Day Three Hundred and Thirty Six - Sister in Canada

Dear all,

A million apologies to you all for my absence this week but [as well as the move] we have been experiencing a whirl wind in the form of my sister, Jo who has been staying for 6 days from the UK!

This is just a quick post with highlights from the first day to compensate for me going AWOL online for a couple of days ( we have been pretty busy!)

Many more stories and pictures to follow from the week of Jo in Canada! Hurray!

Day Three Hundred and Thirty Five - Klick Klack and KFC

Dear all,

We are in the final throws of the move and today Meaford Factory Outlet delivered our highly anticipated Klick Klack, as well as the bar stools and coffee table.

Darren got to work immediately with the Klick Klack as we are still awaiting our mighty sectional from Leons.. so this would be a temporary sofa in the meantime. He is a bit of a wizard when it comes to this sort of thing so I stood back and handed him tools ( and coffee) on request.

Darren worked with impressive speed and quickly got the Klick Klack up and assembled with not so much as a problem, scratch or complaint.

Here is the finished sofa ( it folds back into a bed; perfect for my sister next week!) so now we have somewhere to sit! Bring on the DVDs! Darren is amazing.

To celebrate, Darren popped out and came back with a bag of the Hallowed KFC. I was yet to try the famous fried chicken so was extremely excited about this moment.

And yes, I can report, it tastes finger-licking good. I know it's bad bad bad for you but lordy, this stuff is tasty. Bring on the post-furniture assembling fried chicken!

Day Three Hundred and Thirty Four - Deidre's Work and The Eaton Centre

Dear all,

An exiting and wonderful day for me today as I was set free in the wild and wonderful world of the big smoke. My day really started at 9AM ( after I had already travelled across country, visited an international consulate and drank at least 5 cappuccinos).

I had arranged to meet up with the gorgeous Deidre for lunch while I was in town and I had arranged to meet at her fabulous offices at St Joseph's Media. Despite living in London for many years and priding myself on being a vintage-shopper extraordinaire, I was a little concerned I would look like a bag lady surrounded by the beauties that worked at 'Fashion' and 'Toronto Life'.

The offices were AMAZING! I loved the design; exposed brick, hard wood floors and the constant 'click clack' of fabulous shoes walking up and down the corridors.

Deidre looked incredible and immediately whisked me around on a tour of the building introducing me to all her colleagues and showing me all the various departments. It was a haven for all things beautiful.

We then went for an amazing lunch at The South of Temperance, http://www.southoftemperance.com/page1.html Vince's fabulous restaurant down town, just nearby. It was RAMMED with suits and glamourous ladies, most of them tucking into Irish Stew and Guiness in tribute to the iconic St. Patrick's Day.

We ate and talked and talked and talked. We were chatting so much I even forgot to take any photos for the blog! It was a wonderful wonderful lunch and so great to see Deidre and Vince.

After we left the restaurant and said our goodbyes, I had a few moments to kill before the train so I thought what a golden opporutnity to [lock down my credit card] and visit the Eaton Centre, the so called 'Largest Mall in the world'.... http://www.torontoeatoncentre.com/en/Pages/default.aspx

What can I say, it's amazing! I love Collingwood and [this is a good thing] we just have a sprinkling of stores which means that shopping opportunites are limited. Holy Moly, I was hit slap bang in the face with every one of my favorites stores and, quite frankly, I didn't know what to do with myself!

There were shops galore but I displayed considerable constraint just buying a sci-fi book for Darren; I didn't even purchase any make up ( and I was in Sephora!).

I had such a wonderful day and got back to the station with a bag full of magazines and a grin on my face. Thank you Deidre and Vince for an amazing day!

Day Three Hundred and Thirty Three - Go Train

Dear all,

So sorry for the brief hiatus.. Darren and I have been living in a whirl wind being launched into that strange 'in between' stage in moving where we have transferred all of our things into our new place but are yet to have started any serious unpacking. Darren has been working around the clock to get all the technology back in working order; a huge effort on his part.

Anyway, as I am still diving into the deep ocean of immigration paperwork, today I took a mini sojourn to Toronto to visit the Japanese Embassy in order to get my criminal check done.

I am still not entirely comfortable about driving on the highway, so instead, D suggested I drive to Barrie and hop on the 'Go Train'.

http://www.gotransit.com/publicroot/en/default.aspx

The only 'issue' with this wonderful service is that, due to the fact that their primary cliental are commuters.. the train times are 'interesting' at first glance, the latest train leaving at 7:18am... [gulp].

I knew it would be worth it ( no highway + no parking = no stress) so I set off at 5:30am, grabbed a starbucks en route and made my way to Barrie.

It's funny how the inner-city girl comes out in me once in a while as I had [without realizing] left at the very last minute in order to catch the last train which I saw, standing by the platform as I drove [hastily] across the highway. ...

I then had an out-of-body experience as I left my car ran the terminal, threw my card at the ticket machine, pulled out a day pass and threw myself on the train. I had made it!

As we are in the middle of 'March Break' the train was pretty empty and I had a blissful ride into Toronto where, 90 minutes later, I stepped off at Union Station ready for the fabulous day that awaited.

The Japanese embassy was a stone throw from the station ( another major plus point) and I skipped over, with my second coffee in hand, ready for my interview.

http://www.toronto.ca.emb-japan.go.jp/english/english.htm

Despite the horrific events in Japan at the moment, my experience was amazing. I was in and out in 10 minutes; it was amazing.

More fabulous adventures from Toronto in the next post ( as today started so early, I am counting it as a two-day adventure. I think this is valid).

And in other news:

1. Sending a million love vibes to beautiful Japan at this awful time.

Day Three Hundred and Thirty Two - Moving the TV

Dear all,

This post is a tribute to Darren and Vince and their valiant efforts in moving [literally] a ton of furniture this afternoon.

As I waited patiently for the nice man from Rogers to hook up our cable, the boys went backwards and forwards with loads upon load of the larger items of furniture.

One of the more exciting moments was Darren and Vince moving the {humongous} TV, pictures here in stages.

My contribution came in the form of vocal support and being the official door-opener ( a very important role when attempting to scale a heritage mansion in Collingwood)

And they did it! Here is the TV being installed into its new home with me on hand with a cold Corona at the end of it.

Bravo Darren and Vince!

And in other news:

1. Darren, Vince and I then preceded to eat 4 pounds of chicken wings and a large bowl of filo shrimp! I love it!

Day Three Hundred and Thirty One - Ice Barn

Dear all,

Well, there was a glimpse of the Spring Sun this morning as I drove into work and although this brings forth a wealth of joyous emotions, it also introduces a new and interesting challenge to the mix. The Melt.

I nearly had a heart attack when I walked into the barn this afternoon and realized that it now resembled an ice rink. I know horses like to 'play' but I have never seen set of ice skates that would fit a horse and nor would I think they would enjoy the activity.

Luckily, horses are very smart and had all migrated out into the open air as I waded through the ice/ water/sludge to try and figure out if I could do anything.

Lovely Leah, a new volunteer at the inn, was joined me in my quest as we battles the flood to feed the horses.

It was quite amusing trying to 'walk' through the barn. The chickens were all hiding ( apparently they don't like getting their feet wet) and the guineas were trying to steal food from the barrels (this is a '4 season' activity).

My darling Una was on hand to help me out. She braved the ice to chat to me while I was cleaning the barn and in return, I gave her a treat or two.

Hopefully, once we get warmer nights AND warmers days, all the excess water flowing down from the Escarpment will disappear.. Here's hoping!

Day Three Hundred and Thirty - Sliders

Dear all,

Darren wanted to eat some 'meat' today so after a quick furniture run, we stopped off at Montana's to fill our bellies with meat, meat and more meat.

I needed some blog fodder so went in with an open eye and camera at the ready. Montana's was packed; I had never seen it so busy, but we managed to get a table and sat down with knife and fork at the ready.

The very first thing that caught my eye [which is almost always the thing I end up choosing after scanning the entire menu] were the 'Beef Sliders'.

Sliders originated from a small company called White Castle that wanted to make low cost burgers so came up with a unique method of cooking the burger meat that was extremely efficient.

• The meat is cooked over a bed of onions and the steam rising from the onions is used to cook the mini-burgers once on the griddle. This 'new' process was coined as 'steam frying'.

• 
  
• The burger bun ( or ciabatta in our case) is placed on the grill to absorb some of the meaty goodness.

The sliders are DELICIOUS! Darren and I shared 3 ( as an appetizer... I love Canada). We were both in awe of the sliders, they were superb. Juicy, succulent and incredible flavor. And so cute ( I love small things).

We then went on to order a whole plate of beef ribs and pork ribs ( not small) which arrived on the biggest plate I have ever seen. Needless to say, we took home a doogy-bag ( or two..) but it was a fantastic meal. Hurray for Darren's ribs craving which led to a brilliant and hilarious evening!

** please note the 'size' of the beef rib as displayed above.

And in other news:

1. Along with everyone else in the World, I am sending a billion love vibes over to beautiful Japan and hope this magical country recovers from the horrific earthquake and Tsunami as soon as possible.