Two short trips with Veronica

I went with Veronica over the labour day long weekend to Osoyoos in the South Okanagan. You know you are living in an obscure corner of the world when the spell checker does not recognize the name of the town in your Province you just visited. Veronica is my girlfriend, although I am old enough and was married long enough that it still seems strange to use that term. We met three months after my separation. We are a good fit, she is wonderful, I am a lucky guy.

She found a bed and breakfast for us to stay at. She sent me pictures asking what I thought, but I didn't get past the view before saying we should definitely go:

I rented a car to drive us up there. I was a victim of agent up-selling and got a more expensive car than I had originally booked. I am at an early enough stage where I am still trying to impress Veronica, but late enough I can tell her and we can laugh about it. The car was a Ford Mustang convertible. I can't recommend it. It does not handle that well, and the convertible top was wasted on me (I like to talk apparently, and I burn easily). 

 

   

The trip up was on the Crowsnest highway (BC #3). This is beautiful country that goes through Manning Park, with varied terrain leading from the Coast to the desert climate in the South Okanagan.

We ate surprisingly well in Osoyoos, went to the Desert Cultural Centre run by the local native band, that seemed well organized and prosperous, and went swimming in the lake. The fancy bed and breakfast and the culinary opportunities are all there because of the array of vineyards and wineries on the road North of town towards Oliver. We did winery tours one day, and went to the Burrowing Owl and Hester Creek. The view below is from the tower at the Burrowing Owl. You can see the smokey haze from the serious fires in nearby Washington State at that time..

I have to say, tasting wines side by side really does give you a sense of the variety of flavours. I recommend going to those kind of tasting events if you are interested in wine and want to spend more money on it than you do now. I did buy one bottle from each of the two places we visited:

Blogging for me is a writing exercise and I do think of how I will phrase things here as I cycle home from work or am on the bus. I had planned to say that I would save these wines and you would know if you were a special friend if I brought them out for you. But, I already drank them. One was with Veronica, which was a mistake since she had one small glass and I had the rest. 

I did have one other trip with Veronica early in our relationship. We went to Seattle together on the train. At the time, my divorce lawyer had said to keep a low profile on my new relationship. I didn't quite understand this but she had given me good advice so I did not blog about that trip at the time. It was a fun trip. Veronica doesn't like the picture below but I do: we look happy! 

There are many stages to romantic love and this blog is too public a place for me to list them all, but I can say that the trip to the Science Fiction Museum and this image moved me along quite a bit. 

We ate well on this trip, too, and I discovered we had some of the same values and sense of humour.

 

Yes Concert

I went to the Yes concert in Vancouver Tuesday night. They are my favourite band and were active from the early 70s for several decades. Their last new work (I think) was in the album, Magnification, that came out in 2001. This tour was of the nostalgia type. I had been to the Yes concert in Vancouver in 1984. Back then, I was an undergraduate at UVIC and came over with some friends specifically for the concert. I think I was with Paul Modos, Dale Starr, and Malcolm Smith -- and we stayed at Dale's grandmother's house, sleeping on the floor. But these details are hazy. At that early concert, Chris Squire (the bassist) was still alive. Steve Howe (lead guitar) was not part of the line-up, instead there was Trevor Rabin. The concert this year had Howe back in the line-up and Billy Sherwood replacing Chris Squire. I have to say that I expected Sherwood to be a disappointment compared to Squire (the greatest progressive rock bassist of all time?) but he was good. Howe was much better than Rabin, especially for the early work they played. I did not even notice that the lead singer was a Jon, but Davison not Andersson, so I can't say there was a drop in quality in the lead vocals! They played one song from each of their first 10 albums. I didn't know the songs from Tales of Topographical Oceans or Tormato, since these were widely regarded as loser albums even by the band members, but the others were all classics. They encored with Starship Trooper and Roundabout (of course). What a great concert!

The tickets were a birthday gift from my girlfriend, Veronica. It was the best gift I have had in years. We were apart for my actual birthday -- I was still in East Lansing and when I got back she was in Europe -- but she had left the tickets in my place for when I got back. You can see my crazed fan smile and her indulgent one below.

There was a long warm-up band, Todd Rundgren. They were OK, but not all their songs appealed to me. I did buy, "This is not a drill", which is quite catchy. 

It was hard not to notice the bad behaviour of other people at the concert, or what my mother would have called bad behaviour anyway. People arrived all through the warm-up band, coming from drinking. Even for Yes, people came and went for drinks and to relieve themselves from the drinking. It was at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre. I guess I expect at a venue like that, if you leave the theatre they won't let you back in until there is a natural break (intermission, set change). Apparently, that is not the accepted expectation.