The Barbecue after the Wedding

I made a slide slow for this one. It was a lovely day and there was a lot of fabulous food. It was surreal visiting Cindy's Dad's farm since it has had a major face lift since the last time I was there. I kept wandering from room to room and marveling at all the changes and all my memories of being in that house. I spent almost as much time there as I did at my own house. It was cool seeing all the adorable babies even if it's a bit strange that it's our little sisters who have them (well, Cindy and Amy's anyway). I also got to see Lexi, one of Venus' puppies from the recent litter. She is getting so big already! It was nice to touch base with lots of people and just relax once the wedding was over and a success. Fun day! Here's a link to all the pictures.

George Gets His Groove Back

I just had to share this video we took of George dancing at the reception. Way too hilarious! He's really got some moves, eh?

The Wedding Cake Fiasco

My Mom made Cindy and George's wedding cake. Possibly you aren't aware of this but my Mom is the best cook/baker ever and basically self taught herself how to do everything. She decided a few years ago to try her hand at making wedding cakes and it's blossomed into an insane (my word, not hers) hobby.

Look at how gorgeous the cake was:
My Mom made this, from scratch. She baked (no cake mix) this lemon pound cake (the bottom two layers) using 12 real lemons, 2 dozen eggs and 6 pounds of real butter. Why are wedding cakes always so dense? Because if it was made of angel food cake then it would collapse when the other layers and decorations were placed on top. That's why traditionally fruitcake has been used since it's so heavy and strong.

Anyway, Cindy's wedding weekend was a scorcher. It was over 30 degrees. Mom had finished up the cake earlier in the week and froze it (very common thing to do). When we went to put it in her 2nd refrigerator to slowly thaw out we discovered it was too giant to fit in (it fit but the door couldn't' be closed without smucking it. So it was decided that it would thaw out in the cool basement. This was on Thursday evening. Friday morning Mom and Tom left bright and early to go to another wedding while Matt and I were helping to decorate the hall and do other odds and ends. Just before it was time to go to the hall to decorate I noticed that something resembling snot was oozing down the cake and the deep freeze and leaving a sticky puddle on the floor. Naturally I did what any mature adult would do. I panicked and frantically called my mother. Mom said she would be able to fix it and she did, the morning of the wedding. Luckily she had an extra batch of the special fondat icing sticking around but it was pretty freaky for a bit. The cake was still a huge hit and had double the icing. Hopefully not too many guests developed diabetes as a result of that cake. Isn't it lovely though?

The Wedding Post

Wow, this has taken me awhile to post about. Things have been extremely hectic in my life with the new apartment and job but stuff is calming down a little bit. I have so many pictures from this wedding that you may as well go here and look at them. I will try to include some of the best ones though.

I woke up ridiculously early on the morning of the wedding- something like 5 am? I just couldn't sleep. You'd think that it was my wedding or something from how stressed and nervous I was. To be fair, Matt and I did have substantial wedding responsibilities. I spent the morning getting gussied up, helping Mom a bit with the cake fiasco (will blog about this next), putting last minute touches to our reception jokes and plans and answering Cindy's phone calls.

Everything went pretty perfectly. Sherry and Jenn (Cindy's sisters and bridesmaids/maids of honor) looked beautiful and Autumn was an adorable flower girl even if she did get a bit scared and fussy by the end of the ceremony (she's three though so considering this she did awesome). I sang the song and was so nervous (also wearing heels and trying to concentrate on not falling) but it's over and I think it went okay and I do not have a copy of the video, thank goodness. There were a lot of teary eyes and the ceremony went much smoother than the rehearsals so I guess it's good that the minister practiced 43042 times. Stephie bawled through the whole ceremony, especially when George had to take a moment to compose himself while saying his vows.

Between the ceremony and the reception I had to run over to the hall and get the "You Score, They Score" stuff set up, find the microphone and get the top secret Tim Horton's donuts in place. Then I had a much deserved milkshake and visited with Donna, Tamara, Jason, Steph, Dad and Sharron. I also managed to get a nap in before we had to head over to the hall.

The reception went reasonably well. We had worked really hard to try and make things entertaining and organized. There were a few fuck ups though and they were mainly my fault. Like when I introduced the wedding party and called George's brother by the wrong name. His name is Kevin but I called him Ross because he looks like Ross from Friends, also George's middle name and son's name is Ross so I think this is why I had that name stuck in my head. It was embarrassing but I tried to play it off. Also I forgot to ask his sister to come up to say grace at the right time. Our hockey themed kiss idea didn't work as well as we hoped but the kids loved it and happily played with it all night and kept out of trouble so I guess that was worth it. At the end of the night we gave the sticks and pucks to the kids to take home.

The dinner was delicious although I did have to sort of rush through eating it. People laughed at most of my jokes and the shoe game was a big hit. There were lots of touching speeches and apparently we pronounced all the names correctly (and other than Kevin we even had their correct first names). Overall a big success.

I cannot stress enough how gorgeous Cindy looked. She was just glowing. I've never seen her look so beautiful! George was looking pretty slick too. We had fun dancing the night away and I was fairly amused at Kevin (George's 30 yr old brother) attempting to pick up Stephie (who is 20). People from Ontario seem a bit strange. Haha. Maybe it was just this sample though. I also was the one that caught the bouquet. I am still not getting married but I just would like to reiterate how competitive I am. I just wanted to win. Matt did not get the garter.

In summary, it was a great day, perfect weather and all things worked out. I was really honored to be included so much in their day. I love you Cindy and George! Oh and I can't wait to see the professional pictures that Heidi took!!!

Quick Hello

We are great but things have been extremely busy this week! I am using "borrowed" internet in our new apartment!! That's right, we are in and it's a huge mess so I'm really glad Leah won't be here for a few more weeks. She would be frightened away, I'm sure! I still have to update about the wedding, a bit about starting my new job, maybe about my government job interview (although I think I will avoid work related stuff on here since I've heard people get fired for that sort of thing), the V-town fair and moving day, of course. Wow. I am exhausted just typing this and I still have to clean a bunch of stuff up before I go to work for 8 hours this afternoon. I can't wait until Thursday and Friday when I have a couple days off to really deal with unpacking. Hopefully this internet will stay available (and the magical free cable TV that we have at the moment!) so I can update some more!

Decorating/Rehearsal

Friday was another frantic day- I spent a lot of it trying to map out our MC stuff exactly (you should have seen my paper and what a freak I am) and some time freaking out about Cindy's cake (there was a meltdown that my Mom fixed like a pro but at the time it was pretty scary) and lots of time keeping Cindy cool and things rolling.

We stopped by the hall and helped decorate for a number of hours. Cindy was stressed but overall pretty calm. She did get a hint of bridezilla going on when she started scouring every rented table cloth for the slightest of stain. We managed to get things set up satisfactorily though. Setting up the hall took way more time than I planned so we ended up going straight to the wedding rehearsal from the hall. This would be no big deal except I was going to have to sing and had no time to warm up.

I haven't been involved in a lot of weddings but this struck me as the longest rehearsal ever!!! It lasted an hour and a half! The minister didn't impress me and seemed to have no clue what was going on and insisted on reading out full passages of things and making us do everything 4 times or more. We had to tell him basic things like "shouldn't you ask the congregation to stand up before Cindy comes in?". He also made me sing my darn song 3 times!! The pianist looked a bit annoyed but we got through everything (and the minister did a good job on the actual day so that's really what counts).

Then it was rehearsal dinner time. As if anything else could go wrong, the restaurant scheduled us for a different day! They found space for us and after a lot of waiting (we had a huge group) we finally ate. We got some awesome thank you presents too- Matt got cuff links engraved with his initials and I got an awesome (but incredibly heavy!!) cast iron tea pot and cups. It's from a store called Teaopia that I will have to check out sometime. It was a long day but a decent one.

You Score, They Score!

Here is the kissing game that Matt and I planned and built for the wedding. What do you think? They are both big hockey fans and had a slight hockey theme in their wedding (the tables were labeled with different team names) and Cindy really didn't want people clinking glasses to get them to kiss. I got the idea when I saw that some people had done a putting thing because they liked golf. In the end, it worked okay but not enough people participated in my opinion. The kids at the wedding loved it though and spent the whole evening playing with it. Their parents were probably pretty happy that they were out of the way. I gave away the toy sticks and pucks to them at the end of the night. (In case it isn't clear, someone has to score a goal and then the couple has to kiss.)

Surprise Bridal Shower

Last Wednesday night I headed out to Sherry (one of Cindy's sisters) house for Cindy's bridal shower. Somehow everyone managed to keep it a secret so she was surprised. I almost let the cat out of the bag on the weekend but remembered at the last second and stopped myself from saying anything. There was a good turn out, lots of yummy food, fun games (I won the "Pin the Junk on the Hunk"game- I know where things go.) and a crazy gift exchange. A lot of it was R rated or bordering on that so I will just give you the link for the bulk of the pictures. No slide show for this one! Some of the pictures may be not safe for work so you have been warned!!! Here they are!

I was a bit choked that I didn't win the quiz about Cindy (I came in second) but there were some tricky questions that could have had more than one answer. It's probably for the best though because then I would have won all the games and that would have been bad for other people. The prizes were delicious smelling Partylite candles and I actually ended up with two packs (I stayed around to talk about MC stuff and they had one left over.)! It was fun holding all the babies and just having a good laugh. Sherry has a great house although it's pretty far away from Edmonton but whatever. Good starter house! Oh and isn't Jenn's daughter Hayley cute? That's the baby I am holding. I repeat, not my baby.

New Dress!

Wednesday was a surprisingly busy day. I was really tense and stressed out about wedding stuff. We weren't totally prepared at that point and the day was coming quickly. I decided to chill out with some shopping therapy and bought this dress on sale. I felt very nautical but it doesn't photograph well. I should know better than to wear horizontal stripes. They are friends to no one! I also got a pedicure so my toes would be looking nice for the wedding. In the evening I headed out to the bridal shower. Anyway, what do you think of my dress?

Stephanie's 20th Birthday

Tuesday was Steph's birthday. We met up with her on the day and went out for a few birthday drinks. She had a real party on Friday night but we were busy with Cindy and George's wedding rehearsal so we couldn't make it. It was great spending time on Whyte even if I cringed at the prices. I will have to make these excursions a special occasion only thing. I made a slide show of the silly pictures we took and there's also a (dark) video of Matt chugging a beer. He's one of those crazy people who can just open up their throats. I think he finishes it in about 8 seconds. I can't believe my little Stephie is 20! Kids just grow up so fast. Haha!

It's Wedding Time!

Wow, I have been so busy this week. Today's the big day for Cindy and George. The hall is decorated and there have only been a few hiccups. I think it should be fabulous. I wish I had slept better- I fell asleep at about 12:30 and woke up at 5 am!!! WTF! You'd think that it was me getting married or something. I think I am just stressed about singing and being the MC but I am sure it's unwarranted. Anyway, look for updates about Steph's birthday, Cindy's bridal shower and the wedding soon!

A Sneak Peak

Here's a picture of part of the living room in our new apartment! We got the keys this week but won't be moving all our stuff in until next weekend. It has a lot of potential I think! It's going to be tons of work going through everything and buying some fresh new stuff but it will be worth it when we are all settled in with lovely Leah in the best located apartment in Edmonton! Yay! Maybe if I ever start working I can save up for a fancy new TV to replace our tiny ghetto one.

Being Sick Sucks

I am not bedridden but considering I have important things that I cannot be sick for this weekend I have been taking it really easy today. Which means I am bored. It's ironic, isn't it? When I am busy (which hasn't happened for many months now) I would kill for a day to myself to just do nothing. I have lots of "I shoulds" too- reading is one of those if I ever plan on getting anywhere near my goal for this year. I'm reading The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula Le Guin right now and it's all right but it probably won't be my most favorite book of all time. I think it's a book that I will like talking about more than I liked reading it. I have also been thinking about how snobby I am with books. Maybe I should try and read something trashy? I read a lot of trashy stuff when I was a teenager but now I just start to get annoyed when things are formulaic, predictable and/or poorly written. Please, if you can recommend some good books with substance I would be grateful!

Tomorrow is Stephie's 20th birthday and also the day that we get the keys to our apartment. It feels like such a tease though since we won't be moving any belongings in there for almost another 2 weeks. I desperately want to unpack and start having a regular life again! We have some things at my dad's house so we will take as many of them as will fit in the Kiester tomorrow. I have to spend time getting things together for Cindy's wedding on the weekend and Matt has a job interview on Thursday.

Supposedly my Auntie Joyce and cousin Jamie are coming by tonight. I can't remember the last time I saw either of them so it should be interesting. It's strange because we have a tightknit immediate family but I really am not close to anyone in my extended family at all. I don't even know how old Jamie is but I think she is a teenager and the last time I saw her she was probably 7 years old.

Also does anyone know of or belong to any kind of online blogging community? I think that would help motivate me to keep blogging while I am not traveling. I need to feel like I have a dialogue going with people and that means I need commenters. I do have some lovely people that comment regularly, however, these also happen to be the people that I talk to almost daily anyway. Hahah. It would be nice to get comments from a variety of people- maybe I should try and get into the book blogging community even though I don't blog solely about books? Any ideas?

The Return of Cindy and George!

Finally Cindy and George have returned to Alberta!!! They moved to Ontario about a year ago and this is the first I've seen them in a really, really long time. Their wedding is in less than a week! Wow! I really have to get over this cold quickly (which has moved from my sinuses into my chest. Fantastic.). We met up at Doan's Vietnamese restaurant last night and had a ton of delicious foods. We had spring rolls, 3 kinds of soup (chicken curry soup, spicy beef noodle and traditional Vietnamese), a stir fry dish and caramelized pork. It was so tasty!

We caught up and went to see the room they booked at the Met before heading to Death by Chocolate for some dessert. At this point Stephie showed up to say hi and we all headed to Hudson's Tap House for a drink. It was so nice seeing them and catching up a bit. Things have been hectic but we're working on putting everything together so their wedding will be awesome.

Cindy and George went on to Cook County Saloon (where they met actually) but we decided not to go. I figured that would be overdoing it with my cold so we stayed at Hudson's a little longer taking silly pictures before calling it a night. What a great time!

Review: We Need to Talk About Kevin

It's hard to know where to start with Lionel Shriver's We Need to Talk About Kevin. This is the kind of book that is perfect for a book club discussion and yet I am the only person I know that has read this book so I have no one to discuss it with. I picked this up while I was in Bangkok and read it pretty quickly. I thought that it started slow but once it picked up it was difficult to put the book down.

This book is about a fictional school massacre and is told in letter format from the mother's (Eva) point of view. She is writing these letters to her estranged husband, Franklin, and is struggling with blame, guilt, confusion and the aftermath of the massacre. Kevin is 15 and she visits him from time to time in jail.

This book brings up so many questions about motherhood, nature vs. nurture and the influence of media in our society. Was Kevin born evil? Was Eva's reluctance and lack of motherly bonds to blame? Could this tragedy have been prevented? I often felt sorry for Eva, even though I know she doesn't come across very favorably most of the time. Is she blameless? No. But I think she is honest and really sheds light on the shame and expectations our society casts on mothers. Mothers are under a lot of scrutiny and pressure and when something goes wrong they are usually the ones held accountable whether it's their fault or not.

It also makes me think about the lack of support there is for people that make life choices that go against the norm. Does everyone have to have children? Why are people so criticized and questioned when they do something a little differently? What about the shame of postpartum depression? I know that more information and support have been made available recently but there still is a stigma for women who have a hard time accepting the changes and responsibilities that come with motherhood. One thing is for certain- people should definitely be talking and this book raises a lot of important issues.

Korea is haunting me!

This past week Korea has been poking it's way into my life every time I turn around. Maybe I am just missing stuff there and noticing these things is making me miss it more. For example, during my first aid course we had the door open and there was someone speaking Korean outside the door! Then later on I saw someone (possibly the same person) carrying an envelope covered in Korean writing. When I was at the theatre to see Year One I went to the bathroom and found this graffiti on the door. I would like to note that the Korean characters are garbage, mean nothing and make no sense. So apparently that Korean shouldn't be too proud of themselves. I wanted to go out for Korean food last night but no one else was very enthused about the idea. I am sure I would kick this cold immediately if I had some gimchi!!! I wish I could find some 한국 친구 (Hangook chingu: Korean friends) and hit up a norae bang or something. Oh Min Jung Ah- why aren't you here?

Pie and Other Adventures

Wednesday night I just wanted to relax and take my mind off of things. Severin was back in town and so we met up at South Common for dinner and a movie. We chose East Side Mario's and were excited to slip into a pizza deal because it was before 6pm. We noticed they could use a spell checker on some of their signs. The best part was that Sev bought a saskatoon pie!!! We brought it into the restaurant and asked if it was okay, primed and ready with outrageous birthday pie excuses if we met resistance. Fortunately no one cared and so we had our pizza pie and then our pie pie.

We went to see Year One which I liked even if it wasn't as funny as other movies I've seen lately. I thought it was sort of a cute attempt at Life of Brian or Lamb. I love Jack Black and Michael Cera so I tolerated the things that weren't as good about the movie. Plus it was nice to laugh at something. Sev also managed to score a sweet watch for only 25 cents. Who says that Canada is always more expensive than Asia? Haha.

Tough Week

This last week just flew by which means that we are one week away from Cindy and George's wedding. Insane! To back up a little, here is what we were doing this week. I wrote a Caseworker Certification Exam on Monday which is part of the process of getting a government job (takes forever). They said that they wouldn't mark the tests for 2 weeks and that lots of people fail it. Well they contacted me yesterday to say that I passed it (I'm pretty shocked) so now I have to figure out when we're doing an in-person interview. Nerve wracking.

I also spent Thursday and Friday in a first aid/CPR course. This was really tough because I had some really bad news given to me on Wednesday about my Mom's health. If you want to know what's going on you can email me privately about it. So needless to say the last place I wanted to be was at some stupid first aid course. What also didn't help was that the girl I kept getting partnered with was young, stupid and never taken first aid. She also liked to argue with me about things and I wanted to smack her. I'm sure I had less patience than usual but she was really irritating me. She kept asking retarded questions and at the end of the day the class was split into two groups. We were in the first group and we were given symptoms to act out and the other group had to come in and treat us. Then we did a switch, so our group left the room and then returned to help the other people and administer first aid. Seems pretty simple, right? It was even numbers so every person should have had one "victim" to deal with. Well, genius girl decided to take off and assist someone else so I was left tending to two victims. Also my victims happened to be really into their "roles" and were super impossible and aggressive. Basically they both died. Haha. And then it turns out that genius girl was going to put the knife back into her stabbing victim to stop the bleeding. Like what the hell!!!! I was really glad when the course was finished and I passed everything so now I shouldn't have to do that again for awhile.

I've also come down with a cold. This is probably due to having to sit in the medi-centre for FOUR HOURS to try and get new prescriptions. Talk about getting more than I bargained for. This is very bad because I am supposed to MC and sing at Cindy's wedding next weekend. Being sick makes it difficult to practice or do much of anything. I am taking medication, drinking fluids and resting so hopefully it goes away as quickly as it came.

Review: Dance, Dance, Dance

Dance, Dance, Dance is the second Haruki Murakami book I've read (the first being Kafka on the Shore). I just learned through Wikipedia that Dance, Dance, Dance is actually a sequel to A Wild Sheep Chase. Hmm. Well I guess I did that backwards! Anyway, despite it being a sequel it was the sort of book that stands on its own (kind of like how Robertson Davies writes his trilogies).

Murakami is obviously Japanese and all of his books are set in Japan and therefore contain a lot of Japanese elements to them. What I like about Murakami is his quirkiness and sense of humor. Despite these being translations I really feel like the original flavor has been preserved. His characters are strange, possibly bordering on unrealistic, but always endearing and fascinating.

Dance, Dance, Dance could be described as a mystery. We follow an unnamed protagonist as he grapples with boredom, alienation and encounters with the Sheep Man, a 13 year old clairvoyent and a former high school classmate who is now a famous movie star. He travels to the location where the Dolphin Hotel once was (although now it has been bought by a large company and changed into a a luxery hotel) because of strange dreams he was having about a past lover (who also happens to be a prostitute). Things get interesting when he has more visions and people start turning up dead.

Murakami books (the two I have read anyway) all deal with characters who are isolated in some way and attempting to make connections with those around them. They all have elements of fantasy or the supernatural. Sexuality is also prevalent throughout the novel and both novels mentioned some form of prostitution in the blase way that it seems to be dealt with in Asia. Dance, Dance, Dance is unusual, surprising and often amusing. These are the kinds of books that I will be reading when I long for Asia.

Hope that helps somewhat Carter!

Boring Life Update

Just for the people that don't talk to me everyday and read this blog (so probably not many people at all). I have accepted a job and am working at jumping through all the hoops so that I can start it. As a result I have booked a first aid course for Thursday and Friday. I've been also trying to plan our stuff for Cindy's wedding and practice my song. I am really excited since she is supposed to be back in Alberta on Friday but who knows when I will see her. I should also try on my dress and make sure that still fits. Haha.

I wrote a test yesterday as part of the process to try and get a job in the government. I think I did all right but it is so competitive. I am not sure how many positions they have but there were at least 40 people who wrote the test. Out of them one was a woman who just moved here from Ontario and used to do this job there, another had done her practiculm in the office and has been hired for a different job there already and another was a woman I used to work with. Apparently a lot of people fail the test and then the ones that get through often fail the interview. Oh and did I mention it will take them up to 2 weeks to mark the tests? Oh government bureaucracy. I'm not going to hold my breath about the job but I guess we'll see.

Otherwise I am just biding my time until my life will be sort of stable again. I am in limbo. We pick up our apartment keys next week (the 14th) but since Cindy's wedding is that following weekend we won't be able to move any of our stuff until the weekend after. It's really frustrating not being able to unpack after all this time. It will be interesting if I start working before our stuff is moved in (which will be pretty likely at this rate) since then we will have to live in Donna's place until we can get settled into the apartment. It's going to be like Christmas when we start unpacking. So that's life in a nutshell.

Review: Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers

When I mentioned to Carter the title of this book by Mary Roach she said something about how I read "scary" books. In fact, this is one of the funniest and most informative books I've read in a long time. Apparently this is the type of subject I find amusing. Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers goes into detail about what really happens when you donate your body to science, new innovations in funeral options, historical background on medical uses of corpses (Have a bruise? Eat a dead person!) and how they study cadavers at accident scenes to figure out what happened.

The book also made me think about my own mortality. I've long decided that I wanted to be cremated (although I would consider some of the new ecological options that Roach mentions if they become available) and I thought about getting various family members to each take a portion of my ashes and spread them somewhere exciting (so that they would get a trip). However, Roach made an interesting observation about people who leave specific, convoluted requests about what to do with their remains; they are just attempting to exert control after they are gone. I thought that was an interesting perspective so maybe I should just donate my body to science and let my family do what they wish with the memorial service.

I could go on for a long time about this book and it even has discussion questions that don't make me cringe at the end of it. I wish I had a book club to discuss it with. I'm going to be on the lookout for Roach's other books for sure!

Happy Canada Day!

Maybe these slide shows are getting tiring but it is a quick and easy way to show all my pictures. If you want to go and see them in the photobucket then go over here. We decided to stay in Edmonton to celebrate Canada Day. I was feeling a bit under the weather but got over it as the day went on. We were up at a decent time so we could have breakfast with my Mom and Tom and then we went to watch the parade. Wow, the parade was terrible!!! I remember it being really fun when we went years ago so either my memory is unreliable (possible) or it has really gone downhill. On the internet it said that the parade was going to last from 12-2pm but it was finished by 12:30!!! I wasn't impressed at all.

After that we drowned our sorrows in more ice cream. I guess this time it was gelatto so we were mixing things up a bit. Why must delicious things be so expensive? It was worth it though. I had hedgehog flavor and another kind with European cream and chocolate shavings (I can't remember how to spell it's fancy Italian name). Matt had eggnog flavor and cinnamon. I can't remember what everyone else had but it was all spectaculor!

Mom and Tom took off to go shopping and pretty much we vegged until Sev showed up. Then we forced him to watch So You Think You Can Dance with us and had some Taco Bell. We walked across the High Level Bridge to get a decent spot to watch the fireworks. I was also pretty surprised that there weren't more Canada Day things planned. It seemed like everything was ending at 4 or 5 pm and the fireworks weren't until 11pm! What the heck? They were also running the fabled waterfall off the High Level Bridge. Wow, it totally looked like a pipe (or twelve) had burst! I don't think that was the effect they were going for but it certainly was dramatic. We ran into my all time favorite high school teacher too! What a small world.

We were pretty early and staked out a spot. Of course a bunch of people showed up at the last minute and basically stood right in front of where we were sitting. So annoying. So we ended up having to stand up to see. I felt bad for the people with small children. I wished I was still a teacher at that point so I could have just told everyone to sit down. I have to say, the fireworks were pretty good though. I was relieved that everything didn't suck but I think next year I will have to have a Canada Day barbecue or something.