Adventure in the 21st century is not like hobbits going to dispose of a ring

With this being the long weekend, and my birthday coming up soon, hubby and I decided that we would attempt going away for a few days.  The parameters were something along the lines of driving distance and relatively cheap.

I sort of got set on the idea of Maine, just because I was kind of digging the idea of seaside and clam chowder, and it's about twice a year that I get to have lobster.  Well, now that I can cook them myself, I'm thinking that number will up itself a bit.

Anyway, Hurricane Earl dashed any sort of plans for Maine, and while I could probably do the travel search thing in a heartbeat, for someone else, professionally, on my own, I'm really quite useless when it comes to booking any sort of vacation.  Business trips seem to be a different story, because then you have a starting point of reference, like location of the conference, hotels and restaurants in close proximity, things to do according to the given schedule.


When we were planning our honeymoon, I was set on the idea of learning to surf somewhere.  I scoured for days, looking at places like Costa Rica, Hawaii ... all for nought, because we ended up going to the Bahamas on the great and fabulous recommendations of two of our best friends.  But also, hubby is generally quite good at planning travel stuff, and on other occasions, while I have been searching for days, he finds something in 15 minutes.

This, however, was not the case.  For various reasons, hubby was being all defeatist in his travel searching.  We have been thoroughly put off bed and breakfasts, and availability of "nice hotels" seemed to be dwindling as the hours went by.  Eventually, hubby called it quits on the search and declared that we would just be spontaneous.

Yikes.  I really don't enjoy being spontaneous.  I like knowing where we're going, I like knowing what to pack, and I like having a plan of action for stuff like nearby restaurants that I'd like to try.

ANYWAY ... we woke up late, and hubby says, "So, let's just get in the car and drive."
Me:  "Uhh ... okay.  We'll leave in two hours."

So I scurry around the house like some headless chicken on crack, flailing about trying to get snacks and grab things that I think we'll need.  I packed spinach dip (to use up the expired-but-still-good sour cream), tortilla chips, water, watermelon (1 pound eaten, 14 to go) and two apples which are sort of nearing their last legs.  (Yes, you do sense a theme here.)  I scurry around some more, grabbing things that I think we'll need, and what hubby should take but doesn't think he'll need.  Then the hallway looks like we are leaving for two weeks of camping.

We get in the car and drive west.  Armed with iPhones and a sat nav (GPS), we briefly enjoy the sites of small towns along the way.  There's a lovely beach near Turkey Point, there's a majestic lighthouse in Long Point, there's a cute little dock somewhere close by.  We stop in Point Stanley, and hubby gets completely turned off of the post-50s bed and breakfast crowd yapping about ponchos.

"We are not staying here," he says gruffly.

So we get on our iPhones and use a combination of the HotelPal, TripAdvisor and Priceline apps to find somewhere close by.  I tell him that the closest available and cheapest hotel is the Howard Johnson (Ho Jo) in London at $90 for the night.  He later tells me that his experiences with the Ho Jo have never been stellar, and which is why we were rushing off to find a Staybridge Suites in London.  We actually really like that brand of hotel - usually the suites come with a kitchenette, and the rooms are quite large.

While hubby drives, I get online to see if the Staybridge Suites have a vacancy.  Nope.  Determined, hubby plows on to London, where he decides that there has to be something available.  We get there, drive through, hubby saying all the while that he's looking for the nice downtown historic part.  We drive down what appears to be a main street, find "town", and decide that it looks too much like Hamilton.  A LOT like Hamilton.  Nevermind.

We keep driving through, and suddenly, London looks like it's finished.  There are just houses and side streets, then more and more farm land.  Oh, guess we went through it.

Eventually, having this wretched cold and blowing my nose every five minutes, I pass in and out of consciousness as the medication weakly kicks in.  When I wake up, we're still in farmland like area, and hey, it looks a lot like 10 minutes from where we actually live.

It starts to rain, and hubby sees a blue provincial sign for two inns.  We drive by the one, call and find out that there's no vacancy.  Boy, I can imagine a pregnant Mary swearing Joseph up and down on that donkey for not having called ahead.

Somewhere along the way, striking out on GOOD hotel availabilities, I did actually say, "This is what happens when you don't call ahead."  I don't think the Bible does justice for Mary in censoring what she probably said.

Eventually, we drove past the Stone Willow Inn.  I looked online quickly and found out that they had ONE room left with two queen beds.  $150 minus $5 for a CAA discount ... sold.  We were tired of roaming around southwestern Ontario.

It turned out to be alright ... no Hilton NYC, but decent enough.  The restaurant wasn't really stellar.  The beds were alright, they had free wireless.  They had a little fridge in the room stocked with bottles of water.  Umbrellas in the lobby for guests to use.  The toiletries were okay, but there was a big set-in stain of some sort on my bath towel.  THAT freaked me out.  And I wrote so on my comment card.

So we won't be visiting St. Mary's again.  It didn't really help that people were staring us down at the diner where we had breakfast.  (And the food was terrible.)  Usually, if you're a "foreigner" to the town, people will be friendly and greet you, or kind of stare until you engage them in some sort of conversation.  If they keep staring with the frowny face after that, well, then you sort of chalk it up to old-school racism.  Surprisingly, living where I do, it happens frequently enough that I'm fairly familiar with the drill.

Our "weekend getaway" wasn't great, but it wasn't disastrous.  Hubby agrees that we're relatively done with small town tourism, but that next time, we'll just have to do a proper vacation and go somewhere city-like.  And book ahead.

A pretty rad thing ...

Yup ... life in a small town is just a little more manageable when you hear that the project for which you were the only writer/researcher for seasons 2 and 3 got a GEMINI NOMINATION!!!

Yes indeed, ladies and gentlemen, www.TasteBudsTV.com got a GEMINI NOMINATION for Best Cross-Platform Project - Children's and Youth!!

And even though my name is not on the billing (it's all the producers' names), I am totally riding the coattails even for the nomination.  Spent time updating my LinkedIn profile, resume and Facebook status ... because my claim to fame by association on that is being THE writer/researcher for seasons 2 and 3.  CONTENT, baby, CONTENT ... is king.  So let's be clear now though that I'm not claiming ownership for all things word-related, but at least I can say that there's enough of a contribution there that I'm going to toot this horn until the if/when of a next award.

I know we'd all be jazzed about nominations for the actual show, but the website is (albeit cross-platform because of the brand but) a separate entity, and my absolute FAVOURITE gig in the whole wide world.  I love the team, I love how straightforward the tasks were, I love the positive responses I got for my work (which didn't feel like work because it was mostly fun); I love that I got to work from home; and I love how promptly I got paid compared to some other companies that take a MONTH or MORE.  (Can you tell that I'm waiting for a cheque?)  And I love that I got to speak on a panel.  [Thanks again Sasha!]

Worked on the stop-mo short today and had a fabulous day.  More on that later.