Seriously, today was a very good day. I had Rotary lunch with interesting presentation by the wife of one of my previous clients who I’ve never met before and then it was meet with two different clients over the afternoon who are powerful women that I enjoy the energy from before heading to Encore For trivia night. On the way, I stopped at fire hall to pick up the swag that was donated to Rotary to find out that my entire trivia team was there for the top takeover. I stayed long enough to have three samplers with paired beer that were delicious from Nelson brewing Company, and then I had it off to Encore to find a team for trivia to join as I had cleared my schedule to do that tonight. It turns out that my friend Sean and his daughter Zoe were here from Vancouver Island and we’re having dinner with Brett and Jill and their two girls Morgan and Riley. I asked her if they would like to form a team and they were into it and I’m not gonna lie. We had so much fun. We tied for a first place with the usual team and Sean went up as our person for the music tiebreaker. My heart was broken when the other guy answered first on the U2 song to win.!
I had a really great connection with Zoe and I’m thankful for that opportunity. I also super connected with Morgan and Riley who have traditionally been shy with me because we don’t spend enough time together, but I felt like I was the Nana to them tonight and we had fun. I hope I get to hang out with them more.
I slept so well last night after realizing that I had an enhanced beverage in my fridge. Time to restock!
This evening I was the MC for the third winter ale evening hosting father Jason and daughter Grace from the Cleland family band followed by Dani Strong who was joined by her daughter Dotty for a song. It really was just a lovely evening. Sad to know there’s only one more to go this season, which may end my career of introduction now that I am no longer on the board.
I found out from Mark that his surgery is May 7 in Vancouver and I am going to drive him down for it and stay and bring him back home again. It may work out nice if Jake is in town and I get to spend Mother’s Day with him that weekend Also, I hope the banksy show is still on
More plans to make, it is slowly setting in about the big trip that I am taking this Fall
I didn’t sleep well and felt rough when I got up. It was a tough morning and I even missed the Chamber Lunch at Ella’s as I wasn’t sure if I was sick sick.
I worked on the umbrellas for the gala. I think the first one turned out nice in spite of my poor spray painting ability. I just have to add a bit of the colourful ribbon around the top.
After getting my work done, I called Dave & Deb’s Expedia Cruise agent and worked through a deal to get the least expensive solo room and then added the perks to include high speed internet so I can work, tips and beverages. She saved me a couple grand. I decided to put a deposit down. So, yeah, I am going to fly to Rome and go on a 26 day Mediterranean Grand Adventure on the Sun Princess, the newest in the fleet, ending with an 8 day transatlantic cruise to Ft Lauderdale.
I met Rae for a shared burger at the Modern Olive. It was delicious and I discovered I love fries dipped in Tsatsiki. We tried to find another one to share that we hadn’t already tried, but settled on cones at Marble Slab followed by my free beer at Encore. I do like Dad Rock.
It was nice to visit and be able to explain my extreme YOLO feels. Now I am home finishing Adolescence which is an incredible show. I don’t really know how to explain it, it is an experience.
OK, so the schedule part of the day was that I worked my tush off and then I went to Encore to celebrate Dee Crozier’s birthday, which is also St. Patrick’s Day and Lennon Delaney was playing and he’s fire. I got home to the delicious smell of my husband‘s (crock pot) cooking.
The extraordinary part of my day is that I agreed to join Dave and Deb on a 26 day cruise Mediterranean and transAtlantic it is not going to be cheap, but there is this part of me that has always wanted to do a Mediterranean cruise and wants a period of time where there are no excursions, no demands on my time, just relaxing to Read books, visit and enjoy. I feel this would be the best combination of those things. I just have to find the best deal because Cruise plus flights could be 10 to 15,000. Now, I have been known to spend 5 to 7000 on a two week adventure so I have to consider that and this is everything in: meals drinks, entertainment etc. and Dave and Deb have told me just book the cheapest room possible and come hang out with them in their Expensive one. Part of me knows it would be cheaper to find a travel companion because travelling solo is what is so expensive however an entire month would be hard to find someone who is available and harder to find someone that I would want to spend a month travelling with. I could probably do fine with Mark, but he doesn’t have the finances and I’m not sure he would love a cruise. This is the part of not having a partner that makes the world more expensive for me. I’d love if one of my besties could spare that kind of time and money but again it’s a big ask.
Woke up to big fluffy snow that just kept coming down.
I worked on emptying a few purses. I definitely have a lot of duplicate stuff.
I tried to find a grandson to go see Paddington in Peru with me but they were all involved in a big DnD campaign so I threw on my jacket that I bought at Machu Picchu and headed to the 2;15 show. I enjoyed it very much and had a good laugh when the father asked their guide if he got his tattoo on a drunken night in Cusco. That is where I got my Peru tattoo! I was glad that I brought my loops as there was a large group of kids for a birthday a couple rows back. They were very well behaved.
Dinner was at Fenwick & Baker as I couldn’t find any of the burger spots open. I had a fun visit with some of the guys and then headed back to the theatre to see Captain Marvel Brave New World. I liked it and there was only one couple and me in the theatre!
The snow has melted but my dang ankle is achy.
Talked to Mom and she says she’s doing ok although I had to remind her to take the cough medicine as she was coughing while we talked.
I had an idea to move my island against the wall, where the cat door is, and the wall is unfinished, and the wind blows in and have my table more out in the middle and accessible and just have a change so I did that and I started sorting all the stuff that’s piled everywhere. I didn’t get it all done, but I got quite a bit done And that makes me happy.
For lunch, I heated up the lobster mac & cheese that I bought frozen at Heid-out yesterday and will have more for dinner. I’m sure.
I went to the office to meet Chris from Murray Technical Excellence who was going to help me do the crib board that I want to offer for the Rotary auction. He was held up for about an hour, which actually worked out well because I got the filing done that has needed to happen for a year. When he did arrive, I took apart the Lazy Susan that I had bought and we made a template. It was probably a four hour adventure by the time I was said and done because I had to stay there while it was being processed by the laser It sure beats the heck out of using an old woodburning kit though lol
It really did turn out beautiful. We both realized once it was fully done after so much attention to detail on the whole size etc. that the Rotary logo is not perfectly circular, but it’s still so gorgeous that I am very happy to donate it in both our names to the auction.
As soon as the laser was finally done, I raced off to buy cough syrup and bring it to mom. She said she is feeling better today. Just the cough is annoying. I made it there just before the doors were locked for the evening. I then came home and had some more mac & cheese and have my foot up as it is really aching today. I don’t know why.
Today was pretty casual. I got work things done. I got volunteer things done. I got another burger in my belly at The Heidout, filling my card for the first time since I’ve been doing this over the years. It was tasty, but I’m sure it was tastier for people who could have the smoked Poblamo, which, of course I had to ask to be not included. It was nice to have a quick visit with the restaurant owner who I consider a friend, Heidi.
Afterwards, I picked up Gene from work and we went to get his dad’s truck and traded out my table that Ashlée had with hers that I had as well as sent home my IKEA chair for Gene to use in his first apartment. At first, I thought I was going to miss having the drop leaf table of Ashlée‘s which I had in the first place because it was the only thing that would fit in my small apartment before I bought this place. Now when I see it in my space and think about where I want to move things around, I know that my beautiful round table that I finished with the help from Mau, one of the very special homestay students from Mexico, is exactly what I needed to get back.
It’s a weird time in the world. We have a new Prime Minister, Mark Carney of whom I know very little. We are becoming super patriotic because of the threats from the president of the US to take over Canada as a 51st state. The saying that means so much to us has become an anthem of the times: Elbows Up! For those of you don’t know it’s a hockey term and it was kicked off in full force by Mike Myers on Saturday Night Live. So much of me wants to ignore it. I’ll do my thing by Canadian where I can. I am just avoid going to the states, but I also had dreams of road tripping to go see my friends and now I feel like this will have to pass. I stopped at the liquor store tonight to see how bad it looked because I heard that the government liquor stores took all American alcohol off the shelves. It actually was quite amazing to see how little was American. That was there in the first place, although what I learned was the number one section that was hit the most was the American wine. This is good for BC growers.
Oh, the Mom part. She called me this morning to say she had a cold, but she was in a good mood and then she called me just as I was about to leave work to ask if I would come help her get into bed tonight because she couldn’t lift her leg of course it’s not what I wanna hear at the end of a Friday when I can’t get her to see a doctor nor get her evening care for the weekend And I know it didn’t just come on todaywhich leaves me feeling frustrated. I did show up there just before eight and had a visit with her and had to be mean and let her do things for herself with my supervision so that I could see what is going on for some reason she has pain in her right growing so that she can’t lift your right leg up enough to get into bed which left me realizing that it wasn’t gonna be of any help to get her settled into bed if as soon as she got up to go to the bathroom, she wouldn’t be able to get back into bed, so I settled her in her chair which lays back and also stands up enough to help her get out. I am going to have to arrange for her to see her doctor or if it gets worse take her to the hospital again. she did admit that she hasn’t been walking and keeping active as she is supposed to. I am feeling very frustrated by this because once again she is barely able to walk and each time it’s because she has stopped moving sat around too much and let herself go. At what point is this not my problem I’m sorry I’m being super cranky, but I am frustrated. I have a lack of taking responsibility for her own health. I can’t go there every night and help her into bed. She’s also a bit of a night owl so the doors to the building lock at eight and I’m pretty sure she doesn’t wanna go to bed at 8 o’clock every night But again I don’t know how late the assistants come anyway. AITA?
I’m trying not to overthink things, but I really have had several good days in a row. Today was another of them. I started out chasing down donations for Rotary and was very blessed to bring in an emerald level sponsorship. It was a rainy kind of morning, but even that made me happy because I got to wear my minion raincoat that I got in California last year Rotary lunch was very interesting. The speaker was Jason Wheeldon, local longtime realtor, who gave a lot of housing statistics and trends, and it was quite fascinating.
Dave Williams
The afternoon was once again pretty productive at the office. I do like March. It’s one of those months where I can just catch up on things and make people happy which means I am not grumpy. Also, a good thing.
I had a 4 o’clock appointment at the travel vaccine clinic to get my final booster for my hepatitis B and that one’s good for 20 years. Most of my others are good for another 10 so that should pretty much cover off my travel years.
Next was Encore for friends with benefits gathering at five. I texted Rae that I was there early for friends with benefits. A while later, she came out of her office and said oh you’re here early and I looked at her strange but didn’t realize for some time that I had accidentally texted the client that I was there early for friends with benefits. They responded with a.’What????’ I was nearly crying. I was giggling so hard when I realized my mistake and I’m grateful that this client is a friend and will laugh about it.
I signed up for trivia night with the usual suspects and then ran off 20 minutes into it to get a haircut with Karissa and came back to play the last couple of rounds and once again we came in second. As I was leaving this lovely gentleman of my era with a delicious accent asked if I would be back next week and I told him that I thought I would be and got a big smile in return. I’m curious what that was all about….
I had meant to be caught off guard by the snow on the ground when I woke up this morning I had hopes that we were done with that although it’s not a surprise it is often snow even in April and it didn’t really stick around so that’s a good thing. What did happen was the barometer had changed enough to cause two things, a low-grade, trying to become something, migraine and an aching ankle. I have a feeling I’m going to become that person now. Remember the old guy with a I can feel the weather is changing. I can feel it in my knees. I can feel it in my toes. Sigh, I can feel it in my ankle.
I enjoyed today at work. I worked on things that give me satisfaction for people who appreciate me and that is a good combination. I took time to virtually attend the chamber AGM as well.
I ran out in the afternoon for my optometrist appointment to find that my eyes are very healthy inside. My prescription is not changed for the second annual appointment in a row, which may be a record and she is going to refer me to the specialist in town for surgery on my eyelids. They are quite hooded and bothersome, making me feel rather stoned and tired all the time now and because they are affecting my health it will be covered by our medical service plan. I did find it rather amusing that at 61 I now have implants.(in my ankle.) and I’m about to have my first plastic surgery as much as the idea of surgery on my eyes freaks me out. I look forward to the difference it will make.
After work, I was to meet Paul and Laura for wing night at Fenwick & baker so I went a little bit early and hung out with Dave for a bit. We had good conversations about ideas for his store and ideas for the donation of Rotary in general. I feel respected conversations which have been hard to come by lately.
I had such a nice dinner with Paul and Laura and good conversation as usual, but it was also nice to just get home and curl up and watch Survivor
I know it’s odd, but I don’t eat burgers most of the rest of the year and here I am eating them nearly every single day right now. after a long day at work I headed to the Heid-out, but there was no parking for way too long of an amount for me to walk so I went to Fenwick & baker. I ended up having a delicious burger, a lovely visit with Codey at the bar and Robbie, the bartender and a few other others that I knew and it made it all worthwhile . I had a great catch up with Keon about his trip to Vegas and we established clearly that he needed to use Marnée’s magical tours for that trip and he didn’t do any of the truly fun things in the whole week that he was there. It made me once again, want to take people on tours or hook them up for their vacations.
I did a bunch of errands this morning before heading to the office, including picking up mom’s pills and taking them to her and having a nice little visit and going to winners to find a barrel to make a cardboard out of for my donation to Rotary. There were no small ones left, but I hit the big time with a beautiful lazy season, but I can’t wait to turn into something beautiful with the help of Chris Marie who runs the laser cutter.
Long day of data entry and reconciling. By 7:30 I was starving so I headed to Boston Pizza for Burger month. I was literally shaking by the time I got my Perogy Chicken Burger and Caesar salad. Skimmerhorn was on special so I got my whole delicious meal for 31.57 including tip. The food was good, the service was good and I got another chapter of my book read. They have cool new charger stations.
I am now enjoying Running Point, a good series on Netflix, with Kate Hudson.
A good sleep, a long cbd bath, a few chores, 3 losses to Mark in Outsmarted, finished The Bear, watched Nice Guys which I’m pretty sure I’ve already seen, and I am glad the wind has calmed down.
I had a good sleep and woke up with no intention of going anywhere. I made coffee and sat in my chair and started watching my shows did a few little chores and relaxed again and then I was scrolling Facebook when I saw a post by Kristen reminding me that I had wanted to go to the Opening at the gallery today it was already an hour well into it and so I got myself ready and headed there. I am so glad I did. I know what it feels like when people you know come out and support the things that you do and I also know what it feels like when they don’t so to be able to go to a show where I saw the artwork of two of my friends and to see them in person and to have wonderful conversations with artists and creators and watch demonstrations of felt art and wet felt forming and other things that I can’t even completely explain, but I took some cool pictures and it was soul filling.
I did buy a two dollar clearance incense holder with cute little package of incense and a gorgeous piece that Kristen made which I can’t get until the show is over at the end of April but it’s even called ‘Oooh so shiny’. it seriously called my name and one of my favourite things is to have art around me that I know the people who made it. We need to support the people that make beautiful things that bring us joy.
One of the demonstrators was Mary who does wet felting and I was so traced by her tea light holders that she made that I wanted to buy them, but she wasn’t selling them and I said, but if you were to make a couple that I could buy from you I would I would buy them and she just gave me two of them. Although I may be spoiling the surprise, my plan is to send one of them off to my friend Linda in England and then we can both have a beautiful piece of art and think of each other when they’re lit up. it is so lightweight and I can flatten it and mail easily. Mary even did a little video for me telling how to Restore it once it gets there.
After the show, I stopped at Encore to pick up a couple of my friends with benefits crawlers. It was crazy busy in there so there was not a chance I was sticking around instead. I decide to go to ABC country restaurant and try their burger for burger month. There was no one there and it was so peaceful. I read my book, enjoyed a Caesar, and the burger was excellent. My favourite one so far I think. Eventually, some people came in, but I sat there for an hour and a half or two just reading my book and enjoying being out.
Once home, I did all those chores that I normally do on Sunday, taking out the garbage changing the litter box, change my bed, doing the laundry, changing over the dishwasher, all those things. It was really quite a productive hour or so and then I’ve been watching my weird little guilty pleasure Highway Thru Hell ever since. it feels like tomorrow is a bonus day now, but I suspect I will get even more things done.
I had decided to take today off, but I was awake at 6:30 so after relaxing for a bit, I decided I might as well go into the office and deal with all the email that were coming in. I ended up being there for a good part of the day and actually got a lot of things done, which clears the list and relieves the tension I did take my recycling and even found out that I can recycle electronics at Staples so I dropped off an old printer and a couple of keyboards. They just had me sign the paper, knowing that I will not be able to get them back and that’s awesome After that, I went to Canadian Tire to buy batteries and a new corn broom, and with the gift card that I was given for Christmas and the points that I had (Canadian Tire money), I ended up only paying $6.71 for two big packages of batteries, a very good broom and a bottle of flavouring for my soda stream. Pretty good deal, all in all
Next stop was Encore for a burger month burger on the way home. I ended up having a nice visit with Rae-Annebefore she headed off with Roger for a walk and said she would be back for the music at nine.
I decided to stay. I ended up having a couple of nice visits and getting a good chunk of my book red before the music began, the opening band, Fyfe Williams included Encore’s brewmaster Brando, the banjo player.
Tailgator closed the night. They were good but maybe too low energy as people were there to dance
I did find it amusing that one of the guys reminded me of Gene Ween.
It was nice to hang out with Dee-Anne and Rae-Anne
I am not sleeping well the last two nights. I still choose to get up and get functioning and get on with my day and get the things done that I can and I feel satisfied with my job. What is still challenge me Is the volunteer work part of which I’m being paid for but the numbers are overwhelming and apparently there is some disrespect as to whether I should be considered a sponsor of the event that I am doing so much work for. I guess what they don’t understand is that I am about to make a 30 day contract and then 30 days maybe at the end
I stopped at fire hall to take in the Burger month Burger, which was fine but again marinara not my favourite so that is my fault not theirs. I did have a wonderful visit with a man named andree from Slovakia who comes here to work Thursday and Friday of every week for the radio station and I learned great deal about him and his family and their 10-year-old son and their immigration processed to Canada and it was really lovely. I do like being the person that can ask the question and stimulate conversation because I think it’s good for them and for me. the Nanaimo Bar is freaking delicious and potent
Fisher Peak performing artist society had its a AGM tonight. It was not without its complications and I felt at one point to go over the meeting, but I grew weary of the side talk and the things that we’re not necessary and I just wanted us to get on with it so that I could be done with it. I am no longer the treasurer however I was grateful to be part of appointing Randy Tapp as it token treasurer. He will let me know what the board has agreed and I will do the books and all the regular treasurer things and give him the reports. I fear for the society. I think many things were brought up tonight that highlighted egos involved and it will be hard for me, but I will need to add a certain level, walk away
When I left the meeting, I settled up to the bar to find Hugh Moore there and we had fun, just sampling whiskey combos and enjoying each other‘s company. That was the perfect and to what was a stressful evening. I also admit that my favourite part was visiting with the president‘s wife, Jean. I noticed during the meeting where she was picking up on things and iterating what was necessary and I appreciated her very much for being there. She has her husband’s back as the president, but she also acknowledges what I have gone through and I appreciated her very much.
I woke up fairly stuffed up again, but took my medications and got through the day a lot better than yesterday. One of the highlights of the day was Monica leaving a gift bag at my office door. I wish I did get a picture. I’ll try to remember tomorrow. She made a hilarious homemade card and on the front of big letters it said ‘snot to be gone’. In the bag were figurines of Ren and Stimpy, which made me laugh, especially because she knew I would know who they are and the amount of bodily fluids that are involved in that show would put a big smile on my face for sure.
I prepped angel food cake, sliced up strawberries, and brought whipped cream to share with everybody at the office. I printed a picture of Jackie with a little story and ask them to hug somebody special today in honour of her. Honestly, it left me a pretty dang good mood all things considered.
I had good texts with the two other people closest to her, her son Reid, and her friend Mike who is in Mexico. Mike a.k.a. Michelle, is the one who introduced us in the first place because I was doing Mike’s books and Jackie was their accountant. That is how I got to know her and how she recruited me to the accounting firm she worked for and how we became fast friends travelling off Island every day., two decades ago.
Amount of work done and then just decided it was time to stop and build my lucky bamboo. I put on CBC and listen to an interesting program while I built it. It was a good meditative thing to do before coming home.
The best message of the day was just as I was finished at work and Reid let me know how happy he was that he was able to pick up his mom in her urn from the funeral home today.
Yep, she’s still controlling and looking after us all from beyond. Happy Birthday JB. I miss you.
I fully admit that my kryptonite is snot and phlegm. I can’t stomach seeing it coming out of other people and I even more can’t handle it when it is my body creating it. I even wore a mask today so that I didn’t share the joy. It’s definitely different when you’re stuffed up and have to wear a mask to protect others as opposed to when we wore them to protect ourselves. It is hard to breathe.
I did get a good amount of work done and took care of some errands and picked up my first burger for burger month from Fire & Oak. It was a pizza burger. It was OK, but unfortunately, not good for take away as it was soggy around the edges and that did not help with my current condition, to have soggy food as well as a soggy head. I also am not a big pizza fan so probably others would enjoy it more than I, but it was for a good cause.
Once I was done at the office, I headed to Safeway to get some daytime nighttime cold capsules and some fruit. Ended up wandering and getting a few groceries, had tremendous savings from a combination of sales points and coupons that I saved over 38%. I forgot how satisfying that is. It’s been so long since I did groceries I was out putting my groceries in the car when I realized that I needed to buy myself flowers so I bought a nice bouquet in honour of my loss and I also bought a wee orchid as that was Jackie‘s favorite Flower and I hope to keep it alive although she knew I never could so we’ll see.
I also picked up strawberries and whipped cream and little angel food cakes and away Mickey of Jagermeister to celebrate tomorrow what would’ve been her 70th birthday. Jager is the only thing she ever drank on occasion besides her daily Canadian beer
It felt good to make a plan for tomorrow and I hope I am feeling better by then as well
Being that I only got clearance to start weight-bearing at all on February 19 I found my Fitbit step count for this week compared to that week quite amusing. I was over 10,000 steps higher than the week before lol
OK, so as long as I am talking about it, I’m still on the right side of this darkness just so you know. My Jackie isn’t here anymore to read all the signs and put me in the right directions and the closer I come to her birthday in two days when I was hoping to have seen her the more I am falling into the abyss. But the thing is it’svnot really about her. It’s about pain and the trauma of my fall and pushing through it and doing all the work and praying I didn’t make mistakes and still making little mistakes because I’m so tired and burned out because I’m good at what I do and people need me to help them and I have trouble saying not right now And when I do it, it’s in the wrong tone and I have to turn around and apologize and I feel like I’m in a strange cosmic monologue of yes, oh I’m sorry. No, oh I’m sorry. Oh, can I help you…… Next? and I have a fucking cold on top of it. Merde!
Oh, and did I mention I came out of work late and then that snowed Yep first time I’ve had to shovel for myself since December at least it wasn’t a lot
I am still fighting something, but feel a bit better today. I spent time moving my Lego and Star Wars things to the den, watched The Substance and Dune Two, made some me food and am now settled in to watch the Oscars. I also took time to break down the BB8 that I bought made. I want to build it myself and add lights.
triumphgal 