Happy Birthday, Dad!

We drove up to Vancouver for dad's birthday (Saturday). The border crossings both ways were really fast and easy. It was nice to see ALL lanes of the crossing into Canada open in preparation for the Olympics.

It was a good if not short trip. I always enjoy going up and visiting my parents and spending time with them and now with them living in Vancouver, it's so much more convenient. Much more preferable is the 2 1/2 hour drive up than the old 4-5 hour ordeal of not just the flight to Edmonton (itself only 1 1/2 hours), but of sitting, waiting at the airport, going through customs, more waiting, baggage checks, security checks, arranging for rides to and from the airport, etc, etc, ad nauseum. And even more so now what with all the gear we have to bring with Ethan.

We had dad's birthday dinner at Sun Siu Wah in Vancouver. It was truly excellent. I cannot describe how tasty the (gigantic!) oysters were, or how tender the sweet and sour beef was or how attentive the service was. A pity that no one thought to whip out a cell phone to take any pictures of the food! Big thank you to Perry A. for the recommendation! We vowed to try the Richmond one next time and hopefully make it for dim sum.

Since Vancouver has gone into "lock down" for the games (i.e. you can't really even drive into downtown anymore), we took the Skytrain into downtown and this was Jonathan's first real venture on this train (he was too young to remember the last time he took it). He just loved it! We managed to get the front car on the trips so he could look out onto the track and see other oncoming trains on the other tracks. He spent the whole time making "Thomas" faces and whenever an oncoming train approached, he gave it a 'Thomas' name (like James, or Gordon, or Henry).

Just before we boarded the Skytrain, we were at Metrotown mall to do some quick shopping/lunch, and ride the little train they had in the mall that Jonathan rode 5 times at Christmas. Alas, we arrived *just* in time for it to close for the afternoon break. Jonathan looked so disappointed. But I then told him that we were going to go ride a "big train" and he perked right up. I'm glad the Skytrain delivered!

We picked up our tickets for the Olympics (men's ice hockey: Team Canada vs. Team Switzerland - go Canada!) without a hitch and now anxiously await our return trip in about 2 weeks when Dina and I will attend our first ever Olympics.

- b