Oh, Canada! (Summer Vacation 2006, Part One)

Our Canadian home in Eastern Ontario is the same general location my grandfather Claude started going back in the 30's. I can tell you many stories about my grandfather, but were not going to get into that just yet. For now I'll tell you that he was a firefighter and an avid fisherman.

One year he and his friend Bill drove up from Cleveland on the insistence of another friend of Bill to find the ultimate Canadian fishing paradise. (Yes, he was also a "Friend of Bill" as a matter of fact, but that's not part of this story either, stop distracting me!) Anywho...they all started coming up every year and bringing their families and we all became friends, all us yankees from the states there. (Some of my more delicate Southern readers might take offense at being referred to as a "yankee." Fear not, to a Canadian redneck, all US Americans are yankees and therefore worthy of spite, if not contempt.) We also made friends among the locals, but the bond among the former Clevelanders was forged in the shared trauma of the 18 - 20 hour drives and of course, being from Cleveland. (A traumatic experience to which I can attest, having been born in Cleveland myself in 1963. Fortunately my parents immediately remedied the situation by moving to Detroit when I was 6 months old, where I was immersed in Motown till I was 3-and-a-half. But I digress.)

Claude had three children, including my mother. TG was the only one of her siblings to produce offspring. Fortunately, Bill had two daughters, both of whom started reproducing right about the same time. Thus I was part of the third generation where you still see me today, or rather last week.

This photo is not complete in any way. These are all the daughters, the three brothers are missing. Those who know us will probably be able to identify everyone in these pictures. If you don't know us, I guess you don't need to know, I will do you the favor of letting you know that we are arranged by age, L to R youngest to oldest. I'm the fat chick. Also, four of the women there are sisters, the other is a cousin.

The woman to my left is my oldest friend in the world, KC. I think that's a safe nickname for her. When I met her she spoke mostly Japanese. She is a woman of many stories that we are also not here to tell today. However, I should tell one on her because she is a wild woman. She had a class to teach on Saturday morning so she drove up on Wednesday and went back on Friday! Insane! That's like a nine hour drive! Good thing she had help!

Here we are making our monster faces!
I think I like this one best! I should point out that this picture was taken *after* the pictures of the 4th generation below. So we had recently engaged in some practice making our monster faces.

The 4th generation.
All the children of the women above plus a couple extra for good measure because you can never have too many kids around, so we like to bring in reinforcements!

At this point, they’re starting to drift off; even Miss Lu is giving me a look. Enough with the camera already, Mom! Let’s go back to the lake!

So we did!

Here's M, making a face for the camera.
Thanks for playing “Funny Faces on Vacation,” M!

Later on I got a picture of this stud-muffin! Humina, humina! He looks like his name should be Hans and he should talk with an accent like the guy on the VW commercials, doesn’t he?Oh sure, he's hot! But remember Ladies; he has one speed and it's mosey. This is why I? Do all the driving. Ahem.

At some point we wisely decided to copy our friends and leave a day early. Something about having that one day to chill between vacation and work really appealed to us. When the early departure plans were announced, uproar ensued!

To be continued…

(Editors note: I’ve been trying to upload the photos for this post for over a week! Blogger is very annoying! This, and only this, is the reason this post needs to be continued. Apparently I need to divide it up. Humph!)