If it is Saturday, well I must be en route for my fly by visit to T.O.
No real "on the road" blogging till Sunday at some point (likely Monday's post), but have stuff in the can for the whole weekend!
Let's talk about some stuff, shall we?
1) Worst Vacations Ever
While I hope that this vacation will be a nice vacation, I have lived through a few bad ones...
Me (on the right of course, my brother and my best friend at the time, Barbie, summer of 1973). I think you could wear my outfit this summer!
And American Rap Treasure and Spokesperson for Weed, Mr. Snoop Dogg, who has since adopted the more advance moniker of Snoop Lion:
No real "on the road" blogging till Sunday at some point (likely Monday's post), but have stuff in the can for the whole weekend!
Let's talk about some stuff, shall we?
1) Worst Vacations Ever
While I hope that this vacation will be a nice vacation, I have lived through a few bad ones...
- PEI camping trip with two small children and it poured. It turns out that neither camping nor rain bring out the best in me. I sat at picnic table with children while Barry and some random guy put up the tent in the driving rain. Everything was soaked. Everyone was miserable. Barry said I was the ring leader of the misery and I think he was right. It rained the next day, too. We got a hotel room we could not afford and once we were checked in, the sun came out. Yes, life is like that.
- PEI cottage trip with parents in 1973. Gee - it sounds like I have a thing against the Island - not at all, I love it - but it is THE local vacation area and have been there a lot so of course some of memories had to be from there.. Anyway, it rained the whole time. My mother hates the beach. When my mother was unhappy, well there was general unhappiness...Yes, the apple didn't fall too far from that tree...Parents fought a lot, Dad had to make multiple rum runs to Charlottetown and while there, we must have spent $100 on books, which was a lot of money in 1973. However, silver lining was seeing Anne of Green Gables: the Musical for the first time. A must-see if you have a child under twelve. My son loved it too, later on!
- ANOTHER overnighter in PEI in 1987 - Barry and I went with two of our best friends (a man and a woman, not a couple) and a friend of the women. We all shared a hotel room. The other three got really drunk. The woman would NOT shut up. Our male friend would not stop hitting on the two women. They giggled and slurred all night long.
- Are you seeing a pattern here???? Hmmm... and I do love the Island...If you do, just don't take me, or my friends, or my parents...
Me (on the right of course, my brother and my best friend at the time, Barbie, summer of 1973). I think you could wear my outfit this summer!
2) GPS for the Erudite and for Hipsters
Our car does not have a built in GPS. We have a portable system, but that one has been in the vehicle our son is driving. So last week Barry bought another one for our trip. In the years since our first GPS purchase, the systems have become quite a bit fancier. Now you can download a celebrity voice to guide you on your way. We could not agree, so this trip will see us guided by English comic treasure, Stephen Fry...
And American Rap Treasure and Spokesperson for Weed, Mr. Snoop Dogg, who has since adopted the more advance moniker of Snoop Lion:
Feel free to go visit the TomTom site to pick your own voices! While Stephen exults with us as we enter the "motorway", Snoop Dogg is all "Church on the move". Will be an interesting trip with these two gentlemen riding shotgun.
3) Scandal
I know - a lot of you have not seen this show yet, so no spoilers. I cannot recommend it enough. We are finally done the 2nd season and all I can say is "Oh No, she did Not!"
I promise you - you haven't been this entertained since Alexis and Crystal went in the pool in Dynasty!
4) India's Entry into the 2016 Summer Olympics
First there were flying monkeys (my personal favourite) and now, swimming monkeys. Bravo, little monkey!
What did we do before Youtube?
Well those are my Saturday ramblings... how about you - what are you up to today? Stay Safe out there!
Good morning and hope the trip is going well. First..what is PEI? I fortunately have not had a "worst vacation ever". Had some better than others. Can't believe you have Snoop Lion. Now that's funny. I do remember Alexis and Crystal in the pool. I let the kids dictate what I watch on you tube...then I'm singing the Narwal song. Don't look it up if you don't know what I'm talking about. It has been in my head off and on for three years.
ReplyDeletePrince Edward Island! No, don't know narwhal!
DeleteSnoop Lion. Ugh, more like Snoop Weasel. Not a fan! Worst vacation ever? Florida, hurricane, two littles, no electricity, and only sweet tarts to eat. Yep, that was it!
ReplyDeleteI am with you! I chose Stephen fry! Son chose snoop dogg!
DeleteLCotP Had to chime in and say love your blog name - takes me away!
DeleteHi Wendy, I wouldn't say we have had any really horrible vacations, but our 4 years in Europe did coincide with our elder son's prime teenage years - we like to say he scowled his way around Europe.
ReplyDeleteI wish we had the option of Stephen Fry on our GPS!!
Patricia, I am with you on Fry, maybe can convince DH to upgrade portable Tom Tom on that basis.
Deleteit is quite lovely patricia - you would like it!
DeleteVACAY HEY HEY Well, I can tell you there are no falls in Great Falls, Montana, and it isn't very great, especially when there is a mass power failure on a Saturday night, all the few restos close and the hotel elevator goes out. However, I am generally an optimist about all trips, even the failures, comes from spending some time growing up in Haiti I think, anywhere a vacation from/ after that. Plus I always think the misadventures and glitches make for great stories and pics - after the fact, of course.
ReplyDeleteStay safe WMM!
I giggled throughout this entire post. We have a portable GPS too, our first one got stolen when we were in Winnipeg in 2009 (that had to be our worst summer trip out to the cottage - I was in Wpg for my cousin's stagette, Hubs had the car, had it parked in the city while running errands and someone smashed our window and stole the GPS, was going to steal other things but Hubs came back to the car just in time). And it happened over a weekend so we had to wait until the Monday to replace the window! Anyway, that GPS had a Hilary Clinton voice (for the English US option), no lie. She actually sounded irate if you missed a turn! Our newer GPS doesn't quite have a Hilary voice, but close enough. I love the Stephen Fry option, the British accents are the best voices for the GPS. It makes driving sound so distinguished.
ReplyDeleteOh and one summer a few years ago, my in-laws were kinda crusty and so we left the cottage a little earlier than planned because we couldn't take it anymore. They didn't like that either! ha ha
Other than that, I can't recall any really bad vacations, just some quirky ones...usually the quirky ones make for the best stories later on!
oh I forgot! when I was in Paris with my parents as a teenager, our cousins offered to drive us to the train station to catch the train back to London...and got totally lost. At one point, our cousin threw up his hands and exclaimed "I LOST!!" My Dad (who knows a little French) had to help him figure out how to get to the station, this was pre-GPS days, so he had to read an old-school (French) map .... so nerve wracking. We made it to the station with seconds to spare. Just made it in time. Heart palpitations all around that day! Yikes.
Deleteoh there is a story from boston that involves me telling my family "I think we're going to have to sprint this" - have never lived that down...
DeleteOMG-I LOVE Scandal! My FAVORITE show ever - in addition to Mad Men - neither of which I can live without. So glad you found it! I follow the show on Twitter too - did I just admit that? Oh well....Have a GREAT trip!
ReplyDeletewell I am going to start following it on twitter too now that I know that the cast tweets during episodes!
DeleteSome funny stories there WMM. Against my husband's advice I went camping with a friend in Waterton park on the May long weekend. It snowed about a foot and we froze. On a trip to Chicago with my husband we were on the 23th floor of our hotel, getting ready to go out for the evening when the fire alarm went off. We had to walk down all the stairs and it was a false alarm. We got back to the room and the alarm went off again. We didn't leave the room and finished getting ready. After 30 minutes later the alarm again. We left after that but the hotel was still standing when we got back.
ReplyDeleteI've had an interest in cartography for as long as I can remember so no GPS for me, it's maps all the way. I have driven in major U.S. and European cities and even the Middle East and I'm always able to find my way. I don't want to lose those navigational skills.
the cold mountain camping would do me in! You and my husband would like each other - he loves a good map!
DeleteI adore maps! MLane's TomTom drives me mad, but I might like it better with S Frye.
DeleteA long, long time ago, I once dated a guy who invited me on a camping trip with his Sierra Club buddies who were also on his basketball team. Imagine how I was not keeping up with all these very tall guys and their very tall girlfriends. And we hiked for hours to get to the campsite using an advanced trail (some parts were so steep you could reach out in front of you to touch the trail). I wanted to die and nearly did.
ReplyDeleteI have no directional skills whatsoever, cannot read a map to save my life, so am on the hunt for a good PGS. However, I need to keep it simple because I have trouble understanding accents. I don't need to be saying 'what did you' say as I drive in circles.
As Blue Booby would say 'total rubbish' but isn't Scandal the most fun you can have on TV?
oops, I meant ruth ... think she'd say 'total rubbish' :)
Deletelove scandal - think ruth would say that and that bb would say something saltier! sierra club hiking - not for me!
DeleteI remember one of our worse vacations ever. We were on our way home from my grandparents house which was a 8 plus hour car ride in the days before interstate (freeway style) highways. My baby sister C who is 9 years younger than me ended up with a raging case of diarrhea while on the trip home. We had to stop at every service station. Poor Mom had bathroom duty with C while Pop, middle sister W & I were left to entertain and amuse ourselves at each stop. We devised a plan to publish a book of restroom ratings for each stop along the way. The three of us potential authors were roaring laughing but Mom & baby sis were not amused. I guess we should have followed up on that since we probably would have made a fortune on our publication!
ReplyDeleteWendy I hope your trip is diarrhea free!
SC - so far, so good! poor sister!
DeleteMost of my vacation horror stories involved small children and long car trips, or lost luggage and no room at the inn. Most I've tried to block from my mind.
ReplyDeleteI do have a faint memory of a very tedious 15 hour drive, two cranky children in the back seat, to an extremely remote campground. Taking 30 painful minutes to settle on the perfect campsite only to discover the tent poles were back home. The drive home was just not pretty. Really nasty. In fact I have to stop thinking about it or I may need a cocktail this morning.