed up for Roger’s US Data Roaming Add On: for an extra $10 a month, I am charged $1 for every MB I use instead of the standard $3/MB. This sucks, but welcome to Canada where you pay more for connectivity (an intangible necessity) than you do food (seriously, I pay $215 per month for connectivity at home and on my phone, and it was an additional $100 until Ed’s phone was paid for by his work).

Recently, Rogers has updated their US Roaming Data plans. They’ve discontinued the $10/month add on, and instead will charge you $7.99 for up to 50MB of data per day the instant you use your first roaming KB. If you go over 50MB, they’ll charge you another $7.99. Many people are upset by this as they are Amish and only want to check email once a day but will have to pay $7.99 regardless if they use 1MB or 50MB, but it’s handy for those of us who aren’t 85 and refer to video games as “the Nintendos”. It’d be perfect for someone like me, because while I very well may use more than 50MB a day, it’d be unusual to go over 100 (and if I did, okay – if it happened regularly and/or I knew I was travelling to the US just to use the internet all day long, I’d make other data arrangements). $16 for a weekend of data use is reasonable (by Canadian standards).

SO. This past weekend, I was in Seattle for two days. During that time, I used 70MB of data, which should cost me $16 per the new rules. At most, it should cost $24 (assuming I used over 50MB on Day 1, and the remainder on Day 2). I can live with this.

Naturally, it’s not that easy. You see, I still pay the $10/month for a non-existent plan. Because I pay that $10/m (and have been doing so for the last 3+ years), I will be charged $1/MB .. to the tune of $70. All because I already pay more for my phone than most people. And because I was never informed that this new $7.99/MB/Day plan existed at all until I did some research on my own.

I am not happy about this. I reached out to Rogers on Twitter, and they confirmed that I’ll be charged the $70 for two days of internet use because of my existing non-existent plan. This really sucks, and is one of those things that will drive me to get a US SIM Card so I can be more in charge of my data use, as well as research alternative options so I can cancel my Rogers contract when it’s up next year. A little understanding in this situation would go a long way (and I’ll overlook the fact I’ve been paying a largely unnecessary $10/m for years), but if they’re going to stick their feet in the mud and abide by the rules instead of common sense .. well, then I’ll know where I stand as a customer.

Why don’t I live in Europe, again?

consolation prize

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I am petulant about vacation.

The last several years have been a whirlwind of international adventure: road trips to San Francisco and Portland, two trips to London, a week in Cuba. These were among my first ever “real” vacations, and I developed a taste for them – did you know it’s FUN to go to exciting places and be all carefree and shit? I had no idea! .. but now that I do, I don’t know that I can ever go back.

Sadly, my reality doesn’t have me jetting off to the UK every time I run out of mascara. Knowing that a trip to London for a third year in a row was probably not in the cards (stupid cards), I planned a simple road trip that would allow Ed and I to spend some time on the coast and in California. The trip never happened for a variety of reasons, so we came up with a less-excited-but-still-fun Plan B: taking our scooter/motorcycle to Victoria, and riding around the Island for a few days. It’s no San Francisco, but it’s one of my favourite things in the world to do. We wanted to make it feel more like an actual vacation, so we were going to get a hotel for a few nights instead of staying in my mother’s horrible basement suite .. but certain financial uncertainties arose making the expenditure unwise. Still, it’d be fun to ride around even if we had to stay in the Basement Suite of Dank Sweaty Hell, so Plan B was looking pretty good.

Then I got caught riding Lola without a Class 6 licence. While we COULD still throw caution to the wind and go anyway, neither of us feel like thumbing our noses at The Man to that extent .. so both Plan A and B are shelved for the year, and I am sad.

But wait! Ed has an idea! “Don’t be sad,” he says. “We can go to EDMONTON!”

If I was merely sad before, I am full-on sobbing now: I am barely okay with not going to (or existing in) London. I can live without driving down the coast and exploring the parts of San Francisco we missed before. We will ride to Victoria eventually, and it will be even better when it’s legal.

But to not do any of those and replace it with a trip to EDMONTON? In the armpit of summer? And think that I would be excited about the adventuresome possibilities that await?

You’re hilarious, universe.

I DO NOT WANT TO GO TO EDMONTON. I feel bad about not wanting to go. There are many excellent reasons – okay, 1.5 excellent reasons – actually, 1 excellent reason and 1 tasty reason – to go: we could visit Ed’s parents, whom we haven’t seen since their trip to BC in 2011. Also, we could eat donairs. And that’s IT.

It’s true that I am somewhat biased against all of Alberta, for reasons that I don’t fully understand myself: alls I know is that when I think about going to Edmonton, my insides get all panicky and I am awash with dread. Ed is very familiar with my extreme distaste in spending my hard-earned vacation days sitting in someone’s basement with nothing to do because it’s hot as balls outside and also it’s Edmonton, but he’d really like it if I was okay with this. I would too, because it would certainly be easier. Unfortunately, there’s a very loud brat living inside my head who can’t get over how my only vacation this year went from London, to San Francisco, to Victoria, and landed on Edmonton. It makes me sad. I want to go on vacation to have happy fun adventure times exploring new places and seeing neat things, not visiting family. All of Ed’s friends and relatives now have children, and I don’t want to spend my Fun Times pretending I’m interested in babies and backyard landscaping. I’m fully aware that this is a shitty way to feel, but I am fundamentally broken in many ways and family freaks me out – so not only would I not be somewhere exotic and fun, I’d be desperately uncomfortable the entire time. I don’t want to subject myself to that, let alone as my only fun getaway this year.

This is stressing me out. I love Ed’s parents and want to see them more often, but I don’t want to go to Edmonton.

What to do?

wanderlust

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With three of my close friends currently wandering around Europe (along with millions of others), I find myself in a desperate state of “I wanna go to the UK”. I don’t have any trips planned, but I’m getting kind of pathetic in my antsiness – it’s almost as bad as my need to be in Vancouver, when I was stuck in Calgary. I wonder if I’m destined to roam the earth like some sort of shiftless vagabond, unable to stay in one place for longer than a decade. I lived in Calgary for 7 years, and have been in Vancouver for 8.5 .. is it time for another change?

That’s scary talk, right there. At the moment, I’d settle for a three-month work trial in London (and even then I’m getting way ahead of myself: this is all just wishful thinking, remember).

It doesn’t help that I’m ALSO feeling a strong need to do Paris again, but properly this time. Why hasn’t instant travel been invented yet? And why am I not free to follow my ever whim and fancy, no matter how ridiculous? Stupid responsibilities and limited resources, you’re harshing my buzz.

I have a team of wonderful elves doing extensive family research for me, and some new details have come to light:

  • My mother doesn’t remember being British (but to be fair, my mother doesn’t remember a lot of things), but this is still a conversation I really ought to have with some sort of consulate. No matter what my mom remembers or not, the fact remains that she was born in Malaysia under British rule .. that’s gotta count for like, two points.
  • Edith Jane Cornes born of Franklin Cornes the Coal Miner and Jane Scott the wife of a Coal Miner is definitely the wrong woman, so now I have the birth certificate of a total stranger which is kind of weird
  • It’s looking more and more likely that the right woman was Edith Jane Corns born of Samuel Corns and Harriet Gough in Kidderminster, Worcestershire, England which is so British I could just drink tea
  • The Corns line can be traced immigrating to Canada as a family in 1893 and landing in Montreal, Quebec
  • The only reason I was looking up “Cornes” in the first place was because of my dad – he had typed out part of his life story, and that’s how he spelled it. THANKS DAD
  • The Corns had a huge family who all went on to create their own huge families – I probably have cousins and second cousins I don’t know about
  • Now I can’t have sex with anyone in Malaysia OR Quebec for fear of accidental incest
  • .. damnit
  • Finding my grandparent’s marriage certificate is proving to be enormously troublesome, and unfortunately it’s the one piece of vital information I neeeeeed if I want to – wishful thinking – apply for a UK visa
  • It’s not London, but yesterday I wandered to Point Roberts with some gnomes:
gnerms!

gnerms!

We also made a new friend:

this is trapper

this is trapper

As soon as he was on the beach, he came running up to us with a stick in his mouth. He dropped the stick, laid down, and waited: he was the politest damn dog I’ve ever seen, and super cute. We took turns throwing the stick for him before he got tired of us and went to play with some kids further down on the beach. There were many (okay, three) large friendly dogs there, and I got to pet them all.

So, now I want to go to London AND have dogs.

Sometimes it feels as though it would be easier to be happy if I didn’t have such dreams.

gnoooomes.

gnoooomes.

one step closer

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Dear England,

When can I move in? Can I just put my stuff anywhere? I’m gonna need a shelf in the bathroom; I have a lot of girl potions.

I received my grandmother’s birth certificate in the mail this week. It’s a little sobering to look at – as someone who often feels adrift and without family ties, it’s probably always going to trip me out to encounter my history. I learned that my great-grandfather was a coal miner! That is neat.

Getting the birth certificate was just one small step in this whole “get to the UK” process: I still need to find a way to tie my grandmother to my family. Unfortunately, it’s proving to be ridiculously difficult to get any information out of Quebec and Nova Scotia – my grandfather’s birth certificate would be nice to have, but I NEED my grandparent’s marriage certificate. Seeing as I have no idea when or where they got married (I’m assuming they didn’t have grandparent sex until they were married, so I can safely guess it happened sometime between 1910 and 1912), this is proving difficult. Complicating matters are the other women who share my grandmother’s name – it seems that a lot of babies were named Edith Jane in England in the late 1800s, and several of them had some variation of the name “Cornes” (if not the name itself). Most of the information I can easily access online refers to an Edith Jane Cornes born in the right location, but the year is off by one. If that’s not the right woman, then everything I have is wrong and I don’t actually know where my grandmother was born. It’s all very confusing.

If I want to get to the UK legally and not just as a tourist, I need to prove that:

  • you are a Commonwealth citizen – check!
  • you are aged 17 or over – check!
  • you are able to work and you plan to work in the UK – checkity check check!
  • you can adequately support and accommodate yourself and your dependants without help from public funds – I don’t want your public funds! Let me work!

I have those, so what next? Well, I must show that at least 1 of my grandparents was born:

  • in the UK (including the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man) – yes, as far as I can tell
  • before 31 March 1922 in what is now the Republic of Ireland – my great grandfather appears to have been born in Ireland, but I think that’s a generation too far removed to qualify
  • on a British-registered ship or aircraft – that would be super cool, but doesn’t apply here

Apparently, I can claim ancestry if my relationship to the relevant grandparent is legitimate OR illegitimate. That makes things easier!

Unfortunately, this is where things get difficult. When I apply for UK entry, I need to include:

  • your full birth certificate – I have this!
  • your parents’ and grandparents’ marriage certificates – um. I don’t know how to get this. My mother MIGHT have her marriage certificate, but I won’t know until I can get my hands on her papers and go through them myself.
  • the full birth certificates of the parent and grandparent through whose ancestry you are applying – I have A birth certificate for a woman I THINK might be my grandmother, but I’m not sure and I don’t know how to verify :(
  • your marriage certificate or civil partnership registration document, if your husband, wife or civil partner intends to join you in the UK – I have this! The real question isn’t “do you have paperwork”, it’s more “will Ed join you” .. that, I don’t know. So far, all of this has been idle wishing. But what if I could do it? What if everything fell into place and I got the papers I need and had a way to get there and a plan and could work and and and? What then? Would Ed come with me? Would I go my own way? Should I stay or should I go? Why DO fools fall in love? Did you let the dogs out?

So many questions.

I wish my dad was around to provide some answers.

And a cream egg. I wish I had a cream egg.

LET ME LIVE IN YOU

london times (days 4-6)

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I managed 6 whole days before resorting to a bulleted list. Aren’t you proud of me?

Thursday:

  • Bus Tour of London
  • River cruise from the Tower of London to Westminster Abbey
  • Harrod’s to gawk at rich people toys
  • ALL THE WALKING

Friday:

  • Another river cruise (this is a reoccurring theme; we’ve cruised the Thames at least 4 times)
  • Tower Bridge
  • Tower of London
  • Namco Funscape
  • ALL THE WALKING
  • Delicious burgers for dinner!

Saturday:

  • Wandered around Southbank
  • Visited the British War Museum (sobering)
  • Realized we were completely going the wrong way when we saw we were at City Hall; turned around
  • Shakespeare’s Globe
  • Tate Modern
  • ALL THE WALKING

Tired.

We didn’t make it to the V&A on Friday night, so that’ll be happening next week along with re-visits to the Tower of London and the British Museum. Tomorrow we’re sticking around the ‘hood; picking up things people have asked for and just trying to take it easy since we’ve been on our feet since we landed last Sunday.

I’m too tired to post pictures, but you can check out my Instagram feed – I’ve been posting regularly; Ed slightly less so.

Okay, here’s one picture:

reflected