Technical Difficulty

I have just been informed that people are unable to view the Old Faithful videos that I had previously posted. Well I think that I have fixed the problem. When I set up the youtube account, I set each video to private so that the videos of Jesse and my parents would not be accessible for everyone in the world to see. I guess it slipped my mind that that would mean people going to the blog wouldn't be able to see them either. So I've changed the setting and now Jesse talking with a sweatshirt on his head is open to the public. I'm sure he'll love that.

The Effects of Radiation

For anyone who watched 24 last night you will know that at nuclear bomb detonated in the LA area. Don't worry, Jesse and I are fine, we didn't feel the blast. The subsequent radiation, however, may have taken a toll.

Jesse's New Job

Job Title: Environmentalist

Position Description:

• wake up at 10 am
• read An Inconvenient Truth: the planetary emergency of global warming and what we can do about it by Al Gore
  
• blame everything on global warming
• stay at home, therefore not driving your car, therefore not burning fuel, therefore not creating pollution and thus doing your part to save the environment

Amazing Juggling Finale

sorry, now that I figured out how to upload videos, it's hard to resist. enjoy.

Old Faithful Footage

Now you can imagine that you were there too....well kind of. This was just the geiser warm-up. The actual eruption lasted about 5 minutes and the water shot up a lot higher.

Sue's Commentary on Old Faithful

about as deep as you can get when commenting on a geiser.

Ed's Commentary of Old Faithful

Jesse's commentary of Old Faithful

please look past the sweatshirt on his head

Zuma Beach

Today Jesse and I made use of the awesome weather and took a little trip to the Santa Monica Mountains. The first park we came to , Malibu Creek State Park, was closed to the public due to the high fire hazard. We were then directed to another park, Paramount Ranch, which just so happened to be where Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman was filmed. The hike was alright, pretty hot and the landscape was dry (a lot different from the last hike we were on in Kelowna). We made a wrong turn and took the wrong trail which made us walk along this really narrow path leading us to a fence. But it was still fun.




We then drove to Zuma beach which is in Malibu to hang out for the rest of the afternoon. Since it was a Tuesday, there were hardly any people there which was great.




Jesse and James Herriot hanging out in the sand.

Christmas Vacation

We left on the morning of Thursday, December 21st to head north to Kelowna, BC to visit relatives for the holidays. On our first day we drove about 9 hours which brought us to Weed, California. What was interesting was that there was snow in Northern California. Weed itself was boring. We stayed in a cheap motel for the night and left fairly early in the morning and thus did not really take in the sights. In the morning our windshield was covered with ice and since we did not have a scraper with us (being residents of southern California) we had to use the lid of a tupperware container instead.

The most notable part of Weed (in that it is featured on the town sign and in all of the postcards) would have to be Mount Shasta. We drove past it on our way out of town the next morning.
Our next day of driving was about as long as the first. We quickly left California, and drove through Oregon making our way to Washington. We spent the night in Cashmere, Washington which was another small town. Other then walking to a restaurant to get some pizza we didn't see much. The next morning we woke up to about a foot of snow on the jetta. Luckily we bought a scraper back in Weed.

Our last day of driving was short, only about 5 hours. Getting across the border was very quick and easy. The only issue being the fact that Jesse and I provided different answers for some of the questions. As a result, we had to throw out some apples before entering Canada. The entire trip took us about 21 hours, 20 hours and 58 minutes of which were spent without any accidents. When we made it to my Uncle's block, we missed our turn and thus decided to loop around at the end of the street. Well, the end of the street was icy, and our loop ended up sliding into the curb. At first we thought we were just stuck when we weren't able to back up. Then we noticed the top of the front right wheel sticking out at about a 45 degree angle from the car. Since we were so close to our destination, we walked up to the house. We couldn't find the hidden key (which we found out later was because they forgot to hide it), so we called the number we were given of a neighbour. We also called a tow truck. Luckily enough there was a volkswagen dealer nearby so Jesse and Jim (the neighbour) took the jetta to the dealership to get fixed and I fell asleep on the couch. A week later, the Jetta was fixed with a new driveshaft and rim.
Christmas in Kelowna was great. On Christmas day we drove up into the mountains to play hockey which was a lot of fun and the rest of our time was pretty much spent reading, playing board and card games, and eating, which just so happen to be some of our favourite things. The best part was that there was a couple of inches of snow the whole time we were there. Jesse and I realized how lucky we are in that up until December 21st we had sunny weather, then we got snow for Christmas (unlike Ontario), and then we got to come back to sunny weather again. I should add that it is currently 28 degrees here in Northridge.
The only pictures that I took while in Kelowna were on our hike. So here they are. In the first one you can see how excited Jesse was about going on a hike.
Alex looks pretty excited too.
There was lots of snow and it was kind of cold but it was good to be outside.
Jesse wore his new Weed California toque.
Uncle Mike and Alex.


This is a picture of the Penney residence which could be seen from the top of the hill. It may be hard to tell but there is a giant house sort of in the centre (a little to the right) which is currently being built. We stayed in the house to the left of that one.

I'm not exactly sure what Jesse is doing in this picture but I can't complain because at least it shows he's making an effort to look like he's enjoying himself when I take a picture of him.
Although it seems like he enjoys trying to push me down the hill the most.

We came across two deer on our journey, although I only got a picture of one.
On December 31st, Jesse and I left Kelowna and drove to Vancouver which is about 4 hours west. The drive was really nice, most of the scenery looking like this...
We stayed at Meghan's house in Burnaby. For New Year's eve we went to a pub on Bowen Island to hear my cousin Kali play in a band. It was a lot of fun, good music, free food, and I even got Jesse to dance...once. We stayed until 2:30 am and since the next ferry off the island wasn't leaving for a couple of hours, Jesse and I slept in the trunk of the Jetta with the back seats pushed down. We thought the next ferry was leaving at 6:30 am, but since it was New Year's day, it didn't leave until 8:30. When we got back to Meghan's, we slept all day and then went to McDonald's for supper. What a great way to start off the new year.
The next day we went downtown to tour around the city for a bit. We walked around China town and somehow made it to East Hastings which is supposedly crack central. We were informed of this by two policemen who stopped us and asked us if we were lost. So, we quickly left that area. We did some more touring when Meghan got back from Ontario. We saw Granville Island and did some shopping (you can just imagine how much Jesse enjoyed himself) but then it got really windy and cold so we went home. Much to Jesse's delight (he was worried since Meghan doens't have cable) we got to watch the World Junior hockey final at Kali's house. Below is a picture of us all chearing when Canada won. Well, it was a picture of us pretending to chear about 10 minutes after they won. If everyone had been looking at the TV and not at the camera it would have seemed more realistic.
Jesse and I left for the sunny south on Saturday, January 6th at about 9 am. Jesse was even happy to get back to California and the warm weather, I think he may be going soft. Our trip can be summerized as followed:

• 1 hour spent driving to the border (this normally only takes 30 minutes but we were trying to find a Tim Horton's)
• rest of trip complaining about how we didn't find a Tim Horton's
• 1.5 hours spent at the border (1 hour in line and half an hour waiting to get our papers stamped inside)
• breakfast at a gas station because we didn't find a Tim Horton's
• after much debate and Jesse winning, deciding to drive along the Pacific Coast Highway through Oregon (because when would we ever do it again?)
• 1.5 hours spent getting to the coast
• supper in the car in the parking lot of a grocery store in Lincoln City, Oregon
• 5 minutes to realize that driving along the coast was a bad choice because a) there were too many stop lights b) it would add about 8 hours onto our trip and c) by the time we got there it was too dark to even see the coast thus negating the whole point of the trip
• 20 minutes driving along the coast
• 1.5 hours driving back to the I-5
• needing fuel in Eugene, Oregon (if we hadn't gone on the 4 hour detour to the coast we would not have needed it yet), stopping at a gas station that just so happened to sell biodiesel and doing our part to save the environment.....PRICELESS

Filling up with biodiesel had to be Jesse's favourite part of the trip, and I mean the whole trip just not the drive home. The rest of the drive was pretty boring because it was dark. We decided to save money and drive straight through the night. All it took was two can's of redbull and some lifesavers. We made it back to Northridge at 8:15 am Sunday morning, so the entire trip took less than 24 hours, including Tim Horton searches, border waiting, rest stops and detours. When we got back we went straight to bed.