The water is back

Woohoo. The boil-water advisory was lifted yesterday. It is still a little queer-looking, so we're going to drink bottled water for a few more days. No more boiling our washing-up water though - that was getting pretty annoying.

We got up yesterday to a good deal of snow. Steph took a bunch of pictures, like the one to the right. Christmas has arrived early! The snow is still around today, and tomorrow there is more snow forecast. The weather is going to warm up towards the end of the week though.

Tonight we are going to our first ice hockey game. I expect I probably won't have any idea what's going on, but it should be fun. Must remember to cheer for the Vancouver Canucks, or I might get duffed up :)

Snow (and other things)

It started to snow yesterday, and it is snowing today too - quite heavily at the moment. Check out the webcam picture opposite. The forecast is for snow until at least Tuesday I think. It is a lot colder than it was last year at this time. A high pressure front means not too much rain though, which is nice.

Steph and I went to see Casino Royale with some friends last Sunday. We all really enjoyed it. I thought it was the best Bond film in ages. Some of the action sequences are awesome, and Daniel Craig seemed to fit the role really well. It was a little too long, and had its moments of silliness, but overall it was a great movie. Recommended!

We are still having to boil our water at the moment. It's improved in quality since last weekend but is still some way off being good enough to drink. I expect the boil water advisory won't be lifted for another week at least. We are getting used to relying on bottled water now, although washing up is still a major pain - boiling enough water to fill the sink is a time-consuming process :/

Last night we went out for drinks for a friend's birthday. We then went 5-pin bowling. It was similar to modern 10-pin bowling that I have done before, but there are only 5 pins (obviously) and the balls are much smaller - small enough to grip in one hand. It was pretty low-tech - the pins themselves were on strings that reset them, and there was no electronic scoreboard. You had to puzzle it out for yourself which isn't easy when you're a little tipsy. It was all very quaint and old-fashioned :) I think everyone enjoyed it though (there were nearly 20 people there altogether) and Steph and I would like to do it again some time.

Don't drink the water...

So on Thursday we were showering and noticed that the water was a nasty brown colour, and smelled of dirt. We figured it was a problem with our apartment block, and would have spoken to our building manager that morning but they were not around. Anyway, when we got to work we found out that the dirty water had another cause. Apparently, torrential rains flowing into Vancouver's fresh water reservoirs have stirred up tonnes of sediment, leading to the nasty water quality. The health authorities have issued a Boil-Water Advisory, which means we have to use bottled water or boil it for at least a minute. As it is so full of dirt, you wouldn't really want to drink the water even after its boiled.

So its Saturday now and the water is looking slightly better, but not much. I've no idea how long this is going to go on for, but believe me washing up our pots has become an epic operation that takes several hours :/

One interesting thing I discovered on Friday - canned drinks don't do much good for you. Normally I drink pure water all the time, but on Friday I had to drink canned juice drinks and so forth. By the middle of the afternoon I had drunk about 5, and was still dry. That can't be right.

Ray sings (and speaks!)

On Thursday (November 16th) we went to see Ray LaMontagne at the Centre for Performing Arts. We saw him once before at Shepherd's Bush Empire in London and he was great then. This time I think he might have been even better. The sound quality at the venue was great, and we had good seats too. Ray's voice was amazing as always. He played a mixture of his most popular songs from his first album, and tracks from his new album too. We were totally absorbed in every song. Initially I thought he was going to be painfully shy as always, but he actually spent a little while talking to the audience this time, which was cool. He was quite a funny guy when he got going. The crowd appreciated his music too, and gave him a standing ovation at the end. Superb. We've vowed never to miss an opportunity to go see him.

Happy 3rd anniversary to us

Wednesday (November 15th) was our third anniversary - go us! Steph and I went for food in the evening to celebrate. We tried a restaurant called Chambar which was excellent - not too pricey and the food was great.

It's been a fantastic year in Canada and we are both looking forward to the next one!