Trippin’ Around North America

Is Atlanta Burning, Scarlet? [No, its freezing!]

October 24

An exciting day for us coming up. Our time in Atlanta with my nephew Robin and his family is something we have been looking forward to for many months. While crossing the state line from South Carolina to Georgia we stopped in at the Georgia Visitors Centre.


Canadians are made especially welcome and given a bag of goodies. The bag has a Canadian flag on it with a Welcome Canadians Motif. There were four pins in it with crossed Canadian and Georgian Flags. Nice gesture.

A few hours of easy driving and we are in the north-east suburbs of Atlanta. Our trusty navigator Jane took us right to their doorstep by 3.30.


Please understand that Robin's household is a very busy and active place. Chaotic is a more fitting description of the situation.

When we pulled up to the house, Rob was at work, Soph was stuck in the airport in New Jersey, Amberly was on her way back from a three day school outing in Florida, [about 160 14 year-olds], and Madison was on the way home from school, where a neighbour was waiting for her. When Madison did arrive, she and her "best friend" Karla came and gave us a welcome hug.


We let ourselves in and started unloading what we needed for our 10-12 day stay here. Soon the laundry was in and we settled in. [The BIG shower was great.]



Unknown to us, Robin, has this crazy tradition where he, and I say he, does not put the furnace on until the temperature in the house hits 60 F. It was 61 when I tried unsuccessfully to get the heat up, unaware of this "insane" tradition, as Amberly later called it. Our threat to go back out to the trailer fell on deaf ears.

Fellette prepared dinner from goodies in the fridge and soon Rob and the girls arrived. Shortly Soph came home and we settled in for an evening of catch-up as some of us huddled in the "Sun Room" where the lights from the plant lights offered a bit of relief from the chilly Atlanta weather! We did a bit of homework with Madison, [grade one], I handled arithmetic while Fellette did the reading part.

We awoke in the morning to a hearty congratulation from Rob for surviving the tradition, the temperature was below 60 so the heat was going on!

By 7.30 AM, Rob, Soph and Madison were out the door while Amberly recouped from her outing. We are left with instructions to get her up at 9.30 to do homework.

This is a bit of a change from our travel routine but nice. We have a few handyman jobs to do around the house, but Rob does not want the deck-rebuild project to happen. He fears an incomplete project!

Factoid of the day: Did you know that 5,500,000 Americans are employed as a result of US trade to Canada?

posted by Doug and Fellette @ 9:27 PM