I am the Burgerfan!

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14 days…

Outlet Mall Stores that are closing shop! So, in addition to their regular 40% off retail prices, the store had 40% off final prices due to the fact they were closing in a few weeks (due to lease issues). That means I got shoes and a new jacket for 36% of the regular retail price (or, 64% off the regular retail price). Holy smokes that is cheap! Boy did I pick the right time to need new shoes…

[Round Rock outlet stores]

Tuesday, September 16, 2008:
You’re 30! Surprise! You’re going to LA tomorrow for five days, you’re already packed! And by the way, you have a ticket to go see The Price is Right!

Tiffany sure knows how to make a surprise… the show taped two hours after our plane arrived, and after driving across L.A. and miraculously making it just in time to be last in line, I got to see the Price is Right, live! That was pretty amazing. The show aired today, and I managed to creep into the scene a few times.

My car has rolled over another milestone in its lengthy history. This morning, the odometer rolled over 400,000 kilometers! Lucky for me I was able to hit some light traffic to watch the nine’s roll up in mesmerizing fashion. I can’t imagine that you’d get the same experience from a digital dashboard.

In honour of this event, I have assembled a collection of related milestones. With this information, it appears that I have had an average speed of 1.75 km/h all day every day over the last decade.

June 11, 2008 – 400,000 km – near Whitemud Amusement Park, Edmonton

August 21, 2001 – 300,000 km – near Didsbury, Alberta

October 7, 1998 – 250,000 km – Ardrossan, Alberta. Just as I rolled onto the cement pad at home. I do not have a photo from this, but I did manage to dig up an email I sent from my University account!

Date: Wed, 7 Oct 1998 19:40:27 -0600 (MDT)
From: Christopher Christou <christou@ugrad.*****.ca>
Subject: Milestone!

My car rolled over 250,000 as I got home from campus today!

WOOHOO!!! Time for another quarter-million! :)

Chris

Other Milestones — Heat

August 9, 2003 – 322,744 km — 37°C – Okanagan Region, B.C.

July 25, 2006 – 365,525 km — 53.5°C [WTF???] – Kelowna, B.C. This was what registered after being parked outside for an hour. It was actually in the high thirties out that day

A few weekends ago I took Tiffany canoing down the North Saskatchewan. She held up well, and we didn’t get sunburned! It started at Devon and ended at the Valley Zoo. Looking on a map afterwards, it turns out we covered 30 kilometres, which is amazing. If somebody had shown me that route beforehand, I wouldn’t have gone, so I am glad that did not happen. Its neat to see a different view of an area — usually the only river sights afforded to me are those seen from the roads that cross the river.

Its impressive to think how ‘people power’ can actually get you from A to B. We have covered lots of distances on foot when backpacking and hosteling, gone around foreign towns on rented bicycles, and voyaged downstream in this boat, all thanks to our own efforts. Its neat to realize accomplishments without mechanized assistance. However, I am not about to give up my cars and airplanes anytime soon.

To celebrate the fourth anniversary of our marriage and continuing adventure, Tiffany and I spent the September long weekend back down in Drumheller.  Only this time we weren’t camping, but enjoying a more luxurious retreat at the Heartwood Inn and Spa.  We spoiled ourselves with a nice room and a massage.

To top off the weekend we even headed out to a Live Dinner Theatre.  Rosebud is a small town that is about 20 minutes away.  If you look on the map, you will see that the town is composed of about four roads.  While you’d think that some production "in the middle of nowhere" would be an amateur quality show at best, you would be dead wrong.  The Rosebud Theatre Company is an amazing find in Alberta.  The dinner is an elaborate (and delicious!) al you can eat buffet.  You are seated in one of five separate rooms, taking away the "eating with everyone" feeling and making it a little more intimate.  Afterwards you head over to the 200-300 seat theatre and enjoy a fantastic production.  It turns out there is an acting school which feeds into this theatre, so this whole ordeal has successfully reinvented this town and kept it from fading into obscurity like so many other Prairie Towns

While it is about 90 minutes from Calgary, it is still worth checking out sometime (we will probably go back on one of our Calgary ventures).  Even better — stay in one of the nearby Bed & Breakfast locations for a weekend adventure of your own!  There is a local museum and stuff that will amuse you and shed light on the history of the region for at least an hour, so go early.

The Drumheller scenery provided us with a great backdrop yet again, and as an added bonus: we watched the sun set twice!  After it set on the town, we drove up out of the valley to see it set once more.

• Heartwood Inn – http://www.innsatheartwood.com/ (Check out the room photos!)
• Rosebud Theatre – http://www.rosebudtheatre.com/
• More information on the Town of Rosebud – http://www.rosebud.ca/

A weekend out of town may not seem like much of a vacation, but when its a fairly close getaway, it can be just as enjoyable.  This past weekend was spent in Drumheller with Tiffany’s family.

Drumheller is the kind of place that excites the imagination of children with its abundance of dinosaurs.  It also makes adults feel like kids again (if only for a while).  The unique landscape makes it an attractive summer destination, and well worth the trip.

It had been a while since my last trek to Drumheller (1998?), and even then, I had never spent more than an afternoon in the area.  So there was no better time to put on the ol’ Tourist Hat and support the local economy.  Unfortunately, I forgot my Tilley Hat, so the sun was in my eyes for most of the weekend.  (No complaints about the sunshine here though!)

Drumheller is a town of about 7,700 people.  While the scenery is attractive, it is apparently it is not in a population boom presently (lucky!).  The main business of the area is tourism.  The town now sports a Wal-mart, Quiznos, DQ, BPs, McDonalds and several other franchise eateries and hotels.  Its kind of weird — there is the old downtown core, and then this new area where all these main franchises are.

• The Royal Tyrell Museum [http://www.tyrrellmuseum.com/] is a must-see.  There is lots to see and read, so its best to come in a more attentive state if you want to learn about the dinos and their history instead of just see them.  Adults $10, save a dollar with an AMA card.
• Wild West Jurassic Tours [http://www.wildwestjurassictours.com/] was a nice way to see some of the general area.  We took the ‘Badlands & Dinosaurs’ tour, which was a 3.5 hour drive with stops all around a 15 km radius of Drumheller.  All the stops were places you could go on your own, but still, you wouldn’t get the background info, and its great to be able to see it all without concentrating on driving.  Apparently there are only seven Ferries in Alberta.  This tour crosses the Bleriot Ferry, and even though its very short, its still cool to claim I was on one in Alberta.

Somewhere just north of Stettler there is a valley that cuts across Highway 56.  Really scenic.  In the valley, you see a small community gathered around two towering grain elevators.  This place is called Meeting Creek, and is home to under 150.  I stopped in to satisfy my curiosity.

Apparently this town was just not given a fair shake.  They pushed really hard to get the railway to come through town in the early 1900′s.  When it did, they received it with great fanfare.  But that was apparently all they would cheer about.  It took about 7 years to get an actual Depot and official staff for the town.  After fifty years, passenger service was canceled, things became derelict, and the tracks around town were pulled out.  Apparently you can take a look in the depot but its by appointment only.  I think it would make a neat little road stop though.

• couldn’t find the Google building (kinda ironic if you think about it), but found a Krispy Kreme by accident
• found the Google building (after the donuts), but left the parking lot and turned the wrong way onto a one-way lane (it was dark out)
• saw the Yahoo! building and made a sudden off-ramp exit
• saw the ebay building on the way to the airport and made another sudden U-Turn into their parking lot
• found and bought one of those squid power bar things!  (See March 16)