Bonne Année

Happy 2008! Get fit, get active, and spend time with loved ones…yadda yadda yadda…

I’ve got the standard bright eyed plans for my New Year kick-off, even though I have NOT hit the gym yet and yesterday I ate a veal sandwich for lunch and pizza for supper.
I figure I’ll start up in February when the new years keeners start to drop out.

2007 was a great year.. With Sharl’s parents visiting, we have been spending practically every day of December with family. We had the good end of the deal with our in-laws staying with Sharl's brother and not in our closet-sized apartment.

Christmas eve, I had brunch with Mandy, Steve, Dan and Char and exchanged pressies.
And since I couldn’t be in Montreal with MY family, I brought Montreal to Toronto. I cooked dinner for the family and made a traditional French Canadian tourtière. I also made a maple Dijon glazed ham, scalloped potatoes, Harvard beets, sautéd beet tops with swiss chard, and goat cheese spinach salad with cranberries and pecans.

New Year’s Eve was a fondue party at my brother-in-law’s house with lots of champagne and pinot grigio and even more champagne. I’m definitely ready for some health. Might even see my naturopath soon.

Being back at work after 10 days off is pretty rough. So was saying goodbye to the new set of parents I’ve come to love. I lucked out with in-laws. Both are extremely loving, even though Mr. R. has got me belting out genuine Afrikaans cuss words. Anyway... this part is a segue into a rant about AC...Air Cak!! Cak is one of the words I've learned which means poo.

Poo like the service we received last night at the airport. We get to the ticket person who does everything to NOT help us. First, a descrepency of Mrs. R's married name and maiden name on the passport and air ticket causes him to lecture us on how since it's not registering on the system we should buy a new ticket. (WTF???) After some annoyed words, we urge him to call his manager, because SOMEHOW, she was allowed to travel all the way here with no problems.
Surely she can't be the FIRST person to be married and have two last names!
Anyway, he reluctantly calls his manager, who overrides the issue for us in 2 seconds. How complicated is that??
Next, we ask for Mrs. R's bags to be flown all the way to Cape Town instead of to her stopover in Frankfurt.
Mr. Dumkop says he can't do that.
I ask him to stop dicking around call the man who overrode the last problem to override this problem.
He does eventually after some complaining that he shouldn't be doing this and that it might not work. Manager gets the problem solved in another 2 seconds. Clearly more complicated stuff.
We politely thank him for his help, and he replies, "Why? I didn't do anything."
No f-ing kidding.
Now why should a customer have to go through all that hassle at the TICKET counter?? IF the problem can be fixed by making a few calls, then make the CALLS! We don't need to HEAR about your lack of authority. Honestly. the WORST. This is strike three for me with Air Cak.