scuba DUDE, too!

Returning to TO was a bit of a letdown as the tropical wisdom that sluiced within me seemed to postpone a lot of my Christmas spirit (even if I was humming Feliz Navidad, Caribbean-style), not only that but we had to say goodbye to Eveline of AT, a Chilean marvel, and to endure 4 hours of waiting at the airport in St. Martin ---- everything hot and closed since it was late in the evening and there were no breezes, clean empty benches, or beers to be found (unless you were seated near TC, that traveller of Wobbly Legs and Stuffed Carry-On Baggage fame). Air Transat, invariably late, invariably incommunicative, actually provided a nice plane, something a a lot newer and roomier than what we flew down on, although they did try to detain Herr Ziggy a few times on the way through the ticket line, boarding pass check, blah blah blah, how many times do you wish to see my identification? It's here somewhere... Now I know he is quite the ringer for a terrorist and I KNOW security is of vital importance to us all but anyone wary of the anti-cyclonic "Pops' probably needs a different modus operandi. Greetings Gustav of Gestapo --- red alert red ALERT!! Your papers. Code Orange! ummmm... excuse me Sir but you won't be allowed on this plane even though you've shown us your passport three times already and boarding pass twice! Bewildered Tiger, Uncomfortable Tiger? Draggin On... Pause. Pause. But Miss I'm with him, he says. And yes, that's been said many times, fingers pointing, eyes belaboured -- upon me, innocent me, nodding, and certainly it's almost always true --- they are with me, and I am innocent, but alors - perhaps this kerfuffle only added to the levity of such an exhausting farcical ad-venture (return?)... here we were already more than an hour late and now they were implicating "US" (Pops and me) in any further delay. [Note: we found the troublesome boarding pass moments after take-off, but by then they didn't care about it, want it, acknowledge it.]

Alas, the flight / ride home was decent despite the pluggedness developing within my ear. The roast beef hockey puck sandwich wasn't as bad as first feared, the cranberry juice was good. I slept for a bit and managed to awaken on descent - my inner ears a little turbulent, and painful, considering I couldn't equalize! Celine I'm trying my best, really. Please don't make that quizzically disappointed face.

Early morning (it was after 230 when we gated) was spent waiting for 'the luggage', carousel 8, then 7, do I hear 6? There's a problem with the... loudspeaker? But then, soon enough, we're driving to Midland in a fashionable late-night snowstorm, as tired as I have ever been. And the only time I've ever actually felt I might fall asleep at the wheel. Did I mention I had been out partying the night before with the cousin of my friend (the above mentioned TC) until about 3 in the morning and then had woken up at 630 and decided to go for a run in an attempt to cure my hangover. No nap the rest of the day either, although I did get to relaxing at the beach in the afternoon, horizontal, with The Girls. On the highway I managed okay, weaved a little, here, there, but didn't crash, and so we arrived "home" to white-glazed fanfare around 540 am. Sleep! Sleep!

That night we celebrated Our Girl's 13th birthday (nice gifts) and then it was back to work for a few fresh unpleasantries, neffing job. Inbetween I smiled of course, sanguine and toothily, and did enough shopping to pass through the festive occasions, and to make the receivers of said shopping a lot happier than they might have expected to be; apres ca it was 10 more days away, north again, to celebrate something, everything, the ear-thing, babysitting?... oh my doesn't it seem like eons ago that my vacation was born... Where's that confounding beach? Those mystifying girls? The sun, the breeze, gravity, Lauren --- Inspiration!

Au plaisir mes amis ------------------ MIKA*