And we're - almost - off

Since I haven't posted for a week and it's been a rather eventful one, I best get going eh?

To begin with there was the temporary breakdown of the shore captain on Saturday as he was getting ready to leave for his trip to see the Capt. in hospital. It appears that one of the local fisherman (aka busybody) mentioned while they were taking his lobsters out that he had 'heard the Coast Guard on the set talking and they were towing a boat in' Now you can only imagine what this gem of information did to someone in a state of hypervigilance (yes that is the official term for those who have PTSD) what with everything that has gone on this winter vessel wise. So this results in him hyperventilating, pacing and frantically trying to figure out what the situation is. I try logic "they're not the only boat off the coast this weekend, I'm sure you'd have heard by now, the weather is great etc" to no avail. He calls a) a local fisherman who has his VHF on scan and has alerted him to troubles at sea before - he's lobstering his wife says b) a local neighbour who does the same - she's not sure but doesn't think the situation is serious c) his mother who has a VHF set - but isn't home and doesn't have voice mail to leave a message d) the Coast Guard office locally - no answer, no voice mail, message to call Search Coordination Center. Mister frantically begins to shave. I suggest calling Search Coordination and he says "go ahead, you call" so I do. I explain to the tech my husband's mental status requiring reassurance and he chuckles but when he calls the name of the vessel up on the database and finds out they're frequent flyers lately he takes the call seriously. When he asks me where they're fishing (and of course I have no idea - in the water comes to mind - they go and then they come back) I have to summon the nervous wreck from his ablutions. They have a great chat and mister is much reassured, leaving shortly to visit the Captain. As he's leaving I tell him to wear his new sneakers to break them in advising him they look great. He asks if I think they look too young for him and I reassure him but he settles as he says "well never mind everything looks too young for me now, except you of course" to which I reply "we do have a history which a man 1/2 your age wouldn't share with me" as I think of a nursing school classmate who is cohabiting with one of her son's friends but if I ever do this again the man is going to old, very rich and have a poor cardiac status, this is my alternate retirement plan! I am left to have extensive conversations with ALL of the recipients of his frantic dialing spree and I stayed home to get my presentations done. Talk about my nerves!

The prodigal son returned early Monday morning. I know this because his father answered the cell phone at 2:34 a.m. and had a yellular conversation - as in Yellular: You know the guy, he’s in Superstore, his cell is cutting out, someone on the other line is talking him through Pasta Shapes 101. And he’s going absolutely yellular, screaming: Linguine? What? I can’t hear you! Farfelle? What? Cavatelli? But I digres....the boy did well, figured many things out on his own and is well on the way to adulthood by the sounds as he described not sleeping, worrying about the crew and the gear, being responsible etc. Who are you and what have you done with my son? So he's on his way and we've waited a long time for THIS aspect of his life to mature.

The week has gone by in a blur as there are the final preparations for work for both of us, home and critters, travel and attempting to get the Captain sprung from hospital - he can't run fast but I considered baking a handgun into a cake for him on several occassions as I advocated for him with discharge planners and nurses at the city hospital who were (to put it mildly) less than helpful in the attempt to get him home. As he told his wife "I can't believe I've been here three and a half weeks and you haven't got a ransom note yet" and was only partially joking. There is some cause for optimism for tomorrow but I sure wish he was underway before we left.

By Wednesday, I did finally get my presentations done (yeehaw), transferred to the netbook (which I absolutely love by the way) stored on the flashstick and printed the notes. Wednesday was the (or else you're not coming) deadline for the packing and haircut for mister which he accomplished by Thursday - not bad for him as he'll be late for his own funeral - but my last travel partner was sure more cooperative than this. By last evening I finished reading Three Cups of Tea even though it meant I gave up on some sleep to do so and yes it was certainly worth it - you MUST read this book!

I had a chat with the baby daughter (of course it involved the transfer of money she's in university and heading over the pond remember?) and she rattled off some pretty impressive marks which will reassure her father and told me about doing injections for premies with RSV so had to reconstitute, draw up and administer the shots so I was blown away (but not really surprised by her technical expertise) and can't believe she's growing up.

Had a message from daughter # 1 who is doing her thing in the financial world - way to go - and a phone chat with a very overscheduled student teacher - hang in there. We're headed off to visit the Capt in hospital, take in Serena Ryder who is performing tonight in the city (and yes she is pretty cool for us old folks to see), sleep a few hours before catching an early a.m. flight to Barbados via Toronto.

So, are we in need of a vacation this year???? You bet. Returning on April 7th so will be in touch then unless we are free and run, run away.

If I had waited until last minute to choose my speaking venue I might be responding to the email I just found but then again none of the listings had an intinerary like I'm heading out on tomorrow:
Caribbean Cruises Destination & Special Interest Speaker Positions Available Some Free, Some 50% off, Some with Air x 1 & Gratuities x 1

And finally to close - and just to explain why I'm taking the netbook for presentations and 'may' get to check email and gloat to those in a North American spring - but not taking my cell phone here is the word of the day listing:

Vacation shows up first in English in Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, specifically in the prologue to the Wife of Bath’s Tale.

In it she complains that her husband spends all his leisure time—his vacation—reading a certain book and not attending to her needs—which must have been urgent since he was her fifth husband.

This talk of books in such a famous source of our knowledge of Middle English confirms that people were reading and writing long before Chaucer took up his pen, it’s just that the further back in time you look, the fewer books survive.

Not only are books lost or destroyed, for old books there were not many to begin with. Before the invention of the printing press all books were produced by hand. In 1476 William Caxton set up the first printing press in England and one of the first things he set about producing was Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales. But that was almost a century after they were written so when Chaucer used the word vacation the book he mentions would have been expensive and precious even when it was new.

No wonder the Wife of Bath received a beating when she tore a page out of it.

The roots of the word vacation are older than Chaucer and lead via Old French back to Latin to a root vacare meaning “to be empty.” The American Heritage Dictionary links this back to an Indo-European root eu meaning to “leave” or “abandon.”

So the Latin “empty” represents your office when you are on vacation.

We vacate our place of business, but more so we mentally move out of the mindset of our regular occupation, and that’s what’s at the heart of the word, a mental removal from work.
That’s why dragging your iphone or your blackberry along means you aren’t really on vacation.