i'm contemplating taking my fitness leadership certification in 2010.
four courses are required : exercise theory, group exercise fundamentals, resistance training, and a minimum of 44hrs of in class practicum.
i'm not gaga about the in class practicum. as a matter of fact, i'm really not excited to get up in front of the class and don a microphone and sweat and show my ass off for the world to see. too many anxieties over it, namely the whole "what if i cant DO everything and there are people laughing that i'm useless"? because, seriously, i do that to instructors i do not respect. fifi anyone?
i know that is not nice, but i do hold my instructors to a certain level. it's like being a gym teacher but never working out...oops, is that too close to home, sil? how about being a cafe employee but refusing to touch the meat because you are vegetarian? or working in a cafe and refusing to clean the bathrooms because you "hate it"? yeah, i worked with twats like that when i first moved here.
all i'm saying is that if i'm going to be an instructor, i have to walk the walk and talk it too. i cant go in there half assed and expect and demand respect. it doesnt work that way. and of course in my mind a fitness instructor is a lean mean fighting machine. well, let me tell you: after this xmas and past month, i'm anything but. my knees are crackin, my shoulders saggin, and whatever else that should be tight is not tight. i have at least 2 to three months of solid clean eating and working out to get to a respectable body shape that i can appreciate and feel confident about. right now wouldnt be the ideal time....
but at the same time, the theory course is at the end of january. it's a 24 hr course jammed into three days. you dont need to DO anything, save study anatomy till your eyes bleed. that's it. so in the meantime i can still go to my classes and eat well and ace the course and still have time to get into good shape for the other ones which are in march and april respectively. theoretically, by the end of the summer, i could be fully certified and onto teaching my own classes come september.
however, it's the practicum that frightens me a bit. do i want to do it at heartbreaker? i love it there, dont get me wrong, but it's the *idea* of working for marla that sets me off. yes, i love her place, but i think she is the kind of person who continually takes until you either snap or quit. i know instructors who were pushed to their max every day with demands, basically running the studio as if it was theirs with no thanks. and i'm the type of girl who has a hard time saying no, so i could see me saying yes to teaching A class 5 days a week, which would suddenly balloon into 15 classes five days a week with weekends thrown in because marla isnt "feeling up to it". no fucking way. i want to enjoy what i do and get a good workout on the side.
at this point i think i could do the three certification classes and see what happens from there. i dont want to get locked into working for marla, that i do know. i'm not sure i want to pimp myself out anywhere else, but i would like the option to choose where i'd like to work. would this become a full time thing? hardly. it would just be a new challenge to embrace and something to keep me motivated to keep on trying.
i still have a few weeks to decide, but honestly, for $200 and one weekend, what could i possibly lose?
Sunday, December 27, 2009
more aloe news
the aloe is continuing to thrive in my kitchen. i just looked at it the other day and the flowering stalk has now bent slightly because it is touching my ceiling in the kitchen. i turned the plant and lo and behold, there are FIVE new sprouts poking through the soil! five!
me thinks it's time for a repotting and relocation to a happier place. i think that tomorrow the xmas tree will come down and furniture will be rearranged in the livingroom and the aloe will move into its permanent home in front of my living room window.
me thinks it's time for a repotting and relocation to a happier place. i think that tomorrow the xmas tree will come down and furniture will be rearranged in the livingroom and the aloe will move into its permanent home in front of my living room window.
reading list
here's my reading list for 2010
oh i know this list is quite short. i'm aware of that. i do want to ensure i read the classics and incorporate them into my regular reading...reading which i sadly do not find time for on a daily basis. that has to change...yes, it does.
- tristram shandy (sterne). had to read it in "the 18thc novel". couldnt get past page 20. seriously, it was terrible. there's part of me that wants to toss it in the fire, but the other part wants to SAY i've read it and mean it. it's a pride thing.
- anna karenina (tolstoy). bought the book on a whim in my "oh i'm a new english major graduate and i've never read this book". started reading it while reading others and quit. it's time to pick it up again.
- ashini (theriault). not a classic per se, but a very interesting french canadian novel about a native displaced. lots of poetic language throughout. easy read. read it in my 2nd year. kept it to read again.
- jude the obscure (hardy). bought for a 19thc novel class in my 2nd year. read part of it, got bored. faked reading it in class. got a b-. not proud. want to finish it.
- anything by the bronte sisters. i took a bronte course in my third year and let me tell you, i loved it. i loved all of their books and stories about the sisters. between them there are 5 novels which are all very good works of literature. i think i've read jane eyre three different times and enjoyed it.
- a suitable boy (seth). three volumes. always stalled out at the first one, despite it being an interesting book. i think the length of it intimidates me. gonna finish it in 2010. dammit.
- david copperfield (dickens). i've owned it for years. cant even remember how or where i acquired it. i dont think i've ever opened it.
- catcher in the rye (salinger). read this one twice and loved it. would continue to read it again and again, much like cat's eye (atwood). that one is a bible of my childhood, i swear.
- to kill a mockingbird (lee). never read it, know i *should*, so i will.
oh i know this list is quite short. i'm aware of that. i do want to ensure i read the classics and incorporate them into my regular reading...reading which i sadly do not find time for on a daily basis. that has to change...yes, it does.
resolutions
i'm going to try to make some resolutions for 2010.
- speak my mind more, but continue to consider feelings
- workout more
- drink only on occasions and not on "hey, it's tuesday, i had a good day" occasions
- gossip less
- think before speaking, contemplating and taking the time to consider without openly volunteering assistance (which always fucking burns me and i'm the one suffering in the end)
- spend more time with family
- take a spanish course or two
- consider taking fitness leadership
- love more
- read classic books. if i'm going to keep them, i may as well read them...if not, toss em.
more strings
during the cruise last year, the family of four was a big pain in the ass. i foresee more problems.
xmas eve was the first time i've seen them since dec 28/08. to be honest, i wasnt missing them and could have gone another yr or longer without visiting with them. even to hear the sil's laughter grates on my nerves.
so yeah, we spent the week bunking beside them. ship walls are thin and we could hear her voice daily as if she was standing in our bedroom.
every night at dinner they'd be late and then pissed off when we'd make their kids sit in between them. in their ideal world (fucking bizarro) they wanted to sit side by side with a kid on either side of them, sandwiched in between an aunt or uncle. and every night, those kids would be left to their own devices. they'd act up, refuse to eat, pull on ch's shirt, or goof off, and if the mother paid any attention to them, it would be to loudly chastise them over every one else's conversation. this would go on every night at supposed five star dinners. we'd watch my nephew refuse to eat his dinner, but would be sure to get two full glasses of chocolate milk, followed by cookies and ice cream at the end. nevermind the nutrition in between, just chock the fucker full of sugar and then complain when he'd act up that you didnt know where he was getting these ideas from and that he's always sooooooo good at dinner. uh huh, riiiiiiiight. fucking kid has never sat through one meal without acting like a little intolerable asshole, so dont give me this shit that he's never behaved like that and you've never seen that before bullshit. assholes.
to top it off, they brought these kids with the expectation that everyone else would be babysitting them. fuck that noise. i'm on vacation and i have zero obligation to them or their kids. you dont see me expecting them to dog sit, so they can pipe right down about babysitting. and because they're stupider than words, they also failed to bring along any entertainment for these kids, just assuming that grandma would tote around games and books for them. of course grandma did, but she is a topic all unto herself and let's just say that she can bitch to high heaven about things, but ultimately, she enables them all to act like useless cunts.
so then on the way home, they didnt bother to arrange seating on the plane so they could sit together. again, it was some shit show with them and attitude pulling if the brother and his wife couldnt share an armrest. they thought it was unfaaaaaaaaaaaaaaair that they had to have their kids with them. so we arrive in miami to fly out, ch and his sister pull a huge embarassing freakout and we end up sitting together. or so we think. in the meantime, the other two fucking morons do nothing to arrange their seating and displace ch and i. so there they sat brother and wife together sharing their armrest with the 5yr old beside her. meanwhile, she'd displaced ch and i, as well as his parents who had to look after the 2yr old. and then she pulled attitude when we got pissed because we had arranged all this 9hrs earlier in miami.
so the first words out of my bil's mouth when he got this gift? "hum. well maybe this year we can rearrange the flights because it's not fair that we got separated".
clay, go fuck yourself.
i've told ch that i dont care which flight everyone else is taking, i will NOT fly with them, or if i do, i'm fucking flying first class so that there is ZERO chance they'll be up there taking our prearranged seats.
i cant wait till therapy in 3 weeks. my therapist is going to have a hay day with this.
xmas eve was the first time i've seen them since dec 28/08. to be honest, i wasnt missing them and could have gone another yr or longer without visiting with them. even to hear the sil's laughter grates on my nerves.
so yeah, we spent the week bunking beside them. ship walls are thin and we could hear her voice daily as if she was standing in our bedroom.
every night at dinner they'd be late and then pissed off when we'd make their kids sit in between them. in their ideal world (fucking bizarro) they wanted to sit side by side with a kid on either side of them, sandwiched in between an aunt or uncle. and every night, those kids would be left to their own devices. they'd act up, refuse to eat, pull on ch's shirt, or goof off, and if the mother paid any attention to them, it would be to loudly chastise them over every one else's conversation. this would go on every night at supposed five star dinners. we'd watch my nephew refuse to eat his dinner, but would be sure to get two full glasses of chocolate milk, followed by cookies and ice cream at the end. nevermind the nutrition in between, just chock the fucker full of sugar and then complain when he'd act up that you didnt know where he was getting these ideas from and that he's always sooooooo good at dinner. uh huh, riiiiiiiight. fucking kid has never sat through one meal without acting like a little intolerable asshole, so dont give me this shit that he's never behaved like that and you've never seen that before bullshit. assholes.
to top it off, they brought these kids with the expectation that everyone else would be babysitting them. fuck that noise. i'm on vacation and i have zero obligation to them or their kids. you dont see me expecting them to dog sit, so they can pipe right down about babysitting. and because they're stupider than words, they also failed to bring along any entertainment for these kids, just assuming that grandma would tote around games and books for them. of course grandma did, but she is a topic all unto herself and let's just say that she can bitch to high heaven about things, but ultimately, she enables them all to act like useless cunts.
so then on the way home, they didnt bother to arrange seating on the plane so they could sit together. again, it was some shit show with them and attitude pulling if the brother and his wife couldnt share an armrest. they thought it was unfaaaaaaaaaaaaaaair that they had to have their kids with them. so we arrive in miami to fly out, ch and his sister pull a huge embarassing freakout and we end up sitting together. or so we think. in the meantime, the other two fucking morons do nothing to arrange their seating and displace ch and i. so there they sat brother and wife together sharing their armrest with the 5yr old beside her. meanwhile, she'd displaced ch and i, as well as his parents who had to look after the 2yr old. and then she pulled attitude when we got pissed because we had arranged all this 9hrs earlier in miami.
so the first words out of my bil's mouth when he got this gift? "hum. well maybe this year we can rearrange the flights because it's not fair that we got separated".
clay, go fuck yourself.
i've told ch that i dont care which flight everyone else is taking, i will NOT fly with them, or if i do, i'm fucking flying first class so that there is ZERO chance they'll be up there taking our prearranged seats.
i cant wait till therapy in 3 weeks. my therapist is going to have a hay day with this.
gifts with string attached, as always
this xmas the inlaws bought us a gift. specifically, they handed us a card with baited breath and big smiles and waited to see our reactions. inside were the words telling us they wanted to plan another hot family holiday to cancun to an all-inclusive resort.
hey, i love me some all-inclusives. my day goes as such: wake up, shower, hit the bar and then the beach. eat some lunch, hit the bar. swim. hit the bar, lay on the beach. read. gossip. hit the bar. get dressed, hit the restaurant and the bar again for good measure. sleep. wake up, rinse and repeat. yes, i could do that for days on end with no complaints. some people [read: my sister] think that i'm a boring person who is too focussed on the bar, but in the circles i spin, this is all par for the course.
anyway, the inlaws have decided that they want all of us to go to el cid in cancun. more importantly, they want to get two big condos for the 9 of us. the kicker? they want the sil to bunk with them while ch and i bunk with his brother, wife, and the fucking two kids aged 6 and 4. yeah, that's right, they expect the two dinks who dont have kids or patience for said kids to bunk with them. they handed this gift to us and ch's brother, so i think that the sil knew about the gift beforehand and was instrumental in room arrangements. {she'd do anything to make sure SHE slept comfortably without disturbance, all while putting us out...why ch fails to see this selfishness is beyond me. hey, i'm all about self preservation, but she takes it to an all new low.}
jesus christ. right away i said to ch that there'd be NO WAY i'd bunk with the family. as it was on the KROOOOZE last year, the sprogs roomed beside us and neither one of the parents had any common sense to shut those fuckers up at 7 am when they insisted on getting up or rearranging balcony furniture. naturally all our balconies were adjoined so we had the pleasure of them running up and down the balconies at all hours and moving chairs and tables around without picking them up. the noise would echo all down the side of the ship and into our room. i'm not much of a sleeper, but let me just tell you that i appreciated the quiet when we were FINALLY away from those twats.
so the inlaws think we all could take turns babysitting the kids, too. uhm, NO. just because they decide to take these kids does not mean that it's up to me to babysit. but right away, i heard my fil say "oh we could all take turns babysitting"...who's holiday is this? riiiiiiiight, the one with strings attached.
hey, i love me some all-inclusives. my day goes as such: wake up, shower, hit the bar and then the beach. eat some lunch, hit the bar. swim. hit the bar, lay on the beach. read. gossip. hit the bar. get dressed, hit the restaurant and the bar again for good measure. sleep. wake up, rinse and repeat. yes, i could do that for days on end with no complaints. some people [read: my sister] think that i'm a boring person who is too focussed on the bar, but in the circles i spin, this is all par for the course.
anyway, the inlaws have decided that they want all of us to go to el cid in cancun. more importantly, they want to get two big condos for the 9 of us. the kicker? they want the sil to bunk with them while ch and i bunk with his brother, wife, and the fucking two kids aged 6 and 4. yeah, that's right, they expect the two dinks who dont have kids or patience for said kids to bunk with them. they handed this gift to us and ch's brother, so i think that the sil knew about the gift beforehand and was instrumental in room arrangements. {she'd do anything to make sure SHE slept comfortably without disturbance, all while putting us out...why ch fails to see this selfishness is beyond me. hey, i'm all about self preservation, but she takes it to an all new low.}
jesus christ. right away i said to ch that there'd be NO WAY i'd bunk with the family. as it was on the KROOOOZE last year, the sprogs roomed beside us and neither one of the parents had any common sense to shut those fuckers up at 7 am when they insisted on getting up or rearranging balcony furniture. naturally all our balconies were adjoined so we had the pleasure of them running up and down the balconies at all hours and moving chairs and tables around without picking them up. the noise would echo all down the side of the ship and into our room. i'm not much of a sleeper, but let me just tell you that i appreciated the quiet when we were FINALLY away from those twats.
so the inlaws think we all could take turns babysitting the kids, too. uhm, NO. just because they decide to take these kids does not mean that it's up to me to babysit. but right away, i heard my fil say "oh we could all take turns babysitting"...who's holiday is this? riiiiiiiight, the one with strings attached.
all over and done with...for another year
yup, it came and went and there it was. xmas. in a blink of an eye, a flash of tinsel, and a sound of ripping and shredding it's all over, save the returns.
we are not returning anything, fortunately, but i almost have retail withdrawl. pathetic, considering i was in our walmart at least 34957349 times last week.
we spent xmas eve with the inlaws at their insistance...no, persistance. it went ON about how we never visit them etc....uh, you're here at least 2x a month and i see you more than MY parents, ffs.
xmas day was spent here with many bottles of booze and a turkey and stuffing and movies. it was great. the only sadness is that it's all over and done with until next year. but i really loved our alone time and we were both excited for the day.
next year will be a different story...
we are not returning anything, fortunately, but i almost have retail withdrawl. pathetic, considering i was in our walmart at least 34957349 times last week.
we spent xmas eve with the inlaws at their insistance...no, persistance. it went ON about how we never visit them etc....uh, you're here at least 2x a month and i see you more than MY parents, ffs.
xmas day was spent here with many bottles of booze and a turkey and stuffing and movies. it was great. the only sadness is that it's all over and done with until next year. but i really loved our alone time and we were both excited for the day.
next year will be a different story...
Sunday, December 20, 2009
why am i excited for xmas?
i really cant answer that question.
ordinarily, i go into super hermit mode and count down till it's over. this time around, i'm running around with anxiety and counting down till the day.
we are likely laying low here and watching movies and hanging out. i think i'm going to go gung ho and try doing a turkey and all the fixings and i'm getting excited now thinking about it.
that shit aint right.
so yeah, i'm menu planning in my head and wondering if i can pull it off in 4 days or less. i'm already excited with the idea of the house smelling like turkey, perhaps some champagne and good red wine, and playing some games. in my silly imagination i even am wearing my fucking apron and pearls for christ's sake.
i have a desire to create a happy xmas this year. not that xmases in the past have been horrid (with the exception of 2003) but they havent really been memorable. just kinda 'there'.
i just want to pull off a turkey, a fait accompli, and have a nice day vegging out. i think it's possible for now.
ordinarily, i go into super hermit mode and count down till it's over. this time around, i'm running around with anxiety and counting down till the day.
we are likely laying low here and watching movies and hanging out. i think i'm going to go gung ho and try doing a turkey and all the fixings and i'm getting excited now thinking about it.
that shit aint right.
so yeah, i'm menu planning in my head and wondering if i can pull it off in 4 days or less. i'm already excited with the idea of the house smelling like turkey, perhaps some champagne and good red wine, and playing some games. in my silly imagination i even am wearing my fucking apron and pearls for christ's sake.
i have a desire to create a happy xmas this year. not that xmases in the past have been horrid (with the exception of 2003) but they havent really been memorable. just kinda 'there'.
i just want to pull off a turkey, a fait accompli, and have a nice day vegging out. i think it's possible for now.
wants are greater than needs
i want a food processor. it's becoming an obsession of mine. i've determined that in 2010 i'm going to buy myself one. i think it should come in handy when making soups and the like. when i really stop to think about it, i have no idea what else i'd make with it besides soup, but i'm sure i'll find uses.
but pricing one out on the internet? kinda impossible. the bay here is about the best place to find reasonably priced, yet quality housewares. sure, i could go to the fabulous kitchen store downtown, but i'm not a gourmande, so i dont need the top of the line $1000 food processor. i'm looking for a reputable brand and a reasonable price. so anyway, i went to look at the bay.com. there are NO prices there. piss me off. now i'll have to do it the old fashioned way.
i'm starting out looking at the foodnetwork.com for ideas and going from there. lately? i've been in love with the food channel. i can watch hours of it, really, and i find it quite entertaining the way some of them just throw things together and how easy it all looks. one show ("chef at home" http://www.foodnetwork.ca/ontv/shows/Chef-at-Home/show.html?titleid=82664) fascinates me. michael smith can just whip it all up and make it look so delicious and effortless that it's absolutely inspiring. i'd love to be his neighbour, but i think i'd be 300lbs in no time flat.
*tangent*
anyway, the hunt is going to be on for a food processor in 2010. hopefully there are some good sales in the new year.
but pricing one out on the internet? kinda impossible. the bay here is about the best place to find reasonably priced, yet quality housewares. sure, i could go to the fabulous kitchen store downtown, but i'm not a gourmande, so i dont need the top of the line $1000 food processor. i'm looking for a reputable brand and a reasonable price. so anyway, i went to look at the bay.com. there are NO prices there. piss me off. now i'll have to do it the old fashioned way.
i'm starting out looking at the foodnetwork.com for ideas and going from there. lately? i've been in love with the food channel. i can watch hours of it, really, and i find it quite entertaining the way some of them just throw things together and how easy it all looks. one show ("chef at home" http://www.foodnetwork.ca/ontv/shows/Chef-at-Home/show.html?titleid=82664) fascinates me. michael smith can just whip it all up and make it look so delicious and effortless that it's absolutely inspiring. i'd love to be his neighbour, but i think i'd be 300lbs in no time flat.
*tangent*
anyway, the hunt is going to be on for a food processor in 2010. hopefully there are some good sales in the new year.
Friday, December 18, 2009
say it aint so...
is seanachie (the calgary based band) over and done with? i havent seen a web page and i've googled them and all their shit is old...
i hope they havent broken up. i loved their music and had many a great pint listening to gordon...
they were here in the hat in 2004. i wanted them to play at my wedding but they wanted $2000 plus accommodations and travel. uhm, a bit much, dudes. now that i look back tho, i should have spent the money on it. i would have had a blast!
i love those guys...god, i hope they're not broken up...it'll be a sad day in music land if it's true.
i hope they havent broken up. i loved their music and had many a great pint listening to gordon...
they were here in the hat in 2004. i wanted them to play at my wedding but they wanted $2000 plus accommodations and travel. uhm, a bit much, dudes. now that i look back tho, i should have spent the money on it. i would have had a blast!
i love those guys...god, i hope they're not broken up...it'll be a sad day in music land if it's true.
therapy
i had a pretty good session again with james this week. we always talk about the inlaws and the same themes keep reappearing. he's dubbed them the "space invaders" and often the phrase used in dealing with them is "you are dealing with people who JUST.DONT.GET.IT.". he's given me many things to think about, the most recent being that the inlaws dont listen to me, so pouring my heart out to them or expressing opinions is a complete waste of time and energy, that they will just continue to do as they wish when they want, always.
i get very angry when i think of the inlaws and often ruminate on it for hours on end. i can really fire myself up on occasion to the point of where it's all i'll talk about. quite frankly, i hate it, so i can just imagine what others are thinking when i start frothing at the mouth. i bore me, so if i'm boring me, i'm surely boring you. many apologies.
like i said, the same things get discussed and the same topic that we always dance around is how i should accept the inlaws for who they are and accept their behaviour. but to me acceptance goes hand in hand with tolerance, and quite frankly, i can not tolerate how they behave. i have figured in the 30-odd years i've been around the sun (heavy on the "odd"), that i do not want to align myself with people i can not respect. i would rather put more energy in to something or someone when i know i get that energy back. or even doing things freely of my own accord without a heavy dose of guilt thrown in. i hate how i'll just suddenly volunteer to do something for those twits like cook a turkey dinner, and then grouse about it for years on end because i was duped into thinking something that never was the case in the first place. james has taught me not to take bites on lines that are thrown my way, although i have to admit that it's a lesson that is taking me much longer to learn than i had hoped.
i struggle with the acceptance part. it's hard for me to say "oh that's just my mother in law...i dont like it, but it's who she is" and move on. i have a hell of a time doing that. i think it's because i know that i'm stuck with the damned selfish idiots for the rest of my marriage and there is no escape. it makes me feel like a cornered rat at times.
my natural response to anything stressful or irritating is to escape. i'm the kind of girl who relishes being alone and gets recharged from it. in concern to the inlaws, it's damned near impossible to get away from them. they're always butting in at the most inopportune moments, which drives me beyond crazy.
i think part of my goal for 2010 is to learn how to accept people for what they are but remain distant at the same time. if there is a fast track way of doing it (besides all-out avoidance), i'd be happy to hear about it. suggestions welcome!!
i get very angry when i think of the inlaws and often ruminate on it for hours on end. i can really fire myself up on occasion to the point of where it's all i'll talk about. quite frankly, i hate it, so i can just imagine what others are thinking when i start frothing at the mouth. i bore me, so if i'm boring me, i'm surely boring you. many apologies.
like i said, the same things get discussed and the same topic that we always dance around is how i should accept the inlaws for who they are and accept their behaviour. but to me acceptance goes hand in hand with tolerance, and quite frankly, i can not tolerate how they behave. i have figured in the 30-odd years i've been around the sun (heavy on the "odd"), that i do not want to align myself with people i can not respect. i would rather put more energy in to something or someone when i know i get that energy back. or even doing things freely of my own accord without a heavy dose of guilt thrown in. i hate how i'll just suddenly volunteer to do something for those twits like cook a turkey dinner, and then grouse about it for years on end because i was duped into thinking something that never was the case in the first place. james has taught me not to take bites on lines that are thrown my way, although i have to admit that it's a lesson that is taking me much longer to learn than i had hoped.
i struggle with the acceptance part. it's hard for me to say "oh that's just my mother in law...i dont like it, but it's who she is" and move on. i have a hell of a time doing that. i think it's because i know that i'm stuck with the damned selfish idiots for the rest of my marriage and there is no escape. it makes me feel like a cornered rat at times.
my natural response to anything stressful or irritating is to escape. i'm the kind of girl who relishes being alone and gets recharged from it. in concern to the inlaws, it's damned near impossible to get away from them. they're always butting in at the most inopportune moments, which drives me beyond crazy.
i think part of my goal for 2010 is to learn how to accept people for what they are but remain distant at the same time. if there is a fast track way of doing it (besides all-out avoidance), i'd be happy to hear about it. suggestions welcome!!
resolutions?
have you got any new years resolutions?
i'm not sure i do just yet. of course i'm contemplating the whole "i'm not drinking till maui" thing, but that's fairly easy to achieve. of course that will break into pieces if i end up going on a vacation, but otherwise i think i can stick with it.
i am not certain what else to figure out...maybe read more? gossip less? say "i love you" more and mean it? spend time and energy where i get the most out of it? i dont know...all i know is that i have to get back on the fitness wagon, stat!
i'm not sure i do just yet. of course i'm contemplating the whole "i'm not drinking till maui" thing, but that's fairly easy to achieve. of course that will break into pieces if i end up going on a vacation, but otherwise i think i can stick with it.
i am not certain what else to figure out...maybe read more? gossip less? say "i love you" more and mean it? spend time and energy where i get the most out of it? i dont know...all i know is that i have to get back on the fitness wagon, stat!
nye with friends
still trying to keep up with the script that is ever changing...
so far it's the dink group plus a couple others and that's it. it should be a good group of friends and a long night. the shitty part is that they're trying to make it a two day blitz at the rooster's place, but with our dogs it's damned near impossible to stay over longer than 4am. if we were to stay (ideally) at the rooster's place, then we'd have to board the dogs or else hire someone to come and check in on them (not ideal). so for now i suppose that we'll drive out there early-ish and then make and prepare food (because we have absolutely insisted to the rooster that he is NOT making anything --because he goes absolutely crazy and overdoes it every party and he needs to have a break FFS) and then take a taxi home when the time comes.
i think it will be a fun evening with everyone. i'm just a bit sad to miss out on a MB breakkie like we had in kimberley, but i think i'll be ok.
for now i think we have a good mix of people and it will be fun to hit the pool and hot tub and just chill the eff out...only 13 days left!
so far it's the dink group plus a couple others and that's it. it should be a good group of friends and a long night. the shitty part is that they're trying to make it a two day blitz at the rooster's place, but with our dogs it's damned near impossible to stay over longer than 4am. if we were to stay (ideally) at the rooster's place, then we'd have to board the dogs or else hire someone to come and check in on them (not ideal). so for now i suppose that we'll drive out there early-ish and then make and prepare food (because we have absolutely insisted to the rooster that he is NOT making anything --because he goes absolutely crazy and overdoes it every party and he needs to have a break FFS) and then take a taxi home when the time comes.
i think it will be a fun evening with everyone. i'm just a bit sad to miss out on a MB breakkie like we had in kimberley, but i think i'll be ok.
for now i think we have a good mix of people and it will be fun to hit the pool and hot tub and just chill the eff out...only 13 days left!
rummy nog
ok, so i totally broke down and bought egg nog and am consuming it with rum right now. oh, it's tastier than what i remembered...so delicious, but frightening. i've had two already and i know it's like drinking a fucking beef, rice, and vegetable dinner, but worse. ugh. but so damned tasty. i'm just glad that eggnog is a seasonal drink and not available year round. i'd be in some serious shit if it was!!
next blog>>
have you ever hit "next blog>>" at the top of the screen? i find it remarkably interesting to hit that. it's sort of like spinning a wheel. you never know what you'll get, but usually it's crap.
i'm sure that others have stumbled on my blog and wondered WTF and thought it was crap as well. hey, i'm ok with that and i know that you cant please everyone. i could care less what others think.
what kills me is that you'll hit that button and it will be the blog of adventures of the so-in-so family. i suppose because i'm a dink, i could care less about you and your fucking nuclear family of brats and how you made cookies or cleaned the toilet or went tobogganing with pictures attached. gak.
of course nobody really wants to read the ramblings and rantings of a dink with a cynical attitude either...
i'm sure that others have stumbled on my blog and wondered WTF and thought it was crap as well. hey, i'm ok with that and i know that you cant please everyone. i could care less what others think.
what kills me is that you'll hit that button and it will be the blog of adventures of the so-in-so family. i suppose because i'm a dink, i could care less about you and your fucking nuclear family of brats and how you made cookies or cleaned the toilet or went tobogganing with pictures attached. gak.
of course nobody really wants to read the ramblings and rantings of a dink with a cynical attitude either...
adopt a family
so we finally finished off the gifts and groceries. i have to say that when this stuff comes around, ch is an expert shopper. very meticulous and he sticks to the game plan. he's very generous and gets excited over getting groceries for strangers. if only he'd muster up that enthusiasm for our groceries, but it would never happen. i'd never see the guy standing in line for OUR things, but for strangers? hell, he'll stand in line with a big smile on. it's amazing.
so we got the smaller family done on tuesday. spoiled the kids with a dvd player, movies, barbies, and toy trucks. the kids will hopefully have a great christmas.
we just finished the larger family tonight and they were more difficult. the boys who were 16 and 14 got shaving kits that we loaded up with deodorant, body sprays, hair gels, and lotions, as well as hoodies and gift cards to cineplex and hmv. the 15yr old girl got a makeup bag with nail polishes and remover and a few other girly goodies inside, as well as a hoodie and a flat iron. we got her a $25 gift card to la senza. as for the 10 yr old boy, he was the easiest: he wanted games and lego so ch got him clue (which i hate because i can not play it successfully) and various lego contraptions. we loaded 2 carts full of shit for this family and it was a $600 load of stuff. we sincerely hope they're happy and ok for xmas.
all in all, the adopt a family thing is awesome. the only shitty part is delivering the stuff to the families. i could really do without seeing where they live or seeing faces. for now we are just playing it off that we are doing it on behalf of the salvation army and trying to just suggest we're delivering and not responsible for purchasing. if we can distance ourselves from it, it's much better.
charity, in my opinion, is best when it's faceless.
so we got the smaller family done on tuesday. spoiled the kids with a dvd player, movies, barbies, and toy trucks. the kids will hopefully have a great christmas.
we just finished the larger family tonight and they were more difficult. the boys who were 16 and 14 got shaving kits that we loaded up with deodorant, body sprays, hair gels, and lotions, as well as hoodies and gift cards to cineplex and hmv. the 15yr old girl got a makeup bag with nail polishes and remover and a few other girly goodies inside, as well as a hoodie and a flat iron. we got her a $25 gift card to la senza. as for the 10 yr old boy, he was the easiest: he wanted games and lego so ch got him clue (which i hate because i can not play it successfully) and various lego contraptions. we loaded 2 carts full of shit for this family and it was a $600 load of stuff. we sincerely hope they're happy and ok for xmas.
all in all, the adopt a family thing is awesome. the only shitty part is delivering the stuff to the families. i could really do without seeing where they live or seeing faces. for now we are just playing it off that we are doing it on behalf of the salvation army and trying to just suggest we're delivering and not responsible for purchasing. if we can distance ourselves from it, it's much better.
charity, in my opinion, is best when it's faceless.
shopping thoughts
we just spent an exhausting few hours at wal mart. i am embarassed to admit that i've been there more often in the last few weeks than i ever intended to be. in the past i've looked at wm with scorn, but christ, they have deals and you can get damned near everything there under one roof. i really dont like shopping in 75 different places to get three things.
the prices are great, too. i can get 20 bags of groceries for under $200, whereas if i went to safeway, i'd be spending $250 or more for the same items. walmart, despite its tendancy to support the chinese market, has some great deals.
the produce sucks balls tho. safeway is still superior for that kind of stuff. same with the meat. hey if you want a cheap lb of beef to fry up, walmart is great. but if you are looking for decent produce that is local, forget it. you'll never see a tomato or cucumber from redcliff greenhouses, even tho it's 10 mins down the highway.
anyway, i'm happy to report that the shopping should be over with for now. for a little while anyway.
the prices are great, too. i can get 20 bags of groceries for under $200, whereas if i went to safeway, i'd be spending $250 or more for the same items. walmart, despite its tendancy to support the chinese market, has some great deals.
the produce sucks balls tho. safeway is still superior for that kind of stuff. same with the meat. hey if you want a cheap lb of beef to fry up, walmart is great. but if you are looking for decent produce that is local, forget it. you'll never see a tomato or cucumber from redcliff greenhouses, even tho it's 10 mins down the highway.
anyway, i'm happy to report that the shopping should be over with for now. for a little while anyway.
new word to add to your lexicon
the word?
CARGOYLES.
cargoyle [cahr-goil] noun. icy chunk of snow and road debris that falls off your tires in winter. can be kicked off or melts off naturally to form dark chunks of ice. cargoyles exist naturally and prolifically during chinooks.
cargoyles.
thank you, cbc 1010 for the fascinating discussion.
CARGOYLES.
cargoyle [cahr-goil] noun. icy chunk of snow and road debris that falls off your tires in winter. can be kicked off or melts off naturally to form dark chunks of ice. cargoyles exist naturally and prolifically during chinooks.
cargoyles.
thank you, cbc 1010 for the fascinating discussion.
Thursday, December 17, 2009
blargh!
i just spent 3 exhausting hours with the accounting tech trying to figure out and balance our year end. ffs, i'm hating accounting. i think it's time now to chill out and relax....
fitness
i have no idea what january holds in store. i'm getting really sick and tired of the current instructor fifi and i want to never take another class with her again. i was looking on the schedule and she is instructing a 6am bikini class while brandie is doing the 6am boot camp with lea. i dont know this lea person and have no idea what to expect, but i do know brandie and quite honestly, i get sick of her classes. no matter what we do, she always yanks out the step and does shit on it. i hate that and i think it's so incredibly boring. i also can see that the 6am bikini wont fill up and then they'll end up combining classes again and i'll be stuck with that dumb twat fifi again.
i think that heartbreaker has definitely gone down hill in the last 4 months or so since janine left. the instructors left standing are unimaginative and fucking lazy. they repeat the same classes every week and wont work out with us. it's getting to the point where i'm not finding any inspiration at the gym anymore and am just going through the motions. i just worry about being motivated enough to work harder in january. honestly, if it is the way it is now, i wont be able to do it.
i should clarify: there are some good instructors left, but they instruct at times that are not convenient to me. for instance, i do like corey, but she is an evening instructor. i dont mind marla, but she could stop screeching every once in a while. i do like jenny but she only instructs some noon hour classes. if she was doing the full session then i'd definitely pop in, but she only does 2 classes per week.
i am sort of contemplating taking the 8pm bikini with terri ann because i know she is a good instructor and isnt a boring ass and will do things with us. the drawback is that i really dont want to shell out the $250 for a program i already know how to do. i've done 5 bikinis now and i know the drill. i'm not interested in before and after pictures and attending nutrition seminars...i just want to work out and be done with it.
i really dont know where i'm going to go with this. i do know that i really enjoy group fitness and dont want to quit that. sure, i could go get a membership at the Y, but i have this membership at heartbreaker that i have 8 months remaining...i'd like to see it through. yes, i could buy a gym pass to the Y and do classes there, but i hate the idea of starting over when i know what i'm getting already.
my membership is up in 8 months. there will be other options out there such as temple fitness. my buddy rhonda works out there and she is in great shape. shane does have a good place and kick ass classes...again, it's starting all over again that bothers me. janine's place is always an option. i do really love and miss her classes and wouldnt mind going there, but mike is such a dork that i dont think i want to give my business to him....
i guess i have 8 months to figure it all out. i just hope that i can find the right solution by then.
i think that heartbreaker has definitely gone down hill in the last 4 months or so since janine left. the instructors left standing are unimaginative and fucking lazy. they repeat the same classes every week and wont work out with us. it's getting to the point where i'm not finding any inspiration at the gym anymore and am just going through the motions. i just worry about being motivated enough to work harder in january. honestly, if it is the way it is now, i wont be able to do it.
i should clarify: there are some good instructors left, but they instruct at times that are not convenient to me. for instance, i do like corey, but she is an evening instructor. i dont mind marla, but she could stop screeching every once in a while. i do like jenny but she only instructs some noon hour classes. if she was doing the full session then i'd definitely pop in, but she only does 2 classes per week.
i am sort of contemplating taking the 8pm bikini with terri ann because i know she is a good instructor and isnt a boring ass and will do things with us. the drawback is that i really dont want to shell out the $250 for a program i already know how to do. i've done 5 bikinis now and i know the drill. i'm not interested in before and after pictures and attending nutrition seminars...i just want to work out and be done with it.
i really dont know where i'm going to go with this. i do know that i really enjoy group fitness and dont want to quit that. sure, i could go get a membership at the Y, but i have this membership at heartbreaker that i have 8 months remaining...i'd like to see it through. yes, i could buy a gym pass to the Y and do classes there, but i hate the idea of starting over when i know what i'm getting already.
my membership is up in 8 months. there will be other options out there such as temple fitness. my buddy rhonda works out there and she is in great shape. shane does have a good place and kick ass classes...again, it's starting all over again that bothers me. janine's place is always an option. i do really love and miss her classes and wouldnt mind going there, but mike is such a dork that i dont think i want to give my business to him....
i guess i have 8 months to figure it all out. i just hope that i can find the right solution by then.
lazy
oh i've been lazy in terms of fitness. i've gotta get on the wagon again.
my knees are still very sore. the other day i went and bought glucosamine and i've been taking 1000mg in hopes that i'll eventually stop sounding like a granny every time i sit down or attempt the stairs.
i've decided that i'm going to only 1 legs class per week. today i slept in because it was plyo and pyramid, which means a lot of lunges, burpees, and squats all fucking class long. even in warmups i feel my knees twinge. i got a serious twinge monday morning that i didnt like.
yesterday i woke up with a lower back ache and i cant figure out where it came from. monday was bagshaw and no back exercises and tuesday was boxing, so god only knows why my back is so sore. it is still sore today...fuck. i was also beat right down on tuesday and so much so that i was falling asleep on the couch at 7pm.
tomorrow's class is arms, a step n sculpt class, so it should be a good one. from there we only have 2 classes next week and then we're off till the 28th. should be a good break.
my knees are still very sore. the other day i went and bought glucosamine and i've been taking 1000mg in hopes that i'll eventually stop sounding like a granny every time i sit down or attempt the stairs.
i've decided that i'm going to only 1 legs class per week. today i slept in because it was plyo and pyramid, which means a lot of lunges, burpees, and squats all fucking class long. even in warmups i feel my knees twinge. i got a serious twinge monday morning that i didnt like.
yesterday i woke up with a lower back ache and i cant figure out where it came from. monday was bagshaw and no back exercises and tuesday was boxing, so god only knows why my back is so sore. it is still sore today...fuck. i was also beat right down on tuesday and so much so that i was falling asleep on the couch at 7pm.
tomorrow's class is arms, a step n sculpt class, so it should be a good one. from there we only have 2 classes next week and then we're off till the 28th. should be a good break.
in unrelated news...
adjacent to the previous post...
the sil told me a few weeks ago that she is graduating from her last chance masters course and wants to go somewhere special for xmas next year.
that special place? hawaii.
ok it's a nice enough place, but boring as fuck. why not go somewhere like mexico where it's all inclusive and nice and hot and somewhere you've never been before?? but she is boring as shit and insists on repetively going places she's already seen, so it's hardly a surprise she'd pick reliable boring hawaii.
and i know her ploy: she's trying to make it a family vacation. she'll never go by herself and spend xmas alone. nay, she will say she wants to go to hawaii and know that her parents will never A) let her pay her own way there or B) go alone and spend xmas by herself, so she knows that if she puts the hints out enough that they will cave and that's where everyone will spend xmas.
so i casually state this to ch and he gets excited. fuck, go figure. so she will get her way again.
the sil told me a few weeks ago that she is graduating from her last chance masters course and wants to go somewhere special for xmas next year.
that special place? hawaii.
ok it's a nice enough place, but boring as fuck. why not go somewhere like mexico where it's all inclusive and nice and hot and somewhere you've never been before?? but she is boring as shit and insists on repetively going places she's already seen, so it's hardly a surprise she'd pick reliable boring hawaii.
and i know her ploy: she's trying to make it a family vacation. she'll never go by herself and spend xmas alone. nay, she will say she wants to go to hawaii and know that her parents will never A) let her pay her own way there or B) go alone and spend xmas by herself, so she knows that if she puts the hints out enough that they will cave and that's where everyone will spend xmas.
so i casually state this to ch and he gets excited. fuck, go figure. so she will get her way again.
noise inside my head
seriously december is a noisy time in my head. it's a time where i'm always preoccupied with avoidance. avoiding my parents, his parents, everyone. i really want to do what I want to do, but nobody respects that.
every christmas, ch and i want to be alone. in years past, his family has always dominated every xmas. it was always about them, whether it was at grandpa matt's house or at their house in yyc, it was always us and them. and "them" was always the sil too in all her annoying glory. the one year we went to lethbridge, it was a fucking epic. how DARE we go and visit MYYYYY parents and not them. i swear, the world tilted on its axis the day we spent xmas with my family and not them. there was a lot of whining. the sil even tried her best to get us to change our mind by telling us that sheeeeeee was going to be all alone and that she'd have nobody to spend xmas with; her little ploy to get ch to cancel our plans. it was like that last thanksgiving where she went on that mom and dad were leaving her and so i FOOLISHLY volunteered to cook a turkey. that night at dinner she announced that she was having twooooo turkeys that thanksgiving and would be going to mom and dad's the next night...all a ploy. so the year we went to my parents' she tried pulling that stunt and ch bit and told her she could come along. funnily enough, the mil said she'd never leave the sil alone and they werent going anywhere...huh. funny how that is, isnt it?
in 2007 we decided to stay here for xmas and do nothing. we had fun doing our own thing and went to a boxing day party. that wasnt good enough for the inlaws; they had to make sure they got us at xmas and bought a cruise for us for the next year over xmas. this year we are trying hard to stay here and the sil talked to ch last night and told him that mommy is making a turkey on the 25 for whoever shows up, and when he expressed disinterest and said we were not sure what we were doing, she switched gears and said that she then would have mommy and daddy here and cook a turkey and we could go to her house. for fuck's sake. so apparently he said that we werent sure WHERE we'd be on xmas and to not do that. well, we'll see about that. i'm pretty sure she will do what she can (read: MANIPULATE) to make sure she gets xmas with ch.
the one year that we did see my parents, she told me, ''you just have to understand: i havent had a xmas without ch in 26 yrs"...fuck off you stupid c*nt.
every christmas, ch and i want to be alone. in years past, his family has always dominated every xmas. it was always about them, whether it was at grandpa matt's house or at their house in yyc, it was always us and them. and "them" was always the sil too in all her annoying glory. the one year we went to lethbridge, it was a fucking epic. how DARE we go and visit MYYYYY parents and not them. i swear, the world tilted on its axis the day we spent xmas with my family and not them. there was a lot of whining. the sil even tried her best to get us to change our mind by telling us that sheeeeeee was going to be all alone and that she'd have nobody to spend xmas with; her little ploy to get ch to cancel our plans. it was like that last thanksgiving where she went on that mom and dad were leaving her and so i FOOLISHLY volunteered to cook a turkey. that night at dinner she announced that she was having twooooo turkeys that thanksgiving and would be going to mom and dad's the next night...all a ploy. so the year we went to my parents' she tried pulling that stunt and ch bit and told her she could come along. funnily enough, the mil said she'd never leave the sil alone and they werent going anywhere...huh. funny how that is, isnt it?
in 2007 we decided to stay here for xmas and do nothing. we had fun doing our own thing and went to a boxing day party. that wasnt good enough for the inlaws; they had to make sure they got us at xmas and bought a cruise for us for the next year over xmas. this year we are trying hard to stay here and the sil talked to ch last night and told him that mommy is making a turkey on the 25 for whoever shows up, and when he expressed disinterest and said we were not sure what we were doing, she switched gears and said that she then would have mommy and daddy here and cook a turkey and we could go to her house. for fuck's sake. so apparently he said that we werent sure WHERE we'd be on xmas and to not do that. well, we'll see about that. i'm pretty sure she will do what she can (read: MANIPULATE) to make sure she gets xmas with ch.
the one year that we did see my parents, she told me, ''you just have to understand: i havent had a xmas without ch in 26 yrs"...fuck off you stupid c*nt.
Thursday, December 03, 2009
December busyness makes way for January cutbacks
december is going to be a rough month in terms of my diet:
~~we have a radio station party friday night and ch wants me to go to a hockey game with him afterward...hockey=zzzzzzzzzzzzzz to me, so it will mean beer to get me through. after the game, he wants to go to rossco's...i want to go there too, which frightens me because i know that i wont stop at one. sometimes i have to fight with myself and alienate myself from drinking in order to stay on the straight and narrow.
~~saturday is a kin bus trip to yql to watch another hockey game. jesus, i know that i'll be bored stupid...and that's where beer comes in. thank god for beer somedays. i know that the trip will be a gong show before i even get to the game. i'm hoping to keep it between the ditches and bitches that night.
~~saturday the 12th is another hockey road trip to yyc to go to the molson box. this time around, beer wont be consumed in the jetta en route to the game, which will cut back the stupidity. i hope
~~the 18th is a kinsmen executive party at the ponderosa and it is a legendary gong show which i fully intend to skip but have been hammered by ch and co to attend out of duty because he is the president.
~~the 26th is an annual darts tourney at our friends' house full of beer and frivolity
~~the 31st is the new years party at the ponderosa...pool and hot tub party for the select few invitees.
december is just shaping up to be a gong show in terms of fitness...i am going to have to work extra hard in january, ffs.
~~we have a radio station party friday night and ch wants me to go to a hockey game with him afterward...hockey=zzzzzzzzzzzzzz to me, so it will mean beer to get me through. after the game, he wants to go to rossco's...i want to go there too, which frightens me because i know that i wont stop at one. sometimes i have to fight with myself and alienate myself from drinking in order to stay on the straight and narrow.
~~saturday is a kin bus trip to yql to watch another hockey game. jesus, i know that i'll be bored stupid...and that's where beer comes in. thank god for beer somedays. i know that the trip will be a gong show before i even get to the game. i'm hoping to keep it between the ditches and bitches that night.
~~saturday the 12th is another hockey road trip to yyc to go to the molson box. this time around, beer wont be consumed in the jetta en route to the game, which will cut back the stupidity. i hope
~~the 18th is a kinsmen executive party at the ponderosa and it is a legendary gong show which i fully intend to skip but have been hammered by ch and co to attend out of duty because he is the president.
~~the 26th is an annual darts tourney at our friends' house full of beer and frivolity
~~the 31st is the new years party at the ponderosa...pool and hot tub party for the select few invitees.
december is just shaping up to be a gong show in terms of fitness...i am going to have to work extra hard in january, ffs.
Coffee talk
i still havent had caffiene yet. ok, i have had it in the form of diet soda but i have not willingly purchased or consumed a coffee with caffiene in it. one day i couldnt resist and bought a decaf latte, but it was decaf. big step for me. this is coming from the girl who drank nearly a pot of full on caffiene a day. i was going through a pound of coffee a week! it's a wonder i wasnt getting headaches and major withdrawl symptoms, however if i experienced them, they were obviously so minor they didnt warrant any concern. my full on daily coffee pot consumption habit was probably a year or two in the making.
i found that coffee made me too twitchy but there are afternoons where i utterly crave it. today i went out and ran errands and passed by the drive through starbucks and sighed. oh how it would have been great to drink a decaf latte with sugar free caramel!! even now i think about it and drool a bit.
i'm really not sure why i'm punishing myself in this manner. i should just switch back to caffiene and be done with it, but in a way it's that stupid stubborn trait i have to do exactly the opposite of what i desire. i dont know why i do that. it's not like i'm going to win a medal for not drinking coffee. nobody cares, ffs. it's just a self-driven desire to hold back on one thing.
and really, of all the things that are bad for me in my life, coffee is the least harmful. if only i could adopt that stance with beer.
sigh.
i found that coffee made me too twitchy but there are afternoons where i utterly crave it. today i went out and ran errands and passed by the drive through starbucks and sighed. oh how it would have been great to drink a decaf latte with sugar free caramel!! even now i think about it and drool a bit.
i'm really not sure why i'm punishing myself in this manner. i should just switch back to caffiene and be done with it, but in a way it's that stupid stubborn trait i have to do exactly the opposite of what i desire. i dont know why i do that. it's not like i'm going to win a medal for not drinking coffee. nobody cares, ffs. it's just a self-driven desire to hold back on one thing.
and really, of all the things that are bad for me in my life, coffee is the least harmful. if only i could adopt that stance with beer.
sigh.
Cravings
right now i'm craving chips, dip, beer and clam. it's that nagging niggling little asshole on my shoulder telling me i have to eat this stuff or die.
sometimes i find cravings almost too hard to overcome, hence the struggles i've had with weight for a decade and a half or more now. going to the gym helps, yes, but it's not everything.
i've been told that diet is 80% of it, physical activity is a mere 10%, and the rest is genetics. it's startling. i'm sure the number of people walking into a gym and then out to mcdonald's would fall over if they knew those facts. (facts which are unsubstantiated, mind you, but told to me during a nutrition session).
i have found the correlation between eating well and exercise. all it takes is one weekend of utter wild abandonment to feel the results come monday morning at 6am. i'm sluggish, tired, and achy and watch the clock endlessly. if i eat better, i have more energy.
when i ate just chicken and rice and limited my sugars, i felt pretty good then too. i think it's going to come to that sooner rather than later in order to prepare for maui.
sometimes i find cravings almost too hard to overcome, hence the struggles i've had with weight for a decade and a half or more now. going to the gym helps, yes, but it's not everything.
i've been told that diet is 80% of it, physical activity is a mere 10%, and the rest is genetics. it's startling. i'm sure the number of people walking into a gym and then out to mcdonald's would fall over if they knew those facts. (facts which are unsubstantiated, mind you, but told to me during a nutrition session).
i have found the correlation between eating well and exercise. all it takes is one weekend of utter wild abandonment to feel the results come monday morning at 6am. i'm sluggish, tired, and achy and watch the clock endlessly. if i eat better, i have more energy.
when i ate just chicken and rice and limited my sugars, i felt pretty good then too. i think it's going to come to that sooner rather than later in order to prepare for maui.
Monday, November 30, 2009
Soup!
today i made this soup...it was yummy...
carrot/yam/squash ginger soup
1.5l chicken stock (i make my own)
3 large carrots grated
2 medium onions
1/2 squash (any variety will do)
2 medium sized yams, approx 3 cups
2tbsp salt (which can be decreased according to taste)
pepper to taste
1/2 tsp ginger
pour stock into large soup pot, add in carrots, squash, onions, and yams. bring to a boil and let simmer until all vegetables are cooked through. add in seasonings. blend in a blender and serve.
it makes approximately 10-1cup servings. enjoy!
calories: 126
fat: 2.4g
sodium: 357
carb: 20
fiber: 3
sugars: 4
protein: 6
carrot/yam/squash ginger soup
1.5l chicken stock (i make my own)
3 large carrots grated
2 medium onions
1/2 squash (any variety will do)
2 medium sized yams, approx 3 cups
2tbsp salt (which can be decreased according to taste)
pepper to taste
1/2 tsp ginger
pour stock into large soup pot, add in carrots, squash, onions, and yams. bring to a boil and let simmer until all vegetables are cooked through. add in seasonings. blend in a blender and serve.
it makes approximately 10-1cup servings. enjoy!
calories: 126
fat: 2.4g
sodium: 357
carb: 20
fiber: 3
sugars: 4
protein: 6
Sunday, November 29, 2009
A quote to live by
“You can have it all, you just can’t have it all at the same time.”
--Gail Vaz-Oxlade
--Gail Vaz-Oxlade
Saturday, November 28, 2009
shopping
i've just returned from shopping for the kids...over $300 later and i'm still not done.
so far i got the neice and nephew some long sleeved tshirts from the boarding house here and my other nephew a hoodie and a transformer. i think he'd really prefer the lego star wars set but that will have to be another day's purchase since it's over $100...since when was lego THAT expensive? maybe i'll give the transformer to my other nephew, as i did buy a dance barbie for the neice.
for the adopt a family kids, i bought the one family a dvd player and movies as they wanted. they'll get some smaller toys to play with later. the second family's kids i bought the three of them hoodies, the 15yr old girl a flat iron and i will eventually get her some makeup because honestly, what girl doesnt like makeup? ok, i know there are some out there, but at that age, i think girls are into experimentation. i noticed in my sephora catalogue that they have a $50 perfume sampler set and i'm quite tempted just to buy it for this girl. hell, I'D be excited to open and try that...plus it also comes with a bonus kat von d tote bag that might be a nice addition to her gifts. i'm still going to decide on that because i've already spent a bit. i'll run it past ch.
the boys will be harder to buy for. the oldest is 16, the middle one is 14 and the baby is 10. the 10 yr old at least has said he wants lego and games. done and done. easy enough. but the rest of them havent really specified what they want, so it will be kind of a crap shoot. winners does have a lot of odd and interesting gifts, so i think we will end up going there to see if there are neat things for the boys.
little kids are easier to buy for, but i'm still struggling with my neice and nephew and what they should get. they are 3 and 5 respectively, so it's really a matter of finding something they'd really want and dont have. and at the present, they have a crapload of stuff in their house. they currently want for nothing, so it makes it harder to find things they'd actually appreciate or desire when opened. it's going to continue to be a big challenge, so we had better get a game plan for the next 15yrs! i was sort of thinking that for bdays we should set aside $ for them in gic's or savings accounts and then when they're 18, they can use the money for whatever they want. i'm also figuring that by the time they're 18, they'll not be in need of gifts and will be ok with that.
i hope.
so far i got the neice and nephew some long sleeved tshirts from the boarding house here and my other nephew a hoodie and a transformer. i think he'd really prefer the lego star wars set but that will have to be another day's purchase since it's over $100...since when was lego THAT expensive? maybe i'll give the transformer to my other nephew, as i did buy a dance barbie for the neice.
for the adopt a family kids, i bought the one family a dvd player and movies as they wanted. they'll get some smaller toys to play with later. the second family's kids i bought the three of them hoodies, the 15yr old girl a flat iron and i will eventually get her some makeup because honestly, what girl doesnt like makeup? ok, i know there are some out there, but at that age, i think girls are into experimentation. i noticed in my sephora catalogue that they have a $50 perfume sampler set and i'm quite tempted just to buy it for this girl. hell, I'D be excited to open and try that...plus it also comes with a bonus kat von d tote bag that might be a nice addition to her gifts. i'm still going to decide on that because i've already spent a bit. i'll run it past ch.
the boys will be harder to buy for. the oldest is 16, the middle one is 14 and the baby is 10. the 10 yr old at least has said he wants lego and games. done and done. easy enough. but the rest of them havent really specified what they want, so it will be kind of a crap shoot. winners does have a lot of odd and interesting gifts, so i think we will end up going there to see if there are neat things for the boys.
little kids are easier to buy for, but i'm still struggling with my neice and nephew and what they should get. they are 3 and 5 respectively, so it's really a matter of finding something they'd really want and dont have. and at the present, they have a crapload of stuff in their house. they currently want for nothing, so it makes it harder to find things they'd actually appreciate or desire when opened. it's going to continue to be a big challenge, so we had better get a game plan for the next 15yrs! i was sort of thinking that for bdays we should set aside $ for them in gic's or savings accounts and then when they're 18, they can use the money for whatever they want. i'm also figuring that by the time they're 18, they'll not be in need of gifts and will be ok with that.
i hope.
Friday, November 27, 2009
An open letter to Blessings Chirambo
dear blessings,
i just wanted to say hello. you dont know me and the odds of us meeting are rare but i wanted to let you know that i am thinking about you.
i just adopted you moments ago. the fact that your name was blessings spoke to me in ways i can not understand. seeing that you love football and helping your family helped as well.
i have never been a parent, so i dont know what it is that 10 year old boys want or need, but i can just imagine. i hope to help you out so that you can reach your dreams and goals and have a bright future, despite living in a community plagued with aids.
i dont know you but already i have warm thoughts about you and wish you well and cant wait to hear more about you.
in the meantime, take care of yourself.
xoxo
i just wanted to say hello. you dont know me and the odds of us meeting are rare but i wanted to let you know that i am thinking about you.
i just adopted you moments ago. the fact that your name was blessings spoke to me in ways i can not understand. seeing that you love football and helping your family helped as well.
i have never been a parent, so i dont know what it is that 10 year old boys want or need, but i can just imagine. i hope to help you out so that you can reach your dreams and goals and have a bright future, despite living in a community plagued with aids.
i dont know you but already i have warm thoughts about you and wish you well and cant wait to hear more about you.
in the meantime, take care of yourself.
xoxo
weak kneed...
i've decided to cut back my legs classes to once a week. this week we had two legs classes, but judging from how my knees have been lately, there's no way i can tolerate 2 classes a week of this bullshit.
i overheard some of the ladies talking about thursday's class and how terrible it was. thank god i skipped. it was plyometrics, which is ordinarily very good, but i knew my knees wouldnt take it, seeing as we had lunge/push on monday. heck, even today when we were in warmups and doing side to side lunges, my knees were giving me great difficulty.
i really dont know what it is with heartbreaker and why they insist on doing 2 legs classes a week. injuries are prevalent there and i really dont want to be added to the casualty list, i really dont. i enjoy relative good health, so as a result, i'm going to take it easy.
maybe i'll pick up an extra cardio class in the meantime to get my fix, instead of working my knees to death. i think i'll need them for the next 50 yrs.
i overheard some of the ladies talking about thursday's class and how terrible it was. thank god i skipped. it was plyometrics, which is ordinarily very good, but i knew my knees wouldnt take it, seeing as we had lunge/push on monday. heck, even today when we were in warmups and doing side to side lunges, my knees were giving me great difficulty.
i really dont know what it is with heartbreaker and why they insist on doing 2 legs classes a week. injuries are prevalent there and i really dont want to be added to the casualty list, i really dont. i enjoy relative good health, so as a result, i'm going to take it easy.
maybe i'll pick up an extra cardio class in the meantime to get my fix, instead of working my knees to death. i think i'll need them for the next 50 yrs.
Another aloe update...zzzzzzzzzz
so my aloe plant is still merrily growing. this time the stalk has grown past the plant and has grown about 3-4 feet above it:
close up of the flowering stalk:
the lower "buds" are starting to fall off. i'm not sure if they will open. i also dont know what to do with the stalk once it's done blooming. as well, i turned the plant and lo and behold, a new juvenile aloe plant is growing beside it! repotting will likely come in the new year in spring and it will move to a bigger pot, probably its permanent home for a few years to come.
Maui, baby!
so in march we are going to maui. it's for our annual convention with the store, so it should be good.
we've decided to spend a few days of the convention in maui hanging out. we're staying at a westin and they've graciously made it all-inclusive for our group, so it will actually be a bonafide vacation. in the past our company has sent us to 5+ star places where drinks are verging on $10/drink, and if you know our vacation habits, it doesnt come cheaply. this vacation will be a nice shift from the usual functions.
from OGG we will take hawaiian airlines to HNL to spend 4 days there hanging out. the last time we were on oahu, we had a great time renting a jeep and driving around seeing the sights. quite frankly waikiki is overdone and boring and not as nice as other remote areas on the island. and the island's interstate freeways are set up so nicely that you can have a great run-around without too much traffic and wonderful vistas in the process.
my favourite place was the north shore. talk about awesome! the waves were insane. i'm hoping to caputre some better photographs this time around. at the time we were there (feb 05), it was the tail end of the surfing competition so when we actually took pictures, the surfers looked like ants compared to the waves they were navigating. even the lifeguards were on full watch...one family took their toddler to dip its toes in the surf and were yelled at and warned by the lifeguard to get back...the rogue waves and undertow are atrocious and it wouldnt take much to knock people down and out to sea.
we experienced a rogue wave at makapuu beach. we went there with our rental jeep and sat on the sand and watched the waves come in and out...we were the only fools wondering why everyone else there was seated high above us...that is, until a wave came in and soaked us completely. god damned tourists! it was definitely a lesson in humility!
this time around we will be more prepared. we will wear sunscreen on ALL parts of our bodies. while touring about, i ended up with a burn that looked like a happy face on my left bicep and a burn down my hair part. wont be doing that again! this time around we will pack towels so that we can at least *walk* or *sit* on the beach at the north shore....
and this time around, i definitely will NOT be eating at mcdonalds. bleh.
we've decided to spend a few days of the convention in maui hanging out. we're staying at a westin and they've graciously made it all-inclusive for our group, so it will actually be a bonafide vacation. in the past our company has sent us to 5+ star places where drinks are verging on $10/drink, and if you know our vacation habits, it doesnt come cheaply. this vacation will be a nice shift from the usual functions.
from OGG we will take hawaiian airlines to HNL to spend 4 days there hanging out. the last time we were on oahu, we had a great time renting a jeep and driving around seeing the sights. quite frankly waikiki is overdone and boring and not as nice as other remote areas on the island. and the island's interstate freeways are set up so nicely that you can have a great run-around without too much traffic and wonderful vistas in the process.
my favourite place was the north shore. talk about awesome! the waves were insane. i'm hoping to caputre some better photographs this time around. at the time we were there (feb 05), it was the tail end of the surfing competition so when we actually took pictures, the surfers looked like ants compared to the waves they were navigating. even the lifeguards were on full watch...one family took their toddler to dip its toes in the surf and were yelled at and warned by the lifeguard to get back...the rogue waves and undertow are atrocious and it wouldnt take much to knock people down and out to sea.
we experienced a rogue wave at makapuu beach. we went there with our rental jeep and sat on the sand and watched the waves come in and out...we were the only fools wondering why everyone else there was seated high above us...that is, until a wave came in and soaked us completely. god damned tourists! it was definitely a lesson in humility!
this time around we will be more prepared. we will wear sunscreen on ALL parts of our bodies. while touring about, i ended up with a burn that looked like a happy face on my left bicep and a burn down my hair part. wont be doing that again! this time around we will pack towels so that we can at least *walk* or *sit* on the beach at the north shore....
and this time around, i definitely will NOT be eating at mcdonalds. bleh.
our adopt a families
i wont get into details here in a blog post, but we have 2 families.
one family has two kids under the age of 7 and the other one has four ranging in ages from 10 to 16. i'm totally out of the loop as to what to get the teenagers. normally people will specify what they would like for gifts or give ideas out, but the older kids havent...so we are basically stuck with the conundrum of wondering what might be cool or appreciated...
but at the same time, bring it on.
oh and i'm also thinking of sponsoring a child...tonight i'm investigating and checking it out.
one family has two kids under the age of 7 and the other one has four ranging in ages from 10 to 16. i'm totally out of the loop as to what to get the teenagers. normally people will specify what they would like for gifts or give ideas out, but the older kids havent...so we are basically stuck with the conundrum of wondering what might be cool or appreciated...
but at the same time, bring it on.
oh and i'm also thinking of sponsoring a child...tonight i'm investigating and checking it out.
adopt-a-family
this year, like last, we are adopting two families for xmas.
i found out the idea through a friend here and thought it was damned good. she got me in touch with the salvation army and i was able to connect and sponsor 2 families last year.
i have always wanted to take the focus of presents OFF xmas, and do something good for other people. i'm not a people person, but helping out anonymously appeals to me greatly. i had always wanted to serve xmas dinner at the food bank or soup kitchen, but the years i inquired, they were completely full of volunteers.
i always had it in my mind and last year i told ch that i wanted to do this, that a friend had the info and we should do it. so instead of stressing out and buying gifts for the family, we just bought gifts and groceries for strangers.
let me tell you, it's a liberating thing to give to others. it really is. it's wonderful to take the time to give someone something you take for granted. ch and i went shopping on two separate occasions to our walmart supercentre and bought 2 carts full of groceries and gifts for one family, and repeated the process a couple of days later for the second family. and ch is NOT a shopper. ordinarily, you couldnt drag him within 50 feet of a store without a protest, but when it came to our families, ch was enthusiastic and a real trooper in terms of picking out gifts. and on xmas day, he woke up and said "by now, our families are opening presents".
to give is really the greatest gift of all.
so we just buy for the niece and nephews because christmas is about kids. as for the adults, we are all old enough and financially well off enough to get what we want when we want it. and honestly, i know i sound spoiled, but i really dont need another hastily thought out gift where i have to pretend i'm happy to receive it and simultaneously wondering where i'm going to hide it for the rest of the year. and honestly, i'm not tight enough with anyone in ch's family to know what they want or need...they'll simply go and get it themselves. even in terms of my parents, they have everything...what could i possibly buy them?
of course my family, specifically my mother, does not believe in charity. my mom thinks that all people on welfare are gross and dirty and are somehow cheating the system. despite my claims to the contrary, she will not listen when i tell her it takes GUTS to ask for help.
i just ignore her stupid washed up beliefs and focus on the good. yes, there will always be people who cheat the system, but there are people out there who had a hard time coming to terms with asking for help, too.
i found out the idea through a friend here and thought it was damned good. she got me in touch with the salvation army and i was able to connect and sponsor 2 families last year.
i have always wanted to take the focus of presents OFF xmas, and do something good for other people. i'm not a people person, but helping out anonymously appeals to me greatly. i had always wanted to serve xmas dinner at the food bank or soup kitchen, but the years i inquired, they were completely full of volunteers.
i always had it in my mind and last year i told ch that i wanted to do this, that a friend had the info and we should do it. so instead of stressing out and buying gifts for the family, we just bought gifts and groceries for strangers.
let me tell you, it's a liberating thing to give to others. it really is. it's wonderful to take the time to give someone something you take for granted. ch and i went shopping on two separate occasions to our walmart supercentre and bought 2 carts full of groceries and gifts for one family, and repeated the process a couple of days later for the second family. and ch is NOT a shopper. ordinarily, you couldnt drag him within 50 feet of a store without a protest, but when it came to our families, ch was enthusiastic and a real trooper in terms of picking out gifts. and on xmas day, he woke up and said "by now, our families are opening presents".
to give is really the greatest gift of all.
so we just buy for the niece and nephews because christmas is about kids. as for the adults, we are all old enough and financially well off enough to get what we want when we want it. and honestly, i know i sound spoiled, but i really dont need another hastily thought out gift where i have to pretend i'm happy to receive it and simultaneously wondering where i'm going to hide it for the rest of the year. and honestly, i'm not tight enough with anyone in ch's family to know what they want or need...they'll simply go and get it themselves. even in terms of my parents, they have everything...what could i possibly buy them?
of course my family, specifically my mother, does not believe in charity. my mom thinks that all people on welfare are gross and dirty and are somehow cheating the system. despite my claims to the contrary, she will not listen when i tell her it takes GUTS to ask for help.
i just ignore her stupid washed up beliefs and focus on the good. yes, there will always be people who cheat the system, but there are people out there who had a hard time coming to terms with asking for help, too.
More xmas pictures
because you are my captive audience, i hold you captive to look at my pictures...
hey, it's better than vacation slideshows, right?
hey, it's better than vacation slideshows, right?
tree in the livingroom
view looking out our front window with our xmas tree reflected, champion oil well 400m in the distance
front of the house. it's as high as i'm willing to go!
back deck, griswalled out!
Douchebags of the day...
the award goes to the toronto humane society for daring to even put the word HUMANE in their title...
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/toronto/story/2009/11/27/toronto-humane-society653.html
fortunately, charges have been brought to numerous members in charge for their atrocious acts of cruelty toward animals in their shelter.
let's hope the court throws the book at them and doesnt give them a slap on the wrist as they've done in the past to assholes committing cruel acts to innocent animals.
bravo to the cbc.ca for listing names.
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/toronto/story/2009/11/27/toronto-humane-society653.html
fortunately, charges have been brought to numerous members in charge for their atrocious acts of cruelty toward animals in their shelter.
let's hope the court throws the book at them and doesnt give them a slap on the wrist as they've done in the past to assholes committing cruel acts to innocent animals.
bravo to the cbc.ca for listing names.
grey gardens, another update
so when the inlaws were here a couple of weeks ago, they started talking about all the places the mil saw when the realtor took her out. she told me that there's a condo for sale a BLOCK from our house that she was excited about and how great/nice/special/wonderful/23 skidoo it was.
then she said, "oh and ch can JUST go over there and mow the grass and shovel the walks...tee hee".
yeah, laugh it up, fuzzball. reaaaaaaaaally funny.
i told ch later that night and he was outraged. no shit! finally!!!
the one good thing coming from all of this is that i've been able to speak my mind without it resulting in a battle. he actually listens to what i say about his crazy nutso aunt AND even, gasp, his sister. this was virtually unheard of in the past, trust me. he'd erupt and melt down and scream and yell and eventually leave the room if you so much as whispered your dissatisfaction with his sister and family. over the last couple of months he's been more receptive to my criticisms and has actually AGREED with some of my assessments pertaining to his sister...especially in regards to her being stuck in perpetual baby of the family dependant on mommy and daddy mode, and them buying right into it. progress!
the quest to move the aunt here is still on. i told my therapist about it and he didnt say too much and then suddenly something twigged and he said "wait: your inlaws are buying her the condo and then telling her she has to move?" uh huh. it IS that fucked up, james.
i just love how the responsibility of taking care of the aunt is falling solely on ch's shoulders. there's no mention of the sil...of course the normal world knows she cant handle shit, and it would be ridiculous to presume that she would solely take on the responsibilities of the aunt's care without having hissy fit after hissy fit. the parents live squarely up her asshole and dont see her as useless the way the rest of the world does, but see her as "strong", "determined", and the one that always kills me and makes me laugh out loud literally everytime they say it: "independant". riiiiiiiiiiight.
they acknowledge her uselessness in a way that makes them feel needed, so they dont see it as wrong or fucked up that their 31 yr old daughter is codependant and not quite right. what they call "help" is counterproductive and actually churning out an individual that is not responsible for her own actions, ever, and someone who can not possibly face the slightest crisis. it's like the mere idea of a problem cripples her so much so that she can not think rationally. case in point is when her humidifier sprayed water over her unfinished basement. she called our house repeatedly at 7am and kept going till 9am. in the meantime, the calls went between us and the inlaws. and at the time it was very cold and terrible driving conditions, but the fil was willing to get in his car and drive the 3hrs to help her mop the floor...
so she called in sick for the day and then from 7am till god knows when she did nothing. she finally got ahold of ch at 9am and he went over there at ten to drop off our wet vac. 1/2 hr later, she called me wanting an extension cord. 20/20 hindsight is particularly helpful and i should have made her come here since she took the day off, but no, i stupidly went over there with a mop and bucket as well in order to help. i called her as i was leaving my garage and i'm 2 minutes away from her home. this comes in handy because i had to stand on her doorstep trying to juggle everything as she took her sweet time to answer the door. GEE, i'm standing there balancing things and you KNEW i was coming...could you not be waiting there to at least help me carry the bucket, the cord, and the fans i brought?
so i went into her basement and she had done nothing, other than move a couch over to a drier spot. and i'm pretty sure that ch did all the moving because at times of physical necessity, she will pull her "injured shoulder" trick and wont help. so she had been up since 7 presumably crying over the water in her basement and doing nothing till i arrived at 11am.
i have since learned to shut my everloving mouth in terms of immediately volunteering assistance when she starts whining. and to this day, i have never forgiven her for not cleaning up her basement. was she telling me that the water was that overwhelming that she couldnt start till 11am??? she had been up since 7, so what in the fuck was she doing the whole time?
i'm sure she spent a majority of the time crying because we got a few teary messages and i swear that was more emotion that she's EVER displayed in the 12 yrs i've known her. even when her grandparents died, she didnt shed a single tear...but water in her basement? bring on the kleenex!
my whole tangent is to illustrate that coddling adult children is never a good idea...this person now is our problem every time there is a slight crisis...have a spider on your outside window? call your brother and then call your dad to come with his pressure washer to wash off your condo later...and in the meantime, everyone sits back and nods and speaks as if it's the most normal thing in the world...
am i the only one who is sane in this family?? i'm beginning to understand why it is that i'm in therapy and wondering aloud if more people should be there instead of me.
then she said, "oh and ch can JUST go over there and mow the grass and shovel the walks...tee hee".
yeah, laugh it up, fuzzball. reaaaaaaaaally funny.
i told ch later that night and he was outraged. no shit! finally!!!
the one good thing coming from all of this is that i've been able to speak my mind without it resulting in a battle. he actually listens to what i say about his crazy nutso aunt AND even, gasp, his sister. this was virtually unheard of in the past, trust me. he'd erupt and melt down and scream and yell and eventually leave the room if you so much as whispered your dissatisfaction with his sister and family. over the last couple of months he's been more receptive to my criticisms and has actually AGREED with some of my assessments pertaining to his sister...especially in regards to her being stuck in perpetual baby of the family dependant on mommy and daddy mode, and them buying right into it. progress!
the quest to move the aunt here is still on. i told my therapist about it and he didnt say too much and then suddenly something twigged and he said "wait: your inlaws are buying her the condo and then telling her she has to move?" uh huh. it IS that fucked up, james.
i just love how the responsibility of taking care of the aunt is falling solely on ch's shoulders. there's no mention of the sil...of course the normal world knows she cant handle shit, and it would be ridiculous to presume that she would solely take on the responsibilities of the aunt's care without having hissy fit after hissy fit. the parents live squarely up her asshole and dont see her as useless the way the rest of the world does, but see her as "strong", "determined", and the one that always kills me and makes me laugh out loud literally everytime they say it: "independant". riiiiiiiiiiight.
they acknowledge her uselessness in a way that makes them feel needed, so they dont see it as wrong or fucked up that their 31 yr old daughter is codependant and not quite right. what they call "help" is counterproductive and actually churning out an individual that is not responsible for her own actions, ever, and someone who can not possibly face the slightest crisis. it's like the mere idea of a problem cripples her so much so that she can not think rationally. case in point is when her humidifier sprayed water over her unfinished basement. she called our house repeatedly at 7am and kept going till 9am. in the meantime, the calls went between us and the inlaws. and at the time it was very cold and terrible driving conditions, but the fil was willing to get in his car and drive the 3hrs to help her mop the floor...
so she called in sick for the day and then from 7am till god knows when she did nothing. she finally got ahold of ch at 9am and he went over there at ten to drop off our wet vac. 1/2 hr later, she called me wanting an extension cord. 20/20 hindsight is particularly helpful and i should have made her come here since she took the day off, but no, i stupidly went over there with a mop and bucket as well in order to help. i called her as i was leaving my garage and i'm 2 minutes away from her home. this comes in handy because i had to stand on her doorstep trying to juggle everything as she took her sweet time to answer the door. GEE, i'm standing there balancing things and you KNEW i was coming...could you not be waiting there to at least help me carry the bucket, the cord, and the fans i brought?
so i went into her basement and she had done nothing, other than move a couch over to a drier spot. and i'm pretty sure that ch did all the moving because at times of physical necessity, she will pull her "injured shoulder" trick and wont help. so she had been up since 7 presumably crying over the water in her basement and doing nothing till i arrived at 11am.
i have since learned to shut my everloving mouth in terms of immediately volunteering assistance when she starts whining. and to this day, i have never forgiven her for not cleaning up her basement. was she telling me that the water was that overwhelming that she couldnt start till 11am??? she had been up since 7, so what in the fuck was she doing the whole time?
i'm sure she spent a majority of the time crying because we got a few teary messages and i swear that was more emotion that she's EVER displayed in the 12 yrs i've known her. even when her grandparents died, she didnt shed a single tear...but water in her basement? bring on the kleenex!
my whole tangent is to illustrate that coddling adult children is never a good idea...this person now is our problem every time there is a slight crisis...have a spider on your outside window? call your brother and then call your dad to come with his pressure washer to wash off your condo later...and in the meantime, everyone sits back and nods and speaks as if it's the most normal thing in the world...
am i the only one who is sane in this family?? i'm beginning to understand why it is that i'm in therapy and wondering aloud if more people should be there instead of me.
oh boy (more furnace f*ckery)
the fil called here yesterday afternoon. he just got home from brazil...probably had been home less than 24hrs by that point.
he was really calling here to talk to ch, but i got the phone and ch was glued to the tv. afterall, it was american thanksgiving, so that means hours upon hours of football where he completely zones out and the only thing he wants to discuss is stats. endlessly. he doesnt want phone calls about furnaces.
so the fil and i chatted for a while and then he just said to the mil "want to talk to tracy" and she muffled something and he came back on and said she was siiiiiiiiiick and not feeling well. honestly, she's always sick. like, ALWAYS. and always out for sympathy. every time she's sick it's a process and i swear there is so much overacting going on that might win either a razzie or an oscar, depending on who is judging. i was trying to say NO to the fil as he was attempting to hand the phone off to his wife....dont i get a say in who i'm talking to? oh wait, i've suddenly remembered what family it is i'm dealing with. the answer is a resounding no.
so we chat and then hang up. ch calls him back moments later when there is a longer break in the game and i can overhear him talking to his dad about the furnace f*ckery, but it is a conversation i can tell he isnt willing to have. and it's obvious from what he's saying that he wasnt the one to tell his father.
obviously the sil told them. so let me get this straight: they've been back in canada less than 24 hrs and already --ALREADY-- they know about our furnace? really? is it that exciting that she has to pick up the phone and tattle? honestly? it's a fucking furnace. not only that, as usual she doesnt have the whole story, so then we have to put up with his endless questions.
oh i know, you're probably thinking "but tracy, your fil played the 20 question game with ch already...why wouldnt he just drop it?" an untrained ear would assume the same thing, but i know the fil: he wont let this one rest. as a matter of fact, he grilled ch for a solid 15 mins about it yesterday and ch's answers fell into this range:
--"i dont know, dad"
--"i'm not sure what was wrong, dad"
--"like i said already, i dont know, dad"
--and the final one which indicates that this game aint done being played: "you're going to have to ask tracy".
OH GEE THANKS for throwing me under the bus, you jackass.
great...so now i get treated to playing the fil's version of 20 questions. and even if i quote DIRECTLY off the furnace bill, he will somehow imply that the entire breakdown from start to finish was handled incorrectly and that i should have called him (even tho he was in brazil) or should have handled it better than i did, even tho i did the GROWN UP THING and handled it myself without melting into a pool of 1000 tears the way the sil did when she had water on her basement floor. just because i dont wither in a crisis doesnt mean i cant handle things.
but nevermind, i will be treated to the endless questions while ch throws me under the bus again and sits there silently waiting for me to answer the fil's onslaught of questions. i overheard him saying that HE unplugged the humidifier...uhm, not quite, honey. the furnace repair person did, but thanks for putting that out there.
fun with families.
ugh.
he was really calling here to talk to ch, but i got the phone and ch was glued to the tv. afterall, it was american thanksgiving, so that means hours upon hours of football where he completely zones out and the only thing he wants to discuss is stats. endlessly. he doesnt want phone calls about furnaces.
so the fil and i chatted for a while and then he just said to the mil "want to talk to tracy" and she muffled something and he came back on and said she was siiiiiiiiiick and not feeling well. honestly, she's always sick. like, ALWAYS. and always out for sympathy. every time she's sick it's a process and i swear there is so much overacting going on that might win either a razzie or an oscar, depending on who is judging. i was trying to say NO to the fil as he was attempting to hand the phone off to his wife....dont i get a say in who i'm talking to? oh wait, i've suddenly remembered what family it is i'm dealing with. the answer is a resounding no.
so we chat and then hang up. ch calls him back moments later when there is a longer break in the game and i can overhear him talking to his dad about the furnace f*ckery, but it is a conversation i can tell he isnt willing to have. and it's obvious from what he's saying that he wasnt the one to tell his father.
obviously the sil told them. so let me get this straight: they've been back in canada less than 24 hrs and already --ALREADY-- they know about our furnace? really? is it that exciting that she has to pick up the phone and tattle? honestly? it's a fucking furnace. not only that, as usual she doesnt have the whole story, so then we have to put up with his endless questions.
oh i know, you're probably thinking "but tracy, your fil played the 20 question game with ch already...why wouldnt he just drop it?" an untrained ear would assume the same thing, but i know the fil: he wont let this one rest. as a matter of fact, he grilled ch for a solid 15 mins about it yesterday and ch's answers fell into this range:
--"i dont know, dad"
--"i'm not sure what was wrong, dad"
--"like i said already, i dont know, dad"
--and the final one which indicates that this game aint done being played: "you're going to have to ask tracy".
OH GEE THANKS for throwing me under the bus, you jackass.
great...so now i get treated to playing the fil's version of 20 questions. and even if i quote DIRECTLY off the furnace bill, he will somehow imply that the entire breakdown from start to finish was handled incorrectly and that i should have called him (even tho he was in brazil) or should have handled it better than i did, even tho i did the GROWN UP THING and handled it myself without melting into a pool of 1000 tears the way the sil did when she had water on her basement floor. just because i dont wither in a crisis doesnt mean i cant handle things.
but nevermind, i will be treated to the endless questions while ch throws me under the bus again and sits there silently waiting for me to answer the fil's onslaught of questions. i overheard him saying that HE unplugged the humidifier...uhm, not quite, honey. the furnace repair person did, but thanks for putting that out there.
fun with families.
ugh.
xmas trees...
ok so i rarely get in the festive spirit. getting in the festive spirit to me is getting INTO the (festive) spirits if you catch my drift. glug-glug. i can waste away a good xmas holiday by consuming and becoming merry.
the other day when i was perusing walmart for LED lights, i stumbled on the xmas tree section and found cheap trees that looked nice. i immediately was fixated on the white tree because my grandparents had one but it also looked really nice in the store. it was pre-lit with who knows how many lights and was a 1, 2, 3 set up thing for $54 + tax.
got it home and assembled, tweaked the branches, plugged it in, and it's good to go. in fact, i like it so much that i am not sure i'm even going to put ornaments on it or if i do, they'll be simple and understated.
i really suck at decorating xmas trees and i think that's why i havent really put one up fully in the last few years. having a prelit tree does take away some of the stress and worry about placement.
i still have 2 other regular green trees in the basement that could be brought up. initially i debated having a forest of trees in the livingroom, but let's be serious here: i'm not really that gung-ho for xmas and our house is not a mansion. i could still opt to put another tree upstairs, but that seems like a lot of effort.
for now we'll just settle for the tree on the main floor and debate about ornaments....
the other day when i was perusing walmart for LED lights, i stumbled on the xmas tree section and found cheap trees that looked nice. i immediately was fixated on the white tree because my grandparents had one but it also looked really nice in the store. it was pre-lit with who knows how many lights and was a 1, 2, 3 set up thing for $54 + tax.
got it home and assembled, tweaked the branches, plugged it in, and it's good to go. in fact, i like it so much that i am not sure i'm even going to put ornaments on it or if i do, they'll be simple and understated.
i really suck at decorating xmas trees and i think that's why i havent really put one up fully in the last few years. having a prelit tree does take away some of the stress and worry about placement.
i still have 2 other regular green trees in the basement that could be brought up. initially i debated having a forest of trees in the livingroom, but let's be serious here: i'm not really that gung-ho for xmas and our house is not a mansion. i could still opt to put another tree upstairs, but that seems like a lot of effort.
for now we'll just settle for the tree on the main floor and debate about ornaments....
snowy days
here it is, finally snowing in the hat. i think it will look really nice later tonight when the xmas lights fire up and the snow provides the backdrop. last week i decided i'd griswald the shit out of the house, so i bought LED lights for the front and did the front as high as i could go and the back with the old icicle lights. it looks tackier than hell during the day, but at night it's pretty nice. i'll provide pics later once the sun goes down and the lights come up.
i was hoping to get high on the garage and do the roof. no such beans. i'm too chicken to ascend the ladder and get onto the roof. i think i'd attempt it if i had a spotter, but my spotter is too preoccupied with beer and tv to notice me falling from the sky, so i'll just either hire someone next year to get up and trick out the house, or hire a spotter.
i was hoping to get high on the garage and do the roof. no such beans. i'm too chicken to ascend the ladder and get onto the roof. i think i'd attempt it if i had a spotter, but my spotter is too preoccupied with beer and tv to notice me falling from the sky, so i'll just either hire someone next year to get up and trick out the house, or hire a spotter.
Edited posting
ok, so i'm eating crow. i had to delete part of my last post out of guilt. i cant do it, for KC's sake.
so names are removed, but parties reading it involved would know it's them.
so names are removed, but parties reading it involved would know it's them.
Friday, November 20, 2009
open letter to a stupid ass
hey stupid ass,
you were dumb. we all knew it before you got married. you insisted it was true love, you wanted us to believe you, embrace you and your new bride, and believe that it was all truthful.
truth is that we never believed you for a second. we knew you lied to your new bride's dad on his deathbed. you promised to be faithful, to make her an honest woman, to love her forever, and we all knew all you spewed was lies.
so you married her in august of 2007.
we were there. in fact, ch was one of your groomsmen as you stood there and promised to love her forever. you fucking liar, you fucking kept saying your EX WIFE'S name throughout the fucking reception. you didnt say it just once, you said it many times. the dumb fat cunt even came to the reception at one point. we all knew it was doomed from the get-go.
last year you and your bride tried having kids, but thankfully due to her severe diabetes, she couldnt carry to full term. in fact, you were ssoooooooooooooooo proud of your fathering abilities that you bragged to everyone practically the day after you conceived and when i cornered you and asked you about how your bride was handling it, you waffled and had no answer. any doctor worth their degree would never have advised you guys to go ahead with it. like everything else you fucking well went ahead with it. you fucking retard.
in july you decided to have a melt down at work. of course it was just a coincidence that you then decided it was best for your kids from your first marriage to have you in the same city...nevermind that they'd been without you for at least five years. no, now was the striking point, make your new bride move, quit her full time job, sell HER home that you were living in...reap the rewards of her dad dying...you betcha...just live that high life, buddy. you deserved it. you fucking asshole.
so you moved northward. god only knows what or who you were doing when you were living north of the 49th. knowing your past history that you've never learned from, you were fucking some insecure fat chick who you told that you were on the verge of ending your marriage. oh come on now, we all know you fucking well did that and told this new sucker the same story you've told the last few insecure people. you cant fool me; i've always thought you were one drunk incident from asking me back to your home...but the truth is that you know i'm much too secure for your bullshit...you tried but you'd never succeed with me. i wasnt near as fat or as insecure as your past loves, you turd.
so you moved up there, pretending all was well to your bride as you persuaded her to sell the condo that she outright owned before you moved into her life the way herpes would crawl onto a hooker's crotch. you told her to wait, that you'd find a place, that all would be right....
and then you did what you always do: you fucking told her that you didnt love her anymore. nevermind that you both tried (and failed) to have a second child in august. jesus christ, AC, you fucking impregnated her and then told her not to bother to come up there, that the marriage was over. fuck you, YOU C_CK.
do you know that k is a quiet person, very shy and now living with her mother? and i know, you are probably playing it off that you are friends, that you will divorce amicably...but you know what? you are escaping with more than you entered the marriage. you came in with FUCK ALL and are leaving with 1/2 that condo, that vehicle, and various other things. and sadly, because your bride is a good person, she will probably just say "UNCLE" and let you get away with it.
well, trust me, you are dead to us....your friends who stuck up for you. the people you insisted were your buddies till the end...remember them? the same fucks you have NOTHING to do with now that you are living with someone else and carrying on your life of LIES and OUTRIGHT BULLSHIT in edmonton? remember us?? you fucking asshole.
meanwhile your bride, the one you promised to her dying dad that you'd look after (remember her, you fucking c-nt?), is out of a house, looking for part time work, and calling herself a LOSER, all thanks to you....how does that feel, asshole?
i fucking hate you. the worst thing is that i knew you'd do this. that you'd lie. and christallmighty, i hoped you would have the DIGNITY and INTEGRITY not to do as you'd done to those that came before your bride. you asshole, you just treated her the way you've treated all the other fat pieces of insecure ass you got before this....
i hate your fucking ass. and i swear to god, i would slit your throat if i ever saw you again.
you were dumb. we all knew it before you got married. you insisted it was true love, you wanted us to believe you, embrace you and your new bride, and believe that it was all truthful.
truth is that we never believed you for a second. we knew you lied to your new bride's dad on his deathbed. you promised to be faithful, to make her an honest woman, to love her forever, and we all knew all you spewed was lies.
so you married her in august of 2007.
we were there. in fact, ch was one of your groomsmen as you stood there and promised to love her forever. you fucking liar, you fucking kept saying your EX WIFE'S name throughout the fucking reception. you didnt say it just once, you said it many times. the dumb fat cunt even came to the reception at one point. we all knew it was doomed from the get-go.
last year you and your bride tried having kids, but thankfully due to her severe diabetes, she couldnt carry to full term. in fact, you were ssoooooooooooooooo proud of your fathering abilities that you bragged to everyone practically the day after you conceived and when i cornered you and asked you about how your bride was handling it, you waffled and had no answer. any doctor worth their degree would never have advised you guys to go ahead with it. like everything else you fucking well went ahead with it. you fucking retard.
in july you decided to have a melt down at work. of course it was just a coincidence that you then decided it was best for your kids from your first marriage to have you in the same city...nevermind that they'd been without you for at least five years. no, now was the striking point, make your new bride move, quit her full time job, sell HER home that you were living in...reap the rewards of her dad dying...you betcha...just live that high life, buddy. you deserved it. you fucking asshole.
so you moved northward. god only knows what or who you were doing when you were living north of the 49th. knowing your past history that you've never learned from, you were fucking some insecure fat chick who you told that you were on the verge of ending your marriage. oh come on now, we all know you fucking well did that and told this new sucker the same story you've told the last few insecure people. you cant fool me; i've always thought you were one drunk incident from asking me back to your home...but the truth is that you know i'm much too secure for your bullshit...you tried but you'd never succeed with me. i wasnt near as fat or as insecure as your past loves, you turd.
so you moved up there, pretending all was well to your bride as you persuaded her to sell the condo that she outright owned before you moved into her life the way herpes would crawl onto a hooker's crotch. you told her to wait, that you'd find a place, that all would be right....
and then you did what you always do: you fucking told her that you didnt love her anymore. nevermind that you both tried (and failed) to have a second child in august. jesus christ, AC, you fucking impregnated her and then told her not to bother to come up there, that the marriage was over. fuck you, YOU C_CK.
do you know that k is a quiet person, very shy and now living with her mother? and i know, you are probably playing it off that you are friends, that you will divorce amicably...but you know what? you are escaping with more than you entered the marriage. you came in with FUCK ALL and are leaving with 1/2 that condo, that vehicle, and various other things. and sadly, because your bride is a good person, she will probably just say "UNCLE" and let you get away with it.
well, trust me, you are dead to us....your friends who stuck up for you. the people you insisted were your buddies till the end...remember them? the same fucks you have NOTHING to do with now that you are living with someone else and carrying on your life of LIES and OUTRIGHT BULLSHIT in edmonton? remember us?? you fucking asshole.
meanwhile your bride, the one you promised to her dying dad that you'd look after (remember her, you fucking c-nt?), is out of a house, looking for part time work, and calling herself a LOSER, all thanks to you....how does that feel, asshole?
i fucking hate you. the worst thing is that i knew you'd do this. that you'd lie. and christallmighty, i hoped you would have the DIGNITY and INTEGRITY not to do as you'd done to those that came before your bride. you asshole, you just treated her the way you've treated all the other fat pieces of insecure ass you got before this....
i hate your fucking ass. and i swear to god, i would slit your throat if i ever saw you again.
Roadie Music
i'm never going to hear this song without thinking of fergie and tubby while driving to yyc....
what kills me is how excited tubby got over seeing this song on my ipod...and fergie, too...we all rocked out to that song in the car while consuming a few coors. and simultaneously killed ourselves laughing at the dude that probably got paid thousands just saying "everybody in the club" in the chorus....
what kills me is how excited tubby got over seeing this song on my ipod...and fergie, too...we all rocked out to that song in the car while consuming a few coors. and simultaneously killed ourselves laughing at the dude that probably got paid thousands just saying "everybody in the club" in the chorus....
stress and missing you. fuck.
my sister wants to come saturday and go shopping.
before she comes i want to express to her that i wont be babysitting while she is in panama. it's not going to be an easy conversation. i dont even know how to say it without upsetting her and pissing her off and causing a big fight.
i have missed her quite a bit. it kills me not to talk to her on the phone, it really does.
i wrote a toast to her on my wedding day, a toast that i still continue to stand by to this day...it is killing me that i'm angry with her and not talking to her...
To my sister: you are my best friend. Thank you for being the person I turn to in a crisis. You help me keep a level head. You were always there for me. You’ve talked me out of many situations and helped me keep a cool head and have been there to give me perspective and a dose of sanity when I was at my wit’s end. You have always shown me how to think outside the box, and reminded me that karma is a very strange and inevitable process. You were my friend and enemy growing up: the only kid to play with in a one horse town, but the same kid who stole my clothes, repeated everything I said word for word, the person who took out her anger on me in strange ways (like cutting me off when on our bikes…causing loads of pain and gravel in my knee : I still have the scar!), and speaking of scars, I still have the long one ~if you look just right in the light~ on my left arm from where you scratched me with your talons and it bled so much that I thought I’d pass out and die while locked in the bathroom while you tried to kick the door down to finish me off. I’m sure that mom and dad as well won’t forget our infamous trip from Keremeos to Vancouver in grandpa’s satellite sebring where my arms looked as if they had just done battle with all the pinching and scratch fights on probably the longest five hour trip our family has ever taken! you were the brunt of many of my jokes, including some prank calls to shelly jamison’s place while you were babysitting, the kid I called “nut” or “nerd”, and teased mercilessly in front of my friends and cousins, and yet you still stuck up for me. remarkably, my arms got through a year of living together during in university relatively unscathed, but I think that was the first year where we really connected and put aside our differences and stuck together…after all, we did have another adversary: a roommate who was messy. It was easy to stick together and I think we both agree that if we could make it through one year with this girl, we could do anything together! Not only are you my sister, you are my friend.
********************************************************************
it kills me that we are distant right now. i so want to pick up the phone and talk to you as if nothing's wrong, but there is something wrong and i do believe it wont be simply fixed with a few words. we're going to fight, no doubt about it, and i am not looking forward to the consequences behind it.
before she comes i want to express to her that i wont be babysitting while she is in panama. it's not going to be an easy conversation. i dont even know how to say it without upsetting her and pissing her off and causing a big fight.
i have missed her quite a bit. it kills me not to talk to her on the phone, it really does.
i wrote a toast to her on my wedding day, a toast that i still continue to stand by to this day...it is killing me that i'm angry with her and not talking to her...
To my sister: you are my best friend. Thank you for being the person I turn to in a crisis. You help me keep a level head. You were always there for me. You’ve talked me out of many situations and helped me keep a cool head and have been there to give me perspective and a dose of sanity when I was at my wit’s end. You have always shown me how to think outside the box, and reminded me that karma is a very strange and inevitable process. You were my friend and enemy growing up: the only kid to play with in a one horse town, but the same kid who stole my clothes, repeated everything I said word for word, the person who took out her anger on me in strange ways (like cutting me off when on our bikes…causing loads of pain and gravel in my knee : I still have the scar!), and speaking of scars, I still have the long one ~if you look just right in the light~ on my left arm from where you scratched me with your talons and it bled so much that I thought I’d pass out and die while locked in the bathroom while you tried to kick the door down to finish me off. I’m sure that mom and dad as well won’t forget our infamous trip from Keremeos to Vancouver in grandpa’s satellite sebring where my arms looked as if they had just done battle with all the pinching and scratch fights on probably the longest five hour trip our family has ever taken! you were the brunt of many of my jokes, including some prank calls to shelly jamison’s place while you were babysitting, the kid I called “nut” or “nerd”, and teased mercilessly in front of my friends and cousins, and yet you still stuck up for me. remarkably, my arms got through a year of living together during in university relatively unscathed, but I think that was the first year where we really connected and put aside our differences and stuck together…after all, we did have another adversary: a roommate who was messy. It was easy to stick together and I think we both agree that if we could make it through one year with this girl, we could do anything together! Not only are you my sister, you are my friend.
********************************************************************
it kills me that we are distant right now. i so want to pick up the phone and talk to you as if nothing's wrong, but there is something wrong and i do believe it wont be simply fixed with a few words. we're going to fight, no doubt about it, and i am not looking forward to the consequences behind it.
oh god, the cat
my cat has been really clingy. like, almost unbearably so for about a year now. not only that, she has shrunk in size. i see age in her eyes, her hips and her gait. i know the inevitable is coming sooner than i choose to realise. and yet as i sit here typing, there she is...laying on the carpet just outside the office, a place she occupies every single day and time i'm in this space, and i wonder how much longer i'm going to be graced with her presence.
i met her on a snowy day in november of 1994. dean and i went to the spca in yyc on a whim to see what was there and i immediately fell in love with her. i took her out of her cage and held her and just knew that she was the cat for me. we drove home, wondering what her future would be if we didnt say "YES" immediately. panic experienced, as we talked to our upstairs neighbours and okayed a third cat to the mix of the house. more panic as we phoned the spca inquiring about her and wondering what her future would hold. we were basically told that we were saving her from the brink of extinction. most fortunately, we were okayed by the spca and the neighbours and brought her home for the weekend. life was great.
on the monday, we were to take her in to get fixed. before work, i held her and hugged her, grateful she was mine. and curiously enough the cat gingerly bit me on the left shoulder. i wondered what kind of cat i had adopted...would she bite me? would she be unkind? just what had i gotten into? over the weeks, i read that cats will bite their owers kindly to form a bond.
and we did bond.
this cat has been with me for the last 15+ yrs, through boyfriends, ups, downs, tears, warm and cold nights, through moves and adjustments...all the while taking it in stride the best way a cat can do. she never loved car rides, but she did adjust well to a new sister, to new dogs and to new homes. she's always been my "puppy cat", someone who (unlike her predecessors) will come on command, who will play fetch with toys, and who will respond to a sneeze with a "rowr" that i think is her way of saying "bless you".
and now the twilight of her years is approaching. i can see it in her face, her actions, and it kills me. the clingy nature of her personality is hurting me the most. i will let her up in the mornings while i'm at the gym and when i return home, she is there to greet me and yowling at me saying hello and that she has missed me. when i get out of the bathroom after showering she is there on the carpet outside the door, eager to greet me with a swish of her tail and another yowl of hello. i will go to bed and when i roll over, she is again there at the end of the bed on the floor just waiting for me to wake up and pet her. i might be in bed for hours, but she waits there alone in the cold on the floor for me to simply look up and say hello, maybe pet her, and lead her downstairs.
and here i sit, midnight, and she is right here at my side. everytime i look down, she chirps at me in her feline voice, just eager for a pet and back scratch.
what in the hell am i going to do when i have to make that terrible decision? some nights it keeps me up with worry. i think that i will cry endless tears, that the wound will never heal, that i will constantly be seeing her in the shadows at the corner of my room, i will hear her voice, constantly be telling her "you're fine" when she meows, i cant pet her enough now, trying hard to remember the feel of her fur, the sound of her voice, the way her claws click on the lino as she follows after me as a good old puppy cat.
god, what will i do when she is gone? what?
i met her on a snowy day in november of 1994. dean and i went to the spca in yyc on a whim to see what was there and i immediately fell in love with her. i took her out of her cage and held her and just knew that she was the cat for me. we drove home, wondering what her future would be if we didnt say "YES" immediately. panic experienced, as we talked to our upstairs neighbours and okayed a third cat to the mix of the house. more panic as we phoned the spca inquiring about her and wondering what her future would hold. we were basically told that we were saving her from the brink of extinction. most fortunately, we were okayed by the spca and the neighbours and brought her home for the weekend. life was great.
on the monday, we were to take her in to get fixed. before work, i held her and hugged her, grateful she was mine. and curiously enough the cat gingerly bit me on the left shoulder. i wondered what kind of cat i had adopted...would she bite me? would she be unkind? just what had i gotten into? over the weeks, i read that cats will bite their owers kindly to form a bond.
and we did bond.
this cat has been with me for the last 15+ yrs, through boyfriends, ups, downs, tears, warm and cold nights, through moves and adjustments...all the while taking it in stride the best way a cat can do. she never loved car rides, but she did adjust well to a new sister, to new dogs and to new homes. she's always been my "puppy cat", someone who (unlike her predecessors) will come on command, who will play fetch with toys, and who will respond to a sneeze with a "rowr" that i think is her way of saying "bless you".
and now the twilight of her years is approaching. i can see it in her face, her actions, and it kills me. the clingy nature of her personality is hurting me the most. i will let her up in the mornings while i'm at the gym and when i return home, she is there to greet me and yowling at me saying hello and that she has missed me. when i get out of the bathroom after showering she is there on the carpet outside the door, eager to greet me with a swish of her tail and another yowl of hello. i will go to bed and when i roll over, she is again there at the end of the bed on the floor just waiting for me to wake up and pet her. i might be in bed for hours, but she waits there alone in the cold on the floor for me to simply look up and say hello, maybe pet her, and lead her downstairs.
and here i sit, midnight, and she is right here at my side. everytime i look down, she chirps at me in her feline voice, just eager for a pet and back scratch.
what in the hell am i going to do when i have to make that terrible decision? some nights it keeps me up with worry. i think that i will cry endless tears, that the wound will never heal, that i will constantly be seeing her in the shadows at the corner of my room, i will hear her voice, constantly be telling her "you're fine" when she meows, i cant pet her enough now, trying hard to remember the feel of her fur, the sound of her voice, the way her claws click on the lino as she follows after me as a good old puppy cat.
god, what will i do when she is gone? what?
Thursday, November 19, 2009
F*ckery
so the fil is very concerned about our house and the contents therein. he figures it's his business everytime we do anything in the house, from moving furniture around to hanging pictures, he figures he should be informed. nevermind that this house has been bought and paid for by us, he still has a tough time letting go of the fact that his son is 32 and has a life beyond the four walls of the yyc palace. of course the sil never lets them forget that she is still the baby of the family...so the day that ch was over there killing the big wolf spider that was OUTSIDE of her condo not hurting anyone (except a fly, lol), she was on the phone demanding that her father get down here and bring his pressure washer and wash off her condo. she tells me these things with a straight face as if it's the most normal thing in the world to command her 60-something year old parents to do her bidding. what's worse is that they comply willingly without protest...and they wonder why she's still single?? honestly.
so the fil decided that we needed a new humidifier. this was way back when we first bought the place. he installed it on a weekend and then on a sunday morning in the winter, not soon after the installation, i heard a drip-drip and went down to investigate...sure enough, there was an inch of water on the floor everywhere and it had dripped into the furnace, causing the pilot light to go out. we spent a few hours cleaning and mopping the floor and finally got everything sorted out.
the next weekend the fil was here to reinforce the water lines. every time he came to our house following the flood, he'd go downstairs and check the furnace. see, the basement is the cats' domain. their litterboxes and food and hair and barf and all cat-related atrocities are down there. the fil does not like that so makes great pains to show how much of an effort it is for him to put on his shoes and descend gingerly down the stairs avoiding the hairballs and cat dishes. he acts as if he's walking across a minefield in middle africa. honestly, it's not that bad, but you'd swear he was in upper somalia by the way he navigates the stairs.
he takes it upon himself to maintain our humidifier and furnace. in fact, about 2 weeks ago he was here to change the furnace filter and humidifier pad and then check on our digital thermostat to make sure it was still controlling the humidifier. like i said earlier, he takes great pleasure in donning the shoes, heading to the basement and checking the humidifier to see if it works.
so then he comes up and tinkers and tonkers with my digital thermostat. and then has the nerve to turn to me and criticise MY programs in there and basically suggest that there are too many, that i'm being ridiculous and should re-program my thermostat. that's right, MY thermostat in MY house that fits OUR schedules. but it somehow does not fit the family mold and therefore is mockable and something that needs to get in line.
my good friend once said that my fil is trying to take over the world one house at a time. i dont think she is far off the mark with that one, i really dont.
of course when we got a digital thermostat, the sil had to get one, too. we got a workbench, she had to get one...the list goes on.
anyway, when the fil was here, the mil came along. she is allergic to the cats and makes great protests about the house everytime she crosses the threshold. she doesnt just quietly sniffle into tissues; no, she carries on making that itchy nose face and moving her nose and mouth around as if to indicate she is far too polite to go and get a kleenex, that she is far too genteel to blow her nose, and is too far removed from all out wiping her nose, but is content to sit there and sniff and snivel and turn up her nose and make faces to indicate that i must be the messiest person on the planet. in fact, i'm sure that i should have my place condemned because of the cats. she used to stay here and let me tell you, she would drive me batty. her mere presence stresses me out because naturally the cats and dogs wont leave her alone when she crosses my threshold and that just exacerbates her allergies. and as far as i'm concerned the mil is a very dramatic person so if she thinks she's getting you riled up, she will pour it on so you are more agitated. i'm sure i play right into her kid gloves when she comes here.
she arrived a couple of weeks ago at nine pm after having a pedicure at 2pm...she was still wearing her freaking "sandals" she got from the salon and wouldnt take them off. instead, she just walked onto my carpet after god knows where her feet had been and continued to sit on the couch like a regal throne occupant and sniffed and snivelled while i tried my best to corral the beasts away from her. oh and she is notorious for never taking allergy medication, preferring to "borrow" my medicine each and every time she is in the house.
at the end of the night, my fil suggested that they should stay here, as opposed to always staying with the sil. well, there is NO way the sil would ever allow that, as her parents are her rocks. and quite frankly, i dont want them here...her snivelling and expecting to be entertained and he running around butting into things and bugging me about things i've done without consulting him.
there are times where i wonder how ch turned out to be normal, the antithesis of his parents...and there are times where i completely understand why it is he has a drinking problem.
so the fil decided that we needed a new humidifier. this was way back when we first bought the place. he installed it on a weekend and then on a sunday morning in the winter, not soon after the installation, i heard a drip-drip and went down to investigate...sure enough, there was an inch of water on the floor everywhere and it had dripped into the furnace, causing the pilot light to go out. we spent a few hours cleaning and mopping the floor and finally got everything sorted out.
the next weekend the fil was here to reinforce the water lines. every time he came to our house following the flood, he'd go downstairs and check the furnace. see, the basement is the cats' domain. their litterboxes and food and hair and barf and all cat-related atrocities are down there. the fil does not like that so makes great pains to show how much of an effort it is for him to put on his shoes and descend gingerly down the stairs avoiding the hairballs and cat dishes. he acts as if he's walking across a minefield in middle africa. honestly, it's not that bad, but you'd swear he was in upper somalia by the way he navigates the stairs.
he takes it upon himself to maintain our humidifier and furnace. in fact, about 2 weeks ago he was here to change the furnace filter and humidifier pad and then check on our digital thermostat to make sure it was still controlling the humidifier. like i said earlier, he takes great pleasure in donning the shoes, heading to the basement and checking the humidifier to see if it works.
so then he comes up and tinkers and tonkers with my digital thermostat. and then has the nerve to turn to me and criticise MY programs in there and basically suggest that there are too many, that i'm being ridiculous and should re-program my thermostat. that's right, MY thermostat in MY house that fits OUR schedules. but it somehow does not fit the family mold and therefore is mockable and something that needs to get in line.
my good friend once said that my fil is trying to take over the world one house at a time. i dont think she is far off the mark with that one, i really dont.
of course when we got a digital thermostat, the sil had to get one, too. we got a workbench, she had to get one...the list goes on.
anyway, when the fil was here, the mil came along. she is allergic to the cats and makes great protests about the house everytime she crosses the threshold. she doesnt just quietly sniffle into tissues; no, she carries on making that itchy nose face and moving her nose and mouth around as if to indicate she is far too polite to go and get a kleenex, that she is far too genteel to blow her nose, and is too far removed from all out wiping her nose, but is content to sit there and sniff and snivel and turn up her nose and make faces to indicate that i must be the messiest person on the planet. in fact, i'm sure that i should have my place condemned because of the cats. she used to stay here and let me tell you, she would drive me batty. her mere presence stresses me out because naturally the cats and dogs wont leave her alone when she crosses my threshold and that just exacerbates her allergies. and as far as i'm concerned the mil is a very dramatic person so if she thinks she's getting you riled up, she will pour it on so you are more agitated. i'm sure i play right into her kid gloves when she comes here.
she arrived a couple of weeks ago at nine pm after having a pedicure at 2pm...she was still wearing her freaking "sandals" she got from the salon and wouldnt take them off. instead, she just walked onto my carpet after god knows where her feet had been and continued to sit on the couch like a regal throne occupant and sniffed and snivelled while i tried my best to corral the beasts away from her. oh and she is notorious for never taking allergy medication, preferring to "borrow" my medicine each and every time she is in the house.
at the end of the night, my fil suggested that they should stay here, as opposed to always staying with the sil. well, there is NO way the sil would ever allow that, as her parents are her rocks. and quite frankly, i dont want them here...her snivelling and expecting to be entertained and he running around butting into things and bugging me about things i've done without consulting him.
there are times where i wonder how ch turned out to be normal, the antithesis of his parents...and there are times where i completely understand why it is he has a drinking problem.
Furnace F*ckery
so the furnace person had to be called back a second time monday.
he had spent two hours working on it initially, which set me back $528 and change. assured me it worked.
fine.
i went and turned up the thermostat. nothing happened. oh it said "heat" all right, but nothing was going on downstairs. i paced, i worried. i hate being "that" person who has to point at and critique flaws. i hemmed, i hawwed, and finally i called the place back asking to speak to the tech who helped me. five mins later he called back and said that he'd come right back to check it out. i was sure it would be a simple flick of the switch and off he'd be with me red and embarassed.
not so.
turns out, the humidifier was leaking into the furnace, which caused a short in my thermostat. $70 +gst later, it was all fixed. the newer digital thermostat has had to be junked because it's fried and we are back to our traditional thermostat, warts and all, minus the humidifier. after telling ch about all the drama and the cost, he said "i think we are done with humidifiers from now on" (because we had a huge leak in it the first weekend it was installed and woke up to an inch of H2O on the basement floor one lovely sunday morning, with no furnace, and OH it was in the winter).
we'll see how the fil reacts to that news. he wont like it.
he had spent two hours working on it initially, which set me back $528 and change. assured me it worked.
fine.
i went and turned up the thermostat. nothing happened. oh it said "heat" all right, but nothing was going on downstairs. i paced, i worried. i hate being "that" person who has to point at and critique flaws. i hemmed, i hawwed, and finally i called the place back asking to speak to the tech who helped me. five mins later he called back and said that he'd come right back to check it out. i was sure it would be a simple flick of the switch and off he'd be with me red and embarassed.
not so.
turns out, the humidifier was leaking into the furnace, which caused a short in my thermostat. $70 +gst later, it was all fixed. the newer digital thermostat has had to be junked because it's fried and we are back to our traditional thermostat, warts and all, minus the humidifier. after telling ch about all the drama and the cost, he said "i think we are done with humidifiers from now on" (because we had a huge leak in it the first weekend it was installed and woke up to an inch of H2O on the basement floor one lovely sunday morning, with no furnace, and OH it was in the winter).
we'll see how the fil reacts to that news. he wont like it.
Great things about the Hat.
- monarch theatre http://www.themonarch.ca/index2.php a newly restored theatre in the heart of downtown medicine hat. comfortable seats (no bad seat in the house), "B" movies, and a 50's style color scheme. where else can you go on a wednesday night and spend $5 getting in and $5 for popcorn and drinks?
- swirls. good icecream from a small vendor.
- the roasterie. freshly brewed coffee, roasted beans, and an atmosphere that hasnt sold out to the man. down with starbucks!
- tiger ice cream at tigers hockey games.
- coulees at any time of the year
- deer on your front lawn
- the south saskatchewan from maple avenue bridge at dusk looking westward
- rafting down the south sask with an itsy bitsy floating cooler
- rossco's wings and the rooster himself
- damned good friends.
- the par 3. where else can you drink many beer and have a great game of golf with friends for under $20?
- 10 minute commute ANYWHERE.
- prairie xmas trees across from your house....
- going to BEACH parties year round
- thuy thien, sabi, and sushi miso who represent good solid vietnamese, thai, and japanese meals for quality prices
- roadies
- http://heartbreakerdanceandfitness.com/ kickass classes, instructors, and a real method to getting fit.
- finlay bridge
- prairie sunsets from your front door
- argiropes in your garden and massive-assed wolf spiders in your garage
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
i'm contemplating taking my fitness leadership certification in 2010.
four courses are required : exercise theory, group exercise fundamentals, resistance training, and a minimum of 44hrs of in class practicum.
i'm not gaga about the in class practicum. as a matter of fact, i'm really not excited to get up in front of the class and don a microphone and sweat and show my ass off for the world to see. too many anxieties over it, namely the whole "what if i cant DO everything and there are people laughing that i'm useless"? because, seriously, i do that to instructors i do not respect. fifi anyone?
i know that is not nice, but i do hold my instructors to a certain level. it's like being a gym teacher but never working out...oops, is that too close to home, sil? how about being a cafe employee but refusing to touch the meat because you are vegetarian? or working in a cafe and refusing to clean the bathrooms because you "hate it"? yeah, i worked with twats like that when i first moved here.
all i'm saying is that if i'm going to be an instructor, i have to walk the walk and talk it too. i cant go in there half assed and expect and demand respect. it doesnt work that way. and of course in my mind a fitness instructor is a lean mean fighting machine. well, let me tell you: after this xmas and past month, i'm anything but. my knees are crackin, my shoulders saggin, and whatever else that should be tight is not tight. i have at least 2 to three months of solid clean eating and working out to get to a respectable body shape that i can appreciate and feel confident about. right now wouldnt be the ideal time....
but at the same time, the theory course is at the end of january. it's a 24 hr course jammed into three days. you dont need to DO anything, save study anatomy till your eyes bleed. that's it. so in the meantime i can still go to my classes and eat well and ace the course and still have time to get into good shape for the other ones which are in march and april respectively. theoretically, by the end of the summer, i could be fully certified and onto teaching my own classes come september.
however, it's the practicum that frightens me a bit. do i want to do it at heartbreaker? i love it there, dont get me wrong, but it's the *idea* of working for marla that sets me off. yes, i love her place, but i think she is the kind of person who continually takes until you either snap or quit. i know instructors who were pushed to their max every day with demands, basically running the studio as if it was theirs with no thanks. and i'm the type of girl who has a hard time saying no, so i could see me saying yes to teaching A class 5 days a week, which would suddenly balloon into 15 classes five days a week with weekends thrown in because marla isnt "feeling up to it". no fucking way. i want to enjoy what i do and get a good workout on the side.
at this point i think i could do the three certification classes and see what happens from there. i dont want to get locked into working for marla, that i do know. i'm not sure i want to pimp myself out anywhere else, but i would like the option to choose where i'd like to work. would this become a full time thing? hardly. it would just be a new challenge to embrace and something to keep me motivated to keep on trying.
i still have a few weeks to decide, but honestly, for $200 and one weekend, what could i possibly lose?
the aloe is continuing to thrive in my kitchen. i just looked at it the other day and the flowering stalk has now bent slightly because it is touching my ceiling in the kitchen. i turned the plant and lo and behold, there are FIVE new sprouts poking through the soil! five!
me thinks it's time for a repotting and relocation to a happier place. i think that tomorrow the xmas tree will come down and furniture will be rearranged in the livingroom and the aloe will move into its permanent home in front of my living room window.
here's my reading list for 2010
- tristram shandy (sterne). had to read it in "the 18thc novel". couldnt get past page 20. seriously, it was terrible. there's part of me that wants to toss it in the fire, but the other part wants to SAY i've read it and mean it. it's a pride thing.
- anna karenina (tolstoy). bought the book on a whim in my "oh i'm a new english major graduate and i've never read this book". started reading it while reading others and quit. it's time to pick it up again.
- ashini (theriault). not a classic per se, but a very interesting french canadian novel about a native displaced. lots of poetic language throughout. easy read. read it in my 2nd year. kept it to read again.
- jude the obscure (hardy). bought for a 19thc novel class in my 2nd year. read part of it, got bored. faked reading it in class. got a b-. not proud. want to finish it.
- anything by the bronte sisters. i took a bronte course in my third year and let me tell you, i loved it. i loved all of their books and stories about the sisters. between them there are 5 novels which are all very good works of literature. i think i've read jane eyre three different times and enjoyed it.
- a suitable boy (seth). three volumes. always stalled out at the first one, despite it being an interesting book. i think the length of it intimidates me. gonna finish it in 2010. dammit.
- david copperfield (dickens). i've owned it for years. cant even remember how or where i acquired it. i dont think i've ever opened it.
- catcher in the rye (salinger). read this one twice and loved it. would continue to read it again and again, much like cat's eye (atwood). that one is a bible of my childhood, i swear.
- to kill a mockingbird (lee). never read it, know i *should*, so i will.
oh i know this list is quite short. i'm aware of that. i do want to ensure i read the classics and incorporate them into my regular reading...reading which i sadly do not find time for on a daily basis. that has to change...yes, it does.
i'm going to try to make some resolutions for 2010.
- speak my mind more, but continue to consider feelings
- workout more
- drink only on occasions and not on "hey, it's tuesday, i had a good day" occasions
- gossip less
- think before speaking, contemplating and taking the time to consider without openly volunteering assistance (which always fucking burns me and i'm the one suffering in the end)
- spend more time with family
- take a spanish course or two
- consider taking fitness leadership
- love more
- read classic books. if i'm going to keep them, i may as well read them...if not, toss em.
during the cruise last year, the family of four was a big pain in the ass. i foresee more problems.
xmas eve was the first time i've seen them since dec 28/08. to be honest, i wasnt missing them and could have gone another yr or longer without visiting with them. even to hear the sil's laughter grates on my nerves.
so yeah, we spent the week bunking beside them. ship walls are thin and we could hear her voice daily as if she was standing in our bedroom.
every night at dinner they'd be late and then pissed off when we'd make their kids sit in between them. in their ideal world (fucking bizarro) they wanted to sit side by side with a kid on either side of them, sandwiched in between an aunt or uncle. and every night, those kids would be left to their own devices. they'd act up, refuse to eat, pull on ch's shirt, or goof off, and if the mother paid any attention to them, it would be to loudly chastise them over every one else's conversation. this would go on every night at supposed five star dinners. we'd watch my nephew refuse to eat his dinner, but would be sure to get two full glasses of chocolate milk, followed by cookies and ice cream at the end. nevermind the nutrition in between, just chock the fucker full of sugar and then complain when he'd act up that you didnt know where he was getting these ideas from and that he's always sooooooo good at dinner. uh huh, riiiiiiiight. fucking kid has never sat through one meal without acting like a little intolerable asshole, so dont give me this shit that he's never behaved like that and you've never seen that before bullshit. assholes.
to top it off, they brought these kids with the expectation that everyone else would be babysitting them. fuck that noise. i'm on vacation and i have zero obligation to them or their kids. you dont see me expecting them to dog sit, so they can pipe right down about babysitting. and because they're stupider than words, they also failed to bring along any entertainment for these kids, just assuming that grandma would tote around games and books for them. of course grandma did, but she is a topic all unto herself and let's just say that she can bitch to high heaven about things, but ultimately, she enables them all to act like useless cunts.
so then on the way home, they didnt bother to arrange seating on the plane so they could sit together. again, it was some shit show with them and attitude pulling if the brother and his wife couldnt share an armrest. they thought it was unfaaaaaaaaaaaaaaair that they had to have their kids with them. so we arrive in miami to fly out, ch and his sister pull a huge embarassing freakout and we end up sitting together. or so we think. in the meantime, the other two fucking morons do nothing to arrange their seating and displace ch and i. so there they sat brother and wife together sharing their armrest with the 5yr old beside her. meanwhile, she'd displaced ch and i, as well as his parents who had to look after the 2yr old. and then she pulled attitude when we got pissed because we had arranged all this 9hrs earlier in miami.
so the first words out of my bil's mouth when he got this gift? "hum. well maybe this year we can rearrange the flights because it's not fair that we got separated".
clay, go fuck yourself.
i've told ch that i dont care which flight everyone else is taking, i will NOT fly with them, or if i do, i'm fucking flying first class so that there is ZERO chance they'll be up there taking our prearranged seats.
i cant wait till therapy in 3 weeks. my therapist is going to have a hay day with this.
this xmas the inlaws bought us a gift. specifically, they handed us a card with baited breath and big smiles and waited to see our reactions. inside were the words telling us they wanted to plan another hot family holiday to cancun to an all-inclusive resort.
hey, i love me some all-inclusives. my day goes as such: wake up, shower, hit the bar and then the beach. eat some lunch, hit the bar. swim. hit the bar, lay on the beach. read. gossip. hit the bar. get dressed, hit the restaurant and the bar again for good measure. sleep. wake up, rinse and repeat. yes, i could do that for days on end with no complaints. some people [read: my sister] think that i'm a boring person who is too focussed on the bar, but in the circles i spin, this is all par for the course.
anyway, the inlaws have decided that they want all of us to go to el cid in cancun. more importantly, they want to get two big condos for the 9 of us. the kicker? they want the sil to bunk with them while ch and i bunk with his brother, wife, and the fucking two kids aged 6 and 4. yeah, that's right, they expect the two dinks who dont have kids or patience for said kids to bunk with them. they handed this gift to us and ch's brother, so i think that the sil knew about the gift beforehand and was instrumental in room arrangements. {she'd do anything to make sure SHE slept comfortably without disturbance, all while putting us out...why ch fails to see this selfishness is beyond me. hey, i'm all about self preservation, but she takes it to an all new low.}
jesus christ. right away i said to ch that there'd be NO WAY i'd bunk with the family. as it was on the KROOOOZE last year, the sprogs roomed beside us and neither one of the parents had any common sense to shut those fuckers up at 7 am when they insisted on getting up or rearranging balcony furniture. naturally all our balconies were adjoined so we had the pleasure of them running up and down the balconies at all hours and moving chairs and tables around without picking them up. the noise would echo all down the side of the ship and into our room. i'm not much of a sleeper, but let me just tell you that i appreciated the quiet when we were FINALLY away from those twats.
so the inlaws think we all could take turns babysitting the kids, too. uhm, NO. just because they decide to take these kids does not mean that it's up to me to babysit. but right away, i heard my fil say "oh we could all take turns babysitting"...who's holiday is this? riiiiiiiight, the one with strings attached.
yup, it came and went and there it was. xmas. in a blink of an eye, a flash of tinsel, and a sound of ripping and shredding it's all over, save the returns.
we are not returning anything, fortunately, but i almost have retail withdrawl. pathetic, considering i was in our walmart at least 34957349 times last week.
we spent xmas eve with the inlaws at their insistance...no, persistance. it went ON about how we never visit them etc....uh, you're here at least 2x a month and i see you more than MY parents, ffs.
xmas day was spent here with many bottles of booze and a turkey and stuffing and movies. it was great. the only sadness is that it's all over and done with until next year. but i really loved our alone time and we were both excited for the day.
next year will be a different story...
i really cant answer that question.
ordinarily, i go into super hermit mode and count down till it's over. this time around, i'm running around with anxiety and counting down till the day.
we are likely laying low here and watching movies and hanging out. i think i'm going to go gung ho and try doing a turkey and all the fixings and i'm getting excited now thinking about it.
that shit aint right.
so yeah, i'm menu planning in my head and wondering if i can pull it off in 4 days or less. i'm already excited with the idea of the house smelling like turkey, perhaps some champagne and good red wine, and playing some games. in my silly imagination i even am wearing my fucking apron and pearls for christ's sake.
i have a desire to create a happy xmas this year. not that xmases in the past have been horrid (with the exception of 2003) but they havent really been memorable. just kinda 'there'.
i just want to pull off a turkey, a fait accompli, and have a nice day vegging out. i think it's possible for now.
i want a food processor. it's becoming an obsession of mine. i've determined that in 2010 i'm going to buy myself one. i think it should come in handy when making soups and the like. when i really stop to think about it, i have no idea what else i'd make with it besides soup, but i'm sure i'll find uses.
but pricing one out on the internet? kinda impossible. the bay here is about the best place to find reasonably priced, yet quality housewares. sure, i could go to the fabulous kitchen store downtown, but i'm not a gourmande, so i dont need the top of the line $1000 food processor. i'm looking for a reputable brand and a reasonable price. so anyway, i went to look at the bay.com. there are NO prices there. piss me off. now i'll have to do it the old fashioned way.
i'm starting out looking at the foodnetwork.com for ideas and going from there. lately? i've been in love with the food channel. i can watch hours of it, really, and i find it quite entertaining the way some of them just throw things together and how easy it all looks. one show ("chef at home" http://www.foodnetwork.ca/ontv/shows/Chef-at-Home/show.html?titleid=82664) fascinates me. michael smith can just whip it all up and make it look so delicious and effortless that it's absolutely inspiring. i'd love to be his neighbour, but i think i'd be 300lbs in no time flat.
*tangent*
anyway, the hunt is going to be on for a food processor in 2010. hopefully there are some good sales in the new year.
is seanachie (the calgary based band) over and done with? i havent seen a web page and i've googled them and all their shit is old...
i hope they havent broken up. i loved their music and had many a great pint listening to gordon...
they were here in the hat in 2004. i wanted them to play at my wedding but they wanted $2000 plus accommodations and travel. uhm, a bit much, dudes. now that i look back tho, i should have spent the money on it. i would have had a blast!
i love those guys...god, i hope they're not broken up...it'll be a sad day in music land if it's true.
i had a pretty good session again with james this week. we always talk about the inlaws and the same themes keep reappearing. he's dubbed them the "space invaders" and often the phrase used in dealing with them is "you are dealing with people who JUST.DONT.GET.IT.". he's given me many things to think about, the most recent being that the inlaws dont listen to me, so pouring my heart out to them or expressing opinions is a complete waste of time and energy, that they will just continue to do as they wish when they want, always.
i get very angry when i think of the inlaws and often ruminate on it for hours on end. i can really fire myself up on occasion to the point of where it's all i'll talk about. quite frankly, i hate it, so i can just imagine what others are thinking when i start frothing at the mouth. i bore me, so if i'm boring me, i'm surely boring you. many apologies.
like i said, the same things get discussed and the same topic that we always dance around is how i should accept the inlaws for who they are and accept their behaviour. but to me acceptance goes hand in hand with tolerance, and quite frankly, i can not tolerate how they behave. i have figured in the 30-odd years i've been around the sun (heavy on the "odd"), that i do not want to align myself with people i can not respect. i would rather put more energy in to something or someone when i know i get that energy back. or even doing things freely of my own accord without a heavy dose of guilt thrown in. i hate how i'll just suddenly volunteer to do something for those twits like cook a turkey dinner, and then grouse about it for years on end because i was duped into thinking something that never was the case in the first place. james has taught me not to take bites on lines that are thrown my way, although i have to admit that it's a lesson that is taking me much longer to learn than i had hoped.
i struggle with the acceptance part. it's hard for me to say "oh that's just my mother in law...i dont like it, but it's who she is" and move on. i have a hell of a time doing that. i think it's because i know that i'm stuck with the damned selfish idiots for the rest of my marriage and there is no escape. it makes me feel like a cornered rat at times.
my natural response to anything stressful or irritating is to escape. i'm the kind of girl who relishes being alone and gets recharged from it. in concern to the inlaws, it's damned near impossible to get away from them. they're always butting in at the most inopportune moments, which drives me beyond crazy.
i think part of my goal for 2010 is to learn how to accept people for what they are but remain distant at the same time. if there is a fast track way of doing it (besides all-out avoidance), i'd be happy to hear about it. suggestions welcome!!
have you got any new years resolutions?
i'm not sure i do just yet. of course i'm contemplating the whole "i'm not drinking till maui" thing, but that's fairly easy to achieve. of course that will break into pieces if i end up going on a vacation, but otherwise i think i can stick with it.
i am not certain what else to figure out...maybe read more? gossip less? say "i love you" more and mean it? spend time and energy where i get the most out of it? i dont know...all i know is that i have to get back on the fitness wagon, stat!
still trying to keep up with the script that is ever changing...
so far it's the dink group plus a couple others and that's it. it should be a good group of friends and a long night. the shitty part is that they're trying to make it a two day blitz at the rooster's place, but with our dogs it's damned near impossible to stay over longer than 4am. if we were to stay (ideally) at the rooster's place, then we'd have to board the dogs or else hire someone to come and check in on them (not ideal). so for now i suppose that we'll drive out there early-ish and then make and prepare food (because we have absolutely insisted to the rooster that he is NOT making anything --because he goes absolutely crazy and overdoes it every party and he needs to have a break FFS) and then take a taxi home when the time comes.
i think it will be a fun evening with everyone. i'm just a bit sad to miss out on a MB breakkie like we had in kimberley, but i think i'll be ok.
for now i think we have a good mix of people and it will be fun to hit the pool and hot tub and just chill the eff out...only 13 days left!
ok, so i totally broke down and bought egg nog and am consuming it with rum right now. oh, it's tastier than what i remembered...so delicious, but frightening. i've had two already and i know it's like drinking a fucking beef, rice, and vegetable dinner, but worse. ugh. but so damned tasty. i'm just glad that eggnog is a seasonal drink and not available year round. i'd be in some serious shit if it was!!
have you ever hit "next blog>>" at the top of the screen? i find it remarkably interesting to hit that. it's sort of like spinning a wheel. you never know what you'll get, but usually it's crap.
i'm sure that others have stumbled on my blog and wondered WTF and thought it was crap as well. hey, i'm ok with that and i know that you cant please everyone. i could care less what others think.
what kills me is that you'll hit that button and it will be the blog of adventures of the so-in-so family. i suppose because i'm a dink, i could care less about you and your fucking nuclear family of brats and how you made cookies or cleaned the toilet or went tobogganing with pictures attached. gak.
of course nobody really wants to read the ramblings and rantings of a dink with a cynical attitude either...
so we finally finished off the gifts and groceries. i have to say that when this stuff comes around, ch is an expert shopper. very meticulous and he sticks to the game plan. he's very generous and gets excited over getting groceries for strangers. if only he'd muster up that enthusiasm for our groceries, but it would never happen. i'd never see the guy standing in line for OUR things, but for strangers? hell, he'll stand in line with a big smile on. it's amazing.
so we got the smaller family done on tuesday. spoiled the kids with a dvd player, movies, barbies, and toy trucks. the kids will hopefully have a great christmas.
we just finished the larger family tonight and they were more difficult. the boys who were 16 and 14 got shaving kits that we loaded up with deodorant, body sprays, hair gels, and lotions, as well as hoodies and gift cards to cineplex and hmv. the 15yr old girl got a makeup bag with nail polishes and remover and a few other girly goodies inside, as well as a hoodie and a flat iron. we got her a $25 gift card to la senza. as for the 10 yr old boy, he was the easiest: he wanted games and lego so ch got him clue (which i hate because i can not play it successfully) and various lego contraptions. we loaded 2 carts full of shit for this family and it was a $600 load of stuff. we sincerely hope they're happy and ok for xmas.
all in all, the adopt a family thing is awesome. the only shitty part is delivering the stuff to the families. i could really do without seeing where they live or seeing faces. for now we are just playing it off that we are doing it on behalf of the salvation army and trying to just suggest we're delivering and not responsible for purchasing. if we can distance ourselves from it, it's much better.
charity, in my opinion, is best when it's faceless.
we just spent an exhausting few hours at wal mart. i am embarassed to admit that i've been there more often in the last few weeks than i ever intended to be. in the past i've looked at wm with scorn, but christ, they have deals and you can get damned near everything there under one roof. i really dont like shopping in 75 different places to get three things.
the prices are great, too. i can get 20 bags of groceries for under $200, whereas if i went to safeway, i'd be spending $250 or more for the same items. walmart, despite its tendancy to support the chinese market, has some great deals.
the produce sucks balls tho. safeway is still superior for that kind of stuff. same with the meat. hey if you want a cheap lb of beef to fry up, walmart is great. but if you are looking for decent produce that is local, forget it. you'll never see a tomato or cucumber from redcliff greenhouses, even tho it's 10 mins down the highway.
anyway, i'm happy to report that the shopping should be over with for now. for a little while anyway.
the word?
CARGOYLES.
cargoyle [cahr-goil] noun. icy chunk of snow and road debris that falls off your tires in winter. can be kicked off or melts off naturally to form dark chunks of ice. cargoyles exist naturally and prolifically during chinooks.
cargoyles.
thank you, cbc 1010 for the fascinating discussion.
i have no idea what january holds in store. i'm getting really sick and tired of the current instructor fifi and i want to never take another class with her again. i was looking on the schedule and she is instructing a 6am bikini class while brandie is doing the 6am boot camp with lea. i dont know this lea person and have no idea what to expect, but i do know brandie and quite honestly, i get sick of her classes. no matter what we do, she always yanks out the step and does shit on it. i hate that and i think it's so incredibly boring. i also can see that the 6am bikini wont fill up and then they'll end up combining classes again and i'll be stuck with that dumb twat fifi again.
i think that heartbreaker has definitely gone down hill in the last 4 months or so since janine left. the instructors left standing are unimaginative and fucking lazy. they repeat the same classes every week and wont work out with us. it's getting to the point where i'm not finding any inspiration at the gym anymore and am just going through the motions. i just worry about being motivated enough to work harder in january. honestly, if it is the way it is now, i wont be able to do it.
i should clarify: there are some good instructors left, but they instruct at times that are not convenient to me. for instance, i do like corey, but she is an evening instructor. i dont mind marla, but she could stop screeching every once in a while. i do like jenny but she only instructs some noon hour classes. if she was doing the full session then i'd definitely pop in, but she only does 2 classes per week.
i am sort of contemplating taking the 8pm bikini with terri ann because i know she is a good instructor and isnt a boring ass and will do things with us. the drawback is that i really dont want to shell out the $250 for a program i already know how to do. i've done 5 bikinis now and i know the drill. i'm not interested in before and after pictures and attending nutrition seminars...i just want to work out and be done with it.
i really dont know where i'm going to go with this. i do know that i really enjoy group fitness and dont want to quit that. sure, i could go get a membership at the Y, but i have this membership at heartbreaker that i have 8 months remaining...i'd like to see it through. yes, i could buy a gym pass to the Y and do classes there, but i hate the idea of starting over when i know what i'm getting already.
my membership is up in 8 months. there will be other options out there such as temple fitness. my buddy rhonda works out there and she is in great shape. shane does have a good place and kick ass classes...again, it's starting all over again that bothers me. janine's place is always an option. i do really love and miss her classes and wouldnt mind going there, but mike is such a dork that i dont think i want to give my business to him....
i guess i have 8 months to figure it all out. i just hope that i can find the right solution by then.
oh i've been lazy in terms of fitness. i've gotta get on the wagon again.
my knees are still very sore. the other day i went and bought glucosamine and i've been taking 1000mg in hopes that i'll eventually stop sounding like a granny every time i sit down or attempt the stairs.
i've decided that i'm going to only 1 legs class per week. today i slept in because it was plyo and pyramid, which means a lot of lunges, burpees, and squats all fucking class long. even in warmups i feel my knees twinge. i got a serious twinge monday morning that i didnt like.
yesterday i woke up with a lower back ache and i cant figure out where it came from. monday was bagshaw and no back exercises and tuesday was boxing, so god only knows why my back is so sore. it is still sore today...fuck. i was also beat right down on tuesday and so much so that i was falling asleep on the couch at 7pm.
tomorrow's class is arms, a step n sculpt class, so it should be a good one. from there we only have 2 classes next week and then we're off till the 28th. should be a good break.
adjacent to the previous post...
the sil told me a few weeks ago that she is graduating from her last chance masters course and wants to go somewhere special for xmas next year.
that special place? hawaii.
ok it's a nice enough place, but boring as fuck. why not go somewhere like mexico where it's all inclusive and nice and hot and somewhere you've never been before?? but she is boring as shit and insists on repetively going places she's already seen, so it's hardly a surprise she'd pick reliable boring hawaii.
and i know her ploy: she's trying to make it a family vacation. she'll never go by herself and spend xmas alone. nay, she will say she wants to go to hawaii and know that her parents will never A) let her pay her own way there or B) go alone and spend xmas by herself, so she knows that if she puts the hints out enough that they will cave and that's where everyone will spend xmas.
so i casually state this to ch and he gets excited. fuck, go figure. so she will get her way again.
seriously december is a noisy time in my head. it's a time where i'm always preoccupied with avoidance. avoiding my parents, his parents, everyone. i really want to do what I want to do, but nobody respects that.
every christmas, ch and i want to be alone. in years past, his family has always dominated every xmas. it was always about them, whether it was at grandpa matt's house or at their house in yyc, it was always us and them. and "them" was always the sil too in all her annoying glory. the one year we went to lethbridge, it was a fucking epic. how DARE we go and visit MYYYYY parents and not them. i swear, the world tilted on its axis the day we spent xmas with my family and not them. there was a lot of whining. the sil even tried her best to get us to change our mind by telling us that sheeeeeee was going to be all alone and that she'd have nobody to spend xmas with; her little ploy to get ch to cancel our plans. it was like that last thanksgiving where she went on that mom and dad were leaving her and so i FOOLISHLY volunteered to cook a turkey. that night at dinner she announced that she was having twooooo turkeys that thanksgiving and would be going to mom and dad's the next night...all a ploy. so the year we went to my parents' she tried pulling that stunt and ch bit and told her she could come along. funnily enough, the mil said she'd never leave the sil alone and they werent going anywhere...huh. funny how that is, isnt it?
in 2007 we decided to stay here for xmas and do nothing. we had fun doing our own thing and went to a boxing day party. that wasnt good enough for the inlaws; they had to make sure they got us at xmas and bought a cruise for us for the next year over xmas. this year we are trying hard to stay here and the sil talked to ch last night and told him that mommy is making a turkey on the 25 for whoever shows up, and when he expressed disinterest and said we were not sure what we were doing, she switched gears and said that she then would have mommy and daddy here and cook a turkey and we could go to her house. for fuck's sake. so apparently he said that we werent sure WHERE we'd be on xmas and to not do that. well, we'll see about that. i'm pretty sure she will do what she can (read: MANIPULATE) to make sure she gets xmas with ch.
the one year that we did see my parents, she told me, ''you just have to understand: i havent had a xmas without ch in 26 yrs"...fuck off you stupid c*nt.
december is going to be a rough month in terms of my diet:
~~we have a radio station party friday night and ch wants me to go to a hockey game with him afterward...hockey=zzzzzzzzzzzzzz to me, so it will mean beer to get me through. after the game, he wants to go to rossco's...i want to go there too, which frightens me because i know that i wont stop at one. sometimes i have to fight with myself and alienate myself from drinking in order to stay on the straight and narrow.
~~saturday is a kin bus trip to yql to watch another hockey game. jesus, i know that i'll be bored stupid...and that's where beer comes in. thank god for beer somedays. i know that the trip will be a gong show before i even get to the game. i'm hoping to keep it between the ditches and bitches that night.
~~saturday the 12th is another hockey road trip to yyc to go to the molson box. this time around, beer wont be consumed in the jetta en route to the game, which will cut back the stupidity. i hope
~~the 18th is a kinsmen executive party at the ponderosa and it is a legendary gong show which i fully intend to skip but have been hammered by ch and co to attend out of duty because he is the president.
~~the 26th is an annual darts tourney at our friends' house full of beer and frivolity
~~the 31st is the new years party at the ponderosa...pool and hot tub party for the select few invitees.
december is just shaping up to be a gong show in terms of fitness...i am going to have to work extra hard in january, ffs.
i still havent had caffiene yet. ok, i have had it in the form of diet soda but i have not willingly purchased or consumed a coffee with caffiene in it. one day i couldnt resist and bought a decaf latte, but it was decaf. big step for me. this is coming from the girl who drank nearly a pot of full on caffiene a day. i was going through a pound of coffee a week! it's a wonder i wasnt getting headaches and major withdrawl symptoms, however if i experienced them, they were obviously so minor they didnt warrant any concern. my full on daily coffee pot consumption habit was probably a year or two in the making.
i found that coffee made me too twitchy but there are afternoons where i utterly crave it. today i went out and ran errands and passed by the drive through starbucks and sighed. oh how it would have been great to drink a decaf latte with sugar free caramel!! even now i think about it and drool a bit.
i'm really not sure why i'm punishing myself in this manner. i should just switch back to caffiene and be done with it, but in a way it's that stupid stubborn trait i have to do exactly the opposite of what i desire. i dont know why i do that. it's not like i'm going to win a medal for not drinking coffee. nobody cares, ffs. it's just a self-driven desire to hold back on one thing.
and really, of all the things that are bad for me in my life, coffee is the least harmful. if only i could adopt that stance with beer.
sigh.
right now i'm craving chips, dip, beer and clam. it's that nagging niggling little asshole on my shoulder telling me i have to eat this stuff or die.
sometimes i find cravings almost too hard to overcome, hence the struggles i've had with weight for a decade and a half or more now. going to the gym helps, yes, but it's not everything.
i've been told that diet is 80% of it, physical activity is a mere 10%, and the rest is genetics. it's startling. i'm sure the number of people walking into a gym and then out to mcdonald's would fall over if they knew those facts. (facts which are unsubstantiated, mind you, but told to me during a nutrition session).
i have found the correlation between eating well and exercise. all it takes is one weekend of utter wild abandonment to feel the results come monday morning at 6am. i'm sluggish, tired, and achy and watch the clock endlessly. if i eat better, i have more energy.
when i ate just chicken and rice and limited my sugars, i felt pretty good then too. i think it's going to come to that sooner rather than later in order to prepare for maui.
today i made this soup...it was yummy...
carrot/yam/squash ginger soup
1.5l chicken stock (i make my own)
3 large carrots grated
2 medium onions
1/2 squash (any variety will do)
2 medium sized yams, approx 3 cups
2tbsp salt (which can be decreased according to taste)
pepper to taste
1/2 tsp ginger
pour stock into large soup pot, add in carrots, squash, onions, and yams. bring to a boil and let simmer until all vegetables are cooked through. add in seasonings. blend in a blender and serve.
it makes approximately 10-1cup servings. enjoy!
calories: 126
fat: 2.4g
sodium: 357
carb: 20
fiber: 3
sugars: 4
protein: 6
i've just returned from shopping for the kids...over $300 later and i'm still not done.
so far i got the neice and nephew some long sleeved tshirts from the boarding house here and my other nephew a hoodie and a transformer. i think he'd really prefer the lego star wars set but that will have to be another day's purchase since it's over $100...since when was lego THAT expensive? maybe i'll give the transformer to my other nephew, as i did buy a dance barbie for the neice.
for the adopt a family kids, i bought the one family a dvd player and movies as they wanted. they'll get some smaller toys to play with later. the second family's kids i bought the three of them hoodies, the 15yr old girl a flat iron and i will eventually get her some makeup because honestly, what girl doesnt like makeup? ok, i know there are some out there, but at that age, i think girls are into experimentation. i noticed in my sephora catalogue that they have a $50 perfume sampler set and i'm quite tempted just to buy it for this girl. hell, I'D be excited to open and try that...plus it also comes with a bonus kat von d tote bag that might be a nice addition to her gifts. i'm still going to decide on that because i've already spent a bit. i'll run it past ch.
the boys will be harder to buy for. the oldest is 16, the middle one is 14 and the baby is 10. the 10 yr old at least has said he wants lego and games. done and done. easy enough. but the rest of them havent really specified what they want, so it will be kind of a crap shoot. winners does have a lot of odd and interesting gifts, so i think we will end up going there to see if there are neat things for the boys.
little kids are easier to buy for, but i'm still struggling with my neice and nephew and what they should get. they are 3 and 5 respectively, so it's really a matter of finding something they'd really want and dont have. and at the present, they have a crapload of stuff in their house. they currently want for nothing, so it makes it harder to find things they'd actually appreciate or desire when opened. it's going to continue to be a big challenge, so we had better get a game plan for the next 15yrs! i was sort of thinking that for bdays we should set aside $ for them in gic's or savings accounts and then when they're 18, they can use the money for whatever they want. i'm also figuring that by the time they're 18, they'll not be in need of gifts and will be ok with that.
i hope.
dear blessings,
i just wanted to say hello. you dont know me and the odds of us meeting are rare but i wanted to let you know that i am thinking about you.
i just adopted you moments ago. the fact that your name was blessings spoke to me in ways i can not understand. seeing that you love football and helping your family helped as well.
i have never been a parent, so i dont know what it is that 10 year old boys want or need, but i can just imagine. i hope to help you out so that you can reach your dreams and goals and have a bright future, despite living in a community plagued with aids.
i dont know you but already i have warm thoughts about you and wish you well and cant wait to hear more about you.
in the meantime, take care of yourself.
xoxo
i've decided to cut back my legs classes to once a week. this week we had two legs classes, but judging from how my knees have been lately, there's no way i can tolerate 2 classes a week of this bullshit.
i overheard some of the ladies talking about thursday's class and how terrible it was. thank god i skipped. it was plyometrics, which is ordinarily very good, but i knew my knees wouldnt take it, seeing as we had lunge/push on monday. heck, even today when we were in warmups and doing side to side lunges, my knees were giving me great difficulty.
i really dont know what it is with heartbreaker and why they insist on doing 2 legs classes a week. injuries are prevalent there and i really dont want to be added to the casualty list, i really dont. i enjoy relative good health, so as a result, i'm going to take it easy.
maybe i'll pick up an extra cardio class in the meantime to get my fix, instead of working my knees to death. i think i'll need them for the next 50 yrs.
so my aloe plant is still merrily growing. this time the stalk has grown past the plant and has grown about 3-4 feet above it:
close up of the flowering stalk:
the lower "buds" are starting to fall off. i'm not sure if they will open. i also dont know what to do with the stalk once it's done blooming. as well, i turned the plant and lo and behold, a new juvenile aloe plant is growing beside it! repotting will likely come in the new year in spring and it will move to a bigger pot, probably its permanent home for a few years to come.
so in march we are going to maui. it's for our annual convention with the store, so it should be good.
we've decided to spend a few days of the convention in maui hanging out. we're staying at a westin and they've graciously made it all-inclusive for our group, so it will actually be a bonafide vacation. in the past our company has sent us to 5+ star places where drinks are verging on $10/drink, and if you know our vacation habits, it doesnt come cheaply. this vacation will be a nice shift from the usual functions.
from OGG we will take hawaiian airlines to HNL to spend 4 days there hanging out. the last time we were on oahu, we had a great time renting a jeep and driving around seeing the sights. quite frankly waikiki is overdone and boring and not as nice as other remote areas on the island. and the island's interstate freeways are set up so nicely that you can have a great run-around without too much traffic and wonderful vistas in the process.
my favourite place was the north shore. talk about awesome! the waves were insane. i'm hoping to caputre some better photographs this time around. at the time we were there (feb 05), it was the tail end of the surfing competition so when we actually took pictures, the surfers looked like ants compared to the waves they were navigating. even the lifeguards were on full watch...one family took their toddler to dip its toes in the surf and were yelled at and warned by the lifeguard to get back...the rogue waves and undertow are atrocious and it wouldnt take much to knock people down and out to sea.
we experienced a rogue wave at makapuu beach. we went there with our rental jeep and sat on the sand and watched the waves come in and out...we were the only fools wondering why everyone else there was seated high above us...that is, until a wave came in and soaked us completely. god damned tourists! it was definitely a lesson in humility!
this time around we will be more prepared. we will wear sunscreen on ALL parts of our bodies. while touring about, i ended up with a burn that looked like a happy face on my left bicep and a burn down my hair part. wont be doing that again! this time around we will pack towels so that we can at least *walk* or *sit* on the beach at the north shore....
and this time around, i definitely will NOT be eating at mcdonalds. bleh.
i wont get into details here in a blog post, but we have 2 families.
one family has two kids under the age of 7 and the other one has four ranging in ages from 10 to 16. i'm totally out of the loop as to what to get the teenagers. normally people will specify what they would like for gifts or give ideas out, but the older kids havent...so we are basically stuck with the conundrum of wondering what might be cool or appreciated...
but at the same time, bring it on.
oh and i'm also thinking of sponsoring a child...tonight i'm investigating and checking it out.
this year, like last, we are adopting two families for xmas.
i found out the idea through a friend here and thought it was damned good. she got me in touch with the salvation army and i was able to connect and sponsor 2 families last year.
i have always wanted to take the focus of presents OFF xmas, and do something good for other people. i'm not a people person, but helping out anonymously appeals to me greatly. i had always wanted to serve xmas dinner at the food bank or soup kitchen, but the years i inquired, they were completely full of volunteers.
i always had it in my mind and last year i told ch that i wanted to do this, that a friend had the info and we should do it. so instead of stressing out and buying gifts for the family, we just bought gifts and groceries for strangers.
let me tell you, it's a liberating thing to give to others. it really is. it's wonderful to take the time to give someone something you take for granted. ch and i went shopping on two separate occasions to our walmart supercentre and bought 2 carts full of groceries and gifts for one family, and repeated the process a couple of days later for the second family. and ch is NOT a shopper. ordinarily, you couldnt drag him within 50 feet of a store without a protest, but when it came to our families, ch was enthusiastic and a real trooper in terms of picking out gifts. and on xmas day, he woke up and said "by now, our families are opening presents".
to give is really the greatest gift of all.
so we just buy for the niece and nephews because christmas is about kids. as for the adults, we are all old enough and financially well off enough to get what we want when we want it. and honestly, i know i sound spoiled, but i really dont need another hastily thought out gift where i have to pretend i'm happy to receive it and simultaneously wondering where i'm going to hide it for the rest of the year. and honestly, i'm not tight enough with anyone in ch's family to know what they want or need...they'll simply go and get it themselves. even in terms of my parents, they have everything...what could i possibly buy them?
of course my family, specifically my mother, does not believe in charity. my mom thinks that all people on welfare are gross and dirty and are somehow cheating the system. despite my claims to the contrary, she will not listen when i tell her it takes GUTS to ask for help.
i just ignore her stupid washed up beliefs and focus on the good. yes, there will always be people who cheat the system, but there are people out there who had a hard time coming to terms with asking for help, too.
because you are my captive audience, i hold you captive to look at my pictures...
hey, it's better than vacation slideshows, right?
tree in the livingroom
view looking out our front window with our xmas tree reflected, champion oil well 400m in the distance
front of the house. it's as high as i'm willing to go!
back deck, griswalled out!
the award goes to the toronto humane society for daring to even put the word HUMANE in their title...
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/toronto/story/2009/11/27/toronto-humane-society653.html
fortunately, charges have been brought to numerous members in charge for their atrocious acts of cruelty toward animals in their shelter.
let's hope the court throws the book at them and doesnt give them a slap on the wrist as they've done in the past to assholes committing cruel acts to innocent animals.
bravo to the cbc.ca for listing names.
so when the inlaws were here a couple of weeks ago, they started talking about all the places the mil saw when the realtor took her out. she told me that there's a condo for sale a BLOCK from our house that she was excited about and how great/nice/special/wonderful/23 skidoo it was.
then she said, "oh and ch can JUST go over there and mow the grass and shovel the walks...tee hee".
yeah, laugh it up, fuzzball. reaaaaaaaaally funny.
i told ch later that night and he was outraged. no shit! finally!!!
the one good thing coming from all of this is that i've been able to speak my mind without it resulting in a battle. he actually listens to what i say about his crazy nutso aunt AND even, gasp, his sister. this was virtually unheard of in the past, trust me. he'd erupt and melt down and scream and yell and eventually leave the room if you so much as whispered your dissatisfaction with his sister and family. over the last couple of months he's been more receptive to my criticisms and has actually AGREED with some of my assessments pertaining to his sister...especially in regards to her being stuck in perpetual baby of the family dependant on mommy and daddy mode, and them buying right into it. progress!
the quest to move the aunt here is still on. i told my therapist about it and he didnt say too much and then suddenly something twigged and he said "wait: your inlaws are buying her the condo and then telling her she has to move?" uh huh. it IS that fucked up, james.
i just love how the responsibility of taking care of the aunt is falling solely on ch's shoulders. there's no mention of the sil...of course the normal world knows she cant handle shit, and it would be ridiculous to presume that she would solely take on the responsibilities of the aunt's care without having hissy fit after hissy fit. the parents live squarely up her asshole and dont see her as useless the way the rest of the world does, but see her as "strong", "determined", and the one that always kills me and makes me laugh out loud literally everytime they say it: "independant". riiiiiiiiiiight.
they acknowledge her uselessness in a way that makes them feel needed, so they dont see it as wrong or fucked up that their 31 yr old daughter is codependant and not quite right. what they call "help" is counterproductive and actually churning out an individual that is not responsible for her own actions, ever, and someone who can not possibly face the slightest crisis. it's like the mere idea of a problem cripples her so much so that she can not think rationally. case in point is when her humidifier sprayed water over her unfinished basement. she called our house repeatedly at 7am and kept going till 9am. in the meantime, the calls went between us and the inlaws. and at the time it was very cold and terrible driving conditions, but the fil was willing to get in his car and drive the 3hrs to help her mop the floor...
so she called in sick for the day and then from 7am till god knows when she did nothing. she finally got ahold of ch at 9am and he went over there at ten to drop off our wet vac. 1/2 hr later, she called me wanting an extension cord. 20/20 hindsight is particularly helpful and i should have made her come here since she took the day off, but no, i stupidly went over there with a mop and bucket as well in order to help. i called her as i was leaving my garage and i'm 2 minutes away from her home. this comes in handy because i had to stand on her doorstep trying to juggle everything as she took her sweet time to answer the door. GEE, i'm standing there balancing things and you KNEW i was coming...could you not be waiting there to at least help me carry the bucket, the cord, and the fans i brought?
so i went into her basement and she had done nothing, other than move a couch over to a drier spot. and i'm pretty sure that ch did all the moving because at times of physical necessity, she will pull her "injured shoulder" trick and wont help. so she had been up since 7 presumably crying over the water in her basement and doing nothing till i arrived at 11am.
i have since learned to shut my everloving mouth in terms of immediately volunteering assistance when she starts whining. and to this day, i have never forgiven her for not cleaning up her basement. was she telling me that the water was that overwhelming that she couldnt start till 11am??? she had been up since 7, so what in the fuck was she doing the whole time?
i'm sure she spent a majority of the time crying because we got a few teary messages and i swear that was more emotion that she's EVER displayed in the 12 yrs i've known her. even when her grandparents died, she didnt shed a single tear...but water in her basement? bring on the kleenex!
my whole tangent is to illustrate that coddling adult children is never a good idea...this person now is our problem every time there is a slight crisis...have a spider on your outside window? call your brother and then call your dad to come with his pressure washer to wash off your condo later...and in the meantime, everyone sits back and nods and speaks as if it's the most normal thing in the world...
am i the only one who is sane in this family?? i'm beginning to understand why it is that i'm in therapy and wondering aloud if more people should be there instead of me.
the fil called here yesterday afternoon. he just got home from brazil...probably had been home less than 24hrs by that point.
he was really calling here to talk to ch, but i got the phone and ch was glued to the tv. afterall, it was american thanksgiving, so that means hours upon hours of football where he completely zones out and the only thing he wants to discuss is stats. endlessly. he doesnt want phone calls about furnaces.
so the fil and i chatted for a while and then he just said to the mil "want to talk to tracy" and she muffled something and he came back on and said she was siiiiiiiiiick and not feeling well. honestly, she's always sick. like, ALWAYS. and always out for sympathy. every time she's sick it's a process and i swear there is so much overacting going on that might win either a razzie or an oscar, depending on who is judging. i was trying to say NO to the fil as he was attempting to hand the phone off to his wife....dont i get a say in who i'm talking to? oh wait, i've suddenly remembered what family it is i'm dealing with. the answer is a resounding no.
so we chat and then hang up. ch calls him back moments later when there is a longer break in the game and i can overhear him talking to his dad about the furnace f*ckery, but it is a conversation i can tell he isnt willing to have. and it's obvious from what he's saying that he wasnt the one to tell his father.
obviously the sil told them. so let me get this straight: they've been back in canada less than 24 hrs and already --ALREADY-- they know about our furnace? really? is it that exciting that she has to pick up the phone and tattle? honestly? it's a fucking furnace. not only that, as usual she doesnt have the whole story, so then we have to put up with his endless questions.
oh i know, you're probably thinking "but tracy, your fil played the 20 question game with ch already...why wouldnt he just drop it?" an untrained ear would assume the same thing, but i know the fil: he wont let this one rest. as a matter of fact, he grilled ch for a solid 15 mins about it yesterday and ch's answers fell into this range:
--"i dont know, dad"
--"i'm not sure what was wrong, dad"
--"like i said already, i dont know, dad"
--and the final one which indicates that this game aint done being played: "you're going to have to ask tracy".
OH GEE THANKS for throwing me under the bus, you jackass.
great...so now i get treated to playing the fil's version of 20 questions. and even if i quote DIRECTLY off the furnace bill, he will somehow imply that the entire breakdown from start to finish was handled incorrectly and that i should have called him (even tho he was in brazil) or should have handled it better than i did, even tho i did the GROWN UP THING and handled it myself without melting into a pool of 1000 tears the way the sil did when she had water on her basement floor. just because i dont wither in a crisis doesnt mean i cant handle things.
but nevermind, i will be treated to the endless questions while ch throws me under the bus again and sits there silently waiting for me to answer the fil's onslaught of questions. i overheard him saying that HE unplugged the humidifier...uhm, not quite, honey. the furnace repair person did, but thanks for putting that out there.
fun with families.
ugh.
ok so i rarely get in the festive spirit. getting in the festive spirit to me is getting INTO the (festive) spirits if you catch my drift. glug-glug. i can waste away a good xmas holiday by consuming and becoming merry.
the other day when i was perusing walmart for LED lights, i stumbled on the xmas tree section and found cheap trees that looked nice. i immediately was fixated on the white tree because my grandparents had one but it also looked really nice in the store. it was pre-lit with who knows how many lights and was a 1, 2, 3 set up thing for $54 + tax.
got it home and assembled, tweaked the branches, plugged it in, and it's good to go. in fact, i like it so much that i am not sure i'm even going to put ornaments on it or if i do, they'll be simple and understated.
i really suck at decorating xmas trees and i think that's why i havent really put one up fully in the last few years. having a prelit tree does take away some of the stress and worry about placement.
i still have 2 other regular green trees in the basement that could be brought up. initially i debated having a forest of trees in the livingroom, but let's be serious here: i'm not really that gung-ho for xmas and our house is not a mansion. i could still opt to put another tree upstairs, but that seems like a lot of effort.
for now we'll just settle for the tree on the main floor and debate about ornaments....
here it is, finally snowing in the hat. i think it will look really nice later tonight when the xmas lights fire up and the snow provides the backdrop. last week i decided i'd griswald the shit out of the house, so i bought LED lights for the front and did the front as high as i could go and the back with the old icicle lights. it looks tackier than hell during the day, but at night it's pretty nice. i'll provide pics later once the sun goes down and the lights come up.
i was hoping to get high on the garage and do the roof. no such beans. i'm too chicken to ascend the ladder and get onto the roof. i think i'd attempt it if i had a spotter, but my spotter is too preoccupied with beer and tv to notice me falling from the sky, so i'll just either hire someone next year to get up and trick out the house, or hire a spotter.
hey stupid ass,
you were dumb. we all knew it before you got married. you insisted it was true love, you wanted us to believe you, embrace you and your new bride, and believe that it was all truthful.
truth is that we never believed you for a second. we knew you lied to your new bride's dad on his deathbed. you promised to be faithful, to make her an honest woman, to love her forever, and we all knew all you spewed was lies.
so you married her in august of 2007.
we were there. in fact, ch was one of your groomsmen as you stood there and promised to love her forever. you fucking liar, you fucking kept saying your EX WIFE'S name throughout the fucking reception. you didnt say it just once, you said it many times. the dumb fat cunt even came to the reception at one point. we all knew it was doomed from the get-go.
last year you and your bride tried having kids, but thankfully due to her severe diabetes, she couldnt carry to full term. in fact, you were ssoooooooooooooooo proud of your fathering abilities that you bragged to everyone practically the day after you conceived and when i cornered you and asked you about how your bride was handling it, you waffled and had no answer. any doctor worth their degree would never have advised you guys to go ahead with it. like everything else you fucking well went ahead with it. you fucking retard.
in july you decided to have a melt down at work. of course it was just a coincidence that you then decided it was best for your kids from your first marriage to have you in the same city...nevermind that they'd been without you for at least five years. no, now was the striking point, make your new bride move, quit her full time job, sell HER home that you were living in...reap the rewards of her dad dying...you betcha...just live that high life, buddy. you deserved it. you fucking asshole.
so you moved northward. god only knows what or who you were doing when you were living north of the 49th. knowing your past history that you've never learned from, you were fucking some insecure fat chick who you told that you were on the verge of ending your marriage. oh come on now, we all know you fucking well did that and told this new sucker the same story you've told the last few insecure people. you cant fool me; i've always thought you were one drunk incident from asking me back to your home...but the truth is that you know i'm much too secure for your bullshit...you tried but you'd never succeed with me. i wasnt near as fat or as insecure as your past loves, you turd.
so you moved up there, pretending all was well to your bride as you persuaded her to sell the condo that she outright owned before you moved into her life the way herpes would crawl onto a hooker's crotch. you told her to wait, that you'd find a place, that all would be right....
and then you did what you always do: you fucking told her that you didnt love her anymore. nevermind that you both tried (and failed) to have a second child in august. jesus christ, AC, you fucking impregnated her and then told her not to bother to come up there, that the marriage was over. fuck you, YOU C_CK.
do you know that k is a quiet person, very shy and now living with her mother? and i know, you are probably playing it off that you are friends, that you will divorce amicably...but you know what? you are escaping with more than you entered the marriage. you came in with FUCK ALL and are leaving with 1/2 that condo, that vehicle, and various other things. and sadly, because your bride is a good person, she will probably just say "UNCLE" and let you get away with it.
well, trust me, you are dead to us....your friends who stuck up for you. the people you insisted were your buddies till the end...remember them? the same fucks you have NOTHING to do with now that you are living with someone else and carrying on your life of LIES and OUTRIGHT BULLSHIT in edmonton? remember us?? you fucking asshole.
meanwhile your bride, the one you promised to her dying dad that you'd look after (remember her, you fucking c-nt?), is out of a house, looking for part time work, and calling herself a LOSER, all thanks to you....how does that feel, asshole?
i fucking hate you. the worst thing is that i knew you'd do this. that you'd lie. and christallmighty, i hoped you would have the DIGNITY and INTEGRITY not to do as you'd done to those that came before your bride. you asshole, you just treated her the way you've treated all the other fat pieces of insecure ass you got before this....
i hate your fucking ass. and i swear to god, i would slit your throat if i ever saw you again.
i'm never going to hear this song without thinking of fergie and tubby while driving to yyc....
what kills me is how excited tubby got over seeing this song on my ipod...and fergie, too...we all rocked out to that song in the car while consuming a few coors. and simultaneously killed ourselves laughing at the dude that probably got paid thousands just saying "everybody in the club" in the chorus....
my sister wants to come saturday and go shopping.
before she comes i want to express to her that i wont be babysitting while she is in panama. it's not going to be an easy conversation. i dont even know how to say it without upsetting her and pissing her off and causing a big fight.
i have missed her quite a bit. it kills me not to talk to her on the phone, it really does.
i wrote a toast to her on my wedding day, a toast that i still continue to stand by to this day...it is killing me that i'm angry with her and not talking to her...
To my sister: you are my best friend. Thank you for being the person I turn to in a crisis. You help me keep a level head. You were always there for me. You’ve talked me out of many situations and helped me keep a cool head and have been there to give me perspective and a dose of sanity when I was at my wit’s end. You have always shown me how to think outside the box, and reminded me that karma is a very strange and inevitable process. You were my friend and enemy growing up: the only kid to play with in a one horse town, but the same kid who stole my clothes, repeated everything I said word for word, the person who took out her anger on me in strange ways (like cutting me off when on our bikes…causing loads of pain and gravel in my knee : I still have the scar!), and speaking of scars, I still have the long one ~if you look just right in the light~ on my left arm from where you scratched me with your talons and it bled so much that I thought I’d pass out and die while locked in the bathroom while you tried to kick the door down to finish me off. I’m sure that mom and dad as well won’t forget our infamous trip from Keremeos to Vancouver in grandpa’s satellite sebring where my arms looked as if they had just done battle with all the pinching and scratch fights on probably the longest five hour trip our family has ever taken! you were the brunt of many of my jokes, including some prank calls to shelly jamison’s place while you were babysitting, the kid I called “nut” or “nerd”, and teased mercilessly in front of my friends and cousins, and yet you still stuck up for me. remarkably, my arms got through a year of living together during in university relatively unscathed, but I think that was the first year where we really connected and put aside our differences and stuck together…after all, we did have another adversary: a roommate who was messy. It was easy to stick together and I think we both agree that if we could make it through one year with this girl, we could do anything together! Not only are you my sister, you are my friend.
********************************************************************
it kills me that we are distant right now. i so want to pick up the phone and talk to you as if nothing's wrong, but there is something wrong and i do believe it wont be simply fixed with a few words. we're going to fight, no doubt about it, and i am not looking forward to the consequences behind it.
my cat has been really clingy. like, almost unbearably so for about a year now. not only that, she has shrunk in size. i see age in her eyes, her hips and her gait. i know the inevitable is coming sooner than i choose to realise. and yet as i sit here typing, there she is...laying on the carpet just outside the office, a place she occupies every single day and time i'm in this space, and i wonder how much longer i'm going to be graced with her presence.
i met her on a snowy day in november of 1994. dean and i went to the spca in yyc on a whim to see what was there and i immediately fell in love with her. i took her out of her cage and held her and just knew that she was the cat for me. we drove home, wondering what her future would be if we didnt say "YES" immediately. panic experienced, as we talked to our upstairs neighbours and okayed a third cat to the mix of the house. more panic as we phoned the spca inquiring about her and wondering what her future would hold. we were basically told that we were saving her from the brink of extinction. most fortunately, we were okayed by the spca and the neighbours and brought her home for the weekend. life was great.
on the monday, we were to take her in to get fixed. before work, i held her and hugged her, grateful she was mine. and curiously enough the cat gingerly bit me on the left shoulder. i wondered what kind of cat i had adopted...would she bite me? would she be unkind? just what had i gotten into? over the weeks, i read that cats will bite their owers kindly to form a bond.
and we did bond.
this cat has been with me for the last 15+ yrs, through boyfriends, ups, downs, tears, warm and cold nights, through moves and adjustments...all the while taking it in stride the best way a cat can do. she never loved car rides, but she did adjust well to a new sister, to new dogs and to new homes. she's always been my "puppy cat", someone who (unlike her predecessors) will come on command, who will play fetch with toys, and who will respond to a sneeze with a "rowr" that i think is her way of saying "bless you".
and now the twilight of her years is approaching. i can see it in her face, her actions, and it kills me. the clingy nature of her personality is hurting me the most. i will let her up in the mornings while i'm at the gym and when i return home, she is there to greet me and yowling at me saying hello and that she has missed me. when i get out of the bathroom after showering she is there on the carpet outside the door, eager to greet me with a swish of her tail and another yowl of hello. i will go to bed and when i roll over, she is again there at the end of the bed on the floor just waiting for me to wake up and pet her. i might be in bed for hours, but she waits there alone in the cold on the floor for me to simply look up and say hello, maybe pet her, and lead her downstairs.
and here i sit, midnight, and she is right here at my side. everytime i look down, she chirps at me in her feline voice, just eager for a pet and back scratch.
what in the hell am i going to do when i have to make that terrible decision? some nights it keeps me up with worry. i think that i will cry endless tears, that the wound will never heal, that i will constantly be seeing her in the shadows at the corner of my room, i will hear her voice, constantly be telling her "you're fine" when she meows, i cant pet her enough now, trying hard to remember the feel of her fur, the sound of her voice, the way her claws click on the lino as she follows after me as a good old puppy cat.
god, what will i do when she is gone? what?
so the fil is very concerned about our house and the contents therein. he figures it's his business everytime we do anything in the house, from moving furniture around to hanging pictures, he figures he should be informed. nevermind that this house has been bought and paid for by us, he still has a tough time letting go of the fact that his son is 32 and has a life beyond the four walls of the yyc palace. of course the sil never lets them forget that she is still the baby of the family...so the day that ch was over there killing the big wolf spider that was OUTSIDE of her condo not hurting anyone (except a fly, lol), she was on the phone demanding that her father get down here and bring his pressure washer and wash off her condo. she tells me these things with a straight face as if it's the most normal thing in the world to command her 60-something year old parents to do her bidding. what's worse is that they comply willingly without protest...and they wonder why she's still single?? honestly.
so the fil decided that we needed a new humidifier. this was way back when we first bought the place. he installed it on a weekend and then on a sunday morning in the winter, not soon after the installation, i heard a drip-drip and went down to investigate...sure enough, there was an inch of water on the floor everywhere and it had dripped into the furnace, causing the pilot light to go out. we spent a few hours cleaning and mopping the floor and finally got everything sorted out.
the next weekend the fil was here to reinforce the water lines. every time he came to our house following the flood, he'd go downstairs and check the furnace. see, the basement is the cats' domain. their litterboxes and food and hair and barf and all cat-related atrocities are down there. the fil does not like that so makes great pains to show how much of an effort it is for him to put on his shoes and descend gingerly down the stairs avoiding the hairballs and cat dishes. he acts as if he's walking across a minefield in middle africa. honestly, it's not that bad, but you'd swear he was in upper somalia by the way he navigates the stairs.
he takes it upon himself to maintain our humidifier and furnace. in fact, about 2 weeks ago he was here to change the furnace filter and humidifier pad and then check on our digital thermostat to make sure it was still controlling the humidifier. like i said earlier, he takes great pleasure in donning the shoes, heading to the basement and checking the humidifier to see if it works.
so then he comes up and tinkers and tonkers with my digital thermostat. and then has the nerve to turn to me and criticise MY programs in there and basically suggest that there are too many, that i'm being ridiculous and should re-program my thermostat. that's right, MY thermostat in MY house that fits OUR schedules. but it somehow does not fit the family mold and therefore is mockable and something that needs to get in line.
my good friend once said that my fil is trying to take over the world one house at a time. i dont think she is far off the mark with that one, i really dont.
of course when we got a digital thermostat, the sil had to get one, too. we got a workbench, she had to get one...the list goes on.
anyway, when the fil was here, the mil came along. she is allergic to the cats and makes great protests about the house everytime she crosses the threshold. she doesnt just quietly sniffle into tissues; no, she carries on making that itchy nose face and moving her nose and mouth around as if to indicate she is far too polite to go and get a kleenex, that she is far too genteel to blow her nose, and is too far removed from all out wiping her nose, but is content to sit there and sniff and snivel and turn up her nose and make faces to indicate that i must be the messiest person on the planet. in fact, i'm sure that i should have my place condemned because of the cats. she used to stay here and let me tell you, she would drive me batty. her mere presence stresses me out because naturally the cats and dogs wont leave her alone when she crosses my threshold and that just exacerbates her allergies. and as far as i'm concerned the mil is a very dramatic person so if she thinks she's getting you riled up, she will pour it on so you are more agitated. i'm sure i play right into her kid gloves when she comes here.
she arrived a couple of weeks ago at nine pm after having a pedicure at 2pm...she was still wearing her freaking "sandals" she got from the salon and wouldnt take them off. instead, she just walked onto my carpet after god knows where her feet had been and continued to sit on the couch like a regal throne occupant and sniffed and snivelled while i tried my best to corral the beasts away from her. oh and she is notorious for never taking allergy medication, preferring to "borrow" my medicine each and every time she is in the house.
at the end of the night, my fil suggested that they should stay here, as opposed to always staying with the sil. well, there is NO way the sil would ever allow that, as her parents are her rocks. and quite frankly, i dont want them here...her snivelling and expecting to be entertained and he running around butting into things and bugging me about things i've done without consulting him.
there are times where i wonder how ch turned out to be normal, the antithesis of his parents...and there are times where i completely understand why it is he has a drinking problem.
so the furnace person had to be called back a second time monday.
he had spent two hours working on it initially, which set me back $528 and change. assured me it worked.
fine.
i went and turned up the thermostat. nothing happened. oh it said "heat" all right, but nothing was going on downstairs. i paced, i worried. i hate being "that" person who has to point at and critique flaws. i hemmed, i hawwed, and finally i called the place back asking to speak to the tech who helped me. five mins later he called back and said that he'd come right back to check it out. i was sure it would be a simple flick of the switch and off he'd be with me red and embarassed.
not so.
turns out, the humidifier was leaking into the furnace, which caused a short in my thermostat. $70 +gst later, it was all fixed. the newer digital thermostat has had to be junked because it's fried and we are back to our traditional thermostat, warts and all, minus the humidifier. after telling ch about all the drama and the cost, he said "i think we are done with humidifiers from now on" (because we had a huge leak in it the first weekend it was installed and woke up to an inch of H2O on the basement floor one lovely sunday morning, with no furnace, and OH it was in the winter).
we'll see how the fil reacts to that news. he wont like it.
- monarch theatre http://www.themonarch.ca/index2.php a newly restored theatre in the heart of downtown medicine hat. comfortable seats (no bad seat in the house), "B" movies, and a 50's style color scheme. where else can you go on a wednesday night and spend $5 getting in and $5 for popcorn and drinks?
- swirls. good icecream from a small vendor.
- the roasterie. freshly brewed coffee, roasted beans, and an atmosphere that hasnt sold out to the man. down with starbucks!
- tiger ice cream at tigers hockey games.
- coulees at any time of the year
- deer on your front lawn
- the south saskatchewan from maple avenue bridge at dusk looking westward
- rafting down the south sask with an itsy bitsy floating cooler
- rossco's wings and the rooster himself
- damned good friends.
- the par 3. where else can you drink many beer and have a great game of golf with friends for under $20?
- 10 minute commute ANYWHERE.
- prairie xmas trees across from your house....
- going to BEACH parties year round
- thuy thien, sabi, and sushi miso who represent good solid vietnamese, thai, and japanese meals for quality prices
- roadies
- http://heartbreakerdanceandfitness.com/ kickass classes, instructors, and a real method to getting fit.
- finlay bridge
- prairie sunsets from your front door
- argiropes in your garden and massive-assed wolf spiders in your garage
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
