Category: Domestic Life

The good and the bad

The bad first – the bookkeeper hasn’t responded to my requests and that means I’ll be standing in front of everybody at church tomorrow with no backup information, just the budget for next year.

Fortunately, I am very relaxed about it.  It will be embarrassing, but so what?  I’ve sh*t myself in public, that was worse.  Also, in retrospect, an extremely funny story.  Actually, twice now, once in the Parliament buildings.  I mean, that’s funny in and of itself.

The good – saw Robof9 and Liz last night with Paul for dinner out in Langley. OH IT WAS SO GOOD TO SEE THEM.  I miss Rob, he’s still as much of a card as ever.  We talked a little about Paul’s biz idea but mostly visited.

More bad – there was a f*cking coyote IN THE YARD last night.  I was having an intense convo with Paul about his biz idea in the car, sitting in the driveway, and when I saw the coyote I screeched “The CATS” and booked it into the house to check in on them, all okay thanks for asking.

Canvass is done – thankfully

Sue and I can now quit worrying about that and start worrying about other things.  The church community pulled through and all beings may experience happiness.  I still have to survive the budget meeting, but that will be okay.

Yesterday I realized I have been going about this time off thing all wrong.  I wrote out Beacon Birthday (substantially complete, no lyrics).  I went to the spa and got a lemongrass scrub and hot stone massage, which I needed like you would NOT believe.  I went to Sue’s to do church business.  I did a small shop, which Jeff is going to get the benefit of today as I have a nice brekky planned for him.  I did not go singing, but I did record SIX SEPARATE SONGS by singing into my phone.  I’ve had songs in my head for days, and I composed and recorded, on the spot, six songs.  I don’t even know if they were the songs that have been kicking around my head.  But I certainly seem to have no shortage.

Being off work has made it possible.

Margot came and snuggled with me again.  She likes my bed better now that I’ve gone back to using the duvet cover.

And I quit worrying.  Life is short, and the part of life where I’m mobile and get to enjoy myself is vanishing before my eyes.

I also figured out what I am giving for Christmas.  It is good. I think my friends will like it.

Look at these sloths

Look at them!

So I am 54 years old today.  I’ve already been up for two hours; I made turkey swossage and eggs and toast and coffee and chocolate chip cookies for brekkie.

Today I will practice musical instruments, clean things and go out and eat in a restaurant.  Also watch some TV.

Tammy’s dad has been sent home from the hospital with terminal cancer.  I am very anxious for Tammy’s mother, who has had a horrible time (there have been other family meshugas which I dasn’t speak of), and anxious obviously for Tammy, because her life was already up around the load line before her dad got sick.

Spent the day with Katie yesterday.  She took home $400 of supplies from Costco yesterday.  Now she owes me money, which I don’t imagine I’ll ever see, but given that I’ve gone over to her place half a dozen times now and there hasn’t been anything but mustard, pickles and mayo in the fridge, making sure they had a decent supply of sugar and rice and burritos seemed like a good thing.  Boyfriend is working and Katie is still enjoying living with him, partly because there aren’t any banned subjects of conversation.  I like him because Katie is either the world’s bestest faker or she’s genuinely happy… except for work.  Working with older people means they die, a lot, and Katie’s getting burnt out on that.

Speaking of old, did I mention my decrepitude?  Fifty-four.  I can hear my parents making sepulchral groans about how that’s nothing.

Talked to Carrie on the phone the other day.  There have been so many earthquakes in Masset that she’s freaking out and wanting to get the hell off the island.  Haida Gwaii is great until you realize you live 35 feet above sea level in a tsunami zone.  She was also VERY VERY unimpressed at how white people in trucks drove past little old Haida ladies on scooters when the Tsunami warning went off.  Yuppers, if you want to see the best and worst of people, hang out in a war/disaster zone.

Everybody have a lovely day!!!

Didn’t get the job

Oh well, there’s always another one, right.

Keith got told yesterday they were going to be reducing his hours and 18 hours later had another job.  A more effective way of saying ‘FUCK YOU’ is difficult to imagine.   He was quite pleased with himself and got mom’s fusilli and slow cooked spaghetti sauce as a reward.

Also, the new Homeland, which was awesome, but I like any Homeland where Brody and Carrie have face time.

Carrie is getting MOTION SICKNESS from all the aftershocks in Masset.  I don’t think she wants to be living there any more.  Time to inspect the earthquake kits again.

 

 

The gift

Yesterday was a gift of small pleasures and brief beauty, enamelled and jewelled and assembled with unhurried care.

I awoke early and started my rushing around for a very busy day at church and promptly forgot the single most important thing.  As I stepped out of the house, a scene of surreal beauty met my gaze: in New Westminster all the tall buildings were outlined by the effulgent glow of the sun through a wall of cloud.  The effect was enough to stop me in my tracks and call for Jeff to come and see.

I then went to Thrifty’s to buy meat, bread and cheese for sandwiches for ‘afters’, and then went to the church where I tried to help with setup and then realized I’d forgotten all the Stewardship Drive materials.  D’oh! Back home to collect them and then back to church in time for everything to start.

I gave a several minute ex tempore speech on the subject of pledging and was congratulated by no fewer than three people afterwards.  I never seem to have an accurate sense of how I’m doing, I thought I sounded ill-prepared and merely attempted to connect emotionally and practically to my church siblings.

Please imagine that I was dressed as a steam punk vampire during these shenanigans, as I was.  Somebody else took a picture.

The minister preached a mighty sermon on giving, and used the potlatch as the central idea.  The notion that gracious giving and gracious receiving is part of our human heritage was posited; the emotional calculus of feeling shamed or lorded over when we receive gifts was examined in the light of our materialistic culture.  I must admit I teared up toward the end.  The minister called me on it, asking what happened as I started out smiling and started not exactly scowling but getting more and more serious and I said sheesh if I stop smiling maybe it’s because I’m very moved.

Short talk with Rob W about a specialty item of clothing he may feel inclined to sew up for me. Planning is.

The sandwiches went over (and down) very well.

Tom and Peggy invited me to supper.

The minister helped finish the washing up.  (one of us, one of us!)

I returned home at 1:30 (told you it was a hectic morning…) footsore and tired, and no sooner cleaned one pan and changed that Paul rang.  “Walkies?”

I looked out the window.  With his inerrant attention to the weather, he had picked the one portion of the day wherein we were likely to get direct sun.  Although my feet were already complaining, we did a circuit of Oakalla (aka Deer Lake Park), and saw:

A beautiful sky, filled with cirrus and nimbus and cumulus clouds

A VERY LARGE and unidentifiable raptor soaring in the same skyfield as a gent flying his glider at the model airplane field,

A chickadee chasing a moth (I had never seen such a thing) apparently for pure sport (the moth put on an incredible burst of speed)

Dragonflies catching the last of the sun

Many happy dogs who really should have been on leashes but were well behaved anyway

Sleeping kids in strollers.

Then home, where I relaxed with ER and SG1 until it was time to haul myself upstairs and make biscotti to take.  I made pumpkin spice biscotti out of my own head’s recipe; they were well received.

I supped with all of the local Lunder-males, grampa, boys and grandbean, and it was a delicious meal of inadvertently caramelized butternut squash, roast chicken breasts, taters, broccoli, home made cheese sauce and pumpkin pie.  It was all edible and choice.  Bean-pie is so adorable as he falls asleep it was most charming.

Then home, to sleep; woke at 1:30, forced myself back to sleep and up again at 7.  A windy nasty day, but I have coffee and biscotti and the world can go hang until I watch Treme.

Today  – renew car insurance (I folded – I feel like I can’t live without a car as long as church is so time consuming and then there’s the issue of job hunting), church business have to leave the house for, more church business, another bit of church business, contact the folks in Pemberton to arrange transport of the furniture, and, if the fates are kind, some practicing and writing.

I light a candle for all those in Hurricane Sandy’s way.

I light a candle for the folks at Pennzoil who topped up my brake fluid without charging me.

 

 

wandering across the internet

kid says boo to famous horror heavies.

Cyclone Sandy is going to smash into the east coast and screw up the American election.  All the forecasters say it’s going to be worse than Irene, which made a mess of large swathes of the east coast and actually closed the NY Subway.  It’s supposed to be a century storm.  I’m really glad I wasn’t vacationing in the Dominican Republic this year.

The only time the forecasters have been this hopped up on anxiety was just prior to Katrina.

Butter chicken and rice pudding for dinner last night, but Jeff went to bed before I could put rice pudding in front of him.  Unfortunately it isn’t as pudding-y as the last one, which he very much enjoyed.

The good and the bad

Three homilies in the making

The manifold path – the various things people have done to experience the numinous.  I had extensive notes at one point and lost them, so reconstructing it is a bear.

I had a comrade – coping with loss of friends

This Chalice – the symbol of our faith.

Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful homily by Sandy Burpee yesterday at church.  Sandy has been active in social justice issues since forever, and he is a force to be reckoned with; his accomplishments include getting Beacon involved with the food bank in Coquitlam and getting more social housing into the Tri-Cities.  The homily was in the form of a description of what a day is like at the food bank and I was moved to tears.  We are SO fortunate to have people like the Burpees (Cathy is awesome too!) at our church.

Wore my bardic hat to church.  I love the reference in The Wire to ‘the Sunday crown’ so that’s how I referred to it.  Lovely long chat with Rob W after church.  He likes me because he can be politically incorrect around me.  C’mon, he’s ex-military – gotta cut the man slack somewheres.  I told him about me new project, which is A COMPLETE LIST OF GENDERED SLURS, more on that in another post.

Saw Keith briefly yesterday, we had a nice long chat.

FINALLY heard back from the rellie regarding the piece of furniture I have to go pick up.  He said he might bring it down but he wasn’t enthusiastic, and a drive to Pemberton is no prob.  Thinking of hiring Katie’s dood to assist, and he’s got rellies up there himself so it might all work out.  More on that when we finally get it.

It’s Pledge drive time at church!  If you want to support children so that they may go to a Sunday school where (age appropriate) they can learn about sexuality, critical thinking skills and why being civil is better than being a jerk without getting pounded in the ear about God, please send a cheque in any amount to Beacon Unitarian Church, #414 – 552A Clarke Road,  Coquitlam, BC V3J 0A3. Thank you, no salesthingy will call.  I got Keith to pledge, which pleased me NO END.

I have a LOT OF STUFF to do and of course am swithering about doing it.

Eddie is calling and running up and down the stairs.  Sometimes 10 pounds of cat can sound like heffalumps.

Made stirfried chicken and veg/rice, plus bonus rice pudding, for dinner last night.

Woke up about two hours ago missing John, which started this all off again.  It would have been his birthday this past week, which is probably why I have been thinking about him so very much.

Keith, lunch, Homeland, laundry

I love Showtime’s Homeland so so so much. Just watched S2E2 and all three of us yelled “Holy s@@t!” as the credits rolled. Keith said, “I did NOT see that coming” and is just now catching up on the most recent Castle. Time to close the laptop and go back to folding lawwwwnnnndray.

Keith took me to lunch at Hi Dozo, the dear one.  My prescription has IMPROVED.  That’s crazy, but that’s middle age.  My eyeballs are healthy.  I will post a picture….

Excellent news

I have a job test on Monday at noon which I am very pleased about.

Also I actually TYPED the minutes and sent a draft to Sue already; the board meeting was last night.

Also Sue and I ground our way through the Stewardship Drive work (she did most of the work but I will be instrumental in getting it all printed for the pledge package).

Furnace on for the first time this year.  House smells like a dusty cat.