I have been sliiiightly bad since my spender bender promise, but I have lots of excuses! (I'm really good at coming up with excuses :/).
Here are my 'frivolous' purchases so far this October:

Imagine Vintage Wear: $46 for a skirt and 4 vintage patterns. Seamed stockings were a gift.


Air Canada: $73 for a flight from Edmonton to San Francisco. The rest of the trip was paid with Aeroplan points.

Air Canada: $54 for return flight from San Fran to Edmonton. Again, rest was paid using Aeroplan points.

But truthfully I've been very good so far! Everything else I've spent money on was either essentials (like replacing my glasses, groceries, getting supplies for my sewing class or replacing some things G got in the break-up) or Christmas presents (I've shopped for Bee and my mom, already woohoo!). I didn't buy a single thing in San Fran except for lunch one day. Ian and I didn't get to do much touristy stuff, but we did enjoy Santa Rosa and even a beach date before coming back to home to Edmonton (and snow.)

Amount spent on pre-Christmas spender bender so far: $173

XO Laurie

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Don't forget about the deal eShakti is offering Retro Reporter readers. From now until December 31, first time eShakti shoppers can receive $25 off their order with the coupon LAURIEMARIECALLSEN.

Thanks all to your comments on Facebook, Twitter and on the blog regarding yesterday's post on how to do my hair after an early morning flight. I think I have a good idea now of what I'm going to attempt!

I had a stroke of genius (humble, me) as I was making my way to work. I've decided that I will sleep in pin curls, but I'm going to take out the clips before I leave and let them be. Most of the time if I take them out carefully after sleeping on them they maintain their curled up shape. Then, I'll brush them out once I get to my destination.

However, I do have a plan B! Last night I couldn't be bothered to set my hair, so I thought this morning would be a good opportunity to try an up do. My hair is just long enough to do a little roll in the back, like so:

You know what they say about going to San Francisco.

I just did the front of my hair into victory rolls, but I feel like it's missing a certain je nais se quais. Perhaps several smaller rolls? It was suggested on Instagram that I add in more flowers, but I think it might be overkill.


What do you think? After this whole debacle I'll be sure to post what I ended up doing with my locks.

XO Laurie

Hi gang, I'm in need of some guidance and advice this morning.
This weekend I'm flying to San Francisco to head to Santa Rosa, California with my boyfriend Ian* to his friend's wedding. Besides the fact that this is awesome and very exciting, I do need some help.

What on earth am I going to do with my hair? Or, rather, how am I going to do it?

I have to leave my Edmonton apartment at 4 a.m. Saturday to catch the airport shuttle for my 7:30 a.m. flight, which means I arrive in San Fran at 9:44 a.m. (my wonderful mother gave me some aeroplan points, and I was able to fly direct in business class. Faaaancy!). Ian is already en route to California, and will pick me up before heading to Santa Rosa for the 4:30 p.m. ceremony.


My dilemma is this: When/how will I curl my hair? I don't want to set it overnight Friday and style it at 3 a.m. Saturday as it's sure to fall flat by the time it's the ceremony 13 hours later. I am nervous about setting it in the morning before I leave because I don't want to cause a kerfuffle at the airport. Not too many women (especially 22 year olds) wear their hair up in pin curl clips on the plane. Also, I don't really want my head to get wanded. It's a tad embarressing.

So, pin curls are out of the question unless I have enough time after getting through security and homeland security (sigh) to pin curl while I'm waiting for my flight. My other option is sponge rollers - but again, I don't want to get asked to take them out in line at security.

Has anyone else flown (domestic or otherwise) with a set in? What did you do and how did security personnel react? I'm awaiting your tips and advice!

XO Laurie

*Remember that spiel about how I was going to be all awesome and single for a while? It lasted a month (which y'all didn't know about) and a day. The day after I posted my bachelorette post was when Ian and I went on our first date. Oops.

Growing up in Saskatchewan, I feel that I had several hometowns. Flaxcombe was where we get our mail and is the closest to us; I tell people I'm from the Kindersley-area when they ask me where I'm from; Marengo is where I went to all 13 years of school; and Alsask is where we went to church and I worked as a teen.

Yellow is my farm // Alsask is the blue marker on the far left, the white line is the Sask/Alberta border

In terms of photos, Alsask is the most interesting as it is an abandoned Canadian Forces Detachment. It was opened in 1963 as part of the NORAD Pinetree Line (a full list of sites is here) during the Cold War. The base comprised of three radar towers, a school, pool, barracks and mobile homes, and a rec centre with a bowling alley, snack shop, arcade and beauty parlor - among other things. The detachment was disbanded in 1987 and the radar tower became a designated historical site in 2002.

When the base was active, it was huge. The base had it's own school for a while, but when my dad went to school (the same as me, in Marengo) in the 70s, the base kids went to Westcliffe (and dad said they were pretty cliquey). Actually, I think all the towns in the school area were pretty big - my dad's graduating class in the 70s had about 30 kids, compared to my graduating class of 6.

Alsask itself as a hamlet of the R.M. still exists with homes and a church and a few businesses (like the best Chinese food I have ever had!) but all that remains at the base are a few buildings, all abandoned with a very creepy, distopian aura. I worked at the Gopher Dip Pool (which I think is closed now due to a boiler fire but I'm not 100% sure) and I hated being the last one to lock up at night. It was so creepy being there in day, let alone at night (but I'm a scardey-cat).

When I was home for the weekend I took the time to stop in Alsask to take some photos of the base before carrying on into Alberta. I would love to go in the buildings to do photos like what you would see on How To Be A Retronaut but I would want to be accompanied by someone who knows about the base (and I'd need permission from the R.M. too).

Entrance building

The Gopher Dip Pool

Back of the pool, radar tower in the distance

Administration building

Administration building

Recreation Centre with bowling alley, snack shack etc.

Abandoned playground

One of a few mobile homes still standing

Driveway to nowhere.

Another playground

Tumbleweed Chapel

the Retirement Villa

Craft centre / baseball diamond

Craft Centre

Barracks

Barracks

The Radar Tower

Today, it was knitting:

(I was in the zone, no time for smiling).

I'm much farther along now

Thanks to Camrose twitter and knitter friend Tanya, I have finally joined the ranks of girls who have some sort of hand-made talent, although I am VERY far behind. So far I have about 1/36 of a scarf done with vintage yarn from Eatons, no less! But my hands got tired so I thought I would work on that ole carpal tunnel for a little bit and share what else I've been up to.

Last weekend I went home to the farm in ole Saskatchewan for my Grandma and Grandpa Callsen's 60th wedding anniversary. They were wed Sept. 4, 1951 and are still together today!




It was a blast, not only because I got to see some immediate family I hadn't visited with since July, but also because I got to see my "BC cousins" that I hadn't seen in a few years.

Cousin Ryan, me, my brother Greg, sister Maryanne, cousin Darci and sister Deanna

I also got to try on my Grandma's wedding dress but sadly, we were not a match (my boobs prevented all the little buttons in the back from doing up, waah). But from the front it seems all right!

Doing up alllllll those buttons after.

I also got to visit with my other set of grandparents and get some family stories down on tape. Grandma told me about her family's dairy - The Huff's Maple Leaf Dairy, which was located at 144 ave and 97 st in Edmonton and was the first dairy in the city. She and Gpa Marchant met at an army dance in Edmonton while Grandpa was in the air force (he said she was a fifth wheel, and she was under the impression it was a blind date) and the rest is history. Grandma and I also bonded over my vintage hairstyling book, which is a memory I'll cherish forever.

In other news - how did I JUST discover the magic that is Mary Ford and Les Paul? I'm mad at all of you from keeping this from me. (G wants me to point out that he found it. 3 gold stars for him).


Imelda May and Jeff Beck do a top notch cover in a tribute to Les Paul & Mary Ford too:

Hope all my Canadian readers have a wonderful Thanksgiving (I'm not sure what we'll be doing yet) and that you all have a wonderful weekend.
xo Laurie

Addendum: I also learned today that not only was Cary Grant really into LSD, he forced his wife Dyan to take it even though she didn't want to (which probably accounts for all her bad trips).

Thanks to Hurricane Irene, this will be the second-last New York related post from us (tomorrow will be a travel wrap-up, if we have the energy to write). We are leaving a day early (in 3 hours or so, actually) because of the impending storm. They'll actually shutting down airports after noon, so we've scheduled our flight for 8 a.m. Saturday instead of 8 a.m. Sunday. Fingers crossed we actually get home without delays!

Once we figured all that stuff out, we decided to head out to Central Park to spend our last day in the Big Apple trying to relax before some inevitable travel stress. In fact, I'm getting knots just thinking about it. Moving on....

We started off the day by being interviewed by my sister paper, the Edmonton Sun. I sound really wussy in it, I'm sure, but I don't want to be stuck here during a vacation. Yes I'm a reporter, but staying in a strange city in a hurricane doesn't sound like my cup of tea. Besides, if you were on vacation would you be doing any extra work?

As an ex-reporter I wanted to stay and be a part of the chaos, even if that meant watching from the sixth floor. Of course this is easier to think about than actually be a part of. I'm sure once the streets started flooding and people started looting, I'd want to be home in my comfy bed eating ice cream (something I can do again!) Overall it just makes more sense for us to leave early than bet on the hurricane not hitting the east coast. Laurie also feels a lot better now, which is good because her peace of mind is often mine too.

After getting off the phone with the reporter, we headed to ShakeShack again to pick up some burgers to eat in the park. What can I say, it was too delicious not to do twice.

We ended up getting doubles. I think America's eating habits may have brushed off on us during the trip, but these are some seriously good fast food burgers. The key seems to be the higher quality of ground beef they use and the fact that all their burgers are cooked medium. The cheddar cheese also has a nice rich flavour to it. We never did try their shakes, but that will be for the next visit.

A ShakeShack picnic in Central Park. The pigeons were sooo jealous!

We enjoyed a gorgeous view and a nice breeze on the lake.



We saw some turtles relaxing as well! They were headed to the Shake Shack.


The we got suckered into one of those rickshaw tours around Central Park. For $25 per person, it wasn't that great. If you do want to take the rickshaw tour through Central Park, please make sure your guide can speak English clearly. Our guide, who was from Turkey, was incredibly hard to understand and since we're polite Canadians, we just nodded and pretended to understand him. Lesson learned, but G did get to spot Woody Allen's house.

It's the one with the red roof. Garret is sooo jealous of him!

Then we walked home during sunset. It was amazing but it seemed to warn of the impending storm, even though it's not due to hit the area until tomorrow evening.

Just off Columbus square.

The Met Opera House/Lincoln Centre.

Before we came back, Garret made sure to pick up a lot of his new lactose wonder cure, which he can't find in Canada. I have about 1/2 a year's worth now. These green little pills are like gold to me. I take one in the morning and I feel invincible. When we get home I'm throwing out the vegan margarine and going right back to cultured butter. Hell, I might even put cream in my coffee!

STOKED

We'd like to thank Dan, Mama and Paloma for opening up their wonderful home for us to stay. Without this housesitting opportunity, this trip wouldn't have been possible. Thank you so, so much Dan for helping us create some wonderful memories and we're sorry we had to cut our trip short. Mama and Paloma never really did warm up to us, but we did our best to feed and refill their water bowl, and occasionally pet them when they would let us... they probably could tell Laur and I are dog people. On a serious note, I would also like to thank Dan for letting us be a part of his humble abode and for all the help he provided before arriving to the Big Apple. Your generosity and trust will be long remembered as gift that allowed us to fully enrich our perspective of the world and to grow as more cultured individuals. We can't thank you enough for this opportunity!

Mama

Paloma

Next time we write, hopefully we will be back in Canada (or at least away from a hurricane!)

Until then,
Laurie and Garret

Is it really day 6 already? This trip has flown by so fast that I still feel like we just stepped off the train for the first time. We've gotten so used to the subway, the people and the weather. At the end of the day my feet didn't even hurt anymore!

We started the day off a little bit later. When we left the Bronx the sky looked foreboding and when we came out above ground it was pouring, so we decided to forgo the view from The Top of The Rock, since you wouldn't even be able to see anything.  

And my umbrella that I bought for $5 from the shady guy on the corner was starting to fall a part and rust. You can always tell a New Yorker from a tourist on a rainy day because all the tourist buy the shady-guy's cheap, plastic umbrella (like I did) and the New Yorker who has the reinforced, industrial sized umbrella that could stop a hurricane. Which supports my theory that everything is a little bigger in NYC. Even the squirrels are a little bit bigger than the squirrels back home, but my theory is the squirrels and rats have some how crossbred.

Instead we headed to the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) to get out of the rain. Clearly a lot of people had that thought because it was packed! Art galleries and museums should be quiet and relaxing, but that wasn't my MoMa experience at all.

Someone clearly gave up on this IKEA chandelier

Fonts!

G and his Pollock

Nevertheless, I loved it. It was nicely laid out (I hate confusing layouts of museums) and there was a really big range of exhibits. I loved the photography, design and architecture, although the feature exhibit Talk to Me was also really cool.

Post-MoMa we went to the gift shop and I finally bought something! I picked up some magnets and a Breakfast at Tiffany's poster. I hope to buy more today so when I get home I'll do a wrap-up post.

After MoMa we went to the American Museum of Natural History until it closed. Remember how I said MoMa was so wonderful because it was nicely laid out? AMNH was not.

The outside of the building was gorgeous, but I wish they had kept the interior in the same vein.

We were so confused the whole time about where we were that we probably missed some really cool exhibits, but we did see the evolution exhibit, some animal exhibits, and the dinosaurs (including our ole pal from back home, the Albertosaurus). It seems like we didn't really get to see a lot, we spent most of the time trying to find out where we were.




This was the point in the day where we realized we hadn't eaten anything! But we were really close to Central Park, so we went off to find the Dakota - where John Lennon was shot - and then Strawberry Fields. The Dakota was so beautiful (and old, it was built in 1881). I think Yoko still lives there?





The we trekked off to find food. We were both craving something fast and cheap, and then we found Shake Shack. I had heard about it, so I wanted to give it a go. We managed to find a table just as our food was done, and we didn't need it for very long because we devoured our food (which is why there's no photo). Maybe it's just because I hadn't eaten all day, but it was possibly the best burger I've had. I need to go back.
After that we strolled over to a nearby Pinkberry, because Garret had heard about it on Curb Your Enthusiasm and product placements always work so well on him.



It was also amazing - I had a peanut butter yogurt with chocolate crunch, which was perfect. The staff was also really nice and helpful. If you have either of these resturants near you, you should go.

After that we decided to call it an early night. We've had a busy three days of rushing around doing touristy things, so we decided to have a night in of watching brainless TV and a change to sleep-in in the morning. Today we don't have too many plans, so we've decided to go back to just wandering the city (and hopefully shop some more). There's now big hurricane warnings, so we may have to alter the rest of our trip. We'll be in touch!

Until tomorrow,
Laurie and Garret