flying to camp and baking...

Just got the news today, which could mean that it is going to change tomorrow or so like news in camp always does, that we are now flying directly from Edmonton to camp instead of having a layover in Yellowknife. I don't know if that means that the company completed work on the bigger run way to accomodate a 737 jet or if we could always have had a jet but it took the company this long to realize that it might be cheaper to get a big plane and have us fly up in one big hop instead of paying for everyone to fly to YK on a regular flight, over night with a dinner expense and single room charge for everyone (hotels are about $110 for the cheapest per night) and then charter a small plane to hop us into camp. Either which way, this means that we leave camp around noonish and arrive in Edmonton around 3:30 instead of leaving camp around 10amish and laying over in YK for 5 hours and being in Edmonton for 7pm.

Now this means good news and bad news. Good news cause I dont spend 2 days flying to get to camp but instead do it in one great hop and call it finished. Bad news because this means that I don't get to spend that one day coming into camp in YK visiting with my parents and grandmother or even spend the 4 hours to visit them going out of camp. Though I think the best news is that I no longer have to fly Air Canada Jazz and their iffy flight times (they cancelled their flights 3 times the last year I flew to camp with them due to 'mechanical problems' with the one plane they seem to have that is flying that flight to the north).

In camp I heard some news that I am 2nd cook for 3 weeks and then on my last week in camp they are putting me on nights to start my training as a baker. I think they said their plan is that I am going to be 2nd cook for 2 weeks and then go to baker for 2 weeks, which means another 2 weeks of days and then switch to 2 weeks of nights. Normally I wouldnt take this as serious since the camp manager has been telling me this is going to happen for a year or so now but something happened that made me think there was some validity to the news.

I was walking back to my room last night from my shift and Big D (the present baker) came up to me and said my name. I have already told her that unless it is work related duties I don't talk to her (long story, we have a past and havent really talked in a year or so) but she keeps calling my name now and then probably to annoy me. Anyways, here is how it went:

(M)e - *mumble mumble*

Big (D) - I hear they are going to teach you to be a baker next month.

M - they have dangling that carrot in my face for months now, I will believe it when I see it.

D - oh you are going to have so much fun. It is so exciting. It is so great.

M - *mumble* yeah, sure....*walk away*

I know, I am a grumpy old sod but I really just dont like her. So yeah, they wouldnt tell her that I was going to be baker unless it was a distinct possibility. Guess this means that the chances of me being baker just went from 50/50 to 75/25 chance of me getting the training.

The only other thing to mention is a recent news article about how they are looking at possibly altering the national anthem to be more gender neutral. Apparently the original writing of the anthem lyrics had "True patriot love thou dost in us command," written by Stanley Weir in 1908. I guess it was changed later to be the one I have known all along as 'true patriot love, in all thy sons command'. Now, as much as I am a firm believer of not going with the whole gender neutral stuff and all, I think I can agree with this one. Not because it is making the gender neutral and all but simply because the lyrics make more sense the 1908 way than the way I have always sung it. I mean, who are the 'sons' and why are they commanding me to do anything? Is it the government? The 'sons' of the first founders of Canada's independance? I am not one to take commands from a son that I know of. However, when it comes to the notion of the whole nation of Canada, of course I will take commands from it. The country demands patriot love from all of us in Canada. So yeah, I would say that this is a good idea personally.

No real point to that last bit, just read it in the news article and had to put it out there...so yeah, anyways....ummmmmm, *whistles softly* how about them Blue Jays, huh?