When in Victoria...................the city, not the Queen......

So way back in 2001 Karen and I did a weekend trip to Victoria B.C. just before the holidays. Even though it was December it was a great time to go.

The ride up on the Victoria Clipper was pretty uneventful for the most part. There was a little chop in the water and one of the best parts was that my not-so-evil twin (one of my best friends who shares my same first name and his birthdate is 1 year and 1 day after mine) just happened to be heading up to Victoria for the weekend as well. This gave us time to catch up with each other and share a bit of breakfast.

Karen and I stayed at the Fairmont Empress Hotel. I hate to say it, but I'm a bit of a hotel snob. This really is the only place to stay in Victoria as far as I'm concerned. Sure it's not got all the up to date tech conveniences that some of the new places has, but it has the charm and the service that surpasses all the other.

One of the things that you should do when there (Karen and I do everytime) is do the traditional English afternoon tea service. They really know how to pamper you there. The only thing they don't do is put the food in your mouth and wipe you afterward.


One of the highlights is Craigdarroch Castle. This grand spectacle of obscene wealth and industrialism was built by Robert Dunsmuir a coal magnate and railroad industrialist in Canada. While being a fellow Scot, he seemed to be obsessed with material things and showing off his wealth. While this house has some amazing features, it's more than I would need.






To the left is a photo of the gentleman's cigar room. This is where Robert and the boys would retire to for after dinner cigars and scotch or whatever 19th century rocket fuel happened to be on hand.

A little cluttered, but a fairly cozy room to have a pow-wow and dream up the next capitalist venture.











This is one of my favourite features in the house. There is a spiral staircase that leads up to a turret style look out room with a 360 degree view of Victoria. This is the spire at the top of said staircase that hangs from the ceiling.

This little guy is here to greet all the visitors to the lookout and watch over everyone.













This is another one of my favourite features in the house. This is the library. None of the shelves are taller than chest height.

The coolest feature though is the fireplace. Ah you noticed!!! There is a window just over the fireplace which means that this can't be a real fireplace, right? Wrong. The chimney flu for the fireplace in this room runs up either side of the window!!! That is really cool in my book.











Another thing we got to do that a majority of tourist don't get to do (simply due to the fact that December isn't a peak tourist time of year) is to see the Butchart Gardens at nite for the Christmas light display.


This photo is looking at the main house.










This photo is in the Italian garden just off the side of the main house.













This carousel is just behind the Rose garden.




I'm sure that there is a lot to see and do when visiting Victoria. There is a lot of shopping along Government Avenue. There is China Town. Interesting note about Victoria's China Town is that it's home of the world's narrowest alley which was used for a motourcycle chase scene in the movie Bird On A Wire starring Goldie Hawn and Mel Gibson. Look it up. I wouldn't shit you on that. I'm a movie geek.

Thanks for reading. I'm off to hopefully make it through a Hitchcock film that our very cool new neighbour let us borrow. It's one of my favourite Hitchcock films: Rear Window with Jimmy Stewart, Grace Kelly and Raymond Burr. If you've seen it, good for you. If you haven't, then I'm ashamed of you and you will get 12 lashings under the light of a full moon with a wet noodle for not seeing it.

Oh, and read our neighbours blog. She is new to blogging and we welcome her to this new venture. Here is her site: CelticSprite

Hip Dead Folks In Seattle

So there are some pretty cool things to do in Seattle when visiting or even if you happen to live here and don't know what's in your own backyard.

One of Seattle's best kept secrets is our dead celebrities. Here are just two examples of the celebrities that you can expect to see (in our cemeteries) when in town for a weekend or that next business trip.


First up we have Bruce Lee, master of Jeet Kun Do and action film star. There was more to him though than martial arts.

He was very passionate about Jeet Kun Do and wanted to have a school where he could teach others. He was a gifted writer, talented stunt co-ordinator and devoted husband and father.

Hollywood hosed Bruce for many years because of his race. He lost parts in films and tv series because of these prejudices which is too bad. Hollywood just didn't know how big he would be once the general public saw his films. Too bad for them.

Now it's too bad for us. Unfortunately the world lost Bruce Lee on July 20th 1973. He died during the filming of his 5th film, Enter The Dragon.

Through his determination to teach and ability to put aside the racial short comings of others, had Bruce lived he would have done great things to promote not only his style of martial arts, but also his compassion for those that discriminated against him and others to promote awareness and harmony.



Right next to Bruce Lee you will find son and actor, Brandon Lee. Like his father, he was an action film star and died tragically while making his 5th film, The Crow.

I hadn't seen many of his films. In fact the only other one I had seen was Rapid Fire. It's kind of a blur to me now really. I remember being at work though when I had heard Brandon had been killed during filming. I was really taken down by that news. I had been waiting for this film and had wondered how this could have happened and of course what this meant for the film.

The public would get these answer soon enough. This was really tough to swallow for everyone. Not only did a promising actor get cut down in what was surely going to be the start of a huge career, but he was 18 days away from being married!!!
I actually had a lot of respect for Brandon. I didn't know him and he clearly had never heard of me, but I admired him for wanting to act his way and not live in his father's shadow.

We all want to do things our own way and not be our parents. I never want to be like my birthing vessel (mom that I'm currently not speaking to) or her husband (step-father figure) since they have issues that they clearly need to work on.

Instead these days I find myself trying to become a calmer and more understanding person, which is very different from the way I was raised...........in yelling, verbal abruptness and mental chaos. Thank (insert religious figure here) I was an only child and that I could spend hours in my room doing anything but being in the same room with them.

Now I spend my time trying to find that inner peace and to occasionally silence the music and white noise that is constantly in a state of perpetual motion in my head. I also strive to be more like my biological father-he oozes serenity and I've NEVER seen him flustered by anyone or anything. In the end I have accepted that I can be just like one parent and I'd like to think that Brandon, while not wanting to live in his fathers shadow had learned that he could be his own person and still be like one of his parents.............that individual that stood out and wanted to achieve and make a difference his way.

When in Seattle, you can find Bruce and Brandon Lee interned at Lakeview Cemetary on Capitol Hill. Google it and you will find it.

Another famous, interned Seattle resident is Jimi Hendrix. That is a blog for another time.

*disclamer* clearly the head shot of Brandon Lee and the rest in peace action photo of Bruce Lee are not mine, but the photos of the headstones for Bruce and Brandon Lee are mine. I actually happen to be at Lakeview on July 20, 2008 to take these.......35 years after Bruce Lee's death. We had apparently just missed the History Channel film crew and Bruce's widow Linda Lee Caldwell speaking to fans and well wishers there to celebrate Bruce's life. Now that would have been something to attend.

The Viking and Dirty Martini's

So I recently changed the title on my blog because I wanted to be able to document our travels. This particular trip was a solo mission. It was for work.

Yes, technically I am a travel agent. No I don't work for an agency. I work for a cruise line. I spent 4 years in shore excursions. While there I started a program to identify excursions that disabled guests would be able to do. I started with the toughest criteria. Searching for the tours for guests that are non-ambulatory.

That's confined to a wheelchair for those of you that don't speak the pc lingo on handling these situations.

Well now I work in the department that handles the ADA accessibility of guests on board our ships. Sounds easy you say. Not so. ADA is such a grey area that it is the one reason I shave my head. That way I can't pull it out. :)

So back to the reason of this one: Juneau, Alaska. Been there done that. In the southeast panhandle of the state. Accessible only by boat or plane. They are land-locked and you can't drive to it. They have 42 miles of drivable road. Douglas Island is reported to have a get-away home of Harrison Ford. No truth in that from what the locals have told me.

First I have to say that I was surprised to find that not only could I get a GOOD dirty martini in Juneau, but that the particular pub I went to had the vodka that I really like. Three Olives. This is not a premium vodka but one of the best in my opinion. That pub was The Viking. Nothing spectacular about it. Quiet place (well that I could tell since I'd had a few dirty martinis) and plenty of people to chat with.

One thing I did that really stuck out was the helicopter ride up to the Mendenhall Glacier. This is the most easily viewed glacier in Juneau.

Here is a shot of me up on the glacier. In the back ground is an area called the "thunder bowl" named for the thundering roar that you hear just before ice calves from the top of the ridge into the bowl below.

This excellent trip was due in part to the great folks at Temsco Helicopter.

On this particular tour you get about 20-30 minutes on the glacier. You have a guide to show you around and at the end you have some free time to explore on your own before the helicopter comes back for you.

The Mt Roberts Tram is another really fun attraction while in Juneau. There are two European style trams that take you to the top where you have hiking trails, a cultural theatre, gift shops and a restaurant. The view is phenomenal as you can see. I totally recommend doing this while your there. It's not a lot of money and there is no set time frame since you come and go at your leisure.






I have to throw this one in. It's not Juneau but this is a must see when you get to Alaska. This is the Hubbard Glacier. It's located in the Yakutat Bay. This is accessible by cruise ship. This is one of our cruise ships in the foreground.

Our ships stay one mile back due to the frequency of calving from the glacier. This is a spectacular sight to see and the roar that is created just before the calving is something to hear.

Just to give you an idea how big this particular ship is, it's 82,000 grt (gross registered tons) is 936 ft in length with a beam of 105.8 ft. It accommodates 800 crew and 1848 guests. It's not one of the mega cruise ships out there, but is a healthy size and that glacier really dwarfs it and any other ship out there.

Now it's off to apply another coat of stain to a stool and think about dinner. I will work on putting together some photos of my trip into Ketchikan for another post at another time.

T.O.B.B-The Return of the Bronze Bitch

Well I suppose I should be happy. I have the car back from the shop and hopefully this is all the mechanical work that it will need other than care and maintenance for quite sometime.

Don't get me started on how much it cost. I will say that my mechanic(Tan at Europa) has very good rates that definitely beat other shops and his work is first class.

*side note*--Tan isn't your ordinary tech. He has a phd and used to be a chemist. He bought his first nice car at Barrier and that was the beginning of his path to servicing northern European cars. After having paid way too much for some service work at their dealership he started learning to service his own car and well one thing lead to another. Here he is today, a shop owner and just being the one honest tech out there that will hopefully make a difference. He does this because he didn't like getting ripped off and doesn't want to see others taken advantage of. When in north western Washington and in need of a GREAT shop to service your BMW,SAAB,Volvo,Mercedes or VW go see Tan at Europa in Shoreline.

So now that I have that out of the way- major service job later and this car is great for another 100k. She had a head gasket, t-belt, valve job, piston heads polished, full tune, O2 sensor, oil change and some hoses installed that can only be reached when the head is off (I had them in the trunk just waiting......so.......)

In addition to that, I have had the front grille work out for a few weeks. Sanding and refinishing it and applying new black paint. The kidneys are supposed to be chromed, but I opted for black kidneys. They just look better in my opinion.

I also have the front chin spoiler off the car right now as well. Side story on that is I was on my way to work one wet Thursday morning back in April and in the process of making a lane change, the arse of the car started to slide and spun me around. I got her straight, but was facing the wrong direction. I ended up curbing it. OUCH!!!. Fortunately, the most damage was a severely smacked up wheel (thank the maker that the spare matches the four on the car!!!) and the chin spoiler was ripped off on the high curb that I hit.

So it only took me about 2 weeks to find a chin spoiler. The factory one for the 325 is is really hard to find and when they come up they go fast!!! I was fortunate that I could snag one pretty quick. One of the other members of the local chapter of the BMWCCA had just picked up a wrecked 325 is and the chin spoiler was not spoken for yet. I got it for steal and it has the factory driving lamps and temperature sensor it it still.






The rest of the summer will be spent on going over the body and getting surface rust on the rear quarter taken care of and popping out in impression in hood and one in the lower left just above the rocker panel and one nasty looking ding on the front corner of the left side front fender.

All that will bring the body back to straight and I can concentrate on just getting money together for a good paint job and getting the interior whipped back into shape.




I know that my dashboard buddies are glad to be back in action. They are Hula Hottie and Big Wave Dave. They're the only passenger that don't have to grab a JC handle when things are in motion.

This car has a long way to go still from where the previous owner left me.....................with his headache!! This service call was created because old headbolts were re-used when putting the head back on after having new cam shafts installed. For those that don't speak car-ese, the head bolts are ALWAYS replaced. They are designed to stretch as the newly installed head is broken back in allowing the gaskets to set properly. Fortunately time and patience and some necessary visits to the shop have produced a car that I will be proud of having and showing off on the streets.

Hopefully this will be the end of this series for a while. The next will be about work that is being done because it's time to get it taken care of not because it's broke and I need it now.

Peoples Opinions are just that................

So my wife also has her own blog. Paisley Penguin in case you don't subscribe to it or click on my link of other blogs.

On the 4th of July she is checking email and reading other peoples blogs and such. Well she starts looking over hers and was going to make a new post and notices that someone has left her a comment about one of her post.

It simply states "your blog is boring and uninteresting". How rude I think at first. Blogs are opinions or daily journals or a whatever you want to call it. It's a form of expression. A right that is guaranteed and protected by our constitution.

She deletes it since it makes no difference to her what one person thinks of her blog. Good for her I think. This is her place to put her thoughts down and be heard by more than just me.

I don't think it's boring at all. I live it. I can see where to the average outsider that it might be, but you don't have to read it. Find another website. It's just like finding a new channel to watch or a radio station to listen to.

Then I find myself thinking that this person doesn't have any imagination either. Boring and uninteresting. It's a redundant statement really. So clearly this person has no imagination and is not all that educated if they use redundancy and don't even have the balls to state why they don't like the blog.

My wife did the right thing by deleting this comment. It was negative and there was no support to back up the comment. She made little fuss about it and went on with her day. Good for her!!!

To all the blogers out there (myself included) this is your area to document the happenings in your life and talk about your interest, wishes and whatever else is on your mind. Don't let wankers like this person ruin your fun. They may just be jealous because they don't have anything to write about. Or they may just really be that much of an arse.

Why do I wait 3 days to say anything about this? Well time for one. I find that I just don't do these things in a timely manner. That and I have been thinking about it for the past 3 days and thought to myself in that time if I should write about it or not. It may not make a difference, but I feel a bit better just having gotten this out there and letting everyone know that you should think about the comments you leave for people. We are all watching and can see what you leave.

Mr. E30 and the Tales of the Bronze Bitch- The service tech files

So the beloved E30 is back in the shop. About 3 weeks ago my dad was in town to go see Bob Weir one of the members of the Grateful Dead in concert. This just happen to be on June 21st-summer solstice.

So Karen and I loaded the kids into the Bronze Beast (she has two names really) and headed to Fremont to meet up with my dad and to see the solstice festival progress.

First up was meeting with my dad at Mad Pizza. Here you can get very good pizza by the slice and (only in Fremont) a beer in a plastic to-go cup. Ah I love Fremont.

From there it on to see the statue of Lenin hanging out on the corner just down from Mad Pizza. Yes this is the real deal and not some mock up statue. It was rescued just after the Velvet Revolution and eventually found it's way to Seattle.

Well I'm wandering from the point of this post. After everything was said and done it was time to head back home and let my dad and his friend Frank head off to a concert.

On the way home Karen and I could smell coolant. Great that is all I need to have happen. Another issue. I just had her in the shop a few months prior. Well I kept driving and keeping an eye on the temp gauge and watching all the sensors. Yes this wonderful car even at 21 years old has all kinds of gauges and warning sensors monitoring the functions of the car.

We made it back home (about 12 miles in Seattle weekend traffic-I'd rather be in rush hour traffic as it wouldn't take as long) and all was well. I did spend about an hour looking over the car to see if I could find a leaking hose or a puncture in the radiator or a leaking waterpump. No luck.

So after parking it for the rest of the weekend I took it out the following weekend and closely monitored the temperature. No over heating, but the occasional smell of coolant. This was driving me nuts!! This time it was getting in behind the centre console to see if the heater core was leaking. Nothing.

Next was to check coolant flow. It was good. No blockage anywhere. Double checked hoses. Nothing. All good. Well I had done my bit. Now it was time to take it back to Europa for some TLC.

So it has been at Europa now for about 1.5 weeks. Tan, the wonderful BMW tech had been sick for most of the week after I dropped it off. Understandable and I was in no hurry to get it back. It only gets driven on the weekends for now. As it turns out, it's time for a head gasket. Not fun on the wallet. This is a labour intensive job and will tell me what else is wrong.

Well today I get a call from Europa and now have to go to the shop for "show and tell" as Tan tells me. I get this concerned mindset that Bronze Bitch is toasted. After all she has approximately 230 thousand miles on her. That is a lot of miles in 21 years!

Well thank the maker (I can't say that I worship God or any other deity so choose your method of worship here) that after getting there and speaking to Tan that the car is in amazing shape. He shows me the head and let's me know that it's totally straight and won't need to go to the machine shoppe. He tells me the piston walls are in amazing shape and I inspect them with him. He likens the condition to a new motour. I'm getting really excited now. He does however recommend that he pull the exhaust valves and sandblast them. His wire wheel was not able to get the deposits off them. This will be additional labour, but not parts. Next comes the talk about my timing belt. It looks to be in good shape but he's not able to determine the age of the belt and neither am I. So it's a new belt. Luckily I will save 4 hours labour since the block is already apart. Then there is the cap and rotour-they are hammered and beyond their lifespan. Man this car really knows to hold up under conditions. I love this car.

So all in all this is good. He couldn't guarantee the rest of the car, but the motour is great for another 100k at least. More than enough for me. I have only put 10k-12k on it in the last 2.5 years.

I eagerly await getting her back so that I can finally get the grille back in. I've had it out for refinishing and repainting. Next is getting the brackets built for the chin spoiler so I can get that back on the car as well. I will be able to enjoy this car for another few years. Good thing. I think we've bonded and have an understanding.

Eating out in Washington can be an adventure

Wow so I wanted to post something. I really don't have anything to talk about this week. It's a pretty boring week really. Work is long and dreary just as any coal mine should be.

Ok so I don't really work in a coal mine. Hell I don't even work in a basement or an area without windows. It's nice and bright were I am and I have a view. Of Puget Sound.

Ok so where was I? Oh yeah. So by now you've looked at this photo and have wondered to yourselves "what is this freak putting up here and is it legal" or something to that effect.

I'm not promoting a Jenna Jameson film or something from the Red Shoe Diaries in case you're wondering about that.

The lovey wife and I had a weekend without kids (as we do once a month) and we were out and wandered into our local Bucca de Beppo for dinner. If you've ever been there you know how the place is decorated. There is a hodge podge of photos and poster from anytime period all over the walls relating to anything Italian.

So back to where I'm going with this. I'm sitting there and look up and POW-RIGHT IN MY EYE!! is this photo that has been blown up to a gallery sized display of this blonde having spaghetti, and some guy having spaghetti as well only he's eating from the "big boys" plate if you know what I mean.

Well all I can say is that eating a Bucca de Beppo will never be the same for me anymore. I'll have to make sure that I get sat in a different section next time to see what other crazy shite they have on the walls. I wonder if they have a Michael Corleone room in the place with a still of Sonny on the ground next to his Lincoln at the toll booth?

Well I think that's about it for now and the nothing ramblings. Hopefully the next post will actually be something worth reading to someone other than me.