Belated summary of New Year

Haven’t blogged for ages, haven’t covered my trip to Canada:

Long trip to Canada via Amsterdam – drove from Vancouver through icy snow-and-fog covered mountains with Dionne and Josh to catch the end of the wedding rehearsal dinner at a Thai restaurant, then a visit to the pool hall

– Couple of days of bonding with the groom and friends old and new while prepping the wedding – board games on New Year’s Eve.

– Kyle and Lori-Anne’s wedding on New Year’s Day – I was chauffeur for the bride in her vintage Jag, then did two readings during the service, then was MC (‘well, assistant TO the MC’) with Dionne at the reception, held in an art gallery. My observation that it was our job as partners of these women to facilitate their international long-distance relationships with each other seemed to be met with general approval.

Early the day after the wedding drove back through the mountains down to Vancouver, then over the border to Seattle – spent a week staying with Steve and Tim – met David in an English pub for Man U vs Arsenal and discussion of the joys and trials of US/UK marriages – met my distant cousins for a wonderful Italian meal and much discussion of theatre – met Amy for brunch with Steve, then coffee and heartfelt chat near Seattle University.

Evan arrived from Montana and took me to Stevens Pass for a couple of days to teach me how to snowboard. Of our two motel options we selected the one that WASN’T an exact replica of the Bates motel – obviously couldn’t survive a single evening in the mountains without a cinema, so drove over two hours to see Syriana.

Grasped snowboarding quicker than I thought I would, but still fell a lot, and hard! Snowboarded in the rain without glasses, which once saw me getting on the wrong ski-lift, and twice saw me coming down a slope that was too advanced for me – my aching body really needed the high-spec jacuzzi in Steve’s back garden, sitting under the stars discussing the world.


Thought I’d be fine getting back to Vancouver for my flight home, but eventually had to take the midnight Greyhound from Seattle. Slept in Vancouver bus station for a couple of hours, then got a taxi to meet Alicia for breakfast in the excellent Sophie’s Cosmic café. Got on the rubbish plane to Europe, immediately popped two sleeping pills, and allowed my snowboarding aches to stiffen rigid as I essentially slept in one position for the 11 hours to Amsterdam.