Coming home

So the good news is I appear to be coming out the other side of whatever bug I managed to pick up. The bad news is that Cathy caught it during the relatively short period of time I was sick with it. I am getting grumpy looks and being told that this is "all your fault." I can't really muster up much of a defence. I don't even think any of her kids are sick yet so it's pretty obvious she got it from me.

There is a bug going around, though. Perhaps it's linked with the almost three consecutive weeks of Rain, Drizzle and Fog that have settled over Iqaluit. It's just like back home. And like back home, this is the point in time where people start getting depressed and cranky over the lack of sunlight and the cold bugs start to make the rounds. Really, I haven't been craving sunshine like this since last February when we were getting about 6 hours of it a day. At least it was six hours. The sun came out for the first time around 5 p.m. in days.

The dog is also starting to go crazy for want of a walk. Because he's rather low to the ground and very, very white, it's a pain in the ass to take him out for a walk when the weather is like this. We go out with a little white dog and come back with something that looks like the mop used to clean a high school bathroom.

The one upside of the past few days is that I am now officially going back to St. John's for Christmas. There was some uncertainty because I am low person on the seniority list at work. Also, I just got back from vacation. It's a little odd to go up to the boss and ask about taking more time off even though I am owed it. But I had to do it now because everyone knows how quickly tickets home disappear around the holidays, especially with CanJet gone. Fortunately, the boss was quite cool about it, so I'm off…

Still, I could not imagine what a bizarre trip home I'm going to have. I'm flying four different airlines to get to St. John's and back.

First Air to Ottawa on Dec. 20. WestJet to St. John's, via Toronto which gets me in early (12:08 a.m.) on Dec. 21. I head back on Jan. 2 by catching an Air Canada flight (leaving at 5:10 a.m., dear God) to Ottawa, via Toronto. I then fly back to Iqaluit on Canadian North.

Why? A combination of scheduling and prices. In order to save the most money and not overnight anywhere, this is what has to be done. Even with all that shagging around, and even with Canadian North and First Air having "seat sales" on, it's still going to cost me just shy of $2,000 to get home for a couple of weeks.

So yeah, it'll be nice to get home. It'll be 16 months at that point, which I appreciate is fairly insignificant to some, but does mark the longest I've ever been away from Newfoundland. But $2,000 does sting a bit. My dad flew to Thailand earlier this year for less than it's going to cost me to fly from Iqaluit to St. John's. And that's fucked up, no matter what way you look at it.

I mentioned this last year, but I don't know if there's any thought to some of the Newfoundland bloggers getting together near Christmas for a night out. Nothing fancy, just a drink down at the Duke or something. I know it's Christmas and with family commitments, it might be nearly impossible, but it's something to think about. It would be nice to meet a few more of the people in the local blogging community in person.