And speaking of vacations the life partner (who I have convinced to plan ahead a bit) and myself have booked a trip for September 2014. This is pretty impressive as it's quite a struggle to convince him to plan for the day after tomorrow. We used our vacation share to trade for a week in Alfalgar Village, Algarve, Portugal - here is a link to the town and below the reviews of the resort:
Still (as the RCI countdown told me this morning) 385 days away so lots of time to work out the details and snag a good sale but... hoping to fly end of August to Lisbon, spend the week in Portugal then make our way to a 14 day repositioning cruise from Europe to USA which will reduce the airfare and give us a taste of England, Norway, Shetland Islands, Iceland (3 ports), St. Johns, NL and New York. With an extra day in New York City this will put us home September 23rd and I've given work dates of availability for September 25th. Perhaps a bit close but...I enjoy a challenge. And if I'm returning to the same community - meaning I'm leaving lots of 'stuff' there and have everything packed before I leave - all is well.
It seems that 2014 will be a busy year as I had previously made plans with a nursing colleague to attend the December Diploma in Tropical Nursing program in Liverpool, England. I am checking out the admission process and the 'need for a student visa' part. She mentioned that when she'd studied there before, because her mother was British that she had an "abode of entitlement", now that sounds pretty swish eh? Liverpool is cheaper than London but still....
Again on the subject of travels, the life partner received a text Saturday from the teacher daughter who was flying to Edmonton in the early a.m. It evolved the she and the son-in-law were on the same Halifax to Edmonton flight as her uncle (her father's brother) and they were all unimpressed with a fog delay. Her father had responded to her message with a long text message which truly surprised her (and me when he showed me later) making me exclaim "you really do know how to text"! They were on their way to visit a friend in Slave Lake then sister in Red Deer and one in North Battleford so will have toured a fair bit of Alberta and Saskatchewan in their travels. Talk of hilly hikes and camping made me tired. Her uncle was heading out for work in the western economy. He and I were chatting online before his first day as a heavy equipment operator in Whitecourt (was hired by the first place he visited) and he was telling me how pleased he was to see his niece's friendly face in the airport and on the plane. "Did she tell you about the cat that got loose on the plane" he said? "No, do tell" I encouraged. "Well, it escaped from somewhere and the flight attendant reached over my sleeping seat mate and picked it up from between his legs and he didn't even wake up!" I suggested that he must've been a frequent traveller to sleep that soundly. The eldest daughter confirmed that she had caught a cat once which absconded as they were deplaning - now that could've had tragic consequences if not for a cat lover.
Well, off to run some errands in the city tomorrow - meeting up with a crew member from one of the Holland America ships, renewal of passport for the old guy, lunch at Mezza - a great Lebanese spot:
as we have a Groupon so all in all a day of R&R. So off to catch some zzzzs.
