A FANTASTIC Thanksgiving weekend

Well, it's been a few days, but I'm finally getting a post up after my trip home for Thanksgiving weekend.

I left Peace River last Friday and drove down to Grande Prairie. After driving right past it five times I finally found the church building. I was also there a few hours early, but because I had so much trouble finding it I was terrified to go very far in case I couldn't find my way back. So I sat in the van in the parking lot and read until Ryan, the youth pastor for the Salvation Army in Grande Prairie arrived. I spent 5 hours with the youth group there, playing a bunch of games (most of which were full-contact). It was good to see a couple of friends and to meet some of the other members of that group. I was staying at Ryan's place for the night before my 7am flight to Calgary via Edmonton. We got there about 1am, then talked until about 3am. All in all I got about 2 hours of sleep before getting up at 5:30 to go to the airport.

The flights were uneventful, and I arrived in Calgary right around 11am. Flying was much more comfortable and a lot quicker than taking the bus. It cost a bit more, but I think it was worth it. The entire family went out for Vietnamese food for lunch. I also got some shopping in during the day - I had to pick up some items for our Sunday School in Peace River, as wells as a few things for myself. I had dinner with a friend at Eastside Mario's and we went and saw Open Season - pretty funny. Worth seeing - not sure if I'd buy it though.

Sunday, went to both church services and heard the same sermon twice. Dad, it was good - but twice? We had ham dinner for lunch and I went for a walk in a nature park near my parent's house with my dad in afternoon. I treated my parents to Chinese food and rented a movie for dinner.

Monday we had our Thanksgiving turkey dinner - turkey (of course), stuffing, sweet potatoe, mash potatoe, homemade cranberry sauce - I'm sure I'm missing something. We were going to have turnip but it took a long time to cook and wasn't ready until after we'd finished eating. There were three choices for pie - lemon merange (I'm sure that isn't spelled right), raspberry (actually it was some sort of rhubarb, cream cheese pie or something, but it was supposed to be raspberry), and a small pumpkin pie (that was for me mainly seeing as no one else in the family likes pumpkin pie). We also had Amanda, Phil's girlfriend with us. Phil was at her house for Thanksgiving dinner there on Sunday. They timed that well.

Monday night Dad and I went to the Calgary Flames game. They were hosting the San Jose Sharks. The tickets we were given to the game were excellent - 13 rows up from centre ice. Very expensive tickets, in an area of the Saddledome I didn't even know existed. The Flames didn't play very well at all - a lot of sloppy passes that resulted in the Sharks having too many good opportunities. The final score was 4-1 for the Sharks. I must say that the Flames did play an impressive last four minutes though.

I didn't fly out until Tuesday morning at 11:35am, so I had some extra time with my family. Dad and I got two games of chess in during the weekend - we each won one. I also got a much needed haircut Tuesday morning on the way to the airport.

The biggest suprise of the extended weekend came when I got the airport in Calgary and tried to check-in. The airline agent couldn't find me on the flight I was expecting to take that day. After doing some searching the agent discovere why. My father, being the loving father he is, who misses his eldest son so much, had booked me on a flight a week later. The Westjet agent waived the reservation change fee, but did have to charge the difference in cost for the flights and I was able to fly home on time.

Once I arrived in Grande Prairie I realised that I had completely forgotten to arrange for someone to pick me up at the airport, so I took a cab back to the Salvation Army church where the van had been parked over the weekend. I then drove to the Salvation Army Family Services Centre in Grande Prairie to pick up a load of food that they were sending back with me to help out our Family Services in Peace River. I managed only to miss my turn once this time.

I then made the two hour drive back to Peace River where I unloaded the food and then went off to the weekly drills with the fire department. This week they were working on their skills for fighting propane fires - that was interesting to watch. It took them quite a while to put out a propane fire, but it was amazing to watch them advance on the fire until the were only centimetres from the flames. The strategy they used called for about a dozen fire fighters and four hoses. I tried to take pictures but it was very dark outside and it just didn't work for me.