Gadabout

Gadabout  -noun- one who roams about in search of amusement or social activity.

We've been right gadabouts this weekend, flitting from one social occasion to another. So much so, the Halifax weekend requires episodes.

Episode 1 - Bubbles and the crew go to the big smoke...

Halifax, Nova Scotia was our destination, and with 3 episodes of Trailer Park Boys under my belt, I felt prepared but apprehensive. Richard arrived at the car wearing bubbles glasses.

'We're taking the car with the doors on' he says, which is lucky, because we are packed to the brim, Vina, Richard, Ethan and gadabout dogs, Sookie and Flash. We don't want anyone to go the way of the squashed road skunks...

It's wet and raining, and there's a faint smell of skunk (the live sort)Tim Hortons and industrial fuel. We drive through towns called Quispamsis, Tatamagouche and Shediac, and Vina and Richard challenge 'the Aussie chick' to pronounce the towns correctly. We skip between 200 satellite radio stations, avoiding Richards country music wherever possible. There's an unusual amount of cars on the sides of the roads, and I am told this means its 'gone deer season'. 

can't get enough of Richards 'hillbilly' stories - the time he was billeted during an away hockey trip and his 15 year old host spent the evening at the pub and he stayed home with his billets mother...the horror stories that match the plots of a Stephen King novel, the  notorious Nova Scotia Goler family - (this is my oft told 'living in Canada' story, stemming from a 60 minutes show I watched when I lived on PEI, where a reporter asks a Nova Scotia family who live in the backwaters about 'incest', and they responded through rotting teeth and with broken English, 'Dar 'ittle creatures dat run  dacross da floor'. Google 'Goler' NS for more...) My memories are now confirmed, and my suspicions of embellishing this story as an attention seeking teen, or naïvely succumbing to an urban myth, fall with the autumn Leaves...

My fear of being abducted by a goggle-eyed duck shooting drunken inbred hillbilly and taken to his trailer home in the wilds of Nova Scotia are dispelled when we arrive at Dartmouth, Halifax. Mike, Evelyn, and Madalyn feed us a wholesome meal of ginisa (sweet and sour pork), sinigang (broiled fish including the head), and a desert of pumpkin pie and apple pie ice cream. The house is 'self-built' by Mike and his dad, and Mikes career as a designer shines through. The place feels palatial, 4 bathrooms, 1000s of cupboards and lights, and hand crafted edging. Phillipino born Evelyn prepares food that is befitting of the  impressive surroundings, and provides me with much needed alternative food groups (I have been indulging in the food groups, 'fatty', 'crispy',' salty', 'sweet', and 'caffeine'.) We play the Virtual PS3 on the biggest TV I have seen outside of Times Square NY, and do what all good gadabouts do, and seek the most amusing and entertaining company  possible. We agree on the Casino, and venture out to try our luck...tune into episode two, 'tied to the machine' posted live tomorrow...