My vacation started on Friday. Well, technically, the days off work start on Monday, but on Friday I realized I’d already worked 50 hours for the week by about noon, and I was feeling beat… so I set up my out-of-office email auto-responder agent, changed my answering machine message, and shut down my work laptop at around 2:00 PM. I’ve had some stress at work the past couple of weeks, mostly good stress, but tiring nonetheless.

So, what am I doing with my vacation time? The biggest “event” during my vacation will be a getaway to Vancouver Island with my wife to see the Tall Ships Festival. We are joining my friend Chris and his family there: he’s the one most interested in the sailing ships, for me it is a good opportunity to visit, an excuse to get away for a few days, and maybe a chance to learn some thing about the ships.

Other than that, I’ll be hopefully relaxing, playing some computer games, drinking some beer, and if the Gods of Construction smile, watching some progress on our deck construction take place. Supposedly they will begin pouring the footing next week- and there is a (slim) chance that the spa itself might be delivered the week after. We might even have a way to eliminate the need to use a crane to place the spa in our back yard… I’m somewhat torn on that one. On the one hand, saving a thousand bucks for the crane and operator fees would be very nice. On the other hand, being able to watch a crane lift a 600 kg spa over the roof of my house is definitely something I’ll miss