Life and Times

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But I digress (a lot). Everyone’s perception of any event is different, especially one with 56 people attending. So I’ll tell you about the wedding from my window in life.

We arrived 10pm on Saturday. I was very sick with a cold that was just peaking. Needless to say I spent the whole Sunday in the room. Carmen brought me a selection of food from the buffet but all that I felt like was drinking the soups and lots of water. Seems like a bit of a waste to be at an all-inclusive and you can’t eat or stomach any booze. C’est la vie.

Monday was much better. I awoke starving with a craving for scrabbled eggs and bacon which I found lots on the buffet. Then down to the pool to try and burn off the lingering cold. Monday dinner we overwhelmed the buffet at 7:20 and ended up in small split up groups. That’s when I met Laura, the Urban Planner. We saw the two shows, main stage and the back public square. Did a bit of video poker at the Casino then headed for bed.

Tuesday. Same spot at the pool, same gang. The great thing is you could always walk around the pool and see some of the other 55 people. We got our towels out early. It the first Karaoke night for me. I chose to do John Denver’s “Country Roads”. I had no voice but people liked it anyway. It was a good thing since I could barely sing by the third chorus but everyone else carried on. It was a large sing-a-long crowd at the bar plus the gang I was with.

Wednesday. At the beach 6:45 am for sunrise. There were about 12 other people down there watching the sunrise. It was quite a good one. I prototyped my first sand bear head. Went to the open air Los Olos for breakfast. It was rejuvenating to have breakfast beachside. Dinner at the Japanese was well executed with good food.

Thurs. The Main Event. Up at 6:30 am. Karen would be getting ready. I thought I’d go to the beach and prepare a little surprise for them.

I'm trying (but not too hard) to come down from an emotional high which was Karen and Joe's wedding in Punta Cana.

I thought going down to a wedding with people you know would be fun. In spite of a few downer things, the event way exceeded my expectations.

We (Carmen and I) hung around with a group of Marion's friends (mainly trailer park group). They are such a fun gang. Whether it was bargaining on the beach for stuff or doing karaoke or casino or just lying around the pool, we just felt like part of a group that knew us for years not for a few days. Thanks gang. Not to single out anyone but these are just impression of some people. Marie is such a kid. OK pretty drunk at the wedding reception but just immediately picked up on the funny faces thing (see Facebook photo gallery) and brought out the worse/best in the people as we swept the crowd. Laura, the Urban Planner and her mom Mary, the eternal teacher (seems to always want to interject with a fact or observation). Laura really took me back to high school where one of my teachers taught us about urban sprawl, dangers and ways to prevent it. The really stupid thing is we are here 30 years later with the same problems and the same inaction. She works out of Alliston and the developers have just skipped over the Oak Ridges green belt and just push further north.

I had been told 30 years ago that the simple community includes mixed use like small retail within the communities, so there is at least an option of walking to the corner store. This is not happening in these bedroom communities. This creates heavy reliance on the car. While there is the Honda plant in Alliston, the majority of the new homes will be bought by those commuting to the GTA. Crazy stuff, how can that be Urban Planning for the good of society? The reality is town council want to expand their tax base and will approve anything that fits in the town plan and follows all building requirements. To insist on small commercial in a development rather that creating "big box" malls doesn't bring in any tax money. Each town fends for itself, there is no overall Ontario "master plan", so we will continue to see prime farm land swallowed up by houses that people will live and commute farther and farther to avoid the smog in Toronto. (I hope you laughed and then wrote your MPP.)