| Friday Oct 4. Yes, everyone, today is Mail Day in Kingcome, BC. The day when mail comes and goes. And as we have seen from our first mail day, we cannot escape junk mail. But it makes for great kindling starting a fire in our wood stove! Here are a variety of tidbits of the goings-on as we continue to adjust to life and can find little things exciting: We partaked in a community Bingo fundraiser last weekend. Nicole had a blast as did Kristin and I. Don't tell anyone we took our kid gambling. We don't want the Royal Canadian Mounted Police coming to our door because of our ignorance -we didn't realize we had taken her gambling until 5 days later. But it wasn't gambling, it was fun and for a good cause. So that makes it ok. We didn't win from that (her bedtime impeded our staying very long, plus the fact that bears come out at night and we were all scared stupid to walk the 100 yards back home) but we won some salmon and licorice (not mixed) from a raffle (called a loonie/toonie). We have a radio/CD/Tape at home and the radio is basically pointless. No AM, no FM. Until night time! Then wowee, the AM dial is on-fire with stations as far away as Portland, Oregon. We get Monday Night Football every night on AM, or that's what it sounds like...I've started to like the Phil Hendrie show, anyone know that one? It's pretty funny. Animal contact: No sight of any bears yet - only rumors, I mean rumours (Canada). Some wolf tracks down in the delta, closer to the ocean, a ton of bald eagles on the boat ride in, wild cows somewhere around here, crows, ravens all around, supposedly seals come through the river often. I have heard some people say that cougars are to be more feared, but haven't seen any. Nicole is having a grand time. She is in grade 2, but doing grade 3 work in some areas - she gets her smarts from me, of course. Many families in the community were pitching in to put a bike together from spare bikes, but a whole one was found so she zooms around the village instead of walking. Her commute to school is about 11.75 seconds. We got her an alarm watch before we came so now we can set it, she goes to play and when it beep she comes home. Oh the freedom! Her quote, which may be a usual installment of this newsletter (?) is at the end. Kristin is asking for advice about being a School Counselor and how to encourage or motivate people. I believe this is in reference to getting people to begin, continue and complete their Adult Ed classes. Any advice or past experience is welcome. She also wants any great recipes that you want to send, email or paper mail as she forgot to bring some cookbooks. We have been eating like royalty, so I don't know what she's lacking, but please send some if you'd like. And on a fun, final note: Kristin and I fulfilled what has been an unknown dream in Vancouver before we came to Kingcome. For those of you who have seen "Smoke Signals," you must agree that this is one of the greatest movies of all time. We agree. One of our MCC contact people in Vancouver is the dad of the actor who played Thomas Builds-the-Fire as a young boy in "Smoke Signals." Well, we were at their house exchanging cars, and who happened to be behind the counter making nachos: young Thomas! (ok, his name is really Simon Baker and he's been in "Northern Exposure," "The Sweet Hereafter" and some others...) He's 16 now, we said hi and tried not to say, "Hey Victor, what about your Dad? Have you heard were going to Kingcome. When us Minnesotans leave, we never come back. What do you know about fire?" (movie quotes, forgive me - I know that some of you find that funny...) So that was our brush with stardom - to meet one of our favorite (oops, favourite - Canada) actors from our favourite movie. Never seen it at a theatre. Plus he makes good nachos - we had a couple! I'll never wash my hand again. Until next time friends, family and our friends' families and families' friends, Love, John Kristin Nicole Nicole's quote after finding out that it costs quite a bit to travel to Kingcome and wanting many people to visit: "I'm gonna stop going to the store [local out of a woman's house] to buy ice cream and save my money instead so people can come visit." |