I have a Visa (For real this time).

So it turned out that when our lawyer said 'You can go and get your Visa from the consulate now' it really meant 'you can go and apply for your Visa now.'

Anyways, all shenanigans aside (and there was much shenanigan-ing), I ended up walking out of the Visa office with two passports, each stamped with a Visa valid for November 1st to January 30th.

It turns out that a Visa is not what allows me to live in a country, it's just what allows me to enter a country. In this case, it allows me to enter and work while I'm there. I will still need to get a residence card if I intend to stay in the country past January 30th. More on that when it happens.

In the meantime, huzzah!! I have a Visa!

I have a Visa?

This morning, HR let me know that "the law firm confirmed today that your file arrived at the consulate of France in Vancouver."

This means that my Visa has arrived in Vancouver, and now all I have to do is pick it up.

Update: I really don't know what this means, actually. I went to the consulate today and got an infuriating run-around from the people at the office. When I asked if they had my Visa, they told me that I needed to fill out an application. When I told them that I'd already done that, they asked to see it. When I told them that I submitted it to the consulate in Paris, they laughed and told me that there is no consulate in Paris -- why would they need a French consulate in France? When I told them that I really didn't know who I submitted it to, but my Visa was definitely here, they told me that they couldn't talk to me without an appointment and my application form filled out in triplicate and asked me to come back tomorrow.

160.93 km Thanksgiving

It was Turkey Weekend last weekend, and we were able to host Thanksgiving dinner. Since moving here, we haven't been able to host Thanksgiving as often as I would like. We originally started hosting an Orphan Dinner in 2000 or 2001. Because of our close proximity to family, we spent the previous 3 Thanksgiving weekends busy at dinners that others are hosting. Which is nice, but it's good to cook too.

This year, the regional fam packed up their bags, their bikes, and Grandma, and headed out to Spence's Bridge for Thanksgiving camping and riding. This left us in town with a free weekend, and a couple of hungry friends. So we did up the dinner, but we did it a little different this year.

First, it wasn't an orphan dinner, most people had family plans on the Saturday or Sunday.

Second, we weren't technically hosting, just cooking. We don't really have chairs or a table at the moment, so we actually hosted at Nick's place in Historic Gastown, where we got to watch a homeless guy get arrested for being homeless.

Third, we decided to forgo the traditional Turkey, Stuffing, Potatoes, etc, and run with a Hundred Mile menu instead.

I had heard of the 100-Mile Diet before, but I hadn't really given much thought as to what it meant for regular meals. I was introduced fully to the idea earlier in the summer when I attended a 100-Mile Bar-b-q hosted by a friend from work. Her husband was just finishing filming a Documentary on the diet, and their family had been participating (at home only) during the shoot. Meeting other people who were doing it, and hearing about their stories, was incredible and I thought it would be fun to extend the idea into at least one shared meal before we left. Thanksgiving seemed to be the best place, as it's a time to celebrate the local harvest season, and what better way to celebrate, than to eat! Also, as it's our last Thanksgiving in this area, we thought it would be nice to have foods from the region.

Some interesting facts about eating 100-Mile in Vancouver.

• No one in town makes flour. If you want to eat flour, you have to buy wheat from a local farmer, and mill your own. This requires the use of a wheat mill as well.
• No one in town makes salt. If you want salt, you can head down to the beach, grab some water, and dehydrate until you have homemade sea salt.
• There is no yeast within 100 miles of here. This means no leavened bread, no beer, and very little wine. (Some wine is made with natural occurring yeast that grows on the grapes.) You can still make flatbreads (with your personally milled flour), and I think you might be able to make sourdough.
  
• There is very little naturally occurring oil around here. Hazlenut oil or butter is really the only option.
• Nutmeg, cinnamon, cloves, allspice, chocolate, coffee, olives, etc. do not grow around these parts.
  

There is, however, plenty of meat, fish, vegetables, dairy, berries and several fruits. So we don't really have a shortage of tasty food, but it does take a bit of a mind shift to work within the constraints of the menu.

What we ended up making was as follows:

• Mushrooms in a garlic cream sauce.
  Sarah and K learned to make this at a cooking class earlier in the week. We grabbed some local mushrooms and milk, and mixed with garlic and other kitchen magic to make a tasty appy. We used some brandy from out-of-region in the sauce.
  
• Grilled Sockeye Salmon, with a blueberry/honey reduction, and local herbs.
  Salmon is tasty, and fits better with some dietary restrictions at the dinner. We did the glaze because oil, lemons, pepper, maple, brown sugar and salt (all tasty salmon toppers) are not from around here. Note: Local blueberry juice is crazy expensive.
• Cucumber salad, in a Creme Fraiche and chive dressing.
  I wanted a crunchy salad to go with the meal, and when I tried this at the bar-b-q it was delicious. Also, I got to make the Creme Fraiche from scratch, which was really cool.
• Wheat Berry Tabouleh, with Cranberry and Apple dressing.
  Tabouleh is normally made with Cous Cous, but as it's not a regional grain, we subbed Wheat Berries instead. So good!! Lemons are not regional, so we used cranberries for the sour flavour. Tomatoes, cucumber, herbs, and apples from the farmers market finished it off.
  
• Potatoes au Gratin.
  This was a recipe from a French co-worker. Apparently it's a staple of her family dinners. The potatoes used the home made creme fraiche, some herbs and garlic, and a local cheese. They should have used Swiss, but it's a long way from here to Switzerland.
• Pumpkin Pie.
  This was not 100-MIle Pie. But it was tasty!!!

We cut a few corners here and there, but it was true to spirit. We even cut the salt and oil out of most of the dishes (except the cucumber salad, which used salt for drying the cukes).

It actually wasn't as hard as I would have thought. I think that some of that is because we live in an excellent food producing region. Also, we have been trying to Eat Local, and eat slow, for a while now. The 100-Mile diet fit nicely into both of those systems.

The election results are basically in.

See previous comments.

Students opt for Conservative minority in mock elections

There's a neat story over at the CBC about a mock election held Canada Wide for youth.

"Some of these kids are making more informed decisions that some adults are," said Martin-Keilty on Oct. 10.

"This morning I had kids as little light bulbs say: 'I was going to vote Conservative but in the party's platform it says the Conservatives want to cut $45 million in culture and the arts, and culture and the arts are very important to me, so now I am not voting for them.'"

"For a 13-year-old to say that — wow."

Now, if only their parents would say that too...

Unfortunately, the end results were similar to the real election, with the Conservatives taking a minority win.

Voting Results

There are two great sites on CBC this evening that are tracking live results across the country.

CBC.ca lists up to date results textually.
There's also an interactive map.

I voted.

Voting complete.
Only 15 minutes or so from start to finish this year. I think that's a new record.

New Hockey Night in Canada Theme Song

The winner for the new Hockey Night in Canada theme song has been announced. You can listen to Canadian Gold on the CBC's website.

It's pretty good actually. Although, it's less likely to start a random sing-alongs in foreign bars than the last anthem. I like the bag pipes for the intro.

Mega-update

I've been holding back on updating the blog for about a month now. Not for any good reason, I had all of the text written on the original date attached to each post. I just wanted to make sure that I had the photos in the right place too -- and I was lazy uploading those.

They should be up now, and are available on picassa as well, along with a few others.

My cousin has interesting socks

These came from korea.
I don't understand them.