The Visitors

On Sunday night my indomitable relatives visited from the middle reaches of the empty wasteland between the land of milk and honey and the Pacific Ocean (also known as Saskatchewan). Clint "where's my Stetson?" Langelaar and Karen "Stertorous-Breather" Langelaar came up to Ottawa with little baby Owen "Awesomeness" Langelaar. On Sunday night at 11:30pm the family arrived at the Ottawa train station . . .

*interruption*

"What are you blogging about? How Owen would only smile at me in the morning? What's up with that?" Laurianne queries with rapid-fire delivery. She laughs as she walks away.

*interruption recedes into another area of the apartment*

Anyhow, we talked for a while and then went to bed. Monday morning I drove Laurianne to work and came back to cook my patient guests some breakfast. Being the generous folk that they are, they decided to treat me to breakfast instead. Either that, or the thought of an omelette cooked by John was too distasteful to fathom. I took them to Chez Cora which is, unequivically, the best breakfast restaraunt chain in the universe. Maybe not, but it certainly is worthy of a superlative. After this, we headed back to the apartment where we watched Everything is Illuminated while Karen succumbed to her sleep and Owen took a nap. After Karen had rested, she decided it was time to rest, so Clint and I headed out to the Canadian Museum of War. I should mention that Ottawa was receiving its first real snowfall at this time. This, of course, gave Ottawa's museums an excuse to save money by closing. From the Museum of War, which was closed, we headed downtown where I parked under the World Exchange Plaza. Disheartened, we comforted ourselves with junk food from McDonald's. From there, we hiked over to the Bank of Canada to go to the currency museum (Clint collects rare currency). This museum was also closed.

Having come from a storm system that along with frigid temperatures of -35 had deposited snowdrifts of nine feet, Clint had some choice words about the use of his tax dollars. (We only had about ten centimetres of snow that day). From there, we headed over to Starbucks (?) and sucked back some coffee while we discussed politics, history, and Stephen Harper's hair. We then went to pick up Laurianne from work and took her back to the apartment. Laurianne cooked a very good meal, although she shocked Karen with her copious use of salt. We had a pleasant evening of conversation and then it was off to bed, because we needed to drive them to the airport early the next morning.

We had a great time and it was wonderful to see Karen and Clint after so long and to see little Owen for the first time. He was a bit cantankerous by the time he got to us. This was only natural after having been subjected to enough camera flashes during his time in Port Perry to make a young Hollywood starlet jealous. Nevertheless, the combined awesomeness of Laurianne and I was still enough to coax many smiles from the little guy. I hope Karen and Clint can come again while the museums are open.