Good to know, since we live 20 minutes from the Canadian border and hop over to Windsor frequently. We already have to take the papers proving Mr. Ex has custody of his son, since there are different last names involved and it tends to confuse border guards. What's one more sheaf of paperwork?

Speaking of sons, said stepson's birthday party is tonight. There are five 11 and 12 year old boys in my house as I type. Three of them? Are identical triplets. No shit. I'm tempted to run away.

europa, my sister and BIL live in TC and are having guests up for Cherry Festival. I'll tell them to wave and cheer for the goofy blonde on the Queen's court if they go to the parade. They've lived up there for three years now and still get reminded often that they are fudgies.

Woot! I'm a Reality TV Star! Hmmm, can I be one that has already won a million dollars?

Everytime someone else posts about Amelia and I see the name typed out, I get a little thrill.

Firstly, the job... When I use Machiabelly it comes up as Emperor of all the world I didn't bother checking any further.

Secondly borders and immigration. I am Canadian (happy belated Canada day all) and my wife is from Los Angeles. Yes I got an LA woman to come to PEI.

We drove here two years ago, almost to the week. When we crossed the border we didn't get searched, but we did go into Canadian immigration and get all the paper work started and a permit for her (now our) daughter to go to school. They were super nice and very helpful. While there we found out that we needed a paper from the American side to bring her car into the country, so we had to go back across the border to get it.
This little martinet in black leather gloves and mirror shades (well and a uniform of course) yells at us for 15 minutes about how he could seize the car because we took it out of the country and back in without a permit...yes 50 feet out. Well after all that, he sent us in to his supervisor with a note of disgust in his voice. We got in to the office and his boss gives us the form and says "You have 30 days to fill this out, have a great day and safe journey". The parking lot asshole was just that, an asshole. Grrrrrrrrrrrrr

Forward to now, she has a work permit and everything has been cleared but we are waiting on one fingerprint check from the RCMP. The ones that were sent to the FBI...clear. California Sherrifs office...clear CSIS(Our FBI/CIA) clear. So if she can manage not to get her prints at a crime scene, she should be a permanent resident soon.

Congrats Jenex

Edited to fix tags...as usual

My best earworm is the Sanford & Son theme. No words, but lots of cool funked-out sounds. Sing it with me, people!

Airport security really didn't like my iPod at DIA recently....

My best friend once got that White Zombie song "More Human Than Human" stuck in her head for an entire summer. The bad part is that the only part of the song she knew was "More human than human...more human than human...." and she sung it all. the. time.

JenEx Yep, my friends live in AZ and pop across the border to Mexico occasionally. Good luck with the party. Maybe you can help coach me on this step-mom thing....my bf has primary custody of his 5 yr old son. So when we get married; I'll have an instant family.


Yeah, I've found the security agents at DIA are either super easy going or giant asshats. Not a lot of middle ground.

Suzikins, where does your family live in Oklahoma?

For the most part, down in the southeast/south central part of the state. My grandma lives right off of Lake Eufala and my parents/brothers live in the McAlester area. And I have some aunt/uncles in Seminole and Edmond.

I think I have a few relatives around Lake Eufaula, but I'm from the southwest part of the state. It's a lot drier there (although still mighty uncomfortable when you're in track practice at 3:30 p.m. in August).

Speaking of humidity, when my best friend got married in Bullhead City, AZ, my husband and I flew out to be in the wedding. She picked us up in Vegas and immediately apologized for the humidity. We looked blankly at her and said, "What humidity?"

She said, "It's up to 30 percent." We looked blankly at her and said again, "What humidity?"

Hey, all. I've been lurking here for a long time. I'm going to be starting a job in the middle of July with insane hours, so I'm hoping that you all will be able to help me out when I inevitably miss episodes.

With my screen name, I'm a Jungle Explorer. With my real name, I'm a Brain Surgeon. With my non-nickname, I'm a pirate. If I add my initial, I'm a Stripper, and with the whole thing, I'm a dog walker.

My family has Canadian border stories like you don't even know because we're split about fifty-fifty between the two countries. I think my favorite is the time my uncle, a career soldier in the Canadian army, happened to be the person they decided to fully search at random. As in they took went through everything in the car. I suppose that's more comforting than my father's story though. Back in the late 1960's and early '70's, he used to buy pot for his cousins in Ontario because it was cheaper where he lived. If a Canadian border official searched him, they just wouldn't let him in, so he'd drive to the next border town and try again. I think the only time we've ever had anything taken from us was when I was little. We were coming back into the States with a whole bunch of fresh vegetables one of my aunties had given us in the car and a whole lot of liquor and God knows what else in the boat we were towing behind us. My parents are doing their best to keep straight faces, but when the official got to the produce part, they cracked up. We were forced to turn over the veggies.

Papa Tiger had a terrible time getting a security clearance when he was in the Air Force because he couldn't tell them every time he'd ever left the US. He grew up in far northern Minnesota and not only used to cross into Canada by road regularly, but also used to go fishing all over Lake of the Woods, and there aren't border guards out in the middle of the lake!

Re humidity, trust me, nobody who's not in south Louisiana or south Florida knows from humidity. (Well, except for people in southern Japan, maybe, where it gets to 115F -- 45C -- with 90%+ humidity, but I'm talking North America right now.) I have seriously heard our weather people refer to the humidity as "low" when it is at 80%! And they meant it!

On the bright side, it is good for the skin. Hell on the hair, but great for the skin.

Not wanting to get into a schvitzing match, but they don't call Washington, D.C. "Swamp City" for nothing.

Speaking of humidity -- Winter in southwest Florida, the sky was clear and sunny and the humidity was 100%. That's humid. IIRC the temperature was in the 70s.
If there's a way for it to be more humd than that -- it's on another planet!

I agree, Macaddict. And it jacked up all sorts of Foggy Bottom, spread disease in the late 1800s/early 1900s (history dork) from the shoddy construction & lack of sanitation. Building a capital on a swamp? Genius. Spending summer after summer there? I really should have gotten my head examined.

I'm a little late to the ideal job predictor. (I had to go to a funeral today. Not a fun way to spend your day off.) Anyway, with my real name, I'm a Trained Assasin, and with my screen name, I'm a Rabbit Slayer. So I either get to kill people or bunnies. Fun choice.

I think it's a North American thing. While nothing like DC (or, God help us, anywhere in the southern US), Ottawa can get stinking hot and humid in the summer. And as for swamps, well, there's this little tidbit of info about the building of the Rideau Canal, which runs from Kingston to Ottawa:


These days of course it's West Nile that has us all freaked out. Which reminds me, time to put screens on the rain barrels...

I moved to New Orleans from DC, macaddict, and worked right downtown, so believe me, I have an immediate and firsthand comparison of the two. I will grant DC victory on a single-day basis -- but take a 95 degree day with the highest humidity you can imagine feeling, and then repeat that day every single day for a minimum of three months, with no breaks, zero, zip, nada. It's not just one day in New Orleans that kills you, it's the accumulation of days.

Not to mention the sun is seriously more intense down here. So it beats on your head like you don't feel anywhere, again, except for south Florida. Which can make being out in the heat very difficult at first -- although after a year I did get used to it.

So I'm not saying DC is comfortable in the summer, but you at least get an occasional break in the heat and humidity. The humidity here never goes down. I think we've had maybe three days so far in 2004 when the humidity dropped below about 80%. And here Papa Tiger calls me from Minnesota yesterday and tells me it's 75° with 29% humidity. I could cry.

Well the street that the house I grew up in is on was built on a river so I guess it takes all kinds. And people wonder why we have foundation problems.

I forgot to tell my favorite Canadian border story. When I was 15 and my brother was 20 we took a 12 day road trip across America and decided we should hit Mexico and Canada too. Mexico was no problem except for everyone asking him to buy things for his beautiful wife (ewww!). The Canadian border patrol were convinced that we were runaways and were on the verge of calling our parents which would've been a fun phone call at 11:30 at night. We finally convinced them that our parents did in fact know that we were several thousand miles away from home and did trust us with the car and the credit card. It was so not worth the 40 minutes we spent in Canada.

Nothing here, feel free to move on

Real first name: Pirate. Aaaarrrrrrr, mateys!
Real first and last name: Top Gun Pilot.
TwoP name: As the Clock Speaks. Is this a reference to a book or movie that I should know?

I never could understand all the people you hear about who forget they have a knife or gun in their baggage. Who are these idiots? Apparently, my sister-in-law is one of them. My SIL is an intelligent person. She is a private pilot, an airport manager of a small airport, owns her own aviation-related franchise, and flies commercially fairly often. So what does she do? She forgets she has a steak knife in her purse. She had sold her house and had made the last trip to get the last few things the day before her flight. When she found the steak knife (which had been lost for a couple of years), she didn’t want to throw it in a box in the back of her car, so she put it in her purse. So the next day when she goes through security they ask her if she has a knife. Her reply was something like, “Of course not, I know better than….oh, shit!” So she got to talk to the nice policemen and have a report filled out about her. Now we all razz her whenever she gets ready to take a flight. Did you remove your knife? How about your gun? The grenade launcher?

I took a trip to Glacier National Park in 1987 with a friend I had known since grade school. While we were there we decided to take a day-trip to Waterton, Canada. The Canadian border police asked a lot of questions including several about guns, and then explained the consequences of having and not admitting to having said guns. I didn’t really think about it because Sheila denied any knowledge of any guns. So after we had gone about 5 miles my friend and I had this conversation:

Sheila: “I’m really worried. I’m afraid the police will pull us over.”
Unbridled: “Why would the police pull us over – are you speeding or something? Have you been flashing your boobs again?”
Sheila: “No, uh, well, uh, I’m afraid they’ll find my handgun.”
Unbridled: “Your handgun? What handgun? I haven’t seen any handgun. WHAT HANDGUN!?”
Sheila: “The one just under the edge of my seat.”
Unbridled (freaking out completely): “WHAT???
Sheila: “And it’s not registered either.”

This is exactly what happened to me, and I'm certainly no idiot. I don't think.

I had just moved home from college when I flew from New Jersey to Colorado for a vacation. My carry-on bag had last been used to remove the remnants of my dorm room back to my parents' house, and I had thrown all of my silverware into the bottom of the bag at the last minute. A steak knife had apparently gotten lodged between the seams, and I didn't find it until after my vacation when I was back at home unpacking. I realised that they had let me on five flights (three there, two back) with a potentially lethal weapon in my carry-on luggage. I thought to myself that if they didn't do something about their security, somebody was going to eventually do something dangerous.

This all happened in the last week of August, 2001.

To lighten up this security discussion a bit, a friend visited New Orleans for the first time recently and, as so often happens, fell madly in love with the food. So she sacrificed most of her carry-on space to take home three take-out meals from her favorite restaurant. A security guard tried to confiscate her food, saying that with her bag of trinkets and her computer, she had too many carry-ons, so she smushed the computer on top of the trinkets, breaking a number of them in the process, so as to not sacrifice her food.

The fun part? This past week, they arrested nine airport security people for stealing from passengers. And one of them was the woman who tried to take Marge's food away! Hee! Talk about karma, trying to separate a woman from her gumbo!

You don't mess with people's food, man. That crap comes back to bite you in the ass!

Since we're coming back around to travel related discussions, I have a question for y'all. A friend and I are planning a trip to either Scotland or Iceland, and I'm wondering about the car rental situation. I've heard that automatics are kinda rare. Is that true? Would we even be able to rent a car with solely American driver's licenses or would we need international ones (or is that just for extended periods of time)? I've never been on an international vacation where I planned on driving. Usually, the object of vacation is to have someone else do it!

An international driver's license is something you can pick up for about $10 at any AAA office. Not a big deal.

As for renting cars with automatic, I rented one in Ireland some years back but it did cost a bit more. Well worth it, however, since I was recovering from an ankle injury at the time and couldn't handle a clutch without pain.

This basically happened to me too. My carry-on case was also my bookbag for school, which means I always kept a fork in a side pocket in case I decided to get a fruit cup or something from the vending machines. I forgot it was in there, and got busted in New Orleans (Hi Mama Tiger!). They asked me if I had a fork in there, and I denied it ("A fork? No. Why would I have a fork in my carry-on bag?"). And then they pulled it out (tricky bastards!). My reaction: "Oh. Uh ...." I stood there for a solid minute trying to remember why I would even have had that in there, then the light bulb went on and I could explain. Of course they had to confiscate it. And of course my mom gave me serious shit about that for the rest of the trip and any other trip I have taken with her since. The thing that annoyed me the most was that it was found in New Orleans on my return trip. Why didn't the crack team at O'Hare notice the metal object in my carry-on? Huh? This was in October '01; they should have known better. I could have taken over the plane with that.

Whereas the crack team in New Orleans has repeatedly missed loaded guns carried aboard planes, fake bombs carried on to be hidden in airplane bathrooms to prove how bad security is, etc. Yup, makes me feel safe when I fly outta here.

Of course, they did confiscate the scissors in a manicure kid I'd just bought, that had blades less than 1/2" long. What a lethal weapon!

I have this Swiss army knife fetish. I must own half a dozen, and normally I have one in each purse. So far when flying, I've always remembered to move the one from the purse I'm carrying into my checked bag. (Speaking of which, I'm gone Wed-Sat next week, just in case anyone notices my absence on these boards.) But once, I just did carry-on and got busted at security. Another time, pens and my wallet were juxtaposed in the x-ray machine viewer so that they couldn't tell what the coins and pens were. So they went into my purse to look. This was on the same trip where I had odd-shaped wind chimes my niece had given me, and I'd put them on top of my carry-on in case they looked odd in the x-ray machine and the TSA types wanted to look. No, the wind chimes and carry-on were fine, it was the purse that needed inspecting. I always find these situations mildly amusing.

I don't travel much. As a matter of fact the only times I've been on airplanes were:

In the summer of 1992--flight from Chicago to Mexico City, a few flights within Mexico, and the return from Puerto Vallarta to Chicago. This was a high school Spanish class trip.

AND THEN...

I managed to stay away from airplanes completely until I got a call from my brother in the summer of 2001 telling me he was getting married--in Las Vegas (I live in Wisconsin)--on September 10, 2001 (said date meaning nothing at the time.) Anyway, I started a new job in June of 2001, so by the time the wedding rolled around, I didn't have any vacation time to work with. I did manage to finagle a couple of days off so I could fly out Sunday, September 9, with a return flight on Tuesday, September 11.
So, that Sunday, my husband (who couldn't come with me) dropped me off at the airport. As we made our way through the terminal, (after whizzing through security) we somehow got on the subject of all of the different implements we'd heard of that could get smuggled on to airplanes--different blades, guns, etc... (Little did we know!) Why I was a willing participant in that discussion, I still don't know. I wasn't really letting the subject get to me, but then just as I was about to board the plane I burst into tears--my stepdaughter later told me that maybe I knew something bad was going to happen.
So I spend my brother's wedding day (Monday, 9/10) in Vegas, went to bed in the hotel that night fully expecting to fly out the next morning...only to be woken up by my brother's urgent phone call, telling us to "Turn on the news! A plane just flew into the WTC!" Well, as the realization of the whole ordeal began to dawn on us all, the panic began to set in. For myself, all I could think was, If there are other planes out there, the last place I want to be is on the Strip in Vegas! We were staying at the Aladdin, and I needed to get out of there. Apparently so did most of the rest of my family (the bride and groom refused to cut their honeymoon short--I don't know how they could stay so level-headed on that particular day)...thus beginning a whole new travel adventure--our heisting of two "Las Vegas only" rental cars to carry us back to Chicago. Now that was one HELL of a trip. I'm sure there are other crazy "I got stranded on 9/11" stories out there...

Sorry this was so long! I actually condensed it quite a bit!

My last trip to California, I was flying from Oakland to Long Beach and I got stopped by security at the ticket check-in and had my checked bags x-rayed and hand-searched; at the first security gate, where I was wanded and my carry-on bag was hand-searched; and at the gate, where I had to de-belt and de-shoe and have my carry-on hand-searched again. There were three other people who had to go through the same thing. Turns out we all were flying one-way, which I guess must trigger all sorts of DOHs alarms.

This was probably before a former cow-orker of mine started working security at O'Hare - she had an uncanny ability to carry on a constant, clacking conversation while performing repetitive menial tasks that required a knack for spotting odd details.

The month after she got hired by the TSA, she spotted some guy breaking security and got a major commendation. Nobody else noticed it at all. O'course, she's probably driving her current cow-orkers crazy...

If anyone has the burning curiousity to see my home town (well only about 1/3 of it) here is a link to a streaming web cam. My house is in the part not shown, but it does sweep by a couple of bars, so it is possible you can see me some time.

I can almost see my house from here.

Hey Machiabelly, you can almost see my old house too! TOSH, Class of 198...nevermind.

I have only been in Summerside 5 years. But we may have been rivals at school.
Colonel Grey Class of 1983.
Couldn't have been sports rivals though, as I was couch potato long before it was a level at TWOP. I was on Reach For The Top Provincial championship team in 1983 though.

Hi! I'm here to introduce myself since I'm all excited about the premiere of TAR5 next week. My sister JenEx got me addicted last year. Which of course makes me the soon to be aunt of Amelia. I can't wait! Anywho, I'm 24, married and I'm a pastry chef. I have two dogs, Faith and Buffy, and three cats. Buffy's adorable as you can see, so's Faith but I can't get her pic to work right now. I'm a huge Buffy fan obviously, I just attended my 2nd convention this month. I guess that's enough of an intro for now. I hope ya'll don't mind me contributing every so often. Happy 4th!

I'm one year older than you, and I got cut from the Reach for the Top team, but I did play a mean flute in the band.

Welcome redheadeauntie!

I have been to New Orleans and there is one thing that I can never forget. That was the Creole Bread Pudding Soufflé at Commander's Palace. Every time cheap flights from LA to NOLA come up I dream up a quick trip to go fetch that memory. It would be worth the trip. Mama Tiger do you concur?

A quick trip to New Orleans to eat anything at Commander's Palace is worth it. Or any one of the other five or six Brennan's restaurants (of which CP is the flagship), all of which have equally delectable food with equally delectable service. We ate at Mr. B's a couple weeks ago and about died in food heaven. And Palace Café is also one of our favorites. At both of those, the food is about half the price of CP, but indistinguishable in quality.

Okay, so now I'm curious, I went to their website. Turns out that they have a Commander's Palace in Vegas. And the Soufflé is on that menu too. If I was going to Vegas next Tuesday I could have it. But, no, I've already got tix so I can visit JFK's last motorcade and eat pizza.

But wait! The Brennans just announced that they were opening their very first non-New Orleans restaurant, in the LA area! How can this be?Color me confused.

Color me hungry. Mama Tiger please tell me more. I will be in heaven if they have the Soufflé right here in LA.

I'll have to check with my friend who carried the food home -- she's the one who told me about it. Warning: If it's anything like Commander's Palace, be prepared for prices that even for LA are steep. (They are for New Orleans, too, but the Old Money that patronizes that restaurant doesn't need to worry about it. We went there for lunch -- for two, $70 with tip, no alcohol; dinner runs upwards of $150 per, I think -- and the Ladies Who Lunch were out in full force. I didn't know there were still so many of them in existence!)

Anyway, I'll let you know what my friend says.

Kind of late on both counts, but using the Job Predictor:

For the name I go by in real life? President.

For my TWoP screenname? Superhero.

For my full name?

Sewage worker.

Any wonder I go by something else?

And as far as earworms, my senior year in college, my friends and I used to torture each other by walking up each other and innocently singing, "And all I wanna do...". We'd inevitably scream because just that little bit and then you could not get the damn song out of your head for days. So I still think "All I Wanna Do" by Sheryl Crow is the all-time earworm champ. And I've got a feeling I'm not the only one. At least until the sun comes up over Santa Monica Boulevard.

...is have some fun. I get the feeling, I'm not the only one!

I'm late to the discussion, but since I haven't posted since September, it's better than nothing.

My ideal job...

With the name I use at work: Mermaid;
With my full name as per my biorth certificate: A God; and,
With my screen name: a Soap Actor (ie. River City)

As to bras and underwires, underwires coming out and sticking out in the middle are usually due to bras that don't fit properly. The issue of the hump caused by the underwires, as it was explained to me, is that the band size is too big and the cup size too small. I recently (well, a year and a half ago) found the world's best lingerie shop for large-busted women and they solved the problem for me. Now the underwire sits against my sternum between my breasts and never budges, and my bra never rides up my back.

If you're interested the shop is online here. The first time I bought anything from them I was in the UK on business and spent an afternoon being fitted and trying things on. Now I either mail-order or get Zron to go when he's changing planes in London to save duty and other taxes. That said, they will send you their catalogue, the fitting guide enclosed is good, and they are happy to take back anything that doesn't fit well.

Wait, wait, wait. Zron buys your bras for you?

I think I've got a summer project.

To introduce an entirely new subject, apparently this must be a popular shirt-folding technique in Asia -- there are these two different videos showing the same thing. And it really works -- I managed to get a shirt folded right the first time! How do people dream up this stuff? (On the second video, you'll have to click the link in the center of the page to get to the actual video.)

That was oddly fascinating - and I have a tonne of laundry to fold today.
Now if only they could come up with a similar method for fitted sheets...

Wait! Wouldn't that make a fabulous detour for The Amazing Race? Make them watch the video and then fold 50 shirts or something... kind of like the laundry detour!

We were going to take a hike in western Virginia (not quite in West Virginia) today, but got flash-flooded out en route. If you see a car of the same make and model pulled over after going through a huge puddle, and then your battery light goes on, it's a sign not to continue. We don't go sit on wet grass with mobs of our fellow citizens around us to watch fireworks that might not happen, and we can't agree on a movie (so what else is new?), so I think we're going to watch the DVD of the original Around the World in 80 Days this evening, possibly with Thai carry-out.

If I recall, the conversation went something like this:

"You want me to go to a bra store that doesn't sell anything smaller than a D-cup. During the day. When it will be full of customers. Um, okay. Can I pack a lunch?"

To be clear, when I was ay the shop last year I found 2 styles of bra that fit perfectly. Unfortunately, at 35 pound sterling each, I couldn't afford to buy that much. Plus I did buy a tank top with built in underwire that is fabulous.

In any event, this year when Zron was going to Athens with a four hour layover in London, I gave him a list and sent him to Ealing Broadway to pick things up for me. In the end I save over 30% between tax and duty.

Mama Tiger, I've never seen that, but that's cool! I'd do it, but I like my shirts folded a specific way. I would love to see that as a detour! Or maybe a FF... I think it'd rank under champagne waltzing for best FF ever!

Sorry to hear your plans got flooded out, DariaG, but I don't think you can ever go wrong with Thai food.