Category: Domestic Life

Beautiful sky

The sky is pink, peach and lilac right now; a song sparrow is providing aural punctuation. I like this kitchen table. Oh, look; cat puke. I can’ t really complain, it’s outside on the deck.

Yesterday was a really good day for getting things done. I found my tax stuff, or at least most of it; I replaced my bank card, got new guitar strings, unpacked some boxes, did a small shop, made chocolate banana muffins, removed four pounds of fur (at least) from Eddie, who is visibly more svelte after his many grooming sessions, cleaned the bathroom fixtures, made club sandwiches for lunch (they were REALLY good), hung the Serenity and labyrinth quilts mOm made for me (as well as the heron plaque) and started clearing leftovers out of the fridge, & made an appointment to get my next set of hep shots (and then I’ll be a hepcat, w00t). Yeah, it’s all little stuff but it felt SO good to get some stuff off the list instead of onto it.

Jeff’s day was similarly productive, and included chaining down the barbecue, supervising the repairman who came to look at the stove, and putting up pegs at the back door, which will keep my coat from being draped over any chair I get close to.

Then, some BSGs3 and DeadwoodS3 – For the Deadwood episodes, this is my third time through the series and I’m STILL getting stuff I didn’t see the first & second time through. It’s a damned dense series. I am also seeing nuances in the acting I didn’t get the first time. Titus Welliver is CUTE. Sorry. I just think he is.

Later, Iron Man.  And maybe Mike will drop by after work.  And I definitely need to make some phone calls.  My girlfriends will be thinking I’ve forgotten all about them if I don’t touch base with them soon.

Jericho starts next week – Tuesday night.  I have to start practicing today as well and change guitar strings.

Barbecue & sundry

The new barbecue got baptized in animal fat last night; Jeff seared three very creditable porkchops and I hacked away at the rest of dinner.  I received a phone call which got me thinking further along the lines of spring, and included an adjuration for me to be ‘more fun’; I have prepared a response for that but unleashing it would involve buying mental bleach for everyone who ever reads this blog.  Jeff and I finished Deadwood season 2.  That’s the one where Al is actually smiling a genuine smile for the last frame.

I hope everybody is thinking about having a great day.   I know I am.  I am not thinking about my taxes; I have filed that under U for Unpleasant, at least for the time being.  It’s not as if the feds aren’t pulling money out of my pocket with every fracking breath I take.

I lost my bank card – again.  Good thing I have another bank account at another bank.

I walked to and from the bus loop at work with ScaryClown yesterday.  Virtually every conversation of his starts with the expression “I was watching a documentary yesterday” and yesterday was no exception.  He had his umbrella with him, so he demonstrated how the little pink cheeked, pigtailed girls of the Cultural Revolution in China were trained to yell “Shia!” and mime disembowelling roundeyes.  All the way down from the bus loop.  I love him dearly, but sometimes…..

I should plan the next falldown.  I need to get everything breakable up off the floor.  I need to unpack, and a hundred thousand other things.  But right now, I need another cup of coffee, and I’m going to go to work.  The 27 bus is working properly again; the stop at Rupert and 22nd is functioning, which makes transiting easier in the morning.  My clothes are all clean and put away; my bed is made.  Perhaps I’m running a temperature.

Migraine aura yesterday.  I have learned that when they come in midday, if I sit tight and don’t look at a computer screen for about half an hour, or go outside and get a breath of air, I don’t get a full bore headache.  Thinking happy thoughts assists.

I never did this to my mother

But now I really want to try Marshmallow Fluff.

Eddie made me howl with laughter about an hour ago.  He draped his tail over the wireless keyboard in the living room and got the keyboard beep going off through the speakers in the big tv.  Jeff is sitting up and his expression says, “What dat noise?” and then he gently removes the tail.  Eddie continues to sit there regally.  Oh I wish I were a cat.

It’s spring, and I am about to get maudlin, so goodnight.

butterflies

I’m going to go perform in public so of course I have butterflies…  Peggy has decided to come as well (separate conveyances) and so I asked my folks if she could crash there rather than at Pondside and my folks said yes.  (Lots of room at Pondside, but I volunteered to crawl out of bed early to get her to the bus.)  Pondside, in case you need to know, is where Dr Filk and his madly filking&recording landpeers live.

Last night I went to Superstore and did a small shop.  Forgot bread and cheese.  Duh.  Jeff picked me up and then I cooked salmon steaks, corn and bok choi, with strawberries, bananas and cream for dessert.  Yeah, I got my cooking mojo back after a slack couple of days.  Jeff has acquired a barbeque (Paul has kindly agreed to help him fetch it as the MR2 is a tad parsimonious of cartage room) and we are now looking forward to seared meat on the back deck in the hottest days of the year when you don’t want to be cooking indoors anyway – and believe me Vancouver gets smoking hot in the summertime.

I have just finished the first bake and slice of the biscotti I have been requested to bring to Victoria.  The ones on the top rack are almost but not burnt – the bottom rack biscuits are pretty close to perfect. I guess I am still not one hundred percent with this stove.

Neglected to mention that Jeff and Mike were much amused, last Friday, that they both liked the MR2 and were making tentative plans for a car swap and drive up to Pemberton or some such place…. hope I can come for the ride!  It’s such beautiful country up there.

I was supposed to go with Katie and Suzanne to a comedy show last night in New West, but I was bagged from an emotionally draining day at work (good emotions are draining, too) and knew I had to do a shop and some cooking.  Alas that I canna be in three places at once – I wouldn’t have minded seeing Glenn, either.

Watched a good chunk of Movies 101 last night which is essentially a very long and extremely sympathetic interview with Martin Scorcese.  Jeff and I kept looking at each other and saying, “Scorcese directed that??” or mentioning the Scorcese movies we’d seen that the other hadn’t.  I LOVED the Last Temptation of Christ and Raging Bull.  Jeff hasn’t seen either of them, but he has seen New York New York and Gangs of New York.  I haven’t seen Taxi Driver.  Okay, I guess I have a lot of those movies in my future.  Boxcar Bertha is inbound from zip…..   Barbara Hershey and David Carradine???  mmmm’kay.

Then some Deadwood.  We got up to the part where Woolcott does his nasty deed and Cy bails him out.

Time to get biscotti out of the oven…

the house smells heavenly.

Time to pack…. and feed some butterflies.

Trying times

There are occasions when being a writer and having a blog is a curse. An event will occur, or happen as a consequence of matters I am party to, and nothing would suit me better than to give a full account of it. I would have liked nothing better than to have given a full accounting to the exact reasons for and the beastly behaviour of other people during my marriage breaking up – fine, let it stand that I was self-willed and I’ll leave the name calling and cruelty and bald faced f*cking lies other people subjected me to out of the picture. To protect innocent people, and to prevent myself from looking like a goddamned asshole, more to the point, I guess, that’s what I have had to do. Nor am I complaining about the results. I am clearly happier and better off for having moved out of that house. I just wish I could tell the truth about it. I’m still on good speaking terms with my ex and kids, so no harm done, right?
I would like nothing better than to describe in gory detail what it’s been like to stop being a member of a couple and to have many of favourite activities curtailed and destroyed. Yes, I had to go there, yes, it was my idea when I was no longer psychically safe, but I really really haven’t liked it, and I haven’t talked about the times I’ve spent a day or two, here and there, crying for reasons I can’t describe. Yeah, I could definitely go on at length there. Into the memory hole with it. I’m not even keeping a private journal of those events, it’s not worth it, as in the end it’s living well that counts, not keeping a tally of every grievance. If I wrote it all out it would become impossible to forgive, and even now I haven’t forgiven… into the memory hole. There is no good outcome in setting it all out, whether for myself or others.
I would like to render a full account of yesterday evening’s events – how an entire panoply of human cruelty, stupidity, waste and denial played out as a consequence of the death of a companion animal and how I had to sit with it, and be companionable with that parade of nastiness, and deal in practical terms with it (ie, help move the body of a large Rottie cross onto a board and then a truck, and clean the inevitable leakage off the floor). When Scooter died, it was an opportunity to show family solidarity when we all went to the Lodge to say goodbye to her, in the dark midwinter; when Bounce died we were all together and had each other for one of those uniquely horrible and sad days families go through. Last night wasn’t like that. I have no beef with Mike, he lost his dog, and I am honoured he called on me to help. I have no beef for the icky factual stuff, and I now know that eating a pizza pocket and then cleaning up after a dead dog is a great way to remind yourself your gag reflex is set way high. I am angry, hurt, bewildered and rendered half daft by how mean some people are. Fifty years old almost and I still think people should be nice to each other, and here’s me upset when they aren’t. What am I, a child still?
I intend to give a donation to the SPCA in Vancouver and say a brace of prayers for the animal control staffer, who was an angel of mercy, dignity and punctuality.

I thank my mother for being a civilized human being unlike some others whose behaviour I am shielding as a result of my mother’s teachings, and my brother for his material aid yesterday in conveying me to Mike’s after work.

Chores

Practicing for the gig on Friday went very well; one of the cats, presumably Eddie, had an accident requiring additional laundry but you can ALWAYS wash your bathroom rugs anyway so what the heck; I learned how to play back prerecorded video from Shaw thanks to Jeff’s fabulous instructions (he wrote a BROCHURE); the weather was six kinds of gorgeous; church was great thanks to a really great service and I really didn’t mind doing chairs; my back doesn’t hurt for the first time in about three weeks; all my laundry is done and hung up (remarkable) except one load which I intend to go deal with right now; saw Keith briefly yesterday and he brought a Useful Object into the house, namely something to catch his immense nest of hair in the shower; cleaned various kitchen and household objects; I renewed the server account for this site and paid some other bills; more yelling downstairs but much more subdued than Friday night; ran into Heather at the Nanaimo skytrain and things don’t sound too good in her world right now.  Dunno. I guess I’m happy to be me.
The Luddite took a day off work to play with trains which involved him and a bunch of other guys moving track onto a new setup…. we’re talking about something the size of a basement.  He also mentioned something about strawberries in pots for me; I look forward to this with interest and yumminess.  Container gardening is about all we’ll be able to do here.

Fun evening

I am up rather earlier than I want to be, but I suppose it’s better than sleeping til two and then cursing the absence of daylight in which to run errands…

The mighty Lunch Bunch was reconstituted – Mike, me, Tom and Jerome.  Happy happy sigh. We watched 3:10 to Yuma and otherwise ate and talked and drank beers.  Brian and Chari turned up and added their brand of conviviality and rude remarks to the mix.  Keith turned up as well.  Jeff and the gang seemed to get along – it’s really hard to imagine that they wouldn’t; it felt kinda strange that after all these years my work family hadn’t met my kin.
I have one other piece of happy news – daughter Katie has been to the VCC and picked out what course she wants to take in September.

I am some contented kitty-cat this morning.  I’m going to laze around for a while and then clean up after the party and then go to the Spit… and a Spit is a Dorothy Dunnett Readers Association meetup, usually including food, books and alcohol.  Then, practicing some more.

Plotting n planning

April 18th, so I learn, will be the date for the Willie P Memorial concert in Victoria.  I will consult with the folks and assemble a tune or two… more details as they firm up.  I am thinking about taking the day off.
This weekend a SPIT.  It’s been bally ages since we did that, and we’re meeting up Saturday in a bookstore, so all is good and beautiful.  Then church again on Sunday to set up chairs.  I will be faster this time as I know the drill.  It’s not particularly onerous, but I did feel it on Monday when I woke up; given that my set up partner is well old enough to be my dad further complaining shall be nixed.

This evening, if the fates are kind and the winds propitious, the Luddite will turn up for supper.  I’m thinking home made tortillas. Which reminds me, I should back away slowly from the computer and do some prep so I don’t have to when I get home.

I’m finding the commute okay.  I’m also thinking of finding alternate routes to shake things up a bit, like walking over to Rupert and taking the bus down to that station, to see if maybe I can’t work a little more exercise into the morning routine at least on mornings when it isn’t pouring rain.  The commute is improved by having an MP3 player.  Current set list is a bit eclectic… it’s everything from me singing Lifeline – (I usually skip over it, because as much as I love PD Wohl’s tasty backing I’m not liking my singing) to Verve’s Bittersweet Symphony, the Who’s Won’t Get Fooled Again, John Hiatt’s Walk On, Aretha Franklin’s Chain of Fools… eclectic, yup.  Oh, and the Bastard Fairies We’re All Going to Hell; it’s impossible to sit on the train and listen to that and not smirk.

Further plotting includes maybe taking a songwriting class with the aforementioned PD Wohl; considering maybe taking a course at BCIT now I’m ten minutes away by bus; and figuring out which of Vancouver’s cultural events of the month of April Jeff and I might want to take in.  Also, planning dinner for Friday, the first inaugural fall down.  Honestly, I’m thinking takeout.  Hopefully this large blank where my cooking thoughts usually get scrawled will fill in between now and then.
I can more or less see the floor in my room.

We appear to have blown a fuse in the kitchen.  Sigh.

Jeff, saintly geek that he is, has run his hands over Suzanne’s laptop and restored it to health. (Don’t anybody else get any funny ideas).  Suzanne and Katie dropped by yesterday to collect it with thanks.  Katie got her stipend for helping me move and get my deposit back which was awesomely swift – I hadn’t expected to see it until mid month, but Ray at Cornerstone is the best of landpeers, and he does what he says.

The landpeers here have not responded to Jeff’s polite enquiries about which of the minor irritants he can attack next, which means that he’s going to ignore their ignoring him, and I’ll have my doors fixed shortly.

Somehow I ended up with an autographed Groo in my belongings.  Happy sigh.  I love Groo.

Yet more Deadwood last night after supper, which was spaghetti.

Time to chop veg.

Sundry & Various

I came home from work last night and Jeff had moved all of the boxes we moved on Sunday into the spare bedroom. I was a little off colour yesterday, I’m not precisely sure why, and I was very grateful not to have to physically move anything.  I’m still feeling ‘strange’ today but I think it’s yet another one of my ‘atypical’ migraines. Nothing like being told by a neurologist that you’re ‘atypical’…. as if I could be anything else.

In an explosion of efficiency and organization (his response when I said this, Ha!) Jeff has prepared a list of everything that needs to be done around here. We find the taps in the bathroom, both sets, to be a trial; the bathtub taps have a really unpleasant mushy feel as if you can never get them entirely open or shut; the vanity taps squeak in an astonishing way. He’s already fixed the kitchen tap, and he moved the freezer downstairs on the weekend and it’s now running (the landpeers said we could have a freezer in the laundry room and the downstairs neighbours can use it too if they like). Earlier in the week I finally passed along the box of coloured pencils to the little girl downstairs (whom I have heard but never seen…I gave them to her parents.) It felt weird to have hung on to some stuff of Katie’s for years after she’d stopped using it, and really good to give it to somebody who would use it. Now if I can just get rid of the rest of my crap, life would be a glorious thing.

Scratch made meatloaf and tater tots for dinner. Jeff bought commercial biscotti earlier this week and I laughed at him.

Spoke to Tom and Peggy last night. They will be coming early and leaving early for the party on Friday as they have another event to attend, but even seeing Peggy for two minutes would be lovely (mind you I am going to church for the next two Sundays to help with set up and take down so I’ll see her again soon). I also spoke to the Luddite and assured him that my friends and family would consider his sitting in a corner and reading a book for the entire duration of the party to be unworthy of comment or criticism, but I don’t think I managed to sell him on the idea of coming on Friday, and given that I haven’t laid eyes on him in the best part of a month… oh well. Saturday’s out as he has another engagement and I have to be out the door at hours ongodly for church on Sunday morning. Grr.

My mOm has FINALLY received the results of her followup tests, and everything looks fine. Having braced herself for bad news she’s feeling a little blah. Granny is now well enough to do her own shopping although she fatigues easily. When you’re pushing a century with a broom you’re allowed to get tired; I’m just amazed after her last horrid illness that she’s made the recovery she has, and I am thankful beyond words that my parents are doing such a great job of looking after her while she preserves what independence she can.

At some point I’m going to imitate Jeff and start making a list of the stuff I want to do around here, but I’m still in confusion and error mode, so it may be a while before I’m back on track.

I have a HUGE bolus of work to digest today after many weeks of prep, so I should get off this thing and go deal with it. Have a great day, everybody.

One last thing. I just read a restaurant review which contained the line “If I didn’t know better, I would have thought I’d ordered thin slices of mole poached in Ovaltine.” Bleaugh!

An ongoing education

It’s the damnedest thing, but living with Jeff is proving to be quite educational.  The dishwasher started groaning like the dog that guards the gates of hell, and Jeff said, “I think it’s the sensor.  Let’s clean it.”  I was dubious, but it worked fine after that.  I thought there’s not even 2 thou of soap scum on it, what difference would that make?  Amazing.

Gizmo sat on me for the first time on the weekend…. I forgot to mention that.  I didn’t even notice when he sat down, but that might have had something to do with just getting the moving finished and being slightly brain dead.

Every day I come home on the bus thinking foodlike thoughts – what shall I make us for dinner? …. tonight I’m thinking I want to stop off at Brentwood and get some salad fixin’s and taters to pair up with pork chops.  Then if I simply must start the box shifting magick.

 

Bad nooz…. Jarmo and the family is going to Whistler, so no fries.  I’m almost tempted to go buy a deep fryer, but maybe I’ll just find something equally dripping with fat.

My brain hurts

Rotating 4D hypercube.

I’m out of the old apartment and have turned in my keys.  I am getting my whole deposit back – less the carpet cleaning – so I am really happy and I called Katie to split it with her because it simply wouldn’t have happened without her. 

Now I have four evenings to entirely bust ass on unpacking, dejunking, orgalizing, and making canapés for Friday.  Yee haw!

faw down go boom

it ain’t all bad news

Somebody left a set of red figured velour drapes – like stage curtains – sitting in the square next to where I used to live.  I walked through them and thought of Chipper, as they sort of reminded me of puppet theater curtains….

Aw gone

So I’m out of the old place completely, and apart from swimming in a sea of crap – Jeff is being patient, because I know I have to disappear the crap before the party on Friday – I am feeling pretty good about it.

My good feelings are grounded in three events of yesterday – Katie’s efficient and tireless assistance in the packing, cleaning & moving, and the unpacking when I got here because of course I couldn’t hang around, I had to take the truck back instantly – watching this movie (highly recommended) as the three of us collapsed after I sponsored a meal over at the James Street Cafe – and Mike dropping by.  Supportive friends and family are part of what makes life worth living.

Anyway I’ve got half an hour to fetch laundry from downstairs and get clean and clothed, but at least me and all my clothes are in one place now!  Ack, down one person at work – can’t be late.

I don’t even feel too rough this morning, although I had a hard time getting off the couch last night!

Heave ho

I am still in shock about how much freaking junk I have.  I am so emotionally attached to my books that I’m sitting in the pile of boxes going, wah, wah instead of brutally tossing them.  I’ll be a lot happier when I’m done.  When I get rid of clothes I think “Off to Value Village with you!” and there isn’t a horrible feeling to go along with it.  Books are like little, immobile, rectangular friends, and you don’t just haul your friends off to the garbage.  I have Bookcrossing on some of my books but to do all of them would many days of labour, and so…. I guess they are off to storage.  Heavy sigh.

It freaking SNOWED here again last night.  I know that in late December a dusting of snow on the neighbourhood rooftops is all pine scent and lush orchestrations of cherished carols, but this close to the first of April methinks anything but peace and goodwill when it’s something I see before I’ve had any coffee.

Last night, I failed to cook dinner!  I made cheese scones, but I actually went to bed before sunset, woke briefly at 10:30, and then back to bed until ten after seven.  Moving is tiring; yesterday it was unpacking pretty solidly.  I did make lunch for the menfolks – Keith was here and how good to see him.

Grr

Made another long post this morning and lost it.  Loads o linky fun, o well.

Anyway, Dr Filk is coming to the housewarming party.  The True Party Trifecta is in play!!  Jarmo’s fries, Dr. John’s inimitable musical stylings, and Lexi’s tumtum.  wOOt.