Some things are Irreplaceable!

You know, spending this much time in Vancouver really makes you aware of some important life lessons.

Like:

The lady on the skytrain who's sitting in the 'disabled' seat. Sure, she may not SEEM disabled just by first glance, but when she looks up at you with her blackened eyes and tells your mother to "F*** off, B****," it sure makes you appreciate good health. It was entertaining sad to watch her verbally attack my mother who was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, and, as the crack-addict explained, the "wrong gender". She really likes men, and wasn't upset in the least that my father stood close to her. Because he wasn't female. Waking up with a cold that morning sure seemed like NOTHING compared to what it would have been like to wake up being her!!

Another, valuable life-lesson--

Volunteering at the Olympics is, to quote my father, "like eating chocolate". It's really great for a while, but there HONESTLY is something called 'olympic'd out'. Yesterday, all of us worked double-shifts at the hockey games... equalling over 16 hours on our feet. It is tiring work, and we are talking for the entire day to people, so my voice gets tired, my back get's tired, and my feet hurt like a mother! It is a totally different experience to watch the 'behind the scenes' at the olympics, but totally fun too, as we get to meet lots of important and interesting people. Yesterday was filled with NHL hockey players, Wayne Gretzky's father Walter, and parents of Olympians.

The biggest lesson in life that I've become VERY aware of:

Vancouver and Mo-town are VERY different. And we're not talking size, or Mormon percentage of residents. We're not talking terrain and weather and vegitation. We're not even really referring to culture or diversity of nations.
Monday night, Will and I decided to be tourists, as we had the evening off of working. So we drove to the local mall and took the public transit train, The SKYTRAIN. You're not supposed to park in the mall and then board the train, but it's really the only place to park. We were considerate of the shoppers, and parked far away from the entrance so as not to take prime parking spots, and also so as not to raise awareness that our car was parked there while we were OBVIOUSLY not shopping.
Arriving back to the mall at 10:30 at night, we started to walk to where I parked my van.

Hrm. Maybe I forgot where I parked it.
....

...
nope. I remember parking it here. OH POOP-- they've totally towed us. So I called my brother-in-law to come and get us, and then we called the towing company. Guess what? They haven't picked up ANY vehicles from that mall!!!

????
It was then determined that our van was stolen.

After talking to security guards who said they're not ticketing or towing ANYONE throughout the Olympics, and calling the police, we realized just what this meant.

There, in that van, were two iPods. There was my wallet-- complete with ID for me and my children. There was hundreds in plain-ol' cash. There was a cell phone. There was thousands of dollars of stuff we were using, including equpitment for Will's work (he was going to be drywalling and painting while he was here at my sister's house). There were shoes--- GLORIOUS shoes! Oh the shoes!! :(

A full tank of gas. A brand new oil change. A fully-loaded Van with new tires..

this van was awesome. And I don't think that whomever stole it is going to disagree for a long time-- not with all that stuff in it! When I said I wanted to GIVE MORE and be more charitable, this isn't what I had in mind! That day, Charity sucked! ;P

:(

Life lessons sometimes really suck. But let this be YOUR lesson-- for reals, do not leave ANYTHING in your vehicle. DO NOT park far away. :( Oh yah, and don't do drugs. That poor, addicted lady's skin on the train was reallllly wrinkled and green. And green like that is NOT this season's colour!