I’m in Ottawa for the week for work. I don’t miss the city that much on a day-to-day basis when I’m in Fredericton, but when I’m here, I miss all the little silly things that I loved so much about living here. Hartman’s, Bridgehead, sketchos on the bus, UOttawa campus, awesome restaurants, Centretown doggies…

I especially miss all the amazing friends I made while living here. I’m on a wonderfully strict schedule of lunch with this person, supper with so-and-so, and late night coffee with this other person. It’s amazing. I’m exhausted but loving every minute of it.

And then this weekend I’m spending 100% of my time with my main lady Val. We haven’t seen each other ever since I moved away in December of 2008. I’m incredibly excited and fully anticipating not wanting to leave come Sunday.

So yeah… things I love? Ottawa.

A tiny nine week old sweater-clad Boston Terrier puppy named Izzy that promptly greeted me with puppy kisses on the nose.

I am so happy for him right now. I don’t think I’ve stopped smiling since 8:15 this morning!

As many of you know, Chris and I both grew up in New Brunswick. I grew up in Bathurst (Beresford to be more precise) and he grew up in Miramichi (Napan to be more precise). Over the last few years we’ve been realizing that as much as we love Ottawa and the life we’ve made here, we miss our families and friends in New Brunswick too much to justify staying here. We both feel that we’ve moved out, done our thing, seen another place, but now it’s time to go back. (I swear I’m not being paid by Shawn Graham to say this stuff!)

I’ve been looking for a job in the Maritimes since about July now. Last month I got a call from a manager in Fredericton saying she was interested in speaking with me. We spoke a few times, I met with her National Capital Region counterpart here in Ottawa, I flew down last week to meet with the team in Fredericton, and now they’re in the process of deploying me out to their department’s regional communications office in Fredericton! So as of December 22, I will be transferring departments and classification group. My new job title will be Communications Officer, Web and New Media and I will be working for the Department of Natural Resources Canada. I’m really excited about this new job, and I’m not just saying that because I was pretty much ready to accept any position in order to move, I’m actually really excited about the work I’ll be doing there – it sounds interesting and challenging and everybody on the team seems really excited about new media and Web 2.0 and how we can use it to better communicate with Canadian citizens as a government department.

Chris and I found a new house in Fredericton which we will be renting as of December 15th. The place is gorgeous and really big. The final details of the moving dates are still not completely finalized, but we will definitely be on our way to Fredericton in roughly two weeks.

Two weeks… that leaves me very little time to say goodbye to my life in Ottawa as I’ve known it for the past six years and all the wonderful friends I’ve made here. The next two weeks will more than likely be a whirlwind for Chris and me, but I hope nevertheless that we can squeeze in enough time to say goodbye to everyone and close this chapter of our lives on a positive note.

I don’t think I’ve ever felt this much excitement and sadness all at once.