I have become 29. To celebrate, you get my photo.

Yes, I know 29. I once used to say “but I still feel 16!” Now I say “but I still feel 26!” But to be truthful, I have felt 45 since I started high school.

No No, that is not true. I have felt like I am my own age, but in the 50s, since I was in highschool. “What are those crazy kids up to now?” I would ask the unhearing occupants of a lowered Honda Accord with more decibles than horsepower. In my day the kids all drove jeeps left over from the war…

So I am not really surprised that I am about to enter my 30s. I have a sweet sweet wife, one sweet son, am excellent puppy and a condo. I even have something to do each morning, fulfilling the need for marine appliances all over the world! But there is so much to do!

Wm Ernest Henley dis not say ” I am the Third Mate of my fate/ I am the bosun of my soul”. No! He said he was the captain. I am promoting myself to Captain from now on. Captain Wm. Tomkinson of the Indiaman “Hubris”. Stand-by to reef topsail halyards! Beat to quarters!

Well I’ll let Briana be the skipper sometimes too. We are in the same boat now you know.

Briana will be having her eigthh birthday tommorrow! Yay! She will be a whole quarter of a century old. New Husband, Puppy, Job, Condo; so much change and so much done for my dear spouse. Charge your glass! Hoist your arm! Cry cheers to Briana and her wonderfullness that even the deaf shall hear our joyful noise!



Huzza!
Flickr Photo Download: DSCF1652

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Alright everybody, it is time to pay the piper. We have posted photos and anecdodes of our wedding and our honeymoon. It is your turn now. Lots of you took pictures at the wedding and we are really looking forward to seeing your photos.

Email them to one of us at our gmail accounts with your best shots. I bet they will be awesome. If you don’t have our address, leave a comment here and we will mail it to you. Also, if you have a funy story about the wedding that you think we may not have heard, post it here.

Awesome guys. Thanks.

Flickr Photo Download: WB-098

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So Cute!

Flickr Photo Download: WB-251

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Auntie JL, Little Emily, Momma Leah and Solomon in sweet chicken dance bliss.

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Excellent awesome family wedding victory action!

Cousin John, and the little one celebrating a moment.

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In a genius ploy to elevate the status of the disabled everywhere, my sister and her henchmen have formed a secret society for the purpose of total global domination. Firmly stroking calm white cats, Jocelyn and her ilk have bent their madcap skills to the creation of plasma laser death rays and waffle borne mind control syrup. Their strident symbol, posted above, displays their nefarious intentions.

Will we ever be saved from their destructive wrath? Can we live in a world where all street corners have access ramps and the deaf can clearly understand even our most publicly stated utterances? I don’t know how we will survive… I will be found firmly elevated by four flights of non accessible stairs until the crisis is abated.

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My soooper sister Jocelyn Tomkinson has won the Terry Fox award. She has just achieved her biology degree and has entered a global health master’s program.

She is now officially the most awesome person in Canada. But I already knew that.

Awesome! You rock!

Briana and I are in Portugal and in Portugal it is not so common to have easy and reliabe access to internet. Result? Lots of funtastical stories with interesting photographs and no time to blog them.

While we are able to so far upload the contents of our SD cards to the Flickr website, so yawll can get a view of what we have been seeing. But if a photo is a thousand words, we would not have novels. Here is one funny story of our trip to posturise youself with:

So during the first half of our trip, on a visit to the medieval encastellated town of Obidos in the mid-coastal area of Portugal, I had recently become used to being an honoured master at the secrets of the manual transmission. (there is nothing like a nation of crazy, honking tailgaiting lunatics to advance your learning curve!). I had also, hovever, run over a screw or nail or porcupine or something else beause, to our shock and horror, we have a flat.

Ok, so no big deal, it is just a flat. I have had flats before and I spit in their general direction. This flat was ok, we pulled over, applied an almost full sized spare and checked out what to do next.

The spare said 80 kms on the side and I wanted the flat fixed so the rental company would not charge us a repair fee or something. I send Bree to the housewares store where we have parked to make the repair. She is to ask where the tire shop is. “Gulp. OK!” She gamefully embarks with her phrasebook in hand to the sooopermercado to find some direction while I finish up with the mal-auto.

Afortunado! The customer in line (no inglesh) knows a repair outfit (sooper-bom!) and so he hops on his dirt bike and we zip through the village roads following hin to a close-by rural mechanic.

Afortunado! His name is Carlos, he owns the shop and he has an eager to help mechanic fried (of advanced years, receding dental profile and remarkably usable english) named Roi. Carlos and Roi. Nossa Salvadores do Obidos. Sweet.

They hammer out the dent on the inside of the aluminum rim, pump the tire up, examine it, swap it to a trailing wheel rather than the leading ond and pose cheerfully fr a photo after I cheerfully give them 40 E’s for thier efforts and good spirits.

Fast Forward - Afortunado Nada: The next day of travel sees the Renault Clio at the side of the highway with the same tire flat. It seems Carlos and Roi had not really fixed anything but our delusions. We swap again to the spare and on the way to Nazare we find a tire shop. !200E’s! Original not repairable!

Afortunada. The spare is a normal tire is as good a a regular one and we use it on the rest of the trip. When we hand in the car in Lisbon, we learn that our E-Tailer car rental company has insured us against these problems and we will not be out of pocket. Carlos and Roi’s repair of the aluminum rim has saved us a greater expense and we are golden.

Thus concludes the story about Bree, Will, Carlos, Roi and the Clio and the case of the mysterious Afortunado.