It's been awhile.

Since my last post Max has decided he hates swimming and we've been to Calgary and back.

I guess Max just isn't that comfortable in the pool yet. He is fine when I am just holding him and we are singing songs or something, but whenever we were supposed to do some kind of swimming exercise the screaming began. And it wasn't just me! Shawna took him on his last day of lessons and the same thing happened. Oh well, it was just an intro to the pool. I'm sure by next year he'll have alot more confidence.

The trip to Calgary was good. Max was pretty well behaved in the van. Slept about half the time on the way there and most of the way back. We didn't end up leaving until after 4pm on friday, though. I was supposed to write my physics mid-term exam at 10:45am, but I got to the university and they had changed it to 1:30pm. So, that set us back a couple of hours right away. By the way, I ended up with 16/20 or 80% on the exam. Anyway, I rushed back so we could leave right away and we rolled into Calgary at around 3am local time on saturday. We stayed at Laura's while she was in Banff getting married. Went to sleep until Max wouldn't let us anymore and headed off to Banff for Laura's wedding at about 2pm. Got to Banff, checked into our bed and breakfast and hung out for awhile. The wedding was at 4, so at around 3:30 we got changed (the hotel where the wedding was was only 5 mins away) and I promptly ripped up my pants while picking up Max off the floor! First of all let me say that these pants fit well and tore in the weirdest spot...along the back pocket. So, we got in a panic...Shawna finished getting ready and we ran out of the b&b to head to downtown Banff and find some pants. It's also pouring rain by this point. We know there's a Hudson's Bay in Banff on the main strip, so I park the van and start running down the street looking for it. After 2 blocks I go into a store and ask the clerk there who says it is 2 blocks in the other direction! We had parked almost right behind it without even knowing it. So, I run back, get in the store, grab a pair of pants off the rack, change in the dressing room and walk up to the register wearing the pants. The clerk was kind enough to cut off the tags right there and we were on our way! Arrived at the wedding at about 5 minutes after 4 and were lucky that things hadn't started yet. Actually we would have been better off if we had gotten there later. We were all sitting in the back row and Max was being great, but we were there for about 15 minutes before things got started and right about that time, he started to act up and wanted to run around. Shawna took him out to the lobby and ended up missing the whole ceremony which sucks, but that's life with a kid I guess. After the ceremony we took Max out for a bit. The number of people there was making him a bit crazy. Came back for the reception at 6 and had a great dinner. Max was pretty good as well. There was a huge waiting/lounging area right next to the reception area, so after dinner we sat out there with him mostly, so he could run around. This turned out pretty well. There were people constantly coming and going, so we got to talk to everyone and had a great time. Max was pretty wound up though. He was having fun and still going hard until we left at 11pm. However it took literally about 30 seconds for him to fall asleep once we got back in the van to go back to the b&b!

Sunday we had an awesome breakfast at the b&b (which made up for the room) and took a walk with Max to the cave and basin nearby. Just after paying to get in Max started getting crazy again, so we were outta there. Guess he still hadn't had enough sleep to make up for the last couple of nights. We headed back to Laura's place in Calgary and everybody took a nap. Later we ordered some pizza and had Dave Morgan over for a while to visit. After that it was an early exit to bed.

Monday, we took Max to the Calgary zoo, which he really enjoyed. We ended up being there for about 3-4 hours. After that we took off to the hospital where Max was born to see some of his old nurses and drop off some pictures and a card. Unfortunately, there was only one nurse there that was one of Max's primary nurses. The other three were scheduled for the night shift. Too bad. For dinner Tyler and Natalie invited us out to there place and we had a good time there. Max got to play and even petted the cat with a little encouragement.

Tuesday it was time to move out of Laura's and head over to Tara and Ed's place. First, though we met up with Shawna Y. for lunch at market mall. After that we were off again and moved our vanload of crap over to Tara and Ed's. They were actually headed out for the afternoon, so we did some shopping at the massive Ikea and met them later for supper. Had a nice BBQ dinner with them and just vegged out for the rest of the night.

Wednesday we visited pyramid productions to say hi to anyone we hadn't seen yet and had lunch with Laura since we didn't have much time to visit her with the wedding and all. That afternoon we packed up and left Calgary for Lethbridge. Got to Lethbridge to see Shawna's friend Trish and have dinner with her family. After that we headed straight home!

So, we packed it all in for the few short days we were gone.

We got back thursday morning about 8am. Friday Max had an appointment with an ear specialist due to all his infections. We set up an appointment for him to have tubes put in his ears. Apparently this is pretty common and will definitely stop his infections, which is good. The surgery won't be for about 4 months, though.

The rest of the weekend has been mostly relaxing. Caught 'Troy' on TV saturday night. It was pretty good. Not as bad as I had heard that's for sure.

That's about it. Shawn's back to work tomorrow and I am once again the stay at home dad.

Played hockey for the first time since last december this past weekend. Our team won one and lost one in overtime. Not too bad. More hockey on tuesday, wednesday and friday, but I can only make the tuesday game due to physics and leaving for calgary on friday. The ice at the arenas (there are 4 of them in one complex) was just horrible. The humidity and heat here is just too much I guess. There is water dripping from the roofs creating small holes in the ice and the ice has become some thin in parts that you can see down to the cement. They are actually shutting the place down for 10 days after this friday's game to try and build it back up.

Max went swimming twice last week. He seemed to enjoy it for the most part. He especially likes standing on the side of the pool and having me lift him into the water. He also likes the little slide they have for the smaller kids there. He only went twice last week, because of me being at school on monday, it raining on wednesday, and he had an eye doctor appointment on thursday. Hopefully he'll make it out every day this week.

The eye doctor appointment went great. Everything looks good. He may be a little bit farsighted, but that is apparently normal.

Also, on saturday Shawna and I went to see 'War of the Worlds', which we both liked, but just as in 'Signs' I was a little disappointed in the ending. Without giving much away...for all their technology aliens must be the stupidest things in the universe.

New locks...

Had my first summer physics class yesterday and will be given that lab exemption I was talking about last week. So, I guess this means I have to start studying again! The mid term test is on July 15th in the morning. I'll have to write that and get the hell out of there, because we are leaving for Calgary/Banff that day for Laura's wedding. Final exam is on July 28th, the day before my sister comes to visit from Ontario. The timing worked out pretty well on that part. She'll be here for about a week enjoying sunny Portage la Prairie.

First and second hockey games of the summer are this friday and sunday. I'm really looking forward to it, but I've got some equipment problems. I only played hockey once last winter and never bothered to air my stuff out after that. Which isn't really the BIG problem. The real trouble began, I think, when I put it outside this spring and covered it with our BBQ cover, thinking that it would protect it from the rain, etc. ...Guess not. Opened it up yesterday and everything was soaked and just pretty gross generally. Spots of mold on some stuff...skates in rough shape. It's currently sitting on the balcony getting a much needed drying out. I'll have to see how it fares in the next day or two. Hopefully everything will be okay and I won't have to buy anything new.

Max's first swimming lesson is today. Lessons officially began yesterday, but because I was at school we had to miss the first one. Should be nice a nice day for it. After today it's supposed to be 30ish all week with a high of 34 on sunday.

We did some camping at the beach in St. Ambroise last weekend which was a pretty good time. Max loved playing in the sand and letting the waves roll over his feet on shore. However, as the weekend went on he got crankier and crankier. Too much playing and not enough sleep. The day we got home he took a 3 and a half hour nap, then went to bed about and hour and a half earlier then usual.

And finally Shawna and I got some tickets for the Robert Plant concert when he comes to Winnipeg in September. Looking forward to that. We've never seen him or, of course, Led Zeppelin before. The guy's an icon, so it should be a fun night. It will also give us a chance to check out the MTS Centre where he's playing. That's the new arena the city decided to build for the Manitoba Moose, but wouldn't build it for the Jets. Yes, I'm still bitter! :-)

Later.