INSANITY!!!!!

 He is ours!!!!!  And he is crazy!!!  Holy Hannah!!!!

He has been here for one night.  And I must say he is settling down.  I won't go into endless boring detail like dog owners are want to do, but....he is a lot of fun and extremely high energy.  Right now, until we get the right equipment (halters etc) Ange and I can't walk him.  He is actually that strong and pulls.  Monte has no trouble though and Floyd is really comfortable with Monte.  I don't care what the previous owner told them, he has a pretty high dose of husky in him.  He does look like a German shepherd body wise but his face and ears are all husky.  Plus his tail has been docked.  The previous owner was breeding him and he was advertising him as shepherd/Australian Shepherd....and Australian shepherds have vet docked tails for working safety.  Frankly I quite like him tailless!  Less worry about stuff being swiped off low tables.

Anyway it feels right having another shepherdy type dog in the house.  And there is no doubt this will be a game changer for all three of us.  We all have already expended way more energy than normal!!!

  Thank goodness our yard was made for a dog.  It is completely fenced and huge.  Our plan is to put an outdoor carpet down (already ordered) outside beside the tin shed, move the three Adirondack chairs down and the table.  We can sit out there and have coffee and chuck a ball for Mr. Fetch.  And probably chat with Mr. Howdelydoodely Harry seeing as how we will be directly facing his house.  Ahh...good times.

Okay enough about doggie stuff.  I will be back in a couple days.  The housekeeper comes tomorrow and I don't think she is going to be very happy with the clumps of hair all over the place.  Clearly he is blowing his coat, springtime occurrence! TTYL

'If your dog is fat, you aren't getting enough exercise.'  Anon.

SEE?  IT ISN'T ALL ABOUT FLOYD

OUT AT THE EDGE OF THE EARTH ON MAUI, HAVING A PICNIC AND SNOOPING ON THE FISHERMEN DOWN BY THE WATER (THOSE ARE BINOCULARS IN MY HAND)

OUR DEAR LAHAINA...IN A PART THAT DOESN'T EXIST ANYMORE

THE TAILLESS PART

JUST LIKE LEELOO, STARING AND WHINING AND STARING AND WHINING

STARING AND WHINING AND DROOLING....GOTTA LOVE A DOG

FINALLY!!!!!

STARING AND WHINING

BREAKING NEWS!!!!!!

 This is exciting news....to our household but maybe not to anyone else.  But I am sharing it anyway!!!

This is Floyd.  He is up at our local SPCA. I filled out a form and sent it in and this morning they phoned me and said that we should come meet him and if it goes well he will be ours!!!!!  This household is super excited!!  So in Half an hour we are leaving to go see him and hopefully get him.  He is a Shepherd/Australian Shepherd cattle dog cross.  Five years old.  Wish us luck and I shall post again with the results!!!

TTYL

SIGH

 Remember when I was whining about how much money I have to collect by June?  Well, another chunk was just added.

Aryn and Bradley, bless them, took the van to Fountain Tire in North Vancouver to get the brakes checked.  They are due to leave for a round trip, Kananaskis, Grand Prairie then home, gone two weeks.  They were going to use the van but brakes were likely needed.

Well by the time Fountain, whom I trust implicitly, came up with everything that is wrong with the van and needs fixing right away, the total was shocking!  I guess everything is leaking, tie rods are a problem blah blah blah....final bill is seventy five hundred. ( a steam shovel list) 

I freaked, hooped, said extreme stupid things, settled down, discussed, then Monte and I decided to get it fixed.  I share expenses with him due to my using it as much as he does.  I think I will have to tap into my LOC for this one and make payments.  And I have to say this will be the very first time I have ever borrowed or owed money anywhere ever.  Our properties have always been clear title and I always keep money on my credit cards.  It's going to be weird.  But if we scrapped the van we would never get a second vehicle.  Apparently the motor is in great shape and there isn't a whole lot of mileage on it which makes it saveable. 

And just a note here, Monte has had the van serviced regularly.  How did it get so bad if they were checking it?  And that was at Canadian Tire, thank you very much.  We will be taking it to Dodge Ram from now on for its service checks.  And from now on we are going to keep her running forever.  Possibly we should take it back to Fountain Tire, our family go to for the last thirty plus years, and snag a visit with the family at the same time!  If something goes wrong with what they are doing right now, they can not complain about someone else screwing it up!!!

We have company coming tomorrow.  A friend of Ange's, and now mine as well, (I shan't mention names here), the nicest person possible, has met an apparently fabulous man online.  He lives in Maple Ridge.  I am really happy for her and I so hope it works out.  But due to the fact that we don't know him, some safety measures need to be in place.  So tomorrow afternoon she is bringing him here for coffee.  He will be staying in a hotel so it will be within her control how close she choses to be with him.

Ange and I are so different from her.  This April marks the two year anniversary of her living here.  And at the beginning we both swore there would never be any penises (other than Monte and he doesn't count cuz he is a rellie) living in this house.  And two years later we feel even stronger about that.  We did our time and we are quite happy to be just ourself.  But our friend lost her husband many years ago so she hasn't had the same experience. I understand why she is interested.  Fingers crossed!!!

I have a complaint about instagram.  I really enjoy it.  The reels are so funny.  I have learned that some dogs are smarter than me.  I have heard amazing new music.  I have seen some crazy good artwork.  But....and here's the rub.

I keep everything I put out publicly open to anyone.  If I have something private, I don't post it.  As a result the world can look at my pictures.  But I don't know why they would, except for one group that consistently are looking.  Nigerians.  Bless them.

I get the most sickly sweet, misspelled, ridiculous messages from them along with ridiculous fake pictures.  Even if I was beyond desperate I would hate the invites.  They are too icky.

Two nights ago around three in the morning my phone blew up with notices.  I don't silence it, just turn it down just in case there is an emergency.  Well this thing dinged and dinged and dinged and....  Finally I thought I had better look.  It was one of those messages and he was hearting every single one of my forty pictures.  I immediately blocked him.  These guys treat instagram like a store for old bags that hopefully have money and no brains.

Well I am super hungry.  Back to low carb and intermittent fasting.  It certainly works on my blood sugar.  If anything keeps me trying is I don't want my kidneys getting worse.  It really annoys me that when you are first diagnosed with type 2 they don't tell you that even working hard at it your kidneys take a beating.  There are so many things I would have done differently had I only known.  Like ibuprofen.......bad bad bad.  Mix Tylenol and aspirin they say.  If you have to.  Best to just tough it out, whatever it is.  And my kidneys are only fifty per cent.  So I am drinking quarts of water every day and about to start a new drug, one that gives you certain infections that are not fun.

So I am going to go and make a yummy greek salad.  Have a lovely day and I shall report back how our friend's weekend works out.  Fingers crossed.  TTYL

"Guys number one fear with online dating is the girl is chubby.  Women's is they are going to get murdered."  Hampton Yount

update:  The mystery man has arrived in Port, they are out for dinner and so far no help message from her!!!  Oh I do hope it works out for her.

BUSY WEEK I THINK

 Actually now that I think about it, these past nine days have been very uneventful!!!  The less stuff that happens the less posting I seem to do.  I keep swearing I am going to post twice a week but then don't.  Which is probably good.  You would be getting lots of ....   my hibiscus has a fungus, there is a wasp in my window, the dogwood across the street still hasn't got leaves, my housekeeper couldn't come, my ears keep ringing, I watch endless murder shows (seriously, I could kill someone now and get away with it), I seem to have stopped cooking, I gained five pounds.  Well, you get it.  So I do you a favour and stay off the blog!

We did make one decision.  Upon discussion of the upcoming Panama cruise, we decided to change it to Hawaii.  Mainly because there is no flying involved. 

 Flying for fat people is not fun.  Can you imagine the look on the poor sucker's face when he sees Monte and I descending on the poor hapless soul as we ask for seat belt extensions and squeeze into the two little seats beside him?  (shovel list). Yeah.  We decided that that's not happening. So that limits us to either Alaska or Hawaii.

And Hawaii it is.  And this time we are getting a suite.  It's actually cheaper than the balcony room on the Panama cruise.  And because we cancelled so soon I didn't lose a dime.  I think Monte will be a little happier in a bigger space.  We didn't mind the little room but I think he is a little self conscious about travelling in such close quarters with 'Mommy'.

Monte and I made an impromptu trip to Nanaimo a couple of days ago.  And I managed to NOT go into Costco.  All we did was go to Horang, which is Korean for Tiger.  It is worth the trip to Nanaimo just to get lunch there.  Fantastic interesting healthy food. 

 Trouble is I actually got carsick on the way.  I can't believe it!!!  I have never ever not once ever become carsick.  I blame that car. Smudge is like two inches off the ground and the seats are so low inside, I can't see over the dashboard.  And due to the lowness, that little sucker can corner like a hot dam!  And Monte is like over enjoying that aspect of her.  Ayyayyyai!  I'm getting queasy remembering!!! Consequently I was not hungry and barely ate my plain bowl of rice.  What a waste!  It better not happen again!

One thing I did was take care of 2.5 kilograms of chicken legs!  They were already bagged and they were 99 cents a pound.  You can't beat that!  I sent Monte to go and get them and a couple of boxes of shake and bake.  That kid can eat more chicken legs in one sitting than a hen house would be able to keep up with.  

 Bryce, Monte's friend, makes a brisket every now and then.  He trims about five pounds of pure white tallow off of it first.  And he always offers it to me.  Which of course I instantly agree to take it.  I divide it up into portions to freeze and use for gravy at the next roasty dinner!

Well thats it for today.  There are a couple of things happening this coming week so I shall be able to make a decent post....I hope!  TTYL

'I found there is only one way to look thin, hang out with fat people.'  Rodney Dangerfield. (Bill's all time fave comedian.)

YET ANOTHER OUT MY FRONT WINDOW TAKEN FROM MY CHAIR

TIME FLIES

I had no idea so much time flew by since the last post.  I love posting and there are times when I have things to say but I posted the day before and it is too soon.  Then there are times like now...a whole week goes by!  So unpredictable and inconsistent.  (shovel list)

Well another trip is in the works.  It isn't until the end of next September so both Monte and I should be able to shovel shekels into the travel account to cover the cost.  This one is a little more due to it being twenty days plus a flight home from Fort Lauderdale.

We planned to do three cruises before I cross the rainbow bridge.  This will be number three.  The first was Hawaii, the second one was Alaska and now it is the Panama Canal.

This trip also makes stops in Panama, Mexico, Columbia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, San Francisco. and Fort Lauderdale.  Not in that order.  And of course we transit the Panama Canal.

The only part I am NOT excited about is the flight home.  We fly to Toronto, two hour layover and then home.  I am not sure how I get seats that will accommodate Monte.  There is simply no way he fits into a regular seat on one of those planes.  I may get hold of the vacations to go guy and get him to get us a third seat.  They were only 250 us bucks.

We have been looking at rescue dogs.  There are lots of puppies or young dogs.  We want an old sedate dog that hates walks!  Hahahaha!!!!  I keep hearing about all these dogs needing to be adopted but they sure aren't here in Port!  And the other obstacle is I want a little lappy type dog (Leelooesque) and Monte wants a German shepherd (Parkeresque).  And neither of us are willing to meet in the middle and compromise! 

There seem to be lots of chihuahuas but I can't stand them.  They have bug eyes and they shake.  I don't like boxers or squash faced dogs like pugs, they look like Winston Churchill after he ran into a wall.  But then I think about what a sedentary household we are and start feeling sorry for any dog that enters our life.  When Wrangler was still able to walk we had Peter here who would take him out every day, all day long.  Eventually two things happened.  Wrangler couldn't walk up the stairs after a long walk and Peter left.  I have faith that the perfect dog that suits us both in every way will walk into our life eventually.  Remember that book The Secret?  All you had to do was wish for something hard enough and it would transpire.  Well maybe I will give that the old army try.  I will let you know how that works out!!!

I also want to consider Ange.  She has so very kindly offered to look after the dog when we would be gone.  I think there is a big difference between looking after a little fur ball and a giant needy dog.  I offered to pay her the same as I would a kennel, but some dogs need a huge amount of attention.  Should that end up being the case, kennel it would have to be.

Well enough silly rambling.  The clinic just phoned me to see why I haven't been in for my three month check up.  This doctor I have is pretty amazing.  I ended up with an extra three months of pills so I am not doing my A1c until they are all gone but I think I will go in and see her anyway.  She clearly has noticed my absence.  Normally that would piss me off but I like this doctor.

So I shall sign off now.  I hope this finds you all happy.  Take care.  TTYL

 

A SHOCKING EVENT IN OUR FAMILY

 I shall get to the event momentarily. First a catchup.  

After K&T left, Stan asked if I would like to join them for breakfast at Pescadories, known as Pesky's in our house.  I absolutely jumped on that invitation!!!  This is the second or third time I have gone with them.  I always get Stan to order for me, the same thing he gets.  I put a pic at the bottom!  But this time I couldn't eat it all.  I had to bring home a bunch and eat it later.

Over the last few years I would occasionally take a sleeping pill, or rather a quarter of one.  They are strong!  If I took a whole one I am pretty sure I would sleep for a week!

But a quarter of one knocks me out for basically 24 hours.  It kind of comes and goes.  I wake up, all groggy and swimmy in the head, then go back to sleep, for the 24 hours.  I love it.  But...if something happened and I had to perform the next day I would be up the creek!  Consequently, I plan pretty carefully.  I tell everyone I ain't cookin' that night and I will be comatose on my chair!  

I don't sleep much.  No matter when I go to bed I always, always, wake up at three and that's it.  I may doze afterwards off and on but I don't go back to sleep.  But I have never needed much sleep, but eventually it catches up.  And that is when I plan a sleeping pill.  And then I am good to go for another couple of months!

Now for the shocking event.  I have a huge huge family on my dad's side.  Every five years we have a massive family reunion.  As a result we all know each other and are quite close.  There are about 30 plus first cousins and many many second and now third cousins.  

One of the cousins in Kelowna has a number of adult children and grandchildren.  One of his sons owns Adventure Trucks, he outfits trucks with tents on top of them etc...  They are quite amazing!!!

Someone who is an acquaintance of his, the son's, entered his business, shot him, set fire to the business and then shot himself.  At least that is what we know so far.  Jeez!!!  This is a god fearing family, good good people!  This just doesn't happen in families like that!  I guess the police are figuring it all out right now, as is the family.  Stan phoned Jack, the dad, and sent our love and condolences.  Man, Jack just lost his wife to stomach cancer recently.  Just an awful awful time for him and the family.

Well I guess I had best get on with my day.  There is one helluva stack of dirty dishes to load into a fully loaded dishwasher of clean dishes.  Sigh.  Plus I am hungry!  I don't remember eating much yesterday.  I shall post soon.  TTYL

'What nicer thing can you do for someone than make them breakfast?'  Anthony Bourdain

RANCHO OEVOS (SP?). AND THAT IS CORNBREAD, TOASTED ON THE PLATE!!!

LOOK OUT STAN!!!  SHE'S GOT HER EYE ON YOUR BREAKFAST!!!

SMILES PEOPLE!!!!!

 

FABULOUS WEEK...

Kevin just texted me to say he is home.  They left this morning early to get the ferry and get home in time for dinner.  And I miss them....so much.  The house is so quiet.  I so enjoyed the kids.  They have become, not by accident, truly fine people.  Their parents are probably the best parents I've known.  So concerned about their screen time, phone time and healthy eating.  But most of all they were truly the most consistent parents on the planet.  And that combination of raising them so carefully absolutely showed up in the children's characters.  One is 13 and the other 16.

Every night as soon as dinner was done, up they got and cleared the table, loaded the dishwasher, washed the pots and pans and put all the food away.  And there wasn't even one complaint or resistance.  I must say I was pretty impressed, and grateful!!!

Every evening we would play games and then Kevin and Tandy would go downstairs to their room around 8:30.  The kids would have to have lights off at 10:30 so we would watch cooking shows and visit and just spend time together.  I loved it.  I don't get to spend a lot of time with them so this time was very special.

On their last night Stan and Antonia came for dinner.  So it was a real true blue family night.  It was wonderful.  All you people out there that gather with members of your family, don't take it for granted and be really mindfully grateful.  

Well I am going to sign off now.  I am about to watch a tv show called 500 Days in the Wild.  A woman traversed the Trans Canada Trail and filmed it as she went.  It is an incredible story.  So I shall be back in a couple of days.  TTYL

'Becoming a grandmother is wonderful.  One moment you are just a mother.  The next you are all-wise and prehistoric.'  Pam Brown

I MADE THEM EGGS BENNY ONE MORNING....

DIALED IN

A VERY WISE GIRL!

MOM AND DAD

THIS DOLL HAS A BUTTON.  THE DOLL GIGGLES AND CRIES LIKE A REAL BABY.  CARA...STAN'S DOG, WENT NUTS!!!!  KIKI, KEVIN'S DOG TOTALLY IGNORED IT.

FATDAR POST 2

 Flying is a bitch if you aren't the standard 150 pounds.  Not only a bitch, but painful.  I noticed this morning my thighs have black and blue poke marks on them from bashing into the seat handles down the aisle of the plane on the way to our seats, right at the frigging back, thankyou.  I am not even nearly as big as some of the passengers and not that broad in the beam, very broad in other parts, but not in the beam.  I can't imagine the colour of their legs right now.

When I got into my teeny tiny seat, always in the middle because Bill HAS to have the aisle seat, I grab my seatbelt and pray to God it goes around the part of me that IS really broad.  Most of the time it does but on tiny asian airlines, they don't.  So in pure humiliation you have to ask for an extension.  Thank god this time it fit and I didn't have to.  Now when I say fit I mean I got it done up.  But for 24 hours following the flight I had a seat belt dent in my lap and I could barely feel my legs.  Getting up to go to the loo is not something to look forward to.  Nowadays they insist you keep your seat belt on the whole ten hours and its HARD to do up.  Once clicked in you don't like to disturb the  placement of the belt.  It may not go back there, the one spot you can cinch it tight enough to click it.

Now Bill, his beam isn't that broad nor is his stomach, but his shoulders are ridiculous.  This is why he insists on having the aisle, he can hang over.  But even at that he still hangs over into my seat about 1/3 of the way.  And this is just plain self indulgent on his part, because he doesn't do that when he sits beside strangers.  Meanwhile I am sucking in every inch I can to keep from spreading into the poor hapless passenger in our window seat.  He has already been traumatized when he saw us coming down the aisle aiming straight for him..and so he should.  If he needs to wiz, it will be a good ten minute wait whilst we heave ourselves out of ours to let him out.   No stepping over us as other nimble window passengers are doing in other rows.

Now its time for the safety schpiel.  First of all, the exit doors are about 16 inches across.  Now I haven't measured myself in years but I am pretty sure I am bigger than 16 inches...I had a tumour in me once that was bigger than that and IT went hidden for months.  So I know I am NOT going to fit through that door should the time come.  And if the captain yells BRACE BRACE, the safety card picture shows a passenger bent right down with her head on her knees and hands clasped over the back of her head.  Are you kidding?  What?  Even if I could get my head past the back seat of the seat in front of me I could NEVER get my head down to my knees.  My head hasn't been near my knees in YEARS!  Next came the life jacket demo.  The life jacket is under our seat and that means I am sunk right there.  If something falls on the floor whilst flying, it stays there until the flight is over.  A fat person cannot pick up stuff below their belt line.  Their stomach stops them so no life jacket here.  What are we going to do?  Say to my fellow seat mate, as the plane is filling with water, "Excuse me a minute while I heave myself up out of this seat and turn around and bend over and get my life jacket that is probably not going to fit and if it does I won't be able to move my fat chins enough to grab the little plastic thingy to blow it up."

After a wee while, dinner service starts.  This entails lowering the lap table from the seat in front.  I drop the table and it smacks the top of my stomach around the bra line and stops.  Okay.  You can't eat lunch off a tray that is at a sloping slant that would scare a skier.  So you suck it in as far as you can, take your hand and shove in your stomach so the tray can drop.  Its still on a slant but usable.  Along comes your tray of food.  So open and unwrap, kind of feeling for the stuff closest to you because you cant see it under your gut.  Now, to eat you have to pick the containers of whatever up and hold them at chin level, one by one, leaving the really hot one to last.  Its so annoying.

Now its time to read, or so I think.  I need to turn the light on.  Of course the light switch is on the handle, which of course I can't see, its too far back and under too much personage.  So I lift the handle and straaaaaaiiiiiiiiin and twist and spot the switch briefly and jab!  After a few misses and accidentally calling the stewardess, I give up.  Having done this before I already have my ipad at the ready in the seat pocket in front of me and I don't really need the light.  I haul it out, turn it on, rest it on the still lowered tray when WHAM!!  With no freaking warning whatsover the guy in the seat in front of me slams his seat back, crunches the ipad into my gut and damn near smacks my nose with the top of his seat. You see, what ever can't spread sideways in these seats, goes forward.  The fatter you are the less room there is between you and the seat in front.  Now, with his seat in the recline position,  I can't even hold my ipad properly to read, there simply isn't room.  So yet again I battle the arm of the seat and get it up and find my seat button and slowly push my seat back to make room.  Usually this is fine but now and then you get a real asshole that pushes on the seat and won't let it go back.  (I have learned to call the stewardess and tell her the seat is broken and could she help me put it back...usually works)  

There is no way do you dare go to sleep.  At this point you are sucking in and holding your not Bill side arm over and to keep it there your other hand is holding it, and pushing against Bill and trying to stay there...just so the poor guy by the window isn't going through what I am going through with Bill on the other side.  If you go to sleep all that personage relaxes and spreads...right over into the poor guy's seat.  So I stay awake, sucking it in and listening to Bill snore.

Eventually though, one of us will have to go to the loo.  As soon as Bill heaves himself over the arm of the seat, totally crashing and banging the seat in front of him, pissing off that passenger, a blessed waft of cool air slides in.  Ahhhhh, it is unbearably hot in the middle.  Out I hop, its not too hard for me for some reason, and off we go to line up.  You get really close and personal with everyone that is getting past you to go back to their seats.  It does mean leaning right over the top of whoever is unfortunate enough to be sitting right there.  Finally its your turn.  Right.  This is fun.  Already the seat and floor are wet, thank you men who don't know how to pee and clean up after themselves.  No matter how you slice it, you are going to get wet, in stuff I don't even want to think about.  And when you finally manoeuvre around and sit, you are literally wall to wall ass.  Try doing things you need to do when you cannot move your legs or arms.  Huhhh!!!  Not cool.

Ten hours later we deplane.  Bill is all rested and happy and I am cranky as hell and he doesn't get it!  When our travelling days are finally over, I won't be missing the flying part of it!!   TTYL

REVISITING. FATDAR PART ONE

I hope it's okay but I came across two emails I wrote once on a trip when the wifi wouldn't load the blog.  They made me laugh.  So  this being a busy week with company I thought I would do two posts of them.  They are about being fat.  

A lovely person reading my emails suggested I write a book.  But I just don't have the two things necessary for that.  One is attention span and the other is self discipline.  Both are vital.  But what I can do is jot down things as they come to me. You have read a few of those over the last couple of years!  So seeing as how this has nothing to do with travel, please feel free to skip the  emails called Fat Lady Chronicles.  When I get home I will not be emailing and will be back to blogging it all so you won’t be getting any more annoying emails.

One of my daughters approached me recently to kind of kindly upbraid me for always "putting my self down for being fat and talking about it too much".  She is right.  So I gave it some serious thought and came to a conclusion.  That conclusion is that I don't think I am going to be fat forever (although I wonder sometimes).  And right now, the difficulties that a fat person encounters is kind of amazing in this still skinny world.  There are skills a fat person develops that skinny people just don't have.  And I am really curious how its going to be different when I lose that 150 pounds.  Kind of like an experiment.  So in the meantime, instead of lamenting my ordeal, I am going to experience and record!

The first thing I think I will talk about is FAT RADAR.  Fatdar I call it.  Fatdar is something that one develops when they pass from pleasingly plump to "Can I get through there?" 

 Right now I am sitting up in the buffet area.  As per usual Bill and I managed to get a table for two right by the window.  A great table but as I sit here I am seeing that to get from this table to the food area I must maneuver through a number of tables and chairs with people in them.  So my fatdar  instantly kicks in.  Can I squeeze through there?  or maybe if I go that way I can squeeze through there...or...I will watch and wait until that one gets up and I should be able to squeeze through that way, but then if they come back before I do I won't be able to get back to my table.  And round and round and round the fatdar goes.

Another difficulty we large people encounter quite frequently is in public bathrooms.  When I tipped from large to huge I started using the handicapped loo.  Its bigger, has handles and paper you can reach.  One day I popped into a handicapped stall and was in there for, like, nano seconds.  I am the fastest loo user on the planet.  As I sat there doing whatever for the full ten seconds it took, I saw movement under the loo door.  Silently, two visible wheels rolled into view in the strip of space under the door, and rattle rattle rattle.  A loud aggressive voice strongly and firmly asked “Is someone in there?  You better have a cane or wheelchair when you come out!”

Okay, now I am terrified.  Of a person in a wheel chair.  So I very quickly finish up and open the door.  And there she is, all half of her.  No legs, at least not that I could see.  And she starts giving me shit for using the handicapped stall.  So, nervously smiling and bobbing my head, I apologize…..over and over.  She won’t shut up already!!!!!  So finally I snapped.

“What the hell?”  I yell at her.  “This isn’t a handicap parking space, its a frigging bathroom stall!  Its a courtesy not a law! And you think just because I don’t have a cane or wheelchair I am not challenged?  WELL WATCH THIS LADY!”   I stomped into the stall next to the handicapped one and I proceeded to demonstrate how a fat broad has to actually sit on the john and spread the knees unnaturally wide to the hip cracking point to get into a normal stall and swing the door shut again.  Either that or stand on the damned toilet, especially in those stalls with giant toilet paper dispenser machines on the walls inhibiting knee spreadage.  She sort of sat there in a mouth hanging daze as she watched me go nuts then simply rolled into her stall and finally shut up.  So there.  My fatdar now seeks out wheelchairs and canes before using the challenged stall!  ttyl

WALMART....MOST UNFAIRLY MALIGNED CONGLOMERATE!!

This town would be totally hooped without Walmart.  There is no other store with low prices.  Oh, there are lots of small mom pop shops that we are forever being told to support.  Which I would if they had the stuff I want at equally low prices to Walmart.  But they don't.  There is a Canadian Tire...but there again, their prices are too high.  Especially with good ol' Wally right across the street from them.  I guess if I needed car parts I would go there.  But I don't.  I just need house parts and groceries.

Well I now get my groceries delivered.  The only downside to that is the forced tip we have to add on.  Door Dash does the delivering.  I am not against tipping but we are already paying a premium, well a Wally premium, on the groceries, I don't really want to add to it.  But something happened today that has made me even happier with Walmart.

Yesterday I made an order for a delivery today, at nine this morning.  It was an absolutely enormous order.  I will be indiscreet here and even say how much it was.  It was just under five hundred dollars.  It's all I need to feed six people for the next ten days. With an order that size which included some oddball stuff, vegan stuff, I expected some of the products to not be available.  It happens.  I then waddle across the alley to QF for the missing items.  So I needed to get it done today.  Oh I need to mention...Monte bought them for me.  Things are tight at the moment and he super stepped up!!!

Twelve paper bags of groceries were delivered  right on time.  I got the itemized order up on my phone and checked off things as I put a million things away.  And guess what?  Twenty items were not there.  I added it up and it was 72 bucks worth of stuff, missing.  What the hell?  (big time shovel list)

The next hour was involved with phone calls that didn't work, people that didn't understand blah blah blah.  I finally got a person that oversaw all the online delivery and curbside groceries and she was suitably upset by my dilemma.  We hung up with a promise from her to call me back.  Long story short and a few convos later and me reiterating the list to her over the phone, she made a final phone call.

She told me that she had rounded up all the items and bagged them and handed them off to the door dash people and they were on their way to me as we spoke.  But, and here is the amazing part, she told me that she had refunded me 75 bucks as a 'we are sorry for your trouble' and all the items were replaced....FOR FREE!!!!!!!  I was astounded!!!!  That 75 will cover my usual five dollar tips for a little while!  And I got everything...except vegetable broth and ribs.  I am happy!!!!

Well this is a fast post today.  My charger bit the dust and another doesn't come for a couple of days.  My lappy is dying as I type this.  So back in a few days!!!  TTYL

 

LOVE COMPANY, HATE THE PREP, BUT GLAD FOR IT

 I am a putoffski.  I can procrastinate anything.  And now here I am, sitting in a house of projects, all needing doing before the 23rd.  And both Monte and my backs are in really bad shape.  I think it may have something to do with our giant stomachs....although Monte argued against that one loud and long when I suggested it.

Plus now that I no longer own a truck, which in retrospect was maybe not such a great idea, there are no more dump runs.  And we have a stack  of flattened cardboard the size of my massive deck.  I have grown to utterly despise cardboard.  We also have a number of giant garbage bags full of...well, garbage.  Stinky awful garbage.  (shovel shovel shovel list). So, what do you do?  I am finally catching on.

I went to our local Facebook page and put out a call for a dump/recycling run for a hundred bucks.  Cheaper than owning a truck frankly.  Within ten minutes I had over ten responses.  The upside of living in a poor town.  Monday morning at 11am, a Kyle is coming to pick up all our cardboard and garbage bags.

And that means that not only do we have to get all the flattened cardboard, did I say a HUGE pile already?, down the rickety scary deck stairs and piled neatly in the carport, I also have to get several heavy garbage bags down there as well.

I would have the guy pack the crap down the stairs but with my luck the stairs would collapse when he was half way down.  I have a feeling my house insurance wouldn't cover the law suit.  I mean they won't cover a soaked bedroom from some unknown water source, why busted stairs and a paralyzed person?

And then I have to clean this house and get it ready for the housekeeper coming tomorrow at one.  I have discovered that if you put something somewhere that is convenient but not its final resting place, that something becomes two things, then five then ten then a heaving heap.  Well that is what I have in the dining room.  OMG!!! Containers of veg, containers of plastic containers, small boxes of general kitchen junk, two huge Rubbermaids full of xmas and Vancouver trip food (I mentioned these before and they are still there).  My poor dining room.  And now there is a giant snake in an even gianter aquarium box thingy.

When I agreed, and even looked forward, to having Smooch up here, I had no spacial idea of the size of that terrarium or whatever you call a glass box with a giant ball python in it.  It takes up the whole dang wall.  And my table has a broken leg.  If you move the table the wrong way it falls off.  And the two captains chairs for each end of the table each have one arm broken right off, and the cupboard doors and drawers on the buffet won't stay shut.  They slowly, when you aren't looking, creep open.  Frigging thing.  Bill, bless him, would have fixed all that with folded paper shims, if he were here.  I also need to hang that wall to wall, floor to ceiling cloth mural of the last supper.  If I can find it now.  (another giant shovel list)

I gotta admit I am feel a wee tad overwhelmed.  Monte is up and going to go get us breakfast at McD's and then we are going to gird our loins and go out to that deck and gitter done.  I know I will feel better when I get it all done today.  It's only 8:30 am.  I shall regroup at 8:30 pm and tell you how far I got today!

Well it isn't 8:30 pm, it is noon the next day, Monday.  I worked my butt off yesterday but still had a fair amount to do today.  I am sorely impeded by my stupid back.   I can go for about ten minutes then the pain sets in to the point I can't move.  So I impatiently sit until it subsides enough to get up and go another ten minutes.  So freaking shovel list annoying!!!!!  You have no idea!!!!!

But now here I sit, the house is as organized as possible, my bedroom is sparkling, Monte's bathroom is ready for the housekeeper, my deck is completely cleared of all garbage and cardboard.  My phone rings.  I answer.  The housekeeper isn't coming til tomorrow, something came up.  Really what can you do but laugh.  Such is life.  

Two things you will get very tired of seeing on this blog....pics of the mountain and pics of my living room when it's clean and the sun is shining in.  I love it.

Thats it for today.  Have a lovely four days until I am back.  TTYL

'A good procrastination should feel like you are inserting lots and lots of commas into the sentence of your life.'  Ze Frank

MY LITTLE PEOPLE

MY FLOWER FAMILY

GOOD THING I LIKE RED!

I HAVE BEEN BUSY....AGAIN THUS THE DELAY HERE

 I am sincerely going to try to post every four days.  Time flies by and I neglect the blog.  Now, that means there may be some goofy stuff show up in the posts.  When four mind numbing days go by, and I sit at my lappy, I start to think of things I could write about.  Almost always something ridiculous has happened that I don't like to put out there.  I already have a less than perfect reputation, I don't like to add to that downward spiral.  But when that is the only thing that stands out, well it gets put in here.

With K&T (Kevin and Tandy from now on) coming in a few days, there's a hum of activity about.  We got the deck almost done.  I did the fridge yesterday.  I also did half my room, the biggest mess in the house.  I have NOWHERE to put anything in that room.  I still have to make the bed in the spare room.  And I don't mean the bedding although that has to be done too.  No, I mean actually build the bed.  It's in Brick boxes waiting, calling my name.

I have to mention what I was doing at six this morning.  My bedroom door slowly opened.  I was sitting up in bed watching something that involved naked people on my tv (Naked and Afraid people, not what you may have been thinking!!!). Monte slowly emerged into the light of the television and asked, 'would you like me to make you breakfast?'  Well yes I answered, I was actually hungry.  He asked if I would like a hot drink that involved a syrup he bought quite some time ago.  It was a blackstrap ginger syrup.  Why not? I say.  Sure I will give it a try.

Then I hear him in the kitchen clanking through the bottles and jars I had organized in the fridge.  I know what he is looking for and I know what it looks like.  Then I hear him clumping down the hall again and I call out 'top shelf, I am pretty sure, on the left.'

Nope.  Can't find it.  So I get up and go give a look and I start to think, hmmmm maybe I DID throw it out.  I was pretty positive I hadn't but....

So I take a look on all the shelves and I can't see it immediately either.  So I must have thrown it out.  We both turn and look down into a two thirds full huge garbage can I had brought in from the deck.  It's a massive big one.  The extra large huge garbage bags barely fit.  And it was full of crap from the fridge.  Bottles, jars, old food, emptied containers, big ones, of pea soup, emptied jars of mint relish, pickles, old doughnuts, gooey jams, well you get the picture.

And then, you guessed it, I pulled on my plastic cooking gloves, sat down on my nice red rolly office chair and dug in.  I had Monte hold a new garbage bag as I transferred shitty sticky stinky garbage out of one can into the bag.  Oh god....I had mushy pea soup up to my armpits.

Meanwhile Monte starts to gag.  And because he gets extremely angry if I even remotely laugh I have to hold it in.  I can't even let my shoulders vibrate with held in mirth.  Oh my god!!!  His gagging is the funniest thing I have ever heard and for some reason it triggers instant belly laughter in me.  So sixish in the morning there we are, feeling like we were smack dab in the middle of a CSI scene, me bent over a gross garbage can fishing gross garbage out and into a garbage bag held by a gagging giant man.

At some point I suddenly noticed a gobsmacked Ange standing frozen to the spot on the stairs, looking at us with  what the hell? written all over her face.  Ah jeez.  So we explained.  We were now at the bottom of the garbage can, and no joy.  No jar of syrup.

So I did the only sensible thing one can do in those circumstances.  Back to the fridge.  I moved every single flipping thing and the last shelf back in the dark corner, there it was, all pristine and clean, thumbing its nose at us.  Finally I was allowed to start laughing....out loud.  I still have crusty dried pea soup on my elbows.

Right now he is at Canadian Tire.  He is buying a toilet seat.  Because of his size he goes through toilet seats like the rest of us goes through butter.  (I said butter cuz it has the word butt in it haha) Anyway I knew it would just be a matter of time before the seat gave way, and sure enough it did.  This is the second time up here.  Peter fixed the last one.

He has been forbidden to use our loos from now on.  The seat is floating at the moment on the toilet, unanchored.  So when we sit it slides and tries to dump (I could have said thrown) us off!  It's scary!!  Lucky for us the old lady had the bathroom set up for old cripples so there are grab bars in every strategic spot.  Those bars have saved us several times!

Well enough of this silliness.  I gots lotsa work to do!  Have a great four days TTYL

'Thank you, yard sales, for being the perfect way to say to your neighbours:  We think we are important enough to charge money for our garbage.'  Jimmy Fallon

                     PICS OF GARBAGE

CAN YOU BELIEVE THIS WAS HANGING IN THE MUSEE D'ORSAY IN PARIS....GARBAGE

THE PIG'S END

A GARBAGE HAIRDO

PIZZA.....HATE IT

REAL GARBAGE FROM ONE OF MY HOUSES PREPARING TO MOVE

AN INNOVATIVE USE OF GARBAGE

KING CRAB DETRITUS

AIRPLANE FOOD....TOO SMALL....A TEASER

A FAST FERRY...HAHAHAHAHA!!!!!  ACTUALLY WE SHOULD CALL IT A FARCE FERRY

HOW MY FRIDGE FEELS NOW

SORRY...THIS IS A BIT OF A FOODIE POST...SKIP IF NOT INTERESTED

 One day I mentioned to Ange that as I was gazing out my window I noticed that when a crow would land on the street light, it would come on.  But if a seagull or pigeon landed on it, it didn't come on.  Next, upon studying it, puzzling away, I finally realized there was a solar battery atop that the birds were actually landing on.  And the crow being black,  the light reacted accordingly!

I was pretty amazed by this.  So when Ange came upstairs I started to tell her about this amazing thing.  And what did Ange say? Well I didn't get finished.  She interrupted me mid sentence to finish saying the findings I had found and was trying to impart to her.

After she went back downstairs it just struck me funny that we both share the same view out our respective windows and we are so unbusy we had watched stupid birds land on street lights and took note of the ensuing consequences.  Seriously!!!  Who doesn't have a life?  We don't have a life!!!! hahahaha!!!!

Alright, now for the food part.  I was perusing, in my head, all the food I have.  I have freezers full of meat.  I have a large cupboard with shelves full of dry goods.  I have a huge cabinet in my kitchen full of canned goods. I have a wall, floor to ceiling, of open shelves full of everything else.  I have a messy corner in my dining room with containers of root vegetables and two boxes of bottles of half drunk booze, and two rubber maids, big ones, full of the stuff I didn't use for xmas cooking and another pretty full of cooking stuff from what I brought back from April's.  So I walked through all that, in my head, and then remembered that elsewhere in the dining room there is an amazon box of 12 boxes of stove top stuffing.  TWELVE.  I mean they were only 72 cents each and when I make meatloaf I use them in that.  But 12....sigh.

The other day I bought a kindle book of Muffin Tin recipes.  I like muffin tin snacks.  There are so many low carb, diabetic friendly snacks you can make with a muffin tin. And when my brain finally put two and three together!  meatloaf mixture and stovetop stuffing as stuffing, not just a mix in, you can make a layered thingy!!!!

So today is the day!  I am going to make the meatloaf mixture, and then the stuffing, and then the muffin.  First a layer of meat, then a layer of stuffing, topped with another layer of meat and topped with my secret meatloaf glaze.  Yes!!!!  I melted the meat overnight and I even know where the box of stuffing is....(thats a miracle, I never know where crap is in this house)(shovel list).  I am going to take pics as I go and I shall post them here, today!  I am not posting this until I have loaded the pics onto my laptop here and include them.

Well I did it.  I made them.  They didn't turn out quite the way I had pictured but they were delicious!  I am ready to figure out another muffin thingy.

Well I am getting the house ready for the grandies and Kevin and Tandy.  This is so exciting.  Monte's old room is ready to do a deep clean, deSmooch and build a bed that is coming on Friday from the Brick.  I love building rooms!

So below are the pics, such as they are.  I would have done a lot more today but my blasted back just won't let me.  So annoying.  Anyhoo I shall be back!  TTYL

'Tell me what you eat and I will tell you who you are.'  Brillat Savalin.     egads!!!! keep him away from me!!!!!!  He would end up telling me I am a garbage can, I just know it.

THE PINK 4.97 A POUND AT WALMART MEAT

FILLING THE MEAT BOMBS WITH STUFFING

COVERED WITH SECRET SAUCE AND READY FOR THE OVEN

ALL COOKED AND QUITE DELICIOUSLY UGLY

WOULD I MAKE THIS AGAIN?....NO

EEEEK!!!! I JUST NOTICED IT'S BEEN A WHILE!!

You would be surprised how fast time can go by and then I suddenly remember it wasn't two days ago I posted but a whole week!!!

I had a fantastic weekend with Cookie and Brian.  I just love those two people!  And on Sat. we did some shopping and visiting TJ!!!!  TJ is her daughter.  She is married with two kids and Cook's sister's daughter was there as well.  We had a wonderful visit and it was so good to see them.  I sometimes feel very disconnected from all of them.  Cookie made some fantastic curry.  I ate til I hurt.  Wonderful visit.

I left April's on Wednesday.  I waited til the snow was off the hump.  It was a super rough crossing on the ferry.  We were banging and tipping.  They came on the blower and asked everyone to take a seat and not walk around.

The drive from Nanaimo was wicked.  It was raining and blowing so hard there were trees down, rocks and debris on the roads.  I was afeared they would close our road by the lake.  I skedaddled through there, way over the speed limit, white knuckling it.  But I arrived home in one piece and happy!

The farm venue didn't work out.  It was totally lovely but not right and just too awkward to get to.  They have found another, in town but I shall let April and Myles reveal that when the time is right for them to do so.  I will say this one is definitely a lot more convenient and suitable to the two of them.

It is snowing.  Grrrrr....I wouldn't care but I have to play chauffeur today to Ange.  She has appointments to get to.  That little car ain't no jeep with four by.  In fact it is a pissant, planes in one inch of water on the road and I can only imagine what she can't do in the snow.  If this keeps up I am going to have to warn Ange I ain't going out when it snows.  She might have to call someone else, taxi, walk, or take a bus...which for some reason she won't do.  I tried to get her to but she wasn't interested.  I like to have a decent plan b and walking a million miles aint it.  Makes me feel mean and bad.  Independence is so important for the psycheeee.

I remember a member of Kiwanis in Kamloops.  She was the most fun and nicest person.  But she didn't drive.  She used to call me for rides now and then and it was so annoying.  She lived a fair distance away.  All of us were always aware that for every event she needed to be picked up.  What bugged me was she had a massive beaut of a Harley in her carport!  Overtime I could see she had created a kind of prison for herself and very little independence.  It was damaging.

I must say I was a little proud of myself driving through that storm home on Wed.  I don't do anything to be proud of myself anymore, those days are done gone.  But I know women, yes women sadly, that would never have driven some of the driving trips I have done over the years.  And Wednesday's was one of them.  I remember one friend who wouldn't even drive the Fraser Canyon!!!!   In the good weather and road conditions! 

The doctor I am driving Ange to today can take over an hour.  Actually he sometimes is on time but most the time he isn't.  I was debating about coming home after dropping her off but sure as hell this would be his fast day and I would just have to turn around and go back.

So I decided to use my time wisely.  I used to play a game on my phone when I had to sit around and wait for her.  But I don't have a game anymore.  I used to read on the kindle app but right now that stupid app isn't working.  So I am going to make a timeline of projects, oh so many projects, that need to be done.  So many of them.  Some of them have to be done before Kevin comes.  Some don't.  So it's going to take some time to figure out.  And some of those projects aren't for the faint of heart or weak of body.  MONTE!!!!!!!!

Well thats it for today.  It has quit snowing and the sun has come out!!!!!  It will be a pleasant drive around today.  Yay!!!!!  Also I need to find a gym.  I truly need arm and leg exercises.  But it is going to have to be a cheap cheap one.  Another project!!!!

Have a lovely week or day (never sure when I am back here....but back I promise I will be!). TTYL

'Learn to drive?'  'Never!' said Quentin, 'My mission in life is to be a passenger.'      Diana Wynn Jones

and that would be Kiwanis lady in a nutshell. lol

THIS IS A BEAUTIFUL QUILT COOKIE MADE FOR APRIL!!!!