Well, that went quickly...

I'm having a visitor this summer! Dad is coming up!

He had a suggestion "Maybe Casbah could get his passport, fly down, and drive [with Dad] back up to Nova Scotia?" 

Casbah loved the idea. ESPECIALLY when he found out Dad was bringing the MGB.

So! Passport has been ordered. Ferry bookings made. Now trying to find Dad an air b&b and some airline reservations for Cass - and trying to figure out how to cram thirty years worth of flying-alone wisdom into my never-flown kid.

Psh. It seems a very short time ago he was holding my hand when we crossed the road, and now....now he's going to fly by himself.

( I'm honestly not freaked about him being in an airplane hundreds of feet above the earth  -  I'm thinking of my poor kid being confused and lost in an airport.)

(Also still salty about the fact that I'VE never driven the MG. Okay - to be perfectly honest...  never driven the MG when Dad's OKAYED IT.)

Bookin’

I took about a hundred names off my facebook friend list tonight. Really, it went surprisingly quickly, with only a few 'who was this again?' moments. I was surprised how many different groups of people I have as friends on facebook, and how looking at them can show the course of my life like a big old patchwork quilt. Bloggers, of course, then high-school and university friends, different jobs and peer groups, so many memories! then a huge group of 'people-I-know-but-not-really', and its that group I culled through tonight. Sub-groups as well, including 'Oh, yes, I knew your sister' and 'Yes, we do work at the same place, but we haven't said anything to each other on here in a year' and 'I like your posts but not your attitudes' and the whammo 'Why did I ever???' Waaay back when dinosaurs roamed the earth and Facebook was a young'un, there were Lists. I feel like i could use a few of those to help me sort these remaining people. The strange thing is, I doubt many of the deleted ones will notice I'm gone, really. Which means I've done a very-overdue thing. Feelin' fine tonight.

from playing dolls to kicks and falls

There are ordinary days where everything is swimming along, just a normal day, and suddenly (suddenly) you realize: the kids are growing up.

We threw out Rosey's bedraggled playhouse today. She was teary-eyed but agreed that it was time - it was ripped in a few places, and creased in others - and only squeaked a little. She kept a glittery painted piece "to have" and we cleaned out the front porch of about a million (hint: Roo does NOT EVER NO NEVER need any more Barbies) plastic dolls......

and then we put up a punching bag. So the boy can round-kick and front-jab.

Wow, they're growing up.

the horror of it all

We're moving the office at one of my jobs - started this morning, will probably take another stab at it and complete the move next week. We're moving into some offices in the same building as the public library - I don't think I need to tell you that I'm looking forward to this!

But today was moving day, and it was sweaty and grunt-y and not-so-much-fun, made even less so when it was discovered that our secure locking storeroom....wouldn't unlock. So I had to babysit the document boxes until a solution could be found. "No problem!" I thought. "I'm AT THE LIBRARY. I"ll just grab something to read."

(There was a certain amount of glee running through my psyche at that moment.)

Really, what could be better? I'd just.....

Then I realized I was too early and the library didn't open for another hour and the earth wept and teeth were gnashed and a storm blew in. Or maybe that was just me.

Yes. I was LOCKED OUT of the library.



Thank God I have a Kindle app on my cell phone.

They grow up too fast

 This morning during the whole 'Ahh! Must leave for work NOW!' madness, Bear was hollering for his shoes and I, half-paying-attention and on my way to the bedroom from a swooping run for the dryer and the sock bucket, was pointing out 'There, there, do you see them THERE' and was stopped by B's puzzled "Those aren't mine."

 

"What? Of course they're yours. I wore them yesterday when I was tromping around."

 

(I have big feet.)

Bear grabbed out another pair. "No, mine are here. See? Different colour."

 

"Well then whose are....." there was a pause before our eyes met in horrified realization.

 

Yesterday, I wore my son's shoes. All day. Comfortably.

 

Cass is TEN, and apparently going to be tall like his grandfather.

 

I am in so much trouble. I also need bigger bricks.

 

traffic stop

I took the curve in front of the grocery too fast.

My mind was elsewhere, full of the daily hubbub, the usual go-here-go-there-are-we-getting-low-on-that that runs as background most busy days.

So I pulled out too fast. And stared, incredulously, as a telephone pole (was that there before?) was suddenly in my way, filling my vision.

I swallowed hard, feeling the echo of what-could-have-been deep in my chest, the THUD, the disjointedness of the moment, the sudden silence. Air bags? A screech of brakes? WHUMP and a disjointed did-I-do-that?-shit-I-did-that and an overwhelming desire to turn the clock back just a few minutes. The sheepishness of the crumpled car.

It seems the body does remember  - I've been in one car crash, and it was 24 (twenty-four???) years ago. This was visceral, deep and automatic.

Swallowing hard, I took my foot off the gas, and turned neatly past the pole.


I will never pull out of the grocery parking lot so quickly again.

hiding in closets with birthday boys

My grandfather's ninety-fifth birthday was last week.

And he spent most of it in the closet.

When I called to wish him a happy birthday, the phone rang and rang and rang - a little odd, but maybe they were out? Celebrating, no doubt. Painting the town red. Why ever not?
I would call back later.

I checked Facebook that afternoon and found out that not only was I wrong, I was really wrong. Not only were my grandparents not out kicking up their heels, they were huddled in their bedroom closet with towels wrapped around their heads*, worrying that a tornado would burst through their walls and send them on a spin through the countryside.

Happy Birthday, Grandpa. May this next year not be so tumultous.


*My aunt's idea, to protect from debris. A good one, even if the visual still makes me crack up a little.

the silver bells of whye*

I'm taking a quick break from putting the bulletin together on this blustery, wow-winter-really-is-here day. (it's cold and bitter and not at all what we've become accustomed to)

I'm not used to being here in the manse at this time of day anymore - it's light and bright and the school bus drops off kids right off on the corner.  There's a lot going on!

(The parents have decided to take their munchkins in warm cars - no homeward strolling  in this wind today.)

But yes, I haven't been here in the middle of the day in awhile and I can hear the church bells and they're lovely and pealing out over the wind and still joyfully ringing out

and still
and still??

It must be a wedding. Except who gets married on a Thursday at three pm? That must be a coooold wedding party. I started to feel sorry for the bride in her white dress, resolutely setting her teeth against the shivers that wanted to crawl up her spine and worry her knees, the groom, wishing he had a wool waistcoat instead of just a cummerbund, the flowergirl pulling at her skirts and sitting down to protect her ankles.

And then I remembered that the minister here is an avid gardener who loves windchimes.




*Why so worried, sisters why?  (Look it up, it's pretty. And kind of grim.But pretty, like the windchimes here)

ziteous maximus

I'm hiding behind my computer a bit today, a litle perplexed by the giant scab/dead skin patch on my chin where a rogue blemish lurked beneath the skin for awhile. Then I got impatient and rubbed at it, and now it looks like I've got some creative rug burn. Or something.

I'm forty, for pete's sakes. Why the acne now?? I thought I'd found a skin regime that would stop all this - this is my first breakout in three months, so I guess I can't complain, really...

Probably just couldn't compete with the news that the kids' school is on the review list. Again.

We've stopped this before. Clearly the odds are against us. But we have fire, and we have conviction.

And I have a zit. Damnit.

sitting on the side of the road

I ran out of gas today.

Really.

There was a little bit of spousal involvement (Honey? You are always welcome to take the car I'm going to take to work the next day if you pay attention to how much gas is left in it when you get home, m'kay?) but I can't kick too much - he's the one who came and rescued me.

It was beautiful there - I was close enough to the side of the road so I didn't have to worry about being smushed, and close enough that I could (sneakily) people-watch. It was a sunny afternoon, clear and crisp. (This would be an entirely different post had I spent the time waiting for Galahad wet and shivering.)
Instead, though, I spent the time watching the people on the outdoor track, how busy and industrious and happy they looked, like a gaggle of robins, and made out a mongo shopping list.

I'm beginning to enjoy my enforced car time - Tuesday night is C's judo night, and the studio is juuust far enough away that driving home is ridiculous, so I've gotten quite happy with a book and a coffee and the stillness of the night around me. (I saw the most gorgeous moonrise last week. It hung in the trees forever with a pumpkin-orange glow, and took my breath away every time I looked up.)

Life lately seems to be a lot of hurry. Sometimes it's nice to sit and sip and stare at the moon and do nothing.

purrs and mews

Surprise! We adopted the kittehs. (You never saw it coming, did you?) They had their booster shots yesterday (and a feline leukemia test and a squirt of revolution) and were perfectly behaved, and now they're officially part of the family.

They're lovely and playful and fierce hunters of toes and a lot of fun. They spend less and less time under things (Jasper still freaks them out a bit) and more and more time with their motors running full-throttle, being petted and flopping with all feet in the air for belly rubs. Wish I was that comfortable with people! (Well, maybe not. I think rubbing my belly might be a definite mood-breaker during committee meetings.)

They've also taken over the sunny windowsills in the living room (Fine, huffs Lucy, lashing her tail, I'll go out to the one in the kitchen) and do a fine job of napping, little bodies all wound up together like a jigsaw.

Now we need to figure out the great de-clawing question. But that can probably wait for a bit.

We're busy enjoying all the purrs and mews.

just deserts

Scene: I am on the computer. It has been a verah long day. Bear is watching hockey? something? on tv. The children are upstairs, supposedly getting ready for bed. In reality, this means they're irritating the hell out of each other and trying to make each others lives generally miserable.

I tend to ignore it until it reaches shouting level and I have to go do something about it.

Suddenly, into my quiet evening floats the sound of my much-beloved son's voice.
'Piss off, Rosey. Out of my room!'

My eyebrows climb into my hair. My jaw drops. I wheel around and stare incredulously at B, who is staring right back at me.

There's a small pause. Then Bear shrugs. "Why are you looking at me like that? I don't say that."

Yep. He learned that......
from his mother.

(Bonus points for using it correctly, but still.....)

I should probably go wash my own mouth out with soap. Time to have the 'grown-up words' talk again!

what friendly skies??

Swallowed-down rage in a senior citizen trapped in an airplane on a runway to nowhere smells like cantaloupe, wicked and musky.

The pilot was just admitting even he didn't know why we were still on the ground when she turned to me. 'This,' she intoned, knobby fingers flying with the injustice of it all, 'is intolerable. They act as though we are not human.'

I agreed. We were crammed into a small jet, every seat full, most people hunched in their seats to avoid the low headroom, afraid to fully extend their legs because they might launch the poor fellow sitting in the row in front of them into the seat in front of him (and so on - a domino effect of claiming your rightful space) breathing stale air, and since this was to have been a 'quick' flight, the flight attendant wasn't even bringing the drinks cart around. The idea that we were chickens crammed in a box ready to be taken to market began to take root in my head.

Rose, in the seat next to me, had been on plane after plane today (she was flying back from Italy) and was resolute and pale with the grimness of it all. She was quiet except for a few squawks, exchanging gripes with her friends, her head darting back and forth from where I sat, curving my spine to see out of the window.

Honestly. What good is a window that is placed at chest height? And I'd like to suggest to the airplane industry that they remember that North America is getting fatter and taller, and stop with making the legroom and headroom smaller and smaller, and narrowing the seats. Because if airplane travel is not convienent (which, with the full body scans, the charging for any checked baggage, the ridiculous ticket prices, and the general don't-mess-with-me mentality that 99% of the airport staff have, it's NOT) and it's not fast (over an HOUR and a quarter spent baking on the tarmac at JFK. No official word why.) and it's not comfortable, then why in hell aren't we all taking the train?

I'm not a chicken in a cage, after all.

sheen is a nutbar

Most of the shadows of this life are caused by our standing in our own sunshine. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson




I'm supposed to be putting together quotes (uh, merchandise quotes, not copying the Emerson) and all I REALLY want to do right now is put my head down on my desk for awhile.  Damned cold. And I blame the time change too.

I should have some news on the school possible closing front next week - the big school board meeting is the 23rd. I think we've done about all we can do and now we....wait. (I'm not so good at waiting.)

Happy things! The sun is out, Rosey just went to her best friend's birthday party, and I heard a robin this morning! (Scintillating blogging, I know)

Somewhere deep in the archives of this blog is the account of Rosey's friend P's FOURTH birthday. P just turned SEVEN. I was one of those kids who had long-term friends as well (and while, okay, three years isn't that long in the grand scheme of things) I can see that tendency in R.  It makes me happy.

Now! This week, so I don't implode over the school issue, I intend to make a LOT of cookies and maybe some soup. Feel free to send recipes.


Maybe I'll make some nut bars too.

monarchy - it's what's for breakfast

Rosey was in fine bubbly form this morning, going on about the King and how he was good and

(I didn't catch all of it. I was too busy with my snout in the coffee mug)

and wait a minute? Where on earth was she getting this King business?

Honey, I tried to explain, it's the Queen. Her husband is the Prince.

No, she said, dragging out the milk container, it's the King. I saw him on tv.

I took a deep breath, ready to launch into my (lacking) knowledge of how the British monarchy impacts Canada, (was there a princess-Barbie angle I could use here?) and she rushed on

And he's magic, too! Magically delicious!

Damn Bear for bringing home the sugared cereals and unleashing them so early in the morning.

total recall

This morning at the gas station (yes, the same one) a woman held the door open for me. We locked eyes and she smiled swiftly. 'Well hi Jessica, how've you been?'

I burbled something and nodded and she zoomed off . I went in search of coffee. It wasn't until I was putting the lid on my cup that I realized I had no idea who she was - and I'm not sure the morning huhs? had anything to do with it.

I think my brain might be full.

Well, you can't blame it, for Pete's sakes. It's full of trifles like ancient phone numbers, words to Duran Duran songs, what we ate for dinner last night, multiplication tables and immunization schedules. It remembers things - book titles, household projects, no pink with red, table manners, how to make piecrust, websites. I can recall at a moments notice the smell of fresh-cut grass in the spring, how the sunlight striped the walls and the canopy of my bed when I was seven, my grandmother's fingers touching my arm. The melty goodness of ice cream. It knows the name of every boy and girl in my daughters' Grade One class, and can follow the plotline of (God help me) Star Wars the Clone Wars, with a side of Discovery Science.  Really, my brain should have had a stress leave years ago.

I'm probably not giving it fair odds, either. Wandering around and talking pre-caffeine is never a good idea.

So, friendly lady, I'm sorry I forgot your name. But hey, the next time you want to sing any Eighties pop songs?

I'm your girl.

convenience store

This afternoon at lunch I slipped out and went to go buy a soda at one of the nearby gas stations. I'd won a free bottle of water there a few days ago, so I gathered that up too. Checking out should have been quick and easy...except the winning slip on the water wouldn't go through, and then my debit card wouldn't connect.

We tried three times.  At that point, the woman running the register was about ready to drop-kick the machine and I was casting anxious glances at my watch - I'd only meant to be a moment..

And then we noticed., both of us at the same time....

I was trying to pay for my Pepsi with my library card.

I am obviously not equipped for Monday and need to be more caffeinated than I originally thought.

holy shit, y'all

In the past two weeks, I have


started a new job (the jury is still out on that one - I'm getting in on the ground floor right before some very exciting things happen, but the waiting for the good stuff to happen is hard to do)

Read in church Christmas Eve, and managed to NOT giggle my way through the 'fruit of thy womb' part, which I was SURE was going to come out 'Fruit of the Loom', and how could I possibly not break down and weep with laughter while thinking of these guys hanging out at the manger?

Had a lovely Christmas

Tra-la-la'd my way innocently into the world of after-Christmas sales (why oh why do I never remember to stock up on laundry soap and toilet paper the week before Christmas??) and watched two grown women shove each other and pull hair over a 70% off Christmas tree. What great memories the winner of that item will have each year when she gazes at her tree! This is from the year I snatched old Mrs. Carverson bald. Feliz Navidad!

The accordion seems to be a hit-or-miss thing (I am brain-damaged, obviously) but they seem to be having a lot of fun with their new goodies, so that's good.

And tonight I watched the new year click over in Halifax and again in Times Square with my boy. (And shrimp and champagne, and some cookies for him) It was lovely.

I'm calling it - a new year, a new outlook. This is going to be an EXCELLENT year - how could it be anything but??

the sawmill

In the midst of my statistics project, I discovered something interesting...
Bridgewater (one of the towns near me) had a drive-in movie theatre.

It was closed, of course, and up for sale in 2001, but it hadn't been knocked down for a factory or cut into a thousand house-lots that I could find out, so

maybe....maybe I could find it?

I love drive-ins. I grew up going to them, snug in the back of my parents car, a sleeping bag tossed over our legs, squabbling about pop-corn and laughing at the talking candy-bar concession stand ad from the fifties they played before every show.

I would love to own a drive-in theatre. And I think it's a family-friendly idea from the past whose time has circled back around.

Bear was nonplussed. 'You want to drive around and look for what?'

I forget sometimes that B doesn't know every rock, every tree and every hill in the five county area. His job means he's intimately aware of so much of the surrounding countryside - there have been very few times I've stumped him.

We drove and drove and drove and finally conceded defeat. R was getting a little whoopsie (she gets carsick, something we figured out three days before we left for our marathon-driving vacation, more fun for us) so we pulled over to the side of the road to let her walk it out and discovered.....

an old sawmill.

Grey and weathered boards were all over the place, with giant fallen sentinels here and there.

Far back in the corner, there was evidence

that someone was still using the machines. 

Fresh piles of sawdust and clean sweet new boards lay,  waiting to be used.

We never did find the old drive-in.

But walking around the milled wood and the overgrowth interested us all enough so that the long ride back in the gathering dusk was contented and quiet.

Next trip we'll get directions. Sometimes, though,  poking around is just as fun.

all thumbs

The copier broke again at work. Well, sorta.

Toner out! it insisted, and when I obligingly slid the  new one home, it burped and chuckled for a moment and then smugly asserted I'd done something wrong.

IMPROPER CARTRIDGE! the screen shrieked. ERROR CODE! DOOOM!

(Okay, I made that last bit up.)

I looked through the (copious) literature that comes with the beast, flipping through MAINTENANCE, and TROUBLESHOOTING, and WHAT TO DO IF YOUR COPIER IS BEING A BUTT, and could find no mention of the corresponding error code. Okay, maybe there was something online.

Well. The Sharp website? Lovely. Sleek, even. But trying to find the model number I needed in a three-page list written in tiny type? IRRITATING. But I kept on, found it, downloaded....and the instructions for changing the toner were different than I needed. Same copier, and the illustrations matched, but no mention of the code, and no clear this is what you do NOW step-by-step stuff.

So, I did what I probably should have done from the start. I called the technician.

I have a lot of sympathy for these guys. They've got all the answers, yes, but they're trying to diagnose a problem over the phone.


So when he hemmed and hawed and finally said the words I somehow knew were going to come out of his throat:

'Did you turn the machine off and back on again?'

I did not blast him. (However, the wind generated from the rolling of my eyeballs sent all the notices pinned in the lobby a-flutter.)

Why yes, I said, I did! and resisted the urge to say 'Next!'

"So," he went on, "are you sure you put in the magenta toner? Could you go get the box the toner came in and read me what it says?"

The box for the magenta toner has magenta writing on it. And the cartridge itself is edged with bright PINK plastic edges. This would be hard to screw up. But, again, he's not there, in the room, he's on the phone, so I dutifully fetched the box and read the part number off, trying not to sound resentful that something in my tone apparently led him to believe I was both touched and colourblind.

We bandied on back and forth (I HAD the right toner, surprise!) and he promised to send a new toner to see if that would fix the problem and we hung up, without an answer to the problem, but thinking we were on the right track.

Half an hour later, in walked our usual copier repairman. D the Copier God. (This is said with love, because lord knows he's saved my bacon several times, and he always admits when he doesn't know the answer, which I find admirable.)

And once again, he tried and couldn't replicate what I had seen on the screen. He had some ideas, though, and after some futzing, the great beast obligingly rolled over and began working again.

I still think if I read my manual word-for-word I'd find somewhere a small section titled 'PRANKS TO PLAY ON THE CHICK WHO IS LOW ON COFFEE'.