Getting It Done in ’71

Set your time machines to November 20th, 1971 and let’s talk about going away outfits.  I’ve heard they’re supposed to be stylish and sophisticated and perfect, carefully chosen ensembles you wear for the last dance at your wedding reception before embarking on your romantic honeymoon and the beginning of your new life.

Does anyone even do those anymore?  I’m so out of touch with what goes on at weddings.  I was completely out of touch at my own.  It would have made me so happy to get married barefoot on the beach or to simply elope.  W was all for that too, but our  families were both big on tradition and we got swept up in the kerfluffle.  I’m pretty sure my mother and my mother-in-law did more sighing and eye rolling at my lack of interest than I noticed at the time.  They kept asking me questions even though they hardly ever liked my answers.

Things we didn’t get quite right –

1. There was no engagement ring.  We couldn’t afford one and picked out inexpensive gold wedding bands instead.  I would have lost a diamond.  I lost my wedding band three times.
2. There was no veil.  I made a hooded dress with braided silver trim.  It cost about twenty five dollars.  I wanted my sisters hooded dress to be deep purple, but they couldn’t find suitable material in that colour, so it was royal blue.  Close enough.
3. There was no hairdresser.  By the time this picture was taken my self inflicted bouncy curls had bounced their last and I looked more or less back to normal.
4. The best man (W’s brother) and the ushers (my brother and a friend) all had different coloured suits and shirts and ties and probably socks, for all I know, because we told them just to wear whatever they had.
5. The flowers were artificial.  It was November.  There was freezing rain. We had a church ceremony, a church basement supper, and a get together at my family farm house after that.  The dance was a week later a thousand miles away with the grooms side of the family.
6. We forgot to book a room somewhere, so spent our wedding night at my girlfriend and her husbands house after banging on their door and waking them up.  Good thing they both had a sense of humour.
7.  We had no honeymoon, unless you count a two day drive from         my home town to his.

Oh, let’s just stop at lucky number seven, shall see? There’s lots more but this is getting depressing, and besides, I want you to look at those going away outfits!  I must have pulled some random thing out of my closet because my face is saying “I’m married!  I don’t care!”  And W is wearing his university blazer (that’s confetti, not dandruff) but it’s hard to focus on his clothes because of those sideburns!  I can’t even.  I’m sure you can’t either.  Proof that love is blind is all I can say about that.

Weddings make me hungry.  Handbag under my arm, mouth full of cake, ready to blow this pop stand and set the world on fire.  Maybe starting with that brown and beige thing I’m wearing….

Sharing My World 15

Share Your World – 2015 Week #2

Are you a hugger or a non-hugger?

Hugs are nice, but I rarely initiate them.  We were not a very huggy family when I was growing up.  I know I hugged my own kids, but probably not enough.  Very public displays of affection make me uncomfortable.  However, all that being said, if you want a hug from me, or think I need one of yours, please go ahead.  I will hug you back.  Sometimes there just aren’t words to express what a hug is able to say.

What’s your favorite ice-cream flavor?

I’m going to go way out on a limb here, or way out into right field….because that would be my ideal place to eat ice cream, where no one can see me….and say fudge bars.  We buy big boxes of them to have in the freezer for when the grandchildren visit.  That’s a joke, because they visit us about every six boxes of fudge bars.  But because it’s just fudge bars, we can claim to never buy ice cream.  I like them because they are chocolate, eating one does not involve getting a spoon and a bowl dirty, and you can hide their little white wrappers at the bottom of the garbage can.  You could also use the wooden sticks for crafts later, if you washed them off and if they were not also hidden underneath all that garbage.

Do you prefer exercising your mind or your body? How frequently do you do either?

Of course I prefer exercising my mind, because it requires so little physical effort.  Except maybe for working out those frowning muscles in my face. I can also enjoy a fudge bar while I do it.  However, I have been performing a daily series of very non strenuous stretching maneuvers – I hesitate to call them exercises because they sure don’t feel like that – and can honestly say I feel better for it.  And almost look forward to doing it!  I am waking up muscles that nodded off years ago thinking I was done with them.  My neck and shoulders are less stiff.  My ankles feel stronger.  I’ve been up close and personal with my calves and thighs.  Yikes.

Are you more of a dog person or a cat person? Why?

I’m more of a cat person I suppose, because I totally get how much they like to sleep and generally laze about and do whatever they please.  They entertain themselves and require little more from anyone besides food on demand and a clean litter box.  What a life.  I’m not fond of all that hair shedding though.  When we had cats there was hair in and on absolutely everything.  We kept the lint roller people in business.  I would visit my mom and dad and marvel at how hairless their home was, finally understanding why they preferred animals to live outside or in a barn.  We have no pets now.  It’s enough of a challenge to look after each other.  Plus neither of us sheds much.

Bonus question:  What are you grateful for from last week, and what are you looking forward to in the week coming up?

I’m grateful for a lovely quiet week.  I’ve been able to read and write and draw and play word games and watch movies.  Cats got nothing on me.  And we are almost to the middle of the dread month of January!  The temperature has gone up to -4 C today.  Not quite lawn chair weather, but getting there.  Oh, crap.  There’s a freezing rain warning.  And we’re out of fudge bars.  I need a hug.

Winter Weather Jots

For those of you who don’t already know it, this month is officially Just Jot it January, or JusJoJan.  See, I have the sign to prove it.  You can even click on it for the link.

It is also cold outside, and I have proof of that too because I took a screen shot.

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My new weather network app informed me this clear sunny Sunday morning that the temperature outside was -34 C, feels like -43 C.  So it’s gotten considerably better since then, right?  Except that the early dark always makes me feel colder.

I got rid of my old weather app because it always showed me a pretty rural landscape which appeared to have inclement weather happening somewhere in front of it, or off to the side with little actual effect on the blue sky and green grass.  There was also a big bold and annoying sign hanging in the sky telling me how lovely the premium features of this app would prove to be if only I would decide to purchase the upgrade.  So I deleted it instead.

I live with a weatherman, and the app is just a heads up, so that when he stands in front of me looking out the window to inform me that it’s snowing, I can say I already knew that.  Today of all days he decided he had to get out of the house and do something.  So all by myself I have had to figure out that it’s snowing heavily in B.C. and there is dangerous freezing rain in the Maritime provinces and Newfoundland has some crazy winds going on.

It’s a very good day for all sane Canadians to stay inside and read a good book I think.  This thought brings us all the way back around in a circle to the first prompt theme for JusJoJan which happens to be Reading.  See how I did that?  But, back to the jotting part, the rules state that we can also jot down random thoughts and share them.

Being currently in a very share-y mood and a chronic haver of random thoughts, I decided to go through my list of the puzzling things I have on my notebook phone app.  Little pieces of paper can go missing or be thrown away.  These, on the other hand, tend to accumulate and defy deletion.

1.  dates, rice flour, coconut, espresso powder? (I think the question mark indicates that I feared not being able to find such a thing because it might not exist)

2.  sit in the fridge for 10 minutes (recipe instructions that cracked me up)

3.  4:20 pick up time 23rd (I believe that was about a bus on holidays.  You don’t want to miss a holiday bus.)

4.  Appt at 1, be there 15 min early, allow for traffic and parkade and bicycle accidents (Good advice I guess)

5.  A little mini list of my grandchildren and each of their birthdays.  (I remember doing this one, because I got tired of being asked their ages and having to be vague about it.  Bad grandma.)

6.  Scrubber Vileda (because brand names are hard to remember)

7.  A long and involved recipe for  Lebkuchen  (although I’m not even sure what that is)

8.  Sorry, I was busy expanding my inner bliss in to the universe. (Always put you excuses in writing)

9.  Glop is a valid scrabble word (Who knew?  Probably every scrabble player but me)

10.  De-calcify pineal gland (what?)

There’s  more than ten, but you probably don’t care what my cell phone bill amounts are.  Or the prices of organic produce.  Frankly, neither do I, once the moment has passed.

Well, that’s entirely enough jotting for one day.  There will be a new prompt on the 10th.  I’m sure I will be able to flub my way through that one too.  Or glop.  I could also glop.  Maybe I should jot that down.

Good Things On A Sunday

These are good things on any day, really.

– Adult children.  Really, everyone should have a few.

– Finding decaf coffee for my Tassimo.  I have been blind.  (Thank you K and C for inspiring me to use this coffee maker for more than its previously mostly decorative purposes.)

– Blowing snow from the inside looking out.

– Candles that last all day and into the night.

– Driving home in the pouring rain and getting there just before it starts to freeze.

– Old movies on Netflix.

– Looking into the eyes of our children and seeing what miracles we have created.

– Good books, and lots of them.

– Today.

– Flux – a natural state.  (Our moods change, our lives change, our feelings for each other change.  Our bearings change.  The song changes, the air changes, the temperature in the shower changes.)  Accepting this.

– Magic

– A warm bed after a long day.

– Learning new words, like quaintrelle – a woman who emphasizes a life of passion expressed through personal style, leisurely pastimes, charm, and cultivation of life’s pleasures.

– Big warm sweaters.

– The smell of dinner cooking.

– The sound of laughter.

– Having no definite plans.

– Realizing there is really nothing in the world we lack, and rejoicing in the way things are.

The Rain in Spain

Is there rain in Spain this time of year?  I don’t want to complain about the weather we’re having so far this January because I’m pretty sure that as soon as I do it will get infintesimally worse in every possible way.  So I will just describe it to you.  It’s warm (often above freezing), and rather windy.  There is barely any snow on the ground anywhere.  Our driveway had some ice on it a couple of days ago, but now it is completely bare, except for some dead leaves blowing around.  When I take the garbage out I can do so wearing flip flops and no coat.  When I went shopping on the weekend I left my coat and my gloves at home.  If we get precipitation, it’s either wet snow which promptly melts, or it’s rain.  Freezing rain, although not that nice to deal with if you have far to walk or drive, is preferable to snow as far as I’m concerned.  It goes away faster, for one thing. And it’s not white and it doesn’t blow in your face.

We usually put plastic shrink film insulation on all our windows in the winter, whenever it starts to get cold.  Sometime in November if not before is the norm.  We still haven’t put it on anywhere in the house this winter, because there just have not been any cold enough days to inspire or motivate us.  I am not complaining about that either, believe me.  We could do away with this boring cold weather ritual if we had new windows installed, but so far the plastic has remained a much more economical alternative.

It’s supposedly going to get colder mid-month and then we’ll get our January dump of the white stuff.  And no doubt start scrambling to get the windows covered up.  So I’m enjoying this unseasonable mild weather and I will try bravely to tolerate whatever comes next.  Because what the hell else can you do.

5 Things I’m Looking Forward to This Week

Tassimo T-Discs, assortment (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Coconuts (Photo credit: randomlife)

Smelling like coconut lime.
Not sure why that made top of the list. Surely to God there’s something more exciting in my life than having picked up a big tube of lotion yesterday while grocery shopping. Don’t worry, something is bound to come to me. The coconut lime won out by THIS much over pink grapefruit. It was a tough decision, and now I’ve resigned myself to living with the results of that choice.

Letting my skin breathe.
Well, the skin that’s not covered in coconut lime, at least. And the skin on my face is soaking up the atmosphere as we speak. No work means no make-up for me, and this is the start of my six weeks away from work. WOOHOOHOO!! Yep, my skin and I are uber thrilled.

Having sit down breakfasts with my husband of 39 years.
Our anniversary was yesterday. Almost 4 decades with the same man! That should be some kind of indication of my resolve when it comes to sticking with choices, no matter how bizarre they may be. We went out for dinner and had an argument about what the weather was like 39 years ago. It was not snowing, it was freezing rain. It’s amazing to me the drastically important things he can’t remember. So now we can have some leisurely breakfasts together and I’ll see how much of our personal history I can alter before he catches on that I’m just making shit up.

Drinking Tassimo coffee numerous times a day.
Whoever invented the Tassimo, if he’s not a millionaire already, he should be. Another one of my dubious impulse buys, but I seriously love that thing. It is SO deliciously lovely to brew one perfect cup of coffee whenever the mood strikes me. Espresso, cappuccino, au lait, crema, breakfast blend, Columbian, suchard hot chocolate….be still my heart. Well, like that’s gonna happen with all that caffeine.

Getting my Christmas Shopping done before December 6th.
Won’t that be amazing! And no, I haven’t started yet, but I have complete confidence in myself. On the 6th I’m flying up to ‘the ranch’ to spend time with my daughter-in-law and four of my grandchildren, all the way to Christmas. She actually asked me to come! How’s that for a hard to believe mother-in-law story. The rest of the family will fly or drive up closer to Christmas, so I have to get the gifts ready for my spouse to bring with him. I also have to train him in the art of caring for a fish, and will say my goodbyes to Phinaeus before I leave, just in case.

Huh – I guess that’s 5 things, so that’s it. Coffee anyone? It’s not like I have to get to sleep and be anywhere important first thing in the morning. Oh yeah, except for the breakfast thing. Smelling like a coconut. It’s going to be a great week.