Feliz Navidad!

Merry Christmas from Mexico! At $15usd/day for wifi I will only be posting a limited amount. The trip has been good so far although it is not always relaxing having kids with you on a trip like this. So far the focus has been on keeping the kids rested, fed and alive rather than on relaxation, lounging and book reading by the pool. We did an outing to the xplor park for zip lining, atving, and cave rafting but most of our time has been spread between life guarding at the beach and life guarding at the pool. The weather has been a very agreeable 28 degrees most days. I will try to upload a few pictures from my big camera a little later but for now the ones of us in our helmets at xplor will have to do.

Bring Back The Trough

One of my fondest memories of going to watch the Canucks at the old Pacific Coluseum in Vancouver as a youngster was going to the bathroom and using 'the trough'. Instead of individual urinals, the bathrooms were fitted with a cool mosaic tile trough that stretched around the entire perimeter of the bathroom with a drain at one end. If you found yourself near the drain end, you could watch a veritable river of pee course past you carrying racing cigarette buts. It was an exciting introduction to Newtons third law of drinking: Every beer you drink must at some point exit your body as urine. This urinal-free system maximized the number of simultaneous users meaning shorter wait times for the bathroom. It seems fans in Winnipeg had the same thing and are lobbying for it's return. Long live the trough!

No Departamento De Emergencias

I had a meeting with Dr. Buie this morning in his clinic. As usual there was a big line up and I was one hour late in getting in to see him. As an experienced user of Alberta Health Care this was no surprise to me. However the man sitting across from me was constantly huffing and puffing and looking at his watch as if that was going to speed things up. I suppose it's logical to think that the medical system works like the rest of the world; you make an appointment and, within reason, you expect to be seen at that time if not before. But that simply is not the case at the hospital. There should be a disclaimer when you are given a time to meet with the doctor: "The time you have been given to meet with your doctor is our best guess. We cannot guarantee this time nor do we take any responsibility for repercussions resulting from a tardy meeting. Please plan to spend at least 3 hours at the hospital for this appointment although the actual meeting may only take 10 minutes. Bring lunch if necessary. Thank you for your understanding." Waiting an hour doesn't even phase me now. I expect it and come prepared to read the paper, look over some emails or listen to some music. It's relaxing actually.

The meeting with Dr. Buie was great. We agreed that the surgery was a success. The drain is out of the bottom end now and the only drain I have left (in the top where my old drain was) is clamped off. So far all the drainage is going into the rectum as planned which means in the new year I could be completely drain free! He volunteered to pull it out today but I suggested we leave it in until January since I'm going to be away in Mexico for a week and on Vancouver island for 10 days between now and then. It's a little bit of insurance. The last thing I want is to find myself in the departamento de emergencias in Cancun on Christmas day. That would not be fun.

Unfortunately as good as I'm doing, the kids are not doing so well. They have both traded off some form of the flu. Carly spent Thursday night ralfing her guts out and missed school on Friday. Andrew seemed fine until last night when he spent the night puking. Carly is a little better at the whole thing. She can feel it coming and can usually manage to get it into a bucket or the toilet. Andrew not so much. He kept walking into our room last night and throwing up on the floor. He would do that, then feel better and help himself to a big glass of water. 20 minutes later that would end up on the floor and the cycle would repeat itself. Poor little guy couldn't understand what was happening. In the end Penny got smart and put some towels down on his chosen puke spot to prevent carpet saturation. It seemed to have worked but may have been too little to late. A thorough steam cleaning is in order. This morning he is doing fine and is happy to be cuddled up with mom on the couch watching a movie.

One week until Mexico and less than two weeks until Christmas. Can't wait!

Dan or Mike, you choose.

Today marks two weeks post-surgery. For the most part I'm back to normal. My biggest complaint is the extra drain I got during the surgery that I have to put up with until Monday. I will restrain myself from providing details that may make the reader nauseous, but suffice it to say I have constant leakage and have become a fan of 'Always', especially the big ones with wings. I go to see Dr. Buie on Monday. At that point he will remove that superfluous drain and it should be back to business as usual.

Andrew and I went to get hair cuts earlier in the week. We go to a barber shop run by a great group of guys from Lebanon. It's always fun and Andrew loves going (they have candy and tv). But for some reason they think my name is Mike when, as you know, my name is Dan. I have attempted to correct them on two occasions but something gets lost in translation. They say "hows it going Mike?" and I say "actually it's Dan". But they just keep on calling me Mike. Maybe I say it too fast or it sounds like something else? It's gone on for so long that it's too late to say anything or correct them outright. Isn't it? One day Andrew will be watching me get my hair cut instead of sucking on his lolly and watching treehouse and when they call me Mike he will be totally confused. How do you explain that one? Then someone will ask him on the street "What's your dad's name?" and his reply will be "Dan or Mike". Huh?