Mmmm, barbeque..

It is a well known fact here in Canada, that life just isn't the same without a certain piece of outdoor equipment. Every living establishment here has one, from the largest acreage to the smallest 15th floor condo. No man is without one, no weekend is complete unless it is used at least once. Yes, the barbeque.
In fact, it may even be law that every family must have a barbeque on the premises. I would not be surprised to read that the RCMP had raided a home, searched the house and arrested the owners for 'failing to own a barbeque and thus uphold the Canadian way of life'. How Claire and I managed to get through an entire Albertan summer without owning one is a complete mystery, at least now it is. We took the plunge a week ago, after much ruminating, nipped off to Canadian Tire and splashed out on a gas model complete with rotisserie and side burner - woo hoo! Of course choosing a barbeque is a major task here. There are squillions to choose from, each one slightly different, each one describing it's attributes with strange sounding terms like 'sear plate', 'btu capacity' and such like. The price range can be anything from less than a hundred bucks for a small circular tripod mounted thing up to several thousand (yes, that is thousand) dollars for a complete outdoor kitchen, complete with fridge, oven, larder and full plumbing. We opted for something between the two, with lots of optional cooking facilities and a pleasant design. Well, if it is going to sit on your deck for the next several years, it might as well look good. We fired it up for the first time, easily hooking it onto our outdoor gas supply and we haven't looked back. So pleased are we with it, that we even cooked breakfast on it yesterday. It was like being on vacation - marvellous.

The basement continues apace (I really must put some photos up) as the basic room arrangement has been set out, the cabling and plumbing installed and the dry wall put up. It already looks completely different and once the rooms are finished off, it will look more like another floor of the house than a soulless cavity. The TV and the home theatre equipment is purchased and waiting to be installed (except for the PS3 player, but that will come later) as are the recessed lights. There was some debate over priorities. I wanted to get the PS3 first, arguing that we needed to play the dvd's on something. Claire arguing that we needed furniture on which to watch said dvd's. It was neck and neck until our friend Kelly pitched in and kindly offered to lend us her brand new, unused Blu-Ray player in the short term, thus forcing me into retreat and reluctant acceptance of their logic. Next, in the basement improvement programme comes the really dusty bit - sanding and moulding all the crude drywalling. Claire is already steeling herself for the inevitable invasion of dust in to places we didn't know we had places and the next few weeks will be spent continuously vacuuming no doubt.
It will be worth it though, oh yes. Watch this space.