More Canadian Excursions

Although Thunder Bay was by far the most adventurous trip we went on in Canada, we did venture out of the house to do some traipsing around Winnipeg, too. Like a fun trip to 7-11 in the freezing rain with Chrissie to get ourselves some Winnipeggian slurpees. (Little-known fact: Winnipeg is the slurpee capital of the world.) (Also, the dandruff capital of the world. Now there's a claim to fame.)


One afternoon we went to downtown Winnipeg (with all the stoplights, an almost-45-minute drive) (Winnipeg needs freeways) and had a wonderful visit with Matthew Kwok, a good friend of Richie's. Luke was a big fan of his impressive title: Dr. Matthew Kwok, Assistant Academic Dean and Registrar at Booth College. We felt famous.


Can Luke get his doctorate by osmosis, just spending enough time in Matt's chair?


Matt showered us with gifts upon our arrival, from spoiling us rotten with a restaurant gift certificate so we could go on a date in Winnipeg down to the nitty gritty necessities: socks for Luke.


Luke enjoyed staring at Matt.


Still staring.


Matt shot lots of pictures of the three of us. We felt like moviestars. Except we didn't dodge this paparazzo.


Booth College is run by the Salvation Army (neat, eh?). Luke wanted to be a holybaby and read the Bible while we were there.


He also practiced walking.


And destroyed the gift bag from Matt.


And watched Mommy play the Booth College grand piano.


Later during our stay in Canada, Richie returned for lunch with Matt and, like Luke, wanted to speed up the PhD process by sitting in Matt's chair to acquire the degree by osmosis.


Matt treated Richie to a royal Booth College feast.


They shot some pool.


And then posed for a final picture. Thanks, Matt, for a great time at Booth!


One of our mornings in Winnipeg we spent on the campus of the University of Manitoba, alma mater of both Richie and Mandie. Our first stop was at the track where Richie was crowned provincial champion in the 1500-meter. (Side note: Richie and Bethany both find it funny that people who meet us now make certain assumptions about us based on our current occupations, with no clue about who we used to be... Richie is doing 100% brain stuff right now, but no one knows that he used to be Mr. Athlete, a star at a host of sports and ranked nationally in track; and Bethany is doing 100% mom stuff right now, but no one knows that she used to have a brain... In fact, a woman who works with Richie in the same PhD program recently asked Bethany if she ever went to school, if she needed anything past high school to be a teacher... Bethany just smiled and said "yes"...)


Although she's a stay-at-home mom, Bethany does know how to read, and even had fun at the U of M bookstore.


Luke had fun, too, and wanted to pull all the books off the shelves.


Another afternoon we went to visit Mandie's apartment, which she made magazinely beautiful! Luke paid no attention to the decor, however. He wanted to eat her hairbrush.


He also wanted to leave a big mess behind and take out all her papers, for her to remember him by.


Yet another Winnipeg adventure was to the outskirts of the city with Aunt Susan to a beautiful nature preserve called Fort Whyte. Luke wanted to play with all the dead animals in their museum, and faced off with the bison.


Aunt Susan was very patient with a rather cranky Luke. Although he's smiling here, he did get awfully grumpy when the crisp, cold wind started to hurt his ears. But it sure was beautiful out there, cranky baby and all!