TOTALLY JEALOUS

 I have unwisely been perusing facebook pics of my sister and my bff and their activities.  They are up to their elbows with their grandchildren, baking, sightseeing, halloweening, pumpkin carving etc.  I am so jealous.  I can't even see my grandkids, haven't seen them for almost two years now.  I hate this effing covid.  I would be busting right out and going to see them anyway but then I put them, and myself at risk and you can't do that. So I am going to just frigging sit here and whine and pout and feel sorry for myself.  Hmmmph!

I went downstairs to call Monte yesterday.  Halfway down the stairs I  could smell this horrible smell.  My first thought was that Wrangler had an accident in the night and had gone downstairs to do it.  So I took a cruise all around the basement and he hadn't.  So I then headed into his bathroom, which is super clean because I have put it on Millie's roster.  The smell was awful but I couldn't visually spot where it was coming from.

Monte hunted too and the only thing we could come up with is something has happened to the sewer pipes under the house and the smell was coming up the drain in the shower.  Fuckadoodle!!!!!!!  Have to call the plumber, wait for them to come, and because the house is older I can see a big bill coming down the pipe.  I started my research immediately and found a plumber to call this morning.

Fairly late last night Monte couldn't stand the smell and I suggested he double check if the smell was coming up the drain.  We could cover it.  Well about ten minutes later he hollers up the stairs "FOUND IT!!"  He had been rooting through the freezer weeks ago and set some vegetarian burgers in the kind of plastic pack that bologna comes in, on top of the fridge and forgot to put them back.  I guess it spoiled of course and the gases built up and built up until the plastic exploded and a ghastly rotten terrible smell emitted!  I don't know what the heck was in those veggie burgers but it was really bad.  

And I have to say here that those veggie burgers, plus a lot of other veggie packs of things, came to our house and freezer in a tricky way.  Peter, bless him, was out for one of his walks.  As he walked past a bus bench near Quality Foods he noticed a box (or bag) of veggie packs on that bench.  So he picked them up and brought them home. Now I know some people would freak at the thought of eating bus bench food but not this house.  We ate some of it and didn't die!  Some poor dude forgot his bag on the bench.  Hope he didn't go back for it and it was gone!!!

Well I am starving.  I baked a couple loaves of bread yesterday and I can hear a fresh package of bologna calling my name!  Baloney sammich time!!!  Stay safe and noodle!!!  TTYL

ARYN:

1.  Improve your grip.  Apparently your grip is an indication of your over all strength.  Your grip is important for opening jars, gripping weights etc...I found this one interesting.  There are three kinds of grip.  Crush.  Get a wide lidded jar and just put your hand over it and squeeze and hold for a minute.  A few times a day will quickly improve your strength. Support grip.  Pick up a kettle bell or a bag of stuff and carry it around several times a day. Pinch Grip.  Carry the same thing you used for support grip but between your thumb and fingers.  Stand still, hold it for one minute.  Repeat.  Such a good idea.

2. This is an old one we already know.  Lift with your legs.  Cookie told me a long time ago that you need to keep your legs strong.  They are the first thing to go and if you don't have leg strength you become very limited.  It pays to do leg strengthening exercises.

3.  Use over the counter painkillers sparingly,  well we already do that.  I just want to add here...ibuprofen, that magic painkiller, also kills your kidneys.  My kidneys are at 50% and the dr. made it very clear that my ibuprofen use played a large part in that.

4.  Stay hydrated.  Not a problem for you!  He did super warn agains obsessive hydration.  People that pack water bottles everywhere are because the manufacturers have convinced everyone they need to be drinking constantly.  He said you need to balance between not being thirsty and not running to the John constantly.  And guess what?  The new research shows that tea, coffee, anything you drink hydrates you, not dehydrate.  They count towards your water drinking.  Ha!  I have been saying this for years.  I know if I were marooned on a desert island and I only had coffee to drink, I would not die of dehydration.

5.  No sports drinks....unless you are a football player in Florida who does hours of gruelling practice under the hot hot sun.  They are loaded with sugar and stuff you don't need.  Drink water when you are thirsty.

 

 

NOISE NOISE NOISE

I have been very fortunate over the years to live in dead quiet neighbourhoods.  After ten o'clock you would think we were the only people left on earth.  Well boy has that changed!  

Now, between 4:30 am and five, the Quality Foods trucks start going by.  The loading dock for the store is three houses up and they can only do one truck at a time.  A big semi loaded with food will grind its way by, brakes hissing and gears changing.  Then when it gets to QF, it slowly backs into the bay, beep beep beep beep beep.  Then the next truck comes and parks in front of the house closest to QF and idles, then the next one then the next one until there is one parked in front of our house.  Meanwhile there is an awful lot of metal banging and men shouting as they get their ramps properly placed etc...  That goes on til about noon, but slowing down around 9.

And we have a number of people that go to work around 6 am.  They drive pickups...which heavy objects have to be thrown into the back....crash bang slam.  They start their vehicles at least five minutes before they load them.  So the engine starts by remote fob, runs, and then beep beep...locks the truck while they let it warm up.

And there is a constant barking Rottweiler two doors down.  He is pretty good in the night now but the minute there is movement on the street, he starts barking.  

More often than not too unfortunately, we are right under the medical flight helicopter flight path.  And its really loud!  I am pretty sure its a Sikorsky and they thunder!

But I truly love it here.  Covid, and the fear of it, has been penetrating my dreams of late. And here on our tiny corner of Vancouver Island we are pretty safe.  The numbers of active cases are so low on the Island.  Although two of our schools have had an infected person in them.  

And I can see that this covid thing is going to be the new normal (I hate that expression)(shovel list) for a long time...too long to sit at home, cowering in the corner.  Now I don't mean one should go crazy, rip their clothes off and run down main street screaming.  (we have already had that happen here twice in the last couple of months).  But time to take a risk or two.

That being said, I am going to do two things next week.  I am going to Vancouver to April's for a week and I am going to go get my hair done.  I can't wait! I have so missed seeing my girls in Vancouver and they are super careful. I shall put a mask on and ride the ferry upstairs outside.  I am pretty excited at the prospect of going somewhere, and seeing people!  Its time to carefully start living with this covid thing.

Well, gotta bounce.  Stay healthy and noodling.  TTYL

 

OH NO!!!!!

I just came across an article in one of my news feeds.  It's an article titled "Outdated Fashion Choices Older Women Still Make".  So being pretty sure I wasn't doing any of them, with great smug self confidence, I decided to read it and see what other old ladies were doing wrong.

Well jeez!  The very first one was labelled "Poofy Big Hairdo."  Well what the hell?  Have they never heard of pin head...thats what happens when you cut your hair into the predictable 'helmet hair'.  I remember going into the senior home to visit my mother and seriously! I couldn't find her in that sea of identical helmet headed old ladies.  Plus, when your hair is short you fall prey to bed head, every morning.  When you have a poof like mine all you have to do in the morning is give your poof a tightening yank or two and your done!

Another one was wearing matchy matchy clothes.  Sigh.  Apparently mixing patterns and colours is the in thing.  I refuse to wear brown with blue, red with pink and paisley with plaid.  If that makes me an old lady mistake, well so be it!

A few more just in case some older ladies are reading this:

High waters!  If you want to see why I would not ever be caught dead in those take a look at our current provincial Green Party leader.  She wears them and they look ridiculous and awful.  I noticed too the other day she had a brown high water pant suit on with a BLUE blouse!!!

Long sleeves only.  Now come on!  This is just mean.  Some of us have floppy upper arms that look like oatmeal.  I feel we are doing the world a favour covering that mess up.

Wearing nylons or pantyhose.  Who does that?  You can't even find them in the stores except for Walmart and seriously, who fashion shops at Walmart!  I think the authors are stretching it here! No old lady I know wears nylons anymore.

Keeping the same hairdo forever.  Whats old or wrong with that?  When you hit the one you like, then solder it!!!  Speaking of which, I have a friend that shall remain nameless, who wore her hair short, always.  And in my opinion it made her look unnecessarily matronly and way too much like her lovely mom.  So I convinced her to let it grow out a bit, a little longer.  She has the most beautiful curly hair.  She did and it took ten years off of her.  I totally envy her hair!

To quote the authors, "Chunky jewelry screams old" or as I say, screams old lady real estate lady.

Chunky white velcro runners.  Well come on.  Now you are talking about OOOOOOOLD women, not older ladies.  Really old women need easy dressing sometimes.  I think this one was another stretch by the authors.

No wearing your jacket or sweater around your waist.  Well I haven't been able to stretch the arms of my jackets around my waist for about thirty years.

No heavy black eye makeup...raccoon eyes....I have never seen anyone older than 17 or out of New Jersey wear raccoon eyes.  Never.

Short silk scarves tied around your neck.  Apparently you aren't fooling anyone.

Haha!  I love this one....pearls.  No pearls.  No pearls at any age not just older women.  Pearls are OUT!!

Clunky, squared off, short handled, beige, black or dark blue hand bags.  I totally agree with that.  I stick my phone in my left side bra and a small wallet in the right side.  Who needs a purse anyway.

Gloves.  Oh come on!  Who the hell wears dress gloves anymore?  They don't even make them.  The authors are sliding back into OLD lady area, the ones that dig around in the back of their underwear drawers and find gloves from the fifties.

Okay, this one is ridiculous.  No wearing high socks and short shorts!  What?  Again, knee socks are NOT sold anymore.  And short shorts?  Old ladies don't even wear shorts never mind a daisy duke!

Now here is another one I totally am on board with.  No elastic waisted trousers!  Especially tan ones.  With a blue long sleeved blouse with a very high neck.  hahahaha!!!  Velcro shoes, pearls, poofy hair and a boxy purse.  Egads!

I have added a few visual aids below to help with the article's points.  Stay safe, noodle and DO NOT WEAR PEARLS!!!!  TTYL

NEVER WEAR ANYTHING WITH CATS ON IT!!!  (THATS MY PERSONAL ADDITION)

LONG HAIR, SILK SCARF, DENIM....HMMMM SEVERAL INFRACTIONS HERE

POOFY HAIR, LONG SLEEVES, BLACK (THEY HAD ALSO SAID NO BLACK), ALMOST RACCOON EYES, DANGLY EARRINGS AND PEARLS...WRONG ON ALL LEVELS HERE

SOME THINGS WERE SO OBVIOUS THEY DIDN'T NEED TO MENTION THEM

WELL THEY DID SAY NO POOFY HAIR OR GLOVES OR BIG HIGH HEELS.  JEEZ!  ALL THATS MISSING IS A WHIP

 

SAD AND AWESOME DAY YESTERDAY

 It was an emotional day yesterday.  It was the sixth anniversary of Spod's death.  It's hard to believe six years has passed already.  And I think, to tell the truth, it gets harder as time goes by.  I really miss him.  You know, I knew that I would end my life without him.  He was twenty years my senior after all and I definitely gave that some serious thought at the beginning of our relationship.  But my feelings for him were that strong that the end did not affect the means. 

I was awakened with a definite bolt of something at exactly 3:47 a.m.  out of a dead dead dead sleep.  I was pretty confused and blurry headed then realized that that was the exact time Bill died six years ago...to the dot.  Holy Hannah!!!  So weird!!!

Later that day Monte and I went to Save-on and I went in and bought the typical truck picnic Bill and I used to do..all the time actually.  So the two of us drove out to a park where we could sit in the truck and watch the water, the seals, the fish, the seagulls, people throwing sticks for their doggies.  We ate velveeta, applesauce, crusty bread, pasties and apple strudel.  We stopped in town before hand and picked up coffee from MacD's.  We did all this to the sounds of the Blues from our Serius radio.  I felt much better afterwards.  And it was good I think for Monte to see what his dad loved most.  We did this any chance we got and had a vehicle at our disposal. Maui, Squamish, Mt. Currie, Kamloops, Iceland, France and Europe and Britain.  It was hard to get him to stay still!

Now it's Tuesday.  I read your comment Arnie and yes, I definitely remember that particular episode.  I was rocking Monte in my wee den and the tv was randomly on her show.  You know, Monte and I were talking about that wire whisk and the spun sugar strands the cow made the other day and he actually remembers that!  He also remembers the sassy words I said when I thought he was asleep.  Apparently not.

I am in rough shape physically right now and its pissing me off.  I would like to say its cuz I am getting old and I don't move more than 50 steps per day, but both of these ailments, painful ones I might add, started when I was five.

I can't move my left arm.....again.  I have been through this many times.  Sometimes it's my right arm.  If I move it even slightly the wrong way its like a red hot poker stabbing into it and it doesn't go away for about five minutes.  And my left ankle/foot has gone for a dump as well.  I can hardly walk on it.  That should only last a few days, the arm could be more than a couple of months.  It's already been over a month.  Grrrrrrr....(shovel list)

Well I must go stir my pot.  Once in a blue moon Monte wants my spaghetti with the noodles cooked in the sauce.  It's so good but not like real Italians make.  In fact I have a suspicion I would be dealt with rather scathingly if one should happen upon my kitchen at the moment.  But....this gooey delicious mess is a large step up, in sophistication, not necessarily flavour, from the one I used to make when I was a teenager.  I would over boil the noodles then open a can of Campbell's tomato soup and dump it in.  Thats it.  No besmirching!!!  Just undiluted soup and noodles.  Yummmmm!  Almost as good as mushy bread and baloney!!!!  Methinks we are peasants!!!

Well that's it for today folks.  Gotta get that kid of mine motivated.  He has to go renew the parked insurance on his van.  Ran out a few days ago and that is NOT a good idea.  Stay safe, noodle and TTYL

THE GUEST OF HONOUR

YUM!

HIS EYES ARE CLOSED JUST LIKE HIS DAD.  I DON'T THINK I EVER REALLY GOT A PIC OF BILL WITH HIS EYES OPEN.

OUR VIEW

OKAY I HAVE A QUESTION

Do any of you use hand emulsion blenders?  Back in the day we use to call them braun sticks.  I have had one for yonks...like literally years.  I have used it maybe five times.  It isn't my first go to implement in the kitchen.  I just don't think of it...ever.

But, I watch others use them all the time, and it's got into my head.  I want to start using it.

Jeez I hate blogspot.  Every paragraph the font reverts to tiny.   tiny See?  Stupid program.  Anyway, with that stick in mind, I planned out our dinner.  We have a fair amount of left over turkey.  Twas unavoidable.  So we decided I would curry it.  And not curry it in my usual way.

I used two bags of frozen diced onions, small frozen bag of cauliflower, a few different new spices, one cup of cream and a can of diced tomatoes.

After it was all cooked down it was time to emulsify.  Oh yeah!!!  I plugged it in, plopped it into the muck and let fire.  Now if I were Martha Stewart it would make a lovely humming sound and a few minutes later I would have a beautiful creamy lumpyless yellow sauce.  Well, guess what?  I ain't no Martha Stewart.  That became evident immediately.  

I turned it on and that yellow crap flew everywhere.  And I mean EVERYWHERE!!  How does that happen?  I quickly turned it off and looked around in horror.  It really was everywhere including on my glasses, in my hair, on the microwave, all over the stove, on the wall, on the floor.  How?  What just happened?  So after a pretty thorough clean up, I took the lid to the pot and held it over the top the best I could and tried again.  Some escaped but it did control it quite well.  The inside of the lid was covered though.  

I don't get it.  I don't hear anybody else saying that this is their experience.  So what the hell did I do wrong?  This reminded me of the time I watched Martha Stewart do a pumpkin.  She got a drill and drilled little holes all over the pumpkin, turned the light down low, and took a lit strand of mini xmas lights and stuffed the little holes with one light, one at a time.  It looked fantastic.  So I got Bill to set up a drill for me, got the cleaned pumpkin out onto the kitchen island and set to.  Frigging pumpkin shot all over the kitchen, the floor, the walls, the ceiling!  It was crazy!  Then, carrying on, I started to push a little light into a pumpkin hole and every time I did it gave me a very unpleasant shock. My whole arm vibrated.  This did NOT happen to Martha Stewart!  The cow.

But I will say the curry turned out great!  I wasn't too fond of the stringy things the cauliflower put in it.  How anyone could make 'mashed potatoes' out of cauliflower has to be a myth.  Til I get an answer  though, I am not using that wandie thing again.  There has to be a better way.

Monte is sick.  He is dizzy, coughy, headache, a bad one, and very tired. Who knows?  Poor guy is sticking to his bedroom for now.  I am hiding in mine.  We shall see.  If there wasn't a two day wait on the covid line we would call.  But if he gets super sick I will just take him up to emergency, whether they like it or not.

Thursday is garbage day.  So last night I rounded up the bags and had Monte take them out to the can.  In the night I was laying there, wide awake as usual, when I remembered so I set my alarm clock for 6:30.  As the alarm went off and brought me out of a very deep much needed sleep, I got up, got my boots on and looked out the window to see if it was raining.  It was but...nobody had their garbage out.  Whaaaat? Then I remembered it had been a holiday week end. Dammit!  Garbage day is tomorrow.  Grrrr....no more sleep for me.  So I made coffee.

Well enough of that now.  Take care peeps, stay safe and remember to noodle away from people.  The noodles from the pool are six feet!  TTYL

ARYN:

1.  Reset your neck.  Do stretches.  Swing and rotate your head as you sit straight.  Lean your head to the left or right and stretch the opposite side muscles.  Then swing back and forth and rotate.  It feels good.

2.  Do bone building things.  Swimming and spinning don't cut it.  It has to be weight bearing.  Jogging, dancing, jump rope, rebounders and even walking all count.  I figure with my weight my legs should be bone mondo!

3.  Improve your balance.  I could write lots about this but I am going to suggest you read about proprioceptors.  It is the most interesting thing you will read in a long time.  I first heard about them in that brain book I read about the brain's elasticity and how stroke victims, victims of a certain antibiotic etc lose their ability to know if they are up down flat standing.  They can't walk or do anything.  Then this doctor figured out how, using a computer and the tongue, how to send messages to the brain and trained it to do the balance job.  Amazing!!!  So anyway he wants you to do balance exercises.  Some of them are scary.

4.  Do planks.  (shovel list)

5.  Do push ups.

TURKEY IN TOFINO

 On Saturday we loaded up the truck and headed to Tofino.  The first half was truly beautiful. The leaves have turned even more than a couple of weeks ago and the sun was shining.  The last half was stormy, raining and just as beautiful in a very different way.  We listened to relevant music and drank coffee and ate gas station banana bread.  Oh, and we shared a good sized bag of Hawkins cheesies.  You can't beat that! For my American friends reading this, cheesies are only in Canada and made in Saskatchewan.  When I quit smoking, I ate cheesies instead!  Now when I eat them I want to smoke.  Hahaha!!!

Little side note:  I caught myself, totally out of habit, reaching through my shirt neck hole to yank up a bra strap...which of course had NOT slipped down.  hahaha!!!  I am so happy!!!!  Several times in the past, going on a road trip with Bill, I would rip my bra off in a rage and throw it out the window. 

We got into Tofino about 2:30 and it was gloriously sunny!  We found Graeme and decided to meet at one of the beaches.  I felt so bad not letting him into the truck.  So we had a tailgater in the parking lot of that very very busy spot.  Surfers in slimy black wet suits were in various stages of showering, desanding, peeling suits off and peeling suits on.  Wow!  I thought. The waves must be massive! All these surfers.  Where we were all we could see were trees.

So I hurried down the path to the beach to take in the glorious scene of giant waves and all the surfers doing their thing.  And....when I got there I started to laugh!  They were the weeniest sad waves I ever saw.  After hearing all about the storm and excellent surf conditions I had not expected the sad little swellies I was looking at.  It was still beautiful though. I have been spoiled by Maui..where the waves were taller than houses and whales were cavorting in among the surfers.  I have pics to prove it.

Back to the truck and we ate still very hot turkey dinner wraps.  They were okay.  The wrap part got kind of soggy from being wrapped up so tight and the steam getting to them. Tofino is definitely not picnic friendly.  They do have picnic tables smattered here and there, not many, but none that are covered and it seriously rains in that area.

We then went back to Graeme's hotel parking lot and we had pumpkin pie and whipping cream.  Somewhere in there we took a tour of Tofino in the truck.  We decided to risk exchanging covid germs and put Graeme in the back seat with Wrangler, and we all wore our masks.  Tofino, sorry Graeme, sucks.  Its def not my fave place.  The people (tourists) are all Stepford tourists.  They all look the same.  Young, expensive outdoor clothing, wicked boots, the men all have some sort of trendy toque on, all super skinny.  The stores are expensive and geared to tourist trapping, just like Banff and Whistler!  Trendy Sheeple!

We had a good time.  It was so good to see Graeme.  Its nice to have a destination that isn't only Nanaimo.  There is only one downside.  Monte doesn't fit the truck very well.  He has to duck his head so the roof doesn't block his vision and his head keeps banging on the roof ridge dividing the front and back and his right knee is pushed into the dash area and after a while really hurts.  It's painful.  So we stop now and then, which I like.  

And since getting home we have done nothing but sit around and sleep and eat.  Honestly!!  Its like a holiday!  And I take back the furnace comment I made earlier.  Yesterday and today when I arose, I checked the temperature in the house.  It was 14 degrees!  I could see Wrangler's breath!  I bundled up with my coffee in my chair but I was just too cold.  My nose and ears were frosty!  So I did put the furnace on.  I warmed it up to 17 then turned it off.  And it's bloody cold outside.  Alright now I am talking weather.  Time to stop.  Stay safe and noodle!  TTYL (as usual pics are totally out of order)

PUMPKIN PIE TIME

TOFINO

TAILGATE TURKEY DINNER

A VERY REFLECTIVE PUDDLE

INTREPID SURFERS TACKLING THAT CRAZY SURF

THERE IT IS...THE GIANT SURF

THE PATHWAY DOWN

WHERE THEY ARE REBUILDING THE ROAD AFTER A SLIDE....A MAJOR ENGINEERING FEAT

WE SAW THE MOST AMAZING FURRY TREES

MY DINNER THE OTHER NIGHT....A TURKEY POPES NOSE, MY FAVE.  WE MANAGED TO GET A FIFTEEN POUNDER AFTERALL

MORE ROAD REBUILDING

THE MIDDLE GUY IS BILL (WHOM WE THINK LOOKS LIKE MONTE) ON THE RIGHT IS HIS DAD GUS AND ON THE LEFT HIS BROTHER FRANK.  RANDOM PIC 

A MIRACLE HAS HAPPENED IN MY LIFE

It truly has!!!!!!  But all men reading this you may wish to not read further.  This is a bit of an intimate  subject so please, if you do read this, don't say I didn't warn you.

I need to preface this post with a tiny bit of statistics.  I have been on this earth 67 years almost 68, but I am going to go with 67.  When I was 12 my awesome aunt who I was spending the summer with, took me bra shopping.  And I ended up with the most beautiful wondrous lace bra.  I was running around lifting my shirt showing it off to everybody.

That love affair with that piece of clothing didn't last long.  It dug into my ribs.  It left deep dents in my aching shoulders and it itched.  But the worst thing, the straps would not stay up, no matter how I tightened it.  And fifty five years later...after seeing scientific bra specialists, paying exorbitant amounts of money, buying extender thingies to ties the straps together, using binder twine and bungie cords to keep those suckers from sliding off my shoulders....I discover nothing works.  Nothing.

So I counted.  120 bra strap pull ups per day, 365 days per year, 55 years, I have yanked those freaking things up 2, 409,000  times.  OVER TWO MILLION TIMES!!!!!!!!!!!! (SHOVEL LIST TO THE POWER OF INFINITY PLUS ONE)

Well I was perusing amazon the other day and for some reason, because I was certainly NOT in lingerie, a bra popped up.  It was the ugliest sucker you ever saw.  Beige. Big.  Wide straps.  Skin coloured.  Extraordinarily matronly.  But three things caught my attention. It was a front closer, it was extra wide under the arms and the sizes were dress sizes....like 1x, 2x, 3x etc...sizes I understand. It was only twenty four bucks so I thought why not?  I could always send it back.  So with very little faith involved, I ordered it.  It arrived yesterday.

And boy! was it ugly.  Seriously!  It looked like an old deflated piece of tenting, only not as sturdy.  So I left it on the floor where it had fallen and stepped over it all day, feeling somewhat deflated myself.  But later, getting dressed, I decided to give it a try.  So struggling, as first time things go, and after a few twangs in the face from letting the extremely stretchy pieces go, and taking forever to do the extremely tiny and infinite amount of hooks at the front (I finally figured out a faster system) I adjusted my lumps and bumps and..............I heard the angels sing!!!!!!!  OMG!!!!!  

It is like wearing a cloud!!!!! And it keeps everything in its place!!!!!!!!  There is no digging in the ribs, there is no unsightly fat overhang overtop the underarm part (all plumpers know what that's like), there is no deep gouge on the shoulders, and best of all....I have worn this thing for hours and hours and NOT HAD TO PULL A STRAP UP, NOT EVEN ONCE!!!!!!!!  I could cry.  I immediately ordered another one and I think I will order another one today.

If you are interested it's called Just My Size.  I would rename it Just My Miracle!!!!!  But I know this post may seem over the top...an exaggeration of sorts.  But I am telling you this truly is a game changer.  You skinny people may not have the problems us plumpers have. You will just have to take my word for it!!  I am so happy!!and comfortable.  Fifty five years of bra hell and it's over.  Yipppppeeeeee!!!  Stay safe and noodle!!!  TTYL

THERE IT IS...MY MIRACLE!

NO FURNACE...NOPE...NOT YET

 I am NOT turning on my furnace.  I am not doing it until I either see snow or its Nov. 15th.  Right now it is 17 degrees C/ or 64 F.  It's cold, but not cold enough to see my breath.  I am bundled up in my chair, blanket over me and slippers on.  Yesterday it went up to 24 outside but I don't think there's any hope for that today.

My microwave broke.  It sounds good.  It looks good.  It just doesn't heat anything.  Dangit!!!!  Its a built in over the stove one so this won't be a cheap fix or an easy one.  Whenever I decide to replace it it will have to be from a place that also installs.  In the meantime we shall have to get used to doing without, like Arnie.  She has never owned one.  I have a sneaking suspicion she doesn't have one  because  she thinks it will screw with her brainwaves, not for noble old school cooking.

Speaking of cooking, after all my talk about turkeys, I won't be doing one after all.  It is going to have to be a plump roasting chicken.  All the little turkeys in town are gone.  I guess with people's thanksgivings being super downsized, small turkeys are in demand.

  I am just cursed when it comes to turkey dinners.  They truly are my fave meal but it just seems that something always screws it up.  I could do a giant turkey but that is out of the question.  I just can't have acres of left over meat in the house.  But you know when you bury the meat under taters, sweet taters, stuffing, vegetables of some sort (the boys want Brussels...ewwww! shovel list)and gravy, well I guess the slide from turkey to chicken won't really matter.

I have a dilemma.  I have been having trouble with the ports on my laptop....one quit working and it looks like the other has too, just now.  My laptop will not charge.  Fuckadoodle!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  You pay five thousand for a laptop and thats what happens.  It's only three years old.  I am mad!!!! And there is nowhere to take the frigging thing on the Island to fix it.  So I am going to sign off, try to fix the problem.  Hopefully will be back soon. If it won't fix I am going to go to Walmart and buy a cheap piece of shit that will let me browse the net, send emails and blog.  Stay safe and noodle.  TTYL

ARNIE:

1.  Perform self massage....well gee...ummm...okay.

2.  Take a yoga class....that might work for you but me?  I can just see it now, I would be on hands and knees, stomach grazing the floor and then I would def NOT be able to get up.

3.  Do cat-cow yoga pose.  Holy jeez!!!  I read it and at one point you actually are to draw in your belly button to touch your spine.....on your hands and knees of course.  I mean seriously!  He just throws off the comment that 'just about everybody can do this pose and it should be mandatory in offices". Really?  That 'just about' is important.  Some of us plumpers would NOT be able to do this.  In fact the thought of it is seriously flawed.  Shut up!!!

4.  Reset your shoulders.  No Slumping!!!

5.  Strengthen your neck.  This is a good one.  He is talking about the front neck muscles...holds your head in place.  Get a soft spongy ball.  Stand facing the wall and place the ball between the wall and your forehead. Push against the ball firmly and hold it there for a few seconds and then let go, but keeping the ball there.  Repeat about ten times.  And try to do it several times a day on work days.  Good one!

Thats it!  Now I go solve my lappy's belly ache.

THANKSGIVING IN A WRAP

Well the big family event is coming up this weekend.  Turkey, stuffing, potatoes, blah blah blah. As my family knows, including a four year old great niece (4 at the time), turkey dinner is my all time fave dinner to plan, shop for, cook, share, eat and do awesome things to leftovers.  And no hundred dollar pampered plump, and gayly galloping around the farm turkey for me.  I buy the cheapest Walmart turkey I can find and turn it into the most delicious.  They are under ten pounds and ten dollars.  Can't beat that!

And it isn't just the turkey and all that goes with it, per se.  Its the ritual, the anticipation of the whole event, the tradition of it.  My grandparents and their parents celebrated thanksgiving with the turkey.  The raising, the killing, the plucking and prepping.  Now we don't do that anymore but we do prep the dinner, sometimes all together, and then we anticipate and then exhilarate in the wondrous odour of that bird cooking!  Finally sitting down to a loaded table, both with food and rellies!  Tradition.  It's important.

Well that cannot happen this year.  THANK YOU VERY MUCH BAT EATING PEOPLE! But....I had a brilliant idea.  How about I make a turkey dinner on Friday and with that dinner I make delicious wraps....each one full of potatoes, stuffing, turkey, cranberry, sweet potato etc....Make them hot.  Wrap them up, into a cooler and take the whole enchilada to Tofino and picnic with Toonykoot!  We can have turkey dinner on the beach on the edge of the earth!!! I will put hot gravy in a thermos, pack some little dishes to dip the wraps in!   Plus we will throw in a pumpkin pie and a can of whipping cream.The other thermos I have I shall fill with coffee.  Yum!!!

Now some of you may remember I said I was going vegetarian and the reason for it.  And I have eaten very little meat since then.  Monte is also making this noble attempt.  I am quite capable of going cold turkey (sorry, small pun there) but have decided that on holidays, birthdays, company dinners (unless they are vegetarian) and very unexpected meat opportunities, we would relent and eat meat.  So far there has only been one legitimate such event.  Stan and Antonia visited and I made spaghetti, one of Antonia's fave meals.  Monte and I have really hardly eaten any meat for quite a while now.  And fortunately turkey wraps are in honour of a holiday! Oh!  Baloney is totally allowed.  Can't live without baloney sammiches.

Speaking of Stan and Antonia, we had such a lovely visit.  I love having them here.  We never ever run out of things to talk about.  Of course right now at this particular time in the general run of things, there is endless amounts to discuss.  We are living in the most amazing interesting time! Between Trump, covid, election here, election there....it sure isn't boring!!!  So we visited and ate and visited more.  And Stan very graciously went downstairs to see Smooch....Monte's snake.  First person he has shown her to. I really appreciate Stan going down and taking a look.

So the only other excitement I have is watching the dogwood across the street slowly but surely turn red.  Who knew dogwoods turned red in the fall! I sit in my chair and stare at it, day after day after day after day.  Sigh.  Tv is crap now so no joy there.  I read incessantly.  But my eyes have gotten so bad its kind of tiring.  'whine'. I have been going through my small boxes stacked in my cupboard.  Thats been fun.  Yippee.  Okay.  Enough of this crap.  I'm outta here!  LOL!!  Keep healthy and be sure to noodle.  TTYL

UGLY CHAIR GONE!

 Well its done! NOT!! Getting the chair back to UPS had become almost, not quite, but almost impossible.  Plus when I reread the return instructions email, it was going to cost me eighty bucks!!!  And that eighty I feel is totally unfair.  It wasn't my fault that they completely misrepresented the colour.  If it had actually been the red that was in the picture I would have been over the moon!

  I phoned them and it became clear immediately that the risk of having to return an item for any reason other than the item is broken, was a risk the buyer signed up for.  So.....where's my hammer.  Just kidding!

Monte and I discussed.  I dug deep into my head to see if I could wrap my brain around that ugly colour and we decided to just keep it.  Its still in the box so I don't know but I am looking at it as a good exercise in mind control.  We will see.

I think I have mentioned before that I have a problem with my right eye.  If something is four feet or less in front of me, everything  the right eye is seeing, transposes over to the left.  If I am looking at a picture of one person in the middle of the sight field, my right eye puts that person to the left and I would swear the picture of one person is actually a picture of two people, side by side.  Past four feet you wouldn't even know I have an eye problem.

So things like reading, reading music, typing, poking the right thing on my phone screen etc...isn't so easy.  And there is one more thing that has become difficult to the point of almost impossible.  And that's tweezing my chin hairs.  Yup...not only are they hard to see but trying to pinpoint them is almost impossible.

And I don't know how to get around that.  Its not exactly something I can go, 'Um Monte...can you please come here?" Or I can't just leave them, I truly will end up the bearded lady.  And to make it more difficult they are white!  When they were black they were easy to spot, but now....

  I have a mirror that magnifies things a hundred times and that does help but it still takes me many stabs to finally grab the little critter.  Its amazing how I can zero in on one, twack the tweezers together, only to see the thing waving at me a good two inches in front of the tweezers.

  I would give up and leave it but Kathy and I were looking at a certain person we know who had very long sprouting hairies on her chin and we were like, 'Oh my God!  How can someone not see those in the mirror and then just leave them!!!!!' in a most scathing tone of voice.  So I am going to pluck those suckers come hell or high water.

We were heading up to Tofino tomorrow but I got a call from Stan and they are coming to Port this weekend.  So I let Toonykoot know that we would have to put our trip off til next week.  He graciously agreed.  I want to see my brother as often as possible.  I really miss my family.

They are coming today, bringing lunch with them...sub sammiches I believe..my fave.  And they will be here until after supper.  I was going to order four lamb dinners from our local Greek restaurant..they make the best lamb you ever ate. (I do eat meat on an 'as needed' basis)But I got a call from Antonia.  Apparently they are having Greek dinner the next night with the other friends they are seeing here.  So I changed it to spaghetti, which sounds pretty humdrum but we all love spaghetti and its been ages since I made it, which I did last night.  It's all ready in the fridge awaiting!  (see what I mean?  Why the F would blogspot make this paragraph gargantuas?  Shovel list shovel list shovel list!!!)

So now it's time for me to give Aryn the next five good living suggestions.  So stay safe and keep noodling.  TTYL

ARYN:

1.  Wear flat shoes.  Well thats a must for me but you are a young good looking woman.  Not sure if this is fair to you!

2.  Wear shoes that fit your feet, not the other way around.  Good advice I think.  Sure makes a difference to my back and hip. (thank you Kathy for that advice you gave me after the China trip)

3.  Hahahahahahahaha!!!!!!  Walk like a runway model!!!  Hahaha!!!  Probably good advice and I am going to read the reasons and this can work for you but no matter how much I might channel a model, that 'ol hump in my back and my curvatures sure aren't going to help!

4.  Okay, I have tried really hard to not be sarcastic or scathing with this thing but I have my limits.  This next advice is...well...not doable for me.  It says...Walk backwards!  Probably good for balance etc but also good for looking like a total tool!

5.  Now this is a truly good one...stretch regularly.  When I was going to Curves we had to do a twenty minute regimen of stretch poses at the end.  I was shocked at how much good it did for limbering me up.  I think I am going to reimplement this one right away.

Thats it for this week.  No pics this time.