School, Work and Vacation

Reader warning: this post is full of Al's personal crap and has little to do with writing...he is merely filling in time until the start of the Canada vs USA hockey game...may the force be with them! Umm...'them' being the ones with the maple leaf on the jersey.

I had fully intended on fleshing out a story idea when my son was swimming yesterday morning, but my sister came along to watch and we ended up chatting for an hour. Of course, any chance at procrastination is alright by me. Speaking of procrastination, my son is working on a school project that has to be finished prior to us leaving on holidays in 11 days.

It's one of those large scale--post on Bristol board--historical projects that is to reflect your local culture and heritage. His project is about the collapse of the northern cod fishery here in Newfoundland in 1992 and how the moratorium declared by the Canadian government that year affected the lives of over 22,ooo fishers and plant workers in more than 400 coastal communities. He has collected information from the Internet and library books but still awaits information from his uncle who works at the DFO (Department of Fisheries and Oceans) before he can finalize the information and paste it up on the board. He will also have to present this to the class a day or two before our holiday.

About the holiday...we will be off on a cruise through the southern Caribbean. At this point, you're all probably thinking "Wow! That Davidson dude must be loaded to go on a cruise." Not so. We have been saving for the proverbial 'trip of a lifetime' holiday for about 5 years (and are still going into debt on this one). It started out as going to Orlando to visit Mickey, but as the boy grew older he didn't seem interested. Besides, roller coasters make me Yak...as Sean became interested in sea cadets, and the idea of being in the navy (if he graduates high school), he suggested the idea of a cruise. We picked this particular one as it departs out of Bayonne, New Jersey and we can fly direct to Newark from here.

Due to the unpredictable nature of the weather both here and in New Jersey, we are flying out three days early and staying in Manhattan (cha-ching, that's the sound of the cost of this trip increasing alarmingly). If any of my faithful readers have ideas or hints on getting around downtown...I'm all ears! Have any of you been to a great attraction there, or perhaps a good (ie. not too expensive) restaurant? Al wants to know! A passing thought on this: If any of you are in the New York area the first week of March and care to meet with us, drop me an email and we can try to arrange a place/time to meet. I want to fit as much in as possible as I don't get off of this island very often!

At this point of my monologue you are probably saying. "Al's crazy and ranting, and what the hell's he going to do with his big, black dog!" Good question. As it turns out, a caravan of gypsies * have been camping in the nearby woods. Since the snow is low, I am allowing them to pitch tents in my back yard (but they must leave the dog's running track open so he can continue to sprint about the yard after taking a poo). That being said, they may camp in the yard and use the main floor washroom, and watch the family room TV only on Oscar night. And they can eat some of my lesser favourite food products from the freezer. But I have left explicit instructions for them to keep their grubby hands off the liquor cabinet. Do you think they will follow the house rules?

*Being Canadian, I am again compelled to apologise to anyone of the gypsy persuasion that I may have insulted during to posting of this blog. I speak my mind, and apologise a lot.