Sunday Snippets

Rebel and I were supposed to go to an Alumni Dinner for transplant patients.  Her dinner was even paid by the Heart Institute.  She called me this afternoon and sounded awful.  Flu - upchucking through the night she said.  So far... no other symptoms... but I am a tad freaked... I told her if she felt anything in her breathing to get to the hospital ASAP.   She's living way the hell out past the other end of the city so I can't even get to her all that quickly.  I hope it doesn't turn into any thing else.

I've paid - post dated paid for Scrap and Spa ... first weekend of March.  Yippee.  LOVE my Scrap & Spa annual weekend.

Alouettes won the Grey Cup... whatta Game.. typical Canadian game, it went right to the last two plays.  OMG!!!  The Riders got called for too many men on the field. - HOW does that happen in a championship game?!?!  Als  missed their first field goal attempt at 38 yards,  Riders got the too many men penalty and  The ALs tried again at  33 yards - 28-27  a heartbreaker!   I NEVER thought I could go for an eastern team, but I just can't make myself cheer for the Green Machine.  It's a western thing.   AMAZING game  I might even get an Als t-shirt now. Why not! Until my city has a team I can sneak around on my Bombers.  

My high school is going to have a 50th reunion in 2011.  Right on my birthday and over the May weekend.  I am signing up to go!  I think it will be great fun. Now there's a good reason to work out, deal with the flabby thighs and keep colouring the hair!  botox?  face work?  hmmmmm

XSU has agreed with me - for once - that RJ needs to get the H1N1 shot.  I am going to go this week at some point.

WHY ever did I sign up for the cookie exchange at work?  I am SO NOT good at baking cookies.  I can't roll dough for the life of me.  I did find some easy drop cookies on Epicurious so I am going to have to get on that and hope to goodness I create 3 dozen of something.   The good thing is, I'll get back 3 dozen cookies from those who do bake.  I guess there is some method to my madness.

 Roof is reshingled.  Bank has been semi sorted.  But next go around on my mortgage I am going to shop it around a little more.  As much as they've been good about the financing, the service is not where it should be.  I shouldn't have to be calling every other day to see what's going on with my file.

So... I am offically in reno fatigue.  Bathroom counter tops, fans, paint, changing the outlets and switches, kitchen paint, counter and back splash is just going to have to wait.  I am done with this for now.

Sunday evening.  I think I'll just crawl into my bed with a little glass of something and finish reading my latest book. 

Drama and dilemmas

It seems that I am on the go all the time.  Not far or anything too taxing, but I am really ready for about a week of nothing.  Only problem is I only have 4 days of vacation left until start of the new fiscal year which is April 1.  Man I hope I can make it.  After Christmas there are no stat holidays until Easter so I think I'll save my last few days for those times when I really need the break.  The annual scrap and spa weekend comes to mind.  Oh bliss.

Rebel Junior was at the XSU's this past weekend.  As usual she left a lovely disaster in the new basement - dishes, clothes, and an assortment of teen paraphenalia.  I left the dishes in a pile, tidied up around them and then hid her computer and camera - not to be returned til said dishes found their way into the dishwasher.

As I expected RJ returned home on Sunday and had a fit that I had taken her computer and was keeping her from doing all her homework.  Never mind that her father has a computer in his house that I have been told is the latest aned greatest.  For three hours as she harangued at me, I kept repeating, " clean up your mess - it will take all of 5 minutes and you'll get your computer back. "  If she had taken all that energy used yelling me about giving back her computer and just complied with my request it would have been done in five minutes.   She loves the drama that one.

Unlike her father, I won't and didn't cave in.  She again threatened me with going to live at her dad's full time.  I calmly told her that was her choice.  What's she gonna do?  Frankly, moving to her dad's would involve picking every piece of clothing off the floor of her room and  putting them  in something called a suit case or even trash bags,  and I think that's too much effort for her right now  LOL

Interestingly, Rebel, although living with the loser BF, tends to drop by and stay at my house almost every day or second day.  I asked her why she is constantly at my house aned not going to her dad's place which is closer into town.  Her response was "it doesn't feel like home." 

 I am putting up with RJ's slovenliness and Rebel's leaving stuff around or taking food home out of my fridge,

I am also counting down til RJ goes to France- 74 days.  Rebel may end up living here again too as I am hearing a little more often now " I nearly broke up with him" or some variation on this theme.

More importantly this week, is the troubling dilemma of  Pride or Alouettes All the way?   HOW can I score a trip to the Grey Cup in Calgary on Sunday?!?!?  yes yes yes.. sold out... what EV...  any game with the Saskatchewan Green machine is gonna be good, especially since it's being played in the heart of football country.    Ah well, this may not be the year, so I will find  a few friends, maybe a great sports bar and enjoy the crowd around me - but I won't be painting my face green. 

Share and share alike?

I am not impressed with my bank.    The woman I deal with at my bank does not return phone calls.  After I was done re newing my mortgage  and meeting with my family lawyer to review the bill and paperwork  she reported  that she spent far too much time chasing down the banker - which added a few dollars to my bottom line.

I should have paid closer attention.  This weekend I was supposed to have my roof replaced.  It's going to be a beautiful day by November standards - sunny about 8 C that's about 46-48F no rain , little wind. Perfect!  And where are my roofers?  At someone else's house because the woman at the bank never managed to get back to me.  She left me a message on Wednesday to call her Thursday - which I did and she never returned my call until late in the day.   This past week at work has been incredibly pressure filled and I most certainly wasn't sitting around waiting for her to call.

UGH.  I chose the roofing company because it's managed by the husband of a woman I know at work.  They were planning to come on the weekend if I paid cash and could avoid the taxes.  It was a great deal. So if I have to pay with a credit card it will negate the original plan.   Because the roof was an unexpected expense I didn't budget for it and need a loan.   

I arrived home after work last night to a message from bank lady - "come in on Saturday and let's have a chat."  Oh we'll have a chat all right.

I'll probably go to my secondary bank and see if they'll help.  The joint line of credit was there and so are most of my accounts.  This bank has never given me the time of day any time I went in alone or with the XSU so I am not hopeful.

And the roof is bad. It won't withstand another winter.

I expect though that this too shall pass.

Moral of the story - girls!  Establish yourself financially as a singleton wherever possible  -

Sharing cookies and cake and maybe a beer - okay   Sharing your money and your credit rating - don't even go there!

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Taped up!

Thank goodness for duct tape.  And it now comes in a gazillion different colours too. My recyle boxes are both cracked and looking pretty "ghetto" as the kids say.   I am too cheap to go out and get some new ones.  So I thought to myhself. " If I was the cheap SOB XSU what would I do in this situation?"  And of course the answer came to me pretty much instantly - duct tape.

So I have duct taped the box up and ya know... it does look even more ghetto and RJ sat there rolling her eyes as I put the boxes together.  I just wish I had hot pink and lime green rather than your industrial black. But at least I don't have to go out and buy a bunch of new boxes for garbage day.

My main floor is so close to being finished.  But I think I am hitting reno fatigue.  A few things to move back to the basement, plus two big moving boxes full of stuff that I have to figure out what to do with, and it will be mostly done.

I am bringing my grandma's table up to the dining room but I have to keep a table cloth on it because it is so badly stained it needs refinishing.  I've never done that before and will get a friend to help me with it.  The chairs need to be re upolstered too and I think the same friend will be able to help me do that too.  That will be pretty easy to do I think.  I've watched the youtube how to videos.

It took RJ two days to clean up her mess from her party.  Her laptop has viruses on it she doesn't want to use it until we do a full clean up.  I told her she could use my laptop - AFTER she cleaned up.  She didn't bother until late afternoon and by then I had left the house and put the lofk on the laptop so she couldn't use it.

She says she's going to her dad's for the week but I haven't seen any evidence of her packing her stuff yet.  A week off would be nice.  I have to say I am not missing XSU's presence at all.

I am now heading to look around the house to see what else needs a little duct tape. 

Cloud White and a week full of whatever

As far as weeks go it's been all right.  I broke a light bulb inside the brand new range hood.  Can you see me rolling my eyes?  TattooYou handy painter guy was over and he fixed that up for me.  Main floor and upstairs hall way all painted now except for the Cloud White trim.  And who knew!?!  If I was at all into decorating - which I am not - and if I ever read any of those home design magazines - which I never do - I might have known that Benjamin Moore Cloud White is the "white to beat all white " paints.  Thank goodness for the nice designer lady from the LaZBoy Galleries store who told me "It has to be Cloud White trim you'll love it."  Seems rather silly to think that a paint colour is famous.

Rebel Junior had a party this evening.  I figured there would be noise and loud music til late late.  The kids are all gone and she is in bed before me and I am the one who has to be up at the crack of dawn on Saturday for a Finance Committee meeting of one of my boards.  I am pretty sure there was alcohol involved but I couldn't see it and all seemed to be relatively civil for which I couldn't fault them. I didn't insinuate myself too much but enough for them to know I was around.  RJ does have a decent bunch of friends and even the guys weren't too dorky  They were actually pretty friendly.  All is quiet now.

When RJ first mentioned her party I told her no and to go have her party at her dad's house.  For whatever reason she said she'd rather have it at my place - it's easier to get to on the bus since most of her friends don't live near us, and secondy apparently my house is nicer. seriously.

Okay... I'll take that.  It might change next week,  I am not going to have parties here every weekend though.  I actually count on RJ going to her dad's so I can have some peace and quiet. 

XSU did barge his way into the house once this week.  I took him by surprise by being here.  And so again I asked him why he was in the house.  He wanted to take the desk top computer and do something with it.  It crashed a couple of weeks ago - lost everything on the hard drive  He wanted to do soemthing to it since the rebuild.  Once again I told him to ask permission ahead of time before walking into *my* house.  He took the computer and left without a word.

Worldless Wednesday -Lest we forget Thank you.

photo credit Gail Lalonde.  Found on the CTV web site

Light bulb moments

I can't believe Monday is upon me already. The weekend flew by and was far too short. I had nothing planned for a change and was glad to have a weekend all by myself.

I found myself getting angry again -   It's all the stupid things. Never mind the big one - roof needing fixing, a couple of pieces of trim missing at the top of the stairs, a Macgyvor'd bunch of electrical stuff in my kitchen that just has to go; and a couple of other little things around the house.  It was all bugging me this weekend and making me angry. 

I went to try and put some stuff in the ugly shed shed at the back of the house and put my foot through the floor.  yeah... this is good.  NOT impressed.  The shed is either going to have to be rebuilt or completely demolished and thrown in the red dumpster.

 Irritation factor - I have these really nice lights in my hall way both upstairs and down.  A bulb was burnt out and for the life of me I can't figure out how to get the glass thingy off so I can replace the bulb. Now I am no Einstein, I hate doing math, but gee, I can read instructions - except maps - I can follow a recipe, except for beef stuff, they gave me a masters degree and I am not as inept as my teen ager believes, but really -  replacing a light bulb  is apparently beyond my capabilities.  At least RJ wasn't around rolling her eyes as I attempted to get the light shade down from the ceiling. It was a ridiculous sight. I will wait until TattooYou, my painter guy turns up later this week to show me what the EFF the trick is with these ceiling lamps.  

And talk about lights.  I put one of those last forever environmentally friendly screw type light bulbs into the brand new lamp I bought for the living room.  The thing burnt out this week. huh?  I am hoping it was  just a dud bulb and not a dud lamp.  Clearly we're not sparkling around the place this week.

 

The other niggly make me frustrated stupid thing is the ceiling fan. It's in the stairwell going to the second floor.  WELL it's time for the fan to go clockwise instead of counter clock wise. The whole heat rising AC drops thing.  That much physics I get.  The fan doesn't have a remote control for it the way all the new ones do.  The XSU would bring *his* ladder into the house and get up there and change the direction because the pull chains are 10 feet up in the air. What's a separated-no-ladder-in-the-house-woman supposed to do with the fan?  

The big stuff I dealt with fairly well I think. It's going to be the idiotic small stuff  WTF? type things that will creep up on me little by little that will get my knickers all twisted. 

 Who knew it would be my lack of light changing skills in the DIY department that would set me off. 

He's So Cheap Even The Birds Sing About Him.

The weekend is nearly here – Thank goodness.  I have had a busy week at work while at home the activity level has dropped substantially since Frenchy left on Tuesday to return to France.

We went out for dinner with Frenchy and of course XSU was along.  He made me pay 50% of the bill.  I expected that, but really – I was the one who took the girls to Niagara Falls and Toronto, I have had them with me nearly the entire time and yet he couldn’t for over $40 for a road house meal.  I roll my eyes.
 
This weekend I’ll be doing up the expenses for Frenchy’s visit, as well as my monthly child support from XSU.  I hate spread sheets but on a spread sheet it will all be tallied and emailed to him.  RJ will take him the supporting receipts – AFTER I copy them. Then he will have to cough up his share. 

Rebel has been getting head aches.  She calls them tension headaches and thought it might have to do with her glasses.  She’s been once to the optometrist and has a second appointment next week for more tests.  He may either recommend her to see an ophthalmologist and/or a neurologist depending on what he finds.  It’s always something with that girl.  He thinks she may have a lazy eye that is refusing to focus and this is what is causing the headaches, but he’s checking out everything else too.

XSU gave Rebel and her BF his car, but he refused to put her on his insurance. Refused out right!.  She still drives his car because she needs to get around. I am trying to stay out of that one but I am coaching her on what she needs to do to get on his case about this.  It’s just plain foolish.  I am not understanding what his issue is, but then again, have I ever understood his issues?  

13 on Thursday.

13 things I am working on 

or doing in the next month or so.

 
1. Meeting with the President of the Gymnastics Club to get her organized for the Annual General Meeting.  How to run a meeting according to rules of order.  She needs coaching.  That' s me.  Coffee and banana bread 
2. Finance Committee meeting for the professional association. All day affair next Saturday.  
3. Scrap booking open house - so much new product - so little time to get the scrapbooks done. Renos nearly over, house nearly in shape - the tools are coming out. 
4,5, 6, 7, 8.   yeah - I'm cheating.   Five classes - orientation sessions for new part time instructors at the college where I will be teaching a course during the winter and spring term. 
9. ummm design the course I will be teaching in the Winter and spring.   Draft curriculum to department head by 25th November. 
10. Finish the damn church directory project.  Damn and church usually don't go together.   I couldn't get a volunteer to help me finish it. sigh... it went to the back burner during end of marriage beginning of renos period.  
11. The big Danish Bazaar in a few weeks.  LOVE the Danish food.  I will be stocking up on real Danish pastry for the freezer. 
12. Perogy making Saturday.  Nephew has asked for a care package to be mailed.  That should prove interesting.   
13.  TRANSIBERIAN ORCHESTRA!!! Next Wednesday evening.  So looking forward to that.  A little early for the Christmas music, but perhaps it will inspire me.

I can't cook meat!

I have come to realize that there are some things, well maybe only one or two things, I just can't cook very well.  It seems that beef is at the top of the list.  It's one of those end of marriage things that comes to the fore when you find you have to do something you haven't ever done, or maybe not done in a long time.  Cooking beef is one of those things for me, along with changing lightbulbs, mowing the lawn, and dealing with mouse traps.
I knew I was in trouble when I took a piece of meat, threw it into the oven, cooked it, and it came out tasting like I was eating plywood.

Beef was something that was XSU's responsiblity.  And I have to grudgingly admit he was good at it.  He got rid of the barbecue - I know I know - and bought one of those electric grill things that he kept in the garage.   He regularly spent time in there with his secret sauces and marinades and I just ate.  You know that the electric grill went with him when he left.  In fact it was the only appliance he took.  I should be grateful for this.  Yet even now, a mere two and half months later, it irritates me to no end that the garage still smells like a bad greasy spoon joint. 

Since XSU left I have tried cooking steak, pot roast, a couple of stir fry thingies, and I have to admit, I regularly bomb on all.  RJ sees beef on the counter top and tells me she's not hungry before I even get started. The only thing I can manage is a good beef stew - a full bodied red wine improves everything;. I can also cope fairly well with ground beef.   My roasts - like chewing rubber.  Steaks - we're talking hockey pucks.  And I realized it's because I haven't cooked beef in at least 15-20 years.  Seriously.

I am going to have to re-learn the art of cooking beef. Home Ec 101. Julia Child, Martha Stewart, Joy of Cooking and every other cook book I own will be found strewn across my kitchen when I throw a steak or a roast on the counter and into the oven. Next summer I will have to buy a barbecue and see how many steaks I turn into hockey pucks before I can actually cook a piece of beef worthy of fancy dining room eatin'.  For the next little while though make sure it's chicken, fish or vegetarian if I have invited you over for a meal.