tuesday

Man, the first day back to work after a three-day weekend drags. I've been hunting out statistics on the two closest counties for the last two work days (aaaaAAAAAAAUUUuuugh and YICK!) and compiling a report on the local farm market, so it's only now, that my workday is essentially over, that I've got a chance to take a break and type something out that doesn't have to do with the (fricking) Government transfers as a percentage of employment income (dependency ratios) or some such.

all together now: (aaaaAAAAAAAUUUuuugh)

And it's grey and cloudy outside. My home still probably smells like turkey and apple pie. It should, since yesterday was Canadian Thanksgiving (did you know that the first Thanksgiving Day in Canada after Confederation was observed on April 15, 1872, to celebrate the recovery of The Prince of Wales (later King Edward VII) from a serious illness? I've lived here for TEN YEARS and I didn't know that! I did some (in hind-sight) rude questioning of my in-laws the first few years I had C.T'giving here, since I knew the Pilgrims had no historical significance here....)

and we made turkey and stuffing and pie and potatoes and have a jolly fridge full of Tupperware waiting for Turkey and Dumplings and other casseroles.

Rosey (aged soon-to-be-six) (this weekend, how did she get so OLD??)  made the pie crust, and I'm SO GLAD my heavy hand with pastry seems to have skipped her generation. Mmm, flaky child labor goodness!
Cass peeled potatoes, and B made the stuffing.

Then we sat down to eat on the china I brought back from Michigan with me, the plates I ate every holiday meal on as a child, my mother's china. And there was a twinge of missing her, and then I thought of how she would have loved this, her granddaughter fussing with the glasses and her grandson just waiting for the rest of us to HURRY UP ALREADY so he could dig in, and I knew she was smiling somewhere.

And then the kids ran outside and tried to teach each other how to do cartwheels. And really, who could be gloomy watching that?

beau

Fire Prevention Day today. Picture by J. Evans

Today is my boy's birthday. His NINTH birthday, actually. NINE. That's a LOT.

He's so smart and wonderful, my boy. He fights with me about turning off his light at night (C'mon! I'm almost done with this chapter!) about playing outside (I played all day at school!) and brushing his teeth.
(I think it's more to irk me than anything else, since with his habit of taking thirty minute hot showers, it can't be an aversion to getting clean..)

He's beginning to realize that Santa Claus might not be all real, that his parents can't force him to eat all his vegetables, and that flashing the puppy-dog eyes at Mom will probably get him what he wants.

He wants to be in a rock band and be a scientist and a doctor and help people build things. He wants to grow his hair out and talk about tattoos and guitars and sunglasses and being cool. He loves his dad and his sister and his aunts and his uncles and misses his grandfather terribly. He is his own world.

And we're better - infinitely better - for having him in ours.

Happy Birthday, Cassidy, sweet boy. Happy Birthday, Beau!

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'.

churlish

There is a blogging conference in Toronto next month and I'm not going.
(stomps her feet)

And I haaaaaaaate it.

I had my vacation this summer, took all the time off from work I think I can get away with, especially now (not my stories to tell but things are happening at work)  and I can't really afford it anyway and the kids birthdays are coming up and snuffle snuffle whine whinge

but I wanna.
(stomps her feet)

Y'know, I really thought I'd be farther along than this. I have a good life, a great life, in most respects, but I'm espying forty over the horizon and not being able to do anything spontaneous? Just for me?

sucks. Big fat sweaty donkey balls sucks.

But just so you know? Blissdom Canada '10 is going to rock.

And I'll see you there next year.

Promise.

decade

Holy crap. Have we really been married that long?

I knew I should have faked a lobotomy or something. And you should have run.

Wanna go for another round? I mean, since I kinda like you and all.....

found

I always wonder about the things I see. Sometimes I'm even lucky enough to have my camera with me when I see something that strikes me as wistful, or beautiful, or strange, or worth remembering. Sometimes (and I'm thinking about that abandoned yellow house that I pass every day going to and fro from work that sits in that lovely shaggy field) I have to remember and go back, and often the light has changed or the story isn't the same, and the urge? muse? flees.



Without whimsy, without cartoon eyes and ears and fairies, I believe:

That a tree, chopped down and hurled in chunks on the forest floor, senses the pieces of itself near, and it is comforted. When the splitter roars, the wood screams silently, gaping, choked, horrified cries, and then quiets when stacked, lulled by the proximity of itself, even in pieces.

and then there were two

 Goodbye, Chumba.

We had to put down one of our cats the day before yesterday, and the house feels strange and well, stupid without him.
We were resigned to it - he's been going downhill for some time - but the stark silence where there was once a rumble purr will take some getting used to.

The other cats are unsettled and looking for him. Kate yowl and stares out the window, and won't be pacified with extra ear-rubs and attention. Lucy is digging her way through every closet in the house, keeping up a mumbled conversation, wondering where on earth her friend has gone.

The hardest part about being a pet-owner is knowing that you have to let them go. They depend on me for food and water and to help them feel better - even when the best thing you can do for them is to send them into that good night.

I knew that. I just didn't expect it to be so soon.


B and I are agreed that soon, we'll think about another cat. Maybe even a kitten this time. Just as soon as we can stop reaching up in the middle of the night to that place on my pillowcase where our ginger-furred kitty slept. But thirteen year old habits are hard to break.



*Even though this came out sad and raw (and I suppose in some ways we are) we're not all huddled in the fetal position, crying puddles. Actually, the kids and I are off to the farm market, the library and the grocery. Maybe we'll go walking in the park too. Pictures later!*

hodge-podge

alternate title: Things my post folder has had in it the last week

• I've been having a hard time finding stories to listen to lately. Water For Elephants, while a great book, does NOT come off well in audio, and the otherwise interesting-and -worth listening to story about the fifteen-year-old Indian prostitute? Not so great for when the kids are in the car.

• It's September, the kids are back to school, my rounds of much-loved committee meetings and volunteer work have begun, and I'm finally getting into a groove at work.

• B built the first fire tonight, as it's been a wee bit damp and rainy, and now I'm sitting here trying to look grateful and not actively sweat all over him while he chats on about the bread he made today and we talk about everything and nothing at all.

• I saw my first autumnal tree today. And while it was gorgeous and still-new and exciting enough so that I smiled at the sight, I'm just a wee bit horrified that summer slipped away so fast. It seems like I should have a tighter grip on the changing seasons by now - so much comes with age and maturity - why not that power?

around the corner....

damn, I love living near the water.

the war on crunchy green stuff

My two wander into the kitchen at least three times while I'm cooking, asking for a taste or offering to stir or mix or (god protect us) chop something. And they chat with me about their days, and things will be going swimmingly until a suddenly odd silence falls and I wince in anticipation of the dreaded question ka-thudding into my poor, tired-of-this-battle heart.

"Are there onions in that?"

Yes, I'll say irritably, yes, there are. But I'm cutting them up fine, see? They'll melt into supper. You'll hardly notice them.

"Huh", will come the unbelieving answer, with a definite tone of don't think you're going to hide those from me, and then I'll be watched as I massacre the onions into tiny bits of mush. Then the second question - there's always a second question! - will follow, and I'll grind my teeth silently while they peer into the pot and intone:

"What other vegetables are in supper?"

I have to stop and admire their syntax. While the general air of disdain gets the message across, there is no implied promise the vegetables will be eaten - no 'What else are we eating?' that I can hold over their heads, however clumsily.

Lately, the only vegetable not scorned is carrots. Raw carrots. And dip. And I'm thankful, but limited as to how many times I can serve baby carrots and dip and legitimately call it a healthy or yummy meal.

My children are fabulous little creatures. They even put their plates in the sink.

However, I've come to the conclusion that the gesture is less from my efforts to teach them manners, and more to hide the evidence of  the careful picked-out offending veggies.

They can't get scurvy and die if I feed them enough apples, right??

the end of summer

And it's suddenly the LAST day of summer vacation for my two, and oh! what a'griping and a'groanin' did I hear this morning when I sang up the stairs that they had to get ready to go to the babysitters!

Geez. You'd think I was pulling them from sleep, or something.

(Whoops.)

Today is exciting, because after the work day is done, they get to go and have their hair done. And there will be the usual new backpack and sneaker buying frenzy before school begins tomorrow.

Adding to the excitement is the possibility of a hurricane making a wash of Nova S this weekend. Suppose I'd better scoop up some basics, too, in case we're without power for a few days.

The last few days have been unseasonably hot. We put our pool back up (we'd taken it down before we left for vacation) and due to a couple of leaks it sits lumpishly half-filled, waiting for more water.

R didn't care. She splashed and crashed and tossed herself around. I daresay she had more fun by herself with it last night, even as a glorified wading pool, then she would have had sharing it with others.

I had fun watching her, too. My, the summer went fast!