our family vacation

We had a super nice time. After our big adventure at Skookumchuck Narrows we decided to have a quiet day at the house. We watched eagles, played board games and barbequed steaks. It was great.

Nelson was a bit frightened by the eagles, and also by a couple of bard owls who whooted intermittently from the treetops, but he relaxed and enjoyed himself after a while.

Just before we left, we captured a family photo. I think we'll use it for our Christmas card this year. What do you think?

Oh yeah, we could be in a catalogue or on a calendar or something. Don't you think?



Seriously. It was a great vacation. We're home now, refreshed and relaxed and happy to have enjoyed a few days together.





question: what did you do on your summer vacation?

mompoet - feeling photogenic

the traveling pajamas and the sock monkey

Here's a photo of me wearing the famous traveling pajamas while Cameron and I check email in the hotel room. The pajamas are on this trip but will probably not make a public appearance. That will be Cameron's job.

question: what's cozier? flannel PJs or a cuddly sock monkey?

mompoet - Nelson the rat stayed home to keep Andy and alex company

nelson is back

My friend Diana's cousin Janet took Nelson with her to Egypt, to watch her husband run a race in the Sahara Desert. This is Nelson's first visit to Africa.

Here are some photographs, taken by Janet, who reports that the security guards at the Luxor airport insisted on looking at Nelson, then laughed and offered to buy him. The lady at the airport is Marc and Janet's friend Lara. The beautiful building is the Cairo Museum. The sandy shots are at the race site, where it was 50 degrees out.

question: where would you go, if you were a plastic rat?

mompoet - thank you for not selling Nelson to the security guard, and for taking him with you on your trip, Janet!

the further adventures of Nelson the rat

Nelson will soon go to Egypt. My friend Diana McNamara told me that her cousin Janet will soon travel to Africa. Janet's husband is running in a cross-desert foot race in the Sahara. Diana told Janet about Nelson, the traveling plastic rat, and Janet invited him to come along.

Diana facebooked me Janet's work phone number and I went to Janet's work yesterday afternoon. She's a hair stylist at Stylin' Divas in Port Moody, which is about a kilometer from my house. So I know that this is in the stars for Nelson to go to the Sahara with Janet.

I bid Nelson farewell in a funky basement salon and left him Janet's care. She promised him that she will take him on a camel ride.

Janet and her husband will be back in early November. I'll post the photos when I get them. Janet says Nelson's pedicure is very nice. I'm hoping that before or after (or during) the trip, he might get styled up by Janet and the ladies at Stylin' Divas. Nelson likes to be styled. Yup he does.

question: have you been to the desert?

mompoet - wishing Nelson a happy time and saying thank you to Diana and Janet

Nelson and Ratty enjoyed Mexico

Nelson and Ratty are home from Mexico. While Andy and Sue organize the rest of the photos from the trip, the rats hope that you will enjoy these shots of their fun times.

question: have you ever seen a rat silhouette pass through airport security x-ray?

mompoet - happy, tired and safe at home, with husband and rats

Nelson and Ratty go to Vegas

Cathy, Terry, Wayne and Karen took Nelson and Ratty to Vegas this week. They got home late last night, so both little travelers are still asleep, but Cathy sent us some photos.

more rat vacation pictures

More photos of Nelson and Ratty on their Vegas trip. Looks like they had a spectacular time at the Hoover Dam (if maybe a tad bit dangerous). Thanks again, Cathy, Terry, Karen and Wayne!

Ratty the baby rat returns too!

Dear friend Cathy wrote on my facebook wall on Friday:

"Unbelievabley Good News .... Baby Rat has come home too! Susan, you know how bad I felt telling you that Baby Rat had been taken .... I tore my suitcase apart. Terry, took down suitcases for our trip ..... and he found Baby Rat! Somehow he made his way back from Nova Scotia to Port Moody in two years! I wonder if I was so stressed about thinking I lost him that I didn't see him against the black lining ... yet I know we've used the suitcases since! I am elated ... I can only imagine your level of happiness!"

A couple of years ago, Cathy took Nelson and Ratty to the Maritimes for a vacation. On the way home, Ratty disappeared. We thought maybe he defected, or was abducted, or just went on his own Ratty way. Nelson was consoled only by a brief but healing romance with Petunia the albino rat. Now Ratty has returned! Cathy found him in her suitcase when she began packing for a trip to Las Vegas.

Nelson, Ratty and Cathy are so happy they are celebrating. Nelson and Ratty will join Cathy on the trip to Vegas. This is a special treat because I have vowed never to go to Las Vegas. So this is Nelson and Ratty's chance.

Watch for photos from the big giant place in the desert. Thanks Cathy for finding our little baby rat friend, and for taking him and Nelson along with you on your vacation. Thanks also to Terry, Karen and Wayne who will share hospitality with our little rodent friends. (hint: don't let them near the slot machines!)

question: what do you think happened to baby rat? was he in the suitcase all this time, or is the story more interesting?

mompoet - reunited

Nelson's great weekend

Nelson is happy to be home. He had some fun with us this weekend. He accompanied Dad and me on a walk along the Burnaby Lake trail, and shared a sushi lunch with us (Dad's belated Father's Day treat from me). Later, Nelson joined the Shoreline chapbook group for supper and a meeting at Helmi and Fred's place in Whonnock. On Saturday, he shopped at the Richmond Night Market with some silly girls.

I think Nelson leads a rat's life, which appears to be a most excellent life indeed.

question: If you were a rat, where would you like to go? and with whom?

mompoet - happy to be with my little ratty friend

Nelson returns Part 1

Nelson returns - part 2

Nelson is coming home

Here are some messages I have exchanged with my friend Stacie Boschma, who lives in Decatur, Georgia. Stacie, a poet, visited Vancouver in August, while she was on tour. When she featured at the Vancouver Poetry Slam, I introduced her to Nelson, my pet plastic rat. Nelson asked if he could tour with Stacie and she said yes. Since then, he has traveled around the US with her, and has spent the winter living at her place.

Here are the messages:

Mompoet to Stacie

Hi Stacie,

I'm still looking forward to your visit, and hoping your summer is starting out fruitful and vegetableful.

In the meantime, my husband and I have planned a trip to Mexico for our 25th anniversary on Aug 12. We're flying out of Vancouver on the 8th. We'd love to take Nelson with us. Is there any way he could come home to Vancouver in time to travel with us?

Hope you are well, and Nelson is not redecorating your veranda with dream catchers and fuzzy dice (he has dubious taste in interior decorating).

sue

Stacie to Mompoet

I told Nelson about the Mexico trip and he squealed, rat like, at the adventure of the idea. And then we sat down for a heart to heart about us, our long travels together and all those meandering conversations about the vagaries of love and romance. The truth is that Nelson's wanderlust has been nipping at his heels, and I've seen the way he watches the sunrise through my window. He's a sweet one, never demanding to go, but I feel the way our relationship has changed, and I know there's no holding Nelson back from the wide world he can't stop exploring.

So we sipped coffee from our differently sized mugs and let nostalgia sweep us back to the early morning drive through Arkansas, the bright lights of Portland, the dusty landscape of California's desert. It was good to revisit the places and to remember the hurt and the joy of it all. He's my favorite tour mate yet, and I love him enough to cheer all the journeys ahead of him. Wherever I go, Nelson will be with me, and wherever he goes, he'll go with my fondest wishes.

I'll stow him into some appropriate container and hide him away in a Vancouver-bound train or plane, and trust that he finds his way home safe. There's a great big world out there, and no one knows that better than Nelson, intrepid traveler, and a fine plastic friend.

Mompoet to Stacie

Thank you Stacie! Thank you so much!

Your message made my day. I'm not sure which is better, knowing that Nelson is coming home, or that your time together has meant so much to both of you.

Thank you for giving Nelson the gifts of the road and your love, and for giving me the gift of appreciating our little rat friend the way you do.

sue


So Nelson will be home in time to travel with us again. Stacie will visit Vancouver in the Fall, so it's not good-bye forever.

question: who is your favourite traveling companion?

mompoet - tickled by the image of two differently-sized coffee cups

Nelson is touring with poets

Last night, at the Vancouver Poetry Slam, Decatur Georgia poet, Stacie Boschma rocked the house with her performance. Stacie's poetry is the kind I like: direct and honest, telling stories about real-life situations, revealing truth and beauty with humour, intelligence and heart. She started out with "Freedom," remembered by many of us who saw her perform it at the Women's Showcase at iWPS 2007 in Vancouver, then segued to others including "The View from Gotham" (the Batman poem), "Pineapples," and "Love in the Key of Panda." Stacie was appreciated tremendously by the packed-house audience. We hope she'll return soon. In the meantime, I bought her CD, Happy Rainbow Poems from the Unicorn Petting Zoo and The Shout Rainbows EP.

I first met Stacie at iWPS07, where she performed and volunteered. We've been in touch by blog, email and facebook since. I was hoping we might get her to visit Port Moody, but she and her friends Hollin and Arrie had to leave their three beloved dogs in the US because they did not have the complicated paperwork required to bring the dogs across. So on Canadian performance days they have been border-hopping so as not to neglect their canine companions.

I have known Stacie to be a lover of animals since I met her. She has shown a special enthusiasm for our pet plastic rat, Nelson, who has travelled quite a lot in the past couple of years. I have told Nelson about Stacie, and he asked if he could come to the slam to meet her. You can imagine how excited Nelson was when I asked Stacie if she would take the rat on the road to share adventures with her and Hollin and Arrie and the dogs. He was grinning from whisker to whisker! So Nelson will be away for a time. We know he'll have a spectacular adventure, and we hope he'll write to us once or twice and maybe send a photo. We're grateful to Stacie for packing him along. I have told Nelson to be polite and not eat all of Stacie's potato chips (or if he does, to pretend it was the dogs).

If you would like to catch up on some of Nelson's adventures, here's a compilation of my Nelson blog posts.

question: where would you take Nelson, if you could?

mompoet - happy to see my gypsy rat doing what he likes best

Nelson's Trip to the East Kootenays

Nelson went on a road trip last week. While in Cranbrook he had a baby mouse which proves my father's contention that mice are baby rats. We left the baby in Cranbrook, mostly because Nelson is not very maternal, but also because the baby seems to have imprinted on my sister's cat, Mr. Kitty. You can see that baby is all furry from snuggling with his surrogate mom-cat.

I am back

It's August 4, and my 3-week experiment of writing just for myself is winding down. I have been writing my morning pages, and writing exercises and reading poetry and various other good stuff. I feel like my creative motor has been restarted, and lots of stuff is chuffing and belching out. I have decided to recommence regular blogging, but to put my own writing first. So if I skip a few days here and there, it's because I am turning to the blank page, looking inward, frolicking with my muse.

Summer is a good time for this. I just took a spur-of-the-moment week off and drove up to Cranbrook with Alex. It's been 3 years since I visited my sister's home there, mostly because she was out of the country for a couple of years, then she returned this time last summer so we left her and her family to resettle before arriving as stay-over guests. We've enjoyed several visits here, but it's not the same as when we go there. The thirteen hour drive across the south end of our province was a nice time to talk with Alex alone. We got onto topics like "who is God?" and "the nature of fear." When you are hurtling forward in a car together it's just easier to open up and talk about big ideas and feelings. Once we got there we had a great time. I took my writing and reading stuff and found time each day to do some of each. Mostly we just enjoyed the company of our loved ones. The cousins had a great time together, and we visited Silverwood Theme Park in Idaho, where I rode a wooden coaster that is now my second-favourite in the world. This is not my video, but it does represent the experience pretty well. I like the design of this coaster. You pretty much reverse in a big loop halfway through, and travel back parallel to your original path. Much fun.

Aside from that we have enjoyed celebrating Fiona's birthday, Alex receiving his high school transcripts (yes, he has graduated from Grade 12), and lots of fun in the sun around town. Now I'll sign off, and post a few photos of Nelson's East Kootenay adventure, under a separate heading.

question: have you taken a break from your routine lately?

mompoet - coming up refreshed and energized

Nelson in love

Our friends Robin, Ralph and Emma brought their new friend Petunia to our house the other night. Nelson says it was love at first sight.

We are sure of this because Nelson told us so. Up until now we have communicated with Nelson only by observing his actions, engaging in mental telepathy, and through occasional (albeit lengthy) letters with accompanying photographs. The night that Nelson met Petunia he uttered his first real sound, a faint and breathy squeal. This occurred when Emma showed us that Petunia has a squeaker in her tummy. "Oh, but Nelson does not!" we insisted. Upon Emma's urging, we tried, and discovered that Nelson has a voice. Of course, it is not a squeaker in his tummy. It is a song of love.

question: what sound do you make when your tummy is squeezed?

mompoet - not squeezing too hard

Wasn't that a party?

Nelson had the time of his life, enjoying slurps and crumbs and vistas and his favourite lady friends. Someone told him he could have all the kettle corn that he wanted. I said "no" but I was over-ruled. Nelson liked it when I am over-ruled. The highlight for Nelson was making friends with a very fancy Chinese fibre optic sculpture that was inhabited by the spirit of Jimi Hendrix.

one more sleep

We're going to the sunshine coast, the ladeez and me. We leave on the ferry Friday morning. We're staying

in the big house
on top of the rock
beside the ocean
in the private cove
with the seals
and corgis
and boats
and Nelson
and wine
and pajamas
and did I mention, Myrna, Kirsi, Karen, Leanne, Cathy
and me
and a hot tub

It's a September tradition. We'll spend the weekend re-connecting and relaxing. I can hardly wait!

question: do you have a getaway that you enjoy every so often?

mompoet - lucky, happy, excited

good news, bad news

The bad news is, I returned to work yesterday. Vacation does not last forever.
The good news is, today is massage day. Students from a massage therapy school are visiting and I'm booked in for an hour this morning. That makes going back to work much better.

The good news is, Nelson came back from the Maritimes. He has a cool new skull and crossbones necklace.
The bad news is, he lost his bead bracelet.
The badder news is, baby rat is missing. He did not return from the trip. We're investigating. It's possible he defected to the Maritimes, but also that he was abducted. Nelson seems strangely calm about the whole thing.

The good news is, it's Thursday already.
The bad news is, I have to work Saturday.
The good news is, I have next Friday off.
The gooder news is, next weekend (9 days from now) is the ladeez weekend to the sunshine coast. We booked the great big house on the rock with the ocean deck again. I can hardly wait.

The bad news is, Andy was in a car crash. He was rear-ended at a stoplight.
The good news is, he's feeling better already and damage to the car is minimal, even though the young guy who hit him has a totally smashed-up front end.
The really good news is everyone is basically okay.

The good news is, the kids are back to school and they like their schools and their teachers and their friends at school.
There's no bad news to go with that.

That's all the news for today.

question: what's new with you?

mompoet - mostly good, mostly good

More news from Nelson

Nelson emailed to say that he's home from PEI, bunking just up the street with Cathy until his jetlag feels better. He sent me a few more photographs of his Prince Edward Island adventure. It looks like he had a lovely adventure.

question: if you were Nelson, where would you like to travel?

mompoet - Thank you Cathy!