I love Cooper's Foods.

The obligatory grumpy bunny picture. Isn't she just soooo cute?? This has become her newest place to lounge and keep an eye on me. You never know what silly thing a human will get up to, you know.

This evening I went to the new grocery store near (ish) my house. It's called "Cooper's Foods" and is equivible to an IGA or Sobey's. Basically a grocery store with no frills like pharmacy, or photo, or well. Basically it's food. I hadn't thought much of it on my first trip through, it just seemed another grocery store, oh yippeee - I may as well drive the extra five minutes to the larger Save On Foods. (Owned by the same corporation.)

Tonight I decided I'd go find green tea + lemon ice tea mix. I was on a quest. I was going to start at Cooper's and go all the way to Safeway if I had to. I already knew Save-On didn't have it, so really, that just meant Superstore. However, I never made it further than Cooper's. I didn't find the exact product I wanted, but I found close enough. What made me giggle like a school girl, however, was every aisle had a section called 'Natural Foods' that was blatantly marked.

Typically when shopping for gluten free, or dairy free, or organic, you either have to go to the special aisle or just plain hunt through the store. In Cooper's, the "special" food was in with it's normal cousins. ie: Organic soup was in the soup aisle, rice pasta was in with the wheat pasta. It was just in it's own little section of the aisle and blatantly so.

Friday I went shopping with Jamie in Port Coquitlam and kept saying "Arrrrgh, WE don't have this!" Well, looks like I was wrong and just not shopping in the right place. Not only did I find EVERYTHING that had previously caught my eye, but I found even more.

Looks like I'll be doing all my grocery shopping fifteen minutes from home instead of twenty now! I'm a happy, happy girl.

Which means, of course, I'll be pestering Sage less for hugs. It's all about the bunny y'know.

My Goofball Bunny.

Sage is not quite so attached to being in the same room as me as she was post Scout's passing. Nap time she'll go sleep under the bed, but the rest of the time she follows me around. I attempted to pet her nose yesterday since she was sitting right beside the bed when I woke up but she tossed her head "Eeek, human germs!" so I restrained myself.

The latest thing in the 'my bunny is weird' saga is that she now will only eat while I'm eating. While Scout was around she'd eat with Scout and also on her own, which is how she got so, uh, fluffy. These days there always seems to be some nibbles in the treat/salad bowl and the hay isn't getting hoovered.

Fortunately for both our guts she thinks my drinking ice tea is also eating and if i just look like I'm chewing something, she'll nibble on some hay. So now I spend half my time working at the computer faking eating.

Maybe I should just buy some chewing gum.

Day Eight - Audrey & the Albion Ferry

Audrey says the prices on our gas stations looks awfully familiar.. right up until I pointed out that the numbers were in Canadian dollars, which are about half of the British Pound. She then asked what all the whining about gas prices were about.

Audrey may be English, but she still thinks dunking leaves in hot water and removing the leaves is a bit silly. She thinks if you like leaves you should eat them, not drown them.

CTV is one of Canada's national broadcasters. I spotted the truck at the parking lot of the Albion Ferry and couldn't resist asking if I could take a picture with the truck and Audrey. The driver thought I was a loon until I explained that Audrey is a "Flat Stanley" Obviously having children and done similar things he was suddenly all okay with it and asked where Audrey was from and why a bunny..

Audrey wondered if she was going to be on the six o'clock news, but alas, he was waiting on the reporter.

A bit about the trip now! The Albion Ferry (which is actually two ferries named the Kulleet and the Klatawa) has been operating across the Fraser River from Fort Langley to Maple Ridge since 1957. Recently, the Golden Ears bridge opened twelve kilometers down the river and they're closing the ferry service down. The problem people have with this is the Golden Ears is a toll bridge, something new to us. And when the Port Mann (the main highway's bridge) gets replaced in 2013, it too will be toll. One will have to go way out of one's way to avoid tolls and will instead just waste gas money. Some are saying put the Albion Ferry on the same budget as the SeaBus (passenger ferry between North Vancouver and Vancouver) and it'll save money in the long run.

It doesn't *hugely* effect me at this point, I don't mind paying the $2.75 toll every once in a while, but I can understand how locals are frustrated.

Audrey didn't seem to mind the ride across too much, but she didn't have a lot of shade and it was a hot summer day!

She said the sights were pretty enough, but did the ship have to roll as much as it did??

Here she found a nice cool pipe to rest on! (She's a smart bunny)

Of course, I was quite unpopular when we both realized I hadn't thought to bring any snacks or water! They were both in my car in the parking lot for the ferry.

I hadn't seen much point in driving onto the ferry, off at the other side, and back on again so we just walked on and stayed on when we got to the other side. The ferry staff didn't seem to think that was particularly unusual.

Here we arrive at the north side in Maple Ridge. While the cars were unloading, Audrey and I walked to what was now the front of the ferry and got one of the better seats. Of course, the seats are the metal things they tie rope to, but that's immaterial, right?

Here they're loading on the cars. Audrey was worried that a little bun could easily get run over, but I assured her the staff are very good at keeping passangers both big and small safe!

We got good and comfy at the front! Audrey's wondering about the safety of it all!

"What keeps someone on the ship??" she asks looking at the chains that are all that block the exit. I said common sense. She was very suprised there's not a lot of humans jumping off then, apparently bunnies don't think much of humans and their survival instincts.

Audrey made sure to test the safety equipment. She had no intentions of going down with the ship if there were any emergencies!

Audrey doesn't understand how Sage possibly likes wind in her ears. I explained that Sage is a very strange rabbit, Audrey agreed.

There's the other ferry in the background having just left the south terminal. Its about eight minutes from dock to dock, the ferries leave every fifteen minutes and never seem in a particular hurry.

And here we come into the dock at the south side. Audrey seems very happy to see land again!

"Are we there yet??" she asks. "Not far now," I reply.

And from the Ferry we went on to the Fort Langley fort .. but that's a post for tomorrow, I need to get some sleep! Audrey's kept me very busy!

Audrey & To the Nines - Day Five

I'm not sure why Facebook is eating the photos, you can view the blog at http://itsagoodthingyouarecute.blogspot.com/

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On Sunday evening Audrey joined Wonda and I at a punk show. My friend Chris and his band To the Nines were playing at Cobalt Hotel in Vancouver. The Cobalt is synonomous with 'Pitt of dispair that serves beer.' so Audrey never got far from either one of us!



Here Audrey pops up after trying to figure out the purpose of the game of pool. As far as she can tell the point is to chase balls down the holes and shove them around with her nose. Chris stands here with Wonda, supervising the antics of the little English bunny.



Now, normally people meet myself and Wonda and think Wonda's the GOOD influence. HA. She just LOOKS sweet and innocent! She's really as big a brat as I am! Back in elementary school we were probably as much of bad influences as we were good on each other! Audrey said she'd never heard of cider other than apple, so Wonda let her try the white grape cider. Audrey pronounced it pretty good, I said glacierberry is vastly superior.



Audrey summed up the first act for us as "three people of mixed talent who would sound better if they all played the same songs." I pointed out that I'm not brave enough to get on a stage to attempt to play music, so I can't critize too harshly. She said that getting up on stage doesn't seem so very scary.

So, she batted her baby browns at Chris and he agreed to a little bunny joining them on stage! I didn't realize she knew any punk songs, but duh, she IS an English bunny!



After singing a couple of songs with Lee and Dustin, Audrey moved over to help Justin drum. She observed later that the view from the drum kit was much better than from the amp and the bass drum felt good. Being a sweet, polite underage bunny, I'm not quite sure what she's referring to.



It wasn't a long show, but it was certainly a good show! Audrey agreed that it was worth facing scary hobos, four cockroaches (that were seen!), a bathroom that would scare even Wonder Woman, for a night of bouncing up and down to the product of four talented musicians!



Another trip down the highway, Audrey is becoming quite familiar with this stretch of road! Soon she'll be grumping about the slow spots just like a local!



At 0100 there's not a whole lot open in Chilliwack. After dropping off Wonda to stumble to her bed (since she had to be up for work in five hours!) Audrey and I took stock of our requirements. I need gluten free / dairy fat free, she needs vegetarian. I said 'Vegan?' she said 'please!' What rabbit will pass up a chance at cheese, apparently.. So, we ended up at the local McD's for a nice garden salad.



I crawled in the door at about quarter after one, plunking down a very tired rabbit. McD's salad worked well since I just picked off the cheese and fed them to Sage and Audrey. For some reason Sage seemed to eat more than Audrey.




Mad props go to Chris, Lee, Justin and Dustin (To the Nines) for humouring the insane Valley Girls and allowing the bunny on stage with them! :)

Sage and Lightning.

We had a wicked thunder and lightning storm last night and Sage was *most* unimpressed with it. It surprised me that it took as long as it did to freak her out, but I guess between the rock quarry with it's blasting, the thrice a year firework shows across the hill at the golf course and other noises, it just doesn't phase her until it doesn't stop within twenty minutes.

By the two hour mark she was just twitching and trying to face the direction the loud bangs and rumblings were coming from. It probably wasn't helped that the thunder kept rocking the house when the storm was right overhead. She wasn't even interested in a sour cream and onion chip until the storm had passed on. Well, which isn't to say she didn't take it and hide it incase I tried to take it back, but she didn't eat it till much much later.

On the subject of eating, I don't think I appreciated just how much food and water Scout packed away. I keep thinking Sage is off her food, but she hasn't lost weight, her output is normal and she accepts treats and does eat plenty of hay. I'm starting to think Scout ate all the pellets while Sage sticks mostly to hay.

Ah well, guess I can buy smaller bags of pellets in the future!

Audrey checks for Sharks - Day Four

I'd promised Audrey two days ago we'd go down to the river trail and hike along Chilliwack river. The ducks finally lined up on Saturday and off we went! Well, which isn't to say Mr Flapper Duck and his family arrived and literally lined up, it's just a saying. Audrey wants to mention at this point she wants to meet Mr Flapper Duck and see if he grooms as good as another bunny.


Audrey decided the river walk was must more bunny friendly than the hike through the woods as this trail had grass on either side. There were plenty of bushes to hide in that had a plethora of berries to nom. Oh, and not to mention there was water to drink and rest tired paws in!

This is the start of the trail by the Vedder bridge. Typical stuff here, bench to sit on, area to stretch, some no posts to sit on, a map of the area, and the trail length guide that we have Audrey sitting on. :)


We only did the 1.6 km trip there and back. Audrey has little legs and I have a gimpy left leg so it seemed pretty far to the both of us! Along the way we made a few friends and we re-met Flash the super cute Sheltie. Oh, and his human, of course. Audrey managed to escape without getting licked.


We did run into a group of developmentally disabled teens with their guide and they were all very pleased to meet Audrey, a bunny all the way from England! They all were very happy to hold her and have their guide take their pictures with her. They were very enraptured of the magic of a little plush bunny making her way around the world. When we continued on down the trail, and they continued on to the parking lot they all said "Bye Audrey!" a few times. Their guide thanked me for being so patient. Who am I to deny Audrey bringing smiles to people's faces??

Audrey didn't seem much impressed by this stop. She was getting wind in her fur and the sun was awfully hot! (32C, even down by the water)

Audrey kept hopping off this sign to go explore things so I had to hold onto her. For some reason I don't think she was terribly interested in a sign about big trees.

There's benches all along the trail for little bunny legs to rest on. A good memorial, I think, donating to the Rotary to have a bench put down in your name!



Audrey thought this was a great bunny chewing stick and was very disappointed when I said I don't think she'd be allowed to bring it on a plane, not even British Airways.


Audrey was more than happy to sit on the shore and watch me wade in the river to cool off my little footsies. While there are a few bunnies in the world that enjoy swimming, Audrey assured me she wasn't one of them! She was happy to guard my shoes and camera while I did my water walk. :)


And with a final look at the beautiful vista, Audrey and I headed home!

Audrey visits a little piece of home - Day Three

My Dad and I go for lunch on his days at work as his work is about ten minutes from me. Our favourite restaurant is a place called "Victory Restaurant" in Chilliwack. (Turn left on Hocking from Vedder, spot the sign on the right.) It's an English restaurant run by a couple from Portsmouth, lamb, shepherd's pie, and of course, fish and chips. Yum. :) So, of course, playing host to an English bunny, I had to take her by for a taste of home!



Audrey wasn't too keen about being that close to any sort of trap, but I said she had nothing to fear since they didn't trap bunnies, in fact, Alan, head chef and co-owner, once had pet bunnies of his own!

She decided anywhere that said 'welcome' to a bunny must be a nice place to visit.



Upon entering she took a look around to decide where the best place to sit would be. Beside a window would be nice, for the view is very pretty. But, near the kitchen is good too, 'cause then you can smell all the yummy smells and your food can't possibly arrive faster, or you can sit right beside the coffee pot. My Dad prefers the seat beside the coffee pot, and since my Dad grew up in Surrey, England (via Bristol then Kenya) she decided to follow the gentleman's lead.



Audrey glanced over the specials menu, but it was very hard to keep from studying the walls. They're covered in all sorts of British memorabilia. (It's rumoured the Scottish flag is in it's prominent position to shut some whining Scot up.. but since I don't know any whining Scots named Lorna, I don't know a thing about such rumours.) While she was tempted by the chips (that's French Fries to an American duck!) she decided she'd go with the bunny salad. (Also known as a green salad with no dressing.)


Audrey did consider a pint to go with her salad, but she decided since she's such a light weight she'd have to share it and I being on an N license can't drink and Dad was working so neither can he. She decided on a 'next time' since alochol can't be taken home in a bunny bag. Besides, we were a bit worried once she got a liquid taste of home she'd never want to leave. Time to pay and head home!


"And you wear wheels on your feet? Willingly?" Audrey was very confused by this strange display of human behaviour. Just when she thought humans couldn't get any stranger..

It was retro night at the North Surrey (BC, Canada this time) Recreation Centre and they were having a rollerskate night. You had your choice between inline (rollerblades) and quads (rollerskates) and since I shattered my arm to bits 'blading I went with the rollerskates.


I USED to be a good skater! This time I polished the floor and the walls with my butt and landed on a bench with a little more force than intended when I went to sit down. Not helped by the skates being a bit narrow for my not-so-dainty little feet.

Here Audrey gets a view of people who can skate. She just got carried around the very edge with me as I hung onto the wall for balance. I did manage to glide, but I was more stepping than skating for the most part. I was starting to get the feel for it once more when my feet said "enough!"

And here we are on the way home. Well, my home and Audrey's temporary warren away from warren. In the background is the beautiful Mount Baker, a dormant volcano. We Canadians think it's very generous of our American cousins to have a picturesque volcano for us to look at and be out of range of pyroclastics that will eventually hit the sky.

Audrey thinks I'm a bloody minded Scot at this point, but is far too polite to point it out.